On the other hand, he noted every detail of the fabrication of Burgundy wine, enumerated the different vintages, the cost of casks, bottles, methods of transportation and marketing, the price of "_vin ordinaire_", of oil, butter, cattle, the cultivation of olive trees and fig trees and capers. Monuments are described with a mathematical eye, many small points noted, columns described, ornaments studied, but the only personal impression elicited by Arles is that "The principal monument here, is an amphitheatre, the external portico of which is tolerably complete."
What is true of France is even more true of Italy. At Milan the cathedral is not even mentioned, but "the salon of the Casa Belgiosa is superior to anything I have ever seen." And he adds immediately, "The mixture called Scaiola, of which they make their walls and floors, is so like the finest marble as to be scarcely distinguishable from it." Pages are given to the fabrication of Parmesan cheese. Once, however, in walking along the shore from Louano to Alberga, he could not resist the enchantment of the landscape. There he noted the remarkable coloration of the Mediterranean and was puzzled by it, but he also added, let it be marked to his credit:
If any person wished to retire from his acquaintances, to live absolutely unknown, and yet in the midst of physical enjoyments, it should be in some of the little villages of this coast, where air, water and earth concur to offer what each has most precious. Here are nightingales, beccaficas, ortolans, pheasants, partridges, quails, a superb climate, and the power of changing it from summer to winter at any moment, by ascending the mountains. The earth furnishes wine, oil, figs, oranges, and every production of the garden, in every season. The sea yields lobsters, crabs, oysters, thunny, sardines, anchovies etc. Ortolans sell at this time at thirty sous, equal to one shilling sterling, the dozen.
A queer mixture of suppressed artistic emotions and avowed culinary preoccupations. Shades of Rousseau and Wordsworth, to mention the nightingale and the ortolans in one breath! But one thing at least we must be thankful for is his lack of pretence and conventional admiration. It is, after all, refreshing to find a traveler who does not copy from his guidebook and does not fall into raptures and worked-up ecstasies. He came back through "Luc, Brignolles, Avignon, Vaucluse", simply noting that "there are fine trout in the stream of Vaucluse and the valley abounds particularly with nightingales." He saw Nîmes, Montpellier, Frontignan, where he discussed the manufacture and price of wine; he passed through Carcassonne and was much interested in the canal and "the carp caught there", but did not mention the walls; he stayed several days at Bordeaux, measured the remains of a Roman amphitheater and made a thorough study of the wines; "Chateau Margau, La Tour de Ségur, Hautbrion, Chateau de la Fite, Pontac, Sauternes, Barsac." He visited Nantes, Rennes, Angers, Tours, and ascertained the truth of the allegations of the famous "growth of shells unconnected with animal bodies" mentioned by Voltaire and discussed in the "Notes on Virginia." He saw Chanteloup and heard a nightingale there, but was far more interested in "an ingenious contrivance to hide the projecting steps of a stair-case."