bodies. The relics of plants and animals in the same bed belong to species still existing in the neighbourhood.
Of the craters the most perfect is that of Bar, thus described by Georges Sand:—
"This ancient volcano rises isolated above a vast plateau that is as bare as it is sad. It stands there as if planted as a boundary mark between the old Velay and Auvergne. From the summit of its truncated cone a superb view is obtained extending to the Cevennes. A vast forest of beech crowns the mountain and clothes its sides, which are much rifted towards the base. The crater is a mighty bowl full of verdure, perfectly circular, and with the bottom covered with a turfy sward in which grow pale birch trees thinly scattered. Here was at one time a lake, dried up in the times of Roman occupation. The tradition of the country is strange. It was said that this tarn bred storms; and the inhabitants of Forez accordingly came hither, sword in hand, and forcibly drained it."
The Lac de Bouchet is not a sheet of water filling an ancient crater, but occupies a hollow produced by the bursting of a great bubble of air in the molten lava. It is almost circular, and the ground around it is very slightly raised. Curiously enough, Roman substructures have been traced in the lake. Probably some Gallo-Roman noble had his summer villa there, overhanging the water, as at Baiæ.
"Nullus in orbe sinus Baiis prælucet amœnis,
Si dixit dives—lacus et mare sentit amorem
Festinantis heri."
This originated a tale told by the peasantry to the
- ↑ Jean de la Roche, Paris, Calmann-Lévy.
