Rambles on the Riviera

by M. F. Mansfield

Les Pennes

It shall not further be eulogized here, for fear it may become “spoiled,” though there is absolutely no attraction, within or without its walls, for the traveller who wants the capricious delights of Monte Carlo or the amusements of a city like Aix or Marseilles.

On the “Route Nationale” between Aix and Marseilles is the little town of Gardanne, only interesting because it is a typical small town of Provence. It has for its chief industries the manufacture of aluminium and nougat, widely dissimilar though they be.

Just to the southward rises majestically the mountain chain of the Pilon du Roi, whose peak climbs skyward for 710 metres, overshadowing the towns of Simiane, with its remains of a Romanesque chapel and a thirteenth-century donjon, and Septèmes, with the ruins of its Louis XIV. fortifications, and Notre Dame des Anges, which was erected upon the remains of the ancient chapel of an old-time monastery.

From the platform of Notre Dame des Anges is to be had a remarkable view of the foot-hills, of the coast-line, and of the sea beyond, the whole landscape dotted here and there with yellow-gray hamlets and olive-trees, and little trickling streams. It suggests nothing so much as the artificial spectacular compositions which most artists paint when they attempt to depict these wide-open views, and which it is the fashion to condemn as not being true to nature. This may sometimes be the case; but often they are as true a map of the country as the average topographical survey, and far more true than the best “bird’s-eye” photograph that was ever taken.

The Pilon du Roi, so named from its resemblance to a great ruined or unfinished tower, rises two hundred or more metres above the platform of the church, and to climb its precipitous sides will prove an adventure as thrilling as the most foolhardy Alpinist could desire.

There is a little corner of this region, lying between Marseilles and Gardanne, which, in spite of the overhead brilliancy, will remind one of the grimness and austerity of Flanders. One comes brusquely upon a lusty and growing coal-mining industry as he descends the southern slope of the Chaîne du Pilon du Roi, and, while all around are umbrella-pines, olive-trees, cypress, and all the characteristics of a southern landscape, there are occasional glimpses of tall, belching chimneys and the sound of the trolleys carrying the coal down to a lower level. Here and there, too, one finds a black mountain of débris, sooty and grimy, against a background of the purest tints of the artist’s palette. The contrast is too horrible for even contemplation, in spite of the importance of the industry to the metropolis of Marseilles and the neighbouring Provençal cities.

At Auriol is another “exploitation houillère,” which is the French way of describing a coal-mine. To the tourist and lover of the beautiful this is a small thing. He will be more interested in the vineyards and olive orchards and the flower-gardens surrounding the little townlet, which here bloom with a luxuriance at which one can but marvel. The town is a “ville industrielle,” if there ever was one, since all of its inhabitants seem to be engaged in, or connected with, the coal-mining industry in one way or another. In spite of this, however, the real old-time flavour has been well preserved in the narrow streets, the sixteenth-century belfry, and the ruins of the old château, which still rise proudly above the little red-roofed houses of Auriol’s twenty-five hundred inhabitants. To-day there is no more fear of a Saracen invasion,—as there was when the château was built,—but there is the ever present danger that some yawning pit’s mouth will be opened beneath its walls, and that the old donjon tower will fall before the invasion of progress, as has been the fate of so many other great historic monuments elsewhere.

In the little vineyard country there are to be heard innumerable proverbs all connected with the soil, although, like the proverbs of Spain, they are applicable to any condition of life, as for instance: “Buy your house already finished and your vines planted,” or “Have few vines, but cultivate them well.”