Of these, the first is
situated by the side of the road to Paris, under Mont Ste. Catherine,
yet, still upon an eminence, beneath which are some mineral springs,
that were long famous for their medicinal qualities, but have of late
years been abandoned, and the spa-drinkers now resort to others in the
quarter of the town called _de la Marequerie_. Both the one and the
other are highly ferruginous, but the latter most strongly impregnated
with iron.
The chancel is the only ancient part of the present church of St.
Paul's, and even this must be comparatively modern, if any confidence
may be placed in the current tradition, that the building, in its
original state, was a temple of Adonis or of Venus, to both which
divinities the early inhabitants of Rouen are reported to have paid
peculiar homage. They were worshipped in vice and impurity[63]; nor were
the votaries deterred by the evil spirits who haunted the immediate
vicinity of the temple, and who gave rise to so fetid and infectious a
vapor, that it often proved fatal! This very remark seems to indicate
the scite of the church of St.
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