Adjoining the chapel still exists the house in which the child-queen lodged on landing, also with a very interesting courtyard.
Looking down towards the church from this point, the houses wore a grey, sad and deserted aspect. The church tower rises above them, quaint and curious, in the Renaissance style. The interior is only remarkable for some curious alabaster bas-reliefs, representing the Passion and the Resurrection; an old tomb serving as bénitier, some ancient fonts, and the clever sculpturing of a boat representing the arms of the town; a device also found on the left front of the tower.
There is also a large ossuary in the corner of the small churchyard, now disused. These ossuaries, or reliquaires, in the graveyards of Brittany were built to carry out a curious and somewhat barbarous custom. It was considered by "those of old time" to be paying deference to the dead to dig up their coffins after a certain number of years, and to place the skulls and bones in the ossuary, arranging them on shelves and labelling them in a British Museum style so that all might gaze upon them as they went by. This custom is still kept up in some places; for, as we have said, the Bretons are a slow moving people in the way of progress, and cling to their habits and customs as tenaciously as the Medes and Persians did to their laws. They are not ambitious, and what sufficed for the sires a generation or two ago suffices for the sons to-day.
But to us, the chief beauty of the town was its little port, with its stone pier. The houses leading down to it are the quaintest in Roscoff, of sixteenth century date, with many angles and gables. In one of them lodged Charles Stuart, the Young Pretender, when he escaped after the battle of Culloden, the quaintest and most interesting of all.
Looking back from the end of the jetty, it lies prominently before you, together with the whole town, forming a group full of wonderful tone and picturesque beauty. In the foreground are the vessels in the harbour, with masts rising like a small forest, and flags gaily flying. The water which plashes against the stone pier is the greenest, purest, most translucent ever seen. It dazzled by its brilliancy and appeared to "hold the light." Before us stretched the great Atlantic, to-day calm and sleeping and reflecting the sun travelling homewards; but often lashed to furious moods, which break madly over the pier, and send their spray far over the houses. Few scenes in Brittany are more characteristic and impressive than this little unknown town.
A narrow channel lies between Roscoff and L'Ile de Batz, which would form a fine harbour of refuge if it were not for the strong currents for ever running there. At high water the island is half submerged. It is here that St. Pol first came from Cornwall, intending to live there the remainder of his life; but, as we have seen, he was made Bishop of Léon, and had to take up his abode in the larger town.
No tree of any height is to be seen here, but the tamarisk grows in great abundance. All the men are sailors and pass their lives upon the water, coming home merely to rest. The women cultivate the ground. The church possesses, and preserves as its greatest treasure, a stole worn by St. Pol. Tradition has it that when St. Pol landed, the island was a prey to a fierce and fiery dragon, whom the monk conquered by throwing his stole round the neck of the monster and commanding it to cast itself into the sea; a command it instantly and amiably obeyed by rushing to the top of a high rock and plunging for ever beneath the waves. The rock is still called in Breton language Toul ar Sarpent, signifying Serpent's Hole.
Roscoff itself is extremely fertile; the deadly aspect of the little town is not extended to the surrounding plains. The climate is much influenced by the Gulf Stream, and the winters are temperate. Flowers and vegetables grow here all the year round that in less favoured districts are found only in summer. Like Provence in the far South, Roscoff is famous for its primeurs, or early vegetables. If you go to some of the great markets in Paris in the spring and notice certain country people with large round hats, very primitive in appearance, disposing of these vegetables, you may at once know them for Bretons from Roscoff. You will not fall in love with them; they are plain, honest, and stupid. We found the few people we spoke to in Roscoff quite answering to this description, and could make nothing of them.
On our way back to the station we visited the great natural curiosity of the place: a fig tree whose branches cover an area of nearly two hundred square yards, supported by blocks of wood or by solid masonry built up for the purpose. It yields an immense quantity of fruit, and would shield a small army beneath its foliage. Its immense trunk is knotted and twisted about in all directions; but the tree is full of life and vigour, and probably without parallel in the world.