At Mayenne,
the river of that name divides the provinces. The whole of this
country is singularly beautiful. I observed vast quantities of buck
wheat, which the French call _bled noir_ or _sarazin_. The country was
very much enclosed, producing a great contrast to the vast tracts of
land through which I had passed without a single division.
At two leagues from Mayenne we crossed the river Aisne, winding
through a beautiful valley, between Martigne and Louverne. On the left
the river forms a small lake, surrounded by a wood at the foot of a
very long and steep hill.
The town of Mayenne is ancient and irregularly built, the river
Mayenne running through it. The ruins of an old wall and some decayed
towers remain of the fortifications which were taken by assault, after
several bloody attempts, during the siege by the English, in 1424.
At Laval, where I stopped, after again crossing the Mayenne, I
entered the province of Bretagne: it is an old dirty town, completely
intersected by the river, and has a manufactory for coarse cloths and
cottons. The _Tete Noire_ is one of the worst inns I have met with in
the country. The department of the Isle-et-Vilaine commences here.
This place is celebrated in the history of the Vendean war by the
refuge Madame de Laroche-Jaquelin sought there, after the deplorable
defeat of the royalist army at the battle of Mans, where it received
its death-blow. The wreck of that army, under M. de Laroche-Jaquelin,
were driven from it again on the following day, and from that
hour never rallied so as to make any stand against the victorious
republicans.
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