These arguments silenced if they didn’t convince Lady Turnour, though she had probably never heard of Ziem, or even Corot, and we two in front were able to admire the charming scene in peace.  Crossing bridges here and there we saw, rising above sapphire lake and silver belt of olives jewelled with rosy almond blossom, more than one miniature Carcassonne, or ruined castle small as if peeped at through a diminishing glass.  There was Port le Bouc, the Mediterranean harbour of the Etang, or watergate to fairyland, as Martigues was the door; Istre on its proud little height; Miramas and Berre, important in their own eyes, and pretty in all others when reflected in the glassy surface of blue water.  There were dark groups of cypresses, like mourning figures talking together after a funeral—­ancient trees who could almost remember the Romans; and better than all else, there was Pont Flavian, which these Romans had built.

Even Lady Turnour condescended to get out of the car to do honour to the bridge with its two Corinthian arches of perfect grace and beauty; but she had nothing to say to the poor little, tired-looking lions sitting on top, which I longed to climb up and pat.

She wanted to push on, and her one thought of Aix-en-Provence was for lunch.  Was Dane sure we should find anything decent to eat there?  Very well, then the sooner we got it the better.

What a good thing there was someone on board the car to appreciate Provence, someone to keep saying—­“We’re in Provence—­Provence!” repeating the word just for the joy and music of it, and all it means of romance and history!

If there had not been someone to say and feel that, every turn of the tyres would have been an insult to Provence, who had put on her loveliest dress to bid us welcome.  Among the olives and almonds, young trees of vivid yellow spouted pyramids of thin, gold flame against a sky of violet, and the indefinable fragrance of spring was in the air.  We met handsome, up-standing peasants in red or blue berets, singing melodiously in patois—­Provencal, perhaps—­as they walked beside their string of stout cart-horses.  And the songs, and the dark eyes of the singers, and the wonderful horned harness which the noble beasts wore with dignity, all seemed to answer us:  “Yes, you are in Provence.”

We talked of old Provence, my Fellow Worm and I, while our master and mistress wearied for their luncheon; of the men and women who had passed along this road which we travelled.  What would Madame de Sevigne, or Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, or George Sand have said if a blue car like ours had suddenly flashed into their vision?  We agreed that, in any case, not one of them—­or any other person of true imagination—­would call abominable a wonderful piece of mechanism with the power of flattening mountains into plains, triumphing over space, annihilating distance; a machine combining fiercest energy with the mildest