"It has been the subject of much research, and I, personally, may say that I have grudged neither time nor trouble, but all in vain.
"This much we know: At the top of the southern belfry, the Old Belfry as it is called, near the window-bay looking towards the New Belfry, this name was deciphered: 'Harman, 1164.' Is it that of an architect, of a workman, or of a night watchman on the look-out at that time in the tower? We can but wonder. Didron, again, discovered on the pilaster of the eastern porch, above the head of a butcher slaughtering an ox, the word 'Rogerus' in twelfth century characters. Was he the architect, the sculptor, the donor of this porch—or the butcher? Another signature, 'Robir,' is to be seen on the pedestal of a statue in the north porch. Who was Robir? None can say.
"Langlois, too, mentions a glass-worker of the thirteenth century, Clément of Chartres, whose signature he found on a window of the Cathedral at Rouen—Clement Vitrearius Carnutensis; but it is a wide leap to infer, as some would do, that merely because this Clément was a native of Chartres, he must have painted one or more of the glass pictures in Notre Dame here. And at any rate we have no information as to his life or his works in this city. It may also be remarked that on a pane in our church we read Petrus Bal ...; is this the name, complete or defaced, of a donor or of a painter? Once more we must confess ourselves ignorant.
"If I add to this that two of Jehan de Beauce's colleagues have been traced: Thomas Le Vasseur, who assisted him in the building of the new spire, and one Sieur Bernier, whose name occurs in ancient accounts; that from some old contracts, discovered by Monsieur Lecoq, we know that Jehan Soulas, image-maker, of Paris, carved the finest of the groups that are the glory of the choir-aisles, and can verify the names of other sculptors who succeeded this admirable artist, but who are less interesting, since with them pagan art reappears and mediocrity is evident: François Marchant, image-maker, of Orleans, and Nicolas Guybert, of Chartres—we have mentioned almost all the records worthy of preservation as to the great artists who
laboured at Chartres from the twelfth till the close of the first half of the fifteenth century."
"And after that period the names that have been handed down to us deserve nothing but execration. Thomas Boudin, Legros, Jean de Dieu, Berruer, Tuby, Simon Mazières—these were the men that dared to carry on the work begun by Soulas! Louis, the Duc d'Orléans' architect, who debased and ravaged the choir, and the infamous Bridan, who, to the contemptible delight of some of the Canons, erected his blatant and wretched presentment of the Assumption!"
"Alas!" said the Abbé Gévresin, "and they were Canons who thought fit to break two ancient windows in the choir and fill them with white panes, the better to light that group of Bridan's!"
"Will you eat nothing more?" asked Madame Bavoil, who, at a negative from the guests, cleared away the cheese and preserves, and brought in coffee.
"Since you are so much charmed by our Cathedral, I shall be most happy to take you over it and explain its details," said the Abbé Plomb to Durtal.
"I shall accept with pleasure, Monsieur l'Abbé, for it fairly haunts me, it possesses me—your Notre Dame! You know, no doubt, Quicherat's theories of Gothic art?"