disposed to question: the system, in its present state, appears to me
admirably qualified to attain the object in view; and such seems the
general character of the French _Constitutional Charter_, which unites
two excellent qualities, great clearness and great brevity. The whole is
comprised in seventy-four short articles; and, that no Frenchman may
plead ignorance of his rights or his duties, it is usually found
prefixed to the almanacks. Some persons might, indeed, be inclined to
deem this station as ominous; for, since the revolution began, the frame
of the French government has sustained so many alterations, that,
considering that several of their constitutions never outlived the
current quarter, they may be fairly said to have had a new constitution
in each year. How far the Bourbon charter will answer the purpose of
serving as the basis of a code of laws for the government of an
extensive kingdom, time only can determine. At present, it has the
charm of novelty to recommend it; and there are few among us with whom
novelty is not a strong attraction. Our friends on this side of the
water are greatly belied, if it be not so with them.
The finances of the French municipalities are administered with a degree
of fairness and attention, which might put many a body corporate, in a
certain island, to the blush. Little is known in England respecting the
administration of the French towns: the following particulars relating
to the revenue and expences of Rouen, may, therefore, in some measure,
serve as a scale, by which you may give a guess at the balance-sheet of
cities of greater or lesser magnitude.--The budget amounted for the last
year to one million two hundred thousand francs. The proposed items of
expenditure must be particularized, and submitted to the Prefect and the
Minister of the Interior, before they can be paid. In this sum is
comprised the charge for the hospitals, which contain above three
thousand persons, including foundlings, and for all the other public
institutions, the number and excellence of which has long been the pride
of Rouen. You must consider too, that every thing of this kind is, in
France, national: individuals do nothing, neither is it expected of
them; and herein consists one of the most essential differences between
France and England. To meet this great expenditure, the city is provided
with the rents of public lands, with wharfage, with tolls from the
markets and the _halles_; and, above all, with the _octroi_, a tax that
prevails through France, upon every article of consumption brought into
the towns, and is collected at the barriers. The _octroi_, like
turnpike-tolls or the post-horse duty with us, is farmed; two-thirds are
received by the government, and the remaining one-third by the town. In
Rouen it produced the last year one million four hundred and fifty
thousand francs.--If, now, this sum appears to you comparatively greater
than that of our large cities in England, you must recollect that, with
us, towns are not liable to similar charges: our corporations support no
museums, no academies, no learned bodies; and our infirmaries, and
dispensaries, and hospitals, are indebted, as well for their existence
as their future maintenance, to the piety of the dead, or the liberality
of the living. Nor must we forget that, even in this great kingdom,
Rouen, at present, holds the fifth place among the towns; though it was
far from being thus, when Buonaparté, uniting the imperial to the iron
crown, overshadowed with his eagle-wings the continent from the Baltic
to Apulia; and when the mural crowns of Rome and Amsterdam stood beneath
the shield of the "good city" of Paris.
The population of Rouen is estimated at eighty-seven thousand persons,
of whom the greater number are engaged in the manufactories, which
consist principally of cotton, linen, and woollen cloths, and are among
the largest in France. At present, however, "trade is dull;" and hence,
and as the politics of a trader invariably sympathize with his cash
account, neither the peace, nor the English, nor the princes of the
Bourbon dynasty, are popular here; for the articles manufactured at
Rouen, being designed generally for exportation, ranged almost
unrivalled over the continent, during the war, but now in every town
they meet with competitors in the goods from England, which are at once
of superior workmanship and cheaper. The latter advantage is owing very
much to the greater perfection of our machinery, and, perhaps, still
more to the abundance of coals, which enables us, at so small an
expence, to keep our steam-engines in action, and thus to counterbalance
the disproportion in the charge of manual labor, as well as the many
disadvantages arising from the pressure of our heavy taxation.--But I
must cease. An English fit of growling is coming upon me; and I find
that the Blue Devils, which haunt St. Stephen's chapel, are pursuing me
over the channel.
Footnotes:
[48] _Moore's Journal of a Residence in France_, I. p. 82.
LETTER VIII.
MILITARY ANTIQUITIES--LE VIEUX CHÂTEAU--ORIGINAL PALACE OF THE NORMAN
DUKES--HALLES OF ROUEN--MIRACLE AND PRIVILEGE OF ST. ROMAIN--CHÂTEAU DU
VIEUX PALAIS--PETIT CHÂTEAU--FORT ON MONT STE. CATHERINE--PRIORY
THERE--CHAPEL OF ST. MICHAEL--DEVOTEE.
(_Rouen, June,_ 1818)
My researches in this city after the remains of architectural antiquity
of the earlier Norman æra, have hitherto, I own, been attended with
little success. I may even go so far as to say, that I have seen nothing
in the circular style, for which it would not be easy to find a parallel
in most of the large towns in England. On the other hand, the perfection
and beauty of the specimens of the pointed style, have equally surprised
and delighted me. I will endeavor, however, to take each object in its
order, premising that I have been materially assisted in my
investigations by M. Le Prevost and M. Rondeau, but especially by the
former, one of the most learned antiquaries of Normandy.
Of the fortifications and castellated buildings in Rouen very little
indeed is left[49], and that little is altogether insignificant; being
confined to some fragments of the walls scattered here and there[50],
and to three circular towers of the plainest construction, the remains
of the old castle, built by Philip Augustus in 1204, near to the Porte
Bouvreuil, and hence commonly known by the name of the _Château de
Bouvreuil_ or _le Vieux Château_.--It is to the leading part which this
city has acted in the history of France, that we must attribute the
repeated erection and demolition of its fortifications.
An important event was commemorated by the erection of the _old castle_,
it having been built upon the final annexation of Normandy to the crown
of France, in consequence of the weakness of our ill-starred
monarch,--John Lackland. The French King seems to have suspected that
the citizens retained their fealty to their former sovereign. He
intended that his fortress should command and bridle the city, instead
of defending it. The town-walls were razed, and the _Vieille Tour_, the
ancient palace of the Norman Dukes, levelled with the ground.--But, as
the poet says of language, so it is with castles,--
... "mortalia facta peribunt,
Nec _castellorum_ stet honos et gratia vivax;"
and, in 1590, the fortress raised by Philip Augustus experienced the
fate of its predecessors; it was then ruined and dismantled, and the
portion which was allowed to stand, was degraded into a jail. Now the
three[51] towers just mentioned are alone remaining, and these would
attract little notice, were it not that one of them bears the name of
the _Tour de la Pucelle_, as having been, in 1430, the place of
confinement of the unfortunate Joan of Arc, when she was captured before
Compiégne and brought prisoner to Rouen.
It must be stated, however, that the first castle recorded to have
existed at Rouen, was built by Rollo, shortly after he had made himself
master of Neustria. Its very name is now lost; and all we know
concerning it is, that it stood near the quay, at the northern extremity
of the town, in the situation subsequently occupied by the Church of St.
Pierre du Châtel, and the adjoining monastery of the Cordeliers.
After a lapse of less than fifty years, Rouen saw rising within her
walls a second castle, the work of Duke Richard Ist, and long the
residence of the Norman sovereigns. This, from a tower of great strength
which formed a part of it, and which was not demolished till the year
1204, acquired the appellation of _la Vieille Tour_; and the name
remains to this day, though the building has disappeared.
The space formerly occupied by the scite of it is now covered by the
_halles_, considered the finest in France. The historians of Rouen, in
the usual strain of hyperbole, hint that their _halles_ are even the
finest in the world[52], though they are very inferior to their
prototypes at Bruges and Ypres. The hall, or exchange, allotted to the
mercers, is two hundred and seventy-two feet in length, by fifty feet
wide: those for the drapers and for wool are, each of them, two hundred
feet long; and all these are surpassed in size by the corn-hall, whose
length extends to three hundred feet. They are built round a large
square, the centre of which is occupied by numberless dealers in
pottery, old clothes, &c.; and, as the day on which we chanced to visit
them was a Friday, when alone they are opened for public business, we
found a most lively, curious, and interesting scene.
It was on the top of a stone staircase, the present entry to the
_halles_, that the annual ceremony[53] of delivering and pardoning a
criminal for the sake of St. Romain, the tutelary protector of Rouen,
was performed on Ascension-day, according to a privilege exercised, from
time immemorial, by the Chapter of the Cathedral.
The legend is romantic; and it acquires a species of historical
importance, as it became the foundation of a right, asserted even in our
own days. My account of it is taken from Dom Pommeraye's History of the
Life of the Prelate[54].--He has been relating many miracles performed
by him, and, among others, that of causing the Seine, at the time of a
great inundation, to retire to its channel by his command, agreeably to
the following beautiful stanza of Santeuil:--
"Tangit exundans aqua civitatem;
Voce Romanus jubet efficaci;
Audiunt fluctus, docilisque cedit
Unda jubenti."
Our learned Benedictine thus proceeds:--"But the following miracle was
deemed a far greater marvel, and it increased the veneration of the
people towards St. Romain to such a degree, that they henceforth
regarded him as an actual apostle, who, from the authority of his
office, the excellence of his doctrine, his extreme sanctity, and the
gift of miracles, deserved to be classed with the earliest preachers of
our holy faith. In a marshy spot, near Rouen, was bred a dragon, the
very counterpart of that destroyed by St. Nicaise. It committed
frightful ravages; lay in wait for man and beast, whom it devoured
without mercy; the air was poisoned by its pestilential breath, and it
was alone the cause of greater mischief and alarm, than could have been
occasioned by a whole army of enemies. The inhabitants, wearied out by
many years of suffering, implored the aid of St. Romain; and the
charitable and generous pastor, who dreaded nothing in behalf of his
flock, comforted them with the assurance of a speedy deliverance. The
design itself was noble; still more so was the manner by which he put it
in force; for he would not be satisfied with merely killing the monster,
but undertook also to bring it to public execution, by way of atonement
for its cruelties. For this purpose, it was necessary that the dragon
should be caught; but when the prelate required a companion in the
attempt, the hearts of all men failed them. He applied, therefore, to a
criminal condemned to death for murder; and, by the promise of a pardon,
bought his assistance, which the certain prospect of a scaffold, had he
refused to accompany the saint, caused him the more willingly to lend.
Together they went, and had no sooner reached the marsh, the monster's
haunt, than St. Romain, approaching courageously, made the sign of the
cross, and at once put it out of the power of the dragon to attempt to
do him injury. He then tied his stole around his neck, and, in that
state, delivered him to the prisoner, who dragged him to the city, where
he was burned in the presence of all the people, and his ashes thrown
into the river.--The manuscript of the Abbey of Hautmont, from which
this legend is extracted, adds, that such was the fame of this miracle
throughout France, that Dagobert, the reigning sovereign, sent for St.
Romain to court, to hear a true narrative of the fact from his own lips;
and, impressed with reverent awe, bestowed the celebrated privilege upon
him and his successors for ever."
The right has, in comparatively modern times, been more than once
contested, but always maintained; and so great was the celebrity of the
ceremony, that princes and potentates have repeatedly travelled to
Rouen, for the purpose of witnessing it. There are not wanting, however,
those[55] who treat the whole story as allegorical, and believe it to be
nothing more than a symbolical representation of the subversion of
idolatry, or of the confining of the Seine to its channel; the winding
course of the river being typified by a serpent, and the word
_Gargouille_ corrupted from _gurges_. Other writers differ in minor
points of the story, and alledge that the saint had two fellow
adventurers, a thief as well as a murderer, and that the former ran
away, while the latter stood firm. You will see it thus figured in a
modern painting on St. Romain's altar, in the cathedral; and there are
two persons also with him, in the only ancient representation of the
subject I am acquainted with, a bas-relief which till lately existed at
the Porte Bouvreuil, and of which, by the kindness of M. Riaux, I am
enabled to send you a drawing.
[Illustration: Bas-Relief, representing St. Romain]
To keep alive the tradition, in which Popish superstition has contrived
to blend Judaic customs with heathen mythology, the practice was, that
the prisoner selected for pardon should be brought to this place, called
the chapel of St. Romain, and should here be received by the clergy in
full robes, headed by the archbishop, and bearing all the relics of the
church; among others, the shrine of St. Romain, which the criminal,
after having been reprimanded and absolved, but still kneeling, thrice
lifted, among the shouts of the populace, and then, with a garland upon
his head and the shrine in his hands, accompanied the clergy in
procession to the cathedral[56].--But the revolution happily consigned
the relics to their kindred dust, and put an end to a privilege
eminently liable to abuse, from the circumstance of the pardon being
extended, not only to the criminal himself, but to all his accomplices;
so that, an inferior culprit sometimes surrendered himself to justice,
in confidence of interest being made to obtain him the shrine, and thus
to shield under his protection more powerful and more guilty
delinquents. The various modifications, however, of latter times, had so
abridged its power, that it was at last only able to rescue a man guilty
of involuntary homicide[57]. We may hope, therefore, it was not
altogether deserving the hard terms bestowed upon it by Millin[58] who
calls it the most absurd, most infamous, and most detestable of all
privileges, and adduces a very flagrant instance of injustice committed
under its plea.--D'Alégre, governor of Gisors, in consequence of a
private pique against the Baron du Hallot, lord of the neighboring town
of Vernon, treacherously assassinated him at his own house, while he was
yet upon crutches, in consequence of the wounds received at the siege of
Rouen. This happened during the civil wars; in the course of which,
Hallot had signalized himself as a faithful servant, and useful
assistant to the monarch. The murderer knew that there were no hopes for
him of royal mercy; and, after having passed some time in concealment
and as a soldier in the army of the league, he had recourse to the
Chapter of the Cathedral of Rouen, from whom he obtained the promise of
the shrine of St. Romain. To put full confidence, however, even in this,
would, under such circumstances, have been imprudent. The clergy might
break their word, or a mightier power might interpose. D'Alégre,
therefore, persuaded a young mam, formerly a page of his, of the name of
Pehu, to surrender himself as guilty of the crime; and to him the
privilege was granted; under the sanction of which, the real culprit,
and several of his accomplices in the assassination, obtained a free
pardon. The widow and daughter of Hallot, in vain remonstrated: the
utmost that could be done, after a tedious law-suit, was to procure a
small fine to be imposed upon Pehu, and to cause him to be banished from
Normandy and Picardy and the vicinity of Paris. But regulations were in
consequence adopted with respect to the exercise of the privilege; and
the pardons granted under favor of it were ever afterwards obliged to be
ratified under the high seal of the kingdom.
The _Château du Vieux Palais_ and _le petit Château_ like the edifices
which I have already noticed, have equally yielded to time and violence.
M. Carpentier has furnished us with representations of both these
castles, drawn and etched by himself, in the _Itinerary of Rouen_. The
first of them has also been inaccurately figured by Ducarel, and
satisfactorily by Millin, in the second volume of his _Antiquités
Nationales_; where, to the pen of this most meritorious and
indefatigable writer, of whom, as of our Goldsmith, it may be justly
said, that "nullum ferè scribendi genus non tetigit, nullum quod tetigit
non ornavit," it affords materials for a curious memoir, blended with
the history of our own Henry Vth, and of Henry IVth, of France. The
castle was the work of the first of these sovereigns, and was begun by
him in 1420, two years after a seven months' siege had put him in
possession of the city, long the capital of his ancestors, and had thus
rendered him undisputed master of Normandy. This was an event worthy of
being immortalised; and it may easily be imagined that private feelings
had no little share in urging him to erect a magnificent palace,
intended at once as a safeguard for the town, and a residence for
himself and his posterity. The right to build it was an express article
in the capitulation he granted to Rouen, a capitulation of extreme
severity[59], and purchased at the price of three hundred thousand
golden crowns, as well as of the lives of three of the most
distinguished citizens; Robert Livret, grand-vicar of the archbishop,
John Jourdain, commander of the artillery, and Louis Blanchard, captain
of the train-bands. The two first of these were, however, suffered to
ransome themselves; the last, a man of distinguished honor and courage,
was beheaded; but Henry, much to his credit, made no farther use of his
victory, and even consented to pay for the ground required for his
castle. He selected for the purpose, the situation where, defence was
most needed, upon the extremity of the quay, by the side of the river,
near the entrance from Dieppe and Havre. A row of handsome houses now
fills the chief part of the space occupied by the building, which, at a
subsequent period, was again connected with English history[60], as the
residence of our James IInd, after the battle of La Hague; before his
spirit was yet sufficiently broken to suffer him to give up all thoughts
of the British crown, and to accept the asylum offered by Louis XIVth,
in the obscure tranquillity of Saint Germain's. It continued perfect
till the time of the revolution, and was of great extent and strength,
defended by massy circular towers, surrounded by a moat, and
approachable only by a draw-bridge.
The castle, which still remains to be described, and whose smaller size
is sufficiently denoted by its name, was also built by the same monarch,
but it was raised upon the ruins of a similar edifice that had existed
since the days of King John. Being situated at the foot of the bridge,
the older castle had been selected as the spot where it was stipulated
that the soldiers, composing the Anglo-Norman garrison, should lay down
their arms, when the town surrendered to Philip Augustus.--It was known
from very early time by the appellation of the _Barbican_, a term of
much disputed signification as well as origin: if we are to conclude,
according to some authorities, that it denoted either a mere
breast-work, or a watch-tower, or an appendage to a more important
fortress, it would appear but ill applied to a building like the one in
question. I should rather believe it designated an out-post of any kind;
and I would support my conjecture by this very castle, which was neither
upon elevated ground, nor dependent on any other. It consisted of two
square edifices, similar to what are called the _pavillions_ of the
Thuilleries, flanked by small circular towers with conical roofs, and
connected by an embattled wall. Not more than fifty years have passed
since its demolition; yet no traces of it are to be found.
A few rocky fragments, appearing now to bid defiance to time, indicate
the scite of the fortress, which once arose on the summit of Mont Ste.
Catherine, and which, though dismantled by Henry IVth, and reduced to a
state of dilapidation, was still suffered to maintain its ruined
existence till a few years ago. Its commanding situation, upon an
eminence three hundred and eighty feet high and immediately overhanging
the city, could not but render it of great importance towards the
defence of the place; and we accordingly find that Taillepied, who
probably wrote before its demolition, gives it as his opinion, that
whoever is in possession of Mont Ste. Catherine, is also master of the
town, if he can but have abundant supplies of water and provisions;--no
needless stipulation! At the same time, it must be admitted that the
fort was equally liable to be converted into the means of annoyance.
Such actually proved the case in 1562, at which time it was seized by
the Huguenots; and considerations of this nature most probably prevailed
with the citizens, when they declined the offer made by Francis Ist, who
proposed at a public meeting to enlarge the tower into an impregnable
citadel. In the hands of the Protestants, the fortress, such as it was,
proved sufficient to resist the whole army of Charles IXth, during
several days.--Rouen was stoutly defended by the reformed, well aware of
the sanguinary dispositions of the bigotted monarch. They yielded, and
he sullied his victory by giving the city up to plunder, during
twenty-four hours; and we are told, that it was upon this occasion he
first tasted heretical blood, with which, five years afterwards, he so
cruelly gorged himself on the day of St. Bartholomew. Catherine of
Medicis accompanied him to the siege; and it is related that she herself
led him to the ditches of the ramparts, in which many of their
adversaries had been buried, and caused the bodies to be dug up in his
presence, that he might be accustomed to look without horror upon the
corpse of a Protestant!