HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



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valleys of Argeles and Azun, I strolled on to Pierre- 

 fitte, called at the station for my luggage, which had 

 been sent by rail from Laruns, and turned in to the 

 Hotel de la Poste, a very comfortable and reasonable 

 one, and a good centre for expeditions. Between 

 Argeles and Pierrefitte, I had not come across much : 

 Cynosurus echinatus, Dianthus armeria, Cynodon 

 dactylon, and Cucuialus bacciferus. Next day I set 

 off to visit one of the grandest sights of the Pyrenees, 

 the Cirque de Gavamie, a walk of twenty-five miles. 

 After leaving Pierrefitte, and taking the valley on 

 the left hand, the road enters a magnificent, beauti- 

 fully-wooded gorge, with the mountains towering 

 above on both sides, and the Gave de Pau, foaming 

 along sometimes 200 or 300 feet below. In many 

 places the road has been blasted out of the rocky 

 side of the valley, and is all the way to Gavarnie in 

 splendid condition ; in many plaees there is a stream 

 of water running along the side, from which men 

 water the road with long-handled ladles. Eight 

 miles from Pierrefitte is the watering-place of Luz, 

 and across the river a mile farther on, the more 

 fashionable one of St. Sauveur, one long street of 

 white hotels and lodging-houses. At Luz the road 

 to Bareges branches off to the left, and there is one 

 of the most interesting churches of the Pyrenees to 

 be seen here. It is fortified by a high battlemented 

 wall, has a covered porch containing curious old 

 frescoes of dragons, two open belfries — one contain- 

 ing two, the other three bells — and a doorway, now 

 walled up, where the Cagots entered and left the 

 church, so that the faithful should not be contami- 

 nated by contact with the outcast race. This church 

 was originally built by the Knights Templars at the 

 time when they had the task of guarding the French 

 valleys against the incursions of the Spaniards and 

 Saracens. A little distance past St. Sauveur is the 

 Pont Napoleon, a splendid bridge of a single arch, 

 216 feet above the stream ; the first stone was laid 

 by Napoleon III., and the cost of building 300,000 

 francs. Past St. Sauveur the road continues up the 

 valley, in some places carried along the precipitous 

 side 300 or 400 feet above the stream, and in others 

 almost on a level with it, till eight miles farther it 

 reaches the pretty little village of Gedre, where the 

 valley of Heas branches off from that of Gavarnie. 

 A little before reaching Gedre, a splendid view of the 

 great rock-wall separating France and Spain becomes 

 visible, and conspicuous in the outline is a square 

 gap called the Breche de Roland, immediately above 

 the Cirque de Gavarnie, but invisible from it, which 

 the legend says was carved out by the Paladin Roland 

 with his sword Durandal, to make a passage while 

 in pursuit of the Moors. At the village of Gedre 

 lives Mons. Bordere, the botanist of the Pyrenees. 

 I paid him a visit, and found him surrounded by piles 

 of plants in various stages of drying. Pie and his 

 son collect, while his wife and another person do the 

 drying. He makes expeditions along the whole 



length of the chain, and across into Spain ; and I can 

 strongly recommend anyone, who wishes for a set of 

 good Pyrenean specimens, to apply to him. Up to 

 Gedre I had found very little of interest, except 

 Lathyrus pyrenaicus (Jord.), a variety of L. silvestris 

 (L.) ; Cystisis supinus ; Asplenium septentrionale ; and 

 Cirshtm monspessulano-palustre ; but on an old tower 

 at Gedre I saw a fine patch of Antirrhinum sempervi- 

 rens (Lap.). At Gedre I had dinner, and one of the 

 courses consisted of izard, the name for the chamois 

 in these regions. The remaining four miles to Ga- 

 varnie proved better than all the rest of the way for 

 good plants, Ligusticum pyrenaum (Gou. ) ; Crepis 

 albida (Vill.), with white-bordered phyllaries ; Aco- 

 nitum napellus (L.), var. vulgaris (DC.) ; Campa- 

 nula rapunculoides ; Paronychias erpyllifolia (DC.) ; 

 and P. polygonifolia (DC), the former silvery-white, 

 with its scarious bracts ; Ononis natrix (L.) ; Scro- 

 phularia Hoppii (Koch), with small dark purple 

 flowers on almost naked branches ; Trifolium mon- 

 tanum (L.) ; Sideritis hyssopifolia (L. f. ) ; Hieracium 

 saxatile (Vill.), var. sericeum (Loret.) ; and last, but 

 not least, one of the most lovely plants of the Pyre- 

 nees, the Ramondia pyrenaica (Rich) ; here it was 

 gone to fruit, but higher up it was in flower. In 

 habit it resembles a primrose, but the flowers are 

 purple, and in shape and anthers resemble potato 

 flowers somewhat ; the leaves (radical only) are deep 

 bright green, densely covered with long shaggy rusty- 

 brown hairs, especially beneath ; its habitat is in 

 shady crevices of the rocks, particularly of the huge 

 boulders, fallen from mountains around. Leaving 

 the village of Gavarnie on the right, I took the bridle- 

 path leading straight on to the Cirque, here fully 

 visible, and apparently close to, but really two miles 

 farther on. A little past the village were a number 

 of plants of Carduus carlinafolius (Lam.), and on a 

 large flat space before mounting to enter the Cirque, 

 Alsine tenuifolia, var. Barrebieri (DC.) ; Alchemilla 

 pyrenaica (Duf.) ; Potentilla splendens (Ram.), a small 

 plant, something like P. fragariastrum, but with 

 larger flowers; Aquilegia pyrenaica (DC), var. sub- 

 alpina (Bot.) ; and Arenaria grandiflora (All.) And 

 now I came to the entrance of the far-famed Cirque 

 de Gavarnie, the most wonderful piece of scenery in 

 the range (though this is not the only Cirque, it is 

 much the finest one). Fancy a vast perpendicular 

 wall of black rock forming three parts of a circle, the 

 remainder of the circle being formed of a low mound, 

 as it were, where the stream breaks through ; and 

 these walls of rock tower up above for 1500 feet, 

 nothing being visible above but the sky, and, on one 

 side, the edge of a glacier. On the left, and almost 

 opposite the entrance, are two waterfalls, the higher 

 falling almost unbroken for 1300 feet, the highest fall 

 in Europe, except one in Norway. From the entrance 

 across the Cirque is a good mile or mile-and-a-half, 

 the floor being covered with snow and debris from 

 the rocks, the snow forming a bridge across the 



