The Cathedrals and Churches of the Rhine Part 22

After long pondering, the priest's advice was taken; and, in the gloom of night, the architect hurried tremblingly to the place of meeting.

True to his time, the fiend was there, and, with a smile, complimented the architect on his punctuality. Drawing from his doublet two parchments, he opened one, on which was traced the outline of the cathedral, and then another written in some mysterious character, and having a s.p.a.ce left for a signature.

"Let me examine what I am to pay so dearly for."

"Most certainly," said the demon, with a smile, and a bow that would have done honour to the court of the emperor.

Pressing it with one hand to his breast, the architect with the other held up the holy bone, and exclaimed: "Avaunt, fiend! In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Virgins of Cologne, I hold thee, Satan, in defiance;" and he described the sign of the cross directly against the devil's face.

In an instant the smile and the graceful civility were gone. With a hideous grin, Satan approached the sacred miracle as though he would have strangled the possessor; and, yelling with a sound that woke half the sleepers in Cologne, he skipped round and round the architect.

Still, however, the plan was held tightly with one hand, and the relic held forward like a swordsman's rapier with the other. As the fiend turned, so turned the architect; until, bethinking himself that another prayer would help him, he called loudly on St. Ursula. The demon could keep up the fight no longer; the leader of the Eleven Thousand Virgins was too much for him.

"None but a confessor could have told you how to cheat me," he shrieked in a most terrible voice; "but I will be revenged. You have a more wonderful and perfect design than ever entered the brain of man. You want fame,--the priest wants a church and pilgrims. Listen! _That cathedral shall never be finished, and your name shall be forgotten!_"

As the dreadful words broke upon the architect's ear, the cloak of the Tempter stretched out into huge black wings, which flapped over the spot like two dark thunderclouds, and with such violence that the winds were raised from their slumber, and a storm rose upon the waters of the Rhine. Hurrying homewards, the relic raised at arm's length over his head, the frightened man reached the abbot's house in safety. But the ominous sentence still rang in his ears,--"_Unfinished and forgotten_."

Days, months, years pa.s.sed by, and the cathedral, commenced with vigour, was growing into form. The architect had long before determined that an inscription should be engraved upon a plate of bra.s.s shaped like a cross, and be fastened upon the front of the first tower that reached a good elevation. His vanity already antic.i.p.ated a triumph over the Fiend whom he had defrauded. He was author of a building which the world could not equal, and, in the pride of his heart, defied all evil chances to deprive him of fame. Going to the top of the building to see where his name should be placed, he looked over the edge of the building to decide if it was lofty enough to deserve the honour of the inscription, when the workmen were aware of a black cloud which suddenly enveloped them, and burst in thunder and hail. Looking around, when the cloud had pa.s.sed away, _their master was gone!_ and one of them declared that amidst the noise of the explosion he heard a wail of agony which seemed to say, "_Unfinished and forgotten_."

When they descended the tower, the body of the architect lay crushed upon the pavement. The traveller who beholds the building knows of the difficulties which beset its completion, and thousands have since then sought in vain to learn the name of "The Architect of Cologne," although of late years--though with some doubt it is stated--his name and fame appear to have been established.

_The Pfaffen Thor_

When Archbishop Conrad of Hochsteden, the founder of the cathedral, had been gathered to his fathers, Engelbrecht of Falkenberg reigned over Cologne in his stead; and a fearful tyrant he became.

As in the case of the spiritual lords who ruled over Liege, the crozier of the archbishop became a rod of iron to the citizens, until at length they were goaded to open rebellion. In their contests for liberty, they were led by Hermann Grynn, a townsman who had put aside the peaceful pursuit of his trade to do battle in the good cause of his native city, and to maintain the privileges which his fathers had purchased, not only with their gold, but with their blood.

After numerous contests between the burghers and their oppressors, the cause of the many was triumphant, and the archbishop was glad to agree to terms which he before had spurned. But the truce he sought was hollow and unfaithful, and he was heard to say that, if Hermann Grynn were removed, he would be able to take away the privileges he had surrendered to the townsmen.

This treacherous speech was greedily received by two priests, who determined to advance their own welfare by the downfall of the citizen-patriot. Making the acquaintance of Hermann, whose honest nature suspected no treachery, they wormed themselves into his confidence, and at a fitting opportunity invited him to the cathedral to see its hidden beauties and great store of riches. Leading him from chapel to cloister, and through chamber after chamber, they came at length to a door which they said contained the richest sight of all; and one of them, unlocking the door, invited the citizen to enter. No sooner had he crossed the threshold than the thick portal was closed suddenly upon him, and, at the same moment, he heard the roar of some wild animal, and saw fixed upon him two fierce eyes gleaming with hunger and savage rage.

Hermann Grynn was a man for emergencies. Rapidly twisting his cloak around his left arm, and drawing his short sword, he prepared for the attack; nor had he long to wait. With a growl of triumph, a huge animal sprang upon him with open jaws; but with admirable coolness the hero received his a.s.sailant upon the guarded arm, and, whilst the brute ground its teeth into the cloak, he thrust his sword into its heart.

Searching around the chamber, he was aware of a window concealed by a shutter, and, opening this, he looked forth into the streets, where a great crowd was collected around a priest, who went along telling some tale which seemed to move the people to deep grief. As the throng drew nearer, he listened eagerly, and heard with surprise "how the good burgess Hermann Grynn, the friend of the people, and the well-beloved ally of the Church, had without advice sought a chamber where a lion was in durance, and had fallen a sacrifice to his unhappy curiosity."

Burning with rage and a determination to expose the treachery of the priests, he waited till the crowd came beneath the window from which he looked; and then, dashing the gla.s.s into a thousand pieces, he attracted attention to the spot, and, leaning half out of the opening, displayed his well-known cap in one hand and his b.l.o.o.d.y sword in the other. He was almost too high to be heard, but the faint echo of his war-cry was enough to convince the people of his ident.i.ty, and with one voice they shouted: "To the rescue!" Forcing their way into the cathedral, they quickly released their leader, and, learning from him the story of cruel treachery, the two priests were ferreted from their hiding-places, and hanged by the neck in the room over the body of the dead lion. To this day the portal they slammed on Hermann Grynn is known as the _Pfaffen Thor_,--the priest's door,--whilst over the gate of the venerable town hall of Cologne may yet be seen, graven in stone, the fight of the citizen-patriot with the hungry lion of the cathedral.

These two legends refer solely to the cathedral. There is, in addition, the rather more familiar one of "St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins."

And, besides legends, there is much real symbolism that peeps out wherever one turns. The skulls of the "Three Kings" still grin from under their crowns in the cathedral, as they did when Frederick Barbarossa stormed Milan and brought back these relics of the three _Magi_. Beneath the pavement of the cathedral lies buried the heart of Marie de Medici, who, in her fallen fortunes, died at Sternen-Ga.s.se 10, in the house where Peter Paul Rubens was born.

In a rather roundabout way the name of one great in letters is a.s.sociated with Cologne. Petrarch came here on his way from Avignon to Paris in 1331, and the superb beginnings of the new cathedral inspired him with the most profound admiration. In a letter which he addressed to his friend and protector, Jean Colonna, he said: "I have seen in this city the most beautiful temple; yet incomplete, but which is truly ent.i.tled to rank as a supreme work."

It was a fortunate day for the history of the church at Cologne when the Evangelist first preached the gospel in the city of Colonia Agrippina.

In those days the primitive church sheltered itself modestly under the shadow of the Roman fortress, whereas to-day the great cathedral rises, stately and proud, high above the fortification of the warlike Teuton--if he really be warlike, as the statesmen of other nations proclaim.

When Charlemagne fixed his official residence at Aix-la-Chapelle, he placed his imperial palace in the diocese of Cologne; the two cities together, by reason of their power and importance, standing as a symbol of mightiness which did much to make the great, unwieldy dominion of the Carlovingian Emperor hang together.

It has been claimed, and there certainly seems some justification for it, that the general plan of the cathedral at Cologne is similar to that of Notre Dame d'Amiens; there is something about the general scale and proportions that makes them quite akin. Perhaps this is due to the particularly daring combination of its lines and the general hardiness of its plan and outline. These features are certainly common to both in a far greater degree than are usually found between two such widely separated examples. At any rate, it is perhaps as safe a conjecture as any, since the hand that traced the plan of Cologne is lost in doubtful obscurity, to consider that there is something more than an imaginary bond between the cathedrals of Amiens and Cologne.

A resemblance still more to be remarked is the great height of the choir and nave. This is most marked at Amiens and still more so at Beauvais.

Cologne, as to these dimensions, ranks between the two.

There was once a Romanesque cathedral at Cologne, but a fire made way with it in 1248. Certain facts have come down to us regarding this earlier building, but they appear decidedly contradictory, though undoubtedly it was an edifice of the conventional Rhenish variety. It is supposed that this original cathedral had at least a "family resemblance" to those at Mayence, Worms, and Speyer.

These three great ecclesiastical works in the Rhine valley mark the Hohenstaufen dynasty as one of the most prolific in German church-building. Although they are not as beautiful as one pictures the perfect cathedral of his imagination,--at least no more beautiful than many other hybrid structures,--they show an individuality that is peculiarly Rhenish, far more so than the present cathedral at Cologne or any of the smaller churches of the region.

After the fire in 1248 a new cathedral was planned as a commensurate shrine in which to shelter the relics of the "Three Wise Men of the East," which henceforth were to be known as "The Three Kings of Cologne." From this period on, Cologne began to acquire such wealth and prominence as to mark the era as the "Golden Age" in the civic and ecclesiastical affairs of the city.

Abandoning the _basilica_ plan entirely, a great Gothic church was undertaken. In its way it was to rival those Gothic masterpieces of France.

The origin of the plan of the cathedral in fact, as well as in legend, is vague. Some have considered Archbishop Engelbert, Count of Altona and Berg, who was murdered in 1225, as the author, but this can hardly have been so, unless it were conceived before the _basilica_ was burned.

a.s.siduous research has been made from time to time in an effort to discover the ident.i.ty of the actual designer of the present cathedral: Archbishops Engelbert and Conrad, Albertus Magnus, Meister Gerard, and others have all had the honour somewhat doubtfully awarded to them and again withdrawn.

There is a great painting exhibited at Frankfort called "Religion Glorified by the Arts," by Overbeck, wherein is an ideal portrait of the "Great Unknown of Cologne" pictured as the genius of architecture.

A comparatively recent discovery seems to award the honour to Gerard de St. Trond. A charter of 1257 makes mention of the fact that the chapter of the cathedral had given a house, for services rendered, to one Gerard, "a stone-cutter," who had directed the work of construction; this gift being made some years after the foundations were first laid.

The same architect figures among the benefactors of the hospital of St.

Ursula as "the master of the works at the cathedral." Perhaps, then, the name of Gerard de St. Trond deserves to be placed with that of Libergier, the designer of Reims, the greatest Gothic splendour of France.

Engelbert's successor, Conrad of Hochsteden, furthered the plans, whoever may have been their creator, and work on the new edifice was begun a few months after the destruction of the older one.

On August 14, 1248, the foundation-stone of the new structure was laid, forty-four feet below the surface of the ground.

The portion first erected was the choir, and for ages it stood, as it stands in its completed form to-day, as perfect an example of the style of its period as is extant.

For seventy years this choir was taking form, until it was consecrated on September 27, 1322.

The occasion was a great one for Cologne and for the church. The ceremony was attended by much glitter and pomp, both ecclesiastical and civil.

No sooner was the choir completed than it was embellished as befitted the shrine of the three kings.

Coloured gla.s.s, stone, and wood-carving, and the art of the gold and jewel smith all blended to give a magnificence to the whole which was perhaps unapproachable elsewhere at the time.

Then, for a time, enthusiasm and labour languished. For nearly two centuries the work was pursued by the prelates and architects in a most desultory and intermittent fashion.

The choir had been completed, and to the westward considerable progress had been made, but there was a gaunt ugly gap between. It would seem as though there were no intention of ever joining the scattered parts, which were linked only by the foundation-stones, for the nave and aisles were left merely covered with temporary roofs.

Then the Reformation came, and that boded no good for the cathedral. The people looked askance at the symbol of such great power in the hands of Rome.

The seventeenth century saw some abortive efforts toward completing the structure, but in the end all came to nought.

In the eighteenth century the choir received its baptism of the Renaissance, and certain incongruous Italian details were added. The stone screens which surrounded the choir proper were demolished and the painted gla.s.s of the triforium mysteriously disappeared.

During the French Revolution, Republican troops bivouacked within the walls of Cologne's cathedral, and the chapter fled to Westphalia, leaving behind valuable archives which were destroyed.

The very fact of its profanation may have been the cause which hastened the restoration of the edifice.