RIVIERA MILESTONES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 13 February 1926, Page 16

RIVIERA MILESTONES.

A MOTORIST'S-MEMORIES.

(London Times.)

About mOO .foot above niv lion cl, ns 1 write this, stand two pieces of grey granite, cylinder-shaped lumps by the roadside, bearing faint traces of lettering and figures. Lu themselves, they arc* uninteresting to the point of vacuity, and, moreover, they do not obtrude, themselves upon the public* and tourist eye. Yet. to an ardent, rondfarcr, they are imbued with a life, a feeling, a reality which nothing else on the Riviera roads can claim. They are Roman milestones, and anyone skilled in such matters can no doubt read off to you the precise* distance in leagues from this point above Monte Carlo to mighty Rome, as easily as you or I at 50 miles an hour can shout into our companion’s ear “York—lS’’ as we flick past a milestone on rlie Great North Road. Think of it! Past these two faded, battered stones how many dusty legionaries have trudged, casting a weary eye at the figures which told them that they were —shall we say—432 miles from the joys of the centre of the universe, 422

miles nearer— —York? The road along which the cohorts marched is still there. Like all Roman roads it scorns gradients and dashes ooldly up and down hill, regardless of contour. It is pretty stony and full of rather terrific potholes! it is narrow and, for heavy traffic like catapult units, it must have been as dangerous as any minor Alpine pass is to-day. .But it is a real road, a road built for the business of empires, a road of unflinching courage. Along that road and past those milestones Caesar marched, leading a nation in arms to add uncounted jewels to the crown of Rome. .Caesar and perhaps Trajan, certainly any of the Roman iriivcrnors of that rude yet profitable Tsle of Britain. Road and milestones have watched a procession of the mighty in history, from the days when men were detailed for duty on the great wall against the little Piets (Decius, leader of the Eighth Cohort, took final leave of Roma Dea when his orders came for Ebor and beyond) till that little grey-coated figure from Corsica came by that way to call most of Europe to heel. Fifty feet above the stones, running almost parallel with the Roman road, lies the gem of the roads in the Maritime Alps, the upper Corniehe which Napoleon hewed out of the everlasting rock between Mentone and Nice. The grey slabs of stone, with their faint Roman figures and letters, have seen the beginnings, of most things which have mattered in the world.

AVhat roads they are, these of the lower Alps! Superb examples of engineering, they carry you safely and easily, allowing you q.n average Ox speed as regular as a clock, from valley to valley, from pass to pass. Some are or seem to be more difficult than others. The short corkscrew climb from La Turbie to the famous Monte Carlo golf links as Mont Agel, and the tricky one up from Monte Carlo itself to La Turbie, are cases in point. Neither can really compare with Napoleon’s imperial military road past the Roman stones, yet both are wonderful examples of French thoroughness and ingenuity. Some of the hairpin bends on the last mile to Mont Agel are, to those who dislike the sudden realisation of great height, distinctly uncomfortable. It is really nothing but your imagination, but as you climb higher and higher and the trees along the road side drop out of sight and give place to low parapets of stone over the top of which you see nothing but space, bounded bv the sea thousands of feet below, vou begin to wonder if the safety of the French military road has not been a little exaggerated.

It is only that, as it were, the rungs of the ladder are more exposed. The road’s gradient never alters, the sharpness of the corners remains constant. Yet, without a background of trees or rocks, each perfect "elbow" seems steeper and more .sudden than the last, and it is with a quite absurd sense of relief that you finally emerge on to the summit.

And what memories these and the lower roads hold for us! People used to bicycle madly from Monte Carlo to Nice along the Corniche. Conceive it! It is a very good ?.0 kilometres of very dusty road*. To-day there is less dust, because a certain amount of tarring has been accomplished, but at no time could it, in our eves of to-day, have been called a pleasant ride on a pushbike. Then came the great, strenuous adventures with the pioneers in motorears, when people driving cars with lube ignition offered up special prayers against following or. side-winds, lest their flaccid engines fainted by the roadside. Followed the first of the 1921 car’s real distinguishable genuine ancestors —-wonderful old Panhards, Georges. Richards, Mors and the great Mercedes, the car which was justly

known as the cax' “ten years ahead of its time.” Each had its own virtues, its peculiar and generally terrifying vices, but the extraordinary thing was that, although none of these or any others were made nearer to Nice than Lyons, and most of them saw the light a good deal further north or east, one and all had to “come out" on the Biviera roads and during the Riviera season. Properly to launch a startlingnew model of car on the roads of Europe, you had to put it through a kind of unofficial social test on the roads between Cannes and Ventimiglia. Mention any famous make of car or any famous driver to a veteran of the roaa and he will .instantly reply: “Rather! I remember X taking the first 2S h.p. they turned out from the Promenade des Anglais to La Turbie in 38£ minutes, and covering a kilometre on the Cagnes road in one minute—the next day.” Yes, the next day. Those wonderful old cars needed a deal of nursing, and one star turn per diem was about their limit.