AMONG THE HILLS OF MORVAND - 1882

Half-way between Paris and Lyons you come to an upland region more or less wooded, about sixty miles in extend, with hills that rise wave beyond wave till they finally assume the dignity of mountains called the Montagnes Noires, which are divided by deep glens and beautiful valleys kept fresh by streams that come pouring down to feed the tributaries to the Seine and the Loire.

The freshness and varied character of the landscape is delightful, especially to one coming up from the bleached, arid plains of Provence. On one side it looks severe and with its dense woods and dark, solitary ravines bordered by tall granite cliffs; and on the other graceful and attractive, with undulating hills whose wooded slopes embosom fair islets of green pasture-land where graze flocks of white sheep and herds of cattle with beautiful horns.

Now you come upon a gorge through which dashes an impetuous torrent between high rocks blackened by time and rent by storms into fantastic shapes; and again upon fresh, sunny meadows and cultivated fields with bird-haunted copses in every direction. Here you are surprised to see a hamlet suspended, as it were, on the side of a mountain; and there a group of cabins half hidden in the depths of a secluded valley.

The mountains are not like the lofty, precipitous peaks of the Alps, however, but for the most part have gentle declivities clothed with rich forests or covered with harvests, but more or less bristling with sharp gray cliffs. Here grow the oak, the beech, and the witch-elm, the aspen and the alder, from which vast quantities of charcoal are made, and the firewood cut to be floated down the rivers to Paris.