We left Nismes on the afternoon of the twenty-eighth, for the Pont du Gard. The latter part of the way has some picturesque points of view, adorned by the ruins of old castles perched on rugged rocks; but it is deficient in wood, and in water; though we passed two or three abundant springs, and at each spring a village. We crossed the valley of the Gardon, by means of a bridge built against the ancient aqueduct; and found close by it a very decent country inn, with civil and obliging people, where we slept.

The Pont du Gard is a portion of a Roman aqueduct, formed to convey the water of two springs in the neighbourhood of Uzès, to Nismes; it being imagined to be of a quality superior to any which could be found at a smaller distance. Perhaps also their elevation, by means of which the water could be distributed readily all over the town, contributed to the preference given to them. It is a noble work, consisting of two ranges of large arches, and a third of small ones over them; the latter forming the immediate support of the water-course; the utmost length is 870 feet; the height, from the water of the little stream below, 156 feet.

After spending about four hours of the next morning at the aqueduct, we set off for Beaucaire, passing below the convent of Montfrin, whose ruins are of great extent, and occupy a fine situation. The fair was concluded, the people were packing up their merchandise, and every thing was in confusion. We descended the river to Arles, but a thick fog obscured the prospect, which we had the less cause to regret, since in this part, the Rhone passes through a flat alluvial country, and has little beauty to boast of. Arles stands on a gentle eminence. It is surrounded by walls and towers, which, though useless for defence, form sometimes admirable features in the landscape. It is a dirty disagreeable place, containing however, Roman antiquities of considerable importance; but the bad weather may perhaps have influenced my opinion of the city. Arles, like many other French towns, lays claim to a very remote antiquity, being, according to Lalauziere, (Abrégé Chronologique de l’Histoire d’Arles), a capital city, and the seat of a royal court, in the year of Rome 260, when the Phocæan colony founded Marseille. In order, however, to conciliate the advocates for the antiquity of the latter city, the author is willing to acknowledge a prior establishment of Marseille, before that recorded in history, (B. C. 539,) by two Phocæan chiefs, differing from the others only in name; which does not seem to be much, since we know, that in topographical histories, heroes have the attributes of pantonomism and ubiquity. These, however, arrived in France only forty-six years before the others. I must confess, I think this a very stingy allowance of Arles’s antiquary, when he had many ages at his entire disposal. Arles having been founded, according to the ‘Sçavant Anibert,’ seven hundred years before Rome. Leaving these dreams, Arles appears to have been a city of considerable importance, when the Cæsar Constantius fixed his residence there in 292; and from this time to 312, or perhaps to 324, when Constantine ultimately defeated Licinius, it was considered the capital of the western part of the Roman world; and it is probably to this period that we are to refer its principal monuments. The younger Constantine was born there in 315; and in 316 the first Constantine celebrated there the decennial games with great magnificence. Pownal says, that it is not to the great Constantine that Arles is indebted, but to Constantine the Third, a usurper in the reign of Honorius, who was proclaimed in Britain in 407, and defeated and put to death in 411. This man indeed made Arles for a short period his capital, but his reign was too short and turbulent for the production of extensive monuments of architecture. The amphitheatre is a larger building than that of Nismes, but so encumbered with houses within and without, that it is impossible to obtain a good view of it, and we must collect the parts as we see them here and there, to form an opinion of the whole. We found one open space, where we could walk on the tops of eight or ten of the upper row of vaults. It is said at present to contain within its circuit a thousand houses, but I would not vouch for the truth of this estimate. Lalauziere attributes it to Tiberius Nero, quæstor under Julius Cæsar, forty-six years before Christ.

The remains of a theatre, where a frieze ornamented with foliage is found over an architrave enriched with triglyphs, announce a great decline of art, and such as we can hardly suppose to have taken place before Constantine. In the progress of the fine arts towards perfection, it seems probable that the capital would take the lead. At least, in modern Europe, the metropolis seems to afford the example to the provinces; and in architecture, as in dress in the time of Steele and Addison, we may sometimes find a fashion commencing in the country, when it has had its day, and is already exploded in the city. Will this take place at all times? I do not mean in every particular instance, but may it be considered as a general rule, applicable to all periods? I incline to the affirmative, and conclude, that the earliest corruptions, as well as the earliest improvements, would take place in the chief towns: yet I suspect, that even at Rome, we shall be unable to find a greater absurdity than this at Arles, before the expiration of the third century. In the court of a convent of Cordeliers, are two columns of variegated marble without flutes, supposed also to belong to the theatre. They are of the Corinthian order, and appear to stand in their original position. The abacus of the capitals contains ovolos and dentils, as if it were a reduction of the cornice; yet the foliage seems to have been in good taste, and well carved, but it is much injured; these and the bases are of white marble, and are supposed to have been taken from the temple of Diana, and placed at the principal door of the Scene. We find a number of fragments in the same spot, of similar material; portions of shafts of columns of four different sizes, and as many different cornices; and morsels of sculpture, which show themselves to have belonged to very fine statues. In another place there are two capitals, and a piece of an entablature, which, together with two granite shafts on a larger scale than the parts they now support, are of a purer style: these are said to have belonged to the ancient capitol, but a capitol was a fortress, and for its own construction required no columns, and hardly admitted them. These columns were perhaps, those of a temple within the capital, or are we to suppose that the whole became a sacred inclosure, as at Athens, and was ornamented with a propylæon. Whatever it was, the edifice is believed to have been begun by the second Constantine in 339, and finished by his brother Constantius about 353. The architecture contradicts the history, unless we suppose it to have been composed of the spoils of more ancient buildings; which is the more probable, since these granite columns are too large for their capitals. If it formed part of a tetrastyle front, about one-third of the frieze and architrave remain, and these have holes in them, which doubtless supported letters of metal, and from these holes, and on that supposition, M. Seguier, who decyphered the holes at Nismes, has restored the whole inscription; a degree of supersagacity, which rather weakens the credit of his former exploit. An obelisk, 47 feet high, adorns the principal square of Arles, but it is not well mounted. The pedestal has a fulsome dedication to Louis the Fourteenth, and another, as fulsome, to Napoleon; but the latter was covered with a board, on which was painted a third, to Louis the Eighteenth. The investigation of the antiquities of Arles would be a fine subject for a skilful antiquary, but the attention of the French is more directed to the accurate examination of what is not in their own country, than to what is. Even the political condition of Arles down to 1251, when the Republic submitted itself to the counts of Provence, would form a curious subject. We feel an interest in the history of a free and independent state, where the mind and character are able to display themselves; but with the loss of liberty, the events of a provincial city lose all attraction for a stranger; and in all these states, which were once free, but are now subject to arbitrary power, it is extremely instructive to trace both the causes and consequences of the loss of freedom.

Beside the buildings already mentioned, there are several Roman vaults, the remains of baths; but all the parts of these that are known, are occupied as cellars, and make no appearance above ground. There are also in the neighbourhood, the fragments of an aqueduct, which collected the water of different springs in the principality of Baux, and conducted them to Arles, but I did not visit them.

What strikes a stranger the most at Arles, is the immense number of sarcophagi, of which the best are now collected in an old church. The sculpture shews that some are of Pagan, and some of Christian origin; but all of the lower empire, and of poor workmanship. One of them exhibits the fragment of a temple, where the supports seem to have been alternately columns and caryatides; but it is much damaged, and I am not quite sure that there were any columns. At the other end of the same sarcophagus, is an ornament which resembles those in the portal of Nôtre Dame at Dijon. On others, one might fancy it possible to trace the origin, both of the pointed arch, and of what has been called the trefoil ornament. One of them is ornamented with a range of Corinthian columns, supporting alternately semicircular and triangular arches, if they may be called so. I think, however, that we ought to consider both as pediments, where the horizontal cornice has been omitted; especially as they are ornamented with dentils. Another has a little point hanging down in the middle of the arch, thus:

A little out of the town is the old Roman burying ground, (necropolis) where there are still numbers of sarcophagi, and of their coverings, scattered about, but without sculpture; the former are uniformly parallelopipedons, not smaller at the base than above. The latter are of the usual form, like a hipped roof of very small elevation, with an eighth part of a sphere at each angle, by way of finish; but I observed one, with a quarter of a sphere also at each side. Just beyond the necropolis, are the ruins of the convent of Minims, which at one time seems to have contained a large collection of these sarcophagi. The number must have been originally exceedingly great. Many have been carried away for domestic purposes, to hold wine, oil, or water; to serve for washing, or for the preparation of saltpetre.^[22] Charles IX. and Catherine of Medici being at Arles, gave several to the duke of Savoy, and to the Prince of Lorraine. The French monarch and his mother attempted to carry eight columns of porphyry, and many beautiful sarcophagi, to Paris; but the boat foundered at Pont St. Esprit, and these spoils remain yet concealed in the Rhone. Cardinal Barberini obtained permission of the town of Arles, and transported many of the most beautiful into Italy. In 1635, the Marquis St. Chaumont received thirteen, as a present from the municipality; three others were given in 1640 to Alphonso du Plessis, cardinal Archbishop of Lyon. Various other princes and nobles have carried away sarcophagi from Arles; and as, where it was in their power, they doubtless selected the best, one may be justly surprised at the number, and interest of those that remain.

The church of this convent is evidently very ancient. It is attributed to St. Virgil, Archbishop of Arles, in the seventh century, and it has been ruined in the most picturesque manner.

At some distance is another convent, of which the ruins appear yet more considerable; and both for form and situation, are of great value in the landscape.

Arles is in an unwholesome situation. It rained almost all the time we were there, with a suffocating south wind; I do not know whether it was owing to this, or to the bad cookery at the Lion d’Or, (the Hotel du Nord was full) that my health suffered, and I became very impatient to get away. This was attended with some difficulty, as there is no post road to the place. The soil is clayey, and the ways are almost impassable in wet weather; it is true there are rocky limestone hills at a little distance, but nobody thinks of mending the road with these materials. At last we procured a cart, and placing a mattress in it, proceeded at a foot pace to Tarrascon, and thence to St. Remi, where a fine air and wholesome food soon restored me. We do not find our hosts very complaisant or obliging in this part of France; they give us what they please, when they please, and how they please; and if you don’t like it, you may let it alone. However, since we cannot bend them to our ways, we endeavour to accommodate ourselves to theirs, and do not experience any essential inconvenience.

The monuments of St. Remi are about a mile from the modern town. They occupy a delightful situation at the foot of some fine limestone rocks of the principality of Baux, and the ground slopes from them into a fertile plain, which the eye entirely commands. They consist of two distinct objects, entirely unencumbered by any neighbouring building, and with a few trees about them which afford some degree of shade. The first is an arch, supposed to be of the same date with that of Orange, and according to some French antiquaries, erected on the same occasion; but there is no other authority for this than a supposed similarity in the architecture. All the upper part is gone, and we have neither capitals nor entablature. There has been but a single arch, and that remains nearly entire, with the lower part of two columns on each side, and their bases and pedestals. The bases are of the Roman, not of the Greek, Attic; and though in other respects there is some similarity to the arch at Orange, yet it is hardly enough to prove that they were productions of the same period. The archivolt in both is in one face, entirely filled with a sculpture of leaves and fruit; two gigantic figures occupy the space between the columns on each side, and there are slight indications of a victory on each spandril. These are all the figures that remain.

At the distance of a few paces is a monument with this inscription, SEXLMIVLIEICFPARENTIBVSSVEIS; but these names do not help us to the date. The style of architecture, I should think posterior to that of the arches. Millin thinks it later than the Antonines. It is composed of a square plinth elevated on two steps, which supports a pedestal filled with sculpture, representing equestrian combats; upon this rises a square edifice, with a three-quarter column at each angle, or perhaps rather more than three-fourths of the column are exposed. The architrave has hardly any projection before the face of the work, so that the columns stand out beyond it for half their diameter, and do not appear to contribute materially to its support. This peculiarity was perhaps the result of judgment, (good or bad) and not of ignorance or carelessness, as it certainly preserves the pyramidal shape of the monument, and the general form of the whole is very fine, though thus singularly obtained. Above this division of the edifice is a circular temple of six columns, with a conical, or perhaps rather funnel-shaped roof, and in it are two statues, one male and the other female, the parents to whom the monument was erected.

We were fortunate enough to meet with a cabriolet de poste at St. Remi, and found cause enough to congratulate ourselves, that our carriage was ‘suspendu.’ Places are sometimes found on our sea-shores, where a bed of large rounded stones is fixed with some degree of firmness in the sand. This was precisely the state of the first part of our road. After having passed the long bridge of the Durance, a vast destructive torrent, rather than a river, descending from the Alps, we travelled for some leagues through a plain, sprinkled, not shaded, with mulberry trees. The little bridges over the water-courses which intersect and fertilize this plain, were hardly wider than the carriage, and without any sort of fence; one of them, moreover, had a large hole in it, and this was not the only place in the way where it appeared impossible that we should escape an overturn, but we happily passed them all without any accident.

We were later in the day than we ought to have been at Vaucluse, for the rays of the sun had already entered the deep, and almost naked valley, in which the spring rises; and being reflected from the rocks, rendered the heat insupportable. The place in England most like Vaucluse, is Malham Cove; but the rock at Vaucluse is much higher, and the river, after issuing from its subterraneous reservoir, foams along its rocky channel in a deep valley: this however shortly opens, and it assumes a more tranquil character: a column has lately been erected in the middle of the spring, to the memory of Petrarch and Laura.

From Vaucluse we returned to the high road at St. Andiol, where Mr. Sharp found a place in the diligence to Marseille, and I remained in a dirty, miserable inn, in order to resume my journey next morning to Avignon.

I find from Millin that there were two or three Roman monuments within the district I have been rambling over, which I did not see; a triumphal arch at Carpentras, another at Cavaillon, and the Pont de Chamay, consisting of a bridge, with a fine arch at each end. I am sorry to leave the country without seeing them, but there are so many objects of antiquity in these provinces, both of Roman times, and of almost every succeeding age, that it would take many months to examine them all, and I must leave them to the chance of a future opportunity.

Having now communicated to you my observations on the Roman architecture in these provinces, I will endeavour to throw into something of a connected form, those remarks on the edifices of a later date, which I have hitherto refrained from particularizing, in order to be able to give you a general view of the subject. If I were to arrange all the ancient buildings which I have lately seen, according to their supposed date, they would be in the following order:

These dates startle you, but if we still have many Roman buildings remaining, why should we not find some of later dates? Europe was in so disturbed a state during the period immediately following the fall of the Roman power, that we do not readily conceive that the means, or the will, should have been found, of erecting any considerable buildings; but from 539 to 585, after its submission to the kings of France, who made of Arles a sort of capital; and during the whole of the seventh century, and beginning of the eighth, Provence seems to have enjoyed a degree of tranquillity quite sufficient to account for the erection of public buildings of some magnificence; and their intercourse with Greece and Italy might have supplied artists. In 876, Arles became the capital of a powerful kingdom, and if the ambition of its sovereigns drew them away from their own subjects, the Counts of Provence, who were rich, powerful, superstitious, and nearly independent, may be well supposed capable of adorning their country with churches and monasteries. In short, from 539 to 736, and again from 879 to 1131, history offers no objection to the idea that magnificent edifices may have been raised in this country. The twelfth century was an age of republics, but of very turbulent ones.

I have already described the remains of Roman architecture; I will now particularize the others, in the supposed order of dates. The porch of the church of Nôtre Dame de Dom, is said by some antiquaries to be prior to the church; while others maintain, that the body of the building is also of the same early date; there is an upright joint in the masonry, about 15 inches from the main edifice, which appears to me to separate the erections of two different epochs. It seems quite the general opinion, but not resting on sufficient authority, that this porch was part of a Roman temple dedicated to Hercules. It is not in itself a complete edifice, but forms three sides of a small quadrangular building, with a Corinthian column at each of the two angles of the front, and an arch between them. The columns are set on pedestals, but the pilasters of the arch pass between them to the ground, as is usually the case in the Roman triumphal arches; so far the whole is correct. Above the columns there is merely an architrave, whose upper moulding is very large and solid. It is even finely profiled as a termination, but would appear rather too massive, if it were surmounted by a frieze and cornice; I will not assert that this was not the case, though there are now no vestiges of either: the present termination being a plain gable end to the roof. Though a little stiff and dry, both the ornaments, and their disposition, are decidedly Roman. The inner doorway, which is in the wall of the church tower, is nearly a repetition of the composition of the entrance to the porch, but instead of a pilaster, there is a little column under the impost of the arch, which is not brought down so low as the larger column, and the impost is an entire entablature. The columns may still be called Corinthian, but the volutes are little more than curled leaves, and the caulicoles have entirely disappeared. Instead of the bold and masculine character of the outer architrave, we find a small detached rectangular block above the capital, supporting a compressed cornice; and a raking cornice, with two rows of modillions, forms a very acute pediment. From the porch we enter into the vestibule: this is square below, octangular above, and is finished, I believe, by a hemispherical dome, which has eight ribs springing on the faces of the octagon, and not from the angles. It is in the tower, the whole lower part of which is likewise attributed to the Romans, but from the character of the architecture, it appears that the inner doorway, this vestibule, the nave, and the lantern at the end, are all of the same date, and though much disturbed by subsequent alterations, they offer the best specimen I have seen of cavern-like Gothic. Here is a new term for you, but it is also a new style of architecture, and one which seems nearly peculiar to the south of France. It is principally characterized by the continued vaulting of the roof, generally pointed, but without groins, and by the absence of windows in the sides of the nave, or if any, they were very small. There is no proper transept, but sometimes there are approaches to one; altogether it has very much the appearance of a cavern. In the present instance, four semi-circular arches open under the vaulting of the nave; the fifth division is not vaulted, but four advancing arches on each side contract it to a square, which is surmounted by an octagonal lantern with a dome; there have been eight windows in this drum, but seven are now filled up, and windows have been opened in the nave. There is also a window on each side below the lantern, which perhaps existed in the original work. The choir, I suspect to be somewhat later. In the fourteenth century all the arches on the south side seem to have been altered to the style of that age, the semicircular arches having been taken out, and pointed ones introduced; side chapels of greater extent were also then added, in one of which is a Gothic tomb of John XXII., of excellent design, but poor workmanship. Another, called the chapel of the popes, is also attributed to the fourteenth century, and corresponds in several particulars with the church of St. Nizier at Lyon, which is of the same period. The bases are all at the same elevation, but the shafts run up through the capitals, and are lost among the mouldings of the ribs. The roof of the earlier part of the building is covered with stone slabs, which I believe rest on the vaulting without the intervention of any wood-work. There is a little ridge ornament of intersecting ribs of stone, which does not seem to be of equal antiquity.

The next subject is the church at Orange. The arch which forms the western doorway here, is so much like the Roman work of the theatre, that it might almost be supposed to be of the same age. The church itself is of very high antiquity, and of a style of architecture very similar to that of Nôtre Dame de Dom; it is vaulted with a continued arch, slightly pointed, but without groins; there are no side aisles, but on each side are four chapels, with semicircular arches; the windows are small also, with semicircular heads, which enter into the vaulting of the nave, and are not perhaps as old as the building. At the end of the church is an apsis. I believe this is a semicircular niche, nearly as high as the nave, and like that with a pointed arch, but modern ornaments hide its form; and in the back of it there is a single lancet window. This I write from memory, as I neglected to note it on the spot; at any rate I should doubt of its being part of the original construction; it is rare to find this ancient apsis existing, as it has usually been pulled down to make room for a more spacious choir.

The nave of the cathedral at Arles, dedicated to St. Trophimus, is said to have been built by St. Virgil, and consecrated on the 17th May, 626. I am inclined to believe that we now see the original building. The vaulting is very obtusely pointed without groins. This church has aisles and no side chapels, but these aisles are vaulted only in a quarter of a circle, which forms a counterpoise to the thrust of the great arch of the nave; the openings into the side aisles are also very obtusely pointed. The windows are modern, and I suspect that no window was intended in the nave, except a small circular one over the principal entrance; how the choir was originally finished, I have not sufficient evidence to decide, but it is most likely that the building terminated in an apsis, as in the ancient churches of Rome, with the altar in front, and an inclosure for the choir before the altar.

Although in all the churches of this style, windows posterior to the date of the building have been opened into the nave, yet they almost always feel close, and have a disagreeable smell; this was very strongly the case at Arles, and perhaps contributed to my illness there. The bones of St. Trophimus were brought here in 1152, and it is not improbable that the porch was added on this occasion. It is very magnificent, consisting of a large and rich semicircular arch, with multiplied mouldings, supported on slender columns, and the whole adorned with a profusion of statues. Although of a style which terminated with the twelfth century, it is evidently an adjunct to the original building, but one to which it would be I believe, impossible to find a parallel. It is difficult to explain how it happens, that such a contradiction to good sense, as supporting a great arch upon little columns, can produce a pleasing effect, yet I must acknowledge that this porch is not only singular, but very beautiful. The porch at Tarrascon, already mentioned, was somewhat similar to this, but greatly inferior, and it has been much damaged during the Revolution, while that of Arles remains perfect.

The cathedral at Nismes has a simple nave, with groined and pointed arches and chapels, with semicircular arches on the sides. The west front bears evident traces of the Roman style of design; it has a pediment, and a cornice supported by modillions, with roses in the intervals, both on the upright face and on the soffite. Under the cornice is a continued frieze ornamented with a series of figures from the scripture history. This front has suffered much by repeated alterations; the part above described is certainly ancient, but lower down, the original form is become very obscure: it seems to have been a continued wall, ornamented with very slender shafts supporting small semicircular arches. The upper part of the western tower, for there is at present only one, is of the fifteenth century; the lower part is considerably more ancient. There is a gloomy passage behind the choir, and a ladies chapel, which is of later date. The church at St. Remi also partakes of this cavern style, and many of the village churches which I could not stop to examine seem to exhibit it, and are perhaps of the same early date.

The church at Valence is a very remarkable example, which must rather be classed with what is called Norman architecture, than with the edifices above described. Yet it must be confessed, that if it resemble the ancient buildings of our own country, in so many particulars as to be comprehended in the same term, it yet differs in others so much as to present an appearance by no means exactly similar. The ornaments in particular are all Roman; the only attempt at novelty in the earlier buildings of the middle ages, in the south of France, consisting in placing some of them topsy-turvy. The shape is a Latin cross, of which the foot is remarkably long, and the head short. The vaulting of the nave is waggon-headed, that of the side aisles is groined; all the vaults and arches are semicircular. The capitals are all nearly alike, and are only a step farther from the Corinthian than those of the inner archway of the church of Nôtre Dame de Dom. It is amusing to follow the steps of this degradation of the Roman architecture from one building to another; and here, though very much altered, there is still much more of the original form than we find in England, or in the north of France. The piers consist of four half columns of very slender proportions, united to a square pillar; and these half columns rise in one height, without any intermediate bands, from the small plinth on which they stand, to the underside of the vaulting. The arches of the side aisles rise nearly to the springing of the vault of the nave. The intersection of the nave and transept is surmounted with a dome, and the chevet finishes in a niche-head or semi-dome; it is earlier than any thing I know in the eleventh century, but the existence of a transept makes me unwilling to suppose its erection prior to the year 1000. The lower part of the tower is perhaps older; the upper is certainly more recent than the body of the church; yet it is still a sort of Norman, but with some Gothic ornaments, which do not seem to be additions. As the Norman, or something very like it, appears to have been the architecture of Charlemagne, it is possible that the cathedral at Valence is of the eighth century; but I find that I have freed myself from all those shackles about dates, which I had imbibed in England and strengthened at Paris; and now ramble through five or six centuries with very little light to guide me.

The church at Vienne which I have already described, is the last which retains any trace of this cavern-like style, and that rather in some of the accessories than in any of the principal parts. There we meet with something of Norman details, and something of a degraded Roman. The Norman may perhaps itself be called a degraded Roman, but the degradation has not always taken place exactly in the same manner. It is curious enough that in the latter imitations of Roman, they should frequently have reversed the ornaments, putting the eggs and darts, for instance, the wrong side uppermost, while at the expiration of the Gothic in the sixteenth century, we may sometimes find the trefoil ornament reversed in the same manner.