Page:The Bible of Amiens.djvu/240

204 Thirdly. The Madone Nourrice, who is the Raphaelesque and generally late and decadence one. She is seen here in a good French type in the south transept porch, as before noticed.

An admirable comparison will be found instituted by M. Viollet le Duc (the article 'Vierge,' in his dictionary, is altogether deserving of the most attentive study) between this statue of the Queen-Madonna of the southern porch and the Nurse-Madonna of the transept. I may perhaps be able to get a photograph made of his two drawings, side by side: but, if I can, the reader will please observe that he has a little flattered the Queen, and a little vulgarized the Nurse, which is not fair. The statue in this porch is in thirteenth-century style, extremely good: but there is no reason for making any fuss about it—the earlier Byzantine types being far grander.

50. The Madonna's story, in its main incidents, is told in the series of statues round the porch, and in the quatrefoils below—several of which refer, however, to a legend about the Magi to which I have not had access, and I am not sure of their interpretation.

The large statues are on the left hand, reading outwards as usual.