No town in France proper seems to have possessed in the Middle Ages prior to the end of the 15th century either a municipality or a town-hall of any note. When necessary to discuss communal business it was the custom to meet in the open air, or occasionally in the churches or cloisters. There is one notable exception to this in the town-hall of St. Antonin, in the department of Tarn and Garonne, which is a remarkable edifice of the 12th century, and though partially restored retains still the principal features of its early design (Woodcut 670). The ground storey, used as a market, consists of a series of pointed arches, the one on the left being a passage-way through. On the first floor is a fine room, lighted by three windows, each subdivided by three shafts. The two piers separating the windows (and which on the inner wall support segmental arches carrying the wall above) are decorated with sculpture representing Adam and Eve and Moses. The second storey, which rises into the roof, is lighted by three double windows. Of later examples at the end of the 15th and commencement of the 16th centuries there exist still the town-hall of Compiègne, a beautiful example, with central tower; and at Saumur, St. Quentin, Orleans, Bruges, and Beaugency a series of small but interesting buildings, some flamboyant and others showing early Renaissance influence. In a work like the present, which is barely sufficient in extent to admit of all the great typical examples of architectural art being enumerated, much less described, it is evident that to domestic art a very subordinate position must be assigned. Perhaps it ought to be omitted altogether. There are, however, so many beauties in even the most insignificant productions of the great ages, that it may be expedient at least to direct attention to the subject, and the three examples here given may serve to illustrate the forms of the art at the three great epochs of the French Gothic style. [Illustration: 671. House at Cluny. (From Gailhabaud.)] The first (Woodcut No. 671) is from a house at Cluny, and exhibits the round-arched arcade with its alternate single and coupled columns, which arrangement was usual at that period, and of which examples are found all over the South of France and as far north at least as Auxerre.