Winged Wheels in France

TOMB OF AGNES SOREL AT LOCHES By permission of Mansell & Co.

MICHAEL MYERS SHOEMAKER
Author of Islands of Southern Seas, The Great Siberian Railway, The Heart of the Orient, Prisons and Palaces of Mary, Queen of Scots, Etc.
ILLUSTRATED

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON The Knickerbocker Press 1906
Copyrighted 1906 by Michael Myers Shoemaker
TO My Dear Friend Mrs.W. P. HULBERT of Cincinnati
This is not a love story. These wings are wings of motion, not of Cupid, yet there is much of romance and story in these pages,—for who can travel the plaisant pays de France and not dip deeply into both?
When I entered my red machine at Nice no route had been laid out,—to me there is small pleasure in travel when that is done,—so I told Jean to start and left the direction to him. Being French he naturally turned towards his own country, and knowing whither the superb highways and enchanting byways could lead one, I tacitly agreed, and we glided away by the level sea and on into the olive-crowned hill of Provence, to where Aix—the home of politeness—dreams the years away and the air seems still to echo to King René's music. Arles, Narbonne, fantastic Carcassonne, Lourdes, and Pau followed in rapid succession, and then we rested awhile at Biarritz with short journeys into Spain. Turning northward we rolled off into Central France, pausing daily in some ancient city or quaint village, climbing mountains to long forgotten castles, or rolling into valleys in search of deserted abbeys.