At Amiens there is not much glass, and yet the student will not have
wasted his time, for he will there see one of the finest cathedrals in
Europe, and will furthermore be able to note what the lack of coloured
glass means, in this way learning to value it even more highly than
before. If a visit to this great church renders us no other service than
this, we shall all agree that it is no small one. We shall never again
question that a magnificent ecclesiastical interior is not only vastly
improved, but actually needs its light tempered by stained glass. Our
pilgrim has long ere this learnt that he cannot always rely on
guide-books to tell him whether or not fine windows are to be found in
certain towns, and therefore we may serve a useful purpose and save some
reader a disappointing trip by setting out the facts. The cathedral owes
its chief beauty to the extraordinary detail and amount of sculpture
to be found without and within. So complete are the scriptural events
chronicled upon its west front that Ruskin has given it the title of the
"Bible in Stone." Nor are the carvings which are to be found inside in
any way inferior to those which fascinate us without. The stone screen
which runs around the ambulatory would alone repay much study, but the
most notable display of the carver's art is the little army of nearly
four thousand figures upon the choir stalls. Notwithstanding this wealth
of sculpture, we are struck by the bareness of the lofty interior. We
long for a touch of mystery and cannot but feel that in the glare of
light streaming through the immensely tall uncoloured windows everything
is too clearly revealed and there is lacking the softness which would
add so much to the beauty of the carvings. What a change there would be
for the better if we could wave a wand and by some fairy power will back
into the windows their ancient glories. Everything is too stately and
cold, too sharply outlined; in fact, far too much denuded of the
mysterious charm, the awe-inspiring gloom which lays hold upon us at
Chartres or Bourges.
Although but little of its glass has survived, it is almost all of the
thirteenth century, and some is very good. In one of the choir chapels
to the left is an interesting Tree of Jesse in the medallion style. The
left window of the easternmost chapel has a charming blue background
and a novel use of small white birds in its border. Above us in the
easternmost window of the clerestory (the only one in the clerestory
that has survived intact) another unique feature catches the eye--its
four slender lancets contain some very decorative lettering introduced
into the design. This lettering is glazed in white on a blue background
and its legend when deciphered sets out that those three windows were
given by Bernard d'Abbeville, Bishop of Amiens, in the year 1269. In
contrast to these meagre remains of glass, there are also to be seen
three fine rose windows which are completely glazed. They all have
quaint names, that in the west facade being called the "Rose of the
Sea"; that in the north the "Rose of the Winds"; that in the south the
"Rose of Heaven." This poetic and quaintly familiar method of naming
windows is not unknown elsewhere; it is also found at Chartres. The huge
western rose, thirty-eight feet in diameter, although dating from 1241,
has lost its original glass and was reglazed in the sixteenth century.
There are no figures in the north rose, but instead a mosaic of colour;
we have noticed a similar arrangement at St. Quentin. In the south rose,
red predominates, but with it there is also considerable green. If the
reader decides to visit Amiens, notwithstanding the small amount of
glass to be seen there, he will surely conclude that the day has not
been wasted, for he will not leave that splendid interior without a
truer appreciation of the great service which the glass artist rendered
to the architect, as well as a sigh for the fragile beauty which is no
longer there.