SHOOTING THE RAPIDS.
At this point we alight, our water-way being blocked for nearly a mile.
It is a charming walk to Les Vignes: to the left we have a continuation
of the rocky chaos just described, to the right a path under the shadow
of the cliffs, every rift showing maidenhair fern and wild-flowers in
abundance, the fragrant evening primrose and lavender, the fringed
gentian. The weather is warm as in July, and of deepest blue the sky
above the glittering white peaks. Half-way we meet the rural postman,
whose presence reminds us that we are still on the verge of
civilization, eerie as is all the solitude and desolation around.
At Les Vignes we lose our pleasant, chatty, well-informed young
boatmen, the brothers Montginoux, and embark for the fourth and last
time. We have now to shoot the rapids.
A boat lay in readiness; two chairs placed for us, and willow branches
in plenty below; our baskets and bundles carefully raised so as to be
above water. In the least little detail the greatest possible attention
is thus paid to our comfort. I would suggest that if lady tourists had
the courage to imitate a certain distinguished Frenchwoman--an
explorer--and don male attire here, the shooting of the rapids would be
a more comfortable business. The boatmen cannot prevent their little
craft from being flooded from time to time, and though they scoop up
the water, skirts are apt to prove a sore incumbrance. Foot-gear and
dress should be as near water-proof as possible upon this occasion.
We were somewhat disconcerted at the sight of our first boatman, an
aged, bent, white-haired man, hardly, one could fancy, vigorous enough,
to say nothing of his skill, for the hazardous task of shooting the
rapids. He at once informed us that his name was Gall, to which the
first place is given in French guide-books. Even such a piece of
information, however, hardly reassured us.
Our misgivings were set at rest by the first glance at his companion.
'My colleague, brother of Monsieur le Maire,' said the veteran,
presenting him.
A handsome, well-made man in his early prime, with a look of
indomitable resolution, and a keen, eagle-like glance, our second
boatman would have inspired confidence under any circumstances, or in
any crisis. I could but regret that such a man should have no wider,
loftier career before him than that of steering idle tourists through
the rocks and eddies of the Tarn. Enough of character was surely here
to make up a dozen ordinary individualities. You saw at a look that
this dignified reserve hid rare qualities and capacities only awaiting
occasion to shine conspicuously forth.
How Carlyle would have delighted in the manly figure before us, from
which his simple peasant's dress could take not an iota of nobility!
This French rustic, brother of a village mayor, was endowed by Nature
beyond most, the spirit within--there could be no doubt of
that--matching an admirable physique. Of middle stature, with regular
features and limbs perfectly proportioned, every pose might have served
for a sculptor's model, whilst his behaviour to-day sufficiently
indicated his fitness for weightier responsibilities and more complex
problems. Never shall I forget the study before us during that short
journey from Les Vignes to Le Rozier. The old man Gall we could not
see, being behind; his companion stood at the other end of the boat
facing the rapids, and having his back turned towards us.
With form erect, feet firmly planted, sinews knit, every faculty under
command, he awaited the currents.
It was a soldier awaiting the enemy, the hunter his prey.
The white crests are no sooner in sight than he seizes his pole and
stands ready for the encounter.
A moment more and we are in the midst of the eddying, rushing, foaming
rapids. We seem to have been plunged from a lake of halcyon smoothness
into a storm-lashed sea. Around us the waves rise with menacing force;
now our little boat is flooded and tossed like a leaf on the turbulent
waters; every moment it seems that in spite of our brave boatman we
must be dashed against the rocks or carried away by the whirlpool!
But swift and sure he strikes out to the right and to the left, never
missing his aim, never miscalculating distances by an inch, till, like
an arrow shot by dexterous archer, the little craft reaches the calm.
Whilst, indeed, it seems tossed like a shuttlecock on the engulphing
waves, it is in reality being most skilfully piloted. The veteran at
the stern we could not see, but doubtless his skill was equally
remarkable. The two, of course, act in concert, both knowing the river
as other folks their alphabet.
To each series of currents follows a stretch of glassy water for
awhile, and we glide on deliciously. It was instructive to watch the
figure at the helm then; he laid down his pole, his limbs relaxed, and
he indulged in cigarette after cigarette, pausing to point out any
object of interest on the way.
The swirling, rushing, eddying currents once more in sight, again he
prepared himself for action, and for a few minutes the task would be
Herculean--the mental strain equally phenomenal. His keen, swift,
unerring glance never once at fault, his rapid movements almost
mechanically sure, he plied his pole, whilst lightly as a feather our
little boat danced from cascade to cascade, all but touching the huge
mossy slabs and projecting islets of rock on either side.
There was wonderful exhilaration in this little journey. We felt that
every element of danger was eliminated by the coolness and dexterity of
our conductors, yet the sense of hazard and adventuresomeness was
there! My more stout-hearted companion was a little disappointed, would
fain have had an experience nearer akin to Niagara. It is as well to
remind the traveller that these apparently playful rapids are by no
means without risk. Several are literally cascades between rocks,
hardly allowing space for the boat to pass. Here the least imprudence
or want of skill on the part of the boatman might entail the gravest
consequences. At one of the points, indeed, a party of tourists very
nearly lost their lives some years since, their boatman being
unfamiliar with the river.
The scenery changes at every turn. Just as one moment we are in
lake-like waters, smooth as a mirror, the next apparently in mid-ocean,
so we pass from sweet idyllic scenes into regions of weird sternness
and grandeur. Now we glide quietly by shady reaches and sloping hills,
alive to the very top with the tinkle of sheep-bells; now we pass under
promontories of frowning aspect, that tower two or three thousand feet
above the water's edge. The colours of the rock, under the shifting
clouds, are very beautiful, and golden, bright and velvety the little
belts and platforms of cultivated land to be counted between base and
peak. We have to crane our necks in order to catch sight of these truly
aerial fields and gardens, all artificially created, all yet again
illustrations of the axiom: 'The magic of property turns sands to gold.'
Truly marvellous is the evidence of this love of the soil in a region
so wild and intractable! High above we obtain a glimpse of some ancient
village, its scrambling roofs shining amid orchard-trees and firwoods,
or an isolated chalet of goatherd or shepherd breaks some solitude. One
ruined château crests the jagged cliffs, a real ruin among the
semblances of so many.
Again and again we fancy we can descry crumbling watch-towers,
bastions, and donjons on the banks of the Tarn, so fantastic the forms
of the Causses on either side. What a scene for a Doré!
Soon straight before us, high above the wooded heights that hem us in,
rises the Causse Noir--dark, formidable, portentous as the rock of
Istakhar keeping sentinel over the dread Hall of Eblis, or the
Loadstone Mountain of the third Calender's story, which to behold was
the mariner's doom. The Causse Noir from the Tarn is a sight not soon
forgotten. With black ribs set close about its summit, it wears rather
the appearance of a colossal castellation, an enormous fort of solid
masonry, than of any natural mass of rock.
What with this spectacle, the excitement of the rapids, the varied
landscape, the study of that statuesque figure before us, the brother
of M. le Maire, this stage of the way seemed all too short. We
regretted--but for the sake of our boatman--that there were not
twenty-five more rapids still to be passed before we reached our
destination. We regretted, too--who could help it?--that we were not
hardy pedestrians, able to clamber amid the rocks overhead, and make
that wonderful expedition on foot described by the discoverers of this
region, as the writers I have before alluded to may indeed be called.
But if the half may not always prove better than the whole in travel,
at least it is better than nothing, and the day's excursion here
described had of itself amply repaid the long journey from England.
Sorry, then, were we to come in sight of the bridge spanning the Tarn,
behind the village of Le Rozier. Just eight hours after quitting St.
Énimie we alighted for the last time, and, following our boatmen, took
a winding path that led to the village.
It was a scene of quiet, pastoral beauty that now met our eyes. The
Tarn, its sportive mood over, the portals of its magnificent gorge
closed, now flows amid sunny hills, quitting the wild Lozère for the
more placid Aveyron; immediately around us are little farmsteads,
water-mills, and gardens, whilst opposite, like a black thundercloud
threatening a summer day, the Causse Noir looms in the distance!