The room dedicated by Tocqueville to Ampere is
above me. Creepers in great luxuriance cover the walls up to the first
floor windows. The little park consists of from thirty to forty acres,
well wooded and traversed by an avenue in this form, leading from the
road to the front of the house.
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To the west the ground rises to a wild common commanding the sea, the
lighthouses of Gatteville, Barfleur, La Hogue, and a green plain covered
with woods and hedgerow trees, and studded with church towers and spires
of the picturesque forms of the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth
centuries. It has no grand features, except the sea and the rocky coast
of the Cherbourg peninsula, but it is full of variety and beauty. I can
understand Tocqueville's delight in the house and in the country. The
weather is perfect; the thermometer in my bedroom, the walls of which are
about six feet thick, is 71 deg., in the sun it is 80 deg.; but there is a strong
breeze.
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