Contents
ChapterPage
1.Early Days in the Riviera[1]
2.The Corniche Road[8]
3.Nice: The Promenade des Anglais[14]
4.Nice: The Old Town[19]
5.The Siege of Nice[29]
6.Cimiez and St. Pons[36]
7.How the Convent of St. Pons came to an End[41]
8.Vence, the Defender of the Faith[49]
9.Vence, the Town[59]
10.Grasse[67]
11.A Prime Minister and Two Ladies of Grasse[80]
12.Cagnes and St. Paul du Var[97]
13.Cap Ferrat and St. Hospice[104]
14.The Story of Eze[118]
15.The Troubadours of Eze[123]
16.How Eze was Betrayed[127]
17.The Town that Cannot Forget[135]
18.The Harbour of Monaco[143]
19.The Rock of Monaco[151]
20.A Fateful Christmas Eve[161]
21.Charles the Seaman[165]
22.The Lucien Murder[170]
23.How the Spaniards were got rid of[176]
24.A Matter of Etiquette[181]
25.The Monte Carlo of the Novelist[187]
26.Monte Carlo[191]
27.Some Diversions of Monte Carlo[195]
28.An Old Roman Posting Town[206]
29.The Tower of Victory[214]
30.La Turbie of To-day[224]
31.The Convent of Laghet[231]
32.The City of Peter Pan[239]
33.The Legend of Roquebrune[248]
34.Some Memories of Roquebrune[252]
35.Gallows Hill[259]
36.Mentone[265]
37.The First Visitors to the Riviera[273]
38.Castillon[281]
39.Sospel[286]
40.Sospel and the Wild Boar[294]
41.Two Queer Old Towns[297]
Index[305]
List of Illustrations
[A Riviera Garden]Frontispiece
FACING PAGE
[At the Bend of the Road]8
[Nice: The Old Terraces]16
[Nice: Rue du Sénat]26
[Nice: A Street in the Old Town]32
[Cimiez: The Roman Amphitheatre]36
[Cimiez: The Marble Cross]40
[Cimiez: The Monastery Well]40
[Vence: The East Gate and Outer Wall]52
[Vence: The Church and Court of Bishop’s Palace]58
[Vence: Old House in the Place Godeau]62
[Vence: Rue de la Coste]62
[Grasse: The de Cabris House]68
[Grasse: The Cathedral]72
[Grasse: The Place aux Aires]76
[Grasse: Rue de l’Evêché]80
[Grasse: Rue sans Peur]90
[Cagnes]96
[Cagnes: The Town Gate]98
[Cagnes: The Place Grimaldi]100
[Cagnes: The Castle]100
[St. Paul du Var]102
[St. Paul du Var: The Entry]102
[St. Paul du Var: The Main Gate]102
[St. Paul du Var: A Side Street]104
[St. Paul du Var: A Shop of the Mediæval Type]104
[Cap de St. Hospice]108
[St. Hospice: The Madonna and the Tower]108
[Villefranche]110
[Villefranche: The Main Street]112
[A Road in Beaulieu]114
[Eze]120
[Eze: The Main Gate]124
[A Street in Eze]134
[Eze: On the Way to the Castle]138
[Eze: All that Remains of the Castle]138
[Cap d’Ail, near Monaco]144
[Monaco]148
[Monaco: The Sentry Tower on the Rampe]156
[Monaco: The Drawbridge Gate, 1533]156
[Monaco: The Palace]162
[Monaco: The Old Hôtel de Ville]168
[Monaco: The Cliff Garden]172
[The Gorge between Monaco and Monte Carlo]178
[The Chapel of St. Dévote]184
[Monte Carlo from Monaco]192
[Monte Carlo: The Terrace, Christmas Day]196
[Monte Carlo: The Casino Garden]202
[The Roman Monument, La Turbie]206
[A Corner in La Turbie]210
[A Street in La Turbie]216
[La Turbie: Old Window in the Rue Droite]216
[La Turbie: The Old Bakehouse]224
[La Turbie: La Portette]226
[La Turbie: The Fortress Wall, showing the Roman Stones]226
[La Turbie: The Nice Gate]228
[Laghet]232
[Laghet: The Entrance]234
[Laghet: One of the Cloisters]236
[Roquebrune, from near Bon Voyage]240
[Roquebrune: The East Gate]246
[Roquebrune: The Place des Frères]246
[Roquebrune: Showing the Castle]252
[Roquebrune: Rue de la Fontaine]256
[The Roman Milestones, “603”]258
[A Piece of the Old Roman Road]258
[The Roman Fountain near La Turbie]260
[Gallows Hill]262
[Mont Justicier: The Two Pillars of the Gallows]262
[The Chapel of St. Roch ]264
[Mentone: The Old Town]266
[Mentone: The East Bay]268
[Mentone: Rue Longue]272
[Mentone: A Doorway in the Rue Longue]274
[A Side Street in Mentone]276
[A Side Street in Mentone]278
[Mentone: Rue Mattoni]278
[Castillon: (In the snow)]280
[Castillon: The Entry to the Town]280
[Castillon: The Main Street]282
[Castillon: The Main Street and Church Door]284
[Sospel: The Old Bridge]286
[Sospel: The River Front]288
[Sospel: The Place St. Michel]290
[A Square in Sospel]292
[Sospel: The Ruins of the Convent]292
[A Street in Sospel]294
[Sospel: The City Wall and Gate]294
[A Street in Gorbio]298
[A Street in Gorbio]298
[A Street in St. Agnes]300
[A Street in St. Agnes]302

THE RIVIERA OF THE

CORNICHE ROAD

I
EARLY DAYS IN THE RIVIERA

THE early history of this brilliant country is very dim, as are its shores and uplands when viewed from an on-coming barque at the dawn of day. The historian-adventurer sailing into the past sees before him just such an indefinite country as opens up before the eye of the mariner. Hills and crags—alone unchangeable—rise against the faint light in the sky. The sound of breakers on the beach alone can tell where the ocean ends and where the land begins; while the slopes, the valleys and the woods are lost in one blank impenetrable shadow.

As the daylight grows, or as our knowledge grows, the forms of men come into view, wild creatures armed with clubs and stones. They will be named Ligurians, just as the earlier folk of Britain were named Britons. Later on less uncouth men, furnished with weapons of bronze or iron, can be seen to land from boats or to be plodding along the shore as if they had journeyed far. They will be called Phœnicians, Carthaginians or Phocæans according to the leaning of the writer who deals with them. There may be bartering on the beach, there may be fighting or pantomimic love-making; but in the end those who are better armed take the place of the old dwellers, and the rough woman in her apron of skins walks off into the wood by the side of the man with the bronze knife and the beads.

There is little more than this to be seen through the haze of far distant time. The written history, such as it is, is thus part fiction, part surmise, for the very small element of truth is based upon such fragments of evidence as a few dry bones, a few implements, a bracelet, a defence work, a piece of pottery.