is nothing to fulfil the expectation.  Here is width and space, but no trottoir; and the buildings are as incongruous as can well be imagined, whether as to height, color, projection, or material.  Most of them, and indeed most in the city, are merely of lath and plaster, the timbers uncovered and painted red or black, the plaster frequently coated with small grey slates laid one over another, like the weather-tiles in Sussex.  Their general form is very tall and very narrow, which adds to the singularity of their appearance; but mixed with these are others of white brick or stone, and really handsome, or, it might be said, elegant.  The contrast, however, which they form only makes their neighbors look the more shabby, while they themselves derive from the association an air of meanness.  The merchants usually meet upon a small open plot, situated opposite to the quay, inclosed with palisades and fronted with trees.  This is their exchange in fine weather; but adjoining is a handsome building, called La Bourse a couvert, or Le Consulte, to which recourse is always had in case of rain.  It was here that Napoleon and Maria Louisa, a very short time previous to their deposition, received from the inhabitants of Rouen the oath of allegiance, which so soon afterwards found a ready transfer to another sovereign.

About the middle of the quay is placed the bridge of boats, an object of attraction to all strangers, but more so from the novelty and singularity of its construction than from its beauty.  Utility rather than elegance was consulted by the builder.  This far-famed structure is ugly and cumbrous, and a passenger feels a very unpleasing sensation if he happens to stand upon it when a loaded waggon drives along it at low water, at which time there is a considerable descent from the side of the suburbs.  An undulatory motion is then occasioned, which goes on gradually from boat to boat till it reaches the opposite shore.  The bridge is supported upon nineteen large barges, which rise and fall with the tide, and are so put together that one or more can easily be removed as often as it is necessary to allow any vessel to pass.  The whole too can be entirely taken away in six hours, a construction highly useful in a river peculiarly liable to floods from sudden thaws; which sometimes occasion such an increase of the waters, as to render the lower stories of the houses in the adjacent parts of the city uninhabitable.  The bridge itself was destroyed by a similar accident, in 1709, for want of a timely removal.  Its plan is commonly attributed to a monk of the order of St. Augustine, by whom it was erected in 1626, about sixty years after the stone bridge, built by the Empress Matilda in 1167, had ceased to be passable.  It seems the fate of Rouen to have wonderful bridges.  The present is dignified by some writers with the high title of a miracle of art:  the former is said by Taillepied, in whose time it was standing,