soul, when, owing to an irregularity of the road, for which he was in no
way to blame, he took an unintentional dive down a very steep bank, at the
bottom of which was a dense forest of brambles. As he was quite unable to
extricate himself, his companions, after a consultation, decided to haul
him up by the legs; and it was to this manner of being rescued that he
attributed most of the damage done to his ears.

[Illustration: CHATEAU DES EYZIES.]

We passed under the ruined castle of Les Eyzies, which was never very
large, because the shelf of rock on which it was built would not have
admitted of this; but when defended it must have been almost inaccessible.
The ruin is very picturesque, with the overleaning rock above, and the
clustered roofs below. The village is continued up the marshy valley of the
Beuene, which here joins that of the Vezere. In the face of the overleaning
rocks are orifices that strike the attention at once by their shape, which
distinguishes them from natural caverns. They have been all fashioned like
common doors or windows on the rectangular principle, which proves that
they are the artificial openings of human dwellings. The men who made their
homes in the side of the precipice, and who cut the rock to suit their
needs, must have let themselves down from the top by means of a rope. To
what age these Troglodytes belonged nobody knows, but it is not doubted
that they came after the flint-working savages, whose implements are found
in the natural caverns and shelters near the ground.

We continued up the valley of the Beuene. The banks under the rocks were
starred with primroses, and from the rocks themselves there hung with
cotoneaster the large and graceful white blossoms of that limestone-loving
shrub, the amelanchier. In the centre of the valley stretched the marsh,
flaming gold with flags and caltha, and dotted with white valerian. The