Morning journal and courier., 1890-01-04
STUDIES In BRITTANY.
The Land of S0mbfe Mountains and
Llmpid Lakes-The Modern Breton
ancient Pagan Burial Places-Car-
mao and Mount st. Michael.

-Ancient Pagan Burial Places-Car-
mao and Mount st. Michael.
CARNAc, Brittany, Dec. 16.
To the Editor Of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
On the Atlantic boundary of France, a
little north of its central line of latitude,
and setting far out into the sea, like some
crouching monster sullenly receiving the on
slaughts of the tempests, is piece of rock
buttressed land, traversed by three somber
ranges of mountains and innumerable flash
ing rivers. The River Loire, winding
through the fairest of the valleys of France,
cuts behind and below it on the southeast,
and after sweeping by the quaint old city of
Nantes, mingles it's waters with those of the
vast Bay of Biscay which pound and howl
among its skirting southwestern islands and
headland orags. Its northern walls, almost
in direct east and west line of grandly
massive parapeted ports, are washed by the
currents of the English Channel which,
broken by the brunt of the Channel islands,
here flow in stately and measured tides,
piercing the French coast deeply at the
western base of the peninsula, and forming
a majestic sea angle in the noble bay of Cam
Gale. This splendid out jutting of land,
with Its ragged fringe of islands and its
countless inlets and estuaries, has a greater
expanse of coast line than has all the rest of
France, from St. Malo to the Belgium out
posts, and from the Loire to the sea abutting
Pyrenees which guard Castillian lands.
Within its confines are five departments of
Eroroo-T oira Trfor;ouro oud tn. Tk Wilt
ane, stretching from the Loire to the Eng
1ish Channel on the east; Morbihan and
Cotes Du Nord, lying next, to the west, the
former on the Bay of Biscay, the latter on
the Channel; and the fifth, Fnistere, the
Glands End" of the French, in whose sea-
foaming jaws sits the city of Brest, where,
through the channel of Goulet, flash and
gleam the mighty naval ornaments of
France, under those vast and impregnable
ramparts begun by Frances greatest cardi-
nal, Richelieu, and completed by the then
empires grandest military author and engi-
neer, Sebastian L. Prestre Vauban. Geo.
graphically this is Brittany.
1t is land of somber mountains broken
by limpid lakes and flashing rivers where
foreign anglers ever are, and where forestsrs
hack and trim in the olden way as Troyon's
brush has painted; of valleys stretching far
and dssolate and Wales Of sweetest pastoral
scenes; Of Roman roads and crumbling
walls; of sunken lanes, hewn stiles and
mile stones; of olden cities with cathedrals
vast and splendid; of sleeping villages with
quaintest chapel and affairs; of roadside
shrines and startling crucifxes standing tall
and dark against the horizon; of tended
herds Of cattle and guarded focks Of fowls;
Of strange, great houses with high peaked
roofs, whose upper stories seem to boil up
from and over each other; Of PROFESSIONS
with banners and pilgrimages with offerings;
of chateaus and chalets cleaning from nests
of frs; Of great avenues of breeches like
grim sentinels behind the fierce walls of
princely possessions; Of wild, brown marsh
es Of salt where no living thing ever circles
above; of ruined castles of the past and
Gus monuments In stone to the superstition
or valor of unknown and unrecorded pagan
ages; and of air and sky and wind and
weather % strange, changeable and wonder
full in their mystic, wizard effects upon all
that the eye may behold, Or the fancy
painter, have plodded and pothered within
It than ever saw Italy-but ono, the Roor
man, Millet, Of Barbszon, ever setting be-
fore the world true limnings of Its Sictur-
esque, sometimes merry, but oftener ibstheti.
caily sodden, peasantry. scenically( this is
Brittany.
Here are three million people mGre pecu-
liar and interesting than can bH found In
any other equal space In EUROPE. Since
there Il any record Of them they have stood
here in this granite buttressad peninsula,
self contained, self sustainedk isolate. The
mighty waves Of TeutonM encroachment
have never touched them. Tho splendid
civilization Of the ''tiG16t little island" jusi
across the Channel thlere, has remained far
ther from them Il I'm Ii has from India
Though its poppllation Is one-twslfth Of
that Of e,l Fr9alee; though all its cities ars
reached by, ,nezil in few hours from Paris
its peoplefh have sturdily retained their OWE
individuality In tradition, customs, dresl
and le6guage, to that degree that, at least
In lss6gnage, thought, manner and every day
liA, Breton folk are less French to-day thar
Grishmen In Ireland are English. I do no
tknow what the aristocracy Of Brittany ma!
he, for the aristocracy anywhere oil the leas
n Of the real worlds, but the people Of Brit
tany, the peasAntry and the Iowly Of Bretoi
citi1, posssss certain rsmarkable character
istics. Womsn and men alike irs beasts o
burden. Al refuse and recent innovation
Esch sssna oontsnted With his q her los