The month of September having considerably advanced, and the weather becoming sensibly colder, I began to think of suspending the use of the hot baths, and removing to a milder climate. I had the pleasure, however, of thinking my health materially improved, my eyes in particular felt lighter, and I fancied that I could occasionally discern a flash of light from the under part of the left one. I selected Nice for my winter’s residence, and on the 14th of September left Aix in the diligence, for Antibes, taking leave of the last town in France, where I proposed making any extended residence. It is not easy to describe my emotions in quitting a people, with whose language and habits I was now becoming well acquainted, and to whom I felt a degree of attachment, grounded, if not upon congeniality of sentiment, at least upon a grateful sense of repeated acts of kindness, and attention, which I had experienced from them. It is true, that I was fully alive to all the anticipated enjoyments of a land of promise; the favoured Italy, highly gifted by nature and art; the cradle of genius; the birth-place of poets, orators, and warriors; and once the sole arbitress of the fate of the world. I sought consolation in reflections of this nature, and in repeating the lines of a favourite poet. “Hope must brighten days to come While memory gilds the past.” CHAP. IX. JOURNEY TO NICE. On leaving Aix, our coach, besides myself, contained two gentlemen, sons of General M⸺, who had been residing for eight years at a college near Toulouse. We breakfasted at Luc, where we took up two or three more passengers; from hence we passed on to Frejus, and thence over the Estralès, formerly noted for numerous banditti. At Cannes General M⸺ came out with his daughter, in his carriage, to meet his sons, whom we here parted from. The remaining passengers also quitted us about this time, so that before we entered Antibes I had the whole carriage to myself. At Antibes I got my passport signed, to enable me to enter his Sardinian majesty’s dominions; but this gave little trouble, as a person negotiated the affair for the remuneration of one franc. I remained at the inn where the diligence put up, in consequence of finding that the one for Nice set off from it on the following morning. I got my supper at the table d’hôte, in company with two or three officers; the fare was very indifferent, and the charge exorbitant, in consequence of not having made my bargain beforehand. After supper I retired early to bed, in hopes of compensating for my loss of sleep on the preceding night in the coach; but, alas! I reckoned without my host, for it proved a night of misery; a multitude of mosquitoes tormented me without intermission, and with joy did I welcome the arrival of the moment, which announced that the diligence was preparing to depart.