.rO-^r ■';. "^ '^^V^^^^^^^ o^ v\^ .NJ-' J 1 A ^ '^^ -^ ^'Vi'^.* ,/\ ■'ff .-^^ .^' ^ . 7^^ -^ ^ "^ ,#■ ^^-^^ ^^^' ^^ ., /. vO %%^ ^^' "% ■^^ < - ** J s ^ \ ^ ~^- 'H %% C^, .-^ 0> s ^ '/ ' •V •--' ,#' 0^ -7* .-^^^^ .\^ r> <'^ '^ -^ * * •> oo. IN THE [ Shadow of the Pyrenees FROM Basque-Land to Carcassonne BY MARVIN R. VINCENT, D.D. WITH ETCHINGS AND MAPS K'etD fork CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1883 Copyright, 1883, by- CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS Trow's Printing and Bookbinding Company 201-213 East Twelfth Street New York JC ym T,o tfee Stei^^ <=; WHO KEEP A father's HEART BEYOND THE SHADOW OF THE PYRENEES THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE Bayonne, . I CHAPTER II. Anglet, . 19 CHAPTER III. Le Blanc Pignon, 32 CHAPTER IV. Biarritz, 39 CHAPTER V. Saint- Jean-de-Luz and the Boundary, , , . ^^8 CHAPTER VI. On the Frontier, 59 CHAPTER VII. The Basques, 71 CHAPTER VIII. Euscaldanac, . 90 vi Contents, CHAPTER IX. PAGE By Omnibus to Pasages, 102 CHAPTER X. Pasages, in CHAPTER XI. San Sebastian, 121 CHAPTER XII. The Hill Country, . 142 CHAPTER XIII. Azpeitia and Loyola, 155 CHAPTER XIV. Springs and Chateaux, "^IS m CHAPTER XV. LOURDES, 192 CHAPTER XVI. Toulouse, 211 CHAPTER XVIL Carcassonne, 233 Notes, . . 265 ETCHINGS= Basque Cart, ...... FrojiHspiece Jaines D. Stnillie. To face J-ages ^Street in Fuenterrabia, 67 Jajues D. Smillie. ' Priest's Walk— San Sebastian, . . . .135 R. Sivain Gifford. Tour Visiqothe and Tour de l'Inquisition— Car- cassonne, ........ 233 Leroy M. Yale. MAPS. ^ Bayonne — Biarritz — Cambo, . . . . . i GuiPUZcoA, . 103 ^San Sebastian, 125 ^ Carcassonne, . . - . , . , ♦ , 245 BAYONNE—BIHI 30 ■f o Capdu Figu'ier ^ Pt \ Bidax" IN THE SHADOW OF THE PYRENEES. CHAPTER I. BAYONNE. " Nunguam Polluta.^'' — Motto of Bayonne. A BREAK at last in the weary stretch of ghastly, wounded pines and glassy la- goons which has flanked the railroad all the way from Bordeaux. We are passing out of les LandeSy (i) and entering upon the battle-ground of the sand and the sea. Beyond the little sta- tion of Labenne the bright surf of Biscay flashes into view ; there is a glimpse of a signal-tower, a mass of dark pines crowning a low promon- tory, lines of yellow sand, the chafing Adour, and the stone jetties — the long arms with which it is fighting back the persistent sands, and BAYONNE— BIAR-^ 'ITZ—CA.MBO. Authoi*3 Route IN THE SHADOW OF THE PYRENEES. CHAPTER I. BAYONNE. " Nunquam Polluta." — Motto of Bavonne. A BREAK at last in the weary stretch of ghastly, wounded pines and glassy la- goons which has flanked the railroad all the way from Bordeaux. We are passing out of les LandeSy (i) and entering upon the battle-ground of the sand and the sea. Beyond the little sta- tion of Labenne the bright surf of Biscay flashes into view ; there is a gHmpse of a signal-tower, a mass of dark pines crowning a low promon- tory, lines of yellow sand, the chafing Adour, and the stone jetties — the long arms with which it is fighting back the persistent sands, and 2 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. keeping open the way to Bayonne. Two great stone piers mark the channel of the river, where a black steamer lies at anchor, while the huge, unwieldy barges creep slowly up past Boucaut toward the long quay and the thick shade of the Allees Marmes, the favorite promenade of the Bayonnais. Two graceful white spires shoot up from a mass of mingled foliage and chimney-pots ; then warehouses and railway- buildings close in the train on the right, and a steep mass of rock on the left, and we glide into the station at Bayonne. Theophile Gautier, whose Voyage en Es- pagne, though written in the old diligence days, is still among the most thorough and interesting of books of travel, dismisses Bay- onne with a sarcastic sentence : ''A heap of tiles overtopped by a squat and ugly tower." But he approached it under a rain-storm, and adds, apparently with some compunction for his sweeping judgment, *'A city which one sees under the rain is naturally ugly." M. Taine was equally unfortunate. *' It rains; the inn is insupportable. It is stifling under Bayonne. 3 the arcades ; I am bored at the cafe, and am acquainted with nobody. The sole resource is to go to the Hbrary." So he fills out his chapter on Bayonne with old, blood-curdling legends. M. Perret, on the other hand, in his recent charming book, Le Pays BasqiiCy says, ** Bayonne m'a cause seulement une grande impression d'aise et de plaisir ; " and proves it by lingering in the old city through two pleasant chapters. ** It is the point of view that is the essential thing," remarked the airy young Barnacle of the Circumlocution Office. For myself, I can truly say I have seen Bayonne from about every conceivable point of view. Circumstances detained me there a month. I forget who it is that says that, in order to fall in love with a place, one must be bored with it. Certainly I was bored with it, and became thor- oughly tired of it ; but as certainly I carry away from it the impression of one of the love- liest old towns in all France. Like the whole of Gaul, as described by Caesar, Bayonne is divided into three parts. Situated at the confluence of the Adour and 4 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, the Nive, the former river separates the quarter Saint-Esprit from Petit Bayonne, which, in its turn, looks across the Nive to Bayonne proper. The spacious court of the railway station opens into Saint-Esprit, or the Jews' Quarter. When Ferdinand and Isabella, in I495> ex- pelled the Jews from Spain, the exiles first took refuge in Portugal, where, notwithstanding the hatred of the Portuguese, a number of them ob- tained permission to settle at Lisbon. A pesti- lence having broken out, however, the populace wreaked its fury on the Jews, butchering and burning them by hundreds, in order, as was claimed, to appease the divine wrath. The majority of those who escaped sought a refuge in the environs of Bayonne, where, after having been alternately protected and persecuted by the French kings, they were placed upon an equal footing with other French subjects by a decree of Louis the Sixteenth, in 1776. From the station gate, a sharp turn to the left reveals an ascending street lined with common houses and shops. The Jewish physiognomy peers out here and there ; the names on the Bayonne, 5 signs have sometimes a flavor which is not French ; and an inscription on a large brick building indicates an Asylum for aged Israel- ites ; but, on the whole, the Jewish mark is not deeply set. Saint-Esprit has, generally, a cheaper and more neglige aspect than Bay- onne proper ; it is Bayonne en d^shabille\ but is not especially dirty or otherwise repul- sive. Trade is a mightier fusionist than reli- gion ; and the day is long past when the Bay- onne Jew was forbidden to appear out of doors after sunset, was forced to wear a yellow cord on his robe and bonnet, and must say hep ! instead of s-s-s-t ! when he called a Bayonnais in the street, so that the worthy Christian should not be betrayed into turning his head at the appeal of a Jew unless he so chose. Near the summit of the hill the street falls off on the left into a wooded slope, where some soldiers are practising the rifle-drill, marking the time, un / deux / trois ! in concert and with strong explosive tones. It is by no means certain, by the way, that the bayonet owes either its name or its origin to Bayonne. The 6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. French cross-bowmen were anciently called bawnniers, and hayna is Spanish for a sheath of a small sword. The sheath may have given name to its contents ; a supposition which seems to be confirmed by several facts. The earliest bayonet-sheaths were very elaborately ornamented, and the rules relating to military costume have a great deal to say about the position of the sheath. A youngster lies in the path, in imminent danger of rupture from his attempts to produce the military calls on an old bugle. A path through the grove leads to the rear gate of the citadel, and passing over the bridge, through a network of passages, and up narrow stone steps to the grass-grown summit of the wall, we work round to the right, stopping now and then to gather the abundant black- berries, and come out upon the face of the cita- del, which forms part of the tremendous fortifica- tions of Vauban by which Bayonne is encircled. Nothing can exceed the loveliness of the view from this point. The city, crowned by the white spires of the cathedral, is directly below, across the Adour. The Nive, stealing Bayonne. 7 softly down from the Basque Hills, cuts it diag- onally, and passes under four handsome stone bridges to mingle with the Adour, the point of junction being marked by a triangular redoubt overshadowed witji trees, and with a piquant little turret at the salient angle ; which redoubt alio forms the head of the great bridge of eight arches spanning the Adour, and connecting Bay- onne with Saint-Esprit. The triangle formed by the two rivers embraces Petit Bayonne, overlooked by the twin towers of the church of Saint- Andre. The Adour creeps away in many a swirl under the flat arches and round the massive piers of the stone bridge, past a long line of shaded quay, and under the ugly iron railroad bridge, and loses itself in the low wooded hills to the eastward — the boundary of Beam. Turning back to the city, the eye passes from the square custom-house with its drum-like dome, across the little shaded square on the right, to the solid masonry of the Porte Marine, the beginning of the line of works which throw out their gray bastions against the emerald-green glacis and the dark foliage of the 8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. Alices Paulmy. From the Porte Marine, the quadruple row of trees of the Alices Marines stretches along the river bank toward the sea, to the great bend that terminates in the Blanc Pignon, over the dark pines of which sparkles the sea. Back from the Adour the ground rises in mingled woodland and pasture, with the convent buildings at Anglet and the top of the pharos at Biarritz. The magnificent back- ground of the picture begins far to the east in the faint blue summits of the higher Pyrenees, and is prolonged by the nearer mountains of Navarre, and completed by the sea. On a clear day, one may look past the pharos at Biarritz, and over into the bay of Saint-Jean-de-Luz with its fortress of Socoa, and across to Cap du Fig- uier and Fuenterrabia on its little promontory. Solomon in all his glory would have paled before a Bayonnais hackman. As he comes into view, at the end of a long street or perspec- tive of trees, one is reminded of Dante's picture : *' As when, upon the approach of morning, Through the gross vapors Mars grows fiery red, Down in the west upon the ocean floor." Bayonne. 9 Two rudimental tails barely redeem from jackethood his black coat, trimmed with silver lace, faced with scarlet and white, studded with countless buttons, and opening over a blazing scarlet waistcoat. White pants complete this wondrous creature at one extremity, and a high shiny hat with broad silver band at the other. Under the auspices of this brilliant vision, marshalling us like a pillar of fire over the Pont Saint-Esprit, and past the huge structure resting upon its shady arcades, which serves for theatre, custom-house, city hall, and most other public purposes, we reach the Hotel Saint-Etienne, in the Rue Thiers. Our landlord was a veritable forlorn hope in his desperate and heroic assault on the English tongue, of which he now and then succeeded in carrying an outwork, though with much slaughter of verbs and prepositions. A pleasant memory is that cosy little dining- room, with its pink walls, and the two gargons, the dark-eyed, bilious Spaniard, and the wiry little Frenchman whose chef-d'oeuvre in English was two eggSy and who described last night's storm by — rain to-night/ The pleasant, lo In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. shaded street in front leads up past the Chateau Vieux, with its four low cylindrical towers, built in the twelfth century, and, according to some, resting in part upon Roman foundations. A little farther on, at the end of the street, rises the cathedral. The liveliest imagination cannot make it impressive, though it has been vastly improved by the two spires, for which, as for several other noble gifts, Bayonne is in- debted to a private citizen, one M. Lormand. The front is dilapidated and shabby, and rude wood and plaster booths or shops project here and there between the buttresses, like old sores. It is not a large church, possibly a little larger than the cathedral in Fifth Avenue, and dates from the thirteenth century. The interior is a good and pure specimen of high gothic, entirely wanting in decoration, with the exception of some colored escutcheons in the vaulting of the nave, and the new polychromatic adornment of the chapels in the retro-choir. A hint of the city's history is given in the leopards of England sculptured on the key-stones of the vaulting within, while the fleur-de-lis is sown in profusion Bayonne. 1 1 over the buttresses of the towers. From 1295 to 145 1, Bayonne was in possession of the Eng- lish ; the fleur-de-lis marks its recovery by France in 145 1. The only remains of the an- cient sculptures are found over the south door, which now opens into the sacristy, and represent Christ and the apostles, the virgin and child surrounded by angels with instruments of music, Christ showing his wounds amid a group of an- gels bearing the instruments of the passion, and the resurrection. From the sacristy a passage leads to the cloisters, the only really remarkable feature of the church. On each of the three sides (the church forming the fourth), six su- perbly vaulted bays are separated by sheaves of columns with richly carved capitals, and open upon the court by grand pointed windows, each divided by three delicate shafts supporting ogives. The western and part of the southern sides have been enclosed and coarsely decorated in color, forming a chapel ; the other portions are bare and much defaced, containing nothing of interest except the mutilated statue of a bishop. The old sacristan was communicative, 1 2 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. and expressed views on the Chinese question in America, as he had a son in San Francisco. What a Babel of tongues ! French is spoken with a peculiar accent, the silent e, for instance, being usually enunciated. Every shopkeeper speaks Spanish, and the signs are often in both languages. With these mingle the harsh accents of the Basques, who may be seen everywhere, and especially along the Nive, on the quay which bears their name, distinguished by the colored sash round the loins, and the peculiar cap — the blue boyna or herety a little fuller in the crown than that of the Spanish Basques. Let us saunter toward the river under these low, sombre arcades of the Port Neuf, swarm- ing with shops and recalling the streets of Berne. We shall surely yield to the seduc- tions of the chocolate shops, Cazenave's espe- cially. The trimly-shod, pretty Bayonnaises trip modestly by, olive- skinned, dark-eyed, grave, with the coils of black hair at the back of the head neatly enfolded in gay handker- chiefs. Emerging from the arcades and turn- ing to the right, the Quai des Basques leads Bayonne, 1 3 past the new iron market, tempting with its fruit and flowers and the fish swimming in the cool dark tanks. All along the quay lie the flat galtipes with their long narrow rudders, laden with broken stone and firewood. Across the stream are the Arceaiix de la Galuperie. The monotonous sound of children's singing or re- citing comes across the water from the ^cole Communale. On the stone slope leading down to the water, a man is washing a lamb, while another holds a string attached to the collar of a wretched white cur, and having soused him sufficiently, lifts him out by the string and begins to go over him with a stiff brush. We are at the end of the quay, and pass out of the city through the Porte Saint-Leon. The Nive stretches away toward the green hills of Cambo round a beautiful wooded bend, and under a stiff railroad bridge. The gate of the fosse at the cor- ner of the city wall is raised a little, forming a pool into which some artillery-men are driving their horses breast deep, perched on their backs on all-fours to avoid a wetting. In a hollow to the left, a score of women are washing clothes 14 /^ the Shadow of the Pyrenees. and chatting round a covered reservoir. A little, oven-like, hexagonal structure is close at hand, of rough stone, whitewashed and sur- mounted with a cupola. This is the famous fountain of Saint-Leon, bearing on its front a tablet recounting the legend of this martyr of the tenth century, who, when beheaded, took up his head and carried it as far as this spot, where the fountain sprang up from the drops of blood. For a long time the water was supposed to possess miraculous virtue. The fountain is now entirely enclosed, and a substantial iron pump- handle discharges the sacred stream through a copper pipe. Up the slope, with the gray, grass- topped city wall and the green fosse and glacis on the right, and the fine, shaded parade-ground on the left. Here is the Porte d'Espagne, out of which issues the road to Biarritz and Cambo. A street runs between the western wall and the houses, a quiet, shady walk, broken at in- tervals by a round, plastered tower stepping out from the line of dwellings, a remnant of the older fortifications utilized for home purposes, and by no means unattractive with its small Bayonne* 1 5 windows and climbing vines. Past the Chateau Vieux, and back again to Saint-£tienne. A picturesque group this before the door : an old man with a broad-brimmed hat crowded down over a black handkerchief, accompanied by an ancient dame carrying a cup for contri- butions, and the twain escorting a patriarchal ram, whose tremendous dimensions suggest the woolly hero of Colchis ; the beast hobbling on three legs, and wildly pawing the air in the vain effort to get the fourth to the ground. The monotony of a long stay in Bayonne was somewhat relieved by a great fair which continued during several weeks. The Place d'Armes, directly facing the Custom-house, was surrounded on all four sides by booths, where a bewildering variety of cheap articles was exposed, and where the air was rent with the howls of rival vendors. But the great attraction was along the Alices Paulmy, just outside the western wall, where was a row of shows which nothing but a Dutch Kermis could equal. There were two circus tents, be- fore one of which the whole company paraded 1 6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. for half an hour before each performance : two clowns, one gymnast, one fat woman in tights, two smaller women who merely ambled round the platform, and a band of five musicians, in- cluding a trombone player, the perfect embodi- ment of the dime-novel brigand. Close by, a menagerie advertised its attractions by highly colored paintings of valiant hunters in deadly battle with lions and bears, and in the person of Mademoiselle Aissa, '*the renowned <^^;;^/- teuse^'' who appeared in front of the booth, now beating a drum, now juggling with balls, and again, wearing round her swarthy neck a live anaconda. A merry-go-round, bedecked with spangles and furnished with wooden horses, was a constant attraction to the youngsters, as it flew round to the music of a drum and a barrel- organ. The adjoining exhibition of wax figures displayed cartoons representing the tortures of the Inquisition and a scene at a dissecting table. The entire front of the unfortunate subject was dissected out, and a young demonstrator was expounding over the cavity to a group of awe- stricken students. Meanwhile an automatic organ at the entrance played Schubert's Sere- Bayonne. i y nade with a volume of dismal sound which literally saturated the air, and which, blending with the neighboring hand-organ and the toot- ings of the three rival bands, made one long for the calliope. Then there was a bird lot- tery, and a photograph gallery, and a shooting booth, and waffle-bakeries, and the two crock- ery lotteries, the one presided over by the man with the eternal smile, and the other by a pretty Frenchwoman who handled the crowd with charming adroitness, dealing her tickets with a running fire of talk, beguiling the boat- men and soldiers with her smiles, now whirling the great wheel, and now handing down a prize of decanters or drinking-glasses to a pleased housewife, or bestowing with ineffable grace a nameless article upon an astonished soldier. The motley but well-behaved crowd surges up and down between the booths, servant maids from the town, soldiers from the garrison, sail- ors from the ships in the Adour, Basque coun- try people from Ustaritz and Itsatsou ; French, Spanish, Basque chatter mingles with the drone of the organs and the rattle of the drum at which one of the clowns is leathering away. 1 8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, In a shooting booth a man is practising with a rifle at live ducks, the victim being placed in an iron tank with a weight attached to his leg, in water only high enough to leave his head above the edge of the tank. The marksman kills two while I stand. It is growing dark, and dinner is waiting at the Saint-Etienne. The arcades of the Custom-house flare out in gas jets. There is a crowd at the corner of the Place d'Armes. The drums roll for the relief of the guard, and the fifteen or more trumpeters march up the Rue Thiers to the Chateau, sound- ing the recall. The omnibus dashes up from the train, and the anxious passengers dismount and hold conference with Madame B. ere the trunks are ordered down, for the Saint-Etienne is full. From an open window far up in the Custom-house float the shrill notes of an inde- fatigable practitioner on the flute. The rich strains of the splendid military band rise from the adjoining square ; the newsboys wail La Gironde ! and we count at least eleven dogs in the street, with the pleasing certainty that the night will be "filled with music." Anglet. 19 CHAPTER 11. ANGLET. " Into the silent land ! Ah, who shall lead us thither? " — Salis. ALONG, low, unobtrusive little railroad station seems to be trying to hide itself among the trees just behind the Alices Marines ; and in front of this appear, every twenty min- utes or so, a little locomotive with a very high and slender smoke-stack, and a train of two- story carriages, by which train one can run down to Biarritz in a quarter of an hour. A little more than half-way to Biarritz is the sta- tion of Anglet, a small and not picturesque vil- lage, where, however, a visitor will be repaid for a delay of two hours by witnessing one of the noblest fruits of Christian charity, and one of the oddest developments of Romish superstition. The Abbe Cestac, who had already estab- lished at Bayonne a Maison d' OrphelineSy was 20 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. urged to found a refuge for fallen women, and accordingly purchased for this purpose, in 1839, a large tract of land between Bayonne and Biarritz. His extensive knowledge of chem- istry was at once applied to reclaim the sandy soil, and with such success that the barren plain was in due time converted into a smiling and productive farm. Here he erected a range of buildings and invited the repentieSy who, upon their reception into the Refuge, were set at work about the gardens, fields, and barns. The institution was placed in charge of the ** Servants of Mary," the same order which had superintended the orphanage at Bayonne. In 1842, Sister Madeleine, the sister of the Abb^ and his associate in the work of founding the Refuge, asked his permission to retire, for meditation and prayer, to a neighboring cabane, where some aged people were already await- ing death. Followed by several sisters of the order, she betook herself to a desolate, sandy tract between the sea and the Adour, and in this *^ new and dismal Thebaid " the little band of devotees gave themselves up to silence, Anglet. 21 agricultural labor, and prayer. This was the foundation of the new order of Bernardines, which received the formal approval of the Pope in 1851. The sisters of the ** Servants of Mary," who are quite distinct from the Bernardines, may often be seen on the railway between Biarritz and Bayonne, distinguished by their costume of plain blue, with white apron and head-dress. As I walked up toward the village this morn- ing, I met three of them riding to the station in a little donkey-cart. To the right of the main road, a private road reserved for visitors turned off, following the enclosure of the Refuge stables, where several women were busy at the compost heaps, and opened, at the corner of the enclo- sure, into a large court, one side of which was formed by the buildings of the Refuge, and an- other by the church, a spacious and apparently new building, with transepts, and a vaulted ceil- ing decorated in polychrome. One of the blue-robed sisters, with her eyes protected by colored goggles, took me in charge, and led the way through a gate into a large 22 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. quadrangle and through a series of well-kept hot-houses containing a brilliant array of flow- ers ; thence into a large vegetable garden, on one side of which a plain slab marks the resting- place of the Abbe Gestae. It was a great day in the quiet life of the sisters, as it happened, for Monseigneur the Bishop of Bayonne had chosen that day for a visit to the Refuge, and drove up in a coach with attendant clergy as I was beginning my explorations. Another vis- itor was also present in the person of a Capu- chin friar, in brown habit, with sandaled feet, and with a very decided tonsure, in marked contrast with the French priests in this neighbor- hood. So far as I could see, these latter were shy of the tonsure, confining it in many cases to a round spot on the back of the head about as large as a silver dollar, and much smaller than may be seen upon the pate of many a free-thinking Bostonian. Having made the circuit of the gardens and passed through some of the lower rooms of the Refuge, neat as a Broek parlor and furnished with Quaker-like simplicity, the blue sister mar- Anglet, 23 shalled me along a road between fields of grain, where the broad-brimmed straw hats of the peni- tents appeared among the stalks, and past the large brick building of the Pe?isionnat, until, at a distance of about a quarter of a mile, we struck into a pathway of loose sand leading through a grove of pines. Five minutes' walk brought us to a short archway of plane trees, under which lay the entrance to the home of silence. The place was absolutely isolated. Not a hint of sea, river, or mountain reached the eye from any point. The roar of the surf at Biarritz came hoarsely on the wind, and this, with the occa- sional sighing of the breeze through the pines, was the only sound which broke the deathlike stillness. Through a flower garden in Avhich was an en- closure containing the tomb of Soeur Madeleine, we passed to the chapel, a small, plain structure, with an altar of gray paper manufactured at the Refuge. The altar was surmounted by a figure of the Virgin with a really beautiful face, and dressed in a black robe trimmed with gold lace. Close by the church door, agate opened upon a 24 I^ the Shadow of the Pyrenees. scene which can be described only as a garden of nightmares. A large oblong space, surround- ed by the conventual buildings, was laid out in hotbeds, and bending over these were half a dozen female figures which incarnated the most hideous fancies of childish dreams. A coarse woollen robe of dirty white enveloped the person from head to foot ; a heavy, pointed cape was fastened back over the shoulders, dis- closing portions of the blue cross on the back ; an enormous cowl, fitting closely round the back of the head and projecting several inches in front of the face, was gathered up into a small circular opening which effectually concealed the features. The bare feet were thrust into coarse sandals, and the red, cracked, roughened hands gave no hint of the gracious ministries of womanhood. The blue sister, in a kind of stage whisper, exclaimed Voila les Bernardmes / Not a sign betrayed that they were aware of the presence of visitors. Mutterings issued from the hoods from time to time — snatches of prayers, verses of Scripture — and they plied their toil with a ner- vous intensity, as if trying to drown at once the Anglet. 25 memory of their faultful past, and the sense of their dismal present. The spectacle was as ghostly as any picture in the Inferno. These goblins, furiously scratching the earth and tear- ing up weeds, suggested ghouls ransacking a churchyard rather than humble penitents ex- piating their faults. In reply to my question whether the obliga- tion of silence was absolute and perpetual, the sister said yes, as respected intercourse with each other ; but that, in cases of emergency, they were allowed to address their superiors of the Refuge. I could not restrain the utterance of a little mild skepticism. Human nature is pretty much the same in a Romanist and in a Protestant; in a lonely pine-wood and in a city. Twenty or thirty women (to say nothing of the other sex) cannot be shut up anywhere and not talk. The " emergencies," I take it, are blessings in disguise, and I am greatly mistaken if more than Scripture quotations and prayers does not issue from those woollen lanterns. With every disposition to be tolerant of the crudest forms of sincere devotion, I conceived the impression 26 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. that there was a taint of humbug about this thing, and that it was maintained, in part at least, as a paying exhibition. The sisters of the Refuge, with two of whom I conversed, evidently inteUigent women, appeared to me to regard it with something of contempt. I visited the institution twice. The first time, I was detained outside the garden of the Ber- nardines while the attendant sister went on before. Was I quite uncharitable afterward in the thought that she had gone to arrange the ghastly scene at the hotbeds ? The second time, there were no goblins on duty in the garden, but two or three were standing with their brooms in the doorway of one of the buildings ; and, on my sudden appearance, they whisked away with an agility which indicated that the con- ventual discipline, however it might have fet- tered their tongues, had not affected their limbs. At the end of the nightmare garden, a door opened into the refectory, a low, long room with benches and tables of unpainted pine round the four sides, the soft sand for a floor, Angle t, 27 and the windows encased in ugly brown paper frames, and ornamented with some rude statu- ettes, and some flowers which formed a refresh- ing contrast to this wholesale perversion of na- ture. Little drawers in the tables contained the table-furniture of each nun, consisting of a little pipkin of coarse red earthenware, a knife, a fork, a wooden spoon, and a napkin with a blue border. Voila le cristal ! said the sister, taking up the pipkin ; and, pointing to the knife and fork and spoon, added, Voila V argenterie ! When the Soeur Madeleine and the first re- cluses went into retreat, they built for them- selves some rude huts and a chapel of straw, which, in 185 1, were replaced by the present board cells covered with tiles, and by a more substantial chapel. The original chapel, how- ever, is still preserved, together with one of the original huts. This latter was close beside the refectory door. It was constructed of light strips of wood, with straw woven neatly be- tween and with a roof of thatch. It was about five feet square, and I could just stand comfort- ably upright under the roof The floor was of 28 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. sand mixed with sharp stones. One side of the cell was entirely occupied by a hard, narrow bed, at the foot of which was a black cross on the wall,, and the motto DiEU Seul in black letters on a white ground. A box, on which were placed a bowl and pitcher of the coarsest kind, and a wooden, rush-bottomed chair at the bed's head, completed the furniture. A flea, at this point, found green pastures and death on the back of my neck, and from the violent inflammation which ensued, I was led to infer that that insect, already much too vigorous and venomous in his natural state, was encouraged here as a means of grace. The good blue sis- ter, instead of exulting over this infliction as a righteous judgment upon a heretic, tenderly patted my inflamed neck (she was past sixty), and uttered gentle expressions of sympathy. The original chapel is, like the hut, of the rudest description. A figure of the dead Christ lay below the paper altar, and the Virgin stood above in blue and white and surrounded with evergreens in pots. All over the establish- ment, over every door and on every wall, are Anglet. 29 hung or painted mottoes. Here are two or three specimens: ** Je conduirai Tame dans la solitude, et la je parlerai a son coeur." ** Si vous oubliez vos peches, Dieu s'en souviendra. Si vous en souvenez, II les oubliera." In the sales-room are these: **I1 en coute de bien vivre, mais qu'il sera doux de bien mourir." ** Soyez pret, dit Notre Seigneur. L'etes vous dans ce moment " ? This sales-room is filled with dolls in the monastic costumes, photographs, crosses, pin- cushions, amulets, and other articles which one sees at church fairs ; but the skill of the Servantes is not confined to these things. The very cases and shelves of the sales-room are their work. They are carpenters and shoemakers as well as seamstresses. It was like awaking from a ghastly dream to pass out under the planes and into the open pine-wood ; to see the blue mountains and the spires of Bayonne. As we walked back to the Refuge, the sister said, in answer to my ques- tion, that the system employed there worked well ; that the Magdalens came of their own 30 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. o accord, and were at liberty to leave when they would, but that they mostly remained and de- voted themselves to the hard labor required of them. Whatever we may think of the system, it is a fair and sharp embodiment of a definite policy of Christian philanthropists with regard to a class which is a standing problem to Pro- testantism. There might be worse things for these poor creatures than a cleanly home under strict discipline, with simple fare and hard labor, and in the atmosphere of devotion. Stubborn Protestant as I am, I have only a good word to say of the quiet work at Anglet, always ex- cepting the horrors of the Bernardine convent. Not only Protestantism, but natural instinct and common sense, recoil from those. The blue sister led me through the rabbit- hutches and the poultry-yards, and into the spacious barns, where figures of the Virgin look down on the stalls neatly littered for the return- ing cows ; and thence to the piggery, a large paved court surrounded with closed pens, where the presiding genius, a barefooted damsel of sixteen or seventeen, opened sundry doors, and Anglet. 31 stirred up with vigorous kicks the representa- tive porkers of Anglet to come out and exhibit their beauties. Here, it seems, the story of the parable is reversed, and the returned prodi- gal is set at keeping swine. It was with a touching naivete that the blue sister observed, as a gigantic fellow heaved up his fat side, ** He will make good ham by and by ! " I could not help saying to her as she finally let me out at the gate, ** God bless you ! You will not hesitate to take that at least from a Pro- testant." '' By no means," she answered, '* God bless you!'' She had been there, she said, thirty-two years. Kindly, courteous, cul- tivated, ready-handed, her life given to those to whom Divine lips said, ^* Go in peace and sin no more," she will finish her few remaining years in such ministries, and lie down to quiet rest amid the flowers she has tended, and with the solemn voice of the sea ever coming up from Biscay, and beyond there, where there is no more sea, shall it not be said to her, '' Well done " ? 32 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, CHAPTER III. LE BLANC PIGNON. " Per la pineta in sul lito di Chiassi." — Dante. WE linger in Bayonne. Who would not be moved to linger ? For this summer morning, under the trees of the AUees Marines, is a veritable dream of peace. The Adour rip- ples and swirls against the long stone quay, its sparkling surface ruffled by the cool morning wind which blows up from the sea, filling out the sails of the huge barges, making a pleasant sound in the trees, and weaving an ever-shifting pattern of shadows on the trim, gravelled paths, and on the sides of the moored ships. The cheerful bugle-calls ring down from the citadel. The anglers sit on the stone coping, musingly watching their lines as they sway with the eddies. Across the river the panting engines bustle up and down ; some soldiers are bathing Le Blanc Pignon. '^'^ in front of the white tents pitched by the shore at the foot of the citadel, and a group is gath- ered round a steam pile-driver, which comes down at intervals of a minute upon the head of a sturdy pine log with a crack like a rifle's. A city of nearly thirty thousand people is just within those rain-streaked walls yonder, yet the quiet is almost that of the open country. The noise of the stream of vehicles and pedestrians, which pours unceasingly across the bridge of Saint-Esprit, does not reach the ear, and the figures pass and repass as in a panorama, while the long boats shoot the arches and come mer- rily down with the tide. The Blanc Pignon was a grateful refuge this morning from the shadeless stretch of road be- tween it and the Alices Marines. This pine- grove, covering the promontory at the mouth of the Adour, is one of the fringes of that re- markable region known as Les Landes, and ex- tending from the Garonne to the Adour, and from the Gelise to the ocean dunes — that region of sand, pines, stagnant pools, malarial fevers, and men and women on stilts. Here, in the 3 34 I^ i^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. Blanc Pignon, one may examine the process of bleeding the pines which furnishes the principal revenue of Les Landes. The tree must not be bled until its trunk measures about a yard, at a height of six feet from the ground. The bark is raised over the whole surface destined for the cuts of the year, by a kind of knife called sarcle a pela. About a month later the first transverse incision, called pique ^ is made, and a new one is added below, every eight days, until the whole space to the ground has been cut. These cross- cuts are then all united in a broad incision run- ning up the trunk, and known as the care. This care is used for five or six years and then aban- doned. Meanwhile, after about three years, an- other care is opened on the opposite side of the tree, and so on, at intervals, all round the trunk. In some of the trees the cares number three, four, five, six, and on one I counted eight. The tree seemed pretty far gone, but the resin was flowing freely from the last cut. The resin is of two kinds, le b arras and lagemme ; the latter the more valuable, and falling in drops like pearls. The barras is white and opaque, clinging to the Le Blanc Pignon. 35 care^ which it covers with a substance like sugar- candy. The cuttings which I saw ran up from the ground to a height of ten or twelve feet ; and a tin leader, about an inch in width, con- ducted the resin into a small earthen receiver like a crucible. The deposit in the pots was sometimes of the consistency of water and of a light yellow color, and sometimes like white wax, and again of a blood-red tint ; while the barras in the care formed a mass like a rough- ened icicle. On a day like this one is not in haste to leave the cool shadow of the pines, especially when the beautiful view of Bayonne and its mountain background, commanded by the summit of the promontory, is such a feast to the eye. Never- theless, we hearken to the voice of the sea call- ing from beyond the pines, and stroll on ** Su per lo suol che d'ogni parte oliva," until the semaphore appears at the entrance of the river, and the odd little port of Boucaut on the opposite bank — a port, the destinies of which have been capricious, since they have de- ^6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. pended upon the freaks of a very capricious river. For it is almost certain that the Adour has changed its bed several times. Toward the end of the fourteenth century, if we are to be- lieve the chroniclers, the river took a fancy to move northward, opening a track in the sand at the foot of the dunes to the sea, between Vieux Boucaut and Cap Breton, forming a fine har- bor at the former place, around which grew up a seaport town which counted its mariners by hundreds. Meanwhile, poor Bayonne was vainly bewailing the perfidy of its river from the bot- tom of the lagoon in which it found itself lodged, until relief came, either from the ingenuity of the French engineer, Louis de Foix, or from the deluge of water from the Pyrenees which followed a tremendous tempest, and, in finding its way to the sea, forced the sands to the right. The port of Bayonne was suddenly reopened, and the channel which had carried the Adour to old Boucaut was as suddenly closed, leaving the latter high and dry. Yet the river still shows vagabond tendencies which the highest engi- neering skill finds it difficult to restrain. ''Lit- Le Blanc Pignon, - 37 tie grains of sand " become a formidable agent in such hands as those of the billows of Biscay. Within five or six years a tempest made the entrance to the river impracticable for sever- al weeks, and Bayonne seemed destined once more to be cut off from the sea. Even the two huge jetties, between which the river now enters the ocean, afford no certainty that it will not some day rob Bayonne of its commerce again. The bar is forever in a ferment, and it is only at high tide, and with a strong and favorable wind, that ships can go up without the aid of the steam-tug which is stationed off New Boucaut. To the left of the jetties lies the race-course, with a track of eighteen hundred feet. The headland of Saint-Martin, with the great light- house of Biarritz, comes into view, and, beyond, Biarritz itself rising on its terraces. A few min- utes' walk brings us to the Chambre d'Amour, a cave at the foot of a cliff, and now nearly closed by the sands. The legend runs, that two lovers, Angele and Psycale, having resorted to this somewhat damp trysting-place, found them- selves surprised one day, not by the obdurate 38 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. parents, but by the still more remorseless tide, which put a summary end to their endearments and their hopes. Any disposition to become sentimental over this story receives an ex- tinguisher in the very matter-of-fact words of M. Ferret : "■ De la Chambre d' Amour, se voient les hauteurs d'Anglet ; la est un etab- lissement de fiUes repenties : a deux pas de la Chambre d Amour ^ voila le contraste ! " Biarritz. 39 CHAPTER IV. BIARRITZ. " Und es wallet und siedet und brauset und zischt, Wie wenn Wasser mit Feuer sich mengt, Bis zum Himmel spritzet der dampfende Gischt, Und Fluth auf Fluth sich ohn' Ende drangt, Und will sich nimmer erschopfen und leeren, Als woUte das Meer noch ein Meer gebaren." — Schiller. BIARRITZ is neither French, English, Spanish, nor Basque-. As in all similar resorts, the local coloring is modified or washed out by successive waves of tourists. The shops are crowded closely together along the main street, which runs parallel with the sea. There are rich displays of dry goods and millinery, the varied daintiness of fancy stationery, heaps of bric-a-brac, and book-stores, where English, French, and Spanish titles appear cheek by jowl in the windows. The street is alive with carriages and loungers. The resplendent Bay- onnais coachman is offset by the soberly-clad. 40 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. cinctured Basque. It is too early for the Eng- lish. Only an occasional white helmet appears amid the crowd of less assertive '* tiles." The Britons will descend in swarms at the beginning of November. Later still, the Russians will appear ; as for the American, he is not at home here. Now, the Spaniard is in the ascendant. A crowd pervades the beaches and prom- enades, for which the more sober attractions of San Sebastian and Saint-Jean-de-Luz have no charms ; and the mantilla, which, alas ! is passing away, appears at Atalaye and the Cote des Basques, and the dark-eyed Spanish boys paddle their canoes in the Port-Vieux. From the main promenade a short, broad street turns sharply to the right, and leads past the end of the spacious Casino to the terrace overlooking the sea. You are the centre of an arc reaching round to Saint-Martin's lighthouse on the right, and to the promontory of Atalaye on the left ; the chord of the arc being formed by a broken line of rocks just outside the breakers. What Ariel is working out in these arches and tunnels and pinnacles the weird Biarritz. 4 1 sea-dreams of Biscay ? It is a clear, bright day. The July sunshine pours down in floods, and only the lightest of breezes is astir, yet the surf is tremendous ; some gigantic thrust is pressing inward far beyond that glittering ho- rizon-line. It is not the final dash, with its great leaps of foam and showers of spray, which is most impressive, but rather the slow, majes- tic, relentless rise with which the surge gathers itself up, and sweeps on, noiselessly burying the outermost rocks, until, as the foam-beads begin to cluster on its crest, its pace quickens, and it throws itself upon the nearer rocks, pour- ing and spurting through unsuspected chinks and blow-holes, washing over the summits in sheets of foam, and then plunging headlong upon the fretted, creased, tortured cliffs which line the shore, racing, breaking, tearing, seeth- ing far back in the dismal caverns it has mined at their base, with an incessant, dull, smothered boom like distant artillery. As we lounge against the terrace-rail, J — — tells me he has seen the surf strike Saint-Martin, break over the bluff at a height of eighty-five feet, and then 42 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, run up the lighthouse tower to the lantern, more than a hundred and fifty feet higher. Down below it is breaking in long lines of white rollers on the Cote des Fous^ the great bathing-beach, with its long, red brick bath-house capped with two domes. Farther toward Saint-Martin rises the plain, square Villa Eugenie, built by Na- poleon in 1856 for the proud and beautiful Montijo, and now converted into a second-class Casino. The breakers of the Cote des Fous are alive with bright-colored bathing dresses, and the kickings and sprawlings of unpractised swim- mers are clearly visible through the clear sea- green of the surf. We turn to the left down the path at the foot of the Casino, over the chaos of rocks called la Chinaotigey and past two large stone enclosures into which the sea flows, and where oysters and fish are preserved. Some boys are swimming in the narrow passage between the walls, committing themselves to the strong current to be carried inward. Be- yond recedes the little Port aux Pechetirs. In front is Atalaye, the other "■ horn " of the bay, Biarritz, 43 a low promontory, crowned with the ropes and cross-bars of a semaphore. The sun is making himself felt, so that one is tempted to envy the two horses down there in the shadow of that deep cavern at the base of the promontory, buried up to their necks in the cool, green water, and undergoing a washing at the hands of a groom. Yonder priest too has taken his books into the shade of the wall below the road, and is quietly reading there. The path suddenly burrows under the promontory by a tunnel some two hundred and fifty feet long. The moisture drips from the rocks above and around ; the air is damp and chill ; ' boom ! boom ! ' thunders the surf in the hideous cav- erns underneath ; the eye runs down the per- spective of the tunnel until it is caught by the conical rock — le Ciicurlon — pierced by an arch- way and surmounted by the Virgin Mother— Stella Maris — looking placidly down upon the Phlegethon below, and not out of reach of an occasional drenching, since the rock is chiselled into spirals by the waves to her very feet. Through the arch of le Cucurlon appears a 44 I^ ih^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. ruined breakwater, which commemorates the unsuccessful attempt to form a new port, by connecting the promontory of Atalaye with some rocky islets by means of a dike formed of blocks of concrete. The terrible breakers of the winter of 1872-73 made wild work with the partly completed structure. Off the end lie the huge masses of masonry broken off by the surf, with the marks of the railroad-tracks still visible upon them. Now the surge, gathering with that grand, deliberate swell, bears down upon the surviving portion of the dike as though bent on completing the ruin, and pours creaming over the landward side in cascades of foam. The view from this point must take rank among the loveliest coast scenes of the world. No words can paint that wonderful sky, that blue vast of sea shimmering under the brilliant sunlight ; that exquisite atmosphere, softening every out- line ; those masses of white cloud hovering over the mountain crests ; that warm, tender haze, full of pulses of light, thinly veiling the distant shores. Falling back to the left into a magnifi- cent bay, the Cote des Basques ^ the coast sweeps Biarritz, 45 round by Guethary and Saint-Jean-de-Luz to the entrance of the Bidassoa, where the two rocks of Sainte Anne face Jaizquibel, Cap Fig- uier, and Fuenterrabia across the river. Past Figuier the eye ranges on to Cap Machicaco be- hind which hides San Sebastian, and still on to the distant blue heights which overlook the val- ley of Nervion and Bilbao. A band of silver, following the grand curve from Biarritz to St. Anne, marks the wash of the surf, from which gentle slopes of green rise to meet the moun- tains of Navarre, Haya with its triple crown, Aran and Anie, and red La Rhune. A short climb over the rocks, and we are looking down into a little cove sheltered from the fury of the surf, and stirred only by the last struggles of dying waves. This is the Vieiix Port. Here congregate the bathers who shrink from the tremendous rollers of the Cote des Fous and of the Cote des Basques. Here are the ** little wanton boys that swim on bladders," youngsters in bathing-dress navigating tottlish canoes amid the archipelago of bobbing heads, 46 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, and highly picturesque damsels practising their " striking out." A road leads round the head of the little bay and behind the bathing houses, and turns off to the left into a passage between rocks and over a bridge spanning a deep, narrow cleft worked far back into the cliff by the cease- less chafing of the surf. This is the Po7it du Diahle. Then two or three immense, sharp rocks point outward from the land, as if to say ** See there ! " and we pass out into full view of the splendid curve of the Cote des Basques, with its huge rollers breaking on the broad beach. The whole geological structure seems to have changed in an instant. Instead of the fantastic, grooved, and pierced rocks of the Cote du Mou- lin and Atalaye, a precipice of gray clay rises almost perpendicularly behind the beach, as- cended by a series of zigzags. The distant view is the same as that from Atalaye ; the nearer view of course includes the inner side of the Cote des Basques, which cannot be seen from the former point. Hither, in the month of August, from the villages of Labourd, La Soule, and even of Biarritz. 47 Basse Navarre, come the troops of Basques in holiday costume, crowned with flowers and rib- ands, and with their national instruments, the flageolet, tambourine, violin, and drum. They pervade Biarritz. In the streets and in the open places, everywhere groups may be seen forming to dance the mouchico ; and this ended, they climb down the clifls to the shore, disdaining the calmness of the Port Vieux, and not finding, even in the heavy rollers of the Cote des Fous, enough of dangerous excitement. The surge of the Cote des Basques is furious ; nothing breaks it, and it is fretted besides by the rocks of the bottom. Here then they stand, men and women, hand in hand in one long line, and with songs and their peculiar wild cries march out to meet the surf, running back after a few shocks to throw themselves on the sand in the sun, and rising again after their rest to plunge into the waves. But of the Basques, more hereafter. 48 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. CHAPTER V. SAINT-JEAN-DE-LUZ AND THE BOUNDARY. " That stood on a dark strait of barren land." — ^Tennyson. WE were so fascinated by the gigantic play of the surf and the grandeur of the view down the Cantabrian coast, that it was hard to climb the rocks from Atalaye under the blistering sun to the streets of Biarritz. If there is one need for which that town is con- spicuous, it is the need of shade on the public promenades. The view of the shady private gardens, under such circumstances, is pecu- liarly exasperating. But the coach was waiting at the stable in the busiest part of the busy street, and the cool breeze caused by its mo- tion speedily dispelled the languor of the sunny afternoon. The road lay for miles between rows of poplar, elm, and sycamore ; every turn, every ascent opened a fresh perspective of St^-yean-de-Luz and the Boundary. 49 trees. The excitements of carriage-buying at Bayonne, and of the surf and scenery at Biar- ritz, had been too much for J , and, under the tranquillizing fumes of his cigarette and the easy motion of the carriage over the superb road, he slumbered peacefully and — sonorously. Ex- ample added force to inclination; and yet, it seemed almost sacrilege to doze in that gold- en sunshine, under that marvellous blue. But the drowsy fit passed off in due time. Jumping out for a walk, we disturbed the peace of a hulking countryman who had taken the oppor- tunity to steal a ride, though how he accom- plished the feat remains a mystery, for the only available place of lodgment behind the carriage was thickly studded with sharp iron points, on which an ordinarily constructed mortal would no sooner think of sitting down than on a heap of carpet-tacks. Saint-Jean-de-Luz, into the narrow street of which we were now driving, occupies a neck of land washed on one side by the sea, and on the other by the waters of the Nivelle. The high rocks of Sainte-Barbe, and the jetty and circular 4 50 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. fort of Socoa, form the horns of the noble bay commanded by the sleepy little town, the re- pose of which is broken only by the annual inroad of the ubiquitous Briton, who finds there salt and seclusion. How different from the olden days. Some time in the eleventh century, it was the port of Ustaritz, the little capital of the feudal domain of Labourd. In those days the whale tossed up his flukes in the Cantabrian Gulf, and the Labourd Basques had been among the first, if not the first seamen in the world to attack him with the harpoon. It was a rendezvous of fishermen and explorers, whose descendants contest, to this day, with the partisans of the Venetian Cabot, the honor of discovering Newfoundland and Cape Breton. It was a nest of corsairs, formidable to men and to cities as to sea-monsters, and who left their bloody mark on Irun and Fuenterrabia, and chased the Spaniards as far as to the Mediter- ranean. At the beginning of the reign of Louis the Fourteenth, twelve thousand people filled its homes, and eighty vessels, manned by three thousand seamen, sallied forth to wage war with St,'-yean-de--Luz and the Boundary. 51 the whale and the cod. Richelieu appealed to Saint-Jean-de-Luz when the He de Re was block- aded by the English fleet under Buckingham, and her response came to the besieged in the shape of fifteen armed vessels. Then the darker days drew on. The levies for the French fleet in 1669 included the Basque fishers, notwith- standing the exemption pledged them by their franchises ; and the wars which followed de- stroyed the greater part of the male population of the town. The peace of Utrecht, which de- prived France of Newfoundland, was another blow at Saint-Jean ; emigration commenced, and finally the sea itself turned traitor. The bay of Biscay, formed by the right angle at which the French and Spanish coasts join, constitutes a kind of funnel with its base opening toward the northwest. Into this opening drive the huge billows, propelled by the northwest wind across the whole, unbroken breadth of the Atlantic, striking the steep slopes of the Cantabrian coast, setting back into the deep water which washes their bases, and creating eddies and great bottom-waves which mine the shores with 52 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. the power of a million of drills. The headlands of Socoa and Sainte-Barbe gradually gave way under these repeated assaults ; the sea ad- vanced upon the town, in spite of the various expedients adopted to arrest it ; tempest fol- lowed tempest, until, in 1822, a fearful storm set in, and raged for eight days, utterly destroy- ing the immense and apparently impregnable dike which protected the harbor, and giving the coup-de-grace to the commercial prosperity of Saint-Jean. At the head of the little street lined with its white houses and projecting gables, stands the church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste. *' The patron of Saint-Jean-de-Luz," says M. Ferret, '* is a fore- runner : that is why his parishioners have al- ways been seen in the front, showing the way in their marine enterprises to sailors of other ports." As in all Basque communities, the church dominates the town. Its walls are bare, its windows small and high up, its belfry octa- gonal. Within, two ranges of galleries sur- round it on three sides, for the accommodation of worshippers of the sterner sex ; who thus sit St.-yean-de-Luz and the Boundary. 53 comfortably apart on convenient seats, leaving the floor of the nave to the women, who are not furnished with chairs, but only with a sim- ple cushion of black cloth, broidered with a cross and placed on the floor. It has been ob^ served that this is one of several Basque cus- toms which, in indicating the religious and moral inferiority attached to women, goes to show the antiquity of the race. In the shadow of the gothic door on the southern side, one of the few remnants of the original structure, fancy peoples the street with the brilliant retinue of Mazarin, just arrived to negotiate the alliance between France and Spain, which Louis the Fourteenth sealed, a year later, by his espousal of the Infanta, Maria Theresa. He had run down secretly to Fuenterrabia, where the marriage was being celebrated by proxy, and had had a good look at his bride, who, however, saw through his incognito and blushed rosy-red, while Philip laughed and said, "I have a handsome son-in-law." Two days later the actual marriage was celebrated in this church of Saint-Jean-Baptiste. The north door, by 54 /^ ihe Shadow of the Pyrenees. which the royal couple entered, is now walled up. The Infanta's residence was in that large building directly facing the bridge over the Nivelle, with a front formed by two square towers connected by arcaded galleries, and now known as the Chateau de L'lnfante. Over the door is the inscription : " L'Infante je re9us I'an mil six cent soixante, On m'appela depuis le Chateau de I'Infante." While the fair, blue-eyed Infanta within these walls was eagerly rummaging the gold-bound coffer containing the King's wedding gift, what of poor Marie de Mancini in her exile at dismal Brouages, among the marshes and salt-works ? What of this very Louis, the bridegroom of the morrow, in that quaint old house near by, with its dormers and corbel towers ? Was there a heart-ache at Saint-Jean as well as at Brouages ? What did it matter ? What cared Mazarin for one heart-ache, or two, or a hundred ? And yet Louis must have writhed a little at that parting puncture from St.-yean-de-Luz and the Boundary. 55 the woman who had loved him so well. '' You are a king ; you weep, yet I go." J wants to go, too. He is not in a his- toric mood ; he is in a hurry to reach Spain, and, besides, he is thirsty. The cafe, fronting on a large, shaded, ill-kept square, is irresist- ible ; and the enjoyment of the gazeuse is varied by the study of natural history in the persons and antics of some enormous black goats, verit- able prodigies, which appear to have the free- dom of the city, and are as prodigious to the smell as to the eye. The road crosses the Nivelle, which is wrestling just now with the incoming tide. On the left, the green, wooded and vine-clad slopes, dotted here and there with the red and white houses of the Basque peas- ants, rise in successive stages to the first but- tresses of La Rhune, with its slender peak top- ping its granite masses. The shaded road again, and Urrugne, with its fifteenth-century church, whose clock, with its arrow-shaped hands, bears the motto, Vulnerant omnes^ ultima necat. Now the Bidassoa, marking the boundary line between France and Spain, and the little town 56 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. of Behobie, and the international bridge, and the Spanish guard-house, where our driver must stop and procure his " permit " for traversing the roads of Guipuzcoa. Just where the Bidas- soa widens and the sand-banks give place to ugly banks of mud, revealed by the low tide, appears the little lie des Faisans^ a mere patch in the stream — '' not so long," says Gautier, ** as a fried sole of a small species" — and in- debted to the accident of its position on the boundary line for its historic importance, as the scene of sundry royal conferences and treaties, notably of the four months' negotiations which ended in the Franco-Spanish treaty of 1659 and the marriage of Louis the Fourteenth and Maria Theresa. A white monument gleams among the trees, which has, as M. Ferret observes, the air of a mausoleum, and which bears the fol- lowing inscription in French and Spanish : Eft memoir e des coftfe'rences de 1659, dans lesquelles Louis XIV. et Philippe IV., par tine heureuse alliance J mirent fin a une longue guerre entre les deux nations, Napoleon III., empereur des Franqais, et Isabelle, reine des Espagnes, out St.-yean-de-Luz and the Boundary. 57 re'tabli cette tie, Van 1861. A gorgeous spec- tacle the little island must have presented on the third of June, 1660. According to Montpensier, a temporary palace rose among the trees ; a bridge connected the island with the mainland on either frontier. The bridges, forming cov- ered galleries, were precisely alike, and led to two saloons, splendidly furnished and decorated, having lateral chambers and dressing-rooms ; while, in the exact centre, calculated to an inch of surface, was the spacious hall of meeting, lighted only on the riverward side. Two doors of entrance, precisely opposite to each other, enabled the two great contracting parties to make a simultaneous entrance ; while the floor, divided in a straight line across the centre, was covered, on the Spanish side, with Persian car- pets, wrought on a ground of gold and silver. In each compartment were placed an arm-chair and a table ; and upon the latter stood two ink- stands and two time-pieces. Evening is drawing on. The long shadows fall from Haya, and the clouds hang low on the sides of Jaizquibel. Fuenterrabia looms darkly 58 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. above its crumbling battlements ; a few purple gleams touch the bristling rocks of Cap Fig- uier, and linger on the glassy surface of the Bidassoa ; the red ray from the pharos of Figuier answers the blaze of the Fresnel on Saint-Martin's. We are in Spain. On the Frontier. 59 CHAPTER VI. ON THE FRONTIER. " Est modus in rebus, sunt certi denique fines, Quos ultra citraque nequit consistere rectum." — Horace. MOST modern travellers will enter Spain by rail ; in which case they must run the custom-house gauntlet at Irun. A hint to you, unwary tourist, booked through from Paris to Madrid. Trust not that passage in Mr. Henry O'Shea's most valuable and generally accurate guide-book which saith that luggage, regis- tered through, is examined only on the arrival at Madrid ; otherwise you shall wake at Madrid with your luggage four hundred miles behind you, to be confronted with the tears and re- proaches of one or more females with nothing to wear. The words Del Norte on the railway carriages announce that you have struck the great artery which carries the life-blood of mod- ern Europe to the heart of Spain. You must 6o In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, change carriages. A ''through carriage" is impossible in the nature of the case. The gauge is altered with a view to a possible French invasion. The building of the new station is proceeding in leisurely fashion. Man after man ascends the ladders with a little con- tribution of stones or mortar, and with an edify- ing deliberation. The trunks are carried one at a time by a line of porters to the custom-house. The passengers crowd through the narrow gate- way. The grave, swarthy, mustachioed offi- cials go through their duty with exasperating and incorruptible punctiliousness. Do not try a " tip," it is thrown away. The grim func- tionary lifts tray after tray, and peers solemnly and knowingly into the abysses where repose "Much linen, lace, and several pair Of stockings, slippers, brushes, combs, complete; With other articles of ladies fair, To keep them beautiful or leave them neat," and occasionally thrusts a hand into the sacred depths, and upheaves the substrata. Can you speak Spanish ? No, but French. What of that ? Do you reason, good friend, that a On the Frontier. 6i Spanish official on the French frontier ought to be able to speak French ? Alas, the Spanish official does not admit your premiss. Is it from the old Moorish invaders that the Spaniard has caught something of that fatalistic tendency of the Oriental to fall in with the current and ac- cept things as they are ? Why should he learn the tongues of the men who come to visit him ? Why should they not speak his tongue ? At any rate, it is better to get up even a lit- tle Spanish for travelling ; for be it said here that a traveller in Spain is at greater disadvan- tage from ignorance of the language than in most other parts of Western Europe. We shall not change carriages, for we are to stop here at Irun. This Spanish sun, which even the proximity of the mountains and the sea does not entirely mitigate, makes Sefior Garviso's shady parlor, with its polished chest- nut floor, a welcome refuge, and the cosy noon breakfast is a welcome refreshment to appetites whetted by a long morning ride. Among the items of the pleasant chat which circulates round the breakfast table, is the assertion of the 62 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, Sefior, who is a -Basque, that both *' Yankee Doodle" and "God save the Queen" are of Basque origin. As respects the former, it is a relief to a patriotic American to learn that his country is, at least, not responsible for the gen- eration of that atrocity, however she may be for its adoption. Through the window appears the public square, with the market-women sell- ing fruit in the shadow of the handsome town- hall, and a little way down the descending street is one of the institutions of every Basque town, however small, — the ball-court, which is simply a square with a high wall at one end. The national game oi pelota is to the Basque what cricket is to the Englishman or base -ball to the American. His love for it amounts to a passion. It is related that, in the time of the Empire, fourteen Basque soldiers of a certain regiment encamped on the Rhine, having learned that a game was to be played at Saint-Etienne- de-Baigorry, about eighteen miles from Cambo, left the ranks without permission, won the game, and returned just in time for the battle of Aus- terhtz. They will travel all night on foot in On the Frontier, ' 6^ order to take part in the play, and return the following night after a day of wild excitement and violent exercise. The name of a champion pelotist flies on the wings of fame from the ocean to the highest cottages on the mountains. When these tournaments are celebrated at im- portant points, and the '* crack " players of the Spanish Basques have accepted the challenge of the champions of Ustaritz, Cambo, and Saint- Jean-de-Luz, the crowd of spectators is enor- mous, and the enthusiasm is in striking contrast with the ordinary saturnine habit of the Basque. Nor do these champions represent only the lower order, but number among themselves proprietors and official dignitaries ; and even the abbes cheerfully substitute the blouse for the cassock, and enter the lists with their par- ishioners. The ordinary game consists in throw- ing the ball against the wall, allowing it to come to the ground, and then striking it with the hand at the first bound, and sending it back to the wall. The test of skill is, of course, the number of times that the player can drive it back to the wall without missing that first 64 /^ the Shadow of the Pyrenees. bound. Another form of the game requires the use of a peculiar glove, to the back of which, and projecting about a foot from the ends of the fingers, is attached a sort of scoop made of wicker, and somewhat resembling the fore-part of a snow-shoe. The ball, as it rebounds, is caught in this scoop, and the greater leverage thus gives increased power to the throw. The art consists in letting the ball, as it comes back from the wall, nearly exhaust the force of the rebound, and then giving it the forward throw at the instant when the contrary impulse is weakest. The force with which a practised hand will hurl the ball is amazing. On our way to visit the parish church, the Sefior, whose name graces the list of the mayors of the town, pointed with just pride to a large and neat school-building erected mainly by his efforts, and remarked, '' I would rather have done that than to have built a bull-ring ; " an observation which, it need hardly be said, had a special force in Spain, where the founder of a Plaza de Toros would be regarded with much the same veneration which attached, in On the Frontier. 65 Bible times, to the man who dug a well. In- deed, in the matter of public instruction, this province of Guipuzcoa is one of the most ad- vanced in Spain. The university of Onate has existed since 1 540, and the royal college of Ver- gara since 1764. There is a provincial Institute at San Sebastian, where pupils are prepared for the special schools which are found at Tolosa, Irun, and elsewhere ; and there are free public schools for both sexes in all the towns of the province, and male and female teachers in the smallest villages. In the towns, elementary in- struction is compulsory, and the police may be seen conducting the vagabond children to the schools. From the school we descend to the church. The Basque churches follow one general model, which gives to the exterior a somewhat bare and forbidding look. The walls are very high, and the windows small and pierced high up toward the eaves. There may sometimes be seen in different parts of the wall, loopholes for musketry, telling the story of a militant church, which has served as a fortress no less than as a 5 66 In the Shadow of the Py7'enees. spiritual refuge. Often the portals are elabo- rate, like those at Hernani and Renteria, and the building is commonly furnished with a low porch, either in front or on one side. The in- terior, not unfrequently, affords an agreeable surprise by the greater dignity of line than the outside would have led one to expect. The choir, as in most of the smaller Spanish churches, is over the main entrance and facing the high altar, like the "singers' gallery" in the old New England " meeting-houses." The decoration is almost invariably tawdry, and its principal splendors are concentrated upon the chancel, at the rear of which, and behind the altar, rises the retablo, a huge structure of columns and panels richly gilded, often mount- ing nearly to the ceiling, and covered with carvings representing some series of sacred incidents, such as the life of our Lord. The Irun church is in the form of a Greek cross, and the front is scarred with the reminders of the Carlist bombardment of 1874. The fine tribune forms an elliptical curve ; the ceiling is in large semi-circular arches with double ' mouldings, On the Frontier, 6y and resting upon cylindrical columns ; but the decoration is hideous and suggestive of a wall- paper shop rather than of a church. Stopping for a moment as we came out, to in- spect two quaint tombs in front of the church, we took carriage for a drive to Fuenterrabia, about two miles distant. The road led over a fertile little plain by a causeway, making a detour to avoid the canals which are filled by the tide, and then under the flank of Jaizquibel to the promontory at the mouth of the Bidassoa, on which sits the odd little town, snugly packed within its ruinous walls. Its history dates back to the tenth century. Its frontier position ex- posed it to the first shocks of French invasions, and its annals are full of sieges. We drove slowly round the walls, which everywhere re- vealed great breaks and cracks and loosened stones with grass growing between, until the horses stopped near a small, shady park, flanked by a stream where some youngsters, in a state of nature, were displaying their amphibious qualities by diving for coppers. The lair of the ** tiger*' was close at hand, near the city gate ; 68 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. in other words, the antique flavor of Fuenter- rabia Is qualified by a decidedly modern ktirsaal, the property of a company, and in charge, it is said, of one of the former celebrities of Baden- Baden. A gambling license of thirty years was granted it, but it is now closed. A narrow arched gate leads into the city, before which one IS arrested by the cabalistic inscription, '' Fuenterrabia, la M. N : M. L : M. V: y M. S. py A Daniel is at hand in the person of J , who interprets as follows: '^ Fuenter- rabia, la muy noble, muy leal, muy valorosa, y miiy siempre fiel ;'' that is to say, **Fuenter- rabia, the very noble, very loyal, very brave, and always faithful.*' We enter the narrow, ascending street, and ask ourselves if this is not a dream. '* Rien de plus saisissant," says M. Joanne, and justly. We are between two rows of houses blackened with age, the huge eaves reaching out toward each other across the street, supported on dou- ble and sometimes triple tiers of elaborately carved brackets ; their grated windows of both stories opening on massive balconies of richly On the Frontier, 69 wrought iron, supported sometimes on stone corbels, and sometimes on immense iron brack- ets running diagonally from the front of the balcony to the wall. Over these droop the yel- low, blue, gray, white window shades. The first, general impression is that of a chaos of gracefully wrought iron and carved wood, in- terspersed with patches of color. The heavy escutcheons bulge from the house-fronts like enormous warts. Below are the sombre shops, above, on the balconies, occasional glimpses of a white hand behind the jalousies, or of a por- tion of a figure in a mantilla. ** C'est le decor du Barbier de Seville, c'est la comedie espa- gnole — un morceau de I'Espagne du 16^ siecle pieusement conserve par les archeologues." ^ At the head of the street stands the church, with its renaissance tower rising above the roofs of the town. The gothic interior, rendered more sombre by the walling up of some of the windows and the grating of others on the side toward the river, is marked by the usual display 1 Perret. i«^ 70 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. of tawdry gilding which characterizes the Basque churches, and by the elevated seats reserved for male worshippers. A glass case at one of the side altars contains what purports to be a lock of the church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jeru- salem, presented by a townsman. A side door admits to a little court or platform opening on the river. The view from this point is charm- ing. Beneath are the shoal-streaked waters of the Bidassoa, and the stone column in the midst of the stream marking the frontier line ; beyond, to the left, appear the rocks of Sainte Anne, then Behobie and the international bridge, the tree-tops of the He des Faisans ; above, the hermitage and fort of St. Martial, under cover of whose batteries Wellington ef- fected the passage of the Bidassoa in 1813 ; Hendaye and the slopes of the Croix des Bou- quets ; to the right, the little plain of Irun, with its grain-fields and canals, and behind all the imposing masses of La Rhune and Haya. The Basques, 71 CHAPTER VII. THE BASQUES. Cantaber sera domitus catena. — Horace. A LEARNED Scotch divine, commenting upon a vexed passage of Scripture, re- marked that " the varieties of exposition were enough to afflict the student with intellectual paralysis." The same might be truthfully said of the question of the origin of the Basques. A hundred and thirty years after the deluge, say the old Spanish historians. Tubal, the son of Japhet, to whom was assigned the duty of peopling Europe, arrived on the Cantabrian coast, from which his descendants spread over the neighboring territories. The Basques thus claim descent directly from Adam and Eve, and declare that they speak the language which Noah received from Adam. Theories are plenty as blackberries. The Basques are a remnant of the population of the 72 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. vanished Atlantis ; they came in with the hosts of Attila, Gengis, and Tamerlane ; they are related to the Finns ; they are the debris of the Iberians, the primitive people of Spain ; they are descendants of the Phoenicians ; they issued from Latium in Italy ; they are akin to the Ber- bers of Africa ; they were Semitic emigrants in company with Phoenicians, who were the pro- moters and media of their migrations; and who, traversing the Mediterranean, and doubling Gibraltar, reached the Cantabrian provinces. The reader may take his choice. I shall not trouble him nor myself with a discussion of the comparative merits of these theories ; but in at- tempting a brief sketch of the history and pecu- liarities of this remarkable race, I start from the conclusion of Humboldt, Thierry, Quatre- fages, Elisee Reclus, Cenac Moncaut, and Professor Edward Freeman, which is that the Basques are the remnant of the Iberians, the primitive people of Spain, who are supposed to have extended beyond Spain into Gaul, Sicily, a part of Italy, and perhaps as far north as England. The Basques. 73 Upon the invasion of the Celts, some sixteen hundred years B.C., by which the Iberian abor- igines were either exterminated or fused with their conquerors under the name of Celtiber- ians, a small number who escaped extermina- tion and refused alliance, betook themselves to the westernmost point of the Pyrenees, and there formed little confederated republics. Phoenicians, Greeks, Egyptians, Carthagin- ians, successively poured into the Peninsula. Hamilcar, with Hasdrubal and Hannibal, the latter a boy of nine years, crossed the straits of Gibraltar about 236 B.C. The Carthaginians gradually gained possession of the south of the Peninsula, and concluded a treaty with Rome, 228 B.C., the Ebro being the northern boundary of the Hispano-Carthaginian empire. Eight years more, and under the vigorous ad- ministration .of Hannibal, all Spain south of the Ebro was subject or allied to Carthage, ex- cepting Saguntum, which yielded after a siege of eight months. The Punic wars followed, and, with the destruction of Carthage, the Phoenician civilization vanished from the bor- 74 ^^ ih^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. ders of the Mediterranean. Not satisfied with their conquest, the Romans followed their enemies into all their ports of refuge, and then attacked those communities in the interior which were in sympathy with Carthage, encouraging the old antipathies between the provinces, mingling in their intrigues, taking their soldiers into their pay, and plundering them remorse- lessly. During nearly two hundred years, the in- habitants of this little mountain-corner of the Cantabrian Gulf, or Bay of Biscay, remained un- subdued, entering into the great Cantabrian league with the Celtiberians, which was alter- nately the ally and the enemy of Rome, but never subject to it. At last Augustus Caesar seriously set himself to subjugate them. Descending the Adour, and joining his fleet, possibly at Bayonne, he proceeded to the Cantabrian coast, and having made himself master of Segisama in Asturias, he directed some regiments against the Can- tabrians. True to their favorite tactics, these hardy tribes, avoiding battle, omitted no op- The Basques, y^ portunity of harassing their foe, and were so successful in cutting off supplies, that Augustus, at one time, feared the destruction of his troops by famine. " Every forest became an ambus- cade, every precipice a tomb," until the Emperor, worn out with fatigue, fell sick and retired to Tarragona. To be thus successfully defied by a body of savage mountaineers, was to the last degree exasperating to this petted minion of Fortune. He undertook a war of extermination, and all prisoners were put to death with tortures. The impatience of the Cantabrians for vengeance at last overcame their caution ; they gave battle, were defeated, and withdrew thereupon to Mount Vinnio, in Galicia, the summits of which rise more than nine thousand feet above the sea, boasting that the waters of the Atlantic should reach them sooner than the Romans. Their boast, however, was vain ; Roman per- sistence drove them even from this refuge, from which they retreated to the town of Araceli, the modern Huarte Araquil, about twenty-four miles northwest of Pamplona. "J 6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. Pressed by siege, they finally abandoned the town, which the Romans set on fire, and be- took themselves to a neighboring height from which they looked down on the conflagration, and when finally summoned to surrender, they killed each other amid the lurid glare of the flames, preferring death to captivity. An attempt was now made to unite three Cantabrian armies against the Romans, and the invaders had nearly fallen into the snare, when the movement was discovered. The Asturians were attacked before they could effect a junc- tion with the Vascons, and at Vellica, near the sources of the Ebro, the Romans gained a bloody victory. Augustus soon discovered that his conquest was likely to prove a troublesome one. To defeat these stubborn freemen, was one thing ; to govern them and levy tribute, was quite another. Notwithstanding the precautions of his general, ^milius, in building numerous fort- resses among the mountains, his forces were con- stantly harassed by unexpected sallies from the rocky fastnesses. Another confederation was The Basques. yj formed, and a whole Roman army was des- troyed. The confederation was dispersed in turn, the Asturians submitted, the others were crushed. Some of them were taken to Rome as prisoners, escaped, returned to their country, and formed a new league, which was dispersed by Agrippa. The tribes which com- posed it finally abandoned their territory to the Romans. Henceforth the resistance en- trenched itself in the west oi the Pyrenees, in what are now the provinces of Navarre, Gui- puzcoa, and Vizcaya. During the first centuries of the Christian era, the Basques allied with the Romans, aided them in the wars in Gaul, but retired to their mountains before the hordes of Barbarians which overran the Empire of the Caesars. Iso- lated and unsubdued amid the floods of Alans, Suevi and Vandals which swept over Spain during the first half of the fifth century ; re- fusing to be incorporated with the great West- Gothic Kingdom which, with Toulouse as its capital, stretched from the Pillars of Hercules to the Loire and Garonne ; their subsequent ^8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. embroilment with the Goths, and their defeat on the plains of Navarre, only drove them deep- er into their ancestral fastnesses, whither their enemies dared not pursue them. Nor could the Moors, the conquerors of the Gothic Empire, penetrate into the Basque coun- try. They occupied Pamplona, but did not attempt the rocks of Alava and Guipuzcoa. Converted to Christianity through their contact with the Goths, the Basques lost no oppor- tunity to war with Islamism. The Saracens, crossing the Pyrenees, had no sooner penetra- ted into Aquitaine, than they were pursued by the Cantabrian mountaineers, who arrived dur- ing the memorable battle of Tours (2), carrying confusion into the Islamite camp, burning their chariots, and contributing greatly to the vic- tory of the Christiars. Two years later they cut to pieces, in the defiles of the Pyrenees, a Saracen force under Abder- Ahmet, who attempted to penetrate into Aquitaine in order to avenge the disaster of Tours. Toward the close of the eighth century, The Basques. 79 Charlemagne availed himself of the invitation of a Saracen prince from Zaragoza, to take ad- vantage of the dissensions of the Moors. He captured Pamplona and Zaragoza in 'J^'^y sub- jugated the country as far as the Ebro, and formed it into a Spanish viceroyalty. On his return, the Basques fell upon his rear-guard in the valley of Roncesvalles, rolling down upon them enormous rocks from their ambuscade, and slaying many of the bravest noblemen, among them Roland, Count of the March of Brittany. Above the scene of this slaughter rises the peak of Altabizcar to a height of near- ly five thousand feet. The Basques still make the mountains echo with the " song of Altabiz- car," which commemorates the victory of Ron- cevaux, and the manuscript of which is alleged to have been found in a convent at Fuenter- rabia (3). A long struggle between the Basques and the Franks followed this disaster. The Spanish monarchy, building itself up province by province, gradually encroached upon the independence of the Basques. Se- parated from the rest of the Peninsula no less 8o In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, by natural barriers than by language and cus- toms, they nevertheless became, by a succes- sion of circumstances, the allies of the kings of Castile and Aragon. Guipuzcoa, in the thir- teenth century, accepted the sovereignty of Alphonso the Eighth, and furnished to Ferdi- nand the Third and Jacques the First, of Ara- gon, volunteers who served against the Moors. Alava united itself in 1332 to the crown of Cas- tile, by a formal contract, and Vizcaya followed in 1390. A few words should be said at this point con- cerning the fueroSy which, from the time of the voluntary incorporation of the Basques with the kingdom of Castile and Aragon, up to 1876, entered very prominently into their history. A fuero was a charter formally recognizing and defining liberties and privileges which had been long taken for granted ; in return for which the party receiving it became pledged to fidelity, and to certain specified services to the general administration. These charters, from the eleventh century, entered into the adminis- tration of the whole Peninsula, and their number The Basques, . 8i was greatly multiplied during the two following centuries ; but with the centralization of the Spanish power, the local fueros gradually gave way. Charles the Fifth first ventured to en- croach upon them in the interest of the crown ; and with the reign of Philip the Second, they ceased to exist in Spain, except in Navarre and in the Basque provinces, where they were stub- bornly insisted on, and were confirmed by suc- cessive sovereigns. Each province had a distinct set of fueros, but the main features were the same in all. The provinces formed a confedera- tion of small republics, ruled by chiefs elected among themselves, and having their own house of commons, tariffs, police, and army. The sover- eigns, on their accession, appeared before the provincial assembly and swore to maintain the charters. Among the privileges conveyed by these was exemption from all imposts save those which were self-imposed for local purposes, and from all duties on imported merchandise. They were not obliged to appear before any tribunal beyond the bounds of their own seignory, nor to tolerate the presence of any royal superin- 82 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. tendent or comptroller ; they were exempt from all royal monopolies, such as that of tobacco ; no royal establishment except the post-office could be set up within the territory, no royal troops could be admitted without per- mission, and no conscription for the royal army was tolerated. Added to these was the patent of universal nobility attaching to the mere fact of birth within these provinces. Every Basque was a nobleman because he was a Basque. The reader will recall the encounter of Don Quixote with the Biscayan, and the ire of the latter on being told that he was no gentleman. *' What ! me no gentleman ! I swear thou be a liar, as me be Christian. If thou throw away lance and draw sword, me will make no more of thee than cat does of mouse ; me will show thee me be Biscayan, and gentle- man by land, gentleman by sea, gentleman in spite of devil ; and thou lie if thou say contrary." '* Among the Basques," says Joanne, '' each one is the equal of the richest, each one is the equal of the poorest, each one enjoys, from time immemorial, not the same privileges but the The Basques. ^t^ same rights, and those the ones which, with time, have become the common right of modern Europe : equality of all before the law ; exemp- tion from all servitude and from all subjection, and the absolute respect of person and prop- erty." When Ferdinand the Seventh appeared likely to die without issue, the absolutists of Spain began to turn their attention to the matter of the succession, and matured a scheme for induc- ing the king to abdicate in favor of his brother, Don Carlos. This was the origin of the Carlist party. Ferdinand contracted, in 1829, a fourth marriage with Maria Christina of Naples, and decreed the next year the abolition of the Salic law, soon after which Isabella was born. In 1833 she was publicly declared her father's successor, with Christina as regent, and Don Carlos, with many of his followers, was expelled from the kingdom. Ferdinand's death, the same year, was followed by a long and bloody civil war lasting for seven years. The first act of the young Queen's guardian. Senator Cas- tanos, was to abolish the fueros, a proceeding 84 /^ the Shadow of the Pyrenees, which threw the Basques into the party of Don Carlos. Isabella, on her accession, confirmed the fueros, and the Basque provinces remained tranquil from 1840 until the revolution of 1868, which dethroned her. The succeeding provi- sional government, Don Amadeo, and the re- public, alike promised to maintain the fueros ; so also did Alfonso the Twelfth, the present sover- eign ; but the Basques organized an armed rebel- lion in the interest of Don Carlos, the grandson of the former pretender, and the result, at the close of the war in 1876, was the final aboli- tion of the fueros, and the occupation of the principal points in the provinces by Spanish troops. The history of the French Basques is less eventful. Up to the end of the last century, the French government had remained almost a stranger to this people. Having no powerful dukes or ambitious counts who could menace the authority of the sovereign, it mattered little to the French kings that the Basques main- tained an independent administration, which, if it did not acknowledge the royal authority, at The Basques. 85 least did not contest it. Moreover, while the Basque provinces of Spain contained important towns, such as Vittoria, Fuenterrabia, Tolosa, Pamplona, San Sebastian, the country of the French Basques had only villages. It offered no commercial advantages, its inhabitants were poor, and neither fiscal revenues nor commer- cial profits were to be looked for. On the \ other hand, they asked no favors except to be let alone, to live in their own way and in their traditional obscurity. Thus, even under the reign of Louis the Fourteenth, so jealous of his authority, no one was at pains to inform himself of their affairs or to meddle with their quarrels. Some local collisions indeed arose out of at- tempts to subject them to royal monopolies or taxes. A bloody tragedy, which the reader will find related at length in M. Taine's " Pyre- nees," grew out of the effort of Pe de Puyane, the mayor of Bayonne, to exact the cider-tax. He seized five of the recu^nts, and tying them to the piles of the bridge at low tide, left them to a lingering death in the presence of a jeering crowd of Bayonnais ; but the same night, two 86 In the Shadow of the Pyre7iees. hundred Basques, infuriated by the cruel deed, surrounded the toll-tower which commanded the bridge, scaled the wall with the aid of their knives and finger-nails, and butchered the sixty soldiers whom they found carousing within. The Revolution of 1789 inaugurated their unification with France. They adjusted them- selves without much difficulty to the national administration. They furnished Napoleon the First some brave soldiers and able officers, and remained secretly faithful to him during the Pen- insular war. Under the Restoration, they gave a new proof of their love of independence and of their ancestral territory. The French Gov- ernment having conceded to Spain a portion of the frontier where the Basques had been accus- tomed to pasture their flocks, and of which, in the absence of official boundary lines and from long occupation, they regarded themselves as the rightful possessors, they at first protested, and then encamped in arms on the disputed ter- ritory. The French minister promised the ab- rogation of the treaty. They declared that they The Basques, 87 would wait until the first of May, 1830, and that then, if they did not receive justice, they would obtain it for themselves. At the appointed time, two thousand armed Basques occupied the ground, vowing that they would shoot any Spaniard who should interfere with their pastur- age, and would avenge, by the burning of mon- asteries and convents, any attacks upon their ancient possession. The Spanish Government sent troops from Pamplona. Whether any collision took place is uncertain ; if not, it was doubtless avoided by new assurances in formal terms, securing the rights which they claimed, and which were subsequently de- fined by the official determination of the boun- dary. At present the government of France is ac- cepted without protest, because it does not press hardly upon them, nor seriously interfere with their customs or their independence. Taxes are relatively light ; rents are lower than elsewhere ; necessary articles they obtain at a low price ; as for such things as sugar, coffee, and tobacco, they manage, notwithstanding bri- 88 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. gades of custom-house officers, to procure them in Spain at moderate rates. Nevertheless, the work of unification is re- tarded by their insuperable horror of enforced military service. The conscription records show that the number of recusants in the Basses-Py- renees is equal to two-fifths, and sometimes to one-half of those of all the rest of France. Even when they are enlisted, desertions are frequent. They do not conceal themselves, they do not resist official authority, but the younger, braver, and more intelligent Basques choose exile in preference to conscription. The number of French Basques who embark every year for Montevideo, Buenos Ayres, and other South American towns, amounts to two thousand. Fifty or sixty thousand are settled on the bor- ders of the Rio de la Plata. Many also go to seek employment in the great cities, in Bor- deaux, Toulouse, Bilbao ; and marriage, and change of habits and of language do their cus- tomary work in modifying the original charac- teristics ; while the railroad, and the contact with tourists at Cambo, Biarritz, Saint-Jean-de-Luz, The Basques, 89 Ustaritz, and Guethary, are combining with these to complete the work of fusion. The days of the Basques as a distinct nationaUty are practically numbered. In Spain, the pro- cess is accelerated by the decree which re- quires the use of the Spanish language in the schools. 90 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, CHAPTER VIII, EUSCALDANAC. "These are very bitter words," — Shakspeare. THE Basques call themselves Euscaldanac^ which is said to mean " a strong hand," and their language Eskara or Euskara. Upon the question of its origin, which is involved in the same obscurity with that of the origin of the people themselves, this is not the place to enter. Suffice it to say that its affinities, so far as they can be traced, seem to point to remote oriental sources. It has no likeness whatever to any of the. dialects of Southern Europe. A Spaniard and a Basque can no more understand each other than a New Yorker and a Camanche. It is said to be exceedingly difficult ; so much so that, according to the popular legend, the Devil, who has a special interest in mastering as many tongues as possible, spent seven years in the Euscaldaiiac, 91 study of Basque, and learned only three words ; but the charitable reader will scarcely regard this meagre result as a reflection upon the capa- city of the Father of lies, when he shall have at- tentively considered the two following sesquipe- dalia, which M. Garat cites as specimens of a large number : Izarysaroyarejilurrearenbarenay which is, be- ing interpreted, '' the centre of the mountain road." Azpilciietagaraycosaroyarenbej'ecolarrea^ or '' the lower ground of the high hill of Azpil- cueta." Or these names of mountain-peaks : Bor- dacahara ; Abaracoucoharia ; Halcalaudy. (i) As to pronunciation, it is sufficient to cite the Andalusian proverb, that the Basque writes *' Solomon " and pronounces it '' Nebuchadnez- zar." Nevertheless, this fearful and wonderful tongue is not without its sturdy panegyrists, one of whom observes that ** it is truly beauti- ful, and has the sweetness of the Italian, and the manly sonorousness of the Spanish." A language containing many such words as the specimens given above, could not fail to 92 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. have a voluminous literature. The Basques de- velop the poetic instinct in a high degree. (2) On the banks of the streams where the washerwo- men gather, at the maize-huskings, in the fields where the ploughshare opens the furrow, the Coblacariy or born poets, improvise pastorals, serenades, and elegies. Their fables, satires, and legends, we are told, sparkle with beauties and invite comparison with the masterpieces of Greek and Roman literature ; while tragedies and comedies not unworthy to be named with those of Sophocles and Aristophanes are per- formed, not in crowded saloons, but in vast mountain amphitheatres, before populations gathered from the mountain-sides. Of the ro- mance " Love and Duty," which M. Augustin Chaho, an authority on Basque antiquities, published in 1845, he says : " We challenge all Europe to point out among popular poems a piece which can compare with it." H\iQ: fetes patronales, which are occasions for the display of poetic talent, are thus described : "■ A guard of horsemen opens the procession, dressed in white pantaloons, sashes of crimson Euscaldanac. 93 silk, white surtouts, and enormous bear-skin caps ornamented with variously colored plumes and ribbons. Then comes the music : flutes, tambourines, drums, violins. The dancers fol- low, in two files, and with rhythmical step. It is the dance known as the Mauresque, which is reserved for national fetes. Each dancer holds in his right hand a rod, garnished with ribands and crowned with a bouquet of flowers. Then follow the poet and the usher, then a judge and two advocates in court costume. A foot-guard armed with rifles and acting as escort, closes the procession. The judge and advocates ascend a platform and seat themselves at three tables. The poet takes his position in front and an- nounces his subject. Then ensues a dialogue between the two advocates in rhythmical prose, which runs into a general satire of vices and ab- surdities of all sorts, and provokes the frequent applause of the audience with its caustic and witty sallies." The Basques of the interior are mostly shep- herds and farmers. Their farming is with a view to home consumption. The principal pro- 94 ^^^ i^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. ducts are maize, the grain of which is converted into metchoura, the bread of the country; apple trees, the fruit of which serves for cider, pit- tara ; and hemp, which, after being stripped and spun by the several families, passes to the weaver to be converted into linen. The husking of the maize recalls the custom of New England. The etcheco-yauna, or mas- ter of a well-to-do house, announces to his neighbors that, on such an evening and the evenings following, there will be a husking at his house. The guests gather round a great heap of maize, the lads on one side and the maidens on the other. The husks plucked off pass from hand to hand till they reach the fair- est damsels. The young people sing the na- tional songs, and at least one poet is always pres- ent, eager to display his powers. Affectionate glances begin to pass to and fro ; there is a gen- eral stir; a young man has found a red ear, a discovery which entitles him to the privilege of kissing all round ; the ice is broken, they chat- ter, laugh, and sing, and meanwhile the work goes steadily on and the baskets are filled, emp- Etiscaldanac. 95 tied, and refilled. At midnight they separate with cries oi Kikissai ! Irrincina ! uttered as only Basque throats can shout, to come together again the next evening. The Basque peasant in gala dress is superb. His blue beret droops over his ear ; his bree- ches are of dark velvet ; a red scarf surrounds his loins ; his vest hangs gracefully upon one shoulder, and his pear-tree stick, pointed with iron, is slung by a cord to his wrist. The Basque is a born huntsman. Birds of passage are often detained among the moun- tains by bad weather, at which times the rocks echo with salvos of musketry. A favorite sport is the hunting of the wild pigeon. High up in the tallest trees of the forest, huts of branches are constructed. These huts, around which are arranged decoys which are made to flutter whenever a flock of pigeons is signalled, accommodate from four to six huntsmen, each one stationed in front of a loophole made so as to aflbrd an enfilading shot which will kill a number of birds at once. At the sound of the chief swhistle, there is a simultaneous fire, and gS In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. great is the carnage. In some quarters great nets are stretched among the trees, and the birds, scared by the rattles, and by the decoy hawks of wood and feathers which are thrown at them, quicken their flight and rush helplessly into the snares. It has been remarked that the amusements of this people resemble those of the ancient Greeks in their peculiarly national character, in the ceremony with which they are celebrated, in the importance attached to them, and in the fact that they contemplate not only the exercise of the physical, but of the intel- lectual powers. They alone among the French peasants still perform with scenery and music, and always with male actors, the national pas- torales or shepherd-dramas, the subjects of which are taken from the Bible, from legends, from Grecian mythology, from the mediaeval traditions, and even from the Ottoman annals. (3) They are passionately devoted to the dance. "A child," says Boileau, ** knows how to dance before it can call its father or its nurse. The delight begins with life, and ends only with • Euscaldanac, 97 death.'' The music is furnished by the three- holed flageolet or chirola, the violin, the tam- bourine, and the accordeon or concertina. It is full of color and of strong rhythm. The satit basque, or mutchicOy is one of the great national amusements, to which the young people aban- don themselves with an ardor amounting to frenzy. After the representation of the pas- torals, the honor of dancing the first three mut- chicos is put up at auction, and the first is some- times knocked down at one hundred and fifty or two hundred francs. The dance is thus described by M. Joanne, as performed at Biar- ritz on the occasion of their annual reunion : **From every part of Biarritz is heard the noise of instruments, songs, and wild cries. The Basques arrive by every road. In an instant the whole town is invaded ; in the public squares, and wherever the streets widen, groups are arranging themselves. The mutchico be- gins. The women occupy the centre and sing to the monotonous rhythm of the instruments, turning meanwhile on their heels. Around them the men dance in a ring, improvising the stran- 7 98 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. gest steps, at intervals leaping, uttering deafen- ing cries, and brandishing, crossing, and strik- ing their staves, and then, at a given signal, turning, and repeating the performance in the opposite direction." Even the priests were formerly wont to take part in the dance, possibly in imitation of King David, and the churches have been known to be opened at Christmas for the tam- bourine and the dance. The women were formerly not allowed to participate ; the cler- gy set down their dancing in the list of deadly sins, and one of the native poets, with more vehemence than gallantry, asserted that a wo- man who danced ought to be cudgelled. M. Garat says that though the priests no longer dance, they have become no more indulgent to- ward the women in this particular ; but in Guipuzcoa, at least, the damsels have either mollified or defied their spiritual fathers, for I have often stopped to watch the dancing groups in front of the taverns or on the greensward, and have never seen one composed only of men. Euscaldanac, 99 In religion they are strict Roman Catholics, their native independence and impatience of control seeming to desert them in spiritual things. All that their natural reason cannot account for, they impute to God — who is known as Jain Goicoa, or the good master on high — and still more to the Devil. They have a mul- titude of superstitions, sometimes gloomy, al- ways naive. Sorceresses and fortune-tellers are in high repute. When they build fires at Saint- Jean-de-Luz, it is not only to dance, but to please the Saint, for whom a seat is provided by placing a stone in the midst of a brazier; and the more artless do not fail to inspect the ashes the next day to see if the Saint may not, by some lucky accident or benevolent design, have left a hair among them. The sea-going Basques claim that there are those of their num- ber who possess the gift of second-sight, and affirm that such have seen at certain times the death-ship, a sort of Flying Dutchman— a sure presage of disaster. Their physical type is very fine, especially on the part of the men. My own observation lOO In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, does not confirm the current statements as to the beauty of the women in general, except as respects their hair, which is superb. Both men and women have poor teeth. But, on the roads, walking beside their oxen, at work in the fields, and standing in the streets of the country towns, I have often seen men whose truly grand faces would adorn an assembly of senators ; the head large and round, the fore- head full, the nose slightly aquiline, the lower jaw massive, the mouth and chin finely cut, and the face oval. The complexion is light, but usually sunburned, the eyes black, the hair and eyebrows brown. They are of medium stature, muscular, well-proportioned, and with small and well-modelled hands and feet ; their bearing is simple, dignified, and reserved, and their taciturnity is notorious. It has been truthfully observed that, in an- cient times, the Basques kept themselves out- side of the Roman world ; in the middle age they remained outside of feudal society ; while to-day they would fain keep out of the modern world. The spectacle of this little confederacy, Euscaldanac. loi sturdily maintaining its isolation for so many centuries, is most interesting, and, in some as- pects, affecting ; but the very stubbornness and the prolonged success of its resistance to all attempts to draw it into the current of modern life and thought, only enhances the significance of its ultimate failure, and furnishes an expres- sive commentary upon the futility of a people's most determined efforts to hold itself aloof from the brotherhood of nations. Contact is God's manifest decree. The five Basques at Bayonne bridge, helpless against the incoming tide, present a truthful prophecy of the destiny of the whole race before the advancing and mounting wave of modern civilization (4). I02 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, CHAPTER IX. BY OMNIBUS TO PASAGES. "Now let us ride, and herkeneth what I say. And with that word we riden forth our way." — Chaucer. THE red and yellow omnibus makes the trip between Irun and San Sebastian two or three times daily, without a serious strain upon the horses. There is plenty of room to-day on the broad seat above and be- hind the driver, and having clambered to our places, we are lumbering the next moment up the narrow main street of Irun, from which a sharp turn to the left brings us at once into the open country. One more look, ere we descend the hill before us, at that charming panorama on the right — Fuenterrabia, and the bright waters of the Bidassoa, and blue Biscay be- yond ; the bustling frontier railway-station in the valley below, and Santa Maria Guadalupe, with its slender spire and huge churchyard- By Omnibus to Pas ages. 103 cross, high up on the side of Jaizquibel, which stretches his long razor-back ridge, relieved at intervals by watch-towers, along the side of our route. The. road is superb. The Basques are notable road-makprs. I have ridden a whole day with scarce any intermission, traversing a large part of the province of Guipuzcoa, and every inch of the way over a road as firm and even as the best Alpine pass, or the finest drive in Central Park. The country is most inviting. Carefully cultivated slopes rise on every hand, and the abundance and variety of the trees — chestnut, poplar, oak, ash, fig, hazel, apple — presents a striking contrast to many other parts of Spain. The saying that a Spaniard hates a tree is a slander, abundantly disproved by the care with which he fosters such as he can raise on the barren plain of Madrid, for example. Nature saves the Basque such trouble, and muffles his hills and valleys thick with green. There are abundant reminders of the Carlist war. Every town among these mountains is defaced with blackened ruins, and the new, red- tiled roofs indicate where enterprise has made I04 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. good the ravages of the fire. Our driver, whose ample dimensions left no room on the ** box," was a garrulous old fellow, and travel over these roads during the stormy times had furnished him with a large stock of reminis- cences. Having been commissioned on one occasion to carry a large sum of money, it was left to his own discretion to go by sea or by land, and as he was subject to sea-sickness, he preferred to follow his accustomed route. He rolled up his money, and some articles be- longing to the passengers, in the tarpaulin cov- ering of the baggage-caboose, just behind his seat, to the great amusement of certain other passengers, who ridiculed his caution. But a band of Carlists soon threw the laugh on the other side. The party was " gone through," but the driver brought off his tarpaulin and its contents in safety. Jaizquibel, which furnishes the valleys with mill-stones, is now shadowing our right, and Haya rises on the left. On the former, the numerous paths leading up to the solitary watch-towers are in plain sight. What places they must be on a bleak winter night, By Omnibus to Pasages. 105 with the snow driving, and the wind howling round that bare ridge. What furrous fights have raged round those square enclosures, rain- ing death from their loopholes. I came upon one of them one afternoon, on a rocky crag of Igueldo, overlooking the village of that name. The iron-plated door was fast locked, and was absolutely peppered with bullet marks. The women pass us, bearing huge bundles of ferns which they deposit in heaps for manure. The ploughs which one sees are of modern construction, so different from those of Anda- lusia, where one is constantly reminded of his pictorial Bible and his Bible-dictionary ; for the plough is still the old oriental plough, little better than two sticks. There, too, the water- wheel still revolves in the streams, with earthen pots tied to the circumference, and the thresher is drawn on his drag by the mules, round and round in the heap of grain. Here, in Basque- land, is the modern plough, but not the modern ox-cart. The Basque cart is a rather pictur- esque affair, especially as to its wheels, which are solid disks made of pieces of inch plank io6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. fitted neatly together. The beautiful Alderney- dun cattle — cows and oxen alike being used for draught — have their foreheads protected by heavy tufts of colored wool ; and the driver stands in an easy attitude, leaning on his ox- goad, and salutes us with dignity. Now the little river Oyarsun comes into view as we turn into Renteria. An old friar is making himself comfortable under an umbrella in an adjoining field, and a group of washerwo- men are standing up to their knees in the water, and beating the linen against flat stones. Over two arched bridges, and the church, with its high walls and richly ornamented doorway, appears on the left, succeeded by a long range of fac- tories, and a street lined with plastered houses with their projecting eaves and iron balconies. Renteria once acquired some importance by its ship-building ; but the Franco-Spanish wars of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were fatal to its prosperity, because, being half-way be- tween two important points, Fuenterrabia and San Sebastian, it had to sustain the depreda- tions both of its enemies and of those who By Omnibus to Pasages. 107 should have been its friends. More fatal than all, however, has been the gradual filling up, with the debris brought down from the moun- tains by the heavy rains, of the bed of the Oyarsun, the entrance of which into the bay of Pasages formerly served as a port. Before reaching Renteria, at the distance of about a mile, the road passed under the railway through a spacious arch ; and close by, where not a sign of a stream was visible, there had been discov- ered, as the driver told us, remains of boats like the clumsy scows which still lie moored near the mouth of the river. The wood was black with age and moisture, and the iron crumbled like paper. He himself remembered how, twenty- seven years before, he had seen ships go up from Pasages to Renteria, where the Oyarsun is now only a creek. To-day, Renteria depends mainly upon its manufacture of linen and prints, an important branch of industry in Guipuzcoa, since, besides the three factories at Renteria, there are also works at Andoain, Lasarte, Vil- labona, and Zarauz. In passing through the streets of this, as of io8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. every other Basque town, the stranger will at once be struck with the profusion of escutch- eons decorating, not only the public buildings, but many of humbler pretensions. Reference has already been made to the grant of universal nobility conceded by the fueros, in recognition, according to Moncaut, of the services and valor of the Basques during the wars with the Moors. This fact explains a phenomenon which con- trasts oddly enough with the other features of a Basque village ; for, while these towns all give evidence of thrift, they present few if any signs of wealth . The coats of arms are of two classes : those of the cities or valleys, and those of indi- vidual families. The escutcheon of Fuenterra- bia, for instance, is quartered, and bears, in the first and fourth quarterings, two sirens ; in the second, a lion rampant ; and in the third, a ship with the tower of Castile below. The arms of San Sebastian are a ship under full sail, with the device Noblessa y Lealtad gagnada por fideltat. The escutcheon of each city or valley forms the basis on which each of its families constructs its own, varied according to the family history. By Omnibus to Pas ages. 109 The sluggish, narrow stream of the Oyar- sun, with ugly black barges moored to the bank, is close on our right as we mount a slight ascent, on the crest of which the road branches to right and left, and opens upon a sort of am- phitheatre with a distant background of blue, broken peaks. The railway is at our feet. The bottom of the amphitheatre is formed by a sheet of water which opens to the sea on the left, through a narrow passage between two odd lit- tle towns close to the water's edge. This is the bay of Pasages. On the right, at the end of the bay stands Lezo, at the foot of Jaizquibel, its few houses clustered about its tall, yellow church, which is celebrated in Guipuzcoa as a place of pilgrimage, especially on the four- teenth of September, the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. The tide is out, and from Lezo half-way to the entrance of the harbor, is an expanse of mud over which wades a fisherman with his hand-net, groping for bait-fish in the little pools. Vessels lie at anchor off the towns, or are moored to the quay at the foot of the embankment on which we stand. A long rope- no In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. walk stretches along the opposite bank; just beneath us is the railroad-station, and not far off the lead works of the Capuchinos, where the silver-bearing ore from the foot of Haya is treated. The mountains behind us, which form the valley of Oyarsun, give evidence of having been thoroughly ransacked for their metallic treasures of iron, lead, silver, and copper ; and there are still to be seen the traces of gigantic mining operations, which must have employed great numbers of workmen for many years. Galleries penetrate horizontally into the heart of the mountain, and ramify into a labyrinth of passages, or terminate suddenly in bottomless abysses. In the same region, also, are to be found remains of a great Roman road running toward Navarre ; and only a few years ago a tomb of Roman construction was discovered, with an illegible Latin inscription, and contain- ing weapons of copper, pottery, and some silver coins bearing the ^^%y of Octavius Augustus. But our business now is with the living, and not with the dead. What of Pasages ? Pasages. 1 1 1 CHAPTER X. PASAGES. " On one side lay the ocean ; and on one Lay a great water." — Tennyson. A BRIGHT summer afternoon, and a hard, smooth road under foot, made walking a luxury. The highway to San Sebastian, which we struck at the mouth of the Oyarsun after leaving Renteria, followed the western shore of the bay of Pasages, and turning off to the right, led round the shore of the inner bay, a veritable Serbonian bog at that hour, though all over its surface the inward-setting currents in the little pools and rivulets, heralded the ris- ing tide. At the turn of the shaded path where the inner bay opened into the main harbor, a flight of massive stone steps led down to the water, and close by were the remains of an arch which, apparently, had formed part of a bridge across the entrance to the inner bay. On the 112 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. landward side of the path rose a high slope, cov- ered with trees and vines, and falling back into a charming little recess, where the trees, the stone wall, and some children playing with an ox-cart, formed a pretty picture. Close by the shore, a man was fishing for shrimps with a yellow net mounted on two sticks, and pushed before him through the water. A few steps more brought us to the entrance of Saint-Peter, the part of the town on the west side of the inlet. At the corner was a remarkably fine ball-court, entirely enclosed, with tiers of seats on each side, and nicely paved, where some children were gathered at the entrance, and a gray-haired, bare-footed man in a blue blouse and cap, and a soldier with blue frock and red pants, were playing at pelota. The soldier showed himself the more proficient of the two. He was playing the game with the glove, and the force with which he hurled the ball from the end of the wicker scoop, as he skil- fully caught it at each rebound, was amazing. At the head of the street into which we now turned, stands the church of Saint-Peter, its Pasages. 113 cupola surmounted with the symbol of the keys. We found the interior interesting, though taw- dry and poor to the last degree. A pretentious fresco over the high altar adorned the chancel, and from the ceiling, in different parts of the church, hung models of ships suspended by cords. A small organ occupied the elevated choir gallery, and the floor was covered with chairs, in front of which lay blocks of wood with long strings of wax-taper wrapped round them. Not far from the altar was a huge basket from which issued a white cat, while another and younger pussy advanced from nearer the sacred precinct. The pulpit, near the entrance-door, was wrapped round with a rich piece of crimson silk embroidered with gold. Leaving the church, we passed on through the narrow street, which is cut like a terrace in the side of the rocky slope, and from which, at intervals, paths run up to dwellings above ; while, on the other side, steep passages open to the water, revealing unsightly objects, and emit- ting *' a very ancient and fish-like smell." The balconied houses are neatly painted, and display 114 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees, the usual armorial decorations ; women and children are in the doorways ; here is a neat faj'macia / and now the street takes a sharp turn to the left into a narrow passage, flanked on one side by the living rock, which, to half the height of the adjoining houses, reveals the work of the waves by the holes eaten out over its sur- face. From this passage we emerged upon the stone platform overlooking the narrow entrance to the harbor, in one corner of which was a stone washing-trough where several women were busy, among them a fearful hag with a long chin and a savage voice. The office of the com- mandant of the port opened on the platform ; the sea-wall was furnished with embrasures for cannon, and a great piece of iron machinery of some kind lay half buried in the water at the foot of the wall. This is a pleasant place to rest, and while we sit here we may recall some of the facts about this unique little harbor and its two towns. The name Pasages^ according to M. Capistou, arose from the necessity oi passing by boat from one side to the other of the narrow inlet which Pasages. 115 connects the harbor with the ocean. In the fif- teenth century, the discovery of America gave importance to this harbor, which was then known as Puerto Oiarso^ from the valley of Oyarsun, of which its territory was a part, and from the jurisdiction of which it passed later into that of Fuenterrabia. In 1767, the town became entirely indepen- dent, in recognition of the services of its seamen to the French fleet when blockaded by the Eng- lish at Rochelle. Its arms were two oars crossed under a fleur-de-lis. It was from this port that Lafayette embarked for America. The advan- tages of the harbor appealed at once to the quick eye of Napoleon the First, as did its lamentable condition from the deposits of the Oyarsun, which accumulated very rapidly, especially in the part toward Lezo and Renteria. He rec- ommended the construction of a tunnel under Jaizquibel, by means of which the waters of the Oyarsun might be diverted from the harbor; and modern engineers have been able to sug- gest no better plan to obviate the necessity of constant and laborious dredging. Stimulated ii6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. by the ravages of a fever in 1870, the Spanish Government authorized the province of Guipuz- coa to undertake operations on a large scale for the clearing and improvement of the harbor ; and the contract was taken by a company at Madrid, which pushed the works with great vigor and success until they were interrupted by the civil war. Our seat on the platform commands a view of the narrow passage, across which a strong hand could easily throw a stone, flanked on the one side by Jaizquibel and on the other by Ulia, and faced, at the point where it enters the sea, by a mass of rock over which, at inter- vals, the tremendous surf breaks in cataracts of creamy foam. The passage is between this rock and the mainland on the northwestern side, over which flames by night the friendly pharos on Ulia, and is accessible for vessels of the heaviest tonnage. Directly across from our platform lies the town of Saint-John, run- ning nearly at a right angle to Saint-Peter, and resembling it in all essential particulars. A very small procession with drum and fife was Pasages. 117 parading the street along the inlet, and a boy was letting off small rockets which exploded in the air with a sharp crack ; a demonstration which portended, as we were told, a holiday on the morrow — Saint James's day — and a bull-fight of such proportions as could be compassed in the narrow street and with the narrower resour- ces of the Pasagians. Boats were in waiting at the foot of the plat- form, in one of which we were ferried across to Saint-John by two women, who handled the huge, clumsy oars with a muscular ease and dexterity which explained why Philip the Fourth, in 1660, took a number of these vigorous oars- women to Madrid to row the pleasure boats in the Retiro. We were landed at the foot of a flight of stone steps where some naked gamins were disporting themselves in the water, one of them evidently chilly and with his face drawn up in the most comical fashion. At the top of the steps we were met by a poor little cripple with his crutch, in blue garments and red cap, and with a pretty, childlike face, who eagerly proffered his services as guide. Saint-John is less cleanly 1 1 8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, than Saint-Peter, and like it, is built at the foot of a steep height, on a narrow street, with side passages leading down to the water and emit- ting evil smells. The street runs under arch- ways at intervals ; some of the houses are in ruins ; on one were the remains of a once beau- tiful entrance between columns now worn with age, and displaying a shield the bearings of which were mostly effaced ; the only well-de- fined figure being that of some rampant beast with a miraculous tail. From the side of the street a series of steep stairs mounted to the church of Santa-Anna, high up on the moun- tain-side, and near the end of the town rose the church of Saint-John, to which we were admitted by a woman whom our bright little guide summoned from an adjoining house, and who bore a formidable bunch of keys. The principal object within was the huge retablo with its profusion of gilding. Here and there were displayed hideous images, one in a chapel to the right of the entrance — a crucifixion, most horrible to behold. The choir contained a somewhat pretentious organ, but our attend- Pasages. 119 ant said it was useless, and that some two thousand dollars would be required to put it in repair, a consummation which was apparently quite remote, since she informed us that the in- dustries of the place had so declined that some Americans (meaning South Americans) would be necessary to restore prosperity to Saint- John. One of the chapels, on the left of the high altar, was made of a dark wood elabor- ately carved, and was said to be a thank-offer- ing from a trader or captain, who brought the wood from *' foreign parts," had it worked up, and presented it to the church in acknowledg- ment of a prosperous voyage. On the left side of the church, about half-way from the entrance, was a shrine, consisting of a glass case contain- ing a reclining female figure of wax, dressed in rich satin. The face and figure were less repul- sive than usual, and underneath was a piece of plaster with the inscription Faustine in Pace, Kal. Oct. , and with the palm branch scratched below. The letters had been colored red, and the fragment was apparently a genuine one from a Christian tomb in the Catacombs at 1 20 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, Rome. The altar to the right of the tribune resembled Castile soap. From the church we strolled into the porce- lain factory, sniffed unwillingly the odor of hot oil from the sardine-packing establishment, and returned to our landing place, where we amused ourselves by throwing coppers for the naked urchins to dive after. One of them was clamorous, insisting that the coin should be wrapped in paper ; and vented his rage at re- fusal by throwing water at his confrere in the bath, and thereby plentifully besprinkling us. The stout damsels ferried us back to Saint-Peter and tried to get a little extra fare out of us ; and retracing our steps amid the *' well-defined and separate " stenches, two and seventy, more or less, which a member of the party, in view of the numerous coats of arms, suggested might be the odors of decaying nobility, we repassed the ball court, where the soldier was still at play, but without his coat, and took the road to San Sebastian. San Sebastian. 121 CHAPTER XL SAN SEBASTIAN. *' he passed the sea. And reached a river opening into it. Across the which the white -winged fowl did flit From cUfF to chff, and on the sandy bar The fresh waves and the salt waves were at war, At turning of the tide." — WiLU am Morris : Jason. THE road from Pasages is lined for some distance with red, ferruginous rocks. The excellence of their arms which rendered the Basques so formidable to the Roman armies, was due in great part to the abundance of metals afforded by their mountains. I have already spoken of the mines of Oyarsun ; and this whole region abounds in haematite ore of the best quality. One of the most important industries of the Basque provinces is furnished by the iron mines of Bilbao, about eleven miles from that city, in which fifteen millions of dol- lars of foreign capital are invested. During 1 88 1, over two and a half millions of tons of 122 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, iron ore were exported ; and the mining popu- lation, largely composed of mountaineers from Navarre and from the three Spanish-Basque provinces, is not less than thirteen thousand. The road begins to descend. A fortress crowning a headland, and a high tower beyond, come into view. Then in the valley beneath, a fine railway station and a plaza de toros ; cul- tivated terraces, sprinkled with houses and gar- dens, rise from a beautiful semicircular bay; there is the silver line of a little river ; a flash of white breakers flinging their spray at the cas- tellated headland ; a fine bridge spanning the river ; and a compact, handsome town, crowd- ed thickly under the landward side of the cita- del and stretching round the semicircle of the bay. This is the capital of Guipuzcoa, San Sebastian, or, as the Basques call it, Donos- tiya. The traveller who shall consult Mr. O'Shea's ** Guide to Spain," will read as follows : '* Irun, San Sebastian, etc., are nothing but Basque towns, devoid of interest." Such manuals as Mr. O'Shea's (and his is truly valuable) are San Sebastian. 123 largely used by a class of tourists whose ideal of travel is to visit as many great cities, and to see as many churches, picture-galleries, and palaces as possible. That class cannot do bet- ter than accept the above oracular statement, and fly on the wingS' of steam past San Sebas- tian, to Pamplona, Zaragoza, Burgos, and Ma- drid. But to one who loves to surrender him- self leisurely, day after day, to the charm of nature ; to one who loves to study the life and characteristics of a strongly-marked and noble race ; to one who is in search of a quiet nook where the summer may melt away in a deli- cious climate, tempered by the salt breezes of Biscay and the bracing air of the Basses-Pyre- nees ; to one who desires a centre for a circle of charming excursions, within easy reach of some of the old historic cities of Spain, and of an end- less variety of drives and walks through one of the finest mountain countries of the world, — San Sebastian will present peculiar attractions. If cities, like men, are perfected through suf- fering, San Sebastian has enjoyed unusual facil- ities for attaining perfection. It has been swept 124 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. by five great fires, and was wasted by a pestil- ence in 1597 ; its marine was nearly destroyed by the English in 1780 ; it has suffered succes- sive invasions by the French ; was besieged and taken by the Duke of Berwick in 1719 ; was destroyed and sacked with the most infernal cruelty by the English and Portuguese in 1813 ; was bombarded during the Carlist wars ; besides being the scene of numerous bloody struggles between the Carlists and Isabellists. That it has survived at all, to say nothing of its pres- ent thrift and beauty, speaks volumes for the courage and energy of its people. It was anciently known as Hizurmn or Irur- uniy a Basque name meaning three entrances ^ doubtless in allusion to the two passages from the ocean into the Concha bay, and the en- trance at the mouth of the Urumea. This name it retained up to the tenth century. It is also referred to by Roman authors under the name of Easo. As to the present Basque name, Do- nostiya^ its etymology is unknown. In the twelfth century, the jurisdiction of San Sebas- tian extended from Fuenterrabia to the river SAN SEBASTIAN. San Sebastian. 125 Oria, and from Pasages to Navarre. Charles the Fifth conferred on it the title of Noble and Loyaly and it was raised to the rank of a city somewhere about the time of the Franco-Span- ish alliance and the marriage of Louis the Four- teenth and Maria Theresa. During the last civil war, it was one of the principal bases of operations for the national army, and suffered greatly in its commerce and industries by the blockade of the Carlist guerillas. A reference to the accompanying plan will give the reader a general idea of the situation and prominent features of the city. It was originally confined to the isthmus, and included in the enceinte of Urgullo, which projects into the ocean, and is crowned with the castle of La Mota, built in the fifteenth century. In 1863, the wall of the enceinte which crossed the isthmus was demolished, and a wide boulevard, called the Alameda, was constructed from bay to bay : a pleasant, shaded street, lined with shops and handsome cafes, and where the fine band of the garrison dispenses excellent music on summer evenings. Since the opening of this 126 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. boulevard, the town has gradually spread over the entire isthmus, round the Concha, to the little suburb of Antigua, up the height of San Bartolomeo, and across the Urumea along the road to Pasages. The railway station is far- ther up the Urumea, and behind it is the Plaza de Toros, a flimsy-looking circular structure of wood, mounted upon a brick basement, and said to accommodate ten thousand spectators. Standing on the handsome stone bridge of Santa Catalina and facing seaward, the eye runs down the Zurriola, or estuary of the Urumea, where its narrow stream, flanked by shoals, passes out into the sea between Monte Ulia and Monte Urgullo, its entrance being marked by a white line of frightful breakers. At the time of my visit, the works for the filling up of the Zurriola were in active progress, and the shoals on each side of the river-channel were already covered with masses of masonry ; but the heavy gales of September, 1882, destroyed all that had been done. The force of the breakers often makes itself felt as far up as the bridge ; and I have seen a lounger on the parapet thoroughly San Sebastian. 127 drenched by the expiring leap of one of those watery Anakims of Biscay. Down the Zurri- ola, from the bridge to Urgullo, runs a wide, shaded promenade, terminating at the pubUc market, and named Oquendo, after a famous admiral. It is, however, the view to the left of the isth- mus which possesses the greatest charm. Be- ginning at Urgullo, the line of the superb bay of the Concha sweeps round in a perfect semi- circle to the headland of Chubillo, which is crowned with a massive stone tower, and forms the end of Monte Igueldo. Between these two headlands lies the little island of Santa Clara, with its lighthouse, and to the right of this, snugly sheltered under the shoulder of Urgullo, . are the trim stone docks. Along the curve of yellow sand stretching from headland to head- land, breaks the surf, its first fury tempered by its contact with Santa Clara and the rocks at the entrance. Above, the town follows the line of the bay along a fine avenue known as the Paseo de la Concha, rising still higher in detached villas along the slope of San Bartolomeo, and 128 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. merging, about two-thirds of the way round the semicircle, into the suburb of Antigua. It would be hard to find, or even to fancy^ a finer combination of mountain and sea, town and garden, than is presented by San Sebas- tian. Our summer home was about the centre of the arc of the Concha ; a spacious brick house, with airy rooms and hard-wood floors ; its front facing the Paseo de la Concha, and its rear piazza resting on a sea-wall some thirty feet in height, and directly over the broad", smooth bathing-beach. Will the coming days ever give back the dolce far 7iieitte of those hours on that balcony ; the ineffable charm and daily freshness of that exquisite scene which melted insensibly into memory, while the pleas- ant chat went round, and the light wind bore the fragrant cigar-clouds to mingle with the salt odors of Biscay ? The sun seems to enter upon a happier sky when he touches the Pyrenees. Such clarity of light ! Such sweet, tremulous blue in the heavens ! Such deep sapphire along the horizon-line of the sea! Such translu- cent green of the billows, rallying from their San Sebastian, 129 first shock against UrguUo and Santa Clara, poised in curves of emerald for an instant ere they drop upon the sand, then climbing the sea-wall, and, as they recede, encountering the on-coming breaker in tossing whirls of foam and spray ! Such undulations of purple, rolling silently landward when the wind goes down at sunset, and Chubillo stands out against the flames of the rosy west, and the light begins to twinkle on Santa Clara ! Down on the beach, nearer the town, cluster the pavilions of La Perla del Oceano, the great sea-bathing estabHshment. The beautiful dun cattle slowly draw the gayly painted bathing machines into the surf; boats hover on the safety-line, which is marked by a row of flags, and mount guard over the host of bathers ; while a remarkable barge, a combination of the Ro- man galley and the Chinese junk, gay with float- ing streamers, and furnished with trapezes and diving platforms, presents attractions for more adventurous swimmers. The Madrilenes are here in troops. The stout bathing- women, perennially moist, escort timid spinsters and elderly dames 130 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. into the outskirts of the breakers. Portly fathers lead in prancing boys and girls, who fill the air with their shrill cries of delight ; while young men in closely fitting and unspeakable bathing cos- tumes, display their amphibious qualities on the platforms of the barge. Morning, noon, and evening, the white lines of foam are dotted thickly with black heads, reminding one of a preserve of seals or of sea-lions. Now a regi- ment of soldiers comes trooping down to the beach and plunging into the surf, each man crossing himself as his feet touch the water; or some small boys, who know well that they are on forbidden ground, surreptitiously strip under the shadow of the balcony, and scamper, like frightened snipe, to hide themselves in the water. The panting little propeller plies, all day long, between Santa Clara and the docks ; the white breakers leap round the rocks of Urgullo and Chubillo ; now a steamer works slowly out of the docks, and moving cautiously out between Urgullo and Santa Clara, heads for Santander, or Bilbao, or Bayonne, or an inward bound one stands off and on until the tide may San Sebastian. 131 serve ; the fishing-boats, by twos and threes, creep round the headland and anchor in the open sea, now borne on high, and now buried in the mighty swell. Now there is a sudden rush along the beach, and the crowd gathers on the terrace above. Longinus, the majordomo of our little establishment, blacker than ink, seems to have taken on a more funereal shade as he solemnly announces that a man is drowned. All eyes are fastened on a little group, in the midst of which the glass reveals the ghastly form of an elderly, beastly-looking man, over whose naked body doctors and bathing-men are busy trying to rekindle the vital spark. They rub, they twist his limbs, they breathe into his nostrils ; now and then a trained ear is laid against the cold breast, and a practised fin- ger feels for the pulse-beat. All in vain ; the spirit is away, and nothing remains but that un- sightly clod. Cover it with a blanket 'd.xid. finis . Under their little awning on the Paseo sit the carabineros, and doze and smoke, flashing out into momentary vigilance as a country cart comes by, or a woman with a basket on her 132 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. head. They stir up the straw in the cart, or examine the bales and boxes, or thrust a sun- burnt hand into the basket, and go back to the shadow of their awning again. Half-way down the grassy slope to the beach, each morning, with the regularity of clock-work, an old half- imbecile plants himself, leading a sheep by a cord, and sits there with his woolly companion the livelong day, thinking and doing heaven only knows what. The poor sheep, at least, does not find fat pasturage. Near the gate, in the shadow of the trees, stands or sits each day, with equal perseverance, a beggar with some hideous disease or mutilation of the lips, but dignified as a cavalier in his appeal for alms. Priests with their black cassocks and broad- brimmed fur hats, pass to and fro between the town and the little religious establishment at Antigua ; now the tinkling of a bell is heard, and another priest in full canonicals, preceded by crosier and censer, goes his way to the chamber of the dying. There is a rattle of wheels, and a succession of vigorous shouts, as the striped omnibus for Zarauz comes by, laden ,San Sebastian. 133 with baggage and crammed with passengers within and without ; for there is a rise in the road just here, where the driver invariably lays on the whip and breaks, into vociferation. Here come the soldiers, a thousand or so, in their red pants and white alpargatas or sandals, their officers in black, gold-laced coats with wide sleeves, and preceded by the superb band of sixty or seventy pieces. They are on their way to the parade-ground at Antigua, close by the water's edge, for their afternoon drill, whence they will come back in loose order toward sunset, • laughing, chatting, singing, whooping, and pausing to crack jokes upon black Longinus, who is a curiosity in these parts, and who stands at the gate arrayed for his ministrations at the dinner-table. The sunlight fades ; the city glows with gas and electric light ; the bathing-barge quits its moorings and is towed to the docks ; the little steamer makes its final trip across the bay, glid- ing under the deep shadows of the headlands like a ghostly shallop ; the light streams full and clear from Santa Clara ; Chubillo's tower looms 134 ^^ i^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. up in the gathering gloom — a gigantic phantom ; the bugle-call rings down from La Mota ; ' ' the slow moon climbs, the deep Moans round with many voices." Biscay heaves darkly under the stars, and then breaks into gold beneath the rising moon, and all is still save the ceaseless thunder of the surf, as " The plunging seas draw backward from the land Their moon-led waters white." The town itself is handsome, compactly built of a yellowish stone. The older portion, between the Alameda and the citadel, is threaded by narrow streets, and contains, besides the older, sixteenth century church of San Vicente, the principal church of the city, Santa Maria, fin- ished in 1764. Spite of Cenac Moncaut's em- phatic statement that it is the most irreproach- able monument of the Renaissance, it is a monument of a corrupt taste. As M. Capistou justly observes, it bears the mark of the unset- tled and troublous period of its erection, being a mixture of all orders and belonging to none. Its rococo fa9ade is pierced by a central portal adorned with statues in niches, and with a host San Sebastian. 135 of florid embellishments, above which stands Saint Sebastian, plentifully skewered with darts. Within, its size and architectural lines give it a degree of dignity, notwithstanding its gaudy ornamentation. The choir, which, as usual, is a gallery over the end opposite to the huge high- altar, contains some richly carved stalls, and several of the side- altars are costly and elabo- rately sculptured. Behind the church, a long flight of stone steps leads up to a little, tawdry chapel, connected with the convent of Santa Teresa, the grated windows of which command the staircase. Its most notable feature is the iron grating enclosing the choir gallery, which opens into the convent ; a barrier so tremendous as to suggest a prison for the most dangerous brigands or contraband- ists, instead of a retreat for innocent nuns. From the foot of the staircase it is but a mo- ment's walk to the docks, small, but well and handsomely built, where a few coasters, a steamer or two, and an occasional vessel from South America or the Antilles, furnish a feeble reminder of the fleets which so effectively aid- 136 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. ed Spain in her wars with Holland, England, and France. Most of the marine trade of the Basque provinces now centres at Pasages. A steamer for Bayonne has steam up, and a little crowd is gathered about the gangway. There is a cry and a sudden rush toward one of the inner docks, and a pair of stout shoes de- scribes a semicircle in the air, as a Basque 'long- shoreman turns a somersault over a pile of bales. In a moment the cause of the disturbance is fished out of the water in the shape of a small and par- ticularly wet boy, who is landed and led away, very much scared, but otherwise safe and sound. Before leaving this section, it is worth while to climb to the Priest's Walk, a shady terrace on the landward side of Urgullo, furnished with seats, and displaying some attempts at orna- mental gardening. It is a cool and pleasant place, and commands an excellent view of the Concha and of the docks. Down the narrow street, toward the Zurriola. What are those dark-colored, odd-looking ob- jects on the sidewalk, like huge bladders tied at the four corners ? When you drink your Valde- San Sebastian, 137 penas, my friend, you will find out, through a flavor in the cup which is not of the grape, but of the hog-skin in which your beverage has come to market. Possibly the hint of the swine con- veyed in every taste of that somewhat potent fluid, may act as a check upon prodigal ten- dencies. Here is the Plaza de la Constitucion. A droll and knowing old fellow, while escort- ing me, some weeks ago, through the crooked streets of Toledo, dryly observed that every Spanish town contained a Plaza de la Constitu- cion and a Plaza de Toros ; a remark which was not so much of a joke as it seemed, though the rationale of the association of bulls and consti- tutional government might not be at once appa- rent. Be that as it may, the remark itself finds an illustration in San Sebastian. The Plaza de la Constitucion is a square, enclosed by yellow houses built over arcades, and commanded at the western end by the Casa Consistorial , with its granite base and doric front. What is within I do not know from personal observation, but, according to M. Capistou, the council-hall is adorned with four statues, representing Wis- 138 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, dom, Commerce, Prudence, and Justice, to- gether with sundry objets d'art, including two large vases of Sevres porcelain, presented to the city in 1858 by Louis Napoleon and Eugenie. Now, the Zurriola and the bar with its breakers, and the broad walks and shade-trees of Oquendo, and the market, where the stout huckstresses sit in rows, each with her goods in a basket at her feet and a basket of fruit, or vegetables, or a pair of chickens in her lap. For the chicken, like the fish, is an important factor of the Span- ish cuisine. No cooks in the world know how to prepare eggs in so many and such appetizing forms. As for the chicken itself, there is literally no part of it, except the beak and the feathers, which does not appear at table in some form or other. The interior arrangements of the fowl are displayed in heaps on the marble slabs of the market ; and I was reminded of a worthy dame in a little New England town, where the luxury of sweetbreads was unappreciated, and who, with a most delicious horror, asked, when she heard me inquiring for them of the butch- er, ** Do you eat them entrails f^ San Sebastian, 139 A visit to the castle will pleasantly occupy an afternoon. The ascent begins on the side toward the town, by a broad^ shaded road, which winds round the headland and reaches the castle on the seaward side. This seaward slope is sprinkled with white tombstones, mark- ing the graves of English officers and soldiers killed in the memorable siege of 1813, and also in defending San Sebastian against the Carlists in 1836. At one point of the footpath above the carriage-road, just behind an empty stone socket which has evidently once upheld a cross, is an inscription to the memory of him who made this via crticis, and near by is a notice. It is forbidden to take the short cut. True indeed. The way of the cross allows no short cut. The fortifications are interesting only to a military antiquarian, and would stand no chance against the terrible enginery of modern warfare. The view, it need hardly be said, is exquisite. The superb panorama of the city, the Concha, and the encircling hills, opens on the landward side, while, on the other, the eye ranges out over the limitless expanse of Biscay, 140 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, down the indented coast-line to where France looms up through the soft haze, and past the lighthouse of Igueldo, along the ocean-front of Guipuzcoa, to the distant, heavy mountain- masses of Vizcaya. Returning through the Alameda and the ad- joining streets, we shall find little to detain us in the shops, unless it be the beautiful work in iron, inlaid with elaborate patterns in gold and silver, an art for which Toledo is especially famous, and which is employed in the manufac- ture of brooches, match-boxes, and many other pretty knicknacks. To-night there is great popping of muskets and cracking of rockets. There is to be not only a bull-fight, but a series of bull-fights, one on Sunday, of course ; but as there is but one Sunday in the week, the remainder must needs fall on week-days. The walls are garnished with gay placards. Three representative mata- dors are to appear, among them Frascuelo, the veteran hero of the Madrid ring. Frascuelo is really coming ! Frascuelo is here ! Alphonso himself would not be greeted with more en- San Sebastian, 141 thusiasm. Riding on horseback through the streets, dressed in close-fitting velvet jacket and breeches, the blue silk scarf round his waist, the little pigtail escaping from beneath his vel- vet hat, his dress glittering with trinkets — his progress is an ovation. San Sebastian is in a tumult of delighted expectancy ; the Alameda is well nigh impassable. Special trains are run- ning from all the neighboring towns ; the win- dow of the ticket-office is ablaze with the gilt paper wrapped round the sharp banderillaSy or little darts, which are used to exasperate the bull. The horses which are to take part in the exhibition, sorry hacks, display on their flanks ghastly scars which are an ominous prophecy of the fate in store for them. In Spain alone the old Roman amphitheatre survives. Did I go ? No, reader ; I have no love for brutal ex- hibitions, and like J , my Spanish friend, my sympathies are all with the bull. If you are curious as to the details of the performance, read Edmondo De Amicis' Spain and the Span- iards; only make a little allowance for his ex- uberant fancy. 142 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, CHAPTER XII. THE HILL-COUNTRY. "the clouds, The mist, the shadows, light of golden suns, Motions of moonlight, all come thither — touch, And have an answer — thither come, and shape A language not unwelcome to sick hearts And idle spirits : — there the sun himself. At the calm close of summer's longest day, Rests his substantial orb ; between those heights And on the top of either pinnacle. More keenly than elsewhere in night's blue vault. Sparkle the stars, as of their station proud. Thoughts are not busier in the mind of man Than the mute agents stirring there." — ^Wordsworth. THE streets of San Sebastian are enlivened with touches of briUiant scarlet — the color of the closely fitting boynas or Basque caps of the hackmen, who swarm about the Alameda and up and down the Concha, perched on their neat basket-phaetons, and driving the little, hardy Basque horse, which Silius Italicus, a Roman poetaster of the first century, described as " Parvus sonipes, nee Marti notus," The Hill- Country, 143 or, translating freely, '* a pony, and not a war- horse." The labors of these little fellows are mitigated by the splendid roads which thread Guipuzcoa in every direction, among the quaint, picturesque towns of the beautiful hill-country. One of our first drives will be to Hernani, about four miles from San Sebastian, a town of some thirty-five hundred inhabitants, over which rises the mountain crest of Burunza Mendi, crowned by the bastions of the fortress of Santa Barbara. The greater part of these houses which line its narrow main street belong to the sixteenth cen- tury. What a display of sculptured facades ! What a zoological garden of heraldic beasts — oxen, rams, hogs — rearing or couching on its stone escutcheons amid porridge-pots and caul- drons depending from trees ! Above the plas- tered houses rises the huge church, with its domed tower, its ornate front, and its high, bare walls. Its retablo is imposing ; and the sacristy contains an Ecce Homo, the back turned to the spectator, exhibiting a horrid realism in the bleeding flesh and livid, swollen scourge- weals. An archway leads through a mass of 144 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees, masonry which crosses the street and abuts upon the church — all that remains of the Casa Consistorial, which was destroyed in 1875 by an explosion of the ammunition stored within. The town suffered two bombardments during the Carlist war, of which its houses bear ghastly traces. Now, emerging from the narrow street, and following for some distance the stone wall of an extensive villa, we are stopped, not by a Carlist brigand, but by the officer of the road, who demands our driver's ** permit." The owner of a carriage pays some six or seven dol- lars for the use of the roads during the summer, and thus a part of the revenue is furnished for the construction and repair of the highways. Here, on the grass by the shaded road, is a band of gypsies kindling their evening fire. " Imps, in the barn with mousing owlet bred, From rifled roost at nightly revel fed." On the evening air is borne the sound of the flageolet ; a turn in the road reveals a group of merry dancers, a score of girls and perhaps half a dozen men and boys. The dance, in triple The Hill- Country. 145 rhythm, is spirited but thoroughly modest, com- plicated to a stranger's eye, the figure appa- rently resolving itself into groups of four, and the dancers, with raised arms, marking the beat by snapping their fingers. With what solemn assiduity that tall, elderly fellow addresses him- self to the work ! With what conscientiousness he frisks and snaps and balances, bending grave looks from his superior height upon the circling damsels ! Another day we turn off from Renteria, and mount through the chestnut-woods to Oyarsun, with its church of Saint- Stephen, its blackened ruins, its iron balconies and carved gables. It is the most ruinous-looking town I have seen in the province, and bears sad traces of its occupa- tion by the Liberals and the Carlists alternately during the civil war of 1833-40. The strong fortress of Saint-Mark is in full view on a neigh- boring height ; we pass manufactories of terra- cotta and tiles, and flouring-mills turned by the stream which threads the valley. Or we go through Lasarte, with its spinning works, and along the valley of the Oria past Usurbil, with 10 146 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, its fine church of San Salvador, and Aguinaga in its lovely amphitheatre of hills, and the for- est of Irisasi, belonging to the ancient monas- tery of Roncesvalles ; or through Orio, home of fishermen, and Andoain, with its church of granite and jasper, and its cotton-factories and print-works. One July morning, J and myself started for a walk to Igueldo, the little town bearing the name of the height which forms the left horn of the Concha. The whole range, which consists of three elevations, is commonly known as Ig- ueldo ; but strictly the name belongs to only one of the three; the headland which terminates the range on the seaward side, and which is lower than the others, being properly known as Chubillo. The tower on Chubillo, perhaps the most prominent object in the scene, has appar- ently formed a part of a larger building now de- stroyed. It is a massive, cylindrical, stone struc- ture, to the best of my recollection about fifty or sixty feet in height, and mounted upon a square platform, to which one must scramble up as best he can, at the risk of a bruised finger or The Hill- Country. 147 a lamed foot from a loose stone. A good, and not difficult footpath, leads up from the beach to the foot of the tower in a leisurely walk of twenty minutes, which is more than repaid by the beautiful view from the summit. On the slope facing the sea, a little below the tower, stands a lighthouse of much greater size and power than the one on Santa Clara, the outer side of which island is visible from this point, presenting to the sea a smooth, perpendicular wall like a series of great flagstones set on end. Our route to Igueldo, however, led us to the left of Chubillo, and struck at last into the new road now in process of construction from San Sebastian to the hamlet of Igueldo, and beyond, to the bay of Guetaria ; often lying directly through masses of the yellow sandstone which furnishes such fine building- and mill-stones. Rising on the landward slopes of the mountain, the road worked upward and outward toward the sea, until, at the end of a hard climb, the freshening breeze was followed by the view of the ocean and of the coast tow*ard Vizcaya ; and after scaling sundry stone walls, and tra- 148 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, versing one or two fields, we fell into a little caravan of donkeys and women, the latter with baskets on their heads and displaying a variety of colors — pink, red, brown, blue — in their cos- tume. A few miserable houses announced the entrance to Igueldo. The people of whom we made inquiries were either indisposed to an- swer, or, what is more likely, understood noth- ing but Basque. The village stands on the brow of a height, looking westward down the splendid coast to the mountains of Vizcaya. It was a miserable little place, though its street commissioners were evidently enthusiasts, if not extravagant, since the sidewalks were of supe- rior quality. The prominent object was a low, whitewashed church, with an entrance under a long portico, the roof of which was supported by rude, half-hewn timbers, while the rough tiles which covered it, as well as the entire church-roof, were loaded down with large stones, like the roofs of the Swiss chalets, for protection against the wind. The square church-tower, of yellow sandstone, was evi- dently more recent than the rest of the build- The Hill- Country, 149 ing, and the church was lighted by small lat- ticed windows over the portico. Close by, the road-making was in active progress ; the oxen with their shaggy, blue woollen frontlets, heav- ily dragging the solid-wheeled carts, and dump- ing loads of the yellow soil upon a huge em- bankment. Climbing over a stone wall, and pushing our way through the prickly shrubs which covered the ground, we mounted the height overlooking the village, where we found one of the little stone forts so common every- where throughout these mountains ; a simple square enclosure some thirty feet in height, pierced with loopholes, and with a single door, sheathed with iron and battered with bullet- marks. Following the ridge back toward San Sebastian, we encountered a large stone cross planted in the solid rock, from which a magnifi- cent panorama unrolled itself at our feet. On our left, Biscay stretched away to the horizon ; behind was the coast of Guipuzcoa, the heights encircling Guetaria, and beyond, the heavy, cloud-capped masses of Vizcaya, while on the right lay a heaving sea of green hills and a net- J 50 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. work of roads and valleys, rising gradually to the slopes of the lower Pyrenees. It would seem to have been general washing-day through- out the province, since the landscape at every point, on the hillsides and over the greenswards of the valleys, was flecked with patches of snowy linen. Descending through a tangle of bushes and prickly plants, and crossing a little valley, another summit lay before us, about equal in height with the one we had just left ; and mounting this, we found ourselves under the walls of a quite elaborate fort, surrounded with a deep and wide ditch, over which a wooden bridge led to the entrance. A swarthy soldier in rags opened the door. The interior gave un- mistakable evidences of domestic life no less than of military occupation, in a row of poor dwellings and a group of unkempt children. No munitions of war were visible, but the fort was furnished with casemates and with facilities for mounting heavy guns. The view from this point was even finer than that from the stone cross. Added to the ocean outlook on the left and the undulating masses of green hill and The Hill- Country, 151 pasture on the right, was the whole entotirage of San Sebastian in front. Chubillo was at our feet ; the eye ranged round the grand sweep of the Concha to the city, where the sharp divi- sion between the old and the new towns was marked by the dark masses of trees along the Alameda ; beyond uprose the white breakers of the Zurriola, with the sea outside tinged for at least half a mile by the sand-laden waters of the Urumea ; still farther beyond lay the quiet bay of Pasages, and the church and houses of Lezo, and Ulia, and the whole long ridge of Jaizqui- bel with its crest of towers ; the slopes of wood and pasture dotted with white dwellings, rising back from the Urumea ; the lofty, undulating summits bounding the horizon ; then, coming round again to the right, the eye was caught by San Marco's bastions frowning over the valley of Oyarsun, and by Santa Barbara, with its rocky palisades, looking protectingly down on Hernani. Having made the circuit of the mountain, we descended by paths lined with the beautiful red bruy^re, the fragrant anise, and the wild, spicy 152 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. pink ; among trees of apple, pear, peach, nec- tarine and fig, and down through a farm-yard and orchard to Antigua, the suburb of San Sebastian, where the tall chimneys announce the cement-factory and the glass-works, in which latter, it is said, about six thousand bottles of all shapes and sizes are daily produced. From mountain-glory to glass and mortar is somewhat of a leap ; nevertheless, having taken the leap and alighted among the factories, I may close this chapter with a few words about the manufactures of this little province. Those who have been wont to regard this corner of Spain as the home of a semi-barbarous race, unworthy a traveller's notice, would be surprised at the number and variety of the industries which are plied in these quiet valleys. Tolosa manufac- tures cloth, paper, straw fabrics, Basque caps, flour, copper boilers, leather, and carriages. Along with Irun, Pasages, Hernani, Arechava- leta, Fuenterrabia, Onate, Villafranca, Villareal, and Zumarraga, it represents Lucifer in the fab- rication of matches, the consumption of which, by this nation of smokers, is enormous. Azpei- The Hill' Country, 153 tia, like Renteria, Andoain, Lasarte, Villa- bona, and Zarauz, furnishes linen, and adds thereto nails and fire-arms. The latter are also made at Eibar, Plasencia, and Elgoibar. La- sarte and Beasain contain iron-foundries ; the lead-works overlook Pasages ; the rumble of flour-mills ascends from Lasarte, Andoain, Ur- nieta, Usurbil, Tolosa, and Mondragon ; while Ibarra offers pianos to the Muses, and sends up the odors of leather to mingle with those from Tolosa, Legazpia, Mondragon, and Onate. Be- sides the cement- and glass-factories, San Sebas- tian contains a lithographic establishment, brew- eries, manufactories of paper, sulphuric acid, soap and candles, lead pipes, hats, cigars, and chemicals. Homeward through Antigua. The setting sun throws Igueldo into sharp outline, and, to a good eye, the stone cross is distinctly visible. The soldiers are slowly defiling from the parade ground. The sound of the accordeon from the midst of a crowd gathered in front of a little inn, indicates that the dance is in full career ; and behold, here is our long and solemn friend 154 -^^ i^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. again, capering and snapping his fingers with his wonted gravity. Up, under the circular rifle- tower, with its narrow loopholes, and past the little Church of Antigua, and along the terrace overlooking the beach, where two priests are walking in grave conference, and a nurse is lead- ing some pretty children to peep over the para- pet. The voice of the sea welcomes us home, and we hurry down to the beach to throw our- selves into the arms of the glorious surf, and to lie cradled on the sunset-tinted waves. A zpe itia and L oyola. 155 CHAPTER XIII. AZPEITIA AND LOYOLA. " Yet hath Pamplona seen, in former time, A moment big with mightier consequence. Affecting many an age and distant clime. That day it was which saw in her defence, Contending with the French before her wall, A noble soldier of Guipuzcoa fall, Sore hurt, but not to death. For when long care Restored his shattered leg, and set him free. He would not brook a slight deformity, As one who, being gay and debonnair, In courts conspicuous as in camps must be : So he, forsooth, a shapely boot must wear ; And the vain man, with peril of his life. Laid the recovered limb again beneath the knife. Long time upon the bed of pain he lay, Whiling with books the weary hours away ; And from that circumstance and this vain man A train of long events their course began, Whose term it is not given us yet to see." — SouTHEV : Tale of Paraguay. COFFEE was served early this morning, while the surf-swept rocks at the foot of Chubillo were yet in shadow. The promenade overlooking the bathing pavilions was almost deserted ; the barge with its platforms and streamers was leisurely getting into position 156 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. for the day ; the red and yellow flags along the deep water line flapped lazily in the light morn- ing wind, and a solitary bather's head appeared amid the listless breakers. Making our way to the railroad-station over the bridge of Santa Catalina and down the unshaded, dusty stretch along the Urumea, we caught the morning train for Madrid, and a charming ride of about an hour, aflbrding fine views of Hernani and Andoain, brought us to Tolosa. The station is at considerable distance from the town, and we walked down the long street, passing the ball- court, and stopping just outside the city gate to examine a clumsy old church with a great porch, on one end of which was painted a warn- ing against playing ball on the consecrated ground. It proved to be a miserable, tawdry aflair within. A chapel near the entrance con- tained a hideous death's-head with an inscrip- tion which recalled the one so often seen in New England churchyards : ' ' As you are now so once was I ; As I am now so you must be." A zpeitia and Loyola. 157 In the open space before the church some sol- diers were lounging ; a long, low building bore the sign Posada Americana; (American, in Spain, being always understood of South America) and a fountain in front of the city gate splashed and dripped with a pleasant sound in the quiet air. A long, narrow, dark street, presenting the usual characteristics of Basque towns, led past the busy market-place to an open square, where was the Hotel Mendia and the stage office, and where we applied in vain for a carriage to Az- peitia. The official, however, directed us to a place not far from the entrance of the town, where we found an old, bare-legged woman sweeping the stairs, by whom a man was sum- moned who agreed to provide us a vehicle. Strolling forth into the street, we encountered the public crier beating his drum and making proclamations which seemed to suggest coffee to J- , for he forthwith led the way through a dry-goods store and up a flight of stairs, into a small room which displayed a table covered with a soiled red cloth, some flowers in vases, two guitars hanging against the wall, some 158 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. maps, and a picture of a famous giant, wearing a prodigious cocked hat. There was also a photograph of a company of young men with guitars in their hands. It was formerly a cus- tom for Spanish students, in their vacations, to travel with their guitars as itinerant musicians, living on what might be given them for their music. The custom, which had declined, was subsequently revived ; and one company hav- ing visited Paris, was received with great en- thusiasm and gave a series of highly successful entertainments. This led to the formation of a regular society, or musical student-guild. Coffee appeared after reasonable delay, and having partaken and descended to the street, we found a comfortable coach with a team of stout mules, and a lithe, good-natured young fellow perched upon the box. Tolosa lies in the midst of a fine mountain amphitheatre on the left bank of the little river Oria. Its foundation dates back to about 121 5. In the fourteenth century it was the political centre of twenty-four *' localities" of the prov- ince, and, being strongly walled, was the ar- A 2peztta and Loyola, 159 senal of Guipuzcoa. Its original walls were destroyed in the fifteenth century, in order to enlarge their compass. It was at its best in that century, and took an active part in the wars with France. Gradually its forces dimin- ished, its dependencies became autonomous, and at the end of the eighteenth century it was only a little town without any distinctive in- dustry, and a kind of tributary to San Sebas- tian. In the civil war from 1833 to 1840, it fell into the hands of the Carlists, was evacu- ated by the liberals in 1874, and was the resi- dence of Don Carlos and his court until 1876. Tolosa was the scene, in 1840, of the abdication of Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, who, after having been beaten in the battle of Novara by Radetzki, passed through Tolosa in disguise on his way to Portugal. An accident prevented him from continuing his journey, and the same evening he was met by General La Marmora and the Count of San Martino, who demanded and received his abdication, which was signed before the notary of Tolosa. In the last half century Tolosa has become a very important i6o In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, manufacturing town, its environs being occu- pied with paper, cotton, and woollen mills, and with foundries and workshops. The parish church of the seventeenth century, which we did not have time to visit, is said to be one of the finest in the province. Our road ran for awhile along the shaded Oria, and then began to ascend. The day was superb. Trees in abundance lined the track, chestnut, poplar, oak, ash, hazel, and now and then a fig. As we mounted, the backward view of the mountains around Tolosa was very striking, and soon Hernio rose on the right across the valley at our feet, over three thou- sand feet above the sea-level, an enormous mass of gray limestone with a tumor-like pro- jection on one end, its lower slopes wooded, but its crest bare and crowned with a cross. At its foot lay the little town of Albistur, just above which, on a spur of the mountain, my at- tention was drawn to a patch of ground which illustrated the careful cultivation practised in these mountain districts. It fairly bristled with rocks; but the whole space was nevertheless Azpeitia afid Loyola. i6i cafefully ploughed and sown, the furrows mak- ing a perfect labyrinth among the rocks. At this point we overtook a lean, seedy-look- ing little man, stripped to his shirt for walking, and bearing the mail, who asked for a '' hft," and, mounting beside the driver, rode for some distance. After he had alighted, the driver ob- served that he was a poet, and wrote canzoni. J remarked that he was rather leaUy to which coachy sententiously replied, "Like all poets." Not far from Albistur stood a house with an in- scription to the effect that Don Valentin de Olano, "glory of Guipuzcoa," eminent as an orator and defender of the fueros, died there suddenly on June 27, 1851. Hernio constantly asserted himself, his tumor becoming more pronounced as we advanced. When we came to descending ground, our driver employed an original species of brake, — nothing more nor less than a pair of old alpargatas, or cloth san- dals, which he said took better hold than the ordinary brake. Now, coming toward us over the hill in front, appeared a party of peasant-women, driv- n 1 62 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, ing among them a donkey which would almost have gone into a good-sized overcoat-pocket, his panniers laden with enormous loaves of breati. Passing Bidain, we came to a halt at Goyaz, a hamlet consisting of about twenty houses ; the inn being designated by the green branches over the door. Near the entrance stood a huge stone trough, and on one side of the door, cut in the black limestone door- post, appeared a little holy-water vessel, its bowl inscribed with a crescent, and a cross above. The sound of church-bells echoed softly among the mountains. The little church-porch was a mere shed of rough beams and boards ; children were everywhere noticeable for the light color of their complexions, notwithstand- ing their habitual exposure to the sun. At the inn at Goyaz two dun cows were added to our team of mules, and after a steep and hard pull of a couple of miles, we came out at the summit of the pass upon a glorious pros- pect. Below, in the valley, lay the town of Regil, or Erregil, meaning, so the driver said, '* to kill easily ;" the spot being the scene of an A zpettza and Loyola. 163 ancient battle with the Romans. The sea of hills stretched away in front toward the ocean, which was hidden by the haze. In line with the break in the mountains which reveals the sea, rose the hermitage of Ingrazia on its steep height, and to the left the tremendous mass of Itzarraiz, bare, gray, savage, at the foot of which lies Azpeitia. Far behind were the heights of Aralar, and Hernio still refused to retire from view. The fresh, pure mountain air, laden with the sweet odors of the forest, stirred the blood like wine ; a hawk hung poised far up in the crystalline air ; the turquoise sky, the purple- gray masses of rock, the green, wooded slopes, the sun-saturated haze veiling the distant sea, the brown patches of tilled soil, the white dwell- ings clustered round the venerable church- towers — formed a scene in which the grandest outlines were offset by the richest and most varied contrasts and combinations of color. We went down between banks purple with bruyere, and through woods which revealed, under arches of ash-boughs, pleasant glimpses of fields and streams, until at our feet appeared 1 64 In the Shadoiv of the Pyrenees. Azpeitia, with Itzarrai'z in full view, and the dome of Loyola beyond the town. It was two o'clock when we reached the inn, and breakfast was doubly welcome under the stimulus of the mountain air ; after which, leaving J to ne- gotiate for transport to Zarauz, I made my way down the Calle Iglesia, between rows of work- men seated before their shops and weaving the soles of alpargatas with stout flaxen cord, to the church. It was by far the most pretentious building of this character I had seen in the province. Tradition asserts that it was built by the Templars. It is a mixture of Roman and Gothic, with a steeple tower, a very large porch, and with its portal wholly of jasper and granite. The ceiling rests on large columns ; the space beneath the choir is enclosed, forming a chapel, the sides of which are apparently of some highly polished stone, and the ceiling is very handsomely groined. The high altar is over- loaded with sculptures, and the font is exhibited in which Loyola received baptism. 'By the time I had completed my hurried visit and returned to the inn, J had suc- ^ # A zpeitia and Loyola. 165 ceeded in engaging an uninviting vehicle, to which a pair of mules was being attached ; and, with regrets for our comfortable Tolosan estab- lishment, we cHmbed into our places and es- sayed the heart-shaking, marrow-cleaving pave- ments of Azpeitia. The narrow street, with its grateful shade, soon debouched into a hot, un- sheltered road, with bare Itzarraiz blazing and glinting in the sun on the right, and the great dome of the Monastery of Ignatius Loyola di- rectly in front at the distance of about half a mile. In 1682, Anne of Austria, the mother of Charles the Second, undertook to erect a mon- astery and a college on this spot where Loyola was born ; but the work was prohibited by an interdict of Charles the Third. The casa solar — the house of his birth — passed by inheritance to the family of Alcanices y Oropesa, of whom Anne purchased it in 168 1, under the conditions that the house of Loyola should remain intact, that in the new edifice projected, suitable ac- commodations should be provided for the mar- quises of the family, and that the principal 1 66 l7t the Shadow of the Pyrenees. chapel in the church should be adorned with their arms and reserved for their sepulture. The work was begun in 1684, and slowly progressed until 1766. A fancy of the same kind which has discov- ered the figure of a gridiron in the outlines of the Escorial, has described the bird's-eye view of the Monastery of Loyola as representing an eagle with outstretched wings ; the chapel and peristyle forming the head, and the buildings of the convent and seminary the two wings. The effect of the central mass of buildings, which is rather imposing by reason of the great dome and the rich sculpture of the fagade, is marred by the unfinished wings. A broad marble stair- case of two stages mounts between a pair of defaced stone lions to the peristyle, which pre- sents a semicircular front of marble almost black, relieved by Corinthian columns and a richly sculptured frieze, and pierced by three door- ways with round arches, and with the royal es- cutcheon of Castile and Leon over the cen- tral opening. The ample vestibule into which the door opens is embellished with cheap, Azpeitia and Loyola. 167 plaster statues of Loyola, Xavier, and other worthies of the Society of Jesus ; while the Virgin-mother, flanked by two cherubs, is en- throned above the door which opens into the church. The general plan of the church within is that of a square, with the dome directly over the centre, and the high-altar facing the entrance. This altar is distinguished by a shrine of marble mosaic containing a figure of the Virgin, which is bathed in a soft, rich glow by means of crim- son curtains arranged in a window behind it. Everywhere marble, marble, cold, pitiless mar- ble, of all conceivable colors and combined in an infinite variety of patterns. Each altar is a new achievement of patience and ingenuity. The most voluminous draperies would scarcely dissipate the sense of coldness and hardness which asserts itself above all the riches of color and gilding, and is rendered even more oppres- sive by the warm, rosy atmosphere which en- velops the Virgin. On all the rigid marble lines pours down a flood of white, glaring light from the great dome, round the base of which 1 68 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, runs a cornice resting on white marble brack- ets, and which is decorated with shocking taste. The choir is over the main entrance, where the organ seems to have found room with some difficulty. From the vestibule a door on one side opens into an arched passage, one side of which is formed by the house of Loyola, built of rough brick, and bearing over the door the inscription, in gold letters on a black marble slab, Casa SO- LAR DE Loyola. Aqui nacio S. Ignacio en 149 1. Aqui visitado por S. Pedro y la S. S. ViRGEN, se entrego i. Dios EN 1 52 1.' An- other slab bears the family escutcheon of Loyola, two dogs or wolves disputing over a cauldron suspended by a chain. No officials or attend- ants were to be seen anywhere. The profound- est silence reigned over the whole establish- ment. Entering by another door into a hall where there was a small chapel at the foot of the ^ Family house of Loyola. Here Saint-Ignacio was born in 1491. Here, having been visited by Saint-Peter and by the most Holy Virgin, he gave himself to God in 1521. A zpeitia and Loyola. 169 stairs, we mounted the staircase, pausing for a moment to look at a revolting picture of the crucifixion over the first landing. The Savior's form was draped in a kind of petticoat, from the waist nearly to the ankles ; and the heads of the nails in the feet were as large as a quarter of a dollar. The staircase led to an apartment on the second floor, two sides of which were occupied by a row of confessionals, while behind a railing on another side were three chapels, one of them containing in a glass case a mask of Loyola. On the story above, the stairway ended in a broad landing, the ceiling of which was covered with gaudy frescoes. A door near the head of the stairs opened into a chapel, little higher than a man's head, and with the ceiling covered with sculp- tures in wood representing scenes in the life of Loyola. The three altars, encrusted with sil- ver, were behind a railing which reached to the ceiling ; and the whole enclosed space was kept in subdued, rosy light by means of crim- son curtains. From within the railing a door opened into an inner chapel. In the outer 170 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. apartment, Saint-Peter and the Virgin are said to have appeared to Ignacio while recovering from his wound received at Pamplona. Two women kneeled or sat in reverent silence by the railing. With all the stony splendors of the church, and the elaborate and costly adornments of this chapel, the effect was more than tawdry and vulgar. It went deeper than that to one who knew the history of the remarkable order which it represented. It carried with it the sense of a strong, pitiless hand laid upon the breast. To a man fresh from the great world of outspoken thought, from the robust contact of men, and the healthful clash of opinion — to one with the free breath of the glorious mountains yet in his nostrils and the salt of the ocean-spray scarce gone from his lips — this place was like a prison and a baby-house combined. The subtle, pas- sionless, inexorable policy of the order seemed to have infused itself into the atmosphere. Though no warden appeared, and no attendant followed the visitor through the desolate halls, one might well feel as though a wary eye saw every movement from some secret spying-place, Azpeitia and Loyola, I'/i and that the very walls conveyed each word to a practised ear. The remorseless, passive final- ity darkly hinted in the initials over the en- trance, P. A. C.,^ might well make it a relief to bound down those marble steps and turn the back upon the source of the most consummate piece of devilish ingenuity that ever wrought to corrupt the human soul, to dwarf and per- vert the human intellect, or to menace the most precious institutions of society. The entire right wing, as one faces the build- ing, is unfinished — an unsightly mass of stone. A part of the fagade of the left wing is merely a wall built in front of the house of Loyola, and the remainder of the wing is occupied for mo- nastic and school purposes. A small hotel ad- joins the monastery, (i) Returning to Azpeitia, our mules were ex- changed for horses, and moving slowly out of the square before the inn, under a volley of stares from the neighboring Casino, we rattled ^ Perinde ac Cadaver — "just like a corpse" — a terrible ex- pression of the utter, passive submission which the Jesuit vows to the superiors of his order. 172 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. through the main street and emerged upon the road to Zarauz. The Urola, with its pleasantly- shaded banks and neat, arched bridges, was on our right, while high, wooded slopes rose di- rectly from the roadside on our left. Now we plunge into the shadow of Erlo's high, bare, pyramidal peak, and race down hill and over a fine bridge into Cestona, with its mineral springs, looking out from its little promontory upon the valley of the Urola and across to mountains studded with treasures of rock-crys- tal, jasper, and marble. The convalescents gathered in front of the bathing-houses rouse themselves from their afternoon lounge at the noise of our rattling chariot. The road turns off to the right and follows the right bank of the Urola to Oiquina, from which it mounts over a steep hill commanding one of the finest val- ley-views in the whole province, and then de- scends by a long series of zigzags. The sea flashes into view between the headlands, pleas- ant villas appear on each side, and we dash, at six o'clock, into the public square of Zarauz, one of the oldest towns of Guipuzcoa, and built Azpeitia and Loyola. i "j^^ at the head of a beautiful bay. Our team is changed again. This time it is a mixtOy that is to say, a horse and a mule; and, judgi;ng from the frequent and vigorous applications of the whip to the unfortunate mule, the combina- tion would not seem to be a happy one. The young driver handles his whip with such a breezy looseness, and with such a profusion of flour- ishes, that it becomes necessary to remind him that his team and not his passengers are the proper subjects for flagellation, and that two pairs of eyes are in some peril from his graceful backstrokes. As we leave the town we catch a backward view of the bay of Zarauz with its odd, saddle-back promontory, and a short ride brings us to the bank of the Orio, where a fine bridge is being constructed ; but, pending its completion, we must rely on the clumsy barge, pulled across by ropes, for our ferriage to the dirty little fishing-town of Orio. Our mixto has given place to two good horses, and our lumbering Azpeitian car to a light basket-phae- ton. Orio is left behind ; Mount Hernio is in view on the right, glorious with rosy sunset 1 74 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. clouds ; the moon is up, and hangs in purple haze over the mountains as we speed along the Orio through Aguinagua and Usurbil, until Chubillo looms darkly up, and we catch the gleam from Santa Clara and the lights of San Sebastian. Sprhigs and Chateaux, 175 CHAPTER XIV. SPRINGS AND CHATEAUX. " I'll show thee the best springs." — SfiAKSPEAKE. GUIPUZCOA might be supposed, from the previous pages, to be little short of a paradise. But every Eden has its serpent ; and though this province is not a territor}'' of snakes, its capital city, at least, bears away the palm for fleas. I am morally convinced that the Cantabrian coast is the primitive home of the flea, and that the first created flea jumped on the Cantabrian sands when the morning-stars sang together. He partakes of the hardy, en- terprising, indomitable character of the other Cantabrians. Like the Basque mountaineer, the Basque flea has successfully resisted the en- ervating influences of modern civilization. He feeds his strength and renews his youth on the blood of the Anglo-Saxon ; but this modern 176 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. infusion does not tend in the least to abate either his ferocity or his venom. He develops the stealthy caution of a Vidocq, the dan of a chasseur of the Old Guard, and the remorse- lessness of a Nana Sahib. Seriously, this is the one drawback to the pleasure of a summer on the Cantabrian coast, except to those happily constituted, insensate cuticles on which the poison produces no effect. If then the victim, wearied out with the ever renewed and fruitless hunt for these little de- mons, and sore with daily and nightly excoria- tions, resolves to fold his tent and silently steal away, he is still not absolutely sure of getting away when he will. Spanish rail- way travel involves possibilities for which the stranger, whose ideas of railroading have been formed in England, or America, or France, will scarcely be prepared. For ex- ample, having come from Bayonne one day to San Sebastian for a brief visit, I arranged to return by a train advertised to leave at four o'clock, which would bring me back about dusk. On applying at the station I was re- springs and Chateaux, 177 fused a ticket, on the ground that the train was already full ; and had the mortification of see- ing it move off before my eyes. The next and only train being a slow one, and stopping an hour or more at the frontier, I reached Bayonne half an hour before midnight, much to the re- lief of two frightened daughters. Of course I telegraphed, but the operator left out the im- portant part of the despatch — the hour of my arrival, besides misspelling both the name and the address. Back at Bayonne again. A man who, firmly entrenched in his apartment, has calmly sur- veyed for several weeks the repulse of new ar- rivals from the over-full hotel, is naturally a little chagrined, on returning to his old haunts, to find himself a new arrival and repulsed. Nevertheless, the Saint-fitienne was full. Mad- ame B was inconsolable but helpless. How- ever, she despatched Monsieur B to see what could be done, who returned in a few minutes saying he had secured a room for me down a neighboring street ; and that matter being disposed of, I was at liberty to repair to 12 178 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. the pink-flowered dining-room, and to receive the hearty greetings of my keen-eyed Httle gargon, and indulge in the leisurely comfort of dinner ; only it was strange to sit there alone, without the two dear, bright young faces which had borne me company there for a month. I was off for a fortnight's trip in the higher Pyrenees, a plan which, as the event proved, was utterly defeated by the incessant rains. But, being again in Bayonne, I would not lose the opportunity to visit Cambo, one of the cele- brated v/atering-places of the Basque country, which abounds in mineral springs. Besides those at Cestona, referred to in the previous chapter, there are the waters of Santa Agueda near Mondragon in the southwestern corner of Guipuzcoa ; the sulphuro-saline springs at Are- chavaleta, where are also iron springs ; with others at Cortezubi, Zaldivar, and elsewhere. Cambo, one of the most charming of these re- sorts, is situated on the Nive, about two hours by carriage from Bayonne. The road, issuing from the Porte d'Espagne, turns to the left past a fine hospital founded by M. Lormand, " the springs and Chateaux. 179 benefactor of Bayonne." Just beyond this, some gray stone ruins appear, crowning a little eminence and surrounded with fine shade- trees. These are the remains of the Chateau de Marrac, built in 1707 by the widow of Charles the Second of Spain, Anne, who refused to live there because one of her maids of honor had occupied an apartment before her. In 1808, Napoleon, then maturing his great scheme, the prologue of which was the occupation of the Spanish throne by his brother Joseph, pur- chased the chateau as a convenient place from which to conduct his Spanish affairs in person. Here he received Charles the Fourth and Fer- dinand the Seventh. Here were signed the abdication of Ferdinand and the cession of all rights by Charles ; and from this spot Joseph departed for Spain to assume his throne. The chateau was finally burned, at the instigation of the English, it is said, in 1825. The road, skirting the outworks of the forti- fications of Bayonne, passes through Ustaritz, once the capital of the viscount of Labourd, and one of the ancestral council-centres of the i8o In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. Basques, who met for their deliberations under the ancient oaks. The place retains many of its Basque characteristics, though modern innova- tion is apparent, especially in the church, which is a new Gothic structure in very marked con- trast to the churches of the Basque villages gen- erally. On the hills little groups of white houses are perched amid orchards. The shade becomes denser as the road descends toward the river, past the seminary of Laressore on its high, walled terrace lined with poplars, and between lines of chestnut and oak to Cambo, which con- sists of two parts : Bas Cambo, on the bank'of the Nive, which here describes a semicircle, and Haut Cambo, on a terrace two or three hundred feet above the river on one of the but- tresses of Mount Ursouya. The waters of Cambo are charged with both sulphur and iron. Their use can be traced back to 1635 ; and the thermal establishment was founded by a royal ordinance in 1819. A su- perstition prevails throughout the country that if one drinks of these waters on the twenty-third of June, the eve of \\\.^ fete of John the Baptist, springs and Chateaux. i8i he is insured against sickness for a year ; and accordingly, on that day, there is a great as- semblage of Basques, and music and dancing of course. The brow of the terrace is crowned by the excellent hotel Saint-Martin, from the wide piazza of which a fine view is obtained of the beautiful valley of the Nive. While await- ing lunch, I strolled down the shaded road to Bas Cambo, and found myself in a sweet little Vallombrosa — a shaded opening surrounded by a group of neat houses, and flanked on one side by the well-appointed bathing establishment, near which a pretty suspension-bridge spanned the shallow, brawling river ; while along the stream ran an avenue of arching trees, to a white portico covering a stone basin into which the water of an iron-spring poured through a pipe. The path, stretching on beyond until it was lost in the thick wood, offered a strong temptation to prolong my walk ; but the omi- nous muttering of thunder and the gathering gloom of a summer shower, drove me back to the hotel, none too quickly ; for the refresh- ing deluge speedily broke and came down, 1 82 In the Shadow of the Pyi^enees. delightfully cooling the air for the homeward ride. The next morning found me on the early- train for Pau ; my only companion in the car- riage being a young Frenchman, who was very communicative, and bent on disposing of tickets for an approaching/"^/^ at Biarritz. The scenery along the route is decidedly tame. The road follows the Adour for some distance, through monotonous plains planted with maize, poplars, willows, and elms. A pretty, wooded bend in the stream appears near Urt, at the embouchure of the Joyeuse or Aran, along the left bank of which the train runs for awhile and then crosses the Bidouze a little way from its junction with the Adour. After leaving Urt, the mountain horizon-line of the higher Pyrenees begins to be seen on the right ; low hills rise on either side of the road, and the ruined chateau of Guiche appears above the village of that name. Now the train crosses the Bee de Gave. Ten minutes at Peyrehorade, where the chief industry is said to be the making of fish-lines ; and in ■ truth the sleepy-looking town is strongly suggestive springs and Chateaux. 183 of ** the contemplative man's recreation." Now- past the crumbling tower of the Chateau d'As- premont on the left, and then comes Labatut with its donjon-keep, and the high, tiled roofs of Puyoo where we meet the train from Dax, and, across the Gave, Bellocq, with the six tow- ers of its great chateau, of which M. Ferret says that he knows only two or three feudal edifices as large in all France, (i) Baigts, the next sta- tion, is thus summarily dismissed by Joanne : ** Baigts a une population de looi habitants. C'est tout ce qu'on peut en dire." Only think of that odd one. Next, Orthez, formerly the seat of a Calvinist university where Theodore Beza w^as professor. When the town was car- ried by assault under the Protestant General Montgomery, the story runs that the Gave was tinged with blood, and that the soldiers, tearing open the tombs, played at skittles with the skull of Gaston Phoebus. Here the river cuts its way through a mass of rocks which it has chiseled into fantastic shapes, and is spanned by a fine bridge, carried high above its bed on four noble ogivai arches. From the middle of 184 /^2 the Shadow of the Pyrenees. the bridge rises a slender hexagonal tower, with a pointed roof, and a window about half way up, where it is said that the Calvinists, at the capture of Orthez, placed a number of priests, giving them their choice between the pikes of the soldiers in the rear, and a leap into the stream in front. The window is known as la fenetre des pretres. The Pyrenees are now well up on the horizon, the sharp tooth of the Pic du Midi d'Ossau as- serting itself strongly above the blue serrated ridge. Argagon, Lacq, Artix, Lescar, follow in quick succession, and then Pau. There is a flashing glimpse of a great bridge. A wide plain with a shoal-flecked river is on the right, and on the left a long terrace, more than a hun- dred feet above the river, on which are perched a strange, vast structure with a crown of pointed tower-roofs and battlements, and a line of great hotels. The omnibus from the Hotel de France toils slowly up the zigzag road, and brings us out upon the Place Royale, a fine, open square, commanding the valley of the Gave and the distant Pyrenees, and containing a springs and Chdteattx. 185 marble statue of Henry the Fourth — Henry of Navarre — standing erect, with the right hand extended and the left resting on the sword-hilt. I shall not attempt a description of Pau. It is not unfamiHar ground to tourists, and in truth there is little to describe in the city itself. As a city it is one of the tamest and most doleful places conceivable. With the single exception of the Chateau, it does not contain a noteworthy building. The churches are so commonplace that one is not even at pains to remember their names. There is a Casino, remarkable chiefly for the splendid prospect it commands ; a Palais de Justice, and a Caserne, said to be one of the largest in France. After a long drive through the streets and in the suburbs, one returns with a general impression of a pale, gray, monoto- nous town — its distinctive traits diluted by its accommodation to English tastes — and an end- less succession of villas. The charms of Pau consist, as most readers know, in its delicious winter climate, its magnificent mountain-view, ^nd the social gayeties which attend the annual 1 86 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, sojt>urn of the three thousand or more EngHsh visitors from October to May. Henry of Navarre is the tutelary genius of the place, and the chateau which bears his name is the real gem of the town. Tradition says that the Ossalois, the ancient proprietors' of this part of France, gave to some Merovingian viscounts the ground for a chateau, the boundaries of which were marked by ^xqq, pieux or stakes. In the Bearnais dialect pieu is paii^ and hence the chateau was called Castet du Paii, the name passing from it to the town. Erected on the western end of the great terrace, where it slopes down to a pretty, w^ooded park, it is a mass of buildings of different dates, the whole forming an isosceles triangle with the base toward the east. A broad ditch separates the promontory on which it stands from the main terrace. Crossing this by a bridge which bears the name of Louis the Thirteenth, we enter the triangular court un- der a richly sculptured portico of marble, on the left of which rises the most remarkable feature of the building — the square donjon-tower erected by Gaston Phoebus in the fourteenth century. springs and Chateaux, 187 Its walls are seven feet thick, and its crenelated top is a hundred and twelve feet from the pave- ment. At its foot is a small modern chapel, with a window behind the altar representing the adoration of the Magi, after Zurbaran. Di- rectly opposite rises the tower of Montaiiset or Monte-Oiseau, so called because the ascent within was by means of ladders which could be drawn up after mounting. A fascinating mystery invests this structure, which originally seems to have had no opening in its walls, the gate at the bottom having been broken through in 1793 when the castle was sacked by the Rev- olutionists ; and dark hints of torture and of hideous, lonely imprisonment attach to the seven or eight straitened dungeons or oubliettes which have been found within the thickness of the walls. Round the triangular court the roofs rise steeply, faced with elaborately-carved dormers. Entering by a small door at the western end, we turn into the salle des gardes^ a large hall with a groined .ceiling and an immense fire-place ; thence into the officers' dining room, containing 1 88 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. statues of Henry the Fourth and Sully. Ad- joining is the grand salle a manger, eighty-five feet in length, its ceiling of dark wood, gilded, and the walls hung with Gobelin tapestry repre- senting hunting scenes. Then comes the grand staircase, where the groined ceiling bears at the intersections the initials of Henry and Margaret of Valois, and glimpses of the distant Pyrenees are caught through the deep embrasures of the windows. A succession of apartments follows, filled with carved bedsteads, tapestries, chests, cabinets, chairs, sculptured mantels and Sevres vases. The interest culminates in the chamber where Henry the Fourth first saw the light in 1553, and where hangs the royal cradle under a canopy — a single tortoise-shell suspended from a tripod. Another room contains Gobelins, after Teniers, representing peasants dancing ; and in another is the bed of Louis the Fourteenth, cov- ered with rich tapestry embroidered by the ladies of Saint-Cyr, under the direction of Madame de Maintenon. It is wearisome work at best, this defiling through a series of rooms with a score or so of springs and Chateaux. 189 people, and an attendant speaking his little piece in each apartment. It was a relief to descend into the park and leisurely inspect the huge, quaint old structure through the overarching trees. The front, with its twin peaked towers, presents a charming effect at the end of the per- spective of boughs. But the crowning charm of Pau, after all, is furnished neither by history nor by art, but by nature. The view from the terrace is a dream of beauty ; one of those scenes which always emerges in sharp outline out of the crowding reminiscences of travel. It recalls the prospect from the Schanzli at Bern, yet it differs widely from that, both in detail and in general effect. At Bern, the eye does not leap at once to the mountains, but is caught and stayed half way by the bright little city with its towers and terraces and masses of shade. There, moreover, the undertone of the scene is imparted by the contrast of the eternal snows with the fresh green of summer. Here the more genial sun banishes perpetual snow to a height of nine thousand feet ; so that now, in the late summer, the woody slopes beyond the Gave shade off 190 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, into the blue ridges which cut the sky in longer and less serrated lines than those of the Bernese range. Out from these lines abruptly leaps the Pic du Midi d'Ossau, with its sharp, blue cone, over nine thousand feet above the sea-level. Farther to the east appears the Pic du Midi de Bigorre. There is an element of sternness in the Swiss scene which is wanting here. There, a dead-line seems to bar all communion between the lower lands and the lonely ice-peaks ; while here, the Spanish mountains, their tender blue softened by the summer haze or deepened into violet by the sunset, never appear to lose their sympathy or their contact with the green up- lands which climb to meet them. Can I better close this chapter than by quoting the exquisite description of M. Taine, already familiar to so many readers? **The current of the river sparkles like a girdle of jewels ; the chains of hills, yesterday veiled and damp, extend at their own sweet will beneath the warming, penetrating rays, and mount, range upon range, to spread out their green robe to the sun. In the distance the blue Pyrenees look like a bank of clouds ; springs and Chateaux, 191 the air that bathes them shapes them into aerial forms, vapory phantoms, the farthest of which vanish in the evanescent horizon — dim contours, that might be taken for a fugitive sketch from the lightest of pencils. In the midst of the serrate chain the peak du Midi d Ossau lifts its abrupt cone ; at this distance, forms are soft- ened, colors are blended, the Pyrenees are only the graceful bordering of a smiling landscape and of the magnificent sky. There is nothing imposing about them nor severe ; the beauty here is serene, and the pleasure pure." 192 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, CHAPTER XV. LOURDES. " In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water."— Saint- John. THE Pic du Midi shook himself clear from the heavy clouds for a few minutes this morning, by way of informing us that he was still there, and then resigned himself once more to the embrace of the mists which concealed his brethren. To the sight, at least, the French mon- arch's words, *^ There shall be no Pyrenees," were realized. Above, it was an all-day fight between the sun and the clouds. An occasional gleam of sunshine and patch of blue sky awakened hopes which collapsed each time as a fresh mass of huge clouds rolled up and delivered its burden of rain. I strolled about the town, wrote letters, and watched the heavens until four o'clock in the afternoon, when it became evident that the day was going against the sun ; and reluctantly Lourdes, 193 giving up the ride to Eaux Bonnes, I started for Lourdes, and arrived there about six o'clock. The story of Lourdes has become famihar to Christendom. From an obscure, shabby moun- tain town, it has blossomed out, within twenty- five years, into a centre of devotion and pil- grimage worthy to be named with Loretto or Compostella. The story, briefly told, is this : In the winter of 1858, Bernadette Soubirous, a feeble, asthmatic child of fourteen, and daughter of a poor peasant of Lourdes, was sent one day to the rocks of Massavielle, on the outskirts of the village, to gather fuel. Having wandered away from her companions to the entrance of a grotto in the side of the rock, she suddenly heard, as she declared, the sound of rushing wind, and, at the same moment, beheld, in a niche in the grotto, a beautiful woman in a white robe and veil and a blue girdle, and holding in her hands a glittering rosary terminating in a golden cross. The apparition w^as seen by her, as she claimed, eighteen times within five months, but by her alone ; for though thousands were drawn by her story to visit the grotto, the 13 194 ^^ ^-^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. vision did not appear to them. From time to time the child brought messages from the ap- parition to her priest ; one, to the effect that he should cause a church to be built on the hill over the grotto, and another that the lady of the vision was immaculately conceived. The cure, like another Gideon, demanded a sign ; no less than that the wild eglantine overhanging the rock should blossom with roses. This sign was refused, but another was vouchsafed. At one of her appearances the vision commanded Ber- nadette to eat some grass growing in a corner of the grotto, and to dig a hole in the ground. Thereupon a stream of water issued forth, and flowed outward to the entrance of the cave. The spring increased in volume. Soon it was noised abroad that it possessed healing virtue. Crowds began to flock to the spring ; the Bishop of Tarbes issued a solemn mandate declaring the miracle authentic. A church was begun over the grotto, completed in 1876, and conse- crated on the first and second of July of that year, on which occasion thirty-five archbishops and bishops, with the Cardinal- Archbishop of Lourdes, 195 Paris and the papal nuncio, assisted in the cere- monies. Bernadette, who to the end of her Hfe continued to affirm the truth of her story, soon began to decline in health, and repaired to the Ursuline Convent at Nevers, where she died a few years ago. It is this story of a sickly and ignorant child which has lifted Lourdes from its obscurity into the position of one of the great religious centres of Roman Catholic Christen- dom. Marvellous as the volume of the sacred fountain is said to be, it is surpassed by the streams of pilgrims which meet there from every part of Europe and from America. During the first six months, one hundred and fifty thousand people are said to have visited the grotto. A friend at Pau told me that, only a few days be- fore, an immense company from Scotland had passed through that town on their way to Lourdes. In summer, trains de piete are run for pilgrims, and a special entrance and exit are reserved for them at the railroad station ; while around the grotto and church has arisen, as by magic, a circle of convents, shelters for pilgrims, and retreats for devotees. 196 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. The omnibus, lumbering up a wide street, past a venerable church, and under the shadow of the ancient and dismal castle, deposited me in due time under the archway of the Hotel des Pyrenees, where I was installed in a stuffy little chamber ; and having seen my belongings be- stowed therein, I sallied out at once ; and after losing my way twice at least, finally reached, through some very crooked streets, the scene of the miracle and the centre of devotion. From the foot of the plateau on which the town is built, a plain, laid out in walks, and studded with trees, extends along the bank of the Gave. At the opposite end of this, perhaps two hun- dred feet from the river, and parallel with it, is a mass of rock, in the side of which is the grotto, while its summit is crowned with the graceful monumental church directly facing the city. Above this, again, rises another and higher ridge, and on the top of it an immense crucifix, to which a road is carried, along the side of the height toward the church, on enormous and carefully-laid masses of masonry. Close by the new stone bridge leading from the town to the Lourdes. 197 plain, appears a crucifix with the figures of two women at the foot, and near this a huge cross arranged with pipes and Httle glass lanterns for illumination. About the centre of the plain is the great statue of** Our Lady of Lourdes," also arranged for illumination, copies of which, of all sizes, are multiplied as numerously as were the silver models of Diana's temple at Ephesus, and are for sale everywhere. The statue professes to embody the vision of the Virgin as described by Bernadette. Her feet, on each of which is a full-blown rose, rest upon a rock encircled with a wreath of vines. From beneath her golden crown escapes a white veil, thrown back from her upturned face, and falling nearly to the hem of her white, closely-fitting robe, which is relieved by an ample blue scarf round the waist. Her hands are clasped, and from her right arm depends a rosary. Scores of people, with the yellow wooden rosaries purchased at the grotto wound round their hands or suspended from their necks, were returning to the town, some of them with help- less Hmbs and pale, suffering faces, wheeled in T98 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. perambulators, and others leaning upon the arm of a friend or servant. Going toward the grotto, I came suddenly, at a turn in the shaded path, upon a group of thirty or forty men and women, kneeling upon the ground in front of a rude wooden enclosure, over the door of which was a small statue of the Virgin. Among them were two priests and a capuchin friar, and all were praying audibly, with their open palms extended at their sides, their devotions being led by one of the priests, to whom they re- sponded as he read sentences from his breviary. Every eye was fastened upon the figure above the door, through which persons were contin- ually passing in and out ; not a person nor a circumstance in the passing crowds diverted their attention ; their whole demeanor indicated the most intense and absorbing devotion. A few steps beyond was a low building against the rock, the open door of which revealed piles of tin cans for the use of pilgrims in carrying away the water ; and to the wall was affixed an appeal to the faithful for contributions to maintain the supply of piscince. Close by was Lourdes. 199 a neat stone tank furnished with brass faucets, and bearing an inscription to the effect that the water from the grotto had been brought by- pipes to this spot ; and here a young priest, with his robe tucked up, and displaying a very shapely leg, was dispensing the water. Next, the grotto itself; a ragged hole in the rock, possibly twenty feet high at the entrance, which bristled with weather-beaten crutches and canes, the souvenirs of recovered cripples, and was surmounted with a rudely-arched niche con- taining a plaster figure of the Virgin, with the inscription Je sins V immaciile Conception. The interior was aglow with the light of candles, which mingled their unctuous drippings with the moisture continually trickling from the roof, and revealed a booth, close by the entrance, crowded with rosaries and similar knick-knacks. The sacred spring is covered with a wire net- work, and a crevice displayed a number of let- ters addressed to the Virgin. The paved space in front of the grotto, for some distance toward the river, was occupied by plain wooden benches, on which a number of people were seated, lis- 200 hi the Shadow of the Pyrenees. tening to a priest who was discoursing from a small, rude pulpit on the right of the entrance ; and mingled with these were others, standing or kneeling on the pavement. No kind of devo- tional demonstration attracted attention. Such things are the order of the place. Wheeled chairs were scattered everywhere ; people were continually passing in and out ; an aged man, moving his limbs with the utmost difficulty, was tenderly led within by a vigorous young woman on whose shoulder he leaned ; and a tall, digni- fied, middle-aged gentleman, with an ineffable blending of love, pity, and awe in his fine face, bore out in his arms a helpless lad, apparently of twelve or thirteen years. It was not a sight to move the mirth of the most skeptical. The evidences of suffering were too many and too real for that. There were no extravagant mani- festations, but everything proceeded in a quiet, almost business-like way ; while the genuine kindliness and hopeful sympathy which asserted themselves toward the sufferers, appealed to something far deeper than a difference of creed. It was growing dark as I walked round from Lourdes. 201 the grotto to the front of the church, and climbed the high flight of steps leading up to the entrance. The church consists of a single nave, with the choir at the farther extremity, from which radiate three apsides. Chapels, communi- cating with each other, line the aisle on both sides, and these, as well as the central arches and the clere story, are hung with votive offerings, including numerous embroidered banners pre- sented by prominent towns of France, Italy, and elsewhere, as well as by private families. Under the church is a crypt filled with similar objects. The winding street which led to the town from the church, was lined with booths and shops crammed with photographs, drinking- shells, images of the Lady of Lourdes of all sizes, some larger than life ; water-cans, plain and gilded ; crosses, and wooden rosaries. Two of the largest establishments bore the name of Soubirous, indicating that the family of the young visionary had not failed to reap material advantage, at least, from the saintly reputation of their kinswoman. The population of Lourdes evidently entertains no doubt that godhness has 502 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, " promise of the life that now is." Whatever may be thought of the miraculous virtue of the foun- tain, it is certain that the miracle has been the fountain-head of a lively trade. Saint-Peter can- not affirm here, as when he healed the cripple at the temple-gate : " Silver and gold have I none." Beggary is rampant, alike in the persons of the dirty vagabonds who whine for alms by the way- side, and of the plump Sisters of Charity who be- set the stranger at the grotto with polite appeals for contributions toward an infirmary or a chapel. Hardly was I seated at dinner when the dining- room was invaded by two of these ecclesiastical sirens in full costume, armed with subscription- books, who went the rounds of the table d'hote, not neglecting the guests at the private tables. Dinner over, I jumped into one of the numer- ous hacks about the hotel door, and was whirled, at a somewhat alarming pace, back to the bank of the Gave, toward which the stream of people was already setting. The statue in the middle of the plain now appeared under a mimic grotto of lights ; the great cross near the bridge was ablaze ; the entrance to the church was illumin- Lourdes. 203 ated by a star of gas-jets, while the ** light, aerial gallery " round its base ** burnt like a fringe of fire." The gates of the grotto were closed ; the interior glittered with the light from countless candles, and on the broad area in front was gathered a momently increasing crowd, standing, walking, filling the benches, kneeling on the pavement, and lining the stone parapet along the river. Almost every person bore a long, lighted taper, with a funnel of paper round the top to protect the flame. The night was dark and windless, and at intervals a few stars succeeded in break- ing through the clouds. Out of the flood of light round the grotto rose the vast, buttressed wall which supports the platform of the church, to the gallery, where the row of lights along the balustrade brought out vaguely a priest's face here and there turned downward upon the crowd, and threw into deeper shadow the dim outlines of the church far above. Only the murmur of the Gave and the subdued hum of conversation broke the silence, until suddenly 204 Ifi the Shadow of the Pyrenees. a voice near the grotto struck the first notes of a hymn, and in a moment the strain was taken up by hundreds of voices, and, # " Like circles widening round Upon a clear blue river,'* the melody rolled outward from the grotto, over plain and stream, to the mountains. People came hurrying up by twos and threes, striking into the song as they came within hearing ; and no sooner was it finished than another was be- gun and taken up as before. The effect, under the still night and in the open air, was superb : there was a contagion in it which I could not resist, and I joined in myself. The melodies were all of a very simple and popular character, like the Moody and Sankey tunes. Meanwhile a priest had mounted the little pulpit, and reading his text by the light of a candle which some one held for him, proceeded to deliver a sermon. Not being in a homiletic mood, I walked back into the shadow of the trees, deepened by the flood of light around the grotto, and on to where the Lady of Lourdes Lourdes. 205 stood alone in her illuminated bower, neglected for the time, for everybody was hurrying to the centre of attraction. I stepped for a moment into a large hall close by the river, lighted, and with some appointments of a chapel about it, though its special design I do not know ; but the music, breaking out afresh, quickly recalled me to the grotto, to the right of which I now observed a road ascending to the level of the church by two or three zigzags. The multitude was al- ready falling into line and beginning the ascent of these terraces, preceded by a great banner. They marched t^vo and two, men and women, each hand bearing a light and every voice join- ing in the hymn of praise to Mary. The line of light trailed upward, lengthening out behind the banner, and then doubled upon itself as the pro- cession turned up the second slope ; while below, couple after couple kept falling in, marshalled by gentlemanly young men, and swelling the chorus : "Ave! Ave! Ave Maria!" Going hastily round to the front of the church, I mounted the road which separates it from the 2o6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. high, rocky promontory overlooking it on the left, and met the procession as it emerged upon the plateau at the side of the church, throwing its high, white walls and round arches into strong light by the glare of hundreds of tapers. At this point the mass divided into two lines on opposite sides of the road, and remained stand- ing for some minutes, singing all the while ; and then, forming as before, they commenced the march up the second ascent toward the great cross which looks down upon the church and the valley. The red glow crept up the tall spire as the line of torches mounted — " In ordered files — One ever-lengthening line of gliding light," flashed upon the drops of moisture beading the ragged rocks along the path, and brought out the overhanging trees in weird, dusky masses, such as Dante saw in that fearful wood in the seventh circle ; while down from the cross, far above, as the stream of light flowed round it, rang the burden : ** Ave ! Ave ! Ave Maria ! " Lourdes. 207 This is no place for the serious discussion of a phenomenon which a Protestant can hardly be expected to regard without prejudice, and with the current explanation of which he will not be likely to have much patience. One thing is patent, that this whole remarkable development of pilgrimage and prayer and healing has grown up on the most slender basis conceivable— an ignorant and sickly peasant-child's ghost-story. No one else ever pretended to have seen the vision. Her simple credulity, her delusion even, are no subjects for mockery. Let us, as a modern divine insists, '* regard the faith of this child as charitably as that of theologians and pietists, who, in the middle ages, through even grosser superstitions, certainly reached toward and received the favor of God ; " but the uses which an astute religious policy may make of her simplicity raise another question quite dis- tinct from this. Bernadette's fond fancy and the machinery of Lourdes are by no means of the same piece, however they may seem to be so. As to the evidence furnished by the ap- pearance and phenomenal flow of the sacred 2o8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. spring — a spring in a region which embraces Eaux Bonnes, Eaux Chaudes, Panticosa, Cau- terets, Saint-Sauveur, Bareges, Bagneres-de- Bigorre, and Luchon, is surely no miracle. This neighborhood abounds in grottos like that of Massavielle. The Spelugue is only about ten minutes' ride from the grotto of the miracle, and not far beyond is the Grotte du Loup, which tra- verses a great part of the mountain, and in which is a deep well where one may hear the dull boil- ing of the water far down in the darkness. As for the cures, without so much as pretending to chal- lenge the array of testimonies collated and dis- pensed for the conviction of unbelievers and the confirmation of the faithful, the connection of the vision and the spring with the cures is by no means inevitable. If the realm of religion is full of surprises, no less so is that of medical science. There is scarcely a physician of average experi- ence who has not been baffled by recoveries which contradicted his best-verified diagnosis, and for which no existing medical knowledge could account. The operation of ordinary phys- ical laws will doubtless explain and eliminate Lourdes. 209 from the catalogues of Lourdes a goodly number of cases, and subtler and less familiar interactions of body and spirit another considerable portion ; as for the residuum, such cases as ** cancers healed in a moment, tumors disappearing in- stantaneously, decayed and carious bones be- coming sound at the touch of that wondrous fountain," ^ I can but say, I share in the wonder ; I reject the explanation so far as it is bound up with the fantasy of an ignorant child, and with that view of the nature and offices of the Mother of our Lord, which I believe to be in the face of Scripture and of common-sense alike. The Rev. S. H. Tyng, Jr., in his pamphlet entitled *' The Mountain-Movers," says that nothing is prom- ised in connection with the use of the water. ^^ All emphasis is laid upon believijtg prayer and this alone.'' "^ Possibly I do not fairly apprehend Dr. Tyng's conception of *' emphasis;" but people pressing by thousands into the grotto to drink of the water, and into the bath-houses to ^ From an ingenious plea for modern Romish miracles, in the Nineteenth Century, for November, 1882. * The italics are mine. 14 2IO In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. bathe in it, a storehouse piled to the ceiling with vessels for carrying it away, scallop-shells and piscines on sale by hundreds in the booths and shops, barrels of the water sent to every part of Europe and to America, certainly seem to indicate that all the ** emphasis" is not laid upon prayer. Furthermore, if prayer alone is the secret of these miraculous cures, why go to Lourdes or to any similar place at all ? To sum up, Lourdes is a delightful place for a picnic ; a good point for the lover of the pictur- esque ; a scene of much honest faith and sin- cere devotion, and of not a few remarkable cures of disease ; the centre of a skilfully-managed system for swelling the revenues of the Roman Church, and for filling the pockets of the villa- gers, and a fosterer of shameless beggary. Toulouse, 211 CHAPTER XVI. TOULOUSE. " To the stake ! to the stake ! with the heretic crew. That day and night vexes all good men and true. Shall we let them Saint Scripture and her edicts defile ? Shall we banish pure science for Lutherans vile ? Do you think that our God will permit such as these To imperil our bodies and souls at their ease ? To the stake ! to the stake ! the fire is their home ! As God hath permitted let justice be done," — Translation of a Placard posted in Paris, 1533. I HAD counted on another half- day in Lourdes, but the morning came in with a dead, hopeless, gray sky, and a steady deluge of rain, which put mountain excursions out of the question. A day in the Hotel des Pyrenees was too appalling a prospect to be contemplated for a moment ; and finding that there was a train for Toulouse at ten o'clock, I took polite leave of the thrifty landlady, and proceeded to the station, which presented an affecting combination of devotion and umbrellas in a crowd of drenched pilgrims. Near the door of the waiting-room 212 hi the Shadow of the Pyrenees. stood a fashionably dressed damsel whom one might have supposed to be suffering from a formidable tumor, had not the swelling at the side of her travelling-dress terminated in the neck of a gilded water-can. Two elderly gen- tlemen in the railway-carriage were likewise armed with large wicker flasks, presumably of the sacred water. It was a dreary, dreary ride. The newly married couple who occupied the opposite seat were too staid and decorous to be at all interesting : not a feature of the mountain landscape was visible, and the rain beat and dripped with a dismal persistence. Breakfast at Montrejeau was a consummate swindle, a poor meal, tardily served and roundly charged for, and the train was announced before it could be finished. The sight of the great, bricky city of Toulouse, about three o'clock, was a relief, if only for the prospect of a change. It was still pouring as the train entered the station, and after considerable delay and confusion, I was finally deposited in comfortable quarters at the Hotel de I'Europe. Toulouse makes its first appeal to the feet. Toulouse. 213 The sidewalks are laid with small pebbles, set edgewise in a kind of herring-bone fashion, which must render shoemaking a profitable branch of industry. One is speedily impressed with the justice of M. Taine's observation : ''At the end of five minutes your feet tell you, in the most intelligible manner, that you are two hundred leagues away from Paris." A short walk which I took before dinner furnished nothing but a prospect of interminable streets, and two of the largest loads of hay I ever saw. Whatever impression one may carry away from Lourdes, he has at least seen there religion concerning itself with the sweet and gracious work of relieving human misery. At Toulouse another phase comes out, not indeed in any- thing actually existing, but in the memories re- called by its streets and churches, which brand it as a historic centre of the most relentless bigotry and of the most bloody and ferocious persecution in the name of the Christian faith. Toulouse is eminently a religious centre, as it has been from the earliest times. More than a century before Christ, GalHc superstition had 214 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees, amassed there that enormous treasure of vo- tive offerings which excited the cupidity of a Roman consul, the punishment of whose avarice gave rise to the phrase Aurinn Tolosanum, or riches which bring down the vengeance of the gods. The tenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries, in which Catholic zeal was roused by the inroads of Manichseans, Arians, and Vaudois, furnished Toulouse with abundant opportunities for the display of its religious zeal. As early as 1020, the long series of butcheries and auto-da-fes was inaugurated by the burning of some Mani- chaeans. Thither in 1198, Pope Innocent the Third despatched Arnaud-Amaury, Abb^ of Citeaux, who ** concealed under the robe of a monk the destructive genius of a Genseric and an Attila," in order to offset and counteract the milder disposition of Count Raymond the Sixth, who appears to have had little taste for burning and butchering his subjects. A crusade was proclaimed by the same Pope in 1208, which was prosecuted under^ Simon de Montfort with every revolting detail of barbarity, and which W-^>^'vvv^ \^\\\ k Toulouse. 2 1 5 laid waste the cities of Languedoc. Betrayed into a surrender in 12 14, under the seal of the most solemn oaths, the principal citizens of Toulouse were massacred, and on the submis- sion of its Count in 1229, the Inquisition was organized there and prosecuted with relentless vigor. The sixteenth century was prolific in atrocities. The parliament of Toulouse in 1531 was styled ''the bloody," and was the tool of priestly fanaticism. The man who refused to lift his cap before an image, or to kneel when the Ave Maria bell rang, was at once pounced upon as a heretic. *' If any man," such was the edict of the parliament, ''takes pleasure in the ancient languages and polite learning, he is a heretic. Do not delay to inform against such. The parliament will condemn them, and the stake shall rid us of them." Jean de Caturce, an able lawyer and professor of laws in the University, was burned by a slow fire in 1532, because, at a festival on the eve of Epiphany, he gave, instead of the toast "the King drinks," the sentiment **May Christ, the true King, reign in all our hearts." In 1562, a fearful massacre of Hugue« 2i6 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, nots, to the number of three thousand, was per- petrated by the army of Blaise de Montluc, a brute who boasted of having executed more Huguenots than any other royal lieutenant, and who delighted in having the two hangmen who were his usual attendants, called his ** lackeys." The massacre was followed by a judicial inquiry which resulted in the execution of two hundred persons within three months. A centenary jubilee was instituted in commemoration of this event, which called forth the remonstrance of Voltaire against a jubilee ** to thank God for four thousand murders;" and in 1862, Mon- seigneur Desprez, Archbishop of Toulouse, gave notice of the recurrence of the celebration in these words: **The Catholic Church always makes it a duty to recall, in the succession of ages, the most remarkable events of its history — particularly those which belong to it in a special manner. It is thus that we are going to celebrate this year the jubilee commemorative of a glorious act accomplished among you three hundred years ago." It is gratifying to know that the French Government forbade the proces- Toulouse. 217 sion and all out-door solemnities, and declared the celebration of the jubilee to be nothing less than *^the commemoration of a mournful and bloody episode of our ancient religious dis- cords." ' Charles the Ninth's edict of 1568, pro- scribing the reformed faith, banishing all Pro- testant ministers from France, and deposing all Protectant magistrates, was to Toulouse like the scent of blood to a hound. A crusade was preached, and a solemn league for the extermina- tion of heresy was formed in the Cathedral of Saint-Etienne. As may readily be supposed, the wave set in motion by Saint-Bartholomew did not spend itself without reaching Toulouse, and overwhelmed two or three hundred Pro- testant prisoners in a massacre in which the law students of the university figured as execu- tioners. It is not strange, therefore, if the visitor in Toulouse is sometimes haunted by an eerie sense of treading on blood-stains ; unless, as in ^ See the admirable work of Professor Henry M. Baird, of the University of New York, "The Rise of the Huguenots of France," vol. ii., pp. 53-54. 2i8 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, my case, that impression is merged in the sense of treading on tenpenny nails. If the pavements of the city were designed to make strangers oblivious of its history, the design certainly reflects infinite credit upon the ingenuity of its originator. I had stepped into Saint-Sernin for a moment on the previous evening, and now proceeded at once to this representative church of Toulouse, a Romanesque structure of brick, like most of the buildings in the city, and impressive, alike from its size, its grand elliptical apse, flanked by five chapels, and its striking octagonal tower, formed by five diminishing tiers of arches sur- mounted with a short spire. The choir and transepts date from the eleventh century, the nave is of the twelfth, and the tower and the still unfinished fagade belong to the thirteenth. In its size and general aspect it recalled some of the vast churches of Bologna. On the southern side, directly facing the Rue du Taur, the Porte Miegeville opens into the nave. It is an exquisitely sculptured portal, the capitals of the columns representing the murder Toulouse. 219 of the innocents — a highly appropriate sub- ject, by the way — the expulsion of Adam, and other scriptural incidents. On the same side, a double portal, the Fortes des Comtes, so called from its containing the tombs of some of the early Counts of Toulouse, leads into the south transept. The sacristan at once seized upon me, and directed me to the depository of relics, the great feature of the church, to which, after lingering awhile in the north transept and inspecting the tomb of Montmorency with its ghastly crucifix, I proceeded, and passed through a low door into the crypt beneath the choir, a beautiful piece of groined Gothic, but spoiled by tawdry decoration in polychrome. Over the door is in- scribed in Latin, Here are the gtcardians which protect the city ; and over the corresponding door on the opposite side, There is not, in all the World, a holier spot. I was handed over to a priest, who inquired if I were a Protestant, and who assumed an air of good-natured toler- ance as he led me through a collection of gilded- caskets, busts, shrines, bones, and other reUcs, 2 20 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. the very recollection of which is confounding. If a hundredth part of what was told me were true, I ought to have been profoundly im- pressed; and so I was, but I fear not in the way which my priestly guide could have desired. There was the skull of Thomas Aquinas, and likewise that of Saint-Barnabas, whose body (I tell the tale as it was told to me) was discovered in 488, with a copy of the Gospel of Matthew upon the breast. His remains having been conveyed to Toulouse, were hidden away in the interior of a column, and were re-discovered in the sixteenth century. Of Saint-Bartholomew there is a piece of skin and a part of the head ; there are bones of the two James, and a vulgar fraction of Philip. In short, Saint-Sernin claims to possess relics of six Apostles, a distinction which it owes largely to the liberality and piety of Charlemagne. But all this was as nothing to what remained. A section of an Apostle was a trifle ; for here was a shrine in which a crystal casket held a thorn from the sacred crown. The party who held the candle did not appear anxious to have Toulouse. 221 me examine too closely, and I found it impos- sible to determine whether the line which might be supposed to indicate the thorn was not one of the facets of the crystal. Next, a little golden cross. *' Here is a piece of the true cross." ** Where?" I innocently asked. '* Oh, it is en- closed in this cross of gold." I muttered to myself Credat Judceus Apella, and passed on. Of the Virgin Mary there is a piece of the robe, besides a stone on which she laid the holy Child for a moment when he was born, and a fragment of stone from her tomb, wherever that m^ay be. There are relics of Peter and of Paul, though of what kind is not stated ; four bones of Saint-Suzanne of Babylon ; a jaw and one tooth of Saint-Christopher, etc., etc. And this is really the latter half of the nineteenth century ! On the rear wall of the choir are a Holy Family, ascribed to Correggio, and some quaint relievos in polished stone, said to belong to the time of Charlemagne, one of them the figure of a bishop seated, and with two fingers and the thumb raised in blessing. Some Sisters in 2 22 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, white bonnets filed down into the crypt, while I mounted the high platform behind the great altar, where, under an ugly baldacchino, was a gilded casket containing the relics of Saint-Sat- urnin or Sernin. This very reverend gentle- man, the first Bishop of Toulouse, was born, so says the legend, in Greece, and subsequently passed over into Palestine and became, succes- sively, a disciple of John the Baptist and of our Lord. He followed Peter to Antioch and Rome, and was sent by him to Toulouse, whence, in course of time, he passed into Spain, and finally returned to Toulouse, where he suffered martyr- dom by being tied to a bull and dragged to death. The Rue du Taur, and the Eglise du Taur, erected on the spot where the cord is said to have broken, perpetuate the memory of this characteristically Toulousan incident. Passing down into the choir, I rummaged about for some time among the stalls, until I discovered what I was in search of, on the seat of the first stall to the right, to wit, the figure of a hog seated in a kind of pulpit-chair, and addressing three figures, two of which wore the Toulouse, 223 high Puritan hats. It is a small but piquant souvenir of the Toulousan sentiment respecting Calvinism ; and in order to prevent all possibil- ity of mistake, the significant memorandum is added: Calvin el pore pt. {prechant). Stopping for a moment at the Hotel TAssezat, ascribed to Margaret of Navarre, I went on to the Church of La Dalbade, of the sixteenth cen- tury, with its plain brick front surmounted by three pointed turrets, and the lunette over the handsome doorway filled by a colored relievo of the Coronation of the Virgin. The interior con- tains a large number of paintings, and a chapel modelled after the grotto at Lourdes. The ancient and the modern blend oddly in Toulouse, in this reminding one of Rouen. The business part of the town has a thriving air, and the shops are handsome ; but the city as a whole offers little that is homelike or cheerful. It is big, bare, bleak. There is a pleasant, but not re- markable, Jardin des Plantes, and a handsome public park. One comes at intervals suddenly upon quaint carvings, or old corbels, or elabo- rately sculptured doorways wedged in among 224 In the Shadow of the Pyrejtees. more modern structures. At a street corner I noted an odd bracket with the figure of a devil. A narrow street of common houses is relieved by the florid Hotel de Pierre, which presents a front of light-colored stone traversed by flat, grooved pilasters, and loaded with carvings of birds, armor, flowers, human figures and faces. The open doorway in the centre reveals a large square court and two huge caryatides flanking the opposite door. A New Yorker would smile to read at the street-corners of an American city, ''Fox Street," "Bull Street," "Turkey Street," but here we have them : Rue des Trots RenardSy Rue dti TauTy Rue de Cog d Inde ; also Rue de la Fonderie, Rue de V Inquisition^ and Rtie des Filatiers. In this latter street is shown the house of Jean Galas, who, on a trumped-up charge of having murdered his eldest son to prevent his abjuring Calvinism, was broken alive upon the wheel. His murder marks the end of the persecutions which had harassed the Protestants of Southern France for a century, and the noble exertions of Voltaire, as is well Toulouse. 225 known, procured the tardy justice of a formal proclamation of his innocence by the parliament of Paris. Saint-Sernin, though the largest and most note- worthy church, is not the cathedral. Strange to say, the Notre Dame of Toulouse, Saint-Etienne, was begun, at the end of the thirteeth century, by that very Raymond whose tenderness for the heretic Albigeois resulted in his excommu- nication. It faces a large square, and the front is wedged in between ordinary houses, above which it lifts its ugly square tower crowned with an open belfry. The great pointed arch of the fagade contains a superb rose-window, with a gallery below it ; and a peculiar, disor- derly effect is produced by the point of the ogive over the entrance being out of line with the centre of the rose. The church has no ar- chitectural unity. The earliest portion, built by Raymond, is the nave, the vault of which has a span of sixty-two feet, and which con- tains but two chapels, one on either side of the entrance. The walls are lined with pictures, most of them treating of the history of the first 15 2 26 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. Christian martyr. Here, upon the proscription of the Protestants in 1568, the exterminators of heresy assembled, and prepared themselves for their bloody undertaking by confession and communion, and by a solemn oath to expose life and property for the maintenance of the faith, adopting for their motto : Eamus itoSy moriamur cum Christo, and attaching to their dress a white cross to distinguish them from Protestants. Thus, in the words of a modern historian, "the Christian protomartyr has, by an irony of history, been made a witness of acts more congenial to the spirit of his persecutors than to his own." ' The choir, begun in 1272 and erected on a different axis from the nave, forms a distinct church of the high-Gothic type, its high-altar overloaded with ornament, and surmounted by a sculptured group representing the Stoning of Stephen. The iron grating round the altar is very elaborate, and the glass of the windows is of the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth cen- ^ Baird : " Rise of the Huguenots of France. " Toulouse, 227 turies. An organ resting on an enormous cor- bel, is built high up on the wall of a short transept opening to the left, between the nave and choir. By the time lunch was finished the sun was shining in good earnest, and a stiff breeze was driving the clouds before it, and rustling among the trees of the pretty Jardin des Plantes through which I strolled on my way to the Ga- ronne, which runs between high walls of brick, and is spanned by the Pont Neuf, a heavy stone structure resting upon seven elliptical arches, between which large openings traverse its en- tire width. The fair breeze had unveiled the mountains, and their blue, distant heights ap- peared in the direction of Luchon. A signifi- cant hint of the erratic propensities of the river is given by the water-scale at one end of the Pont Neuf, and by the ruins of two other bridges, one above and the other below. From the huge, brick Hotel Dieu, on the left bank, starts an arch, which, with one pier, is all that remains of the bridge of Saint-Pierre, carried away by the inundation of 1853. Crossing the Pont 2 28 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, Neuf, with the church tower of Saint- Nicholas in full view, there appears, almost opposite the Hotel Dieu, the Chateau d'Eau, a cylindrical tower with a domed cupola, and an inscription commemorating the efforts of Charles Lagane to establish public fountains in the city. Wor- thy Lagane ! Surely it was high time for water instead of blood to flow in Toulouse ! From this side of the river a good view of the city is obtained, the prominent objects being the square tower of La Dalbade, denuded of its spire, and that of the Jacobins, which rises in tiers of angular-headed arches. Close down by the river is the Church of La Daurade, or Basilica de Maria Deaurata, the old portal of which was pulled down when the adjoining monastery was converted into a tobacco fac- tory, and has been re-erected in the Museum. On this Jacobin tower as a landmark I fast- ened my eyes, and, recrossing the bridge, be- gan to work my way toward it, past the dismal Morgue in the river-wall just below the semi- circular apse of the transept of La Daurade ; but the Church of the Jacobins seemed to have Toulouse. 229 a strange faculty of hiding itself, and evaded discovery in the most exasperating manner. Threading one narrow, gloomy street after an- other, I stumbled at last upon a .carved door- way opening into a square court, and enter- ing, saw over the doorway a gallery with three elegant arches, but degraded into a woodshed, besides the traces of fine carvings in other parts of the court. I found I was in the Lycee, which contains the public library, consisting in great part of works pertaining to the Jesuits. Here, too, I was close by the object of my search, for the building really formed a part of the once vast establishment of Les Jacobins. The church, which I reached at length through a yard, repaid the trouble I had taken to find it. The high side-walls rise in great arches of brick separated by buttresses; within, the grand nave is divided down the centre by a single row of cylindrical columns, on which rests the Gothic ceiling with its oddly-colored arches. The church has been long dismantled, and was at one time used for a barrack ; but two sides still remain of what must have been one 230 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. of the most charming of cloisters, the arcades of which are formed by small, pointed arches, supported by slender and graceful columns of stone. The pavements of Toulouse had done their work so effectually that I was tempted to give the go-by to the Museum ; but the polite shop- woman who sold me some photographs pointed out the entrance close by, and on pulling the bell-rope I was admitted into the dismantled Church of the Augustinians, of which the anti- quarians have taken possession. It is not the first instance in which a church has become a depository of antiques, and in this case, at least, the arrangement was felicitous. A large hall had been converted into a picture-gallery which contained little that was interesting. There was a wretched Saint-Diego, laid to Murillo, and a shocking Crucifixion, by Rubens, besides a powerful though revolting picture, by Benjamin Constant — Mohammed the Second entering Constantinople. The larger cloister of the church presents one of the prettiest pictures imaginable. The four sides are bordered with Toulouse, 231 charming arcades, each consisting of twenty little ogive arches resting on slender double- columns ; and under these, as well as in the open square which they surround, is arranged a large collection of mural tablets, tombstones, marbles with Roman inscriptions, several of them bearing the name of CN. POMPEIUS ; stone sarcophagi, and some stone figures, among which I noted especially two very ugly dogs or wolves sitting upright on their haunches. In the centre of the square a fountain had been constructed out of what was, apparently, an old altar, supported on columns and sculptured with two full-length figures in ecclesiastical cos- tume. The smaller cloister is not used for the dis- play of antiquities, and in its way is equally a little gem with the other. The square space is formed by the surrounding buildings, the lower story of which forms an arcade with three large elliptic arches on each side, the walls over the arches displaying groups of figures in relief, and masses of climbing vines ; while a fountain in the centre, surmounted by a female figure in 232 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, marble, reveals the gold-fish through the trans- parent water in its basin. Thoroughly tired, I plodded back toward the hotel through the Place du Capitole, the princi- pal square of the city, and bounded on one side by the Capitol, a long and not particularly im- pressive structure, with an Ionic fagade adorned with eight red-marble columns. Passing through the Rue du Taur, I stopped for a moment at the Eglise du Taur. It was too dark to obtain a very distinct impression of the interior, but I could see the large fresco over the altar, which represented Saint-Sernin tied to a very for- midable bull. Most welcome was the cosy, quiet dining-room of the Europe. I strolled awhile through the streets among the brilliantly lighted shops, and round the Ronde Napoleon in front of the hotel, and looking up, saw in the twinkling stars a good augury of a fair day for Carcassonne. Ca re as Sonne, 233 CHAPTER XVII. CARCASSONNE. "How old I am ! I'm eighty years ! I've worked both hard and long. Yet patient as my life has been, One dearest sight I have not seen — It almost seems a wrong ; A dream I had when life was new, Alas, our dreams ! they come not true ; I thought to see fair Carcassonne That lovely city — Carcassonne ! " — Gust AVE Nadaud : translated by M. E. W. Sherwood. I HARDLY know what it was that had made me for so many years a sharer in the old peasant's simple wish to see Carcassonne, but I am sure the desire had been deepened by that exquisite little poem of Gustave Nadaud ; at any rate, the words had been running all night in my brain ; and when, through the parted cur- tain, I saw ** shadow streaks of rain " crossing the gray morning haze, the verses took on the character of a prophecy — *'I could not go to Carcassonne, I never went to Carcassonne. " 234 ^^ ^-^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. Shall I not give it up and seek fairer skies in the North ? And yet it is only two hours away ! And so, laboring through coffee and rolls in that peculiar mental state in which a man, while debating a question with the upper half of his mind, is all the while dimly conscious of yield- ing to a decided current in the lower half, I somehow found the question settled by being at the station with my ticket for Carcassonne in my hand. It was a lonely ride of two hours; the rain falling in an undecided kind of way, and the clouds persistently menacing. The route of- fered little of interest beyond the general pic- turesqueness of the old towns. The architec- ture of the village churches presented constant repetitions of the peculiarity I had observed in the Eglise du Taur ; the front being carried up to a great height above the roof, and pierced near the top with openings for bells. The abun- dance of windmills would have kept the warlike ardor of Don Quixote at its highest pitch. As the train approached Carcassonne, I looked eagerly out on both sides of the carriage for a Carcassonne, 235 view of the ancient city, but in vain ; for the road ran between embankments to the very sta- tion. I sat down to breakfast in the waiting- room, and they brought me tripe, which I de- test, and a cutlet, which was a choice of evils, while an elderly boor opposite my seat drew forth and kindled his stinking pipe with a sub- lime indifference to the stomachs of his neigh- bors ; so that, on the whole, the breakfast quite eclipsed the one at Montrejeau, except that there was plenty of time, A spiteful little rain was driving against my umbrella as I left the back door of the station, and crossing the Canal du Midi, entered upon a boulevard shaded with noble trees, and termina- ting in a little park, which contained two foun- tains, a column of red marble, and a variety of flowers. Plunging, hap-hazard, down the first street which opened into the city, I came upon the Church of Saint- Vincent, where, as in duty bound, I stopped for a moment to pay my re- spects, not to my sainted namesake, but to the beautiful stained glass of his church, and then, pursuing my way blindly among the streets, I 236 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. caught at last a glimpse of a black wall and a line of turrets across the river, and having thus obtained my bearings, was soon clear of the city and crossing the Aude by the Pont Vieux, with old Carcassonne in full view. I know of no place of which it is more difficult to give a reader a correct idea by mere descrip- tion. I think there can hardly be another view in Europe like that which it presents. The nearest approach to it that I have seen is the view of Avignon, with the Palace of the Popes and the huge fortress of Saint-Andre on the height across the Rhone ; but there is a weird, barbaric quality in the view of Carcassonne which is wanting in the other. A long ridge rises from the valley of the Aude, crowned with an irregular line of battlements, from every part of which shoot up, apparently at random, square or cylindrical towers of different heights, with pointed or truncated summits like a group of spouting geysers suddenly turned to stone. From the Pont Vieux one is looking, not only across the Aude, but over a gap of thirteen centuries. Behind, within five minutes' walk, Carcassonne. 237 are a railroad, and telegraphs, reading-rooms, newspapers, libraries, steam-mills, stove-pipe hats and cutaways. In front is a walled city of the fifth century, built for defence against man- gonels, catapults, cross-bows, and scaling-lad- ders, where it would excite no surprise to see a mailed figure in helmet and greaves patrolling the battlements. To me the impression was the more vivid, after having lived for weeks within the defences of Bayonne, in daily sight of Vau- ban's mathematically sloped walls, trim glacis, and symmetrical bastions. Under the lowering sky and through the streaks of the driving rain, the aspect was not only strange but savage. However, as one moves up the western slope toward the Porte de I'Aude, he is diverted from historic reminiscences and romantic musings by the necessity of taking heed to his steps ; since the Carcassonians appear to have retained the barbaric contempt for decency, and the well- paved road and the corners of the walls are defiled in a manner which at once forbids and beggars description. If I am to render this chapter at all inteUigible, 238 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. I must tax the reader's patience with a little his- tory, without which Carcassonne is a riddle in stone. Here are two towns bearing the same name, the one on a salubrious height, command- ing a noble prospect, the other in a river-valley ; yet the town on the higher and finer site is but an ancient ruin, containing within its walls only about fourteen hundred people of the poorer class, often living, if reports are to be credited, like swine ; while something like twenty-six thousand swarm in the busy city across the Aude. No villas crown the height. It is given up to desolation, silence, and poverty. Carcassonne, the old city I mean, occupies the site of Carcaso, an ancient city of Southern Gaul belonging to the Volcae Tectosages, a Celtic tribe of Asia Minor. It makes almost no appearance in Roman history ; is known to have been taken by the Franks in the fourth century and to have been quickly retaken by the Ro- mans, and first comes distinctly into view in 436 A.D., when Theodoric, the king of the Visigoths, took possession of it, and held it with all the adjacent territory. Ca 7' c as Sonne, 239 The principal fact which the visitor is to keep in mind is that, in the walls and towers of this city, he has before him a complete course of the art of fortification from the fifth to the fourteenth century : the enceinte consisting of a double line of works, the inner one being the old Visigothic fort of the fifth century, while the outer repre- sents a stage eight or nine centuries later. The two have a general resemblance in being alike earlier than the age of artillery, and therefore designed for defence against the same kind of weapons and the same methods of assault. The line of the Visigothic works, which is easily fol- lowed, formed an oval with a slight depression on the western face, following the configuration of the plateau upon which it was built. Most of the Visigothic towers were erected upon Roman foundations, readily distinguished by their huge square blocks from the closer masonry of the superstructures, which rise in courses of small, rough stones alternating with narrow bands of large bricks. The Visigoths appreciated the importance of the site, commanding as it did the valley of the Aude, which formed the natural 240 l7i the Shadow of the Pyrenees. route from Narbonne to Toulouse, and the en- trance of the defiles leading into Spain. The Visigothic kingdom came to an end in the eighth century, and gave place to the Moors of Spain, and again Carcassonne disappears from history for four centuries. No traces are to be found of constructions between the Visi- gothic period and the end of the eleventh century, when Pope Urban the Second appears at Carcassonne to appease some local disturb- ance, and gives his blessing to the Church of Saint-Nazaire and to the materials prepared to complete it. Bernard Aton was viscount of the city at this time, and the unruliness of his vassals at last compelled him to call to his assistance the neigh- boring Count of Toulouse, with whose aid he reduced them to subjection. The goods of the leading rebels were confiscated in the interest of a few vassals who had remained faithful, and to whom were given in fief the towers and houses of the city, on condition of their guarding them and residing there with their families dur- ing the months of their service. The chateau, Carcassonne, 241 which forms one of the two great masses rising above the western front — the Church of Saint- Nazaire being the other — was built near the Porte de I'Aude about 11 30. In 1209, Carcassonne, owing to the presence of the Albigeois, incurred the taint of heresy ; and upon the proclamation of the anti-heretic crusade by Pope Innocent the Third, was be- sieged by the papal armies under the notori- ous Simon de Montfort, and surrendered after a siege of fourteen days. The place was united to the French crown under Louis the Ninth, or Saint-Louis, in 1239 ; from which period a new and important stage of its history begins. The young viscount Ray- mond de Trincavel, who, at the age of two years, had been placed in the hands of the Comte de Foix, suddenly appeared before the gates with a body of Catalonian and Aragonese troops. His forces invested the city on the sev- enteenth of September, 1240, and took posses- sion of the suburb or faubourg of Graveillant, probably on the west side of the city, facing the Porte de I'Aude. This point, however, was 16 242 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. immediately retaken, and after twenty-four days Trincavel was compelled to raise the siege. Meanwhile, some days before the actual invest- ment, an attempt had been made by the inhabi- tants of Trivalle, another faubourg on the east- ern side, to aid the army of the besiegers ; and on the night of the ninth of September, the gates had been opened to the forces of Trinca- vel, who, from this point, had directed his attack against the Narbonne gate. As soon as the siege was raised, Louis, partly to punish the treachery of the suburbans, and partly to pre- vent the reoccupation of points so dangerous to the city, compelled the inhabitants of Trivalle to evacuate it, and forbade those of Graveillant to rebuild that faubourg. At the same time he began a series of elaborate works in order to strengthen the defences of the city. He re- moved the ruins of the faubourgs, cleared the entire ground between the city and the Pont Vieux, and erected that whole line of defences which is still to be seen outside the Visigothic walls. Being resolved to make Carcassonne the bul- Carcassonne. 243 wark- of his kingdom against the heretic lords of the southern provinces, Louis persisted in his refusal to allow Trivalle and Graveillant to be rebuilt ; but, after a seven years' exile of the inhabitants, he at length consented, at the in- stance of Bishop Radulph, to allow them to establish themselves on the opposite side of the Aude, restoring to them their possessions before the war, and requiring them to build, at their own expense, the churches of Notre Dame and Les Freres Mineurs, which they had demolished. The royal letters-patent to this effect, issued on the fourth of April, 1247, mark the date of the foundation of the modern city. The defences erected by Louis the Ninth were further strengthened by Philip the Bold. The Porte Narbonnaise and the Tour duTr^sau with the adjoining curtains,^ belong to this period. Philip also rebuilt the tower of the In- quisition, the Bishop's Tower, and the towers Cahusac, Mipadre, du MouHn, and Saint-Na- * A curtain is the wall which joins two towers. 244 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees, Zaire, in such a way as better to command the valley of the Aude and the southern extremity of the plateau. The outer enciente, that of Louis the Ninth, is built with irregular masses of sandstone with plain facings ; while the stones of the later constructions are chiselled at the edges, and decorated with embossments. The towers of the interior line repaired by Philip are alike in profile; but all his work is more elaborate, while the whole aspect of the outer enclosure, with its loop-holes, gates, and corbels, is more simple and broad. Since that time no new works have been un- dertaken ; and during the Middle Ages the for- tress was regarded as impregnable ; though. In fact, it was not assailed, and only opened its gates in 1355 to Edward the Black Prince, when the whole of Languedoc was subjugated by him. These outlines of history will assist the reader to understand the ensuing references, which must be confined to a few prominent features of the city. A description in full detail would be at once useless and wearisome, and besides, 2. Porte Narboiinaise. 3. Tour du Tresor. 4. Le Chateau. 5. Barbican, 6. Well. 7. Tour de la Justice. 8. Tour Visigothe. 9. Tour de I'Jnquisition. 0. Tour de T^vequc. 1. Church of S. Nazaire. 2. Well. GENERAL PLAN OF CARCASSONNE, by Viollet le Due. Carcassonne, 245 would be impossible without numerous draw- ings/ There is no place where a student of history- could gain, in the same amount of time, so complete and vivid a conception of the art of warfare as it was conducted before the inven- tion of artillery. To quote the words of M. Le Due: *' In examining carefully and in detail the defensive works of these times, one un- derstands those stories of tremendous assaults which we are too prone to charge with exag- geration. Before defences so well planned and so ingeniously combined, we have no difficulty in picturing the enormous appliances of the besiegers — the movable towers, the barricades and terraced bastilles, the sapping-machines on wheels, the mining operations which required time when powder and cannon were not in use. A well-organized and provisioned garrison could ^ The reader who is curious about these details, will find all that is known on the subject in the admirable and exhaustive treatise of M. Viollet le Due, "La Cite de Carcassonne," to which I am indebted for a large part of the material of this chapter. See the accompanying plan. 246 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, prolong a siege indefinitely ; so that it was not a rare thing for a petty town to resist a numer- ous army for months." Here one has before his eyes a scale of the progress made in the art of fortification during eleven centuries. Here he can patrol the Chemin de Ronde, the stone platform within, and just below the sum- mit of the walls, and look down through the great openings for hurling stones or pouring boiling oil on the heads of the besiegers. Now his walk is interrupted by a tower, and a door must be unbarred and a flight of steps scaled before he can continue his round, while some- times the narrow stone pathway follows the outer circuit of the tower. Here and there he comes upon carefully masked sally-ports furnishing communication between different parts of the fortress ; now the doors of the towers are un- locked, and he descends by ladders to gloomy dungeons at the foundations, w^here the light comes feebly through narrow loop-holes ; and now climbs to the upper stories, where the great shutters on their wooden axes show how the besieged could shoot their arrows downward Carcassonne, 247 without exposure to the shafts of the assailants below. The interiors of the towers, in their present state, present little variation. The ancient mode of communication between the different stories was by ladders which could be drawn up after mounting ; so that one is constantly confronted, on entering a tower, with a yawning well, open- ing clear to the foundation, and protected only by a partial covering of loose planks. Let us go round to the eastern side, the side farthest from the modern city, and face the prin- cipal entrance, the only one now accessible for carriages — the Porte Narbonnaise. Two enor- mous towers, with pointed roofs, circular in front and flat on the side toward the city, are con- nected by a wall, also crowned with a peaked roof, and built up to the full height of the tow- ers. In the centre of this wall is the Narbonne Gate, above which appears in a niche the de- faced figure of Carcas, a Saracen woman who, according to the legend, alone remained in the city after a siege of five years by Charlemagne. The versions of the legend differ. One is to the 248 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, effect that she capitulated and presented the keys of the city to Charlemagne ; another, that Charlemagne was about to raise the siege in despair, when a tower on the western side gave way and opened a breach for his troops. On carefully examining this structure we shall conclude that an entrance could have been no easy task for a body of assailants. Here was a ditch to be crossed before the gate was reached, and of course the bridge would be raised. Sup- posing the party, however, to have found means to cross the ditch, they must pass a barbican, from each loop-hole of which poured a stream of arrows, which would follow them the whole length of the oblique path to the gate. Having reached at length the foot of the tow- ers, probably with the loss of some men, the real difficulties of the party would now begin. The entrance was first crossed by a chain, the sockets of which are still to be seen. Then came a portcullis, raised and lowered by pul- leys ; but at this point the machicoulis y a long opening above the gate, would greet the un- welcome visitors with a ton or more of stone, or Carcassonne. 249 with a deluge of hot oil from its ** ponderous and marble jaws." If the first portcullis were carried and the party passed in under the vaulting of the gateway, the salute would be repeated from a similar opening in the vault ; and if their de- termined bravery carried them through all these obstacles to the second portcullis, opening into the city, a third machicoulis discharged another shower of stones. One might think all this sufficiently discour- aging, but not so the defenders of Carcassonne. Above the arch of the gate, and on each side of the niche occupied by Dame Carcas, may be seen three carefully cut openings in the walls of the towers, one of them bevelled so as to receive an inclined beam. A scout, lurking under the walls before an assault, might have seen a stout beam projecting from one of these holes, and astride it a carpenter driving into the mortice on its lower side the end of the oblique brace rising to meet it from the bevelled opening be- low. On these beams were laid planks, and thus a platform was constructed, projecting above the gate and protecting the soldiers on 250 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. guard. Other beams above carried the planks of a roof. The summits of the towers were also furnished with similar timber structures, project- ing so as to allow the besieged to command with their arrows and other missiles the foundations which could not be seen from the loopholes, and thus to embarrass the operations of sappers or scaling-parties. The square holes for beams are still visible everyw^here along the surface of the walls and towers ; and it was, of course, the object of the besiegers to set these timber-nests on fire, or to demolish them with stones or huge bolts launched by catapults. Other and larger square apertures opened through the battlements at equal intervals at the level of the chemin de roiide. In the upper stages of the towers the windows were protected by great shutters mov- ing on wooden axes, which permitted the archer to discharge his arrows downward without ex- posure, and, at the same time, protected the interior from the wind and rain. I found the custodian, after some inquiry, taking his breakfast standing at the sideboard in his little tavern, while his wife sat at the ta- Carcassonne. 251 ble. The worthy couple received me with sim- ple and charming courtesy, and invited me to a seat ; and the good man, having finished his repast and armed himself with his bunch of keys, conducted me first to the chateau, and thence along the western front and a part of the southern extremity, up flights of steps and down ladders, expounding with great fluency, and, I must needs say, in a most clear and in- teresting manner. The towers of both the lines of defence habit- ually break the course of the chemin de rondey so that if any assailant succeeded in gaining the curtain, he found himself hemmed in be- tween two towers. Every tower thus formed a separate redoubt, which must be forced in its turn. To the north of the Porte Narbonnaise rises the Treasury Tower, a superb work of the same height and date with the towers of the gate, commanding the city and the eastern plain. It contains four stories, the first below the level of the city, the second on the level. The third story contains a little chamber for the 252 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees. commanding officer. This story and the one be- low are pierced with loop-holes, opening under large arcades furnished with stone benches. From this tower northward the Visigothic enclosure shows the effects of a terrible siege. The engines of the assailants must have been very effectiveto up turn such huge fragments of the wall, and to throw from the perpendicular towers of which the interiors present only solid masses of masonry. It would seem as though nothing but cannon could have produced such effects ; and yet the siege in which a great part of these ramparts was overthrown was before the twelfth century ; since upon the debris are erected structures identical with those of the thirteenth century. Little pains seems to have been taken to clear away the ruins, for enor- mous pieces of wall may be seen enclosed in the restored curtains, presenting to the eye the beds of their courses of rubble or brick, which neither time nor violence has succeeded in dis- jointing, and which furnish foundations firm as rock for the new walls. On the western side of the fortifications, over- Carcassonne, 253 looking the modern city, is the Porte de I'Aude, or Porte de Toulouse, a work of the twelfth century. This gate was formerly covered by a circular outwork, which has been destroyed and its materials used to build a mill. The sloping, zigzag path leading up to the entrance is com- manded by battlements and a traverse rising to the level of the chemin de ronde, and these, in turn, are overlooked by the Tour de la Jus- tice, and the Tour Visigothe. The assailant here found himself in a trap, commanded on all sides by formidable works, and where he was obliged to make a sharp turn in order to reach the gate. Next to the Tour Visigothe is the Tour de ITnquisition, to the bottom of which I descended by a ladder, and landed in a gloomy chamber with a stone pillar in the centre, gar- nished with chains. Next comes the Bishop's Tower, which bestrides both enclosures so as to cut off, if necessary, all communication be- tween the northern and southern portions of the lices or spaces between the inner and outer walls. The tower spans the space on two arches defended by three machicoulis. The 254 ^^ ^^^ Shadow of the Pyrenees. Bishop's Palace which once adjoined it is com- pletely destroyed, but the foundations of the cloister of the neighboring Church of Saint- Nazaire have been discovered ; and these, to- gether with one wall of the cloister preserved with the columns and the ribs of the vaultings, correspond with the old plans of the city in which the cloister and its outbuildings are laid down. From the cloister, steps give access to the ramparts ; but the cloister and the Bishop's Palace were enclosed in an enceinte of their own, so that the curtains could not be reached from the street. There are in all, thirty-eight towers, fourteen along the exterior enclosure, and twenty-four along the Visigothic line. Farther detail would be interesting only to antiquarians, and I fear that even this very imperfect sketch has taxed the reader's patience. Having then reached the ecclesiastical portion of the town, let us devote a little time to Saint-Nazaire. I The church presents the end of its nave to the western slope of the plateau which it over- looks, in a plain front with a belfry on one cor- Carcassonne. 255 ner, and a square tower in the centre contain- ing four arched windows near the top, and three small circular ones lower down. The belfry is connected with the central tower by a little en- closed bridge carried over on an arch with pic- turesque effect. To the east the church presents its transepts and apsis, pierced with beautiful, high, pointed windows. The nave belongs to the end of the eleventh or the beginning of the twelfth century, and the transepts and apse date from the beginning of the fourteenth, the latter being, without doubt, erected upon Roman foundations. The church is small, but the in- terior is one of the most exquisite architectural gems in Europe. The Roman nave, as in many of the churches of Provence and lower Langue- doc, presents a central vault in bays, with ribbed arches, and buttressed by the vaults covering the very narrow side-aisles, which are lighted by windows in the side-walls. The piers supporting the arches of the central vault are alternately round and ^square. The side-aisles, and the openings into them from the nave, are constructed with round arches ; but the diffi- 256 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, culty of the nave evidently compelled the intro- duction of the pointed arch there. The reason for placing the entrance-door in the north aisle, lay in the requirements of the church militant ; since the western fagade adjoined the ramparts and contributed to their defence. Toward 1260 there was added, on the south- ern flank, a chapel, the floor of which is on a level with the pavement of the ancient cloister. Here is the tomb of the Bishop Radulph, through whose intercession, it will be remem- bered, the exiled inhabitants of the two suburbs of Carcassonne were allowed to settle on the far- ther side of the Aude ; and who is thus, in a sense, the founder of the modern city. A full- length figure of the Bishop surmounts a sarco- phagus on which is carved a series of small fig- ures, representing the canons of the cathedral dressed for the service of the choir. The effect of the choir and transepts ap- proached from the nave is exceedingly rich and striking. Three chapels open upon each arm of the transept, separated from each other by lattices supported by blank eUiptical arches. Carcassonne. 257 Saint-Nazaire is an exception to the churches of Narbonne in the prodigality of its ornament. The glass of the transept and choir is magnifi. cent ; the windows are so large and so numer- ous that the transept and apse resemble a great and richly colored lantern. The glass is of the fourteenth century. One of the most beautiful of the windows represents Christ on the Cross, the temptation of Adam, and some prophets holding scrolls inscribed with predictions of the advent and death of our Lord. The centres of the beautiful rose-windows are modern, but the other parts are of the same date with the larger windows. In the north transept is the tomb of Bishop Pierre de Rochefort, and on one side of the high altar appears a red-marble slab, which is said to mark the first tomb of Simon de Montfort, the hero of the crusades against the Albigeois ; though M. Viollet le Due, un- der whose superintendence the church has been thoroughly restored, questions the genuineness of this monument. The same hero is com- memorated in a very curious relievo in the wall of one of the chapels, representing the assault 258 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, of a fortified town, where the besieged are bringing a mangonel to bear upon the assailants. It is-supposed to represent the death of Simon de Montfort, who was killed before the walls of Toulouse by a stone from an engine handled by- some women. Some angels are seen bearing a soul above the scene of battle into the sky. The kindly old dame who acted as cicerone, having lighted her candle by the aid of my match-box, preceded me into the crypt, which dates from the eleventh century, and was dis- covered by Le Due in 1857, under the sanctuary. Its vaulting had been destroyed in preparing the foundations of the choir and transepts. This was replaced by a stone ceiling, and one may now see the original piers, and the walls with their little bays. The old lady pointed out against one of the walls a mass of stone which she said was an altar of the ninth century. I could have replied with Mr. Snagsby's com- ment on Tulkinghorn's port, '* It might be — any age almost." It goes without saying that the possessors of such a stronghold as this city, liable to be Carcassonne, 259 closely invested for months at a time, would give special attention to the water supply ; so that we must not leave Carcassonne without a word about the wells. There is one in the centre of the town, covered with a large, round, stuccoed building. I passed another on the way to this. Still another is in the cloister of Saint-Nazaire, besides which wells have been discovered in some of the towers. Le Due found a cistern under the ascent to the Porte de I'Aude and between the two enclosures. A stairway built in the thickness of the first enclosure leads down into it, and the water could be drawn from a curbed opening still visible in the wall. That this remarkable historic city can now be visited and its interesting monuments examined with safety and comfort, is due to the Commis- sion des Monuments HistoriqueSy which under- took the work of restoration and preservation in 1844. At that time all the towers of the Visigothic enclosure had been uncovered for years, and had suffered the usual effects of ex- posure to the weather. The ruins had been 26o In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, abandoned to the inhabitants, who used the materials of the parapets and chemins de ronde at pleasure, and converted the towers into de- positories of filth. Since 1855 the Commission has been engaged in covering the towers, and in restoring the most interesting parts of the walls and the Church of Saint-Nazaire. Most of the towers of the inner enclosure are now covered, and ruined portions of the walls, espe- cially on the west side, have been rebuilt ; so that for years yet to come these venerable walls and towers, scarred and blackened with the storms of fourteen centuries, will remain, a les- son-book in stone for the student of history. My explorations ended, I returned to the Porte Narbonnaise, through which the wind swept with a fury which nearly carried away my umbrella ; and following the path along the eastern front and round the northern end, I made my way down to the modern city and into the nineteenth century again. It is a change for the better, spite of the fas- cinating, romantic charm which invests the an- cient towers and bulwarks. No thoughtful man Ca rcassonne. 261 can go from this quaint relic of barbarism and feudalism into even a little provincial city like modern Carcassonne, and not realize the im- mense gulf which separates the new civilization from the old. Though the nations have not yet unlearned the art of war, and human progress, alas, marks its advance by deadHer instruments of destruction, yet the moral and intellectual plane is higher, '' the gray barbarian " is '* lower than the Christian child." As I stroll beneath the grand trees of the modern city, awaiting the train for Toulouse, I am tempted to give the reader the whole of the little poem of Nadaud, with a verse from which this closing chapter is prefaced. The picture is so true to nature ; such a happy illustration of the different keys in which human desires are set ; the story is so sweetly and simply told, that it is pleasant to associate it with the memo- ries of Carcassonne. **How old I am! I'm eighty years! I've worked both hard and long. Yet, patient as my life has been, One dearest sight I have not seen — 262 In the Shadow of the Pyrenees, It almost seems a wrong ; A dream I had when life was new, Alas, our dreams ! they come not true ; I thought to see fair Carcassonne, That lovely city — Carcassonne ! One sees it dimly from the height Beyond the mountains blue, Fain would I walk five weary leagues — I do not mind the road's fatigues — Through morn and evening's dew. But bitter frosts would fall at night. And on the grapes that yellow blight ! I could not go to Carcassonne, I never went to Carcassonne. They say it is as gay all times As holidays at home ! The gentles ride in gay attire, And in the sun each gilded spire Shoots up, like those of Rome I The Bishop the procession leads. And generals curb their prancing steeds, Alas ! I know not Carcassonne I Alas \ I saw not Carcassonne ! Our vicar's right ! he preaches loud, And bids us to beware; He says, * O ! guard the weakest part, And most the traitor in the heart Carcassonne, 263 Against ambition's snare !'* Perhaps in Autumn I can find Two sunny days with gentle wind; I then could go to Carcassonne, I still could go to Carcassonne ! My God and Father ! pardon me If this my wish offends ! One sees some hope, more high than he, In age, as in his infancy. To which his heart ascends ! My wife, my son have seen Narbonne; My grandson went to Perpignan ; But I have not seen Carcassonne ! But I have not seen Carcassonne ! Thus sighed a peasant bent with age, Half dreaming in his chair; I said, ' My friend, come go with me. To-morrow then thine eyes shall see Those streets that seem so fair.' That night there came for passing soul The church-bell's low and solemn toll. He never saw gay Carcassonne. Who has not known a Carcassonne?" The train has come. Toulouse to-night. To- morrow we pass out of the shadow of the Pyrenees. NOTES. CHAPTER I. (i) Les Landes, page i. For a minute and most in- teresting description of this remarkable region, its phy- sical characteristics, people, and customs, the reader is referred to M. Joanne's De Bordeaux a Bayonne. CHAPTER VII. (i) Page 75. The celebrated Song of Lelo, the manu- script of which was discovered at Simancas near the close of the sixteenth century, is said to be founded on the wars of the Roman Emperor Augustus with the Can- tabri, and is claimed by some writers to be almost con- temporaneous with the events it relates. The following is rendered from the French version of M. Capistou : Lelo is dead ! Lelo is dead ! Zara hath slain him. The Romans would conquer Biscay, and Biscay raised the song of war. Octavius is lord of the world, and Lekobidi is lord of Biscay. From the side of the sea and from the side of the land, Octavius attacks us with his warriors. They hold the plains, but the caverns and the mountams are ours. 266 Notes. When we are in a favorable position we defend it with courage. We fear not to meet them on equal terms, even though we lack necessary food. They ga covered with hard cuirasses, but, notwithstanding, we hit them with our lances. Five years of war, day and night, without the least repose, have we undergone. For one of our men who falls, fifty of their's have been destroyed. They are many, and we very few. In the end, a treaty gives peace to us all. In our mountains, as in their country, we are all friends. The Reverend Wentworth Webster, M.A., in his Basque Legends (London, 1879), gives a more Hteral ren- dering and says : '' Many of the words are still very ob- scure, and the translation of them is almost guess-work," He gives it as one of the oldest curiosities of Basque verse, but does not admit the early date claimed for it. (2) Page 78. '^ There can be no doubt but that the battle was fought much nearer to Poitiers than to Tours." — Hallam, Middle Ages, vol. i., p. 7. (3) Page 79. The following translation of the Song of Altabizcar is from Mr. Webster's Basque Legends: A cry is heard From the Basque mountain's midst. Etcheco Jauna,! at his door erect. Listens, and cries, '' What want they ? Who goes there ? " At his lord's feet the dog that sleeping lay Starts up, his bark fills Altabizcar round. ^ " The master of the house," the usual respectful address to a Basque proprietor of any rank. His wife is " Etcheco Anderea." Notes. 267 Through Ibaneta's pass the noise resounds, Striking the rocks on right and left it comes ; 'Tis the dull murmur of a host from far, From off the mountain heights our men reply, Sounding aloud the signal of their horns ; Etcheco Jauna whets his arrows then. They come ! They come ! See, what a wood of spears ! What flags of myriad tint float in the midst ! What lightning-flashes glance from off their arms ! How many be they ? Count them well, my child. I, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, II, 12, 13. 14. 15. 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. Twenty, and thousands more ! 'Twere but lost time to count. Our sinewy arms unite, tear up the rocks, Swift from the mountain-tops we hurl them down Right on their heads. And crush, and slay them all. What would they in our hills, these Northern men ? Why come they here our quiet to disturb ? God made the hills intending none should pass. Down fall the rolling rocks, the troops they crush ! Streams the red blood ! Quivers the mangled flesh ! Oh ! What a sea of blood ! What shattered bones ! Fly, to whom strength remaineth and a horse ! Fly, Carloman, red cloak and raven plumes ! Lies thy stout nephew, Roland, stark in death ; For him his brilliant courage naught avails. And, now, ye Basques, leaving awhile these rocks, Down on the flying foe your arrows shower ! 268 Notes, They run ! They run ! Where now that wood of spears ? Where the gay flags that flaunted in their midst ? Rays from their blood-stained arms no longer flash ! How many are they ? Count them well, my child. 20, 19, 18, 17, 16, IS, 14, 13, 12, II, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, I. One ! There is left not one. 'Tis o'er ! Etcheco Jauna home with thy dog retire. Embrace thy wife and child, Thine arrows clean, and stow them with thine horn ; And then lie down and sleep thereon. At night yon mangled flesh shall eagles eat, And to eternity those bones shall bleach. The claim of this song to an ancient date, though ac- cepted by such high authorities as Cenac Moncaut and A. Chaho, seems to have been very successfully at- tacked. Mr. Webster quotes several eminent Basque scholars, such as M. Blade and M. Vinson, who have denied its authenticity on internal grounds, especially the modern character of the language. He then adds that, in the Gentleman's Magazine iox March, 1859, a let- ter appears from M. Antoine d'Abbadie, Membre de rinstitut, stating that this song had actually been among the unsuccessful pieces submitted for the poetical com- petition at Urrugne, of the previous August ; and that he had heard from one of his Basque neighbors the names of the two persons, the one of whom composed it in French, and the other translated it into modern Basque. *' This testimony," says Mr. Webster, '* has often been repeated by M. d'Abbadie, with the additional assurance Notes. 269 that he knows not only the house, but the very room in which the song was first composed." CHAPTER VIII. (i) Page 91. '' Another difficulty" (in the study of Basque) " arises from the extreme variability of the language. There are, perhaps, not two villages where it is spoken absolutely in the same manner These different varieties are easily grouped into secondary dialects. Prince L. L. Bonaparte recognizes twenty-five of them, but they are reduced without difficulty to eight great dialects. A closer inspection farther reduces these eight divisions to three ; that is to say, the differences between the eight principal dialects are unequal, and admit of partial resemblances. The eight dialects are : the Labourdine, the Souletine, the Eastern Lower- Navarrese, the Western Lower- Navarrese, the Northern Upper-Navarrese, the Southern Upper-Navarrese, the Guipuzcoan, the Biscayan." The dialects do not corre- spond exactly to the territorial subdivisions whose names they bear. Thus the Western Lower-Navarrese is spoken in a part of the ancient Labourd, the Biscayan in Guipuz- coa. Only Guipuzcoa is entirely Basque, in a linguistic point of view. Navarre is only half so, Alava only a tenth part, Biscay three-fourths. Moreover, skirting the districts where the Basque is the native idiom of the ma- jority of the inhabitants at many points, there is an in- termediate zone in which Basque is known only by a minority of the population. This zone is most extensive 2 yo Notes. in Navarre, but exists also in Alava and Biscay. In the valley of Roncal the men speak Spanish together ; with the women they speak Basque, as do the women to each other. A similar state of things exists at Ochagavia in Salazar." — M. JULIEN Vinson : "An Essay on the Basque Language," in Webster's Basque Legends. (2) Page 92. These statements are taken mainly from M. Garat's Origines des Basques de France et d^Es- pagne. A quite different account is given by Mr. Web- ster in his Essay on Basque Poetry, appended to the Basque Legends. He says that there is, perhaps, no people among whom versification is so common, and really high-class poetry so rare, as the Basques. The faculty of rhyming and of improvisation in verse is con- stantly to be met with. Not unusually a traveller in one of the country diligences, especially on a market- day, will be annoyed by the persistent crooning of one of the company ; and if he inquire what the man is about, will be told that he is reciting a narrative in verse of all the events of the past day, mingled, prob- ably, with more or less sarcastic reflections on the pres- ent company, and with special emphasis on the stranger. At the yearly village fetes, when the great ball-match has been lost or won, prizes are sometimes given for improvisation on themes suggested at the moment, and the rapidity of the leading improvisatori or Coblacaris is something marvellous. The whole of Basque po- etry, excepting the Pastorales, is lyrical. There is no epic, and scarcely any narrative ballads. Even in Notes. 271 song the Basques show no remarkable poetical merit. The extreme facility with which the language lends it- self to rhyming has a most injurious effect upon versifi- cation, and the Basques are too often satisfied with mere rhyme. Yet, if thei" poetry has no great merits, it is still free from any ver> gross defects. It is always true and manly, and completely free from affectation. The moral tone is almost always good. The only peculi- arity, in a poetical sense, is the extreme fondness for allegory. In the love-songs the fair one is constantly addressed under some allegorical disguise. It is a star the lover admires, or it is the nightingale who bewails his sad lot. The loved one is a flower, or a heifer, a dove or a quail, a pomegranate or an apple. The rudest of the Basques never confuse these metaphors ; the al- legory is consistently maintained throughout. (3) Page 96. The Pastorale is a representative and survival of the mediaeval '' Mystery " or '' Miracle-Play," and in the remote districts is acted almost as seriously as is the Ober-Ammergau Passion-Play. It is an open- air performance, which unites, in interminable length and in the same piece, tragedy and comedy, music, dancing, and opera. The stage is generally constructed against a house in the Place of the village, and is com- posed of boards resting on inverted barrels ; one or more sheets, suspended from cross-bars, hide the house- walls and form the background ; to this drapery bunches of flowers and flags are affixed, and thus is formed the whole " scenery ; " the rest is open air and sky. Usu- 272 Notes. ally, behind the sheet, though sometimes in front on a chair, sits the prompter or stage-director ; at the cor- ners and sides of the stage are the stage-keepers, armed with muskets, which are fired off at certain effective moments, and always at the end of a fight. The sexes are never mingled, the Pastorale being played either entirely by men or entirely by women, except, some- times, in the case of the " Satans," a part which is too fatiguing for girls. The speech is always a kind of recitative or chant, varying in time according to the step of the actors, and always accompanied by music. In all these Pastorales, sanctity and nobility of character are associated with calmness of demeanor and tone, and villainy and deviltry of all kinds with restlessness and excitement. The angels and saints, the archbishops and bishops, move with folded hands and softly gliding steps ; the heroes walk majestically slow ; the common soldiers are somewhat more animated in their gestures ; the Saracens, the enemies, the villains, rush wildly about ; but the chorus or " Satans " are ever in restless, aimless, agitated movement, except when engaged in actual dancing. This chorus, on which devolves the great fatigue and burden of the acting, is dressed in red beret, red, open jacket, white trousers with red stripes, red sashes, and hempen sandals bound with red ribands. They carry a little wand, ornamented with red ribands and terminating in a three-forked hooked prong. Blue is the color of the virtuous, red of the vicious. When the stage is empty of other actors, the " Satans " occupy the front corners of it, and dance the wild Saut Basque, Notes, 273 singing at the same time some reflections on, or antici- pations of the piece played, much like the chorus of a Greek tragedy ; but in addition to this, there is gener- ally a comic interlude, more or less impromptu, and very slightly, if at all, connected with the main piece, wherein the ''Satans" take the principal role together with the best comedians of the other actors. This is spoken partly in Gascon or in French, while only Basque is used in the Pastorale proper. The representations last from six to eight hours. Among the characters in the Pastorale of "Abra- ham " are, The Eternal Father, who speaks chiefly in Latin quotations from the Vulgate, and always from be- hind the scenes ; three angels, Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel, who mingle quotations from the Vulgate with their Basque ; four Kings of the Turks ; Pharaoh, King of Egypt ; two good giants, Chavoq and Chorre ; with Sarah, Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Lot, with his wife and daughters, Melchizedek, and some inhabitants of Sodom. Satan and Bulgifer, the two '' Satans," are the authors of all Abraham's misfortunes. They stir up war against Abraham and Lot in the persons of the Turkish kings, who conquer Lot and slay his partisans, including the two good giants, whose corpses are carried off by Sa- tan to be feasted on, with the exclamation : '^ O what cutlets ! What a fine leg ! " Lot's wife, when the time comes for her to be changed into a pillar of salt, drops under the stage. When Isaac is born, he is forthwith baptized. — Condensed from Webster's Basque Legends. 2/4 Notes. (4) Page loi. The Spanish Basques occupy the three provinces of Alava, Vizcaya, and Guipuzcoa. Vizcaya, the largest, contains about one hundred and six square leagues ; Guipuzcoa, which is the most densely popu- lated, fifty-two ; Alava, containing about one hundred and eighty square leagues, lies between Guipuzcoa and Navarre. These three provinces are known as Las Pro- vincias Vascongadas. Their national symbol is three hands joined, with the motto Irurac Bat, or three in one. The French Basque country occupies a part of the arrondissement of Bayonne, a very small portion of that of Oloron, and almost the whole of the arrondissement of Mauleon Licharre. It forms three subdivisions : Le Labourdin, or Pays de Labourd, La Soule, and La Basse-Navarre. It is bounded on the north by the Adour, on the west by the ocean, on the south by the Pyrenees. Its eastern limit is a curved line touching the cantons of Sauveterre, Navarreux, Sainte-Marie- d' Oloron, and Aramitz. Prince Bonaparte reckons the actual number of the Basques, not including emigrants established in Mexico, Montevideo, and Buenos Ayres, at 800,000, of whom 660,000 are in Spain, and 140,000 in France. CHAPTER XIII. (i) Page 171. The Jesuits were expelled from Spain by the decree of October 12, 1868 ; but obtained a quasi permission to occupy their monastery at Azpeitia, and took possession again in 1877. The fine library of the monastery was removed to San Sebastian in 1869, but Notes. 275 was restored at the end of the civil war. Since 1855 the monastery has belonged to Guipuzcoa as provincial property. CHAPTER XIV. (i) Page 183. The traveller who may desire to explore this route in detail, will find it useful as well as agree- able to study M. Paul Perret's recent work, Le Pays Basque et Basse-Navarre. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. In the preparation of this little volume, my acknowledgments are due to the following works for matter supplementing and illustrating my own observations : Cenac MoNCAUT. — "Histoire des Pyrenees et des Rapports Internationaux de la France avec I'Efpagne." D. J. Gar AT. — " Origines des Basques de France et d'Es- pagne." M, L. Capistou. — "Guide du Voyageur dans la Province Basque- Espagnole du Guipuzcoa." Paul Perret. — " Le Pays Basque et Basse-Navarre." Pt. IL Adolphe Joanne. — '* Les Pyrenees." This valuable manual, without which no one should attempt a tour in the Pyre- nees, is far more than a guide-book. It is an excellent summary. of historical, topographical, and ethnographical information, carefully worked up from the best sources. 276 Acknowledgments. Adolphe Joanne. — "De Bordeaux a Bayonne," Richard Ford. — *' Handbook for Spain." Henry O'Shea, — "Guide to Spain and Portugal." Henry Blackburn. — " The Pyrenees." H. A. Taine. — "A Tour through the Pyrenees," W. F. P. Napier. — ** History of the War in the Peninsula and in the South of France, from 1807 to 1814." "Le Corps Saints de Plnsigne Basilique Saint- Saturnin de Toulouse." ViOLLET le Due. — ** La Cite de Carcassonne." Henry M. Baird. — " The Rise of the Huguenots of France." Merle d'Aubigne. — "History of the Reformation in the Time of Calvin." Rev. Wentworth Webster, M.A. — ** Basque Legends," with an essay on the Basque Language, by M. Julien Vinson. Murray's ** Handbook of France." Rev. C. Merivale. — " History of the Romans under the Em- pire. " Theophile Gautier— *' Voyage en Espagne." M. R. V. New York, February 12, 1883. '^^ v^^ ^ -7- , ,0 s; ' _^Nk \ * f.i 3 I- -. ; bo"^ '■'o^ /• o V ^y ■^' -/ -f ■I -r "V^ _. ' ', v: ^ >. ^ -<^ ^"f 0^ "V^i^T^,. ^c^. .•^.^ ^& /^ O \y V "» <" / " ■&^^.. aO ^'<^ ;^ i~6 aV^ J.- ^ ^ ^ * vp "oo'' '.^W;? "^^ v^ V o d^ o- r.j ■<-">. ^>' , S -^■- V A. ,^ ■^c^.