cathedral, where Pommeraye[76] tells us the tomb existed in his time; with a bell engraved upon it, and the following epitaph:–
“Cy-dessous gist Jean le Machon
De Chartres homme de facon
Lequel fondit Georges d’Amboise
Qui trente six mille livres poise Mil cinq cens un jour d’Aoust deuxieme Puis mourut le vingt et unieme.”
Nor was this the only misfortune; for, after all, this great bell proved, like a great book, a great nuisance: the sound it uttered was scarcely audible; and, at last, in an attempt to render it vocal, upon a visit paid by Louis XVIth to Rouen in 1786, it was cracked[77]. It continued, however, to hang, a gaping-stock to children and strangers, till the revolution, in 1793, caused it to be returned to the furnace, whence it re-issued in the shape of cannon and medals, the latter commemorating the pristine state of the metal with the humiliating legend, “monument de vanite detruit pour l’utilite[78].”
Some of the clerestory windows on the northern side of the nave are circular: the tracery which fills them, and the mouldings which surround them, belong to the pointed style; the arches may therefore have been the production of an earlier architect. The windows of the nave are crowned by pediments, each terminating, not with a pinnacle, but with a small statue. The pediments over the windows of the choir are larger and bolder, and perforated as they rise above the parapet; the members of the mouldings are full, and produce a fine effect.
The northern transept is approached through a gloomy court, once occupied by the shops of the transcribers and caligraphists, the _libraires_ of ancient times, and from them it has derived its name. The court is entered beneath a gate-way of beautiful and singular architecture, composed of two lofty pointed arches of equal height, crowned by a row of smaller arcades. On each side are the walls of the archiepiscopal palace, dusky and shattered, and desolate; and the vista terminates by the lofty _Portal of St. Romain_; for it is thus the great portal of the transept is denominated. The oaken valves are bound with ponderous hinges and bars of wrought iron, of coeval workmanship. The bars are ornamented with embossed heads, which have been hammered out of the solid metal. The statues which stood on each side of the arch-way have been demolished; but the pedestals remain. These, as well as other parts of the portal, are covered with sculptured compartments, or medallions, in high preservation, and of the most singular character. They exhibit an endless variety of fanciful monsters and animals, of every shape and form, mermaids, tritons, harpies, woodmen, satyrs, and all the fabulous zoology of ancient geography and romance; and each spandril of each quatrefoil contains a lizard, a serpent, or some other worm or reptile. They have all the oddity, all the whim, and all the horror of the pencil of Breughel. Human groups and figures are interspersed, some scriptural, historical, or legendary; others mystical and allegorical. Engravings from these medallions would form a volume of uncommon interest. Two lofty towers ornament the transept, such as are usually seen only at the western front of a cathedral. The upper story of each is perforated by a gigantic window, divided by a single mullion, or central pillar, not exceeding one foot in circumference, and nearly sixty feet in height. These windows are entirely open, and the architect never intended that they should be glazed. An extraordinary play of light and shade results from this construction. The rose window in the centre of the transept is magnificent: from within, the painted glass produces the effect of a kaleidoscope.–The pediment or gable of this transept was materially injured by a storm, in 1638, one hundred and thirty years after it was completed; and the damage was never restored.
The southern transept bears a near resemblance to that which I have already described; but it was originally richer in its ornaments, and it still preserves some of its statues. Here the medallions relate chiefly to scripture-history; but the sculpture is greatly corroded by the weather, and the more delicate parts are nearly obliterated; besides which, as well here, as at the other entrances, the Calvinists, in 1562, and, more recently, the Revolutionists, have been most mischievously destructive, mutilating and decapitating without mercy. The spirit, indeed, of the French reformers, bore a near resemblance to the proceedings of John Knox and his brethren: the people embraced the new doctrine with turbulent violence. There was in it nothing moderate, nothing gradual: it was not the regular flow of public opinion, undermining abuses, and bringing them slowly to their fall; but it was the thunderbolt, which–
“In sua templa furit, nullaque exire vetante Materia, magnamque cadens magnamque revertens Dat stragem late sparsosque recolligit ignes.”
Among the legends recorded on the southern portal, or the _Portail de la Calende_, is that of the corn-merchant; the confiscation of whose property paid, as the chronicles tell us, for the erection of this beautiful entrance. He himself, if we may believe the same authority, was hanged in the street opposite to it, in consequence of having been detected in the use of false measures.
The original Lady-Chapel, at the east end of the cathedral, was taken down in 1302. The present, which is considerably more spacious, is chiefly of a date immediately subsequent. Part, however, was built in 1430, when new and larger windows were inserted throughout the church; whilst other parts were not finished till 1538, at which time the Cardinal Georges d’Amboise restored the roof of the choir, which had been injured in 1514, by the destruction of the spire.
The square central tower, which is low and comparatively plain, is the work of the year 1200. It is itself more ancient than would be supposed from the character of its architecture; but it occupies the place of one of still greater antiquity, which was materially damaged in 1117, when the original spire of the church was struck by lightning. This first spire was of stone, but was replaced by another of wood, which, as I have just mentioned, was also destroyed at the beginning of the sixteenth century. A fire, arising from the negligence of plumbers employed to repair the lead-work, was the cause of its ruin.–To remedy the misfortune, recourse was had to extraordinary efforts: the King contributed twelve thousand francs; the chapter a portion of their revenue and their plate; collections were made throughout the kingdom; and Leo Xth authorised the sale of indulgences, a measure, which, at nearly the same period, in its more extensive adoption for the building of St. Peter’s at Rome, shook the Papacy to its foundation. The spire thus raised, the second of wood, but the third in chronological order, is the one which is now in existence. It was, like its predecessor, endangered by the carelessness of the plumbers, in 1713; but it does not appear to have required any material reparations till ten years ago, when a sum of thirty thousand francs was expended upon it.
From what has already been said, you will not have failed to observe that this cathedral is the work of so many different periods, that it almost contains within itself a history of pointed architecture. To attempt a labored description of it were idle: minute details of any one of the portals would fill a moderate volume; and a quarto of seven hundred pages, from which I have borrowed most of my dates, has already been written upon the subject by a Benedictine Monk of the name of Pommeraye, who also published the history of the Archbishops of the See[79].
The first church at Rouen was built about the year 270: three hundred and thirty years subsequently, this edifice was succeeded by another, the joint work of St. Romain and St. Ouen, which was burned in the incursions of the Normans, about the year 842. Fifty years of Paganism succeeded; at the expiration of which period, Rollo embraced the faith of Christ, and Rouen saw once more within its walls, by the munificence and piety of the conqueror, a place of Christian worship. Richard Ist, grandson of this duke, and his son Robert, the archbishop, enlarged the edifice in the middle of the tenth century; but it was still not completed till 1063, when, according to Ordericus Vitalis, it was dedicated by the Archbishop Maurilius with great pomp, in the presence of William, Duke of Normandy, and the bishops of the province. Of this building, however, notwithstanding what is said by Ducarel[80] and other authors, it is certain that nothing more remains than the part of St. Romain’s tower, just noticed, and possibly two of the western entrances; though the present structure is believed to occupy the same spot.
To the honor of the spirit and good feeling of the inhabitants of Rouen, this church is one of those that suffered least in the outrages of the year 1793. Its dimensions, in French feet, are as follows:–
FEET.
Length of the interior………….. 408 Width of ditto………………….. 83 Length of nave…………………. 210 Width of nave…………………… 27 Ditto of aisles…………………. 15 Length of choir………………… 110 Width of ditto………………….. 35-1/2 Ditto of transept……………….. 25-1/2 Length of ditto………………… 164 Ditto of Lady-Chapel…………….. 88 Width of ditto………………….. 28 Height of spire………………… 380 Ditto of towers at the west end….. 230 Ditto of nave…………………… 84 Ditto of aisles and chapels………. 42 Ditto of interior of central tower.. 152 Depth of chapels………………… 10
Four clustered pillars support the central tower, each of which is thirty-eight feet in circumference; the rest, of which there are forty-four in the nave and choir, those in the former clustered, the others circular, are less by one-third. The windows amount in number to one hundred and thirty-three; the chapels to twenty-five. Most of the latter were fitted up during the minority of Louis XIVth, with wreathed columns, entwined with foliage, the style in vogue in the seventeenth century. In the farthest of these chapels, upon the south side, is the tomb of Rollo, first Duke of Normandy; in the opposite chapel, that of his son and successor, William Longue-Epee, who was treacherously murdered at Pecquigny, in 944, during a conference with Arnoul, Count of Flanders.
[Illustration: Monumental Figure of Rollo, in Rouen Cathedral]
The effigies of both these princes still remain placed upon sarcophagi, under plain niches in the wall. They are certainly not contemporary with the persons which they represent, but are probably productions of the thirteenth century, to which period Mr. Stothard, from whose judgment few will be disposed to appeal, refers the greater part of what are called the most ancient in the _Musee des Monumens Francais_. At the same time, they may possibly have been copied from others of earlier date; and I therefore send you a slight sketch of the figure of Rollo. Even imaginary portraits of celebrated men are not without their value: we are interested by seeing how they have been conceived by the artist.–Above the statue is the following inscription:–
HIC POSITUS EST
ROLLO,
NORMANNIAE A SE TERRITAE, VASTATAE, RESTITUTAE,
PRIMUS DUX, CONDITOR, PATER,
A FRANCONE ARCHIEP. ROTOM.
BAPTIZATUS ANNO DCCCCXIII,
OBIIT ANNO DCCCCXVII.
OSSA IPSIUS IN VETERI SANCTUARIO, NUNC CAPITE NAVIS, PRIMUM CONDITA,
TRANSLATO ALTARI, HIC COLLOCATA
SUNT A B. MAURILIO ARCHIEP. ROTOM. ANNO MLXIII.
Two other epitaphs in rhyming Latin, which were previously upon his tomb, are recorded by various authors: the first of them began with the three following lines–
DUX NORMANNORUM, CUNCTORUM NORMA BONORUM, ROLLO FERUS FORTIS, QUEM GENS NORMANNICA MORTIS INVOCAT ARTICULO, CLAUDITUR HOC TUMULO.
Over William Longue-Epee is inscribed–
HIC POSITUS EST
GULIELMUS DICTUS LONGA SPATHA,
ROLLONIS FILIUS,
DUX NORMANNIAE,
PREDATORIE OCCISUS DCCCCXXXXIV.
with an account of the removal of his bones, exactly similar to the concluding part of his father’s epitaph.
The perspective on first entering the church is very striking: the eye ranges without interruption, through a vista of lofty pillars and pointed arches, to the splendid altar in the Lady-Chapel, which forms at once an admirable termination to the building and the prospect. The high altar in the choir is plain and insulated. No other praise can be given to the screen, except that it does not interrupt the view; for surely it was the very consummation of bad taste to place in such an edifice, a double row of eight modern Ionic pillars, in white marble, with the figures of Hope and Charity between them, surmounted by a crucifix, flanked on either side with two Grecian vases.
The interior falls upon the eye with boldness and regularity, pleasing from its proportions, and imposing from its magnitude. The arches which spring from the pillars of the aisles, are surmounted by a second row, occupying the space which is usually held by the triforium: the vaulted roof of the aisles runs to the level of the top of this upper tier. This arrangement, which is found in other Norman churches, is almost peculiar to these; and in England it has no parallel, except in the nave of Waltham Abbey. Within the aisle you observe a singular combination of small pillars, attached to the columns of the nave: they stand on a species of bracket, which is supported by the abacus of the capital; and they spread along the spandrils of the arches on either side. These pillars support a kind of entablature, which takes a triangular plan. The whole bears a near resemblance to the style of the Byzantine architecture. Above the second row of arches are two rows of galleries. The story containing the clerestory windows crowns the whole; so that there are five horizontal divisions in the nave.–I give these details, because they indicate the decided difference of order which exists between the Norman and the English Gothic; a difference for which I have not been able to assign any satisfactory cause.
The tombs that were originally in the choir, commemorating Charles Vth, of France; Richard Coeur de Lion; his elder brother, Henry; and William, son of Geoffrey Plantagenet, were all removed in 1736, as interfering with the embellishments then in contemplation. The first of them alone was preserved and transferred to the Lady-Chapel, where it has subsequently fallen a victim to the revolution. The others are wholly destroyed; nor could Ducarel find even a fragment of the effigies that had been upon them; but engravings of these had fortunately been preserved by Montfaucon[81], from whom he has copied them. The monument of the celebrated John of Lancaster, third son of our Henry IVth, better known as the Regent Duke of Bedford, had been previously annihilated by the Calvinists. Lozenge-shaped slabs of white marble, charged with inscriptions, were inserted in the pavement over the spots that contain the remains of the princes, and they have been suffered to continue uninjured through the succeeding tumults. On the right of the altar, you read,–
COR
RICHARDI, REGIS ANGLIAE,
NORMANNIAE DUCIS,
COR LEONIS DICTI.
OBIIT ANNO
MCXCIX.
On the opposite side:–
HIC JACET
HENRICUS JUNIOR,
RICHARDI, REGIS ANGLIAE,
COR LEONIS DICTI, FRATER.
OBIIT ANNO
MCLXXXIII.
And in the choir behind the altar:–
AD DEXTRUM ALTARIS LATUS
JACET
JOHANNES, DUX BEDFORDI,
NORMANNIAE PROREX.
OBIIT ANNO
MCCCCXXXV.
Of Prince William nothing is said; it was found, upon opening his place of sepulture, that he had not been interred here.–Richard strangely received a triple funeral. In obedience to his wishes, his heart was buried at Rouen, while his body was carried to Fontevraud, and his entrails were deposited in the church of Chaluz, where he was killed:–this division is commemorated in the quaint, yet energetic lines, which are said to have been inscribed upon his tomb:–
VISCERA CARCEOLUM, CORPUS FONS SERVAT EBRARDI, ET COR ROTOMAGUM, MAGNE RICHARDE, TUUM. IN TRIA DIVIDITUR UNUS QUI PLUS FUIT UNO; NEC SUPEREST UNI GLORIA TANTA VIRO.
Richard neither withheld his gifts nor his protection from the metropolitan church; and, after his death, the chapter inclosed the heart of their benefactor in a shrine of silver. But a hundred and fifty years subsequently, the shrine was despoiled, and the precious metal was melted into ingots, forming a portion of the ransom which redeemed St. Louis from the fetters of his Saracen conqueror.
Henry the younger, who was crowned King of England during the life-time of his father, against whom he subsequently revolted, also requested on his death-bed, that his body might be interred in this church; and his directions were obeyed, though not without much difficulty; for the chapter of the cathedral of Mans, where his servants rested with the body _in transitu_, seized and buried it there; nor did those of Rouen recover the corpse, without application to the Pope and to the King his father.
A tablet of black marble, affixed to one of the pillars of the nave, contains the following interesting memorial:
IN MEDIA NAVI,
E REGIONE HUJUS COLUMNAE,
JACET
BEATAE MEM. MAURILIUS,
ARCHIEP. ROTOM. AN. MLV.
HANC BASILICAM PERFECIT
CONSECRAVITQUE ANNO MLXIII.
VIX NATOS BERENGARII ERRORES
IN PROX. CONCIL. PRAEFOCAVIT.
PLENUS MERITIS OBIIT ANN. MLXVII. HOC PONTIF. NORMANNI,
GULIELMO DUCE, ANGLIA POTITI SUNT ANNO MLXVI.
[Illustration: Monumental Figure of an Archbishop, in Rouen Cathedral]
In the northern aisle of the choir, there still exists a curious monument, in an injured state indeed, but well deserving of attention, from its antiquity. It has been referred by tradition to Maurice, or William of Durefort, both of them archbishops of Rouen, and buried in the cathedral, the former in 1237, the latter in 1331; but the recumbent figure upon it seems of a yet more distant date. It differs in several respects from any that I have seen in England[82]. The tomb is in the wall, behind a range of pillars, which form a kind of open screen round the apsis. Below the effigy, it is decorated with a row of whole-length figures of saints, much mutilated: the circular part above is lined with angels, a couple of whom are employed in conveying the soul of the deceased in a winding-sheet to heaven[83].
[Illustration: Monument of an Archbishop]
The Lady-Chapel contains two monuments of great merit, and which, considered as specimens of matured art, have now no rivals in Normandy; for both owe their origin to a period of refinement and splendor. The sepulchre raised over the bodies of the two Cardinals of Amboise, successively Archbishops of Rouen, towers on the southern side of the chapel. The statues of the cardinals are of white marble. The prelates appear kneeling in prayer; and the following inscription, engraved in a single line, and not divided into verses, is placed beneath them:–
PASTOR ERAM CLERI, POPULI PATER, AUREA SESE LILIA SUBDEBANT QUERCUS[84] ET IPSA MIHI. MORTUUS EN JACEO, MORTE EXTINGUUNTUR HONORES; AT VIRTUS MORTIS NESGIA MORTE VIRET.
Immediately behind the cardinals are figures of patron saints; a centre tablet represents St. George and the Dragon; above are the apostles; below, the seven cardinal virtues. The execution of these is particularly admired, especially that of the figure of Prudence; but a row of still smaller figures, in devotional attitudes, carved upon the pilasters between the virtues, are in higher taste. Various arabesques in basso-relievo, of great beauty, and completely in the style of the _Loggie_ of Raphael, adorn the other parts of this sumptuous tomb.–As a whole it is unquestionably grand, and it is yet farther valuable as an illustration of the gorgeous taste that prevailed at the end of the fifteenth century; but the mixture of black and white marble and gilding has by no means a good effect, and every part is overloaded with ornaments[85]. These, however, are the faults of the times: its merits are its own.
On the north side of the chapel is entombed the Duke of Breze, once Grand Seneschal of Normandy; his tomb is chaste and simple, forming a pleasing contrast to the elaborate memorial of the cardinals. The statue of the seneschal himself, represented stretched as a corpse, upon a black marble sarcophagus, is admirable for its execution. The rigid expression of death is visible, not only in the countenance, but extends through every limb. Diana of Poitiers, a beauty who enjoys more celebrity than good fame, erected the monument; and she caused her statue to be placed on the tomb, where she is seen kneeling and contemplating. In the following inscription she promises to be as faithful and united to him after his death as she was while they both lived: and she truly kept her word; for, during his life-time, she was grievously suspected of infidelity[86], and she subsequently lived in an open state of concubinage with Henry IInd, and was at last buried at her own celebrated residence at Anet, twenty leagues from her husband.–
HOC, LODOICE, TIBI POSUI, BREZAEE, SEPULCHRUM, PICTONIS AMISSO MOESTA DIANA VIRO;
INDIVULSA TIBI QUONDAM ET FIDISSIMA CONJUX, UT FUIT IN THALAMO, SIC ERIT IN TUMULO.
A second female figure on the tomb, with a child in her arms, has been supposed intended to represent the nurse of the duke; as if the design of the sculptor had been to read a lesson to mortality, by exhibiting the warrior in the helplessness of infancy, in the vigor of manhood, and as a breathless corpse. Some persons, however, consider it as a personification of Charity; others suppose that it represents the Virgin Mary. In the midst was originally an erect statue of De Breze, decorated with the various symbols of his dignities; but this sinned beyond the hope of redemption against the doctrines of liberty and equality, and it was accordingly removed at the time of the revolution, together with two inscriptions. One of them, which detailed his honors, with the addition that he died July twenty-third, 1531, has recently been recovered by the care of M. Riaux, and is restored to its place. The other inscription and the effigy, it is feared, are irrevocably lost. An equestrian statue in the upper part of the monument was suffered to remain, and, as a record of the military costume of the sixteenth century, I annex a sketch of it. The armorial hearings upon the horse and armor are nearly obliterated.–The pile is surmounted a figure of Temperance; the bridle in whose mouth shews how absurd is allegory, when “submitted to the faithful eye.”
[Illustration: Equestrian Figure of the Seneschal de Breze, in Rouen Cathedral]
Lenoir, who, in his work on the _Musee des Monumens Francais_, has treated much at large of the history of Diana of Poitiers, and has figured her own beautiful mausoleum, which he had the merit of rescuing from destruction, pronounces[87] this monument to be from the hand of Jean Cousin, one of the most able sculptors of the French school.
Over the altar in the Lady-Chapel is the only good painting in the cathedral, the _Adoration of the Shepherds_, by Philip de Champagne, a solid, well-colored, and well-grouped picture. Two cherubs in the air are excellently conceived and drawn: the whole is lighted from the infant Christ in the cradle, a _concetto_, which has been almost universally adopted, since the time when Corregio painted his celebrated _Notte_, now at Dresden.
There is no great quantity of painted glass in the church, but much of it is of good quality. The windows of the choir, on either side of the Lady-Chapel, are as rich as a profusion of brilliant colors can make them; but the figures are so small, and so crowded, that the subjects cannot be traced. They are said to be the work of the thirteenth century. The painted windows in St. Stephen’s chapel, of the sixteenth century, are generally considered the best in the cathedral. I own, however, that I should give the preference to those in the chapel of St. Romain, in the south transept. One of them is filled with allegorical representations of the virtues of the archbishop; another with his miracles: every part is distinct and clear, and executed with great force and great minuteness. The vestments of the saint have all the delicacy of miniature-painting.
The library of the cathedral, formerly one of the richest in France, disappeared during the revolution; but the noble room which contained it, one hundred feet long, by twenty-five feet wide, still remains uninjured; as does the door which led into it from the northern transept, and which continues to this day to bear the inscription, _Bibliotheca_. The staircase, communicating with this door, is delicate and beautiful. The balustrades are of the most elegant filagree; and it has all the boldness and lightness which peculiarly characterise the French Gothic. Its date being well ascertained, we may note it as an architectural standard. It was erected by the archbishop, Cardinal d’Etouteville, about the year 1460, thirty or forty years subsequently to the building of the room.
Respecting the contents of the sacristy, I can say little from my own knowledge; but I find by Pommeraye, that, before the revolution, it boasted of a large silver image of the Virgin, endued with peculiar sanctity, a few drops of her milk, and a portion of her hair[88]; a splinter of the true cross, set in gold, studded with pearls, sapphires, and turquoises; and reliques of saints without number. Now, however, it appears, that of all its treasures, it has preserved little else except the shrine of St. Romain, and another known by the general name of _Chasse des Saints_. The former is two feet six inches long, and one foot nine inches high, and is of handsome workmanship, with a variety of figures on the sides, and St. Romain himself at the top. Formerly it was supposed to be made of gold; now I was assured by one of the canons, that it is of silver gilt; but Gilbert[89], who is a plain layman, maintains that it is only copper. Had it been otherwise, it would have contributed to the ways and means of the unchristian republic; but the democrats spared it, for they had well ascertained that the metal was base, and that the jewels, which adorn it, are but glass.–This is not the original shrine which held the precious relics: the shrine in which they were deposited by the archbishop, William Bonne Ame, when first brought to the cathedral, in 1090, was sold during a famine, and its proceeds distributed to the starving poor; after which, in 1179, Archbishop Rotrou caused another still more costly to be made; but the latter was broken to pieces by the Calvinists, in 1562, and the saint’s body cast into the fire[90].
Thus, then, I have led you, as far as I am able; through the cathedral, adjoining which, at the east end, stands the palace of the archbishop, a large building, but neither handsome nor conspicuous, principally the work of the Cardinal Georges d’Amboise, though begun by the Cardinal d’Etouteville, in 1461. The rooms in it which are shewn to strangers are the anti-chamber, commonly called _la salle de la Croix_, the library, and the great gallery. This last, which is one hundred and sixty feet long, is also known by the name of _la salle des Etats_. In it are placed four very large paintings by Robert, an eminent French artist of comparatively modern date. They represent the city of Rouen, the town of Dieppe, that of Havre de Grace, and the archiepiscopal palace at Gaillon. The view of Rouen represents in the foreground the _petit Chateau_, and is on that account peculiarly interesting. All of them are fine paintings, but much injured by the damp. In the anti-chamber are portraits of seven prelates of the see, and among them those of the Cardinal de la Rochefoucault, and M. de Tressan: our guide could name no others.
The present archbishop is the Cardinal Cambaceres, brother to the ex-consul of that name, a man of moral life and regular in his religious duties. He was placed here by Napoleon, all of whose appointments of this nature, with one or two exceptions, have been suffered to remain; but I need scarcely add that, though the title of archbishop is left, and its present possessor is decorated with the Roman purple, neither the revenue, nor the dignity, nor the establishment, resemble those of former times. The chapter, which, before the revolution, consisted of an archbishop, a dean, fifty canons, and ten prebendaries, besides numberless attendants, now consists but of his eminence, with the dean, the treasurer, the archdeacon, and twelve canons. The independent annual income of the church, previous to the revolution, exceeded one hundred thousand pounds sterling; but now its ministers are all salaried by government, whose stated allowance, as I am credibly informed, is to every archbishop six hundred and twenty-five pounds per annum; to every bishop four hundred and sixteen pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence; and to every canon forty-one pounds thirteen shillings and four-pence. But each of these stipends is doubled by an allowance of the same amount from the department; and care is taken to select men of independent property for the highest dignities.–From the foregoing scale, you may judge of the state of the religious establishment in France. It is, indeed, unjustly and unreasonably depressed, and there is much room for amendment; but we must still hope and trust that things will not soon regain their former standard, though attempts are daily making to identify the Catholic clergy with the present dynasty; and the most lively expectations are entertained from the well-known character of some of the royal family.
Footnotes:
[71] _Bentham, History of Ely, 2nd edit_. I. p. 34.
[72] _Liverpool Panorama of Arts and Sciences_, article _Architecture_.
[73] The only views of the cathedral with which I am acquainted, are,
A single plate of the west front, 16 in. by 11-1/2in.–_Anonymous_; . . . . . . . . . . . north side, 16 in. by 11-1/2in.–Marked _S.L.B._; A small north-west view, engraved by Pouncey, in the first volume of _Gough’s Alien Priories_;
And the west front, on an extremely reduced; scale, in _Seroux d’Agincourt’s Histoire de l’Art par les Monumens, Architecture_, t. 64. f. 21. p. 68.
[74] This great benefactor to Rouen died the following year, deeply lamented by the inhabitants, and generally so by France; but, above all, regretted by Louis XIIth, his sovereign, whom, to use the words of Guicciardini, he served as oracle and authority. The author of the History of the Chevalier Bayard, is still louder in his praise.–The western facade of the cathedral was not finished till 1530, twenty years after his death.
[75] A representation of this has recently been published from an engraving on stone by Langlois.
[76] _Histoire de l’Eglise Cathedrale de Rouen_, p. 50.
[77] _Noel, Essais sur le Departement de la Seine Inferieure_, II. p. 239.
[78] _Millin, Histoire Metallique de la Revolution Francaise_, t. 22. f. 84.
[79] _Histoire des Archeveques de Rouen_, folio 1667.
[80] Anglo-Norman Antiquities, p. 12.
[81] _Monumens de la Monarchie Francaise_, II. t. 15. f. 3 and 5.
[82] As these effigies are in general little understood, even by those who look at them with pleasure as specimens of art, or with respect as relics of antiquity, I am happy to be able to give the following detailed illustration of this at Rouen, extracted from a letter which the Right Rev. Dr. Milner had lately the kindness to write me upon the subject.
“The sepulchral monument in the cathedral of Rouen represents a prelate; that is to say, Bishop or Mitred Abbot, as appears by his mitre, gloves, ring, and sandals. But, as he bears the _Pallium_, (to be seen on his neck, just above his breast, and hanging down before him, almost to his feet) it appears that he is a _Metropolitan_, or Archbishop, as, indeed, each of the bishops of Rouen was, from the time of St. Ouen and St. Romanus, in the seventh century, if not from that of St. Nicasius, in the third or fourth. The statue has been mutilated in the mitre, the face, and the crosier; probably when the Huguenots were masters of the city. The mitre is low, as they used to be from the tenth century, when they began to rise at all in the Latin Church, down to the fourteenth, since which they have grown to their present disproportioned height. The arms are crossed, as in prayer; and the left arm supported a crosier, the remnant of which is seen under that arm. Both hands are wrapped up in ornamented gloves, which were an essential part of the prelatic dress. The principal vestment is the _Planeta, Casula,_ or _Chausible_; as it was shaped till within these three or four hundred years. Underneath that, and behind the hanging _Pallium_, appears the _Dalmatic_, edged with gold lace; and under that, extending the whole breadth of the figure, and finishing with rich and deep thread lace, is the _Alb_, made of fine linen. The _Tunic_ is quite hidden by the dalmatic. The _Sandals_ appear to be of gold tissue, and to rest on a rich carpet.
“I ought to have mentioned, that the mitre appears, by the jewels with which it is ornamented, to represent that which is called _Mitra pretiosa_, from this circumstance. An inferior kind of mitre, worn on less solemn occasions, was termed _Mitra Aurifrygiata_; and a common one, made of plain linen or silk, was termed _Simplex Mitra_. The only part of the dress which puzzles me, is the great ornament on the neck and shoulders. The question is, (which those can best determine who have seen the original statue,) whether it adheres to the _Pallium_, or to the _Casula_. In either case, it must be considered as part of the vestment to which it adheres.
“It is quite out of my power to determine, or even to conjecture on any rational grounds, which, of a certain three-score of archbishops of Rouen, the figure represents; but, if I were to choose between Maurice, the fifty-fourth archbishop, who died in 1235, and William, of Durefort, the sixty-first, who died in 1330, from the comparative lowness of the mitre, and some other circumstances of the dress, I should determine in favor of the former. Perhaps it may represent our Walter, who was first Bishop of Lincoln, and then transferred to Rouen, by Pope Lucius IIIrd. He died in 1208, after having signalized himself as much as any of his predecessors or successors have done.
“P.S. On consulting with an intelligent ecclesiastic of Rouen, I am inclined to think that the above-mentioned ornament upon the shoulders, is the _Mozetta_, being a short round cloak, which all bishops still wear, with the _Rochet, Pectoral Cross_, and _Purple Cassock_, as their _ordinary dress_; but, in modern times, the _Mozetta_ is laid aside, when the prelate puts on his officiating vestments; though he retains the cassock, cross, and rochet, underneath them. My informant says, that this mozett is common on the tombs of bishops who died in former ages.”
[83] The same idea is to be observed on many ancient monuments: among others, it is engraved on the fine sepulchral brass to the memory of Sir Hugh Hastings, in Elsing church.–See _Cotman’s Norfolk Sepulchral Brasses._
[84] By the words _Lilia_ and _Quercus_, are designated the armorial bearings of the King of France, and Pope Julius IInd, of the House of Rovere.
[85] The bodies of the Cardinals d’Amboise were dug up in 1793, together with most of the others interred in the cathedral, for the sake of their leaden coffins: at the same time the lead was also stripped from the transepts; and a colossal statue of St. George, which stood on the eastern point of the choir, was likewise consigned to the furnace.
[86] Ducarel says (_Anglo-Norman Antiquities_, p. 20.) that she was the favorite mistress of two successive kings; but I do not find this assertion borne out by history.
[87] Vol. IV. p. 47.
[88] The doctrine of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, gave rise to some curious doubts respecting the authenticity of the Virgin’s hair. Ferrand, the Jesuit, states the arguments to the contrary with candor; but replies to them with laudable firmness. The passage is a whimsical specimen of the style and reasoning of the schools:–“Restat posteriore loco de capillis Deiparae Virginis paucis dicere, enimvero an illi sint jam in terris!–Dubitationem aliquam afferre potest mirabilis ipsius anastasis, et in coelum viventis videntisque assumptio triumphalis.–Quid ita?–quid si intra triduum ad vitam revocata, si coelis triumphantis in morem invecta, si corpore gloria circumfuso Christo assidet? _Quidquid Virgineo capiti crinium inerat hand dubie caelis intulit_, ne quid perfectae ac numeris omnibus absolutae ipsius pulchritudini deesse possit. Nae ille in politiori literatura imo et in rebus humanis omnino peregrinus sit qui ignoret quantum ad muliebrem formam comae conferat pulchritudo … ne singulas Marianae pulchritudinis dotes persequar, ejus ima craearies de qua, agimus tantae fuit venustatis ut mysticus ipsius Sponsus blande querulus exclamare cogatur, _vulnerasti cor meum in uno crine colli tui_…. Naenias igitur occinere videtur qui Deiparae capillos in terris relatos esse memoret atque adeo servari obfirmate asseveret, cum illos tantum ad redivivae Virginis speciem conferre constet.–Non efficiet tamen unquam haec _Antidicomarianitae_ fabula, quin credam bene multos ex aurea Dei Genitricis caesarie crines, diversis in locis ecclesiisque religiose servari…. Meae fidei non unum est argumentum; nam a prima aetate ad confectam usque, e Mariana coma non pancos, ut fit, capillos pecten decussit, nisi si forte caesariem B. Virginis impexam semper perstitisse velis, quod numquam (ut inquit de Christo Diva Brigitta) super eam venit vermis, aut perplexitas, aut immunditium. At sine causa multiplicari miracula quis aequo animo feret?–Ubi vero Genetrix e vita discessit, quam sollicite pollinctrices auream illam Marianae comae segetem demessuerunt, quam in sacris suis tunc hierothecia reconderent ad memoriam tantae Imperatricis, et ad suae consolationis et pietatis argumentum: quod si forte totam funditusque a pollinctricibus, Deiparae reverentissimis, demessam caesariem ferre nec possis nec velis, extremes saltem illius cincinnos attonsos fuisse feres ab piissimis illis faeminis, quibus vel perexiguus Dei Genitricis capillus ingentis thesauri loco futurus etat.”–_Disquisitio Reliquiaria_, l. 1. cap. II.
[89] _Description Historique de l’Eglise de Notre Dame de Rouen_, p. 83.
[90] The event is described in the metrical history of Rouen, composed by a minstrel ycleped _Poirier, the limper_. This little tract is a _chap-book_ at Rouen: most towns, in the north of France and Belgium, possess such chronicle ballads in doggerel rhyme, which are much read, and eke chaunted, by the common people.
“… un massacre horrible
Survint soudainement.
Les Huguenots terribles
Et Montgommerie puissant,
Par cruels enterprises
Renverserent les Eglises
De Rouen pour certain.
Sans aucune relache
Pillent et volent la chasse
Du corps de St. Romain.
“Le zele Catholique
Poursuivant l’Huguenot
Un combat heroique
Lui livra a propos,
Au lieu nomme la Crosse,
Et reprirent par force
La chasse du Patron.
Puis de la Rue des Carmes
La portent a Notre Dame
En deposition!”
LETTER XI.
POINTED ECCLESIASTICAL ARCHITECTURE–THE CHURCHES OF ST. OUEN, ST. MACLOU, ST. PATRICE, AND ST. GODARD.
(_Rouen, June_, 1818.)
In the religious buildings, the subject of my preceding letters, I have endeavored to point out to you the specimens which exist at Rouen, of the two earliest styles of architecture. The churches which I shall next notice belong to the third, or _decorated_ style, the aera of large windows with pointed arches divided by mullions, with tracery in flowing lines and geometrical curves, and with an abundance of rich and delicate carving.
This style was principally confined in England to a period of about seventy years, during the reigns of the second and third Edward. In France it appears to have prevailed much longer. It probably began there full fifty years sooner than with us, and it continued till it was superseded by the revival of Grecian or Italian architecture. I speak of France in general, but I must again repeat, that my observations are chiefly restricted to the northern provinces, the little knowledge which I possess of the rest being derived from engravings. No where, however, have I been able to trace among our Gallic neighbors the existence of the simple _perpendicular_ style, which is the most frequent by far in our own country, nor of that more gorgeous variety denominated by our antiquaries after the family of Tudor.
So long as Normandy and England were ruled by the same sovereign, the continual intercourse created by this union caused a similarity in their architecture, as in other arts and customs; and therefore the two earliest styles of architecture run parallel in the two countries, each furnishing the counterpart of the other. Whether or not the _decorated_ style was transmitted to England from the continent, is a question which cannot be solved, until our collections of continental architecture shall become more extensive. After the reign of Henry VIth, our intercourse with Normandy wholly ceased; and, left to ourselves, many innovations were gradually introduced, which were not known to the French architects, who, with nicer taste, adhered to the pure style which we rejected. Hence arose the _perpendicular_ style of pointed architecture, a style sufficiently designated by its name, and obviously distinguished from its predecessors, by having the mullions of its windows, its ornamental pannelling, and other architectural members and features, disposed in perpendicular lines. Finally, however, both countries discarded the Gothic style, though at different aeras. The revival of the arts in Europe, in consequence of the capture of Constantinople and of the greater commercial intercourse between transalpine Europe and Italy, gradually gave rise to an admiration of the antique: imitation naturally succeeded admiration; and buildings formed upon the classical model generally replaced the Gothic. Italian architects found earlier patrons and earlier scholars, in France, than amongst us, our intermediate style being chiefly distinguished by its clumsiness.
I will not detain you by any attempt at a comparison between the relative beauties of the Gothic and Grecian architecture, or their respective fitness for ecclesiastical buildings. The very name of the former seems sufficient to stamp its inferiority; and perhaps you will blame the employment of a term which was obviously intended at the outset as an expression of contempt; but I still retain the epithet, as one generally received, and therefore, commonly understood. It may be added, that the modern French seem to be the only _Goths_, in the real and true acceptation of the word. They, to the present day, build Gothic churches; but, instead of confining themselves to the prototypes left them, they are eternally aiming at alterations, under the specious name of improvements. Horace was indignant that, in the Augustan age, the meed of praise was bestowed only upon what was ancient: the architects of this nation of recent date seem under the influence of an opposite apprehension. They build upon their favorite poet:–
“Loin d’ici ce discours vulgaire
Que l’art pour jamais degenere,
Que tout s’eclipse, tout finit; La nature est inepuisable,
Et le genie infatigable
Est le Dieu qui la rajeunit.”
But they overlook, what Voltaire makes an indispensable requisite, that art must be under the guidance of genius: when it is not so, and caprice holds the reins, the result cannot fail to be that medley of Grecian, Norman, Gothic, and Gallic, of which this country furnishes too many examples.
The church of St. Ouen is unquestionably the noblest edifice in the pointed style in this city, or perhaps in France; the French, blind as they usually are to the beauties of Gothic architecture, have always acknowledged its merits. Hence it escaped the general destruction which fell upon the conventual churches of Rouen, at the time of the revolution; though, during the violence of the storm, it was despoiled and desecrated. At one period, it was employed as a manufactory, in which forges were placed for making arms; at another, as a magazine for forage.
Nor was this the first instance of its being violated; for, like most of the religious buildings at Rouen, it was visited in the sixteenth century with the fury of the Calvinists[91], who burned the bodies of St. Ouen, St. Nicaise, and St. Remi, in the midst of the temple itself; and cast their ashes to the winds of heaven. The other relics treasured in the church experienced equal indignities. All the shrines became the prey of the eager avarice of the Huguenots; and the images of the saints and martyrs, torn from their tabernacles, graced the gibbets which were erected to receive them in various parts of Rouen.
Dom Pommeraye, in reciting these deplorable events, rises rather above his usual pitch of passion: “O malheur!” he exclaims, “ces corps sacres, ces temples du Saint Esprit, qui avoient autrefois donne de la terreur aux Demons, ne trouverent ni crainte ni respect dans l’esprit de ces furieux, qui jetterent au feu tout ce qui tomba entre leurs mains impies et sacrileges!”–The mischief thus occasioned was infinitely more to be lamented, he adds, than the burning of the church by the Normans;–“stones and bricks, and gold and jewels, may be replaced, but the loss of a relic is irreparable; and, moreover, the abbey thus forfeits a portion of its protection in heaven; for it is not to be doubted, but that the saints look down with eyes of peculiar favor upon the spots that contain their mortal remains; their glorified souls feeling a natural affection towards the bodies to which they are hereafter to be united for ever,” on that day, when
“Ciascun ritrovera la trista tomba, Ripigliera sua carne e sua figura,
Udira cio che in eterno rimbomba.”
The outrages were curiously illustrative of the spirit of the times; the quantity of relics and ornaments equally characterise the devotion of the votaries, and the reputed sanctity of the place.
The royal abbey of St. Ouen had, indeed, enjoyed the veneration of the faithful, during a lengthened series of generations. Clothair is supposed to have been the founder of the monastery in 535; though other authorities claim for it a still higher degree of antiquity by one hundred and thirty years. The church, whoever the original founder may have been, was first dedicated to the twelve apostles; but, in 689, the body of St. Ouen was deposited in the edifice; miracles without number were performed at his tomb; pilgrims flocked thither; his fame diffused itself wider and wider; and at length, the allegiance of the abbey was tranferred to him whose sanctity gave him the best claims to the advocation.
Changes of this nature, and arising from the same cause, were frequent in those early ages: the abbey of St. Germain des Pres, at Paris, was originally dedicated to St. Vincent; that of Ste. Genevieve to St. Peter; and many other churches also took new patrons, as occasion required. According to one of the fathers of the church, the tombs of the beatified became the fortifications of the holy edifices: the saints were considered as proprietors of the places in which their bodies were interred, and where power was given them, to alter the established laws of nature, in favor of those who there implored their aid. But the aid which they afforded willingly to all their suitors, they could not bestow upon themselves. And oft, when the sword of the heathen menaced the land, the weary monks fled with the corpse of their patrons from the stubborn enemy. Thus, St. Ouen himself, on the invasion of the Normans, was transported to the priory of Gany, on the river Epte, and thence to Conde; but was afterwards conveyed to Rouen, when Rollo embraced Christianity. Other causes also contributed to the migration of these remains: they were often summoned in order to dignify acts of peculiar solemnity, or to be the witnesses to the oaths of princes, like the Stygian marsh of old,
“Dii cujus jurare timent et fallere numen.”
William the Conqueror, upon the dedication of the abbey of St. Stephen, collected the bodies of all the saints in Normandy[92].
Those who wish to be informed of the acts and deeds of St. Ouen, may refer to Pommeraye’s history of the convent, in which thirty-seven folio pages are filled with his life and miracles; the latter commencing while he was in long clothes. The monastery, under his protection, continued to increase in reputation; and, in the year 1042, the abbatial mitre devolved upon William, son of Richard IInd, Duke of Normandy, who laid the foundation of a new church, which, after about eighty years, was completed and consecrated by William Balot, next but one to him in the succession[93].
But this church did not exist long: ten years only had elapsed when a fire reduced it, together with the whole abbey, to ashes. An opportunity was thus afforded to the sovereign to shew his munificence, and Richard Coeur de Lion was not tardy in availing himself of it; but a second fire in 1248 again dislodged the monks; and they continued houseless, till the abbot, Jean Rousel, better known by the name of _Mardargent_, laid the foundation in 1318, of the present structure, an honor to himself, to the city, and to the nation. By this prelate the building was perfected as far as the transept: the rest was the work of subsequent periods, and was not completed till the prelacy of Bohier, who died in the beginning of the sixteenth century.
To speak more properly, I ought rather to say that it was not till then brought to its present state; for it was never completed. The western front is still imperfect. According to the original design, it was to have been flanked by magnificent towers, ending in a combination of open arches and tracery, corresponding with the outline and fashion of the central tower. These towers, which are now only raised to the height of about fifty feet, jut diagonally from the angles of the facade; and it was intended that, in the lower division, they should have been united by a porch of three arches, somewhat resembling the west entrance of Peterborough; and such as in this town is still seen, at St. Maclou, though on a much larger scale. Pommeraye has given an engraving of this intended front, taken from a drawing preserved in the archives of the abbey. The engraving is miserably executed; but it enables us to understand the lines of the projected building. Pommeraye has also preserved details of other parts of the church, among them of the beautiful rood-loft erected by the Cardinal d’Etouteville, and long an object of general admiration. The bronze doors of this screen were of a most singular and elegant pattern: Horace Walpole imitated them in his bed-room, at Strawberry-Hill. The rood-loft, which had been maimed by the Huguenots, was destroyed at the revolution; when the church was also deprived of its celebrated clock, which told the days of the month, the festivals, and the phases of the moon, and afforded other astronomical information. Such gazers as heeded not these mysteries, were amused by a little bronze statue of St. Michael, who sallied forth at every hour, and announced the progress of time, by the number of strokes which he inflicted on the Devil with his lance.
[Illustration: Tower of the Church of St. Ouen, at Rouen]
It is impossible to convey by words an adequate idea of the lightness, and purity, and boldness of St. Ouen. My imperfect description will be assisted by the sketches which I inclose. Of their merits I dare not speak; but I will warrant their fidelity; The flying buttresses end in richly crocketed pinnacles, supported by shafts of unusual height. The triple tiers of windows seem to have absorbed the solid wall-work of the building. Balustrades of varied quatrefoils run round the aisles and body; and the centre-tower, which is wholly composed of open arches and tracery, terminates, like the south-tower of the cathedral, with an octangular crown of fleurs-de-lys. The armorial symbol of France, which in itself is a form of great beauty, was often introduced by the French architects of the middle ages, amongst the ornaments of their edifices: it pleases the eye by its grace, and satisfies the mind by its appropriate and natural locality.
The elegance of the south porch is unrivalled. This portion of the church was always finished with care: it was the scene of many religious ceremonies, particularly of espousals. Hence they gave it a degree of magnitude which might appear disproportionate, did we not recollect that the arch was destined to embower the bride and the bridal train. The bold and lofty entrance of this porch is surrounded within by pendant trefoil arches, springing from carved bosses, and forming an open festoon of tracery. The vault within is ornamented with pendants, and the portal which it shades is covered with a profusion of sculpture: the death, entombment, and apotheosis of the Virgin, form the subjects of the principal groups. The sculptures, both in design and execution, far surpass any specimens of the corresponding aera in England. But this porch is now neglected and filled with lumber, and the open tracery is much injured. I hope, however, it will receive due attention; as the church is at this time under repair; and the restorations, as far as they go, have been executed with fidelity and judgment.
[Illustration: South Porch the Church of St. Ouen, at Rouen]
The perspective of the interior[94] is exceedingly impressive: the arches are of great height and fine proportions. If I must discover a defect, I should say that the lines appear to want substance; the mouldings of the arches are shallow. The building is all window. Were it made of cast iron, it could scarcely look less solid. This effect is particularly increased by the circumstance of the clerestory-gallery opening into the glazed tracery of the windows behind, the lines of the one corresponding with those of the other. To each of the clustered columns of the nave is attached a tabernacle, consisting of a canopy and pedestal, evidently intended originally to have received the image of a saint. It does not appear to have been the design of the architect that the pillars of the choir should have had similar ornaments; but upon one of them, at about mid-height, serving as a corbel to a truncated column, is a head of our Saviour, and, on the opposite pillar, one of the Virgin: the former is of a remarkably fine antique character. The capitals of the pillars in this part of the church were all gilt, and the spandrils of the arches painted with angels, now nearly effaced. The high altar is of grey marble, relieved, by a scarlet curtain behind, the effect of which is simple, singular, and good. Round the choir is a row of chapels, which are wholly wanting to the nave. The walls of these chapels have also been covered with fresco paintings; some with figures, others with foliage. The chapels contain many grave-stones displaying indented outlines of figures under canopies, and in other respects ornamented; but neglected, and greatly obliterated, and hastening fast to ruin. It is curious to see the heads and hands, and, in one instance, the crosier of a prelate, inlaid with white or grey marble; as if the parts of most importance were purposely made of the most perishable materials. I was much interested by observing, that many of these memorials are almost the exact counterparts of some of our richest English sepulchral brasses, and particularly of the two which are perhaps unrivalled, at Lynn[95].–How I wished that you, who so delight in these remains, and to whom we are indebted for the elucidation of those of Norfolk, had been with me, while I was trying to trace the resemblance; and particularly while I pored over the stone in the chapel of Saint Agnes, that commemorates Alexander Berneval, the master-mason of the building!
[Illustration: Head of Christ, in the Church of St. Ouen, at Rouen, seen in profile] [Illustration: Head of Christ, in the Church of St. Ouen, at Rouen, seen in front]
According to tradition, it was this same Alexander Berneval who executed the beautiful circular window in the southern transept. But being rivalled by his apprentice, who produced a more exquisite specimen of masonry in the northern transept, he murdered his luckless pupil. The crime he expiated with his own life; but the monks of the abbey, grateful for his labors, requested that his body might be entombed in their church; and on the stone that covers his remains, they caused him to be represented at full length, holding the window in his hand.
These large circular windows, sometimes known by the name of rose windows, and sometimes of marigold windows, are a strong characteristic feature of French ecclesiastical architecture. Few among the cathedrals or the great conventual churches, in this country, are without them. In our own they are seldom found: in no one of our cathedrals, excepting Exeter only, are they in the western front; and, though occasionally in the transepts, as at Canterbury, Chichester, Litchfield, Westminster, Lincoln and York, they are comparatively of small size with little variety of pattern. In St. Ouen, they are more than commonly beautiful. The northern one, the cause of death to the poor apprentice, exhibits in its centre the produced pentagon, or combination of triangles sometimes called the pentalpha.–The painted glass which fills the rose windows is gorgeous in its coloring, and gives the most splendid effect. The church preserves the whole of its original glazing. Each inter-mullion contains one whole-length figure, standing upon a diapered ground, good in design, though the artist seems to have avoided the employment of brilliant hues. The sober light harmonizes with the grey unsullied stone-work, and gives a most pleasing unity of tint to the receding arches.
Among the pictures, the-best are, the _Cardinal of Bologna opening the Holy Gate, instead of the Pope_, in the nave; and _Saint Elizabeth stopping the Pestilence_, in the choir: two others, in the Lady-Chapel, by an artist of Rouen, of the name of Deshays, the _Miracle of the Loaves_, and the _Visitation_, are also of considerable merit.–Deshays was a young man of great promise; but the hopes which had been entertained of him were disappointed by a premature death.
A church like this, so ancient, so renowned, and so holy, could not fail to enjoy peculiar privileges. The abbot had complete jurisdiction, as well temporal as spiritual, over the parish of St. Ouen; in the Norman parliament he took precedence of all other mitred abbots; by a bull of Pope Alexander IVth, he was allowed to wear the pontifical ornaments, mitre, ring, gloves, tunic, dalmatic, and sandals; and, what sounds strange to our Protestant ears, he had the right of preaching in public, and of causing the conventual bells to be rung whenever he thought proper. His monks headed the religious processions of the city; and every new archbishop of the province was not only consecrated in this church, but slept the evening prior to his installation at the abbey; whence, on the following day, he was conducted in pomp to the entrance of the cathedral, by the chapter of St. Ouen, headed by their abbot, who delivered him to the canons, with the following charge,–“Ego, Prior Sancti Audoeni, trado vobis Dominum Archiepiscopum Rothomagensem vivum, quem reddetis nobis mortuum.”–The last sentence was also strictly fulfilled; the dean and chapter being bound to take the bodies of the deceased prelates to the church of St. Ouen, and restore them to the monks with, “Vos tradidistis nobis Dominum Archiepiscopum vivum; nos reddimus eum vobis mortuum, ita ut crastina die reddatis eum nobis.”–The corpse remained there four and twenty hours, during which the monks performed the office of the dead with great solemnity. The canons were then compelled to bear the dead archbishop a second time from the abbey cross (now demolished) to the abbey of St. Amand[96], where the abbess took the pastoral ring from off his finger, replacing it by another of plain gold; and thence the bearers proceeded to the cathedral. These duties could not be very agreeable to portly, short-winded, well-fed dignitaries; and consequently the worthy canons were often inclined to shrink from the task. In the case of the funeral of Archbishop d’Aubigny, in 1719, they contented themselves with carrying him at once to his dormitory; but the prior and monks of St. Ouen instantly sued them before the parliament, and this tribunal decreed that the ancient service must be performed, and in default of compliance, the whole of their temporalities were to be put under sequestration: it is almost needless to add, that a sentence of excommunication would scarcely have been so effectual in enforcing the execution of the sentence.
The gardens formerly belonging to the abbey are at this time a pleasant promenade to the inhabitants of the town: the remains of the monastic buildings are converted into an _Hotel de Ville_, where also the library and the museum are kept, and the academy hold their sittings. No remains, however, now exist of the abbatial residence, which was built by Anthony Bohier, in the beginning of the sixteenth century, and which, according to the engraving given of it by Pommeraye, must have been a noble specimen of domestic architecture. The sovereigns of France always took up their abode in it, during their visits to Rouen.–The circular tower called the _Tour des Clercs_, mentioned in a former letter, is the only vestige of Norman times.–The cloister corresponded with the architecture of the church: the south side of the quadrangle attached to the northern aisle still exists, but blocked up and dilapidated, and converted into a sort of cage for those who are guilty of disturbances during the night.
[Illustration: Stone Staircase in the Church of St. Maclou, at Rouen]
The church of St. Maclou is unquestionably superior to every other in the city, except the cathedral and St. Ouen. Its principal ornament are its carved doors, produced during the reign of Henry IIIrd, by Jean Goujon, a man so eminent as to have been termed the Corregio of sculpture; but they have been materially injured by repairs and alterations by unskilful hands. Within the church, near the west entrance, is a singularly elegant stair-case, in filagree stone-work, which formerly led to the organ.–This building was erected in the year 1512, and chiefly by voluntary contributions, if such can be called _voluntary_ as were purchased by promises from the archbishop, first of forty, and then of one hundred, days’ indulgences, to all who would contribute towards the pious labor.–The central tower resembles that of the cathedral, both in the interior and the exterior. It now appears truncated; but it was originally surmounted by a spire, which was of such beauty, that even Italian artists thought it worthy to be engraved and held out as a model at Rome[97]. The spire, however, was greatly injured by a hurricane, in 1705, and it was at last taken down thirty years afterwards. To the triple porch, I have already alluded, in describing the intended front of St. Ouen. The general lines of the church, are such as in England would be referred to the fourteenth century: on a closer examination, however, the curious eye will discover the peculiar beauties of the French Gothic. Thus the bosses of the groined roof are wrought and perforated into filagree, the work extending over the intersections of the groins, which are seen through its reticulations. Such bosses are only found in the French churches of the sixteenth century. In other parts, the interior closely resembles the style of the cathedral[98].
St. Patrice is a building of the worst style of the commencement of the sixteenth century: to use the quaint phraseology of Horace Walpole, it exhibits “that _betweenity_ which intervened when Gothic declined and Palladian was creeping in.” The paintings on the walls of this church, and the stained glass in its windows, are more deserving of notice than its architecture. The first are of small size, and generally better than are seen in similar places. One of them is after Bassan, an artist, whose works are not often found in religious edifices in France. The painted windows of the choir deserve unqualified commendation. They are said to have been removed from St. Godard. Each is confined to a single subject; among which, that of the _Annunciation_ is esteemed the best.
To this church was attached a confraternity[99], established in 1374, under the name of the _Guild of the Passion_. Its annual procession, which continued till the time of the revolution, took place on Holy-Thursday. It consisted of the usual pageantry; a host of children, dressed like angels, increased the train, which also included twelve poor men, whose feet the masters of the brotherhood publicly washed after mass. Like some other guilds, they were in possession of a pulpit or tribune, called, in old French, a _Puy_, from which they issued a general invitation to all poets, who were summoned to descant upon the themes which were commemorated by their union. The rewards held out to the successful candidates were, in the true monastic spirit of the guild, a reed, a crown of thorns, a sponge, or some other mystic or devotional emblem. Occasionally, too, they gave a scenic representation of certain portions of religious history, according to the practice of early times. The account of the _Mystery of the Passion_ having been acted in the burial-ground of the church of St. Patrice, so recently as September, 1498, is preserved by Taillepied[100], who tells us, that it was performed by “bons joueurs et braves personages.” The masters of this guild had the extraordinary privilege of being allowed to charge the expence attendant on the processions and exhibitions, upon any citizen they might think proper, whether a member or otherwise.
The neighboring church of St. Godard possesses neither architectural beauty, nor architectural antiquity; for, although it occupies the scite of an edifice of remote date, yet the present structure is coeval with St. Patrice. It has been supposed that this church was the primitive cathedral of the city[101]. One of the proofs of this assertion is found in a procession which, before the revolution, was annually made hither by the chapter of the present cathedral, with great ceremony, as if in recognition of its priority. The church was originally dedicated to the Virgin; but it changed its advocation in the year 525, when St. Godard, more properly called St. Gildard, was buried here in a subterranean chapel; and, for the reasons before noticed, the old tutelary patroness was compelled to yield to the new visitor. In the succeeding century, St. Romain, a saint of still greater fame, was also interred here; and, as I collect from Pommeraye[102], in the same crypt. This author strenuously denies the inferences which have been drawn from the annual procession, which he maintains was performed solely in praise and in honor of St. Romain; for the chapter, after having paid their devotions to the Host, descended into the chapel, to prostrate themselves before the sepulture of the saint; on which subject, an antiquary[103] of Rouen has preserved the following lines:–
“Ad regnum Domini dextra invitatus et ore, Huic sacra Romanus credidit ossa loco; Sontibus addixit quae caeca rebellio flammis, Nec tulit impietas majus in urbe scelus. Quid tanto vesana malo profecit Erynnis? Ipsa sui testis pignoris extat humus. Crypta manet, memoresque trahit confessio cives, Nec populi fallit marmor inane fidem. Orphana, turba, veni, viduisque allabere saxis, Est aliquid soboli patris habere thorum.”
The body of St. Godard was carried to Soissons; but the tomb, which, has doubtfully been designated as appropriated either to him or to St. Romain, was left to the church, and remained there at least till the revolution. I have even been told that it is there still; but I had no opportunity of going down into the chapel to verify this point. It consisted, or rather consists, of a single slab of jasper, seven and a half feet long, by two feet wide, and two feet four inches thick. Upon it was this inscription:–
“Malades, voulez-vous soulager vos douleurs? Visitez ce tombeau, baignez-le de vos pleurs; Rechauffez vos esprits d’une divine flame; Touchez-le settlement du doigt,
Et vous y trouverez (si vous avez la foi) Et la sante du corps, et la sante de l’ame.”
The building retains, at this time, only two of its celebrated painted windows; but they are fortunately the two which were always considered the best. One of them represents the history of St. Romain; the other, the genealogy of Jewish kings, from whom the Holy Virgin descended. Rouen has, from a very early period, been famous for its manufactories of painted glass. But the windows of this church were still esteemed the _chef d’oeuvre_ of its artists; and these had so far passed into a proverb, that Farin[104] tells us it was common throughout France to say, in recommendation of choice wine, that “it was as bright as the windows of St. Godard.” The saying, however, was by no means confined to Rouen, for it was also applied to the windows of the Ste. Chapelle, at Dijon.
It was at St. Godard that the burst of the reformation was first manifested. The Huguenots, taking courage from the secret increase of their numbers, broke into the building, in 1540, demolished the images, and sold the pix to a goldsmith. But the man suffered severely for his purchase: he was shortly afterwards sentenced, by a decree of the parliament, to be hanged in front of his shop; and two of those concerned in the outrage also suffered capital punishment. The spark thus lighted, afterwards increased into a conflagration; and, to this hour, there is a larger body of Protestants at Rouen, than in most French towns.
I do not expect that you will reproach me with the prolixity of these details. The subject is attractive to me, and I feel that you will accompany me with pleasure in my pilgrimage, from chapel to shrine, dwelling with me in contemplation on the relics of ancient skill and the memorials of the piety of the departed. Nor must it be forgotten, that the hand of the spoliator is falling heavily on all objects of antiquity. And the French seem to find a source of perverse and malignant pleasure in destroying the temples where their ancestors once worshipped: many are swept away; a greater number continue to exist in a desecrated state; and time, which changes all things, is proceeding with hasty strides to obliterate their character. The lofty steeple hides its diminished head; the mullions and tracery disappear from the pointed windows, from which the stained glass has long since fallen; the arched entrance contracts into a modern door-way; the smooth plain walls betray neither niches, nor pinnacles, nor fresco paintings; and in the warehouse, or manufactory, or smithy, little else remains than the extraordinary size, to point out the original holy destination of the edifice.
Footnotes:
[91] The following brief statement of their excesses is copied from a manuscript belonging to the monastery: the full detail of them engages Pommeraye for nearly seven folio pages:–“Le Dimanche troisieme de May, 1562, les Huguenots s’etans amassez en grosse troupe, vinrent armez en grande furie dans l’Eglise de S. Ouen, ou etant entrez ils rompirent les chaires du choeur, le grand autel, et toutes les chapelles: mirent en pieces l’Horloge, dont on voit encore la menuiserie dans la chapelle joignant l’arcade du coste du septentrion, aussi bien que celles des orgues, dont ils prirent l’etaim et le plomb pour en faire des balles de mousquet: puis ils allumerent cinq feux, trois dedans l’Eglise et deux dehors, ou ils brulerent tous les bancs et sieges des religieux, auec le bois des balustres des chapelles, les bancs et fermetures d’icelles, plusieurs ornemens et vestemens sacrez, comme chappes, tuniques, chasubles, aubes, vne autre partie des plus riches et precieux ornemens de broderie et drap d’or ayant este enlevee en l’hotellerie de la pomme de pin, ou ils les brulerent pour en auoir l’or et l’argent. Ils firent la mesme chose des saintes reliques, qu’ils brulerent, ayant emporte l’or, l’argent, et les pierreries des reliquaires.”–_Histoire de l’Abbaye Royale de St. Ouen_, p. 205.
[92] Farin, Histoire de Rouen, IV. p. 134.
[93] _Histoire de l’Abbaye Royales de Saint Ouen_, p. 204.
[94] The following are the dimensions of the interior of the building, in French feet:
Length of the church……………… 416 Ditto of the nave………………… 234 Ditto of the choir……………….. 108 Ditto of the Lady-Chapel………….. 66 Ditto of the transept…………….. 130 Width of ditto…………………… 34 Ditto of nave, without the aisles….. 34 Ditto, including ditto……………. 78 Height of roof…………………… 100 Ditto of tower…………………… 240
[95] _Figured in Cotmans Norfolk Sepulchral Brasses_.
[96] The house of the abbess of St. Amand is still standing, though neglected, and in a great degree in ruins. What remains, however, is very curious; and is, perhaps, the oldest specimen of domestic architecture in Rouen. It is partly of wood, the front covered with arches and other sculpture in bas-relief, and partly of stone.
[97] _Farin, Histoire de Rouen_, IV. p. 156.
[98] The dimensions of the building, in French feet, are,–
Length of the nave……………….. 70 Ditto of choir…………………… 40 Ditto of Lady-Chapel……………… 30 Ditto of the whole building………. 140 Width of ditto…………………… 76 Height to the top of the lanthorn…. 142
[99] _Farin, Histoire de Rouen_, IV. p. 168.
[100] _Antiquitez et Singularitez de la Ville de Rouen_, p. 186.
[101] _Farin, Histoire de Rouen_, IV. p. 132.
[102] _Histoire des Archeveques de Rouen_, p. 130.
[103] _La Normandie Chretienne_, p. 487.
[104] _Histoire de Rouen_, IV. p. 134.
LETTER XII.
PALAIS DE JUSTICE–STATES, EXCHEQUER, AND PARLIAMENT OF NORMANDY–GUILD OF THE CONARDS–JOAN OF ARC–FOUNTAIN AND BAS-RELIEF IN THE PLACE DE LA PUCELLE–TOUR DE LA GROSSE HORLOGE–PUBLIC FOUNTAINS–RIVERS AUBETTE AND ROBEC–HOSPITALS–MINT.
(_Rouen, June_, 1818.)
Amongst the secular buildings of Rouen, the Palais de Justice holds the chief place, whether we consider the magnificence of the building, or the importance of the assemblies which once were convened within its precinct.
The three estates of the Duchy of Normandy, the parliament, composed of the deputies of the church, the nobility, and the good towns, usually held their meetings in the Palace of Justice. Until the liberties of France were wholly extirpated by Richelieu, this body opposed a formidable resistance to the crown; and the _Charte Normande_ was considered as great a safeguard to the liberties of the subject, as Magna Charta used to be on your side of the channel. Here, also, the _Court of Exchequer_ held its session. According to a fond tradition, this, the supreme tribunal of Normandy, was instituted by Rollo, the good Duke, whose very name seemed to be considered as a charm averting violence and outrage. This court, like our _Aula Regia_, long continued ambulatory, and attendant upon the person of the sovereign; and its sessions were held occasionally, and at his pleasure. The progress of society, however, required that the supreme tribunal should become stationary and permanent, that the suitors might know when and where they might prefer their claims. Philip the Fair, therefore, about the year 1300, began by enacting that the pleas should be held only at Rouen. Louis the XIIth remodelled the court, and gave it permanence; yielding in these measures to the prayer of the States of Normandy, and to the advice of his minister, the Cardinal d’Amboise. It was then composed of four presidents, and twenty-eight counsellors; thirteen being clerks; and the remainder laymen. The name of exchequer was perhaps unpleasing to the crown, as it reminded the Normans of the ancient independence of their duchy; and, in 1515, Francis Ist ordered that the court should thenceforward be known as the _Parliament of Normandy_; thus assimilating it in its appellation to the other supreme tribunals of the kingdom. There is an old poem extant, written in very lawyer-like rhyme, which invests all the cardinal virtues, and a great many supernumerary ones besides, with the offices of this most honorable court, in which purity is the usher, truth has a silk gown, and virginity enters the proceedings on the record.
“De ceste _court_ grace est grand _chanceliere_, Vertus ont lieu de _presidens_ prudens: Verite est premiere _conseillere_,
Et purete _huyssiere_ la-dedans: La _greffiere_ est virginite feconde, Et la _concierge_ humilite profonde.
Pythie _procure_ a vuider les discords, Comme _advocat_, amour ayde aux accords. De _geolier_ vacque le seul office:
Aussy on voyt par _officiers_ concors, La noble _court_ rendante a tous justice.”
In the same style and strain is a ballad, which, thanks to the care of De Bourgueville, the author of the _Antiquities of Caen_, hath been preserved for the edification of posterity. It enumerates all the members of the court _seriatim_, and compares their lordships and worships, one after another, to the heroes and demi-gods of ancient story.
The parliament in its turn has given way to the _Court of Assizes_; and, where the states once deliberated, the electors of the department now come together for the purpose of naming the deputies who represent them in the great council of the nation;–such are the vicissitudes of all human institutions.
When the Jews were expelled from Normandy, in 1181, the _Close_, or Jewry, in which they dwelled, escheated to the king. The sons of Japhet spoiled the sons of Shem with pious alacrity. The debtor burnt his bond; the bailie seized the store of bezants; the synagogue was razed to the ground. In this _Close_ the palace was afterwards built. The wise custom of Normandy was mooted on the spot where the law of Moses had once been taught; and, by a strange, perhaps an ominous, fatality, the judge held the scales of justice, where whilome the usurer had poised his balance.
The palace forms three sides of a quadrangle. The fourth is occupied by an embattled wall and an elaborate gate-way. The building was erected about the beginning of the sixteenth century; and, with all its faults, it is a fine adaptation of Gothic architecture to civil purposes. It is in the style which a friend of mine chooses to distinguish by the name of _Burgundian architecture_; and he tells me that he considers it as the parent of our Tudor style. Here, the windows in the body of the building take flattened elliptic heads; and they are divided by one mullion and one transom. The mouldings are highly wrought, and enriched with foliage. The lucarne windows are of a different design, and form the most characteristic feature of the front: they are pointed and enriched with mullions and tracery, and are placed within triple canopies of nearly the same form, flanked by square pillars, terminating in tall crocketed pinnacles, some of them fronted with open arches crowned with statues. The roof, as is usual in French and Flemish buildings of this date, is of a very high pitch, and harmonizes well with the proportions of the building. An oriel, or rather tower, of enriched workmanship projects into the court, and varies the elevations. On the left-hand side of the court, a wide flight of steps leads to the hall called _la Salle des Procureurs_, a place originally designed as an Exchange for the merchants of the city, who had previously been in the habit of assembling for that purpose in the cathedral. It is one hundred and sixty feet in length, by fifty in breadth.
“In this great hall,” says Peter Heylin, “are the seats and desks of the procurators; every one’s name written in capital letters over his head. These procurators are like our attornies; they prepare causes, and make them ready for the advocates. In this hall do suitors use, either to attend on, or to walk up and down, and confer with, their pleaders.”–The attornies had similar seats in the ancient English courts of justice; and these seats still remain in the hall at Westminster, in which the Court of Exchequer holds its sittings. The walls of the Salle des Procureurs are adorned with chaste niches. The coved roof is of timber, plain and bold, and destitute either of the open tie-beams and arches, or the knot-work and cross timber which adorn our old English roofs. If the roof of our priory church was not ornamented, as last mentioned, it would nearly resemble that in question.–Below the hall is a prison; to its right is the room where the parliament formerly held its sittings, but which is now appropriated to the trial of criminal causes. The unfortunate Mathurin Bruneau, the soi-disant dauphin, was last year tried here, and condemned to imprisonment. He is treated in his place of confinement with ambiguous kindness. The poor wretch loves his bottle; and, being allowed to intoxicate himself to his heart’s content, he is already reduced to a state of idiotism.–Heylin, who saw the building when it was in perfection, says, speaking of this _Great Chamber_, “that it is so gallantly and richly built, that I must needs confess it surpasseth all the rooms that ever I saw in my life. The palace of the Louvre hath nothing in it comparable; the ceiling is all inlaid with gold, yet doth the workmanship exceed the matter.”–The ceiling which excited Heylin’s admiration still exists. It is a grand specimen of the interior decoration of the times. The oak, which age has rendered almost as dark as ebony, is divided into compartments, covered with rich but whimsical carving, and relieved with abundance of gold. Over the bench is a curious old picture, a _Crucifixion_. Joseph and the Virgin are standing by the cross: the figures are painted on a gold ground; the colors deep and rich; the drawing, particularly in the arms, indifferent; the expression of the faces good. It was upon this picture that witnesses took the oaths before the revolution; and it is the only one of the six formerly in this situation that escaped destruction[105]. Round the apartment are gnomic sentences in letters of gold, reminding judges, juries, witnesses, and suitors, of their duties. The room itself is said to be the most beautiful in France for its proportions and quantity of light. In the _Antiquites Nationales_, is described and figured an elaborately wrought chimney-piece in the council-chamber, now destroyed, as are some fine Gothic door-ways, which opened into the chamber. The ceiling of the apartment called la _seconde Chambre des Enquetes_, painted by Jouvenet, with a representation of Jupiter hurling his thunderbolts at Vice, is also unfortunately no more. It fell in, from a failure in the woodwork of the roof, on the first of April, 1812. It was among the most highly-esteemed productions of this master, and not the less remarkable for having been executed with the left hand, after a paralytic stroke had deprived him of the use of the other.
Millin observes, with much justice, that one of the most remarkable of the decrees that issued from this palace, was that which authorized the meetings of the _Conards_, a name given to a confraternity of buffoons, who, disguised in grotesque dresses, performed farces in the streets on Shrove Tuesday and other holidays. Nor is it a little indicative of the taste of the times, that men of rank, character, and respectability entered into this society, the members of which, amounting to two thousand five hundred, elected from among themselves a president, whom they dressed as an abbot[106], with a crozier and mitre, and, placing him on a car drawn by four horses, led him, thus attired, in great pomp through the streets; the whole of the party being masked, and personating not only the allegorical characters of avarice, lust, &c. but the more tangible ones of pope, king, and emperor, and with them those of holy writ. The seat of this guild was at Notre Dame de Bonnes Nouvelles.
[Illustration: Sculpture, representing the Feast of Fools]
In the cathedral itself the more notorious _Procession des Fous_ was also formerly celebrated, in which, as you know, the ass played the principal part, and the choir joined in the hymn[107],–
“Orientis partibus
Adventavit Asinus,” &c.
These, or similar ceremonies, call them if you please absurdities, or call them impieties, (you will in neither case be far from their proper name,) were in the early ages of Christianity tolerated in almost every place. Mr. Douce has furnished us with some curious remarks upon them in the eleventh volume of the _Archaeologia_, and Mr. Ellis in his new edition of _Brand’s Popular Antiquities_. I am indebted to the first of these gentlemen for the knowledge that the inclosed etching, copied some time ago from a drawing by Mr. Joseph Harding, is allusive to the ceremony of the _feast of fools_, and does not represent a group of morris-dancers, as I had erroneously supposed. Indeed, Mr. Douce believes that many of the strange carvings on the _misereres_ in our cathedrals have references to these practices. And yet, to the honor of England, they never appear to have been equally common with us as in France.–According to Du Cange[108], the confraternity of the Conards or Cornards was confined to Rouen and Evreux. I have not been able to ascertain when they were suppressed; but they certainly existed in the time of Taillepied, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, about fifty years previously to which they dropped their original name of _Coqueluchers_. At this time too they had evidently degenerated from the primary object of their institution, “ridendo castigare mores atque in omne quod turpiter factum fuerat ridiculum immittere.” Taillepied was an eye-witness of their practices; and he prudently contents himself with saying; “le fait est plus clair a le voir que je ne pourrois icy l’escrire.”
At a short distance from the palace is a small square, called the _Place de la Pucelle_, a name which it has but recently acquired, in lieu of the more familiar appellation of _le Marche aux Veaux_. The present title records one of the most interesting events in the history of Rouen, the execution of the unfortunate Joan of Arc, which is said to have taken place on the very spot now covered by the monument that commemorates her fate. Three different ones have in succession occupied this place. The first was a cross, erected in 1454, only twenty-four years after her death; for even at this early period, the King of France had obtained from Pope Calixtus IIIrd, a bull directing the revision of her sentence, and he had caused her innocence to be acknowledged. The second was a fountain of delicate workmanship, consisting of three tiers of columns placed one above the other, on a triangular plan, the whole decorated with arabesques and statues of saints, while the Maid herself crowned the summit, and the water flowed through pipes that terminated in horses’ heads. The present monument is inferior to the second, equally in design and in workmanship: it is a plain triangular pedestal, ornamented with dolphins at the base, and surmounted by the heroine in military costume. Of the two last, figures are given by Millin[109], who could not be expected to suffer a subject to escape him, so calculated for the gratification of national pride. In a preceding volume of the same work[110], he has represented the monument erected to her memory by Charles VIIth, upon the bridge at Orleans: the latter is commemorative of her triumphs; that at Rouen, only of her capture and death. But the King testified his gratitude by more substantial tokens: he ennobled her three brothers and their descendants; and even allowed the females of the family to confer their rank upon the persons whom they married, a privilege which they continued to enjoy till the time of Louis XIIIth, who abolished it in 1634.
In the square is a house within a court, now occupied as a school for girls, of the same aera as the Palais de Justice, and in the same _Burgundian style_, but far richer in its sculptures. The entire front is divided into compartments by slender and lengthened buttresses and pilasters. The intervening spaces are filled with basso-relievos, evidently executed at one period, though by different masters. A banquet beneath a window in the first floor, is in a good _cinque-cento_ style. Others of the basso-relievos, represent the labors of the field and the vineyard; rich and fanciful in their costume, but rather wooden in their design: the Salamander, the emblem of Francis Ist, appears several times amongst the ornaments, and very conspicuously. I believe there is not a single square foot of this extraordinary building, which has not been sculptured.–On the north side extends a spacious gallery. Here the architecture is rather in Holbein’s manner: foliaged and swelling pilasters, like antique candelabra, bound the arched windows. Beneath, is the well-known series of bas-reliefs, executed on marble tablets, representing the interview between Francis Ist of France, and Henry VIIIth of England, in the _Champ du Drap d’or_, between Guisnes and Ardres. They were first discovered by the venerable father Montfaucon, who engraved them in his _Monumens de la Monarchie Francaise_[111]; but to the greater part of our antiquaries at home, they are, perhaps, more commonly known by the miserable copies inserted in Ducarel’s work, who has borrowed most of his plates from the Benedictine.–These sculptures are much mutilated, and so obscured by smoke and dirt, that the details cannot be understood without great difficulty. The corresponding tablets above the windows, are even in a worse condition; and they appear to have been almost unintelligible in the time of Montfaucon, who conjectures that they were allegorical, and probably intended to represent the triumph of religion. Each tablet contains a triumphal car, drawn by different animals, one by elephants, another by lions, and so on, and crowded with mythological figures and attributes.–A friend of mine, who examined them this summer, tells me, that he thinks the subjects are either _taken_ from the triumphs of Petrarch, or _imitated_ from the triumphs introduced in the _Polifilo_. Graphic representations of allegories are susceptible of so many variations, that an artist, embodying the ideas of the poet, might produce a representation bearing a close resemblance to the mythological processions of the mystic dream.–Of one of the most perfect of the historical subjects, I send you a drawing: it is the first in order in Montfaucon’s work, and exhibits the suite of the King of England, on their way from the town of Guisnes, to meet the French monarch. Two of the figures might be mistaken for Henry himself and Wolsey, riding familiarly side by side; but these dignified personages have more important parts allotted them in the second and third compartments, where they appear in the full-blown honors of their respective characters.
[Illustration: Bas-Relief, from the representations of the Champ du Drap d’or]
The interior has been modernized; so that a beam covered with small carvings is the only remaining object of curiosity. On the top, a bunch of leaden thistles has been a sad puzzle to antiquaries, who would fain find some connection between the building and Scotland; but neither record nor tradition throw any light upon their researches. Montfaucon, copying from a manuscript written by the Abbe Noel, says, “I have more than once been told that Francis Ist, on his way through Rouen, lodged at this house; and it is most probable, that the bas-reliefs in question were made upon some of these occasions, to gratify the king by the representation of a festival, in which he particularly delighted.” The gallery sculptures are very fine, and the upper tier is much in the style of Jean Goujon. It is not generally known that Goujon re-drew the embellishments of Beroald de Verville’s translation of the Polifilo; and that these, beautiful as they are in the Aldine edition, acquired new graces from the French artist.–I have remarked that the allegorical tablets appear to coincide with the designs of the Polifilo: a more accurate examination might, perhaps, prove the fact; and then little doubt would remain. The building is much dilapidated; and, unless speedily repaired, these basso-relievos, which would adorn any museum, will utterly perish. In spite of neglect and degradations, the aspect of the mansion is still such that, as my friend observed, one would expect to see a fair and stately matron standing in the porch, attired in velvet, waiting to receive her lord.–In the adjoining house, once, probably, a part of the same, but now an inn, bearing the sign of _la Pucelle_, is shewn a circular room, much ornamented, with a handsome oriel conspicuous on the outside. In this apartment, the Maid is said to have been tried; but it is quite certain that not a stone of the building was then put of the quarry.
Hence I must take you, and still under the auspices of Millin[112], to the great town-clock, or, as it is here called, _la Tour de la Grosse Horloge_; and I cannot help wishing on the occasion, that I had half the powers of instructing and amusing which he possessed. Like the writers in our most popular Reviews, he uses the subjects which he places at the head of his articles as little more than a peg, whereon to hang whatever he knows connected with the matter; and the result is, that he is never read without pleasure or information. Such is peculiarly the case in the present instance, in which he takes an opportunity of giving the history of the origin of clocks, tracing them from the simple dial, and particularising the most curious and intricate contrivances of modern ingenuity. Another name of the tower which contains this clock, is _la Tour du Beffroi_, or, as we should say in English, the _Belfry_; for the two words have the same meaning, and it is not to be doubted but that they originated from the same root, the Anglo-Saxon _bell_, whence barbarous Latinists have formed _Belfredus_ and _Berfredus_, terms for moveable towers used in sieges, and so denominated from their resemblance in form to bell-towers. I mention this etymology, because the French have misled themselves strangely on the subject; and one of them has wandered so widely in his conjectures, as to derive _beffroi_ from _bis effroi_, supposing it to be the cause of double alarm! Happily, in the most alarming of all times for France, that of the revolution, this bell, though appointed the _tocsin_, had scarcely ever occasion to sound. There is, however, another purpose, alarming at all periods, and especially in a town built of wood, to which it is appropriated, and to which we only yesterday heard it applied, the ringing to announce a fire. The precautions taken against similar accidents in Rouen, are excellent, and they had need be so; for insurance-companies of any kind are unknown, I believe, in France[113], or exist only upon a most limited scale, at the foot of the Pyrenees, where the farmers mutually insure each other against the effects of the hail. The daily office of this bell is to sound the curfew, a practice which, under different names, is still kept up through Normandy. Here it rings nightly at nine. In other towns it rings at nine in winter only, but not till ten in summer. In some places it is called _la retraite_.
Adjoining the bell-tower is a fountain, ornamented with statues of Alpheus and Arethusa, united by Cupid; a specimen of the taste of the far-famed _siecles de Louis XIV et de Louis XV_, and a worthy companion of the water-works at Versailles. There are in Rouen more than thirty public fountains, all supplied by five different springs, among which, those of Yonville and of Darnetal are accounted to afford the purest water.–The Robec and the Aubette also flow through Rouen in artificial channels. St. Louis granted them both to the city in 1262; but it was the great benefactor of the place, the Cardinal d’Amboise, who brought them within the walls, by means of a canal, which he caused to be dug at his own expence. For a space of two leagues their banks are uninterruptedly lined with mills and manufactories of various descriptions; and it is this circumstance which has given rise to the saying, that Rouen is a wonderful place, for “that it has a river with three hundred bridges, and whose waters change their color ten times a day.”
As a building, the fountain of Lisieux, decorated with a bas-relief representing Parnassus, with Apollo, the Muses, and Pegasus, is most frequently pointed out to strangers; a wretched specimen of wretched taste. Infinitely more interesting to us are the Gothic fountains or conduits, which are now wholly wanting in England. Such is the fountain _de la Croix de Pierre_, which, in shape, style, and ornaments, resembles the monumental crosses erected by; our King Edward Ist, for his Queen Eleanor. The water flows from pipes in the basement. The stone statues, which filled the tabernacles, were destroyed during the revolution: they have been replaced by others in wood.–The fountain _de la Crosse_ is of inferior size, and more recent date. It is a polygon, with sides of pannelled work, each compartment occupied by a pointed arch, with tracery in the spandrils. It ends in a short truncated pyramid, which, in Millin’s time, was surmounted by a royal crown[114]. Its name is taken from a house, at whose corner it stands, and on whose roof was originally a crozier.
Writing to a friend may be regarded, if we extend to writing the happy comparison which Lord Bacon has applied to conversation, not as walking in a high-road which leads direct to a house, but rather as strolling through a country intersected with a variety of paths, in which the traveller wanders as fancy or accident directs. Hence I shall scarcely apologize for my abrupt transition to another very different subject, the hospitals.–There are at Rouen two such establishments, situated at opposite extremes of the town, the _Hospice General_ and the _Hotel Dieu_, more commonly called _la Madeleine_. The latter is appropriated only to the sick; the former is also open to the aged, to foundlings, to paupers, and to lunatics. For the poor, I have been able to hear of no other provision; and poor-laws, as you know, have no existence in France; yet, even here, in a manufacturing town, and at a season of distress, beggary is far from extreme. These institutions, like all the rest at Rouen, are said to be under excellent management.
The annual expences of la Madeleine are estimated at two hundred and forty thousand-francs[115]; out of which sum, no less than forty-seven thousand francs are expended in bread. The number of individuals admitted here, during the first nine months of 1805, the last authentic statement I have been able to procure, was two thousand seven hundred and seventeen: during the same period, two thousand one hundred and fifty-eight were discharged, and two hundred and seventy died. The building is modern and handsome, and situated at the end of a fine avenue. The church, a Corinthian edifice, and indisputably the handsomest building of that description at Rouen, is generally admired. The Hospice General, destitute as it is of architectural magnificence, cannot be visited without satisfaction. When I was at this hospital, the old men who are housed there were seated at their dinner, and I have seldom witnessed a more pleasing sight. They exhibited an appearance of cleanliness, propriety, good order, and comfort, equally creditable to themselves and to the institution. The number of inmates usually resident in this building is about two thousand; and they consisted, in 1805, of one hundred and sixty aged men, one hundred and eighty aged women, six hundred children, and eight hundred and twenty-five invalids. Among the latter were forty lunatics. The food here allowed to the helpless poor is of good quality; and, as far as I could learn, is afforded in sufficient quantity: there are also two work-shops; in one of which, articles are manufactured for the use of the house; in the other, for sale.
The principal towns of France, as was anciently the case in England, have each its mint. The numismatic antiquities of this kingdom are yet involved in considerable obscurity; but it is said that the monetary privileges of the towns were first settled by Charles the Bald[116], who, about the year 835, enacted, that money, which had previously only been coined in the royal palace itself, or in places where the sovereign was present, should be struck in future at Paris, Rouen, Rheims, Sens, Chalons sur Saone, Mesle in Poitou, and Narbonne. At present, the money struck at Rouen is impressed with the letter _B_, indicating that the mint is second only to that of Paris; for the city has remained in possession of the right of coinage throughout all its various changes of masters: it now holds it in common with ten other, cities in the kingdom. Ducarel[117] has figured two very scarce silver pennies, coined here by William the Conqueror, before the invasion of England; and Snelling and Ruding[118] detail ordinances for the regulation of the mintage of Rouen, during the reign of Henry Vth. I have not been able, however, to procure in the city any specimens of these, or of other Norman coins; and in fact the native spot of articles of _virtu_ is seldom the place where they can be procured either genuine or in abundance. Greek medals, I am told, are regularly exported from Birmingham to Athens, for the supply of our travelled gentlemen; and, if groats and pennies should ever rise in the market, I doubt not but that they will find their way in plenty into the old towns of Normandy. There is not, at Rouen, any public collection of the productions of the mint. Since the annexation of the duchy to the crown of France, no coins have been struck here, except the common silver currency of the kingdom: the manufacture of medals and of gold coins is exclusively the privilege of the Parisian mint. The establishment is under the care of a commissary and assay-master, appointed by the crown, but not salaried. Their pay depends upon the amount of money coined, on which they are allowed one and a half per cent., and are left to find silver where they can; so that, in effect, it is little more than a private concern. The work is performed by four die-presses, moved by levers, each of which requires ten men; and about twenty thousand pieces can be produced daily from each press. But this method of working is attended with unequal pressure, and causes both trouble and uncertainty: it is even necessary that each coin should be separately weighed. The extreme superiority of the machinery of our own mint, where the whole operation is performed by steam, with a rapidity and accuracy altogether astonishing, affords Just reason for exultation to an Englishman.–It is true, that the execution of our bank paper rather counterbalances such feelings of complacency.
Footnotes:
[105] This appears from the following inscription now upon a silver tablet placed near it.–“Ce tableau est celui qui fut donne par Louis XII, en 1499, a l’Exchiquier, lorsqu’il le rendit permanent. C’est le seul de tous les ornemens de ce palais qui ait echappe aux ravages de la revolution: il a ete conserve par les soins de M. Gouel, graveur, et par lui remis a la cour royale de Rouen qui l’a fait placer ici, comme un monument de la piete d’un roi, a qui sa bonte merita le surnom de pere du peuple, et dont les vertus se reproduisent aujourd’hui dans la personne non moins cherie que sacree de sa majeste tres chretienne, Louis XVIII, 15 Janvier, 1816.”
[106] Du Cange, (I. p. 24.) quoting from a book printed at Rouen, in 1587, under the title of _Les Triomphes de l’Abbaye des Conards_, &c. gives the following curious mock patent from the abbot of this confraternity, addressed to somebody of the name of De Montalinos.–
“Provisio Cardinalatus Rothomagensis Julianensis, &c.
“Paticherptissime Pater, &c.
“Abbas Conardorum et inconardorum ex quacumque Natione, vel genitatione sint aut fuerint: Dilecto nostro filio naturali et illegitimo Jacobo a Montalinasio salutem et sinistram benedictionem. Tua talis qualis vita et sancta reputatio cum bonis servitiis … et quod diffidimus quod postea facies secundum indolem adolescentiae ac sapientiae tuae in Conardicis actibus, induxenunt nos, &c. Quocirca mandamus ad amicos, inimicos et benefactores nostros qui ex hoc saeculo transierunt vel transituri sunt … quatenus habeant te ponere, statuere, instalare et investire tam in choro, chordis et organo, quam in cymbalis bene sonantibus, faciantque te jocundari et ludere de libertatibus franchisiis, &c…. Voenundatum in tentorio nostro prope sanctum Julianum sub annulo peccatoris anno pontificatus nostri, 6. Kalend. fabacearum, hora vero noctis 17. more Conardorum computando, &c.”
[107] The music of this hymn, or _prose_, as it is termed in the Catholic Rituals, is given in the Atlas to Millin’s Travels through the Southern Departments of France, _plate_ 4.
[108] See under the article _Abbas Conardorum_, I. p. 24.
[109] _Antiquites Nationales_, III. No. 36.
[110] Vol. II. No. 9.
[111] Vol. IV. t. 29, 30, 31.
[112] _Antiquites Nationales_, III. No. 30.
[113] This ceased to be the case almost immediately after this remark was made; for, on my return to France, in 1819, I observed on the whole road from Dieppe to Paris, the letters P A C I, or others, equally meaning _pour assurance contre l’incendie_, painted upon the fronts of the houses.
[114] _Antiquites Nationales_, III. article 30, p. 26.–(In the figure, however, which accompanies this article, the summit is mutilated, as I saw it.)
[115] _Peuchet, Description Topographique et Statistique de la France, Departement de la Seine Inferieure_, p. 33.
[116] _Histoire de la Haute Normandie_, I. p. 94.
[117] _Anglo-Norman Antiquities_, p. 33. t. 3.
[118] _Annals of the Coinage of Britain_, I. p. 505-507.
LETTER XIII.
MONASTIC INSTITUTIONS–LIBRARY–MANUSCRIPTS–MUSEUM–ACADEMY–BOTANIC GARDEN–THEATRE–ANCIENT HISTORY–EMINENT MEN.
(_Rouen, June_, 1818.)
The laws of France do not recognize monastic vows; but of late years, the clergy have made attempts to re-establish the communities which once characterized the Catholic church. To a certain degree they have succeeded: the spirit of religion is stronger than the law; and the spirit of contradiction, which teaches the subject to do whatever the law forbids, is stronger than either. Hence, most towns in France contain establishments, which may be considered either as the embers of expiring monachism, or the sparks of its reviving flame. Rouen has now a convent of Ursulines, who undertake the education of young females. The house is spacious; and for its neatness, as well as for the appearance of regularity and propriety, cannot be surpassed. On this account, it is often visited by strangers. The present lady-abbess, Dame Cousin, would do honor to the most flourishing days of the hierarchy: when she walks into the chapel, Saint Ethelburgha herself could not have carried the crozier with greater state; and, though she is somewhat short and somewhat thick, her pupils are all wonderfully edified by her dignity. She has upwards of dozen English heretics under her care; but she will not compromise her conscience by allowing them to attend the Protestant service. There are also about ninety French scholars, and the inborn antipathy between them and the _insulaires_, will sometimes evince itself. Amongst other specimens of girlish spite, the French fair-ones have divided the English damsels into two _genera_. Those who look plump and good-humored, they call _Mesdemoiselles Rosbifs_; whilst such as are thin and graver acquire the appellation of the _Mesdemoiselles Goddams_, a name by which we have been known in France, at least five centuries ago.–This story is not trivial, for it bespeaks the national feeling; and, although you may not care much about it, yet I am sure, that five centuries hence, it will be considered as of infinite importance by the antiquaries who are now babes unborn. The Ursulines and _soeurs d’Ernemon_, or _de la Charite_, who nurse the sick, are the only two orders which are now protected by government. They were even encouraged under the reign of Napoleon, who placed them under the care of his august parent, _Madame Mere_.–There are other sisterhoods at Rouen, though in small numbers, and not publickly patronized.
Nuns are thus increasing and multiplying, but monks and friars are looked upon with a more jealous eye; and I have not heard that any such communities have been allowed to re-assemble within the limits of the duchy, once so distinguished for their opulence, and, perhaps, for their piety and learning.
The libraries of the monasteries were wasted, dispersed, and destroyed, during the revolution; but the wrecks have since been collected in the principal towns; and thus originated the public library of Rouen, which now contains, as it is said, upwards of seventy thousand volumes. As may be anticipated, a great proportion of the works which it includes relate to theology and scholastic divinity; and the Bollandists present their formidable front of fifty-four ponderous folios.
[Illustration: Initial Letter from a MS. of the History of William of Jumieges]
The manuscripts, of which I understand there are full eight hundred, are of much greater value than the printed books. But they are at present unarranged and uncatalogued, though M. Licquet, the librarian, has been for some time past laboring to bring them into order. Among those pointed out to us, none interested me so much as an original autograph; of the _Historica Normannorum_, by William de Jumiegies, brought from the very abbey to which he belonged. There is no doubt, I believe, of its antiquity; but, to enable you to form your own judgment upon the subject, I send you a tracing of the first paragraph.
[Illustration: Historica Normannorum tracing of autograph]
I also add a fac-simile of the initial letter of the foregoing epistle, illuminated by the monk, and in which he has introduced himself in the act of humbly presenting his work to his royal namesake. I am mistaken, if any equally early, and equally well authenticated representation of a King of England be in existence. The _Historia Normannorum_ is incomplete, both at the beginning and end, and it does not occupy more than one-fifth of the volume: the rest is filled with a comment upon the Jewish History.
The articles among the manuscripts, most valued by antiquaries, are a _Benedictionary_ and a _Missal_, both supposed of nearly the same date, the beginning of the twelfth century.
The Abbe Saas, who published, in 1746, a catalogue of the manuscripts belonging to the library of the cathedral of Rouen, calls this Benedictionary, which then belonged to the metropolitan church, a _Penitential_; and gives it as his opinion, that it is a production of the eighth century, with which aera he says that the character of the writing wholly accords. Montfaucon, who never saw it, follows the Abbe; but the opinion of these learned men has recently been confuted by M. Gourdin[119], who has bestowed considerable pains upon the elucidation of the history and contents of this curious relic. He states that a sum of fifteen thousand francs had been offered for it, by a countryman of our own; but I should not hesitate to class this tale among the numberless idle reports which are current upon the continent, respecting the riches and the folly of English travellers. The famous Bedford Missal, at a time when the bibliomania was at its height[120], could hardly fetch a larger sum; and this of Rouen is in no point of view, except antiquity, to be put in competition with the English manuscript. Its illuminations are certainly beautiful; but they are equalled by many hundreds of similar works; and they are only three in number, the _Resurrection_, the _Descent of the Holy Ghost_, and the _Death of the