River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1918-01-10

way WdIu SL1CCLO VI kAALW II
n there fell one day 400 years
ago the mellow din of bells.
In gay and golden peal the carlton
Of Notre Dame sang to the town until
every eye turned toward the belfry
and every foot FASTENED to the cathe-
dral door.
Over the threshold paced a process
sion rich with the color and stiff with
the pomp of the middle ages. AS the
company went up the nave, where vel
vets and jewels caught added radiance
from the crimson and amber of stained
windows, the bells beat upon the air
again with louder triumph before
they at last fell silent.
There was good cause for the 1usty
strokes which the carlton ringers
tugged at their ropes on that pleasant
day in 1907. For the new bell, the
Big Bell, had come safe from the cast
ing furnace; the bishop in his robes
was there to cOnsecrate it, and the
king himself was standing as it's spon-
SOr.
been spoken that dedicated the bell
at the service Of God and Antwerp,
Charles struck from the bronze sides
one loud tone. The noise rose clear
and deep through the hush of the
cathedral. It fioated among the dim
rafters as voice that promised bless
ings and it hummed into oblivion with
a slow, portentous melancholy that
might well have been a presage of it's
doom.
Big Bell Into a Furnace.
For doomsday has dawned upon the
big bell of Notre Dame and upon the
bells of all the other steeples in Elan
ders-the Germans need metal. They
have taken the doorplates and piano
ornaments from the homes of Brus-
sells and the splendid bronze horses
from the Avenue Louise. They have
taken the chimes from Isegnem and
Roulers, from Bruges and a dozen
villages.
The bells arc being made into guns.
When next day they speak it will be
in a roar that means ruin to the very
fields over whose harvests they so long
have rung the curtew and the angelus.
The bells have always meant much
to Flanders. A wealthy lowland beset
by greedy neighbors, the little kingdom
has countless times been warned of
marching enemies by the clamor from
a Steeple. In days of peace the Flem-
ish developed their chimes into the
lively Tilt of the carillons which made
their guilds CT ringers noted through
they built some of the noblest towers
the world has seen, and when the
towers were built the cities We'd with
each other in filling them with noble
bells. There were forty bronze voices
in the tower of Bruges cathedral and
the same number at Louvain. There
were forty-four at Malines and almost
hundred in Antwerp's Notre Dame.
Bells Reused the Towns.
Every one OF these had it's baptismal
name, as well as a popular nickname.
'"That's 'Doucement,' the villagers
would say as a high tone trembled
on the air at evensong. Or, in the
dawn, "La Pucelle' is calling to mat
ms" Or as an alarm crashed forth
some anxious night, ""The Thunderer!
Here comes the enemy"
Usually the alarm bell, which was
as a matter of course the largest in
the church, belonged not to the ca
thedral, but to the town. It was
owned by the municipality because the
tocsin proved vital in primitive times
to the towns existence. No fewer
than three bells in Notre Dame were
the property Of Antwerp itself. The