gunpowder and artillery had developed. Cannons were mounted on the walls. The Porte Drouaise, Porte S. Michel and the Porte des Épars have disappeared, but the Porte Guillaume remains to show us what they were like. This gate, named after the Vîdame Guillaume de Ferrières (1182), has been referred to the tenth century by local enthusiasts. But that date is too ambitious, except perhaps for the foundations. The inside of the gate, on the town side, and part of the vaulting belong to the year 1182, when the enlargement of the town _enceinte_ took place and the perimeter of the walls and fortifications was extended, especially in the quarter between the Gates Châtelet, des Épars and S. Michel. But the outside of the Porte Guillaume, its façade very much as we have it now, was constructed after Poitiers. With its well-preserved crenellated parapet and machicoulis, and the openings for the play of the drawbridge, it presents a fine specimen of the military architecture of that period, and reminds one not a little of the contemporary towers of the Bastille at Paris (1369), a plan of which is in the town museum. The drawbridge used to connect the main towers of the gateway with an advanced fortification surrounded by the waters of the moat. The reader will gain a clear idea of the arrangement by referring to the old print reproduced on page 275. The strength of the Porte Guillaume was so great, that though dominated by the heights of S. Barthélémy and S. Chéron, it withstood all the assaults and batteries of besiegers, and the town was never taken from this side. Deservedly, therefore, it remains almost intact, though nearly all the rest of the fortifications of Chartres have been converted into boulevards and ‘Its once grim bulwarks tamed to lover’s walks Look down unwatchful on the sliding Eure.’ Close under it, in old days, was a chapel dedicated to S. Fiacre, whither pilgrims afflicted by the distressing complaint known as Mal de S. Fiacre used to come in hopes of healing. But this has long since disappeared.