[Illustration: 0053]
Quoting that eminent architect, Mr. Ralph Adams Cram, "We may pause in
spirit in Arras (it would not be well to be there now in body, unless
one were a soldier in the army of the Allies, when it would be perilous,
but touched with glory), for sight of an old, old city that gave a
vision, better than almost any other in France, of what cities were
in this region at the high-tide of the Renaissance. It is gone now,
utterly, irremediably, and the ill work begun in the revolution and
continued under the empire, when the great and splendid Gothic Cathedral
was sold and destroyed, has been finished by Prussian shells.
"Capital of Artois, it had a vivid and eventful history, continuing
under Baldwin of the Iron Arm, who became the first Count of Arras; then
being halved between the Count of Flanders and the King of France; given
by St. Louis to his brother Robert, passing to the Counts of Burgundy,
reverting to Louis de Male, of Flemish fame, abandoned to the Emperor,
won back by France;... coming now to its end at the hands of the German
hosts.
"What Arras must have been before the Revolution we can only guess, but
its glorious Cathedral, its Chappelle des Ardents, and its 'Pyramid
of the Holy Candle' added to its surviving Town Hall, with its
fantastically beautiful spire, and its miraculously preserved streets
and squares lined with fancifully gabled and arcaded houses, it must
have been a sanctuary of old delights. The Cathedral was of all styles
from the twelfth to the sixteenth century, while the Chapel and the
Pyramid were models of medieval art in its richest state. Both were
destroyed by one Lebon, a human demon and an apostate priest, who
organised a 'terror' of his own in his city, and has gone down to
infamy for his pestilential crime. Both the destroyed monuments
were votive offerings in gratitude to Our Lady for her miraculous
intervention in the case of the fearful plague in the twelfth century,
the instrument of preservation being a certain holy candle, the melted
wax from which was effective in preserving the life of all it touched.
The Pyramid was a slender Gothic tabernacle and spire, ninety feet
high, standing in the 'Petit' Place,' a masterpiece of carved and gilded
sculpture, unique of its kind. Every vestige has vanished,--Berlin has
just announced that it has been completely and intentionally destroyed
by gun-fire.
"The fine vigor of the Renaissance and its life were gone with the color
and gold of the carved and painted shrines and houses, the fanciful
costumes, the alert civic life.--Wantonly destroyed!"
Madeline Wartelle, a voluntary nurse, who was in Arras during the great
bombardment in July, 1915, wrote in the volume "Les Cites Meurtries"
the following account of her experiences during the destruction of the
Cathedral and the other noble buildings.
"On July 2d, about six o'clock in the evening several shells fell upon
the Cathedral. Then followed a calm for two hours. At half past eight,
a bomb dropped from above, set fire to the house of M. Daquin in the rue
de' l'Arsenal, and in a few moments the flames were mounting to a great
height. When the firemen (_pompiers_) arrived, the fire had already
spread to the house of Mme. Cornnan, and could not be confined even
to the neighboring ones. During and following this catastrophe, at
one o'clock in the morning, an avalanche of great bombs, those called
'Marmites,' fell all over this quarter of the town. This time, alas,
we had no trouble in getting all the details of the happening, for our
house collapsed, being struck by the second bomb dropped by the 'Taube,'
which went through the roof to the cellar. Luckily, we had gone to R--s
when the fire broke out, and thus we all escaped.
"Forced to leave (Arras) we did not see the demolishment of the
Cathedral and the Palace of St. Vaast on Monday, July 5th, but I
set down here what I have learned from the lips of a witness of the
deplorable 'aneantisment.'
"From six o'clock on that date, the gun-fire of the 'Huns' was
especially directed at the Cathedral, and the fire which ensued spread
to the end of the Palace of St. Vaast, which contained the archives
of the town, and which was entirely consumed, and spreading further
likewise destroyed the Library and the Museum of the Seminary. The fire
department did what it could to save the books and sacred objects, but
their efforts were in vain, such was the rain of projectiles from the
'Taubes' above, and the shells from the great guns miles away. So the
order to evacuate was given by the authorities.
"At one o'clock the following morning the smouldering fire in the
Cathedral was fanned by a high wind which sprang up, and soon enveloped
the whole interior; the two great organs, the large pulpit, and the
Bishop's stalls were entirely consumed. The fire in the Cathedral burned
two whole days, watched by a mourning throng of the townspeople, who
thus braved death by the falling bombs. All was consumed but the great
door on the rue des Charriottes, which did not fall until the week
following. On the twelfth day, at five in the morning, the fire
demolished the Bishopric, and the Chapel of the great Seminary. Nothing
is now left but a heap of smoking cinders and ashes, from which some
charred beams protrude. The treasured Chateau d'Eau is gone!"