On entering the cemetery of Père la Chaise, proceed directly to the foot of the first hill, and, turning into the alley to the left, you will find a plain obelisk of white marble, without epitaph or inscription, except the simple name "Julie!" It stands in a little garden of flowers, enclosed with a fence of iron; and I have myself seen a young officer, with more than one decoration on his breast, removing those that were withered, and binding fresh wreaths round its little boundary. It never wanted flowers in any season, for he came every day to deck it himself, though the colour gradually forsook his cheek, and pale corroding care was marked in every feature. One day he came no more, and shortly after he was laid in the earth beside her he loved. But before he died, he expressly forbade his name also to be inscribed on the monument which he had raised to his lost Julie.
Such was the tale of our new acquaintance, nearly in his own words; but as he spoke rapidly and fluently, the time it occupied in telling was not, or at least did not seem, long. We felt that he had a good right to call upon us for a return, and finding myself, as usual, when I wish to recollect a good story, totally bankrupt of memory, I turned to the friend who had accompanied me from England--a gentleman in every sense of the word, a man of refined taste and excellent heart. I was very sure that, if he could so far conquer his laziness as to begin, whatever he told would prove interesting; but idleness was predominant, and he was endeavouring to push back the burden to my shoulders, when Monsieur Petit, who seemed to divine the spirit which held us so long together, glided into the room, and told us, that if we were curious in wine, he had some Burgundy so perfect in its kind that he would beg us just to try it.
We nodded the universal head; and while our worthy host was producing his nectar, my friend, stimulated by the very anticipation, gave me one reproachful look for stirring him from his repose, and said, "Well, well, since it must be so, I will try if I can remember a story I once heard of our own country, and give you Two Scenes from the Civil Wars."
TWO SCENES FROM THE CIVIL WARS.
SCENE I.
It was late on the night of an early day in spring--perhaps about two hours past midnight--and yet the inhabitants of a small lonely dwelling on the edge of a large piece of common-ground, lying about ten miles from Farringdon House, were all awake and up, and, with anxious eyes, gazing from the small long windows upon the blank darkness that hung over the world. A single candle stood upon a plain oaken table in the midst of the room, by the light of which might be seen, at one of the windows, a small finely-formed female figure, which still preserved all the lines of exquisite beauty, though a certain degree of stiffness, corresponding well with some deep wrinkles on the cheek, and with the white hair that was braided from the forehead, spoke the passing of many years under the petrifying power of Time, since that form had been in its prime, and the beauty, which still lingered, had known its first expansion. Leaning over her shoulder was a second figure so like the first--but with every grace which time had nipped in the other, just blown; with the cheek unwithered, and the brow unseared--that it seemed a living picture of what the other had been some twenty years before--a portrait in a family picture-gallery, where human loveliness may see and moralize on all the graces that the eternal reaper has gathered as he flew.
At the second window was a somewhat untidy maid-servant, contrasting strongly, in her slatternly disarray, with the plain neatness which decked the two other figures, whose garb I shall not pause to describe; let it suffice that it was of white, and fashioned in the mode of the time, A. D.164-, though either poverty, simplicity of taste, or deference to the puritanical mania of the day, had deprived it of every extraneous ornament.
The night upon which the whole party looked out was dark and sad; for the moon had gone down, and the clouds over head, though not particularly heavy, were quite sufficiently so to hide every star, and cast a deep gray shadow over the wide extent of undulating moorland which, in the day-time, stretched away for many a mile within view. A few faint streaks of pale light upon the edge of sky separated the darkness of the heavens from the darkness of the earth, and marked where the prospect ended; and thitherward were turned the eyes of all, watching with strained and anxious gaze a particular point on the dim horizon, where, every now and then, bright red flashes, sudden and sharp, but circumscribed and momentary, broke upon the night, followed by a distant report as quick and transitory.
No one spoke while those flashes continued; but the silence itself seemed to show the intense anxiety which was felt, by the tenants of that chamber, in regard to the events of which they obtained so dim and unsatisfactory a view. At the end of five minutes, however, the sudden bursts of light entirely ceased; the reports were no longer heard; and the elder of the two ladies, turning away from the window, said, in a low voice, "It is over: God's will is wrought by this time!"
The younger said nothing; but, clasping her fair hands together, raised her eyes towards the dark, heavens, while her full sweet lips moved silently, offering up a petition to that never-closed ear which hears the still voice of the heart's thoughts as plainly as the loudest-tongued appeal.
In a moment after, the clattering sound of horses' feet was heard coming quickly down the road. At first it was faint and distant--the dull heavy tramp of several fleet steeds galloping over moist ground; but soon it came nearer and nearer--left the turf of the common--clanged over the firm and stony road--came close to the house--passed it--and died away in the distance.
"They are flying!" said the younger lady. "Oh, my mother, they are flying! Surely some of the dark powers of the air must assist those bloodthirsty fanatics. They are flying; do you not hear the horses galloping on?"
"Nay, nay, Margaret," replied the other, "it may be the roundheads who fly. Though Goring and his cavaliers marched by here, we cannot tell what way the struggle may have turned, or on what side he attacked the rebels. So it may well be the traitors that fly themselves. But look out, look out; your eyes are younger than mine, and less dimmed with tears; perchance you may catch a passing glimpse that will give us glad news."
The younger lady pressed her eyes close to the window; and though, by this time, the first party of fugitives had passed the house, yet the distant sound of others coming nigh met her ear; and she continued to gaze upon the faint line of the road towards a spot where the yellow glare of the gravel, which distinguished it from the ground about it, was lost in the general darkness of the common. At length three dark figures came forward with tremendous speed; at first so near together, and so hidden by the night, that she could hardly distinguish them from each other; but gradually the forms became more and more clear; and, as they darted past the house, she exclaimed in a glad tone, "They are the rebels, they are the rebels flying for life! I see their great boots, and their morions without crest or plume!"
"But they may be pursuing those who went before," said her mother, with a less elated tone; "they may be the followers, and not the flyers, Margaret."
"No, no, they are flying, in good sooth!" replied the young lady; "for ever and anon they turn their heads to look behind, and still they urge their horses faster each look. But they are gone! And now pray God that victory may not cost us dear! I would that my brother were come back, and Henry Lisle."
"Fie, Margaret, fie!" said her mother; "give God undivided thanks; for if my son and your lover be both left upon the field of battle, we ought still to feel that their lives were well-bestowed to win a victory for their royal master."
Margaret covered her eyes with her hands, but made no answer; and, in a moment after, fresh coming sounds called her again to the window. It was a single horseman who now approached; and though he rode at full speed, with his head bent over the saddle, yet he continued his course steadily, and neither turned his look to the right or left. As he approached the house, his horse started suddenly from some object left by the road-side, plunged, and fell; and the rider, cast with frightful violence from his seat, was thrown on his head upon the ground. A deep groan was, at first, the only sound; but, the moment after, the horse, which had borne him, starting up, approached close to the body of its master, and, putting its head to where he lay, by a long wild neigh, seemed at once, to express its sorrow and to claim assistance.
"If it be Essex or Manchester, Fairfax or Cromwell, we must render him aid, Margaret," said the mother; "never must it be said that friend or enemy needed help at my door, and did not meet it. Call up the hind's boy, Bridget; open the door, and bring in yon fallen man."
Her commands were speedily fulfilled; for though brought low in her estate, the Lady Herrick was not one to suffer herself to be disobeyed. The stranger was lifted from the ground, placed in a chair, and carried into the house. His eyes were closed; and it was evident to the elder lady, as she held the candle to his face, that, if not killed, he was completely stunned by his fall. He was a hard-featured man, with short grizzled hair, and a heavy determined brow, on which the lines of habitual thought remained, even in the state of stupor into which he had fallen. He was broadly made and muscular, though not corpulent; and was above the middle size without being tall. His dress consisted of a dark gray coat, which clove to him with the familiar ease of an old servant; and a brown cloak, which, in truth, had lost much of its freshness in his service. Above his coat had been placed a complete cuirass, the adjustment of which betrayed great symptoms of haste; and by his side he wore one of those long heavy blades of plain steel which had often been the jest of the cavaliers.
His head was uncovered either by hat or morion; and the expanse of his forehead, the only redeeming point in his countenance, was thus fully displayed. The rest of his face was not only coarse in itself, but bad in its expression; and when, after some cold water had been thrown over it, he revived in a degree and looked around, the large, shrewd, unsatisfactory eyes which he turned upon those about him had nothing in them to prepossess the mind in his favour.
The moment that consciousness had fully returned, he made an effort to start upon his feet, but instantly sunk back again into the chair, exclaiming--"The Lord has smitten me, yet must I gird up my loins and go, lest I fall into captivity."
"Fear not, fear not!" replied Lady Herrick, whose humanity was somewhat chivalrous, "you are in safety here; wait for a while till you are better able to mount, and then get you gone, in God's name, for I seek not to foster roundheads more than may be. Yet stay till you can ride," she added, seeing his hand again grasp the chair as if to rise; "women should know no enemies in the hurt and wounded."
"Nay, but, worthy lady," replied the parliamentarian, "should the crew of the Moabitish General Goring follow me even here, to smite me hip and thigh, as they have vowed to do to all who bear arms for godliness sake, or to bear me away captive--"
"Fear not, fear not!" answered the lady; "none should dare, by my hearth's side, to lay hands on one that common mercy bade me take in and shelter--fear not, I say. That is right, Margaret," she added seeing her daughter pour some wine into a glass for the use of the stranger; "take that, it will revive you, and give you strength to speed on."
"Nast thou caught the stranger's horse, Dickson?". she demanded, turning to the boy who had aided in bringing in the commonwealth man, and who now re-entered the room after a momentary absence.
"He is caught and made fast below," replied the lad; "and here are my young master and Master Henry Lisle coming up from the court. They have beaten the roundheads, and killed Colonel Cromwell, and taken his whole army prisoners!" Scarcely had he time to pour forth this rapid tide of news when the door was thrown open, and two young cavaliers, in broad hats and plumes, followed one another rapidly in, each taking with the lips of the two ladies that dear liberty consecrated to intimacy and affection. "Welcome, welcome, my gallant son!" cried the mother, as she held the first to her bosom.
"My own dear Margaret!" whispered the young gentleman who had followed, as he took the unresisted kiss which welcomed him back from danger and strife. But further congratulations of every kind were suddenly stopped, as the eyes of the two cavaliers fell upon the stranger; who had now recovered strength to rise from his seat, and was anxiously looking towards the door beyond them.
"Who, in the devil's name, have we here?" cried Sir George Herrick. "What cropped-eared villain is this?"
In vain his mother explained, and strove to pacify him. The sight of one of the rebels raised again in his bosom all the agitating fury of the fight in which he had been just engaged; and neither the prayers of his mother or his sister, the promises they had made to the stranger, or their remonstrances to himself, had any effect. "Ho, boy!" he exclaimed, "bid your father bring a rope. By the Lord of heaven, I will hang this roundhead cur to the oak before the door? Bring a rope, I say!" and, unsheathing his sword, he advanced upon the parliamentarian, calling upon his companion to prevent his escape by the door.
The stranger said not a word, but bit his nether lip; and, calmly drawing his tuck, retreated into one corner of the room, keeping a keen fixed eye upon the young cavalier, who strode on towards him. Margaret, seeing that all persuasion was vain with her brother, turned her imploring eyes to Henry Lisle, who instantly laid his hand upon his companion's cloak, "What now?" exclaimed the other, turning sharp upon him.
"This must not be, George," replied the other cavalier.
"Must not be!" thundered Sir George Herrick; "but it shall be! Who shall stay me?"
"Your own better reason and honour, I trust," replied the other. "Hear me--but hear me, Herrick! Your lady mother promised this fellow safety to stay and to go; and upon her promise alone, she says, he staid. Had that promise not been given, we should not have found him here. Will you slay a man by your own hearth, who put confidence in your mother's word? Fie, fie; let him go! We have slain enough this night to let one rebel escape, were he the devil himself."
Sir George Herrick glared round for a moment, in moody silence, and then put up his sword. "Well," said he, at length, "if he staid but on her promise, let him take himself away. He will grace the gibbet some other day. But do not let me see him move across the room," he added, with a look of disgust, "or I shall run my blade through him whether I will or not."
"Come, fellow, get thee gone!" said Henry Lisle, "I will see thee depart;" and while his companion fixed his eyes with stern intensity upon the fireplace, as if not to witness the escape of the roundhead, he led him out of the chamber to the outer door.
The stranger moved forward with a firm calm step, keeping his naked sword still in his hand, and making no comment on the scene in which he had been so principal a performer.
As he passed through the room, however, he kept a wary glance upon Sir George Herrick; but the moment he quitted it, he seemed more at ease, and paused quietly at the door while the boy brought forward his charger. During that pause, he turned no unfriendly look upon Henry Lisle; and seemed as if about to speak more than once. At length he said in a low voice, "Something I would fain say--though God knows we are poor blinded creatures, and see not, what is best for us--of thanks concerning that carnal safety which it may be doubted whether----"
"No thanks are needed," interrupted Henry Lisle, cutting across what promised to be one of the long harangues habitual with the fanatics of that day, "no thanks are needed for safety that is grudgingly awarded. I tell thee plainly, that, had it not been for the lady's promise, I would willingly have aided in hanging thee with my own hands; and, when next we two meet face to face, we shall not part till the life-blood of one or other mark our meeting-place!"
"It may be so, if such be God's will," replied the parliamentarian, "and I pray the Lord to give me strength that I may never be found slack to do the work appointed me."
"Thou hast never been so yet, though it be the work of the evil one," answered Henry Lisle, and then added, "I know thee, though none else here does, or it had fared harder with thee in despite of all promises."
"Thou knowest me!" said the stranger, without testifying any great surprise, "then thou doest the better deed in Israel; and I will trust, notwithstanding thy present malignancy, that the day of grace may yet come to thee. Farewell!"
Thus saying, he put his foot in the stirrup, and mounting somewhat heavily the horse which was now brought up for him, rode away across the common.
Time flew--years passed--the temporary success obtained by General Goring over the forces of Oliver Cromwell was swept away and forgotten in a tide of brilliant triumphs won by the parliamentary general, who trod upon steps of victory to the government of an empire. He had conquered his opponents by the sword; he had conquered his partisans by hypocrisy; he had subdued all to his will, and, under the name of Lord General, ruled with more power than a king.
In the mean while, Sir George Herrick and Henry Lisle had fought to the last in the cause of their ancient monarchs; and their zeal--like that noblest of human energies, hope--had grown but the stronger under the pressure of misfortune and distress. Amongst the various chances of the civil war, five times had the day been appointed for the union of Henry Lisle with Margaret Herrick, and five times had some unforeseen mishap intervened to delay what all so much desired. Each day that went by, Lady Herrick, with means quite exhausted and hopes quite depressed, longed more and more to see her child united to a man of talent, and firmness, and resource; and each battle that passed by, Sir George Herrick, struck with a presentiment of approaching fate, thanked God that he had lived to place his sister's hand in that of his friend.
The last time the marriage was suspended, was on the fatal-call to Worcester field, where Sir George Herrick fell; and Henry Lisle only escaped to bear his companion's last request to Margaret, that without further pause or delay, without vain ceremonies or useless tears, she would give herself, at once, to her promised protector. Their wedding was a sad one--no glad peal, no laughing train, announced the union of the two lovers; and, ere the day of their bridal was spent, Henry Lisle was a prisoner, journeying towards the tower of London. His trial was delayed some time; but when it took place it was soon decided. No evidence was wanting to his full conviction of loyalty to his king; and the block and axe was the doom pronounced upon him. A brief three days lay between him and death; and Margaret, who was permitted to see him, clung in agony to her husband's bosom. Lady Herrick to whom he had been more than a son, gazed, for some time, with equal agony, upon his fine, but faded countenance, which, worn by toil, and anxiety, and long imprisonment, was still more clouded by the hopeless despair of her he loved. But suddenly, without a word, the mother turned away, and left the prison.
SCENE II.
It was in that great and unequalled hall, whose magnificent vault has overhung so many strange and mighty scenes in English history, and whose record of brief and gorgeous pageants reads as sad a homily on human littleness, as even the dark memorials of the tomb. It was in Westminster Hall, on the 16th day of December, that, with the clangour of trumpets and all the pomp and splendour both of military and civil state, a splendid procession moved forward to a chair or throne, raised on some ornamented steps at the further extremity of the building, Judges, in those solemn robes intended to give dignity to the judgments they pronounce, and officers, dressed in all that glittering panoply destined to deck and hide the rugged form of war, moved over the echoing pavement between two long ranks of soldiers, who kept the space clear from the gazing and admiring multitude. But the principal figure of the whole procession, the one on which all eyes were turned, was that of a stout, broad-built man, with a dingy, weather-beaten countenance, shaggy eyebrows, and a large red nose. His countenance was as unprepossessing as can be conceived; nor was his dress, which consisted of plain black velvet, at all equal to those which surrounded him: But there was something in his carriage and his glance not to be mistaken. It was the confidence of power, not the extraneous power of circumstance and situation, but of that contracted internal strength which guides and rules the things around it. Each step, as he planted it upon the pavement, seemed destined to be rooted there for ever; and his eye, as it encountered the glances of those around, fell upon them with a calm strength which beat them to the dust before its gaze. Passing onward, through the hall, he ascended the steps which raise the chair of state; and, turning round, stood uncovered before the people. The two keepers of the great seal, standing on his right and left, read a long paper called the Institute of Government, by which, amongst other things, the Lord General, Oliver Cromwell, was named Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England. The paper was then signed, an oath was administered, and, putting on his hat, the figure which had advanced to the chair sat down, amidst the acclamations of the people, while all the rest continued to stand around uncovered.
Various other ceremonies were performed; and then the great usurper, rising from his seat, led back the precession towards the door of the hall; but scarcely had he traversed one half of its extent, when a woman, who had been whispering to one of the soldiers that lined the way, pushed suddenly past, and cast herself at Cromwell's feet. "An act of grace, Lord Protector!" she exclaimed, "an act of grace, to bring a much needed blessing on the power you have assumed!"
"What wouldst thou, woman?" demanded Cromwell "somewhere I have seen thy face before, what wouldst thou? If thy petition be conceived in godliness, and such as may be granted with safety to these poor disturbed realms, it shall not be refused on such a day as this."
"When Colonel Cromwell failed in his attack on Farring-House;" said Lady Herrick--for it was she who knelt before him: "and when General Goring surprised and cut to pieces his troops at night near Warnham common"--Cromwell's, brow darkened, but still she went on--"he fled from a disaster he could not prevent, and was cast from his horse, stunned, at the door of a widow woman, who gave him shelter. He was the enemy of her and hers, and flying from a battle in which her own son had fought; and yet she gave him rest and comfort, and opposed that very son, who would have shed his blood by her hearth. There, too, Henry Lisle interposed to save his life, and was successful; otherwise, Lord Protector, I tell thee, thou wouldst never have sat in that seat which thou hast taken this day. Condemned by, your judges for acting according to his conscience, I now ask the life of Henry Lisle, in return for the life he saved. Grant it--oh, grant it, as you are a man and a Christian!"
Cromwell's brow was as dark as thunder; and after gazing on her for a moment in silence, his only reply was, "Take her away; the woman is mad--take her away and put her forth; but gently--gently--bruise not the bruised--so--now--let us pass on; for, in truth, we have been delayed too long."
Put out of the hall by the soldiers; her last hope gone; her heart nearly broken for her child and her child's husband, Lady Herrick wandered slowly on towards that sad place where she had left all that was dear to her. The gay and mighty cavalcade, which conveyed the usurper back to his palace, passed her by like one of those painful dreams which mock us with sights of splendour in the midst of some heavy woe; and before she had threaded many more of the solitary streets, robbed of their population by the attractive ceremony of the day, a single trooper galloped up, gazed on her for a moment, and rode on. At the tower, no formalities were opposed to her immediate entrance of the prisoner's chamber--she was led to it at once; the door was itself open; an unsealed paper lay upon the table; Henry held Margaret in his arms; and tears, which she never before had seen in his eyes, now rolled pitifully down his cheeks, and mingled with those of his bride; but, strange to say, smiles were shining through those tears, and happiness, like the rainbow sun, beamed through the drops Of sorrow.
"Joy, mother, joy!" were the first and only words. "Joy, mother, joy!--Henry is pardoned!"
By the time the second scene was over, the bottle was out and the clock struck one. The lamps, too, were burning low and dim, and it would have been an excellent moment for a ghost story to wind up the evening. But our dear new-found friend was about to set out by the steam-packet for England, early the next morning; our horses were ordered for Rouen at six o'clock, and we were forced to say good night.
The next morning we were punctual to our hour, and reached the fine old city of the Seine, whilst day was still shining bright upon it. The place itself is too well known to need description, and nothing occurred of any interest that is not comprised in a single letter which I wrote thence to a friend now dead. It was never sent, and is only worth preserving as a memorial of the first suspicion that entered my mind, that my servant might not be dealing fairly with me, a suspicion which; if it had been then confirmed, might have saved me many a long hour of misery.
TO W. H----, ESQ.
Rouen, 1824.
My dear H----,
You will be surprised to find that we have got no farther on our pilgrimage than Rouen, but my desultory habit of never proceeding straight to any object, and suffering myself to be tempted always by the collateral; makes our progress slow. We arrived here, through some beautiful valleys, filled with manufactories of cotton: and after passing by a long alley of fine trees, wound through a number of narrow dull streets, to the Hotel----, which, though one of the best in the town, still offers that mixture of finery and filth which pervades all French inns. The salle à manger, I am convinced, has never been swept or cleaned since its construction. The dirt may sometimes have been kicked out by accident, but can never have been removed intentionally.
Our breakfast was served to us on very handsome plate; but a pig, followed by some turkeys, walked in from the court with a cabbage-leaf in his mouth, and with true French urbanity, seemed very much inclined to keep us company at our meal. Although we explained to him in the clearest manner that we wished to be alone, we had some difficulty in keeping him out, as the door would not shut, and he appeared to have right prescriptive to a free entrance. Shortly after, we had the company of our landlady, who, though much more élégante than a person of the same class in England, has the most tremendous tongue that ever woman was blessed with. She began upon her own history, and went through it from the beginning even unto the end. She informed us that her husband was bête, but bon, explained to us her opinions upon various points of morality which did not exactly coincide with our own, and was then going to enter upon another story--when, as we could not get rid of her as we had got rid of the pig--we wished her good morning, and took a ramble through the town.
The general appearance of Rouen is dull, but there is an air of antiquity about it which I have often found wanting as a characteristic in places considerably older than this. One of the first things which attracted our notice was the beauty of the women: certainly never did I see such a number of pretty faces, as there are here framed and glazed at shop windows, with their large dark eyes glancing at us like diamonds as we pass by. But this is no subject for you, Sir Stoic; old mouldering monuments, and crumbling ruins, will better suit your musty, antiquarian soul. You would revel were you with us here. This place is one great museum of ancient buildings: every thing smacks of old days; and memory has plenty of occupation in raking up all the histories that each object recall.
I have seen good paintings of the Cathedral as it appeared some years ago, before the spire was burnt; and though the people lament very much its fall, I cannot say that I think the building has lost by the accident. The spire was light and elegant certainly, but it did not seem to me to harmonize well with the rest of the church. I believe that we wore out the patience of our valet-de-place, staying nearly three hours to examine every part of it, and admiring and re-admiring the beautiful combinations which the light Gothic arches present at every step you take along the aisles. Round some of the principal columns there is a curious sort of open balcony, which I do not remember to have seen any where else, and which has a very pleasing effect.
After remaining so long in the interior we mounted the tower, and proceeding through a little door which led to the outside, found ourselves amongst all the grotesque figures with which our good Norman ancestors ornamented their churches. There were monkeys, and bears, and parrots, and dragons, and devils, and saints; all pellmell, jostling against each other, without any respect for persons.
It was singular to remark, that the iconoclastic spirit of the French revolution had found out the statues of the saints and martyrs even up here, and chopped their heads off without mercy, leaving the devils as the proper images of the spirit of the time. It certainly was the most ridiculous fury that ever seized a mad nation, to think of beheading blocks of marble. When the sans-culottes entered the town of Nancy in Alsace, they found, amongst other things, the statues of Apollo and the nine muses; these they immediately christened the King and the royal family, and proceeded to guillotine them on the spot. The busts of Voltaire and Rousseau were about to undergo the same fate, but the librarian of the town saved them, by announcing them as the very patriarchs and apostles of the revolution.
Immediately after the Cathedral, we saw the Abbey church of St. Ouen. It wants the vast solemnity of the other, but more than makes up for it, by the correctness of the proportions, and the minute elegance of all the parts. A very beautiful effect is produced by the disposition of the font, which is so placed as to reflect almost the whole interior of the building.
From St. Ouen we went to the Library, whose principal curiosity seems to be an old illuminated psalm-book, which must have cost a world of useless labour to the monk who, as the librarian informed us with no small emphasis, occupied fifty years of his life in painting it. Afterwards, in rambling through the town, we came to the spot where poor Jeanne d'Arc was burnt. It is called La Place de la Pucelle; and in a neighbouring house we were shown the cabinet in which, it is said, her judges deliberated their cruel sentence. It is a dark, gloomy, octagonal room, lined with black oak; and one naturally repeoples it with the merciless countenances of those who once sat there, to gratify their bloodthirsty malice on the poor enthusiast who had been the means of their overthrow. There can be little doubt that the Maid of Orleans was nothing but a visionary, and as such became the tool of Agnes Sorrel and her party, to whom the delivery of France front the English yoke is really to be ascribed.
A great part of the common dwelling-houses in Rouen bear evident marks of their ancient construction, but the one I have just mentioned, in the Place de la Pucelle, is particularly worthy of remark, on account of a curious relief on one of the pavilions, representing the famous meeting of Henry VIII. and Francis I. between Guisnes and Ardres. Most of the figures are very perfect, and on various parts of the building there are some curious sculptures and arabesques. Before the revolution, the number of churches in Rouen, must have been immense; at every step the vestiges of some of these edifices present themselves, converted into workshops or storehouses: and there remain a great many, still appropriated to the purposes of religion. The French possess an infinity of monuments of this kind, but they are not careful of them. It is truly disgusting to see quantities of dirty stalls and outhouses raised against their finest buildings, and all sorts of nuisances practised against them in midday. The interior is also often spoiled by the bad taste of those who have the charge of them; frequently we find the fine stonework painted all sorts of colours; no qualm of conscience opposes itself to adding a Greek doorway or skreen to a Norman church; and the horrid daubs of pictures which are to be met in the finest churches in France, would disgrace a barber's shop.
The churches in Rouen, are, I believe, without exception Gothic, which appears to me to be far better suited than any other architecture to the character of the Christian religion. There is that pensive kind of shade which invites the mind to thought. The grandeur of the objects, and the vastness of the proportions, make us feel our own littleness: we find ourselves as nothing in the temples we ourselves have made; and our thoughts naturally turn to Him who created all.
Certain it is, that the purer the religion, the less is it connected with external appearances; but so little have we the power of abstracting our ideas from the immediate matter of our senses, that there are few who have not, at some time, felt that a great degree of solemnity in all which surrounds us, is absolutely necessary, when we would turn the whole current of our thoughts towards the sublime object of our devotion. Pomp and show, and stage effect, are beneath the dignity of religion; but when under a dispensation which guides the heart and its feelings, as well as the body and its actions, the creature kneels to adore its Creator, the solemnity of every object around can never be too great for such an awful occasion.
The religion of the Greeks, in harmony with their climate, their customs, and their minds, was one of striking and brilliant ceremonies, formed to excite the passions and dazzle the imagination; with more show than feeling, more elegance than solemnity.
The architecture of their temples was consonant both to the nature of the people and their religion, light, rich, and graceful, and full of forms more calculated to excite pleasure and admiration, than thought or devotion, it had far more grace but less grandeur than the Gothic. Its very perfection is the cause of its wanting solemnity. The pillars are exactly proportioned to the building, and the ornaments to the parts which they adorn; every thing is gradual and easy; but in Gothic architecture, all is abrupt and striking. The minute ornaments which are too small to distract the attention from general effect, give, by contrast, an additional vastness to the high pointed arches, and enormous columns. The very disproportion of the parts makes the whole appear larger than it really is, the soul of man seems to have power to expand amidst the gigantic vaults, under which he walks as an insect; and his mind naturally takes a tone from the solemn vastness of the building.
To you, who are almost as great a Goth as myself in these points, I am not afraid to express my opinions; although I have no architectural knowledge to support them. I am apt to judge alone from my feelings, and certainly I never experience the same sensation of awe in any other building that I do in a Gothic cathedral.
Nothing has occurred to myself worth commemorating since our arrival in this city, if I except some suspicions which have assailed me regarding my worthy servant Essex. You remember the fellow and his extreme plausibility. Amongst other points of his character he affected no slight dislike to his former master, your acquaintance Wild; representing him as the most violent and malevolent of human beings. On going to the post-office myself, the other day, I saw fixed up amongst the letters which have not been forwarded for want of postage, one addressed to no other person than Alfred Wild, Esquire, and that address, too, written in the precise hand which delivers me my weekly accounts. What, this means I do not know; but I mentioned to my friend B----, while the fellow was in the room, the fact of having seen a letter addressed to Wild, but not forwarded for want of postage. The next day the letter was no longer there. This, however, might be nothing, did I not feel very sure that--at whose instigation I know not--the rascal gives himself the trouble of watching me in my various rambles through the town. If I detect him, he will return to England with a broken head, although he can find out but little in my goings forth which can injure
Your's ever,
J---- Y----
THE JOURNEY.
Quatuor hinc rapimur viginti et millia rhedis
Mansuri oppidulo quod versu dicere non est
Signis perfacile est. Venit vilissima rerum
Hic aqua. Horace.
What can it be? It can not be food, nor climate, nor customs, which make two races of people, living side by side, so very different from each other. Certain it is, that beauty stops short at the gates of Rouen; and that from thence to Berney, they are the ugliest, ill-looking generation that ever I beheld. Not a pretty face was to be seen for love or money. Nature seemed to have expended all her beauty upon the scenery.
About three leagues from Rouen we stopped at the foot of a high hill, and climbing amongst some fine oaks to the left, arrived at the top of a pinnacle, which commanded the whole country round. It was as beautiful a view as can be conceived. One vast forest, with innumerable valleys winding away towards the horizon covered with rich wood; but as the withering touch of time had not affected all the trees alike, the thousand autumnal tints of the foliage, and the various shadows thrown by the undulations of the country, offered a variety and richness of colouring seldom to be equalled.
The height where we stood had anciently been fortified, and some parts of the walls are still remaining, which bear the name of The Château of Robert le Diable. Whence the celebrated legend of that personage derives its origin I know not. The only account I could obtain of him in this part of the country was from an old woman not to be relied on.
"In the old times," she said, "when Normandy was separate from France, the lord of that castle, The Comte Robert, was a bold, wild young man, rather famous for doing what he ought not to have done. His lady mother had been a strange, solitary being, living separate from all the world after her husband's death, only entertaining herself with books, which the people judged to be of sorcery, because nobody but herself understood them, and only talking with spirits; so the people said, though nobody had ever been present at any of these ghostly conversazione. Be that as it may--in her last moments she was attended by a capuchin of the neighbouring monastery, who was so horrified (it appeared) at the confession of her monstrous sins, that he was seen to stagger out of the castle like one distracted; and when one of the servants, entirely from love to his mistress, and without any curiosity whatever, ran after him to ask, what was the matter, he replied, like a man out of his senses, swearing that he would not drink the other bottle and crying out that the young count was the devil, and his mother not a whit better. Now the valet, who was a very religious man, and believed every thing a capuchin said to him, returned to the castle and told all the people that, his young master was the devil.
"'C'est le diable,' said the valet. 'Le diable!' cried the butler, laying his finger on his proboscis. 'Le Diable!' exclaimed the écuyer, pulling up his boots. 'Le Diable!' said the countess's maid, getting closer to the écuyer. 'Do not be frightened, Jeannette,' whispered he, 'the devil himself shan't hurt you--' What he said more was lost in a buzz. 'Fie! don't be blasphemous, Roger,' cried Jeannette, 'who knows what may happen?' and so they talked it all over, and agreed that it was very possible that the young count might be the devil.
"When the old lady was safely dead and buried, Count Robert ordered his cellar to be replenished, for it had fallen much to decay; and getting together a great company of young knights and nobles, they fell into all manner of excesses; hunting till they were tired, eating till they were full, and drinking till they were drunk, bespattering the old women with dirt from their horses' feet, and kissing the young ones in a very unbecoming manner. So that every body cried out that Count Robert was--le diable.
"Now it so happened that the Count fell in love with the abbess of the convent of Beauchamp, whom her brother, the Marquis of Millemonte, had caused to take the veil. He having some religious scruples and qualms of conscience to paying the dower her father had left her, in case she entered into the state of matrimony. Nevertheless, the count, who cared little about religious matters, set his brains to work; and taking the method of the famous Count Orry, he obtained admission to the convent; so that every body cried out more than ever, that Count Robert was certainly--le diable.
"The news of this occurrence was not very palatable to the Marquis of Millemont, but Count Robert heeded not whether he liked it or no, and went on in revelry and feastings, till one night, the marquis, with a large company, suddenly broke in upon him, and began to lay about him without mercy. Now, though the count was as drunk as the sow of a certain celebrated personage, he fought so hard, that every one swore Count Robert was le diable; till, overpowered by numbers, he was driven, with the few of his followers who remained alive, from chamber to chamber, even to the outer wall; whence, sooner than be taken, he threw himself down into the ditch of the castle; and all those who were by vowed and averred, that the water where he fell hissed and fizzed, as if a piece of hot iron had tumbled into it, which completely convinced all the world that Count Robert was really nothing but le diable.
"From that time to this," said the old woman, "the château has gone gradually to decay. I remember it, standing high above every thing around, but now the upstart trees measure their height against it, and in the greenness of their youth seem to mock its forlorn old age, forgetting that they shall decay and fall like it, and like me. Every year robs it of something; and it is only wonderful that it has not fallen before, as for many a century it has never been inhabited: for who would dwell in the château of Robert le Diable?"
I hated sentiment at that time of my life; and as the old woman was beginning to grow somewhat sentimental on the old castle, we wished her good morning, and proceeded as fast as we could to Berney. The postmaster, or rather the post-mistress, for it was a women, was very civil and good-tempered, and as she kept an hotel into the bargain, we should have lodged with her, had it not been for a wet court-yard between the inn and the street. It had been originally carpeted with straw, which had since been beaten into a mash and wetted with a fortnight's rain, so that with the assistance of a number of oxen, horses, goats, and pigs, it had been rendered quite impassable. We went then to l'Equerre where we were shown through the kitchen into a single room with two beds. I hinted to the landlady, that we should require two rooms, and here began our first battle. She had no idea, it appears, of people occupying two rooms, when one would do. But I kept to my point, and told her that an Englishman always required a room to himself. She said that it was very extraordinary. I agreed to that, but told her that the English were an extraordinary nation, and when they could not get two rooms they always went away. Thereupon, she instantly gave us what we required, though she had vowed fifty times before that she had but that one apartment vacant.
While dinner was preparing we went out to visit the churches, and walked through the beautiful valley of Charentonne. We staid a moment in the cemetery, but there was only one tomb to be distinguished from the routine of epitaphs commonplace. On the one I speak of appeared a broken rose, rudely sculptured in the stone, and below were written some lines, the idea of which was better than the versification.