Memoir, Correspondence, and Miscellanies, From the Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2Jefferson, Thomas
History
Memoir, Correspondence, and Miscellanies, From the Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2
Jefferson, Thomas
United States -- Politics and government -- 1775-1783; United States -- Politics and government -- 1783-1865
April 6. _Hieres_. This is a plain of two or three miles diameter,
bounded by the sea on one side, and mountains of rock on the other. The
soil is reddish, gravelly, tolerably good, and well watered. It is in
olives, mulberries, vines, figs, corn, and some flax. There are also
some cherry trees. From Hieres to the sea, which is two or three miles,
is a grove of orange trees, olives, and mulberries. The largest orange
tree is of two feet diameter one way, and one foot the other (for the
section of all the larger ones would be an oval, not a round), and about
twenty feet high. Such a tree will yield about six thousand oranges a
year. The garden of M. Fille has fifteen thousand six hundred orange,
trees. Some years they yield forty thousand livres, some only ten
thousand; but generally about twenty-five thousand. The trees are from
eight to ten feet apart. They are blossoming and bearing, all the year,
flowers and fruit in every stage at the same time. But the best fruit
is that which is gathered in April and May. Hieres is a village of about
five thousand inhabitants, at the foot of a mountain, which covers it
from the north, and from which extends a plain of two or three miles to
the sea-shore. It has no port. Here are palm trees twenty or thirty feet
high, but they bear no fruit. There is also a botanical garden kept by
the King. Considerable salt-ponds here. Hieres is six miles from the
public road. It is built on a narrow spur of the mountain. The streets
in every direction are steep, in steps of stairs, and about eight feet
wide. No carriage of any kind can enter it. The wealthier inhabitants
use _chaises à porteurs_. But there are few wealthy, the bulk of the
inhabitants being laborers of the earth. At a league’s distance in the
sea is an island, on which is the Chateau de Géans, belonging to the
Marquis de Pontoives: there is a causeway leading to it. The cold of the
last November killed the leaves of a great number of the orange-trees,
and some of the trees themselves.
From Hieres to _Cuers, Pignans, Luc_, is mostly a plain, with mountains
on each hand at a mile or two distance. The soil is generally reddish,
and the latter part very red and good. The growth is olives, figs,
vines, mulberries, corn, clover, and lucerne. The olive trees are
from three to four feet in diameter. There are hedges of pomegranates,
sweet-briar, and broom. A great deal of thyme growing wild. There are
some enclosures of stone; some sheep and goats.
April 9. From Luc to _Vidavban, Muy, Frejus_, the road leads through
vallies, and crosses occasionally the mountains which separate them. The
vallies are tolerably good, always red and stony, gravelly or gritty.
Their produce as before. The mountains are barren.
_Lesterelle, Napoule_. Eighteen miles of ascent and descent of a very
high mountain. Its growth, where capable of any, two-leaved pine, very
small, and some chêne vert.
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