"The ship drew on: it had safely passed the strait, which some volcanic shock has made between the isle of Calasareigne and the isle of Jaros; had doubled Pomègue, and approached the harbour under topsails, jib, and foresail, but so slowly and sedately that the idlers, with that instinct which misfortune sends before it, asked one another what misfortune could have happened on board. However, those experienced in navigation saw plainly that, if any accident had occurred, it was not to the vessel herself, for she bore down with all the evidence of being skilfully handled, the anchor ready to be dropped, the bowsprit-shrouds loose, and, beside the pilot, who was steering the _Pharaon_ by the narrow entrance of the port Marseilles, was a young man, who, with activity and vigilant eye, watched every motion of the ship, and repeated each direction of the pilot. "The vague disquietude which prevailed amongst the spectators had so much affected one of the crowd that he did not await the arrival of the vessel in harbour, but, jumping into a small skiff, desired to be pulled alongside the _Pharaon_, which he reached as she rounded the creek of La Réserve." The process of coming into harbour at Marseilles does not differ greatly to-day from the description given by Dumas. New harbour works have been constructed, and sailing-ships have mostly given way to great steamers, but the channel winds and twists as of old under the lofty brow, capped by the sailors' church of Notre Dame de la Garde, which is to-day a tawdry, bizarre shrine, as compared with the motive which inspired the devout to ascend its heights to pray for those who go down to the sea in ships. Marseilles, of all cities of France, more even than Bordeaux or Lyons, is possessed of that individuality which stands out strong on the background of France--the land and the nation. In the commercial world its importance gives it a high rank, and its _affaires_ are regulated by no clues sent each morning by post or by telegraph from the world's other marts of trade. It has, moreover, in the Canebière, one of the truly great streets of the world. Dumas remarked it, and so, too, have many others, who know its gay cosmopolitan aspect at all the hours of day and night. From "The Count of Monte Cristo," the following lines describe it justly and truly, and in a way that fits it admirably, in spite of the fact that Dumas wrote of it as it was a hundred years ago: "The young sailor jumped into the skiff, and sat down in the stern, desiring to be put ashore at the Canebière. The two rowers bent to their work, and the little boat glided away as rapidly as possible in the midst of the thousand vessels which choke up the narrow way which leads between the two rows of ships from the mouth of the harbour to the Quai d'Orléans.