All other cathedrals of France form a chronicle of splendor. They record changing epochs, times, and architectural impulse. The varying personalities of their great designers were wrought out in their details; they present the thoughts of many men, each expressing his highest thought and ideals, and the result is magnificent agglomeration, covering many years of work. With Rheims however, which was begun in 1211, the case is different. For it was finished within the same century, to be exact, in fifty years, and in perfect accordance with the original plan and conception. To say that its sculpture ranked with that of ancient Greece does not magnify its importance. To urge that the splendor and artistry of its painteld glass was unrivaled, means little now, for its disappearance is too recent, too grievous and painful. Its eulogy must be written by an abler pen than mine--and in a day far hence, when time has softened the blow. (Paris, Jan. 10, 1917.) "Albert Dalimier, Under Secretary of Fine Arts, made a statement to-day regarding Rheims Cathedral, which, it has been reported, the Pope is anxious to have restored, having asked permission to this end from the German authorities." "Orders were given by the French Government for provisional repairs to the roofs of the Cathedral in autumn of 1914," said M. Dalimier, "but we were unable to begin work without an agreement with the military authorities, and they begged us to do nothing. They pointed out that the Cathedral was _still under German fire_, that from Nogent to La Bassée, where the batteries firing on the town were installed, everything that passed could be distinctly seen by the Germans, and that workmen on the Cathedral would therefore be sure to be observed and fired upon." The great interior was four hundred and sixty-six feet long and one hundred and twenty-one feet high. Both nave and transepts have aisles. Eight bays were in the nave, and each transept projected to the depth of a single bay. A triforium was above the aisles, and eight exquisite chapels radiated from the choir. Apse of Cathedral: Rheims [Illustration: 0363] The great capitals were covered with beautiful sculpture, beggaring description. Over the large west portal was shown the Martyrdom of St. Nicaise, and over the whole west wall was a multitude of small statues in niches ending in a display of the Massacre of the Innocents. A myriad of these statues filled the whole church. Adoring angels too adorned the buttresses of the choir chapels. Rich tapestries, fourteen in number, the gift of Robert de Lénoncourt in 1530, hung on the chapel walls, and there were two magnificent pieces given by Cardinal Lorraine in 1570, called the "Tapisseries du fort roi Clovis," and others from Archbishop Henri de Lorraine in 1633, called the "Perpersack." Some Gobelins, also, designed in 1848 by Raffaelle, were hung here.