From the Chapter I went to the COLLEGE LIBRARY.  In other words, there is a fine public school, or Lycee, or college, where a great number of lads and young men are educated “according to art.”  The building is extensive and well-situated:  the play-ground is large and commodious; and there is a well-cultivated garden “tempting with forbidden fruit.”  Into this garden I strolled in search of the President of the College, who was not within doors.  I found him in company with some of the masters, and with several young men either playing, or about to play, at skittles.  On communicating the object of my visit, he granted me an immediate passport to the library—­“mais, Monsieur, (added he) ce n’est rien:  il y avoit autrefois quelque chose:  maintenant, ce n’est qu’un amas de livres tres communs.”  I thanked him, and accompanied the librarian to the Library; who absolutely apologized all the way for the little entertainment I should receive.  There was indeed little enough.  The room may be about eighteen feet square.  Of the books, a great portion was in vellum bindings, in wretched condition.  Here was Jay’s Polyglot, and the matrimonial Sanctius again!  There was a very respectable sprinkling of Spanish and French Dictionaries; some few not wholly undesirable Alduses; and the rare Louvain edition of Sir Thomas More’s Works, printed in 1566, folio.[146] I saw too, with horror-mingled regret, a frightfully imperfect copy of the Service of Bayeux Cathedral, printed in the Gothic letter, UPON VELLUM.  But the great curiosity is a small brass or bronze crucifix, about nine inches high, standing upon the mantlepiece; very ancient, from the character of the crown, which savours of the latter period of Roman art—­and which is the only crown, bereft of thorns, that I ever saw upon the head of our Saviour so represented.  The eyes appear to be formed of a bright brown glass.  Upon the whole, as this is not a book, nor a fragment of an old illumination, I will say nothing more about its age.  I was scarcely three quarters of an hour in the library; but was fully sensible of the politeness of my attendant, and of the truth of his prediction, that I should receive little entertainment from an examination of the books.

It is high time that you should be introduced in proper form to the famous BAYEUX TAPESTRY.  Know then, in as few words as possible, that this celebrated piece of Tapestry represents chiefly the INVASION OF ENGLAND by WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR, and the subsequent death of Harold at the battle of Hastings.  It measures about 214 English feet in length, by about nineteen inches in width; and is supposed to have been worked under the particular superintendance and direction of Matilda, the wife of the Conqueror.  It was formerly exclusively kept and exhibited in the Cathedral; but it is now justly retained in the Town Hall, and treasured as the most precious relic among the archives of the city.  There is indeed