that the miracle was genuine. The poem, which is in the Northern
dialect, and is marked throughout by a charming _naïveté_, commences
with a eulogium of the Virgin:

'La douce mère du Créateur
À l'église à Rochemadour
Fait tants miracles, tants hauts faits,
C'uns moultes biax livres en est faits.'

The huge, inartistic, but imposing block of masonry that appears from
a little distance to be clinging, after the manner of a swallow's
nest, to the precipitous face of the rock, and which is reached from
below by more than 200 steps in venerable dilapidation[*], contains
the church of St. Sauveur, the chapel of the Virgin, called the
Miraculous Chapel, and the chapel of St. Amadour, all distinct. The
last-named is a little crypt, and the Miraculous Chapel conveys the
impression of being likewise one, for it is partly under the
overleaning rock, the rugged surface of which, blackened by the smoke
of the countless tapers which have been burnt there in the course of
ages, is seen without any facing of masonry.

[*] Since the foregoing was written the old slabs have been turned
round, and the steps been made to look quite new.

If by looking at certain details of this composite structure one could
shut off the surroundings from the eye, the mind might feed without
any hindrance upon the ideas of old piety and the fervour of souls
who, when Europe was like a troubled and forlorn sea, sought the
quietude and safety of these rocks, lifted far above the raging surf.
But the hindrance is found on every side. The sense of artistic