While in 1869 I was spending my autumn holiday in Brittany, over the eastern portion of which I had largely roamed and familiarised myself with most of the places of interest within easy reach of St. Servan, I was fretting after an opportunity for some more extended expedition, and suggested to my friend Mr. Frederick Greenwood, of the “Pall Mall Gazette.” a series of articles on the ensuing vintage of the grand wines of France. He approved of the idea, and I at once started off to the famous wine district of the Gironde in company with my wife and eldest son, then assistant-secretary to the Institution of Naval Architects. We first of all made our way by rail to Nantes, to which the memories of its terrible noyades and mariages républicaines during the first French revolution gave a melancholy interest. During our short stay there we, of course, went over the mediaeval chateau where the famous edict of Nantes was signed, where Gilles de Eaiz, marshal of France and the Breton Barbe-bleu, was imprisoned before his trial, and whence Cardinal de Eetz escaped by lowering himself with a rope into a boat on the Loire. We were shown, too, the rooms where the Duchess de Berri had been confined, and our guide pointed out to us the island in the river where the fanatic Gilles de Raiz paid the penalty of his revolting crimes.