Benezet, but under its arches on the green meadows of the
Isle de la Barthelasse, and that "Sur" in lieu of "Sous" is due to
northern misunderstanding of their sweet Provencal tongue.
Orange
By Henry James
[Footnote: From "A Little Tour In France." By special arrangement with,
and by permission of, the publishers, Houghton, Mifflin Co. Copyright,
1884.]
I alighted at Orange to visit a collection of eminently civil monuments.
The collection consists of but two objects, but these objects are so fine
that I will let the word pass. One of them is a triumphal arch, supposedly
of the period of Marcus Aurelius; the other is a fragment, magnificent in
its ruin, of a Roman theater. But for these fine Roman remains and for its
name, Orange is a perfectly featureless little town, without the Rhone--
which, as I have mentioned, is several miles distant--to help it to a
physiognomy. It seems one of the oddest things that this obscure French
borough--obscure, I mean, in our modern era, for the Gallo-Roman Arausio
must have been, judging it by its arches and theater, a place of some
importance--should have given its name to the heirs apparent of the throne
of Holland, and been borne by a king of England who had sovereign rights
over it.
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