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DATA STRUCTURES AND

ALGORITHMS USING C#
C# programmers: no more translating data structures from C++ or Java to
use in your programs! Mike McMillan provides a tutorial on how to use data
structures and algorithms plus the first comprehensive reference for C# imple-
mentation of data structures and algorithms found in the .NET Framework
library, as well as those developed by the programmer.
The approach is very practical, using timing tests rather than Big O nota-
tion to analyze the efficiency of an approach. Coverage includes array and
ArrayLists, linked lists, hash tables, dictionaries, trees, graphs, and sorting
and searching algorithms, as well as more advanced algorithms such as prob-
abilistic algorithms and dynamic programming. This is the perfect resource
for C# professionals and students alike.

Michael McMillan is Instructor of Computer Information Systems at Pulaski

Technical College, as well as an adjunct instructor at the University of
Arkansas at Little Rock and the University of Central Arkansas. Mike’s previ-
ous books include Object-Oriented Programming with Visual Basic.NET, Data
Structures and Algorithms Using Visual Basic.NET, and Perl from the Ground Up.
He is a co-author of Programming and Problem-Solving with Visual Basic.NET.
Mike has written more than twenty-five trade journal articles on programming
and has more than twenty years of experience programming for industry and
education.
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DATA STRUCTURES AND

ALGORITHMS USING C#
MICHAEL MCMILLAN
Pulaski Technical College
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo

Cambridge University Press

The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK
Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521876919

© Michael McMillan 2007

This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of

relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place
without the llausv permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published in print format 2007

ISBN-13 978-0-521-87691-9 hardback

ISBN-10 0-521-87691-5 hardback

ISBN-13 978-0-521-67015-9 paperback

ISBN-10 0-521-67015-2 paperback

Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls
for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not
guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
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Contents

Preface page vii

Chapter 1
An Introduction to Collections, Generics, and the
Timing Class 1

Chapter 2
Arrays and ArrayLists 26

Chapter 3
Basic Sorting Algorithms 42

Chapter 4
Basic Searching Algorithms 55

Chapter 5
Stacks and Queues 68

Chapter 6
The BitArray Class 94

Chapter 7
Strings, the String Class, and the StringBuilder Class 119

Chapter 8
Pattern Matching and Text Processing 147
v
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vi CONTENTS

Chapter 9
Building Dictionaries: The DictionaryBase Class and the
SortedList Class 165

Chapter 10
Hashing and the Hashtable Class 176

Chapter 11
Linked Lists 194

Chapter 12
Binary Trees and Binary Search Trees 218

Chapter 13
Sets 237

Chapter 14
Advanced Sorting Algorithms 249

Chapter 15
Advanced Data Structures and Algorithms for Searching 263

Chapter 16
Graphs and Graph Algorithms 283

Chapter 17
Advanced Algorithms 314

References 339
Index 341
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Preface

The study of data structures and algorithms is critical to the development

of the professional programmer. There are many, many books written on
data structures and algorithms, but these books are usually written as college
textbooks and are written using the programming languages typically taught
in college—Java or C++. C# is becoming a very popular language and this
book provides the C# programmer with the opportunity to study fundamental
data structures and algorithms.
C# exists in a very rich development environment called the .NET Frame-
work. Included in the .NET Framework library is a set of data structure classes
(also called collection classes), which range from the Array, ArrayList, and
Collection classes to the Stack and Queue classes and to the HashTable and
the SortedList classes. The data structures and algorithms student can now see
how to use a data structure before learning how to implement it. Previously,
an instructor had to discuss the concept of, say, a stack, abstractly until the
complete data structure was constructed. Instructors can now show students
how to use a stack to perform some computation, such as number base con-
versions, demonstrating the utility of the data structure immediately. With
this background, the student can then go back and learn the fundamentals of
the data structure (or algorithm) and even build their own implementation.
This book is written primarily as a practical overview of the data struc-
tures and algorithms all serious computer programmers need to know and
understand. Given this, there is no formal analysis of the data structures and
algorithms covered in the book. Hence, there is not a single mathematical
formula and not one mention of Big Oh analysis (if you don’t know what this
means, look at any of the books mentioned in the bibliography). Instead, the
various data structures and algorithms are presented as problem-solving tools.
vii
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viii PREFACE

Simple timing tests are used to compare the performance of the data structures
and algorithms discussed in the book.

PREREQUISITES

The only prerequisite for this book is that the reader have some familiarity
with the C# language in general, and object-oriented programming in C# in
particular.

CHAPTER-BY-CHAPTER ORGANIZATION

Chapter 1 introduces the reader to the concept of the data structure as a

collection of data. The concepts of linear and nonlinear collections are intro-
duced. The Collection class is demonstrated. This chapter also introduces the
concept of generic programming, which allows the programmer to write one
class, or one method, and have it work for a multitude of data types. Generic
programming is an important new addition to C# (available in C# 2.0 and
beyond), so much so that there is a special library of generic data structures
found in the System.Collections.Generic namespace. When a data structure
has a generic implementation found in this library, its use is discussed. The
chapter ends with an introduction to methods of measuring the performance
of the data structures and algorithms discussed in the book.
Chapter 2 provides a review of how arrays are constructed, along with
demonstrating the features of the Array class. The Array class encapsulates
many of the functions associated with arrays (UBound, LBound, and so on)
into a single package. ArrayLists are special types of arrays that provide
dynamic resizing capabilities.
Chapter 3 is an introduction to the basic sorting algorithms, such as the
bubble sort and the insertion sort, and Chapter 4 examines the most funda-
mental algorithms for searching memory, the sequential and binary searches.
Two classic data structures are examined in Chapter 5: the stack and the
queue. The emphasis in this chapter is on the practical use of these data
structures in solving everyday problems in data processing. Chapter 6 covers
the BitArray class, which can be used to efficiently represent a large number
of integer values, such as test scores.
Strings are not usually covered in a data structures book, but Chapter 7
covers strings, the String class, and the StringBuilder class. Because so much
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PREFACE ix

data processing in C# is performed on strings, the reader should be exposed

to the special techniques found in the two classes. Chapter 8 examines the
use of regular expressions for text processing and pattern matching. Regular
expressions often provide more power and efficiency than can be had with
more traditional string functions and methods.
Chapter 9 introduces the reader to the use of dictionaries as data structures.
Dictionaries, and the different data structures based on them, store data as
key/value pairs. This chapter shows the reader how to create his or her own
classes based on the DictionaryBase class, which is an abstract class. Chap-
ter 10 covers hash tables and the HashTable class, which is a special type of
dictionary that uses a hashing algorithm for storing data internally.
Another classic data structure, the linked list, is covered in Chapter 11.
Linked lists are not as important a data structure in C# as they are in a
pointer-based language such as C++, but they still have a role in C# program-
ming. Chapter 12 introduces the reader to yet another classic data structure—
the binary tree. A specialized type of binary tree, the binary search tree, is
the primary topic of the chapter. Other types of binary trees are covered in
Chapter 15.
Chapter 13 shows the reader how to store data in sets, which can be useful in
situations in which only unique data values can be stored in the data structure.
Chapter 14 covers more advanced sorting algorithms, including the popular
and efficient QuickSort, which is the basis for most of the sorting procedures
implemented in the .NET Framework library. Chapter 15 looks at three data
structures that prove useful for searching when a binary search tree is not
called for: the AVL tree, the red-black tree, and the skip list.
Chapter 16 discusses graphs and graph algorithms. Graphs are useful for
representing many different types of data, especially networks. Finally, Chap-
ter 17 introduces the reader to what algorithm design techniques really are:
dynamic algorithms and greedy algorithms.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

There are several different groups of people who must be thanked for helping
me finish this book. First, thanks to a certain group of students who first
sat through my lectures on developing data structures and algorithms. These
students include (not in any particular order): Matt Hoffman, Ken Chen, Ken
Cates, Jeff Richmond, and Gordon Caffey. Also, one of my fellow instructors
at Pulaski Technical College, Clayton Ruff, sat through many of the lectures
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x PREFACE

and provided excellent comments and criticism. I also have to thank my

department dean, David Durr, and my department chair, Bernica Tackett, for
supporting my writing endeavors. I also need to thank my family for putting
up with me while I was preoccupied with research and writing. Finally, many
thanks to my editors at Cambridge, Lauren Cowles and Heather Bergman, for
putting up with my many questions, topic changes, and habitual lateness.
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C HAPTER 1

An Introduction to
Collections, Generics,
and the Timing Class

This book discusses the development and implementation of data structures

and algorithms using C#. The data structures we use in this book are found
in the .NET Framework class library System.Collections. In this chapter, we
develop the concept of a collection by first discussing the implementation of
our own Collection class (using the array as the basis of our implementation)
and then by covering the Collection classes in the .NET Framework.
An important addition to C# 2.0 is generics. Generics allow the C# pro-
grammer to write one version of a function, either independently or within a
class, without having to overload the function many times to allow for differ-
ent data types. C# 2.0 provides a special library, System.Collections.Generic,
that implements generics for several of the System.Collections data structures.
This chapter will introduce the reader to generic programming.
Finally, this chapter introduces a custom-built class, the Timing class, which
we will use in several chapters to measure the performance of a data structure
and/or algorithm. This class will take the place of Big O analysis, not because
Big O analysis isn’t important, but because this book takes a more practical
approach to the study of data structures and algorithms.

1
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2 INTRODUCTION TO COLLECTIONS, GENERICS, AND TIMING CLASS

COLLECTIONS DEFINED

A collection is a structured data type that stores data and provides operations
for adding data to the collection, removing data from the collection, updating
data in the collection, as well as operations for setting and returning the values
of different attributes of the collection.
Collections can be broken down into two types: linear and nonlinear. A
linear collection is a list of elements where one element follows the previous
element. Elements in a linear collection are normally ordered by position
(first, second, third, etc.). In the real world, a grocery list is a good example
of a linear collection; in the computer world (which is also real), an array is
designed as a linear collection.
Nonlinear collections hold elements that do not have positional order
within the collection. An organizational chart is an example of a nonlinear
collection, as is a rack of billiard balls. In the computer world, trees, heaps,
graphs, and sets are nonlinear collections.
Collections, be they linear or nonlinear, have a defined set of properties that
describe them and operations that can be performed on them. An example
of a collection property is the collections Count, which holds the number of
items in the collection. Collection operations, called methods, include Add
(for adding a new element to a collection), Insert (for adding a new element
to a collection at a specified index), Remove (for removing a specified element
from a collection), Clear (for removing all the elements from a collection),
Contains (for determining if a specified element is a member of a collec-
tion), and IndexOf (for determining the index of a specified element in a
collection).

COLLECTIONS DESCRIBED

Within the two major categories of collections are several subcategories.

Linear collections can be either direct access collections or sequential access
collections, whereas nonlinear collections can be either hierarchical or
grouped. This section describes each of these collection types.

Direct Access Collections

The most common example of a direct access collection is the array. We define
an array as a collection of elements with the same data type that are directly
accessed via an integer index, as illustrated in Figure 1.1.
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Collections Described 3

Item ø Item 1 Item 2 Item 3 ... Item j Item n−1

FIGURE 1.1. Array.

Arrays can be static so that the number of elements specified when the array
is declared is fixed for the length of the program, or they can be dynamic, where
the number of elements can be increased via the ReDim or ReDim Preserve
statements.
In C#, arrays are not only a built-in data type, they are also a class. Later
in this chapter, when we examine the use of arrays in more detail, we will
discuss how arrays are used as class objects.
We can use an array to store a linear collection. Adding new elements to an
array is easy since we simply place the new element in the first free position
at the rear of the array. Inserting an element into an array is not as easy (or
efficient), since we will have to move elements of the array down in order
to make room for the inserted element. Deleting an element from the end of
an array is also efficient, since we can simply remove the value from the last
element. Deleting an element in any other position is less efficient because,
just as with inserting, we will probably have to adjust many array elements
up one position to keep the elements in the array contiguous. We will discuss
these issues later in the chapter. The .NET Framework provides a specialized
array class, ArrayList, for making linear collection programming easier. We
will examine this class in Chapter 3.
Another type of direct access collection is the string. A string is a collection
of characters that can be accessed based on their index, in the same manner we
access the elements of an array. Strings are also implemented as class objects
in C#. The class includes a large set of methods for performing standard
operations on strings, such as concatenation, returning substrings, inserting
characters, removing characters, and so forth. We examine the String class in
Chapter 8.
C# strings are immutable, meaning once a string is initialized it cannot be
changed. When you modify a string, a copy of the string is created instead of
changing the original string. This behavior can lead to performance degrada-
tion in some cases, so the .NET Framework provides a StringBuilder class that
enables you to work with mutable strings. We’ll examine the StringBuilder in
Chapter 8 as well.
The final direct access collection type is the struct (also called structures
and records in other languages). A struct is a composite data type that holds
data that may consist of many different data types. For example, an employee
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4 INTRODUCTION TO COLLECTIONS, GENERICS, AND TIMING CLASS

record consists of employee’ name (a string), salary (an integer), identification

number (a string, or an integer), as well as other attributes. Since storing each
of these data values in separate variables could become confusing very easily,
the language provides the struct for storing data of this type.
A powerful addition to the C# struct is the ability to define methods for
performing operations stored on the data in a struct. This makes a struct
somewhat like a class, though you can’t inherit or derive a new type from
a structure. The following code demonstrates a simple use of a structure
in C#:
using System;

public struct Name {

private string fname, mname, lname;

public Name(string first, string middle, string last) {

fname = first;
mname = middle;
lname = last;
}

public string firstName {

get {
return fname;
}

set {
fname = firstName;
}
}
public string middleName {
get {
return mname;
}

set {
mname = middleName;
}
}

public string lastName {

get {
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Collections Described 5

return lname;
}

set {
lname = lastName;
}
}

public override string ToString() {

return (String.Format("{0} {1} {2}", fname, mname,
lname));
}

public string Initials() {

return (String.Format("{0}{1}{2}",fname.Substring(0,1),
mname.Substring(0,1), lname.Substring(0,1)));
}
}

public class NameTest {

static void Main() {
Name myName = new Name("Michael", "Mason", "McMillan");
string fullName, inits;
fullName = myName.ToString();
inits = myName.Initials();
Console.WriteLine("My name is {0}.", fullName);
Console.WriteLine("My initials are {0}.", inits);
}
}

Although many of the elements in the .NET environment are implemented as

classes (such as arrays and strings), several primary elements of the language
are implemented as structures, such as the numeric data types. The Integer
data type, for example, is implemented as the Int32 structure. One of the
methods you can use with Int32 is the Parse method for converting the string
representation of a number into an integer. Here’s an example:

using System;

public class IntStruct {

static void Main() {
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6 INTRODUCTION TO COLLECTIONS, GENERICS, AND TIMING CLASS

int num;
string snum;
Console.Write("Enter a number: ");
snum = Console.ReadLine();
num = Int32.Parse(snum);
Console.WriteLine(num);
}
}

Sequential Access Collections

A sequential access collection is a list that stores its elements in sequential

order. We call this type of collection a linear list. Linear lists are not limited
by size when they are created, meaning they are able to expand and contract
dynamically. Items in a linear list are not accessed directly; they are referenced
by their position, as shown in Figure 1.2. The first element of a linear list is
at the front of the list and the last element is at the rear of the list.
Because there is no direct access to the elements of a linear list, to access an
element you have to traverse through the list until you arrive at the position
of the element you are looking for. Linear list implementations usually allow
two methods for traversing a list—in one direction from front to rear, and
from both front to rear and rear to front.
A simple example of a linear list is a grocery list. The list is created by
writing down one item after another until the list is complete. The items are
removed from the list while shopping as each item is found.
Linear lists can be either ordered or unordered. An ordered list has values
in order in respect to each other, as in:

Beata Bernica David Frank Jennifer Mike Raymond Terrill

An unordered list consists of elements in any order. The order of a list makes
a big difference when performing searches on the data on the list, as you’ll see
in Chapter 2 when we explore the binary search algorithm versus a simple
linear search.

1st 2nd 3rd 4th ... nth

Front Rear
FIGURE 1.2. Linear List.
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Collections Described 7

Bernica Push Bernica Pop

David David
Raymond Raymond
Mike Mike

FIGURE 1.3. Stack Operations.

Some types of linear lists restrict access to their data elements. Examples
of these types of lists are stacks and queues. A stack is a list where access is
restricted to the beginning (or top) of the list. Items are placed on the list
at the top and can only be removed from the top. For this reason, stacks are
known as Last-in, First-out structures. When we add an item to a stack, we
call the operation a push. When we remove an item from a stack, we call that
operation a pop. These two stack operations are shown in Figure 1.3.
The stack is a very common data structure, especially in computer systems
programming. Stacks are used for arithmetic expression evaluation and for
balancing symbols, among its many applications.
A queue is a list where items are added at the rear of the list and removed
from the front of the list. This type of list is known as a First-in, First-out struc-
ture. Adding an item to a queue is called an EnQueue, and removing an item
from a queue is called a Dequeue. Queue operations are shown in Figure 1.4.
Queues are used in both systems programming, for scheduling operating
system tasks, and for simulation studies. Queues make excellent structures
for simulating waiting lines in every conceivable retail situation. A special
type of queue, called a priority queue, allows the item in a queue with the
highest priority to be removed from the queue first. Priority queues can be
used to study the operations of a hospital emergency room, where patients
with heart trouble need to be attended to before a patient with a broken arm,
for example.
The last category of linear collections we’ll examine are called generalized
indexed collections. The first of these, called a hash table, stores a set of data

Mike Mike
Raymond De Queue
David Raymond
Beata David
En Queue Beata
Bernica Bernica

FIGURE 1.4. Queue Operations.

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8 INTRODUCTION TO COLLECTIONS, GENERICS, AND TIMING CLASS

“Paul E. Spencer”

37500

“Information Systems”

FIGURE 1.5. A Record To Be Hashed.

values associated with a key. In a hash table, a special function, called a hash
function, takes one data value and transforms the value (called the key) into
an integer index that is used to retrieve the data. The index is then used to
access the data record associated with the key. For example, an employee
record may consist of a person’s name, his or her salary, the number of years
the employee has been with the company, and the department he or she works
in. This structure is shown in Figure 1.5. The key to this data record is the
employee’s name. C# has a class, called HashTable, for storing data in a hash
table. We explore this structure in Chapter 10.
Another generalized indexed collection is the dictionary. A dictionary is
made up of a series of key–value pairs, called associations. This structure
is analogous to a word dictionary, where a word is the key and the word’s
definition is the value associated with the key. The key is an index into the
value associated with the key. Dictionaries are often called associative arrays
because of this indexing scheme, though the index does not have to be an
integer. We will examine several Dictionary classes that are part of the .NET
Framework in Chapter 11.

Hierarchical Collections

Nonlinear collections are broken down into two major groups: hierarchical
collections and group collections. A hierarchical collection is a group of items
divided into levels. An item at one level can have successor items located at
the next lower level.
One common hierarchical collection is the tree. A tree collection looks like
an upside-down tree, with one data element as the root and the other data
values hanging below the root as leaves. The elements of a tree are called
nodes, and the elements that are below a particular node are called the node’s
children. A sample tree is shown in Figure 1.6.
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Collections Described 9

Root

FIGURE 1.6. A Tree Collection.

Trees have applications in several different areas. The file systems of most
modern operating systems are designed as a tree collection, with one directory
as the root and other subdirectories as children of the root.
A binary tree is a special type of tree collection where each node has no
more than two children. A binary tree can become a binary search tree, making
searches for large amounts of data much more efficient. This is accomplished
by placing nodes in such a way that the path from the root to a node where
the data is stored is along the shortest path possible.
Yet another tree type, the heap, is organized so that the smallest data value
is always placed in the root node. The root node is removed during a deletion,
and insertions into and deletions from a heap always cause the heap to reor-
ganize so that the smallest value is placed in the root. Heaps are often used
for sorts, called a heap sort. Data elements stored in a heap can be kept sorted
by repeatedly deleting the root node and reorganizing the heap.
Several different varieties of trees are discussed in Chapter 12.

Group Collections

A nonlinear collection of items that are unordered is called a group. The three
major categories of group collections are sets, graphs, and networks.
A set is a collection of unordered data values where each value is unique.
The list of students in a class is an example of a set, as is, of course, the integers.
Operations that can be performed on sets include union and intersection. An
example of set operations is shown in Figure 1.7.
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be obtained at the Observatory. Bramabiau may also be visited from
Le Vigan. The rivulet of the Bonheur, that descends from the Col de
Séyrerède near the Aigoual, after flowing over granite and schist,
encounters a mass of Dolomitic limestone, through which it has
bored a channel for a distance of 1,200 feet. The tunnel through
which it flows is in one place open to the sky through the falling in of
the roof. The name Bramabiau given to this cavern traversed by a
stream is onomatopœic, and signifies the bellowing of a bull, as the
water in time of flood gives forth angry sounds.
Nothing surprises one more than the apparent inadequacy of the
means to the end attained. The Bonheur is but a small stream, yet
the work it has achieved is tremendous. But it must be borne in
mind that where stands Camprieu was once a lake, the water held
back by the barrier of limestone, and that the accumulated force was
brought to bear on the rock to effect this tunnel of drainage.
Moreover, the rock itself was full of holes like a sponge, with large
vaults like huge bubbles in its interior, so that it was not a solid mass
through which the stream had to bore its way. It was further aided
by several springs rising within the rock, all working in their several
courses to effect their escape.
 Bramabiau

The exploration of Bramabiau was accomplished in June, 1888, by

M. Martel and his guides. They attempted first to penetrate by the
opening through which the Bonheur leaps into light again, but found
that the gallery consisted of a series of ascents, with cascades and
pools; and although by wading and with ladders they succeeded in
reaching a considerable distance, they could not attain to the point
where the stream begins to dive underground. On the following day
these indefatigable explorers attacked the tunnel from above, where
the Bonheur enters, and were able to descend to the point reached
on the preceding day, and further to pursue their course till they
came out where the stream issues, a distance as the crow flies of a
kilometre.
In January, 1888, a man of Camprieu disappeared, and there was
reason to suspect he had committed suicide. As his body could not
be found, it was supposed that he had flung himself down the abyss
of the Bonheur; and, in fact, when M. Martel searched the cavern he
found the body wedged into a spot where, in the cave itself, the
stream disappears underground for a while, to again reappear and
continue its subterranean course. It goes through these vagaries
twice, and perpetrates seven cascades.
"To avoid repetitions," says M. Martel in his account of the exploration,
"I will say no more of the magic of magnesium light under vaults lofty as
Gothic naves; I must only ask of the reader to figure, if he can in the
profound night of these caverns, the deafening roar of the falling water,
the dispersion of the party groping in all directions for passages, the
flicker of the feeble candles, the distant calls and signals, whistles, and
horns, the cords strained, and the ladders set up against steep walls, our
silhouettes magnified against the walls in shadows, and profiled against
the boiling torrent, all under vaults 150 feet high and at the extremity of
galleries of 300 feet.
"One portion of our course was effected only by a series of gymnastics,
according to the width of the gallery that varied from three feet to ten
feet, according to how far the ledges were practicable—so we crept along,
a few yards above the torrent, clinging to the rock with our fingers, our
breasts against the wall, or else wading in the water up to our armpits.
Often our candles went out, caused by our rapid movements, or by the
rush of wind that swept through the tunnel; the drip of our soaked
clothes, the difficulty of communication amidst the roar of the falling
water, increased our difficulties tenfold."

Where the Bonheur escapes into daylight there is an immense rift

in the rocks, and out of this the stream leaps in a fall of some
dignity. Up to 1888 it was not thought possible that the Bonheur
could be the stream that issued at Bramabiau, for anything thrown
in above never issued below. But the exploration by M. Martel solved
the mystery. The stream sinks, filters through the rock, leaving
above that which is thrown in, and issues limpid at the cascade that
rushes from the entrance.
The descent of the Aigoual on the side of Valleraugue is by a
thousand steps hewn in granite and schist, and at the bottom of this
is the vegetable garden of the officials of the Observatory.
Valleraugue lies at the bottom of a cirque of mountains at the
confluence of the rivers of the Mallet and the Clareau, and it is after
their marriage that the united streams assume the name of Hérault.
The descent from the Aigoual to Valleraugue occupies two hours, the
ascent by the carriage road takes seven. Valleraugue is a busy
factory town; the population is mainly engaged in silk spinning and
weaving. The place is almost wholly Protestant. This valley of the
Hérault as far as Ganges is one of the most active in silk industry in
the Cévennes. The vegetation is wholly southern; the hillsides
disposed in terraces are planted with vines and mulberries; and
ilexes abound, providing the tanneries with their bark. "This valley,"
says Ardouin Dumazet, "is a synthesis of all the somewhat severe
graces of the Cevenol land." The Roman road over l'Hospitalet has
been already referred to. It runs from Avignon to Anduze and then
ascends the crest above the Gardon, and passing under Barre
stretches away to Florac. Barre itself occupies a Gallo-Roman
oppidum, of which traces remain, and throughout the
neighbourhood relics of the Roman tenure of the land are found.
After the Col d'Aire de Côte ensues a series of frightful cirques,
whose vertical walls crumble away by degrees under the action of
the weather. The flanks of the mountain are profoundly breached,
and form precipices. The nature of the rock contributes to augment
the savagery of the region. It is composed of schists steeply inclined
towards the north, and penetrated by numerous veins of porphyry
that metamorphized them. Here are needles, here masses of schist
support tables of limestone. A little triangular plateau, a lost islet of
the Causse, succeeds to the schists. This is the Can de l'Hospitalet.
"Here, atmospheric agencies have carved the strangest edifices. Huge
calcareous hats cover and overhang slender schistous supports, shaped
like the tables in a glacier. Many of these gigantic mushrooms have reeled
on their corroded stalks and are thrown into a sloping position like fallen
dolmens. The plateau of l'Hospitalet is both picturesque and of scientific
interest." [12]

Florac hardly comes within the range that I have marked out for
description, and yet some words must be given to it, as it was the
centre of the Cevenol revolt, and was the scene of several conflicts
and of the execution of Camisards.
 It is a very dirty place, originally walled; the houses were so
crowded that the streets were contracted to the narrowest possible
width. One has to be careful not to walk down them before eight
o'clock in the morning, as all the slops are thrown from the windows
into the street, and may fall on the head of the incautious
passenger; and here no warning call is given, as in the narrow lanes
of old Edinburgh, to put the man in the street on his guard. What is
cast forth remains where it falls till torrential rains sweep away the
accumulated filth of weeks and even months. In the Languedoc
towns that reek with evil odours, in a country too where the hillsides
are redolent with aromatic herbs, lavender, sage, marjoram,
rosemary, beds of violets, thyme in sheets, one can hardly help
repeating the lines of Bishop Heber:
"What though the spicy breezes
Blow sweet o'er Ceylon's isle,
And every prospect pleases,
Yet only man is vile."

But it is not man who is vile, that he is nowhere, it is the refuse he

casts about him that is offensive, and the offensiveness is a
provision of nature to instruct him to remove it beyond the reach of
the nose. But familiarity must breed a liking for these disgusting
odours, or women would not sit on their doorsteps all day working
and chatting, and let their children play about amidst festering
garbage.
Florac is, in spite of dragonades and gallows and the stake, almost
entirely Protestant. The large meeting-house contains nothing but a
pulpit and bare benches. The Catholic church is a new and mean
structure, the temple bare as a barn, the church ugly as a modern
French architect can make one.
Florac is near the influx of the Mimente into the Tarnon. The three
valleys of the Mimente, the Tarn, and the Tarnon lead into the
inextricable labyrinth of defiles in which the Camisards were able to
establish their arsenals, hospitals, and storehouses. The Mimente
rises in the mountain of Bougès, whose summit is crowned by the
forest of Altefage, where under three huge beech trees met the
murderers of the Abbé du Chayla. At Cassagnas, a village near the
source of the Mimente, the caverns may be inspected that served
the Camisards as magazines, filled with corn, wine, oil, and above all
chestnuts. Roland had established here a powder factory; the
saltpetre was obtained, as later during the European wars of
Bonaparte, from the numerous caverns that contained the bones of
extinct beasts. Drugs were procured for the wounded from
Montpellier, where there were many well-wishers ready to smuggle
them into the mountains. When the water-mills for grinding the corn
were destroyed by the military commander of Languedoc, the
Camisards reverted to the use of querns. In some of the caves whole
flocks and herds were secreted; others were stored with salted
meat.
Florac possesses its natural curiosity, the Fontaine du Pêcher, that
discharges the water infiltrated from the plateau of Méjan. It pours
forth in an abundant stream and forms a cascade, but the water is
at once eagerly captured for the purpose of irrigation. During the
winter and after a storm it vomits forth a torrent with a roar like that
of a lion.
After a visit to the summit of the Aigoual it would be well to
descend the Dourbie to Milau, reaching the Dourbie by the ravine of
the Trévesel. The Pas de l'Ase is a profound gorge, 1,200 feet deep,
between fiery-red dolomitic cliffs, in three stages superposed and
separated by slopes of detritus. At midday, when the sun streams
down on these rocks, the effect is dazzling. At Trèves, where are
coal mines, is the cave called the Baume de S. Firmin, and near by
the ruins of a castle.
S. Firmin was the grandson of Tonantius Ferreolus, Prefect of
Gaul, who, as we have seen, was the host of Sidonius Apollinaris. He
had a villa here, Trevido, as the town was then called, and in it he
died in the year 470. Firminus was educated by his uncle Noricus,
Bishop of Uzès, the son of Tonantius, and he in turn became bishop
of the same see, and died at the early age of thirty-seven, in the
year 553, and was succeeded by his nephew, Ferreolus; so that at
that time it is pretty clear bishoprics had become the perquisites of
members of the great families of Gallo-Roman origin. When S. Firmin
visited his grandfather or his father, at Trèves, he was wont to retire
to the cave that bears his name, for reading and devotion. Possibly
the dampness of this grotto may have sowed the seeds of the
disorder from which he died. The cave runs deep into the mountain,
and is adorned with numerous white and graceful stalactites. But it
is very damp; notwithstanding this, prehistoric man occupied it, for
in the first two halls of the grotto have been found old hearths,
remains of feasts, broken and split bones, and fragments of badly
burnt pottery.
About ninety feet above the Baume de S. Firmin is another cave
forming a great vault that is filled with water during heavy rains.
Nevertheless man inhabited it at a remote period; for thence also
have been excavated numerous fragments of vessels, which by their
paste and ornamentation show that they belonged to the age of
polished stone.
How the men of that period must have suffered from rheumatism!
And it has been noticed that among the bones of prehistoric man,
who was a cave dweller, rheumatic swellings of the joints are
common. Usually the caves in limestone and chalk are tolerably dry.
France must have teemed with peoples at that early period, for not
only on the Causse, but also in the chalk districts of Dordogne and
Lot, and in the sandstone regions of Maine-et-Loire and Vienne,
troglodite habitations abound.
After crossing the Col de la Pierre-Plantée, the road winds down
into the valley of the Dourbie, which wriggles along at a great depth
below between rocks of quartz and schist, then passes among
chestnut trees, and reaches S. Jean-du-Bruel, when we are in the
valley of the Dourbie. Here comes in the road from Saudières, where
is a station on the line from Le Vigan to the junction on the main line
opposite Roquefort; and the lower valley of the Dourbie can be
visited from Le Vigan by taking the train to Saudières and a carriage
thence to Milau.
Nant, a little town on the left bank of the Dourbie, has a Celtic
name, very descriptive, for Nant signifies a valley or a river bottom.
Nantes in Brittany has the same derivation, as has also Devon in
Welsh, Dyffneint, the county of valleys. So also the Dourbie and the
Durzon proclaim that they were named by Celts, for dour signifies
water in Welsh.
The church of S. Pierre of the twelfth century is all that remains of
a Benedictine abbey; the Romanesque chapel of S. Alban stands on
a barren rock 2,400 feet high. But the great attraction is the source
of the Durzon, as Reclus describes it:—
"A little river issuing from a deep foux some six or seven kilometres
from Nant, near the Mas-de-Pommier, at the bottom of a cirque where
walls, which are those of the Larzac, rise above the well to the height of
900 feet. There opens a great gulf, un dormant qui ne dort pas toujours. A
slight rain on Larzac agitates it, and it begins to boil languidly in the
centre of the well; but after a long rain, a storm, or the melting of the
snows, the water rises in clashing floods like a cascade turned upside
down; it is no longer a murmuring stream, but a growling torrent whose
voice breaks the austere silence of the cirque."

Still descending the valley, we see perched high up on the right

the curious village of Cantobre, on a point of the Causse Bégon,
shaded by gigantic dolomitic mushrooms, and comprised within the
walls of a ruined castle that was destroyed in 1660, after its owner,
Jean de Fombesse, had been executed as a coiner.
But more curious even than Cantobre is the village of S. Veran,
plastered against the rocks which shoot up into needles. The ravine
opening behind it describes a circus bristling with pinnacles and
rocks scooped out and shaped into the most fantastic forms. The
whole is commanded by an immense wall of limestone on which,
and intermingled with which, are the artificial structures of a castle,
the cradle of the family of Montcalm, whose most illustrious member
was the Marquess who fell on the heights of Abraham, 14th
September, 1759, in the struggle over Quebec, that cost also the life
of Wolfe. The inhabitants of this poor hamlet, in a barren and waste
land, are themselves wretchedly poor. Some one said to one of
them: "So, the Montcalms left this place!" "Aye! and would to God
we could leave it too," was the reply.
Below this is La Roque, whence Roquesaltes may be visited, and
the Rajol, extraordinary groups of rocks little less curious than those
of Montpellier le Vieux, that are also reached from the valley of the
Dourbie. But these I have described elsewhere, and I am not so
garrulous that I care to repeat myself.

FOOTNOTE
[12] Martel: Les Cévennes. Paris, 1891.
 CHAPTER XVI
THE LAND OF FERDINAND FABRE

Ferdinand Fabre—His novels—Biography—The uncle—Discouragement—Les

Courbezon—Bédarieux—Ruined by a strike—Hérault—The Population—Iberians
—Ligurians—Umbranici—The Gauls—Chestnuts—The Beaters—Ballad of the
Chestnut-tree—The Séchoire—Fêtes in Hérault—Carotat at Béziers—Pepezuc—
The Ass of Gignac—Roquefort Cheese—Le Bousquet d'Orbe—Lamalou—N.
Dame de Capimont—Extinction of the hermits—Villemagne—Gorge of the Héric
—S. Gervais—The church spire—The inhabitants of the Highland and of the
Lowland—The Pillard.

HE number of readers of the novels of Ferdinand Fabre in

England is but few, I fear; but those few recognise in him one of
the most graceful and delightful of writers. His novels may be
divided into two categories: those that deal with his reminiscences of
early life in the Cévennes about Bédarieux, and those in which he
combats the intrigues of the Jesuits, "they which creep into houses,
and lead captive silly women laden with sins"; or who meddle with
and thwart the good work of the simple country and town curés,
acting as spies for Rome on the bishops and the parochial clergy.
To the first class belong—I mention only the best—Les Courbezon,
Julien Savignac, Mon Oncle Célestin, Barnabé, Monsieur Jean, and
Xavière. To the latter a series—La Paroisse du Jugement Dernier, Le
Calvaire de Mme. Fuster, Le Couvent de la Falosque Bergonnier,
L'Hospice des Enfants Assistés; and the purely clerical romances,
Lucifer and l'Abbé Tigranne.
The delicacy of touch, the exquisite delineation of character
among the peasantry of the Cévennes, and the beautiful descriptions
of scenery and bird life in the first category make these stories
essential to a knowledge of the country I am describing in this
chapter, and no one should visit it without having read at least some
of them. Ferdinand Fabre was born in 1830 at Bédarieux, and was
the son of an architect. After having spent his first school years in
his native place, he was committed to his uncle, the curé of
Camplong, and he remained with him for two years. These years left
an indelible impression on his mind. The happy life in the country,
the habits of the villagers, the ways of the birds, the bald causses,
and the chestnut woods of the valleys; above all, the kind, simple-
minded old uncle, and the grumbling, economising, but tender-
hearted old housekeeper, filled the young heart so full, that it was
Fabre's delight in mature life to pour forth his reminiscences of those
two happy years. The uncle and the housekeeper recur again and
again, the former either as the Abbé Courbezon, the Curé Fulcran, or
Mon Oncle Célestin.
On leaving Camplong, Ferdinand entered the Petit Seminaire at S.
Pons, and thence passed in due time to the Grand Seminaire at
Montpellier. It was there that he made those experiences of clerical
life that he has given forth in the remarkable novel, l'Abbé Tigranne,
remarkable if only in this particular, that it is a novel without a
woman in it. This story represents the conflict of an ultramontane
bishop imposed on the diocese with his clergy, who are Gallican-
minded.
Not feeling a vocation for the priesthood, Fabre went to Paris, and
was at first a lawyer's clerk, but was soon left to his own resources.
There he published his first literary venture, Feuilles de Lierre, 1853,
which attracted little notice, and, disheartened, with enfeebled
health, he returned to the south. Then he began to write stories
concerning scenes and personages with which he was intimate. He
produced Les Courbezon in 1862, and this "caught on" at once. The
charm of style, the sweetness of mind it displayed, the keenness of
insight into character, and the daintiness of description caused the
literary world to realise that a writer of extraordinary merit had risen
as a star on the horizon. Les Courbezon was crowned by the
Académie. Next year, 1863, appeared Julien Savignac, a study of a
mind affected with incipient insanity. The tale is powerful and
painful. Le Chevrier was produced in 1868, a disappointing
performance, but, with the curious perversity that characterises
many an author, preferred by Fabre to his other works; and as it did
not obtain success as a novel, he converted it into a drama, which
was also a failure. Barnabé, an excellent study of a class of men now
completely passed away, appeared in 1875. Fabre died in Paris on 11
February, 1898.
Bédarieux is, or rather was, a busy manufacturing town, with
forges and glass works, indebted for its coal to the neighbouring
mines of Grassensac. But a few years ago a strike took place. The
ironmasters and glassmasters could not meet the demands of the
men, and forges and factories have since been closed, and the
population has dwindled to nearly half what it was. This also has
seriously affected the miners of Grassensac.
Bédarieux is on the Orb at the confluence into it of the Courbezon.
The station is three-quarters of a mile from the town. There is
nothing of interest in the place itself, except the church of S.
Alexandre of the fifteenth century, and that not remarkable. For a
centre of excursions it is good, but preferable is Lamalou-les-Bains,
where are excellent hotels; but Bédarieux must be tarried at for a
few nights if Rochefort, Lunas, and Boussagues are to be visited, or
much time will be lost in the trains. Bédarieux is the station of
bifurcation of three lines from the main trunk from Clermont to
Béziers, and any one who has had experience of French lines will
know that as often as not this implies a tedious halt, perhaps of an
hour, at the station where a change has to be made.
The nature of the mountains through and by which flows the Orb
differs greatly from that of the schisty Cévennes—the Cévennes
proper—and the limestone of the causses and of the garigues. They
are a ripple rather than a billow, and being sheltered from the north
winds by the high range at their back form a sort of natural
hothouse, in which the sweetest fruits of a southern clime ripen
readily, where the spring comes earliest and the autumn sun lingers
longest.
In the Languedoc plain, in Roussillon, even to Perpignan, the icy
blasts from the Cévennes are dreaded. The olives, the planes, the
mulberries are bent, leaning towards the south, permanently given
this incline under the influence of these cruel winds. They scourge
Béziers and Montpellier as with a cat-o'-nine-tails dipped in water
that has been frozen. But these winds pass over Bédarieux and the
valley of the Orb to expend their violence elsewhere. Here in the
upper reaches of the Orb the vine, the fig, the olive, the
pomegranate, the almond, the nettle-tree luxuriate, untortured,
unnipped.
Villages are many, clustering as so many sets of beehives in every
warm and sheltered nook that faces the sun, and has a mountain
wall at its back.
And it is precisely here, where least wanted, that a prodigal nature
lavishes heating material in beds of anthracite and other coal.
"The peasants of the low hills of the Monts d'Orb are less accessible to
superstition than those of the highlands, but they have less character and
veritable greatness. The sun has not only heated their land, it has also
sucked up from their brains all those vapours full of poetry that make of
the men of the causses a type original and picturesque. Between the
inhabitant of Servier, who never sowed a seed, and he of Camplong, who
gets fuddled on new wine, the distance is immeasurable, and yet they are
parted by nothing more than the granite mass of Bataillo."

This is what Fabre says of the natives. There are two types not
due to difference of blood, but of surroundings and of occupations.
We are now in the department of Hérault, of Lower Languedoc, and
I may be allowed a few words on the mixture of peoples of diverse
origin that have been fused together into a homogeneous race.
From a period before history began, this country was inhabited by
populations of diverse origins, habits, and language, drawn thither
by the delicious climate, its natural resources, or simply by the
chance of migration. One fact characterises the establishment of the
tribes or nationalities in these parts; so far as we can judge, it was
their attitude towards the people who preceded them. If some of
them swept away the indigenous race, more often they planted
themselves beside the earlier population peaceably and fused with
them. Most of these invaders seem to have possessed gentle
manners, and were not goaded on by the passion for extermination,
for which there was no provocation or need, as the land was wide
and rich enough to sustain all. This mode of colonisation had the
result of filling Lower Languedoc with very heterogeneous
inhabitants, the complexity of which explains the apparent
contradictions of early writers. But on one point these writers are
unanimous: the variety of races or mixtures that occupied the land in
Gallia Narbonensis. In the first century before Christ, Cicero notices
this; and in the fourth century after Christ, Ausonius sang: "Who can
record all thy ports, thy mountains and thy lakes, who the diversity
of thy peoples, their vestures and their languages?"
The most ancient inhabitants recorded were the Iberians, who
extended their domination over the Spanish peninsula and to the
Rhône on the east, which formed the boundary between them and
the Ligurians. But at a time difficult to determine these latter crossed
the river and invaded the territories of the Iberians. But instead of
expelling the conquered peoples, the Ligurians, having an aptitude
for absorption, mingled with those whom they had subdued and
formed the mixed race of the Iberian-Ligurian. There was, however,
already in the land a third nation, that of the Umbranici, apparently
the same as the Umbrians of Northern Italy. They have left their
name at Ambrussum, now Pont-Ambroise, on the Vidourle. Twenty-
three inscriptions remain, mostly in Gard, in an unknown tongue, but
written in Greek characters, that bears an affinity alike to the Ossian
and Umbrian language in Italy.
The Greek trade of Marseilles spread through the land. At Murviel,
a cyclopean enclosure, not many miles from Montpellier, have been
found Greek coins of Marseilles.
In the fourth century before the Christian era a new ethnic
element came to add to what already existed. The Gauls appeared in
the land. A branch of this stock was that of the Volci. These
established themselves between the Rhône and the Garonne, and
extended their authority over the Ibero-Ligurians. These new arrivals
seem to have treated the conquered much as the Ligurians had the
Iberians. They established themselves peaceably among them or
alongside of them. This was the more easy, for, as Strabo says,
though the Gauls belonged to a wholly different stock, yet they
resembled the Ligurians in their mode of life.
Their dominion was not for long—not for more than two centuries
—for in B.C. 121 their country was conquered by the Romans.
Such, then, is the origin of the population of Lower Languedoc,
and explains the diverse origin of the names of rivers, mountains
and towns, some Iberic, some Celtic, some Latin, some of
undiscoverable derivation, given perhaps by the Umbrian colony.
The staple of life in the Cévennes, mainly in the southern portion,
is not corn, but the chestnut. That is why we see this tree
everywhere, old and twisted, but sturdy still, young and vigorous
when recently planted. But unhappily a malady has broken out
among them, the cause of which has not been discovered with
certainty, nor has any remedy been found efficacious. In some years
the leaves fall in September, and the fruit comes to nothing,
reducing the people to a condition almost of famine. In order to
preserve the nuts through the winter and spring and prevent the
sprouting, they are subjected to desiccation in clèdes that may be
seen as a part of the outbuildings of every farmhouse and of many
cottages.
The Spanish chestnut is a beautiful tree. It was indigenous in
England. A few years ago I was draining a field by the river, and cut
down to glacial clay nearly nine feet below the surface, and lying on
this was a huge tree, black as ebony. With great labour I had it
removed to the sawmill, thinking it to have been black bog oak. It
was Spanish chestnut, and since then others have been found in the
same valley. It seems willing to grow anywhere. The peasants build
up terraces no larger than a doormat, and it grows there. But where
there is plenty of soil it will grow much more vigorously than on a
ledge of rock.
"I wish," said R. L. Stevenson, "I could convey a notion of the growth of
these noble trees; of how they strike out boughs like the oak, and trail
sprays of drooping foliage like the willow; of how they stand as upright
fluted columns like the pillars of a church; or like the olive, from the most
shattered bole can put out smooth and youthful shoots, and begin a new
life upon the ruins of the old. Thus they partake of the nature of many
different trees; and even their prickly top-knots, seen near at hand against
the sky, have a certain palm-like air that impresses the imagination. But
this individuality, although compounded of so many elements, is but the
richer and the more original. And to look down upon a level filled with
these knolls of foliage, or to see a clan of old unconquerable chestnuts
cluster like herded elephants upon the spurs of a mountain, is to rise to
higher thoughts of the powers that are in Nature."

I believe that the reason why we have so few old chestnuts in

England, why we have not woods of them, is that the rabbit dearly
loves its sweet bark when young. In planting chestnuts they must be
protected by wire, or every one will be pealed in early spring by
these wretched rodents. The beating of the trees and the gathering
of the fallen chestnuts is a great festival among the Cevenol, as is
the vintage in the plains. I will give an account of the beginning of
the gathering in from the pen of Ferdinand Fabre. I must premise
that the mountaineers from the bald causses come down to the zone
where the precious tree grows and hire themselves out as beaters
and gatherers. A body of men, mostly young, arrive in a village
waving branches, and is met by the old people in the street.
"Our old men and women, very attached to the Fête of the Chestnuts
which brightened their youthful years, had quitted the fireside and had
advanced to the first house of the village. There they drew up in file,
ranged against the south wall. From one end of the line to the other the
features were grave with wrinkles and furrows, softened on some by their
white hair. Warped, bowed, shivering, they looked ahead with glassy eyes
kindled with curiosity. The young folk of the mountain were about to pass
by and they desired to see them, and in seeing them revive recollections
of their own young days, and warm themselves thereat.
"At the first house the arrivals halted; then waving their boughs in
salutation, asked altogether, 'Good folk, how go the chestnuts this year?'
'Very well, children,' replied the old people. Then a little woman, aged
eighty-five, detached herself from her nook in the wall and advanced
towards the beaters. 'You have not forgotten, friends, the Complaint of
the Chestnut Tree?' 'To be sure, the Complaint of the Chestnut Tree,' cried
all.
"From the midst of the grove of boughs carried in their hands, and
which seemed suddenly to have taken root in the soil of the road, rose the
Complainte (ballad), so popular among the Cevenols of the south, and
which, like most of their popular songs, express their toil, their sweat,
their sighs of hunger at last assuaged by labour.

"Quand le châtaignier est planté

Il monte, monte, monte!
Quand le châtaignier est planté
Nous buvons largement à sa santé.

Quand le châtaignier est en fleur,

Belle, belle, belle!
Quand le châtaignier est en fleur,
Le pays prend son odeur.

Quand le châtaignier a grainé,

Il graine, graine, graine!
Quand le châtaignier a grainé,
Chacun danse dans son pré.

Quand les châtaignes nous avons,

Bonnes, bonnes, bonnes!
Quand les châtaignes nous avons,
Nous les mangeons, puis nous mourons.

"After the fourth couplet the ballad was interrupted. Our Cevenols
raised their boughs, brandished the leaves, and made therewith the sign
of the cross.
'On your knees!' said the old woman, extending her hand. The beaters
knelt at once. Then, all at once, from a thousand sturdy breasts young for
 the most part, rolled forth the final verse of the Complainte du
Châtaignier. It was as grand, as beautiful, as sublime as any psalm, any
hymn I have heard in any church.

"Cévennes pleins de rochers,

Hautes, hautes, hautes!
Cévennes pleins de rochers,
Faites nous forts et religieux."

When the chestnuts have been gathered, then in November they

are dried in séchoirs. These are small square structures with a door
and window on one side, and on the other three or more long
narrow loopholes, called in the country carézéïros, that are never
closed. A fire of coals is lighted and kept burning incessantly in the
drying-house, and the smoke passes through shelves on which the
chestnuts are laid, in stages, and escapes by the loopholes. To any
one unaccustomed to the atmosphere in these séchoirs, it is hard to
endure the smoke, and one stands the risk of being asphyxiated.
Nevertheless the peasants spend two months in the year in these
habitations, amidst cobwebs and soot, swarming with mice and rats,
and the smoke at once acrid and moist, for in drying the chestnuts
exude a greenish fluid that falls in a rain from the shelves. The
natives do not seem to mind the dirt and smell of these horrible
holes. Moreover, if there be in a village any one suffering from
phthisis, at the end of autumn the patient is taken by the relations in
his or her bed, and this is deposited in a corner of the séchoir. The
sick person is not allowed to leave the drying-house, and it is a
singular phenomenon that not infrequently, under the influence of
the heat and the sulphurous smoke, the tuberculosis is arrested, and
the sufferer lives on for many long years.
It is economy that drives the peasants to live in the drying-houses.
As they are forced to light fires for the chestnuts, they extinguish
those on their hearths in the farm-houses. Why have two fires going
when one will suffice? So the peasant bids his wife and children cook
their soup at the brazier in the séchoir. And he himself, driven under
shelter by the rain and cold, brings to the common hearth his
hatchet and long strips of wild chestnut, of which he fashions hoops
for barrels or baskets for the collectors of olives. Through the two
months from the Jour des Morts to Christmas Eve the séchoir is the
village centre; to it flock the poorest members of the commune, who
have no drying-houses of their own.
The fêtes in Hérault are often very curious, and evidently date
from an early period, and are reminiscences of paganism.
For instance, the Carotat at Béziers on Ascension Day has nothing
Christian about it. Till 1878, on the eve, the servants of the Consuls
were wont to parade the town with music going before them, and
knock at the doors of houses asking for contributions. They were
followed by a clumsy wooden structure covered with hide to
represent a camel; and all largesses received were put into the
mouth of the beast.
Next day, to the sound of cannon and bells, the Corporation
assembled in three ranks, led by the Provost bearing a cake decked
out with ribbons and attached to his left arm, attended by a servant
carrying a basket of bread, followed by the camel. This fête is dead.
But what does survive at Béziers and at Montpellier and elsewhere is
the Danse des Treilles at the fête called Roumarin. The young
people, in their gala dresses and adorned with bunches of rosemary,
carry hoops similarly decorated, with which they perform the
evolutions of a graceful ballet in which there are seven figures; and
the bystanders pelt them with violets. At Montpellier the dance is
considered to be a commemoration of the marriage of Peter II. of
Aragon to Marie de Montpellier, June 15th, 1204. [13]
At Béziers no public festival formerly took place without a
preliminary visit to Pepezuc, a mutilated white marble statue with
the head knocked off and replaced by one of common stone. It is
obviously a representation of a Roman emperor, perhaps of
Augustus. It stood on a fluted column, and on the base is inscribed
P.P.E.S.V. But the common story was that it represented a gallant
officer who had driven out the English from the town, of which they
had obtained possession. Pepezuc was wont to be dressed up and
decorated with flowers. That is stopped, as the statue has been
removed to the town museum.
The Ass of Gignac continues to be fêted. The town was besieged
by the Saracens. One night, after a hard day's fighting, the
defenders, wearied out, had gone to sleep, when an ass brayed long
and loud. His master had forgotten to feed him, and this he
resented. The man awoke, for the braying of an ass would rouse the
Seven Sleepers, and he saw that the enemy was escalading the
walls. He roused the garrison, and they succeeded in hurling back
the ladders. However, the deliverance was temporary, for a few days
later the town was captured and burnt. In gratitude for what the ass
had done, the people of Gignac instituted an annual
commemoration, in which they march a figure of an ass through the
street to the sound of fife and tabor. Then in reminiscence of the
fight a contest takes place in a field called Le Senibelet, in which one
duellist wears a huge helmet, preserved in the town hall, to
represent the Christian warrior, whilst the adversary has a turban on
his head. They fight with sticks of the garrigou, that grows on the
otherwise barren limestone, till the Mussulman drops with
exhaustion, when the victor is divested of his helmet and conducted
in triumph to the house where the ass is supposed to have brayed.
A visit should certainly be made to Roquefort, where the famous
cheese is made from ewe's milk. The town is built not only against,
but into a rock of limestone that has been riddled with caves natural
and artificially bored to serve as cellars, in which the cheese is kept
at an even temperature, and is supposed then to attain its special
flavour. The cheese is, however, not all made there; it is brought
there from the Larzac, that maintains enormous flocks of sheep, and
indeed from throughout the arrondissement of Ste. Affrique. The
cheeses are conveyed to Roquefort, there to mature. The blue
mould in them is not, however, due to natural mildew in the cheese,
but to mildewed crumbs of bread blown into the curd in process of
formation. The cheeses are ranged on stages of wooden boards by
over nine hundred girls in short petticoats, called cabanières, whose
special duty it is to attend to the cheeses. They are clean, good-
natured, happy-faced lasses, who marry early, usually at sixteen. It
is extraordinary if one is still unmarried at nineteen.

Cheesemakers, Roquefort

I have described the making of the cheese in my Deserts of

Central France. The natural caves in Roquefort number twenty-three,
and there are thirty-four in all. The rocks in part of the town
overhang the houses.
At Lunas, commanded by the escarpments of the Pioch, there is
not much more to be seen than the ruins of a castle and a church
partly Romanesque. Le Bousquet d'Orb occupies a picturesque
situation, on a mamelon in the midst of a basin. On the highest
terrace the church stands up boldly. This is a place with mines of
coal and copper. Boussagues is a very ancient village, once a town
enclosed within walls, and possessing two churches and two castles.
The town has retained its medieval physiognomy—and its smells.
 The train from Bédarieux to Lamalou follows the Orb, that flows
through a green and smiling plain. Properly the Orb should pursue
its further course due south, but a low range of hills obstructs the
way, and the river is forced to turn abruptly round and flow due
west. The hills to the south rise; on a lofty isolated height above
green forest gleams white a pilgrimage chapel. We pass on to
Lamalou, where every comfort may be obtained.
Lamalou is picturesquely situated in a narrow lateral valley of the
Orb, in the midst of the buttresses of the Espinouse, or rather of the
Caroux, that links the Cévennes proper to the Montaigne Noire. This
thermal station is growing in importance, the waters being thought
specially and peculiarly beneficial in spinal troubles, above all in
cases of S. Vitus's Dance. In winter it has but 900 inhabitants, but in
summer arrive 10,000 visitors, and a special train-de-luxe starts
twice a week from Paris for Lamalou, enabling the journey to be
made in fifteen hours.
A favourite walk is to N. D. de Capimont, which occupies from two
hours to two and a half. This is a little chapel on the height above
the village, with a hermitage attached. There is no hermit there now.
The last died five years ago. He was found dead in his cell, some
days apparently after that he had expired. He was the last, and
there are not likely to be any successors to an Order that was by no
means an element of good in the country. Ferdinand Fabre has given
a graphic account of the hermits in Barnabé, and also in Mon Oncle
Célestin.
"I am in despair," says he. "Letters from the South inform me that one
by one the hermitages are being closed; that the hermits, knapsack on
back, are quitting their solitary chapels, and that they do not return. Did
the order for their suppression issue from the Prefecture or from the
Episcopal Palace? It is supposed from both simultaneously. What a pity! O
how the picturesqueness of our South will be the poorer thereby."

The hermits, calling themselves Free Brothers of S. Francis, were a

begging fraternity; they rambled about the country selling sacred
pictures, rosaries, and other religious trifles; they frequented the
fairs and the taverns, and neither ate nor drank in moderation, and
their morals were not irreproachable. But they served a purpose.
They attended to the solitary chapels, and made ample provision for
the pilgrims who visited these shrines.
"Mon Dieu!" says Fabre; "I know well enough that the Free Brothers of
S. Francis, as they loved to entitle themselves, had allowed themselves a
good deal of freedom, more than was decorous. For instance, it was not
particularly edifying at Bédarieux on a market-day to see the hermits from
the mountains round about leave the tavern of the Golden Grapes
staggering, jolting against one another, shouting, and at nightfall
describing ridiculous zigzags as they went on their way straying along the
roads leading to their solitary dwellings.
"But as these monastically habited gentry in no way scandalised the
population of the South, who never confounded the occupants of the
hermitages with the curés of the parishes, why sweep away these
fantastic figures, who, without any religious character, recruited from the
farms, never educated in seminaries, peasants at bottom, in no way
priests, capable, when required, to give a helping hand with the pruning-
knife in the vineyard or with the pole among the olives, or the sickle
among the corn. Alas! they had their weaknesses, and these weaknesses
worked their ruin."

At the French Revolution the Free Brothers of S. Francis did not

creep into their shells and hide their heads there—they knew better
than that. Though not even in minor orders, they did something
smack of the clerical, and might be sent à la lanterne. So they
doffed the brown habit and donned the blouse, went to farmers and
served them till the tyranny was over-passed. In 1806 the curés of
the parishes were glad to find any pious laymen who would keep the
chapels clean and serve at Mass on the days when pilgrims streamed
to them. The men thus installed assumed a Franciscan snuff-
coloured habit, and called themselves, without other justification,
Brethren of S. Francis.
When he was a child, Fabre says, there were six hermitages in the
upper valley of the Orb. Now most of the chapels are falling to
decay, as there is no one authorised to look after them. But N. D. de
Capimont is still in considerable repute, and is frequented by crowds
on the Feast of the Assumption. A curious old town, situated high,
may be visited from either Lamalou or Bédarieux. This is Villemagne,
with a ruined abbey and mint. The abbey was founded by
Charlemagne in 780. The church of the parish is dedicated to S.
Majan, and is a vast building; the choir alone was erected in the
fourteenth century. It contains a curious altar of the sixth century,
now used as a bénitier. The old church of S. Gregory, of the
thirteenth century, long used as a granary, has been restored. The
old town is full of ancient buildings, in narrow streets, and is very
curious.
But the finest excursion of all is that to the gorge of Héric. For this
it is advisable to take the train to Colombières and walk thence, or
drive from Lamalou. The station of Trivalle is close to the entrance of
the gorge, but from that side it can rarely be ascended, as the path
built up against the precipice is often broken down and not repaired.
But from the other side the ascent is easily made. The view up the
ravine to the needle rocks of granite above is hardly to be surpassed
for beauty of colour and form. The sides are precipitous for 900 feet.
By the path one can reach the village of Héric, lost at the extremity
of this tremendous ravine, and by this is its only means of
communication with the outer world; and so dangerous is the path
that there is a saying in the country that no inhabitant of Héric dies
in his bed. What I have said before I repeat here. None of the
gorges in the Cévennes resemble one another; they have not even a
family likeness, for the Caroux from which the stream descends, and
into the bowels of which this gorge is cleft, is of granite; and what
resemblance can there be between granite and basalt or dolomitic
limestone? When I visited the ravine, snow powdered the silvery-
grey needles at the head and lay in the laps. So seen, the picture of
that ravine is indelibly impressed on my memory as one of
surpassing savage beauty.
S. Gervais is a picturesque little town situated at the junction of
the Casselouvres and the Mare, that takes its rise in the Signal de
l'Espinouse, 3,380 feet. Its church has the peculiarity of the spire
being a grove of trees and a bed of wallflowers that have rooted
themselves in the stonework and been allowed to grow there
unmolested. The town, notwithstanding that it preserves many relics
of the Middle Ages and a general aspect that is venerable, is but
modern compared with the older town, now abandoned, that was
built on a jagged rock, its ruins mingling with the rock and scarce
distinguishable from it. The more modern town is planted on a
hillock standing by itself; the streets are narrow, scrambling up the
side of the hill, and the houses are dingy, dirty, and dilapidated. The
still more modern town lies below the hill. There is an intermittent
spring in the side of the Hôtel Soulié. At Saint Gervais at fair time
may be noted the contrast that exists between the inhabitant of the
sun-baked, semi-tropical lower land, rich in oil, honey, and wine, and
the mountaineer who descends there to sell his cattle. Those who
live in the sheltered valleys are clothed in stout broadcloth and
serge, or bottle-green velvet. They arrive at a fair or market, noisy,
sprightly, their mules laden with corn and fruit. On the other hand,
the inhabitant of the heights of the Espinouse or Larzac is grave,
reserved, uncommunicative, clothed in a garment of coarse cloth
called grisaoud, followed by interminable flocks of sheep, goats, and
oxen.
At Bédarieux—
"They trade, they chaffer over almonds, olives, honey, cocoons, wheat,
the produce of a sunny nature; at Saint Gervais is a cattle market, and is
of a graver character, for though a man can dispose lightly of the fruits of
the earth that he has tilled, of the tree he has planted, it is not without a
pang that the shepherd can separate himself from the beast he has
nourished. Between the pastor and his flock do there not exist, moreover,
mutual sentiments of affection, even of love, that defy all psychology?"

But the market is not one of cattle and corn only, it is of human
beings as well, for hither come the shepherds to hire boys to attend
during the year on the sheep and herds of swine. These lads are
locally called pillards, and the token that one has been engaged is
that the shepherd buys the boy a pair of new sabots out of his own
money, a sort of investiture in the pastoral office. These lads and the
shepherds lead a lonely life in the mountains. The boys are not
unkindly treated, for the Cevenol, if rough and silent, has a gentle
and kindly heart. But what a life for a growing boy in wild nature,
among mountains and shrubs, birds of all kinds, and creeping things
innumerable, and at night with the stars shining above his head with
a sharpness and intensity as though they stabbed him to the heart,
but left an exquisite pain behind. He learns to know the signs of the
times, the winds, the voices of nature, to distinguish one bird's note
from another, and to ascertain the virtues of the aromatic herbs on
the limestone causse. The life may be hard, but it is healthy both to
body and mind and soul.

FOOTNOTE:
[13] Ferd. Troubat: Danse des Treilles. Toulouse, 1900.
 CHAPTER XVII
THE HÉRAULT

Clermont l'Hérault—Church and castle—Aimar Guilhem—Deserts the cause of his

Count—Peyrolles the Potter—N.D. du Peyrou—Villeneuvette—Military cloth
factory—Its semi-feudal organisation—Valley of the Dourbie—Mourèze—The
quarries—Decomposition of the rock—Church—Lodève—The Count—Contest
with him carried on by S. Fulcran—The bishops—Perjury—The people gain the
victory—Cathedral—S. Michel-de-Grammont—Dolmen—Caverns—L'Escalette—
Larzac—Le Caylar—Flora of Larzac—Abdias Maurel—La Couvertoirade—Aniane
—Gorges of the Hérault—Mills—S. Guilhem-le-Désert—Guillaume de Courtenez
—His parting from his wife—His visit to Paris—Church—Monuments—Cloister—
Saracen inscriptions—Farewell to the Cévennes.

N admirable centre for several expeditions of no little interest is

Clermont l'Hérault, where is a good hotel.
Clermont, though called l'Hérault, is not actually on the river of
that name, though near it. The town is built at the base and up the
sides of a steep hill crowned by a ruined castle.
The church is one of the very few in the department with side
aisles to the nave. Indeed, the form affected throughout southern
Languedoc is a vast nave without pillars, and chapels between the
buttresses. This church was begun in 1275 and ended in 1313. It
has a seven-sided apse. Over the west window is a gallery with
machicolations, so that it could be used as a fortress, and melted
lead or boiling pitch could be thrown down on besiegers. Narrow,
steep, and dirty streets climb the hillside to the castle, now enclosed
within the walls of a convent; little remains, however, but a keep of
this once sumptuous seigneural residence of the barons of Clermont.
Formerly it consisted of a semicircular ring of wall defended at
intervals by seven round towers, and with an eighth on the side of
the chord of the arc. The view from the height extends over the
plain watered by the Hérault and the Lergue, that begins at the feet
of the Lodève Mountains and extends to the low range of the
Taillades de Gignac. From thirty to forty towns, villages, and hamlets
dot this plain.

S. Guilhem-le-Désert
 In 1209 Aimar Guilhem, seigneur of Clermont, was the ally of the
unfortunate Raymond, Count of Toulouse, against whom Innocent
III. hurled the thunders of excommunication because he would not
butcher and burn his subjects, who had embraced the Albigensian
heresy; and Aimar was accordingly involved in his sentence.
Innocent called together the riff-raff of Europe to join in a crusade
against Raymond, promising life eternal and absolution from all sins
to those who would join in an indiscriminate slaughter of the
Albigenses, and placed Simon de Montfort at the head of this horde
of the Children of God, as they called themselves, who swept over
the land committing indescribable horrors. After the massacre of the
inhabitants of Béziers by the crusaders, Aimar retired to his castle
and awaited events. His conduct may have been prudent, as he
saved the town from sack and slaughter, but it was unworthy of him;
as had he roused the country of Lodève, he would have menaced
the rear of Simon de Montfort, and might have forced this
commander of the soldiers of the Papacy to deal less cruelly with the
seigneurs of Languedoc, whom he robbed of their domains with
impunity.
On the Place under trees is a monument, surmounted by a bust of
Peyrolles, a potter of Clermont, who composed verses in the
Languedoc dialect. He became jealous of the fame acquired by
Jasmin, the hairdresser of Agen, the great vernacular poet, and sent
him a challenge. "I will go to Montpellier any day and hour you
choose to name. Let four men of literary notoriety give us three
themes on which to compose poems in twenty-four hours; and let us
be shut up in one room, with no admission of any one to us or of
anything but our food—and see who in the time will turn out most
poetry." Jasmin replied that he declined the contest. For his part, he
could not produce verses as fast as Peyrolles could pots; his powers
did not reach further than the composition of two or three verses in
a day.
 In the Cirque, Mourèze

A delightful walk or drive is to Mourèze, up the valley of the

Dourbie. On the col crossed by the road leading into this valley is the
quaint chapel of N. D. du Peyrou. It is pointed, with an immense
porch composed of two flying buttresses sustaining a roof. A chapel
at the west end is out of line with the axis of the principal building.
The nave was rebuilt or altered at the Renaissance. In the choir on
one side are oval frames containing representations of girls who
have made their first communion, in white paper cut out with
scissors, and on the other side similar frames contain nuptial crowns.
A largely attended pilgrimage visits this chapel on Monday in Easter
week. This shrine is at the entrance to the beautiful basin of
Villeneuvette, rich with cork trees, micocouliers (Celtis Australis),
mulberries, chestnuts, tall ancient cypresses, pines, caper bushes,
and the kermes-oak.
Here in the bottom, by the little river, is the industrial settlement
of Villeneuvette. An avenue of planes leads to a wall, with a gateway
in it, over which is the inscription, "Honneur au travail." Up to 1848 it
bore the title "Manufacture royale." This is the last existing example
of the factories established by Colbert in 1666 for the weaving of
cloth for the Levant trade, and for each piece of cloth woven was
received a bonus of ten francs. It was found that the trade in the
Levant of French cloth was failing owing to English competition.
Colbert founded this among other colonies of workmen to ensure
that the cloth exported was of good quality, and agents in
Constantinople and in Pondicherry received and sold it. In order to
protect the establishment during the religious wars that desolated
the Cévennes, the settlement was surrounded by a rampart,
crenelated and flanked by redoubts. Within are the factory, a church,
and the houses of the artisans, arranged on a formal plan. The
colony had its own municipal government, and elected its own
mayor. Every night the drawbridge was raised and the gate fastened.
Villeneuvette owns a considerable territory around it, and the land
is parcelled out among the workmen engaged in the factory. Each
family has its garden, its vineyard, and its plantation of mulberries,
so that when work is slack in the factory there is plenty of
occupation for the hands in the fields.
For more than two centuries Villeneuvette has been in private
hands. It had failed to be a success financially in 1703, and was
disposed of to M. Castamé-d'Aurac, who built the church. A century
later, in 1803, it became the property of the family of Maistre, and it
has remained in the same hands ever since.
 It now turns out exclusively cloth for the army and uniforms for
colleges and railway officials. Long stretches of dark blue and
crimson cloth are seen in the meadows outside the walls, destined to
be cut into the jackets and breeches of the military. Villeneuvette has
retained much of its curious patriarchal organisation. There is no
village outside the embattled walls; of the ninety-eight cottages all
are given rent free to the artisans, and nothing more is exacted of
them save respect for rules of decency and cleanliness. Here no
slops may be thrown out of the windows, nor may birds' nests be
molested. These restrictions have been indignantly protested against
by the Radicals, who charge the organisation of the little community
with being bound down by the chains of feudalism. Where is liberty
if a householder may not throw his slops down on the head of any
one passing in the street? Where is equality if the urchins of
Clermont may rob robins' nests and not those of Villeneuvette?
Where is fraternity if the artisans may not get fuddled together and
roar and riot in drunken bands?
The road ascends the valley of the Dourbie, but to reach Mourèze
it makes a circuit round the conical mountain, Le Puy de Bissou, on
the summit of which is a chapel where once lived a hermit, but to
which no pilgrimages are now made. A bridge has been thrown over
the river, and a new road has been begun which will give speedier
access by carriage to Mourèze, but which can now only be traced on
foot. The sparkling stream slides over contorted slate rocks, and
trout dart through the pools. The hillsides are covered with pale grey
flowered heath and the stunted kermes-oak with its glistening
leaves. This, the Quercus coccifera, never grows higher than five
feet, the garus it is that gives its name to the garigues, the desolate
regions of limestone on which nothing else will grow. On its leaves
feeds the kermes insect, round as a ball, and formerly supposed to
be the fruit growing out of the rib of the leaf as does the berry of
the butchers' broom. It produces a red dye, less brilliant than
cochineal, and some of the Oriental reds are produced from it. The
dye of the kermes is more permanent than cochineal. Suddenly on
our eyes bursts Mourèze, one of the most fantastic groups of rock,
castle, church, and village to be seen anywhere. We are disposed to
regard the pictures by Gustave Doré of rock scenery interspersed
with ruined towers as in his series, Le Juif errant, to be the creations
of a fevered dream. But they are not so. He must have lived or
travelled among the dolomitic formations of Languedoc, and thence
drawn his inspiration.

Group at Mourèze

The approach to Mourèze by the old carriage road is different; it is

through red sandstone, soft and friable, and torn by streams into
gullies. One would suppose that Mourèze had been founded
originally by refugees from a world devastated by wars. It is
concealed from view on all sides. It is Nature's hiding-place for
persecuted men. At its back start up sheer cliffs of limestone, pink
and yellow and grey, rising from 1,300 to 1,600 feet. Dolomitic
limestone is composed of carbonate of lime and carbonate of
magnesia, and the texture is mostly crystalline and granulated. Each
grain, having a power of resistance different from the other, yields or
remains under the influence of the air and rains, so that alongside of
massive rocks, eroded, hollowed out, perforated, or protruding in
knots and elbows, are heaps of sand formed by the decomposition
of the cement that held the grains in place. Thus are obtained the
most bizarre and varied shapes of rock. All that imagination can
picture of what is strange is found here—dismantled towers, gigantic
monoliths, excavated walls, narrow gullies between monstrous
shapes, great porticoes, pyramids standing on their heads, grouped
together, and among them cottages clinging to their sides, a church
on a ledge above a precipice, and over all a castle, the walls of
which can hardly be distinguished from the rock out of which they
grow. Contrast adds to the picturesque effect. The dolomite bristling
with needles lies in the lap of a great cirque or cradle of more
compact calcareous rock, disposed in regular horizontal beds, and
attaining to a top over 1,610 feet that supports the ruins of the
Romanesque church of S. Jean d'Aureillan. These walls back the
scene on the north. The south is closed by the Puy de Bissou,
clothed in woods, 1,450 feet. To the west is the mountain of S.
Scholastica, 1,500 feet, and wooded ranges to the east of less
elevation complete the enclosure and the screen that hides Mourèze
from the world without.
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