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Tours is the city of Saint Martin. Most of your Vendéens will be able to tell you several stories of saints and fairies. Martin was a Roman soldier during times when that empire ruled the world. One day he came upon a beggar suffering in the cold. He took his sword and cut his cape in two, sharing half with the beggar. The next day Jesus-Christ came to visit Martin and Christ was wearing the cape. Martin left the army and began to spread the word and works of Jesus. He would die near here in the village of Candes-Saint-Martin, and his body would become one of the great objects of pilgrimage in all of Christendom. Today, in this place, tourists and pilgrims are nearly indistinguishable, but to the careful eye it's easy to see those who came for reasons of the spirit and those who came for reasons quite other.
