* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 47: Masson de St. Amand, Essais Historiques sur Evreux, I. p. 39.]

[Footnote 48: Johnes' Translation, 8vo, IV. p. 292.]

[Footnote 49: See Britten's Architectural Antiquities, III. t. 2.]

[Footnote 50: Goube, Histoire de Normandie, III. 249.]

[Footnote 51: Histoire de la Haute Normandie, II. p. 319.]

[Footnote 52: Mr. Gough, (See Archaeologia, X. p. 187.) whose attention had been much directed to this subject, seems to have known only four fonts made of lead, in the kingdom;—at Brookland in Kent, Dorchester in Oxfordshire, Wareham in Dorsetshire, and Walmsford in Northamptonshire; but there are in all probability many more. We have at least four in Norfolk. He says, "they are supposed to be of high antiquity; and that at Brookland may have relation to the time of Birinus himself. To what circumstance the others are to be referred, or from what other church brought, does not appear."—The leaden fonts which I have seen, have all been raised upon a basis of brick or stone, like this at Bourg-Achard, and are all of nearly the same pattern.]

[Footnote 53: See Concilia Normannica, II. pp. 56, 117, 403, 491, 508, &c]



LETTER XX.

MOULINEAUX—CASTLE OF ROBERT THE DEVIL—BOURG-THEROUDE—ABBEY OF BEC—BRIONNE.

(Brionne, July, 1818.)

Having accomplished the objects which we had proposed to ourselves in Rouen and its vicinity, we set out this morning upon our excursion to the western parts of the province. Our first stage, to Moulineaux, was by the same road by which we returned a few days ago from Bourg-Achard. It is a delightful ride, through the valley of the Seine, here of great width, stretching to our left in an uninterrupted course of flat open country, but, on our right hand, bordered at no great distance by the ridge of steep chalky cliffs which line the bank of the river. The road appears to have been a work of considerable labor: it is every where raised, and in some places as high as fifteen feet above the level of the fields on either side.—Agriculture in this district is conducted, as about Paris, upon the plan called by the French la petite culture: the fields are all divided into narrow strips; so that a piece of not more than two or three acres, frequently produces eight or ten different crops, some of grain, others of culinary vegetables, at the same time that many of these portions are planted with apple and cherry trees. The land is all open and uninclosed: not a fence is to be seen; nor do there even appear to be any balks or head-marks. Strangers therefore who come, like us, from a country entirely inclosed, cannot refrain from frequent expressions of surprise how it is that every person here is enabled to tell the limits of his own property.

Moulineaux is a poor village, a mere assemblage of cottages, with mud walls and thatched roofs. But the church is interesting, though desecrated and verging to ruin. Even now the outside alone is entire. The interior is gutted and in a state of absolute neglect.—The building is of the earliest pointed style: its lancet-windows are of the plainest kind, being destitute of side pillars: in some of the windows are still remains of handsome painted glass.—Either the antiquaries in France are more honest than in England, or they want taste, or objects of this kind do not find a ready market. We know too well how many an English church, albeit well guarded by the churchwardens and the parson, has seen its windows despoiled of every shield, and saint, and motto; and we also know full well, by whom, and for whom, such ravages are committed. In France, on the contrary, where painted glass still fills the windows of sacred buildings, now employed for the meanest purposes, or wholly deserted, no one will even take the trouble of carrying it away; and the storied panes are left, as derelicts utterly without value.—The east end of the church at Moulineaux is semi-circular; the roof is of stone, handsomely groined, and the groinings spring from fanciful corbels. On either side of the nave, near the choir, is a recess in the wall, carved with tabernacle-work, and serving for a piscina. Recesses of this kind, though of frequent occurrence in English churches, do not often appear in France. Still less common are those elaborate screens of carved timber, often richly gilt or gorgeously painted, which separate the nave from the chancel in the churches of many of our smaller villages at home. The only one I ever recollect to have seen in France was at Moulineaux.—I also observed a mutilated pillar, which originally supported the altar, ornamented with escalop shells and fleurs-de-lys in bold relief. It reminded me of one figured in the Antiquarian Repertory, from Harold's chapel, in Battle Abbey[54].

Immediately after leaving Moulineaux, the road winds along the base of a steep chalk hill, whose brow is crowned by the remains of the famous castle of Robert the Devil, the father of Richard Fearnought. Robert the Devil is a mighty hero of romance; but there is some difficulty in discovering his historical prototype. Could we point out his gestes in the chronicle, they would hardly outvalue his adventures, as they are recorded in the nursery tale. Robert haunts this castle, which appears to have been of great extent, though its ruins are very indistinct. The walls on the southern side are rents, and covered with brush-wood; and no architectural feature is discernible. Wide and deep fosses encircle the site, which is undermined by spacious crypts and subterraneous caverns.—The fortress is evidently of remote, but uncertain, antiquity: it was dismantled by King John when he abandoned the duchy. The historians of Normandy say that it was re-fortified during the civil wars; and the fact is not destitute of probability, as its position is bold and commanding.

Bourg-Theroude, our next stage, is one of those places which are indebted to their names alone for the little importance they possess. At present, it is a small assemblage of mean houses, most of them inns; but its Latin appellation, Burgus Thuroldi, commemorates no less a personage than one of the preceptors of William the Conqueror, and his grand constable at the time when he effected the conquest of England.—The name of Turold occurs upon the Bayeux tapestry, designating one of the ambassadors dispatched by the Norman Duke to Guy, Earl of Ponthieu; and it is supposed that the Turold there represented was the grand constable[55].—The church of Bourg-Theroude, which was collegiate before the revolution, is at present uninteresting in every point of view.

About half way from this place to Brionne, we came in sight of the remains of the celebrated abbey of Bec, situated a mile and half or two miles distant to our right, at the extremity of a beautiful valley. We had been repeatedly assured that scarcely one stone of this formerly magnificent building was left upon another; but it would have shewn an unpardonable want of curiosity to have passed so near without visiting it: even to stand upon the spot which such a monastery originally covered is a privilege not lightly to be foregone:—

"The pilgrim who journeys all day, To visit some far distant shrine; If he bear but a relic away, Is happy, nor heard to repine."—

And happiness of this kind would on such an occasion infallibly fall to your lot and to mine. A love for botany or for antiquities would equally furnish relics on a similar pilgrimage.

As usual, the accounts which we had received proved incorrect. The greater part of the conventual edifice still exists, but it has no kind of architectural value. Some detached portions, whose original use it would be difficult now to conjecture, appear, from their wide pointed windows, to be of the fifteenth century. The other buildings were probably erected within the last fifty years.—The part inhabited by the monks is at this time principally employed as a cotton-mill; and, were it in England, nobody would suspect that it ever had any other destination. Of the church, the tower[56] only is in existence. I find no account of its date; though authors have been unusually profuse in their details of all particulars relating to this monastery. I am inclined to refer it to the beginning of the seventeenth century, in which case it was built shortly after the destruction of the nave. Its character is simple, solid elegance. Its ornaments are few, but they are selected and disposed with judgment. Each corner is flanked by two buttresses, which unite at top, and there terminate in a crocketed pinnacle. The buttresses are also ornamented with tabernacles of saints at different heights; and one of the tabernacles upon each buttress, about mid-way up the tower, still retains a statue as large as life, of apparently good workmanship. They were fortunately too high for the democrats to destroy with ease. The height of the tower is one hundred and fifty feet, as I found by the staircase of two hundred steps, which remains uninjured, in a circular turret attached to the south side. The termination of this turret is the most singular part of the structure: it is surmounted by a cap, considerably higher than the pinnacles, and composed, like a bee-hive, of a number of circles, each smaller than the one below it. A few ruined arches of the east end of the church, and of one of the side chapels are also existing. The rest is levelled with the ground, and has probably been in a great measure destroyed lately; for piles of wrought stones are heaped up on all sides.

If historical recollections or architectural beauty could have proved a protection in the days of revolution, the church of Bec had undoubtedly stood. Ducarel, who saw it in its perfection, says it was one of the finest gothic structures in France; and his account of it, though only an abridgement of that given by Du Plessis, in his History of Upper Normandy, is curious and valuable.—Mr. Gough states the annual income of the abbey at the period of the revolution, to have exceeded twenty thousand crowns. Its patronage was most extensive: the monks presented to one hundred and sixty advowsons, two of them in the metropolis; and thirty other ecclesiastical benefices, as well priories as chapels, were in their gift[57].—Its possessions, as we may collect from the various charters and donations, might have led us to expect a larger revenue. The estates belonging to the monastery in England, prior to the reformation, were both numerous and valuable.

Sammarthanus, author of the Gallia Christiana, says, in speaking of Bec, that, whether considered as to religion or literature, there was not, in the eleventh century, a more celebrated convent throughout the whole of Neustria. The founder of the abbey was Hellouin, sometimes called Herluin, a nobleman, descended by the mother's side from the Counts of Flanders, but he himself was a native of the territory of Brionne, and educated in the castle of Gislebert, earl of that district. Hellouin determined, at an early age, to withdraw himself from the court and from the world: it seems he was displeased or affronted by the conduct of the earl; and we may collect from the chroniclers, that it was not a very easy task in those times for an individual of rank, intent upon monastic seclusion, to carry his purpose into effect, and that still greater difficulties were to be encountered if he wished to put his property into mortmain. Hellouin was obliged to counterfeit madness, and at last to come to a very painful explanation with his liege lord; and, when he finally succeeded in obtaining the permission he craved, his establishment was so poor, that he was compelled to take upon himself the office of abbot, from an inability to find any other person who would accept it.—The monkish historians lavish their praises upon Hellouin. They assign to him every virtue under heaven; but they particularly laud him for his humility and industry: all day long he worked as a laborer in the building of his convent, whilst the night was passed in committing the psalter to memory. At this period of his life, a curious anecdote is recorded of him: curious in itself, as illustrative of the character of the man; and particularly curious, in being quoted as matter of commendation, and thus serving to illustrate the feelings of a great body of the community.—His mother, who shared in the pious disposition of her son, had attached herself to the convent to assist in the menial offices; and one day, while she was thus engaged, the building caught fire, and she perished in the flames; upon which, Hellouin, though bathed in tears, lifted up his hands to heaven, and gave thanks to God that his parent had been burned to death in the midst of an occupation of humility and piety!

During the life of Hellouin, the abbey was twice levelled with the ground: on each occasion it rose more splendid from its ruins, and on each the site was changed, till at length it was fixed upon the spot from which its ruins are now vanishing. The whole of Normandy would scarcely furnish a more desirable situation. Under the prelacy of Hellouin, Bec increased rapidly in celebrity, and consequently in the number of its inmates: it was principally indebted for this increase to an accidental circumstance. Lanfranc, a native of Pavia, a lawyer in Italy, but a monk in France, after having visited various monasteries, and distinguished himself by defending the doctrine of the real presence, then impugned by Berengarius, established himself here in the year 1042, and immediately opened a school, which, to judge from the language of Ordericus Vitalis[58], seems to have been the first ever known in Normandy. Scholars from France, from England, and from Flanders, hastened to place themselves under his care; his fame, according to William of Malmesbury, went forth into the outer parts of the earth; and Bec, under his auspices, became a most celebrated resort of literature. To borrow the more copious account given by William of Jumieges—"report quickly spread the glory of Bec, and of its abbot, Hellouin, through every land. The clergy, the sons of dukes, the most eminent schoolmasters, the most powerful of the laity, and the nobility, all hastened hither. Many, actuated by love for Lanfranc, gave their lands to the convent. The abbey was enriched with ornaments, with possessions, and with noble inmates. Religion and learning increased; property of all kinds abounded; and the monks, who but a few years before, could scarcely command sufficient ground for the site of their own building, now saw their estates extend for many miles in a lengthening line."—Promotion followed the fame of Lanfranc, who soon became abbot of the royal monastery of St. Stephen, at Caen, and thence was translated to the archiepiscopal see of Canterbury.

It was the rare good fortune of Bec, that the abbey furnished two successive metropolitans to the English church, both of them selected for their erudition, Lanfranc and Anselm. It is not a little remarkable, too, that both were Italians. Lanfranc, whilst archbishop of Canterbury, presided in the year 1077, at the dedication of the third church built at Bec. We may judge how far the abbey had at that time increased in consequence; for five bishops, one of them brother to the Conqueror, honored the ceremony with their presence; and the nobles and ladies of France, Normandy, and England crowded to the spot, to refresh their bodies by the pleasures of the festival, and their souls by endowments to the convent.

In the fifteenth century, when our Henry Vth brought his victorious armies into France, the monks of Bec were reduced to a painful alternative. It was apprehended by the French monarch, that the monastery might be converted into a depot by the English; and they were commanded either to demolish the church, or to fortify it against the invaders. They naturally regarded the latter as the lesser evil; and the consequence was, that the abbey was scarcely put into a state of defence, when it was attacked by the enemy, and, after sustaining a siege for a month, was obliged to surrender. A great part of the monastic buildings were levelled to the ground; and the fortifications which had been so strangely affixed to them were also razed: meanwhile the monks suffered grievously from the contending parties: their sacristy was plundered; their treasury emptied; and they were themselves exposed to a variety of personal hardships. At the same time, also, the tomb of the Empress Maud[59], which faced the high altar, was destroyed, after having been stripped of its silver ornaments.

Considering the number of illustrious persons who were abbots or patrons of Bec, and who had been elected from it to the superintendance of other monasteries, the church does not appear to have been rich in monuments. We read indeed of many individuals who were interred here belonging to the house of Neubourg, a family distinguished among the benefactors of the convent; and the records of the abbey speak also of the tomb of Richard of St. Leger, Bishop of Evreux; but the Empress was the only royal personage who selected this convent as the resting-place for her remains; and she likewise appears to have been the only eminent one, except Hellouin, the founder, who lay in the chapter-house, under a slab of black marble, with various figures of rude workmanship[60] carved upon it. His epitaph has more merit than the general class of monumental inscriptions:—

"Hunc spectans tumulum, titulo cognosce sepultum; Est via virtutis nosse quis ipse fuit. Dum quater hic denos aevi venisset ad annos, Quae fuerant secli sprevit amore Dei. Mutans ergo vices, mundi de milite miles Fit Christi subito, Monachus ex laico. Hinc sibi, more patrum, socians collegia fratrum, Cura, qua decuit, rexit eos, aluit. Quot quantasque vides, hic solus condidit aedes, Non tam divitiis quam fidei meritis. Quas puer haud didicit scripturas postea scivit, Doctus ut indoctum vix sequeretur eum. Flentibus hunc nobis tulit inclementia mortis Sextilis quina bisque die decima. Herluine pater, sic cA"lica scandis ovantA"r; Credere namque tuis hoc licet ex meritis."

In number of inmates, extent of possessions, and possibly, in magnificence of buildings, other Norman monasteries may have excelled Bec: none equalled it in the prouder honor of being a seminary for eminent men and especially for those destined to the highest stations in the church. Lanfranc and Anselm were not the only two of its monks who were seated on the archiepiscopal throne at Canterbury. Two others, Theobald and Hubert obtained the same dignity in the following century; and Roger, the seventh abbot of Bec, enjoyed the still more enviable distinction of having been unanimously elected to fill the office of metropolitan, but of possessing sufficient firmness of mind to resist the attractions of wealth, and rank, and power. The sees of Rochester, Beauvais, and Evreux were likewise filled by monks from Bec; and it was here that many monastic establishments, both Norman and foreign, found their pastors. Three of our own most celebrated convents, those of Chester, Ely, and St. Edmund's Bury, received at different epochs their abbots from Bec; and during the prelacy of Anselm, the supreme pontiff himself selected a monk of this house as the prior of the distant convent of the holy Savior at Capua.—The village of Bec, which adjoins the abbey, is small and unimportant.

I was returning to our carriage, when a soldier invited me to walk to a part of the monastic grounds (for they are very extensive) which is appropriated to the purpose of keeping up the true breed of Norman horses. The French government have several similar establishments: they consider the matter as one of national importance; and, as France has not yet produced a Duke of Bedford or a Mr. Coke, the state is obliged to undertake what would be much better effected by the energy of individuals.—A Norman horse is an excellent draft horse: he is strong, bony, and well proportioned. But the natives are not content with this qualified praise: they contend that he is equally unrivalled as a saddle-horse, as a hunter, and as a charger. In this part of the country the present average price of a hussar's horse is nineteen pounds; of a dragoon's thirty-four pounds; and of an officer's eighty pounds.—These prices are considered high, but not extravagant. France abounds at this time in fine horses. The losses occasioned by the revolutionary wars, and more especially by the disastrous Russian campaign, have been more than compensated by five years of peace, and by the horses that were left by the allied troops. An annual supply is also drawn from Mecklenburg and the adjacent countries. Importations of this kind are regarded as indispensable, to prevent a degeneration in the stock. A Frenchman can scarcely be brought to believe it possible; that we in England can preserve our fine breed of horses without having recourse to similar expedients; and if at last, by dint of repeated asseverations, you succeed in obtaining a reluctant assent, the conversation is almost sure to end in a shrug of the shoulders, accompanied with the remark—"Ah, vous autres Anglais, vous voulez toujours voler de vos propres ailes."

As we approached Brionne, the face of the country became more uneven; and we passed an extensive tract of uncultivated chalk hills, resembling the downs of Wiltshire.—Brionne itself lies in a valley watered by the Risle: the situation is agreeable, and advantageous for trade. The present number of its inhabitants does not amount to two thousand; and there is no reason to apprehend that the population has materially decreased of late years. But in the times of Norman rule, Brionne was a town of more importance: it had then three churches, besides an abbey and a lazar-house. At present a single church only remains; and this is neither large, nor handsome, nor ancient, nor remarkable in any point of view. We found in it a monument of the revolution, which I never saw elsewhere, and which I never expected to see at all. The age of reason was a sadly irrational age.—The tablet containing the rights and duties of man, disposed in two columns, like the tables of the Mosaic law, is still suffered to exist in the church, though shorn of all its republican dignity, and degraded into the front of a pew.

On the summit of a hill that overhangs the town, stood formerly the castle of the Earls of Brionne; and a portion of the building, though it be but an insignificant fragment, is still left. The part now standing consists of little more than two sides of the square dungeon, The walls, which are about fifty feet in height, appear crumbling and ragged, as they have lost the greater part of their original facing. Yet their thickness, which even now exceeds twelve feet, may enable them to bid defiance for many a century, to "the heat of the sun, and the furious winter's rages."—Nearly the half of one of the sides, which is seventy feet long, is occupied by three flat Norman buttresses, of very small projection. No arched door-way, no window remains; nor any thing, except these buttresses, to give a distinct character to the architecture: the hill is so overgrown with brush-wood, that though traces of foundation are discernible in almost every part of it, no clear idea can be formed of the dimensions or plan of the building. Its importance is sufficiently established by its having been the residence of a son or brother of Richard IInd, Duke of Normandy, on whose account, the town of Brionne, with the adjacent territory, was raised into an earldom. Historians speak unequivocally of its strength. During the reign of William the Conqueror, it was regarded as impregnable. This king was little accustomed to meet with disappointment or even with resistance; but the castle of Brionne defied his utmost efforts for three successive years. Under his less energetic successor, it was taken in a day. Its possessor, Robert, Earl of Brionne, felt himself so secure within his towers, that he ventured, with only six attendants, to oppose the whole army of the Norman Duke; but the besiegers observed that the fortress was roofed with wood; and a shower of burning missiles compelled the garrison to surrender at discretion.—The castle was finally dismantled by the orders of Charles Vth.

Brionne is known in ecclesiastical history as the place where the council of the church was held, by which the tenets of Berengarius were finally condemned. It appears that the archdeacon of Angers, after some fruitless attempts to make converts among the Norman monks, took the bold resolution of stating his doctrines to the duke in person; and that the prince, though scarcely arrived at years of manhood, acted with so much prudence on the occasion, as to withhold any decisive answer, till he had collected the clergy of the duchy. They assembled at Brionne, as a central spot; and here the question was argued at great length, till Berengarius himself, and a convert, whom he had brought with him, trusting in his eloquence, were so overpowered by the arguments of their adversaries, that they were obliged to renounce their errors. The doctrine of the real presence in the sacrament, was thus incontrovertibly established; and it has from that time remained an undisputed article of faith in the Roman Catholic church.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 54: Vol. III. p. 187.—The engraving in the Antiquarian Repertory was made from a drawing in the possession of the late Sir William Burrell, Bart.]

[Footnote 55: The word Turold, in the tapestry, stands immediately over the head of a dwarf, who is holding a couple of horses; and it has therefore been inferred by Montfaucon, (Monumens de la Monarchie Francaise, I. p. 378.) that he is the person thus denominated. But M. Lancelot, in the Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, VI. p. 753, supposes Turold to be the ambassador who is in the act of speaking; and this seems the more probable conjecture. The same opinion is still more decidedly maintained by Father Du Plessis, in his Histoire de la Haute Normandie, II. p. 342.—"Sur une ancienne tapisserie de l'Eglise de Baieux, que l'on croit avoir ete faite par ordre de la Reine Mathilde femme du Conquerant, pour representer les circonstances principales de cette memorable expedition, on lit distinctement le mot Turold a cote d'un des Ambassadeurs, que Guillaume avoit envoiez au Comte de Ponthieu; et je ne doute nullement que ce Turold ne soit le meme que le Connetable. Le scavant Auteur des Antiquitez de notre Monarchie croit cependant que ce mot doit se rapporter a un Nain qui tient deux chevaux en bride derriere les Ambassadeurs; et il ajoute que ce Nain devoit etre fort connu a la Conr du Duc de Normandie. On avoue que si c'est lui en effet qui doit s'appeller Turold, il devoit tenir aussi a la Cour de son Prince un rang distingue; sans quoi on n'auroit pas pris la peine de le designer par son nom dans la tapisserie. On avoue encore que le nom de Turold est place la de maniere qu'on peut a la rigueur le donner au Nain aussi bien qu'a l'un des deux Ambassadeurs; et comme le Nain est applique a tenir deux chevaux en bride, on pourrait croire enfin que c'est le Connetable, dont les titres de l'Abbaie de Facan nous ont appris le nom: Signum Turoldi Constabularii. Mais le Nain est tres-mal habille, il a son bonnet sur la tete, et tourne le dos au Comte de Ponthieu, pendant que les deux Ambassadeurs noblement vetus regardent ce Prince en face, et lui parlent decouverts: trois circonstances qui ne peuvent convenir, ni au Connetable du Duc, ni a toute autre personne de distinction qui auroit tenu compagnie, ou fait cortege aux Ambassadeurs."]

[Footnote 56: This tower is figured, but very inaccurately, by Gough, in his Alien Priories, I. p. 22.—The cupola which then surmounted it is now gone; and the cap to the turret, which served as the staircase, has strangely changed its shape.]

[Footnote 57: Alien Priories, I. p. 24.]

[Footnote 58: "Nam antea, sub tempore sex ducum vix ullus Normannorum liberalibus studiis adhaesit; nec doctor inveniebatur, donec provisor omnium, Deus, Normannicis oris Lanfrancum appulit. Fama peritiae illius in tota ubertim innotuit Europa, unde ad magisterium ejus multi convenerunt de Francia, de Wasconia, de Britannia, necne Flandria."—Duchesne, Scriptores Normanni, p. 519.]

[Footnote 59: A question always existed, whether the Empress was really buried here, or at the abbey of Ste Marie des Pres, at Rouen. Hoveden expressly says, that she was interred at Rouen: the chronicle of Bec, on the other hand, is equally positive in the assertion that her body was brought to Bec, and entombed with honor before the altar of the Virgin. The same chronicle adds that, in the year 1273, her remains were discovered before the high altar, sewed up in an ox's hide.—Still farther to substantiate their claim, the monks of Bec maintained that, in 1684, upon the occasion of some repairs being done to this altar, the bones of the empress were again found immediately under the lamp (which, in Catholic churches, is kept constantly burning before the holy sacrament,) and that they were deposited once more in the ground in a wooden chest, covered with lead.—The Empress was a munificent endower of monasteries, and was at all times most liberal towards Bec. William of Jumieges says, that it would be tedious to enumerate the presents she made to the abbey, but that the sight of them gave pleasure to those strangers who have seen the treasures of the most noble churches. His remarks on this matter, and his account of her arguments with her father, on the subject of her choice of Bec, as a place of her interment, deserve to be transcribed.—"Transiret illac hospes Graecus aut Arabs, voluptate traheretur eadem. Credimus autem, et credere fas est, aequissimum judicem omnium non solum in futuro, verumetiam in praesenti seculo, illi centuplum redditurum, quod seruis suis manu sicut larga, ita devota gratanter impendit. Ad remunerationem vero instantis temporis pertinere non dubium est, quod, miserante Deo, sopita adversa valetudine, sanctitatem refouit, et Monachos suos, Monachos Beccenses, qui prae omnibus, et super omnes pro ipsius sospitate, jugi labore supplicandi decertando pene defecerant, aura prosperae valetudinis ejus afflatos omnino redintegravit.—Nec supprimendum illud est silentio, imo, ut ita dicatur, uncialibus literis exaratum, seculo venturo transmittendum; quod antequam convalesceret postulaverat patrem suum, ut permitteret eam in CA"nobio Beccensi humari. Quod Rex primo abnuerat, dicens non esse dignum, ut filia sua, Imperatrix Augusta, quae semel et iterum in urbe Romulea, quae caput est mundi, per manus summi Pontificis Imperiali diademate processerat insignita, in aliquo Monasterio, licet percelebri et religione et fama, sepeliretur; sed ad civitatem Rotomagensium, quae metropolis est Normannorum, saltem delata, in Ecclesia principali, in qua et majores ejus, Rollonem loquor et Willelmum Longamspatam filium ipsius, qui Neustriam armis subegerunt, positi sunt, ipsa et poneretur. Qua deliberatione Regis percepta, illi per nuncium remandavit, animam suam nunquam fore laetam, nisi compos voluntatis suae in hac duntaxat parte efficeretur.—O femina macte virtutis et consilii sanioris, paruipendens pompam secularem in corporis depositione! Noverat enim salubrius esse animabus defunctorum ibi corpora sua tumulari, ubi frequentius et devotius supplicationes pro ipsis Deo offeruntur. Victus itaque pater ipsius Augustae pietate et prudentia filiae, qui ceteros et virtute et pietate vincere solitus erat, cessit, et voluntatem, et petitionem ipsius de se sepelienda Becci fieri concessit. Sed volente Deo ut praefixum est, sanitati integerrimae restituta convaluit."—Duchesne, Scriptores Normanni, p. 305.]

[Footnote 60: Histoire de la Haute Normandie, II. p, 281.]



LETTER XXI.

BERNAT—BROGLIE—ORBEC—LISIEUX—CATHEDRAL—ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.

(Lisieux, July, 1818.)

Instead of pursuing the straight road from Brionne to this city, we deviated somewhat to the south, by the advice of M. Le Prevost; and we have not regretted the deviation.

Bernay was once celebrated for its abbey, founded in the beginning of the eleventh century, by Judith, wife of Richard IInd, Duke of Normandy. Some of the monastic buildings are standing, and are now inhabited: they appear to have been erected but a short time before the revolution, and to have suffered little injury.—But the abbey church, which belonged to the original structure, is all desolate within, and all defaced without. The interior is divided into two stories, the lower of which is used as a corn market, the upper as a cloth hall. Thus blocked up and encumbered, we may yet discern that it is a noble building: its dimensions are grand, and in most parts it is a perfect specimen of the semi-circular style, except the windows and the apsis, which are of later dates. The pillars in the nave and choir are lofty, but massy: the capitals of some of them are curiously sculptured. On the lower member of the entablature of one capital there are still traces of an inscription; but it is so injured by neglect and violence, that we were unable to decipher a single word. The capital itself is fanciful and not devoid of elegance.



The convent was placed under the immediate protection of the sovereign, by virtue of an ordinance issued by Philip Augustus[61], in 1280, at which time Peter, Count of Alencon, attempted to establish a claim to some rights affecting the monastery. He alleged a grant from a former monarch to one of his predecessors, by whom he asserted that the convent had been founded; and, in support of his claim, he urged its position within the limits of his territory. The abbot and monks resisted: they gave proof that the abbey of Bernay was really founded by the duchess; and therefore the king, after a full and impartial hearing, decided against the count, and declared that the advocation of the monastery was thenceforth to belong to himself and his successors in the dukedom for ever.—Judith died before the convent was entirely built, and the task of completing it devolved upon her widowed husband, whose charter, confirming the foundation, is still in existence. It begins by a recital of the pious motives[62] which urged the duchess to the undertaking; it expressly mentions her death while the building was yet unfinished; and, after detailing the various lands and grants bestowed on the abbey, it concludes by denouncing the anger of God, and a fine of two hundred pounds weight of gold upon those who disturb the establishment, "that they may learn to their confusion that the good deeds of their ancestors, undertaken for the love of God, are not to be undone with impunity."

The parochial church at Bernay is uninteresting. The sculptures, however, which adorn the high altar, are relics saved from the destruction of the abbey of Bec. The Virgin Mary and Joseph are represented, contemplating the infant Jesus, who is asleep. The statues are all of the natural size. We saw many grave-stones from the same abbey, nine or ten feet long, and covered with monumental figures of the usual description, indented in the stone. These memorials were standing by the side of the church door, not for preservation, but for sale! And at a small chapel in the burial-ground near the town, we were shewn twelve statues of saints, which likewise came from Bec. They are of comparatively modern workmanship, larger than life, and carved in a good, though not a fine, style. In the same chapel is kept the common coffin for the interment of all the poor at Bernay.

The custom of merely putting the bodies of persons of the lower class into coffins, when they are brought to the burial-ground, and then depositing them naked in their graves, prevails at present in this part of France as it did formerly in England.—In a place which must be the receptacle for many that were in easy, and for not a few that were in affluent, circumstances, it was remarkable that all lay indiscriminately side by side, unmarked by any monumental stone, or any sepulchral record.—Republican France proscribed distinctions of every description, and those memorials which tended to perpetuate distinctions beyond the limits of mortal existence, were naturally most unpardonable in the eyes of the apostles of equality. But doctrines of this nature have fallen into disrepute for more than twenty years; and yet the country church-yard remains as naked as when the guillotine would have been the reward of opposition to the tenets of the day. There are few more comfortless sights, than such a cemetery: it looks as if those by whom it is occupied regarded death as eternal sleep, and thought that the memory of man should terminate with the close of his life. However unlettered the muse, however hackneyed the rhyme, however misapplied the text, it is consolatory to see them employed. Man dwells with a melancholy satisfaction upon the tomb-stones of his relations and friends, and not of them alone, but of all whom he has known or of whom he has heard.—A mere hic jacet, with the name and years of him that sleeps beneath, frequently recals the most lively impressions; and he who would destroy epitaphs would destroy a great incitement to virtue.—In other parts of France tomb-stones, or crosses charged with monumental inscriptions, have re-appeared: at Bernay we saw only two; one of them commemorated a priest of the town; the other was erected at the public expence, to the memory of three gendarmes, who were killed at the beginning of the revolution, and before religion was proscribed, in the suppression of some tumult.

At less than a mile from Bernay, in the opposite direction, is another church, called Notre Dame de la Couture, a name borrowed from the property on which it stands. We were induced to visit it, by the representation of different persons in the town, who had noticed our architectural propensities. Some assured us that "C'est une belle piece;" others that "C'est une piece qui n'est pas vilaine;" and all concurred in praising it, though some only for the reason that "les processions vont tout autour du choeur."—We found nothing to repay the trouble of the walk.

Bernay contains upwards of six thousand inhabitants, the greater part of whom are engaged in manufacturing coarse woollen and cotton cloths; and the manufactures flourish, the goods made being principally for home consumption. It is the chief place of the arrondissement, and the residence of a sub-prefect.—Most of the houses are like those at Rouen, merely wooden frames filled with mortar, which, in several instances, is faced with small bricks and flints, disposed in fanciful patterns: here and there the beams are carved with a variety of grotesque figures. The lower story of all those in the high street retires, leaving room for a wooden colonnade, which shelters the passenger, though it is entirely destitute of all architectural beauty. The head-dress of the females at Bernay is peculiar, and so very archaic, that our chamber-maid at the inn appeared to deserve a sketch, full as much as any monumental effigy.



On our road between Bernay and Orbec, we stopped at the village of Chambrais, more commonly called Broglie. Before the revolution, it belonged to the noble family of that name, and it thence derived its familiar appellation. The former residence of the Seigneurs of Broglie, which is still standing, apparently uninjured, upon an adjoining eminence, has lately been restored to the present Marechal Duc de Broglie. It looks like an extensive parish work-house, or like any thing rather than a nobleman's seat.—The village church is very ancient and still curious, though in parts considerably modernized. Unlike most churches of great antiquity, it is not built in the form of a cross, but consists only of a nave and choir, with side-aisles and an apsis, all on a small scale[63]. Towards the north, the nave is separated from the aisle by some of the largest and rudest piers I ever saw. They occupy full two-thirds of the width of the intervening arches, which are five feet wide, elliptic rather than semi-circular, and altogether without ornament of any kind. Above each of these arches is a narrow, circular-headed window, banded with a cylindrical pilaster; and, in most instances, a row of quatrefoils runs between the pillar and the window. The bases of the windows rest upon a string-course that extends round the whole building; and on this also, alternating with the windows, rest corbels, from which spring very short, clustered columns, intended to support the groinings of the roof. On the south side, the massy piers have been pared into comparatively slender pillars; and the arches are pointed, as are all the lower windows in the church.—The font is of stone, and ancient: it consists of a round basin, on a quadrangular pedestal, like many in England.—The west front of the church is peculiar. It is entered by a very wide, low, semi-circular door-way, of rude architecture, and quite unornamented. Above is a window corresponding with those in the clerestory; and, still higher, a row of interlaced arches, also semi-circular. A pointed arch, the receptacle for the statue of a saint, surmounts the whole; but this is, most probably, of a later aera, as evidently are the two lateral compartments, which terminate in slender spires of slate, and are separated from the central division by Norman buttresses.

We stopped to dine at Orbec, a small and insignificant country town, formerly an appendage of the houses of Orleans and Navarre, with the title of a barony; but, more immediately before the revolution, the domain of the family of Chaumont. Its church is a most uncouth edifice: the plan is unusual; the entrance is in the north transept, which ends in a square high tower.

Bernay, Orbec, and Lisieux, communicate only by cross roads, scarcely passable by a carriage, even at this season of the year. From Orbec to Lisieux the road runs by the side of the Touques, which, at Orbec, is no more than a rivulet. The beautiful green meadows in the valley, appear to repay the great care which is taken in the draining and irrigating of them. They are every where intersected by small trenches, in which the water is confined by means of sluices.—In this part of the country, we passed several flocks of sheep, the true moutons du pays, a large breed, with red legs and red spotted faces. Their coarse wool serves to make the ordinary cloth of the country, but is inapplicable to any of a finer texture. To remedy this deficiency, and, if possible, improve the local manufactures, some large flocks of Merino sheep were imported at the time when the French occupied Spain; and they are said to thrive. But it is only of late years that any attempts, have been made of the kind.—The Norman farmer, however careful about the breed of his horses, has altogether neglected his sheep; and this is the more extraordinary, considering that the prosperity of the province is inseparably connected with that of the manufactures, and that much of the value of the produce must of necessity depend upon the excellence of the material. His pigs are the very perfection of ugliness: it is no hyperbole to say, that, in their form, they partake as much of a greyhound as of an English pig.—These animals are sure to attract the gaze of our countrymen; and poor Trotter, in his narrative of the journey of Mr. Fox, expressed his marvel so often, as to call down upon himself the witty vengeance of one of our ablest periodical writers.

Melons are cultivated on a great scale in the country about Lisieux. They grow here in the natural soil, occupying whole fields of considerable size, and apparently without requiring any extraordinary pains.—As we approached the city, the meadows, through which we passed, were mostly occupied as extensive bleaching-grounds. Lisieux is an industrious manufacturing town. Its ten thousand inhabitants find their chief employment in the making of the ordinary woollen cloths, worn by the peasantry of Normandy and of Lower Brittany. Linen and flannels are also manufactured here, though on a comparatively trifling scale. For trade of this description, Lisieux is well situated upon the banks of the Touques, a small river, which, almost immediately under the walls of the town, receives the waters of a yet smaller stream, the Orbec. A project is in agitation, and it is said that it may be carried into effect at an inconsiderable expence, of making the Touques navigable to Lisieux. At present, it is so no farther than the the little town of the same name as the river; and even this derives no great advantage from the navigation; for, however near its situation is to the mouth of the stream, it is approachable only by vessels of less than one hundred tons burthen.—It was at Touques that Henry Vth landed in France, in the spring of 1417, when the monarch, flushed with a degree of success as extraordinary as it was unexpected, quitted England with the determination of returning no more till the whole kingdom of France should be subjugated.

The greater part of the houses in Lisieux are built of wood; and many of them are old, and most of them are mean; yet, on the whole, it is picturesque and handsome. Its streets are spacious, and contain several large buildings: it is surrounded with pleasant boulevards; and its situation, like that of most other Norman towns, is delightful.—In consequence of the revolution, the city has lost the privilege of being an episcopal see. Even when Napoleon, by virtue of the concordat of 1801, restored the Gallican church to its obedience to the the supreme Pontiff, the see of Lisieux was suppressed. The six suffragan bishops of ancient Normandy were at that time reduced to four, conformably to the number of the departments of the province; and Lisieux and Avranches merged in the more important dioceses of Bayeux and Coutances.

The cathedral, now the parish church of St. Peter, derived, however, one advantage from the revolution. Another church, dedicated to St. Germain, which had previously stood immediately before it, so as almost to block up the approach, was taken down, and the west front of the cathedral was made to open upon a spacious square.—Solid, simple grandeur are the characters of this front, which, notwithstanding some slight anomalies, is, upon the whole, a noble specimen of early pointed architecture.—It is divided into three equal compartments, the lateral ones rising into short square towers of similar height. The southern tower is surmounted by a lofty stone spire, probably of a date posterior to the part below. The spire of the opposite tower fell in 1553, at which time much injury was done to the building, and particularly to the central door-way, which, even to the present day, has never been repaired.—Contrary to the usual elevation of French cathedrals, the great window over the principal entrance is not circular, but pointed: it is divided into three compartments by broad mullions, enriched with many mouldings. The compartments end in acute pointed arches.—In the north tower, the whole of the space from the basement story is occupied by only two tiers of windows. Each tier contains two windows, extremely narrow, considering their height; and yet, narrow as they are, each of them is parted by a circular mullion or central pillar. You will better understand how high they must be, when told that, in the southern tower, the space of the upper row is divided into three distinct tiers; and still the windows do not appear disproportionately short. They also are double, and the interior arches are pointed; but the arches, within which they are placed, are circular. In this circumstance lies the principal anomaly in the front of the cathedral; but there is no appearance of any disparity in point of dates; for the circular arches are supported on the same slender mullions, with rude foliaged capitals, of great projection, which are the most distinguishing characteristics of this style of architecture.

The date of the building establishes the fact of the pointed arch being in use, not only as an occasional variation, but in the entire construction of churches upon a grand scale, as early as the eleventh century.—Sammarthanus tells us that Bishop Herbert, who died in 1049, began to build this church, but did not live to see it completed; and Ordericus Vitalis expressly adds, that Hugh, the successor to Herbert, upon his death-bed, in 1077, while retracing his past life, made use of these words:—"Ecclesiam Sancti Petri, principis apostolorum, quam venerabilis Herbertus, praedecessor meus, coepit, perfeci, studiose adornavi, honorifice dedicavi, et cultoribus necessariisque divino servitio vasis aliisque apparatibus copiose ditavi."—Language of this kind appears too explicit to leave room for ambiguity, but an opinion has still prevailed, founded probably upon the style of the architecture, that the cathedral was not finished till near the expiration of the thirteenth century. Admitting, however, such to be the fact, I do not see how it will materially help those who favor the opinion; for the building is far from being, as commonly happens in great churches, a medley of incongruous parts; but it is upon one fixed plan; and, as it was begun, so it was ended.—The exterior of the extremity of the south transept is a still more complete example of the early pointed style than the west front: this style, which was the most chaste, and, if I may be allowed to use the expression, the most severe of all, scarcely any where displays itself to greater advantage. The central window is composed of five lancet divisions, supported upon slender pillars: massy buttresses of several splays bound it on either side.

The same character of uniformity extends over the interior of the building. On each side of the nave is a side-aisle; and, beyond the aisles, chapels. The pillars of the nave are cylindrical, solid, and plain. Their bases end with foliage at each corner, and foliage is also sculptured upon the capitals. The arches which they support are acute.—The triforium is similar in plan to the part below; but the capitals of the columns are considerably more enriched, with an obvious imitation of the antique model, and every arch encircles two smaller ones. In the clerestory the windows are modern.—The transepts appear the oldest parts of the cathedral, as is not unfrequently the case; whether they were really built before the rest, or that, from being less used in the services of the church, they were less commonly the objects of subsequent alterations. They are large; and each of them has an aisle on the eastern side. The architecture of the choir resembles that of the nave, except that the five pillars, which form the apsis, are slender and the intervening arches more narrow and more acute.—The Lady-Chapel, which is long and narrow, was built towards the middle of the fifteenth century, by Peter Cauchon, thirty-sixth bishop of Lisieux, who, for his steady attachment to the Anglo-Norman cause, was translated to this see, in 1429, when Beauvais, of which he had previously been bishop, fell into the hands of the French. He was selected, in 1431, for the invidious office of presiding at the trial of the Maid of Orleans. Repentance followed; and, as an atonement for his unrighteous conduct, according to Ducarel, he erected this chapel, and therein founded a high mass to the Holy Virgin, which was duly sung by the choristers, in order, as is expressed in his endowment-charter, to expiate the false judgment which he pronounced[64].—The two windows by the side of the altar in this chapel have been painted of a crimson color, to add to the effect produced upon entering the church; and, seen as they are, through the long perspective of the nave and the distant arches of the choir, the glowing tint is by no means unpleasing.—The central tower is open within the church to a considerable height: it is supported by four arches of unusual boldness, above which runs a row of small arches, of the same character as the rest of the building; and, still higher, on each side, are two lancet-windows.—The vaulting of the roof is very plain, with bosses slightly pendant and carved.



At the extremity of the north transept is an ancient stone sarcophagus, so built into the wall, that it appears to have been incorporated with the edifice, at the period when it was raised. The style of the medallions which adorn it will be best understood by consulting the annexed sketch, which is very faithful, though taken under every possible disadvantage. The transept is now used as a school; and the little filthy imps, who are there taught to drawl out their catechisms, continued swarming round the feverish artist, during the progress of the drawing. The character of the heads, the crowns, and the disposition of the foliage, may be considered as indicating that it is a production, at least of the Carlovingian period, if it be not indeed of earlier date. I believe it is traditionally supposed to have been the tomb of a saint, perhaps St. Candidus; but I am not quite certain whether I am accurate in the recollection of the name.—Above are two armed statues, probably of the twelfth or thirteenth centuries. These have been engraved by Willemin, in his useful work, Les Monumens Francais, under the title of Two Armed Warriors, in the Nave of the Cathedral at Lisieux; and both are there figured as if in all respects perfect, and with a great many details which do not exist, and never could have existed, though at the same time the draftsman has omitted the animals at the feet of the statues, one of which is yet nearly entire.—This may be reckoned among the innumerable proofs of the disregard of accuracy which pervades the works of French antiquaries. A French designer never scruples to sacrifice accuracy to what he considers effect.—Willemin describes the monuments as being in the nave of the church. I suspect that he has availed himself of the unpublished collection of Gaignat, in this and many other instances. It is evident that originally the statues were recumbent; but I cannot ascertain when they changed their position.—No other tombs now exist in the cathedral: the brazen monument raised to Hannuier, an Englishman, the marble that commemorated the bishop, William d'Estouteville, founder of the College de Lisieux at Paris, that of Peter Cauchon in the Lady-Chapel, and all the rest, were destroyed during the revolution.

The diocese of Lisieux was a more modern establishment than any other in Normandy. Even those who are most desirous to honor it by antiquity, do not venture to date its foundation higher than the middle of the sixth century. Ordericus Vitalis, a monk of the province, suggests with some reason that we ought not to be hasty in forming our judgment upon these subjects; for that, owing to the destruction caused by the Norman pirates and the abominable negligence (damnabilis negligentia) of those to whom the care of the records of religious houses had subsequently been intrusted, many documents had been irretrievably lost.—The see of Lisieux was also peculiarly unfortunate, in having twice been in a state of anarchy, and on each occasion for a period of more than a century. The series of its prelates is interrupted from the year 670 to 853, and again from 876 to 990.

It is rather extraordinary, that no one of the Lexovian bishops was ever admitted by the church into the catalogue of her saints. Many of them were prelates of unquestionable merit. Freculfus, in the ninth century, was a patron of literature, and himself an author; Hugh of Eu, grandson of Richard, Duke of Normandy, was one of the most illustrious ecclesiastics of his day; Gilbert is described by Ordericus Vitalis as having been a man of exemplary charity, and deeply versed in all sciences, though it is admitted that he was somewhat too much addicted to worldly pleasures, and not averse from gambling; and Arnulf, whose letters and epigrams are preserved among the manuscripts of the Vatican, was a prelate who would have done honor to St. Peter's chair.—All these were bishops of Lisieux, during the ages when canonization was not altogether so unfrequent as in our days. Arnulf particularly distinguished himself by taking a leading part in the principal transactions of the times. He accompanied the crusaders to the holy land in 1147; five years subsequently he officiated at the marriage of Henry Plantagenet with Eleanor of Guyenne, the repudiated wife of Louis le Jeune, which was performed in his cathedral; he assisted at the coronation of the same king, by whom he was shortly afterwards employed in a mission of great importance at Rome; and he interposed to settle the differences between that sovereign and Thomas a Becket; and though he espoused the part of the prelate, he had the good fortune to retain the favor of the monarch. A life thus eventful ended with the conviction that all was vanity!—Arnulf, disgusted with sublunary honors, abdicated his see and retired to a monastery at Paris, where he died.—One of the immediate successors of this prelate, William of Rupierre, was the ambassador of Richard Coeur-de-Lion to the Pope; and he pleaded the cause of his sovereign against Walter, Archbishop of Rouen, on the occasion of the differences that originated from the building of Chateau Gaillard. He also resisted the power usurped by King John within the city and liberties of Lisieux, and finally obtained a sentence from the Norman court of exchequer, whereby the privileges of the dukes of the province were restricted to what was called the Placitum Spathae, consisting of the right of billetting soldiers, of coining money, and of hearing and determining in cases of appeal. The decision is honorable both to the independence of the court, and the vigor of the prelate.—In times nearer to our own, a bishop of Lisieux, Jean Hennuyer, obtained a very different distinction. Authors are strangely at variance whether this prelate is to be regarded as the protector or the persecutor of the protestants. All agree that his church suffered materially from the excesses of the Huguenots, in 1562, and that, on the following year, he received public thanks from the Cardinal of Bourbon, for the firmness with which he had opposed them; but the point at issue is, whether, after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, ten years subsequently, he withstood the sanguinary orders from the court to put the Huguenots to the sword, or whether he endeavored, as far as lay in his power, to forward the pious labor of extirpating the heretics, but was himself effectually resisted by the king's own lieutenant.—Sammarthanus tells us that the first of these traditions rests solely upon the authority of Anthony Mallet[65] but it obtained general credence till within the last three years, when a very well-informed writer, in the Mercure de France, and subsequently in the article Hennuyer in the Bibliographie Universelle, espoused, and has apparently established, the opposite opinion.

We visited only one other of the churches in Lisieux, that of St. Jacques, a large edifice, in a bad style of pointed architecture, and full of gaudy altars and ordinary pictures. On the outside of the stalls of the choir towards the north is some curious carving; but I should scarcely have been induced to have spoken of the building, were it not for one of the paintings, which, however uninteresting as a piece of art, appears to possess some historical value. It represents how the bones of St. Ursinus were miraculously translated to Lisieux, under the auspices of Hugh the Bishop, in 1055; and it professes, and apparently with truth, to be a copy, made in the seventeenth century, from an original of great antiquity. The legend relating to the relics of this saint, is noticed by no author with whom I am acquainted, nor do I find him mentioned any where in conjunction with the church of Lisieux, or with any other Norman diocese.—But the extraordinary privilege granted to the canons of the cathedral, of being Earls of Lisieux, and of exercising all civil and criminal jurisdiction within the earldom, upon the vigil and feast-day of St. Ursinus, in every year, is most probably connected with the tradition commemorated by the picture. The actual existence of the privilege, in modern times, we learn from Ducarel; who also details at length the curious ceremonies with which the claim of it was accompanied. The exercise of these rights was confirmed by a compact between the canons and the bishop, who, prior to the revolution, united the secular coronet of an earl with the episcopal mitre, and bore supreme sway in all civil and ecclesiastical polity, during the remaining three hundred and sixty-three days in the year.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 61: This ordinance is preserved by Du Monstier in the Neustria Pia, p. 400.]

[Footnote 62: The preamble of the charter is as follows:—"Nulli dubium videri debet futuros esse haeredes Regni coelestis, et cohaeredes Dei, qui Christum haeredem sui facientes, eorum, quae in hujus vitae peregrinatione, quasi a quadam paterna haereditate possident, locis ea Divino cultui deditis mancipare non dubitant. Ad quam rem, nostram firmat fidem calix aquae frigidae, qui, juxta Evangelicum verbum, suo pollet munere. Non ergo divini muneris gratia privari credendi sunt, qui Ecclesiasticis obsequiis, etsi officio non intersunt, rerum tamen suarum admistratione, Divini officii sustentant ministros: ea spe temporalem subministrantes alimoniam, ut sic solummodo coelestibus reddant intentos, qui coelestis Regis assiduo constituuntur invigilare obsequio, participes fiant ejusmodi beneficii omnimodo."—Neustria Pia, p. 398.]

[Footnote 63: The following are the dimensions of the building, in English feet:—

LENGTH. WIDTH. Nave 54 15 Choir 45 15 North aisle 7 South ditto 15

]

[Footnote 64: Anglo-Norman Antiquities, p. 47.]

[Footnote 65: "Sed ne quid omittam eorum etiam quae unum Antonium Mallet habent auctorem, anno 1572, cum prorex urbis Lexoviensis Livarotus a Carolo rege literas accepisset, quibus qui Lexovii infecti erant haeresi occidi omnes jubebantur per eos dies quibus princeps civitas cruore ejus insaniae hominum commaduerat, easque communicasset episcopo: Neque sum passurus, inquit praesul, oves meas, et quamquam evagatas Christi caula, meas tamen adhuc, necdum desperatas, gladio trucidari. Referente contra prorege imperio se mandatoque urgeri principis; quod si posthabeatur, omnem esse periculi aleam in caput suum moriendique necessitatem redituram: Et polliceor, inquit episcopus, illa te eximendum, postulantique cautionem, praesul consignatum manu sua scriptum tradidit, fidem datam confirmans. Qua illico publicata clementia, et ad errantes oves perlata, sollicitudine praesulis vigilantis circa gregis commissi sibi salutem et conservationem, rediere sensim in ecclesiae sinum omnes quotquot Lexovii per ea tempora novum istud fataleque delirium dementarat, nec ultra ibidem diu visi qui a recta fide aberrarent."—Gallia Christiana, p. 802.]



LETTER XXII.

SITE AND RUINS OF THE CAPITAL OF THE LEXOVII—HISTORY OF LISIEUX—MONASTERIES OF THE DIOCESE—ORDERICUS VITALIS—M. DUBOIS—LETTER FROM THE PRINCESS BORGHESE.

(Lisieux, July, 1818.)

Lisieux represents one of the most ancient capitals of the primitive tribes of Gaul. The Lexovii, noticed by Julius Caesar, in his Commentaries, and by other authors, who were almost contemporary with the Roman conqueror, are supposed by modern geographers to have occupied a territory nearly co-extensive with the bishopric of Lisieux; and it may be remarked, that the bounds of the ancient bishoprics of France were usually conterminal with the Roman provinces and prefectures.

The capital of the Lexovii was called the Neomagus or Noviomagus Lexoviorum; and no doubt ever was entertained but that the present city occupied the same site, till an accidental discovery, in the year 1770, proved the contrary to be the fact.—About that time a chaussee was formed between Lisieux and Caen; and, in the course of some excavations, which were made under the direction of M. Hubert, the superintending engineer, for the purpose of procuring stone, the laborers opened the foundations of some ruined buildings scattered over a field, called les Tourettes, about three-quarters of a mile from the former town. The character of these foundations was of a nature to excite curiosity: they were clearly the work of a remote age, and various specimens of ancient art were dug up amongst the ruins. The extent of the foundations, which spread over a space four times as large as the plot occupied by modern Lisieux left no doubt but that Danville, and all other geographers, must have been mistaken with respect to the position assigned by them to the ancient Neomagus. M. Hubert drew a plan of the ruins, and accompanied it with an historical memoir; but unfortunately he was a man little capable of prosecuting such researches; and though M. Mongez, in his report to the National Institute[66], eulogized the map as exact, and the memoir as excellent, they were both of them extremely faulty. It was reserved for M. Louis Dubois, of whom I shall have occasion to speak again before I close this letter, to repair the omissions and rectify the mistakes of M. Hubert, and he has done it with unremitting zeal and extraordinary success. The researches of this gentleman, among the remains of Neomagus Lexoviorum, have already brought to light a large number of valuable medals, both in silver and bronze, as well as a considerable quantity of fragments of foreign marble, granite, and porphyry, some of them curiously wrought. The most important of his discoveries has been recently made: it is that of a Roman amphitheatre, in a state of great perfection, the grades being covered only by a thin layer of soil, which a trifling expence of time and labor will effectually remove.

Such vestiges prove that Neomagus must have been a place of importance; and, like the other Gallo-Roman cities, it would probably have maintained its honors under the Franks; but about the middle of the fourth century, the Saxons, swarming from the mouths of the Elbe and Weser, laid waste the coasts of Belgium and of Neustria, and finally established themselves in that portion of northern Gaul called the Secunda Lugdunensis, which thence obtained, in the Notitia Imperii, the title of the Littus Saxonicum.—In the course of these incursions, it is supposed that Neomagus was utterly destroyed by the invaders. None of the medals dug up within the precincts of the town, or in its neighborhood, bear a later date than the reign of Constantine; and, though the city is recorded in the Itinerary of Antoninus, no mention of it is to be found in the curious chart, known by the name of the Tabula Peutingeriana, formed under the reign of Theodosius the Great; so that it then appears to have been completely swept away and forgotten.

The new town of Lisieux and the bishopric most probably arose together, towards the close of the sixth century; and the city, like other provincial capitals in Gaul, took the name of the tribe by whom the district had been peopled. It first appears in history under the appellation of Lexovium or Lexobium: in the eleventh century, when Ordericus Vitalis composed his history, it was called Luxovium; and soon after it became Lixovium, and Lizovium, which, gallicised, naturally passed into Lyzieulx, or, as it is now written, Lisieux. The city was ravaged by the Normans about the year 877, in the course of one of their predatory excursions from Bayeux: it again felt their vengeance early in the following century, when Rollo, after taking Bayeux by storm, sacked Lisieux at the head of his army on his way to Rouen. The conqueror was not put in possession of the Lexovian territory by Charles the Simple till 923, eleven years after the rest of Neustria had been ceded to him.

United to the duchy, Lisieux enjoyed a short respite from the calamities of war; nor does it appear to have borne any prominent part in the transactions of the times. The name, indeed, of the city occurs as the seat of the council held for the purpose of degrading Malgerius from the primacy of Normandy; but, except on this occasion, Lisieux is scarcely mentioned till the first year of the twelfth century, when it was the seat of rebellion. Ralph Flambart, bishop of Durham, a prelate of unbounded arrogance, had fled from England, and joined Duke Robert, then in arms against his brother. Raising the standard of insurrection, he fixed himself at Lisieux, took forcible possession of the town, and invested his son, only twelve years old, with the mitre[67], while he himself exercised despotic authority over the inhabitants. At length, he purchased peace and forgiveness, by opening the gates to his lawful sovereign, after the battle of Tinchbray.—In the middle of October, in the same year, Henry returned to Lisieux, and there held an assembly of the Norman nobility and prelates, who proclaimed peace throughout the duchy, enacted sundry strict regulations to prevent any infringement of the laws, and decreed that Robert, the captive duke, should be consigned to an English prison.—Two years subsequently, another council was also assembled at Lisieux, by the same sovereign, and for nearly the same objects; and again, in 1119, Henry convened his nobles a third time at Lisieux, when this parliament ratified the peace concluded at Gisors, six years previously, and witnessed the marriage[68] of the king's son, William Adelin, with Matilda, daughter of Fulk, earl of Anjou.

Historical distinction is seldom enviable:—in the wars occasioned by the usurpation of Stephen, Lisieux once more obtained an unfortunate celebrity. The town was attacked in 1136, by the forces of Anjou, under the command of Geoffrey Plantagenet, husband of the Empress Maud, joined by those of William, Duke of Poitiers; and the garrison, consisting of Bretons, seeing no hope of effectual resistance or of rescue, set fire to the place to the extreme mortification of the invaders, who, in the language of the chronicles of the times, "when they beheld the city and all its wealth a prey to the flames, waxed exceedingly wroth, at being deprived of the spoil; and grieved sorely for the loss of the booty which perished in the conflagration."—The town, however, was not so effectually ruined, but that, during the following year, it served King Stephen as a rallying point, at which to collect his army to march against his antagonist.—In 1169, it was distinguished by being selected by Thomas a Becket, as the place of his retirement during his temporary disgrace.

History from this time forward relates but little concerning Lisieux. Though surrounded with walls during the bishopric of John, who was promoted to the see early in the twelfth century, the situation of the town, far from the coast or from the frontiers of the province, rendered the inhabitants naturally unwarlike, and caused them in general to submit quietly to the stronger party.—Brito, in his Philippiad, says that, when Philip Augustus took Lisieux, in 1213, the Lexovians, destitute of fountains, disputed with the toads for the water of the muddy ditches. His mentioning such a fact is curious, as shewing that public fountains were at that early period of frequent occurrence in Normandy.—Our countrymen, in the fifteenth century, acted with great rigor, to use the mildest terms, towards Lisieux. Henry, after landing at Touques, in 1417, entered the town, in the character of an enraged enemy, not as the sovereign of his people: he gave it up to plunder; and even the public archives were not spared. The cruelty of our English king is strongly contrasted by the conduct of the Count de Danois, general of the army of Charles VIIth, to whom the town capitulated in 1449. Thomas Basin, then bishop, negociated with such ability, that, according to Monstrelet, "not the slightest damage was done to any individual, but each peaceably enjoyed his property as before the surrender."

The most celebrated monasteries within the diocese of Lisieux were the Benedictine abbeys of Bernay, St. Evroul, Preaux, and Cormeilles.—Cormeilles was founded by William Fitz-Osborne, a relation to William the Conqueror, at whose court he held the office of sewer, and by whom he was promoted to the earldom of Hereford. Its church and monastic buildings had so far gone to ruin, in the last century, as to call forth a strong remonstrance from Mabillon[69]: they were afterwards repaired by Charles of Orleans, who was appointed abbot in 1726.—The abbey of Preaux is said to have existed prior to the invasion of the Normans; but its earliest records go no farther back than the middle of the eleventh century, when it was restored by Humphrey de Vetulis, who built and inclosed the monastery about the year 1035, at which time Duke Robert undertook his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. This abbey, according to the account given by Gough, in his Alien Priories, presented to thirty benefices, and enjoyed an annual revenue of twenty thousand livres.—Among its English lands which were considerable, was the priory of Toft-Monks in our own immediate vicinity: the name, as you know, remains, though no traces of the building are now in existence.

The third abbey, that of St. Evrau or St. Evroul, called in Latin, Monasterium Uticense, was one of the most renowned throughout Normandy. The abbey dates its origin from St. Evroul himself, a nobleman, who lived in the reign of Childebert, and was attached to the palace of that monarch, "from which," to use the words of the chronicles, "he made his escape, as from shipwreck, and fled to the woods, and entered upon the monastic life."—The legend of St. Ebrulfus probably savors of romance, the almost inseparable companion of traditional, and particularly of monastic, history: it is safer, therefore, to be contented with referring the foundation of the monastery to the tenth century, when William Gerouis, after having been treacherously deprived of his sight and otherwise maimed, renounced the world; and, uniting with his nephews, Hugh and Robert de Grentemaisnil, brought considerable possessions to the endowment of this abbey. The abbey was at all times protected by the especial favor of the kings of France. No payment or service could be demanded from its monks; they acknowledged no master without their own walls, besides the sovereign himself; they were entitled to exemption from every kind of burthen; and they had the privilege of being empowered to castellate the convent, and to compel the people of the surrounding district to contribute their assistance for the purpose.

St. Evroul, however, principally claims our attention, as the sanctuary where Ordericus Vitalis, to use his own expressions, "delighted in obedience and poverty."—This most valuable writer was an Englishman; his native town being Attingesham, on the Severn, where he was born in the year 1075. He was sent to school at Shrewsbury, and there received the first rudiments, both of the humanities and of ecclesiastical education. In the tenth year of his age, his father, Odelerius, delivered the boy to the care of the monk Rainaldus. The weeping father parted from the weeping son, and they never saw each other more. Ordericus crossed the sea, and arrived in Normandy, an exile, as he describes himself, and "hearing, like Joseph in Egypt, a language which he understood not." In the eleventh year of his age, he received the tonsure from the hands of Mainerius, the abbot of St. Evroul. In the thirty-third year of his age, he was ordained a priest; and thenceforward his life wore away in study and tranquillity. Aged and infirm, he completed his Ecclesiastical History, in the sixty-seventh year of his age; and this great and valuable work ends with his auto-biography, which is written in an affecting strain of simplicity and piety.—The Ecclesiastical History of Ordericus is divided into parts: the first portion contains an epitome of the sacred and profane history of the world, beginning with the incarnation, and ending with Pope Innocent IInd. The second, and more important division, contains the history of Normandy, from the first invasion of the country, down to the year 1141.—Though professedly an ecclesiastical historian, yet Ordericus Vitalis is exceedingly copious in his details of secular events; and it is from these that his chronicle derives its importance and curiosity. It was first published by Duchesne, in his collection of Norman historians, a work which is now of rare occurrence, and it has never been reprinted.

Valuable materials for a new edition were, however, collected early in the eighteenth century, by William Bessin, a monk of St. Ouen; and these, before the revolution, were preserved in the library of that abbey. Bessin had been assisted in the task by Francis Charles Dujardin, prior of St. Evroul, who had collated the text, as published in the collection of Norman historians, with the original manuscript in his own monastery, to which latter Duchesne unfortunately had not access, but had been obliged to content himself with a copy, now in the Royal Library at Paris. It is to be hoped, that the joint labors of Bessin and Dujardin may still be in existence, and may come to light, when M. Liquet shall have completed the task of arranging the manuscripts in the public library at Rouen. The manuscript which belonged to St. Evroul, and was always supposed to be an autograph from the hands of Ordericus Vitalis himself, was discovered during the revolution among a heap of parchments, thrown aside as of no account, in some buildings belonging to the former district of Laigle. It is now deposited in the public library of the department of the Orne, but unfortunately, nearly half the leaves of the volume are lost. The earliest part of what remains is towards the close of the seventh book, and of this only a fragment, consisting of eight pages, is left. The termination of the seventh book, and the whole of the eighth are wanting. From the ninth to the thirteenth, both of these inclusive, the manuscript is perfect. A page or two, however, at the end of the work, which contained the author's life, has been torn out.—At the beginning of the sixteenth century, the manuscript was complete; for it is known that, at that time, a monk of St. Evroul made a transcript of it, which extended through four volumes in folio. These volumes were soon dispersed. Two of them found their way to Rouen, where they were kept in the library of St. Ouen: the other two were in that of the abbey of St. Maur de Glandefeuille, on the Loire. A third, though incomplete, copy of the original manuscript was also known to exist in France before the revolution. It formerly belonged to Coaslin de Camboret, Bishop of Metz, by whom it was presented, together with four thousand manuscripts, to the monks of St. Germain des Pres at Paris. But the greater part of the literary treasures of this abbey fell a prey to the flames in July, 1793, and it is feared that the copy of Ordericus perished at that time.

The original code from St. Evroul, was discovered by M. Louis Dubois, whom I have already mentioned in connection with the ruins of Neomagus. He is an antiquary of extensive knowledge and extraordinary zeal. His History of Lisieux, which he has long been preparing for the press, will be a work of great curiosity and interest. The publication of it is for the present suspended, whilst he superintends an edition of the Vaux-de-Vires, or Vaux de villes, of Olivier Basselin, an early Norman poet. Meanwhile, M. Dubois still continues his researches among the foundations of the ancient city, from which he has collected a number of valuable relics. Some of the most pleasant and instructive hours of my tour have been spent in his society; and, whilst it was under his guidance that I visited the antiquities of Lisieux, his learning assisted me in illustrating them. M. Dubois likewise possesses a large collection of original autograph letters, which I found much pleasure in perusing.

During the reign of Napoleon, he held the office of librarian of Alencon, a situation that afforded him the opportunity of meeting with many literary curiosities of this nature. Among others, which thus fell into his hands, was the following letter, written by the Princess Borghese, sister to the Emperor, and addressed to the Empress Marie-Louise, by whom it was received, while on a tour through the western departments. I annex a transcript of this epistle; for, although it has no immediate connection with the main subject of our correspondence, it yet is a very singular contribution towards the private history of the dynasty of Napoleon.—The odd mixture of caudle-cup compliment and courtly flattery, is sufficiently amusing. I have copied it, word for word, letter for letter, and point for point; for, as we have no other specimen of the epistles of her imperial highness, I think it right to preserve all the peculiarities of the original; and, by, way of a treat for the collectors of autographs, I have added a fac-simile of her signature.

Madame et tres chere SA"ur,

je recois par le Prince Aldobrandini la lettre de V.M. et la belle tasse dont elle a daigne, le charger pour moi au nom de L'empereur, je remercie mille fois votre aimable bonte, et j'ose vous prier ma tres chere sA"ur d'Atre aupres de L'empereur l'interprete de ma reconnaissance pour cette marque de souvenir.—je fais parler beaucoup le Prince et la Princesse Aldobrandini sur votre sante, sur votre belle grossesse, je ne me lasse pas de les interroger, et je suis heureuse d'apprendre que vous vous portes tres bien, que rien ne vous fatigue, et que vous aves la plus belle grossesse qu'il soit possible de desirer, combien je desire chere sA"ur que tous nos vA"ux soient exaucA(C)s, ne croyA(C)s cependant pas que si vous nous donnes une petite Princesse je ne l'aimerais pas. non, elle nous serait chere, elle resemblerait a V.M. elle aurait sa douceur, son amabilite, et ce joli caractere qui la fait cherir de ceux qui out le bonheur de la Conaitre—mais ma chA"re sA"ur j'ai tort de m'apesantir sur les qualites dont serait douee cette auguste princesse, vous nous donneres d'abord un prince un petit Roi de Rome, juges combien je le desire nos bons toscans prient pour vous, ils vous aiment et je n'ai pas de peine a leur inspirer ce que je sens si vivement.

je vous remercie ma tres chere sA"ur de l'interest que vous prenez a mon fils, tout le monde dit qu'il ressemble a L'empereur. cela me Charme il est bien portant a present, et j'espere qu'il sera digne de servir sous les drapeaux de son auguste oncle.—adieu ma chere sA"ur soyA(C)s assA(C)s bonne pour Conserver un souvenir a une sA"ur qui vous est tendrement attachee. Napoleon ne cesse de lire la lettre pleine de bonte que V.M. a daigne lui ecrire, cela lui a fait sentir le plaisir qu'il y avait a savoir lire, et l'encourage dans ses etudes—je vous embrasse et suis,

Madame et tres chere SA"ur

de V.M.

La plus attachee



Pitti le 18 janvier 1811

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 66: See Magazin Encyclopedique, for 1802, III. p. 504.]

[Footnote 67: This transaction appears to have been peculiarly flagrant: a long detail of the circumstances, accompanied by several letters, very characteristic of the feeling and church-government of the times, is preserved in the Concilia Normannica, p. 520.—The account concludes in the following words:—"Exhorruit ad facinus, non Normannia solum et Anglia, quibus maledicta progenies notissima erat, sed et universa Gallia, et a singulis ad Apostolicum Paschalem delatum est. Nec tamen utrique simul ante quinquienniuin sordes de domo Dei propulsare praevaluerunt. Ceteris ferventius institit Yvo Carnotensis Antistes, conculcatae disciplinae ecclesiasticae zelo succensus; in tantum ut Neustriacos Praesules quasi desides ac pusillanimes coarguere veritus non sit: sed ea erat Ecclesiae sub ignavo Principe sors per omnia lamentabilis, ut ipsemet postmodum cum laude non invitus agnovit."]

[Footnote 68: Sandford, in his Genealogical History of the Kings of England, says, that this marriage was solemnized at Luxseul, in the county of Burgundy; but he refers for his authority to Ordericus Vitalis, by whom it is stated to have been at Luxovium, the name by which he always calls Lisieux; and he, in the same page, mentions the assembly of the nobles also held there.]

[Footnote 69: Annal, IV. p. 599.]



LETTER XXIII.

FRENCH POLICE—RIDE FROM LISIEUX TO CAEN—CIDER—GENERAL APPEARANCE AND TRADE OF CAEN—ENGLISH RESIDENT THERE.

(Caen, August, 1818.)

Our reception at Caen has been somewhat inauspicious: we had scarcely made the few necessary arrangements at the hotel, and seated ourselves quietly before the caffe au lait, when two gens-d'armes, in military costume, stalked without ceremony into the room, and, taking chairs at the table, began the conversation rather abruptly, with "Monsieur, vous etes sous arret."—My companions were appalled by such a salutation, and apprehended some mistake; but the fact turned out to be, that our passport did not bear the signature of the mayor of Rouen, and that this ignorance of the regulations of the French police had subjected us to so unexpected a visit. It was too late in the day for the deficiency to be then supplied; and therefore, after a few expostulations, accompanied with observations, on their part, that we had the good fortune to have fixed ourselves at an honnete hotel, and did not wear the appearance of suspicious persons, the soldiers took their leave, first exacting from me a promise, that I would present myself the next morning before the proper officer, and would in the meanwhile consider myself a prisoner upon my parole.

The impression which this occurrence could not fail to make upon our minds, was, that the object of the gens-d'armes had been either to extort from us money, or to shew their consequence; but I have since been led to believe that they did no more than their duty.—We have several acquaintance among the English who reside here, and we find from the whole of them, that the utmost strictness is practised in all matters relating to passports, and not less towards natives than foreigners. No Frenchman can quit his arrondissement unprovided with a passport; and the route he intends to take, and the distance he designs to travel, must also be specified. A week or two ago the prefect of the police himself was escorted back to Caen, between a couple of gens-d'armes, because he inadvertently paid a visit to a neighboring bathing-place without his passport in his pocket. This is a current story here: I cannot vouch for its authenticity; however it is certain, that since the discovery of the late plot contrived by the ultras, a plot whose existence is generally disbelieved, the French police is more than usually upon the alert.