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CHAPTER X.

The Solitary Big Hotel—The Knitters of the Pyrenees—The Weavers of the Pyrenees—Pigeon-catching in the Pyrenees—The Giant of the Pyrenean Dogs—Murray and Commis Voyageurs—The Eastern Pyrenees—The Legend of Orthon

167-186 CHAPTER XI.

Languedoc—The "Austere South"—Beziers and the Albigenses—The Fountain of the Greve—The Bishop and his Flock—The Canal du Midi—The Mistral—Rural Billiard-playing

187-199 CHAPTER XII.

Travelling by the Canal du Midi—Travelling French People—The Salt Harvest—Equestrian Thrashing Machines—Cette—The Mediterranean—The "Made" Wines—The Priest on Wines—La Cuisine Française

200-218 CHAPTER XIII.

The Olive-gathering—A Night with the Mosquitoes—Aigues-Mortes—The Fever in Aigues-Mortes—My Cicerone in Aigues-Mortes—The Pickled Burgundians—Reboul's Poetry—The Lighthouse of Aigues-Mortes

219-235 CHAPTER XIV.

Fen Landscape—Tavern Allegories—Roman Remains—Roman Architecture—Roman Theatricals—The Maison Carrée—Greek Architecture—Catholic and Protestant—The Weaver's Cabane—Protestant and Catholic

236-255 CHAPTER THE LAST.

Backward French Agriculture—French Rural Society—The Small Property System—French "Encumbered Estates"

256-264

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CLARET AND OLIVES.

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CHAPTER I.

The Diligence—Old Guienne and the English in France—Bordeaux and a Suburban Vintaging.

"Voila la voila! La ville de Bordeaux!"

The conductor's voice roused me from the dreamy state of dose in which I lay, luxuriously stretched back amid cloaks and old English railway-wrappers, in the roomy banquette of one of the biggest diligences which ever rumbled out of Caillard and Lafitte's yard.

"Voila! la Voila!" The bloused peasant who drove the six stout nags therewith stirred in his place; his long whip whistled and cracked; the horses flung up their heads as they broke into a canter, and their bells rang like a joy peal; while Niniche, the conductor's white poodle, which maintained a perilous footing in the leathern hood of the banquette, pattered and scratched above our heads, and barked in recognition of his master's voice.

I rubbed my eyes and looked. We were on the ridge of a wooded hill. Below us lay a flat green plain, carpetted with vines. Right across it ran the broad, white, chalky highway, powdering with dust the double avenue of chestnuts which lined it. Beyond the plain glittered a great river, crowded with shipping, and beyond the river rose stretching, apparently for miles, a magnificent façade of high white buildings, broken here and there by the foliage of public gardens, and the dark embouchures of streets; while, behind the range of quays, and golden in the sunrise, rose high into the clear morning air, a goodly array of towering Gothic steeples, fretted and pinnacled up to the glancing weather-cocks. It was, indeed, Bordeaux.

The long journey from Paris was all but over, yet though I had been tired enough of the way, I felt as if I could brave it again, rather than make the exertion of encountering octroi officers, and plunging into strange hotels. For after all, comfortable Diligence travelling makes a man lazy. It is slow, but you get accustomed to the slowness; in the banquette, too, you are never cramped; there is luxurious roominess behind, and you plunge your legs in straw up to the knees. Then leaning supinely back, you indulge a serene passiveness, rolling lazily on with the rumbling mountain of a vehicle. The thunder of the heavy wheels, and the low monotonous clash, clash, clash, of the hundred grelots, form a soothing atmosphere of sound about you, and musingly, and dreamingly you watch the action of the team—these half dozen little but stout tough work-a-day horses, trotting manfully in their rough harness, while the driver—oh, how different from our old coaching dandies!—a clumsy peasant, in sabots, and a stable-smelling blouse, sits slouched, and round-shouldered like a sack before you, incessantly flourishing that whistling whip, and shouting in the uncouth jargon of his province, to the jingling team below. And next you watch the country or the road. A French road, like a mathematical line, on, and on, and on, straight, straight, mournfully, dismally,