Our strongest impression of Bourg en Bresse—apart from its associations with the Eglise de Brou—was that it brought us almost within hail of the beloved Midi. As at MÂcon, the sun, when it shone, was aggressive. You welcomed the sight of leafy plane trees, you hugged the shady side of the road. Good peaches were to be had for a sou la piÈce; and the cattle wore hats—red and yellow tassels and elaborate string fly-protectors bound about their foreheads. These things are full of significance for one who has seen the south.

Another memory is the ill-manners of the townspeople. The attentions of the folk at Paray were but neglect when compared with the fixed stare of Bourg. One delinquent was so absorbed in us that he nearly wrecked his motor in the open street: another fell down the hotel stairs; there were three cases of abrasion. The fact that these victims had obviously not forgotten the "convenances," only made more striking their failure to observe them. They appeared to have no control over certain faculties. Both sexes had forgotten how to blush. They wrought me to anger, and my wife to tears.

But such trifles, after all, are merely the "petit dÉsagrÉments" of travel—remembered only with a smile; relics of primitivism, such as was the service de la gare—omnibuses still running, not so much as varnished since the French Revolution.

"C'est ancien" said a hotel porter, with a wave of the hand. "C'est un monument historique," added a bystander. The porter smiled, as his hand closed mechanically over a franc.

We rode, that first afternoon, to Cezenat, on the slopes of the Jura. The aspect of the country round was harsher than that of central Burgundy, and the light fiercer; the landscape, as a whole, lacks the soft charm of the vine-clad CÔte d'Or, without attaining to the romantic quivering whiteness of the vrai midi. It was very delightful to rest before the cafÉ opposite to the church of Revonnat, and watch the shapely, creamy cattle, following the swarthy maid to the water-trough beneath the virgin-crowned fountain. They drank steadily, until a long stick, rattling about their shiny muzzles, made them raise mildly-protesting heads. They walked home with unruffled dignity, a processional frieze of madonnas—their faces veiled, as befits holiness.

More, and then more, came tinkling by, driven by a diminutive boy. They disappeared down a winding lane, and were followed by four horses, harnessed tandem, wearing the three-horned attelage of the Midi, and stamping, swishing their tails, and tossing heads, till all the village was vocal with their music. After them waddled a fat woman, leaking seed, and followed by a hundred hungry fowls. Last of all, two piebald oxen, harnessed in front of a skinny pony, tugged wearily up the hill the household goods of a whole family piled upon a creaking cart.

With the exception of a few old houses and the world-famous Brou, there is very little architecture worth seeing in Bourg. Or, if there is, it did not detain us long. We made at once for Princess Margaret's Church, rather more than a kilometre distant from the lower part of the town, at the end of a long, straight, squalid road. There we found it—this jewel ill-set. The authorities, with the cynical apathy, or ignorance, that characterises French ecclesiasticism, have surrounded the building, on the west and north, with a gravelled open space, like the playground of a board-school, adorned with a tawdry crucifix, and a lavatory, the whole enclosed within an ignoble wall. Why the French public tolerate such outrages is a mystery!

I suppose that, in this case, darkness is just ignorance.[198] Yet before their very eyes are evidences that it was not always so. The pictures in their church show that the "parvis" was originally planted with shrubs, which would grow as readily to-day as they did then; failing a grassy lawn, and the money or men to keep it green and trim.

Enough of the setting—what of Princess Margaret's Church? Looking up at it, we are reminded, at once, of her Flemish sympathies. The high gables of this west front—of which the centre one is lightened by a rose and three triangular windows, symbols of eternity and the Trinity—recall the splendid architecture of Bruges and the Rhine country. Rich flamboyant carving is to be seen everywhere; yet the effect is more striking than successful. The faÇade is surrounded with elaborate embellishments, that, jostling with one another, break the harmony of line; the ornament is tortured, and conveys the impression that it is merely hung upon the Church; the figures in the tympanum below the flat-arched portal, are poor in execution; the tower is mean and insufficient. Yet we must not hasten to condemn. This fallen Gothic, though marred by the defects of its qualities, and, beyond question, fundamentally decrepit, has yet wintry graces all her own. Her death days were neither ignoble, nor frozen; rather they were instinct with a repentant animation, and warmed by a delicate flush, the hope and vision of coming spring.

Yes, despite the wanton waste of ornament, despite intemperance and lack of restraint, there is pathos, there is beauty, even, in these splendid agonies of a matchless art. That proud princess of ancient lineage, lying stricken in her darkened chamber, where yet lingered the shadows of a passing night, bent timidly, fearfully, her dreamy, dying eyes upon the before and after, upon what had been and was yet to be; until, gathering strength for a last effort, the frail, fair, white hand, drawing apart the silken folds of the curtain, caught, through the glowing casement, a glimpse of a golden dawn brightening a yet lovelier world, and smiled to see the pure radiance of a happier, more human belief touching with the tender light of a new-born hope the sterner mysticism of her earlier discarded faith. The discarded faith was mediÆvalism; that new-born hope we call the Renaissance.

Come with me into the building, and, before I tell Margaret's story, look, for a moment, round this amazing church. The nave, though it conveys at once to the mind of the devotee of pure Gothic, a sensation of wintry decadence, that neither the richness of the lovely jubÉ, nor a glimpse, through its open door, of the wonderful marble tombs within the choir, can quite dispel, is pleasing in its grace and simplicity, qualities which the exterior would not have led you to expect. So restful, too, are the flowing lines of the columns and engaged colonnettes rising, unbroken by capitals, to the low vaults, that one imagines the architect to have planned deliberately this cool, white marble hall, in which worshippers could soothe spirits wrought to intensity by sights seen within. They may well have needed such repose, since we need it to-day; though the love which brought this church into being was left lonely four hundred years ago. Pass through that open doorway, and see for yourself. You stand in a maze of sculptures, among a thousand flowers, figures, emblems, devices, and myths, feminine fantasies carved everywhere, in regal profusion upon many a pedestal and column, upon shadowy niches and overhanging tabernacles, upon dainty shaft, and lightest fretwork pinnacle, their marble whiteness all warmed in blue, crimson, and golden light streaming from the painted windows. Whether you look down upon the blue enamelled bricks at your feet,[199] at the silent figures beneath those strangely decorated canopies, and the myriad carven shapes about them, or whether you look up at the resplendent saints, kings, and nobles ablaze upon the panes, your sensation is one of unsatisfied wonder, and you know yourself to be in a building, that, for all its faults, is unrivalled in the world of art. Let me tell how it came to be so.

The story of Margaret d'Autriche, the unfortunate princess to whom we owe this extraordinary Eglise de Brou, is closely linked with events and personalities already mentioned in these pages. Born in 1480, she was the daughter of Maximilian and Marie de Bourgogne, and grand-daughter of Charles le TÉmÉraire. In the closing years of his life, that old fox, Louis XI., had chosen her out as the future wife of his Dauphin, and would, no doubt, have had his will, had not his erstwhile ally, death, turned against him at last, and claimed forfeiture.

The childhood of Marguerite passed peaceably in that lovely ChÂteau of Amboise by the Loire, in the company of her official husband, Charles VIII., and his French Court, was not foreshadowed by sorrows that were soon to come. The King torn between desires to unite Burgundy and Brittany to the French crown, and finding that he could not have both, decided in favour of the latter. Acting upon that decision, he broke his sworn faith to Marguerite, dismissed his fiancÉe, and married Anne of Brittany. Marguerite left in anger; nor did she ever forgive Charles. Henceforth, France was her enemy. So, for many years, was Fortune. The next stroke fell swiftly.

In April, 1497, Marguerite married Juan, Prince of Castille, the son of Ferdinand and Isabella, who died of fever at Salamanca in the same year—a misfortune that—if we are to believe her historiographer, Jean Lemaire—neither crushed the girl's spirit, nor extinguished her natural wit; "for, being on shipboard, and having passed a horrible and tempestuous night, in fear of perilous shipwreck, as the following day the sea had been calm and tranquil, while Marguerite was conversing with her maids upon their past fears and perturbations, the proposal was made that each should compose her own epitaph; whereupon she promptly composed her own in this manner":

Truly a very joyous epitaph, as Lemaire says, "si plein de vraie urbanitÉ." Not so did she salute the death of her next husband.[201]

It was on the 26th of September, 1501, that was signed the treaty of her marriage with Philibert le Beau, Duke of Savoy—the event that first links Marguerite's story with that of Brou.

The fifth of August in the following year, when Philibert and Marguerite paid their first visit to Bourg, was a memorable day in the annals of the town. Artillery boomed, joy bells clashed; every house was bright with gay hangings of all colours, with festoons, and the arms of Burgundy and Savoy. Soon the call of the trumpet drew all the crowd to the Town Hall, whence issued the corps municipal, preceded by the syndics clothed in red robes, one of whom bore the keys of the town upon a silver plate.

The procession moved slowly forward, to the beat of music, until a warlike fanfare of trumpets, and the neighing of horses, announced the coming of the ducal cortÈge, at the head of which rode Philibert and Marguerite. Loud were the cries of joy that greeted the young couple. On a prancing steed, decked with rich draperies, bearing the arms of Burgundy, its beautiful head plumed with tossing white feathers, rode Marguerite, wearing the ducal crown. Through the folds of her silver veil, spectators could obtain a glimpse of a gracious face, and long fair tresses. Her dress was of crimson velvet, embroidered in gold, showing upon the skirt the escutcheons of Austria and Savoy. In one hand she held her reins, the other was lifted in gracious salutation to the crowd. At her right ambled the Duke Philibert, proud of the reception that Bourg was according his lady.

Philibert le Beau was a handsome, gay, debonair prince, who loved to give to music and good cheer all the hours he could spare from his favourite pastime of the hunt. He left to his ministers exclusively all such troublesome matters as affairs of State. Such was the young gallant who rode by Marguerite's side through the streets of Bourg.

Every house, as we have said, was gay with blazoned arms and bunting. On a great scaffold before the Church of Notre Dame, the preaching friars were presenting mystery plays, the Christian legends of St. George and of the Archangel St. Michael. On the scaffolds, in various parts of the town, were figured scenes from mythological history. The Labours of Hercules, or Jason's encounters with monsters and dragons during his quest of the Golden Fleece. Before the town wall, in the presence of a crowd so dense that a way could scarcely be cleared for the duchess, was represented the allegory of "The Fountain and the Maid," in which, from the metal breasts of a gigantic female figure, two jets of wine splashed into the basin below.

During the three short years of Philibert's married life, the peace of Europe was untroubled, and the Duke of Savoy was forced to appease his military ardour in tournament and hunt. A chronicler of the time has left us a detailed account of the jousts held on the occasion of the marriage of Laurent de Gorrevod, at the Castle of Carignan. Philibert bore himself so bravely in the lists, that the ladies, with one consent, "benign and not ungrateful, knowing the honour and the great and mighty feats of arms done for love of them, advised that by right and without favour, the honour and prize of the combat should be given to Duke Philibert. Wherefore the said ladies desired him that he would of his grace accept the ring presented to him on their behalf by a young and fair demoiselle—which supplication, as one full of honour, courtesy, and benignity, thanking the said ladies, their said ring and present he graciously accepted."[202]

The Duke's favourite hunting-seat was at ChÂteau de Pont-Ain,[203] high up on the hill overlooking Bresse and Bugey. Many a day the dark woods around echoed the merry note of the horn, and the deep bay of his hounds, as Philip and Marguerite rode forth together. She with "the ivory horn hung in a sling, mounted on a spirited palfrey, followed her very dear lord and spouse, in hot chase of the horned stags, by wood and plain, by mountain and valley, fearing not the ardour of the sun nor the toil of the hunt, so that by her careful presence she could guard him from all misfortune."

On a very hot morning, in September, 1504, the young prince, led far afield by the excitement of the chase, "and almost separated from his party, who could follow him no longer, was passing, at mid-day, a long and narrow valley, on foot, because his horses, by reason of the long ride, were dead or broken down."

Arriving, breathless and bathed in perspiration, at the Fontaine St. Vulbas, he was charmed by the cool shade of the place, and ordered his meal to be served to him there. Before long, feeling himself seized with a sudden shivering fit, he ordered his horse, and began his homeward journey, "holding his hand to his chest, then commencing to bend forward and to be in great agony." He reached the Castle at last, and threw himself down upon a camp bed, "beside which came soon, all troubled in heart, the very dear Duchess, his very dear spouse and companion, who, seeing her lord and friend lying ill, and nevertheless not knowing as yet of her great mourning so soon to be, began to comfort him very sweetly, and to cheer him with all her power."

For several days the young prince battled with a violent attack of pleurisy; but, at last, in spite of bleeding and many prayers, even his strong constitution gave way, and the lovers knew that they must part. "And himself feeling his end drawing near, rose and would fain bid an eternal farewell to his very loved companion, holding her in a strong embrace." He died in the arms of Marguerite, on the 10th September, 1504, in the very room in which he had been born, twenty-four years before, in the ChÂteau de Pont-d'Ain.

The brief days of Marguerite's happiness were closed. Coming years were to bring their measure of consolation to the stricken woman; but, as she herself, a poetess of sorrow, wrote in verse, whose graceful melodies recall the plaintive notes of Charles D'OrlÉans, henceforth for her

So poor Marguerite adopted a new device, the last and saddest of three comments upon her destiny.[205] You may read it to-day, a hundred times, on the walls, the tombs, the windows of the church of Brou.

FORTUNE. INFORTUNE. FORT UNE.[206]

It was in the spring of 1505 that Margaret laid with her own hand the first stone of the building she had dreamed of ever since her husband's death, a church which would, at the same time worthily perpetuate the memory of their loves, and accomplish the unfulfilled vow of her mother, Marguerite de Bourbon, who had sworn many years before to erect a church to the glory of God, should her husband recover from an illness that then threatened his life.

The princess chose for her architect Loys van Boghen, a Flamand of great ability, under whose direction the whole fabric of the church was constructed. The statues and sculptures were in the hands of "Maistre Conrard, le consommÉ tailleur d'ymages," between whom and the difficult, quarrelsome Loys considerable friction seems to have arisen. This we gather from the archives of Ain.[207]

"Insomuch as Maistre Loys is somewhat light of word and threat towards one and another, both ecclesiastic and secular, whence much scandal may arise, as indeed has already chanced, and our Lady's work thereby retarded, the said Maistre Loys is thereby expressly forbidden and prohibited henceforth from using such threats and words; and should he notwithstanding attempt to do so, he will be held accountable therefore to our Lady in his person and goods. The same shall be said to Maistre Conrard and to all other whom it may concern."[208]

At length, stone by stone, in spite of Maistre Loys' temper and the awful famine and pestilence, which, in those years, were ravaging the town of Bourg, Marguerite's darling project approached completion. Many a day would she ride over from the Castle of Pont d'Ain, where she was passing the early years of her widowhood, to watch her beloved building growing beneath her eyes.

The closing years of Marguerite's life were passed in administering, wisely and justly, the affairs of the Pays Bas, of which country she had long been appointed governor. Her wealth, her great abilities, and her exalted rank all combined to render her one of the most prominent figures in the political life of the time.

Francis I., after his defeat at Pavia, sought her good graces; she was courted of many; her voice was loud in the counsels of Europe. But Marguerite, who had already refused the hand of Henry VII. of England, was not to be dazzled by the glitter of a crown. Long ago she had renounced wedded life, until friendly death should lay her once more beside Philibert in those bridal tombs. Her inmost thoughts, far away from thrones and principalities, were turning towards the cloister, as a fitting refuge from the cares of state, when, in 1530, her unhappy life was brought to a sudden close. This is the traditional story of her death, as told in a manuscript of the eighteenth century.[210]

On the fifteenth of the month of November, in the morning, before rising, she asked for a drink of water from one of her attendants, Magdeleine of Rochester, who, obeying her immediately, brought the water in a crystal cup; but, while taking it back, she unfortunately let the glass fall in front of the bed, where it was smashed to pieces. The girl gathered the fragments up, as carefully as she could, but did not think of looking into her Royal mistress's slippers. Some hours later, Princess Marguerite put on her slippers, and walked to the fire. Feeling a violent pricking sensation in her left foot, she called a lady in waiting, who found a fragment of the broken cup firmly embedded therein. This she drew out, as carefully as she could, and the princess, with her usual courage, made light of the matter, and dismissed it from her mind.

Some days after, she began to feel great pain in the foot, and noticed that the limb was swollen. Physicians were summoned, who, after private consultation, decided that the wound was gangrened, and that amputation was the only practicable means of saving the patient's life. They communicated their decision to MontÉcut, the princess's confessor, and asked him to break the news to his mistress. She was much surprised, but bore bravely what she must have known to be virtually a sentence of death. The next few days having been passed in confession, absolution, and the settlement of her temporal affairs, she submitted herself to her doctors, who proceeded to administer to their patient so large a dose of opium "that they put her to a sleep so sound that it is not yet ended, and will not end until the Resurrection of all the dead."

Marguerite was buried at Malines, where her body lay for two years, until, her tomb being ready, she was laid, in 1532, according to the express terms of her will, beside her "lord and husband," who was to rest between his mother and his wife.

There you may see her to-day lying, proud and lovely, as in life, her royal face still turned to the man to whose glory, rather than to God's, she had raised those astounding memorials of a woman's devotion. There, in flaming colour upon the purpled panes, in blazoned device upon floor and wall, in a thousand delicate fancies, wrought, with most exquisite art, upon the pale, white marble of the tombs, and altar pieces, you may read the story of her life.

We are now in a position to realize why the church, though built by men, breathes femininity. It was the expression of a woman's mind, the love offering of a lady to her lord. As such, all women's virtues are expressed in it—dignity and grace in the flowing lines of the nave, purity in the whiteness of the marble, wit and ingenuity in the legends and devices, daintiness in the exquisite detail; courage, patience, and devotion, revealed everywhere in the complete unity of the whole.[211] And those women's virtues carried with them women's faults—a certain lack of breadth and vision; over-elaboration of detail, and a love of prettiness that verges upon the petty.[212] All these things are apparent. But the greatest defect of all—the subordination of design to ornament—is as much the fault of the age as of the individual. These were the years of transition.

The old greatness had passed; the new greatness in building was not yet come. In that sense this church is inherently decadent.

When men of the early middle ages reared their mighty fanes to God and to his saints, they lifted vault and roof into echoing airy spaces, where the rapt worshippers, looking upward, might seek haply after God; but here is no upward call. This roof is low, flattened, heavy; threatening, almost, to fall upon the heads bent in prayer. The builders of pure Gothic loved to ornament their churches with the richest sculpture that skilful, reverent hands could carve; and they sought their inspirations in Nature alone, who shapes the tree before she decks it with leaves, and fashions the plant before the flower.

But these later men, losing sincerity, lost truth; they thought of the leaf before the limb, and of blossom rather than of bough. That is why Brou leaves us unsatisfied. Yet, as I have said, we must not blame utterly. Whatever architect and sculptor may have lacked, one thing they did not lack—patience. And if patience were indeed genius, as Buffon says it is, then is genius here, too. Surely, the most fastidious spectator may say with Paradin, the old chronicler of Savoy, "aprÈs tout estant lÉans (À Brou), semble que voyez un songe, et ne savez À quoi premierment addresser vos yeux pour les repaistre, parce qu' une chascune chose se convie Á regarder comme un nouveau spectacle."

We have no space left in which to deal with details of the tombs, the choir stalls, altar pieces, and other marvels the church contains. The reader must discover them for himself; we can only give a few general impressions.

As you face the east end of the Church, the tomb of Marguerite d'Autriche is on your left, that of Philibert le Beau in the centre, and that of Marguerite de Bourbon on the right. This last, the earliest of the three, is obviously inspired by the royal tombs at Dijon, but, having no base, it lacks their dignity, just as it lacks their harmony and simplicity. The pleurants are very poor, when compared with those of Claus Sluter and his nephew. The minute detail is extraordinarily good, but there is a superabundance of ornament, and the whole is tortured and conscious. The meaning of the device bearing the letters F E R T has been much debated. Some say that it represents Fortitudo Ejus Rhodum Tenuit, or Tuetur, in memory of AmÉdee le Grand's victory over the Turks; others that it is a chevaleresque French device; Frappez, Entrez, Rompez Tout. The guide, however, gave us Fide et Religione Tenemur, as the true solution.

Philibert's tomb is quite fittingly the best of the three, as being the simplest and most dignified. The detail is very Flemish, some of the figures recalling in pose as well as in costume, the manner of Van Eyck and his school.

The tomb of Marguerite d'Autriche is beautifully proportioned, but much of the ornament has so little relation to the design that it appears to be appliquÉ. Tortured lines are the inevitable result. Many of the figures however, are very charming; notably the Madeleine holding her hair, and Catherine of Alexandria trampling down the Emperor Maximilian of Italy. The Marguerites make effective and appropriate ornament, as also do the briquets of the house of Burgundy—two sticks in the form of St. Andrew's cross.

The altar piece of the virgin in the north transept is one of the most extraordinary productions of its kind that I know. It is more magnificent even than the tombs, and far exceeds them in grace, charm, and realism. The seven scenes represented are: The Ascension of the Virgin; the Visitation; the Annunciation; the Nativity; the Adoration; Pentecost; Christ appearing to His Mother. In the oratory of Marguerite d'Autriche there is a curious oblique arch, enabling her to see both altars at the same time.

Let me close these few notes on the church of Brou with some lively comments from Paradin's Chronique de Savoie.

"As to the pavement, even that which is in the choir as well as that which is in the chapel of my said Lady Marguerite d'Autriche, it is in truth a thing as pleasant and delicious to see as may possibly be found, being all such joyous and singular leadwork mingled with very divers picturing ... which so pleases spectators that almost with regret one walks upon it. I remember that, being there, was a gentleman who feeling scruples at walking on this pavement, spat in the face of a great rascal of a pastrycook, whose nose was all beflowered with knobs of scarlet tint, saying that there was no spot in all the church more dirty to spit on than that."

"I remember also having seen descend (here), the late King Francis[213] when he came to Bourg, who, having seen this church, was ravished with admiration, saying that he had never seen nor heard of a temple of such excellence for what it contained. And true it is that he noted (as he was a Prince exceeding in good sense all the kings of his time) that this white stone of which the Church is built, would not well endure frost, being too rare and tender. And it was since found that he spoke truly; for long after there fell from the clock tower some of the great bastions or gargoyles which take the water over the roof, on the side of the cloisters, a thing which did much hurt to the building."

The revolutionary mob were proposing to do still greater hurt to the building, and would have done so, had not the wisest man in all Bourg filled the church with hay which the sans-culottes could not bring themselves to burn. So Brou is ours, we hope, for many centuries to come.