Page:Costello - A pilgrimage to Auvergne from Picardy to Velay - A 30154 1.pdf/17

 placed in the cloisters of St. Bertin, and were perhaps the very treasures discovered in 1830, when some of the “ old stones” were removed to serve as materials for the now Hôtel de Ville. Certain it is, that a small chest containing bones and inscribed with Gothic letters was found in a wall of the cloisters; but it appears that St. Omer possesses few antiquarians cither learned enough to decipher the inscription, or curious enough to care what has become of the relic. At the same time, while the work of destruction was going on, and splendid capitals, delicate pillars, and carved blocks of marble were thrown down in one general ruin, destined to a future work of utility, a row of tombs appeared to the astonished eyes of the workmen, each containing a nun “in her habit, as she lived,” —the serge of the dresses still strong and fresh: but the pickaxe and spade soon confounded them in the surrounding dust, and except that the holy train may occasionally be seen winding their way up the three hundred steps, roused by the hollow voice of the great bell Bertine, they have disappeared for ever from mortal sight.

There was once a famous chalice at St. Bertin of massive gold above a foot high, the cup half a foot deep, and the circumference in proportion : a patène of gold more than a foot in diameter, a silver chasse for the bones of St. Omer, rich plate of

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