The very grim but majestic severity of its canopied portal—with its flanking cylindrical pillars, called by the French tourelles élancés—gives the key-note of it all, and a note which many a more perfect church lacks.
This curious porch well bespeaks the time when the Church was both spiritual and militant, and ranks as an innovation—though an incomplete and possibly imperfect one—in the manner of finishing off a west façade. Its queer, suspended canopy and slight turreted towers are unique; though, for a fact, they suggest, in embryo, those lavish Burgundian porches; but it is only a suggestion, because of the incompleteness and bareness. However, this porch is the distinct fragment of the cathedral which will appeal to all who come into contact therewith.
The general effect of the interior is even more plain than that of the outer walls, and is only remarkable because of its fine and true proportions of length, breadth, and height.
The triforium is but a suggestion of an arcade, supported by black marble columns. The clerestory above is diminutive, and the window piercings are infrequent. At the present time the choir is hung with a series of curtains of panne—not tapestries in this case. The effect is more theatrical than ecclesiastical.
The architectural embellishments are to-day practically nil, but instead one sees everywhere large, uninterrupted blank walls without decoration of any sort.
The principal decorations of the southern portal are the only relaxation in this otherwise simple and austere fabric. Here is an elaborately carved tympanum and an ornamented architrave, which suggests that the added mellowness of a century or two yet to come will grant to it some approach to distinction. This portal is by no means an insignificant work, but it lacks that ripeness which is only obtained by the process of time.
Three rectangular towers rise to unequal heights above the roof, and, like the western porch, are bare and primitive, though they would be effective enough could one but get an ensemble view that would bring them into range. They are singularly unbeautiful, however, when compared with their northern brethren.
XI
CATHÉDRALE D'AGDE
This tiny Mediterranean city was founded originally by the Phœnicians as a commercial port, and finally grew, in spite of its diminutive proportions, to great importance.