Flèche

Flèche, LA, a town of France, in the department of Sarthe, on the Loir, 60 miles NW. of Tours by rail. It has manufactures of paper, oil, leather, and timber, and since 1764 has been the seat of a famous military school (Prytanée), founded in 1607 as a Jesuit college, where Eugene of Savoy and Descartes were educated. Here, too, are the heart and a statue (1857) of Henri IV.; and here David Hume spent three years (1734-37). Pop. 7977.