Its extensive picture gallery contains a considerable variety of interesting paintings and ancient portraits. In short the general character and internal decorations of this spacious and antique building, its neat and extensive pleasure grounds, with the pretty sylvan park attached thereto, together render the place an object of very general interest.
PLESSIS-LES-TOURS.
In the plain, about a mile to the west-ward of Tours, a few comparatively inconsiderable remains of the royal Castle and appendages of Plessis-les-Tours, are still to be seen; they consist of an extensive wall about 15 feet high enclosing about 60 acres of arable land, an uninteresting habitable portion of the ancient structure, and a remnant of the once famous and beautiful Saint Hubert's Chapel. These solitary relics in fact barely suffice to attest the spot where high in the air, arose the noble and massive pile, which during the feudal times of darkness and of danger, was watched and defended with the most extreme and jealous care.
This castle was the favourite residence of Louis XI, and many were the strange and plotting scenes enacted here during the period it was dignified by the presence of his mysterious court. He is said to have been excessively superstitious, crafty, vindictive and cruel, and the vigilance and surveillance he caused to be exercised in the vicinity of his palace, by his not over scrupulous agents, continually filled the surrounding neighbourhood with awe and apprehension.
A vast enclosed chase, termed in latin of the middle ages, Plexitium, encircled the external enclosures surrounding the open esplanade which sloped up to the castle walls, rendering the precincts of the Royal domain as sombre and portentous in aspect, as were the dark and multiplied battlements which frowned above the monarchs of the surrounding forests.
The cruel and treacherous cardinal La Balue was a great favourite at this court, and for a considerable period basked in the smiles of royalty at Plessis-les-Tours, but Louis having strong grounds for suspecting that he had been mainly instrumental in betraying him to the duke of Burgundy,—his feuds with whom were highest about 1460—he ultimately caused him to be immured in one of the iron cages, we have referred to in our notice of Loches. In this horrid den, the invention of which some ascribe to Balue himself, he was confined eleven years, principally it is said at Plessis-les-Tours, nor did Louis permit him to be liberated till his last illness.
Such are a few of the historical facts associated with the crumbling memento which as yet remain of this favourite and beautiful demesne of a great and powerful monarch. All its proud bulwarks have long since fallen beneath the ruthless hand of time, and its noble and extensive forests been laid prostrate by the active axe of the cultivator, while the march of rural improvement which has entirely renewed the face of the plain, will ere long have swept every ancient vestige away leaving the antiquary to search for the locality of Plessis-les-Tours, alone in the page of History.
But what reasonable and enlightened mind will regret even such a consummation, for, as moral improvement advances towards the climax of perfection, we every day see the face of nature rejoicing in its progress, and her children enjoying the fruits of their industry in the fullness of freedom and of unrestricted liberty.
The clustering vine and the golden waving corn, now deck the place of the arbitrary halls, and the dismal dungeons of the castle, the peaceful hamlet with its neat and assiduously cultivated gardens, covers no inconsiderable portion of the once exclusive and lordly precincts, while its unsophisticated population pursue their daily avocations in fearlessness and in peace.
Old tottering ruins and dismantled Towers may of themselves under many circumstances be justly deemed very picturesque objects, and merit to be valued accordingly, but to preserve and venerate all solely for their historical associations, which at best, are but too frequently the dark and ignominious doings of a clandestine and barbarous age, would seem to argue a morbid sensibility, more befitting the devoted and infatuated antiquarian, than the true and enlightened philosopher who sees "language in stones and God in everything."