838 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



narrow and sparsely settled. Miles can be traveled without seeing 

 a Imiuau habitation. Yet all this ajiparently remote and unfre- 

 quented region is traversed by those wonderful public roads to be 

 found everywhere in France, as substantially built, as smooth and 

 as well-kept_, although not as wide, as the Grand Boulevard and 

 Riverside Drive in New York City. These magnificent highways 

 wind around among the mountains, sometimes pass through them 

 by tunnels, and are carved from the sides of the precipitous cliffs, 

 so as to maintain easy grades, and often span deep chasms, or cross 

 valleys from mountain to mountain, upon causeways of solid ma- 

 sonry, with long series of lofty arches. This grand public work, 

 as complete when passing a hamlet as when approaching a city 

 like Orleans, commands the admiration of the stranger for the 

 engineering skill displayed, the evident durability of construction, 

 the perfection of finish and maintenance, and the beauty of the nu- 

 merous bridges and arcades. 



Aveyron may also be approached from the south, by the Midland 

 Railway, which, from the quaint old city of Cotte, on the Mediter- 

 ranean shore, traverses miles of rock country filled with vast vine- 

 yards, the town of Narbonne being a great wine producing center, 

 and then climbs and winds through the hills and a coal and iron 

 mining district, until it enters the desolate country already men- 

 tioned. Descending from the carriage of the iron road — as the 

 Frenchman says — at the station of Tournemire, a hamlet only, upon 

 the little stream called Soulzon, in a deep valley, one sees clinging 

 to the face of lofty limestone cliffs what looks at a distance much 

 like an ancient cliff town in a canon of Arizona. This is the village 

 of Roquefort, appropriately so called, and which has made its name 

 known throughout the civilized^ world, by the unique variety of 

 cheese which now, as for many generations, if not centuries, has 

 constituted the sole industry of this little town and the only raison- 

 d'entre for its existence in that peculiar location. 



Following a good highway, winding up the face of the mountain 

 from the valley, the climb of 2,000 feet is easily made, a pair of 

 horses carrying a strong vehicle and six men at a trot much of the 

 way. Then a snug little town is found, solidly built of stone, upon 

 terraces. It has a fixed population of about 800, temporarily in- 

 creased to 1,000 in the busy season. The buildings are severely 

 plain, many old, and nearly all hav^ one side attached to the cliff. 

 They are two, three and sometimes four stories and most of the 

 houses are but one room in depth, as light and air are available 

 only on one side, overlooking the valley. The rocks tower above 

 the little town 1,000 or 1,200 feet or more, like a lofty rear wall, 

 and the face of the mountain has a crescent shape, with this queer 

 settlement clinging to the deepest part of the concave surface, and 



