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There are no trolley-lines in Saint Pierre and but few voitures. The ox-cart is here, attendant on the Salt Vessels, carrying off the salt from them to the warehouses. It is a decidedly French cart, with high sides. And the oxen wear a curious neck-yoke adorned with a fluffy sheep-skin. A French driver urges the oxen to move, with many a “Marche donc”.
Not the least interesting sights on Saint Pierre streets are the gay uniforms of the gendarmes. But even these give place to the little dog-carts everywhere, looking as if they had been transplanted out of Belgium.
Two important and rather unique landmarks stand out at Saint Pierre above all others; one, the figure of the Blessed Virgin, life size, set in a deep niche of the cliff-side; the other, a huge Crucifix, mounted high on a slim wooden Cross, standing on the hills above the town, and silhouetted clear and strong against the sky.
Many stories centre around the origin of this cross. Some say it was erected by the citizens to show their gratitude for a miraculous preservation at the time of some great winter storm; others, that it was erected in order that sailors leaving port might be reminded to turn their thoughts and prayers to Him, Who alone has power to still the waves and give prosperity. Still another story runs, that it is for sailors entering port, to remind them to return thanks to Him Who has brought them safely out of dangers and given them, perhaps in addition, “a good catch”. To those who have lost—it points the only Comforter.
The street passing under the shadow of this Cross goes by the distinctive name of Rue Calvaire. It is not surprising, therefore, to have some fishwife, whose photograph you have just taken, tell you, when asked for her address, that she lives “up ag’in the Cross”; that is, if she is of Newfoundland origin, and speaks English; if she is French, “‘Rue Calvaire’, Madame, s’il vous plait”—the street of the Cross.
The women of Saint Pierre wash their clothes in the streams, of which there are several running down the hills at the back of the town. They dam up the water with stones so as to form little pools, and kneel in wooden boxes on the edge of these to wash. They slap the linen with a flat piece of wood to make it very clean and white, and when all is done, they carry it in a wet bundle on their backs up the hill, to spread it to dry on the great rocks at the foot of the Crucifix.
A long way below this curious landmark of the hills, lies the cemetery, one of the most beautiful spots in Saint Pierre. It has been made so by a great deal of work, for so solid is the barren rock here that each grave has had to be blasted out with charge after charge of dynamite. But in the end each grave is surrounded by a wooden coping surmounted at one end by a wooden cross painted black or white. The coping is filled in with earth sifted from the debris of the blasts or brought from a distance. In these enclosures flowers are massed till the entire cemetery has the appearance of one great garden.
Love of flowers is a marked characteristic of the Saint Pierrais people. Though there is practically no soil in the place, every window is a mass of potted blooms. All these lilies, geraniums, oleanders, cacti, begonias, etc., were brought from France. It is even said that the soil in one little garden was brought here from France. Every Saturday morning a little boy goes the rounds of the pensions and perhaps the cafes, on his arm a small basket with a few nosegays of sweet old-fashioned flowers. And these are bought up at once.
The central building of interest in Saint Pierre is the fine white church, built to replace the old Cathedral destroyed by fire several years ago, together with the Palais du Justice.