There is no trace of
such frivolities now in the sleepy little town....
The two great towers of Amboise with the inclined planes of brickwork,
which wind upward in the midst instead of staircases, were the result
of the work which Charles set on foot as a distraction of his grief.
These strange ascents had been partially restored by the Comte de
Paris, the present owner of Amboise, before his exile stopt the work
of repairing the chateau, and it is still possible to imagine the
"charrettes, mullets, et litieres," of which Du Bellay speaks,
mounting from the low ground to the chambers above, or the Emperor
Charles V., in later years, riding up with his royal host Francis I.,
always fond of display, amid such a blaze of flambeaux "that a man
might see as clearly as at mid-day."
These great towers and the exquisite little chapel were the work of
the "excellent sculptors and artists from Naples" who, as Commines
tells us, were brought back with the spoils of the Italian wars; for
the young king "never thought of death" but only of collecting round
him "all the beautiful things which he had seen and which had given
him pleasure, from France or Italy or Flanders;" but death came upon
him suddenly.
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