more deplorable than Mortain in its domestic arrangements, and the inn
is to be avoided by all cleanly people; however, with the completion of
the railway from Vire to Granville, we are promised much better things.

[Illustration: CLOCK TOWER AT VIRE.]

The chief architectural object of interest at Vire is the old
clock-tower of the thirteenth century, over the Rue de Calvados, with
its high gateway, formerly called 'the gate of the Champ de Vire.'
Over this gateway (which we cannot see from the position where we have
sketched the belfry) there is a statue of the Virgin, with the
inscription, '_Marie protége la ville_.' This tower has been altered and
repaired at several periods, and, like two others near it, is too much
built up against and crowded by, what the French call '_maisons
vulgaires_,' to be well seen.

We have not spoken of the castle first, because there is little of it
left besides the keep; and the part that remains seems no longer old.
The bold promontory on which it stood is now neatly kept and 'tidied'
with smooth slopes, straight walks, and double rows of trees, pleasant
to walk upon, but more suggestive of the Bois de Boulogne than the
approach to a ruin.

It is from this promontory, or rather from what Murray calls 'this dusty
pleasure ground,' that we obtain our best view of the country westward,
towards Avranches; and from whence we can see the bold granite
formation of the rocks in the neighbourhood. We may see where the
manufacturers of cloth and paper have established their mills; and also
where, in some cases, they have had to widen out the valleys, and to cut
roads through the rocks to their works. All the streams turn