Béziers.—An important town; the centre of the wine trade of the Midi; stands on raised plateau above the Orb; thirteenth-century bridge; aqueduct of the Midi Canal, and churches of—(1) St. Nazaire, (2) St. Jacques, (3) La Madelaine, (4) St. Aphrodise.
Pézenas.—A small town, with fifteenth-century gateway and several old houses.
Montagnac.—A dreary little town in a pleasant, hilly country.
Mèze.—A town on the Etang-de-Thau; fourteenth-century church of no interest.
Gigean.—An uninteresting village.
Carcassonne was for a long period a dual town, and even to-day, when the original city is mainly an historical monument, it contains a considerable
Town Plan No. 17.—Carcassonne.
number of people within its ancient walls. A glance at the plan will reveal the position and relative sizes of the two towns, and it need scarcely be stated that the original city is the one standing on a raised site east of the river. Because of the great antiquity of the “Cité,” the large town beneath it is too often regarded as a mushroom growth. It was, however, founded in the thirteenth century by the people of the original Carcassonne,