Saint Elizabeth
stopping the Pestilence_, in the choir: two others, in the Lady-Chapel,
by an artist of Rouen, of the name of Deshays, the _Miracle of the
Loaves_, and the _Visitation_, are also of considerable merit.--Deshays
was a young man of great promise; but the hopes which had been
entertained of him were disappointed by a premature death.

A church like this, so ancient, so renowned, and so holy, could not fail
to enjoy peculiar privileges. The abbot had complete jurisdiction, as
well temporal as spiritual, over the parish of St. Ouen; in the Norman
parliament he took precedence of all other mitred abbots; by a bull of
Pope Alexander IVth, he was allowed to wear the pontifical ornaments,
mitre, ring, gloves, tunic, dalmatic, and sandals; and, what sounds
strange to our Protestant ears, he had the right of preaching in public,
and of causing the conventual bells to be rung whenever he thought
proper. His monks headed the religious processions of the city; and
every new archbishop of the province was not only consecrated in this
church, but slept the evening prior to his installation at the abbey;
whence, on the following day, he was conducted in pomp to the entrance
of the cathedral, by the chapter of St. Ouen, headed by their abbot, who
delivered him to the canons, with the following charge,--"Ego, Prior
Sancti Audoeni, trado vobis Dominum Archiepiscopum Rothomagensem vivum,
quem reddetis nobis mortuum."--The last sentence was also strictly
fulfilled; the dean and chapter being bound to take the bodies of the
deceased prelates to the church of St. Ouen, and restore them to the
monks with, "Vos tradidistis nobis Dominum Archiepiscopum vivum; nos
reddimus eum vobis mortuum, ita ut crastina die reddatis eum
nobis."--The corpse remained there four and twenty hours, during which
the monks performed the office of the dead with great solemnity. The
canons were then compelled to bear the dead archbishop a second time
from the abbey cross (now demolished) to the abbey of St. Amand[96],
where the abbess took the pastoral ring from off his finger, replacing
it by another of plain gold; and thence the bearers proceeded to the
cathedral. These duties could not be very agreeable to portly,
short-winded, well-fed dignitaries; and consequently the worthy canons
were often inclined to shrink from the task. In the case of the funeral
of Archbishop d'Aubigny, in 1719, they contented themselves with
carrying him at once to his dorm