ds gently to the horizon, with
distant white cottages inviting one to walk: the quiet curve of river
below, with all the river-side details: the three great purple-tiled
masses of Saint Germain, Saint Pierre, and the cathedral of Saint
Etienne, rising out of the crowded houses with more than the usual
abruptness and irregularity of French building. Here, that rare
artist, the susceptible painter of architecture, if he understands the
value alike of line and mass of broad masses and delicate lines, has "a
subject made to his hand."

A veritable country of the vine, it presents nevertheless an expression
peaceful rather than radiant. Perfect type of that happy mean between
northern earnestness and the luxury of the south, for which we prize
midland France, its physiognomy is not quite happy--attractive in part
for its melancholy. Its most characteristic atmosphere is to be seen
when the tide of light and distant cloud is travelling quickly [52]
over it, when rain is not far off, and every touch of art or of time on
its old building is defined in clear grey. A fine summer ripens its
grapes into a valuable wine; but in spite of that it seems always
longing for a larger and more continuous allowance of the sunshine
which is so much to its taste. You might fancy something querulous or
plaintive in that rustling movement of the vine-leaves, as blue-frocked
Jacques Bonhomme finishes his day's labour among them.

To beguile one such afternoon when the rain set in early and walking
was impossible, I found my way to the shop of an old dealer in
bric-a-brac. It was not a monotonous display, after the manner of the
Parisian dealer, of a stock-in-trade the like of which one has seen
many times over, but a discriminate collection of real curiosities. One
seemed to recognise a provincial school of taste in various relics of
the housekeeping of the last century, with many a gem of earlier times
from the old churches and religious houses of the neighbourhood. Among
them was a large and brilliant fragment of stained glass which might
have come from the cathedral itself. Of the very finest quality in
colour and design, it presented a figure not exactly conformable to any
recognised ecclesiastical type; and it was clearly part of a series.
On my eager inquiry for the remainder, the old man replied that no more
of it was [53] known, but added that the priest of a neighbouring
village was the possessor of an entire set of tapestries,