s and feet in shadow, the body in
subdued light, and the head bathed in a torrent of glory; Durtal gazed
up in the air at the motionless ranks of Patriarchs, and Apostles, and
Bishops, and Saints in a glow as of dying fires, dimly lighted glass,
guarding the Sacred Body at their feet, below them; they stood in rows
along the upper storey in huge pointed settings, with wheels above them,
showing to Jesus, nailed to earth, His army of faithful soldiers, His
legions as enumerated in the Scriptures, the Legends, the Martyrology;
Durtal could identify in the armed throng of the painted windows St.
Laurence, St. Stephen, St. Giles, St. Nicholas of Myra, St. Martin, St.
George of Cappadocia, St. Symphorian, St. Philip, St. Foix, St. Laumer,
and how many more whose names he could not recollect--and paused in
admiration near the transept, in front of a figure of Abraham fixed for
ever in a threatening gesture, holding a sword over a crouching Isaac,
the blade shining brightly against the infinite blue.

He stood admiring the conceptions and the craftsmanship of those
thirteenth century glass-workers, their emphatic language, necessary at
such great heights, the way in which they had made the pictures legible
from a distance by introducing a single figure in each, whenever that
was possible, and painting it in massive outline, with contrasting
colours, so as to be easily taken in at a glance when seen from below.

But the triumph of this art was neither in the choir, nor in the
transepts of the church, nor in the nave; it was at the entrance, on the
inner side of the wall, where on the outside stood the statues of the
nameless queens. Durtal delighted in this glorious show, but he always
postponed it a little to excite himself by expectancy, and revel in the
leap of joy it gave him, repetition of the sensation not having yet
availed to weaken it.

On this particular day, under a sunny sky, these three windows of the
twelfth century blazed with splendour with their broad short blades, the
blade of a claymore, flat wide panels of glass under the rose that held
the most prominent place over the west door.

It was a twinkling sheet of cornflowers and sparks, a shifting maze of
blue flames--a paler blue than that in which Abraham, at the end of the
nave, brandished his knife; this pale, limpid blue resembled the flames
of burning punch and of the ignited powder of sulphur, and the lightning
flash of sapphires, but of quite young sa