IN THE SHADOW OF LA GRANDE CHARTREUSE
One may leave Rousseau's smiling valley above Chambéry and journey to
Grenoble via La Grande Chartreuse, or by the valley of the Isère, as
fancy dictates. In either case one should double back and cover the
other route or much will otherwise be missed that will be regretted.
Grenoble is militant from heel to toe. Its garrison is of vast numbers,
soldiers of all ranks and all arms are everywhere, and every hill
round-about bristles with a fortification or a battery of masked guns.
Every foot of the region is historic ground, and whether one crosses
from Savoy to Dauphiny or from Dauphiny to Savoy the borderland is at
all times reminiscent of the historic past.
The cradle of the Dauphin princes of France is not only a region of
mountains and valleys, but it is a land where a numerous and warlike
nobility was able to withstand invaders and oppressors to the last. Like
Scotland, Dauphiny was never conquered; at least it lost no measure of
its original independence by its alliances until it was cut up into the
present-day departments of modern France.
Dauphiny is possessed of multiple aspects. It has the sun-burnt
character of Provence in the south, with Montelimar and Grignan as its
chief centres; it has its _coteaux_ and _falaises_, like those of
Normandy, around Crest and Die; and its "Petite Hollande" neighbouring
upon Tour-de-Pin where the Dauphins once had a gem of a little
rest-house which still exists to-day. The mountains of Dauphiny rival
the Alps of Switzerland--the famous Barre des Écrins is only a shade
less dominant than Mont Blanc itself.
The chief singer of the praises of Dauphiny has ever been Lamartine. No
one has pictured its varied aspects better.
"L'oeil embrasse au matin l'horizon qu'il domine
Et regarde, à travers les branches de noyer,
Les eaux bleuir au loin et la plaine ondoyer.
* * * * *
On voit à mille pieds au dessous de leurs branches
La grande plaine bleue avec ses routes blanches
Les moissons jaunes d'or, les bois comme un point noir,
L'Isère renvoyant le ciel comme un miroir."
[Illustration: _Maison des Dauphins, Tour-de-Pin_]
The very topographical aspect of Dauphiny has bespoken romance and
chivalry at all times. The mass of La Grande Chartreuse was dedicated to
religious devotion, but those of other mountain chains, and the plains
and valleys lying between, were strewn with castle towers and donjons
almost to the total exclusion of church spires.
Coming south from Chambéry by the valley of the Graisivaudan, by the
side of the rushing waters of the Isère hurrying on its way to join the
greater Rhône at Valence, the point of view is manifestly one which
suggests feudalism in all its militant glory, rather than the
recognition of the fact that it is overshadowed by the height of La
Grande Chartreuse, whose influences were wholly dissimilar.
It was the valley of Graisivaudan that Louis XII rather impulsively
called the most beautiful garden of France: "_charmé par la divinité de
ses plantements et les tours en serpentant qu'y fait la rivière Isère_."
Stendhal, too, compared it to the finest valleys of Piedmont. One may
differ, but it is a very beautiful prospect indeed which opens out from
Barraux or Pontcharra, midway between Grenoble and Chambéry.
Near Pontcharra is the Chateau Bayard, where was born and lived the
famous "_Chevalier, sans peur et sans reproche_." As an historic
monument of rank its position is pre-eminent, though not much can be
said of its architectural pretence. Still here it is, on the route from
Grenoble to Gap by the famous Col. Bayard, also celebrated in history,
almost as much so as the famous Breche de Roland in the Pyrenees.
It was through this cleft in the mountain that Napoleon marched on that
eventful journey from Golfe Jouan to Paris in the attempt to rise again
to power. It was not far from the crest, the pass between the two
principal valleys of the French Alps, that Napoleon made the first
important additions to the few followers who had gathered around him on
his doubtful journey. The troops sent out from Grenoble opposed his
progress, whereupon he advanced towards them, bareheaded and alone, and
demanded to know if they, his former fellows in arms, would kill their
leader. Not one of them would fire, though the order was actually given.
With one common inspiration they went over to him _en masse_, with the
classic cry of "_Vive l'Empereur!_" and continued their way towards the
capital, where, just before Grenoble, they were also joined by the
forces of Labedoyère, with their colonel at their head, sent out to
stop them.
On the shores of the Grand Lac de Laffrey, as the marvellous mountain
road swings by on its _corniche_, one notes a marble tablet on which is
carven the following words, which are quite worth copying down. No
further explanatory inscription is to be seen, simply the words:
"_Soldats! Je suis votre Empereur. Ne me reconnaissez vous pas!
S'il en est un parmi vous qui veuille tuer son general, me voila!_"
(7 Mars 1815.)
In spite of the significance of the words the driver of a cart going the
same way as ourselves professed an utter ignorance of their meaning.
Passing strange, this, but true! Is it for this that history is written?
The ruins of the Chateau de Bayard sit imposingly on a height commanding
a wide-spread panorama of the valley below, and the distant barrier of
mountain peaks on every side. The walls and turrets are mouldering
to-day, as they have been for generations, but local historians and
antiquarians have on more than one occasion written of the rooms and
gardens where strolled and played the youthful warrior, and acquired the
principles which afterwards led to so great a fame.
Of the ancient chateau of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, where
(1476-1524) was born the Chevalier Bayard, but a crumbling portal and
tower remain sufficiently well preserved to suggest the dignity it once
had. They attach themselves to two minor structures, one of which was
probably the chapel, and the other, perhaps, the Salle des Gardes.
Within the walls which enclose the latter are also the apartments which
were occupied by the warrior-knight in his youth, doubtless the same as
that in which his mother, Helene Alleman, gave him birth. The guardian
claims all this, and, since this is what you come to see, you accept the
assertion gratefully, though history itself vouches for nothing so
precise.
A bridge which crosses the river Breda at this point has on its parapet
an equestrian statue representing the infant Bayard. The "bon chevalier"
was descended from a local lord who bore the name of Bayart, but some
careless chronicler changed the final consonant of Aymon Terrail's title
(Seigneur de Bayart), and the name of his better known progeny has thus
gone to history.
The family was of antique extraction; "of a noble and antique chivalry,"
as one learns from the old historians of Dauphiny. "The prowess of a
Terrail" has passed into a local proverb. So the infant Terrail who was
to become the future Bayard came to his glorious calling by good right.
At the age of six or seven the young Terrail went to live with his
uncle, Bishop of Grenoble, but at twelve returned to the paternal
chateau, where his inclinations became the "_plus belliqueuses_,"
whereas, before, his infant predilections were of a studious kind.
Henceforth he was for war, and he came rightly enough by his liking, for
one of his ancestors, Philippe Terrail, died gloriously at Poitiers,
another at Crécy, another at Verneuil and another, already known as
"Épée Terrail" to the English, died at the side of Louis XI.
Young Pierre was asked by his father (1487) what profession he would
adopt, and it was then that he replied that the war spirit was bred in
him and that he would never renounce it. His uncle, the bishop,
presented him to the Duc Charles de Savoie, who was holding court at the
moment at Chambéry, and by his mere riding up on his horse before the
duke, he was immediately accepted as a page of his suite.
Opposite Pontcharra, on the opposite bank of the Isère, is the
comparatively modern Fort Barraux, which looks far more ideally
picturesque than the historic castle of the Bayards. History has not
been silent with regard to the fortifying of these mountain peaks of
Dauphiny and Savoy. The fortress was first built on this site by Charles
Emmanuel, Duc de Savoie, though an opposing army was drawn up before him
under the command of the celebrated Connetable Lesdiguières. Being
reproved by his king, Henri IV, for his dilatoriness in allowing the
enemy to so entrench itself whilst he and his men stood idly by, the
Connetable sagaciously and brilliantly replied, "Your Majesty has need
of a fortress on the Savoyan side to hold in check that of Montmélian,
and since Charles Emmanuel has been good enough to commence the building
of one, let us wait until it is finished." The wait was not long, and
the completed fortress, after a very slight struggle, came to the French
king.
The remarkable feudal Chateau de Rochefort-en-Montagne, above
Pontcharra, is a ruin scarcely equalled, as a ruin, by any other above
ground to-day. It has a majestic sadness and appeal, crumbled and
dishonoured though it is.
To paint the picture one must hold the brush himself. Little
satisfaction can be got from the contemplation of another's sketch of
this noble ruin. Grand and imposing it is, however, though but a mere
echo of the splendid edifices of the Renaissance in the Loire valley,
and yet its firm, flat ground plan, its massive portal and its massive
round tower are all reminiscent of the best of the Renaissance castle
builder's art. The point should be recognized nevertheless that it is of
the mountain and not of the plain. This will account for many of its
vagaries of detail as compared with the more familiar chateaux of the
Loire.
The surroundings are varied and beautiful, and the grim gaunt drabness
of the proud old walls give at once a note of melancholy memory which
sounds perhaps the stronger because this fine old feudal monument is but
a shell as compared contrastingly with the better preserved examples of
its era to be seen in mid-France.
The property belongs to-day to the Rochefort-Lucay family, of which
Henri Rochefort, the publicist, is best known. It is not, however,
habitable in any sense, but it could be made so with a more reasonable
expenditure than one usually puts into a great country house, so let us
hope that its fortunes will some day come into their own again.
Just below Grenoble are Sassenage and Saint Donat, quite unknown and
unworshipped. They deserve a better fame. Sassenage, but six kilometres
from Grenoble, is what the French call "_propre, riant_" and "_aise_."
It is all this, as a round of a fortnight's excursions in different
directions, in and out of Grenoble, proved to us. There is nothing else
quite in its class, and its chateau is a wonderfully chiselled sermon in
stone, as its portal and façade demonstrate readily enough to the most
casual observer. A most curious emblem is here to be noted. It is worthy
of being added to those carved porcupines and salamanders of Louis XII
and François Premier. In this case it is a mythological, or traditional,
figure, half woman and half snake, and possessed of two tails. It is a
most unpleasant architectural decoration and perpetuates the mythical
character of a local legend. One is glad to know that it is not an
emblem personal to the family of the present owner.
Some kilometres to the south is the Tour Sans Venin, one of the ancient
wonders of Dauphiny, though it is little more than a single flank of
wall to-day. The natives, skeptical when they first heard the tale of
Roland the Paladin, built the edifice of which this wall formed a part,
and built it of wonderful stone,
[Illustration]
or earth, warranted to chase away reptiles and vermin. Imagination, no
doubt, played its part, but one can readily enough accept the properties
as desirable ones for a building material to possess.
Saint Donat, still further down the valley, has hardly a memory for one
save that he remembers having heard of it in connection with the rather
merry life of Diane de Poitiers. To-day it is nothing but a no-account
little Dauphinese village. It is not even a railway junction. It has
however an old mill built up out of an old _rendez-vous de chasse_ where
the fickle Diane had more than one escapade. Like many another old ruin
of Dauphiny the Chateau de Saint Donat is reminiscent of the local
manner of building. It is nothing luxurious, but massive, and, withal, a
seemingly efficient stronghold for the time in which it was built, or
would have been had it ever been called upon to serve its purpose to the
full. It seems a fatal destiny that a chateau should be no longer a
chateau, for here in Dauphiny no inconsiderable number of mediæval
dwellings of this class have been turned into factories of one sort or
another. Here in the _salles_ and _chambres_, as the apartments are
still named on the spot, are machines and workmen spinning silk and
weaving ribbons for the great Paris department stores. The Chambre de
Diane, however, is still preserved as a show-place in much the same
manner in which it was originally conceived. It is a circular apartment,
rather daringly attached to the main building. A sort of alcove, or
addition, is built out into the open still further, and one only reaches
it by three steps up from the floor. Three secret doors separate the
sleeping apartment itself from the connecting corridor. If there is
anything of the sentiment of the enchanting huntress Diane hanging about
the apartment to-day one quite forgets it by reason of its being drowned
out by the noise of the whirring mill-wheels below.
The twentieth century is far from the time when romance dwelt in purling
brooks or stalked through marble halls. "Other days, other ways" is a
trite saying which applies as well to chateaux as other things. To-day,
in Dauphiny in particular, a purling brook or a mountain torrent is more
valued for its "_force motrice_" than for any other virtues, and a
chateau that can be readily transformed into a silk-mill is a better
business proposition than would be its value as a ruin. This is the
practical, if sad, point of view.
There are no coal mines in Dauphiny, but the _houille blanche_, as the
French call water-power, is a product highly valued. Sentiment and
romance are apt to be little valued in comparison.