On The Whole, Chambord Makes A Great Impression;
And The Hour I Was, There, While The Yellow Afternoon
Light Slanted Upon The September Woods, There Was A
Dignity In Its Desolation.
It spoke, with a muffled
but audible voice, of the vanished monarchy, which
had been so strong, so splendid, but to-day has be-
come a sort of fantastic vision, like the cupolas and
chimneys that rose before me.
I thought, while I
lingered there, of all the fine things it takes to make
up such a monarchy; and how one of them is a su-
perfluity of mouldering, empty, palaces. Chambord is
touching, - that is the best word for it; and if the
hopes of another restoration are in the follies of the
Republic, a little reflection on that eloquence of ruin
ought to put the Republic on its guard. A sentimental
tourist may venture to remark that in the presence of
several chateaux which appeal in this mystical manner
to the retrospective imagination, it cannot afford to be
foolish. I thought of all this as I drove back to Blois
by the way of the Chateau de Cheverny. The road
took us out of the park of Chambord, but through a
region of flat woodland, where the trees were not
mighty, and again into the prosy plain of the Sologne,
- a thankless soil, all of it, I believe, but lately much
amended by the magic of cheerful French industry
and thrift. The light had already begun to fade, and
my drive reminded me of a passage in some rural
novel of Madame Sand.
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