I have already alluded to the way in which the names of certain places impose themselves on the mind,and I must add that of Toulouse to the list of expressive appellations.It certainly evokes a vision,suggests something highly meridional.But the city,it must be confessed,is less pictorial than the word,in spite of the Place du Capitole,in spite of the quay of the Garonne,in spite of the curious cloister of the old museum.What justifies the images that are latent in the word is not the aspect,but the history,of the town.The hotel to which the welladvised traveller will repair stands in a corner of the Place du Capitole,which is the heart and centre of Toulouse,and which bears a vague and inexpensive resemblance to Piazza Castello at Turin.The Capitol,with a wide modern face,occupies one side,and,like the palace at Turin,looks across at a high arcade,under which the hotels,the principal shops,and the lounging citizens are gathered.The shops are probably better than the Turinese,but the people are not so good.Stunted,shabby,rather vitiated looking,they have none of the personal richness of the sturdy Piedmontese;and Iwill take this occasion to remark that in the course of a journey of several weeks in the French provinces Irarely encountered a welldressed male.Can it be possible the republics are unfavorable to a certain attention to one's boots and one's beard?I risk this somewhat futile inquiry because the proportion of mens ?coats and trousers seemed to be about the same in France and in my native land.It was notably lower than in England and in Italy,and even warranted the supposition that most good provincials have their chin shaven and their boots blacked but once a week.
I hasten to add,lest my observation should appear to be of a sadly superficial character,that the manners and conversation of these gentlemen bore (whenever I had occasion to appreciate them)no relation to the state of their chin and their boots.They were almost always marked by an extreme amenity.At Toulouse there was the strongest temptation to speak to people,simply for the entertainment of hearing them reply with that curious,that fascinating accent of the Languedoc,which appears to abound in final consonants,and leads the Toulousains to say bieng and maisong,like Englishmen learning French.It is as if they talked with their teeth rather than with their tongue.I find in my notebook a phrase in regard to Toulouse which is perhaps a little illnatured,but which I will transcribe as it stands:"The oddity is that the place should be both animated and dull.Abig,brownskinned population,clattering about in a flat,tortuous town,which produces nothing whatever that I can discover.Except the church of SaintSernin and the fine old court of the Hotel d'Assezat,Toulouse has no architecture;the houses are for the most part of brick,of a grayishred color,and have no particular style.The brickwork of the place is in fact very poor,inferior to that of the north Italian towns,and quite wanting in the richness of tone which this homely material takes on in the damp climates of the north."And then my notebook goes on to narrate a little visit to the Capitol,which was soon made,as the building was in course of repair and half the rooms were closed.
