0, and straight streets have risen up, with
no traces of its having been once the ancient capital of Brittany. Indeed,
so French is it altogether, that the saying runs--"Bon Breton de Vannes,
bon Francais de Rennes." It was here that Constance, heiress of the duchy,
held her court, with Geoffrey Plantagenet, who, with their unfortunate son
Arthur, were the only Plantagenets, dukes of Brittany. On the murder of
Arthur, his sister Alice carried the ducal crown to her husband, Pierre de
Dreux (called Mauclerc, from his animosity to the clergy), and from them
descended the dukes of Brittany down to Queen Anne, whose double marriage
conveyed the duchy to France and the Valois.

When Henry IV. made his solemn entry into Rennes, the Governor presented
him with the three silver-gilt keys of the city, of rich workmanship; upon
which the King observed, "Elles etaient belles, mais qu'il aimait mieux
les clefs des coeurs des habitants."

The following year we made a tour along the banks of the Loire, and at
Angers embarked on board the steamer for Nantes. The scenery down the
Loire is rich, and the hills covered with vineyards, islands planted with
willows, and sunny villages, or occasionally a gloomy fortress comes to
view. Ingrandes is the frontier town, half in Anjou and half in Brittany,
between the modern departments of Loire Inferieure and Maine-et-Loire.
Lower down is St. Florent (Maine-et-Loire), with its recollections of the
wonderful passage of the Loire by the Vendean army, so graphically related
by Madame de la Rochejacquelin, and near the island of Meilleraie, where
their brave General Bonchamps expired, after the fatal engagement of
Chollet; his last act being the saving the lives of four thousand
prisoners shut up in the church, and about to be executed by the
exasperated Vendeans. "Grace aux prisonniers" were his dying words.
Opposite St. Florent is Varades, where the Vendeans landed after crossing
the Loire. Only a feeble post opposed them. Had the republicans lost less
time, and sent a force after their victory at Chollet, much calamity would
have been spared to Brittany, and the Royalists themselves would have been
saved the terrible defeats of Le Mans and Savenay.

Passing Ancenis, which rises in an amphitheatre on the vine-clothed hills,
and, with its suspension-bridge, is one of the most picturesque points in
the river, we reached Oudon, with its tall octagonal tower; on the left,
in the department of Maine-e