NOTRE DAME DE LOURDES.
“THOU WEL OF MERCY, SINFUL SOULES CURE.”—CHAUCER.
Lourdes, apart from any religious interest, is well worth a visit, for it is an old historic place. “Bigerronum arx antiqua fuit Luparda, quæ nunc Lourda est,” says Julius Scaliger. It is associated with the Romans, the Moors, the paladins of Charlemagne, and the flower of French and English chivalry, and is celebrated by Gregory of Tours, Froissart, Monstrelet, and all the ancient chroniclers of the land. Situated at the entrance of the seven valleys of the Lavedan on the one side, and the rich sunny plains of Béarn on the other, under a sky as soft and bright as that of Italy, it is as attractive to the eye of the tourist as to the soul of the archæologist and the pilgrim.
We arrived at Lourdes in less than an hour after leaving Tarbes. The station is some distance from town, and at least a mile from the world-famous grotto; but there are always hacks and omnibuses eager to take the visitor to one of the numerous hotels. The depot is encumbered with luggage and crowded with pilgrims going and coming, and on the side tracks are long trains of empty cars that tell of the importance of the station—an importance solely due to the immense number of pilgrims, who sometimes amount to five hundred thousand a year.
On leaving the station, one naturally looks around to discover the renowned sanctuary of Notre Dame de Lourdes, but not a glimpse of it is to be seen. Nothing meets the eye but a gray picturesque town shut in by the outlying Pyrenees. Nothing could be lovelier than the fresh green valley in which it stands, framed by hills whose sides are blackened with débris from the immense quarries of slate. It is only a pleasant walk to the town in good weather, which gives one an opportunity of taking in the features of the charming landscape. Flowers bloom in the hedge-rows, elms and ash-trees dot the grassy meadows, the hillsides beneath the quarries are luxuriant with vineyards and fields of waving grain. The way is lively with hurrying pilgrims, all intent on their own business and regardless of you; some saying their rosaries, others in a band singing some pious hymn, and many solitary ones absorbed in their own reflections.
We soon reach the town. The houses are of stone with slated roofs. Nearly every one is a hotel, or a lodging-house, or a shop for the sale of religious objects. The windows are full of rosaries, medallions inscribed with the words of the Virgin to Bernadette, miniature grottos, photographs—in short, everything that can recall the wonderful history of the grotto of Massabielle. The very silk kerchiefs in the windows, such as the peasants wear on their heads, are stamped with the Virgin in her niche. The old part of the town has narrow streets, without any sidewalks, paved with cobble-stones quite in harmony with the penitential spirit of a true pilgrim. They are mere lanes, fearful in muddy weather when crowded with people in danger at every step from the carriages.
The Hotel de la Grotte is the nearest to the church of Notre Dame de Lourdes, and very pleasantly situated at a convenient walking distance from it. At one of our visits to the place, we stopped at the Hotel des Pyrénées in the heart of the town, where we were made very comfortable; but the second time, it was in the height of the season, and there was not a room to be had in any of the hotels, and had we not providentially stumbled on a friend with a vacant room at his command, we might have been forced to spend the night in the church—no great penance, to be sure, in so heavenly a place, where Masses begin at midnight and do not cease till afternoon. The only safe way is to secure rooms beforehand, especially when the place is most frequented.
Lourdes is a small town of about five thousand inhabitants, mostly workers in marble, slate, etc., that is, those who do not keep a hotel, or a café, or a shop of some kind; for the good people seem quite ready to avail themselves of every opportunity of benefiting by the piety that brings so many strangers among them. They are shrewd, quick-witted, upright, and kind-hearted; attached to their ancient traditions, and firm in their faith as their rock-built houses. They have always been characterized by their devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Five of the chapels in the parish church are dedicated to her honor. The confraternities of the Scapular and the Rosary are flourishing, and the congregation of the Enfants de Marie is one of the oldest in the country. The dark-eyed women of Lourdes have a Spanish look, and are quite picturesque in their scarlet capulets or black capuchins, but the men have mostly laid aside the Bigorrais cloak, once so sought after that they were exported from the country, and mentioned by learned men. Pope Gregory I., in a letter to Eulogius, Bishop of Alexandria, thus alludes to them: “Sex minora Aquitanica pallia.” S. Paulinus of Nola, in a letter to Ausonius, says: “Dignaque pellitis habitas deserta Bigerris.” “Bigerricam vestem, brevem atque hispidam,” says Sulpicius Severus. And the poet Fortunatus, in his life of S. Martin, says: “Induitur sanctus hirsuta Bigerrica palla.”