The high altar is modern, as are also the black and white marble baptismal fonts.
The pulpit is quite a grand affair, though modern also. Its sounding-board shows a figure of Moses holding aloft the tables of the law. It is admirably conceived and executed, and is of much artistic merit.
Arnheim possesses several other religious edifices; but, as satisfactory expressions of ecclesiastical art or architecture, they are quite unworthy. The only one worthy of remark—and that only for its unseemliness—is a modern Protestant place of worship in the[{336}] form of a vast rotunda, which in all respects resembles a great building enclosing a panorama.
Behind the chevet of the Groote Kerk, the ancient cathedral, is a fine old-time house of the sixteenth century. It is known, somewhat sacrilegiously one thinks, as the Maison du Diable, and was formerly the residence of a famous brigand or highwayman,—if there be any subtle distinction between the two. This brigand was moreover of the nobility, and was known as Martens van Rosum, Duke of the Guelderland. In front of the house is a miniature terrace, and, on the walls above, to the right, are three monstrous effigies of devils, as well as one of a woman. In the centre, upon a pillar, is a bust of Van Rosum, and an inscription to the effect that the house was restored in 1830. To-day it is occupied by certain municipal offices.
Utrecht
In many respects Utrecht was, in the past, the most important city in Holland, not commercially, but politically.
To-day it is simply the capital of the province of Utrecht, the seat of a Catholic archbishop,[{337}] and of a Jansenist archbishop as well.
Of its population of quite a hundred thousand souls, one-third, at least, are of the Catholic profession, which is an astonishing proportion for a city of Holland. For this reason, perhaps, the city remains the metropolis of the Catholic religion in the Netherlands.
The environs of the city are exceedingly picturesque. The Rhine again divides into two branches, the Oud Rijn continuing to the North Sea, through Leyden, and the other branch, known thenceforth as the Vecht, flowing into the Zuyder Zee.
Utrecht is one of the most ancient cities of the Netherlands, having been founded under Nero by a Roman Senator named Antony, hence it is frequently referred to by historians as Antonia Civitas.