Stendhal visited the city in 1838 as part of his tour of the South of France. He did not like the city, partly because he could not find a decent café. He did, however, praise the Esplanade: '[it] is pleasantly situated on a little height that ends at the citadel which Louis ..... built as a detached fort', M.H. Beyle [Stendhal], Travels in the South of France, English trans., London, 1971, p. 172