aine preferred the chateau of Francois I. to that of
Louis XII., perhaps the naivete of that of the good king will give
true artists more pleasure, while at the same time they admire the
magnificent structure of the knightly king. The elegance of the two
staircases which are placed at each end of the chateau of Louis XII.,
the delicate carving and sculpture, so original in design, which abound
everywhere, the remains of which, though time has done its worst, still
charm the antiquary, all, even to the semi-cloistral distribution of
the apartments, reveals a great simplicity of manners. Evidently,
the _court_ did not yet exist; it had not developed, as it did under
Francois I. and Catherine de' Medici, to the great detriment of feudal
customs. As we admire the galleries, or most of them, the capitals
of the columns, and certain figurines of exquisite delicacy, it is
impossible not to imagine that Michel Columb, that great sculptor, the
Michel-Angelo of Brittany, passed that way for the pleasure of Queen
Anne, whom he afterwards immortalized on the tomb of her father, the
last duke of Brittany.

Whatever La Fontaine may choose to say about the "little galleries"
and the "little ornamentations," nothing can be more grandiose than
the dwelling of the splendid Francois. Thanks to I know not what
indifference, to forgetfulness perhaps, the apartments occupied by
Catherine de' Medici and her son Francois II. present to us to-day
the leading features of that time. The historian can there restore the
tragic scenes of the drama of the Reformation,--a drama in which the
dual struggle of the Guises and of the Bourbons against the Valois was a
series of most complicated acts, the plot of which was here unravelled.

The chateau of Francois I. completely crushes the artless habitation of
Louis XII. by its imposing masses. On the side of the gardens, that is,
toward the modern place des Jesuites, the castle presents an elevation
nearly double that which it shows on the side of the courtyard. The
ground-floor on this side forms the second floor on the side of the
gardens, where are placed the celebrated galleries. Thus the first floor
above the ground-floor toward the courtyard (where Queen Catherine was
lodged) is the third floor on the garden side, and the king's apartments
were four storeys above the garden, which at the time of which we write
was separated from the base of the castle by a deep moat. The chateau,
already colossal as