“Ma sœur, te souvient-il encore
Du château que baignait la Dore?
Et de cette tant vieille tour
Du Maure,
Ou l’airain sonnait le retour
Du jour?
“Te souvient-il du lac tranquille
Qu’effleurait l’hirondelle agile,
Du vent qui courbait le roseau
Mobile,
Et du soleil couchant sur l’eau,
Si beau?
“Oh! qui me rendra mon Hélène,
Et ma montagne et le grand chêne?
Leur souvenir fait tous les jours
Ma peine:
Mon pays sera mes amours
Toujours!”
St. Servan, like St. Malo, is steeped in antiquity; practically they form one town, although separated by the narrow strait which forms an entrance to the outer harbour of St. Malo. St. Servan registers over a hundred St. Malo craft engaged in fishing and in the coast trade. As the ancient Gallo-Roman town of Alethum, St. Servan, from very early times an archbishopric, was ravaged by barbarians and by floods and had a varied career, but at last the steady growth of the comparatively modern St. Servan made it a prosperous town of perhaps twelve thousand souls.
The chief of St. Servan’s architectural monuments is the great Tower of Solidor, built far out upon the rocks at the mouth of the Rance. It was built in 1384 by Duke John IV., at the epoch when he was combating the pretensions of Josselin of Rohan, Bishop of St. Malo, for the sovereignty of the town.
It is a great triangular hold with a cylindrical tower at each corner. Within is a stone staircase winding spirally upward and giving access to various vaulted chambers. It could oppose no great strength to modern artillery, and even in the olden time could not have been very secure, could the besiegers but get to the base of its walls. At the same time, from its isolated position, it served admirably as an outpost which at least offered a superior vantage against an attacking force, and it is unlikely that it could have been taken except by siege or by the fall of the supporting city at its back.
