"Tell us, Monsieur Bianchon!" was the cry on every side. 

The obliging doctor bowed, and silence reigned. 

"At about a hundred paces from Vendome, on the banks of the Loir,"
said he, "stands an old brown house, crowned with very high roofs, and
so completely isolated that there is nothing near it, not even a fetid
tannery or a squalid tavern, such as are commonly seen outside small
towns.  In front of this house is a garden down to the river, where the
box shrubs, formerly clipped close to edge the walks, now straggle at
their own will.  A few willows, rooted in the stream, have grown up
quickly like an enclosing fence, and half hide the house.  The wild
plants we call weeds have clothed the bank with their beautiful
luxuriance.  The fruit-trees, neglected for these ten years past, no
longer bear a crop, and their suckers have formed a thicket.  The
espaliers are like a copse.  The paths, once graveled, are overgrown
with purslane; but, to be accurate there is no trace of a path. 

"Looking down from the hilltop, to which cling the ruins of the old
castle of the Dukes of Vendome, the only spot whence the eye can see