In the southwest point of Normandy, separated from Brittany only by a
narrow and straight river, like the formal canals of Holland, stands the
curious granite rock which is called Mont St. Michel. It is an isolated
peak, rising abruptly out of a vast plain of sand to the height of
nearly four hundred feet, and so precipitous toward the west that
scarcely a root of grass finds soil enough in its weather-beaten clefts.
At the very summit is built that wonderful church, the rich architecture
and flying buttresses of which strike the eye leagues and leagues away,
either on the sea or the mainland. Below the church, and supporting
it by a solid masonry, is a vast pile formerly a fortress, castle,
and prison; with caverns and dungeons hewn out of the living rock, and
vaulted halls and solemn crypts; all desolate and solitary now, except
when a party of pilgrims or tourists pass through them, ushered by a
guide. Still lower down the rock, along its eastern and southern face,
there winds a dark and narrow street, with odd, antique houses on either
side. The only conveyance that can pass along it is the water-cart which
supplies the town with fresh water from the mainland. The whole place
is guarded by a strong and high rampart, with bastions and battlemented
walls; and the only entrance is through three gateways, one immediately
behind the other, with a small court between. The second of these strong
gateways is protected by two old cannon, taken from the English in 1423,
and still pointed out to visitors with inextinguishable pride by the
natives of Mont. St. Michel.

A great plain of sand stretches around the Mont for miles every way--of
sand or sea, for the water covers it at flood-tides, beating up against
the foot of the granite rocks and the granite walls of the ramparts. But
at neap tides and _eaux mortes_, as the French say, there is nothing