VIII
STE. MARIE MAJEURE DE MARSEILLES
"These brown men of Marseilles, who sing as they bend at their oars, are Greeks."
—Clovis Hughes.
Marseilles is modern and commercial; but Marseilles is also ancient, and a centre from which have radiated, since the days of the Greeks, much power and influence.
It is, too, for a modern city,—which it is to the average tourist,—wonderfully picturesque, and shows some grand architectural effects, both ancient and modern.
Marseilles
The Palais de Long Champs is an architectural grouping which might have dazzled luxurious Rome itself. The Chamber of Commerce, with its decorations by Puvis de Chavannes, is a structure of the first rank; the Cannebière is one of those few great business thoroughfares which are truly imposing; while the docks, shipping, and hotels, are all of that preëminent magnitude which we are wont to associate only with a great capital.
As to its churches, its old twelfth-century cathedral remains to-day a mere relic of its former dignity.
