A Little Tour In France [85]
precipitous streets, bordered by empty houses, with gaping windows and absent doors, through which we had glimpses of sculptured chimney-pieces and fragments of stately arch and vault. Some of the houses are still inhabited; but most of them are open to the air and weather. Some of them have completely collapsed; others present to the street a front which enables one to judge of the physiognomy of Les Baux in the days of its importance. This im- portance had pretty well passed away in the early part of the sixteenth century, when the place ceased to be an independent principality. It became - by bequest of one of its lords, Bernardin des Baux, a great cap- tain of his time - part of the appanage of the kings of France, by whom it was placed under the protection of Arles, which had formerly occupied with regard to it a different position. I know not whether the Arle- sians neglected their trust; but the extinction of the sturdy little stronghold is too complete not to have begun long ago. Its memories are buried under its ponderous stones. As we drove away from it in the gloaming, my friend and I agreed that the two or three hours we had spent there were among the happiest impressions of a pair of tourists very curious in the picturesque. We almost forgot that we were bound to regret that the shortened day left us no time to drive five miles further, above a pass in the little mountains - it had beckoned to us in the morning, when we came in sight of it, almost irresistibly - to see the Ro- man arch and mausoleum of Saint Remy. To compass this larger excursion (including the visit to Les Baux) you must start from Arles very early in the morning; but I can imagine no more delightful day.
XXXIII.
I had been twice at Avignon before, and yet I was not satisfied. I probably am satisfied now; neverthe- less, I enjoyed my third visit. I shall not soon forget the first, on which a particular emotion set indelible stamp. I was travelling northward, in 1870, after four months spent, for the first time, in Italy. It was the middle of January, and I had found myself, unexpected- ly, forced to return to England for the rest of the winter. It was an insufferable disappointment; I was wretched and broken-hearted. Italy appeared to me at that time so much better than anything else in the world, that to rise from table in the middle of the feast was a prospect of being hungry for the rest of my days. I had heard a great deal of praise of the south of France; but the south of France was a poor consolation. In this state of mind I arrived at Avignon, which under a bright, hard winter sun was tingling - fairly spinning - with the _mistral_. I find in my journal of the other day a reference to the acuteness of my reluctance in January, 1870. France, after Italy, ap- peared, in the language of the latter country, _poco sim- patica_; and I thought it necessary, for reasons now in- conceivable, to read the "Figaro," which was filled with descriptions of the horrible Troppmann, the mur- derer of the _famille_ Kink. Troppmann, Kink, _le crime do Pantin_, very names that figured in this episode seemed to wave me back. Had I abandoned the so- norous south to associate with vocables so base?
It was very cold, the other day, at Avignon; for though there was no mistral, it was raining as it rains in Provence, and the dampness had a terrible chill in it. As I sat by my fire, late at night - for in genial Avignon, in October, I had to have a fire - it came back to me that eleven years before I had at that same hour sat by a fire in that same room, and, writ- ing to a friend to whom I was not afraid to appear extravagant, had made a vow that at some happier period of the future I would avenge myself on the _ci- devant_ city of the Popes by taking it in a contrary sense. I suppose that I redeemed my vow on the oc- casion of my second visit better than on my third; for then I was on my way to Italy, and that vengeance, of course, was complete. The only drawback was that I was in such a hurry to get to Ventimiglia (where the
XXXIII.
I had been twice at Avignon before, and yet I was not satisfied. I probably am satisfied now; neverthe- less, I enjoyed my third visit. I shall not soon forget the first, on which a particular emotion set indelible stamp. I was travelling northward, in 1870, after four months spent, for the first time, in Italy. It was the middle of January, and I had found myself, unexpected- ly, forced to return to England for the rest of the winter. It was an insufferable disappointment; I was wretched and broken-hearted. Italy appeared to me at that time so much better than anything else in the world, that to rise from table in the middle of the feast was a prospect of being hungry for the rest of my days. I had heard a great deal of praise of the south of France; but the south of France was a poor consolation. In this state of mind I arrived at Avignon, which under a bright, hard winter sun was tingling - fairly spinning - with the _mistral_. I find in my journal of the other day a reference to the acuteness of my reluctance in January, 1870. France, after Italy, ap- peared, in the language of the latter country, _poco sim- patica_; and I thought it necessary, for reasons now in- conceivable, to read the "Figaro," which was filled with descriptions of the horrible Troppmann, the mur- derer of the _famille_ Kink. Troppmann, Kink, _le crime do Pantin_, very names that figured in this episode seemed to wave me back. Had I abandoned the so- norous south to associate with vocables so base?
It was very cold, the other day, at Avignon; for though there was no mistral, it was raining as it rains in Provence, and the dampness had a terrible chill in it. As I sat by my fire, late at night - for in genial Avignon, in October, I had to have a fire - it came back to me that eleven years before I had at that same hour sat by a fire in that same room, and, writ- ing to a friend to whom I was not afraid to appear extravagant, had made a vow that at some happier period of the future I would avenge myself on the _ci- devant_ city of the Popes by taking it in a contrary sense. I suppose that I redeemed my vow on the oc- casion of my second visit better than on my third; for then I was on my way to Italy, and that vengeance, of course, was complete. The only drawback was that I was in such a hurry to get to Ventimiglia (where the