

Transcribed from the 1864 Chapman and Hall “Tales of All Countries”
edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org





                     THE CHÂTEAU OF PRINCE POLIGNAC.


FEW Englishmen or Englishwomen are intimately acquainted with the little
town of Le Puy.  It is the capital of the old province of Le Velay, which
also is now but little known, even to French ears, for it is in these
days called by the imperial name of the Department of the Haute Loire.
It is to the south-east of Auvergne, and is nearly in the centre of the
southern half of France.

But few towns, merely as towns, can be better worth visiting.  In the
first place, the volcanic formation of the ground on which it stands is
not only singular in the extreme, so as to be interesting to the
geologist, but it is so picturesque as to be equally gratifying to the
general tourist.  Within a narrow valley there stand several rocks,
rising up from the ground with absolute abruptness.  Round two of these
the town clusters, and a third stands but a mile distant, forming the
centre of a faubourg, or suburb.  These rocks appear to be, and I believe
are, the harder particles of volcanic matter, which have not been carried
away through successive ages by the joint agency of water and air.

When the tide of lava ran down between the hills the surface left was no
doubt on a level with the heads of these rocks; but here and there the
deposit became harder than elsewhere, and these harder points have
remained, lifting up their steep heads in a line through the valley.

The highest of these is called the Rocher de Corneille.  Round this and
up its steep sides the town stands.  On its highest summit there was an
old castle; and there now is, or will be before these pages are printed,
a colossal figure in bronze of the Virgin Mary, made from the cannon
taken at Sebastopol.  Half-way down the hill the cathedral is built, a
singularly gloomy edifice,—Romanesque, as it is called, in its style, but
extremely similar in its mode of architecture to what we know of
Byzantine structures.  But there has been no surface on the rock side
large enough to form a resting-place for the church, which has therefore
been built out on huge supporting piles, which form a porch below the
west front; so that the approach is by numerous steps laid along the side
of the wall below the church, forming a wondrous flight of stairs.  Let
all men who may find themselves stopping at Le Puy visit the top of these
stairs at the time of the setting sun, and look down from thence through
the framework of the porch on the town beneath, and at the hill-side
beyond.

Behind the church is the seminary of the priests, with its beautiful
walks stretching round the Rocher de Corneille, and overlooking the town
and valley below.

Next to this rock, and within a quarter of a mile of it, is the second
peak, called the Rock of the Needle.  It rises narrow, sharp, and abrupt
from the valley, allowing of no buildings on its sides.  But on its very
point has been erected a church sacred to St. Michael, that lover of rock
summits, accessible by stairs cut from the stone.  This, perhaps—this
rock, I mean—is the most wonderful of the wonders which Nature has formed
at La Puy.

Above this, at a mile’s distance, is the rock of Espailly, formed in the
same way, and almost equally precipitous.  On its summit is a castle,
having its own legend, and professing to have been the residence of
Charles VII., when little of France belonged to its kings but the
provinces of Berry, Auvergne, and Le Velay.  Some three miles farther up
there is another volcanic rock, larger, indeed, but equally sudden in its
spring,—equally remarkable as rising abruptly from the valley,—on which
stands the castle and old family residence of the house of Polignac.  It
was lost by them at the Revolution, but was repurchased by the minister
of Charles X., and is still the property of the head of the race.

Le Puy itself is a small, moderate, pleasant French town, in which the
language of the people has not the pure Parisian aroma, nor is the glory
of the boulevards of the capital emulated in its streets.  These are
crooked, narrow, steep, and intricate, forming here and there excellent
sketches for a lover of street picturesque beauty; but hurtful to the
feet with their small, round-topped paving stones, and not always as
clean as pedestrian ladies might desire.

And now I would ask my readers to join me at the morning table d’hôte at
the Hotel des Ambassadeurs.  It will of course be understood that this
does not mean a breakfast in the ordinary fashion of England, consisting
of tea or coffee, bread and butter, and perhaps a boiled egg.  It
comprises all the requisites for a composite dinner, excepting soup; and
as one gets farther south in France, this meal is called dinner.  It is,
however, eaten without any prejudice to another similar and somewhat
longer meal at six or seven o’clock, which, when the above name is taken
up by the earlier enterprise, is styled supper.

The déje