LES MONTAGNES DES MAURES
Exceptional character of the Maures—Warm quarters in the Southern
nooks of the chain—A future for them—The cork tree—The carob—The
mulberry—The Saracens take possession of the chain—King Hugh
makes terms with them: his history—Marozia—S. Majolus—William of
Provence—Le Grand Fraxinet—Grimaud—S. Tropez—The Bravade.
A HUNCH of granite heaved up, and carrying on its back the beds of
schist and gneiss that had overlain it, stands up between the Gapeau
and the Argens. Its nearest geological relations, not connexions,
are the Cevennes and Corsica, all pertaining to the same period of
upheaval. Only to the east does the granite assert itself above the
overlying formations. This mass of mountain is of no great elevation,
never rising above 1,200 feet, and extending over a superficies of
200,000 acres.
“It forms by itself,” says Elisée Reclus, “an orographic system
sharply limited. Its mass of granite, gneiss, and schist is separated
from the surrounding limestone mountains by profound and wide
valleys, those of the Aille, the Argens, and the Gapeau. In fact, it
constitutes an _ensemble_ as distinct from the rest of Provence as if
it were an island separated from the continent.”
The forms of the mountains are rounded, and there are no bold crags;
but it is scooped out into valleys that descend rapidly to the sea and
to little bays; and these scoopings afford shelter from winter winds
and cold, facing the sun, and walled in from every blast.
I know a farm kitchen where a pair of curved settees are drawn about
the fire, and the gap between the settees is closed in the evening
by a green baize curtain. The family sits on a winter night in this
cosy enclosure, the men with their pipes and jugs of cider, the women
knitting and sewing; all chattering, singing, laughing.
Now the southern face of the Maures is precisely such a snuggery formed
by Nature. The mountains curve about to focus the sun’s rays; and the
cork woods, evergreen, kill all glare. Here the date trees ripen their
fruit; here the icy blasts do not shrivel up the eucalyptus, and smite
down the oranges.
The pity is, there are as yet no well-established winter resorts at
Lavandou, Cavalière, and, above all, Cavalaire—places more adapted to
delicate lungs than Hyères, exposed to the currents of wind over the
Crau; than that blow-hole S. Raphael, planted between the cheeks of the
Maures and l’Estérel; than Cannes, where the winds come down from the
snows over the plains of the Siagne; than Nice, with the Paillon on one
side and the Var on the other.
But for the English visitor in these suntraps three things are
lacking—a lawn-tennis ground, a lending library, and an English
chapel. Inevitably the Bay of Cavalaire will, in the future, become a
great refuge for invalids. But that this may become so, above all, what
is needed is a bunch of thorns applied to the tail of the engine that
runs the train along the line from Hyères to S. Raphael by the coast.
From Hyères to that place is just fifty miles, and the quick trains do
it in four, the slow in five hours.
The mountains are mantled in cork wood, save the bald heads of some,
and the making of corks is the main industry of the scattered villages.
The cork tree (_Quercus suber_) retains its leaves for two years. It
has two envelopes of bark, which are quite distinct. The inner cannot
be removed without destroying the life of the tree.
Virgin cork is not of much value; it is employed only for nets, and has
no elasticity.
Only after the third harvest is the cork in perfect condition. The tree
is then about forty years old. It is first skinned (_démasclée_) when
the tree is aged twenty or five-and-twenty. The second peeling takes
place when it is aged thirty or five-and-thirty. The third and best is
collected when the tree is between forty and forty-five years old. The
cork is taken off the trunk from above the ground to a height of about
six feet, leaving the under surface of a coffee colour.
The cork bark is plunged into a cauldron of boiling water, and is left
in it for half an hour. Then it is cut into strips, next into squares.
It is again boiled for a quarter of an hour, and then allowed slowly
to dry, and is not touched again for six months, after which it is cut
into shape. The best corks are made out of strips that have been kept
for three years. To whiten the corks they are subjected to sulphur
fumes.
The great enemy to the cork tree is the _Coroebus bifascatus_, an
insect that bores a gallery, not in the bark, but in the wood of the
tree. It attacks the branches, and its presence can be detected by
the sickly look of the leaves. When this indication shows that it is
burrowing, the branches affected are cut off above the point to which
it has bored, and are burnt.
At one time it was supposed that the cork tree required no culture.
But of late years great pains have been taken with it, and it readily
responds to them. A self-sown tree growing up in the midst of heather
and cistus is not likely to attain to a great size. It is cut down to
the root; then, when it sends up fresh shoots, one is kept, the rest
removed. This operation has to be repeated, and the ground about the
root to be well dressed. After six years the tree will take care of
itself.
The great danger, above all, to which the cork woods are exposed,
is fire; whole tracts have been devastated in this way, and the
proprietors ruined. Consequently, precautions are insisted on. Smokers
are specially warned not to throw about their unextinguished matches.
The carob tree (_Ceratonia siliqua_) is another that is met with, and
which attracts the attention of the visitor from the north. The pods,
called locust beans, are supposed to have been those on which S. John
the Baptist fed when in the wilderness. These beans grow in shape like
a horn, which has given its name to the tree. They contain a sweet
nutritious pulp, enclosing yellow seeds. The fruit is used extensively
for feeding animals, and is eaten by children, who, indeed, will eat
anything. When the phylloxera was ravaging the vineyards of France, a
company started a distillery at Cette to manufacture cognac out of the
fruit of the carob. But it failed, as the brandy so made retained a
peculiar and disagreeable flavour that could not be got out of it.
The carob is an evergreen, vigorous and beautiful. It grows in most
stony, arid spots, where is hardly a particle of soil. Such a tree
cannot live only on what it derives from its roots; it must live in
a great measure by its leaves, as, indeed, to a large extent, do all
evergreens. The scanty soil will in many places not feed trees that
drop their leaves in autumn, and supply them afresh every spring.
Such renewal exacts from the poor soil more than it can furnish.
Consequently, Nature spreads evergreens over the rocky surfaces that
contain but slight nutritive elements. Thus it is that in Provence the
vegetation is nearly all of an evergreen character.
Beside the manufacture of corks, the inhabitants of the Maures breed
silkworms, and so grow mulberry trees for their sustenance.
King Réné is credited with having introduced the mulberry into Provence
from Sicily; but it is more probable that it is indigenous. What Réné
did was to suggest its utilisation for the feeding of the silkworm.
This branch of production was greatly encouraged by Henry IV., but
wars and intestine troubles, the ravaging of the country by rival
factions, by the Savoyards and by the French, caused the cultivation
of the silkworm to decline. Of late years, however, it has been on the
increase, and the number of mulberry trees planted has accordingly
also, greatly increased. The Chain des Maures takes its name from the
Saracens, who occupied it, and made it their stronghold, whence they
descended to burn and destroy.
By the infusion of new elements, forms of government, new religious
ideas, conceptions of individual and political rights, the old world
of Gaul was in process of transformation; it was gradually organising
itself on a broad basis, when in the midst of this society in
reconstruction appeared a new element, quite unknown, and on whose
advent no reckoning had been made. It came from the coasts of Africa,
and was Mohammedan. Some called these people Hagarenes, as descendants
of Hagar, but they themselves regarded their descent as from Sarah, and
so called themselves Saracens.
Their first appearance on the Provençal coast was in 730, when they
sacked Nice and other towns, and the inhabitants fled to the mountains
to save their lives.
They harassed the littoral incessantly, not in large forces at a time,
attempting a conquest, but arriving in a few vessels, unexpectedly, to
pillage, murder, and carry away captives. As soon as ever the forces of
the Counts arrived, they escaped to their ships and fled, to recommence
their devastations at another point.
In 846 the Saracens carried ruin and desolation over the whole plain of
Aix, and made themselves masters of all vantage points along the coast.
The population sunk in despair, no longer offered effective resistance,
and the nobles, quarrelling among themselves, invoked the aid of the
infidels against their neighbours of whom they were jealous. About
this time it happened that a Moorish pirate was wrecked in the bay of
S. Tropez. He soon saw the strategic value of the chain of granite
and schist mountains, and returning to Africa collected a large band,
crossed the sea, and took possession of the whole mountainous block.
At this time, moreover, Mussulman Spain was a prey to a bloody schism.
The dynasty of the Abassides was succeeded by that of the Ommiades, and
the vicissitudes of parties continually augmented the number of those
who were conquered and proscribed. These, flying from Spain, sought
refuge in this corner of Provence, which by such means was converted
into a little Mussulman realm. On every height was built a _rebath_, a
fort that the Christians called a _fraxinet_, whence a sharp watch was
kept over the sea, and should a merchant vessel be descried, at once a
flotilla of pirate boats started out of the harbour of S. Tropez, and
fell on the unfortunate merchantmen.
Thus established here, masters also of the Balearic Isles, of Sardinia
and Sicily, as well as of the African coast, they completely paralysed
the trade of the Mediterranean, and exposed the inhabitants of the
seaboard, that was Christian, to daily peril of being carried off to be
sold in the slave markets of Tunis and Morocco.
In Spain, the Mussulman conquerors had developed a high state of
civilization. They had become architects of great skill. They
cultivated science and literature.
In Provence they were not constructive. They did nothing for
civilization, everything to waste, set back, and to destroy. They have
left behind them in the country not a trace, save a few names, of their
strongholds. The condition of affairs had became intolerable. The Moors
of the Grand Fraxinet, their principal fortress in the Montagnes des
Maures, started on a pillaging expedition, crossed Lower Provence, and
entered the Alps. As they turned north they met with great resistance.
They ascended the river Roja, they pushed over the Col de Tende, and
descended into the plains of Lombardy. They took the monastery of S.
Dalmas de Pedene, and although most of the monks had fled, they caught
and killed forty of them, and either massacred or took prisoners all
the peasants about.
Another pillaging excursion crossed the great S. Bernard to attack the
monastery of S. Maurice, where the Archbishop of Embrun, and some of
the Provençal prelates had stored the treasures of their churches. A
third party from the Fraxinet, aided by a fleet from Africa, had taken
Genoa, and put all the inhabitants to the edge of the sword.
Hugh, Count of Provence and King of Italy, was appealed to for aid.
Having no naval force to oppose to that of the Moors, he solicited help
from the Emperor of the East, and a fleet from Constantinople entered
the Gulf of S. Tropez, and burnt that of the Saracens. Hugh, in the
meantime, invaded the mountains and reached the Fraxinet.
But whilst thus engaged, he heard that Berengarius, Marquess of Ivrea,
had taken advantage of his absence to fall on his possessions in Italy.
Hugh thereupon dismissed the Greek fleet, and made an alliance with the
Saracens, to whom he committed the passages of the Alps.
About this same Hugh of Provence, one of the biggest scoundrels who
ever breathed, it will be as well to say something.
Hugh was the son of Theobald, Count of Provence, and of Bertha,
daughter of Lothair, King of Burgundy. The House of Provence had
acquired great possessions during the reign of Louis III., King of
Arles and Emperor (d. 915), the uncle of Hugh. But Hugh was not
content. He raised pretensions to the kingdom of Italy, then held
by Rudolf, King of Transjuran Burgundy. Hugh was seconded by his
half-brothers Guido and Lambert, Dukes of Tuscany and Spoleto, and by
his sister, Ermengarde, widow of the Marquess of Ivrea. Pope John
X., Lambert, Archbishop of Milan, and nearly all the Lombard nobles,
supported his claim, and he disembarked at Pisa in 926, and was crowned
at Pavia. The crafty Hugh, fully estimating the influence of the clergy
in the politics of Italy, affected the most profound zeal for religion,
and flattered the clergy. John X., in Rome, was in a difficult
position. Rome at the time was ruled by the infamous Marozia. John had
been the favourite of Marozia’s equally infamous mother Theodora. He
had, in fact, been her paramour, and it was she who had advanced him
from one bishopric to another, and had finally placed the tiara on
his head. On the death of his mistress, John found himself engaged in
a fierce contest for the mastery of Rome with Marozia and her lover,
or husband, the Marquess Alberic, by whom she had a son of the same
name, and another, by Pope Sergius it was rumoured, whom she afterwards
elevated to the Papacy.
John managed to drive the Marquess out of Rome, and he was assassinated
in 925; whereupon Marozia married Guido, Duke of Tuscany, half-brother
of Hugh of Provence. The Pope hoped, notwithstanding this connexion, by
offering the prize of the Imperial crown, to secure Hugh’s protection
against his domestic tyrants. But he was disappointed. Marozia seized
on the Pope, the former lover of her mother. His brother Peter was
killed before his face, and John was thrown into prison, where, some
months after, he died, either of anguish or, as was rumoured, smothered
with a pillow.
Marozia did not venture at once to place her son on the Papal throne. A
Leo VI. was Pope for some months, and a Stephen VII. for two years and
one month. The son was still a mere boy, too young for the shameless
woman to advance him to the Chair of S. Peter. But on the death of
Stephen, Marozia again ruled alone in Rome; Guido, her husband, was
dead, and she made her son Pope under the title of John XI.
But Marozia was not satisfied with having been the wife, first of a
Marquess, then of a Duke; the mistress of Pope Sergius, the mother of
Pope John XI. She sent to offer her hand to Hugh of Provence, the new
King of Italy. Hugh was not scrupulous in his amours, but there was
an impediment in the way. She had been the wife of his half-brother.
But the youthful Pope, the son of the wretched woman, was ready with a
dispensation, and the marriage was celebrated in Rome.
Hugh set to work now to strike down, one after another, the nobles who
had supported him, and had shaken down the throne of Rudolf, acting
with unexampled perfidy and ingratitude. He did not even spare his
half-brother, Lambert, who had succeeded Guido in the Duchy of Tuscany,
for he plucked out his eyes.
His high-handed and merciless conduct alarmed those who had not yet
suffered. One day, Alberic, the son of Marozia, was commanded by King
Hugh to serve him with water, at supper, so as to wash his hands.
Performing his office awkwardly or reluctantly, the youth spilled the
water, whereupon the King struck him in the face. Alberic was furious;
he went forth and placed himself at the head of a conspiracy against
his stepfather. The bells of Rome rang out, the people rushed into the
streets, besieged the Castle of S. Angelo, and took it. Hugh had to fly
and form a court at Pavia.
It was in 936 that King Hugh marched into Provence to dislodge the
Moors from the Grand Fraxinet, when a general conspiracy broke out
in Northern Italy, headed by Berengar, Marquess of Ivrea. Hugh had
despoiled his half-brother, Lambert, of the Duchy of Tuscany, and had
given it to his own full brother Boso; but after awhile, becoming
jealous of his power, he had dispossessed Boso. Berengar, Marquess of
Ivrea, had married Willa, the daughter of Boso. Berengar had been at
the court of Hugh, when that King had made a plan to seize and blind
him. But he received timely warning from Lothair, King Hugh’s son, and
had fled. Finding discontent rife, he placed himself at the head of the
Italian princes and nobles.
After his abandonment of the Mountains of the Moors, and having come to
terms with the Saracens, Hugh hastened into Italy, only to find that
his cause was lost. Amidst general execration, he was forced to retire
into Provence in 946, and there he died three years later, in the odour
of sanctity.
Thenceforth for awhile the Moors were left undisturbed, to continue
their ravages. Berengar and his son even contracted alliance with them.
But at last an effort was made to be rid of the incubus. And the person
who was the motive force to set the Count of Provence in action was S.
Majolus.
Majolus was born of wealthy parents about the year 908, near Riez, in
Provence. But owing to an incursion of the Saracens the family estate
was ruined, houses were burnt, crops destroyed, and the peasants
killed or carried off as captives. Majolus took refuge in Macon with
his uncle, who was bishop. Then he became a monk at Cluny. In 948 the
abbot Aymard resigned, and appointed Majolus to succeed him. But the
ex-abbot one day, whilst in the infirmary, fancied a bit of cheese,
and screamed for it to be brought to him. No one paid attention to his
angry and repeated yells, as the monks at the time were themselves
dining. Aymard was so offended at this neglect that he deposed Majolus
and resumed the headship of the establishment. But on his death Majolus
was elected in his room. After a visit to Rome, Majolus was on his way
back when a band of Saracen marauders took him. Seeing one of the Moors
about to cleave the head of one of his companions whom they considered
not likely to fetch a ransom, Majolus sprang forward and interposed
his arm. He saved the life of his comrade, but long suffered from the
wound. The Saracens forced the monks of Cluny to pay the heavy ransom
of a thousand pounds of silver for their abbot.
Majolus had now suffered twice from these scourges of the South, and he
preached a crusade against them in 972.
It took him ten years, however, to rouse the Provençals to undertake
the expulsion of the Moors, so cowed and despairing had they become. He
was ably assisted by one Bavo, son of Adelfried, a noble of Nuglerium
(Noyers, near Sistèron?), who had taken a vow to avenge the honour
of his wife, who had been outraged by a Saracen. This man swore to
exterminate every Moor who came within reach of his arm. Eventually he
died at Voghera, on a pilgrimage to Rome to give thanks for victory
over the Moors.
[Illustration: GRIMAUD]
William, Count of Provence, at the instigation of Majolus, took up arms
against the Moors, and hemmed them into the chain of mountains that
still bears their name. The campaign lasted through several years,
till finally the main stronghold, Le Grand Fraxinet, was taken. After
this, one fort and then another fell, and the boats were captured and
burnt. William did not massacre the infidels, but reduced them to
servitude, and their descendants continued to live on in Provence in
this condition. Romeo de Villeneuve, in his will, dated 1250, ordered
his male and female Saracen slaves to be sold.
William of Provence had been aided by a Grimaldi from Genoa; he made
his prisoners build the walls of Nice and cultivate the soil. To this
day a quarter of Nice bears the name of _lou canton dei sarraïs_,
for it was here that these people were interned. Grimaldi, for his
services, was granted lands in the Chaine des Maures, and the Golf de
Grimaud and the town of Grimaud take their name from him. The Grimaldi
family comes first into notice covered with honour, as liberators of
the Christian from plunderers and pirates. The Grimaldi of to-day at
Monaco are known as living on the proceeds of the gaming tables of
Monte Carlo, the plunderers of Christendom.
Le Grand Fraxinet itself may be visited, but there remain few traces of
the Saracen stronghold; some substructures and a cistern are all. It
has been supposed and asserted that the natives of the town, in their
cast of feature, in their dark eyes and hair, in the pose of their
bodies, still proclaim their Moorish descent. No one who has been in
Tunis or Algiers will corroborate this. In fact, the inhabitants are
indistinguishable from other Provençals.
Cogolin and Grimaud are two little towns living upon, and smelling of,
cork, at a very little distance apart. The Castle of Cogolin has been
wholly destroyed, save for a bell tower. That of Grimaud is in better
condition, but is a ruin. The place was taken from the Grimaldis in
1378 by Louis I. of Anjou and Provence, as the Grimaldi of that time
had sided in the war of succession with Charles of Durazzo, and he gave
it to Christopher Adorno. It passed from one to another, and was raised
into a marquisate in 1627; but the castle was dismantled in virtue of a
decree in 1655.
The town is curious, built on a conical hill dominated by the castle.
The streets are narrow. The church is rude, Early Romanesque, and very
curious.
Undoubtedly the sea originally ran up to Cogolin and Grimaud. Now all
the basin out of which they rise is a flat alluvial plain intersected
by dykes, and growing, near La Foux, splendid umbrella pines.
S. Tropez, charming little town as it is, the best centre for
excursions in the Chain of the Maures, is nevertheless not a place
that can ever become a winter residence, as it looks to the north and
is lashed by the terrible Mistral. But it has this advantage denied to
the other towns on the coast, that, having the sun at the back, one
looks from it upon the sea in all its intensity of colour without being
dazzled.
S. Tropez has been supposed to occupy the site of a Phœnician-Greek
town, Heraclea Caccabaria, but this is improbable. This place was
almost certainly in the sweet sun-bathed Bay of Cavalaire. There were,
indeed, two ancient towns on the Gulf, Alcone and Athenopolis; and
certainly Grimaud was a town in Roman times, for there are remains of
the aqueduct that supplied it with water.
The Gulf was called Sinus Sambracitanus, and, as already stated, at one
time reached inland to the feet of Grimaud. And at Cogolin a Greek
funerary monument has been found.
S. Tropez was completely ruined by the Saracens when they occupied
the Maures. After they were driven out it was rebuilt, but was again
destroyed in the War of Succession between the Duke of Anjou and
Charles of Durazzo. It was rebuilt under King Réné and colonised by
some Genoese families, who fortified it and undertook to defend it. In
1592 it gallantly resisted the Duke of Savoy, and forced him to retire.
In 1652 S. Tropez was a prey to civil war between the _Sabreurs_ and
the _Canifets_, who had succeeded to the feud of the Carcists and
Razats. The Sabreurs were those representing military force, the
Canifets represented the _échevins_, and were nicknamed after the
_canif_ used by the latter to mend their pens. I shall have more to
say about this when we come to Draguignan. The Sabreurs got possession
of the castle, but the Duc de Mercœur sent a regiment to assist the
citizens, and the Sabreurs were dislodged.
The town is divided into two parts—the old town and the new—and the
former teems with picturesque features that attract the artist. The
women of S. Tropez are noted for their good looks, due to the infusion
of Italian blood. S. Tropez is the scene of a peculiar festival, _La
Bravade_, taking place on the 16th, 17th, and 18th May every year, in
commemoration of the defence of the town against the Duke of Savoy in
1637; combined with the patronal feast of S. Tropez on May 17th. Every
Monday in Easter week a Captain of the Town is elected for the ensuing
year, and he has the regulation of the festival. This is initiated
on May Day, or the next Sunday and Thursday, by the “Promenade des
Joies,” when members of a company carrying hoops adorned with
many-coloured fluttering ribbons, promenade the town, led by drummers.
On May 16th, at 3 p.m., the Captain, with his attendant officers,
marches to the Mairie, where he is presented with pike and banner
by the Mayor, to a discharge of firearms, which thenceforth go on
banging day and night till the evening of the ensuing day. The guns are
discharged at any passer-by, but only at the legs—and are, of course,
charged with powder alone. The clergy, led by the cross, escorted
by the beadles, arrive from the church and bless the guns and other
weapons. Then the Bravadeurs follow to the church, where they receive
the bust of S. Tropez, and the procession starts capering, dancing,
swaying in and out of the streets, through the town, fifes screaming,
drums rolling, guns exploding. The procession moves to the Port, where
the Captain and all his company salute the sea. Whereupon any gunboats,
torpedo boats, etc., that happen to be anchored in the harbour, return
the salute by a general thunder of guns.
But the 17th—the day of S. Tropez—is that of greatest festivity.
It opens with a Mass of the _Mousquetaires_ at 8 a.m., after which
follows a general procession. In the afternoon the Bravade marches to
the Mairie and the pikes and banner are surrendered. On May 18th, at 8
a.m., is a Mass at the chapel of S. Anne; around the chapel are ranged
stalls of sellers of black nougat and a sort of cake known by the name
of _fougasette_. Then ensues a _déjeuner_ given by the Captain to his
assistants and to the town authorities; and in the evening the festival
concludes with a general farandol on the _Lices_.
[Illustration: UMBRELLA PINE, S. RAPHAEL]