TARASCON FROM BEAUCAIRE, SHOWING KING RENÉ'S CASTLE.
By E. M. Synge.
"Let us go to Tarascon!"
Barbara jumped at it, and we centred our hopes and imaginings on that most Provençal of Provençal cities as the train puffed along on its leisurely way.
The towers of Chateau Renard in the middle distance have a romantic, mysterious effect, standing as they do on a rocky little hill just far enough away to look strangely mysterious, with the soft bloom of the spaces and the peaked ranges behind it. The station of Barbentane is on the line, but we did not succeed in making out the village on the hill-top.
Ardouin-Dumazet writes:—
"Les cultures enveloppent jusqu'au Rhone le petit massif sur lequel se dresse la haute Tour de Barbentane."
This gives one at once the character of the country. Further on we come to La Montagnette de Tarascon, which "contrasts its bare slopes with the opulent plain. It is like an island rising out of verdure—the white calcined rock takes in an amusing fashion, the airs of a chain of rocky mountains. The Montagnette is a miniature of the Alpilles, those miniature Alps."
The Alpilles—strange little knobbly mountains—grow into greater prominence as we move eastward and the outline shows itself more than ever eccentric and altogether out of fashion, as one imagines fashion among mountains.
They have a style of their own, a marked personality that is very fascinating. They were yet to explore, with their memories of the campaign of Marius, their Courts of Love, their rock-hewn city of Les Baux, their Trou d'Enfer, their haunts of the famous witch Tavèn and her demon-companies. We had half a mind to divert from our route at once and take the little local train up into the heart of the range, but not liking to think ourselves lacking in decision of character, we nailed our colours to the mast, and resolved to see Tarascon first.