announcements in the town of Pont Croix of "Ici on loge à pied et à cheval;" but this seemed to be the chief inn, and, from the general look of it, we congratulated ourselves that we had not arranged to stay there.

Our driver came after some delay and announced to us that he wished to spend the rest of the day at home, and had therefore engaged a fresh horse and carriage and another driver to take us on to Douarnenez, and home in the evening, if we wished, to Quimper. We did not benefit in any way by the exchange. The fresh horse would not go, and our new coachman knew nothing, and had an inveterate habit of gossipping on the road; and as this was the anniversary of several other Pardons in the neighbourhood, we continually met carts full of peasants in rich and beautiful dresses, often with pretty girls, and our driver, who was evidently a favourite, was for ever jumping down to have a chat with some of his friends, leaving our horse to crawl along at a snail's pace. We began to fear it would grow dusk before we got to Douarnenez, At last my companion whipped up the horse during one of these absences, and we went on at a quick pace, leaving our chattering driver to overtake us as he best could; and when he finally reached us, puffing and panting and very red in the face, he seemed effectually cured of his love of gossip.

We stopped a few moments at Confort to examine the handsome modern Calvary and the pretty little church. Inside this, fastened to the roof, is a curious old sacring wheel with a peal of bells. We much wished to hear these, but could not find the sacristan; the whole village was seemingly deserted; every one had gone to the Pardon at Pont Croix.

The road between Confort and Poul David looked even more charming than we had thought it the first time, and as we turned off to Douarnenez and followed the course of the river the tall spire of Ploaré seemed to follow us as it had done on our way to Audierne, while glimpses of the bay before us were exquisite.

WE had been told so much that was unfavourable about

Douarnenez that our first impressions were full of delightful surprise. A longer acquaintance with the little town teaches one that it is very ill kept and is full of unsavoury smells. But whoever sees the Bay of Douarnenez for the first time, either at early morning or at sunset, will never forget its exquisite loveliness. It may be that its beauty is enhanced when one comes to it fresh from the savage dreariness of Penmarc'h and the tormented sea and bare fantastic rocks of the Raz; but the lovely blue islandgemmed bay, reaching from the Pointe de la Chèvre to the Pointe de Van, now bordered by dark jagged rocks, now curving into numerous tiny bays, where valleys that lie sunk between stretches of moorland end in nooks of silver sand, sometimes almost fringed by trees and clinging plants that clothe the very cliffs, is a picture that can never be forgotten.

To the seeker after loveliness in nature Douarnenez offers a constant and varied charm. It is far more beautiful than Sidmouth, and has besides the two great charms of variety and picturesqueness.

In a charming paper in the Cornhill Magazine the writer says: "Round all the eastern and northern shores of the bay the view is bounded by long ranges of noble outline; first the hill of St. Ronan, where that saint had his hermitage, in the midst of what was then the great forest of Nevet; and following the chain of moors called the Black Mountains, with the Ménéhom for its crowning point. And so the whole shore of the bay is a succession of the wildest cliffs and the most perfect sands, the range of each extending generally for a mile or two at a time."

We drove first to the hospitable little inn, where we found a very pleasant gathering of travellers from many nations. Then we strolled through the little town, which has formal, uninteresting houses, and took a path on the right. This led across a field glowing a golden green in the level sunlight, and screened on one side by lofty trees to the edge of the côte overlooking the bay itself. Along the edge of this côte was a low hedge broken through in many places, and over it clematis and brambles flung long arms down towards the silver-looking sand below. The spreading trees near us were almost black against the glowing sky, for the intense blue of the whole bay was gilding into orange and softening into the tenderest green. Warm light glowed on the rock islets of the bay till they changed to purple. A few boys were bathing in one of the lovely little coves far in the distance. Three fishing-boats with brown and tawny-red sails glided over the calm sea, so full of peaceful beauty.

Tristan, the largest of the islands, grew darker every moment. It is so near the town that at low water it can almost be reached dry-footed.

There is a lighthouse on the Île Tristan, and from the top of this the view is magnificent. Far away at the extreme ends of the bay are, on one side the bare white cliffs of the Chèvre, and on the other the dark rugged rocks near the Baie des Trépassés. Between these lie Douarnenez, backed by trees and meadows, Ploaré and other villages, and rising up above, in dark grandeur, is the ridge of the Ménéhom. The colours on this hill were indescribably full of change as the sun sank and gradually disappeared.

The Île Tristan is said to take its name from Sir Tristram Lyonesse of the Round Table; and in a little village close by, to the east of Douarnenez, called Plomarc'h, the foundations of King Marc'h's palace are said to exist. A local tradition fixes on this King of Cornouaille, the husband of Iseulte, a fable resembling that of King Midas. Marc'h is Breton for horse, and the king's barber is said to have told the secret of the King's ears to the sands of the bay. Some time after three reeds sprang from the sand, and being cut and used for pipes they repeated always, “Marc'h, the King of Plomarc'h, has horse's ears."

But the Île Tristan has much local interest as having been the fastness of the brigand chief Guy Eder, who called himself Baron de Fontenelle. He was the youngest son of Robert Eder, Lord of Beaumanoir, and was born in 1572. He ran away from the college he had been placed in at Paris in 1589 to join a band of ruffians, who, under pretext of fighting for the League, plundered and murdered indiscriminately.