he stair-rail
has preserved some of its details better than any of the rest, the
superiority of these French ladies cannot be sufficiently studied,
though several of their heads may be seen watching the procession from
the windows and balconies of Ardres. The plumed hats and horses of the
escort are particularly clear here, and they are more numerous than in
the famous "Triumph of Maximilian" or in the "Entry of Charles V. into
Bologna." The figure of the courtier just mounting his horse is the
one I like best of all except the dignified personage who bears the
cross before the French ecclesiastics.

If the English ambassador in 1596 was easily able to recognise the
subject of these carvings, no less quickly would the Cardinal de
Florence, the Papal Legate who came to Rouen in the same year, and was
also lodged in this house, remember the originals from which were
taken the carvings on the frieze above the windows on this wall. For
though later generations have misunderstood them, just as they
imagined the lower carvings to be the Council of Trent, it is quite
clear from some words first discovered on the stone in 1875, that the
frieze was inspired by the "Triumphs" of Petrarch. These words are as
follows; and I have added their proper continuation and beginning in
italics:--

"_Amor vincit mundum
Pudicitia vincit amorem
Mors vincit pudicitiam_
Fama vincit mortem
Tempus vincit _famam_
_Divinitas seu Eternitas omnia vincit_."

M. Palustre has pointed out that an edition of these "Triumphs" was
published in Venice in 1545 by Giolito, with woodcuts; and though this
is rather too late for the carvings (unless, as was the case with
Holbein's "Todtentanz," we may imagine the cuts were known long before
the book) it is a matter of common knowledge that the subject was a
favourite one not only for such illustrations but especially for
tapestry; as Agrippa d'Aubigne records of contemporary tapestries at
Lyons: "Elles representent quatre triomphes, chacun de trois
partis...." And it was also by just such chariots, cars, and
elephants, or other animals, that virtues and vices were represented
in the great processions of the kings and queens at Rouen and
elsewhere, processions which of course were often taken as the subject
for tapestries commemorating their magnificence. In Petrarch's verses
you may read:--

"Quattro destrier via piu che neve bianchi
Sopr' un carro di foco un garzon