re. Yet we are the heirs of all that is noblest in that
greatest of all arts; and if you would test that, you need only look
at any mediaeval French Cathedral with a seeing eye. You will find no
meaningless mass of bricks and mortar, but the speaking record of the
age that built them. "The stone shall cry out of the wall, and the
beam out of the timber shall answer it."

[Illustration]

CHAPTER II

_The First City_

"Latera aquilonis civitas regis magni
Deus in domibus eius cognoscetur cum suscipiet eam."

Follow the Rue de la Republique past the Abbey of St. Ouen and up the
hill to the Place Sainte Marie. On your left you will find the Musee
des Antiquites which contains the earliest traces of the inhabitants
of Rouen. There are so few of them that they are easily contained in a
few glass cases; and this Museum is itself an excellent place with
which to begin your visitation of the town. Few travellers go there,
yet it is well worth the while, for here are collected many relics of
an age that has left few traces anywhere, and here can be filled up
many gaps in that story of Rouen which you can never read completely
in what is left of the old town. In the courtyard that faces the Rue
de la Republique are several of the ancient gateways that have given
way before the press of modern traffic, and a few facades of carved
and timbered houses rest like empty masks against the wall, looking
forlorn enough, yet better here than lost. One of the best of these
empty shells was taken in 1842 from No. 29 Rue Damiette. Dating about
1500, its overhanging storeys are carved with statues of St. John and
of St. Romain with his Gargouille. It probably belonged to the
Professional (Pellottier or Racquettier) of the Tennis Court near it,
the Jeu de Paume St. Jacques. In this same courtyard of the Museum is
a row of ancient weather-beaten statues, and, best relic of them all,
the exquisite original of the fountain Croix de Pierre which is
represented by a more modern imitation on the spot it once adorned.[1]

[Footnote 1: Built in 1515, its name is misleading, for it was made by
Cardinal d'Amboise not to hold a cross but to carry a fountain which
happened to be placed near the stone cross erected by Archbishop
Gauthier in commemoration of the profitable exchanges made when
Richard Coeur de Lion built his Chateau Gaillard in 1197 on land
belonging to the Cathedral. When the Cross disappeared the Fountain
took its n