Spiers: Memoranda of an autumn tour in 1836
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Contd Augt 9. Tuesday
passport, commencing, as usual most pompously “Au nom du Roi”, in which my companion was guessed at 32, mine at 30, whereas he is three years my junior. But the furrows which the cares of matrimony must have ploughed on his countenance are doubtless the cause. On conferring with friends we found the difficulty of procuring a conveyance to Ostend & the time that might be occupied in the dull journey to be obstacles, too serious for us to venture on; & Antwerp, for which a packet was bound on Thursday was therefore decided on. We dined at Henry Pratt’s & finished the day with George Horn at Holloway.
AUGUST 10. WED: – This morning we occupied ourselves in procuring passports. In consequence of the jealousy still subsisting between Holland & Belgium, a traveller is not admitted into the former country with a Belgian passport & we therefore procured one from the Prussian consul at an expense which alarmed & surprised us, being 10/- each. The ambassador grants them free of expense, but a days notice is required. The countersigning of the Belgian consul was then attached & this trouble was for the present at an end. – We then visited the tower & passed an interesting hour among remembrances of bygone days & the trophies of former
valour. Henry Pratt was with us, and his scientific acquaintance with ancient armour rendered the exhibition more valuable to us. The beautiful piece of ordnance cast & worked at
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attracted much our regards and the stands of 100,000 muskets in one room form a splendid sight. Sir Francis Burdett’s residence, the tower in which state prisoners had been confined from time immemorial to the days of Thistlewood & traitors’ gate with its portcullis, brought many violent recollections to memory. But all we saw convinced us more & more of this impolicy & the meanness of our government in suffering any changes to be made & such extravagant ones, for a sight of this national monument & its contents. – A visit to the panorama of Isola Bella in the Lago Maggiore carried me back to the happy period of my Italian tour & at the House of Commons in the evening the debate on the grant for the erection of a lady's gallery & for purchases made for
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