The Cathedrals of Southern FranceMansfield, M. F. (Milburg Francisco)
History
The Cathedrals of Southern France
Mansfield, M. F. (Milburg Francisco)
Cathedrals -- France; France -- Description and travel
"A peculiarity of the Riviera is that each of the prominent
watering-places possesses a tutelary deity of our own. (Modest this!)
Thus, for instance, no visitor to Cannes is allowed to forget the name
of Lord Brougham, while the interest at Beaulieu and Cap Martin centres
around another great English statesman, Lord Salisbury. Cap d'Antibes
has (or had) for its _genius loci_ Grant Allen, and Valescure is chiefly
concerned with Mrs. Humphry Ward and Mrs. Oliphant."
This quotation is, perhaps, enough to make the writer's point here: Why
go to the Riviera to think of Lord Brougham, long since dead and gone,
any more than to Monte Carlo to be reminded of the unfortunate end which
happened to the great system for "breaking the bank" of Lord----, a
nineteenth-century nobleman of notoriety--if not of fame?
The charm of situation of the Riviera is great, and the interest
awakened by its many reminders of the historied past is equally so; but,
with regard to its architectural remains, the most ready and willing
temperament will be doomed to disappointment.
The cathedral cities of the Riviera are not of irresistible attraction
as shrines of the Christian faith; but they have much else, either
within their confines or in the immediate neighbourhood, which will go
far to make up for the deficiency of their religious monuments.
It is not that the architectural remains of churches of another day, and
secular establishments, are wholly wanting. Far from it; Fréjus, Toulon,
Grasse, and Cannes are possessed of delightful old churches, though they
are not of ranking greatness, or splendour.
Still the fact remains that, of themselves, the natural beauties of the
region and the heritage of a historic past are not enough to attract the
throngs which, for any one of a dozen suspected reasons, annually, from
November to March, flock hither to this range of towns, which extends
from Hyères and St. Raphael, on the west, to Bordighera and Ospadeletti,
just over the Italian border, on the east.
It is truly historic ground, this; perhaps more visibly impressed upon
the mind and imagination than any other in the world, if we except the
Holy Land itself.
Along this boundary were the two main routes, by land and by water,
through which the warlike and civil institutions of Rome first made
their way into Gaul, conquered it, and impressed thereon indelibly for
five hundred years the mighty power which their ambition urged forward.
At Cimiez, a suburb of Nice, they have left a well-preserved
amphitheatre; at Antibes the remains of Roman towers; Villefranche--the
port of Nice--was formerly a Roman port; Fréjus, the former _Forum
Julii_, has remains of its ancient harbour, its city walls, an
amphitheatre, a gateway, and an arch, and, at some distance from the
city, the chief of all neighbouring remains, an aqueduct, the crumbling
stones of which can be traced for many miles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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