302 The Unknown River. 



for something more than its mere salableness. But the 

 best evidence that the French are not indifferent to the 

 beauty of their trees is, that scarcely a single town, 

 however insignificant, is without its public avenues, in 

 which the trees are encouraged to attain their fullest 

 possible development. What English town, of equal 

 population, has any thing comparable to the magnificent 

 avenues that encircle Sens ? 



The navigation during this part of the voyage was 

 more agreeable to the traveller himself than likely to 

 prove interesting when narrated. Here and there the 

 rocky bed of the stream produced narrow passes of a 

 trifling degree of difficulty, and after them the river 

 widened into long and tranquil reaches, over which 

 drooped the heavy-leaved branches, dipping their ex- 

 tremities in the deep water that reflected them. At 

 length, when these were gilded by the refulgence of 

 sunset, the sound of a mill-wheel became audible in the 

 distance, and that pleasant rush of water that may indi- 

 cate either a rapid or a weir. Then a village church 

 came into sight, and finally a few roofs of picturesque 

 mossy thatch, which turned out to be the whole village. 



The church was one of those simple old Romanesque 

 edifices which abound in this part of France. The 

 architects of to-day have broken with the Romanesque 

 tradition, and, in order to get more imposing effects of 

 height and size, have adopted a very plain kind of 

 lancet-Gothic. But for a little village church I think 

 nothing can be so well adapted as the Romanesque, 

 with its tiny apse and aisles, and its general air of snug- 



