The queen-mother, still charged with the care of two young children (him who was afterward Duc d’Alencon, and Marguerite, the wife of Henri IV., the sister whom Charles IX. called Margot), had need of the whole of the first upper floor.

The king, Francois II., and the queen, Mary Stuart, occupied, on the second floor, the royal apartments which had formerly been those of Francois I. and were, subsequently, those of Henri III.  This floor, like that taken by the queen-mother, is divided in two parts throughout its whole length by the famous partition-wall, which is more than four feet thick, against which rests the enormous walls which separate the rooms from each other.  Thus, on both floors, the apartments are in two distinct halves.  One half, to the south, looking to the courtyard, served for public receptions and for the transaction of business; whereas the private apartments were placed, partly to escape the heat, to the north, overlooking the gardens, on which side is the splendid facade with its balconies and galleries looking out upon the open country of the Vendomois, and down upon the “Perchoir des Bretons” and the moat, the only side of which La Fontaine speaks.

The chateau of Francois I. was, in those days, terminated by an enormous unfinished tower which was intended to mark the colossal angle of the building when the succeeding wing was built.  Later, Gaston took down one side of it, in order to build his palace on to it; but he never finished the work, and the tower remained in ruins.  This royal stronghold served as a prison or dungeon, according to popular tradition.

As we wander to-day through the halls of this matchless chateau, so precious to art and to history, what poet would not be haunted by regrets, and grieved for France, at seeing the arabesques of Catherine’s boudoir whitewashed and almost obliterated, by order of the quartermaster of the barracks (this royal residence is now a barrack) at the time of an outbreak of cholera.  The panels of Catherine’s boudoir, a room of which we are about to speak, is the last remaining relic of the rich decorations accumulated by five artistic kings.  Making our way through the labyrinth of chambers, halls, stairways, towers, we may say to ourselves with solemn certitude:  “Here Mary Stuart cajoled her husband on behalf of the Guises.”  “There, the Guises insulted Catherine.”  “Later, at that very spot the second Balafre fell beneath the daggers of the avengers of the Crown.”  “A century earlier, from this very window, Louis XII. made signs to his friend Cardinal d’Amboise to come to him.”  “Here, on this balcony, d’Epernon, the accomplice of Ravaillac, met Marie de’ Medici, who knew, it was said, of the proposed regicide, and allowed it to be committed.”

In the chapel, where the marriage of Henri IV. and Marguerite de Valois took place, the sole remaining fragment of the chateau of the counts of Blois, a regiment now makes it shoes.  This wonderful structure, in which so many styles may still be seen, so many great deeds have been performed, is in a state of dilapidation which disgraces France.  What grief for those who love the great historic monuments of our country to know that soon those eloquent stones will be lost to sight and knowledge, like others at the corner of the rue de la Vieille-Pelleterie; possibly, they will exist nowhere but in these pages.