campanile, with here and there bits of crenellated ramparts,
and higher still the tough remnant of a castle still fit to do service
in the wars. Indeed, it all was so good in colour--with its blendings of
green and grey shot with warm yellow tones; and its composition was so
excellent--with its sweep upward from the river to the castle
battlements--that to my American fancy (used rather to Mediaeval
semblances than to Mediaeval realities) it seemed to be temporarily
escaped from an exceptionally well-set operatic stage.

[Illustration: THE LANDING-PLACE AT TOURNON]

All Tournon was down at the water-side to meet us, and on the
landing-stage was the very Mayor: a lean and tri-coloured man who took
off his hat comprehensively to our whole company in a magnificent bow.
Notables were with him--the Sous-Prefect, the Mayor of Tain, the
Adjoint, leading citizens--who also bowed to us; but not with a bow like
his! Laurel garlands decorated the landing-stage; more laurel garlands
and the national colours made gay the roadway leading up the bank; and
over the roadway was a laurel-wreathed and tri-coloured triumphal
arch--all as suitable to welcoming poets and patriots, such as we were,
as suitable could be. As the _Gladiateur_ drew in to the bank there was
a noble banging of _boites_--which ancient substitute for cannon in
joy-firing still are esteemed warmly in rural France--and before the
Mayor spoke ever a word to us the band bounded gallantly into the thick
of the "Marseillaise."

With the _boite_ banging fitfully, with the band in advance playing "La
Coupe," the tri-coloured Mayor led off with the most distinguished lady
of our company upon his arm: and away we all went, under the triumphal
arch and up the garlanded roadway two by two--as though Tournon were a
Rhone-side Ararat and we were the animals coming out of the Ark. Our
entry was a veritable triumph; and we endeavoured (I think successfully)
to live up to it: walking stately through the narrow streets, made
narrower by the close-packed crowds pressing to see so rare a poetic
spectacle; through the cool long corridors of the Lycee; and so out upon
a prettily dignified little park--where, at a triad of tables set within
a garlanded enclosure beneath century-old plane-trees, our breakfast
was served to us to the accompaniment of bangs from the _boite_ and
musical remarks from the band. And all Tournon, the while, stood above
us on a terrace and sympathetically looked