gray stones, still round themselves with an elegant boldness; beneath
are stowed away carts and casks and pieces of wood; here and there
workmen were handling wheels. A broad ray of light fell upon a pile of
straw, and made the somber corners seem yet darker; the pictures that
one meets with outweigh those one has come to seek.

From the esplanade which is opposite, the whole valley and the
mountains beyond may be seen; this first sight of a southern sun, as
it breaks from the rainy mists, is admirable; a sheet of white light
stretches from one horizon to another without meeting a single cloud.
The heart expands in this immense space; the very air is festal; the
dazzled eyes close beneath the brightness which deluges them and which
runs over, radiated from the burning dome of heaven. The current of
the river sparkles like a girdle of jewels; the chains of hills,
yesterday veiled and damp, extend at their own sweet will beneath the
warming, penetrating rays, and mount range upon range to spread out
their green robe to the sun.

In the distance, the blue Pyrenees look like a bank of clouds; the air
that bathes them shapes them into aërial forms, vapory phantoms, the
farthest of which vanish in the canescent horizon--dim contours, that
might be taken for a fugitive sketch from the lightest of pencils. In
the midst of the serrate chain the peak Midi d' Ossau lifts its abrupt
cone; at this distance, forms are softened, colors are blended, the
Pyrenees are only the graceful bordering of a smiling landscape and of
the magnificent sky. There is nothing imposing about them nor severe;
the beauty here is serene, and the pleasure pure.

The statue of Henry IV., with an inscription in Latin and in patois,
is on the esplanade; the armor is finished so perfectly that it might