Pickwick Abroad: or, The Tour in France — page 303: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

PICKWICK ABRUAD. 95}. Dread is that sight !—They enter in the hall, And cast a gloomy shade upon them all : Each guest is stupified with inward fear, As Death and Exile seize their victims near, And bear them from the banquet, while their brain Seeks to dispel the fumes of wine in vain! Having brought the perusal of this poem to a conclusion, Mr. Pick- wick declared to himself that it was very beautiful, and wondered why Mrs. Weston should have taken the trouble to translate it for him. He then thought that Mrs. Weston was a very amiable person, and was not at all displeased to find himself in some measure the object of her care and solicitude; having come to which conclusions, he was re- solved to make himself as agreeable as possible to her the next time they met. His ruminations, the nature of which had shed a glow of satisfaction and radiant felicity over his animated countenance, were scarcely brought to a conclusion, when the entrance of his friends and the sound of Mr. Weller’s voice in the antechamber, singing the highly popular air of ‘* Barclay and Perkins’s Dray-man,” reminded him that the hour of dinner was approaching. He accordingly retired to his bed-room to make preparations for that important ceremony. CHAPTER XXX, FRANCONI’S CIRCUS IN THE CHAMPS ELYSEES.—MESSIEURS BRANDEN- BERGH AND PEACOCK AGAIN INTRODUCED TO THE READER.—MR. WELLER'S VISIT TO THE OFFICE OF THE ENGLISH CONSUL, AND THE IMPRESSIONS HE THERE RECEIVED. Waar a wonderful place is Franconi’s !' Astley’s is but ‘‘cakes and gingerbrea to it. M. Franconi was the lessee of a theatre on the ulevard du Temple, in which his equestrian representations took place in winter, and the proprietor ofa large wooden amphitheatre in which he and his followers exhibited their talents in the summer. The latter is invariably crowded to excess: the admittance is cheap -—the sports attractive to the middling and lower orders of society — and the locality, which is the Champs Elysées, is peculiarly convemient for the appointments which the young clerks of the public offic.:s make with the pretty milliners of the Faubourg du Roule. With such attractions to recommend a visit to this charming place of entertainment, the reader must not be surprised if the four front seats on the right side of the orchestra were one evening filled by Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Scuttle; and another immediately behind them by Mr. Samuel Weller. They were all in their best clothes and spirits; and if the audience did not perceive that they were five very eminent men, it must be supposed that the rformance of the equestrians absorbed the general attention, and iverted it from the contemplation of other and more important matters. ) 6)(0)) Si (c©)