beneath the windows, and the Gothic
altars of the transepts.

[Illustration: _CATHEDRAL of S. LOUIS BLOIS_]

III

ST. LOUIS DE BLOIS

Regardless of the sentiment which attaches itself to Blois by reason of
its magnificent chateau, and in spite of its undeniably picturesque and
interesting environment, it hardly takes sufficient rank as a cathedral
city to warrant more than a passing consideration. As it is, one cannot
get from under the shadow of its overpowering attraction, and, in spite
of the poverty and depressing qualities of the Cathedral of St. Louis,
perhaps no place in the Loire valley has more claim upon the attention
of the enthusiastic tourist. The wonderful chateau is all that has been
said of it, and more. The picturesqueness of the city's streets of
stairs, and its general up and down hill situation, offering charming
vistas, unique in a city of the north, are, except for its size, really
more suggestive of Genoa or Naples. In the general ensemble of the city,
the Loire is an attraction of itself, when viewed from across that
wonderful stone bridge, the first public work endowed by Louis XV. But
even then, the awkward and uninteresting cathedral does not enter into
the view with that liveliness and impressiveness which we are wont to
associate with such an environment. In short, it must be set down that
in the lack of pleasing qualities in its cathedral, is found Blois'
greatest disappointment.

The tourist _pur sang_ will care little about this. He usually rushes in
and out during the daylight, and recalls but little except the
fascinating staircase of the chateau attributed, as to its spiral
formation, to Da Vinci; the ornamental chimney-pieces; and the fact that
historical events of the past have intermingled inextricably the
gruesome stories of the royal houses which bore respectively the arms of
hedgehog and salamander. This only, with perhaps the memory that at one
time or another a certain event took place involving the use of some
forty odd daggers.

Perhaps, after all, it would be an embarrassment of riches did the town
possess a cathedral, or even other monuments, to vie with this
spectacular attraction which, from every view-point realizes the ideal
of our imagination, as to just what a chateau and its history might be.

From near or far the cathedral shows no charm of outline. Its ridgepole
is marred by three unusually obtrusive "lightning conductors," which
could hardly have