Vendôme is a charming town, with old quarters, a castle and a Town Gate and a good pedestrianised centre. Among a number of medieval churches, its chief glory is the Église Abbatiale de la Trinité, the finest flower of the Flamboyant gothic, the last and daintiest development of the style. It was restored twenty years ago at a cost of 40 million francs; a sum not raised as in England by begging the charity of visitors, but contributed by local and national government as a natural and proper preservation of national heritage. If this is what disestablishment does for churches, I’m in favour. The doorway in particular (left) is a marvel, the door merely another opening in a vast wall of glass, a thin and permeable veil between the town of Vendôme and the Kingdom of God.