a town of France, capital of the department of Indre-et-Loire, on a flat piece of ground at the confluence of the Loire and Cher, 65 miles S.W. of Orleans, and 120 S.S.W. of Paris. It is surrounded by boulevards, occupying the site of the former fortifications, and beyond these are several suburbs. The principal approach to the town is by a magnificent stone-bridge, of fifteen arches, over the Loire, 475 yards long and 16 broad. From its termination, a straight, broad, and handsome street extends through the town, to a bridge over the Cher on the other side. Besides this street, a great part of the town is new, and consists of handsome houses and good streets and squares; but in some quarters there still remain the old, mean, and dirty lanes and houses, that formerly characterized the entire town. The chief building in Tours is the cathedral, which was rebuilt after the destruction of a former one in the twelfth century, but not completed till 1550. The west front, erected by Henry V. of England, has three high and richly carved portals, surmounted by a window of great size, and flanked by two towers 205 feet high. The interior is rich rather than elegant; it contains much fine painted glass, and many interesting monuments. The other churches of Tours are small and gloomy. Two towers are all that remain of the large abbey of St Martin, which existed for twelve centuries, but was destroyed at the Revolution. There are also here an archbishop's palace, one of the finest in France, a town-hall, court-house, public library, picture-gallery, museum, hospital, college, and various schools. Tours is an important manufacturing town, and is especially famous for silk fabrics, woollen cloth, hosiery, and leather. Corn, wine, brandy, fruits, hemp, and wool, are the chief articles of trade. Along the rivers' sides there are spacious quays, which, being lined with trees, form agreeable promenades; and there are also beautiful walks in the outskirts of the town. Tours was anciently called Caesarodunum, and was the chief town of the Turones, and afterwards the capital of a division of Gaul under the Romans. In modern times it had risen to great prosperity by the silk trade, and had a population of 80,000, when, by the revocation of the edict of Nantes, it was deprived of half its inhabitants, and nearly all its industry. From this blow it has never entirely recovered. It suffered greatly in the inundation of 1856. Tours is a favourite residence of the English in France. Pop. (1856) 33,204.