contrée un séjour délicieux, si de tristes débris, qui heureusement
disparoissent tous les jours, ne rappelaient encore le souvenir
affligeant de nos discordes civiles. Les armées Révolutionnaires qui
combattirent les Vendéens, en 1793 et en 1794, employèrent inutilement
pour les réduire le fer et le feu; la flamme atteignit les villes, les
villages, les métairies, et jusqu'aux humbles chaumières; et, dans ce
vaste et épouvantable incendie, Clisson ne put échapper à une ruine
complète. Jamais peut-être cette petite ville ne se seroit entièrement
réédifié, sans une circonstance particulière qui contribua puissamment
à la faire renoître de ces cendres".

In the town of Clisson was born the celebrated Barin de la
Galissonniere, Admiral of France, who fought the well-known action
off Mahon, in the month of June, 1756, with Admiral Byng, who, in
consequence of his conduct on that occasion, was brought to a court
martial and shot. The French writers make the following absurd remark,
as to the _cause_ of his fate: "Les Anglais, furieux d'avoir été
vaincus par un Amiral François, firent fusiller l'Amiral Byng". It is
now well known that he was sacrificed to an unprincipled ministerial
faction.

The ancient Château de Clisson is built on a rock, on the bank of the
Sèvres, facing the mouth of the river, called Le Moine, which empties
itself into the Sèvres at this place, so that the town of Clisson
stands between the two rivers at their junction. An ancient bridge,
from whence this view is taken, joins one part of the town to the
other, and leads to the castle, which was once considered the barrier
of Bretagne. The two rivers run over a bed of granite rock, which, in
some places, forming a cataract, adds considerably to the surrounding
scenery: large masses of this rock in many parts seem as if piled up