Tours
a town in France, capital of the department of Indre-et-Loire; on the Loire; 145 miles S. W. of Paris. The Loire is here crossed by two suspension bridges, a railway bridge, and a fine stone bridge 1,423 feet long. Many of the streets are spacious, and there are several historic chateaus in the neighborhood. The principal edifice is the cathedral (Tours being an archbishopric), flanked by two towers, 205 feet high, a fine building begun in the 12th, completed in the 16th centry. Of the old abbey church of St. Martin of Tours only two towers remain. The modern buildings include the church of St. Joseph, the theatre, and the musuem. Manufactures include silk, cloth, carpets, chemicals, etc., and there is a large printing and publishing establishment. Tours was known to the Romans by the name of Cæsarodunum. In later times it became famous for its silk manufactures, and had population of 80,000, when the ocation of the edict of Nantes deprived it of nearly half its inhabitants, a blow from which it has never recovered. In 1870 Tours was the seat of the govern- TOWER HILL