Part IV — The Mediterranean Coast
I Introductory
The Mediterranean shore of the south of France, that delectable land which fringes the great tideless sea, bespeaks the very spirit of history and romance, of Christian fervour, and of profane riot and bloodshed.
Its ancient provinces,—Lower Languedoc, the Narbonensis of Gaul; Provence, the most glorious and golden of all that went to make up modern France,—the mediæval capital of King René, Aix-en-Provence, and the commercial capital of the Phoceans (559 B. C.), Massilia, all combine in a wealth of storied lore which is inexhaustible.
The tide of latter-day travel descends the Rhône to Marseilles, turns eastward to the conventional pleasures of the Riviera, and utterly neglects the charms of La Crau, St. Rémy, Martiques, and Aigues-Mortes; or the more progressive, though still ancient cathedral cities of Montpellier, Béziers, Narbonne, or Perpignan.
There is no question but that the French Riviera is, in winter, a land of sunshiny days, cool nights, and the more or the less rapid life of fashion. Which of these attractions induces the droves of personally-, semi-, and non-conducted tourists to journey thither, with the first advent of northern rigour, is doubtful; it is probably, however, a combination of all three.
It is a beautiful strip of coast-line from Marseilles to Mentone, and its towns and cities are most attractively placed. But a sojourn there “in the season,” amid the luxury of a “palace-hotel,” or the bareness of a mediocre pension, is a thing to be dreaded. Seekers after health and pleasure are supposed to be wonderfully recouped by the process; but this is more than doubtful. Vice is rarely attractive, but it is always made attractive, and weak tea and pain de ménage in a Riviera boarding-house are no more stimulating than elsewhere; hence the many virtues of this sunlit land are greatly nullified.
“A peculiarity of the Riviera is that each of the prominent watering-places possesses a tutelary deity of our own. (Modest this!) Thus, for instance, no visitor to Cannes is allowed to forget the name of Lord Brougham, while the interest at Beaulieu and Cap Martin centres around another great English statesman, Lord Salisbury. Cap d’Antibes has (or had) for its genius loci Grant Allen, and Valescure is chiefly concerned with Mrs. Humphry Ward and Mrs. Oliphant.”
This quotation is, perhaps, enough to make the writer’s point here: Why go to the Riviera to think of Lord Brougham, long since dead and gone, any more than to Monte Carlo to be reminded of the unfortunate end which happened to the great system for “breaking the bank” of Lord——, a nineteenth-century nobleman of notoriety—if not of fame?
The charm of situation of the Riviera is great, and the interest awakened by its many reminders of the historied past is equally so; but, with regard to its architectural remains, the most ready and willing temperament will be doomed to disappointment.
The cathedral cities of the Riviera are not of irresistible attraction as shrines of the Christian faith; but they have much else, either within their confines or in the immediate neighbourhood, which will go far to make up for the deficiency of their religious monuments.
It is not that the architectural remains of churches of another day, and secular establishments, are wholly wanting. Far from it; Fréjus, Toulon, Grasse, and Cannes are possessed of delightful old churches, though they are not of ranking greatness, or splendour.
Still the fact remains that, of themselves, the natural beauties of the region and the heritage of a historic past are not enough to attract the throngs which, for any one of a dozen suspected reasons, annually, from November to March, flock hither to this range of towns, which extends from Hyères and St. Raphael, on the west, to Bordighera and Ospadeletti, just over the Italian border, on the east.
It is truly historic ground, this; perhaps more visibly impressed upon the mind and imagination than any other in the world, if we except the Holy Land itself.
Along this boundary were the two main routes, by land and by water, through which the warlike and civil institutions of Rome first made their way into Gaul, conquered it, and impressed thereon indelibly for five hundred years the mighty power which their ambition urged forward.
At Cimiez, a suburb of Nice, they have left a well-preserved amphitheatre; at Antibes the remains of Roman towers; Villefranche—the port of Nice—was formerly a Roman port; Fréjus, the former Forum Julii, has remains of its ancient harbour, its city walls, an amphitheatre, a gateway, and an arch, and, at some distance from the city, the chief of all neighbouring remains, an aqueduct, the crumbling stones of which can be traced for many miles.
Above the promontory of Monaco, where the Alps abruptly meet the sea, stands the tiny village of La Turbie, some nineteen hundred feet above the waters of the sparklingly brilliant Mediterranean. Here stands that venerable ruined tower, the great Trophœa Augusti of the Romans, now stayed and strutted by modern masonry. It commemorates the Alpine victories of the first of the emperors, and overlooks both Italy and France. Stripped to-day of the decorations and sculptures which once graced its walls, it stands as a reminder of the first splendid introduction of the luxuriant architecture of Rome into the precincts of the Western Empire.
Here it may be recalled that sketching, even from the hilltops, is a somewhat risky proceeding for the artist. The surrounding eminences—as would be likely so near the Italian border—are frequently capped with a fortress, and occupied by a small garrison, the sole duty of whose commandant appears to be “heading off,” or worse, those who would make a picturesque note of the environment of this ci-devant Roman stronghold. The process of transcribing “literary notes” is looked upon with equal suspicion, or even greater disapproval, in that—in English—they are not so readily translated as is even a bad drawing. So the admonition is here advisedly given for “whom it may concern.”
From the Rhône eastward, Marseilles alone has any church of a class worthy to rank with those truly great. Its present cathedral of Ste. Marie-Majeure assuredly takes, both as to its plan and the magnitude on which it has been carried out, the rank of a masterwork of architecture. It is a modern cathedral, but it is a grand and imposing basilica, after the Byzantine manner.
Westward, if we except Béziers, where there is a commanding cathedral; Narbonne, where the true sky-pointing Gothic is to be found; and Perpignan, where there is a very ancient though peculiarly disposed cathedral, there are no really grand cathedral churches of this or any other day. On the whole, however, all these cities are possessed of a subtle charm of manner and environment which tell a story peculiarly their own.
Foremost among these cities of Southern Gaul, which have perhaps the greatest and most appealing interest for the traveller, are Carcassonne and Aigues-Mortes.
Each of these remarkable reminders of days that are gone is unlike anything elsewhere. Their very decay and practical desertion make for an interest which would otherwise be unattainable.
Aigues-Mortes has no cathedral, nor ever had; but Carcassonne has a very beautiful, though small, example in St. Nazaire, treated elsewhere in this book.
Both Aigues-Mortes and Carcassonne are the last, and the greatest, examples of the famous walled and fortified cities of the Middle Ages.
Aigues-Mortes itself is a mere dead thing of the marshes, which once held ten thousand souls, and witnessed all the pomp and glitter which attended upon the embarking of Louis IX. on his chivalrous, but ill-starred, ventures to the African coasts.
“Here was a city built by the whim of a king—the last of the Royal Crusaders.” To-day it is a coffin-like city with perhaps a couple of thousand pallid, shaking mortals, striving against the marsh-fever, among the ruined houses, and within the mouldering walls of an ancient Gothic burgh.