sandstone, crowned by magnificent pines, cypresses, cork trees and ilexes, that embower a chapel of S. Cassien and a farm. Here, till recently, lived a hermit. These gentry are becoming scarce. Possibly the prognostication of M. Anselme Benoit, in Jules Fabre's novel Man Oncle Celestin, is accomplishing itself:
"Va au diable avec tes médailles et tes chapelets. Je te le prédis depuis longtemps: à force d'embrasser les filles, tu finiras par embrasser les gendarmes au detour de quelque chemin."
In 1661 Bishop Godeau found a vagabond hermit at S. Jeanette, and tried in vain to dislodge him ; but the man hung on, and Godeau found him still there in 1667.
These men pick up a subsistence by the sale of sacred metals, pictures, scapulars, rosaries ; sometimes manufacturing the latter themselves. Very often they are simply lazy loons who can subsist on such sales and occasional alms; but some have been as great scamps as Jacopo Rusca in Fabre's delightful story—which is a graphic picture of country life and country people in the South, full of delicious word painting.
Formerly S. Cassien was the fortress to the town of Arluc. Castle and town have disappeared wholly. Arluc, Ara lucis[1] as the place is called in old deeds, was a shrine in a sacred wood. The Provençal Troubadour Raymond Ferand tells a story of it.
Here lived once on a time a sorcerer named Cloaster; he had an altar in the wood, at which he practised all kinds of diableries. There was a bridge over the Siagne crossed by the people who came there to worship. Now S. Nazarius was abbot of Lerins. One day, a
- ↑ A fantastic derivation. Actually, Arluc is By the Mere.
