United States or Spain ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
His minister, Perrenot de Granvelle, born at Ornans, infused new intellectual and artistic life into the place he ruled as a prince.
We are now on the high road from Ornans to Pontarlier, and are passing some of the wealthiest little communities in Franche-Comte, Montgesoye, Vuillafans, Lods, all most picturesque to behold, and important centres of industry.
Ornans is celebrated for its cherry orchards and fabrications of Kirsch, also for Absinthe, and its wines. Everywhere you see cherry orchards and artificial terraces for the vines as on the Rhine, not a ledge of hill side being wasted. Gruyere cheese, so called, is also made here, and there are besides several manufactures, nail-forges, wire-drawing mills, and tile-kilns.
Everywhere we find haymakers at work, and picturesque figures they are. Ornans is lovely, and no wonder that Courbet was so fond of it. Nestled in a deep valley of green rocks and vineyards, and built on the banks of the transparent Loue, its quaint spire rising from the midst, it commends itself alike to artist, naturalist, and angler.
Soon, however, the vine, the oak, the beech, and the ash tree disappear, and we have instead the sombre pine and fir only. Monthier is perched on a hill-side amid grandiose mountains, and is hardly less picturesque than Ornans, though not nearly so enticing. In fact it is a trifle dirty when visited in detail, though charming, viewed from the high road above.
These close winding combes form one of the most characteristic and picturesque features of Franc-Comtois scenery. Leaving the more adventuresome part of this journey therefore to travellers luckier in respect of weather than ourselves, we turn our horses' heads towards Ornans, where we rest for coffee and a little chat with friends.
Iron foundries, kirsch distilleries, chemical works, and other manufactures maintain these rustic populations, and such isolated little nuclei of trade will doubtless take extraordinary development when the line of railway from Besancon to Pontarlier, by way of Ornans, is completed.
Word Of The Day