and religion, were so singularly blended together, and gave a romantic
half-polished manner to the greatest barbarians. In later times it
became the scene of events which no one can contemplate without the
deepest interest. In viewing this magnificent ruin, it is impossible
not to regret that a place so frequently the theatre of noble
achievements, inhabited by one of the greatest men that France has
produced, François I. Connétable de Clisson,[9] father to Anne of
Bretagne, should have been so recently the scene of such savage
horrors and bloodshed! Now, all is silence and solitude: and amidst
the noble ruins which were once decorated with banners, and the
hard-earned trophies of victory,--where high-born knights and splendid
dames mingled in mirth and festivity to the echoes of the minstrels,
singing lays of love or battle,--are now only to be seen and heard the
birds of prey, hovering over a solitary tree, planted to mark the spot
where a deed was committed which has not often its parallel in the
darkest histories of the most ferocious nations.

[Footnote 9: In the "Histoire Généalogique de France", tom. vi. is an
account of the Constable's death. "The Duke of Orleans, brother to the
king, was very fond of a Jewess, whom he privately visited. Having
some reason to suspect that Peter de Craon, Lord of Sablé and de la
Ferté-Bernard, his chamberlain and favourite, had joked with the
Duchess of Orleans upon his intrigue, he turned him out of his house
with infamy. Craon imputed his disgrace partly to the Constable of
Clisson. On the night of the 13th June, having waited for him at the
corner of the street _Coulture Ste. Catherine_, and finding he had but
little company with him, he fell upon him at the head of a score of
ruffians. Clisson defended himself for some time without any other
weapon than a small cutlass; but after receiving three wounds, fell
from his horse, and pitched against a door, which flew open. The