Brittany

“ AMERICANS IN BRITTANY When the Yankees return home after the great war is over, those who have been quartered in Brittany will carry back a vivid impression of long stretches of green forests and fields, of tumbling green waters, of gray-and-white skies with dashes of tender blue, of glinting sunshine lying warm on blue slate roofs, of low stone villages huddled about quaint church-towers, and of granite buildings of unknown antiquity—and some may carry home recollections of yellow- or auburn-haired girls, rosy-cheeked, clad in heavy black peasant costumes and white muslin "coiffes." ”

“ The roads and the villages are full of people returning from the "pardon," and all these people are amazed at seeing pass this carriage-load of madmen with the three sailors dancing on the top.
The splendour of June throws over this Brittany its charm and its life; the breeze is mild and warm beneath the grey sky; the tall grass, full of red flowers; the trees, of an emerald green, filled with cockchafers. ”

“ But our lasting impressions of Brittany are of a people and of a country, interesting for their isolation from the rest of Europe: of a people who are, as has been well said, “dwelling in an heroic past that possibly never existed, consoling the failures of their destiny by beautiful fancies, and throwing a grace over their hard, unhopeful lives with romantic dreams and traditions” ”

“ I was in the Near East when these little letters of Yves reached me; they brought me, in their simplicity, the already far-off perfume of the Breton country.
My memories of Brittany were fading fast. Even now I seemed to see them as through a mist of dreamland; the reefs I had known so well, the lights on the coast, Cape Finistère with its great dark rocks; and the dangerous approaches to Ushant on winter evenings, and the west wind blowing under a mournful sky, in the fall of December nights. From where I was now, it all seemed a vision of a sunless country. ”

“ The country inland is as original as the coast, and both the peasant on shore and the sailor on the sea are Breton to the core. Never has Brittany been called charming or gracious, never lovely or sweet, but always cold, though not so in climate, which is always terrible and austere. ”

“ Of all the many localities celebrated in the fairy lore of Brittany none is so famous as Broceliande. Broceliande! “The sound is like a bell,” a far, faëry chime in a twilit forest. In the name Broceliande there seems to be gathered all the tender charm, the rich and haunting mystery, the remote magic of Brittany and Breton lore. It is, indeed, the title to the rarest book in the library of poetic and traditional romance. ”

“ The sun shines full on the wrinkled faces of the men, and on the white caps of the women, and lights up the group with unwonted brilliancy; even the sober costumes of the people with their blue and brown stuffs, and the black, and white and fawn-coloured, cattle which they lead, would, if recorded faithfully by a painter, stand out in high accents of colour against the low-toned land; a rustic picture so fitful and vanishing that only the rapid artist, who has presented Brittany to us in these pages (as it has never been pictured before) , could depict. ”

“ A very land of desolation this, yet grand and even beautiful in its rugged, mournful way, for there is a vein of poetry which runs throughout Brittany, even in its loneliest and most desolate parts, a poetry which finds its expression in the history of its people, set as it is to the music of its wild winds, waves, and rugged moorlands, music in a minor key wailing across wastes and through valleys and forests, music which sings of love and passion, the free untamable spirit of the Celt, with all its romance and love of the supernatural. ”

“ You have over-exerted both your mind and your body; and I see that you are always better and happier when you are with me in Brittany."
I had not strength of mind to say no; and, besides, I had persuaded myself that neither danger nor harm could accrue from my following the course he pointed out. We returned, therefore, to Brittany, after a very short stay in Paris. The journey seemed an eternity; and, when once I was embarked in it, more than one misgiving as to my own resolution and firmness certainly did cross my heart. ”

“ But if you would dare her wiles you must come alone to her fountain by night, for she shuns even the half-gloom that is day in shadowy Broceliande. The peasants when they speak of her will assure you that she and her kind are pagan princesses of Brittany who would have none of Christianity when the holy Apostles brought it to Armorica, and who must dwell here under a ban, outcast and abhorred. ”

“ In Brittany, on the contrary, on the most ancient geological formation on our globe, on that soil of granite and of flint, lives a race solid as that granite, sharp as that flint, a sturdy and antique race. Just as much as Normandy progresses, Brittany retrogrades. Witty, lively, and too imaginative, the impossible, the utterly absurd, are ever welcome to her. But, if wrong on many points, she is great upon a most important one ”

“ THE SAINTS OF BRITTANY An important department in Breton folk-lore is the hagiology of the province—the legendary lore of its saints. This, indeed, holds almost as much of the marvellous as its folk-tales, ballads, and historical legends, and in perusing the tales of Brittany’s saintly heroes we have an opportunity of observing how the motifs of popular fiction and even of pagan belief reflect upon religious romance. ”

“ Clear, ringing voices, joyous laughter, and now and then deep manly voices mingled with the neighing of horses. The travellers were the Duchess of Brittany, her son, and attendants. The seneschal rode in advance with two heralds, followed by Constance in a riding-habit of green silk, mounted upon a beautiful palfrey. Höel rode by her side, his fiery bay taking the lead whenever the road narrowed, to make room for the Duchess’s horse. Then came Duke Arthur and Alan on prancing black steeds. ”

“ The coast-line is ragged, indented, and inhospitable, lined with deep reefs and broken by the estuaries of brawling rivers. In the southern portion the district known as ‘the Emerald Coast’ presents an almost subtropical appearance; the air is mild and the whole region pleasant and fruitful. But with this exception Brittany is a country of bleak shores and grey seas, barren moorland and dreary horizons, such a land as legend loves, such a region, cut off and isolated from the highways of humanity, as the discarded genii of ancient faiths might seek as a last stronghold. ”

“ Many are the casual travellers who know Normandy and Brittany, at least know them by name and perhaps something more, but how many of those who annually skim across France, in summer to Switzerland and in winter to the Riviera or to Italy, there to live in seven-franc-a-day pensions, and drink a particularly vile brand of tea, know where Brittany leaves off and Normandy begins, or have more than the vaguest of vague notions as to whether the charming little provincial capital of Nantes, on the Loire, is in Brittany or in Poitou. ”

“ The native, of course, reviles the car and its occupants, not because he hates them,—for they are one of the mainstays of the inns of the countryside,—but merely to display that untamable spirit of independence, which every mother’s son of a French peasant has developed to a high degree.
In Brittany, as in most other lands,—in summer,—the traveller by road gathers in a fine crop of wingy, stingy things, which project themselves into one’s eyes with a formidable force when one goes at them with a swift-moving car. ”

“ This is something more than mere superstition, it is a philosophical turn of mind, and that is good for a man. The heroes of legend are frequently those of history. One may cite Joan of Arc with relation to old France, and Duguesclin in Brittany. There is a difference, of course, and it is wide, but the comparison will serve, as there is no other character in all the history of Brittany—unless it be that of Duguay-Trouin, the Corsair of St. Malo—who stands out so distinctly in the popular mind as does Duguesclin, “the real Breton.” ”

“ In Brittany, in every parish church and at every wayside shrine, is almost always to be found not only a little knot of devoutly kneeling peasants, but, on all occasions of mark, a congregation overflowing beyond the doors. ”

“ The sea-birds of Brittany, like those of other rock-bound shores, are ever interesting to the traveller. Like the gulls of London Bridge, those near the great bay of Concarneau are wonderfully tame and singularly ravenous, and apparently eat all day. ”

“ An Englishman who spent some time in Brittany in 1818 says of the peasants:—“They are rude, uncivilised, simple, and dirty in their habits; they live literally like pigs, lying upon the ground and eating chestnuts boiled in milk as their principal food. Their houses are generally built of mud, without order or convenience, and it is a common thing in Brittany for men, women, children, and animals to sleep together in the same apartment, upon no resting-place but the earth covered with straw.” ”

“ In the seventeenth century French Brittany was completely permeated by Jesuitical customs and by the modes of piety common to the rest of the world. Up to that time the religion of the country had had features of its own, its special characteristic being the worship of saints. Among the many peculiarities for which Brittany is noteworthy, its local hagiography is assuredly the most remarkable. Going through the country on foot there is one thing which immediately strikes the observer. ”

“ Now the soft lapping of the waves replaces the roar of cannon; the green fields of Brittany, the crumbling buildings of their old home; but their little hearts are heavy, many a baby is crying for "maman" when bed-time comes. Their wan cheeks are growing rosy in the breezes from the Atlantic. Good butter, milk, eggs and peaceful sunny days, freedom from the fear of bombardment, are building up their fragile little bodies, and the strained look is leaving their eyes, and they are becoming normal children again. ”

“ It would be strange indeed if a country sprinkled with white caps, and set thickly in summer with the brightest blossoms of the fields, should not attract artists in search of picturesque costume and scenes of pastoral life. Rougher and wilder than Normandy, more thinly populated, and less visited by the tourists, Brittany offers better opportunities for outdoor study, and more suggestive scenes for the painter. Nowhere in France are there finer peasantry; nowhere do we see more dignity of aspect in field labour, more nobility of feature amongst men and women ”

“ One feels, whether at a pig market or a wayside shrine, that these people are dreamers living in a romantic past. Unchanged and unpolished by the outside world, they cling to their own traditions; every stone in their beloved country is invested by them with poetic and heroic associations. Brittany looks as if it must have always been as it is now, even in the days of the Phœnicians; and it seems impossible to imagine the country inhabited by any but medieval people. ”

“ It was a time, therefore, when men went warily, mistrustfully, with eyes glancing to right and left for fear of enemies, and ears open to listen to the breath of treachery. Above all, on the borders of Brittany was such watchfulness needed. What wonder then if the Sieur de Mereac, riding homewards from the chase with his daughter and kinsman beside him, pondered first on the counsel of one and then of the other, finally deciding that the Frenchman's fate must be tempered with justice, but small mercy, and that the rope end was the best meed for the enemy of the Duchess Anne? ”

“ Is cheated of its prey.
Now Bretons, let the Britons see
The heart of Brittany!
Brothers, we come to save, our swords
Are sheathed, our hands are free.
There is a fiercer fight toward,
A fiercer foe than we! ”

“ As he sits and listens with perplexed attention to the principal speaker, and others gather round in the common room to hear the oracle, we have a picture which tells its story with singular eloquence, and presents to us the common everyday life of the people of lower Brittany with a truthfulness and vivacity seldom, if ever, exceeded. The only bright colour in the picture is in the red sashes of the men and in one or two small ornaments worn by the women. ”

“ The religious fervour of the Breton folk has been remarked of all who know them howsoever slightly. It is universal, and, if it be more apparent in one place than any other, it is in the Department of Finistère, and it is not in the cities and towns that it reaches its greatest height, but mostly in the country-side, or on the seacoast among the labourers and the fisher-folk.
The religion of Brittany to-day is of the people and for the people. ”

“ The ranges of the Montaignes Noires and the Monts d'Arrez are insignificant. Yet the valleys are pretty, but never grand. The charm of Brittany is to be found in the people and in the churches. The former with their peculiar costumes, and their customs are full of interest, and the latter are of remarkable beauty and quaintness. The ordinary tourist will hardly see much of the costume unless he attends a pardon, the Patron of the Irish peasant; the patronal feast at some chapel frequented only on the day of the pardon. ”

“ The time has long since passed when travellers reviled Brittany as a province where “husbandry was no further advanced than among the Hurons,” as a writer of the eighteenth century said within twenty-four hours after he had crossed the boundary between Normandy and Brittany, at Pontorson, where the causeway road branches off to Mont St. Michel. Evidences of husbandry are still very much to the fore, but it is more advanced in the interior, at least; on the coast the harvest of the sea takes its place. ”