I t!K i i Mestminster Kbbc^ Sbe Catbebtab of Englanb arrar, Mllman, ^tanle^ University of California Southern Regional Library Facility S:f;^0 theirs LIBRARY THE UNIVERSITY 0¥ CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA PRESENTED BY MRS. ALFRED W. INGALLS "CXDlcstininstcr Hbbc^ an& XEbe Catbcferale ot England M 2)can6 3farrai% /Wbilman, Stanley an^ otbcrs XiXIlitb Dicvvs ot tbc Catbebvals anb K^ottraits ot tbc 2)ionitanc6 lplbiIa^clpbia 3obn C. Minston & Co. 1895 l^^"^ EDITORS PREFACE. 1"^HE large number of books that have been published describing the Cathedrals of England indicate the rich and varied interest iu them, both religious and secular. This general interest and the perfection to which the art of photography has been advanced, in making views, and in reproducing them for the purpose of illustra- tion, suggest this additional book picturing these monuments of the past. In the history of these cathedrals, all of the Anglican race are interested, for to whatever branch of the Christian Church we may belong, we have an inherited claim to the parentage of the early English Church. We can easily understand the pride which all Englishmen take in these historic possessions. Each summer finds increasing numbers of Americans strolling through the cool, lofty aisles of these cathedrals, and enjoying the peaceful atmosphere which generally pervades English cathedral towns. Next to the advantage — as Dean Stanley says — of seeing the place where a great event happened — the picture, statue, and tomb of an illustrious man — is seeing the exact reproduction supplied by photographs. A full collection of views takes the place, to a great extent, of a visit to the locality. The cathedral architecture, full of Christian signification, grew to its high state of perfection from the religious enthusiasm of devout Christians, in the rural parts of England, during her primitive state ; and many centuries after, their labours still have their influence in centres of densely populated communities, and are, to the present day, the best models of our church architecture. The high pointed naves of a cathedral, the gracefully shaped mouldings and richly flowered detail naturally suggest the high vaulted arches aud interlacing limbs and foliage of our great American forests. Architecture in our country was developed under circumstances totally different. It was primarily influenced by considerations of economy and mercantile interests ; in all stages of advancement, from the Western settler, covering his log cabin with the tin from his provision cans, to the fifteen-storied office buildings of the capitalist. So many, who are not students of architecture, seem to regard mere novelty as a beauty, that attention is called to the above facts for the consideration of those who may not fully appreciate the influence surroundings have upon those who create works of art. (3) 4 Editor'' s Preface. In selecting illustrations for this work, the idea has been to give as complete a collection of a variety of subjects as possible, rather than to give corresponding views of each cathedral. In this way the special features of each cathedral can be presented, in place of duplicating several very similar subjects. Durham's massive Norman nave, Salisbury's uniform nave of the pointed period, with West- minster's decorated choir, Canterbury's choir of several ages, and St. Paul's modern renaissance interior, are sufficient to illustrate the general effect inside of all the cathedrals. For this reason the cathedrals in the latter part of the book, even though the text does not refer to each photograph, have been more fully illustrated as to their own peculiar beauties: York's vast exterior facade and rood screen, Durham's commanding situation and ancient castle, Lincoln's elevated position, noble towers and bishop's palace, Winchester's reredos and picturesque precincts, Salisbury's spire, cloister and chapter-house, and Chester's richly carved stalls. The text used in the descriptions of the cathedrals has been, in several cases, taken from exhaustive writings upon the subject, but in collecting a condensed account for this book of illustrations, I should say, in deference to the various distinguished authors, that great care has been taken to eliminate nothing that would detract from the authors' original ideas. On the contrary, the effort has been to put together the best accounts with the finest illustrations. As the tomb of St. Thomas at Canterbury was the objective point of so many travelers in the early days, both pious Saints on pilgrimages and casual travelers giving the same reason for an excursion, so now is Westminster Abbey the first object in England to which a large majority of Americans turn their faces. They are probably more familiar with the history of this church than with the history of any other building in England. Although it is not now a cathedral, Westminster is frequently thought of as such, because of its size and importance. From 1540 to 1550, however, a bishop's chair was erected at Westminster, by Henry VIII. , making it for that time a cathedral. Revenues were sometimes taken by the King from St. Peter's (Westminster Abbey) and applied to St. Paul's, which gave rise to the saying, " Robbing Peter to pay Paul." Shakespeare is said to have passed the night in the "Cathedral of Westminster" while preparing the grave-diggers' scene in Hamlet. Westminster was centuries ago the honored place of burial, and it still so continues, although Sir Godfrey Kneller's ambition did not incline him toward a tomb there, for, said he, " It is there they do bury fools." Nelson, before his last battle, is said to have exclaimed, " Victory, or Westminster Abbey." Wm. Ellis Scull. CONTENTS, PAGS Westminstkr Abbey ii By the Very Rev. F. W. Farrar, D. D., Dean of Canterbury. St. P.a.ul's C.\thedral 6i By the Very Rev. H. H. Milman, D. D., Dean of St. Paul's Cathedral. Canterbury Cathedrae 89 By the Ver}- Rev. A. P. Stanley, D. D., Dean of Westminster. York ]\Iixster 125 By Miss Constance .Anderson. Durham Cathedral i43 By the Rev. Canon Talbot, M. A., of Durham. Lincoln Cathedral • . . • • • 163 By the Rev. Precentor Venables, M. A., of Lincoln. Winchester Cathedral 183 By the Very Rev. G. W. Kitchen, D. D., Dean of Winchester. Salisbury Cathedral ^99 By the Rev. H. T. Arnifield, F. S. A. Chester Cathedral 209 By the Very Rev. J. S. Howson, D. D., Dean of Chester. The Dignit.aries 53' ^^c. By the Rev. L. B. Thomas, D. D., of St. Peter's Church, Philadelphia. (5) LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. WESTMINSTER : westminster abbey Dean Farrar and Bishop Brooks . Westminster from the Hungerford Bridge Monument to Shakespeare Shrine of Edward the Confessor Westminster Abbey from Dean's Yard Henry Vii's Chapei. Entrance to Jerusalem Chamber . Cloister Court Poets' Corner — Historical Side Choir and Confessor's Chapel Altar and Ricrkdos Coronation Chair, with Stone of Scone Roof of Hknkv Vii's Chapel . Henry VII's Chapel — Si\-o>id I'icu/ . Henry VU's Chapel — J'hird View . Monument of Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt Tomb of Mary, Queen of Scots Monument to William Wilberforce Tomb of Lady Elizabeth Nightingale . Tomb of Sir Isaac Newton East Side ok North Transept Isaac Watts Epitaph of the Weslevs .... Dean Stanley's Altar-Tomb . Poets' Corner Monument to Charles James Fox . DEAN Stanley Dean Farr.\r ST. PAUL'S: St. Paul's Cathedral De.an Milman .... St. Paul's from Waterloo Bridge St. Paul's from Fleet Street West Front The Nave, Looking East . St. Paul's from Cheapside Temple Bar Page lO II 12 13 14 16 18 19 21 24 25 27 29 30 32 35 37 3S 39 40 42 43 45 47 48 49 51 54 57 60 61 62 63 64 66 68 69 ch ST. VKVL'S— Continued : The Choir The Crypt Altar and Reredos Monument to Nelson Dean Church Canon Liddon CANTERBURY : ' Canterbury Cathedral St. Martin's Church . Baptismal Font, St. Martin's Chur St. Augustine's Chair Cathedral and Bell Harrv Tower Transept of Martyrdom . Norman Baptistery To.mb of The Black Prince French Chapel in the Crypt . Christ Church Gateway . Becket's Crown .... Norman Porch .... Tomb of Archbishop Tait . The Choir Archbishop Tait .... Archbishop Benson YORK : York Minster York from the Railway Station . The Five Sisters ..... The Choir vScreen .... Tinworth's Terra-cotta "Crucifixion The Vestry York Minster from the Southeast North Aisle of the Choir .\rchbishop Magee .... Archbishop Maclagan DURHAM : Durham Cathedral from the Wear Lindisfarne The Dun Cow (7) Page 71 74 -6 7S 82 S5 88 90 91 92 95 98 100 103 104 106 109 III 112 114 118 121 124 126 127 128 129 130 132 134 136 139 142 143 144 8 List of Illitstralions. DVRHAU—Coti/inued: Page Holy Island Fisherwomen . . . ■ '45 The Sanctuary Knocker 146 The Nave 148 The Bishop's Throne 150 Cathedral and Castle from Railway Station, 152 The Galilee Chapel 153 Bishop Ughtfoot 156 Bishop Westcott 159 LINCOLN : Lincoln Cathedral from High Street . 162 Bishop Alexander's Doorway .... 164 Lincoln Cathedral from the Northwest . 167 The Imp in the Angel Choir .... 169 Ruins of the Old Palace 170 The New Episcopal Chapel . . . 171 Bishop Wordsworth's Monument . . . 173 Bishop Wordsworth 176 Bishop King 179 WINCHESTER : Winchester Cathedral ... . 1S2 WINCHESTER— Co«i'/«a^(^ .• The Deanery' The Great Screen Chantries in South Aisle of the Choir The Close Gateway . Ruins of the Cloisters Bishop Wilberforce . Bishop Thorold . SALISBURY : Salisbury' Cathedral . The Cloister Garth . The Cloisters, The Nave, Looking East The Chapter-House . Sedalia in the Chapter-House CHESTER : The Choir, Chester Cathedral Mosaics Chester Cathedral— North Side Chester Cathedral— West End Bishop Jay-ne .... Page 183 185 1S7 188 189 192 195 198 200 202 204 205 206 20S 209 210 211 214 \YESTMINSTER ABBEY. WESTMINSTER ABBEY. SOIME French author— T thinlc it was Voltaire — said of the English that " they amuse themselves gloomily, according to the fashion of their nation." So far as the observation is true, the gloom conies from hurry. There are very few of us who have suffi- cient leisure from our occupations. We crowd each page of life up to the ver}^ edges, and leave no margin for beauty and convenience. It is, for instance, distressing to see the aimless and listless way in which multitudes of wear}^ sight- seers wander through the en- chanted rooms of the National Gallery. This is not their fault. It is no doubt mainly due to a lack of all training in the objects, the principles, the history of art. But it is also due to the fact that so many of them regard the National Gallery as a thing to be " done," so that when they are asked, " Have you seen the National Gallery ? " they can say "Yes." I am often distressed to see how less than nothing is the amount of real pleasure and advantage gained by multitudes of those who stroll about the Abbey in hundreds day after day, not knowing at what they ought to look, or what they (II) DEAN FARRAR AND BISHOP BROOKS. 12 Westminster Abbey. ought to see in it, or what is to be gained from seeing it. I once had the pleas- ure of conducting the genial American poet, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, round the Abbey for two hours, and when I left him he told me that he should always recollect those two hours spent there as among the most memorable in his life. But "the eye can only see what it brings with it the power of seeing." The out- ward impressions are as meaningless without the inward susceptibility, as colours to the blind or melodies to the deaf To those who have neither eyes to see, nor knowledge to understand, nor sensibility to enjoy, a visit to the Abbey is too often WESTMINSTER FROM THE HUNGERFORD BRIDGE. a blank of dullness and disappointment. But what such a visit might be to a man of universal knowledge, unlimited interest, and complete sympathy, no one can understand ; for no single person possesses or can possess the consummate culture which would be requisite for the reception of such full impressions. Let me try to catalogue some of the varied regions of delight and interest. First, there is the religious symbolism of the building. Its structure is by no means accidental. Down to the minutest particulars it is " a theology in stone." Its prevalent number is three — triple height, triple length, triple breadth — to remind us of the doctrine of the Trinity. Its other predominant numbers are four — the Westminster Abbey. 13 number of earthly perfectness, the signature of the world, and of divine revelation ; and seven — the signature of the covenant, and of the seven spirits of God, and of the seven pillars of the House of Wisdom. Its structure is cruciform, to remind us of the Atonement. Even the geometrical designs which lie at the base of its ground plan are combinations of the triangle, the circle, and the oval — the s3'mbols of the Trinity, of eternity, and of the saintly aureole. Then there is the sci- entific and architectural in- terest. To the intelligent architect the Abbey, with all its exquisite proportions, be- comes a sort of epic in stone. He tooks with delight on all the details of its ornamenta- tion ; he easily observes where the work of Edward I. joins on to that of Henry IH., and that of Richard H. to that of Edward I., and that of Henrj^ V. to that of Richard II. ; and he sees at once that the great Perpendicular west window belongs to the age of Henry VII., and the days of Abbot Islip. He looks with delight on the minute varying details of arch and moulding, and window tracery, and wall-surface decoration, and he traces in these varia- tions the character and tendencies of the ages to which they belong. I once went over the whole Abbey with the late vSir Gilbert Scott, and he had fifty things to point out which no ordinary observer would have thought of noticing. To enter fully into them we should require the training and insight of such a man as he, or as Sir Christopher Wren, or Mr. Ruskin. Then, thirdly, there is the poetic and emotioual sentiment. To realise that BIONUMENT TO SH.\KESPEARE. 14 Westminster Abbey. adequately we must have the miud and emotions of the poet, such as Wordsworth, when he says in his famous sonnet, — " They dreamt not of a perishable home Who thus could build ! Be mine, in hours of fear Or grovelling thought, to seek a refuge here. Or through the aisles of Westminster to roam ; Where bubbles burst, aud folly's dancing foam Melts, if it cross the threshold ; where the wreath Of awe-struck wisdom droops." To enter into this we should require to feel as a Shakespeare or a Wilton felt. But, fourthly, a great sculptor might again be chiefl}^ interested by the artistic crea- tions which meet him on every side. Then, again, how much should we gain at every step and (-•very turn by a thorough and masterly knowledge of History ! How delightful an appreciation f this inexhaustible source of interest is shown b}^ every allusion to the Abbey in the pages of Lord Macaulay ! It was while he was standing under the bust of Warren Hastings that Dean Milman suggested to him the idea of his splendid essaj'- on the great Proconsul : and his allusion to the efi&gy of Chat- ham is one of the best-known passages in his works. When we tread the pavement of the Abbey, not onh' is ever}' step we take on \\o\y ground, but also on classic ground. Here stood Shakespeare and Ben Jonson aud Marlowe when they flung their pens and their verses upon the coffin of Spenser. Here Samuel Johnson leant in tears at the funeral of Oliver Goldsmith; here sat Charles I., all in ill-omened white satin, at his coronation; here little Prince Alfonso, son of Edward I., hung over the tomb of the Confessor the SHRINE OK EDWARD THE CONEESSOR. Westminster Abbey. 17 golden coronet of Llewellyn, Prince of Wales; here stood Henry VI., half-dazed, and marked for liis grave the place where he was never destined to lie ; here sat Queen Victoria on the day of her Jubilee. Who could enter into even half of such associations unless he had some of the knowledge of a Freeman or a Washington Irving ? Again, an antiquarian would iiud much to observe with pleasure which another man would pass over from want of knowledge. And not to multiply too many illustrations, if a man be endowed with nothing more than the " picturesque sensibility " which was one of the charming characteristics of Dean Stanley, how much more vivid will be all his varied im- pressions, and how inexhaustible will be the power and the keenness of his in- terest ! Dean Stanley, as I can testify from personal knowledge, seemed to find fresh delight and fresh instruction in the Abbey every day. Now if a man takes with him but one of these elements of insight, knowl- edge, and S3'mpathy, he gains much ; but what would be his gain if he combined them all ? Imagine a man who could visit the Abbe}^ with the united gifts and feelings of a Wren, a Newman, a Wordsworth, a Scott, a Macaulay, a Flaxman, a Camden, a Stanley I Thousands of visitors carry with them from the Abbey little beyond the impression that it is a dull and dingy place, full of ugly tombs, of which many are to unknown or forgotten personages. Such visitors lose every- thing: but nearly every visitor loses something and even much. Our aim should be, even if we lose much, to gain at least something definite. Multitudes are puzzled by the fact that a parish church should stand so close beside the stately x\bbey, which dwarfs into insignificance its smaller, yet not insignificant, proportions. We are often told that the mediaeval builders, in almost every cathedral city, delighted to erect smaller churches beside the huge masses of these minsters, to serve as a scale whereby to measure the size of the larger edifices. Certainl}' the result is effective. The would-be lovers of the picturesque who glibly talk about pulling down St. Margaret's to improve the view of the Abbey, talk ignorant nonsense. Many years ago a Government Committee, following all the best artistic advice of the age, decided that the aspect of the Abbey is in every sense improved by the vicinity of the smaller building. The frontispiece may help to show that, as Mr. Augustus Hare saj-s, " the outline of the Abbey is beautifully varied and broken by St. Margaret's Church, which is not only deeply interesting in itself, but is invaluable as presenting the greater edi- fice alongside it in its true proportions." But the church was originally built — as far back, certainly, as the days of the Confessor, and, perhaps even earlier — for the worship of the population. The Abbey was not intended for parochial services. Its choir was the daily chapel of the Benedictine monks. Its nave was not a place for worship, but was set apart i8 IJ^csivi/jistcr Abbey. for great national and ecclesiastical processions. St. IVIargaret's is the most ancient, and was at one time the only, church west of Temple Bar. Let us pause before the exterior of the east end of Henry VII. 's Chapel, with the end of the south transept, one of the flying buttresses, and a corner of the Chapter House, projecting behind the private house of one of the IMinor Canons. The name, " Henry VII.'s Chapel," has entirely superseded the name of " Lady Chapel." In mediaeval minsters the chapel at the east end was invariably dedicated to the Virgin IMar}-, who was commonly referred to as " Our Lady." The position of the chapel, in the symbolism which ran through the minutest Chapter -House. North Transept, HENRY VII.'S CH.\PEL. details of these sacred buildings, was meant to indicate the Virgin standing beside the Cross, during the Crucifixion. But just as the gorgeous chapel at Windsor was known as " Wolsey's," and now as the " Prince Consort's Chapel," so the splendid and lavish expenditure of the first Tudor king on this memorial, in- tended to enshrine his tomb, has connected it permanently with his name. It is perhaps the loveliest specimen of richly decorated Perpendicular architecture in the world. The reader cannot fail to observe the exquisitely delicate lace-work of its ornamentation. It still retains its charm in spite of the deadly fumes which we suffer to be poured in volumes into the air of London from the neighbouring Westminster Abbey. 19 potteries and other works ; but when it came fresh from the sculptor's hands, and before it was densely begrimed by the ever-accumulating soot of centuries, it must have been a vision of perfect beauty. This scene is called " Poets' Corner," because it leads to the entrance into the south transept, where the poets lie buried. Just as the remains of the sainted Confessor attracted round them the dust of so many kings and queens, so the grave of Chaucer acted as a magnet to draw into its neighbourhood the memorials of Drayton, Ben Jonson, Spenser, Shakespeare, ENTRANCE TO JERUSALEM CHAMBER. IMilton, Graj^, Addison, and many more, including the great Victorians, Robert Browning and Alfred Tenn3-son. The Chapter House is visited b}' comparatively few of the myriads who come to the Abbey ; but those who know what to look for may well linger for some time in this deeply interesting building. The splendor and loveliness of the en- trance to it show the important place which it held in the general estimation. The stones under the left arcade of the vestibule are still deeply worn by the feet of generations of monks, as they walked two and two to their weekly assem- 20 Westminster Abbey. blies. The vaulting and its bosses are quaint aud rich. The quaint entrance door itself, bleared aud ruined as it now is, was once rich with gold and scarlet. Entering the Chapter House, we see at a glance an octagon of the noblest proportions, of which the roof is supported b}' a slender and graceful pillar of polished Purbeck, thirty-five feet high, " surrounded by eight subordinate shafts, attached to it by three moulded bands." The painted windows were placed there as a memorial to Dean Stanley. One was given by the Queen, and one by Americans. In the central light, at the summit of each, is represented the greatest man of each century — the Venerable Bede, St. Anselm, Roger Bacon, Chaucer, Caxton, and Shakespeare. In the window over the door is Queen Victoria. The central band of the windows represents man}' of the great historical events connected with the Abbey. When the visitor stands in this glorious Chapter House, he stands on the spot round which centre some of the most important events in English history. The scenes here enacted may have been sufficiently exciting for the monks, when they confessed their sins to one another, or were accused and judged, and scourged in the sight of the communit}' before that central pillar. But how far more mem- orable was the assembly when the Chapter House was set apart, before 1340, for the separate use of the House of Commons. The Speaker sat in the abbot's seat. Under this roof were passed such far-reaching Acts as the Statute of Provisors (1350) and the Statute of Pitemmiire., which " pared the Pope's nails to the quick, and then cut his fingers." Here Wolsey held his court as Cardinal Legate. Here the martyrs, Bilney and Barnes, were tried and sentenced to be burnt for their Protestant opinions. Here were passed the Act of Supremac}' and the Act of Submission ; and before that slender pillar was laid the Black Book of damning evidence against the monasteries, which led to their dissohition, and roused a cry of indignation from the listening senators. And here the House of Commons continued to sit till the last day of the reign of Henry VIII. In 1547, the first year of Edward VI., the Chapel of St. Stephen, in the Palace of West- minster, was prepared for the use of the Lower House, and the Chapter House, though it was no longer used for their debates, was still regarded as public property, and was turned into the Record Office, in which, for three centuries more, were kept Doomsda}^ Book and all the other precious documents of the Kingdom. In 1S65 it was happily restored from its condition of neglect and de- facement by Sir Gilbert Scott. We now pass into the south cloister — tlie one which is in a line with the entrance from Dean's Yard. This southern walk was the place in which, under tbe supervision of the " spies of the cloister," the Benedictine monks passed the greater part of the day — all that was not set apart for worship, labour, sleep, and IVcstuinistcr Abbey. 23 meals. Here, for centuries, they might have beeu seen in their long black tunics, with large-sleeved, black, upper frocks, and split cowls with pointed ends. Here they were shaved once a fortnight, and bled once a month. As he walks down the cloister let the visitor notice the ancient lockers which once contained the towels of the monks ; the gravestone of the little nephews and nieces of John Wesley ; the large flagstone (" Long Meg ") under which lie the bodies of twenty- six monks, who, with their abbot, Byrchestou, were swept away by the disastrous plague of 1348. The West Walk — now so familiar to the scholars of Westminster School, who stand along it on Sundays, in their white surplices, to await and salute the Canon and Master as they enter the Abbey — was also built by Abbot Littlington, and was in old days the novices' school. For many a long year has it resounded with the murmurs of the boys as they sat conning their lessons, and sometimes, perhaps, with their cries, as they received the rough corporal punishment of past times. Their books were kept in two aumbreys, now obliterated by a square, hideous, pretentious tomb, erected to I know nt)t whom. The holes which may still be seen here and there in tlie stone bench, sometimes arranged in nines, are a relic of the games at " lowckiiigs in and out^^ played by those boys of so many centuries ago. The building over the cloister is part of the modern Deanery, which was the palace of the former abbots. The green garth was pleasant to the ej'es of the monks. It used, no doubt, to be bright with flowers, and sometimes a tame stork, or other domestic pet of the monastery, might have been seen wandering there. But, also, an open grave was always visible in the green space, and in that open grave each monk knew tliat his body would be placed if he happened to be tlie first to die. It was a perpetual memento mori to wean their thoughts from the worldliness which could penetrate too fatally even into the cloister precincts. In a walk round the cloisters, the visitor may gain a notion of the whole life of a Benedictine monk in the Middle Ages. Passing through Dean's Yard, he is in the Sanctuary precincts, which contained their granary, mill, calberge, and guest-house. Entering the cloister he passes through the reception-parlour, where they met their relatives and visitors. Then he must imagine that the west cloister, to his left, is full of boys, who fill it with the busy murmur of their voices as they study under the stern rule of the master of the novices, though their eyes often wander to the petulant tame stork which is so fond of coming up to them for food and caresses. The cloister before him still contains the stone " lockers " where the monks kept their towels, close by the adjoining lavatory. Up and down this cloister walked its appointed guardian, who saw tliat the monks were silent and employed. Behind tliis wall ran their vast refectory, of which the windows, now filled up, may be seen from the oppo- 24 Westminster Abhev. site side of tlie garth above the cloister leads. In the green garth sleep gener- ations of monks who have passed away and been forgotten. In the east cloister are the entrances to the dortnre and the Chapter House, and the part reserved for the lord abbot's Maundy service. The quadrangle is completed by the Scrip- torium, full of monks diligently engaged in reading or in copying and illuminat- ing manuscripts. The beautiful door at the end of the west cloister opened into the Abbey, and through it they often wended their way with solemn litanies. By the east door they usually entered for their seven dail}' and nightly services. POETS' CORNER— HISTORICAL SIDE. We now leave the cloisters, and enter the Abbey itself. Before us is the choir, the east end, with the sacran'iim, or space in which stood the high altar. This was regarded as the most sacred part of the church. The choir was set apart for the daily seven services of the monks, which took place every three hours — lauds, prime, tierce, sext, nones, vespers, and compline. Only " the relig- ious " were as a rule present in the choir. The front of the reredos, richly ornamented with statues, mosaic, and gems, is modern. The aspect of the choir, when it is filled with one of the great Sunday congregations, and all the clergy and the choir and the Westminster boys are there in their white surplices, is impressively beautiful. Cllum AND CONFESSORS CHAPEL-HE.NRY V.'S CHANTRY IJ N THE BACKGROUND. Wcsfviinslrr Abbey. 2^ And here I may refer to a fact which has always caused me surprise. It is that Westminster Abbey is scarcely ever the recipient of any voluntary offering. One such gift was spontaneously offered it more than twenty years ago. With a munificence and public spirit which is only too rare, Mr. G. W. Childs, of Philadelphia, presented a fine stained-glass window to the Abbey in memory of the two religious poets, George Herbert and William Cowper ; as he also pre- sented a memorial fountain, in honour of Shakespeare, to the town of Stratford- ou-Avon, and a window to St. Margaret's Church in memory of Milton. But with the exception of this one spontaneous gift, nothing has been offered to tlie ALTAR AND REREDOS. Abbey, so far as T am aware, either in living memory or for many previous years. In old davs, indeed, the Abbey was verj' wealth}' ; but its immense revenues passed long ago into the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. It now possesses not a single acre of estates, and the annual sum devoted to its maintenance is so inadequate, that it has already been necessary to suppress one of its canonries in order to provide funds to prevent its actual fabric from crumbling to pieces. Barely able to maintain its daily staff, choir, and services, the Dean and Chapter are totally unable to provide additions to its splendour and beauty. Tens of thousands of pilgrims yearly visit it; the whole English- 28 Wcstvu'nstcr Abbey. speaking race expresses love and veneration for it as the shrine of all onr great historic memories. Yet no one does anything to immortalise himself by its adornment, and during so long a time it has received but one voluntary offer- insr, and that from an American! We pass from the choir into the Chapel of the Confessor. The shrine of the founder, or patron saint, is frequently placed behind the sacrarium, as at St. Albans and at St. Thomas Cantelupe at Hereford. This shrine was the splendid work of an Italian artist, Peter of Rome, whom Henry HI. emploj'ed in the lack of English artists of sufficient skill. Originally it blazed with colour, gilding, and mosaic, but it shows the defacing ravages of time during the six centuries which have passed since it was erected. It consists of three parts : (i.) The fcretrnm, or basement of stone, with arcaded recesses in which pilgrims might sit who were afflicted with diseases which they desired to cure by thrust- ing themselves as close as possible to the saintly relics. One of the stones at the north end of the shrine is hollowed out by the knees of innumerable pil- grims. (2.) The theca, loculns, or upper chest, which contains the body of the saint. (3.) The co-operforiuvi, cover, or lid, which might be lifted off to exhibit the coffin. The present cover is the only trace left in the Abbey by Fecken- ham, its last abbot ; the only addition made to the ornamentation of the Abbey in the reign of Mary Tudor. It was once inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and looked sufficiently gorgeous, but, being of poor material, was probably only in- tended to be temporary. The floor of the chapel was once inlaid in rich mosaic, which may still be partly seen on the space where now stands the coronation chair. It has been mostly worn away by the hurrying feet of generations. A lovely fragment of it, of a sort of tartan pattern, once adorned the grave of little Prince Alfonso, son of Edward I., who, on August 19, 12S4, hung over the shrine the golden circlet of Llewellyn, Prince of Wales. It may be seen by uplifting the step under the chantry of Henr}' V. It was the presence of the saintly Confessor and the desire to rest near his bones, which gathered into tlie little chapel the remains of Henry III., Edward I., Edward III., Richard II., Henry V., and of the Queen Edith, daughter of Earl Godwin, good Queen Maud, Eleanor of Castile, Philippa of Hainault, Anne of Bohemia, Katherine of Valois, and of many princes and princesses, including the once highly-honoured Thomas of Woodstock, whose treacherous murder is a serious blot on the character of his nephew, Richard II. The tombs on the south are those of Edward I. and his queen. The chantry at the end is that of Henry V., the most splendid monument in the Abbey. Under it is the warped and ruined effigy of heart of oak, which Wcshniuslcr Abb iry. 29 the passionate affection of the luitioii ])hiced over the bones of its hero-king. Originally it was plated with silver, and had a head and regalia of silver, all of which had been stolen before the end of Henry VIII. 's reign. The chantr)- was built for the use of monks, who were to sing masses for the king's soul ; and here, a few years ago, after curious and romantic fortunes, were re-buried the re- mains of the hero's queen, Katherine, daughter of Charles VI. of France. On the beam above are the helmet, shield, and saddlebow used by Henry V. at the battle of Agiucourt. Sucli is the tradition of _ the Abbey; but antiquarians assert that B^iiH' this is a mere tilting helmet carried before the bier at the King's funeral, and not what Shakespeare calls " the helm Which did afFri^ht the air at A,L;iiicc)urt." The massive and artistic iron gate was the work of a London smith in the ninth year of Henry VI. We now pass into the south ambulatory. The word ambulatory is applied to the walks on either side of the choir and round the chapel of the Confessor. The tomb at the left is that of the great Plantagenet, Edward III. Its canopy is " of carved wood, with imitation vaulting, pinnacles, and but- tresses." In the north ambulatory are the tombs of Edward I. and Henry III. The tomb of Edward I. was always a very plain one ; perhaps because he had ordered his son to carry his bones at the head of the army till Scotland was subdued. The tomb never had niche, or enamel, or colour, or effigy, but it was once covered with a painted canopy and protected by a iine piece of ironwork. These have disappeared, as well as the embroidered pall which probably once covered the unadorned monument of this warrior king. The pictures on pages 32 and 35 show us the chapel raised for the reception of the Tudor king, Henry VII. Here stood the old Lad}- Chapel dedicated to the Virgin, which Henry destroyed in order to replace it by this sumptuous and lovely CORONATION CHAIR, WITH STONE OF .SCONK. 30 Westminster Abbey. building. Everything in this chapel is worthy of careful study. The bronze gates, once shining, now dim, are not only an exquisite specimen of a rare kind of work, but also illustrate the quiet yet intense determination of Henry VII. to put into the forefront every possible indication of his claims to the crown of England. The gate is ingeniously adorned with the falcon and fetterlock of the House of York; with the portcullis of the House of Lancaster; with a double Tudor rose; with the interwoven letters H. R. ; with crowns surmounted by daisies, in allusion to the name of his mother, Margaret of Richmond; and besides all this, it is here and there decorated with a dragon, which is meant for the Red Dragon of Cadwallader, and was designed to hint that Henry's claim was strengthened by his supposed descent from that British king. Henry's ancestor, Owen Tudor, was ROur OF HENRY VII. 'S CHAl'hlv. pronounced by a Welsh commission of inquiry to be an undoubted lineal descend- ant of Brute, the Trojan, and of ^neas himself — a genealogy of forty-seven de- grees, which they claim to have incontestably proved, and in which there was only one female ! The fan tracery of the self-poised roof, which is also to be found at St. George's, Windsor, and in King's College Chapel, Cambridge, is never found in Continental architecture, but is the peculiar glory of the English style. The choir stalls and Miserere seats are exquisitely and elaborately carved, but with designs which are sometimes grotesque and satirical. The niches which run round the walls once contained one hundred and seven stone figures, of which ninety-five remain. All these figures, except those of some philosophers, in the south-east bays, have been identified by the antiquarian knowledge and research HENRV xii's CHAPEI,. Westminster Abbey. 33 of Mr. Micklethwaite. Some of them are exceedingly curious. One is to a saint who has been for ages forgotten. It is the fiftli figure from the east in tlic south aisle, and represents a bearded woman leaning on a T-shaped cross. It is St. Wilgefortis, who was also known as St. Uncnmber and Santa Liberada. She was apparently a saint only of the vulgar, and is ignored by Alban Butler and by Abbe Glaire. She used to be approached with an offering of oats b}- peasant couples who desired to be loosed from unhapp}- marriages ; and the legend is that she prayed to be free from a match which was being forced upon her. Her prayer was granted, and the contract was ended by her growth, in one night, of a manly beard, as she is here represented. It is perhaps the only figure of her in England. We can but hope that Henry did not place her among his accustomed " avours or guardian saints " out of any uneasiness which he felt in his marriage with the fair and gentle Elizabeth of York. The cost of the whole chapel was stupendous, and it shows that Henr}^ VII., though accounted miserl}', stopped short at no expense for the glorification of himself and his d^-nasty. The banners are those of the Knights of the Bath, of which this was constituted the chapel b\' George I. in 17-5. The banner of George I. and of his grandson, Prince Frederick, are among them. The magnificent tomb in front is that of the founder of the chapel, whose effigy — a marvel of delicate sculpture — lies beside that of his wife, Elizabeth of York. " He lieth at Westmiuster," said Lord Bacon, " in one of the stateliest and daintiest monuments of Europe, both for the chapel and the sepulchre. So that he dwelleth more richly dead in the monument of his tomb thau he did alive in Rich- mond or in any of his palaces." The bronze "closure" round the tomb is the work of the fierce Florentine sculptor, Torregiano, who as a }-outh broke the nose of Michael Angelo with a blow of his mallet ; who frightened Benvenuto Cellini from accepting his invitations to England by his " loud voice, and frowning e^-ebrows, and boasts of his feats among those beasts of Englishmen;" and who finally starved himself to death in a Spanish dungeon of the Inquisition, where he was imprisoned because in a fit of rage he had dashed to pieces his own fine statue of the Virgin, for which the Duke of Arcos, who had given him the commission, paid him insufficiently. It would require too much space to describe adequately this noble tomb. In front of it, behind the hanging chains, is the small altar- tomb of Edward VI., of which the delicate sculpture is also the work of Torregi- ano. It is a restoration, for, strange to say, the only tomb whicli the Puritans entirely destroyed in the Abbey was that of the only English king who was an absolute Puritan. This is easily accounted for when we recall that it was an altar- tomb, and was erected in the reign of Mary Tudor. The end of the north aisle of Henry VII. 's Chapel is known as " Inno- 34 Westminster Abbey. cents' Corner," since only children lie buried there. The cradle tomb to the left is that of the Princess Sophia, an infant daughter of James I., who died in 1606, aged three days. The next is that of her sister, the Princess Mary, who died in 1607, at the age of two years, and whom her father describes as " a little ro3-al rose prematurely plucked by death." The small sarcophagus in a recess of the east wall between these two tombs contains the bones of the two poor boys, Edward V. and his brother Richard, Duke of York. They were murdered in the Tower, by order of their uncle, Richard III., in 14S3, and their bones were found in 1674 in a chest under a staircase in the Tower. As there could be no doubt that these were the bones of the two royal bo3's, Charles II. spared an infinites- imal sum from his gross and selfish extravagances to erect this paltry little memorial in their honour. The design is bj- Sir Christopher Wren. The sculptured figures above will show the character of all the statues with which the chapel is surrounded, most of which are so high up that they cannot easily be examined. All the saints represented have been identified b}- their em- blems. One is St. Lawrence with his gridiron, and one is a king with a book, which may be meant for St. Louis of France or King Henry VI., whose canoni- sation was, however, not completed, because Henr}' VII. grudged the large fees which the Pope demanded. One was long an enigma to the antiquaries. It repre- sents a priest who is bearded, is vested for mass, and has a scapular pulled over his chasuble. But he appears also to be a .soldier, for he wears iron gauntlets ; and a student, for he carries a book ; and a slayer of monsters, for his right hand holds a stole, which is twisted round the neck of a dragon. Mr. ]\Iickleth- waite, F. S. A., has now proved that this is an ideal figure — an "All-hallows," of which it is an almost unique example. It was the custom in mediaeval churches to place at the east end an image of the patron saint. When a church was dedicated to All Saints, a figure was sometimes placed above the altar which represented the combined attributes of many saints; and this is the probable ex- planation of this curious composite figure. •JENNY-LIND- V /COLDSCHMIDT- \ THE STATUARY. WESTMINSTER ABBEY contains specimens of the scnlpture of five and a half centuries, from the recumbent effigies of the Plantagenets to Sir E. Boehm's statue of the Earl of Shaftesbury, Mr. Gilbert's memorial of Mr. Forster, and the bust of the x^merican poet, Longfellow. If we enter the cloisters we see still more ancient monuments in the South Cloister, where there are three effigies in low- relief of early abbots. The oldest is that of Abbot Vitalis, 10S5. There is scarcely one English sculptor of anj^ name who has not cumbered the Abbey with souie sign of his incapacit}'^ or enriched it with some specimen of his skill. " Every virtue is personified in marble to excess. Figures of Fame are blowing trumpets. In this Christian church there are statues of Minerva, Neptune, Hercules, and other heathen deities ; charity children are not omitted and, to complete the variety, there are not wanting negroes and Red Indians. There are also a number of statuettes of attendants, children, saints, or others, as weepers over the deceased." And, to complete the list, there are multitudes of dogs, lions, dragons, and other creatures, imaginary or real. Of the latter, few which are not heraldic deserve much notice. I cauuot even admire the highl}^ praised lions by Flaxman couched beside the pedestal of the statue of Captain Montague. Of the artistic merits and demerits, however, of these very numerous specimens of statuar}' I shall say but little. I shall speak mainly of the general inferences which we may draw from them, and then ask the reader to come with me and look at some of those which have a special interest. (37) 38 Westminster Abbey. One remarkable change in their general characteristics can hardly fail to strike us. The older monuments are religious, the latter ones are mundane. Every one of the earlier tombs which commemorate the dead, whether in the form of effigies or of monumental brasses, represents them in the attitudes of death and prayer. " Two praying hands," says the Russian proverb, " and life is done." The Tudors, Henry VII., Elizabeth of York, and Queen Elizabeth — since whom no English king or queen has been honoured with a tomb — as well as Mary, Queen of Scots, Margaret of Lennox, and Margaret of Richmond, are all similarly represented. The later ones, it is true, sometimes hold a ball and sceptre, but all the earlier have the two hands folded as in prayer upon the breast. The thought of what life has been is not excluded. Tlie kings sometimes wear their golden crowns ; the knights and crusaders are clad in their hauberk and mail ; the young Prince John of Eltham wears the coronet round his helmet ; the ladies are clothed in the nun's dress — like Eleanor of Gloucester or Margaret of Richmond. Dean Stanley and others have pointed out how gradual, but how decisive, was the change of sentiment which led to the exhibition on the tombs of the pride and self-assertion of life in lien of the repose and help- lessness of death. " It was not in England alone," says Westmacott, " that the miserable decline in ecclesiastical sculpture was apparent." It is observable in Italy, in St. Peter's, even in the tombs of the Popes. The true spirit of religious art disappeared, and sculpture, like painting, became a mere theatre in which to parade the vain science of the living, and the empty self-satisfaction of the dead man or his survivors. These later tombs are so lacking in repose that some of them look " as though they had been tumbled out of a waggon on the top of a pyramid." TOMB OF MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. Westminster Abbey. 39 After the sixteenth century it no longer seems to be the object to teach ns that man is a thing of nought, that his days pass like a shadow, that he is crushed before the moth, but rather to displaj^, as though they were enduring and desirable, the prizes and the magnificence of life. The epitaphs are no longer brief and simple, but revel in the enumeration of titles and the eulogy of achievements. The dead man flourishes his sword, or displays his book, or looks about him for applause, while (in time) all sorts of allegorical figures point at him, and crown him, and naked cherubs shed over him their imaginary and lu'pocritic tears. The figures of the departed first rise to their knees, as on the tomb of Lord Burleigh ; then stand erect, as on that of Sir George Holies ; then sit in their easy-chairs, like Elizabeth Russell, or even loll therein, like Wilberforce. Another wave of tendency which is most observable and sig- nificantly interesting is the different aspect in which death itself is re- garded. The early tombs were like radiant phantoms, with blue and vermilion, and gold, and glass mosaic, and lustrous enamels, and floral sculpturings, and angels with outspread wings. In these death was not presented as a thing re- volting and abhorrent, nor was any prominence given to the mere accidents of corruption and decay. The tombs of a later age become widely different. The skull and cross-bones — most futile, most conventional, most offensive of all " decorations " — appear for the first time on the unfinished tomb of Anne of Cleves. After that we get, with increasing frequency, the ridiculous multitudes of weeping children, and the females who sit under willows and clasp urns to their breast.* MONUMENT TO WILLIAM WILBERFORCE. * " The sum of a life expeuded, a pearl in a swine-trough cast, A comedy played aud ended — and what has it come to at last ? The dead face pressed on a pillow, the journey taken alone, And the tomb with an urn and a willow, and a lie carved deep in the stone." — G. J. Whyte-Melville. 40 Westmvtster Abbey. The attempt to force into prominence the fact that death is a thing for which to weep, and the angel of death a king of terrors, culminates in two tombs in the chapel of St. John the Evangelist. One — with the inscription Lacriniis struxit amor — is spotted all over with imaginary tear-drops, falling from an eye which is carved above it! The other is the famous tomb of Lady Elizabeth Nightin- gale, of which Burke disapproved, but which is usually regarded as Roubiliac's masterpiece, and which Wesley is said to have considered the finest monument in the Ab- be}', as showing " common sense among heaps of unmeaning stone and marble." Considered merely as sculpture, the contrasted figures of the dying wife and the startled, agonised husband are imdeniably fine and skilful, but nothing can be more repellent or less like the feeling with which the early Christians regarded death, than the revolting skeleton who issues, with his javelin, from the dark tomb below. The Renaissance, when it had sunk to decadence, was ac- companied by a gradual fading of the old religious ideals ; but it left as sad a legacy in the history of monumental sculpture by what it introduced as by what it dis- carded. It was marked by sheer paganism, vapid allegory, ostenta- tious science, pseudo-classicalisra, insincere or affected religionism, and monstrous in- congruities. A few instances will illustrate the disastrous change. Let the visitor walk, first, to the effigy of Margaret of Richmond, the gentle and noble mother of Henry VIL, who died, practically as a nun, in the monastery of Barking. As a piece of sculpture it is very lovely. We seem to see the TOMB OF I^ADY ELIZABETH NIGHTINGALE. Wrstviinstcr Abbey. 41 royal lad}- lying before us in her simple religious dress, with her face emaciated by asceticism, and furrowed, as in life-time, with many a tear. The hands, folded in prayer, are delicately perfect. There is no pride or pomposity about this memorial of the ancestress of a line of mighty kings. Walk from this monument to what remains of the vulgar and preposterous cenotaph to the now utterly forgotten Admiral Tyrrell, who died in 1766. It is in the south aisle of the nave — " a prodigious mass of rocks, clouds, sea, and ships." It almost blocked up an entire window with clouds like oyster shells, from which it received the name of " The Pancake." It is remarkable for the most ridiculous im- itation of waves ever devised by man. History, Navigation, Hibernia are represented as semi-nude figures under the sea among the rocks ; the latter is rapturously pointing to the spot on the terrestrial globe where the Admiral was born. The Admiral himself, nude, is — or rather was^ for the figure is now removed — ascend- ing out of the sea and soaring heavenwards, " looking for all the world," said Nollekens, " as if he were hanging from a gallows with a rope round his neck." We see the same "kicking gracefulness" on the tomb which represents the bald and semi-nude Kempenfeldt also soaring hea\enwards. Perhaps the earliest invasion of paganism into the monumental sculp- ture of our Christian minster is in the costly and pompous tomb raised by his widow to the Duke of Buckingham, the murdered favourite of Charles I. It is by Nicholas Stone. Here we have Fame "even bursting herself and her trum- pets to tell the news of his so sudden foil ; " and the pensive or weeping figures of Mars, Minerva, Neptune — and Beneficence! The juxtaposition reminds one of the four figures on the roof of the library at Trinity College, Cambridge, which as freshmen were told, stood for Faith, Hope, Charity, and — Geography! Yet these obtrusive heathen symbols are hardly so banalcs as the vapid allegorical figures of the later tombs. An anecdote will show how meaningless the symbolism became. Banks was offered three hundred pounds to carve a monument for some provincial gentleman. " Who was he ? '' he asked. " Was he benevo- lent ? " " Well, I don't know," said the visitor, " but he always gave sixpence to the old woman who opened the pew for him on Sunday." " That will do ! that will do ! " said the sculptor, " zuc viust have recourse to our frietid the pelican / " Rj's- brach (d. 1770) and Scheemacker (d. 1769) are, as a rule, more sensible. The bas- relief of the former on the tomb of Sir Isaac Newton is full of ingenuity and charm. Chantrey is somewhat prosaic, but to him we owe tlie final abandonment of these foolish figures. Once, when another sculptor told Chantrej' that he had been sculpturing a statue of Adam, Chantrey took snuff and looked up with the quick question, "Is it like f'' The difi&culties presented to a sculptor by our modern dress may be con- 42 Westinitister Abbey. ceded, but nothing can defend the absurdity of representing Sir Robert Peel, as Gibson has done, in the toga of a Roman senator. It is a matter of congratulation that the taste of modern times has returned to the tone of pre-Raphaelite days, and the effigies of Dean Stanley and Lord John Thynne are of the older and simpler tj'pe. There are some who have iirged the sweeping away of many of the cumbersome monstrosities of the later centuries, and restoring something of the architectural beauty and sj-mmetry which they in part deface. Dean Stanley ventured to take a few timid steps in this direction by pruning the luxuriance of the Tyrrell monument, and reducing the towering height of the one erected to Captain Cornewall. If an annexe to the Abbey existed I confess that I should like to place in it one or two of the huge structures which express the naval pride and exultation of the nation in the days of Howe and Rodney. They blot out many a fine vista, and take up a disproportionate amount of valuable space. I would also ruthlessly dimin- ish the masses of marble placed behind some of the statues, those for instance, of General Stringer and Lord Chatham. But further than that I would not go. The Abbey reflects the changes of every succeeding epoch. The very fact that it does so adds materially to its interest. Few things are more interesting than to trace back those changes to the deep-lying moral and spiritual facts in which they originated, and there is perhaps no building in the world where it is so easy to do this as it is in Westminster Abbey. TOMB OF SIR ISAAC NEWTON. '^9B THE EPITAPHS. AN ep for ISAAC WATTS DDf I HORN lULY 17 1674 r D^H) \()\':r) 1748 ISAAC WATTS. N epitaph, intended to be for years, perhaps centuries, the sole remaining memorial ot a person who has been in many cases honoured, and in most cases presumably beloved, is a composition which usually involves much care and consideration. Yet it is undeniable that nothing in the Abbey receives less attention than these inscriptioUs upon the tombs, though the tombs themselves are gazed upon with curiosity every year b}' hundreds of thousands of visitors ; and this is the more strange because many of these inscriptions have been written by men -who ■''-" ';V''.if'i^ were selected for their eminence and literary skill. One great cause for this neglect is to be found in the inordinate length of these too often pompous and needlessly verbose eulogies. That the epitaphs are invariably eulogistic was perhaps to be expected. "Where, then, do they bury the bad people?" asked a child, after reading in a cemetery the superhuman and exceptionless virtues of such a multitude of immaculate women and blameless men. There have been instances in which the record on the gravestone has been so notoriously belied by the memories of the life that we are not surprised at the line of the satirist — "Believe a woman or an epitaph." Perhaps the palmary instance of unconscious vanity and incongruity in this direction is found on the bust erected by Benson to Milton, in which we have one line al)out Milton and four or five about the small official magnificences of Benson. This curiosity should be given entire. It is — " This bust of the Author of ' Paradise Lost ' was placed here by William Benson, Esquire, one of the two Auditors of the Imprests to His Majesty King George II., formerly Surveyor-General of the works to H. M. King George I." (45) 46 Westminster Abbey. If the tombs of really great men were crowded with such facts their epitaphs would almost assume the proportions of biographies. The greatest meu and women, as a rule, have the shortest epitaphs, and have been those who would care least about loug ones. Two words, Carolus Magnus^ were enough for Karl the Great. We know that on the grave of Wordsworth, in Grasmere Churchyard, are only the two words " William Wordsworth." Keats wished nothing else carved on his tombstone than " Here lies one whose name was writ in water." On the fine bust of Dryden, raised to his memory by the Maecenas of literature in his day, John Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, the Duke knew that it was wholly unnecessary to add anything to the words, "John Dryden, born 1632, died May i, 1700." Already on the tomb of Spenser had been inscribed the w-ords — " Here lies (expecting the second coming of onr Saviour Christ Jesus) the bod)- of Edmund Spenser, the Prince of Poets in his time, whose divine spirit needs no other witness than the works which he left l)ehind him. He was born in London in 1553, and died in 1598." The tombs and graves and busts of Samuel Johnson, David Garrick, Isaac Watts, George Grote, Charles Darwin, Robert Browning, Charles Dickens, and others, are marked only by their names and the dates of their birth and death. On the grave of Newton are the words, Hie dcpositum est Isaaci Newtoni quod uiortale fait. On the cenotaph of Samuel Butler, the author of " Hudibras," J. Barber, Lord Mayor of London, placed the not unhappy turn of speech, "Ne cui vivo deerant fere omnia Deesset etiam mortuo tumulus." The Abbey contains but two epitaphs by Lord Tennyson. One is on Sir Stratford de Redcliffe — "Thou third great Canning, stand among our best And noblest, now thy long day's work hath ceased, Here silent in our Minster of the West, Who wert the voice of England in the East." The inscriptions on the tombs of later days show a marked increase of taste and common-sense. Thej^ are in many cases brief, striking, and essentially illustrative of the lives and characters of those whose memory they are intended to perpetuate. This was mainly due to the genial wisdom, wide reading, and lit- erary taste of Dean Stanley, to whom all who love the Abbey owe an inesti- mable debt of gratitude. He made the epitaphs not only fitting memorials of the dead, but also to be, like the Hermas at Athens, a source of instruction and moral ennoblement to all who read their lofty sentiments. Thus, under the bust of the first Lord Lawrence are inscribed the words spoken of him by a friend — " He feared Westfunisfrr Abbey. A7 man so little because he feared God so much." On the cenotaph of John and Charles Wesley are carved three famous sayings of the founder of the Methodists — " The best of all is, God is with us ; " which were the words repeated by him three times, with strange energy, as he lay on his death-bed. " I look on the whole world as my Parish ; " words which he used as a defence of the evangelistic energy of his life; and ^^^^ wesley. m a • OflM JUNC IT. 1703 OtEO MARCN 2 lltl. CHARLES WESLEY. MA. BORN DCCEMBCn (S. ITOBT DIED MANCH 79 178k. "THE BEST OF AL IS, COO IS WITH US" " God buries His workmen, but carries on His work." In a grave where rested for a time the remains of the philanthropist, George Peabody, are inscribed his best-known words — " I have prayed my Heavenly Father day by day that He would enable me to show my gratitude for the blessings which I have received by doiug some great good for my fellow-men." Again, on the grave of Livingstone, which is always a point of the deepest interest to all visitors of the Abbey, are recorded the last words he ever wrote — the words which he had written in his diary very shortly before he was found by his black followers dead upon his knees. "All I can add in my solitude is, M.ay Heaven's rich bles.sing come down on every one, American, Englisli, or Turk, who will help to heal this open sore of the world," /'. c, the slave trade. Certainly the two epitaphs in the Abbey which, as epitaphs, are most famous and most frequently repeated are those on a great dramatist and an un- known little child. Every one reads with interest the well-known words, "O Rare Ben Jonson," which a casual passer-by had engraved, at a cost of half-a-crown to the sexton, on the square stone under which the poet was buried upright. He has never needed any other memorial. In the cloister is a plain tablet to a little child of the humbler classes, who died in infancy in the year of revolution i6S8. "In that eventful year of the Revolution," says Dean Stanley, " when Church and State were reeling to their foundation, this dear child found her quiet resting-place in the eastern cloister. The sigh over the prematurely ended life is petrified into 48 Westnii)ister Abbey. stone, and affects us the more deeply from the great events amidst which it is enshrined." There is no other inscription of all these hundreds which recalls the pathetic, exquisite simplicity of the epitaphs in the Catacombs, where the perse- cuted Christians of the first centuries rest in peace. It is simply, " Here lyes Jane Lister, dear Childe." On Dean Stanley's own altar-tomb of alabaster is an inscription such as DEAN STANLEY'S ALTAR-TOMB. he himself would have approved. It gives no pompous enumeration of titles and honours, but the date of his career, and the appropriate text — " I know that all things come to an end ; But Thy commandments are exceeding broad." I think that a visit to the Abbey may teach us two lessons, among many others, which we should all try to learn : namely, tolerance for opinions, and sym- pathy with men. We should here learn to be tolerant of opinions which differ widely from our own. Here lie side by side a multitude of those who were equally good and great, yet who in their lifetime regarded each other as heinous heretics and IVcslniiiislcr Abbey. SI monstrous blasphemers. The dust of Romanist abbot sleeps side by side with the dust of Protestant dean, and the great EHzabetli, true queen of the Reformation, shares the same quiet tomb with the Papist Alary, as they each experienced the trials of the same uneasy throne. Sir Walter Scott, recalling that the great rivals, Pitt and Fox, sleep under the same pavement within a few feet of each other, sings — " Here, where the end of earthly things La)-s heroes, patriots, bards, and kings. Where still the hand and still the tongue Of those who fought, and spoke, and sung. Here where the fretted aisles prolong The distant notes of holy song, As if some angel spoke again, 'All peace on earth, good will to men' — If ever from an English heart, Oh, here let prejudice depart."' If the aspiration be need- ful as regards political differ ences, how much more needful is it with reference to those " unhappy divisions " which rend asunder the peace of the Christian Church! But the lesson of a wise and noble tolerance in judging of opinions is closely connected with the dnt}' of loving sympathy for men. To create gaps and chasms in history which separate us from this or that age of our forefathers by the discontinuity of fierce aversions, is even a smaller evil than the almost universal lack of charity in speaking or thinking of living men. Westmiuster Abbey should be " a great temple of silence and reconciliation, where the discords of twenty generations lie buried." Let us dwell on the greatness and goodness of "famous men, and the fathers who begat us," rather than on their differences, and human frailties, and mutual persecutions, and all their "glimmerings and decays." Of all tempers that exist among mankind, surely the vilest and the most serpentine is that which delights in criticism and depreciation. If sensuality be- longs to the beast within us, malice and envy and lies belong to the demons. MONUMENT TO CHARLES JAMES FOX. C2 IVeshninstcr Abbey. To revel in " the loatlisome and lying spirit of defamation, which studies man only in the skeleton, and nature only in ashes," may be the glory of the world- ling, but it is the infamy of the Christian. Here, in the quiet light of history, we may read that many who, in their lifetime, hated and denounced each other, who embittered each other's brief, sad lives, and would even have burnt one another, were yet the common servants of one dear Lord. "The meek, the just, the pious, the devout," said William Penn, " are all of one religion." How bitter have been the mutual animosities of schools, and parties, and rival Churches ! Yet here surely we may honour, and reverence, and love the beauty of holiness in all God's saints, and pray that He would make us mindful to follow their good examples. How fully may the}^ have learnt beyond these noises, " That all their early creed was not correct, That God is not the leader of a sect ! " Once, in the French wars, an English frigate encountered another during the night. Each mistook the other for a French man-of-war. They fought with each other furiously, they injured each other desperatel}', in the darkness. Da}' dawned, and lo ! with salutes and bitter weeping, amid the dead and the dying and the shattered debris of the fight, each recognized the English flag flying over the other ship, and found that they had been injuring their common country, slaying and shattering their friends and brethren. Ah ! let us not make the same mistake in the twilight of our earthly opinions. When we are tempted to shoot out our arrows, even bitter words, against those who differ from us, let us remember how we must weep and blush for such base and ignorant railing when we see them shining in the light of their Saviour's presence, God's chosen saints before His throne. DIGNITARIES. DEAN STANLEY. ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, D. D. AT WESTMINSTER, the late lamented Dean, Arthur Penrh3'n Stanley, has, by his memorials of the Abbey (1S67), put all visitors under his debt. His ■was a most interesting personality, universally popular in societ\^ owing to the charm of his manner and the delight of his conversation. He was a leader of the Broad Church party and was not infrequently misunderstood, and credited with laxer views and greater heterodoxy than he reall}^ possessed, through the warm enthusiasm with which he defended any one whom he believed to be suffering for con- science' sake. The vividness and power of diction displayed in his lectures on the Jewish Church and other theological works gave them great popularity, though, as Bishop Lightfoot's criticism of his commentary shows, there are many misstatements, inaccuracies and contradictions to be found in them b}^ a more impartial scholar. July 18, iSSi, he died, and was buried in the Abbey. (55) FREDERIC WILLIAM FARRAR, D.D. ONE should not visit Westminster without, if possible, listening to the eloquent Canon and Rector of little St. Margaret's, Frederic William Farrar, Archdeacon of Westminster. To his oriental birthplace (born at Bomba_y, August 7, 1831,) possibly some of the vivid rhetoric and pictorial imagination which mark his books may be owing. He has been a prolific writer upon a wide range of subjects, first becoming known as the author of rather sensational tales of school-boy life, next of books upon language, and finally of theological works, which, through his poetic temperament and superabundant fertility of language, joined to an undoubted scholar- ship, have become very popular. It may suffice to name his "Eternal Hope," denying the usually accepted doctrine of the future state of the wicked, which aroused a great controversy, and his Life of Christ, which has been called the most widely read theological work of the century, reaching a twelfth edition in the 3'ear of its publication. The latter is a brilliant reproduction of the Gospel narratives refracted and considerably coloured by the writer's imagination. Archdeacon Farrar is an ardent teetotaler and champion of the Low Church party, though probably better described as a Broad-churchman himself. The recent promotion of Archdeacon Farrar to the Deanerj' of Canterbury has met with general approval. (56) DEAN FARRAR. ST, PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. ST. PAUL'S. W TAS, then, the Fire of London, if so renior-seless, so fatal a de- stroyer ? Are we to mourn with nqmitigated sorrow over the de- molition of old St. Paul's ? Of Eng- land's more glorious cathedrals, it seems to me, I confess, none could be so well spared. Excepting its vast size, it had nothing to distinguish it. It must have been a glooni}-, ponderous pile. The nave and choir were of different ages (that was common), but ill formed, ill adjusted together, with disproportioned aisles, and transepts, and a low, square, somewhat clumsy tower, out of which once rose a spire, tall indeed, but merelj- built of wood- work and lead. London would, at best, have been forced to bow its head before the cathedrals of man}- of our provincial DEAN MILMAN. ^-^-^^^ qj^^ g^ ^^^y^ ^^^ nothing of the prodigal magnificence, the harmonious variety of Lincoln, the stateh' majesty of York, the solemn grandeur of Canterbury, the perfect, sky-aspiring unity of Salisburj-. It had not even one of the great conceptions which are the pride and boast of some of our other churches ; neither the massy strength of Durham, " looking eternit}' " with its marvellous Galilee, nor the tower of Gloucester, nor the lantern of El}', nor the rich picturesqueness of Beverle}', nor the deep receding, highly decorated arches of the M-est front of Peter- borough. And of ancient St. Paul's, the bastard Gothic of Inigo Jones had cased the venerable if decayed walls throughout with a flat, incongruous facing. The unrivalled (6i) 62 S/. PauPs. beauty of luigo Jones's "Portico" was the deformity of the church. Even iu its imme- diate neighbourhood, though wanting a central tower, and its western towers, not too suc- cessfully afterwards added by Sir Christopher Wren, the Abbey, with its fine soaring columns, its beautiful proportions, its solemn, gray, diapered walls, — the Abbe}', with its intricate cliapels, with its chambers of royal tombs, with Henry VII. 's Chapel, an excres- cence indeed, but in sufficient harmony with the main building, in itself an inimitable model of its style, crowned by its richly fretted roof, — the Abbey of Westminster would have put to perpetual shame the dark, unimpressive pile of the City of London : West- Jlu I ii./.iiil,ii. i_: ST. JIARTIX'S CIIUKCH. answer, bearing upon it a stamp of truth which it is impossible to doubt : " Your words are fair, and your promises ; but because they are new and doubtful, I cannot give my assent to them, and leave the customs which I have so long observed, with the whole Anglo-Saxon race. But because you have come hither as strangers from a long distance, and as I seem to myself to have seen clearly that what you yourselves believe to be true and good you wish to impart to us, we do not wish to molest you ; nay, rather we are anxious to receive you hospitably, and to give you all that is needed for your support, nor do we hinder you from joining all whom you can to the faith of your religion." Such an answer, simple as it was, really seems to contain the seeds of all that is excellent in the English character. Canterbury. 91 From tlie Isle of Thanet, the missionaries crossed the broad ferry to Rich- borough. Underneath the overhanging cliff of the castle, so the tradition ran, the King received the missionaries. They then advanced to Canterbury by the Roman road over St. IMartin's Hill. The first object that would catch their view would be the little British chapel of St. Martin — a welcome sight, as showing that the Christian faith was not wholly strange to this new land. And then, in the valley below, on the banks of the river, appeared the city — the rude wooden city as it then was — embosomed in thick- ets. In St. IMartin's they wor- shipped ; and no doubt the mere splendour and strangeness of the Roman ritual produced an in- stant effect on the rude barba- rian mind. And now came the turning-point of their whole mis- sion, the baptism of Ethelbert. We know the da}^ — it was the Feast of Whit-Sunday — on the 2d of June, in the year of our Lord 597. Unfortunately we do not with certainty know the place. Still, as St. Martin's Church is described as the scene of Augustine's ministra- tions, and, amongst other points, of his administration of baptism, it is in the highest degree prob- able that the local tradition is correct. i\.nd although the ven- erable font, which is there shown as that in which he was baptised, is proved by its appearance to be, at least in its upper part, of a later date, yet it is so like that which appears in the representation of the event in the seal of St. Augustine's Abbey, and is in itself so remarkable, that we may perhaps fairly regard it as a monument of the event. The conversion of a King was then of more importance than it has ever been before or since. The baptism of any one BAPTISM.\L FONT, ST. MARTIN S CHURCH. 92 Cantcrbiirv- of these barbarian chiefs almost inevitably involved the baptism of the whole tribe, and therefore we are not to be snrprised at finding that when this step was once achieved, all else was easy. The next stage of the mission carries us to another spot. Midway between St. Martin's and the town was another ancient building — also, it would appear, al- though this is less positively stated, once a British church, but now used by Ethel- bert as a temple in which to worship the gods of Saxon paganism. This temple Ethelbert did not destroy, but made over to Augustine for a regular place of Christian worship. Augustine dedi- cated the place to St. Pancras, and it became the Church of St. Pancras, of which the spot is still indicated by a ruined arch of ancient brick, and by the fragment of a wall. But Ethelbert was not satisfied with establishing those places of wor- ship outside the city. Augustine was now formally consecrated as the first Archbishop of Canterbury, and Ethel- bert determined to give him a dwelling- place and a house of prayer within the city also, and gave up his own palace and an old British or Roman church in its neighbourhood, to be the seat of the new archbishop and the foundation of the new cathedral. As St. Martin's and St. Pan- cras's witnessed the first beginning of English Christianity, so Canterbury Cathedral is the earliest monument of an English Church Establishment — of the English constitution of the union of Church and State. Of the actual building of this first cathedral, nothing now remains ; yet there is much, even now, to remind us of it. First, there is the venerable chair, in which, for so many generations, the primates of England have been enthroned, and which, though probably of a later date, may yet rightly be called " St. Augus- tine's Chair." Finally, in the neighbourhood of the Church of St. Pancras, where he had first begun to perform Christian service, Ethelbert granted to Augustine the ground on which was to be built the monastery that afterwards grew up into the ST. AUGUSTINE'S CHAIR. Can/nhiiry. 93 great abbey called by his name. His last act at Canterburj', of which we can sj)eak witli certainty, was his consecration of two monks who had been sent out after liim by Gregory to two new sees — two new steps farther into tlie country, still under the shelter of Ethelbert. Justus became Bishop of Rochester, and Mellitus Bishop of Loudon. The arrival of Augustine explains to us at once why the primate of this great Church, the first subject of this great empire, should be Archbishop not of London, but of Canterbury. Humble as Canterbury may now be — " Kent itself but a corner of England, and Canterbury seated in a corner of that corner " — 5'et so long as an Archbishop of Canterbury exists, so long as the Church of England exists, Canterbury can never forget that it had the glory of being the cradle of English Christianity. Let any one sit on the hill of the little Church of St. Martin, and look on the view which is there spread before his eyes. Immediatelj' below are the towers of the great Abbey of St. Augustine, where Christian learning and civilisation first struck root in the Anglo-Saxon race ; and within which now, after a lapse of many centuries, a new institution has arisen, intended to carry far and wide to countries of which Gregory and Augustine never heard, the blessings which they gave to us. Carry your view on — and there rises high above all the magnificent pile of our cathedral, equal in splendour and state to any, the noblest temple or church that Augustine could have seen in ancient Rome, rising on the very ground which de- rives its consecration from him. And still more than the grandeur of the outward buildings that rose from the little church of Augustine and the little palace of Eth- elbert, have been the institutions of all kinds, of which these were the earliest cradle. From Canterbury, the first English Christian city ; from Kent, the first English Christian kingdom — has, by degrees, arisen the whole constitution of Church and State in England which now binds together the whole British Empire. And from the Christianity here established in England has flowed, by direct consequence, first, the Christianit}' of Germany ; then, after a long interval, of North America ; and lastly, we may trust in time, of all India and all Australasia. The view from St. Martin's Church is indeed one of the most inspiriting that can be found in the world ; there is none to which I would more willingly take any one who doubted whether a small beginning could lead to a great and lasting good — none Vvdiich car- ries us more vividly back into the past or more hopefully forward to the future. 94 Ca)iicrbury. THE MURDER OF BECKET. THE year 1170 witnessed the termination of the struggle of eight years between the King and the Archbishop. In addition to the general question of the immu- nities of the clergy from secular jurisdiction, which was the original point in dispute between the King and the Archbishop, another had arisen within this very year, of much less importance in itself, but which now threw the earlier controversy into the shade, and eventually brought about the iinal catastrophe. In the preceding June, Henry, with the view of consolidating his power in England, had caused his eldest son to be crowned king. In the absence of the Archbishop of Canterbury the ceremony of coronation was performed \>y Roger, Archbishop of York, assisted by Gilbert Foliot and Jocelyn the Lombard, Bishops of London and of Salisbury, under (what was at least believed to be) the sanction of a Papal brief. The moment the intelligence was communicated to Becket, a new blow seemed to be struck at his rights ; but this time it was not the privileges of his order, but of his office, that were attacked. The inalienable right of crowning the sovereigns of England, from the time of Augustine downwards, inherent in the See of Canterbury, had been infringed ; and with his usual ardour he procured from the Pope letters against the three prelates who had taken part in the daring act. Tuesday, his friends remarked, had alwa^-s been a significant daj' in Becket's life. On a Tuesday he was born and baptised ; on a Tuesday he had fled from Northampton ; on a Tuesday he had left England on his exile ; on a Tuesday he had received warning of his martyrdom in a vision at Pontigny ; on a Tuesdaj^ he had returned from that exile. It was now on a Tuesday that the fatal hour came ; and (as the next generation observed) it was on a Tuesday that his enemy. King Henry, was buried, on a Tuesday that the martyr's relics were translated ; and Tuesday was long afterwards regarded as the week-day especially consecrated to the saint with whose fortunes it had thus been so strange!}' interwoven. In the morning he attended Mass in the cathedral ; then passed a long time in the chapter-house, confessing to two of the monks, and receiving, as seems to have been his custom, three sconrgings. Then came the usual banquet in the great hall of the palace at three in the afternoon. He was observed to drink more than usual ; and his cup-bearer, in a whisper, reminded him of it. " He who has much blood to shed," answered Becket, " must drink much." The dinner was now over ; the concluding hymn or " grace " was finished, and Becket had retired to his private room, where he sat on his bed, talking to his friends. A violent assault on the door of the hall, and the crash of a wooden partition in the passage from the orchard, announced that the danger was close at hand. The Canterbury. gj monks, with that extraordinary timidity which they always seem to have displayed, instantly fled, leaving only a small body of his intimate friends or faithful attendants. They united in entreating him to take refuge in the cathedral. " No," he said ; " fear not ; all monks are cowards." On this some sprang upon him, aud endeavoured to drag him there by main force ; others urged that it was now five o'clock, that vespers were beginning, and that his duty called him to attend the service. Partly forced, partly persuaded by the argument, partly feeling that his doom called him thither, he rose aud moved ; but seeing that his cross-staff was not as usual borne before him, he stopped and called for it. Thrice they were delayed, even in that short passage ; for thrice he broke loose from them. At last they reached the door of the lower north transept of the cathedral, and here was presented a new scene. The vespers had already begun, and the monks were singing their service in the choir, when two boys rushed up the nave, announcing, more by their terrified gestures than b}^ their words, that the soldiers were bursting into the palace and the monastery. Instantly the service was thrown into the utmost confusion ; part remained at prayer, part fled into the numerous hiding-places which the vast fabric affords, and part went down the steps of the choir into the transept to meet the little band at the door. " Come in, come in ! " exclaimed one of them ; " come in, and let us die together ! " The Archbishop continued to stand outside, and said, " Go and finish the service. So long as you keep in the entrance, I shall not come in." Becket, who had stepped some paces into the cathedral, but was resisting the solici- tations of those immediately about him to move up into the choir for safety, darted back, calling aloud as he went, " Away, j'ou cowards ! By virtue of your obedi- ence I command you not to shut the door ; the church must not be turued into a castle." It was, we must remember, about five o'clock in a winter evening. The tran- sept in which the knights found themselves is the same as that which, though with considerable changes in its arrangements, is still known by its ancient name of " The ]\Iartyrdom." At the moment of their entrance the central pillar exactly inter- cepted their view of the Archbishop ascending the eastern staircase. Fitzurse, with his drawn sword in one hand, and a carpenter's axe in the other, sprang in first, and turned at once to the right of the pillar. The other three went round it to the left. lu the dim twilight they could just discern a group of figures mounting the steps. Oue of the knights called out to them, " Stay ! " Another, " Where is Thomas Becket, traitor to the king?" No answer was returned. Fitzurse rushed forward, and exclaimed, " Where is the Archbishop ? " Instantly the answer came : " Reginald, here I am — no traitor, but the Archbishop and Priest of God ; what do you wish ? " Attired, we are told, in his white rochet, with a cloak and hood thrown over his shoulders, he thus suddenly confronted his assailants. 98 Canterbury. The well-known borror wliicli in that age was felt at an act of sacrilege, together with the sight of the crowds who were rushing in from the town through the nave, turned their efforts for the next few moments to carry him out of the church. Fitzurse threw down the axe, and tried to drag him out by the collar of his long cloak, calling, "Come with us; you are our prisoner." "I will not fly, you detestable fellow!" was Becket's reply, roused to his usual vehemence and wrenching the cloak out of Fitzurse's grasp. Becket set his back against the pillar and resisted with all his might ; whilst Grim, vehemently remonstrating, threw his arms around him to aid his efforts. In the scuffle Becket fastened upon Tracy, shook him by his coat of mail, and exerting his great strength, flung him down on the pavement. It was hope- less to carry on the attempt to remove him, and, in the final struggle which now began, Fitz- iirse, as before, took the lead. But as he approached with his drawn sword, the sight of him kindled afresh the Archbishop's anger, now heated by the fray ; the spirit of the chancellor rose within him, and with a coarse epi- thet, not calculated to turn away his adversary's wrath, he ex- claimed, " You profligate wretch, you are my man — you have done me fealty — you ought not to touch me ! " Fitzurse, glowing all over with rage, retorted, " I owe you no fealty or homage, contrary to my fealty to the King," and waving the sword over his head cried, " Strike, strike! " [Fercz, ferez !) but merely dashed off his cap. The Archbishop covered his eyes with his joined hands, bent his neck, and said, " I commend my cause and the cause of the Church to God, to Saint Denys the martjT of France, to Saint Alfege, and to the saints of the Church." Meantime Tracy, who since his fall had thrown off his TRANSEPT OF MARTYRDOM. Canterbury. gg hauberk to move more easily, sprang forward, and struck a more decided blow. Grim, who up to this moment had his arm round Becket, threw it up, wrapped in a cloak, to intercept the blade, Becket exclaiming, " Spare this defence ! " The sword lighted on the arm of the monk, which fell wounded or broken ; and he fled disabled to the nearest altar, probably that of St. Benedict, within the chapel. The blood from the first blow was trickling down Becket's face in a thin streak ; he wiped it with his arm, and when he saw the stain, he said, " Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend mj^ spirit." At the third blow, which was also from Tracy, he sank on his knees — his arms falling, but his hands still joined as if in pra3'er. With his face turned towards the altar of St. Benedict, he murmured in a low voice — which might just have been caught bj' the wounded Grim, who was crouching close by, and who alone reports the words — " For the name of Jesus, and the defence of the Church, I am willing to die." Without moving hand or foot, he fell flat on his face as he spoke, in front of the corner wall of the chapel, and with such dignity that his mantle, which extended from head to foot, was not disarranged. In this posture he received from Richard the Breton a tremendous blow, accompanied with the exclamation (in allusion to a quarrel of Becket with Prince William), "Take this for love of my Lord William, brother of the King ! " The stroke was aimed with such violence that the scalp or crown of the head — which, it was remarked, was of unusual size — was severed from the skull, and the sword snapped in two on the marble pavement. The frac- ture of the murderous weapon was reported b}' one of the eyewitnesses as a presage of the ultimate discomfiture of the Archbishop's enemies. Hugh of Horsea, the subdeacon who had joined them as they entered the church, taunted by the others with having taken no share in the deed, planted his foot on the neck of the corpse, thrust his sword into the ghastly wound, and scattered the brains over the pavement. " Let us go, let us go," he said, in conclusion. " The traitor is dead ; he will rise no more." It was not till the night had quite closed in, that Osbert, the chamberlain of the Archbishop, entering with a light, found the corpse lying on its face, the scalp hanging by a piece of skin ; he cut off a piece of his shirt to bind up the frightful gash. The doors of the cathedral were again opened, and the monks returned to the spot. Then, for the first time, they ventured to give way to their grief, and a loud lamentation resounded through the stillness of the night. When they turned the body with its face upwards, all were struck by the calmness and beauty of the countenance : a smile still seemed to play on the features, the color on the cheeks was fresh, and the eyes were closed as if in sleep. After t3'ing up the head with clean linen, and fastening the cap over it, the}' placed the body on a bier, and carried it up the successive flights of steps which led from the lOO Canterbury. transept through the choir — "the glorious choir," as it was called, " of Conrad" — to the high altar, iu frout of which they laid it down. The night was now far advanced, but the choir was usually lighted — and probably, therefore, on this great occasion — by a chandelier with twenty-four wax tapers. Vessels were placed underneath the body to catch any drops of blood that might fall, and the monks sat around weeping. The aged Robert, Canon of Merton, the earliest friend and instructor of Becket, and one of the three who had remained with him to the last, consoled them by a narration of the austere life of the martj-red prelate, which hitherto had been known only to himself, as the confessor of the Primate, and to Brun the valet. In proof of it he thrust his hand iinder the garments, and showed the monk's habit and haircloth shirt, which he wore next to his skin. This was the one thing wanted to raise the enthusiasm of the b3'standers to the highest pitch. Early in the next day a rumour or message came to the monks that Robert de Broc for- bade them to bury the body among the tombs of the Arch- bishops. They accordingly closed the doors, which apparently had remained open through the night to admit the populace, and deter- mined to bury the corpse in the NORMAN BAPISTERY. Thither they carried it, and in that venerable vault proceeded to their mournful The fortunes of the King grew darker and darker with the rebellion of his It was this which led to the great penance at Canterbury. [1174.] He arrived at Southampton on Monday, the 8th of July. From that moment he began to live crypt, task. sons. Canterbury. loi on the penitential diet of bread and ^vater, and deferred all bnsiness till lie had fulfilled his vow. At St. Dunstan's Church, he entered the edifice with the prelates who were present, stripped off his ordinary dress, and walked through the streets in the guise of a penitent pilgrim — barefoot, and with no other covering than a woolen shirt, and a cloak thrown over it to keep ofi" rain. So, amidst a wondering crowd — the rough stones of the streets marked with the blood that started from his feet — he reached the cathedral. There he knelt in the porch, then entered the church, and went straight to the scene of the murder in the north transept. Here he knelt again, and kissed the sacred stone on which the Archbishop had fallen, the prelates standing round to receive his confession. Thence he was conducted to the crj-pt, where he again knelt, and with groans and tears kissed the tomb and remained long in prayer. At this stage of the solemnity Gilbert Foliot, Bishop of London — the ancient opponent and rival of Becket — addressed the monks and bystanders, announcing to them the King's penitence. The King requested absolution, and received a kiss of reconciliation from the prior. He knelt again at the tomb, removed the rough cloak which had been thrown over his shoulders, but still retained the woolen shirt to hide the haircloth, which was visible to near observation, next his skin, placed his head and shoulders in the tomb, and there received five strokes from each bishop and abbot who was present, beginning with Foliot, who stood by with the " balai," or monastic rod, in his hand, and three from each of the eighty monks. Fully absolved, he resumed his clothes, but was still left in the crypt, resting against one of the rude Norman pillars, on the bare ground, with bare feet still unwashed from the mudd}^ streets, and passed the whole night fasting. For those who believe that an indiscriminate maintenance of ecclesiastical claims is the best service they can render to God and the Church, and that opposition to the powers that be is enough to entitle a bishop to the honours of a saint and a hero, it mav not be without instruction to remember that the Constitutions of Clarendon, which Becket spent his life in opposing, and of which his death procured the suspension, are now incorporated in the English law, and are regarded, without a dissentient voice, as among the wisest and most necessary of English institutions ; that the especial point for which he surrendered his life was not the independence of the clerg}' from the encroachments of the crown, but the personal and now forgotten question of the superiority of the See of Canterbur}' to the See of York. I02 Canterbury. EDWARD THE BLACK PRINCE. EVERY one who lias endeavoured to study history must be struck by the advan- tage which those enjoy who live within the neighbourhood of great historical monuments. To have seen the place where a great event happened ; to have seen the picture, the statue, the tomb, of an illustrious man — is the next thing to being present at the event in person, to seeing the scene with our own eyes. In this respect few spots in England are more highly favoured than Canterbury. It is not too much to say that if any one were to go through the various spots of interest in or around our great cathedral, and ask what happened here — who was the man whose tomb we see — wh}' was he buried here — what effect did his life or his death have on the world — a real knowledge of the history of England would be ob- tained, such as the mere reading of books or hearing of lectures would utterly fail to supply. If any one asks why Canterbury is what it is — why from this small town the first subject in this great kingdom takes his title — why we have any cathedral at all — the answer is to be found in that great event, the most important that has ever occurred in English history — the conversion of Ethelbert, King of Kent, by the first missionary, Augustine. And if }-ou would understand this, it will lead you to make out for yourselves the history of the Saxon kings. And then if you enter the cathe- dral, you will find in the tombs which lie within its walls remembrances of almost every reign in the history of England. Augustine and the first seven Archbishops are buried at St. Augustine's ; but from that time to the Reformation they have, with a very few exceptions, been buried in the cathedral, and even where no tombs are left, the places where they were buried are for the most part known. And the Arch- bishops being at the time not only the chief ecclesiastics, but also the chief officers of state in the kiugdom, their graves tell you not merely the history of the Eng- lish clergy, but also of the whole Commonwealth and State of England besides. It is for this reason that there is no church, no place in the kingdom, with the exception of Westminster Abbey, that is so closely connected with the general his- tory of our common country. The kings before the Reformation are for the most part in the Abbey ; but their prime ministers, so to speak, are for the most part in Canterbury Cathedral. Ask who it was that first laid out the monastery, and who it was that laid the foundations of the cathedral as it now stands, and you will find that it was Lanfranc, the new Archbishop whom William the Conqueror brought over with him from Nor- mandy, and who thus re-established the old church with his Norman workmen. Then look at the venerable tower on the south side of the cathedral, and ask who lies buried within, and from whom it takes its name, and you will find yourself with Canfnh/iiy. 103 Anselm, the wise counsellor of William Rufus and Henry I. — Anselm, the great theologian, who of all the Primates of the See of Canterbury is the best known by his life and writings throughout the world. And then we come to the most remarkable event that has happened at Canterbury since the arrival of Augustine, and of which the effect may be traced not in one part only, but almost through every stone in the cathedral — the murder of Becket, followed by the penance of Henry II. and the long succession of Canterbur}^ pil- grims. Then, in the south aisle, the efiSgy of Hubert Wal- ter brings before us the camp of the Crusaders at Acre, where he was appointed Archbishop by Richard I. Next look at that simple tomb in St. ^Michael's Chapel, half in and half out of the church, and you will be brought to the time of King John ; for it is the grave of Stephen Langton, who more than any one man won for us the Magna Charta. Then look back at the north transept, at the wooden statue that lies in the corner. That is the grave of Archbishop Peckham, in the reign of King Edward I. ; and close beside that spot King Edward I. was married. And now we come to the reign of King Edward III. And so we might pass on to Archbishop Sudbury, who lost his head in the reign of Richard 11. ; to Henry IV., who lies there himself; to Chichele, who takes us on to Henry V. and Henry YI. ; to Morton, who reminds us of Henry VII. and Sir Thomas More ; to Warham, the friend of Erasmus, predecessor of Archbishop Cranmer ; and then to the subsequent troubles — of which the cathedral still bears the marks — in the Reformation and the Civil Wars. Let us place ourselves in imagination by the tomb of the most illustrious layman who rests among us, Edward Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, commonly called lUMB 01< XHK BLACK PRINCE. I04 Canterbury. the Black Prince. Let us ask whose likeness is it that we there see stretched before us — why was he buried in this place, amongst the Archbishops and sacred shrines of former times? The events of his life which have made him famous in war were the two great battles of Cressy and of Poitiers. It is enough for us to remember that the war was undertaken by Edward III. to gain the crown of France — a claim, through his mother, which he had solemnly relinquished, but which he now resumed to satisfy the scruples of his allies, the citizens of Ghent, who thought that their oath of allegiance to the " King of France " would be redeemed if their leader did but bear the name. FRENCH CHAPEL IN THE CRYPT. Canterbury had soon a substantial connection with the Black Prince. In 1363 he married his cousin Joan in the chapel at Windsor, which witnessed no other royal wedding till that beautiful and touching day which witnessed the union of our own Prince of Wales with the Princess Alexandra of Denmark. Of these nuptials Edward the Black Prince left a memorial in the beautiful chapel still to be seen in the crypt of the cathedral, where two priests were to pray for his soul, first in his lifetime, and also, according to the practice of those times, after his death. It is now, by a strange turn of fortune, which adds another link to the historical interest of the place, the entrance to the chapel of the French congregation — the descendants of the very nation whom he conquered at Poitiers ; but you can still trace the situa- Canterbury. 105 tion of the two altars where his priests stood, and on the groined vaultings you can see his arms and the arms of his father, and, in connection with the joyful event, in thankfulness for which he founded the chapel, what seems to be the face of his beautiful wife, commonly known as the Fair Maid of Kent. Seldom, if ever, has the death of one man so deeply struck the sympathy of the English people. Our fathers saw the mourning of the whole country over the Princess Charlotte, and the great funeral procession which conveyed the remains of Nelson to their resting-place in St. Paul's — we ourselves have seen the deep grief over the death of our most illustrious statesman. For nearly four months — from the 8th of June to the 29th of September — the cofl&ned body laj^ in state at Westminster, and then as soon as Parliament met again, as usual in those times, on the festival of Michaelmas, was brought to Canterbury. It was laid in a stately hearse, drawn by twelve black horses ; and the whole Court, aud both houses of Parliament, followed in deep mourning. On entering Canterbury they paused at the west gate. Here thej^ were met — so the Prince had desired in his will — by two chargers, fully caparisoned, and mounted by two riders in complete armour — one bearing the Prince's arms of England and France, the other the ostrich feathers ; one to represent the Prince in his splendid suit as he rode in war, the other to represent him in black as he rode to tournaments. Four black banners followed. So they passed through the streets of the city, till they reached the gate of the Precincts. Here, according to the custom, the armed men halted, and the body was carried into the cathedral. In the space between the high altar and the choir a bier was placed to receive it, whilst the funeral services were read, surrounded with burning tapers and with all the heraldic pomp which marked his title and rank. Let us turn to that tomb, and see how it sums up his whole life. Its bright colors have long since faded, but enough still remains to show what it was as it stood after the sacred remains had been placed within it. There he lies : no other memorial of him exists in the world so authentic. There he lies, as he had directed, in full armour, his head resting on his helmet, his feet with the likeness of "the spurs he won " at Cressy, his hands joined as in that last pra5'er which he had offered up on his death-bed. There you can see his fine face with the Plantagenet features, the flat cheeks and the well-chiselled nose, to be traced perhaps in the effig}' of his father in Westminster Abbey and of his grandfather in Gloucester Cathedral. On his armour you can still see the marks of the bright gilding with which the figure was covered from head to foot, so as to make it look like an image of pure gold. High above are suspended the brazen gauntlets, the helmet, with what was once its gilded leopard-crest, and the wooden shield ; the velvet coat also, embroidered with the arms of France and England, now tattered and colourless, but then blazing with blue and scarlet. There, too, still hangs the empty scabbard of the sword wielded perchance io6 Canterbury. at his three great battles, and which Oliver Cromwell, it is said, carried away. On the canopy over the tomb there is the faded representation — painted after the strange fashion of those times — of the Persons of the Holy Trinit}^, which he directed in his will should be hung round his tomb and the shrine of Becket. Round about the tomb, too, you will see the ostrich feathers, which, according to the old but doubtful tradition, we are told he won at Cressy from the blind King of Bohemia, who perished in the thick of the fight ; and interwoven with them, the famous motto, with which he used to sign his name, Houmojit, Ich diene. In the centre of the crypt, on the spot where you now see the gravestone of Archbishop Morton, it had been his wish to be laid, as expressed in the will which he signed only the day before his death. But those who were concerned with the funeral had prepared for him a more mag- nificent resting-place ; not in the darkness of the crj-pt, but high aloft in the sacred space behind the altar, and on the south side of the shrine of St. Thomas, in the chapel itself of the Holy Trinit}', on the festival of which he had expired, they determined that the body of the hero should be laid. That space is now surrounded with monuments ; then it was en- tirely, or almost entirely, vacant. The gorgeous shrine stood in the centre on its coloured pavement, but no other corpse had been admitted within that venerated ground — no other, perhaps, would have been admitted but that of the Black Prince. In this sacred spot — be- lieved at that time to be the most sacred spot in England — the tomb stood in which, "alone in his glory," the Prince was to be deposited, to be seen and admired by all the countless pilgrims who crawled up the stone steps beneath it on their way to the shrine of the saint. CHRIST CHURCH GATKWAY. Cantcibury. 107 THE SHRINE OF BECKET. AMONGST the many treasures of art and of devotion which once adorned or which still adorn the metropolitical cathedral, the one point to which for more than three centuries the attention of every stranger who entered its gates was directed, was the shrine of St. Thomas of Canterbury. For the few years immediately succeeding his death, there was no regular shrine. The popular enthusiasm still clung to the two spots immediately connected with the murder. The transept in which he died within five years from that time acquired the name by which it has ever since been known, " The Mart3'rdom." Next to the actual scene of the murder, the object which this event invested with especial sanctity was the tomb in which his remains were deposited in the crypt behind the altar of the Virgin. It was to this spot that the first great rush of pilgrims was made when the church was reopened in 1172, and it was here that Henry performed his penance. Hither, on the 21st of August, 1179, came the first King of France who ever set foot on the shores of England, Louis VII. ; warned b^^ Saint Thomas in dreams, and afterwards, as he believed, receiving his son back from a dangerous illness through the saint's intercession. He knelt by the tomb, aud offered upon it the celebrated jewel, as also his own rich cup of gold. About four 3'ears after the murder, on the 5th of September, 11 74, a fire broke out in the cathedral, which reduced the choir — hitherto its chief architectural glory — to ashes. The grief of the people is described in terms which show how closely the expression of mediaeval feeling resembled what can now only be seen in Italy or the East: "They tore their hair; they beat the walls and pavement of the church with their shoulders aud the palms of their hands ; they uttered tremendous curses against God and his saints — even the patron saint of the church ; they wished they had rather have died than seen such a day." How far more like the description of a Neapolitan mob in disappointment at the slow liquefaction of the blood of Saint Januarius, than of the citizens of a quiet cathedral town in the county of Kent ! The monks, though appalled by the calamity for a time, soon recovered themselves ; work- men and architects, French and English, were procured; and amongst the former, William, from the city of Sens, so familiar to all Canterbury at that period as the scene of Becket's exile. No observant traveler can have seen the two cathedrals without remarking how closely the details of William's workmanship at Canterbury were suggested by his recollections of his own church at Sens, built a short time before. The forms of the pillars, the vaulting of the roof, even the very bars and patterns of the windows, are almost identical. io8 Canterbury. According to the precise system of orientation adopted by the German and Celtic nations, the eastern portion of the church was in those countries regarded as pre-eminently sacred. Thither the high altar was gradually moved, and to it the eyes of the congregation were specially directed. And in the eagerness to give a higher and holier even than the highest and the holiest place to any great saint on whom popular devotion was fastened, there sprang up in most of the larger churches during the thirteenth century a fashion of throwing out a still farther eastern end, in which the shrine or altar of the saint might be erected, and to which, therefore, not merely the gaze of the whole congrega- tion, but of the officiating priest himself, even as he stood before the high altar, might be constantly turned. Thus, according to Fuller's quaint remark, the super- stitious reverence for the dead reached its highest pitch — " the porch saying to the church-yard, the church to the porch, the chancel to the church, the east end to all, ' Stand further off, I am holier than thou.' " These were the general principles which determined the space to be allotted to the shrine of St. Thomas in the reconstruction of Canterbury Cathedral. In earlier times the easternmost chapel had contained an altar of the Holy Trinity, where Becket had been accustomed to sa}' Mass. Partly for the sake of preserving the two old Norman towers of St. Anselm and St. Andrew, which stood on the north and south sides of this part of the church, but chiefly for the sake of fitly uniting to the church this eastern chapel on an enlarged scale, the pillars of the choir were contracted with that singular curve which attracts the eye of every spectator. The eastern end of the cathedral, thus enlarged, formed, as at Ely, a more spacious receptacle for the honoured remains ; the new Trinity Chapel, reaching considerably beyond the extreme limit of its predecessor, and opening beyond into a yet further chapel, popularly called " Becket's Crown." High in the tower of St. Anselm, on the south side of the destined site of so great a treasure, was prepared — a usual accompaniment of costly shrines — the " Watching Chamber." It is a rude apartment, with a fireplace where the watcher could warm himself during the long winter nights, and a narrow gallery between the pillars, whence he could overlook the whole platform of the shrine, and at once detect any sacrilegious robber who was attracted by the immense treasures there collected. When the cathedral was thus duly prepared, the time came for what, in the language of those days, was termed the " translation " of the relics. The Primate to whose work the lot fell was one whose name commands far more unquestioned respect than the weak King Henry ; it was the Cardinal Archbishop, the great Stephen Langton, whose work still remains amongst us in the familiar division of the Bible into chapters, and in thfe Alagna Charta, which he was the chief means of wresting from the reluctant John. On the eve of the appointed day the Archbishop, with Richard, Bishop of Salisbury, and the whole body of monks, headed by their prior, Walter, entered the Ccxulrrhiiiy. Ill crypt by uiglit with psalms aud liymus ; aud after prayer and fasting, at midnight solemnly approached the tomb and removed the stones which closed it, and with tears of joy saw for the first time the remains of the saint. Four priests, distinguished for the sanctity of their lives, took out the relics^first the head, (then, as always, kept sepa- rate,) aud offered it to be kissed. The bones were then deposited in a chest well studded with iron nails and closed with iron locks, and laid in a secret chamber. The next day a loug procession entered the cathedral. It was headed by the young king — " King Henry, the young child." Next was the Italian Pandulf, Bishop of Norwich, and Legate of the Holy See; and Archbishop Langton, accom- NORMAN PORCH. panied by his brother Primate of France, the Archbishop of Rheinis. With them was Hubert de Burgh, the Lord High Justiciary and greatest statesman of his time, and " four great lordlings, noble men and tried." On the shoulders of this distinguished band the chest was raised, and the procession moved forward. ]\Iass was celebrated by the French Primate, in the midst of nearly the whole episcopate of the province of Canterbury, before an altar which, placed in front of the screen of the choir, was visible to the vast congregation assembled in the nave. The day was enrolled amongst the great festivals of the English Church as the Feast of the Translation of Saint Thomas. 112 Canterbury. And now began the long succession of pilgrimages wliicli for three centuries gave Canterbury a place amongst the great resorts of Christendom, and which, through Chaucer's poem, have given it a lasting hold on the memory of English- men as long as English literature exists. As relics took the place of all the various natural objects of interest which now occupy the minds of religious, literary, or scientific men, so pilgrimages took the place of modern tours. A pil- grim was a traveler with the same adventures, stories, pleasures, pains, as travelers now ; the very names by which we express the most listless wanderings are taken from pilgrimages to the most solemn places. TOMB OK ARCHBISHOP TAIT. At the church door the miscellaneous company of pilgrims had to arrange themselves " every one after his degree " — "The courtesy 'gan to rise Till the knight of gentleness that knew right well the guise, Put forth the prelate, the parson, and his fere." Here they encountered a monk, who with the " sprengel " sprinkled all their heads with holy water. After this, " The knight went with his compeers round the holy shrine, To do that they were come for, and after for to dine." The first object was the Transept of the Martyrdom. To this they were usually taken through the dark passage under the steps leading to the choir. They were next led down the steps on the right to the crypt, where a new set THE CHOIR. Cantrybitry. iic of guardians received them. Oti great occasions the gloom of the old Norman aisles was broken by the long array of lamps suspended from the rings still seen in the roof, each surrounded by its crown of thorns. Here were exhibited some of the actual relics of Saint Thomas — part of liis skull, cased in silver, and also presented to be kissed ; and hanging aloft the celebrated shirt and drawers of hair-cloth, which had struck such awe into the hearts of the monks on the night of his death. Emerging from the crypt, the pilgrims mounted the steps to the choir, on the north side of which the great mass of general relics were exhibited. Most of them were in ivory, gilt, or silver coffers. The bare list of these occupies eight folio pages, and comprises upwards of four hundred items ; some of these always, but especially the arm of Saint George, were offered to be kissed. "The holy relics each man wiUi his mouth Kissed, as a goodly monk the names told and taught." And now they have reached the holiest place. Behind the altar, as has been already observed, was erected the shrine itself What seems to have impressed every pilgrim who has left the record of his visit, as absoluteU' peculiar to Canterbury, was the long succession of ascents, by which "church seemed," as they said, "to be piled on church,'^ and " a new temple entered as soon as the first was ended." This unrivalled elevation of the sanctuary of Canterbur}' was parti}' necessitated by the position of the original crypt, partly by the desire to construct the shrine im- mediately above the place of the saint's original grave — that place itself being beau- tified by the noble structure which now encloses it. Up these steps the pilgrims mounted, many of them probably on their knees ; and the long and deep indenta- tions in the surface of the stones even now bear witness to the devotion and the number of those who once ascended to the sacred platform of the eastern chapel. Near these steps, not improbably, they received exhortations from one or more of the monks as they approached the sacred place. We now arrive at the shrine. Although not a trace of it remains, yet its posi- tion is ascertainable beyond a doubt, and it is eas}' from analog}' and description to imagine its appearance. The lower part of the shrine was of stone, supported on arches ; and between these arches the sick and lame pilgrims were allowed to ensconce themselves, rubbing their rheumatic backs or diseased legs and arms against the marble which brought them into the nearest contact with the wonder-working body within. The shrine, properly so called, rested on these arches, and was at first in- visible. It was concealed b}' a wooden canop}-, probably painted outside with sacred pictures, suspended from the roof; at a given signal this canopy was drawn up by ropes, and the shrine then appeared blazing with gold and jewels ; the wooden sides were plated with gold, and damasked with gold wire ; cramped together on this gold ii5 Canfcrbury. ground were innumerable jewels, pearls, sapphires, balassas, diamonds, rubies, and emeralds, and also, " in the midst of the gold," rings, or cameos, of sculptured agates, carnelians, and onyx stones. As soon as this magnificent sight was disclosed, every one dropped on his knees; and probably the tinkling of the silver bells attached to the canopy would in- dicate the moment to all the hundreds of pilgrims in whatever part of the cathe- dral they might be. The body of the saint in the inner iron chest was not to be seen except by mounting a ladder, which would be but rarely allowed. But whilst the votaries knelt around, the prior, or some other great officer of the monastery, came forward, and with a white wand touched the several jewels, naming the giver of each, and, for the benefit of foreigners, adding the French name of each, with a description of its value and marvellous qualities. The lid once more descended on the golden ark; the pilgrims, "telling heartily their beads, Prayed to Saint Thomas in such wise as they could," and then withdrew, down the opposite flight of steps from that which they had ascended. So completely were the records of the shrine destroyed, that the cathedral archives throw hardly the slightest light either on its existence or its removal. And its site has remained, from that day to this, a vacant space, with the marks of the violence of the destruction even yet visible on the broken pavement. Round it still lie the tombs of king and prince and archbishop; the worn marks on the stones show the reverence of former ages. But the place itself is vacant, and the lessons which that vacancy has to teach us must now take the place of the lessons of the ancient shrine. In proportion to our thankfulness that ancient superstitions are destroyed, should be our anxiety that new light and in- creased zeal and more active goodness should take their place. Our pilgrimage can- not be Geoffrey Chaucer's, but it may be John Bunyan's. In that true " Pilgrim's Way " to a better country, we have all of us to toil over many a rugged hill, over many a dreary plain, by many opposite and devious paths, cheering one another by all means, grave and gay, till we see the distant towers. In that pilgrimage and progress towards all things good and wise and holy, Canterbury Cathedral, let us humbly trust, may still have a part to play. Although it is no longer the end in the long journey, it may still be a stage in our advance; it may still enlighten, elevate, sanctify, those who come within its reach; it may still, if it be true to its high purpose, win for itself, in the generations which are to come after us, a glory more humble but not less excellent than when a hundred thousand worshipers lay prostrate before the shrine of its ancient hero. DIGNITARIES. ARCHBISHOP TAIT. ARCHIBALD CAMPBELL TAIT, D. D. THE late Archbishop Archibald Campbell Tait, (born iSii, died 1SS2,) as might be surmised from his name, was of Scotch Presbyterian descent. He first achieved notoriety as one of the four tutors -who protested against Dr. Newman's misconstruction of the Thirty-nine Articles in Tract 90. In 1S42 he succeeded Dr. Arnold as Master of Rugby. In 1S56 he became Bishop of Loudon, in which position he was signall}- successful, throwing himself vigourously into his work. In a few years he raised nearly ^350,000 for the Bi.shop of London's fund for the building of churches, schools and parsonages, and largely increased the number of workers in his Diocese. He refused the Archbishopric of York, and in 186S accepted that of Canterbury. During his Archbishopric he had to deal with many burning questions, and to steer the ship of the Church through stormy seas, He was thoroughly equal to the duties of his high station, possibly rather more statesman than priest, tolerant as a rule, yet knowing when firmness was needed, and very seldom making a false step. (119) EDWARD WHITE BENSON, D. D. THE Most Reverend Edward White Benson, D. D., (born 1829,) the present occupant of the chair of Augustine at Canterbury, and Primate of all England, was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, an assistant master at Rugby School, and in 1858 the first Head-master of Wellington College, holding that position until he became Chancellor of Lincoln Cathedral, in 1872. In December, 1876, at the recommendation of Lord Beaconsfield, he was nominated to the newly restored Bishopric of Truro, and consecrated in St. Paul's, April 25, 1877. He displayed great energy of organisation, began the building of a cathedral at his See city, the first built in England since the Reformation, and raised by his personal efforts much of the _;^ioo,ooo which its outward shell alone cost. In December, 1882, at Mr. Gladstone's recommendation, he was nominated to the Archbishopric of Canterbur3\ In his ecclesiastical policy he has been conservative and conciliatory, yet not without the courage of his convictions w^hen necessary. Though a liberal High-churchman rather than a controversialist, in his celebrated judgement in the " Lincoln case " he evinced a desire to decide with a full knowledge of the law and the usage of the Church, much to his credit, and calculated to give great weight to the conclusions reached by him. In defence of the Church over which he presides he has been firm and decided in opposition to all schemes for her spoliation, and recently has taken active steps to arouse the laity against its disendowment. (120) ARCHBISHOP BENSON. YORK MINSTER. YORK MINSTER. SIR WALTER SCOTT calls this cathedral "the most august of temples, the noble Minster of York," and its most devoted lover can never complain that it has not in every age received its due share of veneration. Let us look first at the west front, that exquisite specimen of Gothic art, which " has been compared with the celebrated facade at Rheims Cathedral for richness, sublimity, and beauty of architectural design ; it is certainly not surpassed by that of an}' church in England in its fine proportions, chaste enrichments, or scientific arrangements." An eight-pin- nacled tower rises at each side, and between is a gable with perforated battlement, surmounted by a crocketed pinnacle. The central doorway is divided into two by a slender shaft, as is not unusual, but the space beneath the deep vaulting of the arch is filled with a circular six-light window, which is an uncommon, if not unique, arrangement. Over this is a crocketed gable, in the centre of which is a niche containing the statue of Archbishop Melton, who finished the building of the western part of the nave. " He sits, graven in stone, in his archiepiscopal attire, with his hand still raised in the attitude of benediction. Over his head is the finest Gothic window in the world, built in all probability by himself, and still beaming with the glowing colours with which he adorned it nearly five hundred and fift)^ years ago. On either hand is an efiigy of a benefactor of the church, the heads of the noble houses of Vavasour and Percy, bearing in their arms the wood and stone which they once gave." The nave was begun by Archbishop Romaine in 1291, and finished by Arch- bishop Melton in 1330. Archbishop Roger (1154-1181) built the choir with its crypts, with the archiepiscopal palace to the north of the cathedral, and the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre between the two buildings. He gave one of St. Peter's bones and part of his sandals to the church. These were put into a crucifix of gold, and were among the things sent for the ransom of Coeur-de-Lion, but were afterwards redeemed. He waged long and actively the war with Canterbury about the question of supremac}^ and " bearing the cross," the right to carry that symbol erect belonging exclusively to the Primate. At the Council of Westminster, September, 1102, Gerald (125) 126 York Afi>ister. of York kicked over the chair prepared for him, because it was on a lower level than that put for Anselm of Canterbury. Roger vindicated his claim in an even more amusing and undignified way, and this also at a Council at Westminster. This is the largest nave in any English cathedral, and, as in the case of that other, St. Peter's, in a sunnier city, the proportions are so exquisite that the eye takes some time to realise the size. All is so simple, so grand, and fault-finders add " so cold." Perhaps there is a little want of colour, but where form is so perfect one could scarcely wish, even for the sake of warmth, to risk the loss of purity. Most of the windows retain their original glass, fairly perfect, and YORK— FROM THE RAILWAY STATION. here and there a shimmering bit of colour is cast to the ground, but this is never by the oldest glass, which always transmits pure light. No satisfactory explanation has been given of this, and some say it is a " lost art ; " is it not more probably the result of the outside surface of the old glass being roughened by the weather? or may it not be that in the old windows the dark patches are generally surrounded by clear glass, the rays of which diverge and absorb those which pass through the dark ones before reaching the floor ? The glass of many of the windows is ver}^ much out of plumb, owing to the melting of the lead which binds it together during the fire of 1S40. This catastrophe took place on the night of May 20th, when the whole Vbr/: Minster. 12- nave was burnt up to the central tower; this the fire conld not pass, as there was nothing in it to burn. It originated in the south-west tower, where some workmen are supposed to have left a light. The metal of the melted bells poured down among the ruins, and was collected, and for years snuff-boxes, «Slc., made of " bell- metal," were a staple commodity among the curiosity vendors of the city. The new bells rang for the first time on July 4, 1844. " Great Peter," who occupies the other tower, does not " utter forth his glorious voice " quite as often as some of us could wish. He has to be struck by a hammer, because, owing to his enor- mous weight, the machiner}' has never been arranged for ringing him. Let us pass up the nave, now noticing a stone dragon which projects from the triforium, and from which at one time hung the canopy of the font, and now wondering if Charles I. were not right after all when he ordered the organ to be re- moved because it spoilt the view of the east window. We pause at the south-east corner of the nave. It was upon this spot that Arch- bishop John Romanus stood on April 6, 1 291, to lay the foundation stone of this his great work, and to call down the blessing of the Holy Ghost upon it. What would lie look round and see? To the right Roger's Norman choir, almost above his head the great tower, and beyond it the north transept, both of which his father had built — noble example to any son. The " Five Sisters " would look down on him much as they do now on us ; behind him would be the transept and tomb of Walter Gray, and before him THE "FIVE SISTERS." 128 York Minster. the ruins of the Norman nave, built by Thomas, burnt in 1137, and which he was preparing to make even as we see it now. The central tower, the largest in England, was built about 1260 by John Ronianus the elder, treasurer of the cathedral, who enclosed the Norman piers in the present many-shafted pillars. As William of Wykeham was at that time a good deal in York, and also a friend of the Archbishop, probably so energetic a builder would have a hand in it too. Across the two eastern pillars of the tower is the magnificent screen so justly celebrated. The carved work of the canopies is very rich. There are seven niches THE CHOIR SCREEN. on one side of the central doorway, and eight on the other, containing statues of the Kings of England from the Conqueror to Henry VI. The iron gate was given in the early part of last century by a Mrs. Mary Wandesford, a maiden lady, who took " brevet rank." She also endowed an " old maids' hospital " for her poorer sisters. York has always been a great place for single ladies, and the memor}- of five of the number is exquisitely perpetuated in the next lovely object which meets our gaze — the celebrated window of the " Five Sisters." It consists of five equal- sized lancets of the most perfect Early English. The sisters are each said to have done one panel in needle-work, and then had it copied in glass by foreign artists, but the exact when and where are not known. It is a most beautiful specimen of York Minster. 129 late thirteenth-century painted glass, and the peculiar blending of the grisaille tints is quite unrivaled. This window fills the whole of the end of the central aisle of the north transept, which was built by John Romanus the elder, in the reign of Henry III. Entering the choir by the door in the screen, the magnificent east window bursts into view. It is the largest in England which retains its original glazing. The number of subjects represented in glass is about one hundred and fifteen, from the Old Testament and the Revelation. The figures are generally about two feet high, the drawing is good, and the fiices are exquisitely finished, resembling in style the work of the early Italian painters. It was begun by John Thornton, of Coventry, in 1405. He was to have four shillings a week, and five pounds a year in addition, and to finish it in three years, and, if the work were really well done, ten pounds at the end of that time. The altar-screen is an exquisite specimen of Perpendicular work, in perfect harmony with its surroundings, and it is unfortunate that the same cannot be said for the reredos, which is not what one might wish either in form or colour. The moulding of Tiuworth's terra-cotta " Crucifixion " and the wood-carving are both good, but cannot atone for covering so much of the east window. Descending a few steps into the south aisle we cross to the vestry, where a great many interesting relics are preserved. Adjoining the vestry is the beautiful Early English room called Archbishop La Zouche's Chapel. He began building it in 1350, intending to be buried there, but was called away in 1352, before it was ready for him, so he was laid in the nave. Leaving the vestry, we turn to the right along the south aisle of the choir towards the Lady Chapel. The principal monuments are in this part of the cathedral, and it must be owned there are very few of any great interest or beauty. The first crypt is nearly square. It has a groined roof supported by six short pillars, some of which have Norman capitals, all different, and some very beautiful. One has figures dancing round. The whole effect is interesting, and, with the dashes of sunlight that find their wA.y in, quite charming, but it is perplexing to find stones of many different styles in this part of the building, so that no date can be assigned to it, and records are not explicit. We descend a few more steps and are in the crypt proper — Roger's glorious work — begun in 1171. Four of the original magnificent pillars remain with their TINWORTirS TERRA-COTTA " CRT'CIFIXION." 130 York Minster. zigzag aud diaper pattern, and the remains of four slender pillars round eacli. Between them are the bases of small columns. Outside these are some walls of the older Norman church, which in some places encase the herring-bone stonework of the Saxon. But the interest of this most interesting place centres in an earthy mound just under the site of the Norman high altar. And here let us pause. This is the spot hallowed for centuries as that upon which King Edwin was baptised, and where his head was brought home to be buried. The first date that stands out clear and certain is April 12th, Easter Day, 627, when Paulinus baptised King Edwin, two of his children, and " many other persons of distinction and royal birth." A little THE VESTRY. wooden hut was the beginning of York Minster, but over it rose a larger church of stone, which Edwin did not live to finish. That task was accomplished about 642 by Oswald, his successor. It was repaired by St. Wilfrid about 720, and destroyed by fire in 741, rebuilt by Egbert (732-766), first Archbishop since Paiilinus, and demolished by the Danes. Thomas of Bayeaux — chaplain to King William, and first Archbishop after the Conquest — rebuilt the church, but it was again burnt in 1 137 — this time only partially — along with St. Mary's Abbey and thirty-nine parish churches ! This was in the episcopacy of Thurston, and perhaps his time was too much occupied with military matters, and rousing up the monks of St. Mary's, for Vofk Miiis.lcr. 133 liiin to begin any restoration. This work was taken in hand by Roger, his snccessor, wlio lived to finish the Norman choir, and the crypt of which we now speak. The chapter-house, by some considered the gem of all, is octagonal in shape with no central pillar, a window on each side with six arches below each, and a seat under each arch separated by pillars of Purbeck marble. All sorts of quaint little carvings are in the canopies of these stalls. One is a devil taking the crown from a king's head ; another a monk and a nun kissing. The original glass, mostly heraldic, of Early Decorated date, remains in all except the east window, which is modern and very humiliating. Looking back along the vale of years, how many memories come thronging up as we gaze upon York Cathedral or linger beneath its over-arching roof ! Kings and saints have knelt where we kneel, have pra^'ed where we pray. Here from age to age have come the warrior in his strength, the old man with his hoary " crown of glor}'," the sinner with liis burden, the maiden with her joy. Here (in 1221) the Princess Joan, daughter of King John, though only eleven years old, was married to Alexander H. of Scotland, and here thirtv-one years later came her little niece, Margaret of England, to be united to Alexander HI. That was indeed a gay Christmas. Henry HI. and his queen and court were there, and the royal family of Scotland, to witness the union of the two children. Neither the bride nor the bride- groom was j'et eleven ! A thousand knights in robes of silk attended the bride, while the King of Scotland was surrounded by the most distinguished vassals of his crown, and by the highest dignitaries of the Scottish Church. Tournaments and balls and processions succeeded each other for many days ; and such was the number of the guests and the profuse hospitality of the hosts, that six hundred oxen were killed for one feast. In the midst of the festivities an attempt was made to make the King of Scotland do homage for his kingdom to the King of England ; but the bo}', with a spirit and discretion above his years, refused to take a step of such importance without the consent of the estates of his realm. It will be remembered that King William had been entrapped into that very act of homage at York by Henry I. (1175), and placed his spear and shield on the altar. At that altar (January, 132S) another and even more distinguished voung couple began their long and happy married life, Edward III. and Philippa of Hainault. He Avas not yet seventeen, and she was onh' fourteen years of age. Yet another princess bride came to York, Margaret Tudor, sister of Henry VIII. , when on her way to be married to James IV. of Scotland (July, 1503). She lodged in the palace of the Archbishop, and went more than once to the minster, and St. William's head was brought for her to kiss. She wore a gorgeous dress of cloth of gold. In after years she would perhaps look back at the days in York as among the palmiest of her life, for her husband hated his father-in-law, and visited his repugnancy upon his wife. 134 York Minster. From wedding to funeral — so is the way of the world. Here was buried the head of King Edwin, founder of the church, and Eadbert, one of his successors on the throne of Northumbria. Here the remains of Tosti, Tiger of the North, brother of Harold, were brought after the battle of Stamford Bridge, to rest quietly at last. Here, when pious hands brought Archbishop Gerard home to his grave (1108), the crowd pelted his coffin with stones, because he had died with his head on an astronomical book ! Here is the last home of two of our noblest Arch- bishops, Scrope and Nevill, the first put to death by the fourth Henry, the second " done " to death by the fourth Edward, in revenge for the deeds of his brother, the king-maker ; and here was laid in the cold earth the fier}' Harry Hotspur. These are the towers which Cardinal Wolsey, Archbishop of York, saw from Cawood ; he was sum- moned south before he had taken a nearer view. In conclusion, let me quote from old Drake's time- honoured volume : " Let it be then the praj^er of all good men that this glorious build- ing, the great monument of our forefathers' piety, may never want a governor less devoted to its preservation than the last two actually were or the presetit seems to be. That this fabrick may stand firm, and transmit to late posterity the virtues of its founders, and continue, what it has long been, not only a singular ornament to the city and these northern parts, but to the whole kingdom." NORTH AISLE OF THE CHOIR. DIGNITARIES. ARCHBISHOP MAGEE. WILLIAM CONNOR MAGEE, D. D. ONE of the greatest orators and most brilliant controversialists of onr day passed from the scene when the last Archbishop of York, William Connor Magee, died, May 5, 1S91. His oratory, persuasive clearness and terseness of ex- pression were accompanied by withering powers of sarcasm, much logical reasoning and humourous illustration, expressed in a full-toned voice, capable of sounding every gradation of feeling. His speech in the House of Lords in opposition to the disestablishment of the Irish Church, condemning the bill as unjust, impolitic and opposed to the verdict of the nation, Lord Salisbury said the greatest authorities considered the finest speech ever delivered by an}' living man in either house of Parliament. " Every sentence tells and every shot hits." It is said that most ora- tors objected to speak after him. He was consecrated November 16, 1S68, Bishop of Peterborough, and ruled the Diocese wisely and vigourously, and although his strong hand occasionally provoked opposition, his efficiency was appreciated by clergy and laity. (137) WILLIAM DALRYMPLE MACLAGAN, D. D. THE present occupant of the northern primacy, William Dalrymple Maclagan, D. D., a Scotchman by birth (in 1826), resembles some of our American Bishops, who were indeed of the Church militant in a very literal way before they received their spiritual commission, and fought in the Federal or Confederate armies during the Civil War, Like them. Dr. Maclagan served in early life in the army, retiring from the East Indian service with the rank of Lieutenant in 1852. Afterwards he went through an university course, and was ordained. He became Bishop of Lichfield, June 24, 1S78, and was translated to York in 1891. Dr. Maclagan's views ou the attitude of the Church in relation to the social question are worth giving here, as they are of value at the present time, and apply equally well to all nations. He says : " The aims of the Church should be to regu- late the relations between the wealthy and the needy, that the rich may employ their wealth, not selfishly, but for the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and this end would be brought about less by legal compulsion than b}^ that moral influence which it is the duty of the Church in every direction to promote." As to the question of disestablishment, his belief is that the lesson of caution should be learned from the fate of the Irish Church, but hope may be had from the example of the American Church. (138) ARCHBISHOP MACLAGAN. DURHAM CATHEDRAL. LINDISFARNE. DURHAM. THE romance of tliis great cathedral of the north may be said to begin, as far as the visitor of to-day is concerned, with the impression which its enormons propor- tions make as he stands on Framwellgate Bridge. From the banks of the Wear he looks np a steep cliff to where that great pile crowns the height : " half house of God, half castle 'gainst the Scot. " On the edge of the same cliff, and on a level with the cathedral, frowns the companion castle. The river Wear almost en- circling the hill on which both cathedral and castle stand is the completion which nature has given to a position of unequaled security. The origin of the cathedral connects itself with the character of the great St. Cuthbert, the saintly Bishop of Lindisfarne. The grave evangelist of the north lived in simplest and austerest manner on the Northumbrian coast. As Bishop of Lindis- farne, in succession to St. Aidan, he made a name for holiness which has never died away. He made Christ in his own age such a realit}- in the north that he can never be forgotten. Retired in his latter days to one of the Fame Islands, rendered illustrious centuries later by the fame of Grace Darling, Cuthbert passed thence into the life to come in the year 687. His bodj' was brought to Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, and preserved there as a sainted relic. Two hundred years passed away, and the body of the saint rested quietly in Lindisfarne. But in S75 the Danes were fiercely (143) 144 Du7-hafn. ravaging Nortliumbria, and in consternation at their approach the inhabitants of Holy Island fled with the precious body, and it found, for the time being, a resting-place in Chester-le-Street, half-way between Newcastle and Durham. A century later, in 995, the body was transferred to Durham and with it the seat of the northern bishopric. The visitor to Durham Cathedral will notice in a niche of a turret on the north wall of the building the sculpture of the famous Dun Cow. The present sculpture is a modern reproduction of a much more ancient work. This curious sculpture com- memorates the legend which connects itself with the choice of this site for the final resting- place of St. Cuthbert's remains. The legend runs that after the removal from Chester-le-Street, St. Cuthbert announced in a vis- ion his determination to rest at Dun-holm. The place was un- known ; but whilst the monks were wandering in search of it, a woman was heard asking an- other if she had seen her cow that had strayed, and the an- swer was, " It's down in Dun- holm." Dun-holm signifies the hill-meadow, and Durham is its modern equivalent. It was, in- deed, nothing but a rough field, which the bearers of St. Cuth- bert's body found when they $' W .^ - ■- ' arrived from Chester-le-Street. 1 £ — \ -^ ^ — J A small church of twisted THE DUN COW. boughs was at once formed until a more permanent building of wood could be prepared. This again w^as succeeded by a stone building, in which, in the 3'ear 999, the body of the saint was reverently laid. But a grander structure was to be the memorial of the great missionary bishop. We have come now to the Norman Conquest and to that great leap in architecture which England took under the inspiration of the continental influences for which the invasion of William the Conqueror had opened the way. Wales and Scotland with their highland fastnesses Diirlici))!. 145 were sources of coutiniial danger to the security of the crown. William, therefore, formed the two Palatinate counties of Chester and Durham. These counties Palatine, as they were called, were two large areas, over each of which was placed a vicegerent to act for the King, and who was called a Count Palatine. This functionary held a very similar position to a modern vicero3\ Most of the powers of the crown were vested in the Count to exercise at discretion over the area of his Palatinate. The Palatine of Chester was a temporal lord, but the Palatine of Durham was a spiritual peer — he was the Bishop of the see — the distinguishing title he received was that of a Prince Bishop. As a suitably imposing residence for the Prince Bishop of the HOLY ISLAND FISHKRWOMEN. Palatinate of Durham, the Conqueror founded Durham Castle. The See of Durham, therefore, from the early times of the Conquest gained a precedence of dignity over all other bishoprics. But we must hasten on to the episcopate of William of St. Carileph (1081-1096), who, in 1083, gathered together at Durham the Benedictine monks previously located at Wearmouth and at Jarrow. Ten years later Carileph commenced the present lordly structirre, one of the grandest specimens of the massive Norman architecture which can be found anywhere. By the time of Carileph's death onl}' the choir had been com- pleted. Four years elapsed before the appointment of another Bishop, but during 146 Diirkavt. those four years the monks themselves worked at the transepts. The next Bishop, Ralph Flambard (1099-1128), completed the nave. In the year 1104 the body of St. Cuthbert was brought to its final resting-place and laid behind the altar. In quick succession subsequent prelates completed the adjuncts of the cathedral and the ex- tensive monastic buildings which occupied the south side of the church. With this hasty review of the history of the building we must pass on and say a few words upon each of the most noteworthy features of the structure. And first of all the north entrance door tells an interesting tale. The present door is a modern restoration, and some of the original features of the famous entrance have been obliterated. Towards this door many a poor wretch hastening to escape the hands of the avenger has sped his fearful steps in days gone by. Attached to the door still glares a fearful-looking metallic head hold- ing a ring in its mouth. In its now ej'eless sockets were once in all probability balls of crystal or enamel. When once the ring was grasped by the hand of the fugitive he was safe. He had claimed the " peace " of St. Cuthbert and the sanctity of the neighbouring shrine shielded him. Above the door bj- day and night watched relays of monks to admit those who claimed sanctuary. So soon as ever the fugitive had reached the door he was admitted. This done he had to confess the crime of which he was guilty, and his statement was taken down in writing. All the while a bell was tolling to give notice that some one had taken refuge in the church. Then the culprit was arrayed in a black gown with a yellow cross on his left shoulder, and remained within the precincts for thirty-seven days. If at the end of that time he could not obtain a pardon of the civil authorities, he was conveyed across the seas to commence his life again elsewhere. As we pass within we find ourselves in full sight of the imposing interior, which, including the Galilee Chapel, measures 461 feet in length. The uniform character of the architecture and its enormous solidity produces the feeling, so well expressed by THK SANCTUARY KNOCKKR. Durliani. 149 Dr. Johnson, of " rocky solidity and indeterminate dnration." The whole extent of the cathedral can now be seen from the west end, bnt before the Reformation a series of screens divided the eastern or choir portion from the nave. The choir was then the church of the monks and the nave the church of the people. At that time in front of the choir screen stood the Jesus Altar, having painted above it on the screen carved figures descriptive of the Life and Passion of our Lord ; above again were figures of the Apostles. This, of course, has been removed long since, and lately in its place has been erected a modern screen, which in no way impedes either sight or sound. The choir itself, apart from the beauty of its architecture, contains many ob- jects of interest. The most noticeable feature is the great screen behind the altar, called the Ne- ville Screen, on account of its expense being in a large measure borne by Lord Neville of Rab\'. The screen was erected in 13S0. The prior of the day employed at his own expense seven masons for nearly a year to fix the screen, the execution of which is supposed to have been the fruit of the labours of French, artists. The screen origin- ally was much more elaborate than at present, being covered with rich colour, and every niche filled with sculptured figures, but even now its present appearance is graceful. On the south side of the choir lies the body of Bishop Hatfield. The Bishop's effigy, fully vested, lies upon an altar tomb beneath a canopy, and above rises the episcopal throne which he himself designed. The throne is lofty and imposing, and ascended by a flight of stairs. At the back of the throne rich tabernacle work fills in the space of the choir arch. Behind the altar is the great eastern transept, which goes by the name of the Nine Altars. The architecture here is in striking contrast to that of the choir and nave, being a magnificent specimen of early English architecture of the thirteenth centur3^ The most interesting feature of this part of the cathedral is the lofty platform which adjoins the back of the altar, and wherein lies the body of St. Cuthbert. The platform is approached from two doors on the side of the altar, and the much-worn pavement gives witness to the number of pilgrims who from time to time have visited the spot. At the dissolution of the monaster}- the visitors broke open the iron-bound chest in which the body of St. Cuthbert la\', and " found him l3ang whole, uncorrupt, with his face bare, and his beard as of a fortnight's growth, and all the vestments about him as he was accustomed to sa\^ Mass, and his met wand of gold lying by him." The relics were removed until " the King's pleasure should be known." And when at a later time the King's pleasure was apparentl_v understood, the body was again buried in its former place. In the 3'ear 1827 the tomb was once more opened, and a skeleton was found wrapped in robes -which had once been of great richness. A skull was also found which was supposed to be the 15° Durham. skull of King Oswald, whicli, according to tradition, had been placed in St. Cuthbert's coffin. The skeleton and the skull were re-enclosed in another coffin, and interred beneath the platform behind the altar. There is, however, a tradition that the real bod}- of St. Cuthbert was secretly conveyed awa}' by the monks at some time and buried in a certain part of the cathedral, which is only known to three members of the Bene- dictine order, who, as each one dies, choose a successor. In allusion to this legend (for prob- ably it has no real foun- dation) the lines of Scott ma}- be quoted : — " There deep in Dnrliam's Gothic shade His rehcs are in secret laid, But none nia\- know the place ; Save of his holiest servants three, Deep sworn to solemn secrecy, Who share that wondrous grace." The Galilee Chapel must not be omitted in a description of the church. It was designed for the sake and for the use of the women who wished to worship in the church. Its name of Galilee has probably some reference to Galilee of the Gen- tiles, and implies that it was considered less sacred than the rest of the cathedral. St. Cuthbert had a more than usual monkish fear of women, and they were not allowed to approach the shrine. A cross let into the pavement of the nave at the far west end curiously marks the far-removed spot nearer than which women might not approach. The prejudices of the good saint were thus perpetuated long after his death. THE BISHOPS THRONE. Durham. 153 The whole effect is light and graceful, and if the women were not allowed to enter farther than the western extremity of the church, they certainly had a most beautiful place of worship. The most interesting monument here is the plain altar slab which marks the burial-place of the great Northumbrian scholar. On the tomb are engraved the well-known words, Hac sitnf in fossa Bedce Vcnerabilis ossa (In this grave lie the bones of the Venerable Bede). According to the old legend the monk, who was casting about for a word to complete the scansion of his line between " Bedse " and " ossa," left a space blank until he could in the morning return to his task with a mind refreshed. However, during the night an unknown hand added THE GALILEK CHAPEL. the metrically suitable " Venerabilis." This, according to the legend, is the origin of the peculiar prefix Venerable, alwaj-s associated with the name of Bede. We must not forget that Durham Cathedral was the church of a great monastic house until the Reformation. The whole fabric was cared for with infinite pains by the monks, and in some measure was actually built by them. Closely attached to the cathedral on its south side are the remains of the monastery, which show one what a large community once lived under the shadow of the church. The cloisters raise up many thoughts of the busy stream of life which in the days of the old order must have flowed through them. Here a door leads into a refectory, another into the church, another to the dormitory, another to the prior's lodgings, another 154 Durham. to the chapter house, another to the cemetery, where the brethren were laid down under the shadow of the minster. Still to-day we can stand in the splendid room with its rough oak beams, as rough almost as after their first felling, where all the monks slept. And here again is still intact the refectory where they ate their meals. Here, too, is the strong room where the rebellious monks were subdued by a paternal discipline. Still standing is the great octagonal kitchen which supplied the bodily needs of the community, and there the guest chamber where strangers were entertained. Ruthless Vandalism has spoiled of all its beauty the magnificent chapter house where the brethren conferred over their affairs and position. No one cau look through these wonderfull}^ complete remains without feeling that he has had a glimpse of that ideal of life which is not ours now, but which in its own time was so great a healing and preserving influence in a rough and violent world. In the year 1S36, on the death of Bishop Van Mildert, the founder of Durham University, the title of Count Palatine ceased. The Prince Bishops came to an end. A peaceful country needed no more the defence which the Bishopric had once afforded. But while some old, and now happily useless, associations of the historic see were then removed, its fame did not grow less in popular esteem. With no name will the bishopric be more associated than with that of the great scholar, ruler, saint, who has lately been taken away. Bishop Lightfoot summed up in himself the great qualities of his predecessors — their courage, their liberality, their firmness, their massiveness, their saintliness, their learning. He did not wield the traditional mace of the Count Palatine ; but his word was weightier than a rod of iron. He was not a Prince Bishop, but he was a prince of bishops. Such men, so richly endowed as he was with wisdom and knowledge, are rare. With what could such a life be more fittingly linked than with the stirring associations of Durham ? DIGNITARIES. BISHOP LIGIITFOUT. JOSEPH BARBER LIGHTFOOT, D. D. CHRISTIAN scliolarsliip even yet laments the loss of him who last held this See, Joseph Barber Lightfoot. For man}' years, in varions positions at Cam- bridge, he was a most efficient snpporter of every effort to increase the usefnl- ness of the university. As a scholar he sat upon the commission for revision of the English translation of the Bible, and was of great influence in determining its char- acter. April 25, 1S79, he was consecrated Bishop of Durham. With great thor- oughness and success he devoted himself to every department of his unaccustomed work, neglecting no routine, and making the best of all existing resources, being quick to discern deficiencies and devise or adopt agencies for supplying them. Himself a bachelor, he turned his episcopal palace into a theological seminary and spent every penny of his diocesan income on the See. So contagious was his active enthusiasm, that rich men were afraid to go to his meetings, at one of which ^^30,000 was sub- scribed in the room. It has been said there seemed nothing he could not do in the best possible way; as scholar, teacher, speaker, author, and administrator, his work remains a model. As a great Biblical critic, and the leading patristic scholar of his time, the prevailing characteristics of all his writings show him to have had a calm, judicial temper of mind, and great sagacity in dealing with the materials out of which history has to be constructed. As one hardly in sympathy with his position said, " His editions and commentaries, as well as his critical dissertations, have an imper- ishable value, and even where it is impossible to agree with his results, his grounds are never to be neglected." (157) BROOKE FOSS WESTCOTT, D. D., D. C. L. THE Right Rev. Brooke Foss Westcott, D. D., D. C. L., (born 1825,) who suc- ceeded his friend, Dr. Lightfoot, in the Bishopric of Durham, May i, 1S90, has been active in all Church matters of his time. He was one of the company for the revision of the Authorized Version of the New Testament, the Greek text followed by the revisers being credited largely to his influence. He sat on the late Ecclesiastical Courts Commission and took a large share in drawing up the report. He is an ardent advocate of what is known as "Christian Socialism," and distin- guished himself as the successful arbitrator of labour disputes in his Diocese. With his friend. Prof. F. J. A. Hort, in iSSi, he issued a New Testament in Greek, the result of twenty-eight years' labour on the text. He has also written valuable com- mentaries on the writings of St. John, and scholarly introductions to the study of the New Testament. Since the publishing of his writings while Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, he has stood in the front rank of the distinguished scholars and theologians. (158) BISHOP WESTCOTT. LINCOLN CATHEDRAL. LINCOLN. ^^T^EAUTIFUL for situation, the joy of the whole earth. On the north side jj lieth the city of the Great King." These words of the Psalmist instinc- tively occur to the mind when one gazes up from below at Lincoln Minster, seated in queenly majesty on what Wordsworth so aptly styles her "sov- ereign hill," looking down in serene repose from her northern height on the din and turmoil of the bus}- streets and crowded factories which fill the valley below, or climb the steep hillside. Nor is the first impression lessened on closer ap- proach. The nearer we get to it, tlie more minutel}^ we examine it, the more fully shall we realise the exquisite grace, both of the building as a whole and of its separate parts, down to its minutest detail. But be3-ond its architectural glories, beyond the memory of the great and good men who have presided over the see of which it is the centre, beyond the stirring events of which it has been the sceue, that which makes Lincoln Minster a veritable piece of the histor}^ of our country, which gives it its highest dignity, is the fact that it is a hou.se of God, a Christian church ; for eight centuries the home and gathering-place of Christian souls, where they have met to hold com- munion with their God, that they might learn how to serve Him more truly and gain strength to do so. To this sacred character it owes its permanence. Castles and fortresses framed with even greater strength have passed away, or exist only in shattered ruins : the Cathedral of Lincoln and her fair sisters remain in all, or more than all, their pristine glory. As Dean Stanle}^ has eloquently said of his own Abbey of Westminster, " Whatever our cathedrals have become of heroic, or historic, or artistic, they would have ceased to be if they had not been over all, and above all, places dedicated for ever to the worship of Almighty God." Such thoughts as these fitly rise in the mind as we make our way along the High street, crowded with market-folk and factory hands, and slowly climb the hill, justly called "The Steep," to the cathedral precincts. On reaching the summit of the almost precipitous ascent, glad enough to be on level ground once more, we turn to the right, with the castle gate behind (163) 164 Lincoln. us, aud in front the massive western gateliouse of the Close, known as the Ex- chequer Gate from the Minster accounts having been kej^t there in old times, with the cathedral towers and the upper part of the west front soaring above it. Under the shelter of this archway we may do well to pause a few minutes, and, while we recover breath after our climb, take a brief review of the history of the building. Begun abont 1074, the church was ready for consecration in 1092. The 9th of May was fixed for the rite. King Rufus had summoned all the prelates and great lords of the realm to the cere- mony, which was to be of the grand- est. But it did not take place. Three days before the day fixed, the founder of the church breathed his last, to find a grave in the still unhallowed fane. Where we stand we have before us the only visible remnant of this first cathedral, in the central portion of the western fa9ade. It is character- ised by the stern, almost savage, plainness of the Early Norman style. Three deep, cavernous recesses, their arches unrelieved by moulding or chamfer, break the flat, unadorned wall. In 1 141, the minster having lost its roof and been otherwise damaged by an accidental fire, such as were continually occurriug in the flat timber-ceiled Norman churches, Alexander, nephew of Henry's mighty Chancellor, Roger, vaulted the whole church with stone, and repaired the injury "with such subtle artifice," writes the chronicler, "that it looked fairer than its first newness." As we have already said, the western doorways, of remarkable beauty aud richness, the lower portions of the towers, and the side gables, bear witness to Alexander's munificence and the skill of his architect. The towers were originally capped with tall spires of timber, covered with lead. These were removed at the close of the fourteenth century — the precise date and the name of the builder are entirely unknown — when the lofty belfry storeys, which soar into the air above us with their tall coupled windows, were added. BISHOP ALRXAXDKR'S DOORWAY. Lincoln. 165 Much as there is to see witliin and about the miuster, we caunot yet leave the west front. It will be seen that Remigius's plain Norman walls are set in a kind of frame of richly arcaded work of Early English date. Though architect- urally a mistake, for it does not honestly answer to anything behind it, and is little more than an ornamental screen-wall, no one can deny that the west front of Lincoln is a composition of singular grandeur of outline and beauty of detail. The front is flanked by tall turrets crowned with spirelets. That to the south bears on its summit the mitred statue of St. Hugh, the holy bishop who may be trul}' called the second founder of the cathedral ; on that to the north is seen the famous " Swineherd of Stow," a thirteenth-century Gurth blowing his horn to call his herd together. The story goes that he saved a peck of silver pennies in his life-time and bequeathed his hoard to the fabric of the minster, and that the Dean and Chapter set up his statue where all might see it and it might sa}' to them, " Go and do thou likewise." The open doors invite us to enter the cathedral, but we must deny our- selves the privilege a little longer, until we have walked round the building, and rapidly traced its architectural history. Turning the south corner of the front we have a view of the long line of the nave, with its lancet windows, sturdy but- tresses below, and flying buttresses above, arcaded clerestory, and western chapels. Here recorded history fails us, but we know that this part of the cathedral must have been built between the death of St. Hugh in 1200, and the episcopate of Grosseteste, which began in 1235; and that the moving spirit was probably Grosseteste's predecessor and patron, another Bishop Hugh, known from his birth- place as Hugh of Wells, whose brother Jocelyn was at the same time engaged in rebuilding his own native cathedral. The only certain date is given by a castastrophe, which architectural evidence assures us must have taken place after the nave and transepts had been fully completed. This was the collapse, in 1237, of the central tower, which had been recently built, but, as was often the case with these mid-towers, on pillars too slight to sustain the huge mass they had to bear. Grosseteste was just then be- ginning his vigorous episcopate, and one of his first acts was to put his own house — his Cathedral Chapter — in order. Much needed reforming there ; but, as usually happens when the need is the most pressing, the subjects of the reforma- tion resisted it most indignantly. They stood upon their rights ; they even re- sorted to forgery to maintain them. " No bishop had ever visited them ; no bishop ever should." In the full heat of this struggle one of the canons, having to preach in the nave, appealed to the people against his bishop. "Such," he cried, " are the deeds of this man that if we were to hold our peace the very stones would cry out." The words were hardly out of the preacher's mouth when down 1 66 Lincoln. came the tower, crusliiug two or three innocent people in its fall, but not injuring the chief offender, who did not fear to speak evil of dignities. Grosseteste, strong man as he was, disregarded the omen, prosecuted his visitation, purged the Chapter of the slothful luxurious men who were its disgrace, and manifested equal care for the material fabric. His renowned episcopate, which shed lustre on the whole English Church, saw the commencement of the great central tower, which is the chief glory of the cathedral, and which may be styled one of the two or three most beautiful towers in Christendom. In his days were built the two lower store3's, the walls of which are encrusted with the diaper, seen also in the gable of the west front, and popu- larly known as Grosseteste's Mark. The cathedral had to wait till the end of the century for the lofty belfry stage, which is the crowning ornament of the central tower, as pure an example of the Decorated style as the lower part is of the Early English. The transepts, or cross-aisles, are intermediate in date between the choir and the nave. Each of them, as at Westminster Abbey, has a circular or rose window in its front. These round windows — rather a rare feature in an English church — formed part of St. Hugh's original plan. The Metrical Chronicle tells us that they were meant to symbolise the two eyes of the church ; that to the north, on which side lay the deanery, signifying the " Dean's Eye," watchfully open to guard against the snares of Lucifer, the Evil One, who, according to Isaiah xiv. 13, "sits in the sides of the north;" that to the south, overlooking the episcopal palace, the " Bishop's Eye," inviting the genial influences of the Holy Spirit. Beyond the transepts we come upon the most interesting portion of the building, both architecturally and historically — the choir of St. Hugh. We cannot here narrate the career of this singularly " holy and humble man of heart," one of the most fearless champions of right before the fierce Plautagenet Kings, the constant friend of the poor, the outcast, aud the oppressed, whose name so deserv- edly occupies a place in the Anglican Calendar on November 17th, the day when, in the last year of the twelfth century, he entered into rest. In 1 192 the foundation was laid for the choir, and before his death, in 1200, the choir and eastern transepts, and a portion of the western transept, were com- pleted. As originally built, it ended like Westminster Abbey in a polygonal apse, with a six-sided lady-chapel behind. But all beyond the eastern transept was re- moved half a century after St. Hugh's death for the erection of the matchless "Angel Choir," built to form a fitting shrine for the remains of the sainted founder, to which they were "translated" — such is the recognised ecclesiastical term — in 1281, in the presence of Edward I., his much-loved Queen Eleanor, and their royal chil- dren, and a host of bishops and barons summoned from all parts to swell the pageant. rs" "y 'nffnfi Lincoln. 169 With the erection of this easternmost portion, in which English Gothic archi- tecture reaches a perfection of beauty of form and delicacy of detail which has been rarely equalled and never surpassed, the fabric of the cathedral, with the exception of the towers and one or two small side chantry chapels, was brought to a con- clusion. The whole work of re-edification, from the laying of the first stone of St. Hugh's church to the translation of his body, occupied something less than a centur}-, no unduly long time for so great a work. In old times men built slowly, and they built solidly, and therefore their labour remains. It >- r- was no task work they did ; the}' put their hearts , into it. Entering the cathedral by Bishop Alexander's richl)'' sculptured and pillared Norman doorway, one of the grandest portals of its date in the kingdom, we have on each side of us one bay of Remigius's Norman cathedral, plain, stern, solid, lower and narrower than that which has supplanted it. Before us stretches the long arcaded vista of the vaulted nave, the work of the episcopate of Hugh of Wells, in the early part of the thirteenth century — a marvelous combination of dignity and grace, in which we hardly know whether to admire most the boldness of its construction or the elegance of its detail. At the south-west corner of the south transept stands the two-storeyed Galilee Porch, built to provide a state entrance for the bishop, whose palace lies a short distance to the south. The two buildings, cathedral and palace, are separated by the city wall and the lofty earthworks, mound and ditch which formed the southern boundary of the Roman cit}' of " Liudura Colonia." The bishop, therefore, had no direct access to his cathedral until Henry I. gave Bishop Bloet leave to pierce the city wall, provided it could be done without injury to the security of the citizens. The roundheaded archway then formed still stands firm and strong after the lapse of nearly eight centuries, but it has long since been blocked up, and is now half buried by the rise of the soil. Past it runs the favourite walk of the present bishop. There, among his snow-white pigeons and gorgeous peacocks, on a sunn}' terrace bordered with gay old-fashioned flowers, the tribute of the parsonage-gardens of the diocese, with the stately towers of the cathedral rising on one side and the bus}- town with its tall chimneys and huge factories filling the valley below, he finds what may be THE IMP, IN THE ANGEL CHOIR. 170 Lincoln. called a typical position for a bishop's residence, " below the church and above the world." The present bishop is the first since the Reformation who has lived where, as a rnle, all bishops ought to live, in their cathedral city, and close to their cathedral church. The shameless robbery of the see by the greedy statesmen who exercised authority in the name of the boy-king, Edward VL, compelled the Bishops of Lincoln to seek a more modest home. So the palace was deserted — the palace which had been the episco- pal residence since the beginning of the twelfth centur}' ; the home of St. Hugh and of Grosseteste ; of Alnwick, the counsellor of Henry VI. in his royal foundation of Eton and King's College, Cambridge ; of Smith, the founder of Brasenose College, Oxford, in which Henry Vn. spent his first Easter after liis accession to the throne, and " full like a Cristen prynce," with his own noble hands, " humbly and cristenly for Cr3'ste's love," washed the feet of twent3--nine poor men in the Great Hall, and in which Henry VIII. and his fifth queen — the loose-living Katherine Howard, who, the next 5'ear, lost her head for acts, of some of which this palace was the scene — were received, on their waj' into York- shire, by Bishop Longland, the bitter persecutor of the early " Gospellers." Then came the Great Rebellion, when the palace was first turned into a prison, and then despoiled of its lead and even of its ironwork, windows, and wainscots, and all that would fetch money, and left to the slow but sure action of the elements as a use- less ruin. In the dai-k days of the last century, when all reverence for ancient buildings had died out, and they were regarded as mere encumbrances of the ground, the palace was used as a stone quarry for the repairs of the cathedral, the chapel was pulled RUINS OF THE OLD P.-\.LACE. Lincoln. 171 down, its roofless hall was turned into an orchard, and each year saw the once grand pile sinking into more irreparable decay. But happily the palace never passed out of the possession of the see, and little b}^ little it has recovered its ancient purpose. Bishop Jackson made it the residence of his secretary, and tlie place of his weekly interviews with his clergy ; Bishoji Wordsworth, though unable to carry out his much- cherished wish of making it his home, commenced the work of restoration in the re- pair of Bishop Alnwick's Tower, for the use of the students of the Chancellor's Theological School. The work has been completed by Bishop King, and Lincoln has once more welcomed its bishop as a permanent resident. The old episcopal chapel being hope- lessly ruined, a new chapel has been cleverly constructed out of a portion of the domestic build- ings, and additional rooms have been built, with long suites of bed-chambers for the reception of the clergy and of the candi- dates for Orders at the Ember seasons. But, though some account of this historic palace cannot be regarded as out of place, it is time that we should return to the cathedral. Beyond the transepts is the choir, the work of St. Hugh, at the close of the twelfth century, at which he sometimes wrought with his own hands, the earliest-dated example of pure Gothic in the country, without any trammeling admixture of earlier forms, simple and dignified. We enter it under a richly carved vaulted screen of the fourteenth century, originally resplendent with gilding and colour, on which now stands the organ, but which in earlier days supported the Great Rood or Crucifix with the images of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. John on either side. The choir is furnished with a range of sixty-two stalls, with elbowed seats below, rising in three tiers on each side, and returned at the end. The Dean occupies the right-hand stall at the entrance ; THU NliW EPISCOPAL CHAPEL. 172 Luicoln. tlie Precentor, the chief musical ofl&cer, that to the left ; the Chancellor, the theologian and literary official of the Chapter, who in old times wrote the letters and arranged the preachings, and took care of the library, is seated in the last stall of the southern range to the east ; the Treasurer was originall}- placed in a corresponding place on the north side. The reason of the dignitaries being so placed was that they might over- look every part of the choir and maintain order among the vicars and singing boys, not always so intent on their sacred functions as they should have been. Each stall has a hinged turn-up wooden seat, with a projecting bracket on the under side, known in old times as misericords or misereres. This name they gained from being merciful provisions for the relief of wearied human nature, offering a partial support to the body during the protracted services of the earlier Church, without adopting the irreverent attitude — now, alas, too common — of sitting in pra3'er. Those who used them, however, had to beware lest drowsiness overtook them. If the body was thrown too far forward the seat lost its equilibrium, and the sleeper was in danger of being hurled down, to his own disgrace and the derision of others. In St. Hugh's choir the example of the Cathedral of Canterbury — a plan derived from Clugny — was followed. It was provided with a second pair of transepts, each with two semicircular chapels on the east side. One of these, that of St. John the Baptist, by the cloister door, was by his own desire the original burial-place of St. Hugh, whose patron saint the Baptist was. The last directions to his architect on his death-bed were for the construction of the altar in this chapel and its consecration. " I shall not be present in bod}-," he said, " but I shall be there in spirit." " Bury me there," he continued, " where I have so often loved to minister ; but lay me b}- the side of the wall, where people will not be in danger of tripping over my tomb." He sought not to be a stumbling-block to his brethren in life, and he would be grieved to prove a stumbling-block to them when dead. The humble and holy Hugh was not allowed to remain long in the lowly grave he had chosen for himself. Miraculous cures, according to the belief of the age, began to be worked at his tomb. He received canonisation from the Pope, and it was decreed that he must have another resting-place. So, as we have already said, the apse he had erected half a centurv before was pulled down, the cathedral was lengthened by five baA's, and on its completion the saint's body was carried in stately procession to a shrine covered with plates of silver gilt, standing behind the high altar, in the middle of the "Angel Choir," that exquisite architectural work, the very crown and glory of the Decorated st3'le. At the Reformation, in common with all such " monuments of superstition," the shrine was destroyed by the command of Henr}' VIII., the gold and silver work sharing the fate of the before-mentioned ornaments of the church, and the bones of the saint were interred in a grave hard by. " His body is buried in Lincoln. 173 peace; but his name liveth for evermore." Near Hugh's last resting-place rises the lofty canopied monument of one whose name will go down to posterity as one of the greatest prelates of the Church of England, great alike in learning, piety, and dauntless courage, the late bishop of the see, Christopher Wordsworth. His mitred effigy reposes upon a richly carved altar-tomb. Much that Lincoln Minster contains of histori- cal interest and architect- ural beauty must be passed over in this brief sketch ; but we cannot omit to mention one of its most instructive memorials, the shrine of little St. Hugh, in the south choir aisle. From the very earliest ages of Christianity down to our own times the horrible charge — always, we are persuaded, ground- less — has been brought against the Jews of tortur- ing and murdering Chris- tian children in mockery of our blessed Lord's suf- fering, and has been made the ground of cruel perse- cution. " Anti-Semitism," which has developed so fiercely in late years, especially in Russia, is no new thing; but, however contrary to the true spirit of Christianity, it is, sad to say, almost coeval with the establishment of its power as the dominant re- ligion. In all countries the same hideous tales have been repeated and believed. In our own land the so-called martvrdoms of St. William of Norwich, St. Harold BISHOP W(-)RDSWURTirS MONUMENT. 174 Liiicoln. at Gloucester, St. Robert at Edmundsbury, and others, culminating in tbe most famous of them all, that which has taken a wide place in our ballad literature, and which Chaucer has immortalised — ■ "Young Hew of Lincolne slaine also With cursed Jewes, as it is notable, For it nis but a litel while ago" — bear witness to the same credulous acceptance of unfounded accusations against members of a hated race, whom it was very convenient to get rid of. The Jews, it will be remembered, were the great money-lenders — indeed, the only money-lenders — of the Middle Ages, and to get your creditor hanged and his account-books burnt was a rough-and-ready way to discharge one's liabilities. Whatever may be thought of the charge, the supposed murder of little St. Hugh, a boy of lyincoln, and the consequent execution of a large number of Jews and the confiscation of their property, as accessories to the crime, in 1255, are historical events which cannot be questioned. The Dean and Chapter begged the bod}^ of the little child, and gave it the honour of a richly carved shrine and an altar in the minster, beneath which the tiny skeleton still reposes. His martyrdom holds its place in the Roman Catholic calendar. Five-and-thirty years after this Lincoln persecution, the Jews, as a body, were expelled from the realm, their prop- erty was confiscated, and any Jew found in England after All Saints' Day, 1290, in- curred the penalty of death by hanging. How powerfully do such events bring to our minds the old word of prophecy! — "The Lord shall scatter thee among all peoples . . . and among those nations thou shalt have no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot find any rest . , and thy life shall hang in doubt before thee ; and thou shalt fear day and night, and shalt have none assurance of thy life." "What is your strongest argument in support of Christianity?" scoffingly asked Frederick the Great of one of his chaplains. " Tlie Jews, sire," was the unanswerable reply. One is tempted to linger within the beautiful ten-sided Chapter-house, with its vaulted roof spreading from a central pillar, to dwell on the great historical memories of Edwardian Parliaments, to conjure tip the scene of the trial of the much maligned, but altogether guiltless, Kniglits Templar, or that of the " Pil- grimage of Grace," so vividly described b}' Fronde ; but, though much has been left unsaid, we must bring our walk to an end, hoping that what we have told may induce many to visit Lincoln for themselves. DIGNITARIES. BISHOP WORDSWORTH. CHRISTOPHER ^¥ORDSWORTH, D. D. '"I'^HE venerated Dr. Christopher Wordsworth, last Bishop of Lincoln, nephew of the I poet (born 1S07, died 1885), was a verj' great scholar of the older type, becoming uncommon in this day of natnral science. A classical scholar first, he will probably be longest remembered for his commentary on the Bible, the Greek Testament appearing Ijetween 1856-60, and the Old Testament in English, with notes and introductions, between 1S64-70. In this he takes a very conservative position, and draws his comment mainly from the ancient fathers and the great English divines. He played a prominent part in controversial theology, was a leader of the old- fashioned High Church party, and was equally out of sj'mpath}^ with Romanism and Dissent. In 1869 he became Bishop of Lincoln, and laboured earnestly for the best interests of his Diocese. His idea of episcopal duty was high, but it has been said that he lacked the breadth of view and of sympathy necessary to make him a great administrator. Still the singleness of his aims and his real nobility of character commanded the respect of all men. He died at Lincoln, March 20, 18S5, only a few weeks after resigning the See. ('77) EDWARD KING, D. D. EDWARD KING, D. D. (boru 1S29), the present saintly Bishop of Lincoln, came of a family which, by inheritance, was irabned with the responsibility and priestly significance of the clergy. Among his clerical relations were his father, Arch- deacon of Rochester, and his grandfather. Bishop of Rochester. He is himself a celibate. He was from 1863-73 Principal of Cnddesden College, where, at the same time being Canon of Christ Cluirch, Oxford, and Regins Professor of Pastoral Theology, he exercised a wide inflnence throughont the university, and, no doubt, aided largely in bringing about the reaction from extreme secularism. In 18S5 he was consecrated Bishop of Lincoln. He is probably the most advanced Ritualist upon the Episcopal Bench. He is, however, a loyal son of the Church, and after his celebrated trial for non-conformity to the rubric in some features of his service, abstained without hesitation from those condemned by the Archbishop. Furthermore, the position taken by him that a Bishop should not be subject to the jurisdiction of an Archbishop, but to the authority of his comprovincial Bishops, is sufficient evidence that he is opposed to the ideas of Romanism. His gentle, earnest face, his kind and noble character, and his past actions are enough to assure those who differ with him as to Church doctrine, that his influence upon the ritualists will be for tolerance and loyalty to Anglicanism. (178) BISHOP KING. WINCHESTER CATHEDRAL. WINCHESTER. IN the fair valley of the Itchen, where the downs on either hand draw near together, has stood from prehistoric days a little town which grew to be Winchester, one of the most important capital cities of England. The first anthentic records of it are those which have been dug out of the soil, not written in books. There is a doubt whether the Saxon cathedral was on the site of the present building, or a little to the northward of it ; at any rate, whatever Saxon work there may be in it has been completely incorporated, and we shall not go far wrong if we consider that the existing church was begun by Bishop Walkelyn in 1079. The magnificence of Norman skill and piet}' may still be understood b}^ any one who will make careful study of the two transepts, which re- main almost as Walkelyn left them in 1093. From them we may picture the glory of the long and lofty nave, its massive piers, broad, deep triforium, and dignified clerestory'. The original tower, however, was not destined to stand long. Soon after William Rufus was buried under it, in iroo, whether from fault}' construction, or uncertain foundations in the wet ground, or from being weakened by excavating too near the piers ; or whether, as the resentfull}' pious held, from the cankering wickedness of the Red King's bones — from whatever cause — in 1 107 the tower fell in with a mighty crash over the monarch's tomb. WalkeUm had, (183) THK DEANERY. 184 Winclicstcr. however, left funds to the church, and a new tower was carried out with massive firmness. There is but little in the church of Decorated or Middle-Pointed style ; four bays of the choir, unrivaled in grace and richness of mouldings, and the tracery of one or two windows, are all that Winchester can show of the most beautiful and exuberant period of English architecture. Satiated with the rich ornamentation and variety of the period, men, in the latter half of the fourteenth century, turned towards a harder and a simpler manner of building, a severe architectural Puritanism. They trusted for effect to height and repetition, even to monotony, and to the upward pointing of reiterated vertical lines. Winchester Cathedral was the first to feel the influence of this change of taste. First, Bishop William of Edyndon, then the more famous William of Wykeham, attacked and " reformed " the massive and noble Norman work. Edyndon began at the west end, altering the fa9ade completely, and converting to modern style two bays on the north and one on the south. Tlie huge west window, which forms the main feature of the fa9ade, has been mercilessly criticised and condemned by Mr. Ruskin in his " Stones of Venice" (vol. i., chap, xvii.), who first draws a caricature of the window, and then condemns his own creation. The work thus set in hand by Edyndon was carried through by W^illiam of Wykeham, who, through his colleges, has imposed the unimaginative Perpendicular style on England. He did not pull down the ancient Norman nave, but encased the columns with the poor mouldings of this later Gothic. Bishop Fox built up the east end of the choir, placing on the central pinnacle a life-like statue of himself. To him also is due, in its striking height and exquisite elaboration of detailed canopy work, the great reredos, which is repeated, with less happy effect of proportion, at St. Albans. Just before, and in his day. Priors Hiinton and Silkstede pushed out the Lady Chapel some twenty-six feet in the later Perpendicular manner. This additional bay of the Lady Chapel, with its stiff ornament and half-obliterated frescoes, made this church the longest cathedral in England. With the death of Bishop Fox in 15 28, the structural changes in the fabric came almost to an end. Later additions or alterations were but small ; such as the closing of the fine Norman lantern of the tower with a wooden groining, erected under the eyes of Charles I., as we see by the bosses and ornaments ; there is the royal monogram in many forms, and royal badges, and the initials of the King and Queen, C. M. R. (Carolus, Maria, R.), and a large circular medallion displaying in profile the royal pair themselves ; in the centre is an inscription giving us the date of this work^ 1634. The library, a lean-to along the end of the south transept, was built to hold Bishop Morley's books after his death in 1684 ; and the porch at the west end was restored iu the present century. THE GREAT SCREEN. // 'inrhcsier. 187 Within the walls the most striking object of interest is undoubtedly the famous Norman font of black basaltic stone, which was probably placed in the church in the days of Walkelyn ; it portrays in bold if rude relief the life and miracles of St. Nicolas of Myra. Next after the font may perhaps be noted the fine carved spandrels, fourteenth-century work, of the choir-stalls, with the quaint misereres of the seats ; then Prior Silkstede's richly carved pulpit of the fifteenth century, and the very interesting and valuable Renaissance panels of the pews, put in by William Kingsmill, last prior and first dean, in 1540. The chantries and tombs in this church are of unusual beauty and interest. Three founders of colleges at Oxford lie buried here : Wykeham, of New College and St. Mary's Winton; Wayne- flete, of Magdalen Col- lege; and Fox, of Corpus Christi College. William of Wykehara lies buried in the nave, between two of the great piers ; the altar in his chantry has been removed, as have also the statues ; other- wise his alabaster effigy and the stonework of the canopies remain un- injured ; and the great bishop's serene counte- nance, with the three characteristic little Benedictines at his feet, has been handed down to us in life-like truthfulness. In the retro-choir, on the north side, is William of Wajmeflete's splendid chantry ; and by the side of what was the high altar, until he himself removed it, is the tomb of Bishop Fox, a very elaborate example of Late Perpendicular work. No effigy of the bishop is here ; he built the tomb himself, and perhaps thought it enough to be seen on the pinnacle outside or in the great east window ; there is a richly ornamented altar and reredos, and behind it a little chamber, still called his stud}', because in his old age, when blind, the good bishop was daily led thither to sit and CHANTRIES IN THE SOUTH AISLE OF THE CHOIR. i88 // 'utclicstcr. rest and pray. Ou the outside of this chantry, and of that of Bishop Gardiner over against it, are placed two ghastly nicnicnlo iiiori figures, such as are not unusual on the monuments of foreign prelates, evidences of that morbid feeling about death which pervaded the period just before the Reformation, and made men depict on so many walls these emblems of corruption or the corresponding and still more ghastly- humourous dances of Death. In no English church, except Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's, lie so many men of name. For just as the features of the cathedral represent all the successive phases and changes of the art of building, until it has been styled a " School of THE CLOSE GATEWAY. English Architecture," so it ma}' be said to be the home and centre of our early history. Long is the roll of kings and statesmen who came hither, and whose bones here lie at rest. Cynegils and Cenwalh, West-Saxon kings, founders of the church, are here ; Egbert was buried here in S38 ; Ethelwulf also, and Edward the Elder, and Edred. The body of Alfred the Great la}' awhile in the church, then was transferred to the new minster he had built, and finally rested at Hyde Abbey. And most splendid name of all, the great Cnut was buried here; as was also his son Harthacnut, as bad and mean as his father was great. The roll of kings was closed when Red William's blood-dripping corpse came jolting hither in the country cart from the New Forest. Here also lie Emma, Lady of the English, whom her mean son, Edward the n 'iiiclicster. 189 Confessor, treated so ill ; and Richard, the Conqueror's second son, and one of the greatest of Englishmen, Earl Godwin, and his nephew, Dnke Beorn. Of churchmen there is also good store. Besides the prelates mentioned above, St. Birinus and St. Swithuu, and Archbishop Stigand, and ^-Ethelwold, parent of the Benedictine priory, Walkelj'n, the master-builder, and the saintly Giffard, lie here ; also Henry of Blois, King Stephen's brother, first founder of the Hospital of St. Cross ; Peter des Roches also, guardian of the realm in the youth of Henry HI. ; and Edyndon, builder of the western front, and in later da3's Peter Mews, and Morley, and Hoadley, with many another of lesser fame. There are but few men of letters here : in a chapel in the south tran- sept Izaak Walton is buried ; and in the north aisle of the nave lies the well-known novelist. Miss Austen. Near the west end of the church is Flaxman's striking monument to Joseph Warton, the critic, and head of Winchester Col- lege. There is hard b}^ another specimen of Flaxman's work in a graceful group on the monument to Mrs. North, the bishop's wife. Bishop North himself kneels in effigy (one of Chantre3''s masterpieces) at the other end of the church, against the east wall of the Lady Chapel. And finalh-, in the south transept stands Scott's elaborate memorial to the late Bishop Wilberforce, ill-placed among the surroundings of the massive Norman work. In this great church many stirring scenes of English history have been enacted. The early kings made Winchester their home and the cathedral their chapel. Here it was that Egbert, after being crowned /// rcgcm totins Brittanicc^ with assent of all parties, issued an edict in S2S ordering that the island should thereafter be always styled England, and its people Englishmen. Here King Alfred was crowned and lived RUINS OF THli CLUISTEKS. I go Winchester. and died. Here in 1035 Cnut's body lay in state before the liigh altar, over which was hung thenceforth for many a year, most precious of relics, the great Norseman's crown. Here William the Conqueror often came, and wore his crown at the Easter Gemot ; here, too, clustered many of the national legends : St. Swithun here did his mighty works, and here were the forty dismal days of rain ; hard by is the scene of the great fight between Colbrand the Dane and Guy of Warwick ; in the nave of the church Queen Emma trod triumphant on the red-hot ploughshares as on a bed of roses ; hither came Earl Godwin's body after his marvelous and terrible death, one of the well-known group of malignant Norman tales. It was in Winchester Cathedral that Henry Beauclerk took to wife his queen, Matilda, to the great joy of all English-speaking folk. Here Stephen of Blois was crowned King ; and here, on the other hand, the Empress Maud was welcomed by city and people with high rejoicings ; here, too, was drawn up and issued the final compact, in 1153, which closed the civil war of that weary reign, and secured the crown to the young Prince Henry. , He in his turn often sojourned in Winchester, and befriended, in his strong wa}'^, the growing city. The cathedral witnessed another compact in the dark days of King John : the King was here reconciled to the English Church in the person of Stephen Langton ; Henry HI. and his queen, Eleanor, were here in 1242 ; and on May-day of that year " came the Queen into the chapter-house to receive society." In 1275 Edward I., with his queen, were welcomed with great honour by the prior and brethren of St. Swithun, and attended service in the church. The christening of Arthur, Prince of Wales, elder brother of Henry VIII., was here; and here Henry VIII. met his astute rival, the Emperor Charles V. It was in Winchester Cathedral that the marriage of Philip and Mar}'^ took place, and the chair in which she sat is still to be seen in the church. The Stuart kings loved the place. Here in the great rebellion was enacted that strange scene when, after the capture of the city, the mob rushed into the cathedral, wild for booty and mischief, and finding in the chests nothing but bones, amused themselves b}' throwing them at the stained windows of the choir. It was at this time that Colonel Nathaniel Fiennes, a Parliamentary officer and an old Wykehamist, stood with drawn sword at the door of Wykeham's chantry, to protect it from violence. Since the da3's of the INIerry Monarch, who was often at Winchester, and loved it so well that he built his palace here, no striking historical events have been enacted within its walls. The church by degrees recovered from the ruin of the Commonwealth time, and has had a quiet, happy life from that time onward, a tranquil gray building, sleeping amidst its trees, in the heart of the most charming of all South English cities. DIGNITARIES. BISHOP WILBERFORCE. SAMUEL WILBERFORCE, D. D. How can one possibly compress within a few lines of print tlie varied career of the manj'-sided, energetic, eloquent Samuel of Oxford, a great pulpit and par- liamentary orator, a great bishop, a wit, a scholar, and a man of the world. His friend, Dean Bnrgon, well calls him " the remodeler of the Episcopate." Son of the celebrated William Wilberforce, he early reached distinction, and became Bishop of Oxford in 1845. In that position he was for twenty-four years the most prominent figure in the English Church. The popular notion of a bishop's office before his time was connected, above all things, with the ideas of dignified leisure and serene isolation. On the contrary', since his appointment to the See of Oxford, it has been identified with nothing so much as incessant labour, ubiquitous exertion, and the utmost publicity. He left upon the whole English Episcopate the abiding impress of his own earnest spirit and extraordinary genius. One secret of his success was his power of sympathy. He was large-hearted, liberal, and generous to a fault in his treatment of his clergy- ; prepared to throw himself, heart and soul, into any project which seemed capable of being successfully worked, and which had good for its ob- ject. In 1S69 he was translated to the See of Winchester, and July 19, 1S73, was suddenly killed b}' a fall from his horse. {193) '3 ANTHONY WILSON THOROLD, D. D. THE present, and ninety-eiglith Bishop, the Right Rev. Anthony Wilson Thorold, D. D., (born Jnne 13, 1825,) comes of old Saxon stock. He was rector of London parishes some thirteen years, then Canon of York, and an examining chaplain to the Archbishop, and in 1S77 Bishop of Rochester. In 1891 he was translated to Win- chester. His face might be thonght sombre, bnt it brightens with fire and feeling. His style in writing is apt and strong, and he is the author of several very pop- ular devotional works, " The Presence of Christ " and " The Gospel of Christ," having run through several editions. The great responsibility he felt in the management of the enormous Diocese of South London was as much as his health could stand, and the hopelessness of the task is evidenced by his review on a report in the "Record" on the spiritual con- dition of the masses in that neighbourhood. He ends by saying: "To you I be- queath (in my heart it is hidden, heavy, sorrowful, abasing, stinging with its fire), cue sentence of this report which we can not forget, because it is so terrible, which we must not destroy, because it is so true — ' Christianity is not in possession in South London.' " He made frequent trips across the United States. (194) BISHOP THUROLU. SALISBURY CATHEDRAL. ^m& 'f%Zi,. SALISBURY. 1"^HE last time that Pugin was in Salisbur}^ he stood at the window of a house overlooking the cathedral and exclaimed, "Well, I have traveled all over Europe in search of architecture, but I have seen nothing like this." There is ample justification for such a verdict. The structure itself is vast; the clear space around is probably without a parallel ; the spire is exceptional both for its elegance and its height ; the colour is determined by the same lichen that has grown through the same generations over the entire mass, and in those gray walls rising out of the greensward, the impression undoubtedly is conve3-ed that there are points in which Salisbury Cathedral stands without a rival in the world. There is one characteristic about its architecture which it shares with St. Paul's Cathedral alone amongst English cathedrals — that it was built all at one period. It is therefore no museum of English architecture, as so many similar churches are, in which we can study the movements of the art in their several periods. It is from end to end the monument of one single epoch, the first half of the thirteenth cen- tury — it was begun in the year 1220 — built, as seems probable, not altogether apart from French influence, yet in its severity, its reserve, its stern disdain of ornament, thoroughly English in its spirit, being indeed the completest survival in this country of what has been often thought the best and purest period of English art. The lofty spire, upon which the repute of Salisbur}' Cathedral is popularly rested, seems to have been no part of the original design. The lantern was at first completed a little above the roof of the nave. The piers and foundations below were never intended to carry so vast a weight ; and it was not probably till a generation or two had elapsed that some unknown architect, with the daring of a true artist in exhausting the capability of his material, planned the tower and spire, which have since been recognized as amongst the chief glories of the pile. This cathedral is peculiarly rich in the survival of consecration crosses, which in mediaeval daj^s were carved or painted on the walls of a church. The}' are to be seen both outside and inside the building. Those on the inside were twelve in number, three on each wall, to the north, south, east, and west. It seems probable, (199) 200 Salisbniy. but not perhaps quite certain, that the number of external crosses was the same. The whole ritual of the consecration is extremely curious, and is described by Durandus, a French bishop who was nearly contemporary with the building of Salis- bury Cathedral. The deacon was shut up alone in the church, and his business was to light twelve lamps before the twelve crosses painted on the walls. Meantime the bishop, clergy, and people outside thrice made the circuit of the building, the bishop sprinkling the walls with water which he had previously blessed. On their entering the church, a cross in ashes and sand was made upon the pavement, and upon the cross the entire alphabet was written in Greek and Latin characters. THE CLOISTKK. GARTH. The bishop then made the tour of the interior and anointed the twelve painted crosses with the sacred chrism. The artistic effect of the inierior is not at all equal to that of the exterior of the church ; and the question arises as to what is the particular respect in which its builders failed ? why is it that they who were so great and strong outside have become so feeble aud so poor within ? It is perhaps open to doubt whether it is the originators who failed at all. Here are at all events many of the same fine qualities within that won our admiration without. Here, as on the exterior, there are size, elegance, symmetry, just proportions, modesty of treatment, aud many other Salisbury. 2or such attributes. Yet, judged by its own high standard, it fails. The hite Poet- Laureate is understood to have framed the criticism tliat it is deficient in mystery. This result is no doubt in a great measure due to colour, or more strictly speaking to the absence of right colour. Outside the building Nature has done the exquisite colouring with her mantle of lichen ; internally the present colour-effect is due to successive generations of men, of whom some have misunderstood and some have even derided the power of colour. As the cathedral has been seen for the last hun- dred years, and probably for much longer, the whole effect is too light. Until the restoration of the past ten years, when its marble shafts have once again begun to gleam with their dark polish, and the vaulting of the roof has been robed in modern polychrome, the dominant effect was universally, as indeed it still is in part, that produced by a kind of buff wash. But it may be doubted whether we have au}- idea of the splendour of this interior as its originators meant it to look. Then, no doubt every pillar in the structure, being of marble, helped by its dark rich burnish to remove that pale monotony which we ha\'e found so painful ; then, arch and wall and groining were from end to end aflame with vermilion in arabesque and saint and angel ; then, every window — and the wall of this cathedral is nearly all windows — must have flashed its jewels on the floor. It must have been a magnificent interior then. The giant-artists of the exterior were not so feeble directh' they got within the porch. The colour-system of the cathedral has been terribl}' misunderstood — the modern arabesques, for example, are painted upon a white ground ; the old ones may still be seen to have been painted xipon a deep colouring, making a vast differ- ence in the solemnity of the aggregate effect — but the S3'stem, whatever it was, was not confined to the inside, but reaches even to the exterior of the church. On the west portal there is an example of what is ver}- rare in this climate — colour on the exterior of a building. Within living memor}' that door was known as the " Blue Door." The " restoration " by Wyatt in the last century removed much of the colour, and the recent work has removed still more ; but some slight traces of the blue may still be discerned. The same is true of the arcading in the cloisters, where there is still sufficient evidence before the seeing eye for the presumption that their wall-spaces were once covered with cartoons in colour. One difficulty always strikes the eye of the intelligent spectator about the inside of Salisbury Cathedral. There seems to be no kind of an elevation where the high altar could have been placed. The floor seems perfectly flat. The difficulty is removed hy a reference to some of the French churches. The altar probablj- stood not as we see it — at the end of everything — but on a dais of its own, covered probably with a gorgeous canopy, rich in sculpture and metal-work, with its superb corona, as we actually know, suspended before it, and girt with every circumstance 202 Salisbury. of splendour. The ritual of Sarura demanded that it should stand free of any wall ; and its probable position was at the intersection of the lesser transept with the choir, where the decoration overhead of all three arms of the fabric, in front of it, leads up to the figure of Our Lord in Majesty. The internal arrangement of Salisbury may serve to correct a popular mistake whereby an expression about " the old monks " is so often hazarded in connection with any and every cathedral. There were no monks at Salisbury ; and the choir stalls all placed east of the transept may serve to remind us of it. The law is correctly laid down b}' the eminent French writer Viollet-le-Duc, that non-monastic THE CI.OISTERS. churches had their choir-stalls east of the transept, while monastic churches had theirs to the west, in the nave, or across the transept. The arrangement at West- minster compared with that of Salisbury is an example of this. A very singular feature in the internal structure is the plinth, carried all round the church, upon which the great shafts of the arcade rest. Most probably it was intended for a seat ; and in the early days it was perhaps the only sitting accommodation provided in the nave. The sermons of those days, preached in the nave, were certainly not less lengthy than those of our own time ; but the bulk of the hearers must either have stood or have rested the arms and chin upon the crutch-shaped leaning-staff (reclinatorium), which was the precursor of the more comfortable arrangements of modern times. Salisbmy. 205 From an artistic point of view there are two or three tombs of exceptional interest at Salisbury. First, there is the thirteenth-centur}' tomb of Bishop Brid- port, which has been seriously mutilated by the iconoclastic zeal of the past, but which is still perfect enough to exhibit to us the British architect of that day, in his efforts to throw off the grim severity of treatment which marks the earliest beginnings of the cathedral. This monument has been copied for the Cr3-stal Palace. The tomb with recumbent effigy of Longspee, Earl of Salisbury, is valuable as a specimen of monumental art partly in wood. Originally it was ablaze with colour, which can still be traced in some profusion. Indeed, the whole series of tombs, which in the last century were arranged down the nave, serves to show that for THE CHAPTER-HOUSE. many generations the old English artists coloured everything. Here it may still be seen that they painted even their alabaster. Amongst the curiosities of monumental art are two recumbent figures repre- sented as skeletons. Until the recent restoration, only one of these tombs was exposed to view, and it was popularly believed to be the monument of one who had reduced himself to a state of emaciation by excessive fasting. This view received a severe shock when the removal of the old fittings of the choir disclosed a second tomb of a similar character. Such monuments exist, moreover, in other churches ; and they belong in fact to a period when it was the fashion to represent the mortality of man in this ghastly form. 2o6 Sa/isbmy. Another curiosity is found in tlie recumbent figure of the so-called " Boy- Bishop." It was the custom of the mediaeval Church for a few days after the children's festival of St. Nicholas, in December, to allow a parody of ecclesiastical pomp on the part of the children, one of the number being actually invested with the mock dignity of the bishop. The m.M^\ \^'^M^^V^ ^^M stor}^ went that one such boy died during his term of office, and that this was his tomb. In this case likewise the popular story has been exploded by comparative science. Similar monuments in miniature are found elsewhere ; and two ex- planations of them are possible. Either there was a fashion at one period of constructing monuments of diminutive size, as there was at other periods of aiming at colossal size ; or, what is more probable, the small stone was made to cover the relics of some eminent person when only little of them could be recovered. What if, in the present instance, the eminent person was no less a figure than St. Osmund himself — the nephew of William the Conqueror, the founder of the see, and in his use of Sarum, the father of the worship of the whole English Church ? His relics — what little had survived of them — were certainly collected at the time of his canonisation in 1457, when there was a great festival at Salisbury, and when no fewer than forty thousand persons came to pass in front of his shrine. There is no trace of any cover for so eminent a treasure either recorded or surviving in Salisbury Cathedral unless it be this unexplained stone.- '"jfacoh ii'reitlln£: zvitlt tht- Angt-t." SEDALIA IN THE CHAPTER-HOUSE. CHESTER CATHEDRAL, MOSAICS. CHESTER. THE present Cathedral of Chester was not the earliest episcopal chnrch of the diocese which now bears this name. If we tnrn to the periods which imme- diately preceded and followed the Norman Conquest, we find Chester, Lichfield, and Coventry co-ordinated as sister cathedral cities, the bishop's title being taken indifferently from an}' one of them. This is the reason why three mitres appear in the arms of the See of Chester. The kingdom of Mercia was then one vast diocese, which extended far over the north-west of England, including even part of Wales, and reaching to the edge of the territory of the Bishops of Durham. It is the more important to name this historical fact, because then the Chester Cathedral of this unwieldy diocese ^\■as the fine Norman Church of vSt. John the Baptist, where a great calamity, in the fall of a magnificent tower, has recently deprived the city of Chester of one of its most dignified and characteristic features. The history of this diocese has been, to a most remarkable degree, a history of successive subdivisions. The first important change of this kind was the creation by King Henry VIII. of a separate See of Chester, the abbey church of the great Benedictine house of St. Werburgh being assigned as the cathedral church to the new diocese, which was made part of the Northern Province. This new diocese, however, 14 (209) 210 Chester. though separated off from Shropshire, Staffordshire, and Derbyshire, was still enormous ; for besides Cheshire it included the whole of Lancashire and Westmore- land, with parts of Denbighshire, Flintshire, and parts of Cumberland and Yorkshire. Recent changes, indeed, of the most imperative and advantageous kind have been made. It was over this vast area, however, that even Bishop Blomfield was the ecclesiastical ruler ; and it must be remembered that we are thinking here not merely of a large extent of country, but of a population rapidly growing and full of energy. The first of the recent subdivisions was the result of the creation of tlie See of Ripon in 1836, the second resulted from that of the See of Manchester in 1S47, the CHESTER CATHEDRAL— NORTH SIDE. third from that of the See of Liverpool in 1880. Now the diocese is simply coincident with the county of Chester, which has a proud and well-defined history of its own. If we begin now with the church of the time of King Henry L, its Norman architecture is not, indeed, at first sight very obtrusive ; yet, when closely examined, it is quite sufficient to lead us to some important conclusions, and these conclusions have been largely aided by discoveries made during the work of recent restoration. The Norman arches on the exterior of the northern w^all of the nave, and the unfinished Norman tower (destined now for a baptistery, for which the preparations are already in progress), show that the length of the nave during the time of the early Plantag- Chester. 211 enet kings was the same as at present. The size and the form of the small north transept remain as they were at this period. It has been ascertained that the piers of the choir were then, in their massive rotundity, like the piers of St. John's Church. The lines of curvature of the apsidal terminations on the east have been discovered, and special mention must be made of the recently disinterred and restored Norman crypt, which is on the west side of the cloister, and is now one of the best surviving specimens of Norman architecture in this part of England. The reign of King Edward I. may be taken as our next historical landmark for architectural description. Before his visit to Chester the Lady Chapel was built CHESTER CATHEnRAI.— WEST END. on the east of the choir, and the architects whom he aided were probably engaged upon the choir and its aisles at the time when he was here. As to the former portion of the cathedral buildings, great ingenuity was shown by Sir Gilbert Scott in discov- ering the correct form of the buttresses, whereby he was enabled at this place to effect a forcible and truthful restoration. As regards the latter, the attention of all who walk on that part of the city wall, which is on the east of the cathedral, must be arrested by a singular cone at the eastern extremity of the south aisle of the choir. This also is a recover)' of the past, and it is the result of a shrewd observation of facts by Mr. Frater, who was clerk of the works from 1868 to 1876. The evidence ou which the rebuilding of this cone is justified was quite certain. There seems no 212 Chester. doubt that it was the result of some fancy of a monk or architect from Normandy ; and at Norrey, near Caen, ma}' be seen a structural peculiarity of exactly the same kind. In each of these instances the obliteration of ancient features, the happy recovery of which has now been found possible, was chiefly due to the prolongation of the aisles of the choir in a late period of bad architecture. The south aisle is now arrested at its original point. The change observed in the vaulting of the north aisle tells its own story. To the Early Pointed style succeeded in due order that which is termed the Decorated; and good specimens are found of each of its subdivisions in the geomet- rical tracery of some windows and the flowing tracery of others. The former are in the south aisle and in the clerestor}' of the choir, the latter in the south aisle of the nave and in the east aisle of the south transept. The general impression, however, produced on the e^^e by these two conspicuous parts of the cathedral is that of the commanding presence of the latest or Perpendicular style of Gothic architecture. This arises from the large clerestory windows of that date. Those of the nave belong probabl}' to the reign of Henr}' YII. Those of the transept are earlier in date and better in form. It ought to be added that the great central tower and the exquisite woodwork of the clioir belong to the earliest and best part of the Perpendicular period. The upper portion of the north transept, recently restored, is of the same general date. The great south transept is so remarkable, both historically and architecturally, that it deserves, and indeed requires, a separate mention. In size it is as large as the choir and nearly as large as the nave. This circumstance constitutes it the most singular feature of Chester Cathedral ; and it attracts attention the more because of its contrast with the diminutive size of the north transept. This anomaly, if we may so call it, probably arose in this wa}^ that the Benedictine monks, unable to extend their church to the north, because the conventual buildings were there, pushed it forward to the south, so as to absorb the parish church of St. Oswald. In the end the parishioners recoiled successfully upon the monks, and obtained permission to hold their services within the abbey church on the old ground. The mouldings of the late doorway inserted in one of the windows on the south of the transept combine with other evidence to attest this fact. The parochial rights within the cathedral continued till the close of 1880, and thus St. Oswald's name is still connected with this part of it ; and it is to be hoped that this association with the good missionary King of Northumbria will never be lost. DIGNITARIES. BISHOP JAYNE. FRANCIS JOHN JAYNE, D. D. FRANCIS JOHN JAYNE, D. D., the present Bisliop of Chester, was born January I, 1S45. He received his earU' education at Rugby School, after leaving whicli he Avent to Wadham College, Oxford, there taking a double first class in 1 868, becoming the same 3-ear a Fellow of Jesus College. He was ordained Priest in 1870, and for one year after that time was Curate of St. Clement's, Oxford. He later became Tutor of Keble College, remaining there until 1S79. In 1S79 he was appointed Principal of Lampeter College, and by his unusual abilit}- greatly increased its efficiency. In 1SS6 Dr. Gott, having been appointed Dean of Worcester Cathedral, Bishop Jayne was appointed in his place to the important Vicarage of Leeds thus left vacant. In 1S89 he was consecrated Bishop of Chester. Although Chester is one of the minor cathedrals, it is made more prominent because of Bishop Ja3me's extended influence, and because it is generall}- the first cathedral visited bj^ the thousands of American tourists in England. (215) THE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW. CIRC. AFTER NOV 281 9T|2 Series 9482 D 000 302 695 2 Univers Sout]