“The keep cannot be ascended without difficulty. We ventured to scale it; and we were fully repaid for our labor by the prospect which we gained. The Seine, full of green willowy islands, flows beneath the rock in large lazy windings: the peninsula below is flat, fertile, and well wooded: on the opposite shores, the fantastic chalky cliffs rise boldly, crowned with dark forests.”
FOOTNOTES:
[185] Vol. II. p. 113.
[186] So says Monstrelet; and he has generally been followed; but, according to Masseville, (Histoire de Normandie, IV. p. 84) the Norman Chronicle limits the duration of the siege to only seven months.
PLATE LXXXII.
CHURCH OF MONTIVILLIERS.
Plate 82. Abbey Church of Montivilliers.
West End.
Montivilliers is a town of about four thousand inhabitants, situated in a beautiful valley upon a small stream, called the Lezarde, near the western extremity of the Pays de Caux, within the distance of six leagues from Fécamp, and two from Havre de Grace. Its fortifications, now in ruins, were erected near the close of the fourteenth century, till which time it was altogether defenceless; but the state of France, just recovered from one English invasion and threatened with another, turned the thoughts of the government towards the securing of all vulnerable points on the northern frontier; and the trade of the place, though at present trifling, was at that period far otherwise. The cloths of Montivilliers were then considered to rival those of Flanders; and the preservation of the manufacture was regarded of so much consequence, that sundry regulations respecting it are to be found in the royal ordinances. The two circular towers of one of the gates now standing, afford a good specimen of the military architecture of the time.