The Cathedrals of Northern France

The lower portion of the northwest tower, called the Tour St. Romain, is all that is left of the eleventh-century building, the remainder of which was destroyed by fire in 1200. Rebuilding followed in succeeding years and shows work of many styles. Additions, repairs, and interpolations were incorporated with the fragment of the tower, so that the structure as we now know it stood complete with the early thirteenth century. Viollet-le-Duc is the authority for the statement that the apse and transept, chapels, choir, and two doorways of the west façade were quite complete before the influence of the perfected Gothic of the Isle of France was even felt. One Enguerrand was the chief designer of the new church, assisted by Jean d'Andeli as master mason. The early century saw the nave chapels built, having been preceded by the Portail aux Libraires, a sort of cloistered north entrance, still so referred to, one of the most charming and quiet old-world retreats to be found to-day even within the hallowed precincts of a cathedral. The Portail de la Calende did not follow until a century later, when the Tour St. Romain was completed to its roof; at which time was also added the screen or arcade which separates the Portail aux Libraires from the street.

This century, too, saw the beginning of the famous Tour de Beurre, built mostly by the contributions of those who paid for the indulgence of being allowed to eat butter during Lent. Its foundation was laid in 1487 under Archbishop Robert de Croixmore, and it was completed under Cardinal d'Amboise in 1507. A chapel at the base of the tower is dedicated to St. Stephen. The ornate decorations of the west front, added by Georges d'Amboise, are mainly of the sixteenth century and form no part of the original plan or design. It borders upon the style we have since learned to decry, but it is, at least, marvellous as to the skill with which its foliaged and crocketed pinnacles and elaborate traceries are worked. Ruskin was probably right in this estimate at least, – "The central gable is the most exquisite piece of pure flamboyant style extant." At the present day this west front is undergoing such restoration and general repair that the entire gable, rose window, and part of the flanking towers are completely covered with a most hideous array of scaffolding.

The central spire as it exists to-day, in reality an abomination of abominations, is naturally enough admired by all when first viewed from afar. It certainly looks not dwarfed, or even fragile, but simply delicate, and withal graceful, an opinion which ultimate association therewith speedily dispels. It must be one of the very first examples of modern iron or steel erection in the world, dating from 1827, following three former spires, each of which was burned. The architect responsible for this monstrosity sought to combine two fabrics in incoherent proportions. More than one authority decries the use of iron as a constructive element, and Chaucer's description of the Temple of Mars in the Knight's Tale reads significantly:

"Wrought all of burned steel…Was long and straight and ghastly for to see."

The great part of the exterior of this remarkable church is closely hidden by a rather squalid collection of buildings. Here and there they have been cleared away, but, like much of the process of restoration, where new fabric is let into the old, the incongruity is quite as objectionably apparent as the crumbling stones of another age. Notre Dame de Rouen is singularly confined, but there seems no help for it, and it is but another characteristic of the age in which it was built, – that the people either sought the shelter of churchly environment, or that the church was only too willing to stretch forth its sheltering arms to all and sundry who would lie in its shadow.

In an assignment of ranking beauty to its external features, the decorative west front must manifestly come first; next the Portail aux Libraires, with its arcaded gateway and the remains of the booksellers' stalls which still surround its miniature courtyard; then, perhaps, should follow the Tour St. Romain and the Portail de la Calende, with its charmingly recessed doorway and flanking lancet arches. The sculptured decorations of all are for the most part intact and undisfigured. The gable of the southern doorway rises pointedly until its apex centres with the radiated circular window above, which, by the way, is not of the exceeding great beauty of the other two rose windows, which rank with those at Reims and Chartres as the beaux ideals

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