Part 8

The castle of Cagnes stands at the top of the town on a wide platform from which can be obtained a view of the sea, on the one hand, and of the snow-covered mountains on the other. This is a castle of the great Grimaldi family. It dates, Mr. MacGibbon[22] says, from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and is claimed to be the finest specimen of a mediæval stronghold in this part of France. It is simply a vast, square keep, as solid as a cliff and as grim as a prison. It is heavily machicolated below the parapet. It is frankly ugly, brutal and repellent, an embodiment of frightfulness, a frown in stone.

It is said that the great hall of the château possesses a ceiling painted by Carlone in the seventeenth century. The fresco represents the Fall of Phæton. The present state of this work of art is doubtful, for in 1815 the castle was occupied by Piedmontese soldiers who, lolling on sofas and divans, amused themselves by firing at the head of Phæton and apparently with some success.

The castle has, however, been disfigured in such a way as to render it pitiable and ridiculous. At some period huge modern windows have been cut in its fearsome walls. These windows, brazen and aggressive, have all the assurance of the windows of a pushing boarding house and to sustain that character are furnished with sun-shutters and lace curtains. The worst phase of this outrage is the cutting away of some of the glorious machicolations in order to make room for the blatant plate glass. This superb old castle, in its present plight, can only be compared to the figure of a sun-tanned and scarred veteran with a helmet on his grey head and a halberd in his hand and on his breast, in the place of the steel cuirass, a parlourmaid’s pinafore trimmed with lace.

St. Paul du Var, on the way between Cagnes and Vence, affords a vivid realisation of the fortified town of the middle ages. It is but little altered and that only on the surface. Its fortifications, laid down in 1547, are still quite complete. Its circle of ramparts is unbroken. There are still the old gates, the towers, the bastions and the barbicans. The path along the parapet that the sentry patrolled is undisturbed. One almost expects to hear his challenge for the password. The town is as ready to withstand the attack of an army of bowmen or of halberdiers as it ever was. It might even defy cannon if they were as small and as weak as the old piece of ordnance that still occupies the battery by the main gate.

The streets are disposed as they were in the days of the leathern jerkin and the farthingale. There are more houses of obvious antiquity in the place than will be seen in any town of its size in Provence. The hand of improvement has of course passed clumsily over them. Whitewash can wipe out the past and it has done much in this way in St. Paul. If the stone wall of a house has become too rugged and worn it can be covered up with plaster and paint. If the balcony crumbles away its balustrade can be used in the fowl-house and can be replaced by something in cheap iron from a shop in Nice. When the stone chimney falls down a tin stovepipe can fill the void. If the Gothic window be too small it is easy to make a fine square opening that will take lace curtains and be worthy of Bermondsey, and when the oak door, whose black nails have been fumbled over by ten generations of boys and girls, has become shabby a door of deal, painted green and varnished and provided with a brass knocker will make the whole town envious. Still, in spite of all these sorry evidences of advance with the times, the town of St. Paul remains a rare relic worthy (if it were possible) to be placed bodily in a museum, for it is a museum specimen.

The visitor enters the town through the vaulted passage of the main gate and then makes his way by the inner guard and under a tower, with a channel for the portcullis, into the town. It is a rather terrifying entry that belongs to the old days of romance. A gateway that the reader of heroic tales has passed through, in imagination, many a time. It should be held with flashing swords by such men as the Three Musketeers, by Athos, Porthos and Aramis, but at the moment it is obstructed only by an aged woman with a perverse and overburdened donkey.

The town is quiet and clean, full of picturesque lanes, of quaint corners and of odd passages. As it was at one time a favourite resort of the nobles of the country and at all times a place of much dignity it contains still many houses with handsome stone staircases and elaborate chimney-pieces; while over door after door will be found carved the armorial bearings of old world tenants. The dates above many entries go back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Some of the old wooden doors still standing are most beautiful, while examples of ancient windows and of ancient archways are very numerous.

In St. Paul du Var will be seen, in almost every street, examples of the little shop of the Middle Ages. Under a wide arch or in a square opening will be found a door approached by a step and by the door a window. The window only reaches to the level of the middle of the door. It there ends in a stone counter upon which the goods for sale were displayed. The window (which is, of course, not glazed) is closed by a shutter. Both shutter and door are usually studded with heavy nails. These curious little establishments are no longer used as shops, but through them the dwelling is still entered.

On the summit of the town is the church and, close to it, two great, square towers of the thirteenth or fourteenth centuries. The taller of these is the belfry of the church, while the more sturdy is the tower of the town. They are both severely plain and fine specimens of the period to which they belong.

The church dates from the same era as the towers and is—as regards its interior—one of the most beautiful churches in Provence and certainly one of the most interesting. Among its notable features are certain altar screens of exquisitely carved wood which date from between the fifteenth and the seventeenth centuries. The chapel of St. Clement the Martyr, completed in 1680, is a magnificent work of art, full of details of great merit. It is classed as a national monument. On the north side of the church is a bust of Saint Claire, carved in wood, a work of the sixteenth century. It represents the head of a young woman with a singularly beautiful and pathetic face. It is a haunting face, for whenever the church of St. Paul is recalled to mind this face at once comes back among the shadows of its aisles.

There is in the sacristy a collection of treasures which has made the church famous throughout France. It includes marvellous crucifixes in silver, silver statuettes of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, a _tabernacle portatif_ and numerous old reliquaries, one of which—very curious in shape—contains the shoulder-bone of St. George.

[22] “Architecture of Provence,” 1888.

XIII CAP FERRAT AND ST. HOSPICE

CAP FERRAT is the name of a narrow tongue of land which is suddenly thrust out into the sea between Villefranche and Beaulieu. It is one of the great landmarks along the coast, is nearly a mile in length and rises at one point to the height of 446 feet. It is a peninsula of rock covered with trees and forms a pleasant strip of green athwart the blue expanse of water. At its further end it breaks up into two capes which spread apart like the limbs of a Y. One is Cap de St. Hospice, the other Cap Ferrat.

Cap de St. Hospice is a very humble cape, small and low. All the present dignity of the peninsula belongs to Cap Ferrat, which has a lighthouse on its point and a great hotel, as well as a semaphore on a hill and a number of villas of high quality. Cap de St. Hospice has none of these things; but it possesses a little fishing village, a lonely church, an ancient tower and a wealth of glorious memories. Cap Ferrat is modern. It has no associations; for until the road-maker and the villa builder came it was merely a strip of rough forest. The whole interest of this would-be island centres around the promontory of St. Hospice.

In the early days the land, far and wide, that bordered on the cape was buried in the gloom of paganism. It was as dark as a moonless night in winter and as chill. Then, in a certain year, a spark of light appeared on Cap de St. Hospice. It was very small, a mere isolated speck in the overwhelming shadow. It glowed from a humble monastery of a few stone huts which formed the first Christian settlement in this part of the Mediterranean. With the passage of years the spark grew until the darkness about the cape changed to day and the whole country beyond was flooded with a light that men came to know as the Light of the World.

The missionary who established himself upon this remote point of land was St. Hospice or St. Auspicius. He, with only a few followers, planted on the cape, in the year 560, an outpost of the Christian religion. So primitive and crude was the settlement that it was rather an entrenchment than a monastery. Of the rough stone hovels that composed it no trace, of course, exists.

St. Hospice is described as a man, eloquent of speech, whose presence was commanding but whose heart was that of a child. He had the gift of prophecy and the power of working miracles. He foretold the coming of the Lombards and saw, as in a vision, the desolation that they would leave in their track. He warned his converts to seek safety in strong places and to take their goods with them. As for himself, when the news reached Cap Ferrat in 572 that the Lombards had crossed the Col di Tenda, he shut himself up in an old deserted tower on the crest of the cape and—like St. Paul—hoped for the day.

When the barbarians arrived they were convinced that the tower, which was so closely shut, must be the hiding place of treasure. One of the robbers at once climbed to the top of the stronghold and peeped over. He found it roofless and, looking down into the depth, saw not coffers filled with silver and gold but a solitary man, emaciated and in rags, sitting on the bare stones. They assumed him to be a miser who had vast wealth buried beneath the flags on which he crouched. With violent hammer blows they broke down the door and effected an entry.

The captain of the gang pushed through the opening and, confronting the silent figure on the ground, demanded who he was and where his hoard was concealed. To this the supposed man of wealth replied, “I am a murderer. There is no crime that I am not guilty of, and with each misdeed I have crucified anew the Son of God.” This was a dark saying very hard to understand. The Lombard, although himself a practised murderer, felt that he was in the presence of a criminal of unusual virulence, of a malefactor whose wickedness was even riper than his own. His moral sense was shocked by this revolting creature crouching on the earth, and moved by an impulse of justice he proceeded to kill him. This was in accord with the routine procedure adopted by Lombards in all cases of doubt. “He raised his weapon to strike a deadly blow on the criminal’s head, but, to the horror of all present, his arm remained dry and stiff in the air and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.”[23]

This terrible occurrence filled those who had crowded into the tower with shivering dread. They feared that they too might be punished in this mysterious and abrupt manner. They felt their limbs all over to see if they were still sound, looked at the placid figure on the floor with awe and finally fell down upon their knees and implored mercy and forgiveness. St. Hospice now arose, touched the withered arm, made over it the sign of the cross and uttered some fervent words. At once the limb became whole again.

So vivid was the impression made upon these rude men that two officers and many of the company expressed a desire to be baptised then and there. They never dreamt that the expedition would end in this way. They had come to plunder and burn, not to be baptised. Those outside the tower who had not seen the demonstration accomplished by the supposed criminal promptly retreated. They were unfortunately met on the way by a body of Ligurians who fell upon them and killed them. The attack on Cap Ferrat thus proved a failure and the Lombards viewed the peninsula with such mistrust that they left it in peace.

St. Hospice continued to live in the old tower as a hermit, beloved and reverenced by all. In this tower he died in the year 580 and under the grass at the foot of the tower he was buried. Some vestiges of this Tower of the Withered Arm were still to be seen as late as 1650, but at the present day no trace of it is to be discovered.

A sanctuary, in the form of a little chapel, was erected by the side of the tower to keep green the memory of the saint. It is mentioned in a Bull issued by Pope Innocent II in 1137. It was repaired by Charles Emmanuel II, Duke of Savoy, about 1640 and was dignified by an inscription in marble. Of this memorial chapel also no vestige now exists.

In later years, when the Saracens came, they established a fortress—Le petit Fraxinet—on Cap de St. Hospice and during the troubled centuries that followed the promontory was strongly fortified and was the scene of many assaults and numerous bombardments. Of these strongholds not a stone is now standing, save alone the Emmanuel Philibert Tower, of which an account is given on p. 110. Between the years 1526 and 1528 the cape was occupied by the Knights of St. John who rendered great service during the famine of 1527 and promoted, in many ways, the commerce along the coast.

There is a curious legend of the cape which relates to the time of the saint, for it belongs to the year 575 when St. Hospice was still living in his old roofless tower. It is the Legend of the Stream of Blood.

On a certain day a party of honest folk—villagers and monks—started from Cap Ferrat to walk up to Eze. Their purpose was peaceful and indeed they seem to have been merely taking a stroll. When the evening came they had not returned. They were never to return; for, as they climbed up the cliff, they were set upon by a gang of miscreants and murdered to a man. Plunder was not the object of the attack, for the victims were poor but they were disciples of St. Hospice and the religion taught by that good man was held in abhorrence by the profane. As no trace of the murderers was ever discovered it is assumed that they were agents of the devil and that they had come direct from the bottomless pit on this especial mission.

On the following morning some fishermen were starting in their boats from the cove where now stands the village of St. Jean. The morning was calm. The sea was smooth as a mirror and as blue as the petals of the gentian. The boatmen were amazed to see a crimson stream coming towards them on the surface of the deep from the direction of Eze. It was a stream, narrow and straight, and as clear in outline as a ribbon of scarlet satin drawn across a sheet of blue ice. As they approached it they were horrified to perceive that it was blood, warm blood, thick and gelatinous looking. It smelt of fresh blood and from it rose a sickly steam.

As the men drew nearer the red streak began to recede in the direction whence it came. They followed it. It led them to the beach at Eze. They landed and saw before them the rivulet of blood trickling, in slow, glutinous ripples, over the stones. It withdrew to the foot of the cliff. They followed and as they advanced the stream still retreated. Looking up they could see it coming down the path as a thick red band, with clots hanging here and there from the steps and from low-lying brambles. As they mounted up the cliff the stream withdrew before them.

Finally the fishermen came to a mossy ledge, where they found the bodies of the dead villagers lying in a tangled heap. Beneath them was a cross which they had never seen before. They proceeded at once to bury the victims of this wicked outrage. The ground about was rocky; but, as they dug, the rock softened and became as sand. They left the cross as they had found it and, after offering up a prayer for those who had passed away, they walked silently down the path to their boats.

St. Jean is a little place that hangs about a tiny harbour full of fishing boats. It is quite modern or at least all that part of it that is presented to the eye belongs to the period of to-day. It is popular because it is supposed to be a fisher village away from the world, and those who live in towns love fisher villages, since they suggest a picturesque quietness, a place of nets and lobster pots and of sun-tanned toilers of the deep, a primitive spot where people live the simple life in vine-covered cottages.

Now there is little of the fisher village about St. Jean, not even the smell. There are certainly nets and boats and an appropriate brawniness about the people; but the fisher village element is wanting. St. Jean is, in fact, a popular resort for the humbler type of holiday folk, a place they can reach in the beloved tram and where they can eat and drink and be merry. The whole quay front is occupied by bars, cafés and restaurants, where _langouste_ can be enjoyed and that rare dish the _bouillabaisse_ which is claimed to be a speciality of the place.

St. Hospice would not approve of St. Jean in its present guise and could he find the way back to his tower he would be horrified by the placards of “American drinks” and “Afternoon teas.” There is no missionary spirit abroad in St. Jean, nothing of the old monastic life. The early morning fishermen would never again expect to see a stream of blood creeping over the tide. St. Jean, in fact, is no longer adapted for miracles; while its romance goes little beyond the romance of a lunch in the open air by a harbour-side.

Beyond St. Jean is the point of Cap de St. Hospice, a low, rocky promontory covered with firs, olive trees and cactus. On the extremity of the cape is the tower erected by Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, in 1561. It is a structure in yellowish stone, plain, round and squat, with a few emplacements for small guns on its summit and a few narrow slits in its uncompromising flanks. It is as insolent and as defiant a structure as can be imagined. By its side is placed a most astonishing object—a newly-made statue of the Virgin, some 28 feet in height and nearly as tall as the tower itself. The statue stands on the grass facing the east, is of a bilious tint but otherwise unpainted. Few more incongruous things have ever been brought together in this world. The statue is so very modern, so artificial and so frail; while the tower is so old, so primitive and so coarse in its braggart strength. The statue, it appears, was provided by the subscriptions of the faithful, but want of funds or want of purpose has prevented its being placed on the top of the tower where it was intended that it should ultimately stand.

The tower has walls of enormous thickness. An upper story can be reached by a stair and there the visitor will be brought face to face with the most substantial apparition that has ever been found in a mediæval stronghold. He will find himself, when near the roof, confronted by the ashen face of the Madonna, a face as big as a boulder, for the tower is occupied by a model of the statue which is of the same proportions as the stupendous image itself. To complete the anomalies of this remarkable household the ground floor of the tower is occupied by a family surrounded by the amenities of a cave dwelling.

Beyond the tower is the chapel of St. Hospice. It is a humble, barn-like little church with a roof of red tiles and a bell gable. It is comparatively modern, for it has been in existence for just one hundred years. It is only opened once annually—viz. on October 16th—for the celebration of the Mass.

The spot on which it may reasonably be assumed that the monastery of St. Hospice stood is occupied by a café-restaurant where dancing is indulged in on Sundays and holidays to the music of a pianola. One wonders what the saint—who was eloquent and forcible of speech—would say if he could visit again the cape that bears his name.

There are some half-buried fragments of old walls on the promontory, and these the imaginative man, if free from scruples, can assume to belong to whatever building and whatever period in the history of the place he may particularly affect.

From the point of the spit is a fascinating view of the mainland and especially of Eze which stands exactly opposite to St. Hospice. La Turbie also can be seen at great advantage. It lies in the col between Mont Agel and the Tête de Chien and marks the place of crossing of the Roman road.

On the coast, on either side of Cap Ferrat, are respectively Beaulieu and Villefranche. Beaulieu is a super-village of sumptuous villas. It lies on an evergreen shelf by the sea, pampered by an indulgent climate, made gorgeous by an extravagant vegetation and provided by all the delights that the most florid house agent could invent. It breathes luxury and wealth, languid ease and a surfeit of comfort. It can be best viewed from the Mid-Corniche road on the way up to Eze. Here the envious can lean over a wall and look down upon Naboth’s vineyard, upon a village which is possibly the richest in Europe and upon gardens whose glory is nowhere to be surpassed.

Villefranche, the harbour town, lies across the blue lagoon. It is as little like Beaulieu as any place could be, for whatever Beaulieu boasts of Villefranche lacks. It is a very ancient town; but it has been so persistently modernised that it has an aspect of the present day. It is like an old face that has been painted and powdered and “made up” to look young. The result as regards the town is like the result as regards the face—an imperfect success; for in the dim lanes of Villefranche are still to be traced the wrinkles of old age, while the grey of its withered stones is still quite apparent even under a toupee of auburn tiles.

There are boats everywhere, not only in the harbour and on the quay but up the streets, where they are being patched and hammered at. The quay is carpeted with nets and among them old women in straw hats are sitting on low chairs repairing broken strands. Ducks are wandering about and against any support that is solid enough a thoughtful mariner is leaning.

At the south end of Villefranche is the citadel, a lusty, rambling fortress built in 1560 by Emmanuel Philibert about the time that he erected the very gallant fort which still stands on the summit of Mont Alban, high above the town. The citadel is now grey and green with age, is much humiliated by certain modern buildings, but still is cut off from the world by a terrifying moat spanned by a timid bridge and is still said to retain in its depths some dreadful dungeons.