existed from time immemorial," and which, to judge from Ducarel's
description and figure, must have been curious, has now entirely
disappeared.

In the suburb of Vaucelles, the church of St. Michael contains some
architectural features of great curiosity[75]. The circular-headed
arches in the short square tower, and in a small round turret that is
attached to it, are unquestionably early Norman, and are remarkable for
their proportions, being as long and as narrow as the lancet windows of
the following æra. It would not be equally safe to pronounce upon the
date of the stone-roofed pyramid which covers this tower. The north
porch is entered by a pointed arch, which, though much less ornamented,
approaches in style to the southern porch of St. Ouen, and, like that,
has its inner archivolt fringed with pendant trefoils. The wall above
the arch rises into a triangular gable, entirely covered with waving
tracery, the only instance of the kind which I have seen at Caen.

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 71: _Huet, Origines de Caen_, p. 12.]

[Footnote 72: Upon this subject, Huet has an extraordinary observation,
(_Origines de Caen_, p. 186.) "that, in the early times of Christianity,
it was customary for all churches to front the east or north, or some
intermediate point of the compass."--So learned and careful a writer
would scarcely have made such a remark without some plausible grounds;
but I am at a loss where to find them. Bingham, in his _Origines
Eccleslasticæ_, I. p. 288, says, "that churches were so placed, that