ed crowd of the Canabier
Prolongue had for him an "Arabian Nights" fascination, but the wharves
held a deeper fascination still.

Marseilles draws its most subtle charm from far away in the past. Beaked
triremes have rubbed their girding cables against the wharves of the old
Phocee; the sunshine of a thousand years has left some trace of its gold,
a mirage in the air chilled by the mistral and perfumed by the ocean.

At Marseilles took place the meeting between Mary Magdalen and Laeta
Acilia, so delightfully fabled by Anatole France. The Count of Monte
Cristo landed here after he had discovered his treasure, and here
Caderouse after the infamy at "La Reservee" watched old Dantes starving to
death. Multitudes of ships, fabled and real, have passed from the harbour
to countries curious and strange, but never one of them to a stranger
country than that to which _La Joconde_ was to bear Berselius and his
companion.

Gay as Naples with colour, piercing the blue sky with a thousand spars,
fluttering the flags of all nations to the wind, shot through with the
sharp rattle of winch-chains, and perfumed with garlic, vanilla, fumes of
coal tar, and the tang of the sea, the wharves of Marseilles lay before
the travellers, a great counter eternally vibrating to the thunder of
trade; bales of carpets from the Levant, tons of cheeses from Holland,
wood from Norway, copra, rice, tobacco, corn, silks from China and Japan,
cotton from Lancashire; all pouring in to the tune of the winch-pauls, the
cry of the stevedores, and the bugles of Port Saint Jean, shrill beneath
the blue sky and triumphant as the crowing of the Gallic cock.

Between the breaks in the shipping one could see the sea-gulls fishing and
the harbour flashing, here spangled with coal tar, here whipped to deepest
sapphire by the mistral; the junk shops, grog shops, parrot shops,
rope-walks, ships' stores and factories lining the quays, each lending a
perfume, a voice, or a scrap of colour to the air vibrating with light,
vibrating with sound, shot through with voices; hammer blows from the
copper sheathers in the dry docks, the rolling of drums from Port St.
Nicholas, the roaring of grain elevators, rattling of winch-chains,
trumpeting of ship sirens, mewing of gulls, the bells of Notre Dame and
the bells of St. Victor, all fused, orchestrated, into one triumphant
symphony beneath the clear blue sky and the trade flags of the world.

_La Joconde_ was berthed beside a