It is impossible to have
anything to do with the French working classes, and not observe the
effect of this artistic culture, and here and there throughout this work
I have adduced instances in point. We have nothing in England to be
compared to the general filtration of artistic ideas, by means of
gratuitous art and technical instruction, and the opening on Sunday of
all art and literary collections.
But after all it is the watchmaking school, or, Ecole d'Horlogerie that
will perhaps most interest and instruct the traveller here, and he
should by no means neglect to visit it; however short his stay may be.
Watchmaking is, as is well known, the speciality of Besancon, and dates
as an important branch of industry from the year 1793. The National
Convention is to be thanked for the foundation of the first
"horlogerie," having invited to Besancon the refugee watchmakers of
Chaux de Fonds and Locle, who had been prescribed for their adherence to
the Republican idea. By a decree of the Convention, these exiles were
accorded succour, after which the Committee declared watchmaking in the
Department of the Doubs to be a national institution. Many hundred
thousand watches are made here annually, and it has been computed that,
out of every hundred watches in the French market, eighty-six come from
Besancon.
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