afterwards.  To the triple porch, I have already alluded, in describing the intended front of St. Ouen.  The general lines of the church, are such as in England would be referred to the fourteenth century:  on a closer examination, however, the curious eye will discover the peculiar beauties of the French Gothic.  Thus the bosses of the groined roof are wrought and perforated into filagree, the work extending over the intersections of the groins, which are seen through its reticulations.  Such bosses are only found in the French churches of the sixteenth century.  In other parts, the interior closely resembles the style of the cathedral[98].

St. Patrice is a building of the worst style of the commencement of the sixteenth century:  to use the quaint phraseology of Horace Walpole, it exhibits “that betweenity which intervened when Gothic declined and Palladian was creeping in.”  The paintings on the walls of this church, and the stained glass in its windows, are more deserving of notice than its architecture.  The first are of small size, and generally better than are seen in similar places.  One of them is after Bassan, an artist, whose works are not often found in religious edifices in France.  The painted windows of the choir deserve unqualified commendation.  They are said to have been removed from St. Godard.  Each is confined to a single subject; among which, that of the Annunciation is esteemed the best.

To this church was attached a confraternity[99], established in 1374, under the name of the Guild of the Passion.  Its annual procession, which continued till the time of the revolution, took place on Holy-Thursday.  It consisted of the usual pageantry; a host of children, dressed like angels, increased the train, which also included twelve poor men, whose feet the masters of the brotherhood publicly washed after mass.  Like some other guilds, they were in possession of a pulpit or tribune, called, in old French, a Puy, from which they issued a general invitation to all poets, who were summoned to descant upon the themes which were commemorated by their union.  The rewards held out to the successful candidates were, in the true monastic spirit of the guild, a reed, a crown of thorns, a sponge, or some other mystic or devotional emblem.  Occasionally, too, they gave a scenic representation of certain portions of religious history, according to the practice of early times.  The account of the Mystery of the Passion having been acted in the burial-ground of the church of St. Patrice, so recently as September, 1498, is preserved by Taillepied[100], who tells us, that it was performed by “bons joueurs et braves personages.”  The masters of this guild had the extraordinary privilege of being allowed to charge the expence attendant on the processions and exhibitions, upon any citizen they might think proper, whether a member or otherwise.