It is uncertain whether Michel Colombe, who designed this fountain and also that masterwork, the tomb of the Duc François II. and Marguerite de Foix, at Nantes, was a Tourangeau or a Breton, but Tours claims him for her own, and settles once for all the spelling of his name by producing a "_papier des affaires_" signed plainly "Colombe." The proof lies in this document, signed in a notary's office at Tours, concerning payments which were made to him on behalf of the magnificent sepulchre which he executed for the church of St. Sauveur at La Rochelle. In his time--fifteenth century--Colombe had no rivals in the art of monumental sculpture in France, and with reason he has been called the Michel Ange of France. The cathedral quarter has for its chief attraction that gorgeously florid St. Gatien, whose ornate façade was likened by a certain monarch to a magnificently bejewelled casket. It is an interesting and lovable Gothic-Renaissance church which, if not quite of the first rank among the masterpieces of its kind, is a marvel of splendour, and an example of the "_caprices d'une guipure d'art_," as the French call it. Bordering the Loire at Tours is a series of tree-lined quays and promenades which are the scenes, throughout the spring and summer months, of fêtes and fairs of many sorts. Here, too, at the extremity of the Rue Nationale, are statues of Descartes and Balzac. The Tour de Guise on the river-bank recalls the domination of the Plantagenet kings of England, who were Counts of Anjou since it formed a part of the twelfth-century château built here by Henry II. of England. [Illustration: SCENE IN THE QUARTIER DE LA CATHÉDRALE, TOURS] At the opposite extremity of the city is another other tower, the Tour de Foubert, which protected the feudal domain of the old abbey of St. Martin. The history of days gone by at Tours was more churchly than political. Once only--during the reign of Louis XII.--did the States General meet at Tours (in 1506). Then the deputies of the _bourgeoisie_ met alone for their deliberations, the chief outcome of which was to bestow upon the king the eminently fitting title of "Père du Peuple." One may question the righteousness of Louis XII. in throwing over his wife, Jeanne de France, in order to serve political ends by acquiring the estates of Anne of Brittany for the Crown of France for ever, but there is no doubt but that he did it for the "_good of his people_." The principal literary shrine at Tours is the house, in the Rue Nationale, where was born Honoré de Balzac. One could not do better than to visit Tours during the "_été de St. Martin_," since it was the soldier-priest of Tours who gave his name to that warm, bright prolongation of summer which in France (and in England) is known as "St. Martin's summer," and which finds its counterpart in America's "Indian summer."