Approach to Ely.--The Park.--Walpole Gate.--Crauden
Chapel.--Western Tower,
Galilee.--Nave.--Baptistery.--Roof.--Prior's
Door.--Cloisters.--Owen's Cross--Octagon.--Alan's
Grave.--Transepts.--St. Edmund's Chapel.--Choir
Stalls.--Presbytery.--Norman Piers.--Reredos.--Candlesticks.
The foregoing pages have taught us something of the history of Ely
Cathedral, of the men and women who have loved it and worked for it;
of those who have defaced and pillaged it; of the wars and revolutions
that have surged around it. Now we propose to visit it, and to see for
ourselves the very stones which, though silent, can speak to us;
hoping to be favoured with a fine day, that we may be able to study
the Minster advantageously from without as well as from within. And
let us come provided with a glass, for much of the best carved work is
high above our heads.
It may be unenterprising to come to Ely by rail; but yet there is no
approach that can give us a finer impression of the Minster than we
gain by our first view of it from the train, whether we arrive from
the north or from the south. In either case we have been travelling
over flat dull country, when suddenly there stands up before our eyes
the "stately fane" of which we have heard so much, and our first
impulse is to show her some token of reverence. We take a good look at
the pile of building before us, and we resolve not to forget our first
sight of this our new friend. Well did the quaint historian, Thomas
Fuller, write of Ely Minster in 1660, "This presenteth itself afar off
to the eye of the traveller, and on all sides, at great distance, not
only maketh a promise, but giveth earnest of the beauty thereof."
Leaving Ely station, our best course will be to walk toward the
Cathedral, taking the second turn to the right. This brings us into a
commonplace street; where, however, we should notice on our right a
row of thatched cottages, with their overhanging upper storeys, that
have survived from olden days. Just opposite these cottages is an iron
gateway which invites us into the Cathedral "Park," an undulating
piece of ground some sixteen acres in extent grazed by cattle and
sheep, its highest point being an artificial mound, now densely
clothed with trees, called Cherry Hill. An award of the seventeenth
century speaks of it as Mill Hill, an early print shows it topped by a
windmill; so here, doubtless, stood the windmill of the Monastery,
mentioned in the epitaph on Alan of Walsingham as one of the four
wonders of Ely due to his genius (the others being the Lantern, the
Lady Chapel, and the Abbey vineyard). The place of the mill (which
itself superseded the Norman keep built on this eminence by William
the Conqueror) is now occupied by a monument in memory of Bentham, the
historian of the Abbey of Ely, who wrote in the eighteenth century.
Grassy hillocks rise between us and the cathedral; and we gain an
impression as of some great ship riding majestically over ocean
billows. The church, indeed, is actually about the size of a large
liner, and the green swells of the park are not unlike in magnitude to
those of the Atlantic. Turner's painting of Ely Minster gives this
same ship-like impression of the place, thus embodying the history of
this wondrous pile. It has in truth weathered many a tempest, has been
wrecked and built afresh, has sunk and been restored, and is preserved
for us still as a holy and classic House of God.
The first of the Abbey buildings that we come to on our walk is the
tithe barn with its tiled roof, one of the largest in England,
constructed in mediaeval days, with no architectural beauty, yet with a
dignity of its own. It still bears witness to a financial state of
affairs, when rent was paid in kind, far removed from that which now
exists, since the commuting of tithes for payment in cash.
Leaving this barn on our left, we find ourselves in front of a massive
gatehouse, known as the "Ely Porta" or "Walpole Gate." It was begun
about 1396, and finished under Prior William Walpole, whose name still
clings to it. This gatehouse has been used for various purposes, for
a chapel, for a prison, for a brewery. To-day it serves as the chief
schoolroom of the "King's School," which represents the famous Choir
School where Edward the Confessor was educated. His coat of arms, a
cross and five martlets, is carved accordingly on the northern
hood-moulding of the gateway, those of the See of Ely on the other
side. It was never finished according to the original design; the
money of the Abbey being needed for other matters, of which one was a
tedious lawsuit relating to the Bishop's jurisdiction.
We will not pass through the gateway yet; but, again turning to the
right, follow the alley that leads us toward the cathedral itself. We
will stop first at Prior Crauden's Chapel, a small upper room with a
vaulted chamber beneath it. Passing through a narrow doorway, we climb
a spiral staircase which brings us into the little Sanctuary, built by
Prior Crauden, from the designs of his friend Alan of Walsingham, for
his own private use. The Abbey records speak of him in monkish Latin
as follows "Brother John of Crauden ruled the convent as a peaceable
shepherd, and was beloved by God and man; may his memory be held
blessed for ever. Adjoining the Priory he built a chapel of wondrous
beauty, where he might worship God in prayer and praise. Hither did he
resort by night and day for spiritual meditation, unless prevented by
sickness; here he would commend to God, himself, his Church and all
that concerned the Church. His face and his form were goodly to
behold." Let us picture him to ourselves at his devotions in this tiny
chapel--it only measures 31 feet by 15 feet--a very gem of Decorated
architecture; and from the delicate leaf-like tracery around us, let
us learn what to expect when we reach the Minster itself, which
abounds in the work of this period. The contemporary mosaic pavement,
representing Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, is specially
noteworthy. So is also the dim fresco of daisies and trefoils, as
delicate in design as it is true to nature, still visible on the
southern wall.
[Illustration: _Prior Crauden's Chapel._]
John of Crauden held the office of Sacrist from 1321 till 1341, while
John Hotham was Bishop. On the Bishop's death, in 1337, the monks of
Ely unanimously elected Prior Crauden to succeed him, as being a man
of marked piety and generosity; but the Pope annulled this election,
and Simon de Montacute became Bishop. We are not told how the
saintly prior took this rebuff; we may believe he bore it with a grace
reflected from or by the chapel that he had built. Not only was he a
builder and a man of piety; he was also a promoter of education;
providing an endowment for the maintenance of three or four young
monks in the then yet youthful University of Cambridge. For
generations this chapel was partitioned into three rooms and belonged
to the adjoining house. It has been restored of late years for
devotional use, and here the boys of the King's Grammar School attend
daily Mattins and Evensong.
The Canon's residence which adjoins the chapel was once the Priory,
and is attached to the professorship of Hebrew at Cambridge. Here
Prior Crauden entertained Queen Philippa, when she visited Ely with
her husband, Edward the Third. Further on we see the Deanery, built of
old as the dining-hall of the Abbey. Adjacent to it is the "Fair
Hall," designed for great receptions, now the residence of the Head
Master of the King's School.
Retracing our steps, we have on our right ancient buildings at present
used by the boys of the same school; beyond them we reach again the
Ely Porta; and this time we pass through it to find ourselves in a
side street of the little city, along which run the station omnibuses.
Opposite the gateway is a modern building, "Hereward Hall," occupied
by the King's Scholars; while the dignified Chamber of the Ely Porta
is also at their service in school hours. Turning to the right we
follow the street, here styled "the Gallery," and we make straight for
the cathedral. On our left is the wall of the Palace garden, and,
showing well above, we see its splendid plane tree, planted in 1639,
and said to be the finest in England.
Now we are actually approaching the western tower and the
south-western transept of the cathedral; and these we may take as an
object lesson. Ely, like Rome, was not built in a day, and it took
centuries to complete its tower. Begun during the latter half of the
twelfth century, the lower part is of late Norman work, with round
arches and bold simple mouldings; but the architect and workmen who
built these passed away, and their work had to be continued by the
hands of others on whom had dawned the beauty of pointed arches. These
later builders were not to be tied down by what they felt to be the
crude ideas of former generations; and we see the workmanship of the
tower and transept, stage above stage bearing evidence of growth, till
through the Early English period it has passed into a narrowed
octagonal tower with windows of Decorated tracery. There is a
delicious harmony in it all; in the intricacy of the masonry, in the
very colour of the stone; and we admire those builders of yore who,
while respecting the work of their forefathers, did not hesitate to
deal with their material according to their own fuller light and
skill. Perhaps we shall doubt as to calling the topmost octagonal
tower wholly in keeping with the base of the steeple; yet if we had
the power we should not have the wish to alter it.
It is well that we should realise how much the preservation of this
stately steeple has cost. Ever since the central tower fell in 1322,
sacrists, priors, monks, bishops, deans, have lived in constant terror
lest what had befallen the central might also befall the western
tower. We can read how they have braced it with iron and wood, how
they have weighted it with bells; how they have lightened it by
removing its wooden spire, how they have buttressed it, how they have
plastered it. Century after century they have continued the repairs,
sometimes making mistakes, but never asking the question, fatal to all
good work, "Is it worth while?" There it stands, surveying its vast
plain for thirty miles around, with its air of unbroken security.
Jutting out from the tower, westward, is the so-called Galilee Porch.
It is conjectured that it was so named because, as Galilee was the
district of the Holy Land furthest from Jerusalem, so this western
porch was the part of the sacred building farthest from the High
Altar. Much doubt exists as to the date of this porch. It is commonly
said to have been built under Bishop Eustace, who died in 1215; but
some authorities hold that it belongs to a somewhat later period, when
the style in which it is built had fully developed. Probably it dates
from the close of his episcopate. Anyhow, it is a beautiful specimen
of that Early English work of which we shall see so much more before
we leave the Cathedral. Its walls are thicker than needful if the
porch alone were to be considered, and it is thought that it was built
thus massively with a view to acting as a buttress to the tower, which
needed support. Over the porch is a parvise chamber, now disused; it
may in early days have served to accommodate musicians, or as a place
of sanctuary for criminals fleeing from justice. During the eighteenth
century the Galilee narrowly escaped demolition; for Essex, who was
architect to the Chapter of Ely, advised that it should be pulled down
as being of no use, and in a condition too ruinous to admit of repair.
Happily his counsel was rejected, and the Galilee still stands to
gladden our eyes with its beauty.
From the Galilee we step into the nave. To attempt any description of
the view before us would be futile; when we say that we are "uplifted"
by it we have expressed in one word all that we dare to formulate. By
moonlight, when the minster is empty; or on some day of Choral
Festival, when arch and pillar echo back the music, this wondrous
fabric, hallowed and mellowed by time, says to us, with a voice almost
audible, "Sursum corda!" "The place whereon thou standest is holy
ground."
The nave in which we are standing is wholly Norman in its
architecture; its pillars, alternately clustered and cylindrical,
support round arches; these again support the round-headed double
arches of the triforium, and these yet again the triple lights of the
clerestory windows, three tiers in all. The arches are somewhat
stilted, starting with a straight line, and are rather higher than
semi-circular. All this severe architecture of Norman type leads on,
as it were, to the more delicate tracery and moulding of the Early
English lancet lights of the east window.
It seems almost paradoxical to say that the western arches as we see
them are of more recent date than the tower which they support; yet
this statement is true, for they were constructed in the fifteenth
century to strengthen the steeple built more than two hundred years
before. The more ancient masonry is for the most part completely
hidden by the newer, but the tops of the original archways remain in
full view to show how much they have been contracted by this encasing
stonework. During the previous century six bells had been hung in the
steeple; moreover, the eight-sided turret had been built on the top of
it, and all this additional weight must inevitably have led to the
fall of the whole, but for the strengthening and underpinning of the
piers.
[Illustration: _South Aisle of the Nave, Ely._]
Over the westernmost archway is a modern window inserted by Bishop
Yorke toward the close of the eighteenth century, noteworthy only for
its Flemish glass. In the lower southern light we see St. John the
Evangelist playing with a partridge, illustrative of the legend which
relates how his disciples found him, as an aged man, thus engaged,
and how, in answer to their expression of surprise at this unwonted
relaxation, he remarked to them "A bow cannot be kept always strung."
Strange to say, this story, which would seem specially fitted to call
forth the painter's gifts, is almost unknown to art.
Through the southern of these archways we step into the western
transept, the Baptistery of the cathedral, where stands a font of
modern date. Here to the east is the apsidal chapel known as St.
Catharine's. All tracery and ornament around us is still strictly
Norman in character, and zigzag moulding prevails; but we can see here
how the round arched stone-work, as it intersects, forms graceful
lancets, thus suggesting the pointed or two centred arch; and when
once the architect's eye had caught its beauty, he refused to let his
compass trace out the simpler one-centred arch of the Norman period,
and Early English architecture came in with a rush.
St. Catharine's Chapel is used daily by the students of the Ely
Theological College, and a beautiful altar of alabaster and jasper,
placed here in 1896, harmonises, in its character of dignity and
permanence, with the Norman stonework around. The apse in which it
stands is a modern restoration, having been for many years a ruin;
indeed the whole of this western transept was for long cut off from
the Tower by a wall of stud and plaster, and served as a workshop and
lumber-room, where materials for use in the repairs of the Cathedral
could be stored, till Dean Peacock set himself in 1842 to remedy this
condition of things. It is now one of the most romantic corners of the
Minster.
We return to the Tower, and pause for a moment to notice "the
Maze"[224] inlaid in marble in the pavement. From this quaint design
at our feet we turn to look at the roof of the nave over our heads,
painted with scenes from the Old and New Testaments. The western end
is the work of Mr. Le Strange, who died in 1864, before his work of
love was completed. Happily it was continued and finished by Mr.
Gambier Parry, as devoted a lover of the Church and of art, a personal
friend of Harvey Goodwin, who was Dean at the time, and at whose
request the artist undertook the arduous task of roof-painting. A
slight change in the character of the designs shows where one painter
ended his work and the other took it up.
[Footnote 224: This is a wholly modern device. Mediaeval mazes are
common in Continental churches; but none are found in England.]
These over-head paintings take us from the Creation of Man and his
fall, through the old Testament up to the Annunciation and Nativity,
in a series of scenes instructively thought out; while Patriarchs and
Prophets lead on to the Evangelists. Some part of the design is said
to be due to a visit paid by Mr. Le Strange, on the advice of Sir
Gilbert Scott, to the Church of Hildesheim in Hanover, where there
existed a then untouched painted ceiling of mediaeval date; but in the
main it was his own conception.
Let us next turn aside into the southern aisle to look at the "Prior's
Door." If we find it locked we can get it opened by asking one of the
vergers to let us go through it. We shall thus obtain a sight of its
outer mouldings; bold and fantastic, yet withal dignified and
graceful, executed about the year 1180, and due, it may be, to some
Masonic Company that had handed on its traditions from east to west,
generation after generation; perhaps to members of that "Comacine
Guild" that had its headquarters on an island in Lake Como, where its
members had taken refuge from the Gothic invaders of Italy. In the
tympanum, within a vesica shaped panel, is sculptured our Lord in
Glory, holding in His left hand a book and a cross, while the right is
raised in the act of blessing. On the door-posts are carved designs
somewhat grotesque, suggesting the Signs of the Zodiac, and the course
of human life.
This unique doorway opens into the garden of the Deanery, where once
stood the Cloisters. In the walls that bound it, traces of the
cloister windows still remain, now filled in with brickwork. The
garden has its own especial charm, in its gay borders and pleasant
paths; but when we picture what once it was, when we recall the
cloisters we have perhaps ourselves seen, at Westminster, at
Salisbury, at Gloucester, at Chester, we cannot but feel this
walled-in garden, attractive though it is, a place of ruin. Beyond
almost any other abbey where the church still stands, Ely has been
robbed of her cloisters. They once ran round this garden, the southern
wall of the nave forming one side, the whole being thus sheltered from
the northern wind, while catching all the warmth and light of the
sun. Traces are still left in the masonry, proving that Norman
cloisters once existed here, but that these were removed and replaced
during the fifteenth century.
Could we have passed through this ornate doorway while the cloisters
were still in use, what should we have met with in this "haunt of
ancient peace"? We should have entered a covered cloister forming a
square, with each side approximately one hundred and forty feet
long,[225] its windows opening into the well-turfed cloister garth.
Low-recessed archways in the cathedral wall, facing south (one of
which still exists), would hold a set of aumbries or cupboards
containing a good library of books of reference, the works of the
great doctors of the church, and of profane authors as well. Of such
books there was an ample and well-replenished store, for Bishop Nigel
had, towards the close of the twelfth century, bequeathed certain
tithes to provide for the "making and repairing of books" at Ely, and
this bequest would doubtless be spent on books for purposes of study
in the cloister, as well as for use in church. Opposite to these
aumbries we should see a row of carrells, or wainscoted cells, under
the windows, each holding a desk fitted up suitably for reading and
writing, large enough for the use of one monk, and there we should see
him in his black Benedictine robes seated at his work. Through his bit
of the window, if his eye wandered from his books, he could look out
on the pleasant plot of enclosed grass, and see the other three sides
of the cloister. During the fifteenth century glass came into use in
the cloister windows, chiefly on the side next the church, where most
of the writing and reading was done. It would appear that the
cloisters were not only used for study but served also as a
school-room, where novices and choir boys received instruction; and
the part chiefly dedicated to study was the northern side, close to
the bookcases. The Cloister, we must remember, was the centre of
monastic life, giving its very name to the calling of a monk, for here
the brethren spent their working hours.
[Footnote 225: This was the average length in the larger abbeys,
notably surpassed only by the splendid dimensions of Glastonbury,
where the cloisters were a square of 221 feet on each side.]
We shiver at the very thought of the cold that life in the cloister
must have entailed. We hear of a scribe whose hands were so paralysed
by cold that he had to delay finishing his copy of the works of Bede;
one author had to lay aside his writing for the winter till spring
should return. No attempt was made to heat the cloisters, but in
mid-winter a single fire was kept burning in a room called the
"_calefactorium_" where the brethren might go in turn to warm
themselves. We speak of life in the open air as an idea of modern
days; in truth it had been forestalled by the monks of old. The
cloisters were lighted by lamps fed with grease from the kitchen, and
the candles used were of rush-pith dipped in the same.
Silence was maintained in the cloister, and the monks used signs
instead of words when asking for a book. Strict rules were laid down
as to the keeping clean and putting back of books. One Benedictine
writer adds to his manuscript the following note: "Whoever pursues his
studies in this book should be careful to handle the leaves gently and
delicately, so as to avoid tearing them; and let him imitate the
example of Jesus Christ who, when he had quietly opened the book of
Isaiah and read therein attentively, closed it with reverence and gave
it again to the minister." The lending of books was counted as one of
the principal works of mercy, but only to be done under the most
careful regulations as to the return of the volume lent. Such is in
outline the scene we should have beheld had it been our lot five
hundred years ago on this very ground,
"To walk the studious Cloister's pale."
We now re-enter the cathedral through the Prior's Door, and taking a
few steps further along the interior of the aisle we come to Owen's
Cross. Owen was St. Etheldreda's faithful steward, the "Primus
Ministorum" (or "Over-alderman," as the Anglo-Saxon has it,) of her
fenland kingdom, and governor of her family. His Welsh sounding name
bears witness to his being a fenman of British ancestry. Bede tells us
that Owen was a man of much piety; that when his royal mistress no
longer needed his services he forsook the world and became a monk
under St. Chad, Bishop of Lichfield. Owen set forth on his journey to
the monastery dressed in a plain garment, carrying a pick-axe and
bill-hook, to denote that as he was little capable of meditating on
the holy scriptures he would the more earnestly apply himself to the
labour of his hands, and had not come to the monastery, "as so many
do," to live idle. St. Chad received him with much favour, and it was
Owen who was permitted to hear the angelic voices that announced to
the holy bishop that he was to die within seven days.
Owen was himself canonized, and this cross became an object of
veneration at Haddenham, where pilgrims from Cambridge crossed the
Ouse. During the eighteenth century its mutilated base was brought
into the cathedral from Haddenham, where it had long served as a
horsing-block. It is now more worthily placed, and we can still read
the inscription in Latin which runs as follows (the name of Owen being
Latinized almost out of recognition),
LUCEM TUAM OVINO
DA DEUS ET REQUIEM.
AMEN.
Grant O God to Owen Thy light and rest. Amen.
A little further on, still in the south aisle, we come to the "Monks'
Door," with its strange outer carvings of dragons, its one door-post
enriched with spiral fluting, a sister doorway to the prior's, but by
no means a twin. Almost touching it is the half of an ancient arched
doorway now walled up, its door-post spirally and deeply sculptured.
In both doorways one door-post is hidden by the masonry of a great
buttress built here by Alan of Walsingham to support his central
tower. We are here in the last remnant of Ely's cloisters, and let us
not fail to observe the recessed archway for books in the southern
wall of the nave mentioned above. Before leaving the aisle we should
notice that its windows are for the most part late insertions, the
original Norman fenestration being replaced by Perpendicular.
We now come to the wonder of Ely, of which we have already heard much,
its Octagon Tower and Lantern. Other features in the cathedral we may
meet with elsewhere, but this central feature was not itself a copy,
nor has it served as a pattern--it remains alone, a brilliant
make-shift, a great Necessity having proved the mother of a great
Invention. We can hardly here enter into the details of this Octagon
Tower as an engineering feat, but we can remind our readers how, by
enlarging the base of his steeple, by making it rest on eight
supporting piers, instead of on four like its fallen predecessor,
Alan of Walsingham gave it greatly increased stability.
[Illustration: _The Tower from the Cloisters._]
Thomas Fuller, whom we have quoted before, thus racily describes the
Lantern at Ely, as it was at the close of the Commonwealth, and draws
from it the lesson he loved to find underlying outward things. After
speaking of the beauty of the minster, he goes on to say, "The
lanthorn therein, built by Bishop Hotham, is a masterpiece of
architecture. When the bells ring the woodwork thereof shaketh and
gapeth (no defect but perfection of structure) and exactly chocketh
into the joints again; so that it may pass for the lively emblem of
the sincere Christian who, though he has _motum trepidationis_ of fear
and trembling, stands firmly fixed on the basis of a true faith."
We, too, can admire the ingenuity with which the woodwork forming the
Lantern is fitted together so as to be self-supporting; and our
attention should be called to the vast size of the eight upright beams
of oak above us, fore-shortened, as we see them from the floor, so
that we hardly realise that the length of each is sixty-eight feet. We
can well believe the chronicler who tells us that Alan "procured them
with much trouble, searching far and wide, and with the greatest
difficulty finding them at last, paying a great price for them, and
transporting them by land and water to Ely." During the nineteenth
century, when this woodwork had to be restored, and to some extent
replaced, the difficulty met with in procuring and conveying the
timber required was almost enough to daunt those responsible for the
work.
On the central boss of the groining we see a half-length figure of
Christ in Glory, carved in oak, the right hand raised to bless,
considerably above life size. In the sacrist's accounts for the
building of the Lantern, under the date of 1340, occurs this item:
"Paid to John of Burwell, for carving the figure upon the principal
Key Vault, two shillings and his keep at the Prior's table." A good
two-shillings' worth, even if we multiply the sum by thirty to make it
equivalent to the present value of coin.
The modern glass of the windows above these arches commemorates those
whose names are connected with Ely; eight personages in each window.
The south-east window gives us in its upper lights, St. Etheldreda as
Queen, with her father and her two husbands; below she appears again
as Abbess, with Bishop Wilfrid and the two sisters who followed her as
Abbesses, Sexburga and Ermenilda. In the north-east window is
represented her niece Werburga, who also became Abbess, and St.
Withburga; and, on a line with these ladies, St. Edmund and Archbishop
Dunstan; in the lower four lights stand Bishop Ethelwold, Earl
Brithnoth, Abbot Brithnoth, and King Edgar the Peaceful, the refounder
of the Abbey after the Danish desolation. The north-west window
depicts in the upper tier four kings of England, William the
Conqueror, Henry the First, Henry the Third, and Edward the Second. In
the row beneath stand Abbot Simeon, Hervey, the first Bishop of Ely,
Bishop Northwold, and Alan of Walsingham. In the four upper lights of
the south-west window are portrayed Queen Victoria in her Coronation
robes, Prince Albert arrayed as Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge, Edward
the Third and Queen Philippa; below come Bishop Turton and Dean
Peacock, who both contributed to the cost of this glass, and in a line
with them are Bishop Hotham and Prior Crauden.
At the ends of the hood-mouldings of the diagonally placed arches of
the Octagon are carved eight heads. Edward the Third in his crown
gazes with kingly bearing across the archway at his Queen, Philippa,
who wears an expression of cheering benignity, well becoming a queen;
Bishop Hotham looks his part, and Prior Crauden has the countenance of
a saint and an enthusiast. On the north-western archway Alan of
Walsingham, clean shaven, and his master mason, with flowing locks,
face each other carved in the stone that they knew so well how to
manipulate. The seventh and eighth heads are grotesque.
Slightly higher than these portrait heads, supporting canopied niches,
come the celebrated corbels on which are sculptured the leading events
of the life of St. Etheldreda in the following order:
I. She appears at her second marriage, as a most reluctant bride,
forced into holding the bridegroom's hand.
II. Having escaped from her husband, she takes the veil from St.
Wilfrid.
III. Her pilgrim's staff bears foliage and fruit.
IV. Seated on a rock, the tide protects her from her husband's
pursuit.
V. She is enthroned as Abbess by St. Wilfrid.
VI. Her death and burial.
VII. A prisoner is miraculously released by her prayers.
VIII. The first translation of her body.
Just where the nave and the Octagon Tower join is a slab, which some
hold to cover the grave of Alan of Walsingham. A well-worn stone is
all we see, but we can trace on it a dimly embossed matrix, showing
that once it held a brass of rich workmanship, since torn away.
Whether this be his tomb or no, Alan has his monument here in the
structure we behold above and around us, bearing witness to his life,
which ended in 1364 when he had reached the age of seventy. On the
brass which once marked his resting-place we know that there was
engraved a lengthy epitaph in Latin verse, still extant, of which we
offer an abridged translation as follows:
"These things of note are at Ely, the Lantern, and Chapel of Mary,
A windmill too, and a vineyard that yieldeth wine in abundance.
Know that the Choir before you exceedeth all others in beauty,
Made by Alan our brother, Alan the wise Master Builder;
He who of craftsmen the flower, was gifted with strength in his lifetime.
Alan the Prior, forget not, here facing the Choir lieth buried.
He, for that older Tower which fell one night in the darkness,
Here erected, well-founded, the Tower ye now are beholding.
Many the Houses of God that, as Prior and Sacrist, he builded.
May God grant him in Heaven a seat as the end of his labour."
From this epitaph we may conclude that Alan of Walsingham had given
Ely both a windmill and a vineyard; of these no trace exists (though
we know that the mill stood on the summit of "Cherry Hill"); but "the
Lantern and Chapel of Mary" and the western bays of the Choir, as
built under him at Bishop Hotham's charge, remain for us to this day.
From the Octagon we can view the transepts begun in 1083 by Abbot
Simeon. The columns and mouldings bear witness to the fact that these
eastern transepts are of earlier date than the nave. At the western
corner of the north transept we notice a doorway of classical design
inserted in 1699 by Sir Christopher Wren, to repair a fall which had
taken place there. Before leaving this transept let us enter the
Chapel of St. Edmund (one of two screened off chambers against the
eastern wall), and take note of the alabaster reredos, exquisite in
design and material, placed there in 1898 by Canon Stanton, in memory
of his father.
[Illustration: _Cathedral Towers._]
On this reredos Christ appears in glory, as the ascended High Priest
of His Church, interceding for His people. Beneath on the retable is
inscribed in Greek the words: "Able to save them to the uttermost that
come unto God by Him." The chapel is intended to be used for private
meditation and for services connected with missionary work. We leave
it with the sense that the highest message the minster has to give is
still remembered among us.
From the Octagon we may pass into the Choir, where gates of brass open
through the richly carved screen of oak. This screen is a really
beautiful creation of the nineteenth century, while the tabernacled
oaken stalls within are mediaeval, dating from 1337, and are yet more
beautiful, forming as they do part of Alan of Walsingham's great
restoration. For over four centuries these stalls stood where Alan
placed them, under the Octagon, separated from the nave by a massive
Norman screen of stone. About 1770 they were moved by the architect
Essex to the eastern end of the Choir. The stalls having been thus
removed, Essex saw no reason for preserving the Norman screen, so he
had it destroyed. Had the venerable structure still stretched across
the nave we should feel it purposeless, and it would undoubtedly have
been inconvenient: so we ought perhaps to admit that Essex really
conferred on the cathedral a boon by his drastic act on which a less
daring and more conservative architect would not have ventured. Still
we send a sigh of regret after the ancient work, that had stood
through so many centuries only to be pulled down as an encumbrance,
and carted away at last as rubbish.
The stalls after their removal eastward were painted to look like
mahogany (!) in accordance with eighteenth century standards of beauty.
They were left in this far eastern position for about eighty years, when
they were shifted half-way back again, into their present place, under
the supervision of Sir Gilbert Scott, the architect employed to direct
the restoration then in progress. Their upper panels have been filled
with Bible scenes carved in high relief in wood; mostly the work of a
Flemish artist of the nineteenth century. On the south are scenes from
the Old Testament, on the north from the Gospels. They repay a careful
study, being beautiful and original in design. Twenty-five in number on
either side, arranged chronologically, they face each other, answering
in several instances as type and antitype; the Deluge corresponds with
the Baptism, Jacob's Deception of Isaac with the Betrayal; the Lifting
up of the Brazen Serpent with the Crucifixion, the Ascent of Elijah with
the Ascension. Whether this is intentional or accidental we leave to be
decided by those who, familiar with Bible incidents, are wishful to
exercise their ingenuity and their power of discernment, in discovering
further and less obvious correspondence.
The stall seats are on hinges, and are known as "Miserere" (_i.e._
mercy) seats. They were thus named from being so contrived that when
turned back they gave a merciful support to the monks, who could thus
sit after a fashion, instead of having to stand, during the lengthy
nocturnal services in which they were engaged; but if the occupant of
the stall abused this relief by permitting himself to be overcome with
sleep, he and his seat fell forward together with a crash, to his
great discomfiture. When turned back the quaint carvings usual under
such seats may be seen, the work of the fourteenth century carvers.
The subjects represented are strangely varied; scriptural, legendary,
grotesque, according to the taste and fancy of the carver, and no two
are alike. We find here Noah's Ark, a pelican feeding her young, a nun
at prayer, monkeys and dragons, a woman beating a fox for robbing her
hen-roost, a fox attired as a bishop, a monkey extracting a man's
tooth, a king and a monk fighting, St. Martin sharing his coat with a
beggar. The upper canopied work of these stalls is of delicate beauty,
little damaged by all it has undergone, whether of neglect or of
change, during the six centuries and a half of its existence.
But while admiring these choir stalls, we are almost inclined to
grudge their presence, for they obstruct the view of the stone arches
against which they stand. We are still beholding the work of the great
Alan; after the tower fell he and his workmen built these three bays,
with the triforium and clerestory arches above; and we feel how
perfectly brain, heart, and hand must have worked together in harmony
to produce so exquisite a result. It was Bishop Hotham who provided
the funds for most of this work.
Passing on up two steps beyond these three bays we come to arches
somewhat different; while we observe a corresponding change in the
character of the liern vaulting overhead. We are now in the presence
of Early English masonry, wrought a century before under Bishop
Northwold, and perhaps yet lovelier than the Decorated work which was
her daughter. Arch beyond arch, six in number, extends this
Presbytery, as it is called, ending in an east window of three lower
lancet lights, with an upper tier of five smaller lancets. The
Northwold Presbytery does not merge imperceptibly into Alan's Choir;
for the transition is marked on either hand by a semicircular shaft of
stone that soars aloft, the only remnant left to us of the eastern
limb of the original Norman church. These venerable piers therefore
deserve our special notice, though they might not attract it if we
were ignorant of their story. They themselves stand as raised by their
builders, but Bishop Northwold gave them new capitals of Purbeck
marble harmonising with the work he was erecting eastward.
Next let us study the modern reredos or altar screen, all of white
stone and marble, having as its background the three lancet windows of
the east end, filled with not unworthy modern glass, against which it
stands out with grace and dignity; a space of thirty feet intervening.
The reredos consists of five spandrels surmounted by gables, and is
made of alabaster, lavishly gilt and bejewelled, inlaid with mosaic.
On the highest gable stands a figure representing Christ in Glory, His
hand held forth to bless His people. Immediately below comes the
Annunciation, carved in low relief in a trefoil-shaped medallion.
Below again is a statuette of our Lord, with Moses and Elijah on
either hand, and beneath these, under a canopy of alabaster, is the
Last Supper. In a line with this, still in the same high relief, is
sculptured our Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem, His washing of
the Disciples' feet, His agony in Gethsemane, His bearing of the
cross. Immediately over these Gospel scenes, under the shadow of a
marble canopy, we have the heads of the four great prophets, Isaiah,
Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, on one side, balanced on the other by the
four Latin doctors of the Church, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, St.
Augustine, St. Gregory. Within the four side spandrels are carved the
heads of Mary Magdalene, of Mary the mother of James, of St. John the
Evangelist, and St. John the Baptist; on the points of the gables
above are the four Evangelists, while between them, and flanking them,
stand on spiral pillarets delicate figures emblematical of faith,
hope, and charity, of justice, prudence, and fortitude--those graces
and virtues which made the saints here represented to be such.
On the retable at the foot of the reredos, stand two massive
candlesticks of silver gilt. These were procured for the cathedral in
1660, on the restoration of the Chapter and the return of Bishop Wren
after his imprisonment of eighteen years. During the Commonwealth the
cathedral staff had dwindled down to one canon and one verger. It is
recorded that the first requisites purchased by the Chapter on being
reinstated were these very candlesticks--plus a wheelbarrow and a
broom.
And now we shall do well to make an appreciable physical effort, in
order to get a view of two bosses of special interest in the vaulting
overhead. It is somewhat neck-racking work, and a glass is absolutely
necessary if we are to carry away any definite impression of the
sculptures in question. On one of these bosses the coronation of the
Virgin is carved most gracefully and reverently; on the other is St.
Etheldreda, crowned and gorgeously robed, seated with a crozier in her
right hand, as Abbess. Both are richly coloured, and have escaped,
through being inaccessible, the injury done to the other images in the
cathedral. For more than 600 years they have looked down on the tomb
of Bishop Northwold, the builder of this noble Presbytery, erected, we
must remember, to do honour to the shrine of the Foundress.
This Presbytery of wondrous beauty, enriched by the best that could be
wrought by human hands, alike in the past and in our own days, may
well recall to us Keble's lines:
"Love delights to bring her best,
And where Love is, that offering evermore is blest."
The "Angel Choir" in Lincoln Cathedral, built at the same time, is so
nearly a twin with Bishop Northwold's Choir at Ely that to distinguish
the two, if their photographs are placed side by side, requires some
nicety of observation. Whether either was actually copied from the
other we do not know, for in those days the torch of architectural
inspiration quickly passed from hand to hand. This is the case in our
own time with regard to inventions due to the increase of scientific
knowledge; when no part of the civilised world remains long behind the
rest, if light, locomotion, or medicine is concerned. Age after age
man sets himself to make his own the best that can be obtained, and to
say for himself, no less than for the world at large
"Let Knowledge grow from more to more."