A Book of the Pyrenees. Baring-Gould Sabine

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СКАЧАТЬ gallant fellow-countrymen lie who thus fell is on the edge of the Landes, on the north side of the Adour. When Queen Victoria visited Biarritz, as also recently when King Edward VII was there, this cemetery was duly visited by both monarchs. No one who remains any length of time in Bayonne should omit a visit to the beautiful lakes that lie embosomed in cork woods and pine forests in the Landes, in the abandoned course of the Adour. The river, instead of entering the sea where it does now, formerly turned north, and had its mouth at Cape Breton, something like ten miles distant. But at the close of the fourteenth century a violent tempest blowing from the west threw up a barrier of sand and blocked the mouth of the Adour, which then pursued its course northward, and finally discharged its waters into the Atlantic at Vieux-Boucau, and that remained its mouth for two centuries. But in 1579 the inhabitants of Bayonne, aided by a flood, managed to pierce the isthmus of sand-hills which separated their town from the sea, and thus created a new mouth for the river. The Adour, however, pours into the bay in a contrary direction to the prevailing winds, consequently there is an incessant struggle going on there between the current and the waves, resulting in a deposit of mud, sand, and pebble, and the building up of a bar which the sea is incessantly driving towards the shore, whereas the river is as incessantly engaged in repelling it. The existence of this bar makes the entrance to the Adour difficult and even dangerous, and has necessitated expensive works.

      The lakes in the Landes are a haunt of wild fowl, and afford good fishing.

      Biarritz needs little more than a mention, though a place of some antiquity. It is spoken of in the eleventh century, when some Basques harpooned a whale in the Bay of Biscay. It throve on the whale fishery, and so wealthy did it become that the tithe of its revenue constituted the principal source of the income of the bishops of Bayonne. In course of time the whales abandoned the coast and migrated to the north, and then the prosperity of Biarritz declined, and it sank to being an insignificant fishing village, till the Empress Eugénie took a fancy to it, and a new era of prosperity began. It is now a fashionable resort, especially for Spanish nobles. The heaths around in early summer are lovely with the intensely blue Lithospermum, and the crimson Daphne cneorum.

      Visitors to Biarritz make an expedition to the “Refuge,” distant about three miles, over a heath. The Abbé Céstac had founded an orphanage at Bayonne for girls, and had placed it under the charge of the Servantes de Marie. Not content with this good work he gathered about him a number of penitents and lodged them in the attics of the orphanage. Then in 1839 he bought a little property near Biarritz, and moved his penitents to it and placed them under the control of his sister Madelaine.

      “Complete isolation, absolute silence, total abstinence from flesh meat, manual labour in the garden and graveyard, constant prayer in the church, or meditation in their cells, constitute their rule of life. Like the Trappists, their bed is a hard board, to which they retire at eight in the evening to rise at four in the morning. On Friday they take a meal which serves for dinner – unseasoned vegetables – on their knees. They never read a book, except one of devotion, and are entirely ignorant of the politics and changes of society. This holy Thebaid is shut out from all view of the external world; neither ocean nor river, nor plain nor hill, can be discerned from it, although Nature, immediately outside its limits, presents herself in her loveliest aspects of sea and mountain. Unbroken silence and solitude prevail, and the stranger who enters its sacred seclusion becomes involuntarily overpowered by the sentiment that pervades the atmosphere and fills the mind with awe and wonder.”4

      I should add, with indignation that human beings, even penitents, should be reduced by this method to stultification.

      S. Jean de Luz is a favourite bathing place for such as desire more quiet and less heavy hotel charges than Biarritz affords. In 1660 the church saw the marriage of Louis XIV and Maria Theresa, Infanta of Spain. In commemoration of this event, the magistrates walled up the door by which the bridal pair passed out, and it has remained thus shut to this day. At S. Jean de Luz may be seen what is usual in Basque and Béarnais churches, as also in Tyrol, the men occupying the galleries, not infrequently in double tiers, whilst the women fill the body of the church. In the Maison Lobobiagne, with turrets, lodged Louis XIV; the Infanta and her mother, Anne of Austria, occupied the Maison Joanoëna.

      I can recall rides en cacolet as customary among the Basques some sixty years ago, now quite obsolete. A horse was furnished with two baskets, one on each side, and two persons were accommodated, one in each basket. Inglis says in 1835: —

      “Morning, noon, and evening, the road between Bayonne and Biarritz is crowded with travellers en cacolet. The horses belong generally to the women who drive them; these women are generally young, many of them handsome. They generally speak French, Basque, and a little Spanish, and are rather intelligent than otherwise, always carrying on an unintermitting conversation during the whole ride. The horses are usually indifferent; they go at a small trot, and perform the trajet in about forty minutes.”

      One of the most puzzling facts in the study of mankind is the manner in which the most unmeaning customs are found extended far and wide. I shall have something to say of the couvade in another chapter. There is another which is met with in the Basque country, and which is also, or was, usual in Yorkshire. On Easter Monday the girls seize on lads and heave them up in the air, and hold them aloft till they redeem themselves with a coin or a kiss. On Tuesday the boys enjoy the same privilege with the girls. I have been so lifted up near Bayonne. I recall an instance in Yorkshire, where H.M. Inspector of Schools, a grave and reverend signor, came to a manufacturing town on Easter Monday. As he was sedately walking from the station he encountered a bevy of mill lasses, when at once he was uplifted by them and carried in triumph, in vain expostulating, and a kiss from him was demanded by each before he was released.

      So with April Fools’ Day —le poisson d’avril– it is honoured in the same fashion in Hindustan as in Europe.

      Few visitors to Biarritz fail to take a run over the frontier into Spain. The Bidassoa for about twelve miles forms the line of demarcation between France and Spain. Near the bridge of Behobia are the remains – they are nothing more – of the Ile des Faisans, on which conferences were held between Cardinal Mazarin, plenipotentiary for France, and Don Luis da Haro, acting for Spain, which led to the conclusion of the famous Treaty of the Pyrenees, in 1659, cemented by the marriage of Louis XIV with the daughter of Philip IV. At the meeting on the Ile des Faisans each party advanced from its own territory by a temporary bridge to this patch of neutral ground in mid-stream. The death of Velasquez, the painter, was due to exposure whilst superintending the decoration of the tent for the minister of Spain – a duty more befitting an upholsterer than a great artist. By the treaty France received la Cerdagne and Roussillon, but surrendered Lorraine to Duke Charles IV, on condition that he should dismantle all its fortresses. As he delayed doing this Louis retained his hold on the duchy.

      Fontarabie (Fuenterrabia) does not signify the Fountain of Arabia, and retains in its name no reminiscence of Moorish domination; the derivation is from the Latin fons rapidus. It is a picturesque, dirty town, malodorous; bearing as its arms in quarterings an angel holding a key, to signify that the town holds the key of Spain – a squalid beggar would be more appropriate than an angel; a whale and two syrens, the whale to indicate the fishing of the leviathan, now long departed; and lastly a castle between two stars. These arms were accorded to Fuenterrabia by Philip IV in 1638, when the admiral of Castile repulsed the Prince of Condé, who was besieging it. The church, Gothic in style, has been modernized externally; within it is overloaded with barbaric ornament. The castle, known as the palace of Charles V, dates originally from the tenth century, but has undergone much rebuilding and adaptation. The courtyard is picturesque, and the terrace commands a beautiful view.

      Fuenterrabia brings no pleasing remembrances to an Englishman. The citizens begrudged a lodging to our sick and wounded during the passage of the Pyrenees by the allied troops under Wellington when in pursuit of Soult in the depth of winter. The town authorities even wanted to take away the boards on which were СКАЧАТЬ