t day; with perhaps a fair or a
procession thrown in. You reach the Cathedral of St. Sauveur (Sint
Salvator), erected in the tenth century, though the foundations date
back to the seventh. The narrow lane-like street winds around the rear
of the church. Presently another church is discerned with a tower that
must be nearly four hundred feet high, built, you learn, some time
between the tenth and fourteenth centuries. Notre Dame contains the
tombs of Charles the Bold and Mary of Burgundy, a lovely white marble
statue of the Virgin and Child ascribed with justice to Michael
Angelo, and a fine bow-window. We pass the Hospital of St. Jean, turn
up an alley full of cobblestones and children, and finally see the
canal that passes the houses of the Beguinage. The view is of
exceeding charm. The spire of Notre Dame and the apsis may be seen up
(or is it down?) stream. A bridge cuts the river precisely where it
should; weeping willows to the left lend an elegiac note to the
ensemble, and there is a gabled house to the right which seems to have
entered the scene so as to give an artist the exact balance for his
composition. Nature and the handicraft of man paint pictures all over
Bruges.

We enter the enclosure with the little houses of the beguines, or lay
sisterhood. There is nothing particular to see, except a man under a
tree admiring his daubed canvas, near by a dog sleeps. The sense of
peace is profound. Even Antwerp seems a creation of yesterday compared
with the brooding calm of Bruges, while Brussels is as noisy as a
boiler shop. The Minnewater (Lac d'Amour) is another pretty stretch,
and so we spent the entire day through shy alleys, down crooked
streets, twisting every few feet and forming deceptive vistas
innumerable, leading tired legs into churches, out of museums, up
tower steps.

That first hard stroll told us how little we could know of Bruges in a
day, a week or a month. Bag and baggage we moved up from Brussels and
wished that the clock and the calendar could be set back several
centuries. At twilight the unusual happened: the Sandman appeared with
his hour-glass and beckoned to bed. There is no night in Bruges for
the visitor within the gates; there is only slumber. Perhaps that is
why the cockneys call it Bruges the Dead. The old horse that drags the
hotel bus was stamping its hoofs in the court-yard; the wall of St.
Jacques, eaten away by the years, faced us. The sun, somewhere, was
trying to rub its slee