remained. Dean Kitchin has given a tantalizing account of it, and
during the Civil War a wall was built before it. But throughout the
last century, the niches were filled with modern vases, the gift of an
excellent prebendary, Master Harris, whose zeal was greater than his
taste.
Leaving the learned to fight the dusty battle of Rufus and De Blois,
we make our way to the iron gate, and each deposit the silver obolus
to admit us to the realms of the departed. Here a group of visitors is
waiting, and we look up at the interesting Norman work in the south
transept. There are good reasons for supposing that the transepts were
not built continuously--a change of plan can be traced--and it would
seem that there was at one time an intention of placing a couple of
towers at the end of each transept. The great central tower also was
erected later--after Walkelin’s death.
[Sidenote: Isaak Walton.]
Just before me stands an old oak settle, perhaps nearly coeval with
the transept. How many generations of monks have sat on it and warmed
their withered hands over a pan of charcoal! I could almost imagine
that on certain days their ghosts may perambulate their old haunts,
and seat themselves here again. In the centre of the transept lies
Bishop Wilberforce. On the east side is Prior Silkstede’s Chapel, as
it is called. It is now a vestry, and here Isaak Walton is literally
trodden under foot. In answer to my inquiries, the verger pulled up
the matting and showed his slab inscribed with Bishop Ken’s[77] verses.
They are not worthy of the author of the morning and evening hymns.
They inform us that he lived--
“Full ninety years and past
But now he hath begun
That which will ne’er be done.
Crowned with eternal Blisse
We wish our souls with his.”
Isaak was an erect, hale old man to the last. He was a theologian, and
we hear that to atone for long neglect, a statue to him is about to be
placed on the screen, beside the saintly Fishermen.
“I wish that Andrews, Bishop of Winchester, had been buried here,”
said Mr. Hertford, “and that we had an epitaph on him by Milton. The
elegiacs he wrote on his death were as beautiful as ‘Lycidas.’”
And now all are ready, and we advance along the aisle behind the choir,
and come in sight of the “presbytery screen,” some arches surmounted by
coffers, which look like small locomotives on a railway viaduct. All
this was the work of Fox, who was bishop in the reigns of the Henrys
(VII. and VIII.). He built the clerestory and vaulting of this part.
We look up at the roof and remark the bosses exhibiting the Tudor arms
and other heraldic emblems dear to Fox; while beyond, in the vaulting
of Bishop Lucy, the devices are more scriptural, including not only
the instruments of the Passion, but the faces of Pilate and his better
half, and Peter’s sword with Malchus’ ear upon it.
The bones of the Saxon kings and bishops buried in the Cathedral, had
been well dried and preserved, having been placed in stone coffins
pierced with holes. Fox piously collected them into these chests, on
which he inscribed the venerated names of their owners.[78] He hoisted
them up, having great confidence in the safety gained by elevation, and
his trust was justified, with regard to his window in the gable and his
statue above it, but in respect of these chests, he did not rightly
measure the height to which mob violence might attain. After the storm
had passed away, the bones were collected and replaced, but no one knew
what remains were stored in any particular chest. A small set of bones
has been thought to have belonged to Queen Emma. There are twelve
names, and as late as 1845, the confused contents were all safe; but by
1873, one of the twelve skulls was gone.
“Purloined, perchance, by some over-zealous phrenologist, whose
principles were not more sound than his theories,” said Mr. Hertford.
[Sidenote: Fox’s Chantry.]
We now come to Fox’s Chantry, and admire the diversified stone carving
of the exterior. It is most refined and in the best taste, while the
figure of Death stretched beneath it is in the worst, and reminds us of
the skull and cross-bones, with which headstones were formerly adorned.
We enter, and think we can see the dark ascetic bishop kneeling in
his little stone study, for hither when blind, in his old age, he
was led daily for prayer. His memory will ever be cherished lovingly
here, and in Oxford, where he founded Corpus Christi College. Through
this chantry, we reach the Feretory (from _feretra_, biers). Here, in
ancient times, the gold and silver shrines of Birinus, Swithun, and
other saints, the head of St. Just, and one of the feet of St. Philip,
stood upon a platform higher than the present one, and reflected a
holy light upon the worshippers in the choir. The contents of the
feretory are now not so brilliant, though interesting. Here lies a
prostrate giant--a figure of Bishop Edington--which was once perched
up over the west front, but becoming dilapidated, was replaced by that
of Wykeham. Here is the lid, or side of a reliquary chest (1309) with
sacred subjects painted on its panels. The other remains are melancholy
to behold, heads and portions of the bodies of statues found about the
Cathedral.
“It looks like an old curiosity shop, or a sculptor’s studio,” observed
Miss Hertford.
“And it reminds me,” chimed in her father, “of a story I heard about
some country labourers, who had been visiting the British Museum. When
asked how they liked it, they said, ‘Very much, but some had no arms,
some had no legs, and some had no heads. The butler, however, was very
kind, and told us it was intended to represent a railway accident.’”
On the other side of this feretory is Gardiner’s Chantry. He is
generally associated in our minds with fire and faggot, but when we
first read of him, he was a young man at Paris, chiefly remarkable for
his skill in mixing salads. How unfortunate that he did not confine
himself to this cooler occupation!--he would at least have received
the blessings of epicures. Why should we recall the ghastly past?
Gardiner’s violent Catholicism was partly from jealousy of Cranmer. Had
he been made archbishop, he might have been a reformer; for there was
a time when he was in Rome brow-beating the Pope, on behalf of Anne
Boleyn.
[Sidenote: Death’s Effigy.]
The only good act the rebels did in the Cathedral was done here; they
knocked the head off the wretched figure of Death, which had been
placed, I suppose, as a companion in misery for that in Fox’s Chantry
opposite. Perhaps the poet Young, had these scarecrows, which he knew
well, in his mind, when he wrote--
“Who can take
Death’s portrait true? The tyrant never sat.”
The mob would, doubtless, have turned out Gardiner’s remains had not
some pious Catholics put a skull and bones above them, which were
mistaken for the bishop’s. They would have been glad to have put
him again to destructive work, not indeed, destroying heretics, but
breaking to pieces the saints in the stained-glass windows. In this
chantry there is still to be seen a portion of one of the round pillars
of the Norman apse.
Returning through Fox’s Chantry, and proceeding eastward, we enter the
large retro-choir built in the beautiful Early English style by Bishop
de Lucy about seventy years after Walkelin’s time. It is erected on
piles, so we may be thankful it has stood so long. Immediately at the
back of the feretory, we see an arch leading to “the holy hole”--or, as
some of our companions called it, “the ’oly ’ole”--in which interments
formerly took place. An attempt was made to enter it in 1789, but
the masonry had fallen down and the enterprise was relinquished. The
Edwardian canopies over it are charming. The area in which we stand
is studded with tombs. There are two splendid chantries here--one of
Bishop Wayneflete, the founder of Magdalen College, Oxford; and the
other, of Cardinal Beaufort. Wayneflete is represented as grasping
his heart.[79] Both monuments have suffered. Wayneflete’s head was so
much damaged that a new one was lately given him. Beaufort’s figure
is supposed not to be original, and “a horse-load of pinnacles”
had by Milner’s time[80] fallen or been knocked off this canopy of
“bewildering” embellishment.
An old gentleman of our company inquired whether Cardinal Beaufort
was a Roman Catholic, and I could see by his countenance that the
affirmative answer he received greatly altered his opinion of that
eminent man.
[Sidenote: Altar Tombs.]
The other monuments are “altar tombs,” comparatively insignificant,
being only two or three feet above the pavement. But to our eyes they
seemed a promising array, and proved disappointing. We had read that
among others Prior William of Basynge, Sir Arnald de Gaveston, Prior
Silkstede and Bishop Courtenay were lying here. On the first we came
to, that of Basynge, I deciphered the pleasant announcement that
whoever prays for him shall obtain a hundred and forty-five days’
indulgence.
“That seems,” observed Mr. Hertford, “as if he was not so anxious about
the souls of others as about his own.”
The ledger-stone which bears this inscription is the only genuine part
of the tomb.
Then we come to the line of four tombs extending from the Edwardian
Arcade to the Lady Chapel. First, there is the goodly figure of Bishop
Sumner, whose snow-white marble looks out of place among the dark tones
of distant centuries; he is not buried here. Next to this is a tomb of
some bishop of the fifteenth century, not that of Silkstede--a nearly
perfect skeleton in black serge and funeral boots was found in it. Then
we come to the only ancient knight who makes a figure in the Cathedral.
He is in armour, with his legs crossed, which denotes some rank. Surely
this is Sir Arnald de Gaveston, the Gascon knight who saved Edward I.’s
life. When he died the King sent cloth of gold for his funeral.
But no, he was buried in the north transept. This is supposed to
represent William de Foix.
“Whoever he is Time has pulled him by the nose a little,” said Mr.
Hertford; “but he always loves to deride the greatness of man.”
“He would have had a better excuse,” I returned, “had he treated the
delightful ‘Piers’ in this unhandsome manner.”[81]
“Why, not one of these tombs has the ring of truth about it,” said Mr.
Hertford, discontentedly.
[Sidenote: Peter de la Roche.]
“Well this last one next the Lady Chapel is genuine,” I replied. “It is
that of Bishop de Lucy, but was long asserted by an easy and patriotic
error to be that of Lucius, the British king. The occupant of the
tomb immediately to the north of Bishop Sumner is unknown, but to the
north-east lies Petrus de Rupibus. Few would understand without a
teacher that this meant Peter de la Roche, but in that age the manner
in which names were Latinized raises a suspicion that some jesters were
engaged in the work. Thus we find Montagu rendered ‘de Monte acuto;’
and in this Cathedral we have the grave of ‘Johannes de Pontissara,’
_i.e._, John Sawbridge.”[82]
“Much more mellifluous,” observed Mr. Hertford. “But one might almost
say to them as Quince said to Bottom in the ass’s head, ‘Bless me! thou
art translated.’”
“Peter de la Roche,” I continued, “was a native of Poictiers, and had
served in youth under Richard Cœur de Lion. He became Henry III.’s
guardian and tutor, and seemed at one time to have all the kingly power
at his command. As a bishop he supported the Papal authority against
the national party, which was represented by Hubert de Burgh. When
unsuccessful he ‘took the cross’--went to the Crusades. Afterwards he
returned, presented the monastery with one of the feet of St. Philip,
and was able to entertain Henry sumptuously at Wolvesey Castle. He
became the head of the Government, founded the Dominican Convent at
the Eastgate, and built (or suggested)[83] Netley Abbey, and the great
North ‘Solomon’s’ porch at Westminster. On the southern wall of this
area is a monument to Sir John Cloberry--representing him as a kind of
‘fat boy,’ with a long curly wig. He was an officer under Monk, and
contributed to bring about the Restoration. His house was in Parchment
Street.”
Further on, at the extreme east, we come to Bishop Langton’s Chantry
(he died in 1500). This and the next chapel is beautifully enriched
with oak carving. Next to this we enter the Lady Chapel, by building
which Priors Hunton and Silkstede made this the longest cathedral in
England.
[Sidenote: Mary and Philip.]
A gleam of gold and jewellery comes to us here from 1554. We were
told that in this Lady Chapel Mary and Philip were married, but there
is no doubt that the ceremony was performed before the high altar,
which seemed the proper place. The chair in which Mary sat is here,
and has originated the claim of the chapel. It is small, with a low
back--a faldistorium--of a form not then uncommon, but was brave with
brass nails, gilding, and velvet. It has now a shabby and melancholy
appearance, like the performances of the sovereign who sat in it; the
horse-hair is coming out, and no wonder, for nearly every second lady
visitor poses in it as the queen of the moment.
But let us look at something better. The light of love is in the eyes
of the gloomy bride, and is even slightly reflected from the dark,
underhung visage of the king. All the nobility are gathered from the
whole of England. The Queen in cloth of gold, with the sword borne
before her, sweeps up with a long retinue from the west entrance, and
takes her place on the “Mount,” beneath the rood loft. On her left is
Philip, also in cloth of gold, having beside him a large number of
nobles of Spain. Golden hangings glow in the choir, and at the altar
stand six bishops with their crosiers. But with all this brilliancy
none could fail to see the dark cloud of popular discontent lowering in
the sky, and alas! the golden apparel concealed a sad and a false heart.
In this Lady Chapel, which has such high pretensions, the remains of
some old frescoes (Silkstede’s) long covered with paint and plaster,
are still visible. There are twenty-four separate designs, all in
honour of the Virgin. In one place a young man puts a gold ring on the
Virgin’s finger to keep it till he sees his lady-love. When he returns
for it he finds it will not come off. He does not attribute this to
the trickery of the monks, but to the intervention of the Virgin, and
forthwith jilts his sweetheart and takes the cowl. In another design
a painter accustomed to represent the devil “as ugly as he knew him
to be,” is executing on a high wall, a figure of Our Lady, with the
devil under her feet. His artistic work is stopped by a dragon-like
fiend pulling down his scaffolding, when lo! the Virgin he has just
painted holds out her hand to him and supports him till assistance
arrives. Here also we have John Damascen, a celebrated writer of the
eighth century, condemned by Saracen Caliph to lose his right hand. The
peccant member is cut off, and hung up in the market-place, but on its
being taken down and applied to the wrist with prayers to the Virgin,
it is reunited.
“What absurd stories,” said Miss Hertford. “I wonder how even a child
could have believed them.”
“I did not credit them,” I replied, “but now that I see framed on the
wall that wonderful restoration of these indistinct outlines, I may
think that the miraculous power of the Virgin is still present in her
chapel.”
[Sidenote: Rebuses.]
Those who deem that a person guilty of a pun should suffer imprisonment
will not look with much appreciation on the humour attempted on the
vaulting of this and the last-named chapels. All that can be said in
its behalf is that it has the flavour of a bygone age. These rebuses
seem to us puerile. There might be a temptation to represent Silkstede
by a skein and a horse; and as Winchester was often called Winton, and
famous for its wine, there might be something juicy in symbolizing it
by a vine issuing from a tun. But here we have a musical note termed
“long,” coming out of a tun for Langton, and some can see a hen making
a similar egress for Hunton. The dragon issuing from a tun refers to
Proverbs xxiii. 31, 32: “Look not upon the wine when it is red, when it
giveth his colour in the cup.... At last it biteth like a serpent and
stingeth like an adder.”
We might be surprised that, when Fox put up the panelling here, he
did not insert his own name in a similarly humorous manner. Reynard
was a known ecclesiastical emblem, but not a complimentary one--in a
church carving we find him preaching to a flock of geese. Our austere
bishop would have been shocked at such a representative; he chose the
self-sacrificing pelican.[84]
“Playing with words was much in fashion even at a later epoch,” said
Mr. Hertford. “Not a few of our great families have punning mottoes as
‘Ver non semper viret’ for Vernon, ‘Cavendo tutus’ for Cavendish, and
so on.”
“I do not dislike the little conceits here,” I replied; “it shows that
the ascetic monks had something fresh and green left in them. Perhaps
that fine Chantrey monument is not so much out of place here as some
suppose. Bishop North was a good Christian and a good cricketer. It
is said that sometimes while he was in the field hitting away, his
chaplain was in the tent bowling hard questions at the candidates for
ordination.”
Our guide now took us into the next or northernmost chapel, dedicated
to the “Guardian Angels.”
“There is nothing of much interest here?” I observed, looking around.
“No, sir,” he replied, “except the window.”
“There is nothing remarkable in that?”
“No; except that it was put up by a remarkable man,” he returned,
warmly; “the best dean we could possibly have--generous to rich and
poor; and yet,” he added, with a twinkle, “he left a good bit, £50,000.”
The dean of whom the verger spoke so enthusiastically lived to be
ninety-six. His son became a dean, lived to be seventy, and died before
his father. Expectant heirs, take note.
[Sidenote: Ethelmar.]
Passing westward to the north presbytery aisle we find an old-fashioned
dumpy ship carved over the grave of Harthacnut.[85] Hard by lies the
heart of Ethelmar, the half-brother of Henry III. When the bishop,
after landing at Dover, came to Winchester, the King, who was much at
this city, went out to meet him with a grand procession. Ethelmar seems
to have been an avaricious young man;[86] he was scarcely elected when
he had a conflict with the Archbishop of Canterbury, and also with the
monks of St. Swithun. He deposed the prior here because he refused
to give an account of some property, and the lawsuit between him and
the monks was so serious that they mortgaged the church of Winchester
for 7,000 marks--about £5,000. Afterwards Ethelmar paid off a part of
this, and the monks gave him the Isle of Portland and other property as
compensation. When the Barons held a parliament here in 1258, Ethelmar
was obliged to fly from the country. He died in Paris when only
thirty-four, and sent over his heart, which perhaps the monks did not
much appreciate. But it proved a “golden heart” to them in producing
miracles. When the steps of the altar were being lowered it was found
beneath them in a golden cup by a workman, who kept the cup and placed
the heart in this north aisle.
We now dive down into the crypt, and find it of grand dimensions,
propped with pillars such as we have just seen a specimen of in
Gardiner’s Chantry. There is still a controversy as to whether this is
Saxon or Norman work. It seems strange that Walkelin should have made
no use of the extensive excavations and foundations of the previous
building, but history asserts that the old high altar remained after
the new Cathedral was finished, and the best authority considers that
this edifice was entirely new. The well in the crypt is thought to
have existed previously, as it is not symmetrically placed with regard
to the pillars. There is still water in it, I was told. Until lately
the floor was much obstructed by earth--sixteen loads have been lately
removed. When James Ellis paid his visit about the middle of the last
century, he found “at the end of the crypt a chapel, but the extent
of it I could not examine, as it was locked up and used as a wine
vault.”[87]
[Sidenote: Frescoes.]
In the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre, just under the organ, there are
some fine frescoes of the thirteenth century in fair preservation, and
in the north transept, especially in the north-east corner, there are
traces of colour and patterns, and a large but somewhat faint fresco
apparently representing some monarch. On the ancient rood screen there
were carved and painted figures, and the spires of the stalls were gilt
until the last century.
As we passed down the Cathedral the sun was setting, and the effect of
the rays falling through the vast west window was magnificent.
Near the entrance on the north side there is a remarkable door of
grille work, thought to be of the eleventh or twelfth century, perhaps
the oldest specimen in England. It was formerly near the choir, and the
object was, it is said, to keep unsavoury and diseased pilgrims at a
safe distance.
“Perhaps some of them were like the pilgrims in the East at the present
day,” said Mr. Hertford; “it was not always easy to determine ‘where
the dirt ended and the saint began.’”
FOOTNOTES:
[62] He says that the monastery at this time extended all round the
church; but it is difficult to understand his description, except
that the palace and chief offices were on the south.
[63] Rudborne is supposed to have put Dagon for Woden, but he had
mentioned the latter just before.
[64] “Gloucester Fragment,” published by the Rev. S. Earle.
[65] Edred gave a great gold cross and figures to the monastery.
[66] Cnut patronized poets, and made verses himself, which at that
time showed religious tendencies. Emma, “The Rose of Normandy,” was
celebrated for her beauty; she was called by the English Ælfgifu. It
is remarkable that at the time when she was married at Winchester to
her first husband, Ethelred, the massacre of the Danes was plotted
here.
[67] “Chronicle of a Monk of Winchester.”
[68] Athelstan had given the head of St. Just.
[69] After reading such accounts we can understand the Recorder of
Winchester being suspended in 1657, because among other offences he
did not reprove a man for saying that “if all writings and pens were
at liberty it would make the Protector as black as the blackest devil
in hell.”
[70] The cost of whipcord for these operations figures in the City
Rolls. The sufferers were stripped to the waist, and the irons for
the women were fixed lower than for the men, to avoid injury to the
breasts; after 1790 the old theatre was used partly as a store,
partly as a lock-up or watch-house. In the reign of Henry VIII. the
pillory and cage were in the “Square.”
[71] There is now here a balcony whence the bishops bestowed their
blessings on festivals.
[72] The cross and two figures of Mary and St. John in silver and
gold, given by Stigand, then stood over the rood screen, which was
just at the top of the stairs. The space between it and the present
screen was occupied by chapels, and afterwards by vestries, removed
in Charles I.’s time.
[73] This Cathedral, measuring 556 feet from the western entrance to
the end of the Lady Chapel, is the longest in England or on this side
of the Alps. It is inferior in area only to two English cathedrals,
York and Lincoln.
[74] Two figures of the Perpendicular period remain in the west
window. A little of the glass in Fox’s east gable window is of later
date.
[75] Colonel Nathaniel Fiennes stood with a drawn sword to preserve
Wykeham’s Chantry when Cromwell took Winchester.
[76] Rufus was extravagant in dress, and resented a present of boots
which only cost 3s.
[77] He was a Fellow of the College and a Canon of Winchester. Ken
was brother-in-law of Walton.
[78] That is, approximately, for when long before, De Blois moved
many of these from the crypt, he found no inscriptions and went by
hearsay.
[79] A physical representation of the exhortation, “Lift up your
hearts!” He ordered five thousand Masses to be said for himself and
his friends.
[80] At the end of the last century.