Wayfaring in France, from Auvergne to the Bay of Biscay (1913) (14786024513)

Identifier: wayfaringinfranc00barkuoft (find matches)

Title: Wayfaring in France, from Auvergne to the Bay of Biscay

Year: 1913 (1910s)

Authors: Barker, Edward Harrison, 1851-1919

Subjects: France -- Description and travel

Publisher: London, Macmillan

Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto

Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

Text Appearing Before Image:

he ground was marshy; but the strip of landbetween the forest and the water became narrowerand narrower, and I was soon struggling throughhigh heather at the foot of the sandhills. Innumer-able dragon-flies darted through the air. Someof them had bright-yellow bodies, which gave thema very fierce and wicked look : others—a smallervariety—were, excepting the all but invisible wings,the colour of rubies. I disturbed colonies of frogsbasking among the reeds. They waited until I waswithin a few yards of them, then rose like a flight ofbirds and dropped into the water, their green backsglittering just a moment in the sunlight. Morecows—these were wading breast-high far out in theshallow water and ringing their inseparable bells.Little brown lizards, from three to four inches long,darted over the sand, and in the winking of an eyewere lost among the rusty roots of the heather.The knapsack now felt like a mountain on my back,the perspiration dropped from my face, and one LAKE CAZAU 481

Text Appearing After Image:

D<N< of my hands—that on the side of the sun—hadturned lobster-red, and smarted with the blistering i i 482 IN THE LANDES heat. Still I plodded on over the hot and yieldingsand, or through the tangled brushwood, and couldhave convinced myself that everything was for thebest in the best of worlds, were it not for the thirstthat parched me. This is a sensation which theanimal spirits, though they leap like a mountainstream, cannot drive away. I turned to the winewhich my forethought made me bring. It was hot—mulled by the sun, and I could not drink it. Icast longing looks at the blue lake that seemed socool. It was really tepid, and I had been told thatthe water was unfit to drink. I had only walkedabout ten kilometres, and there were some twentymore to cover before I could reach Biscarosse bythe way I had chosen. As I went on, the sandbecame terribly fatiguing. Why did I not learn towalk on stilts like the Landais before undertakingthis journey ? I was told at Cazau that ha

wayfaring in france from auvergne to the bay of biscay 1913 book illustrations description and travel images from internet archive canada

1913

University of Toronto

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