Chateau of Prince Polignac | Page 4

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'hote
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