visit regularly once a year. They are like old friends, and every visit
makes them more precious. I determined to revisit Rodez during the
following summer. The cathedral is rich within and without. Its rood-
loft, carved stalls, altar screen, and monuments require a chapter to
themselves. Let us hope that some future traveller, more learned than
myself in such matters, will give us their history in detail. The town,
too, possesses some fine remains of Renaissance architecture, and the
views from the ancient ramparts are magnificent.

But the memory I carry away is of that lovely three-storied tower, the
whole carved delicately as lace-work; the colour, deep terra-cotta;
above it a warm southern sky.

Such a sight is worth a long journey, and the discomforts of a dingy
hotel, dirty floors, foul-smelling passages, broken chairs, scant
toilet appliances, as usual, in part compensated by excellent beds,
good food, good wine, and very moderate charges. The oddest part of
these experiences is that the dirtier the inn the better the fare.
Wherever we found a little smartness and tidiness, there we were sure
to find also a decided falling-off in the cuisine.

Perhaps herein is to be found the true philosophical cause of our own
poor cookery. English cooks and housewives are ready to go mad on the
subject of scouring pots and pans, but pay scant heed to what goes
into, much less what comes out of them. In France the quality of the
dinner is the first question of national importance, after the recovery
of Alsace-Lorraine!

The railway takes us direct to Aurillac, chef-lieu of the Cantal, and
ancient capital of Haute Auvergne. At first the scenery resembles that