e delicately carved
rood-loft, or jube, the small sculptures of the choir and nave, and the
flamboyant chapels of the fifteenth to seventeenth century, challenge
minute attention from those who would study decorative detail _in
extenso_. The capitals of certain columns in the nave have fluted
pilasters in imitation of the antique, but are most curiously ornamented
with grotesque and fantastic human figures on a background of foliage.

The choir, of early pointed style, in its actual disposition and
arrangement, may be included in that classification which comprehends
some of its more important northern compeers, though, as a matter of
fact, it lacks their magnitude. Indeed, the building is one of the
smallest cathedrals in all France. The exterior offers an imposing and
picturesque ensemble, with its crocketed spire rising some two hundred
and fifty or more feet above the roof-tops of the ancient city.

Nearer inspection shows a certain incoherence of construction,
particularly in reference to the evidences of garish crudities in the
work done under Robert I. in 1031-76, in contrast to the later pointed
work.

The doorway of the lateral southern wing is ornamented with a series of
grossly exaggerated columns, in imitation of the antique, with the
addition of an apse, which contrastingly shows work of a late flamboyant
order.

The spire itself is the masterwork of the entire structure, and, unlike
those which surmount many another church, appears not to have suffered
the dangers of fire. As a fifteenth-century work, it merits special
mention. Rising abruptly from a heavy square base, the pyramid is very
acute, and is ornamented at the angles with foliaged crockets, basely
called stone cauliflowers by unimaginative persons. One might say, with
the gentle Abbe Bourasse, that the "ornamentation breaks into sky and
cloud with an exceedingly agreeable effect, far beyond that of a
straight line." The inconsistency lies only in the juxtaposition of the
two western transition towers, which have hardly enough of the Gothic in
them to merit the name.

The lower windows of the nave are of good flamboyant style, with a sort
of Romanesque triforium, and a simple round-headed window in each bay of
the clerestory, which is the more poor in treatment and effect in that
it holds no notable glass. There are none of those distinctly northern
accessories, the great rose windows, and the whole reeks of distinctly a
milder atmosphere. T