At Pont St. Esprit we find the first bridge over the Rhone, in descending from Lyon. It was begun on the 4th of September, 1265, and finished in February, 1309: the water-way is contracted to about 1,800 feet, passing through nineteen large arches, and seven small ones, with great rapidity. As well as I could judge by the eye, the water is about fifteen inches higher, above, than below the bridge. The edifice is very well built, with semicircular arches, but it is very narrow, and in order to oppose more resistance to the action of floods, is not built in a straight line. In walking upon it we perceived how much we lost in this part of the Rhone, where the banks are comparatively low, by the depressed position of the eye in a boat; a rich and fertile plain shaded by mulberry trees, appeared between us and the hills, of which we had seen nothing from the water.
There are some whimsical particularities in the churches at Pont St. Esprit; but perhaps depending rather on the fancy of the architect than on the style of the time, and therefore not very interesting. The date is probably the fifteenth century. In one of these is a vault, said to have the property of preserving the human body, but like so many other things, most of the objects thus preserved were destroyed in the fury of the revolution, when the French populace gave full play to the desire to injure and destroy, which seems so natural in an ignorant multitude. One, the body of a female, was, as I was informed, still entire, and I went to see it; arms, legs, and mutilated trunks, were pulled out from a hole, one after another, to gratify my curiosity, and at last the desired object. It was exceedingly light, of a dingy buff colour, somewhat shrivelled, but in other respects very perfect.
We engaged a voiture from Pont St. Esprit to Orange, and travelled the whole way in a mizzling rain, which continued all the evening and the next morning. My companion finds the climate of the south of France much like that of Ireland, and I cannot contradict him; but I suppose that such summers are very rare.
Orange is a little city of about 8,000 inhabitants, but it is said to have had 15,000 under the government of its own princes. It was added in 1713, by the treaty of Utrecht, to the crown of France. The situation is at the foot of an insulated hill, round which a fine plain extends to a considerable distance; beyond are hills, mountains, rocks, and valleys, all of which are seen to great advantage from the summit of this eminence. The inns are in the suburbs, the high road passing on the outside of the town; and this is absolutely necessary, as the widest part of the widest street does not exceed twelve or thirteen feet, and few are more than nine or ten. Here we first saw an order which we have since met with in several other places, that no carts are permitted to enter the city. The inhabitants tell us, that the situation of the town is cold, and subject to violent blasts of wind from the Alps; but we observed pomegranates in full bloom in the hedges. The general aspect of the vegetation is very different from that of England and the north of France.