But to return to the house. We enter a vast apartment with heavy rafters gilded, and in blue. Its walls are hung in ancient Flemish tapestry and a huge fire-place occupies one end. There are many curious pictures and ancient objects of art. Evidently the place has remained unchanged for centuries. What a sense of repose these places afford one, how far off the bustle of the world seems! I mention this to mine host, but he shakes his head replying, "There is little peace in France." In one of the great round towers is a library, and behind the salon a wide drawing-room where things are of the fashion of the great Louis, and where that monarch would not feel the lapse of years or out of place if he could return. Crimson damask, fast going to tatters, cover the walls, from which ladies in high wigs and gentlemen in court dresses question "your presence here in such a costume." The Grand Mademoiselle is in great array, but Marie Antoinette knows the vanity and sorrow of all things and smiles sadly at you. Here I discover that the present family have owned the château for only one century. The portraits are all of the ancient race who died out long ago. That painting under the groined roof of the great hall is of the last of that line, the Baron de St. Elix, who died childless and so the house passed to strangers. Whether the Terror was the cause of his death or not, I could not discover, but that man in the hall would have gone to the guillotine with dignity, of that I am sure. If his shade ever returns, he must feel grieved at the sadness of these old towers of his race. Some of that same sadness is reflected in the face of the present owner as he watches us speed away into the greater world of which he knows so little and which means life and progress to him. The sunlight strikes athwart the ancient portal and the stately towers, turning the garden into green and gold, lighting the village and its ancient dames in a sad sort of fashion, emphasizing the silence which is a part of it all. A turn in the long avenue and we are off and away down the dusty highway, leaving the Château de St. Elix to its dull repose. CHAPTER VII THE DEATH OF A DOG--ENCOUNTERS ON THE HIGHWAY--TRAVELLERS BY THE WAY--PEOPLE OF THE PROVINCES--LOURDES--HER SUPERSTITION AND HER VISIONS