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Castles and Chateaux of Old Navarre and the Basque Provinces
_WORKS OF_
_FRANCIS MILTOUN_
[Illustration: text decoration]
_Rambles on the Riviera_ $2.50
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_The Cathedrals and Churches of the Rhine_ 2.50
_The Cathedrals of Northern France_ 2.50
_The Cathedrals of Southern France_ 2.50
_Castles and Chateaux of Old Touraine and the Loire Country_ 3.00
_Castles and Chateaux of Old Navarre and the Basque Provinces_ 3.00
_The Automobilist Abroad_ _net_ 3.00
_Postage Extra_
[Illustration: text decoration]
_L. C. PAGE & COMPANY_
_New England Building, Boston, Mass._
[Illustration: A PEASANT GIRL OF THE ARIÈGE]
Castles and Chateaux
OF
OLD NAVARRE
AND THE BASQUE PROVINCES
INCLUDING ALSO FOIX, ROUSSILLON AND BÉARN
BY FRANCIS MILTOUN
Author of "Castles and Chateaux of Old Touraine," "Rambles
in Normandy," "Rambles in Brittany," "Rambles
on the Riviera," etc.
_With Many Illustrations_
_Reproduced from paintings made on the spot_
BY BLANCHE MCMANUS
[Illustration]
BOSTON
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
1907
_Copyright, 1907_
BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)
_All rights reserved_
First Impression, October, 1907
_COLONIAL PRESS
Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.
Boston, U. S. A._
By Way of Introduction
"Cecy est un livre de bonne foy."
_Montaigne._
No account of the life and historical monuments of any section of the
old French provinces can be made to confine its scope within
geographical or topographical limits. The most that can be accomplished
is to centre the interest around some imaginary hub from which radiate
leading lines of historic and romantic interest.
Henri de Navarre is the chief romantic and historical figure of all that
part of France bounded on the south by the Pyrenean frontier of Spain.
He was but a Prince of Béarn when his mother, Jeanne d'Albret, became
the sovereign of French Navarre and of Béarn, but the romantic life
which had centred around the ancestral château at Pau was such that the
young prince went up to Paris with a training in chivalry and a love of
pomp and splendour which was second only to that of François I. The
little kingdom of Navarre, the principality of Béarn, and the dukedoms
and countships which surround them, from the Mediterranean on the east
to the Gulf of Gascony on the west, are so intimately connected with the
gallant doings of men and women of those old days that the region known
as the Pyrenean provinces of the later monarchy of France stands in a
class by itself with regard to the romance and chivalry of feudal days.
The dukes, counts and seigneurs of Languedoc and Gascony have been names
to conjure with for the novelists of the Dumas school; and, too, the
manners and customs of the earlier troubadours and crusaders formed a
motive for still another coterie of fictionists of the romantic school.
In the Comté de Foix one finds a link which binds the noblesse of the
south with that of the north. It is the story of Françoise de Foix, who
became the Marquise de Chateaubriant, the wife of Jean de Laval, that
Breton Bluebeard whose atrocities were almost as great as those of his
brother of the fairy tale. And the ties are numerous which have joined
the chatelains of these feudal châteaux and courts of the Midi with
those of the Domain of France.
These petty countships, dukedoms and kingdoms of the Pyrenees were
absorbed into France in 1789, and to-day their nomenclature has
disappeared from the geographies; but the habitant of the Basses
Pyrénées, the Pyrénées Orientales, and the Hautes Pyrénées keeps the
historical distinctions of the past as clearly defined in his own mind
as if he were living in feudal times. The Béarnais refers contemptuously
to the men of Roussillon as Catalans, and to the Basques as a wild,
weird kind of a being, neither French nor Spanish.
The geographical limits covered by the actual journeyings outlined in
the following pages skirt the French slopes of the Pyrenees from the
Atlantic Gulf of Gascony to the Mediterranean Gulf of Lyons, and so on
to the mouths of the Rhône, where they join another series of recorded
rambles, conceived and already evolved into a book by the same author
and artist.[1] The whole itinerary has been carefully thought out and
minutely covered in many journeyings by road and rail, crossing and
recrossing from east to west and from west to east that delectable land
commonly known to the Parisian Frenchman as the Midi.
[1] "Castles and Châteaux of Old Touraine and the Loire Country."
The contrasts with which one meets in going between the extreme
boundaries of east and west are very great, both with respect to men and
to manners; the Niçois is no brother of the Basque, though they both be
swarthy and speak a _patois_, even to-day as unlike modern French as is
the speech of the Breton or the Flamand. The Catalan of Roussillon is
quite unlike the Languedoçian of the Camargue plain, and the peasant of
the Aude or the Ariège bears little or no resemblance in speech or
manners to the Béarnais.
There is a subtle charm and appeal in the magnificent feudal châteaux
and fortified bourgs of this region which is quite different from the
warmer emotions awakened by the great Renaissance masterpieces of
Touraine and the Loire country. Each is irresistible. Whether one
contemplates the imposing château at Pau, or the more delicately
conceived Chenonceaux; the old walled Cité of Carcassonne, or the walls
and ramparts of Clisson or of Angers; the Roman arena at Nîmes, or the
Roman Arc de Triomphe at Saintes, there is equal charm and contrast.
To the greater appreciation, then, of the people of Southern France, and
of the gallant types of the Pyrenean provinces in particular, the
following pages have been written and illustrated.
F. M.
PERPIGNAN, _August_, 1907.
[Illustration: CONTENTS]
CHAPTER PAGE
BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION v
I. A GENERAL SURVEY 1
II. FEUDAL FRANCE--ITS PEOPLE AND ITS
CHÂTEAUX 18
III. THE PYRENEES--THEIR GEOGRAPHY AND
TOPOGRAPHY 46
IV. THE PYRENEES--THEIR HISTORY AND PEOPLE 73
V. ROUSSILLON AND THE CATALANS 95
VI. FROM PERPIGNAN TO THE SPANISH FRONTIER 110
VII. THE CANIGOU AND ANDORRA 130
VIII. THE HIGH VALLEY OF THE AUDE 152
IX. THE WALLS OF CARCASSONNE 161
X. THE COUNTS OF FOIX 175
XI. FOIX AND ITS CHÂTEAU 185
XII. THE VALLEY OF THE ARIÈGE 197
XIII. ST. LIZIER AND THE COUSERANS 211
XIV. THE PAYS DE COMMINGES 222
XV. BÉARN AND THE BÉARNAIS 230
XVI. OF THE HISTORY AND TOPOGRAPHY OF BÉARN 244
XVII. PAU AND ITS CHÂTEAU 258
XVIII. LESCAR, THE SEPULCHRE OF THE BÉARNAIS 278
XIX. THE GAVE D'OSSAU 287
XX. TARBES, BIGORRE AND LUCHON 297
XXI. BY THE BLUE GAVE DE PAU 307
XXII. OLORON AND THE VAL D'ASPE 324
XXIII. ORTHEZ AND THE GAVE D'OLORON 335
XXIV. THE BIRTH OF FRENCH NAVARRE 354
XXV. THE BASQUES 372
XXVI. SAINT-JEAN-PIED-DE-PORT AND THE COL
DE RONÇEVAUX 393
XXVII. THE VALLEY OF THE NIVE 405
XXVIII. BAYONNE: ITS PORT AND ITS WALLS 413
XXIX. BIARRITZ AND SAINT-JEAN-DE-LUZ 422
XXX. THE BIDASSOA AND THE FRONTIER 436
INDEX 449
[Illustration: LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS]
PAGE
A PEASANT GIRL OF THE ARIÈGE _Frontispiece_
THE PYRENEAN PROVINCES MAP _facing_ 1
WATCH-TOWER IN THE VAL D'ANDORRE _facing_ 24
FEUDAL FLAGS AND BANNERS 32
THE PEAKS OF THE PYRENEES (Map) 49
BRÈCHE DE ROLAND _facing_ 50
THE COL DE PERTHUS (Map) 57
THE FIVE PROPOSED RAILWAYS (Map) 68
STATIONS THERMALES (Map) 69
THE BASQUES OF THE MOUNTAINS _facing_ 74
IN A PYRENEAN HERMITAGE _facing_ 78
A MOUNTAINEER OF THE PYRENEES _facing_ 84
GITANOS FROM SPAIN 91
ROUSSILLON (Map) 95
CATALANS OF ROUSSILLON _facing_ 98
THE WOMEN OF ROUSSILLON _facing_ 100
ARMS OF PERPIGNAN 110
PORTE NOTRE DAME AND THE CASTILLET, PERPIGNAN _facing_ 112
CHÂTEAU ROUSSILLON _facing_ 118
COLLIOURE _facing_ 124
CHÂTEAU D'ULTRERA _facing_ 126
THE PILGRIMAGE TO ST. MARTIN _facing_ 132
VILLEFRANCHE _facing_ 142
ARMS OF ANDORRA 147
CHÂTEAU DE PUYLAURENS _facing_ 154
AXAT _facing_ 158
PLAN OF CARCASSONNE (Diagram) 164
THE WALLS OF CARCASSONNE _facing_ 166
GROUND PLAN OF THE CHÂTEAU DE FOIX (Diagram) 190
CHÂTEAU DE FOIX _facing_ 190
KEY OF THE VAULTING, CHÂTEAU DE FOIX, SHOWING
THE ARMS OF THE COMTES DE FOIX 191
TARASCON-SUR-ARIÈGE _facing_ 202
CHÂTEAU DE LOURDAT _facing_ 210
ST. LIZIER _facing_ 216
TRAINED BEARS OF THE VALLÉE D'USTOU _facing_ 218
ST. BERTRAND DE COMMINGES _facing_ 224
PAU AND THE SURROUNDING COUNTRY (Map) 258
ARMS OF THE CITY OF PAU 259
CHÂTEAU DE PAU _facing_ 268
ESPADRILLE-MAKERS _facing_ 288
A SHEPHERD OF BIGORRE _facing_ 302
CHÂTEAU DE COARRAZE _facing_ 308
CHÂTEAU DE LOURDES _facing_ 314
CAUTERETS _facing_ 318
THE PONT D'ORTHEZ _facing_ 338
THE WALLS OF NAVARREUX _facing_ 346
BÉARN AND NAVARRE (Map) 354
KINGS OF BASSE-NAVARRE AND KINGS OF FRANCE
AND NAVARRE (Diagram) 360
THE ARMS OF NAVARRE 362
ARMS OF HENRI IV OF FRANCE AND NAVARRE _facing_ 368
THE BASQUE COUNTRY (Map) 372
THE GAME OF _PELOTA_ _facing_ 378
"LE CHEVALET" _facing_ 390
THE QUAINT STREETS OF SAINT-JEAN-PIED-DE-PORT _facing_ 394
ARMS OF BAYONNE 413
A GATEWAY OF BAYONNE _facing_ 414
BIARRITZ AND THE SURROUNDING COUNTRY (Map) 422
BIARRITZ _facing_ 424
ST.-JEAN-DE-LUZ _facing_ 430
ILE DE FAISANS (Map) 437
THE FRONTIER AT HENDAYE (Map) 441
MAISON PIERRE LOTI, HENDAYE _facing_ 442
IN OLD FEUNTARRABIA _facing_ 446
[Illustration: The PYRENEAN PROVINCES]
Castles and Chateaux
of Old Navarre
and the Basque Provinces
CHAPTER I
A GENERAL SURVEY
This book is no record of exploitation or discovery; it is simply a
review of many things seen and heard anent that marvellous and
comparatively little known region vaguely described as "the Pyrenees,"
of which the old French provinces (and before them the independent
kingdoms, countships and dukedoms) of Béarn, Navarre, Foix and
Roussillon are the chief and most familiar.
The region has been known as a touring ground for long years, and
mountain climbers who have tired of the monotony of the Alps have found
much here to quicken their jaded appetites. Besides this, there is a
wealth of historic fact and a quaintness of men and manners throughout
all this wonderful country of infinite variety, which has been little
worked, as yet, by any but the guide-book makers, who deal with only the
dryest of details and with little approach to completeness.
The monuments of the region, the historic and ecclesiastical shrines,
are numerous enough to warrant a very extended review, but they have
only been hinted at once and again by travellers who have usually made
the round of the resorts like Biarritz, Pau, Luchon and Lourdes their
chief reason for coming here at all.
Delightful as are these places, and a half a dozen others whose names
are less familiar, the little known townlets with their historic
sites--such as Mazères, with its Château de Henri Quatre, Navarreux,
Mauléon, Morlaas, Nay, and Bruges (peopled originally by
_Flamands_)--make up an itinerary quite as important as one composed of
the names of places writ large in the guide-books and in black type on
the railway-maps.
The region of the Pyrenees is most accessible, granted it is off the
regular beaten travel track. The tide of Mediterranean travel is
breaking hard upon its shores to-day; but few who are washed ashore by
it go inland from Barcelona and Perpignan, and so on to the old-time
little kingdoms of the Pyrenees. Fewer still among those who go to
southern France, via Marseilles, ever think of turning westward instead
of eastward--the attraction of Monte Carlo and its satellite resorts is
too great. The same is true of those about to "do" the Spanish tour,
which usually means Holy Week at Seville, a day in the Prado and another
at the Alhambra and Grenada, Toledo of course, and back again north to
Paris, or to take ship at Gibraltar. En route they may have stopped at
Biarritz, in France, or San Sebastian, in Spain, because it is the vogue
just at present, but that is all.
It was thus that we had known "the Pyrenees." We knew Pau and its
ancestral château of Henri Quatre; had had a look at Biarritz; had been
to Lourdes, Luchon and Tarbes and even to Cauterets and Bigorre, and to
Foix, Carcassonne and Toulouse, but those were reminiscences of days of
railway travel. Since that time the automobile has come to make travel
in out-of-the-way places easy, and instead of having to bargain for a
sorry hack to take us through the Gorges de Pierre Lys, or from
Perpignan to Prats-de-Mollo we found an even greater pleasure in finding
our own way and setting our own pace.
This is the way to best know a country not one's own, and whether we
were contemplating the spot where Charlemagne and his followers met
defeat at the hands of the Mountaineers, or stood where the Romans
erected their great _trophée_, high above Bellegarde, we were sure that
we were always on the trail we would follow, and were not being driven
hither and thither by a _cocher_ who classed all strangers as "mere
tourists," and pointed out a cavern with gigantic stalagmites or a
profile rock as being the "chief sights" of his neighbourhood, when near
by may have been a famous battle-ground or the château where was born
the gallant Gaston Phoebus. Really, tourists, using the word in its
over-worked sense, are themselves responsible for much that is banal in
the way of sights; they won't follow out their own predilections, but
walk blindly in the trail of others whose tastes may not be their own.
Travel by road, by diligence or omnibus, is more frequent all through
the French departments bordering on the Pyrenees than in any other part
of France, save perhaps in Dauphiné and Savoie, and the linking up of
various loose ends of railway by such a means is one of the delights of
travel in these parts--if you don't happen to have an automobile handy.
Beyond a mere appreciation of mediæval architectural delights of
_châteaux_, _manoirs_, and _gentilhommières_ of the region, this book
includes some comments on the manner of living in those far-away times
when chivalry flourished on this classically romantic ground. It treats,
too, somewhat of men and manners of to-day, for here in this southwest
corner of France much of modern life is but a reminiscence of that which
has gone before.
Many of the great spas of to-day, such as the Bagnères de Bigorre,
Salies de Béarn, Cauterets, Eaux-Bonnes, or Amélie les Bains, have a
historic past, as well as a present vogue. They were known in some cases
to the Romans, and were often frequented by the royalties of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and therein is another link which
binds the present with the past.
One feature of the region resulting from the alliance of the life of the
princes, counts and seigneurs of the romantic past, with that of the
monks and prelates of those times is the religious architecture.
Since the overlord or seigneur of a small district was often an amply
endowed archbishop or bishop, or the lands round about belonged by
ancient right to some community of monkish brethren, it is but natural
that mention of some of their more notable works and institutions should
have found a place herein. Where such inclusion is made, it is always
with the consideration of the part played in the stirring affairs of
mediæval times by some fat monk or courtly prelate, who was, if not a
compeer, at least a companion of the lay lords and seigneurs.
Not all the fascinating figures of history have been princes and counts;
sometimes they were cardinal-archbishops, and when they were wealthy and
powerful seigneurs as well they became at once principal characters on
the stage. Often they have been as romantic and chivalrous (and as
intriguing and as greedy) as the most dashing hero who ever wore cloak
and doublet.
Still another species of historical characters and monuments is found
plentifully besprinkled through the pages of the chronicles of the
Pyrenean kingdoms and provinces, and that is the class which includes
warriors and their fortresses.
A castle may well be legitimately considered as a fortress, and a
château as a country house; the two are quite distinct one from the
other, though often their functions have been combined.
Throughout the Pyrenees are many little walled towns, fortifications,
watch-towers and what not, architecturally as splendid, and as great, as
the most glorious domestic establishment of Renaissance days. The _cité_
of Carcassonne, more especially, is one of these. Carcassonne's château
is as naught considered without the ramparts of the mediæval _cité_, but
together, what a splendid historical souvenir they form! The most
splendid, indeed, that still exists in Europe, or perhaps that ever did
exist.
Prats-de-Mollo and its walls, its tower, and the defending Fort
Bellegarde; Saint Bertrand de Comminges and its walls; or even the
quaintly picturesque defences of Vauban at Bayonne, where one enters the
city to-day through various gateway breaches in the walls, are all as
reminiscent of the vivid life of the history-making past, as is Henri
Quatre's tortoise-shell cradle at Pau, or Gaston de Foix' ancestral
château at Mazères.
Mostly it is the old order of things with which one comes into contact
here, but the blend of the new and old is sometimes astonishing. Luchon
and Pau and Tarbes and Lourdes, and many other places for that matter,
have over-progressed. This has been remarked before now; the writer is
not alone in his opinion.
The equal of the charm of the Pyrenean country, its historic sites, its
quaint peoples, and its scenic splendours does not exist in all France.
It is a blend of French and Spanish manners and blood, lending a
colour-scheme to life that is most enjoyable to the seeker after new
delights.
Before the Revolution, France was divided into fifty-two provinces, made
up wholly from the petty states of feudal times. Of the southern
provinces, seven in all, this book deals in part with Gascogne (capital
Auch), the Comté de Foix (capital Foix), Roussillon (capital Perpignan),
Haute-Languedoc (capital Toulouse), and Bas-Languedoc (capital
Montpellier). Of the southwest provinces, a part of Guyenne (capital
Bordeaux) is included, also Navarre (capital Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port)
and Béarn (capital Pau).
Besides these general divisions, there were many minor _petits pays_
compressed within the greater, such as Armagnac, Comminges, the
Condanois, the Pays-Entre-Deux-Mers, the Landes, etc. These, too,
naturally come within the scope of this book.
Finally, in the new order of things, the ancient provinces lost their
nomenclature after the Revolution, and the Département of the Landes
(and three others) was carved out of Guyenne; the Département of the
Basses-Pyrénées absorbed Navarre, Béarn and the Basque provinces;
Bigorre became the Hautes-Pyrénées; Foix became Ariège; Roussillon
became the Pyrénées-Orientales, and Haute-Languedoc and Bas-Languedoc
gave Hérault, Gard, Haute-Garonne and the Aude. For the most part all
come within the scope of these pages, and together these modern
départements form an unbreakable historical and topographical frontier
link from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean.
This bird's-eye view of the Pyrenean provinces, then, is a sort of
picturesque, informal report of things seen and facts garnered through
more or less familiarity with the region, its history, its institutions
and its people. Châteaux and other historical monuments, agriculture and
landscape, market-places and peasant life, all find a place here,
inasmuch as all relate to one another, and all blend into that very
nearly perfect whole which makes France so delightful to the traveller.
Everywhere in this delightful region, whether on the mountain side or in
the plains, the very atmosphere is charged with an extreme of life and
colour, and both the physiognomy of landscape and the physiognomy of
humanity is unfailing in its appeal to one's interest.
Here there are no guide-book phrases in the speech of the people, no
struggling lines of "conducted" tourists with a polyglot conductor, and
no futile labelling of doubtful historic monuments; there are enough of
undoubted authenticity without this.
Thoroughly tired and wearied of the progress and super-civilization of
the cities and towns of the well-worn roads, it becomes a real pleasure
to seek out the by-paths of the old French provinces, and their historic
and romantic associations, in their very crudities and fragments every
whit as interesting as the better known stamping-grounds of the
conventional tourist.
The folk of the Pyrenees, in their faces and figures, in their speech
and customs, are as varied as their histories. They are a bright, gay,
careless folk, with ever a care and a kind word for the stranger,
whether they are Catalan, Basque or Béarnais.
Since the economic aspects of a country have somewhat to do with its
history it is important to recognize that throughout the Pyrenees the
grazing and wine-growing industries predominate among agricultural
pursuits.
There is a very considerable raising of sheep and of horses and mules,
and somewhat of beef, and there is some growing of grain, but in the
main--outside of the sheep-grazing of the higher valleys--it is the
wine-growing industry that gives the distinctive note of activity and
prosperity to the lower slopes and plains.
For the above mentioned reason it is perhaps well to recount here just
what the wine industry and the wine-drinking of France amounts to.
One may have a preference for Burgundy or Bordeaux, Champagne or Saumur,
or even plain, plebeian beer, but it is a pity that the great mass of
wine-drinkers, outside of Continental Europe, do not make their
distinctions with more knowledge of wines when they say this or that is
the _best_ one, instead of making their estimate by the prices on the
wine-card. Anglo-Saxons (English and Americans) are for the most part
not connoisseurs in wine, because they don't know the fundamental facts
about wine-growing.
For red wines the Bordeaux--less full-bodied and heavy--are very near
rivals of the best Burgundies, and have more bouquet and more flavour.
The Medocs are the best among Bordeaux wines. Château-Lafitte and
Château-Latour are very rare in commerce and very high in price when
found. They come from the commune of Pauillac. Château Margaux, St.
Estèphe and St. Julien follow in the order named and are the leaders
among the red wines of Bordeaux--when you get the real thing, which you
don't at bargain store prices.
The white wines of Bordeaux, the Graves, come from a rocky soil; the
Sauternes, with the vintage of Château d'Yquem, lead the list, with
Barsac, Entre-Deux-Mers and St. Emilion following. There are innumerable
second-class Bordeaux wines, but they need not be enumerated, for if
one wants a name merely there are plenty of wine merchants who will sell
him any of the foregoing beautifully bottled and labelled as the "real
thing."
Down towards the Pyrenees the wines change notably in colour, price and
quality, and they are good wines too. Those of Bergerac and Quercy are
rich, red wines sold mostly in the markets of Cahors; and the wines of
Toulouse, grown on the sunny hill-slopes between Toulouse and the
frontier, are thick, alcoholic wines frequently blended with real
Bordeaux--to give body, not flavour.
The wines of Armagnac are mostly turned into _eau de vie_, and just as
good _eau de vie_ as that of Cognac, though without its flavour, and
without its advertising, which is the chief reason why the two or three
principal brands of cognac are called for at the wine-dealers.
At Chalosse, in the Landes, between Bayonne and Bordeaux, are also grown
wines made mostly into _eau de vie_.
Béarn produces a light coloured wine, a specialty of the country, and an
acquired taste like olives and Gorgonzola cheese. From Béarn, also,
comes the famous _cru de Jurançon_, celebrated since the days of Henri
Quatre, a simple, full-bodied, delicious-tasting, red wine.
Thirteen départements of modern France comprise largely the wine-growing
region of the basin of the Garonne, included in the territory covered by
this book. This region gives a wine crop of thirteen and a half millions
of hectolitres a year. In thirty years the production has augmented by
sixty per cent., and still dealers very often sell a fabricated
imitation of the genuine thing. Wine drinking is increasing as well as
alcoholism, regardless of what the doctors try to prove.
The wines of the Midi of France in general are famous, and have been for
generations, to _bons vivants_. The soil, the climate and pretty much
everything else is favourable to the vine, from the Spanish frontier in
the Pyrenees to that of Italy in the Alpes-Maritimes. The wines of the
Midi are of three sorts, each quite distinct from the others; the
ordinary table wines, the cordials, and the wines for distilling, or for
blending. Within the topographical confines of this book one
distinguishes all three of these groups, those of Roussillon, those of
Languedoc, and those of Armagnac.
The rocky soil of Roussillon, alone, for example (neighbouring
Collioure, Banyuls and Rivesaltes), gives each of the three, and the
heavy wines of the same region, for blending (most frequently with
Bordeaux), are greatly in demand among expert wine-factors all over
France. In the Département de l'Aude, the wines of Lézignan and Ginestas
are attached to this last group. The traffic in these wines is
concentrated at Carcassonne and Narbonne. At Limoux there is a specialty
known as Blanquette de Limoux--a wine greatly esteemed, and almost as
good an imitation of champagne as is that of Saumur.
In Languedoc, in the Département of Hérault, and Gard, twelve millions
of hectolitres are produced yearly of a heavy-bodied red wine, also
largely used for fortifying other wines and used, naturally, in the
neighbourhood, pure or mixed with water. This thinning out with water is
almost necessary; the drinker who formerly got outside of three bottles
of port before crawling under the table, would go to pieces long before
he had consumed the same quantity of local wine unmixed with water at a
Montpellier or Béziers table d'hôte.
At Cette, at Frontignan, and at Lunel are fabricated many "foreign"
wines, including the Malagas, the Madères and the Xeres of commerce.
Above all the _Muscat de Frontignan_ is revered among its competitors,
and it's not a "foreign" wine either, but the juice of dried grapes or
raisins,--grape juice if you like,--a sweet, mild dessert wine, very,
very popular with the ladies.
There is a considerable crop of table raisins in the Midi, particularly
at Montauban and in maritime Provence which, if not rivalling those of
Malaga in looks, have certainly a more delicate flavour.
Along with the wines of the Midi may well be coupled the olives. For oil
those of the Bouches-du-Rhône are the best. They bring the highest
prices in the foreign market, but along the easterly slopes of the
Pyrenees, in Roussillon, in the Aude, and in Hérault and Gard they run a
close second. The olives of France are not the fat, plump, "queen"
olives, sold usually in little glass jars, but a much smaller, greener,
less meaty variety, but richer in oil and nutriment.
The olive trees grow in long ranks and files, amid the vines or even
cereals, very much trimmed (in goblet shape, so that the ripening sun
may reach the inner branches) and are of small size. Their pale green,
shimmering foliage holds the year round, but demands a warm sunny
climate. The olive trees of the Midi of France--as far west as the
Comté de Foix in the Pyrenees, and as far north as Montelimar on the
Rhône--are quite the most frequently noted characteristic of the
landscape. The olive will not grow, however, above an altitude of four
hundred metres.
The foregoing pages outline in brief the chief characteristics of the
present day aspect of the old Pyrenean French provinces of which Béarn
and Basse-Navarre, with the Comté de Foix were the heart and soul.
The topographical aspect of the Pyrenees, their history, and as full a
description of their inhabitants as need be given will be found in a
section dedicated thereto.
For the rest, the romantic stories of kings and counts, and of lords and
ladies, and their feudal fortresses and Renaissance châteaux, with a
mention of such structures of interest as naturally come within nearby
vision will be found duly recorded further on.