TARASCON.
Position of Tarascon and Beaucaire opposite each other--Church of S.
Martha--Crypt--Ancient paintings--Catechising--Ancient altar--The
festival of the Tarasque--The Phoenician goddess Martha--Story of S.
Fronto--Discussion at _déjeuner_ over the entry of M. Carnot
into Marseilles--The change in the French
character--Pessimism--Beaucaire--Font--Castle--Siege by Raymond VII.--Story
of Aucassin and Nicolette.
Tarascon and Beaucaire stand frowning at each other across the Rhone, each
with its castle; Beaucaire a grand pile on a crag, Tarascon dipping its
feet in the water, and sulkily showing to its enemy a plain face, reserving
all its picturesqueness for its side towards the town. This castle of
Tarascon was one in which King René resided, as well as in that at Aix, but
the Aix castle is gone, and that at Tarascon remains. Beaucaire belonged
to the counts of Toulouse, whereas Tarascon, as already said, belonged to
Provence. I do not like to venture on an explanation of the name, but the
_Tar_ with which it begins is most probably the Keltic _Daur_, water. [1]
But the Tarasconese will not hear of this. To them the name is taken from
the Tarasc, a monster that devastated the whole country round, but whom S.
Martha bridled and slew. S. Martha, as we have already seen, is the very
prophetess who directed Caius Marius in his campaign against the Teutons
and Ambrons, the devastating horde that has in the popular imagination been
represented as a dragon. The body of S. Martha is supposed to lie in the
crypt, in an early Christian marble sarcophagus, probably brought from the
Alyscamp at Arles, representing Moses striking the rock, and the miraculous
feeding of the multitude, the miracle of Cana, and the resurrection of
Lazarus.
[Footnote 1: _Gwask_, in Breton, is _contraction_, and at Tarascon the
river is drawn together by the opposed points of Beaucaire and Tarascon.
This may perhaps form the second syllable.]
[Illustration: Early altar, Tarascon.]
[Illustration: Spire of S. Martha's Church, Tarascon.]
In this crypt is a Corinthian capital turned upside down and converted into
a holy water stoup; also a very early and curious altar, the slab of which
is just two feet square, and has in the midst a square hole cut, probably
of later date, for the reception of relics; the height of the altar is
three feet three and a-half inches, it is of a porous stone that has become
greatly corroded with weather. It is probably the earliest Christian altar
in France.
In the crypt is a life-size representation of the entombment of S. Martha,
with figures standing round, Christ at the head, and S. Pronto at the feet.
[Illustration: Iron door to safe in S. Martha's Church.]
The church of S. Martha is of the fourteenth century, with the exception of
the south portal, which dates from 1187, and is rich in its deeply-recessed
mouldings filled with sculpture, but has been sadly mutilated. Within the
church is some very fine ironwork, a grille dividing the choir from the
side aisles, and a charming iron safe let into the wall on the north side,
of ironwork painted and gilt. There are moreover some quaint paintings; an
ancient altarpiece representing S. Rocque, between S. John and S. Laurence,
on a gold ground; a S. Mary Magdalen with the portrait of a canon kneeling
at her feet; the finest painting is S. Michael, also with a canon kneeling
below. The armour of the archangel is very rich, and heightened with gold.
The date of these pictures is 1513. There is another of the Nativity that
is inferior. Whilst looking round the church, I heard singing muffled and
distant, and presently, on reaching the steps that descended to the crypt,
found that a young priest was there catechising a class of little girls.
After some instructions they sang a hymn, which a Sister of Mercy was
accompanying on the harmonium. The air was taking. It puzzled me at first.
It was familiar and yet strange, and not till the children had reached the
last verse did I recognise a wonderfully distorted form of the mermaid's
song in _Oberon_, all the accents being altered. In this crypt is the tomb
of a Neapolitan knight attached to the court of king René; and in the
floor a well the water of which rises and falls with the river. In all
probability this crypt was originally the baptistery of the first basilica
erected in Tarascon.
[Illustration: King René's castle, Tarascon.]
The castle of King René is wonderfully picturesque on the landside. It was
begun in 1400; he is said to have instituted the festival of the Tarasque,
that used to be conducted with great merriment annually on July 29th.
A procession of mummers attended by the clergy paraded the town, escorting
the figure of a dragon, made of canvas, and wielding a heavy beam of wood
for a tail, to the imminent danger of the legs of all who approached. The
dragon was conducted by a girl in white and blue, who led it by her girdle
of blue silk, and when the dragon was especially frolicsome and unruly
dashed holy water over it.
The ceremony was attended by numerous practical jokes, and led to acts of
violence, in consequence of which it has been suppressed.
S. Martha has inherited the symbols of the Phoenician goddess of her own
name, the ship and the dragon; there can be little doubt that the first
Phoenician settlers in Provence introduced her worship as the patroness
of sailors, and that this worship acquired a fresh impulse after the
destruction of the Teutons who had overrun the land, when the prophetess
Martha was regarded as one with the earlier goddess. When Christianity came
in, the name of the hostess of Bethany was given to the churches erected
where Martha the moon goddess had been venerated before, so as gradually to
wean the heathen from their old faith. They came over into the Church, but
brought with them their myth of the pagan goddess.
[Illustration: A bit in Tarascon.]
An odd legend is told of her death.
On a Sunday morning, S. Fronto, bishop of Perigeux was about to say Mass,
and whilst waiting for the congregation to assemble, fell asleep in his
chair, when he saw Christ appear, who bade him come and assist at the
obsequies of Martha. Instantly he found himself translated to Tarascon,
in the church with our Lord, he at the feet and Christ at the head of the
body, and the Saviour sang the burial office. In the meantime at Perigeux,
the deacon wondered at the heavy sleep of the bishop, and had much ado to
rouse him. At length Fronto opened his eyes, when the deacon whispered that
the people were impatient with long waiting.
"Do not be troubled," said Fronto, "you do not understand what I have been
about."
Now it fell out that whilst at Tarascon Fronto was engaged in burying
Martha, he had taken off his glove and ring, and had put them into the
hands of the sacristan. When Fronto informed the congregation at Perigeux
what he had been about, they disbelieved. However, messengers were sent
to Tarascon, and his glove and ring were identified. These were preserved
as relics in the church till the Revolution. Unfortunately for the story,
Fronto of Perigeux belongs to the fourth century, so that the lapse in
dream was not merely a skip over half France, but also through four
centuries.
Tarascon has some picturesque bits in the town, arcades with shops
underneath, and quaint doorways of Renaissance work; but its chief charm
after the castle is certainly the view across the river to the heights of
Beaucaire with its grand ruins.
I lunched at an hotel where, nearly opposite me, was a gentleman who had
been at Marseilles on the arrival of the President, and was very full of
what he had seen. At the table were half-a-dozen beside myself, and he held
forth to them on the spectacle. Opposite him sat a bullet-headed commercial
traveller.
"But," said the latter, "I would not have crossed the Rhone by the bridge
of Tarascon to have seen him. What is M. Sadi-Carnot? He is naught."
"No, but he represents the nation. Give us a pump as president, and we must
garland that pump with flowers. And believe me, c'est un vilain métier cet
de président. If he leans a little too much on this side he goes down into
the mud, a little too much on the other he rolls in the dust. One must
feel some respect for the man who undertakes such a thankless office. And,
again, when a man rides in an open landau in pelting rain, when il lui
pleut dans le nez, without an umbrella, with his hat off, saluting right
and left, he deserves recognition."
"It was not worth the cost of his entertainment. I am surprised that
Marseilles did it."
"I beg pardon. It was worth while doing it. Had the weather been fine, it
would have brought money into the town."
"What! Would any English and American travellers desert Montecarlo for a
day to see a Sadi-Carnot?"
"No, but every woman in Marseilles would have bought a new kerchief or a
trinket to make herself smart, just because it was a fête. As it was, money
circulated."
"How so?"
"One thousand and ninety-seven umbrellas were sold that day at prices
ranging from five to fifteen francs, which on other occasions sell for two
francs twenty-five centimes, and ten francs."
I do not know whether I have been peculiarly unfortunate in lighting on
only one class of men under the present _régime_, but whether it be in
France, Switzerland, Belgium, or Italy, that I have come across Frenchmen
and had a talk with them of late years, I have noticed a prevailing
discouragement, a pessimism, that certainly was absent in former days. The
very character of a French _table d'hôte_ is changed. Instead of Gallic
vivacity, merriment, and general conversation, such as one was wont to
find there, one encounters silence, reserve, and a marked absence of
self-assertion. It is the Germans who are now boisterous and self-assertive
at table. The French are quiet and subdued. As I have already said, I may
be mistaken; I may have hit on exceptional cases, but it is a fact that
those Frenchmen I have conversed with during the last two or three years
have been oppressed with a conviction that France has lost caste among the
nations, that her future is menaced, and they say that they see no way out
of their present condition.
As one said to me last winter in Rome: "The idea of France is an
abstraction. We range ourselves now under parties, our devotion is no
longer to our country but to our party. Have you ever been at a stag hunt?
When the noble beast is down the huntsman slices it open and throws the
heart and liver and entrails to the hounds. Then ensues a battle. Every dog
snatches at what he desires, and envies the other the piece of offal he has
secured. All are filled with hatred of each other, and selfish greed as to
who can eat most and the best morsels of the fallen beast. And that is a
picture of France. If war came upon us, we must infallibly be overthrown,
for each general would be seeking out of the accidents of warfare to steal
an advantage for himself or the party he favours."
The town of Beaucaire, on the farther side of the Rhone, is fuller of
picturesque points than is Tarascon. Seated at the head of the Beaucaire
Canal, that communicates with the sea, it has that commercial prosperity
which is lacking at Tarascon. The old church is an exact reproduction of
that of S. Martha, but has in addition a most remarkable font, a structure
rising in stages like a tower, and with a spire to cap it, resembling
somewhat the sacramental tabernacles in the German churches. The Hôtel de
Ville is a picturesque Renaissance building with bold open staircase on
pillars. The castle of Beaucaire crowns the ridge of limestone that extends
across the country from Nimes and is cut through by the Rhone, again
emerging, in a low eminence, at Tarascon. This noble castle was taken by
Simon de Montfort in the Albigensian War from the Count of Toulouse, but
the youthful Raymond VII., though only nineteen years old, laid siege to it
in 1216, and succeeded in recovering it. In this siege, the inhabitants of
the town, under the young count, assailed the castle. Simon de Montfort
collected an army and attacked Raymond in the rear. There is a very curious
account of this siege in a Provençal poem on the Albigensian War, from
which I will quote a few lines, only premising that in the original the
castle is called the Capitol:--
"The townsmen set up their engines against the Crusaders in the castle, and
so battered it that castle and watch-tower were broken, beams and lead and
stone. At Holy Easter the battering-ram was made ready, long, iron-headed,
sharp, which so struck and cut that the wall was injured, and the stones
began to fall out. But the besieged were not discouraged; they made a loop
of cords attached to a wooden beam, and with that they caught the head of
the ram and held it fast. This troubled those of Beaucaire sore; till the
master engineer came, and he set the ram in motion once more. Then several
of the assailants got up the rock, and began to detach portions of the wall
with their picks. This the besieged were ware of, and they let down upon
them sulphur and pitch and fire in sackcloth by a chain along the wall,
and when it blazed it broke forth and was spilt over the workmen, and
suffocated them so that not one could there continue. Then they went to
their machines for casting stones, and they threw them with such effect
into the castle as to break all the beams thereof."
Beaucaire castle is now in ruins, but the Romanesque chapel remains in
tolerable condition. In it Louis IX. is said to have heard Mass before
he embarked for the crusade to Egypt. The pretty old Provençal poem of
Aucassin and Nicolette, which has been recently translated into English by
Mr. Andrew Lang and daintily published, has its scene laid at Beaucaire.
Tieck gave a version of it in his "Phantasus."
[Illustration: The chapel of Beaucaire Castle.]
As we are on the very scene of this graceful little tale, I must give
the essence of it. The romance, which dates from the second half of the
thirteenth century, is in prose, mingled with scraps of rhyme, destined to
be sung, and with their musical notation given. At the head of each scrap
of verse comes the rubric "Now is to be sung," and the prose passages are
headed, "Now is to be said."
Aucassin was the son of the Count of Beaucaire. He was fair of face, with
light curled hair and grey eyes. Now there was a viscount in the town who
had bought of the Saracens a little maid, and he taught her the Christian
faith, and had her baptised and called Nicolette.
Then said the Count of Beaucaire to his son Aucassin that he should go to
battle and win his spurs and be dubbed a knight. Aucassin replied that he
had no wish to be a knight, unless his father would give him Nicolette "ma
douce mie" to wife. The count is indignant. He says that his son must marry
the daughter of a king or of a count; but Aucassin replies that were an
empress offered him he would refuse her for Nicolette. Thereat the count
goes to the viscount and bids him give up the little maid that he may burn
her as a witch. The viscount hesitates, and promises he will put her out
of reach of Aucassin. Thereupon he shuts her up in a tower, along with
her nurse, where there is but a single window. And the count promises his
son that he shall have his "douce mie" if he will go to fight against the
mortal enemy of their house, the Count of Vallence. Aucassin believes his
father; goes and captures the count. Then the father refuses to fulfil his
promise. Aucassin in a rage releases the Count of Vallence, and the Count
of Beaucaire imprisons his son in a tower of the castle.
One moonlight night, when her nurse is asleep, Nicolette ties the
bedclothes together and lets herself down out of the window, escapes from
the town, and goes under the castle, where she hears Aucassin lamenting in
his prison. She speaks to him and he replies.
But (as it is ascertained that she has escaped) the guard are sent forth in
search of her, with orders to run her through the body if found. However,
the chief officer of the guard is a merciful man, and so, as he goes about,
he sings a song to warn her, and she hides in the shadow of the tower till
the watch is gone by and then flies away into the forest land. There she
builds herself a hut. When no tidings of Nicolette are heard, the Count of
Beaucaire lets his son forth from prison. One day, as Aucassin rides in the
forest, he lights on the cabin of his dear Nicolette, and they resolve to
fly together. So they take a boat on the Rhone and they are washed down
towards the sea, captured by Saracen pirates and separated. Aucassin is
ransomed and returns home. Nicolette stains her face, makes her escape,
obtains a _vielle_, and travels about Provence, singing ballads. She comes
to Beaucaire, where Aucassin is now count, his father having died, and
sings to her hurdy-gurdy the song of her adventures. The tears run down his
cheeks, and he promises her rich gifts if she will tell him more. Then she
goes to the viscountess--the viscount is dead--washes off the walnut juice,
dresses in best array, is seen and recognised by Aucassin, they are married
with great pomp, and are happy ever after. A dear little innocent story,
fresh and sweet with the springtime bloom of early literature, withal full
of curious pictures of the feelings of the time relative to chivalry,
monachism, and religion.
[Illustration: Beaucaire Castle from Tarascon.--Sunset.]