in the
event of a night attack. This tower, Froissart says, was so constructed,
that when dislodged it could be taken to pieces, and many carpenters and
other workmen were engaged, at very high wages, to go with it to England
to superintend the putting of it together. Four thousand men-at-arms and
2000 cross-bowmen were in readiness for the expedition, with horses,
vessels laden with wine, salted provisions, and other necessaries. All
these formidable preparations were rendered useless by the arrest of the
Constable the day before his embarkation. We went to the Cemetery, which
has its ossuary, reliquary, or bone-house, an inseparable appendage to a
Breton churchyard. It is the custom in Brittany, after a certain time, to
dig up the bones of the dead, and preserve their skulls in little square
boxes, like dog-kennels, with a heart-shaped opening through which the
skull is visible. They are all ticketed with the names and dates of the
deceased, as "Ci git le chef de * * * D. c. D. (decede) le * * * * *.
Priez Dieu pour son ame."

[Illustration: 21. Skull-box.]

These boxes sometimes occupy prominent places inside the churches or
porch, on window sills, the capitals of columns, and other ledges; but
more often are ranged in the ossuaries or charnel-houses built in the
churchyards to receive them, with a row of death's-heads carved in the
stone outside. The large bones are also placed in the ossuaire. The rich
are buried in "enfeux" or arched recesses in the chapels or abbeys they
have founded.

We continued our carriage to Lannion, our driver not very clear of his
way, and in Brittany the road is very difficult to be discerned; for on
each side are high earthen banks, sometimes eight or ten feet high, and on
the top of these are planted timber-trees, such as oak, elm, and ash,
which often meet at the top, entirely intercepting the view, making these
narrow lanes a perfect slough and most intricate to thread. Sometimes they
are cut in irregular steps in the solid rock, and serve for the bed of a
stream. Each field is also surrounded by these hedgerow-trees, which are
cut every four or five years.

We drove to Perros Guirec, a lovely little watering-place built on a small
promontory with a safe harbour, whence wheat, hemp, and cattle are
exported to England; it is six miles from Lannion. A dangerous rock,
called Roche Bernard, is at its entrance. The view is lovely. From Perros
we scrambled over a hilly cart-road to Plo