the floors are gone, and it is reduced to a wreck. Below this series of
cave-dwellings is the Fountain of Anduee of crystal water, supposed to
be endowed with miraculous properties. The whole hill is moreover
pierced with galleries and store-chambers, and served as a refuge in
time of war, in which the villagers of Lavardin concealed their goods.
The noble ruin of the castle shows that it was once of great majesty.
It was battered down by the Huguenots, who for the purpose dragged a
cannon to the top of the church tower.

Nearer to Vendome is the Chateau of Rochambeau. The present mansion
that has replaced the ancient castle is a very insignificant and
tasteless structure. All the interest it possesses consists in its
dependencies that are rock-hewn. The bass-court is reached through a
long and lofty gallery bored athwart the rock, and issuing from it we
find ourselves in a sort of open well, probably originally natural but
appropriated and adapted by man to his needs. This vast depression, the
walls of which are seventy-five feet high, is circular, and measures
eighty feet in diameter. Round it are cellars and chambers for domestic
purposes. Others are accessible from the gallery that leads to the
court. One of them, the Cave-Noire, possesses a chimney bored upwards
through the rock to the level of the surface. Another peculiarity of
this cavern is that along one side, throughout its length, 120 feet,
are rings cut in the rock showing tokens of having been fretted by
usage. They are at the height of four feet above the soil, and are on
an average four feet ten inches apart. A second range is three feet or
four feet higher up. In an adjoining cavern are similar ranges of
rings. A third is cut almost at the level of the soil. Precisely the
same arrangement is to be found at Varennes hard by in artificial caves
still employed as stables, and some as dwellings for families.