The former of these is the work of Germain Pilon, and was originally placed under the dome of Philibert Delorme's magnificent chapel erected for the Valois family. It is of marble with bronze figures. The king and queen pray upon the housetop; at each end are openings through which are to be seen the figures of the defunct in the sleep of death. The terrible side of death, which is prominent in the expression on the faces of Louis XII. and his queen, is here absent; and Catherine is represented young and beautiful as she appeared at the death of her husband, whom she survived thirty years. At the four corners are bronze figures of the Cardinal Virtues; and the kneeling figures of the sovereigns upon the canopy are also in bronze. The tomb has always been justly esteemed as a magnificent work, and even Bernini admired it. "_Le cavalier Bernin_," says Sauval, "_a admiré le tombeau de Valois, qui voulait ne rien trouver de passable en France_." The Virtues ornament this tomb also, and present a note-worthy point for Total Abstainers, the figure of Temperance bears _two_ cups; can this be meant for wine as well as water? or for two sorts of water, aërated and mineral? When the tomb was reconstructed it was found that many of the marbles had antique sculptures upon the back, showing that they had been taken from works of Classic origin. The monument of François I^{er.} and Claude de France is the largest of these splendid tombs. It was erected about 1552 by Philibert Delorme with the assistance of several sculptors. Pierre Bontems was the author of the bas-reliefs upon the stylobate and some of the kneeling figures upon the canopy; Germain Pilon sculptured the statues of children under the canopy, allegorically representing Fortune, and Ambroise Perret, the Four Evangelists; while the details of ornament were the work of Jacques Chantrel, Bastien Galles, Pierre Bigoigne, and Jean de Bourges. The recumbent figures have been attributed to Jean Goujon, from the exceptional beauty of the workmanship, but without any positive proof. The tomb is of white marble, with a little black and grey introduced for some of the mouldings; the bas-reliefs represent the king's campaigns in Italy. In the bas-reliefs of the Louis XII. monument many of the costumes are more Roman than French; but those upon the tomb of François I^{er.} are treated with more historical truth, and represent the fashion of the day. The faces of the recumbent statues are beautifully modelled; that of the queen bearing an expression of the sanctity with which she was accredited. [Illustration: COLUMN OF HENRI III.]