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Route 24]

MARSEILLES: HARBOUR-CATHEDRAL.

with fountains (supplied by subterranean cuts from the Huveaume, &c. and the great canal from the Durance). That of Porte Paradis was raised to those excellent persons who attended on their townsmen in the great plague; one in Rue d'Aubagne is actually dedicated to 'Homer, by the descendents of the Phocæans;' another stands in Place Royale, the largest square in the city. That in Place des Fainéants is a black marble obelisk, 23 feet high, on four lions; the Fontaine de Puget, in Rue de Rome, is a little pyramid before the old house of this Marsellaise architect, whose works served to adorn his native city, but wore swept away after the revolution. He was known in England by having built Montague House, the old British museum. Place de Lenche was the site of roman baths. The large corinthian triumphal arch at the Porte d'Aix was begun 1823, in honour of the Duc d'Angoulême, but remains unfinished.

The Harbour is an oblong of about 3,080 feet by 980, or about 70 acres, and is extremely safe, though the mouth is narrow. It is generally crowded with shipping, of which it will hold 1,200, with water deep enough for those of 600 tons. A great disadvantage is, that the ebb and flow of the tide being very small, the stench of the sewers opening into it is constantly felt. It is lined with narrow quays, where all the costumes and languages of the Mediterranean may be witnessed. On the south side, or Rive Neuve, or Commerce, are the mast-house, the douane and magazines, with a canal running round them, the place-aux-huiles (oil stores), ship yards, stores for soap, bones, &c. Along the opposite side, or Boutique, you see the Place du Cul de Bœuf, the Consigne or board of health, the fish market and cafés, the Hôtel de Ville, stamp office, bazaar, shops for ship-chandlery, &c., and Fort St. Jean. A wet dock, or Bassin de Carenage, lies just outside the harbour, on the south.

The Hôtel de Ville, a small building, has basreliefs on its front, with a bust of Louis XIV., and a latin inscription; on the staircase a statue of Liberty, and some pictures in the hall. The ground floor is used for the Bourse or exchange.

The Préfecture, in Place St. Ferreol, on one side of a wide court, has two façades, and is one of the largest public structures in the city. Near the old prisons is the palais de justice, with

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nothing particular to distinguish it. The new prisons, built 1823, are at Aix.

Among the market-places or Halles, are the vieille poissonnerie, the halle Puget, and halle neuve (new), rebuilt 1801, on the site of an older one. A large boucherie, or shambles, stands on the sea, between the anses (bays) de l'Ourse and de la Joliette,-the latter, they say, named after Julius Cæsar. Here a new port is making, inside a breakwater and two moles; but it is reported to be dangerous with unfavourable winds. Not far from this, at the entrance of the town, is Porte Joliette, one of the few pieces of antiquity here, but much decayed, and used as the bureau of the Octroi.

Most of the churches are plain buildings; that of De la Major, or the Cathedral, near the Anse de l' Ourse, is the most ancient; it replaces a temple to the great goddess Diana,' whose worship the Greeks brought here, and is a tasteless mixture of various styles, with a front spoilt by the plasterer; a bas-relief of St. Lazarus is of the eleventh century, and there is a good organ. St. Victor, one of the oldest, near Fort St. Nicholas, stands over the burial place of an early martyr, which became the site of a rich abbey; it has crypts of the eleventh century, and Pope Urban's two towers built 1350; with an image of the Madonna, to which the people come to pray in long seasons of drought. St. Vincent de Paul is in the Allées des Capucins; near the Cours Italien is Notre Dame du Mont, re-built 1822, except its old clock tower. That on Mont Carmel has a good prospect. A new circular church stands close to the Flèche des Accoules, which is the tall romanesque clock-tower of a large church, pulled down at the revolution, with another at a little distance from it. The Chapelle du Château Babon belonged to a castle on the site of Fort St. Jean. A pretty chapel of the seventeenth century, called the Madeleine or Chartreux, outside the town, has a good nave, and light campanile towers. There are Protestant and Greek churches, a synagogue, &c.

Hôtel Dieu or Hôpital du St. Esprit, behind the town-hall, was founded 1188, and is a large irregular mass in the heart of the old city, having beds for 560 and a chapel built 1600. La Charité, near Place de l' Observance, and founded 1640, for 850 old people and orphans, forms a court, in which stands an oval chapel by Puget,

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with a dome. Among other charitable institutions are the two hospices of St. Joseph and St. Lazare, the asylums for alienés (lunatics) and for the deaf and dumb (sourds-muets.)

Most of the learned societies are established in the old convent of the Bernardines (in Cours de Marché, near the Champ de Mars), which has several long galleries in it, a tower, and a cruciform church crowned with a dome. Here are the academy of sciences and belles lettres; a large public bibliothèque or library of 60,000 vols. and 1,270 MSS., in a room 130 feet long, open Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays; cabinets of roman and greek antiquities, and of medals and natural history; a picture gallery in the old chapel, of about 140 paintings of the French (89 specimens), Italian, and Flemish schools; the college or high school; and schools of design and architecture, &c. A school of navigation is fixed in the observatory, which has a fine prospect. The jardin des plantes or botanic garden, in the Chartreux quarter, opened since 1810, has many exotics, including an orangery.

In Place Royale is the Grand Théâtre like the Odéon of Paris, built 1787, with a front of six columns. Théâtre Français stands near the Allées des Meilhaus. There is a concert-hall; another place of amusement is the Montagnes Russes. Baths in the Prado, &c.: sea-baths on the bassin d' Aren, to the north of the town; charge 1 fr., including the omnibus; lodgings 6 to 7 fr. a day.

The gendarmerie barracks are near Places de la Porte d'Aix and du Terras. The arsenal stands in Cours Napoleon, not far from his column and the road to Fort Notre Dame, the most commanding point above the city. It is so called from a pilgrim's chapel of the thirteenth century, round which Francis I. built the fortress, and is still crowded with a multitude of curious votive gifts from sailors, &c.; at the Fête Dieu, the image of the Bonne Mère is carried in procession. The prospect here is a beautiful panorama of the city, the coast, the sea, and islands off the town. Fort St. Nicholas, lower down, opposite Fort St. Jean, was built by Louis XIV., and has been lately restored, Tour Carrée (Square Tower) was raised by king René.

About two miles west of the harbour is the Ile d'If, and the fort of Francis I., in which

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Mirabeau was confined; a little beyond it are two larger islands, Pomègue and Ra toneau, with batteries on them, and joined by a causeway 980 feet long, making the quarantine port of Dieudonné (God-given) for 200 vessels. Here Cæsar's fleet anchored when he took Marseilles; and in the present day, when a foolish man forgets himself, they call him Roi de Ratoneau, in allusion to a story of a poor lunatic soldier, who assumed the title of king and turned the guns on his comrades in 1765.

For sanitary purposes, there are a lazaret (lazaretto) of 50 acres, between Points de la Joliette and St. Martin, where infected persons are fumigated; and the Consigne or quarantine office in the harbour. The latter has Puget's bas-relief of the Plague of Milan, Gerard's picture of the Great Plague of Marseilles, Vernet's picture of the Cholera, &c. A large cemetery is laid out beyond the city. An abundant supply of water is now brought in by the great canal lately cut from the Durance, 25 miles off. It is the work of M. Montricher, and passes through several tunnels, and, by the great aque. duct of Rochefavour (1,200 feet long), over the Arc, coming into the city at a point 400 feet above the sea.

The custom duties of this port are a fourth to a fifth of all France; the imports include hides, tallow, dried fruits, sugar, coffee, olive oil, cotton wool, lead, bones, &c.; and among the articles made or exported are salt meat, salt fish, fruit, almonds, wine, refined sugar, molasses, madder, oil, sulphur, soap, candles, chemicals, liqueurs, essences and perfumes, printed woollens and cottons, morocco leather, tobacco, hats, glass, porcelain, china, coral ornaments, anchovies, &c. Steam engines are made by Taylor and Sons.

In the suburbs are the villages of St. Genie, Capelette, St. Pierre, La Madeleine, Chartreux, St. Charles, Barthelemi, St. Just Passet, Belle de Mai, Bon Sécours, Canet, and others, some of them seated on the little rivulets Huveaume, Jarres, Plombières, and Aygalades. The last has an old castle on it; and on the Huveaume is the aqueduct of Ville-a-là Pomme, with the château Boully, a fine seat near the sea, built by a Mar. seilles banker. Further off is the Madrague de l'Estagne, where the large tunny fish is caught; near it a part of a roman aqueduct may be seen, also the Bouido which spouts up after rain, and

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the Maoupasset, a seat of le bon Roi René, where they show some of his paintings. Wild fowl swarm in the Etang (lake) de Martigue; and at Christmas crowds of sportsmen go out to shoot wild ducks.

PUY DE MIMET, 12 kil. north-east of the city is noticeable for the experiments made there by Baron Zach, the astronomer, for measuring the density of the earth. It has a grotto much frequented for views about it.

White, red, and muscadel wines are produced in this corner of France. The language is a mixture of French and Provençal (a corrupt Latin), with a tincture of Greek and Celtic.

Pytheas, an early navigator who sailed to Britain and Iceland and to the Baltic from this place, was a native of it; in modern days it reckons Puget the sculptor and painter, and Barbaroux, a member of the Convention.

Conveyances.-By railway to Arles, four times a day, in 2 to 2 hours, (see Bradshaw's Continental Railway Guide). Thence to Avignon, Nismes, Cette, &c. Omnibuses run from the great thoroughfares to the station near the Arche de Triomphe. By coach daily to Aix, Avignon, Lyons, &c,; to Toulon, Nice, Draguignan, Aix, Nismes, Martigues, Barjols, Brignolles, Manosque, Briançon, &c., on the routes to all the chief towns.

By steam (see Bradshaw's Guide) to Arles up the Rhône, and to every part of the Mediterranean. The English naval steamers, with mails on the 8th and 26th of each month to Malta, for the Ionian Islands, and Alexandria, 1st class, £8 2s.; 2nd, £4 10s.; 3rd, £2 14s., including provisions and every charge; passage in about 70 hours. Office in Rue Haxo, No. 9.

The Anglo Italian Company's Screw Steamers join from Italy, on the 15-17th, and proceed to Liverpool, calling at Gibralter, on the 17-20th. Office, 12, Rue Jeune Anacharsis.

The French mail steamers of the messageries nationales, start on the Italian Line (by Genoa, Leghorn, Naples, Messina,) to Malta, 9th, 19th, and 29th of each month, taking 6 days, and corresponding with the Levant packets from Malta on the 5th, 15th, and 25th; on the Levant Line (by Malta, Syra, Smyrna,) to Constantinople, 1st, 11th, and 21st of the month, in 11 days, corresponding at Syra with the Italian packets; on the Greek Line (by Malta, Syra, Athens, Naupia, &c.) 1st, 11th,

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and 21st of the month, in 12 days; on the Egyptian Line (by Malta) to Alexandria, 4th and 23rd of the month, in 8 days; on the Syrian Line, every 20 days, in connexion with the Constantinople and Egyptian Lines, taking the round of Rhodes, Alexandrette, Latakia, Tripoli, Beyrout, and Jaffa, between Smyrnaand Alexandria, (12 days). On the return there is 5 days quarantine at Smyrna.

The United French, Sardinian, and Neapolitan Line starts every other afternoon; they are dear, crowded with goods, an uncivil, the Neapolitan boats being the best managed. They carry English engineers, and take 18 hours to Genoa, 10 to Leghorn, 12 to Civita Vecchia (for Rome), 11 to Naples. Enquire if there is a quarantine anywhere, or you may be kept on board for 6 days.

French mail steamers to Bastia (26 hours), and Ajaccio (22 hours), weekly. Steamers also to Cette (8 hours), twice a week; to Nice (12 hours), weekly; to Algiers, every five or six days; to Oran, twice a month; to Cadiz. (by Barcelona, Valentia, Alicante, Carthagena, Almeria, Malaga, Algesiras) in 8 days, about once a week, in French and Spanish boats.. Offices, 26, Rue de Breteuil; and 29, Rue Montgrand.

ROUTE 24, continued.

From Marseilles, on the road to Toulon and Nice, you pass

AUBAGNE (17 kil.), a town of 6,200 souls, on a hill by the Huveaume, with a ruined château and a roman bath in the neighbourhood. The Abbé Barthelemy, who wrote the Travels of the Jeune Anacharsis, giving an account of ancient manners and customs, was a native.

[At 5 kil. to the north-west, is the picturesque village of Allauch, having remains of towers, walls, &c., belonging to a much older place.At 7 kil. to the south-south-west, is Cassis, on the coast, the Carsicis Portus of Antonine's Itinerary, with a good port. It has a trade in coral, fruit, and Muscatel wine.Cistal (the greek Citharistes) lies to the east ;; and beyond it is the site of Tarentum.-At 8 kil. to the north-north-east, is Roquevaire, on the Huveaume.]

CUJES (12 kil.) has an old country seat, in a fertile spot.

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