d pieces, each a
gem of price to-day.

"Of course we flew from one thing to another, and did not wait upon any
order of our going about, nor did we examine a tenth part of the treasures
on the tables: but it strikes me now that the wealth in silver alone there
must be simply enormous. The intendant could tell us nothing positive, and
everything is so black and encrusted with dust that we could not see with
certainty: but it is probable that what appears to be family plate,
literally covering these tables, is the Courance heirloom silver. Much of
it is very old, as shown by the antique designs and the marks of wear.
Near the centre of one of the long tables we cleared up eighteen or twenty
beautiful pieces of the Italian school established in Paris under the
patronage of Francis I., and on the dais-table a full set, the exquisite
work of the Antwerp smiths, dated 1598.

"We had no means for brushing off the pictures, and M. Gambeau was not in
the least inclined to help us, being not at all pleased with our
disturbing the dust of ages so freely. However, the walls are in a good
state, and we could see very well that between the windows they are
decorated by Boucher with the elaborate and formal panels of Paris in his
time. At the lower end of the room is a very large and magnificent
fruit-and flower-piece by Jan van Huysum of Amsterdam. On each side of the
dais are grand entrances from the main hall of the 'new house,' but the
floor is broken up at this end of the salon, probably by rats, and rather
than risk a fall we returned by the kitchen passage.

"Crossing under the grand stairway, we tumbled through a wood-closet into
the drawing-room, a splendid apartment on the first floor of the 'new
house,' corresponding to the banquet-salon, only that the side wall,
instead of having windows, is penetrated by three wide arches opening into
a suite of state apartments extending through the old chateau. The most
noticeable things in these rooms are the hangings, arranged apparently in
chronological series, beginning with the quaint and curious needlework
covering the bare stone walls of the red tower, and continuing in regular
order through the several rooms, to the masterpieces of Lebrun and
Mignard. Some of them have fallen, and lie in mouldering heaps on the
floor, but most of them are still in place, and in none of the royal
palaces I have visited is the progress of the art of tapestry so fully
illustrated as here. We coul