UPON well nigh every headland of any considerable size on the banks of the winding river Meuse, there glowered a vine clad castle in a more or less ruinous state, and usually at its foot slept a farmstead, a village, or a town. Over each stream-laved promontory and every high hill there have been fought great and small battles year in, year out, through the ages since the time of Charlemagne. One could not wander far here in any direction without lighting upon some shattered monument of human passion and pride. "Here might reigned supreme with fantastic honor as its handmaid; at ambition's footstool religion and right were vassals." One stands before one of these shattered, time-battered castle walls, and tries perchance to picture the siege of old, with the crowds of iron-armed men busily sapping the walls. Through the ragged breaches made by the great stone-hung rams, they discharged into the interior by quaint cumbrous machines large stones, blazing bundles of fagots, and even carrion, while from the besieged warriors on the battlemented walls above came streams of molten lead, and showers of heavy iron barbed bolts. The country about during these battles was considerably damaged, and there must have been an appalling noise over it all, but somehow one cannot picture any very great carnage as a result, at least nothing like that which took place here at Verdun in the great battle of 1916, nor any such destruction of property.

This town of Verdun, now upon every one's lips, was the ancient Roman "Verodunam" and ever has held a most important place in European affairs and history. Captured by Charlemagne, in the dim days of a. d. 843, it was divided among his three grandsons, Charles the Bald, Lothaire, and Lewis the German. Thus divided, the members of the Empire, Teutonic and Gallic, were never again united. Until the year 1552 the town, once the seat of a powerful bishop, remained free, and in 1648 it was formally united to France after the peace of Westphalia, when Austria relinquished the three great bishoprics of Verdun, Toul, and Metz. Verdun fell to the Prussians after a fierce bombardment lasting only five hours, and a story is told of how a bevy of fair young girls appeared in the public square before the HÔtel de Ville, where the conquerors were drawn up, and made peace-offering to them of the "bon-bons" for which, even up to the outbreak of the great world war, and invasion of 1914, Verdun was famous. These bon-bons were known locally as "DragÉes."

Old House on the Meuse: Verdun

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After the battle of Valmy, the revolutionists recaptured the town and, it is said, sought out these same young maidens and put them to death.

The town, which was rather attractive and picturesque, stood in a sort of plain, on the river Meuse, which divides here into several streams. It was surrounded by fortifications, considered impregnable, which were planted with large trees, and there was a very satisfying Mediaeval gateway flanked by two great towers, while an attractive street called the "Promenade de la Digne" followed the banks of the river. The sights of the town, however, were very soon exhausted. If one followed the Avenue de la Gare, one came to the Porte St. Paul, and just beyond it the Palais de Justice and a large new college building. Then there was the Porte ChaussÉe, which was very old and had two fine crenelated towers. There were several bridges crossing the river Meuse, and along its banks a collection of ancient many colored houses, all so battered, bewindowed, and balconied, as to be quite fascinating pictorially but certainly very dirty and "smelly." Ranged along the water washed walls of these quaint houses, were many barges and washing boats, painted in charming tones of green and brown, and these, reflected in the water, made delightful pictures for the painter and snap shots for tourists.

A very good regimental band played in the square once a week, and this formed an excuse for a promenade of the townspeople, and a social gathering at the small cafÉs, for the post prandial "bock."

There was a HÔtel de Ville of the seventeenth century, lacking however in character, in the courtyard of which were displayed some bronze cannon, given to Verdun by the government in recognition of its heroic resistance in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. Near the cathedral were the remains of an ancient gate called the Porte ChÂtel. The Cathedral, the towers of which were high above the town, though lacking spires, was not unimpressive, but it had been so often rebuilt and changed, as to have few vestiges of the structure begun in the twelfth century. The two towers were square and topped by balustrades of little or no character. The buttresses of the apse were, however, of architectural value, and the apse had some curious and remarkable sculptures, while the triple nave was of noble proportions and had some Gothic vaulting.

A curious bas relief representing the Assumption was shown in the transept; but beyond these features the Cathedral had little or nothing to offer, save a very beautiful fifteenth century cloister, which we nearly missed seeing, connecting die Cathedral with the grand sÉminaire.

The great Citadel, renowned throughout Europe, upon which such high hopes centered in the beginning of the present war, and which resisted the efforts of the army of the Crown Prince, occupied the ancient site of the Abbey of St. Vannes, of the tenth century. It was so rigidly guarded that no one was permitted to enter it. From a roadway called the Promenade de la Roche one might idle away the hours appraising the picturesque valley of the Meuse.

Alost of those who visited Verdun, and stopped at "des trois Maures or du Cog Hardi," which were the rival hostelries, usually started to explore the town after "dejeuner," and brought up at the Cathedral as a finish. But to him who stayed awhile, and rambled about aimlessly outside the town, there was no end of curious beauties, of small scenic and antique discoveries, of quaint nooks, and groupings and surprises! all about were flowers and vines, and long white winding roads, past small mills embosomed in verdure, and wayside shrines where old women seemed rooted telling their beads.

And night beyond the town brought her own peculiar graces, when the mazy ravines lay hidden in the glimmering dusk, and the lights of Verdun twinkled across the valley, or answered to their images in the stream.

In towns of this region one was impressed with the prevalence of Colonels and Generals. Each hotel seemed to be provided with an officer, looking, too, much like all the others. They were invariably somewhat red faced and "puffy," bored in manner, and while slow of speech, were not mentally active or entertaining. Invariably, too, they were anglers, displaying in sporting knee breeches stockinged calves of the shape of "ten pins." They seemed mysterious as to their families, but were undisguisedly gallant in their attentions to the fair sex, and invariably headed the "table d'hÔte" at which universal deference was accorded them.

Once, in a small town, I fancied that the spell was broken, and that no General or Colonel was in the hotel, but on the third day I learned that "M. le General was confined to his room with the gout." This room was on the floor above, and although the proprietor often assured us that "M. le General" would, in all probability, be able to come down on the morrow, and occupy his wonted seat at the head of the table, he did not come, and so we never saw him.

All about Verdun were charming small villages, particularly along the river Meuse, and if one liked one could take a slow moving train, which went through a long black tunnel, and at length entered the valley of the Moselle—but that was another adventure which is not to be set down in this volume.

Cathedral: Verdun

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For this summer end of 1910, the valley of the Meuse was to us all sufficient. Here, while dozing among these small towns and villages, bordering on the vine clad river's splash and sparkle, resting by night in quaint clean and generally well kept inns, the world beyond became a figment. Curious fortresses still were to be found among these old rocks; and on the plateau the antiquarian, the geologist, the botanist may find much food for wonder and study, if they searched. But if they did, at least I never met them there. Should tourist by chance pass that way, it was by train, or swiftly speeding automobile all begoggled of eyes, and mummied by greatcoat, mindful only of the smoothness of the winding road, or the consumption of gasoline. But from all such doth Dame Nature hide her soul.

Then, tiring of this aloofness, one could always return to the bustle of Verdun, and find entertainment in the tortuous streets between the amorphous houses, with their aged carven doors surmounted by strange old trade-emblems, their overhanging gables; across the rough cobbled market place with the old town hall of pepperbox turret, its arcade, and its dusty hall where the "Échevins" held their courts of justice, and where the peasants chaffered their wares on market days, through the ancient gateways, and over the old bridges reflected in the eddying river.

I like to think of Verdun, as we saw it "en fÊte" that late summer morning. The town was gay with wreaths and flags and streamers, the windows aflame with flowers. In the Cathedral since five o'clock there had been scarce space to kneel for the toll of masses unbroken at the altar. White clad priests came and went through the aisles. The air was tense and restless with murmured prayer and the incessancy of "sacring-bells." When the last "housel" had been taken, the last "Ite" said, thousands of people filled the streets, lining the narrow ways in thick serried ranks, crowding the doors and windows, and stretching in a double row across the bridge.

Over all is a sense of waiting, as for a solemn thing about to happen, and this thrills the multitude. At the bridge end I could see the figure of a priest gesticulating, raised somewhat above the crowd, clad in a cope of gold and white, but I was too far away to hear his voice. Soon came a procession headed by a banner bearer, and I caught a glimpse of the scarlet of my lord the Archbishop, amid a cloud of filmy laced priestly cottas, and the violet surplices of chanting men, set in a great splash of white robes. Here and there a banner shone all red and gold, and at the end of the bridge was a great golden Crucifix.

Here a short sermon was preached, and this being over there came a stir and a heave in the crowd, which fell back along the ways. Forward moved the cross, twelve banners escorting it; tapers of wax tall and thick blazed, and from upcast censers sprang misty spirals of fragrance, blue as the hills beyond the town.

From a murmur which sweeps through the throng of people, a chant grows in volume until it is like the sound of a vast organ. All at once the gay burners, the smoking censers, and the gorgeously clad priests vanish around a turning in the street; the spell is broken; the crowd, before so orderly, swarms like bees in the hive, and here and there are couples dancing and jostling all unmindful of each other's proximity, but performing with stolid good humor. The spirit of the dance takes hold of the crowd, it spreads across the bridge, and sets of four, six and eight form in rows, holding one another at handkerchief length, eyes dancing with eyes to limbs' measure.

There was little of passion but much of poetry in this dance, a sort of polka with three steps forward and two back, a serpentine swinging unison. Words are poor painters of the scene: like unto a moving wheatfield swept by two winds, or the sea surge whose oscillant ebb and flow is so fascinating. And so throughout the day, and far into the night the celebration continued, with meetings—rejoicings—and mild potations sacramental of reunited friendships; but not until long after the celebration ended and common events regained dominion over the streets and square, did one cease to see mentally the swinging sway of that dance, or hear the pounding, insistent, snarling drone on the barrel organs of that reiterated tune.... And this is how one likes to recall old, old Verdun, now so pathetically battered and shell torn, its cathedral towers ragged against the sky, and its Citadel dismantled.