158 PRÆTERITA-I

182. Of Rouen, and its Cathedral, my saying remains yet to be said, if days be given me, in Our Fathers have Told Us.¹ The sight of them, and following journey up the Seine to Paris, then to Soissons and Rheims, determined, as aforesaid,² the first centre and circle of future life-work. Beyond Rheims, at Bar-le-Duc,³ I was brought again within the greater radius of the Alps, and my father was kind enough to go down by Plombières to Dijon, that I might approach them by the straightest pass of Jura.

The reader must pardon my relating so much as I think he may care to hear of this journey of 1835, rather as what used to happen, than as limitable to that date; for it is extremely difficult for me now to separate the circumstances of any one journey from those of subsequent days, in which we stayed at the same inns, with variation only from the blue room to the green, saw the same sights, and rejoiced the more in every pleasure-that it was not new.

And this latter part of the road from Paris to Geneva, beautiful without being the least terrific or pathetic, but in the most lovable and cheerful way, became afterwards so dear and so domestic to me, that I will not attempt here to check my gossip of it.

183. We used always to drive out of the yard of La Cloche at Dijon in early morning-seven, after joyful breakfast at half-past six. The small saloon on the first floor to the front had a bedroom across the passage at the west end of it, whose windows commanded the cathedral towers over a low roof on the opposite side of the street. This was always mine, and its bed was in an alcove at the back, separated only by a lath partition from an extremely narrow passage leading from the outer gallery to Anne’s room. It was a delight for Anne to which I think she

¹ [See the scheme for the intended continuation of that work, Vol. XXXIII. p. 186.]

² [See above, p. 156.]

³ [A favourite stopping-place of Ruskin’s :see Vol. II. pp. 402, 404; Vol. VII. pp. xxvii.-xxviii.; Vol. XXV. p. 350.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]