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We see also at the same glance that something just to the west of the apse has been destroyed or left unfinished. Beyond this again is a much lower western body, a nave with its aisles thrown under one roof. This last is not attractive from without, but when we go in, we find that it is the jewel of Exmes.
But far greater changes were presently designed. As at Gisors, as at a hundred other places, the Flamboyant architects thought the elder building too plain, and above all things too low. In a great number of cases they rebuilt the choir after their own fashion, but never carried the work on to the nave. Here at Exmes the work in the eastern part was never finished.
The site of the castle of Exmes is not exactly in an ideal state. The best case of all would be if it still bore a castle of the right date; the second best would be if there were only a green hill and its ditch, with full power of walking freely over them as one thought good.
As soon as she learned of her father's death, she entered Normandy from the south, near Domfront, and was admitted to that town and to Argentan and Exmes without opposition by the viscount of that region, who was one of King Henry's "new men" in Normandy, and who recognized her claims at once.
Such is all that is to be seen of the castle of Exmes; but, in the absence of an actual donjon that can have seen the wars of the Conqueror and his sons, it is quite enough. The look-out is a wide one indeed; but it is now easier to get it from the road going back to Argentan than from the top of the hill itself.
Tall Exmes, lithe and cruel like a tiger it was pleasant to stroke him. The tiger was there, the parrot, the hare, the goat of course, and certainly much apishness. And, one and all, they were like the creatures, in their vagrant, short, memories, alert perpetually on the topmost crest of the day and hour, transferred so heartlessly, so entirely, from yesterday to to-day.
In special Norman history Exmes, under some or other of the forms of its name, Oximum, Hiesmes, anything else, often shows itself; its early importance is noticed by its giving its name to the large district, Pagus Oximensis, Oixmeiz, Hiesmsis. And the Oximenses are sometimes spoken of in a special way, as if they were a distinct people, capable of acting for themselves.
But we can say nothing as to the further merits or demerits of the Donjon, and the Three Maries sheltered us well enough by the space of six days. Exmes and Almenèches; one fancies that those names will sound strange to almost any one save those who have been lately reading the eleventh book of Orderic the Englishman.
Perhaps not the donjon itself, but the high ground about it is said to be seen from the tower of Saint German at Argentan. But we at least could not see it from Exmes. The other object in the little town of Exmes, now hardly more than a village, is the church. This stands on the general mass of high ground from which the castle hill juts out.
The castle-hill of Exmes is not in so happy a case as either of these; but it is much better off than if it were surmounted by a barrack or a prison.
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