THE CURIOSITIES.
I am as fond of seeing curiosities as any other grown child that ever existed; and as my companion was of the same mind as myself, the first thing we did the morning after our arrival at Poitiers, was to visit the ruins of the amphitheatre; which are very little worth seeing, except to those who love ruins for their own sake. The arena is filled up with gardens, and though the whole site is perfectly well marked out, but little of the walls exist at present. It was the son of the proprietor who showed us over the spot. He might be an idiot, or he might not, but he gave us no information, and kept grinning at us, and listening to our foreign dialect with evident marks of horror and astonishment. On our departure he followed us into the street, and still kept staring in our faces, till my friend appealed to my better knowledge of France to ascertain what he wanted. I answered, "A franc." My companion was incredulous, but I put my hand in my pocket, and drawing one out, I begged the young gentleman to give it to "la domestique." He took it immediately, with great satisfaction, and whether the servant ever received it or not, is between her young master and herself.
We went to the church of St. Radigonde too. It is really singular how prone the human mind is to lend itself to every sort of absurdity. We are made of odd clay certainly, of so soft a temper in our youth, that it takes the first form it happens to find, and then hardening there, would sooner break than quit it. There were a dozen old women at the church door, who make a livelihood by fixing themselves in the suite of Saint Radigonde, and we were instantly assailed by la bonne Ste. Radigonde prie pour vous, together with much counting of rosaries, and all the rest of Catholic begging. On entering the church we found an iron grating with a fine figure of the saint, dressed in a blue cloak powdered with fleurs de lys, not at all unlike one of the figures placed at the head of a ship. There, too, was what they are pleased to call the foot-mark of our Saviour, covered with some bars of iron, and an inscription above, to give authority to the falsehood. Round about it were scattered several pieces of money, from a sous to a franc, which my companion, in his fisherman's slang termed ground-bait.
Farther on is the tomb of the saint, with a silver lamp ever burning, the gift of Anne of Austria, in gratitude for the restored health of Louis XIV. after his illness at Metz, which the Queen attributes entirely to Saint Radigonde. In imitation of this royal credulity, multitudes of persons affected with various maladies have hung up at the shrine little effigies of the afflicted parts, modelled in wax: so that there are enough of waxen legs and arms to furnish the largest doll-shop in Europe. Passing through a low arch, we descended by a few steps to the sort of vault in which lies the stone coffin, supposed to contain the body of Saint Radigonde. This, the pious take care to adorn with large tapers, much to the gratification of the priests and the wax-chandlers.