Monday 2 May 1644

We took boat again, passing by Charmont ((The birthplace (1460) of Cardinal George d’Amboise (see ante, p. 93); and the residence of Catherine de Médicis. –AD )), a proud castle on the left hand; before it is a sweet island, deliciously shaded with tall trees. A little distance from hence, we went on shore at Amboise, a very agreeable village, built of stone, and the houses covered with blue slate, as the towns on the Loire generally are ((Plus que le marbre dur me plaist l’ardoise fine, Plus mon Loyre Gaulois que le Tybre Latin, — sings Joachim du Bellay in his Regrets, 1565.- AD)) ; but the castle ((Chateau Royal d’Amboise -GS))chiefly invited us, the thickness of whose towers from the river to the top, was admirable. We entered by the drawbridge, which has an invention to let one fall, if not premonished. It is full of halls and spacious chambers, and one staircase is large enough, and sufficiently commodious, to receive a coach, and land it on the very tower, as they told us had been done. There is some artillery in it; but that which is most observable is in the ancient chapel ((The Chapel of Saint Hubert – Saint Hubert being the patron saint of hunters. -GS)), viz, a stag’s head, or branches, hung up by chains, consisting of twenty browantlers, the beam bigger than a man’s middle, and of an incredible length. Indeed, it is monstrous, and yet I cannot conceive how it should be artificial they show also the ribs and vertebræ of the same beast; but these might be made of whalebone ((Reresby, who duly mentions the winding staircase, adds: “In the chapel we saw the horns of a stag, of an incredible bigness, which they tell you swam from the sea, and came out of England; as also the neck-bone and one of his ribs, of five cubits and a half long” (Travels [in 1656], 1831, p. 26). –AD )).

Leaving the castle, we passed Mont Louis, a village having no houses above ground but such only as are hewn out of the main rocks of excellent freestone. Here and there the funnel of a chimney appears on the surface among the vineyards which are over them, and in this manner they inhabit the caves, as it were sea-cliffs, on one side of the river for many miles.

We now came within sight of Tours, where we were designed for the rest of the time I had resolved to stay in France, the sojournment being so agreeable. Tours is situate on the east side of a hill on the river Loire, having a fair bridge of stone called St. Edme; the streets are very long, straight, spacious, well built, and exceeding clean; the suburbs large and pleasant, joined to the city by another bridge. Both the church and monastery of St. Martin are large, of Gothic building, having four square towers, fair organs, and a stately altar, where they show the bones and ashes of St. Martin, with other relics.

The Mall ((Reresby calls it “the longest pell mell in France” (Travels, 1831, p. 26). -AD)) without comparison is the noblest in Europe for length and shade, having seven rows of the tallest and goodliest elms I had ever beheld, the innermost of which do so embrace each other, and at such a height, that nothing can be more solemn and majestical. Here we played a party, or party or two, and then walked about the town walls, built of square stone, filled with earth, and having a moat. No city in France exceeds it in beauty, or delight.