France in eighteen hundred and two

One of the earliest calamities which the intemperate zeal of her would-be reformers brought upon France was the entire confiscation of all ecclesiastical property, this property being placed at the disposal of the nation. Broken loose from the bonds of subordination, the people misinterpreted this decree, and in the effervescence of a wanton and licentious spirit demolished the sanctuaries of religion, persecuted their ancient pastors and disturbed the tranquil ashes of the dead.

The National Assembly was finally compelled to acknowledge its precipitate folly by ordering the committee which had charge of alienated property to take measures for the preservation of those monuments of art erected on the domains of the Church.

The municipality of the city of Paris nominated several literary men and artists who were to point out what books and monuments should be saved from destruction. These persons formed a “Commission des Monuments.” The desecrated convent “des Petits Augustins” was chosen for a deposit of sculpture and paintings and that of the “Capucins” in the Rue St. Honoré for books and manuscripts.

This was shortly before the actual and final downfall of the Monarchy. But when a few months later Paris was torn by strong convulsions and the Republic ushered in amidst shrieks of murder and falling ruins, it became the fashion to talk of nothing but philosophy and regeneration, while the demon of havoc made his devastating rounds.

An era of uproar, confusion, fierce fanaticism and mental darkness overspread France.

Science and learning were perverted to the vilest purposes; incendiaries and murderers, wearing the masks of patriots and philanthropists, deluged France with blood.

A man of mild and unassuming manners, of spotless purity of principle, of general and profound knowledge, and of inflexible perseverance, devoted the labours of his life to collect and preserve from the general wreck the monuments of his country. This man is Monsieur Lenoir, the founder and director of the Musée des Monuments Français.

This excellent man traversed France in every direction to save and preserve the precious evidences of his country’s former exploits. Examining the tombs of the dead, amidst crackling flames and temples crushing to atoms, he rescued much priceless worth from the tempest of destruction.

Both my wife and myself consider it one of the happiest events of our lives to have been introduced to M. Lenoir and his lady. Grave, silent, modest and pensive, his character and manner in speaking of his work is that of an affectionate son who collects with tender care the ashes of a murdered parent.

Monsieur Lenoir was for fifteen years the pupil of Doyen, by whom he was presented to the municipality of Paris as a proper person to act as conservator of the depôt of monuments, which by a decree of the Assembly, January 4, 1791, was established in the convent des Petits Augustins. He retained this post through all the anarchy and fury of the years which followed. In many cases he was able to arrest the hands of folly employed in beating down statues and tearing to pieces valuable pictures and destroying the finest bronzes.

“From the Abbey de St. Denis,” says M. Lenoir, “the interior of which the flames seem to have consumed from the roof to the bottom of the graves, I have saved the magnificent mausoleums of Louis XII., François I., Henri II., Turenne and many more. I have collected such of the precious remains that I could restore, and I am already able to display those of François I. and Louis XII. in all their splendour. Happy shall I be if I succeed in making posterity forget the ravages of vandalism.”

When we consider the light which monuments throw upon chronology and history, it is strange to hear M. Lenoir met with multiplied objections from artists (such as David) against his preservation and accumulation of the monuments of the Middle Ages—monuments which they explained were of no service to art. Monsieur Lenoir met their objections by affirming that their presence was necessary to complete his series, and he also justly observed that nothing tends more to give a just notion of any art than the view of its progress and the opportunity of comparing distances between rudeness and refinement.

M. Lenoir collected into one establishment all paintings and statues which had any reference to the history of France. “Such an imposing mass of monuments of every period,” says he, “made me conceive the idea of forming an historical and chronological museum in relation to French art and French history, and, in despite of the malevolent and in the face of great opposition, my plan was favourably received by the Committee of Public Instruction of the National Convention, and on the 15th Germinal, year 4, the Museum was opened.”

M. Lenoir, after ten years of assiduous researches, is now able to display five centuries and also a sepulchral chamber, containing the fully restored tomb of François I.

This Museum embraces the sepulchral art of France, from the age of Clovis to the present time.

Here French and English artists may find models of costumes and arms of every age and rank in a regular series, from Clovis to Philip II. There seems little variation in dress. Rapid changes in costume and fashion appear only to have commenced after the return of the Crusaders.

We enter the Museum through the portico of the now demolished Château d’Anet (immortalised by Voltaire in his Henriade). In the first hall are the monuments of the Middle Ages; many, including that of Fredegonde and her husband Chilperic, have been taken from the church of St. Germains des Près.

The bones of Charlemagne, contained in a marble sarcophagus of Roman origin, were sent from Aix-la-Chapelle by Dervailly, one of the Republican Commissioners. The great conqueror, torn from his magnificent tomb, now lies in a Museum!

One of the most ancient stone coffins is that of an Abbot of St. Germains des Près, A.D. 990, in it his skeleton was found extremely well clothed in a robe of satin of a faded red colour, a long woollen tunic of purple brown, ornamented with an embroidery upon which several figures were wrought, slippers of an extremely well-tanned black leather served as shoes.

The southern gate of the Abbey of St. Denis, which is in this hall, is a most important specimen of early art. The large bas-relief in the middle represents the punishment of St. Denis and his companions Rusticus and Eleutherus.

Denis is the saint to whom the temple was dedicated; but, what is very remarkable, a sprig of vine, laden with grapes, is placed at his feet, precisely in the form as a badge of Dionysus or Bacchus. M. Lenoir says he cannot answer whether the priests who dedicated these temples considered Denis and Dionysus to be the same person, or whether by mere tradition they ordered that to be executed which would certainly characterise both. But it is certain that all the ornaments which decorate St. Denis are attributes of Bacchus. The vine, hunting and tigers appear; Bacchus is cut to pieces by the Maenades; Denis has his head cut off at Montmartre; Bacchus is placed in a tomb and bewailed by women; the body of Denis is collected by holy women, who weep over his remains and place them in a tomb; Bacchus rises again; Denis, after undergoing execution, rises again, picks up his head and walks. On this gate are two tigers, emblematical of the worship of Bacchus. It presents as well a chronology of thirty-six Kings of France.

On entering the hall which contains the monuments of the thirteenth century there are ceilings at angles, sprinkled with stars on a blue ground, supported by posts, rudely decorated. These ceilings are also adorned by the flowers of those times, three of which are emblems of the Evangelists, the others consist of the cabbage and the thistle in a variety of forms. The doors and the windows, constructed from the remains of a ruined building of the thirteenth century, which had been destroyed by the Jacobins, and which Lenoir collected at St. Denis, have been arranged according to the revised taste in architecture by the celebrated Montreau.

Three painted glass windows, representing moral subjects, and taken from the refectory of St. Germain des Près, shed a gloomy light upon the spot.

The tombs Louis IX. erected to his predecessors are only cenotaphs, merely large confines of hollowed stone, in which the body was placed and covered by another stone, the inscription, when there was one, being engraven on the inside. According to St. Foix the tombs of the Kings of the first race were small deep vaults of stone. On these vaults neither figures nor epitaphs were to be seen, as it was the inside that was engraven with inscriptions and laid out with magnificence. Charlemagne was originally buried in a sitting posture. His body after being enbalmed was seated on a throne of gold, clad in the Imperial dress, with the sword Joyeuse by its side. The head of the dead Emperor was ornamented with a golden chain in shape of a diadem. He held a globe of gold in one hand, and a New Testament was placed upon his knees. His gold sceptre and shield were hung on the wall opposite to him.

After the cave had been filled with perfumes, aromatics, and much treasure, it was shut up and sealed.

In the Hall of the Fourteenth Century are some very curious monuments, which show the improvement in the art of design, which the Crusaders brought back with them. A new species of decoration, the Arabian taste, was introduced into architecture. The heavy edifices of the former age gave way to more elegant buildings, and gilding and brilliant colours ornamented the churches. This hall is decorated with the ruins of the St. Chapelle in Paris, built about the year 1300. The Apostles, sculptured in stone of natural size, were taken from this chapel, and are remarkable for the naturalness of their expression and excellent execution. Their habits give an exact idea of the stuffs and embroidery then in fashion, the former of which being not unlike our Indian shawls. The mosaics which cover the ceilings and the walls of this hall were formed from materials taken from St. Denis. The painted windows in this hall are of the same century, and were taken from the “Celestines” and the “Bonshommes de Passy.”

In the fifteenth century artists began to produce general plans, and to connect the calculations of their minds with a grand and careful execution. Gothic art in consequence disappeared. As Paris did not afford many palaces or ornamented houses of this century, M. Lenoir went several times among the monuments left by Cardinal d’Amboise, who employed in the decoration of his palaces Jean Juste, a sculptor, born at Tours, whom the Cardinal had sent at his own expense to Rome, for the purpose of studying the revived Grecian art.

The ceiling, windows, and in general the whole embellishment of this hall are composed on the type of the tomb of Louis XII., which stands in the middle of it, together with the materials brought from the Château de Gaillon, which has been lately demolished. The pillars which support the gates are a present to M. Lenoir from the Administrators of the Department of Eure et Loire, who, to M. Lenoir’s consternation, pulled down the portico of the church of the St. Père at Chartres in order to place its fragments at his disposal.

This portico was erected in 1509, and superadded to an ancient edifice built by Hildnard, a Benedictine monk, in 1170. Two bas-reliefs in this hall merit attention, one, representing God the Father in the midst of angels, was taken from the Cemetery of the Innocents. The other, from the church of St. Geneviève, represents the Pentecost. The violet and blue grounds, the gilded framework and the carmined legend are characteristic of the fifteenth century. Four marble medallions are worthy of careful notice, purchased from the ruined château of Gaillon. Anne of Brittany is represented as Minerva, Louis XII. as Mars, Gallas and Vespasian occupy the remaining medallions.

In this hall stands a bust of Joan of Arc by Beauvollet, after an ancient painting; this bust is placed beside that of Charles VII., whom she maintained on the throne of France. The Hall of the Sixteenth Century contains many interesting figures, and its glass windows are taken from Ecouen, Vincennes, Ault, and the Temple. The monument to the historian Philippe de Comines is an admirable work, and rests on a grand bas-relief, representing St. George and the Dragon. The tomb of Louis XII. and Anne of Brittany, which occupies the centre of this hall, is a superb monument. Unfortunately this fine mausoleum has greatly suffered from the fury of the revolutionary fanatics.

Here are also the statues of François I^er, of Chancellor de l’Hôpital; Montaigne, Prieur, Diane de Poitiers, Philip Desportes the poet, Jean Goujon, the celebrated artist and sculptor, a magnificent monument erected to the Constable of France, Anne de Condé, and the tomb of the Valois, surmounted by statues of François I^er and his wife Claude.

The Hall of the Seventeenth Century contains a fine monument erected to the family of the Villeray; one to the celebrated historian de Thou, the statue of Louis XI., the chef d’œuvre of Girardon, containing the celebrated group in marble designed by Lebrun, 14 feet long and 6 feet broad, which forms the mausoleum of Cardinal Richelieu, the inscription bears: “Magnum disputandi argumentum.”

This admirable sculpture, which had previously been mutilated by anarchists who had forcibly entered the chapel, was afterwards injured by the revolutionary soldiers, who bayoneted M. Lenoir for opposing their destructive intentions; he still bears the scar of this wound on his hand.

Cardinal Mazarin’s monument of white marble, executed by Coyzevox, is equal in artistic merit to that of Richelieu. The Cardinal is represented on his knees.

An admirable group in white marble by Girardon represents Louvois, the French Minister, and History in the form of a woman turning towards him and pointing to her book. The First Consul was attracted to this monument on his visit to the Museum, and gazed upon it a considerable time. When he was in the Hall of the Thirteenth Century he said to M. Lenoir: “Lenoir, vous me transportez en Syrie, je suis content.”

The fine statue of Louis XIV. which stood in the Place Vendôme, was destroyed in 1792, but there is here an exact representation in bronze.

Monsieur Lenoir has also re-erected one from the ruins of that which stood on the Place des Victoires. In this Hall of the Seventeenth Century are the busts of all the great men who figured during that period in France.

The Hall of the Eighteenth Century contains a vast number of subjects, but few of them are very remarkable.

Here are busts of Louis XVI. and his Queen, and of Brissac, who with the prisoners of Orleans was assassinated at Versailles. In the garden belonging to this institution an elysium is formed in which above forty statues are placed. Here and there on a mossy ground, pines, cypresses and poplars shroud these monuments, and funereal urns placed on the walls serve to diffuse an air of repose and melancholy over the whole. In this enclosure a sepulchral chapel to the memory of Abelard and Héloise has been formed out of part of the ruins of the Abbey of St. Denis, in order to show the style of architecture adopted in that age.

Much remains yet to be done by M. Lenoir, but he has already effected wonders, and without ostentation or bustle he has done more for France than she has had the gratitude to acknowledge. Notwithstanding he is extremely circumscribed in the sums allotted to him, being only allowed £1000 per annum, he is always collecting and is continually in advance for the benefit of the institution.

What a contrast does the life of this disinterested antiquarian present to that of the conduct of that gang of philosophical thieves belonging to the National Institute!

M. Lenoir related to me two curious circumstances connected with the taking up of the bodies of the Kings, Queens, Princesses and celebrated men who during the space of 1500 years had been buried in the Abbey of St. Denis, which act of horrid indecency was ordered to be executed by a special decree of the National Convention, for the sake of extracting the lead belonging to these tombs. On October 12, 1793, the workmen opened the tomb of Turenne and found the body of this great man in so perfect a state of preservation that neither were his features deformed nor his countenance altered.

M. Lenoir, who had an opportunity of examining it, stated that it resembled in every way the pictures and medallions of the hero.

The body of Henri IV. was in a perfect state of preservation and the features of his face unchanged.

A soldier who was present, moved by martial enthusiasm, threw himself upon the body and embraced it, and after a long silence of admiration cut off a long lock from the beard and exclaimed, “And I too am a French soldier, henceforth I will have no other mustachios!” And he placed it on his upper lip. “Now,” said he, “I am sure to conquer, and I march to victory!” Immediately after this he disappeared, and was never seen again in the town.