[Gutenberg 42954] • Brittany

1\. DOUARNÉNEZ

The gray and somewhat uninteresting village of Douarnénez undergoes a change when the fishing-boats come home. Even with your eyes shut, you would soon know of the advent of the fishermen by the downward clatter of myriads of sabots through the badly-paved steep streets, gathering in volume and rapidity with each succeeding minute. The village has been thoroughly wakened up. Douarnénez is the headquarters of the sardine fishery, and the home-coming of the sardine boats is a matter of no little importance. The 9,000 inhabitants of the place are all given up to this industry. Prosperity, or adversity, depends upon the faithfulness, or the fickleness, of the little silver fish in visiting their shores. Not long ago the sardines forsook Douarnénez, and great was the desolation and despair which settled upon the people. However, the season this year is good, and the people are prosperous.

As one descends the tortuous street leading to the sea, when the tide is in, everything and everyone you encounter seem to be in one way or another connected with sardines. The white-faced houses are festooned and hung with fine filmy fishing-nets of a pale cornflower hue, edged with rows of deep russet-brown corks. Occasionally they are stretched from house to house across the street, and one passes beneath triumphal arches of really glorious gray-blue fishing-nets. This same little street, which barely an hour ago was practically empty and deserted, now swarms with big bronzed fishermen coming up straight from the sea, laden with their dripping cargo of round brown baskets half filled with glistening fish. They live differently from the sleepy villagers—these strapping giants of the sea, with their deep-toned faces, their hair made tawny by exposure, their blue eyes, which somehow or other seem so very blue against the dark red-brown of their complexion, their reckless, rollicking, yet graceful, sailor's gait. A sailor always reminds me of a cat amongst a roomful of crockery: he looks as if he will knock over something or trip over something every moment as he swings along in his careless fashion; yet he never does.

CONTENTS

1\. Douarnénez

2\. Rochefort-en-Terre

3\. Vitré

4\. Vannes

5\. Quimper

6\. St. Brieuc

7\. Paimpol

8\. Guingamp

9\. Huelgoat

10\. Concarneau

11\. Morlaix

12\. Pont-Aven

13\. Quimperlé

14\. Auray

15\. Belle Isle

16\. St. Anne d'Auray

17\. St. Malo

18\. Mont St. Michel

19\. Château des Rochers

20\. Carnac

21\. A Romantic Land

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

1. Marie Jeanne

FACING PAGE

2. Homeward Bound

3. Grandmère

4. Meditation

5. Minding the Babies

6. A Cottage in Rochefort-en-Terre

7. At Rochefort-en-Terre

8. Mid-day Rest

9. A Cottage Home

10. Mediæval Houses, Vitré

11. Preparing the Mid-day Meal

12. In Church

13. Père Louis

14. Idle Hours

15. La Vieille Mère Perot

16. A Vieillard

17. Place Henri Quatre, Vannes

18. Gossips

19. A Cattle Market

20. Bread Stalls

21. In a Breton Kitchen

22. A Rainy Day at the Fair

23. In the Porch of the Cathedral, Quimper

24. The Vegetable Market, Quimper

25. Outside the Cathedral, Quimper

26. By the Side of a Farm

27. On the Road to Bannalec

28. Débit de Boissons

29. Church of St. Mody

30. Reflections

31. A Sabot-Stall

32.