What the Chateau de Bazoches lacks in great renown it makes up for in imposing effect. Each angle meets in a svelt round tower of the typical picture-book and stage-carpenter fashion. Each tower is coiffed with a peaked candle-snuffer cap and a row of machicoulis which gives the whole edifice a warlike look which is unmistakable. The finest detail of all is "La Grande Tour" supporting one end of the principle mass of the chateau, and half built into the hillside which backs it up on the rear. Vauban bought an old feudal castle in 1663 and added to it after his own effective manner, thus making the chateau, as one sees it to-day, the powerful bulwark that it is. The chateau belongs to-day to the Vibrave family, who keep open house for the visitor who would see within and without. The principle apartment is entirely furnished with the same belongings which served Vauban for his personal use. Another neighbouring chateau, bearing also the name Chateau de Vauban, was also the property of the Maréchal. It dates from the sixteenth century, and though in no way historic, has many architectural details worthy of observation and remark. CHAPTER IV SEMUR-EN-AUXOIS, ÉPOISSES AND BOURBILLY Due east from Avallon some thirty odd kilometres is Semur-en-Auxois. It is well described as a feudal city without and a banal one within. Its mediæval walls and gates lead one to expect the same old-world atmosphere over all, but, aside from its churches and an occasional architectural display of a Renaissance house-front, its cast of countenance, when seen from its decidedly bourgeois point of view, is, if not modern, at least matter-of-fact and unsympathetic. In spite of this its historical recollections are many and varied, and there are fragments galore of its once proud architectural glories which bespeak their prime importance, and also that the vandal hand of so-called progress and improvement has fallen heavily on all sides. The site of Semur to a great extent gives it that far-away mediæval look; that, at least, could not be taken away from it. It possesses, moreover, one of the most astonishing [Illustration: _Semur-en-Auxois_] silhouettes of any hill-top town in France. Like Constantine in North Africa it is walled and battlemented by a series of natural defences in the form of ravines or gorges so profound that certainly no ordinary invading force could have entered the city. Semur was formerly the capital of the Auxois, and for some time held the same rank in the Burgundian Duchy. The city from within suggests little of mediævalism. Prosperity and contentment do not make for a picturesque and romantic environment of the life of the twentieth century. It was different in the olden time. Semur, by and large, is of the age of mediævalism, however, though one has to delve below the surface to discover this after having passed the great walls and portals of its natural and artificial ramparts.