as these extensive ruins indicate.
The park of Blossac is the most attractive promenade of Poitiers: it is beautifully laid out, and well kept. An intendant of Poitou, M. de la Bourdonnaye-Blossac, established it in 1752, with the benevolent intent of giving employment, in a hard winter, to the poor. In constructing it, a great many sepulchres of the Gauls, and funereal vases, were discovered; some of which are preserved in the museum.
The view is charming from the terrace of Blossac above the Clain, and one is naturally led to pursue the agreeable walks which invite the steps at every turn. We found that, by following as they pointed, we should arrive at most of the places we desired to see; and, as the interior of the town has few attractions in itself, we resolved to skirt it, and continue our way along the ramparts. They extend a long way, and are extremely pleasant in their whole extent. Remnants of ancient towers and rampart walls appear here and there, the river runs clear and bright beneath, and beyond are gently undulating hills; while, occasionally, heaps of grey rocks, of peculiar forms, some looking like temples, others like towers, rise suddenly from their green base, surprising the eye.
In the direction of the most remarkable of these, may be found a pierre levée, said, by veracious chroniclers, to have been raised on the spot by the great saint of Poitiers, Sainte Radegonde, who is reported to have brought the great stone on her head, and the pillars which support it in the pockets of her muslin apron: one of these pillars fell from its frail hold to the ground, and the devil instantly caught it up and carried it away, which satisfactorily accounts for the stone being elevated only at one end. Unfortunately the same legend is so often repeated respecting different saints, and in particular respecting Saint Magdalen, who has often been known to establish herself in wild places, bringing her rugged stool with her, that it would seem some or other of these holy people plagiarised from the other.
Rabelais attributes this stone to Pantagruel, who, "seeing that the scholars of Poitiers, having a great deal of leisure, did not know how to spend their time, was moved with compassion, and, one day, took from a great rock, which was called Passe-Lourdin, an immense block, twelve toises square, and fourteen pans thick, and placed it upon four pillars in the midst of a field, quite at its ease, in order that the said scholars, when they could think of nothing else to do, might pass their time in mounting on the said stone, and there banqueting with quantities of flagons, hams, and pasties; also in cutting their names on it with a knife: this stone is now called La Pierre Levée. And in memory of this, no one can be matriculated in the said University of Poitiers who has not drunk at the cabalistic fountain of Croustelles, been to Passe-Lourdin, and mounted on La Pierre Levée."
Bouchet's opinion is, that the stone was placed by Aliénor d'Aquitaine, about 1150, to be used at a fair which was held in the field where it stands.
It is, no doubt, one of the Dolmen, whose strange and mysterious appearance may well have puzzled both the learned and unlearned in every age since they were first erected.
One of the most interesting monuments in Poitiers is the museum; for it is a Roman structure—a temple or a tomb—almost entire, and less injured than might have been expected, serving as a receptacle for all the antiquities which have been collected together at different periods, in order to form a musée. They are appropriately placed in this building, and are seen with much more effect in its singular walls than if looked at on the comfortable shelves of a boarded and white-washed chamber.
As is usual in those cases, disputes run high respecting the original founder and the destination of this building, unique in its kind. Some insist that it is a tomb erected to Claudia Varenilla, by her husband, Marcus Censor Pavius; others see in it a pagan temple, transformed into a place of early Christian worship; others, the first cathedral of Poitiers.
It has undergone numerous changes of destination, at all events, having been used as a church, as a bell-foundry, as a depôt for economical soup, and as a manufactory. The Society of Antiquaries have at length gained possession of it, and it is to be hoped that it will know no further vicissitudes.
In this temple may be seen numerous treasures of Gaulic and Roman and Middle-age art of great interest: sepulchral stones inscribed with the names of Claudia Varenilla, Sabinus, and Lepida; Roman altars, military boundary-stones, amphoræ, vases, capitals, and pottery, all found in the neighbourhood of Poitiers: a good deal of beautiful carving from the destroyed castle of Bonnivet, fine specimens of the Renaissance, and numerous relics of ruined churches.
Among the treasures is a block of stone, said to be one on which the Maid of Orleans rested her foot when she mounted her horse, in full armour, to accompany Charles VII. on his coronation. A piece of stone from the old church of St. Hilaire is exhibited, which, when struck, emits so horrible an effluvia as to render it unapproachable. The church is said to have been built of this stone; if so, the workmen must have been considerably annoyed while constructing it, and deserved indulgences for their perseverance in continuing their labour. It would appear that this is a calcareous[4] rock, which has been described by several French naturalists who have met with it in the Pyrenees, at the Brèche de Roland, and on the height of Mont Perdu, and whose odour of sulphureous hydrogen is supposed to arise from the animal matter enclosed in its recesses. Some marbles have the same exhalation, yet are employed in furniture: as the smell does not appear to be offensive unless the stone is struck with some force, it may, perhaps, be unobserved; but I could scarcely regret that the church of St. Hilaire was almost totally destroyed when I heard that such disagreeable materials entered into its construction. No doubt the presence of the arch-enemy was considered as the cause of this singular effluvia in early times, and the monks turned it, as they did all accidents, to good account.
The Grand Gueule, a horrible beast, discovered in the caverns of the abbey of Sainte Croix, who had eaten up several nuns, was probably found out by the smell of sulphur which pervaded his den, and brought forth to punishment by the holy men who were guided to his retreat by this means—their instrument being a criminal condemned to death, who combated the beast, and killed him. The dragon was usually carried in processions, following the precious relic of a piece of the true cross which had vanquished him; and his effigy in wood, with the inscription, Gargot fecit, 1677, exists still, though it has ceased to be used.
notre dame—the keys—the miracle—procession—st. radegonde—tomb of the saint—foot-print—little loubette—the count outwitted—the cordelier—late justice—the templars.
Poitiers is one of the largest towns in France, but is very thinly inhabited; immense gardens, orchards, and fields, extend between the streets; the spaces are vast, but there is no beauty whatever in the architecture or the disposition of the buildings. The squares are wide and open, but surrounded by irregular, slovenly-looking houses, without an approach to beauty or elegance; the pavement is rugged, and cleanliness is not a characteristic of the place.
The churches are extremely curious, although, in general, so battered and worn as to present the aspect of a heap of ruins at first sight. This is particularly the case with Notre Dame, so revered by Richard Cœur de Lion, in the great place, before which a market is held. I never saw a church whose appearance was so striking, not from its beauty or grace, but from the singularly devastated, ruined state in which it towers above the buildings round, as if it belonged to another world. Nothing about it has
