Nor was this the only misfortune; for, after all, this great bell proved, like a great book, a great nuisance: the sound it uttered was scarcely audible; and, at last, in an attempt to render it vocal, upon a visit paid by Louis XVIth to Rouen in 1786, it was cracked[[77]]. It continued, however, to hang, a gaping-stock to children and strangers, till the revolution, in 1793, caused it to be returned to the furnace, whence it re-issued in the shape of cannon and medals, the latter commemorating the pristine state of the metal with the humiliating legend, "monument de vanité détruit pour l'utilité[[78]]."
Some of the clerestory windows on the northern side of the nave are circular: the tracery which fills them, and the mouldings which surround them, belong to the pointed style; the arches may therefore have been the production of an earlier architect. The windows of the nave are crowned by pediments, each terminating, not with a pinnacle, but with a small statue. The pediments over the windows of the choir are larger and bolder, and perforated as they rise above the parapet; the members of the mouldings are full, and produce a fine effect.
The northern transept is approached through a gloomy court, once occupied by the shops of the transcribers and caligraphists, the libraires of ancient times, and from them it has derived its name. The court is entered beneath a gate-way of beautiful and singular architecture, composed of two lofty pointed arches of equal height, crowned by a row of smaller arcades. On each side are the walls of the archiepiscopal palace, dusky and shattered, and desolate; and the vista terminates by the lofty Portal of St. Romain; for it is thus the great portal of the transept is denominated. The oaken valves are bound with ponderous hinges and bars of wrought iron, of coeval workmanship. The bars are ornamented with embossed heads, which have been hammered out of the solid metal. The statues which stood on each side of the arch-way have been demolished; but the pedestals remain. These, as well as other parts of the portal, are covered with sculptured compartments, or medallions, in high preservation, and of the most singular character. They exhibit an endless variety of fanciful monsters and animals, of every shape and form, mermaids, tritons, harpies, woodmen, satyrs, and all the fabulous zoology of ancient geography and romance; and each spandril of each quatrefoil contains a lizard, a serpent, or some other worm or reptile. They have all the oddity, all the whim, and all the horror of the pencil of Breughel. Human groups and figures are interspersed, some scriptural, historical, or legendary; others mystical and allegorical. Engravings from these medallions would form a volume of uncommon interest. Two lofty towers ornament the transept, such as are usually seen only at the western front of a cathedral. The upper story of each is perforated by a gigantic window, divided by a single mullion, or central pillar, not exceeding one foot in circumference, and nearly sixty feet in height. These windows are entirely open, and the architect never intended that they should be glazed. An extraordinary play of light and shade results from this construction. The rose window in the centre of the transept is magnificent: from within, the painted glass produces the effect of a kaleidoscope.—The pediment or gable of this transept was materially injured by a storm, in 1638, one hundred and thirty years after it was completed; and the damage was never restored.
The southern transept bears a near resemblance to that which I have already described; but it was originally richer in its ornaments, and it still preserves some of its statues. Here the medallions relate chiefly to scripture-history; but the sculpture is greatly corroded by the weather, and the more delicate parts are nearly obliterated; besides which, as well here, as at the other entrances, the Calvinists, in 1562, and, more recently, the Revolutionists, have been most mischievously destructive, mutilating and decapitating without mercy. The spirit, indeed, of the French reformers, bore a near resemblance to the proceedings of John Knox and his brethren: the people embraced the new doctrine with turbulent violence. There was in it nothing moderate, nothing gradual: it was not the regular flow of public opinion, undermining abuses, and bringing them slowly to their fall; but it was the thunderbolt, which—
"In sua templa furit, nullâque exire vetante
Materiâ, magnamque cadens magnamque revertens
Dat stragem latè sparsosque recolligit ignes."
Among the legends recorded on the southern portal, or the Portail de la Calende, is that of the corn-merchant; the confiscation of whose property paid, as the chronicles tell us, for the erection of this beautiful entrance. He himself, if we may believe the same authority, was hanged in the street opposite to it, in consequence of having been detected in the use of false measures.
The original Lady-Chapel, at the east end of the cathedral, was taken down in 1302. The present, which is considerably more spacious, is chiefly of a date immediately subsequent. Part, however, was built in 1430, when new and larger windows were inserted throughout the church; whilst other parts were not finished till 1538, at which time the Cardinal Georges d'Amboise restored the roof of the choir, which had been injured in 1514, by the destruction of the spire.
The square central tower, which is low and comparatively plain, is the work of the year 1200. It is itself more ancient than would be supposed from the character of its architecture; but it occupies the place of one of still greater antiquity, which was materially damaged in 1117, when the original spire of the church was struck by lightning. This first spire was of stone, but was replaced by another of wood, which, as I have just mentioned, was also destroyed at the beginning of the sixteenth century. A fire, arising from the negligence of plumbers employed to repair the lead-work, was the cause of its ruin.—To remedy the misfortune, recourse was had to extraordinary efforts: the King contributed twelve thousand francs; the chapter a portion of their revenue and their plate; collections were made throughout the kingdom; and Leo Xth authorised the sale of indulgences, a measure, which, at nearly the same period, in its more extensive adoption for the building of St. Peter's at Rome, shook the Papacy to its foundation. The spire thus raised, the second of wood, but the third in chronological order, is the one which is now in existence. It was, like its predecessor, endangered by the carelessness of the plumbers, in 1713; but it does not appear to have required any material reparations till ten years ago, when a sum of thirty thousand francs was expended upon it.