Black-robed nuns and bare-footed Carmelites
pass silently along. Perhaps some traveller from America opens his
guide-book to study the map of a city which had risen to greatness
long before Columbus crossed the seas. A few English people hurry
across, and pass under the archway of the Rue de l'Ane Aveugle
on the way to their tennis-ground beyond the Porte de Gand. The
sunshine glitters on the gilded facade of the Palais de Justice,
and lights up the statues in their niches on the front of the Hotel
de Ville. There is no traffic, no noise. Everything is still and
peaceful. The chimes, ever and anon ringing out from the huge Belfry,
which rises high above the housetops to the west, alone break the
silence.
This is Bruges sleeping peacefully in old age, lulled to rest by
the sound of its own carillon. But it is easy, standing there, to
recall the past, and to fancy the scenes which took place from time
to time throughout the long period of foreign danger and internal
strife. We can imagine the Bourg, now so peaceful, full of armed
men, rushing to the Church of St. Donatian on the morning when
Charles the Good was slain; how, in later times, the turbulent
burghers, fiery partisans of rival factions, Clauwerts shouting
for the Flemish Lion, and Leliarts marshalled under the Lily of
France, raged and threatened; how the stones were splashed with blood
on the day of the Bruges Matins, when so many Frenchmen perished; or
what shouts were raised when the Flemish host came back victorious
from the Battle of the Golden Spurs.
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