Winged Wheels in France

The guard tells the history as he moves onward, and I notice that those of the party who evince the least reverence for the sacred places are two priests, who laugh at everything. The refectory interests them most—one of the finest Gothic halls in France—and time is spent in the inspection of the three great chimneys in the kitchen with many sighs and much patting of capacious stomachs,—in regret, I doubt not, at not having been on hand at all these feasts throughout the centuries. This portion of the monastery dates from the year 1203, and if you descend into the crypt beneath the church choir you will find pillars twelve feet in diameter. Though one sees much, I fancy, that as at Loches, there is much one does not see. If you could only come alone and be permitted the freedom of the place. But you might get lost,—it is quite possible I should think. If Louis XI. did not have some particularly choice and horrible prison hidden away in Mont St. Michel then he was not the king history paints for us. The cathedral is being restored by the State. France seems desirous of preserving her historic spots in the proper form and gives a good example to her neighbour, Great Britain, who allowed the great hall of Edinburgh Castle to be restored by a private citizen, and still permits the desecration of Stirling Castle. There are plenty of places which would serve as well and better for barracks and it is a disgrace to Scotland that she permits such a use to be made of Stirling, whose great halls are cut up and divided by common partitions to form accommodations of such a character. Royal Stirling of all places! For the sake of the history of the nation and the students thereof it should be cleared out, it would be far more instructive than any history extant.

CHAPTER XXI

ARRIVAL AT CAEN—WILLIAM THE NORMAN AND CHARLOTTE CORDAY—CHURCH OF ST. ÉTIENNE—PEOPLE AND RAILROADS OF NORMANDY—ROUEN AND ITS CHURCHES—THE MAID OF ORLEANS, HISTORY OR LEGEND?—CASTLE OF PHILIPPE LE BEL—DEPARTURE FROM ROUEN

There are two names connected with the history of Caen which obliterate the memory of all others: one of a king and warrior, the other of a woman who gave her life for her country,—William of Normandy, and Charlotte Corday. How far apart their lives lay, how widely different their history! While the story of the man is full of interest and glory, my thoughts rest longest on that of the girl, and I seem to see her stepping from the door of the old house in the Rue St. Jean and flitting away, down the long highway towards Paris and the guillotine; her figure clothed in quiet gray stuff, a white kerchief crossed on her bosom, and fastened by a bow of black ribbon, while a mass of wavy black hair is crowned by a white cap bearing a black bow, and great dark eyes light up a pallid face,—eyes glowing with that intense love of country much more common to women than to men. That is to my mind Charlotte Corday and in a simple house of the bourgeoise in this quiet street she passed most of the years of her life. Its façade is changed but the interior remains and one can picture the simple provincial household with its scant furniture, its necessary economies, the old aunt confiding to the family friend her "fear for Charlotte," the meeting with her young patriots, and the last quiet closing of the door of her home with no farewells to any one—the flitting away down this long bright highway where we are speeding joyously to-day. Follow her and you will go to the garden of the Palais Royal where she bought the knife; go with her to the chamber of Marat where she slaughtered his vileness; see her in the hands of the furies of the Revolution; watch her as she mounts the scaffold. Surely if ever murder was forgiven by God, that girl went spotless into His presence,—pure as the Maid of Orleans.

But Charlotte did not walk to Paris. She travelled in the diligence, and seems to have had a very good time of it. She is a case in point showing that vanity in women, especially in French women, is strong even in the face of death by violence. We find her smiling upon the artist who sketched her during the trial and turning her face towards him, while, as the executioner waited, she gave a sitting for her portrait in the Conciergerie. In this portrait which still exists she is clothed in the red robe in which she met her death, as she called it, "the toilette of death arranged by somewhat rude hands, but it leads to immortality."

It rained in torrents as she moved out to her doom, and then the sun shone forth. "Its departing rays fell upon her head, and her complexion heightened by the red of the chemise, seemed of an unearthly brilliance. Robespierre, Danton, and Camille Desmoulins watched her on her way, a celestial vengeance appeased and transfigured."

How different the story of the other name which makes Caen famous! Pomp and glitter, the call to arms and a throne! While the girl's grave is unknown her death was attended by a nation, though the King sleeps in the choir of the majestic Church of Saint Étienne and his descendants rule in his stead, his death was neglected and he was buried by charity. But which name stands first in the great court of God?

As the traveller enters Caen the first object which greets his eye is the Church of St. Étienne, the Church of the Abbey of Men, which was founded by the Conqueror in 1036, the same year his Queen Matilda founded the Church of the Abbey of Women,—La Trinité, which one sees over yonder, both as an expiation of the sin they had committed in marrying within the forbidden degree of consanguinity. While singularly majestic, St. Étienne is simple to severity, but what do architects think about its façade and the odd-looking spires? To me they appear as though brought by some giant on a dark night and set upon the wrong church, after which it was not worth while to take them down. Certainly to one who is not an architect, they seem oddly placed on that façade.

Our way through Normandy is as though driving through a beautiful park. The long highways stretch off into the smiling country like great white ribbons turning and twisting on a bed of delicate green satin and the brooks bubble and sing along happy in the ever increasing life of spring. Tall poplars clothed in the pale green which seems peculiar to France in this season, march away in stately procession, while the quaint thatched cottages are all a-blossom with the flowers of peach and pear trees trained over their faces, and through which the windows twinkle out at you like the eyes of a maiden from under the frills of a white sunbonnet. There are many Evangelines abroad in this smiling country, still wearing their Norman caps and kirtles of homespun. Ancient dames sit by the open doors thankful that they may bask in the sunshine of another year, and that they will not as yet add another cross to the many on the hillside yonder. One with whom a black-robed priest is talking is evidently so old that she must say farewell to all this brightness before very long. We pass many curious groups. Here comes one on a make-shift of a wagon, evidently of home construction. It is hauled by three poor dogs, one on each side and one underneath it. A stolid-looking girl pushes behind, and in it sits enthroned a beast of a man, evidently a cripple in his legs, but with bestiality written on every feature; such a man as Quilp must have been. A wretched baby completes the party, but such groups of misery are the exception, most of the people of Normandy look happy.

Our route lies through Lisieux, a prosperous little city, earnestly engaged in its own affairs, and having no time to waste on a passing show like ourselves. But we note as we glide by that Lisieux possesses a church and many bits of curious architecture that would interest, but to-day is one of those days when it is good to be alive, when there is great joy in motion, so we sail onward almost like the flight of a great flamingo, onward and onward, until from the top of a hill the Seine comes into view, winding through its fair valley on the way to the sea; and, off in the other direction, with her spires glittering in the sunlight, sits Rouen, the pride of all this region which would appear to have placed the town in its centre, and arranged its hills like a vast amphitheatre all around it, that the looker-on might the better observe the pageant of history as it swept through the ancient city. As we move onward and into her streets we discover that the Rouen of to-day, while evidently a "member of one of our oldest families" is not a dead town. The Seine sweeping through her midst bears on its waters ships from all over the world as well as the quaint barges and puffing little steamers which come down from Paris. The old walls have vanished, giving place to wide boulevards, which encircle the ancient town and are in turn surrounded by far-spreading suburbs. Light and life is everywhere and the cafés over-flow far into the streets with their little tables and merry throngs. Evidently the fortune of the ancient city was great, for its heir of to-day is certainly in affluent circumstances,—so that there is nothing of the sadness which envelops so many of the ancient towns of the Republic, and yet few, if any, of them preserve intact so much that belongs to the Middle Ages.

Leave the wide, gay boulevard by the river and enter any of the adjoining streets and you slip at once backward for hundreds of years,—large sections stand unchanged by the flight of time,—ancient mansions gaze down upon you still bearing their coats of arms in stone,—still showing the high peaked roofs and heavy carving of a distant age.

Moving on, you will pass the exquisite Church of St. Maclou and at last pause with a feeling of satisfaction before the majestic façade of the great cathedral. This temple holds perfect beauty in its plan, is a poem in stone, which satisfies the mind and the eye ever more and more. When the traveller passes into the shadowy interior he is forced to pause in deepest admiration. The majestic pillars of its nave stretch away hundreds of feet before him until merged in one of the most beautiful choirs in Europe; centuries old all of it, and never having been restored it possesses that mellow beauty which only the passage of the years can bestow, and the artist lingers long in its shadows drinking in the charm around him, with scarcely a desire to enter into an examination of details,—nor shall I attempt such descriptions here.

As you move on into the choir, you will pass over some small lozenge-shaped pieces of marble, marking the spot where rested once the lion heart of Richard, and the body of his brother Henry. Here they found the former in a greenish taffeta bag inclosed in a case of lead,—it is now in the Museum. The gorgeous monument of George, Cardinal of Amboise and Louis de Brézé will hold the attention in one of the chapels,—both stately affairs. Brézé was the husband of Diane de Poitiers, who is here represented clothed in deep mourning and shedding many tears. An inscription upon the tomb states that she was faithful in life and will be with him in death. Doubtless Francis I. or Henry II. helped her erect the monument and compose the epitaph. As for her sepulchre, it was built in her Château of Anet and there she was buried. As for her faithfulness to her husband, those two kings, father and son, can testify better than we can. One wonders why the furies of the Revolution did not pull that tomb to bits,—for even in our day, a complacent husband is not a pleasant object. As one wanders out into the quiet streets of the old town, one wonders much as to whether things in those days were after all very different from things in our own time. Certainly those husbands did not think it worth while to kill themselves.

Passing onward the traveller comes to the Church of St. Gervais—the oldest in Rouen and in the priory of which William the Conqueror died.

The royal dead in France were generally treated with scant respect on their final journeys. Francis II. and Louis XV. were carted in old wagons by night to St. Denis, and even this English king owes his burial to a stranger. After the siege of Nantes, wounded to death, he retired to this priory of St. Gervais to die. Deserted by his sons and plundered by his servants when scarcely dead, his body lay naked and uncared for until in pity and charity, a neighbouring knight assumed the obligation of his funeral and escorted his body to the Church of St. Étienne in Caen.

St. Gervais has suffered restoration, so let us move onward to where the Maid of Orleans is supposed to have ended her life at the stake.

Which story are we to believe as to this maiden,—that given by history and with which every schoolboy is familiar, or that related by M. Lesigne, who terms the former "a beautiful legend?" He points out that it is incredible that people should seriously believe that the English were driven out by a peasant girl even though inspired and he shows that just then the power of the French was strengthened, while that of the English was weakened by dissensions at home; that Jeanne was taken up by the war party,—not to lead its armies but to instill religious fervour and courage into the hearts of its soldiers, that she was not even aware of the first action between the contending armies but was in fact in bed at the time; that Orleans fell because the English had been abandoned by their allies of Burgundy, and he gives credit for that to "the astute policy of Charles VII.," which, by the way, is the first move denoting any brains on the part of that monarch of which we have ever been made aware; that Jeanne's triumph came during the rejoicings at Orleans, and when Charles was crowned at Rheims. Taken by the Burgundians, she was transferred to the English, whose king, as a Christian monarch, was under obligations to hand her over to stand trial before the proper ecclesiastical court, but that court had no power to inflict punishment, death, or torture. The judgment of a secular court was necessary. On threat of being consigned to that court, Jeanne signed a recantation, which was accepted, provided she promised henceforth to wear woman's dress. Condemned to life imprisonment, she passed again into the hands of the English as a prisoner of war who represented a large ransom. Left to herself she soon assumed male attire and was again handed over to the Church for trial. Again recanting, she was recommended by that court to the mercy of the secular powers, the English, who had never pronounced judgment upon her. The legend of her burning was due to a desire to make her fulfil the whole prophecy of the ancient Merlin, who was supposed to have said that the islanders would put her to death, but she seems to have subsequently married Robert des Armoises, and we possess a document drawn up in the names of Robert des Armoises, Chevalier, Seigneur of Trichiemont and "Jehanne du Lys la Pucelle de France," wife of said Trichiemont. The identity of Jehanne du Lys and Jeanne d'Arc is proven by several documents, among these a part of the chronicle of Saint Thibault de Metz, describing her meeting with her brothers and mentioning her marriage. This is the substance of M. Lesigne's book, proving that every story has two sides. However, the world in general and the Church in particular accept the story as history gives it.

She is now a regularly canonised saint of the Church of Rome and I should not like to suggest to many healthy schoolboys at home that she was not burned to death. If that did occur, it was not where this meaningless and absurd monument stands to-day, but on the site of the Théâtre Français. The scene of her imprisonment, trial, and condemnation was the ancient Castle of Philip Augustus in 1204, of which nothing now remains unless, as is claimed, the donjon tower shown to-day as the prison of Jeanne d'Arc be part thereof. It certainly was not her prison as that was torn down in 1809,—a year, by the way, which seems to have been more fatal to many of these old buildings than the period of the Revolution.

Few of the old houses which crowd these streets and point their aristocratic gables towards the sky stood here in 1400, though many of the less pretentious did do so. The great churches were here, and in whatever direction you may stroll in Rouen, you will arrange to pass through one at least of these beautiful shrines, carrying away with you into after life the memory of something which you would not forget.

CHAPTER XXII

THE RACE THROUGH PICARDY—AMIENS CATHEDRAL—ITS VASTNESS—THE ROAD TO BOULOGNE

So we bid farewell to Rouen, deep down in her valley by the river, and rolling swiftly through the fair country towards Neufchâtel, we pause a moment to render homage at the altar of their great god, cheese; and so onward past many picturesque spots and interesting ruins. But the day is too fair to pause for the dead past. This air is the wine of life and the rush of our car drives it into and through us until, on arriving at Amiens for luncheon, we are ready to eat anything.

One really runs a risk of being ruined by dyspepsia on such a journey, as one's appetite becomes great and one gets no exercise. After a long day's ride and a hearty dinner, bed becomes most attractive at an early hour, and I often find myself snugly ensconced at eight o'clock and awakened at two in the morning by vivid dreams of my ancestors, entangled in flying wheels.

There are few in the vast tide of travellers between London and Paris who do not note, as their train speeds across the plains of Picardy, the towering gables and gigantic roof of the great cathedral of her capital, Amiens. It rises so far above the surrounding city that it appears to have nothing in common with it, nor are there any other structures round about to detract from this impression.

In common with millions of others, I had heretofore found no time for closer inspection. The tide of life sweeps too strongly through here to allow one to do more than gasp at the immensity of this church. To-day as we roll onward from the smiling country into the streets of the town, the cathedral looms up grander and grander until all thought of anything else passes from the mind. The busy tide of life and the city of seventy thousand souls does not and will not hold your attention for half an hour while within its limits. "It is a great manufacturing town, weaves cotton velvets for Spain, spins woolen yams, makes satin for ladies' shoes, and was the cradle of cotton manufacture in France."

Yes, yes, yes,—perhaps so, perhaps so, but, what is that to us? Leave it all and move faster, into that square. Now,—stop.——What are all the cotton mills of earth compared to this stately shrine? Look at those three deeply recessed and majestic portals towering as high as an ordinary church before you, the destroyer has passed them by and they are crowded with statues, prominent amongst which, dividing the central doors is that of the "Beautiful God of Amiens. "Over the central doorway is the Last Judgment in high relief,—the twelve Apostles, the wise and foolish virgins. Yonder is the Virgin crushing a monster with a human head, and above it the expulsion of Adam and Eve. One sees the burial and assumption of the Virgin in another spot, and row after row of kings, bishops, and priests, with the great towers rising far above and equally rich in carvings to their very summit. There would appear to be too much of carved work and yet the church is so huge that it would look barren without it. Entering, you are at once impressed with the vast dimensions, which are surpassed only by St. Peter's and the Dom of Cologne. The nave rises one hundred and forty feet above you. Its height and breadth are so great and the pillars so majestic that one wonders whether this church was not built by and intended for a larger, grander race of beings than we who now walk this earth.

Passing onward down the nave and into the choir, you are again struck with the beauty and richness of the carvings both in the stalls in wood and in the stone screens and altars, all around you. The rose windows are glorious, and yet—you feel that you have dropped your sense of delightful satisfaction somewhere. What is it,—why? It is absurd to criticise such a temple, yet Amiens, notwithstanding its majestic interior, does not fascinate, is not so satisfying as the great churches of Rouen, and I think it is because there is too much light. There, all is subdued; here a glare of white light detracts from the majesty, if such a thing be possible. Certainly one shivers and is cold and fully realises that ancient coloured glass has a wonderfully beautifying effect in these old churches.

Amiens has her history also. Henry IV. from a seat up yonder watched the retreat of the Spaniards and Isabeau of Bavaria here married the idiot Charles VI.

There is nothing in the city to interest, save the cathedral, and I come again and again, and finally take a swirling view as my auto flashes around it, and off and away to the northward. As we move farther and farther afield, I turn again and again to look backward and each time the cathedral has risen higher and higher until it reigns supreme in a kingdom all its own,—a thing not made by man.

The route from Amiens to Boulogne is very unpleasant for France, narrow and badly marked, so that we several times go astray, especially before reaching Abbeville. The way is also crossed frequently by stone gutters which will in passing destroy the springs of the auto unless extreme caution be used. These should be changed, one does not find them south of Paris.

As it would be impossible to pass through Brussels without a thought of Waterloo so at Abbeville the mind wanders away from the noisy town and off to the neighbouring battlefield of Crécy whose forest we see at our right as we speed northward.

Reaching Boulogne at about three o'clock, we are almost blown backward by the winds off the Channel, and seek shelter in a draughty, desolate hotel. Yama thinks that we have come to the end of the world, and will be lost if we attempt to go out on that churning sea. He asks if England is five days off, and seems very doubtful of my truthfulness when I say it is but an hour's sail.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE RIDE TO BEAUVAIS—DEAD DOGS—GREAT CHURCHES—BEAUVAIS BY NIGHT—VAST WEALTH OF THE CHURCHES OF FRANCE—WONDERFUL TAPESTRIES

Two days of gloom and mist in London, London during the holidays, which means a desert, rendered our return to France doubly agreeable. The sun streams out its light as we enter the harbour at Boulogne, and Jean waves his cap at us while the auto is snorting a welcome.

The important custom-house officials insisted upon examining my bundle of home papers but finding the Enquirer harmless, passed it and we sailed away. Collecting the wash and traps at the windy, disagreeable, and most expensive Hôtel Pavilion Impérial we started off once more, gladly shaking the dust of Boulogne from our wheels. It's a sadly dreary place where indigent English come over to enjoy the risk of gambling at a dead sort of casino,—good church members at home, very pillars of the sanctuary, who gamble like street arabs all the time they are here. Let us leave it and roll off and away into the fair land of France.

The ride to Beauvais proves to be one of the most delightful of the journey. The roads are superb and we meet many autos which, while they add to the danger, also give zest to the sport as they go shrieking past us. Just now we killed one poor dog so suddenly that he never knew what hurt him. Rushing at us from an out-house he got his neck just in the spot for our flying wheels to pass over it, and he never moved after that. It was over in a flash, all his wild rollicking life snuffed out like the flame of a candle. We regretted the accident but could in no way have prevented it.

Skirting the town of Abbeville and leaving Amiens well to our left, we go directly south via Poix, Grandvilliers, and "Marseilles the Little." Once during the afternoon, though the sun shines brilliantly the air becomes suddenly very cold and a short, sharp shower of hail forces us to slow down and draw up the cover. We are moving very rapidly and our momentum added to the force of the hailstones causes us to feel as though suddenly subjected to an assault of the enemy, but it lasts for a moment only, and with top again thrown back, we are speeding onward.

If you would feel the elixir of life and youth pouring into your veins, take such a ride on such a day. There is nothing with which to compare it, save the wild flight of a toboggan. An eagle may know the sensation as he soars through space, but until mortals shall have put on immortality or wings we can know it only in auto cars or toboggans, for I am told that in a balloon one feels no motion unless one falls, and it does not last long even then,—mercifully so.

The ride is superb all the way to Beauvais. It is Easter Sunday, all the villages are rejoicing. Giddy-go-rounds are in full swing, and the Beauvais hotel is occupied by boys from Paris and their best girls, the latter are not above flirting even with an elderly gentleman like myself. The fact that his arm is around her waist and his head on her shoulder does not in the least interfere with her double actions,—she can squeeze his hand while she throws languishing glances at me.

But dinner is over and the old town presents greater attraction to me than these passers-by within her limits. Darkness has come down upon the narrow streets, where, as I wander along, the lamps cast queer shadows under the eaves of the gabled houses. There is a mass of something over there that should be the cathedral, it towers so high into the sky and I pause before it in doubt. Part is Gothic and as the light will permit, I fancy very beautiful. The remainder is evidently a building of another century, certainly of a totally different style of architecture. While I am pondering, a foot-step draws nearer and nearer, the only sound of life in the city, and its owner, a little man, in answer to my question, assures me that this is not the Cathedral, but St. Étienne—a structure as old as the greater church which stands quite on the other side of the town, and "If Monsieur visits it, let him go at noon and ask for the old clock, it is well worth an inspection and very curious."

So he patters off into the silence of the night, and I wander on through street after street until the Cathedral looms up before me. Only a piece of a church, but what a piece, how gigantic! Why, since there would be few if any rivals on the earth, does not the nation complete it to its own glory? It may lose some of its majesty by daylight,—that often happens,—but to-night it is superbly solemn and most majestic, even though but a fragment.

These great religious temples are all in place here in old Europe, but I cannot but think that the erection of a vast cathedral for the Episcopal Church in America is money ill spent and but to gratify vanity. These structures were built when great temples were almost a necessity for the processions of the Church of Rome, but they are of little use, save the choir, for any other purpose even in that church of to-day and, aside from the Cathedral of Westminster in London, the Church of Rome has erected no such structures since that of Orleans.

The good people of Beauvais in the year 1225 evidently bent upon building a church which would dwarf that of their neighbors in Amiens, began this one before me; and if they had completed it they would have succeeded in their intention, for that vast edifice could then have been placed bodily within this structure, as the ridge pole of this roof is one hundred and fifty-three feet above the pavement or thirteen feet higher than that of Amiens, and three feet higher than the Cathedral of Cologne; but, money and the genius of the architect both failed,—the former want calling a halt on further progress, and the latter, through his desire to have as few inner supports as possible over-shot his mark, so the walls bulged and roof collapsed in 1284. With the repair of that damage came a cessation of all work, and so the cathedral stands to-day. As I wander around it in the darkness, I stumble upon a little structure at its western end, evidently much older than its gigantic neighbour, as it is Roman in design, and in the shadow farther on rise two great round towers of some château; exactly what it is one does not know or care to inquire, leaving all facts for the plain daylight of the morrow and allowing the darkness of to-night to claim what it may.

Even in the shadows one may discern that Beauvais is a very curious old place. Ancient it certainly is, as Cæsar mentions this district, but its most memorable day was that upon which it closed its gates in the face of a vast Burgundian army, and kept them closed until succour arrived from Paris. Women took such a prominent part in the siege that Louis XI. complimented them and declared that they should forever march first in the commemorative procession,—this they do in this year, 1905. One can well imagine that Louis cared little for the women, but it gave him another opportunity of humiliating his noblemen.

On my return to the inn, I have the great square all to myself save for a rising moon,—in fact, I wonder whether I have not the whole of Beauvais to myself, for I have not met a dozen of my kind since I started out,—but as the air is cold and the moonlight seems very old to-night, let us to bed, where I, at least, dream of disjointed churches and queer round towers when I dream of anything at all,—which is not often, for sleep after these rushing rides is as profound as death.

Daylight brings another state of affairs. The inn is alive with the noise of departing autos, and there is much wonderment that I will linger in this "queer place," with Paris and all it holds so near. There are even doubtful glances cast at my red car and insinuations that it will not go. It certainly will not now, nor for several hours to come.

Passing out into the sunny street I find a busy little bustling city, alive to its own concerns. Yonder old gentleman in that postal card shop is very much alive to the fact that I have not patronised his wares, which I do at once, and he is delighted that I really take an interest in his beloved old town. His preference is for the ancient city but he does not forget her attractions of to-day and trusts that I will not depart without an inspection of the factory where the tapestries are made. This factory was established before the Gobelins, and these good people of Beauvais consider their work far superior to that of the better known fabric near Paris.

As I enter the Cathedral, even the majesty of the building is for a time secondary to the interest excited by the splendid specimens of this work, which hang upon the walls. They are vast in size and very rich in colouring, as well as beautiful in design, and represent the histories of St. Peter and St. Paul after the cartoons of Raphael. These tapestries are worth a million and a half of francs, and it has been proven by the returns made to the Minister of Fine Arts from all over France, that the art treasures of the churches far surpass in beauty and value those of the great public institutions of Paris, Versailles, the Louvre, Luxembourg, de Cluny, and Carnavalet. In fact those vast collections are but a small part of the artistic wealth of France. Its real wealth is in its churches, and if brought to a sale would realise the fabulous sum of six thousand millions of francs, or twelve hundred millions of dollars.

The little Roman church of Conques, hidden in the mountains of the Aveyron, possesses a treasure,—shown at the Exhibition of 1900, for which a syndicate offered thirty-two million francs. It is well for France that it is inalienable. It holds the finest enamels in the world, reliquaries given by the kings, and Roman statues in gold and silver. For the silver Virgin of Amiens, eight hundred thousand francs was offered, and the one at Le Mans is valued at a million, while the Cathedral of Rheims possesses in its panel, representing the Nativity, the most valuable piece of tapestry extant.

That these treasures were not dispersed by the Terrorists is a marvel; they certainly would have produced far more money for their cause than the melting down of a few bells. The colouring of these pieces in Beauvais is of a freshness and strength which surprises one. They evidently have been shut off from the light through most of the many years since they were made.

This cathedral in the daytime still impresses by its immensity, and now one sees the painted glass of the sixteenth century. There is so much of it and the windows are so close together that the effect is like that of the Sainte Chapelle in Paris enlarged enormously, and the church has the appearance of a glass house as the stone work is far less prominent than in other cathedrals.

I spend some time in the adjacent château. The great round towers observed last night are but the guardians of the entrance to the court, across which rises the old palace of the Archbishop, now the Hôtel de Ville. The whole is picturesque, but the interior is not of interest.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE ROUTE TO SAINT-GERMAIN-EN-LAYE—THE PEOPLE—THE CASTLE AND TERRACE—THEIR PICTURESQUE HISTORY—FIRST VIEW OF PARIS

It is close to high noon when we enter the ancient and once royal city of St. Germain-en-Laye, after some miles speeding through the aisles of her forest, where they say wild boar may be found to this day. As we enter the town, the people are streaming out of the churches and off and away in every sort of vehicle for the festal part of the day. How happy they all look, especially the children, whose faces are, as it were, mirrors reflecting the sunlight. Here are the funny little donkey and dog carts, both such serious-looking concerns. Yonder is a bridal coach with its happy party, and in this tram-car is another bridal party not at all ashamed of its costumes, and all around it seem bent upon making it happy for this one day at any rate. The morrow and its sorrows will come soon enough. This is a work-a-day world, and this festival will be looked back upon throughout all the coming years. I saw last spring in one of the Parisian gardens a bride in full regalia, veil and all, proudly seated on an elephant, and very happy over the admiration of the groom and the others around below her.

Passing rapidly through the streets of Saint-Germain we emerge upon the castle square, with that picturesque structure to our left, while far beyond it, along the brow of the hill, stretches the stately and famous terrace, its balustrade, vases, and statues glimmering white against the squarely trimmed, pale green trees bordering the walks, and behind all rise the darker masses of the forest. Off and away before us the land drops to where the Seine twists and winds through the valley of rich green. Yonder are the heights of Marly and the forest of Vésinet and beyond, the white city of Paris, glittering in the sunshine, spreads away over hill after hill, crowned on the one side by the Cathedral of Montmartre and on the other by the Fortress of Mt. Valerian. There is no fairer scene in all the world than this before us,—as there is no such fair city on earth as Paris in the month of May. All the world is abroad to-day. Here in the square of the palace of St. Germain the tide of people is quite tremendous, beating its human waves against the walls of this ancient abode of the kings of France and streaming far out upon the wide walks of her terrace.

If Louis le Grand should return and visit this favourite promenade, favourite until he grew old enough to find the plainly to be seen towers of St. Denis disagreeable of contemplation, what would he think of this democratic assemblage where two centuries ago all was state and ceremony, velvets and laces? However, there are women here as lovely as La Vallière or de Montespan, and he would probably arrange a later meeting with some of them. After all is said, the people are about the same, notwithstanding the lapse of centuries. There are plenty of La Vallières and Louises in plain air on yonder terrace to-day where the gay god of love reigns just as supreme as in the days of le grand Monarque.