REESE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, t^ Received WAR 13 1893 ' '^^ * t (^lass i\'u. ' i, « . U. U,-jU U, U,.M^II, tU, ll,-i»MJ Pny injurcd thc en- tire community. No reader of these pages can be unfamiliar with what is called torchon lace, that cheap, durable thread lace sold at every draper's shop for sixpence and up- ward a yard. More elaborate and expensive kinds still find their way into the market, but the staple in- dustry consists of the former kind, and may be almost said to have supplanted the other. What a degener- ation ! To realize the beauty," finish, and elaborate- ness of this lace in its most flourishing epoch we must visit the Musee de Dentelles of Le Puy, no less char- acteristic a collection than the Musee de Rubans of St. Etienne. When the lace trade flourished in the de- partment of the Haute Loire, ladies indulged in a flounce, scarf, or shawl of rich tSrchon or guipure^ which like a jewel was the ornament and possession of a lifetime, a heritage to bequeath to others. Lace- makers at that time could easily earn from five shil- lings and upward a day, and it was a local proverb that the men minded the house while the women sup- ported the family. Nowadays costly hand-made lace s little patronized, or even ordinarily genuine lace, dressmakers supplying instead odiously stiff and itn- becoming edges of beads, tinsel, and ribbon ruching. Such a fashion will doubtless pass away ; but the love of cheap finery among all classes and international LACE. 53 competition militate against a real revival of hand- made lace. Yet the cheaper kind, that durable lace for which the maker receives twopence a yard and the purchaser pays fivepence, has much to recommend it. Caprices of taste, ill-directed economy, and machinery are driving even this commodity out of the market. A good deal oi passementerie^ or ornamental gimp in black silk thread, is also made here, housewives tak- ing it up at odd times. A decent living is hardly to be gained by the lace-pillow or gimp-card in these days. An old woman keeping a stall in the market- place told me that in her youth she used to earn five shillings a day by making Alengon point. Now she plies her reels at fivepenny lace, eking out an exist- ence by means of a fruit and cake stall. It is chiefly in winter that the pillows are called into requisition. When the labors of the field are stopped for several months, women meet at each other's houses and work in company. A hundred thousand lace-makers are often at work in fairly good seasons. Children learn to handle the bobbins from four years old and upward. The Musee de Dentelles offers a rare treat to con- noisseurs. Nothing to be called color meets the eye, nothing is here to dazzle or bewilder, only hues nega- tive and restful as the vellum of some ancient manu- script or the weather-stained marble of classic frieze; and in harmony with these are the daintiest artistic fancies ever made subservient to personal adornment. No one can study such chefs-d'oeuvre of taste and skill without a pang of regret. The stately, durable, and elaborate ornamentation that formerly made the 54 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. dress of both sexes so beautiful bas given way to frip- pery and tinsel too often indicative of moral degradation. The city of Le Puy recalls some piece of antiquated, battered plate set in a brand-new case of bright green velvet. Around it stretches a beautifully cultivated plain, patchwork of manifold pasture and crops, the air in autumn scented with newly-mown hay, the land- scape fresh and verdant as in April. It is difficult to believe on a sultry September day that we are here in what has been called the Siberia of the south, so rude is the six-months' winter. Towering above this sweet pastoral country is the famous chateau of Polignac, no finer feudal ruin in France. The masses of dark volcanic formation are everywhere strikingly con- trasted with the dazzling verdure, and no less so the weird, canny picturesqueness of Le Puy with the uni- formity of the plain. Here, as in the Cevennes, the Dauphin e, and other regions, State replanting of trees is actively carried on. Hundreds of thousands of acres, chiefly mountain-sides, have been replanted with saplings of late years. Me- dicinal and aromatic plants abound and form an im- portant article of commerce. Large quantities are sold to chemists, perfumers, and especially herbalists — her- horisterie^ or simpling, being still a recognized profession. Out of every thousand inhabitants, eight are chem- ists or herbalists, the two callings being bracketed to- gether in the census, their total number making forty- five thousand. We may compare these figures with the sum total of doctors, seventy thousand for the en- tire population of France, or sixteen out of every thou- sand. II. GARONNE, TARN, AND GARONNE. The department of the Gard offers an anomaly pleasing to English observers and progressists gener- ally. Here and here alone throughout the length and breadth of France are found villages without a Catho- lic church, villages that have held fast to Protestant- ism and the right of private judgment from time im- memorial. Nor is it among the meek and the lowly that the more enlightened doctrine has chiefly pre- vailed. In higher places the Protestant element is over- whelming. Alike moral and material, spiritual and intellectual forces are here arrayed against intolerance and superstition. Were the same spectacle witnessed elsewhere, and the Gard no phenomenon on the French map, we might draw good augury for the future. Half a dozen departments, Protestant to the core, and Boulangisme were impossible, Lourdes a survival to blush at, the cloistered convent out of date as an auto- da-fe^ France saved by the remnant. We must be thankful to find one such department out of the eighty- six. That this tremendous Protestant supremacy should 66 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. excite concern and disquietude in the opposite camp need not surprise us. A Nimois Catholic recently writing to the Ultramontane organ, JJ Univers^ pointed out that the three senators then representing the Gard (1891) were all Protestants. At the last general elec- tions of 1889, out of six Kepublican candidates, five were Protestants ; of the six deputies who sat in the Chamber, five were Protestants, the sixth being a Jew. " The County Council of the year [1891] is made up of twenty -three Protestants and seventee-n Catholics. The seven members of the Board of Hospitals at Niraes are all Protestants ; three out of the four In- spectors of Health are Protestants, as well as the four chairmen of the Councils of Hygiene in the four de- partmental districts. Nine out of the twelve head- mistresses of the public schools for girls belong to the Eeformed Faith ; the Chamber of Commerce numbers eleven Protestant members out of twelve, and ninety- five out of one hundred and twenty excisemen. Twenty-nine out of forty Juges de Paix are Protestants. In 1889, when the Bishop of Nimes died, the Govern- ment appointed a Protestant notary as trustee of his estate." The Daily Neius correspondent, here quoted, adds : " The Catholics denounce this as intolerable op- pression. But the truth is that the Protestants are as a rule highly educated, while the Catholic peasants are utterly illiterate." One-quarter of the entire popula- tion of this department is Protestant, none other show- ing a comparable muster.^ * See Appendix, Note 5. SAUVE. 57 There are material as well as moral characteristics no less sharply defined. Besides specific crops, we find here some of those curious and highly ingenious rural industries which often account for the well-being of the peasant. Not the Proteus of Odyssean story could more easily transform himself than the French son of the soil, hus- bandman to-day, mechanic to-morrow ; at one season of the year skilfully plying the pruning hook, at an- other the turner's lathe. This adaptability of the French mind, strange to say, is nowhere seen to great- er advantage than in out-of-the-way country regions, where we should expect mental sluggishness. Not one of Millet's heavy-looking peasants in sabots and blouse but is master of a dozen handicrafts. Half-way between Nimes — the fair city of Nimes, Pradier's city, the one worthy of the other! — and Le Yigan lies the little town of Sauve, at which Arthur Young halted and moralized somewhat more than a century ago. "Leaving Sauve," he wrote in July, 1787, " I was much struck with a large tract of land, seemingly nothing but huge rocks ; yet most of it en- closed and planted with the most industrious atten- tion. Every man has an olive, a mulberry, an almond, or a peach tree and vines scattered among them ; so that the whole ground is covered with the oddest mix- ture of these plants and bulging rocks that can be conceived. The inhabitants of this town deserve en- couragement for their industry ; and if I was a French minister, they should have it. They would soon turn all the deserts around them into gardens. Such a 58 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. knot of active husbandmen, who turn their rocks into scenes of fertility, because, I suppose, their own, would do the same by the wastes, if animated by the same omnipotent principle." " The same " has been done and is still being done. Turn which way we will, we find evidence of unimaginable patience and enterprise, the last being stimulated by public spirit. Portions of communal waste are from time to time ac- corded the peasants on condition that they should be put under cultivation. We see huge blocks of stone that have been wrenched up, piled into heaps, be- tween these flourishing miniature corn-field, orchard, or vegetable garden. The French peasant is not only a Proteus, able to transform himself at will — there is also something of a Paracelsus about him: he can transmute the most unpromising material into gold. The special industry of Sauve is an instance in point. No tree is really ugly, but there are degrees of beauty in the vegetable world, and the Celtis australis^ or net- tle-tree [Ulmaceoe)^ is more useful than ornamental. It is the goose that lays the golden eggs ; but, unlike the feathered providence of fable, is many -lived. Hack and hew as you may, it springs up again. From its forked branches, which seem to shoot" out in three directions on purpose, are made yearly thousands upon thousands of the three-pronged forks used in agricul- ture, this rustic article of commerce representing a considerable revenue. The wood is very hard, tough, and flexible, thus lending itself to manipulation. Its leaves are of a light, cheerful green, and its berries, first yellow, then turning black, are much relished by LOCAL INDUSTRIES. 59 children and birds. When the peasant's corn crops fail, or his bit of vineyard is ruined by the phylloxera, he falls back upon the manufacture of three-pronged forks. The cherry-tree comes next in importance to the micocoulier. During a single season cherries were sold at Sauve to the value of £8,000. Trees, like human beings, are capricious, and we never exactly know why an especial kind flourishes in an especial spot. The immediate neighborhood of this town may be called a cherry-orchard, just as a certain spot near Dijon has won for itself the name of raspberry-valley. Sauve is a picturesquely-placed, most prosperous little town, famous in the annals of the Camisard war ; and, I should say, from a sanitary point of view, precisely on the footing of that horrible epoch. In striking, al- most grotesque contrast with its malodorous, unswept streets, are the spacious, handsome schools recently erected by the town, and other signs of lavish munic- ipal expenditure. The communal forests alone bring in a revenue of several hundred pounds. Yet hygiene and sanitation are utterly disregarded. Between Sauve and the neighboring town of Quissac is a suggestive sight — nursery gardens of the vine, acres and acres of young plants for sale. Most of these are grafted upon American stocks, which from their hardness and dryness resist the phylloxera. From four to five years are required for the maturing of a vineyard — in other words, the vigneron's capital is sunk for that period. Quissac, a cheerful, cleanly little town, displays 60 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. even more ingenuity in making money out of nothing than her richer neighbor. The heraldic bearings of Sauve should be a three-forked branch of micocoulier ; of Quissac — with all respect be it suggested — an old shoe ! To make a fortune out of old boots and shoes seems really next door to alchemy ; yet this, in sober truth, is what the good folks here are doing. Some native genius discovered that however well worn a shoe may be, valuable bits of leather are found in the sole. These better portions are cut out, and from them boot-heels are made ; the remainder, boots, shoes, and slippers, no matter their material, being thrown on the land as manure. What fattening property exists therein analysts must determine. Just outside the town lie heaps of such debris, a puzzling sight enough to the uninitiated. High above Quissac, amid beautifully-diversified foliage, rises the chateau of C , noble residence of beneficent owners, an Anglo-French home, in which are found the gros hon sens of John Bull and English comfort combined with French esprit, amiability, and elegance. From its terrace, the eye commands a vast and most beautiful panorama, a richly-cultivated plain dotted with villages and homesteads, the blue Cevennes framing in the picture. Here I stayed and made ex- cursions in the neighborhood. I reached Quissac on the 22d of August, 1891, and already the corn was gathered in, thrashing-machines were at work, ploughmen turning up the ground. It is difficult to believe that the climate of this favored land is one of the most changeable in the world, hot PEASANT FARMS. 61 days being succeeded by frosty nights, the thermome- ter often showing* a change of ten degrees within twelve hours. The dryness of the air must be said in some degree to compensate for these great and sudden variations of temperature. Even delicate persons can sit out of doors till a late hour on summer nights with- out risk of rheumatism or bronchitis. The rocky, chalky soil is only adapted to certain crops, of which the chief are the silkworm mulberry-tree, corn, and vine. The average price of land here is £25 per acre, not much more than half the price of the rich land round about Nimes. Of late years the devastations of the phylloxera have told upon the prosperity of the country-folks, but matters are now improving. Metay- age, the mi-fruit or half-profit system, is common, and the land much divided. As I shall fully describe the m^tairies of the Berry farther on, I prefer here to con- fine myself to peasant farms managed by their owners. One may be accepted as typical of the rest. The holding I visited in company of my host and hostess consisted of 32 acres, with stock and crops rep- resenting capital to the extent of £2,000 or there- abouts, the owner having in addition £1,000 invested, bringing in about £42 a year. The farm is the prop- erty of four persons, namely, father, married daughter, son-in-law, and unmarried daughter, who on her mar- riage will receive a portion of land, an allowance, or share in money. This farmer had in former days made as much as £400 in a single year by his vintage alone. These halcyon days are over for the time, but may return. Throughout the length and breadth 62 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. of France, as we shall see, the phylloxera is being combated as if eaph insect were a human foe waging war to the knife. Meantime there are the silkworms and the corn, to say nothing of minor crops and make- shift industries. The good people received us with that ease and agreeableness of manner which so forcibly struck Mr. Barham Zincke among the Auvergnats. Outside the farm-house an enormous oven was being heated by the men for their eight days' baking, while in a huge drawer in-doors the bread was rising — good wheaten bread, not the mixture of buckwheat or maize we find in the Pyrenees. The large kitchen, although un- scoured, was clean swept and tidy, with rows of cop- per cooking vessels and earthen pots neatly arranged on shelves. The bedrooms, which had also a neat, comfortable appearance, were upstairs. I find, indeed, wherever I go, an improvement taking place in this re- spect, the alcoved bed gradually disappearing from the kitchen. Two horses were kept here for farm-work, and the unmarried daughter, as is usual, guides the plough. Wages of adult male laborers are three and a half francs a day ; of women working in the house, two francs with board. We next visited an elderly woman who would, I suppose, be accepted by certain writers as a representative peasant proprietor. This old lady enjoyed a life-interest in two acres and a cot- tage, her stock consisting of a goat, a pig, and poultry, her invested capital about one hundred pounds. Meagre as appear these resources, she is by no means to be pitied or inclined to pity herself, earns a few PEASANT FARMS. 63 francs here and there by charing, sells her crops and as much as she can spare of eggs and chickens, and above all enjoys absolute independence. Hundreds of thousands of such cases are to be found throughout France, but they hardly represent peasant property. One little farm of thirty acres was pointed out to me as possessing a peculiar interest for the inquirer. This had lately been bequeathed by an old man, childless and a widower, to a young married couple, his stewards in advancing years, the only instance of adoption among the peasants that has ever come under my notice. We are bound to infer, on the one hand, that the foster-children had acted conscien- tiously, on the other, that affection as well as grati- tude actuated their adopted father. What a charm- ing idyl George Sand would have made of the sub- ject ! These worthy country-folks stick to their prejudices tenaciously as their forefathers to Protestantism. As soon to persuade a nineteenth-century Huguenot of the Cevennes to worship the Virgin as try a steam thrashing-machine! For nearly a quarter of a cen- tury the peasant farmers of Quissac and its environs have had before their eyes the most enlightened agri- cultural methods year after j^ear, object-lessons of which one might suppose the least enterprising would alertly profit. But no such thing ! Although a steam thrashing-machine could be had for the asking, and proof positive was forthcoming of the enormous sav- ing of time and labor, wherever we went we came upon scenes of biblical primitiveness, horses treading 64 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. out the corn as in the days of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Here and there a farmer more advanced than his neighbors will resort to the modern system, but the exceptions are rare. The staple commodity of the Gard is, as every one knows, raw silk; the most important crop, the silk- worm mulberry -tree. This is the morus alba^ or white mulberry, a native of China, and grown here as are pollard elms in England. It is in spring that the silk- worm-farms, or magyianeries^ are to be seen at work. So voracious are the worms that the rearers are then up till three o'clock in the morning, and often all night long, the munching of the hundreds of thou- sands of tiny feeders making a peculiar and wholly in- describable noise. Alike large and small owners rear silkworms, the Gard being foremost of all departments in this industry, the Ardeche alone surpassing it in the number of silk factories. At the charmingly- placed little town of Le Vigan we may see the process of silk-weaving in all its stages, rows of girls manipu- lating in. hot water those " golden tombs whence a worm emerges in the form of a butterfly," and through- out vast ateliers hundreds of shuttles being swiftly plied, broad bands of the pure, gold-colored silk dazzling the eye. The silk industry has of late years suffered heavily from two causes : firstly, excessive competition, cheap Oriental and other silks supplanting the richer and costlier Lyons manufacture ; secondly, disease among the moths. However vehemently we may disapprove of M. Pasteur's so-called method of stamping out hy- SILKWORMS. 65 drophobia, we must acknowledge tlie great services rendered by him to commerce. By a simple method of selection, he has taught silkworm-rearers to breed only from healthy moths. The eggs are examined microscopically, and all showing signs of disease are thrown away. This discovery has benefited French industry to the amount of five milliards of francs — the sum total of the Prussian war indemnity and also of the loss caused by the phylloxera. France still main- tains her old supremacy in this field. More silks are manufactured in French looms than in those of the rest of Europe put together.^ The sobriety of the people, especially of the women, is noteworthy ; as a rule the country-women are water- drinkers.2 A drunken woman in France may indeed be pronounced non-existent. Neither town nor coun- try is disgraced by the spectacles of every-day oc- currence in England. Throughout my long residences in France I have never seen one of my own sex in the least the worse for drink. Alas ! in Hastings women are brought before the borough magistrate at every sitting for drunken and disorderly conduct. The peasants are also very saving. My hostess informed me that she was never under the necessity of inducing her maid-servants to put by ; one and all do this as a matter of course. The uniform neatness and appro- priateness of female dress strikes an English eye. Finery is considered not only unbecoming but disrep- utable in working women. * See Appendix, Note 6. * See Appendix, Note 7. 5 ; 66 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Mr. Barham Zincke noticed that in Auvergne the men eat while their mothers and wives serve, taking their own meals afterward. The same custom pre- vails here. In Anjou it is quite otherwise, as we shall see, the family meal being the most sociable and gayest hour of the day. Large farmers board their laborers, and they live apart from the household, their lodging la ferme being under distinct management. Most of the large landowners hereabouts are Protest- ants, and as a natural consequence we find admirable communal schools, evening classes, lending libraries, and other aids to self-instruction. A great similitude of type prevails, dark hair and eyes, olive complex- ions, and regular features being the rule. The small profits of State forest-farming will be alluded to farther on. Individuals as well as com- munes of the Gard, on the contrarj'-, make a good deal by their trees. One proprietor told me that his faggots and brushwood brought in a yearly sum of £30, and he received £2,000 every twenty years for his timber. Trees are systematically cut here as else- where, twenty years being alloAved for growth. On the waste lands wild lavender grows in enormous quantities, and in autumn cart-loads are carried to the town for sale. A few miles from Quissac, on the road to Le Vigan, is Ganges, a name forever famous in the annals of rural economy and progress generally. It was here that Arthur Young halted on the eve of the Eevolution, and penned the memorable words which alone entitle him to a tablet in Westminster Abbey — or at least a statue 1 Aie UES-MORTES. 67 "From Ganges," he wrote in July, 1787, "to the mountain of rough ground which I crossed " (in the direction of Mondardier), " the ride has been the most interesting which I have taken in France ; the efforts of industry the most vigorous, the animation the most lively. An activity has been here that has swept away all difficulties before it and has clothed the very rocks with verdure. It would be a disgrace to common sense to ask the cause ; the enjoyment of property must have done it. Give a man the secure possession of a bleak rock, and he will turn it into a garden." Yet a little farther southward of Kimes we come upon transformations much more startling. A visit to Aigues-Mortes is no longer a pilgrimage of interest to the archaeologist only. The economist here is brought face to face with a revolution, climatic, physical, and commercial, surely one of the strangest and most complete which nineteenth-century science can show. Not the once fever-stricken marshes of Algeria, changed by means of the Eucalyptiis globulus into healthful, fertile plains; not the Landes, a genera- tion ago mere shifting sands, barrenness itself, to-day intersected by canals, a vast, ever-increasing area of vegetation and forest, show metamorphoses more sur- prising. Unique by virtue of position and picturesque- ness, the ancient city of St. Louis now stands con. spicuous in the history of progress. We have here before our eyes one of those beneficent and legitimate wrestlings with Nature the result of which will be felt by remote generations. 68 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. A few years ago Aigues-Mortes was described, and correctly described, in Murray's " Guide " as a " deso- late little city in the midst of salt marshes and lagoons, whose exhalations render it unhealthy." And just ten years since a French writer thus writes: "The country round about Aigues-Mortes is of a sadness not to be matched anywhere. Perhaps ages must elapse before vegetation will replace these salt marshes and lagoons. We have here a desert." ^ Eastern in aspect as Damascus or Jerusalem, its un- broken line of ancient walls saffron-hued under a burning blue heaven, the Aigues-Mortes of to-day rises from an entourage of verdure dazzlingly brilliant, the green of an Irish vale not brighter or more luxuri- ant. This belt of richest, freshest gold -green reaches to the very edge of the sea, here of deeper, intenser azure than the sky ; the whole a striking and wholly indescribable picture. From Nimes to the sea-shore, a distance of about twenty-five miles, we traverse one vast vineyard, the entire region being planted with vines, to be seen in all stages of growth — nurseries of tiny shoots, vines in the intermediate stage, others of mature growth show- ing purple fruit. The effect is often that of large beds of potato-plants, and on nearer view the mathemati- cally-exact arrangement fatigues the eye. The dis- tances between plant and plant seem calculated to the fractional part of an inch. When we remember that five years must elapse before the planting and matu- * See Appendix, Note 8. VINEYARDS— SALT WORKS. 69 rity of a vineyard, we may form some notion of the enormous amount of capital temporarily sunk in these regions. Already hundreds of thousands of pounds have been reaped by what may be described as the discov- ery of the day in France, namely, that the phylloxera avoids sand and salt marshes; but results are a mere bagatelle to possibilities. This once dreary, fever- stricken, unproductive region has a future which, to say the least of it, is incalculable, and alike small owners and great are straining every nerve to hasten their millennium. Looking landward, around the fortifications, close to the gates of the old town, vine- yards are seen in full maturity. On approaching the coast we find the transitional stage, the ancient sea. bed, but yesterday sun-cracked salt marsh, being ploughed up and prepared for the vine. If dazzling is the contrast presented by emerald vineyard, crocus- colored walls, and sapphire sky at Aigues-Mortes itself, more blindingly brilliant are the effects a little farther off. For the economist no less than the lover of the pic- turesque, a visit to the sea-side resort of the Gran du Roi is of deepest interest. Half an hour takes us thither, our way now lying between vineyards and salt works, the waxen-green foliage and glittering white salt between sea and sky of indescribable depth and intensity. These symmetrically-arranged cone-shaped salt heaps awaken a fantastic image. The imaginative might well conjure up the picture of St. Louis and his Crusaders as they halted under tents before embarka- TO FRANCE OF TO-DAY, tion. The scene is as instructive as it is strange and pictorial. Just as we may here observe the creation of a vineyard in all its stages, so we may see the proc- ess of salt-making, from its shining blue mare or pool of its liquid state to the sugar-loaf, compact as a rock and white as snow. Turning our back upon the low line of hot, blue sea, line upon line of cone-shaped salt heaps and patchwork of vineyard and marsh, we obtain an ade- quate view of Aigues-Mortes. It is a perfect little thing, gem of its kind, the rectangular ensemble of walls, intact as if finished yesterday ; southward and close by stands the enormous circular mass of the Tower of Constance, a monument of feminine endu- rance, destined, let us hope, to outlast the Pyramids. What may last longer is the fine little poem consecrated to the memory of those grand Huguenot women by a Mmois poet. It is composed in patois, but in a French translation is familiar to young and old.^ Martyrs of another kind as yet await alike their deliverer and their poet. As we drove home from the Grau du Eoi, I noted cruelly overladen, overdriven horses carrying passengers to and fro. One bare- ribbed, feeble beast, with a large open sore on its side, was dragging a wagonette in which were twelve peo- ple besides huge boxes. The Loi Grammont needs drastic enforcement here. Can we wonder that it should be so while bull-fights are still permitted 'at Mmes and Aries? ^ See Appendix, Note 9. CARCASSONNE. 71 Bj way of Montpellier, once the Nice of English valetudinarians, and of Cette, fast developing into a lesser Marseilles, we continue our journey westward. On either side are vines, vines, vines; vineyards in every stage of growth, and little else excepting or- chards and market-gardens in the vicinity of towns. Carcassonne — who, like the immortal peasant of Nadaud's song, would die without having seen Car- cassonne? — stands amid a broad bright belt of ver- dure; and when we climb to its second and more ancient self, like Aigues-Mortes a perfect little thing, we find the same picture on a vast scale. The en- ceinte of rampart here is oval, not rectangular as at Aigues-Mortes, and from the openings, lofty vantage- ground, we have a view, restful to the eye — a vast expanse of vineyard spread before us as a carpet, broken by bright river, scattered homesteads, and little hamlets far away. Immediately around Carcas- sonne the scenery is very varied and beautiful ; we get sweet pictures at every turn. The department of the Aude, with its neighbor the Herault, stands among the foremost of wine -producing regions. In spite of the invasions of the phylloxera, the Aude supplies a tenth of the entire wine crop of France. Its grapes have not the fine flavor of more famous vintages — those of the Gironde. Burgundy, Champagne — but nevertheless produce wine of excellent quality. The white wine of Limoux is held in high esteem. Mediaeval Carcassonne, crown lightly placed on the brow of fair hill, lies in perpetual trance, slumbers unbrokenly as the enchanted princess of fairy tale. 73 FRANCE OF TO-DAY, The modern town is prosaic enough, wide awake as Chicago. Even English enterprise has found scope here. An English firm of capsule-makers employs six hundred hands. The staple manufacture of Car- cassonne is cloth, famous in Arthur Young's time. We smile as we read the Suffolk farmer's entry: "At Carcassonne they carried me to a fountain of muddy water and to a gate of the barracks, but I was better pleased to see several good houses of manufac- turers, that show wealth." We could less easily for- give any other writer for ignoring that lovely vision close at hand, vision in truth it seems, dream-city lifted high above the common world. Toulouse, next visited, is rehabilitating itself. The only city throughout France that welcomed the In- quisition has been among the first to open a high school for girls. Here, in the name of religion, were perpetrated some of the most diabolical crimes that disgrace humanity ; and here, alas ! in our own day, grovelling superstitions survive tigerish thirst of blood. Agnostics and Protestants are no longer tortured and roasted alive at Toulouse, but during the disastrous floods of 1875 the archbishop and clergy marched a certain miracle-working Black Virgin round the city in solemn procession, praying that she would stay the waters. Which she did, gravely asserted our cabman. A pleasanter subject of contemplation is the Lycee, or public day-school for girls, opened in conformity with the Educational Acts of 1880 and 1882. It may here be worth while to say a word or two about these Lycees, now found in most French cities and the larger GIRLS' LYCEES. 73 towns — that of Toulouse may be accepted as represen- tative of the rest. The course of study is prepared by the rector of the academy of the city, the rules of general management by the municipal council ; thus the programme of instruction bears the signature of the former, while the prospectus, dealing with fees, practical details, is signed by the mayor in the name of the latter. We find a decree passed by the town council in 1887 to the effect that in the case of two sisters a fourth of the sum total of fees should be remitted ; of three, a half; of four, three-quarters; and of five, the entire amount. Even the outfit of the boarders must be approved by the same authority. A neat costume is obligatory, and the number and material of under garments is specified with the utmost minuteness. Besides a sufficient quantity of suitable clothes, each student must bring three pairs of boots, thirty pocket handkerchiefs, a bonnet box, umbrella, parasol, and so forth. Such regulations may at first sight look trivial and unnecessary, but there is much to be said on the other side. From the beginning of the term to the end, the matron, whose province is quite apart from that of the headmistress, is never worried about the pupils' dress : no shoes in need of repair, no garments to be mended, no letters to be written begging Madame A. to send her daughter a warm petticoat, Madame B. to forward a hair-brush, and so on. Again, the uniform obliga- tory on boarders prevents those petty jealousies and rivalries provoked by fine clothes in girls' schools. 74 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Alike the child of the millionaire and of the small official wear the same simple dress. Children are admitted to the lower school between the ages of five and twelve, the classes being in the hands of certificated mistresses. The upper school, at which pupils are received from twelve years and upward, and are expected to remain five years, offers a complete course of study, lady-teachers being aided by professors of Faculty des Lettres and of the Lyc^e for youths. Students who have remained throughout the entire period, and have satisfactorily passed final examinations, receive a certificate entitling them to admission into the great training college of Sevres or to offer themselves as teachers in schools and families. The curriculum is certainly modest compared with that obligatory on candidates for London University, Girton College, or our senior local examination ; but it is an enormous improvement on the old conventual system, and several points are worthy of imitation. Thus a girl quitting the Lycee would have attained, first and foremost, a thorough knowledge of her own language and its literature ; she would also possess a fair notion of French common law, of domestic econ- omy, including needlework of the more useful kind, the cutting out and making up of clothes, and the like. Gymnastics are practised daily. In the matter of religion the municipality of Toulouse shows abso- lute impartiality. No sectarian teaching enters into the programme, but Catholics and Protestants and Jews in residence can receive instruction from their respective ministers. QIRL8' LYCEES. 75 The Lycde competes formidably with the convents as regards fees. Twentj-eight pounds yearly cover the expense of board, education, and medical attend- ance at the upper school ; twenty-four at the lower , day-boarders pay from twelve to fifteen pounds a year ; books, the use of the school omnibus, and laun- dress being extras. Three hundred scholars in all attended during the scholastic year ending July, 1891. Day -pupils not using the school omnibus must be ac- companied to and from the school, and here an interest- ing point is to be touched upon. In so far as was prac- ticable the Lycee for girls has been modelled on the plan of the time-honored establishments for boys. As yet a uniform curriculum to begin with was out of the question ; the programme is already too ambitious in the eyes of many, while ardent advocates of the higher education of women in France regret that the vices as well as the virtues of the existing system have been retained. Educationalists and advanced thinkers generally would fain see a less straitlaced routine, a less stringent supervision, more freedom for play of character. The Lycee student, boy or girl, youth or maiden, is as strictly guarded as a criminal ; not for a moment are these citizens of the future trusted to themselves. In the vast dormitory of the high school here we see thirty neat compartments with partitions between, containing bed and toilet requisites, and at the ex- treme end of the room, commanding a view of the rest, is the bed of the under-mistress in charge, surveil- lante as she is called. Sleeping or waking the stu- 76 FRANCE OF TO-BAT. dents are watched. This massing together of numbers and perpetual supervision no longer find universal favor. Many regret that the organizers of Ljc^es for girls did not strike out a new path. There can be no doubt, nevertheless, that the revolution effected by these excellent schools is enormous. Charles Lamb would have been a happy person at Toulouse. The city swarms with beggars; at every turn you come upon some bit of human deformity ; begging seems the accepted livelihood of cripples, blind folk, and the very old, all of whom ought to be cared for by the town, the public, or the church. Wrinkled hags besiege you wherever you go: here you see a living torso fearful to look upon, there con- spicuously displayed a hideously -distorted limb or loathsome sore. That nervous matrons can walk these streets and bring well-formed offspring into the world is little short of miraculous. One more stricture. The driving is as bad as it can be. Vehicles of all kinds are driven at a furious pace, as if the secret of driving lay in dangerous speed and abominable noise. Of the handsome city, its noble public gardens, superbly-housed museum, of its canals I need not * speak. Fullest information is afforded elsewhere. An hour by rail from Toulouse lies the ancient city of Montauban, alike of deepest interest to art-lovers and progressists. We may taste to the full " the joy* of civilization " of which Matthew Arnold speaks, and at the same time breathe the invigorating air of men- tal freedom. This finely-placed chef-lieu of the Tarn and MONTAUBAir. 77 Garonne is alike a sLrine of art and of religious liberty. Here was born that strongly individualized genuis Ingres ; here Protestantism withstood Madame de Main- tenon's dragonnades and flourishes to this day. Nor flourishes only I Here may be read by those who run the most scathing criticism of intolerance. At the Protestant college for intending ministers are nowa- days found Catholic priests, in their turn martyrs to conscience, reflecting, clear-sighted men who have un- frocked themselves for the truth's sake, renouncing worldly honors, family ties, good repute, in exchange for a mind at ease. A few ^^ears back three ex-priests, two of them men of distinction, former dignitaries of the Church of Eome, were preparing for the pastorate side by side. Shade of Madame de Maintenon 1 Could the ghost of that evil genius of France and humanity ever after rest in its grave? The city of Ingres may be thought of by itself; there is plenty of food for reflection here without re- calling the prude whose virtue caused more mischief than the vices of all the Montespans and Dubarrys put together. Let us forget the Maintenon terror at Montauban, the breaking up of families, the sending to the galleys of good men and women, the torturings, the roastings alive, and turn to the delightful and soothing souvenirs of genius! Every French town that has given birth to shining talent is straightway turned into a Walhalla. This ancient town, so strik- ingly placed, breathes of Ingres, attracts the traveller by the magic of the painter's name, has become an art pilgrimage. The noble monument erected by the 78 FRANCE OF TO-BAY, townsfolk to their great citizen and the picture-gallery he bequeathed his native city well repay a much longer journey than that from Toulouse. We see here to what high levels public spirit and local munificence can rise in France. We see also how close, after all, are the ties that knit Frenchman and Frenchman, how the glory of one is made the pride of all. The bronze statue of the painter, with the vast and costly bas-re- lief imitating his Apotheosis of Homer in the Louvre, stand in the public walk, the beauty of which aroused even Arthur Young's enthusiasm. " The promenade," he wrote in June, 1787, " is finely situated. Built on the highest part of the rampart, and commanding that noble vale, or rather plain, one of the richest in Europe, which extends on one side to the sea and in front to the Pyrenees, whose towering masses heaped one upon another in a stupendous manner and covered with snow offer a variety of lights and shades from indented forms and the immensity of their projections. This prospect, which contains a semicircle of a hun- dred miles in diameter, has an oceanic vastness in which the eye loses itself; an almost boundless scene of cultivation ; an animated but confused mass of in- finitely varied parts, melting gradually into the dis- tant obscure, from which emerges the amazing frame of the Pyrenees, rearing their silvered heads above the clouds." The Ingres Museum contains, I should say, more works from the hand of a single master than were ever before collected under the same roof. Upward of a thousand sketches, many of great power and IJSrGBBiS. 79 beauty, are here, besides several portraits and one masterpiece, the Cbrist in the Temple, brilliant as a canvas of Holman Hunt, although the work of an octogenarian. The painter's easel, palette, and brushes, his violin, the golden laurel-wreath presented to him by his native town, and other relics, are reverently gazed at on Sundays by artisans, soldiers, and peasant- folk. The local museum in France is something more than a little centre of culture, a place in which to breathe beauty and delight. It is a school of the moral sense, of the nobler passions, and also a temple of fame. Here the young are taught to revere excel- lence, and here the ambitious are stimulated by worthy achievement. III. THE HAUTES AND BASSES PYEENEES. Between Toulouse and Tarbes the scenery is quite unlike that of the Gard and the Aude. Instead of the interminable vineyards round about Aigues-Mor- tes and Carcassonne, we gaze here upon a varied land- scape. Following the Garonne with the refrain of Nadaud's famous song in our minds — " Si la Garonne avait voulu" — we traverse a vast plain or low vale rich in many- colored crops : buckwheat, sweeps of creamy blossom, dark green rye, bluish-green Indian corn with silvery flower-head, and purple clover, and here and there a patch of vine, are mingled together before us ; in the far distance the Pyrenees, as yet mere purple clouds against the horizon. We soon note a peculiarity of this region — vines trained' to trees, a method in vogue a hundred years ago. " Here," wrote Arthur Young, when riding from Toulouse to St. Martory on his way to Luchon, " for the first time I see rows of maples with vines trained in festoons from tree to tree;" and farther on he adds, " medlars, plums, cherries, maples in every hedge with LOURDES. 81 vines trained." The straggling vine-branches have a curious effect, but the brightness of the leafage is pleasant to the eye. No matter how it grows, to my thinking the vine is a lovely thing. The rich plain passed, we reach the slopes of the Pyrenees, their wooded sides presenting a strange, even grotesque, appearance, owing to the mathematical regularity with which the woods are cut, portions being close shaven, others left intact in close juxtapo- sition, solid phalanxes of trees, and clearings at right angles. The fancy conjures up a Brobdingnagian wheat-field partially cut in the green stage. Sad havoc is thus made of once beautiful scenes, richly- wooded slopes having lost half their foliage. A hundred years ago Lourdes was a mere mountain fortress State prison, to which unhappy persons were consigned by lettres-de-cachet. Apologists of the An- cien E^gime assert, in the first place, that these Bas- tilles were comfortable, even luxurious retreats ; in the second, that leiires-de-cachet were useful and necessary ; in the third, that neither Bastilles nor lettres-de-cachet were resorted to on the eve of the Ee volution. Let us hear what Arthur Young has to say on the sub- ject. "I take the road to Lourdes," he writes in August, 1787, " where is a castle on a rock, garrisoned for the mere purpose of keeping State prisoners, sent hither by lettres-de-cachet. Seven or eight are known to be here at present ; thirty have been here at a time ; and many for life — torn by the relentless hand of jealous tyranny from the bosom of domestic com- fort, from wives, children, friends, and hurried, for 82 FRANCE OF TO-DAT. . crimes unknown to themselves, most probably for vir- tues, to languish in this detested abode and die of de- spair. O liberty, liberty ! " In the present day, epoch of telegraph wires, tele- phones, phonographs, and electric lighting, Lourdes affords a spectacle hardly less afflicting. The burn- ing alive of Hindoo widows and processions in honor of Juggernaut would not be more out of keeping with nineteenth-century civilization. In the midst of these pitiable scenes, grovelling superstition on the one hand, barefaced truckling to credulity on the other, we look round almost expecting the sight of a torture-chamber or auto-da-fe. Both would be consistent, of a piece with our surroundings at Lourdes. Great is the contrast between the lovely entourage of this notorious place and the triviality and vulgar nature of its commerce. The one long-winding street may be described as a vast bazaar, more suited to Chaucer's Canterbury Pilgrims than to holders of rail- way tickets and contemporaries of the Eiffel Tower. A brisk trade is done here, the place wearing the aspect of a huge fair. Eosaries, crosses, votive tablets, ornamental cans for holding the miraculous waters, drinking-cups, candles, photographs, images, medals are sold by millions. The traffic in these wares goes on all day long, the poorest " pilgrim " taking away souvenirs. The Lourdes of theology begins where the Lourdes of bartering ends. As we quit the long street of bazaars and brand-new hotels, the first glimpse gives us an insight into its life and meanings makes us feel LOVRDES. 83 that we ought to have been living two or three hun-* dred years ago. We glance back at the railway station, wondering whether a halt were wise, whether indeed the gibbet, wheel, and stake were not really prepared for heretics like ourselves ! The votive church built on the outer side of the rook from which flows the miraculous fountain is a basilica of sumptuous proportions, representing an outlay of many millions of francs. Its portico, with horseshoe staircase in marble, spans the opening of the green hills, behind which lie grotto and spring. We are reminded of the enormous church now crown- ing the height of Montmartre at Paris ; here, as tliere and at Chartres, is a complete underground church of vast proportions. The whole structure is very hand- some, the gray and white building stone standing out against verdant hills and dark rocks. A beautifully- laid-out little garden with a statue of the miracle-work- ing Virgin lies between church and town. Looking from the lofty platform on the other side of the upper church, we behold a strange scene. The space below is black with people, hundreds and thou- sands of pilgrims, so called, priests and nuns being in full force, one and all shouting and gesticulating with the fierce zealotry of dancing dervishes, egged on by a priest or two holding forth from a temporary pulpit. Between these closely-serried masses is a ghastly array. On litters, stretchers, beds, chairs, lie the de- formed, the sick, the moribund, awaiting their turn to be sprinkled with the miraculous waters or blessed by the bishop. These poor people, many of whom are 84 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. 'in the last stage of illness, have for bearers volunteers; these are priests, young gentlemen of good family, and others, who wear badges and leather traces, by which they attach themselves to their burden. All day long masses are held inside the church and in the open air ; at a given signal the congregation stretching out their arms in the form of a cross, pros- trating themselves on the ground, kissing the dust, as did the heathens of old. It is indeed a heart-break- ing exhibition of credulousness and fraud, paganish gullibility and unblushing imposture. If these dev- otees who prostrate themselves on the ground and kiss* the dust are sincere, what indeed removes them from the fetish worshippers of uncivilized Africa? We must descend the broad flight of steps in order to obtain a good view of the grotto, an oval opening in the rocks made to look like a stalactite cave, with scores and hundreds of ex-votos in the shape of crutches. Judging from this display, there should be no more lame folks left in France. The Virgin of Lourdes must have healed them all. In a niche of the grotto stands an image of the Virgin, and behind, perpetu- ally lighted with candles, an altar, at which mass is celebrated several times daily. On one side, the rock has been pierced in several places, deliciously pure, cool water issuing from the taps. Crowds are always collected here, impatient to drink of the miraculous fountain and to fill vessels for use at home. We see tired, heated invalids and apparently dying persons drinking cups of this ice- cold water; enough, one would think, to kill them LOURDES. 85 outright. Closely by is a little shop full of trifles for sale, but so thronged at all hours of the day that you cannot get attended to; purchasers lay down their money^ take up the object desired, and walk away. Here may be bought a medal for two sous, or a cruci- fix priced at several hundred francs. The praying, chanting, and prostrating are at their height when the violet-robed figure of a bishop is caught sight of, tripping down a side path leading from the town. Blessing any who chance to meet him on the way, chatting pleasantly with his companion, a portly gentleman, wearing the red ribbon of the Legion of Honor, the bishop hastens toward the grotto, dons Lis sacerdotal robes of ivory-white and gold, and cele- brates mass. The ceremony over, there is a general stir. Adjusting their harness, the bearers form a pro- cession, the bishop emerges from the grotto, and one by one the thirty and odd litters are drawn before him to be sprinkled, blessed — and healed! alas, such doubtless, is the fond delusion of many. The sight of so many human wrecks, torsos, and living skeletons all agog for life, health, and restora- tion is even less heart-breaking than that of their com- panions. Here we see a mother bending with agonized looks over some white-faced, wasted boy, whose days, even hours, are clearly numbered ; there a father of a wizen -faced, terribly deformed girl, a mite to look at, but fast approaching womanhood, brought hither to be put straight and beautified. Next our eye lights on the emaciated form of a young man evidently in the last stage of consumption, his own face hopeful 86 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. still, but what forlornness in that of the adoring sister by his side ! These are spectacles to make the least susceptible weep. Grotesque is the sight of a priest who must be ninety at least ; what further miracle can he expect, having already lived the life of three gener- ations? The last litter drawn by, the enormous crowd breaks up; tall candles are offered those standing near, and a procession is formed, headed by the bishop under his gold-and-white baldachin, a large number of priests following behind, then several hundred men, women, and children, the black and white robes of the priests and nuns being conspicuous. Chanting as they go, outsiders falling on their knees at the approach of the baldachin, the pilgrims now wind in solemn pro- cession round the statue in front of the church, finally enter, when another religious celebration takes place. Services are going on all day long and late into the night. Hardly do these devotees give themselves time for meals, which are a scramble at best, every hotel and boarding-house being much overcrowded. The table-d'hote dinner, or one or two dishes, are hastily swallowed, and the praying, chanting, marching, and prostrating begin afresh. At eight o'clock from afar comes the sound of pilgrims' voices as the procession winds toward the grotto. There is picturesqueness in these nocturnal cele- brations, the tapers twinkling against the dark heavens,* the voices dying away in the distance. We can but regret that the whole thing should be a gigantic fraud and speculation. Superstition has its season as well LOURDES. 87 as sulphur-baths and chalybeate springs. The rail- way station is a scene of indescribable confusion; enormous contingents come for a few hours only ; the numbered trains that brought them are drawn up out- side the main lines awaiting their departure. Here we are hustled by a motley throng ; fashionable ladies bedizened with rosaries, badges, and medallions; ele- gant young gentlemen, the jeunesse doree of Boulang- ism, disciples of M. de Cassagnac — of any enemy of representative government and liberty of conscience — proudly wearing the pilgrim's badge, all travel- ling third class and in humble company for their souls' good ; peasant women from Brittany in charming costumes; a few, very few, blue blouses of elderly civilians; enormous numbers wearing religious garb. Lourdes is indeed a happy hunting-ground of abbes, cur^s, sisters, and reverend mothers. An American would describe it as " high jinks," " a boom " for them all ; and so complacent and self-satisfied is their ex- pression, so jaunty their behavior, that it seems morose to look askance or criticise. What most strikes an observer here is the complete ignoring of Christianity — that is to say, the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth. The Mariolatry, pure and simple, taught and put into practice at Lourdes, is a wholly modern invention, has indeed no more affinity with the life of Christ and the New Testament than table-turning, spirit-rapping, or the so-called revelations of Madame Blavatsky. A late dignitary of the Church of England, it is true, could speak in the pulpit of " that magnificent woman, the Virgin Mary." Perhaps Canon Liddon had never 88 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. visited Lourdes and witnessed to what mental aberra- tions the adoration of that " magnificent woman " may lead. It seems a pity that a bargain could not be struck by France and Germany, the Emperor William re- ceiving Lourdes in exchange for Metz or Strasburg ! Lourdes must represent a princely revenue, far in excess, I should say, of any profit the Prussian Govern- ment will ever make out of the annexed provinces; and as nobody lives there, and visitors only remain x a day or two, it would not matter fo the most patrio- tic French pilgrim going to whom the place belonged. An adequate description of the Pyrenees, even from the picturesque point of view, would fill a volume. To do justice to the condition of the people in a work of the present scope is only possible by singling out types and sections. I shall describe farther on the large and wealthy peasant farmers of La Vendee and other regions. In the Pyrenees, for centuries a land of small ownerships, I have to deal with the more primitive stage of peasant property, perhaps indeed the most primitive throughout France. The tourist brings evil as well as good in his track, and the tax upon glorious scenery here is not the globe-trotter, but the mendicant. Gavarnie is, with- out doubt, as grandiose a scene as western Europe can show. In certain elements of grandeur none other can compete with it. But until a balloon ser- vice is organized between Luz and the famous Cirque it is impossible to make the journey with an unruffled temper. The traveller's way is beset by juvenile QAVARNIE. 89 vagrants, barefaced and importunate as Neapolitans or Arabs. Lovers of aerial navigation have otherwise not much left to wish for. Nothing can be more like a ride in cloud-land than the drive from Pierrefitte to Luz and from Luz to Gavarnie. The splendid rock-hewn road is just broad enough to admit of two carriages abreast. On one side are lofty, shelving rocks, on the other a stone coping two feet high, nothing else to separate us from the awful abyss below, a ravine deep as the measure of St. Paul's Cathedral from base to apex of golden cross. We hear the thunder of the river as it dashes below by mountains two-thirds the height of Mont Blanc, their dark, almost perpendicular sides wreathed with cloud, on their summits gleaming never- melted snow, here and there the sombre parapets streaked with silvery cascades. At intervals the Ti- tanic scene is relieved by glimpses of pastoral grace and loveliness, and such relief is necessarj^ even to those who can gaze without giddiness on such awful- ness. Between gorge and gorge lie level spaces; amid dazzlingly-green meadows the river flows calm and crystal clear, the form and hue of every pebble dis- tinct as the pieces of a mosaic. Looking upward we see hanging gardens and what may be called f armlets, tiny homesteads with minute patches of wheat, Indian corn, and clover on an incline so steep as to look ver- tical. Most beautiful and refreshing to the qjq are the little hay-fields sloping from the river, the fresh- mown hay in cocks or being turned, the shorn pasture around bright as emerald. Harvest during the pres- 90 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. ent year (1891) was late, and in the first week of Sep- tember corn was still standing ; nowhere surely corn so amber- tin ted, so golden, nowhere surely ripened so near the clouds. In the tiny chalets perched on the mountain ridges, folks literally dwell in cloud-land, and enjoy a kind of supernal existence, having for near neighbors the eagles in their eyries and the fleet- footed chamois or izard. These vast panoramas — towering rocks of manifold shape, Alp rising above Alp snow-capped or green- tinted, terrace upon terrace of fields and homesteads — show every variety of savage grandeur and soft beauty till we gradually reach the threshold of Ga- varnie. This is aptly called "chaos," which we might fancifully suppose the leavings, " the fragments that were left," of the semicircular wall now visible, thrown up by transhuman builders, insurmountable barrier between heaven and earth. No sooner does the awful amphitheatre break upon the view than we discern the white line of the principal fall, a slender silvery column reaching, so it seems, from star -land and moon- land to earth; river of some upper world that has overleaped the boundaries of our own. No words can convey the remotest idea of such a scene. We may say with regard to scenery what Lessing says of pictures, we only see in both what we bring with us to the view. More disconcerting than the importunities of beggars and donkey -drivers are the supercilious remarks of tourists. To most of course the whole thing is " a sad disappointment." Every- thing must necessarily be a disappointment to some QAVARNIE. 91 beholders; and with critics of a certain order, the mere fact of not being pleased implies superiority. The hour's walk from the village to the Cirque is an event also in the life of the fiower-lover. We have hardly eyes for Gavarnie, so completely is our gaze fascinated by the large luminous gold and silver stars gleaming conspicuously from the brilliant turf. These are the glorious flower-heads of the white and yellow Pyrenean thistle that open in sunshine as do sea- anemones, sending out lovely fringes, sunrays and moonbeams not more strikingly contrasted. As we rush hither and thither to gather them — if we can — their roots are veritable tentacula3 ; other lovely flowers are to be had in plenty: the beautiful deep blue Pyre- nean gentian, monk's-hood in rich purple blossom, rose- colored antirrhinum, an exquisite little yellow sedum, with rare ferns. On one side, a narrow bridle-path winds round the mountain toward Spain ; on the other, cottage-farms dot the green slopes ; between both, part- ing the valley, flows the Gave, here a quietly meander- ing streamlet, while before us rises Gavarnie; a scene to which one poet only — perhaps the only one capable of grappling with such a subject — has done justice : "Cirque, hippodrome, Sta.c:e whereon Stamboul, T3^re, Memphis, London, Rome, With their myriads could find place, whereon Paris at ease Mifi^ht float, as at sundown a swarm of bees, Gavarnie, dream, miracle ! " * ^ " Un cirque, un hippodrome, Un theatre oii Stamboul, Tyr, Memphis, Londres, Rome, Avec leurs millions d'hommes pourraient s'asseoir. Ou Paris flotterait comme un essaim du soir. Gavarnie I— un miracle ! un reve ! " — Victor Hugo, Dieu» 92 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. How to give some faint conception of the indescrib- able? Perhaps the great French poet has best suc- ceeded in a single line : " L'impossible est ici debout." We feel indeed that we are here brought face to face with the impossible. Let the reader then conjure iip a solid mass of rock threefold the circumference of St. Paul's Cathedral ; let him imagine the fa9ade of this natural masonry of itself exceeding the compass of our great Protestant minster; then in imagination let him lift his eyes from stage to stage, platform to platform, the lower nearly three times the height of St. Paul's from base to apex of golden cross, the higher that of four such altitudes; their gloomy parapets streaked with glistening white lines, one a vast column of water, their shelving sides showing patches of never-melted snows ; around, framing in the stupendous scene, moun- tain peaks, each unlike its majestic brother, each in height reaching to the shoulder of Mont Blanc. Such is Gavarnie. My next halting-place was a remote Pyrenean village admirably adapted for the study of rural life. With- in a few hours' journey of the Spanish frontier, Osse lies in the beautiful valley of Aspe, and is reached by way of Pau and Oloron. At the latter town the rail- way ends, and we have to drive sixteen miles across country, a delightful expedition in favorable weather. The twin towns, old and new Oloron, present the con- trast so often seen throughout France, picturesque, SCENERY. 93 imposing antiquity beside utilitarian ugliness and uni- formity. The open suburban spaces present the ap- pearance of an enormous drying-ground, in which are hung the blankets of the entire department. Blankets, woollen girdles or sashes, men's bonnets are manufac- tured here. ''Pipers, blue bonnets, and oatmeal," wrote an English traveller a hundred years ago, " are found in Catalonia, Auvergne, and Suabia as well as in Lochaber." We are now in the ancient kingdom of Beam, with a portion of Navarre added to the French crown by Henry IV., and two hundred years later named the department of the Basses Pyrenees. Every turn of the road reveals new features as we journey toward Osse, having always in view the little Gave d'Aspe, after the manner of Pyrenean rivers, making cascades, waterfalls, whirlpools on its way. Most beautiful are these mountain streams, their waters of pure, deep green, their surface broken by coruscations of dazzlingly white foam and spray, their murmur ever in our ears. When far away we hardly miss the grand contours of the Pyrenees more than the music of rushing waters. No tourists meet us here, yet whither shall we go for scenes sublimer or more engaging? On either side of the broadening velvety green valley, with its tumbling stream, rises a rampart of stately peaks, each unlike its neighbor, each having a graciousness and grandeur of its own. Here and there amid these vast solitudes is seen a white glittering thread breaking the dark masses of shelving rock, mountain torrent falling into the river from a height of several hundred feet. Few and far between 94 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. are the herdsmen's chalets and scattered corn-fields and meadows, and we have the excellent carriage road to ourselves. Yet two or three villages of considera- ble size are passed on the way ; of one, an inland spa much frequented by the peasants, I shall make men- tion presently. For three hours we have wound slowly upward, and as our destination is approached the valley opens wide, showing white-walled, gray-roofed hamlets and small towns all singularly alike. The mountains soon close round abruptly on all sides, making us feel as if we had reached the world's end. On the other side of those snow-capped peaks, here so majestically massed before our gaze, lies Spain. We are in a part of France thoroughly French, yet within a few hours of a country strikingly contrasted with it; manners, customs, modes of thought, institutions radically dif- ferent. The remoteness and isolation of Osse explain the existence of a little Protestant community in these mountain fastnesses. For centuries the Keformed faith has been upheld here. Not, however, unmolested. A tablet in the neat little church tells how the original place of Protestant worship was pulled down by order of the king in 1685, and only reconstructed toward the close of the following century. Without church, without pastor, forbidden to assemble, obliged to bury their dead in field or garden, these dales-folk and mountaineers yet clung tenaciously to their religion. One compromise, and one only, they made. Peasant property has existed in the Pyrenees from time im- PROTESTANTmM. 95 memorial, and in order to legitimize their children and enjoy the privilege of bequeathing property, the Prot- estants of the Yallee d'Aspe were married according to the rites of the Eomish Church. In our own days, here as elsewhere throughout France, the religious tenets handed down from father to son are adhered to without wavering, and at the same time without ap- parent enthusiasm. Catholics and Protestants live amicably side by side; but intermarriages are rare and conversions from Home to rationalism infrequent. The Sunday services of the little Protestant church are often attended by Catholics. Strangers passing through Osse, market-folk, peasants, and others, never fail to inspect it curiously. The Protestant pastor is looked up to with respect and affection alike by Cath- olic and Protestant neighbors. The rival churches neither lose nor gain adherents to any extent. This fact is curious, especially in a spot where Protestant- ism is seen at its best. It shows the extreme conser- vatism and stability of the French character, often set down as revolutionary and fickle. In England folks often and avowedly change their religion several times during their lives. Is not the solemn reception into Eome of instructed men and women among ourselves a matter of every day? In France it is otherwise, and when a change is made we shall generally find that the step is no retrograde one. If the aspect of Protestantism is encouraging at Osse, the same may be said of peasant property. Even a Zola must admit some good in a community un- stained by crime during a period of twenty years, and 96 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. bound by ties of brotherhood which render want im- possible. A beautiful spirit of humanity, a delicacy rare among the most polished societies, characterize these frugal sons and daughters of the soil. Nor is consideration for others confined to fellow-beings only. The animal is treated as the friend, not the slave of man. " We have no need of the Loi Grammont here," said a resident to me ; and personal observation con- firmed the statement. As sordidness carried to the pitch of brutality is often imputed to the French peasant, let me relate an incident that occurred hereabouts, not long before my visit. The land is minutely divided, many possessing a cottage and field only. One of these very small owners was suddenly ruined by the falling of a rock, his cottage, cow, and pig being destroyed. Without saying a word, his neighbors, like himself in very humble circumstances, made up a purse of five hun- dred francs, a large sum with such donors, and, too delicate-minded to offer the gift themselves, deputed an outsider to do it anonymously. Another instance in point came to my knowledge. This was of a young woman servant, who, during the illness of her em- ployers, refused to accept wages. " You shall pay me some other time," said the girl to her mistress; "I am sure you can ill afford to give me the money now." Peasant property and rural life generally here pre- sented to me some wholly new features ; one of thej?e is the almost entire self-sufhcingness of very small holdings, their owners neither buying nor selling, making their little crops and stock almost completely MILK-DRINKERS. 97 supply tlieir needs. Thus on a field or two enougli flax is grown with which to spin linen for home use, enough wheat and Indian corn for the year's bread- making, maize being mixed with wh eaten flour ; again^ pigs and poultry are reared for domestic consumption — expenditure being reduced to the minimum. Coffee is a luxury seldom indulged in ; a few drink home- grown wine, but all are large milk-drinkers. The poorest is a good customer of the dairy farmer. I was at first greatly puzzled by the information of a neighbor that he kept cows for the purpose of selling milk. Osse being sixteen miles from a railway sta- tion, possessing neither semi-detached villas, hotels, boarding-houses, convents, barracks, nor schools, and a population of from three to four hundred only, most of these small farmers, who were his patrons? I afterward learned that the "ha'porth of milk," which means much more in all senses than with us, takes the place of tea, coffee, beer, to say nothing of more pernicious drinks, with the majority. Kew milk from the cow costs about a penny a quart, and per- haps if we could obtain a similar commodity at the same price in England, even gin might be supplanted. Eggs and butter are also very cheap ; but as the peas- ants rear poultry exclusively for their own use, it is by no means easy at Osse to procure a chicken. A little, a very little money goes to the shoemaker and general dealer, and fuel has to be bought; this item is inconsiderable, the peasants being allowed to cart wood from the communal forests for the sum of five or six francs yearly. The village is chiefly made up of 7 98 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. farm-houses ; on the mountain-sides and in the valley are the chalets and shepherds' huts, abandoned in winter. The homesteads are massed round the two churches, Catholic and Protestant, most having a nar- row strip of garden and balcony carried along the upper story, which does duty as a drying-ground. One of these secluded hamlets, with its slated roofs, white walls, and brown shutters, closely resembles another ; but Osse stands alone in possessing a Protestant church and community, looked on, we may be sure, with no friendly eyes by the neighboring cures. Although the little centre of a purely agricultural region, we find here one of those small, specific indus- tries, as characteristic of French districts as soil and produce. Folks being great water-drinkers, they will have their drinking-water in a state of perfection. Some native genius long ago invented a vessel which answers the requirement of the most fastidious. This is a pail-shaped receptacle of yewen wood, bound with brass bands, both inner and outer parts being kept exquisitely clean. Water in such vessels remains cool throughout the hottest hours of the hottest sum- mer, and the wood is exceedingly durable, standing wear and tear, it is said, hundreds of years. The turning and encasing of yewen wood, brass-bound water-jars is a flourishing manufacture at Osse. Here may be seen and studied peasant property in many stages. I will begin with the lowest rung of the ladder, methodically working my way upward. I would again remark that any comparison between the condition of the English ^agricultural laborer and the ACQUAINTANCES, 99 French peasant proprietor is irrelevant and inconclu- sive.^ In the cottage of a small owner at Osse, for instance, we may discover features to shock us, often a total absence of the neatness and veneer of the Sussex ploughman's home. Our disgust is trifling compared with that of the humblest, most hard-working owner of the soil, when he learns under what conditions lives his English compeer. To till another's ground for ten or eleven shillings a week, inhabit a house from which at a week's notice that other can eject him, pos- sess neither home, field, nor garden, and have no kind of provision against old age, such a state of things appears to our artless listener wholly inconceivable, incommensurate with modern civilization and bare justice. As an instance of the futility of comparisons, I will mention one experience. I was returning home late one afternoon when a poorly-dressed, sunburnt woman overtook me. She bore on her head a basket of bracken, and her appearance was such that in any other country I should have expected a demand for alms. Greeting me, however, cheerfully and politely, she at once entered into conversation. She had seen me at church on Sunday, and went on to speak of the pastor, with what esteem both Catholics and Protes- tants regarded him, then of the people, their mode of life and condition generally. "No," she said, in answer to my inquiry, "there is no real want here, and no vagrancy. Everybody ^ See Appendix, Note 9. 100 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. has his bit of land or can find work. I come from our vineyard on the hillside yonder, and am now re- turning home to supper in the village — our farm- house is there." She was a widow, she added, and with her son did the work of their little farm, the daughter-in-law minding the house and baby. They reared horses for sale, possessed a couple of cows, be- sides pigs and poultry. The good manners, intelligence, urbanity, and quiet contentment of this good woman were very striking. She had beautiful white teeth, and was not prema- turely aged, only very sunburnt and shabby, her black stufi dress blue with age and mended in many places,' her partially bare feet thrust in sabots. The women here wear toeless or footless stockings, the upper part of the foot being bare. I presume this is an economy, as wooden shoes wear out stockings. We chatted of England, of Protestantism, and many topics before bidding each other good-night. There was no con- straint on her part and no familiarity. She talked fluently and naturally, just as one first-class lady- traveller might do to a fellow-passenger. Yet, if not here in contact with the zero of peasant property, we are considering its most modest phase. A step higher, and we found an instance of the levelling process characteristic of every stage of French society, yet hardly to be looked for in a re- mote Pyrenean village. In one of our afternoon ram- bles we overtook a farmeress, and accepted an invita- tion to accompany her home. She tripped cheerfully beside us; although a Catholic, on friendliest terms SOCIAL STAGES. 101 with her Protestant neighbors. Her thin white feet in toeless stockings and sabots, well-worn woollen petticoat, black stuff jacket, headgear of an old black silk handkerchief, would have suggested anything but the truth to the uninitiated. Here also the unwary stranger might have fumbled for a spare coin. She had a kindly, intelligent face, and spoke volubly in patois, having very little command of French. It was indeed necessary for me to converse by the medium of an interpreter. On approaching the village we were overtaken by a slight, handsome youth conducting a muck- wagon. This was her 3^ounger son, and his easy, well-bred greeting and correct French prepared me for the piece of intelligence to follow. The wearer of peasant's garb, carting manure, had passed his exam- ination of Bachelor of Arts and Science, had, in fact, received the education of a gentleman. In his case, the patrimony being small, a professional career meant an uphill fight, but doubtless, with many another, he would attain his end. The farm-house was large and, as is unusual here, apart from stables and cow-shed, the kitchen and out- house being on the ground-floor, the young men's bedrooms above. Our hostess slept in a large cur- tained four-poster, occupying a corner of the kitchen. A handsome wardrobe of solid oak stood in a conspic- uous place, but held only a portion of the family linen. These humble housewives count their sheets by the dozen of dozens, and linen is still spun at home, al- though not on the scale of former days. The better- off purchase strong, unbleached goods of local manu 102 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. facture. Here and there I saw old women plying spindle and distaff, but the spinning-wheel no longer hums in every cottage doorway. Meantime our hospitable entertainer — it is ever women who wait on their guests — brought out home- grown wine, somewhat sour to the unaccustomed palate, and as a corrective, home-made brandy, which, w^ith sugar, formed an agreeable liqueur, walnuts, everything indeed that she had. We were also in- vited to taste the bread made of wheaten and maize flour mixed, a heavy, clammy compound answering Mrs. Squeers' requirement of "filling for the price." It is said to be very wholesome and nutritious. The kitchen floor, as usual, had an unscoured look, but was clean swept, and on shelves stood rows of earthen and copper cooking-vessels and the yewen wood, brass-bound water-jars before mentioned. The fa9ade of the house, with its shutters and balcony, was cheerful enough, but just opposite the front door lay a large heap of farm-house manure awaiting transfer to the pastures. A little, a very little, is needed to make these premises healthful and comfortable. The removal of the manure-heap, stables, and cowshed ; a neat garden plot, a flowering creeper on the wall, and the aspect would be in accordance with the material condition of the owner. The property shared by this widow and her two sons consisted of between five and six acres, made up of arable land and meadow. They kept four cows, four mares for purposes of horse-breeding, and a little poultry. Milch-cows here are occasionally used on SOCIAL STAGES, 103 the farm, an anomaly among a population extremely gentle to animals. My next visits were paid on a Sunday afternoon, when everybody is at home to friends and neighbors. Protestant initiative in the matter of the seventh-day rest has been uniformly followed ; alike man and beast enjoy complete repose. As there are no cabarets and no Salvation Army to disturb the public peace, the tranquillity is unbroken. Our first call was upon an elder of the Protestant church, and one of the wealthier peasants of the com- munity. The farm-house was on the usual Pyrenean plan, stables and neat houses occupying the ground- floor, an outer wooden staircase leading to kitchen, parlor, and bedrooms; on the other side a balcony overlooking a narrow strip of garden. Our host, dressed in black cloth trousers, black alpaca blouse, and spotless, faultlessly-ironed linen, received us with great cordiality and the ease of a well-bred man. His mother lived with him, a charm- ing old lady, like himself peasant-born, but having excellent manners. She wore the traditional black hood of aged and widowed Huguenot women, and her daughter-in-law and little granddaughter neat stuff gowns and colored cashmere kerchiefs tied under the chin. We were first ushered into the vast kitchen, or " liv- ing-room " as it would be called in some parts of Eng- land to-day, with every other part of the house in apple-pie order. Large oak presses, rows of earthen and copper cooking-vessels, an enormous flour-bin, 104 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. with plain deal table and chairs, made up the furni- ture, from one part of the ceiling hanging large quan- tities of ears of Indian corn to dry. Here bread is baked once a week and all the cooking and meals take place. Leading out of the kitchen was the salon or draw- ing-room, the first I had ever seen in a peasant farmer's house. A handsome tapestry table-cover, chimney ornaments, mirror, sofa, arm-chairs, rugs, betokened not only solid means, but taste. We were next shown the grandmother's bedchamber, which was handsomely furnished with every modern requirement, white toilet- covers and bed-quilt, window-curtains, rug, washstand ; any lady unsatisfied here would be hard indeed to please. The room of master and mistress was on the same plan, only much larger, and one most unlooked- for item caught my eye. This was a towel-horse (per- haps the comfortably-appointed parsonage had set the fashion?), a luxury never seen in France except in brand-new hotels. As a rule the towel is hung in a cupboard. We were then shown several other bed- rooms, all equally suggestive of comfort and good taste ; yet the owner was a peasant, prided himself on being so, and had no intention of bringing up his chil- dren to any other condition. His farm consisted of a few hectares only, but was very productive. We saw his cows, of which he is very fond, the gentle creatures making signs of joy at their master's ap- proach. Four or five cows, as many horses for breed- ing purposes, a few sheep, pigs, and poultry made up his stock. All that I saw of this family gave me a INTERIORS. 105 very liigli notion of intelligence, morality, thrift, and benevolence. Very feelingly all spoke of their ani- mals and of the duty of human beings toward the ani- mal world generally. It was the lirst time I had heard such a tone taken by French peasants, but I was here, be it remembered, among Protestants. The horrible excuse made in Italy and Brittany for cruelty to beast, " Ce ne sont pas des chr^tiens," finds no accept- ance among these mountaineers. Our second visit brought us into contact with the bourgeois element. The farm-house, of much better appearance than the rest, also stood in the village. The holding was about the size of that just described. The young mistress was dressed in conventional style, had passed an examination at a girls' Lyc^e, entitling her to the brevet siq:)erieur or higher certiiicate, her hus- band wore the dress of a country gentleman, and we were ushered into a drawing-room furnished with piano, pictures, a Japanese cabinet, carpets, and cur- tains. The bedrooms might have been fitted up by an upholsterer of Tottenham Court Koad. It must be borne in mind that I am not describing the wealthy farmers of the Seine and Marne or La Vendue. The fact that these young people let a part of their large, well-furnished house need not surprise us. There is no poverty here, but no riches. I do not suppose that any one of the small landowners to whom I was introduced could retire to-morrow and live on his savings. I dare aver that one and all are in receipt of a small income from invested capital, and have a provision against sickness and old RSITY lOG FRANCE OF TO-DAY. The master of the house showed me his stock first, five or six handsome cows of cross-breed, in value from £10 to £16, the latter the maximum price here. We next saw several beautiful mares and young colts and four horned sheep. Sheep-keeping and farming are seldom carried on together, and this young farmer was striking out a new path for himself. He told me that he intended to rear and fatten sheep, also to use artificial manure. Up to the present time, guanos and phosphates are all but unknown in these regions ; only farm-house dung is used, cows being partly kept for that purpose. Although the land is very productive, my informant assured me that much remained to be done by departure from routine and the adoption of advanced methods. The cross-breeding of stock was another subject he had taken up. Such initiators are needed in districts remote from agricultural schools, model farms, and State-paid chairs of agriculture. Each of the four instances just given differed from the other. The first showed us peasant property in its simplest development — a little family contentedly living on their bit of land, making its produce sufiice for daily needs, independent of marts and markets as the members of a primitive community. The second • stage showed us a wholly dissimilar condition, yet not without its ideal side. We were brought face to face with that . transitional phase of society and pacific revolution, of happiest augury for the future. From the peasant ranks are now recruited contingents that will make civil wars impossible, men who carry into politics, learning, and the arts those GENTLEMEN FARMERS. 107 solid qualities that have made rural France the admi- ration of the world and more than once saved her Ee- public. The third instance exemplified the intense conserva- tism of the French peasant. Liberal in politics, en- lightened in religion, open to the reception of new- ideas, here was nevertheless a man absolutely satisfied with social conditions as they affected himself and his children, utterly devoid of envy or worldly ambition. To reap the benefits of his toil, deserve the esteem of his neighbors, bequeath his little estate, improved and enriched, to his heirs — surely this was no contemptu- ous ideal either. The last case differed from the other three. We were now reminded of the English tenant, or even gentleman farmer — with a difference. Alike master and mistress had received a good education and seen something of the world ; they could enjoy music and books. But in spite of her brevet superieur^ the wife attended to her dairy ; and although the husband was a gentleman in manners and appearance, he looked after the stock. They lived, too, on friendliest terms with their less-instructed and homelier neighbors, the black alpaca blouse and colored kerchief, doing duty for bonnet, being conspicuous at their Sunday recep- tions. Not even a Zola can charge French village life with the snobbishness so conspicuous in England. It will be amply shown from the foregoing examples that peasant property is no fixed condition to be arbi- trarily dealt with after the manner of certain econo- mists. On the contrary, it is many-phased ; the full- 108 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. est and widest development of modem France is in- deed modern France itself. The peasant owner of the soil has attained the highest position in his own country. No other class can boast of such social, moral, and material ascendency. He is the acknowl- edged arbitrator of the fortunes of France. I will now cite two facts illustrating the bright side of peasant property in its humblest phase, where we have been told to expect sordidness, evea brutality. The land hereabouts, as I have before stated, is ex- cessively divided, the holdings being from two and a half acres in extent and upward. It often happens that the younger children of these small owners give up their share of the little family estate without claim- ing a centime of compensation, and seek their fortunes in the towns. They betake themselves to handicrafts and trade, in their turn purchasing land with the sav- • ings from daily wages. Again, it is supposed that the life of the peasant owner is one of uniform, unbroken drudgery, his daily existence hardly more elevated than that of the ox harnessed to his plough. Who ever heard of an Eng- lish laborer taking a fourteen-days' rest at the seaside? When did a rheumatic ploughman have recourse to Bath or Buxton? They order these things better in France. Between Osse and Oloron stands Escot, long famo'yis for its warm springs. The principal patrons of this modest watering-place are the peasants. It is their Carls- bad, their Homburg, many taking a season as regularly as the Prmce of Wales. The thing is done with thor- BUS TIC SPAS. 109 ou^lmess, but at a minimum of cost. They pay half a franc daily for a room and another half -franc for the waters, cooking their meals in the general kitchen of the establishment. Where the French peasant be- lieves, his faith is phenomenal. Some of these valetudi- narians drink as many as forty-six glasses qf mineral ■water a day ! What must be their capacities in robust health? The bourgeois or civilian element is not ab- sent. Hither from Pau and Oloron come clerks and small functionaries with their families. Newspapers are read and discussed in company. We may be sure that the rustic spa is a little centre of sociability and enlightenment. Let me now say something about the crops of this sweet Pyrenean valley. The chief of these are corn, maize, rye, potatoes, and clover; the soil being too dry and poor for turnips and beet-root. Flax is grown in small quantities, and here and there we see vines, but the wine is thin and sour. From time immemorial artificial irrigation has been carried on in the Yallee d'Aspe, and most beautiful is the appearance of the brilliantly green pastures, inter- sected by miniature canals in every direction; the sweet pastoral landscape framed by mountain peaks of loveliest color and majestic shape. These well-watered grass-lands produce two or even three crops a year : the second, or regain as it is called, was being got in early in September, and harvest having taken place early, clover was already springing up on the cleared corn-fields. Ev^ery where men and women were afield making hay or scattering manure on the meadows, the latter sometimes being done with the hands. 110 FRANCE OF TO-DAY, All these small farmers keep donkeys and mules, and on market-days the roads are alive with caval- cades; the men wearing gay waist-sashes, flat cloth caps, or berets, the women colored kerchiefs. The type is uniform — medium stature, spareness, dark eyes and hair, and olive complexion predominating. With- in the last thirty years the general health and physique have immensely improved, owing to better food and wholesomer dwellings. Goitre and other maladies arising from insufficient diet have disappeared. Epi- demics, I was assured, seldom work havoc in this val- ley ; and though much remains to be done in the way of drainage and sanitation, the villages have a clean, cheerful look. The last, ailment that would occur to us proves most fatal to those hardy country folks. They are very neglectful of their health, and as the changes of temperature are rapid and sudden, the chief mortality arises from inflammation of the lungs. It is difficult indeed to defend one's self against so variable a climate. On my arrival the heat was tropical. Twelve hours later I should have rejoiced in a fire. Dangerous, too, is the delicious hour after sunset, when mist rises from the valley, while yet the purple and golden glow on the peaks above tempts us to linger abroad. The scenery is grandiose and most beautiful. Above the white-walled, gray -roofed villages and townlings scattered about the open, rise sharp-pointed green* hills or monticules, one gently overtopping the other ; surmounting these, lofty barren peaks, recalling the volcanic chains of Auvergne, the highest snow-capped SCENERY. Ill point twice the altitude of the Puy de Dome, two- thirds that of Mont Blanc. Whichever way we go we find delightful scenery. Hidden behind the folded hills, approached by lovely little glades and winding bridle-path, tosses and foams the Gave d'Aspe, its banks thickly set with willow and salicomia, its solitary coves inviting the bather. The witchery of these mountain streams grows "upon us in the Pyrenees. We hunger for the music of their cas- cades when far away. The sun-lit, snow-lit peaks, towering into the brilliant blue heavens, are not de- serted as they appear. Shepherd farmers throughout the summer dwell in huts here, and welcome visitors with great affability. Let me narrate a fact interesting alike to the natu- ralist and meteorologist. On the 7th of September, 1891, the heat on one of these summits, nine thousand feet above the sea-level, was so intense that a little flock of sheep were seen literally hugging the snow, laying their faces against the cool masses, huddled about them as shivering mortals round a fire in win- ter. And a little way off the eye-witness of this strange scene gathered deep blue irises in full bloom. On the lower slopes the farmers leave their horses to graze, giving them a look from time to time. One beautiful young horse lost its life just before my ar- rival, unwarily approaching a precipitous incline. As a rule accidents are very rare. The izard or Pyrenean chamois, although hunted as game, is not yet a survival here, nor the eagle and bear, the latter only making its appearance in winter- time. 112 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Tent-life in these monntain-sides is quite safe and , practicable. Who can say? A generation hence and these magnificent Alps may be tunnelled by railways, crowned by monster hotels, peopled from July to October with tourists in search of disappointments. At present the Yallee d'Aspe is the peacefullest in the world. Alike on week-days and Sundays the current of life flows smoothly. Every morning from the open windows of the parsonage may be heard the sweet simple hynins of the Lutheran church, master and mistress, servants and children, uniting in daily thanksgiving and prayer. And a wholesome correct- ive is the Sunday service after the heathenish idolatry of Lourdes. The little congregation was striking. Within the altar railings stood two anciens, or elders, of the church, middle-aged men, tall, stalwart, the one fair as a Saxon, the other dark as a Spaniard. Both wore the dress of the well-to-do peasant, short black alpaca blouses, black cloth trousers, and spotless collars and cuffs, and both worthily represented those indomita- ble ancestors who neither wavered nor lost heart under direst persecution. By the time the pastor ascended the reading-desk, the cheerful, -well-kept little church was full, the men in black blouses, the women wearing neat stuff or print gowns, with silk handkerchiefs tied under the chin, widows and the aged the sombre black-hooded garment, enveloping head and figure, of Huguenot matrons of old — supposed to have suggested the con- ventual garb. SUNDAY. 113 • Among the rest were two or three Catholics, peas- ants of the neighborhood, come to look on and listen, not without profit, we may be sure. The simple, in- telligible service, the quiet fervor of the assembly might well impress a sceptical beholder. Even more impressive the inscription over the door. A tablet re- cords how the first Protestant church was pulled down by order of the king after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and rebuilt on the declaration of religious liberty by the National Assembly. Gazing on that inscription and the little crowd of worshippers, a sen- tence of Tacitus came into my mind. Eecording how not only the biographers of good men were banished or put to death, but their works publicly burnt by order of Domitian, the historian, whose sentences are volumes condensed, adds: "They fancied, forsooth " — he is speaking of the tyrant and his satellites — "that all records of these actions being destroyed, mankind could never approve of them." An illusion shared by enemies of intellectual liberty from the Caesars to their latest imitator, unhappily not wholly dispelled in our own day. Whether the homeward journey is made through the Landes by way of Bayonne and Bordeaux, or through the Eastern Pyrenees by way of Perpignan, we are brought face to face with scenes of strangest transformation. In the former region the agency has been artificial, the shifting sands being fixed and solid- ified by plantations on a gigantic scale, and large tracts rendered fertile by arl^ficial irrigation ; in the 114 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. latter, Nature has prepared the field, the more labori- ous portion of the husbandman's task is already done. The Landes I hope to revisit and describe in detail on a future occasion. " The districts of sand, as white as snow and so loose as to blow," seen by Arthur Young toward the close of the last century, can hardly be said to exist in our own day. Even within twenty -five years the changes are so great as to render entire regions hardly recognizable. The stilts, or chanques^ of which our word " shanks " is supposed to be the origin, become rarer and rarer. The creation of forests and sinking of wells, drainage, artificial manures, and canals are rapidly fertilizing a once arid region ; with the aspect of the country a proportionate change taking place in the material condition of the people. No less startling is the transformation of lagoon into salt marsh, and marsh into cultivable soil, witnessed between the Spanish frontier, Perpignan, and Nimes. Quitting Cerb^re, the little town at which travellers from Barcelona re-enter French territory, we follow the coast, traversing a region long lost to fame and the world, but boasting of a brilliant history before the real history of France began. We are here in presence of geological changes neither effected by shock nor convulsion, nor yet by infinitesimally slow degrees. A few centuries have sufficed to alter the entire contour of the coast and reverse, the once brilliant destinies of maritime cities. "With the recorded experience of mediaeval writers at hand, we can localize lagoons and inland seas where BURIED CITIES. 115 to-day we find belts of luxuriant cultivation. In a lifetime falling short of the Psalmist's three-score years and ten, observations may be made that necessitate the reconstruction of local maps. The charming little watering-place of Banyuls-sur- Mer, reached soon after passing the Spanish frontier, is the only place on this coast, except Cette, without a history. The town is built in the form of an am- phitheatre, its lovely little bay surrounded by rich southern vegetation. The oleanders and magnolias in full bloom, gardens and vineyards, are no less strik- ingly contrasted with the barrenness and monotony that follows, than Banyuls itself, spick and span, brand- new, with the buried cities scattered on the way, an- cient as Tyre and Sidon and once as flourishing. There is much sadness yet poetic charm in the landscape sweeps of silvery-green olive or bluish salicornia against a pale blue sky, dull brown fishing villages bordering sleepy lagoons, stretches of white sand, with here and there a glimpse of the purple, rock-hemmed sea. Little of life animates this coast, in many spots the custom-house officer and a fisherman or two being the sole inhabitants, their nearest neighbors removed from them by many miles. Only the flamingo, the heron, and the sea-gull people these solitudes, within the last few years broken by the whistle of the loco- motive. We are following the direct line of railway between Barcelona and Paris. The first of the buried cities is the musically-n^med Elne, anciently Illiberis, now a poor little town of the department of the Eastern Pyrenees, hardly indeed 116 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. more than a village, but boasting a wondrous pedi- gree. We see dull brown walls, ilex groves, and above low-lying walls, the gleaming sea. This appar- ently deserted place occupies the site of city upon city. Seaport, metropolis, emporium had here reached their meridian of splendor before the Greek and the Roman set foot in Gaul. Already in Pliny's time the glories of Elne had become tradition.^ We must go farther back than Phoenician civilization for the beginning of this town, halting-place of Hannibal and his army on their march toward Rome. The Great Constantino endeavored to resuscitate the fallen city, and for a brief space Elne became populous and animated. With other once flourishing seaports it has been grad- ually isolated from the sea, and the same process is still going on. Just beyond Perpignan a lofty tower, rising amid vineyards and pastures, marks the site of Ruscino, another ancient city and former seaport. The Tour de Roussillon is all that now remains of a place once important enough to give its name to a province. Le Roussillon, from which was formed the department of the Pyrenees Orientales, became French by the treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659. Here also the great Car- thaginian halted, and here, we learn, he met with a friendly reception. Monotonous as are these wide horizons and vast stretches of marsh and lagoon, they appeal to the lover of solitude and of the more pensive aspects of nature. The waving reeds against the pale sky, the sweeps of ' See Appendix, Note 10. NARBONNE. 117 glasswort and terebinth, show delicate gradations of color ; harmonious too the tints of far-off sea and en- vironing hills. Not cities only seem interred here ; the railway hurries us through a world in which all is hushed and inanimate, as if, indeed, mankind no less than good fortune had deserted it. The prevailing uniformity is broken by the picturesquely placed little town of Salses and the white cliffs of Leucate. Strabo and Pomponius Mela describe minutely the floating islands or masses of marine plants moving freely on the lake of Salses. Here, as elsewhere, the coast line is undergoing slow but steady modification, yet we are in presence of phenomena that engaged the attention of writers two thousand years ago. From this point till we approach Cette the region defies definition. It is impossible to determine nicely where the land ends and the sea begins. The railway follows a succession of inland salt lakes and lagoons, with isolated fishermen's cabins, reminding us of lake-dwellings. In some places the hut is approached by a narrow strip of solid ground, on either side sur- rounded by water, just admitting the passage of a sin- gle pedestrian. The scene is unspeakably desolate. Only sea-birds keep the fisher-folk company; only the railway recalls the busy world far aw^ay. Of magnificent aspect is Narbonne, the Celtic Venice, as it rises above the level landscape. The great sea- port described by Greek historians six centuries before our own era, the splendid capital of Narbonese Gaul, rival of the Eoman Nimes and of the Greek Aries, is now as dull a provincial town as any throughout 118 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. France. Invasions, sieges, plagues, incendiaries, most of all religious persecutions, ruined the mediaeval Nar- bonne. The Jewish element prevailed in its most prosperous phase, and M. Kenan in his history of Averroes shows how much of this prosperity and in- tellectual pre-eminence was due to the Jews. The cruel edicts of Philip Augustus against the race proved no less disastrous here than the expulsion of Hugue- nots elsewhere later. The decadence of Narbonne as a port is due to natural causes. Formerly surrounded by lagoons affording free communication with the sea, the Languedocian Yenice has gradually lost her ad- vantageous position. The transitional stage induced such unhealthy climatic conditions that at one period there seemed a likelihood of the city being abandoned altogether. In proportion as the marsh solidified the general health improved. Day by day the slow but sure process continues, and when the remaining salt lakes shall have become dry land, this region, now barren and desolate, will blossom like the rose. The hygienic and atmospheric effects of the Eucalyptus globulus in Algeria are hardly more striking than the amelioration wrought here in a natural way. The Algerian traveller of twenty-five years ago now finds noble forests of blue gum tree where, on his first visit, his heart was wrung by the spectacle of a fever-stricken population. On the coast of Languedoc the change has been slower. It has taken not only a generation, but a century, to transfer pestilential tracts into zones of healthfulness and fertility. An interesting fact, illustrating the effect of physi- AeDE. 119 cal agencies upon human affairs, must be here men_ tioned. Till within the last few years this town counted a considerable Protestant community. The ravages of the phylloxera in the neighboring vine- yards caused a wholesale exodus of vine-growers be- longing to the Eeformed Church, and in 1886 the number had dwindled to such an extent that the ser- vices of a pastor were no longer required. The minis- ter in charge was transferred elsewhere. The dull little town of Agde is another ancient site. Its name is alike a poem and a history. The secure harborage afforded by this sheltered bay won for the place the name of Good Fortune, dyadij rb-pi^ whence Agathe, Agde. A Greek settlement, its fine old church was in part constructed of the materials of a temple to Diana of Ephesus. Agde possesses interest of another kind. It is built of lava, the solitary peak rising behind it, called Le Pic de St. Loup, being the southern extremity of that chain of extinct volcanoes beginning with Mont Mezenc in the Cantal. A pa- thetic souvenir is attached to this lonely crater. At a time when geological ardor was rare, a bishop of Agde, St. Simon by name, devoted years of patient investigation to the volcanic rocks in his diocese. The results of his studies were recorded in letters to a learned friend, but the Eevolution stopped the poor bishop's discoveries. He perished by the guillotine during the Terror. The celebrated founder of socialism in France was his nephew. Here our journey ends. We now complete our loop, rejoining the railway quitted at Montpellier on our way to Quissac and Carcassonne. PAET II. PROYINCES: ANJOU, POITOU, GAS- COIGNE, BEERY. department: maijs^e and loire. Maine and Anjou have the appearance of deserts. —Arthur Young. The section here taken in hand represents an obtuse triangle on the French map, the several points touch- ing Paris, Angers, Bordeaux. While far from being the most striking or picturesque region of France, the territory thus comprised offers peculiar interest. No- where has the face of the country been more completely modified since the Eevolution ; nowhere has social and economic progress been more marked within our own time. On every side we see the handiwork of mighty genii, nor do the great gods rest in these days from their labors. Absent yourself for a few years, and once familiar towns and villages are hardly recogniza- ble, so rapid, so enormous the advance. Each of the regions here reviewed has strongly marked characteristics : the Berry, Cinderella of French provinces, glorified by the golden dower of romance; the Vendee, blood-sodden wilderness, now made to blossom as the rose; the Gironde, stronghold of Prot- estantism, but for whose lion-hearted fisher-folk free- dom of faith might have perished in France. Nor is 124 FRANCE OF TO-DAT. Anjou — erewhile England over the water, its gracious city alike the court, capital, and stronghold of Eng- lish kings — without special claim ; and it would be difficult to single out any group of departments offer- ing greater diversity, whether we take under consider- ation physical features, population, or products. Angers, the most elegant city of Western, as Nancy is of Eastern France, city of exquisite flowers, beauti- ful women, and artistic genius, yet shows material progress worthy of Chicago. Since the beginning of the century it has been completely metamorphosed, and of late years Haussmannized within an inch of its ruin. But a miss is as good as a mile. Angers still remains full of interest for the archaeologist and art- lover, while it is a charming place to live in, musical, ntellectual, refined. The city must be considered under a threefold aspect, as a port, a tiny Paris, and Shakespeare's " contemptuous town ! " The grandiose chateau, covering an enormous area, giving a very good idea of the Angers realized by the poet's mental vision. Many dark, narrow streets have been pulled down, and airy, handsome quarters added. In return- ing here after a few years' absence, I lost my way at every turn, so tremendous are the changes, and cer- tainly from a hygienic and economic point of view greatly for the better. Boulevards, schools, hospitals, bridges, manufactories, hotels, bespeak the general prosperity and an active public spirit. A word as to its hospitals. Perhaps no aspect of the Revolution has been more overlooked than the philanthropic, yet the measures of the first Eepublic on behalf of the HOSPITALS. 125 poor display zeal wortliy of Howards and Shaftes- burys.^ At Angers individual efforts, alike lay and clerical, had already in some degree alleviated the suf- ferings of the sick, the infirm, and the orphan ; it re- mained for the Eevolution to organize public charity on a comprehensive and impartial scale. Hospitals were placed under responsible committees of manage- ment, and a law of the 17 Yentose, An iii. (7th March, 1795), decreed the establishment of an orphanage, or "Hospice des Enfants de la Patrie," at Angers, and under the same roof a lying-in hospital. These and other institutions have been greatly developed, and no French city now shows more splendid or better man- aged charitable institutions. One rule, formerly a great grievance in a mixed Protestant and Catholic community, has been rescinded. In former days the first thing required of any one accepting public char- ity was confession. At the present time the only obli- gation is that of respect for the religious opinions of others. On the committee of management — a note- worthy fact — figures the name of the Protestant pastor. In the neighborhood of Angers and throughout the department may be seen those cave-dwellings noticed by Arthur Young a hundred years ago. . Down to our own times the Angevin peasant, like man, unblessed by Promethean fire, dwelt — In hollow holes, Hke swarms of tiny ants, In sunless depths of caverns. The tufa, or yellow calcareous rock, that easily ^ See Appendix, Note 11. 126 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. lends itself to such a purpose, was hollowed out into ready-made habitations, rendered more or less comfort- able as the means of the occupant permitted, but al- ways out of keeping with modern ideas. In the canton of Gennes in 1875 (a canton is the limit of jurisdiction of ajuge de paix^ also an electoral division) I was con- stantly coming upon little troglodyte hamlets, some- times having the backs of the houses toward the road, only tall chimneys being visible. Elsewhere might be seen the inner side of a cave divided into half a dozen dwellings, crops and fruit trees flourishing over- head. Many had no windows, the only ventilation being by door and chimney. Vines and roses trained on the ochre-colored walls gave a warm southern as- pect to the strange scene. During one of my visits I was shown a weaver's loom that had been worked there for many years. Already the darkest and most comfortless of the caves had been turned into out- houses and stables, but on visiting the neighborhood eleven years later I found that they were fast being abandoned altogether. Here, as in so many other parts of France, we are reminded of brand-new settlements of newly-colonized land. Let me give particulars of what I now saw at St. Georges-des-Sept-Yoies, a commune of the canton of Gennes (a commune is the smallest division admin- istered by mayor and municipal council) in which I have upon different occasions spent some weeks. We first visited a small cottage built at a cost of £80, and consisting of three rooms only. But this was an im- mense improvement on the cave-dwelling, alike in COTTAGE HOMES, 127 hygiene, comfort, and cheerfulness. Its owners, an aged farm-servant and his wife, showed great pride in their new possession; and no wonder. The fruit of life-long savings had afforded a retreat for old age They could quote Touchstone : " 'Tis a poor thing, but 'tis my own." It must never be forgotten that underlying the sor- didness, with some truth attributed to the French peas- ant, is a dignified and manly ambition. The con- sciousness of an inferiority which it is in his own power to remove humiliates him. Certain good things of life, matters of mere chance, he does not envy. Material, social, and intellectual equality seems no Utopian dream. Thus these good people welcomed their rich neighbor and her English guest much more heartily than they would have done to a burrow in the cliff. Their cottage accorded with the fitness of things ; they too were marching with the times. We are describing the lowest rung of the ladder : let us next see what the more prosperous peasant is about, the man who has not only been able to lay by for old age, not only possesses a house and plot of land, but, bit by bit, has acquired what, in my native Suffolk, folks style " a tight little property." The house this small landowner was building for himself consisted of kitchen, back kitchen, and parlor on the ground-floor, four commodious bedrooms on the upper, reached by a handsome staircase. In front a small flower-garden was being laid out, and the whole when completed would answer to one of our 128 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. own suburban villas. I asked the probable cost of construction, and was informed about £240. This seems an inadequate sum, but it must be borne in mind that the owner possessed wood and building stone, the tufa being abundantly quarried here, also that most of the work in these cases, as elsewhere in France, is done by the peasants themselves, thus re- ducing the cost to a minimum. The substitution of neat cottages or villas for cave-dwellings is but one sign of progress out of many. We must see things with our own eyes in order to realize the social as well as material advance taking place in rural districts. I cannot for a moment admit that the peasants' prog* ress is one of worldly condition only. It will be seen that these experiences point to an opposite conclusion, showing equal strides in another and loftier direction. Still less will my acquaintances with French rural life bear out the portraiture of Zola. Let me here adduce examples. My hostess at St. Georges-des-Sept-Voies was a rich, liberal-minded, and sociable lady landowner. Her property, of several hundred acres, was cultivated by herself with the help of a farm-bailiff and his family, with dairymaid and other farm-servants boarded in the house. This lady lived on terms of affectionate intimacy with her hum- ble neighbors, and one day entertained a family party to dinner. Her guests, wearing the mob cap and blue blouse, were perfectly natural and self-possessed in manner. Abundance of good things and a variety of wines and liquors were moderately partaken of. They entered easily into general conversation; and when SOCIABILITIES. 129 the hour for departure came, drove home in a com- fortable wagonette. But the most striking fact re- mains to be told. One of the party was what Charles Lamb describes as " a grand fragment, as good as an Elgin marble. He was as the man-part of a Centaur, from which the horse-part had been cloven in some dire Lapithan controversy." This poor fellow who had been born thus deformed, and could of course never earn a centime, was absolutely dependent on those around him. This family, although strictly be- longing to the peasant class, fortunately was well-to-do. With his small heritage and the help of kinsfolk he was well cared for, supplied with books, the burden of helplessness lightened to the utmost. He lived with a widowed sister-in-law and niece, and nothing could exceed their tenderness and devotion. I will quote one remark that dropped from the lips of this crippled peasant, whose existence had been spent in the heart of Anjou. " J'ai bien regrett^ la chute de M. Gladstone. C'est une retrogression dans votre pays de bien des anndes." (I much regretted the fall of Mr. Gladstone. It has retarded progress in your country by many years.) This was in August, 1886. Again, take the case of my hostess' farm-bailiff. He worked as hard as any English laborer, his wife and children wore plain, homely clothes ; but on fur- ther inquiry I found that he possessed one bit of land here, another there, had money invested in the funds, could give his daughters a dowry and bequeath his sons a small freehold. 9 130 FRANCE OF TO-BAY, Nor had excessive toil dulled the faculties or sensi- bilities of this charming peasant. One Sunday after- noon he busied himself in re-arranging a small lend- ing library founded by his employer for the good of her less-instructed neighbors. It was touching to see how reverently, almost affectionately he handled the books destined for the entertainment and instruction of younger aspirants. The lady coming in to watch him at his work, impatiently remarked that the only works in favor were novels. " But we may learn something from novels too," he replied. A pathetic and suggestive figure, that of the unlet- tered peasant, covering books on the one holiday of the week for the use of others — humble Moses, rejoic- ing in the Promised Land, regime of intellectual equal- ity he was not himself to enjoy. The Angevin char- acter has an ideal side. Often and often, the labors of the day finished, his fellow-workers abed, our good Louis would roam the premises, like Patience in Mauprat gazing upon the stars, with what cravings after the illimitable, the unknown, with what vague aspirations and upliftings of spirit, we can only guess ! Integrity personified, adoring his children, a firm yet gentle steward, he went his quiet way keeping his deepest thoughts to himself. M. Baudrillart, in his admirable study of rural Nor- mandy, mentions the love of the dance handed down from the olden time. In Anjou the peasants are never too tired to foot it merrily in the round. Supper over — all meals are taken out of doors during the warm weather — young and old join hands and dance to the TYPES. 131 sound of their own voices, tlie pastime being often kept up till midnight. As an instance of the elastic- ity of the French temperament, take the following fact. On the occasion of my second visit, these joyous dancers had lately undergone a severe trial. The vil- lage notary had failed a short time before, and his bankruptcy was in reality the breaking of the local bank. The country-folk trusted him implicitly, and were in the habit of confidmg small savings to his care, pending the opportunity of an investment in land. One and all were more or less victimized. My friend's dairymaid, now treading a measure so gayly, had lost her entire saving of £60, the farm-bailiff, our star-gazer, £40. Such trials are surmounted by hopefulness and resolution. The typical French peasant, to borrow a Positivist designation, is a determinist. He makes up his mind to save money, and he does save it. The foregoing fact is interesting from another point of view. Indebted the small proprietor will of course sometimes be ; most often he is a lender, not borrower, on interest. Yet another trait or two of these good farming folk. Hilarious, even noisy as were the out-of-door meals and moonlight dances, conversation and behavior were alike uniformly seemly. Between father and mother, carefully guarded as young ladies in fashionable con- vent schools, sat the two daughters of the farm-steward. These hard-working, neatly-dressed, modest girls would never go to service ; domestic service is looked down upon by the well-to-do peasant proprietor; instead, 132 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. each having her little portion, they would marry some respectable neighbor's son and live within reach of the parental home. Primitive as habits of life still remain in country places, a gradual advance is nevertheless noticeable. A few years ago, for instance, men and women ser- vants would wait at table bare-legged, their unstock- inged feet thrust into sabots. Nowadays, even out- door laborers of both sexes wear good shoes and stockings. The neat coif of the women, still partially adhered to, will inevitably give way to hat and bon- net. By little and little more important domestic in- novations are sure to become universal. And here may be mentioned the incalculable services rendered to sanitation and hygiene by the great Jubilee Exhi- bition of 1889. Hundreds of thousands of peasants from remote corners of France then gazed for the first time on sanitary appliances of the first necessity to health and decency, and long ago familiar to all classes in England. It is not that the French peasant loves sordidness and squalor. Comfort and luxury have not as yet come in his way. Thus it comes about that in certain respects out-of-the-way districts remain al- most as behindhand as Arthur Young found them a hundred years ago. Before we too strongly animad- vert on the apparent neglect of hygiene by the State and municipalities, we must remember the arduous duties imposed upon both in the matter of education. Here the advance has been prodigious. The Suffolk squire in his French travels never by any chance whatever alludes to a village school. And for the ADVANCES. 133 best possible reason. The village school could not be said to exist. The cure or abbe here and there would get the children together and teach them the cate- chism, credo, and paternoster. Writing, reading, arith- metic, and the teaching of French were deemed un- necessary. The Convention during its short regime decreed a comprehensive system of primary instruc- tion, lay, gratuitous, obligatory ; ^ but the initiative was not followed up, and the first educational law carried into effect was that of 1838. How slowly matters advanced may be gathered from the fact that so late as 1872 two-thirds of the inhabitants of certain departments could neither read nor write. The Third Eepublic has vigorously grappled with the problem, and within the last twenty years schools and training- colleges for both male and female teachers have been multiplied in all directions. In 1879 only twenty-six technical schools existed throughout the country; in 1883 they numbered 400. In 1866, 35 per cent, of the entire population of France could neither read nor write. In 1882 the percentage of these illetres had dwindled to nineteen ! It may be safely affirmed that the progress we are able to attest from personal experience is more start- ling than any adduced by statistics. The great Act of 1884 not only enormously developed national edu- cation, but completely revolutionized its spirit. Let us see now how these statements are borne out with regard to the Maine and Loire, and especially the ' See Appendix, Note 12. 134 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. commune under review. The chief stumbling-block in the way of French educationalists was of course the sectarian difficulty. Broadly speaking, the education of the young, and of girls till they left school, was in the hands of uncertificated irresponsible teachers — that is to say, nuns. A lettre d' obedience from the head of her order enabled a sister to teach or pretend to teach anything she liked, just as the same pseudo di- ploma in country places enabled her to fulfil the func- tion of surgeon, apothecary, dentist, and midwife. The consequences are obvious. While the boys of a commune received an excellent elementary in- struction from the certified schoolmaster, the girls learned nothing but the catechism, needle-work, and perhaps reading and writing. On my first visit to my friend's village both boys' and girls' schools were, as now, ecoles communales sup- ported by the State. Unfortunately, the commune had been induced some years before to accept a house and piece of ground from a benevoleat Catholic lady, on condition that the girls' school should be conducted by nuns. Girls and boys therefore received an edu- cation fundamentally different — a fact curiously and painfully illustrated at the annual distribution of prizes. The rule is to give every scholar a prize, the most meritorious receiving the best. I noticed when present upon one of these occasions in 1875 that the boys were awarded handsomely got-up editions of Jules Yerne and translations from good English works for the young, adventure, travel, biography, and so on; while the girls, being under the supervision of SCHOOLS. 135 the nuns, received dry theological treatises, lives of saints, expositions of the sacraments, and so on, the only attraction being a gaudy cover. When revisiting the same place twelve years later, I found all this changed. The Act of 1884, rendering the teacher's certificate in every case obligatory, had meantime come into force. On asking a little girl to show me her schoolbooks, I recognized among them a well-known and admirable primer of French history, long used in boys' schools, the Textes and Recits d'His- toire de France^ par E. Foncin. I have been assured by ladies reared in fashionable convent schools that the history of France formerly taught there ended with the death of Louis Seize! Fortunately within the convent-walls the diploma can no longer be dis- pensed with. The Lycee, or public day-school for girls, is another important factor in female education, hastening the period when, to use the eloquent words of Gambetta, " our girls and boys shall be united by the intellect before they are united by the heart." The position of village schoolmaster until recent date was wretched in the extreme. Fifteen years ago, £80 a year with a house and small capitation fee was the emolument at the commune I speak of, and edu- cation not being obligatory, the latter addition could hardly be taken into account. Boys were early em- ployed on the land instead of being sent to school. Since that time the educational grants of M. "VYadding- ton and other ministers have greatly improved the condition of teachers of both sexes, so much so that the number of candidates is often far in excess of the 136 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. 4 demand. Tlie son of the soil, self-raised to the con- dition of landowner, becomes ambitious for his chil- dren. He desires not only to see their material pros pects improved, but their social status raised. Many a peasant-born lad now attains his degree of Bachelor of Arts, and studies in Paris for the learned profes- sions. Hitherto, strange as it may appear, the nun has been the most redoubtable rival of the country doctor. In former days a young practitioner who should return to his own village and set up practice there was starved out by female quacks in the guise of Sisters of Mercy. I remember well paying a visit to the Sisters of St. Georges, one of whom, a harsh-featured, shrill-voiced woman, began at once speaking of her medical rounds. It seemed that on her devolved the duty of physick- ing the people. " Heavens, how busy I am just now !'' she cried. " Everybody has been out of sorts. Tout le monde a besoin d'etre purge;" and she evidently administered her remedies with a vengeance. There were medicines in the convent parlor enough to supply an apothecary's shop. Except in case of very serious accident, no one thought of fetching a medical man. This was in 1875, and on making inquiries at the pres- ent time I find that amateur surgery and physicking are still up to a certain point permitted. The her- balist, whose remedies for the most part are simple enough, requires no certificate, and nuns may still purge, draw teeth, and dress wounds with impunity. I am also assured that female quackery is useful in poor and remote districts, no doctor being able to earn ANJOU. 137 a living there. When visiting rich friends in Bur- gundy a few years ago, the cook, an aged woman, was severely bitten by a dog. Although only half an hour by rail from a large city, the surgeon called in was a nun ! Such a money-grubber is the French peasant sup- posed to be, that we never imagine him taking rest on Sundays. I always found Sunday strictly observed as a holiday in Anjou. At an early hour the village- folk, dressed in their best, would set off for church. The remainder of the day was given up to friendly visits, walks, and drives, all the well-to-do keeping a vehicle of some kind. Next let us glance at the landscape described by Arthur Young as wearing the appearance of a desert. It would be easier nowadays to say what Anjou does not produce than to give a list of its products. The astounding country ! Corn, fruit, and flowers, seem to have here their home, as if in any less-favored spot they would become exiles, be at chilling disadvan- tage, the same excellence and profusion not to be looked for. Nowhere else throughout the length and breadth of France do you feel more overwhelmed with the plenty of common things, more conscious of the spell wrought by possession. Give a man a black rock, wrote our "wise and honest traveller," "and he will turn it into a garden." Here the miracle has been worked on gigantic scale. The wealth and luxuri- ance beggar description. Alike sick and poor can dispense with the shop and the market in the Maine and Loire. Everything for 138 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. comfort and grace is at their doors, in their larders, and clothes-presses. At my friend's house no more shopping was done than if she were living on a desert island. Besides the stores of home-grown wine, spirits, liquors, and essences, the delicate orange-flower among these, there were jams and jellies enough to stock a grocer's shop, walnut oil, raisin vinegar, honey, home- made medicines, stimulants, ointments,- home-spun linen, everything for use but shoes and stationery. Of course there were cows, affording cream and butter ; a well-stocked poultry -yard ; calves and sheep ; in addi- tion to these, fish from the neighboring streams ; and of course fruit and vegetables in abundance. Every- thing flourishes — strawberries, peaches, figs, mulber- ries, grapes, peas, asparagus, the delicate aubergine or Solanum insanurn introduced from the West Indies in 1815, salads of all kinds; none of these good things being mere dainties for elegantly appointed tables. Many of the very small holdings here may indeed be described as orchards, fruit and vegetable gardens, fruit-trees and bushes being planted amid the crops and by the wayside, no one ]3ilfering his neighbor. In my native Suffolk, tenant farmers and their land- lords used to have perpetual bickering about trees. A tree standing in a cornfield was regarded by the occu- pant as an enemy. The French farmer, on the con- trary, avers that a tree earns its own living. The walnut, the service-berry, and the apple are allowed to overshadow the wheat and barley undisturbed, on ac- count of their own valuable crops. The oil made from the walnut is excellent; a wholesome drink is pro- CROPS. 139 duced from tlie service-berrj ; apples are generally sold for cider. As a rule, we shall find the frugal country folks seldom drinking wine if they can procure a cheaper substitute. The field-crops show the same variety, and dazzling indeed is the peasants' patchwork from April till November. Sky-hued flax, dark green hemp, crimson clover, bright yellow colza, golden wheat, the stately Indian corn with its deep-hued, waxen, green leaves and rich orange-colored seeds, the creamy-blossomed buckwheat, so poetically called by Michelet " la neige d'ete " — summer snow. All these flourish side by side, and often on a farm of two or three acres. But crops more dazzling still embellish and enrich the land Arthur Young found a desert. The Suffolk squire in those vivid pages of his no more describes flowers than schools. France, that is to say, the France of the people, the peasant, was a flowerless country on the eve of the Revolution. Anjou, in the present day, would be styled the Flora of the French departments were it not that the Floras are legion. The Angevin capital has nevertheless for itself won the name of "la ville de fleurs." Like Florence, it is a city of flowers. Its floriculture is not only a spectacle for a stranger, but a source of princely revenue. De- spatch an English telegram to a horticulturist of Angers, and you receive next day, in a straw basket made ex- pressly for the purpose, a bouquet of choicest roses, violets, heliotrope, and mignonette; or exotics, fresh and beautiful, as if that moment plucked. Every year we find a love of flowers taking root 140 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. among the people, perhaps a spiritualizing influence of greater significance than we imagine. A pretty flower festival may be witnessed in country houses. On the occasion of my hostess' name-day, or fete of her paternal saint, we adjourned to the drawing-room after dinner, when a charming procession streamed in, all bearing enormous posies. Would that some artist had been by to portray these sunburnt peasant-folk in blue blouses and mob caps as they offered their flow- ers. There were old men and matrons, stalwart youths and damsels, all natural and merry, as if feting one of their own people. Each donor kissed the lady of the house on either cheek, wishing her a happy year. It was touching to see with what pains the poorest had made bouquets of wild flowers and grasses in default of flowers. When the last was added to the floral pyramid on the table, we went out of doors to drink toasts with sparkling wine, and join hands in the merry round. I may mention, as an instance of the homely ways of even rich country people in France, that the champagne was drunk out of common earthen mugs ! Yet the dispenser of hospitality here enjoyed an income of a thousand pounds a year. Generally speaking, Anjou is a land of small farms, the larger proportion consisting from two and a half to fifty acres. Naturally, the smaller of these cannot support a horse ; one is therefore kept by two or more owners on co-operative principles. A cow, a dozen sheep, pigs, geese, and poultry constitute the stock. It will be seen how greatly the small farmer depends on the multiform nature of his crops. Plenty of fruit CLEARINGS. 141 will make up for a bad harvest ; a good vintage for a poor apple season. He has always something in re- serve. In 1875 the phylloxera had hardly invaded the Maine and Loire; twelve years later I found the vine- yards in many places completely ruined. One neigh- bor, a lady managing for herself and children a farm of several hundred acres, had lost the greater part of her income through the vine-pest. With the national elasticity of temperament, she was now turning her attention to corn. When we called one afternoon we found her busily superintending the thrashing of a large wheat-stack. Lady farmers are not perhaps so common as in some parts of England, yet they are found here and there — an argument that should tell favorably for female suffrage when the question is seriously mooted in France. Wages fifteen years ago were as follows : Two francs a day without board for average field-work, or one franc with meals ; washer- women received the last-mentioned pay, needlewomen rather less. Work paid by the piece was much better remunerated. Thus, during harvest and vintage, able laborers could earn four or five francs daily. It must be remembered that most farm laborers have small holdings of their own. With the progress of agricul- ture, wages have risen slowly but steadily in most parts of France, 20 per cent being the average ad- vance. Increased facilities of transport and communi- cation, the extended use of machinery and artificial manures, and the cross-breeding of stock had in 1862 accorded the Maine and Loire fourth rank among 142 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. French departments. In 1880 it stood first as a corn producing region, the area thus cultivated being 170,- 000 hectares out of a total of 712.509 hectares. Wastes and brushwood have almost disappeared from a coun- try thus described by Arthur Young just a hundred years ago: "Immense tracts are waste, under ling, fern, fui-ze, etc., but the soil of these does not differ from the cultivated parts, and, with cultivation, would be equally good." Between the years 1833 and 1870 the value of land here showed a rise of 50 per cent. Of late years agri- culture throughout France has gone through a period of depression, the phylloxera and other parasites, the supersession of valuable crops by foreign products — ■ among these madder and beetroot — lastly, bad seasons have seriously affected the farming interests all over the country. Anjou has suffered less than its neigh- bors. Wine, fruit, and flowers are largely exported, and alike in town and country we witness enormous progress from year to year. The beauty of Angevin landscape, like the beauty of Frenchwomen in the words of Michelet, is made up of little nothings. This engaging land should be seen lazily, sauntered through as the pages of D'Urfey's pastoral. We may begin at any point and leave off where we will. In summer-time the country is a mosaic of green, purple, and gold, the pale tints of ripening corn mingling with the richer hemp and dark-leaved beetroot. Oftentimes our way lies through one vast orchard, fruit-trees bordering the high road, walnut tree, service-berry, plum, pear, and apple needing no PEASANT AND CHURCH. 143 protection — none is needed. In another direction we may come upon some huge monolith of granite, rude stone monuments here keeping fine old churches company. Summ.er is tropical throughout Anjou, and the in- tense transparence and luminosity of the air enhance the beauty of the landscape. The fields are aban- doned during the meridian heat of the day, the labors of the farmer often beginning at four o'clock in the morning. Toward sunset the cornfields are flooded with amber radiance, and every object is bathed in vapory gold, later on, changed to tints of mother-of- pearl. Later still, we obtain the extraordinary effects that lend enchantment to Oriental travel, the same in- tensity of light, the same brilliance, if I may so ex- press myself, of shadow. Only in the Gironde have I witnessed similar purity of atmosphere. Some may ask. What is the blot on these bright pic- tures? where is the drawback to a state of things ap- parently Utopian? We cannot shrink from a conclusion forced upon us by accumulated experience. The only spiritualiz- ing influence hitherto within the peasant's reach has failed to touch him. We gladly acknowledge his high qualities, probity, thrift, respect for authority, self- denial. For higher things we must not always look, ^et we have here the offspring of that Church which has nowhere ruled with more powerful sway. Until our own day, she has had no rival. From outward influences the peasant has been excluded. A just and rational government has lifted him from the 144 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. " abyss of wretchedness and isolation " in which, to quote De Tocqueville, he dragged on existence before the Eevolution. But an enlightend state has had enough to do in attending to his worldly interests. Outside the circumscribed, often sordid world of self, beyond the humdrum life of toil, he has had nothing but the Church, her teaching, sacraments, and minis- trations. The terrible portraiture of Zola, then, if true at all, is the most scathing criticism as yet passed en a creed whose basis is the contempt of reason, the sur- render of man's soul to fellow-man. The French peasant of the next generation, what- ever he may be, will not assuredly in this respect re- semble his forefathers. Already village congregations consist for the most part of women and children ; their husbands and fathers, in theology as in politics, are learning to think for themselves. But these sober heads of houses are far from communicative. Just as they never confide to any one the name of the deputy to be voted for next day, so their religious opinions are kept to themselves. Fireside peace is not forfeited for the sake of airing scepticism or a spirit of rational inquiry. Even an appearance of orthodoxy will be put on for the sake of quiet. Hardness, in the case of animals, degenerating into cruelty, is the real blot on French rural life. In Anjou this defect is less marked than in many other regions. As I have before mentioned, the character of the people is gentle and amiable. Yet we daily witness acts altogether barbarous in English eyes, and which would be criminal under English jurisdiction. Lot QRAMMONT, 145 The plucking of feathers from live geese, practised twice a year, is an instance in point, and many others could be adduced. Fortunately, the humane Loi Grammont, based on our own laws for the prevention of cruelty to animals, becomes every year more effec- tive. To touch the sympathies of the people, to arouse a tender feeling on behalf of the weak and the help- less, is, however, a task beyond the power of legisla- tion much more stringent. II. DEUX SEVRES, VENDEE. Poitou is an unimproved, poor, and ugly country. Arthur Young. If the face of some parts of France has undergone complete transformation within the last hundred years, others, humanly speaking, may be said to have come into existence. We are now in a region, which like the Morvan, the Gausses, and other inaccessible dis- tricts, was not even a name to our Suffolk squire on the eve of the Eevolution. That division of Poitou called La Vendee had evidently never been mentioned to Arthur Young. He just touches the borderland of places destined a few years later to win blood-stained renown ; but in our own time, Goshens, overflowing with milk and honey. The truth is, there were neither roads, inns, towns, nor anything to tempt the curious traveller ready to defy such obstacles. The Vendean Bocage which enters into the department of Deux Sevres was a mere coppice- wood on a large scale, with here and there patches of rye and buckwheat. From this wilderness have arisen two Yenddes, the one ever famous in heroic story, the other blossoming as the rose; never an obscure waste so speedily endowed with a history, never desert so magically transformed into a garden ! NIORT. 147 Mj first acquaintance with this country began some years ago, when I zigzagged in all directions by dili- gence. Since that time railway communication has been much extended, and the most striking changes are witnessed on every side. Fifteen years before I had visited Yendean towns, accessible by railway, yet lighted only by the stars and moon in summer, by Ian terns slung upon cords in winter. At the present time we find out-of-the-way townlings provided with all the accessories of a city, insalubrious quarters re- placed b}^ spacious blocks, boulevards laid out, schools, training-colleges, and other works of public utility erected regardless of cost. Arrived at the chef-lieu of the Deux Sevres, the traveller might fancy himself in a capital, so vast the railway station, so full of activity its handsome streets. Yet Niort numbers twenty thousand and odd souls only. No rags, dirt, or beggary meet the eye in this pleasant, half-Protestant town. The charming Yen- dean coif may still be seen, even rich countrywomen not having abandoned the time-honored head-dress of their ancestresses, often trimmed with an heirloom of beautiful old lace. Niort was unfortunate enough to give birth to Maaame de Maintenon, who undid the work of Jeanne d'Arc. May not French history be summed up in a sentence? One woman rescued France, another brought about her overthrow. To this day the sui- cidal policy of Louis XIY.'s religious persecution is apparent. Niort was ruined by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The town, charmingly placed on 148 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. the banks of its little river, the Sevre Niortaise, lies amid vast fruit and vegetable gardens. In spite of the abundance of greenery, this richly cultivated belt has a warm, mellow, southern look; huge fig-trees recall the East; melons, tomatoes, peaches, purple grapes, ripen in the sun. These market gardens, pro- ducing alike choicest as well as homeliest first-fruits, admirably exemplify the adaptability of the French mind. The peasant finds out just what suits his soil, and devotes himself to that special culture, taking care to have other resources to fall back upon. Thus the onion has been found to prefer the soil around Niort. Accordingly 250 acres are devoted to this ancient veg- etable delicacy of the Pharaohs. La Yendee may also be said to flavo^ the soups of France and the wedding-cakes of Europe, candied angelica being largely exported from Niort. Within a few miles of the town, amid gracious scenery, we find those large tenant-farms which form a distinctive feature of the department. The Vendean character has a touch of Angevin affability. The inquisitive tourist, far from being regarded with suspicion, obtains a courteous welcome, and all the information he requires. It was a tenant-farm of between four and five hun- dred acres that I visited here in company witlt a Frenchwoman, who knew something about agricul- ture, and could therefore aid me in my researches. The first thing to strike an English mind was that contrasted wealth and squalor so often characteristic of French rural life. Their bare feet thrust in sabots, were the wife and children of a substantial farmer, MULE-REARING, 149 about them, in an unswept, smoke-begrimed kitchen, hens and chickens disported, while we were afterward shown a handsome new hooded carriage lately bought for family use! The housewife apologized for her untidy appearance, saying that she was very busy just then; but her husband, coming up with charming urbanity, offered to show us his stock. He had good- naturedly left his corn-thrashing and his workmen to place himself at our disposal. For sixty-five years this holding had been in the hands of the same family — a fact speaking volumes for both owner and tenant. It originally consisted in part of waste-lands, let at a nominal rent to begin with, the price being raised as the land increased in value. Mule-rearing for expor- tation to the Peninsula is one of the chief resources of the farmer here, and we saw forty young mules of various ages and great beauty. Sad it was to reflect that these carefully tended animals would fall into the hands of brutal Spanish and Portuguese drivers ! A new, airy stable had just been built for their accom- modation. The mules as well as the cattle are only put out to pasture in the cooler hours of the day. The price of a mule varies from £30 to £80, accord- ing to breed and beauty. Horses, cows, and oxen numbered about thirty head, and besides these there were sixty sheep. Part of the farm of course con- sisted of grazing-land, the remaining crops being corn, maize, rye, potatoes, beetroot. Nothing could exceed the cheerfulness of our host, although when I unwit- tingly asked how much vine-yard he had, he shook his head, saying: '' All my vineyards are ruined." It was 150 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. distressing to see here and there stacks of blackened vines that had been uprooted. These devastated vine- yards are either planted with American shoots or other crops, but it takes years for the owner to recoup his loss. The capital of this tenant-farmer could not be under ten thousand pounds, and he also possessed some land of his own. On this, most likely, he would build a house later on for retirement in old age, leav- ing the management of the farm to his children. If we were to go back to the beginnings of such a fam- ily, we should doubtless find that the first to hire any land kt all began with a nest-egg of a thousand or two francs. Doubtless at the onset he had farmed on the half-profit or metayage system, so often the stepping- stone from the position of day -laborer to that of free- holder or large occupier. Owing to sixty-five years of thrift and toil, the land has been doubled, tripled, and quintupled in value, alike to the advantage of the state, the owner, and the cultivator. And here an interesting fact is to be noted. As we travel through the length and breadth of the land, we find that the very word "peasant" applied to the small farmer is falling into disuse — in fact, rapidly becoming a survival. Just as the domestic servant who has saved up enough to live upon is called rentier^ a designation answering to our old-fashioned use of "gentleman," meaning a person who lives upon his means, so, no sooner does a peasant pos- sess or hire a holding of any size, than he becomes a cultivateur and takes the rank as well as the title of his wealthier neighbor, the owner or occupier of thou- WOMEN'S DRESS. 151 Our Yendean farmer, evidently peasant-born, yet courteous, intelligent, a man in the best sense of the word, awakened another reflection. The terrible twelfth chapter of De Tocqueville's great work must again and again present itself to the mind of the in- quirer in rural France. The " poverty-stricken, igno- rant, brutal, and shiftless rustics," of whom Turgot also spoke, have been replaced by what a competent living authority calls the healthier portion of the French nation. And the great minister of Louis XYI- did not know the peasant so well as M. Baudrillart, who in our own day has devoted his life to the study. Eoughly speaking, every one here may be said to possess U7i avoir — that is to say, a cottage and plot of land ; but I admit that it is often difficult for English observers to realize such universal well-being. Many small owners enjoying an income of two thousand francs yearly work as hard as if they were penniless day-laborers. In the villages round about Niort the dress of the women must to the uninitiated bespeak extreme poverty. Not that they were ragged or dirty, but in summer-time they seemed to wear only a coarse home-spun linen chemise with long sleeves ; over this, a black, whaleboned pair of stays did duty as a bodice ; home-spun woollen petticoat or overskirt, with sabots, completed the costume. The neat white head-dress was never wanting. If we enter these primitive interiors, we shall often find much to shock us. In the matter of sanitation, many Yendean villages are hardly better off than they were in Arthur Young's time. Provincial sediles 152 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. have yet to wake up to the necessity of sweeping re- forms of this kind. Wherever we go we find drainage the last thing thought of ; boulevards are laid out, hand- some schools erected, museums organized, statues raised, the tiniest townlet accorded an air of Paris, ^^et, when we inquire into the appliances for health and decency, we too often find few signs of improvement. There is much sweet pastoral scenery within easy reach of Niort. A charming sight is afforded by the mules disporting themselves toward sundown. The celebrated meadows of Belle Isle are then seen at their best, and nothing can be lovelier than the stretches of velvety pasture, sparkling streams, and alder-trees pencilled against the amber heavens, all bathed in effulgent gold. To realize the immense advance made by small towns, we must visit Fontenay-le-Comte, situated on the little river Vendee. Never perhaps since the Eubicon has insignificant stream won wider fame! Here the Yendee is navigable, and gives this small chef-lieu the bustle of a port. Formerly precious to the archaeologist, we might nowadays suppose that Fontenay-le-Comte, like La Eoche-sur-Yon, had been created, built from end to end just because a town was wanted. In the old quarters, far away from the railway station, bits of antiquity still peep out. We are reminded that this once dead-alive place possesses a history, having distinguished itself as a cradle of the Renaissance and given birth to many distinguished men. Fontenay-le-Comte, formerly devoted to the culture FONTENAY-LE-COMTE. 153 of tlie beautiful, is now absorbed in the manufacture of hats, just as Eouen now spins cotton instead of building churches. The architectural glories of this little Yendean town have disappeared; by way of compensation we see what municipal enterprise can effect for the com- munity. As we quit the railway station, it is difficult to be- lieve that we are entering a town of little over ten thousand inhabitants. Theatre, schools, training- colleges for teachers, hotels, boulevards, all of re- cent date, would seem rather to belong to some small flourishing city. As an instance of the public spirit shown by local governing bodies, the following inter- esting fact may be cited. Some years ago, a daughter of Fontenay-le-Comte, having brilliantly passed the examination of Bachelier-es-Sciences, wished to qual- ify herself as a physician in Paris. The municipal council, proud of their young townswoman, gallantly and generously placed the necessary funds at her dis- posal, with the rider, somewhat mortifying for advo- cates of the cause, " not because they approved of women doctors, but because Mile. B. was Mile. B." Mile. B. is now one of the most distinguished and successful lady physicians in France. A curious yet infallible sign of progress is often afforded by the advertisements in country railway stations. At Fontenay-le-Comte might be seen the large placard of an artificial-manure manufacturer of Suffolk. The geography of La Vendee (the article is omitted 154 FRANCE OF TO-DAT. in designating tlie department) is somewliat compli- cated, and requires explanation. Physical conforma- tion divides the ancient province into four portions — • the Bocage, the Plaine, the Marais, and the islands. First comes the Bocage, or eastern division, land of coppice- woods, thickets, and streams ; next, the Marais, or vast tract of marsh land, stretching westward to the sea; thirdly, the rich plain lying between these two, and in which stands Niort ; lastly, the islands of Yeu and Noirmoutier. But a historic division remains to be explained to the reader. In the annals of the civil war we con- stantly meet with the designation, " La Vendue mili- taire." This region, theatre of the most desperate encounters between the Kepublican and Royalist armies, lies northward of Niort and alongside the Loire toward the confines of Anjou. ^ III. LA CHARENTE INFERIEURE, LA GIRONDE. The traveller, taking a southwesterly dirsction from Niort, will be reminded of the moated granges of the Isle of Wight, the large, walled-in farmsteads attest- ing the extent and importance of the holding. We soon quit the department of the Deux Sevres and enter the Charente Inferieure, obtaining glimpses of many an ancient town by the way, all closely linked with the history of two great struggles — the death-throes of Anglo-French supremac}'', and the desperate fight for liberty of conscience. Between Niort and Saintes the country presents the appearance of one vast, richly- wooded park. Sunny hills rise on either side, and rivers meander through verdant meads. First of all comes St.-Jean d'Angely, its abbey towers dominat- ing the lanscape; next Saintes, home of the great Palissy, and famous for its amphitheatre, resembling that of Nimes, and triumphal arch in honor of Ger- manicus, hero of Tacitus' moving page. Here we quit the Charente as it winds amid lofty poplars and velvety reaches toward Angouleme. Pons, with its formidable donjon seen from afar, comes next — a pic- turesque old town placed high above a sweet land- scape. By and by these smiling scenes are exchanged 15G FRANCE OF TO-DAY. for a sad sight — vineyard after vineyard, lately sources of magnificent revenue, utterly destroyed by the phylloxera. Many, at the time I speak of (1887), were abandoned altogether, as if their owners had yielded to despair; in some places, cabbages and hardy crops were planted; in others, the American vine. More uprooted vineyards are passed ; then a whiff of sea air and the sight of low-lying sands remind us that Royan i3 reached, the fashionabe watering-place of rich Bordelais. Half an hour's driving through pine forests, now fast disappearing, bring us to St.- Georges de Didonne, the forest nook by the shores of the Atlantic discovered and, in a material sense, created by Michelet. Here, enchanted by the quiet beauty, primitiveness, and solitude of the place, he lingered, loath to tear himself away ; here, imbued with its poetry, he penned the fanciful pages of La Mer. The mixed rural and seafaring life, the artless, sturdy character of its inhabitants, a handful of staunch Protestants, the singular flora of the downs, the vast stretches of forest, and perpetual sights and sounds of the sea, exercised an extraordinary fascina- tion over the historian's mind. Readers of his prose poem must be prepared to find a great difference be- tween the ideal picture and the reality. When the poetizer, some would say the Zola of French history, came here more than a generation ago, this fishing- village was unknown to the holiday-world. La Mer made it popular. St.-Georges is an instance of the many health resorts SEA-SIDB FARMS. 157 that have sprung up within recent years in France, a noteworthy element of prosperity. Chalets and res- taurants, yearly added to, now stud this charming lit- tle bay. The iniflux of summer visitors compensates for poor harvests alike of land and sea. All that St.- Georges has, as yet, surrendered to the world is its quiet shore, soft flowing tide, and smooth brown sands. So firm, even, and velvety are these sands that not only is croquet played thereon during the day, but quadrille-parties held by moonlight. Visi- tors make up these al-fresco dances, and the villagers go to ga^e. On the shore, holiday folk disport them- selves ; elsewhere is solitude enough and to spare. Be- fore us we see the broad Gironde flowing from Bor- deaux to lose itself in the sea, and towering loftily from mid-ocean the celebrated lighthouse of Cordouan — • " the oldest in Europe," writes Michelet, " and for six months my perpetual contemplation and, I may add, daily society." Something of former rusticity re- mains. Little farms lie close to the sea, and not a. fisherman's cottage is without garden and vineyard. The half-seafaring and half-agricultural population is the thriftiest, soberest imaginable. Every man sits under the shadow of his own fig-tree, and want is unknown. Nature's bounteous gifts and the easily reaped fruits of a most productive soil are pretty equally shared among the population. Life is laborious in the extreme; luxuries for the most part are un- known, but tidiness, contentment, and sobriety prevail. Each owns his little dwelling, his modicum of soil, and the sense of independence renders him cheerful. 168 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. One sign of increasing prosperity is the number of neat cottages lately built or in course of erection by the peasant folk themselves for their own use. For the most part these houses are one-storied to begin with, a second being added when time and money can be spared. Never shall I forget the cheerfulness and dignity of an aged peasant I used to see daily at work in his garden. He told me that he had made over his farm to his sons, living under their roof, and only keeping a plot for occupation and amusement. A most productive piece of ground it was: grapes, peaches, tomatoes, artichokes, flourished in abundance, the rich, light soil requiring very little cultivation. The old man's head would have afforded a study for Eembrandt ; and as he chatted, leaning on his spade, he beamed with cheerfulness and satisfaction. It often happens that when age and infirmity overtake the owner, he thus surrenders responsibility to his chil- dren, receiving an allowance or maintenance out of the estate. The frequency of the arrangement would seem to show that it answers in the long run, though I am assured by the greatest living authority on the subject that unwillingness to fulfil these family com- pacts not unfrequently blots the character of the French peasant. No instances in point have come under my own observation. On the other hand, I wholly demur to the assertion that more reverence is manifested toward parents and grandparents in France than among ourselves. I have generally found the French child to be the fireside fetich, the object of reverence and adulation, elders giving way, expected PROTESTANTS. 159 to give way, as a matter of course to the caprices and convenience of little autocrats in pinafores. It is touching to witness the tenacity with which Protestantism has taken root in remote corners, ten- der plant, crushed, tempest-tossed, uprooted again and again, yet struggling for dear life till a more auspi- cious moment should come. Just a hundred years ago a minister of the Eeformed faith heroically settled at St. -Georges to preach the gospel to a handful of fisher- folk. Well might he be called by his biographer the pastor of the desert, for a veritable wilderness was this forest-girt seaboard. Terrible, too, beyond belief, was the position of Protestants throughout the coun- try at that time. Their children, although born in wedlock, were illegitimate according to French law, tlie only recognized baptism, marriage, and burial being those of the Catholic ritual. Ministers were liable at any moment to be imprisoned, exiled, or cruelly put to death ; children to be torn from their parents and consigned to Catholic teachers. But the iniquitous edicts of 1745 went farther: men attending Protestant worship were condemned to the galleys without trial, women to perpetual imprisonment, and heavy fines were inflicted on all who, without being present, should refrain from denouncing those guilty of such offences. Could the religion of persecution go beyond this? Jarosseau, the historic pastor of St.- Georges de Didonne, was compelled to gather his flock together in the forest depths, or with his little congre- gation put out to sea and there hold divine service. He was compelled to sleep in a walled -up cupboard, 160 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. approaclied by a secret stair, never venturing abroad except at risk of life. Unable to endure this state of things, Jarosseau set off for the capital on his sorry nag, appropriately named "Misere," and after almost unheard-of privations and difficulties obtained an in- terview with Louis XVI. On his knees the pastor demanded, and to his ineffable joy received, the royal permission to celebrate Protestant worship at St.- Georges. Little did he dream, when selling off his wife's patrimony in order to defray the expense of the journey, what great events were looming in the future. A year or two later, the Eevolution, with a stroke of the pen, proclaimed absolute liberty of conscience throughout France. None the less is Jarosseau 's name worthily held in veneration among French Protestants. His humble parsonage, with its walled - up chamber, still exists, aptly styled by Michelet a temple of humanity. One of his grandsons has chronicled his touching story. During my stay, the inauguration of a new pastor took place, the simple ceremony affording much mat- ter for .thought. The congregation assembled to welcome their minister was an interesting study. Those sunburnt, stalwart farmers and fishers, with their women folk in black cloaks and hoods, might have figured in a historic canvas as Huguenots of old. One veteran's head was sublime : his snow-white hair and tawny, beardless face, with Roman features, Worthy of Coligny himself. With upraised head he sat, drinking in every syllable of the preacher's dis- course ; on his brow written the fiery spirit, the in- FRENCH PROTESTANTISM, 161 domitable conviction, that had once been ready to brave fire and sword, rnin and exile, separation from wife and child, rather than surrender conscience. St.- Georges may be taken as typical of scores and scores of little Protestant centres scattered throughout South- west France — communities of homely yet thoughtful men, who have changed their politics and social creeds, but cloven, through good and evil days, to the faith of their fathers. It cannot be said that great religious fervor is dis- played either on the part of shepherd or flock. As a rule, I have found the Reformed Church somewhat inadequate and lukewarm in country places. The office of pastor often seems as much a matter of rou- tine as that of juge de paix. Service is coldly per- formed once a day on Sundays, the rites of baptism, marriage, and burial are duly celebrated, the minister receives a house, good garden, and small salary, and there the matter ends. If Protestantism loses rather than gains ground, I think we need not go far for an explanation. Of course we meet with admirable ex- ceptions here and there. The average village pastor, as a w^orker and pioneer, is not for a moment to be compared with an East End curate or a captain of the Salvation Army. I have sometimes known a country church or temple remain unswept and undusted from Sunday to Sunday — a trifle in itself, but full of sig- nificance. It is curious that the phylloxera should have the same effect as an edict against Protestantism. Yet so it is ; the pastor Just elected to St.-Georges de Didonne 163 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. had q-uitted his post at Narbonne on account of the dispersal of his congregation. The Protestants of that town, as I have before mentioned, being chiefly wine merchants, on the ruin of their trade had gone else- where. The annexation of Alsace-Lorraine made a large gap in the French Reformed Church, reducing its numbers from a million to six hundred thousand, or about one and a half per cent of the total popula- tion. We observe, when studying the reign of Louis XIV., that Protestantism has been chiefly handed down from generation to generation among the indus- trial and mercantile classes. The dazzling splendor of the court, the prestige of the king's person, mag- netized in more senses than one. A great centralizing movement, social, political, and theological, then took place. Thus, during the reign of the Grand Monarque most of the aristocratic Huguenot houses still remain- ing in France went over to Catholicism, while the merchant, the artisan, the shepherd, who lived remote from such influences, never abandoned their religion. It needed the iron will and staunch conviction of a Turenne to resist the threats and blandishments of the most fascinating despot history has portrayed. The department of the Charente Inferieure shows an appreciable percentage of Protestants — about one- twentieth of the entire population. As we go farther south, we shall find this percentage increase, while the wealth and social position of the members of the Re- formed Church become conspicuous. Happily, religious differences no longer engender social feudsj and Catholics and Protestants live at St.- A FEMALE MISER. 163 Georges on neighborly terms. When a venerable and much-esteemed pastor lately died there, the entire community followed his remains to the grave. In- terxnarriages are not frequent, but do occasionally take place. Agriculture is behindhand in these seaboard vil- lages, and the sordid side of peasant property never struck me more humorously than in Michelet's Ar- cadia. In our walks we used daily to meet a weather- beaten, miserably clad old woman keeping a little flock of sheep, perhaps a dozen in all. So abject was her appearance that, but for my tolerably wide experi- ence of rural France, I should have offered alms. Well that I did not ! This pitiable-looking crone, in her coarse, oft-patched woollen clothes, her stocking- less feet thrust in sabots, never returning home till night-fall, was no recipient of charity, no vagrant thus permitted to earn a few sous daily by keeping sheep, but one of the richest landowners, nay, the richest woman farmer for miles round, possessed of stocks and shares, houses and lands, able if she chose to live in fashionable retirement at Bordeaux. So great was her penuriousness that, like the Carmelite nuns, she wore no linen, and never, although a Catholic, tidied herself .and went to mass. This ancient Cinderella had a daughter, and, as so often happens in France, for her the Ancien Edgime had come to an end and the new begun. The daughter, educated and up to a certain point reared as a young lady, was married just before my arrival. The wedding was celebrated at church and 164 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. mairie with conventional parade, a sumptuous ban- quet laid out at the principal inn ; and by the side of the bride, who wore the orthodox white satin, long veil, and myrtle wreath, a seat reserved for the hos- pitable entertainer. As yet she had not made her appearance, and all was tiptoe expectation as the guests took their places, the mayor, municipal coun- cillors, and leading inhabitants being among the com- pany. The banquet had nearly come to an end when in hobbled the hostess, for once wearing Sunday dress — that is to say, white muslin coif, black gown, gay shoulder kerchief, and neat shoes and stockings. The daughter, amply dowered and married into a middle-class family of a provincial town, pays her mother visits from time to time, but the marriage made no difference whatever in the old lady's habits. I shall have many counter-pictures to set against this one ; it is only fair to give both sides of peasant life. Here, be it remarked, no vice was added to miserli- ness. If Catholicism has not spiritualized the French peasant, neither has the creed of Luther, however admirable its moral and social influences as witnessed here. A less quarrelsome, more temperate population it would be hard to find. During a stay of many weeks, I never heard a rough word or saw a sign of drunkenness. People go about their days' work cheerfully without needing the stimulus of the caba- ret. The chief business of the garde champetre^ who does duty for policeman in rural France, seems to be that of town-crier. Crime is exceedingy rare. CHANGED FOR THE BETTER, 165 When Michelet wrote, the headlands between St.- Georges and Roy an were mere waste, in summer showing a mosaic of wild flowers. This vast expanse has gradually been laid under cultivation, alternating with tamarisk in rosy bloom, or groups of dark ilex, are tiny vineyards, cornfields, or patches of potato, all flourishing high above the shore. Quitting the whitewashed village with its trellised vines and venerable fig-trees, we enter a bit of forest shutting out the sky, or traverse little pastures watered by crystal clear runlet, in the midst of this solitude and seclusion finding some husbandman at work in vineyard or plot of maize. Everywhere promising spots are utilized, and inch by inch waste lands re- deemed. Beautiful trees flourish here in great vari- ety; aspen, ilex, oak, chestnut, ash, elm, beech, birch, alder, acacia, pine, and fir all grow side by side, and close to the sea. If we go farther afield, we find a rich open country, not many years since mere skit marsh, now fertile and productive. Here as elsewhere many vines have been partially or entirely ruined by the phylloxera. The farmer cheerfully drives his team across the uprooted vineyard, and, awaiting better times, accepts with thankfulness a fourth part of his former revenue. In spite of such devastation the department still holds first rank as a wine-produc- ing region, while it is also one of the richest from an agricultural point of view. Between the years 1874 and 1881 its wine-crops were reduced by oncrseventh. On the other hand, year by year, immense tracts of salt marsh have been rendered cultivable, and the 166 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. averages of corn and other cereals proportionately increased. Flax and hemp, lucerne, colza, and clover are also among its products. The rich harvests of the sea must not be forgotten. The Charente Inferieure is not only the nursery of • the American vine, hundreds of thousands of shoots being planted here ; it is also the cradle of the oyster. Loungers at St.-Georges de Didonne may amuse them- selves by gathering oysters for breakfast, the hollowed cliffs abounding with them in all stages of growth, from oy sterling no larger than a baby's thumbnail to the full-sized delicacy. These are but as wild strawber- ries to the large, luscious first-fruits of the hothouse. The education of the oyster, like that of the silk- worm, is an elaborate process. The young are brought in from La Vendde, Brittany, and Portugal in a white condition, and are laid in grottoes visited by the tide not oftener than four or six times a month. At the end of September they are in that state of green per- fection supplied at the famous restaurants of Bor- deaux. The great oyster-parks of Marennes, representing a commerce of many millions, more than compensate for a lost industry. At one time foremost salt-work in France, Marennes now produces oysters renowned throughout Europe. Competition ruined the salt- distiller as the phylloxera had ruined the wine-grower, but a second goose was at hand to lay golden eggs ! La Tremblade is another centre of oyster-rearing, while in certain villages the mussel is cultivated with almost equal profit. These marine plantations, as they de- THE VINE-PEST. 167 serve to be called, employ thousands of men and women. With keen regret the traveller will take leave of Michelet's holiday haunt, all the more so as its primi- tiveness and poetry are fast disappearing. One charm must remain. The atmospheric effects are here bril- liant, phenomenal as in Anjou. On a certain day of early October I noted the loveliest scene — a warm blue sky, over which floated rosy clouds, the silver crescent of the moon just visible as through a veil above the brown vineyards and tamarisk groves; a gleam of metallic sea ; gradually the rose melted into the blue, and the pale silvery crescent shone out dazzlingly bright, a fiery splendor amid the deep azure heavens. Eoyan is sheer commonplaceness, cosmopolitan har- borage for sea-bathers and valetudinarians, nothing more. All the fascination of heroic story clings to beautiful La Eochelle. The barest chronicle of its two sieges stirs the blood still, while the antique state- liness of the place well matches so magnificent a re- nown. It is one of the most beautiful towns of France, hardly so elegant as pensive Nancy (Nancy weeping for her lost Alsace !) ; not so engaging as Dijon, the home-like; less picturesque than sombre Le Puy; less romantic than mountain-girt Mende or St.-Claude ; ^ not so sweet a picture as Autun — yet none fascinate us more. Of late years the maritime importance of this thrice- martyred city — the first glorious siege under Coligny, 168 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. the second, and the ruin effected by the Edict of Nantes making up the list— ^has greatly risen. Ex- tended docks and floating basins have changed the aspect of the sea front. Between 1855 and 1880 its tonnage had quadrupled. The little island of Oleron, within an hour of the coast, is an instance of the rapid development of agri- culture in remote regions. Within forty years the products of the lie d'Oleron have quadrupled in value. A " silver streak " would seem to afford protection against more than one invader. The phylloxera has not appeared here, and persistently avoids a sandy soil. From Eoyan a steamer bears us to Bordeaux in three hours, the journey through the bright Medoc affording many a charming scene, and much matter for thought. Let us give our minds for a little space to that terrible question of the phylloxera. Never sadder incident figured in the fairy tale of science. It is now twenty-five years ago since the inhabitants of Eoquemaure, on the Rhone, found their vines mys- teriously withering. A little later the left bank was attacked, and about the same time the famous brandy- producing region of Cognac in the Charente showed the same symptoms. When in 1868 the cause of the mischief was brought to light, the revelations were appalling. Here was an insect hardly visible to the naked eye, yet so formed by nature as to be a whole- sale engine of destruction — mitrailleuse of the vege- table world ! its phenomenal productiveness no less fatal than its velocity of motion. A parasite propa- gating millions in one season — a thousand eggs sufiio THE VmE-PEST. 169 ing to destroy a hectare of vines — is redoubtable enough ; the fact that it is also furnished with wings, or rather sails, according unlimited powers of loco- motion, might well awaken a feeling of despair. A breeze, a grain of dust, and this winged destruction, infinitesimal as the germ of some fearful plague, is borne whither chance directs — if into the midst of a vineyard, to the certain ruin of plants. It will easily be understood with what rapidity the havoc spread. From end to end of vine-growing France arose cries of consternation. One world-re- nowned vintage was attacked after another: now the Clos Yougeot; next Epernay; none escaped. Since the appearance of the destroyer, the damages have reached a sum total of two hundred millions sterling, an equivalent of Bismarck's mxonstrous war indemnity. Nevertheless , in the exceptionally good season of 1875 France produced almost enough wine to supply each inhabitant of the globe with a bottle — that is to say, a thousand millions ! At the present time pro- duction does not suffice for home use. Large quanti- ties of wine are now imported from Spain and Italy, much being utilized in the manufacture of brandy. The phylloxera, introduced by American vines, appears likely to, strange to say, be exterminated by them — the same country imparting both disease and remedy. The root of the American vine is hardy, resisting all attacks, and among the most efficacious means tried by ruined wine-growers is the replanting with trans- Atlantic shoots. An enormous superficies (three hundred thousand hectares) has been thus trans- 170 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. formed of late years, the department of the Herault, devastated to the extent of a million francs, being entirely Americanized. Other experiments have an- swered elsewhere, as we shall see, and, on the whole, French economists begin to say " The battle is won." ^ Several circumstances favored the Medoc : its sandy soil, its brisk westerly winds, above all, the extraor- dinary precautions taken in time, have here minimized the damage of the phylloxera. As the traveller steams between these incomparable vineyards, he is not made melancholy by scenes of ruin and desolation. The opulence of Bordelais wine-growers, attested by their noble chateaux and mansions studding the banks of the Gironde, is still princely. Magnificent too is the approach to the city, awakening the reflection of Arthur Young, "We must not name Liverpool in competition with Bordeaux." But "the grand fea- ture " distinguishing the two consists no longer of mere bricks and mortar, as was the case a hundred years ago. What strikes an English traveller at the present time is the absence here of that appalling spectacle witnessed in our own first seaport — a pinched, tattered, barefooted juvenile population, evidently thrown on its own moral and material resources. No such anomaly disgraces the lively streets of Bor- deaux. The first object of the stranger should be his break- fast. To quit the noble capital of southwest France without having degustated one of its famous dejeuners ' See Appendix, Note 13. COOKERY AS A FINE ART. 171 would be to leave Eome without a sight of St. Peter's.^ There are of course restaurants and restaurants in this busy brilliant city of three hundred thousand souls. You may eat gold, silver, or small change; in other words, spend as much or as little as you please. If your object is experience, then the best restaurant should be patronized regardless of cost. Not only is cookery cultivated as a fine art — the highwater mark is also reached in minor accessories, exquisite finish imparted to every detail. The waiters are trained no less carefully than young men destined for the learned professions. In addition to irreproach- able personal appearance, alertness, amiability, they must possess an engaging presence, tact, charm of manner, and, above all, be skilled in physiognomy. It is their business to discover at a glance what people can, and what they cannot, digest. For the proper enjoyment of certain local dainties, one must be Bordelais born and bred. The famous dish called ceps^ or mushrooms prepared in oil, requires an apprenticeship. No doubt the taste with the re- quisite digestive power would come in time. Again, Bordeaux is not only celebrated for its oysters, but the epicurean method of eating them. Nothing what- ever is added except a little of the salt water impreg- nated with its flavor; and as an oyster is cold, gas- tronomic delectation and diojestion are attained bv delicate little sausages steaming hot and eaten sand- wich-like between. It is stated that the English consume more champagne than any other nation. French hosts, connoisseurs in matters of the table, know 172 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. better than to spoil a clioice banquet with treacherous, sparkling wine. They give you a glass of the best Sauterne, Mddoc, or Beaune, which neither muddles the brain, heats the blood, nor interferes with the di- gestion; and, when coflEee is served, a thimbleful of Cognac cellared thirty or more years ago. To see the bewitching Bordelais to perfection, we must spend a Sunday afternoon in the Botanical Gar- den, when first-rate military music, one of the most beautiful pleasure-grounds on a small scale imaginable, and general example entice every one out of doors. And to see the characteristic headdress at all, we should lose no time, the bonnet fast replacing the soft silk kerchief of blue, pink, white, or yellow, inimita- bly twisted round dark hair and fastened with an ornamental pin. The Bordelais are proud of their opera-house, and no wonder. Built on the eve of the Revolution, at a cost of three million francs, it is the handsomest, without and within, of provincial France, and is kept up regardless of expense. Fastidious taste is exer- cised in the choice of artistes, who pay a visit on ap- proval. Only first-rate talent is acceptable to the critical townsfolk. I witnessed Gounod's Faust and the Hamlet of Thomas, in both cases the principal role being filled by candidates. I found a fine orchestra, a charming mise-en-schne^ highly finished acting, and a ballet only to be objected on the score of inadequate clothing. "On n'y fait pas attention," remarked a French friend good-naturedly; and, true enough, no one seemed to pay attention. STEAMERS. 173 The lover of the grandiose who reaches Bordeaux by rail will do well to take one of the little steamers plying between the city and Lormont, five miles lower down on the opposite side of the river. A rapid view is thus obtained of the noble sea-front — none nobler in the world, the Gironde, here wine-red, spanned by lofty bridges, mile upon mile of quays crowded with shipping, flags of all nations fluttering in the air; proudly dominating all, the superb clock-towers of the cathedral and St.-Michel. In close juxtaposition are magnificent steamers carrying a thousand passengers between Bordeaux and the Brazils, timber-laden brigs from Norway, more modest craft still from Liverpool ; the stranger bent on closer inspection being politely shown over any. During my visit I spent a good deal of time in tlie docks, and was warmly welcomed by some fellow- countrymen, captain, chief mate, and cook of a tiny English steamer under repair. They invited me most cordially to return to Liverpool with them, promising me every care and attention. I mention the incident, as a French friend accompanying me was much struck by it. "I understand now," he said, "the secret of English greatness beyond seas. The English language binds your country-folks together — forms a veritable bond of union. With ourselves it is not so. A fel- low-countryman is not warmly welcomed merely as such." I should have thought the reverse to be the case. In Arthur Young's charming account of Bordeaux, while streets, threatrc, and inns are minutely described, 174 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. we find no word concerning popular education, now developed on so lavish and comprehensive a scale. At the present time there is no subject, technical, lit- erary, artistic, or scientific, that adult scholars of both sexes may not learn free of cost. The noble city has completed the work of the state, and placed the priv- ileges of higher instruction within the reach of all. Among the subjects taught in these free evening classes I found English, Spanish, and German ; each of the first importance in a great emporium of foreign trade. Besides night-schools, exist many institutions especially founded in the interests of women. In his great geographical work, E. Eeclus accredits Bordeaux with the first technical school opened in France for girls. This is an error. Already an institution of the kind had been founded at Nantes by the late dis- tinguished Dr. Guepin and his public-spirited wife. Bordeaux has also a Lycee or public day-school for girls, a training-college for women teachers, and many strictly popular organizations, swimming-schools, gym- nasiums, and the like. When we come to the fine arts, we find that Arthur Young could no more have described museums than educational institutions, for the very good reason that they did not exist. The splendidly housed collections here date from the First Eepublic. Forty-five canvases formed the nucleus of the present collection, which, although inferior to that of Montpellier and Lyons, contains several chefs- d'oeuvre and specimens of living masters. IV. THE CHAEENTE, HAUTE VIEI^NE, INDEE. With melancholy feelings the traveller entered the department of the Charente in 1885. A veritable wave of ruin had swept over the country, entirely changing its aspect; the dreaded cyclone of tropic regions not more disastrous than the wine-pest here ! From every side the same tale of ruin and desolation reached my ears. Large numbers of peasant wine- growers had migrated to the towns in search of em- ployment; many had found work in the various fac- tories set up for "their benefit ; villages, once entirely given up to agriculture, now resounded with tne drone of machinery; and, curiously enough, one of the cost- liest products of the world was exchanged for the cheapest — the laborious but profitable culture of the vine replaced by the manufacture of paper ! Scribbledom, instead of Bacchic revel, now enriches the Charentais — perhaps a consolatory thought for those who deplore the over-production of books. While the vintages throughout the department had been reduced by a tenth, the manufacture of paper had proportionately increased. The celebrated paper of Angouleme is largely exported to America, quality rather than quantity being paid for. An eighteenth 176 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. of the entire manufacture of France only is made here, but a tenth of the commerce in money is represented- The age of compulsory education is naturally the apogee of paper-mills. The bulk consumed in French schools averages yearly two hundred million pounds' weight — almost double that of private correspondence. Other local industries have been established; this reigns supreme. Paper revived the hopes of a ruined population. Paper gradually filled empty parses, and brought cheerfulness to desolate firesides. By the time I speak of, the acuteness of the crisis was already past. Companies had been formed for the purpose of grafting vines on American stocks, trying chemical processes, submergence, and other means for the ex- tirpation of the phylloxera. Some authorities regard the vine-pest as a disease fastening itself on a worn- out constitution, and urge the necessity of enrichiDg and resting the soil. Incredible as it may appear, many vineyards had not been manured for upward of fifty years. The Charente, with the other departments of south- west France, possesses a marked Protestant element, but I am assured that alike Catholics and Protestants are indifferent on the subject of religion. This atti- tude is accounted for in the tremendous sufferings un- dergone by their forefathers during the religious wars. Religiosity has made religion distasteful. The more thoughtful came to the conclusion generations ago that doo^ma and matters outside human cosrnizance were not worth the bloodshed and deadly feuds they had occasioned. Thus the prevailing indifference of this AMALGAMAMATIOJSr. 177 Laodicea of departments is regarded as hereditary — an interesting speculation to the psychologist. Substan- tial wealth may still be found in rural districts. Dur- ing my stay the autumnal manoeuvres were taking place, and a general of division with his staff were in- vited by a village mayor to dinner.. The banquet, admirably cooked and served, would have done credit to a wealthy middle-class house ; the peasant farmer, his wife and daughter, doing the honors with the ease and reserve characteristic of their class. In De Tocqueville's great work he describes his countrymen before the Eevolution as so many units, without cohesion or points of contact. While one Frenchman closely resembled another, he affirmed that each section of society held aloof. Arthur Young noted the same characteristic, and was overcome with astonishment at the stringency of social distinctions. We may here and there find such a state of things existing to this day, but, on the whole, the tendency is rather toward amalgamation. Intermarriages, the revised military law, education, all aid the levelling process. In many a village, school-children of the rich merchant and poor charcoal-burner learn their A B C side by side. The heir of an ancient house may find in his comrade of the barracks some neighboring peasant's son. Young ladies sent to fashionable con- vents have for school-fellows daughters of village black- smith or baker. And the gradual disappearance of costume is not without effect also. The substitution of the bonnet for the coif, the frock-coat for the blouse, has more significance than we imagine. 178 FRANCE OF TO-BAY, Angouleme is one of. those Frencli cities of the third rank quite magnificently placed. It stands on a pyramidal rock, the steep sides of the \oiij summit, crowned by the ancient town and ramparts, running horizontally to the plain below. The city, with its noble Eomanesque cathedral, clustering spires, and gleaming roofs, rises above hanging woods and gar- dens, coronal of greenery smiling away all savageness. Fair beyond description is the vast plain below, Henri Quatre's favorite river making sinuous way amid pop- lars, and pastures, every object reflected in the trans- parent waters ; green islets, mere groves and gardens- are formed by its convolutions, while farther off white villages and church-spires dot the landscape. Lovely is the play of light and shadow on foliage and water, the great charm of the Charente being its transparency. The effect from a boat is magical. We seem to be floating in mid-air. I reached Angouleme, not with- out misgivings, on the eve of the general election. My scruples were soon laughed away. " You would not know unless you were told," said French friends, " that anything unusual is going on to-morrow." True enough, next day the town presented its usual aspect. Nothing had been done in the way of decoration: there were no flags flying, no colors worn, and very few placards to be seen. Groups collected here and there, but without any sign of excitement. Nor as the day wore on did matters alter. About four o'clock in the afternoon we strolled to the Hotel de Ville to watch the voters. A solitary sergent-de-ville guarded the door of the polling-place, and even his presence SCHOOLS. 1T9 was unnecessary. Yoters went in by twos and threes quietly, as if about to make a purchase. At night the streets presented a striking contrast to those of an English town under similar circumstances. All was quiet, peaceful, and orderly. Brass bands, noisy pro- cessions, cheers, groans, and songs were alike absent. Yet not so long ago we were accustomed to regard our neighbors as the most excitable race under the sun, quite incapable of controlling themselves under un- usual circumstances. Here as elsewhere we find evidences of the tremen- dous efforts of the Third Republic on behalf of female education. Not the least interesting ©f the splendid modern buildings that adorn the city is its recently constructed training-college for female teachers. The Protestant element throughout the department is ap- preciable by virtue of character rather than numbers, the 4,000 and odd Protestants scattered among the principal towns being decidedly ahead of their neigh- bors in education, enterprise, and position. And here, too, the spectre of Mme. de Main tenon rises before us — veritable fury, carrying fire and sword wherever she went, her path marked by tears, blood- shed, and ruin. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes depopulated this region. Cognac, Jarnac, and other flourishing industrial centres losing their fore- most citizens. .Richly endowed, both in talents and in energy, the Charentais have surmounted one crisis after another, benefiting as well as honoring their native land. It is not a very productive country between Limoges i80 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. and ngouleme, but pastoral, varied, and refreshing to the eye. Eomantic as are these Old-World villages, we are perpetually reminded of modern utilitarianism. By the banks of clear-flowing streams, in the heart of secluded valleys, here, as in the Jura, factories com- pensate for the barrenness of the soil, paper-mills, pot- teries, enamel- works, shoe factories, tanneries, alternat- ing with Romanesque churches, old chateaux, and mediaeval strongholds. For a great part of the way we follow the winding Yienne, a lovely river that seems to have chosen for itself the loveliest surroundings. Even Arthur Young was moved to enthusiasm amid these scenes. For the most part provokingly indif- ferent to beauty in landscape, the illustrious farmer be- comes rapturous here. " The beauty of the Limousin," he writes, " does not depend on any particular feature, but the result of many. Hill, dale, wood, enclosures, streams, lakes, and scattered farms are mingled in a thousand delicious landscapes." Not far from Limoges is a spot so romantic and engaging as to have won for itself the name of a little Switzerland. This is in the neighborhood of Aixe, an ancient town possessing, as do many others hereabouts, a little river of its own, the Aixette, and a Romanesque church. Limoges, chef-lieu of the Haute Yienne, stands in the heart of the chestnut country. What the apple is to Nor- mandy, the olive to Provence, the grape to Burgundy., is the chestnut to the Limousin. These trees are still a glory to behold, but, unfortunately for the lover of the picturesque, large numbers are annually destroyed in order to plant cereals. Chestnuts are still eaten, al- CHESTNUTS, 181 though the country people no longer regard them as a substitute for bread. In the early part of this century these trees covered an area equal to that of an average department. In spite of the diminution — about one- third in 1887 — the entire crop represents as large a revenue as that of French faience, just upon fifty mil- lions of francs. Both are specialities of the Haute Yienne. The fortunes of Mulhouse, the great centre of cotton printing, are due to the extraordinary purity of its water, the beauty of the so-called toiles d' Alsace chiefly depending on this circumstance. The prosperity of the porcelain manufactures of Limoges is also due to natural causes; in other words, to the abundance of kaolin and p^tunzd found hereabouts. The history of kaolin is curious. It is a fine white clay found in strata above the gneiss, and was long known to the Chinese, and used by them in their manufacture of so-called hard or kaolinic porcelain. It is from the Chinese we have the name. The Germans had also discovered the value of kaolin at an early period, but for some time kept their method a secret. Not till 1760 was this beautiful substance discovered in France. The magnificent beds of Saint-Yrieix, near Limoges, were found a few years later by the wife of a poor country doctor. Whether the family fortunes were thereby enriched local history does not say. The effect of the discovery on French ceramic art, espe- cially at Sevres, was tremendous. Petunzd, a kind of felspar, known to the Chinese, and equally valuable in the manufacture of porcelain, also exists here. 182 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Kaolin, in its pure state, is a bluish-white substance, which undergoes many processes, and most of these are courteously shown and explained to the visitor. The porcelain industry of Limoges is of later date than the no less famous works of Kouen, Nevers, Strasburg, Luneville, and other towns, but now holds the fore- most place. Its magnificent collections and schools of art and design, founded in 1881, render this town an artistic centre of the first importance. We have not only French ceramic art epitomized before our eyes, but famous faiences of the world are here adequately represented. The French section will of course chiefly interest English visitors. The museum contains mas- terpieces of former as well as contemporary artists. Much of the old Limoges-ware is pure white, or white with gold border. Modern taste inclines to delicate color. Exquisite landscapes in pale green, pink, or deep purple, seaweeds on a pure white ground, silvery moon and stars amid misty blue heavens, cornflowers and other elegant blossoms, shells, butterflies, and in- sects, are treated with consummate skill, fancy, and artistic feeling. A favorite kind is pure white porce- lain with semi-transparent pattern. I may remark by the way that the taste for artistic pottery is spreading throughout every part of France. In quite out-of-the- way places we come upon faienceries of recent date, and in the homes alike of artisan and peasant speci- mens of cheap majolica now adorn chimney-piece or sideboard. The traveller approaching Chateauroux, chef-lieu of the Indre, by way of Limoges, will hardly pass Argen- FAlENOE. 183 ton without a halt. We are here " on the shores of old romance," having entered the region immortal- ized by the greatest idealist of modern fiction. With Le Peche de Monsieur Antoiiie in hand, we may realize the changes that have taken place here since George Sand's time. Even on revisiting the Indre after five years' absence, I found unmistakable signs of prog- ress, waste-lands replaced by crops, improved agricul- tural methods, increased well-being. A hundred years ago Argenton presented to the Suffolk squire "a delicious scene," and this is un- changed. The deep-roofed houses still rise terrace- wise above the river, forming stage upon stage of pic- turesque streets hemmed around by green hills ; the deep blue, transparent Creuse meandering below, with many a loop, around its windings sunny pastures and lace-like foliage of poplar and alder. If the sweeps of ling and gorse and the shining mares^ or marshy pools, gradually disappear, the bolder features of the landscape remain. Here romance and reality, prose and poetry, may be taken hand in hand. While visit- ing the idyllic scenes described by an inimitable pen, we can study two subjects Arthur Young sought for here in vain, "fat farmers" and "a good bit of tur- nips." Chateauroux affords convenient if not delectable headquarters for the inquiring traveller. We are here in the Bas Berry, the Haut Berry, with Bourges for its capital, forming the department of the Cher. No part of France presents better opportunities for study- ing the land question and rural life generally than 184 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. George Sand's country. It is essentially an agricul- tural region. It is a region in which during the last fifty years large tracts have passed into the hands of the peasants. Side by side with farms of three or four acres, acquisitions of yesterday, may be seen holdings of several hundred acres, farmed on the half- profit or metayer system. My host, a large landowner living within a few miles of Chateauroux, was the very person to instruct an inquirer upon rural affairs. Formerly owner of al- most an entire commune, he has gradually reduced the size of his estate by selling small parcels of land to his neighbors and in former days his day -laborers. Such steps were taken from mixed motives, personal, social, and philanthropic. Commercially speaking, the transaction was advantageous. The expense of keeping these large tracts in good cultivation is very great, and he could not realize anything like the re- turns of the small owner. Much land hitherto unpro- ductive was thus turned into capital, while the effects of the transfer upon the people are incalculable. The cultivator of the soil is raised socially and morally ; he is able to advance his children in life, his future as well as their own is assured, and, having a stake in the welfare of his country, he is certain to be found on the side of law and order. Thus in his person the peasant-farmer guarantees the political stability of France. " When we have solved the like problem in our cities and large towns," observed this gentleman to me, " when the French artisan as well as the peasant FARMS. 185 becomes a possessor, a freeholder, then the condition of France will be firm as a rock " (inebranlable). Great as are the moral gains to both state and indi- vidual by this extension of peasant proprietorship, the material benefits accruing to the nation are yet more considerable. Land in the neighborhood of Chateau- roux has doubled, trebled, and quadrupled in value within the last fifty years. Eoads and railways have contributed to bring about this rise in value, but th^ change must be chiefly attributed to the indomitable perseverance and laboriousness of the peasant. Aa all readers of Greorge Sand know well, the Berry abounded in landes, or waste. The extent of these wastes is being gradually reduced. Every acre oi ground that is sold, every thousand francs expended upon land, is so much added wealth to the country, Much of the scenery between Chateauroux and my friend's village is very pretty and very English. But for the patches of vineyard here and there, we could fancy ourselves in Sussex or Devonshire. The road is bordered with tall hedges, a tangle of wild rose, clematis, and bryony, while beyond we obtain glimpses of wide fields and vast pastures, divided, as with our* selves, by close-set hawthorn. Quiet, shady paths lead to woodland nooks or by winding streams bor dered with lofty poplars, and in every meadow the beautiful tan-colored cattle of the district were taking their ease. Here and there, at some little distance from the road, we see the large farmhouse or manoir of gentleman-farmer, or a metairie standing in the midst of farm-buildings. 186 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Soon we enter the vast forest of Chateauroux, and follow a broad road, amid oak, chestnut, and walnut trees ; then we come upon stretches of heath and brush- wood, where amid broom and heather some little Fadette keeps her flock of geese or turkeys. Let rue describe exactly what I saw iu the company of my host during a visit in 1886. We began by vis- iting one of the smallest holdings that had been re- cently purchased of him — namely, a farm of two and a half hectares, or about six acres. Here, as in most other cases, the new owner had built himself a cottage and laid out a vegetable garden. As land at that time fetched £40 per hectare, we had already evidence of an economy to the extent of £100. The cost of build- ing materials, agricultural implements, stock, consist- ing of pigs, a few sheep, geese, horse or donkey, rep- resented at least a similar outlay. My host informed me that the owner of ten to twelve hectares, that is to say, from twenty to thirty acres, may be set down as a capitalist worth £800 or £1,000. We may as- sume the owner of two and a half to be worth a fourth part of that sum. It is obvious that so small a hold- ing will not support a family ; in order to make ends meet, also to lay by for further purchases, the small farmer works half the week as laborer, or takes out his labor in the use of a team. By little and little the domain is increased. Five hectares will keep a cow, or even a pair of oxen for tillage. Five hectares will support a family, while ten or twelve mean comfort and ease. The first holding we visited was a recent acquisi- COTTAGE HOMES. 187 tion, and it was delightful to witness the friendly feel- ing that existed between the old proprietor and the new. The farmer quitted his work in a field adjoining to shake hands with us and invite us indoors, evi- dently with pride in his house. Solid oak presses full of homespun linen, flitches of bacon hanging from the ceiling, a neat hearth, and even cheap pictures and ornamental pottery indicated rustic ease and some craving after beauty. As a rule, the best bedstead stands in the front kitchen, and my host explained this arrangement. In the first place, the four-poster with its hangings, usually of some bright color, is re- garded with complacency as a piece of ornamental fur- niture; and secondly, winter being very rude here, the kitchen is the warmest place to sleep in. Upper rooms are used for storage. The housewife and chil- dren wore good, serviceable clothes suited to their occupation, and were quite clean and tidy. I alluded afterward to the bare look of the cottage as compared with one in England, home of .ill-paid day -laborer, possessed of not a farthing, and with no future but the workhouse. I was assured that absence of little comforts in the way of a bit of carpet, an easy -chair, window curtains, and the like, arose from lack of taste rather than want of means. Comfort and prettiness in the home were mere matters of time. We imme- diately came upon an illustration. One new proprietor of two and a half hectares only had built himself a house with front kitchen or parlor, and a bedroom at the back. "C'est beaucoup plus propre," he said, using the word in its secondary sense of tidy, becom- ing. 188 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. This cottage abutted on a hovel of the pre-Revolu- tionarv period. What a contrast the two presented ! The one, spick and span, roomy, lightsome, airy; the other, a wretched, windowless cabin. We were again received in the most cordial manner. The new posi- tion of landowner was evidently much appreciated, while my host expressed himself delighted with the altered condition of things. " I am socially a gainer," he said ; " I have, for near neighbors, honest, satisfied, prosperous people. Family life is encouraged, the moral tone of the community raised, and good feeling promoted among class and class." We next visited other farms varying in extent from two and a half to twelve hectares, finding everywhere the same thrift, contentment, and well-being. The tendency is rather to increase than diminish the size of holdings. The purchaser of five hectares does not rest till he has acquired ten, the owner of ten sets his mind upon the possession of twenty, and so on. The provident, self-denying spirit of these Berrichon peas- ants is beyond all praise. It takes more than one bad season, or even a succession of bad seasons, to ruin the small farmer. He looks far ahead, prepared for the evil day. The farming is not first-rate. Artificial manure is, however, more largely used than formerly, corn is threshed by machinery, and scientific methods begin to prevail. It must not be forgotten that the newly -made landowner has many difficulties to contend with, his purchase often consisting partly of waste. This is cleared after rough-and-ready fashion. The ground is broken with the harrow, and rye planted, METAYAGE. 189 hay follows as a second crop, and the soil is thus pre- pared by degrees. How persistently the redemption of waste-lands is carried on throughout the country every stage of our journey teaches us. Wherever we go, north, south, east, west, we find the process going on, and statistics show the strides made. Between the years 1844 and 1882 the superficies of landes or wastes in France had diminished by one-third. The vine is cultivated round about Chateauroux, but the sober country-folks indulge in neither wine nor beer. Their usual drink is home-made syrup of fruits. A fine stalwart race we find here, on good terms with the cure, ardent Kepublicans, but excessively reserved as to their political opinions. No one, not even the wife of his bosom, ever knows how the peasant votes on election-day. He reads the new^spaper, and thinks for himself. We afterward visited a metairie of nearly four hun- dred acres, also the property of my host. The system is a partnership, the owner supplying land rent free, stock, and implements; the metayer, manual labor, all profits being equally shared. This arrangement is in full force in the Berry, as in some other departments, and answers admirably. The metayer boards his farm-laborers, as was the custom in England fifty years ago. Wages, at the time I write of, 1885, were from two and a half to four francs a day, with or without board ; thirty or forty years ago a day -laborer earned only seventy centimes daily. Arthur Young, naturally judging of theories by the result before his eyes, summarizesjaa^tervftaa^as a tfNIVERSITT 190 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. " miserable system that perpetuates poverty and ex- cludes instruction." Throughout his survey we find farming on half-profits condemned in the strongest terms, yet nothing has done more to improve the French husbandry within the last fifty years. It is the stepping-stone from the status of hired laborer to that of capitalist, and, while the metayer is thus raised in the social scale, by his means vast tracts are brought under cultivation. So popular is the arrangement that in 1872 the census showed an excess of metayage over peasant proprietorship. In 1880 a slight diminu- tion had taken place. Two conditions of success are necessary. The in- termediary or farm bailiff must be dispensed with, and a good understanding exist between the contracting parties. From fifty to a hundred and fifty acres is the most suitable size for a metairie. Besides such hold- ings as I have described, extensive estates are found here in the hands of their owners. The gentleman and lady farmer are not peculiar to England. Country life is no longer regarded, as before the Eevolution, in the light of banishment. Let us now make the acquaintance of another class of proprietors. At Chateauroux the problem of turn- ing the artisan into a freeholder has been partially realized. Here at least many a workman has emulated the zeal of his thrifty neighbors, and hardly a journey- man shoemaker, carpenter, or mason but owns a house and garden. In other words, he is a capitalist to the extent of one or two hundred pounds. The admirable workmen's cites of Mulhouse, de- ARTISANS. 191 scribed elsewhere, are partly due to benevolence ; the initiative at Chateauroux has been taken by the arti- san himself, and herein lies the interest of the matter. Self-help, sobriety, and praiseworthy ambition have been the sole influences at work. In company of a well-known resident, I visited several of these neat lit- tle dwellings, not massed together and forming quarters apart as at Mulhouse, but just placed where a plot of building-ground was to be had. Outwardly one re- sembles another, although we found a considerable difference in the interiors, some being fastidiously clean and comfortably furnished, others slovenly and bare. A front kitchen, in which the best bedstead with bright hangings stands conspicuous, a back-room^ attics, outhouses, and garden — ^such is the artisan's home at Chateauroux ; and if it has not the trim ap- pearance of a model English cottage, at least he enjoys possession. In a double sense the workman's home is liis own creation. His plot acquired, the purchaser devotes every spare moment to the construction of his house. Such help as he needs in the way of carpen- try, glazing, and so on he gets from other journeymen. The notion of going to a shop never crosses his mind. In every case we found that the value of the tenement and ground amounted to two hundred pounds, often more — a sum betokening prodigious economy. It will occasionally happen that money is borrowed in order to complete the purchase, and this loan proves an extra stimulus to exertion. Subr.rban Chateauroux may be described as a straggling village, made up of cottages all recently built. My cicerone knew many of 192 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. the owners, and we were cordially welcomed. The women are affable; the men, although brusque and often uncouth in manner, readily answer any questions put to them. As well as the small farmers, all are evidently proud of their property. The moral tone of the place, I was assured, has been greatly raised by this transformation of the artisan into a freeholder. Early marriages are the rule, and young women, many of whom are employed in the state tobacco factory here, lay by so as to help their betrothed to purchase a house. Public-houses are few and far between; want, drunkenness, and beggary rare. Nothing indeed throughout my entire French experiences ever more impressed me than what I saw here. These scores upon scores of substantial little dwellings, each the property of its occupier, represents neither state aid, benevolence, nor philanthropy, but individual deter- mination to attain independence, and rise above envy, want, and incertitude. Chateauroux is a cheerful, rather noisy place, with sumptuous new churches, recently constructed boule- vards, and fast-increasing suburbs attesting its pros- perity. After an interval of five years, I found consid- erable changes: here, as everywhere else throughout France, that modernization at work, disastrous in one sense, yet to be acclaimed on the score of sanitation. On the occasion of my first visit to Chateauroux, one of my cicerones was a young artist, son of a Pro- testant pastor, who ^as going through his period of military service. He bore the burden cheerfully, but complained of the frequent terms of incarceration CONSCRIPTS. ' 193 imposed for trifling offences. Certainly patriotism in the young is necessary to render conscriptiofi anything else but a nightmare, a shadow darkening the thresh- old of manhood. Here was a promising young fel- low condemned to lose several years' study, fare hard, wear coarse, ill-fitting clothes, and consort with such companions as chance threw in his way. One effect was clearly that of doing away with daintiness, ren- dering the character pliable, daily habi ts elastic. " The soldier can eat anything," said my young friend, as he smilingly compared the table-d'hote dinner of the hotel (no epicurean fare either) to.his barrack ordinary. Even at that time, in spite of apparent equality, military service in France was far from being equita- ble. As this is a most interesting subject, let me here "briefly explain the recent changes that have taken place. It may not be generally known that until the year 1872 the organization of the French army was strictly in accordance with the decrees of 1832. The general features of the system were as follows: Lots were drawn every year, the highest number entitling the drawer to total exemption from military service, the lowest to seven years' service. Certain exceptions were made; that is to say, in the case of only sons of widows, seminarists, professors and teach- ers pledged to ten years' public service, and others. And in all cases, exemption could be purchased, the mini- mum price for a substitute being 2,500 francs, just a. hundred pounds. Much larger sums were often paid, the agents transacting these substitutions being called les marchands d'hommes. 13 194 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. It will be seen that in spirit the organization of the French army remained eminently anti-democratic until the reforms effected by the Third Eepublic. The rich could escape military service altogether ; the poor could not. Seven years of the prime of life were lost to the breadwinner of the poor. After the reverses of 1870-71, the French army was reconstructed upon the Prussian system. Every Frenchman, with very few exceptions, now became a soldier, his obligation being that of five years' service, and liability to fifteen years' more in case of war. Exemption was still accorded in times of peace to elder or only sons of widows, seminarists, and, further, young men having passed certain examinations with a view to following certain professions could purchase remission of four years' service on payment of 2,500 francs. These so-called voluntaires d'un an formed a special class, might indeed be called the spoiled chil- dren of the army. They were subject to a wholly modified treatment in barracks ; hence arose jealousies? and the necessity of further reforms. The law of 1889 introduced, if not absolute, at least all but abso- lute equality into the French army. Every French citizen is now under the obligation of three years' mil- itary service, and liable to be called up until his forty- fifth year. No payment under any circumstances can now pur- chase a substitute; only the sick, the disabled, and the deformed can now escape conscription. In the interests, however, of art, science, literature, and phil- anthropy, and in a very few cases, the three-years' service is reduced to one. MILITARY LAW. 195 The exceptions are as follows : Firstly, young men under an engagement to serve ten years in public edu- cational or pliilantliropic institutions, either in France or the French colonies, such as schools for the deaf and dumb, the blind, etc.; secondly, students who have passed certain examinations in science, art, or letters, or who have received certain diplomas in national schools of agriculture, technical schools, etc., or who have obtained the first prize in the Academy or Conservatory of Music; thirdly, students in the- ology, preparing for the ministry, either Catholics, Protestants, or Jews; fourthly, a certain number of artisans selected by a jury of each department — en- gravers, decorators, modellers, and others — all of whom have to pass a competitive examination. Such, in brief, is the tenor of the new military law — a law based upon truly democratic principles. Between Chateauroux and La Chatre — French Weimar, shrine ever dear to the devotee of letters — lies the valley of the Indre, the Yall^e Noire of La Petite Fadette, It is a region that requires sunshine to beautify it. The broad pastures traversed by alder- bordered streams, the solitary wastes, the wide fallows across which some blue-bloused farmer guides his team, the isolated cottage here and there, and solitary field in which a goose-girl knits her stocking amid her flock, all else silent and lonely about her — such scenes inspire melancholy under a lowering autumn sky. On the occasion of my second visit, several years later, and a month earlier in the year, I found wonderful freshness and charm ; the park-like meadows glowed 196 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. in brilliant sunshine, the oak-woods were golden against the warm sky, the undulating hills dazzlingly bright. The little town of La Chatre had meantime not stood still. Handsome suburban villas and public buildings have lately sprung up ; the noble statue of George Sand, erected by her townsfolk, seems to have stimulated local ambition. Could the authorities only secure quiet in the streets after eleven o'clock at night, many travellers would enjoy a halt here. The brawl- ing and unseemly uproar of cafes and cabarets till long past midnight detract from the otherwise pleasant im- pression left by George Sand's town. A new handsome boulevard leads to the beautifully kept little pleasance in the midst of which rises Mil- let's statue of the great novelist. It is a very splen- did work. There is something sibylline about the face as she looks up in the transport of inspiration, her flowing robes rather those of a priestess than of a Frenchwoman of our own time. On the sides of the pedestal are carved the names of her chief works, mas- terpieces of imaginative literature unsurpassed in any language. Three miles off lies ISTohant, the novelist's beloved home, lately put up for sale. For awhile we follow the Indre, flowing limpidly between well-culti- vated stretches of loam, the extreme richness of the soil attested by the number and variety of crops raised ; three or four of lucerne, among others, daring the year. Men and women were busily cutting regain^ or aftermath, either for immediate use as fodder or to stow away in the green state, according to the method GEORGE SAJVB'S TOMB. 197 called ensilage, for sheep's food in winter. Lucerne increases the quality and richness of cows' milk. There are but few hedges ; the land is cultivated in broad strips or patches, some of considerable extent; the standing crops were maize, potatoes, beetroot, buckwheat — a little, indeed, of everything ; and, at in- tervals, were fallow-fields being ploughed up by the fine dun-colored oxen of the country. Flocks of geese and pigs were turned loose in the cleared corn- fields. Fruit-bearing trees, especially walnut trees cul- tivated for their oil, dotted the fields. Hereabouts, as near Chateauroux, may be found holdings of all sizes and tenures of every description ; properties of a few acres, farms cultivated on the half- profit system, tenant-farms large and small. Want is rare, all being able to live by their land or obtain work. La Chatre possessing cloth and tobacco manu- factories, besides smaller industries. The village-folk are very tidy in appearance, and most of the little brown mud-built cottages have a flower or two in gar- den or window. On the occasion of my first visit to Kohant five years before, a neat maid answered my ring, and I was at once conducted to George Sand's tomb, now en- closed in the village church-yard, but formerly a por- tion of her own garden. In 1890 I found the place utterly deserted, hens and chickens running about in all directions, the court-yard choked with grass and weeds, the garden a wilderness, and the pleasant coun- try-house, consecrated by illustrious souvenirs, close- shuttered. The great novelist's grave also, a plain 198 FRANCE OF TO-BAY, slab of gray marble, showed woful neglect. Surely La Chatre, so proud of its townswoman, will hence- forth undertake the care of her resting-place ! Out- side the little cemetery, on the other side of the road, stand the church and village. George Sand thus lived close to the humble neighbors she loved and depicted so inimitably, and in whose steadily-increasing pros- perity she would have taken such delight. Maurice Sand formally adopted for himself and his children his mother's glorious pseudonym, and like herself was buried according to Protestant rites. His widow and two married daughters survive him. Twenty-five years ago the Indre, with its neighbor- ing department of the Cher, possessed an unenviable notoriety. Two-thirds of their inhabitants in 1866 could neither read nor write. The census of 1891 will doubtless show gratifying results of the thousand and odd elementary schools now at work, a large number having been opened during the interval. Already in 1882 the proportion of the totally uninstructed had been reduced throughout France from 35 and 45 to 19 per cent Between Chateauroux and Bourges, ancient capital of Berry, chef -lieu of the Cher, lies a cheerful, varied country, the cathedral at last towering grandly above the level landscape as our own Ely above the eastern plains. Most French cities may be called the embodi- ment of some presiding spirit; and the genius of Bourges was Jacques Coeur. His story reads more like an episode of Oriental romance than a piece of sober chronicle. A Haroun-el-Raschid in his love of BOURQES. 199 splendor, a Medici in his patronage of art, a Eotlischild in his command of millions, the great financier was one of the noblest citizens who ever served an ignoble king. His palace might have been finished yesterday, so successfully has it resisted time and restoration.- There is comfort in the thought that, if domestic archi- tecture has fallen so low in our own day, such monu- ments of its apogee may last long as the Pyramids. Other masterpieces of the kind are less fortunate, the process of modernization being rapidly carried on. Since George Sand's death, nearly twenty years ago, the place has undergone transformation. Many public buildings have been erected, and old quarters replaced by airy streets. Alike theatre, military school, and hospital, asylum for the insane, slaughter-house, are quite modern. Bourges is one of the great military arsenals, and a strategical post of the first importance. The cathedral, like the stupendous churches of Spain, is a world in itself. I, do not know which to call the grander itspect, that of its quintuple porch, or fine naved interior, perpetually rose-tinted with jew- elled light. No mere stained glass seems here, rather shafts of pure ruby and amethyst composing the small upper windows of the triforium. The larger windows underneath show wonderfully imaginative designs, roses, stars, wheels with lovely little groups of saints and angels, each a perfect picture within. The wealth of color — topaz, emerald, sapphire, opal, ruby, ame- thyst — recalls Apocalyptic vision, those glories daz- zling the inner sight of him of Patmos. The lofty dome, ever rosy-red with the windows of 200 FRANCE OF TO-DAY, triforium and clerestory, the five vast naves, without transepts, giving a wonderful sense of space — splendors sucli as these are alike "unimaginable and not to be described ; they form indeed a veritable Apocalypse to ordinary mortals. The exterior is very majestic, and adjoining lie the beautiful grounds of the ev^che, open to the public. On Sunday afternoons a military band plays here, attracting the entire population. The townsfolk are brisk, good-looking, affable, but even noisier than their neighbors of La Chatre, which is saying a good deal. One might really suppose that a premium were put upon turbulence in Jacques Coeur's grand old city. Close under the windows of the highly respectable, thoroughly French Hotel de France are cafes chantants^ in which singing with loud pianoforte accompaniment and deafening applause goes on till midnight; later still, turbulent assemblies of young men and lads turn the place into a Pandemonium when all decent folks ought to be fast asleep. Truth to tell, the French populace, like the French child, is often humored past bearing. On the occasion I speak of, the police tried to disperse the roysterers by throw- ing cold water on their heads. Disturbers of nocturnal peace ought to be treated more seriously; sleepless nights are too often the penalty paid for delightful days in provincial France. After the nightly com- motion of the charming old towns just described, Paris seemed peaceful as a Trappists' convent ! The country between Bourges and the capital is one vast stack-yard. On we glided by alleys and LARGE FARMS, 201 alleys of golden pyramids, the size and number of tlie wheat-stacks attesting the extent of the holdings. In some places we saw double rows, in each a dozen of enormous stacks. Yet this region and the neighbor- ing Beauce no longer stand first in the matter of corn- growing. Other departments, notably the Seine and Marne, owing to advanced methods, produce cereals in greater proportion per acre and of superior kind. The blue-bloused peasants with their teams were now ploughing up the fallow — scenes that recalled the exquisite introduction to the Meunier cC Angihault. The Cher contains many very large farms, which have been handed down from father to son, anteriorly to the Eevolution. Some of these number five or six thousand hectares, occupations of a thousand fre- quently occurring. Side by side exist small parcels of land, mere allotment grounds by comparison — another fact illustrative of the variety of land-tenure in France. PART III. THE VOSGES, ALSACE-LOERAINE. departments: seine and marne, the vosges (alsace-lorraine). The section I now take in hand describes a rhomb or lozenge on the map of France, three separate lines of railway leading from Paris to her eastern frontiers. Let us study one portion of the chart before us carefully. None perhaps in the world's history has been stained with more heroic blood or washed with bitterer tears ; none perhaps offers gloomier perspec- tive to the unflinching student of his age. From end to end of a once rich and happy country rise " curses not loud, but deep." A sullen, implacable thought is ever present with the most generous, the most light- hearted, the most gifted nation of Europe. That thought has never found fitter expression than in the words of our own noble woman-poet : " A time there is for change and chance : Who next shall drink the trembling- cup, Wring out its dregs and suck them up, After France?" If, after a careful examination of the French map we wonder that French feeling toward Prussia re- mains very much what it was immediately after the war, we must visit the annexed provinces for our- 206 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. selves, or read the experiences of conscientious trav- ellers. "A God-blessed, man-cursed land," 1 was the verdict of an Englishman who lately gave us truthful and sympathetic pictures of this and many other parts of France. Since my own sojourn in Alsace-Lorraine, eight years ago, things have greatly changed for the worse, as Mr. Barker and the writer who conceals his identity under the pseudonym of Heimweh testify. It will, however, be seen that already in 1883 a visit to the Poland of the German empire was painful enough, and, in my own case, nothing but a stern sense of duty could prompt the undertaking. Able as we are to rely on our silver streak, we can hardly realize the humiliation of diminished territory and altered frontiers. It was a lesson in geography that destroyed imperialism throughout France. As the late Henri Martin pointed out, the Bonapartes have been her mapmakers to her cost. The half- j)enny brochure of the historian before-mentioned contained a map painted in black and white, except for two colored portions representing the mutilations of the frontier brought about by the treaties of 1815 and 1871. Roughly speaking, the triangle thus indi- cated might enclose any other choice region of France ; the position of Alsace and Lorraine made the two provinces invaluable. A glance will show why Dijon and Besan9on should now be strongly fortified places; for, odd as the statement may sound, Dijon is now a frontier town girt round with forts, all erected within * See Appendix, Note 15. ANNB^ATION^. 207 ten years after the Franco-German war. Foreigners are not permitted within these forts, but the curious in such matters may gather some notion of the Dijon of to-day from Mont Affrique or any other of its " Golden Hills." The pretty little town of Auxonne on the Saone needed no extra defences, having suc- cessfully resisted German attacks in 1871. Besangon has been greatly strengthened, and forts now command important positions between that city and Montbeliard. Belfort possesses a double enceinte, and additional forts cover the pass between the Vosges and the Jura known as the Trouee de Belfort. These works, pushed on with the utmost despatch, have of course heavily taxed the national resources, but were inevi- table. The exactions of Prussia were so adjusted as to lay bare the entire eastern frontier of France. In the fewest possible words, I will now state the precise partition that took place. One of the first acts of the Assemblde Constituante was the division of the ancient provinces, so embar- rassing from a fiscal and administrative point of view, into eighty-six departments. The duchy of Lorraine formed four, namel}^, the Meuse, Meurthe, Moselle, and Vosges. With the first mentioned, bordering on Belgium, the Prussians did not meddle ; it was not their affair; of the two following so large a portion was taken that of the remainder one department had to be formed, the Meurthe and Moselle, with Nancy for its chef-lieu. The picturesque Yosges lost one canton only ; of Alsace a mere fragment was left, pre- cious in itself, but nothing by comparison with the 208 FRANCE OF TO-DAT. forfeited portion. Alsace, "united to the Frencli crown in 1648, formed tlie two departments of the Upper and Lower Ehine, with Strasburg and Colmar for chefs- lieux. Of this vast and magnificent territory only Belf ort was rescued ; that is to say, the town and fort with six cantons, extending over 60,000 hectares, numbering a mixed rural and industrial population of 60,000 souls, and under the name of Territoire de Belfort constituting a new department. The annexed territory, therefore, comprised one en- tire department, the best portion of three parts of a fourth ; furthermore, the French loss numbered over a million and a half of thrifty, enlightened, and patri- otic inhabitants. " Nous sommes plus Frangais que les Frangais " are the first words that greet English ears on crossing the frontier. In visiting Alsace-Lorraine — thus the lost provinces are now called- — we reverse the experiences of Christian in the Pilgrim's Progress. The Delectable Mountains, Immanuel's Land, and the country of Beulah are passed first, the Slough of Despond, Giant Despair, and Doubting Castle coming after. Let us " solace ourselves for a season " in the Seine and Marne, the first department entered by the trav- eller bound for the Yosges, Mulhouse, and Strasburg. Formed from the ancient Champagne and Comte de Brie, this region, while in some degree materialized by wealth, is yet dear as any to the artist. Alter- nating with sweeps of corn and vine are lovely pros- pects of most rural kind : little rivers and canals ru- ning straight as arrows amid lofty lines of poplar, rich THE BRIE. 209 woods, sunny glades, homely villages with quaint church spire. Just such pictures French artists have given us again and again, and we can never have too many. The very simplicity of these landscapes con- stitutes their charm. Mr. Barham Zincke, in his wonderful cabinet pic- ture of the peasants of the Limogne, does not conceal his unmeasured admiration of the French peasant and the system of peasant proprietorship generally. What would he say to the condition of things round about Meaux? We are in one of the wealthiest and best cultivated regions of France, also one of the most enlightened. Cleanliness and order prevail with a diffusion of well- being hardly matched, I should say, in any country. Wealth is the portion of many, sufficiency the general portion, want, vagrancy, drunkenness very rare — lam tempted to aver, unknown. In most of the larger villages are found hot and cold baths, and on Sundays and holidays the blue cotton blouse and cotton gown are exchanged for broadcloth and Parisian costumes. Comfort is not disdained, luxury indulged in. The sordid side of the French husbandman does not come to the surface here, nor perhaps the spiritual. Church- going has long been almost a survival among these rich farmers, market gardeners, and dairymen. The extreme fertility of the soil accounts for the variety of produce on a single acre of ground ; we may see potatoes, vines, Indian corn, clover, mangelwurzel, patches of the medicinal poppy — an article of local commerce — wheat, barley, oats, and rye, with fruit- 14 210 FRANCE OF TODAY. trees and bushes planted between. Black currants, used in the manufacture of cassis, alpine strawberries, honey, are also specialities, the staple product of the country being the celebrated Brie cheese. The dairy- farmers, often tenants possessing small freeholds, are very rich. On week-days they work as hard as their laborers, although able to retire if they chose, and give their daughters a dowry of several thousand pounds. While tenant-farms of several hundred acres are numerous, all but the poorest, here as else- where, possess a cottage and plot of ground. The prosperity of the rural classes, from the large dairy- farmer down to the owner of three or four acres, is obvious. Of course we must bear in mind that, neither in country nor town, are French heads of houses pinched to death by what Mr. Cotter Morison calls " the devastating torrent of children." Except among the ne'er-do-weel, the lawless, and the Bohe- mian classes, the French baby comes as a welcome guest, its future provided for, from the cradle to the grave its existence assured. On reaching Chalons-sur-Marne, I found an illus- tration of the educational effects of enforced military service. It was market-day, and in front of our hotel were displayed a variety of argicultural implements, which some young soldiers were examining with mi- nutest interest. " Observe those recruits," said my travelling com- panion, an English lady, to me, " You would never find our young soldiers spending hours over new ploughs and harrows. The young men yonder are ''GASTRONOMIC DELECTATION^:' 211 interested because they will go back to their own farms when their service is over." And doubtless she was right. Possession not only, to quote Arthur Young, turns sand to gold: it quickens the mental faculties and opens up almost endless sources of interest. The journey from Chalons-sur-Marne to Nancy may be described as a succession of gastronomic delecta- tions. At i]pernay, travellers by express are allowed just sufficient time to drink a glass of excellent cham- pacrn at the buffet. Farther on, at Bar-le-Duc, neatly- packed jars of the raspberry jam for which this town is famous are brought to the doors of your compart- ment. At Commercy, one is enticed to regale on the delicious little madeleines^ or cakes, made there ; not a halting-place is without its special dainty. As we traverse this pleasant, prosperous region, the wayside picture drawn by a countryman just a hundred years ago comes to mind. " Walking up a long hill to ease my mare," wrote Arthur Young when traversing these regions in 1789, " I was joined by a poor woman who complained of the times. Demanding her rea- sons, she said her husband had but a morsel of land, one cow, and a poor little horse, yet they had ^fran- char (42 lbs.) of wheat and three chickens to pay as a quit -rent to one seigneur, and iour franchar of oats, one chicken, and one franc to another, besides very heavy tallies and taxes. This woman, at no great distance, might have been taken for sixty or seventy, her figure was so bent, and her face so furrowed and hardened by labor — but she said she was only twenty- iil2 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. eight. An Englishman who has not travelled cannot imagine the figure made by infinitely the greater part of the countrywomen of France. To what are we to attribute this difference in the manners of the lower people in the two kingdoms? To government." Had M. Taine mastered this sentence, we should perhaps have been spared his interminable apology of the Ancien Regime. The fair, the pensive city of Nancy ! There is an indescribable charm in the sad, stately capital of an- cient Lorraine, with little of life in its quiet streets or movement in its handsome squares, the chef -lieu of the Meurthe and Moselle is yet one of the wealthiest, most elegant cities of France. Hither after the annex- ation of Alsace-Lorraine flocked many rich Alsatian families, and perhaps its proximity to the lost prov- inces accounts for the subdued, dreamy aspect of the jjlace. It is Rachel mourning for her children because they are not. A strikingly beautiful city, with its splendid monu- ments, palace, churches, bronze gates, statues, foun- tains, worthy of a capital, Nancy is yet a busy indus- trial centre. The Alsatian exodus enriched it with upward of 20,000 inhabitants, who like the Huguenots of old, brought their money and commerce with them. Appropriately enough, the art of flower-making is a specialty of a town unsuited to grosser occupations.. Its delicate printed cottons almost equal those of Mulhouse. Here too exists a School of Forestry, in which many young Englishmen prepare for Indian service. I was sorry that etiquette did not permit FRENCH HOLIDAY-MAKING. Jil3 my acceptance of the hospitality offered by a worthy cure in this neighborhood. Acquaintance begun at Dijon was followed by correspondence, and an invita- tion to regard the presbytere as my jpied-d-terre when visiting Nancy. I may here mention, as an instance of the absolute impartiality of the French govern- ment in matters of religion, that this village priest had under his management a school answering in every respect to our own voluntary schools supervised by the clergy.^ I must also acknowledge that I have ever met with great courtesy at the hands alike of priests, monks, and nuns in France. One of my most agree- able and cultivated acquaintances during a year spent at Nantes was a Franciscan brother. From Nancy by way of fipinal we reach Gerardmer, in the very he art of the Vosges. You may search far and wide for a more engaging scene when the sun shines — its verdant slopes sprinkled with white villas, its red-roofed village clustered about a rustic church tower, at its feet the loveliest little lake in the world, from which rise gently fir-clad heights. The popularity of this holiday resort may be said to date from the recent war. French tourists and valetudinarian? have given up Ems and Wiesbaden from patriotic motives, preferring to spend their money on native soil. Thus enterprise has been stimulated in many directions, and we now find good accommodation in spots unmentioned by guide-books a few years before. Gerardmer is resorted to rather ' See Appendix, Note 16. 214 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. for its pastoral charm than for any curative properties of its sparkling water. One of the chief attractions of the principal hotel is evidently the enormous salon given up to music, conversation, and dancing. Visi- tors make themselves agreeable to each other without introduction. For the time being, social distinctions are laid aside, and fraternity becomes the order of the day. On the occasion of my visit the company was a varied and animated one, numbering a member of the French ministry, a writer on the staff of the Figaro^ the head of none of the largest commercial houses of eastern France, diplomats, officers, deputies, artists, with many middle-class families; the Alsatian ele- ment predominating. N^o English or American tourist kept myself and fellow-traveller in countenance. Our charming landlady would join us from time to time, and one evening, sober matron though she was, donned native costume, head-dress of broad black ribbon with flying streamers, short black skirt with green or scarlet border, full-sleeved white bodice, and coquettish apron ; thus apparelled, she gave her hand to a visitor, himself an exile, middle-aged, and father of a family; one of the company struck a familiar note, and amid extraordinary enthusiasm the pair per- formed an Alsatian dance. As they went on excite- ment knew no bounds, bystanders shook hands, em- braced, wept ; the soiree begun so joyously ended in a passionately sorrowful demonstration. Nowhere throughout France is patriotism more ardent, or the democratic spirit more firmly rooted, than in the Yosges. COTTAGE LIFE. 215 We are here on the borders of the two fair and fer- tile departments of the Upper and Lower Rhine, now effaced from the French map. That painful severance of a vast population from its nationality is ever pres- ent to the mind. Enormous as has been the exodus from the annexed provinces, large numbers by force of circumstances and family ties were compelled to remain, French at heart, German according to law. The bitterness and intensity of anti-German feeling, sometimes reined in, yet apparent, constitutes the one drawback of Vosges travel. There is of course a wide difference between the advocates of retaliation and quiet folks who detest war even more than foreign dominion. But the yearning toward the parent country is not to be overcome. No wonder that as soon as the long vacation begins there is a rush of French tourists across the frontier. From Strasburg, Mulhouse, Metz, Colmar, they flocked to G^rardmer and other resorts. Gerardmer is famous for its cheeses ; turnery and the weaving of linen are almost important local industries. Not a cottage hereabouts is without its handloom for winter use, weaving at home being done when the country is covered with snow. Embroidery also employs many hands. Very little land being suitable for tillage, it is chiefly upon these home manufactories, and the annual influx of tourists, that country-folks rely. To these peasants, isolated as they are from the outer world, the summer season is a moral as well as material boon, bringing with extra earnings new ideas. Wherever we went we made friends. The women were especially confiden- 216 • FRANCE OF TO-DAY. tial, inviting ns into their "homely yet not poverty- stricken kitchens, keeping us as long as possible, while they chatted about their own lives or put ques- tions as to our own. Even the poorest met in our walks never dreamed of asking an alms. The beauty, politeness, and clear, direct speech of the children are remarkable. One chief feature at Gerardmer is the congeries of handsome buildings of the communal schools. How stringently the new educational law is enforced throughout France may be gathered from the spectacle of boys at drill. We saw here three squad- rons, each under the charge of a separate master, and evidently made up of all classes of the com.munity. Some of the boys were poorly, nay, wretchedly clad ; others wore strong, tidy clothes; a few were well dressed. One curious feature here is the wooden casing of the houses. This is resorted to as a prptection against the cold ; the Vosges, with Auvergne and the Limou- sin, possessing the severest of the seven climates of France. Most of these cottages have their patch of clover, corn, and garden; the housewives possessing their tiny harvests at the door. Wherever we turn we find forest gorges and park- like glades disturbed by mill-wheel and hammer, tall factory chimneys spoiling many a superb landscape. Beside turbulent river and glittering cascade, paper mills or linen manufactories have sprung up ; around the modern villa of the employer are clustered the homes of his work-people. More in harmony with the characteristic scenery of the Vosges are isolated dwell- CROSJSII^G THE FRONTIER. 317 ings of dalesfolk, and liigh above the herdsman's chalet; a busy scene now, but deserted during the eight-months winter. Since the accession of the present emperor, the Prussian regime throughout Alsace-Lorraine has be- come much more severe. Drastic measures have been put in force, which can serve but one purpose, that of rendering more odious the nationality thrust upon a patriotic people. In 1883 travellers could drive from St. Die to St.-Marie-aux-Mines, on the other side of the frontier, unmolested by the police in search of passports. We first traverse a fruitful, well-cultivated plain watered by the sluggish Meurthe, then slowly ascend a spur of the Vosges formerly dividing the departments of Upper and Lower Ehine, now marking the boundaries of France and annexed Alsace. Amid the orchards and hayfields below we were on French soil ; the flagstaff on a green pinnacle before us marks the line of demarcation. The Prussian helmet makes the fact patent. As surely as we set foot in the Eeich, we see these glittering casques, so hateful in French eyes. They seem to spring from the ground as did Jason's warriors sown with dragon's teeth. This new frontier formerly divided the dominions of Alsace and Lorraine. Alsace is here entered through a needle's eye, so narrow the pass in which the little cotton-spinning town lies. Its site is one of the most extraordinary in France. This collection of red-roofed houses, fac- tory chimneys, and church towers, Protestant as well as Catholic, is hemmed in a narrow gorge, wedged be- 218 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. tween the hills, which are just parted so as to admit the intrusion, no more. The green convolutions of the mountain-sides are literally folded round the town ; a pile of green velvet spread fan-like in a mercer's window has not neater, softer folds. As we descend we find just room for one carriage to wind between the river and hillside. But at the other end the charm- ing valley of the Liepvrette opens, disclosing handsome country-houses, scattered manufactories, and pastoral scenery. St. -Marie-aux -Mines is an excellent centre for the holiday tourist, and at this season of the year [the month was September] overflowed with French family- parties and pedestrians, excursionizing in every direc- tion. We are in the habit of regarding our neighbors as a stay-at-home people. Nothing is farther from the truth, but they take their pleasure for the most part on native ground. Close by is Gustave Dorc's favor- ite haunt, Barr, a close, unsavory little town in the midst of bewitching scenery. The narrow streets smell of tanneries and less wholesome nuisances, and not a breath of fresh air is to be had. No sooner are you beyond these than all is beauty, pastoral ness, and romance. Every green peak is crested with ruined keep and rampart ; at the foot of meeting hills lie pic- turesque villages, each with lofty spire, while every breeze is fragrant of newly-turned hay. These pine, woods and frowning ruins, set like sentinels on every eminence, recall Bore's happiest efforts. Barr is a town of between six and seven thousand inhabitants, about twenty of whom at the time I speak ALSATIAN FEELma. 219 of were Prussians. No pleasant position, certes, for these government officials. Alike the highest and the lowest were completely cut off from French inter- course. One sentiment, and one only, greeted our ears : " Nous sommes plus Frangais que les Frangais." Men, women, and children, rich and poor, learned and simple, gave utterance to the same expression of feel- ing. English visitors were taken into the general confidence, above all. Englishwomen confided in by Alsatian mothers. Alas ! the maternal heart here no longer, with Hannah of old, leaps for joy that a man- child is born into the world. Rather the face of new- born son awakens agonized foreboding and thoughts too painful for utterance. For this German-born child of French parents must be divided from them either in the literal or figurative sense ; the first-named per- haps the least dreaded. He must either quit his home in early youth and become a French citizen at the sacrifice of every earthly tie, or remain, only able to acquire his mother-tongue by subterfuge, compelled to accept a German education, when manhood is reached to don the uniform of a Prussian soldier, pledged to shed the blood of father, brothers, friends, and fellow-citizens. No right of conquest can explain away a dilemma of this kind, no diplomacy excuse a crime only second to the partition of Poland. Wher- ever it is possible, boys are sent across the frontier, some destined for American citizenship, those of richer parents for re-enrolment among sons of France, but in each case the parting has to be borne. Nor must we suppose that annexation is less severely felt 220 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. by the poor. During my sojourn in one Alsatian village after another, the peasant-folk complained bit- terly of Prussian rule, more especially as it concerned the young. I shall never forget the pathetic face of an aged countrywoman with whom I chatted near Barr. She was bringing up a little orphan grandson, and as he sported beside her she sighed or rather moaned out, " And now our children are not allowed to le?.rn French at school ! " The glorious sites within reach of Barr make us for a time forget the gloom hanging over Alsace. The Hohwald poetized by Edmond About, incomparable holiday-ground for pedestrians — the shrine of St. Odille, which a hundred years ago awakened the enthusiasm of the great Goethe — the terraced vine- yards, magnificent forests, limestone crags, and feudal towers recalling Ehineland, may well drive away som- bre associations. But when we once more betake our- selves to the railway hotel or boarding-house, the whole hideous reality comes back again. We are in- deed in a " God-blessed, man-cursed country." Nothing struck me more forcibly during my so- journ than the general outspokenness concerning Prussian rule. This candor to chance-made acquaint- ances was at the same time pathetic and diverting. No heed whatever seemed paid to possible German lis- teners. At the table d'hote, over the shop-counter, in the railway carriage, people would freely pour out their grievances. I remember one evening at dinner in a country inn hearing Bismarck as roundly abused as Mr. Balfour might be here by an enraged Home OUTSPOKENNESS. 221 Euler, or Gladstone by a Chamberlainite. One or two Prussians were present, who heard with a crest- fallen, humiliated air. On expressing some surprise at such occurrences, an Alsatian assured me that were his country-folks arrested for free speech, the whole community would be in prison ! We travelled from Barr to Eothau with two charm- ing sisters, as communicative as the rest. The women especially, these pretty girls explained, might say what they liked, their conversation, however treasonable, was never interfered with ; the young ladies corrob- orated what we had heard elsewhere. The Prussian inhabitants of Alsace-Lorraine, consisting chiefly of government officials, were, they told us, under strictest boycott, completely shut off from French intercourse. The position of these functionaries could hardly be agreeable, although there was the compensation of higher pay and added material comfort. Alsace- Lorraine is indeed a land of Goshen. The vine ripens on these warm hillsides and artificial terraces, the rich plains produce every variety of fruit and vegetables, the streams abound with trout, the forests with game. No wonder that enormous as was the Alsatian exo- dus, the immigration of Prussians has been on a much larger scale. At the time I write of, the more severe processes of Germanization had hardly come into force. I found Alsace French in every respect but name. The prohibition of French in elementary and higher schools, the conscription, the transference of official positions from French to German subjects, the closing of French clubs and literary associations, the inter- 222 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. diction of French newspapers, above all, the passport regulations, are changing the country into a vast military camp, cowering, or at least overriding, an antagonistic civil population. Nor does the woful picture end here. Mr. Barker ("Wayfarings in France ") draws attention to that moral phylloxera now threatening rural Alsace with uni- versal bankruptcy — the Jewish usurer, in whose hands the once happy peasant is. Painful as must be such an admission at the present time, we are bound to accept it. The money-lending Jew is the evil genius of Prussianized Alsace ! Kothau is a very pleasant halting-place in the midst of sweet, pastoral scenery. Here are large factories, handsome chateaux of mill-owners, trim cottages with vineyard and garden. Laundries on a large scale, dye-works, and saw-mills employ the townsfolk. The principal building is the handsome Protestant church, for we are here among Protestants, although of less zealous temper than their Anabaptist forefathers. The once dreariest region of France is now beautifully cultivated. Pomegranates and oleanders are in full, bloom, and the general aspect is of southern warmth and fertility. From the sweet fragrant valley of Eothau a road winds amid green hills and by tum- bling river to Fondai, pastorate and burial-place of the good Oberlin. Here he toiled for sixty years, his career rather that of missionary among an uncivilized race than of a country priest amid his parishioners. It requires no lively imagination to picture this re- gion before Oberlin's efforts. The soil is rocky and WALDERSBACH. 223 barren, the hillsides whitened with mountain-streams, the more cultivable spots isolated and difficult of ac- cess. An elaborate system of irrigation has clothed the valleys with rich herbage, the river turns a dozen mill-wheels, every available inch of ground shows corn or vine. Waldersbach is another little Arcadia, where on Sunday afiernoon we find young and old keeping out-door holiday, the youths and maidens dancing, the children enjoying swings and peepshows. No acerbity has lingered among these descendants of Oberlin's austere congregation. Here the romance of Alsatian travel ends, and all is prose of painful kind. The first object arresting the attention at Strasburg is the railway station, of which we had already heard so much. Erected by the Prussian government at an enormous cost, this handsome structure had just been opened. So great was the soreness of feeling excited by the bas-reliefs decorating the fagade that, for several days after the inauguration, police officers in plain clothes watched the spectators. The sculptures in question give an ideal representation of the surrender of Strasburg to the German emperor, and bear the inscription, Im alien und im neuen Reich (" In the old and new sovereignty"). A bystander, to the relish of the rest, improved it as follows: Im alien reich, im neuen arm (" Eich in the old, poor in the new "). The bombardment of their city, the destruction of public monuments, the loss of life and property, were yet fresh in the minds of the inhabitants, and it is hardly to be wondered at that they chafed at the fiction of a voluntary expatriation. Nor can the tourist help 224 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. drawing a painful contrast between the Strasbnrg of the old and new regime. There is not much to see here now except the cathedral. The library with its priceless books and manuscripts, the museum rich in master-pieces of the French schools, the handsome Protestant church, theatre, and Palais de Justice were all destroyed by the Prussian bombardment, to say nothing of less important buildings, of four hundred private dwellings, and fifteen hundred civilians (men, women, and children) killed or wounded. Nor was the noble minster spared, and would doubtless have perished but for the enforced capitulation of the heroic city. The first thing that attracted my attention was a picture of the funeral procession of Gambetta as it wound past the veiled statue of Strasburg on the Place de la Concorde. Such displays of patriotic feeling are forbidden, but they come to the fore all the same. And almost the first words I heard on entering a bookseller's shop were these : " Nous sommes plus Frangais que les Frangais ! " Here as else- where the clinging to mother-country was pathetically, sometimes comically, apparent. A rough peasant girl employed in our hotel amused me not a little by her vehement tirades against the Prussians, spoken in a language that was neither French nor German, but an odd mixture of both. Strasburg is now a vast camp, with that perpetual military parade so wearisome in Berlin. What a relief to get to the comparatively quiet and thoroughly French town of Mulhouse, despite all at- ANNEXED AND ANNEJTER. 225 tempts to make it German ! But for the imperial eagle placed over public buildings, and the sprinkling of Prussian helmets and physiognomies, I could hardly have realized annexation. The shops are French; French is the language of the educated classes ; French and Jews make up the bulk of the population. I was sorry to find that the Jews were little liked here. The tenaciously French appearance of Mulhouse, accounted for in patriotic clinging to xhe mother-coun- try, occasioned much vexation in high places. It was hardly perhaps to be wondered at that undignified reprisals should follow undignified exactions. Thus, a law was passed forbidding signboards and names over shop doors in French. From that time only the surname of shopkeepers appeared, which is of course the same in both languages. A good deal of jinnec- essary irritation is also caused at post-offices and rail- way-stations by the persistent usage of German, with which many inhabitants are unfamiliar. " Speak Ger- man, and you will be promptly attended to," whis- pered a friend when I entered the post-office, having several matters to transact. As to manuscripts, they are regarded with so much suspicion that but for the help of a well-known resident, I should never have sent off my contribution to an English review at all. The bickering and bullying that goes on about this speaking of German recalls Lucian's witty piece, Charon and Memppus. "You know I can't speak German, while you un- derstand my own language perfectly well," cries an irate Frenchman. 15 22() FRANCE OF TO-DAY. " Do you suppose I am going to learn all the lan- guages in Europe to oblige you? " retorts the German official. " Just say what you have to say in German, or go about your business." " But I tell you I don't know a word of any tongue except my own. You can't make a man speak Ger- man who had never learned it — is as ignorant as a sucking-baby." " You must come again when you do know it, then. That is all I can say." And so the squabbling goes on, each speaking in his own language, each understanding the other per- fectly well. In the end, Menippus — in other words, the Frenchman — amid a storm of abuse, gains his point, Charon goes without his fee — the German has to give in. Painful as is the position of the annexed, the an- nexer does not lie on a bed of roses. I was told that when the theatre is hired by a German company not a single French spectator patronizes it ; when the repre- sentation is given by a French troupe, every seat is occupied. Mu] house possesses a charming zoological garden, free to subscribers only, who have to be bal- loted for. At the time of my visit no Prussian had succeeded in obtaining membership. The poorest contrive to show their patriotism. It is the rule of the German government to send twenty marks (one pound) to every poor woman giving birth to twins. Just before my visit, the wife of a French workman had borne three boys; but, although in very poor circumstances, she refused the donation. " My M. JEAN DOLLFUS. 227 sons shall never be Prussians," she said, "and that gift would make them so." The real thorn in the flesh of the denationalized Alsatians, as I have pointed out, is the enforced Ger- man education and military service. All who have read Daudet's touching little story, La derraere Legon de Francais^ will realize the painfulness of the first fact ; all who have come in contact with young French- men wearing the Prussian uniform will understand the full bitterness of the second. Can any lot be more crushing? Under the German tunic beats a French heart — military discipline is mere outward show ; loy- alty to Prussia would mean a treachery for which words are not strong enough. " Nous ne sommes pas heureux a Mulhouse " (We are not happy at Mulhouse) were the first words ad- dressed to me by that veteran patriot and true philan- thropist, the late Jean Doll f us. M. Dollfus, as well as other French representatives in the Prussian Reichstag, protested against the an- nexation again and again. lie pointed out the enor- mous cost to the German empire in consequence of the military forces required to maintain the provinces, the undying bitterness aroused, the moral, social, and material interests at stake. Latterly, the foremost citi- zen of Mulhouse remained silent, or absented himself from Berlin altogether. It is hardly possible to write of Mulhouse without devoting a few pages to a name already familiar to many English readers. The career of such men forms part of contemporary history, and for upward of sixty 228 FRANCE OF TODAY. years the great cotton-printer, the indefatigable bene- factor of the poor, the fellow-worker with Cobden, Arles-Dufour, and others in the cause of free trade, the ardent patriot, has been before the world. Just before my arrival, was celebrated, with a splendor that would sound unreal in a novel, the diamond wedding of the head of the house of Dollfus, the silver and the golden having been already kept in due form. Mulhouse might well be proud of a unique fete. When M. Dollfus looked out of his window in the morning he found the familiar street transformed into a bright green avenue garlanded with flowers. The change had been effected as at Dunsinane by young fir-trees and boughs transplanted from the neighbor- ing forests. The day was a general holiday. From an early hour the improvised avenue was thronged with visitors of all ranks, bearing cards, con- gratulatory addresses, gifts, and bouquets. The great Dollfus manufactories were closed, and the five thou- sand and odd workmen, with their wives, children, and superannuated parents, were not only feasted but enriched. After the banquet, every man, woman, and child received a present in money, those who had worked longest for the firm having forty francs. The crowning sight of the day was the board spread for the Dollfus family, or the gathering of the clan, as it should properly be called. There was the head of the house, firm as a rock still in spite of his eighty -two years, every faculty alert as of old, beside him the be- loved partner of his long life; on either side, placed according to age, their numerous sons and daughters, A DIAMOND WEDDING. 229 sons-in-law and daughters-in-law, next grandsons and granddaughters, great-grandsons and great-granddaugh- ters ; lastly, the babies of the fifth generation, accom- panied by their nurses in the picturesque costume of Alsace. This patriarchal assemblage numbered be- tween one and two hundred souls. On the table were represented in the artistic confectionery for which Mulhouse is famous some of the leading events in M. Dollf us' busy life. Here in sugar was a model of the achievement which will hand down his name to com- ing generations, the cite ouvriere^ or workman's city, of Mulhouse; and what was no less of a triumph of the confectioner's skill, the romantic ride of M. and Mme. Dollfus on camels to the border of the Algerian Sahara some twenty 3^ears before. The incomparable fete is said to have cost at least half a million francs, a bagatelle in a career devoted to giving. Mulhouse, although somewhat summarily dismissed by the guide-books, is a place of superlative interest. Even a stroll through these cheerful streets teems with instruction, but all who have at heart the well-being of the working-classes will do well to spend some time here. I stayed several weeks with Alsatian friends, and .was loath to tear myself away. We realize at a glance after what fashion the great cotton-printer set to work to s.olve the. problem before him. The life of ease and the life of toil are here seen side by side, and all the brighter influences of the one are brought to bear upon the other. The tall factory chimneys are unsightly as elsewhere, and ugly 230 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. steam tramways ply the streets. But close to the fac- tories and workshops are cheerful villas and gardens of their owners, while near at hand the workmen's dwellings offer an exterior equally attractive. These cites ouvriere form indeed a suburb in themselves, and a very pleasant suburb too. Many middle-class fami- lies in England might be glad to own such a home — neat, well-built, semi-detached cottage standing in its own garden, with flowers, trees, and plot of turf. Some of these little houses are models of trimness and order ; others less so ; a few looked neglected. The general appearance is of thrift and prosperity, and it must be borne in mind that each tenement and bit of ground belong to the occupier, have been gradually acquired by dint of self-help and aid from without. " It is by such means that we have combated social- ism," remarked the veteran philanthropist to me; and this gradual transformation of the workman into a freeholder is but one of his numerous efforts to lighten the burden of toil. These pleasant suburbs are very animated on Sun- days, especially when a wholesale christening of babies takes place. The artisans are paid monthly or bi- monthly — these family celebrations usually occurring after pay-day. One Sunday afternoon we saw quite a procession of carriages returning from church ; no one on such occasions going on foot. There were about* a dozen parties, all well dressed, the infants in fine white muslin robes covered with embroidery. A large proportion of the community is Catholic; and" as an instance of M. DoUf us' liberality — the Dollfus family, FRENCH MULHOUSE. 231 be it remembered, are standi Protestants — I mentioned his gift of a piece of land on which now stands the new handsome Catholic church. We cannot take a turn here without being reminded of the noble spirit ani- mating these princely manufacturers. It is impossi- ble to enumerate the benevolent institutions of Mul- house, and the inspection of all in a short time is equally beyond average capacity. Each quarter has its free dispensary under charge of a Protestant dea- conness — no unenviable person with her pretty cottage and garden. These sisters have learned to dispense medicine, and the doctor only attends twice a week. Goats are kept for the use of sickly children. There are also free libraries, technical schools, and adult classes for both sexes. Within the last few years a museum has been opended, which is as French as French can be — no German element perceptible. Most conspicuous are the portraits of Thiers and Gambetta, also a fine De Neuville representing one of those des- perate hand-to-hand conflicts of the last war, which have so painful a hold on French imaginations. The bombardment of Strasburg is another subject exhibited here. Not actualities only render the place interesting. Its history, illustrated by a visit to the quaint old Hotel de Ville, abounds in suggestive relics. The wheel that figures on the arms of the once free city tells its own story. The Ghent of Alsace has for cen- turies been a thriving seat of manufacture, and on the walls of the ancient council chamber, among the heraldic devices of its burgomasters, figures the bare 232 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. foot of the DoUfus (many -footed) family. What phy- sical vigor and tenacity of character such armorial bearings suggest! An honored name, calling, and family handed down from generation to generation! It is indeed a pedigree to be proud of. Among other civic heirlooms is the document in which the free city of Mulhouse, of its own will, demanded incorpo- ration into French territory. That yellow parchment did not avert rough treat- ment at the hands of the victors in our own time. So exorbitant was the requisite in money, clothes, and supplies, to be forthcoming within twenty-four hours, that M. Dollfus interceded. When he found remon- strance vain, he tore off the Prussian decoration re- ceived some time before, and threw it to th^ ground. "Tell your master," he cried to the military authori- ties, "I should henceforth be as much ashamed of wearing his gift as hitherto I have been proud." An officer rushed forward as if to arrest him, whereupon the lion-hearted old civilian bared his breast, bidding any to strike who would. Such at least is the pop- ular version of an incident which, in substance true, served still further to heighten M. Dollfus' popularity. When the terrible ordeal was over and the treaty concluded making Alsace Prussian, the head of the greatest commercial house in eastern France seriously contemplated migration. M. Dollfus visited Dijon among other places, hoping to find in the neighborhood a suitable site for his- large premises and numerous personnel. What he could not replace was the exquisite water of Mulhouse, and JEWS, 233 the scheme was abandoned. So admirable is this water that table-linen stained with wine or fruit has only to be steeped in it to become white as before. The beauty of the famous Alsatian prints and muslins depends firstly on this circumstance; secondly, on the thorough training of the artisan. Just as Limoges, Lyons, and St. Etienne are art centres, the manufac- ture of ceramics, silk, and ribbons being respectively cultivated as fine arts, so here every process connected with cotton-printing is made a special subject of study. The schools of weaving, dyeing, printing, and design are celebrated throughout Europe. The Jewish element in Alsace is considerable. Al- ready I wrote in 1883 : " Whether the Jews deserve their unpopularity is a painful question not lightly to be taken up." That question has been recently an swered by another English writer before mentioned. During my visit, I found that tenements of the work- men's city had been acquired by Jews as matters of speculation, and wherever I went I noted a cold, mis- trustful attitude maintained toward them. In the crowded saloaof Gdrardmer, a Jewish family sat wholly apart. Few English tourists will be tempted to revisit this " God-blessed, man-cursed " land, and when once we have bade adieu to Alsatian friends, we are severed from them almost as completely as if they were Sibe- rian exiles. No outpourings of the brimful heart may be trusted to the post, no renewal on paper is possible of the anguished confidences that made intercourse so pathetic. But we learn from other sources that the German rule becomes less and less bearable. It was 234 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. not enough to interdict French newspapers and French speech ; religious consolation is being gradually with- drawn from an eminently God-fearing people. One by one French pastors are replaced by ministers of German birth and education. Wherever service is still conducted in French, police-agents are present, as spies upon the pastor. The Sabbath, sole day of the seven that once brought oblivion of tyranny, is now its crudest reminder. PAET IV. FRANCHE COMTE, BURGUNDY, LE MOR- . VAN. departments: the territoire de belfort, the doubs, ain, jura. From Mulhouse we re-enter France by one of "her proudest porticoes. The colossal lion of Belfort, hewn out of the solid rock, is fit emblem of a city whose heroism moved even Bismarck to something like mag- nanimity. The siege of Belfort gave French history as grand a page as that of La Rochelle ; and, advocated by Thiers, "the old man eloquent," rescued the key of the eastern frontier from the fate of Strasburg and Metz. It is a wonderful place, full of martial re- minders, with a bristling crest of forts and triple girdle of fortifications. In the heart of these, as if placed there to be so guarded, are the monuments of its glo- rious defender, Derfert and his men. We are glad for a moment to breathe the air of Belfort, but glad to get away. Peaceful folks and peaceful thoughts seem out of keeping with the warlike little city, ever armed to the teeth, set like fabled dragon at the gate of beauteous garden. From the heights surmounted by Bartholdi's lion, the eye is refreshed with a pleas- ant, prosperous scene, tillage and pasture, running streams and factories, while behind us lies the wooded mountain-pass, the " Trouee de Belfort," leading from 338 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. the Vosges to the Jura. The culture of tobacco, a charming crop with its delicate pink blossoms, is al- lowed by the state here — what sign of favor is not ac- corded the new heroic department? — honey, corn hemp, beet-root, and potatoes are staple products ; cot- ton mills, iron foundries, breweries, brick kilns, the manufacture of pianos, local industries. A large por- tion of territory is covered with forest, the wood of various trees being exported. A few words on forestry in France may not be in- appropriate. Forestry here has long been an impor- tant branch of agriculture. One of the prettiest and most instructive objective lessons of the Jubilee Ex- hibition was the "Pavilion des Forets," a chalet con- structed of various kinds of native timber put together with great effect; within were transverse sections beautifully arranged as panels and in juxtaposition, samples of every use, mechanical, domestic, chemical to which each separate kind was applied. Maps were added showing the distribution of forest throughout France and her colonies, with tabulated statistics as to acreage and products. A sixth part of the soil of France is covered with forests, a million hectares of which belongs to the state. This extent is divided for administrative pur- poses into sections, each section being managed by a government staff, a general inspector "being at the head of the entire department. All officials in the forestry service have to go through a systematic course of training either at the celebrated school of Nancy or elsewhere. The course of instruction em- FORESTRY. 239 braces every subject connected witli the culture, pres- ervation, and replanting of forests, the last-mentioned having paramount importance. As we journey through Dauphine, the Yosges, the Cevennes, we find large tracts ♦carefully replanted with saplings. The promiscuous browsing of goats, so disastrous to young trees, is now prohibited by the state ; trees cut for firewood once in twenty years are methodically replaced, and other means are resorted to for the preservation of forests. The area of woodland in France has fluctuated Y/ithin recent years. In 1871, 15,000 hectares, con- fiscated by Napoleon the Third, were restored to the Orleans family; 100,000 hectares were forfeited by Prussian annexation ; and certain portions have been conceded for agricultural purposes. On the other hand, considerable tracts of former forest have been replanted. The destruction of trees is prohibited or •restricted by law. Forestry is as yet far from profit- able, the net profit to the state, according to recent ofiicials statistics, being but 1 per cent. Native wood is chiefly used for fuel, France import- ing foreign woods for constructing and building pur- poses to the value of two million francs yearly. Here, as at Chateauroux, I found a young friend going through his voluntary or enforced military ser- vice, in his case reduced from a term of five years to one. At the time I write of (1883) it was possible to pay for a substitute, the price being £100. This is no longer the case. The military law of 1889, as I have before mentioned, has introduced absolute 340 FRANCE OF TOD AY- equality in the army, a three-years service being ob- ligatory on all young citizens. We need hardly wonder, seeing its strategic impor- tance, that Montbeliard, passed on our way to Besan- §on, should now bristle with forts. It may be called the sentinel of the canal linking the Ehone and Khine, and of the railway from Besan9on to Mulhouse. Strangel}^ contrasted are these frowning forts with the pastoral scenery around, green lanes, dells, and glades, cu;-ling streams and velvety pastures, each romantically placed village crowned with twin spires, Catholic and Protestant churches standing amicably side by side. Having so fully described the social life and indus- tries of Montbeliard in a former work, I will not re- peat myself here. Since I wrote in 1878, legislation has interfered on behalf of juvenile labor in factories, and the terribly long working-day of adults will in all probability soon be a thing of the past. One old woman employed by me as charwoman during my first visit told me that her daughter worked fifteen hours a day in a watch factory, rising at five even in winter. Painful indeed are these contrasts between industrial and rural France. Cuvier and Victor Hugo are not more contrasted than their native towns: Montbeliard, simplicity, austereness itself, fitting cradle of the hard thinker and indefatigable scientific inquirer; Besan9on still preserving the sumptuosity of an imperial city, proudly placed and proudly peopled, may well glorify herself as the nurse of France's greatest romantic genius. I love to connect French towns with the names that BESANgOIT. 241 immortalize them ; and truly Victor Hugo's birthplace was worthy of the honor — its brilliant, many-sided, complex social life, historic memories sombre as well as inspiriting, its incomparable site and surroundings, the sterner as well as gentler aspects of nature here blended — all these are suggestive of a poet whose sym- pathies were universal, whose imagination fearlessly grappled alike with the tenderest and the most terri- ble problems of human life. From the lofty green eminence called Notre Dame des Buis^ a good view is obtained of the natural and artificial defences which now render BesanQon one of the strongset places in France. Beyond its lofty heights, each headland bristling with forts, stretches a vast panorama — the plains of Burgundy, the moun- tain ranges of the Jura, the Yosges, and snow-capped Alps, every outline sharp and clear in the luminous, transparent atmosphere. Existence here does not flow evenly as at Montb^- liard— sharp lights and shadows, cross-currents and conflicting passions, characterize Besan9on no less than the pages of her poet. An enormous population of priests and soldiery is not consistent with an idyllic state of society. Catholics and Protestants have not hitherto lived here after the lamb-like fashion of primi- tive Christians. As the Third Eepublic is still re- garded by many English critics in the light of a Malay running amuck at the priest, it is well to be reminded of the other side of the question. At Besangon, which numbers a good many Protest- ants, it was found some years since absolutely neces- i6 242 FRANCE OF TO-BAT. sarj to build a Protestant and lay hospital. The petty tyrannies exercised by tlie nuns toward un- orthodox patients in the municipal hospital became at last a crying evil. Again, squabbles innumerable have occurred over the burial of non-Catholic sub- jects. Until quite recently, Protestant pastors with funeral procession have been kept waiting for hours at the cemetery gates, the cure and mayor refusing admission till compelled to obey telegraphic orders from the pr^fet. These unseemly occurrences for- tunately belong to the past; the present government under no plea whatever permitting one sect to perse- cute another. A cornucopia and a pedler's pack ! Such should form the arms of the villages of the Doubs. Not a fairy-like dell, not a faun -suggesting grove, without its steam engine and mill-wheels. Every excursion introduces us to new industries as well as new scenery. Ornans, home of the painter Courbet, derives its wealth from cherry orchards, kirsch distilleries occupy- ing many hands. Absinth and Gruy^re cheese are also local manufactures. Farther on, amid grandiose and lovely scenery, are seen forges, foundries, and chemical works, each enchanting spot being an active little centre of trade. The same feature characterizes the department of the Jura, and here also we find Protestant congrega- tions. One charming little town not far from Salins has a touching interest for all concerned in the spiritual conflicts of their fellows/ The church and school making up what is called the culte Protestant here is RURAL INDUSTRIES. 243 of quite recent date ; the congregation numbers from fifty to sixty members only, chiefly belonging to the peasant and artisan class ; the stipend is about seventy pounds a year with house and garden. Hither, not many years ago, came a distinguished scholar, a gentleman, a man of the world, above all, a former servant of the Church of Kome. The pres- ent minister at the place I speak of voluntarily un- frocked himself for conscience' sake, is a martyr to the cause of free thought and moral responsibility. I have shaken hands with more than one ex-priest in France, and ever with a sense of pride. Such men drain the cup of sorrow and humiliation to the dregs, secession in their case meaning the sacrifice of "worldly prospects, the beginning of life anew ; above all, the severance of every earthly tie. The defroque for conscience' sake is not only a pariah of society, but an outcast from the circles of which he was an honored member. First to fall away from him are mother, sister, niece, those who loved him, whose pure affections kept alive his own ; if kinsmen are less obdurate, they are not always able to testify their sympathy. Feminine influence is too strong. In the Jura two questions occupy the thoughtful, two problems remain to be solved. How to check the depravity brought about by a celibate clergy ; how to replace the lost faith of the masses by an ideal that will tell on daily life — such are the matters upper- most in the minds of social reformers. A lady writer, who brings to her subject much of Zola's sombre realism and something of his power, has not a little 244 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. contributed to the general preoccupation. The popu- larity of Mme. Gagneur's novels, all written in the strongest anti-clerical spirit, attest the feeling of the majority. In the case of Le Roman d^un Pretre the authoress was prosecuted for libel and defamation, but her adversaries lost their cause. Allowing for some exaggeration, the state of things revealed in this novel accords with fact. No wonder that the popular sentiment occasionally displays itself in grossest fash- ion. For instance, at a country fair, just before my second visit to these regions, pictures and dissolving views were exhibited of cures being pitchforked by demons into hell-fire. The peasants were enchanted, but the women much scandalized, and the children frightened out of their wits. The Third Kepublic has set to work to educate its women, high-schools for girls being now opened in all the principal towns. The next step should be the reformation of the rural clergy, the same standard of domestic morality being exacted from them as from our own, or the obligation of celibacy should be re- moved. Lons-le-Saunier, chef-lieu of the Jura, is charmingly situated amid vine-clad slopes; westward we gaze upon the vast plain of the Bresse, eastward and south- ward the Jura range. The modem public buildings of this little town of eleven thousand souls are on -a very handsome scale — museum, lycee, training-col- leges for teachers, bank, hospital, barracks, last but not least, public slaughter-house. When shall we imitate French example, and have public slaughter- SOCIAL WARFARE. 245 houses at a good distance from our towns, and under strictest police surveillance? I have upon two occasions spent some time here with French Protestants, and during my second visit found the same struggle going on — war to the knife between the parties of progress and of reaction. I confess the excitement of finding one's self in the thick of the fray has charms, and I can but feel that, when all things march according to the desires of the ad- vanced Liberal, existence will become less stimulating. Yet on revisiting Lons-le-Saunier and other whilom strongholds of clericalism, the stranger's first impulse is to look round for signs of improvement. English folks can hardly realize with what formidable forces the first enlightened and really representative govern- ment of France has had to contend. Political adven- turers and malcontents, an ambitious aristocracy, a church wielding enormous power, and, excepting for an almost infinitesimal percentage, the entire feminine population — all these have been arrayed against the party of freedom, progress, and order. It was no mere question of political or dynastic supremacy, but of liberty of the subject, of conscience, of speech, and the press. The condition of things had jndeed found its old level, and men like the ever-to-be-respected Jules Grevy and other ujipretending founders of the Third Kepublic, were really performing the task un- dertaken by the framers of liberty in 1789, securing to French citizens the rights we insulars have long taken as matters of course, but were then once more in jeopardy. If this statement appears somewhat 246 FRANCE OF TO-DAY, inflated, let tlie reader turn to a page of Reclus' great geography. He will find mention of a certain town in the Morvan which was literally as well as figura- tively decimated by the coup d'etat of the pseudo- Napoleon. In 1851, 1,500 peaceable citizens of Clamecy (Nievre) were imprisoned or exiled without trial, simply on account of their political principles. And the danger of similar treacheries had by no means ended with the historic Sixteenth of May. But yes- terday we have seen French liberties imperilled by the combined machinations of priests, women, and desperadoes, only the calm good sense and foresight with which the peasants went to the voting-urn avert- ing a catastrophe. The Republican propaganda at Lons-le-Saunier was carried on in the teeth of formidable difiiculties. Contrasted indeed the storm and ferment of social gatherings here to the placid intellectual intercourse of Montbeliard ! It would really seem as if the spirit of its leading men haunted native earth. We find that the presiding genius of this little town was no other than the composer of the Marseillaise! The fiery young soldier-poet, destined to convulse Europe and revolutionize France with a song, was not born in the town itself, but in the romantically placed suburban village of Montaigu. So priest-ridden and reactionary had been the Jura hitherto that not till 1882 was a statue erected to Rouget de Lisle. The inauguration of Bartholdi's fine work was a local fete of great magnificence, marred, however, by bad weather and endeavors to get up a counter-demon- AMPHIBIOUS FARMING. 247 stration. I had travelled from the shores of the Baltic in order to be present, but only arrived in time for an animated dinner-party and the illuminations. From the picturesque eminence of the Chateau de riiltoile we obtain a good view of the surrounding country. In the far distance the valley of the Saone and the violet hills of Burgundy, at our feet the plain of La Bresse, a vast level expanse planted with maize, corn, beetroot, hemp, and other crops, the brilliant mosaic showing clear blue lakelets here and there. These are the artificial ponds which remain for four years, are then filled up, producing abundant har- vests. In the interval large quantities of fish are reared. A similar region, on a larger scale, is that of the Dombes, lying between Bourg-en -Bresse and Lyons, 100,000 hectares dotted over with gleaming pools, and equally given up to what may be described as amphibious farming. The history of these plains may best be given in Faust's farewell words, when Margaret's irresistible lover, a white-haired centenarian, willingly sinks into the grave, evil-doing atoned for, celestial pardon awaiting him : •* A swamp below the mountain stretches wide, Poisoning" all husbandry. To draw away The deadly damp, that were the highest gain. I open place for millions, here to dwell Busy and free, if not secure from ill. Green is the plain and fruitful, man and herds Together on this newest spot of earth Shall cheerful live, and, nestled 'mid the hills. Active as ants, shall thrive the fellowship. Here in the land's deep bosom. Paradise. There flows the river to the coast, Filling each barren place." 248 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. The thaumaturge here has been that most unpoeti- cal of all agencies, a joint-stock company ; the enter- prising company of the Dombes (a feminine substan- tive with a plural look), taking in hand the work begun by the state and the inhabitants, is transform- ing vast swamps into a garden. Plantations, drainage, artificial manures, have in space of twenty years reduced these marshlands by two- thirds, by one-third increased the population, and in the same proportion diminished mortality. Malaria has disappeared, the average length of human life reached the normal figure, and the physical condition of the population immensely improved. Material well-being has rapidly advanced; hay, com, vineyards, pastures, are seen on every side, and every year the wealth of the commu- nity reaches a higher sum total. On the other hand, many parts of the Jura I had found in a highly flourishing condition a few years before, were in 1882 almost ruined by the phylloxera and cold wet seasons. The larger landed proprietors, whose incomes depend greatly on the vintage, thus find themselves much crippled, while the case of the small vigneron is harder still. His sons betake them- selves to the neighboring towns, his daughters to domestic service, with a twofold result. The value of land goes down and a steady migration ensues to the town, where wages are high and existence offers more attractions. A third consequence is inevitable. The town holds out greater temptations for young people of both sexes, the outcome of which is too often immorality and infanticide. The depopulation THE JUOE DE PAIX. 249 of certain rural districts is a problem that taxes the ingenuity of political economists in France as in Eng- lando Broad tracts of vineyard, soon exchanged for moun- tain scenery with scant culture here and there, lie between Lons-le-Saunier and Champagnole — Ru skin's Champagnole, described by him in words that haunt the memory as a beautiful poem. And in spite of railways and the inroad of what Renan calls " 1-a vul- garite Americaine," it is impossible to visit and re- visit this little town without a sense of the gratitude Ruskin speaks of — a feeling that here we hearken to " the first utterance of those mighty mountain sym- phonies, soon to be more loudly lifted and wildly broken along the battlements of the Alps." On the occasion of my second stay at Champa- nole, my visit was to the family of a juge de paix ; and I not only obtained from him a vast amount of information, but was enabled to attend his sittings, thus getting an insight into both theory and practice of rural legislation. The juge de paix^ it is hardly necessary to say, is a creation of the Revolution. In his person is represented one of the most sweeping reforms ever effected by a stroke of the pen. The right of administering justice was summarily trans- ferred from a privileged class to responsible servants of the state. From that moment no French citizen was at the mercy of another, no French citizen could mete out justice to himself. Let me now describe a sitting of \hQ justice de paix^ which is as unlike that of our county or borough benches as can be conceived. 250 FHANCE OF TO-DAY. At 9 A.M. we ascend the handsome staircase of the Hotel de Ville and enter the judge's court, with white- washed walls, and large windows opening pleasantly on to the market-place. Above the chair of office, a fact to be specially noted, hangs a crucifix. In the centre, facing the audience, sits the juge dej^taix wear- ing his robes of office, black advocate's gown with white lappets at the throat, and high-crowned hat with silver band, which may be worn or not at pleasure. On days of ceremony a blue badge is worn. On his right, also wearing judicial hat and gown, sits the greffier or clerk ; on his left the suppUant or coadjutor, the last-mentioned an unpaid official, who represents the public prosecutor. By the judge lies a copy of the French Code. This is not used by witnesses, the simple and dignified formula exacted of witnesses on oath being merely " By God, man, and the truth " {Par Dieu^ les hommes^ et la verite). Opposite the table is a small space railed off for those cited to appear or appearing on their own account, behind are a few seats for lookers-on. Upon this occasion half a dozen blue-bloused figures made up the audience; the season was August, a busy time out of doors, when country-folks are less inclined to litigation or amusement. When frost and snow bring about cessa- tion of labors, these little courts are crowded by the curious. Next to the excitement of a lawsuit of one's own, is that of watching our neighbors, seems the opinion of the shrewd, somewhat quarrelsome Franc-Comtois peasant farmer. Yet let us not jump too hastily to conclusions. PEASANT ORATORY. 251 English rustics, ploughmen, stockmen, and the like are more pacific than the rural population of France, and for the best possible reason — Hodge and his neighbor have nothing to quarrel about. Jacques Bonhomme and his fellows, on the contrary, have a good deal. Boundary-marks are perpetually wrangled over. The small landowner, here as elsewhere, adds to his little domain from time to time a plot here, a field there, and the limitations are difficult to deter- mine. Sometimes the women squabble, and very stormy and often ludicrous scenes take place. Vil- lage termagants are arraigned by each other before the judge, who, amid lively invective and gesticulation, is obliged to decide who is in the wrong. Hard as is sometimes the administration of justice, harder still is the maintenance of gravity. ISTo matter what hap- pens, the magistrate must remain solemnity itself. It is interesting to learn that the majesty of the law represented in his person is invariably respected. No matter how disorderly the offenders or violent the disputants, the simple " You can retire " of the juge de paix suffices. Very rarely have the services of the gendarme to be called into requisition. "What a study for an artist this shrewd old farmer in blue blouse now pleading his own cause! The bone of contention is a certain contract, and he is there to show that the other contracting party has not fulfilled his obligations. His keen, vivacious eyes and weather-beaten features display extraordinary varieties of expression. At one moment he gloats over the assurance that he had convinced the judge 252 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. and carried his point. The next he casts a withering glance at finding himself imperfectly understood. The arguments are gone over again and again with renewed vehemence, the judge and his companions listening with exemplary patience and composure. At last he is requested to listen in turn, the judge simply bidding him to appear with certain documents at the next sitting, when the verdict of the law will be delivered. With a parting burst of eloquence for the benefit of the audience, and evidently sure of ulti- mate victor}^, the picturesque old fellow takes his de- parture. The politeness displayed on both sides was gratifying to witness. " Next stood up two disputants unable to agree to the boundary-marks of their possessions : one a grave, taciturn man of middle age, the other young, smart, and ready to say on his own behalf all and more than the judge could hear. The affair was promptly dis- posed of. On that day fortnight, at eight o'clock in the morning, the litigants were bidden to appear with their title-deeds on the contested border-land, when the rival claims would be adjusted by the judge in person. The functions of the jnge de paix are strictly de- fined. His mission, as set forth in the Code, is to assist, conciliate, and decide. Each canton, contain- ing on an average thirteen communes, has its rural magistrate, whose authority extends over criminal cases up to a certain point. He can sentence to short terms of imprisonment, and to fines not exceeding two hundred francs, the next stage in administration being the Tribunal Correctionnel of the arrondissement. SOUITDART-MARKS. 253 The arrondissement, be it remembered, is that division of department presided over by a sous-jprefet. In cases of burglary, accident, murder, suicide, arson, the juge de paix is immediately summoned to the scene to investigate and take evidence. It is his office to seal the papers of defunct persons, to represent the law at those family councils, or conseils de famille — fin institution happily unknown among ourselves ; in fine, to act as mediator generallj' in matters alike of domestic or civic dispute. Perhaps his usefulness is most felt in cases which come under no especial cate- gory. The beautiful mountainous region round about Champagnole, for instance, has lately been intersected by railways. Thousands of Savoyards and Pied- montese were employed in the construction, when many brawls arose alike between employer and work- men and the foreign laborers and their French com- panions. The judge's knowledge of Italian and his pacific intervention were continually throwing oil on the troubled waters. In nine cases out of ten, quarrels were amicably settled owing to his mediation. The appointment of these rural magistrates is made by the state. The stipends are small, from three to four thousand francs yearly, with a small retiring pension on reaching the age of sixty. Honors and promotions do not await this modest interpreter of the law. He may rise to the first rank in this capacity; higher he cannot go. But provided he fulfils his duty in an intelligent, amiable, and conscientious spirit, he is universally esteemed. And if none of the more brilliant prizes of life fall to his share, he can lead a 254 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. tranquil existence in the full enjoyment of fireside happiness. No sunnier, peacefuller home have I seen than that of mj friend the juge de paix. In his work on " French and English " Mr. Hamerton points out that the Egalite figuring on the escutcheon of the Eevolution is to be taken in the legal sense only. France no more than England exhibits a dead level of social conditions. But at Champagnole the wildest Utopian dreams seem indeed matter of sober fact. We find in this heavenly, beautiful spot an equality, intellectual as well as social, hardly, I should say, to be matched anywhere. The principle of brotherhood is imbibed with mother's milk. Chil- dren alike of the millionaire and the poorest day- laborer, of the owner of mills and chateaux and of the artisan toiling and moiling for daily bread, learn their ABC side by side, and at noon, like the little Spartans of old, share a fraternal meal — thus on the threshold of life acquiring that respect for self and humanity in harmony with democratic institutions. I used to accompany my hostess and her little six- year-old boy to the communal school every morning. It was quite impossible at a glance, or on nearer in- spection, to classify the children, assigning to each its social position. One and all were neatly and appro- priately dressed. "Observe," my hostess said to me, "yonder little thing in spotless pinafore. He is a poor charcoal- burner's son ; but as rich and poor are taught together, it is a point of honor with parents that none should be ashamed of himiSe"^^ ^-^-^ . companions." UTOPIAN EQUALITY. 255 Many of these youthful scholars live at some dis- tance irom th^ school, and for the convenience of all, and in order not to wound the susceptibilities of any, hot so:ip is provided by the municipal council for all at mid-day. Each child brings napkin and bread, and an assistant teacher superintends the meal, which is at the same time a lesson in manners at table. Nor does the higher school divide the rising genera- tion of Champagnole. Boys of the upper and lower ranks here associate as in earlier years, and as they are destined to do later when undergoing the three- years military service. This fusion of class distinc- tions tells in many ways. I was much struck by the affability and dignity of the working-classes here- abouts. In company of my friends, I visited the famous forges of Syam, seat of Yulcan and his Cyclops amid haunt of faun and dryad. We were shown over the vast workshops by a poorly-dressed employee, who explained everything in the politest manner, but could not be induced to accept any gra- tuity at parting. My second visit to Champagnole happened during a cholera scare, and I was struck with the general in- difference to sanitary arrangements. The market-place abounded with delicious fruit, but nobody would so much as eat a green-gage in the acme of freshness and ripeness! Not a soul in the place seemed to think drains and sewage worthy of attention. Yet a fine physique and considerable personal at- tractions characterize the population of the Jura, and health is encouraged ia -^'^-^ime by the daily 256 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. plunge in lake or river. French people, if scant lovers of the ocean, adore fresli water. Wherever you find running streams, you are sure, in warm weather, to come upon bathers. The banks of the Ain, near Champagnole, afford a lively scene at certain hours of the day. Family-parties make dressing-rooms of the bushes and willow-trees, and, appropriately attired after seaside fashion, take their dip or swim in com- pany. Nothing is a greater mistake than to regard a love of water as an insular peculiarity. We bathe indoors, our neighbors abroad — that is the difference between us. The Jura is being fast intersected by railways, and the diligence must ere long become a survival here as elsewhere. Champagnole will soon be connected with Geneva via Morez and Nantua via St.-Claude, although even railway communication is sure to be interrupted from time to time by the deep snows of winter. Between Champagnole and St. Claude on the Swiss border lies some of the most pastoral scenery of France. Every village has its blackened chimnej^s and thundering steam engines. Many a miniature Birmingham is divinely placed, many a tiny Sheffield recalls us from dreams of beauty to the work-a-day world. Here is a village given up to the study of noses; that is to say, the manufacture of spectacles^— a long-nosed people naturally requiring one arch of the rim , an aquiline-nosed, another ; a short-nosed, a third. There is a community occupied in manufac- turing cheap clocks for the country in which time has CO-OPERATIVE DAIRIES. 257 hitherto been supposed to stand still ! China almost entirely monopolizes the cheap machine-made clocks of Morez — ^which also spits the meat of Europe ; hun- dreds of thousands of spits are yearly made here. Electro-plate, enamel shop-plates, drawn wire, and nails are also made here, the population entirely de- pending on its factories. It is its streams that have en- riched Morez ; water-power, a very Ariel, is forced by the insatiable Prospero, man, to do his behests, here turning a wheel, there flowing into channels prepared for it, on every side dispensing wealth and civilization. But civilization with its drawbacks! It was melan- choly to hear of the long working-hours, from five in the morning till seven at night, and to count the cafes and cabarets. On Sundays these are full to overflow- ing; even in lovely weather few workmen are seen walking out with wife and children. The cabarets absorb them all. Let us hope that combination, the progress of instruction, freer intercourse with the outer world, will gradually lighten the lot of labor through- out the Jura and eastern France generally. Morez is the first French town of 5,000 and odd souls I can remember to have found without a museum ! The pastoral features of the country recall the Swiss Alps. The famous Gruyere cheese is made in the isolated chalets perched on the crests of ravines or nestled in the heart of the valley ; for the seven or eight winter months abandoned — during the remainder of the year swarm- ing like beehives with industrious workers. As soon as the snows melt, the herds are let loose from their stalls, and so well do they know thftj r^wny jjraf, each 17 258 FRANCE OF TO-BAY, finds its familiar pasture-ground without need of guid- ance. No sooner do the chill blasts of autumn herald wintry snows than the sagacious animals set off for their sheltered stalls fast as their legs can carry them. The history of French Gruyere cheese is very curious, and strikingly illustrates the value of co-operation. Land here is much divided, and, as enormous quan- tities of milk are used in the manufacture, a small owner, single-handed, could do nothing. All difficul- ties are met by the co-operative principle. Associated dairies, or frtdiilres^ are formed, and often number sixty members, each of whom keeps one, two, or at most three cows. A spirit of honor pervades the transactions of these mountaineers. An associate who should put water to his milk would be at once ex- pelled. A flourishing fruiiiere produces from 20,000 to 80,000 lb. of cheese, and from 3,000 to 4,000 lb. of butter; 800 litres (1.761 imperial pint) of milk are consumed in the manufacture of 50 to 60 livres (1 lb. 1^ oz.) of cheese. The cheeses are stamped with the name of the association and of the quality of milk supplied by each member. The sale takes place half- yearly, and meantime the cheeses are arranged in cel- lars precisely after the fashion of books on shelves, and are turned and rubbed with salt every day. Metayage, another form of co-operation, is in full force. The vineyards were mostly cultivated on the half-profit system, producing five times as much profit as corn, hay, cattle-rearing, and cheese-making. I use the past tense, as of late years the oidium and phyl- loxera have ruined many wine-growers, forcing the ST.-CLAUDE. ^59 cultivators to betake themselves to other occupations. The associated farm is often in the hands of a single family. Thus, in an inquiry in 1866, out of nineteen occupations, seven were managed by brothers, who with their wives and children lived under the same roof. The great majority of peasants in the department of the Jura are landowners on a small scale. Of 90,000 freeholders twenty-five years ago, 40,000 worked partly as day -laborers for others or cultivated addi- tional land on the metayage or half-profit system. We do not find here the wealth of Seine and Marne, or the poverty of certain portions of Brittany. The Jurassien peasant is aise — that is to say, able to earn a fair livelihood. So severe is the climate that it has been said we may encounter between the plains and the highest points as much diversity of vegetation as between Paris and Siberia. In the temperate zones are seen corn, fruit, the vine ; in the Boreal region, likened to Finland, it is with difficulty a potato or onion can be enticed to grow. In the bitter winter of 1879-80, bears made their way into villages near large towns. St.-Claude, the marvellously placed little bishopric in the mountains, shows the same industrial activity as Morez. In spite of enormously long hours of labor and insufficient pay, the general air is one of cheerful- ness. Much of the turnery, wood-carving, and inlaid work for which this town has for centuries been famous is done in the workman's own home. Amid domestic surroundings a skilled wood-carver will more 260 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. readily toil twelve or fourteen hours a day for five francs than in a crowded workshop. The diamond- polisher and gem-cutter of the neighboring villages work under the same conditions, often each member of the family taking part in the business. In 1878 the working-day was from twelve to four- teen hours, and the pay from three to five francs, women earning considerably less than men. Trades unions and strikes in these regions were unknown, and many skilled workmen, in order to better their position, migrated yearly to Paris. n. DEPAKTMENTS: THE COTE d'OK, SAONE AND LOIRE, NIEVRE, YONNE. Just as the railway now carries us from Alpine severity to tropic luxuriance, snow-cladpeak s of the Jura to the oleanders and pomegranates of Burgundian gardens, so on French soil are we oft-times transported from one extremity of the intellectual pole to the other. Thus, during my various sojourns in the re- gions just described, I had breathed an exhilarating mental atmosphere, interchanging ideas on all vital subjects with the advocates of progress. I have now to narrate experiences of quite an opposite kind, find- ing myself amid social circles in which time seemed to have stood still for a hundred years, the finger of the clock arrested several generations ago. The plunge was curious, and in a personal sense painful. Cordially welcomed, made one with amiable family groups, I now for the first time touched French soil and used French speech, yet found myself an alien, a bottomless gulf of divergent opinion dividing me from host, hostess, and fellow-guests — intellectual standard, political ideals, views of society, being the antipodes of my own. It is worth while to note these 262 FRANCE OF TODAY. differences as they throw light on recent events in France, and make clear the tremendous effort to crush liberty of conscience and representative government under the Third Eepublic. Striking is the contrast of scenery as we approach Auxonne or Seurre from Dole — pine forests, deep- shut combes, and mountain torrents exchanged for level sweeps of the dazzling, gold-flowered colza. Two crops are gathered yearly, and the harvest is a sight to see. The wide landscape becomes indeed a field of the cloth of gold. By the banks of the Saone, hemp and maize flourish best; but although the sub- stitution of mineral for vegetable oil has greatly dimin- ished the culture of colza throughout France, it still remains a leading crop here. In 1862 upward of two hundred thousand hectares of French territory were devoted to this plant, representing a commercial sum total of nearly a million francs. In 1887 the area had been reduced by more than a fourth, and the re- ceipts in equal proportion. My halting-place in the valley of the Saone was a pleasant country-house within a few miles of Seurre. I was accompanied by a fellow-guest, a retired notary, and as we jogged along in our hostess' old-fashioned hooded carriage he stopped to speak to this acquaintance and that who passed on the way. It was early morning of a week-day, yet the principal occupation, at least of one sex, seemed church-going. My com^panion, instead of asking after madame or mademoiselle, merely ob- served, as a matter of course, " The ladies are gone to mass?" A query always answered in the affirma- CLERICAL LADIEIS. 263 tive. When we reached our destination, M. le Curd, as a matter of course also, was invited to breakfast in certain circles ; the village priest is always bidden to partake on festive occasions. The conversation for the most part turned upon the atrocities of M. Grevj's government — I am speaking of 1882 — and was very much the same thing as reading a chapter of M. Taine — perhaps a trifle less tiresome. Several anomalies struck me during my two-days visit. Immediately after the long breakfast, one of the ladies retired to a corner of the room with the curd, and consulted him on spiritual subjects, soliciting the favor of an extra confession ; while another, the daughter of the house, who had a decided talent for drawing, showed me her sketchbook. The first pen-and-ink sketch noticed was so clever that with a very little more technique it might have adorned the pages of Charivari. It is the fashion in these parts for the young people to dance on Sundays and fete-days, out of doors, and it seems that the cure had heard that conversation and conduct upon those occasions was apt to be more frivolous than befitted. In order to reassure him- self, he deputed his vicaire to the village green, enjoin- ing him to climb a tree and see and hear all that went on, without being observed. The vicaire obeyed, and chose the tree possessing the thickest foliage as his seat of observation, but was unfortunately detected, nevertheless. No notice was taken of his presence ; but to punish the intrusion, all talked as fast as tongue could go, and danced as long as feet would move. For hours the unhappy priest was kept a prisoner in 264 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. his uncomfortable position — and there before me was the scene depicted by no unskilful hand. Seurre is fragrant from end to end with wood vine- gar, that invaluable antiseptic discovered by a protege of the first Napoleon. Molrat, a chemist of Bijon, had ruined himself by his experiments when the em- peror came to his aid, and the distillation of vinegar from wood was the result. It is manufactured here, and every visitor purchases a bottle. A few drops put into a bath heal the irritation caused by heat- boils, the stings of insects, etc., while a drop applied by the finger will cure a mosquito-bite or bee's sting. Between Seurre and Auxonne, the ancient town of St.-Jean de Losne is passed, famous for one of the most heroic sieges of history, and now a little port of considerable importance, commanding no less than three waterways, the Saone, the Canal de Bourgogne, the Canal du Rhine and Rhone, and also joined to Dijon by rail. We must never in .France lose sight of the value of its canals, those artificial rivers, sup- plementary routes qui raarchent^ that the railways are as far as ever from superseding. If we spread before us the map of France, and study its canalization, we shall realize the force of Strabo's observation, corrob- orated by the greatest canal-cutter the world has ever seen, Lesseps, two thousand years later. France, from the point of view of water communication, is the most favored country of Europe. The tremendous agency of water in commerce and transport explains the clamor for more and yet more canals. At the end of the Ancien Regime the canalization of the entire coun- CANALS. 265 try reached the sum total of 1,000 kilometres, con- siderable additions being made under the Empire, the Eestoration, and the Government of July. The intro- duction of railways somewhat retarded the movement, which is once more in full force. The actual extent covered by these artificial rivers is five times what it was on the eve of the Eevolution. M. de Freycinet's great scheme, which became law in 1889, had for its object the creation of new lines, to the extent of several thousand kilometres, the putting into working order of canals fallen into disuse — lastly, the purchase of canals by the state ; the entire outlay being set down at 1,200 millions of francs. The reali- zation of these projects is a matter of time, more urgent undertakings standing in the way. The rate of transport by canal is very low, one centime a ton per kilometre on certain lines, and for certain com- modities — Belgian coal, for instance, five centimes is the average. The lot of the tower is a hard one: when the wind is favorable, he tows from three in the morning till nine at night — a laboriousness painful to think of. As I strolled one May morning by the canal near Dijon, I saw one of these pathetic figures, his face burnt to a dark brown with the sun, his clothes of the poorest, his limbs strained to the utmost, his barge a picturesque feature in the lovely scene. The little river Ouche ran parallel with the canal, bending sallows, blue sky reflected in the limpid waves of both. Even in happy France such contrasts as these remind us of the terrible lot that poverty may become. The tower looked not beautified, but ren- 266 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. dered automatic by over-toil, dragged down to the level of a beast of burden. Auxonne, another little town of the Saone valley, is not striking as seen from the handsome brid^ facing you as you quit the railway, yet the dark gra roofs clustered round the tall church-spire, the girdle of walls, and double enceinte of ramparts tapestried with green make up a pretty picture. Far away stretch the level lines of mead and colza fields, the river winding between its banks, full and blue in spring, oft-times in summer a mere thread of shallow water amid hot, white sands. When navigation is pos- sible its quays pre3ent a busy scene ; in autumn corn, fruit, and neatly-cut billets of wood being packed for Paris, the bargemen picturesque athletes in their semi- seaman's dress. Auxonne is one vast camp, and as completely forti- fied as any town of the middle ages. It is protected by gates and a double enceinte, the ancient earth- works intervening bright with turf. Cannon are placed at frequent intervals, soldiers swarm every- where, and enormous barracks dwarf the town into insignificance. Fatalists might make much of the fact that Auxonne, a town defying every attack of the Prussians in 1870- 71, should be associated with the youth of the first Napoleon. The victor of Jena and Auerstadt spent some years of his cadetship here. Here he twice nar- rowly escaped drowning; and here, too, as narrowly, so the story runs, marriage with a bourgeoise maiden called Manesca. Two ivory counters; bearing this AUXONNE— DIJON. 26T romantic name in Napoleon's handwriting, enrich the little museum. Appealing more strongly to the imagination is Jouffroy's fine statue in the Place d'Armes. The fig- ure before us is that of the young soldier of the Ke vo- lution, familiar to the Auxonnais in 1791. As yet obscure, perhaps unambitious, his face shows rather dreamy, pensive questioning than lust of power and glory. He seems to peer iiito the future, to ask of the Fates what they have in store for him, to strive to unriddle the mystery of the unknown. Cold, statuesque, beautiful, the features express deep pon- dering and gloomy sadness. Doubtless by the Imperi- alists this statue was regarded as a palladium when the enemy thundered at the gates. Be this as it may, no Prussian entered Auxonne to gaze on the monu- ment of her great conscript. Dijon, described to me by one American tourist as *' a comfortable little place to sleep in," by another as " a place in which there is nothing to see, of course," is, to my thinking, the most delightful town of France, and none has been more improved and enlarged within the last few years. Indeed, the Dijon I first knew and the Dijon of to-day are hardly comparable. Broad, handsome boulevards replace suburban waste-grounds ; the ancient walls have been transformed into a belt of agreeable walks, and at the present moment the un- sightly and historically uninteresting ruins of the chateau are being demolished for the purposes of sanitation and embellishment. Among the imposing constructions of to-day may be mentioned the enor- 268 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. mous lycde for boys, the new communal schools for children of both sexes, and the state tobacco factory ; these are far from exhausting the list. A new ceme- tery has lately been laid out at some distance from the town, the old being overcrowded. Elegant as Nancy, and much more cheerful and engaging, commercial as Kouen, but quieter and less cosmopolitan, Dijon, were it not for the icy winds blowing from the Alps, would be' a perfect place in which to spend one's exist- ence. The winters begin early, and are very severe. While camellias flourish out of doors. all the year round at Nantes, at Dijon the wine oir your dinner- table, despite a blazing wood fire, may freeze in De- cember. This certainly happened in 1879-80, and the wise Dijonnais lay in their stock of firing as soon as September begins — not an hoar too soon. This charming town is celebrated for some time- honored and curious industHes; among these pills, mustard, and gingerbread. We will take the pills first. Without doubt the people who take most pills will be the first to make them palatable, and the consumption of machine-made pills throughout the length and breadth of France is enormous. It was a happy thought of a successful pillmaker, who, with the best intentions in the world, could not satisfy his customers, to have recourse to machinery. This gentleman, Thevenot by name,' a chemist of Dijon, made a handsome fortune by pill^ making, and his descendants are no less prosperous. The hardness of the times in no degree affects the sale of pills. Folks will have their pet luxury at any PILLS AND MUSTARD, 269 sacrifice, and, wliile ready to retrench in dress, house- keeping, and other matters, retain their pill. I have known one middle-class lady in delicate health to spend a thousand francs (£4.0) a year upon pills. The process is extremely rapid and neat. Tar, chloroform, camuhor, castor-oil, oil of eucalyptus, are among the favorite ingredients. Thin layers of a cer- tain • size, composed of gum, sugar, and gelatine are spread out, the oil is then spread on the under layer just as we spread jam on pastry, a second is then put on, the whole adhering after the manner of covered tarts. The sandwich is placed between two iron plates indented with tiny holes the size of the pill, two turns are given in a baking-oven, and out come pills, each separating itself from its envelope, smooth, compact, firm as shot. The pill is like a miniature mince-pie. Any essence indissoluble in water can be used, and of course the economy of labor is enormous. Hundreds of thousands of pills are manufactured daily. The celebrated Dijon mustard is even more worthy of note. Its peculiar virtue is a certain piquancy not to be found in any other mustard, however excellent. The seed is always sown on cleared charcoal beds in the neighboring forests, spaces difficult to utilize by any other means, as the young plants of peas, beans, potatoes, and the like would be devoured by the rab- bits and wild boars, who will on no account touch the mustard-leaf. The soil gives one flavor; another is otherwise accounted for. The mustard when in pow- der is mixed with the juice of new wine, imparting 270 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. the pleasant acidity familiar to us. In order to obtain precisely the degree of acidity, it is necessary that the grape be in precisely the right stage of unripeness, a degree more or less making a difference. The no less famous Dijon gingerbread, or pain d'epice^ is an invention of the middle ages. This excellent cake is made of honey, rye-flour, and spice, no treacle entering into its composition. Honey pos- sesses, as we all know, a medicinal quality, rendering the jmin d'epice useful as well as ornamental on family tables. The seigneurs of Burgundy are said to have invented it, the bourgeoisie and peasants following their examples. Huge bakeries were set up in Dijon, and to this day the trade in gingerbread is very flour- ishing, seven large manufactories existing here. Bookbinding is also a specialty of this town, but more subject to fluctuations than the former articles of commerce. Pills, mustard, and gingerbread are necessaries of life, indulged in whether times are good or bad ; people can deprive themselves of elegantly bound missals, pocketbooks, and photographic albums, to say nothing of books, of which, I should say, in certain circles, a smaller proportion is sold in France than in any neighboring country. One time-honored bookbinding and leather-work manufactory is admirably arranged from the hygienic and moral points of view. The working-hours are cer- tainly long; but out of the prescribed eleven an hour and a half are allowed for meals and recreation. In order to maintain a good tone among the young people of both sexes, the strictest surveillance is exercised, WINE-CELLARS. 271 and immediately anything approaching courtship is observed the pair are summoned before the master's presence, and, unless they consent to be married within a reasonable time, are dismissed. The entire body of work-people looked extremely contented, well- dressed, and respectable. The process of binding, say a photographic album, is very elaborate, twenty-five or thirty stages being gone through before the raw skin is converted into the polished, perfumed exterior familiar to us. The fragrance of Kussian leather does not depend at all in the skin, but on a preparation of the Kussian birch-tree in which it is steeped. Such being the case, we may by and by have leather-work perfumed with the aromatic eucalyptus and other anti- septic and health-giving essences, our very books being made proof against contagions of all kinds. A curious sight of Dijon, although not named in the guide-books, being inaccessible to the tourist generally, is that of the wine-cellars of M. Paul Guillemot, one of the largest and best known wine merchants of the Cote d'Or. Burgundy, the land par excellence of good wines, is also the land of good cellars, even the peas- ant possessing a good storage-place for his wine. When we consider that age is the first recommenda- tion of wine, we shall recognize the importance of the cellan The merchant who purchases only world- renowned vintages pays the grower a high price to begin with, and has to store his purchases ; in other words, to sink his capital for five, ten, fifteen, or more years. Thus, if wine is purchased to begin with at the rate of five francs a bottle, and sold after some 2T2 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. years at fifteen, we see tliat the mercliant's profit is far from extravagant. While the wine ripens in the cellar he gets no interest for his money, besides, in reality, losing a part of his capital, the cellared wine wasting in the cask, and having to be replenished every month. The meritoriousness of wine consists in its age, and wine-growers in these parts never drink new wine ; that of poor vintages is at once sold for foreign wine markets, only the good being stored, whether for sale or private use. These famous cellars form a little subterranean vil- lage, in which 3^ou may lose yourself as in the Cata- combs. There seems no end to the long, arched chambers, some having on either side huge casks con- taining fourteen tuns, others having neat shelves on which bottles are arranged methodically as books of a library. The temperature slightly varies, the mean being about bb"" Fahrenheit. Between three and four thousand tuns of wine are contained in these cellars, their greatest curiosity being specimens of the vintage of 1819. Of the Burgundian vintage I shall have more to say presently. We are at present concerned with Dijon itself. No French town familiar to me has more improved within the last fifteen years, and none has suffered less at the hands of the improver. Two handsome buildings of recent date call for remark. The first is the Jewish synagogue, inaugurated in 1879. This imposing place of worship, standing on the confines of the beautiful park, strikingly illustrates the truly religious spirit of a government set down THE JESUITS. 273 by certain critics in England as quite the reverse. Toward the building fund the French state contrib- uted 25,000 francs. The town, equally liberal, gave the site, the Hebrew community making up the rest. At the opening ceremony, in which Protestant pastors took part, prayers for the Kepublic were offered by the officiating rabbi, in a very different spirit to the hastily mumbled Domine^ fac salvam nostram Bern- 'pvblicam of state-paid priests, and the inauguration speeches were marked by sentiments of patriotism and attachment to republican institutions. In spite of the absolute civic equality enjoyed by French Jews, the social ban exists still. I once took steps to place a young English Jewess as governess in France, but found that none excepting Protestants would receive her. The antipathy toward the race is universal, in a country where clericalism — to use the words of Gambetta — is the enemy, even to this day. Not very far from the synagogue is the enormous Jesuits' College, opened the same year; that is to say, when the expulsion of the order was imminent. With accommodation for 900 students, and vast grounds, the college must have cost millions ; but millions are ever forthcoming for clerical purposes in France. No- where, be it remembered, is the Ultramontane spirit stronger than among the rich middle classes of Bur- gundy. One must have lived among them fully to understand the bitterness of the struggle that has taken place within the last few years; on the one hand, arrayed liberty of conscience, the principles of representative government, and the subordination of i8 274 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. church to state ; on the other, intolerance, Caesarism, and the absolute supremacy of the priest. The Ee- public has come out victorious, mainly, as Mr. Ha- merton points out, owing to the aid of the so-called "free-thinkers"; but while two-thirds at least of Frenchwomen receive an Ultramontane education, the battle will have to be fought again and again. What has really taken place is this: the Jesuits as a corporate body cannot remain in France; dissociated as individuals they are at liberty to do so. Thus the enactment, or re-enactment, of former edicts against the Jesuits only affected their corporate existence. They are still, for the most part, where they were, although they cannot openly associate for educational purposes. At this new college the professorial body is at any rate changed to all appearances; the pro- fessors no longer wear the garb of the order, or are called by their name. But the educational system carried on is precisely the same, and two fathers re- main at the head of affairs. Their pupils belong to the richer classes, and an aristocratic feeling per- vades the institution. What the teaching amounts to will be shown farther on. Dijon is now a frontier town defended by eight forts, all constructed, since the late war, at a cost of many millions. It is a pleasant and instructive drive to Mont Affrique, the loftiest point of the Cote d'Or, crowned by one of these forts, and commanding a view of the plain of Langres, the Jura range, and Swiss Alps. Between the town and its " Golden Hills," so called from the rich harvests of the vine, lie pros- VILLAGES. 275 perous villages, each an admirable sample of French adaptableness, that habit of mind of discovering and utilizing natural opportunities. The stretch of soil between the wooded crags of Plombieres, the first village passed on quitting Dijon, in the direction of Beaune, has been found especially suited to the cul- ture of raspberries. Accordingly the country-folk devote themselves to this crop, and " Easpberry Yal- ley," as they call it, supplies the Paris and London markets. These villages of the Cote are well built, and, for the most part, clean; there are vines and flowers in every garden, and every house possesses an excellent cellar. There may be no parlor-kitchen, and sleeping- rooms are perhaps incommodious — there is invariably a cellar built on a large scale, and adapted to the proper preservation of wine. On every side are vine- yards, and as we gaze we are reminded of the indomi- table thrift and laboriousness of the peasant-owner. Not an inch of soil between vine and vine is wasted. Where room is not to be had for a fruit-tree, we see a black-currant bush, and, where a black-currant bush would be cramped, potatoes or salad. Anything and everything is planted between the vines — asparagus, gooseberry bushes, artichokes, fruit-trees, the great ob- ject being to waste no fraction of soil. A curious feature is here to be noted by wine- lovers. Just as we may draw a line through the French map, which, roughly speaking, divides the vine-producing from the non-vine-producing region, so here we may nicely separate the zone of ordinary 276 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. claret from tliat of the wines that have no price. The Cote begins where the plain ends, and the line divid- ing the two must be drawn just at the rising of the ground. There is no possibility of increasing the peerless wines of the Cote d'Or, because their quality depends on the nature of the soil, and, as this soil covers a circumscribed space only, they must ever re- main one of nature's monopolies. It may easily be conceived with what dismay the approach of the phylloxera was regarded. Already in 1878 the enemy had made its appearance at Meur- sault; a few days later it was seen in the Botanical Gardens of Dijon. Since that time its ravages have spread in all directions. Daring my first visits in the Cote d'Or, that is to say, in the years 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882, both large and small wine-growers were uniformly prosperous ; nothing indeed could be more self-evident than the wealth and ease of the wine- growing population, and perhaps nowhere could all classes better support a succession of bad seasons- Greengages are a specialty of this part of France. In August you may see dozens of cases being packed at Dijon for the English market. Too often in this favored land of Burgundy the peasants' wealth and sociability lead him into excess. The cabaret here, as among ourselves, is the moral phylloxera needing persistent onslaught. The tem- perance of the Italian workman is often held up as an example to his richer French fellow. Large numbers of Piedmontese are employed on the railways and in building throughout eastern France, their presence ITALIAN LABORERS. 277 exciting not a little jealousy and causing grave dis- turbances. But it is an instructive and pathetic sight on Sunday mornings, these foreign bread-earners crowding the Dijon post-office for money -orders to wives and mothers over the frontier. I have often thought that a touching subject for a painter were here, each toil-worn countenance brightening as the missive was put into his hand, price of sweat and toil, wherewith to rejoice the helpless ones clinging to him far away. A less honorable invasion of eastern France is that of the Italian beggar. Dijon does not enjoy the happy immunity from mendicants which forms a fea- ture of so many French towns. In educational and artistic resources it is behind none. Besides magnificent art collections and monu- ments, this engaging little city of fifty -five thousand souls possesses a public library of nearly a hundred thousand volumes; a theatre supported by the town; an academy of arts and sciences ; a conservatorium of music, at which pupils of both sexes can pursue their studies free of cost ; they can also pass examinations for the degree of bachelor of arts and science with- out any expense beyond that of examination fees. It is indeed difficult in a circumscribed compass to con- vey any fair notion of a French provincial town con- sidered as a piece of complex educational machinery. The beautifully kept Botanic Gardens here may appear to the hasty tourist in the light of a public pleasure-ground only. In reality it is a centre of instruction in economic and scientific botany, chemis- 278 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. try, geology, and kindred subjects. Lectures and courses of study are held during the winter, and in the summer pupils make botanical excursions with professors, who are paid partly by the state and partly by the municipality. The garden of economic botany contains, systematically arranged, the principal plants found in the department of the Cote d'Or, and in other portions students may be familiarized with foreign and exotic trees and flowers, each being labelled with the Latin and popular name. The influ- ence of such educational organizations is hardly to be calculated, especially when we consider that they are gratuitous. Roughly speaking, we may affirm that every second and third rate French town possesses its Kew, its natural-history museum, its royal insti- tution, and academy of arts, on a small but complete scale. Strange as it may appear, we yet find within close proximity to this alert little capital absolutely stag- nant circles, social centres unpenetrated by a single modern idea, the political and scientific outlook not an inch wider than they were a hundred years a^o. No one without very intimate and varied experience of French provincial life can conceive the mental dead- level existing here and there ; the spirit of free inquiry, progressive impulses, moral and mental initiative, alike banished from sight, as it seems, hopelessly crush'ed. And by what agency? That terrible weapon sheathed in velvet, the sceptre of Ultramontane women, that influence so softly yet fatally exercised by the Ange- liques and Aliettes of real life. The heroine of FRENCH WOMEN. 279 Balzac's Double Famille^ and of Octave Feuillet's won- derful sketch La Morte^ are psychological studies, true as they are striking, and the tragedies they bring about are faithful representations of French society to this day. The subject is a vast and complicated one, and im- possible to be adequately dealt with in a few pages. We must remember that lay instruction for French girls is a comparative novelty, and that the majority of wives and mothers are convent-bred— to put the matter in a nutshell, have been taught to bow down to tradition and abhor anything in the shape of prog- ress ; alike the advance of science, the establishment of democratic institutions, the advance of humanity and humanitarian causes by the free development of intelligence, are no less hateful to them than to their ancestresses of Marie Antoinette's time. But, igno- rant as they are, without fault of their own, children as are many of them measured by the average intellec- tual standard, they yet wield enormous power. Largely gifted with both the graces and homelier qualities of their sex, affectionate, devoted, engaging, they possess an influence weightier still, and wholly independent of personal charm. The fact must never be lost sight of that the French wife and mother, in all ranks but the poorest, is a capitalist, her fortune equalling or very likely exceeding, that of her husband; in a pecuniary sense she also is the founder of a family From a business point of view, a man is bound to re- spect his wife's judgment as much as if he were deal- ing with the partner of a firm, which to all intents and 280 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. purposes slie is, the marriage contract so regarding her. The most important subject human beings have to deal with, namely, the education of their children, is naturally decided by the mother. If eonvent-bred, her daughters will be confided to the nuns, her sons to the Jesuits, thus acquiring the same views as her own. Most often it happens that Mariolatry, antag- onism to existing institutions, over-hostility to prog- ress, above all, the renunciation of moral responsibil- ity, are doctrines looked at askance by the head of the house, even held in detestation by him. Good Catholics will indeed express themselves after this fashion: " Yes, I am a Catholic, and I follow my re- ligion ; but I nevertheless oppose the confessional, and 1 see no salvation for society or the Church but by doing away with a celibate clergy. A man is now not master in his own house ; a husband is not the confidant of his own wife, the mother of his children. We must have a married clergy, as in England, where the name of a clergyman is at least a guaranty of re- spectability and decent morals." So far the opinion of the old-fashioned Catholic coincides with that of the most vehement anti-clerical going. And in both cases the clamor is for female education. Frenchmen are, above all things, home-keeping and affectionate. The chief element of discord or bitterness in French households is the want of intellectual sympathy an enlightened, instructed man finds in his wife. The fireside ordeal of Feuillet's estimable hero is, alas ! a story of every day. We now come to a third phase of life, that of the HOLIDAY LIFE. 281 Ultramontane circle unleavened by extraneous ele- ment, husbands and fathers as well as wives and mothers having " put out the eyes of their understand- ing," swallowed the reactionary creed whole. Far be it from me to suggest that existence under such roofs is unsupportable even to a progressist outsider ! Once make up your mind to avoid all vital questions, and you may find existence agreeable enough, although your hostess firmly believes in the latest miracle at Lourdes, and your host regards a republican form of government as nothing more nor less than the worst misfortune that could befall any country. Conversa- tion, fortunately, is not limited to theolog}^ or politics, and if we cannot discuss public affairs, Eenan's last book, or Darwinism, we .can learn a good deal about local matters and rural life generally, which is more to the purpose. The great drawback to the long vacation under these circumstances is the behavior of the clocks. It really seems, let those laugh who will, that the pendu- lum of the timepiece and the shadows of the sundial move slower here than elsewhere ; by some inscrutable process Time takes a lagging pace. Each day seems to possess twice its allotted hours, an inestimable boon, could the miracle happen to the busy, but work- ing discomfiture to the idle. It is curious that characteristics noted by Arthur Young a hundred years ago should still be marked features of French social life. Now, as on the eve of the Eevolution we are occasionally struck by the aloofness of class and class and the general dislike to 282 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. the country. Eich citizens of Dijon keep up coun- try-houses, in which they spend a few weeks every year only, and between them and the village-folks no kind of acquaintance grows up. I have often stayed with one of these upper middle-class families during the autumn holidays, but found their sociability strictly limited to the home circle, while so little was even this short rustication relished that the men were per- petually taking train to town. "We form a clan," said a member of the society in question to me ; and a veritable clanship is such an aggregation of kinsfolk, grandparents, parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, sharing the same roof or living next door. As many as six heads of houses, all more or less nearly related, had here pitched their tents within a stone's-throw of each other. In one household the mothers of both husband and wife always spent the long vacation with the married couple and their chil- dren, and the arrangement seemed to answer perfectly. Fancy two mothers-in-law under an English roofl Without donbt, family-life among ourselves is more varied more open to new ideas, richer in cosmopolitan sympathies. The patriarchal plan has points in its favor; it certainly encourages economy, upholds and strengthens family interests. That question of family interest is apt to become too absorbing ; sometimes so irritating is the stagna- tion of patriarchal wealth that we feel almost tempted to extol insular lavishness, disregard of the future, and almost brutal severance of early ties. I could hardly have believed, had I not witnessed the fact AMUSEMENTS. 283 myself, that two classes could live so near together for year after year without coming into contact, as was the case here. Between these rich notaries, advocates, and others, all landowners and country gentlemen during a part of the year, and their neighbors, the peasant wine-growers, small shopkeepers or laborers, I could never discover any trace of friendly inter- course. I never knew the ladies of the clan make a call in the village or speak of the country-folks living at their very doors, or if they did it was to express distrust and aversion. I am far from declaring that class antipathies are the direct outcome of Ultramon- tanism. I only note the fact that when I did find the peasants living on sociable terms with their richer neighbors, those neighbors were Liberals in the fullest sense of the word. If French people make holiday, they do it in right good earnest. Kich citizens idling away the long vacation do not object to a game of whist in the fore- noon, when prevented by bad weather from a turn with their guns. In spite of the national antipathy to rain, there is less growling and grumbling than with ourselves. Novels, newspapers, cards, dominos, perhaps the piano, are good-humoredly accepted as substitutes for more exhilarating occupations, the long day of rain, winding up cheerfully with a family re- union. The young folks get up a dance or play games, their elders play cards or look on. Tea, and the popular biscuits of Huntle and Palmare, are served at nine o'clock, and shortly after ten the various par- ties of guests, one leading the way with a lantern, be- take themselves home. 284 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. The peasants, for the most part, are in easy circum- stances — a fact we may gather for ourselves when the shooting season comes round. For in spite of the foregoing strictures, our French neighbors possess no- tions of equality with which English squires would hardly sympathize. Think of our lords of the manor and county magistrates encountering Hodge with gun on shoulder on the 1st of September! The small vine-growers and farmers here generally invest forty francs for a game-license. This excessive competi- tion is trying to lovers of so-called sport; for while in England, besides the shooting-license, a second author- ization is necessary from the owner of the soil, in France no such rule holds good except when a game- keeper is kept and game is preserved. As a natural consequence, every year the number of licenses in. creases, and the sportsman finds less game. There are also large numbers of poachers, and for the most part feeble attempts are made to catch them. I have known a first-rate marksman return home after a whole day's tramp with only one tiny quail in his game-bag. A peasant in Burgundy not only tastes game in season: his cellars are stored with wine, spirits, and liquors, his larders with home-made jams and jellies, his presses with linen. Every year the festival of St.- Hubert is celebrated, each neighbor feting his friends in turn, the banquet being served without regard to expense. In one of these villages at the time of my stay the baker's son was studying for the bar, and the father was building for his own use a handsome house away LEVELLING UP. 285 from the bakery. Many of the better-ofl: tradesmen and peasants send their daughters to fashionable convent schools, and of course domestic service is looked at askance — they are instead dowered and married. The thriving condition of the peasant here in some cases depreciates the value of land. Thus, in 1880 I was informed that peasant property hereabouts was so prosperous that it was most difficult to get farm-labor done at any price. Many landowners were compelled to leave land uncultivated or sell at a low price in consequence of the cost of tillage, and small owners at such times would naturally invest their sav- ings in stocks and shareg instead of increasing their farms. We can understand how the German war indemnity of two hundred million sterling was paid when we see the country-folks on dividend day. I happened to be at a friend's house at Dijon upon one of these occasions, and he asked if I would like to accompany him to the Eecette Gendrale or local branch of the state bank. Before starting with his own dividends and those of his family, he went upstairs to the kitchen and fetched the servants; true enough, all were fund- holders, one to a considerable extent. Arrived at the office, it was a sight to see the motley crowd flocking in with their coupons — important functionaries, fash- ionable ladies, laundresses and charwomen in neat caps, laborers and artisans in blue blouses, all con- tentedly awaiting their turn. Nothing ever brought more forcibly home to my mind the thrift of the French 286 FRANCE OF TODAY. nation,^ the forethought which brings about a very real and enviable quality. I mentioned domestic servants just now. Fifty years before the .good woman who was the largest dividend-holder in my friend's household had entered the family at yearly wages of six pounds ; at the end of ten years this sum was increased to eight; at the end of ten more to ten. There a stop was made ; but the savings went on apace, and the faithful old crea- ture, what with her saving habits and handsome New Years' gifts, might now retire if she chose, having enough to live upon. But she was regarded as one of the house; here she had liv^ed, here she would die, having no other home. This patriarchal system is on the wane. Wages are fast reaching the level of Paris, and the girls naturally prefer the life of towns. It is far from easy to procure good servants at any price, and they are generally recruited from remote country regions, the Morvan, Alsace, the poorer villages of the Jura, and, in western France, from Brittany. At first sight we might suppose that the countless orphanages and industrial schools for girls under the management of nuns would more than meet this de- mand. But the conventual system is nothing more nor less than a wholesale abuse of children's labor, and, as M. Jules Simon pointed out long ago, at the same time a competition crushing to the ordinary seamstress. In his work L^Ouvriere he showed that out of each hundred dozen shirts sold in Paris eighty ^ See Appendix, Note 18. ORPHANAGES. 287 dozen come from convent schools. One must have inspecied these dreary prisons to realize what the life of the young creatures pent up within is like. The toil to which they are condemned from the time they enter its walls till they leave at twenty-one is of the most monotonous description. No training is given of a kind to fit them for domestic service, or life gen- erally ; and if their eyes are good for anything after so many years of microscopic stitching, they do not know how to use them. Enfeebled alike in body and mind, their moral sense and intellect dulled ]3ast awakening, these victims of so-called charity in turn become the victims of vice. Unless driven to it, no Catholic mother of a family will go to the nuns for a servant. During one of my visits at a country-house near Dijon, my hostess did indeed take such a step, her housemaid having to leave on account of illness. The orphan's outfit was shown me. It consisted of a small bundle containing a pair of stockings, one under- garment, a cotton jacket, a coarse skirt, and a couple of pocket-handkerchiefs. It would be interesting to see on paper the earnings of this girl ; in other words, the net profits to the orphanage during ten or twelve years. Even the lady of the house, although a de- vout Ultramontane, was scandalized, and of course immediately set to work to clothe her charge decently. A few weeks later at Dijon I asked how the experi- ment had answered. " Yery badly," was the reply. " I had to send the girl away at the end of a week." I forebore to ask any further questions. The Burgundian peasant is often far ahead of his 288 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. more fashionable neighbor in matters that require thinking out. As has been seen, Ultramontanism has still the upper hand, yet an inquiring and protesting spirit is found even among the least learned. One day I walked from my hostess' house in the country to a neighboring village to carry a message, and at the same time visit an ancient church. • "Madame is surely not of these parts?" said the good woman to whom I was sent, eyeing me from head to foot. "No," I replied, "I am English, on a visit to M. and Mme. D." "Oh, then," she said quickly, "if you are English, you are of course Protestant." "Certainly," was my reply. " Now tell me what is the difference between your religion and my own? " " The principal points of difference are these : The Protestants do not acknowledge the Pope as head of the Church; we do not worship the Virgin and the saints ; we do not confess to the priest; and our clergy are married." She did not pause to ponder my words, but with the natural quickness of the French intellect realized their full import at once. " You confess to God, then, and not to man. That seems to me only reasonable. Why, for instance, should I, a married woman, go and say all kinds of foolish things to the cure? And so your priests are married? " " Yes, they are heads of families like others." AN INQUIRma SPIRIT. 289 " Surely not the bishops? " "Bishops and archbishops with us are husbands and fathers with the rest." "And rightly too," she replied with uncommon alacrity. " How otherwise can men be fit to guide women and children? " " There is something in that," I said. " Well," was the answer, " I am of opinion that you Protestants are more sensible than we Catholics. It is my belief that so many of our cures are bad men because they are forbidden to marry. But tell me one thing more: Do Protestants take the sacrament? " " Certainly." " And with bread only, or bread and wine? " " With bread and wine." " Wine for the people, the lay-folks? " "Yes, it is so." " Then pray explain to me why it is that our cures themselves communicate with bread and wine, while we are only allowed to communicate with bread? " I confess that this question was too much for me. How could I here enter into the complex theological questions turning on this point. Was not tlie re- fusal of the cup to the laity one of the cardinal differ- ences between Protestantism and the Catholic faith? I cut the matter short as best I could, and hastened back to the pleasant house among the vineyards, no little impressed with what I heard. Here in the heart of an intensely reactionary dis- trict, a district as it seemed unleavened with a particle of progressive thought, the sturdy, untrained intellect 19 290 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. of the French peasant was arriving by a single leap at conclusions so painfully reached by Father Hya- cinthe and other illustrious recalcitrants from the or- thodox dogma. Probably, I may say certainly, for the first time in her life this woman conversed with an English Protestant. Yery likely none of the points discussed had been brought under her notice by book or newspaper, reason and common sense alone making themselves heard. What struck me most about the village priests I came in contact with was their ignorance. At the dinner-table of the hostess in question, the cure put the following question to me, point blank : " Tell me, madame, when the queen of England dies, wjio will succeed to the English throne? " And this good man was living within half an hour's journey of a city ! Without being striking, the country northwest of Dijon and the heights of the Cote d'Or is cheerful and engaging — truly urie plaisante contree^ as a peasant once described it to me. One familiar crop here astonishes the English visitor. Side by side with the vine we find the hop — let us hope a symbol of ever-increasing Anglo-P'rench sym- pathy and good-fellowship! In September the hop harvest is discussed by Burgundian wine-growers as eagerly as by Kentish farmers. Our English pale ale has fostered the taste for beer in France, and every year the number of beer-drinkers increases. The hop is only cultivated to any extent in three departments : namely, the Cote d'Or, Nord, and Meurthe HOP-CULTURE. 291 and Moselle ; but statistics show that while the super- ficies devoted to this plant has tripled since 1840, it has in the interval undergone many modifications. In 1830 three millions of hectolitres of French beer (a hectolitre is very nearly 22 imperial gallons) were manufactured. In 1889 the quantity was more than doubled. The importation of foreign beer has in- creased with no less rapidity, the number of hectolitres imported rising from fifty to several hundred thousand between the years 1869 and 1887. Yet the French drink far less beer per head than their neighbors. While the average Belgian drinks ISO' litres annually — the litre being rather more than an imperial pint — the Briton 130, the Frenchman's portion is but 22. The more thrifty peasants sell alike hops and wine, contenting themselves with refreshing drinks made from reeds, fruits, and berries. Unfortunately, singing-birds are not satisfied with these, and a merciless war is carried on against larks and thrushes. I have been assured that a thrush will eat two bunches of grapes a day. Be this as it may, in some places they are killed in enormous quantities and sold for three-halfpence each, and larks fare no better. In that rich and fruitful plain north of Dijon, called the "Plat de Langres," lark-shooting is prac- tised as a sport. I must here, at the risk of vexing French friends, raise a protest against this chasse aux alouettes. The method practised is as follows : Soon after daybreak, the sportsman sets off for the open, accompanied by a lad, whose business it is to set the trap — so it must be called. This is a small shuttle that Z92 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. gyrates, instrument and motion resembling the flut- tering of a bird's wing. No sooner is the shuttle ad- justed, the sportsman being a few yards off, than, heed- less of his presence or that of other spectators, the unhappy larks singing high up begin to descend. As moths attracted by a flame, they hover nearer and nearer, till, undeterred by the close proximity of the enemy, they come under his gun. Of course there is nothing that deserves the name of sport in such a method. The sportsman can hardly miss aim, the poor little bird being only a few. yards off. Vast numbers of larks are killed thus ; the wonder is that any remain. West of Dijon, the once famous Abbey of Citeaux, now turned into a penitentiary for youthful offenders, will attract the philanthropist, to say nothing of the readers of Mr. J. C. Morison's delightful life of St. Bernard. Forming one of the most powerful monastic bodies in Europe, the Trappists in twenty-five years' time from the foundation of their convent sent out 60,000 monks to make converts and cultivate desert tracts. Citeaux founded 1,800 dependent monasteries and 1,400 nunneries, besides giving four popes to the Holy See. Broken up at the time of the Revolution, under Louis Philippe occupied by Fourierists, it was afterward purchased by the order of St. Joseph, and by its members converted into an agricultural and industrial penitentiary. This order is of quite recent date, and in 1880 when I visited Citeaux numbered under a hundred mem- bers of both sexes, who were dispersed in three es- CITEAUX. 293 tablishments, the above-mentioned being tbe most important. As considerable misapprehension exists in England re:^arding tlie interference of the French state with schools and charitable institutions, I will describe ex. actly what I saw while Citeaux remained on an inde- pendent footing. Three-quarters of an hour by railway from Dijon brings the traveller to the prettily situated little town of Nuits, whence a carriage takes him to Citeaux in half an. hour. On a mellow October afternoon noth- ing can be pleasanter than this drive through the vine- yards and forest formerly making up the monastic domains. Our approach to the colony, as the estab- lishment is called, was indicated by the appearance of lads with brethren in charge, the former wearing the blue blouse, symbol of labor. I was received by a brother with great urbanity, and by him conducted over the place. The most elementary instruction only was afforded, namely, reading, writing, and the elements of arith- metic. Beyond brief lessons of this rudimentary kind, no instruction was afforded whatever, nor anything in the way of supplementary education, such as lectures, demonstrations, readings. The work to which the boys were put falls under two heads, agricultural and industrial — the former comprising labors in the field, the latter brush-making, carpentry, bookbinding, tailoring, shoemaking, and the like-. The working- day was enormously long, beginning at four o'clock, both in winter and summer, and not ending till half- 294 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. past nine, lessons being given in the evening. I in- quired if this enormously long day of toil was broken by no play-hours even for the best behaved? Well, yes, replied my informant ; the boys had music and drill on week-days, and a country walk on Sunda3's. Were no instructive or amusing books lent out as re- wards for good conduct? There was no time for read- ing, replied my cicerone, blandly and briefly. Were there no other recreations? Yes, gymnastics; and the word had certainly a cheerful sound. Yet it seemed to me that as Citeaux was as much of a refuge for destitute boys as a penitentiary for young criminals, some deviation from this Spartan regime could do no harm. Corporal punishment is not permitted in France; but how many things are more endurable to a lad than a flogging ! It was the monotony, the rigid routine, the automatic laboriousness of Citeaux that repelled, especially considering that many of the in- mates were there, not as criminals, but waifs and strays, orphans, sons of indigent widows, and so on. It also seemed undesirable to mass the nine hundred and odd boys indiscriminately, the incorrigible, the first offenders, and the well-behaved. Again, should not some homelike element enter into the lives of these poor castaways? At Mettray, the celebrated industrial penitentiary founded by the late M. Demetz, the admirable system of families pre- vails, each boy forming one of a group or family with the best results. Here nothing of the kind existed. The boys were put to work according to age and capacity, and form so many units of a hive. They A THRIVING CONCERN. 295 were permitted to choose the trade they preferred, and could earn money rewards; the best-behaved, if he remained till his twentieth year, amassing the sum of a hundred francs. When it is considered that the Government paid sixpence a day toward the mainte- nance of each boy, it will be seen how commercially profitable so-called charity may become. Judging from the quantity of work done, the shoes, brushes, carpentry, bookbinding, got through by these boys over and above the needs of the establishment, the brother- hood of St. Joseph must at the time I write of have been one of the most remunerative business firms going. I use the past tense, as I describe what I saw in 1879, and my account will show the necessity for the state interference with religious institutions which has since aroused so much ill-feeling in England. French manufacturers can no longer abuse children's labor with impunity. Why, then, should the Church be held irresponsible? A working-day of seventeen hours and a half was not the only crying evil I found at Citeaux. Will it be believed that the vast con- geries of buildings, even those set apart for the younger children, were never warmed during the Arctic winters of this region? "We keep each other warm," my informant explained, with a smile, as if the hot breath of overcrowded, unventillated workshops were the wholesomest fuel imaginable. I was lastly taken into a room presided over by a sister. Here were a score and odd of little fellows, who ought to have been nfaking mud-pies, sitting crossed-legged, busy as bees, at tailoring. They looked fearfully overworked and 29G FRANCE OF TO-DAY. automatic. And here I must allude to one of the strangest features of the place ; that is, the association under the same roof of so many young men and women. These brethren and sisters of St. Joseph were certainly under the supposed palladium of the monastic vow, but without any other defence against temptation. Such a defiance of accepted standards and moral etiquette, to say the least of it, ill accords with a band of philanthropists having, set themselves to reclaim and educate the young. ^ Another curious feature of Citeaux, characterizing Mettray also, is the reception of . incorrigible youths belonging to the better ranks of society. Of the nine hundred boys, one hundred were neither criminals, street vagabonds, nor " children of the state," but young gentlemen with whom their parents could do nothing — the bad boys of French families, who can be placed here for longer or shorter periods till they are twenty -one. At Mettray these ne'er-do-weels are treated after the manner of first-class misdemeanants — are kept apart, and fare differently with regard to accommodation and the tasks allotted them. At Ci- teaux a boy belonging to the better classes, for whom his parents pay the modest sum of twenty pounds a year, is put on the same footing as the rest, except that he is not set to field-work. My driver, who was in the habit of conducting numerous visitors to Citeaux, informed me that he had lately driven thither a widow lady with her son, a ^ See Appendix, Note 19. AMATEUR PRISONS. 297 youth of seventeen; also another widowed mother with a younger lad. Both had proved wholly incor- rigible at home, and were taken to the reformatory as a last resource. The first-named mother declared it her intention to keep her son there till he should be of age, unless he turned over a new leaf. This young gentleman, reared in ease and luxury, most likely to begin with, a spoiled darling, was relegated to the printing-house ; my conductor, who had seen him since, adding that he looked wretched enough. A very different impression is created by the hos- pital for the sick and aged poor at Beaune. Here the soothing and aesthetic aspect of conventual life is seen, not its cold, calculating materialism. " This charming place would almost make one wish to fall ill at Beaune," wrote the celebrated architect Viollet-de-Duc, and nothing indeed can be more picturesque, graceful, and tranquillizing. The inmates are lodged in a palace ; its long, deep roof studded with little turreted dor- mers, above these a clock-tower, all of soberest gray, recall a Dutch town-hall ; outside, its vast oval courts or flower garden, and double rows of galleries sur- mounted by lofty roofs, many-gabled and dormered, are in keeping with domestic architecture. The en semble is so mediaeval, quaint, and poetic that only the white-robed sisters of charity moving about seem at one with their surroundings. The entire inner court or garden is turfed and turned into an orangery during the warm months, double rows of orange-trees in tubs being placed from end to end. On a perfect October day the rich foliage and verdure and intensely 298 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. blue sky are strikingly contrasted with the quiet tints and subdued harmonies of the architecture. As you saunter by no open door or corridor but reveals a picture. Here a group of nuns in their creamy gowns and snow-white hoods fold linen in a room that must have remained unchanged throughout centuries, its low-panelled ceiling of sober brown, dark, polished oak presses, and richly-carved sideboards making a beautiful background for the gliding, shadowy figures ; there we come upon the kitchen, scores of copper cooking- vessels of all sizes and bright as newly -minted gold pieces cover the walls; while before the magnifi- cent chimney-piece are the massive andirons, pot-hooks, and pot-hangers as used in the olden time. In the brilliantly decorated, dazzlingly bright chapel a great surprise awaits us. Opening out of it, the only sepa- ration being a crimson curtain, is the so-called Orande Salles des Malades, sl vast parallelogram decorated in the same rich style as the chapel, the blaze of color toned down by the rows of snowy beds on either side. So vast is this hall, nearly fifty yards in length, that we get a vanishing perspective of these small, white- curtained beds, and so lofty is its arched roof that alike thair occupants and the quiet figures of the nuns mov- ing about seem as much lost in it as the isolated wor- shippers of a cathedral. Here, then, lie the convales- cent sick and aged poor, each, if strength permits, only needing to crawl to the door to find the fresh air and the orange-tree, each beholding from his bed a dome that may well prefigure the unseen abodes of Heaven, its waves of purple, amber, and crimson richly-fretted HEAVENLY VISIONS. 299 witli gold. If too feeble to get as far as the crimson curtain partly shutting off the chapel, he can gaze on the splendid stained glass of the choir, catch glimpses of the priests and acolytes moving rhythmically before the altar, can see the silver censer swing, and rejoice in the pealing organ and voices of the choristers. For an aged and forlorn Catholic it must be good to fall asleep here, and, if his simple mind is imbued with the poetry and mysticism of his faith, he will see pre- figured the heavenly mansions awaiting^ him beyond the grave. The altered aspects of the country hereabouts with- in the last few years would cause a sinking of the heart were it not for encouraging reports from high quarters. On every side we see evidence of the tre- mendous stand made against the phylloxera, and to meet the foe have been put forth the last devices, of ingenuity and despair. Besides famous vineyards are plantations of young vines and mature plants blue with sulphur. The cost of combating the enemy by chemical and other means amounts to five hundred francs per hectare yearly — an expense not willingly or easily incurred by the small wine-grower. Here as in the Charente, a veritable wave of ruin has swept oyer the country ; but I was assured in 1891 by a large proprietor of Beaune that the worst is over. Shat- tered fortunes, both small and great, have been re- paired, and indomitable energy and courage are bear- ing fruit. An adequate account of what may be called the phylloxera campaign would fill a volume. The in- 300 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. ventions and experiments it has called forth are num- berless. One of the most curious of these, a small apparatus for treating the plant with sulphur, is due to a chemist of Dijon.^ We enter the department of the Saone and Loire by way of Nolay, birthplace of the great Carnot, and threshold of romantic scenery immortalized by the elder Dumas. To descend to homeliest prose — every French town liaving its hero, and its humble goose laying golden eggs — it may be mentioned that JSTolay is famed for its lentils. A little to the southwest of Dumas' Burgundian j^l Dorado are the world-famed foundries of Le Creusot — black town that has sprung up on the threshold of Eden. Covering an area of over a thousand acres, and occupying upward of fifteen thousand workmen, this industrial centre triples the population of Autun, j chef-lieu of the department. In 1837 the Creusot was ; little more than a village, but since that time its de-j velopment has been enormous, the wealth represented/ arising in these days to fifteen millions of francs yearly. A railway connects the foundries with the Canal du Centre, linking the Loire and the Saone, and projected by Frangois I., Sully and Louis XIY., but not begun till 1785. Arthur Young writes in 1789 : " Going out of Chagnie, where I quitted the great Lyons road, pass by the Canal du Chaulais (Charolais, afterward changed to Centre), which goes on very poorly ; it is a truly useful undertaking, and therefore left undone." The ^ See Appendix, Note 30. THE CREUSOT. 301 truly Tiseful -andertaking was finished a few years later. "By a miserable country most of tlie way, and through hideous roads to Autun," he added. Very charming scenery alternating with more som- bre features characterize the country between Dijon and Autun. Vineyards, woods, babbling streams, alternate with granite crags and wind-swept, heath- clad wastes. Here and there we are reminded of England. Fields set round with lofty hedges, wind- ing lanes fragrant with wild rose and honeysuckle, little dells and coppice woods, recall • Sussex and Devonshire. Arthur Young speaks of finding here starving metay- ers, where might well be fat farmers. My first visit to Autun happened on the occasion of the great Sep- tember fair, an inauspicious moment for the mere tourist, but full of interest from a practical point of view. Having in mind the disastrous accounts of English farming in the papers (I am speaking of a few years back), and the depressed condition and low spirits of the farmers at home, I was much struck with what I saw here. The crops had been exceptionally bad throughout France, a protracted drought injuring the wheat and barley, and other harvests falling equally short. But the experience in question sufficiently explains the cheerfulness with which adverse seasons are endured by French farmers, and the little effect it has upon their ultimate prospects. I put up with two French acquaintances at the first hotel of the town, on a level with the White Horse at Ipswich, scene of Pickwick's 302 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. discomfiture. "What was mj astonishment at noon next day to find both dining-rooms crowded to over- flowing with blue-bloused peasants! Here at the largest and most expensive hotel of a cathedral city (the less said of its cleanliness and comfort, the better) 23oured in scores and scores of the wearers of the blue blouses I had seen that morning driving their cattle and sheep to market. But I soon discovered, as did Mr. Barham Zincke in Auvergne, that the symbol of labor in France is no indication of poverty, boorishness, or anything less objectionable. These men were well-to- do, respectable, and well-mannered farmers. The clean blue cotton smock-frock was worn in order to protect the Sunday broadcloth. The tables were crowded with these guests, some of whom had driven in carts and gigs accompanied by wife and children. The greater number had driven their stock on foot, and would be no more ashamed of the fact than of the blouse. Herein consists the stability and wealth of the French farmer. He is not above work or the uni- form of labor. Yery little was said during the elabo- rate iahle-dliote breakfast ; deportment v/as dignified and seemly. There were fireworks and other entertainments at night, but the town was no longer blue with blouses when evening came. The " fat farmers " round about Autun have not that love of amusement found among townsfolk : their business over, they made the best 'of their way home. Perhaps over-carefulness about money and a super- abundance of wealth materialize the French character. WATERING-PLACES. 303 All who have watched the fate of English farmers during the disastrous decade of 1872-82 must feel that their best and most necessary lesson is to be learned from their neighbors over the water. Tenant- farmers at home have had much to endure from bad crops and unfavorable conditions of tenure ; they have fallen upon evil days, before all things, because they aped the squire and lived after the manner of solid capitalists. Every variety of land-tenure is found here, large estates managed by their owners, small freeholds, tenant-farms, metairies. The homely well-being of the peasants generally is indicated by their good clothes and vehicles on Sundays and holidays. As I walked to breakfast with the author of "Eound My House," three miles from the town, I met a stream of country-folks in donkey-carts. It was the great an- nual fete of St.-Lazare, and for miles round people were flocking to the cathedral, where the saint's relics were exhibited. If every corner of France may be said to possess its special product and presiding genius, so also may we safely accredit it with an inland watering-place. Spas . have sprung up throughout the length and breadth of the country as if by magic, and the num- ber of patrons shows an annual increase. How the habit of travelling has developed in France of late years, the following figures will show : In 1872 the annual number of railway passengers amounted to only one hundred and eleven millions. In 1887 the sum total had almost doubled. As everybody now- 304 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. adajs, from the millionaire to the milliner's appren- tice, requires a holiday resort, holiday resorts had to be discovered, and in the* Morvan. they are full to overflowing during the long vacation. St.-Honorc- les-Bains, lying between Autun and Nevers, may now be called fashionable, although the majority of visitors come from the neighboring towns. Its warm sulphur and alkaline springs resemble those of Eaux Bonnes in the Pyrenees ; and granted equal efficacy of healing properties, St.-Honore offers more attractions than many better known rivals. A pleasant domestic at- mosphere pervades society. As at Gerardmer, visitors enjoy family-life on a large scale, all classes fraterniz- ing in a manner agreeable, to behold. Not a few priests and nuns we find mingling with the animated loungers in the park, and most of the ladies attended early mass at the little chapel adjoining the baths. But partisanships, alike political and theological, are kept well in the background. Old and young lay themselves out to please. The peasant farmers take life soberly. During my stay, an election took place at a neighboring town ; blue blouses were put on over Sunday broadcloth in honor of the polling-place, but, the business of the voters over, every one returned with all possible de- spatch to his home. ■ Nestled amid the more smiling scenery of the Mor- van, St.-Honore recalls many a familiar scene to Eng- lish eyes, undulating cornfields set round with lofty hedges, villages peeping between blue hills, beech- woods, and grassy dells. The sterner features of this A CELTIC KIN&DOM. 305 romantic region are seen as we traverse it from end to end ; that is to say, from Autun by way of Chateau- Chinon to Avallon. Such a journey presents, perhaps I should rather say presented, a curious ethnological experience. "Were I to revisit the Morvan for a fourth time, using the railway instead of the diligence, I should most likely miss the sight that made my first journey so memorable. Yet it is hardly a decade since I saw in these solitudes a Morvandial peasant with the Gallic sagum or short cloak, costume of Yercinge- torix, thrown over his shoulders. And not far o£E, in striking contrast with this survival, was a symbol of the altered state of things. Already in 1882, one un- mistakable sign of progress and animation met the traveller's gaze. We knew, without asking, the desti- nation of the half-finished buildings passed here and there. Throughout every hitherto neglected corner of France, in the early years of the Third Eepublic, schools were built as fast as masons and bricklayers could carry on the work. The Morvandial, like the Breton, is learning French. His speech will most likely disappear, as have disappeared local customs and usages. Yillage communism existed here in full force down to the Revolution, and the last commune was not broken up till 1848. The soil is ungrateful and the climate excessively rude. We seem all at once transported to the poorer parts of Brittany. Under a cold autumnal sky the groups passed by the way make pathetic pictures; here a little girl, alone amid savage solitudes, keeping her goats or geese ; there a patient woman taking up 20 306 FRANCE OF TO-BAY. potatoes; farther off, a husbandman with his team breaking up the fallow. The Morvan is richly wooded, and I was assured that in winter the poor need buy no fuel. They can pick up enough and to spare. I know of no more superb site than that of Avallon. Just below the lofty ridge on which the town stands, girded by massive walls and quaint watch-towers of almost playful aspect, the earth shows a wonderful conformation. The gentler features of Morvan scen- ery, smiling glades, dimpled hills, and romantic combes, are suddenly exchanged for huge masses of granite of weirdest shape, and colossal cliffs that yawn on either side, one succeeding the other as if by sheer force of imitation. One vast chasm, its gray cliffs tapestried with green, stretches at the very feet of the town, to the right and left. These forms are repeated on a lesser scale, till gradually, as the breakers of a tre- mendous sea calm down to level lines far away from the shore, we see the distant landscape reassume nor- mal features. So sharply do the rocks run down to the valley below, that we could throw a plummet into the dark little river flowing through its midst. I will only mention one fact in the history of this now cheerful and prosperous town. On the 16th of January, 1871, after having fed 5,000 Prussian sol- diers, it was given up by General Werder to two hours' pillage. I had the whole story ten years later from a victim, a highly respectable resident of the place. The weather was Arctic, and blankets, bedding, and warm clothes were eagerly pounced upon. But the depreda- BOARDED OVT. 307 tors, worthy of Attila's host, did not stop there. Drawers were forced open, colfers ransacked, family relics, trinkets, children's belongings, nothing of value was spared that these Goths and Yandals could carry away. My driver from Avallon to Yezelay was a hand- some young fellow, with a grace of manner and general quickness I could hardly believe provincial. And I was right. He belonged to the category of " children of the state," and had been boarded out in the Morvan. " My first foster-parents were rough, dirty folks," he informed me, '' and I should have perished of neglect had I remained with them. I was placed elsewhere, and, although I fared hard, cannot say that I was badly treated. I have good health, and, being alone in the world, married early. I have two children, and hope to better my condition some day." He told me that his parents were rich, and that the child of shame had been deposited on a doorstep. In his case mis- fortune and hardship had not overcome French light- ness of heart or amiability. His utmost ambition was to possess a house and bit of land. Far and wide we see Vezelay, almost aerial in the distance, with its tall towers and long roof rising above the ancient fortifica- tions and stately green eminence on which they stand. Most beautiful is the nearer aspect, the old-world town with its mellow walls, green-shuttered cottages, and festooned vines having an Italian look ; its abbey church covering, as it seems, the broad hill-top from end to end. The hill indeed seems made for the church, not the church for the hill. But for its red 308 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. tiles, we might here compare Yezelay to St.-Albans. The rich red of the roof, the dazzling whiteness of the " stone towers, the soft blue sky, the waxen green foli- age of the vines beneath, the warm sunshine lighting up all, remind us that we are in France. Fine as is Yezelay itself, planted fortress-like on airy height, St. -P^re-sous- Yezelay at its feet is hard'y less impressive — an architectural pearl flung on a dungheap. The one gains by force of glorious posi- tion ; the beauty of the other is but enhanced by in- adequacy of site. St.-P5re stands by the wayside, one story of its tower springing lightly from the other as at Antwerp Cathedral, the brilliant blue sky shining through its delicate apertures, an extraordinary light- ness combined with great splendor and solidity. The architect seems to have begun his work without any precise plan, the result being a gorgeous and fanciful whole, of which it is difficult to convey an idea. It is a beautiful drive from Avallon to Semur, whence the Paris railway may be joined at Les Laumes. This little town, in that part of ancient Burgundy known as the Auxois, is one of the few perfect things in the world ; like Guerande in Brittany, a mediaeval gem without a flaw. Cresting steep banks, clothed with wood, vineyard, and garden, its walls, watch-towers, and donjons intact, Semur must look just as it did in the terribly turbulent days of Charles the Bold. In spite of keep and battlement, ramparts and postern of sombre gray, all sternness and severity are softened by the surrounding loveliness. The church has special interest for students of dem- A DEMOCRATIC CHURCH, 309 ocratic institutions. Here the ricli merchants and traders of the olden time put stained glass to a new purpose. Instead of commemorating scriptural and legendary subjects, adhering to artistic tradition, these stout-hearted burghers perpetuated daily events of their own lives. In the chapel of the Butchers' Cor- poration we find the master with his men preparing to slaughter a bull; in the drapers' chapel we see master and apprentices making up bales of goods, other scenes being equally characteristic. The embellishments of the entire interior are chiefly due to bourgeois donors, yet Semur enjoyed the reputation of a Burgundian Athens. Letters are still at a premium in the city of Salmasius. By way of Sens and Fontainebleau, a survey of east central France may be brought to a close. APPENDIX NOTES, PEASANT PROPERTY. 1. Origin of peasant property— 2. Extent of— 3. Subdivision of land — 4. Condition of peasant proprietors past and present— 5. Progress of agriculture. For detailed information on these points see Le Morcelle- ment, par Alfred de Foville, chef du Bureau de Statistique au Ministere des Finances, and other works before cited. 1. From the earliest times we find that peasant proprietors existed in France ^ — crushed, it is true, by want and misery, their profits reduced to a minimum by tolls and impositions, to say nothing of the ruin wrought by civil and religious wars, yet unmistakably peasant proprietors. Between the seigneur and the serf were the so-called tenanciers and main- mortdbles. The former could bequeath to their children the fruit of their labor, and possessed the soil subject to the faille and corvee ; the latter lived a freedman, died a serf — in other words, his heirs were compelled to purchase their heritage. Before the enfranchisement of the serfs by Louis le Hutin (1314-16) the Crusades had considerably aided the transfer of land. Impoverished by feuds and excesses, the seigneurs upon those occasions sold parcels of land to their own serfs in order to equip themselves for the Holy Land. Many ran- soms were procured in the same way. Thus the small owner gradually formed one of a numerous class, and in the Etats- Generaux of 1484 summoned by the great daughter of Louis ^ See H. Martin, Histoire de France, vol. iii. p. 268 ; vol. vii. p. 190. 312 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. XI. , we find free peasants taking part in a legislative assem- bly. The Tiers-Etat as a political body already existed. Peasant property, far indeed from being a device invented all of a piece, and carried by force of law, ^ as is still often believed in England, is a natural growth, which had nothing to do with revolutionary violence. In some places the num- ber of small holdings has hardly changed from the middle ages. The sale of Church lands in 1790 by no means wrought the effects generally supposed. About one-third of these con- sisted of forest, which was added to the state ; another third of buildings and town property ; the remainder consisting of land was sold in the lots actually existing, the purchasers be- ing mostly well-to-do bourgeois. 2. Arthur Young sets down one-third of French territory as belonging to the peasants at the time he wrote. This is er- roneous ; in reality about a fourth part of the soil was in the hands of the small owner anteriorally to the Eevolution. Within half a century the number of landowners has in- creased by twenty per cent. ; within a hundred years we find it doubled. In 1789 four millions of French subjects pos- sessed the soil ; eight millions of freeholders are now entered upon the census. 3. Subdivision. — For a just view of this much- vexed ques- tion it is necessary to examine Le Morcellement, already cited. The first authority in France on this subject shows that far from minutely-divided properties being in the ma- jority, large properties occupy nearly the half ; small prop- erties but the fifth part of French territory. That the Revolution mainly brought about the subdivision of soil is another fallacy exposed in M. de Foville's volimaes. We find to our astonishment that in many cases the divi- sions have remained stationary, being neither larger nor smaller than they were a hundred or more years ago. M. de Foville cites as an instance the commune of Paroz (Seine and Mame). A carefully- prepared cartulary, or parish -book, shows that in 1768 and in 1825 the lots of land corresponded ^ See M. Baudrillart, Contemporary Review^ Mslj^ 1886. PEASANT PROPERTY. 313 almost precisely both in number and extent. Other examples are adduced by this writer, also by M. Baudrillart in his article above-mentioned. 4. Condition of peasant owners past and present. — In spite of the sombre pictures of Fenelon and Le Bruyere, both too familiar to need citation, it is certain that even during the reign of Louis XIV. rural districts prospered here and there. Take the following account of the environs of Montauban (Tarn and Garonne) by a contemporary : " It is impossible here," wrote Bois-Guillebert in 1709, "to find a square foot of soil which does not produce all that it is capable of pro- ducing. You cannot see here a man, however poor, who is not decently clothed in woollen garments, who has not plenty of bread and drink (boisson, which may mean wine or -bev- erage made of fruits) . Most eat meat, and all live in tiled houses, which they repair when necessary. " In 1738, the Abbe St. Pierre wrote of another part of France : "Almost all the day-laborers possess a garden or plot of gi-ound. " Fifty years later Arthur Young tells us alike of their well- being and wretchedness. We have only to compare his de- scription of the country-woman of Mars-la-Tour (Meurthe and Moselle) , " who might have been taken for sixty or sev- enty, her figure was so bent and her face so furrowed and hardened by labor ; but she was only twenty-eight, " to that of the villages near Ganges (Herault) : "An activity has been here that has swept away all difficulties before it, and has clothed the very rocks with verdure. It would be a dis- grace to common sense to ask the cause ; the enjoyment of property must have done it." The few pages contributed by Mr. Barham Zincke to the Fortnightly Review (1878) are more eloquent than any statis- tics. This writer concludes his minutely detailed picture of peasant-life in Auvergne with the following remarks: "We are beginning to see that peasant proprietorship contributes to the material wealth of the country ; x>erhaps we shall eventually come to believe that it contributes quite as much to what may be called its human wealth. We cannot be far 314 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. short of the truth in saying that it maintains on the spot a population of genuine cultivators four times as numerous as our system. Our comparatively small number of laborers are deeply tainted with the demoralization of pauperism. This degradation of humanity cannot be said to exist among the dense peasant population of the Limagne. They are, speaking of them as a body, honest, contented, hard-work- ing, hardy, self-respecting, thrifty, and self-supporting. Such a population it is a great advantage in many ways for the state to possess. They are its greatest wealth." 5. Progress of agriculture. — Mr. Barham Zincke adds upon this subject : " One of the commonest arguments now ad- duced against peasant proprietorship is that the average pro- duce of our large English wheat-farms is greater per acre than that of the small peasant farms. I decidedly question this as respects land of equal goodness. But that the total yield in France is less per acre than the total yield in Eng- land is, when rightly considered, a demonstration not of the inferiority but of the superiority of the small culture. We only cultivate wheat on land that nature has well adapted for that grain, but the French peasants cultivate it on all kinds of soil, on some of which it would originally have been im- possible to have cultivated it, and which nothing but the mattock and the spade of the peasant proprietor, working for himself and on his own land, could have made capable of producing it. If this system enables large districts, in fact, a considerable portion of the whole country, to yield crops of wheat and of other kinds of produce, which otherwise would have yielded little or nothing at all, it is no argument against peasant proprietorship that the yield of these lowers the average yield of the whole country. " With regard to stock -rearing, doubtless many hold the opinion expressed by Balzac in Les Paysans (1845). The great novelist proclaimed it his opinion that a time would come, owing to peasant proprietorship, when France would have neither cattle nor horses. Statistics, on the contrary, demonstrate that while the number of horses in France has increased since the beginning of the present century more INDUSTRIAL EXHIBITIONS. 315 rapidly than the population, it is the most subdivided de- partments that show the largest increase in heads of cattle and horses. In the Hautes Pyrenees, the Haute Loire, and the AUier, the number of properties has doubled since 1812 ; the first in the interval has increased its stock from 48, 000 to 99,000 heads, the second from 52,000 to 121,000, the third from 118,000 to 179,000. Again, the Puy de Dome numbered 83,000 cows in 1812; in 1881, 174,000. During the reign of Louis Philippe the proportion of meat eaten in France veas 20 kilogrammes per head ; in 1862, 24 kilogrammes ; in 1873, 26 1-2 kilogrammes. At the present time the quantity has risen to 28 kilogrammes (the kilo- gramme is 2 lbs. 3. 26 oz. ) . - The us^ of agricultural machinery is another test of prog- ress. In 1862 only 10,853 sowing-machines were in use throughout France. In 1882 their number had tripled. "Within the same space of time reaping and sowing-machines had doubled, and artificial manures used much more liber- ally. Wages, both rural and industrial, differ so much in differ- ent parts and at certain seasons of the year that it is difficult to give averages. I again refer the reader to M. de Foville's invaluable little work. La France Economique, before men- tioned, a work indispensable to the economist. I add that seventeen out of the thirty-two million inhabi- tants of France are either agriculturists or employed in agri- cultural pursuits. Note 2.— INDUSTRIAL EXHIBITIONS. The vague notion prevails in England that the late Prince Consort is to be accredited with an initiative so stimulating to art and industry, and so instructive to the world gener- ally. Nothing can be farther from the truth. The Exposition d' Industrie is a French invention, and the first dates from the Revolution. It was therefore with pecu- liar appropriateness that the Jubilee of French Liberties was celebrated in the Champs de Mars. The centenary of the 316 FRANCE OF TO-DAY: Declaration of Rights may thus be called the centenary of Industrial Exhibitions. Suggested and planned by the Convention, the first com- petitive show of arts and industries was not opened till 1798, the year six of the Republic, the third of the Directory, and during Napoleon's campaign in Egypt. Bald as are the ac- counts afforded by official records of the time, we are yet enabled to compute the importance and success of the experi- ment. The site selected, as has been said, was the Champs de Mars, the building erected for the purpose being in the form of an amphitheatre, with galleries at the back. No charge was made for space, and exhibitors were bound to send their own inventions and manufactures only. The nun:Jber of ex- hibitors did not exceed 110. The slowness of postal com- munication, the difficulties of transport, the uncertainty of public affairs, easily account for this paucity of numbers. The departmental system had only existed a few years. All kinds of obstacles stood in the way. The opening was attended with as much state as possible, and a general holiday was proclaimed in honor of the occa- sion. The prominent figure in the inauguration ceremony was FranQois de Neuf chateau, the originator of the scheme, who may, in fact, be called the inventor of industrial exhi- bitions. This citizen was also an active member of the So- ciety of Agriculture mentioned by Arthur Young, and of which full reports have lately been printed (De Foville and Pigeonneau) . "I look around me in vain," he said, "for exhibits from many departments, whose inhabitants perhaps hardly re- ceived invitations in time. But if a scheme so truly patri- otic as this awakens regret among those unable at the present time to come forward, the aim of the Government will be fulfilled, and the year seven of the Republic, and the se(?ond Industrial Exhibition to be held then, will testify all that emulation can achieve in stimulating a free people, friendly to the arts. " During the exhibition, which lasted thirteen days, the gal- INDUSTRIAL EXHIBITIONS. 317 leries were illuminated, orchestral concerts were given, and the period was one of unbroken gala. Among the exhibitors awarded honorable mention (no medals were given) are Erard, Paris, for improvements in the harp, and William Robinson for a spinning-machine, whether resident in Paris or no is not stated. Honorable mention was made of manufacturers and artisans for im- provements in printing, watch-making, weaving, and wall papers. Industrial exhibitions on a much larger scale were held in 1801, 1802, and 1806. Two were held in the reign of Louis XVIII. , one under Charles X. , and three during that of Louis Philippe— namely, in 1834, 1839, 1844. Prince Albert revived the idea ; but the acorn producing the giant oak, the progen- itor of the forthcoming unimaginable World's Fair at Chi- cago, was undoubtedly the modest little exhibition opened in Fructidor, An vi. of the Republic. Note 3. "There is one measure (of the earth) which is worth men- tioning, " he wrote, " on account of the extraordinary times in which it was effected. It was the great measure extend- ing from Dunkirk to Barcelona, and which was afterward continued to Formentera, a small island near Minorca. It is worth mentioning, because it was done in the hottest times of the Revolution. We are accustomed to consider that time as one purely of anarchy and bloodshed ; but the energetic Government of France, though laboring under the greatest difficulties, could find the opportunity of sending out an ex- pedition for these scientific purposes, and thus did actually, during the hottest times of the Revolution, complete a work to which nothing equeJ has been attempted in England." ^ Note 4. Fiscal reforms effected by the Revolution. See E. Reclus, Geographie de la France, p. 493. In the space of five or six » Popular Lectures on Astronomy, delivered at Ipswich 1848. Eleventh edition. MacmiUan, 1883. 318 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. years, the Revolution had quadrupled the resources of civil- ization and enormously developed material progress through- out the country. " ^ Note 5. —PROTESTANTS AND PROTESTANTISM IN FRANCE. It is my firm belief that there is a great future for Prot- estantism in France, were only some Wesley to arise capable of leading the movement. But it must be a Wesley largely imbued with nineteenth- century ideas, an appeal to the taste as well as the feelings. The Salvation Army will never make head on French soil. I have known instances in which Protestant ministers have been asked by a deputation of mayor and municipal council to expound the principles of their faith for the benefit of themselves and their Catholic brethren. The following ex- tract from the Daily News (October, 1891) shows that whole- sale conversions to Protestantism do really take place : Conversion op a Commune to Protestantism.— Our Paris correspondent telegraphs: Another conversion en masse to Protes- tantism has just taken place. This time it is the whole commune of Murat that has gone over. The reason is rather curious, and betrays pique rather than a spirit turned toward theological con- troversy. The Bishop of Cahors was asked to grant the Muratois the right to hear two masses instead of one every Sunday in the parish church. Many had to go a long distance, and it often was inconvenient to set out early. He refused in rather, as it seemed to them, haughty terms, saying that as Christ submitted to be cru- cified for their sakes, if they could not get out of their beds early in the morning to be in time for church, they were not worthy of the name of CathoUcs. This caused deep offence. A public meet- ing was held on the church-green, and a petition was sent to the Minister of Public Worship to give the commune a Protestant pas- tor. If the different evening papers are well informed, the provi- sional ministration of a Protestant clergyman has been secured. When he went to preach his first sermon in an improvized temple he found there a congregation of a hundred adults who showed ^ Mignet, vol. ii. p. 179. PBOTESTANTS.—THE SILK INDUSTRY. 319 great enthusiasm. There is a good deal of Protestantism in the Lot and Lot-et-Garonne, and it is of very old date. The power wielded by the great Protestant newspaper, the Temps, and the cordial sympathy manifested by the Presi- dent of the Republic for the Protestant body will do much to encourage this movement. When at Toulouse two years ago, magnificently greeted by all sections of society, M. Carnot received a deputation of Protestant clergy. Graciously replying to their address, the President alluded not only " to the respect but the affection " with which their Church was regarded by the Republic. Yet bitter and often insulting is the hostility shown by the Catholic priesthood to Protestant pastors and congregations. A cure spoke condescendingly to a Protestant clergyman of " the tolerance " manifested toward his people. " There is no longer any question of religious tolerance in France, " proudly retorted the pastor. " One and all in the eyes of the law stand precisely on the same footing. " How readily, nay, triumphantly, even tolerance would be withheld by the Ultramontane party, we need no ghost to tell us. Some years ago the first technical school for girls was opened at Nantea by the late Dr. Guepin and his public- spirited wife, both Protestants. Girls attending that school in order to learn a handicraft by which they could earn an honest livelihood were threatened by their confessors with all kinds of punishments alike in this world and hereafter. Note 6.— THE SILK INDUSTRY OF FRANCE. Much interesting information on this subject was recently afforded by a contribution to the Revue des Deux Mondes. M. de. Foville, in his France Economique, gives brief statisti- cal tables. Silk-worm rearing, established in France in the fourteenth century, now represents a revenue of 30 million francs yearly. Up till the year 1789 from 6 to 7 millions of kilogrammes of cocoons were produced; their number in 1854 had risen to 26 millions. Then came a period of depression owing to the ravages of the silk-worm pest, reducing the fig- 320 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. ures to the first-mentioned sum-total, and occasioning a loss of 200 million sterling. M. Pasteur's great discovery has borne fruit ; the returns of late years have fluctuated, 12 millions of kilogrammes being the maximum, and as many as the mulberry -trees throughout France admit of. The de ficit of cocoons is made up by importation, the larger quan tity being furnished by Asia. The total silk industry of France represents a yearly sum of half a milliard of francs — i.e. La France Economique. Note 7.— SOBRIETY OF WOMEN. On the subject of intemperance I must again refer the reader to M. de Foville's work. I would, however, mention the testimony of two authorities equally trustworthy as to the sobriety of French working-women. On asking a Bur- gundian wine-grower what had most impressed him in Lon- don, his reply was: "The number of drunken women." This gentleman was in the habit of paying frequent visits to Eng- land, and he went on to say that the insobriety of English working-women was an experience entirely new to him. "When a little later in Paris, I asked the opinion of a doctor on the subject. This gentleman had worked for many years in a populous quarter of the city, by no means one of the poorest, but densely populated with working-people. His reply was brief and to the purpose, "I have never seen a drunken woman in Paris." I add that, while at home, the degrading spectacle may be seen any day, I do not remember ever having encountered in France one of my own sex incapacitated by drink. To this fact must be set down the extraordinary business capac- ities and activity of French women, and the responsible posts they are called to fill — that of station-mistress among others. The other sex, if much soberer than with us, is sufficiently given to petits verves, as M. de Foville's tables show. The average of cabarets throughout France is one for every 88 inhabitants, some departments falling short of, others ex - AIGUES-MORTES. 321 ceeding, that figure. Thus in the Gers we find only one caba- ret for 187 inhabitants ; in the Nord, one for 4G. Here I will add a cutting from the Daily News, October, 1891, apropos of the insobriety of English, especially Lon- don working-women : "There is no mistake," says Mr. Montagu Wilhams in his chat with a contributor to The Strand Magazine, " about what is the cause of nearly all the crime of the East end of London. The curse of all is drink, and I must say that the wives are often worse than the husbands." Speaking from his observation and experience as a magistrate at the Worship Street Police Court, Mr. Williams tells us that "the woman often makes the first start toward breaking up the home while the husband is away at work. She forsakes her children and domestic cares for the bar of a ginshop to drink with a friend, generally another woman. There she passes most of the day, and when the greater portion of the husband's earnings, which in most cases are given bountifully, are spent, she goes and goes again to the pawnshop, until at last, in a state of despair, the hus- band, at the sacrifice of all he has in the world, thinks the public- house not such a bad place after all, and nine men out of ten go after the wife. The next step (adds Mr. Williams) in this fatal downfall is the East end lodging-house, and when once an honest working-man gets there, then comes the beginniag of the end." At Hastings during the " tripper " season it is quite com- mon to see young women and girls tottering toward the sta- tion wholly or half drunk. Not a week's sitting of the burgh magistrates occurs without some woman being brought up for drunkenness. Note 8.— AIGUES-MORTES. Here is a picture of Aigues-Mortes written not quite ten years ago: "La campagne d' Aigues-Mortes est d'une incom- parable tristosse. Le sol penetre du sel marin ne donne naissance qu'a des plantes ternes, aux feuilles grasses, aux fleurs incolores, des joncs, des sondes, des salicornes, emailles qa et la quelques lis marins. La terre vegetale n'existe pas encore et il faudra peut-etre des siecles pour que la culture prenne possession des bas-fond de ces etangs saumatres, der- niere lagune d'une mer disparue. C'est un desert. . . . 322 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. Malgre la tristesse qui I'enveloppe et 1' abandon qui semble etre son partage depuis plusieurs siecles, a cause peut-etre de cette tristesse et de cet abandon, Aigues-Mortes ne peut pas, en doit pas perir ; et quelques soient les vicissitudes de cette cote instable et aride, il restera toujours a la vieille cite de St. Louis un magnifique diademe architectural, et a cette plage deserte une aureole plus radieuse encore de glorieux et touchants souvenirs. " * Note 9.— LA TOUR DE CONSTANCE. This spirited and touching poem by Charles Bigot is writ- ten in the Nimois patois, with his remaining works, but has been translated. " Tour de la f ^ simple et forte, Simbol de gloire et de piet^, Tour de pauvres f emmes mortes Pour leur Dieu et la liberie. " It is not necessary to repeat here the history of the Hugue- not women shut up here for long years on account of their religion. Note 10. Let me here quote from one of the admirable letters that have lately appeared in the Daily News, entitled " Life in Our Villages, " and say to the depredators of peasant property, " look on this picture and on that. " " You have no idea what a condition of serfdom the people are reduced to on some of these big estates," said a resident here to me to-day. " The squire owns the cottage ; he can give or withhold allotments : he is practically the sole employer ; his wife and daugh- ters give coal and lend blankets, and look after the people when they are sick, and the parson finds schoohng and religion, and there is no resisting any of them in anything. There is literally nothing for the people to do but plod quietly on as they are told, take what is given them, and be thankful. It is all well intended, all ber^efi- cent and beautiful, but it is the abnegation of all manhood, of everything like citizenship." * Les Villes Mortes du Golfe de Lyon. Ch. Leuth^rie. 1883. ELNE.— REVOLUTION AND PHILANTHROPY. 323 The entire series should be read and compared with my own experiences of peasant proprietors. On this subject I also cite the conclusions of Mr. Barham Zincke : "The French peasantry build on their own land their own houses, which are therefore substantially built and are fairly adequate to the wants of the family. Fortunately for them they do not live in cottages built, perhaps run up, and maintained, if that word is not often inapplicable, by speculators, or at all events by other people, whose object sometimes is to get as great a rent as possible for, and to spend as little as possible on, a tenement that another is to occupy. Family life is the matin natural education, and the first necessity for family-life is the possession of a home. But it may be questioned whether the word home is applicable to a house not always fit for a human habitation, held from week to week, so that the occupant may be ejected at any time, and therefore, for the pressingly needed improvement of which, however nec- essary such improvement may be for the family-life, should he forbear to do anything, no one could blame him. " Note 11.— ELNE. See Lentherie, Les Villes Mortes du Golfe de Lyon, for an account of Elne, the ancient lUiberis : "C'est la premiere de ces villes mortes que nous recontrons sur le littoral du Golfe de Lyon, anciennes capitales qui ne sont plus aujourdhui que des bourgades presque desertes, que le voyageur et le touriste saluent a peine d'un regard indifferent, mais doivent in- teresser au plus haut degre I'archeologue, le geographe et I'historien ; car elles sont echelonnees le long de la cote et fournissent ainsi de precieux reperes pour la reconstitution du rivage aux epoques historiques les plus eloignees. " ' Note 12.— THE REVOLUTION AND PHILANTHROPY. See on this subject Histoire des Hospices d'Angers, par Eugene Audra, Administrateur des Hospices, Angers. This brochure is very interesting from two points of view. 1 In Gibbon's Decline and Fall, frequent mention is made of II- liberis. 324 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. It demonstrates the activity displayed by the Revolution on behalf of the sick, infirm, and helpless poor, and also the position attained by a body proscribed up to that period. M. Audra, the esteemed pastor of Angers, is one of the manag- ing committee of the city hospitals, and appropriately from his pen comes the vindication of the Revolution as a humani- tarian movement. Not only was a complete scheme of public charity put in force by the Loi du 23 Germinal. An v. 12 April, 1797, but a few years later, the 10 Thermidor, An xiii. , instruction in midwifery was decreed for the benefit of poor women. In accordance with this Act, fifteen women entered the Hospi- tal of Angers as students, being lodged, fed, and instructed at the cost of the department. These classes are still held, and at the present time forty pupils, for the most part exhibitioners, are trained as midwives. Enormous as is the improvement in the management of hospitals since they were taken in hand by the state, the greatest improvement of all is moral, not material. While the Protestant, the Jew, the non- sectarian remained accursed brands only fit for the burning, what was their treatment in sickness, infirmity, and want? As I have shown when speaking of Besangon, the same spirit of persecution ani- mates the Catholics of our own day. Fortunately the French Republic has found determinists able to enforce the law of absolute equality. While on the subject of the great humanitarian movement inaugurated by the Revolution, let me mention the Abbe de I'Epee. This "moral inventor," to borrow the admirable ex- pression of Mr. Cotter Morison, devoted his life and fortune to the instruction of the deaf and dumb. He died in 1789, and the Assemblee Nationale, anxious to foster his work, founded in 1791 a National Institution for the Deaf and Dumb. (See Lalanne ' s Dictionnaire Historique de la France. ) Let me cite the following charming note from a London daily paper, dated Paris, 24th July, 1891 : A banquet to 200 deaf and dumb men and women took place at St. Mande yesterday. Several speeches were made, which were eagerly THE CONVENTION AND EDUCATION 325 followed, if not listened to, and very much applauded. Perhaps this needs an explanation. The term deaf and dumb has become a misnomer. Children born deaf are no longer dumb, as they were necessarily of old. They are now taught by ingenious methods to understand and imitate the motions of the lips in ordinary speech. The Ahh6 de I'Epde is said to have originated the system whereby those born deaf and dumb are put into communion with the rest of mankind. His school was placed under the patronage of the na- tion by an Act of 23d July, 1791, and it was to celebrate his anni- versary that the members of the Friendly Society of the Deaf and Dumb met yesterday at the Salon des Families. —Daily News. Note 13.— THE CONVENTION AND EDUCATION. Tlie Convention, not content with creating technical schools, introduced a certain amount of technical training into its scheme of primary instruction. The pupils of ele- mentary schools were to be taught the principles of geome- try, land -surveying, and kindred subjects. In its elaborate educational programme, especial stress was laid on the teach- ing of French ; and when we consider the country at the time, we shall understand the reason. For what was France until the fall of the monarchy and the departmental divis- ion? A heterogeneous mass of small and large states having no more cohesion than the petty German principalities in our own time incorporated into the German Empire. We expect of course nothing but sophism from Barhe concerning " that putrid carcase, that mother of evil, the French Revolu- tion," and none is more striking than his denunciation of the departmental system ; whereas, instead of such a division proving hurtful to the state and the provinces, it was of the first importance in consolidating the nation and simplifying the process of government. Arthur Young has hardly words with which to express his disgust at the state of things he found in France. " The infinite perplexity of the measures, " he wrote, "exceeds all comprehension. They differ not only in every province but in every district and almost in every town, and the tormenting variations are found equally in the denominations and contents of the measures of land and corn. " 326 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. The unification of weights and measures and the teaching of French in primary schools were of the first importance in consolidating the nation. One of the most curious instances of revolution run wild is the project laid before the Convention as to the "necessity of revolutionizing the language. " Barnave, the Protestant orator, and afterward defender of royalty, complained that, being in a country where a certain " ramage " or chatter was necessary in order to be received into good society, he wished to see the said conventionalities of speech disappear with other baubles of a corrupt society. The proposition created no little sensation, and among those who took part in the dis- cussion was the Abbe Gregoire. The Abbe expressed his astonishment that provinces sup- pressed by decree were still permitted to retain their uncon- stitutional patois, and that the law, in effacing geographical demarcations, had left dialects alone. Of what good to efface the names Gascony and Normandy from the map, while the idiom of the inhabitants revealed the fact by a seditious accent? " It is true, " said the orator, " that such uniformity is diffi- cult to obtain, but let us not calumniate our fellow-citizens by suggesting that they will reject any notion useful to the patrie, with the sacrifice of a feudal or hereditary habit, the sacrifice of an acute accent affixed to the mute e. Ah ! let us not injure them by a suspicion. They have combated federation in politics ; with the same energy they will com- bat federation in syntax and spelling. " And effectively in the 10th Prairial, year ii. of the Eepub- lic, the e was denounced by a public decree. It was decided to form a committee for the purpose of compiling a new grammar and dictionary of the French language, such as would give it that character most appropriate to the language of liberty. This measure was passed just two months before the 9th of Thermidor, that is to say, the fall of Robespierre and the end of the Terror. Absurd as may appear the propositions of Barnave and the VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS. 327 Abbe Gregoire, true it is that to this day an inhabitant of one part of France may be hardly able to understand a fel- low - country man . The great Educational Act of 1886 is changing this state of things, and pure French is now finding its way into re- mote corners of Brittany and the Cevennes. Note 14. Le Vin, par A. de Foville (pamphlet) , Rozir, Paris, 1890. This is a general resume on the subject of French vineyards, the devastations of the phylloxera, and the progress of the anti-phylloxera campaign throughout France. Note 15. See "The Decadence of French Cookery," Longman's Mag- azine, by M. B. E. Note 16. See "Wayfaring in France," by E. Barker, Bentley, 1889. This is much more than a mere delightful book of travel. Carelessly, yet picturesquely written, the writer adds to our knowledge of out-of-the-way regions, and although on this subject is brief, gives most valuable testimony to the utter failure of annexation in Alsace-Lorraine. Note 17. —VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS IN FRANCE. The law is as follows : Communal schools for boys were formerly for the most part conducted by lay teachers, a cer- tain number, however, under the management of the Freres des Ecoles Chretiennes. The communal schools for girls were for the most part conducted by nuns, but a certain number were managed by lay teachers. The Third Republic has decreed that all public schools should be non-sectarian, and ere many years not one will re- main in the hands of priests or nuns. In many communes the "freres" and the nuns, excluded by the law from public teaching, have profited by the liberty 328 FRANCE OF TODAY. accorded them of holding an ecole libre, or voluntary school. The only condition of holding such schools is the scholastic diploma obligatory on teachers of both sexes, also a suitable installation and attention to hygiene. These voluntary schools are not subsidized either by the government or the commune, and depend therefore entirely on donations and subscriptions. As all elementary state schools are gratuitous, only very small fees can be demanded. Pupils of voluntary schools are allowed to pass the same examinations as others, and receive the same certificates and diplomas, only those accorded by the state being now au- thorized. Note 18. In the matter of thrift, as I have elsewhere written, France is the schoolmistress of the world. Taxation is higher in France than in England, and even in Germany. Yet the sol- vency and the savings of the French remain phenomenal, and their future, as far as material wealth goes, must be pronounced unimaginable. A telling calculation has lately been made by the highest Gtatistical authority in France. The Eiffel Tower, M. de Foville informs us, weighs from 7 to 8 million kilogrammes (the kilogramme is 2 lbs. ^V oz.). Reconstructed in silver, an Eiffel Tower would require two additional stories in order to represent the actual deposits of French people in the National Savings Banks within the last ten years, the sum total amounting to 2 milliards of francs. But, as M. de Foville points out, a milliard is not a figure easily grasped by the mind, not a milliard of minutes hav- ing as yet elapsed since the Christian era. See L'^pargne en France (pamphlet), par A. de Foville, Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1890. I subjoin an interesting note from the Daily News (November, 1891) : The French Post-Office Savings Bank.— Our Paris Corre- spondent telegraphs : The annual report on the French Postal Sav- ings Bank has appeared. This institution was founded ten years ago. In 1880 the 6,817 district offices of France received 1,949,371 de- POST-OFFICE SAVINGS BANK. 329 posits, representing a total of 261,999,132 francs, the depositors numbering nearly 2,000,000 persons, and forming the eighteenth part of the inhabitants of France and Algeria. The number of savings- bank books in which a first deposit was recorded in 1890 were 348,- 695, and the total deposits 100,973,521 francs. M. Jules Roche says that the persons who bring the most money are craftsmen and crafts- women and domestic servants, who form more than a half of all those who invest at the Post-Office Savings Bank. Agricultural laborers and clerks only form 82 per cent, of the clients. Soldiers on active service and sailors do not invest often, nor do professional men, heads of business houses, farmers, or shopkeepers. The min- ing interest is represented by less than a quarter of all the deposits. Paris has 100 postal offices where deposits are taken, and after a day's notice prepaid with interest. The central bureau, where payments are made on sight of the savings-bank book, is in the Rue St. Remain. Note 20. See "Le Phylloxera dans la Cote d' Or" (pamphlet), par A. de Laguerre, Dijon, 1878. "Enquete sur I'Etat du Vig- noble entre Dijon et le departement de Saone et Loire " (pam- phlet), Beaune, 1891. Above all, two interesting letters in the Temps, 11th August and 8th September, 1891, from the former of w^hich I subjoin extracts. M. Grandeau writes : Parti de Dijon par la route de terre, j'ai parcouru, trois jours durant, en compagnie et sous la direction d'un des plus grands pro- pri^taires de vignes de la region, M. L^once Bocquet, tout le terri- toire qui s'^tend de Chenovo jusqu'^ Santenay, sur une longueur d'environ 45 kilometres. Nous avona successivement visite, dans I'ordre oti ils se presentent en partant de Dijon, les vignobles de Gevrey-Chambertin, Morey, Chambolle, Vosne, Clos-Vougeot, Musigny, Richebourg, Roman^e-Conti, Nuits, Pr^neaux, Aloxe, les Corton-Pougets, Savigny, Beaune, Pommard, Volnay, Meur- sault-Pulligny, Blagny (Montrachet) , Chassagne et Santenay, voca- bles connus du monde entier. Partout le meme spectacle, tour h tour navrant et consolant ; partout le m^me contraste, faisant dclater aux yeux les r^sultats de I'incurie de I'homme, h, c6t6 des prodiges de defense accomplis centre le fl^au par la volenti de quelques-uns. Des deux c6t6s de la route, sur un parcours de vingt lieues, de vastes ^tendues de terrain, nagufire garries de c^pages des grands crus que je viens d'dnumdrer, aujourd'hui compl^tement en friche 330 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. on portant de chdtives recoltes de poinmes de terre, de haricots, d'avoine ou de sarrazin dont les frais de moisson ne seront sans doute pas couverts par les produits, alternant avee des vignes luxu- riantes. Lorsqu'on p6netre dans ces vignes, h, voir la regularity de la plantation, I'intensite de la vegetation et la recolte qu'elles prommettent, on ne soupgonnerait pas qu'on se trouve en plein foyer phylloxerique et Ton eprouve un sentiment d'admiration pour rhomme arriv^ ainsi, h force de volont^, h dominer un des fldaux les plus redoutables avec lesquels il puisse se trouver aux prises. A cette impression en succede une autre non moins vive ; le regret de ne pouvoir, par enchantment transporter les vignerons de la Champagne, en face de ce spectacle rdconfortant du triomphe de I'homme sur la nature. La cause de la defense serait ainsi bien vite gagn(5e, et pas un cep des vignobles dont les produits personnifient a r stranger la gai'te frangaise et la verve gauloise ne ferait place k un plant amdricain. Accourez, Champenois, et retournez chez vous convaincus: vous vous mettrez vigoureusement h I'oeuvre, vous sauverez, avec votre fortune, la glorie de la Champagne ! Venez voir ces vignes ddfendues pied h pied, ou ne manquent, par ci, par 1&,, que les ceps detruits par les rigeurs du dernier hiver. Venez constater dans le clos du chateau de Vougeot, aux Marcon- nets, h, Savigny, aux Montrachet, h Blagny et Pulligny, la regene- ration de la vigne f rangaise par provignage ou par plantation dans un sol ravage par le phylloxera, avant que M. L. Bocquet n'en devint propri^taire. Partout ou, sur une surface d'un are, le fl^au avait dpargne quelques vieux ceps plus r^sistants que leurs voisins, cet habile viticulteur a repeuple, en moins de quatre ans, de vastes taches phylloxerees : la ou le terrible insecte avait tout detruit, des plants nouveaux ont supplee h, I'absence de provins. De tousc6t6s, enfin, M. L. Bocquet et quelques-uns de ses amis ou emules : MM. Moine, docteur Chanut, Vieilhomme, Josserand, etc., ont sauve leur vignoble et maintenu la recolte de leurs grands crus. Le fait capital de la possibilite d'une defense complete est done indeniable: malgre les atteintes de la pyrale, de I'^crivain, du mildew surtout, qui sont venus aider au phylloxera dans son oeuvre destructive, les vignes defendues, non seulement ont survecu au fl^au, mais ne se distinguent pas des plus belles vignes d' autrefois. N'est-ce pas 1^ une constatation consolante qui merite une excursion de Reims ou d'Epernay en Bourgogne? Dernier point h, noter: cette conservation du vignoble est aussi parfaite sur les parcelles isoiees, d'une longueur de quelques mfetres seulement, que dans les pieces de huit ou dix hectares. L^ oil 1 'application des moyens de THE PHYLLOXERA. 331 defense a ete bien faite, peu importe la proximit(5 du foyer. Les bandes etroites de vignes entour^es de toutes parts de terrains en- tiferement ravages par I'insecte sont tout aussi vivantes que les grandes surfaces protegees, comme elles, par le traitement. La vigne atteinte par le phylloxera n'est point une plante en proie h uue maladie speciale: c'est un etre vivant attaque par un parasite, qu'il suffit de d^truire ou d'eloigner h temps pour lui rendre la vigueur et la sant^ originelles. C'est pourquoi I'etendue des vignes def endues importe relativement peu k leur salut. Quels sont exactement les moyens mis en oeuvre, d^s I'origine du mal, par M. L. Bocquet? A quelle depense entrainent-ils le viticul- teur? C'est ce qui me reste h. indiquer. Disons tout de suite que, pour les grands crus de la Champagne et de la Bourgogne, cette depense, qui n'atteint pas 500 francs h, I'hectare, est presque in- signifiante, ^tantdonnee la valeur de la recolte, tandis qu'elle serait hors de proportion avec cette derni^re dans les regions qui produi- sent des vins de mince qualite, quelle qu'en soit la quantity. Le traitement qui a jjermis au propridtaire du chateau du Clos- Vougeot de sauver int^gralement ses vignes depuis 1' invasion phyllox^rique (1880), de rdtablir les parcelles fortement atteintes, ant^rieurement aux mains d'autres propri^taires et achet^es par lui depuis trois ou quatre ans seulement, de reconstituer, dans ces der- nieres, des taches de grande etendue (16 ares h 80 ares) par simple provignage et sans plantation nouvelle a consiste essentiellement dans I'application intelligente d'un melange de carbone et d'essence de petrole. Ce traitement a ete fait dans les conditions que je vais prt^ciser h I'aide des renseignements que m'a obligement fournis le propri^taire du chateau du Clos-Vougeot. Deux fois par an, h, la fin de I'automne et au mois de juiliet-aout, on injecte dans le sol, k une profondeur variable suivant la nature du terrain (dix h, trente centimetres) , un melange, h volume egal, de sulf ure de carbone et d'essence de petrole. M. L. Bocquet traite, h> raison de quatre coups de pal regulifere- ment rdpartis au m^tre carrd, le pal ^tant gradu^ pour debiter 8 gi-ammes. L'injection introduit done 32 grammes de ce melange par m^tre carr^ de terre; 1' operation etant renouvel^e deux fois par an, la terre regoit annuellement, dans le voisinage de chaque cep, 64 grammes de m(51ange, soit environ 33 grammes de sulfure et 26 grammes d'essence de petrole. * Je me borne h, d^crire le traitement couronne d'un plein succ^.s, sans le mettre en parallelo avec d'autres traitements prefdrds pas certains viticulteurs. 332 FRANCE OF TO-DAY. L' experience a demontre k M. L. Bocquet I'avantage qu'il y a, k employer ce melange, de preference au sulfure de carbone pur. La cause en est probablement dans ce double fait que, 1 'evaporation etant beaucoup moins rapide, la diffusion du liquide est plus lente dans le sol et, d'autre part, le refroidissement produit par I'evapo- ration beaucoup moins intense, ce qui est fort important dans notre climat. Les vignes achet^es dans ces derni^res ann^es par M. L. Bocquet, qui se trouvaient dans un etat de delabrement complet (comme celle de Blagny, I'une des plus belles qui se puisse voir aujourd'hui en Bourgogne), ont regu une forte fumure: cent metres cubes de fumier de ferme par hectare, en ime seule fois; deux k quatre ans plus tard, on leur a donne, de deux en deux ans, dix metres cubes de fumier par hectare. Que coute ce traitement, qui, dans tons les grands cms de la Cote, sans exception, dans tons les sols et k toutes les orientations, a permis k M. L. Bocquet de conserver integralement ses vignes et de reconstituer complfetement les parcelles presque entiferement detruites avant qu'il en devint proprietaire? C'est ce qu'il est aise d'etablir, d'apr^s la comptabilite rigoureuse tenue pour chaque vigne traitee. Voici le chiffre de la d^pense par hectare (1 hectare compte 23,36 ouvrees environ, Pouvr^e etant de 4 ares 28) : Fr. Cms. 165 k. 4 sulfure de carbone k 45 fr. les 100 k, 130 litres essence de petrole k 45 fr. I'hectol, Prix d'un traitement, Prix du 2e traitement, Frais de main-d'ceuvre, . Total par. hectare, A cette depense s'ajoutent les frais d'echaudage pour combattre la pyrale, et le traitement contre le mildew, 74 40 58 80 183 20 133 20 72 338 40 Ce qui porte, au total, k 428 fr. 40 la ddpense par annee et par hectare pour la defense du vignoble contre la pyrale, le mildew et le phylloxera (en plus des anciens frais de culture) . Combien est f aible cette d^pense par rapport aux r^sultats obtenus ! II est aise de s'en convaincre. Les vignes des grands cms, Corton, Clos-Vou- geot, Montrachet, Pommard, etc., auxquelles M.L. Bocquet a su, k force d'energie, d'initiative et de persistance, conserver dans leur THE PHYLLOXERA. 333 integrity la vigueur et la productivite, valent aujourd'hui, pour leur proprietaire, ce qu'elles valaient autrefois. Or les terres d6- vastees qui les cotoyent se vendent difficilement de 2 ^ 3000 francs 1 'hectare, soit dix h vingt fois moins peut-etre, suivant le crus, que la valeur venale des vignes encore en pleine production. Un raisonnement analogue s'appliquerait au vignoble cham- penois. II n'y a done pas h h^siter: il faut appliquer h, ce dernier le traitement qui, en Bourgogne, a sauve les vignes des propri^tairs qui out voulu et su le faire en temps utile. Comparons maintenant les frais de creation de vignes americains h, ceux qu'entraine la plantation de vignes fangaises en anciens cepages de Bourgogne. Actuellement, la creation d'un hectare de vigne en cdpage americain ndcessite les depenses suivantes : Fr. Def outage du sol, 720 . Achat et mise en place du fumier de ferme, . . . 984 Frais de plantation, 240 Au total, 1944 Les cepages americains racines se vendent en Bourgogne 225 k 300 francs le mille, ce qui suffirait h expliquer I'ardeur de ceux ce les produisent h, preconiser la reconstitution en vigne americain, Les mille racines de pineau bourguignon coutent 60 francs au maxi- mum. La plantation d'un hectare de vigne, dans le systfeme bour- guignon en cdpage fran^ais, revient, tous frais compris, ix. 744 francs (31 f r. par ouvr^e) . Les 10, 11, et 12 septembre prochain se tiendront h Beaune, sous le patronage de la Societe vigneronne de I'arrondissement, des con- ferences viticoles dont le programme vient d'etre public. La pre- miere journ^e sera consacree h la defense des vignes par le traitement au sulfure de carbone; la deuxitjme et la troisi^me, h la reconstitu- tion par le cepage americain. Le programme de cette seconde partie du congr^s comprend deux visites au champ d' Experiences departemental et au champ d'experiences de la Society vigneronne. Comment se fait-il que les organisateurs n'y aient pas egalement inscrit una excursion dans le vignoble, afin de mettre sous les yeux des membres du congress les admirables r^sultats de con- servation et de reconstitution des vignes fran^aises dont M. L. Bocquet m'a rendu t^moin? Cette omission nous parait regret- table. C'est k I'initiative des viticulteurs qui assisteront aux conferences de septembre, et notamment aux Champenois qui ne sauraient • negliger une occasion aussi favorable, de provoquer 334 FRANCE OF TO-DAY, ces visites dans les vignes prot^g^es. lis en rapporteront, je n'en doute pas, la conviction qu'il importe, avant tout, au salut du viguoble champenois d'entre-prendre ^nergiquement la defense, par le sulfure et I'essence de petrole, de leurs grands crus menaces, lis s'opposeront avec non moins de fermetd h la rapide expansion du fleau par 1' importation en Champagne des cepages americains, sous le couvert de la loi nefaste du 3 aout 1891. lis fermeront I'oreille aux soUicitations des "marchands de bois," dont la fortune serait leur mine assuree, et sauvegarderont ainsi h la fois leurs in- t^rets les plus chers et la fortune publique d'une region qu'un moment d'affolement en presence du danger peut perdre h tout jamais. La conclusion qui s'impose h mon esprit, h, la suite d5 I'excursion si interessente que je viens de faire sous la conduite de M. L. Boc- quet, se traduit ainsi : Le minis tfere de 1' agriculture a 6t6 des mieux inspires, dfes I'origine de I'invasion phyllox6rique, en conseillant la defense k outrance des c6pages f ran(^ais des grands crus ; le gouv- ernement de la Republique, en apportant son concours pecuniaire bt, ceux qui desiraient suivre les instructions et lesenseignementsqu'on leur prodiguait au prix d'une lutte et en face d'une r«5sistance in- croyables de la part des interess^s, a fait preuve d'une sagacity que le mauvais vouloir et 1 'ignorance des populations vigneronnes ont seuls empechee de porter les fruits qu'on en devait attendre. Le Bordelais a su preserver et def endre la majeure partie de ses grands crus, pour son honneur et son plus grand profit. L'exemple de M. L. Bocquet et de ses emules est \h. pour raontrer quel dt^sastre la Bourgogne eut ^vitds en suivant leur exeinple. A la Champagne aujourd'hui d'aller resolument dans la voie trac^e et, plus heureuse que la region bourguignonne, de sauver son vig- noble tout entier. Savoir et vouloir, tout est Ik, qu'on en soit cer- tain. La viticulture champnois^e peut, elle doit vouloir. Le meilleur moyen d'acqu^rir la conviction h ce sujet est inter- roger les faits. Puissent ces lignes, inspir^es par une sympathie prof onde pour la viticulture champenoise et pour la prospdrit^ de la France, decider quelques-uns de ses ^minents repr^sentants k faire le voyage de Beaune : mon ambition sera atteinte, car ces visiteurs reviendront convaincus et ardents pour la lutte. L. Grandeau. Note 19. It need hardly surprise us that a few years back the condi- tion of things at Citeaux was made matter of criminal in- ASSOCIATIONS BILL. 335 vestigation. Eight or ten of the brothers were tried at the assizes for immoral conduct. THE FRENCH "ASSOCIATIONS" BILL. (From Our Correspondent— Z)at7i/ Neivs.) Paris, 19th January, 1892. The Government Bill to regulate the conditions on which associa- tions are to live may be said to aim exclusively at the rehgious orders with the object of preventing them from being used for polit- ical purposes. The Republicans will almost be solid in voting for the bill, although they may amend it in a Liberal sense. M. Bris- son, M. Isambard, M. Goblet, and other promoters of this measure accuse the communities who devote themselves to the bringing up of waifs and orphans of pursuing an inexorable system of sweating. Hence the clause placing all the convents of these communities within the Factories and Industrial Schools Inspection Laws. The labor of children brought up in conventual asylmns, it is said, not only enables these communities to thrive, but is a great indirect source of income to the Vatican. The bill will be framed so as to prevent fortunes made by communities in this country being in- vested abroad, and to cut at the root of an internationalism which might enable the orders to escape from the action of the Govern- ment. Pious exercises will not be meddled with. It appears that the religious orders have again come forward to help the monarch- ical organizations with money. They did this when the Boulangist agitation was thought favorable to the Comte de Paris. If the Concordat is to remain, the orders must be what they profess to be, associations for facilitating the practices of prayer and piety, and not a great politico-financial power hostile to every vital prin- ciple of the Republic, and able from their vast wealth to imperil its existence. UNIVERSITl .^SITY OF CALIFOBKIA L. BERKELEY YB 57873 ^^^:!^:^^' t avf(tAi--^ ' ^ C