"Pour boire avec le lieutenant du Maire," and so forth. The fifteen taverns mentioned in the accounts of the jovial town clerk from 1377 to 1381 are all to be found going very strong in the sixteenth century. M. de Beaurepaire has preserved their fascinating names:--L'Asne Roye, Les Petits souliers, Le Fleur de Lys pres St. Maclou, Le Cygne devant St. Martin, Le Singe pres de la Madeleine, and many more.] Till the end of the fifteenth century mine host was called the "Seigneur" of his sign, as the "Seigneur de l'Ours, Seigneur de la Fleur de Lys;" and though by the close of the sixteenth century we still find a "Dame de la Croix Rouge" for the hostess, her husband had become (I quote from the accounts in the Archeveche) "maitre du Pilier vert," or "maitre de l'Ecrevisse." But even earlier than the fifteenth century it was already possible to get good lodging for the night at an hotel in Rouen, for a contract of 1395 has been preserved, made between Guillaume Blanc-baston and Guillaume Marc to furnish forth a hostelry, much as we may imagine the Hotel des Bons Enfants was furnished in its youth. "Four casks of good wine at ten livres," says this document; "twelve good beds with twenty-four pairs of sheets; eight cups and a goblet with a silver foot; a dozen 'hanaps' of pewter," with pots and pans and pewter dishes innumerable.[36] [Footnote 36: No. 41 Rue des Bons Enfants is a capital example of the Fifteenth Century Timbered inn. To the right of the inner yard a gallery juts out on crooked pillars, the "avant-soliers" so common in mediaeval streets, and shown in Lelieur's drawings. Queer gables rise into the air at odd corners, and if you are sufficiently hardened to mediaeval atmospheres you may discover other stables than the big shed at the entrance, and you will understand the reason for the Notice "On ne repond pas des accidents qui peuvent arriver aux chevaux." Through a dark narrow slit the phantom of a cobwebbed stable-boy will lead you into the blackened aged stables, and the spire of the abandoned church of St. Croix des Pelletiers rises above them. Lunch here upon omelettes and sound wine; but sleep were possibly unwise, though "Room Number Ten" is almost too fascinating an apartment to resist.] [Illustration: A COBBLER OF ROUEN, FROM THE STALLS OF THE CATHEDRAL]