Here the Cathedral-church is, as usual, the centre of all that there is of antiquity in the town. There is one especially beautiful timber house, known as the Maison Dieu, some little distance from the west front; north and south of the church are various narrow streets--the Rue de la Porte Dollée runs over the stream of the same name, and under a curious old gateway tower; the Rue Henri Amiard leads to the precincts of the Cathedral, the south flank and its outward trend being well seen from here; but there is nothing very tangible in the way of antiquity, and one has an impression that when the bishop departed from Saint-Lô he must have taken with him the soul of the place. Notre Dame de Saint-Lô has a very unusual and original plan, widening towards the east and adding another aisle to the north and south ambulatories. On the north side is its chief curiosity, an outdoor pulpit, built at the end of the fifteenth century and probably used by Huguenot preachers, to whom a sermon was a sermon, whether preached under a vaulted roof or the open sky. What strikes one most about the interior of the church is its want of light. The nave is absolutely unlighted, having neither triforium nor clerestory, and the aisles have only one tier of large windows, whose glass is old and very fine, though in most cases pieced together; the nave piers are massive, with a cluster of three shafts; those of the choir are quite simple, and have one noticeable feature, the absence of capitals, the vault mouldings dying away into the pier. [Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL FRONT ST. LÔ] Like Saint-Lô, Coutances is a city built on a hill, and has therefore a peculiar charm all its own. The steep hill rises very impressively from the rolling country below, showing the Cathedral on the height, the towers of St. Pierre and the grey houses and apple orchards on the lower slope. As a town it has more to say for itself than Saint-Lô; small though it is, in respect of the part it has played in the history of its surroundings it can hold its own with many larger towns. Coutances on its granite rock is the watch-tower of the flat marshy Côtentin. It looks out to sea on the one side and over its subject towns on the other; it has seen the sun flash on the winged helmets of the Danes, on the spears of Englishmen of Agincourt, on the grim figures of the Huguenot leaders in the days of the League, as each in their day marched over the plains to Coutances for the sake of plunder, conquest and religion. Even in Roman times it was of importance; the Gauls called it Cosedia of the Unelli, but towards the end of the third century Constantius Chlorus fortified the town and called it after his name, which it bears at the present day--Constantius--Constance--Coutances.