On the other side of Saint Michael the scene is different; a chubby,
smiling angel is playing with a child whom he has perched on one of his
fellow-angels' shoulders, and the infant delightedly waves a bough;
behind him slowly marches a representative group of saints--a woman, a
king, a cenobite, conducted by Saint Peter towards a doorway leading to
a sanctum where sits Abraham, an old man with a cloth spread over his
knees full of little heads all rejoicing--the souls that are saved.
And Durtal, as he recalled the features of Saint Michael and his angels,
perceived that they were the brethren in art of the Saint Anne, Saint
Joseph, and the angel of the great portal at Reims. They were all of the
same peculiar type--a young and yet old countenance, a long sharp nose
and pointed chin; only here, perhaps, a little rounder, a little less
angular than at Reims.
This sort of family likeness gave support to a theory that the same
sculptors or their pupils had worked on the carvings of those two
cathedrals, but not at Chartres, where no similar type is to be seen;
though a certain striking resemblance exists between other statues in
the north porch and some figures, of a different class however, on the
facade at Reims.
"Anyone of these hypotheses may be correct, though there is no chance of
proving their truth, for we can discover no information with regard to
the schools of art of the period," said Durtal to himself, as he turned
his attention to the left-hand bay of the south porch, dedicated to the
martyrs.
There, in the archway of the door, dwelt, side by side, Saint Vincent
the deacon, of Spain; Saint Denys the bishop; Saint Piat the priest; and
Saint George the warrior; all four victims of the ingenious cruelty of
the infidels.
Saint Vincent in his long gown hung a contrite head over his shoulder.
"He," thought Durtal, "was literally butchered and cooked, for we are
told in the legend according to Voragine that his body was torn with
sharp combs of brass till his bowels fell out, and that after this
foretaste, this _hors d'oeuvre_ of torture, he was broiled on a
gridiron, larded with nails, and basted with the sauce of his own blood.
He lay calm, praying while he was being toasted. He remained unmoved,
grilling and praying. When he was dead, Dacian, his persecutor, ordered
that his body should be cast out on a field to be devoured by beasts;
but a raven came to settle by him, and drove away a wolf by pecking at
it. Then a millstone was tied about his neck and he was thrown into the
sea, but his body came to land near some pious women who buried it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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