Interior of the Abbey
MONT ST. MICHEL
We remember one occasion when, at a high tide, which necessitated the use of a boat for debarking visitors, a solitary English female, of the type so properly satirised by French caricaturists, arrived by the diligence, and was rowed in lonely state through the entrance to the outer court. As the boat grounded she stood up, an angular vision in drab, with dark blue spectacles and a straw hat. In answer to the inquiring shouts of the hotel representatives, she innocently replied in the one word she knew, "Poulard," and there was a rush for her, in which the elder Poulard, thanks to exceptional height and strength, was able to dispose of his rivals, and lift this representative of British womanhood bodily into the kitchen of his hotel. She would probably be as much surprised as most of us are on visiting the place for the first time, to discover that after leaving this kitchen and ascending two stairs in the hope of arriving immediately at our bedroom, the maid calmly opens a door, and we find ourselves in another street, that rises step after step for one hundred yards or so, and brings us to one of the dependencies of the hotel, where probably we may have two or three stories to climb. You have a feeling all the time you are on the Mount that, somehow, you are living on the top of slates, as the houses look down upon each other, and in many cases you can walk from the top flat out on to a street at the back.
In a word, Mont St. Michel is unique. A stay here is an experience unlike any to be had elsewhere in Europe. "Not worth visiting" forsooth!
PRINTING OFFICE OF THE PUBLISHER
Transcriber's Note: