Sunday 29th June 1834

Up at 4 – & off at w [gap] without breakfast for Poligny – pretty drive, breakfasted there at — & off for at – . [gap] for Montrond – country began to be mountainous & very beautiful ascended a long range of mountains (Jura) to Montrond, then to Champagnole, Maison neuve to St. Laurent to Moray [Morez] slept there, comfortable apartment

Courtesy of West Yorkshire Archive Service, Calderdale WYC:1525/7/1/5/1/12

[up at] 4 38/..
[to bed at] 11 1/4

with her an hour and five minutes and two kisses very fine morning Fahrenheit 68° at 5 1/4 – Off from Mont sous Vaudré at 5 38/.. just an hour from the time of my getting out of bed – slept comfortably – good beds as everywhere – charming morning – nice rich corn country – the country from Dôle here, bare of wood, and not so pretty as before – from here (Mont sous Vaudré) to Poligny rich corn country finer as it nears the mountains – just out of Mont sous Vaudré a league’s drive thro the forest of Rahon and all the way good road – easy descent upon Poligny seated amid vines that creep up some distance on the high mountain sides – the town tho’ shabby streets on entering and very narrow a pretty good one and very tolerable hotel au grand cerf where we have just breakfasted – excellent milk and good alpine strawberries – the houses are at the very foot of the mountains – bare rock and shingle sparingly covered with herbage rise almost perpendicular above the houses – but some of the craven hills look as considerable – At Poligny at 7 35/.. and off at 9 48/.. Miss Walker lay down for 1/2 hour before and as long after breakfast and having eaten biscuits in the carriage going a stage before breakfast seems to have suited her very well – I have not enjoyed my breakfast so much since leaving home – for on breakfasting immediately after getting up I never eat with relish – narrow shabby streets on sortant as well as on entrant Poligny – rocky hills terraced almost to the top with vines – pass the old couvent, now a séminaire with 400 jeunes gens, in the fine beautiful vallon de Vaux, and nearly at the end of end turn (left) and traverse to the top of the mountain to the little Café and restaurant du vallon de Vaux at 10 50/.. – walked up nearly the whole of the ascent and a little beyond the café in 50 minutes – very fine view over the rich wooded extensive plain of Dôle – Poligny very picturesquely situated at the very foot of the mountains – had the day been very clear I daresay could have seen Dijon plain enough – the intervening towns and villages with their clochers scattered over the wide plain for ever peeping up among the wood – tolerably even and rich pretty drive along the mountain top (the 1st mountain plain) to Montrond, a nice little scattered village with old ruined round tower on top of round hill (the mont rond?) – cheval de renfort to Montrond, but not from there the next stage (Champagnole) – pretty drive to Champagnole – 1 good street and then down steep descent to the other part of the town where is la poste, a good looking hotel where we might have slept very well – cheval de renfort again – the town surrounded by fir and beech wooded mountains – got out of the carriage just out of the town, and walked 1/4 hour up the hill – and from 2 23/.. to 3 (the last 5 minutes downhill) Adney and I walked up the hill, and then down the steep tho’ shortish descent almost to Maison neuve in a pretty little basin at the foot of pine-covered mountains – the poste and hotel (a poor looking place) a lone house – a few good-looking houses scattered about at a little distance – At 3 1/2 (in 1/4 hour’s slow trotting had gone about 1 mile English? from Maison neuve) pass Le lion roux, a nice, clean, good-looking Auberge (‘on loge à pied et à cheval’) where we might have slept well enough – not very possible to have slept at la poste (at Maison neuve) – at St. Laurent at 4 3/4, very good, clean, well-built village – Good-looking Hotel de L’Ecu de France, probably la poste, for the horses were there ready – I walked up the hill from 5 1/4 to 5 35/.., the road along this narrow gorge cut out of the rock with wood above and below – very fine descent upon Morey /Morez/ from 4 3/4 for 57 minutes only seven of which (about the middle of the descent) without sabot, tho’, except at last, down upon the deep gorge at the end of which is Morey, the road was very good and did not fall more than about 3 inches at a yard – the postboy grumbled at my insisting on his not trotting with the sabot on, looked as cross as the old gentleman and declared he would make me pay for the retard – making a new road a little above the old one along the last part of this long descent just down upon the mountain torrent (dry now) that runs along the bottom of the valley – seem intending to cross the stream and carry the road on the other side of it – the valley of Morey a deep very narrow gorge little more than room for the nice, clean, good little town – reminded me of the Pyrenees – the perpendicular limestone hoary rocks (200 toises, above 1200 English feet high) very fine – At Morey at 7 47/.., La poste, good enough looking hotel but the dirtiest people we have met with and the scantiest dinner we have had – however good beds (3 bedded room) large, lofty room, and comfortable enough Rowe with the postillion – very impertinent – so would only give him at the rate of 15 sols per poste – because 1 1/2 came to 22 1/2 sols, he would not take the 23 sols – would have liards, because he thought and I said I had none – would not take the money at 1st – had up the maître de poste, very civil but got out of the way – threatened to send for one of the police (one of the women of the house said a gendarme) so got rid of the man – Adney laughing, George trembling (like an aspen leaf) she said – dinner at 7 3/4 – the postillion business had prevented my writing – very fine day – Fahrenheit 63° at 11 p.m. much cooler here on the Jura – three quarters hour with Miss Walker before getting into my own bed at eleven and a quarter –

Courtesy of West Yorkshire Archive Service, Calderdale, SH:7/ML/E/17/0047 & SH:7/ML/E/17/0048