AN INN PARLOUR
"O princesso di Baus! Ugueto,
Sibilo, Blanco-Flour, Bausseto,
Que trounavais amount sus li roucas aurin,
Cors subre-bèu, amo galoio,
Dounant l'amour, largant la joio
E la lumiero, li mount-joio
De Mount-Pavoun, de Crau li trescamp azurin
Encaro vuei dins soun mirage
Se representon voste oumbrage....
Li ferigoulo meme an counserva l'óudour
De vòsti piado; e m'es vejaire
Que vese encaro,--galejaire,
Gentiéu, courriòu e guerrejaire,--
Que vese à vòsti pèd canta li troubadour."
"O princesses des Baux! Huguette,--Sibylle, Blanchefleur,
Baussette--vous qui là-haut pour trône aviez les rochers
d'or,--corps exquis en beauté, âmes allègres,--donnant l'amour,
versant la joie,--et la lumière, les monticules--de Mont-Pahon,
les landes azurées de la Crau,
"Dans leur mirage d'aujourd'hui--reproduisent encore votre
image....--Les thyms eux-mêmes ont conservé l'odeur--de
vos traces; et il me semble--que je vois encore,
guillerets,--courtois, coureurs et guerroyeurs,--que je vois
à vos pieds chanter les troubadours."
MISTRAL.
After dinner--which by the way was of extraordinary excellence--we were
invited to the parlour of mine host, and felt like travellers in some
old romance on the eve of antique adventures. Nothing antique, however,
happened, except, indeed, the odd gathering of the family and the guests
of the hotel, and the talk that went circling cheerfully round the fire
in the little dull-tinted room. The dulness of colouring was the result
of long use; everything having faded into harmony and grown together
through long and affectionate association.
Besides Madame and a pretty niece who was staying with her, there were
two youths employed in the seed industry, who lived in the town and
came in every evening for their dinner. They were on terms of friendly
intimacy with the host and hostess who evidently regarded their office in
other lights than that of mere commercial enterprise. They looked upon
their guests as under their charge, and their desire was to minister to
their comfort and pleasure in every possible way. Monsieur and one of
the youths played draughts, Madame sewed and chatted, and Mademoiselle,
the niece, made herself generally agreeable. Between the two youths
was a mild rivalry for her smiles. We, as strangers, were treated with
special courtesy.
Madame and her husband did the honours of their homely _salon_ most
gracefully. The conversation turned on the Monuments of St. Remy, its
objects of interest which strangers come to see, and its excursions:
Les Baux above all, on the other side of the Alpilles.
"Une ville très ancienne, sculptée dans les rochers, toute élevée au
dessus de la vallée--mais une cité vraiment remarquable, Mesdames. Vous
devez certainment y aller."
And we decided at once to do so, arranging to have a trap to take us
across the mountains on the following morning.
Meanwhile we gathered further information about St. Remy itself. There
is _La Maison de la Reine Jeanne_, in which the family of the famous
Mistral has lived for generations. In the foundations were discovered
the bones of an elephant and various weapons, all supposed to be relics
of Hannibal's passage through the country at the foot of the Alpilles.
The famous poet, however, does not live in this historical home at
St. Remy, but at Maillane, a little village of the plain about seven
kilometres distant. The house, to which many a pious pilgrimage has been
made, is square and white and stands in a little shady garden with a
high wall and iron gate facing the village street. Thanks to the poet
and his colleagues the ancient costume still lingers at Maillane and
at St. Remy, and on Sundays the women go to church in the soft, white
fichu and picturesque head-dress that one has learnt to associate with
the women of Arles. The Provençal type is characteristic; dark eyes and
hair, olive skin, and a singularly fine carriage of the figure and head.
[Illustration: GROVE AT ST. REMY.
_By E. M. Synge._]
Mistral and his fellow Félibres have much to do with the survival of
art and old customs. One of this little band of modern troubadours lives
still, as we learn, in the house of his family at St. Remy, and Mistral
(as we have seen) is not far away across the plain, faithful always to
the land that he loves so deeply and labours so hard to preserve in its
ancient beauty, ancient faiths and ancient language. I had afterwards
the privilege of visiting Mistral at Maillane and M. Girard and his
wife at St. Remy, and of hearing them speak with intense enthusiasm
and affection of the Provence that is passing away. M. Girard's angry
melancholy at the erasure of all character and individuality from lands
and peoples was pathetic and impressive.
He exhibited his fine collection of ancient furniture, crockery, pewter,
and a thousand beautiful relics: among them a splendid example of the
"Crêche," that quaint Provençal institution with which the children
are made happy every Christmas. It is a modelled representation of the
coming of the Magi, but on this root idea the artists of Provence have
grafted many additions. The Virgin, beautifully sculptured and coloured,
sits in a hilly landscape and holds a sort of grand reception: Magi and
other distinguished visitors surround her, while shepherds, merchants,
publicans and sinners, varied by ornate donkey-drivers and goatherds,
are perched on hill-tops among companionable windmills about their own
size; and peasants are lavishly distributed in very green meadows in the
vicinity; all congregated to offer homage to the Madonna and the haloed
Babe. The _crêche_ is reverently veiled with a curtain on ordinary days,
and its owner drew this aside and lighted the candles to illumine the
treasured heirloom which has delighted so many generations ... and not
alone of children.
* * * * *
Our hostess of the Hôtel de Provence was learned about the seed industry
of St. Remy, and explained how ruthlessly every bloom is nipped off and
prevented from seeding if it does not answer truly to its type. That was
how the splendid flowers were achieved: viz., by a persistent interference
with the ordinary course of nature--a fact which gives food for thought.
Besides flowers, St. Remy has some fine vegetables to boast of. I had
often noticed strange, unknown, gourd-like things, bright red or yellow,
in the shop windows. The _cornichon serpent_, "ce légume extravagant,"
as somebody calls it, is said to measure nearly two metres! But that
immoderate object we never saw.
* * * * *
We were out betimes next morning, in the rose-garden which was glistening
with dew. The Garden of Pleasure truly, guarded by the mournful cypresses!
That seemed full of significance: the Roses of Pleasure sheltered by
those dark trees of Experience and Grief.
Burns sings that "pleasures are like poppies"; and so perhaps they are,
but there are some that are more like roses--Roses of Provence!
They are the sort of pleasures of which that strange _pot-pourri_ that we
call happiness is made. For surely there _is_ such a thing as happiness,
though the science of it is as hard to learn as any other; perhaps harder
than them all. Maybe it is necessary for us unteachable mortals to have
torn our way--bruised and bleeding--through that black line of cypresses
before we come in sight of it.
If happiness is a will-o'-the-wisp, is it so because of the eternal
nature of things, or because, as Carlyle frankly insists, men are mostly
fools? Would not every desired object assume an elusive character if as
soon as we came in touch with it, we flew off on the hunt for something
else? On this principle we must go through life unpossessed of our own
fortunes, strangers and pilgrims in our own kingdom. Barbara and I agreed
that we would not forget to gather the roses in our Provençal garden
for the illusive sake of other roses further afield.
* * * * *
In this little mediæval pleasure city it seemed natural to speculate about
the life of the Middle Ages, and we wondered if part of the sad secret of
those times lay in that inveterate habit of the human mind to look for
the Earthly Paradise round the next corner. For then, possibly, there
was only a sage here and there who had learnt the folly of it through
long and footsore wanderings in the desert which stretches unremittingly
between the traveller and his mirage Eden. The restless barbarous manners
of the age must have made the truth harder to understand than it need
be to us who have many centuries of growing experience behind us, both
as a hereditary influence and as an object-lesson in the conduct of life.
Incessant war and struggle, with no great results, but only further
struggle, further war as the fruit of the lifelong contest: such was the
mediæval life, and no one saw its absurdity. Not a trace of the old Greek
spirit remained; not a vestige of the philosophies of the East, except
perhaps in the cloister, and even here, at its best, the religion partook
of the objective character of the general life, and placed the site of
"heaven" for the saint, as the sinner placed his happiness,--round the
next corner.
* * * * *
In those mad, picturesque, mediæval days St. Remy used to be the country
retreat of the Counts of Provence. They here retired from the excitements
of their capital at Aix, the learned little city a few leagues to the
northeast, beyond the Alpilles. We afterwards visited Aix, and found
another larger town of plane-avenues, more dignified, more important, but
almost as silent and forgotten as St. Remy itself. One could not but wonder
what the Counts had found of country joys at St. Remy that they could not
have commanded at the old city of Sextius with its shady ways and gardens.
[Illustration: ROMAN MONUMENTS, ST. REMY.
_By E. M. Synge._]
But, in fact, the human mind seeks not merely a change from excitement to
repose; it demands a change of scene and a change of thought-atmosphere
for its own sake.
During the whole of our stay at St. Remy we lived in an atmosphere of
roses. We could not gather enough of them to please our host; and we
used to have great bunches in our rooms placed on the window-sill, so
that the sunlight filtered through their petals; and over them we could
see the garden of their birth and the pale mountains beyond. Our very
dreams were of roses and rose-gardens!
One evening, inspired by their loveliness, I arranged a wreath of them
in Barbara's hair, added a creamy shawl flowing to her feet, and stood
back to admire the result. It was something to be proud of! Our dull,
discreet _régime_ of ladylike nonentities had disappeared, and there
was the poetry, the unapologetic grace of the classic world.
Barbara rose to try to see herself in the minute mirror.
She gasped in dismay.
"No, no! you _dare_ to take it off! There are some more roses to come
yet." (The victim made a comic face of resignation.) "I want _profusion_."
"You _do_!" said Barbara, sitting down to laugh. "Am I to wear this
costume when we go to Les Baux to-morrow?" she asked.
"It depends on the weather."
But, alas! as soon as active opposition was withdrawn, Barbara removed
the improvised costume, took the roses out of her hair and the vision
of the ancient world faded away. When we went down to dinner we both of
us had on our sombre prison garments.
And though Barbara laughed, I knew that the world was a sadder and a
drearier place because of it!