Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone Part 5

Had they, indeed, in a public manner, denounced the vengeance of Heaven against the murderers of the unfortunate Brune, or pointedly rebuked the religious and political animosities subsisting in the south of France, they would have given a proof of their sincerity, but at the risk of much of that good which it was desirable to use their temporal influence in effecting. Instead, therefore, of giving unnecessary offence, they laboured to eradicate from the minds of their hearers the seeds of hatred and uncharitableness, and to divert their attention from their private bickerings and dissensions, to the common guilt of all in the sight of Heaven. The very object which, from all we learn respecting the state of feeling in Languedoc and Provence, appears particularly desirable, appears also to have been sought, not only by repeated and fervent exhortations, but by the exaction also of public vows and promises, so as to enlist the sense of shame as much as possible, in favour of the general forgiveness which the missionaries preached. Their exertions also, always supposing the tract in question to be ent.i.tled to credit, were rewarded by the conduct of their penitents, some of whom put away their vices, and others their mutual animosities. If this be fanaticism, then it were to be wished that such fanaticism should prevail widely in the south of France. "Out of the same mouth cannot proceed blessing and cursing;" and if the secret object of the Mission be to denounce the disaffected, or preach crusades against Protestants, it must be owned that their public labours at Avignon savour but little of such a purpose, as far as all appearances go.

There is, it is true, something extravagant and bordering on stage effect, in many of the ceremonies performed, and expressions used, as recorded by the pen of M. Fransoy. An Englishman, however, is not always a fair judge of the best means of influencing the mind of a Frenchman, more particularly a south-eastern one. The Provencaux possess, both in appearance and in character, the strong characteristics of a people born under a burning sun; at once lively and ferocious, strongly led away by the excitement of the moment, and ardent in their partialities and antipathies: in short, the same romance of character is perceptible among them, which, in the dark ages, peopled the country with troubadours. The ma.s.s of such a people, particularly when profoundly ignorant, may not be accessible to cool argument; and the manner and style of oratory which would disgust a reasoning Scotch peasant, or English mechanic, may be exactly adapted to act on the temperament of an Avignonese. The surest test, therefore, of the character and design of the Mission, will be the practical effects which it produces on the conduct of its congregation, as well as the future application of those liberal donatives, which have excited so much unfavourable feeling against it. Time and fair play alone can justify the motives of those who planned and conducted it. The question in the mean time is, not whether they may or may not have occasionally gone to the lengths of a "zeal without knowledge," but whether or not their purpose has been to instruct and benefit their fellow-countrymen according to the best of their power and belief, and without reference to political party.

CHAP. VIII.

PONT DU GARD--NISMES--MONTPELIER--CETTE.

MAY 13.--This day was fixed on for a journey to Vaucluse, the road to which is better adapted for the accommodation of two wheels than of four. M. Durand, our voiturier, attended accordingly with one of his portly mares harnessed to a sort of cabriolet, very much resembling an Irish noddy. Its high boarded front reaching to our chins, and the little fat person of Durand rather incommoded than accommodated on a cushion tied to the shaft, and much too near the mare on every account, formed a grotesque combination but little in character with what ought to have been a voyage of sentiment. The deficiency in pathos, however, was made up by the poor mare, who bewailed her absent companion with such incessant roarings, as to draw many cuts of the whip, and "sacra carognas," from the unrelenting Durand. We were struck, by-the-by, more than once during this day's route, by the Spanish and Italian terminations of the Provencal patois. A village which we pa.s.sed, on an insulated height commanding the road, and crowned by ruined fortifications, is laid down as Chateau Neuf in the map, and called by the peasants Castel Novo. A man of whom we inquired the distance to Avignon, answered "Tres horas," using not only the words, but the method of computation which a Spaniard would employ.

Whether we really reached our place of destination, or were stopped short by intense heat and execrable roads, were interested, or overturned, this deponent saith not, nor indeed is it necessary. One may be pardoned for omitting the mention of a subject already so fully described as Vaucluse, its rocks and fountain, its a.s.sociations, and even its eatables; for some travellers have dwelt on the subject of its excellent bisque, or crayfish soup, and its eels, a solace, no doubt, to[34] that gentle degree of melancholy, which Fielding affirms to be a whet to the appet.i.te.

[Footnote 34: "And do not forget the toasted cheese." Vide _Matilda Pottingen_ in "The Rovers."]

"And, says the anatomic art, The stomach's very near the heart;"

as Peter Pindar also maintains. Some also, with an accuracy worthy Moubrays treatise on domestic fowls, have informed us that the hens near the fountain of Vaucluse are peculiarly prolific in fine eggs, and so on. For my own part, I may as well honestly confess that I am more partial to the memory of Petrarch as a philosopher, a patriot, and reviver of ancient learning, than as the Werter of Troubadours, though in the latter capacity he has stood unrivalled for five hundred years. I must own, also, that the hermitage whither he retired to stifle his rebellious pa.s.sion for the wife of another, however melancholy and impressive the ideas may be which it would of itself excite, is poisoned, in my mind, by the pestilent frivolities with which the mawkish of all ages have defaced its sombre features, in violation of truth and sound feeling. What syllables of dolour the forgotten Della-Cruscan school may have yelled out on the subject, is not worth ascertaining, and probably recollected by few or none. The French, who with all their ingenuity, are not very apt at comprehending the madness of contemplative minds, have caricatured the shade of poor Petrarch most woefully, and[35] the Abbe Delille (peace to his ashes!) has teazed the innocent trees of Vaucluse with embarra.s.sing questions, fitter for the mouths of Susanna's elders. Under such blighting influence, the stern rocks of Vaucluse are transformed into a sentimental tea-garden, the high-minded and melancholy Petrarch into a more ingenious Piercie Shafton, and the virtuous Laura, who probably never saw the place, into a starched Gloriana of the old school, paraded and gallanted round it with all due form. It is, perhaps, a judgment on Petrarch's adulterous Platonism, that it has laid him open to impertinences like these, which would torture his sensitive ghost almost as keenly as oblivion itself, and which very strongly remind one of Punch's intrusion at a tragedy.

Such ideas cannot be engrafted on the [36]Nonwenwerder, or the [36]Pena de los Enamorados, spots on which a simple and obscure legend has thrown an interest which Vaucluse cannot really possess, though embellished by every thing which poetry can do for it.

[Footnote 35: See the Quarterly Review, to which I am obliged for the Abbe's remark.]

[Footnote 36: See Campbell's ballad of "The Brave Roland," in one of the numbers of the New Monthly Magazine; and Southey's tale of Manuel and Leila, in his early productions.]

It were to be wished, that the shade of Petrarch could return to his former haunts, to frighten away frivolous visitors, and read a lesson to the thinking. Instead of rejoicing at the posthumous fame which his poetical talents have earned, he would probably dwell on the insufficiency of the highest mental endowments without conduct and self-command. He would also probably describe his pa.s.sion as fostered by the pedantic and high-flown gallantry of the age, and the applauses bestowed on his verses; as increasing and strengthening, after the marriage of Laura had rendered it criminal, without any purpose which his better conscience dared avow, till his eyes at length opened themselves too late to its culpable nature. His mind, of that high-wrought and desponding tone which often characterizes extraordinary genius, and too sincere to trifle with impunity, struggled then fruitlessly against a fatality formerly imagined, but become real; and the flower of his life was pa.s.sed amid illusions and conflicts, in alternate self-deception and self-reproach, in wild and beautiful visions from which he awoke to sickness of heart and weariness of himself and all things, like the victim of a powerful opiate.

Compromising weakly between his pa.s.sion and his conscience, he would say, he secluded himself at Vaucluse from a society which had become dangerous to him, and by the verses which he composed as a vent to his feelings, fixed the illusion too deep to be eradicated by lapse of time, or the indifference of Laura. Such voluntary mental martyrdom resembles the punishment inflicted by some tyrant of history on his prisoners, whom he commanded to embrace his Apega, a beautiful automaton so constructed as to plunge a concealed dagger into their hearts.

The better feelings of Petrarch's readers will dwell with the least alloy on the period after the death of Laura, when he contemplated her as beyond the reach of human ties, affections, or jealousies, and sought only to rescue from oblivion the virtues and purity which had strengthened and refined his pa.s.sion, while they rendered it hopeless.

There is a beautiful pa.s.sage in Campbell which appears exactly written to express his state of mind at this time, and the retrospective glance which he must have often cast on his past life.

"And yet, methinks, when wisdom shall a.s.suage The griefs and pa.s.sions of our greener age, Though dull the close of life, and far away, Each flower that hailed the dawning of our day, Yet o'er her lovely hopes that once were dear, The time-taught spirit, pensive, not severe, With milder griefs her aged eye shall fill, And weep their falsehood, though she love them still!"

The private memorandum,[37] written in the ma.n.u.script Virgil, of this extraordinary man, which is shown in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, may be considered as expressing his most undisguised feelings, as excited by an event which dissolves trifling attachments, while it gives permanence to those of a genuine nature. It was probably intended for no eye but his own. I annex as literal a translation as possible, and from the beauty and ease of their latinity, have been tempted to precede it with the original words.

[Footnote 37: I had procured this doc.u.ment from Milan, and translated it for the press, previous to reading the version of it which is given in the Quarterly.]

"Laura, propriis virtutibus ill.u.s.tris, et meis longum celebrata carminibus, primum oculis meis apparuit sub primum adolescentiae meae tempus, anno Domini 1327, die 6 mensis Aprilis, in ecclesia sanctae Clarae Avinioni, hora matutina. Et in eadem civitate, eodem mense Aprilis, eodem die 6, eadem hora prima, anno autem Domini 1348, ab hac luce lux illa subtracta est, c.u.m ego forte Veronae essem, heu fati mei nescius!

Rumor autem infelix, per literas Ludovici mei, me Parmae reperit, anno eodem, mense Maii, die mane.

"Corpus illud castissimum ac pulcherrimum in loco Fratrum Minorum repositum est ipsa die mortis ad vesperam. Animam quidem ejus, ut de Africano ait Seneca, in coelum, unde erat, rediisse, mihi persuadeo.

"Haec autem, ad acerbam rei memoriam, amara quadam dulcedine scribere visum est; hoc potissimum loco, qui saepe sub oculis meis redit, ut cogitem nihil esse debere quod amplius mihi placeat in hac vita, et effracto majori laqueo, tempus esse de Babylone fugiendi, crebra horum inspectione, ac fugacissimae aetatis aestimatione, commonear. Quod, praevia Dei gratia, facile erit, praeteriti temporis curas supervacuas, spes inanes, et inexpectatos exitus acriter ac viriliter cogitanti."

"Laura, ill.u.s.trious for her own virtues, and long celebrated by my verses, first appeared to my eyes, in the time of my early youth, on the morning of the sixth day of April, in the year of our Lord 1327, in the church of St. Clare at Avignon; and in the same month of April, on the same first hour of the morning, in the year of our Lord 1348, that light was removed from this light of day, while I by chance was at Verona, unconscious, alas! of my fate. The unhappy news, however, reached me at Parma, in a letter from my friend Ludovico, on the morning of the 19th of May.

"Her most chaste and fair body was buried in the evening of the day of her death, in the convent of the Fratres Minores; but her soul, as Seneca saith of the soul of Africa.n.u.s, hath returned, I am persuaded, to the heaven from whence it came.

"I have felt a kind of bitter pleasure in writing the memorial of this mournful event, the rather in this place, which so often meets my eyes, to the end that I may consider there is nothing left which ought to delight me in this world; and that I may be reminded by the frequent sight of these words, and the due appreciation of this fleeting life, that my princ.i.p.al tie to the world being broken, it is time for me to fly from this Babylon; which, through the preventing grace of G.o.d, will be an easy task, when I reflect deeply and manfully on the superfluous cares, the vain hopes, and the unlooked for events of the time past."

This simple and affecting tribute, written, as it evidently seems, under such solemn impressions, clears the memory of Laura from the imputation of any thing trifling or criminal, while it sufficiently establishes the ident.i.ty of "a nymph," according to Gibbon, "so shadowy, that her existence has been questioned."

May 14.--We left Avignon this morning, with a more favourable impression of its cleanliness and comfort than any other town had as yet left on our minds. The road to Nismes, winding up a hill on the opposite side of the river, above Fort Villeneuve, is remarkably adapted also to display its numerous spires, and the grand Gothic ma.s.s of the legate's palace, to the utmost advantage: and we watched with something like regret the disappearance of these objects over the brow of the hill which we had ascended, more especially as on this spot the eye takes leave, for some time, of every thing agreeable. The view here consists of a high dull flat, with hardly a tree, and the road of rolling stones and dust; and a high wind prevailed, which seemed a combination of the Bise and Mistral, aided by all the bottled stores of a Lapland witch, and very nearly blew poor Durand off his box. After pa.s.sing Fouzay and Demazan, two Little villages, adorned each a la Provencale, with a ruined castle, we turned out of the road to Nismes at Remoulin, where the features of the country somewhat improve. Another mile and a half brought us to an indifferent inn within a ten minutes' walk of the Pont du Gard. It is adapted for nothing more than a baiting-place for a few hours, and not at all of that description which so well-known a ruin would be in most cases capable of maintaining. The landlord, however, "a sallow, sublime sort of Werter-faced man," was civil, and inclined to do his best, and gathered us some double yellow roses, of a sort we had never seen before, to season his bad fare.

The Pont du Gard, which we were not long in visiting, is seen to the greatest advantage on the side on which we approached it from the inn.

The deep mountain glen, inhabited only by goats, whose entrance it crosses from cliff to cliff, forms a striking back-ground, and serves as a measure to the height of the colossal arches which appear to grow naturally, as it were, out of the gray rocks on which they rest.[38]

There is certainly something more poetical in the stern and simple style of architecture of which this n.o.ble aqueduct is a specimen, than in the more florid and graceful school of art. The latter speaks more to the eye, but the former to the mind, possessing a superiority a.n.a.logous to that which the great style of painting (as it is termed) boasts over the florid and ornamental Venetian school. Our own Stonehenge is too much, perhaps, in the rude extreme of this branch of architecture to be quoted as a favourable instance of it; but few persons can come suddenly in sight of Stonehenge on a misty day without being struck by its peculiar effect; and the Pont du Gard, placed in as lonely a situation, exhibits materials almost as gigantic in detail, and knit into a towering ma.s.s which seems to require no less force than an earthquake, or a battery of cannon, to change the position of a single stone. A large and solid bridge which has been built against it by the states of Languedoc, appears by comparison to shrink into insignificance, and shelter itself behind the old Roman arches, the lower tier of which, eleven in number, overtop it in height by about three-fifths. The span of the largest arch is about 78 feet; of the other ten, 66 each: and they are surmounted by a row of thirty-five smaller arches. With the exception of two or three of these last, the whole fabric is complete, and, if unmolested, appears likely to witness more changes of language and dynasty than it has already done. I do not know that the mind is ever more impressed with the idea of Roman power and greatness, than by contemplating such structures as these, erected for subordinate purposes at a distance from the main seat of empire. It is like discovering a broken hand or foot of the Colossus of Rhodes, and estimating in imagination the height and bulk of the whole statue from the size of its enormous extremities.

[Footnote 38: Vide Cooke's Views.]

From the Pont du Gard the road to Nismes has little to recommend it excepting the high state of cultivation of the country, and this is not of a nature to gratify an eye accustomed to English verdure.

Olive-groves, it is true, have been naturalized in poetry as conveying an image of beauty and freshness; but in reality nothing can be more opposed to the oaks and elms of an English hedge-row, than the pale shining gray of this stunted tree, which has more of a metallic than a vegetable appearance. Nor does a perpetual succession of corn-fields, however rich in reality, present the same appearance of luxuriant vegetation as an English pasture. There is, besides, nothing in the nearer approach to Nismes, which reminds one of the environs of an opulent commercial town, and its precincts would cut a poor figure when compared with those of Leeds or Bristol. The transition is immediate, from a dull range of corn-fields, without a gentleman's house, to a long dirty suburb. On emerging, however, from the latter into the better and more central part of the town, one is surprised to find wide and elegant streets well watered and planted, and public buildings, whose beauty and good taste show that the citizens of Nismes have made a good use of the fine architectural models afforded by the ancient Nemausis. The Palais de Justice deserves to be particularly remarked for its cla.s.sical elegance, and contrasts well with the black solid arches of the Arenes, near which it is placed.

"_Monsieour!_ les antiquites!--_Heou! Monsieour!_ les Arenes!--Commissionaire pour voir la Maison Carree!--_Heou--ou!

Monsieour!_ decrotteur, s'il vous plait!--Le Temple de Diane, _Monsieour!_" are the cries with which every third or fourth ragam.u.f.fin at Nismes salutes you, enforcing his application by a peculiar yell, of which no combination of letters can give an idea uncouth enough. As it is hardly possible to walk in the central part of Nismes without seeing its antiquities before you, it is best to avoid a troublesome live appendage of this sort, by appearing totally deaf. The Arenes are nearly in front of the Hotel du Louvre, and the Maison Carree is within two or three minutes' walk of it: the Temple of Diana and the Baths are situated in the most conspicuous spot in the public gardens, whither a perpetual concourse of people may be seen thronging; and the Pharos overlooks them from the summit of a small precipitous hill, which may be ascended in five minutes by a good walker. Every thing therefore lies within the compa.s.s of an evening's stroll.

The Maison Carree is a beautiful bijou, better known than any other of the curiosities of Nismes. I believe the opinion of Mons. Seguier (formed from a laborious examination of the nail-holes belonging to its last bronze inscription) is generally adopted; viz. that it was a temple dedicated to Caius and Lucius Caesar, grandsons of Augustus. A perfect copy of it, built from actual measurement, may be found in the Temple of Victory and Concord, in the Duke of Buckingham's gardens at Stowe. So admirable is the preservation of the original in every part, owing to the dry and pure air of Languedoc, as almost to operate as a disadvantage. Its freshness and compactness suggest rather too much the idea of a modern pavilion of twenty or thirty years standing, instead of that of a temple; and if I may venture to say so, the same want of the aerugo of age, which renders it more valuable as an architectural relic, produces an incongruous and unpoetical effect on the imagination. Age, in fact, has its own characteristic branch of beauty. An old man with curly hair and a fresh smooth complexion, like G.o.dwin's Struldbrugg, St.

Leon, would be an unpleasant and unnatural object. There is a masculine and imposing medium between youthful vigour and decay, in which the leading features of the former man may be distinctly traced; as in Wordsworth's beautiful description of the old knight of Rylstone, and Sir Walter Scott's fine portraiture of Archibald Bell-the-Cat: and I think the a.n.a.logy holds good in cla.s.sical remains. Somewhat should be decayed for effect's sake; and those parts only left which are strikingly beautiful, or of a leading and important nature. The Arena, which we next visited, is perhaps more consonant to this standard than the Maison Carree. Its structure is similar to that of the Colosseum at Rome, of which, however, it falls infinitely short in size and grandeur, while at the same time it so far exceeds it in perfectness, as to give a complete idea to an inexperienced eye of its original figure and arrangement, and of the admirable system of accommodation which such places possessed. It has just enough of the graceful decay of age to render it picturesque, and enough of freshness to answer the questions of the antiquarian: and neither too much nor too little is left to the imagination. Mr. Albanis Beaumont, in his work on the Maritime Alps, calculates the number of persons which this building must have held at 16,599, and the spectators in the Colosseum at 34,000. He also states the widest interior circ.u.mference of the Arena, as 1110-1/2 feet. The plate engraved in his work, dated 1795, represents two square towers over the princ.i.p.al entrance, erected perhaps by Charles Martel, when he converted the building into a citadel; they have however been since destroyed, and the work of clearing away the houses which defaced both its inside and outside, commenced originally by Louis XVI., has been completed. It now stands in a broad open s.p.a.ce, adapted to set off its full height and proportions.

The public garden also presents a well-arranged group of interesting objects; but to behold them to any advantage, it is necessary to turn your back upon a pert little cafe, roofed with party-coloured tiles like the scales of a fancy fish, which glares from under the shade of the trees. From hence you look over a handsome bal.u.s.trade into a large excavated s.p.a.ce adorned with stone steps, which collects the waters of a fine fountain, and in which the foundations of the ancient Baths are still visible. On the summit of the opposite cliff, from whence these waters issue, the ruined Pharos, which forms the princ.i.p.al landmark of Nismes, rises with great majesty, and at its foot, immediately to the left of the fountain, the ruined temple of Diana, though not individually striking, combines admirably with the general group. From the fountain arises a beautifully clear stream, which is distributed in wide and deep stone channels through some of the princ.i.p.al streets at Nismes, and greatly contributes to the ornament and cleanliness of the town. The Pharos, or Tour Magne, to which I scrambled from the Baths, fully answers to its distant appearance. There is a peculiar dignity and solidity in a figure approaching to the pyramidical, when placed on the top of a rock; and independent of its height, which is between eighty and ninety feet, the Pharos has this recommendation also. Its interior appears a curious work of masonry. A high wide conical vault, without pillar or b.u.t.tress, const.i.tutes almost the whole internal s.p.a.ce, admitting just light sufficient to render "the darkness visible," and give additional solemnity to a mere sh.e.l.l of brickwork.

We found the Hotel du Louvre (to which we had been recommended in preference to the Hermite's inn, the Hotel du Luxembourg) excellent in every respect. The two hotels adjoin one another so closely, be it observed, and are so similar in appearance, that one may walk into the wrong salle-a-manger, and only discover the mistake through the difference of the waiter's faces.

May 15.--Seventeen miles to New Lunel, where we breakfasted indifferently enough, not liking French customs sufficiently to qualify the bad coffee with a gla.s.s of the brandy of this place, which is as celebrated as its wine. New Lunel, which has grown on the back of the old town, in consequence of a branch of the Languedoc ca.n.a.l which runs close to it, is a neat and thriving place, but possesses no feature worthy of remark. The country is of the same character as the town, a dull rich flat, over which one may sleep with the soothing consciousness that every thing is going on well with its trade and agriculture. To Montpelier eighteen miles. Within the last league or two, the country begins rather to improve, and rise into somewhat of an undulating form; but no romantic or interesting feature marks the approach to this celebrated town.

"How I envy you the sight of that delightful Montpelier, of which one reads and hears so much!" exclaims many an untravelled lady, no doubt, to her travelled brother or cousin. No place certainly sounds more familiarly in the ear as a novel-scene; and its very name is a.s.sociated with ideas of beauty, verdure, retirement, orange groves, hanging woods, and all the et ceteras of a spot.

"Where simply to feel that we breathe, that we live, Is worth the best joy that life elsewhere can give."

The truth is, that the Montpelier of the imagination may be found at Vico, Sorrento, Ma.s.sa di Carrara; or, with a little alteration, in some spots of our own Devonshire coast. The real Montpelier is a large, opulent, well-frequented provincial capital, full of noise and dress, and possessing an air of neatness and fashion, but totally devoid of any thing allied to the poetry of nature. It stands on a round sweeping hill, commanding a considerable extent of land and sea; but the sea-coast is chiefly an expanse of low ground and etangs, or salt-water lakes; and the neighbouring hill country, resembling in form a succession of cultivated downs, has neither height nor variety to recommend it. The most interesting spot in Montpelier is the Place Peyrou, a public garden raised on high terraces, in a situation commanding the rest of the town. At the extremity of the princ.i.p.al walk stands an elegant open building of the Grecian order, overarching a basin into which the waters of the celebrated aqueduct of Montpelier are received, and from thence distributed through the town. The aqueduct itself, which springs from the foot of this pavilion, and conveys the water from the crest of an opposite hill, is a truly n.o.ble work, and, though modern, worthy in every respect of a Roman aedile. It was erected by the states of Languedoc in honour of Louis XIV. whose statue is placed in the garden. Like the Pont du Gard, it consists of two tiers of arches, fifty of which we counted in the lower range, and one hundred and fifty in the upper, until the lessening perspective baffled all farther attempts at reckoning. The architecture is inferior in dignity and ma.s.siveness to that of the Roman work, but exceeds it in extent, and probably in the quant.i.ty of masonry employed. Nothing can be more elegant than its general form, and the manner in which it is united to the terrace of the Place Peyrou.

Whatever natural objects are interesting in the environs, may be seen also from this elevated spot, though I am inclined to think that the views of distant Pyrenees which we were taught to expect, are a fiction existing in the minds of some travellers. At all events, the glimpses must be partial, and only to be obtained on a fine day. The Cevennes mountains rise, however, to a tolerable height in the distance to the west; and to the south-east, the remains of the old town and cathedral of Maguelone, form a striking distant group, projecting like a low reef of rocks into the sea at the distance of three or four miles. To judge from the site of this ancient town, which tradition describes as the original nucleus of Montpelier, the sea must have made great inroads on the neighbouring coast. The air, it is said, is growing less wholesome than formerly, owing probably to the acc.u.mulation of the etangs. From the edge of the coast to Maguelone, the distance cannot be much less than a mile and a half at low water.

The Montpelliards are considered a scientific people; and, at all events, they seem to have found out the secret of perpetual motion, if we may judge from the experience of the first night we spent in the town. At half past nine, the princ.i.p.al street, which our hotel overlooked, began to swarm with heads. The whole population were on the alert, promenading during the greater part of the night; and such a busy hum arose from beneath the windows, which the heat obliged us to keep open, that it was impossible even to think of sleeping till daybreak.

Our accommodations indeed were not of the most tempting sort; for finding the Hotel du Midi full of travellers, and consequently saucy and unaccommodating, we had tried the Cheval Blanc, described to us as the next best hotel; and detestable enough we found it. On stepping however next morning into a cafe and restaurant in the Place de Comedie, whose superior appearance had attracted us, we found that M. Pical, the master of it, was in the habit of letting rooms, and we immediately removed to his house. Nothing indeed could be more clean and elegant than its accommodations, or more refreshing after the dusty journey of the former day, and the nightly bustle of the streets, than its quiet and coolness, situated as it is in a large area in the suburbs or boulevards. The salle-a-manger partakes of the same character with the rest of the house, and the carte contains a list of many more good things than we were inclined to do justice to. In short, no traveller can do better than order himself to be driven directly to this house, which comprises all the advantages of a private residence at a reasonable charge, with the recommendations of great attention and civility.

This day, May 16, we attended service at the French Protestant Church, and were gratified both with spending a morning on the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean in a manner which reminded us of an English Sunday, and witnessing also the full and respectable attendance of fellow Protestants. The service was performed in the following order:--1, a psalm; 2, a general confession of sins; 3, another psalm; 4, a sermon; 5, the commandments and the creed; 6, a long prayer for the sick and distressed, the king and the royal family; 7, another psalm, and the blessing. The singing was impressive, not so much from any intrinsic merit in the performance, as the earnestness in which the whole congregation joined in it, "singing praises l.u.s.tily with a good courage," instead of deputing this branch of religious duty to half a dozen yawning and jangling charity children, a.s.sisted by the clerk and parish tailor. I believe it is an observation of Dr. Burney, in his History of Handel's Commemoration, that no sound proceeding from a great mult.i.tude can be discordant. In the present instance, certainly, the separate voices qualified and softened down each other, so as to produce a good compound. Of the sermon I cannot speak so favourably, for in truth it savoured somewhat of the conventicle style. Its theme was chiefly the raptures which persons experience under the influence of the Holy Spirit, and it was calculated to discourage all whose imaginations were not strong enough to a.s.sist in working them into this state. The manner of the preacher was however good, and his delivery fluent; and so great was the attention of the congregation, that during three quarters of an hour not a sound interrupted his voice, until, on his pausing to use his handkerchief, a general chorus of tw.a.n.ging noses took place, giving a ludicrous effect to what was, in fact, a mark of restraint and attention.

In the evening we departed for Cette. The road, according to the set phrase of the French Itineraire, is through a "campagne de plus agreables;" but our observation showed us only a bleak high common to the right, and to the left a succession of etangs and sandy flats, affording a prospect at once desolate and uninteresting. The s.p.a.ce between the etangs and the road is generally marshy; and instead of a fine blue expanse of sea in motion, the horizon is commonly bounded by a long white sandy line, over which the sails of the little vessels appear very oddly. One or two houses erected on these ridges, which border the etangs, give to the view, if possible, a still more desolate appearance, being totally unaccompanied by even a tree or a patch of verdure, and only serve to remind you of the nakedness of the land. Near Frontignan the prospect improves, as far merely as concerns its fertility; for it is in the vicinity of this town that the famous Frontignac wine, or to denominate it more correctly, the Muscat de Frontignan, is made. The only thing during this evening's route which could be considered as a feature, was the lofty cape at whose foot Cette stands; a perfect idea of which, from the side on which we approached it, is given by Vernet's picture of that port, in the Louvre. A bridge of fifty-one arches, traversing a series of swampy ground and etangs, connects this promontory with terra-firma, and crosses the great Languedoc ca.n.a.l, which communicates at this spot with the sea. A beautiful sunset, which made the whole expanse of back-water appear of a rose-colour, and which, I confess, I have seldom seen equalled in England, gave as much richness to the view as it was capable of receiving. There is naturally but little in it; and the effect of Vernet's view is derived from accidental circ.u.mstances purposely introduced; so that, on the whole, we wished that our evening's excursion had been confined to the Place Peyrou. I should, however, conceive the air of Cette to be much better adapted to tender lungs than that of Montpelier, as well from the difference of temperature, perceptible even to a person in sound health, as from the superior shelter which its situation affords; while the high and exposed site of Montpelier leaves a doubt whether, in most cases it would not be more hurtful than salutary. The productions of the neighbourhood of Cette are also in a more forward condition than those of Montpelier. We saw hedges of arbor vitae in full flower; and peaches two-thirds grown, in almost a wild state.

May 17.--We rose at five in the morning, desirous to secure a cool walk to the Tour des Pilotes, a signal post on the high cape above Cette. The sun was however prepared for us, and continued to grill us alive from the first moment; and, after all, the prospect from this station, to which you climb as if ascending the steep roof of a house, is not of a nature to repay the exertion. We went to satisfy our consciences that there was nothing to see, and we saw nothing. The Pyrenees, so far from being visible near Montpelier, cannot be distinguished even from this nearer point, excepting, perhaps, on a peculiarly clear day; and no other feature worth mentioning occurs. The coast presents a bare and uninhabited appearance, arising partly from the almost total want of trees. Our perquisitions in the town of Cette itself were more fortunate, though, by-the-by, it exceeds Lyons itself in dirt and ill smells. It is a place of considerable trade in proportion to its size, and is employed chiefly as an entrepot for goods, which may be landed and reshipped without paying duty: and a walk on the quay affords, in consequence, considerable varieties of the human face divine, neat as imported. I recognised a group of Catalan sailors by their brown jackets embroidered with shreds of gaudy cloth, their red night-caps, and the redicillas in which their hair was bagged. No race of men with whom I am at all acquainted bear so marked a character of animation and decision in every movement of ordinary life as these st.u.r.dy provincials, or would be more remarked by a stranger among a mixed concourse of different nations. The same exuberance of animal motion which degenerates into restlessness and buffoonery in the Neapolitan, or the native of Languedoc, a.s.sumes a more dignified character in the Catalan, who is certainly a gentleman of Nature's own making. One of the crew, a tall athletic fellow, was holding forth to the rest on some trivial matter with a varied and graceful action, which might have served as a model to a painter. The rest were at breakfast; but even their mode of pouring the wine on their tongues at arm's length, from the long spout of a sort of gla.s.s kettle, had somewhat cla.s.sical in it, and reminded me of the rec.u.mbent figure in the Herculanean painting, who is drinking in the same manner. Simple as it may appear, this knack is not to be acquired without a long apprenticeship, and I was ludicrously reminded of my abortive efforts to master it by the sight of the party on the quay. It certainly is adapted for making the most of any liquid, and might have been adopted during such a scarcity of water as the Hanoverian consul informed us existed in Cette during the former year. Not a drop of rain fell for ten months, and water at last became dearer than wine.

On crossing the bridge, we observed a man on one of the piers, spearing aiguilles de mer, a beautiful silvery fish, of which he had taken several. They were about two feet long, and of the shape of an eel, excepting in the form of their long picked heads and jaws, which correspond exactly with their name. The tunny is also caught in abundance near this part of the coast; and Vernet has introduced the fishery, from a lack of picturesque circ.u.mstances, into one of his sea-ports, painted by royal order. No other fish can better deserve this particular compliment, uniting, as it does, size, flavour, and the merits of both fish and flesh in a great degree. The "thon marine" is its plainest and best preparation, and is preferable, with a dish of salad, to all the high-seasoned dishes which form a Provencal bill of fare; in short, if our national sirloin obtained knighthood, such a good lenten subst.i.tute as the tunny deserves canonization.[39] I cannot say so much for the dish, common enough among Frenchmen, which a well-dressed man, the harlequin to a troop of comedians, was eating in the salle-a-manger when we entered; viz. a raw artichoke with oil and vinegar. Sterne, it appears, little knew the extent of the a.s.s's good taste, when he deprived him of this article in the Tabella Cibaria, "to see how he would eat a macaroon."

[Footnote 39: A similar dignity was conferred by some heathen poet, I believe, on the _potnia syke_ (the august, or G.o.d-like fig).]

We set off at two o'clock in the day on our return to Montpelier, not a little envying the horses and mules their cool quarters in the immense remise. Within a mile of Cette lies the breakwater of rough stones, which forms a prominent object in the foreground of Vernet's picture, and serves to ascertain the spot from whence he took his design. At Villeneuve, where we stopped to bait the horses, we were diverted by a scene characteristic of the country. A bag had just been found on the road by the conductor of the Cette diligence, which drove up to the inn while we were there; and on Durand disowning it, a shabby-looking foot pa.s.senger claimed it, but could not establish his plea by identifying a single article. In a few seconds every soul in the inn, excepting ourselves, was a.s.sembled to take part in the discussion, and argued the pro and con with a vehemence of voice and action, which would have made a stranger believe it was a matter of life and death to each. A female inside-pa.s.senger, with an infant in her arms, which she nearly let drop in her energies, was the coryphee of this chorus of tongues, which could be compared to nothing but bees in the act of swarming, or the cackle which the entrance of a fox causes in a hen-roost. We were no longer surprised at hearing the peasants whom we met conversing in a tone which we had mistaken for quarrelling. The French generally, indeed, are fond of noise and action and emphasis about what does not concern their own interests a jot, while a London mob indulges an equal degree of curiosity by silent gaping; but these good folks certainly outdid anything I ever witnessed in France before. An action for defamation brought in Languedoc[40] might, with propriety, be worded, "that the defendant did, with four-and-twenty mouths, four-and-twenty tongues, and four-and-twenty pair of lungs, vilify and d.a.m.nify his neighbour's reputation;" for it is probable that a scolding match could not take place in the open air of that country, without enlisting volunteer seconds to that amount on both sides, all equally bawling and violent.