Читать книгу The Sunny South: An Autumn in Spain and Majorca - John William Clayton - Страница 4

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FOLLOWERS OF MAXIMILIAN OF MEXICO.—HAVRE DE GRÂCE.—ROUEN.—THE CATHEDRAL.—INFLUENCE OF SACRED MUSIC.—HEART OF RICHARD I. OF ENGLAND.—ANCIENT QUARTERS OF ROUEN.—MOUNT ST. CATHERINE.—THE SEINE.—NORMAN PEASANT GIRLS.—LISIEUX.—STOPPAGE AT MEZIDON.

IT was almost at the last moment when, after having bid farewell to all our friends, we found ourselves on board the steamer that was to take us from England on an autumn tour to the sunny south. There was great noise and bustle on deck; the friends of the departing passengers had all left the ship, and in a few minutes the anchor was weighed.

It was yet early morning, and the sun was rising with great brilliance in the east; but his appearance was only momentary, for while we were rejoicing in the prospect of a beautiful sunlit day, he suddenly withdrew from our sight, and hid his glorious visage behind a thick cloud. So unexpected was his obscuration, that we could almost have fancied he had covered his face with a veil to conceal from his sight a scene of unexampled squalor and misery that lay heaped upon the fore-deck. A band of fifty followers of the unfortunate Maximilian of Mexico, who had landed in England a day or two before, were now being wafted by a friendly breeze, not the less welcome that it came so late, towards their homes, with simply nothing left to them but their lives.

Without other clothing than a few parti-coloured rags, which but a short time back had composed the gay panoply of war, clinging to their festering bodies, without that glory which, in the lack of every other reward, is often sufficient to compensate soldiers for having left the happy hearths of their homes and the loving eyes of their kindred, these sons of fair-haired Austria were slowly returning, feeble in body and broken down in spirit, to their fatherland, carrying with them the mortifying recollection of a shameful defeat at the hands of a distant, half-barbarous race whom they had despised, and with the destruction of health for life, the loss of limbs, and the blighting of hopes which they had once nourished. Such were the subjects, such the colours, which composed this little illustrative picture of the pomp and circumstance of glorious war. Those young soldiers, all of whom were either suffering from wounds or prostrated by sickness, were standing on the deck in haggard groups, chatting about their native place, about the home of their youth, or about the plans which they intended to carry out when they arrived there. A few were groaning with pain, some of them suffering so severely as to be almost insensible to what was passing around them. Others who were in a comparatively sound condition were laughing and dancing, forgetting with the light spirit of soldiers both what they themselves had endured, and the anguish of their suffering comrades. The garb of all was in the most miserable and tattered condition, showing how soon the gaudy uniform of the soldier is tarnished in the tug of actual war. Falstaff's wretched band of followers did not exhibit more diversity in the colour and fashion of their habiliments than did these followers of an imperial prince.

One poor ragged wretch in a darkly stained red jacket, with a wisp of clotted canvas round his head, lay on his back helpless, without arms or legs, and totally blind. A cannon had burst close to him, and inflicted on him those injuries which must render him henceforward dependent on the bounty and kindness of others. I was informed that his mental sufferings from seeing himself reduced to such a miserable condition were so severe that they had partially affected his mind, and some fears were entertained that he might never recover the use of his faculties. His, in fact, was one of those cases in which mental eclipse would almost be the greatest of mercies. It was sad to see the poor fellow moving the stumps of his arms to and fro like fishes' fins, as they appeared to me; while from time to time some rough comrade tended him gently, and fed him like an infant.

These men, the followers of an emperor, were the intended regenerators of a barbarous state, the agents of the bright spirit of civilization; and what was their state now as they lay there, prostrate in filth, overcome by sorrow, suffering from wounds, and overrun with vermin? They were all swathed in the foul old clothes they had begged by the way, or tricked out in faded remnants of old uniforms, some of them spotted with blood, and others, that had perhaps belonged to officers, covered with rusty patches of gold lace. It is always a sad sight to see misery like this that one cannot relieve, and we were glad when our eyes no longer rested on such illustrations of the pomp and circumstance of glorious war. We came across them afterwards at Havre, enclosed in a sort of sheep-pen at a railway station. The mob were jeering at them through the railings, and the gentle passed them with a sigh.

After a pleasant passage, we glided quickly into the port of Havre, and landed amidst a jargon of bad English and worse French, the British Cockney preferring to explain all manner of difficulties in a foreign tongue, however imperfectly understood, while the cocked-hatted individual whom he addressed manfully persisted in his endeavours to make everything intelligible in his own peculiar mode of speaking the English language. Here at Le Havre, all good little boys and girls should remember, Bernardin de St. Pierre, the author of "Paul and Virginia" was born; also Casimir Delavigne. Here, too, Henry the Seventh embarked en route for Bosworth Field; and close by is Honfleur, where most of the new-laid eggs that one gets in London come from. Two thousand dozen are despatched per week to England.

Delightful old Rouen, city of a hundred memories, sitting by the winding waters of the Seine, which glide like memories away! Where can we go now-a-days, in this blessed nineteenth century, to see a city so complete an embodiment of the past? Perhaps Pompeii; certainly not the boulevards, the gas-lit streets, and the flaming shops of the generality of French towns. However, there before us is the glorious old cathedral, the handiwork of our Norman ancestors, defying shocks, storms, and time. The Gothic façade, the impression produced by which is so imposing, is a miracle of profuse lace-work petrified; and the dark towers and pinnacles, which rise high over all, are so richly ornamented as to resemble filigree work.

We lift a heavy curtain, and facing us as we enter, motionless, on a high stool placed in a corner, sits an awful creature, completely draped in a costume of coarse black serge, with bent head deeply veiled. It seems some living thing from a few low moans which issue occasionally from underneath the drapery, but otherwise is without form, though it can scarcely be called void. A pale skeleton hand nevertheless now and then slowly turns from one side to another a tin box full of copper coins. Throughout the live-long days, year after year, sits this dismal-looking being, concealing, it may be, beneath that dark veil and hood, some mystery which excites a painfully intense curiosity as one stands in its presence amongst the tombs and gloom of the old cathedral.

The grand Gothic arches are lofty and beautifully proportioned, meeting above and lessening away into perspective, like the great avenue of some old forest of an earlier world, with its stems and foliage now turned into everlasting stone. The large rose-windows let in from the day without floods of rich and mellow lights, colouring the dim, heavy air with a splendid diversity of hue. The chaunt of gaudily-robed priests rises upward with the pomp and incense of High Mass, and a dark crowd kneels on the cold stones which cover the bones of ancient chivalry. No language can describe the elevation of feeling which one experiences as he treads these solemn aisles where generations of worshippers have in succession raised their thoughts to Heaven. As the organ peals forth its solemn notes we feel inspired by the spirit of devotion, and are sensible of that diviner principle within us which carries the thoughts of man beyond the bounds of time and space. We have heard organs innumerable, but never have we listened to one which produced such an effect as that of which we were sensible on the occasion in question. A perfect storm of passion seemed to be swept from the great pipes, and when that was succeeded by the soft strains of the voix céleste, one felt as if he were yielding to the gentle influence of some radiant presence, not of this, but of a better world. When men can produce such music, we may naturally ask if the spirits of the departed are near, quickening the soul of the unconscious musician with a spark of the music-spirit of a higher world? This may be considered by many as wild talk; but there are still some human beings who, at least once in their lives, have felt a strain of melody fall with entrancing power upon their hearts, inspiring diviner thoughts than they had ever known before, and so subliming the feelings, that for a time they felt a consciousness of their heavenly origin. He who has never experienced an enthusiasm like this can have no soul for music, but must be entirely of the earth, earthy—"only a clod."

Near the high altar the lion-heart of Richard I. of England was buried. It is now in a very shrunken state, enclosed in a casket, and kept in the museum. It was left as a legacy to Rouen, for which favour no doubt the good inhabitants have been very grateful up to the present hour. His body is in the undisturbed possession of the population of Fontevrault.

Notwithstanding all the modern improvements which have swept away most of ancient Rouen, there still remain some wonderful old quarters, where the crazy wooden houses of centuries back nod towards each other, in a general state of paralysis, across the dark and narrow streets. How they manage to stand at all, leaning upon one another for support, is a mystery; and why they don't sit down bodily upon their occupants is a subject of painful speculation to those good people. It is most interesting to wander in the nooks and corners of this solemn old city; and if the visitor loses his way in the narrow old streets, he may come unexpectedly upon some venerable remnant of antiquity. In many parts every turn reveals some splendid relic of bygone days, of an age of cross-bows, of processions headed by men-at-arms bearing naming braziers through the dark streets, of gallant companies of splendid dames, and flaunting cavaliers in slashed doublets, trunk hose, and inconveniently long swords, all flashing and clanking in the glare as they pass; of an age of night broils, when the clash of arms was heard beneath the dark tower, grated window, and overhanging eaves. Within that ancient palace, ploughed and seamed from gabled roof to the carved monsters on the balustrades beneath, with one rich mass of florid Gothic fretwork, armorial bearings, and quaint gargoyles, we might see the cruel Cardinal of Winchester pacing to and fro in the oak-panelled hall, fretting that the preparations in the square outside, for the burning of Jeanne d'Arc, were proceeding so slowly as to make him late for dinner.

Of course we are not going to describe Rouen and its wonderful architectural remains, nor conjure up visions of mailed Norman chiefs, nursed in war, whose unscrupulous will and iron hearts, backed by the moral weight of great warrior prelates, enforced submission upon all races between Normandy and the far East, from their stern old capital at Rouen. Tempting as is the subject, we have no intention of entering upon any disquisition regarding the vigorous race who founded the city, or of describing the antiquarian relics of which it possesses so rich a store.

It is pleasant to ascend the Mont St. Catherine, and look down upon the fine old town, with its broken walls and ramparts, which have witnessed the gallant struggles of the stout hearts of earlier days, which opposed the onset of Henry V. of England and Henry of Navarre, now overgrown with hoar moss or buried in labyrinths of modern streets, with scarce a thought bestowed upon the past of those mighty chiefs who in old times assailed or defended them—men who, by their deeds, laid the foundations of modern history. It is pleasant to see and feel the solemn air of repose or gentle majesty which hangs over the more silent streets where still stand those time-honoured buildings, the fortresses, palaces, and convents, with piles of toppling planks and wooden turrets, witnesses of ancient story and actors in its varied scenes. There, from the midst of the venerable city, spire up to the level of the wood-crowned heights surrounding Rouen, the fretted pinnacles of the cathedral towers, and beneath them the gables of Gothic houses pierce the air, while afar off the silver windings of the Seine, studded with green islets, lose themselves in the mist which hangs in the distance, seaward.

In the city below died the simple-minded, heroic, and betrayed Maid of Orleans. There, forsaken by his own sons, and his menials even, in agony and neglect, William, the Conqueror of England, and of our Saxon Harold, departed this life. There died also the great Clarendon; and there Corneille and Boieldieu were born.

It is pleasant to look at all this from afar, but very unpleasant to be in the midst thereof; for it is a remarkable fact, alike observable in Cologne as in Rouen, that the more historical the city, the more horrible the smells. Coleridge counted in the former city a certain and distinct number of odours vile; we wonder to what numerals his inquiring nose would have extended itself at Rouen. The prevailing type of flavour in the latter city seems to be a compound of extra-sour vinegar, stale slop pails, and burnt india-rubber. It is also unpleasant to be ferried over a rapid river in a thing like a worn-out gondola, with several holes in the direction of the keel, the portentous effects of which the strenuous baling powers of two men with a sardine box and a coffee cup could scarcely allay. It was, however, observed of us before we embarked, by a funny friend who accompanied us, and whose miserable puns often made us melancholy, that if we trusted ourselves to such a craft we should be in Seine.

No one in these parts, excepting idiots or princes, being in the habit of travelling in a first-class carriage, we started in a second (we mean no pun) en route for Le Mans, in the fresh and healthy society of some young Norman peasant girls. No abominable chignon disfigured the backs of their neat little heads, for there was no necessity with them to shine with borrowed plumes. Their smooth hair was neatly arranged beneath the small linen cap of snowy white, while a striped kerchief was drawn modestly across the breast. "There is no joy without alloy," however, and certainly the old peasant woman up in the corner, with a bottle of red acid liquor and a stout staff of bread—the real staff of life—guarding-like a halberdier the well-closed windows, did not strike the eye as anything peculiarly attractive, excepting perhaps at times, when, from the red acid which she occasionally imbibed, her face took a sympathetic tone, and being completely encircled by her large frill, produced an effect which a rather extravagant imagination might regard as something like that of the setting sun in a nightcap. The girls were young—she, doubtless, at some time or other had been so too; but grey moustaches are not generally associated with any distinct type of beauty in ladies. Notwithstanding the aforesaid head-gear she certainly could not be pronounced cap-tivating as our punning friend said and, wonderful to say, she knew it!

Our train passed through Lisieux, where Henry II. was married to Eleanor of Guienne, and where the modern inhabitants are chiefly employed in the manufacture of horse clothing and general flannelry. Near this not very striking town, M. Guizot spends his summer months, and in it, by-the-by, Thomas à Becket passed his banishment in 1169. About four o'clock p.m. our train turned us out high and dry, bag and baggage, on to a lonely wooden platform in the midst of a dreary flat tract of country, compared with which Cambridgeshire is extremely steep and alpine.

"Où sommes-nous donc?" asked we.

"À Mezidon, m'sieu," said an official. "Deux heures d'attente."

We immediately left our luggage with this trusty man, set our watches by the clocks of the gare, pulled our hats with determination on to our heads, and walked desperately four miles straight along a dusty high road, then turned round and walked four miles back; by which time the train was ready to start again.