It was not even attacked; and when, in 1355, Edward the Black
Prince marched into it, the inhabitants had opened the gates to the
conqueror before whom all Languedoc was prostrate. I am not one of
those who, as I said just now, have a head for such things, and having
extracted these few facts had made all the use of M. Viollet-le-Duc's
pamphlet of which I was capable....
My obliging friend the "mad lover" [of la Cite] handed me over to the
doorkeeper of the citadel. I should add that I was at first committed
to the wife of this functionary, a stout peasant woman, who conducted
me to a postern door and ushered me into the presence of her husband.
This brilliant, this suggestive warden of Carcassonne marched us about
for an hour, haranguing, explaining, illustrating, as he went; it was
a complete little lecture, such as might have been delivered at the
Lowell Institute, on the manner in which a first-rate "place forte"
used to be attacked and defended. Our peregrinations made it very
clear that Carcassonne was impregnable; it is impossible to imagine,
without having seen them, such refinements of immurement, such
ingenuities of resistance.
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