The Devil’s Work

Jacques Paul-Stefani achieves a lifetime ambition by flying from Capu Tafunatu, a unique mountain in the heartland of Corsica

An 18th-century legend has it that Corsica is a mountain peak from the sunken continent of Atlantis, and it is from this time that the following legend comes.

Saint Martin, a fourth century bishop and now one of the most familiar saints in France, and the inhabitants of a village in the north of Corsica are said to have made a pact with the devil. The devil undertook to build a bridge over the River Golo one night before cockcrow. He set to work, using many of his satanic helpers, and all night a terrible din was heard coming from the Golo.

It was still dark, and the devil and his helpers were about to lay the last stone, the keystone of the bridge. But just then, a villager who had been in hiding all night, watching the work, stepped forward and pulled a cockerel out of his coat, which began to crow. 

The devil was furious and hurled his hammer, which struck the mountain and passed right through it from one side to the other. It ended up in the Gulf of Galeria, and Lucifer disappeared at the very same moment.

There are several versions of this legend, but what they have in common is a dispute between Saint Martin and the devil, who ended up throwing his hammer at the...