Cauterets

Cauterets, a fashionable French watering-place in the department of Hautes-Pyrénées, lies 3250 feet above sea-level, in the valley of the Laverdan, 5 miles S. of Pierrefitte, the nearest railway station, and 42 SSE. of Pau. The stationary population of the place is only 1260, but it is annually swelled in summer by 15,000 to 20,000 visitors, for whose accommodation numerous sumptuous hotels and bathing-establishments have been built. It is a good centre and guide-station for ascents among the Pyrenees. The sulphurous springs, twenty-five in number, and varying in temperature from 60° to 131° F., are the most abundant in the Pyrenees (330,000 gallons per day), and have been known from Roman times; though their modern reputation dates from the 16th century, when Margaret, sister of Francis I., held her literary court and wrote much of her Heptameron at Cauterets.