Their brilliant and various colourings--so unlike our sombre brick-work--is
the next cause of the novel impression they produce. The general
strangeness of the effect is completed by the excellence of the pavement,
which is of stones, shaped like those of our best London carriage-ways, but
as white as marble in all weathers, and as regular as the brick-work of a
house-front. The uniformity of the "Place" is broken (not very agreeably)
by the principal public edifice of Calais--the Town Hall; a half-modern,
half-antique building, which occupies about a third of the south side, and
is surmounted at one end by a light spiring belfry, containing a most
loquacious ring of bells, which take up a somewhat unreasonable proportion
of every quarter of an hour in announcing its arrival; and, in addition,
every three hours they play "_Le petit chaperon rouge_" for a longer period
than (I should imagine) even French patience and leisure can afford to
listen to it. Immediately behind the centre of this side of the "Place"
also rises the lofty tower, which serves as a light-house to the coast and
harbour, and which at night displays its well-known revolving lights. Most
of the principal streets run out of this great Square. The most busy of
them--because the greatest thoroughfare--is a short and narrow one leading
to the Port--(_Rue du Havre_:) in it live all those shopkeepers who
especially address themselves to the wants of the traveller. But the gayest
and most agreeable street is one running from the north-east corner of the
"Place" (_Rue Royale_.) It terminates in the gate leading to the suburbs
(_Basse Ville_,) and to the Netherlands and the interior of the country. In
this street is situated the great hotel Dessin--rendered famous for the
"for ever" of a century or so to come, by _Sterne's Sentimental Journey_.
The only other street devoted exclusively to shops is one running parallel
with the south side of the "Place." The rest of the interior of Calais
consists of about twenty other streets, each containing here and there a
shop, but chiefly occupied by the residences of persons directly or
indirectly connected with the trade of Calais as a sea-port town.