patron lay buried for those hundreds of years. It is a gloomy, cell-like
place, most curious and most interesting; and as the traveller saw faith
in the earnest gaze of some of his fellow-visitors, and doubt in the
smiles of others, he wondered what ancient ceremonials, secret Masses,
or secret prayers had been said in this tiny chamber, and what rows of
phantom-like worshippers had filed in and out the dark corridor.

Directly above is the higher upper crypt of the church, a diminutive but
true choir, with its tiny altar and ambulatory,--a jewel of the
Romanesque, heavy and plain and beautifully proportioned, with columns
and vaulting in perfect miniature. This, from its absolute purity of
style, is the most interesting part of the church; and being a crypt, it
is also the most difficult to see. In vain the sacristan ran from side
to side with his little candle, in vain the traveller gazed and
peered,--the little church was full of shadows and mysteries, dark and
lost under the weight of the great choir above.

[Illustration: "THE MAIN BODY OF THE CHURCH."--APT.]

Even the main body of the church, above ground, is dimly lighted by
small, rounded windows above the arches of the nave, and from the dome
of Saint Anne's Chapel. Doubtless, on Sundays after High Mass, when the
great doors are opened, the merry sun of Provence casts its cheerful
rays far up the nave. But this is a church which is the better for its
shadows. A Romanesque aisle of the IX or X century, built by that same
Bishop Alphant who had seen the construction of the little crypt church,
a central nave of the XI century, Romanesque in conception, and a north
aisle of poor Provencal Gothic make a large but inharmonious
interior. Restoration following restoration, chapels of the XVIII
century, new vaultings, debased and conglomerate Gothic, and spectacular
decorations of gilded wood have destroyed the architectural value and
real beauty of the Cathedral's interior. Yet in the dim light, which is
the light of its every-day life, the great height of the church and its
sombre massiveness are not without impressiveness.

The exterior dominates the city, but it is so hopelessly confused and
commonplace that its natural dignity is lost. The heavy arch which
supports the clock tower forms an arcade across a narrow street and
makes it picturesque without adding dignity to the church itself. The
walls are unmeaning, often hidden by buildings, and there is not a
po