The day on which we saw the place was one of those quiet, sleepily-sunshiny days; and the very spirit of a gone-by age seemed to be brooding over it. The very pathway leading up to one of its ancient gates has a sacred bit of past history connected with it, for was it not a convent of the Cordeliers, founded by that saint of old, Francis of Assisi, in 1215? The cloisters and a staircase and some of the walls still remain, trees and shrubs growing wild within its precincts. Beside it are many other ruins of ancient churches, convents and cloisters, amongst which one might name the convent of the Jacobins, the grand, lonely, gaunt fragment of the first convent of the _Frêres Prêcheurs_ or _Grandes Murailles_, which stands in solitary majesty at the entrance to the town, and which can date back before 1287, and the first church of St. Emilion, which was the underground, rock-hewn collegiate church of the 12th century. Besides these, there is the ruined castle, built by Louis VIII, whose great square keep-tower is the first striking piece of old masonry (among many striking examples) which towers over one on entering the town from the station road; and the crenellated ramparts, watch-doors and gates, built in the days when it was one of the _bastides_ founded by Edward I. As regards the gates, Murray declares the original six are still in existence, but though I tried my best to discover any remains of them, I could only find two, the one at the edge of the town leading to the open land outside St. Emilion, commanding a fine view of the "fair meadows of France," some lying faintly red-brown in the rays of a rather sulky-looking sunset, and others, further away, a dark mauve. In the immediate foreground was a splash of vivid yellow, making a gorgeous focus of light. An old woman sitting beside the road (who informed us her age was ninety-two) told us that she still worked in the vineyards, (think of it, at ninety-two!) and that champagne was made in this district, as well as the claret named after the place. St. Emilion is a place whose houses--some three hundred years old--are built at all levels; up and down hill, and in most unexpected crooked corners; some, too, of the dwellings are caves simply. In the _Arceau de la Cadêne_ there is the splendid old house of the _perruquier_ Troquart, and beyond it an old timbered house built of dark oak with crest and sculptures.