There were times, not long ago, when travelling through France was tedious and painful. Those were the days of diligences and passports, and many other things that were very disagreeable. In the present day, such has been the material and social progress of the country, that travellers will find matters not greatly different from what prevails in England. There are railways in all directions; the hotels are frequently on a scale of great splendour; at very nearly the whole of them on the main routes English is spoken; and everywhere visitors are treated with marked civility. We all know what Paris has latterly become--the finest town in the world, an attraction to strangers from all parts of the earth. So lately as twelve years since, the railway from Paris was not pushed beyond Marseilles. There it long remained, and to those who wanted to get on farther, there was no help for it but to take the diligence, or hire a carriage specially for the purpose. I can remember hiring a _voiture_ with a pair of horses to go on to Nice, and of being nearly three days on the journey, including stoppages of two nights, one of those nights being spent at Frejus, in one of the worst and dearest hotels I ever set foot in. Now all this is changed; there is a railway from Marseilles by way of Toulon, Cannes, Nice, and Monaco to Mentone—the trains going several times night and day to suit the convenience of travellers. There are likewise telegraphic wires the whole way, by which messages can be sent in advance to bespeak accommodation at hotels along the line of route.