During the summer of 1854 I employed my vacation in long walks and drives with a college classmate through northern, western, and central France, including Picardy, Normandy, Brittany, and Touraine, visiting the spots of most historical and architectural interest. There were, at that time, few railways in those regions, so we put on blouses and took to the road, sending our light baggage ahead of us, and carrying only knapsacks. In every way it proved a most valuable experience. Pleasantly come back to me my walks and talks with the peasantry, and vividly dwell in my memory the cathedrals of Beauvais, Amiens, Rouen, Bayeux, Coutances, Le Mans, Tours, Chartres, and Orl<e'>ans, the fortress of Mont St. Michel, the Ch<a^>teaux of Chenonceaux, Chambord, Nantes, Am- boise, and Angers, the tombs of the Angevine kings at Fontevrault, and the stone cottage of Louis XI at Cl<e'>ry. Visiting the grave of Ch<a^>teaubriand at St. Malo, we met a little old gentleman, bent with age, but very brisk and chatty. He was standing with a party of friends on one side of the tomb, while we stood on the other. Presently, one of the gentlemen in his company came over and asked our names, saying that his aged companion was a great admirer of Ch<a^>teaubriand, and was anxious to know something of his fellow pilgrims. To this I made answer, when my interlocutor informed me that the old gentleman was the Prince de Rohan-Soubise. Shortly afterward the old gentleman came round to us and began conversation, and on my making answer in a way which showed that I knew his title, he turned rather sharply on me and said, ``How do you know that?'' To this I made answer that even in America we had heard the verse: ``Roi, je ne puis, Prince ne daigne, Rohan je suis.'' At this he seemed greatly pleased, grasped my hand, and launched at once into extended conversation. His great anxiety was to know who was to be the future king of our Republic, and he asked especially whether Washington had left any direct descendants. On my answering in the negative, he insisted that we would have to find some descendant in the collateral line, ``for,'' said he, ``you can't escape it; no nation can get along for any considerable time without a monarch.'' Returning to Paris I resumed my studies, and, at the request of Mr. Randall, the biographer of Jefferson, made some search in the French archives for correspondence between Jefferson and Robespierre,--search made rather to put an end to calumny than for any other purpose.