Vaucouleurs

“ Like the Quakers, the Vaudois were a quiet, even a timid people. They did not seek the notice or the glory of the world. The life they loved the best was that of their lonely Alpine valleys, the simple days of shepherding among the fairy-haunted hills, the evenings when the head of every house read, in his own dialect, the Bible to his assembled children; the bursting of the flowers in spring (flowers which the Fantines, the Vaudois fairies, watch and water every day until they blow) ; the long days out on the hills in summer, when the cattle are led to the upper meadows ”

“ The drive to Vaucluse is of about three quarters of an hour; and though the river, as I say, was promising, the big pale hills, as the road winds into them, did not look as if their slopes of stone and shrub were a nestling-place for superior scenery. It is a part of the merit of Vaucluse, indeed, that it is as much as possible a surprise. The place has a right to its name, for the valley appears impenetrable until you get fairly into it. One perverse twist follows another, until the omnibus suddenly deposits you in front of the "cabinet" of Petrarch. ”

“ In the beginning of the month of September of my second year, I hired a coach with three [Pg 264] horses again, (for no god of them all is so fond of an uneven number as these coach-masters,) and, with part of my family, took the road to Vaucluse. It passes first over a fertile alluvial plain, formed, in remote ages, by the Rhone and Durance when they overflowed their banks, as the Oby and Tobol do now. Then we traversed a country of corn, wine, and oil, and descended to Lisle, a little town on the Sorgues, the river of Vaucluse, from whose fountain it is distant about four miles. ”

“ And many remember the owner of Vaucluse—that pure hearted Christian and cultivated gentleman, who, late in life, devoted himself to the Episcopal ministry, and labored faithfully in the Master’s cause preaching in country churches, “without money, and without price.” Surely his reward is in heaven.
Besides these well ordered establishments, there were some others owned by inactive men, who smoked their pipes, read their books, left everything very much to the management of their negroes and seemed content to let things tumble down around them. ”

“ The afternoon waned. He pointed outside the car window. "See how different all this is from the part of the State which we have left," he said. "The landscape is still rural, but what mellowness it has; because it has been enriched by a larger, more generous human life. One can imagine what this whole section must have been in those old days, before the coming of war and desolation. And Vaucluse was the flower, the centre of it all!" His eye kindled. "Some day external prosperity will return, and then Vaucluse and her ideals will be needed more than ever ”

“ A thick mist having risen up from the valley, the Vaudois set out, late at night, under the guidance of Captain Poulat, a native of the district, who well knew the paths in the mountains. They climbed up on to the heights above, over icy slopes, passing across gaping crevices and along almost perpendicular rocks, admitting of their passage only in single file, sometimes dragging themselves along on their bellies, clinging to the rocks or to the tufts of grass, occasionally resting and praying, but never despairing. ”

“ This, then, is Petrarch's 'grotto;' this is the fountain of Vaucluse. Up from its deep reservoirs, from the mysterious basements of the mountain, wells the silent stream; pauseless 74and motionless it fills its urn, rises unruffled, glides until the brink is reached, then overflows, and foams, and dashes noisily, a cataract, among the boulders of the hills. Nothing at Vaucluse is more impressive than the contrast between the tranquil silence of the fountain and the roar of the released impetuous river. ”

“ Vaughan had said—
'How bright wert thou, when Shem's admiring eye,
Thy burnished, flaming arch did first descry;
When Terah, Nahor, Haran, Abram, Lot,
The youthful world's gray fathers in one knot,
Did with intentive looks watch every hour
For thy new light, and trembled at each shower!'
Indeed, all Campbell's 'Rainbow' is just a reflection of Vaughan's, and reminds you of those faint, pale shadows of the heavenly bow you sometimes see in the darkened and disarranged skies of spring. ”

“ A dusky opening in a range of purpling hills; a vision of a cluster of small white human homes; a shining, murmuring little river spanned by a wooden bridge; a towering background of bald, steep rock, cleft at its base into a shadowy cavern,—such is the first of my memories of the Vaucluse. At the entrance of the little town stands a low white-walled building, over the door of which is a tablet inscribed thus: "On the site of this café Petrarch established his study. ”

“ Who were these Vaudois—this tiny people, springing from Lyons in the twelfth century, and settled among the valleys of the Alps of Piedmont—this scanty, timid herd of mountain folk, for whose destruction the Inquisition was invented? They were, indeed, a remnant, pursued with fire and sword from their earliest days; burned alive in the twelfth century; hacked to death in the thirteenth; suffocated by hundreds under Francis I.; roasted slowly, tortured, hurled like stones down the mountains, slaughtered in every diabolic fashion through the whole diabolic seventeenth century ”

“ The Vaudois," says he, in another place, "are so called from their residence among the valleys and fastnesses of the Alps, and may well be considered as the remains of the purest primitive Christian church. Nor has it been possible to draw them within the pale of the Roman communion, notwithstanding the horrible persecutions exercised against them. At this time they have churches flourishing, as well in doctrine as in examples of a truly innocent life. I speak particularly of those of the Alpine valleys, of whom some are subjects of the king of France, and others of the Duke of Savoy." ”

“ A race of shepherds and martyrs, not of heroes. They could not do battle for their faith and wrestle for centuries with a stronger power, like the indomitable Huguenots of La Rochelle. They could not fight, but they could suffer. And their mild persistence it was impossible to subdue.
In 1530 the tidings of the Reform had penetrated into these quiet valleys. The Vaudois heard with delight that the faith which they had held through pain and death for centuries had arisen, stronger and more able, in the crowded world outside. ”

“ The Sun river tour of 1879, when introducing the “Rocky Mountain Husbandman,” comes fresh. It was then I rested a day with my friend, Robert Vaughn, who had cultivated on that lonely spot a fine farm, built a good home, and owned herds of horses and cattle. We talked of the early days gone by, of Indians and Indian hunting, and wound up the day of pleasure in a hunt among the feathered tribes—geese, ducks and swan. ”

“ This was what the Boers and the natives call the “king vulture,” one of which goes with every flock. He it is who rules the roost and also the carcase, which without his presence and permission none dare to attack. Whether this vile fowl is of a different species from the others, or whether he is a bird of more vigorous growth and constitution that has outgrown the rest and thus become their overlord, is more than I can tell. At least it is certain, as I can testify from long and constant observation, that almost every flock of vultures has its king. ”

“ Engaged in peaceful tillage, they had no means of defence, but fled to the rocks and caves, where their persecutors followed them, and being unable to reach them in their retreats, they piled up fuel at the mouths of the caverns, and so compelled the Vaudois to choose between death by suffocation or the sword. ”

“ One evening, in the twentieth year since he vanished, Wakefield is taking his customary walk towards the dwelling which he still calls his own. It is a gusty night of autumn, with frequent showers, that patter down upon the pavement, and are gone, before a man can put up his umbrella. ”

“ A NOBLE RESOLVE NOBLY CARRIED OUT.
It was morning. Walter Vaughan and his heir were partaking of an early meal before going to the chase. Just previous to their departure, “faithful Evan,” as he was called by the neighbours, entered the hall, and handed his master a letter, which he received with a trembling hand. Mr. Vaughan hastily broke the seal, and commenced perusing its contents, but before he had concluded its perusal, he became as pale as death, he shook like an aspen leaf, and his hand trembled violently. ”

“ It will be seen that these persecuted Vaudois had much in common with the modern sect of Quakers. Like their younger and more fortunate brethren, they would not swear and would not lie. War was no less to them than murder. They believed in no hierarchy, but only in the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. And for holding these tenets they were slaughtered and tormented throughout five centuries. ”

“ Game of all kinds was at this time so little abundant in the woods of Vacouas, that even a Creole, who is an intrepid hunter and a good shot, and can live where an European would starve, could not subsist himself and his dogs upon the produce of the chase. ”

“ After the six long flights had been achieved, around a sharp corner and up a little winding stairway, was the door which bore the name of Pierre Vauquelin. Inside, after stumbling along a narrow hall, as black as Erebus, and floundering through a curtained 29doorway, one came abruptly into the studio, and, in all probability, fell headlong over a little rattan stool, or an easel, or a box of paints, and was picked up by the host, and dusted, and put to rights, and made much of, like a bumped child. Thus restored to equanimity one was better able to appreciate what Pierre called la Boîte. ”

“ The Vaudois of the other valleys welcomed these poor exiles, and joyfully shared with them their own humble and scanty fare. They spread the table for all, and loaded it with polenta and roasted chestnuts, with the milk and butter of their mountains, to which they did not forget to add a cup of that red wine which their valleys produce. [108] Their enemies were amazed when they saw the whole community rise up as one man and depart. ”

“ I want you and Frank to go as quickly as you can across the river and rouse up every soul in the village. Get every team and plough in Wakulla, and bring them over, together with every man and boy who can handle an axe. ”

“ Apparently the notion of the wild beasts roaming in the thickets had chiefly aroused their anxiety for me, but this last suggestion I repudiated with quiet scorn. "What has the Child of the Sun," I asked, "to fear from his Father's humblest subjects, the beasts of the forest? Would they have dared to approach his sacred person save to crouch at his feet and lick them in token of his divinity?" At this rebuke all my attendants stood crestfallen and ashamed. ”

“ Vaughan was about my age, and she is the person whose history I am going to tell you.
"There is a picture of her at The Grove in the room in which your dear cousins spent many of their early days. It is drawn at full length, and is as large as life. It represents a child, of maybe five years of age, in a white frock, placing a garland on the head of a lamb; behind the child, an old-fashioned garden is represented, and a distant view of The Grove house in which she was born." ”

“ This word Vaudois, which they first acquired from their geographical situation, they have preserved as a token of their religion in all countries, as the Vaudois of Provence, and of Bohemia, and the Walloons of the Low Countries. Since the Reformation the names of Lutheran, Calvinist, and Reformed, have served to distinguish all those who rejected the papal doctrines, and the inhabitants of our valleys, the only people who have never been affected by these opinions, have alone retained their original name of Vaudois. ”

“ Huxtable. At last, when I began to nail up a simple sketch of the church at Vaughan St. Mary instead of a noble representation of the Prodigal Son, wearing a white hat with a pipe stuck under the riband, and weeping into a handkerchief with some horse upon it, the good dame could no longer repress her feelings.
"Whai, Miss Clerer, Miss, dear art alaive, cheel, what be 'bout? Them's the smartest picters anywhere this saide of Coorn. Varmer gied a pan of hogs' puddens for they, and a Chainey taypot and a Zunday pair of corderahoys. ”

“ Your king demands cattle, knowing that all the cattle are gone, that scarce a cow is left to give drink to a motherless babe. He asks for maidens also, but if he took those he seeks we should have none left for our young men to marry. And why is this so? It is because the vulture, Lobengula, has picked us to the bone; yes, while we are yet alive he has torn the flesh from us. ”

“ A Couch of Silk-Cotton.
On parting from the presence of his fair cousin, and, at the same time, from the house of his inhospitable relative, Herbert Vaughan struck off through the shrubbery that stretched towards the ridge on the right.
Notwithstanding the storm that was raging in his breast, a reflection had occurred to him, which hindered him from going by the main avenue. Suffering from a keen sense of humiliation, he had no desire to meet with any of his uncle’s people: since the very slaves seemed to be privy to his false position. ”