and red lozenge shapes, with sculptured window-frames, squarely upon
the little tree-bordered place of to-day, which in other times formed
a part of that magnificent terrace which looked down upon the roof
of the Église St. Nicholas, and the Jesuit church of the Immaculate
Conception, and the silvery bell of the Loire itself.

The murders and other acts of violence and treason which took place
here are interesting enough, but one can not but feel, when he views
the chimney-piece before which the Due de Guise was standing when
called to his death in the royal closet, that the men of whom the
bloody tales of Blois are told quite deserved their fates.

One comes away with the impression of it all stamped only upon the
mind, not graven upon the heart. Political intrigue to-day, if quite
as vulgar, is less sordid. Bigotry and ambition in those days allowed
few of the finer feelings to come to the surface, except with regard
to the luxuriance of surroundings. Of this last there can be no
question, and Blois is as characteristically luxurious as any of the
magnificient edifices which lodged the royalty and nobility of other
days throughout the valley of the Loire.

The interior court is partly surrounded by a colonnade, quite
cloister-like in effect. At the right center of the François I. wing
is that wonderful spiral staircase, concerning the invention of which
so much speculation has been launched.

The apartments of Catherine de Medici were directly beneath the
guard-room where the Balafré was murdered, and that event, taking
place at the very moment when the queen-mother was dying, can not be
said to have been conducive to a peaceful demise.