The district of the nobility, called Saint-Marc, after the name of one
of its parish churches, is a sort of miniature Versailles, with straight
streets overgrown with grass, and large square houses which conceal
extensive gardens. It extends to the south along the edge of the
plateau. Some of the mansions built on the declivity itself have a
double row of terraces whence one can see the whole valley of the
Viorne, a most charming vista much vaunted in that part of the country.
Then on the north-west, the old quarter, formed of the original town,
rears its narrow, tortuous lanes bordered with tottering hovels. The
Town-Hall, the Civil Court, the Market, and the Gendarmerie barracks
are situated here. This, the most populous part of the Plassans, is
inhabited by working-men and shop-keepers, all the wretched, toiling,
common folk. The new town forms a sort of parallelogram to the
north-east; the well-to-do, those who have slowly amassed a fortune, and
those engaged in the liberal professions, here occupy houses set out
in straight lines and coloured a light yellow. This district, which is
embellished by the Sub-Prefecture, an ugly plaster building decorated
with rose-mouldings, numbered scarcely five or six streets in 1851; it
is of quite recent formation, and it is only since the construction of
the railway that it has been growing in extent.

One circumstance which even at the present time tends to divide
Plassans into three distinct independent parts is that the limits of the
districts are clearly defined by the principal thoroughfares. The Cours
Sauvaire and the Rue de Rome, which is, as it were, a narrow extension
of the former, run from west to east, from the Grand'-Porte to the
Porte de Rome, thus cutting the town into two portions, and dividing
the quarter of the nobility from the others. The latter are themselves
parted by the Rue de la Banne. This street, the finest in the locality,