Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-03-05
THE GLORY THAT
WAS RHEIMS
The Wrecked Cathedral Revis-
tied by a Man Who Had
Once Celebrated Its
Beauty
By HENRI BAZIN


| 'IHS DDIllVU ~ lUe HllllDHS III wv = '''''
States who know Rheims Cathedral but
from history or study. story OF picture
| could see II today And ! pray the French
nation may ever leave It as II II today
| this desecratcd glory, without attempting
| to restore its marred magn hcence, that
| mutely and oloquently this ncient corona
tion place Of kings NAY mark for all time
the eternal shame Of Germany
journeyed 10 Rheims day or two ago
to visit the cathedral and the French
! trenches n bare mile from the town. !
| had seen trenches before since arriving
| in France They are ever Of undying IN
| terest. But n was the cathedral ! really
! wanted to see. BESIDES. the trenches before
Rheims are calm these days Their
| Combles and ppuaumont periods are but OF
the certain future.
Years ago for other than newspaper pub
ication had written apprcciations OF the
! Gothic churches Of France. Ihe ms was one
! Of those | mad studied Intimately from
| the triple sense Of its proud position in inc
history Of France. an inherent love OF
I architecture and reverence for beauty In
| grained within my sou,
SO as ] left Epernay. twenty-five Nlome-
| ters away. under escort Of n French Neu-
tenant. Il seemed | was about to visit an
! old and wounded friend There is no way
| Of reaching Rheims today by railway from
| Fpernay. But even If the railroad were
free, 1t would be wisdom to Journey over
| the :oad from Epcruay, in order that the
| fra, impression Of lofty towers may come
| from the bend In the road at Monthelon
| vi laEe. two miles away. Thus ! saw them
for the ffth time today. rising majest 'cally
| above the war screens at the roadside.
For the Germans hold tine hills Of Beau
mont and Berru to the north and south OF
Rheims and can shell at Will
Beauty in Ruins
Beautiful ana marvellous these towers
rise. dominating the plains about them.
/ dWaIfnE ia, '.nmpnp aces Of Rheims IT.
s,l9 bUs!% b.. gagged before the war in the
WOODEN ul..up, timed biscuit and pre-
served meat industries. Today Rheims
! makes little else than champagne. In
| August. 1914. IL was n busy commercial
and manufacturing town housing 10000
inhabitants Now but $4,000 bravely elect
to live there. Their houses are in the
main intact.
We sped straight for the cathedral and
stopped before the three portals Of the
most beautiful west front of any church
in Gothic France. Deeply recessed these
portals are. more deeply and richly carved
with Greek and Gothic statues, more intri-
cately enriched with lovely, harmonious
ornament than those OF any building raised
to Gods praise in all the world.
entered through the right portal curl.
ousy the same I had last passed eight years
ago. For the first time in my life. walked
into church with my hat on. For you see.
Rheims cathedral is defled and unconse.
Grated. German horses had made p stable
OF it. German soldiers had made a barn
and bed Of II, afterward deliberately
setting fire to the straw and wood they
brought with them as the murdered beauty
OF carving and sculpture under the south
tower show Men in the gray Of Germany
and the ancient blue and red OF France had
grpped each others throats there, felt each
others bayonets
Since the interior was sacked by fire, the
ashes OF the carven choir stalls have long
since been swept away There Il unob-
structed vista across the shell-torn nave to
the base of the altar that had seen count
less elevations Of the Host since Louis XIV
was crowned there Beyond 1t, rallied apart
its base shattered is the ancient altar
where Clovis, the king, was baptized upon
the hands as embracing Christianity, he re-
ceved the title of Patrce and was crowned
by Saint Remi, Archbishop of Rheims. in
the year 511. TO the left and slightly be-
fore where Joan of Arc stood at the coro-
nation of Charles VII in 1890, her statue
stands intact, the rail about IL shattered by
the force of the same shellithat has gouged
"A twu-ieet deep hole in the stone floor. The
tricolor hangs in dusty folds above her
head.
The Rose Window Wrecked
To enumerate the damage by flame and
. explosion would but record the mutilation
OF an admirable figure of Christ with out
stretched blessing hand. and all the other
ancient glOrleS III the ART ol cdTNeh stoHC
with which the interior of the cathedral
was adorned. or the windows burned with
the royal fire of the thirteenth century,
when the art of stained glass reached its
highest pinnacle of beauty, but two re-
| main intact They depict high up in the
north TRANSIENT the Virgin, st. John and
a figure garbed as an archbishop looking at
a replica Of the cathedral
The lovely colossal rose window, a vast
,,I ,air suhdiyidad its coIored medieval
io,,' e. ~ ,bo most sublime of the Gothic
era 10 a shattered wreck pierced and
era; 10 h,ndred boies Tba same an
p,pNeu - Ii, r., haa,,ifui rosa undar-
p'les W , indaod' oil the noaryeIous an
' neath' anu ,hrougbomt
''lue s'"'" W. e. -, ,,, ,-. ,.
From without the hortn anu west tran,
septs sustained Wltherlhs nle' mere ~ HIu
there delicate norsGi VI oeauty Ie'',anns ia,,n
! intact, but the great s'"''ous ''aHS vi 'o'e
illness is forever gone