At Sottevast we took the omnibus for Bricquebec, which lies nearly five miles from the station. Its ruined castle, dating from the end of the fourteenth century, with its lofty octagonal donjon, nearly a hundred feet high, standing on a high "motte" or [pg 013] artificial mound, has a most imposing appearance. Bricquebec, the most considerable demesne of the Cotentins, was taken by King Henry V. from the Sire d'Estouteville, who had so gallantly defended Mont St. Michel against him. Henry gave Bricquebec to William de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, the ill-fated favourite of Queen Margaret of Anjou, and he, on being taken prisoner by the French, sold it, [pg 014] to raise the money for his ransom, to Sir Bertie Entwistle, who fought at Agincourt, and who held it till the battle of Formigny expelled the English from Normandy, and Sir Bertie fell at St. Albans in the Lancastrian cause. The inn, "Hôtel du Vieux Château," is within the enclosure of the ruins—a most dilapidated old place; our dirty ill-furnished room next to a hayloft, the horses passing through the house to the stable, and every kind of litter and rubbish accumulated under the windows. Yet in the room we occupied had once slept our gracious Sovereign Queen Victoria. On a placard is inscribed, "Chambre de la famille royale d'Angleterre, 18 Août 1857;" and below stairs is another, setting forth, "S. M. la Reine d'Angleterre, le Prince Albert, les Princesses Royale et Alice, le Prince Alfred, sont descendus à l'hôtel du Vieux Château le 10 Août 1857." About a mile from Bricquebec is a Trappist convent; but we were not allowed admission beyond the parlour, where is sold a quantity of cutlery, not made—as we were given to understand when offered for sale—by the monks.
Regaining the railroad, we went on to Valognes, which has been styled the St. Germain of Normandy; a dull town, with worn-out houses, occupied by worn-out aristocratic families. The grass grows in the streets.
Here we left the rail and proceeded to Saint [pg 015] Sauveur-le-Vicomte. On entering the town, the castle is on the right of the road, the Abbey church on the left. The large demesne of Saint Sauveur-le-Vicomte passed by marriage into the Harcourt family, and belonged, in the time of Edward III., to Geoffrey d'Harcourt, whose fortress was one of the most formidable in Normandy. Banished from France, he went over to England and persuaded Edward III. to make a descent upon Normandy instead of Gascony, assuring him he would find rich towns and fair castles without any means of defence, and that his people would gain wealth enough to suffice them for twenty years to come. The King landed at La Hogue, or Saint Vaast-la-Hogue, as it is now called, where he knighted the Prince of Wales and made Warwick and Harcourt marshals of his army. They advanced in three divisions—the King and the Prince in the centre, the two marshals on the right and left—ravaging all before them, and not stopping in their victorious course till the great victory at Crecy. Harcourt subsequently met a traitor's fate. A force was sent against him, his army was routed, and, preferring death to being taken, he fought most valiantly until he was struck to the ground by French lances, when some men-at-arms dispatched him with their swords. He had sold the reversion of his castle to King Edward III., to whom it was confirmed by the treaty of Bretigny. Edward [pg 016] bestowed the barony upon that pride of English chivalry, Sir John Chandos, in recompense for his great services in the wars. The square donjon and inner gate were built by Chandos. The castle is well preserved, and is now used as a hospice for orphans and aged women. The rooms are kept beautifully clean, and on a tablet in one of the corridors is written up "Dortoirs restaurés par la munificence de M. le Comte Georges d'Harcourt en mémoire de ses illustres ayeux, anciens Seigneurs de ce château, en 1838."
The Benedictine convent also belonged to the Harcourts until the revolt of Geoffrey. It is now the property of the Sœurs de la Miséricorde, who have rebuilt the fine Abbey church according to its former model. Originally built in the eleventh century, it was partly burnt in the fourteenth, and reconstructed in the fifteenth. The columns and arches of the nave are of the first period; the form of the church is a Latin cross, having an apse ornamented with a double row of lancet windows, richly sculptured. The sculptures are all executed by an untaught workman of the place, who died before he had completed the pulpit. To collect the funds necessary for the undertaking, the foundress travelled throughout Europe. Her tomb is in the church. "Julie Françoise Catherine Postel, née à Barfleur, 1756. Sœur Marie Madelaine, Fondatrice et première Superieure [pg 017] Générale de l'Institut des Ecoles Chrétiennes de la Miséricorde, morte en odeur de Sainteté 16 Juillet 1846, à l'Abbaye de St. Sauveur-le-Vicomte." The badge of the sisterhood is a cross inscribed with their motto "L'obéissance jusqu'à la mort." Some of the party made an attempt at fishing in the little river Douve, but without success, though rewarded for their walk by a pretty view of the apse of the Abbey church, with its delicately-sculptured lancet windows, from the opposite side of the river.
5. L'OBÉISSANCE
JUSQU'À LA MORT.
We hired a private carriage (voiture à volonté) to Périers. After passing over a hilly road we crossed a marsh which extends from Carentan to the sea, and reached a town called La Haye-du-Puits—a singular name derived from the custom in the middle ages of surrounding the "motte" or enclosure upon which the donjon was built, with a wooden palisade, or sometimes with a thick hedge formed of thorns and branches of trees interlaced: hence La Haye-du-Puits, La Haye-Pesnel, and others. Here is a Norman church restored: all the capitals of the columns are of the same pattern.
The Abbey church at Lessay, where next we [pg 018] stopped, is of the twelfth century, and considered, with Coutances and Périers, to be the finest examples of Romanesque in the Cotentin. The arches are round, and all the architecture of the church, which has been restored, is of the same period. The Abbey of Lessay had transmarine jurisdiction and the right of presentation to the Priory of Boxgrove and other endowments in the diocese of Chichester. The Abbey house, now inhabited, is a fine modernised habitation. At Lessay we saw the manner of washing linen practised in many places throughout Normandy and Brittany. Being first roughly washed in the river, the clothes are placed in layers in a large cask, with a bunghole at the bottom, alternately with wood-ashes, and on the top is laid a piece of coarse sacking. Boiling water is poured over the top, which, as it passes through the linen, absorbs the soda of the ashes, escaping at the bottom and carrying away with it all impurities. This process is repeated several times till the clothes are perfectly white.
Throughout this part of the country the mistletoe hangs as the sign of a cabaret; and if cider is sold, some apples are fastened to the bush. On the road to Périers we crossed a "lande" or common, where we met numerous carts carrying sea sand, here used to mix with the heavy soil as manure.
At Périers we slept at the little inn "La Croix [pg 019] Blanche," kept by Madame Casimir, the widow of a Polish officer, well known for her eccentricity and good cuisine. The entrance to the apartments in the inns is generally through the kitchen; in many the box bedstead (lit clos) stands in the corner near the fire, Breton fashion. On a barber's shop we saw painted up "Içi l'on rajeunit." The church has a tall spire, and is one of the finest religious edifices in this part of Normandy—painted windows, the capitals of the columns of varied foliage, and fine groined clustered arches.