The Marquise is an Englishwoman, a cousin of her husband, their common ancestor being the Duke of Leinster; clever, cultivated, hospitable, and very large minded, which has helped her very much in her married life in France during our troubled epoch, when religious questions and political discussions do so much to embitter personal relations.  The two sons are young and gay, doing the honours of their home simply and with no pose of any kind.  There were two English couples staying in the house.

We had tea in the dining-room downstairs—­a large room with panels and chimney-piece of dark carved wood.  Two portraits of men in armour stand out well from the dark background.  There is such a wealth of pictures, engravings, and tapestries all over the house that one cannot take it all in at first.  The two drawing-rooms on the first floor are large and comfortable, running straight through the house; the end room in the tower—­a round room with windows on all sides—­quite charming.  The contrast between the modern—­English—­comforts (low, wide chairs, writing-table, rugs, cushions, and centre-table covered with books in all languages, a very rare thing in a French chateau, picture papers, photographs, etc.) and the straight-backed, spindle-legged old furniture and stiff, old-fashioned ladies and gentlemen, looking down from their heavy gold frames, is very attractive.  There is none of the formality and look of not being lived in which one sees in so many French salons, and yet it is not at all modern.  One never loses for a moment the feeling of being in an old chateau-fort.

It was so pretty looking out of my bedroom window this morning.  It was a bright, beautiful autumn day, the grass still quite green.  Some of the trees changing a little, the yellow leaves quite golden in the sun.  There are many American trees in the park—­a splendid Virginia Creeper, and a Gloire de Dijon rose-bush, still full of bloom, were sprawling over the old gray walls.  Animals of all kinds were walking about the court-yard; some swans and a lame duck, which had wandered up from the moat, standing on the edge and looking about with much interest; a lively little fox-terrier, making frantic dashes at nothing; one of the sons starting for a shoot with gaiters and game-bag, and his gun over his shoulder, his dog at his heels expectant and eager.  Some of the guests were strolling about and from almost all the windows—­wide open to let in the warm morning sun—­there came cheerful greetings.

I went for a walk around the house before breakfast.  There are five large round towers covered with ivy—­the walls extraordinarily thick—­the narrow little slits for shooting with arrows and the round holes for cannon balls tell their own story of rough feudal life.  On one side of the castle there is a large hole in the wall, made by a cannon ball sent by Turenne.  He was passing one day and asked to whom the chateau belonged.  On hearing that the owner was the Marechal de la Feuillade, one of his political adversaries, he sent a cannon ball as a souvenir of his passage, and the gap has never been filled up.