CHAPTER VI.
Heights of Fourvières—Difficult Descent—Trade in Relics—Our Lady of Fourvières—Saving Lyons from Cholera—Lunatic patients—Dungeon where the first Christian Bishop was murdered—Roman Ruins—The Christians’ early Place of Assembly—St. Irénée—A Coffin—Subterranean Chapels—Bones of the Nine Thousand—The Headsman’s Block, and the Murmur from the Well—Bleeding to Death—Marguerite Labarge—Her Abode for Nine Years—Her Return to upper Air Cause of her Death—Her Family rich Residents in Lyons—Mode of saving the Soul—Body dispensed with—The Pope’s Bull good for ever—A Friend’s Arrival—Jardin des Plantes—Riots of November, 1831—The Préfet’s Mistake—Capt. de——.—Defence of the Arsenal with Unloaded Cannon—The Murdered Chef de Bataillon—His Assassin’s Death—The Grief of his Opponents—Their usual Cruelty and their wild Justice—Their eight days’ occupation of Lyons—Capt. de ——’s defence of Arsenal—Bearer of Proclamation—Danger—Saved by a former Comrade—Interview—Threats—Empty Cannon effective—Invitation to Dinner—Retreat—The Hôtel de l’Europe closed against its Master by a National Guard—Three Hundred killed in St. Nizier—The Cathedral—Second Council General—Jaw of St. John—The Ivory Horn of Roland—Privilege of the Seigneur of Mont d’Or—The first Villeroy Archbishop—Refusal to accept him by the Counts of Lyons—His Text and the Dean’s Reply—Lyons Refuge for the Pazzi—Their Monument destroyed in anger by Marie de Médicis—The last Prince of Dauphiné becoming Prior of the Jacobin Convention, Paris—Procession in St. Nizier—Chapel of Ste. Philomène—Place des Terreaux.
The news of the disturbances in Paris has set all Lyons in a ferment.
18th May.
The weather has been burning. We attempted riding by the steep streets to the summit of Fourvières; but having accomplished half the ascent, it became so rapid, and the sharp pavement so slippery, that we were obliged to dismount and lead the horses under the walls of the Antiquaille, and up a road which is rather like a stair to the church. Not willing to confide our companions to the tender mercies of the mischievous boys, who as usual flocked round us, we led them within the court which surrounds Notre Dame, and up to the low terrace wall. Grizzle, with her ready appetite, devoured the few weeds and moss which grew among the stones; and Fanny looked as attentively at the view, as if she were considering her distance from the inn which was in sight, and the difficulty of getting back again. The hill is here almost perpendicular. The streets we had taken to attain the height, abrupt as they seem, are zigzags cut in the side of the mountain; and the city, with its two rivers, spread like a map below our giddy elevation. The air was particularly clear, except over the Alps, where a haze has provokingly hung ever since our arrival. We could read “Hôtel de l’Europe” distinctly on the front of the inn on the opposite side of the Saône; the Place Bellecour was just behind it, its equestrian statue looking at this distance like a toy; then the broad Rhone, the faubourg, with its gardens and promenades, and the Grande Route we are to travel towards the mountains, a white line crossing bare hills, which seem uninteresting and interminable. A little to our right was the Pont d’Aisnay, traversing the Saône to the arsenal, a low insignificant looking building. Farther, in the same direction, the race-ground of Perrache was visible. About the year 1808 the people of Lyons presented this land to Napoleon, and he accepted it as the site of an Imperial palace! Still beyond we could distinguish the junction of the Rhone and the Saône, no longer in precisely the same spot as when Hannibal crossed the Rhone at the head of his army, where the currents met at Aisnay.
The view to the left is less extensive; the jutting ground of Fourvières in some degree narrows it; but it is fine notwithstanding, and the Jardin des Plantes, green and blossoming as it is now, appears to advantage on the steep side of the opposite hill among the confusion of houses and church towers. It was impossible to return by the same road, and none of the stupid inhabitants of the hovels about us could point out another. Merely knowing the direction, we found our way among hot lanes, between stone walls, till, after an hour’s windings, we issued from them opposite the pretty churchyard of St. Just. A labouring man, answering our question, said, “There was a road that way, certainly, but a very bad one for horses, as it was yet only partly paved.” I should have thought no one knowing the pavement of Lyons would have considered it an advantage. Taking that way, though he strongly advised returning as we came, we passed below the extensive fort, in the completion of which numbers are still employed, and a few minutes brought us on the magnificent road, cut for the sole purpose of making an easy communication between it and the town, (it winds in broad zigzags, the whole way commanding a splendid view,) and arrived at the quay, beneath Pierre Encise. This new work has also contributed to diminish the rock; from the river it must have been a striking object, when the hundred and twenty steps cut in its stone led up to the fortress crowned with a large round tower, whose proportions were of such perfect symmetry.
We returned on foot to Fourvières this morning; on either side of the narrow lane which leads directly to the church are standings without number, covered with what seems on this hill the chief staple of trade,—I mean chaplets, crowns, and bouquets of dyed artificial flowers; coloured prints, framed and glazed, of saints in various attitudes; little waxen heads, legs, and arms, or whole figures; votive offerings, which the faithful present at the shrine of their patron saint, and find here ready at the church door.
The church is kept locked, and we merely read again the inscription above its entrance, which gratefully thanks our Lady of Fourvières, who saved Lyons from cholera. We went up the square tower, D—— to the top, I to the first floor half way, from whose windows the prospect is perhaps as agreeable. The guide pointed to the Antiquaille, directly beneath one of them; it contains, as I told you, an hospital and penitentiary, and also an asylum for lunatics; we could distinguish two of these in the court-yard belonging to the end of the building facing us; one was leaping with all his force against the rails, uttering howls rather like an animal than a human being; we heard him distinctly; the other close by, and quite undisturbed, was on his knees praying, and had been there immoveable (the man said) for the last two hours. The more tractable are allowed to walk with their keepers in the fine gardens adjoining. It is said that the dungeon beneath the Antiquaille remains unchanged, as in the time when St. Pothin, first Bishop of Lyons, was tortured and murdered there; they pretend to show the very fetters he wore.
From this same window, which looks south, you can also distinguish the remains of a Roman amphitheatre, and the commencement of a Roman aqueduct, whose vestiges can be traced three leagues further. Still on the brow of the hill is the square tower of the church of St. Irénée, built over the subterranean chapels where the Christians assembled in the early days of persecution. We left the observatory to go thither, passing on our way four or five broken arches of the aqueduct constructed by the army of Julius Cæsar, whose massiveness in ruin puts the perfection of modern buildings to shame. What I thought a long walk, with innumerable windings, and here and there a beautiful glimpse back to the hills of Burgundy, brought us to the dirty faubourg, where, with some trouble, we found the church. A long flight of steps leads to a rather uninteresting modern building; on either side of the choir are two highly ornamented chapels, one having a finely painted window; and between the choir and the chapels are appended to the wall, framed and glazed, on one side a list of “Indulgences,” annexed to St. Irénée; on the other a bull of his Holiness Pius the Seventh. I thought the latter worth copying; but in the nave there was a coffin, covered with its pall and surrounded by high candlesticks, the black banner with its silver scull and cross bones attached to each. It certainly was a melancholy companion, and D—’s imagination representing to him that the inmate had perhaps died of some contagious malady, he hurried me out. A side door and a narrow flight of steps led to a court at the back of the church, at the extremity of which, and the very edge of the hill, commanding here the most glorious view of Lyons I have yet seen, is the Calvary, on a raised platform, inclosed by a railing. Steps led up to it, (as do others to the vaults below, in which is a representation of the Holy Sepulchre;) the Saviour on the cross, the thieves on either side, the Virgin standing in an attitude of despair, and the Magdalen kneeling at its foot, are large as life, and finely sculptured; and of all the similar groups I have seen, this certainly is most impressive, perhaps from its position, looking down on a world, with the blue sky for a background. Round the court are the stations, each a small covered altar, a basso relievo in white marble affixed to each, representing a scene of the Passion. The little dwelling of the Concierge is close by, and he came to unlock the gate at the top of the stair which leads to the subterranean chapels. They are beneath the church, opposite the Calvary. The light of day penetrates so faintly, that descending these steps it was difficult to distinguish what objects we saw piled behind a grated window on the right hand; it is a mass of human bones, filling a room of considerable size, those of the nine thousand massacred in the year 203, with their bishop, St. Irénée, the greater part in these chapels.
Turning to the left, we entered the first and most ancient; a small vaulted chamber, on whose bare walls are inscriptions copied from the writings of the saints, and the Pagan accusations brought against them. One of these sentences asserts, that St. Polycarpe preached here at the age of eighty-six years. The chapel beyond was constructed a century later; it has an arched roof, supported by ten heavy columns. A few steps lead up to the altar built over St. Irénée’s tomb, who, it is said, was recognised after the massacre. There is a massive stone bench fixed against the wall on either side, and in the centre of the floor a well of extraordinary depth. Tradition tells that these stones served for headsman’s blocks to the assassins, and that down the well so many bodies were thrown as to gorge it to its mouth. Some good Catholics believe that, stooping the ear to the floor, a gushing sound is sometimes heard, like that of bubbling blood. I confess I could hear nothing; but the gloom of the spot is well fitted to such terrible tales, though it is now in some degree dispelled by the construction of a new chapel below the new church, extending behind St. Irénée’s tomb, with bright ornaments and painted windows, having no associations of its own, and robbing of their solemnity places indeed consecrated by the blood of men who died for their faith there.
Beyond this chapel is another small chamber, of the same date as itself; a recess contains a hollow stone. The caprice of the assassins bled to death many of the martyrs, and their blood cast out here found an issue in the streets of the faubourg. A broad stone in the centre of the floor marks the tomb of one Marguerite Labarge, who died about 1692. There is a door in this room, opposite to that opening on the chapel; and mounting a few steps, and climbing over rubbish in the obscurity, we distinguished with some difficulty an aperture to which our guide pointed, large enough for a human being to creep through, and concealed at will by a door of stone, which when he closed I could not distinguish from those which surrounded it. Within there is sufficient height for a person to stand, and space to lie down. Her bed was a stone likewise; I did not see it, (though it remains as in her time,) for not a ray of light penetrates; she lived here nine years, having determined on self-sacrifice at the age of thirty-six. It is presumed that at night she left her den to walk in the adjoining chapels, and sought there what food had been left in charity by such as revered her for her unfortunate fanaticism; but her means of subsistence were never exactly known. When nine years had passed, a popular commotion taking place forced her to leave her cell. She appeared again among the living, and, strange to say, among the sane; but, her constitution having long resisted the want of air and necessaries, the returning to their enjoyment seemed a worse shock, and shortly after she died. Her family was then in straitened circumstances; some of its descendants (become rich) are still residents in Lyons.
The Concierge laid great stress on the “Indulgences” annexed to St. Irénée; and twice told me that any Catholic having died in “état de grâce” for whom a mass should be said before its high altar, would be immediately transferred from purgatory to Paradise. His information reminding me of the coffin in the church. I asked him “who it contained?” he answered “nobody.” A mass for the soul of a deceased priest was performed the night before, and, knowing it was therefore among those of the blest, he had shown some laziness in matters of less moment, and failed to remove the pomp and circumstance. I returned to copy the pope’s bull:—
Bref de notre très Saint Père le Pape Pie
VII., pour la perpétuelle mémoire.
“Paternellement attentif au salut de tous les hommes, nous enrichissons quelquefois du trésor spirituel des Indulgences des lieux sacrés; pour faire jouir les âmes des fidèles décédés des mérites de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ, et des suffrages des saints, qui leur étant appliqués peuvent, par la miséricorde de Dieu, les faire passer des peines du Purgatoire au bonheur éternel. Voulant donc honorer par un don particulier l’eglise paroissiale sous le vocable de St. Irénée, située sur la montagne de ce nom, appelée le Calvaire, hors et près les murs de la Ville de Lyon; par l’autorité que le Seigneur nous a donné, et pleine de confiance en la miséricorde de Dieu tout puissant, en l’autorité de ses bienheureux apôtres Pierre et Paul, nous voulons que toutes les fois qu’un prêtre séculier ou régulier de quelque ordre, congrégation, ou institut qu’il soit, célébrera au dit autel une messe de mort pour l’âme d’un fidèle quelconque décédé en état de grâce, cette même âme obtienne par voie de suffrage l’Indulgence tirée du trésor de l’Eglise, et qu’elle soit délivrée des peines du Purgatoire par les mérites de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ, de la bienheureuse Vierge Marie, et de tous les Saints.
Malgré tous les Réglemens contraires, les présentes vaudront à perpétuité.
Donné à Rome à St. Pierre, sous l’anneau du Pêcheur, le 13 jour de Décembre, 1816; la 17eme année de notre Pontificat.”
Pour le Cardinal Braschio de Nonestis,
G. Bernius, Sous Secrétaire.
Avons vu et permettons de mettre à exécution, et en vertu du présent Bref voulons que le Grand Autel de l’Eglise de St. Irénée sur la montagne jouisse du privilége.
Lyon, Juin 23, 1817.
(Signé) Courbon, Vicaire Général.
19th May.
We were sitting at home owing to the heat of the day, when the door opened suddenly and our friend entered. He was just arrived from Paris, and had found D——’s letter at the barracks, and came to seek us instantly; we were all glad to meet again, for it had been likely that we should never do so, as before Captain de —— went with his regiment to occupy Ancona, from whence they are just returned, he passed four years and a half of constant fighting in Africa. For the sake of talking over old times, D—— has determined on remaining till the 30th: Captain de —— gave us last night some interesting details respecting the riots which took place in Lyons in the year 1831; we walked to the Jardin des Plantes, which from its situation, rather than its size, is extremely beautiful. It occupies the side of the hill, and two long flights of broad steps lead to the entrance gates; from the nature of the ground, the garden is made in terraces, and shaded but very steep walks lead from one to the other. In the artificial flat made in its centre there is a basin, and in the basin a fine swan. D—— and myself commented sometime on the apparent want of harmony subsisting between him and his companion, before the latter issuing from the water we discovered by the colour of his legs that he was—a goose! The broad terrace at the summit commands the town below. Fourvières, now on the right, and the other shore, Mont Pilatre in the distance, and the Alps on the left, seen distinctly though delicately through the green branches of exotics and trees just in leaf and blossom.
Entering the gardens, the Rue de la Grande Côte is on the left, bounding that side, for the workmen’s wretched rooms look down on it. The street is continued far above and beyond, and issues on the Place des Bernardines: it is so steep that a charge of cavalry having been commanded, was found impossible, at least farther than a side-gate of the jardin, where many of the horses fell from exhaustion and some died. How artillery could be dragged, as it afterwards was, to the top, it is difficult to imagine. On the Place des Bernardines, since 1831, has been built a fortified barrack, thus separating at will Lyons from the Croix Rousse, which is on the other side of the Barrière: at the time of the riots no such separation existed. The Place des Bernardines had been occupied by military from the first moment in which tumult was expected, but evacuated by the préfet’s order, who appears to have been strangely mistaken as to the state of the town. Our friend Captain de —— was ordered to the Hôtel de Ville with his company about three in the morning; the Hôtel de Ville looks on the Place des Terreaux, and is at no great distance from the Jardin des Plantes on the town side.
Having lost some of his men, he commanded hardly more than seventy soldiers, when he joined his colonel there.
The general and the préfet had their rendezvous at the Hôtel de Ville, and, important as their meeting was, it seemed difficult that it should take place, for the Place des Terreaux had gradually become thronged; the people having commenced collecting at daylight, continued to pour in from every issue, and more and more menacing every moment, prevented the bataillon beyond from joining its comrades. Aware of the danger of approaching the Hôtel de Ville, the colonel’s anxiety increased.
“What will you give me to clear the place?” asked Capt. de ——. “What do you demand?” exclaimed the colonel. “Five minutes.”
At this time there were present certainly ten thousand, but unarmed to all appearance, and as yet undecided as to their future movements. “Use the butt-ends of your muskets,” said Capt. de ——; “knock down as many as you can and pass over.” The knot of men obeyed, following himself and his example as he headed them, distributing blows with the flat of his sabre. The crowd opened and retreated, astonished and hardly aware of its own strength, and bore backwards towards the steep streets and the Croix Rousse: and the bataillon which had been unable to pass moved across the Place des Terreaux. At this juncture it was first recollected that the arsenal was without protection, and left to the mercy of the mob; it had been forgotten. “Capt. ——,” said the general, “conduct your company there immediately; if it is occupied by the workmen, retake it; if it is still free, occupy and defend it.”
Capt. de —— marched his few men to the arsenal along the quays, and through multitudes who covered them, not without difficulty, and arrived in time. The Pont d’Aisnay is exactly opposite the arsenal, and the mob, well armed, occupied the other side of the Saône, and had raised a barricade at that end of the bridge: it was necessary that the insurgents should remain ignorant of the weakness of the force which was to oppose them. A piece of cannon, by Capt. de ——’s order pointed on their barricade, in some degree served to hold them in awe, though they kept up a pretty constant fire: they had no means of knowing that the piece was unloaded, and the few artillerymen of National Guard, who had joined the soldiers, were unable to manœuvre it.
During this time it had been necessary to dislodge the rioters from the position they occupied in the Rue de la Grande Côte, and others leading to the Croix Rousse; and here many fell, fired on from the houses, all which the mob occupied. A man deeply regretted was the Chef de Bataillon Martines, who received a ball in his chest, in the upper part of the Rue de la Grande Côte, where an advancing house forms an angle. As he fell from his horse the soldiers stopped vowing vengeance, but saw none on whom to exercise it. The light smoke which followed the discharge issuing from the wall of the entresol floor betrayed the murderer, and some of the men of Martines’ company rushed into the house. The assassin had bored a slit in the wall, and when the soldiers caught sight of him was quietly and safely reloading. Seeing them, and expecting no mercy, rather than wait their approach, he rushed up stairs into a room on the third floor, and, as the soldiers who had followed reached the door, flung himself out on the pavement. The fall did not put an end to his existence; he was able to rise and crawl on a few paces. It was not likely he would meet pity from men whose beloved officer he had killed: they finished him with their bayonets. The fire had by this time become unceasing, and poor De Martines, who had died instantly, was necessarily left by the regiment where he fell. After its passage the corpse was discovered on the pavement by a party of the insurgents: he must have been a good and amiable man, for by some of these he was recognised and deplored deeply as by his own soldiers. They raised his body and carried it to a church, where they obliged a priest to perform the mass for the dead; and thence, bearing it to the burying ground, interred it with military honours, themselves firing a volley over his grave,—these very men, and at that very time, were towards their opponents in general guilty of the most atrocious cruelties, torturing and drowning the wounded.
As an instance of the prevailing feeling, I may mention that a young man had been disabled by a shot in the leg, which had however caused no dangerous injury. He was found stretched on the pavement by a woman, whose pity he bespoke, hoping she did not belong to the furies he had seen maltreating his companions: wanting a weapon, she murdered him with blows of her sabot! Still, infuriated and merciless as they were, they in some things exhibited a feeling of wild justice: before the doors of such manufacturers as had kept faith with them, they placed sentinels, and lives and property were respected. Such as, on the contrary, had broken through the agreement made, they pillaged without remorse. Mr. Pauche has told me, that he saw in the streets piles of silks and velvets burning. Several workmen, who attempted to carry away plunder, were shot; and the owners, sought after with as much perseverance as rage, barely escaped with their lives; concealing themselves in cellars, where they remained in disguise and half-starved, afraid to show themselves during the eight days the workmen held possession of the town.
As I said, Capt. de —— had entered in time, and held the arsenal. The third day the chef de bataillon, his superior officer, arrived: he brought a proclamation, addressed to the insurgents by the préfet and the general.
“Capt. de ——,” he said, “you must find among your men some one who will be bearer of this, it may put a stop to the riots.”
Our friend turned to his company:—
“Is there one among you,” he said, “who, not in obedience to my order, as I do not command it, but of his own free-will, will take charge of this paper?” The soldiers did not answer; he repeated his question, and they remained silent.
“Well then,” he said, “I will go myself.”
His men opposed his leaving them with all their power; they said he had defended them for three days, and they would not suffer him to depart. He called them cowards, took the proclamation, and went.
Between the bridge of Aisnay and the arsenal there is a little Place belonging to the latter, and closed by its own barrier. The bridge is no inconsiderable length; and as Capt. de —— advanced along it, and under the fire of the barricade, he waved the paper above his head, but it was unlikely it would neutralize the effect produced by an officer’s uniform. Arrived at its extremity, and at the barricade which concealed from him all that was passing behind, he leaped on and from it, and on the other side found himself in the midst of armed men, the greater part intoxicated. He was received, not as an envoy, but with shouts of fury; those nearest him rested their bare knives and bayonets on his breast, and those more distant took aim at him with their muskets: he thought it was all over.
At this moment a young man, dressed like the others, as a workman, forced his way to Capt. de ——, threw himself into his arms and embraced him.
“Ah! mon pauvre lieutenant,” he exclaimed, “vous êtes perdu.” Capt. de —— looked at him, and recognized a private of the Royal Guard who had served in his own company before the Revolution of 1830. The affection, so little looked for, softened him for a moment, but his firmness did not forsake him; he took advantage of the pause.
“Stand back, and be silent,” he said, in a tone of authority; “I have something to read to you.”
The men obeyed, half-drunk as they were, but closed round him again as he ceased.
“Who is to answer for the execution of these promises,” they said ferociously, “is it you?”
“You are fathers or brothers,” answered Capt. de ——; “you have others dependent on you, and it is important that you should leave the false position in which you have placed yourselves. As to me, a life more or less signifies little to our cause.”
The rioters were not disposed to listen to reason, and their menaces grew more and more alarming; but the private again interposed, and by soothing some, and repulsing others, managed to hold them back while his old officer again passed the barricade, which a few moments before seemed likely to be his monument.
During the same day he had a second interview with some of the insurgents. One of their leaders sent to request a parley; they met in the centre of the same bridge of Aisnay, Capt. de —— alone with only his sabre, the adverse worthy accompanied by four comrades, and armed to the teeth. Capt. de —— desired he would order them to retire. The other repeated his words rather scornfully: “You will either give the command this moment,” exclaimed Capt. de ——, who was very much exasperated, “or I will fling you over the parapet.”
The workman looked at him, and judging, I suppose, that he was sufficiently powerful, and besides seemed quite willing to do so, he was intimidated, and obeyed.
“And now,” said Capt. de ——, “what do you want with me?”
“You must yield the arsenal.”
“That is out of the question.”
“Then we will take it.”
“Impossible; look there,” said Capt. de ——, pointing to the empty cannon, which had an imposing aspect behind him; “I might, had I pleased, have exterminated you long since, I was only restrained by mercy. Who are you who make such a demand of me?”
“I was in the Imperial Guard.”
“That is untrue,” said Capt. de ——, coolly; “an old soldier of the empire would not act such a part, or command a drunken rabble.”
The man looked at him for a few moments, and said after a pause, “You seem a ‘bon enfant;’ you should come and dine with us.”
“I thought the workmen were starving,” replied the officer.
“Their pockets are now full of money; we dine on the quay opposite, (naming the auberge;) we will entertain you well.
“As you were in the Imperial Guard, you must know that a soldier cannot quit his post; but I will, if you like, send you some one,” said Capt. de ——.
“In that case, I give you my oath we will not attack you again to-night.”
They parted; Capt. de —— returned to the arsenal, where he found the ensign of his company, who had managed to join him in plain clothes. He sent him to dine with the workmen, desiring him to eat and drink, and bring back what information he could, but make no promises. The rioters did not keep faith notwithstanding; they renewed their fire. At midnight came the order for retreat; and having hid all arms and ammunition, excepting only a few muskets, they marched from the arsenal and the town in good order. Lyons remained in possession of the insurgents eight days. The Duke of Orleans and Marshal Soult joined the 66th regiment outside the town. Capt. de —— received the cross of honour from the former’s hand, and shortly after promotion. When, in company of other troops, the 66th returned to occupy Lyons, it did so with artillery in its front, and matches lighted, and exasperated to such a degree, that a single shot fired by a townsman might have changed the city to a heap of ruins.
In France tragedy and comedy are often near neighbours. The royal family, when they go to Lyons, are always lodged at the Hôtel de l’Europe. The Duke of Orleans was there, whether after the disturbances of 1831, of which we have been speaking, or those of 1834, I do not at this moment recollect, but the circumstance M. Pauche told me himself. He is a good hearted but violent man; abuses angrily all beggars who come to ask relief, and who listen to him with great humility, quite sure the lecture will be closed by a shower of sous. Not being highly educated, when excited, he swears between each sentence, and, the oath escaped, takes off his hat and begs pardon, which lengthens a story and renders it rather obscure.
“The Duke came with his staff,” said Monsieur Pauche, “he staid a long time, neuf repas, (French innkeepers count time by meals;) and as I had so much to do, ——, (the hat off,) I beg your pardon: I got my ‘pièces montées’ from the confectioner, and being in a hurry, —— (the hat off again,) I ran out for them myself in my cook’s costume, as you have seen me, in my white night-cap and apron. When I arrived back at my own porte cochère, —— (I beg your pardon,) there stood National Guards with crossed bayonets; would not let me in again, —— (this was a furious oath); said I, I am Pauche, and that is my hôtel, and the Prince is waiting for his second course, and how do you think he is to get it if you won’t let me in?” The sentries did not recognize him; it was all in vain. “And —— and ——, said I, (the hat off a third time,) I wish I had my kitchen carving knife.”
Finding remonstrance useless, he at last seized a national guard by the collar, and made a forcible entry, dragging him after him to the scene of his culinary labours.
“And now,” said Monsieur Pauche, catching up a long ladle with his free hand, and pointing to his row of cooks, and then shaking it at the half-choked national guard, “Now do you believe I am chez moi?”
On our return to the Hôtel de l’Europe we passed again across the Place des Terreaux, and before the church of St. Nizier. In the latter, in the year 1834, a terrible scene was acted; the troops having at last obtained the mastery, the insurgents were pursued here, and two or three hundred killed within these quiet walls. The disturbances of 1834 appear, by Monsieur Pauche’s account, to have been equally terrible, for a time, with those of 1831. The rioters had taken up their position on Fourvières, where they had even posted cannon. When they were at last dislodged, a great many escaped by letting themselves drop from the terrace wall to the vineyard below,—no slight fall, but probably on soft ground. It was possible from the hôtel to see them execute this manœuvre, and having performed it, slip away in safety among the bushes. At this time there were incendiaries among the disaffected, for Monsieur Pauche, naturally fearing for the lives of all in his hôtel, which was just opposite Fourvières, wisely went to his country house, and at the moment he passed saw several houses in flames between the Place Bellecour and the Pont de la Guillotière.
You will wonder that I have yet said nothing of St. Jean, the cathedral, yet there I have been many times. We visited it again yesterday. The architecture of the nave is of the time of Philip Augustus. The choir is celebrated as the spot where Gregory the Tenth held the second council general of Lyons, in the year 1274. Its members occupied themselves with the union of the Greek and Latin churches, and in memory of this reconciliation two crosses, one Greek the other Roman, were placed at the extremities of the high altar. Among the treasures preserved by the church are the lower jaw of St. John the Baptist, (you may remember I saw part of his skull at Amiens,) and the small ivory horn which belonged to Roland, nephew of Charlemagne, and Ariosto’s hero. The house of Mont d’Or, which took its name from the fertile mountain which rises just outside Lyons, and extends into Beaujolais, still bearing the same name, prided itself on tracing its descent from Roland. Before 1562 this family was one of great consequence, and the seigneurs of Mont d’Or had the right of repairing to the abbey of St. Barbe on Ascension Day, and taking from the hands of the abbot, who at that period had it in keeping, the famous ivory horn, which they might twice sound and exhibit to the people. During the war of 1562, between Catholics and Huguenots, this relic was lost, and continued to be so during two hundred years, when it was once more recovered, and placed in the treasury of St. Jean. In one of the side aisles is a clock, greatly admired by the good people of Lyons—marking hour, day, year, temperature, and I do not know what beside, and having figures, which, when the hour strikes, perform various evolutions; it is a frightful machine, between thirty and forty feet high. Near the principal entrance is the beautiful chapel of the Bourbons, with its arched and fretted roof, and fine stained glass, commenced by Charles of Bourbon, cardinal, and archbishop of Lyons, who was godfather to King Charles the Eighth, and who lies interred in this chapel, beneath a white marble mausoleum; it was finished by his brother, Peter of Bourbon, called Sire de Beaujeu, who married Louis the Eleventh’s daughter, Anne. The motto of his house reappears everywhere: “N’espoir ne peur.” They held ambition, as well as fear, beneath their dignity. The delicate carving of the stonework reminded me of Scott’s description of Melrose; for one might indeed fancy that some fairy had wreathed the leaves and flowers and petrified them by a spell. A circumstance concerning this cathedral I must mention to you. When the first Villeroy, whose family has since filled honourable posts in Lyons, was raised to the dignity of archbishop here, the members of the chapter (who, from the third century, when they counted among their body nine sons of kings and one of an emperor, had been men of the proudest families of France, and styled themselves not canons, but Counts of Lyons) demurred ere they admitted to be their archbishop, one whose birth did not rank with theirs, as his great-grandfather was the first of his name who had held any employ, and his father the first who had borne a title. Notwithstanding the refusal of the counts, Louis the Fourteenth found means to force them to obedience. When the archbishop harangued the chapter, he took for text the words of the Psalmist:
“The stone which the builders rejected has become the headstone of the corner.”
The discourse which followed was an insulting one for the canons, but the dean had sufficient presence of mind to reply only by reciting the next verse of the same psalm:
“This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes.”
We re-crossed the Pont de l’Archevêché on our way to St. Nizier. Almost behind the Hôtel de l’Europe is a “Place,” and the theatre of the Célestins, where once stood the monastery. The family of the Pazzi, illustrious in Florence, and the Medici’s mortal enemy, had taken refuge in Lyons, and been followed here by many of their faction. In the church of the Célestins they erected a superb monument; and Marie de Médicis, on her arrival at Lyons to espouse Henry the Fourth, visited the churches of the city, and perceived this mausoleum. In indignation at finding so splendid a memorial of those whose ancestors had been the assassins of some of her own, she commanded it to be broken, and only a few of its ornaments escaped destruction. Not far from the Célestins there formerly stood another monastery, that of the Jacobins, or Dominicans. Humbert de la Tour, last sovereign prince of Dauphiny, ceded his province to Philip of Valois, in despair at the death of his only son, André. It was said he had been its cause; for that sojourning at Lyons, and playing with his child at a window which overlooked the Rhone, the boy slipped from his arms, and fell into the rapid river.
In the year 1345 Pope Clement the Sixth preached a second crusade. Humbert obtained the command of this expedition, and embarked at Marseilles with his wife, who insisted on sharing his fatigues and dangers. On their return from the Holy Land, where he had been successful against the Saracens, she died at Rhodes, and some time after this second loss he took the vows in the Dominican monastery at Lyons, and was afterwards prior of the Jacobin convent in Paris.
The outside of St. Nizier has been partly modernized. Within, it is remarkably beautiful. We found a procession of priests and children, who had made their “première communion” in the morning. The little girls marched first very peaceably, and looking pretty, with white frocks and veils; of the foremost ten chosen for good conduct, the first carried a silver crucifix, beneath a miniature tent bed, from whose top depended long white ribands, which the remaining nine held. After the girls came the boys, ignoble looking ragamuffins, not having the advantage of veils to hide their sunburnt faces, pushing for their places, and squabbling for the streamers in a way not edifying. The male and female troop joined in the psalm with the priests and enfans de chœur, making altogether an indescribable howl.
I mentioned to you the votive offerings I have remarked in some Catholic chapels, but nowhere have I seen them abound as in one here dedicated to Ste. Philomène; the walls are literally covered. Among a multitude of dolls’ heads, hands, and arms, I noticed a garland of artificial roses, framed and glazed; this was entitled, “Vœu de Reconnaissance.” A little picture beside it represented a little lady in blue, kneeling by a red bed, looking to an angle of the ceiling, where stood (air-supported) a saint, crowned, and wearing a gold petticoat; below, “Vœu à Ste. Philomène.”
The grandest of the water-colour drawings was the “Chasse Miraculeuse de Ste. Philomène.” Its upper part was divided into various small compartments, each representing an episode of her life. In the first she stands before a tribunal, below, “Jugée;” in the second, tied to a tree, stuck all over with arrows, below, “Percée;” in the third, tumbling over a bridge, below, “Précipitée;” in the fourth, taken out of the torrent, and her head cut off, below, “Décapitée.” At the bottom of the picture she is placed on the Chasse Miraculeuse, finely dressed and her eyes open, I presume all attempts to murder her having failed.
The Place des Terreaux is at no great distance from the church of St. Nizier. The Hôtel de Ville forms one side; in its vestibule are two fine groups in bronze, by Couston:—the Rhone, a majestic male figure, resting on a lion; the Saône, gentle as her own course, couched on a lioness. The chief interest of the Place des Terreaux for us was, in its recollections of the death of De Thou and De Cinq Mars, who perished here on the scaffold, one like a saint, the other like a Roman.[[2]]
The weather has suddenly changed from oppressive heat to the bitter north-east winds which accompanied us here. I suppose the heat took leave on the wings of last night’s thunder-storm.
| [2] | See Appendix. |