Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 2.djvu/436

408 churches of St. Piat, St. Quentin, and St, Jaques; as well as of the burial-place of King Childeric, and some domestic edifices of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; and not forgetting the sumptuous banquet to which we have before alluded. M. M. Dumortier and Le maistre d'Anstaing, on behalf of the commission for the restoration of Tournay cathedral, then requested from the congrès an opinion as to the dates of its several parts, with a view of being guided by such opinion in the progress of their undertaking. Whereon M. Benvignat of Lille said, that he for one agreed with M. Dumortier, that the employment of the Roman foot in planning out the nave, denoted it to be more ancient than the introduction of Byzantine measurements. But the Abbé Jourdain, in an explanation of its sculptured portals and capitals, objected to any such inference, as well as M. Didron, who, moreover, said, that restorers had nothing to do with dates, for that all restorations should be restricted to consolidation, to cleansing and clearing away whitewash, &c.; recommending the use of stones and joints similar to the old ones, and especially deprecating all attempts to retouch paintings or such other decorations as time may have injured. The date of the pointed choir was, however, then considered; M. Dumortier, from some ancient chronicle, assigning to it the date of 1110, and thence asserting that the pointed style arose in Belgium. But this M. de Contencin and M. Benvignat much doubted, because of the slenderness of its pier-shafts; and M. de Roisin with many other gentlemen having again strenuously combated the opinions of M. Dumortier, a committee was eventually appointed for re-visiting the cathedral, and for reporting on the propriety of what had been already done, and as to what should further be accomplished.

On the fifth day, with reference to ancient pavements, M. Villers read a memoir on a pavement in Bayeux chapter-house, exhibiting one of those rare kind of mosaics which, from the arrangement of their materials, have been called labyrinths, and the threading of which was considered in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries as a penance equivalent to the Jerusalem pilgrimages then often enjoined. Whereon M. de Caumont observing that there is still a labyrinth near the west end of the cathedral at Chartres, and that another formerly existed at Amiens, presented a drawing of a brick mosaic from a mansion of the middle ages; and M. de Givenchy gave an account of certain incised slabs in the church of Notre Dame at St. Omer, with allusion to a detailed description of some of them by Dr. Bromet in the Archæologia, who informed the meeting that portions of others might still be found in the cathedral at Canterbury. There are also some, M. de Givenchy said, at Blarynghem near Therovanne, and at Lillers and Arras. On the question as to the form of medieval instruments of music, M. de Roisin spoke of the representation of a rote with seventeen strings; and Dr. Bromet stated that there are several stringed and wind instruments not only depicted but named in a manuscript Psalterium of the tenth century, once belonging to the abbey of St. Bertin at St. Omer. On the question as to the contents of neighbouring museums, M. Tailliar of Douai gave an