In Troubadour-Land: A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc Part 13

By the time the Rhone has reached Arles all its gravel has been champed up and reduced to impalpable mud. That blue crystalline flood that gushed from the Lake of Leman, unsullied by a particle of earth, is now a river of brown mud--thick as pea-soup, and as nutritious. The stones that would have killed all vegetation have been pounded into a condition so attenuated, that they form rich alluvial matter. The river now seeks to deposit all this mud. On reaching the sea, the difference in gravity between the meeting waters, and their variation in temperature, produces rapid precipitation of all the earthy matter held in suspense by the stream. This last stage in the river's course is called the _zone of deposit_.

The inclination of the bed of the Rhone between Tarascon and Arles is four feet three inches in the mile; but at Arles the elevation of the bank is but three feet six inches above the level of the sea; and the river has to run sixty-two miles before it reaches salt waves. Consequently the bed widens, the river branches, and the rapidity of its movement diminishes progressively. The alluvium is deposited, banks multiply, the mouths are enc.u.mbered with submarine islets, locally called _theys_, which the waves and currents of the sea displace and remodel continuously, and render the entrance to the river impracticable. [1]

[Footnote 1: Lentheric: 'Les Villes Mortes du Golfe de Lyon,' Paris, 1883.]

River mouths vary greatly; they are either estuaries, like those of the Thames, the Seine, and the S. Lawrence, or they are deltas, like those of the Nile, the Po, and the Rhone. Very generally in tidal seas we have estuaries; but in those that are tideless, as the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, they are deltas. Where there is a tide, the mouth of the river is washed out and kept open by the flux and reflux of the sea; but where there is no tide there is nothing to interfere with the river choking its mouth with its deposits. In such a case, after a while, the ma.s.s of deposit becomes so great as to interfere with the course of the river. The sea beating against this bar throws up sand and gravel upon it, and at every storm raises it higher. Then the river divides into two or more branches, and forms for itself new beds, which are destined in turn to undergo the same process.

Now, when a river has formed its bar choking its mouth, and is then forced to make a fresh mouth, it leaves a lagoon behind this bar. At every flood its waters overflow, and are unable to escape to the sea when left behind the bar. Sometimes, in like manner, in a gale of wind on sh.o.r.e, the waves are carried over the bar, and there are left as a brackish pool, unable to return to the sea.

Thus the whole of the Bay of the Gulf of Lyons is masked by a false coastline of old bars, behind which lie lagoons all formed in the way indicated. Between Rousillon and Leucate is the Etang de Salses; Narbonne anciently was seated in the lap of another great inland lake or lagoon. The vast Etang de Tau has a barrier between it and the sea on which is planted Cette. Lagoons behind bars extend thence the whole way to Aiguesmortes; and between the mouths of the Rhone, as they flow at present, is the Etang de Valcares.

After the river has deserted its old bed, and the lagoon has been formed behind the bar, or littoral cord, wave and storm working upon this long line of mud and sand succeed in breaking through; then, as the inclination of the land is but 0'm, 01 in the metre--almost nothing, the sweet and salt water mingle in these lakes, they never run dry, though in many cases not three feet deep.

A look at the map of the Gulf of Lyons will show the reader that its special characteristic is the chain of lagoons separated from the sea by a narrow ribbon of sand. It may have caused perplexity in the mind of many that the Gulf should bear the name it does. It cannot take its name from the city of Lyons--the ancient Lugdunum--which is two hundred and twenty miles inland. It certainly cannot derive it from the wild beasts--lions--for there are none nearer than Africa.

The fact is, that the Gulf takes its t.i.tle from the Keltic word for a lagoon, lon or lyn, a name that recurs in Maguelonne--the Dwelling on the Pool--in the Ca.n.a.l des Lonnes, a channel connecting the ponds and lagoons of the Durance and Rhone, and, indeed, in our own London (Londinium) the Dinas, Castle on the Lon, or pool of the Thames and the Ess.e.x marshes.

Anciently, in historic times, Arles, that lies near the apex of the triangle formed by the branches of the Rhone, was bathed on one side by the river, by which she received merchandise from the north; and, on the other side by the _lones_, or submerged land, that extended to the sea; and after Marius had connected these lones with his ca.n.a.l, she exported and imported merchandise over the Mediterranean through the lagoons, as the sea could not be reached by the river on account of its bars.

Moreover, the Greek and Roman cities along the coast are not found on the actual coast, on the bars, but were planted on the lagoons, which afforded them perfect harbourage for their merchant vessels. These lagoons, through which flowed salt and fresh water, were always healthy, and remained healthy as long as communication was maintained with the sea and the river.

But wind and wave and alluvium working together choke these communications, and directly the mouth seawards of a lagoon is closed it is converted into a stagnating marsh that exhales malaria.

During the Middle Ages no attention was paid to this fact, and those stations which had been perfectly wholesome in the Cla.s.sic Epoch were rendered pestilential, and dwindled from populous cities to a cl.u.s.ter of fever-smitten peasants' hovels. In later times this desperate condition of affairs called for remedy. Louis XIV. sent engineers to examine and report on the state of this region, and works were begun which have been maintained and extended annually, the raising of d.y.k.es against overflow by the Rhone and by the sea. Drains have been cut in all directions to carry off the stagnant water, opening by traps into the sea. The extent of d.y.k.e now reaches two hundred and thirty miles. The banks of the two main branches of the Rhone are protected, as well as the sea-face of the Camargue, the triangle between them, and the annual cost to the country to keep them in repair is one hundred and twenty thousand francs. A flood, however, often breaks through the banks, and submerges a large district. On such occasions the additional expense is heavy.

Now, what is the result of all this outlay? The engineers and scientific authorities of the coast-works and d.y.k.es are pretty unanimous in saying that a great mistake was made in the beginning by Louis XIV. The Rhone ought never to have been embanked. What should have been done was to keep open the mouths of the lagoons, to preserve them from festering.

Formerly, the large island of the Camargue, occupying nearly twenty thousand acres, was periodically inundated by the Rhone, and when the waters fell, a film of the richest deposit was left behind, just as in Egypt the Nile overflows and fertilises its delta. At every overflow eighteen thousand cubic yards of alluvium was deposited over this district, all of which is now carried into the Mediterranean and thrown down in the construction of new bars; utterly wasted.

In the time of the Roman domination the Camargue was a second Egypt, and was called "The granary of the Roman army;" and Arles was given the designation of "The b.r.e.a.s.t.s," so flowing with plenty was it held to be.

At the initial cost of millions of pounds, and an annual outlay of five thousand pounds, the Camargue has been reduced to absolute sterility.

The protected lands, deprived of the sweet water which would have washed from them the salt that now spoils their fertility, and of the natural dressing that Providence sends down to them every spring and autumn, are now productive of only a little coa.r.s.e wiry gra.s.s and thistles, and the dried soil is white with saline efflorescence. At the present day the value of land in the neighbourhood of Arles that is subject to periodic inundation is three times that of the land guarded by costly embankments against the bounties of the river.

On descending the sinuous course of the lesser Rhone the hills disappear, the horizon is level as the sea, and all around is desert. Then the current of the Rhone seems to fail wholly, the waters of the river and of the lagoons on both sides of its bed mingle, and become confounded in one sheet. All nature is dead. The dull and sluggish water, streaked with lines of ooze, extend on all sides as far as the eye can reach. The effects of the mirage add bewilderment. One can hardly distinguish water from sky.

Nothing can be more dreary than this naked surface, hushed into silence, where vegetation is reduced to a few tufts of rushes and tamarisks.

But, suddenly, out of the marshy, submerged plain, a strange pile of buildings is seen cutting the horizon, half a castle, half a cathedral, imposing in a ma.s.s as it towers above the fragile and squalid hovels crouched at the feet. This building is _Les Saintes Maries_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Les Saintes Maries.]

Probably nowhere in the world is to be seen a spot so desolate and so wretched. The village is planted at the extreme west angle of the Camargue.

It can be reached by one road only, rough to travel over, and impracticable in winter. This road leaves Arles, or rather Trinquetailles, opposite Arles, traverses the marsh of the Grand Mar, follows the d.y.k.e of the river, and then threads its way among mora.s.ses, and over soil white with salt, and burning under the rays of the sun. Once in the year this route is crowded with pilgrims, who come to pay their devotions at the spot where it is supposed that the Three Marys, Mary, the mother of James, Mary Salome, and their servant Sara, landed. The legend is somewhat mixed. According to one version, those who came to Provence, flying from the persecution raised by the Jews, were Lazarus, Mary Magdalene, and Martha. Lazarus, as we have seen, has been appropriated by Ma.r.s.eilles as its apostle; Martha has been settled at Tarascon, and Mary Magdalene has been given a cell in La Sainte Baume. Here, at Les Saintes Maries, however, the apostolic three are said to be Mary, mother of James, Mary, wife of Cleopas, and Sara, their servant; but a concession to the other tradition is made, in that it is allowed that these three brought with them Lazarus and Martha.

Nothing was known of all this till the time of good King Rene. The church at this point was called in the sixth century S. Maria de Ratis, S. Mary of the Boats, by S. Caesarius, Bishop of Arles. William, Count of Provence, in his will, A.D. 992, gives it the same designation; so Raimbald, Archbishop of Arles in A.D. 1061, "The Church of the Ever Virgin Mother of G.o.d, Mary of the Boats." So also Bertrand II., Count of Provence, at the same date.

Two bulls of popes in 1123 and 1200 speak of the church as that of S. Mary on the Sea. So does Gervais of Tilbury. In 1241 Raymond Berengarius, Count of Provence, ent.i.tles it Notre Dame de la Mer. And so it continued to be called in doc.u.ments down to 1395. If not Our Lady of the Sea, it was S.

Maria de la Mar, of the Mere, the Lagoon.

However, in 1448, King Rene took it into his head that Mary and the Mere were distinct persons, that Mary was not, could not be, the Virgin, she must be one of the other Marys; so with a little putting together of heads and puzzlement, he and his advisers decided that the two Marys were Mary, the mother of James, and Mary Salome. The next thing to be done was to find their bodies there, but that naturally presented no difficulty. There were bones there--from Pagan times. Since that date a great pilgrimage has taken place annually to Les Saintes Maries; and the cure of Les Baux, being very satisfied that the Tremae in his parish must be the Three Marys, erected a chapel under the rock sculptured with the figures of Marius, Martha, and Julia.

The Magdalen is probably a personation of the perished city of Maguelonne, as one of the Marys is the Mar or Mere; and Martha, there can hardly be a question, is the Syrian prophetess who accompanied Marius, but who in her place inherited the attributes and cult of Martis, the Phoenician G.o.ddess, venerated, doubtless, at all the settlements of these mercantile adventurers along the coast.

CHAPTER XIV.

TARASCON.

Position of Tarascon and Beaucaire opposite each other--Church of S.

Martha--Crypt--Ancient paintings--Catechising--Ancient altar--The festival of the Tarasque--The Phoenician G.o.ddess Martha--Story of S.

Fronto--Discussion at _dejeuner_ over the entry of M. Carnot into Ma.r.s.eilles--The change in the French character--Pessimism--Beaucaire--Font--Castle--Siege by Raymond VII.--Story of Auca.s.sin and Nicolette.

Tarascon and Beaucaire stand frowning at each other across the Rhone, each with its castle; Beaucaire a grand pile on a crag, Tarascon dipping its feet in the water, and sulkily showing to its enemy a plain face, reserving all its picturesqueness for its side towards the town. This castle of Tarascon was one in which King Rene resided, as well as in that at Aix, but the Aix castle is gone, and that at Tarascon remains. Beaucaire belonged to the counts of Toulouse, whereas Tarascon, as already said, belonged to Provence. I do not like to venture on an explanation of the name, but the _Tar_ with which it begins is most probably the Keltic _Daur_, water. [1]

But the Tarasconese will not hear of this. To them the name is taken from the Tarasc, a monster that devastated the whole country round, but whom S.

Martha bridled and slew. S. Martha, as we have already seen, is the very prophetess who directed Caius Marius in his campaign against the Teutons and Ambrons, the devastating horde that has in the popular imagination been represented as a dragon. The body of S. Martha is supposed to lie in the crypt, in an early Christian marble sarcophagus, probably brought from the Alyscamp at Arles, representing Moses striking the rock, and the miraculous feeding of the mult.i.tude, the miracle of Cana, and the resurrection of Lazarus.

[Footnote 1: _Gwask_, in Breton, is _contraction_, and at Tarascon the river is drawn together by the opposed points of Beaucaire and Tarascon.

This may perhaps form the second syllable.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Early altar, Tarascon.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Spire of S. Martha's Church, Tarascon.]

In this crypt is a Corinthian capital turned upside down and converted into a holy water stoup; also a very early and curious altar, the slab of which is just two feet square, and has in the midst a square hole cut, probably of later date, for the reception of relics; the height of the altar is three feet three and a-half inches, it is of a porous stone that has become greatly corroded with weather. It is probably the earliest Christian altar in France.

In the crypt is a life-size representation of the entombment of S. Martha, with figures standing round, Christ at the head, and S. p.r.o.nto at the feet.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Iron door to safe in S. Martha's Church.]

The church of S. Martha is of the fourteenth century, with the exception of the south portal, which dates from 1187, and is rich in its deeply-recessed mouldings filled with sculpture, but has been sadly mutilated. Within the church is some very fine ironwork, a grille dividing the choir from the side aisles, and a charming iron safe let into the wall on the north side, of ironwork painted and gilt. There are moreover some quaint paintings; an ancient altarpiece representing S. Rocque, between S. John and S. Laurence, on a gold ground; a S. Mary Magdalen with the portrait of a canon kneeling at her feet; the finest painting is S. Michael, also with a canon kneeling below. The armour of the archangel is very rich, and heightened with gold.

The date of these pictures is 1513. There is another of the Nativity that is inferior. Whilst looking round the church, I heard singing m.u.f.fled and distant, and presently, on reaching the steps that descended to the crypt, found that a young priest was there catechising a cla.s.s of little girls.

After some instructions they sang a hymn, which a Sister of Mercy was accompanying on the harmonium. The air was taking. It puzzled me at first.

It was familiar and yet strange, and not till the children had reached the last verse did I recognise a wonderfully distorted form of the mermaid's song in _Oberon_, all the accents being altered. In this crypt is the tomb of a Neapolitan knight attached to the court of king Rene; and in the floor a well the water of which rises and falls with the river. In all probability this crypt was originally the baptistery of the first basilica erected in Tarascon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: King Rene's castle, Tarascon.]

The castle of King Rene is wonderfully picturesque on the landside. It was begun in 1400; he is said to have inst.i.tuted the festival of the Tarasque, that used to be conducted with great merriment annually on July 29th.

A procession of mummers attended by the clergy paraded the town, escorting the figure of a dragon, made of canvas, and wielding a heavy beam of wood for a tail, to the imminent danger of the legs of all who approached. The dragon was conducted by a girl in white and blue, who led it by her girdle of blue silk, and when the dragon was especially frolicsome and unruly dashed holy water over it.

The ceremony was attended by numerous practical jokes, and led to acts of violence, in consequence of which it has been suppressed.

S. Martha has inherited the symbols of the Phoenician G.o.ddess of her own name, the ship and the dragon; there can be little doubt that the first Phoenician settlers in Provence introduced her worship as the patroness of sailors, and that this worship acquired a fresh impulse after the destruction of the Teutons who had overrun the land, when the prophetess Martha was regarded as one with the earlier G.o.ddess. When Christianity came in, the name of the hostess of Bethany was given to the churches erected where Martha the moon G.o.ddess had been venerated before, so as gradually to wean the heathen from their old faith. They came over into the Church, but brought with them their myth of the pagan G.o.ddess.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A bit in Tarascon.]