In the park is shown the cave in which the Duke of Beaufort, the Roi
des Halles, was concealed when he escaped from the prison of Vincennes.
Francois de Vendome, Duke of Beaufort, was a grandson of Henri Quatre,
a man of inordinate conceit and of very limited intelligence. During
the regency that began in 1643, he obtained the confidence of Anne of
Austria, but his vanity rendered him insupportable, and he went out of
his way to insult the regent, so that she sent him to Vincennes.
Voltaire passes a severe judgment on him. He says of the Duke: "He was
the idol of the people, and the instrument employed by able men for
stirring them up into revolt; he was the object of the raillery of the
Court, and of the Fronde as well. He was always spoken of as the Roi
des Halles, the Market-King." One day he asked the President Bellevue
whether he did not think that he--Beaufort--would change the face of
affairs if he boxed the ears of the Duke of Elbeuf. "I do not think
such an act would change anything but the face of the Duke of Elbeuf,"
gravely replied the magistrate.

There are in the Quartier S. Lubin at Vendome chambers still occupied
in the face of the cliff, high up and reached by structural galleries.

At Lisle, on the river above Vendome, are many caves, one of which was
the hospital or Maladerie.

Above Tours and Marmoutier, on the road to Vouvray, is La Roche Corbon.
The cliff is pierced with windows and doors, and niches for a pigeonry.
This, till comparatively recently, was a truly Troglodyte village. But
well-to-do inhabitants of Tours have taken a fancy to the site and have
reared pretentious villas that mask the face of the cliff, and with the
advent of these rich people the humble cave-dwellers have "flitted."
One singular feature remains, however, unspoiled. A mass of the