"'God and his angels forbid, that I
Should live on earth if Roland die!'
Pale grew her cheek,—she sank amain
Down at the feet of Charlemagne."
So let us leave this tender poem, tender unwontedly among its times; an epic which sincerely merits a vogue more near to its value.
CHAPTER V.
THE CITY OF THE ARROW-PIERCED SAINT;
We glide smoothly away from St. Jean de Luz and its legends, by the unlegendary railroad. The track curves southward, with frequent views of the coast, and it will be but a few minutes before we shall be in Spain. We instinctively feel for the reassuring rustle of our passports, duly viséd at Bordeaux. The low mountain that overhangs Fuenterrabia, one of the nearest Spanish towns, comes closer, and soon the train whistles shrilly into the long station at Hendaye, the last French village, in great repute for its delicious cordial. It is on the edge of the Bidassoa, a placid, shallow river which here lazily acts as the international boundary. Irun, the first town of the peninsula, is across the bridge, and after a short delay the train crosses,—and we instantly feel a hundred miles nearer to the Escorial, a hundred years nearer to Philip and the auto-da-fé.