“C’est une fleur sauvage, O seigneur étranger.
La-bas nous trouverons des bouquets d’oranger.”
Le Voyageur.
“Non! laisse l’oranger embaumer le rivage,
Pour ces parfums si doux je suis barbare encore,
Mais sur ma terre aussi poussent les landiers d’or
Et j’aime la senteur de cette fleur sauvage!”
Such is the charm of the ajonc, “la fleur d’or de Provence.”
St. Nazaire-du-Var
Beyond Ollioules is St. Nazaire-du-Var, a tiny port which resembles in many ways that of Bandol. It has some of the aspects of a station des bains, in the summer months, for it has a fine beach. The railways and the guide-books apparently have little knowledge of St. Nazaire for they call it Sanary, after the old Provençal name. The present authorities of the really attractive little town are doing their best to keep pace with the march of progress, and there are hotels, more or less grand, electric lights, and tram-cars.
The little port is exceedingly picturesque, and its quays are always animated with the comings and goings of a hundred or more fishing-boats, which of themselves smack nothing of modernity. The motor-boat has not yet taken the picturesqueness out of the life of these hardy fishermen of yore, though it is slowly making its way in some parts.
In reality St. Nazaire-du-Var exists no more. The development of St. Nazaire-de-Bretagne overshadowed its less opulent namesake and took most of the mail-matter addressed to the little Provençal port. The inhabitants of the latter protested and addressed who ever has the making and changing of place-names in France to be allowed to adopt its ancient patronymic of Sanary.