[Footnote 36: No. 41 Rue des Bons Enfants is a capital example of the Fifteenth Century Timbered inn. To the right of the inner yard a gallery juts out on crooked pillars, the "avant-soliers" so common in mediæval streets, and shown in Lelieur's drawings. Queer gables rise into the air at odd corners, and if you are sufficiently hardened to mediæval atmospheres you may discover other stables than the big shed at the entrance, and you will understand the reason for the Notice "On ne répond pas des accidents qui peuvent arriver aux chevaux." Through a dark narrow slit the phantom of a cobwebbed stable-boy will lead you into the blackened aged stables, and the spire of the abandoned church of St. Croix des Pelletiers rises above them. Lunch here upon omelettes and sound wine; but sleep were possibly unwise, though "Room Number Ten" is almost too fascinating an apartment to resist.]
[Illustration: A COBBLER OF ROUEN, FROM THE STALLS OF THE CATHEDRAL]
In such an old courtyard as this of the "Bons Enfants," with its overhanging balcony, and queerly managed stables, or in other old inns like No. 19 Rue des Matelas, or No. 4 Rue Étoupée with its charming "signboard," men sat and talked of their various trades, the cobbler, for instance, who is carved on the Cathedral stalls, with the clog-maker, and the wool-comber, and the carpenter, all met and gossiped of their latest piece of profitable business, while the lawyers discussed the never-ending question of the Privilège de St. Romain with some learned clerk over their "vin blanc d'Anjou." By the fourteenth century the list of the prisoners released by the Cathedral Chapter begins to be very full and detailed, and we can quite imagine what was talked about in every tavern of the town as Ascension-tide drew near.
In 1360, for example, the King's Mint was already established in the Rue St. Eloi, and you may still see it at No. 30 in that street as you go up on the right hand from the river to the Place St. Eloi. The "Hôtel des Monnaies" has been all whitewashed over, but there is a strong and ancient look about the windows on the street façade that warns you to go through the little passage-way, to find the soldiers of the Douane lounging about the courtyard inside. On the back of the houses that look out upon the street you will see the arms and cipher of François Premier, which show that in his days the Mint still remained in a house that was far older. And in 1360 the "Officer of the Mint of the parish of St. Eloi," who quarrelled about the price of his chicken in the Parvis, "voulait avoir de la poulaille à son pris." He must have done his bargaining in very strong language, for one of the three brothers Sautel who kept the shop, smote him that he died, and it was to these brothers that the privilege of raising the Fierte St. Romain with pardon for this crime, was in that year granted.