To the south of the river lies a rich, undulating, vine-bearing country, rich in pasturage and harvest, sown with pleasant villages and smiling country houses, and watered by full streams and little rivers. To the north, the appearance of the country changes abruptly. When the traveller has crossed the alluvial zone of the Adour he sees before him a thin, dry, sandy level of a comparatively recent marine formation. Its only products are rye, millet, and maize; its only vegetation, forests of pines and scattered coppices of oaks; beyond these, and they do not extend far, all cultivation ceases, and the soil is stripped of verdure; you enter upon the Landes--seemingly vast as a sea--occupied by permanent or periodical swamps; and where, over a space of several square leagues, in an horizon apparently boundless, you perceive nothing but heaths, sheepfolds or steadings for the flocks of sheep that traverse these deserts, and shepherds keeping mute watch over their animals, living wholly among them, and having no intercourse with the rest of humanity, except when once a week they seek their masters' houses to procure their supply of provisions. It is these shepherds only (_Landescots_ and _Aouillys_), and not, as is generally supposed, all the peasants of the Landes, who are perched upon stilts, so as to survey from afar their wandering flocks, and to traverse more safely the marshes which frequently lie across their path. Wild and uncouth are the figures which these stilt-walkers present, as they move rapidly over the country, often at the rate of six or seven miles an hour; occasionally indulging in an interval of rest, by the aid of a third wooden support at the back (curved at the top, so as to fit the hollow of the body), while they pursue their favourite pastime of knitting. The dress of the Landescot is singularly rude. His coat or paletôt is a fleece; cuisses and greaves of the same material protect his legs and thighs; his feet are thrust into sabots and coarse woollen socks, which cover only the heels and instep. Over his shoulder hangs the gourd which contains his week's store of provisions: some mouldy rye-bread, a few sardines, some onions and cloves of garlic, and a flask of thin sour wine. From sunrise to sunset he lives upon the stilts, never touching the ground. Sometimes he drives his flock home at eventide; sometimes he bivouacs _sub jove frigido_, under the cold heaven of night. Unbuckling his stilts, and producing his flint and steel, he soon kindles a cheery fire of fir-branches, and gathering his sheepskins round him, composes himself to sleep; his only annoyances being the musquitoes, and his fears of the evil tricks of wizard or witch, who may peradventure catch a glimpse of him in the moonlight, as they ride past on their besom to some unholy gathering or demon-dance.