I hardly know what is best there: the strange and impressive little collegial church, with its romanesque atrium or narthex, its doorways covered with primitive sculpture of the richest kind, its treasure of a so-called pagan altar embossed with fighting warriors, its three pyramidal domes, so unexpected, so sinister, which I have not met elsewhere in church architecture; or the huge square keep of the eleventh century--the most cliff-like tower I remember, whose immeasurable thickness I did not penetrate; or the subterranean mysteries of two other less striking but not less historic dungeons, into which a terribly imperative little cicerone introduced us, with the aid of downward ladders, ropes, torches, warnings, extended hands, and many fearful anecdotes--all in impervious darkness. These horrible prisons of Loches, at an incredible distance below daylight, enlivened the consciousness of Louis XI. and were for the most part, I believe, constructed by him. One of the towers of the castle is garnished with the hooks or supports of the celebrated iron cage in which he confined the Cardinal La Balue, who survived so much longer than might have been expected this extraordinary mixture of seclusion and exposure. All these things form part of the castle of Loches, whose enormous _enceinte_ covers the whole of the top of the hill and abounds in dismantled gateways, in crooked passages, in winding lanes that lead to postern doors, in long façades that look upon terraces interdicted to the visitor, who perceives with irritation that they command magnificent views. These views are the property of the sub-prefect of the department, who resides at the Château de Loches and who has also the enjoyment of a garden--a garden compressed and curtailed, as those of old castles that perch on hill-tops are apt to be--containing a horse-chestnut tree of fabulous size, [Illustration: LOCHES--THE CHURCH]