Normandy Picturesque Part 7

CHAPTER IX.

_ROUEN._

At a corner of the market-place at Rouen, there stood, but a few years ago, one of the most picturesque houses in all Normandy, and with a story (if we are to believe the old chroniclers) as pathetic as any in history.

It was from a door in this house that, in the year 1431, the unfortunate Joan of Arc was led out to be 'burned as a sorceress' before the people of Rouen. We need not dwell upon the story of the 'fair maid of Orleans,' which every child has by heart, but (mindful of our picturesque mission) we should like to carry the reader in imagination to the same spot just four hundred years later, when an English artist, heedless of the crowd that collects around him, sits down in the street to sketch the lines of the old building, already tottering to ruin.

Faithfully and patiently does the artist draw the old gables, the unused doorway, the heavy awnings, the piles of wood, the market-women, and the grey perspective of the side street with its pointed roofs, curious archways and oil lantern swinging from house to house; and as faithfully (even to the mis-spelling of the word 'liquer,' on a board over the doorway) almost indeed, with the touch of the artist's pencil, has the engraver reproduced, by means of photography, the late Samuel Prout's drawing on the frontispiece of this volume.[41]

Few artists have succeeded, as Prout succeeded, in giving the character of the old buildings in Normandy, and certainly no other drawings with which we are acquainted, admit of being photographed as his do, without losing effect. It is scarcely too much to say that in this engraving we can distinguish the different washes of colour, the greys and warmer tints, the broad touches of his pencil on the white caps of the women, and the very work of his hand in the bold, decisive shadows.

It is pleasant to dwell for a moment on Prout's work, for he has become identified with Normandy through numerous sketches of buildings now pulled down; and they have an antiquarian as well as an artistic interest. They are 'mannered,' as we all know, but they have more _couleur locale_ than any of the drawings of Pugin; and are valued (we speak of money value) at the present time, above the works of most water-colour painters of his time.

But we must not dream about old Rouen, we must rather tell the reader what it is like to-day, and how modern and prosaic is its aspect; how we arrive by express train, and are rattled through wide paved streets in an '_omnibus du Chemin de Fer_,' and are set down at a 'grand' hotel, where we find an Englishman seated in the doorway reading 'Bell's Life.'

Rouen is busy and thriving, and has a fixed population of not less than 150,000; situated about half-way between Paris and the port of Havre, there is a constant flow of traffic pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing, and its quays are lined with goods for exportation. In front of our window at the Hotel d'Angleterre, from which we have a view for miles on both sides of the Seine, the noise and bustle are almost as great as at Lyons or Ma.r.s.eilles. The Rouen of to-day is given up to commerce, to the swinging of cranes, and to the screeching of locomotives on the quays; whilst the fine broad streets and lines of newly erected houses, shut out from our view the old city of which we have heard so much, and which many of us have come so far to see. As we approach Rouen by the river, or even by railway, it is true that we see cathedral towers, but they are interspersed with smoking factory chimneys and suspension bridges; and although on our first drive through the town, we pa.s.s the magnificent portal of the cathedral and the old clock-tower in the '_rue de la Grosse Horloge_,' we observe that the cathedral has a cast-iron spire, and that the frescoes and carving round the clock-tower are built up against and pasted over with bills of concerts and theatres.

The streets are full of busy merchants, trim shopkeepers, and the usual crowd of blouses that we see in every city in France. There are wide boulevards and trees round Rouen; and if we look down upon the city from the heights of Mont St. Catherine (perhaps the best view that we can obtain anywhere) it may remind us, with its broad river laden with ships and its cathedral towers, of the superb view of Lyons that we obtain from the heights near the cemetery: the view so well known to visitors to that city. The people of Rouen who have spread out into the enormous suburb of St. Sever, on the left bank of the Seine,[42] are busy by thousands in the manufactories,--the sound of the loom and the anvil comes up to us even here; and down by the banks of the river, away westward, as far as the eye can see, up spring clean bright houses of the wealthy manufacturers and traders of Rouen,--rich, sleek, and portly gentlemen with the thinnest boots, who never even pa.s.s down the old streets if they can help it, but whom we shall find very pleasant and hospitable; and with whom we may sit down at a cafe under the trees and play at dominoes in the open street, in the middle of the day, without creating a scandal.

But if Rouen will not compare with Lyons in size, or commercial importance, it surpa.s.ses it in antiquarian interest; and we have chosen our ill.u.s.trations to depict it rather as it was, than as it is. We give a drawing of Joan of Arc's house rather than of a building in the 'rue Imperiale;' and a view of the old market-place in front of the cathedral rather than of the trim toy-garden at the west end of the church of St.

Ouen; and we do this, not only because it is more picturesque, but because the modern aspect of Rouen is familiar to the majority of our readers.

But we must examine the old buildings whilst there is time, for (as in other towns of Normandy) the work of demolition grows fast and furious; and the churches, the _Palais de Justice_, the courts of law, and the tower of the _Grosse Horloge_ will soon be all that is left to us. The narrow winding streets of gable-ended houses, with their strange histories, will soon be forgotten by all but the antiquary; for there is a ruthless law that no more half-timbered houses shall be built, and another that everything shall be in line.

We are surrounded by old houses, but cannot easily find them, and when discovered they almost crumble at the touch--they fade away as if by magic; and there is a halo of mystery, we might almost say of sanct.i.ty, about them which is indescribable; it is as if the blossoms of an early age still clung to the old walls and garlanded with time-wreaths their tottering ruins.

Rouen is disappearing like a dissolving view--a few more slides in the magic lantern, a few more windows of plate-gla.s.s, a few more '_grandes rues_' and the picture of old Rouen fades away.

Let us hasten to the _Place de la Pucelle_, and examine the carving on the houses, and on the _Hotel Bourgtheroude_, before the great Parisian conjuror waves his wand once more. But, hey presto! down they come, in a street hard by--even whilst we write, a great panel totters to the ground--heraldic shields, with a border of flowers and pomegranates, carved in oak; cl.u.s.ters of grapes and diaper patterns of rich design, emblems of old n.o.bility--all in the dust; a hatchment half defaced, a dragon with the gold still about his collar, a bit of an eagle's wing, a halberd snapped in twain--all piled together in a heap of ruin!

A few weeks only, and we pa.s.s the place again--all is in order, the 'improvement' has taken place; there is a pleasant wide _pave_, and a manufactory for '_eau gazeuse_.'

The cathedral church of Notre Dame (the west front of which we have seen in the ill.u.s.tration), and the church of St. Ouen, the two most magnificent monuments in Rouen, are so familiar to most readers that we can say little that is new respecting them. When we have given a short description, taken from the best authorities on the subject, and have pointed out to artistic readers that this west front with its surrounding houses, and the view of the towers of St. Ouen from the garden, at the _east_ end, are two of the grandest architectural pictures to be found in Normandy, we shall have nearly accomplished our task.[43]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CATHEDRAL OF 'NOTRE DAME' AT ROUEN.

"Like a piece of rockwork, rough and encrusted with images, and ornamented from top to bottom."]

'The cathedral of Notre Dame occupies with its west front one side of a square, formerly a fruit and flower market. The vast proportions of this grand Gothic facade, its elaborate and profuse decorations, and its stone screens of open tracery, impress one at first with wonder and admiration, diminished however but not destroyed, by a closer examination; which shows a confusion of ornament and a certain corruption of taste.

'The projecting central porch, and the whole of the upper part, is of the sixteenth century, the lateral ones being of an earlier period and chaster in style. Above the central door is carved the genealogy of Jesse; over the north-west door is the death of John the Baptist, with the daughter of Herodias dancing before Herod; and above them, figures of Virgin and Saints.

'The north tower, called St. Romain (the one on the left in our ill.u.s.tration), is older in date, part of it being of the twelfth century; the right-hand tower, which is more florid, being of the sixteenth.' The central spire in the background is really of _cast iron_, and stands out, it is fair to say, much more sharply and painfully against the sky, than in our ill.u.s.tration.[44] We must not omit to mention the beautiful north door, called the 'Portail des Libraires,' which in Prout's time was completely blocked up with old houses and wooden erections.

'On entering the doorway of the north porch (says _Ca.s.sell_), the visitor will be struck with the size, loftiness, and rich colour of the interior, 435 feet long and 89 feet high. The 'clerestory' of the sixteenth century is full of painted gla.s.s. On each side of the nave there is a series of chapels, constructed in the fourteenth century, between the b.u.t.tresses of the main walls; they are full of very fine stained gla.s.s, and contain good pictures and monuments. The transepts are remarkable for their magnificent rose-windows, and in the north transept there is a staircase of open-tracery work of exquisite workmanship.

'The choir, separated from the nave by a modern Grecian screen, was built in the thirteenth century, the carving of the stalls is extremely curious. The elaborately carved screen in front of the sacristy was executed in the latter part of the fifteenth century, and its wrought-iron door must not be pa.s.sed unnoticed.'[45]

The Church of St. Ouen 'surpa.s.ses the cathedral in size, purity of style, masterly execution, and splendid, but judicious decoration, and is inferior only in its historic monuments. It is one of the n.o.blest and most perfect Gothic edifices in the world.' Thus it has been described again and again; suffice it for us to mention a few details of its construction. It is said that the abbey of St. Ouen was orginally built in 533, in the reign of Clothaire I., and then dedicated to St. Peter.

Through various changes of construction and destruction, it holds a prominent part in the history of the time of the Conqueror and the Dukes of Normandy; and it was not for a thousand years after its foundation that the present building was completed. 'During the troubles of the times of the Huguenots in the sixteenth century, it suffered greatly, especially in 1562, when the fanatics lighted bonfires inside, and burnt the organ, stalls, pulpit, and vestments.' Again at the end of the eighteenth century, 'the building was exposed to the fury of the Revolutionists, when it was used as a manufactory of arms; a forge being erected within it and the painted windows so blackened as to become indecipherable; and later still, 'in the time of Napoleon I., a project was laid before him, by the munic.i.p.ality of Rouen, for destroying the church altogether!'

Perhaps there is no monument that we could point to in Europe which has a more eventful history, or which, after a lapse of thirteen hundred years, presents to the spectator, in the year 1869, a grander spectacle.

If we walk in the public gardens that surround it, and see its towers, from different points, through the trees, or, better still, ascend one of the towers and look down on its pinnacles, we shall never lose the memory of St. Ouen. The beautiful proportions of its octagon tower, terminating with a crown of _fleurs de lis_, has well been called a 'model of grace and beauty;' whilst its interior, 443 feet long and 83 feet wide, un.o.bstructed from one end to the other, with its light, graceful pillars, and the coloured light shed through the painted windows, have as fine an effect as that of any church in France; not excepting the cathedrals of Amiens and Chartres.

We should not omit to mention the beautiful church of St. Maclou at Rouen, and several others that are being preserved and restored with the utmost care. The great delights of this city are its ecclesiastical monuments; for if Rouen has become of late years (as in fact it has) a busy, modern town; if its old houses and streets are being swept away, its churches and monuments remain. And if, as we have said, the inhabitants are p.r.o.ne to imitate many English habits and customs, there is one custom of ours that they do not imitate--they do not 'religiously' close nearly every church in the land for six days out of the seven; their places of worship are not shut up like dungeons, they are open to the breath of life, and partake of the atmosphere of the 'work-a-day' world.[46] In England we dust out our earthy little chapels on Sat.u.r.days, and we complete the process with silken trains on Sundays; we worship in an atmosphere more fit for the dead than the living, and in a few hours shut up the buildings again to the spiders and the flies!

We have little more to say to the reader about the churches in Normandy, and we should like to leave him best at the south-west corner of the square in front of the Cathedral (close to the spot from which M.

Clerget has made his drawing), where he may take away with him an impression of the wealth and grandeur of the architecture of Normandy, pleasant to dwell upon.

If we do not examine too closely into 'principles,' or trouble our minds too much with 'styles' of architecture, the effect that we obtain here will be completely and artistically beautiful, and satisfying to the eye. It is not easy to point out any modern building that fulfils these conditions; where, for instance, can we see anything like the work that was bestowed on the lower portion of this facade? We may spend more money and effort, but we do not achieve anything which seems to the spectator more spontaneously beautiful (if we use the word aright); anything displaying more wealth of decoration, combined with grandeur of effect. Severe, we might say austere, critics speak of the 'confusion of ornament,' and tell us that the over-elaboration of carving on the exterior of this cathedral is a sign of decadence, and that the principles on which the architects of Caen and Bayeux worked were more n.o.ble and worthy; whilst architects will tell us that Gothic art was generally 'debased' at Rouen,--debased from the time when people gave themselves up to the luxury of the Renaissance, and 'pride took the place of enthusiasm and faith, in art.'

We might, indeed, if we chose to make the comparison for a moment between Christian and Mahommedan art, see a higher principle at work in the construction of the mosques and palaces of the Moors, where simplicity, refinement, and truth are noticeable in every line; we might see it in mauresque work, in the absence of grotesque images, or the imitation of living things in ornament; but, above all, in the severe simplicity and grandeur of their _exteriors_, and in the decoration, colour, and gilding of their interior courts alone,--carrying out, in short, the true meaning of the words that, the king's daughter should be--'all glorious within, her clothing of wrought gold.'

On one Sunday morning at Rouen we go with 'all the world' to be present at a musical ma.s.s at the cathedral, and to hear another great preacher from Paris. It was a grander performance than the one we attended at Caen; but the sermon was less eloquent, less refined, and was remarkable in quite a different way. It was a discourse, holding up to his hearers, as far as we could follow the rapid flow of his eloquence, the delight and glory of 'doing battle for Right'--of fighting (to use the common phrase) the 'fight of Faith.'

But he was preaching to a congregation of shopkeepers, traders, and artisans, and his appeal to arms seemed to fall flatly on the trading mind; whilst the old incongruity between the building and the dress of the nineteenth century, was as remarkable as it is in Westminster Abbey; and the contrast between the unchivalrous aspect of the speaker, and the tone of his language, was more striking still.[47]

What priest or cure, in these days, stands forth in his presence or influence, as the ideal champion of a romantic faith, the ceremonials of which seem more and more alienated from the spirit of the nineteenth century--at least in the north of Europe, where colour, imagination, and pa.s.sion have less influence? What real sympathy has the kind, fat, fatherly figure before us with soldiers, saints, or martyrs?[48]

He preached for nearly an hour, with frequent pauses and strange changes in the inflexion of the voice. We will not attempt a repet.i.tion of his arguments, but must record one sentence in an extempore sermon of great versatility and power; a sentence that, if we understood it aright, was singularly liberal and broad in view. Speaking of the rivalry that existed between the different sects of Christians, and making pointed allusion to the colony of protestant Huguenots established at Beuzeval on the sea-sh.o.r.e, he ended with the words, 'Better than all this rivalry and strife (far better than the common result amongst men, indifference) that, like ships becalmed at sea,--when a religious breeze stirs our hearts--we should raise aloft our fair white sails and come sailing into port together, lowering them in the haven of the one true church.'

He made a pause several times in his discourse, during which he looked about him, and mopped his head with his handkerchief, and behaved, for the moment, much more as if he were in his dressing-room than in a public pulpit; but he held his audience with magic sway, his influence over the people was wonderful--wonderful to us when we listened to his imagery, and to the means used to stir their hearts.[49]

In the picturesque and moving times of the middle ages it must surely have needed less forcing and fewer formulae to 'lift up the hearts of the people to the Queen of Heaven;' if it were only in the likeness of the black doll, which they worship at Chartres to this day. But until we realise to ourselves more completely the lives of warriors in mediaeval days, we shall never understand how chivalry and the worship of beauty entered into their hearts and lives, and was to them the highest and n.o.blest of virtues; nor shall we comprehend their ready acceptance of the adoration of the Virgin as the one true religion.

In such a building as the cathedral at Rouen, it is impossible to forget the people who once trod its pavement; memories that not all the modern paraphernalia and glitter can obliterate. If we visit the cathedral after vespers, when the candles in the Lady-chapel look like glowworm-lights through the dark aisles, we are soon carried back in imagination to mediaeval days. The floor of the nave is covered with kneeling figures of warriors, each with a red cross on his breast; the pavement resounds to the clash of arms; there is a low chorus of voices in prayer, a sound of stringed instruments, a silence--and then, an army of men rise up and march to war. There is a pause of six hundred years, and another procession pa.s.ses through these aisles; the pavement resounds to less martial footsteps,--they are not warriors, they are 'Cook's excursionists'!

Let us now leave the cathedral, and see something more of the town.

It is a fine summer's afternoon, in the middle of the week, the air is soft and quiet; the busy population of Rouen seem, with one consent, to rest from labour, and the G.o.ddess of Leisure tells her beads. One, two (decrepit old men); three, four, five (nurses and children); six, seven, eight (Cha.s.seurs de Vincennes or a 'n.o.ble Zouave),' and so on, until the Rosary is complete and there are no more seats.[50] Every day under our windows they come and wedge themselves close together on the long stone seats under the dusty trees, to rest; and thread themselves in rows one by one, as if some unseen hand were telling, with human beads, the mystery of the Rosary.

Why do we speak of what is done every day in every city of France?

Because it is worth a moment's notice, that in the day-time of busy cities men can, if they choose, find time to rest. There are gardens open, and seats provided in the middle of the cities, so that the poor children need not play on dustheaps and under carriage-wheels. There is a small open square in the heart of Rouen, laid out with rocks and trees, and a waterfall, which we should dearly like to shew to certain 'parish guardians.'

The modern business-like aspect of Rouen communicates itself even to religious matters, and before we have been here long, we think nothing of seeing piles of crucifixes, and 'Virgins and children', put out in the street in boxes for sale, at a 'fabrique d'ornaments de l'eglise.'

We, the people of Rouen, do a great business in _chasublerie_, and the like; we drive hard bargains for images of the Saviour in zinc and iron (they are catalogued for us, and placed in rows in the shop windows); we purchase _lachryma Christi_ by the dozen; and, for a few sous, may become possessed of the whole paraphernalia of the Holy Manger.

We have been cheated so often at Rouen, that we are inclined to ask the question whether we, English people, really possess a higher working morality than the French. Are we really more straightforward and honourable than they? Are there bounds which they overstep and which we cannot pa.s.s? It has been our pride for centuries to be considered more n.o.ble and manly than many of our neighbours; is there any reason to fear that our moral influence is on the wane, in these days of universal interchange of thought, free-trade, and rapid intercommunication?

In the course of our journey through Normandy, we have not said much about modern paintings, but at Rouen we are reminded that there are many French artists hard at work. The most prominent painters are those of the school of Edouard Frere, who depict scenes of cottage life, with the earnestness, if not always with the elevated sentiment of Mason, Walker, and other, younger, English painters. The works of many of these French artists are familiar to us in England, and we need not allude to them further; but there is an exhibition of water-colour drawings at Rouen, about which we must say a word.[51]

These sketches of towns in Normandy, and of pastoral scenes, have a curious family likeness, and a mannerism which the French may call '_chic_,' but which we are inclined to attribute to want of power and patient study. There is an old-fashioned formality in the composition of their landscapes, which does not seem to our eyes to belong to the world of to-day, and a decidedly amateurish treatment which is surprising.

They repeat themselves and each other, without end, and evidently are thinking more about _Beranger_ than the places of which he sang; they would seek (as some one expresses it) to 'reconcile literal facts with rapturous harmonies,' in short they attempt too much, and accomplish too little. In form and feature, these pictures remind us (like Rouen itself) of a bygone time, when travelling on the Continent was difficult and expensive, and views of foreign towns were not easy to obtain; when some distinguished amateur (distinguished, perhaps, more for his courage and industry than for his art) visited the Continent at rare intervals, and brought home in triumph a few hazy sketches of a people that we had scarce heard of, and hardly believed in; and had them engraved and multiplied, for the art-loving amongst us, as the best treasures of the time.

The modernised aspect of Rouen is one that we (as lookers-on merely) shall never cease to regret, because it is the town of all others which should tell us most of the past; and it is, moreover, the one town in Normandy which most English people find time to see.