I Remember Going Round To The Church,
After I Had Left The Good Sisters, And To A Little Quiet
Terrace,
Which stands in front of it, ornamented with
a few small trees and bordered with a wall, breast-
high, over
Which you look down steep hillsides, off
into the air and all about the neighbouring country.
I remember saying to myself that this little terrace
was one of those felicitous nooks which the tourist
of taste keeps in his mind as a picture. The church
was small and brown and dark, with a certain rustic
richness. All this, however, is no general description
of Les Baux.
I am unable to give any coherent account of the
place, for the simple reason that it is a mere con-
fusion of ruin. It has not been preserved in lava like
Pompeii, and its streets and houses, its ramparts and
castle, have become fragmentary, not through the
sudden destruction, but through the gradual with-
drawal, of a population. It is not an extinguished,
but a deserted city; more deserted far than even
Carcassonne and Aigues-Mortes, where I found so
much entertainment in the grass-grown element. It
is of very small extent, and even in the days of its
greatness, when its lords entitled themselves counts
of Cephalonia and Neophantis, kings of Arles and
Vienne, princes of Achaia, and emperors of Constan-
tinople, - even at this flourishing period, when, as M.
Jules Canonge remarks, "they were able to depress
the balance in which the fate of peoples and kings is
weighed," the plucky little city contained at the most
no more than thirty-six hundred souls. Yet its lords
(who, however, as I have said, were able to present
a long list of subject towns, most of them, though a
few are renowned, unknown to fame) were seneschals
and captains-general of Piedmont and Lombardy,
grand admirals of the kingdom of Naples, and its
ladies were sought in marriage by half the first
princes in Europe. A considerable part of the little
narrative of M. Canonge is taken up with the great
alliances of the House of Baux, whose fortunes, ma-
trimonial and other, he traces from the eleventh cen-
tury down to the sixteenth. The empty shells of a
considerable number of old houses, many of which
must have been superb, the lines of certain steep
little streets, the foundations of a castle, and ever so
many splendid views, are all that remains to-day of
these great titles. To such a list I may add a dozen
very polite and sympathetic people, who emerged from
the interstices of the desultory little town to gaze at
the two foreigners who had driven over from Arles,
and whose horses were being baited at the modest
inn. The resources of this establishment we did not
venture otherwise to test, in spite of the seductive
fact that the sign over the door was in the Provencal
tongue. This little group included the baker, a rather
melancholy young man, in high boots and a cloak,
with whom and his companions we had a good deal
of conversation. The Baussenques of to-day struck
me as a very mild and agreeable race, with a good
deal of the natural amenity which, on occasions like
this one, the traveller, who is, waiting for his horses
to be put in or his dinner to be prepared, observes
in the charming people who lend themselves to con-
versation in the hill-towns of Tuscany. The spot
where our entertainers at Les Baux congregated was
naturally the most inhabited portion of the town; as
I say, there were at least a dozen human figures
within sight. Presently we wandered away from them,
scaled the higher places, seated ourselves among the
ruins of the castle, and looked down from the cliff
overhanging that portion of the road which I have
mentioned as approaching Les Baux from behind. I
was unable to trace the configuration of the castle as
plainly as the writers who have described it in the
guide-books, and I am ashamed to say that I did not
even perceive the three great figures of stone (the
three Marys, as they are called; the two Marys of
Scripture, with Martha), which constitute one of the
curiosities of the place, and of which M. Jules Canonge
speaks with almost hyperbolical admiration. A brisk
shower, lasting some ten minutes, led us to take refuge
in a cavity, of mysterious origin, where the melancholy
baker presently discovered us, having had the _bonne
pensee_ of coming up for us with an umbrella which
certainly belonged, in former ages, to one of the Ste-
phanettes or Berangeres commemorated by M. Canonge.
His oven, I am afraid, was cold so long as our visit
lasted. When the rain was over we wandered down
to the little disencumbered space before the inn,
through a small labyrinth of obliterated things. They
took the form of narrow, 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.
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