Part 5 (1/2)

As we returned from our trip to Dixmude, Furnes and Nieuport, the Professor announced that our next destination would be Ypres. If he had said that it would he Chingw.a.n.gtao, or the Comoro Archipelago, the ladies could hardly have stared at him more blankly. They had never heard of it. Since October the whole world has heard of it, and the name of the all but forgotten old town is familiar to every schoolboy--and will continue so for generations to come. The record of our visit that follows was written amid the pleasant and peaceful scenes that it describes. When we were there the swans were swimming majestically in the waters of the moat that still surrounded the remnants of the old city walls, but we were told that for military purposes all this was obsolete. No doubt it was, but the brave old town was none the less able--with the help of its stubborn English defenders--to withstand the most furious, determined and b.l.o.o.d.y a.s.saults in all history. To the German host the mediaeval term _la morte d'Ypres_ was revived in those awful weeks of October and November, 1914, for the grim, low-lying ramparts of the town meant death to countless thousands.

Whether anything whatever is still standing of the old structures described in this chapter it is at present impossible to say. The British trenches were under a well-nigh continuous storm of sh.e.l.ls for many weeks, and the town itself must undoubtedly have suffered severely. Late in November it was reported that the old Cloth Hall had been destroyed by the furious German bombardment, or, at least, severely injured. The account of the various points of interest in the famous old town as they appeared in peaceful June--together with some brief sketches of its former greatness--may be all the more interesting now that its ruins lie in the lime-light of the world's attention. As compared with the half-dozen tourists that averaged to visit Ypres each day before the war the return of peace will see it become the Mecca for daily thousands. To these the remains of the town itself should vie in interest with the trenches of the famous battle-fields of the Great War, for during a period two or three times as long as the entire duration of the nation known as the United States of America, Ypres was one of the greatest and richest cities in the world.

It was hard to believe it, however, as we rumbled into the railroad station and, stepping out upon the almost deserted platform, took our first look at the place. As is usually the case in Flanders, the train deposits the visitor some distance from the centre of the town. The very first view was full of delight and promise of better things in store, however, for as we emerged from the station we found ourselves facing a pretty little park or square on the opposite side of which we could see a bit of the ancient city walls which stretched away toward the right most invitingly.

Postponing the pleasure of inspecting these renowned ramparts till a later occasion, we made our way through narrow winding streets direct to the Grande Place, pausing now and then to admire the quaint gabled houses on the rue au Beurre (b.u.t.ter Street). At the Grande Place the Professor led us directly to the huge Cloth Hall, which completely fills one side of it, for here--he said--we would find the best introduction to the history and romance of the city. The concierge proved hard to find, and we wandered up-stairs and through a deserted corridor, trying several doors that proved all to be locked, before we located the familiar sign. Our fees being duly paid--fifty centimes each, which was little enough for the privilege of inspecting the finest monument of its kind in Flanders, or for that matter in all Europe--one of the doors was obligingly unlocked and we found ourselves immediately in the great Guild Hall.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CLOTH HALL, YPRES.]

The _Halle aux Draps_, or Cloth Hall, is the largest civil edifice in Belgium, and without doubt one of the largest in the world. It is four hundred and thirty-three feet long by more than two hundred in width--or larger than Madison Square Garden. Its huge bulk, and that of the former cathedral hard by, contrast strangely with the present dimensions of the little city. Yet when they were built Ypres was the powerful rival of Bruges and Ghent, then at the apex of their glory, and one of the foremost cities in the world. The Cloth Hall was begun in 1200 and completed in 1304, or two years after the Battle of the Spurs, a victory won by the guildsmen of Ypres and Bruges against the chivalry of France. During that period the city had two hundred thousand inhabitants, its woollen weavers operated four thousand looms, and more than four hundred guilds responded to the calls to arms that sounded, at frequent intervals, from the belfry.

The greatest wonder of the edifice is the immense gallery, or hall, which occupies the side next to the Grande Place. This extends for the entire length of the building, broken only by the belfry in the centre which forms a sort of transept across it. In height it reaches clear to the roof, the huge roof beams forming its ceiling. There is a veritable forest of these, ma.s.sive, st.u.r.dy, and as perfect as the day they were hewed from the fair oaks of the countryside roundabout. The concierge will not fail to tell you, if you pause to admire this majestic timber-work of six hundred years ago, that from that day to this no spider has ever spun its web there--nor is any spider ever seen. Like the story of the snakes in Ireland, it would be a big pity to spoil this by finding one and pointing it out--one must needs be a good runner to do it, and be very sure which road leads to the railway station, for it might go hard with him--but we could not see any the day we were there. In fact, the legend has been repeated by many writers since the sixteenth century and is now such a matter of local pride that no doubt the concierge who permitted one to get in and set up housekeeping in this spiderless Eden--for it certainly must look like the Promised Land to a spider--would not only lose his or her job, but be severely punished by the indignant city fathers into the bargain.

Looking at the Cloth Hall from across the Grande Place it has the aspect of being a low building, but within this gallery one gains precisely an opposite impression--of unusual loftiness. Just how high the vast room is can best be estimated by noting the wooden facade of an ancient house that has been taken down and erected against one wall in its entirety. With its three stories and high peaked top this structure appears to be literally lost, looking like an undersized pea in an extra big pod. The great inner walls of the main gallery, facing the windows that look out upon the Grande Place, have been decorated by modern frescoes of great historical and artistic interest painted by two artists of widely different methods and ideals. The portion into which one first enters, extending to the break formed by the tower, was decorated by Ferdinand Pauwels, Director of the Royal Academy of Dresden. Both the art critics, and those who make no pretence to superior knowledge in such matters, agree that this work has been magnificently done. The vastness of the wall s.p.a.ces made it possible to paint the pictures on a scale of size and with a wealth of detail surpa.s.sing the fine frescoes of the Hotel de Ville at Bruges and the general effect upon the beholder is impressive in the extreme.

The pictures represent notable events in the town's history down to the fourteenth century, and were begun in 1872 and completed in 1881.

The subjects selected by the artist are as follows:

1.--Visit of Count Philip of Alsace to the Hospital of Our Lady in 1187.

2.--Count Ferdinand of Portugal orders the Magistrates to fortify the town in 1214.

3.--Countess Jeanne of Constantinople setting prisoners free on Good Friday, 1206.

4.--5.--The Magistrates give the Countess Margaret the ransom of her son William, who was made prisoner during the 7th Crusade.

6.--Building the West wing of the Guild Hall in the time of Guy of Dampierre, 1285.

7.--8.--Return of the armed forces of Ypres in 1302 after the Battle of the Spurs.

9.--The Plague, known as la Morte d'Ypres, in 1347.

10.--11.--Banquet offered in this very hall to Mahaut, Countess of Flanders, and Matthew, Duke of Lorraine on their marriage in 1314.

12.--An episode of the siege of Ypres by the English and the men of Ghent in 1383.

As will be noted, the pictures are not arranged in exact chronological order, but, taken together, they form a wonderful pictorial summary of the city's history--down to the Fall of 1914, which merits a separate gallery by itself. To us the most impressive of the series was the vast picture in two sections showing the triumphant return from the Battle of Courtrai and the tragic representation of the Black Death, which swept through all the densely populated Flemish towns; but was more destructive at Ypres than elsewhere. The visitation here represented was by no means the only one in the city's history, and for centuries _la morte d'Ypres_ was a name of terror throughout the countryside.

In the section of the Great Hall beyond the belfry the mural paintings are the work of Louis Delbeke, a painter of Ypres. His pictures were the subject of violent criticism when they were first exhibited, and are entirely unlike those in the other portion of the chamber. The artist endeavoured to give his work an archaic appearance, in keeping with the antiquity of its surroundings, and it was his intention to symbolise the various manifestations of the public life of the city--Civic Freedom, Commerce, Industry, Charities, Literature and so on. The work was interrupted by his death and has never been completed.

Another room of great interest is the _Salle Echevinale_, where for five centuries the magistrates of Ypres held their sessions. Between 1322 and 1468 local artists painted on the wall above the three Gothic arches in this room a frieze comprising portraits of the early Counts and Countesses of Flanders, beginning with Louis of Nevers and ending with Charles the Bold. When the French occupied the town in 1794 they covered these ”emblems of superst.i.tion and portraits of tyrants” with a thick coat of whitewash which was only accidentally knocked off in 1844, exposing a bit of the ancient and still brilliantly coloured painting. The discovery created quite a sensation, as the very existence of this work had been forgotten, and a native artist was commissioned to remove the whitewash and restore the paintings, which he did in a manner that is not entirely satisfactory, but none the less gives us an opportunity to view once more this interesting work--one of the earliest pieces of mural painting in Flanders. On the north wall of this room is a modern fres...o...b.. G.o.defroid Guffens, representing ”The State Entry of Philip the Bold” in 1384, while on the other side of the room is a monumental Flemish chimney-piece carved by Malfait of Brussels, with mural paintings on each side by Jean Swerts--like Guffens, a painter of the modern Antwerp school.

These represent the Magistrates of Ypres issuing an order regarding the maintenance of the poor, in 1515; and the visit of the Magistrates to one of the Free Schools founded in 1253--thus ill.u.s.trating the early interest taken by the commune in free education and public charities.

Leaving this interesting building we went across a small roughly paved square to the Church of St. Martin, which dates from the thirteenth century, and was for many centuries a cathedral. The unfinished square tower was erected in 1433. The choir is Romano-ogival, while the nave and aisles are early Gothic, and the edifice has many other peculiar features of interest to students of architecture. It contains the usual paintings, of which none are of remarkable interest, and some excellent choir stalls. The most famous of the Bishops of St. Martin, while it was a Cathedral Church, was Jansenius, one of the leading figures in the Reformation, who died of the Plague in 1638. His great work on St. Augustine occupied twenty-two years of his life while at Ypres and caused a tremendous discussion. It was finally declared to be heretical, but its teachings had already given rise to an ardent group of followers of the learned Flemish churchman, who were called Jansenists. The archives of the city and church contain much interesting material regarding this celebrated mediaeval theologian.

His tomb, which still stands in the church of which he was once the head, formerly contained a long and highly eulogistic inscription, which, by an order from the Pope in 1655, was cut down to the bare remnant that still remains.

The Grande Place of Ypres is another of the surprises that this tiny city has to offer to those unacquainted with its history, for it is one of the largest in all Flanders--a veritable Sahara of a Place on a hot summer day, albeit a Sahara bordered with many pleasant oases where cooling drinks, if they do not bubble up from the ground, can at least be had without much difficulty. During most of the week the vast paved s.p.a.ce is almost deserted, save for an occasional peasant's cart that rumbles slowly and clumsily across it, but on market-days it is full of picturesque and swarming life. Then the peasants come in from the countryside by the thousand, while the itinerant hucksters and pedlars who, in Belgium travel from one fair or market-place to another, set up their canvas-covered booths in long streets from one side of the Grande Place to the other. The country people press along between these rows of tiny shops and haggle energetically with the proprietors for whatever takes their fancy. An astounding variety of wares are offered for sale on these market days--dress goods of every description in the great Cloth Hall, which for a brief moment reflects a feeble glimmer of its ancient glory; ready-made garments for man, woman and child; footwear, headwear, and every conceivable kind of hardware, of tinware, of crockery. In short, the display is a veritable department store, for the most part cheap stuff, it is true, but now and then one runs across laces for which the prices asked are quite high. Then, of course, there is the inevitable array of everything possible to eat--from the butchers' stalls in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the Cloth Hall to the huckster selling live chickens from a bag on the corner, and the scores of stands selling fruits and vegetables of every seasonable variety.

At last, however, the market comes to an end, the hucksters and market gardeners take down their booths and drive away in their heavy Flemish carts; the country people, after a more or less protracted visit to the places of refreshment around the Place and in the adjacent streets, go homeward, and the Grande Place settles down again into its sleep of centuries. While we were there the moon was at its full, and as its white light fell upon the gra.s.s-grown Place and the huge grey ma.s.s of the Cloth Hall it was not hard to picture the old days come back again and review, in fancy, some of the stirring times that the old houses around it have looked down upon. The great bell in the Cloth Hall tower rings and from far and wide come hurrying throngs of st.u.r.dy artisans, with their lances, pikes and clubs. The _Serments_, or oath-bound corporations, take their positions gravely and in good order--men of substance these, portly, well-fed, and prosperous. Then the _Metiers_, or lesser craftsmen, a.s.semble--no doubt more noisily and boisterously, as would be expected from their rougher cla.s.s and lower breeding. Each of the four hundred guilds a.s.sembles around its respective banner, the Count and others of the n.o.bility come riding up; and with them, on terms of full equality, the commanders of the citizen soldiery confer. Then, as the trumpets sound, or mayhap the great bell peals again, the hosts march off in serried ranks to the city gates, or to take their positions along the walls. The old streets echo to the sound of their tramping feet, the noise of their shouts and cries dies away, and once more the still moonlight falls upon the deserted old Place.

As we sat in one of the cafes facing the Cloth Hall, our minds filled with these and other fancies of the olden days--the moonlight, the old houses all around us, and the many quaint and ancient things we had seen during the day all contributing to the dreamy sense of enchantment--the Professor told us something of the legend and history of that far-off thirteenth century when much of the Ypres we had seen that day was built. It was an age when men firmly believed in magic and fairies and delighted in tales of mystery and enchantment. Some of the most famous stories told by the old Flemish chroniclers relate to the career of Baldwin IX, who came to be known as Baldwin of Constantinople. After the long and wise reigns of Dierick of Alsace and his son Philip, Flanders had become one of the richest and most prosperous countries in Europe. The French, who looked upon its fertile plains and fair cities with covetous eyes, composed these lines, which no doubt expressed their sincere conviction: