A BOOK OF
THE CEVENNES
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
MEHALAH
THE TRAGEDY OF THE CÆSARS
THE DESERTS OF SOUTHERN FRANCE
STRANGE SURVIVALS
SONGS OF THE WEST
A GARLAND OF COUNTRY SONG
OLD COUNTRY LIFE
AN OLD ENGLISH HOME
YORKSHIRE ODDITIES
HISTORIC ODDITIES
OLD ENGLISH FAIRY TALES
THE VICAR OF MORWENSTOW
FREAKS OF FANATICISM
A BOOK OF FAIRY TALES
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME
A BOOK OF BRITTANY
A BOOK OF DARTMOOR
A BOOK OF THE WEST
I. DEVON
II. CORNWALL
A BOOK OF NORTH WALES
A BOOK OF SOUTH WALES
A BOOK OF THE RHINE
A BOOK OF THE RIVIERA
A BOOK OF THE PYRENEES
[Illustration: THE TAMARGUE FROM LA SOUCHE]
A BOOK OF
THE CEVENNES
BY S. BARING-GOULD, M.A.
"ILLE TERRARUM MIHI PRÆTER OMNES
ANGULUS RIDET, UBI NON HYMETTO
MELLA DECEDUNT, VIRIDIQUE CERTAT
BACCA VENAFRO;
VER UBI LONGUM, TEPIDASQUE PRÆBET
JUPITER BRUMAS."
_Hor._ Od. ii. 6.
[Illustration]
WITH FORTY-FOUR ILLUSTRATIONS
EIGHT OF WHICH ARE IN COLOUR, AND A MAP
London
John Long
Norris Street, Haymarket
[_All rights reserved_]
_First Published in 1907_
Illustrations reproduced by the Hentschel-Colourtype Process
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE CRESCENT 1
II. LE VELAY 15
III. LE PUY 34
IV. ROUND ABOUT LE PUY 60
V. L'AUBERGE DE PEYRABEILLE 84
VI. LES BOUTIÈRES 103
VII. THE VOLCANOES OF THE VIVARAIS 114
VIII. THE CANON OF THE ARDÈCHE 137
IX. THE WOOD OF PAÏOLIVE 153
X. THE RAVINE OF THE ALLIER 161
XI. THE CAMISARDS 177
XII. ALAIS 203
XIII. GANGES 221
XIV. LE VIGAN 237
XV. L'AIGOUAL 248
XVI. THE LAND OF FERDINAND FABRE 262
XVII. THE HÉRAULT 282
INDEX 305
ILLUSTRATIONS
IN COLOUR
THE TAMARGUE FROM LA SOUCHE _Frontispiece_
From a photograph by Artige frères.
LACEMAKER, LE PUIS 25
LACEMAKERS 102
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
CASTLE OF VENTADOUR 128
From a photograph by Bigot-Croze.
PEASANTS OF THE CAUSSES 176
THE GOAT'S LEAP, LE VIGAN 241
PEASANT GIRLS OF THE CAUSSES 248
DOLMEN OF GRANDMONT 293
From a photograph by L. Froment.
IN MONOTONE
THE CYCLOPSES AT MOURÈZE 2
From a photograph by L. Froment.
LE SUC DE SARA 14
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
LA VOUTE-SUR-LOIRE 23
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
CASCADE DES ESTREYS 23
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
LA BÉATE 27
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
CEVENOL PEASANT 29
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
CATHEDRAL, WEST FRONT, LE PUY 34
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
PORCH, CATHEDRAL, LE PUY 40
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
L'AIGUILHE 42
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
BASALT, ESPALY 61
From a photograph by Vazelle.
LA ROCHE LAMBERT 64
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
MÉZENC 69
From a photograph by Artige frères.
GERBIER DE JONC 72
From a photograph by Artige frères.
THE TAVERN OF PEYRABEILLE 84
From a photograph by Margerite-Brémont.
MAYRES 97
From a photograph by Artige frères.
THE VIVARAIS CHAIN 114
From a photograph by Artige frères.
THE VOLANE VALLEY 121
From a photograph by Artige frères.
LE FAUTEUIL DU DIABLE 123
From a photograph by Artige frères.
FALL AT ANTRAIGUES 125
From a photograph by Bigot-Croze.
IN THE ARDÈCHE 129
From a photograph by Artige frères.
CRATER OF LA GRAVENNE 130
From a photograph by Bigot-Croze.
FALLS OF RUY PIC 132
From a photograph by Artige frères.
GORGES OF THE ARDÈCHE 137
From a photograph by Artige frères.
PONT DE L'ARC 144
From a photograph by Artige frères.
"THE CATHEDRAL" 147
From a photograph by Artige frères.
PAÏOLIVE 155
From a photograph by Artige frères.
CASTLE OF GANGES 225
From a photograph by J. Bernard.
BRAMABIAU 253
From a photograph by C. Bernheim.
CHEESEMAKERS, ROQUEFORT 275
From a photograph by E. Carrère.
S. GUILHEM-LE-DÉSERT 283
From a photograph by L. Froment.
IN THE CIRQUE, MOURÈZE 284
From a photograph by L. Froment.
GROUP AT MOURÈZE 287
From a photograph by L. Froment.
THE SENTINEL AT MOURÈZE 288
From a photograph by L. Froment.
ON THE HÉRAULT 296
From a photograph by L. Froment.
S. GUILHEM-LE-DÉSERT 298
From a photograph by L. Froment.
MILLS ON THE HÉRAULT 298
From a photograph by L. Froment.
IN THE TEXT
PAGE
SKETCH MAP OF THE CÉVENNES 4
PREFACE
The Cévennes are a mountain fringe to the uplifted plateau of
Central France, and are less visited by English tourists than any
other mountainous district in la belle France. They have been most
unjustly neglected. The scenery is singularly varied. The historical
associations are rich, but mainly tragic.
This is not a guide-book, but an introduction to the country, to be
supplemented by guide-books. The area is so extensive, that I have had
to exercise restraint and limit myself to a few of the most salient
features and most profitable centres whence excursions may be made.
The Cévennes should be visited from March to June, afterwards the heat
is too great for travelling to be comfortable. For inns, consult the
annual volume of the French Touring Club; Baedeker and Joanne cannot
always be relied on, as proprietors change, either for the better or
for the worse. I have been landed in unsatisfactory quarters by relying
on one or other of these guide-books, owing to the above-mentioned
reason.
The "Touring-Club de France," Avenue de la Grande Armée 65, Paris,
is doing excellent work in refusing to recommend a hotel unless the
sanitary arrangements be up-to-date.
THE CEVENNES
CHAPTER I
THE CRESCENT
The great central plateau—The true Cévennes—The character of
the range—The watershed—The Garrigues—The Boutières—Mézenc—The
Coiron—The mountains of the Vivarais—The Ardèche—Volcanoes—The
Camisard country—Larzac—The Hérault—The Espinouse—The Montagne
Noire—Neglect of the Cévennes—Their great interest.
The great central plateau of France that serves as the watershed
between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, and severs France
proper—the old medieval France—from Languedoc, is due to a mighty
upheaval of granite, carrying with it aloft on its back beds of schist,
Jura limestone, chalk, coal, and red sandstone. The granite has not
everywhere reached the surface, it has not in all parts shaken off the
burden that lay on it. The superincumbent beds do not lie in position
one above another, like ranges of books on shelves. Many of them over a
large tract have been carried away by denudation through the action of
water.
The plateau under consideration stretches over an area of 3,000 square
miles. It dies down towards the north-west, but reaches its highest
elevation in the east and in the south. This great upland district
had to be crossed before the peoples dwelling north and south of it
could be fused into one. The plateau extends through the old provinces
of Marche and Limousin, Auvergne, Forez, the Velay, the Vivarais,
Rouergue, and the Gévaudan. But it was disturbed, broken up, and
overlaid by volcanic eruptions at a comparatively recent date, pouring
forth floods of lava and clouds of ash in Auvergne, le Velay, and le
Vivarais. In its upheaval, moreover, the granite turned up, snapped,
and exposed the superposed beds, and left them as bristling ridges to
the east and south. It is this fringe that constitutes the Cévennes.
These describe a half-moon, with its convexity towards the basin of the
Rhône. Locally, indeed, the name Cévennes is limited to a tangle of
schist ridges and deep-cleft ravines, constituting that portion of the
arc which is between the Coiron and the limestone plateau of Larzac.
But such is not the original limitation. The Romans undoubtedly,
looking from the basin of the Rhône on the long purple chain, behind
which set the sun in a glow of amber, as they passed up and down
between Arles and Vienne—designated that range Cebennæ, and geographers
still are disposed to so name the entire series, as constituting
an orological entity, although the several portions have received
distinguishing appellations.
They all belong to the same system, were all in their main lines thrown
up at the same time, though not by any means all of the same geological
formation; and they are all peopled by the same race, all speaking the
Langue d'Oc.
[Illustration: THE CYCLOPSES, MOURÈZE]
It seems therefore reasonable to take the entire curve as forming the
Cévennes from the depression of the Jarrêt, through which runs the line
from Lyons to the coalfields of S. Etienne, as the northern limit, and
the Montagne Noire, east of the gap of Revel, by which the road by
which Castelnaudary and Castres are linked, as the western termination.
"The Cévennes," says Onésime Reclus, "have this striking feature,
that they separate two climates, two vegetations, two natures.
To the north and to the west are rain, snow, light fog silvered
by the moon, and dense vapours which the sun cannot pierce; and
the streams that water the smallest valleys nourish rich green
meadows; to the south and east is a blazing sun, are glare, heat,
drought, barrenness, dust, the vine, the olive, springs of water
few and far between, but where they do issue, copious and clear;
here—contrasts of colour, sharp-cut horizons, more beautiful than
those of the north. What a contrast within a few leagues' distance
between the verdure of Mezamet and the vari-coloured marbles of
Cannes, between the Agout and the Salvetat d'Angles ... between
the valley of the Dourbie at Nant and the Hérault at Ganges,
between the Tarn at Pont-de-Montvert and the embattled gorges of
the Gardons, between the Allier at La Bastide and the ravines down
which rushes the Cèze, between the young Loire and the terrible
rapids of the Ardèche ... on one side a French Siberia, on the
other an Africa where the sirocco does not parch up the harvests,
but where the mistral shrieks, itself producing a brief winter."[1]
The chain of the Cévennes, of which Mézenc may be regarded as the
hinge, forms a ridge on the right bank of the Rhône, running for a
while parallel to the French Alps upon the left bank. But whereas these
latter turn and curve to the east, forming the Maritime Alps, the
Cévennes have bent in exactly the opposite direction.
Geographically and historically the Cévennes divide into two great
sections—the Cévennes Méridionales and the Cévennes Septentrionales.
This continuous mountain ridge, in fact, forms a line of separation of
waters very distinct, without solution of continuity, and which, in
spite of the variety of its geological structure, has been determined
by the same fold in the earth's crust, by one and the same act of
pressure.
From the main chain, like the rib of a fern, extend lateral offshoots,
between which are valleys watered by the drainage of the principal
spinal chain. On the east side of the Cévennes these are all
approximately at right angles to the axis. But this is not the case
on the west side; nor is it so on the south. On this latter, before
the main range a sort of outwork has been thrown up that deflects the
streams, where they have not cut through it. These bastions are the
Garrigues and the Espinouse.
The eastern face of the Cévennes towards the Rhône is torn and steep.
That towards the west exhibits a different aspect altogether, as there
the range starts out of a high uplifted plain but little eroded.
The Garrigues above mentioned form a barren, waterless bastion, with
little growing on them but the dwarf Kirmes oak (_Quercus coccifera_)
evergreen, with spiky leaves, locally called _garrus_, giving the name
to the range. They are full of pot-holes (_avens_), down which the rain
that falls sinks to travel underground and reappear often at great
distances in copious springs.
[Illustration: Sketch Map of THE CEVENNES]
The northernmost portion of the Cévennes is the chain of the
Boutières, composed of granite and gneiss, and they are the least
interesting portion of the series. Few of the summits surpass 3,600
feet, but they throw out a spur that is a supreme effort, the Mont
Pilat, 4,700 feet; precisely as the Pyrenees, before expiring in the
east, have projected to the north-east, and tossed aloft the noble
pyramid of the Canigou. The Boutières attach themselves at their
southern extremity to Mézenc, the loftiest peak of the Cévennes, 5,750
feet. So also does the chain of the Mégal, separated from the Boutières
by the valley of the Lignon. Seen from Le Puy, this ridge is fine,
broken into peaks. The Mégal itself attains to the height of 4,345
feet. This cone formerly belched forth a torrent of lava reaching to a
thickness of 450 feet, and extending to a distance of fifty miles by
eight miles wide.
From the volcanic nucleus of Mézenc branches south-east the chain
of the Coiron, volcanic as well, stretching to the Rhône, where its
last deposits of lava are crowned by the ruins of Rochemaure. The
geologist Cordier, who had travelled in Auvergne, Italy, Syria, and
Egypt, declared that he had never seen a volcanic region comparable
to the Coiron. This chain is of special interest to the geologist,
and is full of surprises to the ordinary traveller, for the lava bed
caps the mountains, composed of friable limestone, that once formed a
great calcareous plain. The Rhône has lowered its bed a thousand feet
since the liquid stone flowed, and torrents have cut through lava and
limestone, fashioning deep and even broad valleys. Next, the weather
ate into the flanks where the stone was soft, undermined the basalt,
that came down for lack of support in huge masses.
Not only so, but man from the remotest period has burrowed into the
rock to form habitations for himself. Near S. Jean-le-Centenier are the
Balmes de Montbrul, a volcanic crater 300 feet in diameter and 480 feet
deep. Men have scooped out rudimentary dwelling places in the sides
in fifteen to twenty stages, one above another; a chapel and a prison
were among these excavations. A troglodyte family lived in one of these
caves at the end of the eighteenth century.
The mountains of the Vivarais are the finest portion of the Cévennes,
so noble are their outlines, so deep are the clefts that seam them, so
tumbled is the aspect of range heaped on range; and they are supremely
interesting on account of the volcanic vents that remain in good
preservation, and the wondrous walls of prismatic basalt that line the
rivers.
The Ardèche is certainly the most extraordinary river in Europe; after
leaping, and burrowing, and sawing its way through basalt, it passes
down a cleft of lias disposed in beds completely horizontal, and rising
like the walls of houses. In fact, it traverses a long white street,
many miles in length, and then enters the great ravine between lofty
precipices of Dolomitic limestone, where runs no road, and where one
must descend in a boat, shooting rapid after rapid in the midst of
scenery only rivalled by the noted gorges of the Tarn.
It is not necessary to do more than indicate the general aspect of this
portion of the Cévennes, to give an outline that may be filled in with
details later on.
But before quitting this department, I must quote some words of Mr.
Hammerton, no mean judge of landscape:—
"The department of Ardèche on the right bank of the Rhône is
but little visited by tourists, and does not contain a single
mountain whose name is known in England. It is natural that the
hills of the Ardèche should be little known, as the fame of them
is extinguished by the Alps; yet they are highly picturesque and
full of geological interest. As to the altitudes, they are not
considered high mountains in France, but there are twelve of them
that exceed Ben Nevis."
The volcanic region of Mézenc and the Coiron to the east of the
granitic plateau separates the southern from the northern Cévennes. The
first volcanic cones are met with immediately north of Mont Tanargue
(4,785 feet). The southernmost is the Coupe de Jaujac. There are six of
these volcanoes lying at the foot of the granite plateau, but they are
insignificant in comparison with those of the principal range, which
forms the watershed between the Loire and the Rhône, in the centre
of which range is the three-toothed Mézenc, surrounded by subsidiary
cones, among which is the Gerbier de Jonc (5,090 feet), which was 5,610
feet high before a landslip occurred in 1821, that reduced its height.
On the flank of this mountain rises the Loire.
The department of Gard takes it name from several Gardons, a name as
common in this part of the Cévennes as Gave is in the Pyrenees.
We are now in the midst of the Camisard country, an inextricable
network of mountains of lacerated schist and of deeply furrowed
valleys, in which the revolted Cevenols held at bay the armies of
Louis XIV. At the present day the department of Gard contains more
Protestants than any other in France, and whole villages are entirely
Calvinist, with scarce a Catholic in them.
The Cévennes are drifting westward. In Hérault they take a definitely
western direction. Here comes in the limestone plateau of Larzac, that
feeds the countless flocks from which are derived Roquefort cheese.
This is a barren land. It was not always so, but man has devastated
it with the axe, and the sheep devour every plant that shoots, and
kill the future of Larzac. Little soil now remains on this elevated
white tableland; what there is is swept away by the rains and carried
underground in the _avens_ or pot-holes. M. Martel says:—
"Nowadays that atmospheric condensation is weak, the rains so soon
as they touch the calcareous rock are engulfed in its thousands
of fissures, at once, as if evaporated by contact with red-hot
iron. The porosity of the soil is guilty of this legerdemain.
Save on the morrow of great storms, drunk up thirstily by the
parched causse in a few hours, there is not a drop of water on
the plateau. In the stony bed of the torrents one may make almost
a complete circuit of such a peninsula as that circumscribed by
the Vis on the east, and the Virenque on the north, west, and
south, where run their trenches, cut to the depth of 600 to 900
feet, forming tortuous chaplets of rubble beds, grey and sunburnt.
Torrent beds these, sufficiently large to accommodate the Dordogne
with ease, but now only rivers of ballast, where the flood of
a passing storm rarely troubles the sleep of the sand and the
solitary pebbles."
The river Hérault, that gives its name to the department, flows through
a ravine, up which runs no road, save to S. Guilhem-le-Désert. Another
river not easy to be explored is its tributary, the Vis. One can look
down into the cañon from above, but not thread it.
We come next to the coalfields that are more or less energetically
exploited. Some talk has been about running a special line from
them to Marseilles, so as to furnish the vessels with home-produced
steam-coal. But the fuel here turned out has not the heating power of
the anthracite of Cardiff, and it has proved cheaper to obtain a supply
by water from Wales than to employ that which is dug out of the flanks
of the Cévennes 150 miles distant.
The Espinouse gives birth on one slope to affluents of the Tarn,
that discharges its waters into the Garonne and finally into the
Atlantic. On the southern face, which is not a slope but a precipice,
through chasms it sends feeders to the Orb that throws its waters into
the Mediterranean. The Espinouse is composed of gneiss and schist,
penetrated by veins of eruptive matter. Although the actual heights are
not great, rarely exceeding 3,300 feet, yet the sheer cliffs, and the
manner in which they have been cleft by torrents, gives them a grandeur
which makes this portion of the Cévennes well deserving of a visit.
The Monts de Lacaune, almost wholly sterile, link the Cévennes of
Hérault to those of Aveyron. The highest crest is the Pic de Montalet,
3,810 feet. They are composed of mica-schists, granite, and porphyry,
and stretch in barren plateaux, or monotonous rolling ground, frozen
for a great part of the year. The Montagne Noire, on the other hand, is
well wooded. From its wretched hamlets come the men who help to gather
in the vintage in the more fertile plains.
"These mountaineers arrive," says Mme. L. Figuier, "to earn in
one month enough to support them and their families all the rest
of the year in their contracted valleys, rich in vegetation but
very poor in products. The Languedoc peasants treat them harshly.
The unfortunate mountaineers, who ought to inspire compassion,
are often enough badly treated, and serve as butts for chaff to
the grape gatherers of the country to which they have come as
assistants. The farmer who has hired a band of these _montagnards_
gives them a granary and some hay in and on which to rest after
the fatigues of the day. Here they are huddled together, men,
women, and children, living on the grapes and on a coarse soup
which they cook in common in the evening, and eat together out of
one porringer. But these veritable pariahs are linked together
by strong ties of affection. They rise, walk, work, eat, sleep
together always in herds. In the evening, on returning from the
vineyards, they dance their national _bourées_, not so much for
enjoyment, as to bring back to their minds their native country,
and sometimes great tears may be seen rolling down the cheeks of
the young girls, who think of the happy times when they danced so
merrily on the earthen floors of their cottages. The most fertile
plains, the most brilliant cities, cannot compensate, to these
poor people, for the century-old nut trees and the chestnuts which
nourish them in their miserable hovels. Their hearts crave for the
freshness of their valleys, the fragrance of their meadows, their
snowy mountains, and the distaff over the fire of the winter's
evenings."[2]
I have not in this book included the Montagne Noire. I have not
described the range beyond the Espinouse westward, nor the mountains
about Annonais and Mont Pilat, as these portions of the Cévennes are
less interesting than that which intervenes, and, also, lest I should
unduly extend the book.
It is strange that the region of the Cévennes should have been
neglected by tourists to such an extent as it has; but it is explicable.
Those who seek sunshine during the winter in the Riviera leave the
Cévennes far away as a bank of cloud silver-fringed on their right
hand beyond the Rhône. On their way back to England in spring they are
disinclined to loiter, and break their home journey for the sake of
excursions into this region, so little explored. In like manner, those
who go to Pau are carried by the railway far away to the west, and see
nothing of the plateau, because it slants downwards from the lofty
ridge to the east.
Those who travel from Toulouse to Montpellier by the railway have their
eyes attracted south to the snows and glaciers of the Pyrenees, and do
not turn their heads to look north at the range that is so unassertive,
sheltering itself behind the desolate Garrigues.
In 1894 I published a book, _The Deserts of Central France_, in which I
described the great tableland high uplifted that lies in the penumbra
of the great crescent, and I shall say nothing in this of the plateaux
of Lot, Tarn, and Lozère, dealt with in the former work, but confine
myself to the marginal range. Since M. Martel first drew attention to
the gorges of the Tarn, and possibly due in a measure to my work, these
gorges are becoming annually frequented more and more by tourists.
However fine they may be, there are others in the departments of
Ardèche, Gard, and Hérault, that fall but little, if at all, short of
them in savagery and strangeness.
There are no great towns in the Cévennes. Such as there are are sleepy
and stationary; but from Béziers, Montpellier, Nîmes, Le Puy, where
every comfort may be found, it is easy to run into the mountains,
and return from them to recruit. Hotels are vastly improved of late
years owing to the insistence of the Touring Club on the sanitary
arrangements being at least decent, which they were not ten years ago.
Enough has been said to show that the Cévennes abound in scenes of
great beauty, and that they are of special interest to geologists.
They are interesting in another way. The limestone hills are overgrown
with aromatic herbs, mint, marjoram, thyme, sage, lavender, rosemary,
so as to be veritable spice mountains over which the warm air wafts
fragrance. The shrubs and trees present to our eyes, familiar with
northern vegetation, an unfamiliar appearance. They are for the most
part evergreens, where the chestnuts do not spread in forests, or the
mulberry is not cultivated for silkworm culture.
For the geology of the volcanic district of Haute Loire and Ardèche, an
excellent guide is Mr. Paulett Scrope's _Geology and Extinct Volcanoes
in Central France_, London, second edition, 1858.
Lovers of the writings of Robert Louis Stevenson know his _Travels with
a Donkey in the Cévennes_—a delightful book, but dealing very little
with the Cévennes proper, mainly with the Upper Gévaudan, and with that
portion of Lozère threaded by the Tarn, and with neither of these do I
deal in this volume.
[Illustration: LE SUC DE SARA]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _France: Algérie et Colonies_, Paris, Hachette et Cie.
[2] FIGUIER (L). _Mos de Lavène_, Paris, Marpon.