DEVASTATION AT NOYON.

Taihape Daily Times, 1 August 1919, Page 5

DEVASTATION AT NOYON.

CATHEDRAL IN RUINS. ' 1 SYSTEMTAIC DESTRUCTION. ‘ X’ CURE FOR PACIFICTS. I __........ I Pacificists ought to be COIIIDOW‘-5‘ #0 take the cure at Noyon (writes a C(l‘l'eSpondenl; from Paris). T-hose, suffering from the plague of catch 4 words which infest the Peace Conifer--I ence might find in the old Gallic city‘, another Lourdes, which might 1"1-'3' them of all their troubles. Only it is] hard to get certain people to visit‘ such places as Noyon, almost as hard‘ as it was to prevail upon Naamai;,; War Lord of Syria, to go and bathe in j the waters of Jordan_ It is unfortim-; ate, because a practically certain cur-3 could be guaranteed. Arras, Yprz».-..'~:,3 Verdun are associated with great‘? battles; amidst these ruins the Ger-S man Should shrug his shoulders R 1113: say. “It is a pity, but it is war.” Compiegne was once the French general 11£adq1l3I‘tC‘l'S, and there is, therefore, some justification for the havoc vvrought by the nightly shower of German bombs Even for that ‘long, ruined street in Senlis there might Le found some faint excuse in a soldiers’ re_w to war and maddcned by fear. Bu‘: NC'_'~.'On is a beautiful city Sh3.lll€‘leS'~!lY and systematically destroyed; no justification. military or otherwise; can be found for this ruthless act of a beaten foe; it would be impossible for even Mr. Ramsay Macdonald, after it brief hour spent amidst its blackennl portals, ever again to love the GO3 man as a brother, Noyon hada cathedral, one of the glories of France. Little wonder th'lt liiobcrt Louis Stevenson once pressed a desire to be Bishop of Noy,on_ The cathedral can be restored——-.1-it }» price-—but Monseigneur Lagncau l(Stcvenson really could not have ht- } come Bishop of Noyon, for the bishopricdisappearcd “with the Gbncordats and is no-Wzmcrged "in that of - 'B'e'a'.l— told‘ me it his go‘ing"to be- done. It i_s reaiiyrnie doyen of~French Gothic “'O2. thedrals, the pcrf’ect‘~lnonllment'of i that transitiidn -period between Romans i esque‘ and Gothic. ‘i "V

‘ “LOVELY IN ITS RUINS.” Even now it is lovely in its ruins‘. its beauty rises, protesting amidst all this desolation. For -'theGerman. uid his work wel. After .he retired .=as*;year he fired over siiikuhundrecl heavy shells alone on the city, and the cachedral got its share. Even before he left he had begun his work. Monseigne';r Lagneau himself told me that some of his parishioners took _refuge in the ea.tlle(lral during the e.\;citement_caus—ed by tlle_enemy’s departure, and that tl‘.<\\* sztxr the Gernr:ln,g cleliberatfly S-Kt fire tothe organ end then to‘_, the I'oo.f_ A teiupox-_ax'y covering _of,(‘orrugated iron——a hideous glistening thing~—afi'o'rds some protection to the "bare, ruined choirs.” All around crumbling masonry’ and broken statuary. Attempts were made to ]l(J?d services in the nave, but no eengreg-°.-tion, however, determined, could Wol‘ship in such circumstances. Monseij,'nour l'.ague2lu_. ]lo\ve\_/er, has succeeded in improvising the beautiful Salie Capitualaire, and there the faith:'::l nf Noyon daily asseinble. ' V.='\NDALIS~M WITHOUT EXCU.<§'r<J.

3 The oil)’ itself is completely ruin-(3. iTln rlvlightful Hotel do Ville is now ;n.£lSonl'_V; its fine Renaissance facad-7. laowcvcr, still stands. The place where .Cl‘.arlenlagno was born, where Hugues ; C-apef was crowned in 987, has sllfferr_-cl who full blast of the Gcrnlan"s rag-7. I‘.-find. as Mollsojgllour Lagneau insi‘<t.— gorl, there was not the slightest just?lflcation for this vandalism. Gellel-AI Humbm-t’s :u-my did not reach Novnn ; un‘n'.i' the flown lmd been ma.l'kod. Indeed Eas the general told monse'igneul-1, it

would have been dangerous for troops to have enterd the town, as some (~11gjneers reported that the Germans had placed six large. I'ef'zll'de(l mines in the Streets. The Germans destroyed Noyon because they had been be-afen in the field; it is one of the worst outrages C: the war.

All the villages around Noyon are ;-mned but not deserted. Life returns to those poor shelters with the persistence and hope of spring_ The little village chm-ches——Norman pillars and Relraissunce ornamentation——hmm yarticularly suffered. Fruit-tree stumps, battered churches, that is the tale of the Noyon countryside. More than one pure told me wifli tear.‘< ix‘. fiis eyes of the wanton destruction of his church, and of the efl’ol'ts being made to secure some little corner where the villagers can worship, prn-~-tccted from wind and rain. It is hard to_ find such corners. Weeds grow on the interior pillars, and the swallow and sparrow of the Psalmist can build their nests on these broken altars.