By this time Laure had discovered that drowning was both cold and wet, and by no means so agreeable as she had anticipated, so that when Charles approached, she caught such a firm hold of him as to deprive him of the power of saving her. It is probable that under these circumstances, her very decided efforts to demonstrate her change of opinion might have effected her original intention, and drowned them both, had not a boat come round the _Courbure_ at that very moment. The boatman soon extricated them from their danger, and carried them both hone, exhausted and dripping, to the house of Laure's mother. At first the good lady was terrified out of her wits, and then furiously angry; but ended, however, by declaring, that if ever they drowned themselves again, it should not be for love, and so she married them out of hand. THE CHÂTEAU. A naked subject to the weeping clouds, And waste for churlish Winter's tyranny. --King Henry IV. _Second Part_. We intended to proceed on our journey the following morning, but our valet-de-place, who had a longing for more five-franc pieces, put in the claims of the old château of Arques, and we went to visit it next day. I am fond of ruins and old buildings in general, not alone for their picturesque beauty, but for the various trains of thought they excite in the mind. Every ruin has its thousand histories; and could the walls but speak, what tales would they not tell of those antique times to which age has given an airy interest, like the misty softness with which distance robes every far object. No one ought to pass by Dieppe, without visiting the old castle and town of Arques. It is but a short ride, and the road is far from uninteresting. The fields are rich, highly cultivated, and decked with a thousand flowers, and at some distance before reaching Arques, the ruin is seen on the height above, standing in the solitary pride of desolation. A ruin ought always to be separate from other buildings. Its beauties are not those which gain by contrast. The proximity of human habitations takes from its grandeur. It seems as if it leant on them for support in its age. But when it stands by itself in silence and in solitude, there is a dignity in its loneliness, and a majesty even in its decay. Passing through Arques, the château is at some distance, on the height which domineers the town. The hand of man has injured it more than that of time. Many of the peasants' houses are built of the stone which once formed its walls; and the government has, on more than one occasion, sanctioned this gradual sort of destruction. What remains of it has, I believe, been either sold or granted to some one in the town: but, however, a gate has been placed, and some other precautions taken to prevent its further dilapidation.