Page:Tourist's Maritime Provinces.djvu/353

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THE GASPÉ SHORE
295

an every-day article of merchandise whose staple price is five dollars.

The crimson half-dome of Mount St. Anne crowns the emerald glacis that stands behind the village. Twelve hundred feet above surf is a shrine to which pilgrims climb on the name-day of the fishermen's patron. Visitors not infrequently make the ascent for the out-reaching view of the Gulf and Mai Bay, of the rich-hued landmark which legend has compared to a great ship forever sailing to a phantom goal, of the Forillon ridge beyond Gaspé Basin, of the tempest-riven coast to the south and the rolling chain in the interior.

The drive of five and a half miles "around the mountain" merits the term sensational for its array of canyons and naked heights that hold between them the precarious road. At the yawning of riven gorges segments of the Mai Bay appear, flecked by swelling sails. Climbing tortuously, the road emerges from a vale of sombre splendour to broad highlands patched with planted fields and forests. Again the stony highway runs on the flange of a hilly fastness and peers fearfully down an unguarded precipice. The White Mountain shows its chalky crest high above and behind the pate of St. Anne. Another breathless pitch, and the circuit is nearly complete. Below lies the Rock and the oval mound of Bonne Aventure.

A morning ride in the Alpha to the island whose rounded bulk the gnawing sea has cut away from