There is one house in this street, the entire front of
which is covered with grotesquely carved figures, intricate patterns,
and graceful pillars. The exterior woodwork is blackened with age, and
the whole building threatens to fall upon its present tenant--the keeper
of a cafe. The beams which support the roof inside are also richly
decorated.
To give the reader any idea of the variety of the wooden houses at
Lisieux would require a series of drawings or photographs: we can do
little more in these pages than point out these charming corners of the
world where something is still left to us of the work of the middle
ages.
The general character of the houses is better than at Pont Audemer, and
the style is altogether more varied. Stone as well as wood is used in
their construction, and the rooms are more commodious and more
elaborately decorated. But the exterior carving and the curious signs
engraved on the time-stained wood, are the most distinctive features,
and give the streets their picturesque character. Here we may notice, in
odd corners, names and legends carved in wood on the panels, harmonizing
curiously with the decoration; just as the names of the owners (in
German characters) are carved on Swiss chalets; and the words 'God is
great,' and the like, form appropriate ornaments (in Arabic) over the
door of a mosque.[12] And upon heraldic shields, on old oak panels, and
amidst groups of clustering leaves, we may sometimes trace the names of
the founders (often the architects) of the houses in which several
generations lived and died.
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