The Queen-mother occupied the rooms on the first floor that had formerly been those of Queen Claude de France, Francis I.'s wife; and the delicate sculpture is still to be seen of double C's, with a device in pure white of swans and lilies, signifying _Candidior candidis_, the whitest of the white, the badge of that Queen whose name, like Catherine's, began with C, and equally appropriate to Louis XII.'s daughter and to the mother of the Valois; for notwithstanding the violence of Calvinist slander, no doubt was ever thrown on Catherine de' Medici's enduring fidelity to Henri II. The Queen-mother, with two young children still on her hands--a boy, afterwards the Duc d'Alençon, and Marguerite, who became the wife of Henri IV., and whom Charles IX. called Margot--needed the whole of this first floor. King Francis II. and his Queen Mary Stuart had the royal apartments on the second floor that Francis I. had occupied, and which were also those of Henri III. The royal apartments, and those of the Queen-mother, are divided from end to end of the château into two parts by the famous party wall, four feet thick, which supports the thrust of the immensely thick walls of the rooms. Thus on the lower as well as on the upper floor the rooms are in two distinct suites. That half which, facing the south, is lighted from the court, held the rooms for state receptions and public business; while, to escape the heat, the private rooms had a north aspect, where there is a splendid frontage with arcades and balconies, and a view over the county of the Vendômois, the _Perchoir aux Bretons_, and the moats of the town--the only town mentioned by the great fable writer, the admirable la Fontaine. Francis I.'s château at that time ended at an enormous tower, only begun, but intended to mark the vast angle the palace would have formed in turning a flank; Gaston subsequently demolished part of its walls to attach his palace to the tower; but he never finished the work, and the tower remains a ruin. This royal keep was used as a prison, or, according to popular tradition, as _oubliettes_. What poet would not feel deep regret or weep for France as he wanders now through the hall of this magnificent château, and sees the exquisite arabesques of Catherine de' Medici's room, whitewashed and almost smothered by order of the governor of the barracks at the time of the cholera--for this royal residence is now a barrack. The paneling of Catherine de' Medici's closet, of which more particular mention will presently be made, is the last relic of the rich furnishing collected by five artistic kings.