A curious old house is to the right hand corner of the street St. Jean:  as you go to the Post Office.  But I must inform you that the residence of the famous MALHERBE yet exists in the street leading to the Abbey of St. Stephen.  This house is of the middle of the sixteenth century:  and what Corneille is to Rouen, Malherbe is to Caen.  “ICI NAQUIT MALHERBE,” &c. as you will perceive from the annexed view of this house, inscribed upon the front of the building.  Malherbe has been doomed to receive greater honours.  His head was first struck, in a series of medals, to perpetuate the resemblances of the most eminent literary characters (male and female) in France:  and it is due to the amiable Pierre-Aime Lair to designate him as the FATHER of this medallic project.

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In perambulating this town, one cannot but be surprised at the absence of Fountains—­those charming pieces of architecture and of street embellishment.  In this respect, Rouen has infinitely the advantage of Caen:  where, instead of the trickling current of translucent water, we observe nothing but the partial and perturbed stream issuing from ugly wells[106] as tasteless in their structure as they are inconvenient in the procuring of water.  Upon one or two of these wells, I observed the dates of 1560 and 1588.

The PUBLIC EDIFICES, however, demand a particular and appropriate description:  and first of those of the ecclesiastical order.  Let us begin therefore with the ABBEY OF ST. STEPHEN; for it is the noblest and most interesting on many accounts.  It is called by the name of that Saint, inasmuch as there stood formerly a chapel, on the same site, dedicated to him.  The present building was completed and solemnly dedicated by William the Conqueror, in the presence of his wife, his two sons Robert and William, his favourite Archbishop Lanfranc, John Archbishop of Rouen, and Thomas Archbishop of York—­towards the year 1080:  but I strongly suspect, from the present prevailing character of the architecture, that nothing more than the west front and the towers upon which the spires rest, remain of its ancient structure.  The spires (as the Abbe De La Rue conjectures, and as I should also have thought) are about two centuries later than the towers.

The outsides of the side aisles appear to be of the thirteenth, rather than of the end of the eleventh, century.  The first exterior view of the west front, and of the towers, is extremely interesting; from the grey and clear tint, as well as excellent quality, of the stone, which, according to Huet, was brought partly from Vaucelle and partly from Allemagne.[107] One of the corner abutments of one of the towers has fallen down; and a great portion of what remains seems to indicate rapid decay.  The whole stands indeed greatly in need of reparation.  Ducarel, if I remember rightly,[108] has made, of this whole front, a sort of elevation, as if it were intended for a wooden