carved upon it, as if with some allusion to Roman power.  But the most singular part of this church is the crypt under the apsis, a room about thirty feet long by fourteen wide, and sixteen high, of extreme simplicity, and remote antiquity.  Round it runs a plain stone bench; and it is divided into two unequal parts by a circular arch, devoid of columns or of any ornament whatever, but disclosing, in the composition of its piers, Roman bricks and other debris, some of them rudely sculptured.  Here, according to Ordericus Vitalis[67], was interred the body of St. Mellonus, the first Archbishop of Rouen, and one of the apostles of Neustria; and here, his tomb, and that of his successor, Avitien, are shewn to this day, in plain niches, on opposite sides of the wall.  St. Mello’s remains however, were not suffered to rest in peace; for, about five hundred and seventy years after his death, which happened in the year 314, they were removed to the castle of Pontoise, lest the canonized corpse should be violated by the heathen Normans.  In the diocese of Rouen St. Mello is honored with particular veneration; and the history of the prelates of the see contains many curious, and not unedifying stories of the miracles he performed.  His feast, together with that of St. Nicasius, his companion, is celebrated on the second of October; and their labors are commemorated with a hymn appointed for their festival:—­

“Primae vos canimus gentis apostolos,
Per quos relligio tradita patribus;
Errorisque jugo libera Neustria

        CHRISTO sub duce militat.

“Facti sponte suis finibus exules
Huc de Romuleis sedibus advolant;
Merces est operis, si nova consecrent

        Vero pectora Numini.

“Qui se pro populis devovet hostiam
Mellonus tacita se nece conficit;
Mactatus celeri morte Nicasius

        Christum sanguine praedicat.”

Heretics as we are, we ought not to refrain from respecting the zeal even of a saint of the Catholic calendar, when thus exerted.  Besides which, he has another claim upon our attention:  our own island gave him birth, and he appeared at Rome as the bearer of the annual tribute of the Britons, at the very time when he was converted to Christianity, whose light he had afterwards the glory of diffusing over Neustria.  The existence of these tombs and the antiquity of the crypt, recorded as it is by history and confirmed by the style of its architecture, have given currency to the tradition, which points it out as the only temple where the primitive Christians of Neustria dared to assemble for the performance of divine service.  Many stone coffins have also been discovered in the vicinity of the church.  These sarcophagi seem to confirm the general tradition:  they are of the simplest form, and apparently as ancient as the crypt; and they were so placed in the ground that the heads of the corpses were turned to the east, a position denoting that the dead received Christian burial.