_Rector's Chancel._--Would you, or one of your correspondents, kindly
inform me how the following case has been settled; it is one which in
all probability has often arisen, but I have not yet been able to learn
anything about it that is satisfactory.
In old times when a church became too small for the parish, the ordinary
custom was to build an additional part to it in such a way that the old
church, after the alteration, formed an aisle to the new part, which
henceforth because the nave. Until the Reformation the altar in the old
chancel would probably remain after the new chancel was built, and be
used as an inferior altar, while the new altar would be used for high
mass; under these circumstances the rector's right in the chancel would
probably remain untouched, and his obligation to keep it in repair
undisputed. But when, at the Reformation, all but high altars were taken
away, which chancel was accounted the rector's, the new, or the old, or
both? This question has just arisen in an adjoining county.