ent of a sum of money; and, in times of war,
the town of Caen had occasionally interposed, and forced the people to
accept the composition, from an apprehension, lest the enemy should gain
possession of the fort of the Trinity, by introducing themselves into it
among the authorized guests. It appears that, in 1429, the abbess
purchased an exemption at the price of thirty livres, a sum equivalent
to thirty-seven and a half quarters of corn, at a time when wheat sold
for two sols the bushel; and twenty-two years subsequently, Charles VII.
then King of France, granted his letters patent, abolishing the dinner
altogether, upon condition of a like sum being annually paid to the
parochial chest.

To the abbey church of the Trinity were attached several chapels, as
well without as within its walls: the most remarkable of these was that
of St. Thomas, generally known by the name of _St. Thomas l'Abattu_, in
the suburb of St. Giles. It was, in its original state, an hospital, and
was called the Hospital of St. Thomas the Martyr in the fields, whence
De la Rue infers that it was built in commemoration of Thomas-a-Becket,
and was probably erected immediately after his canonization in 1173.
Huet, on the contrary, tells us, that it had existed "from time
immemorial;" and Ducarel, who has described and figured it,[53] appears
to have also regarded it as of very high antiquity. The gradual
disappearance of leprosy had caused it to be long since diverted from
its original purpose. In 1569, it was pillaged by the Huguenots; and, as
no pains were taken to repair the injuries then done, it continued in a
state of dilapidation, imperceptibly wasting away, till the period of
the revolution, when it was sold, together with the other national
property; and even its ruins have now disappeared.

Happily, the abbatial church of the Trinity was at that time more
fortunate: it was suffered to continue unappropriated, till, upon the
institution of the Legion of Honor, Napoleon applied it to some purposes
connected with that body, by whom it was a few years ago ceded for its
present object, that of a workhouse for the department. The choir alone
is now used as a church: the nave serves for work-rooms; and, to render
it the better applicable to this purpose, a floor has been thrown
across, which divides it into two stories.

It has been observed in a recent publication,[54] that "a finer specimen
of the solid grandeur of Norman architecture, is sca