The Project Gutenberg EBook of Rambles in Normandy, by Francis Miltoun This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license Title: Rambles in Normandy Author: Francis Miltoun Illustrator: Blanche McManus Release Date: June 9, 2013 [EBook #42899] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RAMBLES IN NORMANDY *** Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) bookcover Every attempt has been made to replicate the original book as printed. Some typographical errors have been corrected. A list follows the etext. No attempt has been made to correct or normalize the French orthography of the printed book. The images have been moved from the middle of paragraphs to the closest paragraph break for ease of reading. (etext transcriber’s note) RAMBLES IN NORMANDY WORKS OF FRANCIS MILTOUN The following, each 1 vol., library 12mo, cloth, gilt top, profusely illustrated. Net, $2.00; postpaid, $2.16 Rambles in Normandy Rambles in Brittany The Cathedrals and Churches of the Rhine The following, each 1 vol., library 12mo, cloth, gilt top, profusely illustrated. Postpaid, $2.50 The Cathedrals of Northern France The Cathedrals of Southern France L. C. PAGE & COMPANY New England Building, Boston, Mass. Mont St. Michel (See page 385) Mont St. Michel (See page 385) R a m b l e s in N O R M A N D Y B y F r a n c i s M i l t o u n With Many Illustrations B y B l a n c h e M c M a n u s colophon Boston L. C. PAGE & COMPANY 1906 Copyright, 1905 BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY (INCORPORATED) —— All rights reserved Published October, 1905 COLONIAL PRESS Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. Boston, U. S. A. APOLOGIA THE following pages are not intended to be a record of all the historic and picturesque features of the ancient province of Normandy. The most that is claimed is that they are the record of a series of ramblings in and off the beaten tourist track, with the addition of a few facts of history and romance, which could not well be ignored. The scheme of the book as set forth in the table of contents will explain this plan far better than any author’s apology; and will also explain why a more ample guide-book treatment is not given to the cities and large towns such as Rouen, the ancient Norman capital; Caen, the capital of Lower Normandy; and Dieppe, and Evreux. All this, and more, with much information of a varying nature from that set forth herein, is given by Joanne, Baedeker, and the local guide-books, which in France are unusually numerous and trustworthy. These rambles, of the author and artist, extending over some years of wanderings and residence within the province, are, then, merely the record of personal experiences, of no very venturesome or exciting nature, combined with those half-hidden facts which only come to one through an intimate acquaintance. To this has been added a certain amount of practical travel-talk, which, for some inexplicable reason, seems to have been omitted from the guide-books; and a series of appendices, maps, and plans, which should furnish the stay-at-home and the traveller alike with those facts of relative importance in connection with a favoured land often not at hand or readily accessible. Nor is there any attempt at exhaustiveness. On the contrary, the matter has been condensed as much as possible. The illustrations are not so much a complete pictorial survey of this delightful part of old France, as an effort to depict the varying moods and characteristics which will best show its contrast to the other provinces; always with an eye to the picturesque and pleasing aspect of a landscape, a detail of architecture, or the quaint dress and customs of the people. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE PART I. I. Introductory 3 II. The Roads of France 20 III. The Forests of France 38 IV. A Travel Chapter 49 PART II. I. The Province and Its People 73 II. Norman Industries 101 III. Manners and Customs of the Country-side 113 IV. The Châteaux of Other Days 136 V. Some Types of Norman Architecture 150 PART III. I. The Seine Valley—Preamble 157 II. The Seine below Rouen 171 III. The Seine from Rouen to Pont de l’Arche 203 IV. The Seine from Pont de l’Arche to La Roche-Guyon 229 V. In the Valley of the Eure 262 VI. The Pays de Caux 286 VII. The Coast Westward of the Seine 314 VIII. The Cotentin 361 IX. The Norman Country-side 393 Appendices 427 Index of Places: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, Y 443 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Mont St. Michel (See page 385) Frontispiece A Diligence 21 Road Placques, Touring Club de France 28 Road Signs in France 30 A Berline de Poste 33 Explanation of the Maps of the Etat Major 36 Lyons-le-Forêt facing 44 Chapelle Ste. Catherine 47 Map of Normandy facing 48 A Woman of Normandy facing 84 Harvest-time in Normandy facing 104 Norman Horses facing 106 Raising the Sugar-beet 111 A Norman Farmhouse facing 128 A Peasant’s Cart 134 Donjon of Arques (Diagram) 138 Château Gaillard, Les Andelys facing 138 Ancient Manor d’Argouges 146 An Inn by the Seine facing 158 Cape de la Hève 173 Towboats on the Seine 181 Quay of Caudebec-en-Caux facing 184 Jumièges facing 188 The Arms of Agnes Sorel 189 A Rouen Café 199 Rouen from Bon Secours facing 210 Some Seine Sketches 214 Pont de l’Arche facing 222 Ancient Plan of Château Gaillard 239 The Seine at Petit Andelys facing 240 Collegiate Church, Ecouis facing 244 Gisors facing 246 A Seine Hamlet 249 The Two Châteaux of La Roche-Guyon facing 260 Hôtel Du Grand Cerf, Louviers facing 264 Garennes facing 272 Song of the Pays de Caux (Music) 287 A Pigeon-house 289 The Harbour of Fécamp facing 294 The Cliffs of Yport facing 296 Tréport facing 304 A Cauchoise of Yvetôt 312 Honfleur facing 318 In the Cider-apple Country 323 A Norman Cider-press facing 326 Dives-sur-Mer facing 334 Tower of Gens d’Armes 338 Cloister of the Capucin Convent, Caen facing 340 Tinchebray 343 Walled Farm 346 Port-en-Bessin 348 Old Wooden Houses, Lisieux facing 350 Château of Falaise (Plan) 351 Donjon of Falaise facing 352 Street Under the Church of the Trinity, Falaise 356 A Cotentine facing 360 Millet’s Home, Gruchy 365 The Rock of Granville facing 380 Bay of Mont St. Michel (Map) 384 Mont St. Michel in 1657 385 Porte du Roi, Mont St. Michel facing 386 Clock Tower, Vire 392 In the Church of Ste. Foy, Conches facing 400 Rugles 403 The Apiary of La Trappe facing 408 Château d’Alençon 413 Argentan 416 Market-place, Neubourg 417 Abbey of Bec-Hellouin 420 Interior of Abbey of Bernay 424 The Provinces of France (Map) 427 Itinerary of Normandy, I. (Map) 433 Itinerary of Normandy, II. (Map) 434 Profile Map of Normandy 435 The Coast of Normandy (Map) 436 Natural Curiosities of Normandy (Map) 437 Architectural Curiosities of Normandy (Map) 438 Road Map, Normandy Coast 439 Road Map, the Seine Valley 440 Road Map, Across Normandy 441 PART I. RAMBLES IN NORMANDY CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY “ONE doubles his span of life,” says George Moore, “by knowing well a country not his own.” Un pays aimé is a good friend, indeed, to whom one may turn in time of strife, and none other than Normandy—unless it be Brittany— has proved itself a more safe and pleasant land for travellers. When one knows the country well he recognizes many things which it has in common with England. Its architecture, for one thing, bears a marked resemblance; for the Norman builders, who erected the magnificent ecclesiastical edifices in the Seine valley during the middle ages, were in no small way responsible for many similar works in England. It is possible to carry the likeness still further, but the author is not rash enough to do so. The above is doubtless sufficient to awaken any spirit of contention which might otherwise be latent. Some one has said that the genuine traveller must be a vagabond; and so he must, at least to the extent of taking things as he finds them. He may have other qualities which will endear him to the people with whom he comes in contact; he may be an artist, an antiquarian, or a mere singer of songs;—even if he be merely inquisitive, the typical Norman peasant makes no objection. One comes to know Normandy best through the real gateway of the Seine, though not many distinguish between Lower Normandy and Upper Normandy. Indeed, not every one knows where Normandy leaves off and Brittany begins, or realizes even the confines of the ancient royal domain of the kings of France. Rouen, however, the capital of the ancient province, is, perhaps, better known by casual travellers from England and America than any other city in France, save Paris itself. This is as it should be; for no mediæval city of Europe has more numerous or beautiful shrines left to tell the story of its past than the Norman metropolis. Some will remember Rouen as a vast storehouse of architectural treasures, others for its fried sole and duckling Rouennais. Le vin du pays, cidre, or calvados goes well with either. How many Englishmen know that it is in the tongue of the ancient Normans that the British sovereign is implored to approve or reject the laws of his Parliament? This is beyond dispute, though it appears not to be generally known; hence it is presumed that the land of the Conqueror is not wholly an overtilled field for Anglo-Saxon tourists. The formula for the approval of the laws promulgated by the British Parliament to-day is: for the laws of finance, “Le Roy remercie ses bon sujets, accepte leur benevolence, et ainsi le veult”; for laws of general purport, “Le Roy veult”; for a law of local interest, “Soit fait comme il est desiré.” And finally, when the royal endorsement is withheld, the formula is, “Le Roy s’avisera.” In the House of Commons, only within the last year (1905), the First Lord of the Treasury rose to abolish this inexplicable usage, the employment of a foreign tongue. Mr. Balfour replied with a refusal based on historical tradition: “French was the language of state in England by right of the Norman Conquest.” It was in 1706 that the House of Lords forbade the use of French in parliamentary and judicial debates. The only chief of state in England who used the English tongue exclusively was Cromwell. The full significance of the spirit of relationship between Normandy and England to-day is admirably brought out in the expression of sentiment which was advanced on the occasion of the Norman fêtes held at Rouen in the summer of 1904, when the following address was despatched to King Edward at Buckingham Palace by the society that had the fêtes in charge: “To His Majesty, Edward VII.: “With the deepest joy the ‘Souvenir Normand’ respectfully begs your Majesty to accept its greetings from the banks of the Seine, the river whence your glorious ancestor, William, of the stock of Viking Rollo, set out to found the great British Empire under Norman kings. We thank Providence for the happy tokens of your royal efforts to bring about an understanding between the two Normandies, to secure the peace of the world through the Normans. May God preserve your Majesty; may God grant long life and prosperity to the King and Queen of England and to the English Normandy.” Normandy is by no means limited to the lower Seine valley, but for the purposes of the journeys set forth herein it is the gateway by which one enters. Normandy is the true land of the cider-apple, though there are other places where, if it is not more abundant, it is of better quality, or at least it has more of the taste of those little apples which grow on trees hardly larger than scrub or sagebrush. All so-called cidre in Normandy is not cider; most of it is boisson Normande. You buy it in little packets, at a comparatively small price, and add water to suit the taste; only you don’t do it yourself—the landlord of your hotel does it to suit his taste, or his ideas of good business. A little farther south, on the confines of the plain of Beauce, where Normandy ended and the ancient royal domain began, you get another sort of vin du pays. “Du cidre, ou du vin?” says the garçon, or more likely it is a bonne in these parts. “Du vin, s’il vous plait,” you answer, anxious to see what the new variety may be. When you get it, you find it a peculiar concoction, resembling the wines of Touraine, Bordeaux, Burgundy, or the Midi not a whit. Yet it is not cidre, though it well might be from its look, and somewhat from its taste. “C’est petit cousin de la piquette et certainement cousin du cidre,” volunteered an amiable commercial traveller, in reply to a query. A small boy was once asked by a patronizing elder what books he used in studying geography and history, and he answered, curtly, “I use no books, I go to places.” That boy was very fortunate. If the traveller is looking for information and incidental pleasure, he is in a class quite apart from the mere pleasure-seeker; and he ought, if he would profit from his travels to the fullest extent, to be able to increase his power of observation as he widens his horizon. He is often unable to do so, and goes about deploring the absence of pie and buttered toast. With visitors to Normandy, the case is in no wise different, in spite of the fact that the well-known roads from Havre or Dieppe to Paris, via the Seine valley, are a little better known than any other part of France. There are still but two wholly unspoiled spots in all the Seine valley, Les Andelys and La Roche-Guyon; and it is doubtful if they ever will become spoiled by tourists within the lives of the present generation. The railway has only recently come to Les Andelys, and the two pretty little towns, with their stupendous Château Gaillard, are even now not popular resorts, though the French, English, and American travellers are coming yearly in increasing numbers, while La Roche-Guyon—a few miles farther up the river—is even less well-known. Mention is made of this simply because it serves to emphasize the fact that all highroads are not well-worn roads, and that there is a wealth of unlooked-for attraction to be gathered wherever one may roam. Of the theorists who have attempted to class the Normans with the Danes, the least said the better. To rank the Norman-French and the Dane together, as the pioneers of feudalism, is to ignore the fact that it was the Normans who were the real civilizers of Britain. The fact stands boldly forth, however, that the ancestors of Norman William, who afterward became England’s king, came direct and undiluted from Scandinavia, while the Norman Frenchman of later times was a distinct development of his own environment. It is well enough to claim that the English nobility is descended from the Norman barons. At any rate it seems plausible, and one may well agree with those who have said that no Upper House of Lords could ever have been conceived by the Anglo-Saxons. History demonstrates the fact that the idea of the English House of Lords, as an appointment by the Crown, was of Norman conception, and alien to Anglo-Saxon tendencies. It seems, perhaps, superfluous to reiterate these facts here, but they are so commonly overlooked by the traveller in France that it is well to recall that it was the Norman who governed Britain, and not members of the Saxon hierarchy who afterward became kings of France. It is with reason that the Norman speaks so fondly of Jersey, Guernsey, and their sister isles. This is explained, of course, by the geographers, and one should, perhaps, be charitable, and allow for the spirit of patriotism, when the Frenchman calls the Channel Islands Les Iles Normandes. The people there are in many ways as French as French can be. Their laws and their courts make use of the French tongue, and in most, if not quite all, respects the common characteristics are French. The Frenchman himself, too, is often very fond of them, in spite of their alien allegiance. He calls them “très curieusement pittoresques, féodals, sauvages, en même temps que très civilisées, les Iles Normandes sont un anachronisme, loyales à la couronne anglaise, mais avec une autonomie une véritable paradoxe de l’histoire politique.” From this he generally goes on to say that “they are the Canada of Europe, a province of France, which continues the life of the French under the Protectorate of the English.” The law of Jersey is that of the “Coutume Normande.” In Jersey the King of England reigns not; he is Duc de Normandie; the magistrates condemn or acquit “en parler Normand”; the code is Norman; the administration Norman. To London the habitant comes only as a resident, as does a Maltese, or a Canadian. The Journal Officiel of Jersey is written in Norman. In it one reads such announcements as follows: “A vendre, une vache, ainsi qu’une piano, les deux en bon état.” Or again: “On demande une institutrice, et on céderait un vieux cheval, pour un prix peu élevé.” Throughout the islands the sentiment is decidedly republican, or if not republican is at least Norman. It is the English king who is duke, but it is the descendant of Rollon who reigns. All French provinciaux are patriotic beyond belief to the outsider. The Gascon is always a Gascon, and the Norman is always a Norman. They were masterful folks, those early Normans and the Northmen before them. Rollon, the first Duke of Rouen; Rurik, the first Czar of Russia; Eric le Roux, the first colonizer of Iceland and Greenland; Leif Ericson, the first discoverer of America and the colonizer of Vineland. Of the Normans, Guillaume, son of Herleve, Robert le Diable, and Robert Guiscard de Hauteville were kings of Sicily. Cabot of Jersey was the discoverer of Canada, and Jean Cousin of Honfleur was the pilot of Christopher Columbus. Binot Lipaulmier de Gonneville and Jean Denys were the discoverers of Newfoundland, of Brazil, and of the Canaries; the Chevalier de la Salle was the discoverer of the Mississippi; and Champlain was the founder of Quebec. Among other great discoverers and navigators are Jean de Bethencourt, Jean Ango, Duquesne, Dumé, Tourville de Bricqueville, and Dumont d’Urville. In letters and art Normandy has held a proud position. In poesy stand forth the names of Pierre Corneille and his brother Thomas, Alain Chartier, Olivier Basselin, Jean Marot, Jean Bertand, Malherbe,—sometimes called “the father of modern poetry,”—Segrais, Malfiatre, Castel, Madeleine de Scudéry, Benserade, the Abbé de Chaulieu, Bernardin St. Pierre, Casimir Delavigne, and his rival in dramatic verse, Ancelot. The historians and savants, Fontenelle, Huét, and Mezeray, St. Evremond, Dacier, and Burnouf, Armand Carrel, Octave Feuillet, Louis Bouilhet, Gustave Flaubert, and Guy de Maupassant. Among others of Normandy’s great names are: Fresnel, the inventor of the lenticular lanterns for lighthouses, and Conté, the inventor of crayons bearing his name. Among the artists are Jouvenet, Restout, Nicolas Poussin, Gericault, Millet, and Chaplin, and the sculptors, Anguier and Harivel- Durocher, the composers, Boïeldieu and Auber, and the actor Melingue. A great man in industry and statesmanship was Richard Waddington, while still greater and more ancient names, famed in history, round off the list: William the Conqueror, the Minister Le Tellier, Maréchal de Coigny, Charlotte Corday, Le Brun, the Duc de Plaisance, and Dupont de l’Eure. Canada was discovered and colonized by the Norman fishermen, sailors, carpenters, and masons of the fleet of Champlain from Honfleur, Dieppe, and Havre. The regard which the Norman has for things American has generally been overlooked. But one need not go so far as to say, as has been done by Norman writers, that the present cosmopolitan population of America is made up mostly of the Scotch, the Irish, and the Normans of England and France—the descendants of the people whom William and his sixty thousand companions organized in social order. M. Hector Fabre has said that, while all the colonists of New France—actually Canada—were not Normans, it was a curious phenomenon that all the children born in Canada were Norman. The St. Lawrence, which the French still call the Saint Laurent, is to them as Norman as the Mississippi or the Seine, and it is reasonable to presume that they still regard North America as “La Normandie Transatlantique.” All this is with some justification, if we go back as far as the Northmen, as the good people of Boston, in America, well know, for it is they who have supplanted the Genoese admiral by Leif, the son of Eric, and have even erected a statue to him. With all this, then, in view, may the writer be pardoned for presuming that Normandy is not a worn-out touring-ground, nor one of which there is nothing new to tell. The author wishes to repeat, however, that no more has been attempted herein than to gather together such romantic and historical facts as have readily suggested themselves to him and to the artist, who have each of them lived many months in the very heart of that old province between Paris and the sea. Normandy is in many respects the ideal of a delightful tour for those who would not go further afield, or who wish to know still more of those conventional touring-grounds of which, truth to tell, but little is known by those tourists personally conducted in droves, who do a watering-place in the morning, take their lunch at some riverside shrine, and get to a cathedral town in time to nibble at its masterpiece before the hour of opening, which in Normandy, Rouen in particular, is early. The great rhomboid which bounds the France of to-day, enclosed, before the Revolution, thirty-three great provinces, of which, save Guyenne, Gascogne, Languedoc, and Bretagne, Normandy was the largest, and certainly the most potently strenuous in the life of the times. Surrounded by Picardy, the Ile de France (the domaine-royal of the Capets), by Maine, and Bretagne, and bordered on the north by La Manche, it was only joined to France by confiscation by Philippe-Auguste, from Jean Sans-Terre, some two hundred or more years after the advent of the third race of kings. To-day it forms the Department of the Lower Seine, Eure, Le Calvados, La Manche, and a part of L’Orne. Normandy was once doubtless a land of the Celts, who gradually withdrew to Bretagne. In time it became a part of Roman Gaul. The part once known as Neustria was ceded by Charles the Simple in 911 to the Norman descendants of Rollon, from whom it took its new name, Normandy. The Dukes of Normandy became, after the conquest, Kings of England, and in 1154 the Counts of Anjou and of Maine inherited, through Henry Plantagenet, the throne of England, thus giving that country a line of Angevine kings. This strong-growing power of the Norman dukes was broken by Philippe-Auguste, who conquered Normandy in 1204. During the Hundred Years’ War the English many times invaded Normandy, but were finally driven out by the redoubtable Duguesclin. Henry V. invaded France and took Harfleur in 1415, occupying all of the north and northwest of France. Charles VII. victoriously entered Rouen, and at Formigny again achieved the conquest of Normandy by the French. Louis XI. ceded Normandy to his brother. Many ancient fiefs were contained in this great province, but the Comté d’Evreux, Comté d’Alençon, Comté d’Eu, and the Duché de Penthièvre were united definitely with the kingdom in 1789. Previous to 1789 the ancient military government of the province was divided into Rouen, Caen, and Alençon. By its reconstruction into departments the province lost two bishoprics, which were not reestablished by the Concordat, Lisieux and Avranches; and the latter lost, as well, nearly all vestiges of its former beautiful cathedral, before which Henry II. of England expiated his crime of the murder of Becket. The Land of the Conqueror, trod by some of the greatest men the world has known in mediæval and modern times, has not, even now, in spite of its associations and accessibility, become a world-worn resort. Students of art, architecture, and history, and a few tourists from London, who demand a change of scene in a near-by foreign land, reach its shores between Whitsun and the August Bank Holiday; but, popular supposition to the contrary, the traffic receipts of the steamship and railway companies do not indicate anything like a generous patronage of this ideal land for a present-day sentimental journey. Normandy stands to-day as it stood in the middle ages, with many memorials and reminiscences of its feudal pomp and glory, with here and there a monument to Rollon, William the Conqueror, or Richard the Lion-hearted. As it was three centuries or more ago, teeming with many a monument, cathedral, abbey, fortress, and château, so Normandy is to-day, except for the ruin wrought by the bloody hand of revolution. In spirit Normandy is still mediæval, and here and there are evidences of the even more ancient Roman or Celtic remains. History gives the facts, and the guide-books conventional information. The most that the present work attempts is to recount the results of more or less intimate acquaintance with the land and its people, now and again bringing to light certain matters not to be met with in a briefer sojourn. CHAPTER II. THE ROADS OF FRANCE ONE of the joys of France to-day, as indeed it ever has been, is travel by road. The rail has its advantages, but it also has its disadvantages, whereas the most luxurious traveller by road, even if he be snugly tucked away in a sixty-horse royal Mercédes, is nothing more than an itinerant vagabond, and France is the land above all others for the sport. As an industry to be developed and fostered, France early recognized the automobile as a new world-force, and the powers that be were convinced that the way should be smoothed for those who would, with the poet Henley, sing the song of speed. With their inheritance of magnificent roadways, this was not difficult; for the French and mine host—or his French counterpart, who is really a more up-to-date individual than he is usually given the credit of being—rose gallantly to the occasion as soon as they saw the return of that trade which had grown beautifully less since the passing of the malle-poste and the diligence. The paternalism of the French government is a wonderful thing. It not only stands sponsor for the preservation and restoration of historical monuments,—great churches, châteaux, and the like,—but takes a genial interest in automobilism as well. DILIGENCE Hills have been levelled and dangerous corners straightened, level crossings abolished or better guarded; and, where possible, the dread caniveaux—or water-gullies—which cross the roadway here and there have been filled up. More than all else, the execrable paved road, for which France has been noted, is fast being done away with. It is perhaps worth mentioning that the chief magistrate himself is not an automobilist; which places him in practically a unique position among the rulers of Europe. At Bayeux, at Caen, at Lisieux, and at Evreux, in Normandy, one is on that great national roadway which runs from Paris to Cherbourg through the heart of the old province. This great roadway is numbered XIII. by the government, which considers its highways a national property, and is typical of all others of its class throughout France. The military roads of France are famous, and automobilists and some others know their real value as a factor in the prosperity of a nation. It is not as it was in 1689, when Madame de Sévigné wrote that it took three days to travel from Paris to Rouen. Now one does it, in an automobile, in three hours. From Pont Audemer she wrote a few days later to Madame de Grignan: “We slept yesterday at Rouen, a dozen leagues away.” Continuing, she said: “I have seen the most beautiful country in all the world; I have seen all the charms of the beautiful Seine, and the most agreeable prairies in the world.... I had known nothing of Normandy before.... I was too young to appreciate.” Certainly this is quite true of Normandy, now as then, and to travel by road will demonstrate it beyond doubt. The roads in France were, for several centuries after the decline and fall of the Roman power, in a very dilapidated state, as the result of simple neglect. Louis XIV., in the latter part of the seventeenth century, made some good roads in the vicinity of Paris; but it was not until the end of the eighteenth century (1775) that the real work of road-making throughout the country began. It was in the time of Napoleon I. that most of the great national roads, which run through the country in various directions, were constructed. These roads were made largely for military purposes, and connect the chief towns and the French frontiers with Paris. Besides the leading roads, there are also many other roads varying in degrees of importance, classed as follows: (1) Routes Nationales. Constructed and maintained by the national government. (2) Routes Départmentales. Constructed and maintained by the several departments at national expense. (3) Chemins Vicinaux de Grande Communication. Passing through and connecting two or more communities, maintained and served by them, aided by government grant. (4) Chemins Vicinaux de Moyenne Communication. Similar to Class III., but of less importance, and maintained at the cost of the people, but controlled by the department. (5) Chemins de Petite Communication. Of still less importance, maintained by the communities separately under the supervision of government engineers. (6) Chemins Ruraux. Roads of the least importance, and wholly controlled and maintained by the people without any interference from the government officials. The art of road-building in France is only excelled by that of the Romans, and they unfortunately lived before the days of high-speed traffic and rubber-shod wheels. The great national roads, usually tree-bordered, average but three in one hundred grade, the departmental roads four in one hundred, and the Chemins de Grande Communication five in one hundred. In all except very hilly districts, where of course there are deviations, this is the rule. Napoleon’s idea was that these national highways were essentially a military means of communication, and as such they were laid out with a certain regularity and uniformity. Formerly they were largely paved with stone blocks. Who, among those who have travelled extensively by road in France, does not know the execrable pavements of the populated neighbourhoods through which these highways run? To-day these are largely disappearing. The roads in France suffer more from drought than from wet. They dry quickly after rain, and, in order to shade and protect the surface from the dry heat of summer, the planting of trees on the sides of the roads has been largely adopted. As showing the importance that has been attached to this matter, royal decrees were formerly passed, determining the manner of planting, the kind of trees to be used, and the penalties to be imposed on those who injured them. Most of the roads of France, even the national roads, cross the railways on the level instead of over bridges. There are gate-keepers and gates for the protection of the public. At many of them the signalling is of a very primitive kind, and yet there are few accidents. The history of the roads of France is the history of the nation since the conquest of ancient Gaul by the legions of Cæsar. The Voie Auguste was the first, and bound Lyons with Italy by the Col du Petit St. Bernard, which to-day is actually National Road No. 90. Agrippa made Lyons the centre of four great diverging roads; the first by the valley of the Rhine and the Meuse; the second by Autun to the port of Genosiacum, to-day Boulogne-sur-mer; the third by Auvergne toward Bordeaux; and the fourth by the valley of the Rhône to Aix and Marseilles. From the decadence of the Western Empire and the invasion of the Barbarians, these fine roads were practically abandoned. Many good bridges were destroyed, and the work of road-building ceased completely, the people finding their way about by mere trails. With the advent of Christianity in Gaul there was a partial renaissance of these Roman roads, thanks to great fairs and pilgrimages. The monastic orders became in a way the parents and protectors of bridges and roads, with St. Bénèzet at their head, who in the twelfth century constructed the wonderful Pont d’Avignon, which still stands. The general system of the present-day national roads follows largely the old Roman means of communication, as well as those traced by nature, along the banks of rivers and on the flanks of mountains and in the valleys lying between. The great national roads of France form a class by themselves, independent of the departmental and communal roads. They approximate forty thousand kilometres, and run at a tangent from the capital itself and between the chief cities of the eighty odd departments which make up modern France. In general, the designation of the road, its number, and classification are indicated on the kilometre marks with which every important road in France is marked. The national roads, having their origin at Paris, have their distances marked from Notre Dame, and certain of the secondary cities are taken for the point of departure of other great roads. A ministerial decree, put forth in 1853, decided that the national roads should have their distances marked from their entrance into each department, a regulation which has been followed nearly everywhere, except that distances are still reckoned from Paris on most of the great highroads of Normandy and Brittany. Guide-posts are placed at all important cross-roads and pattes-d’oie (a goose-foot, literally). An iron plaque, painted white and blue, beside the road, shows without any possibility of mistake the commune in which it is situated, the next important place in either direction, and frequently the next town of considerable proportions, even though it may be half a hundred kilometres distant. Road Plaques Touring Club de France French roads are indeed wonderfully well marked; and these little blue and white plaques, put up by the roadside or fastened on the wall of some dwelling at the entrance or the exit of a village or town, must number hundreds of thousands. In these days of fast-rushing automobiles a demand has sprung up for a more striking and legible series of special sign-boards along certain roads, in order that he who runs may read. And so the Touring Club of France, on the great road which runs from Paris through Normandy, to Havre and Dieppe, for instance, has erected a series of large-lettered and abbreviated sign-boards, which are all that could be desired. Besides these, there are other enigmatical symbols and signs erected by paternal societies of road users which will strike a stranger dumb with conjecture as to what they may mean. They are all essentially practical, however, as the following tableau will show. It is very important indeed for an automobilist or other road user to know that a railway-gate (like enough to be shut) awaits him around a sharp curve, or that a steep hill is hidden just behind a bank of trees. Still another class of signs met with by road users in France is most helpful. They, too, shoot out a warning which one may read as he rushes by at high speed; printed in great staring letters, one, two, or three words which one dare not, if he values his life, ignore. Truly one who goes astray or contravenes any law of the road in France has only himself to blame. The chief national roads crossing Normandy are as follows: No. 192 and —Paris to Havre, by the right bank of the Seine, passing Poissy, Melun, La Roche-Guyon, Les Andelys, and Rouen. " 14. " 190. —Paris to Rouen and Honfleur, by the left bank of the Seine. " 182. " 180. " 13. —Paris to Cherbourg, via Evreux and Caen. " 26. —Paris to Fécamp by Yvetot. " 14. —Paris to Dieppe. " 14, —bis. Paris to Tréport. " 155. —Paris to St. Malo, via Mayenne. " 24, —bis.Paris to Granville by Verneuil. " 13. and —Paris to Coutances by Bayeux and St. Lô. " 172. " 10. —Paris to Vannes, via Ploërmel. " 12. " 24. " 166. " 10. —Paris to Quimper, via Rennes and Lorient. " 12. " 24. " 165. " 10. —Paris to Brest, via Versailles, Alençon, " 12. —Laval, Rennes, and St. Brieuc. " 10. —Paris to Nantes and Paimbœuf, via Versailles, Chartres, Le Mans, Angers, and Nantes. " 23. After the fall of the Roman Empire the magnificent roadways which threaded Gaul in every direction all but disappeared, and for a time the horse was employed only with the saddle, the more or less indolent nobles travelling mostly by vehicles drawn by oxen. By the middle ages the horse had come to be admired as a noble animal by virtue of his usefulness in war; but the routes of communication were hardly more than simple tracks and by no means replaced the great rivers, which Pascal had called “ces chemins qui marchent.” Indeed the “coches d’eau” had not entirely disappeared from the waterways of France until 1830. The first carriages at all approaching the modern fashion were imported from Italy in the sixteenth century, doubtless by the Medicis. In 1550 there were three, only, in Paris, but under Louis XIV. the roads became more carefully guarded and increased greatly in number. The great carrosses and calèches of the early days were ponderous affairs, a calèche known as a litière, the precursor of the modern sleeping-car, it would seem, having a weight of 2,500 kilos. The following lines well describe it: “C’est un embarras étrange, Qu’un grand carrosse dans la fange, C’est presque un village roulant....” BERLINE de POSTE. Under Louis XV. the carrosse became lighter and the chaise on two wheels came in. Then followed cabriolets, berlines, and the poste- chaise, and finally the malle-poste and the diligence. The most familiar of all, to those of a few generations ago, and to readers of travel literature, is the diligence. These great carriages apparently had a most respectable lease of life, many having been in service for a great many years. To-day they have mostly disappeared, and in Normandy and Brittany practically exist not at all, so far as the tourist traveller is concerned, though once and again they may be useful on a cross-country road in order to connect with the railroad. It was only as late as 1760, however, that a public service of these diligences was established. At that time the coaches left Paris on stated days and travelled with unwonted regularity. The diligence to Rennes, in the heart of Bretagne, was timed for four days’ travelling, and five days was employed for the journey to the old Breton capital of Nantes, on the Loire. These great carriages, commonly known as “Royales,” were hung on springs and drawn by eight horses. They did not travel as quickly as the malle-poste, but their rates were somewhat less, and they performed the common service before the advent of steam and the rail. There was nothing very luxurious or grand about them, but they were majestic and picturesque, and they sometimes carried a load, including passengers and luggage, of five thousand kilos. Closely allied with roads is the general topography of a country as shown by its maps. No country has such a marvellous series of maps of its soil as has France. The maps of the Minister of the Interior and the Etat Major are wonders of the art, and no traveller in Normandy or Brittany, or indeed any other part of France, should be without them. They are obtainable at any bookseller’s in a large town, and the prices are remarkably low; ranging from thirty centimes a sheet for the map of the Etat Major, printed only in black, to eighty centimes a sheet for the map of the Minister of the Interior, printed in colours. The following conventional signs will show the extreme practicability of the maps of the Etat Major, which are made on four different scales, the most useful being that of 1-80,000. The maps of the Minister of the Interior are made only on the scale of 1-100,000. Now and then on these great highroads of France, of which those of Normandy and Brittany are representative, one passes a headquarters or a barracks of the gendarmerie, those servitors of the law, the national police, an organization which grew up out of the men- at-arms or gens d’armes of Charles VII. These great barracks are veritable monasteries, where the religion of faithful duty to the public and the nation reigns supreme. One never passes one of these impressive establishments without a full appreciation of the motto of the knightly Bayard, so frequently graven over their doors: “Sans peur et sans reproche.” The Assembly, in 1790, first instituted this almost perfectly organized police force, and Napoleon himself thought so highly of them that he wrote to Berthier in 1812: “Take not the police with you, but conserve them for the guarding of the country-side. Two or three hundred soldiers are as nothing, but two or three hundred police will assure the tranquillity and good order of the people at large.” To-day, in times of peace, twenty-seven legions of police assure the security of the country-side; an effective force of about twenty-five thousand men and 725 officers, of whom a comparative few only are mounted. A colonel or a lieutenant-colonel is placed at the head of a legion, a company being allotted to each department. The company is commanded by a major; then comes the district, placed under the orders of a captain or a lieutenant; the section, commanded by a junior officer; and finally a squad with a non-commissioned officer or corporal at its head. Independent of crime and its details, the police are responsible as well for the maintenance of order in general. The pay for all this, it is to be regretfully noted, is not at all commensurate. An unmounted policeman receives but 2 fr. 81 c. per day, and if he is mounted but 3 fr. 23 c. per day. CHAPTER III. THE FORESTS OF FRANCE THE forests of France are a source of never-ending interest and pride to the Frenchman, of whatever station in life. They are admirably preserved and cared for, and a paternal ministerial department guards them as jealously as a fond mother guards her children. No cutting of trees is allowed, except according to a prescribed plan; and, when a new road is cut through,—and those superlative roadways of France run straight as the crow flies through many of the finest forest tracts,—as likely as not an old one is replanted. The process of replanting goes on from day to day, and one sees no depleted forests of a former time, which are to-day a graveyard of bare stumps. If there is any regulation as to tree-planting in these great forests, it would seem, to a casual observer, to be that where one tree has grown before two are to be made grow in its place. There is a popular regard among all travellers in France for Fontainebleau, Versailles, and perhaps Chantilly, but there are other tree- grown areas, quite as charming, little known to the general traveller: Rambouillet, for instance, and Villers-Cotterets, of which Dumas writes so graphically in “The Wolf Leader.” Normandy has more than its share of these splendid forests, some of them of great extent and charm. Indeed, the forest domain of Lyons, in Upper Normandy, one of the most extensive in all France, is literally covered with great beeches and oaks, surrounding small towns and hamlets, and an occasional ruined château or abbey, which makes a sojourn within its confines most enjoyable to all lovers of outdoor life. Surrounding the old Norman capital of Rouen are five great tracts which serve the inhabitants of that now great commercial city as a summer playground greatly appreciated. Game of various sorts still exists; deer in plenty, apparently, together with smaller kinds; and now and then one will hear tales of bears, which are, however, almost unbelievable. In some regions—the forests of Louviers, for instance—the wild boar still exists. The chase for the wild boar, with the huntsmen following somewhat after the old custom (with a horn-blower, who is most theatrical in his get-up, and his followers, armed with lances and pikes in quite old-time fashion), is, as may be imagined, a most novel sight. The forests of Roumare and Mauny, occupying the two peninsulas formed by the winding Seine just below Rouen, are remarkable, and are like nothing else except the other forests in France. There are fine roadways crossing and recrossing in all directions, beautifully graded, with overhanging oaks and beeches, and as well kept as a city boulevard. Deer are still abundant, and the whole impression which one receives is that of a genuine wildwood, and not an artificial preserve. In the picturesque forest of Roumare is hidden away the tiny village of Genetey, which has for an attraction, besides its own delightful situation, an ancient Maison de Templiers of the thirteenth century, a well of great depth, and a chapel to St. Gargon, of the sixteenth century, built in wood, with some fine sculptures and paintings, which was at one time a favourite place for pious pilgrims from Rouen. Not far away is Henouville, with a sixteenth-century church, lighted by five great windows of extraordinary proportions. The choir encloses the remains of Legendre, the almoner of Louis XIII., who was curé of Henouville, and whose fame as a horticulturist was as great as that brought him by his official position. The near-by Château du Belley and its domain is now turned into a farm. La Fontaine, a hamlet situated directly on the Seine bank, is overshadowed by a series of high rocks of most fantastic form, known as the chair, or pulpit, of Gargantua. The forest of La Londe, of 2,154 hectares, on the opposite bank of the Seine from Rouen, is a remarkable tract of woodland, its oaks and beeches quite reminiscent of Fontainebleau. The trees as a whole are the most ancient and grand of those of any of the forests of Normandy. Two which have been given names are known respectively as Bel-Arsène, a magnificent beech of eleven great branches, planted in 1773, and the Chêne de la Côte Rôtie, supposed to have the ripe old age of 450 years; and it looks its age. The forest of Londe is what the French geographer would describe as pittoresque et accidentée. It is all this would lead one to infer; and, together with the forest of the Rouvray, exceeds any other in Normandy, except the forest domain of Lyons. At the crossing of the Grésil road is the Chêne-à-la-Bosse, having a circumference of three and a half metres; and, near by, one sees the Hêtre-à-l’Image, a great beech of fantastic form. Amid a savage and entirely unspoiled grandeur is a series of caves and grottoes, of themselves of no great interest, but delightfully environed. Near Elbeuf, on the edge of the forest of Londe, are the Roches d’Orival, a series of rock-cut grottoes and caverns,—a little known spot to the majority of travellers in the Seine valley. Practically the formation begins at Elbeuf itself, onward toward Rouen, by the route which follows the highroad to the Norman capital via Grand Couronne. At Port du Gravier, on the bank of the Seine, is a sixteenth-century chapel cut in the rock, like its brethren or sisters at St. Adrien on the opposite bank, and at Haute Isle, just above Vernon. At Roche-Foulon are numerous rock-caverns still inhabited, and at the Roche du Pignon begins a series of curiously weathered and crumbled rocks, most weird and bizarre. On a neighbouring hill are the ruins of Château Fouet, another of those many riverside fortresses attributed to Richard Cœur de Lion. The forest domain of Lyons is the finest beech-wood in all France, and its 10,614 hectares (rather more than thirty thousand acres) was in the middle ages the favourite hunting-ground of the Dukes of Normandy. It is the most ample of all the forests of Normandy. There are at least three trips which forest-lovers should take if they come to the charming little woodland village of Lyons-le-Forêt. It will take quite two days to cover them, and the general tourist may not have sufficient time to spare. Still, if he is so inclined, and wants to know what a really magnificent French forest is like to-day, before it has become spoiled and overrun (as is Fontainebleau), this is the place to enjoy it to the full. The old Château of Lyons, and the tiny hamlets of Taisniers, Hogues, Héron, and the feudal ruins of Malvoisine, are a great source of pleasure to those who have become jaded with the rush of cities and towns. The château of the Marquis de Pommereu d’Aligré, in the valley of the Héron, can be seen and visited, or rather the park may be (the park and château together are only thrown open to the public on the fête patronale—the first Sunday of September). Croissy-sur-Andelle is another forest village, and the Val St. Pierre, a sort of dry river-bed carpeted with a thick undergrowth, is quite as fine as anything of the kind at Fontainebleau. At Petit Val is a magnificent beech five and a half metres in circumference, and supposed to be four hundred years old. At Le Tronquay there is a great scho...