he mitre, ring, and
pontifical insignia, together with various other honorary distinctions.
The revolution deprived Falaise of its abbey and eight churches. It now
retains only four; two within the walls, and two in the suburbs. Its
population is estimated at about ten thousand inhabitants.

[Illustration: Plate 90. CASTLE OF FALAISE.
_North View._]

The castle of Falaise is with justice regarded by Mr. Turner, as one of
the proudest relics of Norman antiquity. The following description of
it, as more copious than any other that has yet appeared, is transcribed
verbatim from the Tour[200] of that author:--"It is situated on a very
bold and lofty rock, broken into singular and fantastic masses, and
covered with luxurious vegetation. The keep which towers above it is of
excellent masonry: the stones are accurately squared, and put together
with great neatness, and the joints are small; and the arches are turned
clearly and distinctly, with the key-stone or wedge accurately placed in
all of them. Some parts of the wall, towards the interior ballium, are
not built of squared freestone; but of the dark stone of the country,
disposed in a zig-zag, or, as it is more commonly called, in a
herring-bone direction, with a great deal of mortar in the interstices:
the buttresses, or rather piers, are of small projection, but great
width. The upper story, destroyed about forty years since, was of a
different style of architecture. According to an old print,[201] it
terminated with a large battlement, and bartizan towers at the angles.
This dungeon was formerly divided into several apartments, in one of the
lower of which was found, about half a century ago, a very ancient tomb,
of good workmanship, ornamented with a sphynx at each end, but bearing
no inscription whatever. Common report ascribed the coffin to Talbot,
who was for many years governor of the castle; and at length an
individual engraved upon it an epitaph to his honor: but the fraud was
discovered, and the sarcophagus put aside, as of no account. The second,
or principal, story of the keep, now forms a single square room, about
fifty feet wide, lighted by circular-headed windows, each divided into
two by a short and massy central pillar, whose capital is altogether
Norman. On one of the capitals is sculptured a child leading a
lamb,[202] a representation, as it is foolishly said, of the Conqueror,
whom tradition alledges to have been born in the apartment to which th