Part 13 (1/2)
Among the tombstones in the Cathedral of St. Bavon one that deserves more than a pa.s.sing glance is that of Bishop Triest. Designed by the celebrated sculptor, Jerome Duquesnoy, it is a notable example of Flemish sculpture, besides possessing an added interest by reason of the fact that the artist sought to destroy it when complete. More important, however, than the monument and its story is the fact that Bishop Triest was the father of the art of horticulture for which Ghent is so renowned today. It was in his gardens--which were famous throughout the seventeenth century--that rare and exotic plants were for the first time planted out of doors in Flanders and trained to grow in the form of pyramids, arches, summer-houses, and a hundred fantastic shapes. The ”Belvedere Gardens” of the worthy prelate became the model for other gardeners, and the seed, planted in fertile soil, from which sprang a great industry.
Not content with cultivating his own gardens the Bishop sought to encourage in every way the humble gardeners of the city, giving them his august protection, his friendly counsel, making loans to the needy, and uniting them into a society under the patronage of St.
Amand and Ste. Dorothy. This n.o.ble example was speedily followed by the city, which also encouraged the horticulturists. In 1640 William de Blasere, an alderman of the city, constructed the first hothouse ever seen in Europe. It was a hundred feet long, made of wood and gla.s.s, heated with huge stoves, and sufficiently high to accommodate the exotic plants that, in summertime, were set outdoors. This novelty made a great stir and brought many visitors to Ghent. Soon afterward a society of horticulturists was founded, and by the end of the century a botanical garden was established.
In the opening years of the nineteenth century this inst.i.tution very nearly came to an end. It was costly to keep up, produced little or no revenue, and Napoleon, who was then First Consul and included Ghent in his rapidly widening dominions, decided that it should be suppressed.
A friend of the garden skilfully took advantage of a visit of Josephine to Ghent to enlist her aid in persuading her husband to spare it. Inviting the future empress to visit the establishment, he contrived that the plants and flowers should plead their own cause.
Between two palms at the entrance he had a huge placard suspended bearing the words: ”_Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutamus_.” Then, along the different walks, each flower and plant bore a card proportionate to its size and containing a verse alluding to its approaching destruction. Naturally surprised at this outburst of poetry on the part of the ”nymphs” of the garden, as the flowers styled themselves in their effusions, Josephine inquired the reason for it. This gave her conductor his opportunity, and he pleaded for the preservation of the garden with such ardour and eloquence that he won her a.s.surance that if her wishes had any weight his beautiful garden should be preserved and its ”nymphs” should not perish in exile. The event proved that he had secured a powerful ally, for the edict of the First Consul was rescinded and the garden was saved.
To-day Ghent boasts of her t.i.tle of ”the City of Flowers.” The Botanical Garden is protected by a Royal Society, there are many private collections that are worth going far to see, and more than five hundred establishments, large and small, are engaged in horticulture as an industry, the annual exports amounting to millions of dollars. Bishop Triest can therefore be thanked for giving Flanders one of its great industries.
Speaking of Napoleon, it is not generally remembered that Ghent was, for the brief s.p.a.ce of one hundred days, the capital of France. When Napoleon returned from Elba, and was received with open arms by the very troops sent to attack him, Louis XVIII fled incontinently to Ghent where he set up a feeble court at his residence on the rue des Champs. Here Guizot, Chateaubriand, and his other ministers met formally every morning to discuss with His Majesty the chances of his ever getting back to Paris again--Paris where, by the way, the mob was singing mockingly:
”Rendez nous notre pere de Gand Rendez nous notre pere!”
It would take a satirist like d.i.c.kens or Thackeray to describe the scene when the fat monarch sat down to his mid-day meal, in the presence of whoever might wish to watch the curious spectacle. He conquered enormous quant.i.ties of food, but depended on Wellington and Blucher to conquer the army of Napoleon. The forms of sovereignty were none the less carefully observed, as the little court waited day by day for the great event that all men could see was drawing steadily nearer. At last, as the thunder of Napoleon's guns startled the allies from their dance at Brussels, and the tramp of his advancing squadrons shook the fields of Waterloo, this fat little fly on the chariot wheel of European politics prepared once more for flight. Coaches were made ready to carry the entire court to Ostende, where an English vessel awaited them if the battle went against the allies. All day long the horses stood in the courtyard, the drivers whip in hand. History does not record what gastronomic feats His Majesty performed that day, but late at night the tidings came that the Grande Armee was in retreat, and that King Louis could return to his kingdom.
Ghent shares with Bruges the glory of being the birthplace of Flemish painting. The famous ”Adoration of the Lamb,” by the brothers Van Eyck, was ordered by a wealthy burgher of Ghent for the cathedral of St. Bavon--where the greater part of the original work still rests. It was at Ghent that Hubert, the elder brother, planned the masterpiece and completed his share of it. But Ghent also had masters belonging to the early Flemish school whose fame she does not have to share with any other city. One of these was Josse or Justus, usually called Justus of Ghent, who visited Italy in 1468 and there painted several pictures. Another was Hugo Van der Goes who gave promise of becoming as great a master as Jean Van Eyck when he suddenly gave up his chosen profession and entered the Monastery of Rouge-Cloitre, near Bruges. He was admitted to the Guild of Painters at Ghent in 1467, and left the world of action in 1476--eventually becoming insane and dying six years later. There is a story to the effect that he once painted a picture of Abigail meeting David for a burgher of Ghent who lived in a house near the bridge called the Muyderbrugge, and while engaged on this work--which was painted on the wall above a fireplace--fell in love with his patron's daughter. The painting proved a great success, but the stern parents frowned on the suit of the young artist, and the daughter, in despair, entered the convent of the White Ladies known as the Porta Coeli, near Brussels. The house, which was said to have been entirely surrounded by water, has long since disappeared, together with the painting, but the story may be the explanation for the abandonment by the artist of a promising career when he was still in the prime of life. One of the finest pictures in the Modern Gallery at Brussels is that by E. Wauters representing the madness of Van der Goes. The painter is shown seated and staring eagerly at some phantasm before him--perhaps a vision of the fair Abigail--while a group of little choir boys are striving, under the leaders.h.i.+p of a monk, to exorcise the evil demon that possesses their famous brother by means of sacred songs and chants. It is said that this method of cure was indeed attempted while he was at Rouge-Cloitre, but without success.
The best work of both of these artists is, unfortunately, far from Flanders--being found in Italy, where Flemish painters were in their day very highly regarded. ”The Last Supper,” which was the greatest masterpiece of Justus, was painted as an altarpiece for the brotherhood of Corpus Christi at Urbino and still hangs in the church of Sant' Agatha in that Italian town. ”The Adoration of the Shepherds,” which was the greatest work of Van der Goes, is in the Uffizi Gallery at Florence. At Bruges there are two paintings attributed to this master, ”The Death of the Virgin,” in the museum, and the panel representing the donors in ”The Martyrdom of St.
Hippolytus” in the church of St. Sauveur. The greater part of the paintings by Van der Goes in Belgium were destroyed by the iconoclasts in the sixteenth century, including several of which his contemporaries and other early writers spoke in the highest terms.
Frequent mention is made of his skill as a portrait painter, and Prof.
A. J. Wauters, after a careful study of his known works throughout Europe, ascribes to him the famous portrait of Charles the Bold in the museum at Brussels. The early writers state that private houses at Bruges and Ghent, as well as churches, were filled with his works. Let us hope that some of these--hidden away during the religious wars or at the time of the iconoclasts--may yet be discovered and identified.
Ghent, during the fifteenth century, was the artistic centre of Flanders, and the names, but not the works, of many of its painters have come down to us. One of the most celebrated of these in contemporary annals was Gerard Van der Meire, to whom tradition has a.s.signed the triptych of ”The Crucifixion” in the cathedral of St.
Bavon. This artist rose to high rank in the Guild of St. Luke, to which he was admitted in 1452, and a considerable number of paintings in various European galleries are attributed to him. An Italian writer ascribes to him one hundred and twenty-five of the exquisite miniatures in the famous Grimani Breviary, now in the library of St.
Mark's at Venice. If this were true, Van der Meire was indeed a great artist, but this book was ill.u.s.trated after his death.
[Ill.u.s.tration: ”THE ADORATION OF THE SHEPHERDS.”--HUGO VAN DER GOES.]
According to the Royal Commission of Art and Archeology of Belgium, Ghent contains more noteworthy antiquities than any other town in the Kingdom. The Commission, it appears, divides the ”antiquities” into three cla.s.ses, according to their relative importance, and credits Ghent with thirteen of the first cla.s.s, ten of the second and six of the third--or twenty-nine in all. The figures for the other Flemish cities are: Antwerp, seven first, five second, six third, total eighteen; Bruges, four first, six second, six third, total sixteen; Tournai, three first, six second, six third, total fifteen; Malines, four first, eight second, two third, total fourteen. Many places are credited with two or three each. We tried to get a copy of the Report of the Commission giving the names of the antiquities in each cla.s.s, and the reasons for ranking them, but were unable to do so during our stay in Belgium. It would have been a learned check on the list of places we had found most interesting. Quite likely we would have found that the Commission gave the first rank to some ”antiquity” we did not see at all, and maybe never heard of! However, we saw enough to occupy every minute of our brief vacation, and the majority of those we missed--wilfully at least--were churches, of which Flanders has enough to fill three books like this were one to faithfully report them all.
In Ghent there are, as at Bruges, many interesting private houses scattered throughout the city. The Professor and I on our morning walks looked up many of these, but the list would be tedious to enumerate. One of the most famous is the ”Arriere-Faucille,” formerly the home of a rich seigneur, but since 1901 used as a Royal Conservatory of Music. Its castle-like tower is very picturesque, but we saw nothing of interest in the interior. Near by are two very old houses with typically Flemish gables, called the Zwarte Moor and the Groot Moor. Built in 1481, or thereabouts, the Confrerie of St.
George had its headquarters here for many years.
[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD GUILD HOUSES, QUAI AUX HERBES, GHENT.]
The guilds have already been mentioned, and the facades of all of the more famous of the guild houses have been carefully restored. These include the Maison des Mesureurs de Ble and the Maison des Francs Bateliers on the Quai aux Herbes, the Maison des Macons and the Maison des Bateliers non francs. The ancient Grand Boucherie, recently restored, is another interesting ”monument.” It seems that the Butchers' Guild at Ghent owed its prosperity to the fact that Charles V chanced one day to fall in love with the pretty daughter of a Ghent butcher. This young lady obtained for her son and his descendants an imperial monopoly of the slaughtering and meat-selling business which survived all the various dynastic changes till the French Revolution.
The butchers were called _Prinse Kinderen_, or Prince's Children, and seem to have made a very good thing out of the blot on their family escutcheon. Another old edifice is the Maison de l'Etape, or Staple House, a granary dating from the thirteenth century, which stands beside the guild houses on the Quai aux Herbes. In short, the tourist can easily find enough of interest in this rare old Flemish city to occupy many days of leisurely sight-seeing. Ghent, like Bruges, has thus far been spared the destruction that has overtaken so many of the smaller Flemish towns during the war and, as far as is at present known, all of its twenty-nine monuments are still intact.
CHAPTER XVII
AUDENAERDE AND MARGARET OF PARMA
It was on a pleasant morning in June that the Professor and I set forth on a little expedition to the famous town of the tapestry weavers, leaving the ladies to rest and shop at Brussels. The poplar-trees that line the country roads and ca.n.a.ls in all parts of Belgium were in full bloom and their light cotton-clad seeds were drifting like snow in every direction. Moreover, contrary to our experience for some time past, the sun seemed likely to s.h.i.+ne all day and our old friend J. Pluvius was in complete retreat. Our route lay for a considerable distance through a charming hop country, the plots being much smaller than one sees in Kent or in Central New York State, but very numerous, and, no doubt, aggregating a considerable acreage.
Farther along we pa.s.sed through a superb stretch of hilly country where many of the houses and barns had thatched roofs and were so picturesque, both in themselves and in their surroundings, that we would fain have descended at one of the little stations and spent the day exploring and photographing this charming corner of Flanders. The most beautiful spot of all bore the pretty name of Louise-Marie--the thatch-roofed houses nestling cosily together upon a hillside. This little station, by the way, is on the line from Blaton to Audenaerde (in Flemish Oudenaarde), as we were approaching our destination from the south instead of directly from Brussels. Presently the great tower of Ste. Walburge loomed up ahead on our right, and we could even catch a glimpse of the famous Hotel de Ville. Instead of stopping, however, our train went on past the church, past the town, past everything, until we began to fear that our faithful ”_omnibus_” had suddenly gone crazy and fancied itself a ”_rapide_” bound for goodness knows where.