Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/17



was born about 1483 (the date is not certain), at Chinon, in Touraine, that fat and quiet province of subtle-witted, easy-going people, whose character has been so sympathetically described by the great Balzac (as in L'Illustre Gaudissart); for Balzac, like Descartes and Paul Louis Courier, was a son of the same soil, and, like Rabelais and Paul Louis, copiously illustrated his native province. Rabelais calls Touraine the garden of France, and Chinon a most famous, noble, and ancient town, the first in the world; and in Book v., chap. xxxv. of his great work, we read: 'This made me say to Pantagruel that this entry put me in mind of the painted cellar, in the oldest city in the world, where such paintings are to be seen, and in as cool a place. 'Which is the oldest city in the world?' asked Pantagruel. 'It is Chinon, sir, or Cainon, in Touraine,' said I. 'I know,' returned Pantagruel, 'where Chinon