'tt A ^l^-D-^lwi ^ /. auTOiamaf fc j gy^ aa Cornell University Library NA5541.B94C4 The cathedrals of Southern France, 3 1924 015 396 439 "Bate Due Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924015396439 THE • CATHEDRALS ' OF SOUTHERN FRANCE The Cathedral Series Handsome ToIumeB all veiy tiilly Illastrated and written by experts The Cathedrals of England and Wales. By T. Francis Bumpos. With many Plates and minor decorations, with specially designed head and tail pieces to each chapter. 3 vols. W. net each. The Cathedrals of Northern Qermany and the Rhine. By T. Fkancis Bhmpus. With many Plates, ia. net. The Cathedrals and Churches of Northern Italy. By T. Fkancis Bumpus. lis. net. The Cathedrals and Churches of Central Italy. By T. Fkancis Bumpos. 168. net. The Cathedrals and Churches of Rome and Southern Italy. 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Bumpus, Librarian of St Michael's College, Tenbury, author of " A History of English Cathedral Music." Demy 8vo. 21b. net. BOURGES CATIIEDKAL : THE CHEVET (From a drawing by Erie M, Hiok) THE CATHEDRALS OF SOUTHERN FRANCE By T. FRANCIS BUMPUS AUTHOR OF "THE CATHEDRALS OF ENGLAND AND WALES," "THE CATHEDRALS OF NORTHERN FRANCE," ETC. ETC. LONDON T. WERNER LAURIE, LTD. CLIFFORD'S INN MA \i^?>o\ CONTENTS Preface .... WESTERN FRANCE Brittany Rennes Vanfies St Brieuc Quimper PoiTOU AND Limousin Poitiers Limoges Aquitaine (I) Perigueux AngoulSme . Cahors SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE Aquitaine (II) .... Bordeaux ..... Rodez ..... Auch ..... Pace I 7 17 18 20 21 24 26 45 53 58 60 63 64 64 73 80 Languedoc (I) Toulouse Albi . SOUTHERN FRANCE 91 92 103 vi CONTENTS PAGB Languedoc (II) . . . ■ ii8 Carcassonne . n8 Perpignan 123 Narbonne 128 Montpellier __, 130 Mende 133 St riour . 138 Provence . 141 Aries 144 Avignon 144 Aix . 144 AUVERGNE 153 Le Puy en Velay 162 Clermont-Ferrand 175 CENTRAL FRANCE Berri ..... 181 Bourges .... 181 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE Burgundy .... 193 Lyons 203 Autun . 208 Langres 214 Dijon . . 217 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Bourges Cathedral, the chevet . {FroTH a drawing hy Eric M. Hick) Treguier, interior of the former Cathedral, looking Quimper Cathedral, from the north-west Poitiers Cathedral, the west front . ' Poitiers Cathedral, view across the nave Poitiers, east end of St Hilaire Limoges Cathedral, north side AngoulSme Cathedral, the west front . Angouleme Cathedral, interior, looking west Bordeaux Cathedral, the apse Bordeaux Cathedral, the choir, looking east Bordeaux Cathedral, the nave, looking east Rodez Cathedral, the west front Rodez Cathedral, from the south Auch Cathedral, the west front Auch Cathedral, the nave, looking west Rodez Cathedral, the organ . Auch Cathedral, the choir, looking east Auch Cathedral, the altar-piece Toulouse Cathedral, the choir, looking east Toulouse, east end of St Sernin Belfries, in the neighbourhood of Toulouse Albi Cathedral, from, the south-west . Albi Cathedral, the choir, looking west Frontispiece east 8 20 32 32 46 46 60 60 66 66 72 7* 78 78 82 82 88 88 92 92 100 108 108 viii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Carcassonne, SS. Nazaire et Celse, view across the transept . . . • Carcassonne, SS. Nazaire et Celse, the nave, looking east . . . • Perpignan Cathedral, interior, looking east Narbonne, St Just, from the south Narbonne, St Paul Serge, interior Narbonne, St Paul Serge, the east end Mende Cathedral, from the south-east Aries, St Trophime, the nave, looking east Aries, sculpture in western portal of St Tropjiime St Gilles, the western portals . Tarascon, south doorway of Ste Marthe Aix Cathedral, the west front . Avignon, west front of St Pierre Le Puy Cathedral, the west front Clermont-Ferrand, east end of N6tre Dame du Port Le Puy Cathedral, the nave, looking east Le Puy Cathedral, the south-east porch Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral, the apse Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral, the choir Bourges Cathedral, the west front Vienne, interior of St Maurice, looking east Auxerre, the Lady Chapel, St Etienne Dijon Cathedral, the west front Lyons Cathedral, the west front Lyons Cathedral, Chapel of St Louis (From a drawing by Thomas Alloh) Autun Cathedral, the western porch . PREFACE In his previous vdlume. The Cathedrals of Northern France, the writer dwelt with, he trusts, sufficient enthusiasm upon the exquisite art there seen; upon the disposition of the ground plans — ^rarely equalled else- where ; upon the beauty and vigour of the sculpture ; and upon the combined boldness and delicacy of the art in nearly all the buildings of the best period in Normandy, the Domaine Royale, Picardy and Cham- pagne. If some of the cathedrals described in the present volume cannot compete in size, magnificence, and uniformity of design with those of the provinces above alluded to, they are no less valuable, both archi- tecturally and historically, since they present in their styles, plans and generd ecclesiology a variety and interest well nigh inexhaustible. In the ensuing pages the cathedrals, including those of Brittany, which from exigencies of space could not be incorporated in the previous volume, will be found grouped in their respective architectural provinces. This classification, the writer ventures to think, has an advantage over that heretofore adopted, since it has afforded an opportunity for some remarks upon local peculiarities which are more marked in churches of the environing district than in cathedrals, where provincial localisms have, to a very considerable extent, disappeared 2 SOUTHERN FRANCE before the march of architectural progress and develop- ment. As the France of the present day is an agglomeration of ancient and distinct provinces, so also in its ancient buildings we can trace without much difficulty a variety of national and provincial styles; it would be strange if it were not so. These various provinces retain so much of their own traditions and tastes that each presents its own local varieties of architectural style, which were rather intensified than otherwise during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Even in England we have most striking varieties in style, confined generally within the boundaries of particular counties; so that to understand ancient art aright it is requisite to have an exact acquaintance with the Perpendicular of Somersetshire, Devonshire and Cornwall, as well as that of Norfolk and Suffolk; and to be able to perceive all the difference between the Early EngUsh of Wells and Salisbury and that of the Yorkshire niinsters. And if we have such marked differences in a country like this we may well expect a much greater variety in a country which, like France in the Middle Ages, was not as now one great nation, but divided into sections antagonistic to each other, and exercisingi little, if any, reciprocal influence. 1 It is easy, therefore, to map out France into certain divisions, each containing within its boundaries a special individual style of Round-arched and Pointec^ Gothic architecture, distinguished by notable peculiari- ties. Thus we have in the North, distinct French styles in Normandy; in the He de France, or country around PREFACE 3 Paris; in Champagne; in Alsace and Lorraine, where from their contiguity to GermEmy the buildings are German rather than French in many important pair- ticulars; and in Brittany, where provincial localisms are perhaps more strongly marked than elsewhere. Then going south-westwards we have a style marked by extreme pecuharities in Poitou and Aquitaine, and another in an opposite direction in Burgundy. A Romanesque style of extraordinary interest has its centre at Clermont-Ferrand in Auvergne, another at Angoul^me in the district known as the Charente, and a third at Aries in Provence. Then again, in the fourteenth and fifteenth century architecture of Gascony and Languedoc we find some very marked Spanish characteristics. The brick district of the latter province is highly interesting. It centres at Toulouse, and it is here that we meet with such vast aisleless churches as those at Albi, Bazas, Carcassonne and Perpignan — churches which, if deficient in the grace and poetry of the northern examples, are admirably adapted for great congregations and an imposing ceremonial. On the other hand there are, in the provinces south of the Loire, cathedrals and portions of cathedrals re- built since the middle of the thirteenth century to which the architects of the north gave their lines. Thus we have the polygonal apse with its procession path and corona of chapels, the lofty nave arcade and clerestory, and the well-developed triforium. The cathedrals of Limoges, Clermont-Ferrand, Bayonne and Auch, and the choirs of Bordeaux, Toulouse and Narboime, com- bine the northern plan and dimensions with some southern peciiliarities of detail. 4 SOUTHERN FRANCE The churches of the south-west are of great value for architectural study on account of the connection which was maintained between our own country and that part of France during a long period. The writer failed, however, to discover much evidence in these churches of the influence possessed by the English either in the general design or in the details of their archi- tecture. The truth is, when we held this part of France we held it as conquerors, not as colonists, and with the exception of a few features * we left no mark of ourselves, but let the people go on building for us and for themselves in their own way. And their way was full of peculiarities. Perhaps more so than that of any part of France. They had their own system of planning, their own system of vaulting, and, to a considerable extent, their own schools of window tracery, sculpture and so forth; and this, it should be remarked, is sure, if it has any peculiarity, to exercise a most powerful and obvious effect upon the whole ecclesiology. In the present volume will be found descriptions of some of the most important and representative cathedrals in the western, central and southern divisions of France. The writer had planned to include in it all the cathedrals lying to the south of the Loire, but as the work proceeded he found, the limits assigned to him too restricted to admit * As an example of this, the grand Flamboyant choir of St Michel at Bordeaux may be mentioned. The pillars, which are formed of eight shafts grouped around a cylinder, are strikingly reminiscent of those in the choir of York Minster, while the square east end, with its large Perpen- dicular window surmounting an arch which opens to the aisle behind, re- calls St Mary Redclyffe, Bristol. Another English feature used throughout this fine cruciform church is the ridge or longitudinal rib of the vaulting, which was seldom used by the French. It also occurs in the choir of the elegant Middle Pointed cathedral at Bayonne. PREFACE 5 descriptions of several of lesser note without im- poverishing those of the more celebrated ones. With the greatest reluctance, therefore, he has been con- strained to omit the following cathedrals : Agen, La Rochelle and Lugon in the archiepiscopal pro- vince of Bordeailx; Aire, Montauban, Bayonne, Pamiers and Tarbes in that of Auch; Nimes, Valence and Viviers in Avignon; Digne, Frejus, Gap, Marseilles and Nice in Aix en Provence; Annecy, Maurienne and Tarentaise in Chamb6ry; Belley, St Die, Nancy and Verdun in Besangon; St Claude aiid Grenoble in Lyons; and Tulle in Bourges. On the whole this book has involved more labour and research than any of the writer's previous ones. The task of consulting all that has been written on the subject of Southern French architecture has been very great, and the condensation of all that had to be read on his return from visiting the churches described or alluded to has been all the more laborious from the divergence of opinion expressed on them. And the digestion has been no easy task- The labour has-been one of reconciliation of divergent statements in the first place, and of condensation in the second. It was necessary to reduce to oiie page what could easily, and without prolixity, have been treated in a dozen, so that with each page, it may almost be said with each sentence, the question has been what to leave out and what to say. Then, when each page was written, doubts arose as to whether things had been left unsaid that ought to have been said, and whether good had been sacrificed to inferior material. However, notwithstanding the inevitable omis- sions above named, it is hoped that in the ensuing 6 SOUTHERN FRANCE pages a tolerably clear and comprehensive view has been given of the several schools of architec- ture prevalent in Western, Southern, Central and South-Eastem France betvreen the eleventh and six- teenth centuries. THE CATHEDRALS OF SOUTHERN FRANCE WESTERN FRANCE BRITTANY RENNES : VANNES : ST BRIEUC : QUIMPER Brittany, which may be taken as including the modern departments of Finist^re, C6tes-du-Nord, Morbihan, He et Vilaine and Loire Infdrieure, possesses an architecture which, since the begiiming of modem European civilization, has always presented contrasts with that of neighbouring provinces. The abundance of granite rock and the comparative scarcity of other buUding material is one cause of this. The separate racial character and distinctive language of the people, together with their struggle for independence of the Norman dukedom, and later, of the French kingdom, have also powerfully influenced all the civilization of the province. Of buildings of the Romanesque epoch, the most interesting is certainly the nave of St Sauveur at Dinan, than which there are few more monuments of equal interest in the west of France. Other examples are the ruined cloisters at Vannes and Doulas; the round church at Quimperl6, almost wholly rebuilt, however; the tower of the church at Redon, in He et Vilaine; the abbey at La Roe; the churches of N6tre Dame de Kemitron and St Melars (crypt) at Lanmeur; and the 7 8 WESTERN FRANCE Templars' Church at Loctudy, all in Finist^re; St Martin at Lamballe, in C6tes-du-Nord; and in Loire Inferieure, the crypt of the cathedral at Nantes and the nave of St Aubin at Gu6rande. Of the churches Transitional from the Round-arched to the Pointed style, the abbey of St Mathieu, sixteen miles from Brest, is one of the most instructive speci- mens. It is very reminiscent of such Yorkshire minsters as Whitby, in having Pointed arches, but otherwise is completely Romanesque, without, in the nave at least, any intention of vatUting. Its date may be fixed at about 1160. To the same epoch we may assign the nave of St Malo, and portions of the churches at Gu6rande and St Giljf 1^ jr^^ /-^^JEi^lV.t. 1^1 i ■ HOMIPIMV^ glSjF^-s^is^-=-«- ^jZ^l ■^ H^^^^^Hp^A"**":;; c;::7: A, POITIERS 33 One of the most remarkable features of Poitiers Cathedral is the convergence of its sides towards the east, greatly accentuated in the choir, also the sinking of the vault towards that end. This gives an increase in the appearance of perspective retirement, one of those foreshadowings of modernism that in all ages surprises us. In its widest part, i.e., towards the west end, the central division of the church measures 40 feet from pier to pier, and the aisles 30 feet from the engaged shafts of their vaulting to the piers dividing them from the nave. These dimensions may afford some idea of the spaciousness of the church, which is certainly one of the noblest on the Continent, designed on what is called the " hall " plan, that is to say, with a nave and aisles of almost the same height, but without either triforium or clerestory. Although the choir and its aisles terminate rect- angularly, and in a line with each other, on the outside, an apsidal effect is imparted to them within by semi- circular recesses formed in the thickness of the walls, the same construction being repeated on the eastern side of either transept.* More than two centuries elapsed before the com- pletion of this majestic church. No surprise then will be excited that, notwithstanding the general character of the earlier portion (the choir) be preserved through- out, indications of this slow progress may be discerned in the presence of some slight modifications in the detail essential from the successive styles which reigned during this long period (c. 1160-1360). For instance, the bases of the piers in the eastern or twelfth-century part of t^ie church consist of the usual hollow between two rounds on a low octagonal vertical-faced plinth; in the two piers contiguous to the transept the upper round becomes an ogee moulding, and the same form is intro- • The concealment of the apse from without by a straight wall built between two towers is one of the most marked features of such Apulian churches as Bari, Bitetto, Bitonto and Molfetta. C 34 WESTERN FRANCE duced in the square plinth; whilst the bases of the remaining piers, with their capitals, obviously belong to the latter part of the thirteenth century. Such variations render it probable that these parts, being left in the state of uncut blocks (a circumstance of very common occurrence), received their definite form at the same time that many of the original windows — ^lancets in pairs — ^gave place to Geometrical Decorated ones. Throughout the cathedral the piers are composed of eight slender shafts with short capitals sculptured into a variety of foliage and crowned with square abaci. These shafts are disposed about a cruciform nucleus. The three engaged for the transverse arches and the diagonal ribs of the domical vaulting in the choir are uniform in height with those which carry the arches between it and the aisles, and those serving for the ribs of the vaulting over the latter. Consequently, when viewed from any point, these piers form an unbroken cluster of shafts unparalleled, I should imagine, for beauty. In the nave, where the ceUular arch of each vaulting compartment is considerably above the pier arch, leaving an intermediate space, these three shafts are taller than the five remaining ones, thus breaking up the group. The vaulting presents some variations. In the two eastern bays of the choir and its aisles, and in the transepts, the Pointed domical vaults are divided by their bold ribs into four cells. In the first bay of the choir, with its adjacent aisles, at the crossing, in the aisles between it and the transepts, and throughout the nave and its aisles, much thinner ribs separate these vaults into eight compartments. Although the church has no clerestory it is amply lighted by the windows which are placed high up in the walls of the aisles and recessed back over the internal face of them so as to leave a narrow passage affording a free circulation round the church. This is contrived by piercing, with a square-headed trefoil opening, the transverse strip of wall between the windows, to whose front are attached the vaulting shafts of the aisle. POITIERS 35 The balustrade to this passage is a Franco-Italian interpolation, as are the arches over which it is returned at the west end of the nave and aisles, but none of these features are so out of keeping with their environments as some writers on this cathedral assume them to be. As productions of their date they command respect; indeed, they are far preferable to many modern Gothic works of the same kind with which I am acquainted. The gallery at the west end of the nave, which rests upon a richly-coffered arch boldly corbelled from very large brackets, supports the great and choir organs, whose cases close the view westward in a dignified manner. One of the most fascinating branches of archi- tectural study is the growth of window tracery, and so well is this illustrated in Poitiers Cathedral that, at the risk of being tedious, I must devote some space to its consideration. Commencing with the north aisle of the nave, the window in the first bay is a large inserted one of six lights all unfoliated, gathered up into threes by the sub-arcuations, and supporting tracery composed of three sexfoiled circles, while fiUing the main arch is a large circle with wheel-like tracery. The second window, which is filled with exceedingly beautiful grisaille glass, sparingly spotted with dark blue and citron, is also a Middle Pointed insertion. The four lights of which it is composed are broken up into pairs, each pair being surmouilted by an uncusped circle. The lights are plain lancet ones, but the large circle in the head of the window has eight cusps. This is a remarkably good specimen of window tracery assignable to the period of transition from the Early to the Second Pointed French Gothic. In the third bay the original pair of tall lancets with coupled shafts remains, while in the fourth is what was, in all probability, one wide lancet, now made into a poor two-light wii^dow, the openings being wide and supporting a circle, all unfoliated. Crossing over to the south aisle of the nave, the first window counting from the west is a very 36 WESTERN FRANCE grand and bold one, and formed by a pair of two-light windows surmounted by a noble octofoiled circle. From the right-hand window the central monial, the heads of the lights, and part of the trefoil forming its tracery have disappeared, so that it assumes a very singular appearance. The second window is of a similar type but wider. In this instance the two lights comprising the sub-windows support a circlet enriched with an inverted quatrefoU, a grand octofoiled circle occupying the arch. As in the window opposite there is some magnificent old grisaille glass, but of a much deeper tone. The third and fourth bays of the aisle on this side retain their original fenestration — a. couple of lancets. All these windows have beautifully-foli- aged capitals to their shafts, and as studies are of the highest interest and value. No less beautiful is the western window of either aisle. The southern one comprises two sub-windows, each of two plain lancet-hghts, surmounted by inverted quatrefoils, while in the general head is a large circle, eight times cusped. The north-westerly window is a most fascinating one of three trifoliated lights sup- porting trefoils, and tracery in the general head com- posed of three cusped circlets. In the transepts the fenestration has remained imdis- turbed, the earlier character of the work here being indicated by the round heads of the single-light windows, which are disposed in pairs at the north and south ends, and singly, within alcoves, on the eastern and western sides. Passing from the north transept into the choir aisle, the original window in the first bay has been altered to a wide one of two plain lights surmounted by a sept- foiled circle. The second bay retains its pair of round- headed lancets, while in the third a three-light one, with tracery composed of three quatrefoils, has been inserted. The east end of the choir and that of either aisle is lighted by one large just-Pointed window. Two bays of the south aisle retain their original windows of coupled round-headed lancets, while the remaining POITIERS 37 ;ompartinent has received a Middle Pointed window 3f two lights supporting a cinquefoUed circle. The superb stained glass with which a large number of ivindows in Poitiers Cathedral are enriched appears to iiave suffered but little injury during an outburst of Protestant iconoclasm in 1562, when the contents of the sacristy were rifled and dispersed, and the splendid tomb of Bishop Simon de Cramand destroyed. This glass is almost entirely in the mosaic style prevalent during the latter part of the twelfth century ind the first half of the succeeding one, and may be looked for in the following windows: the pair of Pointed lancets in the third bay of the south aisle of the nave, and the corresponding pair in the opposite aisle; in the transepts; in the first two windows of the south choir aisle; in the second of the north aisle; and in the three large single lancets at the east end. The earliest glass is in the last-named windows, that in the central one being particularly fine. At the top is Our Lord stand- ing within a vesica adored by angels. Below is a large oblong compartment divided by the leading into a large red cross, on which the figure of Our Lord, very stiffly treated, is extended. The colour used in His cincture is a rich purple. Above the arms of the rood, on a blue ground, are full-length figures in attitudes of adoration; below them, on a ruby ground, are the Blessed Virgin, St John and the soldier piercing the side of the Saviour. Under this the crucifixion of St Peter is represented in a square compartment surrounded by a quatrefoU. The group of St Peter's martyrdom has a blue ground; those of the minute groups occupying the lobes of the quatrefoil ind the spaces formed by it with the surrounding square are respectively blue and ruby. The window at the east end of either aisle con- tains twenty-one groups, seven in circles arranged ver- tically in the centre of the window, and fomrteen in the talf-circles bordering on the stonework, seven on either side. Much of the glass in the windows of later inser- 38 WESTERN FRANCE tion would appear to have been collected from the original lancets as it is mosaic in character. A tall iron screen of simple but effective workman- ship, thrown across either choir aisle at its second bay, gives an appearance of much greater length to the church in these parts, making one wish there was such a line of demarcation between the nave and the choir, for Poitiers, like the majority of French cathedrals, is bare of the screen, either close or open. On either side of the choir, within the first bay, is a range of good Decorated stalls. The woodwork above them is relieved with a series of twenty tref oiled arches on tripled shafts, crowned with an unbroken cresting of foliaged orna- ment, which, as well as the carvings of angels, birds, animals, etc., in the spandrels formed by the arches, can be seen in all its beauty, now that the paint and varnish with which the whole of the woodwork was covered has been removed. The episcopal throne, in Modern Gothic, stands detached from the stalls within the second bay of the choir, which as it fonns the sanctuary is separated from the aisle on either hand by an iron grille of excellent character. This grille is returned across the choir be- hind the high altar, leaving the third bay to constitute a procession path. The high altar itself, over which is a suspended baldachin, is modern, of rich materials and in the mediaeval style, the front being relieved with seven trefoiled arcades on detached piUarets, coupled at either end; the surface behind is diapered with diamond- shaped patterns in the six side panels, and gold flowers on a blue ground fill a lozenge in the centre one. The six great candlesticks and the crucifix of the Empire school, however, remain. There is no reredos, though until the erection of the present altar there was a very large one of the baroque period so common in Frendt churches. Such altar-pieces, however, still remain in the transepts; and behind the altar, which stands within the shallow apse formed ia the square east end POITIERS 39 of the choir, there is another which looks, from the extreme west end of the nave, as though it belonged to the high altar. The situation of Poitiers Cathedral in a large tree- planted space at the foot of the hill between the city and the river is an instance of that religio loci, that hallowed temenos, which is so marked a feature of our English cathedrals, but so rare in France. Externally it is grand from its simplicity, a pearly grey being the dominant hue of its stonework. The buttresses, at least those belonging to the unaltered parts of the structure, are plain, solid [masses of great projection, imdiminished from the ground to the summit, and have no other horizontal division than the string-course below the windows, which is returned round them. Near to the top a shaft is applied to the front, borne on the shoulders of a grotesque figure, with a capital of foliage which serves as the support of a projecting gargoyle. In the earlier parts of the church the para- pet, as in all Transitional work, is only a plain solid portion of wall of moderate height, but in the nave we have a more graceful finish to the elevation in the shape of a succession of open quatrefoils, while under the eaves, and continued round the buttresses, is a delicate string of foliaged ornament. The east end, up to the string on which the obtusely- pointed lancets lighting the ends of the choir and aisles rest, is perfectly plain, but above them it is relieved with a series of nine shallow arcades whose semicircular arches are carried upon very slender shafts. The wall within three of these arcades is pierced with a tall narrow round-headed window serving to light the space between the vaultings and the roof. This stage of the elevation, being gabled in the centre and horizontal at the sides, has the effect of concealing what would have been a heavy and ungainly feature, viz., the end of one enormous mass of roof over the entire width of the elevation. The gable is filled with blind arcading, £ind the quadrangular wings are 40 WESTERN FRANCE flanked by octagonal turrets with pinnacles whose crpcketed ribs assign them to a date not earlier than that of the other Decorated additions, as easily discerned on the outside as internally. On the north wall of the choir, over the window in its second bay, is a charming little quadrangular belfry, flanked by crocketed pinnacles and supporting one rather larger but similarly enriched pinnacle. Several very good Transitional portals deserve study : one is in the last bay of the nave on the north side; another in the corresponding bay of the south aisle; a third just to the east of the south transept; and a fourth, protected by a lecin-to roof, in the easternmost bay of the choir on the north; but no one of these is completed. In the first-named, which is the most imposing of the series, the three semicircular orders which make up its archway remain unworked, and the tympanum has not received the sculpture destined for its decoration. The very elongated capitals of the three attached shafts on each side are composed exclusively of groups of full- length figures, with a background of foliage, represent- ing scenes from the life of the Blessed Virgin, amongst which may be discerned the Annunciation, the Sahi- tation of Mary and Elizabeth, the Epiphany, the Massacre of the Innocents, and the Flight into Egypt. Small figures, all of the most charming execution, load the abaci of the capitals on the left-hand side of the doorway. The abacus, too, with a very deep hollow chamfer below the square member, is loaded with small figures, all of most charming execution. The opposite doorway is in the same imperfect state. Its semicircular archway includes within it two smaller arches with a pendent corbel between them. The arch-mouldings, the capital and the abacus are mere unwrought blocks. The doorway in the southmost wall, of two semicircular orders of roll-mouldings, on as many shafts in square recesses in the sides, with rich POITIERS 41 capitals of foliage, is crowned by a flowered concentric drip. Standing as they do beyond the line of the west front, and also outside the aisles, the towers, although deficient in height, confer an air of great dignity upon the cathedral as it is approached from the upper part of the city. Three periods of architecture are discer- nible in these towers, showing that some time elapsed between their commencement and their partial com- pletion. In both the two lower stages are First Pointed and contemporary with the western part of the nave. The next storey is Middle Pointed, and the octagonal termination to the north-western tower belongs to the Latest Gothic period. The manner in which this octagon is placed upon the slijuare summit of the tower, and the arrangement of the crocketed pinnacles in the angles formed by its cardinal and oblique sides, are both ex- tremely happy, and the whole only requires the spire with which the octagon was no doubt designed to be crowned to render this north-western steeple of Poitiers Cathedral one of the most pleasing of its class. To the south-western tower, which is of larger dimensions than its neighbour, the pinnacled turrets rising clear above the short octagonal stage, which was certainly destined to carry something more important than its present low p5n:amidal capping, impart a strikingly English appearance. The facade between the towers is mostly of the fourteenth century, and, like the eastern front, has its central and lateral divisions respectively gabled and quadrangular. Buttresses of the same thickness from the base to the summit of the fagade, and terminating in octagonal pinnacles, separate these three divisions, the central one of which displays a large circular window inscribed in a square, and filled with elegant but not elaborate tracery. Over it, formed in the thickness of the wall, is an arcaded gallery covered with a lean-to roof, behind which rises the gabled end of the nave, relieved as to 42 WESTERN FRANCE its surface with a rose of smaller dimensions. Beneath the great circular window the wall is panelled with eight pointed arcades, each enclosing two smaller ones, as in the contemporary transept fronts of Notre Dame, Paris, where, however, the arcading is glazed. In the divisions of the facade corresponding with the aisles the walls are quite plain above the windows whose tracery has already been described. The western fa9ade of Poitiers Cathedral may in some points be compared with the not-far-distant one of Bourges. In both cathedrals the towers are outside the aisles, with this difference, that at Bourges, which was designed with double aisles from the first, the towers are engaged at the ends of the exterior aisles. At Poitiers there are three adjacent portals, one in the centre of the fagade and one opening into either aisle. At Bourges there axe five portals, three of which adjoin each other exactly as at Poitiers, while the other two are in the ground storeys of the towers. The three central portals at Bourges are so similar to those at Poitiers, both in design and execution, that it is not improbable they were the offspring of the same master mind. In both instances the recesses are lined with canopied niches continued along the fronts of the but- tresses between the three divisions of the fagade, and raised upon arcaded plinths; the hollows between the mouldings of the arches are charged with continuous series of small figures ; and the tympana of the arches are filled with sculptured groups in a marvellously good state of preservation, whereas the niches below have been completely bereft of their imagery. The sculpture in the tympanum of the central doorway at Poitiers represents the Last Judgment; in the northern tympajium are the Death and Coronation of the Virgin ; and in the southern one scenes from the life of St Peter, to whom the cathedral is dedicated. Few ecclesiologists will visit Poitiers without one of the most widely-known hymns of the Western Church in mind — the Vexilla Regis prodeunt of Venantius POITIERS 43 Fortunatus, long the fashionable poet of the south of France, the protege of Queen Rad^gonde, and who died Bishop of Poitiers in 609. Venantius Fortunatus forms the commencement of^ a new epoch in hymnology, being the first to employ regular and undeviating rhyme in the world-famous hymn to which I have just alluded. True, the Vexilla Regis * falters with asso- nances, as the first verse may prove : " Vexilla Regis prodewnt, Fulget crueis mysteiiMm, Quo carne carnis conditor Suspensus est patibultf. " But still it cannot be denied that the principle of rhyme is here allowed. In many of the works written when hymnology was yet in its infancy, e.g., Sir Alexander Croke's essay, rhyme is ascribed to a much earlier period; a polished piece, without assonances, is even given to Pope S. Damasus (a.d. ||J). But this is exactly like the proceeding of some French antiquaries in the early part of last century, who would have it that Coutances Cathedral, a lovely First Pointed church, was of Romanesque date. So far as we know Fortu- natus was the 6rst who turned rhyme from a mere ornament, as St Ambrose and St Gregory believed it, into what it afterwards became — a necessity. The Vexilla Regis prodeunt was composed by Venantius on occasion of the reception at Poitiers by Ste Rad6gonde of a portion of the true Cross, sent by the Emperor of Constantinople, but as it stands in the numerous Breviaries of the Western Church it is not ♦ Translated thus by John Mason Neale for the Hyvinal Noted, pub- lished under the auspices of the Ecclesiological Society in 1850 : " The Royal Banners forward go, The Cross shines forth in mystic glow ; Where He in flesh our flesh Who made, Our sentence bore, our ransom paid." The other world-famed Passion-tide hymn, Pange lingua ghtiosi pralium certaminis (Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle), though generally ascribed to Venantius Fortunatus, was more probably composed, as Sirmond has shown (Sirmond in Notic ad Epist, Sidon. Apellin, lib. iii. ep. 4}, by Claudianus Mamertus. 44 WESTERN FRANCE exactly as its author wrote it. His second verse is almost always omitted, nor was it supplied by the compilers of the Hymnal Noted when they introduced it sbcty-two years ago to English churchmen, and for his last two verses later Breviaries have substituted an address to the Cross, and the Doxology, which is given in the English Hymnal referred to. The Vexilla Regis was ia the English Breviaries from the beginning.* One of its innumerable adaptations, for they can hardly be called parodies, flew like wildfire over England, and was sung in processions after the battle of Evesham. It began: " Vexilla Regis prodeunt Fulget cometa comitum, Comes dico LancastriEe, Qui domuit indomitum. '" The poetry of Venantius Fortunatus represents the expiring effort of the Latin muse in Gaul. Even the poet himself felt the decadence, not merely of language but of thought, which characterizes his verse : " Ast ego sensus inops .... Fsece gravis, sermone levis, ratione pigrescens, Mente hebes, arte carens, usu rudis, ore nee expers." And it is difficult to dissent from the severe judgment he has passed upon himself. His style is, generally speaking, pedantic, his taste bad, his grammar and prosody seldom correct for many lines together. The journey from Poitiers to Limoges introduced me to one of the finest churches of the Romanesque period in the Limousin, that of Le Dorat, whose central steeple, rising in three octagonal storeys above the roofs of the structure and surmounted by a tail plain spire, reminded me at a little distance of Bonn. These lofty octagonal towers of the Limousin and Poitou doubtless gave the lines to those later ones of more open character, * In the ancient Office Books it is ordered to be sung In Dominicd in Passione Domini, et Quotidie usque ad Canam Domini., ».«., " On Passion Sunday, and daily until Maundy Thursday." It also forms the office hymn for Vespers on 3rd May (The Invention), and on 14th September (The Exaltation of the Holy Cross). LIMOGES 45 which constitute so striking a feature in the architecture of Toulouse and the surrounding district. In the first stage of this imposing steeple at Le Dorat we have in each of its eight sides a plain round-headed window; in the next two tref oiled arcades; and in the uppermost two round-headed openings spanned by an arch of the same curve . The spire springs directly from the summit of the octagon, and though quite plain, is noble from its simphcity. Another tower rises above the low western fa9ade in two broad stages relieved by simple pointed arcading, and is capped with a rather tall quadrilateral spire flattened at the top to receive a small cupola. On either side of the fa9ade, whose double doorway is preceded by a shallow porch exhibiting four orders of multifoiled arches, and flanking the aforementioned tower, is an octagonal turret, solid in its first and open in its second stage, and terminating in a simple pinnacle. At Limoges we must look for the most important architectural localisms in the steeples of the cathedral and the churches of St Pierre-du-Queyroix and St Michel aux Lions. The peculiarity of these Limousin steeples is the manner in which their octagonal storeys are set upon their square ones. Generally speaking, when this variety in shape is indulged in the cardinal sides of the octagon are set flush with those of the square, but in the three examples just quoted the octagon is placed diagonally, showing two of its sides on each one of the quadrangular portion. At St Pierre the steeple stands at the south-west angle of the church; at St Michel, about midway against the south aisle; and at the cathedral at the west end, but eccentrically to the axis of the church. Here the tower, composed of one square storey and three octagonal ones, is planted upon a massive oblong structure, the only surviving portion of the Romanesque cathedral, while at St Michel the steeple, which is entirely of the latter part of the fourteenth century, has three square and three octagonal storeys. That of St Pierre, which is probably somewhat earlier, has three quad- 46 WESTERN FRANCE rangular and octagonal storeys, but in all these steeples turrets occupy the angles formed by the junction of the two shapes. At St Pierre and St Michel these turrets are solid until they reach the top of the tower, when they are pierced and crowned with pinnacles which group pleasingly with a well-proportioned spire. The cathedral tower originally had a spire similar to those of the above-named churches, Ibut it was destroyed in 1571 during a storm and has never been replaced. To this accident is due the present aspect of the tower, which recalls that of St Bavon at Ghent, or, to take a home instance, the very striking modern one of All Saints, Kensington Park. Limoges Cathedral is one of the few great French churches whose reconstruction dates from the second half of the thirteenth century, and like Clermont- Ferrand, Rodez, and the choirs of Bordeaux, Narbonne and Toulouse, exemplifies the late introduction of the fully-developed Middle Pointed style south of the Loire. The works, however, languished after the completion of the choir, transept and two bays of the nave, and were only resumed about the middle of last century. The choir, to which the great churches of the no;;th gave their lines, is a sublime piece of architecture — indeed, nothing can exceed the beauty of its proportion ; and, except that it wants the depth and earnestness of the earlier examples, it may be classed, with the contem- porary, and in many respects similar, one of Clermont- Ferrand, among the most beautiful buildings of its age in the southern half of France. Internally the pale brown hue of its granite material, aided by the ancient stained glass in the clerestory and the apsidal chapels, produces an effect of almost unearthly solemnity. Limoges Cathedral rises majestically from a dreary square in one of the poorest and least-frequented quarters of the city. Its most attractive feature is the ia.qa.de of the north transept, which, as weU as the southern one, is much narrower than the nave and choir; LIMOGES CATHEDRAL ; NORTH SIDE POITIERS : EAST END OF ST. HILAIEE LIMOGES 47 but by constructing his western buttress at an angle the architect of this most fascinating piece of Flamboy- ant workmanship has succeeded in divesting this facade of that attenuated appearance which, without this clever expedient, would have resulted from the com- bination of great height and inconsiderable breadth. The portal occupies the entire width of the iaga.de, and comprises two square-headed doorways beneath a pointed arch, whose ogee-shaped gable is carried up so as to combine with a graceful screen of tracery conceal- ing the lower part of the great window, which is suffi- ciently recessed to leave room for a narrow gaUery in front of it. As may be seen from the illustration, the whole fagade is covered with Late Gothic ornament of the richest and most florid description; especially beautiful is the " reticulated " or network form of tracery which occupies the tympanum of the doorway, instead of sculpture. The three western bays of the nave seem to be faithful reproductions of the ancient work; but on reference to Viollet le Due's Dictionaire Raisonn/e it will be observed that the author shows on his plan one bay of the nave and aisles of the Romanesque church as existing; and in a footnote he explains it thus: " On a laiss^ subsister un d6bris de I'ancienne nef romaine, et les soubaissements de la tour de XI"" siecle, renforcfe et sur61ev6s au XII"" et au XIV^' sifecles." But this bay of the nave, imfortunately, was entirely demolished, and a porch designed by the archi- tect now separates the nave from the tower. This he arranged to get over the difference of the centre lines of the tower and the nave, and when viewed internally the result is found successful and picturesque. The porch is vaulted at the same height as the aisles and is lighted at its north and south ends by a window of four lights, the two inner ones of which contain fifteenth- century figures of saints formerly in the sanctuary, and removed hither in 1888. The doorways opening|froiii 48 WESTERN FRANCE this porch into the chiurch have square lintel heads carrying the upper part of a four-light window. They are not very successful, but in other cases the ancient details, and even the height of the stone courses, has been scrlipulously adhered to. A light-coloured granite has been used in these new works, like the ancient material, whichhas now weathered to a dark brown tint; but while there is much to praise in these modem portions, the destruction of the Roman- esque fragment and the substitution for it of the porch is to be regretted. The original porch and bell-tower was of the local Romanesque type, and had thin walls with openings and four central columns, Uke those in the belfries at Le Puy and St Benoit-sur-Loire. It was, however, in- capable of supporting the great tower which was erected over it in the fourteenth century. The architect of that day therefore built up the centre and thickened the external walls, so as to get a solid mass on which to start his tower safely. The result is singularly heavy and ugly, and hopelessly ruins the western view, and gives but a narrow and tortuous entrance to the church. The finest view of the exterior of Limoges Cathedral is to be had from the Pont St Etienne over the Vienne, on the south-eastern side of the city. From this point the grandly-proportioned apse, with its lofty clerestory and flying buttresses, soaring above the houses which seem to cluster beneath its shadow, presents a very noble appearance. This portion of the cathedral, begxm in 1273 by an architect foreign to the locaUty, on the established northern French plan, with a five- sided apse, circumambient aisle and radiating chapels, bears so striking a resemblance to the choir of Cler- mont-Ferrand as to induce the belief that the Limousin church, if not by the same architect, is a close copy of the Auvergnat one. The works at Limoges Cathedral were in progress during the whole of the fourteenth century and the greater part of the succeeding one. LIMOGES 49 Towards the close of the latter they were resumed and carried on until 1537, when, two bays of the nave having been finished, operations were entirely suspended, and more than thxee centuries elapsed before the building assumed the aspect intended by its first architect. Regular in plan, and almost uniform in detail, Limoges Cathedral does not afford much for the note-book. The impression that its interior gives is a whole: one of in- expressible grandeur and beauty. In this respect it is like Cologne, that the first glance can in no degree ap- preciate its scale. The proportions are grand, but most accurate and beautiful ; so that at first they only satisfy, and it is long before they begin to astonish. It is curious that one feels as if one had soon " seen " the cathedral. Unlike Canterbury or Winchester, or Bayeux or Rouen, for example, where every part and every detail seems to detain the visitor, Limoges only impresses with one grand effect. Even if a long time be consmned in the chiurch it is not in the examination of a number of interesting periods of firchitecture, but in a contemplation of the whole. The mind expands and soars away in this noble chxurch, forgetful of minute particularities. Throughout the church the piers are formed of a number of slender shafts whose capitals, carved with one row of leafage, are interrupted on the sides facing the nave and choir by the tripled shafts of the quadri- partitely-groined vaulting. A wall-space intervenes between the arches and the triforium, which, even in this most perfect example of Foreign Pointed, is remark- able as being more like a prolonged compartment of the clerestory than a constructional portion of the design. In the apse the triforium is composed of two, and in the nave and choir of four, trefoil-headed openings, corresponding to the number of lights in the clerestory windows, whose heads, in the earlier parts of the build- ing, contain Geometrical, and in the later. Curvilinear tracery. AU the windows in the clerestory of the choir and 50 WESTERN FRANCE apse are filled with fourteenth-century stained glass on the system which prevailed so extensively at that period, viz., of placing one large canopied figure in the centre of each light, so as to produce a decided horizontal line of rich colour, strongly contrasted above and below by grisaille, throughout a long succession of windows. Executed as they were at a time when the art of glass painting was at its zenith, these windows in the eastern part of Limoges Cathedral rank, with the similarly- treated ones in the clerestories of Beauvais, Clermont- Ferrand, Ratisbon and York, as the finest works of their kind in Europe. The transepts, a difficult part of the building to deal with in churches without central towers, are here treated with thorough skill. The architect of Limoges Cathe- dral tried the same experiment which was tried by the architects of St Mary Redclyfie and Bath Abbey. He made his transepts considerably narrower than the nave and choiri At Limoges, where there was to be no central tower, it was open to the designers to make the tran- septs narrower if they chose ; at Bath it had the absurd effect of making the central tower oblong, as it doubtless would at Redclyffe had the tower ever become un fait accompli. It may also be remarked of the transepts at Limoges that the northern one projects one bay beyond the line of the nave and choir chapels, whUe the southern one terminates in a line with them. A remarkable feature of the choir, and one which is ignored in most plans of the cathedral, is its enlarge- ment at the point where it meets the apse. The choir consists of four bays, but when viewed from a short distance westward of the crossing, it appears to have but three. The fact is the easternmost bay on either side slopes outwards, a deflection which, although slight, was intended by the architect to give additional breadth to the five divisions of his apse. In most instances of five-sided apses the two outer bajrs are not visible at all, or at least but partially so; here, however, the whole of the pentagon can be seen from the opposite extremity LIMOGES 51 of the cathedral at one grand coitp d'ceil, and the effect is sublime in the extreme. There is much excellent modem stained glass. That which fills all the two-Ught windows in the chapels opening from the aisle round the apse may be referred to as especially admirable. Each window contains a number of small groups within medallions in imitation of the style of glaring prevalent at the time when this portion of the cathedral was built. The only fault to be found with this glass is its monotony, blue having been used exclusively as a background to the subjects. This might have been avoided by the alternative use of ruby. A Jesse window of more recent insertion in one of the chapels on the north side of the choir is noticeable for the extreme delicacy of its tinctures. Two tones of grey are employed in the small figures seated amid the silvery white convolutions of the vine which spread through the two centre fights, as well as in the figures standing imder canopies in the two outer compart- ments. The positive colours in the recumbent figure of Jesse, in the standing one of the Blessed Virgin which occupies the circle in the head of the window, and in the nimbi of the figures illustrating the genealogy, are very subdued, and contrast well with the groundwork, which throughout the window is a cold blue. In a more conventional style is the glass in two of the windows which Ught the apse of the chapel on the eastern side of the north transept. These windows are each of two trefoUed lights surmoimted by a quatrefoil, a sexfoiled circle filling the general head. Each light contains seven groups within elongated medaUions of complex form, admirably designed and executed in the ■style of the latter part of the thirteenth century. These, however, are exceeded in beauty by the figures of Our Lord seated amid the Seven Can(Uesticks, and of the Blessed Virgin in the circles. As this chapel adjoins the first one in the north aisle of the choir, the window in the right-hand side of the apse exists only in the form 53 WESTERN FRANCE of arcading and tracery corresponding in design with the two windows just described. Here, as wdl as in the blocked window on either side of the short bay between the transept and the apse, fresco takes the place of stained glass. Facing the aisle within the last bay on either side of the choir is the beautiful fourteenth-century tomb of a bishop. The front of Bishop Regnault de la Porte's tomb, in the northern aisle, has eight niches, each gabled and crocketed and containing a statuette. The wall behind the tomb is divided into fomr square panels, cusped, and filled with sculptured groups, among which may be distinguished the Crucifixion, Our Lord adored by angels, and the Coronation of the Virgin. Surmount- ing the whole is a canopy, supported in front by two tall arcades surmounted by gables, crocketed and pierced with tracery. In the other monument, that of Bernard Brun (nephew of Regnault de la Porte), the tref oiled arcades of the canopy are unsupported by shafts, but the front of the tomb is treated similarly to the one just described. The recumbent effigy is supported on either side by an angel (unfortunately decapitated) in the act of drawing aside a curtain, and in the wall behind are figures and groups which will repay the artist in their sentiment and expression, and in the skilful arrange- ment of their accessories. A graceful example of the Cinquecento is the monument of Bishop Langeac, who, in the third decade of the sixteenth century, endowed his cathedral with an Eaily Renaissance rood-loft, which, although long since removed from its original position, has neither been destroyed nor banished to a museum of antiquities, but re-erected at the west end of the nave, where it closes the view in that direction very pleasingly. AQUITAINE I PERIGUEUX : ANGOULEME : CAHORS The department of Haute Vienne, of which Limoges is the chief town, is one of a group comprised in the old province of Aquitaine, whose geographical name can only be used as a general indication. During the Hundred Years' War and thereafter, the duchy of Aquitaine covered the whole country from the boimdary of Touraine southward to Gascony, or even included Gascony, and reached the Pyrenees. After 1450 the term almost disappears from the page of history, and is replaced in a part by Guienne. Its value as describing a part of France is that from the time of Julius Caesar to nearly the end of the Middle Ages it designated what is now south-west France, with the possible exception of the country immediately north of the Pjo-enees. The special glory of Aquitaine is the marvellous collection of Romanesque churches with which the dis- trict known as the Angoumois is covered. The large towns and the small -vallages alike have Romanesque churphes, whose epoch can be ascertained with some exactitude, and which succeed one another throughout the eleventh and twelfth centuries. With Angoul^me for its centre, the department of La Charente, which practically coincides with the ancient province of Angomnois, contains five hundred churches, and the greater number of them owe their principal character to the builders of the twelfth century. Among them may be named : Bassac, Blanzac, Chalais, Fleac, Gensac-la-PaUud, La Cou- ronne, La Rochefoucauld, Les Trois Pallis, Lech^res, S3 54 WESTERN FRANCE Mouthiers-sur-Boeme, Montmoreau, Nersac, Plassac, Rouillac, Ruffec, Saint Amand-de-Boix, Saint Estephe, and Saint Michel d'Entraigues. These churches are not copies of Byzantine buildings, but Romanesque, into which the dome and barrel-vault had been introduced in contradistinction to the groined vaulting of Northern France. With very few exceptions these churches in La Charente are apteral, that is to say, without aisles, a trait which they share with those of Anjou and Maine, but with this difference, that whereas in the buildings of those districts the naves have Pointed vaults of a domical character, here they are roofed with a succession of domes, and where there is a central tower it is often in the form of a domed octagon.* In these churches, then, the dominant feature is the dome, which almost invariably surmotmts the intersection of the arms of the cross. It was imported from the neighbouring Perigord, but it does not appear in Angotmiois until the commencement of the twelfth century. The feature, however, scarcely survived till the thirteenth century, having been found unsuited to the vertical tendencies of Gothic work; and although it may be considered as an experiment which had been tried and failed, it yet produces a striking and singular effect on those who visit these churches for the first time. It was seldom that these domes were visible ex- teriorly, covered as they were by the timber roofs. They were used for spanning the centre of the crossing earlier than as vaulting to the naves, which in the older churches is of the barrel-vault form, either semi- circular or pointed. And the earlier domes are often built upon squinches, the pendentives being of later introduction. When the dome was used over the central crossing it was not allowed to appeeir externally like a baker's oven or a close kiln, but was surmounted by a central tower, square or octagon, and covered with a conical spire of remarkable character. These spires * In its original state the nave of Bordeaux Cathedral must have been one of the largest and 6nest of the apteral class in Aquitaine. AQUITAINE 55 are never steep, and are formed of stones so carved, as to give the appearance of scales, and have obtained in France the appellation " en pomme de pin," from the likeness they present to a fir cone or a pineapple. Examples of such spires occur at Le Palud, Trois Pallis, Plassac and St Estephe. In the cemetery overlooking the church and village of Cellefrouin there is an erection called the Lanteme des Morts ; it consists of a tall pillar composed of eight attached shafts with plain capitals raised upon a tall angular pedestal, and crowned with one of these cone-shaped spires. This singular structure belongs to the thirteenth century. The fa9ades of these churches, not in the Charente alone, but in other departments anciently composing the province of Aquitaine,* are decorated with arcades, generally divided into three or four vertical divisions, besides the gable, and are, as a rule, carried out in their _ entirety, and completed just as memorial monuments ' of their builders. The lower portions are richly floriated, and it is possible to trace in the head-mould- ings of the arches (and confined to them) the origin of the dog-tooth ornament in the stars which decorate them. These fagades appear usually to have marked the completion of the work, and to have received the greatest share of ornamentation. The ground storey generally shows three large arches, of which the central one is the doorway. The second storey consists fre- quently of an arcade of five arches, and the arcades in the upper storeys are more numerous, but the subordi- nation is not invariable. AH the capitals are richly adorned with figures or foliage, and across some of the fronts is carried a frieze, rich, broad and continuous with the capitals of the ground storey arcade. Indeed, one of the most remarkable characteristics of the pro- vince is the extraordinary richness of the ornamenta- tion. It is of two kinds: firstly, of human figures, • Basses Pyrenees, Charente-Inferieure, Deux Sevres, Dordogne, Gers, Gironde, Haute Pyrenees, Landes, Lot, Lot et Garonne, and Tarn et Garonne. 56 WESTERN FRANCE animals and birds, and nondescript compositions of all three; and secondly, of foliage only. The first kind is more or less barbaric, the latter very rich and pure. As respects the historiated capitals, although there may be some deeper meaning in them than at first catches the eye, they more probably indicate the familiar struggles of the inhabitants in battle or in the chase than any allusions to biblical texts, etc. These Charente churches are, as I have already said, aisleless, taking them in the aggregate, and they almost invariably end in an apse, sometimes with two or three shallow apsidal chapels projecting from it, but in no case do I remember an encircling aisle. In this latter respect the churches of the Angoumois differ from those of Poitou, Auvergne and Burgundy.* In cruci- form churches like those of Cellefrouin, La Palud, Mouthiers, Lanville, Rouillac, Bourg-Charente, and the cathedral at Angouleme, we find an apsidal chapel open- ing from the eastern side of either transept. The chancel of Puypercux church presents a very singular outline on its ground plan. It is more elongated than the generality of Angoumois chancels, and has seven semi- circular apses cusping round the sides and end. Romanesque sculpture is to be seen in the Angou- mois, Guienne and Perigord in its highest development, though of somewhat unruly splendour, as for instance in the northern doorway of the cathedral at Cahors, in the fafades of St Jouin de Mames and Singferes in Charente Inf^rieure, in Ste Croix at Bordeaux, St Pierre at Petit Palais, Saint Macaire and Blasinot, all in Gironde, and above all in the wonderful abbey of Moissac in Tam-et-Garonne. In all these examples the sculpture, both of figured and floral subjects, may be pronounced unique in Europe for the boldness and vigour of its conception and execution, * In these provinces the apse has an encircling aisle, with, as a general rule, four semicircular chapels projecting from it. Of the Poictevin chevets, that of St Hilaire at Poitiers is a typical example. The Auvergnat and Burgundian chevets are treated of in the chapters descriptive of their respective localities. AQUITAINE 57 The department of Charente Inf6rieure, on the sea- coast, has a special class of Romanesque churches, generally unrestoted. They are basilical churches, with roofs, either vaulted or intended to be vaulted, and without cupolas. Echebrune and Echillais are two small and highly-enriched churches of this school. A splendid church with long transepts and sculpture of unique interest is that of Aulnay; Pont I'Abb^ has one of the finest facades in France, admirable in proportion and extraordinarily rich in sculpture; the church at Ritaud has a singular polygonal apse decorated with arcades and cfirving of purely architectural character, done for effect of light and shade and almost without reference to natural forms ; then there is the wonderful Romanesque crypt beneath St Eutrope at Saintesj whose tower, as well as that of St Pierre in the same city, and that of Uzeste in Haute Vienne, is a most noble and sumptuous example of the south-western French variety of Flamboyant. In the details of Western French Romanesque, more particularly in western facades, where the architect found a fine field for exuberance and fancy, we mark some singularities. For instance, on the facade of Ste Croix at Bordeaux, the sculpture is of a most curiously Ass5T:ian character. The same remark holds good to some portions, especially drapery, of the sculpture on the cathedral at Angoul^me. The reason for this great infusion of the Oriental into the Romanesque of this part of France is attributable to the fact that the southern part of that country was invaded early in the eighth century by a large Arab army, who, after sub- duing the whole of Spain, except where the Christians stiU held out in the mountain fastnesses of the north, poured into France, and had advanced as far as the Loire, when they were met and routed in the great battle of Tours by the Frank, Charles Martel. The number of Arabs who poured into the south of France at that time were said to be enormous, and tradition asserted that Martel had dispersed as many as three 58 WESTERN FRANCE hundred thousaiid. At all events the host was so large that it is not unnatural to suppose that the debris might have remained in the country and exercised some influence at a subsequent period over its architecture. Again, we know from early Christian history that the French church was of Oriental origin, and it seems evident that the different dioceses long maintained a considerable degree of independence, and some of them kept up a friendly intercourse with the Eastern Church, so long as the Greek Emperor at Byzantimn continued to command the commerce of the Mediterranean, which was until the middle of the eleventh century; previous to that time Venice was a subordinate city of the great Empire, to the commerce of which it succeeded. There were two main lines of commerce through France from the East at this period : one ascending the Rhone from Marseilles by Avignon, Vienne and Lyons, and branching off in various directions, as to Grenoble and Geneva eastward, to Le Puy in Auvergne westward ; the other from Narbonne to Perigueux, Limoges and Poitiers, branching off to Cahors, Angoul^me, etc. As usual, commerce, civilization and religion travelled to- gether and assisted each other. Oriental influences may be traced by these channels in different ways, of which the architecture is one only, although an impor- tant one; various local customs are continued; Oriental tissues and reliquaries are still preserved in the treasuries of the churches in obscure places; and the distinct uses in the liturgies of different dioceses, each with its own breviary, continued up to the Revolution, if not to the middle of the last century. - Besides the churches already named in the Gharente, with the cathedral at Angoullme for their archetype, there are many in the other provinces forming the old duchy of Aquitaine which have at least one cupola, as for instance at the crossing of the nave and transept. No other part of France possesses buildings of this character. The most famous of all these domed churches are St Front (the cathedral) andSt Etienne at Perigueux, PERIGUEUX 59 in Dordogne, Roulet in Charente, the cathedral at Cahors, and the church at Souillac, in Lot. At Peri- gueux, St Front has suffered a destructive restoration, which, though it has resulted in an iateresting modern church studied from a Byzantine original, has lost all its exterior characteristics and somewhat of its interior authenticity. The same must be said of Angouleme Cathedral, and indeed of many another Aquitanian church over which the hand of the restorer has passed not wisely but too well. Probably no building in existence shows the domical principle of construction and composition so plainly and undisguisedly as the cathedral at Perigueux, a building which gives the idea of being thrown off as a rough and grand sketch, the filling of it up being left as a problem to future architects. It is perhaps the only specimen of a perfect Greek cross of which each arm is covered by a cupola, and both in plan and dimen- sions bears an extraordinary and striking resemblance to the nearly contemporaneous church of St Mark, Venice. Exclusive of the apse and the ante-church, St Front measures 182 feet each way. The ante-church and porch are the remains of an older building, now very much destroyed, to which the domical church appears to have been added during the latter part of the tenth century. There is an apse on the eastern side of either transept, and five equal dome compartments, viz., one over the nave, one over the choir, one over each transept, and one over the intersection, huge square piers with narrow round-headed openings in three of their sides carrying the arches which span the entrances to the four arms of the cross. Before M. Abadie came to work upon St Front there existed, beyond the eastern arm, a chapel of one bay and an apse in the style of the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries. This has entirely disappeared and been replaced by an iminteresting piece of modem Roman- esque work. 6o WESTERN FRANCE The domes covering the four arms of the cross and the compartment at their intersection rise above the arches without any " tambour " or vertical member, and as they are not divided by ribs into cells, afford a peculiarly advantageous field for the display of pictures in mosaic or fresco in a style consonant with the archi- tecture ; whUe the great piers and their commerisurately broad plain arches admit of the richest polychrome. Indeed there is hardly an interior in France where a profusion of gorgeous and strongly-contrasted colours would be more in place than that of St Front at Peri- gueux. When the architect above referred to came on the scene these five domes were completely hidden in the exterior view by a modern structure of stonework forming a sort of clerestory and carrying a roof. Now they stand out boldly, and we may suppose that at the present day the church exhibits, to a considerable extent, the outline originally intended by the architect. These domes are divided by a cornice into a drum and a cupola. The former batters considerably, that is to say, it decreases in circumference a? it ascends. The latter has a stone roof ornamented in the " pine- apple " style, and from it rises a lantern formed of a circle of shafts very close to each other, supporting a small cupola without the intervention of arches. SimUar lanterns crown the turrets flajiking the gables over the ends and sides of the choir and transepts, and another, of much more imposing dimensions, forms a remarkably fine termination to the tall square tower which stands over the vestibule at the west end of the church. The gables above mentioned, as well as the turrets, are all restorations, the original ones having disappeared in consequence of the several fronts having been raised to a horizontal line above the gables. A small portion of one of the turrets was in existence, and from this we may assume the form of the present ones was deter- mined, while the gables were still strongly marked out by the bracketed angular cornices. The cathedral of Angoul^me, before the destruction o o ANGOULEME 6i of the southern tower in the sixteenth century, must have been a magnificent building and worthy of the fine position it occupies; its massive nave, the lofty towers rising from the transepts, and the lower octagon of the dome between them forming a group rarely equalled in that age of fine ai'chitectural combinations, the twelfth century. The date of this cathedral is an important starting- point in the history of the churches in La Charente. Gerard de Blaye, who became Bishop of Angoul^me in iioi, and held the see thirty-five years, is recorded to have built the church " a primo lapide " and to have laid the foimdations in 1109. At his death in 1136 the cathedral is said to have been finished. The words " a primo lapide " must apply to a con- struction which, as was usual, did not involve the demolition of the whole of the preceding structure, and forms no argument against the earlier date of the western bay of the nave ; of which its manner of con- nection with the other two, to go no further, seems sufficient proof. Some archaeologists consider this bay to be earlier than Bishop Gerard's work, while others are of opinion that it does not greatly precede in date the rest of the building. The iaqade, which can scarcely be earlier than the end of the twelfth century, differs in character from the severe simplicity of the interior and from the external architecture of the transepts, and fails to con- vey an impression of power, although it does of elegance. Its want of dignity arises from the endeavour to com- press too much into the restricted width which the aisle- less arrangement affords. The subdivisions also dffier from the ordinary Angoumois type, in which the facade is divided primarily into three parts; but here it is divided into five, and this is alsq unfavourable to breadth of effect. The upper storey, including the gable and th6 turrets, with their conical spires, is entirely new, the work of M. Abadie, but below the general frieze a considerable portion of old work remains; all. 62 WESTERN FRANCE however, has been subjected to a very free restoration. The principal sculptured groups are entirely new, but of those which represent St Martin of Tours on the right and St George on the left there may have been sufficient traces to identify the subjects. Ainong the upper figures and ornaments, however, there is a good deal left of the original. The tower over the north transept is a fine specimen of Romanesque enrichment. It has several stages of shafted arcades variously arranged, resting upon strings, the arches being round, and several of them pierced for windows. In proportions this tower is lofty rather than massive, as is the case with many belonging to the same period, and before the restora- tions of 1852-76 terminated in a short octagonal spire. Of the central domed octagon the oblique sides are narrower than the cardinal ones, or, to speak more strictly, its plan is that of a square with the angles boldly rounded off. Within, the broad but aisleless nave is divided into three wide bays by Pointed arches springing from piers whose great internal development is a striking feature. These piers are practically buttresses with greater internal than external projection, and confer upon the interior an air of great solidity that is very striking. Each compartment is roofed with a hemispherical dome on pendentives modified from the true Byzantine type. The lateral arches of these three compartments are like the transverse ones. Pointed, and the walls which they enclose are divided at mid-height into two stages. In the second and third bays the lower stage has three semicircular arches on cylindrical shafts, but in the first, or earlier bay, these arches are carried on plain pilasters. In each case the upper storey of the eleva- tion is pierced eccentrically with two round-headed windows. The great dome at the crossing is open to the church — an unusual feature in this district — and produces a fine effect. Its tambour is lighted by a succession of CAHORS 63 round-headed windows very deeply splayed, plain on the exterior, but enriched within by two orders of arches on piUarets with carved capitals. The transepts are of two bays, separated from one another by a Romanesque arch on massive piers and shafts. The bay adjoining the crossing is oblong, vaulted cylindricaUy, and opens on its eastern side into an apse. The other bay, over which (on the north side) the tower rises, is square to a considerable height, when it becomes octagonal and is roofed with a spherical dome. The choir has a semicircular apse without aisles, and four small apses radiating from it, the vaulting over the choir being cylindrical and semi- domical over the apse. In the cathedral at Cahors we have one of the most important imitations of St Front at Perigueux, with which it is almost contemporary. The plan is very simple, and includes a massive quadrangular western facade, a nave of two great square aisleless bays roofed with spherical domes, which appear externally, and a choir of the same width terminating in an apse with three small apses projecting from it. An earthquake having damaged this portion of the church in 1302, its upper parts were rebuilt, so that it is difficult to determine precisely what its original features were. The five very Early Pointed arches in the base- ment storey remain, but all the work above is of the Decorated period. This apse has three wide and two narrow sides, and two storeys of windows, those in the wider sides being of four lights and those in the narrower ones of two, aU with very bold Geometrical tracery. SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE AQUITAINE II BORDEAUX : RODEZ : AUCH Few French cathedrals present a greater assemblage of miscellaneous architecture than that of St Andr6 at Bordeaux. Such an admixture of style and disparity of dimen- sion may to a certain extent preclude this cathedral from competing on an57thing like fair terms with those of Amiens, Chartres, Poitiers and Rheims, where uniformity is the reigning characteristic; but, on the other hand, for those who make architectural develop- ment a study, the successive changes in its structure, called forth by a variety of circumstances, must have a great fascination, to say nothing of their investing the whole with a picturesqueness of general effect not often met with ia French churches of the first class. The situation of Bordeaux Cathedral in a spacious square enables good general views to be obtained of it from every point. The long aisleless nave, the loftier choir with its graceful apse and corona of chapels, and the transepts, each flanked by a pair of towers, combine with the superb Tour de Peyberland, which rises isolated from the public garden in the rear of the church, to produce a remarkably fine architectural group. The closing decade of the eleventh century was an era of great activity in church-building all over Western Europe. In Central and Southern France the visit of the Pope, Urban II., for the purpose of presiding at the great Council of Clermont in the November of 1095, 64 BORDEAUX 65 gave a great impetus to church-building in those parts, and the completion of numerous religious edifices was expedited in order that they might receive consecra- tion at his hands.* Amoilg them was the cathedral of Bordeaux, whose consecration was performed by the pontiiSE in the presence of a large concourse of bishops and other notables on the ist of May 1096. In the course of ages this Romanesque church gradually dis- appeared, with the exception of the lower part of the wall on either side of the nave, which, in its original state, was doubtless roofed with a succession of domes, such as we have seen in the churches of the Angoumois, but subsequent alterations have entirely obliterated all traces of this arrangement. The eleventh-century choir and transepts were re- moved during the latter part of the thirteenth century and the beginning of the succeeding one to give place to the very graceful Middle Pointed structure we now see, iateresting as affording an example of the force of the expansion of the Pointed style in a district so long impatient of the Northern influence. The conception of these eastern portions of Bordeaux Cathedral, due to Archbishop Bertrand de Goth, afterwards (1305-16) Pope under the title of Clement V.,t is most graceful, but the work generally differs in many points of detail from that north of the Loire. For example, the arches of the choir and apse do not spring from isolated columns, but from single shafts attached to a pier, while the apse, taken as a whole, gives one the idea of its having been designed by a Frenchman under strong English influence. I may be mistaken, but this apse of Bordeaux Cathedral, at least internally, has formed the model for that of one of the finest churches built in England in modem times — St Alban's, Teddington. The plan of Bordeaux Cathedral is the Latin cross, * See p. 154. t Clement V. was the first of the seven popes who reigned at Avignon. This " Babylonish Captivity " of the Roman Church, or, as it is called by Petrarch, " L'Empia Babilonia," lasted seventy years. 66 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE embracing a very wide but aisleless nave of seven bays, transepts and choir, narrower than the nave, with aides, large lateral chapels, and a five-sided apse en- circled with an aisle from which five chapels, each with a three-sided apse, open. All the church eastward of the nave is carried out in the Middle Pointed style, partly in its Geometrical and partly in its Curvilinear phase, but throughout with much excellence of design and workmanship. At that time the English were masters of Guienne, and certain details, notably the employ- ment of the ridge rib in the vaulting of the finely-pro- portioned but by no means exaggerated choir, may be traced to their iiifluence. From the door in the western fa9ade, which, as it abutted on the old ramparts, was never finished, a flight of ten steps brings us to the floor of the nave. The great breadth of this part of the cathedral— from wall to wall it measures a little over 50 feet — enables part of the arches opening to the aisles of the najTower choir to be seen almost from its western extremity. To this circumstance the interior of Bor- deaux Cathedral owes not a little of its picturesque beauty. The length of the nave is divided into seven bays by attached piers of varied form, and its height into three storeys, viz., one of waU-arcading and two of windows^ whereas in the majority of these aisleless naves of Western France the elevation presents but two storeys. The fifth, sixth and seventh bays retain their beautiful vaulting of the end of the twelfth or the beginning of the thirteenth centuries. This is of simple quadri- partite form, with ribs diverging from graceful clusters of shafts with foliaged capitals. An earthquake having caused the vaults over the four western bays to fall in 1437, they were rebuilt, but by no means so intricately as might have been expected from their date. The cells are crossed by lesser ribs, which, as well as the main ribs, are bolder than the Early Gothic ones of the three eastern bays; and as these ribs subside into a plain semicircular pier at the level BORDEAUX 67 of the string course between the second and third stages of the elevation, whereas those of the original vaulting are prolonged to the middle of the second storey, their curvature is much more obtuse. The semicircular piers above mentioned are not carried to the ground but are stopped upon boldly-projecting half columns, whose presence it is not easy to account for. In one instance, i.e., between the third and fourth bays on either side of the nave, this half column is composed of five amalga- mated shafts crowned with a single narrow band of leafage. In the three remaining bays this short pier is changed into the form of a cylinder with three shafts disposed about it, and lesser ones between them, but separated from each other. Perhaps these boldly- projecting piers were intended to carry arches which should open into aisles, and thus give a new aspect to the nave. The wall of the ground storey in each bay is made by shafts into three divisions of which the central one is the widest and occupied by a semicircular arch resting upon shafts with capitals of the d crochet kind. Above this stage is a narrow passage running the whole length of the nave by means of apertures in the vaulting piers, and fenced with a pierced parapet whose intro- duction would appear from the style of its ornamenta- tion to be coeval with the Late Gothic vaulting over the four westernmost bays. The wall behind this passage is lighted in some instances by coupled lancets, in others by windows composed of two plain Pointed openings supporting an equally plain circle. Pointed arches span these windows. In the three eastern bays they have delicate shafts corresponding with those of the vaulting, while square pilasters or semicircular columns serve for those in the four western compart- ments. Completing the elevation is a second tier of windows. These light the space defined by the wall ribs of the vaulting after the manner of most clerestory windows and correspond pretty nearly in their dis- position with those below. 68 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE Externally the nave of Bordeaux Cathedral, from the absence of aisles to break up its elevation, would appear distressingly bald were it not for the buttresses whose construction at different periods was required to resist the thrust of so wide a span of vaulting. Some of these buttresses — ^huge> oblong masses rising gener- ally in three diminishing stages, crowned with graceful pinnacles — adjoin the walls; others, constructed some feet away, are connected with the walls by flying arches relieved with open arcade work.* One of the most remarkable of these buttresses is to be found on the north side of the chiurch. Built between 1530 and 1533, during the archiepiscopate of Charles de Gramont, and styled the " contrefort de Gramont," this buttress is a gem in which an architect of the dawn of the Renais- sance has given play to his charm and fancy. It is connected with the wall between the fourth and fifth bays by a flying buttress, and rises in three oblong stages, which slightly diminish as they ascend; each stage is finished with an entablature, and shafts, en- gaged in the angles, add richness to the composition, which, as it terminates in a low gable, may be called a fagade in miniature. On the completion of the new sacristies below referred to, one which had existed on the north side of the nave was removed, and a fine doorway that served as an entrance to it was disclosed to public view. This doorway, inserted in the fifth bay, close to the Renais- sance buttress just described, and known as the Porte Royale, is a majestic work of the age of St Louis. Upon its emancipation it was found to have suffered consider- able mutilation, but careful and conservative repairs have restored to it much of its pristine beauty. Viollet- le-Duc had so great an admiration for the canopied statues of apostles that guard the two square-headed * The series of outgabling sacristies built between the buttresses on the south side of the nave cannot be said to contribute towards the im- provement of the ensemble. To make way for them, their designer, M. Abadie, whom I heard described as " architecte d'enfer," caused a very beautiful fourteenth-century cloister to be destroyed. BORDEAUX 69 doorways that he took them as models when replenish- ing the empty niches of the doorways at Notre Dame, Paris. The sculpture in the lintel represents the General Resurrection. In the niouldings of the great arch are four rows of canopied figures of angels and saintly person- ages, and in the tympanum is Our Lord enthroned. On either side of Him kneel the Blessed Virgin and St John; above Him are seen two angels bearing repre- sentations of the sun and the moon; other angels, standing, hold the various instruments of the Passion. The whole of this sculpture forms a remarkably fine illustration of that subject frequently introduced in the heads of great doorways — ^the Doom. In the wall immediately over this doorway are eight trefoiled arcades on detached shafts, each containing a full-length statue. Two of these figures (probably David and Solomon) are ancient, the remaining six in pontifical vestments are restorations. The great portal of the northern transept is an exquisite conception, and exemplifies the delicacy and refinement to which French sculpture had attained in the first quarter of the fourteenth century. Here we see the plastic and decorative art of the Middle Ages pushed to the extremity of perfection.* This portal occupies the entire breadth of the fa9ade between the towers, and its arch, which has no gable, is recessed in seven orders of mouldings. Of these orders, four are arches carried on very slender shafts with simply moulded capitals, and alternating with them are three bands of statuary, the number of figures in these bands decreasing as the portal recedes. The innermost voussoir contains ten angels, the intermediate one the twelve apostles, and the outer one fourteen patriarchs and prophets. Occupying the hollows formed between the shafts which support the arches sejiarating these three rows of sculpture, are, on either side of the * Casts of a portion of this doorway may be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington, and in the Mus^e de Sculpture Compar^e at Paris. 70 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE entrance, a corresponding number of figures of bishops, standing on tall triangular pedestals and surmounted by canopies. A similar pedestal between the two square- headed doorways supports the effigy of that Arch- bishop, Bertrand de Goth, who promoted the work of rebuilding the choir and transepts on their present magnificent scale. In the tympanum of the arch three sculptured groups represent the Institution of the Eucharist, the Ascension, and Christ seated in triumph between two angels, one of whom holds the lance of St Longinus and the other the handkerchief of St Veronica, while two more angels, kneeling, bear representations of the sun and moon, as in the Porte Royale. Before re-entering the cathedral a few remarks must be made upon the exterior of the choir. Here we find most of the features which characterize the great choirs of the north — the apse with its corona of chapels, and the flying buttress, redeemed from heaviness in this instance by open tracery. We miss, indeed, the high- pitched roof, but there is dignity conferred by remark- able solidity, and loftiness without exaggeration; skilful grouping of parts, to which the towers flanking the transepts largely contribute, produces an effect of much picturesqueness; and the judicious treatment of detail satisfies the eye as it passes from the mass to examine some individual feature with attention. The windows in this part of the building offer an assemblage of tracery of the best Geometrical period. In the five chapels of the chevet, where they are crowned with gables, the windows are of two trefoiled hghts sup- porting a sexfoiled circle. They are extremely graceful, and may have furnished Sir Gilbert Scott with the model for those in the apse of his fine church of St Mary, Stoke Newington. On the north side of the choir, and co-extensive with its four bays, is the Lady Chapel. The head of each window here, a four or three light one, encloses two circles, the outer one of which has eight cusps, inverted, as in the clerestory of the choir at St Etienne BORDEAUX 71 at Auxerre; the inner circle is foliated in the usual manner. In the corresponding windows of the two chapels on the south the eight cusps of the circle are tref oliated, whereby a very rich effect is produced. The rose window of the soulli transept has tracery com- posed of a number of quatrefoils ingeniously disposed around a large octofoil, while that of the opposite transept is a gf aceful specimen of the Curvilinear period. Some pecuUarities are observable in the towers flanking the transepts. They are oblong in plan, the longer sides being the eastern and western ones; ilie belfry stages of the northern are taUer than those of the southern pair of towers, and are, moreover, crowned with pinnacles and octagonal pierced spires whose oblique sides, instead of faUing within the angles of the towers, spread out at their bases in the form of a tri- angle. Re-entering the cathedral by the great southern portal, which has three rows of small sculptured figures in the voussoirs of its arch and groups within medallions on the plinths, the eye is arrested by the arches con- necting the great piers at the entrances to the nave and choir from the crossing or space formed by the junction of the four arms of the church. The peculiarity of these arches consists in their deviation from the axis of the building consequent upon the unequal width of the nave and choir, the constructors of the latter being desirous of diminishing its breadth while giving it greater height. To this irregularity the dis- arrangement of the va\ilting at the crossing and in the adjacent bay of either transept must be attributed. Standing at the crossing an epitome of French archi- tecture lies open before us. Behind us is the broad aisleless nave Avith its admixture of ?tyles, and termi- nating, at the summit of a flight of steps, in a graceful Early Renaissance loft supporting the organ, whose imposing case occupies the entire width of the west end. On either hand, and in front of us, we have the bold and vigorous Middle Pointed work of the transepts and choir, with attractive views across the large chapels 72 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE flanking the aisles of the latter. The treatment of that part of the wall of the south transept upon which the tower abuts is particularly deserving of notice. It is divided into three stages. In the lowest is a series of arcades with richly-crocketed and finialed gables; in the second and third are mullions and Geometrical tracery disposed in the form of a six-light window. In the opposite wall of either transept a tall, narrow, Pointed arch surmounted by a triforium arcade and a clerestory window seems to indicate that a new nave, uniform in style with the transepts and choir, was contemplated. The transepts being considerably higher than the nave, a wall-space intervenes between the arch opening to it and the vault at the crossing. This space is relieved by a panelling of trefoiled arcades flanking a window similar in design to that in the clerestory already noticed on the western side of either transept, viz., of three lights supporting a circle filled with Geometrical tracery, but unglazed. The choir of Bordeaux Cathedral, separated from the crossing by a low metal grille and gates, is similar in many respects to that of Limoges, with which it is almost contemporary. The four Pointed arches on either side, as well as the five narrower ones of the grace- fully vaulted apse, which in ensemble recalls that of Westminster Abbey, have their inner order of mouldings carried on slender attached shafts, while the outer one subsides into the pier against which the vaulting shaft is fixed. These arches do not rise to the string-course below the triforium, a short wall-space intervening. The easternmost bay on either side is lower than the rest. In the aisles, where the arches dividing them from the chapels, the arches spanning them transversely, and the diagonal ribs of the vaulting require support, the columns assume the form of uninterrupted clusters of shafts. The triforimn in the choir is composed of four trefoiled arches under a flat head, and in the apse of two similar openings to each bay. Corresponding with the triforium arcades are the lights of the clerestory KODEZ CATHEDRAL : THE WEST FRONT BORDEAUX CATHEDKAL : THE NAVE LOOKING EAST RODEZ 73 windows, whose heads are filled with varied and beautiful arrangements of Geometrical tracery. The five windows in the clerestory of the apse have received their comple- ment of stained glass, which must rank as some of the most successful produced since the revival of the art in t"rance. The tinctures are brilliant but delicate, the blue used in the robes of Our Lord and the Blessed Virgin, who are represented as seated within vesicae in the central window, being especially admirable. In the four windows lighting the long Lady Chapel on the north side of the choir the modern stained glass — an earlier production — is not so successful, owing to the pre- ponderance of deep positive colour and the want of white to relieve it. Within an elongated medallion in the centre of each light is a single figure, and above and below a group, while in the circle forming the tracery is a subject from the life of the Blessed Virgin. The high altar stands half-way up the choir, between the second and third bays counting from the west, the stalls of the chapter, the lectern, accompaniment organ and other instrumenta of choral worship occupy- ing the space within the fourth bay and the apse. The area westward of the altar forms the sanctuary, on the north side of which, against the pier between the first two arches of the choir, is the archiepiscopal throne. The prirnitive custom of placing the chorus cantorum in the apse survives in a large number of churches in the south of France, where the Eastern limb is short, but it is curious that it should exist in a fourteenth-century choir of such length as that of the cathedral at Bordea.ux. The three cathedrals jiist described — Perigueux, Cahors and Bordeaux — are in Guienne; to these must be added a fourth, on the eastern side of the province, that of Rodez, whose north-eastern tower, justly the pride not only of the immediate district known as the Cantal, but of the whole department of Aveyron, was the last addition to a structure in which, as regards its plan and dimensions, we perceive the hand of a northern architect. 74 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE The history of Rodez Cathedral runs on much the same lines as that of the in many respects analogous ones at Clermont-Ferrand, Limoges and Narbonne. In 1277, the Romanesque church being found in a ruinous condition, the chapter resolved upon rebuilding it on a much more imposing scale. The work, com- menced, as usual, at the east end, under Bishop Ray- mond de Cahnont, was pursued with such vigour that, on the death of that prelate, the apse, the two bays of the choir adjacent to it, and eleven of the fifteen chapels flanking the aisles and procession path stood completed. During the greater part of the fourteenth century the Bishops of Rodez were resident at the papal court at Avignon, and did but little to expedite the work so nobly begim by Raymond de Calmont, and though all the means commonly resorted to in the Middle Ages to raise funds were tried, the end of the fourteenth century had arrived before the church was half completed. Fifty years later the broken thread was taken up by GuiUaume de la Tour d'Oliergues, a prelate of energy and determination, under whom the four eastern bays of the nave were built. Bertrand de Chalengon, the nephew and successor of GuiUaume, erected the two remaining bays of the nave and furnished the choir with its richly-carved stalls and rood-loft; and in 1531 Frangois d'Estaign crowned the work by the completion of the great north-eastern tower, aptly styled by one of his most worthy successors — Monseigneur Pierre Giraud, afterwards Archbishop of Cambrai — " chef d'oeuvre de I'art chr^tien, noble couronne de Rodez, honneur de la province, merveille du Midi, immortel t^moignage du gout 6clair6 et de la riche munificence d'un des plus grands et des plus saints ^vdques." The quadrangular west front flanked by richly- crocketed pinnacles seems to have had an unfinished appearance in the eyes of the Cardinal Bishop d'Arm8irgnac, so he commissioned his secretary, Phil- andrier, who had returned from Italy imbued with the RODEZ 75 spirit of the Renaissance, to crown it with a copy in miniature of one of those double-storeyed facades with which those conversant with the architecture of that country must be famihar. The sumptuous doorway to the sacristy, a smaller one to a chapel on the south side of the choir, and the stone gallery which fills the first bay of the nave on the north side and is returned across the west end, are aU remarkably fine productions of the same school in its early phase, and far from being incongruous, only add to the interest of a cathedral which is perhaps not so fully known as it certainly deserves to be. From the long period that elapsed between its com- mencement and its completion Rodez Cathedral might be assumed to present a miscellaneous assemblage of architecture. Such, however, is not the case, for, not- withstanding the changes through which the Pointed of France was passing diiring those two centuries and a half, each successive architect appears to have respected the work of his predecessor, with the result that we have here a building of extremely uniform character. In England the case would have been reversed. TTie only difference between the two periods of architecture that prevailed during the erection of Rodez Cathedral is observable in the window tracery, which in the early parts of the church is Geometrical and in the later Curvilinear ; and in the addition of a rich hood-moulding to the arches of the windows in the nave clerestory. The plan is the normal one of a first-class French church : nave and choir of six and five bays respectively ; five-sided apse; transepts not projecting beyond the line of the chapels, which, flanking the aisles throughout, are square in the nave and first two bays of the choir, and apsidal in the remaining three bays and the chevet. The sacristy, entered from the fifth chapel on the north side of the choir, is in the ground storey of the tower, a superb creation of the latest Flamboyant school, free, however, from any soupfon of the Renaissance. It rises in four stages, of which the first two are com- 76 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE paratively simple. The third or belfry stage has on each face a window of two lights with Curvilinear tracery, the surfaces of the wall above it and of the angular turrets being richly panelled. This stage is finished with an elegant cresting and supports a solid octagon characterized by even greater exuberance of ornament, which likewise extends to the turrets filling the angles formed by the square portion of the tower with the oblique sides'of the octagon. Figures of the Evangelists crown these turrets, and a colossal one of the Blessed Virgin rises from the cupola of another turret in the centre of the octagon, which, had it been terminated by one of those pierced or crocketed spires of which the south-western French provinces afford so many exquisite examples, would hardly have been surpassed by any other work of its age and class in the country. As it is, the tower of Rodez Cathedral re- calls the celebrated one of the Ueberwasser Kirche at Miinster, and viewed from the Place d'Armes in front of the cathedral groups pleasingly with the unfinished towers of the f a9ade, whose stem fortress-like character is due to its having been raised upon the very ramparts of the city. Notwithstanding its severity there is something very grand about this west front of Rodez Cathedral, and the difference in size between the two towers which are built above the chapels, and- are therefore detached from the central portion of the facade, gives a wonderful variety to the outline. Both towers have low, quadrilateral spires, and are equipped with staircase turrets which tend very consider- ably to mitigate the prevailing sternness of their elevations. The peculiar situation of the front not admitting of any western doorways', the architect attempted no enrichment until he reached the topmost storey. This is flanked by pinnacled turrets and entirely filled by a round window, whose Curvilinear tracery is confined within figures formed by the radiation of six mullions RODEZ 77 from a small circle. A rose window of precisely the same design lights the fa9ade of either transept. Above the western rose is a series of arcades, and surmounting the horizontal top of the elevation is the miniature Renaissance facade already alluded to. This was introduced to conceal the gable-end of the nave roof, which, as well as those of the transepts and choir, is of a much higher pitch than is usual in the south. A very diminutive fl^che rising a little to the east of the crossing is the only break in the long line of roof, the central tower here being, as almost ever5nvhere in Complete Gothic buildings of great size, conspicuous by its absence. The north transept portal by which the cathedral is usually entered is rich in sculpture, but all the figures which fill the archivolts or hollows between the several orders of mouldings have been decapitated, and the three groups in the tympanum have been so shockingly mutilated that it is only possible to suppose they re- presented scenes from the life of the Blessed Virgin, to whom the northern doorway of a French cathedral was so frequently consecrated. The southern portal appears never to have received its complement of sculpture though prepared for its reception, as may be seen by the delicately-wrought canopies which fill the jambs on either side of the double doorway, and which occur at regular intervals in the hollow of the elegantly-stUted arch. In the tympanum, immediately above the two doorways, is a carved plinth intended for the reception of a re- cumbent effigy — probably that of Jesse, as the remain- ing portion of the tympanum is covered with tracery whose arboresque arrangement indicates that the subject of Our Lord's genealogy was contemplated. In their monumental work, Voyages Pittoresques et Romantiques dans I'ancienne France, MM. Taylor, Nodier and de Cailleux give a view of the interior of Rodez Cathedral as it appeared in 1834 when the stone rood-loft was standing at the entrance to the choir. 78 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE To judge from the engraving in the work above alluded to, this /«&/ must have materially enhanced the general view of the interior of the cathedral, and it is. to be regretted that a structure which had escaped the Italianizing mania of the eighteenth century should have yielded in the latter part of the nineteenth to tha.t desire for obtaining a vista which has proved so detri- mental to churches of the first class from one end of. the country to the other. It is, however, satisfactory to state that the rood screen at Rodez has not been demolished but set up in the south transept, and although despoiled of its imag- ery has, on the whole, come down to us with its archi- tectural features in a fairly good state of preservation, and on the whole may be accepted as a t3^ical French work of the fifteenth century. Three Pointed arches with curved drip-stones and rich carving in one of their orders of moulding open into the lierne-groined space beneath the loft. On either side of the central arch is an elaborately-panelled buttress surmounted by a tabernacled niche and a pinnacle. Similar buttresses flank the side arches, but their pinnacles have disappeared. Above the arches is a series of canopied niches, intercepted in the two side compartments by the finials which terminate the drip-stones of the arches. Of the three correspond- ing compartments on the inner side of the juh^ the two side ones were walled up, as altars were placed within them; the central one opened into the choir by a de- pressed arch, the space between it and the containing Pointed one being filled with Curvilinear tracery. At present a low stone wall forms the only screen to the choir, the first three bays of which contain a double row of finely-carved stalls in the style of the fifteenth century, with misericords. There are thirty stalls on either side with high backs overhung by a continuous canopy of ogee-shaped arches filled with open tracery and springing jointly from carved corbels. Originally this canopy was KODEZ CATHEDEAL TEOM THE SOUTH AUCII CATHEDRAL : THE WEST FKONT RODEZ 79 surmounted by a Renaissance balustrade, as may be seen in Taylor and Nodier's view of the choir; but this addition has been judiciously removed and replaced by a low cresting, intercepted at the interval of each stall by a crocketed pinnacle, in accordance with the rest of the work. The original bishop's throne, with its tall spiral canopy, terminates the southern range of stalls, and over the northern range, within the second bay, an orgue d'accpmpaniment has been erected, and provided with a case in harmony with the woodwork of the stalls. Of the great organ-case which stands upon a stone gallery in the nortli transept a good idea is furnished by the illustration.* Flamboyant in style, with a slight feeling of the Renaissance imported into it, this organ- case at Rodez is undoubtedly one of the most grandiose productions of its epoch. The large group of the Assumption so skilfully poised above the central tower of burnished tin pipes, and the figures of angels which crown the somewhat impurely-detailed pinnacles of the other four larger towers, are unique, and form a striking foregrotmd to the superb rose window of the transept. As at Bordeaux, the English character of certain features reminds us that we are in a district of France of which we were for a considerable time the possessors. This is noticeable in the internal contour of the apse at Rodez, which is almost identical with that of Bordeaux Cathedral, and in the simply-moulded capitals of the columns throughout the church. In most instances, where a French column is of a complex tjrpe, it is formed by grouping four or more distinct shafts round a cylindrical core, but at Rodez the columns assume the :orm of eight shafts, not clustered but amalgamated, lewn out of one block, and presenting an octofoil in lection. The triple vaulting shafts are constructed n the same way and rest upon the capitals of the ;olumns, which thus assume the same appearance rom whatever point they are viewed. The triforium ircades, like those at Bordeaux, Limoges and Clermont- • See p. 82. 8o SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE Ferrand, are trefoiled and grouped under square heads, but, except in the apse, do not occupy the entire width of the bays, a wall-space being left on either side. This stage of the elevation is returned across the west end of the nave, and crested with an embattled parapet of open tracery, and above it, seen through a boldly- moulded arch, is the graceful rose window filled with stained glass in patterns, crimson and blue being the prevailing colours. Viewed from behind the high altar this window has a very beautiful effect, especially at sunset. The clerestory ^yindows correspond in width with the triforium arcades, and, except in the apse, are of four lights, the two outer ones of which are, in most cases, filled with stonework. In the apse and the four eastern bays of the choir the tracery in these windows is Geometrical; in the western bay, and throu^out the nave, it is Curvilinear. Of old stained glass there are some remains in the northern clerestory of the choir and in several of the chapels eastward of the transepts. In the nave the clerestory windows have borders of gold fieur-de-lys on blue or red grounds. With these ex- ceptions the stained glass in Rodez Cathedral is modem, but little of it rises above mediocrity. The first view of the Gascon city of Auch, with its stately cruciform cathedral crowning the declivity washed by the Gers, is very captivating. When it is said that Ste Marie's (that is the name of Auch Cathedral) was begun in 1489, on the site of a much older edifice, the reader will imagine a Flamboyant structure of the most florid character. To this, the latest phase of Gothic, Auch Cathedral certainly belongs, but it is Flamboyant of a subdued character, and, compared with earlier buildings in the same style, of a physiognomy somewhat coarse, though there is a grand sweeping boldness about the lines of its Curvilinear window tracery and an almost studied simplicity about its piers and arches that is pleasing. In plan this cantio cygni of French Gothic is quite AUCH 8i northern ; in detail it features most of the other Late Gothic churches in Gascony; but what is most extra- ordinary, considering the century over which its con- struction extended, is the homogeneity of its design, the same features being repeated, from the noble chevet with its halo of chapels, to the west end of the nave. Completed in all essentials in 1597, Auch Cathedral was left unprovided with towers imtil the middle of the seventeenth century, when a well-proportioned pair, crowned with balustrades and vases, was raised above that portico of three round arches with coupled Corin- thian pillars between them which constitutes so solemn and dignified an approach to an interior unsurpassed for grandeur and justness of proportion by any other of its epoch in France. Rejecting this addition then, the cathedral of Auch must be regarded as a wonderful embodiment of the longevity of the Pointed style in the coimtry, though, as might be expected from the late period (1597) at which the vaulting of the nave was completed, some Classicisms are observable in the great masses of masonry which do duty for flying buttresses to the clerestory. Doubtless the external ensemble would have derived greater dignity from the presence of a high-pitched roof, but we must remember that Auch is almost in the extreme south of France, where climatic reasons naturally dictated the employment of a depressed one; and this is only one of the numerous examples of that spirit of horizontalism which opposes itself to the all- pervading verticality of northern mediaeval architecture presented to our notice in the departments neighbouring the Mediterranean. Beyond its cathedral there is little or nothing of ecclesiological interest in this pleasant old chief town of Gers, but that alone will engross several days' study, not onlyof the building itself but of the almost unrivalled collection of Early Renaissance stained glass in the windows of the choir aisles and chapels encircling the apse, and of the stalls in the choir, which is one of the F 82 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE few in France tha,t have survived the innovating spirit of the eighteenth century and the destructive pro- pensities of the modem " redistributor " of mediaeval arrangements. The. plan of Auch Cathedral, which is the normal one of a Latin cross, includes a nave of five and a choir of four bays terminating in a pentagonal apse. The transept is of sufficient depth to confer dignity upon the external outline, and completing the plan are twenty-three chapels built with the greatest regularity between the buttresses of the aisles. Eighteen of these chapels are square in plan; the remaining five, those opening from the d6ambulatoire or procession ■path, are polygonal. At the west end is the deep neo- classical portico already alluded to with its pair of towers in corresponding style. One of the most remarkable features of the interior of Auch Cathedral is an almost^ total absence of structural ornamentation. The massive circular piers dividing the nave and choir from their aisles, the vault- ing shafts and the half-columns which receive the join- ing ribs of the aisles, are entirely devoid of capitals; the arch mouldings either subside into the piers or are prolonged down them in narrow strips of masonry to their bases. Throughout the church, notwithstanding the late period of its erection, the vaulting is of the simplest quadripartite character, the diagonal ribs meeting in a key-stone' still left in the block. About all this there is a restraint that is very noble, though it must be confessed that there is a feeling of baldness in the treatment of the triforium, where the openings are wide segmental arches made into divisions by muUions without any ramifying tracery — mere gratings, in fact. The muUions of this singular triforium, whidi extends completely round the church, rise from a parapet whose ornamentation is confined to a series of figures that can only be described as forming the letter S. In the apse the clerestory windows are of two lights, in the choir and nave they are of three, all with rather large and AUCH 83 coarse Flamboyant tracery. The chapels which flank the nave are all lighted by windows of four openings, while in those of the choir and apse the number of lights varies from two to four. Many of the altar-pieces in these chapels are in a good Italian style, and in some instances are surmounted with a tester or overhanging canopy, divided on its under side into panels bearing ornaments of the Tudor rose kind on a white ground. The doorway at the extremity of either transept is a square-headed double one, immediately above which, and comprised within a Pointed archway, is a tall window of four lights. Externally this comprising arch, which is flanked by triangular buttresses terminat- ing in elaborate pinnacles, has an ogee hood moulding crocketed, but both inside and out much of the detail in these doorways is even now awaiting the chisel of the sculptor. This is especially observable in the tall canopies over the niches formed in the flankrag buttresses and in the mouldings of the south transept archway, but where the work has been completed it is characterized by great delicacy and refinement. The windows which light the upper portions of the nave and transept fronts are circular, the CurvUinear tracery fiUing them being especially noticeable for its union of boldness with grace. The whole of the first bay of the nave is occupied by a gallery raised upon a wide obtuse arch flanked by coupled Corinthian pilasters. This supports the organ, a very noble-looking instrument which, with its five towers and four flats of burnished tin pipes gleaming froni a richly-carved case of the Later Renaissance period, is sufficiently high to permit the elegant rose window to be seen above it. The great depth of the choir, and the complete manner in which it is cut off from the rest of the church by high, close screens, renders it useless for those services at which large numbers attend. This has necessitated the Jirrangement of a chorus cantorum and sanctuary 84 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE within the space formed by the junction of the nave and transepts, the choir itself being reserved exclusively for the daily offices of the chapter. The ancient juh^ still remains at the west end of the choir, but the Corinthian portico added to it on the western side by Archbishop Lamouthe Houdincourt in the seventeenth century, with its coupled columns of Languedoc marble, has been removed within recent years. Its place is now occupied by the high altar, to which the western face of the screen forms a reredos, contrived by covering the wall on either side the doorway with Late Gothic fenestriform panelling decorated with figures of saints on gold grounds. Stalls for the clergy and choir are arranged in the lower part of the panelling and across the arches opening to the tran- septs. An organ has been erected on the /«&/, and from the summit of its excellent Modem Gothic case rises a tall wooden Eirch, on the apex of which stands a very majestic crucifix with the attendant figures of the Blessed Virgin and St John — a singular combination of two instrumenta ecclesiastica, but admirable in effect. The choir of Auch Cathedral is remarkable not only for its dignity and expansion but for the sumptuousness of its furniture. The three bays on either side are en- tirely occupied by the stalls, which are returned at the west end and number 113 in all. They were executed between 1520 and 1540, and are described by M. rAbb6 Bourass^, an enthusiastic writer on ecclesiastical art, in his Cathe'drales de France, published durirjg the forties of the last century, in the following enthusiastic terms : " Les stalles sont en chene et sculptdes avec une science et une d^licatesse veritablement prodigieuses. Le bois a pris sous I'influence des siecles une belle teinte fonc^e, d'un ton riche et agr6able, propre encore k relever le fini du travail. Comme celles d' Amiens et de Vendome, les stalles d'Auch sont d'une belle con- servation, et passent avec raison pour un chef d'oeuvre oil le g^nie et la patience ont 6puis6 leurs ressources. AUCH 85 La composition g^n^rale en est aussi remarquable que les details, et il n'a pas fallu moins de verve et d'imagination pour tracer I'ensemble que d'adresse et d'habUit^ pour d^couper ces formes fines et gracieuses. Sur chaque haut dossier, on voit sculpt6s en demi-relief une figure de I'ancien et du Nouveau Testament, ou quelque personnage all^gorique. Chaque figure est posee sur une esp^ce de console en pendentif, d^cor^e de petits bas-rehefs ou d' arabesques dessin^s avec la plus grande facility, ajust^s avec la plus pure ^Mgance. Les stalles sont s6par^es les unes des autres par des pilastres charges de statuettes plac^es dans les niches, surmontees de dais et de pinacles. La decoration est riche jusqu' k la prodigalite, quelquefois soign6e jusqu' a la recherche. Toutes ces ciselures varices k I'infini, groupies avec art, unies avec goClt, sont propres a nous donner une juste id6e de I'indpuisable f^condite du talent des artistes de ces ages privil6gi&." No less thought and expense were bestowed upon the furnishing of the French cathedrals and churches m medi- aeval times than upon the fabrics themselves. The objects included in this denomination were essential parts of the whole design, and we cannot fairly judge of the build- ings themselves at the present day without at least en- deavouring to supply their minor arrangements. This is not easy in France, for the choirs which retain their mediaeval furniture and decorations, or which display all the wealth and ornament once belonging to them, are exceedingly rare. Their instrumenta of worship have either been mutilated by the Huguenots, destroyed and rebuilt in the vitiated taste prevalent during the reigns of the Grand Monarque and his two immediate succes- sors, or overturned during the Revolution, and again rebuilt on the restoration of religious order in the still more questionable fashion of the First Empire. I allude more especially to the high altars, the majority of which, together with their crucifixes and candle- sticks, belong to one or other of the debased epochs above referred to. In a few great French churches 86 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE the high altar has been rebuilt and furnished in the mediaeval style, as at Clermont-Ferrand, Moulins-sur- Allier, Notre Dame, Paris and Poitiers cathedrals, with more or less success. As a rule, when the choir termi- nates in an apse with a procession path round it, the high altar stands in advance of the semicircle without any reredos to intercept the view into the chapels beyond. Sometimes, as in the cathedrals of Angers and Sens, and the churches of St Just and St Paul Serge at Narbonne, and St Semin at Toulouse, the high altar is surmounted by a classical baldachin on lofty pillars; at Chartres Cathedral and Notre Dame at Paris a sculptured group forms the reredos; at Toulouse the three central arches of the apse terminating the choir of the cathedral are concealed by a huge altar-piece in the Revived Classical style such as we see in Belgium ; and at Per- pignan, where the high altar stands close to the wall of an aisleless apse, there is a taU quadrangular reredos in the best and purest style of the Early Renaissance. The situation of the high altar in Auch Cathedral, and the character of its surroundings, will be understood from the view of the choir looking east. In the altar- piece and the screens connecting it with the stalls, the later Renaissance of France, untinged by any feeliag of the rococo, is perhaps nowhere more elegantly exemplified. The coloured marbles are judiciously blended, the smaller decorative features are free from that coarseness which too often pervades work of this kind; and although diametricaJly opposed in feeling to the stall work with which it is in juxtaposition, there is a reticence about the whole which disarms criticism. All the windows in the chapels which flank the choir and the apse are filled with Early Renaissance stained glass, somewhat coarse in certain details but of great richness and brilliancy of tincture. From the uniform- ity which pervades their design these windows would appear to have emanated from the atelier of one artist, Arnaud de Moles, of whose nationality nothing is AUCH 87 known, but whose name is rescued from oblivion by the following inscription, in the Gascon patois, upon a window in the first diapel on the south side of the choir: "I.O. XXV de Juhn mil V cens XIII fon acabades las presens beiines en aunour de dioa et de nost d. Ainaud de Moles." This inscription rendered in modern French would read thus: " Le 25 Juin 1513 fiirent achevges les presentes vitres en I'honneur de Dieu et de N6tre Dame." These windows are not only a valuable collection as showing the general arrangement of the glass through- out the lower part of the eastern limb of the church, but as affording a satisfactory proof of the ease with which in the Cinquecento style unity of design in any par- ticular window may be accomplished by a judicious employment of architectural and ornamental detail| although no visible connection exists between the prin- cipal subjects of the composition themselves. These windows are confined to those of the part already mentioned, to the circular windows at the west end of the nave, and to the north and south extremities of the transept. In all except the three windows of the easternmost chapel of the apse, which are shorter than the others, the principal subject has a small group beneath it, by which means a uniformity of level is preserved through the whole of these compositions. Most of the windows are devoted to three or four full- length figures of Prophets, Apostles and Sybils, but a few have groups, as, for instance, the three-light window of the first chapel on the south, where the Incredulity of St Thomas, and the Appearance of Our Lord to the Magdalene after His Resurrection, are represented — the two iacidents forming, with the figure of Our Lord in the central light, one coimected picture. Another window portraying an incident is the central one of the eastern chapel. The tracery of this window is formed of fleur-de-lys, and in its middle light is the Crucifixion, 88 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE with St Mary and St John in either side one. Above these two figures are angels receiving the Sacred Blood into chalices. The Virgin is robed in purple and blue of a slaty hue, the Beloved Disciple in red and pale green; the Magdalene kneeling at the foot of the cross is attired in the head-dress of the early part of the six- teenth century. The architectural accessories of this window are Late Gothic ; those of the one on either side of it, wherein figures of Prophets and Apostles are repre- sented. Renaissance. In the second window of the south aisle we have two prophets, St Jude and the Sybilla Delphica, with below each a group in miniature. The canopy work above the two central figures is Late Gothic, with spiral tabernacles, all much shaded, while that surmoimting either lateral figure is Renaissance. The crimsons in this window are particularly fine, also a purple in the robes of the sybil. Here, as in most cases, the groundwork above the canopies is blue, while the tracery lights are treated heraldically. In the next window, also of four lights, are St Matthias, two prophets and the Sybilla Tiburtina, the accessories of the outer figures being Gothic, while the two middle ones stand under a grand architectural elevation in the Renaissance style extending across two lights. In many of these windows the unity of the composition is further assisted by the introduction of a dorsel, or tapestry, hanging behind the figures and supported by angels. The Crucifixion group above described, and the Fall of Adam, in the first window on the south, are treated, as at St Jacques Liege and Ste Gudule, Brussels, as pictures seen through an archway. The tracery open- ings are fiUed with figures, heraldry, ornaments, etc. With regard to the relative positions of the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and sybils, we can for the most part only account for them by reference to the legends and doctrines of the Church. In one window, the four-light one in the third chapel of the north aisle, are Abraham, Melchisedec, St Paul and the Sybil of Samos, the last-named bearing a cradle, AUCH CATHEDRAL : THE CHOIR LOOKING WEST AUCH CATHEDEAL : THE ALTAEPIECB AUCH 89 because she is said to have prophesied the Nativity of Our Lord. Below are three analogous subjects. One running through two lights represents Abraham's sacrifice, the others the Conversion of St Paul and the Nativity. The first of these groups is inscribed as follows, "Noli trucidare manu tua puerum tuum"; the second, " Saule, Saule, quid me persequeris? " and the third, " Vingt, et quatre ans eut sybille samie quand elle dis." In this window each of the four figures is placed within a Renaissance alcove sur- moimted by an entablature. In the middle of the window, and therefore cutting across the central monial, is another of these conch-shaped ornaments, and, in the upper portion of either side light, the figure of an angel. The circular window at the west end of the nave, fortunately preserved when the portico and towers were added, has its eye or centre opening filled with a half figure of the Blessed Virgin ; the hghts immediately diverging from it comprise flames of fire, while the outer ones principally contain representations of angels and cherubs. The two other circular windows at the ex- tremities of the transepts are nearly alike. One con- tains a half-figure of St Paul, the other a half-figure of St Peter in its centre, all the radiating lights being occu- pied solely with foHaged ornament. In the windows of the chapels lining either side of the nave, colour is chiefly confined to the tracery and the borders of the hghts. In the former, ornaments and heraldic devices are introduced; in the latter are fruit and flowers, with red, yellow and sage green for the prie- dominant colours; also a pale blue with which some baskets of fruit are tinctured. All the clerestory windows have a similar glazing, which appears to belong to the middle of the seventeenth century (one window in the nave is dated 1649), and if somewhat coarse on a close inspection, must on the whole be considered very effective. The glass painters of the period that witnessed the erection of the windows in the eastern part of Auch 90 SOUTH-WESTERN FRANCE Cathedral certainly surpassed their predecessors and their successors likewise in their technical knowledge of the human figure. Form and proportion are in general well preserved, and the pictures are as well executed as designed, a matter of very rare occurrence in much of the ancient work. The heads of the large figures, from their high finish and flatness of effect, bear a considerable resemblance to those in the oil-paintings of the close of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century. Some of the portraits possess much of the character of Holbein's pictures. The features are represented by well-defined hghts and shadows rather than by actual outlines, though these are used for the sake of giving distinctness and force of expression, and the costumes, viz., those of the period in which this glass was executed, are in general exceedingly rich and splen- did from the colouring, and from the profusion of diaper lavished not only upon them but upon the hangings which in general form the groundwork of the figures. The robes are mostly lined with a different colour, and are disposed so as to show it off as much as possible; in fine, as works of the Cinquecento, I can call to mind no other series of windows presenting so uniform an appearance, or so gorgeous yet grateful an assemblage 01 colour, as those in Auch Cathedral. SOUTHERN FRANCE LANGUEDOC I TOULOUSE : ALBI Bounded on the west by Gascony, on the north by Guienne, Auvergne ajid the Lyonnais, on the east by Dauphine and Provence, and on the south by the Mediterranean, the province of Languedoc corresponds roughly to the modem departments of Ardeche, Gard, H6rault, Lozfere, Aveyron, Tarn, Aude and Haute Garonne. Ariege and P5^enees Orientales, apparently corresponding to the old comtds of Foix and Roussillon, may be included in Languedoc. Architecturally, how- ever, the departments of Ardeche, Gajd, and about half of Herault, must be regarded as formingpart of Provence, while the province of Dauphin^, especially that part of it where it is included in the department of Drome and the southern part of Isere, was under the influence of the successive Proven9al styles. In Roman times Lan- guedoc and Provence formed together the Provincia GalUca, and the Roman architecture of this region, much of which is singularly well preserved, soon ac- quired a quality of its own which distinguishes it from the Roman work of Italy. The style of ardiitecture prevalent in that part of Languedoc which adjoins Provence is almost identical with that of the latter and cannot in any way be dis- tinguished from it. But in the western part of the pro- vince the Romanesque architecture, particularly that about Toulouse, appears to have been influenced by the schools of the Auvergne and Aquitaine. 91 92 SOUTHERN FRANCE Most of the Romanesque buildings in Languedoc that preceded the Albigensian Wars have disappeared, but the nave of the cathedral at Toulouse, and that of SS. Nazaire et Celse at Carcassonne, are more distinctly allied to Provengal work. The Albigensian Wars abruptly broke off the architectural development in Languedoc, and their result was the addition of that province to the royal domain of France . Thenceforward the builduigs constructed after this borrow the Gothic forms of the north, though tertain southern peculiari- ties, notably the wide apteral nave, were retained. Such churches as St Semin at Toulouse, SS. Nazaire et Celse at Carcassonne, the cathedrals of Perpignan and Albi, and the suppressed ones at Narbonne and B^ziers, may be mentioned as the most remarkable archi- tectural monuments of a province which has many claims upon the ecclesiologist ; moreover, it is the only part of France in which the almost exclusive employment of brick on a large and important scale can be studied. Examples of this kind of construction are fewer and less important generally than those of Germany, Italy and Belgium. Stone is so plentiful throughout France that there are but few districts in which there was any or much advantage in the use of brick ; and consequently that practical good sense which made mediaeval archi- tects always prefer the cheapest good material to any other, involved as a matter of course the general use of stone. It is in this southern province of France of which I am now writing, more than an3^where else, that old brickwork is to be seen, and to Toulouse, its most important city, I must first take my readers. Here almost aU the churches are of brick, and of ex- treme interest, and of all ?iges. Let us first look at the cathedral of St Etienne. This strange church consists of an early nave, to the north-east angle of which was added, in the fourteenth century, a nobly-proportioned choir with aisles, procession path and chapels (both lateral and radiating) on northern lines, but in many of its features and details quite local. This grand dioir o D o 6< o o Hi •< . a o J B O in TOULOUSE 93 overtops by far the older portion of the church, and was evidently begun with the intention of some day com- pleting the transepts and of building a nave in place of that which still fortunately stands. I say fortunately, not because the whole work is now harmonious, for it is very much the reverse, but because this old nave — a simple parallelogram of three bays — ^no less than 63 feet wide in the clear, and about 140 feet long — ^happens to be a work of extreme value and interest. There is no evidence, I believe, of the exact original extent east- ward; but doubtless one or two bays were destroyed for the erection of the choir. This was begun consider- ably to the north of the old nave, whose south side is in a Ime with the walls of the chapels on the same side of the choir. In other words, if we take the plan of Toulouse Cathedral and draw a line through it from the centre of the west end of the nave to the east end of the choir, it would terminate, not at the central chapel behind the apse, but at the second one from it on the south side. The effect of this eccentricity is undeniably pictur- esque, and the emerging from the speluncar, aisleless nave into the lightsome choir is attended by a sensation similar to that which one experiences on passing from the lower to the upper churches of the Sainte Chapelle at Paris and St Francis at Assisi. The nave of this cathedral is said to have been built by Count Ra3rmond VI. whilst he was besieged by Simon de Montfort in Toulouse, and with this ^ate the char- acter of the work fairly accords. The side walls are low and perfectly plain, and the enormous (and almost unequalled) span is covered with a simple quadri- partite vault of brick. Here both the filling in of the vaults and the ribs which carry them are all of brick, the ribs plain and square in section, and the whole im- pressive rather for its extreme simplicity and fine scale than for aught else. Yet it would be wrong to deny the architect all credit for refinement, for at the west end there are some windows — a large, boldly-moulded 94 SOUTHERN FRANCE circular one flanked on either side by a lancet-^set within an equally bold arcading in the waU, and this arcading is carried upon shafts whose capitals are carved so delicately and beautifully as to make a real sunshine in a shady place. The vault is very domical in its transverse section, and the three bays are divided by bold coupled shafts with sculptured capitals which carry transverse arches (or ribs) no less than 3 feet 6 inches in width. Such a work as this is not only valuable to us as showing a very grand example of one of the broad aisleless naves so often seen in the south-west of France, but stiU more as showing that it may be successfully executed in brick without any exaggerated — iadeed almost without any — adornment, and yet with very grand effect. There is something so impressive in the vast dimensions of this nave that much elaborate ornament would be alto- gether out of place, and the refinement of the sculpture amply answers the purpose of showing that the artist had the power, where he had the will, of introducing delicate ornament with success. The long choir, begun in 1272 on the northern plan, with a five-sided apse, very narrow aisles, lateral chapels,* and well-developed triforium and clerestory, is on the whole a very imposing structure, though not so harmoniously proportioned as its contemporaries at * The north or south ends of these lateral chapels — six on either side — are rectangular on the exterior. Within, they assume the form of pentagonal apses, the central compartment only having a window of two lights, which is repeated in a blind form on the remaining sides of the figure. Although occasionally employed in Southern French Gothic — as for instance in the choir of Rodez Cathedral — this amalgamation of the rectangular and apsidal shape is never met with in the lateral chapels of the northern churches. The tracery in the windows of these chapels at Toulouse is Geometrical Decorated of very beautiful character, and sufficiently varied to afford subjects for study or imitation. A splierical triangle enclosing three tiers of trefoils within triangles is especiiiUy admirable, as is the ancient stained glass with which most of these windows are filled. The subjects are chiefly small figures seated within medallions or standing beneath Middle Pointed canopies which in some instances are of a beautiful silvery white tone and reach to the heads of the lights. TOULOUSE 95 Bordeaux, Clermont-Ferrand, Limoges and Rodez, being somewhat too broad for its height. The general character of this choir at Toulouse is Geometrical Decorated, but with the exception, perhaps, of the eastern corona of chapels no part of the work can be so early as the date named above. The calami- tous circumstances in which the coimtry was placed between 1328 and 1450, owing to the sanguinary and protracted struggle between the rival crowns of France and England, militated here, as elsewhere, against the achievement of works projected on a grand scale, and it is probable that those at Toulouse were not resumed until the deliverance of the territory from its invaders. We must therefore regard the choir of this cathedral as a production for the most part of the latter part of the fifteenth century, certain details, such as the tracery in the windows of the lateral chapels, having a retrospective character. The vaulting was not com- pleted until 1502, and this was so damaged by a fire early in the seventeenth century as to necessitate its reconstruction under Pierre Lesneville of Orleans. To this accident must be attributed the tracery in most of the clerestory windows, which is Curvilinear; but, being destitute of cusping, is somewhat inelegant. Very graceful are the six arcades on either side of the choir, and those in the five-sided apse, where, owing to the presence of a very grandiose altar-piece in the most florid edition of the Franco-Italian style, they can only be viewed from the encircling aisle. Their acutely Pointed arches partly subside into cylindrical columns and are partly borne on very small shafts disposed round these nuclei at rare intervals. In the apse, the triforium, which is not glazed behind, as was more usual in the north, consists of four obtuse-headed arcades each surmounted by two quatrefoiled circles arranged vertically. In the choir, where the bays are wider, there are six openings, and the tracery is Geometrical, but of a more conventional character. Throughout the choir the clerestory windows are of four lights, but n6 SOUTHERN FRANCE only one window on either side preserves its original tracery, the remainder dating from the reconstruction of the vaulting in the seventeenth century. The last clerestory window on either side of the choir, and all in the apse, are filled with Renaissance stained glass. The iron grUles and gates within the three easternmost bays of the choir, the stalls with their tapestried backs, and the great organ which occupies the wall at the angle formed by the nave and the western side of the north transept, are works of the same epoch, and in their several ways assist in producing an interior which from the irregularity of its plan may truly be styled pictorial. The vastest and most impressive Romanesque church in the south of France, and interesting as ex- hibiting, with the smaller church of Conques in Avey- ron, the earliest example of the chevet, is that of St Sernin in Toulouse. This great church, finished very much as it now stands, in 1097, is nearly 400 feet long by more than 200 feet in width at the transepts. It has a nave with two aisles on each side, eleven bays in length; square-ended transepts with aisles aU round, and an apsidal choir opening with eleven arches into the procession path. Two apsidal chapels project from the eastern aisle of either transept, and five from the ambulatory behind the choir. The construction is in- teresting as affording one of the finest examples of a widely-spread class of churches in which the nave is roofed with a barrel vault, and the triforium gallery over the inner aisle with a half-bajrrel vault, forming in fact a continuous flying buttress to resist the thrust of the nave roof. The aisles have quadripartite vaults. The bases of the columns are of stone, and there is one course of stone above them ; but above this everything inside the church is of brick, save the circular vaultiag shafts and the detached columns ot the triforium. The bricks measure 10 inches x 5 inches x if, and the mortar joint is very thick. Externally a good deal of stone is used in window jambs and arches, in the TOULOUSE 97 cornices, and in some parts of the walls in horizontal courses alternately with brick. The bricks are aU of a deep red colour, and about fifty years ago, when so many great French churches were undergoing restora- tion, they were scraped, cleaned and pointed, though, as is so often the case with brickwork, the pointing has been overdone. The apses on the east side of the tran- sept are particularly valuable as examples of the mixture of stone and brick. Here the jambs of the windows have thin courses of brick between the stone courses; the arches of the windows are of stone, with a brick relieving-arch above them, and another projecting en- closing arch of stone, with a label rich in billet moulding; above this the wall is of brick up to the cornice, except where the engaged stone shafts (which divide the bays of the apse) occur, and the cornice is aU of stone. This Aquitanian t3rpe of church, as represented by St Sernin at Toulouse, was introduced into Spain in the twelfth century. The peculiarities of this type of church may be thus enumerated. The ground-plan has usually nave and aisles, transepts, central lantern and a chevet, with a deambulatoire and chapels opening into it, a space being left between each chapel. The famous church of Santiago at Compostella isoneof this class. With the exception that it is entirely of stone it is an exact reproduction of the Toulousain church, both churches having been planned upon a peculiar system of proportions based on the equilateral triangle. Santiago, again, was copied in the cathedral of Lago. There is no clerestory in the nave of St Sernin, nor in that of Conques, St Gaudens and many more of similar Romanesque character in this part of France. The omission of this member is what we might naturally expect where the dimension of height is not considered the one of greatest importance and where strong and abundant light is not required.* And it must be re- membered that the barrel roof, which is cojtnmon to all * In views of St Sernin taken before its restoration two series of windows appear externally in the portions over the aisles The upper G 98 SOUTHERN FRANCE these churches, itself occupies much of the space filled up by the clerestory of the north, which is often confined to the mere transverse cells, the springs of the vault- ing arch falling as low as the foot of the clerestory windows. This is especially the case in England. At Lincoln the vaulting spring falls as low as a point in the triforium range. The solidity with which these two great churches at Toiilouse and Conques were built, and the general narrowness of their proportions as compared with the domical churches of Northern Aquitaine, enabled the architects to attempt some imposing erection at the junction of the four arms, which is the spot where height should always be aimed at. The central steeple of St Sernin is a very remarkable work, and may be considered the prototype of a class of steeple that seems to have been pretty liberally dispersed throughout the country surrounding Toulouse.* It is octagonal in plan, rises in five stages, each of smaller diameter than the one below, and terminates in a low spire rising from behind an open parapet composed of semicircular arches on pillarets, and having a pinnacle at each angle. The three lowest stages of this splendid erection (wluch I caimot help thinking Wren must l;iave had in his mind when designing that chef-d'oeuvre, the steelpe of St Bride's, Fleet Street) have in each side two roimd-arched openings. These are of the age of the church. The two upper stages, which were added long afterwards, have pointed openings likewise in pairs with triangular canopies to them, all made very ingeniously with brick, series (of small round-headed windows) seems to have been removed during the restorations, though on what authority I do not know- Tii consequence of their removal, the roofs, which hitherto were almost fiai, have now a considerable slope. These openings probably lighted a space between the inner and outer roo^, but on account of the barrel- shaped vaults could never have been any use in lighting the interior. • There are similar steeples in Toulouse itself, belonging to the secularized churches of the Augustinians and Dominicans, and to St Nicolas ; at St Lizier and Pamiers, in Ariige ; at Beaumont de Lnmague, Caussade and Montauban, in Tarn et Garonne ; and at Lombez, in Gers. TOULOUSE 99 without moulding or much labour of any kind, and though differing in design and detail from the three earlier stages, their general form and outline is such as to accord most happily with them. M. Enlart, a distinguished French archaeologist of our own day, traces an affinity between such Lombard steeples as those of San Gottardo at Milan, Chiaravalle, near that city, and Sant Andrea, at Vercelli, and these dockers toulousains. While on the subject of steeples I must allude to one of another tj^e very common in Languedoc — :the tall quadrangular belfry rising far above the roof of the church at the west end, of which the late Mr Butterfield has given us a striking but modified example in St Augustine's, Queen's Gate, South Kensington. During the railway ride from Toulouse to Castelnaudary I saw three such belfries, with some half-dozen others, at Montgiscard, Villefranche-Lauragais, and Ville- nouvelle. They are, of course, much narrower from east to west than from north to south, and rise in two stages above the roofs of their respective churches. The belfry openings are in every case triangular-headed, and at Montgiscard and Villefranche arranged in triplets. The first-named quadrangular erection is flanked by octagonal turrets, is battlemented, and sup- ports a small additional gabled bellcote. At Villefranche there are no battlements, nor have the turrets a low spiral capping as those at Montgiscard. The Ville- nouvelle example is flanked by circular turrets crowned with conical pinnacles, and has its two stages defined by a very deep corbeUing. Here the belfry openings in the lower stage form a pair of triangular-headed windows with a diamond-shaped opening between their heads, and at the top are three such windows, one of which is placed beneath a gable over the pair with charmingly picturesque effect. The whole district is one particularly rich in brick- work and well worthy of study, though it would be difficult to obtain the same effects as those we there see 100 SOUTHERN FRANCE if we be forced to keep to our modem English-shaped brick. The angular-headed openings ■vrfiich form such a characteristic feature in the architecture of this part of France, and which are redeemed from ugliness by their quaintness and depth, as well as by being at times intermixed with arches, either roimd or pointed, would lose their meaning if buUt with a short, thick brick. The large, thin, tile-like brick here in use is difficult to arrange satisfactorily in the arch-shape, but is easily and strongly laid in the so-called " straight-sided arches." The western fagades (and it may here be remarked that the churches in the neighbourhood of Toiilouse are irregular in their orientation) have a certain amount of piquancy, at least to a northern eye, and occurring as they do in a country rich in Romanesque remains, which latter are always grand and severely impressive, even when ornamented with the most delicate and elaborate carving, these lighter erections of the fifteenth to the seventeenth century offer a most suggestive contrast, even as that between the fierce, savagdy-eamest Ufe of the eleventh and twelfth cen- turies and the more polite and courtier-hke ages in which they were built. There is also something of an Eastern semi-barbaric splendour about them, reminding one of the Saracens who overran this district, and who have there left their traces even to the present day; so that the old Celtic coins that are found from time to time are called by the peasants " Sarrasines." Montgiscard is on the summit of a low fine of hills between the valley of the Arifege and that of the small stream that runs by VillenouveUe and Villefranche- Lauragais, and I fancied I could trace in each valley its own t3^e of belfry, those on the Aii^ge being some- what lower and broader, and being finished with a straight line at the top. The colour of the bricks is at times very rich, and the joints being wide and the mortar in places having fallen out, the outUne against the sky is most ragged and picturesque. These west fronts, which at a distance remind one o o o o a " S 1 § s a z, S TOULOUSE loi very forcibly of those huge " screen fafades " met with in the churches of Brunswick and other towns of Lower Saxony, appear, in most instances, to have been origi- nally covered with plaster (like the tower of St Alban's Cathedral), but no doubt their appearance is much improved since it has in great part fallen off, time having, as usual, added a fresh beauty to the original idea of the builders. There are other fa9ades of this type at Pierrefitte and Bagn^res de Bigorre in Haute Pyrenees; Rabastens and Pibrac in Haute Garonne; Saint Sulpice in Tarn; Aigues-Mort in Gard ; and at Notre Dame-du-Camp at Pamiers, Le Fossat, Montjoie, and Las Pujois in Arilge; but the only one of the kind in Toulouse belongs to the church of Notre Dame du Taur, a church which was also originally dedicated in honour of St Semin, built as it was upon the spot where the martyr was left by the bull, to the horns of which he had been bound. This church is one of that broad, aisleless type so com- mon hereabouts, consisting of a three-bayed nave opening at its east end into a somewhat broader space, or kind of double transept, and terminating in two polygonal chapels with a small square space between them for the high altar. The style is Middle Pointed, and the nave is lighted by two tiers of two-light windows, the lower windows being spanned by walled-up arches and the upper ones forming the clerestory piercing the wall over the aforesaid arches and rising to the cells of the quadripartitely-groined roof. The Church of the Jacobins, or Dominicans, in Toulouse is, notwithstanding its secularization, a brick structure of great interest. It was commenced in 1229, only eight years after the death of St Dominic, so that it is almost as old as the Order itself, and completed in about a century. Could we but see it before its treasures were scattered and its works of art mutilated by re- volutionary violence, we shovild find it worthy of an Order celebrated above £dl others as the home of painters and sculptors. 102 SOUTHERN FRANCE The church exhibits several peculiarities of con- struction. It consists of a broad nave divided down the middle by columns of enormous height, the eastern- most standing in the centre of the apse, which has a corona of five imusually deep chapels, each ending in a three-sided apse. Very narrow aisles are formed in each bay within the buttresses and Ughted by a rather taU window of two trefoiled compartments supporting a quatrefoiled circle, while above, spanned on the exterior by a shallow arch from buttress to buttress, is a very lofty clerestory window of three lights with three foUated circles for tracery. Within the seventh bay on the north side stands a noble octagonal tower, designed in all probabihty by the architect of the upper portion of the one at St Semin. On the north side are the cloister, chapter- house and refectory. Of the cloister two walks alone remain, those on the north and west of the quadrangle. It was built at the commencement of the fourteenth century, of which date also are the chapter-house with its flanking chapels, each terminating in a sanctuary of one bay and a three-sided apse. The chapter-house itself has two bays longitudinally and three latitudinally, so that it is composed of a nave of two bays with aisles. The latter terminate rectangularly, while the nave opens into a one-bayed projection finished with a five- sided apse. At the north-east angle of the cloister is the refectory, an oblong building of seven bays, remark- able for the peculiar construction of its wooden roof; its piurlins are embedded in stone arches and the spaces filled in with panelling. It is, in fact, a wagon-head roof with stone principals. Another vast conventual church in Toulouse, also desecrated, is that of the CordeUers or Franciscans. Like the cathedral at Albi, which it almost equals in width, it is another example of an ecclesiastical fortress; and the north side, which is the most exposed to attack, is built upon the same principle. The windows, Uke those at Albi, are placed high out of reach, especially ALBI 103 on the east, and a passage for the garrison is formed along the roof by arches thrown across from buttress to buttress. It appears to have been the object of the architect to screen this passage from observation, which may be the reason why it is not supported on a corbel- table, as is usual in castles and other buildings exclu- sively military. The cathedral at Albi, famous for its vast dimensions, its screened and parclosed choir rich in sculptured imagery, the profuse polychromatic decoration of its walls and roof, and its two delicately-traceried southern portals, is a stupendous example of brickwork; but as regards its decorative features — for they are executed in stone — ^not a particularly valuable specimen of construction in that material. In Pomerania and other brick districts, of north-east Germany aU the moulded work would have been carried out in almost the only material to hand in those regions, brick. Designed like the nave of Toulouse Cathedral, that of Albi is aisleless, but with this difference, that two tiers of arched recesses, some 14 or 15 feet deep, are ranged completely round the church between gigantic internal buttresses. The span of the roof, which is vaulted in brick with stone ribs, is enormous (60 feet). There is no marked division between the nave and the choir beyond that indicated by the rood screen, which divides the laigth (nearly 300 feet) into two almost equal parts. The general design of Albi Cathedral, which is at once a church and a fortress, is, however, somewhat awkward and ungainly; indeed, were it not for its enclosed choir, which forms, so to speak, an island in the vast expanse of floor, such a building would be well-nigh immeasurable by the eye. Albi, anciently Albia or Albiga, a city of Languedoc, now the chief town of the department of Tarn, was early imbued with Christianity, a bishopric having been established here in the third century. Until 1676 Albi was a bishop's see in the province of Bourges, so long regarded as the patriarchal see of 104 SOUTHERN FRANCE Aquitaine. In that year Albi was raised to the rank of an archbishopric, with Cahors, Castres, Mende, Rodez and Vabres as suffragans. Suppressed at the Concordat of 1801, Albi was restored to its archiepiscopal dignity under Louis XVIII. The suffragan sees of Castres and Vabres were not restored, but that of Perpignan, which had formerly been one of the large number subject to Narbonne, was added to the stiU-existing ones of Qihors, Mende and Rodez, and this arrangement has continued to the present day. In the Middle Ages Albi acquired an unenviable notoriety by giving its name to that strange outburst of outworn Manichaeism which seemed to threaten so much confusion to the Christian Church. The Albi- genses, a name given to various persons who opposed the doctrines and corruptions of the Church, congregated chiefly at Albi and Toulouse in the twelfth century. The Pope, Innocent III., caused a crusade to be preached, no longer against Mohammedans, but against Christians, who were looked on as heretics. In the south of Gaul, both in those parts which were fiefs of the Kings of the French and in those which were held of the Emperors as Kings of Burgundy, many men had fallen away into doctrines which bolJi the Eastern and the Western Church condemned, and among these were the Albigenses. The chief princes in those parts were the Counts of Toulouse and the Counts of Provence; each of them held fiefs both of the Emperor q,nd of the King of the French; but the county of Toulouse itself was a fief of France, while the county of Provence was of course a fief of the Empire. The Counts of Provence at this time were of the house of the Kings of Aragon. In 1208 a crusade was preached against Raymond.l/ Count of Toulouse, which was carried on at first by Simon de Montfort, the father of the Simon who was so famous in English history, and afterwards by Louis VIII., King of the French. Simon even defeated Peter,'J King of Aragon, in a great battle and obtained possession of Toulouse. It looked at one time as if thehouse of Mont- ALBI 105 fort were going to be established as sovereigns in the south of Gaul ; but the end of the matter was that the heresy of the Albigenses, which had little in common with that of their contemporaries, the Waldenses, was put down by cruel persecutions, and that in 1229 the county of Toulouse was incorporated with the kingdom of France. From ancient times Albi possessed a cathedral under the dedication of the Holy Cross and St Cecilia, of which there are still some remains, but it was not till the accession of Cardinal Bernard de Castinete, the fifty- fourth bishop, that a building worthy of an episcopal see was commenced. Suppressing the former church of Ste Croix, which had belonged to a chapter of canons regular of St Augustine, the Cardinal selected a more commanding site for his fortress — for Albi Cathedral is a remarkable example of that military tj^e of church so frequently met with in this part of France — 'and laid the foundation of the new cathedral in 1282 under the joint dedication of Ste Croix and Ste Cdcile. This spot is one of wonderful boldness, surrounded by precipices, and so near the Tarn that Albi Cathedral does not possess a west door. On this platform the bishop began to rear a stupendous Middle Pointed church of red brick, but although he took care to provide a building fund out of the annual revenues of the see and chapter, the work seems to have pro- gressed but slowly; for we read that it was only com- pleted in 1397, diiring the episcopate of GuiHaume de la Voulte, the sixty-fifth bishop ; and then it must have been burdened with a heavy debt, for it was not conse- crated tiU the 23rd of April 1480, when Bishop Louis d'Amboise performed the ceremony. By 1380 the church had received that smnptuous poftal, known as Portail Dominique de Florence, from the bishop under whose auspices it was constructed, and towards the end of the fifteenth century a porch of corresponding sumptuousness, locally styled " the baldachin," was added. Bishop Jean Joffiredi, Car- dinal d'Arras, a prelate more famous for warlike io6 SOUTHERN FRANCE achievements and diplomatic talents than for episcopal merits, enriched the walls with paintings; while to Bishop Louis d'Amboise II., nephew and successor of the consecrator, are due the choir stalls, parcloses and rood loft, and the paintings on the roof, thus completing the work of 230 years. The ground-plan of Albi Cathedral shows this to be no ordinary church. Solid and huge, it possesses neither transepts nor aisles, but side chapels merely, of consider- able size indeed, but excavated out of the immense thickness of the walls, while the chorus and sanctuary, surrounded by stone screenwork of a richness almost unparalleled in Europe, stand in the eastern half of the vast apsidaUy-terminated parallelogram, detached from the side waUs. My readers will gather from this how great a resemblance this chorus bears to Basilican arrangement, whether purposely or by accident, and from the circumstances of the church I cannot tell. Although designed on principles entirely at variance with ecclesiastical usage, Albi Cathedral is certainly one of the most imposing religious edifices in the south of France. Imagine a huge apsidal church built almost entirely of red brick, 290 feet long, without aisles, but with a roof-span pf 60 feet, standmg on the brink of a precipice, with side walls rising to the unbroken height of nearly 100 feet, dominated at the west end by a vast square tower 300 feet high, terminating in an octagon, not dissimilar in mass to, though far more solid than, those of Ely and Boston; and then some notion of this church of Ste CecHe at Albi may be formed. The roof is of a very low pitch; but it must not be forgotten that Languedoc is in the south of Europe. The cathedral is altogether conceived in a gigantic spirit, and with slight alterations may be accepted as the model for a great town church in which the altar can be brought into view of the whole congregation. If I mistake not, two of the most distinguished architects of the Victorian era, Pearson and Bodley, had it in mind when planning their respective churches of St Augustine, ALBI 107 Kilburn, and St Augustine, Pendlebury, the one worked out in Early English, the other in Transition from Decorated to Perpendicular. I alluded just now to the huge internal buttresses which divide the length of the church into twelve square chapels, and the semicircle which terminates it eastward. Externally these buttresses have but a slight projection, and, unlike the generality of these masses of masonry, are not divided iato " set offs," nor do they taper to a pinnacle at the top, but retain their size throughout. They are all bound together, first by the vaulting of the chapels, which are formed between them on the ground floor, and again by the vaulting of the loftier chambers above these chapels. Against these buttresses, externally, are built flanking towers, solid and semicircu- lar on plan, with a radius of 8 feet to each buttress or tower. These towers form a considerable part of the walls of the church, extending as they do 5 feet beyond the buttress on each side, and the space between them is filled up with masonry 3 J feet thick. The sohdity of this system of buttresses, towers, walls and vaults running all round the chtirch is fully equal to the support of even the mountain of brickwork contained in the roof of the nave. The flat space above the vaulting of the chambers over the chapels was intended for the use of the garrison, and should have been defended by battlements. This part of the work was never finished, probably because peaceable times had come ; but the absence of a parapet gives an incomplete look to the whole church. In the narrow space between the towers narrower slits are made for windows — ^veritable loopholes on the lower storey, but with some pretence of tracery in the upper. And to keep besiegers from approaching the windows the foimdations are built out below as far as the towers, and shelve off above to the line of the floor inside. At the western end stands the tower, or rather the keep of this fortress. It has no western doorway or other aperture on the ground, and, above the top of the side io8 SOUTHERN FRANCE walls, rises in four storeys, of which the two upper ones are octagonal. The walls are 12 feet thick; and the structure is further strengthened by round towers at the corners, which are solid throughout. The entrance to the church is in the south side, and is approached by a flight of steps with a fortified gateway at the bottom. This gateway is joined at its north end to the buttress between the tenth and eleventh bays of the nave and is flanked on the south by a round tower, and provided with the usual contrivances for pouring down pitch and stones upon the besiegers. In strange contrast to the military severity of the upper and flanking portions of this barbican is its portal, which, as a specimen of the flamboyant Gothic of 'Lan- guedoc, is, I should conceive, unsurpassed. The jambs are fashioned into canopied niches, three on either hand, and raised upon tall angular pedestals. From these richly-tabernacled jambs rises a somewhat acutely- pointed arch of several orders of moulding fringed with a richly-sculptured hood-moulding, crocketed, and flanked by pinnacles placed against buttresses which rise up to the string-course under the battlements. The tympanum of the arch is pierced with Curvilinear tracery contained within a circle supported by the points of a pair of triangles with curved sides. The tracery enriching the latter is partly covered on either hand by figures of angels in adoration of a somewhat elongated statue of the Virgin and Child which, con- cealing the junction of the triangles, rises up into the traceried circle. Within the spandrels of the arch are large medallions, whose outlines may be described as that formed by imposing a square upon a quatrefoil, the surface being relieved by a shield bearing the repre- sentation of a battlemented turret. Passing through this fortified gate and ascending a flight of steps we reach a platform upon which is erected that pride of Albi, the southern porch, or baldachin, so called from its resemblance to that item of church fmrdture. This porch at Albi, which occupies the sixth bay from the ALBI CATHEDRAL, FROM THE SOUTH-WEST ALBI CATHEDRAL : THE CHOIR LOOKING WEST ALBI 109 west, is a glorious piece of design, and stands in strong contrast to the prevailing sternness of the cathedral. Three round-headed arches between massive piers open into it. The arch looking towards the south formerly led into the cloisters; the western one opened into a chapel founded in 1521 but now destroyed; while the northern one contains the entrance to the nave. At the angles formed by the three arches are turrets mounting up into pinnacles. The wall space above these arches, which is very considerable, and terminates in each case in a gable of the ogee form, is completely covered with Curvilinear tracery, so splendid and so picturesque that we are almost driven to the wild luxuriance of Nature to find anything to which we can compare it. The same remarks apply to the ornamentation of the pinnacles and to the tracery in the very elongated tjmipanum of the doorway into the church. The vaulting of that bay of the chapels into which this door opens is very remarkable. It is barrel-shaped, with a succession of ribs resting upon a string, and the wall below is relieved with two tiers of round-headed arcades filled with tracery of the richest description. The arcades in the lower tier rest upon corbels in lieu of being stopped by a string. In concession to the spirit of the times the pointed arch has been employed in Albi Cathedral, where con- structive laws wovdd rather have prescribed the circular form. The vault of the nave and choir, for example, which is of ponderous sohdity, would have been more secure if constructed on the principle of the circular arch, though doubtless to the loss of much elegance. The plan of the church is an oblong of twelve bays, terminating in a five-sided apse and completely sur- rounded by chapels, polygonal in the apse and square in the nave and choir, between which there is no division beyond that marked by the rood loft. This, with the open arch on either side of it, admitting to the ambulatory, formed between the backs of the stalls and the arches opening into the succession of lateral chapels. no SOUTHERN FRANCE stretches completely across the church, and from east to west is of such depth as to entirely occupy the seventh bay on either hand. The manner in which this almost insulated chorus is formed within the vast area of Albi Cathedral is a point to which I desire to call particular attention. It is a curious sight to see how the forgotten things of old are often inevitably revived in the long cycle of the Christian Church. The glorious cathedrals and churches of the Middle Ages, with their deep choirs, seemed for ever to have banished the ancient detached chorus cantorum in the nave. But in the part of France which witnessed the erection of such great apteral churches as the one I am now describing, precisely the same expedient to provide them with a chorus was required which was adopted in the Roman basilicas and churches built after their type. The detached and parclosed choir was the best and only expedient to adopt in such a case as Albi Cathedral, whose continuous un- broken width of 60 feet was eminently calculated for such an arrangement. The twenty-three barrel-roofed chapels which flank the church, and the five cellular- vaulted ones encircling the apse, are formed between the huge internal buttresses.* Above these chapels is a corresponding series of chambers but much loftier, and communicating with each other by smaJl doorways cut in the buttresses. Their floors thus constitute a gallery completely encircling the church, defended on the north, south and east by a richly-traceried parapet, and at the west end, where the organ is played, by a balcony of Renaissance character. Each of these twenty-nine upper chambers is lighted by an elongated window of two compartments, the tracery of which, notwithstanding the late period at which this portion of the church must have been undertaken, is Geometrical, but beautiful and varied in character. For instance, * There are really twenty-four square chapels, but the sixth on the south side cannot be used as such, as it forms a passage to the principal entrance. ALBI III we find two small quatrefoiled circles supporting a large one of eight foliations; two small spherical tri- angles trefoiled surmounted by a large one enclosing tracery of a rayonnant type; three small trefoiled circles; and one large circle filled with six small spheri- cal triangles cusped. Some of these windows contain ancient stained glass, that in the apse comprising a number of microscopic groups within medallions. As no white is used in these windows, their effect, viewed from the west end of the choir, is that of mosaic. It will be obvious that but little light can enter through such narrow windows as those with which Albi Cathedral is provided, and this little is further obscured by the great depth of the lateral chapels and the corre- sponding upper chambers, some 14 feet of wall casting heavy shadows in thick bars across the church. In consequence also of the wide span of the roof its ribs spring from shafts attached to the buttress walls be- tween the chapels from half-way up the height of the nave, which would naturally give a heavy look to the interior. But this and the deficiency of light have been somewhat relieved by colour, deprived of which the interior would be cold, dark and clumsy, and could not bear comparison with the great clerestoried churches of the north. When it is said that the ribs of the vaulting are 2| feet thick some idea may be formed of the prodigious massiveness of the roof of this great cathedral. The enormous weight of this vault, the keystones of which are 95 feet above the pavement is only supported at that great height by the buttresses, each of which is 5 feet thick and 20 feet deep. The transverse and diagonal ribs of this vault divide it into forty-seven compartments, with five more made by that of the apse, and the wliole is perhaps the most astonish- ing work of mediaeval colour decoration excepting that of St Jacques at lAhge, with which it is almost contem- porary, in Western Europe. The cells of this cyclo- pean mass of vaulting are painted a cerulean blue, covered all over, except where the figures and groups— 112 SOUTHERN FRANCE too numerous to admit of desi|;nation by name— occur, with designs in white toned with grey. The ribs, once brilliant bars of gold, are now dull yeUow, and between them are the cells on which are placed the picture groups within medallions, some of which are formed by the convolutions of tendrils and leaves. The work, ex- cepting that in the five cells of the apse, has never been re- touched, being as it was left by its Italian artists in 1512. The blue has lost none of its depth and purity, and all the colours are apparently fresh now and as brilliant as they were four centuries ago. The blue used for colouring the vault was obtained from carbonate of copper, or, in the words of chemical analysis, " from the precipita- tion of salts of copper by carbonate of potassiimi." The colouring of the vertical walling between the great buttresses is chiefly in patterns of Geometric form, but executed, as it in all probability was, by 'prentice hands, is not so good as it might be, and gives but little evidence of inventive capacity, though serving to redeem the brick material from bareness. The twenty-nine chapels still retain some of their original polychromatic decoration, and before any attempt had been made to " preserve " it the work must have been of greater value than it is now. Much, however, of the original work still remains, and dates from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as inscrip- tions upon it indicate, but space forbids me from giving even the barest outline of the subjects. The large painting on the great bulging piers of the tower is one of the oldest and best in the church. It is 50 feet high, and were the whole design perfect it would represent one of the largest wall paintings to be seen. Though executed during the first decade of the fifteenth century it is in a far better state of preservation than Michael Angelo's representation of the same awful subject — The Doom * — in the Sistine chapel of the Vatican, where no pains have been spared to prevent decay. * Attention may be called to the position of this Doom in Albi Cathe- dral, as analogous to the one which that scene occupies in a Greek church. ALBI 113 The Albi " Doom " was apparently painted on the brickwork with so little preparation to receive it that all the lines of the brick jointing show upon its surface. This does not in any way impair the general effect, but improves it rather by giving a play to the surface. Twice has this vast representation of the Last Judg- ment on the western wall of Albi Cathedral been either cut into or almost entirely concealed; first at the close of the seventeenth century, when Archbishop Goux de la Berch^re destroyed all the lower central portion in order to make the entrance into a new chapel under the tower, as though twenty-eight oratories in one church were not enough ; and again in 1736 when the great feature of the work — the Session in Judgment — was concealed by the erection of the organ, which not only soars to the roof but occupies almost the entire width of the nave with its truly magnificent array of pipes contained within nine " towers " and eight " flats." We can therefore only form some idea of the treatment of these lost portions by supposing that their artist followed the traditional methods of dealing with the subject which the whole scene once so fully presented. The great organ case is raised considerably above the loft upon richly-carved woodwork and its towers are surmounted by figures of angels blowing trumpets. Below it, and corbelled upon CEiryatid figures over the Renaissance doorway cut in the centre of the tower wall by Archbishop Berch^re to give access to his chapel, is the choir organ, also in a case of much elegance and consisting of eleven " flats " and " towers." On either side of it is a gallery formed above the two great pro- truding eastern piers of the tower, and connected with the other galleries on the north, south and east sides of the church. Next to its painted roof the great glory of Albi Cathedral is its choir, surrounded by stone screenwork of most elaborate richness, furnished with 120 stalls, and separated from the nave by one of the few medi- aeval jube's that have escaped the fury of the Protestants a 114 SOUTHERN FRANCE and Revolutionists, the execrable taste of the age of Louis XIV., and the ill-judged alterations of the last century. The juy, whose depth occupies the whole of the seventh bay, thus dividing the church into two equal parts, was built by that Cardinal Louis d'Amboise who consecrated it in 1480, and he it was who provided the structure with everything necessary for the most splendid celebration of the Divine offices. In front of the solid portion of the jube stands a most magnificent porch with three arches opening into it. These three arches, their colmnns, and the super- imposed wall space, constitute a very miracle of fret- work, niches and carving, of a very late flamboyant character, strangely contrasting with the rude sim- plicity of the military setting. The vault of the porch is divided into twelve compartments and equals the rest of the work in beauty and minuteness of execution. On the loft itself stands the rood with its attendant figures of the Blessed Virgin and St John, but the original rood is gone. It was of gilt bronze and was suspended from the vault above by a great iron chain of beautiful design. In place of this ancient rood is a rather insignificant one of little artistic merit, but the painted figures flanking it still retain their original places. That of the Blessed Virgin is a particularly good specimen of late fifteenth-century workmanship: the head, slightly bent forward, looks down; the hands are clasped, or rather wrung, and the arms are straightened downward stiffly in front of and close to the body; and from the head, which is partly covered by it, faUs a long clinging robe in straight folds down the back. The whole attitude of this figure is one of intense grief and suffering, not hopeless, despairing, but full of restraint, and very dignified, very impressive. The porch of this juy was once rich in sculptured imagery, now re- presented by statues of Adam and Eve, the only two spared at the Revolution, Which, surpdsingly enough, dealt very lightly with Albi Cathedral, as witness flie wall and roof decoration, and the numerous figures with ALBI 115 which the choir stalls and the parcloses are still en- riched. Passing under the screen and observing to the right and left of its solid portion the doors communicating with the loft, we enter the choir, and turning westwards see five return stalls on either side the beautiful door- way. Like those lining the north and south sides of the choir, these stalls are surmounted by a corresponding number of wooden panels, painted alternately with red and black ground colour, relieved by conventional decorative designs. Surmounting this polychromed wainscotting are the stone canopies, one to every stall, and of a very elongated spiral character, surpassing all description for delicacy of execution, whUe in the spaces formed between them tracery contributes its quota towards the production of an ensemble unequalled almost elsewhere in France. Instead of shafts, small figures of angels, winged and seated, and painted in various colours, divide this stone portion of the enclo- sure into as many compartments as there are stalls, and contribute to the already bewildering sumptuousness of this choir. That the whole work, /m6/ included, was once ablaze with colour there can be no doubt from such traces as remain. Every niche, and there are very many, both in the choir and on the walls facing the quasi-aisles outside it, was once occupied by its painted statue, designed for, and belonging to, its place and no other. The arch opening into the choir from under the rood-screen is composed of two narrow ones. These arches rest upon a corbel, are surmounted by curved gables with finials at their points, and between them, under a spiral canopy, is a figure of St Cecilia holding in one hand a palm branch and in the other an organ. At the east end of the stalls, on the Epistle or south side, is the throne of the Archbishop. Beyond this point, on either side, are obtuse-arched doors sur- mounted by tracery enclosed within ogee gables com- ii6 SOUTHERN FRANCE municating with the ambulatories. The mouldings of these doorways are in broad, simple hollows, not very deep, and the superimposed tracery is remarkable for the long sweeping lines of its curves. Large crockets of vigorously-carved, deeply-cut foliage cover the extrados of the ogee arches. Beyond these doors the screens sweeping round the apse are, in design, a continuation of the solid ones behind the choir stalls, and may be described as a series of windows, with curved or ogee-shaped arches, having mullions and Cmrvilinear tracery of much depth and boldness. Between each window is a statue, standing 4 feet 6 inches high, bearing traces of colour, and in a wonderful state of preservation. These statues stand beneath boldly yet delicately-wrought tabernacles upon moulded pedestals rising from the ground, and repre- sent personages from the Old Testament in the ambula- tories, and from the New on the inner side of the choir. Of the Old Testament characters, some of which are drawn from the Apocrypha, the finest effigies are those of Queen Esther and the four Major Prophets, the wall of the niche behind each figure being painted a plain colour — some red, some blue, others a shade of grey. The colouring on the flesh parts of these figures is not realistic, and there is little, if any, attempt to imitate nature. Faces and hands are but slightly toned, and there does not appear any indication sug- gesting that they were ever otherwise. The drapery, on the other hand, seems to have been highly coloured. Each figure therefore becomes a fascinating point of interest all round the screen. Each apostle holds in his hand a scroll inscribed, after mediaeval precedent, with a sentence of the Creed, and ther^ is a correspondence between the sentence borne by each of these and the inscription carried by the Old Testament figure which stands in relation to it, and immediately behind it in the ambulatory — the apostles facing the sanctuarj^. Thus, St Jude bears the clause " Camis Resurrectionem," paralleled by the " Educam vos de sepulcris " borne by ALBI 117 Daniel.* Indeed, the entire iconography of this late fifteenth-century choir of Albi Cathedral requires very close study and a more minute description than it has been found possible to give of it in the present sketch. • Such parallelisms between the Prophets of the Old Testament, and the Apostles of the New are of continual occurrence in Mediaeval Art, and examples of it are found in many of the painted windows and other decorative works still existing in churches both at home and abroad. The tradition which assigns the separate articles of the Apostles' Creed to different members of the Apostolic body is one familiar to every student of medieval divinity. There is, however, some variation in the form of the tradition. LANGUEDOC II CARCASSONNE: PERPIGNAN: NARBONNE: MONTPELLIER: MENDE : ST FLOUR Comparable in some respects with the cathedral at Albi are the stone churches of St Michel and St Vincent at Carcassonne, the former of which has, since the Re- volution, contained the cathedra of the bishop, vice the f£ir finer and more interesting SS. Nazaiie et Celse in the old cU/. Both these churches are in a well-developed Middle Pointed style, with broad, chapel-fringed naves (that of St Vincent is the widest of its class in France, measur- ing 68 feet from buttress to buttress) opening into the narrower choir and its aisles by three arches. This manner of breaking up the enormous width, whereby the choir and its aisles are visible at a coup-d'oeil from the nave, has its counterpart, though on a much grander scale, in the not far distant cathedral at Gerona and Sta Maria del Pilar at Barcelona. The construction of the nave of Gerona Cathedral was certainly a prodigious feat, only to be appreciated by those who are accus- tomed to a modem English church with its regulation derestoried nave, aisles and chancel. The architect of this nave at Gerona had to design one to accommodate 2300 people in view of the altar and within hearing of the preacher. In his Gothic Architecture in Spain Street gives a very interesting account of the discussions which preceded the adoption of the bold plan of Giul- lermo BofBy, " master of the works " in 1416, for building the nave of Gerona as wide as the choir and its aisles. The result is the widest Pointed vault in 118 CARCASSONKE : SS. NAZAIRE ET CELSE VIEW ACROSS THE TRANSEPT CARCASSONNE 119 Christendom. Its clear width is 73 feet, and its height is in projjortion. In order to understand what an internal width of 73 feet is it may be well to remember that York Minster, our widest nave, only measiires 52 feet across, while that of Westminster Abbey is only 38 feet. The nave of Gerona is only four bays in length, and each of these bays has two chapels opening into it on either side,^ filling up the space between the enor- mous buttresses, which project no less than 20 feet from the wall. One additional bay would have made this nave absolutely perfect in proportion. Over the arches opening into the flanking chapels of these two churches at Carcassonne, and immediately under the waU ribs of the simple quadripartite vaulting, is a series of circular windows, the tracery in those at St Vincent being produced by cusping the interstices formed by two intersecting triangles, while in the St Michel windows we have a central sexfoiled circle set round with six trefoils. The traceries of these Southern French Middle Pointed churches are generally elaborately Geometrical and rather rigid and iron-like in their character, fair but not especially interesting. They reflect what was passing elsewhere in the fourteenth century, and ex- hibit, just as did the northern parts of the country, England and Germany, at the same moment, the fatal results of the descent from poetry and feeling in archi- tecture to that skill and dexterity which are still occa- sionally in the twentieth century, as they were in the fourteenth, regarded as the elements of art to be striven after and most taught. Art, in truth, was ceasing to be vigorous and natural, and becoming rapidly tame and academical. At this time art was cosmopolitan, and all Europe seems to have been possessed with the same love fcr Geometrical traceries, for crockets,' for their delicate mouldings, and for sharp naturalesque foliage, so that no country presents anything which is absolutely new, or unlike what may be seen to some extent elsewhere. 120 SOUTHERN FRANCE But although by the first half of the fourteenth century the Gothic style, at least as regards its details, was pretty much the same all over Northern Europe, several countries had arrived at it by totally different routes. The church of SS. Nazaire et Celse, above alluded to, is situated near the south-western extremity of the old cit^. Indeed, until Louis the Saint extended the line of defence the church stood on the line of the fortifications; consequently the western fa9ade is nothing but a very thick wall without openings, built at the end of the eleventh or the beginning of the twelfth century, and constructed for defence, as it commands the neighbour- ing walls. The nave, almost unique in its Late Roman- esque character, is divided from its aisles by Pointed arches springing alternately from a pier and a tall cylindrical column. It has neither triforium nor clerestory, and, as well as the aisles, is covered with a tunnel vault. The choir and transepts with their magnificent windows are a chefd'auvre of the latter part of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth century, and in point of size may be classed with such gems of the Complete Gothic as St Urbain at Troyes and Ste Marie del'^pine near Chalons-sur-Mame. The massiveness of the nave is in pointed contrast with the wall of stained glass, most of it coeval with the building, which encircles the choir and transepts, and it is worthy of remark that the architect of this mingling of late thirteenth with early fourteenth century work adjusted his exquisite creation to the existing nave with far more concern for the buUding of his predecessor than was common in mediaeval times. Whether the ground covered by these new works at St Nazaire corresponds with that occupied by the Roitianesque transepts and choir I am not in a position to say, but at any rate it does not seem to have been sufficiently extensive to admit of the procession path and its corona of chapels. But the architect has given us the most beautiful substitute for this arrangement it is possible to conceive by building a short sanctuary CARCASSONNE 121 terminating in an aisleless pentagonal ^pse, and trans- ferring his chapels to the eastern side of either transept, from which they open by Pointed arches on taU cylin- drical columns, featuring those of the nave in shape and corresponding with them in dimensions. It is not improbable that the idea for these six square-ended chapels was derived from some of those vast T-shaped churches we encounter so frequently, built by the Preaching and Mendicant orders in Central Italy, of which the t3^ical example is Sta Croce at Florence. But the architect of these new portions of SS. Nazaire et Celse in the old citd of Carcassonne has produced something far more graceful than can be seen in any of those great churches, by piercing the walls separating the chapels from one another, and also those between the chapels and the sanctuary, with windows, of course unglazed, but corresponding in height and appearance with the very elegant ones which Ught the ends of the chapels and the apse. The effect of such an arrangement is engaging be- yond description, the succession of unglazed screens permitting views across these chapels in every direction ; indeed it is surprising that it should have had no imitators, being, as far as I am aware, unique, in Middle Pointed days at least, in France. As such we welcome it here with more than ordinary joy, as affording a relief from the stereotyped chevet, which somewhat palls on repetition. A sojourn of several days in the neighbourhood of Carcassonne afforded opportimities for frequent visits to this lovely churchy so that I was enabled to view its sombre nave and its fairy-like addition, where the two great transeptal rose wmdows and the elongated ones of the apse and flanking chapels scintillate with the most gorgeous hues that have ever been evoked from the brush of the artist, or have emanated from the kiln of the executant. In the old ci^/of Carcassonne ever37thing is mediaeval. Carcassonne was VioUet-le-Duc's pet patient; for many 122 SOUTHERN FRANCE years he was busy trying to bring back the old body to life and rehabilitate its decayed and shrunken form; but although the doctor appears to have had it all his own way, and to have prescribed regardless of expense, the result is not altogether satisfactory. There is something ludicrous in this expensive and useless res- toration of old fortifications, nor can one approve of the wholesale manner in which old work has been pulled down and carted away to make way for new. With the two churches just described in Carcassonne and the vast cathedral of Albi may be classed that of St Jean at Perpignan, situated in the extreme south- west of Languedoc, in a district known as the RoussUlon. Little as it is visited by ecclesiologists, Roussillon has some very interesting churches. There is the unique chapel of Planis, a plain building composed of the intersection of an equilateral triangle and a trefoil; the glorious Romanesque portal of Tolujus, where the Council was held in 1027 which instituted the Treuga Dei; that of Custojas, built in 988; those of Llan and Hix. But the most interesting in the province is the once cathedral of Ehie, the ancient Illiberia. The road from Perpignan to Elne skirts the Medi- terranean at about the distance of a mile; to the right arise the buttresses of the Eastern Pyrenees, culminat- ing in glorious and snow-capped Caftigou (8358 feet). The aloe, the cactus, the palm remind us how far south we are; the hoopoe flies before us, and the scarlet flamingo whirrs away from the dtang; while the rough Ca;talan differs almost as widely from the Spani&h of Madrid as it does from the French of Paris. We see to the left the village of Cabestaing, so famous in troubadour lore for the unholy lives and tragic end of William of Cabestaing and the Chatelaine of Roussillon. and presently there comes into view the huge, towering chevet of the ci-devant cathedral church of Ste Eulalie, at Elne. It is a triapsidal church of the eleventh century, with additions of the fourteenth, and communicates to the north with a pretty little cloister of three arches o PERPIGNAN 123 on each side, begun in the twelfth century, and evi- dently worked at till the fifteenth. The First Pointed capitals in this cloister are worth a journey to see alone, while those interested in monumental inscriptions will find here one of the finest collections in France. It may be observed that, thoroughly Catalan as is Roussillon, none of its churches have any symptoms of that Spanish arrangement by which the choir is encravado in the nave. It has never been my fortune to visit Catalonia, and therefore I am unable to say whether that peculiarity exists there as in the rest of Spain. Very possibly, as it is tmknown in Portugal, it may be in a province not really more Spanish than Portugal is. That a very strong Spanish element per- vades the instrumenta of worship in the churches of this district is clear from the magnificent altar-pieces, both in the Later Gothic and Early Renaissance styles, that are still preserved in the cathedral and one of the churches at Perpignan. The see of Perpignan was transferred from Elne in 1602, the episcopal throne being set up in the church of St Jean, which was founded, as an inscription remains to tell, by Sancho, second King of Majorca, 20th April 1324. A second stone was laid the same day by Berenger Bailie, Bishop of Elne; the choir was vaulted during the temporary occupation of Roussillon by Louis XL, as the arms of France remain on a boss to show; the nave was consecrated in 1509, and the western fa9ade was erected by Philip II. of Spain in 1577. Between the churches of St Michel and St Vincent at Carcassonne and the cathedral at Perpignan there are several points of similarity and dissimUarity. In the two former, the narrower choir, with its aisles de- bouching from the nave, serves to break up an expanse which would otherwise be immeasurable by the eye. In the great brick cathedral at Perpignan there is no such contraction. The width of the nave and choir, exclusive of the chapels built between the great internal buttresses, is 60 feet, and as the church has neither the 124 SOUTHERN FRANCE great height nor the peninsular chorus of Albi to counter- act this enormous expanse, the general effect is one of depression. The nave is divided into eight bays. The last one on either side is higher and wider than the rest, and opens into a transept, on the eastern side of whicL is an apsid^ chapel. As at Carcassonne there is a clerestory of circular windows within the arches formed by the wall ribs of the vaulting, each bay of which is divided into four cells by bold ribs sprung from corbels, attached to the walls between the chapels, and meeting in large pendent bosses. In the windows of two lights which are placed high up in the walls of the chapeb the tracery is Curvilinear, while that in the three-light windows of the pentagonal apse which terminates the short aisleless choir is a combination of the flowing and the rectilinear. This apse of Perpignan Cathedral is most impressive by reason of its elegant proportions. The groining is particularly remarkable, and its e/awc/ character, which gives it an appearance of great strength, is due to the mEinner in which the ribs, after leaving the capitals of the shafts between the windows, are carried up verti- cally for a considerable distance before spreading out to unite at the boss. Behind the high altar is a superb white marble reredos of early seventeenth-century Spanish workman- ship. Quadrangular in form, occupying rather more than the central compartment of the apse, and rising one stage above the window-sills, it is divided into eight panels, the central one of which contains a figure of St John the Baptist and the remaining seven groups chiefly from the life of that saint. The pilasters dividing the several panels are enriched either with figures in niches or delicately-sculptured ornament in foliage. A low wall, pierced with a square-headed doorway and terminating in a pediment, connects the reredos with the compartment of the apse on either side of the central one. PERPIGNAN 125 There are several very sumptuous altar-pieces in chapels, all manifesting a strong Spanish feeling, of tlie Later Gothic and Early Renaissance schools. One in the apse on the eastern side of the north transept is a particularly remarkable specimen of carved and gUt work. It rises in three square-headed com- partments, of which the central one is highest and con- tains a full-length figure of St Peter holding in one hand a book, in the other the keys. Surmounting this are groups of the Epiphany and the Crucifijfion, which, as well as the three in the side compartments, are gilt, set off against a background of blue, and enclosed beneath delicately-carved canopy work. In the predella are six groups in miniature, representing incidents in the Passion of Our Lord, a Pieta and a Madonna. In the corresponding apse of the opposite transept is a smaller altar-piece of similar shape but less elaborate, a carved figure of the Blessed Virgin and Child occupy- ing the central compartment, and three tiers of paintings the one on either side. The altar-pieces in the ,9cyle of the Spanish Renaissance, with their wreathed and twisted columns rising to a great height and enclosing paintings, are in the north transept and in two of the chapels on the same side of the nave. For the period of its design and execution the monument of Louis de Montmor, the first French Bishop of Perpignan, who died at the age of fifty-one, 23rd January 1695, is one of the most pleasing works of its kind in the country; indeed, by those viewing it for the first time, and before reading the inscription engraved upon the slab, it might be taken for one of late mediaeval workmanship. A sarcophagus resting upon couchant lions supports the recumbent effigy of the prelate, who is vested in the ample cope and tall mitre in vogue during the seven- teenth century. The right hand lies across the breast, the left holds the pastoral staff, and the whole figure is one of dignity and calm repose. The embroidery on the morse and orphreys of the cope is particularly 126 SOUTHERN FRANCE remarkable for the delicacy with which it is wrought, and the sculptor has emancipated himself from the notion of a visible bed whereon to stretch the idealized form by substituting a carpet with a border of fringe into which he has thrown a naturalism that contrasts admirably with the stem character of the substructure. Nor is the contrast between the colours of the material employed less happy, white being used for the effigy and for the lions supporting the sarcophagus, which is of a very dark red with bevelled edges of black for the inscription. The organ almost entirely occupies the sixth bay of the nave on the north side, and is enclosed within a case which, notwithstanding some alterations that have been made in it of late years, is one of the largest and most interesting Gothic examples of that item of church furniture in France. The shutters, now removed, bear the date 1504, but the instrument and its case are in all probability older by some twenty years. In com- position and detail the organ in Perpignan Cathedral is quite Spanish. The cul de lampe, or gallery for the player, is about 16 feet from the pavement, and rises from a moulded stone base partly supported by and partly corbelled from a pier. The case itself, 45 feet high by 23 feet wide, projects but slightly into the nave, and is in five square-headed compartments, the outer one on either side being so high as to conceal the lower part of the groining ribs of the vault over the bay of the nave within which the organ is situated. The manner in which this part of the case has been fitted into the ribs of the groin is remarkable. These outer " towers " are entirely occupied by the 32-feet pipes, while the one adjacent on either side, which is somewhat lower, contains two ranks of pipes of medium size. The central compartment rises up into the wall between the arch and the vaulting and contains three tiers of pipes, some of which are but 4 feet high. Formerly the lowest of these three tiers exhibited the Spanish arrange- ment of two groups of pipes, one above the other, the PERPIGNAN 127 heads of the upper pipes being turned downwards. It is to be regretted that this disposition of pipes has been done away with and one rank of the ordinary kind substituted, since, with the exception of the great organ at Bois-le-Due, that in Perpignan Cathedral was the only one out of Spain that exhibited this arrangement. Behind these pipes were wooden panels painted with figure subjects, and formed by their disposition into one elliptical and two semi-elliptical compartments. The tracery designs framing the several flats aiid towers of pipes are Spanish, with a decidedly Mooresque feeling, as are those on the narrow sides of the case projecting from the piers, and on the front of the plajong gallery. Two enormous shutters were attached to the sides of the organ, and corresponding with the two halves of the case were intended, when closed, to cover in the whole of the front. The great weight of these valves must have prevented their frequent use for this purpose, hence their removal, which, aesthetically considered, is a matter of regret. Perpignan Cathedral is so enclosed by houses that no good general view of its exterior is obtainable. The chapels lining the nave are contained beneath a continuous lean-to roof; the clerestory with its eight circular windows is broken up into a corresponding number of low gables, and simflar gables terminate the walls of the sanctuary and the five-sided apse. The roof, being almost flat, is invisible, and were it not for these gables the sky-line of the church would appear very dull and heavy. At the south-west angle is a plain square tower crowned with a railing and one of those little open bell turrets of ironwork that constitute so charming a feature in the church architecture of Languedoc. Exigencies of space forbid me to give any length- ened description of the cathedrals and churches of two ci-devant episcopal cities passed on the line of railway between Perpignan and Montpellier — ^Narbonne and Beziers. 128 SOUTHERN FRANCE Both these sees were suppressed at the Revolution. The last Archbishop of Narbonne * was among the several prelates who emigrated to our shores in that bouleversement of ecclesiastical affairs which ensued upon the refusal of the majority of the French bishops and clergy to take the constitutional oath in 1790. We find him mentioned as assisting with the refugee bishops of Lombez, Montpellier and Rodez at a solemn Requiem, on i6th November 1799, at St Patrick's Roman Catholic Chapel, Soho, for Pope Pius VI., who had died in captivity at Valence on zgth August of that year. The title. Archbishop of Narbonne, is still, however, borne by the Archbishop of Toulouse. The choir of St Just at Narbonne is but a fragment of what, had it been completed on the same imposihg scale, would have ranked as one of the noblest churches raised in this part of the country during the second half of the thirteenth century. Rising to the stupen- dous height of 120 feet, this grand choir is designed in the northern method, and in imitation of the cathedirals of Clermont-Ferrand and Limoges, with very lofty arcades, triforium, clerestory and chapels opening both from the aisles and their prolongation round the apse. Less imposing in dimensions is St Paul Serge, one of the most interesting and instructive cruciform churches in Languedoc. The apsidal choir is in the First Pointed style, with five very shallow pentagonal chapels radiating from the ambulatory into which, as well as into the aisle on either side of the choir, the traceried openings in the triforium stage of the latter look. The arches opening to the apsidal chapels are surmounted by a triforium corresponding with the pseudo one on the opposite side. These arches have neither mullions nor tracery, and rise from short, thick piers cut through to afford a passage-way above the chapels. Windows of two tref oiled compartments and * Previous to the Revolution tiie Metropolitan of Narbonne had eleven suffragans — viz., at Agde, Alais, Alet, Beziers, Carcassonne, Lod^ve, Montpellier, Nimes, Perpignan, St Pons and Uzes. NARBONNE : ST. JUST FROM THE SOUTH NAHBONNB : INTERIOR OF ST. PAUL SERGE NARBONNE 129 a quatrefoil above light this thoroughfare, whose intro- duction naturally gives additional height to the aisles and ambulatory of the choir. Outside, the roof over this stage of the elevation is almost flat, and above it are seen the windows in the clerestory of the main apse, which has also a very low-pitched roof. There is a decidedly Spanish character about this east end of St Paul Serge at Narbonne, as may be gathered from the illustration, which gives a better idea of it than a page of laboured description.* In the interior view the three great bridge-like " strainer arches " thrown across the nave to correct some instability in the original work wiU be remarked. They certainly have the " novelty of the unexpected," and in spite of their heaviness are by no means unpicturesque elements in an interior which rather gains in dimensions by their presence. The west front of the commandingly-situated church of St Nazaire (formerly the cathedral) at Beziers is another of those curious unions of ecclesiastical and military architecture so frequently encountered in the south-western provinces, t The broad Late Middle Pointed nave is of two bays with clerestory, and chapels in lieu of aisles. The transepts are excellent First Pointed, and the aisleless choir, which terminates in an apse of nine sides lighted by lancet windows retaining much valuable early stained glass, illustrates the work of several periods, including the Romanesque. Though small, the church has an appearance of great size owing to the skilful grouping of its various parts. The tower stands in the angle formed by the north transept with the choir. Its ground storey is a vaulted chapel, opening, with the intervention of a short bay, into an apse; and quite distinct from this, but on the same side of the choir, is a square sacristy lighted * Ste p. 134. _+ At Agde.'Albi, Carcassonne, Esnandfis, Clermont-rH^rault, Lodfeve, Saintes Marie de la Mer, Narbonne and Rodez, are churches presenting a more or less fortified character. 130 SOUTHERN FRANCE by wiadows of two and three compartments with Curvilinear tracery and covered with a domical vault of extraordinary beauty. The manner m which the tower is ascended from the interior of the church by a staircase turret projecting boldly into the north transept is not the least remarkable of the many features of iaterest of a church which should on no account be left unvisited by those making a tour of the coast be- tween the Pyrenees and the Riviera. "Hie neighbouring city of Montpellier has been the seat of a bishop only since the first half of the sixteenth century. Originally established in the sixth century at Maguelonne,* about six miles distant, the see was removed in 757 to Substantion. Here it remained until 1037, when the chapter returned to Maguelonne, where it continued until its transference, by a bull of Pope Paul III. in 1536, to Montpellier. For his cathedral the bishop had assigned to him the church of a Benedictine monastery founded in 1364 by Urban V.,. but scarcely was the chapter installed in its new quarters than the religious wars broke out. During tills troublous period not only all the churches in the city but a very large portion of the cathedral were destroyed by the Huguenots, who were guilty of pro- fanations and barbarities, not only here but in all parts of the coimtry, which might well seem incredible, were they not unhappily attested by indisputable evidence, both from the perpetrators and the sufferers. On its establishment in 1536 the see of Montpellier was made suffragan to Narbonne. Suppressed in 1790, it was restored under the Concordat of 1801 as * The sole relic of this once-populous town is its fortress-like church, which, from its exposed situation, open to the attacks of Saracenic corsairs as well as Christian robbers, looks more like a baronial castle. Its west doorway, which shows a curious admixture of Classical, Saracenic and Gothic taste, and is dated 1178, consists of a Pointed arch of dark and light marble in alternate vertical courses, with a sculptured tym- panum, resting upon a richly-folii^ed frieze, making the actual doorway square-headed. On either side of the door, in the upper part of the walli is a semi-arched panel containing a bas-relief of St Peter and St Paul, with their respective emblems, the keys and the sword. MONTPELLIER 131 suffragan to Totdouse, but on the further redistribution of dioceses between 1817 and 1822 it was placed under Avignon. As an architectural monument Montpellier Cathedral is not very remarkable or attractive, though lofty and of ample dimensions, the only portion claiming anti- quity, the nave — ^which dates from the establishment of the Benedictine monastery in 1364 — ^being poor and coarse in detail. The eastern parts were rebuilt in 1775, but gave place, between 1856 and 1867, to the present very handsome transepts and choir, in the style transitional from First to Second Pointed. The central portion of the west front, which is flanked by a pair of somewhat prim-looking towers, terminating in open parapets and pinnacles, is occupied by a porch co-extensive in breadth and height. Like the highly-elaborated one on the south side of Albi Cathedral, this porch at MontpeUier assumes the form of a baldachino. Its three open arches, which are deficient in gables, subside at the rear into the wall of the fafade, and in front into two massive circular turrets crowned with conical pinnacles; but as this framework requires the accessories that render the " baldachin " at Albi one of the most beautiful works of its kind in existence, the Montpellier porch looks, in its unadorned condition, extremely gaunt and un- gainly. From this porch there is a descent of several steps- into the nave, which, if deficient in elaboration or refinement of detail, is imposing from its breadth well carried off by proportionate height. Six Pointed arches on attached shafts with thin capitals open, as at Beziers, Perpignan and Carcassonne, into as many oblong chapels, some of which are destitute of windows. Ample light is, however, afforded by the clerestory, whose windows of two uncusped divisions, supporting a quatrefoiled circle, rise from the string-course above the pier arches. All these windows contain modem stained glass, which would be much improved by the substitution of white for the too deeply tinctured 132 SOUTHERN FRANCE pattern-work above and below the equally heavily- coloured single figures. In the new transepts and choir the architect has reproduced the Northern variety of the style prevalent about the middle of the thirteenth century. Like most modem French work these additions are some- what hard and cold, but the general effect is fine from the grandeur of its dimensions. The transepts are the same width as the nave and choir, but, as they do not project beyond ihe chapels of the former, appear somewhat too short for their great breadth. Each is lighted by an enormous rose window filled with unusually fine modem stained glass, the group representing the Coronation of the Virgin in the centre of the southern rose being of especial beauty. Over the arch, between each transept and the choir aisle, is a window composed of two plain lancets with a trefoiled circle above, the same type of window being employed in the clerestory of the choir and the seven-sided aisleless apse. Much of the carved work is praiseworthy for its combined boldness and refinement, especially that in the capitals of the clustered columns of the three-bayed choir, which produce a very engaging effect when viewed en profile from the angle of either transept. Externally the extremities of the choir aisles are straight, but within their walls are hollowed out into apses of three sides, the central division being pierced with a lancet window. Besides the towers, , on either side of the west front, there is another and more gracefully-contoured pair in a corresponding position at the east end of the nave. In outline they recall the towers on either side of the gigantic choir of St Just at Narbonne, and built as they are over chapels which are oblong, necessarily take the same shape; and although of in- considerable height, form the most attractive objects in distant views of the cathedral. Hidden at the bottom of deep valleys in the moun- tainous northern part of Languedoc is the small city MENDE 133 of Mende, whose cathedral will be visited with interest from its association with its bishop, Durandus, author of the celebrated Rationale Divinomm Officiorum. When, in 1843, a translation of this work was put forth by two pioneers of the " Cambridge Camden Society," it was received with a burst of incredulity and contempt. That any, or, if any, such, symbolical principles should have influenced the minds and moulded the plans of mediaeval architects seemed utterly impossible. Durandus was ridiculed as an empty dreamer, and his translators something worse. It is, however, remark- able that this work, which may be considered the fountain-head of ecclesiastical symbolism, should con- tain so little evidence of the essentials in form and number which, in the clerical mind seventy years ago, constituted the chief grace of architectural design. But there are other difficulties in the way. An earnest Churchman who beHeves, with the late thirteenth- century Bishop of Mende, that " a church consisteth of four walls " because it is buUt on the doctrine of the Four Evangelists, cannot fairly complain that the plan of a Methodist chapel is too simple in form. Durandus points to the weathercock on the summit of a church as the appropriate symbol of a watchful preacher. The writer of an epigram in an early number of the Ecdesiologist calls it the symbol of a wavering mind,^ and applauds its removal to make room for a cross. According to Durandus, the chancel (that is the head of the church), being lower than its body, signifieth how great humility there should be in the clergy. It happens to be one of the peculiar points insisted on in the design of every orthodox modern church that the chancel shall be highef than the nave. These inconsistencies are merely mentioned here to show what little iniportance can be attached to the letter of symbolism when studied as a science. Yet into defence of this symbolism the Ecdesiologist earnestly entered, and, in accordance with its principles, fanatical devotees and over-zealous antiquaries, whose time 134 SOUTHERN FRANCE might have been better employed, proceeded to ransack every church and rack their brains with the hope of discovering some mysterious significance in structural or decorative features of wood and stone which owed their origin, in most cases, to simple expedience or ingenious fancy. That the outward and visible form of church architecture was in the Middle Ages influenced by theological creed there can be little doubt, but that this influence extended to every detail of construction and ornament — that it inspired the designers or work- men with anything more than an ordinary respect for the traditions of their craft, or that as a rule they allowed the principle of sjnnbolism to interfere witiEi more practical considerations — ^it is difficult to believe without rejecting the plainest evidence of common sense. Of the present cathedral at Mende no portion can be ascribed to Durandus's time, nor is any memorial of the author of the Rationale to be found within its walls.* An entire reconstruction was commenced in 1368 under the auspices of the then reigning Pope, Urban V., Guillaume de Grimoard, who, until his elevation to the chair of St Peter, six years previously, had been Bishop of Mende. Moreover, Urban was a native of the Gevaudan, the district of which Mende forms the centre, so that his interest in the work was a peculiar one.t Of the mattres d'oeuvre engaged from time to time in the reconstruction of the cathedral at Mende, the • Durandus died in 1296 in Rome, and was buried in the Dominican church of Sta Maria sopra Minerva. His recumbent portrait statue on a marble sarcophagus, guarded by two angels with outspread wings, under a canopy with a cusped arch, is one of the finest extant works by Joannes Cosmati, one of a family distinguished in successive generations. It was the Cosmati by whom were maintained, at Rome, the traditions of Gothic art — a style some suppose to have been first introduced into that city by the Florentine Arnulfo del Cambio, the contemporary of Deodatus and Giovanni Cosmati. + A statue of Urban V. has been erected in the square before the west front of the cathedral. MENDE 135 names of several have descended to posterity. At the outset the works appear to have been placed under the direction of Pierre Juglar, who, twelve years later, was associated with Guy de Dammartin in the erection of the graceful Sainte Chapelle attached to the modern Palais de Justice at Riom, in Auvergne; but the wars occasioned by that sanguinary and protracted struggle between the rival crowns of England and France, with their unvarying recital of provinces laid waste, towns ruined, and their monuments given up to the flames, were, in the Gevaudan district of Languedoc, as else- where, inimical to the arts of peace, and the works at Mende remained at a standstill until 1452, when they were resumed with some activity under Pons Caspar and Jean Davant (called Jean d' Auvergne). The church was completed in essentials in 1466, the towers and spires nearly half a century later. In the provinces north of the Loire we meet with instances of large parish churches designed without transepts, but, if we except the Complete Gothic portion of that at Nevers, no cathedral exhibits that peculiarity. South- ward, however, of that boundary we find several cathedrals in which the transept has been omitted, and among these is the small one of Mende,* which consists merely of a clerestoried nave and choir of uniform height, and without any visible distinction externally. The aisles, flanked by chapels, broken in the fifth bay of the nave on either side by a porch, co- extensive in depth, are continued round the apse, but only two chapels project from the ambulatory, these being at its. north and south angles. At the west end is a pair of well-proportioned towers with spires, and these, together with the clerestory, and, for the south, the unusually high-pitched and ridge-crested roof, confer an air of majesty upon a building of unassuming proportions. • The others are Aix en Provence, Albi, Bourges, Cahois, Grenoble, Moulins-sur-Allier, Pamiers, St Flour, and the ci-devant cathedrals at Bazas and Vienne. 136 SOUTHERN FRANCE The fa9ade between the towers is quadrangular, crested with a pierced parapet, behind which is seen the gabled end of the nave, and only relieved from absolute baldness by a shallow arch enclosing a rose window. The porch has one wide arch facing west and two narrow ones constructed obliquely so -as to occupy the whole breadth of the front. All this work is modem, old views of the front showing three square-headed windows and a lean-to porch of nondescript character. Like many in France the western towers of Mende Cathedral are unequal both in height aild elaboration of detail, but each rises two stages above the centre of the fa9ade. A studied simplicity is th& leading feature of the southern tower, skilfully relieved by the buttresses which project very boldly in an oblique direction from each angle except the north-eastern one. These but- tresses terminate in gables on a level with the para- pet, behind which rises a plain crocketed spire. In the angle formed by the south-eastern buttress with the eastern face of the tower a circular staircase turret, finishing in a crocketed pinnacle, is introduced with strikingly picturesque effect. There is a similar turret in the south-west angle of the far richer northern tower, the first stage of which above the centre of the fa9ade forms an open gallery defended by a parapet supporting the slender shafts of six obtuse-headed arches. The buttresses are also placed anglewise and terminate in pinnacled turrets, connected by flying buttresses with an octagonaJ lantern which supports a short crocketed spire. On the north and south sides of the nave and choir the walls between the chapels are carried up above their roofs in two stages of simple masonry, finishing in equally plain gables. From these vertical mtisses fljdng buttresses are thrown across the aisles to the walls of the clerestory, where the Avindows, including those of the apse, are of two lights with tracery of the Geometrical and Curvilinear forms combiaed. MENDE 137 Within, plain circular columns, devoid of capitals, and raised on rather tall bases of greater circumference, receive the mouldings of the nine Pointed arches on either side of the church, the five between the apse and the procession path, and the transverse arches and ribs of the vaulting to the aisles, which, as well as that over the nave, is of the ordinary quadripartite kind. This is remarkable in a fifteenth-century church like Mende, but, as I have had occasion to remark in former works, the Continental system of groining, especially that of France and Italy, was, as a rule, much simpler than with us, even in the latest and richest phases of the art. Of the nine bays into which the church is divided the three easternmost ones are occupied by the sanctuary and the chorus cantorutn, the latter, after the old basilican manner, being behind the altar, which stands between the seventh and eighth bays. The bishop's throne, with a stall on either side of it for his attend- ants, is placed within the central arch of the apse, the panel behind and the desk in front of it bearing reliefs of the Baptism of Our Lord and the Aimunciation respectively. Similar carvings enriching the subsellae, or lower range of stalls to the right and left of the throne, re- present various scenes from the hfe of Our Lord and the Blessed Virgin. Several of these subjects are re- peated on the subsellae fronts in the western part of the choir, where, together with representations of events in the life of a bishop, they are coloured and gilt, and apparently of earlier execution than the rest. Further specimens of this carved work, which from the natural- ism of its conception would appear to belong to the latter part of the seventeenth century, may be seen in a double row of stalls ranged along the walls of the second chapel (pn the north side of the nave. This chapel forms the baptistery, the font being a basin of red marble from within which rises a graceful urn of grey marble terminating in a ball and cross. Con- 138 SOUTHERN FRANCE tiguous to the altar in most of the side chapels is a long trefoUed niche provided at the foot with a shallow basin and drain for canying off the rinsings of the chalice at the conclusion of Mass, and divided at mid height by a shelf for the reception of the sacred vessels prior to their presentation on the altar. Thus these niches serve the double purpose of a piscina and credence. There is no ancient stained glass, but the clerestory windows in the eastern part of the nave, in the choir and the apse, have received very fair modem work, representing full-length figures of saints, under canopies, white being judiciously employed in the architectural accessories. In the central window of the apse is the Coronation of the Virgin within a cusped arch sur- mounted by tabernacle work, the remaining windows of the nave clerestory being filled with quiet pattern- work en grisaille, well balanced by colour in the borders. One of the few Gothic churches of importance in the neighbouring district of Auvergne is the Cathedral of St Flour, which, on account of the resemblance it bears, both in plan and style, to that of Mende, may be briefly described here. The bishopric of St Flour is not of remote antiquity, being one of several created in various parts of France, in 1J17, by a bull of Pope John XXII. A collegiate church had been in existence on the same site since the ninth century, and in this church the episcopal chair was placed, but a century and a half later it was deter- mined to rebuild this structure on a scale more worthy of the dignity to which it had been raised. The simUajrity that exists between the cathedrals of Mende and St Flour may be accounted for by the fact that the architect of the latter was commissioned, in 1466, to draw up a report on the works then approach- ing completion at Mende. Whether the old collegiate church of St Flour had no transepts, and that in re- building it the architect adhered to the original plan, ST FLOUR 139 or whether the site at his command was insufficient for their introduction without unduly robbing the nave and choir of theit proper dimensions, I am not pre- pared to say; but that he seems to have been impressed with the plan and style of Mende Cathedral there can be no doubt. This is noticeable in the studied sim- plicity of all the details, in the capless columns, in the plain wall-space which intervenes between the pier arches and the clerestory throughout the church, and in the location of the chorus cantorum behind the high altar. There are, however, some points of dissimilarity between the two cathedrals. At St Flour the apse has only three sides, the nave and choir are rtiuch narrower than at Mende, and the eight bays of which they are together composed axe subdivided into four by the vaidting compartments; hence the groining is necessarily sexpartite, or divided into six cells. The piers, too, are angular, and there are double aisles on either side of the nave which, excluding those covered by the pair of western towers, has five bays. In the remaining three, which compose the sanctuary and chorus cantorum, the outer aisles are divided into chapels, and three polygonal chapels are grouped round the procession path. The groining of these three chapels is very good, the ribs, which meet in a star- shaped boss with curved sides and fleur-de-lys at the points, springing from cylindrical and angular shafts with capitals. Each chapel has three windows of two lights with mixed Geometrical and flowing tracery, and all are filled with passable modem stained glass illus- trating, in the centre chapel, events in the life of St Flour — the first Bishop of Loddve, who brought the Gospel to the Auvergne and died towards the close of the fourth century; and in the side ones the principal incidents in the lives of St John the Baptist and St Peter. Raised upon a plinth two steps above the floor in the last chapel on the south side of the choir is a very 140 SOUTHERN FRANCE beautiful piece of sculpture representing Our Lord Isdng in the tomb, from the chisel of Faugenet. In the wall behind this effigy is a Pointed arch, flanked by pinnacled buttresses and crested with a richly-crocketed hood-moulding of ogee form. The space enclosed by this arch is divided into one triangular and two oblong panels, all filled with sculpture illustrating the Last Judgment. In the topmost, or triangular panel formed by the head of the arch, Our Lord is seated with the orb in His left hand and the right raised in blessing. On either side of Him is an angel, kneeling and offering a crown. In the central compartment are angels bringing souls to Christ in the shape of diminutive figures, three of which are held in the folds of His robe. In the lowest compartment figures are being conducted in one direc- tion to Paradise, and in another driven bound together to the place of Eternal Punishment, represented by a cauldron which flames are licking. There is little on the exterior of St Flour Cathedral calling for remark beyond its unbroken line of roof and somewhat ungainly pair of western towers. These are co-extensive in breadth with the double aisles and are of such a size as to quite overpower the narrow central portion of the fagade. The two upper storeys of these towers, destroyed in 1596 and only rebuUt during the last century in a very meagre style, with poor coupled lancet windows in their belfry stages, parapets, and thin angle pinnacles, are rather painfully suggestive of the work which passed for very satis- factory Gothic in England eighty years ago. PROVENCE ARLES : AVIGNON : AIX Travellers who confine their architectural studies exclusively to the very interesting province of Nor- mandy form but an inadequate notion of the general spirit and character of the church architecture of France. The same may perhaps be said of any other province, for, as I have already pointed out, it is reason- able to suppose that over so extensive a surface as that of the French territory there must prevail numerous and strongly-marked local varieties. This is the case in the comparatively small area of England — every comity has its own pecuhar architectural features, and it would be necessary to examine buildings in several before a fair idea of the English mediaeval style in general could be formed. The remark, however, applies with still greater force to Normandy, for this province and Brittany are in a manner insulated from the rest of France. They present a kind of link between English and French architecture and furnish examples partaking much more of the former than the latter. For instance, the Romanesque of Normandy is very different from that of the southern and eastern parts of France. Not- withstanding the later introduction, of the Pointed arch, it exhibits (in common with our own) a Transitional tendency at a much earlier period. The Norman architect seems always to have fixed his eye upon some future development. He threw out his design, simple, and frequently even naked, in point of ornament, and not seldom careless in actual workmanship, but elabo- rate in construction, and carefully arranged in its pro- portions, as matter for a succeeding generation to work upon. It may be that he had some prescience of the 141 142 SOUTHERN FRANCE speedy demolition of his work, that it might make way for improvements, suggested as it were by itself, and was willing to bestow his time, thought and labour rather upon an idea that would not only last, but grow and ripen into excellence, than upon a mere fabric likely to be swept away in the course of a century. Now the southern architect was content with his style as it existed. He neither looked for, nor wished for, any further development. He gave up his atten- tion altogether to refining and adorning it. It may be questioned whether the richest buildings in Provence and Burgundy of the middle of the twelfth century show the slightest advance towards Gothic beyond those of the tenth and eleventh — even the constant use of the Pointed arch, the introduction of which in the north almost instantaneously formed the style, proves by its inefficiency, in giving the impulse, that the principle either did not exist, or was very stagnant. But if such a thing as a pure, beautiful and correct round-arched style lies within the bounds of possibility we can nowhere better look for its elements than in the southern provinces of France, where from the neigh- bourhood of Graeco-Roman antiquities* the buildings of the eleventh and twelfth centuries partake much of their character, whether from imitation or from the actual use of old fragments. For instance, in the portals of St Trophime at Aries, Ste Marthe at Tarascon, St GiUes (about 15 miles south of Ntmes), the cathedral at Avignon, and in the octa- gonal baptistery of that at Aix, we meet with speci- mens worked alniost with the classical delicacy of the Itahan style. The shafts and pilasters, in some cases with even the classical fluting, have often nearly a pure Corinthian capital; indeed, the heavy cushion * The ttiumphal arches at Orange and Carpentras ; the amphitheatres at Aries and Ntmes; the Maison carrit at Ntmes, one of the most elegant Corinthian temples of the Roman world, owing probably a great deal of its beauty to the taste of a colony of Greeks long settled in the neighboiir- hood ; and the equally graceful and, in many respects, similar temple of Jupiter and Livia at Vienne. PROVENCE 143 capital, so usual in Northern Romanesque work, is scarcely to be found south of the Loire. However the earliest Romanesque may have originated in barbarisms and unskilful imitations of Roman archi- tecture, the Late Romanesque, where, it showed an incliaation to imitate, was the very reverse of barbarous. We remark this, not only in the Rhone-side cities af Provence, but in those lying for a considerable distance along the courses of the Sa6ne and its tributaries, where the existence of Roman remains has influenced the architecture of the twelfth century in Burgundy, as for example in the apse of Lyons Cathedral, in the fine cruciform church at Beaune, and above all in the interior of the cathedral at Autun. Here the fluted pilasters to the nave arcades and the acanthus-leafed capitals in the triforium, evidently adopted from classical models, may be easily compared with those in the Roman Porte d'Arroux, and the comparison will not be disadvantageous to the later work. Similar classicisms exist in the more distant cathedral of Langres, which, as regards its nave, may be considered the offspring Of Autun, and we know from drawings that they formed a very prominent feature in destroyed Cluny. The date of this conscious revival of Classic form cannot be determined with certainty, but the earliest example of it is probably the western porch of the cathedral at Avignon, which the best antiquaries con- cur in assigning to the last decade of the eleventh century, i.e., about the time of the First Crusade. This porch is almost a reproduction of the Roman triumphal arch at the neighbouring town of Carpentras, with variations showing Byzantine influences. In Provence we find a predilection for antique forms but a monotonous sameness of plans. In Burgundy the ground-plans are richer, the construction and oimamentation variegated; sometimes groups of steeples interrupt the architectural lines of the exterior, whilst the interiors are provided with more hght, and 144 SOUTHERN FRANCE the arraxigement is marked by greater Teutonic freedom and broader general dimensions. To judge from such typical Provencal examples as Notre Dame des Doms (the cathedral) at Avignon, the nave and transepts of St Trophime at Aries, and the south aisle (f orinerly the nave) of the cathedral at Aix; the Romanesque of the period which witnessed the construction of these churches must have been of a very plain character. A semicircular apse, without d6ambulatoire or chapels, invariably terminated these churches eastward. The piers are plain and square, with thin, simply- moulded capitals ; the arches are plain and semicircular, with, between them, corbels supporting shafts with angle colonnettes from which spring the transverse arches dividing the barrel-shaped roof into bays. Sometimes, as at Aries, there are a clerestory and very harrow aisles with " ramped " or half-barrel shaped vaults ; but at Aix and Avignon there do not appear to have been any aisles at all, consequently the interiors must have been very gloomy. Such is the character of the interior of Avignon Cathedral, despite the additions made to its original nucleus at different times. Here a wide north aisle, apsidally terminated, was added on the north-eastern side before the disappearance of the Romanesque, and prolonged, or else rebuilt, in a westemly direction in Late Gothic times. Then two chapels, also in Late Gothic, and roofed transversely to the axis of the nave and its north aisle, were added. On the opposite side, chapels, some in Late Gothic, others in the Renaissance taste, were built, and increased accommodation being a desideratum, round arches supporting a gallery were raised in front of the original nave arcades, and returned across the west end of the church. At Aix, the old Proven9al Romanesque nave, with its octagonal baptistery adjoining it on the south, were suffered to remain when, in the fourteenth century, a new nave, choir and north aisle were built, the former ARLES 145 opening out of the old nave from the north. The choir, which, like the nave, has no clerestory, finishes in an aisleless apse; the aisle, corresponding in height with the nave, has been spoilt by pseudo-ItaUan interpola- tions, but the general effect is imposing. At Aries the original choir has disappeared and given place to a Middle Pointed one of somewhat insipid character, with low arches whose mouldings are carried down uninterruptedly to the bases of the columns, a three-sided apse, clerestoried like the choir, and with a procession path and radiating chapels. Classical influences may be traced in the tastefully- treated ornamentation of the large and noble cloisters attached to this church, and in its western portal. In the latter, constructed towards the end of the twelfth century, the lines strive upwards. It is com- posed of a round-arched centre surmounted by a gable, and short quadrangular wings, the mass giving some- what the idea of a stone triptych. In the wings are detached columns of the most graceful proportions crowned with Corinthianesque capitals.* Some of these columns are fluted, and they support an archi- trave ; their dimensions are well proportioned and their capitals show signs of a correct study of the antique. The bases represent hons and other animals, as was usual with the aesthetically untrained artists of the Middle Ages in the south of Europe. The interior of the central arch of the portal and the architraves of the wings are perhaps somewhat overloaded with sculpture, which represents the Last Judgment. Sculptured in high relief, a calm, grand figure of Our Lord, seated within a yesica, occupies the tympanum above the double doorway. The right hand is raised, while the left holds a book which rests upon the knee. Bold and spirited carvings of the Evangelistic symbols occupy the spaces formed by the * The same type of colqma is emplojed in the marvellously beautiful triple portals of the church at St Gilles, K 146 SOUTHERN FRANCE vesica with the arch, the archivolts of which are enriched with two rows of ministering angels, culminating under the keystone in a figure of St Michael, from which the two balances have disappeared. Withia the architraves of the quadrangular wings, and continued along the sides and back of the porch, is a multitude of small, closely-set figures. Those im- mediately above the two square-headed doorways, and therefore beneath the feet of " The Majesty," are seated and represent the Twelve Apostles, but these figures have no distinguishing symbols. They are flanked on either hand by another figure, also seated, that to the left, as the spectator faces the porch, being intended for Abraham receiving the elect into his lap. In the frieze corresponding to that over the doors we have, on the left-hand wing of the composition, the elect, headed by two bishops, the women following the men; while in that lining the interior of the pordi is the usual repre- sentation of souls being weighed in a balance, those found wanting being carried off by a demon. In the frieze over the right-hand wing are seen the damned bound by a chain and walking amid flames, conducted by a demon, to the place of eternal punishment. The corresponding portion of frieze within the porch is occupied by figures advancing towards those of the apostles, whereas those on the returned frieze are re- presented as retreating. Between the columns sup- porting these friezes, and within the porch on either side, are full-length figures of the evangelists and saints of the early Church ; one of the latter, vested as a bishop, being probably intended for St Trophime himseu. These effigies stand within oblong panels, framed and crowned with delicate arabesques and minutely-sculp- tured groups, the latter composing a frieze subsidiary to that upper one whose closely-set figures impart a curiously i4ss5n:ian character to the work viewed en masse. In fact, that distinguished architect, Viollet- le-Duc, pronounces this porch at Aries " d'une diaractfere Romano-grecque-syriac," as regards its architecture, SOME PROVENQAL CHURCHES 147 and the sculpture " Gallo-romaine avec une influence Byzantine prononcde." In general treatment the sculpture may be said to take up ground intermediate between the conventional, ' elongated and emaciated Byzantine ones of half a century earUer (as exemplified in the western portals of Chartres and Angers, the lateral ones at Bourges, and in much of the plastic art of Poitou and Aquitaine) and the matured work seen at Amiens, Paris and Rheims. Grouping, symmetry and life-like proportions were beginning to be cultivated in these figures at Aries, their distinguishing features being a greater variety, airiness and geniality. They are shorter and much better proportioned, and more correct in their ana- tomical details; while in the " Majesty " of the tym- panum the flat niello treatment has given way to an alto-relievo of greater power and excellence. In the Provengal style the more decorated parts are separated or framed in by suitable and strong archi- tectural lines. In Aquitaine, on the contrary, the whole fa9ade is generally crowded with mystic figures. By means of arcades these form horizontal lines in niches or medallions and surround the protruding porches, window-frames and archivolts. The human figures have to accommodate themselves to the narrow spaces in which they are thrust, as may be seen in the fagade of Notre Dame la Grande at Poitiers. In the foregoing instances the deviation from a pure Romanesque has been rather towards the Classical than the Gothic. In the next we consider, namely, the cathedral of Valence, upon the Rhone, an older church probably than any yet named, the Gothic principle shows itself, though not very prominently. The shafts attached to the nave piers are of great height compared with their diameter; were it not for this a purer model for an interior could hardly be found. The piers of the nave are rectangular, and have on the sides facing the nave a shaft with a delicate Corinthian capital and square abacus supporting a plain vaulting-arch, while 148 SOUTHERN FRANCE the semicircular arches dividing the nave from its aisles rest on similar shafts but of less height.* The roof of the nave is a cylindrical barrel-vaulted one, and there is neither triforium nor clerestory. The compartment over the junction of the transepts with the nave and choir has a domical vault ; the apse semi-domical with- out ribs. The latter has a procession path. On the outer wall of the nave, above the aisle roof, runs a course of small arches, alternately round and triangular, like those we find in the transept fronts in the interiors of numerous Auvergnat churches. These may be taken to be mere fancies of the builder, no way tending to the formation or development of a style: whether they be marks of antiquity, as denoting a period when the architect was less closely bound to the observance of certain general rules, is another question. A church that perhaps approaches nearest of any to a puie Romanesque in Provence is that of St Martin d'Ainay, in the south-eastern quarter of Lyons. Part' of this is considered to be of high antiquity — as early as the time of Charlemagne ; and though some modern additions have been made they do not seem to have interfered much with the original building. The piers of the nave are Corinthian columns of low proportions, having the capitals, which are not very elaborately carved, somewhat stunted, and crowned with a thin square abacus. The arches, like those at Valence, are semicircular, with plain archivolt. The columns supporting the, square central lantern, though of the same altitude as the others, are of greater girth, the four being made of two colmnns which belonged to an ancient temple; these are of granite. As the vaulting of the nave is cylindrical, and its spring is considerably above the crown of the pier-arches, a space of wall remains between the transverse arch of the * A very accurate representation of two piers with the intermediate, or vaulting arch, in the nave of Valence Cathedral, will be found in the fifth plate of Professor Willis' Remarks on the Architecture of the Middle Affes ilS3i). SOME PROVENQAL CHURCHES 149 lantern and the roof; this is pierced with an unglazed window of two round-headed compartments divided by a shaft. The east end is apsidal. The roof of the aisles is cylindrical, slightly broken by the windows. The central tower h'as a fine massive appearance ex- ternally; each side has two pairs of round-headed arches, with shafts doubled in the direction of the thickness of the wall. An engaged western tower rises hi^er than the central one, but is less massive; it has also round-headed windows^ a low, quadrangular, pyramidal spire, and at each angle one of those curious pinnacles which may be described as taking the form of an equilateral triangle, half of which is on one side of the tower and half on the other. Such pinnacles are very common on the towers of the churches lining the route from Chambery to Turin, and with the tall jdain spire constitute one of the leading characteristics in the ecclesiology of Piedmont. Speaking generally it is safe to say that Pointed Gothic architecture was never brought to the highest perfection in Soiith-Eastern France. Its people were too wedded to Classic traditions to excel in an art which seems to have required for its perfection no sort of looking back to such a past. Hence there is but little work of the period comprised between the thirteenth and the sixteenth centuries for which it is possible to feel the same admiration and enthusiasm as must he felt by every artist in presence of the great works of the north. Space, however, must be iound for a few notes on some of the choicer examples. A fine specimen of the Transition period is the lower part of the nave of the transeptless ciurch of St Maurice (formerly the cathedral) at Vienne. Here Pointed arches with plain archivolts are carried upon tall attached shafts, fluted, and, crowned with Corinthian- esque capitals, reminiscent of those which surround the well-preserved temple of Jupiter and Livia in the same city. As is frequently the case with churches in 150 SOUTHERN FRANCE this part of France, the apse has no deambulatoire, but is divided into three storeys corresponding with the arcades, triforium and clerestory of the nave. In the ground storey of this five-sided apse at Vienne are deeply-moulded lancet windows surmounted by a blind triforium of four lancet arcades to each side of the apse, and above that a clerestory lighted by windows composed of two plain lancets over which is a quatre- foiled circle.* The whole treatment of this part of the church is distinctly Burgundian, featuring as it does very strongly the aisleless apses at Chalon-sur-Saone and Notre Dame Dijon. The aisles and clerestory of the nave afford admirable studies of developed window tracery, mostly Geometrical, while the western fa9ade, with its flanking towers so grandly situated at the summit of steps a short distance from the banks of the Rhone, still pre- serves much of its Curvilinear beauty in the triple portals, the seven-light window and other details. A feature wanting in many of the large churches built in Provence during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is the triforium, and where the arcades opening into the aisles are low a bare expanse of waU intervenes between them and the clerestory. This is especially noticeable in the several very imposing churches still used for divine worship in Avignon, one of which is St Pierre, so remarkable for its quadrangular west front. Flanked by octagonal turrets, divided into five tiers of oblong panels, some of which are relieved with carving and crowned with crocketed pinnacles, this fa9ade comprises two stages. The lower one is entirely occu- pied by a doorway flanked by tabernacle work and enclosing two smaller obtuse-headed doorways, each surmounted by a gable with crockets on its convex sides. Between these doorways, whose valves are admirable examples of Early Renaissance wood-carviag, is a beautifully-moulded pedestal, angular, and sup- * See illustration, p. 198. SOME PROVENCAL CHURCHES ^51 porting a tabernacle in front of which is a naturalis- tically-treated statue of the Virgin and Child. The expanse of wall within the tympanum of the containing arch is devoid of sculpture or tracery, so that it has rather a bald appearance, but the outermost order of the arch itself has a rich ogee-shaped gable prolonged in the form of a very exaggerated finial into the upper storey of the front until it reaches the top of the graceful, and also ogee-hooded, two-light window on either side of it. The wall surface here is further relieved by slender pinnacled buttresses; two of these rise from the tabernacle work on either side of the doorway, until they are stopped by the delicately-moulded horizontal parapet crowning the work, which is grand from its massiveness and fine proportions, and pleasing from the judgment with which ornamentation has been dis- tributed over its surface.* Other works of the fourteenth and two succeeding centuries in the style practised by the Provencal archi- tects most deserving of mention are the additions to the old nave of the cathedral at Aix, including its superb Flamboyant west front and flanking north-western tower, square, and supporting a somewhat poorly- detailed octagon, whose contour recalls that of the beffroi at Bruges; the square-ended church of St Jean de Malte in the same city; and Ste Marthe at Tarascon, where the capitals of the columns may furnish the student with suggestions to be acted upon according to a variety of contingencies. The square tower, usually gabled on each side and supporting an octagon and a crocketed spire, is one of the leading characteristics of Late Provencal Gothic. Such steeples are attached to the churches of St Pierre, St Didier, and a very noble but, alas ! desecrated church in the rear of the post-office at Avignon; to Ste Marthe * There is a very similar fa9ade to the neighbouring church at Carpentras, a few miles to the east of Avignon ; indeed, the likeness between the two structures would lead us to pronounce them to be works from the same hand, and that a Breton. 152 SOUTHERN FRANCE at Tarascon ; to St Paul at Beaucaire on the opposite side of the Rhone ; and to St Jean de Malte at Aix. It may be observed of these churches that their exteriors are as a rule plain; and to support the span of their vaults an unbroken wall extending over the aisles is frequently used where we expect to see flying buttresses. The buttresses at the angles of the apse, •syhich is almost invariably without the circumscribing aisle, are often very deep, and almost without set-offs; this is particularly noticeable in the east end of the desecrated church just alluded to at Avignon, where the tracery of the long three and six light windows exhibits considerable beauty and delicacy. AUVERGNE LE PUY EN VELAY: CLERMONT-FERRAND This book makes no pretensions to a history of archi- tectural art in France, but, as I remarked at the outset, it is impossible in traversing that country not to be struck with the varying styles of architecture in the several provinces and districts of those provinces into which it was anciently divided. In these provincial locahsms we may read the habits and almost discern the thoughts of mankind at certain periods, whilst, independently of the information thus conveyed by their plans and arrangements, there is, even in these noble buildings, whether Romanesque or Pointed, enough of artistic beauty to create a high interest in the mind of the student. Indeed) the history of church architecture in France is so closely bound up with the progress of civilization and the general history of the country that it is impossible to understand the one without some knowledge of the other. Every one of the ancient French provinces developed by degrees its own architecture, and of all the local forms of Romanesque which arose in the latter half of the eleventh century none has a more distinct character of its own than that which prevails in Auvergne, with its centre at Clermont-Ferrand. This region, once occupied by the dukedoms of Bourbon and Auvetgne, and by several smaller iade- pendent states, is now cbmprised in the departments of Allier, Cantal, Correze, Creuse, Haute-Loire, Loire and Puy-de-Dome. It is the home of the curious and beautiful variety of Romanesque designs which includes colour in external effect and which is represented on 153 154 SOUTHERN FRANCE the most imposing scale by a group of churches, all of them easily accessible from Clermont-Ferrand, their geographical centre. To its north are Riom, Volvic, Menat, Manzac and Ennezat; to the east, Chauriat; to the west, Royat and Orcival; and to the south, St Nectaire, St Satumin, Issoire, Brioude, and the marvel- lous cathedral of Le Puy en Velay. The influence of the Auvergnat school of Romanesque extended itself into the Bourbonnais and the Nivemais, where, unit- ing with the school of Burgundy, we find striking examples in St Etienne at Nevers, in the nave of the abbey at Souvigny and the church of St Menoux, both of which are accessible from Moulins-sur-AUier. In the same department of AUier are the churches of Chatel- Montagne and EbreuU, the latter remarkable for its fafade in the form of a western tower of oblong section, nearly as wide as the whole three-aisled church, and opened below into a vaulted porch. BeauUeu, in Corr^ze, and the Priory Church at Charlieu, in Loire, are buildings of the utmost importance for their early twelfth-century sculpture, in the richness and variety of which the churches of the Auvergnat rival the great buildings of Poitou, with whose architecture that of Auver^e combines. Its influence likewise extended to the south, where among numerous specimens we have such churches of almost precisely the same design and construction in St Sernin at Toulouse, and the Abbey Church at Conques. The Auvergnat school of Romanesque then was one with a distinct and marked tradition of its own, and as important a family in the Romanesque era as that of Cologne, Normandy, Pisa and Lombarcfy, and a typical Auvergnat church has a character of its own which it is impossible to mistake. It must be remembered that the end of the eleventh and commencement of the twelfth century were re- markable epochs in France. The Council of Clermont had been the centre of the Crusade movement. A most important agitation, that of Communal emancipation, AUVERGNE i55 was permeating the country. Creeping secret Mani- chseism, under such leaders as Clement, Peter and Henry, was making an effort in all directions. Christian art was called into play by the increase of population and rapid rise of new religious Orders; and at the same time the papal visits to France gave an especial bias to church building. Thus, in 1095, we find Pope Urban II. dedicating the cathedral of Valence; visit- ing Le Puy, Chaise-Dieu, Tarascon, Saint-Gilles and Avignon. He assisted, at the beginning of November, at that celebrated Council of Clermont which may be said to have lighted the spark of the Crusades in Europe, the train having been laid by Peter the Hermit ; at the beginning of December he consecrated a church at Saint Flour; 31st December, consecrated St Martial at Limoges; 27th January, of the following year, that of Montiemeuf in Poitiers; loth February, that of St Nicholas at Angers; 9th March, that of Marmoutier; ist May, the cathedral of Bordeaux ; 24th May, St Semin at Toulouse. This may show the fervour of church- Building which then possessed France; and the journey of Pascal II. thither a few years later gives proofs of the same thing.* Before proceeding to analyse any Auvergnat Romanesque churches I may draw attention to the material used in their construction. Most of my travelled readers must have noticed how much the style and character of ecclesiastical work depends on its materials. The ironstone of North- amptonshire; the red sandstone of the Western Mid- lands and the flint of East Anglia; the granite of the Limousin; the red brick of Languedoc, Lom- bardy, the Netherlands, Pomerania, Denmark and parts of Bavaria, all had a vast influence upon the architecture of these districts. In Auvergne the visitor makes his first acquaintance with the dark lava of Volvic, an admirable stone in * As e.g. that noble Romanesqne fragment the church at Charit^-sur- Loiie in the department of Nievre. 156 SOUTHERN FRANCE everything but c'olour for ecclesiastical purposes. Its tone is, generally speaking, dark slate, with the slightest possible tinge of green; and it has the unpleasant quality of coming off when rubbed. By employing different kinds of lava a natural polychrome is produced, which is very pleasing; and this more especially in the heads of the Romanesque windows, and in checkwork introduced in the spandrels between them. The coloured materials are used in two ways. Some- times the whole of the wall is built of the dark volcanic products, and patterns are obtained by the occasional use of white stone or by alternate courses of this and the darkest scoriae that can be found. Or else the walls generally are built of stone and the patterns only formed with the dark material. Here, too, as is the case in all old exairiples of coloured constructions with which I have ever met, the colours follow the natural course of the construction. In the cathedral at Le Puy, for instance, the courses are alternately light and dark, producing bold horizontal bands of colour. The arch stones are continued generally in one line of colour all across an arch, even when it consists of several orders; and from the arch on into the wall. The bands of ornament are mostly arranged in horizontal stripes, generally placed where they will dignify and give value to some very prominent architectural member. They never occur below the line of the springing of an arcade, and are richest under cornices and between the corbels. And when we consider the date at which this inlaid work was executed, and compare it with what we know of our own art at the same period, or indeed with that of other parts of France, we cannot too highly extol its delicacy and grace, and its carefulness of design and execution. So far as I have spen, this constructioilal polychrome which distinguishes the exteriors of the churches throughout this volcanic district was never, save in Le Puy Cathedral, admitted into the interior. This is much to be regretted, because it seems that AUVERGNE 157 the plain barred vaults of their naves, the domes of their crossings, and the ribless semi-domes of their apses, would have afforded splendid fields for this kind of decoration. There can be no doubt that the walls of these Auvergnat Romanesque churches were once covered with painting, and as long as this existed a mosaic of black and white and dull red would have been valueless; but now that the iconoclast, the whitewasher (badig^nist) and the " restorer " — all of them at least as busy in France as they have ever been in England-— have done their worst, the want of some decoration on the otherwise bald surface of the vaults is desirable, though I should dread to see it carried to such an extent as it has been, for instance, at Issoire, where the colourist has left hardly a decorative feature free from paint and gilding for the eye to rest upon. Generally speaking, an Auvergnat church is cruci- form, the transepts having just sufficient depth to give expression to the exterior, and to separate the nave from the choir, which are beautifully proportioned to one another. The choir is short, and terminates in a semi- circular apse, surrounded by a procession path with, as a rule, an even number of chapels opening from it, a peculiarity which I have observed in the Poictevin churches ; and there is frequently an apse on the eastern side of either transept, but the church is never, or very rarely, transverse triapsidal. At Issoire a square central chapel is inserted in the middle of the circum- scribing aisle between the two more easternly semi- circular ones. Under the choir is sometimes a crypt, in which, in addition to the columns under the columns of the apse, are four shafts, which were intended for the support of the altar, and whose presence seems to suggest that it must have been a baldachin and not merely an altar that they were designed to support. The entrances to these crypts are by stairs from the transepts in most instances, but at Notre Dame, Clermont-Ferrand, they are at the east end of the nave. At the intersection of the four arms of the cross there 158 SOUTHERN FRANCE is a tower, whose means of support is one of the prin- cipal distinguishing features of the Auvergnat school. Although it is central, in the first stage it is three or four times the dimensions from north to south that it is from east to west, forming rather a huge upper transept than a tower. Hence, as it projects so far into each of the transepts, a single transept arch would not be sufficient, and consequently there are two — that which we should usually call the transept arch, and a second, usually about the third part of the distance from this to the end of the transept itself. From this oblong mass rises the tower, which is almost invariably octagonal, in two or more stages of open arcades. Sometimes the octagon is shafted at the angles and capped with a stone spire sloping at an angle of about 60°. The central steeples of Issoire and Notre Dame at Clermont-Ferrand are modem, the latter, until the fifties of the last century, having been a bulbous-slated erection with an open lantern at the top. Ancient examples, more or less perfect, still exist at St Satumin, Ennezat, Orcival, St Nectaire and Huret, and all of these are octagonal. In the chapter on the architecture of the Auvergne, Mr Fergusson-, in his Handbook of Architecture, praises the elongated mass of masonry supporting the church towers of that district, " the want of which," he says, " is painfully felt in most of our own central spires " (towers, I presume, the professor means), " all of which need something more than the central roof out of which they seem to grow." But those who have in mind the stately manner in which such central towers as Norwich and Lincoln, Coutances and Rouen, rise from huge piers, in a perfectly legitimate manner, at the junction of four steeply-pitched roofs, will hardly concur with the professor in this opinion. Interiorly, it must be owned, this very singular Auvergnat feature is much better than exteriorly, as it not only increases the effect of height, but further supplies a new pair of lofty arches, at the jimction of the A^ti 'H. w\ AUVERGNE 159 transept with the aisle wall, to increase the complication of grouping, and of arches crossing one another, some measure of which is necessarily found in every cruciform church. If the central octagon of an Auvergnat church has a base of its own to rise from, the square tower at the west end has something of the same kind. It commonly rises from between a pair of huge shoulders forming outside what one might call a western transept, and which has a character more analogous to the western transept of a Rhenish Romanesque church than to that of Ely. The lower stages have a tendency to take the shape of something like a narthex, which, opening into the nave by one or more arches, constitutes a very striking feature. And it is curious that this narthex not infrequently has the air of being the oldest part of the church; at least it often contains capitals which may well be older than any of their fellows. This narthex again, as forming part of the tower, has other stages above it opening into the church, some- times by wide arches like the German triforium galleries (Mannerchore), sometimes by coupled windows. In- deed, most of the Auvergnat peculiarities have, like this of the western tower and transept, a tendency to affect inside and outside at once. Viewing one of these churches from without for the first time, we are tempted to fancy that, Angevin-like, it had no aisles, but when we get inside we shall be able to solve the problem. Now the Romanesque architects of the Auvergne, like their neighbours of Provence and other southern dis- tricts of France, where, for a very considerable portion of the year, the hot sun drives the worshipper to seek speluncar shade, covered their churches with stone roofs of that barrel form which did not adapt itself to the clerestory, like the domical quadripartite vault of the north. So, for the admission of light into the upper parts of the church, a gallery, of the width of the aisles below, with its windows placed in the outer wall above those of the aisle, was built. This gallery is not i6o SOUTHERN FRANCE so lofty as our Norman triforia at Ely, Norwich and Peterborough, or as those of the Transition period in the north-east of France and the Rhine provinces, but vaulted, and sufficiently high for congregational pur- poses if required. Inside one hardly knows whether to call it a tri- forium without a clerestory or a clerestory without a triforium. Such an upper range of windows over the aisle windows is common in the triforia of the churches above alluded to ; but then there is the clerestory rising again behind and above all. Here there is no other clerestory; the wall with its two rows of arcades and windows is the full height of the church. The staircases to these galleries over the aisles of an Auvergnat church are variously placed. At Notre Dame du Port they are in the middle of the north end of the aisles; at Brioude, in the transepts, and also at the west end; and in this church an enormous wooden stair leads from the south door up to the chapel of St Michael over the narthex. The entrances to the crypts are by stairs from the transepts or " crossing." The western steeple, as well as the central lantern, was sometimes, at any rate, provided with a domed vault, that at Brioude being a most valuable example of the best type of dome in the district . The choirs are vaulted with barrel-vaults terminating with semi-domes, and the apsidal chapels, the wall space between each of which is pierced with a round-headed window, are also each covered with a semi-dome. The columns are generally square with shafts engaged on three, and some- times on four sides, the latter only when the main vault of the nave has transverse ribs below it. The columns round the apse are always isolated and circular, but much slimmer than those in the chevets of the Poictevin churches, and detached shafts against the apse walls carry the groining, shafts being occasionally introduced inside and outside the window-jambs of the choir. In the nave and triforia the windows are generally very plain, with a label containing a billet-moulding, though AUVERGNE i6i the latter have sometimes, as at Clermont and Issoire, jamb shafts. The capitals of the columns are carved with great richness, as are many of the doorways, which appear to be of two types — one enriched with sculpture, the other with inlaid work. Of the former, the southern portal of Notre Dame du Port is a fine example. Were I to tell my readers more about these churches of Auvergne I should not be able to add much to what I have already said, for they present so little variety, and were built within so short a space of time (1060-1100), that a description of each of them in succession would be wearisome to a degree. Of course there are some variations. For example, St Amable at Riom has the main arches pointed, whilst the triforium arcade is round-arched, and the vault of the nave is also pointed instead of round. The nave of Issoire is another example of the Pointed vault. At St Nectaire the usual compound piers have given way to isolated columns. At Brioude the style seems to have reached its perfection, the aisles round the choir being most striking in their general effect. Here the roof is constructed as a regular barrel- vault without any ribs, and seems to be as true in principle, and to carry the eye on even more agreeably than the ordinary Gothic vaulting of circular aisles, where we are often distracted by numbers of conflicting lines of ribs. The wall arcades between the chapels are trefoiled, a form which also occurs in the triforium of the south side of Notre Dame at Clermont-Ferrand. That the architects of these churches were the ablest of their time there can be no question whatever; more- over, they never seem to have attempted more than they knew they could accomplish, and the consequence is that, to this day, many of these Auvergnat churches stand uninjured ajid undecayed, and aU might have done so had they received commonly fair treatment at the hands of their guardians. I believe, too, that we may regard the whole of the work in Velay and Auvergne as that of native artists. The detail of i62 SOUTHERN FRANCE sculpture is, when compared with such work as is to be found in Provence, exceedingly rude — vigorous, indeed, but deficient in that extreme deUcacy and refinement which marks the work at Aries, Ste Gilles and Tarascon. Situated in a wide-spread hollow, surrounded by mountains, in the midst of close-packed houses climbing a steep hill to reach the great church above, is the city of Le Puy, the ancient capital of Velay, a district of Auvergne on the confines of Languedoc. All about, on other rocky points, are chapels and shrines, so picturesque, so oddly placed, so unlike an3^hing one has seen before, as to suggest nothing in Nature but the realization of some quaint, architectural fancy, a dream, let us say, of Albert Diirer. No place is so dreamlike, so visionary as Le Puy. Indeed, one is seduced away from study, and tempted to pay less heed than one had meant to the details of its Eastern-looking cathedral, assuredly one of the most remarkable and instructive buildings raised in France during the eleventh and twelfth centuries. In truth it is only too possible to spend a fortnight at Le Puy and come away remembering far better the im- pression of the city as a whole than any distinct details of architecture. What one remembers best of Le Puy is the approach to its cathedral along a steep street, which breaks presently into steps, continuing on through a mighty porch, not distinguished by ans^hing very characteristic or at all rich in design, but whose great length and depth are strangely impressive ; it is conceived with imagina- tion, and it stimulates that faculty in us in a remark- able way. The raison d'itre of this abnormal porch was this. The precipitous i;ock on which the church was built was only long enough to admit of the erection of a choir, transepts and a nave of three bays. At a later period an extension of the nave to six bays was felt desirable, so, in order to form a substructure for the three new bays, this vast porch was reared against the western LE PUY EN VELAY 163 face of the precipice. Looking therefore at the west froiit of Le Puy Cathedral, it must be borne in mind that the actual floor is above the three great open arches of the porch. Now the spectator wUl say, the front of the church above the porch is not immoderately lofty in its proportions, so the interior itself must be somewhat deficient in height. This deficiency the architect had, to the eye and the imagination, to correct. He did this by throwing across, between each of the six bays of the nave, an arch supporting a waU pierced with arched openings, thus giving to each bay a rectangular lantern lighted on its north and south sides by a round- headed window and covered with a domical roof. Externally these domed lanterns are invisible for the reason that they are concealed by the roof which is carried uninterruptedly over them from the larger dome built over the crossing to the western gable of the nave, so that anyone viewing the exterior of Le Puy Cathedral, but as yet unaware of this ingenious expedi- ent for increasing its height inside, could have no idea of the existence of these six contiguous lanterns. Another reason for the erection of this great cavernous porch was, that the concourse of worshippers crowding the steps within it on great festivals could see as they knelt there, outside the church, the ceremonial at the high altar; but the actual entrance from it to the nave has long since been closed, and the steps finally branch off, on the left to the cloisters, on the right by a roundabout way to the south aisle of the nave, rifear the transept. The steps within this porch, whose three bays from east to west and from north to south correspond with the three additional bays of the nave and its aisles, are arranged in successive groups of eleven steps, with platforms between them. They formerly rose in a straight line, until they came up in the very centre of the church, in the fifth bay of the nave, and in front of the rood-loft, and of the miracle-working image of the Blessed Virgin, which, brought from the East and i64 SOUTHERN FRANCE given to the church by St Louis, was, until its destruc- tion in the cataclysm of the Great Revolution, the greatest attraction for pilgrims in France. The singular manner in which the pilgrims entered the church, and having paid their devotions at the shrine, passed out by doors on the eastern side of either transept, gave rise to an old saying that, " In Notre Dame du Puy one entered by the navel and went out by the ears." The majesty, I may say the awfulness, of this western porch can hardly be exaggerated. It owes little to delicate detail or enrichment of any kind, for though these have been they are no longer. It is the gloom and darkness, the simple nervous forms of arch and pier, the long flight of steps lost in obscurity, which constitutes the strange charm of this strangest of entrances. In the third bay of either aisle of this porch a chapel is formed — that on the right dedicated to St Martifi, and that on the left to St Qilles. They have western doorways with plain round arches, but no carving in the tympana, and these doorways stiU retain their wooden valves, which, notwithstanding their ruinous condition — owing, it is said, to bonfires having been built up against them at the time of the Revolution — are of singular interest. They are of some soft wood, carved in the very flattest relief, not more than a quarter of an inch deep, merely " groimded out," as carvers say, the details apparently being added in paint. Vestiges of this may yet be traced, but they are insufficient to convey any idea of what the effect of the colour may have been. Each door is hung folding, and divided into four upright narrow divisions, crossed horizontally by broad bands boldly inscribed, and then broken up into little square panels, the subjects in which would appear, from the inscriptions, which are in Latin hexameters, to be from the early life of Our Lord, on the door to St Gilles' chapel, and from His Passion on that to St Martin's. LE PUY EN VELAY 165 The inscriptions on the broad horizontal bands are less easy to decipher, owing to the contractions indulged in by the carver, but it is always singularly ornamental, simple though the lettering is. On the doors to the chapel of St Gilles the inscription is of extreme value : " GaUlfredus : me : fct : Petrus : epi"; after which some letters are lost. This band wanted ornamentation, and Godfrey the carver made use of it to tell us that the work was his, and if my reading of the last letter but one is correct, I think it leads to the conclusion that these doors were made during the episcopate of one Peter, who was con- secrated at Ravenna by Pope Leo IX. in 1043 and died at Genoa ten years later as he returned from the Holy Land. If the inference I have drawn from the inscription be true, it gives the date also to the second portion of the construction of the cathedral, to which the chapels in the porch uiiquestionably belong; and the result would be that whilst we should assign the earliest portion of the church to about the end of the tenth century or the commencement of the eleventh, the second portion would be dated at about 1050; and finally, there is little doubt as to the whole having been completed in the course of the twelfth century. These dates are, as in all such cases, of course only approxi- mate; but it is pretty evident that there was seldom any long pause in the works, and the development in their architectural features is therefore very gradual. The manner in which the architects of Le Puy Cathedral have contrived to cover the whole of the summit of the rock on which it stands with its several dependencies is most ingenious. It consists of a nave of six bays with aisles, transepts, a choir with aisles, and a steeple attached to the east end of the south choir-aisle. In the angle formed by the south transept with the choir-aisle is a porch over which stands a chapel of commensurate size, whilst to the north are the cloisters, two grand halls, some ruins, and to the i66 SOUTHERN FRANCE north-east a chapel dedicated to St John, and other buildings. The oldest portion comprises the transepts and crossing and the two easternmost bays of the nave. The choir, in its original state, presented the peculiarity of a square exterior and a semicircular interior, but an entire rebuilding, which took place about forty years ago, has obliterated all traces of this interesting arrangement. From a drawing which I have seen representing the Ulterior of Le Puy Cathedral before the destruction of the old choir, it would appear that this limb had a continuous Romanesque arcading round the walls of its apse, and as its vaulting, which terminated in a plain semi-dome, was on a level with the eastern arch of the crossing, the whole was visible from the west end of the church. The architect of this new choir has not covered it with a lantern such as we see over each bay of the nave, but he has so raised its walls as to bring his barrel- shaped vaulting to the same height as the domes of these lanterns, with the result that both it, and the large lancet window at the east end are quite invisible, except on a near approach. The windows on the north and south sides of the choir are plain roimd-headed ones in pairs, filled with stained glass representing large single figures. The eastern lancet contains the Blessed Virgin and Child and the Annunciation; both groups are treated in the style of the thirteenth century, and if somewhat archaic, are praiseworthy as regards drawing and tincture. Against the waU below this window stands the orgue d' accompaniment, for, following the old basilican arrangement, this rectangular eastern hmb of Le Puy Cathedral forms the chorus cantorum, the high altar being placed in advance, beneath the central lantern. The arches opening into the choir-aisles are old, but the aisles themselves were altered at various times. That on the south has been rebuilt in Second Pointed LE PUY EN VELAY 167 of poor character, and is now a mere passage-way to the modem sacristy, and that on the north was pro- bably interfered with not long after its first construc- tion, when the great steeple which now abuts upon it was commenced. It has been suggested that the base of the tower was originally a baptistery, but there is no evidence of such an intention, for it is impossible to doubt, when the whole design comes to be examined, that though the steeple was a long time in reaching its present height, the main feature of its design was from the first just what we now see it to be. Moreover, the chapel of St Jean close by is said to have been the baptistery for the whole city until within the last hundred years. With regard to the original plan of the eastern portion of Le Puy Cathedral, I may venture to say that it was very nearly the same as that of St Martin d'Ainay at Lyons, in which the choir-aisles are shorter than the choir, and all are terminated in apses. The date of the foundation of Ainay is some time in the ninth century, and it was carried on until the eleventh; but the apse and capitals of the colurons of the crossing — ^for the columns themselves are Roman — cannot be later than about 950 to 1000, which latter would be the date generally accepted for the old choir of Le Puy were it still in existence. The arches of the crossing are semicircular and carried upon coupled detached shafts. These arches carry a low square tower surmounted by an octagon, but the junction of the two is concealed from within by a low-domed ceiling having an aperture at its top through which the waUs and dome of the octagon are seen. The space left between the apex of this lower dome and the base of the octagonal lantern is floored and forms a gallery. Round the aperture above alluded to is a balcony whose ornamentation, as well as that of the moulding which fringes the aperture, would proclaim it a work of the latest Gothic period, with a soupfon of the Renaissance. A series of white i68 SOUTHERN FRANCE bannerets affixed to this balcony at frequent intervals produces a pleasing effect. Much of the work in this central lantern of Le Puy Cathedral is modem, though the universality of this feature in the churches of the district makes it probable that it is, to some extent, a legitimate restoration. The transepts have barrel-vaults, and are crossed by tribunes carried by two round arches on coupled shafts. On the northern tribune, the organ, in a Re- naissance case, is stationed; the southern one gives access to a First Pointed chapel of great beauty built over the south-eastern porch, and opening from the tribune by two Pointed arches, which spring jointly from a tall circular pillar with an elongated capital, richly foliaged. The lower part of either transept wall below the tribune is scooped out to form two miniature apses, and the tribunes are groined with ribless quadripartite vaults. The views across the nave from the transepts are grand in the extreme; indeed it would be difficult to name an interior which conveys so great an impression of size and importance with such small dimensions as that of Le Puy Cathedral. This grandeur of effect is due in a great measure to the manner in which the nave is crossed at the interval of each bay by a bold arch — ^round in the eastern and pointed in the western parts — uniting with the walls over the arches opening to the aisles to support a lantern covered by an octo- partitely - groined dome. The manner in which the junction between these square lanterns and their eight-sided domical roofs in the first four bays counting from the west is effected is so very remarkable and instructive as to merit some analysis. To the walls of the lantern are attached eight arches in alternate courses of light aftd dark stone, one on each face and one in each angle. These arches spring from coupled colonnettes with foliaged capitals sur- mounted by an abacus or narrow strip of moulding. LE PUY EN VELAY 169 This abacus, which serves for both capitals, sweeps round each angle of the lantern in a graceful curve; the space between it and the circumscribing arch assumes the form of a semi-dome, and thus constitutes what is termed a pendentive, or device for effecting an agreeable transition from the square of the lantern to the octagon of its domical roof. These pendentives are also constructed in alternate courses of light and dark stone, and the difference between their semi- circular plan and the square angle in which they are placed is skilfully concealed by coupled shafts placed under the strip of moulding which forms a continuation of the abaci to the shafts on the four sides of the lantern. The arches opening from the nave into its aisles are round in the fifth and sixth bays and pointed in the first four. As the capitals of their piers are placed just below those of the transverse arches, these arches do not rise so high, consequently there is a considerable wall space between them and the string-course below the arcading of the lanterns. In the earlier bays of the nave this space is bare, but relieved in the later ones by three very plain wall arcades. The pilasters of these arches between the nave and aisles form, with those of the arches spanning the nave ajid aisles, grand angular masses. Much elaborate sculpture is introduced in their capitals, but it is nowhere of any very high merit, and is so inferior in delicacy and beauty to the contemporary work seen in Provence that one would attribute it to a native school of sculptors, acquainted probably with none but inferior Roman sculpture, from which they endeavoured to develop a style for themselves. The aisles are vaulted quadripartitely, without ribs, except in the first two on the north and the first three on the south, where the ribs are very bold; this affords in- teresting evidence of the very gradual yet regular development of the art as the work progressed west- ward. But even in the latest portion of the church, the west end, the pointed and the round arch meet in 170 SOUTHERN FRANCE friendly rivalry; the former in the western window of the nave, and the latter in the corresponding window^ of either aisle, as may be seen on reference to the illus- tration of the fagade. Internally the central lancet — a broad one occupying almost the whole of the wall — is spanned by two arches rising from slender shafts with delicately-sculptured leafage to their capitals. The arch immediately over the window is semicircular and the bases of its shafts rest upon the string-course, while the outer arch, which is pointed, corresponds with those opening from the western bay of the nave to the aisles. Consequently, although these two arches spanning the window rise from the same level, some wall-space is left between them. The shafts of the outer arch are continued to the groimd, and group very beautifully with those of the responds or wall- piers of the arches opening to the aisles from the western lantern. In the earlier parts of the church, i.e., the two bays adjoining the transepts, the windows lighting the aisles are round-headed ones in pairs; in the later work they are broad single ones with round or just-pointed heads. A large plain circle lights the fourth bay of the north aisle. The cloister on the north side of the church appears to be in part coeval with the earliest, or perhaps the second portion of the fabric, and in part with the later additions to it. Their northern and southern walks are co-extensive with the four easternmost bays of the nave; the eastern and western ones are somewhat longer, the latter being flanked by a noble room roofed with a series of barrel-vaults, and called the Salle des Etats du Velay, and the former by another large hall, also covered with a Pointed barrel-vault, originally styled the choir of St Andrew. The south end of this chapel abuts on the front of the northern transept, with which it is co- extensive in width. The arcades of the cloister looking into the garth LE PUY EN VELAY 171 have semicircular arches on slender shafts, one on each face of a square pier. The capitals of these shafts are all richly sculptured, some with figures, some with foliage. The spandrels of the arches are filled in with a reticulation of coloured stones; above the arches runs a band of similar ornament, and above this again is a carved cornice, which in the later part of the cloister forms a kind of frieze. The arches of the arcades are formed of dark and light coloured stone in alternate courses, and the lean-to roof of each walk is covered with red tiles. In some portions of the cloister, on the sides looking on to the enclosure, the arches have key-stones, in some instances carved, in others left in the block, a peculiarity which I hardly remember to have met with before in work of the same date. The groining of the walks is all quadripartite without ribs, and their walls a.re enriched at the interval of each bay with shafts, noticeable for their very considerable entasis, and slightly detached from a square pier. From the northern walk one of the best views of the external side elevation of the cathedral is to be obtained. Here, even more clearly than inside, the division of the building into different epochs is seen. The two bays of the aisle nearest the transept have coupled windows with parti-coloured voussoirs and jamb shafts. The clerestory is very peculiar ia its treatment, and very effective; the windows — those which light the lanterns internally on their north and south sides — are of one light in each bay and round- headed, and on each side of them, above the springing, there is a recess in the wall, in the centre of which a detached shaft is placed to carry the cornice. A similar recess and a smaller shaft occur immediately over the arch of the window, and the window arch being built of alternately light and dark stone, and all the sunk panels being filled with Geometrical patterns composed in the same way, an extremely beautiful polychro- matic effect is obtained. Recesses of the same kind in the upper part of the 172 SOUTHERN FRANCE walls occur all along the eastern face of the transept of Le Puy Cathedral, and between the clerestory windows of Notre Dame du Port at Clermont-Ferrand, St Paul at Issoire, and commonly in Auvergne. Judg- ing from the portion of the cathedtal in which it occurs, and from the early and simple character of the work itself, one would incline to the belief that it is earlier here than in any of the other examples. It would be of great interest to have some more positive evidence on this and similar questions of date. But, so far as I could discover, there is no such evidence, and we are left in doubt, therefore, whether this portion of the architecture of Velay came from Auvergne, or whether the reverse was the case; as also whether this external decoration of the fabric is coeval with its first erection, or was applied subsequently. • In the clerestory of the two central compartments of the nave the windows are similar with small arched recesses between them; these recesses are, however, omitted in the two westernmost bays. In both the voussoirs are counterchanged, and the wall from the springing of the window ardies to the eaves coursed with stone and lava. The transept gables are noticeable for the courses of inlaid patterns with which they are enriched. All these patterns are formed with white stone and lava. The latter indeed forms the whole ground of the walls, and varies in colour from a greenish grey to black, the patterns being formed of the darkest lava and stone. The external elevation of the west front above the porch is similar in style to the two adjoining bays of the clerestory on the north side, and is mainly executed in alternate courses of lava and stone. The three windows seen above the porch light the ends of the nave and aisles whose flooring would be on a level with the top of the central arch of the porch, while the Smaller window between the two charmingly inlaid aircades of the next storey serves to light the western LE PUY EN VELAY 173 side of the first of those lanterns into which the church, as we have akeady seen, is divided. The pierced walls above the two side windows were introduced partly to mask the lean-to roofs of the aisles and partly to give greater dignity and breadth to the front. Two features remain to be described on the exterior of this marvellous cathedral — ^the south-eastern porch and the steeple. The whole detail of the porch, which occupies the angle formed by the south aisle of the choir with the eastern side of the transept, is a very rich kind of Pointed, and aboimds in half-Romanesque, half-Byzantine detail. It opens on to a small plateau (bounded on the western side by the bishop's palace) by two Pointed arches, one looking towards the south, the other towards the east. At the angle of this porch is a mass of masonry, sufficiently deep to admit of the introduction of two distinct arches separated by a narrow strip of barrel-vaulting. On one side these arches, whether facing east or south, spring from the above-mentioned block, and on the other from a shaft and a square pier connected with one another by means of a lintel passing from the abaci of their respective capitals. Into the hollows formed by the mouldings of these arches, both outer and inner, small pieces of foliaged ornament are fixed at regular intervals, producing an effect of great richness. Indeed, it reminds one of our fourteenth-century ball-flower ornament. In both cases the shaft from which the outer of these two arches springs is circular, its surface, from top to bottom, being so chiselled as to resemble the rind of a pine-apple. It has, moreover, the peculiarity of a band of foliage separated by a narrow string from the actual capital, which is very deep, beautifufly carved into foliage, and crowned with a square abacus. The inner of these two arches has a square pier in alternate bands of light and dark stone for its support, also with a richly-sculptured capital. On the other side these arches rise from a string 174 SOUTHERN FRANCE connecting the capitals of two shafts attached to the comers of the great square block of masonry at the south-east angle of the porch. The sexpartite groining of this impressive vestibule is in alternate coloured courses, and it has the very rare peculiarity (in France) of the ridge rib, which in this case runs from east to west. Two doors open from the church into this porch; one from the transept,, the other from the south aisle of the choir. The former, whose inner arch is noticeable on account of its con- tinuous cusping — a singular feature in Romanesque work — ^has been cut through the lower part of a window, as its semicircular head and the upper portions of its shafts still remain in the waU; the latter has fluted pilasters supporting a lintel, above which is a round arch. The steeple which adjoins the north aisle of the choir at its east end is as bizarre and unusual in design as if is remarkable in construction. It consists of no less than nine stages on the exterior, diminishes rapidly in diameter, and is, perhaps, on the whole, more curious than pleasing in its outline. At the base of the tower the internal diameter is 24 feet 6 inches, but this is reduced to only la feet by four detached piers, i foot 10 J inches square. These piers are carried up from the base to the very summit, detached in the three lower stages, and forming part of the thick- ness of the wall in the poiiion above. The highest stage of the steeple, 12 feet in internal and 16 feet in external diameter, is therefore, as nearly as possible, carried up on these four piers, and the rapid decrease in the external dimensions, from 36 feet to 16 feet, was only rendered possible by this very ingenious mode of construction. The lower part of the steeple at Le Puy may safely be referred to the end of the eleventh century, and its completion to the end of the twelfth, whilst the planning gives one the impression that it was the work of a Byzantine artist, the construction of the piers in the lowest stage being almost identical with that of the CLERMONT-FERRAND 175 main piers under the domes of St Mark's, Venice, and St Front, Perigueux. The arrangement of the belfry stage with its gable on each face of the tower is very remark- able, and is, perhaps, one of the earliest examples of a t3^e which developed afterwards into the well-known arrangement of the belfry of the south-western tower at Chartres, and this combined with the influence of the Rhenish Romanesque into almost all subsequent modifications of the spire with its gabled spire-lights. One of the windows imder this gable is planned in a most ingenious manner, presenting externally a semi- dome pierced by two Pointed arches ; another window is pierced with a trefoil head, the diameter of which is much larger than that of the light it surmounts. This is a favourite form of cusping throughout this district, and there can, I think, be little doubt that it is somewhat Eastern in its origin and analogous to the horseshoe form of arch. At Clermont-Ferrand we see in its noble cathedral — one of the very few complete Gothic works of import- ance in Auvergne * — the chevet in its perfected form, viz., with its five contiguous polygonal chapels. Conceived as it was, just before the thirteenth century had reached its meridian, the choir of Clermont- Ferrand Cathedral is one of the few French works of the fully-developed Gothic to be met with on a large scale, and like the cathedrals of Limoges, Dijon and Bayonne, the choirs of Bordeaux, Narbonne and Toulouse, and the churches of St Ouen at Rouen and St Urbain at Troyes, fills a gap which otherwise would be much felt in the architectural history of the country. * Others are the church at Chaise Dieu ; the choir of the church at Ennezat — a small edition of that at Clermont-Ferrand ; the Ste Chapella at Riom; the cathedral at St Flour; and St Laurent at Le Puy. The last-named, famous for the monument of the constable Du Guesqlin, is a large Middle Pointed building, not of very first-rate excellence but with many beautiful points, of detail. It is very Italian in its design, the elevation of one bay of the nave being almost identical with that of San Petronio at Bologna, though of course on a very reduced scale. The plan is Italian also, the nave groining compartments being square, whilst those of the aisles are oblong. 176 SOUTHERN FRANCE In design and proportions the glorious choir of Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral bears so strong a resem- blance to that of its sister suffragan at Limoges as to tend to the conclusion that the two churches were the work of the same architect, and he a stranger to the region which, like Germany, was slow in accepting those forms and dimensions which had long before attained to such perfection in the north. The -history of the two cathedrals runs very much on the same lines. Both are on the site of Romanesque buildings,* and the rebuilding of both was commenced in the Northern Gothic style late in the thirteenth century, on the same general plan, and, as I have already surmised, under the same architect's directions. In each case the choir (and at Clermont three bays of the nave) was completed in the Middle Pointed style. At Limoges the transept and two bays of , the nave were proceeded with and finished, and the lower portions of two more were commenced in the fifteenth century; while at the same time, at Clermont, a portion of another bay of the south aisle was erected. The works then were stayed at each church, leaving standing por- tions at the west end and the towers of the Romanesque churches. The works, completed within the memory of many now living, follow more or less on the ancient lines. M. Viollet-le-Duc gave plans of each showing exactly what was originally carried out, and he further indicated the supposed intention of the architect. It was interesting to examine these new works and to compare them with their plans, and some important differences were discovered in them; but, on the whole, they represent fairly well the new work done. At Clermont-Ferrand, in the new portion of the nave, aisles and chapels, the old details have been carefully fol- lowed in all respects, and the result is very satisfactory, giving its due effect and proportions to me very beau- tiful original design. The apse and the surrounding * Excavations have proved that the Romanesque cathedral of Clermont- Ferrand was on the same plan as N6tre Dame du Port. CLERMONT-FERRAND 177 chapels, with the magnificent old stained glass com- bined with the dark tone of the lava of which the whole is btult, are, to my mind, almost unequalled in beauty, except, perhaps, by the glorious apse of Bar- celona Cathedral. But with regard to the west end, there sfeems variations from VioUet-le-Duc's plans; the western towers are puzzling. He speaks of the ancient Romanesque west-end towers thus: " On voit encore les restes de la fa9ade du XI"" siMe," and proceeds to say in a footnote — " Deux tours qui subsistaient encore sur cette facade, mais qtii avaient 6t6 denaturSes depuis longtemps, ont da €tre d^molies, parce qu'elles m^nacaient de s'^crouler." This front was pulled down in 1855, and a new front and towers erected in the style of the thirteenth century from the designs of M. Mallay, as shown in the plan given by Le Due. The spires were completed about 1883, and the effect is very good; but unfortu- nately the lower storey of the towers, both inside and out, Eire exceedingly poor in detail and effect. The space is cut up int6 passages and steps, and is very different in effect to the lower storeys of the Cologne towers, the plan of which is here imitated on a small scale — Cler- mont Cathedral being one of the few in France planned with double aisles to its nave. That the ancient Romanesque towers were not strengthened and restored is a matter for deep regret. The new works are all carried out in lava, but of a somewhat lighter tone than that used in the old work. It is a material of great strength, and wears remarkably well. The ancient work is, therefore, in an almost perfect state. The whole construction is exceedingly slight, yet the wonderful skill and knowledge shown in its design is most remarkable. During the Revolution the church suffered serious injury, being stripped of all its ornaments and monu- ments, the stained glass, however, being preserved, and, but for the strenuous exertions of a citizen named M 178 SOUTHERN FRANCE Verdier Latour, who represented that the building would be useful for public meetings and other civic purposes, the cathedral would have shared the fate of Arras, Avranches, Cambrai, St Nicaise at Rheims, and many another noble church throughout the length and breadth of the land. The cathedral church of Clermont-Ferrand is not an Auvergnat church at all. Just like that of Limoges, it is an exotic, though a very beautiful exotic. As a characteristic example of the Geometrical Decorated Gothic of France it is admirable simply as a work of art ; it has not, like N6tre Dame du Port, any special, pro- priety in the city in which it happens to stand. Built on Auvergnat soil it is purely French, and it might just as well have stood on any other spot of the wide space which came within the range of the French dominions and the French taste. Historically it proves nothing except the fact that when it was built French artistic taste had thoroughly established itself in Auvergne. The church is t5^icaljy French, and brings out most of the points in which a French cathedral differs from an Enghsh one. In other words, it is short and lofty, with western towers and spires but no central. It cannot be said to belong to the first rank of French churches in point of scale, either in length or height. In England it would take a very low place indeed in point of lengthy while as regards height it would rank, one would imagine, third in England. Here is a church, perhaps, of the length of Tewkesbury, rising higher in the air than any minster in England except Westminster and York, and consisting of a nave of six bays (if we include that between the western towers) with double aisles and chapels; tran- septs, not extending beyond the former; and a choir of four bays with a single aisle and chapels on either side, terminating in an Amiens-like apse with five surrounding chapels of uniform depth, each with an apse of three sides. The windows in these chapels and also those in the clerestory of the apse are very graceful CLERMONT-FERRAND 179 examples of late thirteenth-century work, consisting of two trefoil-headed lights surmounted by a trefoiled triangular figure, and a large sexfoiled circle in the general head. It will surprise no one that Clermont Cathedral was designed for six towers, two at the west end, and two flanking the fa9ade of either transept, and that none of the six marks the crossing of the four limbs. Nor wiU it surprise anyone to hear that of these six towers three remain imperfect to this day. All this means that Clermont Cathedral is distinctly and thoroughly French, and to say of a church of this date that it is distinctly and thoroughly French is to say that it has an internal effect of its own kind with which no English one save Westminster can compare. France is — speak- ing of Gothic churches only — as distinctly the land of perfect internal effects as England and Normandy are the lands of perfect external outlines. Clermont Cathedral has a better effect at a distance than it has when we come near. The short and lofty body covered by one imbroken line of high-pitched roof looks well from most points, and its pair of modem towers and tall octagonal stone spires are exceedingly felicitous both in outline and proportions. In the distance the transepts are lost, their gables and roofs remaining for future ages to complete. As it is, their fafades termi- nate horizontally, just above their magnificent rose windows, giving them the appearance of very broad unfinished towers, particularly the fagade of the southern transept, where neither of the flanking towers has been carried up. Within, the church is of extreme beauty. We can sit and gaze with delight on the graceful arches rising in the nave and choir from clustered shafts and in the apse from cylindrical columns; on the triforium and the lofty clerestory with its grand array of saintly figures set in the middle of the lights with an expanse of grisaiUe above and below; and, uninterrupted by a high altar-piece, on the gorgeous feast of colour spread [8o SOUTHERN FRANCE orth in the mosaic glass of the corona of chapels round ;he apse. But when we come to criticize this dusky nterior it is hardly so satisfactory as the admirable juUding at Limoges. The two are so near in style and icale that comparison between them is easy and 'air. Both are constructed of a rich dark material, Limoges of granite, Clermont of the black lava of Volvic. \t Clermont the gabled triforium is not so skilfully nanaged as at Limoges, nor do the transepts strike one IS a special feature like the two unequal ones there. At Clermont they are wide and shallow, put there mainly :or the purpose of building towers against them; ndeed, one is tempted to wish they had been omitted iltogether, as at Vienne and Bourges and in the two ittle cathedrals of St Flom: and Mende. Yet Cler^ nont Cathedral is inside a most graceful and lovely auilding taken as a whole, and it comes as a surprise to those whose ideas of Auvergnat church architecture lad been founded on Brioude, Issoire and Notre Dame iu Port. CENTRAL FRANCE BERRI BOURGES The colossal cathedral of Bourges, the pride of the adjacent province of Berri, ranks after those of Paris, Chartres, Amiens and Rheims as the finest and most perfect monument of the period to which it almost entirely belongs — the thirteenth century. Its great peculiarity, the omission of the transept, may by some be considered a defect as far as external appearance is concerned, but it gives great value to the internal dimensions, the appearance of length being far greater than when the view is broken by a crossing. The nave and choir form one architectural whole, uniform in height and width, and distinguished only by the ritual arrangements and by a change in the detail. Of the churches successively raised on the spot the first is attributed to St Ursin, the apostle of Berri, to whom, in 251, the Roman senator, Leocadius, residing in Gaul, gave part of his palace for use as a Christian basilica and depository for the relics of St Stephen. This having been destroyed a little more than a century later, St Pelagius erected on the site a church of great beauty, which lasted until the ninth century, when its reconstruction was undertaken by Raval de Turenne, a relative of Charles the Bold, and carried on by succes- sive prelates, one of its most active promoters being Gaulin, brother of Hugh Capet. Of this structure, believed to be represented on the seal of the chapter affixed to existing documents of the thirteenth century, the north and south portals are about the only remains. The history of the cathedrals which have preceded the 181 t82 . CENTRAL FRANCE 2xisting one is vague, owing to the numerous fires which it various times have destroyed the city records, but it would seem that scarcely had this Romanesque build- ing been completed when, either from instability of construction or the desire to emulate other cathedrals ivhich were being built in the new style coming into rogue, Archbishop Henri de Sully was inspired, towards the close of the twelfth century, to plan a new edifice ivith double aisles based partly on the Roman ramparts. Contributions were diligently collected by succeeding irchbishops and the work was carried on untU 1324, Afhen from a deed of that year we may infer that Ecclesiam Bituricensem was sufiiciently completed to receive consecration by the Archbishop GuiUaume de Brosses. The architect, having resolved on immensity of scale, confined himself to the simple plan of a nave and choir inder one unbroken length of roof, with double aisles to both.* By the omission of .the. trarisept the length s exquisitely adapfeS to the othei^diinensions, and jreat originality is imparted to the design by raising the intaanediate. aislaj;a-juxh a hei^lt_-as to^admit its liaving ^ triforium.and cler^SrxT This is a truly loble idea, and one which is met with in the choh-s of "outances and Le Mans cathedrals. At Bourges these aisles themselves (71 feet high) are oftier than the naves of some of our cathedrals, and constitute one of the most remarkable characteristics )f this magnificent church, whose very position in the jxact centre of France is happily appropriate; the sun ' with surpassing glory crown'd " of a system adorned, IS that fine country is, with many a subordinate, yet nost splendid satellite, differing each from the other in irchitectural glories. The huge imbroken length of its nave and choir is * With the exception of N6tre Dame at Paris, Bourges is the only "ranch cathedral planned with double aisles to nave, choir and apse. At ^hartres, Coutances and Le Maiis the choir and apse only"afe similarly iesigned. In all these instances the chapels project from the outer of he two aisles, thus leaving two clear procession paths round the apse. BOURGES 183 visible throughout a widely-extending range of distance in all directions, the more so from Bourges being built (as the ancient Gauls mostly took care to build their cities) on elevated ground commanding a view of the circumjacent country; and when the spectator who has caught glimpses of this stupendous fabric from afar, after watching for its first appearance in the horizon, beholds the colossal proportions, there is no disappoint- ment — ^nothing falls short. As a whole Bourges Cathedral is one of the most perfect and least-altered great works undertaken at a time when the French architect had emancipated him- self thoroughly and once for all from old traditions. The apse and the five bays adjacent to it, with their double aisles, were the first portions completed; in all probability before the first half of the thirteenth century had expired. By this time the style had reached a greater development, so that an increased enrichment and delicacy is, as might be exjjected, discernible in such features as the arcades of the triforia and the tracery of the clerestory windows, but the plan so nobly conceived by the original architect was strictly adhered to as the work proceeded westward. The five great western porches, the west window, the north-western tower, the north and south porches and several chapels illustrate in a striking manner the several changes that affected the style between the middle of the fourteenth century and the commencement of the sixteenth. The five great western portals corresponding with the nave and its double aisles are exquisite conceptions of the fourteenth century. Less cavernous than those of Amiens and Rheims, they are sufficiently deep to allow of the central one having six orders of mouldings and the pair on either side of four. All these mouldings are composed of a multitude of small canopied figures. The walls on either hand are lined with canopied niches, which the axes and hammers of the Huguenots have almost entirely denuded of their i84 CENTRAL FRANCE statues. These niches are raised upon a basement of" equal height panelled with trefoUed arcading, which, as , well as the niches above, is returned along the face of |; each great buttress, thus uniting the five portals into'P one grand composition. The tympana of these five great doorways at BoUrges are entirely filled with ; subjects sculptured with a delicacy that calls to mind those ivory triptychs in the fashioning of which the mediaeval French artist was perhaps unrivalled. The spirit with which these historical sciilptures at Bourges are designed is admirable, and even in the most serious subjects there is that grotesque slyness which the artist knew so well how to render telling in subordind,- tion to his grand design. In the tsmipanum of the central doorway is the Last Judgment; scenes from the life of th^ Blessed Virgin and St Stephen are portrayed in the one to the left and right respectively; the miracu- lous deeds and founding of the church by St WUliam are represented in the doorway leading to the outer north aisle; and such episodes in the life of St Ursin as his mission to Gaul by the Pope, with his companion, St Just, carrying the relics of St Stephen, burying his com- panions, and baptizing Leocardius and his son, are com- memorated in the corresponding doorway on the south. Allusion has been made to those relics of the Roman- esque cathedral, the north and^outh doorways of the nave, which by an uiiaGGOuntably Hajpy chance or pur- pose were preserved and rebuilt, piece by piece, in the sixth bay on either side counting from the west. They are remarkable not only for the really astonishing skill of the mechanics who wrought the curious sculptures with which their columns and other members are covered, but for the fact that among the branches of foliage, in which the utmost skill of Byzantine artists is rivalled, nude figures and animals are re- \2 presented with a feeling for nature which is all the more surprising when compared with the stiff and conven- tional representations of life-size human figures in the same work. BOURGES C'ATHEPEAL : THE WESi' FRONT _ BOURGES 185 . The southern doorway is in very nearly perfect con- dition. The sculpture is exquisite and unusually ad- vanced in the figure work for the Romanesque period. The central seated figure in the tympanum is a fine instance of the nobility and power attainable by true artistic feeUng, and in spite of a limited technique and a strictly conventional tradition — a. feeling shown no less closely by the complete subordination of the entire work to a dominant idea — it is in every way a master- piece of genius. The Majesty is seated in a vesica and surrounded by the evangelistic symbols. In two of the archivolts of the semicircular arch is a series of little seated figures; the other two are moulded. Three saints in niches, and supported on short, richly-moulded shafts, line the portal on either side. Between the doors is a standing figure of Our Lord, and in the architrave below the Majesty are the twelve Apostles, seated in little round-headed arcades. The dpor? themselves are graceful examples of Late Gothic wood-carving. Each has two tiers of panelling in three compartments. The upper panels have ogee- shaped heads with" elongated finials and crockets; the lower ones are trefoil arched with smaller trefoils in the cuspings, giving them an appearance of great richness. Studding the lower panels of the right-hand door is the initial I and hearts within wings, indicating that these doors were the gift of Jacques Cceur and his son Jean, Archbishop of Bourges. The left-hand door is similarly studded with the initisds R. B. — Reginaldus Boicelli, the friend and executor of the donors; and over its upper panels is spread the legend, " Orate pro defunctis et benefactoribus ecclesiae. Reginaldus Boiselli." The classical character of the scroll of foliage which decorates the architrave of the northern portal, and the acanthus leaf in the capitals of the pilasters that support it, indicates the hand of a southern French if not an Italian master of the Lucchese and Pisan school. i86 CENTRAL FRANCE Here only one statue stands on either side of the double portal, the places of the other two being taken by shafts variously ornamented. Both these portals have gained considerably in effect by the addition of deep quadripartitely-vaulted porches, which produce a mysterious and harmonious solemnity of light and shade. A semicircular arch enclosing two smaller ones of the same shape forms the entrance to either porch, a large open sexfoiled circle occupjdng the tsmipanum. The subsidiary arches have grotesquely-carved cusps of such depth that the lowest project considerably beyond the capitals of the shafts from which their enclosing arches jointly spring. As examples of fourteenth-century work these porches deserve minute study, the employment of the semi- circular arch at so late a period being remarkable. On first entering Bourges Cathedral one is almost overwhelmed by.its solemn and religious grandeur, the enormous height of the nave (1^3. feet) and of tKelnter- mediate aisles (70 feet), the triforium and clerestory of the latter, the noble sweep of columns round the apse, and the wealth of ancient stained_glass being the ele- ments mainly conducive to so impressive an ensemble. To those conversant with Spanish ecclesiology the interior of Bourges Cathedral will recall that of Toledo. Designed about the same time, and evidently by a Frenchman, the plan of that church, one of the vastest in Christendom, is one of the finest ever devised, and it is not a little strange that so magnificent a development of the French plan should bein the ecclesiastical capital of Spain. At first sight it would seem that in the interior of Bourges Cathedral the sublime in architecture had been reached; but the first sensation of wonder having sub- sided, the impression that the architect has starved the two upper storeys of the nave for the sake of the ad- jacent aisles forces itself on the mind. In reality the triforium and clerestory are of very grand dimensions, but viewed from below they seem thrown into com- parative insignificance by the extraordinary height of BOURGES 187 the piers and arches, an additional 20 feet being de- manded by the eye to preserve the balance. "JTie^giers are gigantic cylinders encircled by slender shafts, those serving for the longitudinal arches of the nave and choir, the transverse arches of the aisles, and the diagonal ribs of their vaulting compartments being crowned with short foliaged capitals. Two additional shafts without capitals on the nave and choir side of each pier rise as far as a string-course forming a continuation of the abaci to the capitals of the other shafts, and upon these strings rest the shafts supporting the several members of the vaulting. Including the one between the towers, the nave and choir of Bourges Cathedral have, between them, thirteen bays, nine of which are given to the former and four to the latter. Counting from the west, the first two bays are vaulted r[uadripartitely, that is to say each bay is covered with a vault divided into four cells. In the succeeding tgnbaysthe vaulting is of the description known as sexpartite. and so includes two bays in each transverse compartment of the vault. This form of vaulting is not of common occurrence in French Gothic work, but examples of it on a grand scale are presented ill the cathedrals of Paris, Beauvais and Lyons, and in Notre Dame at Laon.\"The ribs of the great polygonal vault of the semi-dome of the chevet unite at a boss with the diagonal ones of the thirteenth bay, which is necessarily groined in four compartments, and as they start from the string-course between the triforium and the clerestory they take a very wide sweep, but the architect has combated any appearance of heaviness by piercing each spandrel with a foliated circle. This expedient, one amongst the most beautiful suggestions of Gothic art, is unique, I believe, in French work of the same date as the apse of Bourges Cathedrd. Instances of it occur in some later buildings,* but it seems to have found no admirers and but few imitators. * As for instance in the apses of Toulouse Cathedral and the Abbey Church at Sonvigny near Moulins. i88 CENTRAL FRANCE The aisles are separated from one another by Pointed arches rising from piers composed of an assemblage of small shafts round a large central one. They are among the most beautiful works of the kind to be found in the whole range of French Pointed architecture, and their effect as they sweep round the apse in unbroken array is most impressive. The slight changes made in the designs after the apse and the five bays adjacent to it had been com- pleted are observable in the triforia and clerestories of the nave and the inner aisle. Externally the clerestory appears to consist of a uniform series of twelve windows composed of three lancets surmounted, though not touched, by a foliated circle. But on a closer inspection it wiU be found that in the five windows of the earlier portion thej^ucgts are of uniform height, while in those of the remaining seven bays the central lancet is lower than the one on either side of it, thus leaving a less solid space round the circle, which is still treated plate-tracerywise. In the clerestory windows of the inner aisle a much greater difference is apparent, those in the five eastern bays and the apse being lancets in pairs, while those in the seven remaining bays are composed of two unf oliated lights supporting a circle without any interval of solid stone between them, thus showing the advance that had been made towards a more perfect system of tracery. In the apse, the five adjoining bays, and in the co-extenr sive portion of the inner aisle, the triforium consists of four or more Uncet openings of uniform height com- prised within a Pointed arch, the tympanum of which is quite plain. The lancets are graduated in the seven remaining bays, and the t3mipanum of the arch is pierced with a quatrefoiled circle, but in the corresponding bays of the inner aisle the design is quite changed. Here the comprising arches are subdivided into two lesser ones, which in their turn contain two trefoiled arcades; foliated circles are pierced in the tjTmpana of the main and sub arches, and the whole work, from its BOURGES 189 greater richness and elegance, has a more advanced architectural character. The outer aisles, except where they have been altered by the addition of Flamboyant chapels, are lighted by simple lancet windows. In the glorious chevet of Bourges Cathedral — a semi- circle divided into five exactly equal parts — ^we have, in all probability, an illustration of the treatment of the original one of Notre Dame at Paris before its chapels were removed at the close of the thirteenth centtiry to give place to the exceedingly beautiful, if not so archi- tecturally interesting, ones we now see. At Bourges, as at Paris, the outer wall of the second aisle has three com- partments for every one in the central apse; and from the centre division of each of these a very small circular chapel projects. Viewed from without these chapels look like segments of turrets with tall spiral roofs,* partly supported upon and partly corbeUing out of a square pillar of masonry carried down between the windows of the crypt, which, being visible externally, adds height and elegance to the three receding buttressed elevations of the chevet, whose general aspect is one of harmoniousness and grand repose. The treatment of this exterior aisle of the chevet at Bourges is very beau- tiful, retaining as it does the windows — ^in this instance broad lancets in pairs — ^between the chapels, which con- stitute so fine a feature in the early chevets of Poitou and Auvergne. Moreover, it reUeves what would be the baldness of a chevet consisting, as we may assume to have been the case at Paris, of two aisles with no projections to break the monotony of the outer wall. At Bourges the architect made another impor- tant modification. At Paris the plan involved the placing of a column in the series of arcades between the two aisles opposite the centre of the arches of the apse terminating the choir. At Bourges, however, the * These roofs may be compared with that of the apse of St Nicholas at Caen, and a similar one over the apsidal chapel at the east end of the south aisle of Chester Cathedral. igo CENTRAL FRANCE attempt to make all the vaulting compartments equal was abandoned; the irregular plan for the first aisle was accepted, the outer columniation being made wider than in the apse, and then, by dividing the outer wall into three and making one bay of four-celled vaulting, which is an exact counterpart of that in the first aisle only reversed, and two bays of triangular shape, the Bourges architect showed that he knew and appreci- ated the arrangement at Paris. Below, in the mag- nificent First Pointed crypt, the similarity between the vaulting of these two great cathedrals is even greater. The most comprehensive view of the exterior of Bourges Cathedral is to be had from the archiepiscopal garden, whence the entire length of the church, with its unbroken line of roof, semicircular apse, grandly-massed fljdng buttresses and pinnacles, is presented at a glance. Compared with the Astant view of Chartres, Bourges, abstractedly speaking, hardly composes so well in a picture. The cathedral of the former uprears two spires, each perfect of its kind, to the skies, and the effect is charming. At Bourges there is a difference in alti- tude of between 50 and 60 feet between the towers which rise over the west ends of the outer aisles, but they mass well, and, paradoxical as it may sound, they become an ingredient of beautiful effect in having averted formal perfection. The south-western tower, which rises only one storey above the f a9ade and carries a short quadrangular spire, is entirely First Pointed. The companion tower, of the same age, fell in 1506, con- sequent on faulty foundations, and was rebuilt on its present colossal scale in the Flamboyant style then pre- valent, but, as regards the lower stages, with a restraint from over-elaboration of ornament which seems to indicate that the designer was anxious to assimilate his work to that of the other portions of the fa9ade. A marvellous sight to behold is this western fagade of Bourges, with its five sculptured portals, immense six-light central window and its flanking towers, em- bodying in vast proportions the most elegant and ex- BOURGES 191 pressive design, and, withal, the most minute and ela- borately-finished details. Massiveness and ornamenta- tion are here equally conspicuous; and so startling is each prominent feature of the mighty whole that one feels constrained to devote, in slow and deliberate in- quiry, all the powers of the mind to the contemplation of this one portion of the cathedral alone. The wealth expended on this magnificent edifice, from the chevet to the five western portals, each of which may well be called, as was that eminently magnificent portal that arrested the gaze of every traveller to Jerusalem, " the beautiful gate of the Temple," must have been incalcu- lable. In each successive generation the revenues of Central France must have poured in as free-will offer- ings towards the consummation of one great design; and three centiuies seem hardly a sufficiently long period of time for the completion of such a masterpiece of genius and art; but in mediaeval times it is certain the artificers, and even the meanest " operatives," worked under no ordinary impulses. The exhortations of the priests and prelates, the approving smile or the threatening frown of zealot kings and rulers, and all the aids and inducements derivable from religious in- fluences — the dread of hell, the hope of heaven, and the sober certainty of high and constant wages — ^brought these stupendous monuments of the Mid(fie Ages to a far more speedy termination than could be thought possible in the present day without all the marvel- working appliances and improvements of modem invention. Most difiicult it is to declare which is the most astonishing and delectable to behold at Bourges — the architecture or the wealth of superb old stained glass, the vastness of the general design, or the inconceivable varieties of particvdar detail. This mighty House of God teems with the riches of art and the wonders of science. All has been nobly, all has been wonderfully begun, continued and ended; and so manifold are the distinctive features that mind and body are equally con- 192 CENTRAL FRANCE scious of the labour of contemplation: in other words, it is a relief to the attentive spirit and to the over- wrought heart to pause, as object succeeds to object, and admiration grows more and more intense, amid the overpowering influences of such a spectacle. SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE BURGUNDY LYONS : AUTUN : LANGRES ; DIJON Burgundy, the most eastern of the French archi- tectural provinces, including the modem departments of Ain, C6t6 d'Or, Doubs, Dr6me, Hautes Alpes, Haute Saone, Isere, Jura, Rhone, Savoie and Seine et Loire, is the home of a Romanesque and Pointed Gothic having very strongly-marked peculiarities. The lead- ing characteristics, especially those of the former epoch, may be thus enumerated: The western porch, or narthex, either open, as at Autun, Beaune, Dijon, Paray-le-Monial and Semur; or closed, and forming spacious ante-churches, as at loumus, Vezelay, and formerly at Cluny. The strong Classic feeling in details and mode of con- struction, such as the employment of the fluted pilaster md the Corinthian capital. The ^ly use of the Pointed arch, almost stilted. The sculpture and the carving. The roofs, which are iither barrel- vaulted or groined domically, the diagonal rroining rib, though the arches be Pointed, being gener- illy absent; and The ornamental cut stonework externally forming •atterns, which is found only in the southern dis- ricts of the province, and which is really more char- cteristic of Auvergnat work. Most of the peculiarities above enumerated are not Dnfined to Bmrgimdy, but assert themselves more or !ss in the adjacent districts, as e.g. the Lyonnais, the N 193 194 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE Nivemais, the Bourbonnais and Franche Comt6. Even in the thirteenth century the Burgundians did not fear to preserve certain Romanesque ideas in the construction of the flying buttress, in the enlargement of ■windows, and in the development of the chevet. The whole of Burgundy was artistically under monastic rule, and acknowledged as its suzerain the Abbey of Cluny. The Order, started at the commence- ment of the tenth century, rapidly developed, and reached its zenith about the middle of the eleventh, its rule extending not only over the duchy but far beyond it. Indeed, the influence of this great monastic establishment on art, on letters, on civilization, and on the modem polity of all Europe, although it has never been completely realized, can never perish. Of the magnificent church of this abbey but scanty fragments remain. Including the narthex it measured 561 feet in length, and comprised a western ante-church of five bays with a single aisle on either side; a nave of eleven bays with double aisles; an aisleless transept with chapels opening from the eastern side of either area ; a choir of four bays with aisles, double as far as the lesser transept,* which interrupted it at the third bay; an apse, with d^ambulatoire and five chapels; and, at different points of the building, eight towers. In the heyday of the Cluniac Order 314 monasteries, scattered over the length and breadth of Europe, owned the sway of the Abbot of Cluny, who was really the head • The second or eastern transept of Canterbury Cathedral, introduced on the reconstruction and enlargement of the choir after the fire of 117O1 under William of Sens, was most probably borrowed from Cluny. We find it also in its full development in the cathedrals of Lincoln, Rochester, Salisbury and Worcester, and in the collegiate church of Beverley. It also appears in a minor form at Hereford and Wells. At York it seems to have formed part of the Norman church of Archbishop Roger, but its projection was small, and although reproduced on the rebuilding of the choir in the fourteenth century has been virtually lost in the increased breadth of the aisle. The eastern transept, without, however, any prolongation of the choir beyond it, is seen at Durham and Fountains. In France the only instance of this additional transept is the noble church of St Quentin in Picardy. BURGUNDY 195 of a little principality, coining his ovm money, and directing the affairs of the brotherhood without even admitting the dictation of the Pope himself. An attack on the monastery by an armed band of peasants, 29th July 1789, was frustrated by the townspeople of Cltmy, notwithstanding their chronic disagreements with its denizens. But by a decree of the National Assembly, 2nd to 4th November of the same year, the goods of the great house were confiscated. The monks were not immediately disturbed, but orders for their ejection were subsequently issued, and in October 1790 they were driven forth. The municipality of Cluny seems to have strained every nerve to save this magnificent church and to secure the monastic biuldings for some great public purpose, but their efforts were futile. It was not, how- ever, until 1801 that the work of demolition com- menced by driving a street right through the nave, whose breadth, including the double aisles, was 101 feet ; and although efforts were made to preserve the choir and the two transepts, neither the Government of the Empire nor the restored Bourbons took any heed, and the work of demolition, resumed in 1806, was carried on at inter- vals until 1817. Thus perished, by the insensate folly and the crass supineneSs of Frenchmen, a church which, had it been preserved, would have been one of the chief architectural glories of their country. Of the Roman- esque work the only portions existing are some frag- ments of the south wall of the nave and the south arm of the great transept, with its tower. As the visitor stands in this truncated fragment, whitewashed and inartistically furnished though it is at present, he can- not fail to be struck with the loftiness of the vaulted roof and the massive simplicity of the architecture, and can faintly conjure up a vision of what the stately Romanesque pile must have been in the days of its pristine magnificence. The chevet with its monoKth columns of rarest marble, and its Majesty painted in the conch-head, and still existing after the main portion 196 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE of the church had fallen, are described as awfully grand. Some of the later additions to the church, in the shape of three chapels and the sacristy, also escaped the general demolition. The domestic buildings of the abbey are to a considerable extent intact, and, as well as the portions just alluded to, are occupied by the Ecole Normale de I'Enseignement Sp6cial. It was at Vezelay, the greatest of the schools of Cluny, that crusades were preached in 1098, and again in 1146, and it was from there that in 1187 the Frank king, Philippe Auguste, and Richard I. of England, started for the Holy Land. Many monks and other learned men accompanied these crusades as missionaries, and some of them doubtless returned filled with delight for the masterpieces of art they had seen in far-off lands. For it was in the East that the old Greek tradition still lingered and the descendants of the old Greek artists still worked. This was to have an important influence on the ecclesiastical architecture of Burgundy; but there was another influence, equally powerful, which affected it much — ^the existence of many old buildings dating from the Roman occupation. At Autun, for instance, are two Roman gateways, in good preservation, besides other remains of classical antiquity. It is not surprising, therefore, to find in such twelfth-century works as Autun Cathedral (a secular church built in rivalry of the religious), in parts of the church at Beaune, and Paray-le-Monial, fluted pilasters with Corinthian capitals, which might be attributed to the second century a.d. ; and Classic ornament, such as the egg and dart, the fret, the leaf and dart, and the guiUoche, differing but slightly from that executed by Roman workmen in the days of the Empire. From illustrated monographs on the great church at Cluny, published prior to its demolition at the begin- ning of the last century, it is clear that the Pointed arch was used throughout its nave, although this part of the building was in progress during the first quarter of BURGUNDY 197 the twelfth century. In the nave of the equally splendid but happily-preserved church of the Madeleine at Vezelay, in progress almost simultaneously, the stilted semicircular arch is used throughout; but in the narthex, built between 1130 and 1150, all the arches are Pointed, excepting the one that supports the western gallery. It also appears in the nave at Autun, Beaune, Chalon-sur-Saone and Langres, the nave of the last- named cathedral being manifestly the child of Autun; so that from these facts the reader may draw his con- clusions that the Pointed form was in general use in Burgundy earlier than in any other of the architectural provinces save Provence. The perfect Cistercian church at Pontigny affords another and but slightly later illustration of the same phenomenon, rebuilt as it was between 1150 and 1170. This venerable church has such large claims upon the sympathies and interest of students of English Church history that a slight historical sketch may not be unacceptable. In the year 11 14 a certain priest named Ansius (said to be also known as Hildebert, Canon of Auxerre) applied to Stephen, Abbot of Citeaux, who happened to be an Englishman, to send some monks of the new Cistercian order to settle at Pontigny, and the consent of the Bishop of the diocese having been gained, this celebrated abbey was accordingly built and endowed for twelve monks. But " the holy life of the monks of Pontigny," to quote from the Gallia Christiana, " scattered its fragrance over the whole earth, seduced by which there came to Pontigny from all quarters per- sons remarkable for the grace of their conversation, of high descent, of great learning arid worth," so that it became necessary to rebuild the church and convent. In H50 the cloister, dormitory and church were rebuilt at the expense of Theobald, Count of Champagne. Of this great work the church stUl remaias to testify the severity of taste with which St Bernard inspired the whole Cistercian order. The church, built in the simple 198 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE style of the Transitional period, consists of a nave and apsidal choir with aisles intersected by a transept. There is a procession path round the apse, but no chapels. The fittings of the choir, which includes the two eastern bays of the nave, date from the beginning of the eighteenth century, but in other respects the church remains in the same state as when Thomas 4 Becket received in it the monastic habit at the hands of Guickard, the second £fl)bot, a.d. 1164. But the remembrance of Thomas k Becket is not the only link between the Church of England and Pontigny. Two other of our archbishops have found shelter here, and one of them still lies in the church. Stephen Langton, with some of the Chapter of Canter- bury, took refuge here from the t5n:anny of King John in 1207, and if the tradition be correct which assigns to Langton the existing division of our Bible into chapters and verses, Pontigny was most probably the scene of his labours in this respect. All to whom this convenient division is familiar have an interest in the scene of this achievement. But the crowning glory of this convent is the shelter it gave to Edmimd, Archbishop of Canterbury, who, with St Richard, his chancellor, spent some time here while prevented from returning to his church at Canter- bury. He died here in 1239, and his remains are still the object of veneration. Their translation to the position they now occupy, in the chevet behind the high altar, took place in 1244, ^ ^^^ presence of St Louis and Blanche, his queen ; and having fortunately escaped desecration at the Revolution, they continue to the present day in a state of preservation. The attach- ment of St Edmund to this place is shown by his bequest of an annual pension of ten marks, in memory of the hospitality shown to himself and his predecessors, Archbishops of Canterbury. For a catalogue of the many beautiful works of the Early and Late Pointed epochs with which Burgundy BE ^Bv ^ l'^ ^Mg IPRVflP^^''' ' ■ ^^^i^g^^jH ^^a>s'l£Si^M^I^-:' . .'^ -^ ^^li' ^!!/]HB ^^HH| ^^■■■■1 ' ■ -L.^.L-li^^ft^^jl m^^^^J^^^ _ BURGUNDY 199 is so richly endowed, I must refer my readers to the invaluable Manuel d'Archdologie Fratifaise, Tome I., of M. Enlart. In' this place I can mention only such typical productions of the thirteenth century, i.e., those contemporary with our " Early English," as Notre Dame, Dijon, the churches at Clamecy and Semur, the choirs of St Etienne, Chalon-sur-Sa6ne, St Etienne, Auxerre, and Notre Dame, Tonnerre, the church of St Pere and the choir of the Made- leine at Vezelay; the transepts and nave of Lyons Cathedral, the chapter-house of St Philibert at Tour- nus, and the great open western porch of the church at Beaune. To the latter part of the same century may be re- ferred the transepts and choir of the cathedral at Dijon, and to the two succeeding centuries the Flamboyant tower and spire, chapels, etc., of Autun Cathedral, the transepts, nave and west front of St Etienne at Auxerre, the choir of the Abbey Church at Souvigny, and the ele- gant church of Notre Dame de Brou near Bourg-en- Bresse. The western fagades of St Michel and the little Carmelite church at Dijon, and the south side of St Pierre at Tonnerre, will delight students of the Early Renaissance. In the south-eastern part of Burgundy the Romanesque architecture abounds in valuable material, much of it of an Italian character. The little mountain chapels of the Hautes Alpes and Savoie are worthy of much study on account of their simple effec- tiveness, while they have some details of great purity. The crypt of St Laurent at Grenoble is one of the most important pieces of Romanesque north of the Alps. At St Donat in Drome there is an admirable square tower. In fact these Italian-like bell-towers, square and plain, with arcaded belfries such as we see, too, in St Martin d'Ainay at Lyons, for instance, and at St Andr6 le Bas at Vienne, to wander a little beyond the pale, are as well worthy of study as the smaller trans- Alpine campanili. Burgundy presents much variety in the treatment 200 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE of the apse. Of Romanesque apses one of the most interesting is that of St Philibert at Touraus, so remark- able for its two-storeyed western narthex, tall, plain, cylindrical nave columns, and main-roof barrel-vaulted from north to south in a series of bays. Here the apse is encircled with an aisle from which three square- ended, two-storeyed chapels project. Cluny had a corona of five contiguous chapels, and the same arrange- ment may be seen at Langres and Vezelay. In the former instance the radiating chapels are Middle Pointed, and as such mar the unity of the beautiful Romanesque apse with its semicircular sweep of columns; but in the latter we have a perfect Burgundian First Pointed chevet, which in many respects may be compared with the Norman First Pointed one of St Etienne at Caen. The choir and choir aisles of Autun Cathedral were originally finished with semicircular aisleless apses. These existed until the middle of the fifteenth century, when they were rebuilt in their present angular, but still aisleless form. At Beaune, when the Romanesque choir was rebuilt in First Pointed days, the three low semicircular chapels were retained and incorporated in the otherwise reconstructed procession path. The choir of St Etienne at Auxerre, perhaps the iiiost exquisite architectural creation of the first half of the thirteenth century in Burgundy, was designed, like the earlier one at Sens, with a d^ambulatoire and only one chapel. This chapel, which on plan is a perfect square, is lighted on its north and south sides by two, and at its east end by three lancet windows all filled with superb stained glass of the same period. Two slender columns with stiff-leafed capitals stand at the entrance to this chapel from the diambulatoire, theit abaci serving to support not only the groining ribs of the vault over the aisle at this point, but also pUlarets from which spring the three arches opening into this chapel. Nothing can be more elegant than the manner in which the architect of this Lady Chapel at Auxerre has effected its junction with the great apse of the choir; BURGUNDY 2oi for though this was a difficulty which the French architects almost invariably surmounted with skill, the design, as may be seen from the illustration, has, in this instance, been carried out with more than ordinary success. The church at Semur-en-Auxois, remarkable for the narrowness of its nave and choir, has so many features in common with St Etienne at Auxerre as to incline one to the belief that it was the work of the same architect. Among them may be mentioned the cylin- drical columns carried round the apse in a dignified sweep; the triforium stage with its lancet arcades standing a little in advance of a blank waU; and the clerestory of two broad unfoliated lancets supporting a large circle filled with tracery. At Semur the three- bayed choir has double aisles. The outer one on either side is coincident only with the three bays, being blocked at its east end by one of the three large poly- gonal chapels opening from the procession path, which is a continuation of the inner aisle. Several large and important Burgundian churches have the polygonal apse without aisle or chapels. This arrangement seems to have been a common one in the province after the latter part of the twelfth century, probably from its connection with Germany, where the French chevet was rarely made use of, even in Complete Gothic times, and then only with partial success. Of the Burgundian churches exhibiting the aisleless apse the most interesting and important are the Transitional choir of Lyons Cathedral, the Early Pointed Gothic ones of St Etienne, Ch§lon-sur-Sa6ne, the churches of Notre Dame at Cluny, Dijon and Tonnerre, and the later ones of St Benigne (the cathedral) and St Michel at Dijon. In the neighbourhood of Semur is Flavigny, which no ecclesiologist should omit to visit, as its parish church of St Genes has a very good Early Pointed nave present- ing the unique arrajigement of rood-loft and triforium, by which an uninterrupted communication is formed £ill 202 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE round the interior of the structure westward of the tower. The town was formerly of some extent and import- ance; but the faubourgs were destroyed during the religious wars for the fortification of the place, and it has not recovered their loss. Before the Great Revo- lution Flavigny possessed, besides its parish church, another, belonging to a Benedictine abbey, one of those establishments with which Burgundy was more richly endowed than any other province. At the restoration of religious order under the Consulate only one of these was given back to the original uses, but the towns- people were permitted to decide which they would have, and they chose the parish church to which they had been accustomed. The abbey was in consequence suffered to fall into ruin, and on its subsequent demolition very few vestiges remained of what must have been an establishment of some magnitude. The plan of this church at Flavigny is singular. The nave, of six bays with aisles, and tribunes of the same height over them, is covered with one expanse of roof. Chapels were thrown out at a later period from the second, third and sixth bays of the north aisle, and from the third, fourth and fifth of the southern one. Some of these chapels rise to the full height of the nave walls. A square tower, surmounted by a short spire, stands between the nave and the choir, which is of three bays and equal in width to the nave and its aisles. There are no aisles to the choir, but on its south side is a large chapel reaching from the south-western pier of the tower to the apse, which is three-sided and lighted by long windows of two compartments. Transepts are not in evidence, but the tower is flanked on its north side by a low outgabling chapel, and on the opposite one by the prolongation of the chapel mentioned as joining the south side of the choir. The parts east of the tower and the interpolated nave chapels are of late and inferior architecture, but the nave is early and good. On either side of it are six Pointed LYONS 203 arches supported on slender attached shafts with boldly- foliaged capitals, and above these arcades is a range uniform in height and width, and opening to the spacious triforia or tribunes over the aisles. Each bay of either elevation is hghted by a single lancet window, at least in such parts as have not been disturbed by late accretions, those in the tribunes doing duty for clerestory windows after the manner of the Roman- esque churches in Auvergne. A short wall space inter- venes between the arches of the tribune and the vaulting, which is quadripartite, the transverse arches separating it into bays being carried upon shafts whose bases unite with those of the arcades opening into the aisles. Occupying the whole depth of the easternmost bay of the nave is the rood-loft — not a screen but a bridge formed upon a single arch. There is a narrow and in- convenient descent by a few steps into the triforium at each end of this /m6/. At the west the circuit is com- pleted by a vault thrown across the nave to a level with the triforium, and two whole bays in width. A wooden balustrade of the fifteenth century is inserted within the arcades of the tribunes and the western gallery. The rood-loft is of the same date and richly executed in stone. It is reached by stone staircases from the aisles, and steps from the interior lead to a doorway in the staircase on the south side. This jube at Flavigny is further remarkable for a pulpit which is thrown out from it on a corbel supported by the figure of an angel. It occupies the north-west comer of the jub/, the parapet of w^ich is made to pass round it. A gallery over the aisles and across the west end of the nave is not a Burgundian feature, but it is a recog- nized one in many of the twelfth and early thirteenth- century churches of the north-east, and in the smaller class of Rhenish churches. The speciality of this gallery at Flavigny consists in the completion of the circuit by its junction with the rood-loft. The primatial see of Burgundy is Lyons, founded in the second century by St Pothinus, an Asiatic Greek. 204 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE Of the five sees which at the present day are suffragan to it, three, viz., Autun, Dijon and Langres, are in Burgundy, and two, St Claude and Grenoble, in the adjacent provinces of Franche Comt^ and Dauphine respectively. The see of Dijon was created la 1731 and that of St Claude in 1742. Ch§lon-sur-Sa6ne and Macon, which had been suffragan to Lyons from time immemorial, were suppressed at the Concordat of rSoi, and have not since been re-established. Architecturally considered, Lyons is one of the most interesting and instructive of southern French Cathe- drals, but it has not been done justice to by the generality of writers. Taken all in aU, it is more imposing within than without, for although it has four towers, none are of sufiftcient magnitude to make it an important feature in the panorama of the city; and moreover, it stands crushed by the heights of Fourvi^reS, which rise at a short distance from the western fagade. Inside there is no rival to detract from the positive proportions of Lyons Cathedral, and the church pleases accordingly by the great height of its nave, its breadth, repose and deep solemnity. The plan of Lyons Cathedral is cruciform, compris- ing a short choir terminating in an aisleless apse, with square-ended aisles; transepts surmounted by low towers, an arrangement almost unique; and a nave of eight bays, with aisles, chapels, and towers flanking the western facade. Of these portions the choir is the earliest. It was begun during the latter part of the twelfth century, and although of comparatively modest dimensions is a remarkably graceful specimen of the Transitional period, recalling Sens and Canter- bury in some details. Here the round and the pointed arch appear ia juxtaposition, the former in the triforium, the latter ia the windows below it and in the clerestory; while in the fluted pilasters carrying the tref oiled arcading, which relieves the wall at the basement, and in those of the coupled triforium openings, we have one of those reminiscences of classical antiquity that are of LYONS 205 such constant occurrence in the mediaeval architecture of Provence and Burgundy. The seven windows in the lower part of the apse are tall simple lancets; those in the clerestory are of two small Pointed lights- without foliations, and the tracery between them and the com- prising arch assumes the form of a fleur-de-lys. The groining ribs of the apse start from the string-course above the triforium, but the cells, or spaces between them, are so completely filled by the clerestory windows, which from their style seem to be later insertions, as to leave but little of the vault visible. All the windows in the apse and clerestory of the choir are filled with thirteenth-century stained glass representing groups within medallions or large single figures. In the latter the drawing is somewhat crude, but the colouring is superb, and contributes in a remarkable degree to the grandeur and soleimiity of this part of the cathedral. In the choir aisles, which may be classed among the most beautiful works of the lancet period, the Pointed arch holds almost undisputed sway. Each aisle has two bays covered with vaulting, divided by its bold ribs into four cells. The east end of the northern aisle is lighted by a round-headed window, over which is a rose filled with tracery, composed of seven uncusped circles. The corresponding window of the opposite aisle is surmounted by a circle enclosing a quatrefoil. In order to bring the vault at the crossing to a height uniform with that of the nave, which is loftier than the choir and transepts, it was necessary to raise walls above the arches opening to those portions. Over the arch spanning the entrance to the choir is a large rose window with a lancet on either side of it, all filled with old stained glass, the corresponding space above the much narrower arch opening to either transept being relieved with four trefoiled arcades over which is a circle all unglazed. The transepts project one bay beyond the line of the nave and choir aisles, with which they are about equal in width, and as it was intended to make them 2o6 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE the bases of towers, they are square on plan. In these arms of the crdss all the beauties of the lancet stylfe are so fully and gracefuHy developed that more in- structive works oif their epoch could hardly be put before the student. One of the most interesting features of these tran- septs is the treatment of the arcading in the lower part of their eastern walls, the shafts on which the lancet arches are borne being composed of two, the base of the upper shaft resting upon the capital of the lower one. The northern and southern fronts of these tran- septs are lighted by one lancet vrandow separated from a circular one of twelve trefoiled compartments by arcading which is returned along the western and eastern sides. Over this arcading on the eastern side of either transept is a triplet of wide lancets, a similar triplet lighting the wall above the arches, which open into the choir and nave aisles. The old stained glass with which most of the windows in the transepts are filled contributes very materially towards the solemnity of this part of the cathedral. That in the lancet and rose at the extremity of each arm comprises either small figures or groups within medallions, while the triplets above the en- trances to the choir aisles are glmost entirely occupied by large single figures of Old Testament personages in the same archaic style as those in the clerestory of the choir and apse; but deficiencies of drawing in these figures are forgotten in our deUght at their superb coloration, which a recent cleaning has brought out in all its beauty. The nave of Lyons Cathedral, conceived on a far grander scale than the portions just described, presents at a first glance a uniform character. Examination, however, discovers that, although in the mass it is First Pointed, certain parts, particularly the lofty clerestory, call for distinct classification. For a century, commencing in 1270, the works were carried on by a .'i -i r^ tr- LYONS 207 succession of mattres d'ceuvre, whose names have been preserved in the archives of the building, terminating with that of Jacques de Beaujeu, first mentioned in 1370, and who died in 1418 after having completed the sumptuous western fa9ade and the grand rose window which adorns it. His successor, Jacques Morel, who was resident in Lyons between 1418 and 1425, attained considerable renown as a sculptor, one of his most admired works being the tomb of CharleSj Duke of Bourbon, in the abbey church at Souvigny. The latest portions of the nave consist in distinct additions to the primitive design in the form of chapels. Two of these on the south side of the nave are rich and good examples of the Flamboyant period, while others are illustrations of those uninteresting mutilations of original work which we have too often occasion to deplore. Sufficient remains, however, exist in the aisle walls to enable us to form some idea of their original thirteenth- century character. For instance, in one bay on either side towards the west is a pair of lancet windows, sup- ported on shafts, surmounted by a very deeply-cut quatrefoil and comprised within a deeply-splayed arch; and in the fifth bay of the north aisle a First Pointed doorway, above which is a quintuplet of arcades on tripled shafts. The tall columns which divide the nave from its aisles are cylinders with seven shafts crowned with capitals of the d crochet kind grouped round them, the eighth shaft, i.e., that on the nave side of each column, being represented by the vaulting shaft, which, except between the first and second bays, counting from the west, is prolonged to the floor. It is from the aisles that the full beauty of these " compound " piers in the nave of Lyons Ca,thedral can be most appreciated. The triforium, in the six bays counting from the east end of the nave, consists of two pairs of coupled lancet openings, elegantly shafted. These openings 2o8 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE are spanned by Pointed arches with unpierced t jnnpana, but in the two western bays, where the work is evidently of a more advanced character, the tjnnpana are pierced with quatrefoUed circles. In this form the triforium is returned across the west end, where, from the absence of the organ gallery, the whole of its elevation, terminat- ing in a magnificent Curvilinear rose, is laid open. The clerestory presents an interesting series of windows giving, in order, the gradation from plain lancets and circles without foliation to the perfect mullioned window with Curvilinear tracery. The nave is groined sexpartitely, one compartment of vaulting divided into cells covering every two bays, as at Bourges, Paris and Laon. Each of the eight bays of the aisles is vaulted quadripartitely. Of the chapels which have been thrown out from the aisles, that of St Louis, which extends along two bays of the southern one, is, taken on the whole, a model of well-conceived and well- executed splendour, which it is impossible to contem- plate without acknowledging that the Flamboyant style was capable of producing works in some respects worthy of being compared with the efforts of what we rightly regard as the better days of the art. In this chapel, which was founded by the Cardinal de Bourbon and his brother Pierre, son-in-law of Louis XL, the Flamboyant reigns with undisputed sway, and appears, with certain contrivances of construction and modes of enrichment, as novel as effective. Of its sumptuousness some idea may be derived from the accompanying illustration, which is reproduced from a drawing by Thomas AUom, a talented draughtsman of the eariier part of the last century (p. 210). The cathedral of Autun, situated in that most beautiful district of Western Burgundy known as the Morvan, bears, at a distance, with its graceful central spire and nave chapels, a Pointed, not a Romanesque appearance. But when we come to study its detail we shall find that it shows in its main portioijs a close AUTUN 209 imitation of the neighbouring Roman remains, particu- larly in the emplos^nent of that fluted pilaster which forms so graceful a feature in the Portes d'Arroux and St Andre — ^two Roman gates of the fourth or fifth century, and in a remarkably good state of preservation. Like many churches in this part of France the cathedral of Autun is dedicated to St Lazare, first Bishop of Marseilles. Until early in the twelfth century, when it was entirely rebuilt, Autun Cathedral had for its patron St Nazaire — an abbot of L6rins, near Cannes, in the fifth century, and said to have been a disciple of St Honoratus, afterwards Bishop of Aries. It is almost needless to say that the legend of Lazarus having been first Bishop of Marseilles has nothing but the grossest credulity for its support. The cult, how- ever, grew, and has had its influence on the Galilean Church. Lazarus, Martha and Mary, the legend runs, came to Marseilles, driven from the Holy Land by the persecution of the Jews. Martha was buried at Tar- ascon, Mary at V6zelay, and Lazarus at Autun. Thus it came about that upon the rebuilding of the old basilica in the twelfth century, it was thought that the bones of Lazarus must be somewhere in its precincts, whereupon it was re-dedicated, no longer to St Nazaire, but to Lazarus, who was raised from the dead. And here, affixed to the central pillar of the noble Romanesque portal forming the entrance to the cathedral through the narthex, may be seen the three effigies of Lazarus (vested in pontificalihus), Martha and Mary. This narthex is a magnificent, open, western porch, two bays deep, and divided into a nave and aisles corresponding with the three latertd portions of the church. The central division is covered with a Pointed barrel roof and opens to its aisles by very plain pointed arches on attached shafts with elongated capitals, whose style of ornamentation would indicate that this narthex was the latest addition to this Burgundian Romanesque cathedral. It was in all probability 210 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE completed about 1178. Rising above the first bay of either aisle, which is vaulted quadripartitely without ribs, and flanking an upper storey, is a square tower terminating in a low four-sided spire. Within each division of the narthex is a flight of steps rendered necessary by the slope of the ground from east to west, on which the cathedral is buUt, and contributing not a little towards the general impressive- ness of this dignified approach to the nave. The doorway at the summit of the central flight of steps is a superb specimen of mid-twelfth-century Romanesque. Some of its featmres, remarkably the tripled shafts, from which the elaborately-moulded arches spring, evince a very strong Byzantine feeling, like most southern French work of this period; but in the fluted pilasters which carry the lintel there is a strong evidence of that influence exercised by the remains of Classical antiquity which shows itself even more distinctly on certain details in the interior of the church. The composition of the sculpture within the tym- panum of this portal is grand but wild. As was customary, this space is filled with a representation of the Last Judgment, into which are introduced several devils of colossal proportions and of fearful aspect, who are seizing and tormenting the figures of the con- demned. An equally exaggerated figure of St Michael weighs a soul and protects it against the combined efforts of two of these demons, who endeavour to press close to the side of the Archangel. These are to the left hand of Our Saviour, who is seated in the aureole with both arms extended. The head is gone but the cruciferous nimbus remains. To His right are the blessed. A row of small figures, in attitudes corre- sponding with the two divisions above, form a frieze in the lintel, and deserve attention for the varied expres- sions which the sculptor has thrown into them. During some deplorable alterations to which the cathedral was subjected during the second half of the AUTUN CATHEDRAL : THE WESTERN PORCH LYONS CATHEDRAL : THE CHAPEL OF ST. LOUIS (From a. drawing by Thomas AlloHi; AUTUN 211 eighteenth century, under the influence of the Mar6chal de Richeheu, a friend of "Voltaire, this rich sculpture was plastered over — a. proceeding so far fortunate, since the plaster has all been removed and the whole work, with the exception of the head of the central Figure, has come down to us in a marvellously com- plete state of preservation. The ensemble of the cathedral from the north-west is very picturesque. Windows of the Flamboyant epoch (1460-70) light the chapels which flank the aisles; flying buttresses, whose vertical portions terminate in gables, have been added to the untouched Romanesque clerestory; the northern transept retains its twelfth- century fagade unimpaired; and a low Late Gothic tower, with one large pinnacled turret at its north- west angle, and smaller ones rising from a graceful parapet, crowns the intersection. This is surmounted by a tall crocketed spire without broaches or flying buttresses, but relieved on each side at its base by cusped arches surmounted by gables. Beyond the crossing is a choir of two bays in the same twelfth- century style as the nave, but the simple semicircular ■ apses, with which both it and the aisles originally ter- minated, were replaced during the Late Gothic period by polygonal ones with Pointed windows, from which the mullions and tracery have been removed, whereby they have been reduced to mere lancets. The central apse has five sides and each of the lateral ones three. However the earliest Romanesque may have originated in barbarous and unskilfiil imitations of Roman architecture, the later Romanesque, when it showed an inclination to imitate, as in the nave, tran- septs and choir of Autun Cathedral, which were in pro- gress between 1120 and 1150, was the very reverse of barbarous. Indeed we remark this in places where the existence of. Roman remains has influenced the architecture of the twelfth century. At Autun, for instance, the interior of the cathedral, with its fluted pilasters and its triforium arcade of round arches 212 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE separated by small pilasters, likewise fluted, all evidently adopted from Classical models, may be easily compared with the Roman Porte d'Arroux, to which allusion has been made; and the comparison wiU not be found disadvantageous to the later work. It would be difficult to point to an interior of its size more im- pressive in its general effect, or more pleasing in its general arrangement and proportions; and the devia- tion from the Roman type, such as the pointing of the pier arches, the barrel roofs,* and the composition of the vaulting pilasters, show no ordinary degree of thought. The two buildings which compare most favourably with Autun Cathedral as regards the early employment of the Pointed arch and its marriage with Classical details are, now that Cluny has been destroyed, the cathedral at Langres and the church at Beaune. But in both these buildings, where the capitals of the pilasters are much more directly adaptations of the Corinthian acanthus, Classicism is carried to a far greater extent than at Autun. Here the capitals are carved with subjects, each in itself forming a study. Not a few are strikingly curious, and it is interesting to find sub- jects from fabled as well as scriptural story illustrated in them. For instance, two capitals near the western entrance illustrate " Androcles and the Lion," and "The Wolf and the Stork." The latter subject, which is met with elsewhere than at Autun, t was a favourite one in Christian symbolical zoology. It illustrates the bold audacity and ingratitude of the wolf, and was used as a caution to Christian people to remember that there is danger even in doing an act of kindness. In this fable, the wolf is the type of vice in its most irevolting form, and the stork is the symbol * About the middle of the last century it was found that the original vaults were pressing the walls outward; they were replaced by vaults formed of earthenware jars banded with iron. t As for instance in the church of St Ursin at Bourges, on the main portal of the cathedral at Amiens, and on a misericoide in St George's Chapel, Windsor. AUTUN 213 o!f confiding simplicity, deficient in the cardinal virtue of prudence. Christian art, which represented vices and virtues in often not easily-intelligible forms, found in this fable an admirable and easily-decipherable moral lesson, which the most unlettered might read» on the importance of the cardinal virtue, the want of which caused the ruin of the otherwise irreproachable stork. Of the sacred subjects, that of the " Pelican in her Piety," upon a capital in the eastern limb, is perhaps the most striking. Indeed, the study of this cathedral may contribute to mature theories of the highest interest in the principles of Christian art, for during the time that it was in progress the cathedral school was being presided over by the famous Honorius, who composed a Liturgical Summa, in which are found the boldest ideas of Christian mysticism applied to the construction of churches. That which, above all, gives importance to the connection which may be established between the ideas of Honorius and those which are expressed on the pier capitals in Autun Cathedral is that Honorius affirms, in a passage of his works, that he has advanced nothing except on the testimony of ancient authors. According to a text of this author the south side of the nave, especially assigned to men, figures the combats which Jesus Christ, the Spouse of the Church, wages with the demon, and with the strongest tempta- tions, without any sensible consolation; the north side, especially assigned to women, figures, on the contrary, the sensible consolations which God ad- ministers to less strong souls, in order to support them in the way of the sacrifice which He demands from them. And so it is that demons are represented upon almost all the capitals of the south side, and, that one sees good angels on the capitals of the opposite one. The nineteen capitals on the south combme into a system in which they form six groups, corresponding to the six persecutions which the Church is destined to be subjected to, according to the ideas of Honorius 214 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE in his Gemma animce. The subjects of the twenty capitals on the north appear to have a special reference to the early days of the Church, in the bosom of the Sjmagogue, exposed to all the persecutions of foreign nations and to her own internal errors. He concludes this section with sa3nng that the whole sculpture of the church — ^the portal, nave and aisles — ^has for its end to trace the pictorial history of the Church's life in the midst of the agitations of earth. The triforium of tripled semicircular arches sepa- rated by classical fluted pilasters is carried round the interior of the church, including the north and south fronts of the transepts, imtil broken by the interpola- tion of the polygonal Late Gothic apse. In their Kirchliches Baukunst des Abendlandes (vol. ii. pi. 140) MM. Dehio and Bezold give a "restoration," no doubt very authentically, of the original Romanesque apse, in which this story of the elevation is shown, with one row of five round-headed windows above and two below it. In the north aisle of the nave, the walls, with the exception of their piers and arches, were entirely re- moved when the chapels were projected in the fifteenth century, but above the cusped and ogee-canopied arches opening into the southern range the upper part of the single roimd-headed windows which lighted this aisle may still be seen. One chapel on this side of the nave has a doorway of singular beauty. Cunningly wrought and brilliantly coloured, its tympanum is diarged with a group of the Blessed Virgin attended by angels. Another doorway, exhibiting equally choice Late Gothic workmanship, admits to the sacristies from the south transept. This portal has its ogee canopy richly finialed, crocketed and flanked by pinnacled buttresses, the actual door being obtuse-headed, with the space between it and the canopy relieved by an elongated circle filled with Curvilinear tracery of the greatest delicacy and refinement. The cathedral at Langres, on the confines of Bur- LANGRES 215 giindy and Champagne, has so many features in com- mon with that of Autun that it might be styled its off- spring. Cruciform in plan, but without the central tower, Langres Cathedral has a nave of six bays, tran- septs and a choir of one, bay terminating in a semi- circular apse, with, in this instance, an aisle, from which it is separated by two wide and seven narrow Pointed arches on monolithic columns of pink marble with Corinthian capitals. A very graceful band of moulding is carried round each arch, above which is a short imrelieved space of wall. Then we have a tri- forium consisting of two narrow round-headed arches to each bay springing jointly from a pillaret and sepa- rated by Corinthian pilasters ; and above this a clerestory of closely-set round-headed windows. The semi-dome of the apse is a plain conch without ribs powdered with gold stars. The grandly-dimensioned nave is separated from its aisles by Pointed arches springing from fluted pilasters, whose capitals as well as those which support the arches between each division of the Pointed barrel- vaulted roof partake entirely of the Corinthian char- acter. The triforium and clerestory are the same as at Autun, but the aisles have fortunately remained almost entirely undisturbed by any late accretions in the form of chapels. Westward the nave terminates in an organ gaUery supported on two tall Corinthian pillars, which originally formed part of the screen between the nave and the choir. This screen, a work of the Early Renaissance, harmonizes admirably with the style of the cathedral, and in its outline recalls the division between the nave and the chancel in Hawks- moor's grandiose Christ Church, Spitalfields. Beneath, this screen forms a spacious vestibule or narthex, which, together with the whole of the western fa9ade, whose flanking towers are crowned with balustrades, was built between 1761 and 1768 in the Italian style then pre- valent. There are several details of interest in the north aisle of the nave. At its west end a very beautiful doorway 2i6 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE of latest and richest Romanesque, but with an im- portation into it of Classical detail, opens into the vestibule just alluded to. From this doorway the view along the aisle is one of great impressiveness; equally fine are the views across the nave from this point. In the north wall of the same aisle a grilled archway opens into a large baptistery of very ornate PaUadian character, with a richly-vaulted roof and an elaborate coeval tessellated pavement. Next to this baptistery is the shrine of St Regne, whose effigy stands in a niche between two Corinthian pillars, with, on either side, an elongated panel enriched with sculpture from the life of Our Lord, the whole forming quite a gem of the Early Renaissance. Passing into the north transept the noble simplicity of Langres Cathedral is more powerfully felt than else- where. Perhaps the detail here is a thought richer than in the nave, a very highly-elaborated guipure or band of wrought stone being carried round the Pointed arches opening into the aisles of the nave and choir, as weU as below the triforium, which is similar to that of the nave, and, as at Autun, carried round the north and south fronts of the transepts. These are Ughted by large circular windows with six foliations of the plate- traceried kind. The effigy of Monseigneur Guerrin, (Bishop of Langres, 1852-77), kneeling upon a black marble sarcophagus, imparts additional solemnity to the northern transept. As at Lyons the sanctuary is formed beneath the crossing, which has a very fine quadripartite vault, the high altar — ^very simple and Classical — being placed beneath the eastern arch. The stalls for the clergy and choir are arranged in the bay intermediate between the crossing and the apse. Behind the? high altar is a lofty crucifix in wood and silver, a copy of the cele- brated one attributed to the sixteenth-centurs? artist, Gentrl, in the neighbouring church of St Martin. Its attendant figures are in silver, and the whole group, from its size, has a very imposing appearance from the DIJON 217 west end of the cathedral. Tall iron grilles and gates screen off the transepts and choir aisles from the sanc- tuary, the episcopal throne being placed against those on the north. Among the later additions to the cathedral the Early Middle Pointed window, which has been inserted in the clerestory of the choir on either side, deserves notice. Of the three lights composing these windows the central one is carried up to the point of the contaiaing arch, after the manner of the western window in All Saints', Margaret Street; the side-lights are lower and are surmounted by inverted trefoils. Excellent modem stained glass, representing full-length figures of saints and bishops, on blue grotmds, balanced by silvery grey in the canopy work, fills these windows, which, with the exception of the inferior Middle Pointed chapels radiat- ing from the procession path, and two sides of a truly beautiful cloister of the same period, appear to be the only structural additions or alterations of importance. The see of Langres was founded in the third century, and at the outbreak of the Revolution was suffragan to Besan^on. In 1731 a new see was created at Dijon, whose area was taken from a portion of that of Langres. At the Concordat of 1801 the see of Langres was sup- pressed and merged into that of Dijon, which, until the re-establishment of Langres, in 1817, included the adjacent departments of C6t^ d'Or and Haute Mame. Since then Langres has been suffragan to Lyons, with jurisdiction over the department of Haute Mame, while the C6t6 d'Or was assigned to Dijon. On the establishment of the latter see, in 1731, the Bishop's throne was placed in the now desecrated church of St Etienne, but, on the restoration of rehgious order in 1801 it was transferred to that of St Benigne, a Middle Pointed church of comparatively small dimen- sions occupying part of the site of one of the grandest Romanesque churches in Burgundy. This church was so materially damaged in 1271 by the fall of the central tower that its reparation appeared to present more 2i8 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE difficulty than the construction of an entirely new one, which was accordingly commenced on 7th February 1280: "Eodem anno (1271) die 14 Febr., mediae Turris inopino lapsu, antiqua ecclesia, Biunonis episcopi et Guillelmi abbatis opus, pene Integra coriuit, quam, an 1280 die 7 Febr. Hugo Abbas instaurare coepit a iiuda- mentis, ea forma, qua hodie amplissima cernitur." Index Abbatum. LXIV. Hugo II. cognomtnto de Arcu (eCArc). The efforts of seven years sufficed to re-establish the choir, which was consecrated in 1287, in order that the celebration of the Divine offices might suffer the least interruption; but that the church was unfinished at this time is demonstrated by the request of certain revenues destined to aid its completion by the Abbot Hugo. The eminent services rendered to his com- munity by this dignitary were rewarded at his death in 1300 by the honours of sepulture in the choir in front of the high altar. His successor continued the work as far as the west front, of which he buUt the tower at the south angle, at the foot of which he was interred in 1310. The following half-century would appear to have been employed in the endeavour to collect fimds for the prosecution of the undertaking; at length Alexandre de Montagu had the satisfaction to witness the termina- tion of these protracted labours, and then in the year 1393 he procured the solemn dedication of the entire church. Subsequently to this event are recorded the raising of a leaden steeple at the junction of the nave, transepts and choir; its destruction by lightning in 1506, and a repetition of the same calamity in 1625, which on this occasion extended its ravages to the greater part of the vaulting of the church. The dimensions of St Benigne, the cathedral of Dijon, are not vast. Cruciform in plan, it is distinctly Burgundian in its details. These are especially graceful in the early parts of the work, i.e., the transepts and short choir, which terminates in a three-sided apse lighted by two tiers of windows. There is no aisle DIJON 219 round the apse, but the side arches of the choir open into aisles likewise terminating in apses. This parallel triapsidal plan, which was common in Burgundy, is met with in Dijoft in the two grand churches of Notre Dame and of St Michel, the former, eclipsing the cathedral in size and beauty, being of the First Pointed age and the latter of the Flamboyant. The lower tier of windows which light the apse of the cathedral have two trefoiled compartments supporting a cinquefoUed circle. Be- tween these and the upper tier is a tref oUed arcade, and a short unrelieved space of wall. The upper windows, which are loftier, comprise three lights with tracery in the heads formed by a trefoil above either side-light and a large octofoiled circle in the head of the arch. Delicately-tinctured stained glass has been inserted in all these windows of recent years, whereby the solemnity of this part of the church has been much enhanced. The sanctuary is formed within the bay opening to the aisles, the chorus in the one beyond and in the apse. Wainscotting carved in the style prevalent during the Louis XV. period covers the walls above the stalls, and in the central compartment of the apse is a very pretty accompaniment organ of corresponding character, with, figures of angels upon its towers. Throughout the choir and transepts, which do not project beyond the aisles, and are lighted on their fronts by windows filled with very bold Geometrical Decorated tracery and placed high up in the walls, the detail is of a very refined character. In the nive, however, a great falling off is percep- tible. Here the columns carrying the five Pointed arches which divide it from the aisles are of cylindrical form set round with four slender shafts, the bells of whose capitals are devoid of foliaged ornament. Tripled shafts resting upon the capitals of these columns carry the various members of the quadripartitely- vaulted roof; the triforium consists of four Pointed openings pierced in the wall over each pier arch, and the clerestory windows have neither cusps to the lights nor 220 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE to the circles which form their tracery. Westwards the view is bounded by the usual gallery and organ ol imposing appearance with five towers and four flats of pipes, and bracketing out over the arch supporting the gallery is the choir organ of much smaller dimensions. An air of much dignity is conferred on the exterior of Dijon Cathedral by its uniform pair of western towers. At the point where they rise clear of the f agade they take an octagonal form in two storeys, finishing in pierced parapets within which rise low spires of the same shape, roofed, as is the rest of the cathedral, with red and green tiles. Fiaely-massed buttresses attached to the square portions of the towers at their north and south-west angles respectively are continued up the corresponding oblique sides of the octagons in the form of pinnacled turrets. This is a feature simple in itself, but it is only one out of many by means of which the skilful architect can invest an otherwise formal design with charm and piquancy. Between the towers and rising to about half the height of the fagade is a deep porch covered with a very steep lean-to roof which, cuts oH the lower part of the west window. The six hghts of which this window is composed support a corresponding number of circles, surmounted in the general head by three large ones. The lights as well as the circles are devoid of cusping and waUed up, a not uncommon practice abroad when the window is immediately behind the great organ. Above the one wide Pointed arch opening to the porch is a gallery lighted by a continuous series of un- glazed windows which, with one exception^ are composed of two Pointed openings supporting a foliated circle. As the gables with which it was probably intended to crown this range of openings are wanting, this other- wise very graceful feature has a somewhat unfinished appearance. (See illustration, p. 206.) Originally the tympanum of the doorway leading from this porch into the church was filled with con- temporary sculpture representing the Nativity and Epiphany of Our Lord, but this, having been almost DIJON 221 entirely obliterated by revolutionary violence, was re- placed by a group of the niart3n:dom of Stephen from the old cathedral, for which it was executed by the celebrated seventeenth-century sculptor, Bouchardon. As a work of its period this piece of sculpture is admirable, but it is hardly in accordance with its four- teenth-century environments. The roofs at the intersection of the nave, choir and transepts are crowned with a fleche designed about fifteen years ago by M. Suisse on the " motif " of those at Amiens and Notre Dame, Paris. This steeple replaces a taU, needle-like one which was constructed in 1742 by two clever carpenters of Dijon, Sauvestre and Lin- assier. Its removal was no doubt much regretted by many, who looked upon it as one of the most familiar objects in the panorama of the city, though it must be conceded that the present fleche is more in consonance with the building which it surmounts. Of the vast Romanesque church built at the com- mencement of the eleventh century by the Abbot GuiUaume, there are no traces above ground, but according to the plans given by Dom Plancher in his Histoire de Burgoyne, and by MM, Taylor and Nodier in their Voyages Pittoresques, it consisted of a nave of ten bays with double aisles, a transept, and a short choir, beyond which was a rotunda opening into the oblong chapel built by St Gregory, Bishop of Langres, in 506 to receive the remains of St Benigne. The rotimda, which was kept of the same breadth as the short eastern limb, and consisted of two concentric ranges of columns and narrow arches, had its counterpart, though with three aisles round it, in the ruined abbey church at Charroux, near Civray, in Poitou. It appears to have escaped in the general ruin caused by the fall of the central tower in 1271, and when the present church of St Benigne was begun to the west of it, was preserved, remaining behind the apse, but quite distinct from it, until the Revolution, when its destruction took place. The crypt beneath the rotunda still exists, and researches 222 SOUTH-EASTERN FRANCE undertaken here in 1858-59 found this substructure, whose plan is identical with that of the vanished upper church, to be almost entire. Some have considered that the semicircular apse represents the rotimda, simplified by the removal of the western portion of the circle so as to throw the adytum within view of the nave and choir. A very early example of this supposition may be adduced from the existing plan of the vast abbey of St Martin at Tours, which, having escaped destruction at the Revolution, was subsequently bought and razed to the ground by a private individual, who openly avowed his act as spring- ing from a hatred of Christianity. At Tours the chevet greatly exceeded a semicircle. It is more likely, how- ever, that the originals of the rotundas at Dijon and Charroux exist in the circular churches of Sta Costanza and San Stefano Rotundo, at Rome. INDEX Aix-bn-Pkovbncb Cathedral, 144 Albi Cathedral, 103-117 Altar-pieces at Perpignan, 125 AngoulSme Cathedral, 60 Angoumois, Romanesque of the, 53 Aquitaine, Church architecture of, S3-S9 Axles, St Trophime, 145 Auch Cathedral, 80-90 Autun Cathedral, 208-214 Auvergne, Church architecture of the, 153-162 Auxerre, St Etienne, 200 Avignon Cathedral, 144 ; churches, ISO Belfries, quadraQgular, near Tou- louse, 99 Beziers, St Nazaire, 129 Bordeaux Cathedral, 64-73 Bourges Cathedral, 181-192 Brick architecture of Languedoc, 92 Brittany, Church architecture of, 7-lS Building materials, in Auvergne, 155 ; Brittany, 7, liz ; Languedoc, 92 Burgundy, Church architecture of, 194 Cahors Cathedral, 63 Calvaries in Brittany, 10 Carcassonne, cathedral and churches at, 118 Cathedrals : Aix-en-Provence, 144 ; Albi, 103 ; Angoul€me, 60 ; Auch, 80 ; Autun, 208 ; Avignon, 144 ; Bordeaux, 64 ; Bourges, 181 ; Cahors, 63; Carcassonne, 118; Clermont-Ferrand, 175; Dijon, 217; Langres, 214; Le Fuy, 162; Limoges, 46; Lyons, 204; Mende, 132; Montpellier, 130; Perigueux, 59; Perpignan, 122; Poitiers, 29; Quimper,'2i ; Rodez, 73 ; St Brieuc, 20 ; St Flour, 138 ; Toulouse, 92; Vannes, 18 Chaion-sur-Sa6ne, 199, 201 Charente, La, architecture of, 53 Choir-stalls, at Albi, 115; Auch, 84; Poitiers, 38 ; Kodez, 78 Classic^ influence on architecture, of Burgundy, 143, 196 ; of Pro- vence, 142 Clermont-Ferrand Cathedral, 175- 180 Cluny, 194 Cordeliers, church of the, Toulouse, 102 Dijon Cathedral, 217-222 Domed churches of Aquitaine, 54 Doorways, at Aries, 145; Autun, 210; Bordeaux, 68; Bourges, 183 ; Poitiers, 40 ; Rodez, 77 Durandus, Bishop of Mende, 133 Flavigny, church and rood-loft at, 201 Jacobins, church of the, at Tou- louse, lOI Just, St, Narbonne, 128 Kreizkbr, the, St Pol de L^on, 9 La Charbntb, architecture of, 53 Langres Cathedral, 214 Languedoc, Church architecture of, 91 La Roche Morice, Ossuary at, 15 Laurent, St, Le Puy, 175 Le Dorat, church at, 44 Le Puy Cathedral, 162-175 Limoges Cathedral, 46-52 Lyons Cathedral, 204-208; St Martin d'Ainay, 148 223 224 INDEX Magublonnb, church at, 130 Martin d'Ainay, St, Lyons, 248 Mende Cathedral, 132 Michel, St, steeple of, Limoges, 45 Montpellier Cathedral, 130 / ' Organ-cases, at Albi, 113; Per- pignan, 126 ; Rodez, 79 Oriental influence on architecture of Western France, 57 Ossuaries in Brittany, 15 Paul Serge, St, Narbonne, 128 Perigufeux Cathedral, 59 Perpignan Cathedral, 123 Pierre, St, steeple of, Limoges, 4; Plougastel-Daoulas, Calvary at, 1 1 Poitiers Cathedral, 29-42 ; churches, 28 Pol de L^on, St, 8 Pontigny, abbey church, 197 Porches, at Albi, 108 ; Autun, 209 ; Bourges, 186 ; Le Puy, 162, 173 ; Montpellier, 131 Provence, architecture of, 141 Quadrangular belfries, in Lan- guedoc, 99 Quimper Cathedral, 21 Renaissance, the, in Brittany, 10 Rennes Cathedral, 16 Rodez Cathedral, 73-8o Romanesque architecture, of Aqui- taine, 53; Auvergne, 153 ; Brit- tany, 7 ; Languedoci 92 5 Pro- vence, 142 Rood-screens, at Albi, 114; Auch, 84; Flavigny, 203; Limoges, 52 ; Rodez, 77 Roussillon, 123 Sculpture, in Aquitaine, 56; in Provence, 145; at Autun, 210, 212 ; at Bourges, 184 Semur-en-Auxois, 201 Sernin, St, Toulouse, 96 St Brieuc Cathedral, 20 St Flour Cathedral, 138 St Pol de L^on, 8 Stained glass, at Auch, 86; Bordeaux, 73; Limoges, 50; Poitiers, 37 Tombs and monuments, at Limoges, 52 ; Perpignan, 125 Toulouse Cathedral, 92 ; St Sernin, 96 ; N6tre Dame du Taur, lOl ; churches of the Jacobins and Cordeliers, lOi Tournus, 200 Towers and spires, in Auvergne, 158; AngoulSme, 62 ; Avignon, 151 ; Bordeaux, 71 ; Brittany, 9; Dijon, 220; Le Puy, 174; Limoges, 45; Mende, 135; Poitiers, 41 ; Rodez, 75 Tracery, studies of, at Poitiers, 35 Transitional style, the, of Brittany, 8 ; of Poitou, 26 Trophime, St, Aries, 145 Urban IL, Pope, churches in France consecrated by, 155 Valence, 147 Vannes Cathedral, 18 Venantius Fortunatus, 42 Vexilla Regis, 42 Vezelay, abbey church at, 196 Vienna, St Maurice, 149 Window tracery at Poitiers, 35 COLSTONS LIMITED, rRIHTSKS, BDimUBGH