Pont-Aven is associated with agreeable memories. This village in the South of FinistÈre draws men and women from all over Europe, summer after summer. Many of them stay there throughout the winter, content to be shut off from the world, allowing the sweet and gentle lassitude of the place to lull their cares and troubles. Is it climatic—this soothing influence—or is it the outcome of a spell woven over beautiful Pont-Aven by some good-natured fairy long ago? I have often wondered. Certain it is that intelligent men, many of them painters, have been content to spend years in Pont-Aven. Some time ago Mother and Father, touring in Brittany, came to this delightful spot, and determined to spend three weeks there. They stayed three years.

All my life I have heard stories of this wonderful place, and of their first visit. It was when my father had only just begun his career as a painter. The experience, he says, was a great education. There he found himself in an amazing nest of French and American painters, all the newer lights of the French school. He was free to work at whatever he liked, yet with unlimited chances of widening, by daily argument, his knowledge of technical problems. For the three years that he remained on this battlefield of creeds conflicts of opinion raged constantly. Everyone was frantically devoted to one or another of the dominating principles of the moderns. There was a bevy of schools there.

One, called the Stripists, painted in stripes, with vivid colour as nearly prismatic as possible, all the scenery around. Then, there were the Dottists, who painted in a series of dots. There were also the Spottists—a sect of the Dottists, whose differentiation was too subtle to be understood. Men there were who had a theory that you must ruin your digestion before you could paint a masterpiece. No physically healthy person, they declared, could hope to do fine work. They used to try to bring about indigestion.

One man, celebrated for his painting of pure saints with blue dresses, over which Paris would go crazy, never attempted to paint a saint until he had drunk three glasses of absinthe and bathed his face in ether. Another decided that he was going to have, in Paris, an exhibition of merry-go-rounds which should startle France. He had a theory that the only way to get at the soul of a thing was to paint when drunk. He maintained that the merry-go-rounds whirled faster then. One day my father went to his studio. He was dazed. He did not know whether he was standing on his head or his heels. It was impossible to see 'Black Bess' or any of the pet horses he knew so well. The pictures were one giddy whirl.

Then, there was the Bitumen school, a group of artists who never painted anything but white sunlit houses with bitumen shadows. A year or two afterwards a terrible thing invariably happened. Without any warning whatsoever, the pictures would suddenly slide from off their canvases to the floor. The bitumen had melted.

The Primitives afforded joy. Their distinctive mark was a walking-stick, carved by a New Zealand Maori, which they carried about with them. It gave them inspiration. So powerful was the influence of these sticks that even the head of a Breton peasant assumed the rugged aspect of the primitive carvings in their paintings. The most enthusiastic disciple of the sect was a youth who was continually receiving marvellous inspirations. Once, after having shut himself up for three days, he appeared looking haggard and ravenous. Without a word, he sat down heavily near a table, called for absinthe, and, groaning, dropped his head in his hands, and murmured, 'Ah, me! Ah, me!' All beholders were in a fever to know what the mystery was. After some minutes of dead silence the young man rose majestically from his chair, stretched forth one arm, and, with a far-away look in his eyes, said, 'Friends, last night, when you were all asleep, a beautiful creature came to me in spirit form, and taught me the secret of drawing; and I drew this.' Then he brought out a picture. It was far above his usual style, and the more credulous envied his good fortune. Some weeks afterwards, however, it was discovered by a painter with detective instincts that the marvellous vision was in reality a chambre au clair—that is to say, a prism through which objects are reflected on paper, enabling one to trace them with great facility.

Such are the extraordinary people among whom Mother and Father found themselves on their first visit to Pont-Aven—geniuses some of them, mere daubers others, all of them strange and rough and weird. More like wild beasts they looked than human beings, Mother told me; for very few women came to Pont-Aven in the early days, and those were Bohemians. The artists allowed their hair and beards to grow long. Day after day they wore the same old paint-stained suits of corduroys, battered wide-brimmed hats, loose flannel shirts, and coarse wooden sabots stuffed with straw.

Mother, who was very young at the time, has often told me that she will never forget their arrival at the little HÔtel Gleanec. They were shown into a salle À manger, where rough men sat on either side of a long table, serving themselves out of a common dish, and dipping great slices of bread into their plates.

Mother was received with great courtesy by them. She found it very amusing to watch the gradual change in their appearance day by day—the donning of linen collars and cuffs and the general smartening up. Many of the men who were then struggling with the alphabet of art have reached the highest rungs of the ladder of fame, and their names have become almost household words; others have sunk into oblivion, and are still amateurs.

The chief hotel in the village was the HÔtel des Voyageurs, to which Mother and Father soon migrated. It was kept by a wonderful woman, called Julia. Originally a peasant girl, she had by untiring energy become the proprietress of the great establishment. Her fame as hostess and manager was bruited all over France. Everyone seemed to know of Julia, and year after year artists and their families came back regularly to stay with her. She is a woman with a strong individuality. She gathered a large custom among artists, who flocked to the HÔtel des Voyageurs as much because of the charm of Mdlle. Julia, and the comfort of her house, as for the beauty of the scenery.

There was a delightful intimacy among the guests, most of whom were very intelligent. Mdlle. Julia took a sincere interest in the career of each. All went to her with their troubles and their joys, certain of sympathy and encouragement. Many are the young struggling painters she has helped substantially, often allowing them to live on in the hotel for next to nothing. Many are the unpaid bills of long standing on the books of this generous woman. I fear that she has never made the hotel pay very well, for the elaborate menu and good accommodation are out of all proportion to her charges. A strong woman is Mdlle. Julia. She has been known to lift a full-grown man and carry him out of doors, landing him ignominiously in the mud.

There was one man, a retired military officer, whom no one else could manage. He had come to stay in Pont-Aven because he could live there for a few francs a day and drink the rest. He suffered from hallucinations, and took great pleasure in chasing timid artists over the countryside, challenging them to duels, and insulting them in every way possible. He was the terror of the village. He had a house on the quay, and early one morning when the snow was thick upon the ground, just because a small vessel came into the river and began blowing a trumpet, or making a noise of some kind, he sprang out of bed in a towering rage, rushed in his nightshirt into the street, and began sharpening his sword on a rock, shouting to the ship's captain to come out and be killed if he dared. The captain did not dare. The only person of whom this extraordinary person stood in awe was Mdlle. Julia. Her he would obey without a murmur. No one knew why. Perhaps there had been some contest between them. At any rate, they understood each other.

The friends of Mdlle. Julia ranged from the Mayor of the town to Batiste, the butcher, who sat outside his door all day and watched her every movement.

'If I want to remember where I have been, and what I did at a certain hour, I have only to ask Batiste,' she was wont to say.

All the artists worshipped the ground she trod upon; and well they might, for they would never have a better friend than she. Her salle À manger and grand salon were panelled with pictures, some of which are very valuable to-day. Tender-hearted she was, and strong-minded, with no respect for persons. Mother told me that once when my brother and sister, babies of three and four years old, were posing for Father on the beach with only their linen sunbonnets on, their limbs were somewhat sunburnt and blistered. When they returned to the hotel, Mdlle. Julia applied sweet oil and cold cream to the tender skin, and rated my parents soundly between her tears of compassion for the little ones. It was of no use explaining that it was in the cause of art. She bade them in unmeasured terms to send art to the Devil, and scolded them as if they were children. I doubt not she would have reprimanded the King of England with as little compunction.

Mdlle. Julia made the reputation of Pont-Aven by her own overpowering individuality. If she went to Paris or elsewhither for a few days, everyone in the village felt her absence. Things were not the same. Pont-Aven seemed momentarily to have lost its charm. The meals were badly cooked and worse served; the bonnes were neglectful. All missed the ringing laugh and cheery presence of Julia. How soon one knew when she had returned! What a flutter there was among the bonnes! What a commotion! How everyone flew hither and thither at her command! She seemed to fill the hotel with her presence.

I went to Pont-Aven when I was ten years old, and I remember well how Mdlle. Julia came to meet us, driving twenty miles through the deep snow. What happy days those were in the dear little village! We lived as wild things, and enjoyed life to the full. M. Grenier, the schoolmaster, acted as tutor to us. He was lenient. We spent our time mainly in rambling over the countryside, making chocolate in Mdlle. Julia's wood, bird-nesting, and apple-stealing. M. Grenier taught us to row, and we learnt all the various intricate currents and dangerous sandbanks so thoroughly that after a time we could almost have steered through that complicated river blindfold. We learnt how to make boats out of wood, and how to carve our names in a professional manner on trees. We became acquainted with a large selection of Breton ballads and a good deal of rough botany. More advanced lessons have faded from my mind. Of actual book-learning we accomplished very little. Many a time M. Grenier pulled himself together, brought us new copybooks, fine pens, his French grammar and readers, and settled us down in the salon to work; but gradually the task would pall on both master and scholars, and before the morning was half over we would be out in the fields and woods again, 'just for a breath of fresh air.'

Children have the power of making themselves at home in a foreign country. Within a week my brother and I knew everyone in the village. We became acquainted with all their family affairs and troubles. In many households we were welcome at any time of the day. There was the sabot-maker, whom we never tired of watching as he cleverly and rapidly transformed a square block of wood into a rounded, shapely sabot. He was always busy, and sometimes turned out a dozen pairs in a day. To my great joy, he presented me with a beautiful little pair, which I wore painfully, but with much pride. Although when you become accustomed to them sabots are comfortable and sensible gear, at first they are extremely awkward. Of course, you can kick them off before you enter a house, and run about in the soft woollen chausson with a leather sole which is always worn underneath. Round the hotel doorway there is always a collection of sabots awaiting their owners. In a country such as Brittany, where it rains a good deal, and the roads are often deep in mud, they are the only possible wear. The sabot is a product of evolution. In that respect it is like the hansom cab which is a thing of beauty simply because it has been thought out with regard to its usefulness and comfort alone.

Batiste, the butcher, was a great friend of ours. With morbid fascination we witnessed his slaughter of pigs and cows. Then, soon we knew where to get the best crÊpes. These are pancakes of a kind, so thin that you can see through them, made on a round piece of metal over a blazing fire. Eaten hot, with plenty of butter and sugar, they are equal to anything in our English cookery. There was one particular old lady living down by the bridge who made crÊpes. We saw her mixing the ingredients, mostly flour and water, and spreading the dough over the round piece of metal. It became hard in an instant, and curled up brown and crisp, as thin as a lace handkerchief. Likewise, we knew where to buy bowls of milk thick with cream for one sou. We had to tramp over several fields and to scale several fences before we found ourselves in the kitchen of a large farm, where the housewife was busy pouring milk into large copper vessels. Seated at the polished mahogany table, we drank from dainty blue bowls.

I went back to Pont-Aven recently, and found it very little changed. We travelled by diligence from Concarneau; but, as the conveyance left only once a day, we had several hours to while away. The Concarneau and Pont-Aven diligence is quaint and primitive, devoid of springs, and fitted with extremely narrow and hard seats. We passed through villages in which every house seemed to be either a buvette or a dÉbit de boisson. At these our driver—a man in a blue blouse and a black felt hat—had to deliver endless parcels, for which he dived continually under the seat on which we were sitting. For discharging each commission he received several glasses of cider and wine. He stopped at every place to drink and talk with the host, quite oblivious of his passengers. With every mile he became more uproarious.

Our only travelling companion was an old woman in the costume of the country, with a yellow and wrinkled face. On her arm she carried a large basket and a loaf of bread two yards long. Ruthlessly she trod on our toes with her thick black sabots in getting in. Although I helped her with her basket and her bread, she never volunteered a word of thanks, but merely snatched them from my hands. Many Bretons are scarcely of higher intelligence than the livestock of the farms. They live in the depths of the country with their animals, sleeping in the same room with them, rarely leaving their own few acres of ground. The women work as hard as the men, digging in the fields and toiling in the forests from early morning until night.

At one of the villages where the diligence stopped, a blacksmith, a young giant, handsome, dark, came out from the smithy with his dog, which he was sending to some gentleman with hunting proclivities in Pont-Aven. The animal—what is called a chien de la chasse—was attached by a long chain to the step, and the diligence started off. The blacksmith stood in the door of his smithy, and watched the dog disappear with wistful eyes. The Bretons have a soft spot in their hearts for animals. The dog itself was the picture of misery. His moans and howls wrung one's heart. I never saw an animal more wily. He tried every conceivable method of slipping his collar. He pulled at the chain, and wriggled from one side to another. Once he contrived to work his ear under the collar, and my fingers itched to help him. Had the truant escaped, I could not have informed the driver. Strange that one's sympathies are always with the weakest! In novels, an escaping convict, no matter how terrible his guilt, always has my sympathy, and I am hostile to the pursuing warder.

As we drew near to Pont-Aven the scenery became more and more beautiful. On either side of the road stretched miles and miles of brilliant mustard-yellow gorse, mingled with patches of dried reddish bracken, and bordered by rows of blue-green pines. Here and there one saw great rocks half-covered with the velvet-green of mosses thrown hither and thither in happy disorder. Sometimes ivy takes root in the crevices of the rocks where a little earth has gathered, and creeps closely round about them, as if anxious to convey life and warmth to the cold stone. The sun, like a red ball, was setting behind the hills, leaving the sky flecked with clouds of the palest mauves and pinks, resembling the fine piece of marbling one sometimes sees inside the covers of modern well-bound books. Now and then we passed a little ruined chapel—consecrated, no doubt, to some very ancient saint (it was impossible to make out the name), a saint whose cult was evidently lost, for the little shrine was tumbling to ruins. We saw by the wayside little niches sheltering sacred fountains, the waters of which cure certain diseases; and passed peasants on the roadside, sometimes on horseback, sometimes walking—large, well-proportioned, fine-featured men of proud bearing. In Brittany the poorest peasant is a free and independent man. He salutes you out of politeness and good nature; but he does not cringe as if recognising himself to be lower in the social scale. The Breton, howsoever poor, is no less dignified under his blue blouse than his ancestors were under their steel armour.

A long straight road leads from Concarneau to Pont-Aven, and at the end of it lies the pretty village among hills of woods and of rocks bathed in a light mist. One could almost imagine that it was a Swiss village in miniature. By the time we arrived it was night. We could only discern clean white houses on either side, and water rushing under a bridge over which we passed. The HÔtel des Voyageurs looked much the same as ever, except that over the way a large building had been added to the annexe. To our great disappointment, we discovered that Mdlle. Julia had gone to Paris; but we recognised several of the bonnes and a hoary veteran called Joseph, who had been in Julia's service for over twenty years.

Gladly I rushed out next morning. There is nothing more delightful than to visit a place where one has been happy for years as a child, especially such a place as Pont-Aven, which changes little. My first thought was to see the Bois d'Amour. I found it quite unchanged. To be sure, I had some difficulty in finding the old pathway which led to the wood, so many strange houses and roadways had been built since we were there; but at length we found it—that old steep path with the high walls on either side, on which the blackberries grew in profusion. There are two paths in the forest—one, low down, which leads by the stream, and the other above, carpeted with silver leaves. A wonderful wood it is—a joyous harmony in green and gold. Giant chestnuts fill the air with their perfumed leaves, forming an inextricable lattice-work overhead, one branch entwining with the other, the golden rays of the sun filtering through. The ground is carpeted with silver and salmon leaves left from last autumn; the pines shed thousands of brown cones, and streams of resin flow down their trunks. It is well-named the Bois d'Amour. Below runs a little stream. Now it foams and bounds, beating itself against a series of obstacles; now it flows calmly, as if taking breath, clear, silver, and limpid, past little green islands covered with flowers, and into bays dark with the black mud beneath. Low-growing trees and bushes flourish on the banks, some throwing themselves across the stream as barricades, over which the laughing water bounds and leaps unheedingly, scattering diamonds and topaz in the sunlight. Everything in the Bois d'Amour seems to join in the joyous song of Nature. The little stream sings; the trees murmur and rustle in the wind; and the big black mill-wheel, glistening with crystal drops, makes music with the water.

By the riverside, women are washing their clothes on square slabs of stone, which stretch across the water. It was on these stepping-stones, I remember, that my brother and I lost our shoes and stockings. At one place the stream is hidden from sight by thick bushes, and you find yourself in a narrow green lane, a green alley, walled on either side and roofed overhead by masses of trees and bushes, through which the sun filters occasionally in golden patches. Whenever I walk down that lane, I think of the song that my bonne Marie taught me there one day; it comes back as freshly now as if it had been but yesterday. The refrain begins, 'Et mon coeur vol, vol et vol, et vol, vers les cieux.'

One meets the river constantly during this walk, and every mile or so you come across a little black mill. The mills in Pont-Aven are endless, and this saying is an old one: 'Pont-Aven ville de renom, quatorze moulins, quinze maisons.'

Picturesque little mills they are. The jet-black wheels form a delightful contrast to the vivid green round about; and small bridges of stones, loosely put together and moss-grown here and there, cross the river at intervals.

I love this rough, wild country. How variable it is! You may sit in a wood with the stream at your feet, and all about you will be great hills half-covered with gorse and bracken, and here and there huge blocks of granite, which seem ready to fall any moment.

The Bois d'Amour is a happy hunting-ground of artists. This particular view of the mill at which I gazed so long has been a stock-subject with painters for many years. You never pass without seeing at least one or two men with canvases spread and easels erected, vainly trying to reproduce the beautiful scene. Artists are plentiful in this country. Wherever you may wander within a radius of fifteen miles, you cannot stop at some attractive prospect without hearing an impatient cough behind you, and, turning, find yourself obstructing the view of a person in corduroys and flannel shirt, with a large felt hat, working, pipe aglow, at an enormous canvas. The artists, who are mostly English, are thought very little of by the people about. I once heard a commercial traveller talking of Pont-Aven.

'Pshaw!' he said, 'they are all English and Americans there. Everything is done for the English. At the HÔtel des Voyageurs even the cuisine is English. It is unbearable! At the table the men wear clothes of inconceivable colour and cut. They talk without gestures, very quickly and loudly, and they eat enormously. The young mecs are flat-faced, with long chins, white eye-lashes, and fair hair. Many are taciturn, morose, and dreamy. Occasionally they make jokes, but without energy. They mostly eat without interruption.'

This is the French view, and it is natural. Pont-Aven does not have the right atmosphere for the Frenchman: the Bretons and the English are supreme.

Nothing is more delightful than to spend a summer there. You find yourself in a colony of intelligent men, many of them very clever, as well as pretty young English and American girls, and University students on 'cramming' tours. Picnics and river-parties are organized by the inimitable Mdlle. Julia every day during the summer, and in the evening there is always dancing in the big salon. The hotel is full to overflowing from garret to cellar. Within the last few years Mdlle. Julia has opened another hotel at Porte Manec, by the sea, to which the visitors may transfer themselves whenever they choose, going either by river or by Mdlle. Julia's own omnibus. It is built on the same lines as Mme. Bernhardt's house at Belle Isle, and is situated on a breezy promontory.

The river lies between Pont-Aven and Porte Manec, which is at the mouth of the sea. How beautiful this river is—the dear old browny-gray, moleskin-coloured river, edged with great rocks on which the seaweed clings! On the banks are stretches of gray-green grass bordered by holly-bushes. The scenery changes constantly. Sometimes it is rugged and rocky, now sloping up, now down, now covered with green gorse or a sprinkling of bushes, now with a wilderness of trees. Here and there you will see a cleft in the mountain-side, a little leafy dell which one might fancy the abode of fairies. Silver streams trickle musically over the bare brown rocks, and large red toadstools grow in profusion, the silver cobwebs sparkling with dew in the gorse.

It is delightful in the marvellous autumn weather to take the narrow river-path winding in and out of the very twisty Aven, and wander onwards to your heart's content, with the steep hillside at the back of you and the river running at your feet. You feel as if you could walk on for ever over this mountainous ground, where the heather grows in great purple bunches among huge granite rocks, which, they say, were placed there by the Druids. Down below flows the river—a mere silver ribbon now, in wastes of pinky-purple mud, for it is ebb tide; and now and then you see the battered hulk of a boat lying on its side in the mud. On the hill are lines of fir-trees standing black and straight against the horizon.

Night falls in a bluish haze on the hills and on the river, confusing the outline of things. At the foot of the mountains it is almost dark. Through the open windows and doors of the cottages as one passes one can see groups round the tables under the yellow light of candles. One smells the good soup which is cooking; the noise of spoons and plates mingles with the voices of the people. Pewter and brass gleam from the walls. It is a picture worthy of Rembrandt. The end of the room is hidden in smoky shadow, now and then lit up by a flame escaping from the fireplace, showing an old woman knitting in the ingle-nook, and an old white-haired peasant drinking cider out of a blue mug. It is strange to think of these people living in their humble homes year after year—a happy little people who have no history.

Not far from Pont-Aven is the ruined chÂteau of Rustephan. One approaches it through a wood of silver birches, under great old trees; cherry-trees and apple-trees remain in what must once have been a flourishing orchard. The castle itself has fallen to decay. The wall which joined the two towers has broken down, and the steps of the grand spiral staircase, up which we used to climb, have crumbled; only the main column, built of granite sparkling with silver particles, which will not fall for many a day, stands stout and sturdy. One of the stately old doorways remains; but it is only that which leads to the castle keep—the main entrance must have fallen with the walls centuries ago. Bits of the old dining-hall are still to be seen—a huge fireplace, arch-shaped, and a little shrine-like stone erection in the wall, worn smooth in parts; one can imagine that it was once a sink for washing dishes in.

It is a drowsy morning; the sun shines hotly on the back of the neck; and as one sits on a mound of earth in the middle of what was once the dining-hall, one cannot resist dreaming of the romantic history of GeneviÈve de Rustephan, the beautiful lady who lived here long ago. Up in one of the great rounded towers spotted with orange lichen and encircled with ivy is a room which must have been her bedchamber. An ancient chimney-stack rears itself tall and stately, and where once gray smoke curled and wreathed, proceeding from the well-regulated kitchen, long feathery grasses grow. All round the castle, in what must have been the pleasure-gardens, the smooth lawns and the bowling-green, my lady's rose-garden, etc., are now mounds of earth, covered with straggling grass, bracken, and blackberry-bushes, and loose typical Breton stone walls enclosing fields. Horrible to relate, in the lordly dining-hall, where once the dainty GeneviÈve sat, is a fat pig, nozzling in the earth.

Naturally, Rustephan is haunted. If anyone were brave enough to penetrate the large hall towards midnight (so the peasants say), a terrible spectacle would be met—a bier covered with a white cloth carried by priests bearing lighted tapers. On clear moonlight nights, say the ancients, on the crumbling old terrace, a beautiful girl is to be seen, pale-faced, and dressed in green satin flowered with gold, singing sad songs, sobbing and crying. On one occasion the peasants were dancing on the green turf in front of the towers, and in the middle of the most animated part of the feast there appeared behind the crossbars of a window an old priest with shaven head and eyes as brilliant as diamonds. Terrified, the men and the girls fled, and never again danced in these haunted regions.

One feels miserable on leaving Pont-Aven. It seems as if you had been in a quiet and beautiful backwater for a time, and were suddenly going out into the glare and the noise and the flaunting airs of a fashionable regatta. I can describe the sensation in no other way. There is something in the air of Pont-Aven that makes it like no other place in the world.