The last province is Tréguier, which answers as nearly as possible to the Côtes du Nord. The Trégorrois at first sight is less intensely national than either the man of Vannes, of Léon, or of Cornouaille. His costume is less special, and French is more generally spoken throughout his country; there are also more manor-houses than fortresses in Tréguier, life is more gentle, and there is less squalid poverty than in Cornouaille; and nowhere else, not even in Léon, is the power of the priesthood so paramount. One cannot travel without becoming aware of this fact. As the coasts of Cornouaille and Léon furnish the best sailors to France, so Tréguier is the great nursery of the Breton priesthood. Here chiefly the kloar or kloarek, as the student for holy orders is called, studies his vocation, although there are seminaries all over the country. Taken from a poor peasant home, he lives and lodges hardly; and when he comes home for long summer and winter holidays is treated with reverence by all, even by his parents, and it often happens that, during these idle hours spent with old companions among the orchards and in the harvest-fields, he sees some maiden whose good looks tempt him to regret his vocation, and to rebel against the life which dooms him to celibacy. Brizeux has shown this in "Loïc."

The Trégorrois have a special talent for improvisation, and their voices are said to be more musical than those of their neighbours when they sing their ballads at the Pardons. Their religion is less gloomy than that of the Léonnais. One should, perhaps, go to a wedding or a wrestling-match in Cornouaille, a funeral in Léon, and a festival or a pilgrimage in Tréguier, where processions and hymns, songs and dances, replace the rougher sports

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.

IT.

enacted at the Pardons of the Kernewote, although dancing seems to be a popular amusement everywhere. These popular rites, especially the weddings and Pardons of Brittany, give a colour and interest to its towns and villages as special as attractive, and take the traveller back to the Middle Ages as he gazes at the quaintly garbed processions and violent sports of the stalwart dark-eyed people, so uncouth, yet so indescribably picturesque. A knowledge of Breton is very helpful in listening to the ballads of the mendicants or old women, who in some parts of the country still make a profession of story-telling.

The religious plays of the Bretons were still acted a few years ago in Tréguier. There are many interesting churches and châteaux to be seen in this part of the country. Besides the ruined abbey of Beauport, Tréguier possesses two most interesting cathedrals, those of Dol and Tréguier.

At first sight the Bretons appear cold, sullen, and repelling; but they are really a very interesting people, and yet very unlike their Norman neighbours. They are sadly addicted to drink, and are very dirty in their habits, especially in out-of-the-way districts; they are obstinate, but they seem fairly honest and sincere, and the men are brave and independent; they seem too to be a religious, thoughtful, and self-respecting race. Their language is troublesome to learn, as there are several different dialects. In many villages in Finistère only a few of the inhabitants speak French. There is perhaps more resemblance between Britons and Bretons than between Bretons and Frenchmen; one special point of resemblance is that of being good sailors. The French navy is chiefly composed of Bretons.

Brittany has also a special attraction for English people, for if, as the French people say, we were conquered by the Duke of Normandy, and are therefore, after all, only a Norman colony, we certainly colonised Brittany, and the first reputed king of that country was born in Troynovant, the ancient London, in the time of the Emperor Gratian.

It seems to be certain that in the century preceding the birth of Christ Great Britain and Ireland were inhabited by the same race, who at that time peopled the north-west provinces of France, or, to speak more correctly, by a mixture of two races, the Gaels and the Cymri. When the Romans invaded Armorican Britain, or Brittany, the western portion of Celtic Gaul consisted of six provinces, inhabited by people who spoke the same language, but each possessing an independent form of government. The Romans called these people Diablinthes (afterwards Madonienses or Malouins), Rhedones (or people of Rennes), Nannetes (or people of Nantes), Curiosolites (afterwards people of Tréguier), and people of St. Brieuc, under the names Trecorenses and Briocenses, Veneti and Ossismienses. When part of the territory of the Veneti and that which remained. of the Curiosolites was merged in the diocese of Corisopitenses, or Quimper, the Ossismiens called themselves Legionenses or Léonnais, a name given them by the Romans. The diocese of Quimper went by the name of Cornu-Galliæ, or Cornouaille; and the northern part of Breton Armorica, comprising the dioceses of Léon, St. Brieuc, and Dol, by that of Donnonée.

There is no authentic history of ancient Brittany; the Druids, who still existed in the seventh century, and their bards have left no records but those which still linger in some

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13

of the more ancient ballads; and, although there were many Christian monasteries at that time, the monks seem to have been too busy in weaning the people from their ancient faith to occupy themselves with chronicling the events of their time.

According to some authorities, the history of Brittany begins with Brutus, grandson of Ascanius, who founded the city of Occismor before he landed in Great Britain and built Troynovant, while others say that Gomer, the son of Japhet, settled in Armorica, and begot the Celtic race there. M. de la Borderie divides Breton history into three periods: from B.C. 56 to A.D. 938, that is from Julius Cæsar to Alain Barbe Torte, the first Duke of Brittany; from 938 to 1532, when, after the death of Duchess Anne, Brittany was annexed to France; and from 1532 to 1789. And these periods he again subdivides into B.C. 56 to A.D. 455, Gallo-Roman period; 455 to 753, the immigration from Great Britain under Conan Meriadech, the subversion of the Druids, and the struggles of the Breton kings with the Carlovingians; 753 to 938, during which period the existence of Brittany as a separate nation was severely menaced.

The first real history we come to is the memorable war undertaken by Julius Cæsar on the occasion of the resistance which the warlike Veneti offered to his all-conquering arms. And this war seems to have been the cause of the Roman invasion of our island; for, Great Britain having aided the Veneti, when Cæsar had conquered that people he made his first voyage across the channel in order to punish the Britons for their audacity. A fabulous history of Breton kings begins with Conan Meriadech, who, in the reign of the Roman emperor

Gratian, at the end of the fourth century, came over from Great Britain with the Roman general Maximus, recently proclaimed emperor by his own troops. Maximus had robbed Conan of the probable succession to the kingdom of Britain, and he offered as a recompense to associate him with the conquests he proposed to make in Gaul. Conan landed at Occismor, then occupied by a Roman garrison, and as soon as the country was conquered he was crowned king at Rennes. The Bretons had never submitted willingly to the Roman yoke, and Conan having restored to them all the privileges of which the invaders had robbed them, soon found himself able to pacify the nation he had conquered.

He sent to Britain for the wives and children of his companions, and also wrote to Dionotus, then King of Troynovant, to ask his beautiful daughter Ursula in marriage. She set sail, magnificently habited, and accompanied by a very large number of beautiful damsels, her companions. They had hardly started when a fearful storm arose, and wrecked their fleet of boats on the coasts of Holland, near the mouth of the Rhine. Here the unhappy virgins were cruelly massacred by a horde of Picts and Huns; but St. Ursula and her companions were canonised by the Church as martyrs. At this time Brittany seems to have been divided between Druid worship, the pagan mythology of the Roman invaders, and the beginning of Christianity, in the third century preached by St. Clair, and watered into fuller progress by the blood of the martyrs SS. Donatien and Rogatien.

The two most celebrated of the Druid academies were in Belle Ile and the isle of Ushant; there was another in the isle of Sein, but this was devoted to priestesses who were con