I have been able to suggest but a very few of the thoughts which the Palais de Justice of Rouen should arouse in you; and of many points in its history I have no space to tell; as of the "Clercs de l'Échiquier" called the "Basoche," a merry company established in 1430, and enlivening the records of the law for many centuries afterwards, as you will see at the visit of Henri II. But after all, the main impression is a very sombre one. The bitter sarcasms of Rabelais are but too well founded. Mediæval justice was almost as terrible as mediæval crime, and both were followed only too frequently by death. For these old judges let no money go, however prodigal they were of life and suffering; they scarcely ever let a prisoner go who had once got into the grim machinery of their courts; and any miserable victim who was once cast into one of their many dungeons must have welcomed his release from lingering agony in death.
THE DEAD BODY OF DE BRÉZÉ, FROM HIS TOMB
IN ROUEN CATHEDRAL
CHAPTER XII
Death
Sedentes in tenebris et in umbra mortis, vinctos in mendicitate.
... Comme sur un drap noir
Sur la tristesse immense et sombre
Le blanc squelette se fait voir....
... Des cercueils lève le couvercle
Avec ses bras aux os pointus,
Dessine ses côtes en cercle
Et rit de son large rictus.