Exactly opposite the Sorbonne, on its Rue des Écoles side, is the beautiful Musée de Cluny, on the site of the ancient Palais des Thermes of which the ruins are seen in the grounds bordered by the boulevard St-Germain. The palace dates from Roman days. Julian was proclaimed Emperor there. We see an altar from the time of Tiberius. The remains of Roman baths--vestiges of the _frigidarium_, the _tepidarium_, the _hypocaustum_, traces of the pipes through which the water flowed are still there. In the fourteenth century Pierre de Chaslun, Abbot of Cluny, bought the ruins of the ancient palace, and the exquisite Gothic mansion we see was built close up against them. Many illustrious persons found shelter within the home of the Abbots during the centuries that followed. James V of Scotland stayed there. Men of learning were made welcome there. In later times its tower was used as an observatory. The Revolution put an end to the state and prestige of the beautiful mansion. It was sold, parcelled out to a number of buyers, put to all sorts of common and commercial uses, till, in 1833, M. de Sommerard, whose name is given to the street on its northern side, acquired it and set up there his own precious collection of things beautiful, the nucleus of the Museum. The whole property was taken over later by the Beaux-Arts under State protection for conservation. In the garden numerous interesting relics of ancient churches, that of St-Benoît which once stood near, and others, are carefully preserved. [Illustration: LE MUSÉE DE CLUNY] Rue Jean-de-Beauvais was in bygone days inhabited entirely by printers. The Roumanian chapel there was the chapel of the famous College Dormans-Beauvais, founded in 1370. Rue de Latran--modern--runs across the site of the ancient _commanderie_ of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. In Rue des Carmes, dating from 1250, we see at No. 15 the ancient College des Lombards, now the Cercle Catholique d’Ouvriers, founded 1334, rebuilt under Louis XIV by two Irish priests. The little chapel there, dedicated now to “Jesus Ouvrier,” is paved with the gravestones of the Irish clergy who came of yore to live and study there. Rue Basse des Carmes stretches across the site of the demolished Carmelite Convent. We are close now to the Collège de France, le Lycée Louis-le-Grand and l’École Polytechnique. Le Collège de France, Rue des Écoles, its beautiful west façade giving on Rue St-Jacques, was founded as an institution by François I (1530); its lectures were to be given in different colleges. The edifice before us replaces this “Collège Royal,” built in the early years of the seventeenth century, destroyed in the eighteenth century. It dates from 1778, the work of Chalgrin. Additions were made in the nineteenth century. The numerous finely executed busts of noted scholars and eminent professors are the work of the best sculptors of each period.