We can then quite easily imagine the columns and walls painted, the ribs and bosses washed with gold, and making a harmonious whole of this _bonbonniere_, which indeed is a piece of jewelry rather than of architecture.
"This building at Brou was the last effort of mediaeval times, the last rocket flung up by the flamboyant Gothic style--a Gothic which though fallen from its glory struggled against death, fought against returning paganism and the invading Renaissance.

The era of the great cathedrals ended in the production of this exquisite abortion, which was in its way a masterpiece, a gem of prettiness, of ingenuity, of tormented and coquettish taste.
"It was emblematic of the soul of the sixteenth century, already devoid of reserve; the sanctuary, too brightly lighted, was secularized; we here see it fully blown, and it never folded up or veiled itself again.
We discern in this a lady's bower, all paint and gold; the little chapels (or pews) with chimney-places where Margaret of Austria could warm herself as she heard Mass, furnished with scented cushions, provided with sweetmeats and toys and dogs.
"Brou is a fine lady's drawing-room, not the house for all comers.

Then, naturally, with its screen-work, and the carving of the rood-loft stretching like a lace portal across the entrance to the choir, it invites, it almost requires some skilful tinting of the details, the touches of colour that complete it, and harmonize it finally with the elegance of the founder, the Princess Marguerite, whose presence is far more conspicuous in this little church than is that of the Virgin.
"Even then it would be satisfactory to know whether the walls and pillars at Brou ever were really painted; the contrary seems proven.

But in any case, though a touch of _rouge_ might not ill beseem this curious sanctum, it would not be so at Chartres, for the only suitable hue is the shining, greasy patina, grey turning to silver, stone-colour turning buff--the colouring given by age, by time helped by accumulated vapours of prayer and the fumes of incense and tapers!" And Durtal, arguing over his own reflections, ended by reverting, as he always did, to his own person, saying to himself,-- "Who knows that I may not some day bitterly regret this cathedral and all the sweet meditations it suggests; for, after all, I shall have no more opportunities for such long loitering, such relaxation of mind, since I shall be subject to the discipline of bells ringing for conventual drill if I suffer myself to be locked up in a cloister! "Who knows whether, in the silence of a cell, I should not miss even the foolish cawing of those black jackdaws that croak without pause," he went on, looking up with a smile at the cloud of birds that settled on the towers; and he recalled a legend which tells that since the fire in 1836 these birds quit the cathedral every evening at the very hour when the conflagration began, and do not return till dawn, after spending the night in a wood at three leagues from Chartres.
This tale is as absurd as another, also dear to the old wives of the city, and which tells that if you spit on a certain square of stone, set with black cement into the pavement behind the choir, blood will exude.
"Hah, it is you, Madame Bavoil." "Yes, our friend, I myself.

I have just been on an errand for the Father, and am going home again to make the soup.