Many of the men were shouting their loudest at the stalls over which they presided. One, I noticed, who offered for sale a curious little collection of odds and ends was proclaiming their value thus:—
"Voila! toute la service—Toute la Séminée! Tous les articles! Tous les articles!"
Another was crying out, "Toute la soir!" as he lifted on high a bundle of coloured measures.
The "coloured end" of the market was undeniably the fruit and vegetable stalls. There, side by side, everywhere one's eye roamed, lay long sticks of celery, cooked brown pears, little flat straw baskets full of neat little, bright green broccoli; the soft olive green of the heart shaped leaves of the fig throwing into vivid contrast the delicate peach and tawny brown of the déneufles (medlars). Here, the deep flaring orange of the sliced citronne would jostle the cool white, veined, and unobtrusive green of a neighbouring leek, its long, trailing roots lying on the counter like unravelled string. There, would be the céleri rave with its round, bulgy, cream-coloured stumps exchanging contrasts with the deep myrtle tint of the crinkled leaves, puckered and rugged, of a certain species of broccoli.
All around reigned a pandemonium of sound. Upon a cart close to the grey old church of Notre Dame, stood a woman singing "Des Chants Républicans," to the accompaniment of a concertina. Her audience was mixed, and somewhat inattentive. It consisted of soldiers, market women, children, all jabbering, jostling, laughing, and singing little catchy bits of the song. Overhead was a gigantic, brilliant red umbrella. The whole scene was fenced by market carts of all sizes and shapes whose coverings presented to the eye every variety of green linen.
The Church of Notre Dame has three magnificent doorways, full of the most exquisite design and moulding, in perfect preservation. Indeed the whole outward presentment of the church is exceedingly fine, so that one is sensible of keen disappointment, when, on going inside, one is confronted with painted pillars and tawdry, artificial flowers flaunting everywhere. The singing here is very inferior to that which we heard in the churches of Bordeaux; and in neither Notre Dame, nor the cathedral, was the great organ used at High Mass, nor at Vespers.
During the service of Vespers at which I was present, one of the priests played the harmonium, surrounded by a number of choir boys. Whenever it seemed to him that some boy was not attending, he would strike a note, reiteratingly, until he managed to catch that boy's eye, when he frowned in reproof. It was a case of the many suffering because of the misdoings of the one! One of the oldest of the smaller churches at Poitiers is that of St. Parchaise. This church, I found, is kept open all night, and a stove kept burning during the winter months, for the sake of the aged and infirm poor, who have no other refuge.
When I went in at five in the afternoon, it was already growing dark, and a priest was just lighting the lamps; the stove had already comfortably warmed the building, and I could see sitting about in obscure corners, old peasant women. Others were standing quietly before some pictures, or kneeling before a side altar.
By far the most interesting building to the antiquary in Poitiers, is the curious old Baptistery de St. Jean, dating back to the fourth century. It is filled with old stone tombs of the seventh or eighth century, and some as early as the sixth. Upon one of the latter is the inscription: "Ferro cinetus filius launone." On another was: "Aeternalis et servilla vivatisiendo." I noticed a curious double tomb for a man and a woman: in length about five feet. Père Camille de la Croix discovered this baptistery, and was instrumental in having it preserved, and the tombs carefully examined.
Père Camille himself is one of those striking personalities at whose presence the great dead past lights its torch, and once more stands, a living power, before the eyes of the present. Such a personality breathes upon the dry bones beside our path to-day, and they rise from silent oblivion and lay their arresting hands upon our sleeves.