Photo by Mrs. A. H. Harris 



TOWERS OF THE CITADEL: CARCASSONNE, FRANCE 



The castle of Carcassonne adjoined the outer wall, so that if all other defenses failed 

 there might be a possibility of communicating with relieving forces from the outside after 

 the town had fallen. 



like peaks ; deep, irregular, narrow little 

 gorges, each with its rushing, boiling tor- 

 rent far down among the contorted rocks 

 of the bottom. 



The engineering difficulties throughout 

 Dauphine are exceptional. Along the 

 railroad half the scenery is black tunnels 

 and stinging clouds of cinders. But one 

 cares not a whit for that when the train 

 bursts from them upon spidery, inspiring 

 viaducts, and goes zigzagging up or down 

 the mountain side in graceful spirals that 

 deprive one alike of speech and breath. 



ON THE ISERE STANDS GRENOBLE 



Where the cold gray flood of the Isere 

 slips between the mountains like a thread, 

 we find Grenoble, superbly placed at its 

 junction with the Drac, in an exquisite 

 plain, swept about on every side by range 

 upon range of glorious mountains that 

 tower up 10,000 feet, into the realm of 



perpetual snow. Bastioned, turreted 

 walls leap picturesquely up to the forts 

 on the top of the hill on the other side 

 of the river. The fifteenth century Pal- 

 ace of Justice, with its high-pitched roof, 

 bold dormers, and elegant chimneys, is 

 said to be the finest Renaissance building 

 in the valley of the Rhone. The hand- 

 somely towered Hotel de Yille has a very 

 effective formal garden. 



Indeed, Grenoble blossoms with gar- 

 dens, and one of its tree-decorated ave- 

 nues runs straight as an arrow's flight 

 five miles out into the country to the 

 Drac, where the seventeenth century 

 Hurdle Bridge (see page 478) humps 

 its back for the leap across the stream, 

 and gives an exquisite picture, in the 

 rough frame of its arch, of the peaks be- 

 yond. But grandest and most inspiring 

 of all is the scene every evening when 

 Mother Nature reveals her fiery alchemy 



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