Behind the Chastelet stood the _Grande Boucherie_--the Leadenhall market of Paris an hundred years ago; and near it, up a dirty street or two, was one of the finest churches of the capital, dedicated to St Jacques. The lofty tower of this latter edifice (its body perished when the Boucherie and the Chastelet disappeared) still rises in gloomy majesty above all the surrounding buildings. It is as high as those of Notre Dame; and from its upper corners, enormous _gargouilles_--those fantastic water-spouts of the middle ages--gape with wide-stretched jaws, but no longer send down the washings of the roof on the innocent passengers. Hereabouts lived Nicholas Flamel, the old usurer, who made money so fast that it was said he used to sup nightly with his Satanic majesty, and who thereupon built part of the church to save his bacon. He was of opinion that it was well to have the "_mens sana in corpore sano_"--that it was no joke to be burnt; and so he stuck close to the church, taking care that himself and his wife, Pernelle, should have a comfortable resting-place for their bones within the walls of St Jacques. When this was a fashionable quarter of Paris, the court doctor and accoucheur did not disdain to reside in it; for Jean Fernel, the medical attendant of Catharine de Medicis, lived and died within the shade of this old tower. He was a fortunate fellow, a sort of Astley Cooper or Clarke in his way, and Catharine used to give him 10,000 crowns, or something like L.6000, every time she favoured France with an addition to the royal family. He and numerous other worthies mouldered into dust within the precincts of St Jacques; but their remains have long since been scattered to the winds; and where the church once stood is now an ignoble market for old clothes; the abode of Jews and thieves.