Zigzag Journeys in Europe Part 32

"This church," said their guide, taking the Cla.s.s to a side chapel of the cathedral, "contains a very rare relic,--a part of the head of John the Baptist!"

Pa.s.sing into the beautiful chapel the Cla.s.s was shown the shrine containing the precious treasure, which consists of the supposed frontal bone, and the upper jaw of the saint.

The _valet de place_ who accompanied the Cla.s.s from the hotel seemed to have no doubt of the genuineness of the relic, or of the propriety of adoring it, if indeed it were real,--and he bowed reverently before the shrine.

"A very rare relic," he said.

"Wonderful!" said Frank. "I did not know that such sacred remains were anywhere to be found as are shown us in the churches of France."

"_Quite_ a rare relic," said Master Lewis, coolly. "I believe that, previous to the French Revolution, several whole heads of John the Baptist were to be seen in France."

"You do not think that a church like this would be guilty of imposture, do you?" asked Ernest Wynn.

"Not wilfully. Most of these French relics were brought from Constantinople at the time of the Crusades. They may be genuine,--the people believe them so; but, in the absence of direct historic evidence, it is probable that the Crusaders were deceived in them by others, who in their turn may have been deceived.

"You will be shown wonderful relics or shrines supposed to contain them, in nearly all the great churches of France. The French people were taught their reverence for relics by St. Louis, who sought to enrich the churches of his country with such treasures."

"Who was St. Louis?" asked Ernest.

"I am glad to have you ask the question," said Master Lewis. "His name meets you everywhere in France.

STORY OF ST. LOUIS.

"St. Louis was one of the best men that ever sat on a throne. But he was influenced by the superst.i.tions of the times in which he lived.

"His mother was a most n.o.ble and pious woman, and he was a dutiful and affectionate son.

"It was regarded as very pious at this time for a prince to go on a crusade. St. Louis was taken sick, and he made a vow that, if he recovered, he would become a crusader. On his recovery, he appointed his mother regent, and sailed with forty thousand men for Cyprus, where he proceeded against Egypt, thinking by the conquest of that country to open a triumphant way to Palestine. He was defeated, and returned to France.

"He was a model prince among his own people. He used to spend a portion of each day in charity, and to feed an hundred or more paupers every time he went to walk. He visited his own domestics when they were sick; he founded charities, which have multiplied, and to-day cause his name to be remembered with grat.i.tude almost everywhere in France. He made it the aim of his life to relieve suffering wherever it might be found.

"It is related of him, among a mult.i.tude of stories, that he was once accosted by a poor woman standing at the door of her cottage, who held in her hand a loaf, and said,--

"'Good king, it is of this bread that comes of thine alms that my poor, sick husband is sustained.'

"The king took the loaf and examined it.

"'It is rather hard bread,' said he; and he then visited the sick man himself and gave the case his personal sympathy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "IT IS RATHER HARD BREAD."]

"Going out on a certain Good Friday barefoot to distribute alms, he saw a leper on the other side of a dirty pond. He waded through it to the wretched man, gave him alms, then, taking his hand in his own, kissed it. The act greatly astonished his attendants, but the disease was not communicated to him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DEATH OF ST. LOUIS.]

"In 1270 he started on a new crusade, but died in Tunis of the pestilence. Visions of the conquest of the Holy City seemed to fill his mind to the last. He was heard to exclaim on his death-bed in his tent, 'Jerusalem! Jerusalem! We will go up to Jerusalem!'"

One of the first places which the Cla.s.s sought out in Rouen was the statue of Joan of Arc. It is placed on a street fountain near the spot where the unfortunate maid was burned. It disappointed our tourists, and seemed an unworthy tribute to such an heroic character. The great tower, called the Tower of Joan of Arc, seemed a more fitting reminder of her achievements.

The streets of Rouen are narrow, but are full of life. Rouen has been called a New Paris, and Napoleon said that Havre, Rouen, and Paris were one city of which the river Seine was the highway. The gable-faced, timber-fronted mansions are interspersed with evidences of modern thrift, and the Rouen of romance seems everywhere disappearing in the Rouen of trade.

The Cathedral of Rouen is a confusing pile of art; it has beautiful rose windows, and its spire is four hundred and thirty-six feet high.

The old church of St. Ouen, which is larger and more splendid than the cathedral, is regarded as one of the most perfect specimens of Gothic art in the world. It is 443 feet long.

[Ill.u.s.tration: INTERIOR OF ST. OUEN.]

The Palais de Justice, as the old province house or parliament house is called, is an odd but picturesque structure. It lines three sides of a public square.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PALAIS DE JUSTICE, ROUEN.]

"To-morrow," said Master Lewis, after a day of sight-seeing in Rouen, "we go to the most beautiful city in all the world."

"I wish I knew more about the history of Paris," said Ernest Wynn, "now that it is so near to us. I think of it as a place of gayety and splendor, the scene of St. Bartholomew's Ma.s.sacre, of the Revolution, and the Commune. It was the city that Napoleon seemed to love more than any thing else in the world. What is its early history?"

"You will read in Julius Caesar's Commentaries, in your course in Latin," said Master Lewis, "a brief account of Lutetia, the chief town of the Parisii, a Gallic tribe that the Romans conquered. This, I think, is the oldest historical allusion to Paris, as Lutetia came to be called. It was probably an old town at the time of the Roman invasion; it was chosen by Clovis as the seat of his empire in the sixth century; it began to grow when the Northmen came sailing up the Seine in their strange ships to its gates, and made it their prey. In the tenth century it became the residence of Hugh Capet, the founder of the Capetian line of kings, and soon after increased so rapidly that it doubled in size and population. Under Henri of Navarre, in 1589, the city began to be famous for its tendencies to gayety and splendor. Louis the Great lavished the wealth of France upon it, converting the old ramparts into picturesque public walks or boulevards, and enlarging and adorning its palaces so that they rivalled the royal structures of the East. Then Napoleon I. enriched it with the spoils of Europe, spending on it more than 4,000,000 in twelve years. Napoleon III. completed the work of his predecessors by introducing into the city all modern improvements, and making Paris in every respect the most magnificent capital in Europe.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NORTHMEN ON AN EXPEDITION.]

"I have given you in the story of Charlemagne and in the visit to Aix-la-Chapelle a view of the early French Empire; in the story of St.

Louis you have had a glance at France at the time of the Crusades; I think I will here tell you a story which will present to you another period of the nation's history.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BARQUES OF THE NORTHMEN BEFORE PARIS.]

STORY OF CHARLES IX. AND ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S EVE.

"Charles IX., the twelfth king of the family of Valois, came to the French throne when only ten years of age, under the regency of his mother, that terrible woman, Catharine de Medici. He was an impulsive youth, restless and vacillating, and was left wholly to the evil influences of his mother. The first years of his reign were disturbed by the struggles between the Protestant and Catholic parties in France. These difficulties were apparently settled in 1569.

"The queen-mother, who was a Catholic, seemed to entertain kind feelings towards the Protestant leaders. The Protestant King of Navarre was promised the hand of the king's sister Marguerite, and marked courtesy and apparent kindness of feeling were shown by the royal household to many of the leading men of the great Protestant party. The latter were thus rendered unsuspicious of danger, and became almost wholly disarmed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CATHARINE DE MEDICI.]

"But Catharine de Medici, full of craft and wickedness, had resolved to destroy the Protestant power. She was fully versed in crime, and the pa.s.sion for dark deeds grew upon her with years. One day she went to the boy-king, Charles, and disclosed a plot for the ma.s.sacre of the Protestants of France. He listened with a feeling of horror. He had learned to love the Protestant statesmen, and to call their great leader, Coligny, 'father.' His young heart recoiled from such a deed.

But his mother gave him no rest. She confided her plot to the Catholic leaders, who joined hand in hand with her to accomplish the crime.

Church and State united to persuade the young king that the stability of the throne, the glory of his family, and the advancement of religious truth demanded the slaughter of the Huguenots, as the Protestant party were called. Still he hesitated; but after a little while exhibited his characteristic weakness under the influence of persuasion, and the conspirators knew his final a.s.sent was certain.

"St. Bartholomew's Day was at hand, the time appointed by the Catholic leaders, the Guises, for the work of death. Paris was full of Huguenots from the princ.i.p.al provincial cities, who had been drawn hither by the magnificent wedding of the Protestant King of Navarre.

The preparations for the ma.s.sacre were nearly complete, but the young king still hesitated to issue the fatal order.

"His mother now used every art in her power to make him place himself boldly with the Guises. As he was king, she wished the sanction of a royal edict to do her b.l.o.o.d.y work. With this the preparations for the destruction of the Huguenots would be complete. Her appeals at length so wrought upon his mind that he excitedly exclaimed, 'Well, then, kill them! kill them all, that not a single Huguenot may live to reproach me!' This frantic remark was construed as an order.

"The ma.s.sacre was appointed to begin on St. Bartholomew's Eve, at the tolling of a bell. The young king was fearfully nervous and agitated during the preceding day. Just before the fatal hour, his conscience had so affected his better feelings, that he despatched orders to the Duc de Guise, countermanding the slaughter. The duke received the message as he was in the act of mounting his horse to lead the a.s.sa.s.sins.

"'_Il est trop tard!_' 'It is too late!' said the duke to the bearer, and at once rode away.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COLIGNY.]