k were tried in the law courts on the island, and were
punished on the right bank at Montfaucon; unless the rector, feeling the
university to be strong and the king weak, intervened; for it was the
students' privilege to be hanged on their own grounds.

The greater part of these privileges, it may be noted in passing, and
there were some even better than the above, had been extorted from the
kings by revolts and mutinies. It is the course of things from time
immemorial; the king only lets go when the people tear away. There is an
old charter which puts the matter naively: apropos of fidelity: _Civibus
fidelitas in reges, quoe tamen aliquoties seditionibus interrypta, multa
peperit privileyia_.

In the fifteenth century, the Seine bathed five islands within the walls
of Paris: Louviers island, where there were then trees, and where there
is no longer anything but wood; l'ile aux Vaches, and l'ile Notre-Dame,
both deserted, with the exception of one house, both fiefs of the
bishop--in the seventeenth century, a single island was formed out of
these two, which was built upon and named l'ile Saint-Louis--, lastly
the City, and at its point, the little islet of the cow tender, which
was afterwards engulfed beneath the platform of the Pont-Neuf. The City
then had five bridges: three on the right, the Pont Notre-Dame, and the
Pont au Change, of stone, the Pont aux Meuniers, of wood; two on the
left, the Petit Pont, of stone, the Pont Saint-Michel, of wood; all
loaded with houses.

The University had six gates, built by Philip Augustus; there were,
beginning with la Tournelle, the Porte Saint-Victor, the Porte Bordelle,
the Porte Papale, the Porte Saint-Jacques, the Porte Saint-Michel,
the Porte Saint-Germain. The Town had six gates, built by Charles V.;
beginning with the Tour de Billy they were: the Porte Saint-Antoine,
the Porte du Temple, the Porte Saint-Martin, the Porte Saint-Denis, the
Porte Montmartre, the Porte Saint-Honore. All these gates were strong,
and also handsome, which does not detract from strength. A large, deep
moat, with a brisk current during the high water of winter, bathed the
base of the wall round Paris; the Seine furnished the water. At night,
the gates were shut, the river was barred at both ends of the city with
huge iron chains, and Paris slept tranquilly.

From a bird's-eye view, these three burgs, the City, the Town, and
the University, each presented to the eye an inextricable skein of
ecce