Closely bound up with the Sennonais were the fiefs of Auxerre and Tonnerre, whose capitals are to-day of that class of important provincial cities of the third rank which play so great a part in the economic affairs of modern France. But their present commercial status should by no means discount their historic pasts, nor their charm for the lover of old monuments, since evidences remain at every street corner to remind one that their origin was in the days when knights were bold. The railway has since come, followed by electric lights and automobiles, all of which are once and again found in curious juxtaposition with a bit of mediæval or Renaissance architecture, in a manner that is surprising if not shocking. Regardless of the apparent modernity roundabout, however, there is still enough of the glamour of mediævalism left to subdue the garishness of twentieth century innovations. All this makes the charm of French travel,--this unlocked for combination of the new and the old that one so often meets. One can not find just this same sort of thing at Paris, nor on the Riviera, nor anywhere, in fact, except in these minor capitals of the old French provinces. The Comté d'Auxerre was created in 1094 by the Roi Robert, who, after the reunion of the Burgundian kingdom with the French monarchy, gave it to Renaud, Comte de Nevers, as the dot of one, Adelais, who may have been his sister, or his cousin--history is not precise. The house of Nevers possessed the countship until 1182, when it came to Archambaud, the ninth of the name, Sire de Bourbon. One of his heirs married a son of the Duc de Bourgogne and to him brought the county of Auxerre, which thus became Burgundian in fact. Later it took on a separate entity again, or rather, it allied itself with the Comtes de Tonnerre at a price paid in and out of hand, it must not be neglected to state, of 144,400 _livres Tournois_. The crown of France, through the Comtes d'Auxerre, came next into possession, but Charles VII, under the treaty of Arras, ceded the countship in turn to Philippe-le-Bon, Duc de Bourgogne. Definite alliance with the royal domain came under Louis XI, thus the province remained until the Revolution.