As a composition, the plan of the collegiate is original. The apse chapels on each side of the choir chapel are placed on the bias so that the sanctuary opens out like a fan, with five altars visible at the same time. The arrangement was copied in far-off Hungary in St. Martin's church at Kassovie, built for the king by the wandering Picard artist Villard de Honnecourt. In Cologne the church of St. Gereon, and in Marburg that of St. Elizabeth, show the influence of Braine. St. Léger's abbatial at Soissons copied it. St. Yved has a square transept-crossing tower that opens still farther the central part of the edifice. Carved about the interior is a cordon of free springtime foliage. There is youth in every line of this beautiful white church. The superb monocylindrical columns and their capitals are robust virility itself. Everywhere is firmness of touch, and never has the unity been marred by patchwork reconstructions. Like its neighbor, Soissons, the same nicety of stonework is shown. Before the Revolution the collegiate at Braine harbored an unparalleled collection of tombs, since here for centuries were laid to rest the barons and bishops of the proud family of Dreux, warriors at Bouvines, crusaders, and donors of storied windows at Chartres and Rheims. The four west bays of the church of Braine were stupidly demolished after the Revolution, because funds for repairs were at that time lacking. From the destroyed portal were saved the two statues now set in the choir's wall. They represent the Coronation of Our Lady; the robes flow easily and there is scarcely a touch of Byzantine rigidity left in them. Twice during the late World War was Braine's collegiate in the direct path of invasion. The first battle of the Marne freed it, but in May, 1918, the Germans again entered the little town. Then swept forward the second battle of the Marne, and Braine was liberated in September. One can only pray that, in such hasty retreats, St. Yved escaped mutilation. ST. LEU D'ESSERENT[70] I think that that style which is called Gothic is endowed with a profound and a commanding beauty, such as no other style possesses ... and which probably the Church will not see surpassed till it attain to the Celestial City.... The Gothic style is as harmonious and as intellectual as it is graceful.--CARDINAL NEWMAN. St. Leu d'Esserent is one of the small but perfect churches of the classic Ile-de-France that satisfy both eye and soul by the exquisite justness of their proportions. Its serene white charm is unobtrusive. Only a master of the inmost heart of France could have produced the assured rightness of its proportions. Unforgettable are the moments spent in this Benedictine abbatial on the Oise; sometimes up and down its lovely white avenue flits some happy lost bird, rejoicing in the paradise of quietude he has found.