to our bibliomaniacal friend the
desire of leading the forlorn hope in an escalade - it would have been a
desperate act of self-denial to have declined an opportunity of seeing. La
Jeunesse brought coffee, such as we only taste on the Continent, upon a salver,
covered with a napkin, that it might be censé for silver; and chasse-caffé from
Martinique, on a small waiter, which was certainly so. Our repast thus finished,
the Marquis led me up an escalier dérobé, into a very large and
well-proportioned saloon, of nearly one hundred feet in length; but so waste and
dilapidated, that I kept my eyes on the ground, lest my kind entertainer should
feel himself called upon to apologise for tattered pictures and torn tapestry;
and, worse than both, for casements that had yielded, in one or two instances,
to the boisterous blast.
    »We have contrived to make the turret something more habitable,« said the
Marquis, as he moved hastily through this chamber of desolation. »This,« he
said, »was the picture gallery in former times, and in the boudoir beyond, which
we now occupy as a book-closet, were preserved some curious cabinet paintings,
whose small size required that they should be viewed closely.«
    As he spoke, he held aside a portion of the tapestry I have mentioned, and
we entered the room of which he spoke.
    It was octangular, corresponding to the external shape of the turret whose
interior it occupied. Four of the sides had latticed windows, commanding each,
from a different point, the most beautiful prospect over the majestic Loire, and
the adjacent country through which it winded; and the casements were filled with
stained glass, through two of which streamed the lustre of the setting sun,
showing a brilliant assemblage of religious emblems and armorial bearings, which
it was scarcely possible to look at with an undazzled eye; but the other two
windows, from which the sun-beams had passed away, could be closely examined,
and plainly showed that the lattices were glazed with stained glass, which did
not belong to them originally, but, as I afterwards learned, to the profaned and
desecrated chapel of the Castle. It had been the amusement of the Marquis, for
several months, to accomplish this rifacciamento, with the assistance of the
Curate and the all-capable La Jeunesse; and though they had only patched
together fragments, which were in many places very minute, yet the stained
glass, till examined very closely, and with the eye of an antiquary, produced,
on the whole