MILLAU (AVEYRON).
It is a charming drive from Nant to Millau. Our road winds round the
delicious little valley of the Dourbie, the river ever cerulean blue,
bordered with hay-fields, in which lies the fragrant crop of autumn hay
ready for carting. By the wayside are tall acacias, their green
branches tasselled with dark purple pods, or apple trees, the ripening
fruit within reach of our hands. Little Italian-like towns, surrounded
by ochre-coloured walls, are terraced here and there on the rich
burnt-amber walls, the limestone ridges above and around taking the
form of a long line of rampart or lofty fortress, built and fashioned
by human hands. In contrast to this savagery, we have ever and anon
before our eyes the sweet little river, no sooner lost to sight amid
willow-bordered banks than found again.
Nervous people should avoid these drives, on account of the steep
precipices, often within a few inches of the horses' heels. Wherever on
the shelves of rock a few square yards of soil are found or can be
laid, are tiny crops of buckwheat, potatoes, and beetroot. The weather
has a southern warmth and brilliance, and in and out the burning-hot
mountain wall on our left large beautiful brown lizards disport
themselves. The road is very solitary. Till within the precincts of
Millau, we meet only a few peasants and two Franciscan brothers.
The approach to Millau is very pretty. Almond and peach orchards,
vineyards and gardens, form a bright suburban belt. Two rivers, the
Tarn and the Dourbie, water its pleasant valley, whilst over the town
tower lofty rocks in the form of an amphitheatre. Nant may be described
as a little idyll. After it Millau comes disenchantingly by comparison.
Never was I in such a noisy, roystering, singing, lounging place. There
was no special cause for hilarity; nothing was going on; the business
of daily life seemed to be the making a noise.
In spite of its pretty entourage, too, the town is not engaging. Its
hot, ill-kept, malodorous streets do not call forth an exploring frame
of mind. The public garden is, however, a delightful promenade, and
the well-known photographer of these regions has his atelier in one of
the most curious old houses to be seen anywhere.
Climbing a narrow, winding stone stair, we come upon an open court,
with balconies running round each story, carved stone pillars
supporting these; oleanders and pomegranates in pots make the ledges
bright, whilst above the gleaming white walls shines a sky of Oriental
brilliance. The whole interior is animated. Here women sit at their
glove-making, the principal industry of the place, children play, pet
dogs and cats sun themselves; all is sunny, careless, southern life--a
page out of 'Graziella.'
There are several mediæval façades, and some curious old carved arcades
also; much, indeed, that is sketch worthy, if our artists could be
brought to deem anything worth sketching in France, out of Brittany and
Normandy.
Millau, once one of the stanchest Protestant communities of the
Cévennes, was quite ruined by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
May not French history up to the date of the Revolution be summed up in
a single sentence--one woman created France; another ruined it? The
glorious work of Jeanne d'Arc was for a time wholly undone by the
machinations of that arch enemy of mankind, Madame de Maintenon. We
must travel in the Cévennes, and learn by heart the vicissitudes of
these once-flourishing little Protestant centres to realize the
bloodstained page in French history played by the bigoted adventuress
whose sole ambition was to become Queen of France.
And how worthy of such a career the last little episode of her court
life! When the old king, a shadow of his former self, lay on his dying
bed, and whispered that his chief consolation in dying was the thought
that she would rejoin him in heaven, Madame de Maintenon made no reply.
She was, indeed, wearied of the task that had been, in her eyes, so
inadequately rewarded--amusing for thirty and odd years a dull,
resourceless, ennuyé and ennuyant husband; and had no desire to see any
more of him, either in this world or the next.
At present there is but a sprinkling of Protestants in Millau.
We took train to Mende. It is one of those delightfully slow trains
which enable you to see the scenery in detail, after the leisurely
fashion of Arthur Young, trotting through France on his Suffolk mare.
Part of the way lies through a romantic bit of country: château-crowned
hills follow each other in succession, every dark crag having its
feudal shell, whilst patchwork crops cover the lower slopes.
Everywhere vineyards predominate, so persistent the faith of the French
cultivator in the vine, so touching the efforts made to entice it to
grow on French soil. Few and far between are little wall-encompassed
villages perched on the hilltops.
At Sévérac-le-Château romance culminates in the stern, yellowish-gray
ruin cresting the green heights. A most picturesque little place is
this, seen from the railway. We now leave behind us cornlands and the
vine, and reach the region of pine and fir woods.
On the railway embankment we see the yellow-horned poppy and the golden
thistle growing in abundance; many another flower, too, as brilliant
brightens the way-a large, handsome broom, several kinds of mullein,
with fern and heather.
Bright and strongly contrasted are the hues of the
landscape--purply-black the far-off mountains, emerald-green the fields
of rye and clover at their feet. A large portion of the land hereabouts
is mere wilderness; yet the indomitable peasant wrenches up the
boulders, cleans the ground of stones, and turns, inch by inch, the
waste into productive soil. At every turn we are reminded of the dictum
of 'that wise and honest traveller,' Arthur Young: 'The magic of
property turns sands to gold.'
We are now in the region of the Causses; around us rise the spurs of
Sauveterre and Sévérac. The scenery between Marvejols and Mende is
grand; sombre, deep-green valleys, shut in by wide stretches of
stupendous rocky wall, dark pinewoods, and brown wastes.
Then evening closes in, and the rest is lost to us. As on my first
visit to Mende, a year ago, I lose the romantic approach to this
wonderfully placed little city.
The Hôtel Manse, whither we now betake ourselves, is a great
improvement on the other mentioned in my first chapter in matters of
situation, sanitation, and comfort; the people are very civil and
obliging in both.
Here, however, we are not in the very heart of the stuffy, dirty,
ill-kept town, but on the outskirts, looking on to suburban gardens and
pleasant hills, with plenty of air to breathe.
Our rooms are so spacious, well-furnished, and clean that once more we
regret we cannot stay for weeks. Such quarters might indeed tempt many
a tourist to idle away a month here. The people are well-mannered,
affable, and strikingly handsome; and if the town requires an advanced
ædileship, no one need see much of it. Abundance of excursions are to
be made from Mende, and the prices of hotels are very moderate.
At Millau we saw a drunken man, and in the streets of Mende one old
woman came up to us begging an alms. I note these facts as we have so
rarely encountered either drunkards or mendicants on our way.
Strangers might naturally expect a somewhat low standard of morality in
a department so isolated from the great French highways and social
centres as that of the Lozère. The railway to Mende, as I have before
mentioned, dates from a few years only; up till that time the little
bishopric in the mountains would often be completely shut off from the
outer world by the snow, the only link being the telegraphic wire.
Nevertheless, an exceptional freedom from crime distinguishes the
country, as may be gathered from the following statement in a French
newspaper, dated August 29th, 1888.
'The opening of the assizes of the Lozère, which should have taken
place on the 3rd of September, will now be unnecessary, the list of
cases being _nil_.' What are called 'white sessions' (assises
blanches), for the matter of that, are of no infrequent occurrence in
the department of the Lozère, eminently an honest one. This is the
second time that 'white sessions' have distinguished it during the
present year.
As the Lozère is essentially a region of peasant owners, far from the
richest of their class, I commend the fact to the opponents of peasant
property--albeit, I know too well, to small purpose. The people have no
right to the soil in the eyes of these political economists. Whether
the possession of the soil makes them better or happier is wholly
beside the question. Just as the great autocrat Louis XIV, after very
serious reflection on the matter, came to the solemn conclusion that
his subjects had no right to any property whatever, and that the
sovereign was the divinely-ordained owner of everything supposed to
belong to them, so certain writers believe that, according to some
direct Providential arrangement--a second choosing of a special
people--not a Canaan alone, but every inch of Mother Earth, is the
heaven-sent heritage of the superior few.