The picture by Th. Maillot is equally wanting in aërial perspective, but instead of an obscuring fog overwhelming the good citizens of Paris who are pouring down the "mountain" with S. Geneviève's châsse, a glaring sun cuts out the figures from the background. The scene represents a procession through what is now the market of the Place Maubert. It was the 12th of January, 1496; so says a manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale. Rain had been pouring down incessantly for an unnatural period, although there was then no Eiffel tower upon which to lay the blame. What was to be done? Clearly an appeal must be made to the patron Saint, and her intercession supplicated to stay the flood. And so the bishop, the abbot, and the canons regular and secular, trudged barefooted down the montagne bearing the châsse containing the relics of the maid of Nanterre. An account of the event is given in a letter from Erasmus to his friend Nicholas Werner. The sage was ill of a fever at the time, but that did not prevent him from taking part in the procession, and we easily recognise his familiar physiognomy in the foreground of M. Maillot's work. "Il y a trois mois qu'il pleut ici, sans cesse. La Seine étant sortie de son lit, a inondé la campagne et la ville. La châsse de Sainte Geneviève a été descendue et portée en procession à Notre-Dame. L'évêque, accompagné de son clergé et du peuple, est venu au-devant. Dans cette auguste cérémonie, les chanoines réguliers, précédés de leur abbé marchant nu-pieds, conduisaient les reliques et quatre porteurs en chemise étaient chargés de ce précieux fardeau. Depuis ce temps le ciel est si serein qu'il ne peut l'être davantage."
The bishop is represented with a gilt mitre, the abbot wears a white one. Behind them are the provosts, the military, the magistrates, the canons, and the people, the procession terminating with the king's drummers and trumpeters. The crowd of people seem to be walking, or rather tripping down a very perpendicular street, to cross a zigzag wooden bridge with no side rails. The horizon is close to the top of the frame, so that the châsse appears to be falling off the shoulders of the men who are carrying it, and the people seem to be stepping down a steep incline. The colour is bright, and the costumes are picturesque, the whole picture having the effect of an early Flemish work, or of a page torn out of an old manuscript; so early is it in style that it is as incongruous in its place as would be a van Eyck, or a van der Weyden. Imagine Raffaello and Michael Angelo decorating S. Peter's after the manner of Giotto, Botticelli, or Ghirlandajo, and you have no greater incongruity than Maillot's fresco in S. Geneviève. Placed in S. Germain l'Auxerrois, or Notre-Dame, the picture would be in keeping with the architecture; in the Panthéon one feels that the decoration preceded the building.
Totally different in style, but equally out of keeping with the building, are the noble pictures of J. P. Laurens, The last moments and the funeral of the Saint. The artist has endeavoured to depict the semi-barbarous Gallo-Roman period. S. Geneviève, old and dying, is surrounded by women who are bringing their children to receive her last blessing. Rich and poor, nobles and serfs, old men and children, matrons and young girls, priests and soldiers—all are tearful at their approaching loss. Splendidly drawn and full of vigour and dramatic power (which are the characteristics of all M. Laurens' works) the pictures are somewhat black in colour; and, by reason of their very strength, they look completely out of harmony with the cold, grey purity of this Classic temple. M. J. P. Laurens is a grand artist, a lover of dramatic effect and movement, but in the Death of S. Geneviève he is subdued and reposeful. The grouping of the figures round the bed of the Saint, the wistful gaze of the children, and the prayerful expression of the mothers, are all most truthfully rendered; but might not the Saint have had a little more beauty; might she not have been a little idealised?
M. Bonnat's Martyrdom of S. Denis is well known. The Saint, just decapitated, clutches at his head; upon the block blazes a nimbus of the sun tribe; above is an Angel, hurrying down with a palm and crown; general consternation is depicted upon the faces of the assistants, as might be expected. It is a masculine work, full of power, but over dramatic and heavy in colour.
Of J. E. Delaunay's work we can form no idea yet awhile; he began it, but death cut him off too soon, and another must finish it. One of France's greatest artists, the painter of the Peste à Rom in the Louvre, is not likely to have failed in his designs for the Panthéon. Baudry was also commissioned, but he, too, went all too soon, or we might have had some panels which would have been fit pendants to those of Puvis de Chavannes.
The Return of Clovis from Tolbiac, by M. Joseph Blanc, is also academic and correct; superb in drawing, and sober of colour, its chief interest is in the fact that it contains contemporary portraits—Gambetta, Arago, Lockroy; and Coquelin figuring as a monk.
Jeanne d'Arc is no more fortunate here than elsewhere; it seems as if she were an impossibility in art. When one contemplates the number of painters, sculptors, poets, and musicians who have essayed her history and sung her praises, one is appalled by the results. One of the most sublime pages of history; the finest character among heroines; the grandest of women, of patriots, and of dreamers; the most modest, the most saint-like, the most unselfish of warriors, la Pucelle seems to oppress everyone who tries to depict any scene from her life. Perhaps the greatest success of modern times is Frémiet's fine Renaissance statue in the Place des Pyramids. Very beautiful also is Bastien-Lepage's Jeanne as a whole; but the figure does not possess the nobleness which one attaches to the militant maiden. Certainly M. Lenepveu's compositions form no exception to the general failure of Jeannes d'Arc. The maid is tied to the stake surrounded by a goodly assemblage of faggots; one monk reads, another flings a cross into her hands—as if the poor maid had objected to the cross! Soldiers are all about, and old Rouen at the back is picturesque with its gabled houses, and the cathedral in the distance. A man is just seizing a torch, and you know the end is near; but you are not impressed; you either do not care, or you do not realise the horror. But it is popular with the populace, and so serves one purpose for which it was painted—that of pointing a moral of patriotism and unselfish devotion almost unique but for the recent example of Garibaldi.
Last, but not least, charming in design, refined, and quite in harmony with the style of the building, are the mosaics of A. E. Hébert, which are among the best works of the artist, and quite exempt from the affectation and sentimentality which, somewhat too often, mar his pictures. These compositions occupy the apse. In the centre Le Christ montre à l'ange de la France les grandes destinées du peuple dont il lui confia la garde. Below this are the words: Christus vincit, Christus regnat, Christus imperat. At the side of the Saviour is the Blessed Virgin interceding for France; near her, the patroness, clad as a shepherdess, with a lamb under her arm, is praying for the city under the symbol of a ship. Above are the following subjects, The baptism of Clovis by S. Remi in the presence of S. Clotilde; S. Louis seated between Justice and Power; Jeanne d'Arc listening to the voices.
The ornamental framing of the several pictures has been executed by a master of decorative art, the late V. Galland. The borders are formed of garlands of flowers in a low scale of colour, which are divided at regular intervals by tablets bearing inscriptions and monograms. On the whole, the decoration of the Panthéon gives little encouragement to other nations who are desirous of covering large surfaces of wall in their public buildings. The art seems to be lost; for if the greatest of the French painters have, from one reason and another, failed to produce an harmonious scheme of decoration, who is likely to succeed? At best, the church presents a sort of pot-pourri. No schools are so dramatic as the French; and yet these wall paintings fail to impress us in the same way as do those, for example, of the Riccardi Palace, by Benozzo Gozzoli. It is probably the religious spirit which is wanting. We can draw better and paint better than the early Italian or Flemish artists—but the sentiment is lacking; and thus, whether we turn to Paris or München, to Berlin or London, we find the decoration of large buildings, and particularly of churches, more or less a failure. Perhaps the worst examples are the terribly dismal, cold, maudlin Nibelung series at München, compared to which the Panthéon is Raffaelesque. Had Puvis de Chavannes been allowed to do the whole church, the result would have been certainly more harmonious, and possibly more edifying; but though gaining in harmony, the frescoes might possibly have lost in variety. Sometimes too much of a good thing results in a wearisome monotony.