This is perhaps inexplicable, but it is a fact, which is only in a measure accounted for by reason of the "local colour"--whatever that vague term of the popular novelist may mean--and customs which weave an entanglement about one which is difficult to resist. The river Agout is as weird a stream as its name implies, and divides this haphazard little city of the Tarn into two distinct, and quite characteristically different, parts. Intercourse between Castres and its faubourg, Villegondom, is carried on by two stone bridges; and from either bank of the river, or from either of the bridges, there is always in a view a ravishingly picturesque _ensemble_ of decrepit walls and billowy roof-tops, that will make the artist of brush and pencil angry with fleeting time. The former cathedral is not an entrancingly beautiful structure; indeed, it is not after the accepted "good form" of any distinct architectural style. It is a poor battered thing which has suffered hardly in the past; notably at the hands of the Huguenots in 1567. As it stands to-day, it is practically a seventeenth-century construction, though it is yet unfinished and lacks its western façade. The vaulting of the choir, and the chapels are the only constructive elements which warrant remark. There are a few paintings in the choir, four rather attractive life-size statues, and a series of severe but elegant choir-stalls. The former _évêché_ is to-day the Hôtel de Ville, but was built by Mansart in 1666, and has a fine _escalier_ in sculptured stone. As a centre of Christianity, Castres is very ancient. In 647 there was a Benedictine abbey here. The bishopric, however, did not come into being until 1317, and was suppressed in 1790. XIX NOTRE DAME DE RODEZ The cathedral at Rodez, whose diocese dates from the fifth century and whose first bishop was St. Amand, is, in a way, reminiscent--in its majesty of outline and dominant situation--of that at Albi. It is not, however, after the same manner, but resembles it more particularly with respect to its west façade, which is unpierced in its lower stages by either doorway or window. Here, too, the entrance is midway in its length, and its front presents that sheer flank of walled barrier which is suggestive of nothing but a fortification. [Illustration: NOTRE DAME _de RODEZ_ ...] This great church--for it is truly great, pure and simple--makes up in width what it lacks in length. Its nave and aisles are just covered by a span of one hundred and twenty feet,--a greater dimension than is possessed by Chartres or Rouen, and nearly as great as Paris or Amiens. Altogether Notre Dame de Rodez is a most pleasing church, though conglomerate as to its architecture, and as bad, with respect to the Renaissance gable of its façade, as any contemporary work in the same style. Rodez lacks, however, the great enfolding tower central of Albi.