This unique and beautiful chapel was built by King Henry VII., and stands
at the east end of the Abbey, raised above the level of the older church.
The whole is a marvel of delicate carving and rich ornament. We see in
the illustration the hanging pendants of the stone roof known as fan
tracery, and the walls are covered with statues, the space between them
filled up by Tudor roses, French fleur-de-lis, and other appropriate
decorations. Behind the altar is the tomb of the founder himself; it is
protected by a finely-worked grille, within which we see the gilt bronze
effigies of Henry and his wife, fashioned by the master hand of
Torrigiano, lying upon an altar tomb of black marble. Above are the
banners of the Knights of the Bath, which date from the eighteenth
century, and at the back of the stalls below are their coats of arms.
George I. reconstructed the Order, and for a brief period afterwards the
knights used to be installed here.
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{91}
The present altar was reconstructed, under Dean Stanley's supervision,
from such pieces of the old Italian pilasters and frieze as could be
found; one was actually discovered at Oxford in the Ashmolean Museum.
Upon it stands the cross which was presented by the Ras Makonnen, Envoy
from Abyssinia, as a votive offering for the present King's recovery from
his sudden illness, when the Coronation was postponed in the summer of
1902. The stalls next claim our attention, and it must be pointed out
that only part of these date from the sixteenth century, but the ancient
seats are easily distinguished from the later ones by their quaintly
carved misereres. The rest were added when the Order of the Knights of
the Bath was reconstituted by George I. in 1725, and the banners above,
as well as the coats of arms at the back of the top stalls, belong to the
Knights. The Dean was made Chaplain of the Order, a post which he has
held _ex officio_ ever since. At that time, and for a long period, the
installations of the Knights were held here. Upon one of the original
stalls at the west end is a crowned figure of the founder, Henry VII.,
his face turned towards the east. So familiar has the name of this
chapel become to us, that we are apt to forget that it was dedicated to
the {92} Virgin Mary, and replaced the Early English Lady Chapel, which
had stood on the same spot ever since the beginning of Henry the Third's
reign. Henry VII. first intended to consecrate his new chapel to the
memory of Henry VI., and arrangements were made for removing the saintly
King's bones to Westminster from Windsor, but, owing partly to quarrels
between the two convents, the scheme fell through and was abandoned by
the royal founder. The stone was laid in 1503, and, although the
building was not completed till 1519, before he died Henry had
practically settled every detail with the Abbot as to the endowment. His
wife's body already lay at the east end, and Henry arranged for his own
interment in the same place, and for the memorial services, which were
afterwards to be held in their honour. Some of the indentures between
the King and Convent can be seen at the Record Office, others are in the
custody of the Dean and Chapter. Sir Reginald Bray, head of the royal
masons, is often spoken of as if he were the architect, but his death
took place soon after the laying of the foundation stone, and the chapel
was not finished for another sixteen years, long after Henry VIII.'s
accession, when the monasteries were tottering to their fall. Abbot
Islip supervised {93} the building, and it is more than likely that Sir
Thomas Lovell, whose bust has lately been placed near Lady Margaret's
tomb, had, as executor to both the King and his mother, a share in
designing their monuments. In any case, Lovell was a patron of
Torrigiano, the famous Italian sculptor, who was employed to make the
beautiful effigies of the King, his wife, and his mother, as well as the
rich altar tombs upon which the figures lie. A fine bronze grille, which
is, like the gates, of English workmanship, preserves the founder's tomb
from injury. The whole is decorated with roses and fleurs-de-lis, while
upon the screen itself are the Welsh dragon of Cadwallador, the last
British king, from whom the Tudors claimed descent, and the greyhound, a
crest belonging to the Nevilles, who were relatives of Henry's wife.
Nearly all the statuettes upon the outside have been stolen; but within,
round the black marble altar tomb, are still intact twelve medallions,
six on either side, each of which encloses two silver-gilt images. The
saints represented are St. George of England, St. Denis of France, St.
Edward and St. Peter, the patrons of the Abbey, as well as the King's own
special guardians. Amongst these perhaps the most charming are the burly
form of St. Christopher, with {94} the tiny infant Christ upon his
shoulder, and the very graceful figure of St. Barbara with her tower in
her hand, who is thus easily distinguishable from the conventional Mary
Magdalene beside whom she stands. Finely moulded cherubs, also in gilt
brass, support the royal arms, and we may trace the master hand of
Michael Angelo's great rival in these as in all the other accessories.
The effigies themselves are unique specimens of Torrigiano's art,
equalled only by his other masterpiece, the recumbent figure of Lady
Margaret in the adjacent aisle. The King's thin face and strongly marked
features bear a striking resemblance to the ascetic lined countenance of
his mother, but are in strong contrast with those of the youthful wife by
his side, whose long flowing hair escapes under her close head-dress. In
the vacant space to the east, within the grille, an altar used to stand,
where precious relics, which included the leg of St. George, were kept.
In the vaults below, Dean Stanley found the coffins of James I. and of
Anne, his Danish queen. Close at hand is the altar tomb, with a white
marble effigy by Boehm, of the Dean himself; behind it is the memorial
window which he dedicated to his wife, Lady Augusta, whose own portrait
is delineated there {95} as well as various familiar scenes from the life
of her famous ancestor, Robert Bruce, including the well-known story of
the spider. The coronation chair at the extreme east end of the chapel
was made for Mary II., a queen regnant in her own right. Her husband,
William III., whose claim to the crown was considered equal to his
wife's, sat in St. Edward's chair. The vault in front of it is now
filled up with a miscellaneous collection of bodies, including some of
Charles the Second's illegitimate descendants, whose names were cut upon
the pavement, as were those of the other persons interred in this chapel,
by Dean Stanley's care. Within this vault once rested some of "the chief
men of the Parliament by land and sea," notably the regicides Cromwell,
Ireton, Bradshaw, a few of Cromwell's relatives, and the famous Admiral,
Robert Blake. These, as well as all the other persons buried in the
Abbey during the Commonwealth who were in any way connected with the
republican party, were disinterred by order of Charles II., shortly after
his restoration, and thrown into a pit in St. Margaret's churchyard, with
the exception, that is, of the three arch offenders, the regicides.
Charles wreaked a futile vengeance upon their mouldering corpses, which
{96} received the treatment usually meted out to living traitors, and
were hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn; the heads were chopped off
and fixed up, as a warning to their admirers, outside Westminster Hall.
A few steps to the left we see the stone which marks the grave of
Cromwell's charming daughter, Elizabeth Claypole, whose untimely death
broke her father's heart. The body was left undisturbed, probably out of
respect for the memory of a woman who had been a favourite with Royalist
and Roundhead alike. In the reign of Queen Anne a great General, the
Duke of Marlborough, was temporarily buried in the Cromwell vault, but
after many years the body was removed to his own mausoleum at Blenheim.
Amongst the many soldiers' memorials in the nave and choir aisles will be
found two, those of Creed and Bringfield, which recall Marlborough's
famous victories, Ramillies and Blenheim. The right-hand chapel is
filled up by the heavy monuments of the Richmond and Lennox family, and
here, close to the old Duke's tomb, used to stand the wax figure of
Frances, Duchess of Richmond and Lennox, now removed to the Islip Chapel.
This lady was a noted beauty, and is said to have been the model for the
figure of Britannia on the coins. Her {97} cousin, Charles II., much
admired her, and might even have made her his queen had not "La belle
Stuart" eloped with her other relative, the young Duke. On the opposite
side is the costly monument which was raised by his widowed Duchess over
the body of Charles the First's unpopular favourite, George Villiers,
Duke of Buckingham, who was cut off in his prime by an assassin's knife.
The white marble effigies of the Duke and Duchess, and the group of their
children above, are not without merit. The elder of these chubby boys
succeeded to his father's dukedom and was notorious at the Restoration
Court, while the younger was slain, bravely fighting for his king, in a
skirmish with the Parliamentary troopers at Hampton, and buried below
this tomb. Close by, a later and most unattractive monument records the
name of a patron of poets, a literary man himself, Sheffield, Duke of
Buckinghamshire. He built Buckingham House, where is now the palace, and
there his wife, who was a left-handed descendant of the Stuart king, used
to sit dressed in weeds on the anniversary of Charles the First's
execution, and thus call attention to the royal blot upon her escutcheon.
In the choir aisle another ugly memorial perpetuates her want of taste
and the {98} forgotten fame of her pet doctor, one Chamberlain. Near his
is a tablet to her other medical friend, the really notable royal
physician, Dr. Mead, one of the first inoculators for smallpox.
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[Illustration: The Coronation Chair]
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