Mme. Ducros—A Southern French country town—"Tartarin de Tarascon"—His prototypes at Nyons—M. Sisteron the roysterer—The Southern French—An octogenarian pesteur—French industry—"Bone-shakers"—A wonderful "Cordon-bleu"—"Slop-basin"—French legal procedure—The bons-vivants—The merry French judges—La gaiete francaise—Delightful excursions—Some sleepy old towns—Orange and Avignon—M. Thiers' ingenious cousin—Possibilities—French political situation in 1874—The Comte de Chambord—Some French characteristics—High intellectual level—Three days in a Trappist Monastery—Details of life there—The Arian heresy—Silkworm culture—Tendencies of French to complicate details—Some examples—Cicadas in London.
As it had already been settled that I was to enter the Diplomatic Service, my father very wisely determined that I should leave Harrow as soon as I was seventeen to go to France, in order to learn French thoroughly. As he pointed out, it would take three years at least to become proficient in French and German, and it would be as well to begin at once.
The French tutor selected for me enjoyed a great reputation at that time. Oddly enough, she was a woman, but it will be gathered that she was quite an exceptional woman, when I say that she had for years ruled four unruly British cubs, varying in age from seventeen to twenty, with an absolute rod of iron. Mme. Ducros was the wife of a French judge, she spoke English perfectly, and must have been in her youth a wonderfully good-looking woman. She was very tall, and still adhered to the dress and headdress of the "sixties," wearing little bunches of curls over each ear—a becoming fashion, even if rather reminiscent of a spaniel.
The Ducros lived at Nyons in the south of France. Nyons lay twenty-five miles east of the main line from Paris to Marseilles, and could only be reached by diligence. I think that I can safely say that no foreigner (with the exception of the Ducros' pupils) had ever set foot in Nyons, for the place was quite unknown, and there was nothing to draw strangers there. It was an extraordinarily attractive spot, lying in a little circular cup of a valley of the Dauphine Alps, through which a brawling river had bored its way. Nyons was celebrated for its wine, its olive oil, its silk, and its truffles, all of them superlatively good. The ancient little walled town, basking in this sun-trap of a valley, stood out ochre-coloured against the silver-grey background of olive trees, whilst the jagged profiles of the encircling hills were always mistily blue, with that intense blue of which the Provence hills seem alone to have the secret. So few English people knew anything about the conditions of life in a little out-of-the-way French provincial town, where no foreigners have ever set foot, that it may be worth while saying something about them. In the first place, it must have been deadly dull for the inhabitants, for nothing whatever happened there. Even the familiar "tea and tennis," the stereotyped mild dissipation of little English towns, was quite unknown. There was no entertaining of any sort, beyond the formal visits the ladies were perpetually paying each other. The Ducros alone, occasionally, asking their legal friends to dinner, invitations accepted with the utmost enthusiasm, for the culinary genius who presided over the Ducros' kitchen (M. Dueros' own sister) deservedly enjoyed an enormous local reputation.
Most people must be familiar with Alphonse Daudet's immortal work, Tartarin de Tarascon, in which the typical "Meridional" of Southern France is portrayed with such unerring exactitude that Daudet himself, after writing the book, was never able to set foot in Tarascon again.
We had a cercle in Nyons, in the Place Napoleon (re-christened Place de la Republique after September 4, 1870), housed in three rather stately, sparsely furnished, eighteenth-century rooms. Here, with the exception of Tartarin himself, the counterparts of all Daudet's characters were to be found. "Le Capitaine Bravida" was represented by Colonel Olivier, a fiercely moustached and imperialled Crimean veteran, who perpetually breathed fire and swords on any potential enemy of France. "Costecalde" found his prototype in M. Sichap, who, although he had in all probability never fired off a gun in his life, could never see a tame pigeon, or even a sparrow flying over him, without instantly putting his walking-stick to his shoulder and loudly ejaculating, "Pan, pan," which was intended to counterfeit the firing of both barrels of a gun. I once asked M. Sichap why so excellent a shot as he (with a walking-stick) invariably missed his bird with his first barrel, and only brought him down with his second. This was quite a new light to M. Sichap, who had hithered considered the double "Pan, pan," an indispensable adjunct to the pantomime of firing a gun; much as my young brother and I had once imagined "Ug, ug," an obligatory commencement to any remark made by a Red Indian "brave."
In so remote a place as Nyons, over four hundred miles from the capital, the glamour of Paris exercised a magical attraction. The few inhabitants of Nyons who had ever visited Paris, or even merely passed through it, were never quite as other people, some little remnant of an aureole encircled them. The dowdy little wife of M. Pelissier, who had first seen the light in some grubby suburb of Paris, either Levallois-Perret or Clichy, held an immense position in Nyons on the strength of being "une vraie Parisienne," and most questions of taste were referred to her. M. Sisteron, the collector of taxes, himself a native of Nyons, had twenty years before gone to Paris on business, and spent four days there. There were the darkest rumours current in Nyons, to the effect that M. Sisteron had spent these four days in a whirl of the most frantic and abandoned dissipation. It was popularly supposed that these four days in Paris, twenty years ago, had so completely unsettled M. Sisteron that life in Nyons had lost all zest for him. He was perpetually hungering for the delirious joys of the metropolis; even the collection of taxes no longer afforded him the faintest gratification. Every inhabitant of Nyons was secretly proud of being able to claim so dare-devil a roysterer as a fellow-townsman. The memory of those rumored four hectic days in Paris clung round him like a halo; it became almost a pleasure to pay taxes to so celebrated a character. M. Sisteron was short, paunchy, bald, and bearded. He was a model husband and a pattern as a father. I am persuaded that he had spent those four days in Paris in the most blameless and innocuous fashion, living in the cheapest hotel he could find, and, after the manner of the people of Nyons, never spending one unnecessary franc. Still, the legend of his lurid four days, and of the amount of champagne he had consumed during them, persisted. In moments of expansion, his intimate friends would dig him in the ribs, remembering those four feverish days, with a facetious, "Ah! vieux polisson de Sisteron, va! Nous autres, nous n'avons pas fait des farces a Paris dans notre jeunesse!" to M. Sisteron's unbounded delight. It was in the genuine spirit of Tartarin de Tarascon, with all the mutual make-believe on both sides. His wife, Mme. Sisteron, was fond of assuring her friends that she owed her excellent health to the fact that she invariably took a bath twice a year, whether she required it or not.
The other members of the cercle were also mostly short, tubby, black-bearded, and olive-complexioned. When not engaged in playing "manille" for infinitesimal points, they would all shout and gesticulate violently, as only Southern Frenchmen can, relapsing as the discussion grew more heated into their native Provencal, for though Nyons is geographically in Dauphine, climatically and racially it is in Provence. In Southern France the "Langue d'Oil," the literary language of Paris and Northern France, has never succeeded in ousting the "Langue d'Oc," the language of the Troubadours. From hearing so much Provencal talked round me, I could not help picking up some of it. It was years before I could rid myself of the habit of inquiring quezaco? instead of "qu'est ce que c'est?" and of substituting for "Comment cela va-t-il?" the Provencal Commoun as? I found, too, that it was unusual elsewhere to address people in our Nyons fashion as "Te, mon bon!"
Those swarthy, amply waistcoated, voluble little men were really very good fellows in spite of their excitability and torrents of talk.
The Southern Frenchmen divide Europe into the "Nord" and the "Midi." The "Nord" is hardly worth talking about, the sun never really shines there, and no garlic or oil is used in cookery in those benighted regions. The town of Lyons is considered to be in the "Nord," although we should consider it well in the south of France. To the curious in such matters, it may be pointed out that the line of demarcation between "Nord" and "Midi" is perfectly well defined. In travelling from Paris to Marseilles, between Valence and Montelimar, the observer will note that quite abruptly the type of house changes. In place of the high-pitched roof of Northern Europe the farm-houses suddenly assume flat roofs of fluted tiles, with projecting eaves, after the Italian fashion; at the same time the grey-green olive trees put in a first appearance. Then you are in the "Midi," and any black-bearded, olive-complexioned, stumpy little men in the carriage will give a sigh of relief, for now, at last, the sun will begin to shine.
Nyons had been for two hundred years a Huguenot stronghold, so for a French town an unusual proportion of its inhabitants were Protestants, and there was, oddly enough, a colony of French Wesleyans there.
M. Ducros' father had been the Protestant pasteur of Nyons for forty-four years. He was eighty-six years old, and on week-days the old gentleman dozed in the sun all day, and was quite senile and gaga. On Sundays, no sooner had he ascended the pulpit than his faculties seemed to return to him, and he would preach interminable but perfectly coherent sermons with a vigour astonishing in so old a man, only to relapse into childishness again on returning home, and to remain senile till the following Sunday.
The Ducros lived in a large farm-house on the outskirts of the town. It was a farm without any livestock, for there is no grass whatever in that part of France, and consequently no pasture for cattle or sheep. Every one in Nyons kept goats for milk, and, quaintly enough, they fed them on the dried mulberry leaves the silkworms had left over. For every one reared silkworms too, a most lucrative industry. The French speak of "making" silkworms (faire des vers-a-soie). Lucrative as it is, it would never succeed in England even if the white mulberry could be induced to grow, for successful silkworm rearing demands such continual watchfulness and meticulous attention as only French people can give; English people "couldn't be bothered" to expend such minute care on anything they were doing.
Every foot of the Ducros' property was carefully cultivated, with vineyards above on the terraced hillside, olive-yards below, and mulberry trees on the lower levels. Our black mulberry, with its cloying, luscious fruit, is not the sort used for silkworms; it is the white mulberry, which does not fruit, that these clever little alchemists transmute into glossy, profitable cocoons of silk. The Ducros made their own olive-oil, and their own admirable wine.
In that sun-drenched cup amongst the hills, roses bloomed all the year round. I always see Nyons with my inner eyes from the terrace in front of the house, the air fragrant with roses, and the soothing gurgle of the fountain below in my ears as it splashed melodiously into its stone reservoir, the little town standing out a vivid yellow against the silver background of olive trees, and the fantastic outlines of the surrounding hills steeped in that wonderful deep Provencal blue. In spite of its dullness, I and the three other pupils liked the place. We all grew very fond of the charming Ducros family, we appreciated the wonderful beauty of the little spot, we climbed all the hills, and, above all, we had each hired a velocipede. Not a bicycle (except that it certainly had two wheels); not a so-called "ordinary," as those machines with one immensely high, shining, nickel-plated wheel and a little dwarf brother following it, were for some inexplicable reason termed; but an original antediluvian velocipede, a genuine "bone-shaker": a clumsy contrivance with two high wooden wheels of equal height, and direct action. Even on the level they required an immense amount of muscle to drive them along, and up the smallest hill every ounce of available strength had to be brought into play. They did not steer well, were very difficult to get on and off, and gave us some awful falls; still we got an immense amount of fun out of them, and we scoured all the surrounding country on them, until all four of us developed gigantic calves which would have done credit to any coal-heaver.
M. Ducros' sister was a brilliant culinary genius such as is only found in France. We were given truffled omelets, wonderful salads of eggs, anchovies, and tunny-fish, ducks with oranges and olives, and other delicacies of the Provencal cuisine prepared by a consummate artist, and those four English cubs termed them all "muck," and clamoured for plain roast mutton and boiled potatoes. It really was a case of casting pearls before swine! Those ignorant hobbledehoys actually turned up their noses at the admirable "Cotes du Rhone" wine, and begged for beer. In justice I must add that we were none of us used to truffles or olives, nor to the oil which replaces butter in Provencal cookery. Mlle. Louise, the sister, was pained, but not surprised. She had never left Nyons, and, from her experience of a long string of English pupils, was convinced that all Englishmen were savages. They inhabited an island enveloped in dense fog from year's end to year's end. They had never seen the sun, and habitually lived on half-raw "rosbif." It was only natural that such young barbarians should fail to appreciate the cookery of so celebrated a cordon-bleu, which term, I may add, is only applicable to a woman-cook, and can never be used of a man. This truly admirable woman made us terrines of truffled foie-gras such as even Strasburg could not surpass, and gave them to us for breakfast. I blush to own that those four benighted boys asked for eggs and bacon instead.
Although M. Ducros had heard English talked around him for so many years, he had all the average Frenchman's difficulty in assimilating any foreign language. His knowledge of our tongue was confined to one word only, and that a most curiously chosen word. "Slop-basin" was the beginning and end of his knowledge of the English language. M. Ducros used his one word of English only in moments of great elation. Should, for instance, his sister Mlle. Louise have surpassed herself in the kitchen, M. Ducros, after tasting her chef d'oeuvre, would joyously ejaculate, "Slop-basin!" several times over. It was understood in his family that "slop-basin" always indicated that the master of the house was in an extremely contented frame of mind.
The judicial system of France is not as concentrated as ours. Every Sous-prefecture in France has its local Civil Court with a Presiding Judge, an Assistant Judge, and a "Substitut." The latter, in small towns, is the substitute for the Procureur de la Republique, or Public Prosecutor. The legal profession in France is far more "clannish" than with us, for lawyers have always played a great part in the history of France. The so-called "Parlements" (not to be confounded with our Parliament) had had, up to the time of the French Revolution, very large powers indeed. They were originally Supreme Courts of Justice, but by the fifteenth century they could not only make, on their own account, regulations having the force of laws, but had acquired independent administrative powers. Originally the "Parlement de Paris" stood alone, but as time went on, in addition to this, thirteen or fourteen local "Parlements" administered France. After the Revolution, the term was only applied to Supreme Courts, without administrative powers. M. Ducros was Assistant Judge of the Nyons Tribunal, and the Ducros were rather fond of insisting that they belonged to the old noblesse de robe.
As a child I could speak French as easily as English, and even after eight years of French lessons at school, my French was still tucked away in some corner of my head; but I had, of course, only a child's vocabulary, sufficient for a child's simple wants. Under Madame Ducros' skilful tuition I soon began to acquire an adult vocabulary, and it became no effort to me whatever to talk.
The French judicial system seems to demand perpetual judicial inquiries (enquetes) in little country places. M. Ducros invited me to accompany him, the President, and the "Substitut" on one of these enquetes, and these three, with their tremendous spirits, their perpetual jokes, and above all with their delightful gaiete francaise, amused me so enormously, that I jumped at a second invitation. So it came about in time, that I invariably accompanied them, and when we started in the shabby old one-horse cabriolet soon after 7 a.m., "notre ami le petit Angliche" was always perched on the box. My suspicions may be unfounded, but I somehow think that these enquetes were conducted not so much on account of legal exigencies as for the gastronomic possibilities at the end of the journey, for all our inquiries were made in little towns celebrated for some local chef. These three merry bons-vivants revelled in the pleasures of the table, and on our arrival at our destinations, before the day's work was entered upon, there were anxious and even heated discussions with "Papa Charron," "Pere Vinay," or whatever the name of the local artist might be, as to the comparative merits of truffles or olives as an accompaniment to a filet, or the rival claims of mushrooms or tunny-fish as a worthy lining of an omelet. The legal business being all disposed of by two o'clock, we four would approach the great ceremony of the day, the midday dinner, with tense expectancy. The President could never keep out of the kitchen, from which he returned with most assuring reports: "Cette fois ca y est, mes amis," he would jubilantly exclaim, rubbing his hands, and even "Papa Charron" himself bearing in the first dish, his face scorched scarlet from his cooking-stove, would confidently aver that "MM. les juges seront contents aujourd'hui."
The crowning seal of approbation was always put on by M. Ducros, who, after tasting the masterpiece, would cry exultantly, "Bravo! Slop-basin! Slop-basin!" should it fulfil his expectations. I have previously explained that M. Ducros' solitary word of English expressed supreme satisfaction, whilst his friends looked on, with unconcealed admiration at their colleague's linguistic powers. It sounds like a record of three gormandising middle-aged men; but it was not quite that, though, like most French people, they appreciated artistic cookery. It is impossible for me to convey in words the charm of that delightful gaiete francaise, especially amongst southern Frenchmen. It bubbles up as spontaneously as the sparkle of champagne; they were all as merry as children, full of little quips and jokes, and plays upon words. Our English "pun" is a clumsy thing compared to the finesse of a neatly-turned French calembour. They all three, too, had an inexhaustible supply of those peculiarly French pleasantries known as petites gauloiseries. I know that I have never laughed so much in my life. It is only southern Frenchmen who can preserve this unquenchable torrent of animal spirits into middle life. I was only seventeen; they were from twenty to thirty years my seniors, yet I do not think that we mutually bored each other the least. They did not need the stimulus of alcohol to aid this flow of spirits, for, like most Frenchmen of that class, they were very abstemious, although the "Patron" always produced for us "un bon vieux vin de derriere les fagots," or "un joli petit vin qui fait rire." It was sheer "joie de-vivre" stimulated by the good food and that spontaneous gaiete francaise which appeals so irresistibly to me. The "Substitut" always preserved a rather deferential attitude before the President and M. Ducros, for they belonged to the magistrature assise, whilst he merely formed part of the magistrature debout The French word magistrat is not the equivalent of our magistrate, the French term for which is "Juge de Paix." A magistrat means a Judge or a Public Prosecutor.
From being so much with the judges, I grew quite learned in French legal terms, talked of the parquet (which means the Bar), and invariably termed the grubby little Nyons law-court the Palais. I rather fancy that I considered myself a sort of honorary member of the French Bar. Strictly speaking, Palais only applies to a Court of Law; old-fashioned Frenchmen always speak of the Chateau de Versailles, or the Chateau de Fontainbleau, never of the Palais.
There was always plenty to see in these little southern towns whilst the judges were at work. In one village there was a perfume factory, where essential oils of sweet-scented geranium, verbena, lavender, and thyme were distilled for the wholesale Paris perfumers; a fragrant place, where every operation was carried on with that minute attention to detail which the French carry into most things that they do, for, unlike the inhabitants of an adjacent island, they consider that if a thing is worth doing at all, it is worth taking trouble over.
In another village there was a wholesale dealer in silkworms' eggs, imported direct from China. Besides the eggs, he had a host of Chinese curios to dispose of, besides quaint little objects in everyday use in China.
Above all there was Grignan, with its huge and woefully dilapidated chateau, the home of Mme. de Sevigne's daughter, the Comtesse de Grignan. It was to Grignan that this queen of letter-writers addressed much of her correspondence to her adored daughter, between 1670 and 1695, and Mme. de Sevigne herself was frequently a visitor there.
Occasionally the judges, the Substitut, and I made excursions further afield by diligence to Orange, Vaucluse, and Avignon, quite outside our judicial orbit. Orange, a drowsy little spot, has still a splendid Roman triumphal arch and a Roman theatre in the most perfect state of preservation. Orange was once a little independent principality, and gives its name to the Royal Family of Holland, the sister of the last of the Princes of Orange having married the Count of Nassau, whence the House of Orange-Nassau. Indirectly, sleepy little Orange has also given its name to a widely-spread political and religious organisation of some influence.
Vaucluse, most charming of places, in its narrow leafy valley, surrounded by towering cliffs, is celebrated as having been the home of Petrarch for sixteen years during the thirteen hundreds. We may hope that his worshipped Laura sometimes brightened his home there with her presence. The famous Fountain of Vaucluse rushes out from its cave a full-grown river. It wastes no time in infant frivolities, but settles down to work at once, turning a mill within two hundred yards of its birthplace.
Avignon is another somnolent spot. The gigantic and gloomy Palace of the Popes dominates the place, though it is far more like a fortress than a palace. Here the Popes lived from 1309 to 1377 during their enforced abandonment of Rome, and Avignon remained part of the Papal dominions until the French Revolution. The President took less interest in the Palace of the Popes than he did in a famous cook at one of the Avignon hotels. He could hardly recall some of the plats of this noted artist without displaying signs of deep emotion. These ancient towns on the banks of the swift-rushing green Rhone seemed to me to be perpetually dozing in the warm sun, like old men, dreaming of their historic and varied past since the days of the Romans.
My French legal friends were much exercised by a recent decision of the High Court. M. Thiers had been President of the Republic from 1870 to 1873. A distant cousin of his living in Marseilles, being in pecuniary difficulties, had applied ineffectually to M. Thiers for assistance. Whereupon the resourceful lady had opened a restaurant in Marseilles, and had had painted over the house-front in gigantic letters, "Restaurant tenu par la cousine de Monsieur Thiers." She was proceeded against for bringing the Head of the State into contempt, was fined heavily, and made to remove the offending inscription. My French friends hotly contested the legality of this decision. They declared that it was straining the sense of the particular Article of the Code to make it applicable in such a case, and that it was illogical to apply the law of Lese-majeste to the Head of a Republican State. The President pertinently added that no evidence as to the quality of food supplied in the restaurant had been taken. If bad, it might unquestionably reflect injuriously on the Head of the State; if good, on the other hand, in view of the admitted relationship of the proprietress of the restaurant to him, it could only redound to M. Thiers' credit. This opens up interesting possibilities. If relationship to a prominent politician may be utilised for business purposes, we may yet see in English watering-places the facades of houses blazoned with huge inscriptions: "This Private Hotel is kept by a fourth cousin of Lord Rose—," whilst facing it, gold lettering proudly proclaims that "The Proprietress of this Establishment is a distant relative of Mr. Ar—Bal—"; or, to impart variety, at the next turning the public might perhaps be informed in gleaming capitals that "The Cashier in this Hotel is connected by marriage with Mr. As—-." The idea really offers an unlimited field for private enterprise.
The political situation in France was very strained at the beginning of 1874. Marshal MacMahon had succeeded M. Thiers as President of the Republic, and it was well known that the Marshal, as well as the Royalist majority in the French Chamber, favoured the restoration of the Bourbon Monarchy, represented by the Comte de Chambord, as head of the elder branch. People of the type of M. Ducros, and of the President of the Nyons Tribunal, viewed the possible return of a Legitimist Bourbon Monarchy with the gravest apprehension. Given the character of the Comte de Chambord, they felt it would be a purely reactionary regime. Traditionally, the elder branch of the Bourbons were incapable of learning anything, and equally incapable of forgetting anything. These two shrewd lawyers had both been vigorous opponents of the Bonapartist regime, but they pinned their faith on the Orleans branch, inexplicably enough to me, considering the treacherous record of that family. They never could mention the name of a member of the Orleans family without adding, "Ah! les braves gens!" the very last epithet in the world I should have dreamed of applying to them. All the negotiations with the Comte de Chambord fell through, owing to his obstinacy (to which I have referred earlier) in refusing to accept the Tricolor as the national flag. Possibly pig-headed obstinacy; but in these days of undisguised opportunism, it is rare to find a man who deliberately refuses a throne on account of his convictions. I do not think that the Comte de Chambord would have been a success in present-day British politics. A crisis was averted by extending Marshal MacMahon's tenure of the Presidency to seven years, the "Septennat," as it was called. Before two years the Orleanists, who had always a keen appreciation of the side on which their bread was buttered, "rallied" to the Republic. I rather fancy that some question connected with the return of the confiscated Orleans fortunes came into play here. The adherents of the Comte de Chambord always spoke of him as Henri V. For some reason (perhaps euphony) they were invariably known as "Henri Quinquists." In the same way, the French people speak of the Emperor Charles V. as "Charles Quint," never as "Charles Cinq."
My friends the Nyons lawyers were fond of alluding to themselves as forming part of the bonne bourgeoisie. It is this bonne bourgeoisie who form the backbone of France. Frugal, immensely industrious, cultured, and with a very high standard of honour, they are far removed from the frivolous, irresponsible types of French people to be seen at smart watering-places, and they are less dominated by that inordinate love of money which is an unpleasant element in the national character, and obscures the good qualities of the hard-working French peasants, making them grasping and avaricious.
It must be admitted that this class of the French bourgeoisie surveys the world from rather a Chinese standpoint. The Celestial, as is well known, considers all real civilisation confined to China. Every one outside the bounds of the Middle Kingdom is a barbarian. This is rather the view of the French bourgeois. He is convinced that all true civilisation is centred in France, and that other countries are only civilised in proportion as French influence has filtered through to them. He will hardly admit that other countries can have an art and literature of their own, especially should neither of them conform to French standards. This is easily understood, for the average Frenchman knows no language but his own, has never travelled, and has no curiosity whatever about countries outside France. When, in addition, it is remembered how paramount French literary and artistic influence was during the greater portion of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and how universal the use of the French language was in Northern Continental Europe amongst educated people, the point of view becomes quite intelligible.
In spite of this, I enjoyed my excursions with these delightful French lawyers quite enormously. The other pupils never accompanied us, for they found it difficult to keep up a conversation in French.
The average intellectual level is unquestionably far higher in France than in England, nor is it necessary to give, to a people accustomed for generations to understand a demi-mot, the elaborate explanations usually necessary in England when the conversation has got beyond the mental standards of a child six years old. The French, too, are not addicted to perpetual wool-gathering. Nor can I conceive of a Frenchwoman endeavouring to make herself attractive by representing herself as so hopelessly "vague" that she can never be trusted to remember anything, or to avoid losing all her personal possessions. Idiocy, whether genuine or feigned, does not appeal to the French temperament. The would-be fascinating lady would most certainly be referred to as "une dinde de premiere classe."
The French are the only thoroughly logical people in the world, and their excessive development of the logical faculty leads them at times into pitfalls. "Ils ont lesdefauts de leurs qualites." In this country we have found out that systems, absolutely indefensible in theory, at times work admirably well in practice, and give excellent results. No Frenchman would ever admit that anything unjustifiable in theory could possibly succeed in practice—"Ce n'est pas logique," he would object, and there would be the end of it.
The Substitut informed me one day that he was making a "retreat" for three days at the Monastery of La Trappe d'Aiguebelle, and asked me if I would care to accompany him. To pass three days in a Trappist Monastery certainly promised a novel experience, but I pointed out that I was a Protestant, and that I could hardly expect the monks to welcome me with open arms. He answered that he would explain matters, and that the difference of religion would be overlooked. So off we started, and after an interminable drive reached a huge, gaunt pile of buildings in very arid surroundings. The "Hospice" where visitors were lodged stood apart from the Monastery proper, the Chapel lying in between. It was explained to me that I must observe the rule of absolute silence within the building, and that I would be expected to be in bed by 8.15 p.m. and to rise at 5 a.m. like the rest of the guests. It was further conveyed to me that they hoped that I would see my way to attend Chapel at 5.30 a.m., afterwards I should be free for the remainder of the day. Talking and smoking were both permitted in the garden. I was given a microscopic whitewashed cell, most beautifully clean, containing a very small bed, one chair, a gas-jet, a prie-Dieu, a real human skull, and nothing else whatever. We went to dinner in a great arched refectory, where a monk, perched up in a high pulpit, read us Thomas a Kempis in a droning monotone. Complete silence was observed. At La Trappe no meat or butter is ever used, but we were given a most excellent dinner of vegetable soup, fish, omelets, and artichokes dressed with oil, accompanied by the monks' admirable home-grown wine. There were quite a number of visitors making "retreats," and I had hard work keeping the muscles of my face steady, as they made pantomimic signs to the lay-brothers who waited on us, for more omelet or more wine. After dinner the "Frere Hospitalier," a jolly, rotund little lay-brother, who wore a black stole over his brown habit as a sign that he was allowed to talk, drew me on one side in the garden. As I was a heretic (he put it more politely) and had the day to myself, would I do him a favour? He was hard put to it to find enough fish for all these guests; would I catch him some trout in the streams in the forest? I asked for nothing better, but I had no trout-rod with me. He produced a rod, SUCH a trout-rod! A long bamboo with a piece of string tied to it! To fish for trout with a worm was contrary to every tradition in which I had been reared, but adaptability is a great thing, so with two turns of a spade I got enough worms for the afternoon, and started off. The Foret d'Aiguebelle is not a forest in our acceptation of the term, but an endless series of little bare rocky hills, dotted with pines, and fragrant with tufts of wild lavender, thyme and rosemary. It was intersected with two rushing, beautifully clear streams. I cannot conceive where all the water comes from in that arid land. In sun-baked Nyons, water could be got anywhere by driving a tunnel into the parched hillsides, when sooner or later an abundant spring would be tapped. These French trout were either ridiculously unsophisticated, or else very weary of life: they simply asked to be caught. I got quite a heavy basket, to the great joy of the "Frere Hospitalier," and I got far more next day. Though we had to rise at five, we got no breakfast till eight, and a very curious breakfast it was. Every guest had a yard of bread, and two saucers placed in front of him; one containing honey, the other shelled walnuts. We dipped the walnuts in the honey, and ate them with the bread, and excellent they were. In the place of coffee, which was forbidden, we had hot milk boiled with borage to flavour it, quite a pleasant beverage. The washing arrangements being primitive, I waited until every one was safely occupied in Chapel for an hour and a half, and then had a swim in the reservoir which supplied the monastery with water, and can only trust that I did not dirty it much. I was greatly disappointed with the singing in the severe, unadorned Chapel; it was plainsong, without any organ or instrument. The effect of so great a body of voices might have been imposing had not the intonation (as kindly critics say at times of a debutante) been a little uncertain. As Trappists never speak, one could understand their losing their voices, but it seems curious that they should have lost their ears as well, though possibly it was only the visitors who sang so terribly out of tune.
I was taken all over the Monastery next day by the "Pere Hospitalier," who, like his brown-frocked lay-brother, wore a black stole over his white habit, as a badge of office. With the exception of the fine cloisters, there were no architectural features whatever about the squat, massive pile of buildings. The modern chapel, studiously severe in its details, bore the unmistakable imprint of Viollet-le-Duc's soulless, mathematically correct Gothic. Personally, I think that Viollet-le-Duc spoiled every ancient building in France which he "restored." I was taken into the refectory to see the monks' dinners already laid out for them. They consisted of nothing but bread and salad, but with such vast quantities of each! Each monk had a yard-long loaf of bread, a bottle of wine and an absolute stable-bucket of salad, liberally dressed with oil and vinegar. The oil supplied the fat necessary for nutrition, still it was a meagre enough dinner for men who had been up since 3 a.m. and had done two hours' hard work in the vegetable gardens. The "Pere Hospitalier" told me that not one scrap of bread or lettuce would be left at the conclusion of the repast. The immense austerity of the place impressed me very much. The monks all slept on plank-beds, but they were not allowed to remain on these hard resting-places after 3 a.m. Their "Rule" was certainly a very severe one. I was told that the monks prepared Tincture of Arnica for medicinal purposes in an adjoining factory, arnica growing wild everywhere in the Forest, and that the sums realised by the sale of this drug added materially to their revenues.
Next day both the Substitut and I were to be received by the Abbot. It struck me as desirable that we should have our interviews separately, for as the Substitut was making a "retreat," he might wish to say many private things to the Abbot which he would not like me, a heretic, to overhear. As soon as he had finished, I was ushered in alone to the Abbot's parlour. I found the Abbot very dignified and very friendly, but what possible subject of conversation could a Protestant youth of seventeen find which would interest the Father Superior of a French Monastery, presumably indifferent to everything that passed outside its walls? Suddenly I had an inspiration: the Arian Heresy! We had had four lessons on this interesting topic at Chittenden's five years earlier (surely rather an advanced subject for little boys of twelve!), and some of the details still stuck in my head. A brilliant idea! Soon we were at it hammer and tongs; discussing Arius, Alexander, and Athanasius; the Council of Nicaea, Hosius of Cordova, homo-ousion and homoi-ousion; Eusebius of Nicomedia, and his namesake of Caesarea.
Without intending any disrespect to these two eminent Fathers of the Church, the two Eusebius' always reminded me irresistibly of the two Ajaxes of Offenbach's opera-bouffe. La Belle Helene, or, later on, of the "Two Macs" of the music-hall stage of the "nineties." I blessed Mr. Chittenden for having so thoughtfully provided me with conversational small-change suitable for Abbots. The Abbot was, I think, a little surprised at my theological lore. He asked me where I had acquired it, and when I told him that it was at school, he presumed that I had been at a seminary for youths destined for the priesthood, an idea which would have greatly shocked the ultra-Evangelical Mr. Chittenden.
I was very glad that I had passed those three days at La Trappe, for it gave one a glimpse into a wholly unsuspected world. The impression of the tremendous severity with which the lives of the monks were regulated, remained with me. The excellent monks made the most absurdly small charges for our board and lodging. Years afterwards I spent a night in an Orthodox Monastery in Russia, when I regretfully recalled the scrupulous cleanliness of La Trappe. Never have I shared a couch with so many uninvited guests, and never have I been so ruthlessly devoured as in that Russian Monastery.
With June at Nyons, silkworm time arrived. Three old women, celebrated for their skill in rearing silkworms, came down from the mountains, and the magnanerie, as lofts devoted to silkworm culture are called, was filled with huge trays fashioned with reeds. The old women had a very strenuous fortnight or so, for silkworms demand immense care and attention. The trays have to be perpetually cleaned out, and all stale mulberry leaves removed, for the quality and quantity of the silk depend on the most scrupulous cleanliness. To preserve an even temperature, charcoal fires were lighted in the magnanerie, until the little black caterpillars, having transformed themselves into repulsive flabby white worms, these worms became obsessed with the desire to increase the world's supply of silk, and to gratify them, twigs were placed in the trays for them to spin their cocoons on. The cocoons spun, they were all picked off, and baked in the public ovens of the town, in order to kill the chrysalis inside. Nothing prettier can be imagined than the streets of Nyons, with white sheets laid in front of every house, each sheet heaped high with glittering, shimmering, gleaming piles of silk-cocoons, varying in shade from palest straw-colour to deep orange. If pleasant to the eye, they were less grateful to the nose, for freshly baked cocoons have the most offensive odour. The silk-buyers from Lyons then made their appearance, and these shining heaps of gold thread were transformed into a more portable form of gold, which found its way into the pockets of the inhabitants.
The peculiarly French capacity for taking infinite pains, of which a good example is this silkworm culture, has its drawbacks, when carried into administrative work. My friend M. David, the post-master of Nyons, showed me his official instructions. They formed a volume as big as a family Bible. It would have taken years to learn all these regulations. The simplest operations were made enormously complicated. Let any one compare the time required for registering a letter or a parcel in England, with the time a similar operation in France will demand. M. David showed me the lithographed sheet giving the special forms of numerals, 1, 2, 3, and so on, which French postal officials are required to make. These differ widely from the forms in general use.
I have my own suspicions that similar sheets are issued to the cashiers in French restaurants. Personally, I can never read one single item in the bill, much less the cost, and I can only gaze in hopeless bewilderment at the long-tailed hieroglyphics, recalling a backward child's first attempts at "pot-hooks."
The infinite capacity of the French for taking trouble, and their minute attention to detail, tend towards unnecessary complications of simple matters. Thus, on English railways we find two main types of signals sufficient for our wants, whereas on French lines there are five different main types of signal. On English lines we have two secondary signals, against eight in France, all differing widely in shape and appearance. Again, on a French locomotive the driver has far more combinations at his command for efficient working under varying conditions, than is the case in England. The trend of the national mind is towards complicating details rather than simplifying them.
Delightful as was the winter climate of Nyons, that sun-scorched little cup amongst the hills became a place of positive torment as the summer advanced. The heat was absolutely unendurable. Day and night, thousands of cicades (the cigales of the French) kept up their incessant "dzig, dzig, dzig," a sound very familiar to those who have sojourned in the tropics. Has Nature given this singular insect the power of dispensing with sleep? What possible object can it hope to attain by keeping up this incessant din? If a love-song, surely the most optimistic cicada must realise that his amorous strains can never reach the ears of his lady-love, since hundreds of his brethren are all keeping up the same perpetual purposeless chirping, which must obviously drown any individual effort. Have the cicadas a double dose of gaiete francaise in their composition, and is this their manner of expressing it? Are they, like some young men we know, always yearning to turn night into day? All these are, and will remain, unsolved problems?
As I found the summer heat of Nyons unbearable, I went back to England for a holiday, and, on the morning of my departure, climbed some olive trees and captured fourteen live cicadas, whom I imprisoned in a perforated cardboard box, and took back to London with me. Twelve of them survived the journey, and as soon as I had arrived, I carefully placed the cicadas on the boughs of the trees in our garden in Green Street, Grosvenor Square. Conceive the surprise of these travelled insects at finding themselves on the soot-laden branches of a grimy London tree! The dauntless little creatures at once recommenced their "dzig, dzig, dzig," in their novel environment, and kept it up uninterruptedly for twenty-four hours, in spite of the lack of appreciation of my family, who complained that their night's rest had been seriously interfered with by the unaccustomed noise. Next evening the cicadas were silent. Possibly they had been choked with soot, or had fallen a prey to London cats; but my own theory is that they succumbed to the after-effects of a rough Channel passage, to which, of course, they would not have been accustomed. Anyhow, for the first time in the history of the world, the purlieus of Grosvenor Square rang with the shrill chirping of cicadas for twenty-four hours on end.
Six months later I regretfully bid farewell to Nyons, and went direct from there to Germany. After studying the Teutonic tongue for two and a half years at Harrow I was master of just two words in it, ja and nein, so unquestionably there were gaps to fill up.
I was excedingly sorry to leave the delightful Ducros family who had treated me so kindly, and I owe a deep debt of gratitude to comely Mme. Ducros for the careful way in which she taught me history. In teaching history she used what I may call the synoptic method, taking periods of fifty years, and explaining contemporaneous events in France, Italy, Germany, and England during that period.
With the exception of one friendly visit to the Ducros, I have never seen pleasant Nyons again. Of late years I have often meditated a pilgrimage to that sunny little cup in the Dauphine hills, but have hesitated owing to one of the sad penalties advancing years bring with them; every single one of my friends, man or woman, must have passed away long since. I can see Nyons, with its encircling fringe of blue hills, just as vividly, perhaps, with my inner eyes as I could if it lay actually before me, and now I can still people it with the noisy, gesticulating inhabitants whom I knew and liked so much.
I may add that in Southern French style Nyons is pronounced "Nyonsse," just as Carpentras is termed "Carpentrasse."
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