A tree-lined avenue leads from the village street to the château, which sits in the midst of a tiny park; not a grand expanse as at Chambord or Chenonceaux, but a sort of green frame with a surrounding moat, fed by the waters of the Indre. The main building is square, with a great coiffed round tower at each corner. The Abbé Chevalier, in his "Promenades Pittoresques en Touraine," called it the purest and best of French Renaissance, and such it assuredly is, if one takes a not too extensive domestic establishment of the early years of the sixteenth century as the typical example. Undoubtedly the sylvan surroundings of the château have a great deal to do with the effectiveness of its charms. The great white walls of its façade, with the wonderful sculptures of Jean Goujon, glisten in the brilliant sunlight of Touraine through the sycamores and willows which border the Indre in a genuinely romantic fashion. Somewhere within the walls are the remains of an old tower of the one-time fortress which was burned by the Dauphin Charles in 1418, after, says history, "he had beheaded its governor and taken all of the defenders to the number of three hundred and thirty-four." This act was in revenge for an alleged insult to his sacred person. There are no remains of this former tower visible exteriorly to-day, and no other bloody acts appear to have attached themselves to the present château in all the four hundred years of its existence. [Illustration: _Château d'Azay-le-Rideau_] Gilles Berthelot erected the present structure early in the reign of François I. He was a man close to the king in affairs of state, first _conseiller-secrétaire_, then _trésorier-général des finances_, hence he knew the value of money. Among the succeeding proprietors was Guy de Saint Gelais, one of the most accomplished diplomats of his time. He was followed by Henri de Beringhem, who built the stables and ornamented the great room known as the Chambre du Roi from the fact that Louis XIV. once slept there, with the magnificent paintings which are shown to-day. Everywhere is there a rich, though not gross, display of decoration, beginning with such constructive details as the pointed-roofed _tourelles_, which are themselves exceedingly decorative. The doors, windows, roof-tops, chimneypieces, and the semi-enclosed circular stairways are all elaborately sculptured after the best manner of the time. The entrance portico is a wonder of its kind, with a strong sculptured arcade and arched window-openings and niches filled with bas-reliefs. Sculptured shells, foliage, and mythological symbols combine to form an arabesque, through which are interspersed the favourite ciphers of the region, the ermine and the salamander, which go to prove that François and other royalties must at one time or another have had some connection with the château.