s en perspective les creneaux de la courtine opposee, ou
vegetaient des scolopendres et croissait un prunier sauvage. Quelques
martinets, qui, durant l'ete, s'enfoncaient en criant dans les trous des
murs, etaient mes seuls compagnons. La nuit je n'apercevais qu'un petit
morceau du ciel et quelques etoiles. Lorsque la lune brillait et qu'elle
s'abaissait a l'occident, j'en etais averti par ses rayons, qui venaient
a mon lit au travers des carreaux losanges de la fenetre. Des chouettes
voletant d'un tour a l'autre, passant et repassant entre la lune et moi,
dessinaient sur mes rideaux l'ombre mobile de leurs ailes."

The bed on which Chateaubriand died has been brought from Paris and placed
in the room.

[Illustration: 11. Peasant Girl of Cancale.]

The next morning we left Dol for Cancale, of such world-wide celebrity for
its oysters. We left the railway at La Gouesniere, five miles and a half
from Cancale, to which we proceeded by the mail cart. It requires to
travel in Brittany to form any notion of the detestable vehicles, whether
public or "voitures a volonte," in which travellers in this country are
condemned to ride. Uncleaned, unpainted, creaking, jolting machines--as
fully tenanted with every kind of insect annoyance, as if one were
travelling in a hen-house. The horses are good, hardy, enduring little
animals, which go their thirty to fifty miles a day without any distress
either to themselves or the traveller. The Breton drivers are gentle and
kind, making more use of their voices than of their whips in urging on
their horses. The town of Cancale is situated on the heights, a
precipitous descent leading to the village below, called La Houle, which
lines the edge of the shore, and is occupied mostly by fishermen. This is
the port, and here are the pier and the lighthouse, and also a comfortable
inn to which the people of St. Malo resort in large parties, an omnibus
running thence daily. The panoramic view of the bay of Cancale is
beautiful and most extensive, one vast crescent of sand some ten square
leagues in extent, stretching from the picturesque rocks of Cancale to
Granville, its most northern point, and including Mont Dol, Mont St.
Michel, and Avranches. The western side is lined with huts and windmills,
but the water is so shallow that no boat can land. Having walked round the
little hurdled-in oyster parks, numbering, we were told, about 600, and
made ourselves very wet and dirty, thou