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"I will first show you the way," said Phoebus to his companion, "I will then go in search of the fair one who is awaiting me near the Petit-Chatelet." His companion made no reply; he had not uttered a word since they had been walking side by side. Phoebus halted before a low door, and knocked roughly; a light made its appearance through the cracks of the door.
And when the glance passed these bridges, whose roofs were visibly green, rendered mouldy before their time by the vapors from the water, if it was directed to the left, towards the University, the first edifice which struck it was a large, low sheaf of towers, the Petit-Chatelet, whose yawning gate devoured the end of the Petit-Pont.
Paris remained for many centuries in its island state, with two bridges, one on the north, the other on the south; and two bridge heads, which were at the same time its gates and its fortresses, the Grand-Chatelet on the right bank, the Petit-Chatelet on the left.
Then, from the date of the kings of the first race, Paris, being too cribbed and confined in its island, and unable to return thither, crossed the water. Then, beyond the Grand, beyond the Petit-Chatelet, a first circle of walls and towers began to infringe upon the country on the two sides of the Seine.
'Conduct them to the Petit-Chatelet, said he to the archers; 'and take especial care that the chevalier does not escape you: he is a scamp that once before escaped from St. Lazare. "He went out, and left me in a condition that you may picture to yourself.
As he passed the Rue de la Huchette, the odor of those admirable spits, which were incessantly turning, tickled his olfactory apparatus, and he bestowed a loving glance toward the Cyclopean roast, which one day drew from the Franciscan friar, Calatagirone, this pathetic exclamation: Veramente, queste rotisserie sono cosa stupenda!* But Jehan had not the wherewithal to buy a breakfast, and he plunged, with a profound sigh, under the gateway of the Petit-Chatelet, that enormous double trefoil of massive towers which guarded the entrance to the City.
Thus, beginning with the fifteenth century, where our story finds us, Paris had already outgrown the three concentric circles of walls which, from the time of Julian the Apostate, existed, so to speak, in germ in the Grand-Chatelet and the Petit-Chatelet. The mighty city had cracked, in succession, its four enclosures of walls, like a child grown too large for his garments of last year.
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