Omnibuses, cabriolets, and coaches of all kinds are now to be had, and there is neither pleasure nor glory in going uncomfortably in the obsolete _cacolet_.
Biaritz has greatly changed its aspect, since Inglis described it as a desolate fishing village: it has grown into a fashionable watering-place, full of fine hotels and handsome houses, with accommodations of all sorts; the sands are, in the bathing-season, covered with pavilions for the bathers, and all the terrors and dangers of the Chambre d'Amour and the Grottos of Biaritz, are over: that is to say, as far as regards persons being carried away by the tide, or surprised by the waves amongst the rocks; for, unless any one was silly enough to place himself in danger, no risk need be run, as it does not _now_ come to seek you.

The rocks, however, are still terrible to mariners in a tempest; when, in spite of the warning _pharos_, which crowns the height, the vessel is driven into these little bays, bristling with rocks of all sizes and forms, each capable of causing immediate destruction.

No winter passes without dreadful disasters on this beautifully dangerous coast, which looks not half so fatal as it really is.
I had so often heard Biaritz described as magnificent, that I had imagined a bold coast of gigantic cliffs and huge blocks of pyramidal stone, piled at distances along the shore, like those at the back of the Isle of Wight, or on the Breton coast.

I was, therefore, surprised to find only a pretty series of bays, much lower, but not unlike the land at Hastings, with the addition of small circles of sand, strewn with large masses of rock, over and through which the restless waves drive and foam, and form cascades, and rush into hollows, roaring and beating against the caverned roofs and sides with the noise of cannon, increased in violence according to the state of the elements.
In rough weather the sea is so loud here that the reverberation is distinctly heard at Bayonne, as if artillery was being fired, and its hoarse murmur is generally audible there at all times.

A fine light-house has been erected on a height; but this precaution does not altogether prevent accidents, and scarcely a winter passes without sad events occurring on this dangerous coast.