12. Who built it, shall we ask? God, and Man,--is the first and most true answer. The stars in their courses built it, and the Nations. Greek Athena labours here--and Roman Father Jove, and Guardian Mars. The Gaul labours here, and the Frank: knightly Norman,--mighty Ostrogoth,--and wasted anchorite of Idumea. The actual Man who built it scarcely cared to tell you he did so; nor do the historians brag of him. Any quantity of heraldries of knaves and faineants you may find in what they call their 'history': but this is probably the first time you ever read the name of Robert of Luzarches. I say he 'scarcely cared'--we are not sure that he cared at all. He signed his name nowhere, that I can hear of. You may perhaps find some recent initials cut by English remarkable visitors desirous of immortality, here and there about the edifice, but Robert the builder--or at least the Master of building, cut _his_ on no stone of it. Only when, after his death, the headstone had been brought forth with shouting, Grace unto it, this following legend was written, recording all who had part or lot in the labour, within the middle of the labyrinth then inlaid in the pavement of the nave. You must read it trippingly on the tongue: it was rhymed gaily for you by pure French gaiety, not the least like that of the Theatre de Folies. "En l'an de Grace mil deux cent Et vingt, fu l'oeuvre de cheens Premierement encomenchie. A donc y ert de cheste evesquie Evrart, eveque benis; Et, Roy de France, Loys Qui fut fils Phelippe le Sage. Qui maistre y ert de l'oeuvre Maistre Robert estoit nomes Et de Luzarches surnomes. Maistre Thomas fu apres lui De Cormont. Et apres, son filz Maistre Regnault, qui mestre Fist a chest point chi cheste lectre Que l'incarnation valoit Treize cent, moins douze, en faloit." 13. I have written the numerals in letters, else the metre would not have come clear: they were really in figures thus, "II C. et XX," "XIII C. moins XII". I quote the inscription from M. l'Abbe Roze's admirable little book, "Visite a la Cathedrale d'Amiens,"--Sup. Lib. de Mgr l'Eveque d'Amiens, 1877,--which every grateful traveller should buy, for I am only going to steal a little bit of it here and there. I only wish there had been a translation of the legend to steal, too; for there are one or two points, both of idea and chronology, in it, that I should have liked the Abbe's opinion of. The main purport of the rhyme, however, we perceive to be, line for line, as follows:--