“By no means:  by no means:  the Abbe will see you immediately.”  And forthwith appeared a very comely, tall, and respectable-looking gentleman, with his hair en plein costume, both as to form and powder.  Indeed I had rarely before witnessed so prepossessing a figure.  His salutation and address were most gracious and winning; and he told me that I had nothing to do but to accompany him to the place which I wished to visit.  Without even returning to his friends, he took his hat—­and in one minute, to my surprise, I found myself in the street with the Abbe de Mortueux, in the high way to the PUBLIC LIBRARY.  In our way thither our discourse was constant and unrestrained.  “You appear here; Monsieur l’Abbe, to be partial to literature;... but allow me first to congratulate you on the beautiful environs of your town.”  “For literature in general, we are pretty well disposed.  In regard to the beauties of the immediate neighbourhood of Vire, we should be unworthy inhabitants indeed, if we were not sensible of them.”  In five minutes we reached the Library.

The shutters of the room were fastened, but the worthy Abbe opened them in a trice; when I saw, for the first time in Normandy, what appeared to be a genuine, old, unmutilated, unpillaged library.  The room could be scarcely more than twenty-two feet square.  I went instantly to work, with eyes and hands, in the ardent hope, and almost full persuasion, of finding something in the shape of a good old Greek or Roman Classic, or French Chronicle, or Romance.  But, alas, I looked, and handled the tomes in vain!  The history of the library is this:—­The founder was a Monsieur PICHON; who, on being taken prisoner by the English, at the capture of Louisburg in 1758, resided a long time in England under the name of TYRREL, and lived in circumstances of respectability and even of opulence.  There—­whether on the dispersion of the libraries of our Meads, Foulkes’, and Rawlinsons, I know not—­he made his collection; took his books over with him to Jersey, where he died in 1780:  and bequeathed them, about 3000 in number, to his native town of Vire.  M. du Mortueux, who gave me these particulars, has drawn up a little memorial about Pichon.  His portrait, executed by an English artist, (whilst he lived among us) adorns the library; with which I hope it will go down to a distant and grateful posterity.  The colouring of this portrait is faded:  but it is evident that Monsieur Pichon had an expressive and sensible physiognomy.

Wonderful to relate, this collection of books was untouched during the Revolution; while the neighbouring library of the Cordeliers was ransacked without mercy.  But I regret to say that the books in the cupboards are getting sadly damp.  Do not expect any thing very marvellous in the details of this collection; The old-fashioned library doors, of wood, are quite in character with what they protect.  Among the earlier printed books, I saw a very bad copy of Sweynheym