SAINT JOHN OF LIGHT.
"_Guibelerat so'guin eta
Hasperrenak ardura?_"
"As we pursue our mountain track,
Shall we not sigh as we look back?"
--Basque Song.
The days pass happily by, at Biarritz. One quickly feels the charm of
the place; it has its own delightfulness, apart from the season and its
amusements. In the season, however, the amusements are not once allowed
to flag. By half-past ten, fashion is astir and gathers toward the beach
for the bathing hour; then parts to walk and drive, and afterward to
lunch. It takes its siesta as does the nation its neighbor; meets once
more for the afternoon hour on the sands, and at six drifts to the
Casino, where children are soon dancing, little glasses clinking, and
mild gambling games in full swing. The thought of dinner deepens with
the dusk, but in the evening the tide sets again to the Casino, and a
concert or a ball rounds up the day.
The scope of diversions is much the same as on the opposite edge of the
Atlantic,--with due allowance for national types; but here there is
perhaps more color to the scene. European watering-places are naturally
cosmopolitan. Here at Biarritz, English society mingles with the
French, and both are strongly reinforced from Spain. Only thirteen hours
from Paris, or twenty-two, actual travel, from London, it is but one
from the Spanish frontier and eighteen from Madrid. Memories of Orleans,
Pavia and the Armada are canceled in the common pursuit of pleasure.
"Three hosts combine to offer sacrifice;
Three tongues prefer strange orisons on high;
Three gaudy standards flout the pale blue skies;
The shouts are, France, Spain, Albion, Victory!"
There is besides a goodly sprinkling from other countries. A Russian
nobleman and his family are to arrive at our hotel to-morrow. The spot
is not difficult of access for Italians. The Austrians have long
appreciated it. And do we not constitute at least a small contingent
from across the ocean?
Not only visitors make up the parti-colored effect. There are all grades
in Biarritz,--visitors and home-stayers, rich and poor,--
"From point and saucy ermine, down
To the plain coif and rustic gown."
The natives have their peculiar air and customs, and the Basques are
always picturesque. Spanish guitar-players vie with Neapolitan harpists,
and both with the waves and the hum of talk. The lottery spirit shoots
up here from its hot-bed in Spain. Small boys wander about the beach
with long, cylindrical tin boxes painted a bright red and carried by a
strap from the shoulder. The rim of the lid is marked off into numbered
compartments, and in its centre is an upright teetotum with a bone
projection; while the cylinder itself is filled with cones of crisp,
flaky sweet-wafers, stacked one into another like cornucopias. The
charge is one sou for a spin, and the figure opposite which the
projecting bone-piece stops indicates the number of cones due the
spinner. The figures vary from 2 to 30, and there are no blanks. Every
one appears to patronize the contrivance, and you constantly hear the
click of the teetotum along the beach. Though there are but two 30's in
the circumference, each who spins fondly hopes to gain one, and thus the
same spirit which supports Monte Carlo in splendor gives these boys a
thriving trade.
II.
We spend an idle morning on the projecting point of bluff overlooking
the coves and the fishermen's cabins. This promontory uplifts a
signal-station, the _Atalaye_. Down at the left and rear, cutting
inland, is the _Port Vieux_, where the second bathing pavilion stands;
and, sending up their cries and shoutings to the heights, we
"see the children sport along the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore."
The day is breezy and not too warm. We feel few ambitions. Has the
dreamy spirit of the South come upon us so soon?
It will be a perfect spot for a picnic lunch.
We will imitate the _fête champêtre_ of Charles and Catherine held on
the isle of the Adour. The ladies give their sanction, and three of us
are promptly appointed commissaries. We take the path down to the
street, and find a promising little grocery-store. The madame bows a
welcome.
"Can one obtain here of the bread?" we ask.
"Ah, no," deprecatingly, "that is only with the baker."
"A little of cheese, then? and some Albert biscuits? And a bottle or two
of lemonade, and one of light wine?"
"But yes, without doubt; monsieur shall have these instantly;" and a
bright-faced little girl proceeds to collect the supplies.
"Might one carry away the bottles, and afterward return them?" we
venture.
Here the madame begins to appear suspicious. It is evidently an
irregular purchase at best, and this request seems to make her a trifle
frosty.
"A deposit should perhaps be necessary," we suggest; "how much is
desired?"
Madame gives the subject a moment's thought. "Monsieur would have to
leave at least four sous on each bottle," she finally declares.
"And could madame also lend us some small drinking-glasses, it may be,
and a little corkscrew?"
The old lady is visibly hardening. She is clearly averse to mysteries.
We may be contrabandists, or political exiles, or any variety of refugee
foreigners. She hesitates about the drinking-glasses; is not sure she
_has_ a corkscrew. But another deposit is soothingly arranged for and
paid, and the articles are found.
"And now could we ask to borrow a basket?--also on deposit."
But here the madame's obligingness quite deserts her. The refusal is
flat. She has no basket which can possibly be spared.
It is, we see, plainly time that we should explain our mysterious
selections. Confidingly we entrust her with the secret, and lay bare
our unconventional plan. At the first she listens unmoved, but the idea
of "pique-nique" is soon borne in upon her, and lets in a ray of light.
The frost thaws a trifle. "We are with friends," we say; "they are on
the bluffs; they have desired to make a luncheon for once without the
fork,--to eat their little breads in the open air, upon the rocks." Our
listener nods, half doubtfully. Then we play our highest trump: "We are
but on a visit to Biarritz; we have come from far away; we are
Americans."
Instantly the barriers are down; madame is our firmest ally. "Run,
Élise, seek the large pannier for our friends! Is it that you are of the
fair America?--_la belle Amérique._ Ah, but monsieur, why have you not
said thus before? You should most charmingly have been supplied; are
they not indeed always the friends of our country,--the Americans! You
shall bring here the breads you buy at the bakery; we will add knives
and plates and some fruit, and Élise shall herself carry for you the
full basket to the place of the pique-nique."
Verily the Stars and Stripes are words to conjure with! The picnic is a
complete success. The De Medici fête is more than surpassed; even an
attendant nymph, in the person of the rustic Élise, is not wanting; the
historical parallel is perfect.
In fact, the parallel finally carries itself too far. So small an affair
even as this, it appears, cannot escape the hostility of "envious
Fortune,"--the same who untimely cut off its lamented rival. A large,
black cloud, coming up over us like a vengeful harpy, forebodes the
invariable downpour, and grimly compels us to shorten the feast.
On Sunday, we attend the English service; Britain is sufficiently well
represented at Biarritz to support one during both summer and winter.
The day is restful and calm, and we stroll out afterward along the beach
and over to the deserted villa of the Empress, returning by the path on
the bluff. The sound of trowels and hammers is in part stilled about the
town, and the afternoon takes on a comfortingly peaceful tone in
consequence. The English-speaking contingent keeps the day as quietly as
may be; the Continental majority of course does not. In a few weeks,
posters will adorn the Saturday bulletins, announcing the next day's
bull-fight in San Sebastian, over the border; and if Sunday is quiet at
Biarritz in the season, it is simply because all the world spends the
day at San Sebastian.
III.
But Spain and the Pyrenees lie before us, and we cannot tarry longer at
Biarritz. We shall long feel the warm life of the fresh June days by the
sea. The breack rolls again into the court-yard; we pay our devoirs to
mine host and our dues to his minions, and once more we start, this time
toward the south.
We are to dip into Spain for a day, and have chosen to go by road as far
on the way toward the frontier as St. Jean de Luz, before taking the
train. St. Jean lies on the crescent of the shore only eight miles away,
and the road, like the sea-road to Bayonne, follows the curve of the
higher land, and shows beach and hill and sea in turn as it trends over
the downs. It is another clear, taintless morning. The sun is already
high; but, though having the sky wholly to himself, he is forbearing in
his power. Palisades of poplars lend us their shadows; clumps of
protecting firs stand aside for the road, each with a great gash down
its side and a cup fastened below to catch the bleeding pitch. Now we
are facing the Pyrenees; a little to the left they rise before us, still
miles away. These are not the high Pyrenees; the monarchs stand in the
centre of their realm, and are hardly to be seen, even distantly, until
we shall in a day or two turn inland and approach them. The mountain
wall is broken and lower near the sea, both east and west; yet even here
it rises commandingly, filling the horizon with its hazy hills.
The road is the counterpart of that to Bayonne. We fly smoothly on,
above its hard, thin crackle of sand. We meet peasants afoot, and
burdened horses, on their morning way to Biarritz or Bayonne. The men
ornament their loose, blue linen frocks and brown trousers with the
bright scarlet sash so popular in this region. Heavy oxen draw their
creaking loads toward the same centres,--their bowed heads yoked by the
horns, which are cushioned with a woolly sheepskin mat and tasseled with
red netting. They pull strongly, for the loads are not light, and the
clumsy wheels are disks of solid wood. Little donkeys trot amiably by,
with huge double panniers that recall the _cacolet_. A file of marching
soldiers is overtaken; small villages are passed, each one agog with the
stir of our transit; while now and then we meet a dog-cart and cob or a
stylish span, antennae of the coming season of fashion.
To the right is the accurate level of the sea-horizon; about us are the
heath and furze and the sand-dunes; and far along to the south we can
trace the arc of the beach, until it ends in the projecting hills of
Spain.
* * * * *
St. Jean is reached almost too soon, for the drive has been
exhilarating. We enter by a long, narrow street, which is found to be
alive with people. A small procession is in motion, enlivened by a band.
Every one seems in holiday dress. Our driver has before shown his easy
conviction that streets were intended first for breacks, secondly for
citizens; and now he urges his horses down this narrow way without a
pause in their gallop. The whip signals, the bells on the harness jingle
furiously, the wheels clatter along the cobbles; and, almost before we
have time to order a slackening, procession and by-standers, like a
flock of sheep, go in disorder to the wall, and our breack sweeps by
into the central square.
[Illustration]
It is the festival, we find, of the village's patron saint, St. John the
Baptist. The twenty-fifth of June renews his yearly compact of
protection. In the afternoon, there will be the full procession, led by
the priests, and with a canopied effigy of the saint or of the Virgin
borne in solemnity behind them. Services in the cathedral will follow,
and probably an evening of illumination. We enter the cathedral. Its
floor has been newly strewn with sweet hay, and near the altar, is the
sacred image itself, adorned for the procession, dressed in linen and
velvet and gilt lace, and with a chaplet of beads in its wooden hand.
The canopy-frame, ready prepared, is close by, with its projecting
handle-bars, its four upright poles and its roof of white satin
embroidered with gold.
The cathedral itself is somewhat more interesting than we expected to
see; it is a Basque rather than a French church, has a very high chancel
and altar and no transepts, and the altar is marked by a striking
profusion of color and of gilding, which does not degenerate into the
tawdry and which lights up vividly under the entering noon light. The
chapels at the sides are similarly decorated. Dark oaken balconies,
elaborately carved, run in three tiers along the upper part of the nave.
The seats in these are reserved for the men, the women being relegated
to small black cushions placed on the chairless floor.
St. Jean's one great event was the marriage of Louis XIV with the
Infanta of Spain, which took place in this same church. "A raised
platform extended from the residence of Anne of Austria to the entrance
of the church, which was richly carpeted. The young queen was robed in a
royal mantle of violet-colored velvet, powdered with _fleurs-de-lis_,
over a white dress, and wore a crown upon her head. Her train was
carried by Mesdemoiselles d'Alençon and de Valois and the Princess of
Carignan. After the ceremony, the queen complained of fatigue, and
retired for a few hours to her chamber where she dined alone. In the
evening, she received the court, dressed in the French style; and gold
and silver tokens commemorative of the royal marriage were profusely
showered from the windows of her apartment."[6]
[6] MISS PARDOE: _Louis XIV_.
* * * * *
Without, as we turn for an idle stroll, we find a fair-sized town, with
provincial streets like much of Bayonne. Often the stories of the
houses jut out, one over the other. These projections give a relish of
local color to the crooking ways, intensified by the round-tiled roofs
and by occasional red or blood-colored beams and doorposts. Although we
are still on the French side of the frontier, Spanish influence is
already marked, while that of the Basques predominates over both. St.
Jean is also a summer resort, in a modest way, chiefly for quiet Spanish
families; and from the heavy stone sea-wall built along the beach we see
many of their villas. In days before the railroad went beyond, the port
exchanged regular and almost daily steamers with San Sebastian and
Santander, thus connecting with the Spanish rail, and giving a rather
important traffic advantage. It fostered, besides, extensive cod-fishing
and even whaling enterprises. Its harbor has suffered since; the rails
too have gone through to Spain, and St. Jean is left mildly and
interestingly mournful, in its lessened power, its decayed gentility.
IV.
In St. Jean de Luz, we are fairly in the country of the Basques. One
sees so many of that singular people in the streets, and along the
Biscayan shore generally, that inquiries about them are almost forced
upon the attention. The Basques are still the curiously ill-explained
race they have always been; the learned still disagree over their
origin, and the world at large scarcely knows of them more than the
name. They are scattered all through this lower sea-corner of France,
shading off near Bayonne; and are in yet greater numbers in the
adjoining upper edges of Spain. It seems strange that the beginnings of
this isolated race should to-day be almost no better settled than in the
time of Humboldt or Ramond. Yet they contrive still to embroil the
philologists and historians. Here the race has lived, certainly since
the days of the Romans, probably since long before, out of kin with all
the world, and the world's periods have passed on and left them. No one
knows their birth-mark; they have forgotten it themselves. Of theories,
numberless and hopelessly in discord, each still offers its weighty
arguments, and each destroys the certainty of any.
This appears incredible. What mystery is insoluble in the sharp light of
modern research? Yet until the defenders of the view that the Basques
came from Atlantis can make truce with the advocates of their Phoenician
origin,--until the well-attested theory of their affinity with certain
South American races can overthrow the better-attested theory that they
are the remains of the ancient Iberians,--until Moor and Finn,[7] Tartar
and Coptic, can amicably blend their claims to relationship, the Basques
must remain as they are,--foundlings; or rather, a race whose length of
pedigree has swallowed up its beginnings.
[7] It is said that the Basque nomenclature of domestic animals is
almost entirely Finnish.
It is these unattached sea and mountain races who are always hardest to
conquer. Hence the boast of the Basques. Even the Romans, though they
could defeat, could not subdue them. The strong Roman fortress of
Lapurdum (now Bayonne) did not succeed in even terrifying them, though
they were worsted several times by its legions. Down through all the
early part of the long Christian era, the forefathers of these
frank-faced fishers and mountaineers we see here in the streets of St.
Jean kept their hills stubbornly to themselves. Later, as much perhaps
from policy as necessity, the race came gradually to fall in with the
general governments crystallizing about them. The Spanish Basques came
first into the traces, though not until the thirteenth century; they
were then finally incorporated into the Castilian monarchy. But they
claimed and held marked rights in compensation. While special
privileges--_fueros_--were accorded to certain other provinces as well
as to them, theirs were the widest and endured the longest. They had
five special exemptions: they were not subject to military conscription;
nor to certain imposts and taxes, (paying a gross composition in their
place;) nor in general to trial outside their province; nor to the
quartering of troops; nor to any regulations of their internal affairs
beyond that of the _corregidor_, a representative magistrate appointed
by the king. These _fueros_ lasted in substance even up to 1876, when
Alfonso's government finally repealed them. While thus the Spanish
Basques have, even under allegiance, held stoutly to the right of
virtual self-government, their brethren north of the Pyrenees long
preserved a still fuller autonomy, only coming into the national fold of
France under the impetus of the Revolution.
Thus the Basques have a stiff record of independence; it keeps them in
no little esteem, both with themselves and with their neighbors. Trains,
travel, traffic, eat into their solidarity, and may in time disintegrate
it; but a Basque has not yet lost a particle of his pride of clan; it is
inborn and ineradicable; he would be no other than he is; "_je ne suis
pas un homme_" he boasts, "_je suis un Basque_." You note instinctively
his straighter bearing among the neighboring French peasantry; you can
often single out a Basque by his air. This hardens into a peculiar
result: since they are all of the same high lineage, all are
aristocrats; every Basque is _ex officio_ a nobleman; this is seriously
meant and seriously believed. There are no degrees of caste, the highest
is the only; the entire race is blood-proud, ancestor-proud. A Basque
family might not improbably have been the originators of that celebrated
family tree which remarked, in a marginal note only midway back, that
"about this time the Creation took place."
They are not stilted in their pride, however; your true Basque cares
much for his descent and little for its dignities. "Where the McGregor
sits," he would affirm, "there is the head of the table," and so he
cares nothing about the nominal headship. He lives a free, busy life in
the hill-country or near the sea, stalwart, swarthy, a lover of the open
air, apt at work and sufficiently enterprising, self-respecting, "proud
as Lucifer and combustible as his matches," in no case pinchingly poor,
but rarely rich, and never in awe of his own coat-of-arms.
Writers uniformly take a wicked pleasure in maligning the Basque
language. Its spelling and syntax, its words and sentences, its methods
of construction, are openly derided. Unusual word-forms and distended
proper names are singled out and held up to jeers and contumely. A
Spanish proverb asserts that as to pronunciation the Basques write
"Solomon" and pronounce it "Nebuchadnezzar." The devil, it is alleged,
studied for seven years to learn the Basque tongue; at the end of that
time he had mastered only three words and abandoned the task in disgust.
"And the result is," adds a vivacious writer, "that he is unable to
tempt a Basque, because he cannot speak to him, and that consequently
every Basque goes straight to heaven. Unfortunately, now that the
population is beginning to talk French, (which the devil knows terribly
well,) this privilege is disappearing."
Overhearing disjointed Basque phrases on the Biarritz beach or here in
the streets and cafés of St. Jean, one will not blame the devil's
discouragement. There is scarcely one familiar Aryan syllable. For
centuries their speech was not even a written one; there is said to be
no book in Basque older than two hundred years. But, its strangeness and
isolation once allowed for, there is in reality much to defend in the
Basque language. As spoken, it is far from being harsh, and falls
pleasantly, often softly, on the ear; the sounds are clear, the
articulations rarely, hurried as with the French. The words, other than
a few proper names, do not exceed a sober and reasonable length, and as
to spelling, every letter has its assigned use and duty; there are no
phonetic drones. The original root-forms are short and always
recognizable; the full words grow from these by an orderly if intricate
system of inflections and the forming of derivatives.
The inflections are, it must be admitted, intricate. Each noun boasts
two separate forms, and each of its declension-cases keeps a group of
sub-cases within reach for special emergencies. There are only two
regularly ordained verbs,--"to be" and "to have"; but they don different
canonicals for each different ceremony, and their varying garbs seem
fairly without limit. In the Grammaire Basque of M. Gèze, published in
Bayonne, I count no less than one hundred and eight pages of
closely-set tables needed to paint the opalescent hues of these
multiform auxiliaries,--and this only in one dialect, out of six in all.
M. Chaho, an essayist of weight and himself a Basque, informs us
artlessly and seriously that one counts a thousand and forty-five forms
for their combined present indicatives, and a trifle over ten thousand
forms for the two fully expanded verbs; and yet the language, he hastens
to add, is so magically simple that even a Basque child never makes an
error!
As to its appearance in print, the reader may judge for himself, for
here is one of their favorite love-songs. These light songs abound, many
being surprisingly delicate and dainty.
BASQUE SONG
"_Chorittoua, nourat houa,
Bi hegalez airian?
Espanalat jouaiteco,
Elhurra duc bortean.
Algarreki jouanen guiuc
Elhurra hourtzen denian._
"_San Josefen ermita
Desertion gora da.
Espanalat jouaiteco,
Han da goure pausada.
Guibelerat so'guin eta
Hasperrenak ardura?_
"_Hasperrena, habiloua
Maitiaren borthala.
Bihotzian sar hakio
Houra eni beçala;
Eta guero erran izoc
Nic igorten haidala._"
A graceful English version of the above is in existence, and will fitly
complement its original:
"Borne on thy wings amidst the air,
Sweet bird, where wilt thou go?
For if thou wouldst to Spain repair,
The ports are filled with snow.
Wait, and we will fly together,
When the Spring brings sunny weather.
"St. Joseph's hermitage is lone,
Amidst the desert bare,
And when we on our way are gone,
Awhile we'll rest us there;
As we pursue our mountain track,
Shall we not sigh as we look back?
"Go to my love, O gentle sigh,
And near her chamber hover nigh;
Glide to her heart, make that thy shrine,
As she is fondly kept in mine.
Then thou mayst tell her it is I
Who sent thee to her, gentle sigh!"
--COSTELLO.
In regard to length of words, there exist undoubtedly some surprising
examples, but they are merely compound expressions and quite in analogy
with those of better known and less abused tongues. The German, for one,
indulges in such with notorious yet unrebuked frequency. One is
naturally startled at encountering in Basque such imbrications as
_Izarysaroyarenlarrearenbarena_, or _Ardanzesaroyareniturricoburua_,
which are actual names of places in Spanish Basque-land; but they are
mercifully rare, and when analyzed prove to be rational and even poetic
formations, laden with a full equivalent of import,--the first of the
above two signifying "the centre of the field of the mountain of the
star," and the second, "the summit of the fountain of the mountain of
the vine."
These be scarcely fair samples, however. Commoner words and some of
their more musical phrases are instanced in the following, taken in the
dialect of this region of St. Jean:
_Haran_, Valley.
_Etchelde_, Farm.
_Ogi_, Bread.
_Egur_, Wood.
_Maraza_, Hatchet.
_Nekarsale_, Workman.
_Aita_, My father.
_Lo_, Sleep.
_Etche_, House.
_Etchetar_, Household.
_Nerhaba_, Child.
_Nescatcha_, Maiden.
_Zorioneko_, Happy.
_Ama_, My mother.
_Neure maiteak_, My loved ones.
Home words, such as these latter, give a glimpse of this people's home
life. For they are devoted to their household as to their tribe, and
uniformly show a certain homely honesty and simplicity underneath all
their free ways. Love of smuggling does not impugn this honesty,--in
their own view, at all events; for the Basque, man and woman, is a born
smuggler, and believing it right is not ashamed. Indeed, they make
common cause of it; for years, if a revenue officer detected and shot a
Basque in the act, he had to fly the land at once, for the entire
neighborhood united in seeking hot and deadly vengeance.
The race is notably fond of dancing and drama, and the villages hold
frequent open-air theatricals, generally upon religious themes, which
they always handle with great seriousness. They have at intervals unique
contests in improvisation, rivaling Wolfram and Tannhaüser, or the
Meistersingers, in this special talent. They are fruitful, too, in
proverb lore, as would be expected in an old race. Their wise saws are
sharp, often rasping:
"Hard bread makes sharp teeth." (_Ogi gogorrari haguin sorroza_.)
"One eye suffices the seller; the buyer has need of a hundred."
"Marriage-day is the next day after happiness."
"Avarice, having killed a man, took refuge in the Church; it has
never gone out since."
Husbandmen, herdsmen, fishermen,--such are the majority. The farms are
small, averaging four or five acres, and descend by primogeniture; flax,
hemp, corn, are their staples. Basques were the first whalers, so it is
declared, and St. Jean used to be a noted port for their vessels; the
whales have since sought more northern banks, and St. Jean is reduced to
the humbler quest of sardines and anchovies. There are iron-mines and
marble-quarries, besides, to engage many; hunting and logging are
favored pursuits; Basque sailors are to be found in all waters, while
great numbers of the younger men are now yearly emigrating to the South
American coasts, to make a better living,--and to avoid conscription.
Those of the race we see in our transit impress one, on the whole,
favorably. The men have, in the main, the lithe, firm port attributed to
them, though there are Basque "trash," as there are Georgia "crackers,"
and average-lesseners everywhere. The women are often noticeably
attractive; the younger ones have a ruddy face and full, clear eye, but
the skin shrivels and wears with middle age, as does that of their
French peasant sisters. The Basques about Biarritz and St. Jean appear
to associate with the French element in entire amity; the race strives
still to keep distinct, but habits and idioms and manners imperceptibly
mingle; they speak French or patois quite as much as their own tongue,
and in divers ways hint at the working of amalgamation and assimilation.
Mention of this bizarre tribe is perhaps not untimely; the leveling
process progresses fast, over Basque-land as in all the world; steam and
lightning are the genii of the age, but they destroy while they build.
As a significant straw, the French government enforces here, in the
public schools, the teaching and speaking of French to supersede the
Basque. Similarly, Spanish is required in the schools over the border.
In some of these, a child detected in a lapse into Basque must wear a
certain ring, which he is allowed to pass on to the first companion he
catches likewise tripping. The latter may pass it on in turn. At the end
of the week comes the reckoning-day, and the unhappy individual then
found with the ring is, punished for the collective sinners of the week.
Few more ingenious, even if demoralizing, expedients could be devised to
put the native tongue and sentiments under ban.
"It has been truthfully observed," says one,[8] "that, in ancient times,
the Basques kept themselves outside 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, steadily maintaining its isolation for so many centuries,
is most interesting, and, in some aspects, 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 expressive
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."
[8] VINCENT: _In the Shadow of the Pyrenees_. New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons.
V.
In this region, too, lies the famous pass of Ibañeta or Roncesvalles. It
may be readily visited in a two days' excursion from St. Jean or from
Biarritz. There is a carriage-road to Valcarlos, a small village on the
way; beyond, a mule-path winds on up through the pass and down to the
convent on the other side.
This convent was founded to commemorate the one greatest tradition of
the pass,--the destruction of Charlemagne's rear-guard by the Basques in
ambush and the death of the hero Roland.
"Oh for a blast of that dread horn
On Fontarabian echoes borne
That to King Charles did come;
When Rowland brave and Olivier
And every paladin and peer
On Roncesvalles died!"
Of the few writers who have visited this region, all make airy mention
of the battle of Roncesvalles; scarcely one, however, condescends to
details. Yet it gave rise to a great epic poem,--the greatest epic of
France, the delight of all her ancient minstrels. One often hears named
the _Song of Roland_; one seldom hears more than the name. By many the
charm of its story is all unknown.
"In truth and fact," observes a recent anonymous writer, "the chain can
claim one single real legend. That one, however, is so great, so grand,
so dominating,--it is so immense, so universal, so world-wide,--that it
suffices all alone; it creates a doctrine by itself, it needs no aid, no
support, no companions,--it is the mighty tale of Roland. The mountain
is full of Roland. His hands, his feet, his horse, his sword, his voice,
have left their puissant mark on almost every crest, in almost every
glen. Above Gavarnie, amidst the eternal snow, gapes the slashed fissure
hewn by Durandal, his sword; ten miles off in a gorge you see the
indents of the hoofs of Bayard on a rock which served as his half-way
touching-point when he sprang in two flying bounds from the Breach to
the Peak of the Chevalier near St. Sauveur. At the Pass of Roland, above
Cambo, the rock remains split open where the hero stamped and claimed a
passage. The ponds of Vivier Lion, near Lourdes, were dug by the
pressure of his foot and knee when Vaillantif, a charger which carried
him in his last fight, but who was then unbroken, had the audacity to
throw him. At St. Savin, where the monks had lodged him, he paid his
bill by slaying the irreverent giants, Passamont and Alabaster, whose
neighborhood, was unpleasant to the convent. And so on, all about. His
tremendous figure is everywhere, all full of the superbest violence and
of the most wondrous acrobatry. But it is at Roncesvalles that his great
name is greatest. There, where he died, his memory lives in an unfading
halo. In Spain, beneath the Peak of Altabiscar amongst the beech groves,
on the 15th of August, 778, perished the astounding paladin. The _Song
of Roland_ tells how he fell, not quite exactly but very amazingly; the
story is so intensely interesting that the reader is carried away by it
and finds himself for a moment almost able to believe it. It does not
matter that the defeat is attributed to the Saracens, not one of whom
was present, (the whole thing having been got up and carried out by the
Basques alone;) that error was indispensable to the tale, and gives it
much of its strange charm."
There is an excellent reason why the poem might fail in sharp historical
accuracy; it was not formally composed until between three and four
hundred years after the battle. The event itself happened in 778; the
first known MS. was made, by a scribe, about 1150. All during the long
interval, ballad-singers and minstrels had been extolling France and
Roland; the love of the heroic was as strong as before Homer; the hero's
name had grown: with his fame into titanic proportions; the actual
author, (conjectured to have been one Turoldus or Theurolde, a monk,)
had but to take the poetic material ready at his hand and fashion it
into the epic. Time had dimmed and enlarged the details; the _Song of
Roland_ deals in mass and massive heroes; in this it is like a book from
the Iliad.
It is not a long poem; there are only about 3,500 lines in all, but the
Old French in which it is written makes it difficult reading, at least
to one not a Frenchman. The briefest citation will show this:
"Carles li Reis, nostre Emperere magnes,
Sela anz tuz pleins ad estet en Espaigne;
Tresqu'en la mer, cunquist la tere altaigne.
N'i ad castel ki devant lui remagnet."
("Charles le Roi, notre grand Empereur,
Sept ans entiers est resté en Espagne;
Jusqu' à la mer, il a conquis la haute terre.
Pas de château qui tienne devant lui."
--GAUTIER.)
However, it has been transmuted into modern French, and latterly twice
translated into English verse; and the English translations appear to
have preserved remarkably both the power and sweetness of the original.
The poem centres almost wholly upon this deadly battle in the
Pyrenees,--the last battle of Roland its hero. Charlemagne and the
Franks had invaded Spain, and spent seven years warring with the Moors
and conquering their cities. On their return, as the poem narrates it,
the Moors, instigated by a traitor in Charlemagne's army, plotted an
ambush in this pass of Roncesvalles. The army began its march. The main
body defiled through in safety, and turned westward to await the
rear-guard nearer the coast. But when that division, the flower of the
Frankish forces,--commanded by Roland, his bosom friend Oliver, the
warrior-archbishop Turpin, and the others of the twelve great
paladins,--reached the pass, hostiles began to appear,--in front, above,
behind. More and more they thickened around it,--fierce Basques or
swarthy Moslems, "a hundred thousand heathen men;" and the three leaders
soon realized their betrayal. Oliver exclaimed:
"'Ganelon[9] wrought this perfidy!
It was he who doomed us to hold the rear.'
'Hush,' said Roland, 'O Olivier,
No word be said of my step-sire here,'"
--a touch of magnanimity strange for that brutal age, yet only one of
many in the poem. Roland rather exulted than shrank at the prospect of a
battle, by whatever means brought about. Oliver was the cooler of the
two, and he promptly urged Roland to sound his great horn, which might
be heard for thirty leagues, and so summon Charlemagne to the rescue. He
saw that the danger was real, for the odds were overwhelmingly against
them. But Roland impetuously refused. Thrice, though not in cowardice,
Oliver pleaded with him:
"'Roland, Roland, yet wind one blast!
Karl will hear ere the gorge be past,
And the Franks return on their path full fast.'
'I will not sound on mine ivory horn!
It shall never be spoken of me in scorn
That for heathen felons one blast I blew.
I may not dishonor my lineage true.
* * * * *
"'Death were better than fame laid low.
Our Emperor loveth a downright blow!'"
[9] Ganelon was the traitor and Roland's own step-father. The lines
quoted are from the late version by JOHN O'HAGAN, outlined in an article
in the _Edinburgh Review_ to whose appreciative commentary much
indebtedness is acknowledged.
The Moors at last swarmed to the attack. They were no cravens, the
Moors; the fight grew rapidly desperate. The Franks performed wonders;
they tingled with the Archbishop's glorious assoilment:
"In God's high name the host he blest,
And for penance he gave them--to smite their best!"
The twelve paladins slew twelve renowned Paynims; the mailed phalanx
hewed its way into the infidels, laying them low by thousands. But
thousands more were behind,--the reserve was inexhaustible; the "hundred
thousand" were cut to pieces, when the Moorish king, hastily summoned,
came up with a fresh army of myriads more. It was too much; little by
little the Franks were beaten down, not back, and melted unyielding
away. The peers fell one by one, upon heaps of the Moslem dead; the day
wore on; of the twenty thousand Frankish warriors, but sixty men at
length remained. Too late Roland would wind his horn; it was Oliver's
turn to disdain the now useless expedient. Roland sounded nevertheless:
"The mountain peaks soared high around;
Thirty leagues was borne the sound.
Karl hath heard it and all his band;
'Our men have battle,' he said, 'on hand!'
Ganelon rose in front and cried;
'If another spake, I would say he lied!'"
Again the desperate sound was faintly heard:
"'It is Roland's horn,' said the Emperor,
'And save in battle he had not blown!'
'Battle,' said Ganelon, 'is there none.
Old you have grown,--all white and hoar!
* * * * *
"'He would sound all day for a single hare.'"
The third time, Roland blew; his nostrils and mouth are filled with
blood, his temples crack with the stress:
"Said Karl: 'That horn is full of breath!'
Said Naimes: ''Tis Roland who travaileth,'"
--and the Emperor instantly gave the command to turn and rush to the
rescue.
But the battle had gone too far. Again and again the little band of
Franks clove its way into the enemy; the latter wavered, retreated, fell
by hundreds, and came back in thousands. Roland's tears fell fast over
his dead companions:
"'Land of France, thou art soothly fair!
To-day thou liest bereaved and bare.
It was all for me your lives ye gave,
And I was helpless to shield or save.'"
The last Frankish man-at-arms at length fell; only the three foremost
paladins remained of all the host. But the Saracens dared no longer to
approach them; they hurled their lances from afar. Spent and faint and
bleeding, the three still stood out, but the death-wound of Oliver
finally came; his vision swam, he swayed blindly on his horse. There is
no more touching and beautiful incident in the whole range of song than
this of his death:
"His eyes from bleeding are dimmed and dark,
Nor mortal near or far can mark;
And when his comrade beside him pressed,
Fiercely he smote on his golden crest;
Down to the nasal the helm he shred,--
But passed no further nor pierced his head.
Roland marveled at such a blow,
And thus bespake him, soft and low:
'Hast thou done it, my comrade, wittingly?
Roland, who loves thee so dear, am I;
Thou hast no quarrel with me to seek?'
Oliver answered: 'I hear thee speak,
But I see thee not. God seeth thee.
Have I struck thee, brother? Forgive it me.'
'I am not hurt, O Olivier,
And in sight of God I forgive thee here.'
Then each to each his head hath laid,
And in love like this was their parting made."
And now but Roland and the Archbishop were left,--the former on foot,
his charger dead. Wounded and gasping, they rushed forward upon the
enemy; the sword-arm of the Moorish king was cut from his side, his son
fell dead before him. The Moors quailed; their lances fell in storms
upon the heroes. Suddenly a long, far sound was heard; it was of the
trumpets of Charlemagne's returning army rushing to the rescue but still
miles and hours away. The Saracens turned at the very sound; a final
lance-shower, and they fled; the two held the pass of Roncesvalles,
unconquered,--but dying.
For it was too late.
The Archbishop had sunk to the ground, gasping,--lifeless. Roland,
stricken himself, placed his companion gently on the grass:
"He took the fair white hands outspread,
Crossed and clasped them upon his breast."
Then with his remaining strength, he sought one by one for the corpses
of the other ten paladins; one by one he brought them to the feet of the
dead prelate and laid them before the august body,--Oliver's corpse last
and dearest of all. There he might leave them, the solemn assembly of
the peers. It was his last task. His wound too was mortal; his time had
come to join them.
"In vigor and pathos," justly observes the review before mentioned,
"this poem rises to the end. There are few things in poetry more simply
grand than the death of Roland. He moves feebly back to the adjoining
limit-line of Spain,--the land which his well-loved master has
conquered,--and a bow-shot beyond it, and then drops to the ground:"
"That death was on him he knew full well;
Down from his head to his heart it fell.
On the grass beneath a pine tree's shade,
With face to earth, his form he laid;
Beneath him placed he his horn and sword,
And turned his face to the heathen horde
Thus hath he done the sooth to show
That Karl and his warriors all may know
That the gentle Count a conqueror died.
'_Mea culpa_,' full oft he cried,
And for all his sins, unto God above
In sign of penance he raised his glove.
* * * * *
"He did his right-hand glove uplift;
Saint Gabriel took from his hand the gift.
--Then drooped his head upon his breast,
And with clasped hands he went to rest."
There is indeed little in epic poetry to surpass the high simplicity of
this loving portrayal of a hero's death.
It is the climax of the poem. The Emperor's army burst upon the scene,
frantic with anxiety; but no eye was open to give them greeting. Roland
was dead with his slaughtered rear-guard, and lying with his face to the
foe. For three days the sun stayed its motion, at Charlemagne's frenzied
petition, and the Moors were chased and cut to pieces, Saragossa
taken,--a full and furious vengeance exacted. The whole army mourned for
their companions; holy rites attended their stately burial; Ganelon was
tried, condemned, torn to pieces by wild horses. But the joy of the
Franks, their hero, their idol, was gone forever from them; retribution,
even the bitterest, could count for little against the passing of that
peerless spirit.
A pathetic meeting was afterward the old Emperor's with Alva, the
affianced of Roland:
"'Where is my Roland, sire,' she cried,
'Who vowed to take me for his bride?'"
Brokenly at length he told her of the news. A moment she gazed at him
unseeing:
"'God and his angels forbid, that I
Should live on earth if Roland die!'
Pale grew her cheek,--she sank amain
Down at the feet of Charlemagne."
So let us leave this tender poem, tender unwontedly among its times; an
epic which sincerely merits a vogue more near to its value.