of the fanatics of Nismes: and whose ebullitions
render them equally hateful as friends or enemies. There are many
strange historical discoveries which would surprise me more than to
learn that the Moorish blood remained in this part of France
unextirpated by the victories of Charles Martel;[28] for to a person who
knows them only by report and casual observation, the _tout ensemble_ of
its inhabitants seems to differ totally from that of the Gascon and the
Basque; names which, like the name of Norman, convey to the mind an
image of frankness and gallantry.

[Footnote 28: "Cette memorable bataille, sur laquelle nous n'avons aucun
detail, nous sauva du joug des Arabes, et fut le terme de leur grandeur.
Depuis ce revers, ils tenterent encore de penetrer dans la France; ils
s'emparerent meme d'Avignon; mais Charles Martel les defit de nouveau,
reprit cette ville, leur enleva Narbonne, et leur ota pour jamais
l'esperance dont ils s'etaient flattes si longtemps."--_Florian's Precis
Historique sur les Maures._]

On the morning after our arrival, we ascended first of all the Roche
Don, a hill enclosed within the walls of the town, and backing the
ruined palace of the legate; being desirous, as in Lyons, to begin our
survey from a point which might serve as a general key to the whole, and
instruct us in the bearings of different objects. From this elevated
spot, situated at the north-western extremity of the city, we looked to
the east, north, and south, over a plain as rich in verdure and
cultivation as the finest parts of Lombardy; to which the stately towers
of the palace, and the clustering spires and battlemented walls of
Avignon form a fine foreground. The distant hills, at the foot of which
Vaucluse is situated, form the eastern boundary of this plain; and are
succeeded and overtopped to the northward by a chain of the Dauphine
Alps, among which the long sweeping mass of Mont Ventou predominates.
From the latter quarter the Rhone is traced winding up in a wide and
rapid current, till it reaches the highly cultivated islands at the foot
of Mont Don, and pursues its course with increased grandeur towards the
southward. The neighbourhood of its junction with the Durance is marked
in this quarter by a barrier of mountains of less height than those
above-mentioned, but more abrupt and wild in their forms, at whose foot
appear casual glimpses of the two rivers, winding like narrow silver
threads into the horizon. "Vous avez p