AVIGNON.
Leaving Marseilles, the place at which I tarried next was Avignon, where I had comfortable and cheap quarters at the Hôtel Grillon. It was there I saw the only drunken man that came under my notice in France. It was market-day, and the town was full of country-folk, many of whom came to my hotel for the excellentdéjeunerprovided for guests; amongst then was an individual—not a farmer, for he did not wear a blouse—who managed, in spite of the fact that he had had quite enough, to consume the quart bottle ofvin ordinairewhich, in French country hotels, every one is supposed to take at lunch and drink. The allowance was too much for me. The lunch in every case was so excellent and tempting that I could not manage another heavy meal, and was glad to content myself with tea. One thing surprised me at all the country hotels, and that was the predominance of the military element. At every meal there were great numbers of officers present, and, so far as I could judge by the way in which these sons of Mars did justice to the good things provided, all in first-rate physical condition.Avignon is full of soldiers—we met them everywhere. All round the place the old walls seemed turned into barracks.
I stopped at Avignon to see the burial-place of John Stuart Mill. He was fond of Avignon, and spent a great deal of his life there. I am afraid, on the whole, he was rather a hard, cold man. He had a sister living in Paris, but, often as he passed through it, he never went to see her. I suppose he had learnt a good deal from Godwin’s ‘Political Justice,’ which had a great influence at one time among superior people, I remember, when I read it many years ago. You never see the book now. Godwin shows how wrong is the indulgence of social and family affection. Perhaps the philosopher’s way of looking at such things is the right one, after all. As I was sitting with a friend, a philosopher, on board theMidnight Sun, a gentleman, to whom we were neither of us particularly attached, passed us. ‘I think I could save that man’s life,’ I said. ‘Why should you?’ he asked; ‘ought we not to think of the greatest happiness of the greatest number?’ The reply was irresistible, and I acquiesced. ‘Is it not the survival of the fittest,’ I asked myself, ‘that best accords with Nature’s scheme? “If,” says Godwin, “you are in a boat with your father and a philosopher, and you meet with an accident, you are to save the philosopher and leave your father to perish.”’
Mill’s philosophy seems to have been of a similar character. At any rate, his sister’s husband complained much, to an acquaintance of mine, of the philosopher’s neglect. But his worship of Mrs. Taylor, who afterwards became his wife, was intense. Theysleep together in the same grave in the cemetery, a mile or two out of Avignon. On the tomb is the inscription: ‘John Stuart Mill, born 20 May, 1806, died 4 May, 1873,’ and that is all. On the surface of the tomb—a plain white flat one—is a long eulogium of his wife, who had died before him. Her influence, the inscription records, has been felt in many of the greatest improvements of the age, and will be felt in time to come. Following her life, we are told, this earth would become the type of heaven. Her death is described as ‘an irreparable loss.’ The grave is separated by an iron rail from the rest, and is fringed with a few evergreens. It is plain and simple, and certainly much more in accordance with English taste than the rest.
One should visit the cemetery, if only to see what a French cemetery is—all glitter and glass, for many of the flowers placed on the tombs are under glass, and the place was quite dazzling in the summer—or, rather, the autumn—sun. The ground is carefully laid out, and well planted with trees and flowering shrubs. It seems to me of considerable extent, and people come there every day to place fresh flowers on the graves of those they love. It was early in the morning when I was there, yet a good many ladies were engaged in their pious work. By most of the graves were chairs placed for the mourners, who love to repair to such a place. It is evident that family affection is strong in France.
Avignon, I should think, is a pleasant place in which to reside, with its mild atmosphere and a nice country all round. There is a broad promenade (if a short one), with a monument to a native worthy, and trees;The Castle of the Popes, Avignon. From Cassell’s ‘Cities of the World.’but away in the interior the streets are narrow and ill-fashioned. It boasts a cathedral, a museum, and an Hôtel de Ville, and tramcars run backward and forward all day long. In the early days of the French Revolution it was all for union and the ‘Contrat Social’ of the worthy Jean Jacques Rousseau; and yet it burst forth with its 15,000 brave brigands, headed by Jourdain. In 1789 the French Assembly declared that Avignon and the Comtat were incorporated with France, and that His Holiness the Pope should say what indemnity was reasonable.
‘Papal Avignon,’ writes Carlyle, in his wonderful ‘French Revolution,’ ‘with its castle rising sheer over the Rhone-stream; beautifullest town, with its purple vines and gold-orange groves; why must foolish old rhyming Réné, the last sovereign of Provence, bequeath it to the Pope and gold tiara—not rather to Louis XI. with the Leaden Virgin in his hatband? For good and for evil! Popes, Antipopes, with their pomp, have dwelt in the Castle of Avignon rising sheer over the Rhone-stream; there Laura de Sade went to hear Mass; her Petrarch twanging and singing by the Fountain of Vaucluse hard by, surely in a most melancholy manner.’
Speaking of Petrarch, naturally one’s thoughts turn to Rienzi, the Italian liberator, who fell because the Roman people were not at that time prepared for freedom. ‘When,’ writes Lord Lytton, in his splendid novel, ‘Rienzi,’ ‘the capital of the Cæsars witnessed the triumph of Petrarch, the scholastic fame of the young Rienzi had attracted the friendship of the poet—a friendship that continued, with a slight exception, to the last.’
Rienzi was one of the Roman deputies who had been sent to Avignon to supplicate Clement VI. to remove the Holy See back to Rome. It was on this mission that Rienzi for the first time gave indication of his extraordinary power of eloquence and persuasion. The pontiff, indeed, more desirous of ease than glory, was not convinced by the arguments, but he was enchanted with the pleader, and Rienzi returned to Rome laden with honours and clothed with the dignity of high and responsible office. No longer the inactive scholar, the gay companion, he rose at once to pre-eminence amongst all his fellow-citizens. Never before had authority been borne with so austere an integrity, so uncorrupt a zeal. He had thought to impregnate his colleagues with the same loftiness of principle, but in this respect he had failed. Now, secure in his footing, he had begun openly to appeal to the people, and already a new spirit seemed to animate the populace of Rome. According to modern historians, Petrarch and Rienzi went to Avignon together, but, says Lord Lytton, it was more probable that Rienzi’s mission was posterior to that of Petrarch. However that may be, it was at Avignon that Petrarch and Rienzi became most intimate, as Petrarch observes in one of his letters. Perhaps it would have been better for Italy and better for the Roman Catholic Church had they never returned to Rome. If the reader doubts this, let him read Zola’s ‘Rome.’ It was in 1309 that Clement moved his Court thither, and for sixty-eight years, until 1377, Avignon continued to be the Papal residence. The six successors of Clement V., all of them Frenchmen, like himself, were regarded by the Italians with feelings of dislikeand contempt. They were little more than the ecclesiastical agents of the French monarchy.
The climax in the history of Avignon was reached when, in 1309, Clement V. removed thither from Rome, and made Avignon the seat of the Roman Pontiff and the metropolis of Christendom. By land, by sea, by the Rhone—the position of Avignon, writes Gibbon, was at all times accessible—the southern provinces of France do not yield to Italy itself; new palaces arose for the accommodation of the Pope and Cardinals, and the arts of luxury were soon attracted by the treasures of the Church. A part of the adjoining country had long belonged to the Popes, and the sovereignty of Avignon was purchased from the youth and distress of Jane, the first Queen of Naples and Countess of Provence.
Under the shadow of the French monarchy, amidst an obedient people, the Popes enjoyed a tranquillity to which they had long been strangers. Italy deplored their loss, but the Sacred College was filled with French Cardinals, who regarded Rome and Italy with abhorrence and contempt. What remains of the Papal Palace is now turned into barracks, of which you get a good view from the station as you leave for Lyons or Paris. Dr. Arnold, who paid it a passing visit, was struck with horror by the sight of its dungeons. From Avignon the Pope prosecuted a bitter persecution of his neighbours, the Waldenses. The King of France was alarmed, and sent an officer to inquire into the matter. The report was favourable. ‘Then,’ said the King, ‘they are much better Christians than myself or Catholic subjects, and therefore they shall not be persecuted.’ He was as good as hisword, and the Pope at Avignon had for a time to forbear, or Avignon might have had as bloody a record as Rome itself. But at Avignon they do not think of these things. All round the old city are the mulberry trees and the silkworms; and the farmers want protection for their native industry, and to keep foreign raw silk out of the market.
THE GREAT CITY OF LYONS.
In one of the first books which used to be placed in the hands of young people when I was a lad—Fox’s ‘Book of Martyrs’—we get rather an unpleasant idea of Lyons. ‘There,’ writes old Fox, ‘the martyrs were condemned to sit in iron chains till their flesh broiled. Some were sewn up in nets and thrown on the horns of wild bulls, and the carcases of those who died in prison previous to the time of execution were thrown to dogs. Indeed, so far did the malice of pagans proceed that they set guards over the bodies while the beasts were devouring them, lest the friends of the deceased should get them by stealth, and the offal not devoured by the dogs was ordered to be burnt.’ After this we get a little indignant as we turn to Gibbon, and read of the mild and beneficent spirit of the ancient polytheism, which seems to find such favour in his eyes. To-day all is changed. Christians, in the shape of Roman Catholics, have it all their own way; yet one of the handsomest places of worship I saw was that of the Reformed Church. One of the earliest reformers, Waldo, the leader of the Albigenses, was born at Lyons.
The McAll Mission is doing a good work at Lyons, though in some districts they have to report a falling off. They seek to get hold of the children, but they find in this respect the priests are as active as themselves. By means of theœuvres de patronagefounded by the Catholics many of the children are drawn away. In one of the immense remote suburbs of Lyons the mothers’ meeting plays an important part in the work of evangelization. In many quarters Bible-readings have been found to be very successful, and there is a Y.M.C.A., to which many young men belong. As a rule, French Protestantism is not aggressive, else it would not be what it is to-day. Still, during the last few years the churches have waked up wonderfully, and much good has been the result. Be this as it may, Lyons is the finest city next to Paris that France can boast of. It has a population of about half a million, and the Rhone runs through it, adding much to its picturesqueness, as its banks are lined with stately houses and offices and shops. There are some twenty bridges over the river, most of them very handsome. At night you seem a little lonely as you watch the long rows of lamps that glitter along the banks. But by day the picture is reversed: there is busy life everywhere, and so clean and handsome are the buildings that you can scarcely realize that Lyons is planted with silk-mills, and that, in fact, it is the centre of the great silk trade of France. The trees, planted everywhere on the quays, which are used as promenades, make it a very charming residence.
Lyons has a very ancient history. It was adorned by successive Roman Emperors, and became the capital of Gaul. It was the principal mart for theWestern provinces of the Empire. Agrippa made it the starting-point for four great military roads that traversed Gaul. Suddenly it disappeared. As Seneca writes: ‘There was but one night between a great city and nothing.’ Aided by Nero, however, it speedily rose from its ashes. The city fared badly in the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Alaric, the scourge of God, sacked it. In 571 the Lombards ravaged it; in 715 the Saracens appeared, and left it a heap of ruins. Under Charlemagne it became a city of light and learning. Towards the end of the ninth century it came under the rule of the Archbishops and Chapter of St. John. In 1312 Philip le Bel annexed the city to France. The Lyons of to-day is a stately city, splendidly situated at the junction of the Rhone and the Saone—a junction which gave the great Pitt a fine passage in one of his finest speeches.
The Lyonnais, says the writer of an excellent account of Lyons in Cassell’s ‘Cities of the World,’ think the Place Bellecour the finest square in Europe. It is planted with trees, and ornamented with basins and fountains and two elegant pavilions, and is a very favourite promenade of the people of Lyons, especially when the military band plays. According to some, the name is derived frombella curia, and denotes the site of a Roman tribunal. In the Middle Ages the Place was a muddy swamp, often covered by the waters of the Rhone; it was gradually drained and improved by the Consulate, and surrounded with fine buildings. After the Peace of Utrecht, a bronze statue of Louis le Grand—the King who, by revoking the Edict of Nantes, nearly ruined Lyons, to please the Maintenon and her JesuitThe Place Belleour, Lyons. (From Cassell’s ‘Cities of the World.’)friends—was set up in the centre. At the Revolution of 1792 the statue was pulled down and broken up. Some proposed simply to replace the King’s head with a head of Brutus, but the multitude would not hear of it. On this spot perished some of the first victims of the fusillade in the terrible siege by the Republican army in the following year. When the siege was over, Couthon set his troop ofdémolisseursto work, and the beautiful façades of the Place Bellecour were soon irretrievably ruined, and the subsequent erections have not reproduced the monumental character of the original buildings. The Place was still covered with débris when, in April, 1805, the populace of the city, upon their knees, received the blessing of Pope Pius VII., who was then in France as the half-guest, half-prisoner, of Napoleon. On March 11, 1815, the Orleans princes hastened from the town as the advance guard of Napoleon, returning from Elba, was crossing the Pont de la Guillotière. On the morrow the Emperor reviewed 15,000 soldiers in the Place Bellecour, amidst the acclamations of the populace. But the Empire passed away, and in 1825 the restored King placed a second statue of Louis XIV. in the centre of the Place.
Churches abound in Lyons. One of them, that of St. Nizien, in memory of a bishop of that name, is placed on the spot where one of its martyr bishops, St. Pothinus, assembled his flock. It has been rebuilt many times, and is interesting not only as the cradle of Christianity in Lyons—it was also the cradle of its civil liberty. Here the growing commune met in the days of its resistance to the bishops, and the bell of the ancient tower used to call the citizens together to electtheir magistrate. Near the Church of Ainay was the ancient Forum, where Greeks, Orientals, Africans, Gauls, and Spaniards met to exchange the products of their various commerce. In the Forum was an altar dedicated to the Emperor Augustus and Rome, and near it was the Temple of Augustus. In the church was sacredly preserved some hair of the Virgin Mary, and part of the cradle and some of the swaddling clothes of our Saviour. In the western part of the city, beyond the Saone, are found some very interesting churches. St. Irénée was built by the Bishop St. Patient in the fifth century. In the crypt is a well into which, according to tradition, the bodies of 19,000 Christians were thrown when the Emperor Severus revenged himself on Lyons for its adherence to the cause of Albinus. Nearer to the river stands the Church of St. Just. In connection with it was a vast monastery, with massive walls and towers. In its cloisters many sovereigns found a safe asylum. Innocent IV. was one, another was the Regent Louise, while her son Francis I. was fighting in Italy, and here she received the famous letter after the Battle of Pavia: ‘All is lost except honour.’
Still nearer to the river stands the Church of St. Jean Baptiste, the Cathedral of Lyons. In one of the chapels attached to the church was some wood of the true cross; in another is preserved the heart of St. Vincent de Paul. The Chapter of the Cathedral of Lyons was the most important body of clergy in France; they were thirty-two in number, all Counts of Lyons, the rank of Premier Canon being held by the reigning King of France. Amongst the remarkable events that have occurred here was the CouncilGeneral of 1245, when Innocent IV. hurled the thunders of the Church against Frederick II., and where, for the first time, the Cardinals wore the red dress to distinguish them from other prelates. In 1274 a Council General held here formed a short-lived union of the Latin and Greek Churches. In this church Henry II., Emperor of Germany, performed mass, in one of his efforts to desert his throne and take Holy Orders. And here, in 1600, Henry of Navarre renewed his marriage with Marie de Medicis. Close by is the Archiepiscopal Palace, the magnificent apartments of which have accommodated many kings and queens and eminent personages. Napoleon passed a night here on his return from Elba. On that awful St. Bartholomew’s Day, in the courtyard of the Palace, 300 Protestants were murdered.
Thence you ascend by steep and narrow steps to the Church of Notre Dame, on the hill of St. Fourvières. All round are priestly residences and numerous shop for the sale of ecclesiastical millinery. Higher up are the merchants who deal in rosaries, devotional pictures, medals, and wax models of different parts of the body, for offerings in the church, when the time comes for the multitudes of pilgrims who throng thither to obtain pardon of sin and restoration of health. One would have thought that an anachronism in the France of to-day; but we know how credulity reigns rampant, in spite of the philosopher, in every nation in the world. It was our Thomas à Becket, who spent part of an exile in Lyons, who seems to have suggested a church on this spot. In 1643 Lyons was ravaged by a terrible pest, and the municipality dedicated Lyons to Notre Dame in perpetuity, and untilthe Revolution of 1789 the whole city celebrated, on the Feast of the Nativity, the anniversary of the event. Pope Pius, in 1805, superintended the rededication of the building to Divine worship, and, amidst a grand display of flags, discharge of cannon, and ringing of bells from the summit of the hill, blessed the city of Lyons, as Innocent had done centuries before. In December, 1852, Lyons wasen fêteday and night, on the occasion of the planting of a colossal statue of the Virgin on the top of the tower. Like ancient Ephesus, it lived on its saints. Happily, unlike Ephesus, it stuck to trade, and became wealthy, and populous, and great. The Quai de St. Clair is the finest in Lyons, and was formerly the rendezvous of merchants and foreigners, and the centre of Lyonese trade. One of the many quays in Lyons, that known as Les Etroit, a charming promenade, is associated with the memory of Rousseau, in the days of his youthful poverty.
Its modern Hôtel de Ville is held to be one of the handsomest in Europe, and that is saying a great deal when we think of Brussels or Louvain. Its cathedral of St. Jean Baptiste took three centuries to build. The city is one of the Roman Catholic strongholds, and to some of its churches resort every year as many as 1,500,000 pilgrims, who obtain similar privileges to those accorded to the devotees at Loretto.
Now that Lyons is at peace, it exports to England, America, and Russia, manufactured silks to the amount of £18,000,000 yearly. It is to Jacquard that it owes its silk manufacture, and a statue of him properly graces the city. For many years it had been renowned for its manufactures, but in 1802, a workman originally, Jacquard lived to revolutionizethe silk trade, and laid the foundation of its present prosperity. Its workshops for the construction of machinery, its manufactories of chemical products and coloured papers, are justly celebrated; but it is from the production of its silk fabrics that Lyons derives its chief fame. This industry, in which Lyons has no rival, was first brought from Italy. Florentines, Genoese, and others, driven away by revolutions, did for France what in after-times expatriated Frenchmen did for other countries to which they were compelled to flee by reason of tyranny at home. By decree of Louis XI., experienced workmen settling at Lyons were exempt from taxes levied on other inhabitants. Twelve thousand silk-weavers were busy at work in Lyons by the middle of the sixteenth century. At the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, it seemed as if the silk industry was about to be annihilated. More than three-fourths of the looms were silenced; but in the course of a couple of generations the industry resumed its former proportions, and steadily increased, till Lyons becamepar excellencethe city of beautiful silks. The Lyonnese silk-weavers mostly work in their own dwellings. A man with his family will keep from two to six or eight looms going, often employing journeymen. The silk-merchants of Lyons, about 600 in number, supply the patterns and the silk; there are about 40,000 looms at work in the city and in the vicinity. Formerly, the weavers were nearly all grouped together in the northern part of the city, but the employers, in order to lessen the influence of the close trade organizations, have succeeded in distributing the industry throughout the neighbouring villages, though La Croix-Roussestill holds the lion’s share. Its silks still maintain their prestige. The Empress of Germany last year purchased at Lyons white silk, with flowers, birds, and foliage in relief, at twenty-five pounds a yard, five-sixths of the price being the actual value of the raw silk. She intended to have a dress made of it, but it was so beautiful that she used it for a curtain. This is believed to be the highest priced silk goods ever made. Louis XIV. paid twelve pounds a yard for the cloth-of-gold material of which his dressing-gown was made. Lyons has been the birthplace of many distinguished and illustrious personages—Germanicus, and the Emperors Claudius and Marcus Aurelius, the philosopher-king; the ruler who preferred the solitude of the student to the splendour of the palace; the soldier who loved the arts of peace better than the glory of war; who left to the world his ‘Meditations,’ which, even at this era of the world’s history, it does us good to read. Another native of Lyons whose works were at one time much read in England was J. B. Say, the famous political writer. Another of the modern glories of Lyons was Louise Labé, the Lyons Sappho, surnamed La Belle Cordière. Another was Roland, the great statesman, the husband of a yet more illustrious wife. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, was one of the victims of what Fox terms the fifth general persecution, and it is generally supposed that the account of the persecution in Lyons was written by him. He was beheaded ina.d.202.
‘Lyons,’ says the Guide-Book, ‘embraced with ardour the cause of the Revolution, and it suffered frightfully in consequence; but the Patriots knew nothing of the dark days to come, as they formedone bright May morning the Federation of Lyons, in which some fifty or sixty thousand of its citizens took part. What a picture Carlyle gives us of the Lyons guardsmen meeting at five on the Quai de Rhone, marching thence to the Federation Field, amid waving of hats and ladies’ handkerchiefs, great shoutings of some two hundred thousand patriot voices and hearts—the beautiful and brave! ‘amongst whom, courting no notice, and yet notablest of all, what queen-like figure is this, with her escort of house friends and Champagneux, the Patriot editor? Radiant with enthusiasm are those dark eyes in that strong Minerva face, looking dignity and earnest joy—joy-fullest she where all is joyful! It is Roland de Platière’s wife; that elderly Roland, King’s inspector of manufactures here, and now likewise, by popular choice, the strictest of our new Lyons Municipals—a man who has gained much, if worth and faculty be gain; but, above all things, has gained to wife Philipon, the Paris engraver’s daughter. Reader, mark that queen-like burgher woman, beautiful, graceful to the eye, much more so to the mind.’
Lyons had a bitter awakening—famine, ruin, and despair; a long siege and an awful doom. The cry in Paris is, ‘Lyons has rebelled against the Republic; Lyons is no more.’ The infamous Fouché is there, and the hangman follows. There is no end to the fusillading and filibustering, and mangled corpses float down the Rhone. The picture is too awful; let us draw the curtain, and think of Madame Roland, as in her grace and glory she helped to give—alas! in vain—freedom to Lyons and to France. I think of her as I take the train, and bid adieu to a city so splendidand so replete with associations, some pleasant, others much the reverse. Under the Consulate and the Empire Lyons once more rose to life and prosperity. Bonaparte did much for the city in the way of restoration. In 1829 General La Fayette, that mild, well-meaning, but mistaken man, came there to receive an ovation. Once more Lyons throbbed with joy. But its troubles were not over. In 1831 the workmen rose in revolution, and the Duke of Orleans and Marshal Soult had to come there to put it down. This was followed by a disastrous inundation, and in 1849, and again in 1870, it was on the point of and was in connection with the Commune of Paris, which had active agents there. The Frenchouvrieris always discontented, and has no faith in God; yet Lyons is still the second city of France, in spite of the fact that not long since the President of the French Republic was assassinated there.
DIJON, OR THE WINE COUNTRY.
As an illustration of what a French provincial town is in the way of hotels, I would take Dijon, where I stopped a night on my way from Lyons to Paris. From Marseilles to Dijon the country is interesting, giving fine views of the valley of the Loire and hills and mountains far away. From thence to Paris the ride is uninteresting. I suppose a great many people stop at Dijon, as it abounds in magnificent hotels, all of which seem to flourish. I put up at the Hôtel de Jura, close to the railway-station, and I feel as proud as a lord as I enjoy the luxury of that well-appointed hotel. My bedroom is delicious, very unlike that of an English hotel. Everyone in the house seems smiling and civil. The dining-room is large and lofty, the cuisine is excellent, and the smoking-room is elegantly furnished, as much so as a drawing-room in England. I feel that I am in France, and that there they manage better than they do with us. I go into the shop, and the shopkeeper and his men all wear the blue blouse of the country. If I buy anything, it is done up for me in the most careful manner, and so profuse are the thanks of the shopkeeper and his wife that I leave with afeeling that my visit has been a real benefit to the town.
There is much to see in Dijon; it is an ancient city, formerly the capital of Burgundy, and still the headquarters of its extensive wine trade. Let us hope that the dealers are honest men, as burgundy is much in demand in my native land. What I have at the hotel is excellent and cheap, and this is the great difficulty in France in the way of any national temperance movement. Like the Cape, like Australia, the wine trade is an important factor in the national life. It is the Diana of the Ephesians. Try to check it, and everyone is up in arms. The traveller is bound to drink. At lunch he has a quart bottle of red or white wine placed before him, and it is just the same at dinner. The wine is included in the bill, and it is all the same whether you drink it or leave it alone. If there is a family dining or lunching together, the bottle goes round, and perhaps a glass or two will suffice; but a solitary traveller has his two quart bottles to tackle per day, and what are you to do?—one is afraid to drink water when travelling, as there may be poison in the pot. A similar remark applies to milk. It is sadly liable to infection, and it may be that, when you ask for it, it may prove no exception to the general rule. I remember how Sir Russell Reynolds, when on a Continental tour, confined himself to milk, and on his return to England had a serious illness in consequence. No wonder, then, that as a rule the ordinary traveller sticks to the wine of the country, which is little intoxicating, and has a pleasant favour that helps much in its consumption.
I fancy the burgundy of Dijon is much purer andpleasanter than that of London. Nevertheless, two quarts of it a day are rather too much. I got rid of the difficulty by sacrificing my dinner and having tea instead. Dijon is a very ancient city, and full of very interesting remains. Indeed, I fancy it is one of the most interesting cities in France. In an old engraving of it which I have, it is surrounded by a wall, and seems a city of church spires, and its ecclesiastical buildings are very old and numerous, but the walls are gone, and handsome boulevards have taken their place. Its modern fame depends on its wine, its spiced bread, and its mustard. I buy a mustard-pot—a characteristic specimen of French ingenuity. It is an earthenware pig. The back is hollow. You take off the top, and there is the place for the mustard and a long mustard-spoon, the crooked end of which does duty as a tail. The animal has his nose in a trough, which is divided into two portions, one for pepper, the other for salt. I am proud of that mustard-pot, and only use it on state occasions. At Avignon the mustard-pot was equally a combination, but of a less artistic character. It was simply a blue earthenware pot with the mustard in the centre, while just below are two little recesses, one for the pepper and one for the salt; and these you see at really good hotels in preference to the costlier electroplate mustard-pots in use nearer home. At Thetford they make unbreakable earthenware. I should recommend the company to try a few mustard-potsà la Francaise.
Dijon, says the guide-book—one of that excellent series in red known asGuide-Ioannes, to be purchased for a franc, sometimes less, at all French railway-stations—is one of the most interesting cities inFrance, containing 63,425 inhabitants. It is situated at the junction of the Ouche and the Suzon, at the foot of the mountains of the Côte d’Or, and at the commencement of a fruitful valley which stretches as far as the Jura. It is lovely—when I was there it rained, and I did not see much of its loveliness—well built and salubrious. Its principal attractions are the Cathedral of St. Benigne, the Churches of Notre Dame and St. Michel, and the Palace of the Dukes of Burgundy, the Palace of Justice, the museum containing the tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy and the remains of the Chartreuse de Chamoi. Wherever you go you meet with old houses and architecture of the most interesting character. It is a place to be visited carefully by the artist. He will find much to interest him at every step. In England we have nothing like it. In the troubles and wars which led, after many ages, to the establishment of a united France under one monarch, Dijon became a place of great importance and the seat of a legislative assembly. Originally a second-rate Roman settlement, it had become Christianized by the preaching of St. Benigne, who died a martyr for his faith, and to whom, as I have already stated, the great cathedral was consecrated; yet it did not become the seat of a bishopric till 1731. For ages the Dukes of Burgundy resided there, and at a later time it gave to France its grand pulpit orator, Bossuet, and to the Church St. Bernard. In 1477 the French King gained possession of the city, and the rule of the Dukes of Burgundy came to an end.
‘The Lord of Craon,’ writes old Philip de Commines—the father of modern history, whose memoirs, writes Mr. Hallam, almost make an epoch in historical literature—‘when he drew near Burgundy, sent forward the Prince of Orange and others to Dijon to use persuasion and require the people to render obedience to the King, and they managed the matter so adroitly, principally by means of the Prince of Orange, that the city of Dijon and all the other towns in the duchy of Burgundy, together with many others in the country, gave in their allegiance to the King.’ Whether the people gained much by the change is not very clear. Apparently, Commines did not think Dijon had much cause for thankfulness. ‘In my opinion,’ he writes, ‘of all the countries in the world with which I was ever acquainted, the government is nowhere so well managed, the people nowhere less obnoxious to violence and oppression, nor their houses less liable to be destroyed by violence or oppression, than in England, for these calamities only fall upon the authors of them.’ I suppose the people of Dijon were of a similar way of thinking, as the writer of the guide-book tells us that ‘Dijon adopta avec enthousiasme les principes de la Révolution.’ Happily its victims during that reign of terror were few. In the war with France the Germans got hold of Dijon; but Garibaldi came to the rescue. Now Dijon is at peace, and long may it so remain, its hotels affording rest and refreshment to the weary traveller, and its wine, when taken in moderation, making glad the heart of man. Let me make one remark as a hint to the tourist. Possibly he sees in the Continental Bradshaw an advertisement of a hotel where the charges are rather less than those of others. He goes there, but he finds no reduction. The excuse is that the lower charge is not for the hasty traveller, but for the one who comes to stay.
As a recent writer inTemple Barremarks, the general air of pride and prosperity indicates that the capital of the duchy thrives excellently as a member of the Republic. The Rue de Liberté reminds us of some of our old English towns. Step aside into any of the cross-streets, and you find yourself in a labyrinth of crooked by-ways and carved doors, by the side of low angular bell-towers, which seem to have come straight from some old Flemish city, or you come to quaint, quiet, detached squares, planted with young trees, with white detached houses all round some of them, remnants of feudal hotels. In the Salle des Gardes of the old palace the tombs of the two greatest Dukes may still be seen. The palace, a huge, stately, modernized building, is now a museum, a picture-gallery, and the headquarters of all local and departmental business. It is there that the French Protestants of to-day worship. The Church of Notre Dame, of which the great Condé declared that it should be packed in a jeweller’s box to preserve it, is beautiful outside as in. It is the mother-church, to which the Dijonais cling, where their children are baptized and brought on their First Communion. It is crowded of a Sunday. Nor is St. Michel externally less impressive; but the interior is described as dowdy and disappointing. But, after all, I fancy the chief visitors to Dijon are the wine-merchants, and others interested in the wine trade. The railway time-tables are full of familiar names of vineyards. In a journey of thirty miles southwards, you meet with, the well-known names of Chambertin, Vougeot, Beaune, and Meursault, and you think, perhaps, of feasting and gaiety a long time ago. But the countrylacks the picturesque. You may travel far on the main line without seeing anything in the shape of pleasant landscape. The country around is undulating, but on the whole flat. There are many walks with pleasant memories—one leads to Talant, the ancient palace of the Dukes of Burgundy, now the seat of an archaic village with a marvellous church, where they show you an ancient picture said to have been painted by St. Luke. From the common at the foot of the hill you get a good view of Dijon, with the cathedral towers in the foreground, and the cupola of St. Michel standing up above. In an old château near-by was the birthplace of the great St. Bernard. Far off is the rolling expanse of land which stretches away to the frontiers of Champagne. ‘It was among these fields and villages,’ says the writer inTemple Barto whom I have already referred, ‘that the three battles of Dijon were fought during the Franco-Prussian War, and here and there, at turnings in the road and in wide ploughed land, monuments covered with withered wreaths recall the event, and make the sad landscape all the sadder; yet France pines for war, and the clang of martial strains everywhere makes it little better than an armed camp. It is the same everywhere. The one great problem of European statesmen seems to be to find a sufficiency of soldiers and sailors, as if we still lived in the dark ages, when might was right, and the sole arbiter of nations was the sword. It is awful to think of; it is a disgrace alike to Christianity and civilization that such should be the case. It is not now that we can sing, as we did in the great Exhibition year, more than forty years ago, of thetriumph of Captain Pen over Captain Sword. Still, we can pray with Campbell:
‘The cause of truth and human weal,O God above!Transfer it from the sword’s appealTo Peace and Love.Peace, Love! the cherubim that joinTheir spread wings o’er devotion’s shrine;Prayers sound in vain, and temples shine,Where they are not.’
‘The cause of truth and human weal,O God above!Transfer it from the sword’s appealTo Peace and Love.Peace, Love! the cherubim that joinTheir spread wings o’er devotion’s shrine;Prayers sound in vain, and temples shine,Where they are not.’
BOOKS OF REFERENCE.
As possibly some of my readers may wish for a further study of some of the cities and places to which I have referred, I have added a few books of reference which they may consult with advantage. They are as follows:
Plutarch’s ‘Lives.’
Gibbon’s ‘Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.’
‘How to Visit the Mediterranean,’ by Dr. Lunn.
Pollard’s ‘Land of the Monuments.’
‘The Holy City,’ by Dr. Russell Forbes.
Murray and Baedeker’s Guide-Books.
Merriwether’s ‘Afloat and Ashore on the Mediterranean.’
‘Climates of the South of France,’ by Dr. Theodore Williams.
‘Cities of South Italy and Sicily,’ by A. J. C. Hare.
Cook’s ‘South Italy.’
‘Jerusalem Illustrated,’ by G. Robinson Lees.
Cook’s ‘Egypt.’
‘Walks in Cairo,’ by Major Plunkett.
‘England in Egypt,’ by Sir A. Milner.
‘From Pharaoh to Fellah,’ by C. F. Moberley Bell.
‘Scenes from Life in Cairo,’ by Miss Whateley.
‘Leaves from my Sketch-Book,’ by E. W. Cooke.
‘Court Life in Egypt,’ by A. J. Butler.
‘Last Letters from Egypt,’ by Lady Duff Gordon.
‘Egypt as It Is,’ by J. C. Moran.
‘Egypt and its Future,’ by Dr. Wylie.
Budge’s ‘Dwellers on the Nile.’
‘The Nile,’ by Wallis Budge.
‘Egypt as a Winter Resort,’ by Dr. Sandwith.
‘Wintering in Egypt,’ by Dr. A. J. Bentley.
‘Monuments of Upper Egypt,’ by Marriette Bey.
‘Pharaoh’s Fellahs and Explorers,’ by A. M. Edwards.
‘Nile Gleanings,’ by H. Villiers Stuart.
‘Sketches from a Nile Steamer,’ by H. M. Tirard.
‘A Tour in Egypt,’ by Rev. Canon Bell.
‘Egyptian Sketches,’ by J. Lynch.
‘Egypt,’ by S. L. Lane.
‘Leaves from an Egyptian Sketch-Book,’ by Canon Isaac Taylor.
‘Cairo,’ by S. Lane Poole.
‘Egypt of To-day,’ by W. Fraser Rae.
‘Land of the Sphinx,’ by G. Montbard.
‘The New Egypt,’ by Francis Adams.
‘Through David’s Realm,’ by Rev. E. T. D. Tompkins.
‘Palestine,’ by Major Conder.
The Works of Flavius Josephus.
‘Mount Vesuvius,’ by J. Logan Lobley.
‘The Bible and Modern Discoveries,’ by Henry A. Harper.
‘Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid,’ by Piozzi Smith.
‘Palestine under the Moslems,’ by Guy Le Strange.
‘The Women of Turkey,’ by Lucy Garnett.
‘Greek Pictures,’ by Dr. Mahaffy.
‘Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens.’
‘With the Bedouins,’ by Gray Hill.
‘Modern Discoveries on the Ancient Site of Ephesus,’ by J. T. Wood.
‘Essays on Christian Greece,’ by Demetrius Bikelos, translated by the Marquis of Bute.
‘A History of Greek Sculpture,’ by Dr. A. Murray.
‘Eothen,’ by A. W. Kinglake.
‘Cornhill to Cairo,’ by W. M. Thackeray.
‘The History of Sicily,’ by Dr. Edward A. Freeman.
‘Sicily, Phœnician, Greek and Roman,’ by the late Prof. F. A. Freeman (‘Story of the Nations’).
‘Among the Holy Places,’ by Dr. James Kean.
Dean Stanley’s ‘Sinai and Palestine.’
‘Buried Cities and Bible Countries,’ by G. St. Clair.
‘In Christ’s Country,’ by Samuel Rome.
‘The Byzantine Empire,’ by C. W. C. Osman.
‘On the Nile with a Camera,’ by Anthony Wilkin.
‘The Island of Capri,’ by Ferdinand Gregorovius.
‘Diary of an Idle Woman in Constantinople.’
‘Recollections of an Egyptian Princess,’ by Miss Chennelles.
‘Jerusalem, the Holy City,’ by Mrs. Oliphant.
‘The Rulers of the Mediterranean,’ by R. H. Davis.
‘The Historical Geography of the Holy Land,’ by Dr. G. A. Smith.
‘The Holy Land and the Bible,’ by Dr. Geikie.
‘The Ancient Egyptian Doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul,’ by Dr. Wisedeman.
‘Manual of Egyptian Archæology,’ by Dr. Maspero.
‘The Bible and the Monuments,’ by W. St. Chaud Boscawen.
‘Letters from Constantinople,’ by Mrs. Max Müller.
‘Egypt under the British,’ by H. F. Wood.
‘Travel Pictures from Palestine,’ by James Wells, D.D.
‘A History of Egypt,’ by W. M. Flinders Petrie.
‘The Forgotten Isles, Balearic Isles, Corsica and Sardinia,’ by Gaston Villiers.
‘The Sultan and his People,’ by Richard Davey.
‘The Outgoing Turk,’ by H. G. Thomson.
For invalids merely travelling for health, I would recommend ‘The Mediterranean Winter Resorts,’ by E. A. Reynolds Ball, which is now in a third edition. Great prominence has been given to the medical aspect of the principal invalid resorts, and special articles dealing with the climatic, sanitary, and general hygienic conditions of these resorts have been contributed by resident English physicians. This is the only English guide-book published containing authoritative articles on the principal winter resorts by medical experts. Another new feature which may be specially mentioned is the introduction of detailed descriptions of the newer health resorts, such as Biskra, Luxor, Helouan in North Africa; St. Raphael, Grasse, Beaulieu, Ospedaletti on the Riviera; Torre del Greco, Castellamare, Amalfi on the South Italian Littoral, which have come into favour within the last few years. In describing the different places in this guide-book, a certain uniform order has, as far as possible, been preserved in treating of the various subjects. Routes, climatic conditions, society, hotel and villa accommodation, amusements, sport, principal attractions, placesof interest, and excursions, have been dealt with consecutively in the above order, greater or less space being accorded to the various subjects according to the special characteristics of each resort. The author has attempted to give rather fuller information about the newer and less known winter resorts, concerning which little has been written in the standard works of Murray and Baedeker, than he has done when describing the popular and well-known Riviera resorts, which possess a whole library of guide-book and travel literature of their own.
Dealing with the delicate question of hotel accommodation for visitors, Mr. Reynolds Ball has not shrunk from the invidious task of occasional recommendation, based either on personal experience, or on trustworthy reports of friends or residents. Most of the information in this handbook has been derived at first-hand. He has visited nearly all the places described, and with regard to others he has availed himself of the help of travelled friends or residents possessing knowledge gained on the spot.
Magazine articles in connection with the countries and cities here referred to are numerous. Social life at Naples is well described in an article in theNational Reviewfor February, 1892. A readable account of the sanitary and meteorological conditions of Cairo will be found in an article in theLancet, November, 1889, entitled ‘The Winter Climate of the Nile.’ An interesting description of Corfu appeared in theSunday Magazinefor May, 1893, by Professor Mahaffy; the reader will find also a good deal of useful information in Cassell’s ‘Picturesque Mediterranean,’ 1891. For Corsica the reader had better refer to Mr. Freshfield’s interestingaccount of climbing experiences in the island, which appeared in theAlpine Journal, 1880.
When one thinks of the enormous number of works published in connection with Egypt, it is worth noting that when Edward William Lane wrote his account of the ‘Manners and Customs of Modern Egypt,’ of which an excellent reprint has been published in the Minerva Library, when he returned to England with a complete description of Egypt as it then was, and a hundred excellent drawings, Egypt was not known or appreciated in England, and no publisher would incur the expense of publishing the work and reproducing the drawings, though they were universally praised by all who saw them. In this respect the change is simply marvellous.