Just back of Tamaris is, or was, the celebrated “Batterie des Hommes Sans Peur,” which so awakened the interest and curiosity of George Sand that she implored the authorities to make a memorial of the spot forthwith, and spend less time digging for prehistoric remains.
The construction of the battery was one of the first great exploits of the young Napoleon (1793), which, with the subsequent taking of the Petit-Gibraltar (as the present Fort Napoleon was then known), was one of the real history-making events of modern France.
Madame Sand marvelled that the site of this tiny battery had been so neglected. It was due to that distinguished lady that the exact location of the battery was made known, and, though still merely a ruined earthwork, may be reckoned as one of the patriotic souvenirs of a lurid page of history.
George Sand had the idea of buying these twenty metres square of ground, surrounding them with a paling and making a path thereto which should lead from the highway. Ultimately she intended to plant a simple stone with the following inscription: “Ici Reposent les Hommes Sans Peur.” This was never done, however, and so those only who have the memory of the incident well within their grasp ever even come across the site. There is something more than a legendary grandeur about it all, and those who are unfamiliar with the incident had best refer to any good life of Napoleon, and learn what really happened at the famous siege of Toulon.
Toulon is about the best guarded arsenal in all the world. The Caps Mouret, Notre Dame de la Garde, Sicié, and Sepet play nature’s part, and play it well, and the hand of man has added cannons wherever he could find a resting-place for them. “Canons! encore canons, et toujours des canons!” said a French commercial traveller at the table d’hôte, when the artist told him that she had been remonstrated with when making a sketch on the summit of an exceedingly beautiful hillside to the eastward of the city. This admonition was enough. Much better to take good advice than to languish in prison till your consul comes and gets you out,—which is just what has happened to inquisitive artists in France before now.
Toulon is warlike to the very core, and, in spite of an active historic past, there is scarcely a monument in the town to-day, except the old cathedral of Saint Marie Majeure, which takes rank among those which appeal for architectural worth alone. The arsenal is the chief attraction; remove it, and Toulon might become a great commercial centre, or even a “watering-place,” but with it the very atmosphere smacks of powder and shot.
The city is not unlovely as great cities go. It is modern, well-kept, and certainly well-beautified by trees and shrubs and flowers, and wide, straight streets, and, above all, it is blessed with a charming situation.
In Toulon’s Old Port