by nature for the purpose of giving it a more romantic effect. The
whole forms a most picturesque object, when viewed from the opposite
shore, from whence the sketch of the temple erected on the ruin of St.
Gilles is taken; and the remembrance of its recent fate throws over
the scene a strong and melancholy interest.

[Illustration: RUINS OF CLISSON.]

The castle is supposed to have been first erected by the Romans,
as the Province formed a part of the Gaule Aquitanique, under the
Emperors Augustus and Adrian.

The French repaired it during the reign of Louis VIII. in 1223, under
Olivier I. Sire de Clisson, as he is styled; and it was made a regular
fortification, and surrounded by a wall a century after, by the
Connétable: in 1464 the Duc de Bretagne, Francis II. entirely finished
it.

The Sire de Clisson, Olivier I. who had served during one of the
Crusades in Palestine, was knighted with several others, in 1218. "Un
nombre prodigieux de Seigneurs Anglais, Normands, Angevins, Manceaux,
Tourangeaux, et Bretons, prirent la Croix; Le Pape, Innocent III.
envoya en Bretagne, en 1197, Helvain, Moine de St. Denis, pour y
prêcher une croisade. Une grande quantité de Bretons se laissèrent
conduire en Syrie par ce Moine; et, en 1218, plusieurs Seigneurs
Bretons suivirent leur exemple, entre autres, Hervé de Léon, Morvau,
Vicomte du Fou, et le Sire de Clisson".

From the construction of the towers and bastions, it is supposed that
at his return from the Holy Land, he had copied the Syrian style of