initial commit of ebook 38735HEADmain

116 files changed, 53876 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6833f05
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitattributes
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+* text=auto
+*.txt text
+*.md text
diff --git a/38735-8.txt b/38735-8.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..26a7c56
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-8.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,17051 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely, by 
+Edward Conybeare
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely
+
+Author: Edward Conybeare
+
+Illustrator: Frederick L Griggs
+
+Release Date: February 1, 2012 [EBook #38735]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY
+
+
+
+
+  MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
+
+  LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
+  MELBOURNE
+
+  THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+
+  NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO
+  ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO
+
+  THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd
+
+  TORONTO
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Ely Cathedral. Western Tower._]
+
+
+
+
+  _HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS_
+
+  IN
+
+  _CAMBRIDGE AND ELY_
+
+  BY THE
+
+  Rev. EDWARD CONYBEARE
+
+  AUTHOR OF
+  "HISTORY OF CAMBRIDGESHIRE," "RIDES AROUND CAMBRIDGE," ETC.
+
+  WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
+  FREDERICK L. GRIGGS
+
+  MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+  ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
+  1910
+
+
+
+
+  RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, Limited.
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND
+  BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+The Highways of Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely are usually
+regarded as unattractive compared with those of England in general.
+Nor is this criticism wholly unfair. The county does lack the features
+which most make for picturesque rural scenery. There are no high
+hills, little even of undulation, and, what is yet more fatal, a sad
+sparsity of timber. The Highways, then, seem to the traveller merely
+stretches of ground to be got over as speedily as may be, and he
+rejoices that their flatness lends itself so well to this end.
+
+It is however far otherwise with the Byways. These abound with
+picturesque nooks and corners. In every village charming features are
+to be found,--thatched and timbered cottages, hedgerow elms, bright
+willow-shaded watercourses, old-time village greens, and, above all,
+old-time village churches, often noble, and never without artistic and
+historical interest of high order. Few counties better repay
+exploration than Cambridgeshire.
+
+And if the Highways are devoid of attraction during their course
+through the country districts, they make up for it by the supreme
+beauty and interest of their passage through the towns. Cambridge
+itself is, as all know, amongst the loveliest and most interesting
+places in existence, with its world-famed colleges and its
+epoch-making history. And Ely stands in the very first rank amongst
+the glorious cathedrals of England.
+
+To introduce my readers, then, to the unique interest of these two
+places, with special regard to the points mostly passed over in
+guide-books, has been my chief purpose in the following pages. And to
+those who may think that a disproportionate amount of my space has
+been allotted to these, I would apologise by reminding them that the
+vast majority of travellers perforce confine their visits to such
+special centres, and have no time for exploring country lanes. But
+those who can make the time will find it (as this book, I hope, will
+show them) time well spent, and their exploration no small treat.
+
+I need scarcely add that on such well-worn themes originality is
+hardly possible, and that I have made use both of my own earlier
+writings on the subject, and of those of others, my debt to whom I
+gratefully acknowledge. Most especially am I bound to do so with
+regard to Messrs. Atkinson and Clark, whose monumental work "Cambridge
+Described" is a veritable mine of information, and to Professor and
+Mrs. Hughes for the help which I have found in their "County Geography
+of Cambridgeshire."
+
+                                                     EDWARD CONYBEARE.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+  CHAPTER I                                                       PAGE
+
+  Cambridge Greenery. -- The Backs. -- The Lawns. -- Logan's Views. --
+  Old Common Fields. -- Old Cambridge. -- Origin of Cambridge. -- The
+  Castle. -- Camboritum. -- Granta-ceaster. -- Danes in Cambridge. --
+  Cambridgeshire formed. -- Battle of Ringmere. -- Norman Conquest. --
+  The Jewry. -- Religious Houses. -- Rise of University. -- Town and
+  Gown. -- Proctors. -- The Colleges. -- Examinations. -- College
+  Life. -- Cambridge and Oxford                                      1
+
+
+  CHAPTER II
+
+  Entrance to Cambridge. -- Railways. -- Roman Catholic Church. --
+  Street runlets, Hobson, Perne. -- Fitzwilliam Museum. --
+  =Peterhouse=, Chapel, Deer-park. -- Little St. Mary's Church,
+  Washington Arms. -- Gray's window. -- =Pembroke College=, Large and
+  Small Colleges, "Querela Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's Farewell. -- St.
+  Botolph's Church. -- The King's Ditch. -- =Corpus Christi College=,
+  Cambridge Guilds, St. Benet's Church, Firehooks, Corpus Library,
+  Corpus Ghost. -- =St. Catherine's College.= -- King's Parade. --
+  Pitt Press. -- Newnham Bridge, Hermits. -- The Backs River, College
+  Bridges, Hithes                                                   20
+
+
+  CHAPTER III
+
+  =Queens' College=, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel. -- Old
+  Mill Street. -- =King's College=, Henry VI, King's and Eton, Henry's
+  "Will." -- King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton, Windows, Rosa
+  Solis, Screens, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels, View from Roof    47
+
+
+  CHAPTER IV
+
+  Spiked gates. -- Old Kings. -- =University Library=, Origin, Growth,
+  Codex Bezæ. -- =Trinity Hall=, Colours, Library. -- =Clare College=,
+  "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue. -- The Backs, Sirdar Bonfire,
+  College Gardens. -- =Trinity College=, Michaelhouse, King's Hall,
+  Henry VIII, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge, Library,
+  Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's Pillar," Prince
+  Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College Plate, Grace-cup,
+  Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of Granby, Tutors, Old
+  Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge, Chapel, Newton, Organ,
+  Bentley, Windows, Macaulay                                        78
+
+
+  CHAPTER V
+
+  Whewell's Courts. -- All Saints' Cross. -- The Jewry. -- Divinity
+  School. -- =St. John's College=, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+  Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+  Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second Court,
+  Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New Court,
+  Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness. -- =Caius College=, Gonville,
+  The Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues." -- =Senate House=, Congregations,
+  Vice-Chancellor, Voting, Degree-giving. -- =University Church=, Mr.
+  Tripos, Golgotha, Sermons, Tower, Chimes, Jowett. -- Market Hill,
+  Peasant Revolt, Wat Tyler, Bucer and Fagius, Bonfires, Town and
+  Gown                                                             103
+
+
+  CHAPTER VI
+
+  Round Church. -- Union Society. -- The "Great Bridge," Hithe. --
+  =Magdalene College=, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles Kingsley,
+  the "College Window," Master's Garden. -- Castle Hill, Camboritum,
+  Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I, the "Borough," View from
+  Castle. -- St. Peter's Church. -- "School of Pythagoras." --
+  Westminster College. -- Ridley Hall. -- =Newnham College.= --
+  =Selwyn College.= -- Convent of St. Radegund, Bishop Alcock. --
+  Midsummer Common. -- Boat Houses, Bumping Races. -- =Jesus College=,
+  "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House, Chapel, Cranmer, Coleridge  132
+
+
+  CHAPTER VII
+
+  =Sidney College=, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners. -- Holy
+  Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn. -- =Christ's College=, "God's House,"
+  Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden, Milton,
+  Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin. -- Great St. Andrew's, Bishop
+  Perry. -- =Emmanuel College=, Harvard, Sancroft, Chapel, Ponds. --
+  University Museums. -- =Downing College=, Miss Edgeworth. -- Coe
+  Fen. -- First Mile Stone. -- Barnwell, Priory, Abbey Church. --
+  Lepers' Chapel, Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair                    151
+
+
+  CHAPTER VIII
+
+  Roads from Cambridge. -- Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East Angles,
+  Mercians, Formation of County. -- Newmarket Road. -- Quy. -- Fleam
+  Dyke. -- Devil's Dyke. -- Icknield Way. -- Iceni, Ostorius,
+  Boadicea. -- Newmarket Heath, First Racing. -- Exning, Anna. --
+  Snailwell. -- Fordham. -- Soham, St. Felix. -- Stuntney. -- Wicken.
+  -- Chippenham. -- Isleham, Lectern. -- Eastern Heights. -- Chevely,
+  Cambridge Corporation. -- Kirtling. -- Wood Ditton. -- Stetchworth.
+  -- Borough Green. -- Bottisham. -- Swaffham Bulbeck. -- The Lodes.
+  -- Swaffham Prior. -- Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest. -- Burwell,
+  Church, Clunch, Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville             168
+
+
+  CHAPTER IX
+
+  Hills Road. -- Gog Magogs. -- Vandlebury. -- Babraham, Peter Pence.
+  -- Old Railway. -- Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper Stile. -- Linton. --
+  Horseheath. -- Bartlow, St. Christopher, Battle of Assandun. --
+  Cherry Hinton, War Ditches, Saffron. -- Teversham. -- Fulbourn,
+  Brasses. -- Wilbraham. -- Fleam Dyke, Wild Flowers, Butterflies,
+  Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle. -- Balsham, Battle of Ringmere,
+  Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones                         201
+
+
+  CHAPTER X
+
+  London Road. -- Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+  Pool, Upper River. -- Grantchester, Church. -- Cam and Granta. --
+  The Shelfords. -- Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+  "Little John." -- Whittlesford, Old Hospital. -- Duxford. -- Triplow
+  Heath, Civil War. -- Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell. -- Ickleton,
+  Monolith Pillars. -- Chesterford. -- Icknield Way. -- Saffron
+  Walden                                                           219
+
+
+  CHAPTER XI
+
+  London Road. -- Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket Fresco.
+  -- Burnt Mill. -- Haslingfield. -- White Hill, View, Clunch Pits,
+  Chapel, Papal Bulla. -- Barrington, Green, Church, Porch Seats,
+  Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging, Hall. -- Foxton. --
+  Shepreth. -- Meldreth, Parish Stocks. -- Melbourn, Shipmoney. --
+  Royston, Origin, Cave, Heath. -- Bassingbourn, Old Accounts,
+  Villenage. -- Black Death. -- Ashwell, Source of Cam, Church,
+  Graffiti. -- Akeman Street. -- Barton Butts. -- Comberton Maze. --
+  Harlton Church, Old Pit. -- Orwell Maypole, Church, Epitaph. --
+  Wimpole Hall, Queen Victoria. -- Arrington. -- Shingay,
+  Hospitallers, Fairy Cart. -- Wendy. -- Artesian Wells. -- Guilden
+  Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals                        235
+
+
+  CHAPTER XII
+
+  Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge Discoveries. -- Coton.
+  -- Madingley. -- Hardwick. -- Toft, St. Hubert. -- Childerley,
+  Charles I. -- Knapwell. -- Bourn. -- Caxton. -- Eltisley, St.
+  Pandiania, Storm. -- St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred. -- Paxton Hill.
+  -- Godmanchester, Port Meadow. -- Huntingdon, Cromwell's Penance. --
+  The Hemingfords. -- St. Ives. -- Holywell. -- Overcote. -- Earith,
+  the Bedford Rivers, "Parallax"                                   265
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIII
+
+  Island of Ely. -- Haddenham. -- Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+  Belsars Hill. -- Wilburton. -- Sutton. -- Wentworth. -- Via Devana.
+  -- Girton, College. -- Oakington, Holdsworth. -- Elsworth. --
+  Conington, Ancient Bells. -- Long Stanton, Queen Elizabeth. --
+  Willingham, Stone Chamber. -- Over, Gurgoyles. -- Swavesey, Finials.
+  -- Ely Road. -- Chesterton. -- Fen Ditton. -- Milton, Altar Rails.
+  -- Horningsea. -- Bait's Bite, Start of Race. -- Clayhithe. --
+  Waterbeach. -- Car Dyke. -- Denny. -- Stretham. -- Upware. -- Wicken
+  Fen.                                                             282
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIV
+
+  Ely. -- Island and Isle. -- St. Augustine. -- St. Etheldreda, Life,
+  Death, Burial, St. Audrey's Fair. -- Danish Sack of Ely. -- Alfred's
+  College. -- Abbey Restored. -- Brithnoth, Song of Maldon. -- Battle
+  of Assundun. -- Canute at Ely. -- Edward the Confessor. -- Alfred
+  the Etheling. -- Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman Conquest, Tabula
+  Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster. -- Bishops of Ely, Rule over
+  Isle. -- Ely Place, Ely House                                    303
+
+
+  CHAPTER XV
+
+  Bishop Northwold. -- Presbytery Dedicated. -- Barons at Ely. -- Fall
+  of Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon. -- Queen Philippa. -- Lady
+  Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich. -- Bishop Alcock. --
+  Bishop West. -- Styles of Architecture. -- Monastic Industries. --
+  Mediæval Account Books. -- Clothing and Food of Monks. --
+  Benedictine Rule. -- Dissolution of Abbey. -- Bishop Thirlby. --
+  Bishop Wren. -- Bishop Gunning. -- Bishop Turner                 324
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVI
+
+  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                     344
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVII
+
+  Monuments. -- West's Chapel. -- Alcock's Chapel. -- Northwold
+  Cenotaph. -- Bassevi. -- Shrine of Etheldreda. -- Lady Chapel. --
+  View from Tower. -- Triforium. -- Exterior of Minster. -- Palace,
+  "Duties" of Goodrich. -- St. Mary's. -- St. Cross. -- Cromwell's
+  House. -- Cromwell at Ely. -- St. John's Farm. -- Theological
+  College. -- Waterworks. -- Basket-making                         366
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVIII
+
+  Boundary of Fens. -- Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall, Causeway. --
+  Archipelago. -- Littleport, Agrarian Riots. -- Denver Sluice. --
+  Roslyn Pit. -- Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey, Peterborough,
+  Thorney, Crowland                                                386
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIX
+
+  Draining of Fens -- Monastic Works, Morton's Learn. -- Diversion of
+  Ouse. -- Local Government, Jurats, Discontent. -- Jacobean polemics.
+  -- First Drainage Company. -- Rising of Fen-men. -- Second Company,
+  Huguenot Labourers. -- Third Company, Earl of Bedford, Vermuyden. --
+  Old River. -- Cromwell. -- Fourth Company, Prisoner Slaves, New
+  River, Denver Sluice. -- Later Developments                      398
+
+
+  CHAPTER XX
+
+  Coveney. -- Manea. -- Doddington. -- March, Angel Roof. --
+  Whittlesea. -- Old Course of Ouse, Well Stream. -- Upwell, Outwell.
+  -- Emneth. -- Elm. -- The Marshland -- West Walton. -- Walsoken. --
+  Walpole. -- Cross Keys. -- Leverington. -- Tydd. -- Wisbech, Church,
+  Trade, Castle, Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson. -- The Wash. -- King
+  John.                                                            409
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                                                                  PAGE
+
+  ELY CATHEDRAL, WESTERN TOWER                          _Frontispiece_
+
+  MAP OF CAMBRIDGE                                     _Facing_      1
+
+  ST. BENET'S CHURCH AND CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE                      1
+
+  PETERHOUSE WALL, COE FEN                                           5
+
+  THE BACKS, CLARE COLLEGE GATE                                      9
+
+  ST. MICHAEL'S AND ALL ANGELS                                      13
+
+  ORIEL IN LIBRARY, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                              18
+
+  PETERHOUSE                                                        24
+
+  ST. MARY THE LESS, SOUTH SIDE                                     27
+
+  PETERHOUSE FROM ST. MARY'S CHURCHYARD                             29
+
+  ST. BOTOLPH'S CHURCH                                              33
+
+  ST. BENET'S CHURCH, INTERIOR                                      37
+
+  CLARE BRIDGE                                                      42
+
+  ST. JOHN'S BRIDGE                                                 45
+
+  THE PRESIDENT'S GALLERY, QUEENS' COLLEGE                          49
+
+  ORIEL IN QUEENS' COLLEGE                                          51
+
+  QUEENS' COLLEGE GATEWAY                                           53
+
+  CLARE COLLEGE FROM KING'S                                         57
+
+  KING'S COLLEGE CHAPEL                                             61
+
+  OLD GATE OF KING'S COLLEGE                                        81
+
+  OLD SCHOOLS' QUADRANGLE                                           87
+
+  CLARE COLLEGE FROM BRIDGE                                         93
+
+  TRINITY BRIDGE                                                    99
+
+  THE FOUNTAIN, TRINITY COLLEGE                                    103
+
+  TRINITY COLLEGE CHAPEL AND ST. JOHN'S GATEWAY                    111
+
+  HALL, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                                         115
+
+  ORIEL IN SECOND COURT OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                      117
+
+  THE GATE OF HONOUR, CAIUS COLLEGE                                123
+
+  PEAS HILL                                                        130
+
+  THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE                                 135
+
+  ST. PETER'S CHURCH                                               139
+
+  REMAINS OF ST. RADEGUND'S PRIORY                                 141
+
+  JESUS COLLEGE GATEWAY                                            143
+
+  THE BACK COURT, JESUS COLLEGE                                    145
+
+  JESUS COLLEGE CHAPEL, EAST END                                   147
+
+  ORIEL OF HALL, JESUS COLLEGE                                     149
+
+  CHRIST'S COLLEGE CHAPEL                                          153
+
+  EMMANUEL COLLEGE                                                 157
+
+  THE LEPERS' CHAPEL, BARNWELL                                     163
+
+  QUY CHURCH                                                       170
+
+  FORDHAM CHURCH                                                   177
+
+  FORDHAM                                                          179
+
+  SOHAM                                                            181
+
+  SWAFFHAM BULBECK                                                 191
+
+  SWAFFHAM PRIOR                                                   192
+
+  SWAFFHAM PRIOR CHURCHES                                          193
+
+  THE CASTLE MOAT, BURWELL                                         195
+
+  BURWELL CHURCH, WEST END                                         197
+
+  BURWELL CHURCH, N.E. VIEW                                        199
+
+  CHERRY HINTON CHURCH                                             207
+
+  GREAT WILBRAHAM CHURCH                                           211
+
+  GREAT WILBRAHAM                                                  212
+
+  LITTLE WILBRAHAM                                                 213
+
+  BALSHAM TOWER                                                    214
+
+  COTTAGE AT BALSHAM                                               217
+
+  GREAT SHELFORD CHURCH                                            223
+
+  WHITTLESFORD                                                     227
+
+  ST. PETER'S CHURCH, DUXFORD                                      229
+
+  HASLINGFIELD CHURCH                                              237
+
+  FARMHOUSE AT HASLINGFIELD                                        239
+
+  SOUTH PORCH, BARRINGTON CHURCH                                   241
+
+  SHEPRETH                                                         243
+
+  MELBOURN                                                         245
+
+  ASHWELL                                                          249
+
+  ASHWELL CHURCH FROM THE N.W.                                     251
+
+  ASHWELL CHURCH                                                   253
+
+  GREAT EVERSDEN                                                   257
+
+  ROOD SCREEN, GUILDEN MORDEN CHURCH                               261
+
+  COTTAGE AT STEEPLE MORDEN                                        263
+
+  COTON                                                            269
+
+  COTTAGE AT TOFT                                                  271
+
+  WILBURTON                                                        284
+
+  THE BURYSTEAD, WILBURTON                                         285
+
+  SUTTON CHURCH                                                    287
+
+  ALL SAINTS' CHURCH, LONG STANTON                                 291
+
+  OVER, SOUTH PORCH                                                293
+
+  OVER                                                             294
+
+  SWAVESEY                                                         296
+
+  SWAVESEY CHURCH                                                  297
+
+  COTTAGE AT RAMPTON                                               299
+
+  DOVECOTE AT RAMPTON                                              300
+
+  THE QUAY, ELY                                                    301
+
+  THE NORTH TRIFORIUM OF THE NAVE, ELY                             305
+
+  WEST AISLE OF THE NORTH TRANSEPT, ELY                            311
+
+  ELY: THE PRESBYTERY                                              327
+
+  ELY LANTERN                                                      333
+
+  PRIOR CRAUDEN'S CHAPEL                                           347
+
+  SOUTH AISLE OF THE NAVE, ELY                                     351
+
+  THE TOWER FROM THE CLOISTERS                                     357
+
+  CATHEDRAL TOWERS                                                 361
+
+  ST. MARY'S CHURCH                                                378
+
+  THE CATHEDRAL FROM THE WEST FEN ROAD                             380
+
+  ST. JOHN'S FARM                                                  383
+
+  WILLOW WALK                                                      385
+
+  ST. WENDREDA'S CHURCH, MARCH                                     391
+
+  THE OLD FENLAND (NORTHERN DISTRICT)                              404
+
+  THE OLD FENLAND (SOUTHERN DISTRICT)                              405
+
+  ELM CHURCH                                                       412
+
+  WALPOLE ST. PETER                                                414
+
+  LEVERINGTON                                                      417
+
+  BELL TOWER, TYDD ST. GILES                                       419
+
+  WISBECH CHURCH                                                   423
+
+  THE OLD COURT OF CORPUS                                          431
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Walker & Boutall sc._ Cambridge]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Benet's Church and Corpus Christi College._]
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGESHIRE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+     Cambridge Greenery.--The "Backs."--The Lawns.--Logan's
+     Views.--Old Common Fields.--Old Cambridge.--Origin of
+     Cambridge.--The Castle.--Camboritum.--Granta-ceaster.--Danes in
+     Cambridge.--Cambridgeshire formed.--Battle of Ringmere.--Norman
+     Conquest.--The Jewry.--Religious Houses.--Rise of
+     University.--Town and Gown.--Proctors.--The
+     Colleges.--Examinations.--College Life.--Cambridge and Oxford.
+
+
+Cambridge has been described by an appreciative American novelist as
+"a harmony in grey and green." And indeed it is true that few towns
+are so shot through and through with greenery. The London Road enters
+the place through two miles of umbrageous leafage; wide, open spaces
+of grass-land--Stourbridge Common, Midsummer Common, Coldham Common,
+Empty Common, Donkey Common, Peter's Field, Parker's Piece, Christ's
+Pieces, Jesus Green, Sheep's Green, Coe Fen--penetrate from the
+outskirts, north, south, and east, right to the heart of the town;
+while the world-famous "Backs," where the road runs beneath ancestral
+elms, between a continuous series of bowery College gardens and
+precincts--Queens', King's, Clare, Trinity, St. John's--with their
+beckoning vistas of long avenues of lime and chestnut, ring it in to
+the west, and form a scene of park-like loveliness to be found nowhere
+else on earth. Port Meadow, at Oxford, and the Magdalen Walks, furnish
+the nearest comparison; but only to show how far in front Cambridge
+stands in greenery. Even inside the Colleges this precedence shows
+itself; for in Cambridge every College Court in the place, almost
+without exception, unlike so many of the "Quads" of Oxford, has its
+central grass-plot.
+
+These lawns, it may be noted, are sacrosanct, not to be profaned by
+the foot of anyone but a Fellow of the College[1] itself. No outsider,
+from another College, however high in academic rank, may, unless
+accompanied by a Fellow, cross over them; still less any member of the
+College, old or young, who is not himself a Fellow, nor any casual
+visitor, even of the privileged sex. Should any such attempt be made,
+the College porters will politely, but quite firmly, remove the
+transgressor. This convention is absolutely necessary for the very
+existence of the greensward, which, if allowed to be traversed by
+all-comers, would speedily be cut up and ruined.
+
+[Footnote 1: The word "Fellow" signifies, in any College, one of the
+strictly limited corporation to whom its whole property legally
+belongs. This corporation is kept filled up by co-option; the most
+distinguished of the junior students being usually chosen.]
+
+This greenery, however, is a comparatively recent development in the
+history of Cambridge, most of it dating no further back than the
+latter half of the seventeenth century. In the last decade of that
+century an artist named David Logan (or Loggan), said to have been of
+Danish nationality but Scotch extraction, made a series of views of
+the various Cambridge Colleges, elaborated with extraordinary care and
+fidelity. So truthful and observant was he that a mysterious bird,
+long a puzzle in his drawing of the great court of Trinity, has lately
+been discovered, by reference to the College muniments, to have been a
+tame eagle then kept by the Society. His views were reissued in 1905
+by Mr. J. W. Clark, the greatest living authority on Cambridge
+antiquities, and should be consulted by all who are interested in the
+development of Cambridge. In these views the existing avenues in the
+College enclosures at the "Backs" may be observed, but all of young
+trees quite recently planted (as indeed we know to have been the case
+from the College records), while right up to these enclosures run open
+treeless fields, not meadows, but corn-land, where harvesters may be
+seen at work and sheep grazing upon the fallow land. Most of the now
+green Commons are in like manner shown to have been then under the
+plough.
+
+The late Professor Maitland, whose recent death has been so
+irreparable a loss to Cambridge and to the whole historical side of
+English education, has shown (in his _Township and Borough_) how truly
+these views of Logan's represent the seventeenth century facts, and
+how, somewhat earlier, the arable fields had come even to the river
+bank on the west of the town; or, to use his own more accurate
+language, that the western fields of Cambridge extended to the river
+bank. Every old English town and village, it must be remembered, was
+in theory (and originally in practice) self-supporting, and contained
+within its boundary sufficient arable and pasture land to feed its own
+inhabitants and their cattle. These were known as the "Common Fields"
+of the place. They were not "Commons" in our modern sense of the word,
+but were divided into small holdings amongst the townsmen, each man's
+holding consisting of so many tiny strips, never more than an acre in
+extent, scattered as widely as possible to make things fair for all.
+They were cultivated upon the three course system; every landholder
+having the right to pasture a proportionate number of cattle on the
+fallow of the year, as well as in the Common Meadows. The Common
+Fields of Cambridge comprised about five square miles, with the
+inhabited part of the township nearly in the centre, and roughly
+coincided with the existing Parliamentary Borough, though somewhat
+more extensive.
+
+This inhabited part, the mediæval town of Cambridge, was comprised,
+(at least from the tenth century to the eighteenth,) in the space
+bounded by the river on the west, and on the east by a ditch, known
+finally as the "King's Ditch," from having been widened by Henry the
+Third in the Barons' War. This ditch left the Cam at the "King's
+Mill," (the modern representative of which still stands just above
+Silver Street Bridge,) and proceeded along the line of Mill Lane,
+Pembroke Street, Tibbs Row, Hobson Street, and Park Street, to fall
+into the river again opposite Magdalene College. Beyond the "Great
+Bridge," from which the place derived its name, a small cluster of
+houses climbed the steep bank, on the summit of which stood the
+Castle. Our earliest records show this area as by no means thickly
+covered with houses. Not only the inhabitants, but all their cattle
+lived in it; so there must have been many little farmyards and gardens
+interspersed amongst the dwellings.
+
+Domesday Book gives the number of these as only 400, and a couple of
+centuries later, in 1279, when the University was already in full
+existence, there were scarcely more. By the middle of the eighteenth
+century this number had trebled. But even in 1801, as may be seen in
+Lyson's plan of the town, the King's Ditch, which was then still an
+open watercourse, remained substantially the boundary of inhabited
+Cambridge. And the vast suburban extensions in the areas of Barnwell,
+Newnham, Chesterton, and Cherry Hinton are mostly very recent indeed;
+the bulk in fact belonging to the last half century. Their rise, and
+the continuous intrusion of ever fresh University and College
+buildings, has had the effect of once more depleting the area of
+mediæval Cambridge, which to-day contains barely 800 houses. The whole
+of the University buildings, whether ancient or modern, are contained
+within this area, with the exception of the Colleges of Peterhouse,
+Pembroke, Christ's and Jesus (which together with a few of the
+Museums, stand just beyond the Ditch), and the New Court of St. John's
+College, which is on the other side of the river, in the old Common
+Field. The ecclesiastical and feminine foundations similarly situated,
+Selwyn College, Westminster College, Ridley Hall, Newnham College, and
+Girton College, are not recognised by the University as being strictly
+"Colleges" at all.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse Wall, Coe Fen._]
+
+Such was old Cambridge; with its eleven ancient parishes of St. Peter,
+St. Giles, St. Clement, Holy Trinity, St. Michael, St. Mary (the
+greater), St. Edward, St. Benet, St. Botolph, All Saints, and St. John
+(which was destroyed to make room for King's College). Before the
+twelfth century closed three more churches were added, those of the
+Holy Sepulchre, of St. Peter (now St. Mary's the less) outside the
+"Trumpington Gate," of St. Andrew (the greater) outside the Barnwell
+Gate, and St. Andrew (the less) in the detached suburb which grew up
+round the great "Abbey" (really an Augustinian Priory) of Barnwell.
+
+Old Cambridge probably owed its constitution--(quite possibly its very
+existence)--to the genius with which "the Children of Alfred," Edward
+the Elder and his Sister, the "Lady of the Mercians," reorganised the
+Midlands after the great cataclysm of the Danish wars, which in the
+previous generation had swept over the district, obliterating all
+earlier landmarks and boundaries. One pirate horde, under the most
+renowned of all their chieftains, Guthrum--the deadliest antagonist,
+and afterwards the most faithful ally, of our great Alfred,--had for a
+space settled themselves in Cambridge, and from that strategic
+position overawed East Anglia on the one hand and Mercia on the
+other.[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: The kingdom of Mercia comprised the Midlands, and was
+(roughly) bounded on the north by the Humber and Mersey, on the west
+by Wales, on the south by the Thames, and on the east by the Cam and
+the Lea.]
+
+The Cambridge which they sacked was not, however, as it would seem,
+the later mediæval town which we have been already considering, but a
+much smaller stronghold on the western bank of the River, comprising
+what is now known as "Castle End," and is still sometimes called "the
+Borough" _par excellence_. At this point the Cam, one bank or other of
+which is usually swampy even now, and was actually swamp in early
+days, is touched by higher and firmer ground on both sides. The height
+to the west is quite respectable, rising some eighty feet above the
+stream. Here, therefore, and here alone, was there of old any
+convenient passage-way for an army; the river elsewhere forming an
+almost insuperable barrier to military operations, from the Fens
+almost to its source. Such a site was sure to be amongst the earliest
+occupied; and we find, accordingly, that both Romans and Anglo-Saxons
+(presumably Mercians) successively held it. Most probably it was also
+a British site; but the great Castle mound, which earlier antiquaries
+attributed to the Britons, has been shown by Professor Hughes to be,
+mainly at least, a Norman work.
+
+This site was the original Cambridge, and may even have been called by
+that very name in its earliest form. For it is hard not to identify
+the Roman settlement (which the spade shows to have existed here) with
+the "Camboritum," which from the "Itinerary of Antoninus" (an official
+road book, probably of the third century A.D.) must have been
+somewhere in this immediate neighbourhood. And the word Camboritum is
+plausibly derived from the British _Cam Rhydd_ "the ford of the Cam."
+Cam (which, being interpreted, signifies crooked) may well have been
+the British name for a stream with so tortuous a course. But, if so,
+it was not continuously used, so far as records can tell us.
+
+The Roman Camboritum doubtless shared the almost universal destruction
+of Roman stations which marked the English conquest of Britain; and
+the site is described as still "a waste chester" two centuries later,
+when the monks of Ely sought amid the ruins for a stone coffin in
+which to entomb their foundress, St. Ethelreda. By this time the older
+name both of the town and of the river seems to have been forgotten.
+The latter was called, by the English, the Granta, and the former was
+accordingly known only as Granta-ceaster--the chester, or ruined Roman
+city, upon the Granta. (It should be noted that the village now called
+Grantchester was, till comparatively recent days, known as Grant-set.)
+
+Yet another century, and we find, in the days of King Egbert, the
+grandfather of Alfred and the first King acknowledged by the whole
+English nation, that a bridge had been built (or rebuilt) over the old
+ford; and therewith the old site of Camboritum had been reoccupied
+under the new name of Granta-bridge, by which it is known throughout
+mediæval history. We do not meet with "Cambridge" in literature till
+the fourteenth century, nor with "Cam" till almost the date of "Camus,
+reverend sire," in Milton's Lycidas.
+
+However this may be, it is pretty certain that the Cambridge on which
+Guthrum, in the year 872, marched from Repton was the "Borough" of
+Castle End. After holding, or, as one chronicler (Gaimar) would have
+us believe, only besieging it, for a whole year, the Danish host
+hastily made off to Wareham in Dorsetshire, to take part in that life
+and death struggle in the west which began with Alfred's great naval
+victory off Swanage, then drove him into hiding at Athelney, and ended
+with the Peace of Wedmore. By that treaty all England north of the
+Watling Street was ceded to the Danes as an under-kingdom, the
+"Dane-Law"; Guthrum, now a Christian and Alfred's godson, being set on
+the throne. Cambridge thus became undisputedly a Danish town. The
+district around was divided "with a rope" (_i.e._ by chain measure)
+amongst the invaders, and submitted as an organic whole, some half
+century later, to King Edward the Elder. It was probably at this time
+that the town began to extend itself into the East Anglian district to
+the east of the Cam. (Throughout its whole length the river, with its
+marshy banks, was the boundary between the old English kingdoms of
+Mercia and East Anglia; and traces of this are to be found in the
+distinctive customs of adjoining villages, on one side or the other of
+the stream, even to this day.) The "Saxon," or Romanesque, tower of
+St. Benet's Church, may well be of this date, erected by the English
+inhabitants dispossessed of their homes in the Borough by the
+conquering Danes who lorded it over them.
+
+After its submission to Edward the Elder, Cambridge began its career
+as a County Town, giving its name, (as was the case in nearly all
+these new Edwardian counties,) to the surrounding district, which thus
+became known as Grantabrig-shire. The name covered only the southern
+part of the present county; for the Isle of Ely was reconstituted
+under the ancient jurisdiction of its great abbots and bishops. To
+this day, indeed, it has its own separate County Council, and even a
+separate motor-car lettering. The new political unit soon began to
+display no small local patriotism; for we read that in the fatal
+battle of Ringmere, fought on Ascension Day, 1010, between the fresh
+Danish invaders, who were then pouring over the land, and the united
+forces of East Anglia under the hero Ulfcytel, "soon fled the East
+English. There stood Grantabryg-shire fast only."
+
+[Illustration: _The Backs, Clare College Gate._]
+
+The victorious Danes, naturally, proceeded to wreak special vengeance
+on such obstinate foes. The county was ravaged with a ferocity even
+beyond the usual Danish harryings, and Cambridge itself was sacked and
+burnt. When it arose from its ashes, in the quieter days of the Danish
+Canute, the first "King of England," (his native predecessors having
+been Kings "of the English,") it was organised, Danish fashion, into
+ten Wards, each with its own "Lawman." In the reign of Edward the
+Confessor, it had, as we have seen, 400 dwelling-houses (_masurae_),
+not urban cottages closely packed in rows, but mostly tenements of the
+farmhouse type, each with its farmyard, the abodes of the husbandmen
+who owned and tilled the Common Fields of the town.
+
+This number of houses shows Cambridge to have been at this time an
+important place, equal in population to a whole average "Hundred,"
+with its ten villages; and as such we find it counted for legal
+purposes under the Norman and Plantagenet dynasties. But its Common
+Fields were by no means proportionately extensive,[3] so that many of
+the inhabitants must already have depended upon trade for their
+living.
+
+[Footnote 3: An ordinary "Hundred" contained an area some five miles
+square, instead of the five square miles which was that of old
+Cambridge.]
+
+If Cambridge fared ill at the hands of the Danes, it fared little
+better at those of the Normans. William the Conqueror made the place
+his headquarters in his operations against Hereward's "Camp of Refuge"
+at Ely. This resulted in the ruin of fifty-three out of the 400
+houses, besides twenty-seven more pulled down to make room for his new
+Castle, which with its outworks and huge central keep occupied the
+greater part of the old Roman site to the west of the Bridge. The loss
+of these eighty houses probably brought down the population to little
+over 2,000 souls. Even with this reduction, however, the town might
+still claim to rank in the first class of English cities at the time;
+and this is shown by the growth of a Jewry within its walls, in the
+area bounded by St. John's College, Trinity College, and Bridge
+Street. For the Jews, (who first came into England as camp-followers
+of the Norman invaders,) naturally struck for the wealthier towns in
+which to form their settlement. As the place grew in importance
+Religious Houses began rapidly to spring up in and around it; the
+first being the great Augustinian Abbey of Barnwell, founded by Picot,
+the Sheriff of Cambridge under William the Conqueror.
+
+The next generation saw Augustinian Canons settled in the town itself,
+at the Hospital (now the College) of St. John; and Benedictine nuns at
+the Priory of St. Radegund just beyond the King's Ditch, where their
+conventual church is still used as the Chapel of Jesus College. A
+century later, and friars of all the Orders came flocking into
+Cambridge; the Grey Franciscans, the Black Dominicans, the White
+Carmelites, the Austin Friars, the Friars of the Sack, the Friars of
+Bethlehem. The sites occupied by the first three of these names are
+to-day represented by the Colleges of Sidney, Emmanuel, and Queens'.
+Friars always made for the chief centres of life, and by the
+thirteenth century Cambridge had become emphatically such, by the rise
+of that institution destined to give it a perennial fame, the
+University.
+
+How this rise of the University came about is an as yet unsolved
+problem in history. As in the case of Oxford, the great name of Alfred
+was invoked, by unscrupulous mediæval fabricators, as concerned in its
+foundation. And it is possible that there may be really traceable some
+distant connection with that great saint and hero. For Alfred actually
+did found amidst the ruins of Ely, after its sack by the Danes, a
+small College of priests, which lived on to be the nucleus of the
+restored Abbey in the days of his grandson Edgar the Peaceful. And it
+is also historical fact that this restored Abbey was specially
+renowned for the famous school attached to it--so famous as to count
+amongst its scholars more than one future monarch. Furthermore we know
+that the Ely monks taught in Cambridge also, and this may well have
+been the first germ of the University.
+
+At any rate it is certain that, in 1209, when the schools of Oxford
+were for a while closed by the Government, as the outcome of a more
+than usually outrageous "rag," large numbers of the students migrated
+to Cambridge; which seems to point to the place having already some
+educational repute. From henceforward, at all events, it attained
+European reputation in this respect, for, in 1229, we find another
+batch of expelled students, this time from Paris, settling themselves
+here, and yet another swarm of Oxonians twenty years later.
+
+The University had now become an organic body, with its Chancellor,
+its masters, and its scholars or "clerks," so called because, being
+not wholly illiterate, the Law considered them as potential members of
+the clerical profession, and gave them special immunities accordingly.
+They were not amenable to lay jurisdiction, but only to the milder
+"Courts Christian," in which the death-penalty was never inflicted. It
+seems not infrequently to have been deserved; for the earliest
+undergraduates were, at first, an utterly lawless lot, and made
+themselves most unpleasant neighbours to the "burgesses" of the Town.
+
+When first they made their appearance the inhabitants of Cambridge had
+just bought the right to call themselves by this dignified name. This
+bargain was the upshot of a Royal visit in 1207 from King John, who,
+in consideration of a payment of 250 marks, (equivalent to £5,000 at
+the present value of money,) granted Cambridge a Charter of
+Incorporation, with the right to be governed by a Provost and bailiffs
+of their own (instead of by the King's Sheriff), and to regulate their
+own markets. Twenty years later, (by a further contribution to the
+royal purse,) the Provost acquired the higher title of Mayor.
+
+But almost simultaneously, his prerogatives began to be curtailed by
+the rising power of the University, to whose "Taxers" was given, in
+1231, the sole right of fixing the rents which might be demanded for
+lodgings from the inrushing swarm of students; while the regulation of
+the market weights and measures became vested in the Proctors. The
+authority of the Taxers died out when the Collegiate system became
+universal, but has been revived in recent days by the "Lodging-house
+Syndicate": that of the Proctors over the Market has become obsolete;
+not so long, however, but that, to this day, there may be seen, in the
+possession of the Senior Proctor for each year, an iron cylinder, a
+yard long and an inch in diameter, which was, not so many decades ago,
+the standard test for the dimensions of every roll of butter sold in
+Cambridge. For butter in Cambridge was retailed by the inch; a custom
+which still lingers on sporadically amongst our vendors.
+
+The student population speedily became far more numerous than the
+townsfolk, and their accommodation must have been no small problem. At
+first the need was met wholly by private enterprise: University
+lodgers thronged the private houses and the annexes, or "hostels," as
+they are named, run up for their sole use by speculative landlords.
+These hostels gradually attained to more or less of official
+recognition by the University, and paved the way for the setting up of
+Colleges.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Michael's and All Angels._]
+
+The first actual College was Peterhouse, founded by Hugh de Balsham,
+Bishop of Ely, in 1284, and was of the nature of an experiment, the
+success of which it took a whole generation to establish. Once
+proved, a host of imitators appeared; and the following generation saw
+no fewer than seven similar foundations, Michaelhouse and King's Hall
+(the germs of Trinity College), Clare, Pembroke, Gonville, Trinity
+Hall, and Corpus Christi College. Then came a break of a century,
+followed by another outburst of zeal, which in the next hundred years
+produced yet another seven: King's, Queens', St. Catharine's, Jesus,
+Christ's, St. John's, and Magdalene. The last four of these were
+earlier religious and scholastic foundations remodelled; and a like
+process during the half century succeeding the Reformation has given
+us the Colleges of Trinity, Caius, Emmanuel, and Sidney. Not till the
+nineteenth century was the list added to by the appearance of Downing.
+
+The original idea in all these foundations was to provide, not so much
+for the students as for the masters who taught them. To these it was
+an immense advantage to be able to dwell together in small groups and
+in quiet quarters, where they could engage in research and prepare
+their lectures, shut away from the turmoil of the seething crowd of
+Town and Gown in the streets. And it speedily appeared that if the
+seclusion of a College was helpful to the teacher it was even more
+helpful to the taught. For the test applied to students by the
+University before conferring upon them a Degree was by public
+disputations in the schools, each candidate having to support or
+oppose some literary or scientific thesis.
+
+The memory of these wordy "opponencies" is still preserved in the
+denomination of "Wrangler" bestowed on the candidates who obtain a
+First Class in the Mathematical Examination for an "Honour" Degree,
+and by every examination through which such a Degree can be obtained
+being called a "Tripos,"[4] from the three-legged stool which played a
+notable part in those old ordeals. The test demanded steadiness of
+nerve and readiness of wit, as well as mere knowledge; and, in all
+these, the Scholar of a College, well catered and cared for, was far
+better equipped than his lawless, and often all but foodless,
+non-Collegiate competitor.
+
+[Footnote 4: Till the nineteenth century was well advanced the
+Mathematical Tripos was the only avenue to the attainment of "Honours"
+at Cambridge; so that even such a distinguished scholar as Lord
+Macaulay was debarred from them by his inability to pass that
+examination, and had to content himself with the lower status of an
+"Ordinary" or "Poll" Degree (so called from the Greek [Greek: polloi]
+= many, as being the refuge of the common herd of candidates).
+Triposes in many other branches of knowledge, classical, scientific,
+legal, historical, and linguistic, have since been added.]
+
+Thus every College found itself confronted by a great demand for
+admissions, which was met by the introduction of Scholars, so far as
+the pecuniary resources of the Foundation would admit, and,
+ultimately, by the admission of "Pensioners";--students who, without
+being members of the Foundation, were willing to pay for a share in
+its educational advantages. These Pensioners finally came to
+outnumber, (in every College), the masters and scholars together, as
+they do still. The original non-Collegiate students proportionately
+dwindled in number; till the depopulation of the University during the
+religious ups and downs of the Reformation era put an end to them
+altogether. For three hundred years afterwards no one was admitted to
+the University unless attached to one of the Colleges, till, in the
+later decades of the nineteenth century, the great expansion which
+marked that period called Non-Collegiate Students, on a limited and
+tentative scale, once more into existence.
+
+Substantially, however, at the present day, the Colleges _are_
+Cambridge; and to the visitor their buildings completely out-bulk
+those which belong to the University--the Senate House, the University
+Church and Library, the Examination Hall, and the various Museums and
+Laboratories. Each College consists of an enclosed precinct, (to which
+the students are confined at night,) containing blocks of apartments,
+(usually arranged in "Courts,") for Fellows, Scholars, and Pensioners,
+a special "Lodge" for the Master; a Chapel; a Library; and a Hall,
+with Kitchen and Buttery attached. Here the Masters sit at the "High
+Table" on a dais across the upper end of the Hall, and the students at
+less pretentious boards arranged longitudinally. All are bound to dine
+in Hall, unless by special leave; but other meals may be in your own
+rooms, of which each student has a suite of three, in which he is said
+to "keep." All three are within one general outer door, or "oak," to
+be opened only by a latch-key, and "sported" whenever the owner
+desires his citadel to be inaccessible. Over the oak, on the outside,
+is painted his name (always in white capital letters upon a black
+ground), while at the foot of each staircase a similarly painted list
+gives the names of all the men whose rooms are to be found upon it.
+Each student's suite invariably comprises a sitting (or "keeping")
+room, a bedroom, and a pantry, or "gyp-room." This last name records
+the fact that till lately the functions of a housemaid were discharged
+by male servants known as "gyps,"[5] who are now almost universally
+superseded by female "bedmakers" appointed by the College Tutors.
+
+[Footnote 5: These corresponded to the still existing "Scouts" at
+Oxford.]
+
+The Tutors are immediately responsible for the general supervision of
+the students in the College: the actual teaching is done by Lecturers
+in the various subjects, who have special apartments, "Lecture Rooms,"
+provided in every College for their purposes. Every student has to
+attend a certain quota of lectures, but otherwise is very much left to
+educate himself, his progress being checked by periodical College
+examinations, in addition to those required by the University to be
+passed before he can be admitted to a Degree. The lowest Degree is
+that of B.A. (Bachelor of Arts). Three years after attaining this a
+man may proceed to become M.A. (Master of Arts), when he ceases to be
+"in statu pupillari," and is no longer subject to the authority of the
+Proctors.
+
+These officers perambulate the town after dark to punish University
+wrong-doers, usually by a fine of 6_s._ 8_d._, or some multiple of
+that sum, the unit being a survival from mediæval numismatics, as
+equivalent to half a "Mark." More serious offences are met by
+"Rustication," for a Term or a year, during which the offender may not
+show himself in Cambridge, and, in extreme cases, by expulsion from
+the University altogether. These punishments can also be inflicted by
+the authorities of each College on the students of that College. But
+in this domestic forum, for smaller offences the place of fines is
+taken by "gating" for a certain period, during which the nocturnal
+enclosure of the culprit begins at some earlier hour than usual.
+
+As a regular rule the College gates are shut at ten p.m., after which
+no outsider (student or visitor) may enter, and no inmate (under the
+Degree of M.A.) pass out; though to students already out uncensured
+admission is given until midnight. Once inside the gates the student
+is under no obligation to keep to his own rooms, but has the run of
+the College all night. He is bound, however, to spend his nights
+within the walls, and not even for a single night may he be absent
+without a duly signed _exeat_ from the College authorities giving him
+leave. And, as he must be in residence when they require it of him, so
+is he also forbidden to be in residence at such seasons as they bar;
+during the greater part of each Vacation, for example, comprising half
+the year.
+
+Theoretically the Three Terms into which the Academic Year is divided
+consist of about ten weeks apiece; but, in practice, they have only
+eight of "Full Term," during which residence is compulsory. The first
+of these is the "Michaelmas," or, as it is popularly called the
+"October" term, lasting from about mid-October to mid-December. After
+the Christmas vacation follows the "Lent" term, from the middle of
+January to the middle of March. Then comes a month of Easter vacation,
+and then the "Easter" (more generally known as the "May") term; at the
+end of which the close of the working year is celebrated by a series
+of social festivities in connection with the College boat races,
+collectively designated "the May Week," though invariably taking place
+in June. Finally comes the "Long Vacation" (the last word being
+omitted in popular parlance), lasting till a new year begins in
+October. Many of the more studious men are, however, permitted to
+reside during July and August for the purposes of private reading. A
+man in residence, we may mention, is said to be "up"; thus we meet
+with such phrases as "coming up," "going down," and being "sent down,"
+when ordered to leave Cambridge, temporarily or permanently, for
+disciplinary reasons.
+
+All this is very unlike Continental or American University life, but
+is almost the ditto of Oxford. For Cambridge is the sister-daughter of
+Oxford. It was by Oxonian colonists that the University of Cambridge
+was begun; the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse, was not only
+suggested by the earliest Oxford Foundation, Merton, but borrowed its
+very Statutes; and the development of the two seats of learning has
+twinned itself throughout the centuries to an extent unparalleled
+elsewhere in history. The result is that to-day there are no two
+places in the world so alike, socially, intellectually, and even
+physically, as Oxford and Cambridge. The latter has at present the
+larger number of students; but each has approximately the same number
+of Colleges, and of satellite Collegiate institutions, formally or
+informally connected with the University (_e.g._, the Ladies'
+Colleges); and in each the Academic organisation, the social code,
+and the life led by both students and teachers, is almost absolutely
+identical. To experts well acquainted with both places the minute
+shades of difference are of extreme interest; but to the average
+visitor the places are as like as twin sisters. The very names of the
+Colleges are the same in no less than a third of the cases. If there
+is a Trinity at Cambridge there is also a Trinity at Oxford, if there
+is a Magdalen at Oxford there is a Magdalene at Cambridge; while St.
+John's, Jesus, Corpus Christi, and Pembroke are all in like manner
+duplicated. And, both at Oxford and Cambridge, Colleges are named from
+Queens; though a subtle difference in spelling (Queen's and Queens')
+records the fact that, while one Queen founded the Oxford College, two
+were concerned in the Cambridge foundation.
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Library, St. John's College._]
+
+With regard to picturesqueness and architectural merit it is difficult
+to assign the pre-eminence to either place, so far as the University
+and Collegiate buildings are concerned. Of each distinctive feature,
+considered separately, the choicest specimen is to be found in
+Cambridge--the best College Chapel at King's; the finest College Hall
+and College Courts at Trinity; the most characteristic and beautiful
+Library at St. John's. But, out-taken these, Oxford can show several
+examples of each feature better than the next best at Cambridge. And,
+apart from the University buildings, the town of Cambridge, with its
+narrow streets and mean public edifices, is hopelessly outclassed by
+the beautiful city of Oxford. Invidious comparisons, however, are, in
+the case of sisters, more than ordinarily odious.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+     Entrance to Cambridge.--Railways.--Roman Catholic Church.--Street
+     runlets, Hobson, Perne.--Fitzwilliam Museum.--=Peterhouse=,
+     Chapel, Deer-park.--Little St. Mary's Church, Washington
+     Arms.--Gray's window.--=Pembroke College=, Large and Small
+     Colleges, "Querela Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's farewell.--St.
+     Botolph's Church.--The King's Ditch.--=Corpus Christi College=,
+     Cambridge Guilds, St. Benet's Church, Fire-hooks, Corpus Library,
+     Corpus Ghost.--=St. Catharine's College.=--King's Parade.--Pitt
+     Press.--Newnham Bridge, Hermits.--The Backs River, College
+     Bridges, Hithes.
+
+
+Having thus given the reader a very meagre and sketchy outline of the
+sort of knowledge needful for a due appreciation of Cambridge, and
+leaving him to fill in such details as he pleases from the numberless
+histories and guide books, large and small (and for the most part
+excellent) which he will find quite readily accessible, we will now
+suppose him to be entering the town.
+
+Should he do this from the railway station he will have to face a mile
+or so of "long unlovely street" to begin with. For when railroads were
+first made--(the Great Eastern line from London to Cambridge being
+constructed in 1845)--they were regarded with extreme suspicion and
+dislike by the authorities of both Universities. The noise of the
+trains, it was declared, would be fatal to their studies; the facility
+of running up to London would hopelessly demoralise their
+undergraduates; bad characters from the metropolis would come down in
+shoals to prey upon them. Thus both Oxford and Cambridge strenuously
+opposed any near approach of this new-fangled abomination to their
+hallowed precincts. Oxford actually succeeded in keeping the main line
+of the Great Western as far off from it as Didcot, ten miles away,
+whence it did not penetrate to the city itself till a considerably
+later date, when prejudice had been overcome by the patent advantages
+of the new locomotion, and a station hard by was welcomed. At Oxford,
+therefore, no such distance divides the railway and the Colleges as at
+Cambridge, where from the first the station stood in its present
+place. This, at the date of its construction, was far beyond even the
+outermost buildings of the town, with which it is connected by the old
+Roman road, the main artery of Cambridge, running straight, as Roman
+roads do run, for miles on either side to the "Great Bridge." To
+antiquarians this road is known as the Via Devana, because its
+objective is supposed to have been the old Roman city of Deva
+(Chester); during its passage through Cambridge it has no fewer than
+seven official designations, to the frequent discomfiture of
+strangers.
+
+Where it conducts the visitor townwards from the railway station it
+presents, as we have said, a somewhat dreary vista; dignified only by
+the beautifully proportioned spire of the Roman Catholic Church, built
+in 1885. The erection of this edifice was due to the generosity of a
+single benefactor, Mrs. Lyne-Stephens, a French lady, who, early in
+the reign of Queen Victoria, won fame and fortune as the most renowned
+ballet dancer of the London stage. The Church is popularly called, in
+Cambridge, a Cathedral; but this is a misnomer, for the Bishop's See
+is not here but at Northampton.
+
+The cross-roads at which the church is placed rejoice in the inane
+designation of Hyde Park Corner. The best approach to Cambridge is by
+the westward road of the four, which leads into the London Road (or
+Trumpington Road, as it is here called), that umbrageous avenue of
+leafage spoken of in our opening sentences. Keeping along this towards
+the town, we find ourselves confronted with one of the prettiest and
+most uncommon amongst the minor attractions of Cambridge, the runlets
+of clear water which sparkle along the side of either pavement.
+
+This pleasant feature is attributed to the benevolence of an ancient
+Cambridge worthy, Thomas Hobson, who dwelt here from the reign of Henry
+the Eighth to that of Charles the First. By trade he was a "carrier," a
+profession which at that date included not merely the transport of goods
+but the provision of locomotion for passengers--then almost wholly
+equestrian. Thus Hobson not only himself travelled regularly to and
+from London with his stage-waggon, but kept a large stable of horses,
+not fewer than "forty good cattle," ready for hire--even supplying his
+customers with boots and whips for their journey. But he was very
+autocratic in the matter, and would never allow any steed to be chosen
+except in accordance with his will. "This or none" he would say to any
+hirer who dared to remonstrate. And his business was so prosperous that
+he could afford to say it, and thus give rise to the still current
+expression "Hobson's Choice." He rose to be Mayor of Cambridge, and his
+portrait still hangs in the Guildhall.
+
+Finally when he died, at the age of eighty-six, in 1630, he gained the
+honour of a serio-comic epitaph from Milton, then a student of
+Christ's College, "on the University Carrier who sickened in the time
+of his Vacancy, on being forbid to go to London by reason of the
+Plague."
+
+  "Here lieth one who did most truly prove
+  That he could never die while he could move;
+  So hung his destiny, never to rot
+  While he might still jog on and keep his trot.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  Rest, that gives all men life, gave him his death,
+  And too much breathing put him out of breath;
+  Nor were it contradiction to affirm
+  Too long Vacation hastened on his Term.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  But had his doings lasted as they were
+  He had been an immortal carrier."
+
+The popular tradition, (attested by an inscription on the fountain in
+the Market Place,) which gives this hero the whole credit of the
+street runlets, seems, however, to go too far, though they were
+certainly first made during his life-time. Their source is in some
+springs which issue from the chalk near Great Shelford, four miles
+south-east of Cambridge, and which are called, as such sources are
+commonly called hereabouts, "The Nine Wells"--nine being used as an
+indefinite number. It is interesting to remember that this conception
+evolved itself also amongst the ancient Greeks, who talked of the
+"Nine Fountains" at Athens, and the "Nine Ways" at Amphipolis, with
+exactly the same indefiniteness of numeration. The ancient outfall of
+these springs seems to have been by what is now called "Vicar's
+Brook," which is bridged by the London Road at the first milestone
+from Cambridge. Till the eighteenth century the bridge was a ford,
+known as Trumpington Ford. The earliest proposal to intercept the
+stream near this spot and divert its course through the town, was due,
+not to Hobson, but to another worthy (or unworthy) contemporary of
+his, Dr. Andrew Perne, then Master of Peterhouse College, a divine of
+such an accommodating breadth of view that he alone, amongst all the
+higher authorities of the University, succeeded in retaining his post
+and his emoluments throughout the horrible see-saw of the Reformation
+period.
+
+We first hear of him in the reign of Edward the Sixth, as a Protestant
+of such stalwart calibre that he destroyed as "idolatrous" almost
+every single book in the University Library. Under Mary he figures as
+no less ardent a Catholic, even to the degree of digging up and
+publicly burning (in default of living heretics) the corpses of the
+celebrated Protestant teachers Bucer and Fagius. Finally the accession
+of Elizabeth convinced him once more that Protestantism was the truest
+form of Christianity; and she lived long enough to keep him from again
+changing his principles. This amazing versatility naturally did not
+pass without comment. The wits of the University coined from his name
+the Latin verb _pernare_ "to be a turn-coat," and declared that the
+A.P. which showed on a new weather-cock given by him to his College
+stood for A Protestant or A Papist indifferently.
+
+It was this man who, in 1574, started the idea of bringing the
+Shelford water into Cambridge. The plan was carried out by
+"Undertakers" (who hoped to make money by it), in 1610, and amongst
+these Hobson would seem to have been the predominant partner.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse._]
+
+Accompanied by the rippling of these runlets (which only represent a
+very small amount of the water brought by "Hobson's Conduit" into
+Cambridge) we shortly reach our first University edifice, the
+Fitzwilliam Museum, fronted by a singularly fine façade of classical
+architecture, and having in the Entrance Hall a really magnificent
+staircase of coloured marbles. It should be noted that the four lions
+which flank the façade are (unlike those in Trafalgar Square) all in
+differing attitudes. The Museum (which is open to the public three
+days in the week and to members of the University on all days)
+contains a fine collection of pictures and antiques, the nucleus of
+which is a bequest made in 1816 by Viscount Fitzwilliam. The Egyptian
+section is specially noteworthy, and the water-colours by Turner. The
+building was commenced in 1837, but was not finally completed till
+1875, when the cost had run up to a hundred and fifteen thousand
+pounds.
+
+The long-fronted Hospital on the opposite side of the road is the
+modern representative of an ancient institution which gave to this
+region, then quite the extremity of Cambridge, the name (as appears in
+our oldest maps) of Spittal End.
+
+Adjoining the Museum we find ourselves arriving at our first College,
+St. Peter's College, more commonly called Peterhouse, the same of
+which the inevitable Dr. Perne was so long Master. (We may here note
+that in Cambridge this name "Master" is the designation of the Head of
+every College except King's, which has a "Provost," and Queens', with
+its "President.") Peterhouse, as has been mentioned in our first
+chapter, was the earliest College to be founded in Cambridge. Its
+founder Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely, derived his idea from Merton
+College at Oxford, which had been in existence some twenty years when,
+in 1281, he introduced its system into Cambridge, and even adopted its
+very statutes. He first designed to incorporate his College with the
+already existing quasi-monastic Brotherhood of the Hospital of St.
+John (now St. John's College). The double Rule, however, bred so many
+quarrels that he settled his "Scholars of Ely" on their present site;
+their abode being dubbed Peterhouse from the adjoining church of St.
+Peter (now St. Mary's the Less), which for three hundred and fifty
+years served as the College Chapel, and is still connected by a
+covered passage with the College buildings.
+
+The existing Chapel was built by yet another Bishop of Ely closely
+connected with the College, Dr. Matthew Wren, Master here 1625-1634.
+He was uncle to the great Sir Christopher Wren, the architect of St.
+Paul's, and had enough architectural originality of his own to aim at
+copying the beautiful tracery of the mediæval church-builders. It was
+the first time that any such attempt had been made in England; and
+this going behind the Reformation roused the Protestant feeling of the
+time to fury. Men declared it incredible that there could be "so much
+Popery in so small a chapel"; and when the Civil War gave the
+Puritans their opportunity Wren paid for being so far in advance of
+his age by an imprisonment of not less than eighteen years, till
+released, in 1660, by the Restoration. The Chapel windows are now
+filled with some fine Munich glass, the only example of this work in
+Cambridge.
+
+Besides the Chapel, the Library here is remarkable, and the
+"Combination Room" boasts itself as almost, if not quite, the finest
+apartment of its kind in all Cambridge. This name, we may mention, is
+given in every College to the parlour whither the M.A.'s retire, after
+dining in Hall, for wine, dessert, and conversation.[6] That of
+Peterhouse is a luxurious apartment, panelled with oak, and with
+stained-glass windows.
+
+[Footnote 6: The corresponding Oxford name is "Common Room."]
+
+Another feature of the College is its little deer park, the only one
+in Cambridge, and, with the exception of Magdalen College, Oxford, the
+only one in either University. Access to this is obtained by passing
+through the passage between the Hall and the Kitchen. Beyond the deer
+park again an iron gate leads to the College Gardens, the only College
+Gardens in Cambridge which visitors may freely enter. And they are
+well worth entering.
+
+There is, however, no way through this College, as there is through
+many, and we must leave it through the same gate as we entered by,
+thus returning to the street. Over the gate we observe the coat of
+arms belonging to the College, the armorial bearings of the founder
+surrounded by a border of crowns. This feature will be seen in every
+College, for each has its own arms, and these are invariably
+emblazoned above the entrance.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Mary the Less, South side._]
+
+Architecturally attached to Peterhouse is, as has been said, the
+church of St. Mary "the less," so called in contradistinction to
+"Great" St. Mary's, which here, as at Oxford, is the designation of
+the "University Church." This is the only really beautiful church in
+Cambridge, the tracery of the windows being exquisite flowing
+Decorated. All date from the fourteenth century, when the present
+structure displaced the earlier church dedicated to St. Peter. One
+feature of interest here is a monument put up to Richard Washington,
+who was minister of this church in the beginning of the eighteenth
+century. He was of the same family as the great George Washington, and
+in the coat of arms here displayed we may see the origin of the
+American Stars and Stripes, while the crest has become the American
+eagle.[7]
+
+[Footnote 7: The Washington arms are, in heraldic language: Barry of
+four, gules and argent. On a chief azure three mullets of the second.
+Crest, a demi-eaglet sable rising from an earl's coronet.]
+
+To the west of the church we get a view of the back of Peterhouse in
+its untouched picturesqueness, abutting on the churchyard, at the end
+of which comes another Museum, that of Classical Archæology. This is
+reached by a narrow lane, having the church on one side, and on the
+other "Emmanuel," the leading Congregationalist place of worship in
+Cambridge. As we return between these into the street we should look
+up at the buildings of Peterhouse and notice, in front of the window
+at the top corner of the ivy-clad wall, an erection of stout iron
+bars. By these hangs a tale; for the window belongs to the rooms
+traditionally occupied by the poet Gray when in residence here. It is
+said that he caused these bars to be put up, from his constitutional
+dread of fire, and that he kept a stout rope constantly affixed to
+them as a means of escape in case of need. Awakened one night by
+shouts of "Fire! Fire!" he slid down this rope in deshabille--to find
+himself plunged at the bottom into a huge vat of water placed there by
+his friends. So runs the tale; which adds that Gray migrated in
+disgust from Peterhouse to Pembroke. That he did so migrate is quite
+historical.
+
+To reach his new College, Gray had only to cross the street; for
+almost immediately opposite to Peterhouse are seen the more widely
+extended buildings of Pembroke. Not so very many years ago they were
+the less widely extended of the two; for while Peterhouse has remained
+comparatively stationary, Pembroke, more than any other College, has
+partaken in the wonderful expansion which the last half century has
+wrought in the number of University students at Cambridge.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse, from St. Mary's Churchyard._]
+
+From the Restoration onwards the Colleges of Cambridge were for two
+hundred years, till the middle of the nineteenth century, divisible in
+numerical strength between two strongly marked classes. At the top
+came the two great Societies of Trinity and St. John's; of which the
+former gradually drew ahead, and came to have some four hundred
+students to St. John's two hundred. The remaining fifteen Foundations
+were classed together as the "Small Colleges"; the largest of them
+being well under a hundred strong, and the smallest (amongst them
+Pembroke) small indeed. But with the great extension of the University
+curriculum, by the addition of a host of literary and scientific
+subjects to the Mathematics which had previously been the sole avenue
+to a Degree, there has come as marked an increase in the number of
+students, and the old College classification has broken down. Trinity,
+indeed, remains at the top, even more than ever, having almost doubled
+its overwhelming numbers; but St. John's has been caught up and
+overpassed by several of the once "small" Colleges, amongst them by
+Pembroke. And yet, in the year 1858, Pembroke had only one solitary
+freshman; and he migrated to Caius, in dread, as the tale then ran, of
+being divided into sections by the authorities, to satisfy the demands
+of the Mathematical, Classical, and Philosophical lecturers provided
+by the College.
+
+The result is that Pembroke, even beyond most Colleges, is a medley of
+architectural additions. When Gray migrated to it, and for a century
+thereafter, the modest range of low white stone which still contains
+the main entrance, formed the whole frontage; the College buildings
+being a small quadrangle about half the size of the present First
+Court. It was, in fact (except for a new Chapel, built by Wren in
+1663, and still in use), no larger than it was at its first
+foundation, in 1346, by Mary, widow of Amory de Valence, Earl of
+Pembroke, and daughter of Guy, Count of Chatillon and St. Paul. Her
+widowhood was brought about, according to tradition, by her husband
+being accidentally slain, before her eyes, on their very wedding day,
+at the tournament held to celebrate the nuptials. Modern criticism
+disputes this tragic tale, but it was believed in Gray's day, and he
+has referred, in his well-known list of the Founders of Cambridge
+Colleges, to
+
+        "sad Chatillon, on her bridal morn
+  Who wept her bleeding love."
+
+On her widowhood, however occasioned, she retired from the world, and
+took the veil at Denny Abbey, between Cambridge and Ely. The College
+was founded by her in her husband's memory, and has ever since
+displayed her armorial bearings, the coats of Valence and St. Paul
+dimidiated.
+
+At the time of the Civil War, the "Querela Cantabrigiensis" (a
+contemporary publication, written in the Royalist interest), in
+denouncing the misdeeds of the Parliamentary forces, complains
+bitterly that "fourscore ragged soldiers, who had been lowzing before
+Crowland nigh a fortnight, were turned loose into Pembroke Hall, being
+one of the least Halls of the University, to kennel there, and charged
+by their officers to shift for themselves, who, without more ado,
+broke open the Fellows' and Scholars' chambers, and took their beds
+from under them."
+
+A century before this we find Bishop Ridley, the famous Protestant
+martyr, dwelling on this College (of which he had been Master) in his
+touching farewell to Cambridge, composed shortly before his execution:
+
+     "Farewell, Pembroke Hall, of late my own College, my care and my
+     charge ... mine own dear College! In thy orchard--(the walls,
+     butts,[8] and trees, if they could speak, would bear me
+     witness)--I learnt without book almost all Paul's Epistles; yea,
+     and I ween all the Canonical Epistles also, save only the
+     Apocalypse--of which study, although in time a great part did
+     depart from me, yet the sweet smell thereof I trust I shall carry
+     with me into Heaven; for the profit thereof I think I have felt
+     in all my lifetime ever after. And, I ween, of late there was
+     that did the like. The Lord grant that this zeal and love toward
+     that part of God's Word, which is a key and true commentary to
+     all the Holy Scripture, may ever abide in that College so long as
+     the world shall endure."
+
+[Footnote 8: This word reminds us that archery practice was, in
+England, a regular feature of mediæval College life.]
+
+Besides Bishop Ridley, Pembroke can boast other well-known Protestant
+divines of the Reformation era, Grindal, Archbishop of Canterbury,
+Whitgift, his successor, and Lancelot Andrewes, Bishop of Winchester.
+The mitre and pastoral staff of the last named (both of brass, and the
+former quite unwearable) are preserved amongst the College treasures.
+So is also a magnificent silver-gilt cup, the gift of the Foundress,
+which still goes round the High Table on special Feast Days. It bears
+two inscriptions in old English characters. Round the bowl is an
+exhortation to "drenk and mak gud cher" for love of St. Dennis--to
+whom Marie de Valence, as a Frenchwoman, had a special devotion--while
+round the stem are the words "M.V. God. help.at.ned."
+
+This cup is the more valuable as being almost the only piece of
+mediæval plate still surviving in Cambridge. In ancient days the
+College Halls and Chapels were abundantly supplied, but when the Civil
+War broke out the loyal Gownsmen, with one accord, devoted all their
+silver to the service of the King and sent it off to him at Oxford.
+But it never got there; for Cromwell gained his first distinction by
+pouncing upon the convoy "with a ragged rout of peasants," and then
+compelled the surrender of what little was left in Cambridge. How this
+cup escaped is not known.
+
+Nor is Pembroke's lay list of distinguished alumni less notable than
+its clerical. Besides Gray, it has another poet of the first rank in
+Edmund Spenser, and no less a statesman than the younger Pitt. Amongst
+men of science it counts the late Sir George Gabriel Stokes, whose
+memory is still fresh, and the all too much forgotten seventeenth
+century astronomer, Dr. Long. Of the latter a striking memorial long
+remained in the College--a copper globe, eighteen feet in diameter,
+pierced to represent the celestial sphere, and so arranged that thirty
+observers at once could find place within it and see the sequence of
+the constellations as the globe revolved. Unhappily this object of
+unique interest has been improved off the face of the earth, amongst
+the various innovations to which Pembroke has specially lent itself.
+
+The original foundation of this College (which was for some time more
+commonly called "Marie Valence Hall") consisted of a Master, fifteen
+scholars, and four Bible clerks. It has now twelve Fellows,
+thirty-three scholars, and upwards of two hundred students in
+residence.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Botolph's Church._]
+
+A few yards from Pembroke stands the Parish Church of St. Botolph,
+which, according to the original design of the Foundress, would have
+been as closely connected with the College as is Little St. Mary's
+with Peterhouse. In the first inception of the Collegiate system the
+idea was that the Members of each College (which was only regarded as
+a glorified dwelling house of the period, and the Society of which,
+till their "Hall" was built, were, actually, to begin with, quartered
+in already existing dwelling houses) should worship in the nearest
+Parish Church, like other parishioners. Only by special licence from
+the Pope could a private Chapel for a College, or any other mansion,
+be erected. That granted by Pope Urban the Fifth (during the Papal
+exile at Avignon) for the Chapel of Pembroke is still extant in the
+Papal Register. It is dated July 1366, and runs as follows:
+
+     "To the Warden and College of Scholars of Valence Marie Hall,
+     Cambridge:
+
+     License, on the petition of their Foundress, Mary de Sancto
+     Paulo, Countess of Pembroke, to have a Chapel founded and built
+     by the said Countess within their walls, wherein Masses and other
+     Divine Offices may be celebrated by Priests of the said College;
+     saving the rights of the Parish Church."
+
+The Parochial rights here spoken of mean the exclusive right of the
+Parish Priest to celebrate marriages and to receive the dues known as
+"Easter Offerings "and "Surplice Fees."
+
+The dedication of St. Botolph's Church notifies us that we are now
+entering Cambridge proper. For this Saint, who was historically an
+abbot, the pioneer of the Benedictine Order in East Anglia, became
+adopted by travellers as their special patron; and his churches were,
+accordingly, placed for the most part at the gates of towns that his
+benediction might speed the parting voyager. We thus find them at no
+fewer than four of the London exits, Aldgate, Aldersgate, Bishopsgate,
+and Billingsgate, and in more than sixty other places, mostly in East
+Anglia. That which we are now considering was associated with the
+entrance to Cambridge known as "Trumpington Gate," where the mediæval
+traveller from London made his way into the town by crossing the
+ancient defensive work called "The King's Ditch."
+
+The construction of this great trench was popularly ascribed to King
+Henry the Third, who, in his struggle with the Barons, desired to keep
+a firm hold on the important strategic centre of Cambridge. There is
+some reason, however, to suppose that he did not actually initiate the
+idea of thus insulating the town by running a ditch across the bend of
+the river on which it stands, but merely deepened and widened an
+earlier trench, originally made, perhaps, by the Danes during their
+occupation of the place, and remade by King John. However this may
+be, the ditch utterly failed of its purpose. Not only was it unequal
+to keeping the Barons out, but it could not even preserve the town
+from being pillaged by a local marauder, Geoffry de Magnaville or
+Maundeville, who made his lair in the neighbouring fens.
+
+The King's Ditch left the river at "the King's Mill" (now Newnham
+Mill), and re-entered it opposite Magdalene College. It remained an
+open watercourse (and a common sewer) till near the beginning of the
+nineteenth century, when it was filled in, none too soon, for sanitary
+reasons. Timber bridges spanned the stream at "Barnwell Gate," where
+the "Via Devana" entered the town, as well as here at "Trumpington
+Gate." These gates themselves, if they ever had any material
+existence, were probably, at the most, little more than toll-bars.
+
+St. Botolph's Church was intended, as we have seen, to be specially
+connected with Pembroke College. Between them, however, there has
+always existed a block of buildings, while immediately adjoining the
+church on the other side there has arisen a College of later
+foundation, that of St. Mary and Corpus Christi, familiarly known as
+"Corpus." Unlike the other Colleges of Cambridge, this owes its
+existence not to the generosity of any private benefactor, but to that
+of two mediæval Guilds, the Guild of St. Mary and the Guild of Corpus
+Christi, which combined to leave future ages this splendid memorial of
+their beneficence.
+
+These Guilds were merely two out of many such bodies in the Cambridge
+of that day; for the Guild was the Benefit Society of the mediæval
+period, and every respectable citizen was enrolled in one--often,
+indeed, in more than one. The Guild, collectively, saw to the personal
+interests of its members; aided them in distress, old age, and
+sickness; contributed towards the expenses of their burial; and
+finally provided Masses for their souls. This last item ultimately
+proved fatal to the Guilds, which were suppressed wholesale at the
+Reformation, as being thus tainted with Popish superstition, and their
+property confiscated for the benefit of the Royal exchequer.
+
+Guilds, like our Benefit Societies, were voluntary associations,
+co-opting their members, and established on various bases. Earliest to
+rise, in all English boroughs, was the Merchant Guild, which regulated
+the entire trade of the town; fixing at its general meetings, called
+"Morning Talks," the market price of each staple commodity, and the
+hours and places at which it might be bought and sold, besides
+punishing rigorously (by fine or expulsion from the Guild) any unfair
+dealing, such as underselling, or "regrating,"--_i.e._, making a
+"corner" in any article as we should now say. Somewhat later each
+craft began to have its own Guild, supplanting to a large extent the
+older and more general organisation, whose executive insensibly became
+merged in the Town Council. To this day, however, the building in
+which that Council meets for its "Morning Talks," is called the
+Guildhall in most English towns.
+
+Besides the trading Guilds, there arose others organised on a
+definitely religious basis, the members of which were bound to special
+devotion in some particular direction, from which the Guild took its
+name. Amongst these were the two to whom we owe the existence of
+"Corpus"--those of "Corpus Christi" and "Blessed Mary," the former
+having been (in 1342) the original inceptors of the idea. The armorial
+bearings of the College still testify to its double origin, being,
+quarterly, three lilies, (the emblems of Our Lady,) and a pelican "in
+her piety" (_i.e._, feeding her young with her own blood, as
+contemporary legend imagined to be the case), as a reference to the
+Holy Eucharist.
+
+The College, which was founded 1352, was originally intended only for
+the education of a small number of priests, and consisted only of one
+small court, now known as the Old Court, which happily still exists in
+almost its original condition. It is a venerable and secluded spot,
+with ivy-grown walls and mullioned lattices, well worth a visit. From
+its north-eastern corner extends a long gallery pierced by an archway,
+connecting the College with the Church of St. Benedict, or "Benet," as
+it is commonly vocalised.[9] From this connection the College became
+popularly known as "Benet College," just as Peterhouse was so called
+from its like connection with the ancient church of "St. Peter by
+Trumpington Gate." But while Peterhouse retains its old designation,
+that of "Benet" has now become wholly disused, though only within the
+last century.
+
+[Footnote 9: This is shown in our first wood-cut.]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Benet's Church, Interior._]
+
+This connecting gallery is of red brick, toned by age into delicious
+mellowness, and is best seen from the back of the College, where a
+quiet little lane ("Free School Lane"), one of the most charming
+amongst the byways of Cambridge, gives access through the above
+mentioned archway into the quiet little church yard of this quiet
+little church, with its Saxon tower, the oldest monument of
+ecclesiastical architecture in Cambridge, and one of the most
+picturesque. The precise date of its erection, and how the church came
+to exist at all, is, and will probably remain, an unsolved problem in
+history. Some authorities imagine that it points to an East Anglian
+settlement to the east of the Cam, distinct from the Mercian
+"Grantabridge" on the western bank, where the old Roman town once
+stood; others believe that it was built by the English inhabitants
+expelled from that town by the Danes in the time of King Alfred.
+Whatever may be the truth there is no small fascination in this
+venerable relic of the old English days, with its "long and short"
+stonework, the rudely-fashioned Romanesque pilasters in its windows,
+and the nondescript "portal-guarding" lions of its interior archway.
+The body of the church has been altered and re-altered time and again
+during the ages: at the bases of the present chancel-arch those of two
+earlier predecessors may be observed, and the south wall of the
+chancel is honeycombed with disused openings once leading into the
+Collegiate buildings of Corpus, while the existing stairway (also
+disused) is seen in the eastern corner of the south aisle. The church
+is thus of rare interest to the architectural student, and its history
+has been exhaustively dealt with by Mr. Atkinson (_Cambridge
+Illustrated_, p. 133). A glass case in the south aisle contains
+various relics of antiquity belonging to it, and beside them an
+ancient iron "fire-hook," used of old for tearing down blazing roofs
+and buildings.[10]
+
+[Footnote 10: The speediest possible destruction of such buildings was
+the only way of dealing with fires before effective engines came in,
+which was not until the nineteenth century. Rings to facilitate the
+use of fire-hooks are to be found under the eaves of many old houses
+hereabout. The hooks had 30 foot handles, mounted on a pair of
+wheels.]
+
+Out-taken the Old Court, Corpus has nothing in the way of buildings
+that has either beauty or interest, the College having been
+remorselessly remodelled about 1825. But the contents of its Library
+surpass all else of the kind in Cambridge, containing, as it does,
+what is probably the identical Gospel Book used by St. Augustine in
+his conversion of the English, and what is probably the identical copy
+of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle written for King Alfred, if not by his
+own hand. These priceless treasures once formed part of the library
+of Canterbury Abbey, which was sold by Henry the Eighth, at its
+suppression, as waste paper. Such relics as survived twenty years of
+this profanation were rescued by Archbishop Parker (the first
+Protestant Archbishop), in Elizabeth's reign, and were presented by
+him to the College, of which he had been Master.[11] To guard, so far
+as possible, against their again coming "to such base uses," he
+accompanied his gift with the condition that if a certain number of
+the MSS. were ever missing, the whole should pass to Caius College,
+and thence to Trinity Hall in case of a like loss. The authorities of
+these Colleges have (and exercise) the right of annual inspection: so
+far quite fruitlessly, as no single MS. has disappeared during the
+last three centuries. But the result has been to render this Library
+harder of access to visitors than any other, and it can only be seen
+by special arrangement with the Librarian, who has to be present in
+person, along with some other Fellow or Scholar of the College, before
+strangers can be introduced.
+
+[Footnote 11: Bishop Latimer, the Protestant martyr, also belonged to
+Corpus.]
+
+Corpus has the reputation of being haunted by a ghost, the existence
+of which has been taken quite seriously even within the present
+century. But the tale of its origin has a most suspicious number of
+variants. Some hold it to be the spirit of a poor motherless girl of
+seventeen, the daughter of Dr. Spenser (Master from 1667 to 1693), who
+died of fright at being discovered by her father while enjoying a
+clandestine interview with her undergraduate lover. (This tragedy is
+fairly historical.) Others declare that it is the lover; who was
+locked, or locked himself, into a cupboard, where he died of
+suffocation! Others again have a tale of a student from King's, who
+(in order not to haunt his own College) came hither to kill himself!
+That strange noises, not yet accounted for, are heard in some of the
+rooms, is, apparently, an established fact.
+
+Opposite the Gate-tower of Corpus an open roadside esplanade, shaded
+by lime trees, marks the still vacant space destined by St.
+Catharine's College, in the seventeenth century, for a Library, to
+complete its red-brick quadrangle, a design which has come to nothing.
+The interior of the Court, which is not without dignity, still lies
+open to view, shut in only by what was then meant to be a merely
+temporary iron railing, with St. Catharine's wheel conspicuous above
+the entrance. The College was founded as a kind of satellite to King's
+College, by Robert Woodlark, the third Provost of that great
+Foundation, in 1475. It has always remained a small and comparatively
+poor Society.
+
+If we pass through the Court, such as it is, of St. Catharine's,
+(familiarly known as "Cat's,") the western gate will bring us out into
+Queens' Lane. We shall, however, do better to reach this most
+fascinating of all Cambridge byways not thus but through the College
+from which it derives its name, Queens'. To do this we must turn
+westwards down Silver Street, a few yards south of St. Catharine's,
+and just opposite St. Botolph's Church. Before taking this turn we
+should give a glance northward along Trumpington Street at the
+splendid mass of Collegiate and University buildings which here come
+into view. High above all rises the glorious fabric of King's College
+Chapel, while, beyond it, the classical façades of the Senate House
+and the University Library, the fine gateway of Caius College, and the
+further off tower of St. John's College, fill the eye with a
+delightful sense of aesthetic culture and harmony.
+
+Entering Silver Street, a mean thoroughfare, all too narrow for its
+volume of traffic, and demanding no small caution from all and sundry,
+we have on our left a building for all the world like a College--so
+frequently, indeed, mistaken for one by newcomers, as to have gained
+the nickname of "the Freshman's College." In reality this is the
+University Printing Press, or the Pitt Press, as it is commonly
+called; the existing frontage opposite Pembroke having been erected in
+1831, in memory of that statesman, who was a member of Pembroke
+College.[12] All the official printing of the University is done here,
+and the building also serves as the quarters of the University
+Registrary, who keeps the record of Entrances, Degrees, etc.
+
+[Footnote 12: The University had licensed printers from the time of
+Henry the Eighth, but did not set up a Press of its own till the
+eighteenth century, when influenced by the great scholar and critic
+Richard Bentley.]
+
+At the end of Silver Street, which is, happily, little over a hundred
+yards in length, we reach an iron bridge over the Cam; its placid
+stream "footing slow," as Milton says (in Lycidas), and only some
+thirty feet in breadth. Above the bridge, however, it widens out into
+a broad pool, enlivened by the rush of water from the "King's Mill,"
+beyond which the eye ranges over the open levels of "Sheep's Green."
+Both the mill and the bridge are amongst the oldest features of
+Cambridge, and the tolls payable at both were in mediæval times a
+Royal monopoly. The King's agent in collecting them on this bridge
+(known as "The Small Bridge" in contradistinction to the more
+important structure beneath the Castle) was a hermit, for whose
+accommodation a small bridge-house and chapel were built. This curious
+use of hermits, as keepers of roads and bridges, was common in
+Cambridgeshire before the Reformation.
+
+At Silver Street bridge the river enters on its course through the
+enchanted ground of the "Backs," and the visitor will do well to take
+water at the adjoining boat-house; for the stream here forms for half
+a mile a byway lovely beyond words, not to be matched elsewhere in all
+the world; flowing, as it does, between venerable piles of academic
+masonry, and "trim gardens," the haunts of "retired leisure";
+umbrageous, as it is, with the shade of lime, and elm, and beech, and
+chestnut, and weeping willow, and laburnum; spanned, as it is, by
+bridge after bridge, each a new revelation of exquisite design.
+
+First we find ourselves with the old red brick fabric of Queens'
+College on the one bank and the thicket of "Queens' Grove" on the
+other, joined together by a wooden bridge, attributed to Sir Isaac
+Newton, the Great Natural Philosopher and discoverer of the Law of
+Gravity. A miracle of ingenious construction is this bridge, formed of
+a series of mutually supporting beams requiring not a single bolt to
+hold them together. Such at least it was till a few years ago, when
+the old timbers, after two hundred years' wear, fell into decay and
+had to be replaced, as nearly in facsimile as modern skill could
+compass.
+
+A few yards further and the red brick of Queens' gives place to the
+white stone of King's; the proximity reminding us that the Founders of
+these two beautiful Colleges were husband and wife, "the Royal Saint,"
+King Henry the Sixth, and his heroic Consort, Margaret of Anjou. Poor
+young things! They were but twenty-two and fifteen respectively when
+they began these monuments of their liberality and devotion--upon the
+very eve of that miserable conflict, the wars of "the rival Roses,"
+which brought about the downfall and death of both. But their work
+survived them, to be completed by Royal successors; King's by Henry
+the Seventh, Queens' by Elizabeth Woodville, wife of Henry's rival,
+Edward the Fourth of York.
+
+[Illustration: _Clare Bridge._]
+
+King's Bridge, beneath which we now glide, is a single delicate rib of
+stone, a marked contrast to the elaborate woodwork of Queens', and to
+the three arches of grey stone and balustraded parapet of Clare, the
+next in order. Between these the river widens, and the view opens out
+on either side; a spacious meadow dotted and bounded with elms and
+limes on the west, and on the east as spacious a lawn beyond which
+rise the buildings of King's and of Clare College, and the west front
+of that glory of Cambridge and of the world, King's College Chapel.
+This reach of the river used, a few years ago, to be the scene of a
+pretty annual merry-making, known as the "Boat Show," which formed
+part of the attractions of the "May Week."[13] Hither the College
+boats which had been contending for precedence in the May Races used
+to row up in procession and draw up side by side in a mass occupying
+the whole breadth of the stream. Each crew rose in turn with uplifted
+oars to salute the victors who had attained (or retained) the Headship
+of the River; after which the procession returned to the boat houses
+two miles below. (The races were rowed two miles below again, where
+the stream is wide enough for the due manipulation of an
+eight-oar.)[14]
+
+[Footnote 13: See page 17.]
+
+[Footnote 14: See Chapter VI.]
+
+Clare Bridge passed, the College gardens of Clare and Trinity Hall
+(which last must not be confounded with the larger and later
+foundation of Trinity College) flank our course on either side for a
+short space, till the next bridge, Garret Hostel Bridge, which
+proclaims its non-Collegiate origin by being (like Newnham Bridge) a
+tasteless structure of iron. It is, in fact, a public thoroughfare;
+the road leading to it, Garret Hostel Lane, being the solitary
+survival of the dozen or so of little streets which gave access to the
+River from mediæval Cambridge, till the banks were usurped by the
+Colleges. And in its name we have the last surviving reminder of those
+"Hostels," or officially recognised lodging houses, which, before
+Colleges came into being (and for some while after), provided
+accommodation for the swarming students of the mediæval University.
+
+Garret Hostel itself, together with others, was swallowed up by the
+gigantic College which we now reach, Trinity. Trinity Bridge, a
+cycloidal curve carried on three arches, is led up to on either side
+by the "long walk of limes" sung by Tennyson in "In Memoriam"; and the
+splendid range of chestnuts which, as we pass beneath it, opens upon
+us to the north-west, forms the boundary between the paddocks of
+Trinity and St. John's. On the east rises the vast fabric of Trinity
+Library built by Sir Christopher Wren, with its magnificent range of
+arched windows and its warm yellow sandstone, an occasional violet
+block adding to the effect, a veritable feast of quiet colour,
+especially when glowing in the evening sun, and contrasting pleasingly
+with the paler tint of the New Court of St. John's College, which,
+with its plethora of crocketed pinnacles, here bounds our view to the
+left front. To the right front rises the square tower of St. John's
+Chapel, picturesquely reflected in the still waters.
+
+A slight bend in the stream, overhung by great elms, brings us to St.
+John's Bridge, a fine three arched structure of brick and stone built
+in 1696.[15] Beyond it the College buildings rise, like those of
+Queens', directly from the water--to the west the white stone
+abutments of the New Court, to the east the red brick walls and oriel
+window of the Library, the most beautiful building of its class in
+either Cambridge or Oxford. On it we can read the date 1624, and the
+letters I. L. C. S. standing for _Johannes Lincolnensis Custos
+Sigilli_, which commemorate the benefactor John Williams, Bishop of
+Lincoln, and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, to whose generosity we owe
+this gem of architecture. In his day, and for long after, St. John's
+was quite the largest College in Cambridge, rivalled only, for a
+moment, by Emmanuel. The present supremacy of Trinity did not begin
+till late in the eighteenth century.
+
+[Footnote 15: Sculptures over the piers represent the bridge itself, a
+very unusual feature.]
+
+The river is here spanned by the latest of the College bridges, a
+single arch of stone high in air, carrying a pathway vaulted over with
+stone and lighted on either side by grated windows, after the fashion
+of the "Bridge of Sighs" at Venice. It was built about 1830 to form a
+communication between the older part of the College on the eastern
+side of the river and the recently erected New Court on the western,
+while giving no opportunity for illicit leaving of the College. As has
+been already stated, students, while bound to be inside the College
+gates all night, are not bound to keep to their rooms, but may wander
+about the Courts at any hour.
+
+[Illustration: _St. John's Bridge._]
+
+With St. John's the Collegiate buildings cease and are succeeded by
+the last remaining "Hithes," or quays, used for commercial traffic,
+which of old lined the banks for the whole length of Cambridge. We
+read of Corn Hithe, Pease Hithe, Flax Hithe, Garlic Hithe and others.
+For the river was to old Cambridge all and more than all that the
+railways are now, the great artery of traffic, by which goods were far
+more easily and cheaply conveyed than along the roads of the period,
+which were always rough and often mere "Sloughs of Despond." Most
+especially was this the case with fuel, so that in the seventeenth
+century it was a familiar local saying that "here water kindleth
+fire." These ancient hithes, like the street-ways leading to them,
+have been almost all absorbed by the various College precincts. The
+last, as we have said, are to be seen yet, still in use, with barges
+(still laden chiefly with firewood) lying at them, below St. John's,
+by the side of the "Great Bridge," that famous passage of the river to
+which Cambridge owes both its name and its very existence. Opposite
+the lowest of them there is one more riverside College, Magdalene, an
+old monastic educational establishment turned to its present purpose
+at the time of the Reformation by Lord Thomas Audley of Saffron
+Walden, a courtier of King Henry the Eighth, who had obtained a grant
+of it from that rapacious monarch.
+
+Our Cam byway here ends; for the river here passes out of the
+populated area of Cambridge. It is noteworthy that this area abuts on
+its banks to the same extent and no more than it did seven hundred
+years ago. The King's Ditch, which then bounded it, left the stream at
+the King's Mill, where our voyage started, and rejoined it just
+opposite Magdalene, where that voyage closes. It is well worth while,
+however, to retrace our course, for we shall find fresh loveliness in
+the reverse views of the exquisite scenery through which we have
+passed; and may note the many disused archways in the College walls,
+which tell how, scarcely a generation ago, this unique gem of English
+landscape was actually defiled by being used as a shamelessly open
+sewer.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+     =Queens' College=, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel.--Old
+     Mill Street.--=King's College=, Henry the Sixth, King's and Eton,
+     Henry's "Will."--King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton,
+     Windows, Rosa Solis, Screen, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels, View
+     from Roof.
+
+
+When we disembark once more at Silver Street Bridge, we find ourselves
+standing beneath the sombre old red-brick walls of Queens', indented
+just above us by a small projecting turret which we should not leave
+without notice, for it bears the name and, by tradition, was assigned
+to the use of the famous Erasmus during the months he spent in
+Cambridge. This great light of the Reformation, or, more properly
+speaking, of the intellectual revival which led up to it, was brought
+here by the influence of the saintly chancellor, Sir Thomas More,
+whose great wish was to broaden the University outlook by the
+introduction of the Classical spirit. Hitherto its curriculum had been
+almost exclusively confined to Aristotelian philosophy, adapted to
+dogmatic Christianity by the great mediæval Schoolmen, especially St.
+Thomas Aquinas. Erasmus brought in the knowledge of Greek, which he
+had acquired from the learned exiles whom the capture of
+Constantinople by the Turks in 1453 had driven to the west. Unhappily
+he, in no small degree, depreciated this great gift, by clogging it
+with his own self-opinionated pronunciation of the language, instead
+of taking it as actually spoken. Strange to say, this "Erasmian"
+barbarism shortly became a badge of Protestantism (though Erasmus
+himself lived and died a Catholic). It was thus enforced during the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, forbidden in that of Mary, and enforced
+again under Elizabeth. To this day it remains with us, and cuts us off
+from the living tongue of Hellas.
+
+To enter Queens' it is advisable to cross the iron bridge, and recross
+the river by Sir Isaac Newton's wooden structure. Passing through the
+low doorway into which it leads we find ourselves in the most
+picturesque of all College Courts, bounded by the Hall in face of us,
+and on the other three sides by a low range of ancient red-brick
+cloisters. These once belonged to the Carmelite nuns, who removed to
+this site when flooded out of their original quarters at Newnham. In
+1538 they sold their House to the College, just in time to escape its
+confiscation, at the suppression of the monasteries, by Henry the
+Eighth, who, as it was, required the purchase-money to be paid over to
+_him_. Having obtained the property Queens' at once built over the
+northern cloisters the beautiful gallery which serves as the
+drawing-room of the President's Lodge--(it has been stated that the
+Head of a College is, in Cambridge, always called the "Master," except
+here, where he is "President," and at King's where he is "Provost").
+The gallery, which is a wooden construction overhanging the Cloister,
+is eighty feet long by twelve in width, with three large oriels
+looking into the Court. Those on the other side open into the
+President's garden, a charming enclosure abutting upon the river. Both
+gallery and garden are, of course, strictly private. Opposite the
+gallery, at the south-east corner of the cloisters, is a small Court
+of Elizabethan date, known as "Pump Court," and now-a-days as "Erasmus
+Court"; while from the north-east corner a tortuous little passage
+brings us into a more modern Court, shaded by a fine walnut-tree
+(whence its name of "Walnut Tree Court"). Here stands the New Chapel,
+the best bit of modern work in all Cambridge, erected in 1895 from the
+designs of Messrs. Bodley and Garner. The beautiful proportions and
+effective decoration of the interior are specially noteworthy.
+
+[Illustration: _The President's Gallery, Queens' College._]
+
+On the southern side of this court a passage (between the old Chapel
+and the Library) leads to the "Old Court," the original enclave of the
+College. This has remained practically unaltered since the Foundation,
+and is the best example remaining of the way in which a College was
+designed of old, after the fashion of the large country-house, as then
+built--Haddon Hall, for example, in Derbyshire. The red-brick and the
+white stone dressings, have mellowed, as elsewhere in Cambridge, to a
+tone of rich sombreness most restful and satisfying to the eye. The
+somewhat gaudy clock and clock tower are modern, as is also the yet
+gaudier sun-dial often, but erroneously, ascribed to Sir Isaac Newton.
+Over the Hall is emblazoned the very elaborate shield of the College,
+quartering the six bearings to which the poor little Queen Margaret
+laid claim--those of Hungary, Naples, Jerusalem, Anjou, Lorraine, and
+De Barre, all within a bordure "vert" added by Queen Elizabeth. Hence
+it is that green is to-day the distinctive Queens' colour at boating,
+cricket, etc.
+
+Passing out of Queens', beneath the dignified gate-tower, we find
+ourselves in Queens' Lane, the quiet byway already referred to. Quiet
+byway as it now is, this was once a main street of Cambridge, known as
+Mill Street, forming (as it did before the great Colleges of King's,
+Trinity, and St. John's were built across it) the line of interior
+communication between the two bridges of the town, "the Small Bridge"
+by the King's Mill and "The Great Bridge" beneath the Castle. In those
+days it was a busy thoroughfare, thick set with burgher houses; now,
+in such broken lengths of it as survive, the buildings are almost
+wholly Collegiate. As we emerge from Queens' gate, and turn leftwards,
+we have on one side the dark-red bricks of that College, on the other
+the like buildings of St. Catharine's, while, at the further end of
+the street in front, our view is bounded by the white stone of the new
+gateway of King's. The whole effect is delightful.
+
+Through this gateway we now make our way into the Premier[16] College
+of Cambridge, and soon find ourselves face to face with one of the
+most beautiful views of the world. Before us spreads a spacious lawn,
+the most extensive in existence,[17] bounded on three sides by the
+white and grey walls of College buildings, while on the fourth it
+merges into the wooded grass-land of the Backs; the river which
+divides it from these being scarcely perceptible from this point. We
+get a glimpse, however, of Clare Bridge, terminating the graceful
+façade of that College, which is in our immediate front. Behind us are
+the nineteenth-century additions to King's, and to our right front the
+fine pile of "Gibbs' Buildings," erected, in the eighteenth century,
+as a first attempt to approximate in some degree to the wishes of the
+Royal Founder, and transfer his College from the cramped position it
+had hitherto occupied, at the north of the Chapel, to the ampler site
+on the south which he had originally destined for it, and had cleared
+for his purpose by buying up and sweeping away, church and all, one of
+the most thickly populated parishes in Cambridge, that of "St. John
+Zachary" (_i.e._ St. John the Baptist), including a furlong's length
+of Mill Street.
+
+[Footnote 16: This rank is one of the privileges due to the Royal
+Founder. Another was the exemption of King's men from the authority of
+the Proctors; another their right to a Degree without passing the
+usual examinations. This was given up in the middle of last century,
+and now every King's student is required by the College to take
+Honours in some Tripos.]
+
+[Footnote 17: A current story tells how a millionaire, who boasted
+that his money should make him a lawn as perfect, was discomfited by
+being told that to attain such perfection "you must mow and roll it
+regularly for 400 years. That is what has been done here."]
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Queens' College._]
+
+For the scale on which Henry VI. intended to build was something
+hitherto quite unprecedented, and his plan took years to mature. The
+inspiration of it was originally caught from William of Wykeham,
+Bishop of Winchester, whose genius first conceived the idea of twinned
+Colleges, in the provinces and at the University, from the former of
+which the Scholars should pass on to complete their education at the
+latter. This idea Wykeham himself first carried into effect by the
+foundation of the College at Winchester and of New College at Oxford.
+And, fired by his example, Henry VI., when only twenty, resolved on
+doing the same thing himself with truly Royal magnificence. His
+Scholars should begin their course at Eton, beneath the walls of
+Windsor Castle, his birthplace and favourite residence, and should
+thence pass to finish it at Cambridge, in the College which he would
+there dedicate to his own Patron Saint Nicolas, on whose Feast,
+December 6th (still "Founder's Day" to all Etonians and King's men),
+he was born.
+
+This was in 1440. He at once put hand to the work, and that same year
+signed the Charters for both Colleges; the Head of each being called
+"Provost," in order, as he said, "to weld the two Colleges together in
+a bond of everlasting brotherhood,"--a bond which actually lasted in
+its entirety till 1870, and of which traces even yet remain.
+
+The acquisition of the sites involved complicated legal transactions
+which occupied several years; but by 1444 Eton was sufficiently
+advanced to receive its first Scholars, a colony brought by William of
+Waynflete from Winchester; and by 1446 Henry was able to dedicate the
+first stone of his Cambridge chapel. Every dimension of this glorious
+edifice he himself worked out with the utmost minuteness, and set
+down, as he would have it completed, in that notable record of his
+purposes still preserved in the College Library, and known as his
+"Will." The word had not in those days its present purely posthumous
+signification, but was used of any formal disposition of a man's
+estate, or any part of it, to some given purpose.
+
+In this document, "one of the most remarkable works in the English
+language," as Mr. J. W. Clark styles it, the King describes his future
+College so accurately that a complete plan and elevation of the whole
+can be drawn from it. We thus learn that Gibbs' Building represents
+what was meant to be the western side of an enclosed court, with a
+fountain in the midst of it. The Chapel was to form the northern side
+of this court; the entrance, with its turreted gate-tower, the
+eastern; the Hall and Library, the western. The great lawn before us
+was not to be, as now, an empty space, but was to be occupied, partly
+by a small "kitchen court" containing the various offices (bake-house,
+brew-house, etc.), partly by a cloistered cemetery between the Chapel
+and the river, from the western side of which was to rise a pinnacled
+tower, 220 feet high, the rival to that at Magdalen, Oxford, which was
+already being planned by William of Waynflete. Another turreted
+gate-tower, on the very bank of the river, was to give access to the
+College Bridge (further north than the present one). Had this plan
+been carried out in its entirety, King's would indeed have been, as
+the historian Stow puts it, "such that the like colledge could scarce
+have been found again in any Christian land."
+
+[Illustration: _Queens' College Gateway._]
+
+Unhappily its splendid design was brought to nought by the great
+tragedy of the Wars of the Roses, which broke out almost immediately.
+The singular mildness with which that conflict was waged (except on
+the actual field of battle), with no wasting of lands, with no burning
+of towns or villages, with no slaughter (and scarcely any plunder) of
+non-combatants, permitted the work on the Chapel, which, as we have
+seen, was already begun, to proceed, though slowly, and did not even
+stop the conveyance of stone from the chosen quarry at Huddleston in
+Yorkshire. The payment of the workmen was a harder matter, for Henry
+was far from being a wealthy monarch. He and his wife between them had
+less than the equivalent of £50,000 per annum, all too little for the
+expenses of their position, even in days of peace. Still the pay was
+found, in a certain measure, and the workmen came and went till
+dispersed by the appalling tidings that their Royal Saint had been
+deposed and murdered in the Tower. Then in panic horror they flung
+down their tools and fled, with such haste that they did not even
+complete the job on a block of stone, already half sawn through, which
+lay, as Logan's print of 1680 shows it, in the south-east corner of
+the present Great Court, Henry's intended quadrangle, a testimony to
+their despair, for upwards of three centuries. Then, when the idea of
+carrying out his intention was at last revived, this stone was
+appropriately used as the first to be employed for that purpose, the
+Foundation Stone of Gibbs' Building.
+
+The work on the Chapel thus abruptly stopped by the Founder's death
+remained in abeyance for the remainder of the century. Not till 1508
+was it resumed. The shell of the building was finished 1515; the glass
+and woodwork being added under Henry the Eighth. But in the end it was
+completed substantially in accordance with the Founder's Will, and is
+the only part of his design that has been so completed. His huge
+campanile, his cloisters, his gate towers, never came into being; and
+though the Great Court is now where he meant it to be, it is built in
+a fashion very different from his design.
+
+This we see at a glance as we enter it round the southern end of
+Gibbs' Building. For it is not an enclosed quadrangle, but formed of
+two detached blocks to south and west, while the east side is only a
+stone screen, erected in 1825, and of a sadly inferior style. But the
+"goodly conduit" of the Founder's Will does rise in the midst,[18] and
+the north side is actually formed, as he decreed, by his glorious
+Chapel, the most magnificent in the world, which now rises before us
+in all its grandeur as we behold it across the Court.
+
+[Footnote 18: His statue surmounts it, flanked by two figures
+representing Science (gazing at the Chapel) and Religion (with her
+eyes devoutly fixed upon the Hall). To leap across from the lawn to
+the pedestal of this group is a feat seldom accomplished.]
+
+And if the outside view is impressive, that which greets us when we
+enter is absolutely overpowering in its majesty. The sense of space
+and repose; the up-running lines of the shafting catching the eye
+whithersoever it turns, and leading it up to the myriad-celled spans
+of the vault; the subdued light through the pictured windows staining
+the venerable masonry; the great organ, upborne by the rich oaken
+screen, dominating the whole vista, combine to form, as has been well
+said, "a _Sursum Corda_ done into stone," uplifting indeed to heart
+and sense alike. And when to this feast of visual harmony is added the
+feast of aural harmony, when the clear and mellow voices of the Choir
+blend with the majestic tones of the organ,
+
+  "And thunder-music, rolling, shakes
+   The prophets blazoned on the panes,"
+
+we can understand how the inspiration of the scene has thrilled poet
+after poet, not Tennyson only, as above quoted, but Wordsworth, and
+even Milton, Puritan as he was, yet more. To the former King's College
+Chapel suggested one of the most exquisite of his sonnets:
+
+  "Tax not the Royal Saint with vain expense,
+   With ill-matched aims the architect, who planned,
+   Albeit labouring for a scanty band
+   Of white-robed scholars only, this immense
+   And glorious work of fine intelligence.
+   'Give all thou canst! High Heaven rejects the lore
+   Of nicely calculated less and more.'
+   So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense
+   These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof,
+   Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells,
+   Where light and shade repose, where Music dwells,
+   Lingering and wandering on as loth to die;
+   Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof
+   That they were born for immortality."
+
+And Milton, when he came under the spell of this most glorious
+sanctuary, forwent all his conscientious objections to the Laudian
+revival of ornate services, "the scrannel pipes of wretched straw,"
+and all the rest of his denunciations, and was, in spite of himself,
+carried away into forgetfulness of all save the glory and the beauty
+around him. Hear him in "Il Penseroso":
+
+  "But let my due feet never fail
+   To walk the studious cloister's pale,
+   And love the high embowed roof,
+   With antique pillars massy proof,
+   And storied windows richly dight,
+   Casting a dim religious light.
+   There let the pealing organ blow
+   To the full-voiced choir below,
+   In Service high and Anthem clear,
+   As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
+   Dissolve me into ecstasies
+   And bring all Heaven before mine eyes."
+
+[Illustration: _Clare College from King's._]
+
+This passage is memorable, not only for its own intrinsic loveliness,
+but because we, very probably, have in it a key to the great
+historical puzzle connected with King's College Chapel. How came these
+"storied windows," with their hundreds of pictured prophets, saints,
+and angels, to escape the ruthless destruction which was meted out to
+all such "idolatrous" representations, throughout the length and
+breadth of the county, by the Parliamentary authorities at Cambridge?
+William Dowsing, their authorised agent, went from church to church,
+in town and village, shattering and defacing, and has left us a minute
+record of his proceedings, in which he evidently took a keen personal
+delight. Thus, amongst the colleges we have already noticed, he tells
+us that, at Peterhouse, "we pulled down two mighty great Angells with
+wings, and diverse other Angells, and the four Evangelists, and Peter
+with his Keies over the Chappell Dore, and about 100 Chirubims." At
+Queens' "we beat down a 110 superstitious pictures, besides
+Chirubims"; and so on, with monotonous repetition, entry after entry.
+The account also records the sums which each college had to pay him
+for his trouble, and such a sum (of extra amount in consideration of
+the magnitude of the task) was actually paid him by the Bursar of
+King's. Yet here are the windows before our eyes to-day in unbroken,
+unblemished dignity.
+
+No contemporary explanation is forthcoming, and the true facts of the
+case seem to have been kept so close, and to have been known to so
+few, that no tradition, even, of them was handed down to posterity. As
+time went on, the wildest and most impossible theories were evolved to
+account for the marvel. It was gravely said that the windows had been
+taken down by the Fellows themselves in a single night, and securely
+buried from the baffled spite of the Roundheads before morning, till
+better times; the place of each being known to one Fellow only! That
+the west window alone remained plain till the latter part of the
+nineteenth century (a peculiarity really not explained by history),
+was held proof positive that the Fellow in charge of that particular
+burial was done to death by the Puritans without betraying his secret;
+which equally defied the researches of later generations. Such
+searches were actually made. A more sentimental variant of the story
+made the hider a pious little chorister, shot down by Cromwell in the
+chapel itself for refusing to reveal where lay his precious charge!
+Through the empty casement a white dove flew in, and hovered over the
+heroic innocent! It need scarcely be pointed out that to remove the
+glass from a single one of these huge windows would be a work of days
+for a fully equipped band of professional glaziers supplied with
+scaffolding; yet these absurd tales were gravely repeated, and the
+missing window was actually sought for. The truth of the matter will,
+probably, now never be known. But it is certain that the windows could
+not have been spared without the connivance, at least, of Oliver
+Cromwell, whose influence was at that time paramount in Cambridge; and
+it is a plausible conjecture that his protection of them was due to
+the intercession of his friend John Milton, to whom, as we have seen,
+the Chapel and its "dim religious light" meant so much.
+
+A full study of these wonderful windows, crowded as they are with
+marvellously elaborate detail, is a work demanding hours of close
+attention under the direction of a competent guide. Even for the
+cursory examination which will suffice most of us the use of a
+guide-book is essential; and it is fortunate that one has been brought
+out (purchasable at any Cambridge book-shop for the modest sum of
+sixpence) by Dr. M. R. James, the present Provost of King's, who is
+the supreme European authority on ancient stained glass.
+
+The general scheme of decoration is the representation of the life of
+Our Lady (to whom the College is dedicated), beginning in the
+westernmost window of the north side, with her traditional birth, and
+going on round the Chapel, till it ends, in the westernmost window of
+the south side, with her Assumption and Coronation. But as the
+traditions concerning her did not provide a sufficient number of
+scenes for the requirements of the designer, the series is eked out,
+not only by various incidents in her Son's life wherein she does not
+appear (such as His Baptism, Temptation, and Passion), but by the
+three windows to the western side of the great screen on the south
+being filled with subjects drawn from the stories of St. Peter and St.
+Paul; all being, however, within the traditional period of her
+life-time.
+
+A first glance at the windows produces only the effect of a gorgeous
+maze of colouring, through which we marvel that any clue should have
+been found. Next to the general effect of the ineffably harmonious
+blending of hues, the audacious vividness of the hues themselves, red
+and green and blue and gold and purple, is what first impresses the
+eye. Then we notice how, down the central light of each window, stand,
+one above another, four great figures, human or angelic, each
+displaying an inscribed scroll.[19] These figures are known as the
+Messengers, and when not Angels they are Old Testament Prophets. Their
+scrolls, which are in Latin, refer, sometimes by direct description,
+oftener by a suggestive text, to the subjects depicted in the Lights
+on either hand of them. The inscriptions, however, are of very little
+practical use to the visitor. Age has rendered many of them wholly,
+and more partially, illegible; while the black-letter characters of
+their crowded Latin words are not easy to decipher at the best. They
+are, moreover, by no means free from actual blunders, and the
+connection between text and scene is sometimes far from obvious. Their
+interest, in fact, is for experts; and less-gifted visitors will do
+well to content themselves with the interpretation given in the
+guide-book.
+
+[Footnote 19: These figures are somewhat larger than life-size.]
+
+The same advice applies to the glass in general. It is not worth while
+to spend on a detailed study of the windows the time necessarily
+involved. Much of the work is excellent, and almost every window has
+its points of interest, but much, especially amongst the heads of the
+figures, is far from pleasing. This fact is largely owing to a
+considerable "restoration" undertaken in the Early Victorian era; when
+the art of glass-painting was at a sadly low ebb, and when the
+uncurbed restorer positively revelled in substituting for ancient
+decay his spick-and-span modern conceptions. But, as has been said,
+almost every window has features deserving that time should be made
+for their notice, which we now proceed to point out.
+
+Each window contains four scenes, the upper and lower, to left and
+right of the central "Messengers," being normally co-related as Type
+and Antitype. This relation, however, is not universal, and does not
+occur in the first window of the series (that in the north-west corner
+of the Chapel), where the four scenes consecutively illustrate the
+legend connected with the birth of Our Lady. The story runs that her
+parents, Joachim and Anna, were childless even unto old age, and that,
+in consequence, Joachim, on presenting his offering in the Temple, was
+insulted by the High Priest. As he sadly sought retirement in the
+country an Angel appeared to him with the message that he should
+return to Jerusalem, where his wife would meet him at the Temple gate,
+and a daughter would be born to them.
+
+The upper left-hand of the window shows the mitred High-Priest waving
+away Joachim, who is sorrowfully departing. His face is beautifully
+rendered. In the upper right-hand corner we see him kneeling before a
+green and gold angel hovering downwards. The rural surroundings are
+suggested by a pastoral composition. Note the sheep-dog and the
+shepherd's bagpipes.
+
+[Illustration: _King's College Chapel._]
+
+In the lower left-hand light Joachim and Anna are meeting before the
+Temple gate; and in the right-hand Anna is sitting up in a blue bed
+with red curtains, watching the infant Mary being washed. Mary has
+long golden curls, and her face is that of an adult; but Dr. James
+considers this head a later insertion. This window is known to have
+been repeatedly and promiscuously repaired (even as early as 1590),
+and was in utter confusion till the latest releading (1896). The
+repairs seem to have been executed with any old bits of glass the
+glazier might happen to have in stock. On one fragment (now removed)
+some coins of Charles the First were represented. Most of the windows
+have suffered, more or less, in this way, but none (except that over
+the south door) to the same extent as this first window, which though
+the first in order of subject, seems not to have been the first
+inserted, or at least completed; for at the top may be read the date
+1527, whereas the window over the screen on the north side contains
+that of 1517.
+
+These two dates are respectively near the inception and the completion
+of the glazing, which was begun 1515, the year when Luther began the
+Reformation by the publication of his famous Theses, and finished
+1531, the year in which that Reformation was first inaugurated in
+England by the King being declared Supreme Head of the Anglican
+Church. The windows, however, must have been designed at a date
+considerably earlier, for in the heraldic devices which fill the small
+top lights Henry the Seventh, not Henry the Eighth, is treated
+throughout as the reigning monarch; his shield being blazoned in the
+central compartment, while the latter is only commemorated by the
+initials H. K.,--the last standing for his ill-fated wife Katharine of
+Aragon. These heraldic devices are the same in all the windows, and
+show the rival roses of York and Lancaster, the Tudor Portcullis and
+Hawthorn Bush, the Fleur-de-lys, and the initials H. E. (for Henry the
+Seventh and his Queen, Elizabeth of York). All the glass is of English
+manufacture, the work of four London firms, but it seems probable that
+the artists were to some extent under both Flemish and Italian
+influence.
+
+Passing on to the second window, we find it thus arranged:
+
+                 TYPE                |              TYPE
+  Presentation of a golden table in  | The Marriage of Tobias and Sara.
+        the Temple at Delphi.        |          (_Tobit_ vii. 13.)
+                                     |
+               ANTITYPE              |            ANTITYPE
+  Presentation of the Virgin in the  | The Marriage of Mary and Joseph.
+        Temple at Jerusalem.         |
+
+The first scene here is the only instance in the Chapel of a
+non-Scriptural incident being made use of as a Type. It is the
+Classical legend (found in Valerius Maximus, an obscure Latin writer
+used in the sixteenth century as a school book), which tells how a
+question as to the ownership of a golden table found in the nets of
+some Milesian fishermen was referred to the Delphic oracle of Apollo
+for solution. To whom should this table of pure gold be made over? The
+Oracle replied "To the Wisest." The prize was therefore given to
+Thales, the wisest Milesian of the day, who modestly passed it on to
+another sage, and he to yet another. Finally, after thus going the
+round of the Seven Wise Men of Greece, it came into the hands of Solon
+the Athenian, who declared that "the Wisest" could be no other than
+Apollo himself, and accordingly presented the table to the God in the
+Temple of Delphi. By a strange application, this tale was considered,
+in mediæval literature, as typical of the Presentation of the Virgin
+in the Temple at Jerusalem; her purity and that of the gold being,
+apparently, the connecting idea.
+
+In the window we see the offering of the golden table; Apollo being
+represented by a golden image bearing a shield emblazoned with the
+Sun, and a banner. Beneath is Mary, as a young girl dressed in blue,
+walking up the steps of the Temple; an incident much dwelt on in the
+legend. In the upper Marriage scene note the Angel Raphael, the
+comrade and guide of Tobias; and, in the lower, Joseph's rod, the sign
+from which (a dove appearing upon it) marked him out, amongst all her
+suitors, as Mary's destined husband. This scene suggests a
+reminiscence of Raphael's well-known cartoon on the subject, which had
+lately been painted.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the third window the arrangement is:
+
+          TYPE                 |             TYPE
+        The Fall               |        The Burning Bush
+  (Eve's disobedience).        |     (remaining unconsumed).
+                               |
+        ANTITYPE               |           ANTITYPE
+     The Annunciation          |         The Nativity
+    (Mary's obedience).        |    (Mary remaining a Virgin).
+
+Note the human head and hands of the Serpent, and the brilliant
+ruddiness of the apple. Also the ruby flames of the bush, and the
+representation of God the Father at its summit. Moses is in the act of
+putting off his shoes from his feet. In the Nativity scene the Babe
+can only be discovered by following the gaze of the child Angels who
+are clustering round in adoration. Contrary to the usual convention,
+which shows Him sitting on His Mother's knee as if a couple of years
+old, He is here represented realistically as an actual new-born baby.
+Above both lower lights in this window is a renaissance arcading.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the fourth window we have:
+
+           TYPE                |             TYPE
+  The Circumcision of Isaac.   | The visit of the Queen of Sheba
+                               |          to Solomon.
+                               |
+         ANTITYPE              |           ANTITYPE
+  The Circumcision of Christ.  | The visit of the Wise Men to
+                               |            Christ.
+
+The face of Abraham and that of the officiating priest below are both
+good, and so is that of the Queen. The Epiphany Star is a fine object,
+and the effect of its light irradiating the thatch of the manger-shed
+is most powerfully rendered.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window gives us
+
+           TYPE                      |        TYPE
+  The Legal Purification of a woman. | Jacob's flight from the
+                                     |   vengeance of Esau.
+                                     |
+         ANTITYPE                    |      ANTITYPE
+  The Purification of Mary.          | The Flight into Egypt.
+
+In the Purification scene the faces of Simeon, who is the main figure,
+Mary, and Joseph (carrying the dove-cage), are all worth looking at.
+So is Joseph in the Flight episode; which, however, is chiefly
+remarkable for introducing in the back-ground a legend from a late
+carol, which tells how Herod's soldiers pursued the Holy Family, and
+how the pursuit was miraculously checked. The fugitives met a
+husbandman, and instructed him to answer any inquiry for them by
+saying, "They passed whilst I was sowing this corn"; which was
+actually the case. But, lo! when the pursuers shortly came up the corn
+had sprung up, and was ripe already to harvest. It takes some little
+trouble to decipher this scene. The Purification is seen through an
+arcade of the Temple, on the frieze of which is a group of classical
+horsemen like those of the Parthenon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next window is that over the great organ screen dividing the
+ante-chapel from the choir. It is arranged thus:
+
+               TYPE                 |              TYPE
+          The Golden Calf           | The Massacre of the Seed Royal by
+    (the introduction of Idolatry). |         Queen Athaliah.
+                                    |
+             ANTITYPE               |            ANTITYPE
+  The idols of Egypt falling before | The Massacre of the Innocents by
+           the Holy Child           |           King Herod.
+     (the overthrow of Idolatry).   |
+
+The Golden Calf is set high on a magnificent ruby pillar. Before it
+Moses is breaking the Tables of the Law; one fragment of which shows a
+Flemish inscription. Below, an idol is falling headlong from a
+precisely similar pillar. The kneeling figure in this scene is the
+Governor Aphrodisius, who was converted by the miracle; as is recorded
+in the apocryphal "Gospel of the Infancy." In the Massacre scene Queen
+Athaliah is represented by a conventional figure of the _Virgo
+Coronata_ (with her Babe in her arms). The artist evidently had this
+figure in stock, and used it rather than take the trouble of producing
+something less incorrect. Near her there is a minutely depicted
+mediæval thatched house worthy of notice. So is the business-like
+callousness in the expression on the leading soldier's countenance.
+This window bears, as has been said, the date 1517, written 15017.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We are now in the choir, where our first window gives:
+
+             TYPE                  |             TYPE
+  Naaman washing in Jordan.        | Esau tempted by Jacob to sell
+                                   |        his birthright.
+                                   |
+           ANTITYPE                |           ANTITYPE
+   Christ baptised in Jordan.      | Christ tempted by the Devil.
+
+All three Temptations are given, the first being in the foreground.
+The countenance of the Devil (as a respectable old man) is a
+marvellous study.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The second window in the choir is:
+
+                  TYPE               |             TYPE
+  The raising of the Shunamite's son.|     The Triumph of David
+                                     |       (I _Sam._ xvii).
+                                     |
+                ANTITYPE             |           ANTITYPE
+     The raising of Lazarus.         |     The Triumphal Entry.
+
+The Shunamite's house is another bit of minute detail. Note the dishes
+on the shelf in front. Note also the magnificently gigantic head of
+Goliath borne by David on the point of the Philistine's own huge
+sword.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The third window:
+
+       TYPE             |           TYPE
+     The Manna.         |   The Fall of the Angels.
+                        |
+     ANTITYPE           |         ANTITYPE
+  The Last Supper.      |  The Agony in Gethsemane.
+
+The manna is shown as falling in the shape of Communion Breads. Below,
+Christ gives the sop to the red-haired Judas, while Peter, who thus
+becomes aware of the traitor's identity, clenches his fist with a
+gesture of menace extraordinarily forcible.
+
+The connection between the right-hand subjects is not obvious. Dr.
+James suggests that it refers to Christ's speaking of the casting out
+of Satan as a result of His Passion (John xii. 31). The smaller scale
+of this scene, and the nimbi given to Christ and the Apostles point to
+its having been the work of a special artist.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fourth choir window:
+
+        TYPE              |           TYPE
+  Cain murders Abel.      | The mocking of David by Shimei.
+                          |
+      ANTITYPE            |         ANTITYPE
+  Judas betrays Christ.   |     The mocking of Christ.
+
+Cain is killing Abel with a large bone. Note the ruby fires of their
+respective altars in the back-ground, Abel's spiring upwards in full
+flame, while Cain's is blown down to the earth. In the betrayal scene
+the face of Malchus, as he lies upon the ground with his broken
+lantern under him, should be observed. It is highly expressive.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window:
+
+         TYPE           |          TYPE
+   Jeremiah in prison.  |   Noah mocked by Ham.
+                        |
+       ANTITYPE         |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ before Annas.  |  Christ mocked by Herod.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We have now reached the last window of the northern range, that in the
+north-east corner of the Chapel. It shows us:
+
+         TYPE                |          TYPE
+  Job scourged by Satan.     | Solomon crowned by his mother.
+                             |    (_Cant._ iii. 11.)
+                             |
+       ANTITYPE              |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ scourged by Pilate. |  Christ crowned with thorns.
+
+In the scourging scene we may note the singularly unpleasing features
+and expression of the Saviour's face; which Dr. James holds to be
+purposely so delineated, in reference to the words of Isaiah: "He hath
+no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him there is no beauty that we
+should desire Him." We do not, indeed, find in the entire series of
+windows one single attempt to represent Him worthily. The conventional
+face, familiar throughout the ages to Christian Art, even from the
+first century, and probably a real recollection of Him, is
+consistently departed from (as is characteristic of the Renaissance
+period), and with it has gone every divine and exalted association.
+Where even the genius of Michael Angelo failed, we cannot look to find
+the glassworkers of London succeeding.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The great east window has no central messengers, and thus contains six
+scenes, each occupying three lights, arranged thus:
+
+  The Nailing to the | Christ crucified | The Descent from the
+         Cross.      |  (the Piercing). |        Cross.
+                     |                  |
+      Ecce Homo!     |  The Sentence.   | The Way of Sorrows.
+
+There is little to call for special notice in this window. Structural
+conditions necessitate the Cross being of abnormal height. In the
+background of the Way of Sorrows is a vivid ruby patch, which may be
+meant for the Field of Blood.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Turning to the south-east window, we are confronted with an entirely
+exceptional development. The whole of the upper half is occupied with
+a single subject (the Brazen Serpent), and that in Early Victorian
+glass inconceivably poor and crude. The lower half is ancient and
+typical, the type and antitype being placed side by side:
+
+      TYPE                      |         ANTITYPE
+  Naomi bewailing her husband.  | The Holy Women bewailing Christ.
+               (_Ruth_ i. 20.)  |
+
+The history of this marked departure from the norm is that the
+buildings of the Great Court were planned to abut upon the Chapel
+here, so as to block the lower half of the window, for which,
+accordingly, no glass was provided. That which is there now was
+originally in the upper half and was moved down in 1841, the Brazen
+Serpent being substituted for it. The remaining windows on this side
+of the choir also underwent a sad amount of "restoration" at the same
+period.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next window (the fifteenth in the entire sequence) is of the
+normal arrangement.
+
+           TYPE                   |          TYPE
+  Joseph cast into the pit.       |   The overthrow of Pharaoh.
+                                  |
+        ANTITYPE                  |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ laid in the Sepulchre.   |      The Harrying of Hell.
+
+The last scene is a most forcible representation of Christ's
+victorious "Harrying of Hell," as conceived by mediæval imagination
+and referred to by Dante in his Inferno. The Conqueror of Death has
+forced His resistless way through the shattered gates of Hell, on
+which He stands, treading under His feet the gigantic leaden-coloured
+bulk of their demon warder. Before Him kneels Adam, at last rescued
+from his age-long captivity, and other Holy Souls. In the back-ground
+a blue devil gazes in dismay from the red mouth of Hell (represented
+after the usual mediæval fashion, as an actual mouth, with teeth,
+etc.), while another, in livid green, is dancing with demoniac rage
+above, and yet another, white and gold, is scudding away in terror as
+fast as his wings will carry him.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The remaining windows of the choir on this side deal with the
+Resurrection. In the first of these (the third from the east) the
+subjects are:
+
+               TYPE                  |            TYPE
+    Jonah escaping from the Fish.    |  Tobias appearing to his mother
+                                     |    (who had thought him dead).
+                                     |
+             ANTITYPE                |          ANTITYPE
+  Christ arising from the Sepulchre. |  Christ appearing to His Mother.
+
+The Fish is represented as a long green sea-serpent with a black,
+cavernous mouth, out of which Jonah is stepping. In the background is
+a ship, and, beyond, Nineveh. The Sepulchre is in the frequent
+unscriptural shape of a table monument.
+
+In the right-hand type, Tobias has his dog with him, and also his
+angel guardian Raphael. That Christ appeared to His Mother is first
+found in St. Ambrose, who mentions it as undoubted. She is here shown
+kneeling at a prayer-desk.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the next window we find:
+
+             TYPE                    |           TYPE
+    Reuben finds Joseph taken away   | Darius, at the Lions' den, sees
+              from the pit.          |         Daniel living.
+                                     |
+           ANTITYPE                  |         ANTITYPE
+  The Marys find Jesus taken away    |Mary Magdalene, at the Sepulchre,
+        from the Sepulchre.          |        sees Jesus living.
+
+In the last scene Christ is represented with a spade, inasmuch as Mary
+Magdalene supposed Him to be the gardener. Her very pronounced
+costume, with its astonishing golden ear-covers, is probably a German
+fashion of the early sixteenth century.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window gives the story of Christ's appearance to the
+disciples who went to Emmaus:
+
+             TYPE                    |         TYPE
+  Tobias, on his journey, is joined  | Habakkuk shares his meal with
+  by the angel Raphael, in           | Daniel at Babylon.
+  appearance a wayfaring man.        | (_Bel and the Dragon_, v. 33.)
+             (_Tobit_, v. 4.)        |
+                                     |
+           ANTITYPE                  |       ANTITYPE
+  The two disciples on their journey | Christ shares the meal of
+  are joined by Christ, in           |   disciples at Emmaus.
+  appearance a wayfaring man.        |
+
+Observe that the bread in Our Lord's hand appears to be, not broken,
+but cut clean as with a knife. There was a mediæval legend to the
+effect that He showed His divine power by thus breaking it. Note, too,
+Raphael's brilliant green and crimson wings, put in to denote his
+angelic nature, though the story postulates their absence.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following window (that next to the screen) deals with the story of
+St. Thomas (John xx.), and has been wrongly arranged: what are now the
+right-hand scenes should be the left so as to come first. It now
+stands thus:
+
+           TYPE                     |          TYPE
+  The Prodigal Son returns to his   |  Joseph meets Jacob in Egypt.
+              Father.               |
+                                    |
+         ANTITYPE                   |        ANTITYPE
+  Thomas returns to belief in Jesus.| Jesus meets His Disciples at
+                                    |         Supper.
+
+We find in the first scene here what is perhaps the most ably drawn
+figure in the entire series of windows, that of the Elder Brother.
+Observe the utter contempt and disgust written on his face and in his
+whole attitude. He wears a pair of most aggressively red leggings.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The window over the organ loft shows us the Ascension, and the Coming
+of the Holy Ghost.
+
+         TYPE                  |          TYPE
+  Elijah going up into Heaven. | Moses and the Israelites receiving
+                               |      the Law at Pentecost.
+                               |
+       ANTITYPE                |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ going up into Heaven. | Mary and the Disciples receiving
+                               |  the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
+
+Elijah is deliberately turning round in his golden chariot of fire to
+cast down his ample ruby mantle upon Elisha. Moses is taking the
+Tables of the Law from the hand of God.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The subjects of the three windows between the screen and the south
+door are all from the lives of St. Peter and St. Paul, and nearly all
+from the Acts of the Apostles, from which also all the texts are
+taken. Accordingly the place of the usual prophetic Messengers is, in
+these windows, taken by figures of St. Luke (all identical), habited
+in the costume worn by a Doctor of Medicine in the sixteenth century.
+The series of type and antitype is dropped in these windows, and no
+strict chronological order is observed in the sequence of the
+subjects. Probably some have been misplaced, either originally or at
+one of the various releadings to which they have necessarily been
+subjected. Every century brings fresh need for this operation.
+
+The subjects in the first window are:
+
+  Peter and the Apostles entering   | Peter and John bound and
+          the Temple.               |        scourged.
+                                    |
+  Peter and John healing the lame   |   The Death of Ananias.
+        man in the Beautiful Gate.  |
+
+The design of the last scene is directly copied from Raphael's
+well-known cartoon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The second window gives:
+
+  The Conversion of St. Paul.   | St. Paul at Damascus and his
+                                |       escape in a basket.
+                                |
+  St. Paul adored at Lystra.    | St. Paul stoned at Lystra.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The third window is also Pauline:
+
+  St. Paul giving a farewell blessing |St. Paul before the Chief Captain at
+          before embarkation.         |              Jerusalem.
+                                      |
+  St. Paul exorcising the demoniac at |St. Paul before Caesar at Rome.
+  Philippi.
+
+The first of these scenes is interesting. The text (Acts, xvi. 2)
+connects it with St. Paul's departure from Troas on his first voyage
+to Europe. But the subject seems to be the touching scene at Miletus
+(Acts, xx) on his final departure for Jerusalem. The ship here, whence
+the boat is rowing to fetch him, should be noticed, as it is a fine
+and accurate specimen of sixteenth century naval architecture. Observe
+the lateen yard on the mizen mast. The man who drew that ship, unlike
+most artists, knew his ropes, they are all in their right places. In
+the last scene note the startled and awed expression on Nero's almost
+obliterated face, also his Imperial crown.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We have now almost completed our round of the Chapel, and are again at
+the south door by which we entered. Only two more windows remain, and
+in these we return to the typical treatment of Our Lady's life. That
+over the south door has, by accident (as it appears), been more
+shattered and defaced than any other in the Chapel. It is arranged
+thus:
+
+      TYPE              |       TYPE
+  The death of Tobit.   | The burial of Jacob.
+                        |
+    ANTITYPE            |     ANTITYPE
+  The death of Mary.    | The burial of Mary.
+
+Mary is dying with the full rites of the Church. St. Peter sprinkles
+her with holy water, while St. John places in her hand a lighted
+"trindall" (three candles twisted together). The prayer book and cross
+are borne by other Apostles. Her bier is covered by a white pall with
+gold cross, and two severed hands may (with difficulty) be seen
+clinging to it. This refers to the legend that a certain Jew who
+sought to overthrow the bier was thus miraculously dismembered, and
+did not recover his hands till he penitently besought her to restore
+them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Finally the south-west window completes the wondrous series:
+
+         TYPE                |         TYPE
+  The Translation of Enoch.  | Bathsheba enthroned by her son
+                             |        Solomon.
+                             |      (_I. Kings_, ii., 19.)
+                             |
+       ANTITYPE              |       ANTITYPE
+  The Assumption of Mary.    | Mary crowned by her Son Jesus.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The west window remained unglazed, for some unknown reason, till as
+late as 1879, when there arose a benefactor, Mr. Francis Stacey, a
+Fellow of the College, who has left this noble memorial of his
+generosity. The glass is by Messrs. Clayton and Bell, and the subject,
+as is usual in west windows, is the _Last Judgment_. The heraldic
+devices in the tracery are not those found in the older windows, but
+comprise (in order) the Tudor Portcullis,[20] the Plantagenet Rose,
+and the shields of King's College, Eton College, Cambridge University,
+King Henry VI., King Henry VII., King Henry VIII., Queen Victoria, and
+Stacey. There are also the shields of the See of Lincoln, whose Bishop
+is _ex officio_ Visitor of the College, impaling Wordsworth (then
+Bishop), and of Okes (then Provost of the College).
+
+[Footnote 20: The Portcullis was adopted by Henry the Seventh as the
+Tudor badge, to signify that his claim to the throne was double
+(through his mother, Lady Margaret, as well as his wife), even as a
+portcullis doubled the defensibility of a castle gate.]
+
+The glass of King's College Chapel by no means exhausts the interest
+of the building. The next point to be observed is the great organ
+screen, erected during the brief ascendancy of the miserable Ann
+Boleyn, whose initials are carved upon it. On either side of the
+door-way, within, are emblazoned the twin shields of King's and Eton;
+differing only in that the former bears three red roses, the latter
+three white lilies (not fleurs-de-lys) on the sable ground beneath the
+chief, with its lion of England and fleur-de-lys of France on their
+respective red and blue. The organ itself was not put up till 1606,
+but the nondescript Renaissance dragons supporting it show that the
+case must have been in hand more than half a century earlier. They
+are for all the world like Raphael's wonderful creations in the
+Vatican. The great trumpeting angels on the top of the organ are
+eighteenth century work. Originally much smaller angels stood there,
+which in the seventeenth century were replaced by pinnacles. The doors
+of the screen belong to the Laudian revival, and bear the arms of
+Charles the First. The west door of the Chapel is of the same period,
+but the north and south doors are the original ones.
+
+The Choir stalls date from Henry the Eighth, but the elaborate coats
+of arms carved over each were not added till 1633, and the canopies
+not till 1675. The magnificent brass lectern was given by Provost
+Hacombleyn, at the opening of the chapel; but the present altar is a
+very modern addition, having been only put up in the twentieth
+century. It stands, as directed by the Founder, no fewer than 16 feet
+from the eastern wall. The wood-work of the sanctuary walls is not
+even yet (1910) fully completed. It is of Renaissance character, as is
+also the altar. The lighting of the Chapel, it should be said, is
+still, happily, done only with candles; and, on a winter afternoon,
+their twinkling points of fire, in endless range, amid the vasty
+gloom, give an impression of mysterious solemnity to be obtained
+nowhere else.
+
+Beautiful as the Chapel is, it would, had the designs of the Founder
+been carried out, have been yet more beautiful. His Will expressly
+deprecates that "superfluitie of too gret curious werkes of entaille
+and besy moulding" which the ante-chapel now exhibits in the elaborate
+series of Royal coats of arms beneath every window. They are
+beautifully carved, it is true, and we may note that the attitudes of
+the supporters (the Tudor dragon and greyhound) are in no two cases
+identical. But the whole effect is somewhat to weary the eye. So also
+do the perpetual roses and portcullises with which the walls are
+bestudded. One of the former, however, deserves special notice, as in
+it is framed one of the very few mediæval images of Our Lady which has
+weathered the storm of the Reformation. It is to be found at the
+southern corner of the west wall, and is what is known as a _Rosa
+Solis_. The inner petals are sun-rays, and in the midst is the "Woman
+clothed with the sun." (The White Rose of York is also sometimes
+represented in the windows as a sun-rose, the sun being also a
+Yorkist badge, but in this the rays are external to the flower.)
+
+The walls, then, would have been less ornate, and more truly beautiful
+for the absence of profuse ornament, had the Founder's design been
+carried out. And we can see that even the exquisite roof was meant to
+be yet more lovely than as it now enraptures the eye. If we look at
+one of the soaring pilasters and follow up its lines, we shall see
+that each of the flutings is prolonged in a rib of the fan vaulting.
+No, not quite each. There is one member which has no such
+prolongation, but ends meaninglessly at the capital. And this tells us
+that the pilasters were designed to carry not a fan but a _liern_
+vaulting; so called because it appears to be a mesh of intertwined ivy
+(_lierre_) binding the fabric together. And beautiful as a fan roof
+is, a liern roof is capable of expressing harmonies of proportion yet
+more delicate and soul-satisfying. How subtle and exalted these
+harmonies would have been here we shall best learn if we have the good
+fortune to gain admission to the range of small side-chapels which
+flank the fane on either hand, nestling between the mighty buttresses.
+For in these, while the more western have the fan roof, the eastern
+and earlier built show liern vaulting of the most delicious character.
+
+These side-chapels were intended each to have an altar, at which the
+Priest to whom it was assigned should say his own Mass daily, while
+all should meet later before the High Altar to assist at the
+Collegiate Mass. They are now used for various subsidiary purposes
+connected with the services. One contains the heating apparatus,
+another the hydraulic bellows of the organ, while many are mere
+lumber-rooms. These last are those abutting on the Choir, which have
+no opening into the Nave, such as those adjoining the ante-chapel
+possess. Through the gratings we may note some stained glass of an
+entirely different character from that in the Chapel windows. It is,
+in fact, of the previous (Fifteenth) Century, and thus older than the
+Chapel itself. From what earlier building it has been transferred is
+uncertain. Tradition, for some unknown reason, assigns it to Ramsey
+Abbey; but it seems more reasonable to suppose that it came from the
+old church of St. John Zachary hard by, when that was pulled down to
+make room for the College, and its fragments, as excavation has shown,
+utilised for levelling the site.
+
+In one of the southern side-chapels will be found a verger, from whom
+it is well worth while to obtain access to the roof of the Chapel.
+This is reached by a wide spiral stairway in the north-western turret.
+Our first goal is a small door (the key of which should be specially
+asked for) leading into a narrow loop-holed passage, from which we can
+scramble into the space between the two roofs of the Chapel. We are
+here on the top of the fan vaulting which we have so much admired from
+below, and can note with what wondrous skill its huge stones are
+dovetailed into one another with the round keystone boss in the centre
+of each span. Above, and only just above, our heads are the mighty
+beams of Spanish chestnut composing the upper roof, the long vista
+being lighted by a small grated window at either end.
+
+Returning to the staircase it does not take many steps more to bring
+us to the roof proper, with its open-work parapets and long leaden
+slope. This should be climbed to get the full benefit of the view, and
+those gifted with steadiness of head and sureness of foot will do well
+to make their way along the ridge from end to end, for each has its
+own beauties to show. To the West we see below us the great lawn, and
+the court of Clare, and the river, and the delicious verdure of the
+Backs, amid which rise the red walls of the Ladies' College at
+Newnham, and the adjoining Anglican foundation of Selwyn; while beyond
+is the open country, bounded by the low chalk upland stretching from
+Madingley Hill on the North to Barrington Hill on the South. The
+spire, so conspicuous on the summit of this range, is that of
+Hardwicke Church. To the South we can distinguish the places already
+described, (the little glass dome of the Fitzwilliam Museum, and the
+graceful spire of Our Lady's Church, being conspicuous objects,) and,
+beyond, the distant range of the East-Anglian Heights from the
+furthest north-east to the furthest south-west, that form the
+watershed of the wide valley of the Cam. To the East, the tower of the
+University Church, Great St. Mary's, raises its turrets almost to the
+level of our feet, and we look down on a maze of Cambridge house-roofs
+bright with the variegated tiling which is their special and
+beautiful characteristic. Beyond them the near promontory of the Gog
+Magog Hills juts out from the East-Anglian Heights on which lies
+Newmarket. To the North come College after College, Clare, Trinity
+Hall, Caius, Trinity, St. John's, Magdalene; while the University
+Library and the Senate House lie nearer still. Due north, across
+these, and across the wide-flung plain beyond them, the plain of the
+Southern Fenland, we can, if the day be clear, discern on the far
+horizon the shadowy towers of Ely Cathedral, fifteen miles away as the
+crow flies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+     Spiked gates.--Old King's.--=University Library=, Origin, Growth,
+     Codex Bezæ.--=Trinity Hall=, Colours, Library.--=Clare College=,
+     "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue.--The Backs, Sirdar Bonfire,
+     College Gardens.--=Trinity College=, Michaelhouse, King's Hall,
+     Henry the Eighth, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge,
+     Library, Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's
+     Pillar," Prince Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College
+     Plate, Grace-cup, Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of
+     Granby, Tutors, Old Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge,
+     Chapel, Newton, Organ, Bentley, Windows, Macaulay.
+
+
+On leaving King's Chapel we should give a glance to the marked line of
+demarcation between the whitish stone of which the lower courses are
+built and that employed in the upper.[21] It is of historical interest
+as showing how far the work had progressed before the long break
+caused by the Founder's death. Then, passing round the West Front, and
+noting the exquisitely delicate tracery of the canopies over the empty
+niches on either side of the door (wherein the two saints Mary and
+Nicolas to whom the building is dedicated were destined to stand) we
+leave the College by the iron gate on the North.
+
+[Footnote 21: The former is from Huddleston in Yorkshire, the latter
+from Weldon in Northamptonshire.]
+
+The formidable chevaux-de-frise which crown this gate are supposed at
+once to figure and to emphasise the danger run by such presumptuous
+students as dare to contemplate illicit exit from or entrance into the
+College during prohibited hours. It has already been said that between
+10 p.m. and 7 a.m. no undergraduate resident in College may leave its
+precincts, and no outsider may enter, under divers pains and
+penalties. Every College supplements this moral pressure by more or
+less effectual and awe-inspiring physical barriers. None however are
+more fearsome to see, and less effective in fact, than these. For not
+only can the College be entered or left with comparative ease by way
+of the Backs, but even this ghastly array of spikes is not unscalable
+to those who know the trick of it. Tennyson, as will be remembered,
+has referred to this exploit in his "Princess."
+
+Passing beneath them we find ourselves again in that same ancient
+street of Cambridge, here again now a wholly Academic byway, by which
+we entered King's. But though we have left the College behind us we
+have not yet quite got clear of its associations. The fine modern
+Gothic pile to our right embeds, as we see, an ancient gateway. For
+more than three and a half centuries this was the entrance to the one
+small Court which alone represented the magnificent design of Henry
+the Sixth for his Royal Foundation. Not till the nineteenth century
+dawned were the students moved to the other side of the Chapel. The
+old precincts were then mostly destroyed, and the site made over to
+the University Library; for the growth of that magnificent institution
+has long taxed to the utmost all the accommodation that can be
+provided for it.
+
+The mediæval Library of the University was a collection of
+manuscripts, requiring only one small room. Of its eighteen
+book-cases, eight were devoted to Theology, four to Law, and one
+apiece to Classics, Mathematics, Medicine, Logic, Moral Philosophy,
+and Scholasticism. This original Library was utterly swept away at the
+Reformation: Dr. Perne of Peterhouse, when Vice-Chancellor in the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, thus signalising his new-born zeal for
+Protestantism. A few years later, however, we find him amongst the
+first founders of the present Library, which now ranks third amongst
+the great Libraries of England; that of the British Museum standing
+first, and the Bodleian Library at Oxford second. All three are
+entitled to a free copy of every book published in the kingdom; so
+that their growth is now-a-days portentously rapid. One of the most
+striking features in this Library is the tableful of new books, scores
+in number, which is cleared every Friday.
+
+This rapid growth however is modern. The one ancient room sufficed
+for the Library, till George the First rewarded the Whig loyalty of
+the University by a gift of 30,000 volumes.[22] The expansion thus
+begun has continued with accelerated speed. One by one the various
+ancient "Schools" which, with the old Library room, formed a small
+quadrangle, have been absorbed by its growth; until now the whole
+block belongs to it, as well as the old site of King's College, the
+main edifice on which, known as "Cockerell's Building," was erected
+1837, where the College Hall once stood.
+
+[Footnote 22: This gift called forth a satirical epigram from Oxford;
+where the prevalent Toryism was made the pretext for quartering a
+regiment of cavalry in the city to suppress Jacobite demonstrations:
+
+  "King George, observing with judicious eyes
+   The state of both his Universities,
+   To Oxford sent a troop of horse;--and why?
+   That Learned Body wanted Loyalty.
+   To Cambridge books he sent; as well discerning
+   How much that Loyal Body wanted Learning."
+
+A retort (in which the humour is a trifle less spontaneous) was
+speedily penned by Sir William Browne, who specialised on epigrams and
+left prizes for their encouragement which are still annually awarded:
+
+  "The King to Oxford sent a troop of horse,
+   For Tories own no argument but Force.
+   With equal skill to Cambridge books he sent;
+   For Whigs admit no force but Argument."]
+
+The Library is open only to Members of the University (Masters of Arts
+having the privilege of taking out not more than ten books at a time)
+and such ladies as are fortunate enough to find a place on the
+admission list. For this it is needful that two Masters of Arts should
+certify that the lady is, to their personal knowledge, seriously
+engaged in some branch of study or research. And even when admitted,
+she finds herself under disabilities, being forbidden to occupy any
+seat except in one room (the oriel window of which is visible from our
+standpoint at the gate of King's). Ordinary visitors may only enter
+under the escort of an M.A., who may take in six at a time.
+
+[Illustration: _Old Gate of King's College._]
+
+Those who have the good hap to be thus inducted, will, besides the new
+books, probably be most impressed by the long range of volumes forming
+the catalogue, and by the densely packed shelves of long-forgotten
+fiction in the "Novel Room." But the real treasures of the Library are
+to be found in Cockerell's Building. Here, in a range of cases, are to
+be seen our best Manuscripts, including a Thirteenth Century life of
+Edward the Confessor, the illustrations in which were found useful as
+a precedent even at the coronation of his latest namesake on the
+British Throne. At the extreme end, in a separate case, is the crown
+of all, one of the earliest manuscripts of the Gospels, dating from
+the Fifth Century. Only four others of equal authority are known, one
+in the British Museum, one in the Vatican Library, one at Paris, and
+one at St. Petersburg. Ours is known as "D" or "Codex Bezæ," from
+being the gift of the celebrated Calvinist divine Theodore Beza, who
+procured it from a soldier after the sack of its early home, the
+Monastery of St. Irenaeus at Lyons, in the Sixteenth Century. It is
+noteworthy for containing passages not found in any other Codex, one
+of which may be read (in Greek and Latin) on the single leaf here
+exposed to view. It narrates how our Lord, "seeing a certain man
+working on the Sabbath, said unto him: Man, if thou art doing this
+with Knowledge thou art blessed, but if without Knowledge thou art
+cursed."
+
+Space does not permit us to enlarge further on the Library; and we
+return to our station at the old gate of King's College. As we look
+along the lane our view is bounded by the College whose name it now
+bears, Trinity Hall. This must not be confounded with the larger and
+later Foundation of Trinity College, next door to it beyond. Trinity
+Hall was founded in 1350, by Bishop Bateman of Norwich, specially for
+the education of Clergy. It has, however, actually, become especially
+given to the study of Law, and is yet more widely known by its prowess
+in aquatics. Its boat, for the last half century, has never been far
+from the Headship of the River, and has oftener attained that coveted
+position than any other. The colours of the College, white and black,
+are thus of wide renown. They are derived from the College Shield,
+which in heraldic language is sable a crescent ermines with a bordure
+ermines. Visitors who approach Cambridge by the London road see this
+device upon the milestones near the town, which were set up by the
+College in the eighteenth century, and were the first milestones
+erected in Britain since the days of the Roman occupation.
+
+The Library here (which is open to visitors from noon to 1 P.M. in
+Full Term) is the best example left us of what libraries were of old
+in Cambridge. It was built about 1560, and still retains its original
+book-cases, the tops of which form desks for reading the folios in the
+shelves beneath. These were in old days chained to rings sliding on a
+locked bar which ran the whole length of each desk. Some of the books
+are so chained still, but not in the ancient fashion; for of old books
+were shelved with the backs inward, the title being written across the
+closed leaves of the front.
+
+Otherwise the College has little to show us; and, instead of seeking
+it, we shall do better if we turn westwards through the specially
+beautiful iron gate which leads us into Clare College. The coat of
+arms beneath which we pass as we enter has its tale to tell concerning
+the foundation of the College. They are those of the noble lady who,
+in 1338, thus commemorated her widowhood, an example followed, as we
+have seen, in the next decade, by Marie de Valence at Pembroke. But
+Lady Elizabeth, daughter of Gilbert de Clare (the "Red Earl" mentioned
+in _Marmion_), had gone through no fewer than three of these
+lamentable experiences. She therefore not only charged her College
+Shield with the golden chevronels of Clare impaled with the golden
+cross of De Burgh (her latest husband), but surrounded the whole with
+a sable bordure besprinkled with golden heraldic tears, bearing
+perennial witness to her repeated sorrows. Hence it comes that the
+Clare "colours" are to this day black and gold.
+
+Few College edifices convey such a sense of unity as these of Clare.
+"Their uniform and harmonious character gives them, at first sight,
+the appearance of having been built from one design, and carried out
+at one time."[23] As a matter of fact, however, the existing buildings
+are of no fewer than five separate dates, each separated by decades,
+and extending altogether over nearly a century and a half (1638-1768);
+while of the original fourteenth century structure no trace whatever
+is left. The eastern and northern sides of the Court are the earliest,
+built between 1638 and 1643, when the work was stopped, five years
+after its commencement, by the outbreak of the Civil War; while the
+stones and beams made ready for its continuance were commandeered by
+the Roundheads for the new works which they were then throwing up to
+strengthen the defences of Cambridge Castle. Not till 1669 did the
+College finances so far recover from this blow as to permit the
+resumption of the building. The western side was then built, followed
+by the northern (1683-93), while the Chapel was not added till 1768.
+But the result of all this patchwork is an exquisite little gem of a
+Court, its balustraded walls overshadowed by the towering pinnacles of
+King's College, and giving, as we have said, a wonderful sense of
+unity, which is partly owing to older work having been altered to
+harmonise with the newer.
+
+[Footnote 23: Atkinson and Clark, _Cambridge Described_.]
+
+The College treasury contains some most interesting and beautiful
+specimens of sixteenth-century plate. One tankard is known as the
+"Poison Cup," because, mounted in the cover, it has a conical fragment
+of crystal, such as was supposed, in the pharmacy of the day, to
+change colour if poison were poured into the vessel. This cup is of
+glass enclosed in exquisitely wrought filigree work. The thumb-piece
+is an angel with outspread wings. Another tankard is the "Serpentine
+Cup," the bowl being of that stone. This too is enclosed in most
+beautiful silver-gilt work, adorned with flowers and fruit and birds
+and arabesques. Yet another is the "Falcon Cup," a receptacle in the
+shape of that bird, originally intended, it would seem, for holding
+sweetmeats. All these were presented to the College by Dr. Butler,
+Court Physician to King James the First, of whom Fuller says that "he
+was better pleased with presents than money, and ever preferred
+rarities before riches."[24]
+
+[Footnote 24: Foster and Atkinson, _Old Cambridge Plate_.]
+
+Passing through the court, we come to the beautiful bridge, already
+familiar to us from the river. Its balustraded parapet is surmounted
+by fourteen large balls of stone, thirteen of them whole, and one out
+of which a cantle of nearly a quarter of its bulk has, for some
+unknown reason and at some unknown date, been cut. A cheap laugh may
+thus be obtained by challenging a stranger to count these balls
+accurately; for the missing cantle, being turned towards the river, is
+quite invisible from the bridge itself. Another feature in connection
+with these balls is that one of them is visibly much newer than the
+rest (which, like the bridge, date from the middle of the seventeenth
+century). This is due to a not very far off feud between Clare and St.
+John's, when a piratical Johnian crew came up the river after dark and
+stormed the bridge. Before the enraged Clare men could open the iron
+gate under the College archway and pour out to the rescue, the enemy
+had begun throwing the balls into the water, where one sank so deep
+into the muddy bottom that it could never be recovered.
+
+From the bridge we get a lovely view of the College "Backs." To the
+south the single slender arch of King's Bridge flings itself over the
+river in the graceful curve which is all its own; to the north we see
+the iron span of Garret Hostel Bridge, hiding from us the beauties of
+Trinity Bridge beyond. But, if there be no ripple upon the water, the
+three graceful arches of this invisible bridge are seen reflected upon
+the glassy surface with a specially charming effect. The whole view is
+amongst the world's loveliest, especially in the May term, when the
+Master's little garden to our right glows with bright colour, answered
+across the stream by that of the Fellows; when the water is alive with
+gay little craft, gigs, punts, and canoes; and when the "ambrosial
+dark" of the Avenue before us beckons us on to explore the delights of
+its umbrageous depths. It was planted in 1691, and is carried for 150
+yards on a wide embankment, dense with shrubs and closed with
+jealously-spiked gates at either end, across what was once an island
+in the river (known as Butts Close), till it debouches on to the
+elm-shaded length of greensward described in our opening page, and
+named, in old maps of Cambridge, "King's College Back-sides." The
+whole does, in fact, belong to King's, but the many rights of way
+which traverse it make it practically an open park.
+
+Not so long ago oaken railings (still to be seen in places) ran
+between it and the road, till a visit from Lord Kitchener (then Sirdar
+of Egypt, fresh from his Ethiopian victories) was made the occasion of
+a gigantic bonfire in the Market Place, to feed which the whole were
+torn up and carried away by gangs of enthusiastic undergraduates. A
+like fate befell the wooden palings and gates of the College gardens
+across the road, now replaced by iron, and altogether the damage done
+ran into hundreds of pounds; while the town police and the University
+proctors waited for each other to act until too late. There are three
+of these College gardens on end--King's, Clare, and Trinity; and
+rarely lovely they are, with their wide "smooth-shaven" lawns, broken
+into glades by clumps of ornamental trees. But each can only be
+entered under the ægis of a Fellow of its own respective College, and
+they are so carefully planted out from the road that scarcely even a
+glimpse can be gained of the delights within, "where no profaner eye
+may look."
+
+Leaving these on our left we proceed along the northward-leading path
+till we reach the fine iron gate which bears the escutcheon of
+Cambridge's mightiest College, Trinity, a College more than twice as
+large as any other, numbering something like 700 residents, students
+and teachers together. Like London, which an Indian visitor once
+described as "not a city, but a herd of cities," Trinity may be
+described as a conjoined herd of colleges, for it was created by the
+amalgamation of no fewer than nine earlier institutions. Two of these,
+Michaelhouse[25] and King's Hall, were amongst the most noteworthy
+colleges in Cambridge. The former was founded by Henry de Stanton,
+Chancellor to King Edward the Second, in 1323, and was thus, next to
+Peterhouse, the oldest college in Cambridge. And King's Hall was but a
+few years younger, being founded by King Edward the Third in 1336.
+Indeed, it may claim to be actually the elder in embryonic existence,
+for Edward the Second, in 1317, was already maintaining
+scholars--"children of our Chapel" as his writ calls them--in
+Cambridge. And that these "children" (who were required to be at least
+fourteen years of age on coming into residence) were quartered
+hereabouts is evident from King's Hall having been built across the
+line of an ancient street running down to the river and known as
+"King's Childer Lane." The town agreed to the expropriation of this
+lane in consideration of one red rose annually to be paid by the
+College to the Corporation on Midsummer Day. The remaining seven
+foundations incorporated in Trinity College were hostels (institutions
+for lodging students, more or less organised in college fashion, but
+not recognised by the University as colleges). These were St.
+Catharine's Hostel, Physwick Hostel, Crutched Hostel, Gregory's
+Hostel, Tyled Hostel, Oving's Inn, and St. Gerard's or "Garret"
+Hostel; which last, as we have seen, is still kept in memory by the
+name of the public bridge crossing the river between Trinity and
+Clare.
+
+[Footnote 25: Michaelhouse (like Peterhouse) derived its name from the
+neighbouring church which was used for worship by the Scholars till
+they got a chapel of their own.]
+
+[Illustration: _Old Schools' Quadrangle._]
+
+All these, Colleges and Hostels alike, were seized upon by Henry the
+Eighth, when that rapacious and unprincipled monarch desired to pose
+(in 1546, a year before his death) as a Pious Founder, and go down to
+posterity as a benefactor. He gained this credit cheaply; for not only
+did he thus get his edifices ready made, but their endowments also;
+while such additional endowments as he bestowed on his new College
+were almost wholly derived from the spoil of the Abbeys suppressed by
+him. Nor did he fail to take toll of each transfer of this stolen
+property for the benefit of his exchequer. His professed object,
+meanwhile, was "to educate Youth in piety, virtue, self-restraint,
+charity towards the poor, and relief of the distressed." His alumni,
+in short, were to be made as opposite to himself in character as
+possible.
+
+From the very first, Trinity thus became almost the largest and
+wealthiest College in Cambridge. For a century it disputed the
+headship of the University with its neighbour, St. John's College, and
+for another century and more sang second to that great rival. But in
+1785 it drew ahead, and since that date has improved its lead without
+a check, till now it stands not only first but without a second. So
+large is it that it cannot, for very sportsmanship, row as a whole in
+the bumping races, but has to be divided for that purpose into two
+boat clubs, denominated respectively "First Trinity" and "Third
+Trinity,"--or, in common speech, "First" and "Third" simply. The
+former is the original "Trinity Boat Club" and this is still its
+official name, whence it is also known as the "T.B.C." It wears the
+original Trinity colours,--dark blue,[26] with the badge of a golden
+lion and three crowns, the device of King Edward the Third. The latter
+consists of Trinity men from the two great rowing schools, Eton and
+Westminster. It is, of course, a very much smaller body than "First,"
+but, as its members come up ready-made oarsmen, it has been almost as
+frequently Head of the River. Both boats are always in the first
+flight. Once there existed a "Second Trinity" club, which has long
+since ceased to maintain its existence.
+
+[Footnote 26: The T.B.C. boat was one of the two first boats to appear
+on the river. The other was the "Lady Margaret" or St. John's boat,
+whose colours were (and are) bright red. These two boats used to row
+along, challenging each other, by sound of bugle, to extempore bursts
+of racing. This was in the Twenties. The first regular College races
+began in the year 1827; but only five Colleges rowed (Trinity, St.
+John's, Caius, Jesus and Emmanuel). Not till 1859 were all
+represented.]
+
+We enter the precincts of this great College by "that long walk of
+limes," up which Tennyson passed, as he tells us in "In Memoriam,"
+when he re-visited Cambridge, "to view the rooms" once inhabited by
+his friend and hero, Arthur Hallam.[27] This avenue was planted in
+1672,[28] and leads us to the fine cycloidal[29] bridge, built at the
+same period. After crossing this, we should not keep straight, which
+would bring us into the "New Court" where Hallam dwelt (a poor bit of
+architecture erected 1825), but rather turn to the left, by the path
+that sweeps along the bank of the river, with its fine weeping
+willows. Looking back, as we leave the bridge behind us, we may admire
+the climbing agility which frequently enables undergraduates to
+descend to the projecting piers just above the water, and find their
+way back again, without a ducking.
+
+[Footnote 27: Hallam's rooms were on the southern side of the New
+Court, in the central staircase (letter G), and were the western set
+on the first floor. Tennyson himself never "kept" in College, but had
+lodgings, first in Rose Crescent, and afterwards opposite the Bull
+Hotel.]
+
+[Footnote 28: Its line was determined by the distant spire of Coton
+Church which for two centuries closed the vista. (It is now hidden by
+these trees.) A current witticism was that the view symbolised a
+Trinity Fellowship--a long, straight-forward prospect, closed by a
+village church. Till the year 1878 every Fellow had to become a Priest
+of the Established Church within seven years, on pain of forfeiting
+his Fellowship. After this he was a Fellow for life, unless he
+married. And each Fellow in turn had a right to any College living
+that fell vacant. All this is altered now. Fellows are elected
+unconditionally for a limited period (which may be renewed), and
+College livings are assigned to the best men to be had, whether of
+Trinity or not.]
+
+[Footnote 29: A cycloid is the curve described by any single point on
+the rim of a rolling wheel.]
+
+We have here in front of us the New Court of St. John's College, seen
+across its lawn-tennis grounds; while to our left is the magnificent
+range of horse-chestnuts along the boundary of the two Colleges.
+Splendid at all times, these are seen at their very best when duly
+touched by frost. To our right rises the fine mass of Trinity Library,
+built by Sir Christopher Wren in 1675; whose walls of warm-coloured
+stone have been already dwelt upon. The lower portion of the building
+forms an open cloister, with grated windows and gates barring it from
+the Backs where we stand.
+
+Through one of these gates our path leads us, and we find ourselves
+within the College, and at the door of the Library. At certain hours,
+usually between three and four in the afternoon, this is open to
+visitors; at others the escort of a Member of the College is needed.
+Of all the College Libraries in Cambridge this is the most interesting
+in its miscellaneous contents. Mounting the wide stone stair-way, we
+enter the long, wide, lofty, vaulted gallery, with a series of wooden
+book-cases projecting from either wall all along its course. The
+carved wreaths of flowers and leaves and fruitage which adorn these
+cases deserve careful notice. They are by Grinling Gibbons, probably
+the most wonderful wood carver who ever lived, and their intricacies
+bear striking testimony to his almost superhuman skill. In the
+recesses between the cases are to be seen sundry curios, from the
+College estates and other sources, while more are to be found in the
+long ranges of glass-covered tables topping the smaller book-shelves
+which line either side of the central passage way. Roman and
+Anglo-Saxon antiquities, and a splendid series of coins and medals,
+are here exhibited. Amongst the miscellaneous curios are a model of
+Cæsar's famous bridge across the Rhine and a globe of the planet Mars.
+
+What will, however, first catch our eye on entering, will be the
+window at the southern end of the room, with its painted glass so
+unlike anything to be seen elsewhere. It is, in fact, unique, having
+been made in the middle of the eighteenth century by the discoverer of
+this particular method of staining glass, who kept the process
+secret--a secret which died with him and has never been recovered. The
+window cannot be called artistically beautiful, and the subject is
+weird. The University of Cambridge, represented as a lady in a
+somewhat scanty robe of yellow, is presenting Sir Isaac Newton to King
+George the Third (who did not come to the Throne till 1760, many years
+after the great philosopher died), while the transaction is being
+recorded by Francis Bacon Lord Verulam of Elizabethan fame!
+
+Beneath this window is Thorwaldsen's fine marble statue of Lord Byron,
+one of Trinity's greatest poets. This was originally intended for
+Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey, but the Dean and Chapter of the
+period so strongly disapproved of Byron's morality that they refused
+it a place there. Apart from his poetical genius, he as little
+deserved to be honoured in Trinity library; for, as an undergraduate,
+he not only accomplished the apparently impossible feat of climbing by
+night to the roof (which others have more than once done since)[30]
+but abominably disfigured the statues upon it, in which he has had,
+happily, no imitators. Other relics of him are preserved hard by,
+which are supposed to bear upon the thrilling question as to how far
+he had or had not a club foot.[31]
+
+[Footnote 30: Nocturnal exploration of the College roofs has been so
+favourite an amusement amongst undergraduates that not long ago a book
+was actually published entitled _The Roof-Climber's Guide to Trinity
+College_. Every eminence in the College has been scaled, save only the
+Great Gate Tower. The Hon. C. S. Rolls, who was afterwards the first
+man to fly from England to France and back, and who fell a martyr to
+his zeal for aviation, was, in his day, the most daring and systematic
+of all Trinity roof-climbers.]
+
+[Footnote 31: Byron himself was morbidly sensitive on this point. Mr.
+Clark (_Guide to Cambridge_, p. 140) tells how he abused a friend who
+fell behind out of courtesy: "Ah! I see you wish to spy out my
+deformity." He was in residence 1805-8.]
+
+For these few will care; but this end of the library contains things
+which few can fail to care about. Here is the death-mask of Sir Isaac
+Newton, and a reflecting telescope, on the model invented by him. Here
+is Thackeray's manuscript of "Esmond," and Tennyson's manuscript of
+"In Memoriam." Here is Milton's manuscript of "Lycidas," and his first
+design for "Paradise Lost," all cut and scored about with alterations
+and corrections, showing that he originally designed his great poem to
+be a drama, the characters of which (headed by Moses) are here listed.
+Here, too, is a copy of the "Solemn League and Covenant" imposed on
+all men by the Puritans at the time of the Great Rebellion.[32] This
+was found hidden amongst the rafters of a village church near
+Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 32: This instrument bound its subscribers to zealous
+endeavour, far from any "detestable indifference and neutrality," for
+the "extirpation of Popery, Prelacy, ... Archbishops, Bishops, Deans,
+Chapters, Archdeacons, and all that Hierarchy." Every adult in the
+kingdom had to sign this very thoroughgoing test, on pain of
+imprisonment.]
+
+And here is a copy of the famous Indulgence sold by Tetzel, Luther's
+denunciation of which gave the signal for the earliest outburst of
+Protestantism at the Reformation. When the crabbed old printing is
+deciphered it proves to be a startlingly mild document, no licence to
+commit sin, as is generally supposed, but merely granting to the
+purchaser the privilege of confessing, once in his life, to a priest
+of his own choice instead of to the parson in whose parish he dwelt.
+The priest so chosen is given authority to absolve from nearly all
+sins, but not from the heinous offence of buying alum from anyone
+except the Pope, in whose territory it had, at that date (1515), been
+recently discovered. Alum was in those days a most valuable substance,
+and had hitherto been attainable only at the Turkish town of Roc, in
+Syria, whence the name of "rock alum" still surviving in use amongst
+pharmacopoeists. To buy it there was not only to take money out of the
+pocket of the Pope, but to put it into those of the enemies of
+Christendom. Hence the heinousness of the offence.
+
+Trinity library forms the western side of one of the Courts of the
+College, known as "Nevile's Court" (from Dr. Thomas Nevile, Master at
+the close of the sixteenth century, who planned and began it in 1610),
+and also as "Cloister Court," from the wide cloisters which surround
+it on the north, south, and west. The eastern side is formed by the
+Hall, raised four feet above the ground level, and reached by a
+beautiful balustraded and terraced staircase of stone. It is the
+finest college hall in either university, and was also the work of
+Nevile.
+
+In the northern cloister which leads us to it, there are sundry points
+not to be overlooked. As we look along it from the library entrance we
+perceive at the far end a door with a stalwart iron knocker. Now there
+is a fine echo in this cloister, and a stamp of the foot at our end
+will evoke a sound from the door precisely like that of a knocker. So
+great a part does illusion play in human impressions, that five people
+out of six, when they hear this sound, are ready to declare that they
+have seen the knocker actually move. It was by timing this echo, we
+may mention, that Sir Isaac Newton first measured the velocity of
+sound. The echoing properties of these cloisters are referred to by
+Tennyson in the "Princess":
+
+  "our cloisters echoed frosty feet."
+
+The massive block which pillars the angle of the cloister is known as
+the "Freshman's Pillar"; a favourite old-time amusement of the junior
+students (not yet wholly disremembered) having been to traverse the
+very narrow base-top right round, without setting foot to the ground.
+In old times, indeed until the last quarter of the nineteenth century,
+these cloisters played a notable part in undergraduate life. Athletic
+pursuits were far less general than now, and exercise was largely
+pedestrian. On a wet day, accordingly, when the roads were uninviting,
+the cloisters used to be crowded with a veritable swarm of trampers,
+doing "quarter-deck" from end to end of the three covered sides of the
+court.
+
+[Illustration: _Clare College from Bridge._]
+
+The stair-case entrances here lead to specially delightsome sets of
+rooms, with oak panels and beautiful plaster ceilings. One of these
+was occupied by the late Duke of Clarence, when, as "Prince Edward,"
+he was an undergraduate of Trinity, mingling freely with the college
+life around him, and making himself generally beloved by his simple
+unaffected pleasantness.[33] His royal father, when Prince of Wales,
+was also an undergraduate of Trinity; but Court etiquette was stricter
+in those days, and, instead of being in College, he was quartered at
+Madingley Hall, four miles away. A few months after his wedding, in
+June, 1864, he brought his beautiful bride to visit Cambridge and take
+all hearts by storm. In their honour the whole area of Nevile's Court
+was tented in and floored over and made into one vast ball-room, which
+included the cloisters and the hall stairway. The former were used for
+promenading, all the best settees and arm-chairs to be found in
+College being commandeered to be placed in them; the Hall served for
+supper; while the band was housed beneath the Library. All was
+beautifully decorated and lighted (though it was before the days even
+of paraffin lamps), and the whole scene was one of unforgettable
+brilliance.[34] The cost was, naturally, something portentous; but
+those were the times of academic prosperity, before the great
+agricultural depression of the following decade brought down rents,
+and with them college incomes, almost (sometimes altogether) from
+pounds to shillings.[35]
+
+[Footnote 33: These same rooms (on the south-westernmost staircase)
+were probably those occupied by Lord Byron.]
+
+[Footnote 34: The entrance was from the New Court, which communicates
+with Nevile's Court by an arcade in the southern cloister of the
+latter.]
+
+[Footnote 35: All the Colleges have thus suffered severely; King's
+being hit hardest of all. Trinity was less seriously affected, owing
+to the fact that much of its land lies in the North of England.]
+
+The beautiful rooms of Nevile's Court are mostly held by Fellows of
+the College whose names may be known in the doorway lists by the "Mr."
+prefixed to them. Over one doorway we see a small bronze bust, set up
+as a memorial to Mr. Goodhart who once "kept" there and was an object
+of special admiration to all who knew him. He was, in fact, a kind of
+Admirable Crichton; not only a man of great intellectual power (as
+Fellows of Trinity must needs be, for these fellowships are the "blue
+riband" of the University), but excellent at all athletic pursuits,
+and able to do successfully whatever thing he set his hand to. It is
+recorded that on one occasion a bet was laid that he could not make
+himself an entire suit of clothes, and wear them for a month without
+their amateur origin being detected. Goodhart won the bet.
+
+Beautiful as Nevile's Court is, it was originally yet more beautiful,
+with transomed windows, and gabled dormers instead of the present
+eighteenth century parapet. These are shown in a view "after Logan,"
+given by Atkinson,[36] from the terrace before the Hall, by which we
+leave the court, passing through a low and massive wicket gate of
+black oak. This admits us into the "screens," a short and narrow
+passage having the Hall on one side, and, on the other, the kitchen
+and the Buttery. This last word has no connection with butter (though
+butter is here issued), but is derived from _butler_, as being the
+place where the ale for the hall dinners is served out. Its door, as
+is universal in such places, is a "hatch," the upper and lower halves
+of the door opening independently, and a broad sill on the top of the
+latter forming a sort of counter across which the business of the
+place is transacted. Of old the buttery served as an office, where
+much of the clerical work of the College was done; but this branch of
+its usefulness is now transferred to a special department.
+
+[Footnote 36: _Cambridge Described_, p. 444.]
+
+When each College brewed its own ale and baked its own bread, as was
+the case till some half-century ago, the Buttery was a really
+important place. Even now the daily ration of bread and butter to
+which each Collegian in residence has a right, is here booked to him.
+This ration is called his "Commons." If for any approved reason he
+does not desire to draw it in any given week he is said to be "out of
+Commons"; and if, as sometimes happens, he is deprived of the right
+for misconduct, he is said to be "discommonsed" for such or such a
+period. (The equivalent phrase at Oxford is "to be crossed at the
+Buttery.") The Buttery officials also have charge of the adjoining
+strong-room in which the magnificent store of the College plate is
+secured; mighty salvers and bowls and "grace-cups,"[37] besides
+dishes, and the hundreds of spoons and forks, all the gifts of
+benefactor after benefactor since the College was first founded. A
+visitor may sometimes be fortunate enough to get a sight of these
+resplendent piles.
+
+[Footnote 37: A "Grace-cup" is a large silver tankard which at College
+feasts is solemnly passed down the High Table, each guest in turn
+standing up to drink it. Three, indeed, must always be so standing,
+the drinker, the last man, and the next man; whence the cup has
+sometimes three handles. At each potation the three concerned formally
+bow to each other.]
+
+A sight of the kitchen, which adjoins the Buttery, can almost always
+be had, and is worth having; though the glory of the place has largely
+departed with the substitution of gas stoves for the old open ranges,
+six feet high and twelve feet long, before which scores of joints and
+fowls might be seen simultaneously twisting on huge spits. If less
+picturesque, the cooking is now more scientific, and the kitchen is a
+splendid chamber, the finest of all College kitchens, with an open
+pitched roof, and an oriel window, having been traditionally the
+ancient Hall of Michaelhouse. The walls are adorned with the shells of
+turtles, emblazoned with the dates of the great occasions on which
+they were immolated for soup. It is not only the dinners in Hall which
+are here cooked. Members of the College may order dishes to be sent to
+their own rooms, in reason; though any very extra expenditure in this
+respect would need to be authorised by your Tutor. This extraneous
+fare may constantly be seen being carried about the Courts, in large
+flat blue boxes, on the heads of the kitchen servants.
+
+The doors of the Hall may usually be found open, or a request at the
+Buttery may open them; though there is a certain amount of luck in the
+matter, as the Hall is not only used for meals but for College
+examinations also, which, of course, must not be disturbed by
+intruders. A common lunch is served during Full Term, from 12 till 2,
+at which such as list sit where they will, Dons and undergraduates,
+cheek by jowl. The three daily dinners which the size of the College
+makes necessary are more formal affairs, especially the latest at
+7.45, which the authorities of the College attend, sitting at the two
+High Tables on the dais, and faring more sumptuously than the students
+in the body of the Hall. Of these only the "Senior Sophs"[38] may be
+present, the "Junior Sophs" and Freshmen being relegated to the
+earlier hours. The westernmost range of tables is sacred to Bachelors
+of Arts and to the Scholars of the College. The rest may sit where
+they please at the remaining tables, and diners may enter and leave at
+their pleasure during the meal, but any course missed by lateness is
+missed for good. Ordinary morning dress is worn, except on special
+Feasts. Conversation may be freely indulged in, though it hardly,
+nowadays, rises to the height of Tennyson's heroic phrase in "In
+Memoriam," "the thunder of the Halls." The Master of the College
+himself does not dine in Hall except at great Feasts, but in his own
+adjacent Lodge, to the north, which communicates directly with the
+Hall by a door in the panelling between, and also by a sliding panel
+above, whence he (and his ladies) can, unobserved, overlook, and more
+or less overhear, what passes.
+
+[Footnote 38: For the first year of his residence the student is
+called a Freshman, in the next he is a "Junior Soph," and in the third
+a "Senior Soph." The origin of the word "Soph" is doubtful. It is
+presumably short for Sophist; but all Americans will recognise it as
+the origin of their "Sophomore." And American University nomenclature
+is largely derived from Cambridge. The word, however, has of late gone
+out of general use, and practically survives scarcely anywhere but in
+Trinity.]
+
+The high-pitched roof with its elaborate beams is copied, as are the
+other features (and the dimensions) of the Hall, from the Hall of the
+Middle Temple in London. Its ridge is broken in the centre by a
+"Lantern," or small openwork spire of wood (the openings being now
+glazed). This once served as a ventilating shaft, through which might
+escape the fumes of the great brazier (a yard in depth and two yards
+across) standing beneath it, and, till this generation, the only means
+used to warm the Hall. Over the doors is a "Music Gallery," usually
+closed in by quaintly carved shutters, whence, on Feast days, the
+College Choristers still discourse melody. The armorial bearings in
+the windows are those of eminent members of the College; while
+pictures of its more prominent Worthies (or Unworthies) hang on the
+walls. Conspicuous amongst these is Holbein's great portrait of Henry
+the Eighth, who stands "straddled over the whole breadth of the way,"
+above the centre of the High Table, in all his underbred
+self-assertion, looking indeed "all our fancy painted him." His
+unhappy daughter Mary (who built the College Chapel) hangs near him,
+her full dourness and wretchedness in her face. Thackeray (a
+singularly powerful presentation) is also here, so is Clerk-Maxwell,
+so is Bishop Lightfoot, and many another light of literature, science,
+and theology; for the great size of Trinity has given it as great a
+proportion in the rolls of Fame.
+
+On the other side of the Screens, in the "Combination Room," whither
+the High Table adjourns for dessert, may be seen other famous Trinity
+men, the most conspicuous being the celebrated Marquis of Granby,
+standing by his war-horse, with the bare bald head which won him his
+renown. He was in the act of charging the enemy[39] at the head of his
+regiment when the wind of a cannon ball carried away his hat and wig;
+and he did _not_ halt his soldiery that they might be picked up. This
+unexampled pitch of heroism awoke the wildest enthusiasm throughout
+the length and breadth of England and made "The Marquis of Granby," as
+readers of Pickwick will remember, a favourite sign for inns
+throughout many years. Entrance to the Combination Room is only
+obtained through favour. There is little else to notice in it except
+the beautiful polish of the mahogany tables.
+
+[Footnote 39: At the battle of Minden, 1759.]
+
+In the Screens are posted up the current College Notices--the hours
+and subjects of the lectures, the dates and results of the College
+examinations,[40] and the various tutorial admonishments of the Term.
+There is usually only one Tutor in a College, but the great size of
+Trinity requires the services of four; each being responsible for his
+own "Side," as it is called, consisting of some 150 students, to whom
+he is supposed (and the supposition is no unfounded one) to be "guide,
+philosopher, and friend," keeping a wise eye to their progress, moral,
+social, and intellectual.
+
+[Footnote 40: Besides the University Examinations needed to obtain a
+Degree, every College keeps its students up to the mark by extra
+examinations of its own, held usually twice a year. There are also
+competitive examinations for the College Scholarships, and (at
+Trinity) for the Fellowships. About seventy per cent. of Trinity
+students are "Honour men"; reading, not for the ordinary (or "Poll")
+Degree, but for one or other of the various Triposes. And of these
+"Honour" candidates of Trinity, over thirty per cent. attain a First
+Class; which is thus gained by nearly twenty-five per cent. of Trinity
+students, the highest College average in the University.]
+
+[Illustration: _Trinity Bridge._]
+
+Passing through the eastern doorway of the Screens we meet what is
+perhaps the most ideal academic view in the world. From our feet
+descends a semicircular stairway with steps of worn stone leading down
+to a vast enclosure of greensward, surrounded and traversed by broad
+walks of flags and pebbles, and enclosed on all sides by venerable
+Collegiate buildings with battlemented parapets. These buildings are
+not very lofty; which makes the court look even larger than it is, and
+gives the greater effect to the three grand gate towers, one of which
+adorns each of the three sides before us. In the midst of the Court
+(which is not far from square but delightfully irregular in shape)
+rises the inspired gracefulness of the fountain--with its octagonal
+base of broad steps (surrounded by bright flowerbeds) and its
+crocketed canopy upborne upon slender pillars with beautifully
+proportioned arches.[41] The whole is a veritable miracle of design,
+and would hold its own with any fountain even in Italy. It is, indeed,
+the work of Italian craftsmen of the best period,[42] brought over
+specially by Dr. Nevile, to whose genius we owe this most splendid of
+all College quadrangles, the "Old Court" (sometimes called the "Great
+Court") of Trinity.
+
+[Footnote 41: The water is from an ancient conduit made originally to
+supply the Franciscan Convent, and comes from a spring some two miles
+to the west. Till recently this was the only supply for Trinity, and
+(by a charitable tap outside the Great Gate) for many neighbours also.
+Now it is supplemented by an artesian well behind the chapel, bored to
+a depth of 120 feet into the Greensand.]
+
+[Footnote 42: These same craftsmen probably made the beautiful
+ceilings in the Combination Room at St. John's College (which is
+copied from that in one of the rooms in this Court), and in the
+University Library.]
+
+To appreciate the greatness of this debt, we must bear in mind that,
+when he became Master of the College, Nevile found the ground occupied
+by heterogeneous ranges of old buildings, the remains of the
+suppressed Colleges and Hostels, running chaotically in all sorts of
+directions. These are shown in the earliest map of Cambridge,[43] made
+in 1592, just before he began his great work of pulling down, setting
+back, building and rebuilding. He thus remodelled almost the whole;
+the Chapel alone (built fifty years earlier) and the great eastern
+gate-tower remaining as they were before his reconstructions. In
+reality this Court, far more than the Cloister Court, deserves to be
+called by his name, and to remind us of his motto _Ne vile velis_
+("Nothing cheap and nasty").
+
+[Footnote 43: See _Cambridge Described_, p. 443.]
+
+Since his day, indeed, surprisingly little alteration has been made.
+Plaster has been put on (and stripped off) here and there, stonework
+has been touched up, the Master's Lodge has been altered and
+re-altered, but the only radical change has been in the south-west
+corner beyond the Hall, which was rebuilt in 1775, with results as
+artistically deplorable as may well be, especially in comparison with
+the older work. Nevile had left in this corner a beautiful oriel
+window, still to be seen in Logan's view of the College (1680).
+
+Of the three gate towers only one is of Nevile's own building, that on
+the southern side of the Court, known as the Queen's Gate from the
+statue of Anne of Denmark, the Queen Consort of James the First,
+which stands above its inner archway. The gate of this tower is used
+only on occasions. The other two both belonged to King's Hall; the
+eastern being still in its original place, the northern, which
+formerly aligned with it, having been moved back by Nevile to align
+with the Chapel. Both set forth the glories of Edward the Third; the
+former displaying over its entrance gate the armorial bearings of his
+seven sons, while over the archway of the latter he stands himself,
+with his three crowns (of England, France and Scotland) spitted on the
+long naked sword which he holds erect in front of him, and the proud
+motto "_Fama super æthera notus_" ("Known by Fame beyond the skies").
+From his like niche in the eastern tower he has been displaced by
+Henry the Eighth. The statues on the inside of this tower are James
+the First, with his wife and son (afterwards Charles the First).
+
+The northern tower is commonly known as the Clock Tower; being the
+dwelling place of the famous timepiece referred to by Wordsworth in
+the "Prelude" as breaking the silence of his rooms at St. John's
+College, which were not many yards away:
+
+  "Near me hung Trinity's loquacious clock,
+   Who never let the quarters, night or day,
+   Slip by him unproclaimed, and told the hours
+   Twice over, with a male and female voice."
+
+The clock actually does repeat the hour, striking it first on the
+biggest of the three bells in the tower, whose note is A flat, and
+then on the second, E flat, a fifth above. The quarters are notified
+by two, four, six and eight strokes respectively on the first and
+second bells, F and E flat, a tone apart.[44]
+
+[Footnote 44: Both clock and bells are due to Dr. Bentley, the famous
+Master who bullied the College into so many happy and undesired
+expenses during his tenure of office (1700-1742). The repeating is
+solely for convenience; one often fails to note the first stroke or
+two of an hour.]
+
+To complete the round of the Court outside the grass-plots while
+midnight strikes is a favourite test of running powers amongst the
+Undergraduates. It is a fairly severe one; for the distance is 383
+yards, with four sharp corners to negotiate, on somewhat pronounced
+pebbling, and the time occupied by the 32 strokes (8 for the 4
+quarters and a double 12 for the hour) is only 43 seconds. An easier
+performance is to make a standing jump from top to bottom of the
+steps before the Hall; this is chiefly a trial of nerve. There are 8
+steps, each 6 inches high and 15 wide, so that the drop is only 4 feet
+and the distance under 10; but it is a fearsome thought, looking down,
+to contemplate the result should one's heel catch on a step. To jump
+clear _up_ the flight is a real feat, which only two men are known to
+have accomplished: even with the preliminary run which is possible
+below though not above the stairway.
+
+On our way through the Court towards the Chapel, we have on our left
+hand the Master's Lodge, the front of which is an exceptionally happy
+piece of early Victorian restoration. A poor classical façade had
+(under Bentley) replaced Nevile's original front. But this front was
+still to be seen in Logan's print, and was thus (in 1842)
+reconstructed with little alteration. The Lodge contains splendid
+reception rooms, worthy of a palace. The Chapel, though by no means of
+the first rank as regards artistic beauty, is well worth seeing, for
+it contains what high authorities consider the very finest statue ever
+made since the palmy days of Greek art, Roubillac's wonderful
+presentation of Sir Isaac Newton.[45] There he stands at the west end
+of the Chapel, prism in hand, the king of all scientists, gazing with
+rapt eyes into Infinity, and a smile full of hope and illumination
+upon his lips.[46] The story goes that the expression on these lips
+did not wholly satisfy the sculptor at his first sight of his creation
+on its pedestal, and that he climbed up, then and there, chisel in
+hand, to give the effect he desired with a few exquisitely directed
+blows.
+
+[Footnote 45: This was given to the College in 1755 by the then
+Master, Dr. Robert Smith.]
+
+[Footnote 46: Wordsworth in "The Prelude" tells us how he loved
+
+  "The antechapel, where the statue stood
+   Of Newton, with his prism and silent face,
+   The marble index of a mind for ever
+   Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone."]
+
+Other heroic figures are grouped around, Francis Bacon, (Tennyson's
+
+       "Large-browed Verulam
+  The first of those that know,")
+
+[Illustration: _The Fountain, Trinity College._]
+
+Tennyson himself, Macaulay, Dr. Barrow, the Master to whom the
+College owes its Library,[47] and the massive virility of his
+omniscient successor, Dr. Whewell.[48] Brasses affixed to the walls
+commemorate many another great inmate of the College, who, "having
+served his own generation according to the will of God," is here laid
+to rest:
+
+  "Trinity's full tide of life flooding o'er him
+   Morning and evening as he lies dead."
+
+[Footnote 47: Barrow's great wish was that the University should build
+a theatre (like the Sheldonian at Oxford), instead of having its
+dramas performed, as they then were, in the University Church. When
+the Senate boggled at the expense, he declared that Trinity should
+shame them by erecting unaided a yet finer building than he proposed,
+and "that very afternoon" himself staked out the foundations of the
+Library. (_Clark's Guide_, p. 123.)]
+
+[Footnote 48: Of the astonishingly wide sweep of Whewell's knowledge
+many tales are yet told. There was no subject on which he could not
+talk with authority. It is related how an impertinent Fellow once
+hoped to puzzle him by getting up an article on Chinese music in a
+back number of the _Edinburgh Review_, and introducing the subject in
+Hall. "Ah," replied Whewell, "it is a long time since I thought of
+that. But you will find an article of mine about it in the
+_Edinburgh_, some ten or fifteen years ago."]
+
+These lines were written to commemorate Dr. Thompson, the late Master
+(renowned for his sarcastic humour), and refer to the fact that
+undergraduates are expected to put in every week a certain number of
+attendances at the morning and evening Services held daily in the
+Chapel.[49] This obligation is now very leniently construed by the
+Senior and Junior "Deans," under whose cognisance offences against it
+come; but not so very long ago it was exceedingly strict, and the
+Chapel Lists, on which the attendances were recorded, were objects of
+real dread to the slothful. In 1838 the Senior Fellows (then the
+Governing Body of the College),[50] decreed that every student must be
+present twice on Sunday and once on every other day of the week. This
+ukase brought about something like a rebellion. A secret "Society for
+the Prevention of Cruelty to Undergraduates" was formed, and avenged
+their wrongs by publishing every week regular lists exposing the far
+from adequate attendance of the Senior Fellows themselves (Thompson
+being one), to the intense annoyance of these dignitaries. Finally,
+they actually had the assurance to give a prize to the Fellow who had
+been most regular, Mr. Perry, who afterwards became the first Bishop
+of Melbourne, and who cherished the Bible thus won to the end of his
+life. The Society kept their secret for a whole Term, and, when
+finally discovered, were able to escape punishment by promising that
+the publication of their Lists, which made the Seniors the weekly
+laughing-stock of the University, should be brought to an end.
+
+[Footnote 49: On Sundays and Festivals all wear surplices, and the
+throng then presents a very striking appearance. It suggested
+Tennyson's vision of "Six hundred maidens clad in purest white," in
+"The Princess."]
+
+[Footnote 50: This is now the College Council, consisting of the
+Master, the Tutors, and other Members elected for a certain period.]
+
+All these statues and memorials are in the Ante-Chapel, which is
+separated from the Chapel proper, as at King's, by the screen on which
+stands the great organ. This organ is the largest and best-toned in
+Cambridge,[51] but it is far from being as effective as the King's
+organ, to which the magnificent acoustic properties of its Chapel lend
+so wondrous a power. In Trinity there is always the sensation that the
+harmonies are boxed in; indeed the shape of the Chapel does very much
+suggest a box. In justice, however, to its designers, it must be
+remembered that the box-like effect would be very much lessened by the
+east and west windows with which it was originally provided. The
+latter was closed by Nevile's putting back the clock tower to abut
+upon it; the former still exists, as may be seen from the outside, but
+is utterly shut off from the interior by a huge and far from beautiful
+baldachino erected (not at his own cost but at that of the
+impoverished Fellows) by Dr. Bentley. This famous scholar was one of
+the few unpleasant Masters with whom the Crown (in which is here
+vested the right, usually belonging to the Fellows, of appointing the
+Head of the College) ever saddled Trinity. He passed his whole time as
+Head in one long unceasing quarrel with his College. To begin with, he
+was unpopular as being a member of the adjoining Foundation of St.
+John's, between which and Trinity there existed an age-long rivalry.
+Not many years before something like open war had been levied between
+the Colleges on the occasion of a Trinity merry-making, the Johnian
+onlookers being attacked with burning torches and using swords in
+their defence; while an attempt which they made to rush the great
+gates was beaten off by showers of stones and brickbats which had
+been stored to that end on the roof of the Gate Tower.
+
+[Footnote 51: It was made early in the eighteenth century by the
+celebrated Father Smith, an organ-builder of world-wide fame.]
+
+St. John's was at this time the largest College, and despised Trinity;
+a sentiment which Bentley, who was a born bully,[52] expressed with
+the utmost frankness, publicly calling the Fellows "asses," "dogs,"
+"fools," "sots," and other scurrilous names, as they piteously set
+forth in their complaints to their Visitor,[53] the Bishop of Ely.
+Finally he was degraded by the Senate,[54] and reduced to the status
+of "a bare Harry-Soph," as a contemporary diarist (quoted by Mr.
+Clark)[55] puts it. But no Master, except Nevile and Barrow, has left
+so enduring a mark upon the College; for the ruinous expenditure into
+which he dragooned the unhappy Fellows has given the Chapel not only
+the baldachino, but the stalls, the panelling, and the organ; to say
+nothing of the clock, and the splendid oak staircase in the Lodge.
+
+[Footnote 52: By his arrogance Bentley incurred the undying hatred of
+Pope, who denounces him in the "Dunciad" as boasting himself (in
+addressing Dullness)
+
+  "Thy mighty Scholiast, whose unwearied pains
+   Made Horace dull, and humbled Milton's strains;
+   Turn what they will to verse, their toil is vain;
+   Critics like me shall make it prose again."]
+
+[Footnote 53: To every College is attached some high-placed personage
+as Visitor, with a vague, but by no means unreal, power of
+interference when appealed to. Bentley was only saved from deposition
+by the sudden death of the Visitor.]
+
+[Footnote 54: The Senate is the general assembly of Masters of Arts,
+which is the supreme University authority.]
+
+[Footnote 55: _Guide to Cambridge_, p. 129. The meaning of the curious
+word "Harry-Soph" is apparently equivalent to a student unequal to a
+Degree. Bentley was deprived of all his Degrees.]
+
+The profuse gilding and painting which enriches walls and roof in the
+Chapel is due to a restoration some forty years ago, when the outside
+was also faced with stone, and the windows filled with stained glass,
+commemorating ecclesiastical and other celebrities throughout all the
+Christian centuries. The Apostles appear in the most easterly windows
+on either side; whence the series progresses in chronological order
+westwards. The figures are for the most part powerfully drawn, and
+should be examined through an opera glass to appreciate their wealth
+of detail. We can thus see that Hildebrand has driven his crosier
+through the eagles of the Imperial Crown, that Dante, Matthew Paris,
+and Roger Bacon, hold in their hands copies of their own greatest
+works, that Giotto is studying an elevation of his Campanile; while
+noted church-builders, like St. Hugh of Lincoln and William of
+Wykeham, carry models of their edifices. The hapless Mary Tudor holds
+one of this very Chapel, of which she was the Foundress. It is
+appropriate that the beautiful silver cross over the Altar should be
+Spanish work of her date, though only placed there a few years ago by
+the generosity of some members of the College who met with it while
+travelling in Spain. It was originally a processional cross, and has
+been adapted for its new purpose with artistic skill of the first
+order.
+
+When we leave the Chapel, and proceed towards the Great Gate, we are
+treading on classic ground. For it was along this flagged path that
+Macaulay, while at Trinity, used to take his daily exercise, pacing
+assiduously up and down, always the while devouring some author, whose
+pages he turned over with incredible rapidity, and at the same pace
+whether they were filled with the weightiest thought or the lightest
+fancy. Yet whether the book were profound philosophy or exquisite
+poetry or the trashiest of rhyme and fiction, he was ever afterwards
+able to recall its whole scheme and even to quote lengthy portions of
+it verbatim. His rooms were in the staircase facing us--the set on the
+ground-floor to the left of the entrance. This particular staircase
+has been the home of more great men than any other in the University.
+The ground-floor rooms opposite Macaulay's were those of
+Thackeray,[56] and the set above Thackeray's are hallowed as the
+habitation of Sir Isaac Newton: for whom the College built an
+observatory on the roof of the Gate Tower, and who also had the use of
+a small bit of ground which we see outside the gate, now a railed-in
+lawn, but then a pretty little garden, as Logan's view shows, with
+trees and flower-beds, surrounded by a high wall.
+
+[Footnote 56: Readers of _Esmond_ will remember that Thackeray
+quarters that hero on this same staircase, "close by the gate, and
+near to the famous Mr. Newton's lodgings." Thackeray was in residence
+1829-31, Macaulay 1818-24, Newton 1662-1717.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+     Whewell's Courts.--All Saints' Cross.--The Jewry.--Divinity
+     School.--=St. John's College=, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+     Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+     Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second Court,
+     Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New Court,
+     Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness.--=Caius College=, Gonville,
+     The Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues."--=Senate House=,
+     Congregations, Vice-Chancellor, Voting,
+     Degree-giving.--=University Church=, Mr. Tripos, Golgotha,
+     Sermons, Tower, Chimes, Jowett.--Market Hill, Peasant Revolt, Wat
+     Tyler, Bucer and Fagius, Bonfires, Town and Gown.
+
+
+We are now outside the Great Gate of Trinity; but, across the street,
+in front of us, rises yet another gate belonging to the College, and
+leading into its two newest Courts, named from Dr. Whewell, who left
+this noble memorial of his Mastership.[57] Those who list to enter
+them will at once see why the first is popularly known as "the
+Spittoon," and the second as "the Billiard Table"; but there is little
+more to see or to say about them.
+
+[Footnote 57: Whewell was Master of Trinity from 1841 to 1866.]
+
+The slender and lofty stone cross to the north of these buildings
+marks the site of the ancient church of All Saints, which was pulled
+down in the middle of last century, to be rebuilt at the further
+extremity of its parish, opposite the entrance to Jesus College. Its
+earliest name (in the twelfth century) was "All Hallows in the Jewry";
+for Cambridge made good its claim to be amongst the larger towns of
+England by having, like the most of them, its Ghetto, or quarter (more
+or less sharply divided off from the rest), in which alone the Jews
+might reside. They were nowhere popular residents, for they were
+outside the pale of the Law (which refused to take cognisance of
+aliens in race and religion) and mere "chattels" of the Crown. This
+position, however ignominious, gave them special privileges as against
+their neighbours. They were too useful as financial assets to allow of
+their being murdered or robbed by anyone but their Royal owner
+himself; and, secure in his protection, they took small pains to
+conceal their contempt for their Christian neighbours, who retaliated
+by as much petty persecution as they dared, and, now and then, by a
+wholesale massacre. Finally matters became so strained that in the
+fourteenth century, under Richard the Second, the whole race of Israel
+were expelled from England, not to return till the days of Cromwell.
+They had originally come to our shores in the train of the Conqueror's
+army, thus conveniently enabling the Norman soldiers to turn their
+English loot into hard cash. Their quarter in Cambridge was the small
+triangular piece of ground between St. John's Street, Sidney Street,
+and All Saints' Passage.
+
+North again of All Saints' Cross we see the new red-brick walls and
+white stone dressings of the Divinity School, where the Professors of
+that subject hold their classes and lectures. Opposite to this rise
+the stately buildings of St. John's College. We may note how very near
+they approach to those of Trinity. These two great Foundations, so
+long holding undisputed pre-eminence in the University, are, in fact,
+nearer neighbours than any other two Colleges in Cambridge--nearer,
+even, than King's and Clare. The narrow lane that parts their
+respective buildings belongs to St. John's, and is bounded on the
+Trinity side only by a brick wall. This flimsy partition induced Dr.
+Bentley, when congratulated on becoming Master of Trinity, to reply,
+with characteristic infelicity, "By the help of my God, I have leapt
+over a wall." An unverified tradition hence arose that he had actually
+made his way into the College, on the Great Gate being shut against
+his entry, by a ladder applied to the wall of the Trinity Fellows'
+Bowling Green.[58] Keen as has been the age-long rivalry between
+Trinity and St. John's, they have been more closely connected than
+any other two Colleges; and no fewer than four times has a Johnian
+become Master of Trinity. The respective Founders were also closely
+connected; for St. John's was founded (earlier in her grandson's
+reign) by Lady Margaret Tudor, grandmother to Henry the Eighth.
+
+[Footnote 58: This Bowling Green lies to the west of Trinity Chapel,
+and is one of the choicest gems of Cambridge, a gracious, walled
+oblong of turf, with a wooded terrace overlooking the river at its
+western end, and at the east, the lately discovered fourteenth century
+front of the College Bursary, once forming part of King's Hall. The
+privilege of entering this Paradise can only be attained under the
+escort of a Fellow.]
+
+This noble lady is one of the choice characters of history. Her
+disposition, as depicted for us by the one who knew her best, her
+Confessor, the saintly Bishop Fisher, reads almost like an embodiment
+of St. Paul's encomium on Charity: "Bounteous she was, and liberal ...
+of singular easiness to be spoken unto ... of marvellous gentleness
+unto all folk ... unkind to no creature, nor forgetful of any kindness
+or service done to her (which is no little part of very nobleness).
+She was not vengeable nor cruel; but ready anon to forget and forgive
+injuries done unto her, at the least desire or motion made unto her
+for the same. Merciful also and piteous she was unto such as was
+grieved and wrongfully troubled, and to them that were in poverty or
+sickness or any other misery. To God and to the Church full obedient
+and tractable, searching His honour and pleasure full busily. A
+wareness of herself she had always, to eschew everything that might
+dishonour any noble woman.... All England for her death have cause of
+weeping."[59]
+
+[Footnote 59: The above quotation, as well as that which follows, is
+from the sermon preached by Fisher in Westminster Abbey at her burial.
+(I have modernised the spelling.)]
+
+[Illustration: _Trinity College Chapel and St. John's Gateway._]
+
+Lady Margaret was of Plantagenet stock, being great-granddaughter to
+"old John of Gaunt, time honoured Lancaster," and one of the
+legitimatised family of the Beauforts. Her first husband was the Welsh
+Earl Edmund Tudor, the father of her only child, Henry of Richmond,
+who afterwards succeeded to the throne of England as Henry the
+Seventh. After his death she twice married again; but none of her
+nuptials were of long continuance, and her true life was that of her
+widowhood, when she became famed as the Lady Bountiful of the Kingdom:
+"the mother of both the Universities; the very patroness of all the
+learned men of England;[60] the loving sister of all virtuous and
+devout persons; the comforter of all good Religious; the true
+defendress of all good priests and clerks; the mirror and example of
+honour to all noble men and women; the common mediatrice for all the
+common people of this realm.... Everyone that knew her loved her, and
+everything she said or did became her." Before her death she had
+endowed Preacherships and Professorships of Divinity (which still
+remain), both at Oxford and Cambridge, and had seen her first
+Collegiate Foundation, that of Christ's College, rise into full life.
+Her second and greater Foundation, St. John's College, she only lived
+to plan and to endow. When she died, on the 29th of June, 1509 (in the
+bright dawn of her grandson's reign and marriage--both alike destined
+to end in so miserable a tragedy), the buildings were not yet
+commenced.
+
+[Footnote 60: Amongst these we must count Erasmus; who composed the
+epitaph on her tomb.]
+
+She left their erection, however, in the best of hands. It was to her
+friend and counsellor, Bishop Fisher, who knew her so well, and
+appreciated her so dearly, that she committed the carrying out of her
+great design. He was markedly qualified for this purpose, not only by
+his connection with herself, but by special acquaintance with the
+spot. For in him we find yet another link between St. John's and
+Trinity. As Master of Michaelhouse,[61] some years earlier, he had
+been a close neighbour of the ancient Hospital of St. John, and had
+noted how far that venerable fraternity had outlived its usefulness.
+Originally a semi-monastic institution, founded in 1135, as a sort of
+alms-house for necessitous old men, the lack of any sufficient
+discipline had brought it to decay. The attempt made by Bishop Hugh de
+Balsham, in the century after its foundation, to leaven it with the
+scholars whom he afterwards transported to Peterhouse had proved a
+failure, and by the sixteenth century the few Brethren left were far
+from satisfactory in their ways.[62] Fisher, therefore, suggested to
+Lady Margaret to turn the Hospital into a College, under the same
+patronage, and after her death, set promptly to work to make the
+requisite alterations in the existing buildings.
+
+[Footnote 61: Michaelhouse was one of the constituent Colleges of
+Trinity.]
+
+[Footnote 62: We need not, however, take too literally the statement
+in the Instrument of Suppression, that but two ill-conducted Brethren
+remained. For, as Mr. Clark has shown, that Instrument was copied
+verbatim from the earlier one used for the turning of St. Radegund's
+Priory into Jesus College.]
+
+His first act was to enclose a Court, the Gate Tower of which should
+worthily commemorate the Foundress. In this his success was complete.
+The tower, which to this day forms the main entrance to the College,
+is a delightful example of what may be done in architecture by a
+skilful use of red brick. The quoining is of stone, and of stone also
+are the elaborate decorations. In the centre above the first
+string-course a richly-canopied niche contains the statue of St. John
+the Evangelist. Below this, and immediately above the gate, is to be
+seen Lady Margaret's shield, the three lions of England, quartered
+with the three lilies of France, within a bordure barred azure and
+argent, supported by the antelopes of the Beaufort family. On either
+side of both statue and shield appear the Plantagenet rose and the
+Tudor portcullis, each surmounted by an Imperial crown (just as we so
+constantly find them in King's College Chapel), and all round is
+sprinkled the Margaret flower, the daisy. The whole forms a beautiful
+piece of composition which makes us regret that more of Fisher's work
+is not left. All the First Court, indeed, is his, but it has been
+altered out of all knowledge. Now its chief feature is the soaring
+mid-Victorian chapel, the largest in Cambridge (except, of course,
+King's), the most pleasing view of which is to be gained from the
+Trinity Backs, where the tower, framed in foliage, exquisitely doubles
+itself on the surface of the river. This ambitious fabric was built by
+Sir Gilbert Scott in the 'sixties; and a line of cement on the lawn of
+the Court alone traces for us the foundations of Fisher's original
+Chapel.
+
+The Hall ranks in size and beauty next to that of Trinity. The most
+interesting of its portraits are those of Lady Margaret, Bishop
+Fisher, and the poet Wordsworth, who was a resident member of the
+College from 1787 to 1791. His rooms, as he tells in "The Prelude,"
+were in the south-western staircase of the "First Court," just above
+the kitchen:
+
+  "The Evangelist St. John my Patron was:
+   Three Gothic Courts are his, and in the first
+   Was my abiding-place, a nook obscure.
+   Right underneath, the College Kitchens made
+   A humming sound, less tuneable than bees,
+   But hardly less industrious, with shrill notes
+   Of sharp command and scolding intermixed."
+
+Wordsworth was not a very contented student. He shared the anarchical
+ideas then floating in the air, and soon to explode in the French
+Revolution. College discipline was eminently distasteful to him, and,
+above all, he detested the obligation to attend the Services in the
+College Chapel (which, indeed, were, in those days, conducted in far
+from ideal fashion).[63] In "The Prelude," he breaks out against them
+in unmeasured terms:
+
+  "Be Folly and False-seeming free to affect
+   Whatever formal gait of Discipline
+   Shall raise them highest in their own esteem:
+   Let them parade amongst the Schools at will,
+   But spare the House of God! Was ever known
+   The witless shepherd who persists to drive
+   A flock that thirsts not to a pool disliked?
+   A weight must surely hang on days begun
+   And ended with such mockery. Be wise,
+   Ye Presidents[64] and Deans, and to your bells
+   Give seasonable rest, for 'tis a sound
+   Hollow as ever vexed the tranquil air;
+   And your officious doings bring disgrace
+   On the plain steeples of our English Church,
+   Whose worship, 'mid remotest village trees
+   Suffers for this."
+
+[Footnote 63: There was no attempt at music, no organ even, anywhere
+save at King's, Trinity, and St. John's, and these three Colleges kept
+between them a choir of six "lay clerks" (elderly for the most part),
+who used to hurry from service to service, as did also the single
+organist employed! And this went on till 1842!]
+
+[Footnote 64: At St. John's, the title of President is given to the
+Vice-master of the College.]
+
+It is interesting to note that these sentiments are echoed, a year or
+two later, from Oxford, by Southey, then also in his youthful paroxysm
+of Revolutionary fervour. He lets himself go in his "Ode to the Chapel
+Bell":
+
+  "O how I hate the sound! It is the knell
+   That still a requiem tolls to Comfort's hour;
+   And loth am I, at Superstition's bell,
+   To quit, or Morpheus', or the Muse's bower.
+   Better to lie and doze than gape amain,
+   Hearing still mumbled o'er the same eternal strain,
+       *       *       *       *       *
+   The snuffling, snaffling Fellow's nasal tone,
+   And Romish rites retained, though Romish faith be flown."
+
+[Illustration: _Hall, St. John's College._]
+
+The Hall of St. John's was the scene of notable Christmas feasting in
+the good old days of academic prosperity. Daily, from Christmas to
+Twelfth Night, boars' heads, turkeys, gargantuan pasties, and cups of
+a peculiarly enticing composition, went the round of the board. After
+the fatal agricultural depression of the 'seventies these hospitable
+doings dwindled more and more, till now they are wholly of the past.
+
+From the Hall we can often obtain permission to ascend to the unique
+glory of St. John's College, the Combination Room, which is
+incomparably finer than any other apartment of the same kind, either
+at Oxford or Cambridge. It is a spacious panelled gallery, running
+east and west, nearly 100 feet in length, lighted by transomed
+windows[65] along the southern side, and with a richly decorated
+plaster ceiling, the work of the same Italian artists who erected the
+fountain in the Great Court of Trinity, just at the time when this
+room was in building. For here we have got beyond Lady Margaret's
+"First" Court. The Combination Room forms the north side of the
+"Second" Court, erected at the very end of the sixteenth century
+(simultaneously with the Great Court of Trinity) by another noble
+benefactress, Lady Mary Cavendish, Countess of Shrewsbury, whose coat
+of arms (Cavendish impaled with Talbot) stands over the western gate.
+
+[Footnote 65: In one of these windows should be noted a portrait of
+Henrietta Maria, the Queen of Charles the First, who was once
+entertained in this apartment.]
+
+This splendid benefaction was intended to be anonymous, as was also
+that which, in the "Third" Court, has given to St. John's yet another
+unique beauty, its exquisite Library, which (like the Combination
+Room) stands at the head, architecturally, of all College libraries,
+whether at Oxford or Cambridge. The benefactor in this case was Dr.
+John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln and Keeper of the Great Seal. His
+initials, as has been already mentioned, may be seen upon the outside
+of the western wall, beside the beautiful oriel window, overlooking
+the river, with which the room terminates, and his escutcheon hangs on
+the eastern wall, inside, over the door. For in his case, too, as in
+that of Lady Mary Cavendish, the secret leaked out before the work was
+finished, and in 1624 the letters I. L. C. S. (denoting Iohannes
+Lincolnensis Custos Sigilli) disclosed to passers-by the donor's
+identity.
+
+The original bookcases of dark oak still project from either wall.
+They have mostly been heightened to make room for more books, but the
+additional shelves have been added not above but at the bottom, so
+that the sloping desks of the old tops still remain, though too high
+to be used; but the pair nearest the door remain at their original
+height. In the panelled end of each shelf may be noticed a tiny
+folding door, which on being opened proves to contain the catalogue,
+in crabbed early seventeenth century writing, of the books which the
+shelf held when first filled. The Library, however, contains nothing
+of any very special interest, its most noteworthy exhibit being an
+edition de luxe of the "Great Bible" issued in 1540 by Royal authority
+under the auspices of Archbishop Cranmer. This was the first English
+Bible authorised to be read in churches, and a copy was ordered to be
+set up in every parish church throughout the realm; the object being
+that every man might have access to it, and read for his own
+edification. He was not, however, allowed to take it home with him,
+and it was usually chained to the reading-desk to prevent this. And,
+as yet, there was no provision for any reading of Scripture in public
+worship, beyond the Epistles and Gospels of the Mass, the "sense"
+(_i.e._ the English) of which each parish priest had long been bound
+to give his congregation every Sunday as best he might.
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Second Court of St. John's College._]
+
+This first Authorised Version was founded on the work of Miles
+Coverdale, published five years earlier, with a specially fulsome
+dedication to King Henry the Eighth, who, in consideration of his
+recent breach with the Papacy,[66] is described as "our Moses ... who
+hath brought us out ... from the cruel hands of our spiritual Pharao."
+In this edition (of which we have here a copy printed on vellum, and
+perhaps destined for the King's own hands) this idea is enlarged upon
+in a highly elaborated frontispiece. Henry sits, smiling imperially,
+in the middle of the page, distributing Bibles right and left to all
+sorts and conditions of men--bishops, clergy, monks, nobles, commons,
+artisans, husbandmen, and, notably, prisoners;--while out of every
+mouth proceeds a label bearing the universal acclamation "Vivat Rex,"
+the English equivalent of which, "God save the King," is first found
+in this Version.
+
+[Footnote 66: It need scarcely be pointed out that this breach was not
+made from any Protestant zeal, but only to enable the King to put away
+the wife he was tired of, and marry Anne Boleyn, which the Pope would
+not authorise.]
+
+The main approach to the Library is by a fine stone staircase in the
+north-western corner of the "Second Court;" but access is more
+generally obtained at present by an unpretending doorway in the middle
+of the northern side of the "Third Court." This door opens into the
+lower storey of the Library, which contains nothing of interest except
+a not very inspired statue of Wordsworth. Hence a circular iron stair
+leads up to the Library proper.
+
+The "three Gothic courts," mentioned in Wordsworth's "Prelude" as
+belonging to St. John's, sufficed the College till the reign of George
+the Fourth. When it was then determined to expand, the bold departure
+was taken of erecting the new buildings on the other side of the
+river. Never, before or since, has any other College, either at Oxford
+or Cambridge, done the like; and one could wish that the experiment
+had been made at a period when architecture was at a less debased
+level. It was the period which Sir Walter Scott, in the "Antiquary,"
+has in mind when he says "The Lord deliver me from this Gothic
+generation." But, of that period, the "New Court," as it is called, is
+a favourable specimen, most especially the grated[67] bridge
+connecting it with the main body of the College, which has a really
+graceful span. The idea of this structure was suggested by the Bridge
+of Sighs at Venice, and it is commonly known by that name, which
+provokes unkind comparisons. From it we get good views of the Library
+oriel to the north, and, on the other side, of the older bridge
+belonging to St. John's, three arches in the characteristic Johnian
+style of red brick with stone dressings, built at the end of the
+seventeenth century.
+
+[Footnote 67: The gratings are to prevent any nocturnal escape from
+College. Only one man is ever known to have "squeezed himself betwixt
+the bars."]
+
+The New Court has practically but one side, the ends being very
+slightly returned, running east and west, with a quasi-cupola in the
+centre, surrounded by pinnacles and surmounted by a gilded vane. It is
+hard to believe, but it is quite historical, that one morning (in the
+'sixties) this vane was found to be decked out in the brilliant
+scarlet "blazer"[68] of the College boat club, the perpetrator (who
+was never discovered) having actually scaled the roof by means of one
+of the water-pipes! And it was some time before the resources of
+civilisation in the hands of the College authorities availed to abate
+the outrage.
+
+[Footnote 68: This word, now used of all flannel sporting jackets,
+was, for several decades--till nearly 1880, in fact--confined to the
+fiery coats of the St. John's (or, officially, "Lady Margaret") Boat
+Club. When, about that date, the question of having a "universal
+blazer" was debated by the undergraduates, an elderly clergyman
+protested, in all shocked seriousness, against the "incendiary
+tendencies" of such a notion.]
+
+The New Court, on its southern side, is separated by a traceried
+cloister from the College Backs. On passing through the gate of this
+it is well to bear to the left and walk along the bank of the river,
+here overhung by magnificent elms, and affording a picturesque
+prospect of the Trinity buildings on the other side. The grounds of
+both Colleges to the west of the river are here divided up into a
+series of lawn-tennis courts, and are parted from each other by a
+broad ditch, which runs beneath the boughs of bowery horse-chestnut
+trees. In spring the Trinity bank of this ditch is bright with
+daffodils, the Johnian with narcissus. An iron foot-bridge, common to
+both Colleges, with a gate at either end, gives access from one to the
+other; but we had best continue by the path which skirts the Johnian
+bank. This finally leads out of the College grounds into the Backs
+proper, by a fine iron gate bearing a gilded eagle rising from a
+crown, the crest borne by Lady Margaret.
+
+Before we reach this, we find water on either side of us; that to the
+west being not from the Cam, but a small tributary brooklet which
+joins the river near the Great Bridge. It is here dammed up so as to
+afford space for the College swans to make merry in, and on the
+further side is the Fellows' Garden, known as "the Wilderness." The
+wealth of spring flowers here cultivated--snowdrops, daffodils,
+crocuses, primroses, anemones, and hyacinths--is delicious in a
+country like Cambridgeshire, where Nature supplies their charms with
+very niggardly hand in comparison with the more favoured regions of
+England. Outside the Eagle gate we are close to the entrance of the
+Trinity avenue.
+
+Let us stand once more before the great gate of Trinity. Turning to
+the south, instead of the north as before, we find ourselves in a few
+score yards with the buildings of a College again to the east and west
+of the street at once. This College is commonly known as Caius
+(pronounced Keys), and officially as "Gonville and Caius," after the
+original founder in the fourteenth century, and the benefactor who,
+two hundred years later, so largely developed it as to leave his name
+also attached to the site.[69] The former was a simple parish priest,
+rector of Terrington, on the Norfolk seaboard of the Wash. His little
+college, designated the "College of the Annunciation,"[70] and
+consisting only of a Master and three Fellows, found its original
+quarters hard by Pembroke, with which it was founded simultaneously in
+1347. A few years later, on Gonville's death, his friend and diocesan,
+Bishop Bateman of Norwich, moved it to its present site, next door to
+his own new college, Trinity Hall.
+
+[Footnote 69: The two infant cherubs which (without any heraldic
+authority) act as supporters to the College Shield over the gate of
+the new buildings (those to the east of the street) are popularly
+supposed to be meant for the innocent souls of the two Founders. The
+shield itself (duly granted by the Heralds' College, 1575), comprises
+both their Coats with a blue and silver bordure. That of Dr. Caius is
+curious; two green serpents standing on their tails upon a green stone
+amid flowers of amaranth. This is declared (in the grant) to signify
+"Wisdom stayed upon Virtue and adorned with Immortality"--a
+characteristic Elizabethan "conceit."]
+
+[Footnote 70: It was not till after Gonville's death that it began to
+be called by his name.]
+
+There Gonville Hall, as it was now called, gradually developed, but
+remained a very puny bantling till the reign of Queen Mary, when one
+of its own scholars took upon himself the task of expanding it. His
+name was really Keys, which according to the fashion of the day, was
+transliterated into the Latin equivalent Caius, and he was a
+celebrated doctor of medicine, President of the College of Physicians,
+and himself physician to the Royal household. It was in the interests
+of his favourite study that he refounded the college, which to this
+day has a specially medical tinge. He was also a singularly devout
+man, and the spirit in which he built is exemplified by the three
+gates through which we successively pass in our progress through the
+College. From Trinity-street we enter beneath a narrow, plain,
+low-browed archway, known as the Gate of Humility, and inscribed
+HUMILITATIS.[71] A short avenue of lime-trees (also a part of the
+Founder's design) leads across the small court to a loftier, wider
+portal, over which we may read the word VIRTUTIS. Through this we gain
+another court, and, looking back, we discover that in using the Gate
+of Virtue we have indeed used the Gate of Wisdom; for it bears the
+inscription IO. CAIVS. POSVIT. SAPIENTIAE. And, finally, a small,
+beautifully designed turret, rich with Renaissance figures and
+pilasters, and inscribed HONORIS, covers our exit through the Gate of
+Honour, to which those of Humility, Virtue, and Wisdom have
+successively led us on.
+
+[Footnote 71: The present gateway is not, however, the original one,
+but erected in mid-Victorian days at the same time as the large
+pinnacled gate at the south-east corner of the College, but the humble
+character of the original is fairly reproduced.]
+
+This Gate of Honour is really a wonderful little gem of architecture,
+quite unique in its design, which is due to Dr. Caius himself, though
+the work was not finished till after his death. The turret is an
+oblong mass of stone-work, some twelve feet in width by six in depth,
+rising to a height of about twenty feet, and topped with a singularly
+graceful hexagonal cupola.[72] The view of it, more especially from
+the further side of the Court, whence it groups with the Senate House
+and University library just outside, and with the soaring pinnacles of
+King's College Chapel beyond, is one nowhere to be surpassed. From a
+picturesque point of view no one can regret the absence of the
+somewhat gaudy coats of paint and gilding with which it originally was
+covered; but the result of their removal has been that the stone
+(which is soft, and was never intended to stand exposure to the
+atmosphere) is rapidly decaying.
+
+[Footnote 72: Each side of the hexagon was originally a sun-dial.]
+
+The paved footway into which the Gate of Honour leads is known as
+Senate House Passage,[73] and is still the route along which the
+students of the College pass to receive in the Senate House such
+honours as their University examinations may have entitled them to. It
+forms the southern boundary of the College, which, alone amongst the
+Colleges of Cambridge, is wholly surrounded by public ways,
+Trinity-street being on the east, Trinity-lane on the north, and
+Trinity Hall-lane on the west. The tasteless mass of modern red brick
+(erected 1853) at the north-west angle of the block contains the hall;
+with the kitchens, by an unusual arrangement, beneath. These kitchens
+have an immemorial gastronomic renown in Cambridge, and are credited
+with the possession of culinary secrets enabling them to surpass all
+rival establishments. In some verses written about the end of the
+eighteenth century (concerning a well-known young lady of Cambridge)
+we find this referred to:
+
+  "The sons of culinary Caius,
+   Smoaking from the eternal Treat,
+   Gazed on the Fair with greedy air,
+   As she were something good to eat:
+   Even the sad Kingsman lost his gloom awhile,
+   And forced a melancholy smile.[74]
+
+[Footnote 73: "Passage" is the local name applied to the many paved
+footways which intersect Cambridge. They are forbidden ground to
+vehicles, including bicycles, a prohibition which constantly brings
+undergraduates before the Police Court.]
+
+[Footnote 74: At this date King's was a highly conservative College,
+and its discipline strict with a strictness long discarded by the
+University at large.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Gate of Honour, Caius College._]
+
+Dr. Caius himself became the first Master of his new College, a post
+which he accepted with a reluctance which proved only too well
+justified, for he himself was a devout and pious man of the old
+school, and wholly out of sympathy with the militant Protestantism
+which was then fast becoming the dominating spirit at Cambridge, as in
+England generally. He has left in writing his lamentation over the sad
+depletion of the University which was the first result of the
+Reformation.[75] The wholesale destruction of ancient works of
+art--beautifully illuminated service books, and elaborately
+embroidered vestments--by which the votaries of the new religion
+sought at once to express their loathing of the older faith and to
+make its revival the harder, did but recall to him the like policy
+pursued by the Pagan antagonists of Jehovah in the days of the
+Maccabees. And he did what in him lay to stem the tide, rescuing here
+a Missal and there a Chasuble from the iconoclasts, till he had
+accumulated in his Lodge quite a little store of these sacred objects.
+But the times were too hard for him. He was denounced as a
+reactionary, a sympathiser with Popery; a riot broke out among the
+College students; the Lodge was stormed; the Papistical relics thrown
+out of the window and burnt in the midst of the Court;[76] whilst the
+Master and Founder himself was expelled from his own College and (as
+he had spent upon it all he had) ended his days in penury and exile.
+He was, however, allowed a grave in the chapel, which bears the
+touching inscription FUI CAIUS ("I _was_ Caius").
+
+[Footnote 75: "To the Universities," Froude (our most ardent
+Protestant historian) tells us, in his _History of England_, "the
+Reformation brought with it desolation.... They were called Stables of
+Asses--Schools of the Devil.... The Government cancelled the
+exhibitions which had been granted for the support of poor Scholars.
+They suppressed the Professorships and Lectureships--Degrees were held
+anti-Christian. Learning was no necessary adjunct to a creed which
+'lay in a nutshell.' ... College Libraries were plundered and burnt.
+The Divinity Schools at Oxford were planted with cabbages, and the
+laundresses dried clothes in the School of Arts."
+
+At Cambridge Dr. Caius gives a long list of University Hostels,
+filled, within his memory, by zealous students, which, when he wrote
+had become wholly deserted and taken possession of by the townsfolk.]
+
+[Footnote 76: The pillage was actually presided over by the
+Vice-Chancellor of the University, Dr. Whitgift, Master of Trinity,
+whose Protestant zeal raised him later to the Archbishopric of
+Canterbury.]
+
+The undergraduates of Caius wear a gown of a singular and not very
+pleasing violet hue with velvet trimmings. The College "colours" are
+light blue and black; the former, which is, as all know, the
+University colour, having been granted them to use, in memory of a
+famous race, in the early days of College boating, seventy years ago,
+when their crew beat the University Eight. It is, of course, an
+axiomatic rule of sportsmanship that no Club may assume the insignia
+of another (or any colourable imitation thereof), without leave from
+the previous users. The earliest "Light Blues" were the Eton Boat
+Club, by whose permission the Cambridge Boat Club took the colour. The
+Cricket Clubs, at both Eton and Cambridge, were then permitted to use
+it, and now this permission has been extended to all engaged as
+champions of the University, at athletics, football, etc.
+
+The Senate House, to the entrance of which the Gate of Honour has
+brought us, is the nerve-centre of the University. Here are held,
+usually on each Thursday during Term, the meetings ("Congregations" is
+the official word) of that august body the "Senate," to whose vote all
+University legislation must ultimately be submitted. This body,
+however, consisting as it does of all who have attained the Degree of
+Master of Arts, several thousands in number, is far too large to
+initiate that legislation. This is done by a small elected General
+Committee, the "Council," and by special Committees (or "Syndicates")
+dealing with the various special subjects to be considered. Both
+Council and Syndicates also act as executive authorities, and by them
+"Graces" embodying this or that proposal are from time to time laid
+before the Senate. The Grace is read aloud by one of the Proctors, in
+his robes of office, standing beside the Chair, which is occupied by
+the Vice-Chancellor.[77] The benches are tenanted by such members of
+the Senate as care to be present.[78] There is no discussion;[79] but,
+on the Grace being read, any member may utter the words "Non Placet,"
+whereupon the Proctor cries "Ad scrutinium," and the congregation
+divides; the "Placets," (or "Ayes" as they would be called in
+Parliament), moving to the right of the Chair, and the "Non-Placets"
+to the left. Should this grouping not sufficiently disclose the sense
+of the meeting, a poll is held; each member's vote being given
+publicly by writing, on an official form, avouched by his signature.
+These papers are then counted by the Proctors, and their respective
+numbers read out by the Vice-Chancellor.
+
+[Footnote 77: This officer is the acting Head of the University, and
+is appointed by the Council from amongst the Heads of the Colleges,
+usually by rota, year by year. The Chancellor, whom he represents, is
+always some specially distinguished notability, and is appointed for
+life. He is only present on state occasions.]
+
+[Footnote 78: Members are often able to introduce ladies, when there
+is likely to be room for them. And undergraduates may listen to
+proceedings from the Galleries, where, in defiance of rule, they are
+often heard as well as seen, should the business be exciting.]
+
+[Footnote 79: Such discussion as may seem needful has already taken
+place before a Meeting of the resident Members of the Senate, who have
+spent at least forty nights in Cambridge during the last Academic
+year, and whose names are accordingly on the "Electoral Roll." They
+are summoned, as required, by the Vice-Chancellor, to discuss the
+various matters which it is proposed to embody in "Graces."]
+
+These numbers are usually but small; indeed most of the business is
+altogether unopposed. But when some subject which excites general
+interest is brought forward, "backwoods-men" flock (and are whipped)
+up from all parts of England. Macaulay has given us a humorous poem on
+the coach-loads of country clergy thus pitch-forked into Cambridge to
+vote against the admission of Roman Catholics to the University; and
+within the last few decades, similar scenes were witnessed in
+connection with the question of their being allowed a recognised
+Public Hostel of their own, and with those of Compulsory Greek, and of
+granting Degrees to women.
+
+Such is the procedure at the Senate House; or, rather, such it has
+hitherto been, for the whole question of University legislation is
+even now in the melting-pot. The use of the building for the chief
+University examinations is also dying or dead, now that a vast
+"Examination Hall" has been built for that purpose. But Degrees still
+continue to be conferred there; the students found worthy by the
+examiners successively kneeling before the Vice-Chancellor, and being
+admitted by him to their degree in the name of the Trinity. They are
+presented by the "Fathers" of their respective Colleges, in a
+recognised order, beginning with the Royal Foundations, King's always
+coming first and Trinity second. When the Degree of Doctor ("Honoris
+causa") is conferred on any distinguished visitors, the place is
+thronged, and each in turn is introduced with a laudatory Latin speech
+by the "Public Orator," who has to exert his ingenuity in composing
+some neat and appropriate epigrammatic remark about him.[80]
+
+[Footnote 80: The office thus requires no mean scholarly and
+oratorical powers. When Queen Elizabeth visited Cambridge, the Public
+Orator had to make her a laudatory address of half an hour in
+duration, without notes, "with the Queen's horse curvetting under her"
+(for this was not in the Senate House--yet unbuilt--but in the open
+air before King's College Chapel), and with constant mock-modest
+interruptions from her Royal lips. Her only thanks were a commendation
+of his excellent memory.]
+
+The Senate House is a stately classical building, running east and
+west, erected in the early decades of the eighteenth century. Up to
+that date the functions which it now discharges were served partly by
+the old Schools (now the University Library), which have been already
+spoken of, and which adjoin it on the west, and partly by the
+University Church (called here, as at Oxford, "Great St. Mary's"),
+which stands hard by to the east. The legislative meetings of the
+Senate were held in the former,[81] the Degrees were conferred, and
+other gatherings held, in the latter.
+
+[Footnote 81: One apartment was called the Regent House, as being thus
+used by the Governing Body of the University.]
+
+This was all very well before the Reformation, whilst reverence for
+consecrated places still held its own; but, after that great
+convulsion, the proceedings too frequently were markedly
+unecclesiastical in tone. The conferring of Degrees was originally a
+solemn function beginning with High Mass, and continuing with a
+serious _vivâ voce_ exercise of the candidates in the presence of the
+Vice-Chancellor. But when the Reformation had made it fashionable to
+show a healthy Protestant contempt for the old Catholic superstitions,
+the whole ceremony was deliberately turned into a farce. The
+questioning of the candidates was no longer done by grave University
+officials, but by an "old" (_i.e._ a senior) Bachelor, who sat upon a
+three-legged stool, and made his interrogations as profane and
+scurrilous as possible. He was known, from his stool, as "Mr. Tripos,"
+and so essential a part of the proceedings did he become that "Tripos"
+got to be (as it still is) the regular name for an "Honour"
+examination at Cambridge. To judge by the few that have come down to
+us, the jokes current on these occasions were poor to the last degree.
+Thus, in 1657, we read that two Oxonians, got up as hobby-horses,
+presented themselves, giving as their qualification that they "had
+smith's work at their digits' ends," (Smith being a then current
+writer of school books). They were duly admitted, on the ground that
+"such _equitation_ gave them an _equitable_ claim!" And all this was
+in the church; where, indeed, far less innocent performances were
+constantly given, including stage-plays and recitations in which the
+most solemn mysteries of the Catholic Faith were often travestied and
+held up to ridicule.[82]
+
+[Footnote 82: As Protestantism lost its first militant fervour, these
+performances more and more dropped their polemical features. But they
+still remained most inappropriate for a place of worship. We have seen
+how the higher minds of the University, such as Dr. Barrow, felt about
+them before the seventeenth century came to an end. (See p. 104.)]
+
+The church which was thus so long profaned is of late Perpendicular
+architecture. Huge galleries have been inserted for the accommodation
+of such undergraduates as may attend; the nave being appropriated to
+the Master of Arts. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
+the east end was filled with tier above tier of semicircular benches
+for the seniors of the University, from whose prevailingly bald heads
+this elevation became profanely known as "Golgotha." All is now
+arranged in decent fashion, and since the building of the Senate House
+the church has only been used for strictly ecclesiastical purposes.
+Here each Sunday afternoon is preached the "University Sermon," the
+preacher being some clergyman selected by the Council of the Senate.
+No service is held in connection with this sermon, but the preacher,
+before commencing, reads from the pulpit what is known as the "Bidding
+Prayer"--a long list of subjects for intercession, comprising the
+various authorities in Church and State, the Clergy, and (as the
+source of their supply) the Universities and Colleges. Amongst these
+"as in private duty bound" the preacher specifically names the College
+to which he himself belongs, finally concluding with the Lord's
+Prayer.[83] The sermon is officially attended by the Vice-Chancellor
+and Proctors, who gather in the Senate House and cross the street in
+procession to the West door of the church. One of the Proctors carries
+the University Bible, a ponderous tome suspended by a chain; and in
+front is borne the silver mace of the University, by an official
+designated the "Esquire Bedell."
+
+[Footnote 83: On the Sunday after All Saints' Day, when the "Lady
+Margaret Preacher," appointed by the Vice-Chancellor, officiates, he
+begins by reading the long roll of benefactors to the University from
+the earliest times; in itself a specially inspiring predication.]
+
+The church has witnessed various vicissitudes of doctrine. Here,
+during the first outbreak of Protestantism, the Missal was solemnly
+torn up and burnt amid the hooting of the crowd; and when, a century
+later, the Puritans gained the ascendancy, a like fate befell the Book
+of Common Prayer, Cromwell himself presiding at the ceremony. This was
+on Good Friday, 1643, when the Vice-Chancellor and several other Heads
+of Colleges were, for refusing to abet the proceeding, shut up in the
+church "all the long cold night, without fire or candle." They were
+afterwards haled to London, and, after being pelted through the City,
+were subjected to a sort of Black Hole treatment, under hatches on
+board a hulk in the river, with all port-holes closed, and no air
+"save such as they could suck from each others' breaths," as the
+"Querela Cantabrigiensis" piteously complains.
+
+Till lately the tower of Great St. Mary's was a historical record of
+the stirring scenes amid which it arose, for it was slowly built
+during the course of no fewer than 120 years, being begun in the last
+decade of the fifteenth century and finished in the first of the
+seventeenth. Thus the lower stages were of Perpendicular Gothic, the
+higher of Renaissance style. Unhappily the Victorian restorers took it
+in hand, and rebuilt the top as, in their view, it would have been
+built had it been completed without this long delay, so that all
+historical interest is now lost. It contains a fine peal of twelve
+bells, on which sound the famous chimes composed in 1790 by Dr.
+Jowett,[84] tutor of Trinity Hall, which, since their adoption in the
+Westminster clock tower, have spread so widely throughout the country
+and the Empire. Their cadences are:
+
+  1st Quarter 1236
+  2nd  "      3126, 3213
+  3rd  "      1326, 6213, 1236
+  4th  "      3126, 3213, 1326, 6213
+
+[Footnote 84: It is hard upon Dr. Jowett that his name should have
+come down to posterity associated, not with this real contribution to
+the gladness of the world, but with a satirical quatrain on the tiny
+plot which he reclaimed from the street in the angle of Trinity Hall
+adjoining Clare:
+
+  "A little garden little Jowett made,
+   And fenced it with a little palisade;
+   And would you know the mind of little Jowett,
+   This little garden will a little show it."]
+
+The hour is struck on the tenor bell. These bells are of eighteenth
+century date: two more have been added since.
+
+[Illustration: _Peas Hill._]
+
+Great St. Mary's, for all its University connection, still remains
+what it was before the University came into being, a Parish Church;
+its Parish consisting of the Market Place, which opens out to the east
+of it, and is called locally "Market Hill." Whence this curious use of
+the latter word arose is not known, but it is immemorial at Cambridge
+for any expansion of a street into something wider. Besides Market
+Hill, there are the smaller spaces of Peas Hill and St. Andrew's Hill.
+All are utterly flat; yet, so potent is the word in the imagination of
+the Cambridge townsfolk, that such expressions as "I wonder the Hill
+don't fall down upon you" may be overheard in market disputes. Market
+Hill is not very large for its purpose even now; but till the
+nineteenth century it was much smaller, with more than one range of
+houses encumbering its area. On the southern side stands the
+Guildhall, a far from imposing structure, and in the centre rises the
+fountain supplied by the water of Hobson's Conduit, as described in
+our first chapter. The present structure was erected in 1855, the
+earlier one (put up in 1614) being then removed to its present
+position at the junction of Lensfield Road and Trumpington Road.[85]
+
+[Footnote 85: There was a fountain here, however, long before Hobson's
+day--at least as early as the fourteenth century--but whence the water
+came is not known. If, as seems probable, it was a natural spring, its
+existence was probably the factor which originally determined the site
+of the Market.]
+
+Like the University Church, the Market Place has witnessed many
+stirring scenes. Here, in the fierce but short-lived Socialistic
+outbreak which we commonly associate with the name of Wat Tyler, when
+dreams were afloat of melting down all existing distinctions into one
+great _Magna Societas_, which should redress all wrongs and make all
+men equal in all things, a mighty bonfire was made by the insurgent
+peasantry of all the books and documents which could be looted from
+the University Chest in Great St. Mary's, and from the various
+Colleges and Hostels then existing. The Mayor of Cambridge was
+compelled to give the sanction of his presence to the deed; and
+finally the ashes were scattered to the winds, with the cry: "Away
+with the skill of the clerks! Away with it!"
+
+Two centuries later, in 1555, the Hill saw another burning, of a more
+gruesome character. The Catholic reaction under Queen Mary was then in
+full swing; and it was determined to visit with the extreme penalty of
+the laws against heresy the corpses of two notable pioneers of the
+Reformation, Dr. Bucer and Dr. Fagius. Both were amongst the band of
+German Protestants who, under King Edward the Sixth, flocked over to
+disseminate the new Religion in England, and both had died while
+promulgating their tenets at Cambridge. They were now torn from their
+graves, and chained, in their coffins, to the stake, the pyre which
+incinerated them being chiefly composed of their own condemned books.
+
+Within the last decade two other notable conflagrations have here been
+kindled. When Lord Kitchener, then Sirdar of Egypt, and fresh from his
+victories over the Mahdi, visited Cambridge to receive an Honorary
+Degree, his presence amongst us was greeted by the wildest orgies. A
+huge bonfire was kindled on the Hill, the pile ultimately stretching
+diagonally across almost the entire area, and fed with ever fresh
+supplies of wood, for which the whole town was scoured. Railings were
+torn up wholesale (notably, as has been said, in the Backs), shutters
+were wrenched from shop windows, and even doors from houses; while
+hoardings, gates, and tradesmen's barrows were seized and devoted to
+the flames. Like scenes, a few years later, on a somewhat smaller
+scale, celebrated the relief of Ladysmith in the Boer War.
+
+These riotous proceedings were the work of the wilder spirits of
+University and Town alike. But in the earlier part of the Nineteenth
+Century many a fierce collision between Town and Gown took place on
+the Hill. The Fifth of November was the annual occasion consecrated by
+custom to these conflicts. Bands of undergraduates paraded the streets
+shouting "Gown! Gown!" while bands of the fiercer element amongst the
+townsfolk did the like, to the cry of "Town! Town!" Fights were thus
+frequent, in spite of the efforts of the authorities, both Civic and
+Academic. Gownsmen took to flight at the appearance of the Proctors
+and their "Bulldogs,"[86] but it was to re-form elsewhere, and few
+were actually caught. The Police, when they came into existence, in
+the early 'forties, were more formidable. They invariably took the
+side of the Town,[87] and it was due to them that the "Fifth" became
+less and less pugilistic, till it is now only a memory. Fisticuffs
+were all very well, but batons made the fun not good enough.
+
+[Footnote 86: This is the name bestowed on the stalwart officials a
+couple of whom attend each Proctor and exercise such physical coercion
+of delinquents as he may bid.]
+
+[Footnote 87: One specially remembered conflict, when Rose Crescent
+was held by the Gown against an overwhelming force, till a police
+charge drove them in headlong rout to take refuge in Trinity, was made
+the subject of a parody of Macaulay's Horatius, to be found in Clark's
+_Guide to Cambridge_.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+     Round Church.--Union Society.--The "Great Bridge,"
+     Hithe.--=Magdalene College=, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles
+     Kingsley, the "College Window," Master's Garden.--Castle Hill,
+     Camboritum, Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I, the
+     "Borough," View from Castle.--St. Peter's Church.--"School of
+     Pythagoras."--Westminster College.--Ridley Hall.--=Newnham
+     College.=--=Selwyn College.=--Convent of St. Radegund, Bishop
+     Alcock.--Midsummer Common.--Boat Houses, Bumping Races.--=Jesus
+     College=, "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House, Chapel, Cranmer,
+     Coleridge.
+
+
+Starting once more from the Great Gate of Trinity and turning
+northwards past St. John's we soon reach the "Via Devana," the old
+Roman road which, as has been said, is the backbone of Cambridge,
+traversing the town, under various names, from end to end. At this
+point of its course it is called Bridge-street. Opposite to us, as we
+enter it, rises one of the most distinctive buildings of Cambridge,
+the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, popularly known as "the Round
+Church." Its strange shape is an echo of the Crusading period, during
+the whole of which such reproductions of the famous church of the Holy
+Sepulchre at Jerusalem, the deliverance of which from the Turks was
+the Crusaders' dream, were erected in various parts of England.
+Earliest in date comes the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at
+Northampton, built at the very beginning of the twelfth century, in
+the opening fervour of the first Crusade, which has also given us the
+beautiful old chapel of Ludlow Castle (now in ruins) and this church
+in Cambridge. The gallant but fruitless effort of Richard Coeur de
+Lion to retrieve the disastrous loss of Jerusalem is commemorated by
+the Temple Church in London, completed at the very close of that
+century; while the yet more fruitless endeavours of Edward the First,
+a century later again, in the last expiring flash of Crusading zeal,
+inspired the latest of our English Round Churches, that of Maplestead
+in Essex. In all these churches the reproduction of their original is
+of a very modified character.
+
+So it is with our Cambridge example. It consists, indeed, (or, rather
+originally consisted) of a circular nave surrounded by an ambulatory,
+like its Jerusalem prototype, and _may_, like it, have had a domed
+roof, though this is scarcely probable. But there the likeness must
+always have ended; and the structure has, in later days, been altered
+and re-altered time after time. At first there was probably a small
+semicircular eastern apse, which within a century gave place to an
+Early English chancel. This, in turn, was superseded by the present
+chancel with its aisles, built in the fifteenth century, when an
+octagonal bell-tower was also erected over the nave. Finally, in 1841,
+the newly-formed "Camden Society" for the restoration of ancient
+churches was permitted to work its will upon this one, and proceeded
+to reconstruct it in accordance with what they imagined ought to have
+been the design of its first builders.[88] And this imaginary ideal,
+with its pointed roof and tiny Norman windows, is all that we now see.
+Nevertheless, the sight, more especially inside, is impressive in no
+small degree.
+
+[Footnote 88: This design included the undoubted feature of a stone
+altar, the setting up of which gave occasion, after much litigation,
+for the promulgation of the well-known Judgment, which declares that
+in the Church of England the Law permits only a movable wooden table.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Church of the Holy Sepulchre._]
+
+Behind the Round Church rise the sumptuous rooms of the "Union[89]
+Society," a University club primarily instituted as an association for
+the cultivation of oratory amongst undergraduates, which has now added
+to its central debating hall a library, dining-room, smoking-room, and
+the other adjuncts of a first-class club. Here, on each Tuesday
+evening during Term, debates are held, usually on current political or
+social situations, theological polemics being strictly barred. When
+the Society was first instituted, in the early decades of the
+nineteenth century, current politics were also prohibited (by the
+University authorities), and could only be discussed under a decent
+veil of reference to antiquity. But the comparative merits of the
+causes championed by Cæsar and Pompey, or by the Cavaliers and
+Roundheads, were so easily made to apply to the burning questions of
+the day, that the prohibition speedily become obsolete. Many a
+well-known Parliamentary orator has won his first fame on the benches
+of the Union, Lord Macaulay being a notable example. His perfervid
+outpourings here swept away all opposition, and his friend and
+contemporary, Mackworth Praed, records how the issue of any debate is
+irrevocably decided--
+
+      "When the Favourite comes,
+       With his trumpets and drums,
+  And his arms, and his metaphors, crossed."
+
+[Footnote 89: So called because in union with the twin Society at
+Oxford; members of each having, _ipso facto_, all the privileges of
+membership in the other.]
+
+Leaving the Round Church behind us, and proceeding westwards, we pass
+the Church of St. Clement, with its inscription DEUM COLE ("Worship
+God"), which has nothing to detain us, and shortly arrive at "the
+Great Bridge,"[90] that famous passage of the river to which the town
+owes its name and its very existence. It can never have been an
+imposing structure, in spite of its high-sounding title, and is now
+represented by an exceedingly commonplace iron span. But, as the only
+passage of the Cam approachable by an army, in fore-drainage days, for
+many a long mile, it was of old a strategic point of first-class
+importance, and more than once played a notable part in English
+history. Its possession by the anti-monarchical forces shattered the
+last efforts both of King John and of Charles the First, and brought
+about, as we shall see, the speedy ruin and death of the former.
+
+[Footnote 90: So called to distinguish it from the smaller town
+bridges by Newnham Mill and Garret Hostel.]
+
+To the North of the Bridge, and on the Eastern bank of the River, is
+the last of the many "Hithes" (or Quays), of which we read so much in
+connection with old Cambridge, remaining in actual use for traffic.
+Here we may to this day see exemplified the ancient local proverb,
+"Here water kindleth fire;" for barges loaded with fire-wood and turf
+from the fens still discharge their cargoes at this spot.
+
+The old name of the Great Bridge has, for at least a century,[91] been
+commonly superseded by the appellation of "Magdalene Bridge," which
+provokes singularly humiliating comparisons with the beautiful
+structure bearing that name at Oxford. In both cases it is derived
+from the adjoining College of St. Mary Magdalene (spelt, by a mere
+freak, at Oxford without the final e). Our College, however, is of a
+sadly lower grade than that at Oxford, with its ideal tower, and its
+beautiful chapel, and its grey cloisters, and its green "Walks" beside
+the Cherwell. Here we have but little beauty, and no very great
+historical interest. The College was first founded, in the middle of
+the fifteenth century, for the benefit of Benedictine students. It
+belonged to the great Abbey of Crowland, in the Huntingdonshire
+Fenland (though Ely, and other neighbouring Benedictine Houses, took
+part in the building), and was called Buckingham College, from its
+first special benefactor, Henry Stafford, the second Duke of
+Buckingham. At the suppression of the Abbeys, this College, like all
+other monastic property, was confiscated by King Henry the Eighth, who
+granted it to his favourite, Thomas Audley, Lord Chancellor. By him it
+was re-founded under its present name, and the nomination of the
+Master continues, even to this day, to be vested in his descendants.
+The existing representative of his family is Lord Braybrooke;[92] the
+name of whose seat, at Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex,
+records the fact that the whole property of the Benedictine Abbey of
+Walden was also granted to Lord Chancellor Audley. This Abbey had
+shared in the building of Buckingham College.
+
+[Footnote 91: We find "Magdalene Bridge" in Wordsworth's "Prelude."]
+
+[Footnote 92: Over the entrance gateway may be seen the arms of Lord
+Braybrooke's family, the Nevilles. These are also the arms of the
+College.]
+
+The beginnings of the re-founded College were on a very small scale,
+with only a single College servant (who acted as cook). Even forty
+years later this number, as Dr. Caius tells us, had only increased to
+three. To this day, indeed, Magdalene remains a small and select
+College. It consists of a single Court, representing Buckingham
+College, and the further side only of a second Court beyond. This
+isolated side, an admirable arcade, built at the close of the
+seventeenth century, contains the special treasure of the College, the
+collection of books bequeathed to it by the famous diarist, Samuel
+Pepys. This remains, as he himself arranged it, in twelve oaken
+"presses" with glass doors; the books on each shelf being brought to a
+common top level by appropriately graduated blocks of wood (shaped in
+imitation of their backs) inserted under each. The Library is on view
+on Tuesdays and Thursdays during Full Term, from 11.30 to 1 o'clock.
+Over the door is the Pepys motto: _Mens cujusque is est quisque._
+("Each man's mind is his very Self.")
+
+Pepys had been a student here, and his portrait, by Lely, hangs in the
+Hall. So does that of another distinguished Magdalene man, Charles
+Kingsley, who was in residence 1839 to 1842. College tradition still
+records how he used surreptitiously to climb out of the College in the
+very early summer mornings, to be off on one of those piscatorial
+excursions which he so dearly loved. Another well-known writer
+connected with Magdalene is Mr. A. C. Benson, whose "College Window"
+was in the ground floor of the Pepysian Library range, on the North
+side, looking into the gardens of the Master's Lodge. In these gardens
+is a high terraced walk, beneath an old wall. Both terrace and wall
+are supposed to be connected with the ancient defences of Cambridge,
+but this is not proven.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Peter's Church._]
+
+We have, however, now come to the region where those defences did
+actually exist. For beyond this wall to the West rises the steep
+slope, partly natural and partly artificial, of the "Castle Hill,"
+towering into the great mound on which stood the Norman Keep. This was
+built by William the Conqueror; but long before his day the site,
+defensible by nature, and commanding the all-important passage of the
+river, had been utilised for military purposes. Here, probably, was a
+British post, the _Cam-Rhydd_ or "Ford of the Cam," which became the
+Roman Camboritum.[93] Here Oliver Cromwell, as commander over the
+forces of the "Associated Counties,"[94] set up fortifications which
+baffled the gallant effort to retrieve his fallen fortunes made by
+Charles the First after the fatal battle of Naseby. Having there left
+his matchless infantry, "lying with their pikes charged every way as
+when they lived," the unfortunate monarch, with the remains of his
+cavalry, broke through the network of the enemies' squadrons in full
+pursuit "like hounds after a fresh stag," and made a dash for the
+Eastern Counties, "where he had a party forming." Huntingdon he took
+by surprise, and "twice affronted the lines of Cambridge." But these
+were too strong to be rushed by horse-soldiers, and, as there was no
+other passage over the Cam, he had to retire, finally evading his
+pursuers, and making his way safely to Oxford, with all the loot
+acquired in this raid, "six waggons loaded with money, two thousand
+horses, and three thousand head of cattle." And the remembrance of
+Anglo-Saxon lines of defence round the site is perpetuated in the name
+"Borough," which still clings to it.
+
+[Footnote 93: In spite of the enticing similarity of sound, it is
+fairly established that the word Camboritum is not the parent of the
+word Cambridge. In mediæval times we only read of "Granta-bridge."]
+
+[Footnote 94: These were Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambs, Hunts, Beds
+and Herts, which combined to raise a common force (on the
+Parliamentary side).]
+
+Many antiquarians, indeed, hold that the Cambridge of early days
+(anyhow down to the ninth century) was wholly confined to this small
+area, some quarter of a mile square, and that the extension of the
+town across the river was due to the expulsion of the inhabitants by
+Danish and Norman intruders. Be that as it may, we are here
+undoubtedly in the earliest Cambridge. The Castle has gradually passed
+away, till no ruins, even, are now left. Its modern representative,
+the County Court-house, where the Assizes are held, and the County
+Gaol, stand at the western foot of the great mound, whereon the Norman
+Keep no longer rises. From the summit is to be obtained a delightful
+view of Cambridge, with the "green-muffled" ring of the Backs, and the
+grey inner ring of the river-side Colleges, dominated by King's
+College Chapel, girding in the western flank of the Town, and starting
+almost from our feet; the long line of the East Anglian heights
+bounding our southern and eastern prospect; and to the north the
+"boundless plain," with the towers of Ely on the far horizon.
+
+Close below us, and really at our very feet, rise the two churches of
+this earliest Cambridge, that of St. Giles, now merely a handsome
+modern edifice of imposing size, and that of St. Peter, also modern in
+its present form, but embodying some ancient features. It is the
+smallest church in Cambridge, only thirty-five feet in length by
+fifteen in width, being the reconstructed fragment of a larger
+structure built in the twelfth century, and pulled down in the
+eighteenth, when the Parish was united to that of St. Giles. It
+contains a fine late Norman font, with grotesque figures at each
+corner--two-tailed Mer-men, each grasping his tails in either hand. At
+one time the Borough had yet a third church, "All Hallows by the
+Castle" (so called to distinguish it from "All Hallows in the Jewry"),
+but this has wholly disappeared, Parish and all.
+
+[Illustration: _Remains of St. Radegund's Priory._]
+
+Beyond the spire of St. Peter's, as seen from the top of Castle Hill,
+may be distinguished a small mediæval building, known, for some
+forgotten reason, by the high-sounding title of "the School of
+Pythagoras." This lies just off the street to the eastward, at the
+point where this ceases to be a street, and merges into the open road
+that runs along the Backs. It is worth seeking out, for it is a
+picturesque little edifice, and an interesting example of a
+twelfth-century house built of stone. Wood, or, at the best, brick,
+were the materials then commonly used. In spite of the name, there is
+no reason to suppose that it was ever used for scholastic purposes, or
+anything more than a mere private dwelling-house. But Walter de
+Merton, the founder of Merton College, Oxford, actually acquired land
+hereabouts, apparently with some idea of starting a sister
+establishment at Cambridge. This land still belongs to Merton.
+
+The great red brick and white stone edifice opposite the entrance to
+the School of Pythagoras is "Westminster College," wherein candidates
+for the Presbyterian ministry go through their theological course,
+after completing their secular studies at the University. A like
+institution for Anglicans, built in like style (which, indeed, is all
+but universal in modern academic work), is Ridley Hall, at the other
+end of the Backs. Neither of these is recognised by the University as
+anything more than a private lodging-house, nor is the similar (but
+much smaller) Roman Catholic seminary of Edmundhouse, on the slope
+above Westminster College.
+
+The same non-recognition extends to the great Ladies' College of
+Newnham, which flings out its widespread "halls" over a lavish space
+adjoining Ridley. The grand bronze entrance gates to these "vestal
+precincts," inscribed with the name of the first Principal of the
+College, Miss Anne Jemima Clough (sister to the poet Arthur Clough)
+are hard by the more modest entrance to Ridley, and admit the visitor
+to a scene which reminds us of those in Tennyson's "Princess." And
+there are almost as many maidens here as he has assigned to his
+imaginary College, for Newnham is surpassed in the number of its
+students by Trinity only. Each has her own room, in which the bed
+becomes by day a sofa. Each is assigned to one of the "Halls," which
+in many respects are treated as separate entities, but all share the
+common collegiate life. There is, however, no chapel, for Newnham is
+most strictly undenominational. Students are, of course, free to
+attend any place of worship they may prefer, the preference being
+largely given to King's College Chapel. Hence a French traveller, who
+came over to study Women's Education in England, is said to have
+answered when asked on his return what religion was professed at
+Newnham: "Mostly, I think, the King's religion."
+
+[Illustration: _Jesus College Gateway._]
+
+The other Ladies' College, at Girton, has got a chapel, where the
+Church of England services are performed. This is the oldest of all
+the ladies' colleges connected with Oxford or Cambridge, and hence
+comes its position no less than two miles to the west of Castle Hill;
+for when the idea was first started, the close proximity of young men
+was deprecated almost in the trenchant spirit of Princess Ida. The
+very first start, indeed, was made (in 1869) no less than thirty miles
+away, at Hitchin, and only when this was found intolerable did the
+pioneers move (in 1872) to Girton.[95] There the beautiful grounds and
+splendid range of buildings give an impression of space rivalling
+Newnham; but the College is not nearly so large, and is somewhat more
+select. Here each student has a sitting-room as well as a bedroom,
+after the fashion of the men's Colleges.
+
+[Footnote 95: Newnham is just younger, having been opened 1875. It
+then consisted of one Hall only.]
+
+Immediately to the north of Newnham is Selwyn College, a
+denominational institution belonging to the Church of England,
+corresponding to Keble College at Oxford, and, like it, recognised by
+the University, not indeed as a College, but as a "Public Hostel,"
+whose undergraduates are not mere "non-collegiate students." Such
+"unattached" students are under a "Censor" and a special syndicate,
+and have a centre in the "Fitzwilliam Hall" (close to the museum of
+that name), where they have to report themselves daily.
+
+[Illustration: _The Back Court, Jesus College._]
+
+Looking eastwards from the Castle Hill, we see a wide, open green
+stretching from the further bank of the river, and beyond it a low
+church tower rising amid trees. This is the tower of Jesus College
+Chapel, once the Priory Church of St. Radegund. This lady was a
+Frankish queen of the sixth century, and a friend of the poet
+Venantius, the author of the well-known hymns _Vexilla Regis_ and
+_Pange Lingua_. Under her dedication a Benedictine nunnery was founded
+here at the beginning of the eleventh century. It was never a large or
+wealthy institution, but continued to flourish for four hundred years
+and more. In 1455 its account books, still preserved among the
+archives of Jesus College, show an income of £70 per annum, equivalent
+in purchasing power to some £1,200 at the present value of money.
+Every Benedictine nun ranked socially as a gentlewoman, so that this
+income needed careful administration to make it suffice for the nine
+or ten sisters in residence. The Convent, however, was at this date
+quite solvent, but in less than twenty years a single incapable
+Prioress had run it deep in debt. The butcher's bill alone then
+amounted to £21 (equivalent to over £350), and, having no cash to pay
+withal, the nuns were taking two of his daughters free amongst the
+boarders whom they educated. They were also alienating their capital,
+so that the income was rapidly dwindling. In 1481 it had decreased by
+more than 50 per cent., and was only £30. The next Prioress was a
+strong and capable ruler, imposed upon the convent by the Bishop of
+the Diocese, who was its Visitor. But things had gone too far, and, in
+spite of her efforts, the place dwindled away. By 1496 there were only
+two nuns left, and, under Royal license, the convent was turned into
+"Jesus College" by the same Visitor. His name was Alcock, so his coat
+of arms bore three cocks' heads, with yet another cock for crest. This
+device confronts us at every turn in our passage through the College.
+
+[Illustration: _Jesus College Chapel, East End._]
+
+To reach it from Castle Hill, the most pleasant way is by descending
+the street, and turning to the left past St. Giles' Church. This road
+will soon bring us to the river, at a lock, where we cross by an iron
+foot-bridge. We are now on the open Green we saw from above, which is
+known as "Midsummer Common," from the great fair held there at that
+season. As we make our way over it, we see to our left along the river
+bank the long white boathouses[96] of the various colleges; for it is
+not till below this lock that the river becomes navigable for an
+eight-oar, and all the University rowing is done between it and that
+next below, at Baitsbite, three miles and more down the stream to the
+northward. Baitsbite[97] is the starting-point of the annual college
+races, held at the conclusion of the May Term.[98] As is well known,
+these are decided by "bumping," the boats all starting simultaneously
+one behind another, with a clear interval of two lengths between
+each. Any boat making a bump takes the place of its defeated rival in
+the next race, and has the privilege of rowing back to its boat-house
+with its flag flying.[99] This is also done by the boat Head of the
+River, which, of course, cannot bump, though it may be bumped. Should
+a boat make its bump on each of the four evenings that the races last,
+the crew are said to "get their oars," each man's oar becoming his
+personal property and being usually hung in his rooms as a trophy,
+appropriately painted with the College colours. These colours are also
+worn for racing; the most easily recognised being the bright scarlet
+of Lady Margaret (St. John's), the black and white of Trinity Hall,
+the green of Queens', the black and yellow of Clare, and the red and
+black of Jesus. The flags always bear the College arms, except that
+"First Trinity" fly the three crowned lions of King Edward the Third.
+
+[Footnote 96: These are large wooden edifices containing sheds for the
+boats below and dressing-rooms for the crews above.]
+
+[Footnote 97: See Chapter XIII.]
+
+[Footnote 98: There are also races in the Lent Term for the less
+exalted boats. But only the first division in the May races has any
+general interest. Each division contains sixteen boats, and the last
+boat of each division is also the first of the division below, being
+thus known as a "sandwich boat."]
+
+[Footnote 99: The races end at Chesterton, about a mile below the
+boathouses.]
+
+Leaving the distant prospect of the boathouses behind us, we resume
+our way to Jesus College, the grounds of which are separated from
+Midsummer Common by a broad ditch. Skirting this, we come to "Jesus
+Lane," and, turning to the right, reach the main entrance to the
+College, opposite the red brick façade of "Westcott House" (like
+Ridley Hall, an Anglican Clergy Training School), and the tall spire
+of the new Church of All Saints.[100] Iron gates admit us into a long
+passage, between red brick walls, known as "the Chimney," which
+conducts us to the College gate. Jesus is a large college, with
+several courts, but all that is much worth seeing is the chapel with
+its cloisters, to reach which we must seek a low-browed doorway to the
+east of the entrance gate. Both are relics of the nunnery. The latter,
+indeed, were rebuilt in the eighteenth century; but the nineteenth has
+rediscovered, in their eastern range, the beautiful Early English
+entrance into the Nuns' Chapter House. At the north-east corner of the
+cloisters we find the door into the chapel.
+
+[Footnote 100: This church, as has been already said, formerly stood
+at the other end of its Parish, in the old Jewry, hard by Trinity and
+St. John's.]
+
+This bears little resemblance to the conventional College Chapel,
+being a cruciform church of the ordinary Norman shape, with a central
+tower. Very little of the work, however, is Norman, for the nuns did
+not get far on with their design till the twelfth century had come in
+and the Early English period had commenced. A beautiful gem of this
+style the chapel is, and, for once in a way, the drastic "restoration"
+to which it was subjected in early Victorian days is matter of real
+thankfulness.[101] The building had been sadly mauled about in the
+course of ages; the high-pitched roof lowered, the eastern lancets
+destroyed. All is now brought back, in excellent taste, to what it was
+at first. The old chancel has become the chapel proper, the transepts
+and the short nave serving as the ante-chapel.
+
+[Footnote 101: This restoration had the advantage of being carried out
+under the auspices of a man of real architectural taste (though better
+known by his geological distinction), the Rev. Osmund Fisher, then
+Dean of the College. The discovery of the Chapter House entrance in
+the cloisters was also due to him.]
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel of Hall, Jesus College._]
+
+In this the windows are filled with fine Morris glass, the rich hues
+of which are, unfortunately, much faded from their pristine
+brilliance. That at the end of the south transept, which first meets
+the eye, is occupied, above, by a magnificent group of the Celestial
+Hierarchy, in all its nine Orders--Angels, Archangels, Virtues,
+Principalities, Dominions, Powers, Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, with
+the addition, in the tenth place, of Man, as the image of God; and,
+below, by nine Saints, including St. Radegund, with the addition of
+Bishop Alcock. The four other windows of the transept show the four
+Evangelists, each attending a pair of Sibyls,[102] and, in the tower
+lights, Gospel scenes illustrating the Incarnation, Passion,
+Resurrection, and Ascension of Christ respectively. The nave windows,
+on the south, have Patriarchs and Prophets, with scenes beneath from
+the life or writings of each; and, on the north, emblematic figures
+representing the Cardinal and Theological Virtues, each trampling
+under her feet the contrary Vice.
+
+[Footnote 102: Some words put by Virgil into the mouth of the Sibyl
+(or prophetess) of Cumae were supposed by the early Christians of Rome
+(to whom the idea of Sibylline books being prophetic was familiar from
+Roman History) to foretell the Incarnation. Hence she, and her sister
+Sibyls of other fictions as well, came to be considered inspired, and
+before long a whole literature of imaginary Sibylline predictions was
+in circulation.]
+
+The most notable of the alumni of Jesus College was also one of the
+earliest--Archbishop Cranmer. It is from his having been here that he
+is so often and so ridiculously said to have been brought up in a
+_Jesuit_ seminary![103] Another notability was the poet Coleridge, who
+was here from 1790 to 1792. He was not an academic success, for, like
+his contemporaries, Wordsworth at St. John's, and Southey at Christ
+Church, he was carried away by the revolutionary spirit then rampant,
+and, being more audacious than they, got into more scrapes. One of his
+freaks was to trace out in gunpowder on the college lawns the words
+LIBERTY AND EQUALITY, which not only produced a sensation when the
+train was fired, but left the obnoxious sentiment permanently branded
+on the sacred grass. Finally he ran away. But he was taken back, and
+did not lose his love for his old college; for, long afterwards, we
+find him writing of "the friendly Cloisters and happy Grove of quiet,
+ever-honoured Jesus College, Cambridge." The Grove is the name given
+to the grassy field, begirt with trees, which is bordered by the ditch
+separating the College grounds from Midsummer Common.
+
+[Footnote 103: The Jesuits, of course, did not come into being for
+years after Cranmer's academic day.]
+
+The western portion of that common is often called "Jesus Green." It
+witnessed the execution of the only Marian martyr burnt at Cambridge.
+His pile was largely formed of Protestant books of devotion, one of
+which, "a Communion Book," he picked up and read diligently till the
+flames overpowered him, "praising God, who had sent him this
+consolation in his death."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+     =Sidney Sussex College=, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners.--Holy
+     Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn.--=Christ's College=, "God's
+     House," Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden,
+     Milton, Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin.--Great St. Andrew's,
+     Bishop Perry.--=Emmanuel College=, Harvard, Sancroft, Chapel,
+     Ponds.--University Museums.--=Downing College.=--Coe Fen.--First
+     Mile Stone.--Barnwell, Priory, Abbey Church.--Lepers Chapel,
+     Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair.
+
+
+Following Jesus Lane from the "Chimney" gate townwards, we once more
+strike into the Via Devana, here called Sidney Street, from the
+College filling the angle between the two roads. It is not a
+pretentious institution, having always been amongst the smallest
+colleges. But it has nurtured one man of colossal individuality, the
+great Protector, Oliver Cromwell. For Sidney Sussex College (as its
+full name runs, from its foundress, Lady Frances Sidney,[104] Countess
+of Sussex) was instituted (in 1596) for the very purpose of fostering
+such _alumni_. The earliest statutes of the College decree that its
+members shall be taught, before all else, to "detest and abhor
+Popery." Besides Cromwell, his right-hand man, Edward Montagu, Earl of
+Manchester, who distinguished himself when in authority at Cambridge
+during the Civil War by ejecting from their parishes so many recusant
+High Church parsons and filling their places with Puritan divines, was
+also a Sidney man. Both he and Cromwell were "Fellow Commoners," a
+name given to privileged undergraduates who, on payment of extra fees,
+were permitted to rank with the Fellows and to dine at the High Table.
+They also wore a more ornate gown than the ordinary undergraduate. It
+is only of late years that this plutocratic arrangement has been
+discontinued in the University. The site of Sidney was formerly that
+of the Franciscan Convent, with its splendid church, considered the
+finest in Cambridge. At the dissolution of the convent the University
+tried to secure this from King Henry the Eighth as the University
+Church. But the King's price was too high, the negotiations fell
+through, and the glorious building was remorselessly and utterly
+demolished.
+
+[Footnote 104: Her husband had been over the Royal Excise, and the
+College shield bears the familiar Broad Arrow of that department.]
+
+Passing by Sidney, which has nothing to detain us, we shortly note a
+church on our right hand. This is Holy Trinity, the special home of
+the Evangelical movement in Cambridge. In the early days of that
+movement (and of the nineteenth century) the pulpit here was occupied
+by its great leader, Charles Simeon, Fellow of King's College, who
+through much persecution, through evil report and good report,
+championed the cause till he saw it triumphant. And a series of
+like-minded men has followed him.[105] The grey stone building just
+beside the church is the Henry Martyn Hall, built in memory of that
+great Evangelical pioneer and missionary. It is used for meetings
+connected with the movement.
+
+[Footnote 105: The church is architecturally naught, outside; but the
+tower arches, within, form the loveliest gem in Cambridge.]
+
+Leaving Holy Trinity to our right, a turn in the street brings us face
+to face with the grey stone front of Christ's College, one of the most
+ideal in Cambridge. We owe it, like St. John's, to the bounty of the
+Lady Margaret Tudor, King Henry the Seventh's mother, whose beautiful
+character has already been dwelt upon in our last chapter. And she
+bestowed it upon us under the same inspiration as in the case of St.
+John's, that of her friend and confessor, Bishop Fisher, and, in doing
+so, adopted the same plan of transforming and expanding an earlier
+Foundation. This was a very small "School of Grammar," which never
+attained to the dignity of collegiate rank, founded in 1430 by John
+Bingham, parson of St. John Zachary, just before he and his Church
+were swept away to make room for King's College. It was then removed
+to this site, just outside the "Barnwell Gate" of Cambridge, where it
+maintained a microscopic existence for the rest of that century.
+
+[Illustration: _Christ's College Chapel._]
+
+At the beginning of the next it had the good fortune to be taken up by
+Lady Margaret, who increased the number of residents maintained in it
+from five to sixty, and changed the name from "God's House" to
+"Christ's College." At the same time she planned out the principal
+court, as it now exists. Unlike St. John's, it was at least partly
+completed before her death, for the historian Fuller tells a pretty
+story of how she here beheld from a window the dean administering to
+one of the scholars the corporal chastisement which was at that day
+the recognised means of discipline,[106] and called out to him
+"_Lente! Lente!_" ("Gently! gently!") The College is appropriately
+full of her memory: her portrait adorns the Hall; on the front of the
+Gate Tower stands her statue, between the Plantagenet Rose and the
+Tudor Portcullis, and beneath it are carved her armorial bearings, as
+at St. John's, with the addition of the crest, a demi-eagle of gold
+rising out of a crown.[107] On either side are the three feathers of
+the Prince of Wales. These same arms, emblazoned, are over the inner
+gateway that leads into the Gardens, with her own beautiful motto,
+"_Souvent me souvient_" ("Oft I bethink me"). And in the Library under
+a glass shade is a reproduction of the upper part of her person, with
+the hands folded in prayer, from her monument in Westminster Abbey.
+
+[Footnote 106: The rod retained its use in this connection till the
+eighteenth century. In the seventeenth, during the period of Puritan
+ascendancy, it was made a University enactment that if any
+undergraduate should "by day or night enter any river, ditch, lake,
+pond, mere, or any other water within the County of Cambridge, whether
+for the sake of swimming or of washing," he should be flogged in his
+College hall. It must be remembered that students then entered at
+least five years earlier than now.]
+
+[Footnote 107: This crest is absent from the Johnian gate-tower, but
+is found above the iron gate leading into the Backs.]
+
+But, to the ordinary visitor, the memory of even Lady Margaret is, at
+Christ's, overshadowed by the mightier memory of John Milton, who was
+in residence here for seven years, from 1625 till, in 1632, he became
+a Master of Arts. In residence along with him was his "Lycidas," whose
+real name was Edward King. In the gardens an ancient mulberry tree, so
+old that its stem has to be encased in a pyramid of turf, and its
+remaining arms jealously shored up, is called by his name. The
+tradition that he himself planted it is probably unfounded, but it was
+actually there in his day, one of the score of these trees which, by
+the desire of King James the First, were placed in the gardens.
+
+The gardens here are amongst the few College Gardens which at
+Cambridge are open to the public. During certain hours visitors are
+admitted, and no small privilege it is; for there are few lovelier
+spots than this verdurous lawn, shut in on one side by the grey
+"Garden Front" of the College,[108] with its balustraded cornice and
+transomed windows, and everywhere else "bosomed high in tufted
+trees";[109]--an ideal place for Milton's own
+
+                         "retired Leisure,
+  That in trim gardens takes his pleasure."[110]
+
+[Footnote 108: This front belongs to an isolated block known as the
+"Fellows' Buildings," erected shortly after Milton's time.]
+
+[Footnote 109: "L'Allegro."]
+
+[Footnote 110: "Il Penseroso."]
+
+Hidden in a thicket at the north-eastern corner is a sequestered
+swimming-bath, fed by a stream drawn off from Hobson's conduit. To
+climb the statue beside this and dive off the head is a current feat
+amongst Christ's men. Something of a feat it is; requiring
+considerable sureness of foot and skill in balancing oneself.
+
+To reach the Gardens we must cross the first court, a singularly
+pleasant example of a College Court, rendered the more picturesque
+by the central grass-plot being circular instead of the usual
+rectangle, and pass on through the "Screens" at its north-eastern
+corner. Here we are in another Court, only in part surrounded by
+buildings; the "Fellows' Buildings" being immediately in front of
+us. As Christ's, unlike most Colleges, has but one entrance,[111] we
+shall have to retrace our steps. In passing the Hall we should, if
+possible, look in to note the portraits of the College worthies.
+Amongst these are to be found not only Lady Margaret, Bishop Fisher,
+and Milton, but Quarles (the author of the "Emblems"), Paley, the
+Evidencer of Christianity,[112] who was a Fellow here in the
+eighteenth century, and the epoch-making name of Charles Darwin, the
+Apostle of Evolution.
+
+[Footnote 111: A small back door, however, leads from the kitchen into
+"Christ's Lane" (on the south). On one famous occasion, when, at a
+time of popular excitement, the students were confined to the College,
+sympathisers from without burst this in (using the bar which closes
+the lane to vehicles as a battering-ram) and set them free.]
+
+[Footnote 112: Paley's _Evidences_ is still one of the set subjects in
+the "Littlego" (or "Previous Examination") which every student must
+pass before being allowed to proceed further.]
+
+From Christ's we continue along the Via Devana, here called St.
+Andrew's Street from the unlovely church of that name[113] which we
+see opposite the College. Of old the name was Preachers' Street, from
+the great preaching Order of the Dominican Friars, who from the
+thirteenth to the sixteenth century here found their home. The site
+of their House is now occupied by our next College, Emmanuel, as that
+of the Franciscans was by Sidney. It is remarkable that the ground of
+both the great Orders which were called into existence specially to
+preach the doctrines of Catholicism should have passed into the hands
+of men whose main object was to contest those doctrines. But so it
+was. Emmanuel, like Sidney, was founded (1584) expressly to combat the
+errors of Popery; and the Founder, Sir Thomas Mildmay, a courtier of
+Queen Elizabeth, has left on record his special wish that his College
+should turn out a constant supply of able Puritan divines.
+
+[Footnote 113: Unlovely as this church is, it is a monument of the
+piety and generosity of one of the most pious and generous men
+Cambridge has ever known, Dr. Perry, first Bishop of Australia, who,
+while a Fellow of Trinity, devoted his private fortune to the
+ecclesiastical needs of the town, and thus enabled no fewer than three
+large churches to be built. Unhappily it was at a period of execrable
+taste (the earliest Victorian), and the three are far from beautiful
+or correct examples of ecclesiastical architecture. But when the then
+newly formed Camden Society (for the revival of a purer style of
+building) ventured to hint as much, a storm of Protestant indignation
+arouse throughout Cambridge, and a public protest against such Romish
+criticism was actually signed by every resident Fellow of Trinity!]
+
+His hope was realised. Emmanuel at once sprang to the front as the
+great power-house of the Puritan movement in Cambridge; and so strong
+was that movement that for the moment it carried the College to the
+very top of the list, so that it surpassed in numbers even Trinity and
+St. John's. Many of the stalwarts who belonged to the Pilgrim Fathers
+of New England were here educated; notably John Harvard, whose name is
+borne by the Premier University of America. So also were many of the
+preachers who kindled and sustained the ardour of the Roundheads
+through the stress of the Civil War. Even after the Restoration the
+College retained the impress of its Founder's hope. When, in 1664, the
+Duke of Monmouth visited Cambridge, a satirical guide to the
+University, written in doggerel Latin verse for his benefit, sneers at
+the strict moral tone of Emmanuel: "You may well perceive that they
+are all Puritans here." And Archbishop Sancroft, famous as the chief
+of the Seven Bishops who made so staunch a stand against the
+toleration of Roman Catholics under James the Second, was an Emmanuel
+man.
+
+[Illustration: _Emmanuel College._]
+
+For the first century of its existence, the students of Emmanuel
+worshipped in an unconsecrated building running north and south,[114]
+where they received the Sacrament "sitting on forms about the
+Communion Table, and pulling the loaf one after other when the
+minister hath begun. And so the cup; ... without any application of
+the sacred words." But in 1679 this room was turned into the College
+Library, and the present chapel built on the usual Anglican lines.
+
+[Footnote 114: This was on the site of the Dominican Refectory. Sir
+Thomas Mildmay boasts that, in contempt of their religion, he has
+turned their Refectory into a Chapel, and their Church into a
+Refectory. The Hall and Combination Room still occupy the site of the
+Church.]
+
+Emmanuel has little architectural beauty; but there are pleasant
+grounds, with a swimming-bath, as at Christ's, and two larger ponds,
+in which swans and wild ducks are kept. The swimming-bath and the
+smaller pond are accessible only by the favour of a Fellow; but the
+large piece of water is in a great open court (beyond the first
+court). All are fed from a branch of the Hobson's Conduit stream,
+runlets from which run down St. Andrew's Street, even as they run down
+Trumpington Street. Beyond the swan-pond lie the new buildings, lately
+erected to meet the greater expansion of the College, for Emmanuel,
+after over two centuries of depression, now ranks (along with Caius
+and Pembroke) at the head of the list with regard to relative numbers,
+except Trinity alone. In actual numbers she broke in 1890 her record
+of 1628, and has gone on advancing steadily since. Her shield bears a
+blue lion ramping on a white ground and holding a laurel wreath,
+emblematic of the victory of the "Lion of the tribe of Judah."
+
+Immediately opposite the front gate of Emmanuel there runs off, at
+right angles, from the Via Devana, a thoroughfare known as Downing
+Street. Till the present century it actually gave access to Downing,
+the youngest of the Colleges to which the University officially
+accords that title. In those days Downing consisted of a huge
+parallelogram of prettily be-treed greensward, a furlong across and
+three furlongs long,[115] thus covering far more space than any other
+college. But in numbers it was the smallest of all, and also in
+income, till finally agricultural depression reduced it to such
+straits that it was forced to sell its northern frontage to the
+University. Thus Downing Street now leads, not to Downing, but to the
+great central huddle of University museums, laboratories, and
+lecture-rooms, which have been incessantly rising during the last two
+generations, and which are still continuing to rise. Here, cheek by
+jowl (on the site of the old Austin Friary), are the magnificent
+Geological Museum erected in memory of Professor Sedgwick, the Museum
+of Botany, the Law Schools, the Museum of Archæology, the Museum of
+Anatomy,[116] the Museum of Mineralogy, the Chemical Laboratory, the
+Medical Schools,[117] the Physical Laboratory,[118] the Engineering
+Laboratory, the Optical Lecture-room, and, beside these, the
+Philosophical Library, and the huge Examination Hall which is the
+latest addition to the equipment of the University.
+
+[Footnote 115: This occupied all but the whole space bounded by
+Downing Street, Tennis Court Road, Lensfield Road, and Regent Street.]
+
+[Footnote 116: The ethnological series of skulls here ranks (with
+those at Berlin, St. Petersburg, and Washington) as the most complete
+in the world.]
+
+[Footnote 117: On the wall here is engraved Pasteur's inspired saying:
+"_Dans les champs de l'observation le hasard ne favorise que les
+esprits préparés._"]
+
+[Footnote 118: This is called the Cavendish Laboratory, being the gift
+of the late Duke of Devonshire, Chancellor of the University. The word
+laboratory we may note is, in student speech, invariably "Lab," which
+is even used as a verb.]
+
+To reach Downing to-day, one must turn to the left on leaving
+Emmanuel, and continue along the Via Devana (here called Regent
+Street) till large iron gates on the opposite side of the road invite
+us to enter the College grounds. These give still an impressive sense
+of space, though now curtailed at the southern as well as the northern
+end, and form a pretty setting for the two parallel ranges of yellow
+stone, which date from the beginning of the nineteenth century. For
+though Downing was by that time keeping the centenary of its
+foundation (by Sir George Downing, of Gamlingay in Cambridgeshire),
+the funds had not hitherto admitted of the erection of college
+buildings. When first set up, these classical frontages were
+considered the _ne plus ultra_ of architectural perfection, and
+strangers were taken to see them as the great glory of Cambridge.
+
+Regent Street, after we leave Downing, will soon bring us again to the
+Church of Our Lady, so that we have now completed our circuit of
+Cambridge. There remain, however, a few outlying spots worth a visit
+should time serve. Nearest and most picturesque of these is Coe Fen, a
+long strip of common, lying along the eastern bank of the river,
+before it enters on its course through the Backs. The best time to see
+it is at sunset, and the best way to gain it is by following down the
+narrow byway beside Little St. Mary's, and turning to the left at the
+bottom. We shall then find ourselves on the Fen, beneath the old wall
+of Peterhouse deerpark, a delicious, heavily-buttressed, mass of red
+brick-work, leaning over and curved with age, patched and re-patched
+all over with all kinds of fragments, giving colour effects that are
+quite charming.[119] Passing beyond its shelter, and that of its
+continuing hedge (which divides us from Peterhouse and other gardens),
+we may take the first turn to the left, up a narrow (and often dirty)
+byway, which will lead us past the Leys School, the great Wesleyan
+educational outpost of Cambridge, into the Trumpington Road, where it
+joins Lensfield Road at Hobson's Conduit. Or, instead of turning to
+the left we may turn to the right, and, crossing the Cam by the iron
+footbridge, make our way over "Sheep's Green," the Common east of the
+river, to Newnham Mill and the Backs. Or we may hold straight on, by
+the footpath that runs the whole length of the Fen, which will bring
+us out on the Trumpington Road just by the first milestone, where that
+road crosses "Vicar's Brook."
+
+[Footnote 119: See p. 5.]
+
+It is from this side that we notice how this is no ordinary milestone,
+but a grand monolith twelve or fifteen feet in length, and feel that
+it must have a story. And so indeed it has, for it is the very first
+milestone ever set up in Britain since the days of the Roman dominion
+here. In those days every great road in the country had its series of
+milestones recording the distance from the central milestone in
+London, which still exists, in its decay, as "London Stone." But after
+the mighty organisation of the Roman Empire lost its hold upon the
+land, roads went to ruin, and milestones were broken up or used for
+Anglo-Saxon gate-posts. Not till 1729 was the idea of restoring the
+system entertained; and it was a Cambridge College, Trinity Hall, that
+first took it up, and carried it out on the road from Cambridge to
+London. Hence it is that these milestones bear the Crescent of the
+College shield. And for their inaugural milestone was chosen this
+grand monolith, which was itself an old Roman milestone.
+
+North-east of Cambridge stretch the mesh of dingy streets which make
+up the great suburb of Barnwell. Hither and thither they run, in
+soul-crushing monotony; yet even here there are gems of interest to be
+found. The suburb came into existence, to begin with, through the
+proximity of a great Abbey, the Augustinian Priory of Barnwell. This
+House of Religion was founded in the first instance by Hugoline, the
+pious wife of Picot, William the Conqueror's far from pious Sheriff of
+Cambridgeshire. It was by her located close beneath his
+dwelling-place in the Castle, and dedicated to St. Giles. Half a
+century later, the Picot land was forfeited for treason, and granted
+to Richard Peverel, who had been, in the First Crusade,
+standard-bearer to Robert Curthose, the Conqueror's eldest son. He
+transferred the House to the riverside, hard by a holy spring, the
+Burn Well (or source of the Brook), where a hermit of special sanctity
+had already reared an Oratory dedicated to St. Andrew. He also raised
+the number of monks from six to thirty, to correspond with that of his
+own years at the time.
+
+The Abbey grew and flourished. Its inmates, as appears from their
+"Custom Book" of 1296 (lately published by Mr. J. W. Clark), led a
+very civilised life--cleanliness being specially insisted upon; and
+its proximity to Cambridge placed it in touch with political life.
+Royalty stayed in it now and again; in 1388 even Sessions of
+Parliament were held in it; Papal Legates visited it.[120] And when
+civil wars broke out, it was a prize worth plundering; a fate it more
+than once suffered. When the final plunder came, under Henry the
+Eighth, the whole was utterly swept away; the only thing left being a
+small stone building, which was apparently the Muniment room of the
+Abbey. Though utterly ruinous, this little block is by no means
+without architectural merit, and may be found by following the
+Newmarket Road (which enters Cambridge as "Jesus Lane") to its
+junction with East Road (the eastward continuation of Lensfield Road).
+Here Abbey Street runs down to the river, and just off it is our
+building, commonly known as the "Priory Chapel." Hard by is an old
+red-brick dwelling-house, bearing the date 1578, and called the "Abbey
+Barn"; and in its grounds are several venerable fragments.
+
+[Footnote 120: Here was held, in 1430, under the representatives of
+Pope Martin the Fifth, the famous "Assize of Barnwell," which decided,
+by Papal authority, that in the University alone was vested all
+spiritual jurisdiction over its students, to the exclusion of the
+ordinary Diocesan and Parochial claims.]
+
+In close proximity to these ruins is an actually surviving relic of
+Barnwell Priory. This is a tiny church of Early English Architecture,
+known as the "Abbey Church," or "Little St. Andrew's."[121] Small as
+it is, it is the Mother Church of a huge parish (now happily divided
+into districts) containing more than half the entire population of
+the Borough of Cambridge. It was built by the Canons of Barnwell, when
+their Priory was a century old, for the use of the little knot of
+hangers-on whom every great abbey attracted to its doors, and whose
+secular (and, perhaps, far from cleanly) presence was unwelcome at the
+fastidious worship of the Priory Church. And they made it the
+representative of the old hermit's Oratory of St. Andrew. For long
+ages it sufficed for the adjoining population; but when that
+population increased by the hundred-fold, as it did at the opening of
+the nineteenth century, things got to a desperate pass, and Barnwell
+became practically heathen, with an only too well-deserved reputation
+for vice of every kind.
+
+[Footnote 121: So called to distinguish it from "Great St. Andrew's,"
+opposite Christ's College.]
+
+So matters stood when, in 1839, Dr. Perry, Fellow of Trinity College,
+who was Senior Wrangler in 1828, and whom we have met with as the
+devoutest attendant at the College Chapel, and as the builder of Great
+St. Andrew's, came forward to stem the evil. Renouncing the comfort of
+College life, he took upon himself the charge of this hopeless
+district; for which he built, at his own expense, the commodious (if
+ugly) red-brick church opposite the Abbey, and a like fabric (St.
+Paul's) at the other end of the area, on the way to the railway
+station. He laboured devotedly himself, he inspired others to work, he
+invoked the help of a band of pious undergraduates who had already
+begun a Sunday School on their own account,[122] and when he departed
+to become the pioneer Bishop of Australia, he left a well-equipped
+Parish organisation which is still in full activity.[123]
+
+[Footnote 122: This School still flourishes, and is still staffed by
+undergraduates. It is known as "Jesus Lane Sunday School," its first
+quarters having been in that street.]
+
+[Footnote 123: The parish has now been divided into half a dozen
+districts. And its earliest houses, immediately round the Abbey
+Church, remain (as they have been from the first) outlying fragments
+of two small Town parishes, St. Benet's and St. Edward's.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Lepers' Chapel, Barnwell._]
+
+Pursuing the Newmarket Road, we find (at the point where it at last
+ceases to be a Barnwell Street, and crosses the railway into the open
+country beyond), yet another tiny ancient church, called traditionally
+the "Lepers' Chapel." It is of Norman date, and probably served the
+Lepers' Hospital, which we know to have existed hereabouts, as remote
+as might be from the town. This hospital was endowed by King John
+with the tolls of the great Fair held hard by on Stourbridge Common,
+which even so late as the Eighteenth Century boasted itself the
+largest and most important in all Europe, a position now claimed by
+that of Nijni Novgorod in Russia. And, to judge by the accounts that
+have come down to us, the boast was not unfounded. The Cambridgeshire
+historian, Carter, writing in 1753, thus describes it:
+
+     "Stourbridge Fair ... is set out annually on St. Bartholomew by
+     the Mayor, Aldermen, and the rest of the Corporation of
+     Cambridge; who all ride thither in a grand procession, with music
+     playing before them, and most of the boys in the town on
+     horseback after them, who, as soon as the ceremony is read over,
+     ride races about the place; when returning to Cambridge each boy
+     has a cake and some ale at the Town Hall. On the 7th of September
+     they ride in the same manner to proclaim it; which being done,
+     the Fair begins, and continues three weeks; though the greatest
+     part is over in a fortnight.
+
+     "This Fair, which was thought some years ago to be the greatest
+     in Europe, is kept in a cornfield, about half a mile square,
+     having the River Cam running on the north side thereof, and the
+     rivulet called the Stour (from which and the bridge over it the
+     Fair received its name) on the east side, and it is about two
+     miles east of Cambridge market-place; where, during the Fair,
+     coaches, chaises, and chariots attend to carry persons to the
+     Fair. The chief diversions at Stourbridge are drolls,
+     rope-dancing, and sometimes a music-booth; but there is an Act of
+     Parliament which prohibits the acting of plays within fifteen
+     miles of Cambridge.
+
+     "If the field (on which the Fair is kept) is not cleared of the
+     corn by the 24th of August, the builders may trample it under
+     foot to build their booths; and, on the other hand, if the same
+     be not cleared of the booths and material belonging thereto by
+     Michaelmas Day at noon, the plough-men may enter the same with
+     their horses, ploughs, and carts, and destroy whatever they find
+     on the premises. The filth, dung, straw, etc., left behind by the
+     fair-keepers, make amends for their trampling and hardening of
+     the ground.
+
+     "The shops or booths are built in rows like streets, having each
+     their name, as Garlick Row, Booksellers'-row, Cook-row, etc. And
+     every commodity has its proper place, as the Cheese Fair, Hop
+     Fair, Wool Fair, etc.; and here, as in several other streets or
+     rows, are all sorts of traders, who sell by wholesale or retail,
+     as goldsmiths, toy-men, brasiers, turners, milliners,
+     haberdashers, hatters, mercers, drapers, pewterers, china
+     warehouses, and, in a word, most trades that can be found in
+     London, from whence many of them come. Here are also taverns,
+     coffee-houses, and eating-houses in great plenty, and all kept in
+     booths, in any of which (except the coffee-booth) you may at any
+     time be accommodated with hot or cold roast goose, roast or
+     boiled pork, etc.
+
+     "Crossing the main road at the south end of Garlick Row, and a
+     little to the left hand, is a great Square, formed of the largest
+     booths, called the Duddery, the area of which Square is from 240
+     to 300 feet, chiefly taken up with woollen drapers, wholesale
+     tailors, and sellers of second-hand clothes; where the dealers
+     have room before their booths to take down and open their packs,
+     and bring in waggons to load and unload the same. In the centre
+     of this Square was (till within these three years) erected a tall
+     May-pole, with a vane at the top; and in this Square, on the two
+     chief Sundays during the fair, both forenoon and afternoon,
+     Divine Service is read, and a sermon preached from a pulpit
+     placed in the open air, by the Minister of Barnwell; who is very
+     well paid for the same by the contribution of the fair-keepers.
+
+     "In this Duddery only, it is said, there have been sold £100,000
+     worth of woollen manufactures in less than a week's time; besides
+     the prodigious trade carried on here, by the wholesale tailors
+     from London, and most other parts of England, who transact their
+     business wholly in their pocket-books, and meeting here their
+     chapmen from all parts, make up their accounts, receive money
+     chiefly in bills, and take further orders. These, they say,
+     exceed by far the sale of goods actually brought to the Fair, and
+     delivered in kind; it being frequent for the London wholesale men
+     to carry back orders from their dealers for £10,000 worth of
+     goods a man, and some much more. And once in this Duddery, it is
+     said, there was a booth consisting of six apartments, all
+     belonging to a dealer in Norwich stuffs only, who had there above
+     £20,000 worth of those goods.
+
+     "The trade for wool, hops, and leather here is prodigious; the
+     quantity of wool only sold at one fair is said to have amounted
+     to £50,000 or £60,000, and of hops very little less.
+
+     "September 14, being the Horse Fair day, is the day of the
+     greatest hurry, when it is almost incredible to conceive what
+     number of people there are, and the quantity of victuals that day
+     consumed by them.
+
+     "During the Fair, Colchester oysters and white herrings, just
+     coming into season, are in great request, at least by such as
+     live in the inland parts of the kingdom, where they are seldom to
+     be had fresh, especially the latter.
+
+     "The Fair is like a well-governed city; and less disorder and
+     confusion to be seen there than in any other place where there is
+     so great a concourse of people: here is a Court of Justice always
+     open from morning till night, where the Mayor of Cambridge, or
+     his Deputy, sits as Judge, determining all controversies in
+     matters arising from the business of the Fair, and seeing the
+     Peace thereof kept; for which purpose he hath eight servants,
+     called Red-coats, attending him during the time of the Fair and
+     other public occasions, one or other of which are constantly at
+     hand in most parts of the Fair; and if any dispute arise between
+     buyer and seller, on calling out 'Red-coat,' you have instantly
+     one or more come running to you; and if the dispute is not
+     quickly decided, the offender is carried to the said Court, where
+     the case is decided in a summary way, from which sentence there
+     lies no appeal.
+
+     "About two or three days after the Horse Fair day, when the hurry
+     of the wholesale business is over, the country gentry for about
+     ten or twelve miles round begin to come in with their sons and
+     daughters; and though diversion is what chiefly brings them, yet
+     it is not a little money they lay out among the tradesmen,
+     toy-shops, etc., besides what is flung away to see the puppet
+     shows, drolls, rope-dancing, live creatures, etc., of which there
+     is commonly plenty.
+
+     "The last observation I shall make concerning this Fair is, how
+     inconveniently a multitude of people are lodged there who keep
+     it; their bed (if I may so call it) is laid on two or three
+     boards, nailed to four pieces that bear it about a foot from the
+     ground, and four boards round it, to keep the persons and their
+     clothes from falling off, and is about five feet long, standing
+     abroad all day if it rains not. At night it is taken into their
+     booths, and put in to the best manner they can; at bed-time they
+     get into it, and lie neck and heels together until the morning,
+     if the wind and rain do not force them out sooner; for a high
+     wind often blows down their booths, as it did A.D. 1741, and a
+     heavy rain forces through the hair-cloth that covers it.
+
+     "Though the Corporation of Cambridge has the tolls of this Fair,
+     and the government as aforesaid, yet the body of the University
+     has the oversight of the weights and measures thereof (as well as
+     at Midsummer and Reach Fairs) and the licensing of all
+     show-booths, live creatures, etc.; and the Proctors of the
+     University keep a Court there also to hear complaints about
+     weights and measures, seek out and punish lewd women, and see
+     that their Gownsmen commit no disorders."
+
+Fuller (in the seventeenth century) gives us the tradition that the
+fair originated with some Westmorland cloth dealers, who were here
+overtaken by a storm on their way to Norwich, and found so ready a
+market for the goods which they spread out to dry on the grass of the
+common that they went no further but returned hither the next year,
+and again. Thus the special prominence given to the "Duddery" here is
+accounted for. The tradition does not seem improbable, for Kendal has,
+from time immemorial, been renowned for its cloth--the famous "Kendal
+green" worn, in old ballads, by the English archers. To this day the
+shield of that town bears cloth-making implements, with the motto
+"_Pannus mihi panis_" ("Flock is my food"). And Norwich was
+(throughout the Middle Ages) the great commercial centre of the cloth
+trade. That there was some marked connection between Cambridgeshire
+and Westmorland is proved by the constant occurrence here of family
+names derived from Kendal place-names (Sizergh, Docwray, Strickland,
+Sedgwick, etc.) which have been current amongst the peasantry of
+Cambridgeshire since the fourteenth century at least.
+
+Since Carter wrote, the great development of communication has made
+fairs a mere survival, and Stourbridge Fair has fallen from its high
+estate. It is now a very commonplace affair of a few days' duration,
+mainly for the horse trade. But it still is declared open by the Mayor
+of Cambridge or his delegate, and a dish of the white herrings which
+Carter speaks of still forms part of the opening ceremony. And it has
+an abiding interest for English readers, as the prototype of "Vanity
+Fair" in the "Pilgrim's Progress." Bunyan, as a Bedford man, would be
+familiar with the bustling scene, and, if we compare his pages with
+those which we have transcribed from Carter's History, we see how
+vividly he has allegorised it:
+
+     "At this Fair are all such Merchandize sold as Houses, Lands,
+     Trades, Places, Honours, Preferments, Titles, Countreys,
+     Kingdoms, Lusts, Pleasures, and Delights of all sorts, as Whores,
+     Bauds, Wives, Husbands, Children, Masters, Servants, Lives,
+     Blood, Bodies, Souls, Silver, Gold, Pearls, Precious Stones, and
+     what not.
+
+     "And moreover at this Fair there is at all times to be seen
+     Juglings, Cheats, Games, Plays, Fools, Apes, Knaves, and Rogues,
+     and that of every kind.
+
+     "Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, Thefts, Murders,
+     Adulteries, False Swearings, and that of a blood-red colour.
+
+     "And as, in other Fairs of less moment, there are the several
+     Rows and Streets, under their proper Names, here such and such
+     Wares are vended, so here likewise you have the proper Places,
+     Rows, and Streets (namely Countries and Kingdoms) where the
+     Wares of this Fair are soonest to be found. Here is the Britain
+     Row, the French Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row, the German
+     Row, where several sorts of vanities are to be sold. But, as in
+     other Fairs some one Commodity is the Chief of all the Fair, so
+     the Wares of Rome and her Merchandize is greatly promoted in this
+     Fair."
+
+We find also reference to the standing Court of summary jurisdiction
+under "the Great One of the Fair," with "the trusty Friends" who
+formed his police, that took cognisance of the "Hubbub and great Stir
+in the Fair" caused by the demeanour of the pilgrims.
+
+As an instance of how wide a range the commodities sold at this fair
+covered, we may mention that Sir Isaac Newton there bought his famous
+prisms--three of them for £3. They were probably of French or Italian
+make; no glass of this character was as yet manufactured in England.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+     Roads from Cambridge.--Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East
+     Angles, Mercians, Formation of County.--Newmarket
+     Road.--Quy.--Fleam Dyke.--Devil's Dyke.--Icknield Way.--Iceni,
+     Ostorius, Boadicea.--Newmarket Heath, First Racing.--Exning,
+     Anna.--Snailwell.--Fordham.--Soham, St.
+     Felix.--Stuntney.--Wicken.--Chippenham.--Isleham,
+     Lectern.--Eastern Heights.--Chevely, Cambridge
+     Corporation.--Kirtling.--Wood Ditton.--Stetchworth.--Borough
+     Green.--Bottisham.--Swaffham Bulbeck.--The Lodes.--Swaffham
+     Prior.--Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest.--Burwell, Church, Clunch,
+     Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville.
+
+
+At the Lepers' Chapel we are clear of Cambridge and well on the road
+to Newmarket, probably the most trafficked of all the great roads
+which radiate from Cambridge. Of these there are seven; this Newmarket
+Road going to the north-east, the Hills road to the south-east, the
+Trumpington Road to the south, the Barton Road to the south-west, the
+Madingley Road to the west, the Huntingdon Road to the north-west,
+and, finally, the Ely Road to the north. This last takes us into the
+Isle of Ely; the other six serve the county of Cambridge, more
+strictly so-called, _i.e._, the southern half of the Cambridgeshire of
+our maps, not so long ago quite separate, politically, from the
+northern half, and even now not wholly united for administrative
+purposes.
+
+The Isle, which contains the whole of the fenland forming this
+northern half of Cambridgeshire, is far older as a political entity
+than the southern part of the county. Its existence dates back to the
+far-off days of the Anglo-Saxon conquest, in the fifth and sixth
+centuries, when the poor remnants of the British population in East
+Anglia, once the proud tribe of "the great Iceni," fled for refuge
+into the "dismal swamp" of the Fens. Here they held out for centuries,
+and formed themselves into a new tribe, the Girvii (as our earliest
+Latin chronicler transliterates the Welsh name Gyrwy, signifying
+"brave men," by which they called themselves). This Girvian
+principality has ever since held together. It passed as a whole into
+the hands of St. Etheldreda, by her marriage (in 652 A.D.) with the
+last Girvian Prince, Tonbert, and from her to her successors the
+Abbots and Bishops of Ely, whose jurisdiction survived until the
+nineteenth century.
+
+Meanwhile the old southland homes of the unhappy Britons were being
+shared up by their English exterminators. The East Anglians swarmed
+over the uplands to the east, and joined hands (not in friendship)
+with the more powerful Mercians swarming in from the west. Roughly
+speaking the Cam divided these jarring tribes, which lived in undying
+hostility till the various English Kingdoms were united into one (in
+A.D. 827) by the genius and valour of Egbert, the first "King of the
+English." But the boundaries were not effaced till the desolating
+flood of the Danish invasions poured over all.
+
+When that flood was stayed by Egbert's glorious grandson, Alfred the
+Great, and the district once more made English and Christian by his
+only less glorious son, Edward "the Elder," it was formed by him into
+a County called, from its chief town, Cambridgeshire (or, as it was
+then, "Granta-bryg-shire"). This was in the year 921. But for the
+first idea of any union between this new County and the old Isle of
+Ely we must wait another two centuries, when, in 1107, the Abbot of
+Ely became a Bishop, with the Isle and the County together for his
+See. The ecclesiastical tie thus formed has gradually developed into a
+civil tie also; just as the first union of the English race under a
+common Primate, the Archbishop of Canterbury, paved the way for its
+union under a common King.
+
+To many charming byways amid the streamlets and the meadows and the
+gentle slopes of this southern Cambridgeshire the seven highways out
+of Cambridge will successively conduct us. The highways themselves
+are, as has been said, seldom inspiring thoroughfares, save for their
+far-flung horizons; and the Newmarket Road least of all, for it is, as
+might be looked for, motor-swept beyond all the rest. The one
+near-hand object alone worth mention is the little Church of Quy,
+whose far-seen tower dominates some miles of the road. But this has
+little interest except its curious name, which is matter of dispute
+amongst etymologists. "Cow-ey" is the most commonly accepted
+derivation, meaning the Island of Cows. But Quy can never have been an
+island. More probably it is "Cow-way," like the "Cowey Stakes" on the
+Thames, signifying that here was a passage for cattle across the
+marshy ground which bordered the little stream crossed by the road
+before reaching the church. This stream flows out of Fulbourn Fen, an
+isolated patch of fen-land a mile square, even yet only half
+reclaimed, and of old so impassable that it determined the line of the
+great Fleam Dyke, which runs up to it on either side but does not need
+to cross it.
+
+[Illustration: _Quy Church._]
+
+The Fleam Dyke is one of the great prehistoric lines of defence which
+were run from the Fens of the Cam to the summit of the East Anglian
+heights. Those heights were in ancient times clothed with dense
+forest, and formed an impenetrable barrier against enemies from the
+west seeking to invade the East Anglian districts. So too did the
+morasses of the fenland. But between fen and forest stretched a strip
+of open grassland furnishing easy access. To defend this, the only
+gate into their territory, was the great object of the inhabitants of
+those districts; and they ran across it two stupendous earthworks, the
+Fleam Dyke as their outer bulwark and the Devil's Dyke, which we meet
+at Newmarket, as the inner.[124] The former stretches for a length of
+some ten miles from the banks of the Cam at Fen Ditton to the uplands
+by Balsham (its course broken by Fulbourn Fen); the latter ranges in a
+long unbroken rampart from the Fen at Reach to Wood Ditton (_i.e._
+"the ditch-end in the forest").
+
+[Footnote 124: There were other minor Dykes (such as the Warstead
+Street, from Cherry Hinton to Horseheath), but these play no part in
+history.]
+
+When these were constructed we do not know. They first appear in
+history as the scene of desperate fighting between Britons and Romans
+in the first century of our era. But they may very probably have
+existed before even the Britons came into the land. Magnificent
+earthworks they are, some 10 feet high on the inner side, and on the
+outer at least 30, from the bottom of the great ditch which flanks
+them to the crown of the parapet. When that parapet was topped by a
+palisade of timber, they must have presented formidable obstacles
+indeed. The Fleam Dyke we do not see from this road. But as we
+approach Newmarket, and enter upon its famous Heath, we cross the
+Devil's Dyke; and, as we look at its mighty dimensions, we cease to
+wonder that our simple-minded ancestors should have ascribed its
+formation to superhuman agency.
+
+The gap by which we pass through the Devil's Dyke deserves notice. It
+is the one gap in the whole line of the work, and was left to admit,
+not our road, but that which we now join, the London Road of
+Newmarket. For this is one of the most venerable tracks in the land,
+being the "Icknield Way," made how long ago Heaven only knows. From
+the very first settlement of the country there must always have
+existed some route along this open strip between fen and forest which
+formed the only line of communication from the eastern to the midland
+regions of our island. In British days the former were occupied by the
+great clan of the Iceni, whose name survives in the English
+appellation of the road, and can be traced in many place-names along
+it, such as Ickleton in Cambridgeshire, and Ickleford in
+Hertfordshire.[125] The road followed the western slope of the chalk
+hills to the Thames and beyond, till it tapped the line of the great
+Tin-road, by which that then precious metal was brought from Cornwall
+to Thanet.[126]
+
+[Footnote 125: These forms show that the C was sounded hard. On the
+coins of the clan the name is written ECEN. These coins are of gold
+and bear the figure of a horse, being rude copies of the Macedonian
+staters which the tin trade brought to Britain. The earliest known are
+of the third century B.C., the latest (those inscribed with the name)
+of the first half century A.D.]
+
+[Footnote 126: Tin was precious as a component of bronze, which, till
+iron came in, was the material for weapons and tools. See my _Roman
+Britain (S.P.C.K.)_, p. 33.]
+
+At the Roman conquest of Britain in 55 A.D. the Iceni were friendly to
+the invaders, whom indeed they had invited into the land, to free them
+from their subjection to the House of Cymbeline, King of Britain. But
+when, a few years later, during the settlement of the country, the
+Roman general Ostorius ordered them to give up their arms, they
+regarded the demand as an intolerable insult, and bade him defiance,
+manning the Fleam Dyke against him. But such was his energy that,
+though he had no regular troops with him, his light-armed auxiliaries
+stormed the whole length of the line at a single rush. The routed
+Icenians fled in panic homewards, only to find their way hopelessly
+barred by their own fortifications along the Devil's Dyke, and all but
+the few who could force their way through the mad crush at this one
+narrow gap, were, in spite of a desperate resistance, slaughtered
+wholesale. The tribe were then disarmed, and endured unresistingly the
+licence and greed of Roman officials and Roman moneylenders, till
+goaded into madness, twelve years later, by the wrongs of their
+"warrior-queen," Boadicea. Then followed that convulsive explosion of
+popular rage and despair, in which every Roman within reach was
+massacred with every circumstance of horror, and to which the Romans,
+after their victory, replied by such a policy of extermination as to
+blot the Icenian name from the page of history. Never again do we meet
+with it.
+
+Between the Dyke and Newmarket lies the Heath, renowned as the
+earliest English race-course. This form of amusement seems to have
+come in with the Stuart Dynasty. James the First is said to have
+inaugurated the sport. But the well-known tale of how Edward the First
+escaped from his captivity at Hereford, by inducing his guards to ride
+matches till their horses were exhausted and then galloping off on
+his own fresh mount, shows that the idea was afloat long before. And
+at Newmarket in particular such matches must often have been ridden in
+connection with the great horse mart which has given the town its
+name.
+
+This New Market is, like the New Forest, now far from new. It dates
+from the year 1227, when a frightful outbreak of sickness frightened
+away buyers and sellers from their older market-place two miles off at
+Exning (a pretty natural amphitheatre of turf bright with many
+springs), and sent them to meet for the future in the freer air of the
+Heath. This word, by the way, does not, in Cambridgeshire, imply the
+existence of heather, merely meaning an open space.
+
+Thus Newmarket came into being. The sport we first hear of in
+connection with it is not racing but hunting. For the boundless range
+of the moorlands to the east of the town (which even now astonish all
+who first see them) were then haunted by innumerable herds of wild
+deer, and afforded ideal ground for the chase. James the First,
+accordingly, had here a hunting-box,[127] in which his unhappy son was
+afterwards imprisoned for a while by the victorious army of the
+Commonwealth. And thus the Heath became known to his "merry" grandson,
+Charles the Second, who speedily saw how specially adapted its expanse
+was for horse-racing, and established a regular annual race-meeting,
+the first to be introduced into England.
+
+[Footnote 127: In the Register of Fordham Church (a few miles north of
+Newmarket) is an entry to the effect that, on 27 February 1624, "The
+Most High and Mighty Prince, King James the First of England and Sixth
+of Scotland condescended to hunt six hares in Fordham Field!"]
+
+The Royal sport spread like wildfire, and the bare Heath became year
+by year crowded by the gayest throng in England, thus vividly
+described by Macaulay:
+
+     "It was not uncommon for the whole Court and Cabinet to go down
+     there," Charles himself, to the admiration of his subjects,
+     posting down from London in a single day, with only two relays of
+     fresh horses. "Jewellers and milliners, players and fiddlers,
+     venal wits and venal beauties, followed in crowds. The streets
+     were made impassable by coaches and six. In the places of public
+     resort peers flirted with maids of honour, and officers of the
+     Life Guards, all plumes and gold lace, jostled professors in
+     trencher caps and black gowns. For on such occasions the
+     neighbouring University of Cambridge always sent her highest
+     functionaries with loyal addresses, and selected her ablest
+     theologians to preach before the Sovereign and his splendid
+     retinue. In the wild days before the Revolution, indeed, the most
+     learned and eloquent divine might fail to draw a fashionable
+     audience, particularly if Buckingham announced his intention of
+     holding forth; for sometimes his Grace would enliven the dulness
+     of a Sunday morning by addressing to the bevy of fine gentlemen
+     and fine ladies a ribald exhortation which he called a sermon.
+     With lords and ladies from St. James's and Soho, and with doctors
+     from Trinity College and King's College, were mingled the
+     provincial aristocracy, fox-hunting squires and their
+     rosy-cheeked daughters, who had come in queer-looking family
+     coaches, drawn by cart-horses, from the remotest parishes of
+     three or four counties to see their Sovereign.... Racing was only
+     one of the many amusements of that festive season. On fine
+     mornings there was hunting. For those who preferred hawking,
+     choice falcons were brought from Holland. On rainy days the
+     cock-pit was encircled by stars and blue ribbons.... The Heath
+     was fringed by a wild, gipsy-like camp of vast extent. For the
+     hope of being able to feed on the leavings of many sumptuous
+     tables, and to pick up some of the guineas and crowns which the
+     spendthrifts of London were throwing about, attracted thousands
+     of peasants from a circle of many miles."
+
+Nor were these beggars the only ones to profit by the festive
+occasion. The townsfolk of Newmarket reaped a golden harvest; lodgings
+for the press of visitors were at fancy prices, and many were glad to
+pay a guinea a night for even the third of a bed; and "at Cambridge,"
+we read, "a hackney-horse is not to be got for money."
+
+When Newmarket became only one of many racing centres throughout the
+land, this height of glory naturally departed. But to this day its
+meetings rank in the very first class of such fixtures. And as a
+training ground for race-horses it stands second to none. Training
+stables rise all round it, and strings of young thorough-breds are
+constantly to be met along the road, and are treated with reverence,
+even by the drivers of motor-cars, who, for some distance on either
+side of the town are not allowed to travel at any speed over ten miles
+an hour. There are now seven principal annual racing fixtures here,
+the chief being the "Craven," in the spring, and the "Two Thousand" in
+the autumn.
+
+The town of Newmarket is now wholly in Suffolk, although till a few
+years ago it lay partly in Cambridgeshire, for it is built on either
+side of the Icknield Street, which here formed the county boundary.
+But the Old Market at Exning was always in Suffolk; a little island of
+which may be seen on the map, surrounded by Cambridgeshire territory.
+Here we have an interesting historical survival. Whence came about
+this curious delimitation? The answer is that when Cambridgeshire was
+first formed into a county by Edward the Elder it was not yet
+forgotten that Exning had long been a special residence of Suffolk
+royalty.
+
+Suffolk, it must be remembered, is not, like Cambridgeshire,
+Bedfordshire, and other counties named after their chief town, an
+artificial division of the land, called into being by the Government
+merely as an administrative unit, but, like the Isle of Ely, one of
+the originally independent principalities the gradual accretion of
+which has formed England. Very early Suffolk and Norfolk joined
+together in one East Anglian Kingdom; but that Kingdom endured for
+centuries, and was not extinguished till its last monarch, St. Edmund,
+was murdered by the Danes in their great raid of 870 A.D. He was,
+indeed, but a tributary monarch, under the King of the English; but
+this was then only a quite recent arrangement, and his predecessors
+had been wholly independent sovereigns. For many years they were
+engaged in a heroic struggle to preserve their independence against
+Mercia, the great power which occupied all the Midlands, and therefore
+it was that they fixed their Royal abode at Exning, close to the great
+dyke which bulwarked the East Anglian realm, as, long before, it had
+bulwarked the Icenian.
+
+Hence it came about that Exning was the birthplace of St. Etheldreda,
+the foundress of our great "sacred fane" at Ely, round which, almost
+more than Cambridge itself, the fortunes of Cambridgeshire have
+centred. Her father, King Anna, was called to the East Anglian throne
+in troublous times. Christianity and Paganism were at death-grips
+throughout the land. And the latter cause was championed by the
+monarch who was, for the moment, far the most powerful of the English
+sovereigns, Penda, King of Mercia. From his central position he struck
+out north, south, and east, at his Christian neighbours. His first
+blows were against Northumbria, where he successively shattered the
+Roman Mission of Paulinus and the Celtic Mission of Aidan. Next he
+drove into exile Kenwalk, the first Christian King of Wessex, and
+finally, in 654, burst over the East Anglian frontier "like a wolf, so
+that Anna and his folk were devoured as in a moment."
+
+But this breaking up of the Exning family did but scatter its members
+to spread far and wide the cause of the Gospel. And a splendid band
+they were. Not for nothing is Anna described by Bede as "a good man,
+and the father of an excellent family." His eldest son followed him on
+the throne (for Penda was slain shortly after his last victory, and
+the Mercian dominion fell with him), and helped St. Etheldreda in her
+great work at Ely; another son, St. Erconwald, became one of the most
+famous of all the Bishops of London; while, of the daughters, one was
+Abbess of Barking, another of Dereham, another of Brie, in
+France.[128] Yet another, Sexburga, after being Queen of Kent,
+succeeded Etheldreda as Abbess of Ely, and was herself succeeded by
+her daughter Ermenilda, who, as Queen of Penda's son Wulfhere, had
+taken part in St. Chad's great work of converting Mercia. Seldom has
+any place bred such a household of Saints as this quiet little village
+of Exning. A pretty village it still is; but is now fast becoming a
+suburb of Newmarket. The bright little stream running through it is
+derived partly from springs in the old market meadow already spoken of
+(known as "the Seven Springs"), and partly from sources in a copse
+some half-mile to the south, known as St. Wendred's Well. All we know
+of this obscure Saint is that she had a local fame in the tenth
+century, when her body, in a golden coffin, was brought from Ely to
+the great battle between Edmund Ironside and Canute at Assandun, and
+became the spoil of the victor. The church at March is dedicated to
+her.
+
+[Footnote 128: Her abbey was for generations the favourite
+boarding-school in France for young ladies from England.]
+
+The road from Newmarket to Ely (twelve miles) passes several places
+worth notice. First comes Snailwell, with the flint-built round tower
+of its little church rising so picturesquely above the "well," now a
+broad, clear pond, from which the little river Snail crawls away into
+the adjacent fen. At the adjoining hamlet of Landwade there was lately
+unearthed a Roman villa, the fine tesselated pavement of which is now
+in the Sedgwick Museum of Cambridge.
+
+Fordham, which we next reach, is a larger village, with a church of
+most unusual architectural interest. The north porch has a stone roof
+of no fewer than six vaulted bays, running east and west, and
+supporting a parvis chamber, with late Decorated windows, approached
+by a stone staircase from without, and, seemingly, designed for a
+chapel with a separate dedication to St. Mary Magdalene, the Church
+being St. Peter's. This development is unique.
+
+[Illustration: _Fordham Church._]
+
+Three miles on, we come to the furthest outpost of the East Anglian
+uplands, the little market town of Soham, situated on an almost
+isolated peninsula of the chalk, which here runs out into the fen, and
+upon the very borders[129] of the Isle of Ely. The Cathedral is here a
+conspicuous object, rising high upon its hill over the intervening
+fen, and only five miles away. But Soham is associated with a yet
+earlier development of local Christianity than Ely itself. Forty years
+before St. Etheldreda founded her Abbey, one was here established by
+St. Felix, "the Apostle of East Anglia." That title does not mean that
+he was absolutely the first to preach the Gospel to the East English,
+but the first whose work was permanent. For the introduction of the
+Faith into these parts met with more than one set-back before it was
+fairly established.
+
+[Footnote 129: These borders are now marked only in the Ordnance maps.
+The line runs right across the county from west to east, following the
+West River (the ancient course of the Ouse), to its junction with the
+Cam, and then almost straight eastward to the boundary of Suffolk,
+along a water-course known as the "Bishop's Delph" (_i.e._, ditch,
+from the verb _delve_).]
+
+Within two years of the first coming of St. Augustine in 597 A.D.,
+Redwald King of East Anglia, who had succeeded the earliest Christian
+monarch, Ethelbert of Kent, in the dignity of Bretwalda,[130] followed
+him also in seeking baptism. His Christianity, however, was of too
+unconventional a type to be acceptable. Bede tells us how "in the same
+temple he had an altar for the sacrifice of Christ, and a small one to
+offer sacrifices unto devils." This attempt (made under the influence
+of his heathen wife) was foredoomed to failure, and was followed by a
+period of religious confusion, till Sigebert, his son, succeeded to
+the throne. He had been an exile in France, where he had become "a
+most Christian and learned man," under the influence of St. Felix, a
+holy man of Burgundy, whose help he asked, on becoming King, "to cause
+all his province to partake" of his religion.
+
+[Footnote 130: This title implied a vague Primacy amongst the various
+Anglo-Saxon monarchs, conferred, by as vague a recognition on their
+part, upon him who was for the time the most powerful amongst them.
+But though vague it was far from unreal. We find Ethelbert's
+protection enabling St. Augustine to preach all over England. Indeed
+the name (which etymologically signifies merely Broad Wielder) very
+early got to be regarded as meaning Wielder of Britain.]
+
+[Illustration: _Fordham._]
+
+The landing-place of the Saint is still commemorated in the name
+Felixstowe near Harwich, and thence he proceeded to preach with
+entire success throughout all Sigebert's realm. Soham was his furthest
+point, for the fenland beyond was already Christian (the population
+being British, and provided for by Augustine's church at
+Cratendune).[131] And at Soham he set up an Abbey, where he himself
+was buried in 634, three years only after his landing. St. Etheldreda
+(who was probably Sigebert's niece) was at this time a young girl.
+Some imagine Soham to have been the site of a famous school set up by
+Felix, "after the model of those in France, with masters and
+teachers." But this is more likely to have been in his Cathedral city
+of Dunwich, once the leading town in East Anglia, now wholly submerged
+by the encroachments of the German Ocean. The See was transferred to
+Thetford and then to Norwich. Soham Abbey flourished on side by side
+with Ely, till both were destroyed in the great Danish raid of 870
+A.D. Why, when Ely was rebuilt, a century later, Soham was not, is
+unknown.
+
+[Footnote 131: Augustine, true to his mission from St. Gregory, strove
+to rekindle all over the land such embers of the Faith as still
+smouldered on amongst the British refugees. For those in the fenland,
+the Girvii, he had set up a small religious house at Cratendune near
+Ely, which was afterwards absorbed by Etheldreda's larger Abbey.]
+
+The present parish church has a lofty Perpendicular nave, with fine
+flowing Decorated windows in the chancel and transept, and a really
+splendid tower, one hundred feet in height, crowned with a pinnacled
+parapet of flint-work. Shortly after the Norman Conquest, Soham became
+the objective of the first causeway to be made for civil purposes
+between the island of Ely and the mainland.[132] This was due to
+Bishop Hervey (the first to be Bishop of Ely as well as Abbot), and
+was felt to be so epoch-making a work that it was ascribed to
+supernatural influence. St. Edmund, the high-souled King of East
+Anglia (who, after his martyrdom by the Danes in 870, became the
+Patron Saint of the Eastern Counties), was said to have appeared in a
+dream to a man of Exning, bidding him suggest the design to the
+Bishop. The little island of Stuntney[133] formed a stepping-stone for
+this causeway, so that only three miles out of the six between Ely and
+Soham needed an actual embankment.
+
+[Footnote 132: William the Conqueror had already run a military
+causeway across Willingham Fen to the south-west side of the island at
+Aldreth.]
+
+[Footnote 133: The word "stunt" in the dialect of Cambridgeshire
+signifies _steep_. The shores of Stuntney rise from the fen with most
+unusual abruptness.]
+
+[Illustration: _Soham._]
+
+Soham, as has been said, was on all sides surrounded by fen, except on
+the narrow ridge of firm ground between it and Fordham. So
+water-logged, indeed, was the country round that sea-going vessels
+made a port here. This fen is now all drained and become most prosaic
+cornland. But a few miles east and west of Soham two little patches,
+each about a mile square, remain in their original state. These are
+Chippenham Fen to the east, and Wicken Fen to the west. Both are
+fairly inaccessible spots, but when we get to them they enable us to
+form a vivid idea of what the state of things must have been when the
+whole fenland was such as this. Both give the impression of a morass
+hopelessly impenetrable, covered with a dense growth of tall reeds
+rising high above your head, through which you push your way blindly,
+to be constantly checked by some sluggish watercourse, too wide to
+jump, too shallow to swim, and impossible to wade, for the bottom is a
+fathomless stratum of soft turf and ooze giving no foothold. To
+stumble into one of these watercourses is, indeed, no small peril. If
+you are alone the case is well-nigh hopeless, and even a friend on the
+bank would find it hard to pull you out. His best course is to cut a
+fairly large bundle of reeds, by trampling which under your feet you
+may for a moment be able to stand while he rescues you.
+
+One can well understand how it came about that such a country was an
+almost inviolable sanctuary for those whom despair drove to seek
+refuge in its recesses. These small fragments of it still form a
+sanctuary; for many rare plants and insects, exterminated elsewhere by
+the march of progress, here still nourish. Conspicuous amongst these
+is the lovely swallow-tail butterfly; which flits about, dashing with
+bright touches of colour the weird and sombre beauty of the silent
+scene. Very silent it is now. But it was not so of old, when the whole
+fen was crowded with the swarming bird-life, so vividly described by
+Kingsley in "Hereward the Wake": "where the coot clanked, and the
+bittern boomed, and the sedge-bird, not content with its own sweet
+song, mocked the notes of all the birds around, ... where hung
+motionless, high over head, hawk beyond hawk, buzzard beyond buzzard,
+kite beyond kite, as far as eye could see. Into the air whirred up
+great skeins of wildfowl innumerable, with a cry as of all the bells
+of Crowland; while clear above all their noise sounded the wild
+whistle of the curlews, and the trumpet note of the great white swan."
+Such was the fenland of old; but all this wealth of commotion is long
+since gone, and scarcely do we see a bird now at Wicken or Chippenham,
+except here and there a waterhen, and (at Chippenham) the pheasants
+which are reared in coops on its margin.
+
+These birds belong to Chippenham Hall, a mansion built by Admiral
+Russell, the hero of La Hogue in 1692, our first great naval victory
+since the rout of the Armada, "and the first great victory that the
+English had gained over the French since the day of Agincourt."[134]
+It stands on the site of an earlier house, which, in its day, served
+as a place of confinement for Charles the First in 1647, after the
+raid by Cornet Joyce on Holmby House had transferred his custody from
+the hands of the Parliament to those of the Army. Here he remained for
+some weeks, while the somewhat sordid game of political intrigue (out
+of which he still hoped to make his own) was being played around him,
+"very pleasant and cheerful, taking his recreation daily at tennis,
+and delighting much in the company of Cornet Joyce," but refusing to
+listen to the famous Puritan stalwart, Hugh Peters, who was
+accustomed to hold forth "with the Bible in the one hand and a great
+pistol in the other," and who here "moved His Majesty to hear him
+preach. Which His Majesty did the rather decline."
+
+[Footnote 134: Macaulay.]
+
+Within sight of Soham, across the fen to the east, and only three
+miles away, stood for awhile another House of Religion, the Priory of
+Isleham. But to get from one to the other it was (and is) needful to
+go round by Fordham, making the distance at least double. A more out
+of the way place than Isleham cannot well be found, but it is worth a
+visit. All that remains of the Priory is an oblong structure of stone
+buttressed with red brick, looking on the outside like a barn, and,
+indeed, used as such. But it is, in fact, the hulk of the Priory
+Church; and, inside, the pillars and capitals are in very fair
+condition. The work is all Norman. This short-lived establishment was
+built in the eleventh century, as a "cell" (or outlying colony), of
+the Abbey of St. Jacutus de Insula, near Dol in Brittany. Within two
+centuries the monks abandoned it in favour of their sister house at
+Linton.[135]
+
+[Footnote 135: After the suppression of the alien Priories this
+property went to the Crown, and was granted by Henry the Sixth to
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, in whose hands it still remains.]
+
+They may have found Isleham too sequestered. It stands, like Soham, on
+the verge of the Isle of Ely, and also on the verge of Suffolk, to
+which county it seems actually to have belonged throughout great part
+of the Middle Ages. But it was in the Bishopric neither of Ely nor of
+Norwich, but of far away Rochester, to which it had been annexed, as
+tradition went, by Alfred the Great. The Church, dedicated to St.
+Andrew, has an exceptionally fine hammer-beam roof, bearing the
+inscription:
+
+     CRYSTOFER PEYTON DID MAK THYS ROFE
+     IN THE YERE OF OURE LORD MCCCCLXXXXV
+     BEING THE X YERE OF KINGE HENRY THE VII.
+
+A splendid brass records the memory of this benefactor's father,
+Thomas, who brought the Isleham estates into the family by his
+marriage with Margaret Bernard, the heiress of the former possessors.
+She as well as her successor, Margaret Francis, are on either side of
+him, in low-necked and high-waisted robes with ample skirts. That of
+Margaret Bernard bears a large flower and scroll pattern, and on her
+head-gear is inscribed the prayer "Jesu, mercy! Lady, help!" That of
+Margaret Francis is plain, trimmed with fur. Both wear an identical
+necklace, presumably the very same. Thomas himself (who was High
+Sheriff of Cambridge and Huntingdonshire in 1442 and 1452) is in plate
+armour of the most highly developed kind, with quaint and enormous
+elbow-guards. The figures, which are some thirty inches in height, are
+surmounted by an elaborate triple canopy.
+
+Another brass, much more worn, shows somewhat smaller figures of the
+last of the Bernards, Sir John, and his wife, Dame Elizabeth Sakevyle.
+He is also in plate armour of a simpler type,[136] and she in a
+close-fitting kirtle and long gown, fastened by a cord across the
+breast, with a horned head-dress from which a veil depends over her
+shoulders. The dog at her feet implies that she was a lady in her own
+right. And yet a third brass gives us Sir Richard Peyton (1574), who
+was a Reader at Gray's Inn. Over his doublet he wears a gown, long,
+loose, and lined with fur. In his left hand he holds a book, whilst he
+lays the right upon his heart. His wife, Mary Hyde, beside him, is in
+a plain dress, falling open below the waist to show a richly brocaded
+petticoat.[137]
+
+[Footnote 136: He fought at Agincourt, and was one of the knights told
+off to kill the French prisoners.]
+
+[Footnote 137: The Peytons held Isleham till the eighteenth century.]
+
+Besides these brasses, there is the fine tomb, in the north transept,
+of the first Bernard to be Lord of Isleham, a Crusader, as is shown by
+the crossed legs of his recumbent effigy. The _tailed_ surcoat over
+his coat of mail fixes his date at about 1275. He was, in fact, one of
+those who accompanied Edward the First (not yet King) to Palestine.
+The moulding of the canopy above the tomb also connects him with that
+monarch, for it is the same as that of the Coronation Chair in
+Westminster Abbey, placed by Edward over the Holy Stone of Scone,
+which he had carried off from Scotland in token of his claim to be
+indeed the rightful King of that stubborn realm.
+
+Yet another point of interest in this church is the eagle lectern, an
+exquisite piece of mediæval brasswork, so good, indeed, that it has
+been copied in the lectern of Ely Cathedral. It is apparently
+fifteenth century work, and was found buried in the fen, some half
+century ago, between Isleham and Soham, so nearly half way that both
+parishes laid claim to it, and even now Soham folk are not reconciled
+to its loss. Whoever were the original possessors, it was probably
+concealed in the fen to save it from the Puritan iconoclasts of the
+seventeenth century, who, during the Civil War, habitually destroyed
+lecterns of this type as "abominable idols."
+
+Eastward from Newmarket radiate most fascinating roads, leading
+through heather and pine woods to Mildenhall, with its splendid church
+and ancient market hall; and to Brandon, where men still make (as they
+have made for 5000 years) palæolithic flint implements by the very
+same methods used in those prehistoric days; and to Bury St. Edmunds,
+with its wonderful ruins and great historical associations. But these
+are all out of our beat. To the southward, however, we are in
+Cambridgeshire, and a fine avenue, two miles in length, known as "the
+Duchess's Drive," leads up to the ridge of the East Anglian heights.
+It is noteworthy that almost along the whole length of that ridge, and
+particularly hereabouts, villages cluster thick, whereas the slopes
+below can show scarcely any, but form an unoccupied belt, two miles
+wide, between the upland and the lowland populated area. A very
+out-of-the-way district is this watershed between the broad basin of
+the Ouse and those of the little rivers running into the North Sea,
+for the nearest railways are miles away, and an old time peace broods
+over everything.
+
+The first village we come to is Cheveley. The church here is
+cruciform, with a piscina of rare beauty in its Early English chancel,
+which is closed in by a fourteenth century rood screen of Decorated
+work. To the same period belongs the church chest, which has the
+unique feature of being made of cypress wood, and the tower, also with
+the unique feature of an external bartizan or watch-turret, apparently
+for a beacon fire. The dedication of the church is no less unique,
+"St. Mary and the Sacred Host."
+
+The name of Cheveley is associated with what Professor Maitland calls
+"the curious if disgraceful story of the decline and fall" of the
+ancient Corporation of Cambridge.[138] When the Revolution of 1688 had
+put a final end to the old Royal prerogatives over local
+administration, "the Corporation stood free from national
+supervision"; and Parliament, as time went on, appointed Commissioners
+to undertake the duties of police and hygiene, which had formerly been
+entrusted to it. With the cessation of recognised responsibilities the
+Corporation also ceased to have a conscience, and shamelessly
+squandered the corporate property on the personal greediness of its
+members. The Duke of Rutland, from his great seat at Cheveley, became,
+till the flood of nineteenth century reforms cleansed the Augean
+stable, its absolute master, and his nominees only were chosen into
+it, and thus, after a thousand years of strenuous, and mostly
+beneficent life, "first as a knot of heathen hidesmen,[139] then as a
+township of early English burg-men, then as a corporation of mediæval
+burgesses," it finally dwindled to a small dining club, "with good
+wine, and plenty of it," absolutely dominated by one great Tory
+magnate, and claiming "the right to expend their income on themselves
+and their friends, without being bound to apply any part of it to the
+good of the Town." Reform came none too soon.
+
+[Footnote 138: _Township and Borough_, p. 96.]
+
+[Footnote 139: The original Corporation (not yet so called) consisted
+of the local residents who held (or were rated at) a "hide" of land
+(120 acres). This was at the end of the ninth century, when the
+landowners were Danes and heathen.]
+
+Cheveley is some three miles from Newmarket, and, as much further on,
+we reach another interesting little village, Kirtling. The local
+pronunciation of the name is "Catlage," which is unhappily becoming
+obsolete, like so many other local pronunciations throughout England,
+under the orthographical dead level of elementary scholasticism. The
+most striking edifice here is the great red-brick gate tower, with its
+four octagonal turrets, which is all that remains of a mansion, in its
+day one of the most famous in England. It was built in the reign of
+Queen Mary by the first Lord North, whose family still hold "Kirtling
+Tower," and whose son here magnificently entertained Queen
+Elizabeth.[140]
+
+[Footnote 140: A constant tradition declares that she was imprisoned
+(or hidden) here during part of her sister's reign, but it cannot be
+verified.]
+
+The wide moat which surrounded it still exists, and reminds us that
+this mansion was on the site of a great mediæval castle belonging to
+the Tony family, from the days of William the Conqueror to those of
+Henry the Eighth. The manor had once been the property of the
+ill-fated King Harold, and was given by the Conqueror to Judith, widow
+of the saintly hero Waltheof, after his judicial murder. The church
+contains many North monuments, and Kirtling also possesses a pretty
+little Roman Catholic church, being one of the five "Missions" in
+Cambridgeshire--along with Cambridge, Ely, Newmarket, and Wisbech. For
+the Norths still hold, not only their ancient seat, but their ancient
+Faith.
+
+Not far from Kirtling is Wood Ditton; the last word signifying either
+Ditch Town, or, more probably, Ditch End, for it stands at the upland
+extremity of the Devil's Dyke. Along this ridge of the East Anglian
+Heights the primæval forest was of old so dense that no artificial
+defence was needed to check the progress of an invading army. It was a
+veritable wall of oak, and ash, and thorn, and holly, and alder; no
+route for an army at any time, and where the felling of a few trees
+across the glades would speedily form an absolutely impenetrable
+obstacle. Here then the great earthwork, which we saw on Newmarket
+Heath, ends its ten-mile climb from the Fen at Reach, 350 feet below.
+Wood Ditton is a picturesque little place, still suggestive of
+woodland, especially around the flint-built church (constructed in the
+twelfth century and remodelled in the fifteenth), which has an
+octagonal steeple of specially graceful poise. A large brass, in
+somewhat poor condition, dating from 1393, commemorates "Henry
+Englissh and Wife Margt." Henry was a Knight, and wears what is known
+as "Camail" armour, which consisted of a series of small steel
+roundels fastened on to leather, hardened by boiling. Dowsing records
+(under date March 22, 1643), "We here brake down 50 superstitious
+pictures and crucifixes. Under the Virgin Mary was written: 'O Mother
+of God have mercy upon us.'"
+
+The neighbouring village of Stetchworth (or Stretchworth) also
+suffered in Dowsing's visitation. But he failed to notice that one of
+the two ancient bells in the steeple had a "superstitious"
+inscription:
+
+     SANCTA MARGARETA ORA PRO NOBIS.
+
+So it remained unshattered, and still hangs in the belfry, where the
+other bells also have noticeable inscriptions, two bearing the words
+"God save Thy Church. 1608," and the third
+
+                OMS·SPT·LAVDA·DNM.
+  ("Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.")
+
+This and the Margaret bell are ascribed to the fifteenth century.
+
+Stetchworth Manor, in the tenth century, was given to the Abbey of
+Ely, to provide clothing for a newly-professed monk, the son of the
+donor. This sounds an extraordinarily disproportionate gift; but the
+clothing of an Ely monk was really a very serious item, and, as the
+Abbey account books show, cost the convent the equivalent of something
+very like £50 per annum. Readers of Chaucer will remember how
+comfortably, and even luxuriously, the monk of his "Canterbury Tales"
+is dressed.
+
+Of the remaining villages along this upland line there is not much to
+tell.[141] They present a pleasant field for wandering exploration;
+each has its picturesque features, no church is without something of
+antiquarian interest, and over all broods a delicious aloofness.
+Westley Waterless Church has a flint-built round tower, of the Norfolk
+fashion, and a fine brass of 1325, representing Sir John de Creke and
+his wife, Lady Alyne. He is shown wearing the curious surcoat then in
+fashion, known as a _cyclas_, which, in front, reached only to the
+waist, and, behind, to the knees. The lady is one of the first
+examples of female portraiture in brass: her figure is strangely out
+of drawing.
+
+[Footnote 141: The frequent occurrence of "West" in their
+names--Westley, Weston, West Wratting, West Wickham--reminds us that
+their geographical and historical connection is with Suffolk, to the
+east of them, rather than with Cambridgeshire.]
+
+Weston Colville has also a brass, now affixed to the wall, and too
+much damaged for identification. The church here is almost wholly
+Early English, as is that of Dullingham. Borough Green contains some
+fine twelfth century monuments, sadly knocked about. The Parson here
+was ejected by the Puritan Earl of Manchester, Governor of Cambridge,
+during the Civil War, for the heinous offence of saying "that he ought
+to shorten his sermons rather than neglect reading the Common Prayer,
+and that the Collects were to be preferred before preaching." Grounds
+no less frivolous were a sufficient excuse for a like ejection of
+half the parsons in Cambridgeshire at this period. The rest signed the
+Covenant and renounced their Anglican heresies, sometimes with
+considerable emphasis. One curate is recorded to have stamped the Book
+of Common Prayer under his feet, in the face of the congregation,
+declaring that he would henceforth be their minister "by no Prelatical
+and Popish imposition of hands." Some score of these Vicars of Bray
+lived to turn their coats once more at the Restoration.
+
+Half-way between Cambridge and Newmarket, and half a mile from the
+main road, stands the fine Church of Bottisham, with good Decorated
+windows, a stone rood screen of Perpendicular work, and noteworthy
+sedilia and piscina. The beautiful fluting round the clerestory
+windows is still more noteworthy, and also the arcading beneath those
+of the south aisle both within and without. Here is the tomb of Elyas
+de Beckingham, Justice of the Common Pleas under Edward the First,
+who, almost alone, escaped in the clean sweep which that monarch made
+of his Bench for corruption. Here, in 1664, the parson was ejected on
+the grounds "that he was a time-server,[142] and one that observed
+bowing towards the east, standing up at the _Gloria Patri_, reading
+the Second Service at the Communion Table, and such-like superstitious
+worship and innovation in the Church. That he is a very unable and
+unfit man for the ministry; for half his parishioners cannot hear him,
+neither did he ever preach to their edifying, neither is he able, as
+the deponents do verily believe."
+
+[Footnote 142: _i.e._, An observer of holy times and seasons.]
+
+Bottisham, in all probability, played a part in that pathetic episode
+in the life of King Charles the First, which began with his flight
+from Oxford and ended with his vain appeal to the loyalty of the
+Scottish army then besieging Newark. Finding that Oxford must needs
+surrender to the Parliamentary forces closing in upon it, the King cut
+off his hair and beard, and in the disguise of a servant, carrying the
+cloak-bag of the two faithful chaplains who accompanied him, stole
+away at three in the morning, on Monday, April 27, 1646, from the
+beleaguered city, which had been his headquarters for so long. A long
+day's ride of 50 miles brought the party that night to Wheathampstead,
+near St. Albans, where a faithful adherent was found to give him
+shelter, though the Parliament were proclaiming, with drum and
+trumpet, that "what person soever shall harbour and conceal, or know
+of the harbouring and concealing of the King's Person, and shall not
+immediately reveal it to both Houses, shall be proceeded against as a
+traitor, forfeit his whole estate, and die without mercy." The next
+day, Tuesday, in clerical attire this time, and with only one
+companion, Mr. Ashburnham, the hunted Monarch entered Cambridgeshire
+(avoiding the towns) and that night, after another 50 miles of riding,
+slept "at a small village, seven miles from Newmarket." This village,
+Mr. Kingston, the historian of the Civil War in East Anglia, to whom I
+am indebted for this picturesque story, thinks may have been
+Bottisham, whence Charles could have reached Downham, his next stage,
+by water.
+
+Bottisham is the first of a line of interesting villages. We next
+reach, through a mile or two of pretty lanes, Swaffham Bulbeck, where,
+again the church has some good Decorated work, and fifteenth century
+seats, also a cedar chest of the same period, with carvings of the
+Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the Assumption of Our Lady. It is
+remarkable that these should have escaped the specially thorough
+"purification" which Dowsing here describes. "We brake down two
+crucifixes (and Christ nailed to them), one hundred superstitious
+pictures, and twenty cherubims, two crosses from the steeple, and two
+from the church and chancel, and digged down the altar-steps." The
+vicar was also ejected for being "zealous to put into execution Bishop
+Wren's fancies." Wren, the builder of Peterhouse Chapel, was Bishop of
+Ely 1638-1667, and deeply offended the Puritans by ordering the
+Communion Tables to be set "altar-wise" at the east end of the
+chancels (instead of being merely boards, which were habitually leant
+against the walls, and at Communion time were placed on trestles
+anywhere about the church). His High Church proclivities earned him
+eighteen years' imprisonment in the Tower, till released by the
+Restoration.
+
+To the north of Swaffham Bulbeck runs out an extension of the village
+known by the remarkable name of "Commercial End." It consists of one
+picturesque street, at the extremity of which we find ourselves on the
+banks of a deep, narrow waterway, like an old canal. An old canal in
+fact it is, and shows us that we have here reached the beach-line of
+the ancient Fen; for this is Swaffham Lode, one of those artificial
+cuts through the tangled swamp by which barges and even sea-going
+vessels were enabled of old to reach the mainland. Of these Lodes
+there were several; and the knot of population at the termination of
+each shows the amount of traffic they anciently carried. Bottisham
+Lode has given its name to a village larger than Bottisham itself, and
+some three miles from it. And here at Swaffham the commerce of those
+bygone days has left us Commercial End. Hard by are the insignificant
+remains of a small Benedictine nunnery founded by the Bulbeck family
+in the reign of King John.
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Bulbeck._]
+
+A mile further on brings us to another Swaffham, Swaffham Prior, with
+its picturesque churchyard rising steeply fifty feet above the
+village, and containing not one but two churches, dedicated
+respectively to St. Mary, and SS. Cyriac and Julitta.[143]
+
+[Footnote 143: These martyrs were son and mother, and suffered in the
+Diocletian persecution, the former being of very tender years. Julitta
+cheered him on to his glorious death, and was then herself executed.]
+
+Till the Restoration these represented two separate incumbencies; the
+former having been given to the Abbey of Ely by Brithnoth, the heroic
+Alderman of East Anglia under Ethelred the Unready. Both churches have
+passed through singular architectural vicissitudes. The design of the
+Norman tower of St. Mary's (the lower of the two), square below and
+octagonal above, was copied by the fifteenth century builders of St.
+Cyriac's, and is the only surviving portion of their work--the body of
+the church having been pulled down in 1667, at the union of the
+benefices.
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Prior._]
+
+A century later the steeple of St. Mary's was struck by lightning,
+which occasioned so unreasoning a panic amongst the worshippers that
+they resolved to abandon the church altogether. In vain did the Squire
+(then, as now, one of the Allix family)[144] offer to repair the
+damage, which was but slight, at his own charge. Nothing would serve
+but dismantling St. Mary's and using its spoil towards the rebuilding
+of St. Cyriac's, in the shape of a hideous brick tabernacle, of the
+worst Georgian style, attached to the ancient tower. St. Mary's would
+have been entirely pulled down had not the ancient masonry proved so
+solid that the work of demolition did not pay the local builder who
+got the job. As it was, it remained a ruin for yet another century,
+and it was not till the end of the nineteenth that it was
+restored--still under Allix auspices. Now it is once more the place of
+worship, and contains a specially well-executed rood-screen. But the
+beautiful spire which crowned the whole steeple still awaits
+replacement. The Georgian St. Cyriac's yet stands, and is used as a
+parish museum.
+
+[Footnote 144: This family came into England amongst the Huguenot
+refugees from France early in the eighteenth century.]
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Prior Churches._]
+
+From the churchyard of Swaffham Prior we get a grand view over the
+limitless fen to the northward; Ely Cathedral, ten miles away, rising
+conspicuous above it. The road we have been pursuing leads us on
+Ely-wards; but, a mile hence, comes to a dead stop at the little
+hamlet of Reach, once one of the most important places in the whole
+county. For here the mighty earthwork of the Devil's Dyke runs down
+into the fen. To meet it the greatest of all the Lodes was cut from
+the Cam at Upware, and at its hithe (or quay) our road has its
+termination. It is a striking surprise, for one comes upon it abruptly
+round a corner, and suddenly finds oneself at the end of all things.
+The hithe is a quiet green meadow now; but the clear brown water of
+the lode still sleeps beside it, and even yet barges, laden with turf
+or coal, occasionally creep up hither. Of old it was a constantly busy
+spot, where sea-going ships were loaded and unloaded, and trains of
+waggons attended, bringing and carrying off the cargoes.
+
+[Illustration: _The Castle Moat, Burwell._]
+
+Tradition gives Reach seven churches; but for this there is no
+historical evidence whatever, and it is probably only a hyperbolical
+way of extolling the ancient importance of the place. It is now merely
+a chapelry under Swaffham Prior, in which parish the western side of
+the township[145] is situated. For here the houses run in two lines,
+about a hundred yards apart, with a little village green between, on a
+gentle slope some quarter of a mile in length, having the fen level as
+its lower boundary, and, for the upper, the stupendous bulk of the
+Devil's Dyke, here cut clean off as if with a knife. All looks
+ancientry itself; but, in fact, this cutting off of the Dyke is quite
+a modern affair, not yet even two centuries old. Till then the Dyke
+ran right through the village down to the fen itself, effectually
+isolating the Swaffham Prior houses on the west from those on the
+east, which belong parochially to Burwell. Cole, the prince of
+Cambridgeshire chroniclers, whose voluminous MS. notes on the county
+still await a publisher, mentions that when he visited Reach in 1743
+the Dyke still reached the fen; but when he came again in 1768 he
+found the present state of things. Of how, or by whom, this act of
+vandalism was perpetrated I can find no record.
+
+[Footnote 145: Reach is commonly spoken of as a "hamlet," but there is
+still enough historical pride amongst the inhabitants to make them
+resent this phrase.]
+
+Reach was of importance even in Roman days. The Dyke, of course, was
+already ancient when they ruled Britain, and the lode, too, may very
+probably have been already cut. The remains of one of their villas
+have been unearthed here, near the point where the Cambridge and
+Mildenhall railway now cuts through the Dyke. It has a well-preserved
+hypocaust, or apparatus for warming the house by hot air. The Roman
+"villa," we must remember, was the country mansion of the period, and
+equipped with every known luxury. In the Middle Ages the annual Fair
+at Reach (on the Monday before Ascension Day) was big enough to bring
+over the Mayor of Cambridge to open it. And the custom survives even
+today, when the occasion has dwindled to a very petty little
+gathering.
+
+Reach, however, has still a local industry; the cutting of the peat,
+or "turf" as it is here called, in the neighbouring fen, for use as
+fuel. This peat forms a layer often many feet in thickness, and is
+formed for the most part of moss, mingled with the vegetable mould
+made by the decay of the dense forests with which the district was
+covered for uncounted ages; before its final submergence, early in the
+Christian era, destroyed the last of them. A like subsidence had more
+than once produced the same results earlier; for the remains of four
+or five forest beds at different levels have been found in the peat.
+
+The trunks of these prehistoric trees are often of enormous size,
+especially the oaks.[146] One no fewer than 130 feet in length was
+unearthed in 1909. The wood, after its ages of immersion, has become
+black, hard, and heavy, like the Irish bog oak. Associated with such
+débris, the peat often furnishes remains of the dwellers in these
+archaic woodlands; whence we know that bears, wolves, wild boars, and
+gigantic wild bulls roamed their shades. In the skull of one of these
+last, now in the Sedgwick Geological Museum at Cambridge, is imbedded
+a flint axe-head. The arm of the primeval savage who wielded that
+weapon must have been strong beyond the arms of common men.
+
+[Footnote 146: The oaks are always found lying prostrate, but the fir
+stems are frequently still upright for several feet of their length.]
+
+[Illustration: _Burwell Church, West End._]
+
+The peat is cut with a spade of peculiar construction, being flat, and
+both longer and narrower than ordinary spades. It is shaped somewhat
+like a fire shovel with a flange on either side, the object being that
+each "turf" extracted should be of uniform size, like a brick. A
+thousand of these should go to the ton; but though uniform in size
+they are not of uniform weight, for the peat, as might be expected, is
+more dense at its lower levels than near the surface. There is a good
+market for this turf, which makes a hot and lasting fire with a
+minimum of smoke, and that pleasant smoke. It is mostly sent off by
+water to Cambridge, Ely, Wisbech, etc.
+
+This turf-cutting is not, of course, confined to Reach, but it has its
+greatest development here, and at the neighbouring village of Burwell,
+a mile or so to the eastward (to which, as we have seen, part of Reach
+belongs). Burwell is an important village of considerable extent, with
+a population of 2000, and a magnificent church, capable of seating
+them all. It is of the finest fifteenth century workmanship, with a
+few remains of Norman in the tower. The exterior is mostly flint; the
+interior, like that of so many churches in Cambridgeshire, is of
+"clunch," a hardened form of chalk, well adapted for building, and
+easily worked for carving. The beautiful sculptures of the Lady Chapel
+at Ely are of this material, drawn from the large quarries between
+Burwell and Reach. Clunch is found in many places throughout the
+county and has been worked (as existing remains show) ever since Roman
+days.
+
+Burwell Church is specially connected with the University of
+Cambridge, in whose gift is the preferment, burdened with the
+condition that on Mid-Lent Sunday a sermon shall be preached there by
+the Vice-Chancellor or his deputy. Till the nineteenth century this
+condition was no light one; for the roads were in such a state that
+half a dozen men on each side could hardly keep the preacher's
+carriage from overturning, and, whenever possible, the cortege took to
+the newly-ploughed fields in preference. The route was not round by
+Reach but direct from Swaffham Prior.
+
+Here is a remarkable brass of John Lawrence de Wardeboys, the last
+Abbot of Ramsey in Huntingdonshire. For his readiness in abetting the
+designs of Henry the Eighth, not only by eagerly surrendering his own
+abbey, "which was not his to give," but by persuading others to do
+like violence to their conscience, he was rewarded with a pension
+equivalent to between two and three thousand pounds a year. His brass
+records this venality of his principles. It was originally made during
+his abbacy, and showed him in full abbatical vestments, mitre and all
+(for Ramsey was a mitred abbey). After the surrender he had it turned
+over, and on the reverse side, now uppermost, we see him in a simple
+clerical gown and cap. He only lived a few years to enjoy his
+ill-gotten gains, dying in 1542.
+
+[Illustration: _Burwell Church, N.E. View._]
+
+South-west of the church are some scanty remains of Burwell Castle,
+which was built by King Stephen during the miserable "nineteen
+winters" of his war with Queen Matilda, so forcibly described in the
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, when the country was laid desolate by the
+outrages of the robber barons. The particular brigand who afflicted
+Cambridgeshire was one Geoffry de Magnaville, an outrageously wicked
+plunderer, who "did not spare even the churches," regarded as
+inviolable by ordinary malefactors. Both Cambridge and Ely were looted
+by him, and he terrorised the whole district, till at length he was
+slain, by an arrow through the throat, in attacking Burwell Castle.
+"Nor was the earth permitted to give a grave to the sacrilegious
+offender."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+     Hills Road.--Gog-Magogs.--Vandlebury.--Babraham, Peter
+     Pence.--Old Railway.--Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper
+     Stile.--Linton.--Horseheath.--Bartlow, St. Christopher, Battle of
+     Assandun.--Cherry Hinton, War Ditches,
+     Saffron.--Teversham.--Fulbourn, Brasses.--Wilbraham.--Fleam Dyke,
+     Wild Flowers, Butterflies, Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle.--Balsham,
+     Battle of Ringmere, Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones.
+
+
+At Burwell we are within touch of Exning, Fordham, and Soham, so that
+we have now exhausted the interest of the Cambridge-Newmarket Road.
+Next in order comes the Via Devana, which when it leaves Cambridge for
+the south-east is denominated the "Hills Road." The reason for this is
+that it shortly brings us to the most ambitious elevation neighbouring
+the town, no less than 220 feet in height, and bearing the
+high-sounding name of the Gog-Magog Hills.
+
+The origin of this curious appellation is still to seek. According to
+some archæologists it is derived from the prehistoric figure of a
+giant which was formerly to be seen on the slope, traced there by
+cutting away the turf along the outline of the shape, such as that
+still extant near Cerne Abbas in Dorsetshire. This, if it ever
+existed, has long since disappeared. Others consider the name to be a
+seventeenth century skit on the gigantic height of the hills. Others
+again see in it a dim traditional recollection of the days when a set
+of gigantic barbarians really were, for a time, quartered here. This
+was in the reign of the Roman Emperor Probus (277 A.D.), who leavened
+his mutinous British forces with prisoners from the Vandal horde
+lately defeated by the Romans on the Danube. From one such detachment,
+placed here in garrison, the name of Vandlebury is supposed to have
+clung ever since to the great earthwork on the summit of the
+Gog-Magogs.
+
+That earthwork, however, is of far older date, being of British, or
+even earlier, inception. It is a triple ring of gigantic ramparts,
+like those of Maiden Castle near Dorchester, and nearly a mile in
+circumference. All is now buried in the shrubberies of Gog-Magog
+House, the seat successively of Lord Godolphin and of the Dukes of
+Leeds.[147] But before being thus planted out it must have been one of
+the most striking examples in the kingdom of such fortifications. Till
+the eighteenth century it was a favourite scene of bull-baiting and
+other illegal sports amongst undergraduates, because the bare open
+country all round made it impossible for the authorities to surprise
+the offenders. Vandlebury was the original home of the legend, used by
+Sir Walter Scott in _Marmion_, which told how in the ancient camp, by
+moonlight, an elfin warrior would answer the challenge of any
+adventurous knight bold enough to encounter him in single combat.
+
+[Footnote 147: It is now the residence of H. Gray Esq. In the stable
+yard a monument records the celebrated "Godolphin," one of the first
+Arabs (or, more probably Barbs) to be imported, at the beginning of
+the eighteenth century, for the improvement of our thoroughbred
+stock.]
+
+In the early decades of the nineteenth century the then Duchess of
+Leeds here set up for her tenantry one of the earliest rural
+elementary schools. Children of both sexes were taught in this
+institution to read and to sew, the boys making their own smock
+frocks. The boys might, if they would, also learn, as an extra, to
+write; but not the girls, for Her Grace considered that it would
+deleteriously affect their prospects in domestic service if they were
+possessed of the dangerous power of deciphering their employers'
+correspondence.
+
+Our road climbs the hill to the gate of Gog-Magog House, and plunges
+down into woodlands on the other side, in a fashion very unlike the
+usual Cambridgeshire highway, to meet the infant stream of the
+Granta[148] on its meandering way to Cambridge. Our further course is
+amongst the pretty villages along its valley, the best-wooded vale in
+all the county. First of these comes Babraham (anciently Bradburgham),
+with a pretty little Saxon-towered church snuggling in the park beside
+the Hall. Babraham is noted for the epitaph of an old-time swindler,
+who was enabled to pocket the Peter Pence[149] which he collected
+under Queen Mary by sharing his spoil with Queen Elizabeth. It runs
+thus:
+
+  "Here lies Horatio Palavazene,
+   Who robbed the Pope to lend the Queen."
+   "He was a thiefe." "A thiefe? Thou liest;
+   For why? he robbed but Antichrist.
+   Him Death with besome swept from Babram
+   Into the bosome of old Abram.
+   But then came Hercules with his club,
+   And struck him down to Beelzebub."
+
+[Footnote 148: This branch of the Granta is more properly called the
+Bourne.]
+
+[Footnote 149: From the ninth century onwards the Pope could claim, by
+Royal grant, a penny a year from every house in England. This tribute
+was known as "Peter Pence." The phrase is now used amongst Roman
+Catholics for voluntary contributions to the Papal Exchequer.]
+
+A curious fresco on the north wall of the church is thought to
+represent King Edward the Second.
+
+A little beyond Babraham we cross the Icknield Street, on its way from
+Newmarket to Chesterford. Beside it runs, what is almost unknown in
+England, a deserted railroad, built by the Eastern Counties Railway
+Company (now the Great Eastern) in 1848, to afford direct
+communication between Newmarket and London, and abandoned, as a
+financial failure, in 1852, since which date the trains have gone
+round by Cambridge. Where this long disused line runs on the level it
+has melted back again into the adjoining fields, but the old cuttings
+and embankments and bridges still exist, and a weird sight they are.
+
+At the adjoining villages of Great and Little Abington the road makes
+a picturesque zig-zag through the village street, and passes on,
+beneath a fine beech avenue, to Hildersham, where a pretty byway leads
+across the stream to the fourteenth century church. Here there are
+four good brasses (to members of the Parys[150] family), one of them
+showing the unique feature of a lance-rest fastened to the cuirass,
+and another (of 1530) being simply a skeleton. There are also two very
+striking recumbent effigies representing a crusader and his wife, each
+carved out of a single block of wood, now black with age. The
+churchyard here is effectively planted with junipers and fir trees,
+and the east end of the church is embowered in shrubs of rosemary,
+said to be the finest in Cambridgeshire.
+
+[Footnote 150: The fourteenth century historian, Matthew Paris, is
+said to have belonged to this family.]
+
+From Hildersham the road goes on to Linton, a mile or so further;
+while the two places are also connected by a specially pleasant
+footpath, starting from a fine old smithy, and so through the meadows
+by the clear trout-stream, and past the yews and thorn-trees of the
+moated grange of "Little Linton," while above rises (to nearly four
+hundred feet, a proud height in Cambridgeshire) the appropriately
+named Furze Hill, with some real gorse patches (also a proud
+distinction in Cambridgeshire) upon its ridge.
+
+Before we reach Linton we cross the famous "Clapper" stile, which can
+best be described as formed by three huge sledge-hammers (of wood)
+with exceptionally long shanks, hinged near the head to an upright
+post, each about a foot above the next. Normally the three
+hammer-heads rest upon one another and look like a single post (about
+a foot from the first); but, on attempting to cross, the shanks (the
+ends of which are _not_ fastened but slide in a grooved post at their
+side of the stile) yield to our weight, the heads fly apart, and, when
+we are over, come together again with the "claps" whence the name of
+the stile is derived. How old this curious device is does not appear,
+but it is here immemorial. An effective sketch of this stile is given
+by Dr. Wherry, in his "Notes from a Knapsack."
+
+Linton is a tiny town, smaller than sundry villages, but obviously not
+a village, with a long street of undetached houses (duly lighted)
+swinging down the slopes on either side the little river. There is a
+fine Perpendicular church, with some Norman work remaining in it, and
+a good tower, on the top of which an Ascension Day service is annually
+held. Against a wall are suspended two fire-hooks (much lighter than
+the one at St. Benet's, Cambridge) for the destruction of burning
+houses. (See note on page 38).
+
+The main road here goes on, to pass out of Cambridgeshire into
+Suffolk, a few miles further, at the upland village of Horseheath,
+with its picturesque old-world village green on the hillside. The
+church here has a fine fourteenth century brass to Sir John de
+Argentine (a name familiar to readers of Sir Walter Scott, in the
+"Lord of the Isles")[151] and some notable monuments, somewhat
+knocked about, presumably by Dowsing, who records how he here "brake
+down four pictures of the prophets Ezekiel, Daniel, Zephaniah, and
+Malachi," besides other damage.
+
+[Footnote 151: Local antiquarian research, however, considers that the
+name is more probably Audley. One of the Audleys of Horseheath (who
+were in no way connected with the Reformation Audleys, of Audley End
+and Magdalene College), distinguished himself at the battle of
+Poictiers.]
+
+But a more interesting road from Linton is that which continues along
+the Bourne Valley, and leads, not into Suffolk, but into Essex, which
+is here bounded by that stream. A mile beyond the town we pass Barham
+Hall, now a farm-house, but of old a Priory of the same Order that we
+found at Isleham,[152] a Cell (or Colony) of the Abbey of St. Jacutus
+de Insula in Brittany. Another mile brings us to Bartlow, where, hard
+by the church, stand the three huge tumuli from which the name of the
+village is said to be derived. How they came to exist is an unsolved
+problem. Remains found in them, when excavated in 1835, were reported
+to be Roman, but the science of archæology was then in its infancy,
+and this report can hardly outweigh the wholly un-Roman appearance of
+the "Hills," as they are locally called. They look far more like
+British or Scandinavian work; but, indeed, three such mounds so close
+together are not found elsewhere, of any age.
+
+[Footnote 152: See p. 183.]
+
+The little church has an ancient fresco of St. Christopher, placed, as
+usual, opposite the entrance. For this Saint, by virtue of the legend
+which tells how he carried Christ over a river,[153] was in mediæval
+times regarded as a special example for Christians in their going out
+and their coming in; to whom, therefore, was due their first and last
+thought in passing the doorway. More noteworthy is the Saxon tower,
+with its walls no less than six feet in thickness. For in this it is
+quite possible that we may have a part of the very "minster of stone
+and lime" raised by Canute in memory of his crowning victory over
+Edmund Ironside at Assandun.
+
+[Footnote 153: The legend ran that St. Christopher was a giant heathen
+who heard of Christ and desired to serve Him. Enquiring how he could
+do this, he was told to devote himself to deeds of charity, which he
+did by carrying pilgrims over a dangerous ford. Finally, a child whom
+he thus transported proved to be Christ Himself, whence he gained the
+name of Christopher (the Christ-bearer).]
+
+The location of that most dramatic of English battles, fought in the
+year 1016, is hotly disputed amongst historians; but there is much to
+be said for the early view which identifies Assandun with Ashdon in
+Essex, hard by Bartlow. For ten miserable years, under Ethelred the
+Unready, England had been ground in the dust, deeper and ever deeper,
+beneath the heel of the invading Dane. Year by year the degrading
+tribute wherewith she strove to buy off the foe had gone up by leaps
+and bounds. All hope seemed dead, when the accession of a hero to the
+throne roused the harried and exhausted nation into one last
+convulsive effort for freedom. Six times in as many months did Edmund
+of England and Canute of Denmark clash in battle. Five of these fields
+were indecisive, and then, on St. Luke's Day, 1016, the champions met
+once more at Assandun, perhaps on the slope still known as Bartlow
+End.
+
+Treason decided the day against England. The fight began with a
+brilliant charge by Edmund at the head of his bodyguard, which crashed
+through the Danish phalanx "like a thunderbolt." But his absence from
+the English line enabled a traitorous noble, one Edric (who was always
+playing into Canute's hands, in hope of thereby making his own
+advantage), to raise a cry that the King was slain. A panic set in at
+once; and before Edmund could cut his way back, the whole army had
+broken, and was being fearfully cut up in its flight by the pursuing
+Danes. "And there the whole nobility of England was utterly
+destroyed." Edmund died of his exertions the same year; and Canute
+became King of England, the first monarch so to call himself. The
+native title had always been "King of the English." In thanksgiving he
+built a minster on the scene of his victory; and, as he had promised,
+he lifted up the head of Edric "above all the nobility of
+England"--upon the highest turret of the Tower of London. The "Roman"
+theory notwithstanding, the three Bartlow barrows may well be a
+memorial of this great fight, and so may the names of Castle Camps and
+Shudy Camps which attach to the furthest villages in this far-away
+corner of Cambridgeshire. The "Castle," however, of which only the
+moat now remains, was built later by De Vere, the first Earl of
+Oxford. Shudy Camps has a far-seen church on its lofty brow, visible
+even from Barrington Hill, on the other side of the Cam basin, fifteen
+miles away as the crow flies.
+
+[Illustration: _Cherry Hinton Church._]
+
+From the Via Devana, where it leaves Cambridge (just after the bridge
+over the Great Eastern Railway), there branches off to the left
+another road, which leads us to the scenes of earlier battles
+between Dane and Englishman. This is the Cherry Hinton Road, named
+after the first village along its course, some three miles on. Its
+long straight vista suggests at first sight the idea that it too may
+be a Roman road. In fact, however, it dates only from the enclosure of
+the land (about the beginning of last century), when the best
+ploughman in the village was employed, so the story goes, to drive his
+straightest furrow across the whole breadth of the Common Field as a
+guide for the road-makers. The older track between Cherry Hinton and
+Cambridge was by what used to be, till within the last fifty years, a
+pretty footpath across the fenny ground to the north of the field. It
+is fenny no longer, and the path has become for three-fourths of its
+length a somewhat dreary street through the dingy suburb of "Romsey
+Town."
+
+Cherry Hinton itself is not yet absorbed by Cambridge, and remains a
+bright spacious village, with a rarely beautiful church. The exquisite
+Early English chancel is lighted on either side by four couplets of
+lancet windows, in ideal proportion, while five equally ideal lancets
+serve for an East window. Both walls have an arcading of cinque-foil
+pattern; and the double piscina and the graduated sedilia are of no
+less merit. All this loveliness is within a fine oaken screen of the
+fifteenth century, and the rest of the church is not unworthy of it.
+The great quarry, whence the "clunch" of which the church is mainly
+built was drawn, is a conspicuous object on the hill-side above the
+village; and above that again, equally conspicuous, is the reservoir
+of the Cambridge Water-works, looking like a redoubt, on the summit of
+the slope. At the foot clear springs break out from the chalk, which
+are also utilised to supply the town.
+
+Close to the reservoir there is an actual fortification, an ancient
+earthwork, known as the War Ditches, which the researches of Professor
+Hughes have shown to be of British date.[154] At the bottom of the
+fosse he discovered rough British pottery along with the bones of
+domestic animals, and above these a layer of disjointed human
+skeletons of both sexes and all ages, apparently due to a general
+massacre, in some prehistoric struggle, of men, women, and children,
+whose corpses were hurled over the parapet. Above these again came
+Romano-British remains. From this earthwork the line of an ancient
+dyke, now called Warstead Street, may be traced to the East Anglian
+heights near Horseheath.
+
+[Footnote 154: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs_, p. 139.]
+
+Till the nineteenth century the fields between Cherry Hinton and
+Cambridge were bright with the purple flowers of the saffron crocus,
+which was grown, as it was by the ancient Greeks and Romans, for
+medical use and for dyeing purposes. Its cultivation may very probably
+have been introduced into Britain by the Romans. The saffron here
+grown was considered the best in Europe, and fetched no less than
+thirty shillings a pound. But its use, after so many centuries,
+suddenly went out of fashion, and the plant is now wholly extinct in
+Cambridgeshire.[155]
+
+[Footnote 155: _Ibid._ p. 96.]
+
+From Cherry Hinton Church a green lane leads to Teversham, a short
+mile distant, but, except for pedestrians, more easily approached from
+the Newmarket Road. The church here is a pretty little structure,
+mainly Early English, with curious oval clerestory windows, and a nice
+Perpendicular screen. The octagonal pillars have floreated capitals.
+Dowsing's record of his destructions here is of special interest,
+inasmuch as the objects of his Protestant zeal were not, as usual,
+relics of pre-Reformation Popery, but the newly painted devices of the
+Laudian vicar, Dr. Wren (the Bishop of Ely and builder of Peterhouse
+Chapel). They consisted of the name JESUS, "in big letters" no fewer
+than eighteen times repeated, of those of the Three Persons of the
+Blessed Trinity, and of texts from Scripture: "Let this mind be in you
+which was also in Christ Jesus," and "O come let us worship and fall
+down and kneel before the Lord our Maker." All these were "done out"
+as "idolatries"!
+
+From the springs at Cherry Hinton the furrow-drawn road (passing on
+its way the County Lunatic Asylum) makes another bee-line of three
+miles to Fulbourn. Here the church is of special interest. There are
+no fewer than five mediæval brasses, including one, almost life-size,
+of Canon William de Fulburne, 1380, which is notable as being,
+probably, the earliest known example of a priest vested in a cope.
+This ecclesiastic was one of Edward the Third's chaplains. In a wooden
+shrine on the north side of the chancel is a moribund effigy of John
+Careway, vicar here in 1433. This is beneath a sept-foiled arch,
+beside which is another strangely irregular arch over a sedile. There
+is also the very unusual feature of a fourteenth century pulpit of
+richly-carved oak.
+
+The dedication of this church is as unusual. It is to St. Vigor, an
+obscure sixth century bishop of Bayeux, who has only one other church
+in England, at Stratton-on-the-Fosse in Somerset. Till late in the
+eighteenth century there was a second church here in the same
+churchyard, as at Swaffham Prior. This was All Saints', and was ruined
+by the fall of its tower in 1766. The ruins were gradually stolen, the
+wood going first, but it took ten years for the last of the bells to
+disappear.
+
+At the church the road divides. The northern branch meanders through
+the village past an ancient row of old-time almshouses to the station,
+beyond which it becomes a pretty lane leading to the adjoining
+villages of Great and Little Wilbraham. The church at the former has a
+tower arch of strikingly peculiar development, a tall lancet, flanked
+by segments of arches of much larger radius, inserted in the wall on
+either side, which support the central member somewhat in the fashion
+of flying buttresses. The parson here, "a widower with three small
+children" (as the Puritan report gloatingly points out), was ejected
+in 1644 by the Puritans, because "he said it was treason for any man
+to give any money against the King, and in his sermons discouraged his
+parish from doing anything for the Parliament, and that he never read
+any book coming from the Parliament." Caution should be observed in
+passing through these villages, as sundry well-seeming roads simply
+lead down to Fulbourn Fen[156] and end there. Springs feeding the fen
+are plentiful, and the ground is still very much of a swamp.
+
+[Footnote 156: See p. 170.]
+
+But the road to take from Fulbourn Church is that which winds away
+south-eastwards, for in less than three miles it will bring us to the
+Icknield Street,[157] close to the point where that famous war-path
+cuts through the no less famous Fleam Dyke. This is the best place for
+viewing and ascending that splendid prehistoric earthwork, the sister
+and rival of the Devil's Dyke. It makes a most fascinating byway to
+walk along, though it leads nowhither, ending abruptly where it dips
+down into Fulbourn Fen.[158] The dry chalk is clothed with flowers
+all the summer through. At Easter time we may here find the glorious
+purple Pasch-flower, that queen of all the anemone clan; later on "the
+turf is sweet with thyme and gay with yellow rock-rose, blue flax,
+milkwort, pink-budded dropwort, sainfoin, kidney vetch, and viper's
+bugloss, and here and there a bee orchis; with a dancing accompaniment
+of butterflies overhead, graylings, skippers, chalk hill and Bedford
+blues, and a host beside."[159]
+
+[Footnote 157: See p. 171.]
+
+[Footnote 158: Footpaths, however, lead across the fen from its
+termination to Fulbourn and to Wilbraham.]
+
+[Footnote 159: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs_, p. 77.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Wilbraham Church._]
+
+The air is inspiring and so also is the view, with Ely on the far
+horizon to the north; and the historical associations are not less so.
+We can imagine the oaken palisade which topped the dyke lined with the
+Icenian clansmen in their tartan plaids shouting defiance to the
+presumptuous Roman who dared to demand their arms; then the incredibly
+audacious onslaught which, along the whole length of the Dyke at once,
+carried Ostorius and his light-armed troops at one rush clear across
+the mighty ditch, and up the forty feet of precipitous slope beyond,
+to crown the parapet and whirl away the patriot levies in headlong
+flight; then the merciless pursuit which forbade any chance to rally,
+till the fugitives were stopped by their own second line of defence
+at the Devil's Dyke, and slaughtered like rats beneath its
+rampart.[160]
+
+[Footnote 160: See p. 172.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Wilbraham._]
+
+Or our thoughts may turn to the later day when here was beheld the
+last fight worthy to be called a battle ever fought in Cambridgeshire.
+It is the year 905 A.D.; the great Alfred has been dead four years,
+and his son Edward the Elder has been chosen King in his stead. For
+the English monarchy is still elective, though already with a strong
+tendency to become hereditary. And this tendency now gives trouble.
+When Alfred himself was made King his nephew Ethelwald Clito, son of
+his elder brother Ethelred, the late King, was passed over in his
+favour. At that fearful crisis, when it was doubtful whether even an
+Alfred could stem the Danish inrush, there could be no thought of
+choosing a child as King.
+
+[Illustration: _Little Wilbraham._]
+
+But the Danes are now quietly settled in the Eastern Counties, and
+Ethelwald has grown up to manhood, and is bitterly angry at being
+again passed over, this time for his cousin Edward. If the English
+will not choose him, he will try the Danes. So to the Danes he goes,
+with promises of unlimited loot if they will support him, and, in the
+words of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "entices them to break the peace,"
+so that they cross the Watling Street, and make a ferocious raid into
+Mercia. "They took all they might lay hands on, and so turned homeward
+again. Then after them came King Edward, as fast as he might gather
+his force, and overran all their land between the Dykes and the Ouse,
+as far North as the Fens."
+
+The Devil's Dyke and the Fleam Dyke are by this time known as "the two
+dykes of St. Edmund," and now play their latest part in history as
+defences. Edward is no Ostorius, being a valiant warrior of the
+cautious rather than the daring type, and the Fleam Dyke brings his
+avenging host to a standstill. Finally he resolves that to storm it
+would cost too much, and retires his command. But his levies from Kent
+are of another temper, and positively refuse to obey what they look
+upon as an ignominious order. One after another, seven royal
+messengers repeat it in vain; and finally the main body of the English
+army marches off under the Royal banner, leaving the mutineers still
+before the Dyke--probably at the very point where the Icknield Way
+cuts it.
+
+This is the Danes' opportunity. They have now safely deposited their
+plunder, and are ready for another outbreak. With their whole force
+they sally forth, and fall upon these stubborn Kentish men, and the
+fighting becomes desperate. The Kentish Alderman (who combined the
+offices of High Sheriff and Lord Lieutenant) is slain, so is the
+Danish King Eric, so is Ethelwald "the Atheling" himself, "and very
+many with them. And great was the slaughter there made on either hand;
+and of the Danish folk were there the more slain, yet won they the
+field."[161] And thus, after so many ages of warfare, does the Fleam
+Dyke, or Balsham Ditch, as it is also called, enter on its millennium
+of peace.
+
+[Footnote 161: _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle._]
+
+[Illustration: _Balsham Tower._]
+
+For it played no part in the tragedy which, a hundred years after this
+last fight, is associated with its alternative name. Once more Danes
+and Englishmen are at hand-grips; but now it is no mere loose
+aggregate of private hordes pressing, each on its own, into the land,
+but Swend Forkbeard, the monarch of a great Scandinavian Empire
+purposing to add England also to his dominions. And under the weak
+sceptre of Ethelred the Unready, nothing beyond local resistance has
+been offered him; and here alone is the local resistance serious. East
+Anglia is under the governorship of the hero Ulfcytel, who has already
+given the Danes an unforgotten taste of his "hand-play," and he
+gathers her whole force to meet them at Ringmere. But the appalling
+tidings of what Swend has done elsewhere, "lighting his war-beacons
+as he went" throughout the length and breadth of the land, "with his
+three wonted comrades, fire, famine, and slaughter," have taken all
+the heart out of the English levies. For "all England did quake before
+him like a reed-bed rustling in the wind." The battle is speedily
+over. "Soon fled the East Angles; there stood Grantabryg-shire fast
+only."
+
+Upon Cambridgeshire accordingly this vainly gallant stand brought down
+the special vengeance of the conquerors. To and fro went Danish
+punitive columns, and visited the district with a harrying even beyond
+their wont. "What they could lift, that took they; what they might not
+carry, that burned they; and so marched they up and down the land."
+And at Balsham, perhaps because of some local resistance, they are
+said to have killed out the entire population, man, woman, and child;
+save one single individual only, who successfully defended against
+them the narrow entrance to the Church steeple.
+
+It is quite possible that this doorway is the very one which we see
+when we reach Balsham, where the Dyke ends, high on the East Anglian
+heights: for, though the church was rebuilt in the fourteenth century,
+the basement of the tower seems to be far older. Here we are four
+hundred feet up, and the air has quite an Alpine freshness, after the
+damp, sluggish atmosphere of the sea level at Cambridge. We feel well
+why the old Chronicler, Henry of Huntingdon, speaks of "Balsham's
+pleasant hills."
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Balsham._]
+
+There are in this church two most noteworthy brasses, one a
+magnificent memorial, no less than nine feet in length, to John de
+Sleford, rector here, the rebuilder of the church. He was a
+distinguished personage, being Chaplain to Queen Philippa, Master of
+the Wardrobe to her husband King Edward the Third, and Canon both of
+Ripon and of Wells. The orphreys of his cope are embroidered with the
+figures of Saints, five on either side,[162] and in the canopy over
+his head his soul is being borne by angels to the Blessed Trinity with
+the prayer PERSONIS · TRINE · POSCO · ME: SVSCIPE · FINE. The other
+brass is no less magnificent in size and decoration, and commemorates
+a yet more magnificent pluralist, John Blodwell, who was Rector here
+in 1439, besides being Dean of St. Asaph, Canon of St. David's,
+Prebendary of Hereford, and Prebendary of Lichfield. He, too, has
+eight Saints on his cope, and eight more in his canopy.[163] Twelve
+Latin verses give a dialogue between himself and Death, whose words
+are incised, while his are in relief. The chancel has twelve fine
+stalls on either side, and a grand rood screen, all from the
+generosity of Rector Sleford. Yet another, and earlier, worthy
+connected with this place, is Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely and
+Founder of the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse.
+
+[Footnote 162: SS. Mary, John, Katharine, Paul, Magdalene, John
+Baptist, Etheldreda, Peter, Margaret, Wilfrid.]
+
+[Footnote 163: These are SS. Michael, James, Katharine, Gabriel,
+Margaret, ? ? John Baptist, Peter, Asaph, Bridgett, John, Andrew,
+Nicolas, Winifred.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+     London Road.--Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+     Pool, Upper River.--Grantchester, Church.--Cam and Granta.--The
+     Shelfords.--Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+     "Little John."--Whittlesford, Old Hospital.--Duxford.--Triplow
+     Heath, Civil War.--Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell.--Ickleton,
+     Monolith Pillars.--Chesterford.--Icknield Way.--Saffron Walden.
+
+
+Due south from Cambridge goes the great London Road, a name now
+practically supplanted by the local designation of Trumpington Road.
+Trumpington, two miles out, is already joined to Cambridge by a string
+of suburban villas; but these are only on one side of the road, while
+the other is a continuous line of nightingale-haunted elms, not even
+the stench and dust of the motorist having availed to drive away those
+fearless songsters. In leaving the Town the road starts along Hobson's
+Conduit, passing the Botanic Gardens, and crosses Vicar's Brook at the
+historic milestone already described on page 160, the first to be set
+up in England since the days of the Romans.
+
+Trumpington Church shares with Salisbury Cathedral the distinction of
+being built wholly in the Early English style at its best; and it has
+what is, perhaps, the best-known brass in England, that of Sir Roger
+de Trumpington, one of the crusading comrades of Edward the First. The
+knight is in full panoply of chain-armour, with steel epaulettes (or
+ailettes as they were then called) protecting his shoulders. His
+helmet is secured by a chain to his girdle, an unusual precaution, and
+his large concave shield is charged with his punning arms, two golden
+trumpets.
+
+From the Church an alluring hollow lane winds down to a flat green
+island meadow (once a swamp, and still often flooded) between two
+branches of the Cam, dividing Trumpington from the sister village of
+Grantchester. On the Grantchester side of this island we come to a
+mill, with a specially delicious mill-pool below it, overhung by a
+wreath of foliage, chiefly chestnut. This is the representative of the
+mill immortalised by Chaucer, in the Canterbury Tale which describes
+so picturesquely the somewhat unsavoury adventures of the Cambridge
+"clerks":
+
+  At Trompyngtoun, nat far fro Cantebrigge,
+  There goth a brook, and over that a brigge,
+  Upon the whiche brook ther stant a melle,
+  And this is verray sothe that I you telle.
+
+The present mill, however, is not on the actual site of Chaucer's,
+which stood some quarter of a mile higher up the stream. Its mill-pool
+still exists, and is famed as "Byron's Pool." Hither the poet used
+constantly to make his way when an undergraduate, as a retired spot
+where he might enjoy his favourite delight of bathing, which even in
+his day was a practice somewhat frowned upon by the academic
+authorities. A century or so earlier, as has been already said, any
+student found guilty of it was publicly flogged in the Hall of his
+College.[164] It is a fascinating place, overhung by fine trees, and
+remained in favour as a bathing-place even to the middle of the
+nineteenth century. Now it has become so silted up as to be
+practically useless. But on the river above it there is still a good
+swimming reach, little used, however, as most students are content
+with the University bathing sheds between Grantchester and Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 164: See p. 153. After this preliminary domestic castigation
+he was again flogged on the morrow in the University Schools by the
+Proctors. A second offence meant expulsion from the University!]
+
+The footpath past these sheds is a pleasant byway between the two
+places, through the green meadows along the riverbank, and so also is
+the river itself, hereabouts no more than the "brook" which Chaucer
+calls it. It is, however, by no means a water to be played with
+rashly, having a tortuous course full of deep holes, in which many
+lives have been lost. Indeed, no student is now allowed on this "Upper
+River," unless a certified swimmer. A third alternative route is
+afforded by the lane between Grantchester and Newnham. Though the
+southern half of this suburb is actually in Grantchester parish, the
+lane still runs through open fields, and Grantchester itself is in no
+sense suburban.
+
+A strangely zig-zag road (with no fewer than four right-angle bends to
+left and right alternately in as many hundred yards), climbs from the
+mill to the church, which stands, like Trumpington, on the gravel
+terrace above the river. These river gravels are amongst the most
+interesting of Cambridgeshire geological formations. Not only does
+their height above the present stream level (sometimes as much as
+thirty feet) point to an age when the rivers must have been much
+larger than now, but they are prolific in organic remains, indicating,
+sometimes a warmer, sometimes a colder climate than ours. Here, at
+Grantchester, bones of the mammoth and of the woolly rhinoceros
+connote subarctic conditions; but a few miles further up the Cam, at
+Barrington, the terrace is full of hippopotamus, along with elephant
+and rhinoceros of African type, postulating a sub-tropical
+temperature.
+
+Grantchester Church is chiefly noteworthy for its singularly beautiful
+chancel, an almost ideal example of fourteenth century work, perched
+most effectively above one of the bends in the road. The name, with
+its "chester" has led many antiquarians to hold that here was a Roman
+station.[165] But the application of the name to the village is only
+some three centuries old. In earlier days it is always "Grantset." We
+do find "Grantchester" in Bede (as mentioned in our account of Ely);
+but the spot indicated is almost certainly Cambridge, then still in
+ruins after its destruction during the English conquest of Britain.
+
+[Footnote 165: "Chester," "Caster," "Cester," are various Anglicised
+forms of the Latin "castra" (= camp), which our conquering forefathers
+applied to the Romano-British cities which they so ruthlessly
+destroyed in the first sweep of their invasion.]
+
+On the top of the church-tower here we may notice a weird-looking
+piece of iron work. This was put up in 1823 to facilitate the
+astronomical work in the University Observatory, as it is exactly
+south of the telescope dome there, two miles and a half away. With the
+acquisition of collimating telescopes, in 1869, this relationship
+ceased to be of value, and now the growth of trees has rendered the
+tower wholly invisible from the Observatory.
+
+Not far from Byron's Pool we find the watersmeet of the two main
+streams which make our Cambridge river; each so equal in size to its
+sister that neither can be called the tributary of the other. The name
+Granta is usually appropriated to the eastern stream, that of Cam to
+the western. On some maps the latter is called the "Rhee," but this
+(like the Isis at Oxford), is merely a map-maker's name.[166]
+
+[Footnote 166: On the western bank, hard by, is a large meadow known
+as Lingay Fen, which is always (artificially) flooded during the
+winter, in hopes of a frost. It forms an excellent skating ground, on
+which even National Championships have been decided.]
+
+And as the river divides, so also does our London Road, one route
+following either valley. The Granta route goes viâ Bishop Stortford
+and Epping Forest, entering London by the Mile End Road, the other viâ
+Royston, Ware, and Tottenham, coming in by Bishopsgate Street. The
+division comes just as we leave Trumpington, at the lych-gate of the
+village cemetery, whence the left-hand branch brings us to the twin
+villages of Great and Little Shelford, with the Granta running between
+them. Both churches are good, the former with an octagonal steeple,
+and a churchyard kept like a garden, and the latter with a grand
+square-headed Decorated window in its transept, where are preserved
+some nice fragments of the ancient alabaster reredos. There are also
+various good fifteenth century monuments of the De Freville family,
+whose name still lives on as that of a suburban district in Cambridge.
+Great Shelford Church is richly decorated, as it seems to have been of
+old, for here Dowsing destroyed no fewer than 128 "superstitions." The
+bridge over the Granta between the two villages was in mediæval times
+under the charge of a hermit, like Newnham Bridge at Cambridge.[167]
+
+[Footnote 167: See p. 41.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Shelford Church._]
+
+Villages continue to be found on both banks as we ascend the Granta.
+The main road, on the east of the stream, leads through Stapleford, a
+small place, to the large and important Sawston. Its size and
+importance are due to the existence of that all too rare development,
+a really thriving rural industry. For here is not only a flourishing
+paper-mill, turning out its twenty tons a week of superfine
+copper-glazed paper, but the much more uncommon manufacture of
+parchment, and of the "shammy" leather used for cleaning plate, etc.
+And this is produced in a delightfully rural and old-time fashion.
+There are no machines here automatically grinding out facsimile
+products; every process is confided to the skill and judgment of the
+individual in charge of it. There are fifteen or sixteen such
+processes involved, and a very little carelessness in any one of them
+would spoil the whole series. Thus every workman is an expert, and
+takes a pride in his work impossible to the mere driver of a machine.
+The great aim of each is to "keep his skin in condition" while under
+his hands, so as to have a right to glory in the finished article.
+
+The very terms used in this manufacture have an ancient smack about
+them. The sheepskins used are called "pelts," and are supplied by the
+"fell-monger." They are first immersed for a while in a solution of
+lime, and then hung over nothing less primitive than the half of a
+tree, sawn lengthwise, while a "flesher" scrapes and "couches" them
+(_i.e._, removes all wrinkles). They are then "split," the inner skin,
+called the "mutton" or "lining," being adroitly separated from the
+outer "grain." This "lining" is next "frized" (_i.e._, rubbed), to
+remove all fat, then again "limed," and thoroughly washed. It is then
+"squeezed" and "punched" till "the water is killed," then soaked with
+cod-liver oil. This causes fermentation to set in, during which the
+skins have to be carefully watched by men whose duty it is to "turn
+the heats" before "burning" takes place. Alkaline treatment follows,
+and, finally, the skins are "ground," _i.e._, pared with a round knife
+and smoothed with a wooden "scurfer," being sprinkled the while with
+water from a bunch of butchers' broom, called by its old English name
+"knee-holm." They are then packed in "kips" of thirty apiece, and put
+on the market. Before "grounding," the taste of the ordinary customer,
+who likes a pretty white "shammy," is consulted by bleaching most of
+the skins with sulphur. Appearance, however, is thus dearly purchased,
+for sulphur blackens silver, besides shortening the life of the skin.
+The useful colour is dark brown.
+
+"For parchment the 'linings' are tied in a frame by strings fastened
+round grooved pegs, on the same principle as a Spanish windlass....
+After being scraped with a 'half-round' knife, dried, 'shaved,' dabbed
+with whitewash, and heated in a stove to remove the grease, they are
+then scalded and rubbed with pumice until they are fine and
+smooth.... The parchment workers wear clogs, sheepskin leggings, and
+'basil' aprons. A basil is an unsplit tanned sheepskin. In this
+well-managed factory all the refuse goes to make soap, glue, dubbin,
+or manure, and not one scrap of material is wasted."[168]
+
+[Footnote 168: Prof. Hughes' _Geography of Cambridgeshire_, p. 106.]
+
+Sawston, moreover, is not only full of present interest, but rich in
+associations with the past. The Village Cross stands on its ancient
+site, and the church, which retains some Norman features, has several
+mediæval brasses, though none of special merit. The Hall is yet more
+remarkable. It was built in the reign of Queen Mary with materials
+from the ruins of Cambridge Castle, granted by her in consideration of
+the earlier hall having been destroyed for sheltering her. At the
+death of her brother Edward the Sixth, the Protestant Lords of the
+Council sought to arrest her as she approached London. Hearing of
+their design she took refuge at Sawston Hall, then as now the seat of
+the Huddleston family, who then as now steadfastly adhered to the
+ancient faith. Her presence there being reported at Cambridge, a
+Protestant mob, under the direction of the authorities, pounced upon
+the hall so suddenly that she had barely time to escape on horseback
+behind one of the serving men, her course lighted by the flames of the
+burning building, which was utterly destroyed by the disappointed
+Protestants. A missal taken in the sack was, on the following Sunday,
+held up to public derision and formally torn to pieces in the
+University Church.
+
+By the time the rebuilding of the hall was completed another, and more
+thoroughgoing, Protestant persecution had broken out. To hear Mass was
+made treason-felony, punished by forfeiture of goods and perpetual
+imprisonment, while to say it was an act of high treason, for which
+the offending priest suffered the lingering death assigned by the law
+to traitors, being first half-hanged, then disembowelled, and finally
+quartered. The Catholic chapels of the day were accordingly placed in
+the garrets, as in that still existing at Sawston Hall, where the
+worshippers had most warning in case of a domiciliary visit by the
+authorities. Secret cupboards were contrived for hiding the sacred
+vessels, books, and vestments, and secret exits by which the priest
+might, if possible, be smuggled out of the house, and, in case these
+proved unavailable, "Hiding Holes" in which he might take refuge. That
+at Sawston Hall is in the staircase, and is described by Mr. Allan Fea
+in his _Secret Chambers and Hiding Places_:
+
+     "The entrance is so cleverly arranged that it slants into the
+     masonry of a circular tower, without showing the least
+     perceptible sign, from the exterior, of a space capable of
+     holding a baby, far less a man. A particular board in the landing
+     is raised, and beneath it, in a corner of the cavity, is found a
+     stone slab containing a circular aperture, something after the
+     manner of our modern urban receptacles for coal. From this hole a
+     tunnel slants downwards, at an angle, into the adjacent wall,
+     where there is an apartment some twelve feet in depth, and wide
+     enough to contain half a dozen people.... The opening is so
+     massive and firm that, unless pointed out, the particular
+     floor-board could never be detected, and when secured from the
+     inside could defy a battering ram."
+
+This is an unusually commodious Hiding Hole, large enough to hold not
+only the refugee priest but provisions to maintain him during the
+search, a very necessary item of the precautions. For when the
+pursuivants pounced upon a Catholic mansion they always began by
+locking up the inmates, that no succour might be given to the outlaw
+whose presence they suspected, and then proceeded to a most systematic
+and thoroughgoing search, in which chimneys, cellars, and roofs were
+exhaustively explored, panellings pulled down, and floors torn up, for
+days together. The ransacking and wrecking sometimes lasted a whole
+fortnight on end; but with such art were these retreats constructed
+that they constantly defied even so stringent a test, unless
+betrayed--sometimes by the unintentional emotion of those in the
+secret.
+
+Like most others in England this Hiding Hole at Sawston Hall was due
+to the ingenuity of a Jesuit, one Nicolas Owen (nicknamed "Little
+John" from his diminutive stature), who, "with incomparable skill and
+inexhaustible industry," devoted his life to contriving these
+recesses. "And by this his skill," says a seventeenth century writer,
+"many priests were preserved from the prey of persecutors." Finally he
+was himself betrayed into the hands of the Protestant Government, who
+write exultingly of their "great joy" in his arrest; "knowing his
+skill in constructing hiding-places, and the innumerable number of
+these dark holes which he hath schemed for hiding priests throughout
+the kingdom." It was hoped that he might be induced to reveal these
+places, "to the taking of great booty of priests." But Owen remained
+staunch against all threats and blandishments, and finally allowed
+himself to be tortured to death without suffering the secret "to be
+wrung from him," as Cecil ordered that it should be. "The man is
+dead--he died in our hands," is the laconic report of the Governor of
+the Tower in answer to this order.
+
+The knee-holm, or butchers' broom, used in the Sawston leather work,
+grows at Whittlesford, on the other side of the Granta, a pretty,
+shady village with an interesting church; the development of which,
+from a Saxon nucleus, is a nice (and not yet satisfactorily solved)
+problem for lovers of mediæval architecture. There is a wooden porch
+(oak) of the fourteenth century. At Whittlesford Bridge, where the
+Granta is crossed by the Icknield Street, close to the railway
+station, one sees, hard by the road, a decayed stone edifice, with a
+high pitched roof thatched with reeds, now used as a barn.
+
+[Illustration: _Whittlesford._]
+
+This is the chapel of the ancient Hospital of St. John, founded in the
+thirteenth century. There were several such institutions in
+Cambridgeshire, started, not specially for the care of the sick, but
+for "hospitality" in the widest sense of the word. Here travellers
+were entertained, the hungry were fed, the needy were ministered to,
+according to their several necessities. The Hospitals were rarely
+large institutions, and this one, as the size of its chapel shows, was
+quite a small affair, only endowed with some sixty acres of meadow
+land and a water-mill, equivalent, probably, to some £200 a year in
+all. But having been under the direction of a prior (appointed by the
+Bishop of Ely), it is sometimes known by the high-sounding title of
+Whittlesford Priory. The interior of the building still retains some
+beautiful early English work. A specially pleasant roadside hostelry
+next door (the Red Lion), with deliciously quaint carvings on mantel
+and ceiling, may be held, in some sense, its modern representative;
+and, indeed, is thought by many authorities to have actually formed
+part of it.
+
+Though, for some reason, always associated with the name of
+Whittlesford, this Hospital is actually in the adjoining parish of
+Duxford, or rather in one of the two (now consolidated) parishes of
+St. John and St. Peter, between which this little village is divided.
+Both churches still exist (though St. John's is now only used for
+burials in its churchyard), and both are very much of the same build,
+mainly Early English, with a little Norman, of which St. John's
+steeple is the most noteworthy example. St. Peter's has a beautiful
+"low-side" window in the northern wall of the chancel.
+
+To the west of Duxford the Icknield Street traverses a wide bleak
+expanse of treeless fields which, until the nineteenth century, were
+the unenclosed turf-land forming the famous Triplow Heath, the scene
+of the first breach between the Long Parliament and its army. In the
+view of the Parliament that force had now done its work. The Cavalier
+levies had been stamped out, the king had been "bought" from the
+Scots, and was in Parliamentary custody at Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, the Scots themselves had withdrawn to their own
+country; why then should not this costly, and rather dangerous, army
+be disbanded?
+
+But this was far from being the view of the soldiers themselves. A
+return to the monotonous routine of civil life, after the thrilling
+excitements of civil war, had no attractions for them; least of all, a
+return without their pay. That pay--one shilling a day--was more than
+double the current wages; and now it was many months behindhand--a
+whole year in some cases. The suggestions of disbandment were met,
+accordingly, by the concentration of the troops, including Cromwell's
+famous regiments, on Triplow Heath, in his own East Anglian district.
+This was on the 10th of June, 1647.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Peter's Church, Duxford._]
+
+Commissioners from the Parliament were sent down from Westminster,
+with offers of two months' pay in cash and debentures for the
+remaining arrears, contingent on disbandment. But this was not nearly
+good enough; and the offers were met with cries of "Justice! Justice!"
+from the men, and with significant hints from the officers of a march
+on London if their claims were not speedily satisfied, "for a rich
+city may seem an enticing bait to poor beggarly soldiers to venture
+far to gain the wealth thereof."
+
+And, while the baffled Commissioners returned, to call out the London
+train-bands to meet the threatened attack (finding them so reluctant
+to face this new and terrific foe that the death-penalty had to be
+denounced against all malingerers), the Army took more effective
+action by despatching Cornet Joyce, with a troop of horse, to seize
+the King at Holmby House and bring him along as a prisoner; or, as
+they put it, to rescue him from his Parliamentary jailers, and invite
+him to trust his person with his faithful soldiers. They might thus be
+able to sell him again to the Parliament, as the Scots had done, or
+they might really restore him, for a sufficient consideration, or make
+their own of him some way. And, while Charles was being thus carried
+off, as we have already seen, to Chippenham, they struck their camp
+and marched off along the Icknield Street to Royston, and thence to
+St. Albans, as a demonstration against London. When the unhappy
+monarch, a fortnight later, on Midsummer Day, was brought by the same
+route from Newmarket, crossing Whittlesford Bridge and passing through
+the midst of Triplow Heath, the scene had already returned to its
+habitual loneliness.
+
+Triplow itself lies to the west of the Heath, and has a far-seen
+cruciform Church, sister to that in the adjoining village of Foulmire,
+or Fowlmere as it ought to be spelt. An actual mere, noted for its
+wealth of wild fowl, existed here till little more than half a century
+ago. It is now a worthless patch of land, full of springs and runlets.
+There is also a small prehistoric earthwork, known as "The Round
+Moats."
+
+From Duxford, a pretty byway--far prettier till, a year or two ago,
+the picturesque wooden foot-bridge across the Granta was replaced by
+an iron modernity--leads to Hinxton, where the church has some
+interesting architectural developments, and a good brass to Sir Thomas
+de Skelton, steward to "old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster."
+He is shown in full plate-armour, and his two wives lie beside him.
+The Parochial Register here dates back to the very first institution
+of such documents, in 1538, by Thomas Cromwell. This is quite rare;
+for the idea was, in its first inception, to the last degree unpopular
+both with clergy and people, who suspected, from their experience of
+Henry's illimitable greed, that a tax would be exacted upon each of
+the ecclesiastical functions thus registered.
+
+On the outside of the spire, which is of wood covered with lead, hangs
+a "Sanctus" (or "Sacring") Bell, which of old was rung at those places
+in the High Mass where a small bell is sounded by the Server at the
+Altar; that is to say, at the _Ter Sanctus_ and the Consecration of
+the Host. Thus those of the faithful who were unable to attend church
+were invited to unite themselves in spirit with the worshippers there
+at the most solemn moments of the Service. Few of these bells remain,
+as their associations were, of course, specially distasteful to
+Protestant feeling, so that they were mostly destroyed at the
+Reformation.
+
+At Hinxton we are on the borders of Essex, and a shady
+westward-running lane takes us on, across the river and the railway,
+to the last Cambridgeshire village on this line, Ickleton, where the
+church is of quite unique interest. Here, too, there is a Sacring
+Bell, on the side of the steeple; surviving, doubtless, through the
+same unknown local influence which also saved that on the sister spire
+of Hinxton. But the real interest of the church is entirely hidden
+from passers by. Those even who look from the pretty little Village
+Green to the southward see nothing that calls for notice, except the
+Sacring Bell and a fairly good Geometrical window in the steeple. The
+rest of the exterior shows only poor fourteenth century work--and
+cruelly "restored" at that.
+
+But, once inside, we discover that the unsightly exterior is but an
+outer shell, built round, and over, a smaller and far older church,
+still standing, and so entirely enclosed that its clerestory lights
+now open into the existing aisles. Above them are the lights of the
+later fourteenth century clerestory, which, no doubt, originally
+contained Geometrical, or more probably Flowing, tracery. Now,
+however, they are mere "churchwarden" apertures, of various indefinite
+shapes, with mean wooden sashes, having been remorselessly doctored in
+the second decade of the nineteenth century.
+
+It is when we look closely at this interior church that we note its
+truly astonishing features. At the first glance it might be taken for
+an ordinary Norman structure, with its round pillars and round arches;
+and, in fact, it is usually so described by the few authorities who
+notice it at all. The rudeness of the capitals, however, and the
+general aspect of the arcade, does not somehow look like Norman work,
+but more suggests Saxon architecture. And the very small clerestory
+lights, mere loopholes, still more lead us to this conclusion. Some
+archæologists, therefore, consider this interior church at Ickleton to
+be a Saxon edifice; and, so far as the clerestory is concerned, it is
+exceedingly probable that they are right. The piers of the tower
+arches, however, are unmistakably Norman, as is also the west doorway.
+
+But what is the arcade? When we examine the massive circular pillars
+which support it, we see to our amazement that, instead of being built
+up in the usual manner, every one of them is a monolith! We are now
+obliged to confess ourselves in the presence not of Norman or Saxon
+but of _Roman_ work, for no example of such monolithic construction is
+known in any later architecture, and was, indeed, sparingly employed
+even by the Romans.
+
+How did these pillars come to be here? They are of Barnack stone from
+Northamptonshire, and must have been brought at an expense well-nigh
+prohibitory to the finances of a small country parish. We may dismiss
+the idea that they were hewn out of the quarry in this specially
+costly form, and fetched all the way from Barnack by the builders of
+this little unpretending church.
+
+Dismissing this, there remain two other alternatives. A mile distant
+from Ickleton to the southward stands Chesterford, the site of an
+important Roman station, commonly identified with the _Icianos_ of the
+third century "Antonine" Itinerary. The place derived its name, and
+its importance, from its position at the point where the River Granta
+is crossed by the Icknield Way, the line of communication along the
+strip of greensward between the Cambridgeshire fens and the forest
+topping the East Anglian heights, which gave access to the territory
+of the Iceni in Norfolk and Suffolk. The Saxon builders of Ickleton
+Church may have found these pillars amid the ruins of _Icianos_, or of
+some villa in the neighbourhood, and have brought them that short
+distance for their edifice. As they were ready made this would be a
+cheap job.
+
+Such is the one alternative. The other, to which I myself incline, is
+that they did not need to fetch the pillars at all, but utilised them
+on the very spot where they originally stood. According to this view
+we have here an example, unique in Britain, of Roman work _in situ_.
+The very arcading which we see I take to have stood north and south of
+the central hall of some large Roman mansion. Such a mansion usually
+contained an oblong central hall of this kind (often roofless), with a
+peristyle, or cloister, on either side opening into it, a portico at
+one end, and a smaller _tablinum_ or guest-chamber at the other.
+Lanciani has pointed out how this structural arrangement suggested the
+nave, aisles, porch, and chancel of the earliest ecclesiastical
+edifices at Rome.[169] The same suggestion may have influenced the
+builders of Ickleton Church to utilise this old Roman arcading,
+roofing in the enclosed space, but with a clerestory to prevent too
+great loss of light. If this view is correct the narrow north aisle
+probably represents the width of the original peristyle.
+
+[Footnote 169: See my _Roman Britain_, p. 266.]
+
+The south aisle is far wider, as wide indeed as the nave and north
+aisle together; and one asks why the fourteenth century architect
+planned his work so very unsymmetrically. The answer, I think, is to
+be found in the remarkable architectural development of the steeple.
+The piers of the tower are, as I have said, unmistakably Norman, but
+upon them are set, quite unconformably, arches at least a century
+later in date. The tower is pierced by these arches on all four sides,
+and was evidently meant as the centre of a cruciform church with
+transepts. For some reason this Norman plan was never completed, but
+it is very probable that the south wall of the church marks the limit
+to which the transept (which may have been actually begun) was meant
+to extend.
+
+The church has also later features of interest. There are some good
+mediæval seat finials, shaped with the axe and bearing grotesque
+figures, musical instruments, and symbols; the word ORATE being
+decipherable upon one of them. The rood-screen is fifteenth century,
+and is placed across the eastern arch of the tower, with no trace of
+there having ever been a rood-loft.
+
+The land of Ickleton was almost wholly _Terra Ecclesiæ_. A priory of
+Benedictine nuns existed here, founded in the twelfth century by
+Aubrey de Vere, the first Earl of Oxford; while the Abbeys of East
+Dereham in Norfolk, Tyltey in Essex, and even Calder (a "cell" of
+Furness), in far-off Cumberland, each possessed a Manor in the
+Parish. All alike were given by Henry the Eighth to Goodrich, Bishop
+of Ely, in exchange for the far more valuable property of Hatfield
+House. Queen Elizabeth, however, afterwards demanded them all back
+again, with much other land, as a condition of appointing Bishop
+Heton, in 1600, to the See, which she had kept vacant to fill her
+coffers for no less than nineteen years. The Manors were sold by the
+Crown, and are now in private hands. The benefice is in the gift of
+the Lord Chancellor.
+
+The name Ickleton, like those of Ickborough in Norfolk, Ickingham in
+Suffolk, and Ickleford in Hertfordshire, is derived from the position
+of the village on the line of the Icknield Way. It may indeed be the
+direct linguistic descendant of the Roman _Icianos_. We must bear in
+mind that a prehistoric track, such as the Icknield Way, was not one
+single-metalled thoroughfare like a Roman road or a modern highway,
+but a broad line of route along which each traveller made his own
+"trek," so that the "Way" was a series of roughly parallel ruttings
+over the breadth of a mile and more. Such, to this day, are the routes
+across the Siberian steppes, which are often four or five miles
+across. Thus we found the Icknield Way at Whittlesford, three miles
+north of Chesterford, and it is probable that all the various "fords"
+we have been meeting--Shelford, Stapleford, Whittlesford,
+Duxford--have to do with its various passages of the Granta.
+
+Beyond Chesterford the Granta comes down in tiny streamlets from the
+Essex chalk near Saffron Walden, with its wide-naved church, which
+Cromwell's troops used for a drill-shed and council-chamber, and its
+historic mansion of Audley End, once Walden Abbey, and its memories of
+the days, scarcely a century by-gone, when great crops of saffron were
+grown in its fields, leaving their only existing trace in the name.
+And even that is dying out; few of the inhabitants call their home
+anything but Walden. But this town is beyond our Cambridgeshire
+border.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+     London Road.--Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket
+     Fresco.--Burnt Mill.--Haslingfield.--White Hill, View, Clunch
+     Pits, Chapel, Papal Bulla.--Barrington, Green, Church, Porch,
+     Seats, Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging,
+     Hall.--Foxton.--Shepreth.--Meldreth, Parish Stocks.--Melbourn,
+     Shipmoney.--Royston, Origin, Cave, Heath.--Bassingbourn, Old
+     Accounts, Villenage.--Black Death.--Ashwell, Source of Cam,
+     Church, Graffiti.--Akeman Street.--Barton, Butts.--Comberton,
+     Maze.--Harlton Church, Old Pit.--Orwell Maypole, Church,
+     Epitaph.--Wimpole Hall, Queen Victoria.--Arrington.--Shingay,
+     Hospitallers, Fairy Cart.--Wendy.--Artesian Wells.--Guilden
+     Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals.
+
+
+The Cam Valley road from Trumpington leads us over a singularly bare
+mile, edged by sparse thorn-trees, to Hauxton Mill, where we cross the
+Granta. The repair of the bridge here was, in mediæval days, paid for
+by the grant to all who aided this good object of a forty days'
+Indulgence. This does not mean a licence to sin with impunity for that
+period, as perfervid Protestants imagine, but merely the abrogation of
+any ordinary ecclesiastical censure incurred. The little church of
+Hauxton, not far beyond, is one of the few Norman village churches
+existing in Cambridgeshire, for the county suffered so severely in the
+Norman Conquest that little church building could be afforded till a
+century later, when Norman had given place to Early English.
+
+In this church, upon the east wall of the south aisle is a fine fresco
+of Thomas à Becket, dating from within a few decades of his own
+lifetime. Representations of this Saint are extremely rare, for, as an
+ecclesiastic who had braved his king--and that king a Henry,--he was
+specially detested by Henry the Eighth. His Festivals were all
+suppressed, his name was erased from every Service Book, and his
+effigies were destroyed with ruthless diligence, so that this is
+almost the only one known to exist in all England. It was only saved
+by the niche in which it is painted being hastily bricked up and
+plastered over; to be forgotten for upwards of three centuries, till
+accidentally discovered in 1860 during some restoration work.
+
+Hauxton Church stands a little off the main road, on a by way running
+from Shelford on the Granta to Haslingfield on the Cam. West of
+Hauxton this route becomes a mere field track, but quite a pretty one,
+crossing the Cam at an idyllic nook called Burnt Mill Bridges, where
+the green banks and clear waters are closed in by ancient elms and
+thorn bushes. It brings to the mind Milton's lines in Il Penseroso:
+
+  There in close covert, by some brook,
+  Where no profaner eye may look,
+  Hide me from day's garish eye."
+
+Haslingfield (which is more directly reached from Cambridge by the
+Barton Road) has a fine and spacious church of the fourteenth century,
+the steeple being of special merit. Above it rises steeply the eastern
+extremity of a chalk spur to the height of 220 feet. From the summit,
+though so low, we get one of the widest panoramic views in England,
+embracing the whole valley of the Cam. "Ashwell Bush,"[170] which
+marks the source of the river, is conspicuous on a hill some ten miles
+to the south-westward, and Ely Cathedral, just beyond its junction
+with the Ouse, may be seen, twice as far away to the north; Cambridge,
+with its spires and pinnacles, lying between, five or six miles
+distant. Our eastward limit of vision is the long line of the East
+Anglian Heights, from Swaffham steeple[171] on their northernmost
+visible swell, twenty miles away, to the far-off jut of Sharpinhoe,
+near Dunstable, more than thirty miles in the opposite direction.
+Beneath us, in the valley, steeple after steeple rises amid its
+village elms, dotting the landscape like knots in net-work. No fewer
+than eighty of these can be made out, the most conspicuous being the
+cruciform church of Triplow.[172]
+
+[Footnote 170: This "bush" is actually a group of young elms.]
+
+[Footnote 171: See p. 191.]
+
+[Footnote 172: See p. 230.]
+
+[Illustration: _Haslingfield Church._]
+
+This eminence was anciently known as White Hill, from the three great
+"clunch" quarries,[173] which still conspicuously scar its sides,
+and must have done so much more conspicuously of old, when this
+material was much more generally used for building than it is now.
+From these quarries came, for example, the stone used in the First
+Court of St. John's College, Cambridge. The "pits," as they are
+locally called, are rapidly greening over, for the clunch is now only
+dug for the mending of farm roads, and occasionally for marling the
+fields; as Pliny records that the ancient Britons marled them two
+thousand years ago.
+
+[Footnote 173: See p. 198.]
+
+At the summit of the ridge a small roadside cottage, known as "Chapel
+Bush," represents the once famous shrine of "Our Lady of White Hill";
+in mediæval days a noted centre of local devotion, which drew pilgrims
+in large numbers from a wide area, so that their accommodation, as we
+read, was no small profit (and, often, difficulty) to the neighbouring
+villages. No ruins, even, of this ancient chapel remain; but, in 1885,
+there was discovered on its site a leaden _bulla_ of Pope Martin the
+Fifth, the first Pope to be generally acknowledged after the Great
+Schism; when for forty years two (or three) claimants to the Holy See
+were reigning simultaneously, supported some by one part of
+Christendom, some by another. He reigned 1417 to 1431, and was the
+consecrator of Milan Cathedral. It was he who, at the "Assize of
+Barnwell" (1430), pronounced that all spiritual jurisdiction over the
+students of Cambridge was exclusively vested in the University
+authorities. His _bulla_ bears the heads of SS. Peter and Paul, with
+the traditional features, which Lanciani has now established as
+historical; St. Peter having a broad face with curly hair and beard,
+while St. Paul is thin-faced and straight-haired.
+
+On the southern side of the hill lies Barrington, perhaps the
+loveliest of all Cambridgeshire villages. It consists of two long
+lines of scattered cottages, straggling along either side of a Village
+Green nearly a mile in length. The Green is traversed from end to end
+by the "Church Path," a pebbled causeway of immemorial antiquity. The
+church, to which this leads, stands at the north-eastern extremity of
+the Green, and is a noble structure of the twelfth century, with later
+developments. The south doorway and door are thirteenth century, and
+are wonders of graceful work; while the fourteenth century seats are
+of special interest as having been constructed with book-boards,
+showing that reading was not the rare accomplishment in those days
+that it is commonly supposed to have been.[174] There is also an
+iron-bound chest dating from the tenth century, a splendid specimen of
+the smiths-work for which England was then so famous. The font, too,
+is equally old, showing on its margin the depressions (now filled in),
+often provided in fonts of the period when baptism by immersion was
+the rule, as outlets for accidental overflow.
+
+[Footnote 174: The Chantry Priests, of whom there were two in
+Barrington, often acted as village schoolmasters, the Chantries
+themselves serving as classrooms.]
+
+[Illustration: _Farmhouse at Haslingfield._]
+
+Here and there along the Green gush out bright fountains of delicious
+water from artesian wells driven into the "greensand," some 200 feet
+below the surface. Throughout all its length the village is sheltered,
+on the north, by the ridge of White Hill, while, on the south, the
+orchards and closes with their "hedge-row elms," slope down to the Cam
+and its water-meadows. The stream here runs beneath a gravel-terrace
+of its own formation, which has proved exceptionally rich in the
+remains of pleistocene mammalia, mostly, as has been said,[175]
+connoting a semi-tropical climate. Specimens of elephant,
+hippopotamus, rhinoceros, bison, urus, lion, bear, hyæna, derived from
+Barrington, are to be seen in the Sedgwick Museum at Cambridge.
+Associated palæolithic flint implements, and red-deer antlers rudely
+cut, show that human intelligence existed here along with these
+monsters, at least 5000 years ago, at the lowest estimate, which some
+geologists multiply fifty fold; and excavation has shown that the site
+has been populated pretty well ever since. Neolithic, British, Roman,
+Anglo-Saxon, and Mediæval relics have here been unearthed in quite
+astonishing abundance; and, though no Roman villa has yet been
+located, Roman coins have been found literally by the hundred.
+
+[Footnote 175: See p. 221. The gravel here is older than that at
+Grantchester.]
+
+This wealth of finds has been largely due to the "coprolite" digging,
+as it was inaccurately called, which went on here (and throughout the
+neighbourhood) during the whole latter half of the nineteenth century.
+It had been discovered that the "upper greensand"[176] (here a narrow
+deposit immediately over the gault and usually some fifteen or twenty
+feet below the surface) was full of organic remains worth extracting
+for manure. These remains were never true coprolites, but mostly
+formless nodules rich in phosphate of lime, many being sponges, along
+with abundance of sea-urchins, mollusca, crabs, and innumerable
+sharks' teeth.
+
+[Footnote 176: So called because full of green grains of "glauconite,"
+which appear to be the internal casts of the shells of foraminifera.
+This bed, however, is not the true Upper Greensand, but "riddlings"
+from it.]
+
+The industry brought a wave of prosperity to the district; for
+coprolites were worth some £3 per ton, and the average yield was some
+300 tons per acre. The merchants were, therefore, willing to pay well
+for the privilege of digging them out, and usually offered the
+landowner £150 or more per acre for three years' occupation of the
+land (more than its capital value); being bound also to level and
+resoil it at the end of their tenancy. Wages, too, ran high; a good
+"fossil-digger" could earn his 40_s_. per week. This produced a
+corresponding rise in agricultural wages, which went up from 10_s_. or
+12_s_. per week to double that amount. The fossil-digging was all
+piecework, the men being paid by the cubic yard of earth moved.
+
+[Illustration: _South Porch, Barrington Church._]
+
+After being brought to the surface the fossil-bearing greensand was
+washed in a horse-mill on the spot, an artesian well being bored, if
+necessary, to supply the water. This separated out the nodules, while
+the greensand and water was run off as thick mud; used, when dry, for
+levelling the land, and sometimes for brick-making. The nodules were
+ground to powder in central works at Royston and elsewhere, and
+treated with sulphuric acid, thus producing super-phosphate of lime
+adapted for manure. At the height of the industry as many as 55,000
+tons per year were extracted from the Cambridgeshire beds; but with
+their gradual exhaustion the trade dwindled away till it was finally
+destroyed by imports from Charleston, U.S.A., where the like
+"coprolites" are found as a superficial deposit, needing no digging.
+And with the trade has disappeared the artificial prosperity which it
+brought, to be succeeded by the full weight of the agricultural
+depression.
+
+Barrington Hall is the seat of one of the oldest of English county
+families, the Bendyshes, who have held their estate here since the
+reign of John. Their residence at Barrington dates, however, only from
+that of Edward the Third, for whom, during his siege of Calais, they
+raised money by mortgaging their earlier abode at Radwinter, in Essex,
+to the monks of that place. Before the king by repaying their loan put
+them in case to redeem the mortgage, the monks had foreclosed; thus
+driving the family to reside on their Cambridgeshire property at
+Barrington. They are not, however, lords of the Manor there (though
+they are in the adjoining parish of Foxton). That position belongs to
+Trinity College, Cambridge, who are also rectors of the church, by the
+gift of their earliest founder, Hervey de Stanton, Chancellor to
+Edward the Second.
+
+From either end of Barrington lanes lead southward across the Cam to
+Foxton and Shepreth respectively. Both these villages are hard by the
+main road which we are following. Foxton Church has a most beautiful
+Early English east window, and some very good Geometrical tracery.
+Here is found that rare form of rural industry, a book-printing
+establishment, which to some extent mitigates the depression mentioned
+above. At Shepreth this is done on a larger scale by the making of
+cement, for which the clay procurable here is, like that on the
+Medway, peculiarly adapted. This is a little gem of a village, with a
+clear and copious brook running across its maze of thick-shaded lanes.
+The source of these waters is in the ancient Fowl Mere already spoken
+of.[177]
+
+[Footnote 177: See p. 230.]
+
+Another such tributary rises in our next village, Melbourn, and runs,
+on its way to the Cam, through the adjoining Meldreth, an old-world
+place, where the parish stocks are still to be seen at the village
+cross-roads. Till the nineteenth century was well on its way, these
+instruments of punishment were in actual use for the correction of
+minor offences such as vagrancy. They consist of a low upright frame
+of rough wood, so contrived that the prisoner's feet, as he sat upon
+the ground beside it, were passed through holes in the structure and
+there secured. The parish constable was supposed to keep sentry over
+him, but actually seldom kept off either the friends, who might
+alleviate his captivity by beer and tobacco, or the more numerous
+enemies, who found it a good joke to tease and pelt his helplessness.
+The hands were sometimes also secured, sometimes not; but in any case
+the culprit's situation was exceedingly unpleasant, and the stocks
+proved a most wholesome deterrent.
+
+[Illustration: _Shepreth._]
+
+Melbourn is a larger place, and boasts that rare possession, a village
+trysting-tree. This is a huge elm, standing by the roadside at the
+churchyard gate. It is now at the extremity of elm life, some three
+hundred years old, and only the stump (still clothed with leafage)
+remains. But the vast massiveness of the roots show its former
+grandeur. At this tree, in 1640, the villagers spontaneously gathered
+to resist the imposition of the "ship-money," whereby Charles the
+First was striving to recruit his exhausted exchequer. "And they fell
+upon the sheriff's men with stones and staves, and hedgestakes and
+forks, and beat them and wounded divers of them, and did drive them
+out of the highway into a woman's yard for their safety. And were
+forced for saving of their lives to get out of the town a back way;
+which, notwithstanding, some thirty or forty able men and boys pursued
+them above a quarter of a mile, stoning them, and driving the bailiffs
+into a ditch, where some of their horses stuck fast. And the multitude
+got some of the bailiffs' horses and carried them away, and would not
+redeem them without money."
+
+This stirring episode shows that the men of Melbourn were already
+Puritan stalwarts, a character which the place has ever since
+maintained. Three years later the parson himself removed from the
+church "sixty superstitious pictures," and a cross from the steeple,
+and digged down the altar steps. And after the Restoration, when
+Nonconformity was put under the straitest ban of the law, its worship
+still continued here to be practised, so that the place became, as it
+still remains, the chief centre of the Free Church form of religion in
+this part of the county.
+
+Three miles further the road brings us to the small but flourishing
+town of Royston, which, though now wholly in Hertfordshire, was till a
+few years ago partly in Cambridgeshire, with which it has a far closer
+physical connection than with its new county. The place has an
+interesting history. Like Newmarket, at the other end of
+Cambridgeshire, it is not, as are the villages around, one of the
+original English settlements dating from the fifth or sixth centuries,
+but a burgh of mediæval growth, owing its existence (again like
+Newmarket) to its position on the line of the Icknield Way, here
+crossed by another presumably British and certainly Roman road, the
+Ermine Street, which joined, as it still joins, the two great
+nerve-centres of Roman Britain, York and London. It is still known as
+the Old North Road.
+
+Such a junction was necessarily an important spot, and the wonder is
+that there was not always a town here. It was left however still
+occupied when, in the eleventh century, the Lady Roesia, wife of Eudo
+Dapifer, the Norman chieftain to whom the land hereabouts was assigned
+by William the Conqueror, set up here, at the meeting of the ways, one
+of those stone wayside crosses by which mediæval piety so often marked
+such junctions. A century later the new-born devotion to St. Thomas of
+Canterbury led the then lord of the manor, Eustace de Mark, to found
+and dedicate to him a Priory, called, from the neighbouring cross,
+"_De Cruce Rosae_." This, as so often happened, became the nucleus of
+a little town, which got to be called Roesia's Town, or Royston.
+
+[Illustration: _Melbourn._]
+
+At the same period Royston was the scene of yet another ecclesiastical
+development, by the establishment of a famous hermitage in its still
+celebrated cave. This cave is a curious bottle-shaped excavation in
+the chalk below the Icknield Way, of prehistoric origin, having been
+apparently one of those "dene holes" from which the ancient
+inhabitants of Britain used to procure chalk for marling their fields.
+It is not so long since this method was discontinued, and numbers of
+these holes are still to be found in Kent and elsewhere. They were
+always made on the same plan. A shaft was sunk to the desired depth,
+and the chalk excavated all round the bottom as far as safety
+permitted. The hole was then abandoned, and usually filled in. This
+one at Royston, however, remained open, and in the twelfth century was
+taken as his abode by a hermit, who employed himself in carving
+devotional figures and emblems all round the walls.
+
+He must have been a true Solitary, for his shrine was only accessible
+by a rope ladder twenty-five feet long let down through the narrow
+opening at the top. It remained, however, a place of devotion till the
+Reformation, when it not only became disused, but was so effectually
+filled up that its very existence was forgotten for some two hundred
+and fifty years. Then curiosity was aroused by a subsidence at the top
+(under the very centre of the town), and the hole once more cleared
+out, a more convenient approach being cut from adjacent premises, by
+which it may still be visited.
+
+The Priory of Royston was, of course, suppressed under Henry the
+Eighth. But its church was suffered to be bought by the inhabitants of
+the town, who besought the king to spare it to them on the ground
+that, though Royston stood in five several parishes, there was "never
+a parish church within two miles." This was literally true, the
+parochial boundaries having been already long established before the
+town grew up. The five parishes were those of Melbourn, Barley,
+Bassingbourn, Reed, and Therfield. They had therefore attended the
+Priory church, and been ministered to by its monks. The place was, in
+answer to this petition, constituted a parish, and the church
+rededicated to St. John the Baptist instead of to Henry's _bête
+noire_, Thomas à Becket. But the old connection of Royston with this
+saint survives to this day in the annual Fair held in July (near the
+date of his "Translation"), which is still popularly called "Becket
+Fair."
+
+At Royston the Icknield Way used to be the boundary of
+Cambridgeshire, as at Newmarket, so that it was convenient for the
+resident magistrates to be in the Commission for both counties. Thus,
+by merely crossing the road, they could exercise their authority in
+whichever might be desired. Beyond the town, the way continues to run
+south-westwards, along the foot of the East Anglian heights, which
+here form the watershed between the basin of the Ouse and that of the
+Thames. Their northern escarpment is, at this point, still in its
+primæval condition, a steep slope of virgin turf, known as Royston
+Heath, the common property of the township. The Heath has a
+far-reaching view and delicious air, and the Royston folk do well in
+jealously guarding against any usurpation of their rights in it. That
+golf links should not exist on such a magnificent stretch of turf
+would almost be unthinkable, but even over this development many shake
+their heads as an encroachment.
+
+As we continue our way along the hedgeless road at the foot of this
+delightful common, the Great Northern Railway, from Cambridge to
+London, keeps us close company on our right. A mile or so beyond it
+rises a conspicuous line of poplar trees. These mark the village of
+Bassingbourn, one of the most interesting in the county to the
+historian. For here there is preserved in the church a whole library
+of antique books, and amongst these (in manuscript) the churchwardens'
+accounts from 1498 to 1534, kept with an accuracy which enables us to
+picture faithfully the village life of those days. We find that it was
+a period of high wages, for a labourer got threepence a day if
+boarded, and fivepence unboarded. His board then was worth a shilling
+per week. Nowadays it is reckoned at ten shillings at least, so that
+we must multiply all the items by ten to express them in current
+value. His wages were thus equivalent to twenty-five shillings per
+week, double the present rate, while artisans could command nearly
+twice as much. The times were thus abnormally prosperous, and the
+parishioners could afford to spend so lavishly in merrymaking at the
+"Church Ales" that an annual profit equivalent to nearly £50 was
+usually made on these entertainments, which corresponded to the
+Parochial Teas and concerts of the present day. These profits went
+towards the "reparacyon" of the church, and the current church
+expenses, including such heavy items as refounding the bells, at a
+cost equal to over £200, and renovating the clock and the organ.
+Further funds were raised by a great "Miracle Play" of St. George and
+the Dragon, to which the whole neighbourhood assembled.
+
+All this prosperity (founded, as always, on the high rate of wages)
+was the result of that fearful catastrophe, the Black Death, which, a
+few generations back, had all but decimated the population, and
+shattered the old social system of England, wherein the labourers were
+"villains," tied to the manor on which they were born, and bound to do
+for their lord (in lieu of rent) so many "jobs"[178] a year. A "job"
+meant 100 minutes' work, a strange subdivision of time, implying some
+fairly accurate means of measuring its flight, though we know not what
+these may have been. A Cambridgeshire "inquisition" of 1313 values
+each job at a halfpenny, so that the day's work of a "villain" was
+worth about threepence.
+
+[Footnote 178: This word is derived from the Latin _Opus_ ("work")
+which in the Manorial account books was usually written j.op. (_i.e._,
+one _Opus_).]
+
+But the demand for labour after the "Death" became so great, and so
+many of the estate owners had died, that villenage came to an end, and
+the labourers could, as now, go where they would and make the best
+wages they could get in open market.
+
+The result, after a while, was, as we have seen, a great increase in
+prosperity, testified to by the abundant Perpendicular work in almost
+every parish church in England. But the immediate effect was fearful
+distress, and a chaotic dislocation of the old feudal relationships,
+giving birth to the socialistic dreams which for a moment so vainly
+tried to materialise themselves in the anarchical outbreak which we
+call Wat Tyler's Rebellion. An example of this dislocation of ordinary
+conditions is furnished by the Papal registers, which tell us that the
+rectory of this very Bassingbourn (estimated at the equivalent of no
+less than £1,200 per year) was made over, in 1410, to the Chapel Royal
+of St. Martin's-le-Grand, London, "considering that the said chapel
+hath been ruined by the Great Storm, and its lands lie waste for lack
+of labourers through the pestilence."
+
+The "great storm" here referred to took place on St. Maur's Day
+(January 15th), 1361. Of both storm and pestilence we shall find a
+most interesting record in the church of Ashwell, the next and last
+place which we should see in this corner of the county. To reach it we
+have, indeed, to cross the border and go some half mile beyond; but
+though politically in Hertfordshire, Ashwell physically belongs to
+Cambridgeshire. For here is the source of the Cam, and such a source
+as few would dream of for the sluggish unclear stream that we see at
+Cambridge. In the midst of the village the ground sinks into a sort of
+amphitheatre, some 100 yards in length by thirty in breadth and ten in
+depth, with abrupt sides covered with brushwood and overshadowed by
+ancestral ash-trees. All round the floor of this gush forth springs
+upon springs of the brightest, most sparkling water; so copious that
+when the infant stream escapes through a breach towards the north it
+is already nearly thirty feet broad. No prettier river-source is to be
+found throughout the length and breadth of England. The ash-trees,
+however, are not, as one is apt to think at first, the origin of the
+name, but its consequence. The first syllable really embodies that
+Celtic word for water which, as Axe, Exe, Esk, and Usk, meets us in so
+many places all over Great Britain; and this syllable, at some
+far-back date, suggested the planting of ashes around the well.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell._]
+
+Not far from these bounteous springs rises the splendid tower of the
+church, springing high into the air with the same undaunted Early
+English ambition which raised the spire of Salisbury. And on its wall
+(inside) is carved, in rude and deeply incised lettering of Old
+English style, varied by some curiously Greek characteristics, the
+record already spoken of, dealing with the Black Death and the storm.
+This consists of four lines, intended for Latin elegiacs, again with a
+Greek touch, and runs thus:
+
+  M . Ct . Xpenta . miseranda . ferox . violenta .
+         M.CCC.L.
+  Supest . plebs . pessima . testis . in . fineque . vents .
+  Validus . oc . anno . maurus . in . orbe . tonat.
+          M.CCC.LXI.
+
+The opening words stand for the date:
+
+  Ct = Cter = CCC, and Xpenta = XXXXX = 50
+
+The interpretation therefore is:
+
+  1350! Miserable, wild, distracted,
+        1350!
+  The dregs of the people alone survive to witness.
+  And in the end a wind
+  Full mighty. This year St Maur thunders in the world.
+        1361.
+
+The year 1349 marked the most fatal stage of the Black Death in these
+parts. In that year, to judge by the Diocesan records, no less than
+eighty-five per cent. of the beneficed clergy were swept away, which
+implies a corresponding mortality amongst other classes. By 1350 the
+worst was over, but the full wretchedness of the situation was now
+developing itself. The plague lingered on, constantly growing milder,
+till 1361, when the great storm was supposed to have cleared the fair
+of the last remnants of infection. A like popular distich about this
+later visitation is quoted by Adam of Murimuth:
+
+  C ter erant mille decies sex unus, et ille,
+  Luce tua Maure, vehemens fuit impetus auræ.
+  Ecce flat hoc anno Maurus in orbe tonans.
+
+That is, in English:
+
+  There were 300 + 1000 + 60 + 1 and that
+  Mighty blast of wind was on thy day, Maurus.
+  Lo! in this year bloweth Maurus thundering in the world.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell Church from the N.W._]
+
+St. Maur was a Gallican saint of the sixth century who was the first
+to introduce monasticism into France. There are several other
+interesting _graffiti_ on the same wall as the above, one of them
+representing old St. Paul's with its lofty steeple, the highest in the
+world (510 feet), and the famous Rose Window of the transept which
+Chaucer mentions in his Canterbury Tales.
+
+Another, and perhaps prettier, way of reaching Ashwell from Cambridge
+is by taking the road that runs along the Backs, and following it out
+of the town in its course to the south-west. Its local designation is
+the Barton Road, but to antiquarians it has been known, since the
+seventeenth century, as the Akeman Street. It was at that period that
+the accepted identification of our Roman roads came into being, mainly
+through the fearless erudition of Gale. Their names (except that of
+the Via Devana) are as old at least as the Norman Conquest; but, save
+only in the case of the Watling Street, the main line of which has
+never been disputed, the connection between any given name and any
+given road has been matter for the wildest conjecture. Thus, Geoffrey
+of Monmouth, writing in the eleventh century, makes the Ermine Street
+(which we now, with strong reason, identify with the Old North Road
+from London to York) run from St. David's to Southampton! Our Akeman
+Street is supposed to connect Wells on the Wash with Aust on the
+Severn, passing on its way through Bath (the Ake-man-chester of the
+Anglo-Saxons, _i.e._, "the stone stronghold of Aquæ," Aquæ being the
+Roman name for Bath). But a lot of this is mere conjecture. The
+"Barton Road," however, is undoubtedly on the line of a Roman road.
+
+In spite of its name, it does not pass through the village of Barton.
+Indeed, like the other roads leading westwards from Cambridge, it
+curiously avoids the villages on its line, or rather (for the road is
+older than they) the villages have curiously avoided being directly
+upon it, though they lie thick on either side. Possibly the first
+Anglo-Saxon settlers may have had in this district some superstitious
+dread of a deserted Roman road, such as they certainly entertained at
+first for the deserted Roman towns, which they did not occupy for many
+a year (as at Cambridge), though they located their hamlets all round
+them.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell Church._]
+
+But though the Akeman Street does not actually take us through
+Barton village, it does lead us past the rare object of interest to be
+found connected with the place, the ancient Archery Butts of the
+parish. These are to be seen just opposite the sign-post which points
+to Haslingfield, and are worth a pause to contemplate, for they give a
+most impressive idea of what archery meant to our forefathers. Every
+parish, it must be remembered, was bound by law in mediæval times to
+have such a stretch of ground, and every yeoman was bound to constant
+practice upon it. And what practice! These "butts" are a stretch of
+greensward, some hundred yards across, and in length no less than
+three furlongs (660 yards). It looks an almost incredible distance for
+a bowman, but it was the standard, so far as we can judge by the very
+few butts of which the memory still survives. The length of the short
+street in South London, still called Newington Butts, is nearly the
+same.
+
+Here, then, we can picture the sturdy archers of Plantagenet days
+stretching themselves; their bows, not the toys of the modern
+toxophilite with their thirty or forty pounds of pull, but of twice
+the power (eighty lb. being a common pull in those times), and their
+"cloth-yard" arrows, over three feet long, whistling to a target not
+planted forty or fifty yards away, but twelve times the distance--the
+whole length of these butts. Indeed, for anything under two furlongs
+light arrows were not allowed, and the heavy regulation war arrow had
+to be used. Each man was taught, as Bishop Latimer tells us in
+recording his own youthful training, to draw his bow not by mere
+strength, but by sleight of hand, "to lay the weight of his body into
+the bow," and to draw the bowstring not to his breast, like other
+nations, but to his ear. Small wonder that with eye and sinews so
+trained our English archers became the wonder and the dread of Europe,
+or that their shafts decided so many a battlefield--Cressy, Poictiers,
+Agincourt, Flodden.
+
+A mile further we cross the Bourn Brook, a tiny tributary which joins
+the Cam near Grantchester, hard by a small station on the Cambridge
+branch of the London and North Western Railway, called Lord's Bridge,
+from the Lord Hardwicke who, in the beginning of the nineteenth
+century, substituted a bridge for the earlier ford here. To our right
+we see, across the fields, the church tower of Comberton; where, on
+the little village green, can still be seen the worn remains of a
+turf-built "maze," first traced out no one knows when, but certainly
+not later than the sixteenth century. Various mystical reasons are
+conjectured for the origin of these mazes, of which a fair number
+still exist in England (especially in the Eastern counties), while
+many more are known to have been destroyed by the Puritans of the
+seventeenth century as relics of heathen superstition. Such, indeed,
+they probably are. Mr. Walter Johnson, in his "Folk Memory," considers
+them to be exceedingly primitive, begun in connection with "ceremonial
+dances of painted heathen round a prehistoric camp fire." This
+Comberton maze is fifty feet in diameter, while the tracks are two
+feet in width, divided by slight banks of turf, once, it would seem,
+about a foot in height, but now much worn down.
+
+The next turn (to the left) leads to Harlton, a pretty, shady village,
+with a fine Perpendicular church, having a stone rood screen, which is
+rare, and, what is yet rarer, a still surviving stone reredos of the
+fifteenth century, with a central recess, once closed with a door, and
+evidently intended as a "Tabernacle" for the Reservation of the
+Blessed Sacrament. The six niches on either side of this recess were
+as evidently meant for images of the twelve Apostles.
+
+Harlton lies close under White Hill, that chalk spur which we have
+already met at Haslingfield.[179] Here, too, there is a "clunch-pit"
+in the hill-side, from which the material for the church was probably
+dug. It is now disused, except for occasional marling purposes, and
+some unknown benefactor has planted its slopes with larches and
+laburnums, forming a most fascinating little dell, the charms of which
+are free to all.
+
+[Footnote 179: See p. 236.]
+
+Our road now climbs the hill, which it crosses through a cutting, with
+a fine view from the summit in either direction. In the little clump
+of trees just to the west of the road there stood, till the 'seventies
+of the nineteenth century, Orwell Maypole, the last of its class to
+survive in these parts. In mediæval times every village had its
+maypole, round which the lasses and lads hied them to dance on May
+Day. But, like the mazes, they were called (and actually were)
+remnants of heathenism, and, as such, were destroyed wholesale in the
+years of Puritan ascendancy. So it befell with the great maypole which
+gave name to the church of St. Andrew _Under-shaft_ in the City of
+London. It was hewn down, and, as it lay along the street, sawn in
+pieces, each householder taking for firewood the length that lay
+opposite his own door. The Restoration set a certain number up again,
+but the continuity of their use had been broken, and its revival (as
+May Day was connected with no special Festival of the Church, like
+Easter and Christmas, which were also originally heathen feasts)
+became a merely artificial reaction, bound to dwindle away. So it
+befell that Orwell Maypole, after being disused for generations,
+finally perished by natural decay. It stood almost exactly upon the
+meridian of Greenwich, so that it was a valuable and far-seen
+landmark.
+
+Orwell itself lies, as usual, just off the road, on the southern slope
+of the hill. Half a century ago it was the prettiest of villages, with
+its eponymous "well," shaded by magnificent trees, gushing from the
+hill-side, in the midst of a prehistoric earthwork, just below the
+noble church. But, about 1870, the earthwork, unhappily, was found to
+contain "coprolites" (worth probably about £100 after the expenses of
+getting them had been paid). For this paltry sum the whole place was
+destroyed. Well, trees, earthwork, all are now gone; only the church
+is left, perched on its slope high above the village street. It has a
+grand decorated chancel, the roof of which is covered with heraldic
+devices, and contains an interesting epitaph in Latin verse to one of
+the seventeenth century rectors of the parish, beginning:
+
+  Pastor eram dum pastor eram tunc fistula dulcis
+  Tunc tuba qua torvum sprevit ovile lupum.
+
+  ("I _was_ a Pastor, while a Pastor I;
+    Sweet then my pipe; loud then my trumpet-call,
+    Whereat my flock defied the wolf so grim.")
+
+In the south aisle is preserved a small crucifix of stone, dating from
+the thirteenth century. It had been built into the wall to save it
+from destruction at the Reformation, and was not discovered for three
+hundred years.
+
+About a mile further we find a village along the road itself, the
+village of Wimpole. But we notice that the houses are all modern, and
+that no church is to be seen amongst them. A church there is belonging
+to them, but it stands a mile to the west, where the village also
+stood till towards the close of the eighteenth century. At that time
+the mansion and park of Wimpole Hall were being enlarged to their
+present magnificence by Philip, the first Earl of Hardwicke (the
+builder of Lord's Bridge). Plebeian cottages were not to be tolerated
+"betwixt the wind and his nobility," so he pulled down the entire
+village and planted it, where it now is, along the Akeman Street. The
+church, which could not well be moved, he faced with red brick to
+match his new-built stables, close to which it is situated.
+
+[Illustration: _Great Eversden._]
+
+Wimpole Hall has passed through various hands. The central portion was
+built, in 1632, by Sir Thomas Chicheley, the wings were added a
+century later by the Earl of Oxford, from whom it came to the
+Hardwicke family. It is now the seat of Viscount Clifden. The house is
+on a splendid scale, and the grounds on a scale yet more splendid,
+with a double avenue of elms, three miles long, running to the south.
+Here Queen Victoria stayed when visiting Cambridgeshire shortly after
+her marriage, and won all hearts by her graciousness. It is still
+remembered how when, by some blunder, the attendant in charge of her
+jewels was not forthcoming, she came down to the ball-room with a
+simple wreath of roses in her hair, "and not all the jewels in the
+world could have made her look so queenly."
+
+There is, of course, a public road leading from Wimpole village to the
+church, which is also accessible from the west, where the great iron
+gates of the park are usually unbarred at the request of respectable
+visitors. These gates open upon the Ermine Street, which the Akeman
+Street crosses a mile beyond New Wimpole, after also crossing the
+great avenue. Close by them is another transplanted village,
+Arrington, whose church stands on the hill half a mile westward. The
+traffic of the old North Road is responsible for this move, and also
+for the delightful old coaching inn here, the Hardwicke Arms, with its
+old-fashioned rooms and long range of stables.
+
+At the junction our road ceases. To continue our westward course we
+must go along the Ermine Street for half a mile, either northward or
+southward, where we shall find lanes, either of which will carry us
+on. The northern lane here will take us along the line of the hill, to
+Tadlow, Wrestlingworth, Potton, and, finally, Bedford, and will enable
+us, if we will, to explore the three Hadleys (East Hadley, Hadley St.
+George, and Cockayne Hadley), of which the two last have fine halls
+and parks. The southern, however, is the preferable route. It follows
+the course of the infant Cam, crossed by a bridge on the Ermine
+Street, and brings us first to the wholly obliterated Shingay, which,
+though once the most important parish hereabouts, and still giving its
+name to the Rural Deanery, has absolutely ceased to exist, church and
+all; its parishioners being affiliated to the neighbouring village of
+Wendy.
+
+The cause of this ruin was the suppression, at the Reformation, of the
+institution which was literally the life of Shingay, a House of the
+Crusading Order of St. John of Jerusalem, or, as they were commonly
+called, the Knights Hospitallers. This title was given them because,
+at their original foundation, they dwelt in a Hospital (or house for
+the hospitable entertainment of pilgrims) at Jerusalem. We now connect
+this name only with places where the sick are ministered to; but it
+originally connoted far wider ministrations, and, indeed, rather
+corresponded to the other form in which the word has survived into our
+present speech--hotel. We read it on a leaden seal found here at
+Wendy, in 1876, which bears on one side a conventional representation
+of the Shrine of the Holy Sepulchre, surrounded by the legend
+IHERVSALEM, HOSPITALIS. On the other is the name of Guarin de
+Montaigu, who, from 1232 to 1269, was Grand Master of the Order.
+
+The Hospitallers, as readers of "Ivanhoe" know, were, like the
+Templars, a military Order, who, for over six centuries, fought
+unceasingly for Christendom. First at Jerusalem, then at Rhodes, then
+at Malta, they held out with never-failing devotion against the
+on-sweeping torrent of Mahommedan aggression; and it is scarcely too
+much to say that but for their eight-pointed cross Christianity might
+well have been crushed throughout Europe. Not till the nineteenth
+century was their last stronghold, Malta, reft from them by Napoleon,
+to pass finally under the flag of England. The Order still survives,
+but the modern sodality calling itself by the same name, connected
+with what we now call hospital work, was set up in quite recent days.
+
+Preceptories of the Order, as their branch Houses were called, were
+found in every land, and not least in England, where they were so much
+beloved that, when the rival Order of the Temple was suppressed, in
+the fourteenth century, its property was made over to them. Here, at
+Shingay, their establishment was a small one consisting of the
+preceptor, two knights, and three priests, one of whom acted as Vicar
+of Wendy. The gross income of the House was, in 1332 (as we know from
+a Report still existing in the Record Office at Malta), £187 12s. 8d.,
+equivalent to about £3,500 at the present value of money. Of this the
+land (about 1,000 acres) brought in £71; the mills, houses, etc., £4
+13s. 4d.; the work of the villains £38 10s. 0d.; and the Rectories of
+Wendy and Sawston, which formed part of their endowment, £66 13s. 4d.
+The rest was derived from the fees paid by visitors; for, by the rule
+of the Order, the doors of the House were open to all comers. The
+expenses of the year amounted to less than half the income, for they
+lived frugally, their keep only coming to about £3 a week (in present
+value) for the six inmates, besides servants and guests. Men servants
+were paid at the rate of £12 a year (besides their keep), and each
+knight was allowed the equivalent of £25 a year for clothing and
+pocket-money. Thus a large sum was available for the war-chest of the
+Order, and was annually forwarded to the headquarters at Jerusalem or
+Rhodes.
+
+One of their sources of income was a special privilege which is still
+remembered in local tradition. Their House (like those of the
+Templars) was exempt from every ban, even that of the Pope himself.
+Thus, in the dismal days of King John, when England was placed under
+an Interdict, when no rites of religion could be observed, and even
+burial of the dead was forbidden, so that "you might see human bodies
+lying everywhere about the fields unsepultured," Shingay shone out as
+the one spot in the whole district where the consolations of religion
+were still attainable. Here Mass continued to be said, here the
+departed could still be laid in hallowed earth. And hither they were
+brought from all sides. And thus it is that peasants may be found who
+still tell how, at some far off, unknown period, those who, for some
+forgotten, inexplicable reason, might not be buried like Christians in
+their own churchyard, were spirited away by night in a "fairy-cart" to
+Shingay, there to be committed in peace to the ground. This
+"fairy-cart" is an echo of the word _feretorium_ (or bier on wheels),
+in which the conveyance was actually effected.
+
+[Illustration: _Rood Screen, Guilden Morden Church._]
+
+Not a building of any kind now exists at Shingay, and very few at the
+adjoining Wendy, where, at every turn, we are greeted by a wealth of
+fresh-springing waters, derived from the artesian wells of the old
+coprolite diggings. The height in which the water in these wells rises
+is strangely variable. They are always made on the same system; an
+ordinary well being dug through the upper strata till the impervious
+gault is reached, which may be any distance from six to sixty feet
+below the surface. A four-inch bore is then made through the gault by
+means of a sort of Brobdingnagian cheese-taster, four or five feet
+long, screwed to an iron handle three times that length. Again and
+again the taster is brought up, full of gault, and its contents or
+"core" thrown aside. As the bore gets deeper more irons are added,
+till the water-bearing greensand or "rock" is attained, usually in the
+second hundred feet of the bore. The taster is then removed and a
+"chisel" substituted for "striking the rock," _i.e._, punching a hole
+by lifting the entire length of irons a few feet and letting it fall.
+By and by up comes the water, quite suddenly for the most part,
+gushing from the bore and filling the well till it finds its level.
+This, as we have said, is curiously different in different spots; in
+some it does not reach the surface, and has to be pumped up; in
+others, as here at Wendy, it will supply a fountain eight or ten feet
+in height. One of these picturesquely gushes out from the top of an
+old wooden gate-post, up which some artistically-minded
+coprolite-digger has engineered its course. It is almost medicinal in
+the quantity of iron with which it is impregnated, but delicious to
+drink, and the softest possible.
+
+This gate-post is beside the lane leading on Guilden Morden, the last
+village before we once more reach Ashwell, and itself standing on an
+outlying mound of the Ashwell chalk. Round this elevation the Cam
+takes a wide sweep. We may record that Wendy is the highest point
+along its course which navigation has ever attained. The breadth at
+Ashwell at once suggests to visitors that a canoe could reach the
+spot, and many an attempt has been made by ambitious undergraduates.
+But the upper reaches are so choked up with reeds and weeds and rushes
+and bushes that no one has ever penetrated further than this spot,
+some four miles, by water-way, below the source.
+
+Guilden Morden has a far-seen church, a conspicuous object from White
+Hill, over Barrington, twelve miles away. It is a fine building, with
+an unusually spacious tower of Northamptonshire stone, and a Saxon
+font. But it is chiefly interesting for the remarkable development of
+the fourteenth century rood-screen, which on either side expands into
+a small "parclose" or pew, enclosed to the height of twelve feet by
+rich decorated tracery, ornately painted (the original pattern having
+survived sufficiently to be restored). On the west panel of the
+northern parclose may be discerned the figures of St. Erconwald and
+St. Edmund, both members of the royal line of East Anglia. The former
+was a brother of St. Etheldreda, the foundress of Ely, and became a
+much-beloved Bishop of London in the seventh century. The latter was
+the hero king martyred by the Danes a century later, the chosen friend
+of our great Alfred, of whom so lovely a picture has been left us by
+the old chroniclers:--
+
+     "From his earliest years the truest of Christians, he showed
+     himself of such promise that, by the unanimous will of all his
+     folk, he was not so much chosen as rushed into the kingship over
+     them. For his very look was worthy of this high estate; so bright
+     was it with the calm beauty of holiness and of a conscience like
+     the sea at rest. Kind was he of speech and courteous to all; the
+     grace of Humility came natural to him; and amongst his comrades
+     he kept his place as their Lord with wondrous meekness and no
+     touch of pride. For already the Saint bare in his face that which
+     he was afterwards, by God's will, to show forth; seeing that as a
+     boy he had pressed with all his might into the Way of
+     Righteousness, which, as God's pity foreknew, would end for him
+     in the Way of Martyrdom.... And walking in the King's Highway, he
+     turned aside neither to the right hand, by being puffed up with
+     his own merits, nor to the left, by yielding to the faults of
+     human weakness. To the needy was he a cheerful giver, to the
+     widows and orphans the kindest of Patrons; ever keeping before
+     his eyes the saying of the Wise Man: "Behold they have made thee
+     Prince; but be thou among them as one of themselves."[180]
+
+[Footnote 180: Chronicle of St. Neots.]
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Steeple Morden._]
+
+These parcloses seem to have been made to serve as confessional boxes,
+devices which were very rare in England before the Reformation.
+"Shrift," of course, was universal; but neither priest nor penitent
+were shut from view. The former sat in a chair, usually at the altar
+rail, while the latter knelt beside and facing him. In these parcloses
+the priest's head as he sat on the seat would be visible to those in
+the church, but the kneeling penitent would be hidden. That such was
+the purpose here would appear from the lines in old English lettering
+painted upon their sides:--
+
+  Ad . mortem . duram . Jhesu . de . me . cape . curam .
+  Vitam . venturam . post . mortem . redde . securam .
+  Fac . me . confessum . rogo . te . Deus . ante . recessum .
+  Et . post . decessum . cælo. mihi . dirige . gressum .
+
+  "Jesu, in Death's dark vale, be Thou my stay,
+  Make safe my Life to Come from every foe,
+  Grant me Confession, Lord, ere hence I go,
+  And then to Heaven do thou make straight my way."
+
+From Guilden Morden a lane leads straight to Ashwell, leaving on the
+left Steeple Morden (which lost its steeple in the great storm of
+1703), and Littlington, the cradle of Cambridgeshire Nonconformity, of
+which hereafter. Here the old parish Lock-up survives; a dismal den of
+red brick, some ten feet square, with iron-clenched door and
+closely-barred window.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+     Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge
+     Discoveries.--Coton.--Madingley.--Hardwick.--Toft, St.
+     Hubert.--Childerley, Charles
+     I.--Knapwell.--Bourn.--Caxton--Eltisley, St. Pandiana,
+     Storm.--St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred.--Paxton
+     Hill.--Godmanchester, Port Meadow.--Huntingdon, Cromwell's
+     Penance.--The Hemingfords.--St.
+     Ives.--Holywell.--Overcote.--Earith, the Bedford Rivers,
+     "Parallax."
+
+
+Due westwards from Cambridge, turning leftwards out of the Via Devana
+just beyond Magdalene College, runs what used to be the old coaching
+road to Oxford. Till quite recently the milestones along it gave the
+distance to that city, between which and Cambridge there was of old a
+good deal of traffic, for the Universities were more closely connected
+then than even now. Popularly this road was called the _Ad eundem_
+road, a nickname referring to the not so long by-gone privilege by
+which any graduate of either place might be admitted to the same
+degree (_ad eundem gradum_) in the sister University simply on payment
+of the fees and without any further examination. It is now spoken of
+as the Madingley Road, from the first village along its course, or the
+St. Neots Road, from the first town to which it leads. Thence it went
+on to Oxford by way of Bedford, Buckingham, and Bicester.
+
+A short two miles along this road brings us to the porticoed front and
+white domes of the University Observatory, erected in 1822. More than
+a century earlier its embryo had been set up on the summit of the
+Great Gate Tower at Trinity College, for the benefit of Sir Isaac
+Newton; but this seems to have been little used after the death of
+that greatest of scientists. Even after the new Observatory was set up
+a certain lack of keenness pervaded its work. Thus it came about that
+Cambridge and England lost the glory of the discovery of Neptune, the
+most distant planet of our Solar System.
+
+For more than a decade the irregularities in the motion of Uranus
+(itself not long discovered) had suggested to astronomers that there
+must be another planet exterior to it, when, in 1841, John Couch
+Adams, then only an undergraduate of St. John's College, set himself
+to grapple with the arduous task of finding by analytical computation
+the orbit and place of this supposititious body. So stupendous were
+the difficulties that when, after four years of concentrated effort,
+he submitted his results to the Astronomer Royal, begging that the
+planet might be looked for in a certain spot (where we now know that
+it actually was visible at the time), his suggestion received very
+incredulous acceptance. Was it likely that a mere youth should have
+solved this gigantic problem?
+
+That very autumn of 1845 another young man, quite independently,
+devoted himself to the same quest, the brilliant French mathematician
+Leverrier. He, in the following summer, published the results he had
+so far attained. Adams had never published; but these new results so
+strikingly agreed with his that the Astronomer Royal's incredulity
+gave way, and he desired that search should be made with the great
+equatorial telescope, then newly erected at Cambridge through the
+generosity of the Duke of Northumberland.
+
+His injunctions were carried out; but the lack of a trustworthy star
+map made the work long. And it was made longer by lack of promptitude.
+The minute celestial object (only equal to a star of the eighth
+magnitude) had been actually seen, but further observations were
+needed to establish the fact that it was indeed a planet moving
+amongst the stars around it. And these observations were delayed at
+the crucial point by the observers adjourning for a cup of tea! When
+they returned the sky had clouded over and no favourable night
+occurred for many evenings after. Meanwhile Leverrier had called in
+the aid of the Berlin Observatory; where there did exist a good star
+map, and also the eagerness so sadly lacking here at Cambridge. The
+very day his letter was received (23rd September, 1846), the great
+Berlin telescope was directed to the spot which he indicated,--and
+there was the planet.
+
+The story goes that when the tidings of this overthrow of hope
+reached Cambridge, and were reported to the Fellows of Trinity as they
+sat at dinner in their Hall, it was as if a thunderbolt had fallen
+amongst them:
+
+  "And all talk died, as in a grove all song
+   Beneath the shadow of some bird of prey;
+   Then a long silence came upon the Hall,"
+
+broken at last by Adam Sedgwick, the venerable Professor of Geology,
+who solemnly raised his clenched fist and brought it down upon the
+High Table, not with violence but with a concentrated tension of
+indignation, saying slowly, with an equal solemnity: "Confound their
+lymphatic souls."[181] As for the Observatory, the blow thoroughly
+roused it up; and ever since it has remained, both in material and
+moral equipment, amongst the foremost of the great Observatories of
+the world, where solid and useful work is continuously being done,
+while up-to-date instruments, methods, and records are never to seek.
+On one evening of each week during term time any member of the
+University may see the practical working of the place, and bring
+friends with him.
+
+[Footnote 181: The discovery of Neptune is by no means the only
+discovery the honour of which has been lost to Cambridge through that
+scientific temper of mind which is loth to publish investigations at
+an early stage of their verification. Months before Marconi introduced
+wireless telegraphy to the public it had been practised here by
+Professors Rutherford and Sir J. J. Thomson; the first serious
+messages being exchanged, over a distance of two miles, between the
+Cavendish Laboratory and the Observatory. At the same Laboratory the
+Röntgen rays were being investigated ere yet Röntgen became a
+household word. And long years before Bunsen and Kirchoff (in 1859)
+published the true explanation of Fraunhofer's dark lines in the solar
+spectrum, that explanation had been given to his pupils by yet another
+Cambridge Professor, Sir George Gabriel Stokes. Such indifference to
+mere fame reminds us of the old saying that an Oxford man looks as if
+all the world belonged to him, a Cambridge man as if he did not care
+whom it belonged to.]
+
+A mile further we reach the foot of the chalk slope which bounds the
+Cam valley. At this point lanes diverge to the right and left. The
+latter almost immediately brings us to Coton, a tiny village with a
+tiny, but most picturesque, fourteenth century church, having a
+(restored) Norman chancel, a pretty spire, and a yet prettier south
+doorway. There is, too, a massive rood screen, and a curious
+"palimpsest" Table of Commandments, the original sixteenth century
+lettering showing beneath repainted characters of the seventeenth
+century. Altogether the place is well worth the slight divergence
+needed to visit it, more especially as the lane between it and our
+road gives a view of Cambridge almost comparable to the prospect of
+
+  "That sweet City, with her dreaming spires"
+
+which the Cumnor slopes (as Matthew Arnold sings) provide for
+Oxonians. Coton can also be reached from Cambridge by a delightful
+field path beneath overhanging oaks, which runs straight from Garret
+Hostel Bridge. Coton spire (as has been already mentioned) is the
+"objective" of the Trinity avenue, though the view has long been
+closed out by the growth of the branches.
+
+The other lane, to the right, which leads to Madingley, is also worth
+traversing. From its hedgeless "switch-back" terraces we look
+northwards across the valley, not of the Cam but of the Ouse, bounded
+by the uplands of the island of Ely, ten miles away at the nearest
+point, and nearly twice as far where the ridge is crowned by the dim
+and distant towers of the cathedral. Conspicuous in the nearer
+distance is the red-brick mass of the Ladies' College at Girton, some
+three miles away from us. Madingley, to which half a mile or so of
+this prospect leads us, is a little place of steep pitches and
+tree-shaded lanes, very different from the usual Cambridgeshire
+village, but with a special charm of its own. It has a pretty little
+church nestling beneath a fine Elizabethan hall of red-brick. Both
+church and hall contain portions of the spoil of the church of St.
+Etheldreda, which once stood at Histon and was pulled down by Mr.
+Justice Hinde, the first builder of Madingley Hall, to whom the sacred
+edifice was given by Henry the Eighth. Its Norman font is now in
+Madingley Church, while part of its roof is still to be seen in the
+Hall.
+
+At Madingley Hall King Edward the Seventh was quartered while an
+undergraduate of Trinity College. Tradition asserts that it once
+sheltered another monarch, the ill-fated Charles the First, in a
+momentary attempt to escape from the clutches of the rebel army during
+his enforced residence at the neighbouring Hall of Childerley, as will
+be narrated in connection with that place. The Hall has, since that
+date, passed from one family to another, and is now the seat of
+Colonel Harding, D.C.L.
+
+[Illustration: _Coton._]
+
+Madingley is a centre of pretty lanes. Besides that already spoken
+of, another, an avenue of greenery, leads northwards to the Via
+Devana, another westwards to the village of Dry Drayton, and another
+up the hill southwards, to rejoin our St. Neots road on the summit of
+the ridge. Here we are 220 feet above the sea, overlooking the valley
+of the Ouse to the north and to the south that of the Cam, or, rather,
+of its tributary the Bourn Brook. The road keeps the highest ground,
+almost on the level, while a succession of lanes to the right and left
+lead down to the villages on either slope.
+
+First comes a southward turn to Hardwick, the church of which is so
+conspicuous an object in the view from the roof of King's College
+Chapel. Here, in 1644, "Mr. Mapletoft, parson thereof, with a wife and
+seven children, had these articles exhibited against him, viz., that
+he refused to read anything from the Parliament, but read many things
+from the King at Oxford with great boldness; that he prayeth not for
+the Parliament nor hath found them any arms at all; that he is a man
+devoted to many superstitious ceremonies, and commonly useth
+altar-worship, east-worship, and dropping-worship,[182] and after his
+sermon came out of the pulpit into the chancel and there made an end
+of his will-worship." Whereupon, by the Earl of Manchester's warrant,
+he was promptly ejected and sequestrated. The previous year the church
+had been purified by Dowsing, who notes with disgust that for dealing
+with "ten superstitious pictures and a cross" he was here paid only
+3s. 2d. instead of the 6s. 8d., which was his regular fee.
+
+[Footnote 182: _I.e._ genuflecting.]
+
+The great iconoclast has the same grievance in the adjoining village
+of Toft, where he got "only 6s. 8d." for a specially heavy
+"purification" of the church, involving the destruction of
+"twenty-seven superstitious pictures in the windows, ten others in
+stone, three inscriptions, _Pray for the souls_, divers _Orate pro
+animabuses_ [sic] in the windows, and a bell _Ora pro anima Sancta
+Katharina_." The "pictures in stone" were doubtless the alabaster
+images of the reredos, fragments of which are still preserved in the
+church, exquisite in modelling and colour. The most noticeable is a
+headless figure of St. Hubert, the mighty hunter of legend, who was
+converted by meeting a white hart with golden horns (supposed to be an
+emblem of Christ), and received from St. Peter a key wherewith to cure
+hydrophobia. The key is here in his hand, with a dog beneath it, and
+the golden-horned hart couched by his side.
+
+Just before we reach the seventh milestone from Cambridge another
+south-running lane diverges to Caldecote, with its retired little fane
+on the hill-side over the Bourn, a very oasis of devotional peace and
+quietude. Confronting it across the stream is the steeple of Kingston,
+where there is a fine fourteenth century fresco in the north aisle,
+and a delicious little niche in the western wall of the tower,
+outside.
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Toft._]
+
+At the point where this lane leaves the road, another, looking like a
+mere farm road, turns off northwards. This leads to Childerley Hall,
+now a farm house, but in 1647 of sufficient consequence to serve as a
+sleeping place for Royalty. Hither King Charles the First was brought
+by his captors, when carried off by Cornet Joyce from Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, as has been already narrated.[183] He was not
+altogether an unwilling captive, for both he and the Army hoped to
+arrive at some mutual accommodation which would make both independent
+of that Parliamentary control of which both were heartily wearied.
+
+[Footnote 183: See p. 182.]
+
+He was treated, accordingly, with the utmost respect; and during his
+stay at Childerley Hall[184] (from Saturday, June 5, to Tuesday, June
+8), the students of Cambridge "flocked apace" to pay their homage to
+him. "He is exceedingly cheerful," writes a contemporary scribe,[185]
+"shows himself to all, and commands that no scholler be debarred from
+kissing his hand, for which honour they return humble thanks and
+_Vivat Rex_; and there the Sophs are in their gowns and caps as if no
+further than Barnwell." Nay, even the great chiefs of the army, the
+men who at Marston and Naseby had faced and conquered him, Fairfax,
+Ireton, and Whalley, and Cromwell himself, came hither to join in this
+hand-kissing, and, one after another, to be astonished at the ability
+and graciousness which their distressed Sovereign showed in the
+private interview granted to each in turn.
+
+[Footnote 184: Childerley was then the seat of the Cutts family.]
+
+[Footnote 185: Quoted in _East Anglia and the Civil War_ by Mr.
+Kingston.]
+
+But, if local tradition is to be trusted, beneath all this gallant
+show of gracious acquiescence in the inevitable, there lurked in the
+King's heart a deep conviction that the hope on which it was founded
+was forlorn indeed. For this tradition tells of a truly desperate dash
+for freedom, the success of which was all but impossible. It has been
+constantly handed down at Madingley Hall that on one of these June
+midnights a white figure knocked at the door, and a subdued voice
+asked for "Jack" (Sir John Cotton, a noted loyalist, whose seat the
+Hall was at that time). He came, and found this mysterious visitor
+none other than the King himself, disguised in a peasant's smock, and
+imploring concealment till he could escape from the country. By a
+secret stair, traces of which still exist, he was conducted to a
+hiding place in the roof. But it was too late; his flight had been
+discovered, and the pursuing troopers were already out in search of
+him. Madingley Hall would, of course, be amongst the very first places
+to be suspected of harbouring him, and the wild venture ended in
+despair. All was hushed up; for both he and his captors wished to keep
+up the fiction that he was with them willingly.
+
+But they kept a tight grip upon him, and, when he left Childerley that
+Tuesday morning, would not allow him to ride on to his state prison
+at Newmarket through Cambridge (where the streets were being decked in
+his honour with "whole rose-bushes and strewn with rushes and herbs"),
+lest these demonstrations should kindle too ardent a flame of loyalty.
+He was accordingly carried round by way of Grantchester and
+Trumpington. Since that time Childerley Hall has been rebuilt, but the
+room in which the King slept is still to be seen. And hard by the Hall
+there still stands the unpretentious little red-brick chapel (now a
+barn) in which he worshipped on that memorable Sunday.
+
+A mile further along the road, lanes again branch off north and south.
+The northern leads to the secluded hamlet of Knapwell, where a spring
+of ferruginous waters, held of old to be wonder-working, still
+justifies its ancient name of the Red Well. The southern brings us to
+Bourn, where the Bourn brook rises. On the slope above the stream
+stands the beautiful cruciform church, of late Norman and Early
+English architecture; the arches which open from the tower into the
+nave and the aisles being particularly noticeable. Bourn Hall is a
+fine Elizabethan mansion, the seat of J. Briscoe, Esq., and is the
+modern representative of a castle (the moat of which still exists)
+erected here by Picot, Sheriff of Cambridgeshire under William the
+Conqueror, and the scene of hard fighting in the Barons' War, when it
+belonged to the Peverells.
+
+Eleven miles from Cambridge we cross the Ermine Street, a junction
+sufficiently important to have been selected by the wisdom of our
+ancestors as the site of a gibbet; the object being that as many as
+possible should see the gruesome spectacle of malefactors hanging in
+chains, and thus, if evilly disposed, take warning, or, if well
+disposed, be encouraged by this visible vindication of the Law's
+majesty. The gibbet has been gone for a century and more; but till
+quite lately the sign-post here directed the traveller simply TO
+LONDON and TO YORK on either hand, reminding us that this was the old
+North Road.
+
+A mile along it, towards London, stands the little town of Caxton,
+from which the gibbet derived its name. A prosperous place in the old
+coaching days (as the size of its inns still testifies), it is now a
+mere village with 450 inhabitants. But it continues to boast itself a
+town. As the nearest point on the North Road to Cambridge, it was an
+important junction. The historian, Carter, writing in 1753, mentions
+that a mail was carried twice a week (on horseback) between Caxton and
+Cambridge; the only mail connection our University town then had,
+except with London and Bury St. Edmunds! We read also that, in the
+Jacobite rising of 1745, when it was seriously expected that the
+Stuart forces, after their wonderful success in reaching Derby, would
+march on to London, many Cambridge students, who cared little about
+the issue, secured windows at Caxton "to see the Scots pass by."
+
+Sixty years before this another gleam of interest lights up the name
+of Caxton. In 1686 the Bishop, Francis Turner (one of the famous Seven
+prosecuted by James the Second and afterwards deprived by William the
+Third as a non-juror), made a strenuous effort to get Mattins and
+Evensong said daily, according to the Rubric, throughout his Diocese.
+The following characteristic letter addressed by him to the Vicar of
+Caxton was discovered in 1908 amongst the church muniments:
+
+                                                             Ely,
+                                                   _Sept. 11th, 1686._
+
+     GOOD BROTHER,
+
+     The good character I have received concerning you ... has given
+     me a particular confidence in yr. care to putt the directions of
+     my printed letter in practice. Yr. parish, if it be not so
+     numerous as I suppos'd, yet lyes on the Great Northern Roade; it
+     would be for our Churches Honor and for the consolation of well
+     dispos'd travellers to find Daily Prayers in yr. Church. I press
+     them all over the Diocese where it is practicable, but at Caxton
+     I wd. have them by all means, tho' you begin with a congregation
+     of but a widdow or two. Have them if you please at 6 or 7 in the
+     morning if that will be best for passengers. My good friend you
+     have been bredd in a camp to toyle and hardship. I know the
+     putting my orders in execution, that is the making of so many
+     careless people Christian indeed, will cost you a great deale of
+     labour. But do not grudge it; you are sure of as great a Reward
+     in Heaven; and in good time you may find your account by it
+     here.... In the mean time do your Business with all your might,
+     and sett into it presently, before the Visitation. By which you
+     will more than a little oblige, Sir,
+
+     Yr. affect. friend and Brother,
+                                                            FRAN. ELY.
+
+     MR. SAY OF CAXTON.
+
+     P.S.--If you have no little Schoole in your town I shall wonder,
+     and you ought to procure one. If there bee one, then you need not
+     want a congregation for both morning and evening prayers.
+
+After crossing the Ermine Street we come to Eltisley, where there is a
+pretty Village Green and a good village inn; and the church, though
+small, has some fine Early English work. It is dedicated to St. John
+the Baptist and St. Pandiana (or Pandionia), an obscure personage,
+said by Leland to have been a Scottish[186] princess, who found in
+this remote spot a refuge from the importunities of her suitors, and
+was here buried by the side of a spring still known as St. Pandiana's
+Well. Her nunnery perished after the Conquest, and in the fourteenth
+century her body was translated into the church, along with that of
+the yet more obscure St. Wendreda,[187] a purely Cambridgeshire saint,
+whose name is also connected with the church of March, and with a
+"well" near Newmarket.
+
+[Footnote 186: _I.e._ Irish. The name of the Scots lingered on in
+their original home for many centuries after it became more famous in
+North Britain, whither they began to migrate in the fifth century.]
+
+[Footnote 187: See Miss Arnold Forster's Studies in Church
+Dedications, chap. xxxi.]
+
+The village is the scene of a dramatic tale found in Roger of
+Wendover, under the date 1234. A famine was raging, and the hungry
+poor invaded the ripening harvest-fields and devoured the crops, "for
+which they may scarce be blamed. Of the farmers, however, (who ever
+from their avarice, look upon the poor with an evil eye,) many were
+highly wroth at this pious theft. And they of Alboldesley hied them
+all on the next Sunday (July 16th) to the church, and with tumult
+required the priest to excommunicate upon the spot all who had thus
+plucked their wheat-ears. But one pious man alone adjured him in God's
+name to pronounce no such sentence for _his_ crops; adding that he was
+right well content that the poor should take from him in their need,
+and that he commended to the Lord's care whatsoever was left.
+
+"Now scarcely had the priest perforce begun the curse, than there
+suddenly arose such a storm of thunder, lightning, whirlwind, rain and
+hail, that the corn in the fields was torn from the ground as by a
+blast from hell; and all that grew therein, and the cattle, and the
+very birds, were destroyed, as though trodden down by carts and
+horses. But that just man found his land without trace of harm. And
+thus it is clear that as the angels sing Glory to God in the Highest,
+so on earth is there Peace toward men of Good-will.
+
+"This storm began on the borders of Bedfordshire (at Eltisley), and
+passed eastwards through the Isle of Ely. And here is a wondrous
+thing. Such crops as still stood when it was over were found so
+rotted that neither horse nor ass, steer nor pig, goose nor hen, would
+eat thereof." A cyclone of precisely the same character devastated
+Essex on June 24, 1897, and was as capricious in its visitations.
+
+At Eltisley we reach the termination of the long ridge which has kept
+us at an upland level all the way from Madingley, and our road now
+runs rapidly down into the valley of the Ouse. We reach that noble
+stream at the old-world, but thriving, town of St. Neots, where there
+is a fine old bridge and a magnificent church. The name of this place
+is locally pronounced not _Neats_, but _Notes_. This last is the
+correct form, for the name is derived from Neotus, the eldest brother
+and friend of King Alfred, whom that greatest of our monarchs
+recognised as the good genius of his life.
+
+The original name of this notable personality was Athelstane. He was
+the eldest grandson of Egbert, the first "King of the English," and
+held, accordingly, the under-kingship of Kent, at that time the usual
+appanage of the heir-apparent. This dignity he resigned to enter
+Religion, at the Abbey of Glastonbury, under the name of Neotus. A
+special bond of affection united him with his youngest brother,
+Alfred, who, as an enthusiastic boy of seventeen, took this dearest of
+brothers as his spiritual guide and counsellor. When, five years
+later, the successive deaths of the intervening brethren brought him
+to the throne, we read that the inconsiderate zeal with which he
+suppressed abuses drew anxious warnings from St. Neot, who foresaw
+that this overweening course would surely bring disastrous
+consequences.
+
+"But Alfred heeded not the reproof of the man of God, nor listed what
+he foretold. Wherefore (seeing that a man's sins must needs be some
+way punished, either in this world or in that which is to come), the
+Righteous Judge and True willed that he should not be unpunished here,
+that so he might be spared hereafter."[188]
+
+[Footnote 188: The Chronicle of St. Neots.]
+
+The punishment was that sudden and disastrous Danish inroad which
+overwhelmed the whole of the kingdom, and drove Alfred himself into
+hiding at Athelney. While he was there St. Neot died at the
+neighbouring Glastonbury. We read there, ere his departure, the saint
+had promised that as he had been Alfred's spiritual guide in life, so
+should that spiritual guidance and wardship still abide with him.
+"Thy guide have I been ever; thee and thine will I lead on." "I will
+be thy captain, I will be thy champion; thou shalt be glad and rejoice
+in me." "Lo, I will go before thy banner; thine enemies shall perish
+at my presence." And when, a few weeks later, the King led on his
+forces to the crowning victory over the Danes at Ethandune, he was
+persuaded that this promise was being fulfilled. With the eye of
+ardent faith he beheld the blessed spirit of his brother leading on
+the Christian banners to the onset. "See ye not?" he exclaimed to his
+men, "See ye not? That is indeed Neotus, Christ's glorious servant,
+Christ's unconquered soldier; and through him is the victory even now
+given to our hands."
+
+Thus it came about that St. Neot remained the object of unforgotten
+reverence, not only to Alfred himself, but to his heroic son and
+daughter. The former christened after this sainted uncle his own
+eldest son Athelstane, afterwards "Athelstane the Magnificent," the
+mighty King of the English and Emperor of Britain; and when the latter
+delivered Mercia from the yoke of the Danes, she called by his name
+one of the fortress towns, which she founded on the Ouse to keep them
+in check, St. Neots.
+
+It is appropriate that one of the earliest and most spirited of the
+Chronicles that record the great deeds of Alfred should have been
+preserved for five centuries in the Church of St. Neots, and should
+still be known as the "Chronicle of St. Neots."[189] The north aisle
+of this church is known as the "Jesus Chapel," having been built by a
+local mediæval fraternity called "The Guild of Jesus." The sacred
+monogram IHC, is to be seen on the beams of the roof inside and on the
+buttresses outside.
+
+[Footnote 189: To this Chronicle we owe some of the best known legends
+in English History, the story of Alfred and the cakes, for instance.
+It was probably written in the tenth century. (See my "Alfred in the
+Chroniclers.")]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+One of the most delightful routes of the district is that by which we
+make our way along the Ouse from St. Neots to Ely, by way of
+Godmanchester, Huntingdon, and St. Ives. On leaving St. Neots the road
+climbs Paxton Hill, where its shady course overhangs a beautiful sweep
+of the broad stream 120 feet below. Thence it drops to the river at
+Paxton itself, where the church has some good Saxon features, and
+thence continues along the water to the twin villages of Offord Darcy
+and Offord Cluny, close together on the right bank, and so over
+another little eminence to strike the river again at Godmanchester.
+
+The etymology of this name shows it to have been a Roman station, and
+Roman remains have been found here. It is commonly identified with the
+_Durolipons_ of the Antonine Itinerary. Here the Via Devana, running
+straight from Cambridge, strikes the Ermine Street, and the final
+syllable of the Latin name suggests that the united roads crossed the
+river by a bridge before separating on their respective lines towards
+Chester and York. If so the bridge must have stood somewhere near the
+present one, which, however, was not built till the thirteenth
+century. Godmanchester is now a reposeful little town, with a uniquely
+picturesque view across the verdant expanse of Port Holme, the largest
+meadow, as it boasts itself, in the world, a wide, wide flat of breezy
+grass, across which, more than a mile away, rise the buildings of
+Huntingdon. In flood time, when this flat becomes a shining lake, the
+scene is striking indeed.
+
+From the northern end of the town a long causeway, pierced with many
+arches to carry off these floods, leads across the fields to the
+bridge, with its high pitch, its recessed and pointed buttresses, and
+its old bridge-chapel (now used for secular purposes) on the central
+span. Immediately behind lies the town of Huntingdon, larger and more
+stirring than its elder sister Godmanchester. It owes its existence to
+the same cause as St. Neots, being one of the fortresses erected by
+the "Children of Alfred," Edward the Elder and his sister Ethelfleda,
+"the lady of the Mercians," to ensure their pacification of these
+parts when reconquered from the Danes. It is famous as the birthplace
+of Oliver Cromwell, the entry of whose baptism, in 1599, is still to
+be seen in the register of All Saints' Church. The same book contains
+a record of his having been put to public penance, at the age of
+twenty, for scandalous living. The register of St. John's (now united
+to All Saints') tells us that the body of the unhappy Mary Stuart
+rested in that church during its removal by her son, James the First,
+from Peterborough Cathedral to Westminster Abbey.
+
+From Huntingdon our road, keeping close in touch with the river,
+takes us through the pretty villages of Hartford, Wyton, and Houghton,
+to St. Ives. A yet prettier way is to recross the stream at Houghton
+Lock and take a field-road across the meadows to the two Hemingfords,
+Hemingford Abbots and Hemingford Grey. The latter is famous as the
+birthplace of the Misses Gunning, who were the leading beauties of the
+Court in the early days of the reign of George the Third, and married
+into the highest families of the Peerage. Both churches stand on the
+very brink of the Ouse, about a mile apart, their graceful steeples,
+with that of Houghton to the north-east and that of St. Ives to the
+north-west, watching as guardian sentinels over the rich Ouse meadows
+between. All have spires, but that of Hemingford Grey lost its upper
+part by an equinoctial gale in the middle of the eighteenth century,
+and only the base now remains.
+
+St. Ives is yet another of Edward the Elder's fortresses, and is
+probably named from the Cornish town similarly designated. It is
+possible that it may be even a colony from that far-off strand, which
+had never swerved in its allegiance, planted here to leaven the
+turbulent Danish elements around. Certain it is that here Ednoth,
+Abbot of Ely, erected a church dedicated to St. Ivo. Who this saint
+may have been originally is not known; probably he (or she) was one of
+the many obscure Celtic saints whose names dot the map of Cornwall.
+But there grew up in the eleventh century a wild legend that Ivo, a
+Persian (!) bishop, had settled down in the neighbourhood. In the
+fifteenth century a stone sarcophagus, found by a peasant when
+ploughing, was declared to contain the body of this holy Oriental, and
+was translated with due pomp to the neighbouring Abbey of Ramsey. St.
+Ives was specially connected with this House, and it was an Abbot of
+Ramsey who built the beautiful bridge, the ditto of that at
+Huntingdon, by which we here recross to the left bank of the Ouse.
+
+Our next point, on leaving St. Ives, is the tiny village of Holywell,
+which we may reach either by road, through the hamlet of Needingworth,
+or (preferably) by a field-path running westwards from near the
+railway station. The little church here stands on a slope above the
+river, and in the churchyard the holy well is still to be seen. But
+the delight of the place is its strand along the Ouse, a rarely
+picturesque medley of old houses on one side of the road and on the
+other the broad clear stream, here crossed by a ferry. This road
+continues (as a mere field-path) to another delicious ferry a mile
+lower, with a charming little inn beside it, in a grove of lofty
+trees. This lovely spot is named Overcote. Here travellers may cross
+into Cambridgeshire and make their way along the "Hundred Foot"
+embankment (so called because it is thirty yards in width) along the
+river to Earith. For motors the way lies through Needingworth, and
+past the pretty little Church of Bluntisham, with its three-sided apse
+and its churchyard yews.
+
+Earith is a hamlet of Bluntisham, but a much larger place, owing its
+importance to its situation on the point where the great works
+connected with the drainage of the fens have their beginning by the
+diversion of the Ouse waters from their ancient bed into the two
+"Bedford Rivers," the Old and the New, which from this point run
+straight as a die (like the supposed "canals" in Mars) across the fen
+to Denvers Sluice, twenty-two miles away. The former was made in 1630,
+the latter in 1650, at the expense of what we should now call a
+company, promoted by the Earl of Bedford. No such cuts exist elsewhere
+in the world. Along them a clear horizon is to be obtained, and here,
+accordingly, was conducted, some forty years ago, a decisive
+experiment for proving the sphericity of the earth.
+
+At that time a deluded gentleman, who called himself "Parallax," was
+obsessed with the notion that the globe was a flat disc, and used to
+go lecturing with great vigour on the subject. After these lectures he
+invited questions, none of which were able to shake his belief. When
+asked, for example, "Why does the hull of a ship disappear below the
+horizon while the masts remain visible?" he would answer, "Because the
+lowest stratum of air is the densest, and, therefore, soonest conceals
+objects seen through it." In view of the present Polar exploration, it
+may interest our readers to know that one of his points was the
+absolute non-existence of the South Pole. "Explorers say they cannot
+get near it, because of an icy barrier. Of course. That barrier is the
+raised rim of our world plate, and they can but sail round and round
+inside it." Finally he showed his wholehearted belief in his absurd
+views by laying a heavy wager that no one would disprove them. The
+stakes were deposited in the hands of judges, and the trial, under
+agreed conditions, took place upon the New River. Three boats were
+moored three miles apart, each provided with a cross-tree of equal
+height. If the earth was spherical the central cross would appear
+above the other to an observer looking through a telescope levelled
+from the cross-tree of the boat at either end; if it was flat he would
+see both the other cross-trees as one. "Parallax" declared that he did
+so (!), but the judges decided against him, and the poor man lost his
+money.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+     Island of Ely.--Haddenham.--Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+     Belsars Hill.--Wilburton.--Sutton.--Wentworth.--Via
+     Devana.--Girton, College.--Oakington,
+     Holdsworth.--Elsworth.--Conington, Ancient Bells.--Long Stanton,
+     Queen Elizabeth.--Willingham, Stone Chamber.--Over,
+     Gurgoyles.--Swavesey, Finials.--Ely Road.--Chesterton.--Fen
+     Ditton.--Milton, Altar Rails.--Horningsea.--Bait's Bite, Start of
+     Race.--Clayhithe.--Waterbeach.--Car
+     Dyke.--Denny.--Stretham.--Upware.--Wicken Fen.
+
+
+From the bridge over the Ouse by the Earith sluice we see the
+sea-board (for that and nothing less is the word which its appearance
+irresistibly suggests) of the Island of Ely, rising before us, with a
+couple of miles of level fen between. We may reach it, if we will, by
+the main road, which leads eastward to Haddenham, the southernmost of
+the island villages. Haddenham stands on a projecting peninsula of
+high ground, the highest in the island, rising to nearly 150 feet,
+almost cut off from the rest by two inlets of fen (Grunty Fen on the
+north-east and North Fen on the north-west), and nearer than any other
+part to the mainland on the south. This quasi-insulation has left a
+curious mark on the Ecclesiastical map of Cambridgeshire. Throughout
+the whole Isle of Ely--the old Fenland Archipelago--the Bishop acts as
+his own Archdeacon. An Archdeacon of Ely there is; but his
+jurisdiction is confined to Cambridgeshire proper, Cambridgeshire
+south of the Isle. It extends, however, over Haddenham and the
+neighbouring village of Wilburton, the two parishes in this peninsula.
+
+Haddenham has a fine Decorated church; the tower showing the first
+development of that style from Early English (1275), and the transepts
+its transition into Perpendicular (1375). The fifteenth century font
+is richly panelled, with roses and shields supported by lions and
+angels. This church was founded by Owen, the "Over-alderman" who
+governed the Island of Ely under St. Etheldreda, the Foundress of the
+Cathedral, and Queen of the Isle as the childless widow of its last
+native ruler, King Tonbert.[190] Owen's name is interesting as
+testifying to the Celtic survival in the fenland, already spoken
+of.[191] The broken cross bearing his name, now in the south aisle of
+Ely Cathedral, was originally set up at Haddenham; and, after being
+for ages an object of veneration, was, at the Reformation, mutilated
+and degraded into a horsing-block. At length the revived decency of
+the eighteenth century removed it to Ely.
+
+[Footnote 190: See Chap. XIV.]
+
+[Footnote 191: See Chap. VIII.]
+
+The village of Haddenham lies chiefly along the road running southward
+to the hamlet of Aldreth, on the very verge of the Island. The nearest
+point of the low-lying mainland is only half a mile away; the "Old
+River" of the Ouse (now, since the construction of the Bedford Rivers,
+become quite a scanty watercourse) flowing between. This was the point
+selected by William the Conqueror for the famous Causeway, whereby,
+after being once and again baffled by the valour of Hereward, he
+ultimately succeeded in forcing his way into the Island.[192] For
+centuries afterwards this continued to be the chief entrance from the
+Cambridge district, till superseded by the present road viâ Stretham. A
+small barrow at the southern end of this causeway, which is now a mere
+field-track, still bears the name of Belsar's Hill, after the knight
+who, in this campaign, acted as the Conqueror's Commander-in-Chief.
+
+[Footnote 192: See Chap. XIV.]
+
+Wilburton, a mile to the east, was given to Ely by St. Ethelwold,
+Bishop of Winchester, the prelate who aided in King Edgar's
+restoration of the Monastery of Ely, after its destruction by the
+Danes, in 870, had laid it waste for upwards of a century. The church
+has some fine woodwork in stalls, screen, and roof, adorned on the
+spandrills and bosses with the three cocks of Bishop Alcock, the
+founder of Jesus College. While Archdeacon of Ely he here entertained
+Henry the Eighth, when, as Prince of Wales, he accompanied his father
+on the last Royal Pilgrimage ever made to the shrine of St. Etheldreda
+at Ely, which he himself was so soon to despoil and destroy. A good
+brass (now affixed to the wall) commemorates Alcock's predecessor in
+the archidiaconate, Richard Bole (1477). And yet another Archdeacon,
+Wetheringset, is also here buried. Some curious metal-work hangs from
+the roof, and on the north wall of the nave are ancient frescoes,
+representing not only St. Christopher, the usual subject, but the much
+less known St. Blaise and St. Leodegar. The former was Bishop of
+Sebaste, and was martyred in 316 A.D. He became the patron saint of
+wool-combers, and was specially venerated in Leeds and Bradford. The
+latter was Bishop of Autun in Gaul, during the seventh century. There
+is here a fine old red-brick manor-house, called the Burgh-stead (or
+Bury-stead), built in 1600 by a London alderman to whom Queen
+Elizabeth sold the Manor,--after filching it from the Bishop of Ely,
+according to her usual practice.
+
+[Illustration: _Wilburton._]
+
+The whole peninsula is specially rich in memorials of long past ages.
+In the peat of the old Ouse channel by Wilburton was found a great
+hoard of bronze weapons, lying in a promiscuous heap, "in such a
+manner as to suggest that a canoe with a cargo of bronze scrap had
+been upset there," as Professor and Mrs. Hughes picturesquely put it,
+in their "Geography of Cambridgeshire." Grunty Fen has produced a
+bronze sickle, and two splendid ornaments of twisted gold; while, a
+mile east of Wilburton, a British urn was discovered, associated with
+the bones of the urus, or gigantic wild ox of the Neolithic Age. And
+between Earith and Wilburton there has been dug out gold ring-money.
+
+[Illustration: _The Burystead, Wilburton._]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But a yet more striking approach to the Island of Ely may be made by
+taking at Earith the road through the toll-gate which leads northward
+immediately alongside the great embankment of the New River, and lies
+some few feet below the level of its waters. For three miles this
+association continues; then road and river part company, and the
+former drives straight across the fen to climb the western shore of
+the island. The change of scenery when you reach that shore is
+striking in its suddenness. You have been travelling for miles through
+the bare, treeless, dead level of the fen, with its immense width of
+view; then, almost in a moment, you find yourself ascending a steepish
+hill through a tree-shaded hedge-bordered cutting which might be in
+Kent or even Devonshire.
+
+At the top of this brow you look down on the fen behind you and on
+either hand, your southern horizon being bounded by the near uplands
+of Haddenham, with the flat bay of North Fen between. And very shortly
+you come to the undulating village street of Sutton, with its highest
+point crowned by the truly glorious church. This church is all in one
+style, Decorated, on the verge of developing into Perpendicular,
+having been built by Barnet, Bishop of Ely 1366 to 1373. The splendid
+tower is crowned by an octagonal steeple, and that again by a second,
+richly pinnacled, and is a landmark for many miles along the valleys
+of the Ouse and Cam.
+
+From Sutton we reach Ely by way of Wentworth and Witchford. The former
+name is supposed to be a corruption of Owensworth, and to commemorate
+that the place was of old the property of St. Owen. The little church
+has a Saxon porch, with twisted pillars, and contains a remarkable
+carving of the same date, representing an ecclesiastic wearing the
+pall of a Primate. His left hand supports an open book, while in his
+right he holds, not a cross or pastoral staff, but something more
+suggestive of an aspersory for holy water. The corbel in Ely Cathedral
+depicting the burial of St. Etheldreda shows us a figure similarly
+equipped.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In looking southward from Sutton Church, three steeples are specially
+conspicuous in the Ouse valley. They are those of Over, Swavesey, and
+Willingham. All are churches of the first class, and all are best
+reached from Cambridge by way of the Via Devana, which, after crossing
+the "Great Bridge" and climbing the ascent past the Castle, continues
+its straight course to the north-west under the designation of the
+Huntingdon Road. Just as it leaves the town a branch-road on the right
+leads to the village of Histon, which the jam factories of Messrs.
+Chivers have made one of the most flourishing in the county. The
+church here has some good Early English work, and a remarkable "Rood"
+(much defaced) on the gable of the S. transept. This is an almost
+unique example of the early "Majestas" type of crucifix (p. 339).
+Christ, with outspread arms, wears, not the Crown of Thorns, but the
+Old English "king-helm," and is fully robed. About 1200 this ideal
+type gave place to the later "realistic" crucifix.
+
+[Illustration: _Sutton Church._]
+
+A mile beyond the last houses of Cambridge the Via Devana comes to the
+huge red-brick mass of Girton College, which has been already spoken
+of.[193] Its spacious grounds and never-ending corridors impress the
+mind with admiration for the enthusiasm and energy which has thus
+materialised Tennyson's vision of University education for women. At
+this point another northward turn takes us to Girton Church, where
+there are good brasses to two successive fifteenth century parsons. In
+their day the living belonged to Ramsey Abbey, by the gift of Eric,
+Bishop of Dorchester (1016). We next come to Oakington, the Mecca of
+Cambridgeshire Free Churchmen. For here, in the quiet little
+Nonconformist Cemetery, rest, side by side, the three men to whom the
+chief sects of the county trace their spiritual ancestry--Francis
+Holcroft, Joseph Oddy, and Henry Oasland.
+
+[Footnote 193: See p. 144.]
+
+The first named was a Fellow of Clare College where he had for his
+"chum" (_i.e._ chamber-mate, as we find the word used in "Pickwick")
+Tillotson, the future Archbishop of Canterbury. He began his
+ministerial career by taking on himself to supply the place of a
+brother collegian, the Puritan minister in charge of Littlington, near
+Royston, who, most un-Puritanically, was often incapacitated by drink
+from performing his duties. Later, in 1655, when still only
+twenty-two, he himself became pastor of the adjoining parish of
+Bassingbourn. When the "Black Bartholomew" of 1662 deprived him of
+this charge under the Act of Uniformity, he preached, at the risk of
+fine and imprisonment, throughout the neighbourhood, binding together
+his adherents in a loosely-knit organisation, whose members were
+admitted on subscribing the following Profession of Faith:
+
+     "We do in the presence of the Lord Jesus, the awful crowned King
+     of Sion, and in the presence of his holy angels and people and
+     all besides here present, solemnly give up ourselves to the Lord
+     and to one another, by the will of God, solemnly promising and
+     engaging in the aforesaid presence to walk with the Lord and with
+     one another in the observation of all Gospel ordinances, and the
+     discharge of all relative duties in this church of God and
+     elsewhere, as the Lord shall enlighten us and enable us."[194]
+
+[Footnote 194: _Cambs. Monthly Repository X._]
+
+His efforts were vigorously seconded by Oddy and Oasland, whose
+consciences, like his own, would not permit them to use the Anglican
+Prayer Book; and the units of this embryo Church, who were often
+spoken of at the time as "Mr. Holcroft's disciples," became widely
+spread throughout the county. Already, before the end of 1662, they
+had regular meetings at Barrington, Eversden, Waterbeach, and Guyhirn,
+as well as Cambridge; and when, ten years later, they became licensed
+by the King's Proclamation of Indulgence, we find the number increased
+fourfold. So far Nonconformity had been the only bond between these
+scattered bands of worshippers; but they now began to differentiate
+themselves into Baptist, Independent, and Presbyterian Congregations,
+though the lines were not as yet sharply drawn, and, indeed, are not
+even now sharply drawn in the country villages, where a man is
+"Church" or "Chapel," caring little what may be the precise
+denomination of his chapel. The strength of the Dissenting spirit thus
+implanted at Oakington may be measured by that of the language
+employed by the zealous Archdeacon of Ely, who, in 1685, declares this
+to be "the most scandalous parish and the worst in the diocese. The
+people most vile. A Fanatic Schoolmaster."
+
+From Oakington the lane leads on to Long Stanton, where the two
+churches of St. Michael and All Saints are both noteworthy. The former
+is a simple Early English building with a _thatched_ roof (till lately
+made of reeds from the fen, a far more durable material than straw,
+but now unobtainable), a rich double piscina, and an oak chest dating
+from the twelfth century. The latter, at the other end of the "long"
+village street, is a Decorated cruciform structure, the south transept
+having become the mortuary chapel of the Hatton family, who bought the
+lordship of the manor from Queen Elizabeth.
+
+That rapacious monarch, her father's worthy daughter in ecclesiastical
+spoliation, had seized upon it amongst the surrenders which she
+exacted from Bishop Cox, the first Protestant to be Bishop of Ely. On
+his accession she confiscated a full half of his episcopal property,
+and was constantly insisting on further denudations, including Ely
+House, Holborn. On this final act of despotism goading him into
+remonstrance, she is reported (in Strype's _History of the
+Reformation_) to have made the well-known reply, "Proud priest! I made
+you. And I will unmake you. Obey my pleasure, or I will forthwith
+unfrock you." Only his speedy death (in 1581) prevented her from
+actually carrying out this threat. After it she kept the whole
+property of the See in her own hands for no less than nineteen years,
+when she handed it over to Bishop Heton, shorn of yet another moiety,
+which included the Manor of Longstanton with its ancient episcopal
+palace.
+
+This palace had a further connection with Elizabeth; for in it she was
+entertained by Bishop Cox after that visit to Cambridge in 1564, when
+her erudition so thrilled the University.[195] And it was here that
+she was disgusted by the blasphemous entertainment got up for her
+benefit by the Protestant undergraduates, in which a performing dog
+danced with a consecrated Host in his mouth. King's College Chapel was
+the scene originally intended for this outrage; but the graver
+academic programme there lasted so long that the Queen could not stay
+for the afterpiece. The disappointed students begged leave to follow
+her and give an evening performance at Long Stanton. Mutual disgust
+was the result. As soon as Elizabeth understood what was going on she
+indignantly swept from the room, ordering every light to be instantly
+extinguished, leaving the wretched boys to grope for their properties
+and get back to Cambridge as best they could.
+
+[Footnote 195: When praised for loveliness by the Public Orator she
+showed, to the loud admiration of her auditors, that she both
+understood and spoke Latin by exclaiming coyly "Non est verum."]
+
+[Illustration: _All Saints' Church, Long Stanton._]
+
+Following the road to Long Stanton station (six and a half miles), we
+there cross the G. E. R. (St. Ives Branch) and proceed, along a
+somewhat dreary stretch, to Willingham (nine miles), where an
+exceptionally fine church (All Saints) rewards our toil. After
+lingering in neglect and decay for years beyond the neighbouring
+churches, it has now become an ideal example of judicious restoration,
+very different from the drastic process too often known by that name.
+Every ancient feature and development has been preserved, including
+the beautiful roof,[196] with its elaborate carving, its tiers of
+angels and its double hammer beams, the fine parclose screens, and the
+Perpendicular pulpit. Beneath the clerestory may be seen traces of no
+fewer than four successive layers of frescoes, which, from the twelfth
+to the seventeenth century, each in turn adorned the walls. But the
+most striking feature of the church is the small Decorated "treasury"
+adjoining the north wall of the chancel. It is wholly of stone, even
+to the roof with its richly wrought "beams"; an almost unique example
+of this method of treatment. Dowsing here destroyed, on 16 March,
+1643, "forty superstitious pictures, a crucifix, and two superstitious
+inscriptions, also two pictures of the Holy Ghost and one of the
+Virgin Mary in brass."
+
+[Footnote 196: This roof is traditionally said to have been that of
+the great church of Barnwell Abbey (see p. 160). It obviously was made
+for a larger nave than that of Willingham, and has been cut down to
+fit its present purpose.]
+
+From Willingham a field road will take us, if desired, to Belsar's
+Hill,[197] which, besides its historical associations, is rich in the
+pretty crystals of selenite or gypsum. And though, as has been said,
+the track is now all but disused, it is still possible to follow the
+Conqueror's causeway to the Ouse and get ferried over to Aldreth.
+
+[Footnote 197: See p. 283.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next turn on the Via Devana is the southward lane to Madingley,
+already described. Southward also lie Lolworth, Boxworth and Elsworth.
+The last has an exceptionally fine church, Decorated throughout, and
+displaying the almost unique feature of small lockers for books in the
+fourteenth century stalls. Conington, near the road on the same side,
+has a stone-ribbed spire containing three mediæval bells--a rare
+survival. They bear the following inscriptions:
+
+  1. ASSVMPTA . EST . MARIA . IN . CELIS . GAVDENT . ANGELI
+     LAVDANTES . BENEDICVNT . DOMINVM.
+
+     Mary is taken up to Heaven. The Angels are glad.
+     They praise and bless the Lord.
+
+  2. SANCTA . MARIA . ORA . PRO . NOBIS
+     Holy Mary pray for us.
+
+  3. VIRGO . CORONATA . DVC . NOS . AD . REGNA . BEATA .
+     O crownèd Maid lead us to realms of bliss.
+
+[Illustration: _Over, South Porch._]
+
+Northward we find the magnificent churches of Swavesey and Over
+already mentioned. The former is one of the noblest in Cambridgeshire.
+The nave is Perpendicular, but the large windows in the south aisle
+are really Early English lancets, the Perpendicular tracery being
+inserted--a most unusual development. The finials of the fourteenth
+century benches are to be noticed, especially in the north aisle,
+where they take the form of grotesque animals. The small size of these
+seats suggests that they were meant for children. The little ones
+would be charmed with these delightful finials, representing a fox
+and a goose, a fox and a stork, a bear and a dog, a wolf and a hound,
+an eagle and a snake, a wild boar, a lion, a pelican, a cherub, St.
+Peter, and an angel playing upon a dulcimer.
+
+[Illustration: _Over._]
+
+At Over every feature of the church is noteworthy. It is entirely
+built of Barnack stone, richly ornamented externally with running
+ball-flower patterns. The southern porch is beautifully proportioned,
+and the gargoyles extraordinary specimens of birds and beasts,
+apparently under the same inspiration as the Swavesey finials. Over
+the west door is a sculpture (almost weathered out of knowledge) of
+Our Lady in Glory, a very rare subject; also the arms of Ramsey Abbey,
+to which the benefice was presented by Ednoth, Bishop of Dorchester,
+who lies buried in Bishop West's chapel at Ely.[198] The tracery in
+general is Decorated, but the spire rises from an Early English tower,
+and the chancel is also Early English, with inserted Perpendicular
+windows. The Sanctus Bell[199] still hangs over the eastern gable of
+the nave. The interior woodwork is of the best, the roof is
+Decorated, and there is an exceptionally good sixteenth century
+pulpit. The arcading above the windows of the south aisle, with its
+banded Early English shafts, is another beautiful feature here. On
+some of the churchyard tombstones wall-rue may be found growing, a
+rare sight in this neighbourhood. From Over a lane leads on, crossing
+the Hundred Foot Bank to Overcote, that fascinating Ferry Inn upon the
+Ouse whose charms have already been dwelt upon.
+
+[Footnote 198: See Chap. XVII.]
+
+[Footnote 199: See p. 231.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Formerly, as we have said, the regular road from Cambridge to Ely was
+by way of the Causeway at Aldreth. But this roundabout route of over
+twenty miles compared unfavourably with the shorter line taken by the
+Cam, which was accordingly the favourite for such as could afford
+boat-hire. In the eighteenth century regular packet-boats ran daily
+between the two places, drawn by horses. To-day the only passengers on
+the river are pleasure-seekers, and the ordinary way to Ely from
+Cambridge is by the road supposed to represent the hypothetical Akeman
+Street of Roman days.[200] This road turns northwards round Magdalene
+College, and runs through the suburb of New Chesterton. Old Chesterton
+stands on the river, east of the road, and has a finely-proportioned
+steeple, with particularly melodious bells, and a slender spire. At
+this point is the winning-post of the College boat races.[201] On the
+opposite bank, a mile lower down the stream, is Fen Ditton, the "Ditch
+End" where the Fleam Dyke strikes the river.[202] Ditton Corner, just
+beneath the parish church, is the favourite spot for seeing these
+races, as it commands a view of two long reaches, and is also (as a
+bend in the stream must needs be) a highly probable spot for bumps.
+
+[Footnote 200: See p. 252.]
+
+[Footnote 201: See p. 146].
+
+[Footnote 202: See p. 170.]
+
+Leaving these to the right, we reach Milton, whence the poet's family
+name is said to be derived, and where the church has seventeenth
+century altar rails, a very rare possession. Just opposite, with a
+ferry between, is Horningsea, where there is another good church.
+Between this and Fen Ditton is an ancient building, now used for farm
+purposes, which the Ordnance Map marks as "Biggin Abbey." An abbey,
+however, it never was, being only one (and the smallest) of the many
+scattered mansions of the Abbot and Bishop of Ely. On the stream
+beside it is Baitsbite Lock, the starting-point of the boat races.
+Here along the towing path may be seen the posts, set at regular
+intervals on the brink of the stream, to which each boat is moored by
+the "starting cord" held in the coxswain's[203] hand. He must not let
+it go till the gun is fired. Thrilling moments pass while he counts
+aloud the last seconds--"five ... four ... three ... two ... one," and
+the muscles of the crew grow ever tenser, till, at the signal, he
+flings the cord into the water, and every oar strains its utmost in
+the first stroke.
+
+[Footnote 203: This word is invariably abbreviated to "Cox," which is
+also used as a verb.]
+
+[Illustration: _Swavesey._]
+
+The next lock is Clayhithe, two miles further down the river, with an
+inn beside it in special favour for Cambridge boating pic-nics. Here,
+too, is the lowest bridge over the Cam, indeed the only one below
+Cambridge. It belongs to a private company, and is rigorously tolled.
+A pretty shady lane leads to it from Horningsea. Hard by, on the left
+bank, are the villages of Waterbeach and Landbeach. They are
+respectively four and twelve furlongs from the stream, and mark
+successive boundaries of the fenland waters. Between them runs an
+ancient earthwork, the Car Dyke (probably of Roman date), which of old
+kept those waters in flood time from drowning the meadows to the
+south. Starting from the Cam at Clayhithe it runs along the whole
+western limit of the fenland. It reaches the Ouse near the large
+village of Cottenham (where the east window of the fourteenth century
+church is copied from one in Prior Crauden's Chapel at Ely) with over
+2,000 inhabitants, and goes on past the tiny and picturesque Rampton,
+with under 200, to Willingham and Earith, Ramsey and Peterborough,
+Deeping and Sleaford; finally ending its long course on the banks of
+the far off Witham, hard by Lincoln.
+
+[Illustration: _Swavesey Church._]
+
+For a mile or so our "Akeman Street" follows the course of the Car
+Dyke, and then strikes northward across the fen, along a causeway of
+its own, passing near the remains of Denny Abbey, a small foundation
+which passed through unusual vicissitudes. Originally a Benedictine
+House, it was transferred in the twelfth century to the Templars, and
+in 1290, passed from them to the Minor Sisters of the Franciscan
+order. Marie de Valence, the foundress of Pembroke College, was a
+noted benefactress to Denny, and in her statutes solemnly enjoined on
+the scholars of the former institution "kindness" towards the recluses
+of the latter. The abbey is now a farm, but there are more remains of
+the monastic buildings here than almost anywhere else in the county.
+Much of the church is built into the farm house, and the refectory is
+in use as a barn. Many old walls and dykes may be traced, while a
+large entrenchment to the south is known as "Soldiers' Hill." This
+name may be due to the Templars.
+
+Two miles further we cross the old bed of the Ouse (containing now
+only such scanty waters as the Bedford rivers have left to it) at
+Elford, and enter the Isle of Ely. The ramp of the Island, however,
+lies two miles further on yet. We climb it by the village street of
+Stretham, where the ancient Town Cross still exists, an interesting
+and rare feature. It stands hard by the church, which contains various
+ancient tombstones, one to Nicholas de Ryngestone, rector under Edward
+the First, and a late fifteenth century brass to Dame Joan Rippingham,
+mother of two other rectors. A later rector was ejected in 1644 "for
+having made new steps to the altar, himself bowing twice as he went
+up, and as often while he came down." The church was an ancient
+possession of Ely, but was reft from the See by Elizabeth. Stretham
+lies at the extreme end of the little peninsular ridge on which
+Wilburton and Haddenham stand.[204] Beyond it we sink to the enclosed
+inlet of Grunty Fen, passing the hamlet of Little Thetford, and rise
+again to the higher ground where the towers of Ely greet our eyes, a
+little over a mile away.
+
+[Footnote 204: See p. 282.]
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Rampton._]
+
+After leaving Waterbeach our road has diverged widely from the Cam.
+Those who have followed the river course, either by boat or by the
+towing-path, will be rewarded by finding themselves, in course of
+time, at Upware, the tiniest and most sequestered of hamlets, where
+the wide Fens spread all around, bare, treeless, houseless, open to
+the sweep of every breeze, and giving the same delicious sense of
+space as a sea view. The whole atmosphere breathes remoteness, the
+very inn calls itself "FIVE MILES FROM ANYWHERE." But, though wide,
+the view is not like a sea view, boundless. The Island of Ely limits
+it to the north-west, and to the south-east the nearer uplands of East
+Anglia. For here is the nearest point on the Cam to Reach, the little
+hamlet once so important an emporium, where the Devil's Dyke runs down
+to the Fen.[205] To Upware, accordingly, there was cut through the
+sedge and peat, at some time beyond memory, the long straight waterway
+of Reach Lode, whereby even sea-going ships were able to discharge
+their cargoes on Reach Hithe. At a later date, but as early as the
+twelfth century, Burwell Lode was led to the same outlet. Those to
+Swaffham and Bottisham come in somewhat higher up the river.
+
+[Footnote 205: See p. 194.]
+
+[Illustration: _Dovecote at Rampton._]
+
+A mile to the east of Upware we can see how mighty a task those men of
+old undertook who cut these lodes through the primæval jungle. For
+here is that Wicken Fen, which we have already spoken of,[206] where
+a square mile of that jungle is preserved in its primæval condition,
+and where (in all but the old bird life) the fauna and flora of the
+old Fenland may still be studied in their old environment; where the
+peat is still spongy under your foot, and the tall crests of the reeds
+rise high above your head. To dig out masses of that spongy peat, to
+cut through miles of those tall reeds would be no light business even
+with our own modern means of excavation. What must it have been to the
+rude implements of the ancients?
+
+[Footnote 206: See p. 180.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Quay, Ely._]
+
+Some two miles beyond Upware the Cam falls into the Ouse, and the
+united stream sweeps past Thetford and round the corner of the island
+to Ely, where the Cutter Inn (near the railway station) makes a good
+landing-place.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+     Ely.--Island and Isle.--St. Augustine.--St. Etheldreda, Life,
+     Death, Burial, St. Audrey's Fair.--Danish Sack of Ely.--Alfred's
+     College.--Abbey restored.--Brithnoth, Song of Maldon.--Battle of
+     Assandun.--Canute at Ely.--Edward the Confessor.--Alfred the
+     Etheling.--Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman Conquest, Tabula
+     Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster.--Bishops of Ely, Rule
+     over Isle.--Ely Place, Ely House.
+
+
+The tourist through Cambridgeshire should now turn his attention to
+Ely, a place second only in interest, if indeed second, to Cambridge
+itself. The central point of note in Ely is the Cathedral; known to us
+ever since our schooldays through Macaulay's picture-giving pen, which
+sets it before us as "Ely's stately fane." We hope soon to learn
+something of the history of this great church, of her growth, of her
+decay, of her restoration, of those men and women who have made her
+what she is, of the tumults and storms she has over-lived. Truly we
+may say, with Stirling the poet that the Minster at Ely
+
+  "Still ship-like on for ages fares,
+     And holds its course, so smooth so true,
+     For all the madness of the crew;
+   It must have better rule than theirs."
+
+Before we actually visit the place itself let us make ourselves
+familiar with the outline of its chequered history.
+
+The city of Ely has a population approaching 8,000, and stands on the
+western edge of the Island of Ely, once truly an island, being an area
+of dry land rising from the midst of the fens, and, till their
+drainage, accessible only by boat or causeway. This _Island_, a true
+bit of natural _terra firma_, measures about eight miles by six, and
+lies at the southern end of a much more extensive fenland
+archipelago, of irregular shape, measuring approximately thirty miles
+by twenty, known from of old as the _Isle_ of Ely. The waters of the
+Fen, which, so lately as a century ago, made this wide area an
+archipelago indeed, have now given place to a "boundless plain" of
+fertile corn-land, so rich in harvests as to be often called "The
+Golden Plain of England."
+
+A twelfth century chronicler, the writer of the "Liber Eliensis,"
+asserts that, within the first years of the seventh century A.D.,
+Ethelbert, King of Kent, newly converted to Christianity, founded a
+monastery at Cratendune, about a mile south of Ely, and that Saint
+Augustine, the first Archbishop of Canterbury, consecrated it. But we
+cannot say that the authentic history of Ely begins till seventy years
+later, when we see an Anglo-Saxon lady founding a monastery on this
+rising ground in the midst of the Fens. The lady is Etheldreda, once
+Queen of Northumbria; her monastery is known to us as Ely. She is the
+daughter of Anna, King of East Anglia, who had reigned at Exning,
+almost within sight of Ely.
+
+King Anna was a devout man, who himself died a hero's death, fighting
+for the Cross and for his country against the overwhelming onset of
+Penda, the heathen King of Mercia, who made it the object of his life
+to stamp out English Christianity. But, though Anna fell, his cause
+triumphed. Penda shortly died, and his work perished with him. Not so
+Anna's. After his death the tide of Christian progress ran the
+stronger; and all over England it was through members of his family
+that it was specially championed.
+
+Married to the King of Northumbria, his daughter Queen Etheldreda had
+renounced her husband and her northern kingdom, and had returned to
+her native Fenland, there to found a monastery for both monks and
+nuns. In taking this step she had been influenced by two persons of
+note; by St. Hilda, her aunt, the foundress and first Abbess of
+Whitby, and by St. Wilfrid, Bishop of York. Hilda had in early life
+gained a firm hold on the heart of her niece, who had become fired
+with the wish to follow her example and herself to found a monastery.
+In spite of this resolve, of which she made no secret, she had been
+forced (while strongly protesting) into a nominal marriage with
+Egfrid, the youthful King of Northumbria. After twelve years of
+unhappy life, she had been induced by St. Wilfrid to quit her
+husband; from St. Wilfrid's hand she had received the veil, before him
+she had taken the vows that bound her to a monastic life. It is a
+strange, unnatural tale, that cannot claim our approval; but there it
+is, and its truth is not questioned.
+
+Queen Etheldreda, accompanied by certain attendants had then fled
+southward, with her deeply wronged husband in chase. She had been
+sheltered on one occasion from his pursuit by a tide of unprecedented
+height, which protected her on a rocky hiding-place while the King
+passed by, all unaware that he was close to her. At length she had
+reached her own fenland country; and here, still following Hilda's
+example, she set herself to build a monastery, choosing the highest
+ground available. She was a well dowered lady, for her first husband,
+Tonbert, was a Prince of the Girvii, a Celtic tribe descended from
+those refugee Britons who had sought safety in the fens when all else
+was conquered by the English invaders two centuries earlier. This
+prince had bequeathed to his childless widow all his wide fenland
+domains; so Etheldreda had no need to seek further for an endowment
+for her monastery; while her brother Adwulf, now King of East Anglia,
+defrayed the cost of the new buildings. These ere long became the home
+of both monks and nuns, who lived in separate houses and met only for
+their common worship in the Abbey church. No Abbot was appointed, but
+Etheldreda herself was their Abbess, ruling both sexes alike.
+
+It is probable that from its foundation the monastery at Ely was under
+the influence of the rule of St. Benedict, for St. Wilfrid during
+Etheldreda's life-time was a frequent resident there, and he was in
+close touch with St. Botolph, that most influential, though half
+legendary saint, who, from his hermitage at Ickenhoe in Suffolk, was
+introducing throughout East Anglia the rule of the monks of St.
+Benedict, those great preservers of civilisation, which, but for them,
+must in many lands have perished, when the strong hand of the Roman
+Empire lost its grip.
+
+[Illustration: _The North Triforium of the Nave, Ely._]
+
+Little is recorded of Etheldreda's life as abbess; and, after a rule
+of seven years, she died at the age of forty-nine, in the year 679,
+her death being due to an epidemic then prevalent, combined with a
+tumour in the neck. The death-bed scene is sculptured on one of the
+corbels of the Octagon Towers at Ely, where the more picturesque
+events of her life are quaintly set before us in stone. The saintly
+lady died after much suffering, which the ministrations of her devoted
+physician Cynifrid failed to allay; though he did for her all that the
+surgery of those days allowed. She bore her sickness with composure of
+mind, and when she knew that the end was at hand, she (as others have
+done before and since) summoned her whole household to her chamber to
+take her last farewell of them all. She told them that the time of her
+departure was at hand; she spoke to them of the vanity of this world's
+enjoyments, and recommended them to keep Heaven always in view,
+whereby they might in some measure have a foretaste of its joys. After
+this she received the Communion in both kinds from the hands of Huna,
+a priest devoted to her service; then, while praying for the
+inhabitants of the monastery, she passed from earth. It may be of
+interest to remember that throughout the seven years of her rule at
+Ely, Theodore, the great organiser of the Anglican Church, "the first
+Archbishop whom the whole Church of England obeyed," filled the See of
+Canterbury.
+
+It was Etheldreda's wish to be buried with all simplicity in the
+cemetery set apart for the nuns of Ely; so we are glad to learn that
+this her last desire was respected by her followers, and that she was
+laid to rest among the nuns in a wooden coffin. Her elder sister, St.
+Sexburga, widow of the King of Kent, took her place as Abbess, and
+ruled at Ely till another generation was arising. After sixteen years
+had gone by, those who still remembered and loved Etheldreda wished
+that her body should be with them at their devotions in the church,
+and they resolved to translate her remains from the cemetery to the
+Abbey.
+
+No common coffin was held to be a fitting casket for those precious
+relics; but in a waste place named Armeswerke,[207] fifteen miles up
+the River Cam (which may be identified as now forming part of the
+Fellows' garden at Magdalene College, Cambridge, between the terrace
+and the river), there was found a marble sarcophagus of Roman
+workmanship.[208] This was brought to Ely; and with careful and simple
+ceremony the body of the first Abbess was lifted from the wooden and
+laid in the marble coffin, all being carried out under the
+superintendence of Sexburga. On beholding the uncorrupted body of the
+dear sister who had died in so much pain, Sexburga was heard to
+exclaim, "Glory to the name of the Lord most high!" All the look of
+suffering had gone, and the Saint appeared as if asleep on her bed.
+Gently removed from the wooden to the stone coffin, the body was
+carried into the Abbey Church, and placed behind the high altar; and
+for eight centuries the shrine of St. Etheldreda was visited by troops
+of pilgrims, who came from far and near to worship, to leave their
+offerings, and to seek healing from disease and infirmity. Sexburga
+was followed as Abbess by her sister, Ermenilda, Queen of Mercia. Thus
+Ely had three sister queens as her first three Abbesses; and hence
+perhaps the three crowns that still form the arms of the Bishopric.
+
+[Footnote 207: This is the word used by the "Historia Eliensis." Bede,
+our earliest authority, speaks of "a small waste city, which in the
+English tongue is called Grantchester." He almost certainly means
+Cambridge. See p. 221.]
+
+[Footnote 208: Doubt has been cast on this story, owing to the
+incidental mention by the chronicler of a shaped head-space in this
+coffin. This has been held to point to a twelfth century origin for
+the Legend, inasmuch as such head-spaces were not used until that
+date. In the present year(1910), however, an undoubtedly Roman
+sarcophagus thus shaped has been unearthed in Egypt. It is figured in
+the _Illustrated London News_ (July 23, 1910).]
+
+St. Etheldreda was long remembered with affection, and was commonly
+spoken of as St. Audrey. The popular Pilgrims' Fair held at Ely was
+known at St. Audrey's Fair; and the cheap fairings bought and sold
+there (especially the coloured necklets of fine silk known as "St.
+Audrey's chains") were called, from her name, "tawdry"; and thus a new
+word was coined for us with a strange story of its own, a word hardly
+worthy of the great Abbess of the Fenland to whom it owes its origin.
+Centuries later, St. Audrey's Fair, held in October, had grown to be
+one of the most important in the land, lasting for a fortnight. By the
+year 1248 it had become such a centre of merchandise as to interfere
+with the traffic of the Fair which Henry the Third had lately
+established at Westminster in honour of St. Edward the Confessor; the
+King therefore issued a warrant interdicting the fair at Ely. This
+suspension meant serious loss to the Bishop, Hugh de Northwold, "who
+made a heavy complaint to the King concerning the matter, but he
+gained from him nothing except words of soothing promises of future
+consolation," says the chronicler.
+
+For two hundred years after the death of the foundress, the abbey of
+monks and nuns went on with its pious works and ways. Then, in 870,
+appeared the Danes, still pagans; and after working their way through
+Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, where they "wasted with fire and sword all
+that ever they came to, they brake down all the abbeys of the fens;
+nor did Ely, so famous of old, escape." Having laid waste
+Peterborough, then known as Medhampsted, they came across the fens to
+Ely. The abbey and all the buildings pertaining to it were burnt; the
+monks and nuns put to the sword. Before setting fire to the buildings
+the Danes had secured for themselves all they contained of value, and
+great was the store, for the people of the neighbourhood had brought
+their goods into the monastery as to a place of safety. All was seized
+by the invaders, and what they could not carry away they destroyed.
+Thus Etheldreda's Abbey, after lasting 200 years, was left a deserted
+ruin; but her coffin of stone escaped without injury. One of the
+depredators, indeed, is said to have made an attempt to break into it,
+with the result that his eyes started from his head, and then and
+there he died, as the chronicler relates. The ancient sarcophagus had
+proved worthy of its trust.
+
+The hour was one of direst need; for all England lay spent and gasping
+beneath the bloodstained feet of the heathen pirates. But, with the
+need, there arose the deliverer. In 871, the year after the sack of
+Ely, Alfred the Great, "England's darling," succeeded to the kingship
+of the exhausted realm; and the life and death struggle entered on its
+last and most desperate phase. For one moment even he seemed to go
+under, and was driven to an outlaw life in the marshes of Athelney;
+the next, we see him shattering the invaders by his miraculous victory
+of Ethandune, and, with incomparable state-craft, negotiating that
+Peace of Wedmore, whereby the Danes had to acknowledge him as their
+Overlord.
+
+As such, he shortly established a College of Priests at Ely. Eight of
+the clerics who had witnessed the sack of the monastery came back to
+their old home, and rebuilt a part of the church that it might serve
+again as a place of worship. These priests were not monks, and are
+said to have had wives and children. They lived in poverty; for all
+the endowments of the Abbey had been seized by Burgraed, the last King
+of Mercia. But gradually, as the children of Alfred won back the
+kingdom, the endowment of Ely began afresh. Here a fishery, and there
+a wood, and again a mill with adjoining pastures, was bestowed on the
+little College--a term which still clings to the Cathedral precincts
+of Ely, called to this day the College, not the Close as in most
+Cathedral cities.
+
+With the accession, in 958, of the great Edgar, the first English King
+to be Emperor of all Britain, the monarch who, nearly a thousand years
+ago, gained for himself, as but one of our kings has done since, the
+title of "Peacemaker," brighter days dawned. Then, as now, the
+Catholic Church might have been well called "Cette éternelle
+recommenceuse," able to rise from her ashes with life renewed. From
+the havoc wrought by the Danes, the Abbey of Ely, as a Benedictine
+House, arose once more, rebuilt, refounded, and re-endowed by King
+Edgar, who restored to it by Royal Charter all that Etheldreda had
+originally bestowed; adding thereto several demesnes and sundry
+privileges. The re-constitution of the Abbey was carried out under the
+guidance of Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester.
+
+The monks were thus restored; but the nuns of Ely have disappeared
+from view. As for those secular priests who were in possession and had
+maintained the sacred character of the spot for well-nigh a hundred
+years, ever since its devastation by the Danes, they were allowed to
+stay on if they submitted to the Benedictine Rule, otherwise they were
+dismissed.
+
+In the year 970, on the Feast of the Purification, a day that we shall
+again find eventful in the annals of Ely, the new and restored
+monastic buildings were consecrated by Dunstan, who now, as Archbishop
+of Canterbury, filled the highest office in the Church of the land.
+The chronicler, Roger of Wendover, tells us how, by Dunstan's counsel,
+King Edgar "everywhere restrained the rashness of the wicked,
+cherished the just and modest, restored and enriched the desolate
+churches of God, gathered multitudes of monks and nuns to praise and
+glorify the Great Creator, and built more than forty monasteries."
+This shews us that, the events taking place at Ely were in no sense
+isolated, but were part of a great revival going on throughout the
+whole country.
+
+In the year 991 the restored Abbey becomes connected with one of the
+most stirring poems of the English language, the "Song of Maldon." The
+Danish invasions, which had been checked for a century by the glorious
+line of monarchs who inherited King Alfred's blood and energy, were
+beginning again. One of these pirate hordes had landed in East Anglia,
+now no longer a separate principality but merely a district of the
+United Kingdom of England, governed by an "Alderman" named Brithnoth.
+Ethelred, surnamed the Unready, was on the throne--a King who for his
+lack of good judgment well deserved this contemptuous sobriquet--and
+his want of energy and capacity threw on to the shoulders of his
+subordinates the burden of the defence of his realm.
+
+Brithnoth rose to the emergency, as a true Christian hero. At the head
+of his retainers he hurried to meet the foe, calling out the local
+levies to join his march. At Ely, as he hastened past, he, with his
+men, was royally entertained. The day before, when he was passing
+Ramsey Abbey, the Abbot had offered him hospitality, but only for
+himself and half a dozen picked friends. This niggardly invitation
+drew from Brithnoth a scornful answer: "Tell my Lord Abbot," he
+replied, "that I cannot fight without my men, neither will I feed
+without them." At Ely meat and drink were placed before leader and
+followers without distinction, and well were the monks rewarded, for
+Brithnoth requited their hospitality by the gift of no fewer than nine
+manors, all lying near Cambridge--Trumpington, Fulbourn, and
+others--stipulating only that, if slain in battle, his body should be
+brought back to their church for burial.
+
+At Maldon in Essex on the River Panta (or Blackwater, as it is now
+called), he met the Danes, who began by sending a herald demanding a
+ransom, to be fixed by themselves, as the price of peace:
+
+  "Then back with our booty
+   To ship will we get us,
+   Fare forth on the flood,
+   And pass you in peace."
+
+This degrading offer Brithnoth contemptuously refuses:
+
+  "For ransom we give you
+   Full freely our weapons,
+   Spear-edge and sword-edge
+   Of old renown."
+
+The Danes at once make their way across the river and attack the
+English levies:
+
+  "Then drave from each hand
+   Full starkly the spear,
+   Showered the sharp arrows,
+   Busy were bows,
+   Shield met shaft,
+   Bitter the battle."
+
+In the end the pirates are driven back to their ships, but at the cost
+of Brithnoth's own life. He is pierced by a spear, and sinks dying to
+the ground; to the last exhorting his soldiers to fight on, and
+commending his own soul to God in the following beautiful and touching
+lines:
+
+  "To Thee give I thanks,
+   Thou Lord of all living,
+   For all good hap
+   In this life here.
+   Sore need I now,
+   O Maker mild,
+   That Thou should'st grant
+   My spirit grace;
+   That my soul to Thee
+   May depart in peace,
+   And flee to Thy keeping,
+   Thou King of Angels.
+   To Thee do I pray
+   That the Gates of Hell
+   Prevail not against me."
+
+[Illustration: _West Aisle of the North Transept, Ely._]
+
+The Danes carried off Brithnoth's head; but his body was rescued; and,
+according to his wish, the monks came and brought it back to Ely,
+where the Abbot buried it, replacing the missing head by one of wax.
+During the eighteenth century the skeleton was met with in the course
+of some excavations and recognised as Brithnoth's by the absence of
+the skull. It now lies in Bishop West's beautiful chapel, along with
+the bones of other Anglo-Saxon worthies.
+
+The Lady Elfleda, Brithnoth's widow, added largely to the benefactions
+he had bestowed on Ely; she gave the Abbey valuable lands within easy
+reach of the monastery, and she moreover presented to the church a
+golden chain, and a curtain worked with the most notable deeds of her
+husband's life. Those who have seen the Bayeux tapestry, representing
+the events of the life of William the Conqueror, can picture to
+themselves what Lady Elfleda's curtain may have been a century
+earlier.
+
+In the next generation (1016) a body of the monks of Ely accompanied
+another hero to battle against the Danes. The hero of this generation
+was Ethelred's son, King Edmund Ironside; the battle was the great
+fight of Assandun, a place impossible to locate with certainty, but
+not improbably situated on the south-east border of Cambridgeshire.
+During the last twenty-five years the Danes had become more and more
+daring, and now, under their great king, Canute, the mightiest of all
+Scandinavian monarchs, they were attempting nothing less than the
+organised conquest of England. Thus Canute and Edmund were face to
+face in a desperate struggle, and, after five indecisive battles in a
+single year, Edmund was defeated, on St. Luke's Day, at Assandun, and
+his defeat was shortly followed by his death. Canute then assumed the
+crown, by right of conquest, a right which he proclaimed by calling
+himself not, like his predecessors, "King of the English," but "King
+of England."
+
+He proved, however, not at all a bad king. He had been brought up a
+Christian, and he took the Church under his protection. He bore no
+malice against the monks of Ely for their support of Edmund Ironside,
+but, on the contrary, treated the Abbey with marked favour, and gave
+her rich endowments. More than once he visited Ely, and we all know
+the lines of the cheery old ballad which relates how Canute in his
+barge was rowing near the island. It runs thus:
+
+  "Merrily sang they, the monks at Ely,
+   When Cnut the King he rowed thereby;
+   Row to the shore, men, said the King,
+   And let us hear these monks to sing."
+
+This was in the summer-time,[209] when the waters were open; but not
+seldom Canute made his visits in the depth of winter, when, on the
+Feast of the Purification, the Abbot of Ely each year entered on his
+Chancellorship of the realm, an office which he shared in turn with
+the Abbots of Canterbury and Glastonbury, each holding this office for
+four months at a time. The legend may well be true, which tells how,
+on one of these mid-winter visits, Canute reached Ely (from
+Soham)[210] in a sledge, preceded by the heaviest man that could be
+found (characteristically nick-named "Pudding"), who skated ahead of
+the King to ensure the ice would bear. On another occasion Canute was
+accompanied by his wife Queen Emma, and she, in token of her regard
+for the Abbey, left behind, as her gift, splendid hangings for the
+church, and for the shrine of the foundress. An altar frontal of green
+and red and gold, and a shrine cover of purple cloth, bedecked with
+gold and jewels, are described as being of exceptional beauty and
+value, "such as there was none like to them in richness throughout all
+the realm."
+
+[Footnote 209: Archdeacon Cunningham doubts this.]
+
+[Footnote 210: See p. 178.]
+
+This was not Emma's first connection with Ely. While she was yet the
+second wife of Ethelred the Unready (after whose death she married the
+victorious Canute), her younger son, Edward, afterwards King Edward
+the Confessor, had here been presented in infancy at the altar, and
+had been in childhood a pupil of the choir school, where his special
+proficiency in learning psalms and hymns gave promise of his future
+saintliness. The Ely choir school was, at this time, probably the most
+noted educational institution in England, and was under the direction
+of the Precentor, who had general charge over all the literary work of
+the house, such as the reproducing of books, etc. That this precocious
+scholar, who left Ely at nine years old, ultimately came to the
+throne, while Alfred, his elder brother, did not, is due to one of the
+most ghastly tragedies of English history.
+
+After the death of Canute in 1035, it became a question whether this
+same Alfred, "the Etheling" (_i.e._ Prince), Emma's eldest son by
+Ethelred, now a man of over thirty, or Harthacnut, her only son by
+Canute, a boy of sixteen, or one Harold, who, though not an Etheling,
+claimed to be Canute's eldest son, should be chosen King of England.
+Harold, in spite of grave doubts as to his paternity, "had all the
+cry"; and when Alfred, "the innocent Etheling," made an attempt to
+protect his widowed mother against the new King's oppression, he was
+sent as a prisoner by ship to Ely. Before being landed his eyes were
+put out, in a manner so brutal that he shortly died of the shock, to
+find a grave in the Abbey church under its western tower. The
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicler records this crime in a pathetic ballad,
+denouncing it as even beyond the horrors of the Danish wars:
+
+  "Nor was drearier deed
+   Done in this land,
+   Since Danes first came."
+
+That no blame need be attached to the monks of Ely for this atrocity
+is indicated by the fact that, when Alfred's brother, Edward the
+Confessor, came to the throne, he confirmed all their ancient
+charters, granting lands and privileges to the Abbey, and himself
+became a benefactor to the place of his education.
+
+With the Norman invasion, Ely again becomes a centre of war. Led by
+Christian the Bishop, and Osbiorn the Earl, a force of Danish
+adventurers had appeared in the Humber, professing to be the allies of
+the English in their struggle with the Normans. Their real object was
+to place their own King Sweyn, the nephew of Canute, on the throne of
+England, and, if foiled in this purpose, at least to enrich themselves
+with England's plunder. After partaking in scenes of devastation in
+Yorkshire, they sailed southward till they reached Ely, where they
+took up their quarters. Here the fenland folk forgathered with them,
+for the Norman was a more thoroughgoing oppressor than any Dane; and,
+in especial, the "strenuous" outlaw Hereward "the Wake" joined them
+"with his gang."
+
+To show their zeal against the French--and to indulge their lust of
+plunder--they set off, by water, to Peterborough, where the Abbey had
+been recently conferred on a Norman ruffian named Thorold. To save
+this good old English foundation from such degrading occupancy,
+Hereward, as their guide, led them on, first to sack and then to burn
+it to the ground. The Danes, having got their booty, promptly sailed
+away, while Hereward returned to Ely, there to make his memorable
+stand against William and the Normans. Fiction may have embroidered
+the tale of his prowess; but there remains a foundation of truth, even
+after the superstructure of romance has been removed. At Ely were now
+gathered together to him a mixed company of fugitives; misfortune,
+according to her repute, making strange bed-fellows.
+
+When William had conquered at Hastings, England, as a whole, was at
+first disposed to accept the verdict of battle, and to acknowledge
+his claim to the throne, as it had acknowledged Canute's. But when the
+necessities of his position, as the captain of an invading army,
+forced him to confiscate every estate in England (except the Church
+lands), and to bestow it on some Norman adventurer; when every single
+Englishman in high office, Sheriff and Alderman, Bishop and Abbot, was
+turned out to make room for a Frenchman,[211] the whole nation glowed
+with outraged patriotism, and Ely seemed likely to become a second
+Athelney, whence the spark of resistance to the tyrant might spread
+like wildfire throughout the length and breadth of the land.
+
+[Footnote 211: See my _History of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+And had there been a second Alfred this might well have actually come
+to pass. As it was, many of the magnates who could not brook
+submission retired to the "Camp of Refuge," as the Island of Ely now
+got to be called. This fastness, being surrounded on all sides by deep
+fens "as by a strong wall," promised them a sure retreat, and for a
+while enabled them to baffle all the efforts even of the mighty
+Conqueror to subdue them. Thither came Archbishop Stigand (deposed by
+the Conqueror to make way for the great Lanfranc); thither came the
+Abbot of St. Albans, thither came the valiant Ethelnoth, Bishop of
+Durham; thither came Morcar, the last Earl of Northumbria, "with many
+a hundred more," both clergy and laity. Here they received shelter and
+hospitality from Thurstan, the last of the English Abbots of Ely.
+
+By the general voice Hereward was chosen as their captain, and
+fortified the island against the Conqueror. William, on hearing of
+this, hastened to Cambridge with his whole army, and invested the
+place (so far as it was possible to invest it) both by land and water,
+building a castle at Wisbech on the north, and at Reach on the south.
+At Aldreth, where scarcely a mile of fen parted the Island from the
+mainland at Willingham, he made a floating bridge of trees and
+faggots, fastened underneath with cow-hides; but when his men
+attempted to cross it, the unsteady structure capsized, and that
+portion of the army engaged in the attempt was drowned.
+
+Perplexed and almost daunted, William, with his court and army,
+retired for a time to Brandon in Suffolk; while the refugees at Ely
+spent stirring days. The knights and churchmen were hospitably
+entertained in the refectory of the abbey, every man with his shield
+and lance hanging near him, to be ready in case of sudden alarm. Their
+days were diversified by raids into the surrounding country beyond the
+fens, to snatch what provisions they could for their fastness; and
+these raids of the islanders were so dreaded throughout the district,
+that its inhabitants were thankful for the protection of William's
+soldiery.
+
+Hereward, according to the legend, hearing that another attack was
+imminent, followed the example of Alfred the Great by betaking himself
+in disguise to Brandon to learn the King's designs. He found that
+William, by a judicious mixture of severity and conciliation, had won
+over a certain number of the outlying fen-folk, and had imposed upon
+them the task of conveying a great store of wood and faggots for him
+to Aldreth, with which to construct there a causeway once more.
+Hereupon Hereward, still in his disguise, feigned that he was himself
+one of these traitors to England, and eager above all the others to
+help the Conqueror against the marauding thieves of the Camp of
+Refuge. It was he who was foremost in collecting faggots for the
+wood-pile at Aldreth, and then, when all was gathered, who was it but
+Hereward that set it on fire so that all was lost? And once more, when
+the besiegers were making a third attempt to gain the island, under
+the auspices of a reputed witch whom the pious William deigned to
+employ for the sustaining of his men's sunken courage, it was Hereward
+who fired the reed-beds through which the foe was advancing, so that
+the whole column, witch and all, were involved in one common
+destruction.
+
+Finally William, finding that he could not reduce the island by force,
+resolved to bring it under by political pressure, and threatened to
+grant to his supporters all the Abbey lands within his power. On
+hearing this the Abbot and monks resolved to surrender, and they sent
+secret messengers to William, who was at Warwick, offering to submit
+to him on condition that he would spare the possessions of the Abbey.
+To this the King consented; and during Hereward's absence from Ely on
+a foraging expedition, he landed without resistance on the fen-girt
+island. Hereward on his return found that all was lost, and himself
+barely escaped with a few followers, to live on as outlaws in the
+greenwood for a few desperate years, till at length he, too, "came
+in," and was granted "the King's peace."
+
+On William's unopposed success through their connivance the monks
+fondly imagined that they had something to expect from his gratitude,
+and were preparing a formal welcome and act of submission when it
+should please him to visit the abbey church in thanksgiving for his
+victory. William, however, had other designs, and paid his visit
+without notice, at an hour when he knew that the brethren would be in
+the refectory at dinner. He stood alone before the High Altar, and
+casting upon it a single mark of gold, equivalent to about £150,
+quietly departed.
+
+Meanwhile the hapless monks were startled from their meal by the
+abrupt entrance of a Norman knight, Gilbert de Clare, with whom they
+had made interest, and who now rushed in shouting to them: "Ye
+wretched drivellers! Can ye choose no better time for guzzling than
+this when the King is here, yea, in your very church?" Instantly every
+monk sprang to his feet, and the whole community made a rush for the
+church. But it was too late. William was already well on his way out
+of Ely, and the unhappy monks had to run three miles before they
+caught up to him at Witchford. There they did at last succeed in
+impetrating his pardon, but he laid upon them a fine of no less than
+700 marks of silver,[212] to meet which almost all the ornaments of
+the church had to be melted down. The ingots were minted into coin in
+the abbey itself; but the moneyers employed proved fraudulent, and the
+royal officers at Cambridge, to whom the cash was paid, reported it
+deficient in weight. This gave William an excuse for laying on a
+further fine of 300 marks, so that altogether no less than the
+equivalent of £20,000 was wrung by him out of the Brotherhood.
+
+[Footnote 212: A mark of silver was worth 13_s._ 4_d._; a mark of gold
+was 100 shillings. A labourer's wage was at this date 1_d._ per day,
+so that these sums must be multiplied thirty-fold to get their
+equivalent value at the present day.]
+
+Yet the monks were not mistaken in thus casting in their lot with the
+Normans, for though William imposed these heavy fines upon them,
+though he heaped vexatious indignities upon them, though he inflicted
+shocking mutilations on their adherents (not on themselves, for he was
+careful to spare the monks in this respect), though he compelled them
+to maintain a foreign garrison of forty French knights at their very
+doors, yet in spite of all this the Abbey, with its seventy monks,
+prospered under his iron rule. The strange condition of the house at
+this juncture is vividly recorded for us by a picture, still preserved
+in the Bishop's palace at Ely and known as the "Tabula Eliensis."
+
+This "tabula" is a painting of no artistic merit, dating probably from
+the reign of Henry the Seventh, but copied from an older one which has
+perished. It is divided into forty squares, and in each of these
+appears a knight and a monk, the names of both being given fully and
+distinctly. The knight is helmeted and holds his drawn sword in his
+right hand, while between him and his neighbour, the cowled monk,
+hangs his shield emblazoned with his arms. All indicate how the
+knights and monks, when thus forced to dwell in close contact, became
+friendly together as time went by.
+
+Several of the monks bear names which show us that the ancient British
+stock of the Girvians still survived in the neighbouring fenlands.
+Among them we find, Donald, Evan, Cedd, Nigel, Duff, David,
+Constantine: names familiar to us in connection with Highland, Welsh,
+or Cornish literature. Strange as it seems to include such names as
+David and Constantine in this list, we have history, legend and
+geography to justify our counting them as in use among the later
+Britons. And it may be noted that, until the twelfth century at least,
+a man's name is an almost certain guide to his nationality, as (to
+some extent) it is to this day. After that, the old English
+nomenclature, both male and female, was almost wholly supplanted by
+that of the Normans; the only native names to survive being those of
+special heroes and saints, such as Alfred, Edward, Edmund, Edgar,
+Ethel, Audrey and Hilda.
+
+The nave and transepts of Ely Minster erected during the century that
+followed, still stand to show us to what splendid purpose Norman
+architects could design and Norman workmen could build. For here, as
+elsewhere throughout England, one of the first and most striking
+results of the Conquest was such an outburst of church building as the
+country had never yet known. Edgar's church, though barely a century
+old, was condemned as hopelessly out of date. Something on a much
+grander scale was now felt needful. The new Church was founded, in
+1083, by the aged Abbot Simeon, an act of great courage and faith in a
+man so old. He it was who began to build the north and south
+transepts. He also laid the foundation of the central tower and of an
+apsidal choir. Both tower and choir have fallen and been replaced, but
+the transepts stand to this day.
+
+As soon as the choir was ready for it, the body of the first Abbess
+was brought from the Anglo-Saxon church close by, built under Edgar
+the Peacemaker, where it had rested for 130 years, and was placed in
+the new Norman choir behind the high altar. At her feet was laid her
+sister Sexburga, who had succeeded her as Abbess, and, on either side,
+the sister and niece who had, each in turn, followed after her as
+rulers of the house. The earlier church was then pulled down. All this
+did not take place till 1106, and long before then Simeon, like his
+namesake a thousand years before, had sung his "Nunc dimittis,"
+leaving his work to be carried on by the devoted and energetic
+Richard, the last of the non-episcopal Abbots of Ely.
+
+For an event of even greater moment than the building of the church
+took place about this time. Early in the twelfth century, in order to
+quell some dispute that had arisen as to the authority of the Bishop
+of Lincoln over the Abbot of Ely, the Pope had consented, at the
+request of King Henry the First and Archbishop Anselm, that the Abbot
+of Ely should become a Bishop, with the Isle of Ely and the County of
+Cambridge as his See.[213] More than 700 years went by before any
+change was made in the extent of the diocese thus created; for it was
+not till 1837 that the counties of Huntingdon and Bedford and the
+western half of Suffolk were added to it.
+
+[Footnote 213: The county, at this time, comprised only the district
+south of the Isle. This ecclesiastical connection between it and the
+Isle was the first towards their later unification. See p. 8.]
+
+We owe to the creation of this Bishopric the very existence of Ely
+Minster as it now stands; had it remained merely an abbey, instead of
+being also a cathedral, it would have perished at the Reformation,
+along with the yet greater church at Bury St. Edmund's not far away,
+and with many another sister abbey throughout the land. At Ely, too,
+we should see before us ruined arches open to the sky, beautiful
+indeed and pathetic, but no longer a centre of worship. To this day
+the Bishop of Ely sits in his cathedral not as Bishop but as Abbot;
+not at the south-eastern but at the south-western end of the choir
+stalls, while the Dean occupies the seat once belonging to the Prior
+at the north-western end. Richard, as we have said, was the last of
+the Abbots of Ely who were Abbots and nothing else. Hervey, appointed
+in 1109, was the first Bishop-Abbot. He had already been Bishop of
+Bangor, whence he had been driven by a Welsh revolt.
+
+This may be the place to say something of the abnormal civil position
+held by the Bishops of Ely till recent times. Etheldreda, the
+foundress of the Abbey, reigned, as the widow of her first husband,
+Tonbert, over the whole Isle of Ely, and exercised therein the full
+Royal rights of secular jurisdiction. These rights passed on to the
+Abbesses who succeeded her, and then in turn to the Abbots who
+followed; they were confirmed by the Charter of Edgar in 970, and
+again by Edward the Confessor, and when the abbots became bishops they
+still continued to exercise this jurisdiction. Each succeeding Prelate
+enjoyed rights throughout the Isle somewhat resembling those of the
+Prince Bishops of the continent.
+
+This went on until Henry the Eighth fell upon the Church, and took
+away not only many of the Episcopal demesnes but also many of the
+Episcopal privileges (if indeed they may be so termed). Such rights as
+the King spared survived for 300 years longer. The Bishop of Ely still
+possessed a jurisdiction of considerable importance and dignity,
+holding almost sovereign authority within his "Franchise," which was
+styled "the Royal Franchise or Liberty of the Bishops of Ely." He
+himself appointed his own Judges to hear all cases within the Isle of
+Ely; Assize and Quarter Sessions were held in his name and at his
+pleasure; his chief bailiff acted as High Sheriff, and he nominated
+the magistrates. It was the Bishop's Peace, and not the King's Peace,
+against which malefactors throughout the Isle were held to offend.
+This went on till 1836, when on the death of Bishop Spark, these last
+remnants of Etheldreda's jurisdiction as Queen-Abbess ceased by Act of
+Parliament.
+
+But to this day there live on some far-off echoes of the Girvian
+principality. The Isle of Ely, with its three Rural Deaneries and
+forty-six benefices, is ecclesiastically under the immediate
+jurisdiction of the Bishop; no Archdeacon holds any authority there,
+as in other parts of the diocese, except in the parishes of Haddenham
+and Wilburton. True, we have an Archdeacon of Ely, but he ought
+rather to be designated Archdeacon of Cambridgeshire, for, with the
+exceptions named, beyond the limits of the county proper he is
+powerless. The Isle, moreover, has its own County Council quite
+distinct from that of Cambridgeshire, while the common High Sheriff of
+both divisions is nominated from each in turn.
+
+And in the very heart of London, close to Holborn Circus, traces of
+this civil jurisdiction still survive in Ely Place, where stands,
+abutting on houses of the most commonplace type, the beautiful chapel
+dedicated to St. Etheldreda, built at the close of the thirteenth
+century, and once attached to the town palace of the Bishops of Ely.
+Ely Place was a "Liberty," and, within the memory of those still
+living, the Royal writs did not run here, and no police-officer or
+sheriff could follow a debtor who had here taken sanctuary; it was,
+moreover, rated on a basis peculiar to itself. The "Liberty" is still
+governed by certain Commissioners, elected annually by the
+householders. It has its own day and night watchmen, with their
+gold-laced hats, who fulfil the function of policemen, and the silence
+of the night is, even in this twentieth century, broken by their call,
+hour by hour, as of yore. We all remember how Shakespeare makes
+Richard the Third say to the Bishop of Ely,
+
+  "My lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn
+   I saw good strawberries in your garden there,"
+
+and the reference to these lines in the "Ingoldsby Legends" is hardly
+less familiar. Palace, strawberries, garden are no more; the property
+once held in this region by the See of Ely has passed by purchase into
+other hands, but the chapel is still here, well tended, the same House
+of Prayer, after many vicissitudes, that it was 600 years ago; the din
+of modern city life being there shut out by walls eight feet thick.
+
+There exists in London one more very different relic of the old
+demesne of the Bishops of Ely. On the frontage of a great house in
+Dover Street, now occupied by the Albemarle Club, with massive stone
+facings without and marble halls within, there may be seen, over the
+second storey, a mitre carved in stone, shewing that once it was the
+abode of the Bishops of Ely; for after their old Palace in Holborn was
+sold, this "Ely House," built about 1775, took its place, to be sold
+in turn early in the twentieth century with a view to forming a
+nucleus toward the endowment of a new bishopric, when the proposed
+subdivision of the present diocese can be carried out. Times have
+changed; and the Bishop of Ely is now free from the burdensome luxury
+of an official residence in London.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+     Bishop Northwold.--Presbytery Dedicated.--Barons at Ely.--Fall of
+     Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon.--Queen Philippa.--Lady
+     Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich.--Bishop Alcock.--Bishop
+     West.--Styles of Architecture.--Monastic Industries.--Mediæval
+     Account Books.--Clothing and Food of Monks.--Benedictine
+     Rule.--Dissolution of Abbey.--Bishop Thirlby.--Bishop
+     Wren.--Bishop Gunning.--Bishop Turner.
+
+
+The fact that Ely had been made a Bishop's See did not prevent her
+from remaining a monastery, the home of busy monks, living in
+refinement and cleanliness according to the Benedictine Rule. Year by
+year they beautified their Abbey Church; the western tower rose stage
+by stage till it became, as it still continues to be, a landmark for
+the surrounding plain. During the episcopate of Eustace, lasting from
+1198 till 1215, the western porch, known as the Galilee, came into
+being.
+
+The year of his death was disastrous for Ely. It was then raided by a
+horde of foreign mercenaries, hired by King John to support him
+against the Barons; they robbed the Minster of its treasures, and only
+on receiving a heavy ransom were they dissuaded from burning it. "When
+the Barons" (who were in London, at that time their headquarters)
+"heard these things," writes the chronicler, Roger of Wendover, "they
+looked one upon the other and said, 'the Lord gave and the Lord hath
+taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
+
+Later in the same century a Choir, or Presbytery, of exquisite design
+and workmanship, in the Early English style, was thrown out eastward
+by Hugh de Northwold, Bishop of Ely from 1229 till 1254. We have heard
+already of this prelate, and we must now do more than mention his
+name. It was he who had been chosen to take the "toilsome and
+perilous" journey to Provence, thence to bring back Eleanor as bride
+for Henry the Third, and that weakling monarch turned to him on other
+occasions, when in need of a trusty servant.
+
+We read that the Presbytery of Ely Minster was built at the sole
+expense of Hugh, Bishop of that place, a special observer of all that
+was honourable and good. His hospitality knew no bounds. At the
+dedication of his presbytery and other works in the Minster, the King
+himself, with his eldest son, Prince Edward, a boy of thirteen, was
+present; innumerable prelates and nobles came to Ely, and after a due
+observance of spiritual festivities (which included the rededication
+of the whole church to St. Peter, St. Mary, and St. Etheldreda), were
+regally entertained by the Bishop in the leaden-roofed palace he had
+lately built; yet he lamented the small number of the assembled
+guests, declaring that the entertainment was in great measure shorn of
+its dimensions. He, however, "rejoiced in spirit that by God's favour
+he had been allowed to wait for that day, in which he had seen the
+happy consummation of all his designs."
+
+This dedication took place in 1252. "Two years later the good bishop
+died at his manor at Downham, and his body was carried with much
+reverence to Ely, where it was buried in a magnificent Presbytery
+which he had founded and built." Such is the witness of Matthew Paris,
+a contemporary chronicler. We may mention that the income of the See
+of Ely was at this time equivalent to £30,000 a year.
+
+Many years had gone by since the festivities thus described for us,
+when Henry and his son again appeared before Ely under very different
+circumstances. The Barons who had fought against the King, in their
+struggle to secure constitutional liberty, had met with a crushing
+defeat at Evesham (1265), where their heroic leader Simon de Montfort
+had been slain. Their lands had been virtually, though not nominally,
+confiscated, and for this reason they called themselves "the
+Disinherited," and gloried in the name. They refused to accept defeat,
+and made the Island of Ely their headquarters. In vain did the Bishop,
+Hugh de Balsham (the founder of Peterhouse), endeavour to prevent this
+occupancy of his domains; his efforts were fruitless, and only brought
+upon him the reproaches of the King and many others, who attributed
+his misfortunes to his incapacity. The insurgent Barons refused to
+quit the Island, and lived on there, supporting themselves by raid and
+pillage, as Hereward and his comrades had done of old. We are told
+that they entered Cambridge, and carried off abundance of booty; and
+that they seized on the persons of Jews and other rich citizens
+residing there, and took them back to the island as prisoners, to be
+set at liberty only on the payment of a heavy ransom.
+
+The inhabitants of Lynn, then as now the chief seaport of the Fenland,
+found these marauding Barons such objectionable neighbours, that they
+resolved on an expedition against them. A number of citizens, mostly
+of the lower orders, manned a fleet of boats and went up the river
+toward Ely. Forewarned of their coming, the insurgent Barons met them
+drawn up on the bank, with a great array of standards and banners;
+then, feigning terror at the approach of the enemy, they fled inland;
+whereupon the men of Lynn, unversed in war and its strategy, landed
+intent on pursuit. Suddenly they found themselves surrounded by the
+foe; in vain were their efforts to regain their boats; many were slain
+by the dauntless Barons, others were made prisoners, while the few who
+escaped were received with derision on their return to Lynn.
+
+The Bishop and the burghers of Lynn had failed alike to overcome the
+Disinherited; the Papal Legate now tried what he could do, as the
+state of affairs in the Fenland was growing desperate. He sent
+messengers admonishing the insurgents "to return to their Faith and to
+obedience to the Roman Curia, and to unity with Holy Mother Church;
+and to cease from robbery and to make reparation." To this, from their
+fastness, the Disinherited reply, "that they hold the same Faith as
+other Catholic men; that they believe and keep the articles of the
+Creed, that they believe in the Gospels, and in the Sacraments of the
+Church as the Church Catholic believeth, that they are ready to live
+and die for this Faith. They avow further that they do indeed owe
+obedience to the Church of Rome as the Head of all Christendom, but
+not to the avarice and greed of those who ought to govern it better."
+
+[Illustration: _Ely: The Presbytery._]
+
+They urge that they had been unjustly disinherited by order of the
+Legate, and that he ought to make amends to them; that he had been
+sent to England to make peace, but that by adhering to the King he
+kept up the war: that the Pope had ordered that no one should be
+disinherited, but that the King had demanded a ransom equivalent to
+disinheritance; that their first oath had been for the benefit of
+the kingdom and the whole Church; that they were still ready to die
+for it. They asserted, moreover, that many of the partisans of the
+King and Prince Edward had committed robberies, feigning that they
+belonged to the Disinherited; they insisted that their own lands must
+be restored to them, so that they might not be under the necessity of
+pillaging. Lastly, they exhort the Legate to recall his sentence;
+otherwise they would appeal to the Apostolic See, to a General
+Council, and, if needs must, to the Supreme Judge of all (_i.e._, the
+God of Battles), "seeing that they fight for the common weal of Church
+and Realm."
+
+Such was the daring message that, according to Matthew Paris, issued,
+in the year 1267, from the Fenland stronghold. The Bishop and the men
+of Lynn had failed to daunt the recusants, and now the Legate had met
+with no better success. The following year came the King in person,
+along with his valiant son Edward "Longshanks," to try what the Strong
+Hand could do; and besieged the island. We can imagine how the father
+and son, as they sighted Ely, must have felt the contrast between
+their approach this time and their arrival fifteen years before. Then
+all was peace and welcome, now it is bitter war. They had Scottish
+troops at their command, and by constructing bridges of hurdles and
+planks they forced an entrance to the island; and soon the insurgents
+had no choice but to yield; some surrendered, while the rest took to
+flight. Their cause seemed lost; but in truth it was destined to
+triumph, for when Edward the First, six years later, returned as King
+from his Crusade, he granted all, and more than all, that the Barons
+had asked for, by calling into being England's first representative
+Parliament.
+
+Throughout the course of these wars and tumults the House of God at
+Ely stood uninjured in beauty and security. But about the opening of
+the fourteenth century there appeared cracks in the great Central
+Tower. These massive Norman towers were not so strong as they looked,
+their piers being not, as they appeared to be, of solid stone, but
+only hollow pipes filled in with rubble. It was known that a similar
+tower at Winchester had fallen; the same disaster now threatened Ely;
+the monks were warned against entering the Abbey Church, and were
+bidden to say their office in an ancient chapel adjoining the Chapter
+House.
+
+The catastrophe long foreseen came to pass on February 22, 1322. Late
+in the evening, as the monks were retiring to their dormitories, "with
+such a shock," says the chronicler, "that it was thought an earthquake
+had taken place," the tower fell toward the east, crushing the walls
+and pillars of the Norman choir. Northwold's presbytery further east
+remained unhurt, nor did the shrine of St. Etheldreda behind the high
+altar receive any damage. The nave and transepts likewise escaped
+injury. No one was killed, for in consequence of the timely warning
+the church was deserted.
+
+Providentially the monk at this time in charge of the Cathedral fabric
+was an architect of rare genius, the most gifted, probably, that
+England has ever produced. For the Sacrist when this calamity befell
+was none other than the famous Alan of Walsingham, who was called by
+his contemporaries "the flower of craftsmen," and he it was who, in
+virtue of his office, was responsible for repairs. In the full vigour
+of life, a man of twenty-eight, who had been trained as a goldsmith,
+he rose to the occasion, and proved well able to cope with the problem
+and task before him.
+
+The chronicler tells us how he "rose up by night and came and stood
+over the heap of ruins, not knowing whither to turn. But recovering
+his courage, and confident in the help of God and of His kind Mother
+Mary, and in the merits of the holy virgin, Etheldreda, he set his
+hand to the work." In answer to his prayers, an inspiration came to
+him. In place of the square tower that had fallen, he would build one
+octagonal in form, with a wider base gained by cutting off the angles
+of the transepts and choir, and he would crown it with a lantern of
+woodwork. His idea was bold and original, and the lantern-crowned
+Octagon of Ely Cathedral as it now stands, a glorious specimen of the
+Decorated work of the fourteenth century, still bears witness to the
+genius and courage of the young architect who designed and engineered
+it, while at the same time he planned the reconstruction of the Norman
+choir.
+
+With this scheme in his mind, Alan of Walsingham set labourers at once
+to remove the huge mass of rubbish, and meantime he sent far and near
+to procure timber for the work in hand; while the famous quarries of
+Barnack in Northamptonshire supplied him with stone. By 1349, after
+twenty-six years of toil, the tower with its lantern of wood was
+finished. This wood was covered outside with lead, while within it was
+gorgeous with gold and stencilled painting, all the work of the most
+skilled hands that could be hired. We are told that the Sacrist
+himself provided gold florins to be turned into leaf by "Ralph le
+goldbeter." The very names of the workmen employed have an interest
+for us, as we read of John Attegrene, the master mason, of William
+Shank, the chief decorator, of John of Burwell, the best wood-carver.
+Nor must we forget John Hotham, of whom we shall hear more. Being
+Bishop at this juncture, he provided funds for the restoration and
+beautifying of his cathedral.
+
+King Edward the Third and his well-loved Queen Philippa came down to
+see the work, already famous, that was being carried out at Ely. In
+honour of her visit the Queen brought her robes of state, embroidered
+with "squirrels," first worn at her thanksgiving for the birth of the
+Black Prince. These robes she gave to the Prior John of Crauden, to be
+made into three copes and other vestments for the clergy. Whether the
+ancient cope still preserved at the Deanery can be identified as one
+of these is doubtful. It is of rich myrtle-green velvet, worked in
+gold thread, silk, and pearls, with plume-like flourishes that might
+well suggest the term "squirrels." Along its straight edge there is
+laid on a richly embroidered border, representing the Annunciation in
+the centre and saints with their emblems on either side. The design of
+the border indicates that it belongs to a date somewhat subsequent to
+1330, the year when the Black Prince was born; but, seeing that it is
+quite separate from the velvet, it must have been added later, and the
+main portion of the vestment may actually be part of Queen Philippa's
+gift.
+
+But we must not suppose that the Ely builders were engaged during
+these twenty-six years only on the Octagon Tower and the adjacent
+restoration. Almost contemporary with the tower is Prior Crauden's
+lovely chapel, built to the south of the Minster from the designs of
+Alan of Walsingham, while at the same time, adjoining the
+north-eastern transept, there arose the glorious Lady Chapel. The
+foundation-stone of this wondrously elaborated edifice was laid in
+1321, on Lady Day, by Alan of Walsingham himself; for it was he who,
+as architect, designed the building, though the actual carrying out of
+the work was committed to John of Wisbech, the Subsacrist of the
+Abbey.
+
+The funds were partly supplied by Bishop Montacute (whose premature
+death prevented the full completion of the design); partly by "the
+alms of the Faithful," or, as we should now say, by public
+subscription, and partly from a find of treasure-trove which is thus
+picturesquely described by the Abbey chronicler:
+
+     "Now when the aforesaid chapel was in beginning, this Brother
+     John had but little money in hand, or laid by, for the
+     prosecution of so great a work. He betook himself therefore to
+     prayer, and thereafter called his mates together, some being
+     monks, some, likewise, seculars. And them he besought to meet at
+     a certain hour, and help him in digging out a square trench which
+     might serve for the foundation of the whole fabric.
+
+     "At the appointed time, accordingly, they met one night, and
+     began to dig, each separately by himself in the place assigned to
+     him. Thus it chanced that the aforesaid Brother John was digging,
+     all alone by himself, in the place allotted to him. And, by the
+     special will, as we verily believe, of God, he found there, not
+     one of his mates wotting thereof, a brazen pot full of money, as
+     if placed there on purpose to relieve his need.
+
+     "And when the whole night was well nigh spent, in the earliest
+     dawn, a small rain came on, to the annoyance of those digging.
+     Calling then his mates from their work, he said: 'Brethren mine,
+     and fellow labourers, yea, most heartily do I thank you for all
+     your long and well-wrought task. And good it is now to pause a
+     little after your work. Therefore I commend you to God. And may
+     He pay you a full worthy wage for your labour.' But when they
+     drew off, he himself remained on the spot all alone, and bare off
+     that urn, as secretly as he might, and hid it in the dormitory
+     under his own bed. And he took that money, all befouled with rust
+     as it was, and cleansed off the rust by rubbing it with chalk and
+     water, and paid therefrom, while it lasted, the wages of his
+     workmen."
+
+From this account it would seem that this money was not gold, as that
+never tarnishes, but silver; probably old Saxon coins hidden at the
+time of the Danish sack of Ely. Even in the fourteenth century money
+was still largely estimated by weight, without much regard to the
+particular coinage; so that these old pennies would still be good
+currency.
+
+The chapel is surrounded by seats of stone, each with its canopy of
+the same material, a veritable dream of artistic design and
+workmanship. With its completion, at the close of the year 1348, John
+of Wisbech ended his work on earth; a few months later, on June 18th,
+1349, he, like many another priest of these eastern counties, fell a
+victim to the Black Death, which in some districts slew nine priests
+out of ten. He left as his monument this church, a wonderful example
+of the latest Decorated work, in its detailed sculpture and all but
+Perpendicular windows. It is built of clunch, a local stone that lasts
+well for interior use, but perishes somewhat when exposed to the
+weather. This was brought by water from Reach, where the great
+quarries from which it was hewn may still be seen.
+
+This chapel was built, as its name denotes, in honour of the Virgin;
+above and below its canopies stood figures of exquisite grace,
+representing, for the most part, scenes from her life as related in
+the Apocryphal Gospels and later legends then current. For two hundred
+years these sculptures remained intact, till Thomas Goodrich became
+Bishop in 1533. He held the See for twenty-one years, and he made it
+his business deliberately to deface all this statuary. We may
+attribute his action either to his zeal for the extirpation of
+Mariolatry, or to his fear lest sacred legend should be confounded
+with sacred history. Whatever may have been the actuating motive, his
+deeds as an iconoclast remain before our eyes. In October, 1541, he
+issued a mandate to the clergy of his diocese, ordering the utter
+abolition and destruction of all shrines, images, and relics; and we
+find it hard to forgive him for such indiscriminating breakage, even
+when we remember how much we owe to him for his admirable setting
+forth of our duty to God and to our neighbour preserved to us in the
+Catechism of the Church of England. He was also the translator of St.
+John's Gospel in the version known as the "Bishop's Bible."
+
+[Illustration: _Ely Lantern._]
+
+With the close of the fourteenth century the development and
+beautifying of Ely Minster almost comes to a standstill. She is rich
+in Norman, in Early English, in Decorated work; but when Perpendicular
+architecture arose, that type peculiar to England, there came a pause
+at Ely; and the instances of the Perpendicular style to be met with
+here are comparatively unimportant insertions. In Bishop Alcock's
+Chapel, built by 1500, we meet with late Perpendicular work; while in
+Bishop West's, built about 1525, are traces of the Renaissance
+decoration that came in with the revival of classical literature and
+art. Such decoration gained hardly any foothold in England, and is
+extremely rare within our shores, but on the Continent it swept away
+before its inrush many a shrine of earlier date, sparing nothing for
+the sake of its associations or antiquity. With Bishop West's Chapel,
+the story of growth and development closes. Then came the
+Reformation under Henry the Eighth, and we come face to face with the
+work of iconoclasts rather than of builders.
+
+Of all English cathedrals Ely perhaps possesses the most complete
+series of every style of Gothic architecture; and as the Minster
+records and registers relating to the whole period of her construction
+have been fortunately preserved, we can date approximately every arch
+and window, knowing when it was built, and, in many cases, who was the
+builder. Thus Ely provides a key to the dating of all English Gothic
+architecture. As we travel through our own country, and on the
+Continent, we realise the marvellous solidarity that in those Middle
+Ages held Christendom together. Whenever a new architectural
+development calculated to promote beauty, strength, or light, came
+into being in one Catholic land, it spread without fail to the others,
+even to those furthest removed; what was the fashion in Italy, Spain,
+or France became the fashion in Scotland, and, so long as the Latin
+Kingdom of Jerusalem endured, even in the Holy Land; where the
+Crusaders built most diligently, as the yet surviving ruins of their
+churches and castles abundantly demonstrate, even to the present day.
+
+But with the development of the Perpendicular style, about the year
+1375, England began to strike out a line of her own. Buildings of this
+insular type arose, year by year, all over our land, but it never came
+into vogue on the Continent, where the more floreated styles of
+architecture, known as Flamboyant, became prevalent; while in England
+there was a reaction in the opposite direction in favour of less
+ornate tracery.
+
+Roughly speaking we may say that mediæval architecture in England
+occupied four periods:
+
+Norman architecture prevailed from 1075 to 1175;
+
+Early English from 1175 to 1275;
+
+Decorated from 1275 to 1375;
+
+Perpendicular from 1375 till stopped by the Reformation.
+
+In a careful study of the history of Ely Cathedral we shall find a
+confirmation of these dates.
+
+Let us, for instance, stand outside the Minster at the east end, and
+we shall have before our eyes specimens of all these four great styles
+of Gothic architecture. We can see early Norman work in the transepts
+begun under Simeon, who was Abbot from 1081 to 1093. If we direct our
+attention to the east window with its lancet-shaped lights, built by
+Hugh de Northwold, Bishop from 1229 to 1254, we shall gain an idea of
+the exquisite grace and beauty of Early English architecture. In the
+windows of the Lady Chapel, constructed under John Hotham, Bishop from
+1316 to 1337, we see Decorated work, with its branching tracery, at
+its culminating point; while in the chapel built by Bishop West, who
+filled the See of Ely from 1515 to 1533, on the south side of the east
+window, we have an instance of Perpendicular tracery, with its
+characteristic upright shafts running straight from the top to the
+bottom of the window. Comparing the table given above with the dates
+at which the work before us is known to have been carried out, we
+shall find it confirmed, and we may gain much by letting it be well
+impressed on our minds.
+
+At Ely one feature of beauty is lamentably absent, namely stained
+glass contemporary with the building. In the Cathedrals of York and
+Lincoln much ancient glass survives, while remnants exist in many
+village churches; but at Ely, once no less richly be-jewelled, nearly
+all has been swept away. There is no record of its destruction, which
+may have taken place under the unsparing hand of Bishop Goodrich, or a
+century later, it may be, during the Civil Wars. We are the losers,
+and we can hardly feel that our loss is made good by the coloured
+glass with which during the last hundred years many of the windows
+have been refilled, though here and there fine modern glass sheds its
+glow on the grey stonework around.
+
+Yet as we walk round this glorious Minster, surveying it whether from
+within or from without, the feeling uppermost in our minds is rather
+one of thankfulness that so much has been spared than of indignation
+that so much has been destroyed. We can understand what the
+poet-philosopher Coleridge meant when he spoke of Gothic architecture
+as "Infinity made imaginable"; and we may enter into the feelings of
+the peasant woman who, in simpler language, expressed the same idea,
+when after her visit to Ely Minster she remarked, "That Cathedral is
+like a little Heaven below; everybody should see it, both rich and
+poor."
+
+We have now come to the end of the story of the building of Ely
+Minster; her Bishops and Deans have since then had enough to do in
+keeping her stonework in repair without adding to it; and this work of
+restoration has been carried on from century to century with real, if
+sometimes misguided, devotion. Originators have had their day; the
+repairer is now in possession.
+
+Great as were the architectural achievements of the seventy monks of
+Ely, we must not suppose that all their time went in superintending
+such work. We do not know, indeed, whether they did much of it with
+their own hands at all. We have, it is true, seen John of Wisbech, the
+builder of the glorious Lady Chapel, himself digging out the
+foundations with his mates; but on the other hand we are told how
+skilled artisans from a distance were hired to undertake the more
+delicate work in completing the lantern. That the Brethren spent much
+time in writing we have abundant proof. Our own familiar word _ink_ is
+a standing testimony to their industry in this respect, being derived
+from _inc._, the abbreviation universally used in the Abbey account
+books for _incaustum_, the Latin word for their writing fluid.
+
+In the reign of William Rufus, that monarch's Commissioners came to
+Ely, and carried off 300 volumes from the Abbey library, besides all
+the Service books; and we need hardly doubt that most of these books,
+if not all, had been copied on the spot. One beautifully written
+Breviary from Ely is still to be seen in the University Library at
+Cambridge. It is of the fourteenth century.
+
+The monks and Bishops were, moreover, constructors of bridges, of
+roads, and of causeways; they made new ones, they restored the old;
+and they were licensed to exact tolls for the upkeep of their work. In
+1480 Bishop Morton led the way towards the draining of the Fens, by
+cutting the great drain, forty feet across, extending twelve miles,
+from Peterborough to Guyhirn, and still known as Morton's Leam. The
+Bishops also built numerous episcopal residences. Among others, Ely
+Place in Holborn, a castle at Wisbech, palaces at Somersham and
+Downham, manor houses at Doddington, at Fen Ditton, at Hatfield, were
+erected as the centuries slipped by; and seeing that the Bishops were
+also Abbots of Ely, we may believe that the monks did their part in
+carrying out episcopal work.
+
+Ely possesses a unique record of her early days in her celebrated
+Liber Eliensis, a folio volume of 189 leaves of vellum, ten and
+a-half inches by seven and a-half, begun by Thomas, a monk of the
+convent, who lived about the close of the twelfth century, and
+professing to give the history of the monastery from its foundation up
+to his own day. Two copies of this manuscript are known to exist,
+bearing witness to the industry of the monks as scribes, while others
+have doubtless perished. The monks of Ely, moreover, wrote the
+Episcopal Rolls and Registers with the utmost care; these are still
+preserved with their entries as to the expenditure of money, as to
+ordinations, as to the granting of indulgences, as to appeals to the
+Pope, all kept with scrupulous exactitude.
+
+Ely is rich, moreover, beyond most foundations, in other written
+records of her past; and these are preserved, some in the Cathedral
+library, some in the muniment room of the dean and chapter forming
+part of the restored "Steeple" or "Sextry" gateway, some in the
+library of Lambeth Palace, some in the British Museum. The existing
+rolls, or account books, kept by the chief officers of the monastery,
+number 288 in all, and give us full and clear detail as to what was
+spent not only on the building, the alms, and the services of the
+Abbey Church, but also on the food, the wine, the clothing, and the
+medicine of the monks. One item of medicine is "dragon's blood," one
+of food is "blankmang, a mixture of rice and almonds."
+
+The following summary from the Chamberlain's Roll, recounting what was
+the cost of clothing a monk, will show us that he was expected to
+dress with dignity and comfort. The clothing of an Ely monk was really
+a very serious item of expenditure. A monk, like the parson of a
+church, was in England _ex officio_ a gentleman; and his maintenance
+cost his convent the equivalent of £200 per annum (in the present
+value of money).[214] Of this sum at least a fourth went in clothing,
+which, as compared with food, was much dearer then than now. The
+account books still preserved at Ely give us the items. Each monk
+received annually the following garments (for which we give the value
+at the present rate of money):
+
+                                  £   _s._  _d._
+
+  1 Cowl                          1    0     0
+  1 Monk's Frock                  5   10     0
+  1 Pellice[215]                  3    0     0
+  1 Winter coat                   4   10     0
+  1 Summer ditto                  4    5     0
+  1 Shirt (?)                     2    5     0
+  1 Pair of linen drawers         3    0     0
+  2 Pair boots[216]               2    5     0
+  1 Pair Gaiters and Slippers     1    5     0
+  1 "Wilkok"[217]                     10     0
+  1 Counterpane                   4   10     0
+  1 Coverlet                      2    0     0
+  1 Blanket[218]                      12     6
+
+[Footnote 214: We find the monks complaining that the £300 a year
+(equivalent to £9,000 now), to which the Abbey income sank in the
+twelfth century would barely support forty monks. The best working
+standard by which to ascertain how much money is worth in any given
+age is the current day-wage of a labourer. In the fourteenth century
+this was 1_d._; it is now 2_s._ 6_d._ Therefore money went thirty
+times as far then as now.]
+
+[Footnote 215: This was a cassock lined with wool. The word _surplice_
+is derived from it, being an alb roomy enough to wear over a pellice.]
+
+[Footnote 216: The boots were of soft leather rising nearly to the
+knee.]
+
+[Footnote 217: This was probably the head-covering which the monks of
+Ely wore, by special licence from the Pope, "on account of the windy
+situation of their church." The name may survive in our modern
+"billy-cock."]
+
+[Footnote 218: The blanket was 3-1/2 yards long, as blankets are
+still.]
+
+This was in the year 1334,[219] and is a fair average specimen of the
+cost, which varied very little from year to year. Readers of Chaucer
+will remember how comfortably, and even luxuriously, he represents his
+monk in the Canterbury Tales as being dressed. The old garments of the
+monks were, at the end of the year, returned to the Camerarius for
+distribution amongst the poor.
+
+[Footnote 219: It is given by Bishop Stubbs, in his _Historical
+Memorials of Ely_.]
+
+Each monk had to enter the convent provided with a pair of blankets,
+garments of all kinds, bedding, towels, a bag for clothes for the
+wash, a furred tunic, day and night boots, a silver spoon, and many
+other articles. The novices had tablets hung round their necks on
+which to write in pencil each breach of the rule as it was committed
+lest it should be forgotten in the public confession of such formal
+transgressions which every brother had to make at the daily Chapter.
+These youths had also each to carry, in a pouch provided for the
+purpose, a knife, a comb, a needle, and some thread.
+
+A complete set of Cellerarius Rolls is preserved at Ely, and these
+give a full account of the food in use in the monastery, with details
+as to its cost; and it appears to have been both wholesome and
+plentiful. Beef, mutton, venison, bacon, fowls, fish, butter,
+vegetables, rice, and sugar were provided, and bread of five different
+qualities. No less than 2,450 eggs were required for a single week's
+consumption. There was an ample allowance of milk; but the principal
+drink was beer, made in the brewhouse bequeathed to the convent by
+Bishop Hugh de Balsham, and supplied, like the bread, in five
+different qualities, the most inferior being known as "Skegman." All
+the food was in charge of the Cellerarius and Granatarius, themselves
+brethren of the monastery. The latter functionary was responsible for
+the bread and the beer, as being both made from grain. Wine was only
+produced at special festivals, and was almost wholly imported from
+Bordeaux, Oporto, or Xeres in Andalusia; a trade still recorded in our
+current words "port" and "sherry." For though vineyards were common in
+mediæval England (and notably at Ely, as the epitaph to Alan of
+Walsingham reminds us), yet they very seldom produced drinkable wine,
+and practically existed only to supply vinegar, a condiment much in
+use for rendering dry fish less unpalatable.
+
+The Benedictine Rule was strict in itself. The day began at 2 a.m.,
+when every monk had to leave his bed for Mattins and Lauds, a Service
+occupying two hours. Then came an hour during which he might return to
+his bed,[220] to be waked again at 5 a.m., for Prime and Terce.[221]
+Then followed the daily Chapter Meeting, when the work of the coming
+day was apportioned, and the faults of the past day rebuked. This
+ended, all had to attend Low Mass, and at eight o'clock High Mass,
+which was over by ten. Then, and not till then, the monks partook of
+the first meal of the day. For this they repaired to the refectory,
+and on entering they paused and saluted with a profound bow the
+crucifix, hanging over the High Table, and known to them as the
+"Majestas." (This title was due to the phrase in the familiar hymn,
+_Vexilla Regis_, "God reigneth from the tree."[222]) Their food was
+eaten in silence while portions of Scripture were read aloud by one
+of the brethren. He was bound to prepare this reading carefully, and
+was directed to avoid all hurry, and to repeat any passage of special
+note, in order that it might make the deeper impression on his
+hearers. After this came study in the Cloisters, varied by a stroll in
+the Burial Ground for meditation on mortality. At 3 p.m. they went
+again to the church, to sing Vespers; at 5 p.m. came supper with the
+same accompaniment as the morning meal; Compline followed; and then it
+was bed-time. On some occasions the Rule was relaxed and the monks
+were allowed to take part in quiet games, particularly at
+Christmastide.
+
+[Footnote 220: The beds were stuffed with hay, which the Camerarius
+was bound to change once a year, at the annual cleaning of the
+dormitory.]
+
+[Footnote 221: The remaining "Short" Offices were probably said, Sext
+after High Mass, and Nones at mid-day (whence our word Noon).]
+
+[Footnote 222: In this earliest type of crucifix Christ was royally
+crowned and robed (as in the famous _Volto Santo_ at Lucca). See p.
+288.]
+
+Once in six weeks each monk had to undergo the _Minutio sanguinis_, or
+blood-letting, supposed in those days to conduce to health; and this
+drove him into the infirmary, where he had to spend about a week along
+with a batch of his brethren undergoing the same treatment. This
+custom, which sounds to us so unreasonable, tended at least to break
+the monotony of monastic life. Those who could stand it all, and gain
+good by it, must have been men of iron both in mind and body.
+
+Such was the discipline through which those men had to pass who built
+Ely Minster, and dwelt and worshipped there for close upon nine
+hundred years. The "Liber Eliensis" tells us "There was one Rule for
+all; the chief requirement was obedience, love of sacred worship, and
+a full resolve to maintain the honour of God's House." In words that
+form part of their Rule, they could say "We believe that the Divine
+Presence exists everywhere, but above all when we attend Divine
+Service."
+
+In the year 1539 the Monastery was dissolved by Henry the Eighth, and
+reconstituted as a Chapter of Dean and Canons. As we read this the
+question forces itself upon our minds "What became of the monks thus
+disbanded?" At Ely the monastery could, it is true, hold seventy
+monks, but the full roll were seldom, if ever, in residence at one
+time. After the Black Death (in 1349) the number fell to twenty-eight;
+and in the year 1532, seven years before the monastery was dissolved,
+there were only thirty-six monks on the spot, besides the Prior.
+Father Gasquet, a most diligent searcher into the history of that
+time, allows that, in spite of all his labour, "hardly any detail of
+the subsequent lives of those ejected from the dismantled cloisters of
+England is known to exist." It is, however, recorded that three of the
+Ely monks, being noted as good choir men, received a pension of £8 a
+year (equivalent to about £80 now) besides an office. But such traces
+are scanty indeed; some monks who were priests were appointed to the
+cure of souls; others lived on the pensions allotted to them which
+were usually equivalent to about £50 a year, paid as a rule fairly and
+punctually; some received on quitting the monastery a grant of money;
+we hear that one band of monks went out into the world each with a sum
+of twenty-six shillings and eightpence in his pocket (barely £15 at
+the present value of money). Such was the fate of the inmates of the
+Abbeys that submitted to the demands of the King, as did Ely under
+Goodrich, the last of the Abbots. Where "voluntary surrender" was
+refused, as it was by the Abbots of Glastonbury, Reading, Jervaulx,
+and other Houses, on the ground that their monastery was "not theirs
+to give," the monks were turned adrift without any provision
+whatsoever for the future. Some fled to the Continent, others to
+Scotland, while many died as the natural result of a sudden change in
+their mode of life combined with privation and distress.
+
+It is nearly four hundred years since all these changes befell Ely.
+Many devoted men have during these long years filled the See, men of
+mettle, of learning and piety. Among others we may mention Thomas
+Thirlby, Bishop from 1554-1559 during the reign of Mary Tudor, who was
+deposed under Elizabeth on refusing to take the oath of the royal
+supremacy, "having declared that he would sooner die than consent to a
+change of religion." For this he was imprisoned in the Tower for three
+years, till a visitation of the plague led to his being sent from the
+infected air of London to the purer atmosphere of Canterbury, as the
+prisoner-guest of Archbishop Parker, under whose charge he remained
+for seven years. His imprisonment does not appear to have been
+rigorous, as far as physical comfort was concerned; but, with the
+illiberality universal in those days, he was denied the consolations
+of his religion; he might neither say nor hear Mass, he might read no
+books except Protestant ones; he might write no letters, nor even
+converse with anyone save under strict supervision. At Lambeth Palace
+lodging was provided for him, till he died in the summer of 1570, and
+was buried in the adjoining Parish Church.
+
+In the reign of James the First, from 1609-1619, Ely had as her Bishop
+Lancelot Andrewes, whose well-known Book of Devotions bears witness to
+his piety. That he was also a man of culture is evident by his being
+chosen to be one of the translators of the Bible.
+
+In Matthew Wren, who was Bishop of Ely for twenty-nine years, from
+1638-1667, we meet with another prisoner for his faith. Bishop Wren
+was anti-puritan in his aims; throughout his diocese his influence was
+exercised in favour of the re-introduction of reverent ceremonial in
+public worship; and for this he was sent to the Tower, where he
+remained for eighteen years, till the Restoration set him free and
+brought him back once more to his well-loved Cathedral.
+
+He died in 1667, and by his own wish was buried in the chapel of
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, which he had built as a thankoffering for
+his release from prison--(that prison which his friend Archbishop Laud
+had left only for the scaffold); his nephew, the famous Christopher
+Wren, being engaged as architect. Thirty years before, he had, while
+Master of Peterhouse, built from his own designs the chapel of that
+college. The two chapels still face each other across the Cambridge
+street in strange contrast. The earlier one betokens an effort to
+restore Gothic architecture; the later shows that classical ideals
+had, for the time being at least, won the day.
+
+Peter Gunning, who was Bishop of Ely for eight years, from 1675 to
+1683, had likewise faced imprisonment for the sake of his religion. As
+vicar of the church of St. Mary the Less at Cambridge, and later at
+Tunbridge, while on a visit to his mother, he preached sermons in
+support of King Charles the First and in defence of the Church of
+England, which excited against him the resentment of the prevailing
+faction and led to his imprisonment. But before long he regained his
+liberty and returned to Cambridge, where, on his refusing to subscribe
+the Covenant, he was deprived of the Fellowship he held at Clare Hall.
+He then sought refuge with the King at Oxford; and on the surrender of
+that city to the Parliamentary forces betook himself to London, where
+his use of the English Liturgy, and the sermons preached by him in the
+Exeter House Chapel, drew down upon him the censure of Cromwell in
+person. At the Restoration he was given posts of high responsibility.
+He was called upon to assist at the Savoy Conference in the
+remodelling of the Book of Common Prayer, in which the "Prayer for all
+sorts and conditions of men," compiled by him, took its place. At
+Cambridge he held successively within the next ten years the
+Masterships of St. John's and of Corpus Christi, and was also
+successively the Lady Margaret and the Regius Professor of Divinity;
+he was appointed to the See of Chichester in 1670, and in 1675 was
+translated to Ely, where, after eight years, he died. It is recorded
+of him that in 1678 he had the courage to raise in the House of Lords,
+where he sat as Bishop of Ely, a strong protest against the shameful
+Test Act, which imposed upon all civil servants of the Crown, all
+officers, both in army and navy, all professional men, lawyers,
+doctors, and teachers of every grade, that odious formula, the
+so-called Royal Declaration, an age-long source of bitterness, now,
+happily, at last, no longer Royal.
+
+Francis Turner likewise, who held the See from 1684 till 1691, was yet
+another Bishop of Ely who suffered for his principles. He was one of
+the famous seven bishops committed to the Tower in 1688 for refusing
+to promulgate James the Second's Declaration of Indulgence, which they
+regarded as an unjustifiable stretch of the royal prerogative; and
+later he was deprived of his bishopric for declining, as a non-juror,
+to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, whom he considered
+to be usurpers of the royal dignity; showing thus (as Sir Walter Scott
+puts it) that while he could, in the interests of what he held to be
+justice, resist his sovereign, even in the plenitude of his power,
+like a free-born subject, so he would at all sacrifices maintain what
+he believed to be his king's legitimate rights, even in the depths of
+his adversity, like a loyal one.
+
+[Footnote 223: See page 274.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+     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 mediæval 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. Mediæval 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 mediæval 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 mediæval, 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."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+     Monuments.--West's Chapel.--Alcock's Chapel.--Northwold
+     Cenotaph.--Basevi.--Shrine of Etheldreda.--Lady Chapel.--View
+     from Tower.--Triforium.--Exterior of Minster.--Palace, "Duties"
+     of Goodrich.--St. Mary's.--St. Cross.--Cromwell's
+     House.--Cromwell at Ely.--St. John's Farm.--Theological
+     College.--Waterworks.--Basket-making.
+
+
+The monuments within the Ambulatory may now claim our attention.
+Starting at the southern entrance, let us look first at a canopy of
+coloured stone, the tomb of De Luda, Bishop of Ely from 1290 to 1298.
+The builder of Ely Chapel,[226] Holborn, he was eminent for learning,
+and was keen to enrich the See; as a man of note he was sent by Edward
+the First to France to settle terms of peace. Here we can study the
+details of Decorated work at its best. Close at hand is Bishop
+Barnett's tomb of grey marble, of a date somewhat later, robbed of the
+effigy in brass which was once part of it. Next we come to the
+cenotaph of Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, who lived during the Wars of
+the Roses. He had travelled to Jerusalem, and had made his home in
+Italy, and was known as "The Pilgrim Scholar." A pioneer of Greek,
+then reviving in the schools of Western Europe as the result of the
+fall of Constantinople, he was also a patron of Caxton and his novel
+printing press. Under Edward the Fourth he tried his hand at governing
+Ireland, where his cruelty toward the Lancastrians gained for him the
+name of "the Butcher." He was beheaded in 1470, and appears here in
+marble lying between his two wives. Next note Bishop Hotham's tomb, of
+the Decorated period. His name is familiar to us as having promoted by
+every means in his power the work carried out by Alan of Walsingham.
+
+[Footnote 226: See p. 322.]
+
+So far the tombs we have noticed have stood in a line under three
+arches of the Presbytery, as the eastern part of the Choir is called:
+we now turn to the south aisle to look at that of Peter Gunning,
+Bishop of Ely under Charles the Second, who wrote (as we mentioned
+before) the prayer to which we owe the phrase "All sorts and
+conditions of men." The mitred bishop rests his head on one hand, in
+an attitude somewhat ungainly, and his monument is of little artistic
+merit. But the resolute, delicately-cut features deserve our study,
+and the epitaph is of interest as recording how he had vindicated the
+Church of England in the presence of Cromwell himself. Let us pause a
+few steps further east to look at the calm face of Canon Selwyn, a
+nineteenth century lover of the cathedral; and then, as we pass the
+tomb of Bishop Eustace, who built the western porch, let us go back in
+thought to the far-off troublous days of King John.
+
+From the Retro-choir we enter Bishop West's chapel, rich with the
+ornament of Perpendicular architecture at its highest pitch of
+elaboration. Nicholas West was Bishop of Ely under Henry the Eighth,
+from 1515 to 1533; and little did he foresee that the sanctuary he was
+adorning with the devotion of a lover who offers of his best would be
+despoiled and defaced by his own immediate successor in the See.
+
+He was no novice as an architect when he came to Ely; for while Dean
+of Windsor he had completed the vaulting of St. George's Chapel. This
+chantry abounds in work characteristic of the Renaissance, extremely
+rare in England. Again and again, always with arabesque ornament that
+recalls the designs of Raphael in the Loggie of the Vatican, is
+reproduced the bishop's favourite motto, _Gratia Dei sum quod sum_
+("By the grace of God I am what I am"), alluding, it may be, to his
+own humble parentage; for, born the son of a baker in Putney, he rose
+to be Bishop of Ely, and to live "in the greatest splendour of any
+prelate of his time"; he kept a hundred servants; nor did he forget
+the poor, feeding two hundred of them daily at his gate; or it may be
+that the motto refers to his having in early life brought upon himself
+disgrace by his violent temper. He had been turned from these evil
+ways to become the friend and ally of the two saintliest men in
+England--Sir Thomas More and Bishop Fisher.
+
+Besides embellishing this chapel with this motto, he adorned it
+further with exquisite statuary. Here delicate canopies, upwards of
+two hundred in number, still overhang corresponding pedestals, on
+which there stood once, for a few short years, statuettes of
+workmanship equally delicate; but of these nothing is left beyond a
+few traces of their feet, which being carved out of the solid stone
+did not give way when the tiny statue of which they formed a part was
+broken off by the mandate of Bishop Goodrich. When the quarrel arose
+between Henry the Eighth and the Pope as to his repudiating Catharine
+of Aragon, Bishop West was true throughout to the cause of the injured
+Queen; but he died in 1533, just before the bursting of the storm in
+which his friends, More and Fisher, laid down their lives, and was
+buried in the chapel that bears his name.
+
+Here, too, lie the bones of the great Earl Brithnoth, who, as we
+remember, was brought back hither headless, from the battle of Maldon,
+by the monks of Ely to be buried amongst them according to their
+promise. We connect this warrior's character with the dying words
+attributed to him in Anglo-Saxon poetry, "God, I thank Thee for all
+the joy that I have had of Thee in life."[227] Other Anglo-Saxon
+worthies of the ninth and tenth centuries rest also in this chapel: an
+Archbishop of York, a Swedish Bishop, and several Bishops of Elmham,
+in Suffolk, and Dorchester, in Oxfordshire--Sees which were in later
+years transferred to Norwich and Lincoln respectively. It is held that
+these were retired prelates, who had come to end their days at Ely;
+where they were welcome guests, as they were licensed by the Diocesan
+to perform the often-needed episcopal functions of the Abbey, without
+calling in the distant and over-busied Bishop of Dorchester, to whose
+See Ely belonged. This was a convenience both to the Brotherhood and
+to the Diocesan himself. The names of Earl Brithnoth and of these
+contemporaries are inscribed on tablets let into the wall of this
+chantry.
+
+[Footnote 227: See p. 312]
+
+Touching it on the northern side, behind the screen of the High Altar,
+we see a fine tomb, Perpendicular in style, where lies buried the
+Cardinal de Luxembourg, a foreign prelate presented to the See of Ely
+in 1438 by King Henry the Sixth, but never (it seems) canonically
+confirmed as Bishop. In order to gain space for his chapel, Bishop
+West did not scruple to take a slice off the tabernacled work of
+unrivalled beauty that adorned this adjoining tomb, but the northern
+side he left in its perfection. Notice, too, close at hand, a bronze
+monument to Dr. Mills, professor of Hebrew, who died about the middle
+of the nineteenth century. The recumbent figure is of great beauty.
+
+Next we come to Bishop Alcock's chapel, occupying the northern corner
+of the ambulatory, as Bishop West's does the southern. It was built, a
+generation earlier, by Bishop Alcock only a few years after his
+reconstitution of St. Radegund's Priory at Cambridge as Jesus College,
+recorded in our sixth chapter, and is marked as his by the frequent
+recurrence of his "canting" armorial bearings, a shield and crest _all
+cocks_, or, rather, black cocks' heads. He was a great builder, a
+great worker, and, like many another ecclesiastic of his day, a great
+politician, being Lord President of Wales, and Comptroller of the
+Royal Works to Henry the Seventh; yet withal he was a man of marked
+sanctity. His chapel is rich in Perpendicular ornament. A wreath of
+grapes and vine-leaves in stone runs round it in all directions, as if
+verily clambering. The undercutting of this wreath is wondrous, but
+perhaps the marvel of it culminates in a pendant boss of vine-leaves
+on the northern side so deeply wrought that we can see right through
+it, yet perfect to-day as when first carved.
+
+The masons who worked here liked their joke; and one of them made a
+boss of foliage, graceful enough when seen from above,--but stoop down
+to look at it from below, and behold a grinning imp. This stonework
+was chiselled _in situ_, the rough blocks were placed where they were
+to stay, and there they were cut into the shape required, several
+being even yet unfinished. Canopied niches abound here, but of the
+statuary that once filled them one figure alone has escaped
+destruction, and still indicates how beautiful its companions must
+have been. To Bishop Alcock Jesus College, Cambridge, owes its
+existence, and Peterhouse many benefactions; and here is his tomb. In
+1900 Bishop Alwyne Compton filled the window of this chapel with
+stained glass, depicting four of his most noted predecessors.
+
+Leaving this chantry behind we see on our right, under his own Early
+English bays, the monument to our old friend, Hugh de Northwold, who
+lies buried not in this spot but in the middle of his presbytery.
+Before he became Bishop of Ely he had been Abbot of Bury St.
+Edmund's, for which place he ever retained a warm affection. His feet
+touch a block of marble, on which is sculptured the martyrdom of St.
+Edmund, whom we see tied to a tree and shot to death by Danish arrows,
+while his beheading is also represented. Here, too, is a wolf guarding
+the Saint's head, according to the legend. The story ran that, after
+the Saint's martyrdom and decapitation, his surviving subjects, to
+whom his "universal graciousness which yet suffered no unbecoming
+familiarity" had deeply endeared him, sought, so soon as the Danes had
+marched away, to take up his remains for fitting burial. The body they
+soon found, but the head had been cast into a thicket, and was not
+discovered till the searchers heard a voice crying, "Here! Here!
+Here!" which guided them to the spot where it lay. A huge wolf was
+standing, as it were, on guard over the sacred relic, but did not
+offer to attack the finders, who, on their part, suffered it to remain
+unhurt. The faithful beast followed them like a dog till it saw the
+head laid together with the body, and then quietly departed into the
+forest, no man doing aught against it.
+
+Close at hand, leaning against the northern wall of the aisle, is a
+detached fragment of stonework, once the arm of Northwold's abbatial
+chair which he brought with him from Bury St. Edmund's. This, too, is
+made in the form of a beast of prey (somewhat distantly resembling a
+wolf), holding between its paws a human head. The Abbey of Bury St.
+Edmund's, it may be mentioned, was, in some sort, a daughter House of
+Ely. When King Edgar, "the Peacemaker," founded that monastery in
+honour of the Royal Martyr he populated it, in the first instance, by
+drafting forty monks from Etheldreda's earlier royal foundation.
+
+We will next look at the impressive monument of William of Kilkenny,
+Bishop of Ely for three years under Henry the Third. He gave great
+offence through being consecrated bishop by the Archbishop of
+Canterbury in Italy, instead of in England, where it was felt that
+both prelates ought to have been attending to their duties at home;
+he, moreover, died abroad on a journey to Spain, whither he was going
+on the King's business. A traveller and statesman, he was also a
+generous promoter of education, as is shown by his founding
+scholarships at Barnwell Priory. A recumbent figure holding a crozier,
+he rests on a pillow as if asleep.
+
+Next we reach the tomb of Bishop Redman, who held the See for a very
+short time in the opening years of the sixteenth century. The tomb is
+of fine Perpendicular work, and the Bishop lies under a canopy rich in
+armorial bearings; but the figure is strangely truncated at the foot,
+which derogates not a little from its beauty.
+
+Retracing our steps for a few yards, we find beneath our feet a brass
+which records one of the tragedies that the Minster has witnessed;
+here lies buried Basevi, the gifted architect of the Fitzwilliam
+Museum at Cambridge, who met with his death in 1845 while accompanying
+Dean Peacock over the work of repair going on in the western tower.
+The Dean had just a moment before given the architect a caution to
+take care how he walked. Basevi, familiar with scaffolding, smiled at
+the advice, and going on with his hands in his pockets, came to a hole
+he had not perceived, and fell through in a way that would have been
+well-nigh impossible had his hands been free; his feet struck the
+pavement below with a jar so intense that death was almost
+instantaneous.
+
+And now we end our tour round these sepulchres and monuments by
+contemplating all that remains of what was once the rallying centre
+for those countless pilgrims who travelled hither in search of
+spiritual and physical benefit--the shrine of St. Etheldreda. It was
+once enriched with gems and costly hangings. It has been told how
+Queen Emma, in 1016, gave it a "purple cloth worked with gold and set
+with jewels."[228] Sixty years later the shrine is described as "made
+in part of silver, as adorned with pearls, emeralds, onyxes,
+alamandine stones, embossed with images in relief, among which were
+two lions carved in crystal, also four figures of angels carved in
+ivory." Such it was made by Theodwin, who was Abbot for three years
+under William the Conqueror, and such he left it. After another sixty
+years it was robbed by Bishop Nigel, who took away much of its gold
+and silver and used it for his own purposes.
+
+[Footnote 228: See p. 314.]
+
+But if it was despoiled in one century it was enriched in the next.
+From 1252 it stood behind the High Altar in Bishop Northwold's
+Presbytery, erected purposely for its reception; with the figure of
+the Foundress of the Abbey gazing down upon it from the central boss
+of the vaulting overhead. The shrine was thus held in honour till the
+reign of Henry the Eighth; when the Royal greed swooped down upon it,
+the dust of Etheldreda was thrown we know not where (though the chapel
+in Holborn bearing her name, and the church of the Dominicans at Stone
+in Staffordshire claim to possess relics of her hand), her coffin was
+broken up and destroyed, the treasures that adorned her shrine were
+dispersed. Love of loot was the great motive for this spoliation;
+hatred of abuses, some real, some imaginary, was the hypocritical
+excuse. Whatever may have been the pretext for its demolition, the
+shrine was robbed and left empty.
+
+The existing monument is a vaulted canopy of the fourteenth century,
+and is held to be due to Alan of Walsingham. Much of the ancient
+colouring survives on its northern side, but the southern has been
+completely refaced with new stone-work. Let no one leave without
+stooping down to pass beneath it, where it is easy to stand upright.
+It was here that pilgrims congregated, happy in the sense that they
+were in close proximity to the bones of the sainted Abbess. Here once
+was sheltered the sarcophagus of marble that held the body of the
+Foundress of the Abbey. Sturdy blows must have been needed to
+annihilate it; but destroyed it was, and no tradition gives any record
+of its fate, nor has any remnant of it ever been recovered. Stripped
+as we see the shrine, now set aside in the northern aisle of the
+presbytery, it seems left to prove that dignity may linger on for
+ages, long after the word has been spoken "Thy glory is departed."
+
+Before leaving the cathedral we must pass into the Lady Chapel
+adjoining the north-eastern transept, connected with it by a passage.
+We have already told when and by whom it was built, and when and by
+whom it was desecrated. At the Reformation it was rededicated to the
+Holy Trinity, and became a parish church, replacing the church of St.
+Cross, which once stood close to the cathedral, but was pulled down
+during the sixteenth century. Our visit must have its painful side, as
+we remember how one form of faith built this chapel and another
+defaced it. We could envy those who saw it fresh from the hand of
+gifted sculptors and masons, its windows, now so bare, all aglow with
+colour of a richness to which the few poor fragments that remain bear
+eloquent testimony.
+
+This chapel measures a hundred feet in length and is about half that
+width, the roof is of a single span, with no pillars to support it.
+Around it runs a stone bench, divided up by canopied niches still
+bearing traces of the old colouring--red, blue, green and gold. The
+canopied work over these niches is in almost perfect preservation,
+rich and free in design, but the statuary which once abounded under
+and above it has been ruthlessly and deliberately broken. Only one
+head half hidden by sculptured foliage escaped the iconoclasts as they
+went round the hallowed walls to "break down all the carved work
+thereof with axes and hammers."
+
+We look up and see some relics of stained glass, accidentally spared
+when the rest was smashed, in colour most harmonious, the greens and
+reds incomparably mellow in tone; while certain small outlined figures
+strangely traversing it, stiff yet vigorous, recall the painting on
+Egyptian monuments. A few square feet of this precious glass, a
+multitude of headless yet graceful statuettes canopied by unblemished
+stone-work, are still left to show us how beautiful the whole must
+have been when in its glory. We leave with a sigh the chapel, designed
+by Alan of Walsingham, and built by his faithful subsacrist John of
+Wisbech.
+
+Those who desire it can, before they quit the Minster, climb to the
+top of the western tower, and if the day is clear they will be well
+rewarded by a superb view over the "boundless plain" below; towns and
+hamlets, steeples and spires, spread there beneath us, nor must we
+forget the railways, with their kindly evidence of modern life at its
+fullest. To the east the horizon is bounded by those East Anglian
+uplands which nurtured Etheldreda for her great work here. But, beyond
+almost any other, this is essentially a man-made landscape; its
+salient features are not hills, but buildings, not rivers but lodes.
+Peterborough, the sister Abbey-Cathedral, is in view twenty miles away
+to the north-west, and many a church of note and beauty is prominent
+within nearer range, including the towers and spires of Cambridge
+fifteen miles to the south. The very cornfields and pastures beneath
+us have been reclaimed from the marsh by man; while, far on the
+north-east, is "Denvers Sluice" protecting the rich fenland from
+inundation. The view from the top of the tower is well worth a climb,
+if we have time and strength for the venture.
+
+Those who wish to be acquainted with the structural secrets of the
+cathedral should make an effort to gain admittance to one of the
+spiral staircases to the upper passages that lead from triforium to
+triforium, from clerestory to clerestory. In these higher regions we
+shall still come upon deeply wrought crocketing, such as that in the
+upper eastern lancet windows--crocketing seen only by the stray
+visitor, yet worked with ungrudged labour and skill. Here we may step
+along the plank that takes us from beam to beam for a hundred feet
+over the vaulting of the Choir, through the spacious chamber that
+separates this vaulting from the outer roof. On every beam stands a
+pail of water ready in case of fire.
+
+Through a low doorway at the end we pass to the circle of the lantern.
+Here a shutter-like panel can be opened and we can look downwards if
+we will, but we shall probably elect rather to spend these rare
+minutes in gazing upwards, on the figure of Christ in the key boss of
+the vaulting, now that for once in our lives we find ourselves near
+enough to John of Burwell's carving to see how bold and yet how
+reverent it is.[229]
+
+[Footnote 229: See p. 358.]
+
+One question forces itself upon us, how was it placed here? How was
+Mr. Gambier Parry able to paint the glowing angels on these panels? We
+see in imagination the scaffolding, the ropes, the pulleys, that have
+been in use here, where now all is calm and rest, and we feel that
+William Watson might have had this very scene before him when he wrote
+the lines:
+
+  "No record Art keeps
+   Of her travails and woes:
+   There is toil on the steeps,
+   On the summit repose."
+
+The tourist has one further duty to perform; for he must not leave Ely
+without walking round the cathedral outside. He will then be perplexed
+by the anachronisms before him; he will see Perpendicular windows
+inserted in Norman aisles, Decorated tracery in Early English masonry;
+he will observe this from without more plainly than from within, and
+he will realise how the monks who designed and built it all had a firm
+belief in themselves, and in their own age, so that they did not
+shrink from what we should now count as acts of Vandalism. They no
+more hesitated to displace the work of their forefathers by their own,
+than we hesitate to light our houses and churches with electricity,
+instead of being content with the gas that was good enough for our
+grandparents.
+
+As we turn to the north, on leaving the cathedral by the western door,
+we shall be puzzled by the strange appearance of the steeple on its
+northern side. For Ely Minster, we cannot deny it, is lop-sided; it
+has no north-western transept to correspond with the south-western. On
+the north side of the tower there is masonry proving that once it had
+the support of such a transept; but there is no record of its fall or
+demolition, so we are left to surmise that perchance it shared the
+fate of the adjoining church of St. Cross, described as a "lean-to,"
+dark and "uncomley, very unholdsome for want of thorrowe ayre" which
+we know to have been pulled down during the reign of Elizabeth.
+
+We must now go eastward, and, keeping close to the cathedral as we
+follow the path that surrounds it, we shall be able to drink in the
+view, described earlier, of the Minster as seen from the east. From
+this point we can grasp it all, and we can feel ourselves in close
+touch with the builders of yore, with Simeon, and Richard, and Hugh,
+and Alan, and John; for the work of each is here before our eyes at
+once. They now rest from their labours, leaving them as a priceless
+legacy to benefit ourselves and others. Look at Richard's transepts
+resting on old Simeon's foundations; look at Hugh's lancet windows, at
+Alan's incomparable lantern, at the Lady Chapel which John was able to
+build through his finding of that brazen urn. The space that lies
+between us and these men of mark seems bridged by a span as we
+contemplate their work and try to understand it.
+
+As we complete our circuit of the East end, and stand at that of the
+south transept, we shall be struck with a conspicuous range of ruined
+arches built into the Canons' residences to the south-east. These are
+the remains of the Infirmary; which we have seen to play such an
+important part in the life of the Abbey. It had its own chapel, hall
+and kitchen, and stood on the site of the original Saxon church. The
+space between it and the Minster was called the Slype, and served as a
+kind of market, whither travelling merchants brought their wares for
+the inspection of the Prior, Sacrist, and other chief officers of the
+Abbey. These officers, we may mention, did not share the common life
+of the monks, but had houses of their own, fragments of which still
+dot the "College,"--mostly, like the Infirmary, now built into the
+residences of the various Canons.
+
+Not a stone's throw from the Galilee Porch, just across the street
+towards the west, stands the episcopal palace. At one time this palace
+was actually connected with the cathedral by a covered gallery
+crossing the street. We can see from an old print how seriously this
+erection must have blocked the traffic, and on this account it was
+finally removed; yet its name adheres to the thoroughfare over which
+it once passed, and which is still called "the Gallery." The Bishop of
+Ely is fortunate in having his house close to his cathedral, unlike
+too many of the episcopal residences, which are at an inconvenient
+distance from the central city of the See. Moreover, his palace is of
+reasonable size; not too large nor yet too small for the hospitality
+to which a bishop must be given if he is to live up to the Scriptural
+standard; and it has another great practical advantage in being near
+to a station where several lines converge, and where all trains stop.
+
+The Palace was built in the main by Bishop Alcock toward the end of
+the fifteenth century. It is of chequered red brick with stone
+facings; his own arms, three heads of the barn-door cock, and the arms
+of the See, three crowns, are worked in stone on the face of the front
+wing looking north; there project, moreover, three niches (now empty)
+with the canopies he loved so well. Thirty years later Bishop Goodrich
+(who robbed these niches of their statuary) added the western gallery,
+a hundred feet long, with its beautiful oriel window, on whose outer
+panels he caused to be engraved his original version of our Duty
+toward God and our neighbour, which we may still read for ourselves if
+we can contrive to see through certain bushes that hide it. These
+inscriptions are on two slabs of freestone beneath the two side-lights
+of the oriel window in the gallery of the palace. Unhappily they are
+rapidly perishing under the action of the weather, and will soon be
+altogether lost. This is unfortunate, as they are of no small
+interest, representing, as it would seem, Goodrich's original draft
+for the "Duties," which were afterwards expanded into the form so
+familiar to us in the Catechism. Nor does any one seem to have been
+at the pains to record them verbatim while they remained legible; so
+that now many conjectural words have to be supplied, by considering
+the number of letters in the spaces worn away. In the following
+reproduction these conjectural words are placed within brackets and
+italicised. The duty towards God, which is on the eastern side, is in
+Roman capitals, and probably had eleven lines, the first three of
+which are wholly gone. It runs thus:--
+
+  [_The . duty . toward . god . is . to .
+  believe . in . him . to . love . him .
+  with . all . our . hert . & . soul .
+  and_] . all . our . power . to . wors
+  hippe . god . to . give . him . tha
+  nkes . to . put . our . whole . trust
+  in . him . and . to . cal . on . him . to
+  honoure . his . holy . name [_and
+  his_] . worde . and . to . serve . god
+  [_truly_] . all . the . days . of . our
+  lyfe.
+
+The duty towards our neighbour, on the western side, is in Old English
+letters, in fourteen lines, as follows:--
+
+  The . duety . [_towards . our . neigh_]boure . is
+  to . love . him . a[_s . we . do . ourself . an_]d . to
+  do . to . all . men . as . I . wo[_uld . they . do ._ ]to . me
+  to . honour . and . obay . [_the . King . and . all . set_] under . him ? ? ?
+  beme    ?    ?  [_and . to . order . ourselves_]
+  lowly . to . all . [_our . betters_] . to . hurt . no
+  body . by . word . nor . d[_eed . to . be . jus_]te . in . all
+  our . delyng . to . bear . no . [_malice_] . in . our . hert
+  to . kep . our . handes . from . stelyng . & . our
+  tong . from . evil . speaking . to . kep . our . bo
+  dys . in . temperance . not . to . covet . other . mens .
+  goods . but . laboure . truly . for . our . lyvyng . in . y^e
+  state . of . lyfe . it . plese . God . to . call . us . on . to .
+
+Of the many residences once belonging to the See, this palace is all
+that is left. In looking back, we must remember that in days when
+travelling was difficult it may have been of real advantage to the
+Bishop to have places of abode dotted all over his diocese, where he
+could stay, and where he could exercise his episcopal functions. We
+read, for instance, how, in 1487 and the following year, Bishop Alcock
+admitted between forty and fifty persons to minor or higher orders in
+his chapel at Downham Manor.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Mary's Church._]
+
+Beyond the Palace stands St. Mary's Church, built by Bishop Eustace
+about 1200, while Norman architecture was developing into Early
+English. It has been remarked that "its architect was disposed to
+adopt the new style without quitting the old one." The columns of the
+nave are simple Norman; the chancel and chapel on the south are
+distinctly Early English; the tower and spire are of Decorated work;
+and we meet with inserted Perpendicular windows. In the midst of a
+well-kept churchyard may be seen a broken and ancient font, with an
+inscription embossed in lead stating that it has been so placed that
+it may receive only the water of heaven.
+
+The citizens of Ely throughout the Middle Ages were well provided with
+churches, having for their devotions both St. Mary's and also St.
+Cross, of which we have spoken before. The name St. Cross has an
+interesting history. When first the abbey was built, there stood
+against the stone rood-screen thrown across the nave an altar known as
+the Altar of the Holy Cross; here the inhabitants of the city were
+invited to worship, while the monks said their office quite apart
+within the screen. But, as time went on, the monks found that this
+twofold worship was not convenient, and, wishing to have the Abbey to
+themselves, they built, immediately outside it on the north, a church
+for their lay neighbours, "for doing such things as should be done in
+a parish church," and named it St. Cross, after the altar within the
+Minster which was thus superseded. With the dispersion of the monks
+the nave came again into public use, and the church of St. Cross was
+permitted to decay, and was finally removed.
+
+Adjoining the churchyard of St. Mary's stands the vicarage. It is a
+rambling house of moderate size, quaintly made of rough hewn beams
+with reed-stiffened clay in between, and opening on to the street.
+This house has a notable history. It was first built as a tithe house,
+and was within the same ring-fence as the great barn or granary for
+the storing of the tithe sheaves belonging to the monastery. In this
+house lived the farmer of the tithes, who bore the title of Steward,
+and collected tithe, first for the monks, later for the Dean and
+Chapter of Ely; and as this office became hereditary the name of
+Steward was taken as a family surname. The last of these Stewards was
+Sir Thomas, who died in 1636, leaving no son to succeed him; but his
+daughter Elizabeth was the mother of Oliver Cromwell, and Oliver by a
+very natural arrangement stepped into his grandfather's office. He
+accordingly left his home at St. Ives, sixteen miles distant, bringing
+his wife, his mother, and several children, to live in the tithe house
+at Ely; the older lady thus returning to the home of her childhood.
+
+[Illustration: _The Cathedral from the West Fen Road._]
+
+For ten years the Cromwell family occupied this very house, which
+still remains pretty much what it was in their time. Here two children
+were born, and one died. Mrs. Cromwell was an excellent housewife,
+being we are told "as capable of descending to the kitchen with
+propriety as she was of acting in her exalted position with dignity."
+To Cromwell's duties as tithe farmer were added, in the course of
+time, those of Governor of the Isle of Ely. On St. Mary's Green, in
+front of this house, he used to drill and instruct the levies of his
+newly-formed "Eastern Counties' Association," which by and by
+developed into his formidable "Ironsides." The result of his drilling
+speaks for itself in the history of the Civil War; of his precepts,
+one at least, commonly attributed to him, was good, "Say your prayers,
+and keep your powder dry."
+
+The same house served as the residence of the tithe farmers till the
+passing of the Tithe Commutation Acts, when, after the death of the
+last of the officials in 1840, the Dean and Chapter sold it. Only in
+1905 was it purchased by the Vicar of St. Mary's, to become the
+vicarage of his church; appropriate in every way from size and
+position and association for this purpose. The Tithe Barn was a
+massive structure of stone thatched with reeds, but no trace of it is
+left; for it was pulled down about the middle of the nineteenth
+century, when tithe having ceased to be paid in kind[230] it no longer
+served any useful purpose; and on its site were built the almshouses
+and national schools, now to be seen quite close to the vicarage.
+
+[Footnote 230: Within living memory the tithe paid to the parson or
+other tithe owner, was actually the tenth sheaf in every row
+throughout the harvest field. The corn might not be carried till the
+owner's agent had "docked" these sheaves, (_i.e._ marked each by
+crowning it with a dock leaf). He might begin his count with any one
+of the first ten, for obvious reasons. The docked sheaves were
+conveyed to the tithe barn either before or after the carrying of the
+others.]
+
+Cromwell was no friend to the cathedral services, nor did his
+residence near at hand tend to make him love them. He at the tithe
+house, and Bishop Wren at the Palace, must have lived in avowed
+antagonism; but they ceased to be neighbours in 1642, when the Bishop
+was sent to the Tower by warrant of Parliament for his persistent
+effort to restore reverent ceremonial in public worship. The services
+in the Minster were conducted at this time by Canon Hitch, Vicar of
+Holy Trinity, to whom Cromwell wrote as follows from his house hard
+by:
+
+                                              Ely _10th January 1643_.
+
+     MR. HITCH,
+
+     Lest the soldiers should in any tumultuary or disorderly way
+     attempt the Reformation of the Cathedral Church, I require you to
+     forbear altogether your Choir Service, so unedifying and
+     offensive:--and this as you shall answer for it if any disorder
+     should arise thereupon. I advise you to catechise, and read and
+     expound the Scriptures to the people; not doubting but the
+     Parliament with the advice of the Assembly of Divines will direct
+     you further. I desire your sermons too where they usually have
+     been, but more frequent.
+
+     Your loving friend,
+                                                      OLIVER CROMWELL.
+
+Canon Hitch took no notice of this letter, and the "Choir Service"
+went on as before; wherefore Cromwell, sword in hand, his hat on his
+head, attended by a party of soldiers, went to the cathedral at the
+time of Divine Service, and spoke aloud these words: "I am a man under
+authority, having soldiers under me, and am commanded to dismiss this
+assembly." Canon Hitch, who was conducting the Service at the
+Communion Table, paid no attention, and went on without stopping;
+whereupon Cromwell, followed by soldiers and rabble, went up to the
+clergyman, laid his hand on his sword, and, bidding him "leave off his
+fooling and come down," drove the congregation out of the cathedral.
+
+Five years after this scene took place, an order was made by the House
+of Commons to the effect "that the Cathedral Church in the Isle of
+Ely, being in a ruinous condition, should be examined with a view to
+its being pulled down and its material used to make provision for sick
+and maimed soldiers and their families." Providentially this order was
+not carried into effect, Cromwell's own influence being presumably
+used against it.
+
+If we continue our walk for a few minutes further westward along the
+street, we come to a quaint and picturesque building now known as St.
+John's Farm. It was built by Bishop Northwold, in order to unite the
+two Hostels of St. John the Baptist and St. Mary Magdalene. These
+Hostels had been founded for the use of monks who, though residing in
+Ely, wished to be independent of the greater monastery; Bishop
+Northwold put an end to this undesirable state of things by erecting
+one Hostel for the use of the two communities, and placing it under
+the direct supervision of the Sacrist of Ely. The Hostel is now an
+unpretending homestead, much rebuilt, yet retaining bits of thirteenth
+century work still untouched and therefore of interest.
+
+Those who approach Ely from the south must notice two prominent
+buildings standing quite apart from the cathedral. One is the
+Theological College, a structure of red brick well placed on rising
+ground, where twenty students can reside while preparing to take Holy
+Orders in the Church of England; it was founded by Bishop Woodford,
+who filled the See for twelve years from 1873. The College has its own
+private chapel for daily use, but by its constitution the students are
+bound to attend many services in the cathedral; the founder having
+insisted on this proviso as tending to maintain the link between the
+new foundation and the ancient Minster, a link which he foresaw might
+otherwise dwindle away. As a rule students have one year of special
+training and study; and during this time they take part in the
+parochial work of the cathedral city.
+
+[Illustration: _St. John's Farm._]
+
+The other conspicuous building is a round castellated structure that
+might well pass for a Norman keep, but is, in fact, the water tower of
+Ely, supporting a huge tank into which water is forced from springs at
+Isleham some seven miles distant.[231] The inhabitants of the city
+have good reason to be thankful for this water supply; not a hundred
+years ago the natural springs on the spot were so inadequate for their
+use that most of the water for brewing and washing had to be brought
+up from the river, slung in a pair of leather bags on horseback, an
+arrangement manifestly inconvenient, "though providing," as the
+historian adds, "a comfortable subsistence for many industrious poor."
+Let us hope that these poor folk did not bear a grudge against Dean
+Peacock, to whose zeal the waterworks of Ely are mainly due.
+
+[Footnote 231: See p. 183.]
+
+One of the chief industries of Ely is the making of jam, for which the
+rich fruit-growing fields in the neighbourhood supply the material.
+And if we follow the main street down to the wharf on the river Ouse
+we shall see in the piles of willow wands that lie ready stripped on
+its banks, evidence of a much older industry still carried on here.
+This is the basket-making, for the which the fenland districts of
+Britain were famed even before the Romans reached the country.
+Posidonius, the Rhodian geographer under whom Cicero studied, and who
+himself visited our island about 100 B.C., mentions "British baskets"
+as exported for use on the Continent. A century later Strabo tells us
+of their extensive home use, for storing corn, and Martial, in the
+next generation, gives us the very word, which was adopted into the
+Latin from the Celtic original (still used in Welsh), as it has since
+been adopted into English. In sending a present to a lady he alludes
+to it as:
+
+   "A basket rude, from painted Britons come."
+  ("Barbara de pictis venio _bascauda_ Britannis.")
+
+The withies of which the baskets are made were at first, doubtless,
+the shoots of the willows found growing wild along the streams. Now
+they are cut from carefully tended osier-beds, small enclosed areas
+which are periodically flooded, where the willows are regularly
+cultivated with a view to the production of long shoots suitable for
+this industry. "They are regularly cut, peeled, and seasoned and
+afford employment to large numbers of people."[232] Nor is the making
+of baskets the only purpose for which willows may be profitably
+cultivated; for, as Fuller says:--"This tree delighteth in moist
+places and is triumphant in the Isle of Ely, where the roots
+strengthen the banks and the lop affords fuel for the fire. It groweth
+incredibly fast; it being a by-word in this county that the profit by
+willows will buy the owner a horse before other trees will pay for his
+saddle."
+
+[Footnote 232: Hughes. _County Geography of Cambs_, p. 98.]
+
+Having thus come to know something of Ely Minster, we shall feel the
+greater interest in all our further explorations through those
+highways and byways of the surrounding district over which she
+presides with the air of a Mother, and a Queen.
+
+[Illustration: _Willow Walk._]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+     Boundary of Fens.--Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall,
+     Causeway.--Archipelago.--Littleport, Agrarian Riots.--Denver
+     Sluice.--Roslyn Pit.--Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey,
+     Peterborough, Thorney, Crowland.
+
+
+The vast Fenland district of which the Isle of Ely is the core
+consisted, until the fens were drained, of an archipelago of scattered
+islets rising out of a morass, through which the rivers from the
+uplands around stagnated in a complex system of waterways, constantly
+changing, as one branch or another got silted up and the streams had
+to make themselves new channels.
+
+The foreshore of the uplands may still be traced on a contour map, and
+is seen to be deeply indented, with bays running in from the fen and
+capes running out into it. The southernmost point of the morass was at
+Fen Ditton on the Cam, two miles below Cambridge. Its western boundary
+went by, Waterbeach, Cottenham, and Willingham, to Earith; thence
+through Huntingdonshire to Ramsey and Peterborough; thence, by
+Deeping, Holbeach, and Spalding, to the Witham, a few miles below
+Lincoln. Throughout all this length ran a Roman earthwork, the Car
+Dyke, still existing at many points, evidently thrown up by these
+mighty civilisers to keep the floods in check. A like Roman
+embankment, of much larger dimensions, is to be seen on either shore
+of the great estuary which of old brought the sea-shore as far south
+as Wisbech. The eastern boundary of the Fenland needs no such defence,
+as on this side the higher ground sinks much more abruptly to the fen
+level. It passes from Fen Ditton by Horningsea, Bottisham, Swaffham,
+and Reach to Burwell. Here a peninsula projects to Soham, followed by
+a deep inlet to Isleham and Mildenhall. Then it runs north and west to
+Downham, in Norfolk, and thence due north to the sea by Lynn.
+
+We must not, however, suppose that the whole of this immense tract was
+always morass. Oscillations in the land level have more than once
+raised it high enough and long enough for great forests to clothe it;
+the trees of which, frequently of giant size, are constantly exhumed
+from the peat which the later depressions have formed over them.[233]
+The last of these forests seems to have lingered on into Roman times.
+A Roman roadway may still be traced, running east and west across the
+whole breadth of the district, from Denver, at the south-western point
+of the Norfolk uplands, to Stanground, near Peterborough, on the
+Huntingdonshire mainland. The Fens must have been very different from
+what they afterwards became for such a road to be in use. But before
+the collapse of Roman Britain in the fifth century of our era all
+seems to have gone to fen once more; and the islets in it served as a
+refuge for the remnant of the British population when the flood of the
+Anglo-Saxon Conquest burst over the land.[234]
+
+[Footnote 233: See p. 196.]
+
+[Footnote 234: See p. 168.]
+
+These islets number some thirty and more, and vary considerably in
+size. Far the largest is that on which Ely stands, the southern part
+of which has been spoken of in Chapter XII. At its extreme northern
+point, on a subsidiary islet of its own, is the large village of
+Littleport, chiefly memorable as having been the focus of a most
+serious agrarian outbreak, which in the year 1816 convulsed the
+district. Widespread agricultural distress marked the first decades of
+the nineteenth century. The wholesale enclosure of the common fields
+and the waste lands brought with it no small suffering to the
+peasantry; who everywhere lost, by the Enclosure Acts, the advantages
+which the waste lands had afforded them, receiving in exchange a
+scanty portion of "town land" in each parish, the rent of which is
+applied to local charities. And in many instances the policy of the
+Government placed these "town lands" in the least accessible corner of
+the parish; for the express purpose of preventing labourers from
+acquiring allotments in them and thus becoming less dependent on their
+wages. The draining of the fens, moreover, which was then in full
+progress, by exterminating the old abundance of fish and wildfowl
+deprived the marsh-men at once of their chief recreation and their
+most savoury food. Wages were only nine shillings a week, while wheat
+was no less than five guineas a quarter. These grievances actually
+drove the peasantry to arms, not without countenance from sympathisers
+of a superior class, who felt that the demand of the rioters for wages
+enough to purchase a stone of flour a week, which was all they asked,
+could not be called unreasonable.
+
+"Assembling by sound of horn at Littleport, they sacked some of the
+houses of the most prosperous, levied contributions on others, and
+then marched on Ely in formidable force, armed with guns, pistols,
+scythes, etc., and under cover of a waggon, on which they had mounted
+four punt-guns. These formidable weapons, used for wild-fowl shooting,
+with barrels eight feet long, whose charge was no less than a pound of
+gunpowder, projected over the front of the vehicle to clear the way if
+needful. But though the leading inhabitants of Ely had hastily armed
+themselves, and been sworn in as special constables they were not
+prepared to face this artillery, and the town passed without
+resistance into the power of the mob, who repeated their Littleport
+doings on a larger scale, though with little bodily hurt to anyone.
+Unhappily the mob soon got out of hand, and the movement rapidly
+degenerated into a mere drunken riot, the chief sufferers in which
+were, as usual, those who had done most for the relief of the
+poor--the local shopkeepers, who had aided them by credit, and the
+local clergy, who had organised soup-kitchens for them.
+
+"At the first approach of the military force sent for to suppress
+them, the rioters retreated in good order, still under cover of their
+armed waggon, to Littleport, where, however, only a handful made any
+sort of stand when the soldiers actually arrived."[235] The rest
+dispersed in panic, and not a blow was struck in defence of those,
+some eighty in number, who were selected to be made an example of. A
+special commission was held for the trial of these unhappy men. "In
+spite of strong testimony to character, five were hanged, and five
+more transported for life, the rest undergoing various terms of
+imprisonment; all to the accompaniment of ecclesiastical rejoicings,
+the Bishop entering the cathedral in solemn procession, to the strains
+of the triumphal anthem, "Why do the heathen rage?", with his Sword
+of State borne before him (by his butler!), and escorted by fifty of
+the principal inhabitants, carrying white wands. No fewer than three
+hundred of these wand-bearers guarded the execution of the five
+rioters; yet the sympathy for them was so strong that the bishop could
+not get a cart to carry them to the gallows under five guineas for the
+trip."
+
+[Footnote 235: From my _History of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+Such was the last serious exercise of the Bishop's long-descended
+secular jurisdiction over the Isle. From the Girvian Princes to the
+Abbesses of Ely, from the Abbesses to the Abbots, from the Abbots to
+the Bishops that Palatinate jurisdiction had been handed on for twelve
+hundred years;--and this was its sordid close. It died none too soon.
+
+Littleport is now quite a thriving and prosperous place, with a
+shirt-factory employing over 300 hands and a most effective system of
+agriculture in the reclaimed fens around. It has a fine Early English
+church, and a grand tower, through the basement of which goes the
+footway of the street. Until the nineteenth century the place was so
+inaccessible by land that the Cambridgeshire annalist Carter (1752)
+tells us that "it is as rare to see a coach at Littleport as a ship at
+Newmarket."
+
+From Littleport the road pursues its level way for seven miles across
+the fen, till, after crossing the small islet of Hilgay, it strikes
+the Norfolk uplands at their south-western corner, hard by Denver
+Sluice; the present boundary of the North Sea tide, which once ran up
+almost to Cambridge. This magnificent Sluice is the keystone of the
+whole drainage scheme of the fenland. Here the New and the Old Bedford
+Rivers, whose start we saw at Earith (p. 280), once more rejoin the
+Ouse, having conveyed in twenty-two miles the waters which by the old
+channel would have taken thirty-three. This, of course, gives them a
+better fall, and renders them less liable to silt themselves up.
+
+Practically the New River does all the work, very little water being
+in the Old except what the tide brings up. It is a striking sight to
+be on the Sluice at high water and gaze at the sea waves ridging up
+this old river with force that seems illimitable. And yet not enough
+pass in, before the ebb calls them back, ever (or hardly ever) to
+reach Earith, as a glance at the channel there instantly shows. Still
+more striking is it to be on the Sluice when the spring tides are on,
+and see the sea on the north of the Sluice standing fifteen or twenty
+feet higher than the fresh waters on the south. One realises what
+widespread disaster would ensue if the Sluice were to give way. Small
+wonder that during the Fenian dynamite scare of 1867 the place was
+watched day and night by a guard of soldiers. The Sluice itself is a
+massive dam of stonework; having a big lock with two sets of gates,
+one against the stream of the river, the other against the tideway of
+the sea, which reaches this point by a broad cut from the important
+seaport of King's Lynn.
+
+This present erection was built 1752. Its earlier predecessor was set
+up 1651 by the Dutch engineer Vermuyden, the maker of the Bedford
+Rivers, to whose genius the whole present scheme of drainage owes its
+existence. He carried through his plan in face of most determined
+opposition, especially from the towns of Lynn and Cambridge, who
+complained that "whereas of old ships from Newcastle were wont to make
+eighteen voyages in the year to Cambridge with sea coal, now, since
+the blocking of the stream at Denver and the diversion of its waters
+at Earith, they can make but ten or twelve, whereby the price of fuel
+hath increased by half." When this first sluice was "blown up" by the
+tide in 1713 there were loud rejoicings. The consequences, however,
+proved so serious, that the next generation was fain to see it
+replaced.
+
+Lynn is the point to which the road we have been following ultimately
+leads. On leaving Ely by this road, the first turn to the right will
+bring us down to the famous Roslyn (or Roswell) Pit, beloved of
+geologists and botanists. It is a large water-filled excavation by the
+side of the railway, nurturing various rare water plants, and
+presenting the wonderful spectacle of chalk lying _above_
+boulder-clay, a phenomenon now attributed to ice action.[236]
+
+[Footnote 236: See Hughes' _Geography of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Wendreda's Church, March._]
+
+The western declivity of the Island plunges down to the fen at Mepal,
+on the New Bedford River. After crossing this, the road leads straight
+across the fen to Chatteris, and is called Ireton's Way; the causeway
+on which it runs having been made by that great Puritan general, for
+strategic purposes, during the Civil War. Chatteris was the first of
+the wonderful chain of Abbeys which swept round the Fenland from Ely
+into Lincolnshire. The others are Ramsey and Peterborough on the last
+verge of the mainland; with Thorney and Crowland, rising, like
+Chatteris, on islands in the morass.[237] Of these, Chatteris and
+Thorney alone are in Cambridgeshire; though Peterborough is within
+half a mile of the county boundary. The former, a nunnery, was founded
+by the Lady Alwyn, foster-mother to Edgar the Peacemaker. It was never
+a large House, and no remains of it survive; but Chatteris is now the
+seat of another Benedictine community, exiled from France in 1901. The
+place possesses some curious wells of warm water, not of any great
+depth, as such usually are, but penetrating only some ten or twelve
+feet into the fen deposits. Local chemical decomposition is supposed
+to account for the phenomenon. The fen hereabouts is rich in
+geological and archæological remains. And within sight of his mother's
+convent, only six miles away across the fen, her son (also an Alwyn),
+the Alderman or Earl of the district, founded, on the projecting cape
+of the Huntingdonshire mainland, the much larger abbey of Ramsey,
+whose abbot was one of the higher or "mitred" class, privileged to
+give the "Minor" Orders (_i.e._ those beneath the grade of Deacon).
+
+[Footnote 237: The history of the Houses outside our county we only
+touch upon where connected with spots inside.]
+
+Thorney was of earlier date; coeval, indeed, with Peterborough. Of its
+foundation a graphic description is given by the chronicler. After
+telling how King Wulfhere of Mercia (whose wife was sister to St.
+Etheldreda), endowed Peterborough and its abbot Sexwulf with broad
+possessions, he continues:
+
+     "Then said the King: 'This gift is little, but it is my will they
+     hold it so royally and so freely that neither geld nor fee be
+     taken from it....And thus free will I make this Minster, that it
+     be under Rome alone: and my will it is that all we who may not go
+     to Rome visit St. Peter here.'
+
+     "While thus he spake, the Abbot prayed of him that he would give
+     him whatsoever he should ask. And the King granted him. Then said
+     the Abbot: 'Here have I God-fearing monks, who would fain live as
+     anchorites (_i.e._, hermits), knew they but where. And here is an
+     island which is called Ancarig[238] (Thorney). And my boon is
+     that we might there build a Minster, to the glory of St. Mary, so
+     that they who would lead the life of peace and rest may dwell
+     therein.'
+
+     "Then the King answered and said: 'Beloved Sexwulf, lo! not only
+     that which thou hast asked, but all else on our Lord's behalf I
+     thus approve and grant.' ... And King Wulfhere first confirmed it
+     by word, and after subscribed it with his fingers on the Cross
+     of Christ" (_i.e._ he signed his name with a cross, on which he
+     laid his finger, saying, "I deliver this as my act and deed," as
+     we do with the seal on a deed at present. Seals did not come in
+     till the Norman Conquest). Amongst the witnesses to his signature
+     we find "Wilfrid the Priest, who was afterwards Bishop," _i.e._
+     the great St. Wilfrid of Ripon.
+
+[Footnote 238: This name has probably nothing to do with "anchorite,"
+but is of Celtic derivation.]
+
+Thorney, however, was long in rising to abbatial dignity, and remained
+the abode of anchorites, so humble and so sequestered that in the
+great Danish raid of 870, when Ely and every other Religious House
+throughout the Fenland was destroyed, the plunderers did not take the
+trouble to seek it out, and it became a haven of refuge for the
+survivors of the sack of Crowland. The story is graphically told in
+the "Chronicle of Crowland"; in its present form probably a thirteenth
+century work, but obviously compiled from earlier sources.
+
+After describing vividly the utter overthrow, at a great battle in
+Kesteven (West Lincolnshire), of the local forces hastily called out
+to meet the Danish host, he tells how a few poor fugitives got them to
+the Church of Crowland, and interrupted the Midnight Service with
+their crushing tidings.
+
+     "At this news all was confusion. And the Abbot, keeping with
+     himself the oldest of the monks and a few of the children (of the
+     Abbey School), bade all those in their prime to take along with
+     them the sacred relics of the monastery (namely the holy body of
+     St. Guthlac, his scourge, and his psalter) and the other chief
+     treasures, and thus to flee into the neighbouring fens. With
+     sorrow of heart did they his bidding, and, having laden a boat
+     with the aforesaid relics and the charters of the Kings, they
+     cast into the cloister well the frontal of the High Altar (which
+     was covered with plates of gold) along with ten chalices ... and
+     other vessels. But the end of the frontal, so long was it, always
+     showed above the water; whereupon they drew it out and left it
+     with the Abbot; for ever could they see the flames of the towns
+     in Kesteven draw nigher and nigher, and feared lest the Heathen
+     should on a sudden burst in upon them. So took they boat, and
+     came unto the wood of Ancarig on the southern march of their
+     islet. And here abode they with Brother Toretus, an anchorite,
+     and other brethren, then dwelling there, four days, thirty in
+     all, of whom ten were priests. But the Abbot, and two old men
+     with him, hid the aforesaid frontal outside the church, to the
+     North; and afterwards he and all the rest clad in their sacred
+     vestments, met in Choir, and kept the Hours of Divine Service
+     according to their Rule. And the whole of the Psalms of David
+     went they through from end to end. After this sang they High
+     Mass, the Abbot himself being Celebrant....
+
+     "Now, when the Mass was drawing to an end, and the Abbot and his
+     deacon and subdeacon and the taper-bearers had already
+     communicated in the Holy Mysteries, came the Heathen bursting
+     into the church. And upon the very Altar, by the cruel hand of
+     King Oscytel, was the venerable Abbot himself sacrificed, a true
+     martyr and victim of Christ. All they who stood round and
+     ministered with him were beheaded by the savages; and the aged
+     men and children, as they fled from the Choir, were taken and
+     questioned under the bitterest tortures, to make them show the
+     treasures of the church. Dom[239] Asker, the Prior, was slain in
+     the vestry, and Dom Lethwyn, Sub-prior, in the refectory. Behind
+     him there followed close Brother Turgar, a ten year child,
+     shapely, and of a fair countenance; who, when he saw his superior
+     slain, besought earnestly that he too might be slain with him.
+     But Earl Sidroc the Younger, touched with pity for the lad,
+     stripped him of his cowl, and gave him a Danish cloak, bidding
+     him follow everywhere his steps.... And thus, out of all who
+     abode in the Monastery, old and young, he alone was saved; coming
+     and going amongst the Danes throughout all his sojourn amongst
+     them, even as one of themselves, through this Earl's favour and
+     protection.
+
+     [Footnote 239: _Dominus_ is thus abbreviated amongst
+     Benedictines.]
+
+     "Now when all the monks had been done to death by the torturers,
+     and no whit of the Abbey treasures shown thereby, the Danes, with
+     spades and ploughshares, brake open right and left all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints round about that of St. Guthlac. On the
+     right was that of St. Cissa, priest and anchorite, and of St.
+     Bettelin, a man of God, erst an attendant on St. Guthlac, and of
+     Dom Siward (the Abbot) of blessed memory. And on the left was
+     that of St. Egbert, St. Guthlac's scribe and confessor, and of
+     St. Tatwin, the pilot who guided St. Guthlac to Crowland.... All
+     these did the savages burst open, looking to find treasure
+     therein. And finding none, they were filled with indignation; and
+     piling up all these holy bodies on a heap, in piteous wise, they
+     set fire to them, and, on the third day after their coming, that
+     is to say, on the 7th of the Kalends of October (September 25),
+     they utterly consumed them, church and monastery and all.
+
+     "But on the fourth day off they went, with countless droves of
+     beasts and pack-horses, to Medehampstead (Peterborough). And
+     there, dashing at the outer precinct of the Monastery, with its
+     barred gates, they assailed the walls on every side with arrows
+     and machines. At the second assault the Heathen brake in, and, in
+     the very breach, Tubba, the brother of Earl Hubba, fell
+     grievously wounded by a stone cast. By the hands of his guards he
+     was borne into the tent of Hubba his brother, and despaired even
+     of life. Then did Hubba's rage boil over, and he was altogether
+     wild against the monks, so that he slew with his own hand every
+     soul clad in the religious habit; the rest sprang upon the rest;
+     not one in the whole Monastery was saved; both the venerable
+     Abbot Hedda, and all his monks, and all the lay-brethren were
+     massacred; and Brother Turgar was warned by his master, Earl
+     Sidroc, never anywhere to cross the path of Earl Hubba. Every
+     altar was uprooted, every monument broken in pieces, the great
+     library of holy books burnt, the plenteous store of monastic
+     papers scattered to the winds; the precious relics of the holy
+     virgins Kineburgh, Kinswith, and Tibba,[240] trodden under foot;
+     the walls utterly overthrown; the buildings burnt up, church and
+     all, blazing with a bright flame for five whole days after.
+
+     [Footnote 240: Kineburgh and Kinswith were sisters of Wulfhere,
+     the first Christian King of Mercia. Tibba is usually identified
+     with St. Ebba of Coldingham.]
+
+     "Then on the fourth day the Host drew together, with spoil beyond
+     tale from all the country round, and set off towards Huntingdon.
+     The two Sidroc Earls, at the crossing of the rivers, ever came
+     last, to guard the rear of the whole army. Now all their host had
+     passed over the river Nene safely; but, as they were themselves
+     crossing, they had the bad luck to lose two carts, laden with
+     untold wealth and plenishing, which sank in a deep eddy of the
+     stream to the left of the stone bridge, so that horses and all
+     were drowned before they could be got out. And while the whole
+     household of Earl Sidroc the younger was busied in drawing out
+     these same carts, and in transferring the spoil to other waggons
+     and carriages, Brother Turgar slipped away and fled to the
+     neighbouring forest. All night did he walk, and with the earliest
+     dawn came into Crowland. There he found his fellow monks, who had
+     got back from Thorney the day before, and were hard at work
+     putting out the fires, which still had the mastery in many of the
+     ruins of the Monastery.
+
+     "And when they saw him safe and sound they were somewhat
+     comforted; but on hearing from him where their Abbot and the
+     other Superiors and Brethren lay slain, and how all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints were broken down, and all the monuments,
+     and all the holy books and all the sacred bodies burnt up, all
+     were stricken with grief unspeakable; and long was the
+     lamentation and mourning that was made. Satiated at length with
+     weeping, they turned again to putting out the conflagration. And
+     when they raised the ruins of the church roof about the High
+     Altar, they found the body of their venerable father and abbot,
+     Theodore, beheaded, stripped, half burnt, and bruised, and
+     crushed into the earth by the fallen timbers. This was on the
+     eighth day after his murder, and a little away from the spot
+     where he was slaughtered. And the other ministers, who fell with
+     him, found they in like manner crushed into the ground by the
+     weight of the beams--all save Wulfric the taper-bearer.
+
+     "But not all at once. For the bodies of some of the Brethren were
+     not found till half a year after their martyrdom, and not in the
+     places where they were slain. For Dom Paulinus and Dom Herbert,
+     very old men, and decrepit, whose hands were cut off and
+     themselves tortured to death in the Choir, were found, after a
+     diligent search, not there but in the Chapterhouse. In like
+     manner Dom Grimketyl and Dom Egmund, both some hundred years old,
+     who had been thrust through with swords in the Cloister, were
+     found in the Parlour. And the rest too, both children and old
+     men, were sought for in divers places, even as Brother Turgar
+     told just how each had been slain; and at last were all found,
+     with many a doleful plaint and many a tear, save Wulfric only.
+     And Dom Brickstan, once the Precentor of the monastery, a most
+     skilful musician and poet, who was amongst the survivors, wrote
+     on the ashes of Crowland that Lament which is so well known and
+     begins thus:
+
+       'Desolate how dost thou sit, who late wast Queen among Houses
+        Church so noble of old; erst so beloved of God.'
+
+          (Quomodo sola sedes, dudum regina domorum,
+           Nobilis ecclesia, et nuper amica Dei).
+
+     "Now when the Monastery, after long and hard work, was cleared,
+     so far as was then possible, from filth and ashes, they took
+     counsel on choosing them a Pastor; and when the election was
+     held, the venerable Father Godric, though much against his will,
+     was made Abbot. To him came that venerable old man Toretus, the
+     Prior of Thorney, and his Sub-prior, Dom Tissa, both anchorites
+     of the utmost sanctity. And devoutly they prayed him that he
+     would deign to take with him certain Brethren and come to
+     Peterborough, and give, of his charity, Christian burial to the
+     bodies of their Abbot and the other Brethren, which yet remained
+     unburied and exposed to beasts and birds. The Abbot gave heed
+     unto their prayer, and with many of the brethren (amongst them
+     Brother Turgar) came unto Peterborough, where all the Brethren of
+     Thorney met him. And with much labour the bodies of all the monks
+     of that Monastery were got together, 84 by tale, and buried in
+     one wide grave in the midst of the Abbey cemetery, over against
+     what was once the East End of the Church. This was on St.
+     Cecilia's day (November 22).
+
+     "And over the body of the Abbot, as he lay amid his children, he
+     placed a three-sided stone, three feet high and three long and
+     one broad, bearing carved likenesses of the Abbot, and his monks
+     standing around him. And this stone, in memory of the ruined
+     Abbey, bade he thenceforward to be called Medehampstead. And once
+     in every year, while he lived, did he visit it; and, pitching his
+     tent above the stone, said Mass for two days with instant
+     devotion for the souls of those there buried.
+
+     "Through the midst of that cemetery there ran the King's highway
+     (_Via Regia_); and this stone was on the right thereof, as one
+     comes up from the aforesaid stone bridge towards Holland (S.E.
+     Lincolnshire); and on the left stood a stone cross bearing a
+     carven image of the Saviour; which our Abbot Godric then set
+     there, to the intent that travellers who passed by might be
+     mindful of that holy Abbey, and pray to the Lord for the souls of
+     the Faithful who lay in that cemetery."
+
+The Abbot of Thorney was also "mitred," and the House ranked as second
+only to Ely in the county. William of Malmesbury (A.D. 1135) describes
+it as "a little paradise, delightsome as heaven itself may be deemed,
+fen-circled, yet rich in loftiest trees, where water-meadows delight
+the eye with rich green, where streamlets glide unchecked through each
+field. Scarce a spot of ground lies there waste; here are orchards,
+there vineyards. Nature vies with culture, and what is unknown to the
+one is produced by the other. And what of the glorious buildings,
+whose very size it is a wonder that the ground can support amid such
+marshes? A vast solitude is here the monks' lot, that they may the
+more closely cling to things above. If a woman is there seen, she is
+counted a monster, but strangers, if men, are greeted as angels
+unawares. Yet there none speaketh, save for the moment; all is holy
+silence.... Truly I may call that island a hostel of chastity, a
+tavern of honesty, a gymnasium of divine philosophy. From its dense
+thickets it is called Thorney."
+
+At the draining of the Fens, in the seventeenth century, Thorney was
+assigned to the Earls (now Dukes) of Bedford, who, during the
+nineteenth century alone, have expended on their Thorney estates
+nearly £2,000,000. Yet the Thorney property does not even pay its way.
+The noble owners have, however, their reward in the genuine success
+which has crowned the experiment from a philanthropic point of view.
+Thanks to their efforts, Thorney is again, as in the old days of the
+Benedictines, a smiling, well-wooded oasis amid the dreary Fenland;
+where the welfare of the tenantry is, as of old, the chief object of
+the landlord, and where, in consequence, pauperism, drunkenness, and
+crime are alike practically unknown. The remains of the Abbey Church
+are still used for parochial worship, but only 117 of its original 290
+feet of length have survived Henry the Eighth's demolitions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+     Draining of Fens.--Monastic Works, Morton's Leam.--Diversion of
+     Ouse.--Local Government, Jurats, Discontent.--Jacobean
+     polemics.--First Drainage Company.--Rising of Fen-men.--Second
+     Company, Huguenot Labourers.--Third Company, Earl of Bedford,
+     Vermuyden.--Old River.--Cromwell.--Fourth Company, Prisoner
+     Slaves, New River, Denver Sluice.--Later Developments.
+
+
+The thought of the Fenland Abbeys leads on to the fascinating story of
+the draining of the fens. For the monks were the first to reclaim from
+the morass such little patches of ground as each Abbey could bank in,
+and to discover how very fertile such reclaimed soil is. Their early
+chronicles speak with rapture of the hay that could be mown three
+times a year, and the amazing fecundity of the corn-land. Thus it was
+their interest constantly to be enclosing fresh acres. They
+discovered, too, that by judiciously letting in the flood water on to
+a field they could get a fresh deposit of silt, and gradually raise
+the level of the soil. And the first attempt at drainage work on a
+large scale was also due to a monk, Bishop Morton, Abbot of Ely, who
+in 1480 cut the twelve mile long "Leam," or channel, which still bears
+his name, to divert the River Nene from its long meandering course
+through Whittlesea Mere and Outwell, and to bring it straight to
+Wisbech.
+
+Thus it came about that the reclamation of the fens went hand in hand
+with the prosperity of the Abbeys around them. When these were
+prosperous, the whole district prospered; when misfortune befell them,
+the fens likewise suffered; and it often took many years for the marks
+of the ruin to be effaced. After the wholesale destruction wrought by
+the great Danish raid of 870, centuries did not suffice for this. The
+story we have just told of the sack of Crowland clearly shows that
+the place was then accessible by land. But in the hundred and fifty
+years of desolation that followed, such works as the brethren had
+effected fell into decay, and the land once more became waterlogged.
+Even when William of Malmesbury wrote, in the twelfth century, he
+tells us that Crowland could still only be reached by boat. And the
+yet more wholesale destruction wrought by Henry the Eighth was
+followed by a like period of reversion to waste.
+
+The zeal, however, of these early civilisers was not always according
+to knowledge; and at quite an early date a grievous mistake was made,
+which caused endless difficulties ever after, and still affects the
+whole drainage system of the district. This was the cutting, at some
+date between 1215 and 1270, of a leam, not two miles long, from the
+Great Ouse at Littleport to the Little Ouse,[241] thereby diverting
+the waters of the former into the channel of the latter, and bringing
+their united volume into the sea at Lynn. Before that date the Great
+Ouse ran from Littleport to Outwell, where it was met by the Nene, and
+by a branch of the Little Ouse. The joint river was called the Well
+Stream, and poured into the sea at Wisbech.
+
+[Footnote 241: The Little Ouse drains the south-western districts of
+Norfolk.]
+
+That this had been the age-long course of the Fenland waters is shown
+by the existence of a huge Roman sea wall running round the old coast
+line from Lynn to Wisbech, and from Wisbech to Sutton in Lincolnshire.
+This wall traces for us the outline of a great tidal estuary running
+up to Wisbech, which continued an estuary even to the eighteenth
+century. But the diversion of the greater part of its river water to
+Lynn proved fatal to it. Such stream as was left, scarcely more than
+that of the Nene, could not, at the ebb, scour out the channel through
+the sands which the flood-tide continually tended to silt up. Wisbech
+became more and more shut off from the sea, and is now ten miles away
+from it. And further, the inability to escape quickly enough through
+these choking sands drove the river water at Wisbech back upon itself
+and forced it to "drown" the neighbouring fens; while at Lynn the same
+disastrous effect was produced by the new volume of water being too
+great for the narrow bed of the Little Ouse and flooding over the
+banks all round. The Marshland, as the Norfolk district protected by
+the Roman wall was called, suffered especially from this result of
+interfering with Nature.
+
+Nor did it prove possible to undo the mischief. When once a short cut
+has been made for a great river, it is no easy matter to turn the
+stream back into its old tortuous course; and, when once an estuary
+has got thoroughly silted up, it is yet more difficult to restore it
+to its old condition. Throughout the Middle Ages constant complaints
+were made, and occasional attempts; but these were always brought to
+nought by some conflicting interest or other which got the ear of the
+Government. The fen problem was early recognised as a matter of
+national concern, and, from the time of Edward the First onwards, the
+Crown tried to grapple with it, but by hopelessly futile methods.
+
+To begin with, the system of Local Government already established for
+the regulation of Romney Marsh in Kent was extended to the Fenland.
+The Sheriff was bound to summon twenty-four "jurats" from the
+inhabitants of the neighbourhood, to deal with each difficulty as it
+arose. But a plan which worked well enough for a district only some
+ten miles by fifteen, and with no river to speak of, was wholly
+inadequate to deal with the huge area and mighty forces of the
+Fenland, even when this was divided (as it still is for drainage
+purposes) into three "Levels," "North," "Middle," and "South." The
+jurats hated their invidious office, and were themselves hated by the
+inhabitants; each man always declaring that they had saddled him with
+repairs which ought to have been laid upon some neighbour, and each
+man ready to see his own land "drown" rather than put in a single
+spadeful of work which, in his view, should have been someone else's
+job.
+
+Besides, the drain or the dam or the embankment which was good for one
+set of interests was bad for another. We have seen how Cambridge
+complained of the erection of Denver Sluice; and like grievances fill
+page after page of the Plantagenet Rolls. The men of Lynn complain
+that whereas they were of old able to sail straight to Peterborough,
+only thirty miles, they now have to go round by Littleport, over fifty
+miles, owing to the erection of a dam by the jurats. And, again, that
+a new cut has so diverted the waters that they can no longer take
+"navigable" (_i.e._ sea-going) vessels to Yaxley and Holme in
+Huntingdonshire, "whereby our trade is greatly decayed." Loud and
+incessant are the cries from all quarters (except Lynn alone) to
+"bring back the waters into their natural outfall" at Wisbech. But
+this, as we have said, had become beyond the power of man; and,
+despite the well-meant efforts of the unhappy jurats, and of such
+philanthropists as Bishop Morton, things kept getting worse decade by
+decade; till the suppression of the Abbeys completed the ruin, and the
+fens became the dismal tangle of decayed waterways, small and great,
+new and old, artificial and natural, usable and unusable, the
+unravelling of which occupied the next three centuries.
+
+Feeble efforts were locally made here and there to control the waters;
+but, as the historian Carter puts it, the next wet and windy winter
+"down comes the bailiff of Bedford (for so the country people call the
+overflowing of the river Ouse), attended, like a person of quality,
+with many servants (the accession of tributary brooks), and breaks
+down all their paper banks as not waterproof, reducing all to their
+former condition." He goes on to give a vivid description of the
+puzzle-headed conservatism with which the reformers had to contend:
+
+     "This accident put the wits of that and succeeding ages upon the
+     dispute of the feasibility of the design; and let us sum up the
+     arguments for and against this great undertaking.
+
+     "Argument 1. Some objected that God said to the water, 'Hitherto
+     shalt thou come, and no further.' It is therefore a trespass on
+     the Divine prerogative, for man to presume to give other bounds
+     to the water than what God hath appointed.
+
+     "Answer 1. The argument holdeth in application to the Ocean,
+     which is a wild horse, only to be broke, backed, and bridled by
+     Him who is the Maker thereof; but it is a false and lazy
+     principle if applied to fresh waters, from which human industry
+     may and hath rescued many considerable parcels of ground.
+
+     "Argument 2. Many have attempted but not effected it. None ever
+     wrestled with it, but it gave them a foil, if not a fall, to the
+     bruising, if not breaking, of their backs. Many have burnt their
+     fingers in these waters, and instead of draining the Fens have
+     emptied their own pockets.
+
+     "Answer 2. Many men's undertaking thereof implies the possibility
+     of the project; for it is not likely so many wise men should seek
+     for what is not to be found; the failing is not in the
+     improbability of the design, but in the undertakers either
+     wanting heads or hearts to pursue, or pay the people employed
+     therein.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+     "Argument 4. An alderman of Cambridge affirmed the Fens to be
+     like a crust of bread swimming in a dish of water. So that under
+     eight or ten feet earth it is nothing but mere water. Impossible
+     therefore the draining thereof, if surrounded by that liquid
+     element both above and below.
+
+     "Answer 4. Interest betrayed his judgment to an evident error,
+     and his brains seemed rather to swim than the floating earth; for
+     such as have sounded the depth of that ground find it to be Terra
+     Firma, and no doubt so solid to the centre as any other earth in
+     England.
+
+     "Argument 5. The river Grant or Cam (call it what you will),
+     running by Cambridge, will have its stream dried up by the
+     draining of the Fens. Now, as Cambridge is concerned in its
+     river, so that whole County, yea, this whole Kingdom, is
+     concerned in Cambridge. No reason, therefore, that private men's
+     particular profit should be preferred before an universal good,
+     or good of an University.
+
+     "Answer 5. It is granted the water by Cambridge kindles and keeps
+     in the fire therein; no hope of sufficient fuel on reasonable
+     rates, except care be taken for preserving the River navigable;
+     which may be done and the Fens drained nevertheless. To take away
+     the thief is no wasting or weakening of the wick of the candle.
+     Assurances may be given that no damage shall rebound to the
+     stream of Grant by stopping other superfluous waters.
+
+     "Argument 6. The Fens preserved in their present property afford
+     great plenty and variety of fish and fowl, which have therein
+     their seminaries and nurseries; the which will be destroyed on
+     the draining thereof, so that none will be had but at excessive
+     prices.
+
+     "Answer 6. A large first makes recompense for the shorter second
+     course of any man's table. And who will not prefer a tame sheep
+     before a wild duck? a good fat ox before a well-grown eel?
+
+     "Argument 7. The Fens afford plenty of sedge, turf, and reed; the
+     want whereof will be found if their nature be altered.
+
+     "Answer 7. These commodities are inconsiderable to balance the
+     profit of good grass and grain, which those grounds, if drained,
+     will produce. He cannot complain of wrong, who hath a suit of
+     buckram taken from him, and one of velvet given instead thereof.
+     Besides, provision may be made that a sufficiency of such
+     ware-trash may still be preserved.
+
+     "Argument 8. Many thousands of poor people are maintained by
+     fishing and fowling in the Fens, which will all be at a loss for
+     a livelihood if their farms be burnt; that is, if the Fens be
+     drained.
+
+     "Answer 8. It is confessed that many who love idleness live (and
+     only live) by that employment. But such, if the Fens were
+     drained, would quit their idleness, and betake themselves to more
+     lucrative manufactures.
+
+     "Argument 9. Grant that the Fens be drained with great
+     difficulty, they will quickly revert to their old condition, like
+     to the Pontine Marshes in Italy.
+
+     "Answer 9. If a patient, perfectly cured, will be careless of his
+     healthe, none will pity his relapse. Moderate cost, with constant
+     care, will easily preserve what is drained; the Low Countries
+     affording many proofs thereof.
+
+     "Argument 10. Grant them drained and so continuing; as now the
+     great fishes prey upon the less, so then wealthy men would devour
+     the poorer sort of people; injurious partage would follow upon
+     the inclosures, and rich men (to make room for themselves) would
+     jostle the poor people out of their Commons.
+
+     "Answer 10. Oppression is not essential either to draining or
+     enclosing, though too often a concomitant of both. Order may be
+     taken by Commissioners of quality, impowered for that purpose,
+     that such a proportion of Commons may be allotted to the poor
+     that all private persons may be pleased and advance accrue hereby
+     to the Commonwealth."
+
+The outcome of these vigorous polemics was that King James the First
+threw himself whole-heartedly into the idea of a general drainage
+scheme; and under his auspices a Company of "Adventurers" or
+"Undertakers" was formed to carry out the business. This, however, was
+regarded by the Fen-men as an unmitigated piece of tyranny; the
+Opposition in Parliament made violent protests; "Libellers" wrote
+inflammatory broadsides inciting the Fen-men to rise;[242] and the
+Fen-men, who wanted little inciting, did rise in no small numbers.
+Nocturnal raids destroyed every work begun by the Company's labourers;
+the labourers themselves were intimidated; and before long progress
+became impossible. The Company became bankrupt, and the thousands of
+reclaimed acres which were to have been divided amongst the
+"Adventurers" never actualised.
+
+[Footnote 242: A specimen of one of the "libels" is given by Dugdale:
+
+  "Come brethren of the water, and let us all assemble
+   To treat upon this matter, which makes us quake and tremble;
+   For we shall rue, if it be true the Fens be undertaken,
+   And where we feed in rush and reed, _they_ feed both beet and bacon.
+
+  "Away with boats and rudders, away with boots and scatches [skates],
+   No need of one nor t'other; men now make better matches.
+   Stilt-makers all and tanners complain of this disaster;
+   For they would make each muddy lake for Essex calves a pasture.
+
+  "Wherefore let us intreat our ancient Winter Nurses
+   To show their power so great, and help to drain _their purses_,
+   And send us good old Captain Flood to lead us out to battle,
+   Then Twopenny Jack, with scales on back, shall drive out all their cattle."
+
+["Jack" here simply means a pike, the average price of which at this
+time would seem to have been twopence. The "Winter Nurses" are the
+rivers feeding the Fen.]]
+
+[Illustration: THE OLD FENLAND
+
+(Northern District)]
+
+[Illustration: THE OLD FENLAND
+
+(Southern District)]
+
+The Crown, however, did not lose sight of the scheme. A special
+Commission of enquiry was formed, which sent in a most pessimistic
+Report, representing Wisbech as demanding that the "upland men" should
+contribute to the scouring of the outfall there, inasmuch as it
+drained their lands, to which the upland men retorted that Wisbech
+might mind its own business and bear its own burdens. "Hence the
+country about Crowland and Thorney, formerly good ground, hath become
+mere Lerna,[243]--which doth not only cause overflowing in the upland
+country, to their infinite loss, but the Islanders themselves are in
+like danger, as for their cattle and their own safety; out of fear
+whereof they oftentimes, upon the swelling of the waters, ring their
+bells backward, as in other places when the town is on fire."
+
+[Footnote 243: The Lernaean swamp was the legendary home of the famous
+Hydra overcome by Hercules.]
+
+So things dragged on till 1620, when another Company was formed by the
+King, again doomed to speedy failure.[244] Ten years later again,
+Charles the First took up his father's idea, and formed a third
+Company, placing at its head the powerful Earl of Bedford. His first
+act was to call in a Dutch engineer, Cornelius Vermuyden, acquainted
+with the drainage methods so successful in Holland, whose fee was an
+award of no less than 95,000 acres in the lands he might reclaim.
+Under the auspices of this expert was dug from Earith to Denver the
+Old Bedford River already spoken of.[245] But the local opposition was
+still too strong, fostered as it now was by the powerful influence of
+Oliver Cromwell; and it was not lessened when the King himself bought
+up the Company. His action was represented as one more encroachment
+upon the liberties of England, and a regular part of the Puritan
+programme was "to break the King's dykes, to drown his lands, and to
+destroy his tenants." These drastic measures proved only too
+effective; and, with the outbreak of the Civil War, this third
+attempt, like those before it, came to nought.
+
+[Footnote 244: The head of this company was Lord Popham, one of whose
+cuts is still called Popham's Eau. The last word reminds us that many
+of his settlers were exiled French Huguenots.]
+
+[Footnote 245: See p. 280.]
+
+When, however, that war was over, and Charles beheaded, Cromwell
+himself, now Lord Protector of the Realm, came forward as an advocate
+of the scheme, and formed yet a fourth Company, again under the Earl
+of Bedford, who had followed his fortunes, and again with Vermuyden
+for engineer. This time the result was permanent. Cromwell was, as the
+Fen-men speedily discovered, a far more dangerous personage to bully
+than they had found his predecessors at the head of the State.
+Troopers were quartered upon the malcontents, and a plentiful supply
+of extra cheap labour was furnished by the penal servitude of Scotch
+prisoners taken at Dunbar and Dutch sailors captured by Blake in the
+Channel. This method of making war pay its own expenses was familiar
+to Cromwell, who had already sold many shiploads of these gallant
+enemies as slaves, some to toil under the lash for the West Indian
+planters, some to tug at the oars of Venetian galleys. Happily, as he
+was the first Christian commander to adopt this all too thrifty
+procedure, so he was the last, and such atrocious exploitation of
+fellow Christians and fellow soldiers died with him.
+
+Thus was dug, in 1651, the New Bedford River, and thus was built,
+somewhat later, Denver Sluice. Vermuyden's plan, which continued for
+two centuries to be gradually developed on the lines he originally
+laid down, was to cut a few main water-courses through the district,
+running at a higher level than the swamps around, with Lynn for their
+chief outfall, and an infinite number of short straight cuts at right
+angles to these, whence the water draining from the morass should be
+pumped into them. This pumping was originally done by windmills, and a
+picturesque sight it was to see their white sails dotting the wide
+expanse. But all are now superseded by the less poetical but more
+dependable steam pumping stations, whose tall chimneys form a notable
+object in the Fenland landscape.
+
+The work was very gradual, with many drawbacks. The Denver Sluice, on
+which the whole plan depended, was, as has been said, destroyed in
+1713, and not rebuilt till 1750, when the very towns which had most
+rejoiced in its fall were the loudest in demanding its replacement.
+Other calamities also affected the work, which was not finally
+completed till towards the end of the nineteenth century. The
+opposition, too, was unceasing, though it took the form of lawsuits
+rather than violence. But this, too, died out. The very last of them
+was an attempt by Wisbech, in 1844, to force the hand of the Bedford
+Level Corporation (as the old Company of Adventurers is now called) by
+proposing a rival scheme in Parliament.
+
+Now, however, all is victory. For many years past the reclaimed fen
+has borne excellent crops; and if, since the agricultural depression
+of the later nineteenth century decades set in, it can no longer
+merit so fully as it did the title of "the Golden Plain of England,"
+yet the widespread cultivation of fruit and flowers (mostly narcissus)
+has furnished no small compensation, and the district as a whole
+enjoys a very large share of prosperity. At this moment the vast areas
+allotted to the great Adventurers are being largely broken up into
+small holdings, with the happiest results.
+
+Sentimentally, and even to a certain extent economically, we may
+regret the Fenland of old, with its vanished wealth of picturesque
+life; its reeds which made such splendid thatch, its marsh flowers,
+its butterflies, its shoals of fish, its endless skeins of wild-fowl,
+its clever "decoys" where these were taken in such exhaustless numbers
+that a single one (in 1750) sent up to London 3000 couples a week and
+let for £500 a year. But with these have also vanished the incessant
+fever and ague and rheumatism which were an ever-present torment in
+the old Fen life, and the incessant opium-eating in which the Fen-Folk
+were fain to find relief. Taking things altogether, the gain has
+outweighed the loss in the draining of the Fens.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+     Coveney.--Manea.--Doddington.--March, Angel
+     Roof.--Whittlesea.--Old Course of Ouse, Well Stream.--Upwell,
+     Outwell.--Emneth.--Elm.--The Marshland.--West
+     Walton.--Walsoken.--Walpole.--Cross
+     Keys.--Leverington.--Tydd.--Wisbech, Church, Trade, Castle,
+     Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson.--The Wash.--King John.
+
+
+In close contiguity to the Island of Ely, on the west, is a tiny
+satellite, which supports the little village of Coveney. Here the
+church has some remarkable modern woodwork from Oberammergau, the gift
+of Mr. Athelstan Riley. The pulpit is also remarkable, dating from
+1703 and being of Danish work. More remote are Manea and Stonea, both,
+happily for themselves, now on a railway line, but otherwise
+unspeakably inaccessible. It is strange at Manea to see the towers of
+Ely a short five miles away, and to know that twenty miles of bad road
+will scarcely get you there. Both names seem to have the same
+signification, Stone Island; which (as they are eminently unstony,
+being merely low elevations of gravel) may perhaps refer to the
+selenite crystals with which the ground here teems. Manea Station is
+one of the few inland places where the curvature of the earth can be
+clearly seen. The line (towards March) is perfectly straight and
+perfectly level, and along it you may observe the trains rising into
+sight over the horizon like ships at sea.
+
+March stands on a much larger island, seven miles in length. At its
+southern extremity is Doddington, where the fine Early English church
+was once the richest in England. It was the Mother Church of a wide
+district, including its whole island and the fens for miles around. As
+these were drained so did the value of the benefice increase, till it
+became worth over £7,000 per annum. Parliament then stepped in, and
+divided the parish (and income) into seven Rectories, three of these
+being in the town of March, a modern growth around its important
+railway junction at the furthest northern point of the island. A
+fourth is Old March, a quiet "village-hamlet" (as Cardinal Wolsey
+calls it) two miles south of its larger offspring. The church here is
+most exceptionally beautiful. It is a Perpendicular structure, with a
+fine crocketed spire and flint patterns in the outer walls of the
+clerestory. The roof is beyond all magnificent, with "an innumerable
+company of Angels" along its vista of double hammer-beams. A brass
+commemorates William Dredeman, the donor of this crowning glory, who
+died in 1503; and there is another to Catharine Hansard, 1517, on
+which the Annunciation is depicted. The church is dedicated to St.
+Wendreda, a purely local saint.[246] The Parish account-books here
+give a striking picture of the mutations of the Reformation period.
+There are payments "for pluckynge doun emags [images] in ye Chyrch and
+for drynkynge thereat" (1547); "for breckyng down the Altar and
+carrying forth ye stons" (1550); "for makyng the Hy Alter" (1553);
+"for pulling doun ye hy alter" (1558); and "for a comunion tabull"
+(1559).
+
+[Footnote 246: See p. 275.]
+
+March is the half-way house between Ely and Peterborough, and between
+it and the last-named lies Whittlesea, also on a good-sized island of
+its own, which extends nearly to the Northamptonshire mainland. It is
+a pleasant little town, with a picturesque market place, where the
+ancient Market House still rises in the centre. And its church almost
+rivals that of March, with a still more glorious spire. In 1335
+Whittlesea was the scene of a most unedifying conflict between the
+Abbeys of Ramsey and Ely. To begin with, the Abbot of Ramsey and his
+monks raided the lands at Whittlesea belonging to Ely, drove away
+sixteen horses, and (by firing the sedge) burned twenty others,
+besides ten oxen, eighty cows, and one hundred swine, along with much
+grass, reeds, and other property. In retaliation for this outrage the
+Prior of Ely (and he, too, the saintly Prior Crauden) organised a
+regular military expedition, and came, at the head of the whole Abbey
+musters, "with banners flying as in war," to Ramsey itself, where, as
+that House complains, he "hewed down our woods, depastured our grass,
+and drove off our cattle." Both parties appealed to the King; but the
+discreditable transaction seems to have ended in a compromise. That
+such wild work should be possible at all in England reminds us that at
+this date the country had not yet recovered from the confusions
+attendant on the fall and murder of Edward the Second eight years
+before.
+
+Till the latter part of the nineteenth century Whittlesea gave its
+name to a famous mere, lying to the south of the town, and on the very
+border of the fens. It was a sheet of shallow water a couple of miles
+in length and breadth, and furnished a splendid field for angling,
+skating, and boat-sailing. Its shallowness made it none the less
+dangerous; for the bottom was fathomless ooze, so soft that the
+punting poles used here had to be furnished with a round board at
+their extremities, and demanded special skill, for if you once let
+this board get underneath the mud, it was much more likely to pull you
+in than you to pull it out.
+
+Other islets of the fen archipelago are Murrow, between Thorney and
+Wisbech, Westry near March, and Welney, on the Old Bedford river to
+the north of Manea. The name of the last reminds us that by it ran the
+old Well Stream, long robbed of its waters by their diversion to Lynn
+in the thirteenth century. To this day, however, its course may be
+traced on the map by the meandering boundary between Cambridgeshire
+and Norfolk across the fen. Following this line northwards we shortly
+come to the outskirts of the firm ground on which Wisbech stands, an
+_artificial_ island dating from Roman times and owing its existence to
+the great Roman sea wall around the Wash.
+
+Through this island ran the great Well Stream, giving their names to
+the villages (or rather the village, for they form a continuous row of
+houses) of Upwell and Outwell. This is the longest village in England,
+stretching on either side of the road for nearly five unbroken miles.
+It contains over 5,000 inhabitants, and lies partly in Cambridgeshire
+partly in Norfolk. The churches are in the latter county, and are
+grand specimens of the splendid series of churches which glorify the
+Marshland, as this district by the Wash has for ages been named. Both
+are of Perpendicular date, with a tower somewhat older. That of Upwell
+has an elaborate turret for the Sanctus bell. The canopy over the
+pulpit is still more elaborate. The roof has a series of angels, but
+far less numerous and effective than those at March. At Outwell there
+is a fine Decorated door, like that of Barrington.
+
+[Illustration: _Elm Church._]
+
+Emneth, on the further road to Wisbech, also has an angel roof, of
+specially interesting character. Each figure is holding some symbol of
+the Faith; one the Host, another a candlestick, another a Gospel-book.
+At Elm, hard by, may be seen a still more interesting development of
+church architecture. The tower is Early English, enriched on its
+internal face with exquisite shafting, and opening into the nave by an
+Early English arch. But both shafting and arch must have been
+insertions in much older work, for between the two may be seen the
+high-pitched string-course and the rude little window of the original
+Saxon church. The nave is also Early English (clerestory and all,
+which is rare hereabouts), while the chancel is Decorated, with its
+roof higher than that of the nave.
+
+Here at a farm house called Needham Hall (from a famous historic
+mansion formerly on the site) is shown an old table formed of one
+solid piece of oak, on which Oliver Cromwell is said to have once
+slept. When he arrived here at the head of his command during the
+Civil War, he chose this rude couch in preference to the best bed in
+the house, that he might fare no better than his men, who were
+bivouacking in the yard and outhouses.
+
+The churches along the Roman sea-wall on either side of the old Well
+Stream estuary are also of rare magnificence. To the east, in Norfolk,
+we find a series of villages deriving their names from the wall
+itself,--Walsoken, West Walton, Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St.
+Andrew. In every one of these the church is a joy; above all at West
+Walton, with its bell-tower (fifty yards to the south of the main
+building) uplifted on four graceful arches enriched with dog-tooth
+moulding. Octangular buttresses support the angles, which are
+ornamented with blank lancet arches. The next floor has on each side
+an arcade of three lancets, and the storey above a window of two
+lights beneath an arch of two mouldings, forming a splay of four
+banded pillars. No more perfect gem of composition exists; and the
+Perpendicular parapet which now crowns it very inadequately takes the
+place of the spire which seems to have been purposed by the original
+builder. The church itself displays similar features of Early English
+grace. The nave pillars have Purbeck marble shafts, with beautifully
+foliated capitals, and the clerestory is pierced with seventeen small
+archlets, alternately blind and light.
+
+Walsoken, now practically a suburb of Wisbech, has a Perpendicular
+shell around a Norman nave, which is (next to Norwich Cathedral) the
+best example of the style in all Norfolk. The chancel arch is a
+deservedly famous specimen of Transition work. It springs from six
+banded pillars, and has a soffit exquisitely worked with zig-zags and
+cusps. The screens of the chapels which formerly occupied the east end
+of either aisle are rich Perpendicular woodwork. The roof is also
+Perpendicular, with angels on the transome beams.
+
+Walpole St. Peter's is even more remarkable; for there is actually an
+ancient right of way through it, _underneath the Altar_. The
+thirteenth century chancel, with its five large Decorated windows on
+either side, ascends by no fewer than eleven steps from the nave to
+make room for this unique passage way. The five windows of the nave
+are of the earliest and best Perpendicular, and its eastern gable is
+crowned with three beautifully proportioned pinnacles. In this parish
+is the hamlet of Cross Keys, the name of which is sometimes supposed
+to be connected with St. Peter. But it is much more probably the
+_quay_ at the starting point of the ancient low-tide passage across
+the sands of the estuary which led to Sutton Crosses on the
+Lincolnshire side, five miles away, and which played, as we shall
+shortly tell, so notable a part in English history. From Walpole the
+sea-wall sweeps round by Terrington to Lynn. But here we are far in
+Norfolk. We must not, however, forget that we owe one of our Cambridge
+Colleges to Terrington, for Dr. Gonville, while Vicar here, founded in
+1347 his "College of the Annunciation," the embryo of Caius College.
+
+[Illustration: _Walpole St. Peter._]
+
+On the Cambridgeshire side of the Well Stream we also find churches
+fully equal to those on the Norfolk bank. Leverington is one specially
+to be noted, with its beautiful steeple, an Early English tower
+surmounted by a Decorated spire so exquisitely proportioned that it
+seems absolutely to melt away into the sky. There is also a fine
+Decorated porch with a stone-roofed parvis chamber of original and
+singular beauty. The chancel is also Decorated, while the grand nave
+is Perpendicular. The font, too, is Perpendicular, an octagonal
+structure of oolite, with richly ornamented niches on every face, each
+containing the head of a saint in high relief. The east window of the
+north aisle retains much of its ancient glass, proving it to be a
+"Jesse" window, tracing the descent of Christ from that patriarch
+through David.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tydd St. Giles lies at the northernmost extremity of the Isle of Ely,
+where the "Shire Drain" divides the village from its sister parish of
+Tydd St. Mary in Lincolnshire. Here, too, the church is remarkable,
+having its tower fifty feet beyond the East End, a unique position. Like
+Leverington, it has a specially fine octagonal font, richly traceried,
+and carved with emblems of the Passion and with the arms of the See of
+Ely. In the floor of the nave is a thirteenth century gravestone,
+bearing a floriated cross, and the legend (in Old English characters):
+"Orate.pro.anima.dni John.Fysner, cujus.aie.deus.ppiciet.Amen." (Pray
+for the soul of Mr. John Fysner, on whose soul may God be merciful.)
+
+On one of the pillars is a more interesting inscription in rude
+capital letters, much worn. It is in French, and would seem to be of
+the early fourteenth century, when that language was becoming very
+fashionable in England, as our current legal phraseology still shows.
+It runs thus:--
+
+  CEST . PILER . CVME
+  NCAT . RICARD . LE . PRE
+  STRE . PRIMER . PRE
+  YEZ . PVR . LVI
+
+_i.e._ in modern French: "Ce pilier commença Ricard le Prêtre
+premièrement. Priez pour lui"; and in English "This pillar Richard the
+Priest first began. Pray for him."
+
+After having told of so much loveliness all around, it is
+disappointing to be obliged to confess that at Wisbech itself, the
+metropolis of the northern Fenland, the church is comparatively
+commonplace. Not that it is otherwise than a fine structure, and, like
+Great Yarmouth, splendidly wide, having a double nave and a double
+chancel; but it is hopelessly outclassed by those in the neighbouring
+villages. The best feature is the tower, which is richly ornamented
+with sacred and heraldic devices of the later Perpendicular period.
+And in the nave is a fine fifteenth century brass. Otherwise there is
+little to say about it; and, indeed, little to say about Wisbech at
+all. It is a picturesque old place, with that somewhat pathetic
+picturesqueness of an ancient seaport town which the sea has deserted.
+
+Wisbech, however, is not by any means a "dead city." It has 10,000
+inhabitants, and keen local ambitions, which have developed an
+excellent museum and other up-to-date municipal equipment. Modern
+energy and science have, moreover, made so effective a waterway
+through the ten miles of silted-up estuary that vessels of 3,000 tons
+can now, at high tide, reach the wharf. Such, however, are almost
+unknown visitants. Last year (1909) the vessels clearing from the port
+numbered 209, of 36,000 tons in all. Two of these are registered at
+Wisbech itself, as are also twelve sea-fishing boats. A characteristic
+photograph of Wisbech's shipping is given by Mrs. Hughes in the
+"Geography of Cambridgeshire" (p. 118). Other photographs (pp. 47, 48)
+show the great height to which the tide rises in the river, there
+being a difference of over twenty feet between high and low water
+mark. The Nene still has its outfall here, and flows through the town
+in a fine sweep locally called the Brink.
+
+It is hard to believe that this Brink is not the Beach whence the name
+of the town is vulgarly supposed to be derived. But you must not
+suggest this to a Wisbech man. The single vowel is an integral part of
+local faith and local pride, and to insert the "a" is to show yourself
+a hopeless outsider. With it the name would come from _Ouse-beach_
+(like Land-beach and Water-beach near Cambridge). Without it the
+derivation is _Ouse-beck_. This last syllable is a Scandinavian word,
+well known throughout the north of England, and there signifying a
+running brook. Throughout the Fenland it is frequently used for a
+drain. But can the mighty Well Stream of the Ouse, at its tidal
+outfall here, have ever suggested either drain or brook to the men of
+old who named the place? And can these have been Scandinavians?
+
+[Illustration: _Leverington._]
+
+The chief oversea trade of Wisbech is in timber from Norway; and it
+also does a large traffic in fruit, flowers, and vegetables, which are
+extensively grown hereabouts. In this neighbourhood, moreover, may be
+seen a much rarer cultivated crop, nothing less primitive than the
+woad with which the ancient Britons dyed their bodies; though it is a
+mistake to suppose that this dye took the place of clothing, for as
+far back as history traces them they were quite fairly civilised, and
+used woad only for tattooing, like sailors.[247] It is now used for
+dyeing cloth. "An old woad mill, built of turf blocks arranged in the
+ancient herring-bone pattern, with a timber and reed-thatched roof,
+can still be seen at the village of Parson's Drove, about six miles
+from Wisbech. The plant (_Isatis tinctoria_) grows about six feet
+high, and has a blue-green leaf and bright yellow flower; the people
+still call it by its old name, _w[-a]d_. The young plants are
+delicate, and the crop requires much care. It is weeded by men and
+women clad in hardened skirts and leathern knee-caps, who creep along
+the ground and take out the weeds with a curious little handspade
+which fits into the palm. The plant is picked by hand. The leaves are
+crushed to a pulp in the mill by rude conical crushing wheels dragged
+round by horses, and are then worked by hand into large balls and laid
+on "fleaks" of twined hazel, or on planks, in special sheds, for three
+months to dry. After this, the balls are thrown together, mixed with
+water and allowed to ferment in a dark house for five or six weeks.
+The woad is then rammed into casks and is ready to be sold to cloth
+manufacturers."[248]
+
+[Footnote 247: See my _Roman Britain_, p. 47.]
+
+[Footnote 248: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs._, p. 97, where there is an
+interesting photograph of this Woad Mill.]
+
+Wisbech plays but little part in history. Its position at the
+convergence of the two great Roman sea-walls, east and west of the
+estuary, makes it pretty certain that they must have had a station
+here; but, if so, it has wholly passed out of memory. Wisbech Castle
+is said to have been built by William the Conqueror, and certainly
+existed in the time of King John. It passed into the possession of the
+Bishops of Ely, and was rebuilt by two famous holders of the See,
+Bishop Morton, the designer and excavator of Morton's Leam,[249] and
+Bishop Alcock, the Founder of Jesus College, Cambridge.[250] Both
+these prelates were singularly thoroughgoing reformers. The former
+went into minute details about the dress of his clergy, forbidding
+them to wear gaudy attire (such as "lirripoops" or gowns open in front
+like a present-day M.A. gown), and charging them straitly to cut their
+hair "so that all men may see their ears." And the latter was an
+indefatigable pulpiteer; one of his University sermons is recorded to
+have lasted three mortal hours on end.
+
+[Footnote 249: See p. 398.]
+
+[Footnote 250: See p. 146.]
+
+[Illustration: _Bell Tower, Tydd St. Giles._]
+
+This episcopal connection of Wisbech Castle led to its becoming, in
+the reign of Elizabeth, the final scene of that pathetic and lingering
+tragedy, the fate of the old Catholic Hierarchy of England. Such of
+that hierarchy as were alive at Elizabeth's succession were, with one
+exception, deposed for refusing the Oath of Supremacy, to the number
+of fifteen. Shortly afterwards they were imprisoned, not by any
+process of law but by the Royal fiat, and continued under more or less
+severe restraint for the rest of their lives. This was wholly on
+account of their religion. Lord Burghley, a hostile witness (in his
+_Execution of Justice in England_[251]), testifies to their blameless
+characters, describing them as "faithful and quiet subjects," "persons
+of courteous natures," "of great modesty, learning and knowledge,"
+"secluded only for their contrary opinions in religion, that savour
+not (like those of the seminary priests) of treason."
+
+[Footnote 251: This work was published in 1583, to justify the
+execution of the seminary priests in England. Burghley's point is that
+quiet Papists were not put to death.]
+
+Yet, though thus inoffensive, their doom was grievously heavy.
+Committed, to begin with, to solitary confinement, in what Froude
+calls "the living death of the Tower" and other London prisons, for
+three or four years, they were afterwards quartered (singly) on the
+Protestant prelates, who were stringently ordered by the Council to
+prevent them from communication, either by word or letter, with
+anyone, and to see that they had neither paper to write withal, nor
+books to read (except Protestant ones). Thus deprived of every
+intellectual, social, and religious solace, "pining away in miserable
+desolation, tossing and shifting from one keeper to another," they one
+by one drooped and died. But all remained steadfast to their Faith;
+and finally the "obstinate" survivors were, in 1580, closely
+imprisoned, along with others in like case, in Wisbech Castle.
+
+Here they were under the charge of Cox, the new Protestant Bishop of
+Ely, who writes of them as "sworn against Christ," and boasts that "if
+walls, locks, and doors can separate them from out-practice they shall
+not want a sufficient provision of each." "Nor let it be thought, as
+some bishops have reported, that I mind to make trade by over-ruling
+such wretches." The "trade" was handed over to a favourite servant, to
+make what he could out of the unhappy prisoners (who, like all
+prisoners in those days, had to be supported by their friends),
+subject only to providing out of his takings £80 per annum for the
+upkeep of two Protestant preachers, "who are well able to set down
+God's anger" against Popery. These preachers (amongst whom one
+regrets to find "Lancelot Andrewes of Pembroke Hall") were ever and
+anon to pester the "recusants" with denunciatory discourses in the
+castle hall. "And the recusants shall be conveyed thither by a secret
+way, without seeing any; and they shall have a secret place for
+themselves to be in, to hear and not be seen.... This is the holy
+ordinance of God."[252]
+
+[Footnote 252: See Bridgett and Knox, _Queen Elizabeth and the
+Catholic Hierarchy_, p. 197 _et seq._ It may have been these highly
+specialised discourses which put so fine an edge on Wisbech
+Protestantism that, in the Civil War, the Parson here was ejected for
+no more heinous offence than that "he called a Godly Minister (Mr.
+Allison) _Brother Redface_."]
+
+Kept with this rigour the Confessors lingered on, year after year,
+till death set them free. The latest to be released were Thomas
+Watson, Bishop of Lincoln, who died in 1584, and Feckenham, the last
+Abbot of Westminster, who died in 1585. Both are buried (as the Parish
+Registers testify) in Wisbech churchyard.
+
+The castle was sold by the See of Ely in 1783, and has since been
+almost wholly pulled down. Nearly at the same date a young man, born
+at Wisbech, was beginning those efforts which have reflected glory on
+his native town, and have revolutionised public opinion throughout the
+civilised world. The man was Thomas Clarkson, and the cause to which
+he devoted his life was the abolition of slavery. That institution, up
+to his time, was regarded as a very foundation of the earth. Rooted in
+the furthest past of man's history, and as world-wide as it was
+ancient, the idea of questioning its place in the eternal fitness of
+things never occurred even to philanthropists. A virtuous man would
+treat his slaves kindly; but as for not having such, he would as soon
+have scrupled at having sheep and oxen, or at employing hired
+servants.
+
+It was left for young Clarkson, while a student at Cambridge, to
+realise that the time was come when, if the human conscience was to
+make any further progress in enlightenment, this hoary iniquity must,
+root and branch, be abolished. On a steep hillside above Wade Mill, in
+the road between Cambridge and London, a monument by the wayside still
+marks the spot where he dismounted from his horse, and, kneeling on
+the ground in the fervour of youthful enthusiasm, solemnly vowed to
+God that for this holy object he would live and, if need be, die.
+
+At once he set to work. Gathering a band of like-minded friends round
+him (mostly belonging to the so-called Clapham Sect, who were then
+inaugurating the great Evangelical Revival)--Wilberforce, Zachary
+Macaulay, Babington, Thornton, Buxton, Cropper, and the rest--he
+started an agitation in and out of Parliament, which carried all
+before it. The Slave Trade was abolished in 1807; on August 1st, 1834,
+slavery itself ceased throughout the British Empire; the example of
+Britain was followed by other European Powers; and finally, in 1864,
+after a last desperate struggle for existence in the American Civil
+War, it was cast forth from its last stronghold in the United States.
+If practised at all now, it is practised under some feigned name and
+elusive system. No civilised man dare any longer proclaim himself an
+avowed slave-driver. Well indeed does Clarkson deserve the monument
+which Wisbech has erected to her glorious son.
+
+At Wisbech, till the reclamation of the neighbouring Washes,
+Cambridgeshire (or rather the Isle of Ely) possessed an actual strip
+of seaboard extending from Wisbech town northward to the county
+boundary between Tydd St. Mary and Tydd St. Giles. This strip was
+itself reclaimed ground, but of far earlier date, due to the era of
+Roman civilisation in Britain. The old coast-line, as has been said,
+is still marked for us by a massive embankment extending from Sutton,
+in Lincolnshire, to Wisbech, and thence to King's Lynn, in Norfolk--an
+embankment sufficiently old to have given its name to the ancient
+villages along its course. The designations of Walsoken, West Walton,
+Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St. Andrew, all testify to this sea
+wall having been already in existence when the East Anglians, in the
+fifth century, first took possession of the land.
+
+[Illustration: _Wisbech Church._]
+
+This embankment kept back, to the west and to the east, the tide-water
+of the Well Stream (see p. 399), a wide inlet of the sea, narrowing
+southward till it reached its extremity at Wisbech, and forming the
+estuary for the united outfall of all the Fenland waterways. In later
+days operations connected with the draining of the fens have diverted
+nearly the whole volume of the Great Ouse and its tributary streams
+to fall into the sea at King's Lynn, and have led the Nene straight to
+Wisbech. But till the thirteenth century was well advanced the Ouse
+and the Nene joined each other near Outwell, the united river being
+called the "Well" or "Well Stream." The names of Upwell, Outwell,
+Welney, &c., still preserve the memory of this old waterway.
+
+The estuary was, of course, tidal, leaving at low water a broad
+expanse of sands, amidst which the shifting channel of the river was
+so far broadened out as to be fordable at certain points; thus
+admitting of passage across the whole breadth of the inlet, even where
+it became five miles wide. The regular track for this passage was from
+the little hamlet of Cross Keys, on the Norfolk coast (the name of
+which is derived from this circumstance) to Sutton Crosses, near the
+village of Long Sutton, on the Lincolnshire side, and is approximately
+marked for us to-day by the line of the Great Northern Railway between
+these spots, traversing the level fields and meadows which have (since
+the year 1830) finally replaced the sands of old.
+
+The conditions of the passage were identical with those to be found
+now at Morecambe Bay. That estuary can also be crossed at low tide;
+but to do so in safety a good deal of local knowledge is essential.
+The right points for fording the river channels must be found, the
+numerous quicksands must be avoided, while the localities of both
+fords and quicksands are constantly changing. It is therefore
+exceedingly rash to make the attempt without guides; for across the
+level sands of every estuary the tide makes with extreme rapidity,
+sometimes coming in before the wind faster than any man can hope to
+outrun it. These guides are professionals, who await on either bank
+the demand for their services.
+
+All this is exactly what is said of the Well Stream "Washes" in
+authorities of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As late as
+1775, though successive reclamations had by that time reduced the
+breadth of the passage by more than half, we hear of the guide "always
+attending at Cross Keys to conduct passengers over, bearing a wand or
+rod in his hand, probably in imitation of Moses, who held a rod when
+he conducted the Israelites through the Red Sea." The rod was really
+used for probing the sand in front, lest it should prove "quick," and
+also for taking the bearings on the opposite shore by which the course
+was steered.
+
+It was through neglect of such expert advice that the Well Stream
+estuary became the scene of that dramatic episode in English history,
+which, on the 13th of October in the year 1216, cost King John his
+treasures and his life. The story is narrated by the contemporary
+historian Roger of Wendover, and the Barnwell and Coggeshall
+chroniclers. The whole circumstances have been most carefully and
+minutely elaborated by Mr. St. John Hope, through whose kindness I am
+enabled to use his materials. His able monograph on the subject is to
+be found in Vol. LX. of "Archæologia."
+
+John was, in 1216, at death-grips with the Barons, who, in the
+previous year, had wrung from him the signature of Magna Charta. The
+rights and wrongs of the quarrel were not so wholly one-sided as is
+popularly supposed, and the appeal of both parties to the Pope had not
+sufficed to clear them up. The offer of the Crown by the Barons to
+Louis, Dauphin of France, was for the moment more successful. Most of
+England acknowledged him as King, and even the King of Scots came to
+do homage for his sub-kingdom (as Scotland then was); only a few
+strongholds, notably Windsor Castle, holding out for John and being
+besieged by the Barons.
+
+John himself, however, was still at large, and at the head of a small,
+but very effective, mercenary army of filibusters from all the
+countries of Europe. He met the situation by a campaign of
+extraordinary energy; his object being to relieve his invested
+fortresses by drawing off their assailants to the defence of their own
+lands. Incidentally, desire of revenge, and the need of paying his
+troops by plunder, operated as a further motive for the merciless
+destruction which, in a series of brilliant and ferocious raids, he
+meted out to the districts owned by his opponents. The speed of his
+movements is almost incredible, considering the conditions of travel
+in the thirteenth century; but they can be traced with accuracy by the
+still existing entries in the Patent and Close Rolls; for day by day
+John did not cease to do royal business and to sign the documents
+submitted to him, however far he might have marched since morning. In
+the eyes of his Continental contemporaries this consuming energy came
+to be held his chief characteristic. In the "Dittamondo" of the
+Italian poet, Fazio degli Uberti, written early in the fourteenth
+century, which gives a brief notice of the successive Kings of England
+from the Norman Conquest onwards, the one thing mentioned about John
+is the "hot haste" of his riding.
+
+Hot haste it was, indeed! Week after week the King made his army
+(which, though small, cannot have numbered fewer than two or three
+thousand men) cover distances that would be creditable to a solitary
+bicycle tourist on the macadamised roads of to-day. From Corfe Castle,
+in Dorsetshire, whither he had retreated on the landing of Louis, he
+dashed across England (_via_ Bristol) to Cheshire, ravaged that
+district for over a fortnight, and was back at Corfe within six weeks
+of setting out. The very next day he was off again, and by a
+circuitous route of 155 miles (for his enemies' forces barred the
+direct way) reached Oxford within a week. A few days later another yet
+more wonderful week of 225 miles carried him from Reading to Lincoln;
+his daily stages being Bedford (45 miles), Cambridge (30), Castle
+Hedingham, in Essex (25), Stamford (70), Rockingham (10), and Lincoln
+(50). Here he remained ten days, during which he raised the siege of
+the castle; having also succeeded in relieving Windsor, for the Barons
+who were attacking it hastily broke up, and marched to Cambridge in
+hopes of cutting him off at this strategic point--the only place, as
+we have said,[253] where the Cam was passable for an army. It was
+doubtless to escape this danger that John undertook, on September
+19th, the forced march of 70 miles from Hedingham to Stamford, which
+had perforce to be made _via_ "the Great Bridge" of Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 253: P. 6.]
+
+Yet another week of marches up and down Lincolnshire, 115 miles in
+all, brought him round the Wash to Lynn (by way of Wisbech); and then
+came the great catastrophe.
+
+It was on Wednesday the 12th of October, 1215, that King John, after
+three days' stay at Lynn, retraced his steps, with his wonted
+celerity, by way of Wisbech, to Swineshead Abbey near Boston, a
+distance of over forty miles. Documents signed by him on this day at
+all three places are to be found in the Patent and Close Rolls. His
+baggage train, which obviously could not have kept up with this pace,
+he ordered to follow by the direct route across the sands. We read
+with some surprise that his flying column was accompanied by such a
+train at all; but the contemporary historians agree in telling us of
+"carts, waggons, and sumpter horses," loaded with the King's treasures
+and properties (including even a portable chapel), and with the spoil
+amassed during this long raid.
+
+Such a train would cover at least a mile on any road, and could only
+move quite slowly, three miles an hour at the very outside. How it
+kept touch with the column at all is a wonder, and we may be sure that
+it could never have done so during the forced march from Hedingham on
+the 19th of September. After that date the occupation of Cambridge by
+the Baronial forces would effectually bar the way against any attempt
+to follow in the King's track; and it is highly probable that he,
+knowing that this would be so, had ordered the train and its escort to
+make their way instead from Hedingham to Lynn, and that he paid his
+hurried visit to that place with the sole object of once more getting
+into touch with them.
+
+However that may be, there is no doubt that the train did set out from
+Lynn, along the road to Cross Keys, after the King and his troops had
+ridden off towards Wisbech. It was impossible, however, to attempt the
+passage that same day, for the channel of the Well Stream could only
+be forded during the hour or so on either side of low-water, which, as
+calculations show, was on this day about noon. The long line of
+vehicles had, accordingly, to halt for the night at Cross Keys, for to
+have attempted the passage in the dark (the moon was nearly at the
+new), would have been simply suicidal.
+
+Next morning, Thursday, October 13th, they woke to find the tide
+lapping against the old Roman embankment behind which they lay, for it
+was a spring tide, and at its highest about 6.30 a.m. Rapidly it
+receded, and by 9 a.m. the wide expanse of the sands would lie bare
+before them. The moment these were dry enough for the passage of carts
+they would start, for their leaders knew well the urgent necessity for
+speed. To get such a train across the Well Stream channel in the short
+space of two hours they must be at the ford the very moment it was
+practicable. Every instant was precious, and every driver did his
+utmost to press on, regardless of the warnings of the guides (if they
+had any).
+
+But to drive a loaded cart over wet sand is at the best a slow job.
+Readers of Sir Walter Scott will remember his vivid description, in
+_Redgauntlet_, of the difficulties attending such attempts:
+
+     "The vehicle, sinking now on one side, now on the other,
+     sometimes sticking absolutely fast and requiring the utmost
+     exertions of the animal which drew it to put it once more in
+     motion, was subjected to jolts in all directions.... There seemed
+     at least five or six people around the cart, some on foot, others
+     on horseback. The former lent assistance whenever it was in
+     danger of upsetting or sticking fast in the quicksands: the
+     others rode before and acted as guides, often changing the
+     direction of the vehicle as the precarious state of the passage
+     required.... Thus the cart was dragged heavily and wearily on,
+     until the nearer roar of the advancing tide excited apprehension
+     of another danger.... A rider hastily fastened his own horse to
+     the shafts of the cart, in order to assist the exhausted animal
+     which drew it, ... but at length, when, after repeated and
+     hair-breadth escapes, it actually stuck fast in a quicksand, the
+     driver, with an oath, cut the harness, and departed with the
+     horses, splashing over the wet sand and through the shallows as
+     he galloped off."
+
+Multiply all this at least a hundred-fold, throwing in the added
+turmoil caused by the multitude of carts jamming and impeding one
+another, and we can picture something of the scene as that fatal
+morning advanced and the doomed cavalcade ploughed its way on to
+destruction. For there was no margin of time; and though the leading
+vehicles seem to have reached the Well Stream channel, they reached it
+too late. Already it was unfordable, for such traffic at least as
+theirs. Some of the carts doubtless tried to make a dash across; but
+their horses, exhausted by the strenuous effort of the last two hours,
+were unequal to the tremendous strain of negotiating the soft bottom
+of the stream. A very few such failures would entirely bar the way to
+those who were eagerly pressing on behind, and almost in a moment the
+whole column would be in irremediable confusion. In the struggling
+press, to turn would be as impossible as to proceed, while momentarily
+the laden carts, for which the only hope was to be kept going, would,
+at a standstill, sink deeper, inch by inch, into the ever quickening
+sand. And then in the midst of the welter, up came the tide, sweeping
+over the level sands, as spring tides in the Wash do sweep;--and, when
+the waters once more went down, of all that mass of treasure and
+plunder, of all those horses and drivers and carts and waggons not a
+trace was to be seen. The sands had swallowed all; and to this day
+they retain their prey. As Shakespeare makes King John say:
+
+  "These Lincoln Washes have devoured them."
+
+The expanse of sands is now an expanse of fields and meadows, through
+which the River Nene is led by a straight cut from Wisbech to the sea.
+Where that cut is crossed by the Great Northern Railway (which, as has
+been said, runs almost along the line of the old crossing-track) is
+the traditional spot of the disaster, and Mr. St. John Hope believes
+that excavation might there bring to light some of its relics, even
+after the lapse of so many years.
+
+Matthew Paris (in his _Historia Anglorum_), writing in the generation
+following the catastrophe, tells us that John himself was on the scene
+and barely escaped from the rising waters. But he, as we have seen,
+was the previous night (and the next) at Swineshead Abbey. It is just
+possible that, with his astounding energy, he may have ridden in the
+morning with a few attendants to Long Sutton (a distance of twenty
+miles, as before the reclamation of the fens travellers from Boston
+thither would have to go round by Spalding), and thence across the
+sands, to overlook in person the passage of the Well Stream. If so, he
+may well, in the confusion, have been surprised by the tide and have
+barely escaped by hard riding. Anyhow the catastrophe cost him his
+life; for this heart-breaking blow, coming on top of his three months'
+herculean exertions, brought on a feverish attack that very night. Ill
+as he was, he was on horseback again by dawn, and rode fifteen miles
+to Sleaford. Next day he struggled on twenty miles to Newark, where
+"the disease increasing, he received the counsel of Confession and the
+Eucharist from the Abbot of Croxton," and died that same evening
+(October 18th), fairly burnt out by his own consuming and tireless
+energy. If ever King did, he "died standing."
+
+"Foul as Hell is, it is defiled by the fouler presence of John." Such
+is the uncompromising verdict of the inimical chronicler; and such
+(in less trenchant phraseology) has been very much the verdict of
+popular historians even to our own day. But it was a verdict by no
+means universally accepted by contemporaries. John did not, like
+William Rufus, receive what Professor Freeman calls "the distinction
+of a popular excommunication." For Rufus no prayer was said, no psalm
+was sung, no Mass was offered. All men felt that prayer was hopeless.
+But John was buried in peace; and it speedily appeared that the cause
+for which he stood was the cause which (more especially when the
+weight of his own personal unpopularity was removed) most commended
+itself to the heart of England. Men had no desire to see the English
+Crown become an appanage for the heir to the French monarchy. And so
+Louis rapidly found. Within nine days of his father's death the infant
+Henry the Third was crowned at Gloucester,--with his mother's
+bracelet, in default of the proper crown (which, however, is not
+likely to be amongst the treasures lost in the Wash, as many histories
+assume); and within six months men were flocking "as to a Holy War,"
+from all parts of the country, to take part in that decisive battle
+known as "the Fair of Lincoln," which crushed, once and for all, the
+foreign intrusion, and established irrevocably the claim of the
+native-born ruler to succeed his father on the throne of England.
+
+And with this stirring story we take our leave of the Highways and
+Byways of Cambridgeshire, the stage of so many a story, the home of so
+many a memory; the scene--to those who have eyes to see--of so much
+quiet loveliness; where the Present is ever brooded over by the Past,
+and where on the anvils of Thought and Science the Future is ever
+being shaped. We have explored the County from end to end, we have
+mounted her uplands, we have traversed her fens, we have clambered her
+earthworks, we have entered her churches. Her Manor-houses have told
+us their tale of struggle, her Colleges have borne their witness to
+the growth of knowledge. We have been able to
+
+  "Watch Time's full river as it flows";
+
+and the pathos of all that has come and gone stands out before us, as
+a record more thrilling than the most daring romance, as a theme more
+inspiring than the noblest poem. We bid good-bye to the County of
+Cambridge and the Isle of Ely feeling that no hue of dulness attaches
+to them, as is commonly supposed by the unappreciative crowd, but that
+rather the footprints of the past which abound within their borders
+give promise of a future that shall not be unworthy of what has gone
+before.
+
+[Illustration: _The Old Court of Corpus._]
+
+
+
+
+ADDENDA.
+
+
+Attention should have been called to two remarkable ecclesiastical
+inscriptions, on the Eastern and Western borders of our district
+respectively.
+
+In the upland churchyard of Castle Camps (p. 206), hard by the
+Priest's Door into the Chancel, a tombstone has the following epitaph:
+
+  Mors Mortis Morti mortem nisi morte dedisset
+    Æternæ Vitæ janua clausa foret.
+
+  ["Except the Death of Death Death's death by death had been
+      Ne'er would Eternal Life with door unshut be seen."]
+
+And in the church of Fen Stanton, low down amid the Ouse meadows near
+St. Ives, is the following ancient rebus (also hard by the Priest's
+Door):
+
+  QV   A     D    T     M        P
+    OS  NGVIS IRVS RISTI VLCEDINE AVIT
+  H   SA     M    X     D        L
+
+  _I.e._--Quos Anguis dirus tristi mulcedine pavit
+        Hos Sanguis mirus Christi dulcedine lavit.
+
+  ["Whom the dire Serpent fouls with poisonous food
+    Christ washeth in His sweet and wondrous Blood."]
+
+A variant of these lines is to be seen in the Alpine sanctuary of
+Champéry near the Lake of Geneva.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+  A
+
+  Abbeys:
+    Barnwell, 10, 160
+    Chatteris, 390
+    Crowland, 137, 393
+    Denny, 30, 298
+    Ely, 302-341, 345-376
+    Peterborough, 373, 390, 394
+    Ramsey, 75, 198, 279, 310, 392, 410
+    Soham, 178
+    Thorney, 392, 396
+
+  Abbey Barn, 161
+
+  Abington, 203
+
+  Adams, Prof., 266
+
+  "Ad eundem," 265
+
+  Adventurers, 403
+
+  Adwulf, 304
+
+  Agincourt, 184
+
+  Aidan, St., 175
+
+  Akeman Street, 252, 258, 295
+
+  Alan of Walsingham, 329, 345, 356, 360, 362, 366, 373
+
+  Alcock, Bp., 146, 283, 332, 376, 418
+
+  Aldreth, 283, 295, 316
+
+  Alfred the Etheling, 314
+
+  Alfred the Great, 11, 38, 169, 183, 213
+
+  Alum, 92
+
+  Ambulatory, 366
+
+  Ancarig, 392
+
+  Andrewes, Bp., 342
+
+  Andrew, St., Oratory of, 161
+
+  Anna, King, 303
+
+  Archdeacon of Ely, 282
+
+  Armeswerke, 306
+
+  Arnold, Matthew, 268
+
+  Arrington, 258
+
+  Artesian, 260
+
+  Ashwell, 248
+
+  Ashwell Bush, 236
+
+  Assandun, 205, 313
+
+  Assize of Barnwell, 161
+
+  Athelney, 308
+
+  Audley End, 234
+
+  Audrey's Fair, St., 307
+
+  Augustine, St., 38, 303
+
+  Augustinians, 11, 158
+
+
+  B
+
+  B.A., 16
+
+  Babraham, 202
+
+  Backs, 2, 41, 85
+
+  Bacon, 90, 102
+
+  Baitsbite, 296
+
+  Balsham, 171, 216
+
+  Balsham, Bp., 12, 25, 112, 325
+
+  Baptistery (Ely), 352
+
+  Barham Hall, 205
+
+  Barnack, 329
+
+  Barnett, Bp., 366
+
+  Barnwell, 10, 160
+
+  Barnwell Gate, 35, 152
+
+  Barnwell Priory, 16, 160, 370
+
+  Barrington, 238, 289
+
+  Barrow, 102
+
+  Bartlow, 205
+
+  Barton, 254
+
+  Barton Road, 252
+
+  Basevi, 371
+
+  Basket-making, 384
+
+  Bassingbourn, 247
+
+  Bateman, Bp., 82
+
+  Bath, 252
+
+  Becket, Thomas à, 235, 246
+
+  Bedford, Earl of, 406
+
+  Bedford Rivers, 280, 389
+
+  Bedmakers, 16
+
+  Belsars Hill, 283, 292
+
+  Benedictine Rule, 339
+
+  Benson, A. C., 138
+
+  Bentham, 345
+
+  Bentley, 40, 101, 105, 109
+
+  Bible (St. John's Coll.), 117
+
+  Bidding Prayer, 128
+
+  Biggin "Abbey," 295
+
+  Bishop's Delph, 178
+
+  Bishopsgate, 222
+
+  Black Death, 248, 340
+
+  Blaise, St., 284
+
+  Blazer, 119
+
+  Bluntisham, 280
+
+  Boadicea, 172
+
+  Boat Houses, 146
+
+  Boat Races, 88, 146, 296
+
+  Boat Show, 43
+
+  Bonfire, 85
+
+  Borough, 7, 8
+
+  Borough Green, 188
+
+  Botolph, St., 32, 34, 304
+
+  Bottisham, 189
+
+  Bourn, 273
+
+  Bourn Brook, 270
+
+  Bourne R., 202
+
+  Brazier, 97
+
+  Brandon, 185
+
+  Bretwalda, 178
+
+  Bridges:
+    Clare, 42, 84, 93
+    Great, 46, 136
+    Hauxton, 235
+    Hostel, 43
+    Huntingdon, 278
+    King's, 42
+    Magdalene, 136
+    Newnham, 41, 222
+    Queens', 41
+    St. John's, 118
+    Trinity, 43
+
+  Bucer, 23, 131
+
+  Buckingham College, 137
+
+  Bulldogs, 132
+
+  Burgesses, 12
+
+  Burgraed (King), 309
+
+  Burnt Mill, 236
+
+  Burwell, 195, 198
+
+  Bury St. Edmunds, 320, 370
+
+  Butcher's Broom, 227
+
+  Butterflies, 182, 211
+
+  Butter Measure, 12
+
+  Buttery, 95
+
+  Butts, 254
+
+  Byron, 90, 94
+
+  Byron's Pool, 220
+
+
+  C
+
+  Caldecote, 271
+
+  Cam, 7, 8, 40, 222, 295
+
+  Cambridge and Oxford, 2, 11, 17
+
+  Camden Society, 134
+
+  Camp of Refuge, 10, 316
+
+  Canute, 8, 205, 313
+
+  Car Dyke, 297
+
+  Carmelites, 11
+
+  Castle, 4, 138
+
+  Castle Camps, 206
+
+  Cavendish Laboratory, 159, 267
+
+  Caxton, 273
+
+  Ceilings, 100
+
+  Chad, St., 176, 355
+
+  Chained books, 83
+
+  Chancellor, 125
+
+  Chantries, 239
+
+  Chapel, Bush, 238
+
+  Chapel lists, 104
+
+  Chapels (College):
+    Christ's, 153
+    Clare, 84
+    Corpus, 35
+    Emmanuel, 158
+    Girton, 144
+    Jesus, 147, 148
+    King's, 52-77, 290
+    Pembroke, 30, 342
+    Peterhouse, 26, 342
+    Queens', 48
+    St. John's, 113
+    Trinity, 102
+
+  Chapels (at Ely):
+    Bishop Alcock's, 332, 369
+    Bishop West's, 332, 367
+    Crauden's, 330, 346
+    Lady, 330, 372
+    St. Catherine's, 352
+    St. Edmund's, 360
+
+  Charles the First, 101, 138, 182, 190, 268, 406
+
+  Charles the Second, 173
+
+  Cherry Hill, 345
+
+  Cherryhinton, 208
+
+  Chester, 221
+
+  Chesterford, 232
+
+  Chesterton, 295
+
+  Chevely, 185
+
+  Childerley, 271
+
+  Chimes, 101, 129
+
+  Choirs, 114
+
+  Choir School (Ely), 314
+
+  Christopher, St., 205
+
+  Chum, 288
+
+  Church ales, 247
+
+  Churches (Cambridge):
+    Abbey, 161
+    All Saints', 108
+    Christ Church, 162
+    Holy Sepulchre, 133
+    Holy Trinity, 152
+    Our Lady's, 21
+    St. Andrew's the Great, 155
+    St. Andrew's the Less, 161
+    St. Benet's, 36
+    St. Botolph's, 32
+    St. Clement's, 136
+    St. Giles', 140
+    St. Mary's the Great, 127
+    St. Mary's the Less, 25
+    St. Michael's, 13, 86
+    St. Paul's, 162
+    St. Peter's, 140
+
+  Churches (Ely):
+    Holy Trinity, 372
+    St. Cross, 379
+    St. Mary's, 378
+
+  Clapham Sect, 422
+
+  Clapper Stile, 204
+
+  Clarence, Duke of, 94
+
+  Clarkson, 421
+
+  Clayhithe, 296
+
+  Clergy Training School, 148
+
+  Clerks, 11
+
+  Clerk-Maxwell, 97
+
+  Cloisters, 92, 353
+
+  Clough, 142
+
+  Clunch, 198, 236
+
+  Codex Bezæ, 82
+
+  Coe Fen, 159
+
+  Coleridge, 150
+
+  "College" (Ely), 376
+
+  Colleges:
+    Christ's, 152-155
+    Clare, 83-85, 342
+    Corpus Christi, 35-38
+    Downing, 159
+    Ely Theological, 382
+    Emmanuel, 156-158
+    Girton, 144
+    Gonville and Caius, 120-124
+    Jesus, 146-150, 369
+    King's, 50-79
+    Magdalene, 137
+    Newnham, 142
+    Pembroke, 28-34, 298
+    Peterhouse, 25-28, 369
+    Queens', 47-50
+    Ridley Hall, 142
+    St. Catherine's, 39-40
+    St. John's, 109-119
+    Selwyn, 144
+    Sidney Sussex, 151-152
+    Trinity, 86-107, 242
+    Trinity Hall, 82-83
+    Westminster, 142
+
+  Comacine Guild, 353
+
+  Comberton, 254
+
+  Combination Rooms, 26, 97
+
+  Commons, 1
+
+  "Commons," 95
+
+  Common Fields, 3
+
+  Conduit, 23, 130, 158
+
+  Confessionals, 263
+
+  Conington, 292
+
+  Conqueror, William the, 187, 283, 315, 359
+
+  Coprolites, 240
+
+  Corporation, 12, 185
+
+  Coton, 89
+
+  Cottenham, 298
+
+  Courts (College), 2
+
+  Courts, Christian, 11
+
+  Covenant, 91
+
+  Coveney, 409
+
+  Cox, Bishop, 289
+
+  Cratendune, 179, 303
+
+  Cranmer, Abp., 150
+
+  Crauden, Prior, 330, 346, 359, 410
+
+  Cromwell, Oliver, 32, 128, 151, 272, 278, 367, 381, 406, 412
+
+  Cross Keys, 413, 424, 427
+
+  Crusades, 328
+
+  Cycloid, 89
+
+  Cyclone, 276
+
+  Cymbeline, 172
+
+
+  D
+
+  Darwin, 155
+
+  Deanery (Ely), 348, 353
+
+  Decorated, 334
+
+  Degrees, 16
+
+  Denver, 387
+
+  Denver Sluice, 280, 389, 407
+
+  Devil's Dyke, 171, 187, 194, 212, 300
+
+  "Disinherited," 325
+
+  Divinity schools, 109
+
+  Doddington, 409
+
+  Dominicans, 11, 155
+
+  Dowsing, 56, 187, 189, 205, 222, 270
+
+  Dry Drayton, 270
+
+  Dullingham, 188
+
+  Dunstan, Abp., 309
+
+  Dunwich, 180
+
+  "Duties," 377
+
+  Duxford, 228
+
+  Dykes, 170-173
+
+
+  E
+
+  Earith, 298, 389
+
+  Early English, 334
+
+  Eastern Counties Association, 380
+
+  Edgar the Peacemaker, 309, 373, 192
+
+  Edmund the Ironside, 206, 313
+
+  Edmund, St., 175, 180, 262
+
+  Edmundhouse, 142
+
+  Edward the Confessor, 314
+
+  Edward the Elder, 6, 8, 169, 212, 278
+
+  Edward the First, 328
+
+  Edward the Second, 86, 359, 411
+
+  Edward the Third, 86, 101, 330, 348, 359
+
+  Edward the Seventh, 94, 268
+
+  Egbert, 7, 169
+
+  Eleanor, Queen, 324
+
+  Electoral roll, 125
+
+  Elizabeth, Queen, 126, 290, 419
+
+  Elm, 412
+
+  Elsworth, 292
+
+  Eltisley, 274
+
+  Ely, 7, 11, 140, 188, 236, 302-385, 409
+
+  Ely House, 290, 333
+
+  Ely Place, 322
+
+  Emma, Queen, 314
+
+  Emneth, 412
+
+  Enclosure Acts, 387
+
+  Epigrams, 80
+
+  Erasmus, 47
+
+  Erconwald, St., 176, 262
+
+  Ermine Street, 244, 258, 273
+
+  Ermenilda, 176, 307
+
+  Esquire, Bedell, 128
+
+  Ethandune, 308
+
+  Etheldreda, St., 7, 169, 175, 179, 283, 303, 358
+
+  Ethelred, the Unready, 310
+
+  Eton, 51
+
+  Eustace, Bp., 349, 367
+
+  Eversden, 289
+
+  Examination Hall, 15
+
+  Examinations, 14, 98
+
+  Exeat, 17
+
+  Exning, 173, 175
+
+
+  F
+
+  Fagius, 23, 131
+
+  Fairy-cart, 260
+
+  Falcon Cup, 84
+
+  Felix, St., 178
+
+  Fellow Commoners, 151
+
+  Fellows, 2, 89
+
+  Fen Ditton, 171, 295
+
+  Fields, 3
+
+  Firehooks, 38, 204
+
+  First Trinity, 88, 148
+
+  Fisher, Bishop, 110, 152
+
+  Fisher, Osmund, 149
+
+  Fitzwilliam, 23, 371
+
+  Fleam Dyke, 170, 210
+
+  Fordham, 176
+
+  Fowlmere, 230
+
+  Foxton, 242
+
+  Franchise of Ely, 321
+
+  Franciscans, 11, 100, 152
+
+  Free School Lane, 36
+
+  Freshman's Pillar, 92
+
+  Friars, 11
+
+  Fulbourn, 209
+
+  Fuller, 344, 357, 384
+
+
+  G
+
+  Galilee, 324, 349
+
+  Garret Hostel, 43
+
+  Gating, 16
+
+  Geoffry de Magnaville, 34, 200
+
+  George the First, 80
+
+  George the Third, 90
+
+  Gibbet, 273
+
+  Gibbons, 90
+
+  Girton, 268
+
+  Girvii, 169
+
+  Godmanchester, 278
+
+  Godolphin, 202
+
+  God's House, 153
+
+  Gogmagogs, 201
+
+  Gonville, 14, 120
+
+  Goodhart, 95
+
+  Goodrich, Bp., 332, 341, 376
+
+  Granby, Marquis of, 98
+
+  Granta, 7, 202, 222
+
+  Grantabridge, 7
+
+  Grantabrigshire, 8
+
+  Granta-ceaster, 7
+
+  Grantchester, 7, 221
+
+  Grantset, 7
+
+  Gray, 28
+
+  Great Ouse, 399
+
+  Greek, 47
+
+  Greensand, 240
+
+  Guild Hall, 130
+
+  Guilden Morden, 262
+
+  Gunning, Bp., 342, 367
+
+  Guyhirn, 289
+
+
+  H
+
+  Haddenham, 282, 356
+
+  Halls, 15
+
+  Hardwick, 270
+
+  Harlton, 255
+
+  Harvard, 156
+
+  Haslingfield, 236
+
+  Hauxton, 235
+
+  Hemingford, 279
+
+  Henrietta Maria, Queen, 116
+
+  Henry the First, 359
+
+  Henry the Third, 324, 359
+
+  Henry the Sixth, 41, 51, 54
+
+  Henry the Eighth, 87, 97, 118, 152, 283, 372
+
+  Hereward, 10, 283, 315
+
+  Hermits, 41, 222
+
+  Hervey, Bp., 180, 321, 359
+
+  Hervey de Stanton, 86, 242
+
+  Hiding-hole, 225
+
+  High-table, 15, 96
+
+  Hilda, St., 303
+
+  Hildersham, 203
+
+  Hinxton, 230
+
+  Histon, 268, 287
+
+  Hithes, 44, 194
+
+  Hobson, 21, 158
+
+  Holcroft, 288
+
+  Holme, 400
+
+  Holywell, 279
+
+  Honours, 14, 98
+
+  Horningsea, 295
+
+  Horseheath, 209
+
+  Hospital of St. John, 25, 112
+
+  Hospitallers, 258
+
+  Hostels, 12, 43
+
+  Hotham, Bp., 330, 335, 359, 363, 366
+
+  Hubert, St., 270
+
+  Huddleston, 225
+
+  Hundreds, 10
+
+  Huntingdon, 138, 278
+
+
+  I
+
+  Iceni, 168, 211
+
+  Ickleton, 231
+
+  Icknield Way, 171, 203, 234, 244
+
+  Indulgence, 91, 235
+
+  Ink, 336
+
+  Ireton, 272
+
+  Ireton's Way, 390
+
+  Isle of Ely, 8, 168, 282
+
+  Isleham, 183
+
+  Ivo, St., 279
+
+
+  J
+
+  Jacutus, St., 205
+
+  James the First, 154, 173, 403
+
+  Jesus Lane Sunday School, 162
+
+  Jewry, 10, 108
+
+  Job, 248
+
+  John, King, 12, 136, 425-430
+
+  Jowett, 129
+
+  Julitta, St., 191
+
+  Jurats, 400
+
+
+  K
+
+  Kendal, 166
+
+  King's Ditch, 3, 34
+
+  King's Hall, 14, 86, 101
+
+  King's Mill, 34
+
+  Kingsley, 138
+
+  Kingston, 271
+
+  Kirtling, 186
+
+  Kitchen (Trinity), 96
+
+  Kitchener, Lord, 131
+
+  Knapwell, 273
+
+  Knee-holm, 227
+
+
+  L
+
+  Landbeach, 296
+
+  Landwade, 176
+
+  Lantern (Ely), 356
+
+  Lantern (Trinity), 97
+
+  Lectures, 16
+
+  Lepers' Chapel, 162
+
+  Leverington, 414
+
+  Leverrier, 266
+
+  Leys School, 160
+
+  "Libellers," 403
+
+  Liber Eliensis, 303, 337
+
+  Libraries:
+    Corpus, 38
+    King's, 52
+    Pepys, 137
+    Peterhouse, 26
+    St. John's, 44, 116
+    Trinity, 43, 80
+    Trinity Hall, 82
+    University, 79-82, 100
+
+  Lincoln, 298
+
+  Lingay Fen, 222
+
+  Linton, 204
+
+  Littlego, 155
+
+  "Little John," 226
+
+  Little Ouse, 399
+
+  Littleport, 387, 400
+
+  Littlington, 264, 288
+
+  Lock-up, 264
+
+  Lode, 191, 194, 300
+
+  Logan, 2, 95, 100
+
+  London Stone, 160
+
+  Long Stanton, 289
+
+  Long Vacation, 17
+
+  Lycidas, 154
+
+  Lynn, 326, 390, 399, 400, 426
+
+
+  M
+
+  Macaulay, 14, 107, 136
+
+  Madingley, 268
+
+  Maitland, 3, 185
+
+  "Majestas," 287, 339
+
+  Maldon, 310
+
+  Manea, 409
+
+  March, 410
+
+  Margaret, Lady, 110, 152
+
+  Margaret, Queen, 41
+
+  Mark, 318
+
+  Market Hill, 130
+
+  Marshland, 399, 411
+
+  Martial, 384
+
+  Martin V., Pope, 161, 238
+
+  Mary Stuart, 278
+
+  Mary Tudor, 97, 225
+
+  Maur, St., 252
+
+  Mayor of Cambridge, 12
+
+  May pole, 255
+
+  Mazes, 254, 352
+
+  Medhampsted, 308, 394, 396
+
+  Melbourn, 242
+
+  Meldreth, 242
+
+  Mepal, 390
+
+  Merton, 25, 142
+
+  Michael House, 14, 86
+
+  Midsummer Common, 146
+
+  Mildenhall, 185
+
+  Mildmay, 156
+
+  Milestone, 82, 160
+
+  Mill Hill, 345
+
+  Mill, St., 50
+
+  Milton, 295
+
+  Milton, John, 56, 58, 91, 154
+
+  Miserere seats, 363
+
+  Monks' Door, 356
+
+  Monks' garments, 338
+
+  Morning Talks, 36
+
+  Morton, Bp., 336, 398, 418
+
+
+  N
+
+  Needham Hall, 412
+
+  Needingworth, 279
+
+  Nene, 398
+
+  Neotus, St., 276
+
+  Neptune, 266
+
+  Nevile, 92, 100
+
+  Nevile's Court, 92, 94, 95
+
+  Newcastle, 390
+
+  New College, 51
+
+  Newmarket, 173, 174, 389
+
+  Newton, Isaac, 41, 91, 92, 103, 107, 265
+
+  Non-Collegiate Students, 15
+
+  Northwold, Bp. Hugh de, 307, 324, 329, 335, 359, 363, 365, 369, 371
+
+
+  O
+
+  Oakington, 288
+
+  Oasland, 288
+
+  Oath of Supremacy, 419
+
+  Observatory, 221, 265
+
+  Octagon, 356
+
+  Oddy, 288
+
+  Old North Road, 244
+
+  Opponencies, 14
+
+  Organs, 105
+
+  Orwell, 256
+
+  Ostorius, 172, 211
+
+  Ouse R., 277-280, 301
+
+  Outwell, 398, 411
+
+  Over, 286, 294
+
+  Overcote, 280, 295
+
+  Owen, 283, 355
+
+
+  P
+
+  Paley, 155
+
+  Pandiana, St., 275
+
+  Parallax, 280
+
+  Parchment, 224
+
+  Paris, Matthew, 325, 328
+
+  Park (Ely), 345
+
+  Parker, Abp., 39
+
+  Paxton, 278
+
+  Peacock, Dean, 384
+
+  Peas Hill, 130
+
+  Pembroke, 28
+
+  Penda, 175, 303
+
+  Pensioners, 15
+
+  Pepys, 137
+
+  Perne, 23
+
+  Perpendicular Architecture, 334
+
+  Perry, Bp., 105, 155, 162
+
+  Peterborough, 298, 308, 315, 373, 400
+
+  Peter Pence, 203
+
+  Peters, Hugh, 183
+
+  Philippa, Queen, 330, 348, 359
+
+  Picot, 10, 160
+
+  Pilgrim's Progress, 166
+
+  Pitt Press, 40
+
+  Pitt, William, 32
+
+  Plate, College, 31, 84, 95
+
+  Poison Cup, 84
+
+  Population, 4, 10
+
+  Posidonius, 384
+
+  Preachers' Street, 155
+
+  Premier College, 50
+
+  President, 48
+
+  Prior's Door, 353
+
+  Priory Chapel, 161
+
+  Probus, 201
+
+  Proctors, 12, 16, 125
+
+  Provost, 12, 48
+
+
+  Q
+
+  Quarles, 155
+
+  Queen's Lane, 50
+
+  Querela Cantabrigiensis, 31, 129
+
+  Quy, 169
+
+
+  R
+
+  Radegund, St., 10, 144
+
+  Railroads, 20, 203
+
+  Rampton, 298
+
+  Reach, 171, 187, 194, 196, 300
+
+  Regent Street, 159
+
+  Residence, 17
+
+  Richard the Third, 322
+
+  Ridley, Bp., 31
+
+  Ringmere, 8, 214
+
+  Roger of Wendover, 309, 324
+
+  Rolls, C. S., 91
+
+  Romney Marsh, 400
+
+  Romsey Town, 208
+
+  Röntgen, 267
+
+  Roof Climbing, 91
+
+  Rooms, 15
+
+  Roubillac, 102
+
+  Round Churches, 133
+
+  Royston, 244
+
+  Rufus, William, 336, 430
+
+  Rustication, 16
+
+  Rutherford, Professor, 267
+
+
+  S
+
+  Sacring Bell, 231, 294
+
+  Saffron, 209
+
+  St. Ives, 279
+
+  St. John's Farm, 382
+
+  St. Neots, 276
+
+  Sancroft, Abp., 156
+
+  Sarcophagus, 307
+
+  Sawston, 222
+
+  Scholars, 14
+
+  Schools, 14
+
+  Screens, 95, 98
+
+  Seals, 393
+
+  Sea Wall, 399, 411, 422
+
+  Sedgwick, Adam, 267
+
+  Selenite, 292, 409
+
+  Selwyn, Bp., 367
+
+  Senate House, 15, 125
+
+  Sexburga, 176, 306
+
+  Sexwulf, 392
+
+  "Shammy" Leather, 222
+
+  Sharpinhoe, 236
+
+  Shelford, 222
+
+  Shepreth, 242
+
+  Shingay, 258
+
+  Ship Money, 244
+
+  Shudy Camps, 206
+
+  Sibyl, 149
+
+  Simeon, Abbot, 319, 335, 359, 360
+
+  Simeon, Charles, 152
+
+  Simon de Montfort, 325
+
+  Slavery, 421
+
+  Snailwell, 176
+
+  Soham, 178, 180
+
+  Sophs, 96
+
+  Sound, 92
+
+  Southey, 114
+
+  Spark, Bp., 321
+
+  Spenser, 32
+
+  Spikes, 78
+
+  Stanground, 387
+
+  Stapleford, 222
+
+  Steeple Morden, 263
+
+  Stocks, 242
+
+  Stokes, Sir George, 32, 267
+
+  Stonea, 409
+
+  Stone altar, 134
+
+  Stourbridge Fair, 163-167
+
+  Stretham, 283, 298
+
+  Stuntney, 180
+
+  Suffolk, 175
+
+  Sutton, 286
+
+  Sutton Crosses, 424
+
+  Swaffham, 236
+
+  Swaffham Bulbeck, 189
+
+  Swaffham Prior, 191
+
+  Swavesey, 292
+
+  Syndicates, 125
+
+
+  T
+
+  Tabula Eliensis, 319
+
+  Taxers, 12
+
+  "T.B.C.," 88
+
+  Tennyson, 55, 91, 97, 102, 104
+
+  Terms, 17
+
+  Terrington, 120, 414
+
+  Teversham, 209
+
+  Thackeray, 91, 97, 107
+
+  Theodore of Tarsus, 306
+
+  Thetford, 180
+
+  Third Trinity, 88
+
+  Thirlby, Bp., 341
+
+  Thompson, 104
+
+  Thomson, Sir J. J., 267
+
+  Tillotson, Abp., 288
+
+  Tithe Barn, 381
+
+  Toft, 270
+
+  Tonbert, 169, 283
+
+  Triplow Heath, 228
+
+  Tripos, 14, 127
+
+  Trumpington, 219, 310
+
+  Trumpington Gate, 35
+
+  Turf-cutting, 196
+
+  Turner, Bp., 274, 343
+
+  Tydd, 415
+
+
+  U
+
+  Ulfcytel, 8, 214
+
+  "Undertakers," 403
+
+  Union, 134
+
+  University, Origin of, 11
+
+  Upper River, 220
+
+  Upware, 194, 300
+
+  Upwell, 411
+
+
+  V
+
+  Vacations, 17
+
+  Valence, Marie de, 30
+
+  Vandlebury, 201
+
+  Vanity Fair, 166
+
+  Vermuyden, 406
+
+  Via Devana, 21, 159, 206
+
+  Vicars Brook, 23
+
+  Vice-Chancellor, 125
+
+  Victoria, Queen, 257
+
+  Vigor, St., 210
+
+
+  W
+
+  Walden, 137
+
+  Wall-rue, 295
+
+  Walpole, 413, 422
+
+  Walpole Gate, 345
+
+  Walsoken, 413, 422
+
+  War Ditches, 208
+
+  Warstead Street, 209
+
+  Washington Arms, 26
+
+  Waterbeach, 289, 296
+
+  Wat Tyler, 131, 248
+
+  Waynflete, Bp., 52
+
+  Wedmore, Peace of, 8, 308
+
+  Well Stream, 399, 411, 416, 422
+
+  Welney, 411
+
+  Wendred, St., 176, 275
+
+  Wendy, 260
+
+  Wentworth, 286
+
+  West, Bp., 332, 335, 367
+
+  Westcott House, 148
+
+  Westley Waterless, 188
+
+  Westminster College, 142
+
+  Westmorland, 166
+
+  Weston Colville, 188
+
+  Westry, 411
+
+  West Walton, 413, 422
+
+  Whalley, 272
+
+  Whewell, 104, 108
+
+  White Hill, 236
+
+  Whitgift, Abp., 124
+
+  Whittlesea, 410
+
+  Whittlesford, 227
+
+  Wicken Fen, 180, 300
+
+  Wilbraham, 210
+
+  Wilburton, 283
+
+  Wilfrid, St., 303, 393
+
+  Will of Henry the Sixth, 52
+
+  Williams, Bp., 116
+
+  Willingham, 286, 290
+
+  Wimpole, 256
+
+  Wireless Telegraphy, 267
+
+  Wisbech, 399, 403, 415, 426
+
+  Wisbech, John of, 331
+
+  Witchford, 286, 318
+
+  Woad, 417
+
+  Wood Ditton, 171, 187
+
+  Wordsworth, 55, 101, 102, 113, 118
+
+  Wranglers, 14
+
+  Wren, Bp., 25, 189, 209, 342
+
+  Wren, Christopher, 30, 43, 360
+
+
+  Y
+
+  Yaxley, 400
+
+
+
+
+  RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, Limited
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND
+  BUNGAY SUFFOLK.
+
+
+
+
+     =Sussex.= By E. V. LUCAS. With Illustrations by FREDERICK L.
+     GRIGGS.
+
+_WESTMINSTER GAZETTE._--"A delightful addition to an excellent
+series.... Mr. Lucas's knowledge of Sussex is shown in so many fields,
+with so abundant and yet so natural a flow, that one is kept
+entertained and charmed through every passage of his devious
+progress."
+
+
+     =Berkshire.= By JAMES EDMUND VINCENT. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY CHRONICLE._--"We consider this book one of the best in an
+admirable series, and one which should appeal to all who love this
+kind of literature."
+
+
+     =Oxford and the Cotswolds.= By H. A. EVANS. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"The author is everywhere entertaining and fresh,
+never allowing his own interest to flag, and thereby retaining the
+close attention of the reader."
+
+
+     =Shakespeare's Country.= By The Ven. W. H. HUTTON. With
+     Illustrations by EDMUND H. NEW.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"Mr. Edmund H. New has made a fine book a thing
+of beauty and a joy for ever by a series of lovely drawings."
+
+
+     =Hampshire.= By D. H. MOUTRAY READ. With Illustrations by ARTHUR
+     B. CONNOR.
+
+_STANDARD._--"In our judgment, as excellent and as lively a book as
+has yet appeared in the Highways and Byways Series."
+
+
+     =Dorset.= By Sir FREDERICK TREVES. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_STANDARD._--"A breezy, delightful book, full of sidelights on men and
+manners, and quick in the interpretation of all the half-inarticulate
+lore of the countryside."
+
+
+     =Wiltshire.= By EDWARD HUTTON. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY GRAPHIC._--"Replete with enjoyable and informing reading ...
+Illustrated by exquisite sketches."
+
+
+     =Somerset.= By EDWARD HUTTON. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A book which will set the heart of every
+West-country-man beating with enthusiasm, and with pride for the
+goodly heritage into which he has been born as a son of Somerset."
+
+
+     =Devon and Cornwall.= By ARTHUR H. NORWAY. With Illustrations by
+     JOSEPH PENNELL and HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_DAILY CHRONICLE._--"So delightful that we would gladly fill columns
+with extracts were space as elastic as imagination.... The text is
+excellent; the illustrations of it are even better."
+
+
+     =South Wales.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by FREDERICK
+     L. GRIGGS.
+
+_SPECTATOR._--"Mr. Bradley has certainly exalted the writing of a
+combined archæological and descriptive guide-book into a species of
+literary art. The result is fascinating."
+
+
+     =North Wales.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by HUGH
+     THOMSON and JOSEPH PENNELL.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"To read this fine book makes us eager to visit
+every hill and every valley that Mr. Bradley describes with such
+tantalising enthusiasm. It is a work of inspiration, vivid, sparkling,
+and eloquent--a deep well of pleasure to every lover of Wales."
+
+
+     =Cambridge and Ely.= By Rev. EDWARD CONYBEARE. With Illustrations
+     by FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_ATHENÆUM._--"A volume which, light and easily read as it is, deserves
+to rank with the best literature about the county."
+
+
+     =East Anglia.= By WILLIAM A. DUTT. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_WORLD._--"Of all the fascinating volumes in the 'Highways and Byways'
+series, none is more pleasant to read.... Mr. Dutt, himself an East
+Anglian, writes most sympathetically and in picturesque style of the
+district."
+
+
+     =Lincolnshire.= By W. F. RAWNSLEY. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"A splendid record of a storied shire."
+
+
+     =Nottinghamshire.= By J. B. FIRTH. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A book that will rank high in the series which it
+augments; a book that no student of our Midland topography and of
+Midland associations should miss."
+
+
+     =Northamptonshire and Rutland.= By HERBERT A. EVANS. With
+     Illustrations by FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_TIMES._--"A pleasant, gossiping record ... Mr. Evans is a guide who
+makes us want to see for ourselves the places he has seen."
+
+
+     =Derbyshire.= By J. B. FIRTH. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"The result is altogether delightful, for
+'Derbyshire' is as attractive to the reader in his arm-chair as to the
+tourist wandering amid the scenes Mr. Firth describes so well."
+
+
+     =Yorkshire.= By ARTHUR H. NORWAY. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL and HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"The wonderful story of Yorkshire's past
+provides Mr. Norway with a wealth of interesting material, which he
+has used judiciously and well; each grey ruin of castle and abbey he
+has re-erected and re-peopled in the most delightful way. A better
+guide and story-teller it would be hard to find."
+
+
+     =Lake District.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE._--"A notable edition--an engaging volume, packed
+with the best of all possible guidance for tourists. For the most part
+the artist's work is as exquisite as anything of the kind he has
+done."
+
+
+     =Northumbria.= By P. ANDERSON GRAHAM. With Illustrations by HUGH
+     THOMSON.
+
+
+     =The Border.= By ANDREW LANG and JOHN LANG. With Illustrations by
+     HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_STANDARD._--"The reader on his travels, real or imaginary, could not
+have pleasanter or more profitable companionship. There are charming
+sketches by Mr. Hugh Thomson to illustrate the letterpress."
+
+
+     =Galloway and Carrick.= By the Rev. C. H. DICK. With
+     Illustrations by HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_SATURDAY REVIEW._--"The very book to take with one into that romantic
+angle of Scotland, which lies well aside of the beaten tourist track."
+
+
+     =Donegal and Antrim.= By STEPHEN GWYNN. With Illustrations by
+     HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A perfect book of its kind, on which author,
+artist, and publisher have lavished of their best."
+
+
+     =Normandy.= By PERCY DEARMER, M.A. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE._--"A charming book ... Mr. Dearmer is as
+arrestive in his way as Mr. Pennell. He has the true topographic eye.
+He handles legend and history in entertaining fashion."
+
+MACMILLAN AND CO., Ltd., LONDON.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's note: Obvious printer's errors have been corrected, all
+other inconsistencies are as in the original. The author's spelling
+has been maintained.
+
+Text enclosed in = is printed in bold in the book.
+
+Letters preceded by a ^ are superscribt.
+
+Page 117: "Last year (1809)" has been corrected to "Last year (1909)".
+
+Page 343: The footnote 223 present there has no anchor in the text.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and
+Ely, by Edward Conybeare
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+***** This file should be named 38735-8.txt or 38735-8.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/7/3/38735/
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
diff --git a/38735-8.zip b/38735-8.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..28679d1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-8.zip
diff --git a/38735-h.zip b/38735-h.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c348603
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h.zip
diff --git a/38735-h/38735-h.htm b/38735-h/38735-h.htm
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8dea10d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/38735-h.htm
@@ -0,0 +1,19758 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
+<html lang="en">
+
+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
+<title>The Project Gutenberg e-Book of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely; Author: Rev. Edward Conybeare.</title>
+
+
+<style type="text/css">
+<!--
+
+body {font-size: 1em; text-align: justify; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;}
+
+h1  {font-size: 120%; text-align: center; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;}
+h2  {font-size: 115%; text-align: center; margin-top: 4em; margin-bottom: 2em;}
+h3  {font-size: 110%; text-align: center; margin-top: 4em; margin-bottom: 2em;}
+
+a:focus, a:active { outline:#ffee66 solid 2px; background-color:#ffee66;}
+a:focus img, a:active img {outline: #ffee66 solid 2px; }
+
+sup {line-height: 0em;}
+
+hr.hr20 {width: 20%; text-align: center; margin-top: 1.2em; margin-bottom: 1.2em;}
+
+p {text-indent: 1em;}
+
+ul.none {list-style-type: none;}
+ul.roman {list-style-type: upper-roman; margin-left: 5%;}
+ul.decimal {list-style-type: decimal; margin-left: 5%;}
+
+table {border-collapse: collapse; table-layout: auto;
+       margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;
+       margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto;}
+
+table.margleft {border-collapse: collapse; table-layout: auto;
+       margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;
+       margin-left:10%; margin-right:auto;}
+
+.p2 {margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;}
+.p4 {margin-top: 4em; margin-bottom: 1em;}
+
+.tn p {margin-left: 5%; width: 90%; text-indent: 0em;}
+
+.smcap  {font-variant: small-caps; font-size: 95%;}
+.smaller {font-size: 80%;}
+.small {font-size: 70%;}
+.bigger {font-size: 120%; font-weight: bold;}
+
+.center {text-align: center; text-indent: 0em;}
+.right {text-align: right;}
+.right10 {text-align: right; margin-right: 10%;}
+.ralign10 {position: absolute; right: 10%; top: auto;}
+.add1em {margin-left: 1em;}
+.add2em {margin-left: 2em;}
+.add3em {margin-left: 3em;}
+.add10em {margin-left: 10em;}
+.min33em {margin-left: -0.33em;}
+.min66em {margin-left: -0.66em;}
+.noindent {text-indent: 0em;}
+.lspaced2 {letter-spacing: 2em;}
+
+.bordright {border-style: none solid none none; border-color: #C0C0C0; border-width: 1px;}
+.bordleft {border-style: none none none solid; border-color: #C0C0C0; border-width: 1px;}
+.bordboth {border-style: none solid none solid; border-color: #C0C0C0; border-width: 1px;}
+
+.footnote p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.quote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 5%; font-size: 90%;}
+.toc {margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 15%;}
+.toc p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.toc li {margin-top: 0.8em; font-size: 90%;}
+.decimal li {margin-top: 0.8em; font-size: 90%;}
+.chaptitle {text-indent: 0em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+.index {margin-left: 10%;}
+.index p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.advert {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+.poem10 {text-indent: 0em; margin-left: 10%; font-size: 90%;}
+.poem10 p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.poem20 {text-indent: 0em; margin-left: 20%; font-size: 90%;}
+.poem30 p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.poem30 {text-indent: 0em; margin-left: 30%; font-size: 90%;}
+.poem30 p {text-indent: 0em;}
+.caption200 {width: 200px;}
+
+.pagenum  {visibility: hidden;
+           position: absolute; right:0; text-align: right;
+           font-size: 10px;
+           font-weight: normal; font-variant: normal;
+           font-style: normal;  letter-spacing: normal;
+           color: #C0C0C0; background-color: inherit;}
+
+.figcenter {margin: auto; margin-top: 2em; text-align: center;}
+.floatright {float: right; clear: right; text-align: center;
+         padding: 5px; margin: 0 0 0 7px;}
+
+-->
+</style>
+</head>
+<body>
+
+
+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely, by 
+Edward Conybeare
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely
+
+Author: Edward Conybeare
+
+Illustrator: Frederick L Griggs
+
+Release Date: February 1, 2012 [EBook #38735]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<h1>HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS<br>
+<span class="smaller">IN</span><br>
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY</h1>
+
+<a id="img000" name="img000"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img000.jpg" width="200" height="75" alt="Editor's logo" title="">
+</div>
+
+<p class="p4 center">MACMILLAN AND CO., <span class="smcap">Limited</span><br>
+<span class="smaller">LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA<br>
+  MELBOURNE</span></p>
+
+<p class="center">THE MACMILLAN COMPANY<br>
+<span class="smaller">NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO<br>
+  ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO</span></p>
+
+<p class="center">THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, <span class="smcap">Ltd</span><br>
+<span class="smaller">TORONTO</span></p>
+
+<a id="img001" name="img001"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img001.jpg" width="350" height="510" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ely Cathedral. Western Tower.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<h1><i>Highways and Byways</i><br>
+<span class="small">IN</span><br>
+<i>Cambridge and Ely</i></h1>
+
+<p class="center"><span class="smaller">BY THE</span><br>
+  <span class="smcap">Rev.</span> EDWARD CONYBEARE<br>
+<span class="smaller">AUTHOR OF<br>
+  "HISTORY OF CAMBRIDGESHIRE," "RIDES AROUND CAMBRIDGE," ETC.</span></p>
+
+<p class="p4 center"><span class="smaller">WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</span><br>
+  FREDERICK L. GRIGGS</p>
+
+<p class="p4 center smaller">MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED<br>
+  ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON<br>
+  1910</p>
+
+<p class="p4 center smaller"><span class="smcap">Richard Clay and Sons, Limited.</span><br>
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND<br>
+  BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.</p>
+
+<h2><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevii" name="pagevii"></a>(p. vii)</span> PREFACE</h2>
+
+<p>The Highways of Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely are usually
+regarded as unattractive compared with those of England in general.
+Nor is this criticism wholly unfair. The county does lack the features
+which most make for picturesque rural scenery. There are no high
+hills, little even of undulation, and, what is yet more fatal, a sad
+sparsity of timber. The Highways, then, seem to the traveller merely
+stretches of ground to be got over as speedily as may be, and he
+rejoices that their flatness lends itself so well to this end.</p>
+
+<p>It is however far otherwise with the Byways. These abound with
+picturesque nooks and corners. In every village charming features are
+to be found,&mdash;thatched and timbered cottages, hedgerow elms, bright
+willow-shaded watercourses, old-time village greens, and, above all,
+old-time village churches, often noble, and never without artistic and
+historical interest of high order. Few counties better repay
+exploration than Cambridgeshire.</p>
+
+<p>And if the Highways are devoid of attraction during their course
+through the country districts, they make up for it by the supreme
+beauty and interest of their passage through the towns. Cambridge
+itself is, as all know, amongst the loveliest and most interesting
+places in existence, with its world-famed colleges and its
+epoch-making history. And Ely stands in the very first rank amongst
+the glorious cathedrals of England.</p>
+
+<p>To introduce my readers, then, to the unique interest of these two
+places, with special regard to the points mostly passed over in
+guide-books, has been my chief purpose in the <span class="pagenum"><a id="pageviii" name="pageviii"></a>(p. viii)</span> following
+pages. And to those who may think that a disproportionate amount of my
+space has been allotted to these, I would apologise by reminding them
+that the vast majority of travellers perforce confine their visits to
+such special centres, and have no time for exploring country lanes.
+But those who can make the time will find it (as this book, I hope,
+will show them) time well spent, and their exploration no small treat.</p>
+
+<p>I need scarcely add that on such well-worn themes originality is
+hardly possible, and that I have made use both of my own earlier
+writings on the subject, and of those of others, my debt to whom I
+gratefully acknowledge. Most especially am I bound to do so with
+regard to Messrs. Atkinson and Clark, whose monumental work "Cambridge
+Described" is a veritable mine of information, and to Professor and
+Mrs. Hughes for the help which I have found in their "County Geography
+of Cambridgeshire."</p>
+
+<p class="right10 smcap">Edward Conybeare.</p>
+
+<div class="toc">
+<h2><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageix" name="pageix"></a>(p. ix)</span> CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<p class="center">CHAPTER I<span class="ralign10 smcap">PAGE</span></p>
+
+<p>Cambridge Greenery. &mdash;  The Backs. &mdash;  The Lawns. &mdash;  Logan's Views. &mdash;  Old
+  Common Fields. &mdash;  Old Cambridge. &mdash;  Origin of Cambridge. &mdash;  The
+  Castle. &mdash;  Camboritum. &mdash;  Granta-ceaster. &mdash;  Danes in Cambridge. &mdash;  Cambridgeshire
+  formed. &mdash;  Battle of Ringmere. &mdash;  Norman
+  Conquest. &mdash;  The Jewry. &mdash;  Religious Houses. &mdash;  Rise of University. &mdash;  Town
+  and Gown. &mdash;  Proctors. &mdash;  The Colleges. &mdash;  Examinations. &mdash;  College
+  Life. &mdash;  Cambridge and Oxford
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page1">1</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER II</p>
+
+<p>Entrance to Cambridge. &mdash;  Railways. &mdash;  Roman Catholic Church. &mdash;  Street
+  runlets, Hobson, Perne. &mdash;  Fitzwilliam Museum. &mdash;  <b>Peterhouse</b>,
+  Chapel, Deer-park. &mdash;  Little St. Mary's Church, Washington
+  Arms. &mdash;  Gray's window. &mdash;  <b>Pembroke College</b>, Large and Small
+  Colleges, "Querela Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's Farewell. &mdash;  St.
+  Botolph's Church. &mdash;  The King's Ditch. &mdash;  <b>Corpus Christi
+  College</b>, Cambridge Guilds, St. Benet's Church, Firehooks,
+  Corpus Library, Corpus Ghost. &mdash;  <b>St. Catherine's College.</b> &mdash;  King's
+  Parade. &mdash;  Pitt Press. &mdash;  Newnham Bridge, Hermits. &mdash;  The
+  Backs River, College Bridges, Hithes
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page20">20</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER III</p>
+
+<p><b>Queens' College</b>, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel. &mdash;  Old Mill
+  Street. &mdash;  <b>King's College</b>, Henry VI, King's and Eton,
+  Henry's "Will." &mdash;  King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton,
+  Windows, Rosa Solis, Screens, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels,
+  View from Roof
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page47">47</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center"><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagex" name="pagex"></a>(p. x)</span> CHAPTER IV</p>
+
+<p>Spiked gates. &mdash;  Old Kings. &mdash;  <b>University Library</b>, Origin, Growth,
+  Codex Bezæ. &mdash;  <b>Trinity Hall</b>, Colours, Library. &mdash;  <b>Clare College</b>,
+  "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue. &mdash;  The Backs, Sirdar
+  Bonfire, College Gardens. &mdash;  <b>Trinity College</b>, Michaelhouse, King's
+  Hall, Henry VIII, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge,
+  Library, Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's
+  Pillar," Prince Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College
+  Plate, Grace-cup, Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of
+  Granby, Tutors, Old Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge,
+  Chapel, Newton, Organ, Bentley, Windows, Macaulay
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page78">78</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER V</p>
+
+<p>Whewell's Courts. &mdash;  All Saints' Cross. &mdash;  The Jewry. &mdash;  Divinity School. &mdash;  <b>St.
+  John's College</b>, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+  Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+  Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second
+  Court, Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New
+  Court, Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness. &mdash;  <b>Caius College</b>,
+  Gonville, The Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues." &mdash;  <b>Senate House</b>,
+  Congregations, Vice-Chancellor, Voting, Degree-giving. &mdash;  <b>University
+  Church</b>, Mr. Tripos, Golgotha, Sermons, Tower, Chimes,
+  Jowett. &mdash;  Market Hill, Peasant Revolt, Wat Tyler, Bucer and
+  Fagius, Bonfires, Town and Gown
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page108">108</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER VI</p>
+
+<p>Round Church. &mdash;  Union Society. &mdash;  The "Great Bridge," Hithe. &mdash;  <b>Magdalene
+  College</b>, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles
+  Kingsley, the "College Window," Master's Garden. &mdash;  Castle
+  Hill, Camboritum, Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I,
+  the "Borough," View from Castle. &mdash;  St. Peter's Church. &mdash;  "School
+  of Pythagoras." &mdash;  Westminster College. &mdash;  Ridley Hall. &mdash;  <b>Newnham
+  College.</b> &mdash;  <b>Selwyn College.</b> &mdash;  Convent of St. Radegund,
+  Bishop Alcock. &mdash;  Midsummer Common. &mdash;  Boat Houses, Bumping
+  Races. &mdash;  <b>Jesus College</b>, "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House,
+  Chapel, Cranmer, Coleridge
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page132">132</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER VII</p>
+
+<p><b>Sidney College</b>, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners. &mdash;  Holy
+  Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn. &mdash;  <b>Christ's College</b>, "God's
+  House," Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden,
+  <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexi" name="pagexi"></a>(p. xi)</span> Milton, Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin. &mdash;  Great St.
+  Andrew's, Bishop Perry. &mdash;  <b>Emmanuel College</b>, Harvard, Sancroft,
+  Chapel, Ponds. &mdash;  University Museums. &mdash;  <b>Downing College</b>, Miss
+  Edgeworth. &mdash;  Coe Fen. &mdash;  First Mile Stone. &mdash;  Barnwell, Priory,
+  Abbey Church. &mdash;  Lepers' Chapel, Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page151">151</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER VIII</p>
+
+<p>Roads from Cambridge. &mdash;  Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East Angles,
+  Mercians, Formation of County. &mdash;  Newmarket Road. &mdash;  Quy. &mdash;  Fleam
+  Dyke. &mdash;  Devil's Dyke. &mdash;  Icknield Way. &mdash;  Iceni, Ostorius,
+  Boadicea. &mdash;  Newmarket Heath, First Racing. &mdash;  Exning, Anna. &mdash;  Snailwell. &mdash;  Fordham. &mdash;  Soham,
+  St. Felix. &mdash;  Stuntney. &mdash;  Wicken. &mdash;  Chippenham. &mdash;  Isleham,
+  Lectern. &mdash;  Eastern Heights. &mdash;  Chevely,
+  Cambridge Corporation. &mdash;  Kirtling. &mdash;  Wood Ditton. &mdash;  Stetchworth. &mdash;  Borough
+  Green. &mdash;  Bottisham. &mdash;  Swaffham Bulbeck. &mdash;  The
+  Lodes. &mdash;  Swaffham Prior. &mdash;  Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest. &mdash;  Burwell,
+  Church, Clunch, Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page168">168</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER IX</p>
+
+<p>Hills Road. &mdash;  Gog Magogs. &mdash;  Vandlebury. &mdash;  Babraham, Peter Pence. &mdash;  Old
+  Railway. &mdash;  Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper Stile. &mdash;  Linton. &mdash;  Horseheath. &mdash;  Bartlow,
+  St. Christopher, Battle of Assandun. &mdash;  Cherry
+  Hinton, War Ditches, Saffron. &mdash;  Teversham. &mdash;  Fulbourn,
+  Brasses. &mdash;  Wilbraham. &mdash;  Fleam Dyke, Wild Flowers, Butterflies,
+  Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle. &mdash;  Balsham, Battle of Ringmere,
+  Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page201">201</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER X</p>
+
+<p>London Road. &mdash;  Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+  Pool, Upper River. &mdash;  Grantchester, Church. &mdash;  Cam and Granta. &mdash;  The
+  Shelfords. &mdash;  Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+  "Little John." &mdash;  Whittlesford, Old Hospital. &mdash;  Duxford. &mdash;  Triplow
+  Heath, Civil War. &mdash;  Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell. &mdash;  Ickleton,
+  Monolith Pillars. &mdash;  Chesterford. &mdash;  Icknield Way. &mdash;  Saffron
+  Walden
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page219">219</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XI</p>
+
+<p>London Road. &mdash;  Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket
+  Fresco. &mdash;  Burnt Mill. &mdash;  Haslingfield. &mdash;  White Hill, View, Clunch
+  Pits, Chapel, Papal Bulla. &mdash;  Barrington, Green, Church, Porch
+  <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexii" name="pagexii"></a>(p. xii)</span> Seats, Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging, Hall. &mdash;  Foxton. &mdash;  Shepreth. &mdash;  Meldreth,
+  Parish Stocks. &mdash;  Melbourn, Shipmoney. &mdash;  Royston,
+  Origin, Cave, Heath. &mdash;  Bassingbourn, Old Accounts,
+  Villenage. &mdash;  Black Death. &mdash;  Ashwell, Source of Cam, Church,
+  Graffiti. &mdash;  Akeman Street. &mdash;  Barton Butts. &mdash;  Comberton Maze. &mdash;  Harlton
+  Church, Old Pit. &mdash;  Orwell Maypole, Church, Epitaph. &mdash;  Wimpole
+  Hall, Queen Victoria. &mdash;  Arrington. &mdash;  Shingay, Hospitallers,
+  Fairy Cart. &mdash;  Wendy. &mdash;  Artesian Wells. &mdash;  Guilden
+  Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page235">235</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XII</p>
+
+<p>Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge Discoveries. &mdash;  Coton. &mdash;  Madingley. &mdash;  Hardwick. &mdash;  Toft,
+  St. Hubert. &mdash;  Childerley,
+  Charles I. &mdash;  Knapwell. &mdash;  Bourn. &mdash;  Caxton. &mdash;  Eltisley, St. Pandiania,
+  Storm. &mdash;  St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred. &mdash;  Paxton Hill. &mdash;  Godmanchester,
+  Port Meadow. &mdash;  Huntingdon, Cromwell's
+  Penance. &mdash;  The Hemingfords. &mdash;  St. Ives. &mdash;  Holywell. &mdash;  Overcote. &mdash;  Earith,
+  the Bedford Rivers, "Parallax"
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page265">265</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XIII</p>
+
+<p>Island of Ely. &mdash;  Haddenham. &mdash;  Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+  Belsars Hill. &mdash;  Wilburton. &mdash;  Sutton. &mdash;  Wentworth. &mdash;  Via Devana. &mdash;  Girton,
+  College. &mdash;  Oakington, Holdsworth. &mdash;  Elsworth. &mdash;  Conington,
+  Ancient Bells. &mdash;  Long Stanton, Queen Elizabeth. &mdash;  Willingham,
+  Stone Chamber. &mdash;  Over, Gurgoyles. &mdash;  Swavesey,
+  Finials. &mdash;  Ely Road. &mdash;  Chesterton. &mdash;  Fen Ditton. &mdash;  Milton, Altar
+  Rails. &mdash;  Horningsea. &mdash;  Bait's Bite, Start of Race. &mdash;  Clayhithe. &mdash;  Waterbeach. &mdash;  Car
+  Dyke. &mdash;  Denny. &mdash;  Stretham. &mdash;  Upware. &mdash;  Wicken
+  Fen.
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page282">282</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XIV</p>
+
+<p>Ely. &mdash;  Island and Isle. &mdash;  St. Augustine. &mdash;  St. Etheldreda, Life, Death,
+  Burial, St. Audrey's Fair. &mdash;  Danish Sack of Ely. &mdash;  Alfred's
+  College. &mdash;  Abbey Restored. &mdash;  Brithnoth, Song of Maldon. &mdash;  Battle
+  of Assundun. &mdash;  Canute at Ely. &mdash;  Edward the Confessor. &mdash;  Alfred
+  the Etheling. &mdash;  Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman
+  Conquest, Tabula Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster. &mdash;  Bishops
+  of Ely, Rule over Isle. &mdash;  Ely Place, Ely House
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page303">303</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XV</p>
+
+<p>Bishop Northwold. &mdash;  Presbytery Dedicated. &mdash;  Barons at Ely. &mdash;  Fall of
+  Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon. &mdash;  Queen Philippa. &mdash;  Lady
+  Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich. &mdash;  Bishop Alcock. &mdash;  Bishop
+  <span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexiii" name="pagexiii"></a>(p. xiii)</span> West. &mdash;  Styles of Architecture. &mdash;  Monastic Industries. &mdash;  Mediæval
+  Account Books. &mdash;  Clothing and Food of Monks. &mdash;  Benedictine
+  Rule. &mdash;  Dissolution of Abbey. &mdash;  Bishop Thirlby. &mdash;  Bishop
+  Wren. &mdash;  Bishop Gunning. &mdash;  Bishop Turner
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page324">324</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XVI</p>
+
+<p>Approach to Ely. &mdash;  The Park. &mdash;  Walpole Gate. &mdash;  Crauden Chapel. &mdash;  Western
+  Tower, Galilee. &mdash;  Nave. &mdash;  Baptistery. &mdash;  Roof. &mdash;  Prior's
+  Door. &mdash;  Cloisters. &mdash;  Owen's Cross. &mdash;  Octagon. &mdash;  Alan's Grave. &mdash;  Transepts. &mdash;  St.
+  Edmund's Chapel. &mdash;  Choir Stalls. &mdash;  Presbytery. &mdash;  Norman
+  Piers. &mdash;  Reredos. &mdash;  Candlesticks
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page344">344</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XVII</p>
+
+<p>Monuments. &mdash;  West's Chapel. &mdash;  Alcock's Chapel. &mdash;  Northwold Cenotaph. &mdash;  Bassevi. &mdash;  Shrine
+  of Etheldreda. &mdash;  Lady Chapel. &mdash;  View
+  from Tower. &mdash;  Triforium. &mdash;  Exterior of Minster. &mdash;  Palace,
+  "Duties" of Goodrich. &mdash;  St. Mary's. &mdash;  St. Cross. &mdash;  Cromwell's
+  House. &mdash;  Cromwell at Ely. &mdash;  St. John's Farm. &mdash;  Theological
+  College. &mdash;  Waterworks. &mdash;  Basket-making
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page366">366</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XVIII</p>
+
+<p>Boundary of Fens. &mdash;  Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall, Causeway. &mdash;  Archipelago. &mdash;  Littleport,
+  Agrarian Riots. &mdash;  Denver Sluice. &mdash;  Roslyn
+  Pit. &mdash;  Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey, Peterborough,
+  Thorney, Crowland
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page386">386</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XIX</p>
+
+<p>Draining of Fens &mdash;  Monastic Works, Morton's Learn. &mdash;  Diversion of
+  Ouse. &mdash;  Local Government, Jurats, Discontent. &mdash;  Jacobean polemics. &mdash;  First
+  Drainage Company. &mdash;  Rising of Fen-men. &mdash;  Second
+  Company, Huguenot Labourers. &mdash;  Third Company, Earl of
+  Bedford, Vermuyden. &mdash;  Old River. &mdash;  Cromwell. &mdash;  Fourth Company,
+  Prisoner Slaves, New River, Denver Sluice. &mdash;  Later
+  Developments
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page398">398</a></span></p>
+
+<p class="p2 center">CHAPTER XX</p>
+
+<p>Coveney. &mdash;  Manea. &mdash;  Doddington. &mdash;  March, Angel Roof. &mdash;  Whittlesea. &mdash;  Old
+  Course of Ouse, Well Stream. &mdash;  Upwell, Outwell. &mdash;  Emneth. &mdash;  Elm. &mdash;  The
+  Marshland &mdash;  West Walton. &mdash;  Walsoken. &mdash;  Walpole. &mdash;  Cross
+  Keys. &mdash;  Leverington. &mdash;  Tydd. &mdash;  Wisbech, Church, Trade,
+  Castle, Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson. &mdash;  The Wash. &mdash;  King John.
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#page409">409</a></span></p>
+</div>
+
+<h2><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexv" name="pagexv"></a>(p. xv)</span> LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS</h2>
+
+<div class="toc">
+<ul class="none">
+<li>&nbsp;
+<span class="ralign10 smcap">PAGE</span></li>
+
+<li>ELY CATHEDRAL, WESTERN TOWER
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img001"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></span></li>
+
+<li>MAP OF CAMBRIDGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img002"><i>Facing</i> 1</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. BENET'S CHURCH AND CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img003">1</a></span></li>
+
+<li>PETERHOUSE WALL, COE FEN
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img004">5</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE BACKS, CLARE COLLEGE GATE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img005">9</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. MICHAEL'S AND ALL ANGELS
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img006">13</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ORIEL IN LIBRARY, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img007">18</a></span></li>
+
+<li>PETERHOUSE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img008">24</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. MARY THE LESS, SOUTH SIDE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img009">27</a></span></li>
+
+<li>PETERHOUSE FROM ST. MARY'S CHURCHYARD
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img010">29</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. BOTOLPH'S CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img011">33</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. BENET'S CHURCH, INTERIOR
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img012">37</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CLARE BRIDGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img013">42</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. JOHN'S BRIDGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img014">45</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE PRESIDENT'S GALLERY, QUEENS' COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img015">49</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ORIEL IN QUEENS' COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img016">51</a></span></li>
+
+<li>QUEENS' COLLEGE GATEWAY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img017">53</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CLARE COLLEGE FROM KING'S
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img018">57</a></span></li>
+
+<li>KING'S COLLEGE CHAPEL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img019">61</a></span></li>
+
+<li>OLD GATE OF KING'S COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img020">81</a></span></li>
+
+<li>OLD SCHOOLS' QUADRANGLE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img021">87</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CLARE COLLEGE FROM BRIDGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img022">93</a></span></li>
+
+<li>TRINITY BRIDGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img023">99</a></span></li>
+
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexvi" name="pagexvi"></a>(p. xvi)</span> THE FOUNTAIN, TRINITY COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img024">103</a></span></li>
+
+<li>TRINITY COLLEGE CHAPEL AND ST. JOHN'S GATEWAY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img025">111</a></span></li>
+
+<li>HALL, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img026">115</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ORIEL IN SECOND COURT OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img027">117</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE GATE OF HONOUR, CAIUS COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img028">123</a></span></li>
+
+<li>PEAS HILL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img029">130</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img030">135</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. PETER'S CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img031">139</a></span></li>
+
+<li>REMAINS OF ST. RADEGUND'S PRIORY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img032">141</a></span></li>
+
+<li>JESUS COLLEGE GATEWAY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img033">143</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE BACK COURT, JESUS COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img034">145</a></span></li>
+
+<li>JESUS COLLEGE CHAPEL, EAST END
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img035">147</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ORIEL OF HALL, JESUS COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img036">149</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CHRIST'S COLLEGE CHAPEL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img037">153</a></span></li>
+
+<li>EMMANUEL COLLEGE
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img038">157</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE LEPERS' CHAPEL, BARNWELL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img039">163</a></span></li>
+
+<li>QUY CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img040">170</a></span></li>
+
+<li>FORDHAM CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img041">177</a></span></li>
+
+<li>FORDHAM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img042">179</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SOHAM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img043">181</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SWAFFHAM BULBECK
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img044">191</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SWAFFHAM PRIOR
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img045">192</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SWAFFHAM PRIOR CHURCHES
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img046">193</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE CASTLE MOAT, BURWELL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img047">195</a></span></li>
+
+<li>BURWELL CHURCH, WEST END
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img048">197</a></span></li>
+
+<li>BURWELL CHURCH, N.E. VIEW
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img049">199</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CHERRY HINTON CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img050">207</a></span></li>
+
+<li>GREAT WILBRAHAM CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img051">211</a></span></li>
+
+<li>GREAT WILBRAHAM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img052">212</a></span></li>
+
+<li>LITTLE WILBRAHAM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img053">213</a></span></li>
+
+<li>BALSHAM TOWER
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img054">214</a></span></li>
+
+<li>COTTAGE AT BALSHAM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img055">217</a></span></li>
+
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexvii" name="pagexvii"></a>(p. xvii)</span>
+GREAT SHELFORD CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img056">223</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WHITTLESFORD
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img057">227</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. PETER'S CHURCH, DUXFORD
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img058">229</a></span></li>
+
+<li>HASLINGFIELD CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img059">237</a></span></li>
+
+<li>FARMHOUSE AT HASLINGFIELD
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img060">239</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SOUTH PORCH, BARRINGTON CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img061">241</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SHEPRETH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img062">243</a></span></li>
+
+<li>MELBOURN
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img063">245</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ASHWELL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img064">249</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ASHWELL CHURCH FROM THE N.W.
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img065">251</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ASHWELL CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img066">253</a></span></li>
+
+<li>GREAT EVERSDEN
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img067">257</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ROOD SCREEN, GUILDEN MORDEN CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img068">261</a></span></li>
+
+<li>COTTAGE AT STEEPLE MORDEN
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img069">263</a></span></li>
+
+<li>COTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img070">269</a></span></li>
+
+<li>COTTAGE AT TOFT
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img071">271</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WILBURTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img072">284</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE BURYSTEAD, WILBURTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img073">285</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SUTTON CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img074">287</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ALL SAINTS' CHURCH, LONG STANTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img075">291</a></span></li>
+
+<li>OVER, SOUTH PORCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img076">293</a></span></li>
+
+<li>OVER
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img077">294</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SWAVESEY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img078">296</a></span></li>
+
+<li>SWAVESEY CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img079">297</a></span></li>
+
+<li>COTTAGE AT RAMPTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img080">299</a></span></li>
+
+<li>DOVECOTE AT RAMPTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img081">300</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE QUAY, ELY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img082">301</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE NORTH TRIFORIUM OF THE NAVE, ELY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img083">305</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WEST AISLE OF THE NORTH TRANSEPT, ELY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img084">311</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ELY: THE PRESBYTERY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img085">327</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ELY LANTERN
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img086">333</a></span></li>
+
+<li>PRIOR CRAUDEN'S CHAPEL
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img087">347</a></span></li>
+
+<li><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexviii" name="pagexviii"></a>(p. xviii)</span>
+SOUTH AISLE OF THE NAVE, ELY
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img088">351</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE TOWER FROM THE CLOISTERS
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img089">357</a></span></li>
+
+<li>CATHEDRAL TOWERS
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img090">361</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. MARY'S CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img091">378</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE CATHEDRAL FROM THE WEST FEN ROAD
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img092">380</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. JOHN'S FARM
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img093">383</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WILLOW WALK
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img094">385</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ST. WENDREDA'S CHURCH, MARCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img095">391</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE OLD FENLAND (NORTHERN DISTRICT)
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img096">404</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE OLD FENLAND (SOUTHERN DISTRICT)
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img097">405</a></span></li>
+
+<li>ELM CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img098">412</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WALPOLE ST. PETER
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img099">414</a></span></li>
+
+<li>LEVERINGTON
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img100">417</a></span></li>
+
+<li>BELL TOWER, TYDD ST. GILES
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img101">419</a></span></li>
+
+<li>WISBECH CHURCH
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img102">423</a></span></li>
+
+<li>THE OLD COURT OF CORPUS
+<span class="ralign10"><a href="#img103">431</a></span></li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+
+<h1>HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS<br>
+<span class="smaller">IN</span><br>
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY</h1>
+
+<a id="img002" name="img002"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/img002.jpg">
+<img src="images/img002tb.jpg" width="500" height="477" alt="" title=""></a>
+<p class="smcap">Cambridge</p>
+</div>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page1" name="page1"></a>(p. 1)</span>
+
+<a id="img003" name="img003"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img003.jpg" width="500" height="357" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Benet's Church and Corpus Christi
+College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<h2>HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS<br>
+<span class="smaller">IN</span><br>
+CAMBRIDGESHIRE</h2>
+
+<h3>CHAPTER I</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Cambridge Greenery.&mdash;The "Backs."&mdash;The Lawns.&mdash;Logan's
+     Views.&mdash;Old Common Fields.&mdash;Old Cambridge.&mdash;Origin of
+     Cambridge.&mdash;The Castle.&mdash;Camboritum.&mdash;Granta-ceaster.&mdash;Danes in
+     Cambridge.&mdash;Cambridgeshire formed.&mdash;Battle of Ringmere.&mdash;Norman
+     Conquest.&mdash;The Jewry.&mdash;Religious Houses.&mdash;Rise of
+     University.&mdash;Town and Gown.&mdash;Proctors.&mdash;The
+     Colleges.&mdash;Examinations.&mdash;College Life.&mdash;Cambridge and Oxford.</p>
+
+<p>Cambridge has been described by an appreciative American novelist as
+"a harmony in grey and green." And indeed it is true that few towns
+are so shot through and through with greenery. The London Road enters
+the place through two miles of umbrageous leafage; wide, open spaces
+of grass-land&mdash;Stourbridge Common, Midsummer Common, Coldham Common,
+Empty Common, Donkey Common, Peter's Field, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page2" name="page2"></a>(p. 2)</span> Parker's Piece,
+Christ's Pieces, Jesus Green, Sheep's Green, Coe Fen&mdash;penetrate from
+the outskirts, north, south, and east, right to the heart of the town;
+while the world-famous "Backs," where the road runs beneath ancestral
+elms, between a continuous series of bowery College gardens and
+precincts&mdash;Queens', King's, Clare, Trinity, St. John's&mdash;with their
+beckoning vistas of long avenues of lime and chestnut, ring it in to
+the west, and form a scene of park-like loveliness to be found nowhere
+else on earth. Port Meadow, at Oxford, and the Magdalen Walks, furnish
+the nearest comparison; but only to show how far in front Cambridge
+stands in greenery. Even inside the Colleges this precedence shows
+itself; for in Cambridge every College Court in the place, almost
+without exception, unlike so many of the "Quads" of Oxford, has its
+central grass-plot.</p>
+
+<p>These lawns, it may be noted, are sacrosanct, not to be profaned by
+the foot of anyone but a Fellow of the College<a id="footnotetag1" name="footnotetag1"></a><a href="#footnote1" title="Go to footnote 1"><span class="smaller">[1]</span></a> itself. No outsider,
+from another College, however high in academic rank, may, unless
+accompanied by a Fellow, cross over them; still less any member of the
+College, old or young, who is not himself a Fellow, nor any casual
+visitor, even of the privileged sex. Should any such attempt be made,
+the College porters will politely, but quite firmly, remove the
+transgressor. This convention is absolutely necessary for the very
+existence of the greensward, which, if allowed to be traversed by
+all-comers, would speedily be cut up and ruined.</p>
+
+<p>This greenery, however, is a comparatively recent development in the
+history of Cambridge, most of it dating no further back than the
+latter half of the seventeenth century. In the last decade of that
+century an artist named David Logan (or Loggan), said to have been of
+Danish nationality but Scotch extraction, made a series of views of
+the various Cambridge Colleges, elaborated with extraordinary care and
+fidelity. So truthful and observant was he that a mysterious bird,
+long a puzzle in his drawing of the great court of Trinity, has lately
+been discovered, by reference to the College muniments, to have been a
+tame eagle then kept by the Society. His views <span class="pagenum"><a id="page3" name="page3"></a>(p. 3)</span> were reissued
+in 1905 by Mr. J. W. Clark, the greatest living authority on Cambridge
+antiquities, and should be consulted by all who are interested in the
+development of Cambridge. In these views the existing avenues in the
+College enclosures at the "Backs" may be observed, but all of young
+trees quite recently planted (as indeed we know to have been the case
+from the College records), while right up to these enclosures run open
+treeless fields, not meadows, but corn-land, where harvesters may be
+seen at work and sheep grazing upon the fallow land. Most of the now
+green Commons are in like manner shown to have been then under the
+plough.</p>
+
+<p>The late Professor Maitland, whose recent death has been so
+irreparable a loss to Cambridge and to the whole historical side of
+English education, has shown (in his <i>Township and Borough</i>) how truly
+these views of Logan's represent the seventeenth century facts, and
+how, somewhat earlier, the arable fields had come even to the river
+bank on the west of the town; or, to use his own more accurate
+language, that the western fields of Cambridge extended to the river
+bank. Every old English town and village, it must be remembered, was
+in theory (and originally in practice) self-supporting, and contained
+within its boundary sufficient arable and pasture land to feed its own
+inhabitants and their cattle. These were known as the "Common Fields"
+of the place. They were not "Commons" in our modern sense of the word,
+but were divided into small holdings amongst the townsmen, each man's
+holding consisting of so many tiny strips, never more than an acre in
+extent, scattered as widely as possible to make things fair for all.
+They were cultivated upon the three course system; every landholder
+having the right to pasture a proportionate number of cattle on the
+fallow of the year, as well as in the Common Meadows. The Common
+Fields of Cambridge comprised about five square miles, with the
+inhabited part of the township nearly in the centre, and roughly
+coincided with the existing Parliamentary Borough, though somewhat
+more extensive.</p>
+
+<p>This inhabited part, the mediæval town of Cambridge, was comprised,
+(at least from the tenth century to the eighteenth,) in the space
+bounded by the river on the west, and on the east by a ditch, known
+finally as the "King's Ditch," from having been widened by Henry the
+Third in the Barons' War. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page4" name="page4"></a>(p. 4)</span> This ditch left the Cam at the
+"King's Mill," (the modern representative of which still stands just
+above Silver Street Bridge,) and proceeded along the line of Mill
+Lane, Pembroke Street, Tibbs Row, Hobson Street, and Park Street, to
+fall into the river again opposite Magdalene College. Beyond the
+"Great Bridge," from which the place derived its name, a small cluster
+of houses climbed the steep bank, on the summit of which stood the
+Castle. Our earliest records show this area as by no means thickly
+covered with houses. Not only the inhabitants, but all their cattle
+lived in it; so there must have been many little farmyards and gardens
+interspersed amongst the dwellings.</p>
+
+<p>Domesday Book gives the number of these as only 400, and a couple of
+centuries later, in 1279, when the University was already in full
+existence, there were scarcely more. By the middle of the eighteenth
+century this number had trebled. But even in 1801, as may be seen in
+Lyson's plan of the town, the King's Ditch, which was then still an
+open watercourse, remained substantially the boundary of inhabited
+Cambridge. And the vast suburban extensions in the areas of Barnwell,
+Newnham, Chesterton, and Cherry Hinton are mostly very recent indeed;
+the bulk in fact belonging to the last half century. Their rise, and
+the continuous intrusion of ever fresh University and College
+buildings, has had the effect of once more depleting the area of
+mediæval Cambridge, which to-day contains barely 800 houses. The whole
+of the University buildings, whether ancient or modern, are contained
+within this area, with the exception of the Colleges of Peterhouse,
+Pembroke, Christ's and Jesus (which together with a few of the
+Museums, stand just beyond the Ditch), and the New Court of St. John's
+College, which is on the other side of the river, in the old Common
+Field. The ecclesiastical and feminine foundations similarly situated,
+Selwyn College, Westminster College, Ridley Hall, Newnham College, and
+Girton College, are not recognised by the University as being strictly
+"Colleges" at all.</p>
+
+<a id="img004" name="img004"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img004.jpg" width="350" height="492" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Peterhouse Wall, Coe Fen.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Such was old Cambridge; with its eleven ancient parishes of St. Peter,
+St. Giles, St. Clement, Holy Trinity, St. Michael, St. Mary (the
+greater), St. Edward, St. Benet, St. Botolph, All Saints, and St. John
+(which was destroyed to make room for King's College). Before the
+twelfth century closed three <span class="pagenum"><a id="page6" name="page6"></a>(p. 6)</span> more churches were added, those
+of the Holy Sepulchre, of St. Peter (now St. Mary's the less) outside
+the "Trumpington Gate," of St. Andrew (the greater) outside the
+Barnwell Gate, and St. Andrew (the less) in the detached suburb which
+grew up round the great "Abbey" (really an Augustinian Priory) of
+Barnwell.</p>
+
+<p>Old Cambridge probably owed its constitution&mdash;(quite possibly its very
+existence)&mdash;to the genius with which "the Children of Alfred," Edward
+the Elder and his Sister, the "Lady of the Mercians," reorganised the
+Midlands after the great cataclysm of the Danish wars, which in the
+previous generation had swept over the district, obliterating all
+earlier landmarks and boundaries. One pirate horde, under the most
+renowned of all their chieftains, Guthrum&mdash;the deadliest antagonist,
+and afterwards the most faithful ally, of our great Alfred,&mdash;had for a
+space settled themselves in Cambridge, and from that strategic
+position overawed East Anglia on the one hand and Mercia on the
+other.<a id="footnotetag2" name="footnotetag2"></a><a href="#footnote2" title="Go to footnote 2"><span class="smaller">[2]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The Cambridge which they sacked was not, however, as it would seem,
+the later mediæval town which we have been already considering, but a
+much smaller stronghold on the western bank of the River, comprising
+what is now known as "Castle End," and is still sometimes called "the
+Borough" <i>par excellence</i>. At this point the Cam, one bank or other of
+which is usually swampy even now, and was actually swamp in early
+days, is touched by higher and firmer ground on both sides. The height
+to the west is quite respectable, rising some eighty feet above the
+stream. Here, therefore, and here alone, was there of old any
+convenient passage-way for an army; the river elsewhere forming an
+almost insuperable barrier to military operations, from the Fens
+almost to its source. Such a site was sure to be amongst the earliest
+occupied; and we find, accordingly, that both Romans and Anglo-Saxons
+(presumably Mercians) successively held it. Most probably it was also
+a British site; but the great Castle mound, which earlier antiquaries
+attributed to the Britons, has been shown by Professor Hughes to be,
+mainly at least, a Norman work.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page7" name="page7"></a>(p. 7)</span> This site was the original Cambridge, and may even have been
+called by that very name in its earliest form. For it is hard not to
+identify the Roman settlement (which the spade shows to have existed
+here) with the "Camboritum," which from the "Itinerary of Antoninus"
+(an official road book, probably of the third century <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>) must have
+been somewhere in this immediate neighbourhood. And the word
+Camboritum is plausibly derived from the British <i>Cam Rhydd</i> "the ford
+of the Cam." Cam (which, being interpreted, signifies crooked) may
+well have been the British name for a stream with so tortuous a
+course. But, if so, it was not continuously used, so far as records
+can tell us.</p>
+
+<p>The Roman Camboritum doubtless shared the almost universal destruction
+of Roman stations which marked the English conquest of Britain; and
+the site is described as still "a waste chester" two centuries later,
+when the monks of Ely sought amid the ruins for a stone coffin in
+which to entomb their foundress, St. Ethelreda. By this time the older
+name both of the town and of the river seems to have been forgotten.
+The latter was called, by the English, the Granta, and the former was
+accordingly known only as Granta-ceaster&mdash;the chester, or ruined Roman
+city, upon the Granta. (It should be noted that the village now called
+Grantchester was, till comparatively recent days, known as Grant-set.)</p>
+
+<p>Yet another century, and we find, in the days of King Egbert, the
+grandfather of Alfred and the first King acknowledged by the whole
+English nation, that a bridge had been built (or rebuilt) over the old
+ford; and therewith the old site of Camboritum had been reoccupied
+under the new name of Granta-bridge, by which it is known throughout
+mediæval history. We do not meet with "Cambridge" in literature till
+the fourteenth century, nor with "Cam" till almost the date of "Camus,
+reverend sire," in Milton's Lycidas.</p>
+
+<p>However this may be, it is pretty certain that the Cambridge on which
+Guthrum, in the year 872, marched from Repton was the "Borough" of
+Castle End. After holding, or, as one chronicler (Gaimar) would have
+us believe, only besieging it, for a whole year, the Danish host
+hastily made off to Wareham in Dorsetshire, to take part in that life
+and death struggle in the west which began with Alfred's great naval
+victory off Swanage, then drove him into hiding at Athelney, and ended
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page8" name="page8"></a>(p. 8)</span> with the Peace of Wedmore. By that treaty all England north of
+the Watling Street was ceded to the Danes as an under-kingdom, the
+"Dane-Law"; Guthrum, now a Christian and Alfred's godson, being set on
+the throne. Cambridge thus became undisputedly a Danish town. The
+district around was divided "with a rope" (<i>i.e.</i> by chain measure)
+amongst the invaders, and submitted as an organic whole, some half
+century later, to King Edward the Elder. It was probably at this time
+that the town began to extend itself into the East Anglian district to
+the east of the Cam. (Throughout its whole length the river, with its
+marshy banks, was the boundary between the old English kingdoms of
+Mercia and East Anglia; and traces of this are to be found in the
+distinctive customs of adjoining villages, on one side or the other of
+the stream, even to this day.) The "Saxon," or Romanesque, tower of
+St. Benet's Church, may well be of this date, erected by the English
+inhabitants dispossessed of their homes in the Borough by the
+conquering Danes who lorded it over them.</p>
+
+<p>After its submission to Edward the Elder, Cambridge began its career
+as a County Town, giving its name, (as was the case in nearly all
+these new Edwardian counties,) to the surrounding district, which thus
+became known as Grantabrig-shire. The name covered only the southern
+part of the present county; for the Isle of Ely was reconstituted
+under the ancient jurisdiction of its great abbots and bishops. To
+this day, indeed, it has its own separate County Council, and even a
+separate motor-car lettering. The new political unit soon began to
+display no small local patriotism; for we read that in the fatal
+battle of Ringmere, fought on Ascension Day, 1010, between the fresh
+Danish invaders, who were then pouring over the land, and the united
+forces of East Anglia under the hero Ulfcytel, "soon fled the East
+English. There stood Grantabryg-shire fast only."</p>
+
+<a id="img005" name="img005"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img005.jpg" width="350" height="496" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Backs, Clare College Gate.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The victorious Danes, naturally, proceeded to wreak special vengeance
+on such obstinate foes. The county was ravaged with a ferocity even
+beyond the usual Danish harryings, and Cambridge itself was sacked and
+burnt. When it arose from its ashes, in the quieter days of the Danish
+Canute, the first "King of England," (his native predecessors having
+been Kings "of the English,") it was organised, Danish fashion, into
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page10" name="page10"></a>(p. 10)</span> ten Wards, each with its own "Lawman." In the reign of
+Edward the Confessor, it had, as we have seen, 400 dwelling-houses
+(<i>masurae</i>), not urban cottages closely packed in rows, but mostly
+tenements of the farmhouse type, each with its farmyard, the abodes of
+the husbandmen who owned and tilled the Common Fields of the town.</p>
+
+<p>This number of houses shows Cambridge to have been at this time an
+important place, equal in population to a whole average "Hundred,"
+with its ten villages; and as such we find it counted for legal
+purposes under the Norman and Plantagenet dynasties. But its Common
+Fields were by no means proportionately extensive,<a id="footnotetag3" name="footnotetag3"></a><a href="#footnote3" title="Go to footnote 3"><span class="smaller">[3]</span></a> so that many of
+the inhabitants must already have depended upon trade for their
+living.</p>
+
+<p>If Cambridge fared ill at the hands of the Danes, it fared little
+better at those of the Normans. William the Conqueror made the place
+his headquarters in his operations against Hereward's "Camp of Refuge"
+at Ely. This resulted in the ruin of fifty-three out of the 400
+houses, besides twenty-seven more pulled down to make room for his new
+Castle, which with its outworks and huge central keep occupied the
+greater part of the old Roman site to the west of the Bridge. The loss
+of these eighty houses probably brought down the population to little
+over 2,000 souls. Even with this reduction, however, the town might
+still claim to rank in the first class of English cities at the time;
+and this is shown by the growth of a Jewry within its walls, in the
+area bounded by St. John's College, Trinity College, and Bridge
+Street. For the Jews, (who first came into England as camp-followers
+of the Norman invaders,) naturally struck for the wealthier towns in
+which to form their settlement. As the place grew in importance
+Religious Houses began rapidly to spring up in and around it; the
+first being the great Augustinian Abbey of Barnwell, founded by Picot,
+the Sheriff of Cambridge under William the Conqueror.</p>
+
+<p>The next generation saw Augustinian Canons settled in the town itself,
+at the Hospital (now the College) of St. John; and Benedictine nuns at
+the Priory of St. Radegund just beyond the King's Ditch, where their
+conventual church is still used as the Chapel of Jesus College. A
+century later, and friars of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page11" name="page11"></a>(p. 11)</span> all the Orders came flocking
+into Cambridge; the Grey Franciscans, the Black Dominicans, the White
+Carmelites, the Austin Friars, the Friars of the Sack, the Friars of
+Bethlehem. The sites occupied by the first three of these names are
+to-day represented by the Colleges of Sidney, Emmanuel, and Queens'.
+Friars always made for the chief centres of life, and by the
+thirteenth century Cambridge had become emphatically such, by the rise
+of that institution destined to give it a perennial fame, the
+University.</p>
+
+<p>How this rise of the University came about is an as yet unsolved
+problem in history. As in the case of Oxford, the great name of Alfred
+was invoked, by unscrupulous mediæval fabricators, as concerned in its
+foundation. And it is possible that there may be really traceable some
+distant connection with that great saint and hero. For Alfred actually
+did found amidst the ruins of Ely, after its sack by the Danes, a
+small College of priests, which lived on to be the nucleus of the
+restored Abbey in the days of his grandson Edgar the Peaceful. And it
+is also historical fact that this restored Abbey was specially
+renowned for the famous school attached to it&mdash;so famous as to count
+amongst its scholars more than one future monarch. Furthermore we know
+that the Ely monks taught in Cambridge also, and this may well have
+been the first germ of the University.</p>
+
+<p>At any rate it is certain that, in 1209, when the schools of Oxford
+were for a while closed by the Government, as the outcome of a more
+than usually outrageous "rag," large numbers of the students migrated
+to Cambridge; which seems to point to the place having already some
+educational repute. From henceforward, at all events, it attained
+European reputation in this respect, for, in 1229, we find another
+batch of expelled students, this time from Paris, settling themselves
+here, and yet another swarm of Oxonians twenty years later.</p>
+
+<p>The University had now become an organic body, with its Chancellor,
+its masters, and its scholars or "clerks," so called because, being
+not wholly illiterate, the Law considered them as potential members of
+the clerical profession, and gave them special immunities accordingly.
+They were not amenable to lay jurisdiction, but only to the milder
+"Courts Christian," in which the death-penalty was never inflicted. It
+seems not infrequently to have been deserved; for the earliest
+undergraduates <span class="pagenum"><a id="page12" name="page12"></a>(p. 12)</span> were, at first, an utterly lawless lot, and
+made themselves most unpleasant neighbours to the "burgesses" of the
+Town.</p>
+
+<p>When first they made their appearance the inhabitants of Cambridge had
+just bought the right to call themselves by this dignified name. This
+bargain was the upshot of a Royal visit in 1207 from King John, who,
+in consideration of a payment of 250 marks, (equivalent to £5,000 at
+the present value of money,) granted Cambridge a Charter of
+Incorporation, with the right to be governed by a Provost and bailiffs
+of their own (instead of by the King's Sheriff), and to regulate their
+own markets. Twenty years later, (by a further contribution to the
+royal purse,) the Provost acquired the higher title of Mayor.</p>
+
+<p>But almost simultaneously, his prerogatives began to be curtailed by
+the rising power of the University, to whose "Taxers" was given, in
+1231, the sole right of fixing the rents which might be demanded for
+lodgings from the inrushing swarm of students; while the regulation of
+the market weights and measures became vested in the Proctors. The
+authority of the Taxers died out when the Collegiate system became
+universal, but has been revived in recent days by the "Lodging-house
+Syndicate": that of the Proctors over the Market has become obsolete;
+not so long, however, but that, to this day, there may be seen, in the
+possession of the Senior Proctor for each year, an iron cylinder, a
+yard long and an inch in diameter, which was, not so many decades ago,
+the standard test for the dimensions of every roll of butter sold in
+Cambridge. For butter in Cambridge was retailed by the inch; a custom
+which still lingers on sporadically amongst our vendors.</p>
+
+<p>The student population speedily became far more numerous than the
+townsfolk, and their accommodation must have been no small problem. At
+first the need was met wholly by private enterprise: University
+lodgers thronged the private houses and the annexes, or "hostels," as
+they are named, run up for their sole use by speculative landlords.
+These hostels gradually attained to more or less of official
+recognition by the University, and paved the way for the setting up of
+Colleges.</p>
+
+<a id="img006" name="img006"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img006.jpg" width="350" height="558" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Michael's and All Angels.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The first actual College was Peterhouse, founded by Hugh de Balsham,
+Bishop of Ely, in 1284, and was of the nature of an experiment, the
+success of which it took a whole generation <span class="pagenum"><a id="page14" name="page14"></a>(p. 14)</span> to establish.
+Once proved, a host of imitators appeared; and the following
+generation saw no fewer than seven similar foundations, Michaelhouse
+and King's Hall (the germs of Trinity College), Clare, Pembroke,
+Gonville, Trinity Hall, and Corpus Christi College. Then came a break
+of a century, followed by another outburst of zeal, which in the next
+hundred years produced yet another seven: King's, Queens', St.
+Catharine's, Jesus, Christ's, St. John's, and Magdalene. The last four
+of these were earlier religious and scholastic foundations remodelled;
+and a like process during the half century succeeding the Reformation
+has given us the Colleges of Trinity, Caius, Emmanuel, and Sidney. Not
+till the nineteenth century was the list added to by the appearance of
+Downing.</p>
+
+<p>The original idea in all these foundations was to provide, not so much
+for the students as for the masters who taught them. To these it was
+an immense advantage to be able to dwell together in small groups and
+in quiet quarters, where they could engage in research and prepare
+their lectures, shut away from the turmoil of the seething crowd of
+Town and Gown in the streets. And it speedily appeared that if the
+seclusion of a College was helpful to the teacher it was even more
+helpful to the taught. For the test applied to students by the
+University before conferring upon them a Degree was by public
+disputations in the schools, each candidate having to support or
+oppose some literary or scientific thesis.</p>
+
+<p>The memory of these wordy "opponencies" is still preserved in the
+denomination of "Wrangler" bestowed on the candidates who obtain a
+First Class in the Mathematical Examination for an "Honour" Degree,
+and by every examination through which such a Degree can be obtained
+being called a "Tripos,"<a id="footnotetag4" name="footnotetag4"></a><a href="#footnote4" title="Go to footnote 4"><span class="smaller">[4]</span></a> from the three-legged stool which played a
+notable part in those old ordeals. The test demanded steadiness of
+nerve and readiness of wit, as well as mere knowledge; and, in all
+these, the Scholar of a College, well catered and cared <span class="pagenum"><a id="page15" name="page15"></a>(p. 15)</span> for,
+was far better equipped than his lawless, and often all but foodless,
+non-Collegiate competitor.</p>
+
+<p>Thus every College found itself confronted by a great demand for
+admissions, which was met by the introduction of Scholars, so far as
+the pecuniary resources of the Foundation would admit, and,
+ultimately, by the admission of "Pensioners";&mdash;students who, without
+being members of the Foundation, were willing to pay for a share in
+its educational advantages. These Pensioners finally came to
+outnumber, (in every College), the masters and scholars together, as
+they do still. The original non-Collegiate students proportionately
+dwindled in number; till the depopulation of the University during the
+religious ups and downs of the Reformation era put an end to them
+altogether. For three hundred years afterwards no one was admitted to
+the University unless attached to one of the Colleges, till, in the
+later decades of the nineteenth century, the great expansion which
+marked that period called Non-Collegiate Students, on a limited and
+tentative scale, once more into existence.</p>
+
+<p>Substantially, however, at the present day, the Colleges <i>are</i>
+Cambridge; and to the visitor their buildings completely out-bulk
+those which belong to the University&mdash;the Senate House, the University
+Church and Library, the Examination Hall, and the various Museums and
+Laboratories. Each College consists of an enclosed precinct, (to which
+the students are confined at night,) containing blocks of apartments,
+(usually arranged in "Courts,") for Fellows, Scholars, and Pensioners,
+a special "Lodge" for the Master; a Chapel; a Library; and a Hall,
+with Kitchen and Buttery attached. Here the Masters sit at the "High
+Table" on a dais across the upper end of the Hall, and the students at
+less pretentious boards arranged longitudinally. All are bound to dine
+in Hall, unless by special leave; but other meals may be in your own
+rooms, of which each student has a suite of three, in which he is said
+to "keep." All three are within one general outer door, or "oak," to
+be opened only by a latch-key, and "sported" whenever the owner
+desires his citadel to be inaccessible. Over the oak, on the outside,
+is painted his name (always in white capital letters upon a black
+ground), while at the foot of each staircase a similarly painted list
+gives the names of all the men whose rooms are to be found upon it.
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page16" name="page16"></a>(p. 16)</span> Each student's suite invariably comprises a sitting (or
+"keeping") room, a bedroom, and a pantry, or "gyp-room." This last
+name records the fact that till lately the functions of a housemaid
+were discharged by male servants known as "gyps,"<a id="footnotetag5" name="footnotetag5"></a><a href="#footnote5" title="Go to footnote 5"><span class="smaller">[5]</span></a> who are now
+almost universally superseded by female "bedmakers" appointed by the
+College Tutors.</p>
+
+<p>The Tutors are immediately responsible for the general supervision of
+the students in the College: the actual teaching is done by Lecturers
+in the various subjects, who have special apartments, "Lecture Rooms,"
+provided in every College for their purposes. Every student has to
+attend a certain quota of lectures, but otherwise is very much left to
+educate himself, his progress being checked by periodical College
+examinations, in addition to those required by the University to be
+passed before he can be admitted to a Degree. The lowest Degree is
+that of B.A. (Bachelor of Arts). Three years after attaining this a
+man may proceed to become M.A. (Master of Arts), when he ceases to be
+"in statu pupillari," and is no longer subject to the authority of the
+Proctors.</p>
+
+<p>These officers perambulate the town after dark to punish University
+wrong-doers, usually by a fine of 6<i>s.</i> 8<i>d.</i>, or some multiple of
+that sum, the unit being a survival from mediæval numismatics, as
+equivalent to half a "Mark." More serious offences are met by
+"Rustication," for a Term or a year, during which the offender may not
+show himself in Cambridge, and, in extreme cases, by expulsion from
+the University altogether. These punishments can also be inflicted by
+the authorities of each College on the students of that College. But
+in this domestic forum, for smaller offences the place of fines is
+taken by "gating" for a certain period, during which the nocturnal
+enclosure of the culprit begins at some earlier hour than usual.</p>
+
+<p>As a regular rule the College gates are shut at ten p.m., after which
+no outsider (student or visitor) may enter, and no inmate (under the
+Degree of M.A.) pass out; though to students already out uncensured
+admission is given until midnight. Once inside the gates the student
+is under no obligation to keep to his own rooms, but has the run of
+the College all night. He is bound, however, to spend his nights
+within the walls, and not even for a single night may he be absent
+without a duly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page17" name="page17"></a>(p. 17)</span> signed <i>exeat</i> from the College authorities
+giving him leave. And, as he must be in residence when they require it
+of him, so is he also forbidden to be in residence at such seasons as
+they bar; during the greater part of each Vacation, for example,
+comprising half the year.</p>
+
+<p>Theoretically the Three Terms into which the Academic Year is divided
+consist of about ten weeks apiece; but, in practice, they have only
+eight of "Full Term," during which residence is compulsory. The first
+of these is the "Michaelmas," or, as it is popularly called the
+"October" term, lasting from about mid-October to mid-December. After
+the Christmas vacation follows the "Lent" term, from the middle of
+January to the middle of March. Then comes a month of Easter vacation,
+and then the "Easter" (more generally known as the "May") term; at the
+end of which the close of the working year is celebrated by a series
+of social festivities in connection with the College boat races,
+collectively designated "the May Week," though invariably taking place
+in June. Finally comes the "Long Vacation" (the last word being
+omitted in popular parlance), lasting till a new year begins in
+October. Many of the more studious men are, however, permitted to
+reside during July and August for the purposes of private reading. A
+man in residence, we may mention, is said to be "up"; thus we meet
+with such phrases as "coming up," "going down," and being "sent down,"
+when ordered to leave Cambridge, temporarily or permanently, for
+disciplinary reasons.</p>
+
+<p>All this is very unlike Continental or American University life, but
+is almost the ditto of Oxford. For Cambridge is the sister-daughter of
+Oxford. It was by Oxonian colonists that the University of Cambridge
+was begun; the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse, was not only
+suggested by the earliest Oxford Foundation, Merton, but borrowed its
+very Statutes; and the development of the two seats of learning has
+twinned itself throughout the centuries to an extent unparalleled
+elsewhere in history. The result is that to-day there are no two
+places in the world so alike, socially, intellectually, and even
+physically, as Oxford and Cambridge. The latter has at present the
+larger number of students; but each has approximately the same number
+of Colleges, and of satellite Collegiate institutions, formally or
+informally connected with the University (<i>e.g.</i>, the Ladies'
+Colleges); and in each the Academic organisation, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page18" name="page18"></a>(p. 18)</span> the social
+code, and the life led by both students and teachers, is almost
+absolutely identical. To experts well acquainted with both places the
+minute shades of difference are of extreme interest; but to the
+average visitor the places are as like as twin sisters. The very names
+of the Colleges are the same in no less than a third of the cases. If
+there is a Trinity at Cambridge there is also a Trinity at Oxford, if
+there is a Magdalen at Oxford there is a Magdalene at Cambridge; while
+St. John's, Jesus, Corpus Christi, and Pembroke are all in like manner
+duplicated. And, both at Oxford and Cambridge, Colleges are named from
+Queens; though a subtle difference in spelling (Queen's and Queens')
+records the fact that, while one Queen founded the Oxford College, two
+were concerned in the Cambridge foundation.</p>
+
+<a id="img007" name="img007"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img007.jpg" width="350" height="481" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Oriel in Library, St. John's College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page19" name="page19"></a>(p. 19)</span> With regard to picturesqueness and architectural merit it is
+difficult to assign the pre-eminence to either place, so far as the
+University and Collegiate buildings are concerned. Of each distinctive
+feature, considered separately, the choicest specimen is to be found
+in Cambridge&mdash;the best College Chapel at King's; the finest College
+Hall and College Courts at Trinity; the most characteristic and
+beautiful Library at St. John's. But, out-taken these, Oxford can show
+several examples of each feature better than the next best at
+Cambridge. And, apart from the University buildings, the town of
+Cambridge, with its narrow streets and mean public edifices, is
+hopelessly outclassed by the beautiful city of Oxford. Invidious
+comparisons, however, are, in the case of sisters, more than
+ordinarily odious.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page20" name="page20"></a>(p. 20)</span> CHAPTER II</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Entrance to Cambridge.&mdash;Railways.&mdash;Roman Catholic Church.&mdash;Street
+     runlets, Hobson, Perne.&mdash;Fitzwilliam Museum.&mdash;<b>Peterhouse</b>, Chapel,
+     Deer-park.&mdash;Little St. Mary's Church, Washington Arms.&mdash;Gray's
+     window.&mdash;<b>Pembroke College</b>, Large and Small Colleges, "Querela
+     Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's farewell.&mdash;St. Botolph's Church.&mdash;The
+     King's Ditch.&mdash;<b>Corpus Christi College</b>, Cambridge Guilds, St.
+     Benet's Church, Fire-hooks, Corpus Library, Corpus Ghost.&mdash;<b>St.
+     Catharine's College.</b>&mdash;King's Parade.&mdash;Pitt Press.&mdash;Newnham
+     Bridge, Hermits.&mdash;The Backs River, College Bridges, Hithes.</p>
+
+<p>Having thus given the reader a very meagre and sketchy outline of the
+sort of knowledge needful for a due appreciation of Cambridge, and
+leaving him to fill in such details as he pleases from the numberless
+histories and guide books, large and small (and for the most part
+excellent) which he will find quite readily accessible, we will now
+suppose him to be entering the town.</p>
+
+<p>Should he do this from the railway station he will have to face a mile
+or so of "long unlovely street" to begin with. For when railroads were
+first made&mdash;(the Great Eastern line from London to Cambridge being
+constructed in 1845)&mdash;they were regarded with extreme suspicion and
+dislike by the authorities of both Universities. The noise of the
+trains, it was declared, would be fatal to their studies; the facility
+of running up to London would hopelessly demoralise their
+undergraduates; bad characters from the metropolis would come down in
+shoals to prey upon them. Thus both Oxford and Cambridge strenuously
+opposed any near approach of this new-fangled abomination to their
+hallowed precincts. Oxford actually succeeded in keeping the main line
+of the Great Western as far off from it as Didcot, ten miles away,
+whence it <span class="pagenum"><a id="page21" name="page21"></a>(p. 21)</span> did not penetrate to the city itself till a
+considerably later date, when prejudice had been overcome by the
+patent advantages of the new locomotion, and a station hard by was
+welcomed. At Oxford, therefore, no such distance divides the railway
+and the Colleges as at Cambridge, where from the first the station
+stood in its present place. This, at the date of its construction, was
+far beyond even the outermost buildings of the town, with which it is
+connected by the old Roman road, the main artery of Cambridge, running
+straight, as Roman roads do run, for miles on either side to the
+"Great Bridge." To antiquarians this road is known as the Via Devana,
+because its objective is supposed to have been the old Roman city of
+Deva (Chester); during its passage through Cambridge it has no fewer
+than seven official designations, to the frequent discomfiture of
+strangers.</p>
+
+<p>Where it conducts the visitor townwards from the railway station it
+presents, as we have said, a somewhat dreary vista; dignified only by
+the beautifully proportioned spire of the Roman Catholic Church, built
+in 1885. The erection of this edifice was due to the generosity of a
+single benefactor, Mrs. Lyne-Stephens, a French lady, who, early in
+the reign of Queen Victoria, won fame and fortune as the most renowned
+ballet dancer of the London stage. The Church is popularly called, in
+Cambridge, a Cathedral; but this is a misnomer, for the Bishop's See
+is not here but at Northampton.</p>
+
+<p>The cross-roads at which the church is placed rejoice in the inane
+designation of Hyde Park Corner. The best approach to Cambridge is by
+the westward road of the four, which leads into the London Road (or
+Trumpington Road, as it is here called), that umbrageous avenue of
+leafage spoken of in our opening sentences. Keeping along this towards
+the town, we find ourselves confronted with one of the prettiest and
+most uncommon amongst the minor attractions of Cambridge, the runlets
+of clear water which sparkle along the side of either pavement.</p>
+
+<p>This pleasant feature is attributed to the benevolence of an ancient
+Cambridge worthy, Thomas Hobson, who dwelt here from the reign of
+Henry the Eighth to that of Charles the First. By trade he was a
+"carrier," a profession which at that date included not merely the
+transport of goods but the provision of locomotion for
+passengers&mdash;then almost wholly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page22" name="page22"></a>(p. 22)</span> equestrian. Thus Hobson not
+only himself travelled regularly to and from London with his
+stage-waggon, but kept a large stable of horses, not fewer than "forty
+good cattle," ready for hire&mdash;even supplying his customers with boots
+and whips for their journey. But he was very autocratic in the matter,
+and would never allow any steed to be chosen except in accordance with
+his will. "This or none" he would say to any hirer who dared to
+remonstrate. And his business was so prosperous that he could afford
+to say it, and thus give rise to the still current expression
+"Hobson's Choice." He rose to be Mayor of Cambridge, and his portrait
+still hangs in the Guildhall.</p>
+
+<p>Finally when he died, at the age of eighty-six, in 1630, he gained the
+honour of a serio-comic epitaph from Milton, then a student of
+Christ's College, "on the University Carrier who sickened in the time
+of his Vacancy, on being forbid to go to London by reason of the
+Plague."</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Here lieth one who did most truly prove<br>
+  That he could never die while he could move;<br>
+  So hung his destiny, never to rot<br>
+  While he might still jog on and keep his trot.<br>
+
+  <span class="lspaced2">.........</span><br>
+
+  Rest, that gives all men life, gave him his death,<br>
+  And too much breathing put him out of breath;<br>
+  Nor were it contradiction to affirm<br>
+  Too long Vacation hastened on his Term.<br>
+
+  <span class="lspaced2">........</span><br>
+
+  But had his doings lasted as they were<br>
+  He had been an immortal carrier."</p>
+
+<p>The popular tradition, (attested by an inscription on the fountain in
+the Market Place,) which gives this hero the whole credit of the
+street runlets, seems, however, to go too far, though they were
+certainly first made during his life-time. Their source is in some
+springs which issue from the chalk near Great Shelford, four miles
+south-east of Cambridge, and which are called, as such sources are
+commonly called hereabouts, "The Nine Wells"&mdash;nine being used as an
+indefinite number. It is interesting to remember that this conception
+evolved itself also amongst the ancient Greeks, who talked of the
+"Nine Fountains" at Athens, and the "Nine Ways" at Amphipolis, with
+exactly the same indefiniteness of numeration. The ancient outfall of
+these springs seems to have been by <span class="pagenum"><a id="page23" name="page23"></a>(p. 23)</span> what is now called
+"Vicar's Brook," which is bridged by the London Road at the first
+milestone from Cambridge. Till the eighteenth century the bridge was a
+ford, known as Trumpington Ford. The earliest proposal to intercept
+the stream near this spot and divert its course through the town, was
+due, not to Hobson, but to another worthy (or unworthy) contemporary
+of his, Dr. Andrew Perne, then Master of Peterhouse College, a divine
+of such an accommodating breadth of view that he alone, amongst all
+the higher authorities of the University, succeeded in retaining his
+post and his emoluments throughout the horrible see-saw of the
+Reformation period.</p>
+
+<p>We first hear of him in the reign of Edward the Sixth, as a Protestant
+of such stalwart calibre that he destroyed as "idolatrous" almost
+every single book in the University Library. Under Mary he figures as
+no less ardent a Catholic, even to the degree of digging up and
+publicly burning (in default of living heretics) the corpses of the
+celebrated Protestant teachers Bucer and Fagius. Finally the accession
+of Elizabeth convinced him once more that Protestantism was the truest
+form of Christianity; and she lived long enough to keep him from again
+changing his principles. This amazing versatility naturally did not
+pass without comment. The wits of the University coined from his name
+the Latin verb <i>pernare</i> "to be a turn-coat," and declared that the
+A.P. which showed on a new weather-cock given by him to his College
+stood for A Protestant or A Papist indifferently.</p>
+
+<p>It was this man who, in 1574, started the idea of bringing the
+Shelford water into Cambridge. The plan was carried out by
+"Undertakers" (who hoped to make money by it), in 1610, and amongst
+these Hobson would seem to have been the predominant partner.</p>
+
+<a id="img008" name="img008"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img008.jpg" width="350" height="491" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Peterhouse.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Accompanied by the rippling of these runlets (which only represent a
+very small amount of the water brought by "Hobson's Conduit" into
+Cambridge) we shortly reach our first University edifice, the
+Fitzwilliam Museum, fronted by a singularly fine façade of classical
+architecture, and having in the Entrance Hall a really magnificent
+staircase of coloured marbles. It should be noted that the four lions
+which flank the façade are (unlike those in Trafalgar Square) all in
+differing attitudes. The Museum (which is open to the public three
+days in the week and to members of the University on all <span class="pagenum"><a id="page25" name="page25"></a>(p. 25)</span>
+days) contains a fine collection of pictures and antiques, the nucleus
+of which is a bequest made in 1816 by Viscount Fitzwilliam. The
+Egyptian section is specially noteworthy, and the water-colours by
+Turner. The building was commenced in 1837, but was not finally
+completed till 1875, when the cost had run up to a hundred and fifteen
+thousand pounds.</p>
+
+<p>The long-fronted Hospital on the opposite side of the road is the
+modern representative of an ancient institution which gave to this
+region, then quite the extremity of Cambridge, the name (as appears in
+our oldest maps) of Spittal End.</p>
+
+<p>Adjoining the Museum we find ourselves arriving at our first College,
+St. Peter's College, more commonly called Peterhouse, the same of
+which the inevitable Dr. Perne was so long Master. (We may here note
+that in Cambridge this name "Master" is the designation of the Head of
+every College except King's, which has a "Provost," and Queens', with
+its "President.") Peterhouse, as has been mentioned in our first
+chapter, was the earliest College to be founded in Cambridge. Its
+founder Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely, derived his idea from Merton
+College at Oxford, which had been in existence some twenty years when,
+in 1281, he introduced its system into Cambridge, and even adopted its
+very statutes. He first designed to incorporate his College with the
+already existing quasi-monastic Brotherhood of the Hospital of St.
+John (now St. John's College). The double Rule, however, bred so many
+quarrels that he settled his "Scholars of Ely" on their present site;
+their abode being dubbed Peterhouse from the adjoining church of St.
+Peter (now St. Mary's the Less), which for three hundred and fifty
+years served as the College Chapel, and is still connected by a
+covered passage with the College buildings.</p>
+
+<p>The existing Chapel was built by yet another Bishop of Ely closely
+connected with the College, Dr. Matthew Wren, Master here 1625-1634.
+He was uncle to the great Sir Christopher Wren, the architect of St.
+Paul's, and had enough architectural originality of his own to aim at
+copying the beautiful tracery of the mediæval church-builders. It was
+the first time that any such attempt had been made in England; and
+this going behind the Reformation roused the Protestant feeling of the
+time to fury. Men declared it incredible that there could be "so much
+Popery in so small a chapel"; and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page26" name="page26"></a>(p. 26)</span> when the Civil War gave the
+Puritans their opportunity Wren paid for being so far in advance of
+his age by an imprisonment of not less than eighteen years, till
+released, in 1660, by the Restoration. The Chapel windows are now
+filled with some fine Munich glass, the only example of this work in
+Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>Besides the Chapel, the Library here is remarkable, and the
+"Combination Room" boasts itself as almost, if not quite, the finest
+apartment of its kind in all Cambridge. This name, we may mention, is
+given in every College to the parlour whither the M.A.'s retire, after
+dining in Hall, for wine, dessert, and conversation.<a id="footnotetag6" name="footnotetag6"></a><a href="#footnote6" title="Go to footnote 6"><span class="smaller">[6]</span></a> That of
+Peterhouse is a luxurious apartment, panelled with oak, and with
+stained-glass windows.</p>
+
+<p>Another feature of the College is its little deer park, the only one
+in Cambridge, and, with the exception of Magdalen College, Oxford, the
+only one in either University. Access to this is obtained by passing
+through the passage between the Hall and the Kitchen. Beyond the deer
+park again an iron gate leads to the College Gardens, the only College
+Gardens in Cambridge which visitors may freely enter. And they are
+well worth entering.</p>
+
+<p>There is, however, no way through this College, as there is through
+many, and we must leave it through the same gate as we entered by,
+thus returning to the street. Over the gate we observe the coat of
+arms belonging to the College, the armorial bearings of the founder
+surrounded by a border of crowns. This feature will be seen in every
+College, for each has its own arms, and these are invariably
+emblazoned above the entrance.</p>
+
+<a id="img009" name="img009"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img009.jpg" width="350" height="558" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Mary the Less, South side.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Architecturally attached to Peterhouse is, as has been said, the
+church of St. Mary "the less," so called in contradistinction to
+"Great" St. Mary's, which here, as at Oxford, is the designation of
+the "University Church." This is the only really beautiful church in
+Cambridge, the tracery of the windows being exquisite flowing
+Decorated. All date from the fourteenth century, when the present
+structure displaced the earlier church dedicated to St. Peter. One
+feature of interest here is a monument put up to Richard Washington,
+who was minister of this church in the beginning of the eighteenth
+century. He was of the same family as the great George Washington, and
+in the coat of arms here displayed we may <span class="pagenum"><a id="page28" name="page28"></a>(p. 28)</span> see the origin of
+the American Stars and Stripes, while the crest has become the
+American eagle.<a id="footnotetag7" name="footnotetag7"></a><a href="#footnote7" title="Go to footnote 7"><span class="smaller">[7]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>To the west of the church we get a view of the back of Peterhouse in
+its untouched picturesqueness, abutting on the churchyard, at the end
+of which comes another Museum, that of Classical Archæology. This is
+reached by a narrow lane, having the church on one side, and on the
+other "Emmanuel," the leading Congregationalist place of worship in
+Cambridge. As we return between these into the street we should look
+up at the buildings of Peterhouse and notice, in front of the window
+at the top corner of the ivy-clad wall, an erection of stout iron
+bars. By these hangs a tale; for the window belongs to the rooms
+traditionally occupied by the poet Gray when in residence here. It is
+said that he caused these bars to be put up, from his constitutional
+dread of fire, and that he kept a stout rope constantly affixed to
+them as a means of escape in case of need. Awakened one night by
+shouts of "Fire! Fire!" he slid down this rope in deshabille&mdash;to find
+himself plunged at the bottom into a huge vat of water placed there by
+his friends. So runs the tale; which adds that Gray migrated in
+disgust from Peterhouse to Pembroke. That he did so migrate is quite
+historical.</p>
+
+<p>To reach his new College, Gray had only to cross the street; for
+almost immediately opposite to Peterhouse are seen the more widely
+extended buildings of Pembroke. Not so very many years ago they were
+the less widely extended of the two; for while Peterhouse has remained
+comparatively stationary, Pembroke, more than any other College, has
+partaken in the wonderful expansion which the last half century has
+wrought in the number of University students at Cambridge.</p>
+
+<a id="img010" name="img010"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img010.jpg" width="350" height="478" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Peterhouse, from St. Mary's Churchyard.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>From the Restoration onwards the Colleges of Cambridge were for two
+hundred years, till the middle of the nineteenth century, divisible in
+numerical strength between two strongly marked classes. At the top
+came the two great Societies of Trinity and St. John's; of which the
+former gradually drew ahead, and came to have some four hundred
+students to St. John's two hundred. The remaining fifteen Foundations
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page30" name="page30"></a>(p. 30)</span> were classed together as the "Small Colleges"; the largest
+of them being well under a hundred strong, and the smallest (amongst
+them Pembroke) small indeed. But with the great extension of the
+University curriculum, by the addition of a host of literary and
+scientific subjects to the Mathematics which had previously been the
+sole avenue to a Degree, there has come as marked an increase in the
+number of students, and the old College classification has broken
+down. Trinity, indeed, remains at the top, even more than ever, having
+almost doubled its overwhelming numbers; but St. John's has been
+caught up and overpassed by several of the once "small" Colleges,
+amongst them by Pembroke. And yet, in the year 1858, Pembroke had only
+one solitary freshman; and he migrated to Caius, in dread, as the tale
+then ran, of being divided into sections by the authorities, to
+satisfy the demands of the Mathematical, Classical, and Philosophical
+lecturers provided by the College.</p>
+
+<p>The result is that Pembroke, even beyond most Colleges, is a medley of
+architectural additions. When Gray migrated to it, and for a century
+thereafter, the modest range of low white stone which still contains
+the main entrance, formed the whole frontage; the College buildings
+being a small quadrangle about half the size of the present First
+Court. It was, in fact (except for a new Chapel, built by Wren in
+1663, and still in use), no larger than it was at its first
+foundation, in 1346, by Mary, widow of Amory de Valence, Earl of
+Pembroke, and daughter of Guy, Count of Chatillon and St. Paul. Her
+widowhood was brought about, according to tradition, by her husband
+being accidentally slain, before her eyes, on their very wedding day,
+at the tournament held to celebrate the nuptials. Modern criticism
+disputes this tragic tale, but it was believed in Gray's day, and he
+has referred, in his well-known list of the Founders of Cambridge
+Colleges, to</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="add3em">"sad Chatillon, on her bridal morn</span><br>
+  Who wept her bleeding love."</p>
+
+<p>On her widowhood, however occasioned, she retired from the world, and
+took the veil at Denny Abbey, between Cambridge and Ely. The College
+was founded by her in her husband's memory, and has ever since
+displayed her armorial bearings, the coats of Valence and St. Paul
+dimidiated.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page31" name="page31"></a>(p. 31)</span> At the time of the Civil War, the "Querela Cantabrigiensis" (a
+contemporary publication, written in the Royalist interest), in
+denouncing the misdeeds of the Parliamentary forces, complains
+bitterly that "fourscore ragged soldiers, who had been lowzing before
+Crowland nigh a fortnight, were turned loose into Pembroke Hall, being
+one of the least Halls of the University, to kennel there, and charged
+by their officers to shift for themselves, who, without more ado,
+broke open the Fellows' and Scholars' chambers, and took their beds
+from under them."</p>
+
+<p>A century before this we find Bishop Ridley, the famous Protestant
+martyr, dwelling on this College (of which he had been Master) in his
+touching farewell to Cambridge, composed shortly before his execution:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"Farewell, Pembroke Hall, of late my own College, my care and my
+     charge ... mine own dear College! In thy orchard&mdash;(the walls,
+     butts,<a id="footnotetag8" name="footnotetag8"></a><a href="#footnote8" title="Go to footnote 8"><span class="smaller">[8]</span></a> and trees, if they could speak, would bear me
+     witness)&mdash;I learnt without book almost all Paul's Epistles; yea,
+     and I ween all the Canonical Epistles also, save only the
+     Apocalypse&mdash;of which study, although in time a great part did
+     depart from me, yet the sweet smell thereof I trust I shall carry
+     with me into Heaven; for the profit thereof I think I have felt
+     in all my lifetime ever after. And, I ween, of late there was
+     that did the like. The Lord grant that this zeal and love toward
+     that part of God's Word, which is a key and true commentary to
+     all the Holy Scripture, may ever abide in that College so long as
+     the world shall endure."</p>
+
+<p>Besides Bishop Ridley, Pembroke can boast other well-known Protestant
+divines of the Reformation era, Grindal, Archbishop of Canterbury,
+Whitgift, his successor, and Lancelot Andrewes, Bishop of Winchester.
+The mitre and pastoral staff of the last named (both of brass, and the
+former quite unwearable) are preserved amongst the College treasures.
+So is also a magnificent silver-gilt cup, the gift of the Foundress,
+which still goes round the High Table on special Feast Days. It bears
+two inscriptions in old English characters. Round the bowl is an
+exhortation to "drenk and mak gud cher" for love of St. Dennis&mdash;to
+whom Marie de Valence, as a Frenchwoman, had a special devotion&mdash;while
+round the stem are the words "M.V. God. help.at.ned."</p>
+
+<p>This cup is the more valuable as being almost the only <span class="pagenum"><a id="page32" name="page32"></a>(p. 32)</span> piece
+of mediæval plate still surviving in Cambridge. In ancient days the
+College Halls and Chapels were abundantly supplied, but when the Civil
+War broke out the loyal Gownsmen, with one accord, devoted all their
+silver to the service of the King and sent it off to him at Oxford.
+But it never got there; for Cromwell gained his first distinction by
+pouncing upon the convoy "with a ragged rout of peasants," and then
+compelled the surrender of what little was left in Cambridge. How this
+cup escaped is not known.</p>
+
+<p>Nor is Pembroke's lay list of distinguished alumni less notable than
+its clerical. Besides Gray, it has another poet of the first rank in
+Edmund Spenser, and no less a statesman than the younger Pitt. Amongst
+men of science it counts the late Sir George Gabriel Stokes, whose
+memory is still fresh, and the all too much forgotten seventeenth
+century astronomer, Dr. Long. Of the latter a striking memorial long
+remained in the College&mdash;a copper globe, eighteen feet in diameter,
+pierced to represent the celestial sphere, and so arranged that thirty
+observers at once could find place within it and see the sequence of
+the constellations as the globe revolved. Unhappily this object of
+unique interest has been improved off the face of the earth, amongst
+the various innovations to which Pembroke has specially lent itself.</p>
+
+<p>The original foundation of this College (which was for some time more
+commonly called "Marie Valence Hall") consisted of a Master, fifteen
+scholars, and four Bible clerks. It has now twelve Fellows,
+thirty-three scholars, and upwards of two hundred students in
+residence.</p>
+
+<a id="img011" name="img011"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img011.jpg" width="350" height="457" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Botolph's Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A few yards from Pembroke stands the Parish Church of St. Botolph,
+which, according to the original design of the Foundress, would have
+been as closely connected with the College as is Little St. Mary's
+with Peterhouse. In the first inception of the Collegiate system the
+idea was that the Members of each College (which was only regarded as
+a glorified dwelling house of the period, and the Society of which,
+till their "Hall" was built, were, actually, to begin with, quartered
+in already existing dwelling houses) should worship in the nearest
+Parish Church, like other parishioners. Only by special licence from
+the Pope could a private Chapel for a College, or any other mansion,
+be erected. That granted by Pope Urban the Fifth (during the Papal
+exile at Avignon) for the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page34" name="page34"></a>(p. 34)</span> Chapel of Pembroke is still extant
+in the Papal Register. It is dated July 1366, and runs as follows:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+<p>"To the Warden and College of Scholars of Valence Marie Hall,
+     Cambridge:</p>
+
+<p>License, on the petition of their Foundress, Mary de Sancto
+     Paulo, Countess of Pembroke, to have a Chapel founded and built
+     by the said Countess within their walls, wherein Masses and other
+     Divine Offices may be celebrated by Priests of the said College;
+     saving the rights of the Parish Church."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Parochial rights here spoken of mean the exclusive right of the
+Parish Priest to celebrate marriages and to receive the dues known as
+"Easter Offerings "and "Surplice Fees."</p>
+
+<p>The dedication of St. Botolph's Church notifies us that we are now
+entering Cambridge proper. For this Saint, who was historically an
+abbot, the pioneer of the Benedictine Order in East Anglia, became
+adopted by travellers as their special patron; and his churches were,
+accordingly, placed for the most part at the gates of towns that his
+benediction might speed the parting voyager. We thus find them at no
+fewer than four of the London exits, Aldgate, Aldersgate, Bishopsgate,
+and Billingsgate, and in more than sixty other places, mostly in East
+Anglia. That which we are now considering was associated with the
+entrance to Cambridge known as "Trumpington Gate," where the mediæval
+traveller from London made his way into the town by crossing the
+ancient defensive work called "The King's Ditch."</p>
+
+<p>The construction of this great trench was popularly ascribed to King
+Henry the Third, who, in his struggle with the Barons, desired to keep
+a firm hold on the important strategic centre of Cambridge. There is
+some reason, however, to suppose that he did not actually initiate the
+idea of thus insulating the town by running a ditch across the bend of
+the river on which it stands, but merely deepened and widened an
+earlier trench, originally made, perhaps, by the Danes during their
+occupation of the place, and remade by King John. However this may
+be, the ditch utterly failed of its purpose. Not only was it unequal
+to keeping the Barons out, but it could not even preserve the town
+from being pillaged by a local marauder, Geoffry de Magnaville or
+Maundeville, who made his lair in the neighbouring fens.</p>
+
+<p>The King's Ditch left the river at "the King's Mill" (now <span class="pagenum"><a id="page35" name="page35"></a>(p. 35)</span>
+Newnham Mill), and re-entered it opposite Magdalene College. It
+remained an open watercourse (and a common sewer) till near the
+beginning of the nineteenth century, when it was filled in, none too
+soon, for sanitary reasons. Timber bridges spanned the stream at
+"Barnwell Gate," where the "Via Devana" entered the town, as well as
+here at "Trumpington Gate." These gates themselves, if they ever had
+any material existence, were probably, at the most, little more than
+toll-bars.</p>
+
+<p>St. Botolph's Church was intended, as we have seen, to be specially
+connected with Pembroke College. Between them, however, there has
+always existed a block of buildings, while immediately adjoining the
+church on the other side there has arisen a College of later
+foundation, that of St. Mary and Corpus Christi, familiarly known as
+"Corpus." Unlike the other Colleges of Cambridge, this owes its
+existence not to the generosity of any private benefactor, but to that
+of two mediæval Guilds, the Guild of St. Mary and the Guild of Corpus
+Christi, which combined to leave future ages this splendid memorial of
+their beneficence.</p>
+
+<p>These Guilds were merely two out of many such bodies in the Cambridge
+of that day; for the Guild was the Benefit Society of the mediæval
+period, and every respectable citizen was enrolled in one&mdash;often,
+indeed, in more than one. The Guild, collectively, saw to the personal
+interests of its members; aided them in distress, old age, and
+sickness; contributed towards the expenses of their burial; and
+finally provided Masses for their souls. This last item ultimately
+proved fatal to the Guilds, which were suppressed wholesale at the
+Reformation, as being thus tainted with Popish superstition, and their
+property confiscated for the benefit of the Royal exchequer.</p>
+
+<p>Guilds, like our Benefit Societies, were voluntary associations,
+co-opting their members, and established on various bases. Earliest to
+rise, in all English boroughs, was the Merchant Guild, which regulated
+the entire trade of the town; fixing at its general meetings, called
+"Morning Talks," the market price of each staple commodity, and the
+hours and places at which it might be bought and sold, besides
+punishing rigorously (by fine or expulsion from the Guild) any unfair
+dealing, such as underselling, or "regrating,"&mdash;<i>i.e.</i>, making a
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page36" name="page36"></a>(p. 36)</span> "corner" in any article as we should now say. Somewhat later
+each craft began to have its own Guild, supplanting to a large extent
+the older and more general organisation, whose executive insensibly
+became merged in the Town Council. To this day, however, the building
+in which that Council meets for its "Morning Talks," is called the
+Guildhall in most English towns.</p>
+
+<p>Besides the trading Guilds, there arose others organised on a
+definitely religious basis, the members of which were bound to special
+devotion in some particular direction, from which the Guild took its
+name. Amongst these were the two to whom we owe the existence of
+"Corpus"&mdash;those of "Corpus Christi" and "Blessed Mary," the former
+having been (in 1342) the original inceptors of the idea. The armorial
+bearings of the College still testify to its double origin, being,
+quarterly, three lilies, (the emblems of Our Lady,) and a pelican "in
+her piety" (<i>i.e.</i>, feeding her young with her own blood, as
+contemporary legend imagined to be the case), as a reference to the
+Holy Eucharist.</p>
+
+<p>The College, which was founded 1352, was originally intended only for
+the education of a small number of priests, and consisted only of one
+small court, now known as the Old Court, which happily still exists in
+almost its original condition. It is a venerable and secluded spot,
+with ivy-grown walls and mullioned lattices, well worth a visit. From
+its north-eastern corner extends a long gallery pierced by an archway,
+connecting the College with the Church of St. Benedict, or "Benet," as
+it is commonly vocalised.<a id="footnotetag9" name="footnotetag9"></a><a href="#footnote9" title="Go to footnote 9"><span class="smaller">[9]</span></a> From this connection the College became
+popularly known as "Benet College," just as Peterhouse was so called
+from its like connection with the ancient church of "St. Peter by
+Trumpington Gate." But while Peterhouse retains its old designation,
+that of "Benet" has now become wholly disused, though only within the
+last century.</p>
+
+<a id="img012" name="img012"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img012.jpg" width="350" height="488" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Benet's Church, Interior.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This connecting gallery is of red brick, toned by age into delicious
+mellowness, and is best seen from the back of the College, where a
+quiet little lane ("Free School Lane"), one of the most charming
+amongst the byways of Cambridge, gives access through the above
+mentioned archway into the quiet little church yard of this quiet
+little church, with its Saxon <span class="pagenum"><a id="page38" name="page38"></a>(p. 38)</span> tower, the oldest monument of
+ecclesiastical architecture in Cambridge, and one of the most
+picturesque. The precise date of its erection, and how the church came
+to exist at all, is, and will probably remain, an unsolved problem in
+history. Some authorities imagine that it points to an East Anglian
+settlement to the east of the Cam, distinct from the Mercian
+"Grantabridge" on the western bank, where the old Roman town once
+stood; others believe that it was built by the English inhabitants
+expelled from that town by the Danes in the time of King Alfred.
+Whatever may be the truth there is no small fascination in this
+venerable relic of the old English days, with its "long and short"
+stonework, the rudely-fashioned Romanesque pilasters in its windows,
+and the nondescript "portal-guarding" lions of its interior archway.
+The body of the church has been altered and re-altered time and again
+during the ages: at the bases of the present chancel-arch those of two
+earlier predecessors may be observed, and the south wall of the
+chancel is honeycombed with disused openings once leading into the
+Collegiate buildings of Corpus, while the existing stairway (also
+disused) is seen in the eastern corner of the south aisle. The church
+is thus of rare interest to the architectural student, and its history
+has been exhaustively dealt with by Mr. Atkinson (<i>Cambridge
+Illustrated</i>, p. 133). A glass case in the south aisle contains
+various relics of antiquity belonging to it, and beside them an
+ancient iron "fire-hook," used of old for tearing down blazing roofs
+and buildings.<a id="footnotetag10" name="footnotetag10"></a><a href="#footnote10" title="Go to footnote 10"><span class="smaller">[10]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Out-taken the Old Court, Corpus has nothing in the way of buildings
+that has either beauty or interest, the College having been
+remorselessly remodelled about 1825. But the contents of its Library
+surpass all else of the kind in Cambridge, containing, as it does,
+what is probably the identical Gospel Book used by St. Augustine in
+his conversion of the English, and what is probably the identical copy
+of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle written for King Alfred, if not by his
+own hand. These priceless treasures once formed part of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page39" name="page39"></a>(p. 39)</span>
+library of Canterbury Abbey, which was sold by Henry the Eighth, at
+its suppression, as waste paper. Such relics as survived twenty years
+of this profanation were rescued by Archbishop Parker (the first
+Protestant Archbishop), in Elizabeth's reign, and were presented by
+him to the College, of which he had been Master.<a id="footnotetag11" name="footnotetag11"></a><a href="#footnote11" title="Go to footnote 11"><span class="smaller">[11]</span></a> To guard, so far
+as possible, against their again coming "to such base uses," he
+accompanied his gift with the condition that if a certain number of
+the MSS. were ever missing, the whole should pass to Caius College,
+and thence to Trinity Hall in case of a like loss. The authorities of
+these Colleges have (and exercise) the right of annual inspection: so
+far quite fruitlessly, as no single MS. has disappeared during the
+last three centuries. But the result has been to render this Library
+harder of access to visitors than any other, and it can only be seen
+by special arrangement with the Librarian, who has to be present in
+person, along with some other Fellow or Scholar of the College, before
+strangers can be introduced.</p>
+
+<p>Corpus has the reputation of being haunted by a ghost, the existence
+of which has been taken quite seriously even within the present
+century. But the tale of its origin has a most suspicious number of
+variants. Some hold it to be the spirit of a poor motherless girl of
+seventeen, the daughter of Dr. Spenser (Master from 1667 to 1693), who
+died of fright at being discovered by her father while enjoying a
+clandestine interview with her undergraduate lover. (This tragedy is
+fairly historical.) Others declare that it is the lover; who was
+locked, or locked himself, into a cupboard, where he died of
+suffocation! Others again have a tale of a student from King's, who
+(in order not to haunt his own College) came hither to kill himself!
+That strange noises, not yet accounted for, are heard in some of the
+rooms, is, apparently, an established fact.</p>
+
+<p>Opposite the Gate-tower of Corpus an open roadside esplanade, shaded
+by lime trees, marks the still vacant space destined by St.
+Catharine's College, in the seventeenth century, for a Library, to
+complete its red-brick quadrangle, a design which has come to nothing.
+The interior of the Court, which is not without dignity, still lies
+open to view, shut in only by what was then meant to be a merely
+temporary iron railing, with St. Catharine's wheel conspicuous above
+the entrance. The College was founded as a kind of satellite to King's
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page40" name="page40"></a>(p. 40)</span> College, by Robert Woodlark, the third Provost of that great
+Foundation, in 1475. It has always remained a small and comparatively
+poor Society.</p>
+
+<p>If we pass through the Court, such as it is, of St. Catharine's,
+(familiarly known as "Cat's,") the western gate will bring us out into
+Queens' Lane. We shall, however, do better to reach this most
+fascinating of all Cambridge byways not thus but through the College
+from which it derives its name, Queens'. To do this we must turn
+westwards down Silver Street, a few yards south of St. Catharine's,
+and just opposite St. Botolph's Church. Before taking this turn we
+should give a glance northward along Trumpington Street at the
+splendid mass of Collegiate and University buildings which here come
+into view. High above all rises the glorious fabric of King's College
+Chapel, while, beyond it, the classical façades of the Senate House
+and the University Library, the fine gateway of Caius College, and the
+further off tower of St. John's College, fill the eye with a
+delightful sense of aesthetic culture and harmony.</p>
+
+<p>Entering Silver Street, a mean thoroughfare, all too narrow for its
+volume of traffic, and demanding no small caution from all and sundry,
+we have on our left a building for all the world like a College&mdash;so
+frequently, indeed, mistaken for one by newcomers, as to have gained
+the nickname of "the Freshman's College." In reality this is the
+University Printing Press, or the Pitt Press, as it is commonly
+called; the existing frontage opposite Pembroke having been erected in
+1831, in memory of that statesman, who was a member of Pembroke
+College.<a id="footnotetag12" name="footnotetag12"></a><a href="#footnote12" title="Go to footnote 12"><span class="smaller">[12]</span></a> All the official printing of the University is done here,
+and the building also serves as the quarters of the University
+Registrary, who keeps the record of Entrances, Degrees, etc.</p>
+
+<p>At the end of Silver Street, which is, happily, little over a hundred
+yards in length, we reach an iron bridge over the Cam; its placid
+stream "footing slow," as Milton says (in Lycidas), and only some
+thirty feet in breadth. Above the bridge, however, it widens out into
+a broad pool, enlivened by the rush of water from the "King's Mill,"
+beyond which the eye ranges over the open levels of "Sheep's Green."
+Both the mill and the bridge are amongst the oldest features of
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page41" name="page41"></a>(p. 41)</span> Cambridge, and the tolls payable at both were in mediæval
+times a Royal monopoly. The King's agent in collecting them on this
+bridge (known as "The Small Bridge" in contradistinction to the more
+important structure beneath the Castle) was a hermit, for whose
+accommodation a small bridge-house and chapel were built. This curious
+use of hermits, as keepers of roads and bridges, was common in
+Cambridgeshire before the Reformation.</p>
+
+<p>At Silver Street bridge the river enters on its course through the
+enchanted ground of the "Backs," and the visitor will do well to take
+water at the adjoining boat-house; for the stream here forms for half
+a mile a byway lovely beyond words, not to be matched elsewhere in all
+the world; flowing, as it does, between venerable piles of academic
+masonry, and "trim gardens," the haunts of "retired leisure";
+umbrageous, as it is, with the shade of lime, and elm, and beech, and
+chestnut, and weeping willow, and laburnum; spanned, as it is, by
+bridge after bridge, each a new revelation of exquisite design.</p>
+
+<p>First we find ourselves with the old red brick fabric of Queens'
+College on the one bank and the thicket of "Queens' Grove" on the
+other, joined together by a wooden bridge, attributed to Sir Isaac
+Newton, the Great Natural Philosopher and discoverer of the Law of
+Gravity. A miracle of ingenious construction is this bridge, formed of
+a series of mutually supporting beams requiring not a single bolt to
+hold them together. Such at least it was till a few years ago, when
+the old timbers, after two hundred years' wear, fell into decay and
+had to be replaced, as nearly in facsimile as modern skill could
+compass.</p>
+
+<p>A few yards further and the red brick of Queens' gives place to the
+white stone of King's; the proximity reminding us that the Founders of
+these two beautiful Colleges were husband and wife, "the Royal Saint,"
+King Henry the Sixth, and his heroic Consort, Margaret of Anjou. Poor
+young things! They were but twenty-two and fifteen respectively when
+they began these monuments of their liberality and devotion&mdash;upon the
+very eve of that miserable conflict, the wars of "the rival Roses,"
+which brought about the downfall and death of both. But their work
+survived them, to be completed by Royal successors; King's by Henry
+the Seventh, Queens' by Elizabeth Woodville, wife of Henry's rival,
+Edward the Fourth of York.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page42" name="page42"></a>(p. 42)</span>
+
+<a id="img013" name="img013"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img013.jpg" width="350" height="420" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Clare Bridge.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>King's Bridge, beneath which we now glide, is a single delicate rib of
+stone, a marked contrast to the elaborate woodwork of Queens', and to
+the three arches of grey stone and balustraded parapet of Clare, the
+next in order. Between these the river widens, and the view opens out
+on either side; a spacious meadow dotted and bounded with elms and
+limes on the west, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page43" name="page43"></a>(p. 43)</span> and on the east as spacious a lawn beyond
+which rise the buildings of King's and of Clare College, and the west
+front of that glory of Cambridge and of the world, King's College
+Chapel. This reach of the river used, a few years ago, to be the scene
+of a pretty annual merry-making, known as the "Boat Show," which
+formed part of the attractions of the "May Week."<a id="footnotetag13" name="footnotetag13"></a><a href="#footnote13" title="Go to footnote 13"><span class="smaller">[13]</span></a> Hither the
+College boats which had been contending for precedence in the May
+Races used to row up in procession and draw up side by side in a mass
+occupying the whole breadth of the stream. Each crew rose in turn with
+uplifted oars to salute the victors who had attained (or retained) the
+Headship of the River; after which the procession returned to the boat
+houses two miles below. (The races were rowed two miles below again,
+where the stream is wide enough for the due manipulation of an
+eight-oar.)<a id="footnotetag14" name="footnotetag14"></a><a href="#footnote14" title="Go to footnote 14"><span class="smaller">[14]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Clare Bridge passed, the College gardens of Clare and Trinity Hall
+(which last must not be confounded with the larger and later
+foundation of Trinity College) flank our course on either side for a
+short space, till the next bridge, Garret Hostel Bridge, which
+proclaims its non-Collegiate origin by being (like Newnham Bridge) a
+tasteless structure of iron. It is, in fact, a public thoroughfare;
+the road leading to it, Garret Hostel Lane, being the solitary
+survival of the dozen or so of little streets which gave access to the
+River from mediæval Cambridge, till the banks were usurped by the
+Colleges. And in its name we have the last surviving reminder of those
+"Hostels," or officially recognised lodging houses, which, before
+Colleges came into being (and for some while after), provided
+accommodation for the swarming students of the mediæval University.</p>
+
+<p>Garret Hostel itself, together with others, was swallowed up by the
+gigantic College which we now reach, Trinity. Trinity Bridge, a
+cycloidal curve carried on three arches, is led up to on either side
+by the "long walk of limes" sung by Tennyson in "In Memoriam"; and the
+splendid range of chestnuts which, as we pass beneath it, opens upon
+us to the north-west, forms the boundary between the paddocks of
+Trinity and St. John's. On the east rises the vast fabric of Trinity
+Library built by Sir Christopher Wren, with its magnificent range of
+arched windows and its warm yellow sandstone, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page44" name="page44"></a>(p. 44)</span> an occasional
+violet block adding to the effect, a veritable feast of quiet colour,
+especially when glowing in the evening sun, and contrasting pleasingly
+with the paler tint of the New Court of St. John's College, which,
+with its plethora of crocketed pinnacles, here bounds our view to the
+left front. To the right front rises the square tower of St. John's
+Chapel, picturesquely reflected in the still waters.</p>
+
+<p>A slight bend in the stream, overhung by great elms, brings us to St.
+John's Bridge, a fine three arched structure of brick and stone built
+in 1696.<a id="footnotetag15" name="footnotetag15"></a><a href="#footnote15" title="Go to footnote 15"><span class="smaller">[15]</span></a> Beyond it the College buildings rise, like those of
+Queens', directly from the water&mdash;to the west the white stone
+abutments of the New Court, to the east the red brick walls and oriel
+window of the Library, the most beautiful building of its class in
+either Cambridge or Oxford. On it we can read the date 1624, and the
+letters I. L. C. S. standing for <i>Johannes Lincolnensis Custos
+Sigilli</i>, which commemorate the benefactor John Williams, Bishop of
+Lincoln, and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, to whose generosity we owe
+this gem of architecture. In his day, and for long after, St. John's
+was quite the largest College in Cambridge, rivalled only, for a
+moment, by Emmanuel. The present supremacy of Trinity did not begin
+till late in the eighteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>The river is here spanned by the latest of the College bridges, a
+single arch of stone high in air, carrying a pathway vaulted over with
+stone and lighted on either side by grated windows, after the fashion
+of the "Bridge of Sighs" at Venice. It was built about 1830 to form a
+communication between the older part of the College on the eastern
+side of the river and the recently erected New Court on the western,
+while giving no opportunity for illicit leaving of the College. As has
+been already stated, students, while bound to be inside the College
+gates all night, are not bound to keep to their rooms, but may wander
+about the Courts at any hour.</p>
+
+<a id="img014" name="img014"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img014.jpg" width="350" height="480" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. John's Bridge.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>With St. John's the Collegiate buildings cease and are succeeded by
+the last remaining "Hithes," or quays, used for commercial traffic,
+which of old lined the banks for the whole length of Cambridge. We
+read of Corn Hithe, Pease Hithe, Flax Hithe, Garlic Hithe and others.
+For the river was to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page46" name="page46"></a>(p. 46)</span> old Cambridge all and more than all
+that the railways are now, the great artery of traffic, by which goods
+were far more easily and cheaply conveyed than along the roads of the
+period, which were always rough and often mere "Sloughs of Despond."
+Most especially was this the case with fuel, so that in the
+seventeenth century it was a familiar local saying that "here water
+kindleth fire." These ancient hithes, like the street-ways leading to
+them, have been almost all absorbed by the various College precincts.
+The last, as we have said, are to be seen yet, still in use, with
+barges (still laden chiefly with firewood) lying at them, below St.
+John's, by the side of the "Great Bridge," that famous passage of the
+river to which Cambridge owes both its name and its very existence.
+Opposite the lowest of them there is one more riverside College,
+Magdalene, an old monastic educational establishment turned to its
+present purpose at the time of the Reformation by Lord Thomas Audley
+of Saffron Walden, a courtier of King Henry the Eighth, who had
+obtained a grant of it from that rapacious monarch.</p>
+
+<p>Our Cam byway here ends; for the river here passes out of the
+populated area of Cambridge. It is noteworthy that this area abuts on
+its banks to the same extent and no more than it did seven hundred
+years ago. The King's Ditch, which then bounded it, left the stream at
+the King's Mill, where our voyage started, and rejoined it just
+opposite Magdalene, where that voyage closes. It is well worth while,
+however, to retrace our course, for we shall find fresh loveliness in
+the reverse views of the exquisite scenery through which we have
+passed; and may note the many disused archways in the College walls,
+which tell how, scarcely a generation ago, this unique gem of English
+landscape was actually defiled by being used as a shamelessly open
+sewer.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page47" name="page47"></a>(p. 47)</span> CHAPTER III</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle"><b>Queens' College</b>, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel.&mdash;Old Mill
+Street.&mdash;<b>King's College</b>, Henry the Sixth, King's and Eton, Henry's
+"Will."&mdash;King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton, Windows, Rosa
+Solis, Screen, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels, View from Roof.</p>
+
+<p>When we disembark once more at Silver Street Bridge, we find ourselves
+standing beneath the sombre old red-brick walls of Queens', indented
+just above us by a small projecting turret which we should not leave
+without notice, for it bears the name and, by tradition, was assigned
+to the use of the famous Erasmus during the months he spent in
+Cambridge. This great light of the Reformation, or, more properly
+speaking, of the intellectual revival which led up to it, was brought
+here by the influence of the saintly chancellor, Sir Thomas More,
+whose great wish was to broaden the University outlook by the
+introduction of the Classical spirit. Hitherto its curriculum had been
+almost exclusively confined to Aristotelian philosophy, adapted to
+dogmatic Christianity by the great mediæval Schoolmen, especially St.
+Thomas Aquinas. Erasmus brought in the knowledge of Greek, which he
+had acquired from the learned exiles whom the capture of
+Constantinople by the Turks in 1453 had driven to the west. Unhappily
+he, in no small degree, depreciated this great gift, by clogging it
+with his own self-opinionated pronunciation of the language, instead
+of taking it as actually spoken. Strange to say, this "Erasmian"
+barbarism shortly became a badge of Protestantism (though Erasmus
+himself lived and died a Catholic). It was thus enforced during the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, forbidden in that of Mary, and enforced
+again under Elizabeth. To this day it remains with us, and cuts us off
+from the living tongue of Hellas.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page48" name="page48"></a>(p. 48)</span> To enter Queens' it is advisable to cross the iron bridge, and
+recross the river by Sir Isaac Newton's wooden structure. Passing
+through the low doorway into which it leads we find ourselves in the
+most picturesque of all College Courts, bounded by the Hall in face of
+us, and on the other three sides by a low range of ancient red-brick
+cloisters. These once belonged to the Carmelite nuns, who removed to
+this site when flooded out of their original quarters at Newnham. In
+1538 they sold their House to the College, just in time to escape its
+confiscation, at the suppression of the monasteries, by Henry the
+Eighth, who, as it was, required the purchase-money to be paid over to
+<i>him</i>. Having obtained the property Queens' at once built over the
+northern cloisters the beautiful gallery which serves as the
+drawing-room of the President's Lodge&mdash;(it has been stated that the
+Head of a College is, in Cambridge, always called the "Master," except
+here, where he is "President," and at King's where he is "Provost").
+The gallery, which is a wooden construction overhanging the Cloister,
+is eighty feet long by twelve in width, with three large oriels
+looking into the Court. Those on the other side open into the
+President's garden, a charming enclosure abutting upon the river. Both
+gallery and garden are, of course, strictly private. Opposite the
+gallery, at the south-east corner of the cloisters, is a small Court
+of Elizabethan date, known as "Pump Court," and now-a-days as "Erasmus
+Court"; while from the north-east corner a tortuous little passage
+brings us into a more modern Court, shaded by a fine walnut-tree
+(whence its name of "Walnut Tree Court"). Here stands the New Chapel,
+the best bit of modern work in all Cambridge, erected in 1895 from the
+designs of Messrs. Bodley and Garner. The beautiful proportions and
+effective decoration of the interior are specially noteworthy.</p>
+
+<a id="img015" name="img015"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img015.jpg" width="350" height="538" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The President's Gallery, Queens' College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>On the southern side of this court a passage (between the old Chapel
+and the Library) leads to the "Old Court," the original enclave of the
+College. This has remained practically unaltered since the Foundation,
+and is the best example remaining of the way in which a College was
+designed of old, after the fashion of the large country-house, as then
+built&mdash;Haddon Hall, for example, in Derbyshire. The red-brick and the
+white stone dressings, have mellowed, as elsewhere in Cambridge, to a
+tone of rich sombreness most restful and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page50" name="page50"></a>(p. 50)</span> satisfying to the
+eye. The somewhat gaudy clock and clock tower are modern, as is also
+the yet gaudier sun-dial often, but erroneously, ascribed to Sir Isaac
+Newton. Over the Hall is emblazoned the very elaborate shield of the
+College, quartering the six bearings to which the poor little Queen
+Margaret laid claim&mdash;those of Hungary, Naples, Jerusalem, Anjou,
+Lorraine, and De Barre, all within a bordure "vert" added by Queen
+Elizabeth. Hence it is that green is to-day the distinctive Queens'
+colour at boating, cricket, etc.</p>
+
+<p>Passing out of Queens', beneath the dignified gate-tower, we find
+ourselves in Queens' Lane, the quiet byway already referred to. Quiet
+byway as it now is, this was once a main street of Cambridge, known as
+Mill Street, forming (as it did before the great Colleges of King's,
+Trinity, and St. John's were built across it) the line of interior
+communication between the two bridges of the town, "the Small Bridge"
+by the King's Mill and "The Great Bridge" beneath the Castle. In those
+days it was a busy thoroughfare, thick set with burgher houses; now,
+in such broken lengths of it as survive, the buildings are almost
+wholly Collegiate. As we emerge from Queens' gate, and turn leftwards,
+we have on one side the dark-red bricks of that College, on the other
+the like buildings of St. Catharine's, while, at the further end of
+the street in front, our view is bounded by the white stone of the new
+gateway of King's. The whole effect is delightful.</p>
+
+<p>Through this gateway we now make our way into the Premier<a id="footnotetag16" name="footnotetag16"></a><a href="#footnote16" title="Go to footnote 16"><span class="smaller">[16]</span></a> College
+of Cambridge, and soon find ourselves face to face with one of the
+most beautiful views of the world. Before us spreads a spacious lawn,
+the most extensive in existence,<a id="footnotetag17" name="footnotetag17"></a><a href="#footnote17" title="Go to footnote 17"><span class="smaller">[17]</span></a> bounded on three sides by the
+white and grey walls of College buildings, while on the fourth it
+merges into the wooded grass-land of the Backs; the river which
+divides it from these being scarcely perceptible from this point. We
+get a <span class="pagenum"><a id="page51" name="page51"></a>(p. 51)</span> glimpse, however, of Clare Bridge, terminating the
+graceful façade of that College, which is in our immediate front.
+Behind us are the nineteenth-century additions to King's, and to our
+right front the fine pile of "Gibbs' Buildings," erected, in the
+eighteenth century, as a first attempt to approximate in some degree
+to the wishes of the Royal Founder, and transfer his College from the
+cramped position it had hitherto occupied, at the north of the Chapel,
+to the ampler site on the south which he had originally destined for
+it, and had cleared for his purpose by buying up and sweeping away,
+church and all, one of the most thickly populated parishes in
+Cambridge, that of "St. John Zachary" (<i>i.e.</i> St. John the Baptist),
+including a furlong's length of Mill Street.</p>
+
+<a id="img016" name="img016"></a>
+<div class="floatright">
+<img src="images/img016.jpg" width="200" height="268" alt="" title="">
+<p class="caption200"><i>Oriel in Queens' College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>For the scale on which Henry VI. intended to build was something
+hitherto quite unprecedented, and his plan took years to mature. The
+inspiration of it was originally caught from William of Wykeham,
+Bishop of Winchester, whose genius first conceived the idea of twinned
+Colleges, in the provinces and at the University, from the former of
+which the Scholars should pass on to complete their education at the
+latter. This idea Wykeham himself first carried into effect by the
+foundation of the College at Winchester and of New College at Oxford.
+And, fired by his example, Henry VI., when only twenty, resolved on
+doing the same thing himself with truly Royal magnificence. His
+Scholars should begin their course at Eton, beneath the walls of
+Windsor Castle, his birthplace and favourite residence, and should
+thence pass to finish it at Cambridge, in the College which he would
+there dedicate to his own Patron Saint Nicolas, on whose Feast,
+December 6th (still "Founder's Day" to all Etonians and King's men),
+he was born.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page52" name="page52"></a>(p. 52)</span> This was in 1440. He at once put hand to the work, and that
+same year signed the Charters for both Colleges; the Head of each
+being called "Provost," in order, as he said, "to weld the two
+Colleges together in a bond of everlasting brotherhood,"&mdash;a bond which
+actually lasted in its entirety till 1870, and of which traces even
+yet remain.</p>
+
+<p>The acquisition of the sites involved complicated legal transactions
+which occupied several years; but by 1444 Eton was sufficiently
+advanced to receive its first Scholars, a colony brought by William of
+Waynflete from Winchester; and by 1446 Henry was able to dedicate the
+first stone of his Cambridge chapel. Every dimension of this glorious
+edifice he himself worked out with the utmost minuteness, and set
+down, as he would have it completed, in that notable record of his
+purposes still preserved in the College Library, and known as his
+"Will." The word had not in those days its present purely posthumous
+signification, but was used of any formal disposition of a man's
+estate, or any part of it, to some given purpose.</p>
+
+<p>In this document, "one of the most remarkable works in the English
+language," as Mr. J. W. Clark styles it, the King describes his future
+College so accurately that a complete plan and elevation of the whole
+can be drawn from it. We thus learn that Gibbs' Building represents
+what was meant to be the western side of an enclosed court, with a
+fountain in the midst of it. The Chapel was to form the northern side
+of this court; the entrance, with its turreted gate-tower, the
+eastern; the Hall and Library, the western. The great lawn before us
+was not to be, as now, an empty space, but was to be occupied, partly
+by a small "kitchen court" containing the various offices (bake-house,
+brew-house, etc.), partly by a cloistered cemetery between the Chapel
+and the river, from the western side of which was to rise a pinnacled
+tower, 220 feet high, the rival to that at Magdalen, Oxford, which was
+already being planned by William of Waynflete. Another turreted
+gate-tower, on the very bank of the river, was to give access to the
+College Bridge (further north than the present one). Had this plan
+been carried out in its entirety, King's would indeed have been, as
+the historian Stow puts it, "such that the like colledge could scarce
+have been found again in any Christian land."</p>
+
+<a id="img017" name="img017"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img017.jpg" width="300" height="595" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Queens' College Gateway.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page54" name="page54"></a>(p. 54)</span> Unhappily its splendid design was brought to nought by the
+great tragedy of the Wars of the Roses, which broke out almost
+immediately. The singular mildness with which that conflict was waged
+(except on the actual field of battle), with no wasting of lands, with
+no burning of towns or villages, with no slaughter (and scarcely any
+plunder) of non-combatants, permitted the work on the Chapel, which,
+as we have seen, was already begun, to proceed, though slowly, and did
+not even stop the conveyance of stone from the chosen quarry at
+Huddleston in Yorkshire. The payment of the workmen was a harder
+matter, for Henry was far from being a wealthy monarch. He and his
+wife between them had less than the equivalent of £50,000 per annum,
+all too little for the expenses of their position, even in days of
+peace. Still the pay was found, in a certain measure, and the workmen
+came and went till dispersed by the appalling tidings that their Royal
+Saint had been deposed and murdered in the Tower. Then in panic horror
+they flung down their tools and fled, with such haste that they did
+not even complete the job on a block of stone, already half sawn
+through, which lay, as Logan's print of 1680 shows it, in the
+south-east corner of the present Great Court, Henry's intended
+quadrangle, a testimony to their despair, for upwards of three
+centuries. Then, when the idea of carrying out his intention was at
+last revived, this stone was appropriately used as the first to be
+employed for that purpose, the Foundation Stone of Gibbs' Building.</p>
+
+<p>The work on the Chapel thus abruptly stopped by the Founder's death
+remained in abeyance for the remainder of the century. Not till 1508
+was it resumed. The shell of the building was finished 1515; the glass
+and woodwork being added under Henry the Eighth. But in the end it was
+completed substantially in accordance with the Founder's Will, and is
+the only part of his design that has been so completed. His huge
+campanile, his cloisters, his gate towers, never came into being; and
+though the Great Court is now where he meant it to be, it is built in
+a fashion very different from his design.</p>
+
+<p>This we see at a glance as we enter it round the southern end of
+Gibbs' Building. For it is not an enclosed quadrangle, but formed of
+two detached blocks to south and west, while the east side is only a
+stone screen, erected in 1825, and of a <span class="pagenum"><a id="page55" name="page55"></a>(p. 55)</span> sadly inferior style.
+But the "goodly conduit" of the Founder's Will does rise in the
+midst,<a id="footnotetag18" name="footnotetag18"></a><a href="#footnote18" title="Go to footnote 18"><span class="smaller">[18]</span></a> and the north side is actually formed, as he decreed, by
+his glorious Chapel, the most magnificent in the world, which now
+rises before us in all its grandeur as we behold it across the Court.</p>
+
+<p>And if the outside view is impressive, that which greets us when we
+enter is absolutely overpowering in its majesty. The sense of space
+and repose; the up-running lines of the shafting catching the eye
+whithersoever it turns, and leading it up to the myriad-celled spans
+of the vault; the subdued light through the pictured windows staining
+the venerable masonry; the great organ, upborne by the rich oaken
+screen, dominating the whole vista, combine to form, as has been well
+said, "a <i>Sursum Corda</i> done into stone," uplifting indeed to heart
+and sense alike. And when to this feast of visual harmony is added the
+feast of aural harmony, when the clear and mellow voices of the Choir
+blend with the majestic tones of the organ,</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>And thunder-music, rolling, shakes<br>
+  The prophets blazoned on the panes,"</p>
+
+<p>we can understand how the inspiration of the scene has thrilled poet
+after poet, not Tennyson only, as above quoted, but Wordsworth, and
+even Milton, Puritan as he was, yet more. To the former King's College
+Chapel suggested one of the most exquisite of his sonnets:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Tax not the Royal Saint with vain expense,<br>
+  With ill-matched aims the architect, who planned,<br>
+  Albeit labouring for a scanty band<br>
+  Of white-robed scholars only, this immense<br>
+  And glorious work of fine intelligence.<br>
+  'Give all thou canst! High Heaven rejects the lore<br>
+  Of nicely calculated less and more.'<br>
+  So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense<br>
+  These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof,<br>
+  Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells,<br>
+  Where light and shade repose, where Music dwells,<br>
+  Lingering and wandering on as loth to die;<br>
+  Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof<br>
+  That they were born for immortality."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page56" name="page56"></a>(p. 56)</span> And Milton, when he came under the spell of this most glorious
+sanctuary, forwent all his conscientious objections to the Laudian
+revival of ornate services, "the scrannel pipes of wretched straw,"
+and all the rest of his denunciations, and was, in spite of himself,
+carried away into forgetfulness of all save the glory and the beauty
+around him. Hear him in "Il Penseroso":</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>But let my due feet never fail<br>
+  To walk the studious cloister's pale,<br>
+  And love the high embowed roof,<br>
+  With antique pillars massy proof,<br>
+  And storied windows richly dight,<br>
+  Casting a dim religious light.<br>
+  There let the pealing organ blow<br>
+  To the full-voiced choir below,<br>
+  In Service high and Anthem clear,<br>
+  As may with sweetness, through mine ear,<br>
+  Dissolve me into ecstasies<br>
+  And bring all Heaven before mine eyes."</p>
+
+<a id="img018" name="img018"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img018.jpg" width="350" height="491" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Clare College from King's.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This passage is memorable, not only for its own intrinsic loveliness,
+but because we, very probably, have in it a key to the great
+historical puzzle connected with King's College Chapel. How came these
+"storied windows," with their hundreds of pictured prophets, saints,
+and angels, to escape the ruthless destruction which was meted out to
+all such "idolatrous" representations, throughout the length and
+breadth of the county, by the Parliamentary authorities at Cambridge?
+William Dowsing, their authorised agent, went from church to church,
+in town and village, shattering and defacing, and has left us a minute
+record of his proceedings, in which he evidently took a keen personal
+delight. Thus, amongst the colleges we have already noticed, he tells
+us that, at Peterhouse, "we pulled down two mighty great Angells with
+wings, and diverse other Angells, and the four Evangelists, and Peter
+with his Keies over the Chappell Dore, and about 100 Chirubims." At
+Queens' "we beat down a 110 superstitious pictures, besides
+Chirubims"; and so on, with monotonous repetition, entry after entry.
+The account also records the sums which each college had to pay him
+for his trouble, and such a sum (of extra amount in consideration of
+the magnitude of the task) was actually paid him by the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page58" name="page58"></a>(p. 58)</span>
+Bursar of King's. Yet here are the windows before our eyes to-day in
+unbroken, unblemished dignity.</p>
+
+<p>No contemporary explanation is forthcoming, and the true facts of the
+case seem to have been kept so close, and to have been known to so
+few, that no tradition, even, of them was handed down to posterity. As
+time went on, the wildest and most impossible theories were evolved to
+account for the marvel. It was gravely said that the windows had been
+taken down by the Fellows themselves in a single night, and securely
+buried from the baffled spite of the Roundheads before morning, till
+better times; the place of each being known to one Fellow only! That
+the west window alone remained plain till the latter part of the
+nineteenth century (a peculiarity really not explained by history),
+was held proof positive that the Fellow in charge of that particular
+burial was done to death by the Puritans without betraying his secret;
+which equally defied the researches of later generations. Such
+searches were actually made. A more sentimental variant of the story
+made the hider a pious little chorister, shot down by Cromwell in the
+chapel itself for refusing to reveal where lay his precious charge!
+Through the empty casement a white dove flew in, and hovered over the
+heroic innocent! It need scarcely be pointed out that to remove the
+glass from a single one of these huge windows would be a work of days
+for a fully equipped band of professional glaziers supplied with
+scaffolding; yet these absurd tales were gravely repeated, and the
+missing window was actually sought for. The truth of the matter will,
+probably, now never be known. But it is certain that the windows could
+not have been spared without the connivance, at least, of Oliver
+Cromwell, whose influence was at that time paramount in Cambridge; and
+it is a plausible conjecture that his protection of them was due to
+the intercession of his friend John Milton, to whom, as we have seen,
+the Chapel and its "dim religious light" meant so much.</p>
+
+<p>A full study of these wonderful windows, crowded as they are with
+marvellously elaborate detail, is a work demanding hours of close
+attention under the direction of a competent guide. Even for the
+cursory examination which will suffice most of us the use of a
+guide-book is essential; and it is fortunate that one has been brought
+out (purchasable at any Cambridge book-shop for the modest sum of
+sixpence) by Dr. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page59" name="page59"></a>(p. 59)</span> M. R. James, the present Provost of King's,
+who is the supreme European authority on ancient stained glass.</p>
+
+<p>The general scheme of decoration is the representation of the life of
+Our Lady (to whom the College is dedicated), beginning in the
+westernmost window of the north side, with her traditional birth, and
+going on round the Chapel, till it ends, in the westernmost window of
+the south side, with her Assumption and Coronation. But as the
+traditions concerning her did not provide a sufficient number of
+scenes for the requirements of the designer, the series is eked out,
+not only by various incidents in her Son's life wherein she does not
+appear (such as His Baptism, Temptation, and Passion), but by the
+three windows to the western side of the great screen on the south
+being filled with subjects drawn from the stories of St. Peter and St.
+Paul; all being, however, within the traditional period of her
+life-time.</p>
+
+<p>A first glance at the windows produces only the effect of a gorgeous
+maze of colouring, through which we marvel that any clue should have
+been found. Next to the general effect of the ineffably harmonious
+blending of hues, the audacious vividness of the hues themselves, red
+and green and blue and gold and purple, is what first impresses the
+eye. Then we notice how, down the central light of each window, stand,
+one above another, four great figures, human or angelic, each
+displaying an inscribed scroll.<a id="footnotetag19" name="footnotetag19"></a><a href="#footnote19" title="Go to footnote 19"><span class="smaller">[19]</span></a> These figures are known as the
+Messengers, and when not Angels they are Old Testament Prophets. Their
+scrolls, which are in Latin, refer, sometimes by direct description,
+oftener by a suggestive text, to the subjects depicted in the Lights
+on either hand of them. The inscriptions, however, are of very little
+practical use to the visitor. Age has rendered many of them wholly,
+and more partially, illegible; while the black-letter characters of
+their crowded Latin words are not easy to decipher at the best. They
+are, moreover, by no means free from actual blunders, and the
+connection between text and scene is sometimes far from obvious. Their
+interest, in fact, is for experts; and less-gifted visitors will do
+well to content themselves with the interpretation given in the
+guide-book.</p>
+
+<p>The same advice applies to the glass in general. It is not worth while
+to spend on a detailed study of the windows the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page60" name="page60"></a>(p. 60)</span> time
+necessarily involved. Much of the work is excellent, and almost every
+window has its points of interest, but much, especially amongst the
+heads of the figures, is far from pleasing. This fact is largely owing
+to a considerable "restoration" undertaken in the Early Victorian era;
+when the art of glass-painting was at a sadly low ebb, and when the
+uncurbed restorer positively revelled in substituting for ancient
+decay his spick-and-span modern conceptions. But, as has been said,
+almost every window has features deserving that time should be made
+for their notice, which we now proceed to point out.</p>
+
+<p>Each window contains four scenes, the upper and lower, to left and
+right of the central "Messengers," being normally co-related as Type
+and Antitype. This relation, however, is not universal, and does not
+occur in the first window of the series (that in the north-west corner
+of the Chapel), where the four scenes consecutively illustrate the
+legend connected with the birth of Our Lady. The story runs that her
+parents, Joachim and Anna, were childless even unto old age, and that,
+in consequence, Joachim, on presenting his offering in the Temple, was
+insulted by the High Priest. As he sadly sought retirement in the
+country an Angel appeared to him with the message that he should
+return to Jerusalem, where his wife would meet him at the Temple gate,
+and a daughter would be born to them.</p>
+
+<p>The upper left-hand of the window shows the mitred High-Priest waving
+away Joachim, who is sorrowfully departing. His face is beautifully
+rendered. In the upper right-hand corner we see him kneeling before a
+green and gold angel hovering downwards. The rural surroundings are
+suggested by a pastoral composition. Note the sheep-dog and the
+shepherd's bagpipes.</p>
+
+<a id="img019" name="img019"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img019.jpg" width="350" height="533" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>King's College Chapel.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the lower left-hand light Joachim and Anna are meeting before the
+Temple gate; and in the right-hand Anna is sitting up in a blue bed
+with red curtains, watching the infant Mary being washed. Mary has
+long golden curls, and her face is that of an adult; but Dr. James
+considers this head a later insertion. This window is known to have
+been repeatedly and promiscuously repaired (even as early as 1590),
+and was in utter confusion till the latest releading (1896). The
+repairs seem to have been executed with any old bits of glass the
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page62" name="page62"></a>(p. 62)</span> glazier might happen to have in stock. On one fragment (now
+removed) some coins of Charles the First were represented. Most of the
+windows have suffered, more or less, in this way, but none (except
+that over the south door) to the same extent as this first window,
+which though the first in order of subject, seems not to have been the
+first inserted, or at least completed; for at the top may be read the
+date 1527, whereas the window over the screen on the north side
+contains that of 1517.</p>
+
+<p>These two dates are respectively near the inception and the completion
+of the glazing, which was begun 1515, the year when Luther began the
+Reformation by the publication of his famous Theses, and finished
+1531, the year in which that Reformation was first inaugurated in
+England by the King being declared Supreme Head of the Anglican
+Church. The windows, however, must have been designed at a date
+considerably earlier, for in the heraldic devices which fill the small
+top lights Henry the Seventh, not Henry the Eighth, is treated
+throughout as the reigning monarch; his shield being blazoned in the
+central compartment, while the latter is only commemorated by the
+initials H. K.,&mdash;the last standing for his ill-fated wife Katharine of
+Aragon. These heraldic devices are the same in all the windows, and
+show the rival roses of York and Lancaster, the Tudor Portcullis and
+Hawthorn Bush, the Fleur-de-lys, and the initials H. E. (for Henry the
+Seventh and his Queen, Elizabeth of York). All the glass is of English
+manufacture, the work of four London firms, but it seems probable that
+the artists were to some extent under both Flemish and Italian
+influence.</p>
+
+<p>Passing on to the second window, we find it thus arranged:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Second window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright"><span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Presentation of a golden table in the<br>
+Temple at Delphi.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft"><span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Marriage of Tobias and Sara.<br>
+(<i>Tobit</i> vii. 13.)</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright"><span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Presentation of the Virgin in the<br>
+Temple at Jerusalem.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft"><span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Marriage of Mary and Joseph.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The first scene here is the only instance in the Chapel of a
+non-Scriptural incident being made use of as a Type. It is the
+Classical legend (found in Valerius Maximus, an obscure Latin writer
+used in the sixteenth century as a school book), <span class="pagenum"><a id="page63" name="page63"></a>(p. 63)</span> which tells
+how a question as to the ownership of a golden table found in the nets
+of some Milesian fishermen was referred to the Delphic oracle of
+Apollo for solution. To whom should this table of pure gold be made
+over? The Oracle replied "To the Wisest." The prize was therefore
+given to Thales, the wisest Milesian of the day, who modestly passed
+it on to another sage, and he to yet another. Finally, after thus
+going the round of the Seven Wise Men of Greece, it came into the
+hands of Solon the Athenian, who declared that "the Wisest" could be
+no other than Apollo himself, and accordingly presented the table to
+the God in the Temple of Delphi. By a strange application, this tale
+was considered, in mediæval literature, as typical of the Presentation
+of the Virgin in the Temple at Jerusalem; her purity and that of the
+gold being, apparently, the connecting idea.</p>
+
+<p>In the window we see the offering of the golden table; Apollo being
+represented by a golden image bearing a shield emblazoned with the
+Sun, and a banner. Beneath is Mary, as a young girl dressed in blue,
+walking up the steps of the Temple; an incident much dwelt on in the
+legend. In the upper Marriage scene note the Angel Raphael, the
+comrade and guide of Tobias; and, in the lower, Joseph's rod, the sign
+from which (a dove appearing upon it) marked him out, amongst all her
+suitors, as Mary's destined husband. This scene suggests a
+reminiscence of Raphael's well-known cartoon on the subject, which had
+lately been painted.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+In the third window the arrangement is:
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Third window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Fall<br>
+(Eve's disobedience).</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Burning Bush<br>
+(remaining unconsumed).</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Annunciation<br>
+(Mary's obedience).</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Nativity<br>
+(Mary remaining a Virgin).</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>Note the human head and hands of the Serpent, and the brilliant
+ruddiness of the apple. Also the ruby flames of the bush, and the
+representation of God the Father at its summit. Moses is in the act of
+putting off his shoes from his feet. In the Nativity scene the Babe
+can only be discovered by following <span class="pagenum"><a id="page64" name="page64"></a>(p. 64)</span> the gaze of the child
+Angels who are clustering round in adoration. Contrary to the usual
+convention, which shows Him sitting on His Mother's knee as if a
+couple of years old, He is here represented realistically as an actual
+new-born baby. Above both lower lights in this window is a renaissance
+arcading.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>In the fourth window we have:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fourth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Circumcision of Isaac.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The visit of the Queen of Sheba to<br>
+Solomon.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Circumcision of Christ.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The visit of the Wise Men to Christ.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The face of Abraham and that of the officiating priest below are both
+good, and so is that of the Queen. The Epiphany Star is a fine object,
+and the effect of its light irradiating the thatch of the manger-shed
+is most powerfully rendered.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The fifth window gives us</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fifth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Legal Purification of a woman.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Jacob's flight from the vengeance<br>
+of Esau.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Purification of Mary.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Flight into Egypt.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the Purification scene the faces of Simeon, who is the main figure,
+Mary, and Joseph (carrying the dove-cage), are all worth looking at.
+So is Joseph in the Flight episode; which, however, is chiefly
+remarkable for introducing in the back-ground a legend from a late
+carol, which tells how Herod's soldiers pursued the Holy Family, and
+how the pursuit was miraculously checked. The fugitives met a
+husbandman, and instructed him to answer any inquiry for them by
+saying, "They passed whilst I was sowing this corn"; which was
+actually the case. But, lo! when the pursuers shortly came up the corn
+had sprung up, and was ripe already to harvest. It takes some little
+trouble to decipher this scene. The Purification is seen through an
+arcade of the Temple, on <span class="pagenum"><a id="page65" name="page65"></a>(p. 65)</span> the frieze of which is a group of
+classical horsemen like those of the Parthenon.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The next window is that over the great organ screen dividing the
+ante-chapel from the choir. It is arranged thus:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Window over the great organ.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Golden Calf<br>
+(the introduction of Idolatry).</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Massacre of the Seed Royal by<br>
+Queen Athaliah.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The idols of Egypt falling before<br>
+the Holy Child<br>
+(the overthrow of Idolatry).</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Massacre of the Innocents by<br>
+King Herod.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Golden Calf is set high on a magnificent ruby pillar. Before it
+Moses is breaking the Tables of the Law; one fragment of which shows a
+Flemish inscription. Below, an idol is falling headlong from a
+precisely similar pillar. The kneeling figure in this scene is the
+Governor Aphrodisius, who was converted by the miracle; as is recorded
+in the apocryphal "Gospel of the Infancy." In the Massacre scene Queen
+Athaliah is represented by a conventional figure of the <i>Virgo
+Coronata</i> (with her Babe in her arms). The artist evidently had this
+figure in stock, and used it rather than take the trouble of producing
+something less incorrect. Near her there is a minutely depicted
+mediæval thatched house worthy of notice. So is the business-like
+callousness in the expression on the leading soldier's countenance.
+This window bears, as has been said, the date 1517, written 15017.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>We are now in the choir, where our first window gives:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="First window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Naaman washing in Jordan.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Esau tempted by Jacob to sell his<br>
+birthright.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ baptised in Jordan.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ tempted by the Devil.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>All three Temptations are given, the first being in the foreground.
+The countenance of the Devil (as a respectable old man) is a
+marvellous study.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page66" name="page66"></a>(p. 66)</span> The second window in the choir is:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Second window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The raising of the Shunamite's son.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Triumph of David<br>
+(I <i>Sam.</i> xvii).</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The raising of Lazarus.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Triumphal Entry.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Shunamite's house is another bit of minute detail. Note the dishes
+on the shelf in front. Note also the magnificently gigantic head of
+Goliath borne by David on the point of the Philistine's own huge
+sword.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The third window:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Third window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Manna.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Fall of the Angels.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Last Supper.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Agony in Gethsemane.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The manna is shown as falling in the shape of Communion Breads. Below,
+Christ gives the sop to the red-haired Judas, while Peter, who thus
+becomes aware of the traitor's identity, clenches his fist with a
+gesture of menace extraordinarily forcible.</p>
+
+<p>The connection between the right-hand subjects is not obvious. Dr.
+James suggests that it refers to Christ's speaking of the casting out
+of Satan as a result of His Passion (John xii. 31). The smaller scale
+of this scene, and the nimbi given to Christ and the Apostles point to
+its having been the work of a special artist.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The fourth choir window:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fourth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Cain murders Abel.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The mocking of David by Shimei.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Judas betrays Christ.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The mocking of Christ.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>Cain is killing Abel with a large bone. Note the ruby fires of their
+respective altars in the back-ground, Abel's spiring upwards in full
+flame, while Cain's is blown down to the earth. In the betrayal scene
+the face of Malchus, as he lies upon the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page67" name="page67"></a>(p. 67)</span> ground with his
+broken lantern under him, should be observed. It is highly expressive.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The fifth window:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fifth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Jeremiah in prison.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Noah mocked by Ham.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ before Annas.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ mocked by Herod.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>We have now reached the last window of the northern range, that in the
+north-east corner of the Chapel. It shows us:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fifth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Job scourged by Satan.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Solomon crowned by his mother.<br>
+(<i>Cant.</i> iii. 11.)</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ scourged by Pilate.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ crowned with thorns.</td>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the scourging scene we may note the singularly unpleasing features
+and expression of the Saviour's face; which Dr. James holds to be
+purposely so delineated, in reference to the words of Isaiah: "He hath
+no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him there is no beauty that we
+should desire Him." We do not, indeed, find in the entire series of
+windows one single attempt to represent Him worthily. The conventional
+face, familiar throughout the ages to Christian Art, even from the
+first century, and probably a real recollection of Him, is
+consistently departed from (as is characteristic of the Renaissance
+period), and with it has gone every divine and exalted association.
+Where even the genius of Michael Angelo failed, we cannot look to find
+the glassworkers of London succeeding.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The great east window has no central messengers, and thus contains six
+scenes, each occupying three lights, arranged thus:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="East window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="33%">
+    <col width="33%">
+    <col width="33%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Nailing to the<br>
+Cross.</td>
+<td class="center bordboth">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Christ crucified<br>
+(the Piercing).</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Descent from the<br>
+Cross.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Ecce Homo!</td>
+<td class="center bordboth">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Sentence.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Way of Sorrows.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page68" name="page68"></a>(p. 68)</span> There is little to call for special notice in this window.
+Structural conditions necessitate the Cross being of abnormal height.
+In the background of the Way of Sorrows is a vivid ruby patch, which
+may be meant for the Field of Blood.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>Turning to the south-east window, we are confronted with an entirely
+exceptional development. The whole of the upper half is occupied with
+a single subject (the Brazen Serpent), and that in Early Victorian
+glass inconceivably poor and crude. The lower half is ancient and
+typical, the type and antitype being placed side by side:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="South-east window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Naomi bewailing her husband.<br>
+(<i>Ruth</i> i. 20.)</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Holy Women bewailing Christ.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The history of this marked departure from the norm is that the
+buildings of the Great Court were planned to abut upon the Chapel
+here, so as to block the lower half of the window, for which,
+accordingly, no glass was provided. That which is there now was
+originally in the upper half and was moved down in 1841, the Brazen
+Serpent being substituted for it. The remaining windows on this side
+of the choir also underwent a sad amount of "restoration" at the same
+period.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The next window (the fifteenth in the entire sequence) is of the
+normal arrangement.</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fifteenth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Joseph cast into the pit.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The overthrow of Pharaoh.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ laid in the Sepulchre.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Harrying of Hell.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The last scene is a most forcible representation of Christ's
+victorious "Harrying of Hell," as conceived by mediæval imagination
+and referred to by Dante in his Inferno. The Conqueror of Death has
+forced His resistless way through the shattered gates of Hell, on
+which He stands, treading under His feet the gigantic leaden-coloured
+bulk of their demon warder. Before Him kneels Adam, at last rescued
+from his age-long captivity, and other Holy Souls. In the back-ground
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page69" name="page69"></a>(p. 69)</span> a blue devil gazes in dismay from the red mouth of Hell
+(represented after the usual mediæval fashion, as an actual mouth,
+with teeth, etc.), while another, in livid green, is dancing with
+demoniac rage above, and yet another, white and gold, is scudding away
+in terror as fast as his wings will carry him.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The remaining windows of the choir on this side deal with the
+Resurrection. In the first of these (the third from the east) the
+subjects are:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Third window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Jonah escaping from the Fish.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Tobias appearing to his mother<br>
+(who had thought him dead).</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ arising from the Sepulchre.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ appearing to His Mother.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Fish is represented as a long green sea-serpent with a black,
+cavernous mouth, out of which Jonah is stepping. In the background is
+a ship, and, beyond, Nineveh. The Sepulchre is in the frequent
+unscriptural shape of a table monument.</p>
+
+<p>In the right-hand type, Tobias has his dog with him, and also his
+angel guardian Raphael. That Christ appeared to His Mother is first
+found in St. Ambrose, who mentions it as undoubted. She is here shown
+kneeling at a prayer-desk.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>In the next window we find:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Third window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Reuben finds Joseph taken away<br>
+from the pit.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Darius, at the Lions' den, sees<br>
+Daniel living.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Marys find Jesus taken away<br>
+from the Sepulchre.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Mary Magdalene, at the Sepulchre,<br>
+sees Jesus living.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the last scene Christ is represented with a spade, inasmuch as Mary
+Magdalene supposed Him to be the gardener. Her very pronounced
+costume, with its astonishing golden ear-covers, is probably a German
+fashion of the early sixteenth century.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page70" name="page70"></a>(p. 70)</span> The fifth window gives the story of Christ's appearance to the
+disciples who went to Emmaus:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Fifth window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Tobias, on his journey, is joined<br>
+by the angel Raphael, in<br>
+appearance a wayfaring man.<br>
+(<i>Tobit</i>, v. 4.)</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Habakkuk shares his meal with<br>
+Daniel at Babylon.<br>
+(<i>Bel and the Dragon</i>, v. 33.)</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The two disciples on their journey<br>
+are joined by Christ, in<br>
+appearance a wayfaring man.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ shares the meal of<br>
+disciples at Emmaus.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>Observe that the bread in Our Lord's hand appears to be, not broken,
+but cut clean as with a knife. There was a mediæval legend to the
+effect that He showed His divine power by thus breaking it. Note, too,
+Raphael's brilliant green and crimson wings, put in to denote his
+angelic nature, though the story postulates their absence.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The following window (that next to the screen) deals with the story of
+St. Thomas (John xx.), and has been wrongly arranged: what are now the
+right-hand scenes should be the left so as to come first. It now
+stands thus:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Prodigal Son returns to his<br>
+Father.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Joseph meets Jacob in Egypt.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Thomas returns to belief in Jesus.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Jesus meets His Disciples at<br>
+Supper.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>We find in the first scene here what is perhaps the most ably drawn
+figure in the entire series of windows, that of the Elder Brother.
+Observe the utter contempt and disgust written on his face and in his
+whole attitude. He wears a pair of most aggressively red leggings.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The window over the organ loft shows us the Ascension, and the Coming
+of the Holy Ghost.</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Elijah going up into Heaven.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Moses and the Israelites receiving<br>
+the Law at Pentecost.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Christ going up into Heaven.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Mary and the Disciples receiving<br>
+the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>Elijah is deliberately turning round in his golden chariot of fire to
+cast down his ample ruby mantle upon Elisha. Moses is taking the
+Tables of the Law from the hand of God.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The subjects of the three windows between the screen and the south
+door are all from the lives of St. Peter and St. Paul, and nearly all
+from the Acts of the Apostles, from which also all the texts are
+taken. Accordingly the place of the usual prophetic Messengers is, in
+these windows, taken by figures of St. Luke (all identical), habited
+in the costume worn by a Doctor of Medicine in the sixteenth century.
+The series of type and antitype is dropped in these windows, and no
+strict chronological order is observed in the sequence of the
+subjects. Probably some have been misplaced, either originally or at
+one of the various releadings to which they have necessarily been
+subjected. Every century brings fresh need for this operation.</p>
+
+<p>The subjects in the first window are:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="First window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+Peter and the Apostles entering<br>
+the Temple.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+Peter and John bound and scourged.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+Peter and John healing the lame<br>
+man in the Beautiful Gate.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+The Death of Ananias.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The design of the last scene is directly copied from Raphael's
+well-known cartoon.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The second window gives:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Second window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+The Conversion of St. Paul.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+St. Paul at Damascus and his<br>
+escape in a basket.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+St. Paul adored at Lystra.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+St. Paul stoned at Lystra.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page72" name="page72"></a>(p. 72)</span> The third window is also Pauline:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Third window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+St. Paul giving a farewell blessing<br>
+before embarkation.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+St. Paul before the Chief Captain at<br>
+Jerusalem.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+St. Paul exorcising the demoniac at<br>
+Philippi.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+St. Paul before Caesar at Rome.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>The first of these scenes is interesting. The text (Acts, xvi. 2)
+connects it with St. Paul's departure from Troas on his first voyage
+to Europe. But the subject seems to be the touching scene at Miletus
+(Acts, xx) on his final departure for Jerusalem. The ship here, whence
+the boat is rowing to fetch him, should be noticed, as it is a fine
+and accurate specimen of sixteenth century naval architecture. Observe
+the lateen yard on the mizen mast. The man who drew that ship, unlike
+most artists, knew his ropes, they are all in their right places. In
+the last scene note the startled and awed expression on Nero's almost
+obliterated face, also his Imperial crown.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>We have now almost completed our round of the Chapel, and are again at
+the south door by which we entered. Only two more windows remain, and
+in these we return to the typical treatment of Our Lady's life. That
+over the south door has, by accident (as it appears), been more
+shattered and defaced than any other in the Chapel. It is arranged
+thus:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The death of Tobit.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The burial of Jacob.</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The death of Mary.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The burial of Mary.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<p>Mary is dying with the full rites of the Church. St. Peter sprinkles
+her with holy water, while St. John places in her hand a lighted
+"trindall" (three candles twisted together). The prayer book and cross
+are borne by other Apostles. Her bier is covered by a white pall with
+gold cross, and two severed hands may (with difficulty) be seen
+clinging to it. This refers to the legend that a certain Jew who
+sought to overthrow the bier was thus miraculously dismembered, and
+did not recover his hands till he penitently besought her to restore
+them.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page73" name="page73"></a>(p. 73)</span> Finally the south-west window completes the wondrous series:</p>
+
+<div class="center">
+<table border="0" cellpadding="5" summary="Window.">
+<colgroup>
+    <col width="50%">
+    <col width="50%">
+</colgroup>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+The Translation of Enoch.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Type</span><br>
+Bathsheba enthroned by her son<br>
+Solomon.<br>
+(<i>I. Kings</i>, ii., 19.)</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">&mdash;&mdash;</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="center bordright">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+The Assumption of Mary.</td>
+<td class="center bordleft">
+<span class="smcap">Antitype</span><br>
+Mary crowned by her Son Jesus.</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The west window remained unglazed, for some unknown reason, till as
+late as 1879, when there arose a benefactor, Mr. Francis Stacey, a
+Fellow of the College, who has left this noble memorial of his
+generosity. The glass is by Messrs. Clayton and Bell, and the subject,
+as is usual in west windows, is the <i>Last Judgment</i>. The heraldic
+devices in the tracery are not those found in the older windows, but
+comprise (in order) the Tudor Portcullis,<a id="footnotetag20" name="footnotetag20"></a><a href="#footnote20" title="Go to footnote 20"><span class="smaller">[20]</span></a> the Plantagenet Rose,
+and the shields of King's College, Eton College, Cambridge University,
+King Henry VI., King Henry VII., King Henry VIII., Queen Victoria, and
+Stacey. There are also the shields of the See of Lincoln, whose Bishop
+is <i>ex officio</i> Visitor of the College, impaling Wordsworth (then
+Bishop), and of Okes (then Provost of the College).</p>
+
+<p>The glass of King's College Chapel by no means exhausts the interest
+of the building. The next point to be observed is the great organ
+screen, erected during the brief ascendancy of the miserable Ann
+Boleyn, whose initials are carved upon it. On either side of the
+door-way, within, are emblazoned the twin shields of King's and Eton;
+differing only in that the former bears three red roses, the latter
+three white lilies (not fleurs-de-lys) on the sable ground beneath the
+chief, with its lion of England and fleur-de-lys of France on their
+respective red and blue. The organ itself was not put up till 1606,
+but the nondescript Renaissance dragons supporting it show that the
+case must have been in hand more than half a century <span class="pagenum"><a id="page74" name="page74"></a>(p. 74)</span> earlier.
+They are for all the world like Raphael's wonderful creations in the
+Vatican. The great trumpeting angels on the top of the organ are
+eighteenth century work. Originally much smaller angels stood there,
+which in the seventeenth century were replaced by pinnacles. The doors
+of the screen belong to the Laudian revival, and bear the arms of
+Charles the First. The west door of the Chapel is of the same period,
+but the north and south doors are the original ones.</p>
+
+<p>The Choir stalls date from Henry the Eighth, but the elaborate coats
+of arms carved over each were not added till 1633, and the canopies
+not till 1675. The magnificent brass lectern was given by Provost
+Hacombleyn, at the opening of the chapel; but the present altar is a
+very modern addition, having been only put up in the twentieth
+century. It stands, as directed by the Founder, no fewer than 16 feet
+from the eastern wall. The wood-work of the sanctuary walls is not
+even yet (1910) fully completed. It is of Renaissance character, as is
+also the altar. The lighting of the Chapel, it should be said, is
+still, happily, done only with candles; and, on a winter afternoon,
+their twinkling points of fire, in endless range, amid the vasty
+gloom, give an impression of mysterious solemnity to be obtained
+nowhere else.</p>
+
+<p>Beautiful as the Chapel is, it would, had the designs of the Founder
+been carried out, have been yet more beautiful. His Will expressly
+deprecates that "superfluitie of too gret curious werkes of entaille
+and besy moulding" which the ante-chapel now exhibits in the elaborate
+series of Royal coats of arms beneath every window. They are
+beautifully carved, it is true, and we may note that the attitudes of
+the supporters (the Tudor dragon and greyhound) are in no two cases
+identical. But the whole effect is somewhat to weary the eye. So also
+do the perpetual roses and portcullises with which the walls are
+bestudded. One of the former, however, deserves special notice, as in
+it is framed one of the very few mediæval images of Our Lady which has
+weathered the storm of the Reformation. It is to be found at the
+southern corner of the west wall, and is what is known as a <i>Rosa
+Solis</i>. The inner petals are sun-rays, and in the midst is the "Woman
+clothed with the sun." (The White Rose of York is also sometimes
+represented <span class="pagenum"><a id="page75" name="page75"></a>(p. 75)</span> in the windows as a sun-rose, the sun being also
+a Yorkist badge, but in this the rays are external to the flower.)</p>
+
+<p>The walls, then, would have been less ornate, and more truly beautiful
+for the absence of profuse ornament, had the Founder's design been
+carried out. And we can see that even the exquisite roof was meant to
+be yet more lovely than as it now enraptures the eye. If we look at
+one of the soaring pilasters and follow up its lines, we shall see
+that each of the flutings is prolonged in a rib of the fan vaulting.
+No, not quite each. There is one member which has no such
+prolongation, but ends meaninglessly at the capital. And this tells us
+that the pilasters were designed to carry not a fan but a <i>liern</i>
+vaulting; so called because it appears to be a mesh of intertwined ivy
+(<i>lierre</i>) binding the fabric together. And beautiful as a fan roof
+is, a liern roof is capable of expressing harmonies of proportion yet
+more delicate and soul-satisfying. How subtle and exalted these
+harmonies would have been here we shall best learn if we have the good
+fortune to gain admission to the range of small side-chapels which
+flank the fane on either hand, nestling between the mighty buttresses.
+For in these, while the more western have the fan roof, the eastern
+and earlier built show liern vaulting of the most delicious character.</p>
+
+<p>These side-chapels were intended each to have an altar, at which the
+Priest to whom it was assigned should say his own Mass daily, while
+all should meet later before the High Altar to assist at the
+Collegiate Mass. They are now used for various subsidiary purposes
+connected with the services. One contains the heating apparatus,
+another the hydraulic bellows of the organ, while many are mere
+lumber-rooms. These last are those abutting on the Choir, which have
+no opening into the Nave, such as those adjoining the ante-chapel
+possess. Through the gratings we may note some stained glass of an
+entirely different character from that in the Chapel windows. It is,
+in fact, of the previous (Fifteenth) Century, and thus older than the
+Chapel itself. From what earlier building it has been transferred is
+uncertain. Tradition, for some unknown reason, assigns it to Ramsey
+Abbey; but it seems more reasonable to suppose that it came from the
+old church of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page76" name="page76"></a>(p. 76)</span> St. John Zachary hard by, when that was pulled
+down to make room for the College, and its fragments, as excavation
+has shown, utilised for levelling the site.</p>
+
+<p>In one of the southern side-chapels will be found a verger, from whom
+it is well worth while to obtain access to the roof of the Chapel.
+This is reached by a wide spiral stairway in the north-western turret.
+Our first goal is a small door (the key of which should be specially
+asked for) leading into a narrow loop-holed passage, from which we can
+scramble into the space between the two roofs of the Chapel. We are
+here on the top of the fan vaulting which we have so much admired from
+below, and can note with what wondrous skill its huge stones are
+dovetailed into one another with the round keystone boss in the centre
+of each span. Above, and only just above, our heads are the mighty
+beams of Spanish chestnut composing the upper roof, the long vista
+being lighted by a small grated window at either end.</p>
+
+<p>Returning to the staircase it does not take many steps more to bring
+us to the roof proper, with its open-work parapets and long leaden
+slope. This should be climbed to get the full benefit of the view, and
+those gifted with steadiness of head and sureness of foot will do well
+to make their way along the ridge from end to end, for each has its
+own beauties to show. To the West we see below us the great lawn, and
+the court of Clare, and the river, and the delicious verdure of the
+Backs, amid which rise the red walls of the Ladies' College at
+Newnham, and the adjoining Anglican foundation of Selwyn; while beyond
+is the open country, bounded by the low chalk upland stretching from
+Madingley Hill on the North to Barrington Hill on the South. The
+spire, so conspicuous on the summit of this range, is that of
+Hardwicke Church. To the South we can distinguish the places already
+described, (the little glass dome of the Fitzwilliam Museum, and the
+graceful spire of Our Lady's Church, being conspicuous objects,) and,
+beyond, the distant range of the East-Anglian Heights from the
+furthest north-east to the furthest south-west, that form the
+watershed of the wide valley of the Cam. To the East, the tower of the
+University Church, Great St. Mary's, raises its turrets almost to the
+level of our feet, and we look down on a maze of Cambridge house-roofs
+bright <span class="pagenum"><a id="page77" name="page77"></a>(p. 77)</span> with the variegated tiling which is their special and
+beautiful characteristic. Beyond them the near promontory of the Gog
+Magog Hills juts out from the East-Anglian Heights on which lies
+Newmarket. To the North come College after College, Clare, Trinity
+Hall, Caius, Trinity, St. John's, Magdalene; while the University
+Library and the Senate House lie nearer still. Due north, across
+these, and across the wide-flung plain beyond them, the plain of the
+Southern Fenland, we can, if the day be clear, discern on the far
+horizon the shadowy towers of Ely Cathedral, fifteen miles away as the
+crow flies.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page78" name="page78"></a>(p. 78)</span> CHAPTER IV</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Spiked gates.&mdash;Old King's.&mdash;<b>University Library</b>, Origin, Growth,
+     Codex Bezæ.&mdash;<b>Trinity Hall</b>, Colours, Library.&mdash;<b>Clare College</b>,
+     "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue.&mdash;The Backs, Sirdar Bonfire,
+     College Gardens.&mdash;<b>Trinity College</b>, Michaelhouse, King's Hall,
+     Henry the Eighth, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge,
+     Library, Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's
+     Pillar," Prince Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College
+     Plate, Grace-cup, Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of
+     Granby, Tutors, Old Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge,
+     Chapel, Newton, Organ, Bentley, Windows, Macaulay.</p>
+
+<p>On leaving King's Chapel we should give a glance to the marked line of
+demarcation between the whitish stone of which the lower courses are
+built and that employed in the upper.<a id="footnotetag21" name="footnotetag21"></a><a href="#footnote21" title="Go to footnote 21"><span class="smaller">[21]</span></a> It is of historical interest
+as showing how far the work had progressed before the long break
+caused by the Founder's death. Then, passing round the West Front, and
+noting the exquisitely delicate tracery of the canopies over the empty
+niches on either side of the door (wherein the two saints Mary and
+Nicolas to whom the building is dedicated were destined to stand) we
+leave the College by the iron gate on the North.</p>
+
+<p>The formidable chevaux-de-frise which crown this gate are supposed at
+once to figure and to emphasise the danger run by such presumptuous
+students as dare to contemplate illicit exit from or entrance into the
+College during prohibited hours. It has already been said that between
+10 p.m. and 7 a.m. no undergraduate resident in College may leave its
+precincts, and no outsider may enter, under divers pains and
+penalties. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page79" name="page79"></a>(p. 79)</span> Every College supplements this moral pressure by
+more or less effectual and awe-inspiring physical barriers. None
+however are more fearsome to see, and less effective in fact, than
+these. For not only can the College be entered or left with
+comparative ease by way of the Backs, but even this ghastly array of
+spikes is not unscalable to those who know the trick of it. Tennyson,
+as will be remembered, has referred to this exploit in his "Princess."</p>
+
+<p>Passing beneath them we find ourselves again in that same ancient
+street of Cambridge, here again now a wholly Academic byway, by which
+we entered King's. But though we have left the College behind us we
+have not yet quite got clear of its associations. The fine modern
+Gothic pile to our right embeds, as we see, an ancient gateway. For
+more than three and a half centuries this was the entrance to the one
+small Court which alone represented the magnificent design of Henry
+the Sixth for his Royal Foundation. Not till the nineteenth century
+dawned were the students moved to the other side of the Chapel. The
+old precincts were then mostly destroyed, and the site made over to
+the University Library; for the growth of that magnificent institution
+has long taxed to the utmost all the accommodation that can be
+provided for it.</p>
+
+<p>The mediæval Library of the University was a collection of
+manuscripts, requiring only one small room. Of its eighteen
+book-cases, eight were devoted to Theology, four to Law, and one
+apiece to Classics, Mathematics, Medicine, Logic, Moral Philosophy,
+and Scholasticism. This original Library was utterly swept away at the
+Reformation: Dr. Perne of Peterhouse, when Vice-Chancellor in the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, thus signalising his new-born zeal for
+Protestantism. A few years later, however, we find him amongst the
+first founders of the present Library, which now ranks third amongst
+the great Libraries of England; that of the British Museum standing
+first, and the Bodleian Library at Oxford second. All three are
+entitled to a free copy of every book published in the kingdom; so
+that their growth is now-a-days portentously rapid. One of the most
+striking features in this Library is the tableful of new books, scores
+in number, which is cleared every Friday.</p>
+
+<p>This rapid growth however is modern. The one ancient <span class="pagenum"><a id="page80" name="page80"></a>(p. 80)</span> room
+sufficed for the Library, till George the First rewarded the Whig
+loyalty of the University by a gift of 30,000 volumes.<a id="footnotetag22" name="footnotetag22"></a><a href="#footnote22" title="Go to footnote 22"><span class="smaller">[22]</span></a> The
+expansion thus begun has continued with accelerated speed. One by one
+the various ancient "Schools" which, with the old Library room, formed
+a small quadrangle, have been absorbed by its growth; until now the
+whole block belongs to it, as well as the old site of King's College,
+the main edifice on which, known as "Cockerell's Building," was
+erected 1837, where the College Hall once stood.</p>
+
+<p>The Library is open only to Members of the University (Masters of Arts
+having the privilege of taking out not more than ten books at a time)
+and such ladies as are fortunate enough to find a place on the
+admission list. For this it is needful that two Masters of Arts should
+certify that the lady is, to their personal knowledge, seriously
+engaged in some branch of study or research. And even when admitted,
+she finds herself under disabilities, being forbidden to occupy any
+seat except in one room (the oriel window of which is visible from our
+standpoint at the gate of King's). Ordinary visitors may only enter
+under the escort of an M.A., who may take in six at a time.</p>
+
+<a id="img020" name="img020"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img020.jpg" width="350" height="528" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Old Gate of King's College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Those who have the good hap to be thus inducted, will, besides the new
+books, probably be most impressed by the long range of volumes forming
+the catalogue, and by the densely packed shelves of long-forgotten
+fiction in the "Novel Room." But the real treasures of the Library are
+to be found in Cockerell's Building. Here, in a range of cases, are to
+be <span class="pagenum"><a id="page82" name="page82"></a>(p. 82)</span> seen our best Manuscripts, including a Thirteenth Century
+life of Edward the Confessor, the illustrations in which were found
+useful as a precedent even at the coronation of his latest namesake on
+the British Throne. At the extreme end, in a separate case, is the
+crown of all, one of the earliest manuscripts of the Gospels, dating
+from the Fifth Century. Only four others of equal authority are known,
+one in the British Museum, one in the Vatican Library, one at Paris,
+and one at St. Petersburg. Ours is known as "D" or "Codex Bezæ," from
+being the gift of the celebrated Calvinist divine Theodore Beza, who
+procured it from a soldier after the sack of its early home, the
+Monastery of St. Irenaeus at Lyons, in the Sixteenth Century. It is
+noteworthy for containing passages not found in any other Codex, one
+of which may be read (in Greek and Latin) on the single leaf here
+exposed to view. It narrates how our Lord, "seeing a certain man
+working on the Sabbath, said unto him: Man, if thou art doing this
+with Knowledge thou art blessed, but if without Knowledge thou art
+cursed."</p>
+
+<p>Space does not permit us to enlarge further on the Library; and we
+return to our station at the old gate of King's College. As we look
+along the lane our view is bounded by the College whose name it now
+bears, Trinity Hall. This must not be confounded with the larger and
+later Foundation of Trinity College, next door to it beyond. Trinity
+Hall was founded in 1350, by Bishop Bateman of Norwich, specially for
+the education of Clergy. It has, however, actually, become especially
+given to the study of Law, and is yet more widely known by its prowess
+in aquatics. Its boat, for the last half century, has never been far
+from the Headship of the River, and has oftener attained that coveted
+position than any other. The colours of the College, white and black,
+are thus of wide renown. They are derived from the College Shield,
+which in heraldic language is sable a crescent ermines with a bordure
+ermines. Visitors who approach Cambridge by the London road see this
+device upon the milestones near the town, which were set up by the
+College in the eighteenth century, and were the first milestones
+erected in Britain since the days of the Roman occupation.</p>
+
+<p>The Library here (which is open to visitors from noon to 1 <span class="smcap">P.M.</span> in
+Full Term) is the best example left us of what <span class="pagenum"><a id="page83" name="page83"></a>(p. 83)</span> libraries were
+of old in Cambridge. It was built about 1560, and still retains its
+original book-cases, the tops of which form desks for reading the
+folios in the shelves beneath. These were in old days chained to rings
+sliding on a locked bar which ran the whole length of each desk. Some
+of the books are so chained still, but not in the ancient fashion; for
+of old books were shelved with the backs inward, the title being
+written across the closed leaves of the front.</p>
+
+<p>Otherwise the College has little to show us; and, instead of seeking
+it, we shall do better if we turn westwards through the specially
+beautiful iron gate which leads us into Clare College. The coat of
+arms beneath which we pass as we enter has its tale to tell concerning
+the foundation of the College. They are those of the noble lady who,
+in 1338, thus commemorated her widowhood, an example followed, as we
+have seen, in the next decade, by Marie de Valence at Pembroke. But
+Lady Elizabeth, daughter of Gilbert de Clare (the "Red Earl" mentioned
+in <i>Marmion</i>), had gone through no fewer than three of these
+lamentable experiences. She therefore not only charged her College
+Shield with the golden chevronels of Clare impaled with the golden
+cross of De Burgh (her latest husband), but surrounded the whole with
+a sable bordure besprinkled with golden heraldic tears, bearing
+perennial witness to her repeated sorrows. Hence it comes that the
+Clare "colours" are to this day black and gold.</p>
+
+<p>Few College edifices convey such a sense of unity as these of Clare.
+"Their uniform and harmonious character gives them, at first sight,
+the appearance of having been built from one design, and carried out
+at one time."<a id="footnotetag23" name="footnotetag23"></a><a href="#footnote23" title="Go to footnote 23"><span class="smaller">[23]</span></a> As a matter of fact, however, the existing buildings
+are of no fewer than five separate dates, each separated by decades,
+and extending altogether over nearly a century and a half (1638-1768);
+while of the original fourteenth century structure no trace whatever
+is left. The eastern and northern sides of the Court are the earliest,
+built between 1638 and 1643, when the work was stopped, five years
+after its commencement, by the outbreak of the Civil War; while the
+stones and beams made ready for its continuance were commandeered by
+the Roundheads for the new works which they were then throwing up to
+strengthen the defences of Cambridge Castle. Not till 1669 did the
+College <span class="pagenum"><a id="page84" name="page84"></a>(p. 84)</span> finances so far recover from this blow as to permit
+the resumption of the building. The western side was then built,
+followed by the northern (1683-93), while the Chapel was not added
+till 1768. But the result of all this patchwork is an exquisite little
+gem of a Court, its balustraded walls overshadowed by the towering
+pinnacles of King's College, and giving, as we have said, a wonderful
+sense of unity, which is partly owing to older work having been
+altered to harmonise with the newer.</p>
+
+<p>The College treasury contains some most interesting and beautiful
+specimens of sixteenth-century plate. One tankard is known as the
+"Poison Cup," because, mounted in the cover, it has a conical fragment
+of crystal, such as was supposed, in the pharmacy of the day, to
+change colour if poison were poured into the vessel. This cup is of
+glass enclosed in exquisitely wrought filigree work. The thumb-piece
+is an angel with outspread wings. Another tankard is the "Serpentine
+Cup," the bowl being of that stone. This too is enclosed in most
+beautiful silver-gilt work, adorned with flowers and fruit and birds
+and arabesques. Yet another is the "Falcon Cup," a receptacle in the
+shape of that bird, originally intended, it would seem, for holding
+sweetmeats. All these were presented to the College by Dr. Butler,
+Court Physician to King James the First, of whom Fuller says that "he
+was better pleased with presents than money, and ever preferred
+rarities before riches."<a id="footnotetag24" name="footnotetag24"></a><a href="#footnote24" title="Go to footnote 24"><span class="smaller">[24]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Passing through the court, we come to the beautiful bridge, already
+familiar to us from the river. Its balustraded parapet is surmounted
+by fourteen large balls of stone, thirteen of them whole, and one out
+of which a cantle of nearly a quarter of its bulk has, for some
+unknown reason and at some unknown date, been cut. A cheap laugh may
+thus be obtained by challenging a stranger to count these balls
+accurately; for the missing cantle, being turned towards the river, is
+quite invisible from the bridge itself. Another feature in connection
+with these balls is that one of them is visibly much newer than the
+rest (which, like the bridge, date from the middle of the seventeenth
+century). This is due to a not very far off feud between Clare and St.
+John's, when a piratical Johnian crew came up the river after dark and
+stormed the bridge. Before the enraged <span class="pagenum"><a id="page85" name="page85"></a>(p. 85)</span> Clare men could open
+the iron gate under the College archway and pour out to the rescue,
+the enemy had begun throwing the balls into the water, where one sank
+so deep into the muddy bottom that it could never be recovered.</p>
+
+<p>From the bridge we get a lovely view of the College "Backs." To the
+south the single slender arch of King's Bridge flings itself over the
+river in the graceful curve which is all its own; to the north we see
+the iron span of Garret Hostel Bridge, hiding from us the beauties of
+Trinity Bridge beyond. But, if there be no ripple upon the water, the
+three graceful arches of this invisible bridge are seen reflected upon
+the glassy surface with a specially charming effect. The whole view is
+amongst the world's loveliest, especially in the May term, when the
+Master's little garden to our right glows with bright colour, answered
+across the stream by that of the Fellows; when the water is alive with
+gay little craft, gigs, punts, and canoes; and when the "ambrosial
+dark" of the Avenue before us beckons us on to explore the delights of
+its umbrageous depths. It was planted in 1691, and is carried for 150
+yards on a wide embankment, dense with shrubs and closed with
+jealously-spiked gates at either end, across what was once an island
+in the river (known as Butts Close), till it debouches on to the
+elm-shaded length of greensward described in our opening page, and
+named, in old maps of Cambridge, "King's College Back-sides." The
+whole does, in fact, belong to King's, but the many rights of way
+which traverse it make it practically an open park.</p>
+
+<p>Not so long ago oaken railings (still to be seen in places) ran
+between it and the road, till a visit from Lord Kitchener (then Sirdar
+of Egypt, fresh from his Ethiopian victories) was made the occasion of
+a gigantic bonfire in the Market Place, to feed which the whole were
+torn up and carried away by gangs of enthusiastic undergraduates. A
+like fate befell the wooden palings and gates of the College gardens
+across the road, now replaced by iron, and altogether the damage done
+ran into hundreds of pounds; while the town police and the University
+proctors waited for each other to act until too late. There are three
+of these College gardens on end&mdash;King's, Clare, and Trinity; and
+rarely lovely they are, with their wide "smooth-shaven" lawns, broken
+into glades by clumps of ornamental trees. But each can only be
+entered under the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page86" name="page86"></a>(p. 86)</span> ægis of a Fellow of its own respective
+College, and they are so carefully planted out from the road that
+scarcely even a glimpse can be gained of the delights within, "where
+no profaner eye may look."</p>
+
+<p>Leaving these on our left we proceed along the northward-leading path
+till we reach the fine iron gate which bears the escutcheon of
+Cambridge's mightiest College, Trinity, a College more than twice as
+large as any other, numbering something like 700 residents, students
+and teachers together. Like London, which an Indian visitor once
+described as "not a city, but a herd of cities," Trinity may be
+described as a conjoined herd of colleges, for it was created by the
+amalgamation of no fewer than nine earlier institutions. Two of these,
+Michaelhouse<a id="footnotetag25" name="footnotetag25"></a><a href="#footnote25" title="Go to footnote 25"><span class="smaller">[25]</span></a> and King's Hall, were amongst the most noteworthy
+colleges in Cambridge. The former was founded by Henry de Stanton,
+Chancellor to King Edward the Second, in 1323, and was thus, next to
+Peterhouse, the oldest college in Cambridge. And King's Hall was but a
+few years younger, being founded by King Edward the Third in 1336.
+Indeed, it may claim to be actually the elder in embryonic existence,
+for Edward the Second, in 1317, was already maintaining
+scholars&mdash;"children of our Chapel" as his writ calls them&mdash;in
+Cambridge. And that these "children" (who were required to be at least
+fourteen years of age on coming into residence) were quartered
+hereabouts is evident from King's Hall having been built across the
+line of an ancient street running down to the river and known as
+"King's Childer Lane." The town agreed to the expropriation of this
+lane in consideration of one red rose annually to be paid by the
+College to the Corporation on Midsummer Day. The remaining seven
+foundations incorporated in Trinity College were hostels (institutions
+for lodging students, more or less organised in college fashion, but
+not recognised by the University as colleges). These were St.
+Catharine's Hostel, Physwick Hostel, Crutched Hostel, Gregory's
+Hostel, Tyled Hostel, Oving's Inn, and St. Gerard's or "Garret"
+Hostel; which last, as we have seen, is still kept in memory by the
+name of the public bridge crossing the river between Trinity and
+Clare.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page87" name="page87"></a>(p. 87)</span>
+
+<a id="img021" name="img021"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img021.jpg" width="350" height="418" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Old Schools' Quadrangle.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>All these, Colleges and Hostels alike, were seized upon by Henry the
+Eighth, when that rapacious and unprincipled monarch desired to pose
+(in 1546, a year before his death) as a Pious Founder, and go down to
+posterity as a benefactor. He gained this credit cheaply; for not only
+did he thus get <span class="pagenum"><a id="page88" name="page88"></a>(p. 88)</span> his edifices ready made, but their endowments
+also; while such additional endowments as he bestowed on his new
+College were almost wholly derived from the spoil of the Abbeys
+suppressed by him. Nor did he fail to take toll of each transfer of
+this stolen property for the benefit of his exchequer. His professed
+object, meanwhile, was "to educate Youth in piety, virtue,
+self-restraint, charity towards the poor, and relief of the
+distressed." His alumni, in short, were to be made as opposite to
+himself in character as possible.</p>
+
+<p>From the very first, Trinity thus became almost the largest and
+wealthiest College in Cambridge. For a century it disputed the
+headship of the University with its neighbour, St. John's College, and
+for another century and more sang second to that great rival. But in
+1785 it drew ahead, and since that date has improved its lead without
+a check, till now it stands not only first but without a second. So
+large is it that it cannot, for very sportsmanship, row as a whole in
+the bumping races, but has to be divided for that purpose into two
+boat clubs, denominated respectively "First Trinity" and "Third
+Trinity,"&mdash;or, in common speech, "First" and "Third" simply. The
+former is the original "Trinity Boat Club" and this is still its
+official name, whence it is also known as the "T.B.C." It wears the
+original Trinity colours,&mdash;dark blue,<a id="footnotetag26" name="footnotetag26"></a><a href="#footnote26" title="Go to footnote 26"><span class="smaller">[26]</span></a> with the badge of a golden
+lion and three crowns, the device of King Edward the Third. The latter
+consists of Trinity men from the two great rowing schools, Eton and
+Westminster. It is, of course, a very much smaller body than "First,"
+but, as its members come up ready-made oarsmen, it has been almost as
+frequently Head of the River. Both boats are always in the first
+flight. Once there existed a "Second Trinity" club, which has long
+since ceased to maintain its existence.</p>
+
+<p>We enter the precincts of this great College by "that long walk of
+limes," up which Tennyson passed, as he tells us in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page89" name="page89"></a>(p. 89)</span> "In
+Memoriam," when he re-visited Cambridge, "to view the rooms" once
+inhabited by his friend and hero, Arthur Hallam.<a id="footnotetag27" name="footnotetag27"></a><a href="#footnote27" title="Go to footnote 27"><span class="smaller">[27]</span></a> This avenue was
+planted in 1672,<a id="footnotetag28" name="footnotetag28"></a><a href="#footnote28" title="Go to footnote 28"><span class="smaller">[28]</span></a> and leads us to the fine cycloidal<a id="footnotetag29" name="footnotetag29"></a><a href="#footnote29" title="Go to footnote 29"><span class="smaller">[29]</span></a> bridge,
+built at the same period. After crossing this, we should not keep
+straight, which would bring us into the "New Court" where Hallam dwelt
+(a poor bit of architecture erected 1825), but rather turn to the
+left, by the path that sweeps along the bank of the river, with its
+fine weeping willows. Looking back, as we leave the bridge behind us,
+we may admire the climbing agility which frequently enables
+undergraduates to descend to the projecting piers just above the
+water, and find their way back again, without a ducking.</p>
+
+<p>We have here in front of us the New Court of St. John's College, seen
+across its lawn-tennis grounds; while to our left is the magnificent
+range of horse-chestnuts along the boundary of the two Colleges.
+Splendid at all times, these are seen at their very best when duly
+touched by frost. To our right rises the fine mass of Trinity Library,
+built by Sir Christopher Wren in 1675; whose walls of warm-coloured
+stone have been already dwelt upon. The lower portion of the building
+forms an open cloister, with grated windows and gates barring it from
+the Backs where we stand.</p>
+
+<p>Through one of these gates our path leads us, and we find ourselves
+within the College, and at the door of the Library. At certain hours,
+usually between three and four in the afternoon, this is open to
+visitors; at others the escort of a Member <span class="pagenum"><a id="page90" name="page90"></a>(p. 90)</span> of the College is
+needed. Of all the College Libraries in Cambridge this is the most
+interesting in its miscellaneous contents. Mounting the wide stone
+stair-way, we enter the long, wide, lofty, vaulted gallery, with a
+series of wooden book-cases projecting from either wall all along its
+course. The carved wreaths of flowers and leaves and fruitage which
+adorn these cases deserve careful notice. They are by Grinling
+Gibbons, probably the most wonderful wood carver who ever lived, and
+their intricacies bear striking testimony to his almost superhuman
+skill. In the recesses between the cases are to be seen sundry curios,
+from the College estates and other sources, while more are to be found
+in the long ranges of glass-covered tables topping the smaller
+book-shelves which line either side of the central passage way. Roman
+and Anglo-Saxon antiquities, and a splendid series of coins and
+medals, are here exhibited. Amongst the miscellaneous curios are a
+model of Cæsar's famous bridge across the Rhine and a globe of the
+planet Mars.</p>
+
+<p>What will, however, first catch our eye on entering, will be the
+window at the southern end of the room, with its painted glass so
+unlike anything to be seen elsewhere. It is, in fact, unique, having
+been made in the middle of the eighteenth century by the discoverer of
+this particular method of staining glass, who kept the process
+secret&mdash;a secret which died with him and has never been recovered. The
+window cannot be called artistically beautiful, and the subject is
+weird. The University of Cambridge, represented as a lady in a
+somewhat scanty robe of yellow, is presenting Sir Isaac Newton to King
+George the Third (who did not come to the Throne till 1760, many years
+after the great philosopher died), while the transaction is being
+recorded by Francis Bacon Lord Verulam of Elizabethan fame!</p>
+
+<p>Beneath this window is Thorwaldsen's fine marble statue of Lord Byron,
+one of Trinity's greatest poets. This was originally intended for
+Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey, but the Dean and Chapter of the
+period so strongly disapproved of Byron's morality that they refused
+it a place there. Apart from his poetical genius, he as little
+deserved to be honoured in Trinity library; for, as an undergraduate,
+he not only accomplished the apparently impossible feat of climbing by
+night to the roof (which others have more than once done <span class="pagenum"><a id="page91" name="page91"></a>(p. 91)</span>
+since)<a id="footnotetag30" name="footnotetag30"></a><a href="#footnote30" title="Go to footnote 30"><span class="smaller">[30]</span></a> but abominably disfigured the statues upon it, in which he
+has had, happily, no imitators. Other relics of him are preserved hard
+by, which are supposed to bear upon the thrilling question as to how
+far he had or had not a club foot.<a id="footnotetag31" name="footnotetag31"></a><a href="#footnote31" title="Go to footnote 31"><span class="smaller">[31]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>For these few will care; but this end of the library contains things
+which few can fail to care about. Here is the death-mask of Sir Isaac
+Newton, and a reflecting telescope, on the model invented by him. Here
+is Thackeray's manuscript of "Esmond," and Tennyson's manuscript of
+"In Memoriam." Here is Milton's manuscript of "Lycidas," and his first
+design for "Paradise Lost," all cut and scored about with alterations
+and corrections, showing that he originally designed his great poem to
+be a drama, the characters of which (headed by Moses) are here listed.
+Here, too, is a copy of the "Solemn League and Covenant" imposed on
+all men by the Puritans at the time of the Great Rebellion.<a id="footnotetag32" name="footnotetag32"></a><a href="#footnote32" title="Go to footnote 32"><span class="smaller">[32]</span></a> This
+was found hidden amongst the rafters of a village church near
+Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>And here is a copy of the famous Indulgence sold by Tetzel, Luther's
+denunciation of which gave the signal for the earliest outburst of
+Protestantism at the Reformation. When the crabbed old printing is
+deciphered it proves to be a startlingly mild document, no licence to
+commit sin, as is generally supposed, but merely granting to the
+purchaser the privilege of confessing, once in his life, to a priest
+of his own choice instead of to the parson in whose parish he dwelt.
+The priest so chosen is given authority to absolve from nearly all
+sins, but <span class="pagenum"><a id="page92" name="page92"></a>(p. 92)</span> not from the heinous offence of buying alum from
+anyone except the Pope, in whose territory it had, at that date
+(1515), been recently discovered. Alum was in those days a most
+valuable substance, and had hitherto been attainable only at the
+Turkish town of Roc, in Syria, whence the name of "rock alum" still
+surviving in use amongst pharmacop&oelig;ists. To buy it there was not
+only to take money out of the pocket of the Pope, but to put it into
+those of the enemies of Christendom. Hence the heinousness of the
+offence.</p>
+
+<p>Trinity library forms the western side of one of the Courts of the
+College, known as "Nevile's Court" (from Dr. Thomas Nevile, Master at
+the close of the sixteenth century, who planned and began it in 1610),
+and also as "Cloister Court," from the wide cloisters which surround
+it on the north, south, and west. The eastern side is formed by the
+Hall, raised four feet above the ground level, and reached by a
+beautiful balustraded and terraced staircase of stone. It is the
+finest college hall in either university, and was also the work of
+Nevile.</p>
+
+<p>In the northern cloister which leads us to it, there are sundry points
+not to be overlooked. As we look along it from the library entrance we
+perceive at the far end a door with a stalwart iron knocker. Now there
+is a fine echo in this cloister, and a stamp of the foot at our end
+will evoke a sound from the door precisely like that of a knocker. So
+great a part does illusion play in human impressions, that five people
+out of six, when they hear this sound, are ready to declare that they
+have seen the knocker actually move. It was by timing this echo, we
+may mention, that Sir Isaac Newton first measured the velocity of
+sound. The echoing properties of these cloisters are referred to by
+Tennyson in the "Princess":</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">"our cloisters echoed frosty feet."</p>
+
+<p>The massive block which pillars the angle of the cloister is known as
+the "Freshman's Pillar"; a favourite old-time amusement of the junior
+students (not yet wholly disremembered) having been to traverse the
+very narrow base-top right round, without setting foot to the ground.
+In old times, indeed until the last quarter of the nineteenth century,
+these cloisters played a notable part in undergraduate life. Athletic
+pursuits were far less general than now, and exercise <span class="pagenum"><a id="page93" name="page93"></a>(p. 93)</span> was
+largely pedestrian. On a wet day, accordingly, when the roads were
+uninviting, the cloisters used to be crowded with a veritable swarm of
+trampers, doing "quarter-deck" from end to end of the three covered
+sides of the court.</p>
+
+<a id="img022" name="img022"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img022.jpg" width="500" height="391" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Clare College from Bridge.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The stair-case entrances here lead to specially delightsome <span class="pagenum"><a id="page94" name="page94"></a>(p. 94)</span>
+sets of rooms, with oak panels and beautiful plaster ceilings. One of
+these was occupied by the late Duke of Clarence, when, as "Prince
+Edward," he was an undergraduate of Trinity, mingling freely with the
+college life around him, and making himself generally beloved by his
+simple unaffected pleasantness.<a id="footnotetag33" name="footnotetag33"></a><a href="#footnote33" title="Go to footnote 33"><span class="smaller">[33]</span></a> His royal father, when Prince of
+Wales, was also an undergraduate of Trinity; but Court etiquette was
+stricter in those days, and, instead of being in College, he was
+quartered at Madingley Hall, four miles away. A few months after his
+wedding, in June, 1864, he brought his beautiful bride to visit
+Cambridge and take all hearts by storm. In their honour the whole area
+of Nevile's Court was tented in and floored over and made into one
+vast ball-room, which included the cloisters and the hall stairway.
+The former were used for promenading, all the best settees and
+arm-chairs to be found in College being commandeered to be placed in
+them; the Hall served for supper; while the band was housed beneath
+the Library. All was beautifully decorated and lighted (though it was
+before the days even of paraffin lamps), and the whole scene was one
+of unforgettable brilliance.<a id="footnotetag34" name="footnotetag34"></a><a href="#footnote34" title="Go to footnote 34"><span class="smaller">[34]</span></a> The cost was, naturally, something
+portentous; but those were the times of academic prosperity, before
+the great agricultural depression of the following decade brought down
+rents, and with them college incomes, almost (sometimes altogether)
+from pounds to shillings.<a id="footnotetag35" name="footnotetag35"></a><a href="#footnote35" title="Go to footnote 35"><span class="smaller">[35]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The beautiful rooms of Nevile's Court are mostly held by Fellows of
+the College whose names may be known in the doorway lists by the "Mr."
+prefixed to them. Over one doorway we see a small bronze bust, set up
+as a memorial to Mr. Goodhart who once "kept" there and was an object
+of special admiration to all who knew him. He was, in fact, a kind of
+Admirable Crichton; not only a man of great intellectual power (as
+Fellows of Trinity must needs be, for these fellowships are the "blue
+riband" of the University), but excellent at all athletic pursuits,
+and able to do successfully <span class="pagenum"><a id="page95" name="page95"></a>(p. 95)</span> whatever thing he set his hand
+to. It is recorded that on one occasion a bet was laid that he could
+not make himself an entire suit of clothes, and wear them for a month
+without their amateur origin being detected. Goodhart won the bet.</p>
+
+<p>Beautiful as Nevile's Court is, it was originally yet more beautiful,
+with transomed windows, and gabled dormers instead of the present
+eighteenth century parapet. These are shown in a view "after Logan,"
+given by Atkinson,<a id="footnotetag36" name="footnotetag36"></a><a href="#footnote36" title="Go to footnote 36"><span class="smaller">[36]</span></a> from the terrace before the Hall, by which we
+leave the court, passing through a low and massive wicket gate of
+black oak. This admits us into the "screens," a short and narrow
+passage having the Hall on one side, and, on the other, the kitchen
+and the Buttery. This last word has no connection with butter (though
+butter is here issued), but is derived from <i>butler</i>, as being the
+place where the ale for the hall dinners is served out. Its door, as
+is universal in such places, is a "hatch," the upper and lower halves
+of the door opening independently, and a broad sill on the top of the
+latter forming a sort of counter across which the business of the
+place is transacted. Of old the buttery served as an office, where
+much of the clerical work of the College was done; but this branch of
+its usefulness is now transferred to a special department.</p>
+
+<p>When each College brewed its own ale and baked its own bread, as was
+the case till some half-century ago, the Buttery was a really
+important place. Even now the daily ration of bread and butter to
+which each Collegian in residence has a right, is here booked to him.
+This ration is called his "Commons." If for any approved reason he
+does not desire to draw it in any given week he is said to be "out of
+Commons"; and if, as sometimes happens, he is deprived of the right
+for misconduct, he is said to be "discommonsed" for such or such a
+period. (The equivalent phrase at Oxford is "to be crossed at the
+Buttery.") The Buttery officials also have charge of the adjoining
+strong-room in which the magnificent store of the College plate is
+secured; mighty salvers and bowls and "grace-cups,"<a id="footnotetag37" name="footnotetag37"></a><a href="#footnote37" title="Go to footnote 37"><span class="smaller">[37]</span></a> besides
+dishes, and the hundreds of spoons and forks, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page96" name="page96"></a>(p. 96)</span> all the gifts
+of benefactor after benefactor since the College was first founded. A
+visitor may sometimes be fortunate enough to get a sight of these
+resplendent piles.</p>
+
+<p>A sight of the kitchen, which adjoins the Buttery, can almost always
+be had, and is worth having; though the glory of the place has largely
+departed with the substitution of gas stoves for the old open ranges,
+six feet high and twelve feet long, before which scores of joints and
+fowls might be seen simultaneously twisting on huge spits. If less
+picturesque, the cooking is now more scientific, and the kitchen is a
+splendid chamber, the finest of all College kitchens, with an open
+pitched roof, and an oriel window, having been traditionally the
+ancient Hall of Michaelhouse. The walls are adorned with the shells of
+turtles, emblazoned with the dates of the great occasions on which
+they were immolated for soup. It is not only the dinners in Hall which
+are here cooked. Members of the College may order dishes to be sent to
+their own rooms, in reason; though any very extra expenditure in this
+respect would need to be authorised by your Tutor. This extraneous
+fare may constantly be seen being carried about the Courts, in large
+flat blue boxes, on the heads of the kitchen servants.</p>
+
+<p>The doors of the Hall may usually be found open, or a request at the
+Buttery may open them; though there is a certain amount of luck in the
+matter, as the Hall is not only used for meals but for College
+examinations also, which, of course, must not be disturbed by
+intruders. A common lunch is served during Full Term, from 12 till 2,
+at which such as list sit where they will, Dons and undergraduates,
+cheek by jowl. The three daily dinners which the size of the College
+makes necessary are more formal affairs, especially the latest at
+7.45, which the authorities of the College attend, sitting at the two
+High Tables on the dais, and faring more sumptuously than the students
+in the body of the Hall. Of these only the "Senior Sophs"<a id="footnotetag38" name="footnotetag38"></a><a href="#footnote38" title="Go to footnote 38"><span class="smaller">[38]</span></a> may be
+present, the "Junior Sophs" and Freshmen being relegated to the
+earlier hours. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page97" name="page97"></a>(p. 97)</span> The westernmost range of tables is sacred to
+Bachelors of Arts and to the Scholars of the College. The rest may sit
+where they please at the remaining tables, and diners may enter and
+leave at their pleasure during the meal, but any course missed by
+lateness is missed for good. Ordinary morning dress is worn, except on
+special Feasts. Conversation may be freely indulged in, though it
+hardly, nowadays, rises to the height of Tennyson's heroic phrase in
+"In Memoriam," "the thunder of the Halls." The Master of the College
+himself does not dine in Hall except at great Feasts, but in his own
+adjacent Lodge, to the north, which communicates directly with the
+Hall by a door in the panelling between, and also by a sliding panel
+above, whence he (and his ladies) can, unobserved, overlook, and more
+or less overhear, what passes.</p>
+
+<p>The high-pitched roof with its elaborate beams is copied, as are the
+other features (and the dimensions) of the Hall, from the Hall of the
+Middle Temple in London. Its ridge is broken in the centre by a
+"Lantern," or small openwork spire of wood (the openings being now
+glazed). This once served as a ventilating shaft, through which might
+escape the fumes of the great brazier (a yard in depth and two yards
+across) standing beneath it, and, till this generation, the only means
+used to warm the Hall. Over the doors is a "Music Gallery," usually
+closed in by quaintly carved shutters, whence, on Feast days, the
+College Choristers still discourse melody. The armorial bearings in
+the windows are those of eminent members of the College; while
+pictures of its more prominent Worthies (or Unworthies) hang on the
+walls. Conspicuous amongst these is Holbein's great portrait of Henry
+the Eighth, who stands "straddled over the whole breadth of the way,"
+above the centre of the High Table, in all his underbred
+self-assertion, looking indeed "all our fancy painted him." His
+unhappy daughter Mary (who built the College Chapel) hangs near him,
+her full dourness and wretchedness in her face. Thackeray (a
+singularly powerful presentation) is also here, so is Clerk-Maxwell,
+so is Bishop Lightfoot, and many another light of literature, science,
+and theology; for the great size of Trinity has given it as great a
+proportion in the rolls of Fame.</p>
+
+<p>On the other side of the Screens, in the "Combination Room," whither
+the High Table adjourns for dessert, may be <span class="pagenum"><a id="page98" name="page98"></a>(p. 98)</span> seen other famous
+Trinity men, the most conspicuous being the celebrated Marquis of
+Granby, standing by his war-horse, with the bare bald head which won
+him his renown. He was in the act of charging the enemy<a id="footnotetag39" name="footnotetag39"></a><a href="#footnote39" title="Go to footnote 39"><span class="smaller">[39]</span></a> at the
+head of his regiment when the wind of a cannon ball carried away his
+hat and wig; and he did <i>not</i> halt his soldiery that they might be
+picked up. This unexampled pitch of heroism awoke the wildest
+enthusiasm throughout the length and breadth of England and made "The
+Marquis of Granby," as readers of Pickwick will remember, a favourite
+sign for inns throughout many years. Entrance to the Combination Room
+is only obtained through favour. There is little else to notice in it
+except the beautiful polish of the mahogany tables.</p>
+
+<p>In the Screens are posted up the current College Notices&mdash;the hours
+and subjects of the lectures, the dates and results of the College
+examinations,<a id="footnotetag40" name="footnotetag40"></a><a href="#footnote40" title="Go to footnote 40"><span class="smaller">[40]</span></a> and the various tutorial admonishments of the Term.
+There is usually only one Tutor in a College, but the great size of
+Trinity requires the services of four; each being responsible for his
+own "Side," as it is called, consisting of some 150 students, to whom
+he is supposed (and the supposition is no unfounded one) to be "guide,
+philosopher, and friend," keeping a wise eye to their progress, moral,
+social, and intellectual.</p>
+
+<a id="img023" name="img023"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img023.jpg" width="350" height="425" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Trinity Bridge.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Passing through the eastern doorway of the Screens we meet what is
+perhaps the most ideal academic view in the world. From our feet
+descends a semicircular stairway with steps of worn stone leading down
+to a vast enclosure of greensward, surrounded and traversed by broad
+walks of flags and pebbles, and enclosed on all sides by venerable
+Collegiate buildings with battlemented parapets. These buildings are
+not very lofty; which makes the court look even larger than it is, and
+gives the greater effect to the three grand gate towers, one of
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page99" name="page99"></a>(p. 99)</span> which adorns each of the three sides before us. In the midst
+of the Court (which is not far from square but delightfully irregular
+in shape) rises the inspired gracefulness of the fountain&mdash;with its
+octagonal base of broad steps (surrounded by bright flowerbeds) and
+its crocketed canopy upborne upon <span class="pagenum"><a id="page100" name="page100"></a>(p. 100)</span> slender pillars with
+beautifully proportioned arches.<a id="footnotetag41" name="footnotetag41"></a><a href="#footnote41" title="Go to footnote 41"><span class="smaller">[41]</span></a> The whole is a veritable miracle
+of design, and would hold its own with any fountain even in Italy. It
+is, indeed, the work of Italian craftsmen of the best period,<a id="footnotetag42" name="footnotetag42"></a><a href="#footnote42" title="Go to footnote 42"><span class="smaller">[42]</span></a>
+brought over specially by Dr. Nevile, to whose genius we owe this most
+splendid of all College quadrangles, the "Old Court" (sometimes called
+the "Great Court") of Trinity.</p>
+
+<p>To appreciate the greatness of this debt, we must bear in mind that,
+when he became Master of the College, Nevile found the ground occupied
+by heterogeneous ranges of old buildings, the remains of the
+suppressed Colleges and Hostels, running chaotically in all sorts of
+directions. These are shown in the earliest map of Cambridge,<a id="footnotetag43" name="footnotetag43"></a><a href="#footnote43" title="Go to footnote 43"><span class="smaller">[43]</span></a> made
+in 1592, just before he began his great work of pulling down, setting
+back, building and rebuilding. He thus remodelled almost the whole;
+the Chapel alone (built fifty years earlier) and the great eastern
+gate-tower remaining as they were before his reconstructions. In
+reality this Court, far more than the Cloister Court, deserves to be
+called by his name, and to remind us of his motto <i>Ne vile velis</i>
+("Nothing cheap and nasty").</p>
+
+<p>Since his day, indeed, surprisingly little alteration has been made.
+Plaster has been put on (and stripped off) here and there, stonework
+has been touched up, the Master's Lodge has been altered and
+re-altered, but the only radical change has been in the south-west
+corner beyond the Hall, which was rebuilt in 1775, with results as
+artistically deplorable as may well be, especially in comparison with
+the older work. Nevile had left in this corner a beautiful oriel
+window, still to be seen in Logan's view of the College (1680).</p>
+
+<p>Of the three gate towers only one is of Nevile's own building, that on
+the southern side of the Court, known as the Queen's Gate from the
+statue of Anne of Denmark, the Queen Consort <span class="pagenum"><a id="page101" name="page101"></a>(p. 101)</span> of James the
+First, which stands above its inner archway. The gate of this tower is
+used only on occasions. The other two both belonged to King's Hall;
+the eastern being still in its original place, the northern, which
+formerly aligned with it, having been moved back by Nevile to align
+with the Chapel. Both set forth the glories of Edward the Third; the
+former displaying over its entrance gate the armorial bearings of his
+seven sons, while over the archway of the latter he stands himself,
+with his three crowns (of England, France and Scotland) spitted on the
+long naked sword which he holds erect in front of him, and the proud
+motto "<i>Fama super æthera notus</i>" ("Known by Fame beyond the skies").
+From his like niche in the eastern tower he has been displaced by
+Henry the Eighth. The statues on the inside of this tower are James
+the First, with his wife and son (afterwards Charles the First).</p>
+
+<p>The northern tower is commonly known as the Clock Tower; being the
+dwelling place of the famous timepiece referred to by Wordsworth in
+the "Prelude" as breaking the silence of his rooms at St. John's
+College, which were not many yards away:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Near me hung Trinity's loquacious clock,<br>
+  Who never let the quarters, night or day,<br>
+  Slip by him unproclaimed, and told the hours<br>
+  Twice over, with a male and female voice."</p>
+
+<p>The clock actually does repeat the hour, striking it first on the
+biggest of the three bells in the tower, whose note is A flat, and
+then on the second, E flat, a fifth above. The quarters are notified
+by two, four, six and eight strokes respectively on the first and
+second bells, F and E flat, a tone apart.<a id="footnotetag44" name="footnotetag44"></a><a href="#footnote44" title="Go to footnote 44"><span class="smaller">[44]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>To complete the round of the Court outside the grass-plots while
+midnight strikes is a favourite test of running powers amongst the
+Undergraduates. It is a fairly severe one; for the distance is 383
+yards, with four sharp corners to negotiate, on somewhat pronounced
+pebbling, and the time occupied by the 32 strokes (8 for the 4
+quarters and a double 12 for the hour) is only 43 seconds. An easier
+performance <span class="pagenum"><a id="page102" name="page102"></a>(p. 102)</span> is to make a standing jump from top to bottom of
+the steps before the Hall; this is chiefly a trial of nerve. There are
+8 steps, each 6 inches high and 15 wide, so that the drop is only 4
+feet and the distance under 10; but it is a fearsome thought, looking
+down, to contemplate the result should one's heel catch on a step. To
+jump clear <i>up</i> the flight is a real feat, which only two men are
+known to have accomplished: even with the preliminary run which is
+possible below though not above the stairway.</p>
+
+<p>On our way through the Court towards the Chapel, we have on our left
+hand the Master's Lodge, the front of which is an exceptionally happy
+piece of early Victorian restoration. A poor classical façade had
+(under Bentley) replaced Nevile's original front. But this front was
+still to be seen in Logan's print, and was thus (in 1842)
+reconstructed with little alteration. The Lodge contains splendid
+reception rooms, worthy of a palace. The Chapel, though by no means of
+the first rank as regards artistic beauty, is well worth seeing, for
+it contains what high authorities consider the very finest statue ever
+made since the palmy days of Greek art, Roubillac's wonderful
+presentation of Sir Isaac Newton.<a id="footnotetag45" name="footnotetag45"></a><a href="#footnote45" title="Go to footnote 45"><span class="smaller">[45]</span></a> There he stands at the west end
+of the Chapel, prism in hand, the king of all scientists, gazing with
+rapt eyes into Infinity, and a smile full of hope and illumination
+upon his lips.<a id="footnotetag46" name="footnotetag46"></a><a href="#footnote46" title="Go to footnote 46"><span class="smaller">[46]</span></a> The story goes that the expression on these lips
+did not wholly satisfy the sculptor at his first sight of his creation
+on its pedestal, and that he climbed up, then and there, chisel in
+hand, to give the effect he desired with a few exquisitely directed
+blows.</p>
+
+<p>Other heroic figures are grouped around, Francis Bacon, (Tennyson's</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="add2em">"Large-browed Verulam</span><br>
+  The first of those that know,")</p>
+
+<a id="img024" name="img024"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img024.jpg" width="350" height="514" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Fountain, Trinity College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Tennyson himself, Macaulay, Dr. Barrow, the Master to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page104" name="page104"></a>(p. 104)</span> whom
+the College owes its Library,<a id="footnotetag47" name="footnotetag47"></a><a href="#footnote47" title="Go to footnote 47"><span class="smaller">[47]</span></a> and the massive virility of his
+omniscient successor, Dr. Whewell.<a id="footnotetag48" name="footnotetag48"></a><a href="#footnote48" title="Go to footnote 48"><span class="smaller">[48]</span></a> Brasses affixed to the walls
+commemorate many another great inmate of the College, who, "having
+served his own generation according to the will of God," is here laid
+to rest:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Trinity's full tide of life flooding o'er him<br>
+  Morning and evening as he lies dead."</p>
+
+<p>These lines were written to commemorate Dr. Thompson, the late Master
+(renowned for his sarcastic humour), and refer to the fact that
+undergraduates are expected to put in every week a certain number of
+attendances at the morning and evening Services held daily in the
+Chapel.<a id="footnotetag49" name="footnotetag49"></a><a href="#footnote49" title="Go to footnote 49"><span class="smaller">[49]</span></a> This obligation is now very leniently construed by the
+Senior and Junior "Deans," under whose cognisance offences against it
+come; but not so very long ago it was exceedingly strict, and the
+Chapel Lists, on which the attendances were recorded, were objects of
+real dread to the slothful. In 1838 the Senior Fellows (then the
+Governing Body of the College),<a id="footnotetag50" name="footnotetag50"></a><a href="#footnote50" title="Go to footnote 50"><span class="smaller">[50]</span></a> decreed that every student must be
+present twice on Sunday and once on every other day of the week. This
+ukase brought about something like a rebellion. A secret "Society for
+the Prevention of Cruelty to Undergraduates" was formed, and avenged
+their wrongs by publishing every week regular lists exposing the far
+from adequate attendance of the Senior <span class="pagenum"><a id="page105" name="page105"></a>(p. 105)</span> Fellows themselves
+(Thompson being one), to the intense annoyance of these dignitaries.
+Finally, they actually had the assurance to give a prize to the Fellow
+who had been most regular, Mr. Perry, who afterwards became the first
+Bishop of Melbourne, and who cherished the Bible thus won to the end
+of his life. The Society kept their secret for a whole Term, and, when
+finally discovered, were able to escape punishment by promising that
+the publication of their Lists, which made the Seniors the weekly
+laughing-stock of the University, should be brought to an end.</p>
+
+<p>All these statues and memorials are in the Ante-Chapel, which is
+separated from the Chapel proper, as at King's, by the screen on which
+stands the great organ. This organ is the largest and best-toned in
+Cambridge,<a id="footnotetag51" name="footnotetag51"></a><a href="#footnote51" title="Go to footnote 51"><span class="smaller">[51]</span></a> but it is far from being as effective as the King's
+organ, to which the magnificent acoustic properties of its Chapel lend
+so wondrous a power. In Trinity there is always the sensation that the
+harmonies are boxed in; indeed the shape of the Chapel does very much
+suggest a box. In justice, however, to its designers, it must be
+remembered that the box-like effect would be very much lessened by the
+east and west windows with which it was originally provided. The
+latter was closed by Nevile's putting back the clock tower to abut
+upon it; the former still exists, as may be seen from the outside, but
+is utterly shut off from the interior by a huge and far from beautiful
+baldachino erected (not at his own cost but at that of the
+impoverished Fellows) by Dr. Bentley. This famous scholar was one of
+the few unpleasant Masters with whom the Crown (in which is here
+vested the right, usually belonging to the Fellows, of appointing the
+Head of the College) ever saddled Trinity. He passed his whole time as
+Head in one long unceasing quarrel with his College. To begin with, he
+was unpopular as being a member of the adjoining Foundation of St.
+John's, between which and Trinity there existed an age-long rivalry.
+Not many years before something like open war had been levied between
+the Colleges on the occasion of a Trinity merry-making, the Johnian
+onlookers being attacked with burning torches and using swords in
+their defence; while an attempt which they made to rush the great
+gates was beaten <span class="pagenum"><a id="page106" name="page106"></a>(p. 106)</span> off by showers of stones and brickbats
+which had been stored to that end on the roof of the Gate Tower.</p>
+
+<p>St. John's was at this time the largest College, and despised Trinity;
+a sentiment which Bentley, who was a born bully,<a id="footnotetag52" name="footnotetag52"></a><a href="#footnote52" title="Go to footnote 52"><span class="smaller">[52]</span></a> expressed with
+the utmost frankness, publicly calling the Fellows "asses," "dogs,"
+"fools," "sots," and other scurrilous names, as they piteously set
+forth in their complaints to their Visitor,<a id="footnotetag53" name="footnotetag53"></a><a href="#footnote53" title="Go to footnote 53"><span class="smaller">[53]</span></a> the Bishop of Ely.
+Finally he was degraded by the Senate,<a id="footnotetag54" name="footnotetag54"></a><a href="#footnote54" title="Go to footnote 54"><span class="smaller">[54]</span></a> and reduced to the status
+of "a bare Harry-Soph," as a contemporary diarist (quoted by Mr.
+Clark)<a id="footnotetag55" name="footnotetag55"></a><a href="#footnote55" title="Go to footnote 55"><span class="smaller">[55]</span></a> puts it. But no Master, except Nevile and Barrow, has left
+so enduring a mark upon the College; for the ruinous expenditure into
+which he dragooned the unhappy Fellows has given the Chapel not only
+the baldachino, but the stalls, the panelling, and the organ; to say
+nothing of the clock, and the splendid oak staircase in the Lodge.</p>
+
+<p>The profuse gilding and painting which enriches walls and roof in the
+Chapel is due to a restoration some forty years ago, when the outside
+was also faced with stone, and the windows filled with stained glass,
+commemorating ecclesiastical and other celebrities throughout all the
+Christian centuries. The Apostles appear in the most easterly windows
+on either side; whence the series progresses in chronological order
+westwards. The figures are for the most part powerfully drawn, and
+should be examined through an opera glass to appreciate their wealth
+of detail. We can thus see that Hildebrand has driven his crosier
+through the eagles of the Imperial Crown, that Dante, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page107" name="page107"></a>(p. 107)</span>
+Matthew Paris, and Roger Bacon, hold in their hands copies of their
+own greatest works, that Giotto is studying an elevation of his
+Campanile; while noted church-builders, like St. Hugh of Lincoln and
+William of Wykeham, carry models of their edifices. The hapless Mary
+Tudor holds one of this very Chapel, of which she was the Foundress.
+It is appropriate that the beautiful silver cross over the Altar
+should be Spanish work of her date, though only placed there a few
+years ago by the generosity of some members of the College who met
+with it while travelling in Spain. It was originally a processional
+cross, and has been adapted for its new purpose with artistic skill of
+the first order.</p>
+
+<p>When we leave the Chapel, and proceed towards the Great Gate, we are
+treading on classic ground. For it was along this flagged path that
+Macaulay, while at Trinity, used to take his daily exercise, pacing
+assiduously up and down, always the while devouring some author, whose
+pages he turned over with incredible rapidity, and at the same pace
+whether they were filled with the weightiest thought or the lightest
+fancy. Yet whether the book were profound philosophy or exquisite
+poetry or the trashiest of rhyme and fiction, he was ever afterwards
+able to recall its whole scheme and even to quote lengthy portions of
+it verbatim. His rooms were in the staircase facing us&mdash;the set on the
+ground-floor to the left of the entrance. This particular staircase
+has been the home of more great men than any other in the University.
+The ground-floor rooms opposite Macaulay's were those of
+Thackeray,<a id="footnotetag56" name="footnotetag56"></a><a href="#footnote56" title="Go to footnote 56"><span class="smaller">[56]</span></a> and the set above Thackeray's are hallowed as the
+habitation of Sir Isaac Newton: for whom the College built an
+observatory on the roof of the Gate Tower, and who also had the use of
+a small bit of ground which we see outside the gate, now a railed-in
+lawn, but then a pretty little garden, as Logan's view shows, with
+trees and flower-beds, surrounded by a high wall.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page108" name="page108"></a>(p. 108)</span> CHAPTER V</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Whewell's Courts.&mdash;All Saints' Cross.&mdash;The Jewry.&mdash;Divinity
+     School.&mdash;<b>St. John's College</b>, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+     Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+     Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second Court,
+     Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New Court,
+     Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness.&mdash;<b>Caius College</b>, Gonville, The
+     Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues."&mdash;<b>Senate House</b>, Congregations,
+     Vice-Chancellor, Voting, Degree-giving.&mdash;<b>University Church</b>, Mr.
+     Tripos, Golgotha, Sermons, Tower, Chimes, Jowett.&mdash;Market Hill,
+     Peasant Revolt, Wat Tyler, Bucer and Fagius, Bonfires, Town and
+     Gown.</p>
+
+<p>We are now outside the Great Gate of Trinity; but, across the street,
+in front of us, rises yet another gate belonging to the College, and
+leading into its two newest Courts, named from Dr. Whewell, who left
+this noble memorial of his Mastership.<a id="footnotetag57" name="footnotetag57"></a><a href="#footnote57" title="Go to footnote 57"><span class="smaller">[57]</span></a> Those who list to enter
+them will at once see why the first is popularly known as "the
+Spittoon," and the second as "the Billiard Table"; but there is little
+more to see or to say about them.</p>
+
+<p>The slender and lofty stone cross to the north of these buildings
+marks the site of the ancient church of All Saints, which was pulled
+down in the middle of last century, to be rebuilt at the further
+extremity of its parish, opposite the entrance to Jesus College. Its
+earliest name (in the twelfth century) was "All Hallows in the Jewry";
+for Cambridge made good its claim to be amongst the larger towns of
+England by having, like the most of them, its Ghetto, or quarter (more
+or less sharply divided off from the rest), in which alone the Jews
+might reside. They were nowhere popular residents, for they were
+outside the pale of the Law (which refused to take <span class="pagenum"><a id="page109" name="page109"></a>(p. 109)</span>
+cognisance of aliens in race and religion) and mere "chattels" of the
+Crown. This position, however ignominious, gave them special
+privileges as against their neighbours. They were too useful as
+financial assets to allow of their being murdered or robbed by anyone
+but their Royal owner himself; and, secure in his protection, they
+took small pains to conceal their contempt for their Christian
+neighbours, who retaliated by as much petty persecution as they dared,
+and, now and then, by a wholesale massacre. Finally matters became so
+strained that in the fourteenth century, under Richard the Second, the
+whole race of Israel were expelled from England, not to return till
+the days of Cromwell. They had originally come to our shores in the
+train of the Conqueror's army, thus conveniently enabling the Norman
+soldiers to turn their English loot into hard cash. Their quarter in
+Cambridge was the small triangular piece of ground between St. John's
+Street, Sidney Street, and All Saints' Passage.</p>
+
+<p>North again of All Saints' Cross we see the new red-brick walls and
+white stone dressings of the Divinity School, where the Professors of
+that subject hold their classes and lectures. Opposite to this rise
+the stately buildings of St. John's College. We may note how very near
+they approach to those of Trinity. These two great Foundations, so
+long holding undisputed pre-eminence in the University, are, in fact,
+nearer neighbours than any other two Colleges in Cambridge&mdash;nearer,
+even, than King's and Clare. The narrow lane that parts their
+respective buildings belongs to St. John's, and is bounded on the
+Trinity side only by a brick wall. This flimsy partition induced Dr.
+Bentley, when congratulated on becoming Master of Trinity, to reply,
+with characteristic infelicity, "By the help of my God, I have leapt
+over a wall." An unverified tradition hence arose that he had actually
+made his way into the College, on the Great Gate being shut against
+his entry, by a ladder applied to the wall of the Trinity Fellows'
+Bowling Green.<a id="footnotetag58" name="footnotetag58"></a><a href="#footnote58" title="Go to footnote 58"><span class="smaller">[58]</span></a> Keen as has been the age-long rivalry between
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page110" name="page110"></a>(p. 110)</span> Trinity and St. John's, they have been more closely
+connected than any other two Colleges; and no fewer than four times
+has a Johnian become Master of Trinity. The respective Founders were
+also closely connected; for St. John's was founded (earlier in her
+grandson's reign) by Lady Margaret Tudor, grandmother to Henry the
+Eighth.</p>
+
+<p>This noble lady is one of the choice characters of history. Her
+disposition, as depicted for us by the one who knew her best, her
+Confessor, the saintly Bishop Fisher, reads almost like an embodiment
+of St. Paul's encomium on Charity: "Bounteous she was, and liberal ...
+of singular easiness to be spoken unto ... of marvellous gentleness
+unto all folk ... unkind to no creature, nor forgetful of any kindness
+or service done to her (which is no little part of very nobleness).
+She was not vengeable nor cruel; but ready anon to forget and forgive
+injuries done unto her, at the least desire or motion made unto her
+for the same. Merciful also and piteous she was unto such as was
+grieved and wrongfully troubled, and to them that were in poverty or
+sickness or any other misery. To God and to the Church full obedient
+and tractable, searching His honour and pleasure full busily. A
+wareness of herself she had always, to eschew everything that might
+dishonour any noble woman.... All England for her death have cause of
+weeping."<a id="footnotetag59" name="footnotetag59"></a><a href="#footnote59" title="Go to footnote 59"><span class="smaller">[59]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img025" name="img025"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img025.jpg" width="350" height="521" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Trinity College Chapel and St. John's Gateway.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Lady Margaret was of Plantagenet stock, being great-granddaughter to
+"old John of Gaunt, time honoured Lancaster," and one of the
+legitimatised family of the Beauforts. Her first husband was the Welsh
+Earl Edmund Tudor, the father of her only child, Henry of Richmond,
+who afterwards succeeded to the throne of England as Henry the
+Seventh. After his death she twice married again; but none of her
+nuptials were of long continuance, and her true life was that of her
+widowhood, when she became famed as the Lady Bountiful of the Kingdom:
+"the mother of both the Universities; the very patroness of all the
+learned men of England;<a id="footnotetag60" name="footnotetag60"></a><a href="#footnote60" title="Go to footnote 60"><span class="smaller">[60]</span></a> the loving sister of all virtuous and
+devout persons; the comforter of all <span class="pagenum"><a id="page112" name="page112"></a>(p. 112)</span> good Religious; the
+true defendress of all good priests and clerks; the mirror and example
+of honour to all noble men and women; the common mediatrice for all
+the common people of this realm.... Everyone that knew her loved her,
+and everything she said or did became her." Before her death she had
+endowed Preacherships and Professorships of Divinity (which still
+remain), both at Oxford and Cambridge, and had seen her first
+Collegiate Foundation, that of Christ's College, rise into full life.
+Her second and greater Foundation, St. John's College, she only lived
+to plan and to endow. When she died, on the 29th of June, 1509 (in the
+bright dawn of her grandson's reign and marriage&mdash;both alike destined
+to end in so miserable a tragedy), the buildings were not yet
+commenced.</p>
+
+<p>She left their erection, however, in the best of hands. It was to her
+friend and counsellor, Bishop Fisher, who knew her so well, and
+appreciated her so dearly, that she committed the carrying out of her
+great design. He was markedly qualified for this purpose, not only by
+his connection with herself, but by special acquaintance with the
+spot. For in him we find yet another link between St. John's and
+Trinity. As Master of Michaelhouse,<a id="footnotetag61" name="footnotetag61"></a><a href="#footnote61" title="Go to footnote 61"><span class="smaller">[61]</span></a> some years earlier, he had
+been a close neighbour of the ancient Hospital of St. John, and had
+noted how far that venerable fraternity had outlived its usefulness.
+Originally a semi-monastic institution, founded in 1135, as a sort of
+alms-house for necessitous old men, the lack of any sufficient
+discipline had brought it to decay. The attempt made by Bishop Hugh de
+Balsham, in the century after its foundation, to leaven it with the
+scholars whom he afterwards transported to Peterhouse had proved a
+failure, and by the sixteenth century the few Brethren left were far
+from satisfactory in their ways.<a id="footnotetag62" name="footnotetag62"></a><a href="#footnote62" title="Go to footnote 62"><span class="smaller">[62]</span></a> Fisher, therefore, suggested to
+Lady Margaret to turn the Hospital into a College, under the same
+patronage, and after her death, set promptly to work to make the
+requisite alterations in the existing buildings.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page113" name="page113"></a>(p. 113)</span> His first act was to enclose a Court, the Gate Tower of which
+should worthily commemorate the Foundress. In this his success was
+complete. The tower, which to this day forms the main entrance to the
+College, is a delightful example of what may be done in architecture
+by a skilful use of red brick. The quoining is of stone, and of stone
+also are the elaborate decorations. In the centre above the first
+string-course a richly-canopied niche contains the statue of St. John
+the Evangelist. Below this, and immediately above the gate, is to be
+seen Lady Margaret's shield, the three lions of England, quartered
+with the three lilies of France, within a bordure barred azure and
+argent, supported by the antelopes of the Beaufort family. On either
+side of both statue and shield appear the Plantagenet rose and the
+Tudor portcullis, each surmounted by an Imperial crown (just as we so
+constantly find them in King's College Chapel), and all round is
+sprinkled the Margaret flower, the daisy. The whole forms a beautiful
+piece of composition which makes us regret that more of Fisher's work
+is not left. All the First Court, indeed, is his, but it has been
+altered out of all knowledge. Now its chief feature is the soaring
+mid-Victorian chapel, the largest in Cambridge (except, of course,
+King's), the most pleasing view of which is to be gained from the
+Trinity Backs, where the tower, framed in foliage, exquisitely doubles
+itself on the surface of the river. This ambitious fabric was built by
+Sir Gilbert Scott in the 'sixties; and a line of cement on the lawn of
+the Court alone traces for us the foundations of Fisher's original
+Chapel.</p>
+
+<p>The Hall ranks in size and beauty next to that of Trinity. The most
+interesting of its portraits are those of Lady Margaret, Bishop
+Fisher, and the poet Wordsworth, who was a resident member of the
+College from 1787 to 1791. His rooms, as he tells in "The Prelude,"
+were in the south-western staircase of the "First Court," just above
+the kitchen:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>The Evangelist St. John my Patron was:<br>
+  Three Gothic Courts are his, and in the first<br>
+  Was my abiding-place, a nook obscure.<br>
+  Right underneath, the College Kitchens made<br>
+  A humming sound, less tuneable than bees,<br>
+  But hardly less industrious, with shrill notes<br>
+  Of sharp command and scolding intermixed."</p>
+
+<p>Wordsworth was not a very contented student. He shared <span class="pagenum"><a id="page114" name="page114"></a>(p. 114)</span> the
+anarchical ideas then floating in the air, and soon to explode in the
+French Revolution. College discipline was eminently distasteful to
+him, and, above all, he detested the obligation to attend the Services
+in the College Chapel (which, indeed, were, in those days, conducted
+in far from ideal fashion).<a id="footnotetag63" name="footnotetag63"></a><a href="#footnote63" title="Go to footnote 63"><span class="smaller">[63]</span></a> In "The Prelude," he breaks out
+against them in unmeasured terms:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Be Folly and False-seeming free to affect<br>
+  Whatever formal gait of Discipline<br>
+  Shall raise them highest in their own esteem:<br>
+  Let them parade amongst the Schools at will,<br>
+  But spare the House of God! Was ever known<br>
+  The witless shepherd who persists to drive<br>
+  A flock that thirsts not to a pool disliked?<br>
+  A weight must surely hang on days begun<br>
+  And ended with such mockery. Be wise,<br>
+  Ye Presidents<a id="footnotetag64" name="footnotetag64"></a><a href="#footnote64" title="Go to footnote 64"><span class="smaller">[64]</span></a> and Deans, and to your bells<br>
+  Give seasonable rest, for 'tis a sound<br>
+  Hollow as ever vexed the tranquil air;<br>
+  And your officious doings bring disgrace<br>
+  On the plain steeples of our English Church,<br>
+  Whose worship, 'mid remotest village trees<br>
+  Suffers for this."</p>
+
+<p>It is interesting to note that these sentiments are echoed, a year or
+two later, from Oxford, by Southey, then also in his youthful paroxysm
+of Revolutionary fervour. He lets himself go in his "Ode to the Chapel
+Bell":</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>O how I hate the sound! It is the knell<br>
+  That still a requiem tolls to Comfort's hour;<br>
+  And loth am I, at Superstition's bell,<br>
+  To quit, or Morpheus', or the Muse's bower.<br>
+  Better to lie and doze than gape amain,<br>
+  Hearing still mumbled o'er the same eternal strain,<br>
+
+  <span class="lspaced2">.........</span><br>
+
+  The snuffling, snaffling Fellow's nasal tone,<br>
+  And Romish rites retained, though Romish faith be flown."</p>
+
+<a id="img026" name="img026"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img026.jpg" width="350" height="512" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Hall, St. John's College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Hall of St. John's was the scene of notable Christmas feasting in
+the good old days of academic prosperity. Daily, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page116" name="page116"></a>(p. 116)</span> from
+Christmas to Twelfth Night, boars' heads, turkeys, gargantuan pasties,
+and cups of a peculiarly enticing composition, went the round of the
+board. After the fatal agricultural depression of the 'seventies these
+hospitable doings dwindled more and more, till now they are wholly of
+the past.</p>
+
+<p>From the Hall we can often obtain permission to ascend to the unique
+glory of St. John's College, the Combination Room, which is
+incomparably finer than any other apartment of the same kind, either
+at Oxford or Cambridge. It is a spacious panelled gallery, running
+east and west, nearly 100 feet in length, lighted by transomed
+windows<a id="footnotetag65" name="footnotetag65"></a><a href="#footnote65" title="Go to footnote 65"><span class="smaller">[65]</span></a> along the southern side, and with a richly decorated
+plaster ceiling, the work of the same Italian artists who erected the
+fountain in the Great Court of Trinity, just at the time when this
+room was in building. For here we have got beyond Lady Margaret's
+"First" Court. The Combination Room forms the north side of the
+"Second" Court, erected at the very end of the sixteenth century
+(simultaneously with the Great Court of Trinity) by another noble
+benefactress, Lady Mary Cavendish, Countess of Shrewsbury, whose coat
+of arms (Cavendish impaled with Talbot) stands over the western gate.</p>
+
+<p>This splendid benefaction was intended to be anonymous, as was also
+that which, in the "Third" Court, has given to St. John's yet another
+unique beauty, its exquisite Library, which (like the Combination
+Room) stands at the head, architecturally, of all College libraries,
+whether at Oxford or Cambridge. The benefactor in this case was Dr.
+John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln and Keeper of the Great Seal. His
+initials, as has been already mentioned, may be seen upon the outside
+of the western wall, beside the beautiful oriel window, overlooking
+the river, with which the room terminates, and his escutcheon hangs on
+the eastern wall, inside, over the door. For in his case, too, as in
+that of Lady Mary Cavendish, the secret leaked out before the work was
+finished, and in 1624 the letters I. L. C. S. (denoting Iohannes
+Lincolnensis Custos Sigilli) disclosed to passers-by the donor's
+identity.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page117" name="page117"></a>(p. 117)</span> The original bookcases of dark oak still project from either
+wall. They have mostly been heightened to make room for more books,
+but the additional shelves have been added not above but at the
+bottom, so that the sloping desks of the old tops still remain, though
+too high to be used; but the pair nearest the door remain at their
+original height. In the panelled end of each shelf may be noticed a
+tiny folding door, which on being opened proves to contain the
+catalogue, in crabbed early seventeenth century writing, of the books
+which the shelf held when first filled. The Library, however, contains
+nothing of any very special interest, its most noteworthy exhibit
+being an edition de luxe of the "Great Bible" issued in 1540 by Royal
+authority under the auspices of Archbishop Cranmer. This was the first
+English Bible authorised to be read in churches, and a copy was
+ordered to be set up in every parish church throughout the realm; the
+object being that every man might have access to it, and read for his
+own edification. He was not, however, allowed to take it home with
+him, and it was usually chained to the reading-desk to prevent this.
+And, as yet, there was no provision for any reading of Scripture in
+public worship, beyond the Epistles and Gospels of the Mass, the
+"sense" (<i>i.e.</i> the English) of which each parish priest had long been
+bound to give his congregation every Sunday as best he might.</p>
+
+<a id="img027" name="img027"></a>
+<div class="floatright">
+<img src="images/img027.jpg" width="200" height="319" alt="" title="">
+<p class="caption200"><i>Oriel in Second Court of St. John's College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This first Authorised Version was founded on the work of Miles
+Coverdale, published five years earlier, with a specially <span class="pagenum"><a id="page118" name="page118"></a>(p. 118)</span>
+fulsome dedication to King Henry the Eighth, who, in consideration of
+his recent breach with the Papacy,<a id="footnotetag66" name="footnotetag66"></a><a href="#footnote66" title="Go to footnote 66"><span class="smaller">[66]</span></a> is described as "our Moses ...
+who hath brought us out ... from the cruel hands of our spiritual
+Pharao." In this edition (of which we have here a copy printed on
+vellum, and perhaps destined for the King's own hands) this idea is
+enlarged upon in a highly elaborated frontispiece. Henry sits, smiling
+imperially, in the middle of the page, distributing Bibles right and
+left to all sorts and conditions of men&mdash;bishops, clergy, monks,
+nobles, commons, artisans, husbandmen, and, notably, prisoners;&mdash;while
+out of every mouth proceeds a label bearing the universal acclamation
+"Vivat Rex," the English equivalent of which, "God save the King," is
+first found in this Version.</p>
+
+<p>The main approach to the Library is by a fine stone staircase in the
+north-western corner of the "Second Court;" but access is more
+generally obtained at present by an unpretending doorway in the middle
+of the northern side of the "Third Court." This door opens into the
+lower storey of the Library, which contains nothing of interest except
+a not very inspired statue of Wordsworth. Hence a circular iron stair
+leads up to the Library proper.</p>
+
+<p>The "three Gothic courts," mentioned in Wordsworth's "Prelude" as
+belonging to St. John's, sufficed the College till the reign of George
+the Fourth. When it was then determined to expand, the bold departure
+was taken of erecting the new buildings on the other side of the
+river. Never, before or since, has any other College, either at Oxford
+or Cambridge, done the like; and one could wish that the experiment
+had been made at a period when architecture was at a less debased
+level. It was the period which Sir Walter Scott, in the "Antiquary,"
+has in mind when he says "The Lord deliver me from this Gothic
+generation." But, of that period, the "New Court," as it is called, is
+a favourable specimen, most especially the grated<a id="footnotetag67" name="footnotetag67"></a><a href="#footnote67" title="Go to footnote 67"><span class="smaller">[67]</span></a> bridge
+connecting it with the main body of the College, which has a really
+graceful span. The idea of this structure was suggested by the Bridge
+of Sighs at Venice, and it is commonly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page119" name="page119"></a>(p. 119)</span> known by that name,
+which provokes unkind comparisons. From it we get good views of the
+Library oriel to the north, and, on the other side, of the older
+bridge belonging to St. John's, three arches in the characteristic
+Johnian style of red brick with stone dressings, built at the end of
+the seventeenth century.</p>
+
+<p>The New Court has practically but one side, the ends being very
+slightly returned, running east and west, with a quasi-cupola in the
+centre, surrounded by pinnacles and surmounted by a gilded vane. It is
+hard to believe, but it is quite historical, that one morning (in the
+'sixties) this vane was found to be decked out in the brilliant
+scarlet "blazer"<a id="footnotetag68" name="footnotetag68"></a><a href="#footnote68" title="Go to footnote 68"><span class="smaller">[68]</span></a> of the College boat club, the perpetrator (who
+was never discovered) having actually scaled the roof by means of one
+of the water-pipes! And it was some time before the resources of
+civilisation in the hands of the College authorities availed to abate
+the outrage.</p>
+
+<p>The New Court, on its southern side, is separated by a traceried
+cloister from the College Backs. On passing through the gate of this
+it is well to bear to the left and walk along the bank of the river,
+here overhung by magnificent elms, and affording a picturesque
+prospect of the Trinity buildings on the other side. The grounds of
+both Colleges to the west of the river are here divided up into a
+series of lawn-tennis courts, and are parted from each other by a
+broad ditch, which runs beneath the boughs of bowery horse-chestnut
+trees. In spring the Trinity bank of this ditch is bright with
+daffodils, the Johnian with narcissus. An iron foot-bridge, common to
+both Colleges, with a gate at either end, gives access from one to the
+other; but we had best continue by the path which skirts the Johnian
+bank. This finally leads out of the College grounds into the Backs
+proper, by a fine iron gate bearing a gilded eagle rising from a
+crown, the crest borne by Lady Margaret.</p>
+
+<p>Before we reach this, we find water on either side of us; that to the
+west being not from the Cam, but a small tributary brooklet which
+joins the river near the Great Bridge. It is <span class="pagenum"><a id="page120" name="page120"></a>(p. 120)</span> here dammed up
+so as to afford space for the College swans to make merry in, and on
+the further side is the Fellows' Garden, known as "the Wilderness."
+The wealth of spring flowers here cultivated&mdash;snowdrops, daffodils,
+crocuses, primroses, anemones, and hyacinths&mdash;is delicious in a
+country like Cambridgeshire, where Nature supplies their charms with
+very niggardly hand in comparison with the more favoured regions of
+England. Outside the Eagle gate we are close to the entrance of the
+Trinity avenue.</p>
+
+<p>Let us stand once more before the great gate of Trinity. Turning to
+the south, instead of the north as before, we find ourselves in a few
+score yards with the buildings of a College again to the east and west
+of the street at once. This College is commonly known as Caius
+(pronounced Keys), and officially as "Gonville and Caius," after the
+original founder in the fourteenth century, and the benefactor who,
+two hundred years later, so largely developed it as to leave his name
+also attached to the site.<a id="footnotetag69" name="footnotetag69"></a><a href="#footnote69" title="Go to footnote 69"><span class="smaller">[69]</span></a> The former was a simple parish priest,
+rector of Terrington, on the Norfolk seaboard of the Wash. His little
+college, designated the "College of the Annunciation,"<a id="footnotetag70" name="footnotetag70"></a><a href="#footnote70" title="Go to footnote 70"><span class="smaller">[70]</span></a> and
+consisting only of a Master and three Fellows, found its original
+quarters hard by Pembroke, with which it was founded simultaneously in
+1347. A few years later, on Gonville's death, his friend and diocesan,
+Bishop Bateman of Norwich, moved it to its present site, next door to
+his own new college, Trinity Hall.</p>
+
+<p>There Gonville Hall, as it was now called, gradually developed, but
+remained a very puny bantling till the reign of Queen Mary, when one
+of its own scholars took upon himself the task of expanding it. His
+name was really Keys, which according to the fashion of the day, was
+transliterated into the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page121" name="page121"></a>(p. 121)</span> Latin equivalent Caius, and he was a
+celebrated doctor of medicine, President of the College of Physicians,
+and himself physician to the Royal household. It was in the interests
+of his favourite study that he refounded the college, which to this
+day has a specially medical tinge. He was also a singularly devout
+man, and the spirit in which he built is exemplified by the three
+gates through which we successively pass in our progress through the
+College. From Trinity-street we enter beneath a narrow, plain,
+low-browed archway, known as the Gate of Humility, and inscribed
+<span class="smcap">Humilitatis</span>.<a id="footnotetag71" name="footnotetag71"></a><a href="#footnote71" title="Go to footnote 71"><span class="smaller">[71]</span></a> A short avenue of lime-trees (also a part of the
+Founder's design) leads across the small court to a loftier, wider
+portal, over which we may read the word <span class="smcap">Virtutis</span>. Through this we gain
+another court, and, looking back, we discover that in using the Gate
+of Virtue we have indeed used the Gate of Wisdom; for it bears the
+inscription <span class="smcap">Io. Caivs. Posvit. Sapientiae</span>. And, finally, a small,
+beautifully designed turret, rich with Renaissance figures and
+pilasters, and inscribed <span class="smcap">Honoris</span>, covers our exit through the Gate of
+Honour, to which those of Humility, Virtue, and Wisdom have
+successively led us on.</p>
+
+<p>This Gate of Honour is really a wonderful little gem of architecture,
+quite unique in its design, which is due to Dr. Caius himself, though
+the work was not finished till after his death. The turret is an
+oblong mass of stone-work, some twelve feet in width by six in depth,
+rising to a height of about twenty feet, and topped with a singularly
+graceful hexagonal cupola.<a id="footnotetag72" name="footnotetag72"></a><a href="#footnote72" title="Go to footnote 72"><span class="smaller">[72]</span></a> The view of it, more especially from
+the further side of the Court, whence it groups with the Senate House
+and University library just outside, and with the soaring pinnacles of
+King's College Chapel beyond, is one nowhere to be surpassed. From a
+picturesque point of view no one can regret the absence of the
+somewhat gaudy coats of paint and gilding with which it originally was
+covered; but the result of their removal has been that the stone
+(which is soft, and was never intended to stand exposure to the
+atmosphere) is rapidly decaying.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page122" name="page122"></a>(p. 122)</span> The paved footway into which the Gate of Honour leads is
+known as Senate House Passage,<a id="footnotetag73" name="footnotetag73"></a><a href="#footnote73" title="Go to footnote 73"><span class="smaller">[73]</span></a> and is still the route along which
+the students of the College pass to receive in the Senate House such
+honours as their University examinations may have entitled them to. It
+forms the southern boundary of the College, which, alone amongst the
+Colleges of Cambridge, is wholly surrounded by public ways,
+Trinity-street being on the east, Trinity-lane on the north, and
+Trinity Hall-lane on the west. The tasteless mass of modern red brick
+(erected 1853) at the north-west angle of the block contains the hall;
+with the kitchens, by an unusual arrangement, beneath. These kitchens
+have an immemorial gastronomic renown in Cambridge, and are credited
+with the possession of culinary secrets enabling them to surpass all
+rival establishments. In some verses written about the end of the
+eighteenth century (concerning a well-known young lady of Cambridge)
+we find this referred to:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>The sons of culinary Caius,<br>
+  Smoaking from the eternal Treat,<br>
+  Gazed on the Fair with greedy air,<br>
+  As she were something good to eat:<br>
+  Even the sad Kingsman lost his gloom awhile,<br>
+  And forced a melancholy smile.<a id="footnotetag74" name="footnotetag74"></a><a href="#footnote74" title="Go to footnote 74"><span class="smaller">[74]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img028" name="img028"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img028.jpg" width="350" height="531" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Gate of Honour, Caius College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Dr. Caius himself became the first Master of his new College, a post
+which he accepted with a reluctance which proved only too well
+justified, for he himself was a devout and pious man of the old
+school, and wholly out of sympathy with the militant Protestantism
+which was then fast becoming the dominating spirit at Cambridge, as in
+England generally. He has left in writing his lamentation over the sad
+depletion of the University which was the first result of the
+Reformation.<a id="footnotetag75" name="footnotetag75"></a><a href="#footnote75" title="Go to footnote 75"><span class="smaller">[75]</span></a> The wholesale <span class="pagenum"><a id="page124" name="page124"></a>(p. 124)</span> destruction of ancient works
+of art&mdash;beautifully illuminated service books, and elaborately
+embroidered vestments&mdash;by which the votaries of the new religion
+sought at once to express their loathing of the older faith and to
+make its revival the harder, did but recall to him the like policy
+pursued by the Pagan antagonists of Jehovah in the days of the
+Maccabees. And he did what in him lay to stem the tide, rescuing here
+a Missal and there a Chasuble from the iconoclasts, till he had
+accumulated in his Lodge quite a little store of these sacred objects.
+But the times were too hard for him. He was denounced as a
+reactionary, a sympathiser with Popery; a riot broke out among the
+College students; the Lodge was stormed; the Papistical relics thrown
+out of the window and burnt in the midst of the Court;<a id="footnotetag76" name="footnotetag76"></a><a href="#footnote76" title="Go to footnote 76"><span class="smaller">[76]</span></a> whilst the
+Master and Founder himself was expelled from his own College and (as
+he had spent upon it all he had) ended his days in penury and exile.
+He was, however, allowed a grave in the chapel, which bears the
+touching inscription <span class="smcap">Fui Caius</span> ("I <i>was</i> Caius").</p>
+
+<p>The undergraduates of Caius wear a gown of a singular and not very
+pleasing violet hue with velvet trimmings. The College "colours" are
+light blue and black; the former, which is, as all know, the
+University colour, having been granted them to use, in memory of a
+famous race, in the early days of College boating, seventy years ago,
+when their crew beat the University Eight. It is, of course, an
+axiomatic rule of sportsmanship that no Club may assume the insignia
+of another (or any colourable imitation thereof), without leave from
+the previous users. The earliest "Light Blues" were the Eton Boat
+Club, by whose permission the Cambridge Boat Club took the colour. The
+Cricket Clubs, at both Eton and Cambridge, were then permitted to use
+it, and now <span class="pagenum"><a id="page125" name="page125"></a>(p. 125)</span> this permission has been extended to all engaged
+as champions of the University, at athletics, football, etc.</p>
+
+<p>The Senate House, to the entrance of which the Gate of Honour has
+brought us, is the nerve-centre of the University. Here are held,
+usually on each Thursday during Term, the meetings ("Congregations" is
+the official word) of that august body the "Senate," to whose vote all
+University legislation must ultimately be submitted. This body,
+however, consisting as it does of all who have attained the Degree of
+Master of Arts, several thousands in number, is far too large to
+initiate that legislation. This is done by a small elected General
+Committee, the "Council," and by special Committees (or "Syndicates")
+dealing with the various special subjects to be considered. Both
+Council and Syndicates also act as executive authorities, and by them
+"Graces" embodying this or that proposal are from time to time laid
+before the Senate. The Grace is read aloud by one of the Proctors, in
+his robes of office, standing beside the Chair, which is occupied by
+the Vice-Chancellor.<a id="footnotetag77" name="footnotetag77"></a><a href="#footnote77" title="Go to footnote 77"><span class="smaller">[77]</span></a> The benches are tenanted by such members of
+the Senate as care to be present.<a id="footnotetag78" name="footnotetag78"></a><a href="#footnote78" title="Go to footnote 78"><span class="smaller">[78]</span></a> There is no discussion;<a id="footnotetag79" name="footnotetag79"></a><a href="#footnote79" title="Go to footnote 79"><span class="smaller">[79]</span></a> but,
+on the Grace being read, any member may utter the words "Non Placet,"
+whereupon the Proctor cries "Ad scrutinium," and the congregation
+divides; the "Placets," (or "Ayes" as they would be called in
+Parliament), moving to the right of the Chair, and the "Non-Placets"
+to the left. Should this grouping not sufficiently disclose the sense
+of the meeting, a poll is held; each member's vote being given
+publicly by writing, on an official form, avouched by his signature.
+These papers are <span class="pagenum"><a id="page126" name="page126"></a>(p. 126)</span> then counted by the Proctors, and their
+respective numbers read out by the Vice-Chancellor.</p>
+
+<p>These numbers are usually but small; indeed most of the business is
+altogether unopposed. But when some subject which excites general
+interest is brought forward, "backwoods-men" flock (and are whipped)
+up from all parts of England. Macaulay has given us a humorous poem on
+the coach-loads of country clergy thus pitch-forked into Cambridge to
+vote against the admission of Roman Catholics to the University; and
+within the last few decades, similar scenes were witnessed in
+connection with the question of their being allowed a recognised
+Public Hostel of their own, and with those of Compulsory Greek, and of
+granting Degrees to women.</p>
+
+<p>Such is the procedure at the Senate House; or, rather, such it has
+hitherto been, for the whole question of University legislation is
+even now in the melting-pot. The use of the building for the chief
+University examinations is also dying or dead, now that a vast
+"Examination Hall" has been built for that purpose. But Degrees still
+continue to be conferred there; the students found worthy by the
+examiners successively kneeling before the Vice-Chancellor, and being
+admitted by him to their degree in the name of the Trinity. They are
+presented by the "Fathers" of their respective Colleges, in a
+recognised order, beginning with the Royal Foundations, King's always
+coming first and Trinity second. When the Degree of Doctor ("Honoris
+causa") is conferred on any distinguished visitors, the place is
+thronged, and each in turn is introduced with a laudatory Latin speech
+by the "Public Orator," who has to exert his ingenuity in composing
+some neat and appropriate epigrammatic remark about him.<a id="footnotetag80" name="footnotetag80"></a><a href="#footnote80" title="Go to footnote 80"><span class="smaller">[80]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The Senate House is a stately classical building, running east and
+west, erected in the early decades of the eighteenth century. Up to
+that date the functions which it now discharges were served partly by
+the old Schools (now the University Library), which have been already
+spoken of, and which <span class="pagenum"><a id="page127" name="page127"></a>(p. 127)</span> adjoin it on the west, and partly by
+the University Church (called here, as at Oxford, "Great St. Mary's"),
+which stands hard by to the east. The legislative meetings of the
+Senate were held in the former,<a id="footnotetag81" name="footnotetag81"></a><a href="#footnote81" title="Go to footnote 81"><span class="smaller">[81]</span></a> the Degrees were conferred, and
+other gatherings held, in the latter.</p>
+
+<p>This was all very well before the Reformation, whilst reverence for
+consecrated places still held its own; but, after that great
+convulsion, the proceedings too frequently were markedly
+unecclesiastical in tone. The conferring of Degrees was originally a
+solemn function beginning with High Mass, and continuing with a
+serious <i>vivâ voce</i> exercise of the candidates in the presence of the
+Vice-Chancellor. But when the Reformation had made it fashionable to
+show a healthy Protestant contempt for the old Catholic superstitions,
+the whole ceremony was deliberately turned into a farce. The
+questioning of the candidates was no longer done by grave University
+officials, but by an "old" (<i>i.e.</i> a senior) Bachelor, who sat upon a
+three-legged stool, and made his interrogations as profane and
+scurrilous as possible. He was known, from his stool, as "Mr. Tripos,"
+and so essential a part of the proceedings did he become that "Tripos"
+got to be (as it still is) the regular name for an "Honour"
+examination at Cambridge. To judge by the few that have come down to
+us, the jokes current on these occasions were poor to the last degree.
+Thus, in 1657, we read that two Oxonians, got up as hobby-horses,
+presented themselves, giving as their qualification that they "had
+smith's work at their digits' ends," (Smith being a then current
+writer of school books). They were duly admitted, on the ground that
+"such <i>equitation</i> gave them an <i>equitable</i> claim!" And all this was
+in the church; where, indeed, far less innocent performances were
+constantly given, including stage-plays and recitations in which the
+most solemn mysteries of the Catholic Faith were often travestied and
+held up to ridicule.<a id="footnotetag82" name="footnotetag82"></a><a href="#footnote82" title="Go to footnote 82"><span class="smaller">[82]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The church which was thus so long profaned is of late <span class="pagenum"><a id="page128" name="page128"></a>(p. 128)</span>
+Perpendicular architecture. Huge galleries have been inserted for the
+accommodation of such undergraduates as may attend; the nave being
+appropriated to the Master of Arts. During the seventeenth and
+eighteenth centuries the east end was filled with tier above tier of
+semicircular benches for the seniors of the University, from whose
+prevailingly bald heads this elevation became profanely known as
+"Golgotha." All is now arranged in decent fashion, and since the
+building of the Senate House the church has only been used for
+strictly ecclesiastical purposes. Here each Sunday afternoon is
+preached the "University Sermon," the preacher being some clergyman
+selected by the Council of the Senate. No service is held in
+connection with this sermon, but the preacher, before commencing,
+reads from the pulpit what is known as the "Bidding Prayer"&mdash;a long
+list of subjects for intercession, comprising the various authorities
+in Church and State, the Clergy, and (as the source of their supply)
+the Universities and Colleges. Amongst these "as in private duty
+bound" the preacher specifically names the College to which he himself
+belongs, finally concluding with the Lord's Prayer.<a id="footnotetag83" name="footnotetag83"></a><a href="#footnote83" title="Go to footnote 83"><span class="smaller">[83]</span></a> The sermon is
+officially attended by the Vice-Chancellor and Proctors, who gather in
+the Senate House and cross the street in procession to the West door
+of the church. One of the Proctors carries the University Bible, a
+ponderous tome suspended by a chain; and in front is borne the silver
+mace of the University, by an official designated the "Esquire
+Bedell."</p>
+
+<p>The church has witnessed various vicissitudes of doctrine. Here,
+during the first outbreak of Protestantism, the Missal was solemnly
+torn up and burnt amid the hooting of the crowd; and when, a century
+later, the Puritans gained the ascendancy, a like fate befell the Book
+of Common Prayer, Cromwell himself presiding at the ceremony. This was
+on Good Friday, 1643, when the Vice-Chancellor and several other Heads
+of Colleges were, for refusing to abet the proceeding, shut up in the
+church "all the long cold night, without fire or candle." They were
+afterwards haled to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page129" name="page129"></a>(p. 129)</span> London, and, after being pelted through
+the City, were subjected to a sort of Black Hole treatment, under
+hatches on board a hulk in the river, with all port-holes closed, and
+no air "save such as they could suck from each others' breaths," as
+the "Querela Cantabrigiensis" piteously complains.</p>
+
+<p>Till lately the tower of Great St. Mary's was a historical record of
+the stirring scenes amid which it arose, for it was slowly built
+during the course of no fewer than 120 years, being begun in the last
+decade of the fifteenth century and finished in the first of the
+seventeenth. Thus the lower stages were of Perpendicular Gothic, the
+higher of Renaissance style. Unhappily the Victorian restorers took it
+in hand, and rebuilt the top as, in their view, it would have been
+built had it been completed without this long delay, so that all
+historical interest is now lost. It contains a fine peal of twelve
+bells, on which sound the famous chimes composed in 1790 by Dr.
+Jowett,<a id="footnotetag84" name="footnotetag84"></a><a href="#footnote84" title="Go to footnote 84"><span class="smaller">[84]</span></a> tutor of Trinity Hall, which, since their adoption in the
+Westminster clock tower, have spread so widely throughout the country
+and the Empire. Their cadences are:</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="2" summary="Cadences.">
+<tr>
+<td>1st</td>
+<td>Quarter</td>
+<td>1236</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>2nd</td>
+<td class="center">"</td>
+<td>3126, 3213</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>3rd</td>
+<td class="center">"</td>
+<td>1326, 6213, 1236</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>4th</td>
+<td class="center">"</td>
+<td>3126, 3213, 1326, 6213</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>The hour is struck on the tenor bell. These bells are of eighteenth
+century date: two more have been added since.</p>
+
+<a id="img029" name="img029"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img029.jpg" width="500" height="417" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Peas Hill.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Great St. Mary's, for all its University connection, still remains
+what it was before the University came into being, a Parish Church;
+its Parish consisting of the Market Place, which opens out to the east
+of it, and is called locally "Market Hill." Whence this curious use of
+the latter word <span class="pagenum"><a id="page130" name="page130"></a>(p. 130)</span> arose is not known, but it is immemorial at
+Cambridge for any expansion of a street into something wider. Besides
+Market Hill, there are the smaller spaces of Peas Hill and St.
+Andrew's Hill. All are utterly flat; yet, so potent is the word in the
+imagination of the Cambridge townsfolk, that such expressions as "I
+wonder the Hill don't fall down upon you" may be overheard in market
+disputes. Market Hill is not very large for its purpose even now; but
+till the nineteenth century it was much smaller, with more than one
+range of houses encumbering its area. On the southern side stands the
+Guildhall, a far from imposing structure, and in the centre rises the
+fountain supplied by the water of Hobson's Conduit, as described in
+our first chapter. The present structure was erected in 1855, the
+earlier one (put up in 1614) being then <span class="pagenum"><a id="page131" name="page131"></a>(p. 131)</span> removed to its
+present position at the junction of Lensfield Road and Trumpington
+Road.<a id="footnotetag85" name="footnotetag85"></a><a href="#footnote85" title="Go to footnote 85"><span class="smaller">[85]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Like the University Church, the Market Place has witnessed many
+stirring scenes. Here, in the fierce but short-lived Socialistic
+outbreak which we commonly associate with the name of Wat Tyler, when
+dreams were afloat of melting down all existing distinctions into one
+great <i>Magna Societas</i>, which should redress all wrongs and make all
+men equal in all things, a mighty bonfire was made by the insurgent
+peasantry of all the books and documents which could be looted from
+the University Chest in Great St. Mary's, and from the various
+Colleges and Hostels then existing. The Mayor of Cambridge was
+compelled to give the sanction of his presence to the deed; and
+finally the ashes were scattered to the winds, with the cry: "Away
+with the skill of the clerks! Away with it!"</p>
+
+<p>Two centuries later, in 1555, the Hill saw another burning, of a more
+gruesome character. The Catholic reaction under Queen Mary was then in
+full swing; and it was determined to visit with the extreme penalty of
+the laws against heresy the corpses of two notable pioneers of the
+Reformation, Dr. Bucer and Dr. Fagius. Both were amongst the band of
+German Protestants who, under King Edward the Sixth, flocked over to
+disseminate the new Religion in England, and both had died while
+promulgating their tenets at Cambridge. They were now torn from their
+graves, and chained, in their coffins, to the stake, the pyre which
+incinerated them being chiefly composed of their own condemned books.</p>
+
+<p>Within the last decade two other notable conflagrations have here been
+kindled. When Lord Kitchener, then Sirdar of Egypt, and fresh from his
+victories over the Mahdi, visited Cambridge to receive an Honorary
+Degree, his presence amongst us was greeted by the wildest orgies. A
+huge bonfire was kindled on the Hill, the pile ultimately stretching
+diagonally across almost the entire area, and fed with ever fresh
+supplies of wood, for which the whole town was scoured. Railings were
+torn up wholesale (notably, as has been said, in the Backs), shutters
+were wrenched from shop windows, and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page132" name="page132"></a>(p. 132)</span> even doors from houses;
+while hoardings, gates, and tradesmen's barrows were seized and
+devoted to the flames. Like scenes, a few years later, on a somewhat
+smaller scale, celebrated the relief of Ladysmith in the Boer War.</p>
+
+<p>These riotous proceedings were the work of the wilder spirits of
+University and Town alike. But in the earlier part of the Nineteenth
+Century many a fierce collision between Town and Gown took place on
+the Hill. The Fifth of November was the annual occasion consecrated by
+custom to these conflicts. Bands of undergraduates paraded the streets
+shouting "Gown! Gown!" while bands of the fiercer element amongst the
+townsfolk did the like, to the cry of "Town! Town!" Fights were thus
+frequent, in spite of the efforts of the authorities, both Civic and
+Academic. Gownsmen took to flight at the appearance of the Proctors
+and their "Bulldogs,"<a id="footnotetag86" name="footnotetag86"></a><a href="#footnote86" title="Go to footnote 86"><span class="smaller">[86]</span></a> but it was to re-form elsewhere, and few
+were actually caught. The Police, when they came into existence, in
+the early 'forties, were more formidable. They invariably took the
+side of the Town,<a id="footnotetag87" name="footnotetag87"></a><a href="#footnote87" title="Go to footnote 87"><span class="smaller">[87]</span></a> and it was due to them that the "Fifth" became
+less and less pugilistic, till it is now only a memory. Fisticuffs
+were all very well, but batons made the fun not good enough.</p>
+
+<a id="chapvi" name="chapvi"></a>
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page133" name="page133"></a>(p. 133)</span> CHAPTER VI</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Round Church.&mdash;Union Society.&mdash;The "Great Bridge,"
+     Hithe.&mdash;<b>Magdalene College</b>, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles
+     Kingsley, the "College Window," Master's Garden.&mdash;Castle Hill,
+     Camboritum, Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I, the
+     "Borough," View from Castle.&mdash;St. Peter's Church.&mdash;"School of
+     Pythagoras."&mdash;Westminster College.&mdash;Ridley Hall.&mdash;<b>Newnham
+     College.</b>&mdash;<b>Selwyn College.</b>&mdash;Convent of St. Radegund, Bishop
+     Alcock.&mdash;Midsummer Common.&mdash;Boat Houses, Bumping Races.&mdash;<b>Jesus
+     College</b>, "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House, Chapel, Cranmer,
+     Coleridge.</p>
+
+<p>Starting once more from the Great Gate of Trinity and turning
+northwards past St. John's we soon reach the "Via Devana," the old
+Roman road which, as has been said, is the backbone of Cambridge,
+traversing the town, under various names, from end to end. At this
+point of its course it is called Bridge-street. Opposite to us, as we
+enter it, rises one of the most distinctive buildings of Cambridge,
+the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, popularly known as "the Round
+Church." Its strange shape is an echo of the Crusading period, during
+the whole of which such reproductions of the famous church of the Holy
+Sepulchre at Jerusalem, the deliverance of which from the Turks was
+the Crusaders' dream, were erected in various parts of England.
+Earliest in date comes the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at
+Northampton, built at the very beginning of the twelfth century, in
+the opening fervour of the first Crusade, which has also given us the
+beautiful old chapel of Ludlow Castle (now in ruins) and this church
+in Cambridge. The gallant but fruitless effort of Richard C&oelig;ur de
+Lion to retrieve the disastrous loss of Jerusalem is commemorated by
+the Temple Church in London, completed at the very close of that
+century; while the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page134" name="page134"></a>(p. 134)</span> yet more fruitless endeavours of Edward
+the First, a century later again, in the last expiring flash of
+Crusading zeal, inspired the latest of our English Round Churches,
+that of Maplestead in Essex. In all these churches the reproduction of
+their original is of a very modified character.</p>
+
+<p>So it is with our Cambridge example. It consists, indeed, (or, rather
+originally consisted) of a circular nave surrounded by an ambulatory,
+like its Jerusalem prototype, and <i>may</i>, like it, have had a domed
+roof, though this is scarcely probable. But there the likeness must
+always have ended; and the structure has, in later days, been altered
+and re-altered time after time. At first there was probably a small
+semicircular eastern apse, which within a century gave place to an
+Early English chancel. This, in turn, was superseded by the present
+chancel with its aisles, built in the fifteenth century, when an
+octagonal bell-tower was also erected over the nave. Finally, in 1841,
+the newly-formed "Camden Society" for the restoration of ancient
+churches was permitted to work its will upon this one, and proceeded
+to reconstruct it in accordance with what they imagined ought to have
+been the design of its first builders.<a id="footnotetag88" name="footnotetag88"></a><a href="#footnote88" title="Go to footnote 88"><span class="smaller">[88]</span></a> And this imaginary ideal,
+with its pointed roof and tiny Norman windows, is all that we now see.
+Nevertheless, the sight, more especially inside, is impressive in no
+small degree.</p>
+
+<a id="img030" name="img030"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img030.jpg" width="350" height="539" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Church of the Holy Sepulchre.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Behind the Round Church rise the sumptuous rooms of the "Union<a id="footnotetag89" name="footnotetag89"></a><a href="#footnote89" title="Go to footnote 89"><span class="smaller">[89]</span></a>
+Society," a University club primarily instituted as an association for
+the cultivation of oratory amongst undergraduates, which has now added
+to its central debating hall a library, dining-room, smoking-room, and
+the other adjuncts of a first-class club. Here, on each Tuesday
+evening during Term, debates are held, usually on current political or
+social situations, theological polemics being strictly barred. When
+the Society was first instituted, in the early decades of the
+nineteenth century, current politics were also prohibited (by the
+University authorities), and could only be discussed under a decent
+veil of reference to antiquity. But the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page136" name="page136"></a>(p. 136)</span> comparative merits
+of the causes championed by Cæsar and Pompey, or by the Cavaliers and
+Roundheads, were so easily made to apply to the burning questions of
+the day, that the prohibition speedily become obsolete. Many a
+well-known Parliamentary orator has won his first fame on the benches
+of the Union, Lord Macaulay being a notable example. His perfervid
+outpourings here swept away all opposition, and his friend and
+contemporary, Mackworth Praed, records how the issue of any debate is
+irrevocably decided&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="add2em"><span class="min33em">"</span>When the Favourite comes,</span><br>
+<span class="add2em">With his trumpets and drums,</span><br>
+  And his arms, and his metaphors, crossed."</p>
+
+<p>Leaving the Round Church behind us, and proceeding westwards, we pass
+the Church of St. Clement, with its inscription <span class="smcap">Deum cole</span> ("Worship
+God"), which has nothing to detain us, and shortly arrive at "the
+Great Bridge,"<a id="footnotetag90" name="footnotetag90"></a><a href="#footnote90" title="Go to footnote 90"><span class="smaller">[90]</span></a> that famous passage of the river to which the town
+owes its name and its very existence. It can never have been an
+imposing structure, in spite of its high-sounding title, and is now
+represented by an exceedingly commonplace iron span. But, as the only
+passage of the Cam approachable by an army, in fore-drainage days, for
+many a long mile, it was of old a strategic point of first-class
+importance, and more than once played a notable part in English
+history. Its possession by the anti-monarchical forces shattered the
+last efforts both of King John and of Charles the First, and brought
+about, as we shall see, the speedy ruin and death of the former.</p>
+
+<p>To the North of the Bridge, and on the Eastern bank of the River, is
+the last of the many "Hithes" (or Quays), of which we read so much in
+connection with old Cambridge, remaining in actual use for traffic.
+Here we may to this day see exemplified the ancient local proverb,
+"Here water kindleth fire;" for barges loaded with fire-wood and turf
+from the fens still discharge their cargoes at this spot.</p>
+
+<p>The old name of the Great Bridge has, for at least a century,<a id="footnotetag91" name="footnotetag91"></a><a href="#footnote91" title="Go to footnote 91"><span class="smaller">[91]</span></a> been
+commonly superseded by the appellation of "Magdalene Bridge," which
+provokes singularly humiliating comparisons <span class="pagenum"><a id="page137" name="page137"></a>(p. 137)</span> with the
+beautiful structure bearing that name at Oxford. In both cases it is
+derived from the adjoining College of St. Mary Magdalene (spelt, by a
+mere freak, at Oxford without the final e). Our College, however, is
+of a sadly lower grade than that at Oxford, with its ideal tower, and
+its beautiful chapel, and its grey cloisters, and its green "Walks"
+beside the Cherwell. Here we have but little beauty, and no very great
+historical interest. The College was first founded, in the middle of
+the fifteenth century, for the benefit of Benedictine students. It
+belonged to the great Abbey of Crowland, in the Huntingdonshire
+Fenland (though Ely, and other neighbouring Benedictine Houses, took
+part in the building), and was called Buckingham College, from its
+first special benefactor, Henry Stafford, the second Duke of
+Buckingham. At the suppression of the Abbeys, this College, like all
+other monastic property, was confiscated by King Henry the Eighth, who
+granted it to his favourite, Thomas Audley, Lord Chancellor. By him it
+was re-founded under its present name, and the nomination of the
+Master continues, even to this day, to be vested in his descendants.
+The existing representative of his family is Lord Braybrooke;<a id="footnotetag92" name="footnotetag92"></a><a href="#footnote92" title="Go to footnote 92"><span class="smaller">[92]</span></a> the
+name of whose seat, at Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex,
+records the fact that the whole property of the Benedictine Abbey of
+Walden was also granted to Lord Chancellor Audley. This Abbey had
+shared in the building of Buckingham College.</p>
+
+<p>The beginnings of the re-founded College were on a very small scale,
+with only a single College servant (who acted as cook). Even forty
+years later this number, as Dr. Caius tells us, had only increased to
+three. To this day, indeed, Magdalene remains a small and select
+College. It consists of a single Court, representing Buckingham
+College, and the further side only of a second Court beyond. This
+isolated side, an admirable arcade, built at the close of the
+seventeenth century, contains the special treasure of the College, the
+collection of books bequeathed to it by the famous diarist, Samuel
+Pepys. This remains, as he himself arranged it, in twelve oaken
+"presses" with glass doors; the books on each shelf being brought to a
+common top level by appropriately graduated blocks of wood (shaped in
+imitation of their backs) <span class="pagenum"><a id="page138" name="page138"></a>(p. 138)</span> inserted under each. The Library
+is on view on Tuesdays and Thursdays during Full Term, from 11.30 to 1
+o'clock. Over the door is the Pepys motto: <i>Mens cujusque is est
+quisque.</i> ("Each man's mind is his very Self.")</p>
+
+<p>Pepys had been a student here, and his portrait, by Lely, hangs in the
+Hall. So does that of another distinguished Magdalene man, Charles
+Kingsley, who was in residence 1839 to 1842. College tradition still
+records how he used surreptitiously to climb out of the College in the
+very early summer mornings, to be off on one of those piscatorial
+excursions which he so dearly loved. Another well-known writer
+connected with Magdalene is Mr. A. C. Benson, whose "College Window"
+was in the ground floor of the Pepysian Library range, on the North
+side, looking into the gardens of the Master's Lodge. In these gardens
+is a high terraced walk, beneath an old wall. Both terrace and wall
+are supposed to be connected with the ancient defences of Cambridge,
+but this is not proven.</p>
+
+<a id="img031" name="img031"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img031.jpg" width="350" height="425" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Peter's Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>We have, however, now come to the region where those defences did
+actually exist. For beyond this wall to the West rises the steep
+slope, partly natural and partly artificial, of the "Castle Hill,"
+towering into the great mound on which stood the Norman Keep. This was
+built by William the Conqueror; but long before his day the site,
+defensible by nature, and commanding the all-important passage of the
+river, had been utilised for military purposes. Here, probably, was a
+British post, the <i>Cam-Rhydd</i> or "Ford of the Cam," which became the
+Roman Camboritum.<a id="footnotetag93" name="footnotetag93"></a><a href="#footnote93" title="Go to footnote 93"><span class="smaller">[93]</span></a> Here Oliver Cromwell, as commander over the
+forces of the "Associated Counties,"<a id="footnotetag94" name="footnotetag94"></a><a href="#footnote94" title="Go to footnote 94"><span class="smaller">[94]</span></a> set up fortifications which
+baffled the gallant effort to retrieve his fallen fortunes made by
+Charles the First after the fatal battle of Naseby. Having there left
+his matchless infantry, "lying with their pikes charged every way as
+when they lived," the unfortunate monarch, with the remains of his
+cavalry, broke through the network of the enemies' squadrons in full
+pursuit "like hounds after a fresh stag," and made a dash for the
+Eastern Counties, "where he had a party forming." Huntingdon he took
+by surprise, and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page139" name="page139"></a>(p. 139)</span> "twice affronted the lines of Cambridge."
+But these were too strong to be rushed by horse-soldiers, and, as
+there was no other passage over the Cam, he had to retire, finally
+evading his pursuers, and making his way safely to Oxford, with all
+the loot acquired in this raid, "six waggons loaded with money,
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page140" name="page140"></a>(p. 140)</span> two thousand horses, and three thousand head of cattle." And
+the remembrance of Anglo-Saxon lines of defence round the site is
+perpetuated in the name "Borough," which still clings to it.</p>
+
+<p>Many antiquarians, indeed, hold that the Cambridge of early days
+(anyhow down to the ninth century) was wholly confined to this small
+area, some quarter of a mile square, and that the extension of the
+town across the river was due to the expulsion of the inhabitants by
+Danish and Norman intruders. Be that as it may, we are here
+undoubtedly in the earliest Cambridge. The Castle has gradually passed
+away, till no ruins, even, are now left. Its modern representative,
+the County Court-house, where the Assizes are held, and the County
+Gaol, stand at the western foot of the great mound, whereon the Norman
+Keep no longer rises. From the summit is to be obtained a delightful
+view of Cambridge, with the "green-muffled" ring of the Backs, and the
+grey inner ring of the river-side Colleges, dominated by King's
+College Chapel, girding in the western flank of the Town, and starting
+almost from our feet; the long line of the East Anglian heights
+bounding our southern and eastern prospect; and to the north the
+"boundless plain," with the towers of Ely on the far horizon.</p>
+
+<p>Close below us, and really at our very feet, rise the two churches of
+this earliest Cambridge, that of St. Giles, now merely a handsome
+modern edifice of imposing size, and that of St. Peter, also modern in
+its present form, but embodying some ancient features. It is the
+smallest church in Cambridge, only thirty-five feet in length by
+fifteen in width, being the reconstructed fragment of a larger
+structure built in the twelfth century, and pulled down in the
+eighteenth, when the Parish was united to that of St. Giles. It
+contains a fine late Norman font, with grotesque figures at each
+corner&mdash;two-tailed Mer-men, each grasping his tails in either hand. At
+one time the Borough had yet a third church, "All Hallows by the
+Castle" (so called to distinguish it from "All Hallows in the Jewry"),
+but this has wholly disappeared, Parish and all.</p>
+
+<a id="img032" name="img032"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img032.jpg" width="350" height="547" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Remains of St. Radegund's Priory.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Beyond the spire of St. Peter's, as seen from the top of Castle Hill,
+may be distinguished a small mediæval building, known, for some
+forgotten reason, by the high-sounding title of "the School of
+Pythagoras." This lies just off the street <span class="pagenum"><a id="page142" name="page142"></a>(p. 142)</span> to the eastward,
+at the point where this ceases to be a street, and merges into the
+open road that runs along the Backs. It is worth seeking out, for it
+is a picturesque little edifice, and an interesting example of a
+twelfth-century house built of stone. Wood, or, at the best, brick,
+were the materials then commonly used. In spite of the name, there is
+no reason to suppose that it was ever used for scholastic purposes, or
+anything more than a mere private dwelling-house. But Walter de
+Merton, the founder of Merton College, Oxford, actually acquired land
+hereabouts, apparently with some idea of starting a sister
+establishment at Cambridge. This land still belongs to Merton.</p>
+
+<p>The great red brick and white stone edifice opposite the entrance to
+the School of Pythagoras is "Westminster College," wherein candidates
+for the Presbyterian ministry go through their theological course,
+after completing their secular studies at the University. A like
+institution for Anglicans, built in like style (which, indeed, is all
+but universal in modern academic work), is Ridley Hall, at the other
+end of the Backs. Neither of these is recognised by the University as
+anything more than a private lodging-house, nor is the similar (but
+much smaller) Roman Catholic seminary of Edmundhouse, on the slope
+above Westminster College.</p>
+
+<p>The same non-recognition extends to the great Ladies' College of
+Newnham, which flings out its widespread "halls" over a lavish space
+adjoining Ridley. The grand bronze entrance gates to these "vestal
+precincts," inscribed with the name of the first Principal of the
+College, Miss Anne Jemima Clough (sister to the poet Arthur Clough)
+are hard by the more modest entrance to Ridley, and admit the visitor
+to a scene which reminds us of those in Tennyson's "Princess." And
+there are almost as many maidens here as he has assigned to his
+imaginary College, for Newnham is surpassed in the number of its
+students by Trinity only. Each has her own room, in which the bed
+becomes by day a sofa. Each is assigned to one of the "Halls," which
+in many respects are treated as separate entities, but all share the
+common collegiate life. There is, however, no chapel, for Newnham is
+most strictly undenominational. Students are, of course, free to
+attend any place of worship they may prefer, the preference being
+largely given to King's College Chapel. Hence a French <span class="pagenum"><a id="page143" name="page143"></a>(p. 143)</span>
+traveller, who came over to study Women's Education in England, is
+said to have answered when asked on his return what religion was
+professed at Newnham: "Mostly, I think, the King's religion."</p>
+
+<a id="img033" name="img033"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img033.jpg" width="350" height="552" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Jesus College Gateway.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page144" name="page144"></a>(p. 144)</span> The other Ladies' College, at Girton, has got a chapel, where
+the Church of England services are performed. This is the oldest of
+all the ladies' colleges connected with Oxford or Cambridge, and hence
+comes its position no less than two miles to the west of Castle Hill;
+for when the idea was first started, the close proximity of young men
+was deprecated almost in the trenchant spirit of Princess Ida. The
+very first start, indeed, was made (in 1869) no less than thirty miles
+away, at Hitchin, and only when this was found intolerable did the
+pioneers move (in 1872) to Girton.<a id="footnotetag95" name="footnotetag95"></a><a href="#footnote95" title="Go to footnote 95"><span class="smaller">[95]</span></a> There the beautiful grounds and
+splendid range of buildings give an impression of space rivalling
+Newnham; but the College is not nearly so large, and is somewhat more
+select. Here each student has a sitting-room as well as a bedroom,
+after the fashion of the men's Colleges.</p>
+
+<p>Immediately to the north of Newnham is Selwyn College, a
+denominational institution belonging to the Church of England,
+corresponding to Keble College at Oxford, and, like it, recognised by
+the University, not indeed as a College, but as a "Public Hostel,"
+whose undergraduates are not mere "non-collegiate students." Such
+"unattached" students are under a "Censor" and a special syndicate,
+and have a centre in the "Fitzwilliam Hall" (close to the museum of
+that name), where they have to report themselves daily.</p>
+
+<a id="img034" name="img034"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img034.jpg" width="350" height="533" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Back Court, Jesus College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Looking eastwards from the Castle Hill, we see a wide, open green
+stretching from the further bank of the river, and beyond it a low
+church tower rising amid trees. This is the tower of Jesus College
+Chapel, once the Priory Church of St. Radegund. This lady was a
+Frankish queen of the sixth century, and a friend of the poet
+Venantius, the author of the well-known hymns <i>Vexilla Regis</i> and
+<i>Pange Lingua</i>. Under her dedication a Benedictine nunnery was founded
+here at the beginning of the eleventh century. It was never a large or
+wealthy institution, but continued to flourish for four hundred years
+and more. In 1455 its account books, still preserved among the
+archives of Jesus College, show an income of £70 per annum, equivalent
+in purchasing power to some £1,200 at the present value of money.
+Every Benedictine nun ranked socially as a gentlewoman, so that this
+income <span class="pagenum"><a id="page146" name="page146"></a>(p. 146)</span> needed careful administration to make it suffice for
+the nine or ten sisters in residence. The Convent, however, was at
+this date quite solvent, but in less than twenty years a single
+incapable Prioress had run it deep in debt. The butcher's bill alone
+then amounted to £21 (equivalent to over £350), and, having no cash to
+pay withal, the nuns were taking two of his daughters free amongst the
+boarders whom they educated. They were also alienating their capital,
+so that the income was rapidly dwindling. In 1481 it had decreased by
+more than 50 per cent., and was only £30. The next Prioress was a
+strong and capable ruler, imposed upon the convent by the Bishop of
+the Diocese, who was its Visitor. But things had gone too far, and, in
+spite of her efforts, the place dwindled away. By 1496 there were only
+two nuns left, and, under Royal license, the convent was turned into
+"Jesus College" by the same Visitor. His name was Alcock, so his coat
+of arms bore three cocks' heads, with yet another cock for crest. This
+device confronts us at every turn in our passage through the College.</p>
+
+<a id="img035" name="img035"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img035.jpg" width="300" height="504" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Jesus College Chapel, East End.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>To reach it from Castle Hill, the most pleasant way is by descending
+the street, and turning to the left past St. Giles' Church. This road
+will soon bring us to the river, at a lock, where we cross by an iron
+foot-bridge. We are now on the open Green we saw from above, which is
+known as "Midsummer Common," from the great fair held there at that
+season. As we make our way over it, we see to our left along the river
+bank the long white boathouses<a id="footnotetag96" name="footnotetag96"></a><a href="#footnote96" title="Go to footnote 96"><span class="smaller">[96]</span></a> of the various colleges; for it is
+not till below this lock that the river becomes navigable for an
+eight-oar, and all the University rowing is done between it and that
+next below, at Baitsbite, three miles and more down the stream to the
+northward. Baitsbite<a id="footnotetag97" name="footnotetag97"></a><a href="#footnote97" title="Go to footnote 97"><span class="smaller">[97]</span></a> is the starting-point of the annual college
+races, held at the conclusion of the May Term.<a id="footnotetag98" name="footnotetag98"></a><a href="#footnote98" title="Go to footnote 98"><span class="smaller">[98]</span></a> As is well known,
+these are decided by "bumping," the boats all starting simultaneously
+one behind another, with a clear interval of two <span class="pagenum"><a id="page148" name="page148"></a>(p. 148)</span> lengths
+between each. Any boat making a bump takes the place of its defeated
+rival in the next race, and has the privilege of rowing back to its
+boat-house with its flag flying.<a id="footnotetag99" name="footnotetag99"></a><a href="#footnote99" title="Go to footnote 99"><span class="smaller">[99]</span></a> This is also done by the boat
+Head of the River, which, of course, cannot bump, though it may be
+bumped. Should a boat make its bump on each of the four evenings that
+the races last, the crew are said to "get their oars," each man's oar
+becoming his personal property and being usually hung in his rooms as
+a trophy, appropriately painted with the College colours. These
+colours are also worn for racing; the most easily recognised being the
+bright scarlet of Lady Margaret (St. John's), the black and white of
+Trinity Hall, the green of Queens', the black and yellow of Clare, and
+the red and black of Jesus. The flags always bear the College arms,
+except that "First Trinity" fly the three crowned lions of King Edward
+the Third.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving the distant prospect of the boathouses behind us, we resume
+our way to Jesus College, the grounds of which are separated from
+Midsummer Common by a broad ditch. Skirting this, we come to "Jesus
+Lane," and, turning to the right, reach the main entrance to the
+College, opposite the red brick façade of "Westcott House" (like
+Ridley Hall, an Anglican Clergy Training School), and the tall spire
+of the new Church of All Saints.<a id="footnotetag100" name="footnotetag100"></a><a href="#footnote100" title="Go to footnote 100"><span class="smaller">[100]</span></a> Iron gates admit us into a long
+passage, between red brick walls, known as "the Chimney," which
+conducts us to the College gate. Jesus is a large college, with
+several courts, but all that is much worth seeing is the chapel with
+its cloisters, to reach which we must seek a low-browed doorway to the
+east of the entrance gate. Both are relics of the nunnery. The latter,
+indeed, were rebuilt in the eighteenth century; but the nineteenth has
+rediscovered, in their eastern range, the beautiful Early English
+entrance into the Nuns' Chapter House. At the north-east corner of the
+cloisters we find the door into the chapel.</p>
+
+<p>This bears little resemblance to the conventional College Chapel,
+being a cruciform church of the ordinary Norman shape, with a central
+tower. Very little of the work, however, is Norman, for the nuns did
+not get far on with their design <span class="pagenum"><a id="page149" name="page149"></a>(p. 149)</span> till the twelfth century
+had come in and the Early English period had commenced. A beautiful
+gem of this style the chapel is, and, for once in a way, the drastic
+"restoration" to which it was subjected in early Victorian days is
+matter of real thankfulness.<a id="footnotetag101" name="footnotetag101"></a><a href="#footnote101" title="Go to footnote 101"><span class="smaller">[101]</span></a> The building had been sadly mauled
+about in the course of ages; the high-pitched roof lowered, the
+eastern lancets destroyed. All is now brought back, in excellent
+taste, to what it was at first. The old chancel has become the chapel
+proper, the transepts and the short nave serving as the ante-chapel.</p>
+
+<a id="img036" name="img036"></a>
+<div class="floatright">
+<img src="images/img036.jpg" width="200" height="425" alt="" title="">
+<p class="caption200"><i>Oriel of Hall, Jesus College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In this the windows are filled with fine Morris glass, the rich hues
+of which are, unfortunately, much faded from their pristine
+brilliance. That at the end of the south transept, which first meets
+the eye, is occupied, above, by a magnificent group of the Celestial
+Hierarchy, in all its nine Orders&mdash;Angels, Archangels, Virtues,
+Principalities, Dominions, Powers, Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, with
+the addition, in the tenth place, of Man, as the image of God; and,
+below, by nine Saints, including St. Radegund, with the addition of
+Bishop Alcock. The four other windows of the transept show the four
+Evangelists, each attending a pair of Sibyls,<a id="footnotetag102" name="footnotetag102"></a><a href="#footnote102" title="Go to footnote 102"><span class="smaller">[102]</span></a> and, in the tower
+lights, Gospel scenes illustrating the Incarnation, Passion,
+Resurrection, and Ascension of Christ respectively. The nave windows,
+on the south, have Patriarchs and Prophets, with scenes beneath from
+the life or writings of each; and, on the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page150" name="page150"></a>(p. 150)</span> north, emblematic
+figures representing the Cardinal and Theological Virtues, each
+trampling under her feet the contrary Vice.</p>
+
+<p>The most notable of the alumni of Jesus College was also one of the
+earliest&mdash;Archbishop Cranmer. It is from his having been here that he
+is so often and so ridiculously said to have been brought up in a
+<i>Jesuit</i> seminary!<a id="footnotetag103" name="footnotetag103"></a><a href="#footnote103" title="Go to footnote 103"><span class="smaller">[103]</span></a> Another notability was the poet Coleridge, who
+was here from 1790 to 1792. He was not an academic success, for, like
+his contemporaries, Wordsworth at St. John's, and Southey at Christ
+Church, he was carried away by the revolutionary spirit then rampant,
+and, being more audacious than they, got into more scrapes. One of his
+freaks was to trace out in gunpowder on the college lawns the words
+<span class="smcap">Liberty and Equality</span>, which not only produced a sensation when the
+train was fired, but left the obnoxious sentiment permanently branded
+on the sacred grass. Finally he ran away. But he was taken back, and
+did not lose his love for his old college; for, long afterwards, we
+find him writing of "the friendly Cloisters and happy Grove of quiet,
+ever-honoured Jesus College, Cambridge." The Grove is the name given
+to the grassy field, begirt with trees, which is bordered by the ditch
+separating the College grounds from Midsummer Common.</p>
+
+<p>The western portion of that common is often called "Jesus Green." It
+witnessed the execution of the only Marian martyr burnt at Cambridge.
+His pile was largely formed of Protestant books of devotion, one of
+which, "a Communion Book," he picked up and read diligently till the
+flames overpowered him, "praising God, who had sent him this
+consolation in his death."</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page151" name="page151"></a>(p. 151)</span> CHAPTER VII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle"><b>Sidney Sussex College</b>, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners.&mdash;Holy
+     Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn.&mdash;<b>Christ's College</b>, "God's House,"
+     Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden, Milton,
+     Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin.&mdash;Great St. Andrew's, Bishop
+     Perry.&mdash;<b>Emmanuel College</b>, Harvard, Sancroft, Chapel,
+     Ponds.&mdash;University Museums.&mdash;<b>Downing College.</b>&mdash;Coe Fen.&mdash;First
+     Mile Stone.&mdash;Barnwell, Priory, Abbey Church.&mdash;Lepers Chapel,
+     Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair.</p>
+
+<p>Following Jesus Lane from the "Chimney" gate townwards, we once more
+strike into the Via Devana, here called Sidney Street, from the
+College filling the angle between the two roads. It is not a
+pretentious institution, having always been amongst the smallest
+colleges. But it has nurtured one man of colossal individuality, the
+great Protector, Oliver Cromwell. For Sidney Sussex College (as its
+full name runs, from its foundress, Lady Frances Sidney,<a id="footnotetag104" name="footnotetag104"></a><a href="#footnote104" title="Go to footnote 104"><span class="smaller">[104]</span></a> Countess
+of Sussex) was instituted (in 1596) for the very purpose of fostering
+such <i>alumni</i>. The earliest statutes of the College decree that its
+members shall be taught, before all else, to "detest and abhor
+Popery." Besides Cromwell, his right-hand man, Edward Montagu, Earl of
+Manchester, who distinguished himself when in authority at Cambridge
+during the Civil War by ejecting from their parishes so many recusant
+High Church parsons and filling their places with Puritan divines, was
+also a Sidney man. Both he and Cromwell were "Fellow Commoners," a
+name given to privileged undergraduates who, on payment of extra fees,
+were permitted to rank with the Fellows and to dine at the High Table.
+They also wore a more <span class="pagenum"><a id="page152" name="page152"></a>(p. 152)</span> ornate gown than the ordinary
+undergraduate. It is only of late years that this plutocratic
+arrangement has been discontinued in the University. The site of
+Sidney was formerly that of the Franciscan Convent, with its splendid
+church, considered the finest in Cambridge. At the dissolution of the
+convent the University tried to secure this from King Henry the Eighth
+as the University Church. But the King's price was too high, the
+negotiations fell through, and the glorious building was remorselessly
+and utterly demolished.</p>
+
+<p>Passing by Sidney, which has nothing to detain us, we shortly note a
+church on our right hand. This is Holy Trinity, the special home of
+the Evangelical movement in Cambridge. In the early days of that
+movement (and of the nineteenth century) the pulpit here was occupied
+by its great leader, Charles Simeon, Fellow of King's College, who
+through much persecution, through evil report and good report,
+championed the cause till he saw it triumphant. And a series of
+like-minded men has followed him.<a id="footnotetag105" name="footnotetag105"></a><a href="#footnote105" title="Go to footnote 105"><span class="smaller">[105]</span></a> The grey stone building just
+beside the church is the Henry Martyn Hall, built in memory of that
+great Evangelical pioneer and missionary. It is used for meetings
+connected with the movement.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving Holy Trinity to our right, a turn in the street brings us face
+to face with the grey stone front of Christ's College, one of the most
+ideal in Cambridge. We owe it, like St. John's, to the bounty of the
+Lady Margaret Tudor, King Henry the Seventh's mother, whose beautiful
+character has already been dwelt upon in our last chapter. And she
+bestowed it upon us under the same inspiration as in the case of St.
+John's, that of her friend and confessor, Bishop Fisher, and, in doing
+so, adopted the same plan of transforming and expanding an earlier
+Foundation. This was a very small "School of Grammar," which never
+attained to the dignity of collegiate rank, founded in 1430 by John
+Bingham, parson of St. John Zachary, just before he and his Church
+were swept away to make room for King's College. It was then removed
+to this site, just outside the "Barnwell Gate" of Cambridge, where it
+maintained a microscopic existence for the rest of that century.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page153" name="page153"></a>(p. 153)</span>
+
+<a id="img037" name="img037"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img037.jpg" width="500" height="369" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Christ's College Chapel.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>At the beginning of the next it had the good fortune to be taken up by
+Lady Margaret, who increased the number of residents maintained in it
+from five to sixty, and changed the name from "God's House" to
+"Christ's College." At the same time she planned out the principal
+court, as it now exists. Unlike St. John's, it was at least partly
+completed before her death, for the historian Fuller tells a pretty
+story of how she here beheld from a window the dean administering to
+one of the scholars the corporal chastisement which was at that day
+the recognised means of discipline,<a id="footnotetag106" name="footnotetag106"></a><a href="#footnote106" title="Go to footnote 106"><span class="smaller">[106]</span></a> and called out to him
+"<i>Lente! Lente!</i>" ("Gently! gently!") The College is <span class="pagenum"><a id="page154" name="page154"></a>(p. 154)</span>
+appropriately full of her memory: her portrait adorns the Hall; on the
+front of the Gate Tower stands her statue, between the Plantagenet
+Rose and the Tudor Portcullis, and beneath it are carved her armorial
+bearings, as at St. John's, with the addition of the crest, a
+demi-eagle of gold rising out of a crown.<a id="footnotetag107" name="footnotetag107"></a><a href="#footnote107" title="Go to footnote 107"><span class="smaller">[107]</span></a> On either side are the
+three feathers of the Prince of Wales. These same arms, emblazoned,
+are over the inner gateway that leads into the Gardens, with her own
+beautiful motto, "<i>Souvent me souvient</i>" ("Oft I bethink me"). And in
+the Library under a glass shade is a reproduction of the upper part of
+her person, with the hands folded in prayer, from her monument in
+Westminster Abbey.</p>
+
+<p>But, to the ordinary visitor, the memory of even Lady Margaret is, at
+Christ's, overshadowed by the mightier memory of John Milton, who was
+in residence here for seven years, from 1625 till, in 1632, he became
+a Master of Arts. In residence along with him was his "Lycidas," whose
+real name was Edward King. In the gardens an ancient mulberry tree, so
+old that its stem has to be encased in a pyramid of turf, and its
+remaining arms jealously shored up, is called by his name. The
+tradition that he himself planted it is probably unfounded, but it was
+actually there in his day, one of the score of these trees which, by
+the desire of King James the First, were placed in the gardens.</p>
+
+<p>The gardens here are amongst the few College Gardens which at
+Cambridge are open to the public. During certain hours visitors are
+admitted, and no small privilege it is; for there are few lovelier
+spots than this verdurous lawn, shut in on one side by the grey
+"Garden Front" of the College,<a id="footnotetag108" name="footnotetag108"></a><a href="#footnote108" title="Go to footnote 108"><span class="smaller">[108]</span></a> with its balustraded cornice and
+transomed windows, and everywhere else "bosomed high in tufted
+trees";<a id="footnotetag109" name="footnotetag109"></a><a href="#footnote109" title="Go to footnote 109"><span class="smaller">[109]</span></a>&mdash;an ideal place for Milton's own</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="add10em">"retired Leisure,</span><br>
+  That in trim gardens takes his pleasure."<a id="footnotetag110" name="footnotetag110"></a><a href="#footnote110" title="Go to footnote 110"><span class="smaller">[110]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Hidden in a thicket at the north-eastern corner is a sequestered
+swimming-bath, fed by a stream drawn off from Hobson's <span class="pagenum"><a id="page155" name="page155"></a>(p. 155)</span>
+conduit. To climb the statue beside this and dive off the head is a
+current feat amongst Christ's men. Something of a feat it is;
+requiring considerable sureness of foot and skill in balancing
+oneself.</p>
+
+<p>To reach the Gardens we must cross the first court, a singularly
+pleasant example of a College Court, rendered the more picturesque by
+the central grass-plot being circular instead of the usual rectangle,
+and pass on through the "Screens" at its north-eastern corner. Here we
+are in another Court, only in part surrounded by buildings; the
+"Fellows' Buildings" being immediately in front of us. As Christ's,
+unlike most Colleges, has but one entrance,<a id="footnotetag111" name="footnotetag111"></a><a href="#footnote111" title="Go to footnote 111"><span class="smaller">[111]</span></a> we shall have to
+retrace our steps. In passing the Hall we should, if possible, look in
+to note the portraits of the College worthies. Amongst these are to be
+found not only Lady Margaret, Bishop Fisher, and Milton, but Quarles
+(the author of the "Emblems"), Paley, the Evidencer of
+Christianity,<a id="footnotetag112" name="footnotetag112"></a><a href="#footnote112" title="Go to footnote 112"><span class="smaller">[112]</span></a> who was a Fellow here in the eighteenth century,
+and the epoch-making name of Charles Darwin, the Apostle of Evolution.</p>
+
+<p>From Christ's we continue along the Via Devana, here called St.
+Andrew's Street from the unlovely church of that name<a id="footnotetag113" name="footnotetag113"></a><a href="#footnote113" title="Go to footnote 113"><span class="smaller">[113]</span></a> which we
+see opposite the College. Of old the name was Preachers' Street, from
+the great preaching Order of the Dominican Friars, who from the
+thirteenth to the sixteenth <span class="pagenum"><a id="page156" name="page156"></a>(p. 156)</span> century here found their home.
+The site of their House is now occupied by our next College, Emmanuel,
+as that of the Franciscans was by Sidney. It is remarkable that the
+ground of both the great Orders which were called into existence
+specially to preach the doctrines of Catholicism should have passed
+into the hands of men whose main object was to contest those
+doctrines. But so it was. Emmanuel, like Sidney, was founded (1584)
+expressly to combat the errors of Popery; and the Founder, Sir Thomas
+Mildmay, a courtier of Queen Elizabeth, has left on record his special
+wish that his College should turn out a constant supply of able
+Puritan divines.</p>
+
+<p>His hope was realised. Emmanuel at once sprang to the front as the
+great power-house of the Puritan movement in Cambridge; and so strong
+was that movement that for the moment it carried the College to the
+very top of the list, so that it surpassed in numbers even Trinity and
+St. John's. Many of the stalwarts who belonged to the Pilgrim Fathers
+of New England were here educated; notably John Harvard, whose name is
+borne by the Premier University of America. So also were many of the
+preachers who kindled and sustained the ardour of the Roundheads
+through the stress of the Civil War. Even after the Restoration the
+College retained the impress of its Founder's hope. When, in 1664, the
+Duke of Monmouth visited Cambridge, a satirical guide to the
+University, written in doggerel Latin verse for his benefit, sneers at
+the strict moral tone of Emmanuel: "You may well perceive that they
+are all Puritans here." And Archbishop Sancroft, famous as the chief
+of the Seven Bishops who made so staunch a stand against the
+toleration of Roman Catholics under James the Second, was an Emmanuel
+man.</p>
+
+<a id="img038" name="img038"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img038.jpg" width="350" height="510" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Emmanuel College.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>For the first century of its existence, the students of Emmanuel
+worshipped in an unconsecrated building running north and south,<a id="footnotetag114" name="footnotetag114"></a><a href="#footnote114" title="Go to footnote 114"><span class="smaller">[114]</span></a>
+where they received the Sacrament "sitting on forms about the
+Communion Table, and pulling the loaf one after other when the
+minister hath begun. And so the cup; ... without any application of
+the sacred <span class="pagenum"><a id="page158" name="page158"></a>(p. 158)</span> words." But in 1679 this room was turned into
+the College Library, and the present chapel built on the usual
+Anglican lines.</p>
+
+<p>Emmanuel has little architectural beauty; but there are pleasant
+grounds, with a swimming-bath, as at Christ's, and two larger ponds,
+in which swans and wild ducks are kept. The swimming-bath and the
+smaller pond are accessible only by the favour of a Fellow; but the
+large piece of water is in a great open court (beyond the first
+court). All are fed from a branch of the Hobson's Conduit stream,
+runlets from which run down St. Andrew's Street, even as they run down
+Trumpington Street. Beyond the swan-pond lie the new buildings, lately
+erected to meet the greater expansion of the College, for Emmanuel,
+after over two centuries of depression, now ranks (along with Caius
+and Pembroke) at the head of the list with regard to relative numbers,
+except Trinity alone. In actual numbers she broke in 1890 her record
+of 1628, and has gone on advancing steadily since. Her shield bears a
+blue lion ramping on a white ground and holding a laurel wreath,
+emblematic of the victory of the "Lion of the tribe of Judah."</p>
+
+<p>Immediately opposite the front gate of Emmanuel there runs off, at
+right angles, from the Via Devana, a thoroughfare known as Downing
+Street. Till the present century it actually gave access to Downing,
+the youngest of the Colleges to which the University officially
+accords that title. In those days Downing consisted of a huge
+parallelogram of prettily be-treed greensward, a furlong across and
+three furlongs long,<a id="footnotetag115" name="footnotetag115"></a><a href="#footnote115" title="Go to footnote 115"><span class="smaller">[115]</span></a> thus covering far more space than any other
+college. But in numbers it was the smallest of all, and also in
+income, till finally agricultural depression reduced it to such
+straits that it was forced to sell its northern frontage to the
+University. Thus Downing Street now leads, not to Downing, but to the
+great central huddle of University museums, laboratories, and
+lecture-rooms, which have been incessantly rising during the last two
+generations, and which are still continuing to rise. Here, cheek by
+jowl (on the site of the old Austin Friary), are the magnificent
+Geological Museum erected in memory of Professor Sedgwick, the Museum
+of Botany, the Law <span class="pagenum"><a id="page159" name="page159"></a>(p. 159)</span> Schools, the Museum of Archæology, the
+Museum of Anatomy,<a id="footnotetag116" name="footnotetag116"></a><a href="#footnote116" title="Go to footnote 116"><span class="smaller">[116]</span></a> the Museum of Mineralogy, the Chemical
+Laboratory, the Medical Schools,<a id="footnotetag117" name="footnotetag117"></a><a href="#footnote117" title="Go to footnote 117"><span class="smaller">[117]</span></a> the Physical Laboratory,<a id="footnotetag118" name="footnotetag118"></a><a href="#footnote118" title="Go to footnote 118"><span class="smaller">[118]</span></a>
+the Engineering Laboratory, the Optical Lecture-room, and, beside
+these, the Philosophical Library, and the huge Examination Hall which
+is the latest addition to the equipment of the University.</p>
+
+<p>To reach Downing to-day, one must turn to the left on leaving
+Emmanuel, and continue along the Via Devana (here called Regent
+Street) till large iron gates on the opposite side of the road invite
+us to enter the College grounds. These give still an impressive sense
+of space, though now curtailed at the southern as well as the northern
+end, and form a pretty setting for the two parallel ranges of yellow
+stone, which date from the beginning of the nineteenth century. For
+though Downing was by that time keeping the centenary of its
+foundation (by Sir George Downing, of Gamlingay in Cambridgeshire),
+the funds had not hitherto admitted of the erection of college
+buildings. When first set up, these classical frontages were
+considered the <i>ne plus ultra</i> of architectural perfection, and
+strangers were taken to see them as the great glory of Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>Regent Street, after we leave Downing, will soon bring us again to the
+Church of Our Lady, so that we have now completed our circuit of
+Cambridge. There remain, however, a few outlying spots worth a visit
+should time serve. Nearest and most picturesque of these is Coe Fen, a
+long strip of common, lying along the eastern bank of the river,
+before it enters on its course through the Backs. The best time to see
+it is at sunset, and the best way to gain it is by following down the
+narrow byway beside Little St. Mary's, and turning to the left at the
+bottom. We shall then find ourselves on the Fen, beneath the old wall
+of Peterhouse deerpark, a delicious, heavily-buttressed, mass of red
+brick-work, leaning over and curved with age, patched and re-patched
+all over with all <span class="pagenum"><a id="page160" name="page160"></a>(p. 160)</span> kinds of fragments, giving colour effects
+that are quite charming.<a id="footnotetag119" name="footnotetag119"></a><a href="#footnote119" title="Go to footnote 119"><span class="smaller">[119]</span></a> Passing beyond its shelter, and that of
+its continuing hedge (which divides us from Peterhouse and other
+gardens), we may take the first turn to the left, up a narrow (and
+often dirty) byway, which will lead us past the Leys School, the great
+Wesleyan educational outpost of Cambridge, into the Trumpington Road,
+where it joins Lensfield Road at Hobson's Conduit. Or, instead of
+turning to the left we may turn to the right, and, crossing the Cam by
+the iron footbridge, make our way over "Sheep's Green," the Common
+east of the river, to Newnham Mill and the Backs. Or we may hold
+straight on, by the footpath that runs the whole length of the Fen,
+which will bring us out on the Trumpington Road just by the first
+milestone, where that road crosses "Vicar's Brook."</p>
+
+<p>It is from this side that we notice how this is no ordinary milestone,
+but a grand monolith twelve or fifteen feet in length, and feel that
+it must have a story. And so indeed it has, for it is the very first
+milestone ever set up in Britain since the days of the Roman dominion
+here. In those days every great road in the country had its series of
+milestones recording the distance from the central milestone in
+London, which still exists, in its decay, as "London Stone." But after
+the mighty organisation of the Roman Empire lost its hold upon the
+land, roads went to ruin, and milestones were broken up or used for
+Anglo-Saxon gate-posts. Not till 1729 was the idea of restoring the
+system entertained; and it was a Cambridge College, Trinity Hall, that
+first took it up, and carried it out on the road from Cambridge to
+London. Hence it is that these milestones bear the Crescent of the
+College shield. And for their inaugural milestone was chosen this
+grand monolith, which was itself an old Roman milestone.</p>
+
+<p>North-east of Cambridge stretch the mesh of dingy streets which make
+up the great suburb of Barnwell. Hither and thither they run, in
+soul-crushing monotony; yet even here there are gems of interest to be
+found. The suburb came into existence, to begin with, through the
+proximity of a great Abbey, the Augustinian Priory of Barnwell. This
+House of Religion was founded in the first instance by Hugoline, the
+pious wife of Picot, William the Conqueror's far from pious Sheriff of
+Cambridgeshire. It was by her located close <span class="pagenum"><a id="page161" name="page161"></a>(p. 161)</span> beneath his
+dwelling-place in the Castle, and dedicated to St. Giles. Half a
+century later, the Picot land was forfeited for treason, and granted
+to Richard Peverel, who had been, in the First Crusade,
+standard-bearer to Robert Curthose, the Conqueror's eldest son. He
+transferred the House to the riverside, hard by a holy spring, the
+Burn Well (or source of the Brook), where a hermit of special sanctity
+had already reared an Oratory dedicated to St. Andrew. He also raised
+the number of monks from six to thirty, to correspond with that of his
+own years at the time.</p>
+
+<p>The Abbey grew and flourished. Its inmates, as appears from their
+"Custom Book" of 1296 (lately published by Mr. J. W. Clark), led a
+very civilised life&mdash;cleanliness being specially insisted upon; and
+its proximity to Cambridge placed it in touch with political life.
+Royalty stayed in it now and again; in 1388 even Sessions of
+Parliament were held in it; Papal Legates visited it.<a id="footnotetag120" name="footnotetag120"></a><a href="#footnote120" title="Go to footnote 120"><span class="smaller">[120]</span></a> And when
+civil wars broke out, it was a prize worth plundering; a fate it more
+than once suffered. When the final plunder came, under Henry the
+Eighth, the whole was utterly swept away; the only thing left being a
+small stone building, which was apparently the Muniment room of the
+Abbey. Though utterly ruinous, this little block is by no means
+without architectural merit, and may be found by following the
+Newmarket Road (which enters Cambridge as "Jesus Lane") to its
+junction with East Road (the eastward continuation of Lensfield Road).
+Here Abbey Street runs down to the river, and just off it is our
+building, commonly known as the "Priory Chapel." Hard by is an old
+red-brick dwelling-house, bearing the date 1578, and called the "Abbey
+Barn"; and in its grounds are several venerable fragments.</p>
+
+<p>In close proximity to these ruins is an actually surviving relic of
+Barnwell Priory. This is a tiny church of Early English Architecture,
+known as the "Abbey Church," or "Little St. Andrew's."<a id="footnotetag121" name="footnotetag121"></a><a href="#footnote121" title="Go to footnote 121"><span class="smaller">[121]</span></a> Small as
+it is, it is the Mother Church of a huge parish (now happily divided
+into districts) containing <span class="pagenum"><a id="page162" name="page162"></a>(p. 162)</span> more than half the entire
+population of the Borough of Cambridge. It was built by the Canons of
+Barnwell, when their Priory was a century old, for the use of the
+little knot of hangers-on whom every great abbey attracted to its
+doors, and whose secular (and, perhaps, far from cleanly) presence was
+unwelcome at the fastidious worship of the Priory Church. And they
+made it the representative of the old hermit's Oratory of St. Andrew.
+For long ages it sufficed for the adjoining population; but when that
+population increased by the hundred-fold, as it did at the opening of
+the nineteenth century, things got to a desperate pass, and Barnwell
+became practically heathen, with an only too well-deserved reputation
+for vice of every kind.</p>
+
+<p>So matters stood when, in 1839, Dr. Perry, Fellow of Trinity College,
+who was Senior Wrangler in 1828, and whom we have met with as the
+devoutest attendant at the College Chapel, and as the builder of Great
+St. Andrew's, came forward to stem the evil. Renouncing the comfort of
+College life, he took upon himself the charge of this hopeless
+district; for which he built, at his own expense, the commodious (if
+ugly) red-brick church opposite the Abbey, and a like fabric (St.
+Paul's) at the other end of the area, on the way to the railway
+station. He laboured devotedly himself, he inspired others to work, he
+invoked the help of a band of pious undergraduates who had already
+begun a Sunday School on their own account,<a id="footnotetag122" name="footnotetag122"></a><a href="#footnote122" title="Go to footnote 122"><span class="smaller">[122]</span></a> and when he departed
+to become the pioneer Bishop of Australia, he left a well-equipped
+Parish organisation which is still in full activity.<a id="footnotetag123" name="footnotetag123"></a><a href="#footnote123" title="Go to footnote 123"><span class="smaller">[123]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img039" name="img039"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img039.jpg" width="500" height="391" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Lepers' Chapel, Barnwell.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Pursuing the Newmarket Road, we find (at the point where it at last
+ceases to be a Barnwell Street, and crosses the railway into the open
+country beyond), yet another tiny ancient church, called traditionally
+the "Lepers' Chapel." It is of Norman date, and probably served the
+Lepers' Hospital, which we know to have existed hereabouts, as remote
+as might be from the town. This hospital was endowed by King John
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page163" name="page163"></a>(p. 163)</span> with the tolls of the great Fair held hard by on Stourbridge
+Common, which even so late as the Eighteenth Century boasted itself
+the largest and most important in all Europe, a position now claimed
+by that of Nijni Novgorod in Russia. And, to judge by the accounts
+that have come down to us, the boast was not unfounded. The
+Cambridgeshire historian, Carter, writing in 1753, thus describes it:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"Stourbridge Fair ... is set out annually on St. Bartholomew by
+     the Mayor, Aldermen, and the rest of the Corporation of
+     Cambridge; who all ride thither in a grand procession, with music
+     playing before them, and most of the boys in the town on
+     horseback after them, who, as soon as the ceremony is read over,
+     ride races about the place; when returning to Cambridge each boy
+     has a cake and some ale at the Town Hall. On the 7th of September
+     they ride in the same manner to proclaim it; which being done,
+     the Fair begins, and continues three weeks; though the greatest
+     part is over in a fortnight.</p>
+
+     <p>"This Fair, which was thought some years ago to be the greatest
+     in Europe, is kept in a cornfield, about half a mile square,
+     having the River <span class="pagenum"><a id="page164" name="page164"></a>(p. 164)</span> Cam running on the north side thereof,
+     and the rivulet called the Stour (from which and the bridge over
+     it the Fair received its name) on the east side, and it is about
+     two miles east of Cambridge market-place; where, during the Fair,
+     coaches, chaises, and chariots attend to carry persons to the
+     Fair. The chief diversions at Stourbridge are drolls,
+     rope-dancing, and sometimes a music-booth; but there is an Act of
+     Parliament which prohibits the acting of plays within fifteen
+     miles of Cambridge.</p>
+
+     <p>"If the field (on which the Fair is kept) is not cleared of the
+     corn by the 24th of August, the builders may trample it under
+     foot to build their booths; and, on the other hand, if the same
+     be not cleared of the booths and material belonging thereto by
+     Michaelmas Day at noon, the plough-men may enter the same with
+     their horses, ploughs, and carts, and destroy whatever they find
+     on the premises. The filth, dung, straw, etc., left behind by the
+     fair-keepers, make amends for their trampling and hardening of
+     the ground.</p>
+
+     <p>"The shops or booths are built in rows like streets, having each
+     their name, as Garlick Row, Booksellers'-row, Cook-row, etc. And
+     every commodity has its proper place, as the Cheese Fair, Hop
+     Fair, Wool Fair, etc.; and here, as in several other streets or
+     rows, are all sorts of traders, who sell by wholesale or retail,
+     as goldsmiths, toy-men, brasiers, turners, milliners,
+     haberdashers, hatters, mercers, drapers, pewterers, china
+     warehouses, and, in a word, most trades that can be found in
+     London, from whence many of them come. Here are also taverns,
+     coffee-houses, and eating-houses in great plenty, and all kept in
+     booths, in any of which (except the coffee-booth) you may at any
+     time be accommodated with hot or cold roast goose, roast or
+     boiled pork, etc.</p>
+
+     <p>"Crossing the main road at the south end of Garlick Row, and a
+     little to the left hand, is a great Square, formed of the largest
+     booths, called the Duddery, the area of which Square is from 240
+     to 300 feet, chiefly taken up with woollen drapers, wholesale
+     tailors, and sellers of second-hand clothes; where the dealers
+     have room before their booths to take down and open their packs,
+     and bring in waggons to load and unload the same. In the centre
+     of this Square was (till within these three years) erected a tall
+     May-pole, with a vane at the top; and in this Square, on the two
+     chief Sundays during the fair, both forenoon and afternoon,
+     Divine Service is read, and a sermon preached from a pulpit
+     placed in the open air, by the Minister of Barnwell; who is very
+     well paid for the same by the contribution of the fair-keepers.</p>
+
+     <p>"In this Duddery only, it is said, there have been sold £100,000
+     worth of woollen manufactures in less than a week's time; besides
+     the prodigious trade carried on here, by the wholesale tailors
+     from London, and most other parts of England, who transact their
+     business wholly in their pocket-books, and meeting here their
+     chapmen from all parts, make up their accounts, receive money
+     chiefly in bills, and take further orders. These, they say,
+     exceed by far the sale of goods actually brought to the Fair, and
+     delivered in kind; it being frequent for the London wholesale men
+     to carry back orders from their dealers for £10,000 worth of
+     goods a man, and some much more. And once in this Duddery, it is
+     said, there was a booth consisting of six apartments, all
+     belonging to a dealer in Norwich stuffs only, who had there above
+     £20,000 worth of those goods.</p>
+
+     <p>"The trade for wool, hops, and leather here is prodigious; the
+     quantity <span class="pagenum"><a id="page165" name="page165"></a>(p. 165)</span> of wool only sold at one fair is said to have
+     amounted to £50,000 or £60,000, and of hops very little less.</p>
+
+     <p>"September 14, being the Horse Fair day, is the day of the
+     greatest hurry, when it is almost incredible to conceive what
+     number of people there are, and the quantity of victuals that day
+     consumed by them.</p>
+
+     <p>"During the Fair, Colchester oysters and white herrings, just
+     coming into season, are in great request, at least by such as
+     live in the inland parts of the kingdom, where they are seldom to
+     be had fresh, especially the latter.</p>
+
+     <p>"The Fair is like a well-governed city; and less disorder and
+     confusion to be seen there than in any other place where there is
+     so great a concourse of people: here is a Court of Justice always
+     open from morning till night, where the Mayor of Cambridge, or
+     his Deputy, sits as Judge, determining all controversies in
+     matters arising from the business of the Fair, and seeing the
+     Peace thereof kept; for which purpose he hath eight servants,
+     called Red-coats, attending him during the time of the Fair and
+     other public occasions, one or other of which are constantly at
+     hand in most parts of the Fair; and if any dispute arise between
+     buyer and seller, on calling out 'Red-coat,' you have instantly
+     one or more come running to you; and if the dispute is not
+     quickly decided, the offender is carried to the said Court, where
+     the case is decided in a summary way, from which sentence there
+     lies no appeal.</p>
+
+     <p>"About two or three days after the Horse Fair day, when the hurry
+     of the wholesale business is over, the country gentry for about
+     ten or twelve miles round begin to come in with their sons and
+     daughters; and though diversion is what chiefly brings them, yet
+     it is not a little money they lay out among the tradesmen,
+     toy-shops, etc., besides what is flung away to see the puppet
+     shows, drolls, rope-dancing, live creatures, etc., of which there
+     is commonly plenty.</p>
+
+     <p>"The last observation I shall make concerning this Fair is, how
+     inconveniently a multitude of people are lodged there who keep
+     it; their bed (if I may so call it) is laid on two or three
+     boards, nailed to four pieces that bear it about a foot from the
+     ground, and four boards round it, to keep the persons and their
+     clothes from falling off, and is about five feet long, standing
+     abroad all day if it rains not. At night it is taken into their
+     booths, and put in to the best manner they can; at bed-time they
+     get into it, and lie neck and heels together until the morning,
+     if the wind and rain do not force them out sooner; for a high
+     wind often blows down their booths, as it did <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> 1741, and a
+     heavy rain forces through the hair-cloth that covers it.</p>
+
+     <p>"Though the Corporation of Cambridge has the tolls of this Fair,
+     and the government as aforesaid, yet the body of the University
+     has the oversight of the weights and measures thereof (as well as
+     at Midsummer and Reach Fairs) and the licensing of all
+     show-booths, live creatures, etc.; and the Proctors of the
+     University keep a Court there also to hear complaints about
+     weights and measures, seek out and punish lewd women, and see
+     that their Gownsmen commit no disorders."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Fuller (in the seventeenth century) gives us the tradition that the
+fair originated with some Westmorland cloth dealers, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page166" name="page166"></a>(p. 166)</span> who
+were here overtaken by a storm on their way to Norwich, and found so
+ready a market for the goods which they spread out to dry on the grass
+of the common that they went no further but returned hither the next
+year, and again. Thus the special prominence given to the "Duddery"
+here is accounted for. The tradition does not seem improbable, for
+Kendal has, from time immemorial, been renowned for its cloth&mdash;the
+famous "Kendal green" worn, in old ballads, by the English archers. To
+this day the shield of that town bears cloth-making implements, with
+the motto "<i>Pannus mihi panis</i>" ("Flock is my food"). And Norwich was
+(throughout the Middle Ages) the great commercial centre of the cloth
+trade. That there was some marked connection between Cambridgeshire
+and Westmorland is proved by the constant occurrence here of family
+names derived from Kendal place-names (Sizergh, Docwray, Strickland,
+Sedgwick, etc.) which have been current amongst the peasantry of
+Cambridgeshire since the fourteenth century at least.</p>
+
+<p>Since Carter wrote, the great development of communication has made
+fairs a mere survival, and Stourbridge Fair has fallen from its high
+estate. It is now a very commonplace affair of a few days' duration,
+mainly for the horse trade. But it still is declared open by the Mayor
+of Cambridge or his delegate, and a dish of the white herrings which
+Carter speaks of still forms part of the opening ceremony. And it has
+an abiding interest for English readers, as the prototype of "Vanity
+Fair" in the "Pilgrim's Progress." Bunyan, as a Bedford man, would be
+familiar with the bustling scene, and, if we compare his pages with
+those which we have transcribed from Carter's History, we see how
+vividly he has allegorised it:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"At this Fair are all such Merchandize sold as Houses, Lands,
+     Trades, Places, Honours, Preferments, Titles, Countreys,
+     Kingdoms, Lusts, Pleasures, and Delights of all sorts, as Whores,
+     Bauds, Wives, Husbands, Children, Masters, Servants, Lives,
+     Blood, Bodies, Souls, Silver, Gold, Pearls, Precious Stones, and
+     what not.</p>
+
+     <p>"And moreover at this Fair there is at all times to be seen
+     Juglings, Cheats, Games, Plays, Fools, Apes, Knaves, and Rogues,
+     and that of every kind.</p>
+
+     <p>"Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, Thefts, Murders,
+     Adulteries, False Swearings, and that of a blood-red colour.</p>
+
+     <p>"And as, in other Fairs of less moment, there are the several
+     Rows and Streets, under their proper Names, here such and such
+     Wares are vended, so here likewise you have the proper Places,
+     Rows, and Streets (namely <span class="pagenum"><a id="page167" name="page167"></a>(p. 167)</span> Countries and Kingdoms) where
+     the Wares of this Fair are soonest to be found. Here is the
+     Britain Row, the French Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row,
+     the German Row, where several sorts of vanities are to be sold.
+     But, as in other Fairs some one Commodity is the Chief of all the
+     Fair, so the Wares of Rome and her Merchandize is greatly
+     promoted in this Fair."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>We find also reference to the standing Court of summary jurisdiction
+under "the Great One of the Fair," with "the trusty Friends" who
+formed his police, that took cognisance of the "Hubbub and great Stir
+in the Fair" caused by the demeanour of the pilgrims.</p>
+
+<p>As an instance of how wide a range the commodities sold at this fair
+covered, we may mention that Sir Isaac Newton there bought his famous
+prisms&mdash;three of them for £3. They were probably of French or Italian
+make; no glass of this character was as yet manufactured in England.</p>
+
+<a id="chapviii" name="chapviii"></a>
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page168" name="page168"></a>(p. 168)</span> CHAPTER VIII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Roads from Cambridge.&mdash;Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East
+     Angles, Mercians, Formation of County.&mdash;Newmarket
+     Road.&mdash;Quy.&mdash;Fleam Dyke.&mdash;Devil's Dyke.&mdash;Icknield Way.&mdash;Iceni,
+     Ostorius, Boadicea.&mdash;Newmarket Heath, First Racing.&mdash;Exning,
+     Anna.&mdash;Snailwell.&mdash;Fordham.&mdash;Soham, St.
+     Felix.&mdash;Stuntney.&mdash;Wicken.&mdash;Chippenham.&mdash;Isleham,
+     Lectern.&mdash;Eastern Heights.&mdash;Chevely, Cambridge
+     Corporation.&mdash;Kirtling.&mdash;Wood Ditton.&mdash;Stetchworth.&mdash;Borough
+     Green.&mdash;Bottisham.&mdash;Swaffham Bulbeck.&mdash;The Lodes.&mdash;Swaffham
+     Prior.&mdash;Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest.&mdash;Burwell, Church, Clunch,
+     Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville.</p>
+
+<p>At the Lepers' Chapel we are clear of Cambridge and well on the road
+to Newmarket, probably the most trafficked of all the great roads
+which radiate from Cambridge. Of these there are seven; this Newmarket
+Road going to the north-east, the Hills road to the south-east, the
+Trumpington Road to the south, the Barton Road to the south-west, the
+Madingley Road to the west, the Huntingdon Road to the north-west,
+and, finally, the Ely Road to the north. This last takes us into the
+Isle of Ely; the other six serve the county of Cambridge, more
+strictly so-called, <i>i.e.</i>, the southern half of the Cambridgeshire of
+our maps, not so long ago quite separate, politically, from the
+northern half, and even now not wholly united for administrative
+purposes.</p>
+
+<p>The Isle, which contains the whole of the fenland forming this
+northern half of Cambridgeshire, is far older as a political entity
+than the southern part of the county. Its existence dates back to the
+far-off days of the Anglo-Saxon conquest, in the fifth and sixth
+centuries, when the poor remnants of the British population in East
+Anglia, once the proud tribe of "the great Iceni," fled for refuge
+into the "dismal swamp" of the Fens. Here they held out for centuries,
+and formed themselves <span class="pagenum"><a id="page169" name="page169"></a>(p. 169)</span> into a new tribe, the Girvii (as our
+earliest Latin chronicler transliterates the Welsh name Gyrwy,
+signifying "brave men," by which they called themselves). This Girvian
+principality has ever since held together. It passed as a whole into
+the hands of St. Etheldreda, by her marriage (in 652 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>) with the
+last Girvian Prince, Tonbert, and from her to her successors the
+Abbots and Bishops of Ely, whose jurisdiction survived until the
+nineteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the old southland homes of the unhappy Britons were being
+shared up by their English exterminators. The East Anglians swarmed
+over the uplands to the east, and joined hands (not in friendship)
+with the more powerful Mercians swarming in from the west. Roughly
+speaking the Cam divided these jarring tribes, which lived in undying
+hostility till the various English Kingdoms were united into one (in
+<span class="smcap">A.D.</span> 827) by the genius and valour of Egbert, the first "King of the
+English." But the boundaries were not effaced till the desolating
+flood of the Danish invasions poured over all.</p>
+
+<p>When that flood was stayed by Egbert's glorious grandson, Alfred the
+Great, and the district once more made English and Christian by his
+only less glorious son, Edward "the Elder," it was formed by him into
+a County called, from its chief town, Cambridgeshire (or, as it was
+then, "Granta-bryg-shire"). This was in the year 921. But for the
+first idea of any union between this new County and the old Isle of
+Ely we must wait another two centuries, when, in 1107, the Abbot of
+Ely became a Bishop, with the Isle and the County together for his
+See. The ecclesiastical tie thus formed has gradually developed into a
+civil tie also; just as the first union of the English race under a
+common Primate, the Archbishop of Canterbury, paved the way for its
+union under a common King.</p>
+
+<p>To many charming byways amid the streamlets and the meadows and the
+gentle slopes of this southern Cambridgeshire the seven highways out
+of Cambridge will successively conduct us. The highways themselves
+are, as has been said, seldom inspiring thoroughfares, save for their
+far-flung horizons; and the Newmarket Road least of all, for it is, as
+might be looked for, motor-swept beyond all the rest. The one
+near-hand object alone worth mention is the little Church of Quy,
+whose far-seen tower dominates some miles of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page170" name="page170"></a>(p. 170)</span> road. But
+this has little interest except its curious name, which is matter of
+dispute amongst etymologists. "Cow-ey" is the most commonly accepted
+derivation, meaning the Island of Cows. But Quy can never have been an
+island. More probably it is "Cow-way," like the "Cowey Stakes" on the
+Thames, signifying that here was a passage for cattle across the
+marshy ground which bordered the little stream crossed by the road
+before reaching the church. This stream flows out of Fulbourn Fen, an
+isolated patch of fen-land a mile square, even yet only half
+reclaimed, and of old so impassable that it determined the line of the
+great Fleam Dyke, which runs up to it on either side but does not need
+to cross it.</p>
+
+<a id="img040" name="img040"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img040.jpg" width="500" height="315" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Quy Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Fleam Dyke is one of the great prehistoric lines of defence which
+were run from the Fens of the Cam to the summit of the East Anglian
+heights. Those heights were in ancient times clothed with dense
+forest, and formed an impenetrable barrier against enemies from the
+west seeking to invade the East Anglian districts. So too did the
+morasses of the fenland. But between fen and forest stretched a strip
+of open grassland furnishing easy access. To defend this, the only
+gate into their territory, was the great object of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page171" name="page171"></a>(p. 171)</span>
+inhabitants of those districts; and they ran across it two stupendous
+earthworks, the Fleam Dyke as their outer bulwark and the Devil's
+Dyke, which we meet at Newmarket, as the inner.<a id="footnotetag124" name="footnotetag124"></a><a href="#footnote124" title="Go to footnote 124"><span class="smaller">[124]</span></a> The former
+stretches for a length of some ten miles from the banks of the Cam at
+Fen Ditton to the uplands by Balsham (its course broken by Fulbourn
+Fen); the latter ranges in a long unbroken rampart from the Fen at
+Reach to Wood Ditton (<i>i.e.</i> "the ditch-end in the forest").</p>
+
+<p>When these were constructed we do not know. They first appear in
+history as the scene of desperate fighting between Britons and Romans
+in the first century of our era. But they may very probably have
+existed before even the Britons came into the land. Magnificent
+earthworks they are, some 10 feet high on the inner side, and on the
+outer at least 30, from the bottom of the great ditch which flanks
+them to the crown of the parapet. When that parapet was topped by a
+palisade of timber, they must have presented formidable obstacles
+indeed. The Fleam Dyke we do not see from this road. But as we
+approach Newmarket, and enter upon its famous Heath, we cross the
+Devil's Dyke; and, as we look at its mighty dimensions, we cease to
+wonder that our simple-minded ancestors should have ascribed its
+formation to superhuman agency.</p>
+
+<p>The gap by which we pass through the Devil's Dyke deserves notice. It
+is the one gap in the whole line of the work, and was left to admit,
+not our road, but that which we now join, the London Road of
+Newmarket. For this is one of the most venerable tracks in the land,
+being the "Icknield Way," made how long ago Heaven only knows. From
+the very first settlement of the country there must always have
+existed some route along this open strip between fen and forest which
+formed the only line of communication from the eastern to the midland
+regions of our island. In British days the former were occupied by the
+great clan of the Iceni, whose name survives in the English
+appellation of the road, and can be traced in many place-names along
+it, such as Ickleton in Cambridgeshire, and Ickleford in
+Hertfordshire.<a id="footnotetag125" name="footnotetag125"></a><a href="#footnote125" title="Go to footnote 125"><span class="smaller">[125]</span></a> <span class="pagenum"><a id="page172" name="page172"></a>(p. 172)</span> The road followed the western slope of
+the chalk hills to the Thames and beyond, till it tapped the line of
+the great Tin-road, by which that then precious metal was brought from
+Cornwall to Thanet.<a id="footnotetag126" name="footnotetag126"></a><a href="#footnote126" title="Go to footnote 126"><span class="smaller">[126]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>At the Roman conquest of Britain in 55 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> the Iceni were friendly to
+the invaders, whom indeed they had invited into the land, to free them
+from their subjection to the House of Cymbeline, King of Britain. But
+when, a few years later, during the settlement of the country, the
+Roman general Ostorius ordered them to give up their arms, they
+regarded the demand as an intolerable insult, and bade him defiance,
+manning the Fleam Dyke against him. But such was his energy that,
+though he had no regular troops with him, his light-armed auxiliaries
+stormed the whole length of the line at a single rush. The routed
+Icenians fled in panic homewards, only to find their way hopelessly
+barred by their own fortifications along the Devil's Dyke, and all but
+the few who could force their way through the mad crush at this one
+narrow gap, were, in spite of a desperate resistance, slaughtered
+wholesale. The tribe were then disarmed, and endured unresistingly the
+licence and greed of Roman officials and Roman moneylenders, till
+goaded into madness, twelve years later, by the wrongs of their
+"warrior-queen," Boadicea. Then followed that convulsive explosion of
+popular rage and despair, in which every Roman within reach was
+massacred with every circumstance of horror, and to which the Romans,
+after their victory, replied by such a policy of extermination as to
+blot the Icenian name from the page of history. Never again do we meet
+with it.</p>
+
+<p>Between the Dyke and Newmarket lies the Heath, renowned as the
+earliest English race-course. This form of amusement seems to have
+come in with the Stuart Dynasty. James the First is said to have
+inaugurated the sport. But the well-known tale of how Edward the First
+escaped from his captivity at Hereford, by inducing his guards to ride
+matches till their <span class="pagenum"><a id="page173" name="page173"></a>(p. 173)</span> horses were exhausted and then galloping
+off on his own fresh mount, shows that the idea was afloat long
+before. And at Newmarket in particular such matches must often have
+been ridden in connection with the great horse mart which has given
+the town its name.</p>
+
+<p>This New Market is, like the New Forest, now far from new. It dates
+from the year 1227, when a frightful outbreak of sickness frightened
+away buyers and sellers from their older market-place two miles off at
+Exning (a pretty natural amphitheatre of turf bright with many
+springs), and sent them to meet for the future in the freer air of the
+Heath. This word, by the way, does not, in Cambridgeshire, imply the
+existence of heather, merely meaning an open space.</p>
+
+<p>Thus Newmarket came into being. The sport we first hear of in
+connection with it is not racing but hunting. For the boundless range
+of the moorlands to the east of the town (which even now astonish all
+who first see them) were then haunted by innumerable herds of wild
+deer, and afforded ideal ground for the chase. James the First,
+accordingly, had here a hunting-box,<a id="footnotetag127" name="footnotetag127"></a><a href="#footnote127" title="Go to footnote 127"><span class="smaller">[127]</span></a> in which his unhappy son was
+afterwards imprisoned for a while by the victorious army of the
+Commonwealth. And thus the Heath became known to his "merry" grandson,
+Charles the Second, who speedily saw how specially adapted its expanse
+was for horse-racing, and established a regular annual race-meeting,
+the first to be introduced into England.</p>
+
+<p>The Royal sport spread like wildfire, and the bare Heath became year
+by year crowded by the gayest throng in England, thus vividly
+described by Macaulay:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"It was not uncommon for the whole Court and Cabinet to go down
+     there," Charles himself, to the admiration of his subjects,
+     posting down from London in a single day, with only two relays of
+     fresh horses. "Jewellers and milliners, players and fiddlers,
+     venal wits and venal beauties, followed in crowds. The streets
+     were made impassable by coaches and six. In the places of public
+     resort peers flirted with maids of honour, and officers of the
+     Life Guards, all plumes and gold lace, jostled professors in
+     trencher caps and black gowns. For on such occasions the
+     <span class="pagenum"><a id="page174" name="page174"></a>(p. 174)</span> neighbouring University of Cambridge always sent her
+     highest functionaries with loyal addresses, and selected her
+     ablest theologians to preach before the Sovereign and his
+     splendid retinue. In the wild days before the Revolution, indeed,
+     the most learned and eloquent divine might fail to draw a
+     fashionable audience, particularly if Buckingham announced his
+     intention of holding forth; for sometimes his Grace would enliven
+     the dulness of a Sunday morning by addressing to the bevy of fine
+     gentlemen and fine ladies a ribald exhortation which he called a
+     sermon. With lords and ladies from St. James's and Soho, and with
+     doctors from Trinity College and King's College, were mingled the
+     provincial aristocracy, fox-hunting squires and their
+     rosy-cheeked daughters, who had come in queer-looking family
+     coaches, drawn by cart-horses, from the remotest parishes of
+     three or four counties to see their Sovereign.... Racing was only
+     one of the many amusements of that festive season. On fine
+     mornings there was hunting. For those who preferred hawking,
+     choice falcons were brought from Holland. On rainy days the
+     cock-pit was encircled by stars and blue ribbons.... The Heath
+     was fringed by a wild, gipsy-like camp of vast extent. For the
+     hope of being able to feed on the leavings of many sumptuous
+     tables, and to pick up some of the guineas and crowns which the
+     spendthrifts of London were throwing about, attracted thousands
+     of peasants from a circle of many miles."</p>
+
+<p>Nor were these beggars the only ones to profit by the festive
+occasion. The townsfolk of Newmarket reaped a golden harvest; lodgings
+for the press of visitors were at fancy prices, and many were glad to
+pay a guinea a night for even the third of a bed; and "at Cambridge,"
+we read, "a hackney-horse is not to be got for money."</p>
+
+<p>When Newmarket became only one of many racing centres throughout the
+land, this height of glory naturally departed. But to this day its
+meetings rank in the very first class of such fixtures. And as a
+training ground for race-horses it stands second to none. Training
+stables rise all round it, and strings of young thorough-breds are
+constantly to be met along the road, and are treated with reverence,
+even by the drivers of motor-cars, who, for some distance on either
+side of the town are not allowed to travel at any speed over ten miles
+an hour. There are now seven principal annual racing fixtures here,
+the chief being the "Craven," in the spring, and the "Two Thousand" in
+the autumn.</p>
+
+<p>The town of Newmarket is now wholly in Suffolk, although till a few
+years ago it lay partly in Cambridgeshire, for it is built on either
+side of the Icknield Street, which here formed the county boundary.
+But the Old Market at Exning was always in Suffolk; a little island of
+which may be seen on the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page175" name="page175"></a>(p. 175)</span> map, surrounded by Cambridgeshire
+territory. Here we have an interesting historical survival. Whence
+came about this curious delimitation? The answer is that when
+Cambridgeshire was first formed into a county by Edward the Elder it
+was not yet forgotten that Exning had long been a special residence of
+Suffolk royalty.</p>
+
+<p>Suffolk, it must be remembered, is not, like Cambridgeshire,
+Bedfordshire, and other counties named after their chief town, an
+artificial division of the land, called into being by the Government
+merely as an administrative unit, but, like the Isle of Ely, one of
+the originally independent principalities the gradual accretion of
+which has formed England. Very early Suffolk and Norfolk joined
+together in one East Anglian Kingdom; but that Kingdom endured for
+centuries, and was not extinguished till its last monarch, St. Edmund,
+was murdered by the Danes in their great raid of 870 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> He was,
+indeed, but a tributary monarch, under the King of the English; but
+this was then only a quite recent arrangement, and his predecessors
+had been wholly independent sovereigns. For many years they were
+engaged in a heroic struggle to preserve their independence against
+Mercia, the great power which occupied all the Midlands, and therefore
+it was that they fixed their Royal abode at Exning, close to the great
+dyke which bulwarked the East Anglian realm, as, long before, it had
+bulwarked the Icenian.</p>
+
+<p>Hence it came about that Exning was the birthplace of St. Etheldreda,
+the foundress of our great "sacred fane" at Ely, round which, almost
+more than Cambridge itself, the fortunes of Cambridgeshire have
+centred. Her father, King Anna, was called to the East Anglian throne
+in troublous times. Christianity and Paganism were at death-grips
+throughout the land. And the latter cause was championed by the
+monarch who was, for the moment, far the most powerful of the English
+sovereigns, Penda, King of Mercia. From his central position he struck
+out north, south, and east, at his Christian neighbours. His first
+blows were against Northumbria, where he successively shattered the
+Roman Mission of Paulinus and the Celtic Mission of Aidan. Next he
+drove into exile Kenwalk, the first Christian King of Wessex, and
+finally, in 654, burst over the East Anglian frontier "like a wolf, so
+that Anna and his folk were devoured as in a moment."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page176" name="page176"></a>(p. 176)</span> But this breaking up of the Exning family did but scatter its
+members to spread far and wide the cause of the Gospel. And a splendid
+band they were. Not for nothing is Anna described by Bede as "a good
+man, and the father of an excellent family." His eldest son followed
+him on the throne (for Penda was slain shortly after his last victory,
+and the Mercian dominion fell with him), and helped St. Etheldreda in
+her great work at Ely; another son, St. Erconwald, became one of the
+most famous of all the Bishops of London; while, of the daughters, one
+was Abbess of Barking, another of Dereham, another of Brie, in
+France.<a id="footnotetag128" name="footnotetag128"></a><a href="#footnote128" title="Go to footnote 128"><span class="smaller">[128]</span></a> Yet another, Sexburga, after being Queen of Kent,
+succeeded Etheldreda as Abbess of Ely, and was herself succeeded by
+her daughter Ermenilda, who, as Queen of Penda's son Wulfhere, had
+taken part in St. Chad's great work of converting Mercia. Seldom has
+any place bred such a household of Saints as this quiet little village
+of Exning. A pretty village it still is; but is now fast becoming a
+suburb of Newmarket. The bright little stream running through it is
+derived partly from springs in the old market meadow already spoken of
+(known as "the Seven Springs"), and partly from sources in a copse
+some half-mile to the south, known as St. Wendred's Well. All we know
+of this obscure Saint is that she had a local fame in the tenth
+century, when her body, in a golden coffin, was brought from Ely to
+the great battle between Edmund Ironside and Canute at Assandun, and
+became the spoil of the victor. The church at March is dedicated to
+her.</p>
+
+<p>The road from Newmarket to Ely (twelve miles) passes several places
+worth notice. First comes Snailwell, with the flint-built round tower
+of its little church rising so picturesquely above the "well," now a
+broad, clear pond, from which the little river Snail crawls away into
+the adjacent fen. At the adjoining hamlet of Landwade there was lately
+unearthed a Roman villa, the fine tesselated pavement of which is now
+in the Sedgwick Museum of Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>Fordham, which we next reach, is a larger village, with a church of
+most unusual architectural interest. The north porch has a stone roof
+of no fewer than six vaulted bays, running east and west, and
+supporting a parvis chamber, with <span class="pagenum"><a id="page177" name="page177"></a>(p. 177)</span> late Decorated windows,
+approached by a stone staircase from without, and, seemingly, designed
+for a chapel with a separate dedication to St. Mary Magdalene, the
+Church being St. Peter's. This development is unique.</p>
+
+<a id="img041" name="img041"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img041.jpg" width="350" height="453" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Fordham Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page178" name="page178"></a>(p. 178)</span> Three miles on, we come to the furthest outpost of the East
+Anglian uplands, the little market town of Soham, situated on an
+almost isolated peninsula of the chalk, which here runs out into the
+fen, and upon the very borders<a id="footnotetag129" name="footnotetag129"></a><a href="#footnote129" title="Go to footnote 129"><span class="smaller">[129]</span></a> of the Isle of Ely. The Cathedral
+is here a conspicuous object, rising high upon its hill over the
+intervening fen, and only five miles away. But Soham is associated
+with a yet earlier development of local Christianity than Ely itself.
+Forty years before St. Etheldreda founded her Abbey, one was here
+established by St. Felix, "the Apostle of East Anglia." That title
+does not mean that he was absolutely the first to preach the Gospel to
+the East English, but the first whose work was permanent. For the
+introduction of the Faith into these parts met with more than one
+set-back before it was fairly established.</p>
+
+<p>Within two years of the first coming of St. Augustine in 597 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>,
+Redwald King of East Anglia, who had succeeded the earliest Christian
+monarch, Ethelbert of Kent, in the dignity of Bretwalda,<a id="footnotetag130" name="footnotetag130"></a><a href="#footnote130" title="Go to footnote 130"><span class="smaller">[130]</span></a> followed
+him also in seeking baptism. His Christianity, however, was of too
+unconventional a type to be acceptable. Bede tells us how "in the same
+temple he had an altar for the sacrifice of Christ, and a small one to
+offer sacrifices unto devils." This attempt (made under the influence
+of his heathen wife) was foredoomed to failure, and was followed by a
+period of religious confusion, till Sigebert, his son, succeeded to
+the throne. He had been an exile in France, where he had become "a
+most Christian and learned man," under the influence of St. Felix, a
+holy man of Burgundy, whose help he asked, on becoming King, "to cause
+all his province to partake" of his religion.</p>
+
+<a id="img042" name="img042"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img042.jpg" width="500" height="437" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Fordham.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The landing-place of the Saint is still commemorated in the name
+Felixstowe near Harwich, and thence he proceeded <span class="pagenum"><a id="page179" name="page179"></a>(p. 179)</span> to preach
+with entire success throughout all Sigebert's realm. Soham was his
+furthest point, for the fenland beyond was already Christian (the
+population being British, and provided for by Augustine's church at
+Cratendune).<a id="footnotetag131" name="footnotetag131"></a><a href="#footnote131" title="Go to footnote 131"><span class="smaller">[131]</span></a> And at Soham he set up an Abbey, where he himself
+was buried in 634, three years only after his landing. St. Etheldreda
+(who was probably Sigebert's niece) was at this time a young girl.
+Some imagine Soham to have been the site of a famous school set up by
+Felix, "after the model of those in France, with masters and
+teachers." But this <span class="pagenum"><a id="page180" name="page180"></a>(p. 180)</span> is more likely to have been in his
+Cathedral city of Dunwich, once the leading town in East Anglia, now
+wholly submerged by the encroachments of the German Ocean. The See was
+transferred to Thetford and then to Norwich. Soham Abbey flourished on
+side by side with Ely, till both were destroyed in the great Danish
+raid of 870 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> Why, when Ely was rebuilt, a century later, Soham was
+not, is unknown.</p>
+
+<p>The present parish church has a lofty Perpendicular nave, with fine
+flowing Decorated windows in the chancel and transept, and a really
+splendid tower, one hundred feet in height, crowned with a pinnacled
+parapet of flint-work. Shortly after the Norman Conquest, Soham became
+the objective of the first causeway to be made for civil purposes
+between the island of Ely and the mainland.<a id="footnotetag132" name="footnotetag132"></a><a href="#footnote132" title="Go to footnote 132"><span class="smaller">[132]</span></a> This was due to
+Bishop Hervey (the first to be Bishop of Ely as well as Abbot), and
+was felt to be so epoch-making a work that it was ascribed to
+supernatural influence. St. Edmund, the high-souled King of East
+Anglia (who, after his martyrdom by the Danes in 870, became the
+Patron Saint of the Eastern Counties), was said to have appeared in a
+dream to a man of Exning, bidding him suggest the design to the
+Bishop. The little island of Stuntney<a id="footnotetag133" name="footnotetag133"></a><a href="#footnote133" title="Go to footnote 133"><span class="smaller">[133]</span></a> formed a stepping-stone for
+this causeway, so that only three miles out of the six between Ely and
+Soham needed an actual embankment.</p>
+
+<a id="img043" name="img043"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img043.jpg" width="400" height="427" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Soham.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Soham, as has been said, was on all sides surrounded by fen, except on
+the narrow ridge of firm ground between it and Fordham. So
+water-logged, indeed, was the country round that sea-going vessels
+made a port here. This fen is now all drained and become most prosaic
+cornland. But a few miles east and west of Soham two little patches,
+each about a mile square, remain in their original state. These are
+Chippenham Fen to the east, and Wicken Fen to the west. Both are
+fairly inaccessible spots, but when we get to them they enable us to
+form a vivid idea of what the state of things must have been when the
+whole fenland was such as this. Both give the impression of a morass
+hopelessly impenetrable, covered with a dense growth of tall reeds
+rising high above <span class="pagenum"><a id="page181" name="page181"></a>(p. 181)</span> your head, through which you push your way
+blindly, to be constantly checked by some sluggish watercourse, too
+wide to jump, too shallow to swim, and impossible to wade, for the
+bottom is a fathomless stratum of soft turf and ooze giving no
+foothold. To stumble into one of these watercourses is, indeed, no
+small peril. If you are alone the case is well-nigh hopeless, and even
+a friend on the bank would find it hard to pull you out. His best
+course is to cut a fairly large bundle of reeds, by trampling which
+under your feet <span class="pagenum"><a id="page182" name="page182"></a>(p. 182)</span> you may for a moment be able to stand while
+he rescues you.</p>
+
+<p>One can well understand how it came about that such a country was an
+almost inviolable sanctuary for those whom despair drove to seek
+refuge in its recesses. These small fragments of it still form a
+sanctuary; for many rare plants and insects, exterminated elsewhere by
+the march of progress, here still nourish. Conspicuous amongst these
+is the lovely swallow-tail butterfly; which flits about, dashing with
+bright touches of colour the weird and sombre beauty of the silent
+scene. Very silent it is now. But it was not so of old, when the whole
+fen was crowded with the swarming bird-life, so vividly described by
+Kingsley in "Hereward the Wake": "where the coot clanked, and the
+bittern boomed, and the sedge-bird, not content with its own sweet
+song, mocked the notes of all the birds around, ... where hung
+motionless, high over head, hawk beyond hawk, buzzard beyond buzzard,
+kite beyond kite, as far as eye could see. Into the air whirred up
+great skeins of wildfowl innumerable, with a cry as of all the bells
+of Crowland; while clear above all their noise sounded the wild
+whistle of the curlews, and the trumpet note of the great white swan."
+Such was the fenland of old; but all this wealth of commotion is long
+since gone, and scarcely do we see a bird now at Wicken or Chippenham,
+except here and there a waterhen, and (at Chippenham) the pheasants
+which are reared in coops on its margin.</p>
+
+<p>These birds belong to Chippenham Hall, a mansion built by Admiral
+Russell, the hero of La Hogue in 1692, our first great naval victory
+since the rout of the Armada, "and the first great victory that the
+English had gained over the French since the day of Agincourt."<a id="footnotetag134" name="footnotetag134"></a><a href="#footnote134" title="Go to footnote 134"><span class="smaller">[134]</span></a>
+It stands on the site of an earlier house, which, in its day, served
+as a place of confinement for Charles the First in 1647, after the
+raid by Cornet Joyce on Holmby House had transferred his custody from
+the hands of the Parliament to those of the Army. Here he remained for
+some weeks, while the somewhat sordid game of political intrigue (out
+of which he still hoped to make his own) was being played around him,
+"very pleasant and cheerful, taking his recreation daily at tennis,
+and delighting much in the company of Cornet Joyce," but refusing to
+listen to the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page183" name="page183"></a>(p. 183)</span> famous Puritan stalwart, Hugh Peters, who was
+accustomed to hold forth "with the Bible in the one hand and a great
+pistol in the other," and who here "moved His Majesty to hear him
+preach. Which His Majesty did the rather decline."</p>
+
+<p>Within sight of Soham, across the fen to the east, and only three
+miles away, stood for awhile another House of Religion, the Priory of
+Isleham. But to get from one to the other it was (and is) needful to
+go round by Fordham, making the distance at least double. A more out
+of the way place than Isleham cannot well be found, but it is worth a
+visit. All that remains of the Priory is an oblong structure of stone
+buttressed with red brick, looking on the outside like a barn, and,
+indeed, used as such. But it is, in fact, the hulk of the Priory
+Church; and, inside, the pillars and capitals are in very fair
+condition. The work is all Norman. This short-lived establishment was
+built in the eleventh century, as a "cell" (or outlying colony), of
+the Abbey of St. Jacutus de Insula, near Dol in Brittany. Within two
+centuries the monks abandoned it in favour of their sister house at
+Linton.<a id="footnotetag135" name="footnotetag135"></a><a href="#footnote135" title="Go to footnote 135"><span class="smaller">[135]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>They may have found Isleham too sequestered. It stands, like Soham, on
+the verge of the Isle of Ely, and also on the verge of Suffolk, to
+which county it seems actually to have belonged throughout great part
+of the Middle Ages. But it was in the Bishopric neither of Ely nor of
+Norwich, but of far away Rochester, to which it had been annexed, as
+tradition went, by Alfred the Great. The Church, dedicated to St.
+Andrew, has an exceptionally fine hammer-beam roof, bearing the
+inscription:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  CRYSTOFER PEYTON DID MAK THYS ROFE<br>
+  IN THE YERE OF OURE LORD MCCCCLXXXXV<br>
+  BEING THE X YERE OF KINGE HENRY THE VII.</p>
+
+<p>A splendid brass records the memory of this benefactor's father,
+Thomas, who brought the Isleham estates into the family by his
+marriage with Margaret Bernard, the heiress of the former possessors.
+She as well as her successor, Margaret Francis, are on either side of
+him, in low-necked and high-waisted robes with ample skirts. That of
+Margaret Bernard <span class="pagenum"><a id="page184" name="page184"></a>(p. 184)</span> bears a large flower and scroll pattern,
+and on her head-gear is inscribed the prayer "Jesu, mercy! Lady,
+help!" That of Margaret Francis is plain, trimmed with fur. Both wear
+an identical necklace, presumably the very same. Thomas himself (who
+was High Sheriff of Cambridge and Huntingdonshire in 1442 and 1452) is
+in plate armour of the most highly developed kind, with quaint and
+enormous elbow-guards. The figures, which are some thirty inches in
+height, are surmounted by an elaborate triple canopy.</p>
+
+<p>Another brass, much more worn, shows somewhat smaller figures of the
+last of the Bernards, Sir John, and his wife, Dame Elizabeth Sakevyle.
+He is also in plate armour of a simpler type,<a id="footnotetag136" name="footnotetag136"></a><a href="#footnote136" title="Go to footnote 136"><span class="smaller">[136]</span></a> and she in a
+close-fitting kirtle and long gown, fastened by a cord across the
+breast, with a horned head-dress from which a veil depends over her
+shoulders. The dog at her feet implies that she was a lady in her own
+right. And yet a third brass gives us Sir Richard Peyton (1574), who
+was a Reader at Gray's Inn. Over his doublet he wears a gown, long,
+loose, and lined with fur. In his left hand he holds a book, whilst he
+lays the right upon his heart. His wife, Mary Hyde, beside him, is in
+a plain dress, falling open below the waist to show a richly brocaded
+petticoat.<a id="footnotetag137" name="footnotetag137"></a><a href="#footnote137" title="Go to footnote 137"><span class="smaller">[137]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Besides these brasses, there is the fine tomb, in the north transept,
+of the first Bernard to be Lord of Isleham, a Crusader, as is shown by
+the crossed legs of his recumbent effigy. The <i>tailed</i> surcoat over
+his coat of mail fixes his date at about 1275. He was, in fact, one of
+those who accompanied Edward the First (not yet King) to Palestine.
+The moulding of the canopy above the tomb also connects him with that
+monarch, for it is the same as that of the Coronation Chair in
+Westminster Abbey, placed by Edward over the Holy Stone of Scone,
+which he had carried off from Scotland in token of his claim to be
+indeed the rightful King of that stubborn realm.</p>
+
+<p>Yet another point of interest in this church is the eagle lectern, an
+exquisite piece of mediæval brasswork, so good, indeed, that it has
+been copied in the lectern of Ely Cathedral. It is apparently
+fifteenth century work, and was found buried <span class="pagenum"><a id="page185" name="page185"></a>(p. 185)</span> in the fen,
+some half century ago, between Isleham and Soham, so nearly half way
+that both parishes laid claim to it, and even now Soham folk are not
+reconciled to its loss. Whoever were the original possessors, it was
+probably concealed in the fen to save it from the Puritan iconoclasts
+of the seventeenth century, who, during the Civil War, habitually
+destroyed lecterns of this type as "abominable idols."</p>
+
+<p>Eastward from Newmarket radiate most fascinating roads, leading
+through heather and pine woods to Mildenhall, with its splendid church
+and ancient market hall; and to Brandon, where men still make (as they
+have made for 5000 years) palæolithic flint implements by the very
+same methods used in those prehistoric days; and to Bury St. Edmunds,
+with its wonderful ruins and great historical associations. But these
+are all out of our beat. To the southward, however, we are in
+Cambridgeshire, and a fine avenue, two miles in length, known as "the
+Duchess's Drive," leads up to the ridge of the East Anglian heights.
+It is noteworthy that almost along the whole length of that ridge, and
+particularly hereabouts, villages cluster thick, whereas the slopes
+below can show scarcely any, but form an unoccupied belt, two miles
+wide, between the upland and the lowland populated area. A very
+out-of-the-way district is this watershed between the broad basin of
+the Ouse and those of the little rivers running into the North Sea,
+for the nearest railways are miles away, and an old time peace broods
+over everything.</p>
+
+<p>The first village we come to is Cheveley. The church here is
+cruciform, with a piscina of rare beauty in its Early English chancel,
+which is closed in by a fourteenth century rood screen of Decorated
+work. To the same period belongs the church chest, which has the
+unique feature of being made of cypress wood, and the tower, also with
+the unique feature of an external bartizan or watch-turret, apparently
+for a beacon fire. The dedication of the church is no less unique,
+"St. Mary and the Sacred Host."</p>
+
+<p>The name of Cheveley is associated with what Professor Maitland calls
+"the curious if disgraceful story of the decline and fall" of the
+ancient Corporation of Cambridge.<a id="footnotetag138" name="footnotetag138"></a><a href="#footnote138" title="Go to footnote 138"><span class="smaller">[138]</span></a> When the Revolution of 1688 had
+put a final end to the old Royal <span class="pagenum"><a id="page186" name="page186"></a>(p. 186)</span> prerogatives over local
+administration, "the Corporation stood free from national
+supervision"; and Parliament, as time went on, appointed Commissioners
+to undertake the duties of police and hygiene, which had formerly been
+entrusted to it. With the cessation of recognised responsibilities the
+Corporation also ceased to have a conscience, and shamelessly
+squandered the corporate property on the personal greediness of its
+members. The Duke of Rutland, from his great seat at Cheveley, became,
+till the flood of nineteenth century reforms cleansed the Augean
+stable, its absolute master, and his nominees only were chosen into
+it, and thus, after a thousand years of strenuous, and mostly
+beneficent life, "first as a knot of heathen hidesmen,<a id="footnotetag139" name="footnotetag139"></a><a href="#footnote139" title="Go to footnote 139"><span class="smaller">[139]</span></a> then as a
+township of early English burg-men, then as a corporation of mediæval
+burgesses," it finally dwindled to a small dining club, "with good
+wine, and plenty of it," absolutely dominated by one great Tory
+magnate, and claiming "the right to expend their income on themselves
+and their friends, without being bound to apply any part of it to the
+good of the Town." Reform came none too soon.</p>
+
+<p>Cheveley is some three miles from Newmarket, and, as much further on,
+we reach another interesting little village, Kirtling. The local
+pronunciation of the name is "Catlage," which is unhappily becoming
+obsolete, like so many other local pronunciations throughout England,
+under the orthographical dead level of elementary scholasticism. The
+most striking edifice here is the great red-brick gate tower, with its
+four octagonal turrets, which is all that remains of a mansion, in its
+day one of the most famous in England. It was built in the reign of
+Queen Mary by the first Lord North, whose family still hold "Kirtling
+Tower," and whose son here magnificently entertained Queen
+Elizabeth.<a id="footnotetag140" name="footnotetag140"></a><a href="#footnote140" title="Go to footnote 140"><span class="smaller">[140]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The wide moat which surrounded it still exists, and reminds us that
+this mansion was on the site of a great mediæval castle belonging to
+the Tony family, from the days of William the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page187" name="page187"></a>(p. 187)</span> Conqueror to
+those of Henry the Eighth. The manor had once been the property of the
+ill-fated King Harold, and was given by the Conqueror to Judith, widow
+of the saintly hero Waltheof, after his judicial murder. The church
+contains many North monuments, and Kirtling also possesses a pretty
+little Roman Catholic church, being one of the five "Missions" in
+Cambridgeshire&mdash;along with Cambridge, Ely, Newmarket, and Wisbech. For
+the Norths still hold, not only their ancient seat, but their ancient
+Faith.</p>
+
+<p>Not far from Kirtling is Wood Ditton; the last word signifying either
+Ditch Town, or, more probably, Ditch End, for it stands at the upland
+extremity of the Devil's Dyke. Along this ridge of the East Anglian
+Heights the primæval forest was of old so dense that no artificial
+defence was needed to check the progress of an invading army. It was a
+veritable wall of oak, and ash, and thorn, and holly, and alder; no
+route for an army at any time, and where the felling of a few trees
+across the glades would speedily form an absolutely impenetrable
+obstacle. Here then the great earthwork, which we saw on Newmarket
+Heath, ends its ten-mile climb from the Fen at Reach, 350 feet below.
+Wood Ditton is a picturesque little place, still suggestive of
+woodland, especially around the flint-built church (constructed in the
+twelfth century and remodelled in the fifteenth), which has an
+octagonal steeple of specially graceful poise. A large brass, in
+somewhat poor condition, dating from 1393, commemorates "Henry
+Englissh and Wife Margt." Henry was a Knight, and wears what is known
+as "Camail" armour, which consisted of a series of small steel
+roundels fastened on to leather, hardened by boiling. Dowsing records
+(under date March 22, 1643), "We here brake down 50 superstitious
+pictures and crucifixes. Under the Virgin Mary was written: 'O Mother
+of God have mercy upon us.'"</p>
+
+<p>The neighbouring village of Stetchworth (or Stretchworth) also
+suffered in Dowsing's visitation. But he failed to notice that one of
+the two ancient bells in the steeple had a "superstitious"
+inscription:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">SANCTA MARGARETA ORA PRO NOBIS.</p>
+
+<p>So it remained unshattered, and still hangs in the belfry, where the
+other bells also have noticeable inscriptions, two <span class="pagenum"><a id="page188" name="page188"></a>(p. 188)</span> bearing
+the words "God save Thy Church. 1608," and the third</p>
+
+<p class="center smaller">
+                OMS·SPT·LAVDA·DNM.<br>
+  ("Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.")</p>
+
+<p>This and the Margaret bell are ascribed to the fifteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>Stetchworth Manor, in the tenth century, was given to the Abbey of
+Ely, to provide clothing for a newly-professed monk, the son of the
+donor. This sounds an extraordinarily disproportionate gift; but the
+clothing of an Ely monk was really a very serious item, and, as the
+Abbey account books show, cost the convent the equivalent of something
+very like £50 per annum. Readers of Chaucer will remember how
+comfortably, and even luxuriously, the monk of his "Canterbury Tales"
+is dressed.</p>
+
+<p>Of the remaining villages along this upland line there is not much to
+tell.<a id="footnotetag141" name="footnotetag141"></a><a href="#footnote141" title="Go to footnote 141"><span class="smaller">[141]</span></a> They present a pleasant field for wandering exploration;
+each has its picturesque features, no church is without something of
+antiquarian interest, and over all broods a delicious aloofness.
+Westley Waterless Church has a flint-built round tower, of the Norfolk
+fashion, and a fine brass of 1325, representing Sir John de Creke and
+his wife, Lady Alyne. He is shown wearing the curious surcoat then in
+fashion, known as a <i>cyclas</i>, which, in front, reached only to the
+waist, and, behind, to the knees. The lady is one of the first
+examples of female portraiture in brass: her figure is strangely out
+of drawing.</p>
+
+<p>Weston Colville has also a brass, now affixed to the wall, and too
+much damaged for identification. The church here is almost wholly
+Early English, as is that of Dullingham. Borough Green contains some
+fine twelfth century monuments, sadly knocked about. The Parson here
+was ejected by the Puritan Earl of Manchester, Governor of Cambridge,
+during the Civil War, for the heinous offence of saying "that he ought
+to shorten his sermons rather than neglect reading the Common Prayer,
+and that the Collects were to be preferred before preaching." Grounds
+no less frivolous were a sufficient excuse <span class="pagenum"><a id="page189" name="page189"></a>(p. 189)</span> for a like
+ejection of half the parsons in Cambridgeshire at this period. The
+rest signed the Covenant and renounced their Anglican heresies,
+sometimes with considerable emphasis. One curate is recorded to have
+stamped the Book of Common Prayer under his feet, in the face of the
+congregation, declaring that he would henceforth be their minister "by
+no Prelatical and Popish imposition of hands." Some score of these
+Vicars of Bray lived to turn their coats once more at the Restoration.</p>
+
+<p>Half-way between Cambridge and Newmarket, and half a mile from the
+main road, stands the fine Church of Bottisham, with good Decorated
+windows, a stone rood screen of Perpendicular work, and noteworthy
+sedilia and piscina. The beautiful fluting round the clerestory
+windows is still more noteworthy, and also the arcading beneath those
+of the south aisle both within and without. Here is the tomb of Elyas
+de Beckingham, Justice of the Common Pleas under Edward the First,
+who, almost alone, escaped in the clean sweep which that monarch made
+of his Bench for corruption. Here, in 1664, the parson was ejected on
+the grounds "that he was a time-server,<a id="footnotetag142" name="footnotetag142"></a><a href="#footnote142" title="Go to footnote 142"><span class="smaller">[142]</span></a> and one that observed
+bowing towards the east, standing up at the <i>Gloria Patri</i>, reading
+the Second Service at the Communion Table, and such-like superstitious
+worship and innovation in the Church. That he is a very unable and
+unfit man for the ministry; for half his parishioners cannot hear him,
+neither did he ever preach to their edifying, neither is he able, as
+the deponents do verily believe."</p>
+
+<p>Bottisham, in all probability, played a part in that pathetic episode
+in the life of King Charles the First, which began with his flight
+from Oxford and ended with his vain appeal to the loyalty of the
+Scottish army then besieging Newark. Finding that Oxford must needs
+surrender to the Parliamentary forces closing in upon it, the King cut
+off his hair and beard, and in the disguise of a servant, carrying the
+cloak-bag of the two faithful chaplains who accompanied him, stole
+away at three in the morning, on Monday, April 27, 1646, from the
+beleaguered city, which had been his headquarters for so long. A long
+day's ride of 50 miles brought the party that night to Wheathampstead,
+near St. Albans, where a faithful adherent was found to give him
+shelter, though the Parliament were <span class="pagenum"><a id="page190" name="page190"></a>(p. 190)</span> proclaiming, with drum
+and trumpet, that "what person soever shall harbour and conceal, or
+know of the harbouring and concealing of the King's Person, and shall
+not immediately reveal it to both Houses, shall be proceeded against
+as a traitor, forfeit his whole estate, and die without mercy." The
+next day, Tuesday, in clerical attire this time, and with only one
+companion, Mr. Ashburnham, the hunted Monarch entered Cambridgeshire
+(avoiding the towns) and that night, after another 50 miles of riding,
+slept "at a small village, seven miles from Newmarket." This village,
+Mr. Kingston, the historian of the Civil War in East Anglia, to whom I
+am indebted for this picturesque story, thinks may have been
+Bottisham, whence Charles could have reached Downham, his next stage,
+by water.</p>
+
+<p>Bottisham is the first of a line of interesting villages. We next
+reach, through a mile or two of pretty lanes, Swaffham Bulbeck, where,
+again the church has some good Decorated work, and fifteenth century
+seats, also a cedar chest of the same period, with carvings of the
+Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the Assumption of Our Lady. It is
+remarkable that these should have escaped the specially thorough
+"purification" which Dowsing here describes. "We brake down two
+crucifixes (and Christ nailed to them), one hundred superstitious
+pictures, and twenty cherubims, two crosses from the steeple, and two
+from the church and chancel, and digged down the altar-steps." The
+vicar was also ejected for being "zealous to put into execution Bishop
+Wren's fancies." Wren, the builder of Peterhouse Chapel, was Bishop of
+Ely 1638-1667, and deeply offended the Puritans by ordering the
+Communion Tables to be set "altar-wise" at the east end of the
+chancels (instead of being merely boards, which were habitually leant
+against the walls, and at Communion time were placed on trestles
+anywhere about the church). His High Church proclivities earned him
+eighteen years' imprisonment in the Tower, till released by the
+Restoration.</p>
+
+<p>To the north of Swaffham Bulbeck runs out an extension of the village
+known by the remarkable name of "Commercial End." It consists of one
+picturesque street, at the extremity of which we find ourselves on the
+banks of a deep, narrow waterway, like an old canal. An old canal in
+fact it is, and shows us that we have here reached the beach-line of
+the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page191" name="page191"></a>(p. 191)</span> ancient Fen; for this is Swaffham Lode, one of those
+artificial cuts through the tangled swamp by which barges and even
+sea-going vessels were enabled of old to reach the mainland. Of these
+Lodes there were several; and the knot of population at the
+termination of each shows the amount of traffic they anciently
+carried. Bottisham Lode has given its name to a village larger than
+Bottisham itself, and some three miles from it. And here at Swaffham
+the commerce of those bygone days has left us Commercial End. Hard by
+are the insignificant remains of a small Benedictine nunnery founded
+by the Bulbeck family in the reign of King John.</p>
+
+<a id="img044" name="img044"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img044.jpg" width="500" height="296" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Swaffham Bulbeck.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A mile further on brings us to another Swaffham, Swaffham Prior, with
+its picturesque churchyard rising steeply fifty feet above the
+village, and containing not one but two churches, dedicated
+respectively to St. Mary, and SS. Cyriac and Julitta.<a id="footnotetag143" name="footnotetag143"></a><a href="#footnote143" title="Go to footnote 143"><span class="smaller">[143]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Till the Restoration these represented two separate incumbencies; the
+former having been given to the Abbey of Ely by Brithnoth, the heroic
+Alderman of East Anglia under Ethelred the Unready. Both churches have
+passed through <span class="pagenum"><a id="page192" name="page192"></a>(p. 192)</span> singular architectural vicissitudes. The
+design of the Norman tower of St. Mary's (the lower of the two),
+square below and octagonal above, was copied by the fifteenth century
+builders of St. Cyriac's, and is the only surviving portion of their
+work&mdash;the body of the church having been pulled down in 1667, at the
+union of the benefices.</p>
+
+<a id="img045" name="img045"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img045.jpg" width="400" height="341" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Swaffham Prior.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A century later the steeple of St. Mary's was struck by lightning,
+which occasioned so unreasoning a panic amongst the worshippers that
+they resolved to abandon the church altogether. In vain did the Squire
+(then, as now, one of the Allix family)<a id="footnotetag144" name="footnotetag144"></a><a href="#footnote144" title="Go to footnote 144"><span class="smaller">[144]</span></a> offer to repair the
+damage, which was but slight, at his own charge. Nothing would serve
+but dismantling St. Mary's and using its spoil towards the rebuilding
+of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page193" name="page193"></a>(p. 193)</span> St. Cyriac's, in the shape of a hideous brick tabernacle,
+of the worst Georgian style, attached to the ancient tower. St. Mary's
+would have been entirely pulled down had not the ancient masonry
+proved so solid that the work of demolition did <span class="pagenum"><a id="page194" name="page194"></a>(p. 194)</span> not pay the
+local builder who got the job. As it was, it remained a ruin for yet
+another century, and it was not till the end of the nineteenth that it
+was restored&mdash;still under Allix auspices. Now it is once more the
+place of worship, and contains a specially well-executed rood-screen.
+But the beautiful spire which crowned the whole steeple still awaits
+replacement. The Georgian St. Cyriac's yet stands, and is used as a
+parish museum.</p>
+
+<a id="img046" name="img046"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img046.jpg" width="350" height="440" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Swaffham Prior Churches.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>From the churchyard of Swaffham Prior we get a grand view over the
+limitless fen to the northward; Ely Cathedral, ten miles away, rising
+conspicuous above it. The road we have been pursuing leads us on
+Ely-wards; but, a mile hence, comes to a dead stop at the little
+hamlet of Reach, once one of the most important places in the whole
+county. For here the mighty earthwork of the Devil's Dyke runs down
+into the fen. To meet it the greatest of all the Lodes was cut from
+the Cam at Upware, and at its hithe (or quay) our road has its
+termination. It is a striking surprise, for one comes upon it abruptly
+round a corner, and suddenly finds oneself at the end of all things.
+The hithe is a quiet green meadow now; but the clear brown water of
+the lode still sleeps beside it, and even yet barges, laden with turf
+or coal, occasionally creep up hither. Of old it was a constantly busy
+spot, where sea-going ships were loaded and unloaded, and trains of
+waggons attended, bringing and carrying off the cargoes.</p>
+
+<a id="img047" name="img047"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img047.jpg" width="350" height="435" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Castle Moat, Burwell.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Tradition gives Reach seven churches; but for this there is no
+historical evidence whatever, and it is probably only a hyperbolical
+way of extolling the ancient importance of the place. It is now merely
+a chapelry under Swaffham Prior, in which parish the western side of
+the township<a id="footnotetag145" name="footnotetag145"></a><a href="#footnote145" title="Go to footnote 145"><span class="smaller">[145]</span></a> is situated. For here the houses run in two lines,
+about a hundred yards apart, with a little village green between, on a
+gentle slope some quarter of a mile in length, having the fen level as
+its lower boundary, and, for the upper, the stupendous bulk of the
+Devil's Dyke, here cut clean off as if with a knife. All looks
+ancientry itself; but, in fact, this cutting off of the Dyke is quite
+a modern affair, not yet even two centuries old. Till then the Dyke
+ran right through the village down to the fen itself, effectually
+isolating the Swaffham Prior houses on the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page195" name="page195"></a>(p. 195)</span> west from those
+on the east, which belong parochially to Burwell. Cole, the prince of
+Cambridgeshire chroniclers, whose voluminous MS. notes on the county
+still await a publisher, mentions that when he visited Reach in 1743
+the Dyke still reached the fen; but when he came again in 1768 he
+found <span class="pagenum"><a id="page196" name="page196"></a>(p. 196)</span> the present state of things. Of how, or by whom, this
+act of vandalism was perpetrated I can find no record.</p>
+
+<p>Reach was of importance even in Roman days. The Dyke, of course, was
+already ancient when they ruled Britain, and the lode, too, may very
+probably have been already cut. The remains of one of their villas
+have been unearthed here, near the point where the Cambridge and
+Mildenhall railway now cuts through the Dyke. It has a well-preserved
+hypocaust, or apparatus for warming the house by hot air. The Roman
+"villa," we must remember, was the country mansion of the period, and
+equipped with every known luxury. In the Middle Ages the annual Fair
+at Reach (on the Monday before Ascension Day) was big enough to bring
+over the Mayor of Cambridge to open it. And the custom survives even
+today, when the occasion has dwindled to a very petty little
+gathering.</p>
+
+<p>Reach, however, has still a local industry; the cutting of the peat,
+or "turf" as it is here called, in the neighbouring fen, for use as
+fuel. This peat forms a layer often many feet in thickness, and is
+formed for the most part of moss, mingled with the vegetable mould
+made by the decay of the dense forests with which the district was
+covered for uncounted ages; before its final submergence, early in the
+Christian era, destroyed the last of them. A like subsidence had more
+than once produced the same results earlier; for the remains of four
+or five forest beds at different levels have been found in the peat.</p>
+
+<p>The trunks of these prehistoric trees are often of enormous size,
+especially the oaks.<a id="footnotetag146" name="footnotetag146"></a><a href="#footnote146" title="Go to footnote 146"><span class="smaller">[146]</span></a> One no fewer than 130 feet in length was
+unearthed in 1909. The wood, after its ages of immersion, has become
+black, hard, and heavy, like the Irish bog oak. Associated with such
+débris, the peat often furnishes remains of the dwellers in these
+archaic woodlands; whence we know that bears, wolves, wild boars, and
+gigantic wild bulls roamed their shades. In the skull of one of these
+last, now in the Sedgwick Geological Museum at Cambridge, is imbedded
+a flint axe-head. The arm of the primeval savage who wielded that
+weapon must have been strong beyond the arms of common men.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page197" name="page197"></a>(p. 197)</span>
+
+<a id="img048" name="img048"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img048.jpg" width="350" height="430" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Burwell Church, West End.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The peat is cut with a spade of peculiar construction, being flat, and
+both longer and narrower than ordinary spades. It is shaped somewhat
+like a fire shovel with a flange on either side, the object being that
+each "turf" extracted should be of uniform size, like a brick. A
+thousand of these should go <span class="pagenum"><a id="page198" name="page198"></a>(p. 198)</span> to the ton; but though uniform
+in size they are not of uniform weight, for the peat, as might be
+expected, is more dense at its lower levels than near the surface.
+There is a good market for this turf, which makes a hot and lasting
+fire with a minimum of smoke, and that pleasant smoke. It is mostly
+sent off by water to Cambridge, Ely, Wisbech, etc.</p>
+
+<p>This turf-cutting is not, of course, confined to Reach, but it has its
+greatest development here, and at the neighbouring village of Burwell,
+a mile or so to the eastward (to which, as we have seen, part of Reach
+belongs). Burwell is an important village of considerable extent, with
+a population of 2000, and a magnificent church, capable of seating
+them all. It is of the finest fifteenth century workmanship, with a
+few remains of Norman in the tower. The exterior is mostly flint; the
+interior, like that of so many churches in Cambridgeshire, is of
+"clunch," a hardened form of chalk, well adapted for building, and
+easily worked for carving. The beautiful sculptures of the Lady Chapel
+at Ely are of this material, drawn from the large quarries between
+Burwell and Reach. Clunch is found in many places throughout the
+county and has been worked (as existing remains show) ever since Roman
+days.</p>
+
+<p>Burwell Church is specially connected with the University of
+Cambridge, in whose gift is the preferment, burdened with the
+condition that on Mid-Lent Sunday a sermon shall be preached there by
+the Vice-Chancellor or his deputy. Till the nineteenth century this
+condition was no light one; for the roads were in such a state that
+half a dozen men on each side could hardly keep the preacher's
+carriage from overturning, and, whenever possible, the cortege took to
+the newly-ploughed fields in preference. The route was not round by
+Reach but direct from Swaffham Prior.</p>
+
+<p>Here is a remarkable brass of John Lawrence de Wardeboys, the last
+Abbot of Ramsey in Huntingdonshire. For his readiness in abetting the
+designs of Henry the Eighth, not only by eagerly surrendering his own
+abbey, "which was not his to give," but by persuading others to do
+like violence to their conscience, he was rewarded with a pension
+equivalent to between two and three thousand pounds a year. His brass
+records this venality of his principles. It was originally made during
+his abbacy, and showed him in full abbatical vestments, mitre and all
+(for Ramsey was a mitred abbey). After the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page199" name="page199"></a>(p. 199)</span> surrender he had
+it turned over, and on the reverse side, now uppermost, we see him in
+a simple clerical gown and cap. He only lived a few years to enjoy his
+ill-gotten gains, dying in 1542.</p>
+
+<a id="img049" name="img049"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img049.jpg" width="350" height="445" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Burwell Church, N.E. View.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page200" name="page200"></a>(p. 200)</span> South-west of the church are some scanty remains of Burwell
+Castle, which was built by King Stephen during the miserable "nineteen
+winters" of his war with Queen Matilda, so forcibly described in the
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, when the country was laid desolate by the
+outrages of the robber barons. The particular brigand who afflicted
+Cambridgeshire was one Geoffry de Magnaville, an outrageously wicked
+plunderer, who "did not spare even the churches," regarded as
+inviolable by ordinary malefactors. Both Cambridge and Ely were looted
+by him, and he terrorised the whole district, till at length he was
+slain, by an arrow through the throat, in attacking Burwell Castle.
+"Nor was the earth permitted to give a grave to the sacrilegious
+offender."</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page201" name="page201"></a>(p. 201)</span> CHAPTER IX</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Hills Road.&mdash;Gog-Magogs.&mdash;Vandlebury.&mdash;Babraham, Peter
+     Pence.&mdash;Old Railway.&mdash;Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper
+     Stile.&mdash;Linton.&mdash;Horseheath.&mdash;Bartlow, St. Christopher, Battle of
+     Assandun.&mdash;Cherry Hinton, War Ditches,
+     Saffron.&mdash;Teversham.&mdash;Fulbourn, Brasses.&mdash;Wilbraham.&mdash;Fleam Dyke,
+     Wild Flowers, Butterflies, Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle.&mdash;Balsham,
+     Battle of Ringmere, Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones.</p>
+
+<p>At Burwell we are within touch of Exning, Fordham, and Soham, so that
+we have now exhausted the interest of the Cambridge-Newmarket Road.
+Next in order comes the Via Devana, which when it leaves Cambridge for
+the south-east is denominated the "Hills Road." The reason for this is
+that it shortly brings us to the most ambitious elevation neighbouring
+the town, no less than 220 feet in height, and bearing the
+high-sounding name of the Gog-Magog Hills.</p>
+
+<p>The origin of this curious appellation is still to seek. According to
+some archæologists it is derived from the prehistoric figure of a
+giant which was formerly to be seen on the slope, traced there by
+cutting away the turf along the outline of the shape, such as that
+still extant near Cerne Abbas in Dorsetshire. This, if it ever
+existed, has long since disappeared. Others consider the name to be a
+seventeenth century skit on the gigantic height of the hills. Others
+again see in it a dim traditional recollection of the days when a set
+of gigantic barbarians really were, for a time, quartered here. This
+was in the reign of the Roman Emperor Probus (277 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>), who leavened
+his mutinous British forces with prisoners from the Vandal horde
+lately defeated by the Romans on the Danube. From one such detachment,
+placed here in garrison, the name of Vandlebury is supposed to have
+clung ever since to the great earthwork on the summit of the
+Gog-Magogs.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page202" name="page202"></a>(p. 202)</span> That earthwork, however, is of far older date, being of
+British, or even earlier, inception. It is a triple ring of gigantic
+ramparts, like those of Maiden Castle near Dorchester, and nearly a
+mile in circumference. All is now buried in the shrubberies of
+Gog-Magog House, the seat successively of Lord Godolphin and of the
+Dukes of Leeds.<a id="footnotetag147" name="footnotetag147"></a><a href="#footnote147" title="Go to footnote 147"><span class="smaller">[147]</span></a> But before being thus planted out it must have
+been one of the most striking examples in the kingdom of such
+fortifications. Till the eighteenth century it was a favourite scene
+of bull-baiting and other illegal sports amongst undergraduates,
+because the bare open country all round made it impossible for the
+authorities to surprise the offenders. Vandlebury was the original
+home of the legend, used by Sir Walter Scott in <i>Marmion</i>, which told
+how in the ancient camp, by moonlight, an elfin warrior would answer
+the challenge of any adventurous knight bold enough to encounter him
+in single combat.</p>
+
+<p>In the early decades of the nineteenth century the then Duchess of
+Leeds here set up for her tenantry one of the earliest rural
+elementary schools. Children of both sexes were taught in this
+institution to read and to sew, the boys making their own smock
+frocks. The boys might, if they would, also learn, as an extra, to
+write; but not the girls, for Her Grace considered that it would
+deleteriously affect their prospects in domestic service if they were
+possessed of the dangerous power of deciphering their employers'
+correspondence.</p>
+
+<p>Our road climbs the hill to the gate of Gog-Magog House, and plunges
+down into woodlands on the other side, in a fashion very unlike the
+usual Cambridgeshire highway, to meet the infant stream of the
+Granta<a id="footnotetag148" name="footnotetag148"></a><a href="#footnote148" title="Go to footnote 148"><span class="smaller">[148]</span></a> on its meandering way to Cambridge. Our further course is
+amongst the pretty villages along its valley, the best-wooded vale in
+all the county. First of these comes Babraham (anciently Bradburgham),
+with a pretty little Saxon-towered church snuggling in the park beside
+the Hall. Babraham is noted for the epitaph of an old-time swindler,
+who was enabled to pocket the Peter <span class="pagenum"><a id="page203" name="page203"></a>(p. 203)</span> Pence<a id="footnotetag149" name="footnotetag149"></a><a href="#footnote149" title="Go to footnote 149"><span class="smaller">[149]</span></a> which he
+collected under Queen Mary by sharing his spoil with Queen Elizabeth.
+It runs thus:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Here lies Horatio Palavazene,<br>
+  Who robbed the Pope to lend the Queen."<br>
+  "He was a thiefe." "A thiefe? Thou liest;<br>
+  For why? he robbed but Antichrist.<br>
+  Him Death with besome swept from Babram<br>
+  Into the bosome of old Abram.<br>
+  But then came Hercules with his club,<br>
+  And struck him down to Beelzebub."</p>
+
+<p>A curious fresco on the north wall of the church is thought to
+represent King Edward the Second.</p>
+
+<p>A little beyond Babraham we cross the Icknield Street, on its way from
+Newmarket to Chesterford. Beside it runs, what is almost unknown in
+England, a deserted railroad, built by the Eastern Counties Railway
+Company (now the Great Eastern) in 1848, to afford direct
+communication between Newmarket and London, and abandoned, as a
+financial failure, in 1852, since which date the trains have gone
+round by Cambridge. Where this long disused line runs on the level it
+has melted back again into the adjoining fields, but the old cuttings
+and embankments and bridges still exist, and a weird sight they are.</p>
+
+<p>At the adjoining villages of Great and Little Abington the road makes
+a picturesque zig-zag through the village street, and passes on,
+beneath a fine beech avenue, to Hildersham, where a pretty byway leads
+across the stream to the fourteenth century church. Here there are
+four good brasses (to members of the Parys<a id="footnotetag150" name="footnotetag150"></a><a href="#footnote150" title="Go to footnote 150"><span class="smaller">[150]</span></a> family), one of them
+showing the unique feature of a lance-rest fastened to the cuirass,
+and another (of 1530) being simply a skeleton. There are also two very
+striking recumbent effigies representing a crusader and his wife, each
+carved out of a single block of wood, now black with age. The
+churchyard here is effectively planted with junipers and fir trees,
+and the east end of the church is embowered in shrubs of rosemary,
+said to be the finest in Cambridgeshire.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page204" name="page204"></a>(p. 204)</span> From Hildersham the road goes on to Linton, a mile or so
+further; while the two places are also connected by a specially
+pleasant footpath, starting from a fine old smithy, and so through the
+meadows by the clear trout-stream, and past the yews and thorn-trees
+of the moated grange of "Little Linton," while above rises (to nearly
+four hundred feet, a proud height in Cambridgeshire) the appropriately
+named Furze Hill, with some real gorse patches (also a proud
+distinction in Cambridgeshire) upon its ridge.</p>
+
+<p>Before we reach Linton we cross the famous "Clapper" stile, which can
+best be described as formed by three huge sledge-hammers (of wood)
+with exceptionally long shanks, hinged near the head to an upright
+post, each about a foot above the next. Normally the three
+hammer-heads rest upon one another and look like a single post (about
+a foot from the first); but, on attempting to cross, the shanks (the
+ends of which are <i>not</i> fastened but slide in a grooved post at their
+side of the stile) yield to our weight, the heads fly apart, and, when
+we are over, come together again with the "claps" whence the name of
+the stile is derived. How old this curious device is does not appear,
+but it is here immemorial. An effective sketch of this stile is given
+by Dr. Wherry, in his "Notes from a Knapsack."</p>
+
+<p>Linton is a tiny town, smaller than sundry villages, but obviously not
+a village, with a long street of undetached houses (duly lighted)
+swinging down the slopes on either side the little river. There is a
+fine Perpendicular church, with some Norman work remaining in it, and
+a good tower, on the top of which an Ascension Day service is annually
+held. Against a wall are suspended two fire-hooks (much lighter than
+the one at St. Benet's, Cambridge) for the destruction of burning
+houses. (See note on page <a href="#footnote10">38</a>).</p>
+
+<p>The main road here goes on, to pass out of Cambridgeshire into
+Suffolk, a few miles further, at the upland village of Horseheath,
+with its picturesque old-world village green on the hillside. The
+church here has a fine fourteenth century brass to Sir John de
+Argentine (a name familiar to readers of Sir Walter Scott, in the
+"Lord of the Isles")<a id="footnotetag151" name="footnotetag151"></a><a href="#footnote151" title="Go to footnote 151"><span class="smaller">[151]</span></a> and some notable <span class="pagenum"><a id="page205" name="page205"></a>(p. 205)</span> monuments,
+somewhat knocked about, presumably by Dowsing, who records how he here
+"brake down four pictures of the prophets Ezekiel, Daniel, Zephaniah,
+and Malachi," besides other damage.</p>
+
+<p>But a more interesting road from Linton is that which continues along
+the Bourne Valley, and leads, not into Suffolk, but into Essex, which
+is here bounded by that stream. A mile beyond the town we pass Barham
+Hall, now a farm-house, but of old a Priory of the same Order that we
+found at Isleham,<a id="footnotetag152" name="footnotetag152"></a><a href="#footnote152" title="Go to footnote 152"><span class="smaller">[152]</span></a> a Cell (or Colony) of the Abbey of St. Jacutus
+de Insula in Brittany. Another mile brings us to Bartlow, where, hard
+by the church, stand the three huge tumuli from which the name of the
+village is said to be derived. How they came to exist is an unsolved
+problem. Remains found in them, when excavated in 1835, were reported
+to be Roman, but the science of archæology was then in its infancy,
+and this report can hardly outweigh the wholly un-Roman appearance of
+the "Hills," as they are locally called. They look far more like
+British or Scandinavian work; but, indeed, three such mounds so close
+together are not found elsewhere, of any age.</p>
+
+<p>The little church has an ancient fresco of St. Christopher, placed, as
+usual, opposite the entrance. For this Saint, by virtue of the legend
+which tells how he carried Christ over a river,<a id="footnotetag153" name="footnotetag153"></a><a href="#footnote153" title="Go to footnote 153"><span class="smaller">[153]</span></a> was in mediæval
+times regarded as a special example for Christians in their going out
+and their coming in; to whom, therefore, was due their first and last
+thought in passing the doorway. More noteworthy is the Saxon tower,
+with its walls no less than six feet in thickness. For in this it is
+quite possible that we may have a part of the very "minster of stone
+and lime" raised by Canute in memory of his crowning victory over
+Edmund Ironside at Assandun.</p>
+
+<p>The location of that most dramatic of English battles, fought in the
+year 1016, is hotly disputed amongst historians; but there is much to
+be said for the early view which identifies Assandun with Ashdon in
+Essex, hard by Bartlow. For ten <span class="pagenum"><a id="page206" name="page206"></a>(p. 206)</span> miserable years, under
+Ethelred the Unready, England had been ground in the dust, deeper and
+ever deeper, beneath the heel of the invading Dane. Year by year the
+degrading tribute wherewith she strove to buy off the foe had gone up
+by leaps and bounds. All hope seemed dead, when the accession of a
+hero to the throne roused the harried and exhausted nation into one
+last convulsive effort for freedom. Six times in as many months did
+Edmund of England and Canute of Denmark clash in battle. Five of these
+fields were indecisive, and then, on St. Luke's Day, 1016, the
+champions met once more at Assandun, perhaps on the slope still known
+as Bartlow End.</p>
+
+<p>Treason decided the day against England. The fight began with a
+brilliant charge by Edmund at the head of his bodyguard, which crashed
+through the Danish phalanx "like a thunderbolt." But his absence from
+the English line enabled a traitorous noble, one Edric (who was always
+playing into Canute's hands, in hope of thereby making his own
+advantage), to raise a cry that the King was slain. A panic set in at
+once; and before Edmund could cut his way back, the whole army had
+broken, and was being fearfully cut up in its flight by the pursuing
+Danes. "And there the whole nobility of England was utterly
+destroyed." Edmund died of his exertions the same year; and Canute
+became King of England, the first monarch so to call himself. The
+native title had always been "King of the English." In thanksgiving he
+built a minster on the scene of his victory; and, as he had promised,
+he lifted up the head of Edric "above all the nobility of
+England"&mdash;upon the highest turret of the Tower of London. The "Roman"
+theory notwithstanding, the three Bartlow barrows may well be a
+memorial of this great fight, and so may the names of Castle Camps and
+Shudy Camps which attach to the furthest villages in this far-away
+corner of Cambridgeshire. The "Castle," however, of which only the
+moat now remains, was built later by De Vere, the first Earl of
+Oxford. Shudy Camps has a far-seen church on its lofty brow, visible
+even from Barrington Hill, on the other side of the Cam basin, fifteen
+miles away as the crow flies.</p>
+
+<a id="img050" name="img050"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img050.jpg" width="500" height="298" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cherry Hinton Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>From the Via Devana, where it leaves Cambridge (just after the bridge
+over the Great Eastern Railway), there branches off to the left
+another road, which leads us to the scenes of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page208" name="page208"></a>(p. 208)</span> earlier
+battles between Dane and Englishman. This is the Cherry Hinton Road,
+named after the first village along its course, some three miles on.
+Its long straight vista suggests at first sight the idea that it too
+may be a Roman road. In fact, however, it dates only from the
+enclosure of the land (about the beginning of last century), when the
+best ploughman in the village was employed, so the story goes, to
+drive his straightest furrow across the whole breadth of the Common
+Field as a guide for the road-makers. The older track between Cherry
+Hinton and Cambridge was by what used to be, till within the last
+fifty years, a pretty footpath across the fenny ground to the north of
+the field. It is fenny no longer, and the path has become for
+three-fourths of its length a somewhat dreary street through the dingy
+suburb of "Romsey Town."</p>
+
+<p>Cherry Hinton itself is not yet absorbed by Cambridge, and remains a
+bright spacious village, with a rarely beautiful church. The exquisite
+Early English chancel is lighted on either side by four couplets of
+lancet windows, in ideal proportion, while five equally ideal lancets
+serve for an East window. Both walls have an arcading of cinque-foil
+pattern; and the double piscina and the graduated sedilia are of no
+less merit. All this loveliness is within a fine oaken screen of the
+fifteenth century, and the rest of the church is not unworthy of it.
+The great quarry, whence the "clunch" of which the church is mainly
+built was drawn, is a conspicuous object on the hill-side above the
+village; and above that again, equally conspicuous, is the reservoir
+of the Cambridge Water-works, looking like a redoubt, on the summit of
+the slope. At the foot clear springs break out from the chalk, which
+are also utilised to supply the town.</p>
+
+<p>Close to the reservoir there is an actual fortification, an ancient
+earthwork, known as the War Ditches, which the researches of Professor
+Hughes have shown to be of British date.<a id="footnotetag154" name="footnotetag154"></a><a href="#footnote154" title="Go to footnote 154"><span class="smaller">[154]</span></a> At the bottom of the
+fosse he discovered rough British pottery along with the bones of
+domestic animals, and above these a layer of disjointed human
+skeletons of both sexes and all ages, apparently due to a general
+massacre, in some prehistoric struggle, of men, women, and children,
+whose corpses were hurled over the parapet. Above these again came
+Romano-British remains. From this earthwork the line <span class="pagenum"><a id="page209" name="page209"></a>(p. 209)</span> of an
+ancient dyke, now called Warstead Street, may be traced to the East
+Anglian heights near Horseheath.</p>
+
+<p>Till the nineteenth century the fields between Cherry Hinton and
+Cambridge were bright with the purple flowers of the saffron crocus,
+which was grown, as it was by the ancient Greeks and Romans, for
+medical use and for dyeing purposes. Its cultivation may very probably
+have been introduced into Britain by the Romans. The saffron here
+grown was considered the best in Europe, and fetched no less than
+thirty shillings a pound. But its use, after so many centuries,
+suddenly went out of fashion, and the plant is now wholly extinct in
+Cambridgeshire.<a id="footnotetag155" name="footnotetag155"></a><a href="#footnote155" title="Go to footnote 155"><span class="smaller">[155]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>From Cherry Hinton Church a green lane leads to Teversham, a short
+mile distant, but, except for pedestrians, more easily approached from
+the Newmarket Road. The church here is a pretty little structure,
+mainly Early English, with curious oval clerestory windows, and a nice
+Perpendicular screen. The octagonal pillars have floreated capitals.
+Dowsing's record of his destructions here is of special interest,
+inasmuch as the objects of his Protestant zeal were not, as usual,
+relics of pre-Reformation Popery, but the newly painted devices of the
+Laudian vicar, Dr. Wren (the Bishop of Ely and builder of Peterhouse
+Chapel). They consisted of the name JESUS, "in big letters" no fewer
+than eighteen times repeated, of those of the Three Persons of the
+Blessed Trinity, and of texts from Scripture: "Let this mind be in you
+which was also in Christ Jesus," and "O come let us worship and fall
+down and kneel before the Lord our Maker." All these were "done out"
+as "idolatries"!</p>
+
+<p>From the springs at Cherry Hinton the furrow-drawn road (passing on
+its way the County Lunatic Asylum) makes another bee-line of three
+miles to Fulbourn. Here the church is of special interest. There are
+no fewer than five mediæval brasses, including one, almost life-size,
+of Canon William de Fulburne, 1380, which is notable as being,
+probably, the earliest known example of a priest vested in a cope.
+This ecclesiastic was one of Edward the Third's chaplains. In a wooden
+shrine on the north side of the chancel is a moribund effigy of John
+Careway, vicar here in 1433. This is beneath a sept-foiled arch,
+beside which is another strangely irregular <span class="pagenum"><a id="page210" name="page210"></a>(p. 210)</span> arch over a
+sedile. There is also the very unusual feature of a fourteenth century
+pulpit of richly-carved oak.</p>
+
+<p>The dedication of this church is as unusual. It is to St. Vigor, an
+obscure sixth century bishop of Bayeux, who has only one other church
+in England, at Stratton-on-the-Fosse in Somerset. Till late in the
+eighteenth century there was a second church here in the same
+churchyard, as at Swaffham Prior. This was All Saints', and was ruined
+by the fall of its tower in 1766. The ruins were gradually stolen, the
+wood going first, but it took ten years for the last of the bells to
+disappear.</p>
+
+<p>At the church the road divides. The northern branch meanders through
+the village past an ancient row of old-time almshouses to the station,
+beyond which it becomes a pretty lane leading to the adjoining
+villages of Great and Little Wilbraham. The church at the former has a
+tower arch of strikingly peculiar development, a tall lancet, flanked
+by segments of arches of much larger radius, inserted in the wall on
+either side, which support the central member somewhat in the fashion
+of flying buttresses. The parson here, "a widower with three small
+children" (as the Puritan report gloatingly points out), was ejected
+in 1644 by the Puritans, because "he said it was treason for any man
+to give any money against the King, and in his sermons discouraged his
+parish from doing anything for the Parliament, and that he never read
+any book coming from the Parliament." Caution should be observed in
+passing through these villages, as sundry well-seeming roads simply
+lead down to Fulbourn Fen<a id="footnotetag156" name="footnotetag156"></a><a href="#footnote156" title="Go to footnote 156"><span class="smaller">[156]</span></a> and end there. Springs feeding the fen
+are plentiful, and the ground is still very much of a swamp.</p>
+
+<p>But the road to take from Fulbourn Church is that which winds away
+south-eastwards, for in less than three miles it will bring us to the
+Icknield Street,<a id="footnotetag157" name="footnotetag157"></a><a href="#footnote157" title="Go to footnote 157"><span class="smaller">[157]</span></a> close to the point where that famous war-path
+cuts through the no less famous Fleam Dyke. This is the best place for
+viewing and ascending that splendid prehistoric earthwork, the sister
+and rival of the Devil's Dyke. It makes a most fascinating byway to
+walk along, though it leads nowhither, ending abruptly where it dips
+down into Fulbourn Fen.<a id="footnotetag158" name="footnotetag158"></a><a href="#footnote158" title="Go to footnote 158"><span class="smaller">[158]</span></a> The dry chalk is <span class="pagenum"><a id="page211" name="page211"></a>(p. 211)</span> clothed with
+flowers all the summer through. At Easter time we may here find the
+glorious purple Pasch-flower, that queen of all the anemone clan;
+later on "the turf is sweet with thyme and gay with yellow rock-rose,
+blue flax, milkwort, pink-budded dropwort, sainfoin, kidney vetch, and
+viper's bugloss, and here and there a bee orchis; with a dancing
+accompaniment of butterflies overhead, graylings, skippers, chalk hill
+and Bedford blues, and a host beside."<a id="footnotetag159" name="footnotetag159"></a><a href="#footnote159" title="Go to footnote 159"><span class="smaller">[159]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img051" name="img051"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img051.jpg" width="500" height="303" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Great Wilbraham Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The air is inspiring and so also is the view, with Ely on the far
+horizon to the north; and the historical associations are not less so.
+We can imagine the oaken palisade which topped the dyke lined with the
+Icenian clansmen in their tartan plaids shouting defiance to the
+presumptuous Roman who dared to demand their arms; then the incredibly
+audacious onslaught which, along the whole length of the Dyke at once,
+carried Ostorius and his light-armed troops at one rush clear across
+the mighty ditch, and up the forty feet of precipitous slope beyond,
+to crown the parapet and whirl away the patriot levies in headlong
+flight; then the merciless pursuit which forbade any chance to rally,
+till the fugitives were stopped by their own <span class="pagenum"><a id="page212" name="page212"></a>(p. 212)</span> second line of
+defence at the Devil's Dyke, and slaughtered like rats beneath its
+rampart.<a id="footnotetag160" name="footnotetag160"></a><a href="#footnote160" title="Go to footnote 160"><span class="smaller">[160]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img052" name="img052"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img052.jpg" width="400" height="406" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Great Wilbraham.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Or our thoughts may turn to the later day when here was beheld the
+last fight worthy to be called a battle ever fought in Cambridgeshire.
+It is the year 905 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>; the great Alfred has been dead four years,
+and his son Edward the Elder has been chosen King in his stead. For
+the English monarchy is still elective, though already with a strong
+tendency to become hereditary. And this tendency now gives trouble.
+When <span class="pagenum"><a id="page213" name="page213"></a>(p. 213)</span> Alfred himself was made King his nephew Ethelwald
+Clito, son of his elder brother Ethelred, the late King, was passed
+over in his favour. At that fearful crisis, when it was doubtful
+whether even an Alfred could stem the Danish inrush, there could be no
+thought of choosing a child as King.</p>
+
+<a id="img053" name="img053"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img053.jpg" width="500" height="405" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Little Wilbraham.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>But the Danes are now quietly settled in the Eastern Counties, and
+Ethelwald has grown up to manhood, and is bitterly angry at being
+again passed over, this time for his cousin Edward. If the English
+will not choose him, he will try the Danes. So to the Danes he goes,
+with promises of unlimited loot if they will support him, and, in the
+words of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "entices them to break the peace,"
+so that they cross the Watling Street, and make a ferocious raid into
+Mercia. "They took all they might lay hands on, and so turned homeward
+again. Then after them came King Edward, as fast as he might gather
+his force, and overran all their <span class="pagenum"><a id="page214" name="page214"></a>(p. 214)</span> land between the Dykes and
+the Ouse, as far North as the Fens."</p>
+
+<p>The Devil's Dyke and the Fleam Dyke are by this time known as "the two
+dykes of St. Edmund," and now play their latest part in history as
+defences. Edward is no Ostorius, being a valiant warrior of the
+cautious rather than the daring type, and the Fleam Dyke brings his
+avenging host to a standstill. Finally he resolves that to storm it
+would cost too much, and retires his command. But his levies from Kent
+are of another temper, and positively refuse to obey what they look
+upon as an ignominious order. One after another, seven royal
+messengers repeat it in vain; and finally the main body of the English
+army marches off under the Royal banner, leaving the mutineers still
+before the Dyke&mdash;probably at the very point where the Icknield Way
+cuts it.</p>
+
+<p>This is the Danes' opportunity. They have now safely deposited their
+plunder, and are ready for another outbreak. With their whole force
+they sally forth, and fall upon these stubborn Kentish men, and the
+fighting becomes desperate. The Kentish Alderman (who combined the
+offices of High Sheriff and Lord Lieutenant) is slain, so is the
+Danish King Eric, so is Ethelwald "the Atheling" himself, "and very
+many with them. And great was the slaughter there made on either hand;
+and of the Danish folk were there the more slain, yet won they the
+field."<a id="footnotetag161" name="footnotetag161"></a><a href="#footnote161" title="Go to footnote 161"><span class="smaller">[161]</span></a> And thus, after so many ages of warfare, does the Fleam
+Dyke, or Balsham Ditch, as it is also called, enter on its millennium
+of peace.</p>
+
+<a id="img054" name="img054"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img054.jpg" width="350" height="456" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Balsham Tower.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>For it played no part in the tragedy which, a hundred years after this
+last fight, is associated with its alternative name. Once more Danes
+and Englishmen are at hand-grips; but now it is no mere loose
+aggregate of private hordes pressing, each on its own, into the land,
+but Swend Forkbeard, the monarch of a great Scandinavian Empire
+purposing to add England also to his dominions. And under the weak
+sceptre of Ethelred the Unready, nothing beyond local resistance has
+been offered him; and here alone is the local resistance serious. East
+Anglia is under the governorship of the hero Ulfcytel, who has already
+given the Danes an unforgotten taste of his "hand-play," and he
+gathers her whole force to meet them at Ringmere. But the appalling
+tidings of what Swend has done elsewhere, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page216" name="page216"></a>(p. 216)</span> "lighting his
+war-beacons as he went" throughout the length and breadth of the land,
+"with his three wonted comrades, fire, famine, and slaughter," have
+taken all the heart out of the English levies. For "all England did
+quake before him like a reed-bed rustling in the wind." The battle is
+speedily over. "Soon fled the East Angles; there stood
+Grantabryg-shire fast only."</p>
+
+<p>Upon Cambridgeshire accordingly this vainly gallant stand brought down
+the special vengeance of the conquerors. To and fro went Danish
+punitive columns, and visited the district with a harrying even beyond
+their wont. "What they could lift, that took they; what they might not
+carry, that burned they; and so marched they up and down the land."
+And at Balsham, perhaps because of some local resistance, they are
+said to have killed out the entire population, man, woman, and child;
+save one single individual only, who successfully defended against
+them the narrow entrance to the Church steeple.</p>
+
+<p>It is quite possible that this doorway is the very one which we see
+when we reach Balsham, where the Dyke ends, high on the East Anglian
+heights: for, though the church was rebuilt in the fourteenth century,
+the basement of the tower seems to be far older. Here we are four
+hundred feet up, and the air has quite an Alpine freshness, after the
+damp, sluggish atmosphere of the sea level at Cambridge. We feel well
+why the old Chronicler, Henry of Huntingdon, speaks of "Balsham's
+pleasant hills."</p>
+
+<a id="img055" name="img055"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img055.jpg" width="400" height="452" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cottage at Balsham.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>There are in this church two most noteworthy brasses, one a
+magnificent memorial, no less than nine feet in length, to John de
+Sleford, rector here, the rebuilder of the church. He was a
+distinguished personage, being Chaplain to Queen Philippa, Master of
+the Wardrobe to her husband King Edward the Third, and Canon both of
+Ripon and of Wells. The orphreys of his cope are embroidered with the
+figures of Saints, five on either side,<a id="footnotetag162" name="footnotetag162"></a><a href="#footnote162" title="Go to footnote 162"><span class="smaller">[162]</span></a> and in the canopy over
+his head his soul is being borne by angels to the Blessed Trinity with
+the prayer <span class="smcap">PERSONIS · TRINE · POSCO · ME: SVSCIPE · FINE.</span> The other
+brass is no less magnificent in size and decoration, and commemorates
+a yet more magnificent pluralist, John <span class="pagenum"><a id="page217" name="page217"></a>(p. 217)</span> Blodwell, who was
+Rector here in 1439, besides being Dean of St. Asaph, Canon of St.
+David's, Prebendary of Hereford, and Prebendary of Lichfield. He, too,
+has eight Saints on his cope, and eight more in his canopy.<a id="footnotetag163" name="footnotetag163"></a><a href="#footnote163" title="Go to footnote 163"><span class="smaller">[163]</span></a>
+Twelve Latin verses <span class="pagenum"><a id="page218" name="page218"></a>(p. 218)</span> give a dialogue between himself and
+Death, whose words are incised, while his are in relief. The chancel
+has twelve fine stalls on either side, and a grand rood screen, all
+from the generosity of Rector Sleford. Yet another, and earlier,
+worthy connected with this place, is Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely
+and Founder of the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page219" name="page219"></a>(p. 219)</span> CHAPTER X</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">London Road.&mdash;Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+     Pool, Upper River.&mdash;Grantchester, Church.&mdash;Cam and Granta.&mdash;The
+     Shelfords.&mdash;Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+     "Little John."&mdash;Whittlesford, Old Hospital.&mdash;Duxford.&mdash;Triplow
+     Heath, Civil War.&mdash;Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell.&mdash;Ickleton,
+     Monolith Pillars.&mdash;Chesterford.&mdash;Icknield Way.&mdash;Saffron Walden.</p>
+
+<p>Due south from Cambridge goes the great London Road, a name now
+practically supplanted by the local designation of Trumpington Road.
+Trumpington, two miles out, is already joined to Cambridge by a string
+of suburban villas; but these are only on one side of the road, while
+the other is a continuous line of nightingale-haunted elms, not even
+the stench and dust of the motorist having availed to drive away those
+fearless songsters. In leaving the Town the road starts along Hobson's
+Conduit, passing the Botanic Gardens, and crosses Vicar's Brook at the
+historic milestone already described on page 160, the first to be set
+up in England since the days of the Romans.</p>
+
+<p>Trumpington Church shares with Salisbury Cathedral the distinction of
+being built wholly in the Early English style at its best; and it has
+what is, perhaps, the best-known brass in England, that of Sir Roger
+de Trumpington, one of the crusading comrades of Edward the First. The
+knight is in full panoply of chain-armour, with steel epaulettes (or
+ailettes as they were then called) protecting his shoulders. His
+helmet is secured by a chain to his girdle, an unusual precaution, and
+his large concave shield is charged with his punning arms, two golden
+trumpets.</p>
+
+<p>From the Church an alluring hollow lane winds down to a flat green
+island meadow (once a swamp, and still often <span class="pagenum"><a id="page220" name="page220"></a>(p. 220)</span> flooded)
+between two branches of the Cam, dividing Trumpington from the sister
+village of Grantchester. On the Grantchester side of this island we
+come to a mill, with a specially delicious mill-pool below it,
+overhung by a wreath of foliage, chiefly chestnut. This is the
+representative of the mill immortalised by Chaucer, in the Canterbury
+Tale which describes so picturesquely the somewhat unsavoury
+adventures of the Cambridge "clerks":</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  At Trompyngtoun, nat far fro Cantebrigge,<br>
+  There goth a brook, and over that a brigge,<br>
+  Upon the whiche brook ther stant a melle,<br>
+  And this is verray sothe that I you telle.</p>
+
+<p>The present mill, however, is not on the actual site of Chaucer's,
+which stood some quarter of a mile higher up the stream. Its mill-pool
+still exists, and is famed as "Byron's Pool." Hither the poet used
+constantly to make his way when an undergraduate, as a retired spot
+where he might enjoy his favourite delight of bathing, which even in
+his day was a practice somewhat frowned upon by the academic
+authorities. A century or so earlier, as has been already said, any
+student found guilty of it was publicly flogged in the Hall of his
+College.<a id="footnotetag164" name="footnotetag164"></a><a href="#footnote164" title="Go to footnote 164"><span class="smaller">[164]</span></a> It is a fascinating place, overhung by fine trees, and
+remained in favour as a bathing-place even to the middle of the
+nineteenth century. Now it has become so silted up as to be
+practically useless. But on the river above it there is still a good
+swimming reach, little used, however, as most students are content
+with the University bathing sheds between Grantchester and Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>The footpath past these sheds is a pleasant byway between the two
+places, through the green meadows along the riverbank, and so also is
+the river itself, hereabouts no more than the "brook" which Chaucer
+calls it. It is, however, by no means a water to be played with
+rashly, having a tortuous course full of deep holes, in which many
+lives have been lost. Indeed, no student is now allowed on this "Upper
+River," unless a certified swimmer. A third alternative route is
+afforded by the lane between Grantchester and Newnham. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page221" name="page221"></a>(p. 221)</span>
+Though the southern half of this suburb is actually in Grantchester
+parish, the lane still runs through open fields, and Grantchester
+itself is in no sense suburban.</p>
+
+<p>A strangely zig-zag road (with no fewer than four right-angle bends to
+left and right alternately in as many hundred yards), climbs from the
+mill to the church, which stands, like Trumpington, on the gravel
+terrace above the river. These river gravels are amongst the most
+interesting of Cambridgeshire geological formations. Not only does
+their height above the present stream level (sometimes as much as
+thirty feet) point to an age when the rivers must have been much
+larger than now, but they are prolific in organic remains, indicating,
+sometimes a warmer, sometimes a colder climate than ours. Here, at
+Grantchester, bones of the mammoth and of the woolly rhinoceros
+connote subarctic conditions; but a few miles further up the Cam, at
+Barrington, the terrace is full of hippopotamus, along with elephant
+and rhinoceros of African type, postulating a sub-tropical
+temperature.</p>
+
+<p>Grantchester Church is chiefly noteworthy for its singularly beautiful
+chancel, an almost ideal example of fourteenth century work, perched
+most effectively above one of the bends in the road. The name, with
+its "chester" has led many antiquarians to hold that here was a Roman
+station.<a id="footnotetag165" name="footnotetag165"></a><a href="#footnote165" title="Go to footnote 165"><span class="smaller">[165]</span></a> But the application of the name to the village is only
+some three centuries old. In earlier days it is always "Grantset." We
+do find "Grantchester" in Bede (as mentioned in our account of Ely);
+but the spot indicated is almost certainly Cambridge, then still in
+ruins after its destruction during the English conquest of Britain.</p>
+
+<p>On the top of the church-tower here we may notice a weird-looking
+piece of iron work. This was put up in 1823 to facilitate the
+astronomical work in the University Observatory, as it is exactly
+south of the telescope dome there, two miles and a half away. With the
+acquisition of collimating telescopes, in 1869, this relationship
+ceased to be of value, and now the growth of trees has rendered the
+tower wholly invisible from the Observatory.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page222" name="page222"></a>(p. 222)</span> Not far from Byron's Pool we find the watersmeet of the two
+main streams which make our Cambridge river; each so equal in size to
+its sister that neither can be called the tributary of the other. The
+name Granta is usually appropriated to the eastern stream, that of Cam
+to the western. On some maps the latter is called the "Rhee," but this
+(like the Isis at Oxford), is merely a map-maker's name.<a id="footnotetag166" name="footnotetag166"></a><a href="#footnote166" title="Go to footnote 166"><span class="smaller">[166]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>And as the river divides, so also does our London Road, one route
+following either valley. The Granta route goes viâ Bishop Stortford
+and Epping Forest, entering London by the Mile End Road, the other viâ
+Royston, Ware, and Tottenham, coming in by Bishopsgate Street. The
+division comes just as we leave Trumpington, at the lych-gate of the
+village cemetery, whence the left-hand branch brings us to the twin
+villages of Great and Little Shelford, with the Granta running between
+them. Both churches are good, the former with an octagonal steeple,
+and a churchyard kept like a garden, and the latter with a grand
+square-headed Decorated window in its transept, where are preserved
+some nice fragments of the ancient alabaster reredos. There are also
+various good fifteenth century monuments of the De Freville family,
+whose name still lives on as that of a suburban district in Cambridge.
+Great Shelford Church is richly decorated, as it seems to have been of
+old, for here Dowsing destroyed no fewer than 128 "superstitions." The
+bridge over the Granta between the two villages was in mediæval times
+under the charge of a hermit, like Newnham Bridge at Cambridge.<a id="footnotetag167" name="footnotetag167"></a><a href="#footnote167" title="Go to footnote 167"><span class="smaller">[167]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img056" name="img056"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img056.jpg" width="400" height="443" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Great Shelford Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Villages continue to be found on both banks as we ascend the Granta.
+The main road, on the east of the stream, leads through Stapleford, a
+small place, to the large and important Sawston. Its size and
+importance are due to the existence of that all too rare development,
+a really thriving rural industry. For here is not only a flourishing
+paper-mill, turning out its twenty tons a week of superfine
+copper-glazed paper, but the much more uncommon manufacture of
+parchment, and of the "shammy" leather used for cleaning plate, etc.
+And this is produced in a delightfully rural and old-time fashion.
+There <span class="pagenum"><a id="page223" name="page223"></a>(p. 223)</span> are no machines here automatically grinding out
+facsimile products; every process is confided to the skill and
+judgment of the individual in charge of it. There are fifteen or
+sixteen such processes involved, and a very little carelessness in any
+one of them would spoil the whole series. Thus every workman is an
+expert, and takes a pride in his work impossible to the mere driver of
+a machine. The great aim of each is to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page224" name="page224"></a>(p. 224)</span> "keep his skin in
+condition" while under his hands, so as to have a right to glory in
+the finished article.</p>
+
+<p>The very terms used in this manufacture have an ancient smack about
+them. The sheepskins used are called "pelts," and are supplied by the
+"fell-monger." They are first immersed for a while in a solution of
+lime, and then hung over nothing less primitive than the half of a
+tree, sawn lengthwise, while a "flesher" scrapes and "couches" them
+(<i>i.e.</i>, removes all wrinkles). They are then "split," the inner skin,
+called the "mutton" or "lining," being adroitly separated from the
+outer "grain." This "lining" is next "frized" (<i>i.e.</i>, rubbed), to
+remove all fat, then again "limed," and thoroughly washed. It is then
+"squeezed" and "punched" till "the water is killed," then soaked with
+cod-liver oil. This causes fermentation to set in, during which the
+skins have to be carefully watched by men whose duty it is to "turn
+the heats" before "burning" takes place. Alkaline treatment follows,
+and, finally, the skins are "ground," <i>i.e.</i>, pared with a round knife
+and smoothed with a wooden "scurfer," being sprinkled the while with
+water from a bunch of butchers' broom, called by its old English name
+"knee-holm." They are then packed in "kips" of thirty apiece, and put
+on the market. Before "grounding," the taste of the ordinary customer,
+who likes a pretty white "shammy," is consulted by bleaching most of
+the skins with sulphur. Appearance, however, is thus dearly purchased,
+for sulphur blackens silver, besides shortening the life of the skin.
+The useful colour is dark brown.</p>
+
+<p>"For parchment the 'linings' are tied in a frame by strings fastened
+round grooved pegs, on the same principle as a Spanish windlass....
+After being scraped with a 'half-round' knife, dried, 'shaved,' dabbed
+with whitewash, and heated in a stove to remove the grease, they are
+then scalded and rubbed with pumice until they are fine and
+smooth.... The parchment workers wear clogs, sheepskin leggings, and
+'basil' aprons. A basil is an unsplit tanned sheepskin. In this
+well-managed factory all the refuse goes to make soap, glue, dubbin,
+or manure, and not one scrap of material is wasted."<a id="footnotetag168" name="footnotetag168"></a><a href="#footnote168" title="Go to footnote 168"><span class="smaller">[168]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Sawston, moreover, is not only full of present interest, but <span class="pagenum"><a id="page225" name="page225"></a>(p. 225)</span>
+rich in associations with the past. The Village Cross stands on its
+ancient site, and the church, which retains some Norman features, has
+several mediæval brasses, though none of special merit. The Hall is
+yet more remarkable. It was built in the reign of Queen Mary with
+materials from the ruins of Cambridge Castle, granted by her in
+consideration of the earlier hall having been destroyed for sheltering
+her. At the death of her brother Edward the Sixth, the Protestant
+Lords of the Council sought to arrest her as she approached London.
+Hearing of their design she took refuge at Sawston Hall, then as now
+the seat of the Huddleston family, who then as now steadfastly adhered
+to the ancient faith. Her presence there being reported at Cambridge,
+a Protestant mob, under the direction of the authorities, pounced upon
+the hall so suddenly that she had barely time to escape on horseback
+behind one of the serving men, her course lighted by the flames of the
+burning building, which was utterly destroyed by the disappointed
+Protestants. A missal taken in the sack was, on the following Sunday,
+held up to public derision and formally torn to pieces in the
+University Church.</p>
+
+<p>By the time the rebuilding of the hall was completed another, and more
+thoroughgoing, Protestant persecution had broken out. To hear Mass was
+made treason-felony, punished by forfeiture of goods and perpetual
+imprisonment, while to say it was an act of high treason, for which
+the offending priest suffered the lingering death assigned by the law
+to traitors, being first half-hanged, then disembowelled, and finally
+quartered. The Catholic chapels of the day were accordingly placed in
+the garrets, as in that still existing at Sawston Hall, where the
+worshippers had most warning in case of a domiciliary visit by the
+authorities. Secret cupboards were contrived for hiding the sacred
+vessels, books, and vestments, and secret exits by which the priest
+might, if possible, be smuggled out of the house, and, in case these
+proved unavailable, "Hiding Holes" in which he might take refuge. That
+at Sawston Hall is in the staircase, and is described by Mr. Allan Fea
+in his <i>Secret Chambers and Hiding Places</i>:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"The entrance is so cleverly arranged that it slants into the
+     masonry of a circular tower, without showing the least
+     perceptible sign, from the exterior, of a space capable of
+     holding a baby, far less a man. A particular board in the landing
+     is raised, and beneath it, in a corner of the cavity, is
+     <span class="pagenum"><a id="page226" name="page226"></a>(p. 226)</span> found a stone slab containing a circular aperture,
+     something after the manner of our modern urban receptacles for
+     coal. From this hole a tunnel slants downwards, at an angle, into
+     the adjacent wall, where there is an apartment some twelve feet
+     in depth, and wide enough to contain half a dozen people.... The
+     opening is so massive and firm that, unless pointed out, the
+     particular floor-board could never be detected, and when secured
+     from the inside could defy a battering ram."</p>
+
+<p>This is an unusually commodious Hiding Hole, large enough to hold not
+only the refugee priest but provisions to maintain him during the
+search, a very necessary item of the precautions. For when the
+pursuivants pounced upon a Catholic mansion they always began by
+locking up the inmates, that no succour might be given to the outlaw
+whose presence they suspected, and then proceeded to a most systematic
+and thoroughgoing search, in which chimneys, cellars, and roofs were
+exhaustively explored, panellings pulled down, and floors torn up, for
+days together. The ransacking and wrecking sometimes lasted a whole
+fortnight on end; but with such art were these retreats constructed
+that they constantly defied even so stringent a test, unless
+betrayed&mdash;sometimes by the unintentional emotion of those in the
+secret.</p>
+
+<p>Like most others in England this Hiding Hole at Sawston Hall was due
+to the ingenuity of a Jesuit, one Nicolas Owen (nicknamed "Little
+John" from his diminutive stature), who, "with incomparable skill and
+inexhaustible industry," devoted his life to contriving these
+recesses. "And by this his skill," says a seventeenth century writer,
+"many priests were preserved from the prey of persecutors." Finally he
+was himself betrayed into the hands of the Protestant Government, who
+write exultingly of their "great joy" in his arrest; "knowing his
+skill in constructing hiding-places, and the innumerable number of
+these dark holes which he hath schemed for hiding priests throughout
+the kingdom." It was hoped that he might be induced to reveal these
+places, "to the taking of great booty of priests." But Owen remained
+staunch against all threats and blandishments, and finally allowed
+himself to be tortured to death without suffering the secret "to be
+wrung from him," as Cecil ordered that it should be. "The man is
+dead&mdash;he died in our hands," is the laconic report of the Governor of
+the Tower in answer to this order.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page227" name="page227"></a>(p. 227)</span> The knee-holm, or butchers' broom, used in the Sawston
+leather work, grows at Whittlesford, on the other side of the Granta,
+a pretty, shady village with an interesting church; the development of
+which, from a Saxon nucleus, is a nice (and not yet satisfactorily
+solved) problem for lovers of mediæval architecture. There is a wooden
+porch (oak) of the fourteenth century. At Whittlesford Bridge, where
+the Granta is crossed by the Icknield Street, close to the railway
+station, one sees, hard by the road, a decayed stone edifice, with a
+high pitched roof thatched with reeds, now used as a barn.</p>
+
+<a id="img057" name="img057"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img057.jpg" width="500" height="344" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Whittlesford.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This is the chapel of the ancient Hospital of St. John, founded in the
+thirteenth century. There were several such institutions in
+Cambridgeshire, started, not specially for the care of the sick, but
+for "hospitality" in the widest sense of the word. Here travellers
+were entertained, the hungry were fed, the needy were ministered to,
+according to their several necessities. The Hospitals were rarely
+large institutions, and this one, as the size of its chapel shows, was
+quite a small affair, only endowed with some sixty acres of meadow
+land <span class="pagenum"><a id="page228" name="page228"></a>(p. 228)</span> and a water-mill, equivalent, probably, to some £200 a
+year in all. But having been under the direction of a prior (appointed
+by the Bishop of Ely), it is sometimes known by the high-sounding
+title of Whittlesford Priory. The interior of the building still
+retains some beautiful early English work. A specially pleasant
+roadside hostelry next door (the Red Lion), with deliciously quaint
+carvings on mantel and ceiling, may be held, in some sense, its modern
+representative; and, indeed, is thought by many authorities to have
+actually formed part of it.</p>
+
+<p>Though, for some reason, always associated with the name of
+Whittlesford, this Hospital is actually in the adjoining parish of
+Duxford, or rather in one of the two (now consolidated) parishes of
+St. John and St. Peter, between which this little village is divided.
+Both churches still exist (though St. John's is now only used for
+burials in its churchyard), and both are very much of the same build,
+mainly Early English, with a little Norman, of which St. John's
+steeple is the most noteworthy example. St. Peter's has a beautiful
+"low-side" window in the northern wall of the chancel.</p>
+
+<p>To the west of Duxford the Icknield Street traverses a wide bleak
+expanse of treeless fields which, until the nineteenth century, were
+the unenclosed turf-land forming the famous Triplow Heath, the scene
+of the first breach between the Long Parliament and its army. In the
+view of the Parliament that force had now done its work. The Cavalier
+levies had been stamped out, the king had been "bought" from the
+Scots, and was in Parliamentary custody at Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, the Scots themselves had withdrawn to their own
+country; why then should not this costly, and rather dangerous, army
+be disbanded?</p>
+
+<p>But this was far from being the view of the soldiers themselves. A
+return to the monotonous routine of civil life, after the thrilling
+excitements of civil war, had no attractions for them; least of all, a
+return without their pay. That pay&mdash;one shilling a day&mdash;was more than
+double the current wages; and now it was many months behindhand&mdash;a
+whole year in some cases. The suggestions of disbandment were met,
+accordingly, by the concentration of the troops, including Cromwell's
+famous regiments, on Triplow Heath, in his own East Anglian district.
+This was on the 10th of June, 1647.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page229" name="page229"></a>(p. 229)</span>
+
+<a id="img058" name="img058"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img058.jpg" width="400" height="449" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Peter's Church, Duxford.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Commissioners from the Parliament were sent down from Westminster,
+with offers of two months' pay in cash and debentures for the
+remaining arrears, contingent on disbandment. But this was not nearly
+good enough; and the offers were met with cries of "Justice! Justice!"
+from the men, and with significant hints from the officers of a march
+on London if their claims were not speedily satisfied, "for a rich
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page230" name="page230"></a>(p. 230)</span> city may seem an enticing bait to poor beggarly soldiers to
+venture far to gain the wealth thereof."</p>
+
+<p>And, while the baffled Commissioners returned, to call out the London
+train-bands to meet the threatened attack (finding them so reluctant
+to face this new and terrific foe that the death-penalty had to be
+denounced against all malingerers), the Army took more effective
+action by despatching Cornet Joyce, with a troop of horse, to seize
+the King at Holmby House and bring him along as a prisoner; or, as
+they put it, to rescue him from his Parliamentary jailers, and invite
+him to trust his person with his faithful soldiers. They might thus be
+able to sell him again to the Parliament, as the Scots had done, or
+they might really restore him, for a sufficient consideration, or make
+their own of him some way. And, while Charles was being thus carried
+off, as we have already seen, to Chippenham, they struck their camp
+and marched off along the Icknield Street to Royston, and thence to
+St. Albans, as a demonstration against London. When the unhappy
+monarch, a fortnight later, on Midsummer Day, was brought by the same
+route from Newmarket, crossing Whittlesford Bridge and passing through
+the midst of Triplow Heath, the scene had already returned to its
+habitual loneliness.</p>
+
+<p>Triplow itself lies to the west of the Heath, and has a far-seen
+cruciform Church, sister to that in the adjoining village of Foulmire,
+or Fowlmere as it ought to be spelt. An actual mere, noted for its
+wealth of wild fowl, existed here till little more than half a century
+ago. It is now a worthless patch of land, full of springs and runlets.
+There is also a small prehistoric earthwork, known as "The Round
+Moats."</p>
+
+<p>From Duxford, a pretty byway&mdash;far prettier till, a year or two ago,
+the picturesque wooden foot-bridge across the Granta was replaced by
+an iron modernity&mdash;leads to Hinxton, where the church has some
+interesting architectural developments, and a good brass to Sir Thomas
+de Skelton, steward to "old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster."
+He is shown in full plate-armour, and his two wives lie beside him.
+The Parochial Register here dates back to the very first institution
+of such documents, in 1538, by Thomas Cromwell. This is quite rare;
+for the idea was, in its first inception, to the last degree unpopular
+both with clergy and people, who suspected, from their experience of
+Henry's illimitable greed, that a tax would <span class="pagenum"><a id="page231" name="page231"></a>(p. 231)</span> be exacted upon
+each of the ecclesiastical functions thus registered.</p>
+
+<p>On the outside of the spire, which is of wood covered with lead, hangs
+a "Sanctus" (or "Sacring") Bell, which of old was rung at those places
+in the High Mass where a small bell is sounded by the Server at the
+Altar; that is to say, at the <i>Ter Sanctus</i> and the Consecration of
+the Host. Thus those of the faithful who were unable to attend church
+were invited to unite themselves in spirit with the worshippers there
+at the most solemn moments of the Service. Few of these bells remain,
+as their associations were, of course, specially distasteful to
+Protestant feeling, so that they were mostly destroyed at the
+Reformation.</p>
+
+<p>At Hinxton we are on the borders of Essex, and a shady
+westward-running lane takes us on, across the river and the railway,
+to the last Cambridgeshire village on this line, Ickleton, where the
+church is of quite unique interest. Here, too, there is a Sacring
+Bell, on the side of the steeple; surviving, doubtless, through the
+same unknown local influence which also saved that on the sister spire
+of Hinxton. But the real interest of the church is entirely hidden
+from passers by. Those even who look from the pretty little Village
+Green to the southward see nothing that calls for notice, except the
+Sacring Bell and a fairly good Geometrical window in the steeple. The
+rest of the exterior shows only poor fourteenth century work&mdash;and
+cruelly "restored" at that.</p>
+
+<p>But, once inside, we discover that the unsightly exterior is but an
+outer shell, built round, and over, a smaller and far older church,
+still standing, and so entirely enclosed that its clerestory lights
+now open into the existing aisles. Above them are the lights of the
+later fourteenth century clerestory, which, no doubt, originally
+contained Geometrical, or more probably Flowing, tracery. Now,
+however, they are mere "churchwarden" apertures, of various indefinite
+shapes, with mean wooden sashes, having been remorselessly doctored in
+the second decade of the nineteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>It is when we look closely at this interior church that we note its
+truly astonishing features. At the first glance it might be taken for
+an ordinary Norman structure, with its round pillars and round arches;
+and, in fact, it is usually so described by the few authorities who
+notice it at all. The rudeness of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page232" name="page232"></a>(p. 232)</span> the capitals, however, and
+the general aspect of the arcade, does not somehow look like Norman
+work, but more suggests Saxon architecture. And the very small
+clerestory lights, mere loopholes, still more lead us to this
+conclusion. Some archæologists, therefore, consider this interior
+church at Ickleton to be a Saxon edifice; and, so far as the
+clerestory is concerned, it is exceedingly probable that they are
+right. The piers of the tower arches, however, are unmistakably
+Norman, as is also the west doorway.</p>
+
+<p>But what is the arcade? When we examine the massive circular pillars
+which support it, we see to our amazement that, instead of being built
+up in the usual manner, every one of them is a monolith! We are now
+obliged to confess ourselves in the presence not of Norman or Saxon
+but of <i>Roman</i> work, for no example of such monolithic construction is
+known in any later architecture, and was, indeed, sparingly employed
+even by the Romans.</p>
+
+<p>How did these pillars come to be here? They are of Barnack stone from
+Northamptonshire, and must have been brought at an expense well-nigh
+prohibitory to the finances of a small country parish. We may dismiss
+the idea that they were hewn out of the quarry in this specially
+costly form, and fetched all the way from Barnack by the builders of
+this little unpretending church.</p>
+
+<p>Dismissing this, there remain two other alternatives. A mile distant
+from Ickleton to the southward stands Chesterford, the site of an
+important Roman station, commonly identified with the <i>Icianos</i> of the
+third century "Antonine" Itinerary. The place derived its name, and
+its importance, from its position at the point where the River Granta
+is crossed by the Icknield Way, the line of communication along the
+strip of greensward between the Cambridgeshire fens and the forest
+topping the East Anglian heights, which gave access to the territory
+of the Iceni in Norfolk and Suffolk. The Saxon builders of Ickleton
+Church may have found these pillars amid the ruins of <i>Icianos</i>, or of
+some villa in the neighbourhood, and have brought them that short
+distance for their edifice. As they were ready made this would be a
+cheap job.</p>
+
+<p>Such is the one alternative. The other, to which I myself incline, is
+that they did not need to fetch the pillars at all, but utilised them
+on the very spot where they originally stood. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page233" name="page233"></a>(p. 233)</span> According to
+this view we have here an example, unique in Britain, of Roman work
+<i>in situ</i>. The very arcading which we see I take to have stood north
+and south of the central hall of some large Roman mansion. Such a
+mansion usually contained an oblong central hall of this kind (often
+roofless), with a peristyle, or cloister, on either side opening into
+it, a portico at one end, and a smaller <i>tablinum</i> or guest-chamber at
+the other. Lanciani has pointed out how this structural arrangement
+suggested the nave, aisles, porch, and chancel of the earliest
+ecclesiastical edifices at Rome.<a id="footnotetag169" name="footnotetag169"></a><a href="#footnote169" title="Go to footnote 169"><span class="smaller">[169]</span></a> The same suggestion may have
+influenced the builders of Ickleton Church to utilise this old Roman
+arcading, roofing in the enclosed space, but with a clerestory to
+prevent too great loss of light. If this view is correct the narrow
+north aisle probably represents the width of the original peristyle.</p>
+
+<p>The south aisle is far wider, as wide indeed as the nave and north
+aisle together; and one asks why the fourteenth century architect
+planned his work so very unsymmetrically. The answer, I think, is to
+be found in the remarkable architectural development of the steeple.
+The piers of the tower are, as I have said, unmistakably Norman, but
+upon them are set, quite unconformably, arches at least a century
+later in date. The tower is pierced by these arches on all four sides,
+and was evidently meant as the centre of a cruciform church with
+transepts. For some reason this Norman plan was never completed, but
+it is very probable that the south wall of the church marks the limit
+to which the transept (which may have been actually begun) was meant
+to extend.</p>
+
+<p>The church has also later features of interest. There are some good
+mediæval seat finials, shaped with the axe and bearing grotesque
+figures, musical instruments, and symbols; the word <span class="smcap">ORATE</span> being
+decipherable upon one of them. The rood-screen is fifteenth century,
+and is placed across the eastern arch of the tower, with no trace of
+there having ever been a rood-loft.</p>
+
+<p>The land of Ickleton was almost wholly <i>Terra Ecclesiæ</i>. A priory of
+Benedictine nuns existed here, founded in the twelfth century by
+Aubrey de Vere, the first Earl of Oxford; while the Abbeys of East
+Dereham in Norfolk, Tyltey in Essex, and even Calder (a "cell" of
+Furness), in far-off Cumberland, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page234" name="page234"></a>(p. 234)</span> each possessed a Manor in
+the Parish. All alike were given by Henry the Eighth to Goodrich,
+Bishop of Ely, in exchange for the far more valuable property of
+Hatfield House. Queen Elizabeth, however, afterwards demanded them all
+back again, with much other land, as a condition of appointing Bishop
+Heton, in 1600, to the See, which she had kept vacant to fill her
+coffers for no less than nineteen years. The Manors were sold by the
+Crown, and are now in private hands. The benefice is in the gift of
+the Lord Chancellor.</p>
+
+<p>The name Ickleton, like those of Ickborough in Norfolk, Ickingham in
+Suffolk, and Ickleford in Hertfordshire, is derived from the position
+of the village on the line of the Icknield Way. It may indeed be the
+direct linguistic descendant of the Roman <i>Icianos</i>. We must bear in
+mind that a prehistoric track, such as the Icknield Way, was not one
+single-metalled thoroughfare like a Roman road or a modern highway,
+but a broad line of route along which each traveller made his own
+"trek," so that the "Way" was a series of roughly parallel ruttings
+over the breadth of a mile and more. Such, to this day, are the routes
+across the Siberian steppes, which are often four or five miles
+across. Thus we found the Icknield Way at Whittlesford, three miles
+north of Chesterford, and it is probable that all the various "fords"
+we have been meeting&mdash;Shelford, Stapleford, Whittlesford,
+Duxford&mdash;have to do with its various passages of the Granta.</p>
+
+<p>Beyond Chesterford the Granta comes down in tiny streamlets from the
+Essex chalk near Saffron Walden, with its wide-naved church, which
+Cromwell's troops used for a drill-shed and council-chamber, and its
+historic mansion of Audley End, once Walden Abbey, and its memories of
+the days, scarcely a century by-gone, when great crops of saffron were
+grown in its fields, leaving their only existing trace in the name.
+And even that is dying out; few of the inhabitants call their home
+anything but Walden. But this town is beyond our Cambridgeshire
+border.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page235" name="page235"></a>(p. 235)</span> CHAPTER XI</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">London Road.&mdash;Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket
+     Fresco.&mdash;Burnt Mill.&mdash;Haslingfield.&mdash;White Hill, View, Clunch
+     Pits, Chapel, Papal Bulla.&mdash;Barrington, Green, Church, Porch,
+     Seats, Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging,
+     Hall.&mdash;Foxton.&mdash;Shepreth.&mdash;Meldreth, Parish Stocks.&mdash;Melbourn,
+     Shipmoney.&mdash;Royston, Origin, Cave, Heath.&mdash;Bassingbourn, Old
+     Accounts, Villenage.&mdash;Black Death.&mdash;Ashwell, Source of Cam,
+     Church, Graffiti.&mdash;Akeman Street.&mdash;Barton, Butts.&mdash;Comberton,
+     Maze.&mdash;Harlton Church, Old Pit.&mdash;Orwell Maypole, Church,
+     Epitaph.&mdash;Wimpole Hall, Queen Victoria.&mdash;Arrington.&mdash;Shingay,
+     Hospitallers, Fairy Cart.&mdash;Wendy.&mdash;Artesian Wells.&mdash;Guilden
+     Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals.</p>
+
+<p>The Cam Valley road from Trumpington leads us over a singularly bare
+mile, edged by sparse thorn-trees, to Hauxton Mill, where we cross the
+Granta. The repair of the bridge here was, in mediæval days, paid for
+by the grant to all who aided this good object of a forty days'
+Indulgence. This does not mean a licence to sin with impunity for that
+period, as perfervid Protestants imagine, but merely the abrogation of
+any ordinary ecclesiastical censure incurred. The little church of
+Hauxton, not far beyond, is one of the few Norman village churches
+existing in Cambridgeshire, for the county suffered so severely in the
+Norman Conquest that little church building could be afforded till a
+century later, when Norman had given place to Early English.</p>
+
+<p>In this church, upon the east wall of the south aisle is a fine fresco
+of Thomas à Becket, dating from within a few decades of his own
+lifetime. Representations of this Saint are extremely rare, for, as an
+ecclesiastic who had braved his king&mdash;and that king a Henry,&mdash;he was
+specially detested by Henry the Eighth. His Festivals were all
+suppressed, his name was erased from every Service Book, and his
+effigies were <span class="pagenum"><a id="page236" name="page236"></a>(p. 236)</span> destroyed with ruthless diligence, so that
+this is almost the only one known to exist in all England. It was only
+saved by the niche in which it is painted being hastily bricked up and
+plastered over; to be forgotten for upwards of three centuries, till
+accidentally discovered in 1860 during some restoration work.</p>
+
+<p>Hauxton Church stands a little off the main road, on a by way running
+from Shelford on the Granta to Haslingfield on the Cam. West of
+Hauxton this route becomes a mere field track, but quite a pretty one,
+crossing the Cam at an idyllic nook called Burnt Mill Bridges, where
+the green banks and clear waters are closed in by ancient elms and
+thorn bushes. It brings to the mind Milton's lines in Il Penseroso:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  There in close covert, by some brook,<br>
+  Where no profaner eye may look,<br>
+  Hide me from day's garish eye."</p>
+
+<p>Haslingfield (which is more directly reached from Cambridge by the
+Barton Road) has a fine and spacious church of the fourteenth century,
+the steeple being of special merit. Above it rises steeply the eastern
+extremity of a chalk spur to the height of 220 feet. From the summit,
+though so low, we get one of the widest panoramic views in England,
+embracing the whole valley of the Cam. "Ashwell Bush,"<a id="footnotetag170" name="footnotetag170"></a><a href="#footnote170" title="Go to footnote 170"><span class="smaller">[170]</span></a> which
+marks the source of the river, is conspicuous on a hill some ten miles
+to the south-westward, and Ely Cathedral, just beyond its junction
+with the Ouse, may be seen, twice as far away to the north; Cambridge,
+with its spires and pinnacles, lying between, five or six miles
+distant. Our eastward limit of vision is the long line of the East
+Anglian Heights, from Swaffham steeple<a id="footnotetag171" name="footnotetag171"></a><a href="#footnote171" title="Go to footnote 171"><span class="smaller">[171]</span></a> on their northernmost
+visible swell, twenty miles away, to the far-off jut of Sharpinhoe,
+near Dunstable, more than thirty miles in the opposite direction.
+Beneath us, in the valley, steeple after steeple rises amid its
+village elms, dotting the landscape like knots in net-work. No fewer
+than eighty of these can be made out, the most conspicuous being the
+cruciform church of Triplow.<a id="footnotetag172" name="footnotetag172"></a><a href="#footnote172" title="Go to footnote 172"><span class="smaller">[172]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img059" name="img059"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img059.jpg" width="350" height="477" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Haslingfield Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This eminence was anciently known as White Hill, from the three great
+"clunch" quarries,<a id="footnotetag173" name="footnotetag173"></a><a href="#footnote173" title="Go to footnote 173"><span class="smaller">[173]</span></a> which still conspicuously scar <span class="pagenum"><a id="page238" name="page238"></a>(p. 238)</span> its
+sides, and must have done so much more conspicuously of old, when this
+material was much more generally used for building than it is now.
+From these quarries came, for example, the stone used in the First
+Court of St. John's College, Cambridge. The "pits," as they are
+locally called, are rapidly greening over, for the clunch is now only
+dug for the mending of farm roads, and occasionally for marling the
+fields; as Pliny records that the ancient Britons marled them two
+thousand years ago.</p>
+
+<p>At the summit of the ridge a small roadside cottage, known as "Chapel
+Bush," represents the once famous shrine of "Our Lady of White Hill";
+in mediæval days a noted centre of local devotion, which drew pilgrims
+in large numbers from a wide area, so that their accommodation, as we
+read, was no small profit (and, often, difficulty) to the neighbouring
+villages. No ruins, even, of this ancient chapel remain; but, in 1885,
+there was discovered on its site a leaden <i>bulla</i> of Pope Martin the
+Fifth, the first Pope to be generally acknowledged after the Great
+Schism; when for forty years two (or three) claimants to the Holy See
+were reigning simultaneously, supported some by one part of
+Christendom, some by another. He reigned 1417 to 1431, and was the
+consecrator of Milan Cathedral. It was he who, at the "Assize of
+Barnwell" (1430), pronounced that all spiritual jurisdiction over the
+students of Cambridge was exclusively vested in the University
+authorities. His <i>bulla</i> bears the heads of SS. Peter and Paul, with
+the traditional features, which Lanciani has now established as
+historical; St. Peter having a broad face with curly hair and beard,
+while St. Paul is thin-faced and straight-haired.</p>
+
+<p>On the southern side of the hill lies Barrington, perhaps the
+loveliest of all Cambridgeshire villages. It consists of two long
+lines of scattered cottages, straggling along either side of a Village
+Green nearly a mile in length. The Green is traversed from end to end
+by the "Church Path," a pebbled causeway of immemorial antiquity. The
+church, to which this leads, stands at the north-eastern extremity of
+the Green, and is a noble structure of the twelfth century, with later
+developments. The south doorway and door are thirteenth century, and
+are wonders of graceful work; while the fourteenth century seats are
+of special interest as having been constructed with book-boards,
+showing that reading was not the rare accomplishment <span class="pagenum"><a id="page239" name="page239"></a>(p. 239)</span> in
+those days that it is commonly supposed to have been.<a id="footnotetag174" name="footnotetag174"></a><a href="#footnote174" title="Go to footnote 174"><span class="smaller">[174]</span></a> There is
+also an iron-bound chest dating from the tenth century, a splendid
+specimen of the smiths-work for which England was then so famous. The
+font, too, is equally old, showing on its margin the depressions (now
+filled in), often provided in fonts of the period when baptism by
+immersion was the rule, as outlets for accidental overflow.</p>
+
+<a id="img060" name="img060"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img060.jpg" width="500" height="325" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Farmhouse at Haslingfield.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Here and there along the Green gush out bright fountains of delicious
+water from artesian wells driven into the "greensand," some 200 feet
+below the surface. Throughout all its length the village is sheltered,
+on the north, by the ridge of White Hill, while, on the south, the
+orchards and closes with their "hedge-row elms," slope down to the Cam
+and its water-meadows. The stream here runs beneath a gravel-terrace
+of its own formation, which has proved exceptionally rich in the
+remains of pleistocene mammalia, mostly, as has been said,<a id="footnotetag175" name="footnotetag175"></a><a href="#footnote175" title="Go to footnote 175"><span class="smaller">[175]</span></a>
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page240" name="page240"></a>(p. 240)</span> connoting a semi-tropical climate. Specimens of elephant,
+hippopotamus, rhinoceros, bison, urus, lion, bear, hyæna, derived from
+Barrington, are to be seen in the Sedgwick Museum at Cambridge.
+Associated palæolithic flint implements, and red-deer antlers rudely
+cut, show that human intelligence existed here along with these
+monsters, at least 5000 years ago, at the lowest estimate, which some
+geologists multiply fifty fold; and excavation has shown that the site
+has been populated pretty well ever since. Neolithic, British, Roman,
+Anglo-Saxon, and Mediæval relics have here been unearthed in quite
+astonishing abundance; and, though no Roman villa has yet been
+located, Roman coins have been found literally by the hundred.</p>
+
+<p>This wealth of finds has been largely due to the "coprolite" digging,
+as it was inaccurately called, which went on here (and throughout the
+neighbourhood) during the whole latter half of the nineteenth century.
+It had been discovered that the "upper greensand"<a id="footnotetag176" name="footnotetag176"></a><a href="#footnote176" title="Go to footnote 176"><span class="smaller">[176]</span></a> (here a narrow
+deposit immediately over the gault and usually some fifteen or twenty
+feet below the surface) was full of organic remains worth extracting
+for manure. These remains were never true coprolites, but mostly
+formless nodules rich in phosphate of lime, many being sponges, along
+with abundance of sea-urchins, mollusca, crabs, and innumerable
+sharks' teeth.</p>
+
+<p>The industry brought a wave of prosperity to the district; for
+coprolites were worth some £3 per ton, and the average yield was some
+300 tons per acre. The merchants were, therefore, willing to pay well
+for the privilege of digging them out, and usually offered the
+landowner £150 or more per acre for three years' occupation of the
+land (more than its capital value); being bound also to level and
+resoil it at the end of their tenancy. Wages, too, ran high; a good
+"fossil-digger" could earn his 40<i>s</i>. per week. This produced a
+corresponding rise in agricultural wages, which went up from 10<i>s</i>. or
+12<i>s</i>. per week to double that amount. The fossil-digging was all
+piecework, the men being paid by the cubic yard of earth moved.</p>
+
+<a id="img061" name="img061"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img061.jpg" width="400" height="409" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>South Porch, Barrington Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>After being brought to the surface the fossil-bearing greensand was
+washed in a horse-mill on the spot, an artesian well <span class="pagenum"><a id="page241" name="page241"></a>(p. 241)</span> being
+bored, if necessary, to supply the water. This separated out the
+nodules, while the greensand and water was run off as thick mud; used,
+when dry, for levelling the land, and sometimes for brick-making. The
+nodules were ground to powder in central works at Royston and
+elsewhere, and treated with sulphuric acid, thus producing
+super-phosphate of lime adapted for manure. At the height of the
+industry as many as 55,000 tons per year were extracted from the
+Cambridgeshire beds; but with their gradual exhaustion the trade
+dwindled away till it was finally destroyed by imports from
+Charleston, U.S.A., where the like "coprolites" are found as a
+superficial deposit, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page242" name="page242"></a>(p. 242)</span> needing no digging. And with the trade
+has disappeared the artificial prosperity which it brought, to be
+succeeded by the full weight of the agricultural depression.</p>
+
+<p>Barrington Hall is the seat of one of the oldest of English county
+families, the Bendyshes, who have held their estate here since the
+reign of John. Their residence at Barrington dates, however, only from
+that of Edward the Third, for whom, during his siege of Calais, they
+raised money by mortgaging their earlier abode at Radwinter, in Essex,
+to the monks of that place. Before the king by repaying their loan put
+them in case to redeem the mortgage, the monks had foreclosed; thus
+driving the family to reside on their Cambridgeshire property at
+Barrington. They are not, however, lords of the Manor there (though
+they are in the adjoining parish of Foxton). That position belongs to
+Trinity College, Cambridge, who are also rectors of the church, by the
+gift of their earliest founder, Hervey de Stanton, Chancellor to
+Edward the Second.</p>
+
+<p>From either end of Barrington lanes lead southward across the Cam to
+Foxton and Shepreth respectively. Both these villages are hard by the
+main road which we are following. Foxton Church has a most beautiful
+Early English east window, and some very good Geometrical tracery.
+Here is found that rare form of rural industry, a book-printing
+establishment, which to some extent mitigates the depression mentioned
+above. At Shepreth this is done on a larger scale by the making of
+cement, for which the clay procurable here is, like that on the
+Medway, peculiarly adapted. This is a little gem of a village, with a
+clear and copious brook running across its maze of thick-shaded lanes.
+The source of these waters is in the ancient Fowl Mere already spoken
+of.<a id="footnotetag177" name="footnotetag177"></a><a href="#footnote177" title="Go to footnote 177"><span class="smaller">[177]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Another such tributary rises in our next village, Melbourn, and runs,
+on its way to the Cam, through the adjoining Meldreth, an old-world
+place, where the parish stocks are still to be seen at the village
+cross-roads. Till the nineteenth century was well on its way, these
+instruments of punishment were in actual use for the correction of
+minor offences such as vagrancy. They consist of a low upright frame
+of rough wood, so contrived that the prisoner's feet, as he sat upon
+the ground beside it, were passed through holes in the structure and
+there secured. The parish constable was supposed to keep sentry
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page243" name="page243"></a>(p. 243)</span> over him, but actually seldom kept off either the friends,
+who might alleviate his captivity by beer and tobacco, or the more
+numerous enemies, who found it a good joke to tease and pelt his
+helplessness. The hands were sometimes also secured, sometimes not;
+but in any case the culprit's situation was exceedingly unpleasant,
+and the stocks proved a most wholesome deterrent.</p>
+
+<a id="img062" name="img062"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img062.jpg" width="400" height="389" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Shepreth.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Melbourn is a larger place, and boasts that rare possession, a village
+trysting-tree. This is a huge elm, standing by the roadside at the
+churchyard gate. It is now at the extremity of elm life, some three
+hundred years old, and only the stump <span class="pagenum"><a id="page244" name="page244"></a>(p. 244)</span> (still clothed with
+leafage) remains. But the vast massiveness of the roots show its
+former grandeur. At this tree, in 1640, the villagers spontaneously
+gathered to resist the imposition of the "ship-money," whereby Charles
+the First was striving to recruit his exhausted exchequer. "And they
+fell upon the sheriff's men with stones and staves, and hedgestakes
+and forks, and beat them and wounded divers of them, and did drive
+them out of the highway into a woman's yard for their safety. And were
+forced for saving of their lives to get out of the town a back way;
+which, notwithstanding, some thirty or forty able men and boys pursued
+them above a quarter of a mile, stoning them, and driving the bailiffs
+into a ditch, where some of their horses stuck fast. And the multitude
+got some of the bailiffs' horses and carried them away, and would not
+redeem them without money."</p>
+
+<p>This stirring episode shows that the men of Melbourn were already
+Puritan stalwarts, a character which the place has ever since
+maintained. Three years later the parson himself removed from the
+church "sixty superstitious pictures," and a cross from the steeple,
+and digged down the altar steps. And after the Restoration, when
+Nonconformity was put under the straitest ban of the law, its worship
+still continued here to be practised, so that the place became, as it
+still remains, the chief centre of the Free Church form of religion in
+this part of the county.</p>
+
+<p>Three miles further the road brings us to the small but flourishing
+town of Royston, which, though now wholly in Hertfordshire, was till a
+few years ago partly in Cambridgeshire, with which it has a far closer
+physical connection than with its new county. The place has an
+interesting history. Like Newmarket, at the other end of
+Cambridgeshire, it is not, as are the villages around, one of the
+original English settlements dating from the fifth or sixth centuries,
+but a burgh of mediæval growth, owing its existence (again like
+Newmarket) to its position on the line of the Icknield Way, here
+crossed by another presumably British and certainly Roman road, the
+Ermine Street, which joined, as it still joins, the two great
+nerve-centres of Roman Britain, York and London. It is still known as
+the Old North Road.</p>
+
+<p>Such a junction was necessarily an important spot, and the wonder is
+that there was not always a town here. It was left <span class="pagenum"><a id="page245" name="page245"></a>(p. 245)</span> however
+still occupied when, in the eleventh century, the Lady Roesia, wife of
+Eudo Dapifer, the Norman chieftain to whom the land hereabouts was
+assigned by William the Conqueror, set up here, at the meeting of the
+ways, one of those stone wayside crosses by which mediæval piety so
+often marked such junctions. A century later the new-born devotion to
+St. Thomas of Canterbury led the then lord of the manor, Eustace de
+Mark, to found and dedicate to him a Priory, called, from the
+neighbouring cross, "<i>De Cruce Rosae</i>." This, as so often happened,
+became the nucleus of a little town, which got to be called Roesia's
+Town, or Royston.</p>
+
+<a id="img063" name="img063"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img063.jpg" width="400" height="371" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Melbourn.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>At the same period Royston was the scene of yet another ecclesiastical
+development, by the establishment of a famous <span class="pagenum"><a id="page246" name="page246"></a>(p. 246)</span> hermitage in
+its still celebrated cave. This cave is a curious bottle-shaped
+excavation in the chalk below the Icknield Way, of prehistoric origin,
+having been apparently one of those "dene holes" from which the
+ancient inhabitants of Britain used to procure chalk for marling their
+fields. It is not so long since this method was discontinued, and
+numbers of these holes are still to be found in Kent and elsewhere.
+They were always made on the same plan. A shaft was sunk to the
+desired depth, and the chalk excavated all round the bottom as far as
+safety permitted. The hole was then abandoned, and usually filled in.
+This one at Royston, however, remained open, and in the twelfth
+century was taken as his abode by a hermit, who employed himself in
+carving devotional figures and emblems all round the walls.</p>
+
+<p>He must have been a true Solitary, for his shrine was only accessible
+by a rope ladder twenty-five feet long let down through the narrow
+opening at the top. It remained, however, a place of devotion till the
+Reformation, when it not only became disused, but was so effectually
+filled up that its very existence was forgotten for some two hundred
+and fifty years. Then curiosity was aroused by a subsidence at the top
+(under the very centre of the town), and the hole once more cleared
+out, a more convenient approach being cut from adjacent premises, by
+which it may still be visited.</p>
+
+<p>The Priory of Royston was, of course, suppressed under Henry the
+Eighth. But its church was suffered to be bought by the inhabitants of
+the town, who besought the king to spare it to them on the ground
+that, though Royston stood in five several parishes, there was "never
+a parish church within two miles." This was literally true, the
+parochial boundaries having been already long established before the
+town grew up. The five parishes were those of Melbourn, Barley,
+Bassingbourn, Reed, and Therfield. They had therefore attended the
+Priory church, and been ministered to by its monks. The place was, in
+answer to this petition, constituted a parish, and the church
+rededicated to St. John the Baptist instead of to Henry's <i>bête
+noire</i>, Thomas à Becket. But the old connection of Royston with this
+saint survives to this day in the annual Fair held in July (near the
+date of his "Translation"), which is still popularly called "Becket
+Fair."</p>
+
+<p>At Royston the Icknield Way used to be the boundary of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page247" name="page247"></a>(p. 247)</span>
+Cambridgeshire, as at Newmarket, so that it was convenient for the
+resident magistrates to be in the Commission for both counties. Thus,
+by merely crossing the road, they could exercise their authority in
+whichever might be desired. Beyond the town, the way continues to run
+south-westwards, along the foot of the East Anglian heights, which
+here form the watershed between the basin of the Ouse and that of the
+Thames. Their northern escarpment is, at this point, still in its
+primæval condition, a steep slope of virgin turf, known as Royston
+Heath, the common property of the township. The Heath has a
+far-reaching view and delicious air, and the Royston folk do well in
+jealously guarding against any usurpation of their rights in it. That
+golf links should not exist on such a magnificent stretch of turf
+would almost be unthinkable, but even over this development many shake
+their heads as an encroachment.</p>
+
+<p>As we continue our way along the hedgeless road at the foot of this
+delightful common, the Great Northern Railway, from Cambridge to
+London, keeps us close company on our right. A mile or so beyond it
+rises a conspicuous line of poplar trees. These mark the village of
+Bassingbourn, one of the most interesting in the county to the
+historian. For here there is preserved in the church a whole library
+of antique books, and amongst these (in manuscript) the churchwardens'
+accounts from 1498 to 1534, kept with an accuracy which enables us to
+picture faithfully the village life of those days. We find that it was
+a period of high wages, for a labourer got threepence a day if
+boarded, and fivepence unboarded. His board then was worth a shilling
+per week. Nowadays it is reckoned at ten shillings at least, so that
+we must multiply all the items by ten to express them in current
+value. His wages were thus equivalent to twenty-five shillings per
+week, double the present rate, while artisans could command nearly
+twice as much. The times were thus abnormally prosperous, and the
+parishioners could afford to spend so lavishly in merrymaking at the
+"Church Ales" that an annual profit equivalent to nearly £50 was
+usually made on these entertainments, which corresponded to the
+Parochial Teas and concerts of the present day. These profits went
+towards the "reparacyon" of the church, and the current church
+expenses, including such heavy items as refounding the bells, at a
+cost equal to over £200, and renovating the clock and the organ.
+Further funds <span class="pagenum"><a id="page248" name="page248"></a>(p. 248)</span> were raised by a great "Miracle Play" of St.
+George and the Dragon, to which the whole neighbourhood assembled.</p>
+
+<p>All this prosperity (founded, as always, on the high rate of wages)
+was the result of that fearful catastrophe, the Black Death, which, a
+few generations back, had all but decimated the population, and
+shattered the old social system of England, wherein the labourers were
+"villains," tied to the manor on which they were born, and bound to do
+for their lord (in lieu of rent) so many "jobs"<a id="footnotetag178" name="footnotetag178"></a><a href="#footnote178" title="Go to footnote 178"><span class="smaller">[178]</span></a> a year. A "job"
+meant 100 minutes' work, a strange subdivision of time, implying some
+fairly accurate means of measuring its flight, though we know not what
+these may have been. A Cambridgeshire "inquisition" of 1313 values
+each job at a halfpenny, so that the day's work of a "villain" was
+worth about threepence.</p>
+
+<p>But the demand for labour after the "Death" became so great, and so
+many of the estate owners had died, that villenage came to an end, and
+the labourers could, as now, go where they would and make the best
+wages they could get in open market.</p>
+
+<p>The result, after a while, was, as we have seen, a great increase in
+prosperity, testified to by the abundant Perpendicular work in almost
+every parish church in England. But the immediate effect was fearful
+distress, and a chaotic dislocation of the old feudal relationships,
+giving birth to the socialistic dreams which for a moment so vainly
+tried to materialise themselves in the anarchical outbreak which we
+call Wat Tyler's Rebellion. An example of this dislocation of ordinary
+conditions is furnished by the Papal registers, which tell us that the
+rectory of this very Bassingbourn (estimated at the equivalent of no
+less than £1,200 per year) was made over, in 1410, to the Chapel Royal
+of St. Martin's-le-Grand, London, "considering that the said chapel
+hath been ruined by the Great Storm, and its lands lie waste for lack
+of labourers through the pestilence."</p>
+
+<p>The "great storm" here referred to took place on St. Maur's Day
+(January 15th), 1361. Of both storm and pestilence we shall find a
+most interesting record in the church of Ashwell, the next and last
+place which we should see in this corner of the county. To reach it we
+have, indeed, to cross the border and go some half mile beyond; but
+though politically <span class="pagenum"><a id="page249" name="page249"></a>(p. 249)</span> in Hertfordshire, Ashwell physically
+belongs to Cambridgeshire. For here is the source of the Cam, and such
+a source as few would dream of for the sluggish unclear stream that we
+see at Cambridge. In the midst of the village the ground sinks into a
+sort of amphitheatre, some 100 yards in length by thirty in breadth
+and ten in depth, with abrupt sides covered with brushwood and
+overshadowed by ancestral ash-trees. All round the floor of this gush
+forth springs upon springs of the brightest, most sparkling water; so
+copious that when the infant stream escapes through a breach towards
+the north it is already nearly thirty feet broad. No prettier
+river-source is to be found throughout the length and breadth of
+England. The ash-trees, however, are not, as one is apt to think at
+first, the origin of the name, but its consequence. The first syllable
+really embodies that Celtic word for water which, as Axe, Exe, Esk,
+and Usk, meets us in so many places all over Great Britain; and this
+syllable, at some far-back date, suggested the planting of ashes
+around the well.</p>
+
+<a id="img064" name="img064"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img064.jpg" width="500" height="368" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ashwell.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page250" name="page250"></a>(p. 250)</span> Not far from these bounteous springs rises the splendid tower
+of the church, springing high into the air with the same undaunted
+Early English ambition which raised the spire of Salisbury. And on its
+wall (inside) is carved, in rude and deeply incised lettering of Old
+English style, varied by some curiously Greek characteristics, the
+record already spoken of, dealing with the Black Death and the storm.
+This consists of four lines, intended for Latin elegiacs, again with a
+Greek touch, and runs thus:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  M . Ct . Xpenta . miseranda . ferox . violenta .<br>
+<span class="add2em">M.CCC.L.</span><br>
+  Supest . plebs . pessima . testis . in . fineque . vents .<br>
+  Validus . oc . anno . maurus . in . orbe . tonat.<br>
+<span class="add2em">M.CCC.LXI.</span></p>
+
+<p>The opening words stand for the date:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">Ct = Cter = CCC, and Xpenta = XXXXX = 50</p>
+
+<p>The interpretation therefore is:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  1350! Miserable, wild, distracted,<br>
+<span class="add3em">1350!</span><br>
+  The dregs of the people alone survive to witness.<br>
+  And in the end a wind<br>
+  Full mighty. This year St Maur thunders in the world.<br>
+<span class="add3em">1361.</span></p>
+
+<p>The year 1349 marked the most fatal stage of the Black Death in these
+parts. In that year, to judge by the Diocesan records, no less than
+eighty-five per cent. of the beneficed clergy were swept away, which
+implies a corresponding mortality amongst other classes. By 1350 the
+worst was over, but the full wretchedness of the situation was now
+developing itself. The plague lingered on, constantly growing milder,
+till 1361, when the great storm was supposed to have cleared the fair
+of the last remnants of infection. A like popular distich about this
+later visitation is quoted by Adam of Murimuth:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">C ter erant mille decies sex unus, et ille,<br>
+  Luce tua Maure, vehemens fuit impetus auræ.<br>
+  Ecce flat hoc anno Maurus in orbe tonans.</p>
+
+<p>That is, in English:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">There were 300 + 1000 + 60 + 1 and that<br>
+  Mighty blast of wind was on thy day, Maurus.<br>
+  Lo! in this year bloweth Maurus thundering in the world.</p>
+
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page251" name="page251"></a>(p. 251)</span>
+
+<a id="img065" name="img065"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img065.jpg" width="350" height="519" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ashwell Church from the N.W.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page252" name="page252"></a>(p. 252)</span> St. Maur was a Gallican saint of the sixth century who was
+the first to introduce monasticism into France. There are several
+other interesting <i>graffiti</i> on the same wall as the above, one of
+them representing old St. Paul's with its lofty steeple, the highest
+in the world (510 feet), and the famous Rose Window of the transept
+which Chaucer mentions in his Canterbury Tales.</p>
+
+<p>Another, and perhaps prettier, way of reaching Ashwell from Cambridge
+is by taking the road that runs along the Backs, and following it out
+of the town in its course to the south-west. Its local designation is
+the Barton Road, but to antiquarians it has been known, since the
+seventeenth century, as the Akeman Street. It was at that period that
+the accepted identification of our Roman roads came into being, mainly
+through the fearless erudition of Gale. Their names (except that of
+the Via Devana) are as old at least as the Norman Conquest; but, save
+only in the case of the Watling Street, the main line of which has
+never been disputed, the connection between any given name and any
+given road has been matter for the wildest conjecture. Thus, Geoffrey
+of Monmouth, writing in the eleventh century, makes the Ermine Street
+(which we now, with strong reason, identify with the Old North Road
+from London to York) run from St. David's to Southampton! Our Akeman
+Street is supposed to connect Wells on the Wash with Aust on the
+Severn, passing on its way through Bath (the Ake-man-chester of the
+Anglo-Saxons, <i>i.e.</i>, "the stone stronghold of Aquæ," Aquæ being the
+Roman name for Bath). But a lot of this is mere conjecture. The
+"Barton Road," however, is undoubtedly on the line of a Roman road.</p>
+
+<p>In spite of its name, it does not pass through the village of Barton.
+Indeed, like the other roads leading westwards from Cambridge, it
+curiously avoids the villages on its line, or rather (for the road is
+older than they) the villages have curiously avoided being directly
+upon it, though they lie thick on either side. Possibly the first
+Anglo-Saxon settlers may have had in this district some superstitious
+dread of a deserted Roman road, such as they certainly entertained at
+first for the deserted Roman towns, which they did not occupy for many
+a year (as at Cambridge), though they located their hamlets all round
+them.</p>
+
+<a id="img066" name="img066"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img066.jpg" width="350" height="467" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ashwell Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>But though the Akeman Street does not actually take us <span class="pagenum"><a id="page254" name="page254"></a>(p. 254)</span>
+through Barton village, it does lead us past the rare object of
+interest to be found connected with the place, the ancient Archery
+Butts of the parish. These are to be seen just opposite the sign-post
+which points to Haslingfield, and are worth a pause to contemplate,
+for they give a most impressive idea of what archery meant to our
+forefathers. Every parish, it must be remembered, was bound by law in
+mediæval times to have such a stretch of ground, and every yeoman was
+bound to constant practice upon it. And what practice! These "butts"
+are a stretch of greensward, some hundred yards across, and in length
+no less than three furlongs (660 yards). It looks an almost incredible
+distance for a bowman, but it was the standard, so far as we can judge
+by the very few butts of which the memory still survives. The length
+of the short street in South London, still called Newington Butts, is
+nearly the same.</p>
+
+<p>Here, then, we can picture the sturdy archers of Plantagenet days
+stretching themselves; their bows, not the toys of the modern
+toxophilite with their thirty or forty pounds of pull, but of twice
+the power (eighty lb. being a common pull in those times), and their
+"cloth-yard" arrows, over three feet long, whistling to a target not
+planted forty or fifty yards away, but twelve times the distance&mdash;the
+whole length of these butts. Indeed, for anything under two furlongs
+light arrows were not allowed, and the heavy regulation war arrow had
+to be used. Each man was taught, as Bishop Latimer tells us in
+recording his own youthful training, to draw his bow not by mere
+strength, but by sleight of hand, "to lay the weight of his body into
+the bow," and to draw the bowstring not to his breast, like other
+nations, but to his ear. Small wonder that with eye and sinews so
+trained our English archers became the wonder and the dread of Europe,
+or that their shafts decided so many a battlefield&mdash;Cressy, Poictiers,
+Agincourt, Flodden.</p>
+
+<p>A mile further we cross the Bourn Brook, a tiny tributary which joins
+the Cam near Grantchester, hard by a small station on the Cambridge
+branch of the London and North Western Railway, called Lord's Bridge,
+from the Lord Hardwicke who, in the beginning of the nineteenth
+century, substituted a bridge for the earlier ford here. To our right
+we see, across the fields, the church tower of Comberton; where, on
+the little village green, can still be seen the worn remains of a
+turf-built "maze," first traced out no one knows when, but certainly
+not later than <span class="pagenum"><a id="page255" name="page255"></a>(p. 255)</span> the sixteenth century. Various mystical
+reasons are conjectured for the origin of these mazes, of which a fair
+number still exist in England (especially in the Eastern counties),
+while many more are known to have been destroyed by the Puritans of
+the seventeenth century as relics of heathen superstition. Such,
+indeed, they probably are. Mr. Walter Johnson, in his "Folk Memory,"
+considers them to be exceedingly primitive, begun in connection with
+"ceremonial dances of painted heathen round a prehistoric camp fire."
+This Comberton maze is fifty feet in diameter, while the tracks are
+two feet in width, divided by slight banks of turf, once, it would
+seem, about a foot in height, but now much worn down.</p>
+
+<p>The next turn (to the left) leads to Harlton, a pretty, shady village,
+with a fine Perpendicular church, having a stone rood screen, which is
+rare, and, what is yet rarer, a still surviving stone reredos of the
+fifteenth century, with a central recess, once closed with a door, and
+evidently intended as a "Tabernacle" for the Reservation of the
+Blessed Sacrament. The six niches on either side of this recess were
+as evidently meant for images of the twelve Apostles.</p>
+
+<p>Harlton lies close under White Hill, that chalk spur which we have
+already met at Haslingfield.<a id="footnotetag179" name="footnotetag179"></a><a href="#footnote179" title="Go to footnote 179"><span class="smaller">[179]</span></a> Here, too, there is a "clunch-pit"
+in the hill-side, from which the material for the church was probably
+dug. It is now disused, except for occasional marling purposes, and
+some unknown benefactor has planted its slopes with larches and
+laburnums, forming a most fascinating little dell, the charms of which
+are free to all.</p>
+
+<p>Our road now climbs the hill, which it crosses through a cutting, with
+a fine view from the summit in either direction. In the little clump
+of trees just to the west of the road there stood, till the 'seventies
+of the nineteenth century, Orwell Maypole, the last of its class to
+survive in these parts. In mediæval times every village had its
+maypole, round which the lasses and lads hied them to dance on May
+Day. But, like the mazes, they were called (and actually were)
+remnants of heathenism, and, as such, were destroyed wholesale in the
+years of Puritan ascendancy. So it befell with the great maypole which
+gave name to the church of St. Andrew <i>Under-shaft</i> in the City of
+London. It was hewn down, and, as it lay along the street, sawn in
+pieces, each householder taking for firewood <span class="pagenum"><a id="page256" name="page256"></a>(p. 256)</span> the length that
+lay opposite his own door. The Restoration set a certain number up
+again, but the continuity of their use had been broken, and its
+revival (as May Day was connected with no special Festival of the
+Church, like Easter and Christmas, which were also originally heathen
+feasts) became a merely artificial reaction, bound to dwindle away. So
+it befell that Orwell Maypole, after being disused for generations,
+finally perished by natural decay. It stood almost exactly upon the
+meridian of Greenwich, so that it was a valuable and far-seen
+landmark.</p>
+
+<p>Orwell itself lies, as usual, just off the road, on the southern slope
+of the hill. Half a century ago it was the prettiest of villages, with
+its eponymous "well," shaded by magnificent trees, gushing from the
+hill-side, in the midst of a prehistoric earthwork, just below the
+noble church. But, about 1870, the earthwork, unhappily, was found to
+contain "coprolites" (worth probably about £100 after the expenses of
+getting them had been paid). For this paltry sum the whole place was
+destroyed. Well, trees, earthwork, all are now gone; only the church
+is left, perched on its slope high above the village street. It has a
+grand decorated chancel, the roof of which is covered with heraldic
+devices, and contains an interesting epitaph in Latin verse to one of
+the seventeenth century rectors of the parish, beginning:</p>
+
+<div class="poem10">
+<p>Pastor eram dum pastor eram tunc fistula dulcis<br>
+  Tunc tuba qua torvum sprevit ovile lupum.</p>
+
+<p><span class="min66em">("I</span> <i>was</i> a Pastor, while a Pastor I;<br>
+  Sweet then my pipe; loud then my trumpet-call,<br>
+  Whereat my flock defied the wolf so grim.")</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the south aisle is preserved a small crucifix of stone, dating from
+the thirteenth century. It had been built into the wall to save it
+from destruction at the Reformation, and was not discovered for three
+hundred years.</p>
+
+<p>About a mile further we find a village along the road itself, the
+village of Wimpole. But we notice that the houses are all modern, and
+that no church is to be seen amongst them. A church there is belonging
+to them, but it stands a mile to the west, where the village also
+stood till towards the close of the eighteenth century. At that time
+the mansion and park of Wimpole Hall were being enlarged to their
+present <span class="pagenum"><a id="page257" name="page257"></a>(p. 257)</span> magnificence by Philip, the first Earl of Hardwicke
+(the builder of Lord's Bridge). Plebeian cottages were not to be
+tolerated "betwixt the wind and his nobility," so he pulled down the
+entire village and planted it, where it now is, along the Akeman
+Street. The church, which could not well be moved, he faced with red
+brick to match his new-built stables, close to which it is situated.</p>
+
+<a id="img067" name="img067"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img067.jpg" width="500" height="371" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Great Eversden.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Wimpole Hall has passed through various hands. The central portion was
+built, in 1632, by Sir Thomas Chicheley, the wings were added a
+century later by the Earl of Oxford, from whom it came to the
+Hardwicke family. It is now the seat of Viscount Clifden. The house is
+on a splendid scale, and the grounds on a scale yet more splendid,
+with a double avenue of elms, three miles long, running to the south.
+Here Queen Victoria stayed when visiting Cambridgeshire shortly after
+her marriage, and won all hearts by her graciousness. It is still
+remembered how when, by some blunder, the attendant in charge of her
+jewels was not forthcoming, she came down <span class="pagenum"><a id="page258" name="page258"></a>(p. 258)</span> to the ball-room
+with a simple wreath of roses in her hair, "and not all the jewels in
+the world could have made her look so queenly."</p>
+
+<p>There is, of course, a public road leading from Wimpole village to the
+church, which is also accessible from the west, where the great iron
+gates of the park are usually unbarred at the request of respectable
+visitors. These gates open upon the Ermine Street, which the Akeman
+Street crosses a mile beyond New Wimpole, after also crossing the
+great avenue. Close by them is another transplanted village,
+Arrington, whose church stands on the hill half a mile westward. The
+traffic of the old North Road is responsible for this move, and also
+for the delightful old coaching inn here, the Hardwicke Arms, with its
+old-fashioned rooms and long range of stables.</p>
+
+<p>At the junction our road ceases. To continue our westward course we
+must go along the Ermine Street for half a mile, either northward or
+southward, where we shall find lanes, either of which will carry us
+on. The northern lane here will take us along the line of the hill, to
+Tadlow, Wrestlingworth, Potton, and, finally, Bedford, and will enable
+us, if we will, to explore the three Hadleys (East Hadley, Hadley St.
+George, and Cockayne Hadley), of which the two last have fine halls
+and parks. The southern, however, is the preferable route. It follows
+the course of the infant Cam, crossed by a bridge on the Ermine
+Street, and brings us first to the wholly obliterated Shingay, which,
+though once the most important parish hereabouts, and still giving its
+name to the Rural Deanery, has absolutely ceased to exist, church and
+all; its parishioners being affiliated to the neighbouring village of
+Wendy.</p>
+
+<p>The cause of this ruin was the suppression, at the Reformation, of the
+institution which was literally the life of Shingay, a House of the
+Crusading Order of St. John of Jerusalem, or, as they were commonly
+called, the Knights Hospitallers. This title was given them because,
+at their original foundation, they dwelt in a Hospital (or house for
+the hospitable entertainment of pilgrims) at Jerusalem. We now connect
+this name only with places where the sick are ministered to; but it
+originally connoted far wider ministrations, and, indeed, rather
+corresponded to the other form in which the word has survived into our
+present speech&mdash;hotel. We read it on a leaden <span class="pagenum"><a id="page259" name="page259"></a>(p. 259)</span> seal found
+here at Wendy, in 1876, which bears on one side a conventional
+representation of the Shrine of the Holy Sepulchre, surrounded by the
+legend <span class="smcap">Ihervsalem, Hospitalis</span>. On the other is the name of Guarin de
+Montaigu, who, from 1232 to 1269, was Grand Master of the Order.</p>
+
+<p>The Hospitallers, as readers of "Ivanhoe" know, were, like the
+Templars, a military Order, who, for over six centuries, fought
+unceasingly for Christendom. First at Jerusalem, then at Rhodes, then
+at Malta, they held out with never-failing devotion against the
+on-sweeping torrent of Mahommedan aggression; and it is scarcely too
+much to say that but for their eight-pointed cross Christianity might
+well have been crushed throughout Europe. Not till the nineteenth
+century was their last stronghold, Malta, reft from them by Napoleon,
+to pass finally under the flag of England. The Order still survives,
+but the modern sodality calling itself by the same name, connected
+with what we now call hospital work, was set up in quite recent days.</p>
+
+<p>Preceptories of the Order, as their branch Houses were called, were
+found in every land, and not least in England, where they were so much
+beloved that, when the rival Order of the Temple was suppressed, in
+the fourteenth century, its property was made over to them. Here, at
+Shingay, their establishment was a small one consisting of the
+preceptor, two knights, and three priests, one of whom acted as Vicar
+of Wendy. The gross income of the House was, in 1332 (as we know from
+a Report still existing in the Record Office at Malta), £187 12s. 8d.,
+equivalent to about £3,500 at the present value of money. Of this the
+land (about 1,000 acres) brought in £71; the mills, houses, etc., £4
+13s. 4d.; the work of the villains £38 10s. 0d.; and the Rectories of
+Wendy and Sawston, which formed part of their endowment, £66 13s. 4d.
+The rest was derived from the fees paid by visitors; for, by the rule
+of the Order, the doors of the House were open to all comers. The
+expenses of the year amounted to less than half the income, for they
+lived frugally, their keep only coming to about £3 a week (in present
+value) for the six inmates, besides servants and guests. Men servants
+were paid at the rate of £12 a year (besides their keep), and each
+knight was allowed the equivalent of £25 a year for clothing and
+pocket-money. Thus a large sum was available for the war-chest of the
+Order, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page260" name="page260"></a>(p. 260)</span> and was annually forwarded to the headquarters at
+Jerusalem or Rhodes.</p>
+
+<p>One of their sources of income was a special privilege which is still
+remembered in local tradition. Their House (like those of the
+Templars) was exempt from every ban, even that of the Pope himself.
+Thus, in the dismal days of King John, when England was placed under
+an Interdict, when no rites of religion could be observed, and even
+burial of the dead was forbidden, so that "you might see human bodies
+lying everywhere about the fields unsepultured," Shingay shone out as
+the one spot in the whole district where the consolations of religion
+were still attainable. Here Mass continued to be said, here the
+departed could still be laid in hallowed earth. And hither they were
+brought from all sides. And thus it is that peasants may be found who
+still tell how, at some far off, unknown period, those who, for some
+forgotten, inexplicable reason, might not be buried like Christians in
+their own churchyard, were spirited away by night in a "fairy-cart" to
+Shingay, there to be committed in peace to the ground. This
+"fairy-cart" is an echo of the word <i>feretorium</i> (or bier on wheels),
+in which the conveyance was actually effected.</p>
+
+<a id="img068" name="img068"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img068.jpg" width="400" height="440" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Rood Screen, Guilden Morden Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Not a building of any kind now exists at Shingay, and very few at the
+adjoining Wendy, where, at every turn, we are greeted by a wealth of
+fresh-springing waters, derived from the artesian wells of the old
+coprolite diggings. The height in which the water in these wells rises
+is strangely variable. They are always made on the same system; an
+ordinary well being dug through the upper strata till the impervious
+gault is reached, which may be any distance from six to sixty feet
+below the surface. A four-inch bore is then made through the gault by
+means of a sort of Brobdingnagian cheese-taster, four or five feet
+long, screwed to an iron handle three times that length. Again and
+again the taster is brought up, full of gault, and its contents or
+"core" thrown aside. As the bore gets deeper more irons are added,
+till the water-bearing greensand or "rock" is attained, usually in the
+second hundred feet of the bore. The taster is then removed and a
+"chisel" substituted for "striking the rock," <i>i.e.</i>, punching a hole
+by lifting the entire length of irons a few feet and letting it fall.
+By and by up comes the water, quite suddenly for the most part,
+gushing <span class="pagenum"><a id="page261" name="page261"></a>(p. 261)</span> from the bore and filling the well till it finds its
+level. This, as we have said, is curiously different in different
+spots; in some it does not reach the surface, and has to be pumped up;
+in others, as here at Wendy, it will supply a fountain eight or ten
+feet in height. One of these picturesquely gushes out from the top of
+an old wooden gate-post, up which some artistically-minded
+coprolite-digger has engineered its course. It is almost <span class="pagenum"><a id="page262" name="page262"></a>(p. 262)</span>
+medicinal in the quantity of iron with which it is impregnated, but
+delicious to drink, and the softest possible.</p>
+
+<p>This gate-post is beside the lane leading on Guilden Morden, the last
+village before we once more reach Ashwell, and itself standing on an
+outlying mound of the Ashwell chalk. Round this elevation the Cam
+takes a wide sweep. We may record that Wendy is the highest point
+along its course which navigation has ever attained. The breadth at
+Ashwell at once suggests to visitors that a canoe could reach the
+spot, and many an attempt has been made by ambitious undergraduates.
+But the upper reaches are so choked up with reeds and weeds and rushes
+and bushes that no one has ever penetrated further than this spot,
+some four miles, by water-way, below the source.</p>
+
+<p>Guilden Morden has a far-seen church, a conspicuous object from White
+Hill, over Barrington, twelve miles away. It is a fine building, with
+an unusually spacious tower of Northamptonshire stone, and a Saxon
+font. But it is chiefly interesting for the remarkable development of
+the fourteenth century rood-screen, which on either side expands into
+a small "parclose" or pew, enclosed to the height of twelve feet by
+rich decorated tracery, ornately painted (the original pattern having
+survived sufficiently to be restored). On the west panel of the
+northern parclose may be discerned the figures of St. Erconwald and
+St. Edmund, both members of the royal line of East Anglia. The former
+was a brother of St. Etheldreda, the foundress of Ely, and became a
+much-beloved Bishop of London in the seventh century. The latter was
+the hero king martyred by the Danes a century later, the chosen friend
+of our great Alfred, of whom so lovely a picture has been left us by
+the old chroniclers:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"From his earliest years the truest of Christians, he showed
+     himself of such promise that, by the unanimous will of all his
+     folk, he was not so much chosen as rushed into the kingship over
+     them. For his very look was worthy of this high estate; so bright
+     was it with the calm beauty of holiness and of a conscience like
+     the sea at rest. Kind was he of speech and courteous to all; the
+     grace of Humility came natural to him; and amongst his comrades
+     he kept his place as their Lord with wondrous meekness and no
+     touch of pride. For already the Saint bare in his face that which
+     he was afterwards, by God's will, to show forth; seeing that as a
+     boy he had pressed with all his might into the Way of
+     Righteousness, which, as God's pity foreknew, would end for him
+     in the Way of Martyrdom.... And walking in the King's Highway, he
+     turned aside neither <span class="pagenum"><a id="page263" name="page263"></a>(p. 263)</span> to the right hand, by being puffed
+     up with his own merits, nor to the left, by yielding to the
+     faults of human weakness. To the needy was he a cheerful giver,
+     to the widows and orphans the kindest of Patrons; ever keeping
+     before his eyes the saying of the Wise Man: "Behold they have
+     made thee Prince; but be thou among them as one of
+     themselves."<a id="footnotetag180" name="footnotetag180"></a><a href="#footnote180" title="Go to footnote 180"><span class="smaller">[180]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img069" name="img069"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img069.jpg" width="400" height="413" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cottage at Steeple Morden.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>These parcloses seem to have been made to serve as confessional boxes,
+devices which were very rare in England before the Reformation.
+"Shrift," of course, was universal; but neither priest nor penitent
+were shut from view. The former sat in a chair, usually at the altar
+rail, while the latter knelt beside and facing him. In these parcloses
+the priest's head as he sat on the seat would be visible to those in
+the church, but the kneeling penitent would be hidden. That such was
+the purpose here <span class="pagenum"><a id="page264" name="page264"></a>(p. 264)</span> would appear from the lines in old English
+lettering painted upon their sides:&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem10">
+<p>Ad . mortem . duram . Jhesu . de . me . cape . curam .<br>
+  Vitam . venturam . post . mortem . redde . securam .<br>
+  Fac . me . confessum . rogo . te . Deus . ante . recessum .<br>
+  Et . post . decessum . cælo. mihi . dirige . gressum .</p>
+
+<p><span class="min33em">"</span>Jesu, in Death's dark vale, be Thou my stay,<br>
+  Make safe my Life to Come from every foe,<br>
+  Grant me Confession, Lord, ere hence I go,<br>
+  And then to Heaven do thou make straight my way."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>From Guilden Morden a lane leads straight to Ashwell, leaving on the
+left Steeple Morden (which lost its steeple in the great storm of
+1703), and Littlington, the cradle of Cambridgeshire Nonconformity, of
+which hereafter. Here the old parish Lock-up survives; a dismal den of
+red brick, some ten feet square, with iron-clenched door and
+closely-barred window.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page265" name="page265"></a>(p. 265)</span> CHAPTER XII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge
+     Discoveries.&mdash;Coton.&mdash;Madingley.&mdash;Hardwick.&mdash;Toft, St.
+     Hubert.&mdash;Childerley, Charles
+     I.&mdash;Knapwell.&mdash;Bourn.&mdash;Caxton&mdash;Eltisley, St. Pandiana,
+     Storm.&mdash;St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred.&mdash;Paxton
+     Hill.&mdash;Godmanchester, Port Meadow.&mdash;Huntingdon, Cromwell's
+     Penance.&mdash;The Hemingfords.&mdash;St.
+     Ives.&mdash;Holywell.&mdash;Overcote.&mdash;Earith, the Bedford Rivers,
+     "Parallax."</p>
+
+<p>Due westwards from Cambridge, turning leftwards out of the Via Devana
+just beyond Magdalene College, runs what used to be the old coaching
+road to Oxford. Till quite recently the milestones along it gave the
+distance to that city, between which and Cambridge there was of old a
+good deal of traffic, for the Universities were more closely connected
+then than even now. Popularly this road was called the <i>Ad eundem</i>
+road, a nickname referring to the not so long by-gone privilege by
+which any graduate of either place might be admitted to the same
+degree (<i>ad eundem gradum</i>) in the sister University simply on payment
+of the fees and without any further examination. It is now spoken of
+as the Madingley Road, from the first village along its course, or the
+St. Neots Road, from the first town to which it leads. Thence it went
+on to Oxford by way of Bedford, Buckingham, and Bicester.</p>
+
+<p>A short two miles along this road brings us to the porticoed front and
+white domes of the University Observatory, erected in 1822. More than
+a century earlier its embryo had been set up on the summit of the
+Great Gate Tower at Trinity College, for the benefit of Sir Isaac
+Newton; but this seems to have been little used after the death of
+that greatest of scientists. Even after the new Observatory was set up
+a certain lack of keenness pervaded its work. Thus it came about that
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page266" name="page266"></a>(p. 266)</span> Cambridge and England lost the glory of the discovery of
+Neptune, the most distant planet of our Solar System.</p>
+
+<p>For more than a decade the irregularities in the motion of Uranus
+(itself not long discovered) had suggested to astronomers that there
+must be another planet exterior to it, when, in 1841, John Couch
+Adams, then only an undergraduate of St. John's College, set himself
+to grapple with the arduous task of finding by analytical computation
+the orbit and place of this supposititious body. So stupendous were
+the difficulties that when, after four years of concentrated effort,
+he submitted his results to the Astronomer Royal, begging that the
+planet might be looked for in a certain spot (where we now know that
+it actually was visible at the time), his suggestion received very
+incredulous acceptance. Was it likely that a mere youth should have
+solved this gigantic problem?</p>
+
+<p>That very autumn of 1845 another young man, quite independently,
+devoted himself to the same quest, the brilliant French mathematician
+Leverrier. He, in the following summer, published the results he had
+so far attained. Adams had never published; but these new results so
+strikingly agreed with his that the Astronomer Royal's incredulity
+gave way, and he desired that search should be made with the great
+equatorial telescope, then newly erected at Cambridge through the
+generosity of the Duke of Northumberland.</p>
+
+<p>His injunctions were carried out; but the lack of a trustworthy star
+map made the work long. And it was made longer by lack of promptitude.
+The minute celestial object (only equal to a star of the eighth
+magnitude) had been actually seen, but further observations were
+needed to establish the fact that it was indeed a planet moving
+amongst the stars around it. And these observations were delayed at
+the crucial point by the observers adjourning for a cup of tea! When
+they returned the sky had clouded over and no favourable night
+occurred for many evenings after. Meanwhile Leverrier had called in
+the aid of the Berlin Observatory; where there did exist a good star
+map, and also the eagerness so sadly lacking here at Cambridge. The
+very day his letter was received (23rd September, 1846), the great
+Berlin telescope was directed to the spot which he indicated,&mdash;and
+there was the planet.</p>
+
+<p>The story goes that when the tidings of this overthrow <span class="pagenum"><a id="page267" name="page267"></a>(p. 267)</span> of
+hope reached Cambridge, and were reported to the Fellows of Trinity as
+they sat at dinner in their Hall, it was as if a thunderbolt had
+fallen amongst them:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>And all talk died, as in a grove all song<br>
+  Beneath the shadow of some bird of prey;<br>
+  Then a long silence came upon the Hall,"</p>
+
+<p>broken at last by Adam Sedgwick, the venerable Professor of Geology,
+who solemnly raised his clenched fist and brought it down upon the
+High Table, not with violence but with a concentrated tension of
+indignation, saying slowly, with an equal solemnity: "Confound their
+lymphatic souls."<a id="footnotetag181" name="footnotetag181"></a><a href="#footnote181" title="Go to footnote 181"><span class="smaller">[181]</span></a> As for the Observatory, the blow thoroughly
+roused it up; and ever since it has remained, both in material and
+moral equipment, amongst the foremost of the great Observatories of
+the world, where solid and useful work is continuously being done,
+while up-to-date instruments, methods, and records are never to seek.
+On one evening of each week during term time any member of the
+University may see the practical working of the place, and bring
+friends with him.</p>
+
+<p>A mile further we reach the foot of the chalk slope which bounds the
+Cam valley. At this point lanes diverge to the right and left. The
+latter almost immediately brings us to Coton, a tiny village with a
+tiny, but most picturesque, fourteenth century church, having a
+(restored) Norman chancel, a pretty spire, and a yet prettier south
+doorway. There is, too, a massive rood screen, and a curious
+"palimpsest" Table of Commandments, the original sixteenth century
+lettering showing beneath repainted characters of the seventeenth
+century. Altogether the place is well worth the slight divergence
+needed to <span class="pagenum"><a id="page268" name="page268"></a>(p. 268)</span> visit it, more especially as the lane between it
+and our road gives a view of Cambridge almost comparable to the
+prospect of</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">"That sweet City, with her dreaming spires"</p>
+
+<p>which the Cumnor slopes (as Matthew Arnold sings) provide for
+Oxonians. Coton can also be reached from Cambridge by a delightful
+field path beneath overhanging oaks, which runs straight from Garret
+Hostel Bridge. Coton spire (as has been already mentioned) is the
+"objective" of the Trinity avenue, though the view has long been
+closed out by the growth of the branches.</p>
+
+<p>The other lane, to the right, which leads to Madingley, is also worth
+traversing. From its hedgeless "switch-back" terraces we look
+northwards across the valley, not of the Cam but of the Ouse, bounded
+by the uplands of the island of Ely, ten miles away at the nearest
+point, and nearly twice as far where the ridge is crowned by the dim
+and distant towers of the cathedral. Conspicuous in the nearer
+distance is the red-brick mass of the Ladies' College at Girton, some
+three miles away from us. Madingley, to which half a mile or so of
+this prospect leads us, is a little place of steep pitches and
+tree-shaded lanes, very different from the usual Cambridgeshire
+village, but with a special charm of its own. It has a pretty little
+church nestling beneath a fine Elizabethan hall of red-brick. Both
+church and hall contain portions of the spoil of the church of St.
+Etheldreda, which once stood at Histon and was pulled down by Mr.
+Justice Hinde, the first builder of Madingley Hall, to whom the sacred
+edifice was given by Henry the Eighth. Its Norman font is now in
+Madingley Church, while part of its roof is still to be seen in the
+Hall.</p>
+
+<p>At Madingley Hall King Edward the Seventh was quartered while an
+undergraduate of Trinity College. Tradition asserts that it once
+sheltered another monarch, the ill-fated Charles the First, in a
+momentary attempt to escape from the clutches of the rebel army during
+his enforced residence at the neighbouring Hall of Childerley, as will
+be narrated in connection with that place. The Hall has, since that
+date, passed from one family to another, and is now the seat of
+Colonel Harding, D.C.L.</p>
+
+<a id="img070" name="img070"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img070.jpg" width="350" height="525" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Coton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Madingley is a centre of pretty lanes. Besides that already <span class="pagenum"><a id="page270" name="page270"></a>(p. 270)</span>
+spoken of, another, an avenue of greenery, leads northwards to the Via
+Devana, another westwards to the village of Dry Drayton, and another
+up the hill southwards, to rejoin our St. Neots road on the summit of
+the ridge. Here we are 220 feet above the sea, overlooking the valley
+of the Ouse to the north and to the south that of the Cam, or, rather,
+of its tributary the Bourn Brook. The road keeps the highest ground,
+almost on the level, while a succession of lanes to the right and left
+lead down to the villages on either slope.</p>
+
+<p>First comes a southward turn to Hardwick, the church of which is so
+conspicuous an object in the view from the roof of King's College
+Chapel. Here, in 1644, "Mr. Mapletoft, parson thereof, with a wife and
+seven children, had these articles exhibited against him, viz., that
+he refused to read anything from the Parliament, but read many things
+from the King at Oxford with great boldness; that he prayeth not for
+the Parliament nor hath found them any arms at all; that he is a man
+devoted to many superstitious ceremonies, and commonly useth
+altar-worship, east-worship, and dropping-worship,<a id="footnotetag182" name="footnotetag182"></a><a href="#footnote182" title="Go to footnote 182"><span class="smaller">[182]</span></a> and after his
+sermon came out of the pulpit into the chancel and there made an end
+of his will-worship." Whereupon, by the Earl of Manchester's warrant,
+he was promptly ejected and sequestrated. The previous year the church
+had been purified by Dowsing, who notes with disgust that for dealing
+with "ten superstitious pictures and a cross" he was here paid only
+3s. 2d. instead of the 6s. 8d., which was his regular fee.</p>
+
+<p>The great iconoclast has the same grievance in the adjoining village
+of Toft, where he got "only 6s. 8d." for a specially heavy
+"purification" of the church, involving the destruction of
+"twenty-seven superstitious pictures in the windows, ten others in
+stone, three inscriptions, <i>Pray for the souls</i>, divers <i>Orate pro
+animabuses</i> [sic] in the windows, and a bell <i>Ora pro anima Sancta
+Katharina</i>." The "pictures in stone" were doubtless the alabaster
+images of the reredos, fragments of which are still preserved in the
+church, exquisite in modelling and colour. The most noticeable is a
+headless figure of St. Hubert, the mighty hunter of legend, who was
+converted by meeting a white hart with golden horns (supposed to be an
+emblem of Christ), and received from St. Peter a key wherewith to cure
+hydrophobia. The key is here in his hand, with <span class="pagenum"><a id="page271" name="page271"></a>(p. 271)</span> a dog beneath
+it, and the golden-horned hart couched by his side.</p>
+
+<p>Just before we reach the seventh milestone from Cambridge another
+south-running lane diverges to Caldecote, with its retired little fane
+on the hill-side over the Bourn, a very oasis of devotional peace and
+quietude. Confronting it across the stream is the steeple of Kingston,
+where there is a fine fourteenth century fresco in the north aisle,
+and a delicious little niche in the western wall of the tower,
+outside.</p>
+
+<a id="img071" name="img071"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img071.jpg" width="500" height="337" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cottage at Toft.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>At the point where this lane leaves the road, another, looking like a
+mere farm road, turns off northwards. This leads to Childerley Hall,
+now a farm house, but in 1647 of sufficient consequence to serve as a
+sleeping place for Royalty. Hither King Charles the First was brought
+by his captors, when carried off by Cornet Joyce from Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, as has been already narrated.<a id="footnotetag183" name="footnotetag183"></a><a href="#footnote183" title="Go to footnote 183"><span class="smaller">[183]</span></a> He was not
+altogether an unwilling captive, for both he and the Army hoped to
+arrive at some mutual accommodation which would make both <span class="pagenum"><a id="page272" name="page272"></a>(p. 272)</span>
+independent of that Parliamentary control of which both were heartily
+wearied.</p>
+
+<p>He was treated, accordingly, with the utmost respect; and during his
+stay at Childerley Hall<a id="footnotetag184" name="footnotetag184"></a><a href="#footnote184" title="Go to footnote 184"><span class="smaller">[184]</span></a> (from Saturday, June 5, to Tuesday, June
+8), the students of Cambridge "flocked apace" to pay their homage to
+him. "He is exceedingly cheerful," writes a contemporary scribe,<a id="footnotetag185" name="footnotetag185"></a><a href="#footnote185" title="Go to footnote 185"><span class="smaller">[185]</span></a>
+"shows himself to all, and commands that no scholler be debarred from
+kissing his hand, for which honour they return humble thanks and
+<i>Vivat Rex</i>; and there the Sophs are in their gowns and caps as if no
+further than Barnwell." Nay, even the great chiefs of the army, the
+men who at Marston and Naseby had faced and conquered him, Fairfax,
+Ireton, and Whalley, and Cromwell himself, came hither to join in this
+hand-kissing, and, one after another, to be astonished at the ability
+and graciousness which their distressed Sovereign showed in the
+private interview granted to each in turn.</p>
+
+<p>But, if local tradition is to be trusted, beneath all this gallant
+show of gracious acquiescence in the inevitable, there lurked in the
+King's heart a deep conviction that the hope on which it was founded
+was forlorn indeed. For this tradition tells of a truly desperate dash
+for freedom, the success of which was all but impossible. It has been
+constantly handed down at Madingley Hall that on one of these June
+midnights a white figure knocked at the door, and a subdued voice
+asked for "Jack" (Sir John Cotton, a noted loyalist, whose seat the
+Hall was at that time). He came, and found this mysterious visitor
+none other than the King himself, disguised in a peasant's smock, and
+imploring concealment till he could escape from the country. By a
+secret stair, traces of which still exist, he was conducted to a
+hiding place in the roof. But it was too late; his flight had been
+discovered, and the pursuing troopers were already out in search of
+him. Madingley Hall would, of course, be amongst the very first places
+to be suspected of harbouring him, and the wild venture ended in
+despair. All was hushed up; for both he and his captors wished to keep
+up the fiction that he was with them willingly.</p>
+
+<p>But they kept a tight grip upon him, and, when he left Childerley that
+Tuesday morning, would not allow him to ride <span class="pagenum"><a id="page273" name="page273"></a>(p. 273)</span> on to his state
+prison at Newmarket through Cambridge (where the streets were being
+decked in his honour with "whole rose-bushes and strewn with rushes
+and herbs"), lest these demonstrations should kindle too ardent a
+flame of loyalty. He was accordingly carried round by way of
+Grantchester and Trumpington. Since that time Childerley Hall has been
+rebuilt, but the room in which the King slept is still to be seen. And
+hard by the Hall there still stands the unpretentious little red-brick
+chapel (now a barn) in which he worshipped on that memorable Sunday.</p>
+
+<p>A mile further along the road, lanes again branch off north and south.
+The northern leads to the secluded hamlet of Knapwell, where a spring
+of ferruginous waters, held of old to be wonder-working, still
+justifies its ancient name of the Red Well. The southern brings us to
+Bourn, where the Bourn brook rises. On the slope above the stream
+stands the beautiful cruciform church, of late Norman and Early
+English architecture; the arches which open from the tower into the
+nave and the aisles being particularly noticeable. Bourn Hall is a
+fine Elizabethan mansion, the seat of J. Briscoe, Esq., and is the
+modern representative of a castle (the moat of which still exists)
+erected here by Picot, Sheriff of Cambridgeshire under William the
+Conqueror, and the scene of hard fighting in the Barons' War, when it
+belonged to the Peverells.</p>
+
+<p>Eleven miles from Cambridge we cross the Ermine Street, a junction
+sufficiently important to have been selected by the wisdom of our
+ancestors as the site of a gibbet; the object being that as many as
+possible should see the gruesome spectacle of malefactors hanging in
+chains, and thus, if evilly disposed, take warning, or, if well
+disposed, be encouraged by this visible vindication of the Law's
+majesty. The gibbet has been gone for a century and more; but till
+quite lately the sign-post here directed the traveller simply <span class="smcap">TO
+LONDON</span> and <span class="smcap">TO YORK</span> on either hand, reminding us that this was the old
+North Road.</p>
+
+<p>A mile along it, towards London, stands the little town of Caxton,
+from which the gibbet derived its name. A prosperous place in the old
+coaching days (as the size of its inns still testifies), it is now a
+mere village with 450 inhabitants. But it continues to boast itself a
+town. As the nearest point on the North Road to Cambridge, it was an
+important junction. The <span class="pagenum"><a id="page274" name="page274"></a>(p. 274)</span> historian, Carter, writing in 1753,
+mentions that a mail was carried twice a week (on horseback) between
+Caxton and Cambridge; the only mail connection our University town
+then had, except with London and Bury St. Edmunds! We read also that,
+in the Jacobite rising of 1745, when it was seriously expected that
+the Stuart forces, after their wonderful success in reaching Derby,
+would march on to London, many Cambridge students, who cared little
+about the issue, secured windows at Caxton "to see the Scots pass by."</p>
+
+<p>Sixty years before this another gleam of interest lights up the name
+of Caxton. In 1686 the Bishop, Francis Turner (one of the famous Seven
+prosecuted by James the Second and afterwards deprived by William the
+Third as a non-juror), made a strenuous effort to get Mattins and
+Evensong said daily, according to the Rubric, throughout his Diocese.
+The following characteristic letter addressed by him to the Vicar of
+Caxton was discovered in 1908 amongst the church muniments:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+
+<p class="right10">Ely,<br>
+  <i>Sept. 11th, 1686.</i></p>
+
+<p class="smcap">Good Brother,</p>
+
+     <p>The good character I have received concerning you ... has given
+     me a particular confidence in yr. care to putt the directions of
+     my printed letter in practice. Yr. parish, if it be not so
+     numerous as I suppos'd, yet lyes on the Great Northern Roade; it
+     would be for our Churches Honor and for the consolation of well
+     dispos'd travellers to find Daily Prayers in yr. Church. I press
+     them all over the Diocese where it is practicable, but at Caxton
+     I wd. have them by all means, tho' you begin with a congregation
+     of but a widdow or two. Have them if you please at 6 or 7 in the
+     morning if that will be best for passengers. My good friend you
+     have been bredd in a camp to toyle and hardship. I know the
+     putting my orders in execution, that is the making of so many
+     careless people Christian indeed, will cost you a great deale of
+     labour. But do not grudge it; you are sure of as great a Reward
+     in Heaven; and in good time you may find your account by it
+     here.... In the mean time do your Business with all your might,
+     and sett into it presently, before the Visitation. By which you
+     will more than a little oblige, Sir,</p>
+
+<p class="right10">Yr. affect. friend and Brother,<br>
+  <span class="smcap">Fran. Ely.</span></p>
+
+<p class="smcap">Mr. Say of Caxton.</p>
+
+     <p>P.S.&mdash;If you have no little Schoole in your town I shall wonder,
+     and you ought to procure one. If there bee one, then you need not
+     want a congregation for both morning and evening prayers.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>After crossing the Ermine Street we come to Eltisley, where there is a
+pretty Village Green and a good village inn; and the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page275" name="page275"></a>(p. 275)</span> church,
+though small, has some fine Early English work. It is dedicated to St.
+John the Baptist and St. Pandiana (or Pandionia), an obscure
+personage, said by Leland to have been a Scottish<a id="footnotetag186" name="footnotetag186"></a><a href="#footnote186" title="Go to footnote 186"><span class="smaller">[186]</span></a> princess, who
+found in this remote spot a refuge from the importunities of her
+suitors, and was here buried by the side of a spring still known as
+St. Pandiana's Well. Her nunnery perished after the Conquest, and in
+the fourteenth century her body was translated into the church, along
+with that of the yet more obscure St. Wendreda,<a id="footnotetag187" name="footnotetag187"></a><a href="#footnote187" title="Go to footnote 187"><span class="smaller">[187]</span></a> a purely
+Cambridgeshire saint, whose name is also connected with the church of
+March, and with a "well" near Newmarket.</p>
+
+<p>The village is the scene of a dramatic tale found in Roger of
+Wendover, under the date 1234. A famine was raging, and the hungry
+poor invaded the ripening harvest-fields and devoured the crops, "for
+which they may scarce be blamed. Of the farmers, however, (who ever
+from their avarice, look upon the poor with an evil eye,) many were
+highly wroth at this pious theft. And they of Alboldesley hied them
+all on the next Sunday (July 16th) to the church, and with tumult
+required the priest to excommunicate upon the spot all who had thus
+plucked their wheat-ears. But one pious man alone adjured him in God's
+name to pronounce no such sentence for <i>his</i> crops; adding that he was
+right well content that the poor should take from him in their need,
+and that he commended to the Lord's care whatsoever was left.</p>
+
+<p>"Now scarcely had the priest perforce begun the curse, than there
+suddenly arose such a storm of thunder, lightning, whirlwind, rain and
+hail, that the corn in the fields was torn from the ground as by a
+blast from hell; and all that grew therein, and the cattle, and the
+very birds, were destroyed, as though trodden down by carts and
+horses. But that just man found his land without trace of harm. And
+thus it is clear that as the angels sing Glory to God in the Highest,
+so on earth is there Peace toward men of Good-will.</p>
+
+<p>"This storm began on the borders of Bedfordshire (at Eltisley), and
+passed eastwards through the Isle of Ely. And here is a wondrous
+thing. Such crops as still stood when it <span class="pagenum"><a id="page276" name="page276"></a>(p. 276)</span> was over were found
+so rotted that neither horse nor ass, steer nor pig, goose nor hen,
+would eat thereof." A cyclone of precisely the same character
+devastated Essex on June 24, 1897, and was as capricious in its
+visitations.</p>
+
+<p>At Eltisley we reach the termination of the long ridge which has kept
+us at an upland level all the way from Madingley, and our road now
+runs rapidly down into the valley of the Ouse. We reach that noble
+stream at the old-world, but thriving, town of St. Neots, where there
+is a fine old bridge and a magnificent church. The name of this place
+is locally pronounced not <i>Neats</i>, but <i>Notes</i>. This last is the
+correct form, for the name is derived from Neotus, the eldest brother
+and friend of King Alfred, whom that greatest of our monarchs
+recognised as the good genius of his life.</p>
+
+<p>The original name of this notable personality was Athelstane. He was
+the eldest grandson of Egbert, the first "King of the English," and
+held, accordingly, the under-kingship of Kent, at that time the usual
+appanage of the heir-apparent. This dignity he resigned to enter
+Religion, at the Abbey of Glastonbury, under the name of Neotus. A
+special bond of affection united him with his youngest brother,
+Alfred, who, as an enthusiastic boy of seventeen, took this dearest of
+brothers as his spiritual guide and counsellor. When, five years
+later, the successive deaths of the intervening brethren brought him
+to the throne, we read that the inconsiderate zeal with which he
+suppressed abuses drew anxious warnings from St. Neot, who foresaw
+that this overweening course would surely bring disastrous
+consequences.</p>
+
+<p>"But Alfred heeded not the reproof of the man of God, nor listed what
+he foretold. Wherefore (seeing that a man's sins must needs be some
+way punished, either in this world or in that which is to come), the
+Righteous Judge and True willed that he should not be unpunished here,
+that so he might be spared hereafter."<a id="footnotetag188" name="footnotetag188"></a><a href="#footnote188" title="Go to footnote 188"><span class="smaller">[188]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>The punishment was that sudden and disastrous Danish inroad which
+overwhelmed the whole of the kingdom, and drove Alfred himself into
+hiding at Athelney. While he was there St. Neot died at the
+neighbouring Glastonbury. We read there, ere his departure, the saint
+had promised that as he had been Alfred's spiritual guide in life, so
+should that spiritual <span class="pagenum"><a id="page277" name="page277"></a>(p. 277)</span> guidance and wardship still abide with
+him. "Thy guide have I been ever; thee and thine will I lead on." "I
+will be thy captain, I will be thy champion; thou shalt be glad and
+rejoice in me." "Lo, I will go before thy banner; thine enemies shall
+perish at my presence." And when, a few weeks later, the King led on
+his forces to the crowning victory over the Danes at Ethandune, he was
+persuaded that this promise was being fulfilled. With the eye of
+ardent faith he beheld the blessed spirit of his brother leading on
+the Christian banners to the onset. "See ye not?" he exclaimed to his
+men, "See ye not? That is indeed Neotus, Christ's glorious servant,
+Christ's unconquered soldier; and through him is the victory even now
+given to our hands."</p>
+
+<p>Thus it came about that St. Neot remained the object of unforgotten
+reverence, not only to Alfred himself, but to his heroic son and
+daughter. The former christened after this sainted uncle his own
+eldest son Athelstane, afterwards "Athelstane the Magnificent," the
+mighty King of the English and Emperor of Britain; and when the latter
+delivered Mercia from the yoke of the Danes, she called by his name
+one of the fortress towns, which she founded on the Ouse to keep them
+in check, St. Neots.</p>
+
+<p>It is appropriate that one of the earliest and most spirited of the
+Chronicles that record the great deeds of Alfred should have been
+preserved for five centuries in the Church of St. Neots, and should
+still be known as the "Chronicle of St. Neots."<a id="footnotetag189" name="footnotetag189"></a><a href="#footnote189" title="Go to footnote 189"><span class="smaller">[189]</span></a> The north aisle
+of this church is known as the "Jesus Chapel," having been built by a
+local mediæval fraternity called "The Guild of Jesus." The sacred
+monogram IHC, is to be seen on the beams of the roof inside and on the
+buttresses outside.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>One of the most delightful routes of the district is that by which we
+make our way along the Ouse from St. Neots to Ely, by way of
+Godmanchester, Huntingdon, and St. Ives. On leaving St. Neots the road
+climbs Paxton Hill, where its shady course overhangs a beautiful sweep
+of the broad stream 120 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page278" name="page278"></a>(p. 278)</span> feet below. Thence it drops to the
+river at Paxton itself, where the church has some good Saxon features,
+and thence continues along the water to the twin villages of Offord
+Darcy and Offord Cluny, close together on the right bank, and so over
+another little eminence to strike the river again at Godmanchester.</p>
+
+<p>The etymology of this name shows it to have been a Roman station, and
+Roman remains have been found here. It is commonly identified with the
+<i>Durolipons</i> of the Antonine Itinerary. Here the Via Devana, running
+straight from Cambridge, strikes the Ermine Street, and the final
+syllable of the Latin name suggests that the united roads crossed the
+river by a bridge before separating on their respective lines towards
+Chester and York. If so the bridge must have stood somewhere near the
+present one, which, however, was not built till the thirteenth
+century. Godmanchester is now a reposeful little town, with a uniquely
+picturesque view across the verdant expanse of Port Holme, the largest
+meadow, as it boasts itself, in the world, a wide, wide flat of breezy
+grass, across which, more than a mile away, rise the buildings of
+Huntingdon. In flood time, when this flat becomes a shining lake, the
+scene is striking indeed.</p>
+
+<p>From the northern end of the town a long causeway, pierced with many
+arches to carry off these floods, leads across the fields to the
+bridge, with its high pitch, its recessed and pointed buttresses, and
+its old bridge-chapel (now used for secular purposes) on the central
+span. Immediately behind lies the town of Huntingdon, larger and more
+stirring than its elder sister Godmanchester. It owes its existence to
+the same cause as St. Neots, being one of the fortresses erected by
+the "Children of Alfred," Edward the Elder and his sister Ethelfleda,
+"the lady of the Mercians," to ensure their pacification of these
+parts when reconquered from the Danes. It is famous as the birthplace
+of Oliver Cromwell, the entry of whose baptism, in 1599, is still to
+be seen in the register of All Saints' Church. The same book contains
+a record of his having been put to public penance, at the age of
+twenty, for scandalous living. The register of St. John's (now united
+to All Saints') tells us that the body of the unhappy Mary Stuart
+rested in that church during its removal by her son, James the First,
+from Peterborough Cathedral to Westminster Abbey.</p>
+
+<p>From Huntingdon our road, keeping close in touch with the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page279" name="page279"></a>(p. 279)</span>
+river, takes us through the pretty villages of Hartford, Wyton, and
+Houghton, to St. Ives. A yet prettier way is to recross the stream at
+Houghton Lock and take a field-road across the meadows to the two
+Hemingfords, Hemingford Abbots and Hemingford Grey. The latter is
+famous as the birthplace of the Misses Gunning, who were the leading
+beauties of the Court in the early days of the reign of George the
+Third, and married into the highest families of the Peerage. Both
+churches stand on the very brink of the Ouse, about a mile apart,
+their graceful steeples, with that of Houghton to the north-east and
+that of St. Ives to the north-west, watching as guardian sentinels
+over the rich Ouse meadows between. All have spires, but that of
+Hemingford Grey lost its upper part by an equinoctial gale in the
+middle of the eighteenth century, and only the base now remains.</p>
+
+<p>St. Ives is yet another of Edward the Elder's fortresses, and is
+probably named from the Cornish town similarly designated. It is
+possible that it may be even a colony from that far-off strand, which
+had never swerved in its allegiance, planted here to leaven the
+turbulent Danish elements around. Certain it is that here Ednoth,
+Abbot of Ely, erected a church dedicated to St. Ivo. Who this saint
+may have been originally is not known; probably he (or she) was one of
+the many obscure Celtic saints whose names dot the map of Cornwall.
+But there grew up in the eleventh century a wild legend that Ivo, a
+Persian (!) bishop, had settled down in the neighbourhood. In the
+fifteenth century a stone sarcophagus, found by a peasant when
+ploughing, was declared to contain the body of this holy Oriental, and
+was translated with due pomp to the neighbouring Abbey of Ramsey. St.
+Ives was specially connected with this House, and it was an Abbot of
+Ramsey who built the beautiful bridge, the ditto of that at
+Huntingdon, by which we here recross to the left bank of the Ouse.</p>
+
+<p>Our next point, on leaving St. Ives, is the tiny village of Holywell,
+which we may reach either by road, through the hamlet of Needingworth,
+or (preferably) by a field-path running westwards from near the
+railway station. The little church here stands on a slope above the
+river, and in the churchyard the holy well is still to be seen. But
+the delight of the place is its strand along the Ouse, a rarely
+picturesque medley of old houses on one side of the road and on the
+other the broad <span class="pagenum"><a id="page280" name="page280"></a>(p. 280)</span> clear stream, here crossed by a ferry. This
+road continues (as a mere field-path) to another delicious ferry a
+mile lower, with a charming little inn beside it, in a grove of lofty
+trees. This lovely spot is named Overcote. Here travellers may cross
+into Cambridgeshire and make their way along the "Hundred Foot"
+embankment (so called because it is thirty yards in width) along the
+river to Earith. For motors the way lies through Needingworth, and
+past the pretty little Church of Bluntisham, with its three-sided apse
+and its churchyard yews.</p>
+
+<p>Earith is a hamlet of Bluntisham, but a much larger place, owing its
+importance to its situation on the point where the great works
+connected with the drainage of the fens have their beginning by the
+diversion of the Ouse waters from their ancient bed into the two
+"Bedford Rivers," the Old and the New, which from this point run
+straight as a die (like the supposed "canals" in Mars) across the fen
+to Denvers Sluice, twenty-two miles away. The former was made in 1630,
+the latter in 1650, at the expense of what we should now call a
+company, promoted by the Earl of Bedford. No such cuts exist elsewhere
+in the world. Along them a clear horizon is to be obtained, and here,
+accordingly, was conducted, some forty years ago, a decisive
+experiment for proving the sphericity of the earth.</p>
+
+<p>At that time a deluded gentleman, who called himself "Parallax," was
+obsessed with the notion that the globe was a flat disc, and used to
+go lecturing with great vigour on the subject. After these lectures he
+invited questions, none of which were able to shake his belief. When
+asked, for example, "Why does the hull of a ship disappear below the
+horizon while the masts remain visible?" he would answer, "Because the
+lowest stratum of air is the densest, and, therefore, soonest conceals
+objects seen through it." In view of the present Polar exploration, it
+may interest our readers to know that one of his points was the
+absolute non-existence of the South Pole. "Explorers say they cannot
+get near it, because of an icy barrier. Of course. That barrier is the
+raised rim of our world plate, and they can but sail round and round
+inside it." Finally he showed his wholehearted belief in his absurd
+views by laying a heavy wager that no one would disprove them. The
+stakes were deposited in the hands of judges, and the trial, under
+agreed conditions, took place upon the New River. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page281" name="page281"></a>(p. 281)</span> Three
+boats were moored three miles apart, each provided with a cross-tree
+of equal height. If the earth was spherical the central cross would
+appear above the other to an observer looking through a telescope
+levelled from the cross-tree of the boat at either end; if it was flat
+he would see both the other cross-trees as one. "Parallax" declared
+that he did so (!), but the judges decided against him, and the poor
+man lost his money.</p>
+
+<a id="chapxiii" name="chapxiii"></a>
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page282" name="page282"></a>(p. 282)</span> CHAPTER XIII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Island of Ely.&mdash;Haddenham.&mdash;Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+     Belsars Hill.&mdash;Wilburton.&mdash;Sutton.&mdash;Wentworth.&mdash;Via
+     Devana.&mdash;Girton, College.&mdash;Oakington,
+     Holdsworth.&mdash;Elsworth.&mdash;Conington, Ancient Bells.&mdash;Long Stanton,
+     Queen Elizabeth.&mdash;Willingham, Stone Chamber.&mdash;Over,
+     Gurgoyles.&mdash;Swavesey, Finials.&mdash;Ely Road.&mdash;Chesterton.&mdash;Fen
+     Ditton.&mdash;Milton, Altar Rails.&mdash;Horningsea.&mdash;Bait's Bite, Start of
+     Race.&mdash;Clayhithe.&mdash;Waterbeach.&mdash;Car
+     Dyke.&mdash;Denny.&mdash;Stretham.&mdash;Upware.&mdash;Wicken Fen.</p>
+
+<p>From the bridge over the Ouse by the Earith sluice we see the
+sea-board (for that and nothing less is the word which its appearance
+irresistibly suggests) of the Island of Ely, rising before us, with a
+couple of miles of level fen between. We may reach it, if we will, by
+the main road, which leads eastward to Haddenham, the southernmost of
+the island villages. Haddenham stands on a projecting peninsula of
+high ground, the highest in the island, rising to nearly 150 feet,
+almost cut off from the rest by two inlets of fen (Grunty Fen on the
+north-east and North Fen on the north-west), and nearer than any other
+part to the mainland on the south. This quasi-insulation has left a
+curious mark on the Ecclesiastical map of Cambridgeshire. Throughout
+the whole Isle of Ely&mdash;the old Fenland Archipelago&mdash;the Bishop acts as
+his own Archdeacon. An Archdeacon of Ely there is; but his
+jurisdiction is confined to Cambridgeshire proper, Cambridgeshire
+south of the Isle. It extends, however, over Haddenham and the
+neighbouring village of Wilburton, the two parishes in this peninsula.</p>
+
+<p>Haddenham has a fine Decorated church; the tower showing the first
+development of that style from Early English (1275), and the transepts
+its transition into Perpendicular (1375). The fifteenth century font
+is richly panelled, with roses and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page283" name="page283"></a>(p. 283)</span> shields supported by
+lions and angels. This church was founded by Owen, the "Over-alderman"
+who governed the Island of Ely under St. Etheldreda, the Foundress of
+the Cathedral, and Queen of the Isle as the childless widow of its
+last native ruler, King Tonbert.<a id="footnotetag190" name="footnotetag190"></a><a href="#footnote190" title="Go to footnote 190"><span class="smaller">[190]</span></a> Owen's name is interesting as
+testifying to the Celtic survival in the fenland, already spoken
+of.<a id="footnotetag191" name="footnotetag191"></a><a href="#footnote191" title="Go to footnote 191"><span class="smaller">[191]</span></a> The broken cross bearing his name, now in the south aisle of
+Ely Cathedral, was originally set up at Haddenham; and, after being
+for ages an object of veneration, was, at the Reformation, mutilated
+and degraded into a horsing-block. At length the revived decency of
+the eighteenth century removed it to Ely.</p>
+
+<p>The village of Haddenham lies chiefly along the road running southward
+to the hamlet of Aldreth, on the very verge of the Island. The nearest
+point of the low-lying mainland is only half a mile away; the "Old
+River" of the Ouse (now, since the construction of the Bedford Rivers,
+become quite a scanty watercourse) flowing between. This was the point
+selected by William the Conqueror for the famous Causeway, whereby,
+after being once and again baffled by the valour of Hereward, he
+ultimately succeeded in forcing his way into the Island.<a id="footnotetag192" name="footnotetag192"></a><a href="#footnote192" title="Go to footnote 192"><span class="smaller">[192]</span></a> For
+centuries afterwards this continued to be the chief entrance from the
+Cambridge district, till superseded by the present road viâ Stretham.
+A small barrow at the southern end of this causeway, which is now a
+mere field-track, still bears the name of Belsar's Hill, after the
+knight who, in this campaign, acted as the Conqueror's
+Commander-in-Chief.</p>
+
+<p>Wilburton, a mile to the east, was given to Ely by St. Ethelwold,
+Bishop of Winchester, the prelate who aided in King Edgar's
+restoration of the Monastery of Ely, after its destruction by the
+Danes, in 870, had laid it waste for upwards of a century. The church
+has some fine woodwork in stalls, screen, and roof, adorned on the
+spandrills and bosses with the three cocks of Bishop Alcock, the
+founder of Jesus College. While Archdeacon of Ely he here entertained
+Henry the Eighth, when, as Prince of Wales, he accompanied his father
+on the last Royal Pilgrimage ever made to the shrine of St. Etheldreda
+at Ely, which he himself was so soon to despoil and destroy. A good
+brass (now affixed to the wall) commemorates Alcock's <span class="pagenum"><a id="page284" name="page284"></a>(p. 284)</span>
+predecessor in the archidiaconate, Richard Bole (1477). And yet
+another Archdeacon, Wetheringset, is also here buried. Some curious
+metal-work hangs from the roof, and on the north wall of the nave are
+ancient frescoes, representing not only St. Christopher, the usual
+subject, but the much less known St. Blaise and St. Leodegar. The
+former was Bishop of Sebaste, and was martyred in 316 <span class="smcap">A.D.</span> He became
+the patron saint of wool-combers, and was specially venerated in Leeds
+and Bradford. The latter was Bishop of Autun in Gaul, during the
+seventh century. There is here a fine old red-brick manor-house,
+called the Burgh-stead (or Bury-stead), built in 1600 by a London
+alderman to whom Queen Elizabeth sold the Manor,&mdash;after filching it
+from the Bishop of Ely, according to her usual practice.</p>
+
+<a id="img072" name="img072"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img072.jpg" width="500" height="344" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Wilburton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The whole peninsula is specially rich in memorials of long past ages.
+In the peat of the old Ouse channel by Wilburton was found a great
+hoard of bronze weapons, lying in a promiscuous heap, "in such a
+manner as to suggest that a canoe with a cargo of bronze scrap had
+been upset there," as <span class="pagenum"><a id="page285" name="page285"></a>(p. 285)</span> Professor and Mrs. Hughes
+picturesquely put it, in their "Geography of Cambridgeshire." Grunty
+Fen has produced a bronze sickle, and two splendid ornaments of
+twisted gold; while, a mile east of Wilburton, a British urn was
+discovered, associated with the bones of the urus, or gigantic wild ox
+of the Neolithic Age. And between Earith and Wilburton there has been
+dug out gold ring-money.</p>
+
+<a id="img073" name="img073"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img073.jpg" width="400" height="383" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Burystead, Wilburton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>But a yet more striking approach to the Island of Ely may be made by
+taking at Earith the road through the toll-gate which leads northward
+immediately alongside the great embankment of the New River, and lies
+some few feet below the level of its waters. For three miles this
+association continues; then <span class="pagenum"><a id="page286" name="page286"></a>(p. 286)</span> road and river part company, and
+the former drives straight across the fen to climb the western shore
+of the island. The change of scenery when you reach that shore is
+striking in its suddenness. You have been travelling for miles through
+the bare, treeless, dead level of the fen, with its immense width of
+view; then, almost in a moment, you find yourself ascending a steepish
+hill through a tree-shaded hedge-bordered cutting which might be in
+Kent or even Devonshire.</p>
+
+<p>At the top of this brow you look down on the fen behind you and on
+either hand, your southern horizon being bounded by the near uplands
+of Haddenham, with the flat bay of North Fen between. And very shortly
+you come to the undulating village street of Sutton, with its highest
+point crowned by the truly glorious church. This church is all in one
+style, Decorated, on the verge of developing into Perpendicular,
+having been built by Barnet, Bishop of Ely 1366 to 1373. The splendid
+tower is crowned by an octagonal steeple, and that again by a second,
+richly pinnacled, and is a landmark for many miles along the valleys
+of the Ouse and Cam.</p>
+
+<p>From Sutton we reach Ely by way of Wentworth and Witchford. The former
+name is supposed to be a corruption of Owensworth, and to commemorate
+that the place was of old the property of St. Owen. The little church
+has a Saxon porch, with twisted pillars, and contains a remarkable
+carving of the same date, representing an ecclesiastic wearing the
+pall of a Primate. His left hand supports an open book, while in his
+right he holds, not a cross or pastoral staff, but something more
+suggestive of an aspersory for holy water. The corbel in Ely Cathedral
+depicting the burial of St. Etheldreda shows us a figure similarly
+equipped.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>In looking southward from Sutton Church, three steeples are specially
+conspicuous in the Ouse valley. They are those of Over, Swavesey, and
+Willingham. All are churches of the first class, and all are best
+reached from Cambridge by way of the Via Devana, which, after crossing
+the "Great Bridge" and climbing the ascent past the Castle, continues
+its straight course to the north-west under the designation of the
+Huntingdon Road. Just as it leaves the town a branch-road on the right
+leads to the village of Histon, which the jam factories of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page288" name="page288"></a>(p. 288)</span>
+Messrs. Chivers have made one of the most flourishing in the county.
+The church here has some good Early English work, and a remarkable
+"Rood" (much defaced) on the gable of the S. transept. This is an
+almost unique example of the early "Majestas" type of crucifix (p.
+<a href="#page339">339</a>). Christ, with outspread arms, wears, not the Crown of Thorns, but
+the Old English "king-helm," and is fully robed. About 1200 this ideal
+type gave place to the later "realistic" crucifix.</p>
+
+<a id="img074" name="img074"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img074.jpg" width="350" height="528" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Sutton Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A mile beyond the last houses of Cambridge the Via Devana comes to the
+huge red-brick mass of Girton College, which has been already spoken
+of.<a id="footnotetag193" name="footnotetag193"></a><a href="#footnote193" title="Go to footnote 193"><span class="smaller">[193]</span></a> Its spacious grounds and never-ending corridors impress the
+mind with admiration for the enthusiasm and energy which has thus
+materialised Tennyson's vision of University education for women. At
+this point another northward turn takes us to Girton Church, where
+there are good brasses to two successive fifteenth century parsons. In
+their day the living belonged to Ramsey Abbey, by the gift of Eric,
+Bishop of Dorchester (1016). We next come to Oakington, the Mecca of
+Cambridgeshire Free Churchmen. For here, in the quiet little
+Nonconformist Cemetery, rest, side by side, the three men to whom the
+chief sects of the county trace their spiritual ancestry&mdash;Francis
+Holcroft, Joseph Oddy, and Henry Oasland.</p>
+
+<p>The first named was a Fellow of Clare College where he had for his
+"chum" (<i>i.e.</i> chamber-mate, as we find the word used in "Pickwick")
+Tillotson, the future Archbishop of Canterbury. He began his
+ministerial career by taking on himself to supply the place of a
+brother collegian, the Puritan minister in charge of Littlington, near
+Royston, who, most un-Puritanically, was often incapacitated by drink
+from performing his duties. Later, in 1655, when still only
+twenty-two, he himself became pastor of the adjoining parish of
+Bassingbourn. When the "Black Bartholomew" of 1662 deprived him of
+this charge under the Act of Uniformity, he preached, at the risk of
+fine and imprisonment, throughout the neighbourhood, binding together
+his adherents in a loosely-knit organisation, whose members were
+admitted on subscribing the following Profession of Faith:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"We do in the presence of the Lord Jesus, the awful crowned King
+     of Sion, and in the presence of his holy angels and people and
+     all besides here <span class="pagenum"><a id="page289" name="page289"></a>(p. 289)</span> present, solemnly give up ourselves to
+     the Lord and to one another, by the will of God, solemnly
+     promising and engaging in the aforesaid presence to walk with the
+     Lord and with one another in the observation of all Gospel
+     ordinances, and the discharge of all relative duties in this
+     church of God and elsewhere, as the Lord shall enlighten us and
+     enable us."<a id="footnotetag194" name="footnotetag194"></a><a href="#footnote194" title="Go to footnote 194"><span class="smaller">[194]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>His efforts were vigorously seconded by Oddy and Oasland, whose
+consciences, like his own, would not permit them to use the Anglican
+Prayer Book; and the units of this embryo Church, who were often
+spoken of at the time as "Mr. Holcroft's disciples," became widely
+spread throughout the county. Already, before the end of 1662, they
+had regular meetings at Barrington, Eversden, Waterbeach, and Guyhirn,
+as well as Cambridge; and when, ten years later, they became licensed
+by the King's Proclamation of Indulgence, we find the number increased
+fourfold. So far Nonconformity had been the only bond between these
+scattered bands of worshippers; but they now began to differentiate
+themselves into Baptist, Independent, and Presbyterian Congregations,
+though the lines were not as yet sharply drawn, and, indeed, are not
+even now sharply drawn in the country villages, where a man is
+"Church" or "Chapel," caring little what may be the precise
+denomination of his chapel. The strength of the Dissenting spirit thus
+implanted at Oakington may be measured by that of the language
+employed by the zealous Archdeacon of Ely, who, in 1685, declares this
+to be "the most scandalous parish and the worst in the diocese. The
+people most vile. A Fanatic Schoolmaster."</p>
+
+<p>From Oakington the lane leads on to Long Stanton, where the two
+churches of St. Michael and All Saints are both noteworthy. The former
+is a simple Early English building with a <i>thatched</i> roof (till lately
+made of reeds from the fen, a far more durable material than straw,
+but now unobtainable), a rich double piscina, and an oak chest dating
+from the twelfth century. The latter, at the other end of the "long"
+village street, is a Decorated cruciform structure, the south transept
+having become the mortuary chapel of the Hatton family, who bought the
+lordship of the manor from Queen Elizabeth.</p>
+
+<p>That rapacious monarch, her father's worthy daughter in ecclesiastical
+spoliation, had seized upon it amongst the surrenders which she
+exacted from Bishop Cox, the first Protestant <span class="pagenum"><a id="page290" name="page290"></a>(p. 290)</span> to be Bishop
+of Ely. On his accession she confiscated a full half of his episcopal
+property, and was constantly insisting on further denudations,
+including Ely House, Holborn. On this final act of despotism goading
+him into remonstrance, she is reported (in Strype's <i>History of the
+Reformation</i>) to have made the well-known reply, "Proud priest! I made
+you. And I will unmake you. Obey my pleasure, or I will forthwith
+unfrock you." Only his speedy death (in 1581) prevented her from
+actually carrying out this threat. After it she kept the whole
+property of the See in her own hands for no less than nineteen years,
+when she handed it over to Bishop Heton, shorn of yet another moiety,
+which included the Manor of Longstanton with its ancient episcopal
+palace.</p>
+
+<p>This palace had a further connection with Elizabeth; for in it she was
+entertained by Bishop Cox after that visit to Cambridge in 1564, when
+her erudition so thrilled the University.<a id="footnotetag195" name="footnotetag195"></a><a href="#footnote195" title="Go to footnote 195"><span class="smaller">[195]</span></a> And it was here that
+she was disgusted by the blasphemous entertainment got up for her
+benefit by the Protestant undergraduates, in which a performing dog
+danced with a consecrated Host in his mouth. King's College Chapel was
+the scene originally intended for this outrage; but the graver
+academic programme there lasted so long that the Queen could not stay
+for the afterpiece. The disappointed students begged leave to follow
+her and give an evening performance at Long Stanton. Mutual disgust
+was the result. As soon as Elizabeth understood what was going on she
+indignantly swept from the room, ordering every light to be instantly
+extinguished, leaving the wretched boys to grope for their properties
+and get back to Cambridge as best they could.</p>
+
+<a id="img075" name="img075"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img075.jpg" width="400" height="394" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>All Saints' Church, Long Stanton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Following the road to Long Stanton station (six and a half miles), we
+there cross the G. E. R. (St. Ives Branch) and proceed, along a
+somewhat dreary stretch, to Willingham (nine miles), where an
+exceptionally fine church (All Saints) rewards our toil. After
+lingering in neglect and decay for years beyond the neighbouring
+churches, it has now become an ideal example of judicious restoration,
+very different from the drastic process too often known by that name.
+Every ancient feature and development has been preserved, including
+the beautiful <span class="pagenum"><a id="page291" name="page291"></a>(p. 291)</span> roof,<a id="footnotetag196" name="footnotetag196"></a><a href="#footnote196" title="Go to footnote 196"><span class="smaller">[196]</span></a> with its elaborate carving, its
+tiers of angels and its double hammer beams, the fine parclose
+screens, and the Perpendicular pulpit. Beneath the clerestory may be
+seen traces of no fewer than four successive layers of frescoes,
+which, from the twelfth to the seventeenth century, each in turn
+adorned the walls. But the most striking feature of the church is the
+small Decorated "treasury" adjoining the north wall of the chancel. It
+is wholly of stone, even to the roof with its richly wrought <span class="pagenum"><a id="page292" name="page292"></a>(p. 292)</span>
+"beams"; an almost unique example of this method of treatment. Dowsing
+here destroyed, on 16 March, 1643, "forty superstitious pictures, a
+crucifix, and two superstitious inscriptions, also two pictures of the
+Holy Ghost and one of the Virgin Mary in brass."</p>
+
+<p>From Willingham a field road will take us, if desired, to Belsar's
+Hill,<a id="footnotetag197" name="footnotetag197"></a><a href="#footnote197" title="Go to footnote 197"><span class="smaller">[197]</span></a> which, besides its historical associations, is rich in the
+pretty crystals of selenite or gypsum. And though, as has been said,
+the track is now all but disused, it is still possible to follow the
+Conqueror's causeway to the Ouse and get ferried over to Aldreth.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>The next turn on the Via Devana is the southward lane to Madingley,
+already described. Southward also lie Lolworth, Boxworth and Elsworth.
+The last has an exceptionally fine church, Decorated throughout, and
+displaying the almost unique feature of small lockers for books in the
+fourteenth century stalls. Conington, near the road on the same side,
+has a stone-ribbed spire containing three mediæval bells&mdash;a rare
+survival. They bear the following inscriptions:</p>
+
+<ul class="decimal">
+<li>ASSVMPTA · EST · MARIA · IN · CELIS · GAVDENT · ANGELI<br>
+  LAVDANTES · BENEDICVNT · DOMINVM.<br>
+
+  Mary is taken up to Heaven. The Angels are glad.<br>
+  They praise and bless the Lord.</li>
+
+<li>SANCTA · MARIA · ORA · PRO · NOBIS<br>
+  Holy Mary pray for us.</li>
+
+<li>VIRGO · CORONATA · DVC · NOS · AD · REGNA · BEATA ·<br>
+  O crownèd Maid lead us to realms of bliss.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<a id="img076" name="img076"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img076.jpg" width="350" height="463" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Over, South Porch.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Northward we find the magnificent churches of Swavesey and Over
+already mentioned. The former is one of the noblest in Cambridgeshire.
+The nave is Perpendicular, but the large windows in the south aisle
+are really Early English lancets, the Perpendicular tracery being
+inserted&mdash;a most unusual development. The finials of the fourteenth
+century benches are to be noticed, especially in the north aisle,
+where they take the form of grotesque animals. The small size of these
+seats suggests that they were meant for children. The little ones
+would be <span class="pagenum"><a id="page294" name="page294"></a>(p. 294)</span> charmed with these delightful finials,
+representing a fox and a goose, a fox and a stork, a bear and a dog, a
+wolf and a hound, an eagle and a snake, a wild boar, a lion, a
+pelican, a cherub, St. Peter, and an angel playing upon a dulcimer.</p>
+
+<a id="img077" name="img077"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img077.jpg" width="500" height="333" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Over.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>At Over every feature of the church is noteworthy. It is entirely
+built of Barnack stone, richly ornamented externally with running
+ball-flower patterns. The southern porch is beautifully proportioned,
+and the gargoyles extraordinary specimens of birds and beasts,
+apparently under the same inspiration as the Swavesey finials. Over
+the west door is a sculpture (almost weathered out of knowledge) of
+Our Lady in Glory, a very rare subject; also the arms of Ramsey Abbey,
+to which the benefice was presented by Ednoth, Bishop of Dorchester,
+who lies buried in Bishop West's chapel at Ely.<a id="footnotetag198" name="footnotetag198"></a><a href="#footnote198" title="Go to footnote 198"><span class="smaller">[198]</span></a> The tracery in
+general is Decorated, but the spire rises from an Early English tower,
+and the chancel is also Early English, with inserted Perpendicular
+windows. The Sanctus Bell<a id="footnotetag199" name="footnotetag199"></a><a href="#footnote199" title="Go to footnote 199"><span class="smaller">[199]</span></a> still hangs over the eastern gable of
+the nave. The interior woodwork <span class="pagenum"><a id="page295" name="page295"></a>(p. 295)</span> is of the best, the roof is
+Decorated, and there is an exceptionally good sixteenth century
+pulpit. The arcading above the windows of the south aisle, with its
+banded Early English shafts, is another beautiful feature here. On
+some of the churchyard tombstones wall-rue may be found growing, a
+rare sight in this neighbourhood. From Over a lane leads on, crossing
+the Hundred Foot Bank to Overcote, that fascinating Ferry Inn upon the
+Ouse whose charms have already been dwelt upon.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>Formerly, as we have said, the regular road from Cambridge to Ely was
+by way of the Causeway at Aldreth. But this roundabout route of over
+twenty miles compared unfavourably with the shorter line taken by the
+Cam, which was accordingly the favourite for such as could afford
+boat-hire. In the eighteenth century regular packet-boats ran daily
+between the two places, drawn by horses. To-day the only passengers on
+the river are pleasure-seekers, and the ordinary way to Ely from
+Cambridge is by the road supposed to represent the hypothetical Akeman
+Street of Roman days.<a id="footnotetag200" name="footnotetag200"></a><a href="#footnote200" title="Go to footnote 200"><span class="smaller">[200]</span></a> This road turns northwards round Magdalene
+College, and runs through the suburb of New Chesterton. Old Chesterton
+stands on the river, east of the road, and has a finely-proportioned
+steeple, with particularly melodious bells, and a slender spire. At
+this point is the winning-post of the College boat races.<a id="footnotetag201" name="footnotetag201"></a><a href="#footnote201" title="Go to footnote 201"><span class="smaller">[201]</span></a> On the
+opposite bank, a mile lower down the stream, is Fen Ditton, the "Ditch
+End" where the Fleam Dyke strikes the river.<a id="footnotetag202" name="footnotetag202"></a><a href="#footnote202" title="Go to footnote 202"><span class="smaller">[202]</span></a> Ditton Corner, just
+beneath the parish church, is the favourite spot for seeing these
+races, as it commands a view of two long reaches, and is also (as a
+bend in the stream must needs be) a highly probable spot for bumps.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving these to the right, we reach Milton, whence the poet's family
+name is said to be derived, and where the church has seventeenth
+century altar rails, a very rare possession. Just opposite, with a
+ferry between, is Horningsea, where there is another good church.
+Between this and Fen Ditton is an ancient building, now used for farm
+purposes, which the Ordnance Map marks as "Biggin Abbey." An abbey,
+however, it never was, being only one (and the smallest) of the
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page296" name="page296"></a>(p. 296)</span> many scattered mansions of the Abbot and Bishop of Ely. On
+the stream beside it is Baitsbite Lock, the starting-point of the boat
+races. Here along the towing path may be seen the posts, set at
+regular intervals on the brink of the stream, to which each boat is
+moored by the "starting cord" held in the coxswain's<a id="footnotetag203" name="footnotetag203"></a><a href="#footnote203" title="Go to footnote 203"><span class="smaller">[203]</span></a> hand. He
+must not let it go till the gun is fired. Thrilling moments pass while
+he counts aloud the last seconds&mdash;"five ... four ... three ... two ...
+one," and the muscles of the crew grow ever tenser, till, at the
+signal, he flings the cord into the water, and every oar strains its
+utmost in the first stroke.</p>
+
+<a id="img078" name="img078"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img078.jpg" width="500" height="332" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Swavesey.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The next lock is Clayhithe, two miles further down the river, with an
+inn beside it in special favour for Cambridge boating pic-nics. Here,
+too, is the lowest bridge over the Cam, indeed the only one below
+Cambridge. It belongs to a private company, and is rigorously tolled.
+A pretty shady lane leads to it from Horningsea. Hard by, on the left
+bank, are the villages of Waterbeach and Landbeach. They are
+respectively <span class="pagenum"><a id="page297" name="page297"></a>(p. 297)</span> four and twelve furlongs from the stream, and
+mark successive boundaries of the fenland waters. Between them runs an
+ancient earthwork, the Car Dyke (probably of Roman date), which of old
+kept those waters in flood time from drowning <span class="pagenum"><a id="page298" name="page298"></a>(p. 298)</span> the meadows to
+the south. Starting from the Cam at Clayhithe it runs along the whole
+western limit of the fenland. It reaches the Ouse near the large
+village of Cottenham (where the east window of the fourteenth century
+church is copied from one in Prior Crauden's Chapel at Ely) with over
+2,000 inhabitants, and goes on past the tiny and picturesque Rampton,
+with under 200, to Willingham and Earith, Ramsey and Peterborough,
+Deeping and Sleaford; finally ending its long course on the banks of
+the far off Witham, hard by Lincoln.</p>
+
+<a id="img079" name="img079"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img079.jpg" width="350" height="442" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Swavesey Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>For a mile or so our "Akeman Street" follows the course of the Car
+Dyke, and then strikes northward across the fen, along a causeway of
+its own, passing near the remains of Denny Abbey, a small foundation
+which passed through unusual vicissitudes. Originally a Benedictine
+House, it was transferred in the twelfth century to the Templars, and
+in 1290, passed from them to the Minor Sisters of the Franciscan
+order. Marie de Valence, the foundress of Pembroke College, was a
+noted benefactress to Denny, and in her statutes solemnly enjoined on
+the scholars of the former institution "kindness" towards the recluses
+of the latter. The abbey is now a farm, but there are more remains of
+the monastic buildings here than almost anywhere else in the county.
+Much of the church is built into the farm house, and the refectory is
+in use as a barn. Many old walls and dykes may be traced, while a
+large entrenchment to the south is known as "Soldiers' Hill." This
+name may be due to the Templars.</p>
+
+<p>Two miles further we cross the old bed of the Ouse (containing now
+only such scanty waters as the Bedford rivers have left to it) at
+Elford, and enter the Isle of Ely. The ramp of the Island, however,
+lies two miles further on yet. We climb it by the village street of
+Stretham, where the ancient Town Cross still exists, an interesting
+and rare feature. It stands hard by the church, which contains various
+ancient tombstones, one to Nicholas de Ryngestone, rector under Edward
+the First, and a late fifteenth century brass to Dame Joan Rippingham,
+mother of two other rectors. A later rector was ejected in 1644 "for
+having made new steps to the altar, himself bowing twice as he went
+up, and as often while he came down." The church was an ancient
+possession of Ely, but was reft from the See by Elizabeth. Stretham
+lies at <span class="pagenum"><a id="page299" name="page299"></a>(p. 299)</span> the extreme end of the little peninsular ridge on
+which Wilburton and Haddenham stand.<a id="footnotetag204" name="footnotetag204"></a><a href="#footnote204" title="Go to footnote 204"><span class="smaller">[204]</span></a> Beyond it we sink to the
+enclosed inlet of Grunty Fen, passing the hamlet of Little Thetford,
+and rise again to the higher ground where the towers of Ely greet our
+eyes, a little over a mile away.</p>
+
+<a id="img080" name="img080"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img080.jpg" width="400" height="453" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cottage at Rampton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>After leaving Waterbeach our road has diverged widely from <span class="pagenum"><a id="page300" name="page300"></a>(p. 300)</span>
+the Cam. Those who have followed the river course, either by boat or
+by the towing-path, will be rewarded by finding themselves, in course
+of time, at Upware, the tiniest and most sequestered of hamlets, where
+the wide Fens spread all around, bare, treeless, houseless, open to
+the sweep of every breeze, and giving the same delicious sense of
+space as a sea view. The whole atmosphere breathes remoteness, the
+very inn calls itself "<span class="smcap">Five Miles from Anywhere</span>." But, though wide,
+the view is not like a sea view, boundless. The Island of Ely limits
+it to the north-west, and to the south-east the nearer uplands of East
+Anglia. For here is the nearest point on the Cam to Reach, the little
+hamlet once so important an emporium, where the Devil's Dyke runs down
+to the Fen.<a id="footnotetag205" name="footnotetag205"></a><a href="#footnote205" title="Go to footnote 205"><span class="smaller">[205]</span></a> To Upware, accordingly, there was cut through the
+sedge and peat, at some time beyond memory, the long straight waterway
+of Reach Lode, whereby even sea-going ships were able to discharge
+their cargoes on Reach Hithe. At a later date, but as early as the
+twelfth century, Burwell Lode was led to the same outlet. Those to
+Swaffham and Bottisham come in somewhat higher up the river.</p>
+
+<a id="img081" name="img081"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img081.jpg" width="500" height="348" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Dovecote at Rampton.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>A mile to the east of Upware we can see how mighty a task those men of
+old undertook who cut these lodes through the primæval jungle. For
+here is that Wicken Fen, which we have <span class="pagenum"><a id="page301" name="page301"></a>(p. 301)</span> already spoken
+of,<a id="footnotetag206" name="footnotetag206"></a><a href="#footnote206" title="Go to footnote 206"><span class="smaller">[206]</span></a> where a square mile of that jungle is preserved in its
+primæval condition, and where (in all but the old bird life) the fauna
+and flora of the old Fenland may still be studied in their old
+environment; where the peat is still spongy under your foot, and the
+tall crests of the reeds rise high above your head. To dig out masses
+of that spongy peat, to cut through miles of those tall reeds would be
+no light business even with our own modern means of excavation. What
+must it have been to the rude implements of the ancients?</p>
+
+<a id="img082" name="img082"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img082.jpg" width="500" height="384" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Quay, Ely.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Some two miles beyond Upware the Cam falls into the Ouse, and the
+united stream sweeps past Thetford and round the corner of the island
+to Ely, where the Cutter Inn (near the railway station) makes a good
+landing-place.</p>
+
+<a id="chapxiv" name="chapxiv"></a>
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page302" name="page302"></a>(p. 302)</span> CHAPTER XIV</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Ely.&mdash;Island and Isle.&mdash;St. Augustine.&mdash;St. Etheldreda, Life,
+     Death, Burial, St. Audrey's Fair.&mdash;Danish Sack of Ely.&mdash;Alfred's
+     College.&mdash;Abbey restored.&mdash;Brithnoth, Song of Maldon.&mdash;Battle of
+     Assandun.&mdash;Canute at Ely.&mdash;Edward the Confessor.&mdash;Alfred the
+     Etheling.&mdash;Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman Conquest, Tabula
+     Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster.&mdash;Bishops of Ely, Rule
+     over Isle.&mdash;Ely Place, Ely House.</p>
+
+<p>The tourist through Cambridgeshire should now turn his attention to
+Ely, a place second only in interest, if indeed second, to Cambridge
+itself. The central point of note in Ely is the Cathedral; known to us
+ever since our schooldays through Macaulay's picture-giving pen, which
+sets it before us as "Ely's stately fane." We hope soon to learn
+something of the history of this great church, of her growth, of her
+decay, of her restoration, of those men and women who have made her
+what she is, of the tumults and storms she has over-lived. Truly we
+may say, with Stirling the poet that the Minster at Ely</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Still ship-like on for ages fares,<br>
+<span class="add1em">And holds its course, so smooth so true,</span><br>
+<span class="add1em">For all the madness of the crew;</span><br>
+  It must have better rule than theirs."</p>
+
+<p>Before we actually visit the place itself let us make ourselves
+familiar with the outline of its chequered history.</p>
+
+<p>The city of Ely has a population approaching 8,000, and stands on the
+western edge of the Island of Ely, once truly an island, being an area
+of dry land rising from the midst of the fens, and, till their
+drainage, accessible only by boat or causeway. This <i>Island</i>, a true
+bit of natural <i>terra firma</i>, measures about eight miles by six, and
+lies at the southern end of a much <span class="pagenum"><a id="page303" name="page303"></a>(p. 303)</span> more extensive fenland
+archipelago, of irregular shape, measuring approximately thirty miles
+by twenty, known from of old as the <i>Isle</i> of Ely. The waters of the
+Fen, which, so lately as a century ago, made this wide area an
+archipelago indeed, have now given place to a "boundless plain" of
+fertile corn-land, so rich in harvests as to be often called "The
+Golden Plain of England."</p>
+
+<p>A twelfth century chronicler, the writer of the "Liber Eliensis,"
+asserts that, within the first years of the seventh century <span class="smcap">A.D.</span>,
+Ethelbert, King of Kent, newly converted to Christianity, founded a
+monastery at Cratendune, about a mile south of Ely, and that Saint
+Augustine, the first Archbishop of Canterbury, consecrated it. But we
+cannot say that the authentic history of Ely begins till seventy years
+later, when we see an Anglo-Saxon lady founding a monastery on this
+rising ground in the midst of the Fens. The lady is Etheldreda, once
+Queen of Northumbria; her monastery is known to us as Ely. She is the
+daughter of Anna, King of East Anglia, who had reigned at Exning,
+almost within sight of Ely.</p>
+
+<p>King Anna was a devout man, who himself died a hero's death, fighting
+for the Cross and for his country against the overwhelming onset of
+Penda, the heathen King of Mercia, who made it the object of his life
+to stamp out English Christianity. But, though Anna fell, his cause
+triumphed. Penda shortly died, and his work perished with him. Not so
+Anna's. After his death the tide of Christian progress ran the
+stronger; and all over England it was through members of his family
+that it was specially championed.</p>
+
+<p>Married to the King of Northumbria, his daughter Queen Etheldreda had
+renounced her husband and her northern kingdom, and had returned to
+her native Fenland, there to found a monastery for both monks and
+nuns. In taking this step she had been influenced by two persons of
+note; by St. Hilda, her aunt, the foundress and first Abbess of
+Whitby, and by St. Wilfrid, Bishop of York. Hilda had in early life
+gained a firm hold on the heart of her niece, who had become fired
+with the wish to follow her example and herself to found a monastery.
+In spite of this resolve, of which she made no secret, she had been
+forced (while strongly protesting) into a nominal marriage with
+Egfrid, the youthful King of Northumbria. After twelve years of
+unhappy life, she had been <span class="pagenum"><a id="page304" name="page304"></a>(p. 304)</span> induced by St. Wilfrid to quit
+her husband; from St. Wilfrid's hand she had received the veil, before
+him she had taken the vows that bound her to a monastic life. It is a
+strange, unnatural tale, that cannot claim our approval; but there it
+is, and its truth is not questioned.</p>
+
+<p>Queen Etheldreda, accompanied by certain attendants had then fled
+southward, with her deeply wronged husband in chase. She had been
+sheltered on one occasion from his pursuit by a tide of unprecedented
+height, which protected her on a rocky hiding-place while the King
+passed by, all unaware that he was close to her. At length she had
+reached her own fenland country; and here, still following Hilda's
+example, she set herself to build a monastery, choosing the highest
+ground available. She was a well dowered lady, for her first husband,
+Tonbert, was a Prince of the Girvii, a Celtic tribe descended from
+those refugee Britons who had sought safety in the fens when all else
+was conquered by the English invaders two centuries earlier. This
+prince had bequeathed to his childless widow all his wide fenland
+domains; so Etheldreda had no need to seek further for an endowment
+for her monastery; while her brother Adwulf, now King of East Anglia,
+defrayed the cost of the new buildings. These ere long became the home
+of both monks and nuns, who lived in separate houses and met only for
+their common worship in the Abbey church. No Abbot was appointed, but
+Etheldreda herself was their Abbess, ruling both sexes alike.</p>
+
+<p>It is probable that from its foundation the monastery at Ely was under
+the influence of the rule of St. Benedict, for St. Wilfrid during
+Etheldreda's life-time was a frequent resident there, and he was in
+close touch with St. Botolph, that most influential, though half
+legendary saint, who, from his hermitage at Ickenhoe in Suffolk, was
+introducing throughout East Anglia the rule of the monks of St.
+Benedict, those great preservers of civilisation, which, but for them,
+must in many lands have perished, when the strong hand of the Roman
+Empire lost its grip.</p>
+
+<a id="img083" name="img083"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img083.jpg" width="500" height="309" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The North Triforium of the Nave, Ely.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Little is recorded of Etheldreda's life as abbess; and, after a rule
+of seven years, she died at the age of forty-nine, in the year 679,
+her death being due to an epidemic then prevalent, combined with a
+tumour in the neck. The death-bed scene is sculptured on one of the
+corbels of the Octagon Towers at Ely, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page306" name="page306"></a>(p. 306)</span> where the more
+picturesque events of her life are quaintly set before us in stone.
+The saintly lady died after much suffering, which the ministrations of
+her devoted physician Cynifrid failed to allay; though he did for her
+all that the surgery of those days allowed. She bore her sickness with
+composure of mind, and when she knew that the end was at hand, she (as
+others have done before and since) summoned her whole household to her
+chamber to take her last farewell of them all. She told them that the
+time of her departure was at hand; she spoke to them of the vanity of
+this world's enjoyments, and recommended them to keep Heaven always in
+view, whereby they might in some measure have a foretaste of its joys.
+After this she received the Communion in both kinds from the hands of
+Huna, a priest devoted to her service; then, while praying for the
+inhabitants of the monastery, she passed from earth. It may be of
+interest to remember that throughout the seven years of her rule at
+Ely, Theodore, the great organiser of the Anglican Church, "the first
+Archbishop whom the whole Church of England obeyed," filled the See of
+Canterbury.</p>
+
+<p>It was Etheldreda's wish to be buried with all simplicity in the
+cemetery set apart for the nuns of Ely; so we are glad to learn that
+this her last desire was respected by her followers, and that she was
+laid to rest among the nuns in a wooden coffin. Her elder sister, St.
+Sexburga, widow of the King of Kent, took her place as Abbess, and
+ruled at Ely till another generation was arising. After sixteen years
+had gone by, those who still remembered and loved Etheldreda wished
+that her body should be with them at their devotions in the church,
+and they resolved to translate her remains from the cemetery to the
+Abbey.</p>
+
+<p>No common coffin was held to be a fitting casket for those precious
+relics; but in a waste place named Armeswerke,<a id="footnotetag207" name="footnotetag207"></a><a href="#footnote207" title="Go to footnote 207"><span class="smaller">[207]</span></a> fifteen miles up
+the River Cam (which may be identified as now forming part of the
+Fellows' garden at Magdalene College, Cambridge, between the terrace
+and the river), there was found <span class="pagenum"><a id="page307" name="page307"></a>(p. 307)</span> a marble sarcophagus of
+Roman workmanship.<a id="footnotetag208" name="footnotetag208"></a><a href="#footnote208" title="Go to footnote 208"><span class="smaller">[208]</span></a> This was brought to Ely; and with careful and
+simple ceremony the body of the first Abbess was lifted from the
+wooden and laid in the marble coffin, all being carried out under the
+superintendence of Sexburga. On beholding the uncorrupted body of the
+dear sister who had died in so much pain, Sexburga was heard to
+exclaim, "Glory to the name of the Lord most high!" All the look of
+suffering had gone, and the Saint appeared as if asleep on her bed.
+Gently removed from the wooden to the stone coffin, the body was
+carried into the Abbey Church, and placed behind the high altar; and
+for eight centuries the shrine of St. Etheldreda was visited by troops
+of pilgrims, who came from far and near to worship, to leave their
+offerings, and to seek healing from disease and infirmity. Sexburga
+was followed as Abbess by her sister, Ermenilda, Queen of Mercia. Thus
+Ely had three sister queens as her first three Abbesses; and hence
+perhaps the three crowns that still form the arms of the Bishopric.</p>
+
+<p>St. Etheldreda was long remembered with affection, and was commonly
+spoken of as St. Audrey. The popular Pilgrims' Fair held at Ely was
+known at St. Audrey's Fair; and the cheap fairings bought and sold
+there (especially the coloured necklets of fine silk known as "St.
+Audrey's chains") were called, from her name, "tawdry"; and thus a new
+word was coined for us with a strange story of its own, a word hardly
+worthy of the great Abbess of the Fenland to whom it owes its origin.
+Centuries later, St. Audrey's Fair, held in October, had grown to be
+one of the most important in the land, lasting for a fortnight. By the
+year 1248 it had become such a centre of merchandise as to interfere
+with the traffic of the Fair which Henry the Third had lately
+established at Westminster in honour of St. Edward the Confessor; the
+King therefore issued a warrant interdicting the fair at Ely. This
+suspension meant serious loss to the Bishop, Hugh de Northwold, "who
+made a heavy complaint to the King concerning the matter, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page308" name="page308"></a>(p. 308)</span>
+but he gained from him nothing except words of soothing promises of
+future consolation," says the chronicler.</p>
+
+<p>For two hundred years after the death of the foundress, the abbey of
+monks and nuns went on with its pious works and ways. Then, in 870,
+appeared the Danes, still pagans; and after working their way through
+Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, where they "wasted with fire and sword all
+that ever they came to, they brake down all the abbeys of the fens;
+nor did Ely, so famous of old, escape." Having laid waste
+Peterborough, then known as Medhampsted, they came across the fens to
+Ely. The abbey and all the buildings pertaining to it were burnt; the
+monks and nuns put to the sword. Before setting fire to the buildings
+the Danes had secured for themselves all they contained of value, and
+great was the store, for the people of the neighbourhood had brought
+their goods into the monastery as to a place of safety. All was seized
+by the invaders, and what they could not carry away they destroyed.
+Thus Etheldreda's Abbey, after lasting 200 years, was left a deserted
+ruin; but her coffin of stone escaped without injury. One of the
+depredators, indeed, is said to have made an attempt to break into it,
+with the result that his eyes started from his head, and then and
+there he died, as the chronicler relates. The ancient sarcophagus had
+proved worthy of its trust.</p>
+
+<p>The hour was one of direst need; for all England lay spent and gasping
+beneath the bloodstained feet of the heathen pirates. But, with the
+need, there arose the deliverer. In 871, the year after the sack of
+Ely, Alfred the Great, "England's darling," succeeded to the kingship
+of the exhausted realm; and the life and death struggle entered on its
+last and most desperate phase. For one moment even he seemed to go
+under, and was driven to an outlaw life in the marshes of Athelney;
+the next, we see him shattering the invaders by his miraculous victory
+of Ethandune, and, with incomparable state-craft, negotiating that
+Peace of Wedmore, whereby the Danes had to acknowledge him as their
+Overlord.</p>
+
+<p>As such, he shortly established a College of Priests at Ely. Eight of
+the clerics who had witnessed the sack of the monastery came back to
+their old home, and rebuilt a part of the church that it might serve
+again as a place of worship. These priests were not monks, and are
+said to have had wives <span class="pagenum"><a id="page309" name="page309"></a>(p. 309)</span> and children. They lived in poverty;
+for all the endowments of the Abbey had been seized by Burgraed, the
+last King of Mercia. But gradually, as the children of Alfred won back
+the kingdom, the endowment of Ely began afresh. Here a fishery, and
+there a wood, and again a mill with adjoining pastures, was bestowed
+on the little College&mdash;a term which still clings to the Cathedral
+precincts of Ely, called to this day the College, not the Close as in
+most Cathedral cities.</p>
+
+<p>With the accession, in 958, of the great Edgar, the first English King
+to be Emperor of all Britain, the monarch who, nearly a thousand years
+ago, gained for himself, as but one of our kings has done since, the
+title of "Peacemaker," brighter days dawned. Then, as now, the
+Catholic Church might have been well called "Cette éternelle
+recommenceuse," able to rise from her ashes with life renewed. From
+the havoc wrought by the Danes, the Abbey of Ely, as a Benedictine
+House, arose once more, rebuilt, refounded, and re-endowed by King
+Edgar, who restored to it by Royal Charter all that Etheldreda had
+originally bestowed; adding thereto several demesnes and sundry
+privileges. The re-constitution of the Abbey was carried out under the
+guidance of Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester.</p>
+
+<p>The monks were thus restored; but the nuns of Ely have disappeared
+from view. As for those secular priests who were in possession and had
+maintained the sacred character of the spot for well-nigh a hundred
+years, ever since its devastation by the Danes, they were allowed to
+stay on if they submitted to the Benedictine Rule, otherwise they were
+dismissed.</p>
+
+<p>In the year 970, on the Feast of the Purification, a day that we shall
+again find eventful in the annals of Ely, the new and restored
+monastic buildings were consecrated by Dunstan, who now, as Archbishop
+of Canterbury, filled the highest office in the Church of the land.
+The chronicler, Roger of Wendover, tells us how, by Dunstan's counsel,
+King Edgar "everywhere restrained the rashness of the wicked,
+cherished the just and modest, restored and enriched the desolate
+churches of God, gathered multitudes of monks and nuns to praise and
+glorify the Great Creator, and built more than forty monasteries."
+This shews us that, the events taking place at Ely were in no sense
+isolated, but were part of a great revival going on throughout the
+whole country.</p>
+
+<p>In the year 991 the restored Abbey becomes connected with <span class="pagenum"><a id="page310" name="page310"></a>(p. 310)</span>
+one of the most stirring poems of the English language, the "Song of
+Maldon." The Danish invasions, which had been checked for a century by
+the glorious line of monarchs who inherited King Alfred's blood and
+energy, were beginning again. One of these pirate hordes had landed in
+East Anglia, now no longer a separate principality but merely a
+district of the United Kingdom of England, governed by an "Alderman"
+named Brithnoth. Ethelred, surnamed the Unready, was on the throne&mdash;a
+King who for his lack of good judgment well deserved this contemptuous
+sobriquet&mdash;and his want of energy and capacity threw on to the
+shoulders of his subordinates the burden of the defence of his realm.</p>
+
+<p>Brithnoth rose to the emergency, as a true Christian hero. At the head
+of his retainers he hurried to meet the foe, calling out the local
+levies to join his march. At Ely, as he hastened past, he, with his
+men, was royally entertained. The day before, when he was passing
+Ramsey Abbey, the Abbot had offered him hospitality, but only for
+himself and half a dozen picked friends. This niggardly invitation
+drew from Brithnoth a scornful answer: "Tell my Lord Abbot," he
+replied, "that I cannot fight without my men, neither will I feed
+without them." At Ely meat and drink were placed before leader and
+followers without distinction, and well were the monks rewarded, for
+Brithnoth requited their hospitality by the gift of no fewer than nine
+manors, all lying near Cambridge&mdash;Trumpington, Fulbourn, and
+others&mdash;stipulating only that, if slain in battle, his body should be
+brought back to their church for burial.</p>
+
+<p>At Maldon in Essex on the River Panta (or Blackwater, as it is now
+called), he met the Danes, who began by sending a herald demanding a
+ransom, to be fixed by themselves, as the price of peace:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Then back with our booty<br>
+  To ship will we get us,<br>
+  Fare forth on the flood,<br>
+  And pass you in peace."</p>
+
+<p>This degrading offer Brithnoth contemptuously refuses:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>For ransom we give you<br>
+  Full freely our weapons,<br>
+  Spear-edge and sword-edge<br>
+  Of old renown."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page312" name="page312"></a>(p. 312)</span> The Danes at once make their way across the river and attack
+the English levies:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Then drave from each hand<br>
+  Full starkly the spear,<br>
+  Showered the sharp arrows,<br>
+  Busy were bows,<br>
+  Shield met shaft,<br>
+  Bitter the battle."</p>
+
+<p>In the end the pirates are driven back to their ships, but at the cost
+of Brithnoth's own life. He is pierced by a spear, and sinks dying to
+the ground; to the last exhorting his soldiers to fight on, and
+commending his own soul to God in the following beautiful and touching
+lines:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>To Thee give I thanks,<br>
+  Thou Lord of all living,<br>
+  For all good hap<br>
+  In this life here.<br>
+  Sore need I now,<br>
+  O Maker mild,<br>
+  That Thou should'st grant<br>
+  My spirit grace;<br>
+  That my soul to Thee<br>
+  May depart in peace,<br>
+  And flee to Thy keeping,<br>
+  Thou King of Angels.<br>
+  To Thee do I pray<br>
+  That the Gates of Hell<br>
+  Prevail not against me."</p>
+
+<a id="img084" name="img084"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img084.jpg" width="500" height="309" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>West Aisle of the North Transept, Ely.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Danes carried off Brithnoth's head; but his body was rescued; and,
+according to his wish, the monks came and brought it back to Ely,
+where the Abbot buried it, replacing the missing head by one of wax.
+During the eighteenth century the skeleton was met with in the course
+of some excavations and recognised as Brithnoth's by the absence of
+the skull. It now lies in Bishop West's beautiful chapel, along with
+the bones of other Anglo-Saxon worthies.</p>
+
+<p>The Lady Elfleda, Brithnoth's widow, added largely to the benefactions
+he had bestowed on Ely; she gave the Abbey valuable lands within easy
+reach of the monastery, and she moreover presented to the church a
+golden chain, and a curtain worked with the most notable deeds of her
+husband's life. Those who have seen the Bayeux tapestry, representing
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page313" name="page313"></a>(p. 313)</span> the events of the life of William the Conqueror, can picture
+to themselves what Lady Elfleda's curtain may have been a century
+earlier.</p>
+
+<p>In the next generation (1016) a body of the monks of Ely accompanied
+another hero to battle against the Danes. The hero of this generation
+was Ethelred's son, King Edmund Ironside; the battle was the great
+fight of Assandun, a place impossible to locate with certainty, but
+not improbably situated on the south-east border of Cambridgeshire.
+During the last twenty-five years the Danes had become more and more
+daring, and now, under their great king, Canute, the mightiest of all
+Scandinavian monarchs, they were attempting nothing less than the
+organised conquest of England. Thus Canute and Edmund were face to
+face in a desperate struggle, and, after five indecisive battles in a
+single year, Edmund was defeated, on St. Luke's Day, at Assandun, and
+his defeat was shortly followed by his death. Canute then assumed the
+crown, by right of conquest, a right which he proclaimed by calling
+himself not, like his predecessors, "King of the English," but "King
+of England."</p>
+
+<p>He proved, however, not at all a bad king. He had been brought up a
+Christian, and he took the Church under his protection. He bore no
+malice against the monks of Ely for their support of Edmund Ironside,
+but, on the contrary, treated the Abbey with marked favour, and gave
+her rich endowments. More than once he visited Ely, and we all know
+the lines of the cheery old ballad which relates how Canute in his
+barge was rowing near the island. It runs thus:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Merrily sang they, the monks at Ely,<br>
+  When Cnut the King he rowed thereby;<br>
+  Row to the shore, men, said the King,<br>
+  And let us hear these monks to sing."</p>
+
+<p>This was in the summer-time,<a id="footnotetag209" name="footnotetag209"></a><a href="#footnote209" title="Go to footnote 209"><span class="smaller">[209]</span></a> when the waters were open; but not
+seldom Canute made his visits in the depth of winter, when, on the
+Feast of the Purification, the Abbot of Ely each year entered on his
+Chancellorship of the realm, an office which he shared in turn with
+the Abbots of Canterbury and Glastonbury, each holding this office for
+four months at a time. The legend may well be true, which tells how,
+on one of these <span class="pagenum"><a id="page314" name="page314"></a>(p. 314)</span> mid-winter visits, Canute reached Ely (from
+Soham)<a id="footnotetag210" name="footnotetag210"></a><a href="#footnote210" title="Go to footnote 210"><span class="smaller">[210]</span></a> in a sledge, preceded by the heaviest man that could be
+found (characteristically nick-named "Pudding"), who skated ahead of
+the King to ensure the ice would bear. On another occasion Canute was
+accompanied by his wife Queen Emma, and she, in token of her regard
+for the Abbey, left behind, as her gift, splendid hangings for the
+church, and for the shrine of the foundress. An altar frontal of green
+and red and gold, and a shrine cover of purple cloth, bedecked with
+gold and jewels, are described as being of exceptional beauty and
+value, "such as there was none like to them in richness throughout all
+the realm."</p>
+
+<p>This was not Emma's first connection with Ely. While she was yet the
+second wife of Ethelred the Unready (after whose death she married the
+victorious Canute), her younger son, Edward, afterwards King Edward
+the Confessor, had here been presented in infancy at the altar, and
+had been in childhood a pupil of the choir school, where his special
+proficiency in learning psalms and hymns gave promise of his future
+saintliness. The Ely choir school was, at this time, probably the most
+noted educational institution in England, and was under the direction
+of the Precentor, who had general charge over all the literary work of
+the house, such as the reproducing of books, etc. That this precocious
+scholar, who left Ely at nine years old, ultimately came to the
+throne, while Alfred, his elder brother, did not, is due to one of the
+most ghastly tragedies of English history.</p>
+
+<p>After the death of Canute in 1035, it became a question whether this
+same Alfred, "the Etheling" (<i>i.e.</i> Prince), Emma's eldest son by
+Ethelred, now a man of over thirty, or Harthacnut, her only son by
+Canute, a boy of sixteen, or one Harold, who, though not an Etheling,
+claimed to be Canute's eldest son, should be chosen King of England.
+Harold, in spite of grave doubts as to his paternity, "had all the
+cry"; and when Alfred, "the innocent Etheling," made an attempt to
+protect his widowed mother against the new King's oppression, he was
+sent as a prisoner by ship to Ely. Before being landed his eyes were
+put out, in a manner so brutal that he shortly died of the shock, to
+find a grave in the Abbey church under its western tower. The
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicler records this crime in a <span class="pagenum"><a id="page315" name="page315"></a>(p. 315)</span> pathetic
+ballad, denouncing it as even beyond the horrors of the Danish wars:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Nor was drearier deed<br>
+  Done in this land,<br>
+  Since Danes first came."</p>
+
+<p>That no blame need be attached to the monks of Ely for this atrocity
+is indicated by the fact that, when Alfred's brother, Edward the
+Confessor, came to the throne, he confirmed all their ancient
+charters, granting lands and privileges to the Abbey, and himself
+became a benefactor to the place of his education.</p>
+
+<p>With the Norman invasion, Ely again becomes a centre of war. Led by
+Christian the Bishop, and Osbiorn the Earl, a force of Danish
+adventurers had appeared in the Humber, professing to be the allies of
+the English in their struggle with the Normans. Their real object was
+to place their own King Sweyn, the nephew of Canute, on the throne of
+England, and, if foiled in this purpose, at least to enrich themselves
+with England's plunder. After partaking in scenes of devastation in
+Yorkshire, they sailed southward till they reached Ely, where they
+took up their quarters. Here the fenland folk forgathered with them,
+for the Norman was a more thoroughgoing oppressor than any Dane; and,
+in especial, the "strenuous" outlaw Hereward "the Wake" joined them
+"with his gang."</p>
+
+<p>To show their zeal against the French&mdash;and to indulge their lust of
+plunder&mdash;they set off, by water, to Peterborough, where the Abbey had
+been recently conferred on a Norman ruffian named Thorold. To save
+this good old English foundation from such degrading occupancy,
+Hereward, as their guide, led them on, first to sack and then to burn
+it to the ground. The Danes, having got their booty, promptly sailed
+away, while Hereward returned to Ely, there to make his memorable
+stand against William and the Normans. Fiction may have embroidered
+the tale of his prowess; but there remains a foundation of truth, even
+after the superstructure of romance has been removed. At Ely were now
+gathered together to him a mixed company of fugitives; misfortune,
+according to her repute, making strange bed-fellows.</p>
+
+<p>When William had conquered at Hastings, England, as a whole, was at
+first disposed to accept the verdict of battle, and <span class="pagenum"><a id="page316" name="page316"></a>(p. 316)</span> to
+acknowledge his claim to the throne, as it had acknowledged Canute's.
+But when the necessities of his position, as the captain of an
+invading army, forced him to confiscate every estate in England
+(except the Church lands), and to bestow it on some Norman adventurer;
+when every single Englishman in high office, Sheriff and Alderman,
+Bishop and Abbot, was turned out to make room for a Frenchman,<a id="footnotetag211" name="footnotetag211"></a><a href="#footnote211" title="Go to footnote 211"><span class="smaller">[211]</span></a>
+the whole nation glowed with outraged patriotism, and Ely seemed
+likely to become a second Athelney, whence the spark of resistance to
+the tyrant might spread like wildfire throughout the length and
+breadth of the land.</p>
+
+<p>And had there been a second Alfred this might well have actually come
+to pass. As it was, many of the magnates who could not brook
+submission retired to the "Camp of Refuge," as the Island of Ely now
+got to be called. This fastness, being surrounded on all sides by deep
+fens "as by a strong wall," promised them a sure retreat, and for a
+while enabled them to baffle all the efforts even of the mighty
+Conqueror to subdue them. Thither came Archbishop Stigand (deposed by
+the Conqueror to make way for the great Lanfranc); thither came the
+Abbot of St. Albans, thither came the valiant Ethelnoth, Bishop of
+Durham; thither came Morcar, the last Earl of Northumbria, "with many
+a hundred more," both clergy and laity. Here they received shelter and
+hospitality from Thurstan, the last of the English Abbots of Ely.</p>
+
+<p>By the general voice Hereward was chosen as their captain, and
+fortified the island against the Conqueror. William, on hearing of
+this, hastened to Cambridge with his whole army, and invested the
+place (so far as it was possible to invest it) both by land and water,
+building a castle at Wisbech on the north, and at Reach on the south.
+At Aldreth, where scarcely a mile of fen parted the Island from the
+mainland at Willingham, he made a floating bridge of trees and
+faggots, fastened underneath with cow-hides; but when his men
+attempted to cross it, the unsteady structure capsized, and that
+portion of the army engaged in the attempt was drowned.</p>
+
+<p>Perplexed and almost daunted, William, with his court and army,
+retired for a time to Brandon in Suffolk; while the refugees at Ely
+spent stirring days. The knights and churchmen were hospitably
+entertained in the refectory of the abbey, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page317" name="page317"></a>(p. 317)</span> every man with
+his shield and lance hanging near him, to be ready in case of sudden
+alarm. Their days were diversified by raids into the surrounding
+country beyond the fens, to snatch what provisions they could for
+their fastness; and these raids of the islanders were so dreaded
+throughout the district, that its inhabitants were thankful for the
+protection of William's soldiery.</p>
+
+<p>Hereward, according to the legend, hearing that another attack was
+imminent, followed the example of Alfred the Great by betaking himself
+in disguise to Brandon to learn the King's designs. He found that
+William, by a judicious mixture of severity and conciliation, had won
+over a certain number of the outlying fen-folk, and had imposed upon
+them the task of conveying a great store of wood and faggots for him
+to Aldreth, with which to construct there a causeway once more.
+Hereupon Hereward, still in his disguise, feigned that he was himself
+one of these traitors to England, and eager above all the others to
+help the Conqueror against the marauding thieves of the Camp of
+Refuge. It was he who was foremost in collecting faggots for the
+wood-pile at Aldreth, and then, when all was gathered, who was it but
+Hereward that set it on fire so that all was lost? And once more, when
+the besiegers were making a third attempt to gain the island, under
+the auspices of a reputed witch whom the pious William deigned to
+employ for the sustaining of his men's sunken courage, it was Hereward
+who fired the reed-beds through which the foe was advancing, so that
+the whole column, witch and all, were involved in one common
+destruction.</p>
+
+<p>Finally William, finding that he could not reduce the island by force,
+resolved to bring it under by political pressure, and threatened to
+grant to his supporters all the Abbey lands within his power. On
+hearing this the Abbot and monks resolved to surrender, and they sent
+secret messengers to William, who was at Warwick, offering to submit
+to him on condition that he would spare the possessions of the Abbey.
+To this the King consented; and during Hereward's absence from Ely on
+a foraging expedition, he landed without resistance on the fen-girt
+island. Hereward on his return found that all was lost, and himself
+barely escaped with a few followers, to live on as outlaws in the
+greenwood for a few desperate years, till at length he, too, "came
+in," and was granted "the King's peace."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page318" name="page318"></a>(p. 318)</span> On William's unopposed success through their connivance the
+monks fondly imagined that they had something to expect from his
+gratitude, and were preparing a formal welcome and act of submission
+when it should please him to visit the abbey church in thanksgiving
+for his victory. William, however, had other designs, and paid his
+visit without notice, at an hour when he knew that the brethren would
+be in the refectory at dinner. He stood alone before the High Altar,
+and casting upon it a single mark of gold, equivalent to about £150,
+quietly departed.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile the hapless monks were startled from their meal by the
+abrupt entrance of a Norman knight, Gilbert de Clare, with whom they
+had made interest, and who now rushed in shouting to them: "Ye
+wretched drivellers! Can ye choose no better time for guzzling than
+this when the King is here, yea, in your very church?" Instantly every
+monk sprang to his feet, and the whole community made a rush for the
+church. But it was too late. William was already well on his way out
+of Ely, and the unhappy monks had to run three miles before they
+caught up to him at Witchford. There they did at last succeed in
+impetrating his pardon, but he laid upon them a fine of no less than
+700 marks of silver,<a id="footnotetag212" name="footnotetag212"></a><a href="#footnote212" title="Go to footnote 212"><span class="smaller">[212]</span></a> to meet which almost all the ornaments of
+the church had to be melted down. The ingots were minted into coin in
+the abbey itself; but the moneyers employed proved fraudulent, and the
+royal officers at Cambridge, to whom the cash was paid, reported it
+deficient in weight. This gave William an excuse for laying on a
+further fine of 300 marks, so that altogether no less than the
+equivalent of £20,000 was wrung by him out of the Brotherhood.</p>
+
+<p>Yet the monks were not mistaken in thus casting in their lot with the
+Normans, for though William imposed these heavy fines upon them,
+though he heaped vexatious indignities upon them, though he inflicted
+shocking mutilations on their adherents (not on themselves, for he was
+careful to spare the monks in this respect), though he compelled them
+to maintain a foreign garrison of forty French knights at their very
+doors, yet in spite of all this the Abbey, with its seventy <span class="pagenum"><a id="page319" name="page319"></a>(p. 319)</span>
+monks, prospered under his iron rule. The strange condition of the
+house at this juncture is vividly recorded for us by a picture, still
+preserved in the Bishop's palace at Ely and known as the "Tabula
+Eliensis."</p>
+
+<p>This "tabula" is a painting of no artistic merit, dating probably from
+the reign of Henry the Seventh, but copied from an older one which has
+perished. It is divided into forty squares, and in each of these
+appears a knight and a monk, the names of both being given fully and
+distinctly. The knight is helmeted and holds his drawn sword in his
+right hand, while between him and his neighbour, the cowled monk,
+hangs his shield emblazoned with his arms. All indicate how the
+knights and monks, when thus forced to dwell in close contact, became
+friendly together as time went by.</p>
+
+<p>Several of the monks bear names which show us that the ancient British
+stock of the Girvians still survived in the neighbouring fenlands.
+Among them we find, Donald, Evan, Cedd, Nigel, Duff, David,
+Constantine: names familiar to us in connection with Highland, Welsh,
+or Cornish literature. Strange as it seems to include such names as
+David and Constantine in this list, we have history, legend and
+geography to justify our counting them as in use among the later
+Britons. And it may be noted that, until the twelfth century at least,
+a man's name is an almost certain guide to his nationality, as (to
+some extent) it is to this day. After that, the old English
+nomenclature, both male and female, was almost wholly supplanted by
+that of the Normans; the only native names to survive being those of
+special heroes and saints, such as Alfred, Edward, Edmund, Edgar,
+Ethel, Audrey and Hilda.</p>
+
+<p>The nave and transepts of Ely Minster erected during the century that
+followed, still stand to show us to what splendid purpose Norman
+architects could design and Norman workmen could build. For here, as
+elsewhere throughout England, one of the first and most striking
+results of the Conquest was such an outburst of church building as the
+country had never yet known. Edgar's church, though barely a century
+old, was condemned as hopelessly out of date. Something on a much
+grander scale was now felt needful. The new Church was founded, in
+1083, by the aged Abbot Simeon, an act of great courage and faith in a
+man so old. He it was who began to build the north and south
+transepts. He also laid the foundation <span class="pagenum"><a id="page320" name="page320"></a>(p. 320)</span> of the central tower
+and of an apsidal choir. Both tower and choir have fallen and been
+replaced, but the transepts stand to this day.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as the choir was ready for it, the body of the first Abbess
+was brought from the Anglo-Saxon church close by, built under Edgar
+the Peacemaker, where it had rested for 130 years, and was placed in
+the new Norman choir behind the high altar. At her feet was laid her
+sister Sexburga, who had succeeded her as Abbess, and, on either side,
+the sister and niece who had, each in turn, followed after her as
+rulers of the house. The earlier church was then pulled down. All this
+did not take place till 1106, and long before then Simeon, like his
+namesake a thousand years before, had sung his "Nunc dimittis,"
+leaving his work to be carried on by the devoted and energetic
+Richard, the last of the non-episcopal Abbots of Ely.</p>
+
+<p>For an event of even greater moment than the building of the church
+took place about this time. Early in the twelfth century, in order to
+quell some dispute that had arisen as to the authority of the Bishop
+of Lincoln over the Abbot of Ely, the Pope had consented, at the
+request of King Henry the First and Archbishop Anselm, that the Abbot
+of Ely should become a Bishop, with the Isle of Ely and the County of
+Cambridge as his See.<a id="footnotetag213" name="footnotetag213"></a><a href="#footnote213" title="Go to footnote 213"><span class="smaller">[213]</span></a> More than 700 years went by before any
+change was made in the extent of the diocese thus created; for it was
+not till 1837 that the counties of Huntingdon and Bedford and the
+western half of Suffolk were added to it.</p>
+
+<p>We owe to the creation of this Bishopric the very existence of Ely
+Minster as it now stands; had it remained merely an abbey, instead of
+being also a cathedral, it would have perished at the Reformation,
+along with the yet greater church at Bury St. Edmund's not far away,
+and with many another sister abbey throughout the land. At Ely, too,
+we should see before us ruined arches open to the sky, beautiful
+indeed and pathetic, but no longer a centre of worship. To this day
+the Bishop of Ely sits in his cathedral not as Bishop but as Abbot;
+not at the south-eastern but at the south-western end of the choir
+stalls, while the Dean occupies the seat once <span class="pagenum"><a id="page321" name="page321"></a>(p. 321)</span> belonging to
+the Prior at the north-western end. Richard, as we have said, was the
+last of the Abbots of Ely who were Abbots and nothing else. Hervey,
+appointed in 1109, was the first Bishop-Abbot. He had already been
+Bishop of Bangor, whence he had been driven by a Welsh revolt.</p>
+
+<p>This may be the place to say something of the abnormal civil position
+held by the Bishops of Ely till recent times. Etheldreda, the
+foundress of the Abbey, reigned, as the widow of her first husband,
+Tonbert, over the whole Isle of Ely, and exercised therein the full
+Royal rights of secular jurisdiction. These rights passed on to the
+Abbesses who succeeded her, and then in turn to the Abbots who
+followed; they were confirmed by the Charter of Edgar in 970, and
+again by Edward the Confessor, and when the abbots became bishops they
+still continued to exercise this jurisdiction. Each succeeding Prelate
+enjoyed rights throughout the Isle somewhat resembling those of the
+Prince Bishops of the continent.</p>
+
+<p>This went on until Henry the Eighth fell upon the Church, and took
+away not only many of the Episcopal demesnes but also many of the
+Episcopal privileges (if indeed they may be so termed). Such rights as
+the King spared survived for 300 years longer. The Bishop of Ely still
+possessed a jurisdiction of considerable importance and dignity,
+holding almost sovereign authority within his "Franchise," which was
+styled "the Royal Franchise or Liberty of the Bishops of Ely." He
+himself appointed his own Judges to hear all cases within the Isle of
+Ely; Assize and Quarter Sessions were held in his name and at his
+pleasure; his chief bailiff acted as High Sheriff, and he nominated
+the magistrates. It was the Bishop's Peace, and not the King's Peace,
+against which malefactors throughout the Isle were held to offend.
+This went on till 1836, when on the death of Bishop Spark, these last
+remnants of Etheldreda's jurisdiction as Queen-Abbess ceased by Act of
+Parliament.</p>
+
+<p>But to this day there live on some far-off echoes of the Girvian
+principality. The Isle of Ely, with its three Rural Deaneries and
+forty-six benefices, is ecclesiastically under the immediate
+jurisdiction of the Bishop; no Archdeacon holds any authority there,
+as in other parts of the diocese, except in the parishes of Haddenham
+and Wilburton. True, we have <span class="pagenum"><a id="page322" name="page322"></a>(p. 322)</span> an Archdeacon of Ely, but he
+ought rather to be designated Archdeacon of Cambridgeshire, for, with
+the exceptions named, beyond the limits of the county proper he is
+powerless. The Isle, moreover, has its own County Council quite
+distinct from that of Cambridgeshire, while the common High Sheriff of
+both divisions is nominated from each in turn.</p>
+
+<p>And in the very heart of London, close to Holborn Circus, traces of
+this civil jurisdiction still survive in Ely Place, where stands,
+abutting on houses of the most commonplace type, the beautiful chapel
+dedicated to St. Etheldreda, built at the close of the thirteenth
+century, and once attached to the town palace of the Bishops of Ely.
+Ely Place was a "Liberty," and, within the memory of those still
+living, the Royal writs did not run here, and no police-officer or
+sheriff could follow a debtor who had here taken sanctuary; it was,
+moreover, rated on a basis peculiar to itself. The "Liberty" is still
+governed by certain Commissioners, elected annually by the
+householders. It has its own day and night watchmen, with their
+gold-laced hats, who fulfil the function of policemen, and the silence
+of the night is, even in this twentieth century, broken by their call,
+hour by hour, as of yore. We all remember how Shakespeare makes
+Richard the Third say to the Bishop of Ely,</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>My lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn<br>
+  I saw good strawberries in your garden there,"</p>
+
+<p>and the reference to these lines in the "Ingoldsby Legends" is hardly
+less familiar. Palace, strawberries, garden are no more; the property
+once held in this region by the See of Ely has passed by purchase into
+other hands, but the chapel is still here, well tended, the same House
+of Prayer, after many vicissitudes, that it was 600 years ago; the din
+of modern city life being there shut out by walls eight feet thick.</p>
+
+<p>There exists in London one more very different relic of the old
+demesne of the Bishops of Ely. On the frontage of a great house in
+Dover Street, now occupied by the Albemarle Club, with massive stone
+facings without and marble halls within, there may be seen, over the
+second storey, a mitre carved in stone, shewing that once it was the
+abode of the Bishops of Ely; for after their old Palace in Holborn was
+sold, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page323" name="page323"></a>(p. 323)</span> this "Ely House," built about 1775, took its place, to
+be sold in turn early in the twentieth century with a view to forming
+a nucleus toward the endowment of a new bishopric, when the proposed
+subdivision of the present diocese can be carried out. Times have
+changed; and the Bishop of Ely is now free from the burdensome luxury
+of an official residence in London.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page324" name="page324"></a>(p. 324)</span> CHAPTER XV</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Bishop Northwold.&mdash;Presbytery Dedicated.&mdash;Barons at Ely.&mdash;Fall of
+     Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon.&mdash;Queen Philippa.&mdash;Lady
+     Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich.&mdash;Bishop Alcock.&mdash;Bishop
+     West.&mdash;Styles of Architecture.&mdash;Monastic Industries.&mdash;Mediæval
+     Account Books.&mdash;Clothing and Food of Monks.&mdash;Benedictine
+     Rule.&mdash;Dissolution of Abbey.&mdash;Bishop Thirlby.&mdash;Bishop
+     Wren.&mdash;Bishop Gunning.&mdash;Bishop Turner.</p>
+
+<p>The fact that Ely had been made a Bishop's See did not prevent her
+from remaining a monastery, the home of busy monks, living in
+refinement and cleanliness according to the Benedictine Rule. Year by
+year they beautified their Abbey Church; the western tower rose stage
+by stage till it became, as it still continues to be, a landmark for
+the surrounding plain. During the episcopate of Eustace, lasting from
+1198 till 1215, the western porch, known as the Galilee, came into
+being.</p>
+
+<p>The year of his death was disastrous for Ely. It was then raided by a
+horde of foreign mercenaries, hired by King John to support him
+against the Barons; they robbed the Minster of its treasures, and only
+on receiving a heavy ransom were they dissuaded from burning it. "When
+the Barons" (who were in London, at that time their headquarters)
+"heard these things," writes the chronicler, Roger of Wendover, "they
+looked one upon the other and said, 'the Lord gave and the Lord hath
+taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.'"</p>
+
+<p>Later in the same century a Choir, or Presbytery, of exquisite design
+and workmanship, in the Early English style, was thrown out eastward
+by Hugh de Northwold, Bishop of Ely from 1229 till 1254. We have heard
+already of this prelate, and we must now do more than mention his
+name. It was he who had been chosen to take the "toilsome and
+perilous" journey to Provence, thence to bring back Eleanor as bride
+for Henry the Third, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page325" name="page325"></a>(p. 325)</span> and that weakling monarch turned to him
+on other occasions, when in need of a trusty servant.</p>
+
+<p>We read that the Presbytery of Ely Minster was built at the sole
+expense of Hugh, Bishop of that place, a special observer of all that
+was honourable and good. His hospitality knew no bounds. At the
+dedication of his presbytery and other works in the Minster, the King
+himself, with his eldest son, Prince Edward, a boy of thirteen, was
+present; innumerable prelates and nobles came to Ely, and after a due
+observance of spiritual festivities (which included the rededication
+of the whole church to St. Peter, St. Mary, and St. Etheldreda), were
+regally entertained by the Bishop in the leaden-roofed palace he had
+lately built; yet he lamented the small number of the assembled
+guests, declaring that the entertainment was in great measure shorn of
+its dimensions. He, however, "rejoiced in spirit that by God's favour
+he had been allowed to wait for that day, in which he had seen the
+happy consummation of all his designs."</p>
+
+<p>This dedication took place in 1252. "Two years later the good bishop
+died at his manor at Downham, and his body was carried with much
+reverence to Ely, where it was buried in a magnificent Presbytery
+which he had founded and built." Such is the witness of Matthew Paris,
+a contemporary chronicler. We may mention that the income of the See
+of Ely was at this time equivalent to £30,000 a year.</p>
+
+<p>Many years had gone by since the festivities thus described for us,
+when Henry and his son again appeared before Ely under very different
+circumstances. The Barons who had fought against the King, in their
+struggle to secure constitutional liberty, had met with a crushing
+defeat at Evesham (1265), where their heroic leader Simon de Montfort
+had been slain. Their lands had been virtually, though not nominally,
+confiscated, and for this reason they called themselves "the
+Disinherited," and gloried in the name. They refused to accept defeat,
+and made the Island of Ely their headquarters. In vain did the Bishop,
+Hugh de Balsham (the founder of Peterhouse), endeavour to prevent this
+occupancy of his domains; his efforts were fruitless, and only brought
+upon him the reproaches of the King and many others, who attributed
+his misfortunes to his incapacity. The insurgent Barons refused to
+quit the Island, and lived on there, supporting themselves by raid and
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page326" name="page326"></a>(p. 326)</span> pillage, as Hereward and his comrades had done of old. We
+are told that they entered Cambridge, and carried off abundance of
+booty; and that they seized on the persons of Jews and other rich
+citizens residing there, and took them back to the island as
+prisoners, to be set at liberty only on the payment of a heavy ransom.</p>
+
+<p>The inhabitants of Lynn, then as now the chief seaport of the Fenland,
+found these marauding Barons such objectionable neighbours, that they
+resolved on an expedition against them. A number of citizens, mostly
+of the lower orders, manned a fleet of boats and went up the river
+toward Ely. Forewarned of their coming, the insurgent Barons met them
+drawn up on the bank, with a great array of standards and banners;
+then, feigning terror at the approach of the enemy, they fled inland;
+whereupon the men of Lynn, unversed in war and its strategy, landed
+intent on pursuit. Suddenly they found themselves surrounded by the
+foe; in vain were their efforts to regain their boats; many were slain
+by the dauntless Barons, others were made prisoners, while the few who
+escaped were received with derision on their return to Lynn.</p>
+
+<p>The Bishop and the burghers of Lynn had failed alike to overcome the
+Disinherited; the Papal Legate now tried what he could do, as the
+state of affairs in the Fenland was growing desperate. He sent
+messengers admonishing the insurgents "to return to their Faith and to
+obedience to the Roman Curia, and to unity with Holy Mother Church;
+and to cease from robbery and to make reparation." To this, from their
+fastness, the Disinherited reply, "that they hold the same Faith as
+other Catholic men; that they believe and keep the articles of the
+Creed, that they believe in the Gospels, and in the Sacraments of the
+Church as the Church Catholic believeth, that they are ready to live
+and die for this Faith. They avow further that they do indeed owe
+obedience to the Church of Rome as the Head of all Christendom, but
+not to the avarice and greed of those who ought to govern it better."</p>
+
+<a id="img085" name="img085"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img085.jpg" width="350" height="485" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ely: The Presbytery.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>They urge that they had been unjustly disinherited by order of the
+Legate, and that he ought to make amends to them; that he had been
+sent to England to make peace, but that by adhering to the King he
+kept up the war: that the Pope had ordered that no one should be
+disinherited, but that the King had demanded a ransom equivalent to
+disinheritance; that <span class="pagenum"><a id="page328" name="page328"></a>(p. 328)</span> their first oath had been for the
+benefit of the kingdom and the whole Church; that they were still
+ready to die for it. They asserted, moreover, that many of the
+partisans of the King and Prince Edward had committed robberies,
+feigning that they belonged to the Disinherited; they insisted that
+their own lands must be restored to them, so that they might not be
+under the necessity of pillaging. Lastly, they exhort the Legate to
+recall his sentence; otherwise they would appeal to the Apostolic See,
+to a General Council, and, if needs must, to the Supreme Judge of all
+(<i>i.e.</i>, the God of Battles), "seeing that they fight for the common
+weal of Church and Realm."</p>
+
+<p>Such was the daring message that, according to Matthew Paris, issued,
+in the year 1267, from the Fenland stronghold. The Bishop and the men
+of Lynn had failed to daunt the recusants, and now the Legate had met
+with no better success. The following year came the King in person,
+along with his valiant son Edward "Longshanks," to try what the Strong
+Hand could do; and besieged the island. We can imagine how the father
+and son, as they sighted Ely, must have felt the contrast between
+their approach this time and their arrival fifteen years before. Then
+all was peace and welcome, now it is bitter war. They had Scottish
+troops at their command, and by constructing bridges of hurdles and
+planks they forced an entrance to the island; and soon the insurgents
+had no choice but to yield; some surrendered, while the rest took to
+flight. Their cause seemed lost; but in truth it was destined to
+triumph, for when Edward the First, six years later, returned as King
+from his Crusade, he granted all, and more than all, that the Barons
+had asked for, by calling into being England's first representative
+Parliament.</p>
+
+<p>Throughout the course of these wars and tumults the House of God at
+Ely stood uninjured in beauty and security. But about the opening of
+the fourteenth century there appeared cracks in the great Central
+Tower. These massive Norman towers were not so strong as they looked,
+their piers being not, as they appeared to be, of solid stone, but
+only hollow pipes filled in with rubble. It was known that a similar
+tower at Winchester had fallen; the same disaster now threatened Ely;
+the monks were warned against entering the Abbey Church, and were
+bidden to say their office in an ancient chapel adjoining the Chapter
+House.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page329" name="page329"></a>(p. 329)</span> The catastrophe long foreseen came to pass on February 22,
+1322. Late in the evening, as the monks were retiring to their
+dormitories, "with such a shock," says the chronicler, "that it was
+thought an earthquake had taken place," the tower fell toward the
+east, crushing the walls and pillars of the Norman choir. Northwold's
+presbytery further east remained unhurt, nor did the shrine of St.
+Etheldreda behind the high altar receive any damage. The nave and
+transepts likewise escaped injury. No one was killed, for in
+consequence of the timely warning the church was deserted.</p>
+
+<p>Providentially the monk at this time in charge of the Cathedral fabric
+was an architect of rare genius, the most gifted, probably, that
+England has ever produced. For the Sacrist when this calamity befell
+was none other than the famous Alan of Walsingham, who was called by
+his contemporaries "the flower of craftsmen," and he it was who, in
+virtue of his office, was responsible for repairs. In the full vigour
+of life, a man of twenty-eight, who had been trained as a goldsmith,
+he rose to the occasion, and proved well able to cope with the problem
+and task before him.</p>
+
+<p>The chronicler tells us how he "rose up by night and came and stood
+over the heap of ruins, not knowing whither to turn. But recovering
+his courage, and confident in the help of God and of His kind Mother
+Mary, and in the merits of the holy virgin, Etheldreda, he set his
+hand to the work." In answer to his prayers, an inspiration came to
+him. In place of the square tower that had fallen, he would build one
+octagonal in form, with a wider base gained by cutting off the angles
+of the transepts and choir, and he would crown it with a lantern of
+woodwork. His idea was bold and original, and the lantern-crowned
+Octagon of Ely Cathedral as it now stands, a glorious specimen of the
+Decorated work of the fourteenth century, still bears witness to the
+genius and courage of the young architect who designed and engineered
+it, while at the same time he planned the reconstruction of the Norman
+choir.</p>
+
+<p>With this scheme in his mind, Alan of Walsingham set labourers at once
+to remove the huge mass of rubbish, and meantime he sent far and near
+to procure timber for the work in hand; while the famous quarries of
+Barnack in Northamptonshire supplied him with stone. By 1349, after
+twenty-six <span class="pagenum"><a id="page330" name="page330"></a>(p. 330)</span> years of toil, the tower with its lantern of wood
+was finished. This wood was covered outside with lead, while within it
+was gorgeous with gold and stencilled painting, all the work of the
+most skilled hands that could be hired. We are told that the Sacrist
+himself provided gold florins to be turned into leaf by "Ralph le
+goldbeter." The very names of the workmen employed have an interest
+for us, as we read of John Attegrene, the master mason, of William
+Shank, the chief decorator, of John of Burwell, the best wood-carver.
+Nor must we forget John Hotham, of whom we shall hear more. Being
+Bishop at this juncture, he provided funds for the restoration and
+beautifying of his cathedral.</p>
+
+<p>King Edward the Third and his well-loved Queen Philippa came down to
+see the work, already famous, that was being carried out at Ely. In
+honour of her visit the Queen brought her robes of state, embroidered
+with "squirrels," first worn at her thanksgiving for the birth of the
+Black Prince. These robes she gave to the Prior John of Crauden, to be
+made into three copes and other vestments for the clergy. Whether the
+ancient cope still preserved at the Deanery can be identified as one
+of these is doubtful. It is of rich myrtle-green velvet, worked in
+gold thread, silk, and pearls, with plume-like flourishes that might
+well suggest the term "squirrels." Along its straight edge there is
+laid on a richly embroidered border, representing the Annunciation in
+the centre and saints with their emblems on either side. The design of
+the border indicates that it belongs to a date somewhat subsequent to
+1330, the year when the Black Prince was born; but, seeing that it is
+quite separate from the velvet, it must have been added later, and the
+main portion of the vestment may actually be part of Queen Philippa's
+gift.</p>
+
+<p>But we must not suppose that the Ely builders were engaged during
+these twenty-six years only on the Octagon Tower and the adjacent
+restoration. Almost contemporary with the tower is Prior Crauden's
+lovely chapel, built to the south of the Minster from the designs of
+Alan of Walsingham, while at the same time, adjoining the
+north-eastern transept, there arose the glorious Lady Chapel. The
+foundation-stone of this wondrously elaborated edifice was laid in
+1321, on Lady Day, by Alan of Walsingham himself; for it was he who,
+as architect, designed the building, though the actual carrying out of
+the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page331" name="page331"></a>(p. 331)</span> work was committed to John of Wisbech, the Subsacrist of
+the Abbey.</p>
+
+<p>The funds were partly supplied by Bishop Montacute (whose premature
+death prevented the full completion of the design); partly by "the
+alms of the Faithful," or, as we should now say, by public
+subscription, and partly from a find of treasure-trove which is thus
+picturesquely described by the Abbey chronicler:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"Now when the aforesaid chapel was in beginning, this Brother
+     John had but little money in hand, or laid by, for the
+     prosecution of so great a work. He betook himself therefore to
+     prayer, and thereafter called his mates together, some being
+     monks, some, likewise, seculars. And them he besought to meet at
+     a certain hour, and help him in digging out a square trench which
+     might serve for the foundation of the whole fabric.</p>
+
+     <p>"At the appointed time, accordingly, they met one night, and
+     began to dig, each separately by himself in the place assigned to
+     him. Thus it chanced that the aforesaid Brother John was digging,
+     all alone by himself, in the place allotted to him. And, by the
+     special will, as we verily believe, of God, he found there, not
+     one of his mates wotting thereof, a brazen pot full of money, as
+     if placed there on purpose to relieve his need.</p>
+
+     <p>"And when the whole night was well nigh spent, in the earliest
+     dawn, a small rain came on, to the annoyance of those digging.
+     Calling then his mates from their work, he said: 'Brethren mine,
+     and fellow labourers, yea, most heartily do I thank you for all
+     your long and well-wrought task. And good it is now to pause a
+     little after your work. Therefore I commend you to God. And may
+     He pay you a full worthy wage for your labour.' But when they
+     drew off, he himself remained on the spot all alone, and bare off
+     that urn, as secretly as he might, and hid it in the dormitory
+     under his own bed. And he took that money, all befouled with rust
+     as it was, and cleansed off the rust by rubbing it with chalk and
+     water, and paid therefrom, while it lasted, the wages of his
+     workmen."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>From this account it would seem that this money was not gold, as that
+never tarnishes, but silver; probably old Saxon coins hidden at the
+time of the Danish sack of Ely. Even in the fourteenth century money
+was still largely estimated by weight, without much regard to the
+particular coinage; so that these old pennies would still be good
+currency.</p>
+
+<p>The chapel is surrounded by seats of stone, each with its canopy of
+the same material, a veritable dream of artistic design and
+workmanship. With its completion, at the close of the year 1348, John
+of Wisbech ended his work on earth; a few months later, on June 18th,
+1349, he, like many another priest of these eastern counties, fell a
+victim to the Black Death, which in some districts slew nine priests
+out of ten. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page332" name="page332"></a>(p. 332)</span> He left as his monument this church, a wonderful
+example of the latest Decorated work, in its detailed sculpture and
+all but Perpendicular windows. It is built of clunch, a local stone
+that lasts well for interior use, but perishes somewhat when exposed
+to the weather. This was brought by water from Reach, where the great
+quarries from which it was hewn may still be seen.</p>
+
+<p>This chapel was built, as its name denotes, in honour of the Virgin;
+above and below its canopies stood figures of exquisite grace,
+representing, for the most part, scenes from her life as related in
+the Apocryphal Gospels and later legends then current. For two hundred
+years these sculptures remained intact, till Thomas Goodrich became
+Bishop in 1533. He held the See for twenty-one years, and he made it
+his business deliberately to deface all this statuary. We may
+attribute his action either to his zeal for the extirpation of
+Mariolatry, or to his fear lest sacred legend should be confounded
+with sacred history. Whatever may have been the actuating motive, his
+deeds as an iconoclast remain before our eyes. In October, 1541, he
+issued a mandate to the clergy of his diocese, ordering the utter
+abolition and destruction of all shrines, images, and relics; and we
+find it hard to forgive him for such indiscriminating breakage, even
+when we remember how much we owe to him for his admirable setting
+forth of our duty to God and to our neighbour preserved to us in the
+Catechism of the Church of England. He was also the translator of St.
+John's Gospel in the version known as the "Bishop's Bible."</p>
+
+<a id="img086" name="img086"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img086.jpg" width="500" height="395" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Ely Lantern.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>With the close of the fourteenth century the development and
+beautifying of Ely Minster almost comes to a standstill. She is rich
+in Norman, in Early English, in Decorated work; but when Perpendicular
+architecture arose, that type peculiar to England, there came a pause
+at Ely; and the instances of the Perpendicular style to be met with
+here are comparatively unimportant insertions. In Bishop Alcock's
+Chapel, built by 1500, we meet with late Perpendicular work; while in
+Bishop West's, built about 1525, are traces of the Renaissance
+decoration that came in with the revival of classical literature and
+art. Such decoration gained hardly any foothold in England, and is
+extremely rare within our shores, but on the Continent it swept away
+before its inrush many a shrine of earlier date, sparing nothing for
+the sake of its associations or antiquity. With Bishop West's Chapel,
+the story of growth <span class="pagenum"><a id="page334" name="page334"></a>(p. 334)</span> and development closes. Then came the
+Reformation under Henry the Eighth, and we come face to face with the
+work of iconoclasts rather than of builders.</p>
+
+<p>Of all English cathedrals Ely perhaps possesses the most complete
+series of every style of Gothic architecture; and as the Minster
+records and registers relating to the whole period of her construction
+have been fortunately preserved, we can date approximately every arch
+and window, knowing when it was built, and, in many cases, who was the
+builder. Thus Ely provides a key to the dating of all English Gothic
+architecture. As we travel through our own country, and on the
+Continent, we realise the marvellous solidarity that in those Middle
+Ages held Christendom together. Whenever a new architectural
+development calculated to promote beauty, strength, or light, came
+into being in one Catholic land, it spread without fail to the others,
+even to those furthest removed; what was the fashion in Italy, Spain,
+or France became the fashion in Scotland, and, so long as the Latin
+Kingdom of Jerusalem endured, even in the Holy Land; where the
+Crusaders built most diligently, as the yet surviving ruins of their
+churches and castles abundantly demonstrate, even to the present day.</p>
+
+<p>But with the development of the Perpendicular style, about the year
+1375, England began to strike out a line of her own. Buildings of this
+insular type arose, year by year, all over our land, but it never came
+into vogue on the Continent, where the more floreated styles of
+architecture, known as Flamboyant, became prevalent; while in England
+there was a reaction in the opposite direction in favour of less
+ornate tracery.</p>
+
+<p>Roughly speaking we may say that mediæval architecture in England
+occupied four periods:</p>
+
+<p>Norman architecture prevailed from 1075 to 1175;</p>
+
+<p>Early English from 1175 to 1275;</p>
+
+<p>Decorated from 1275 to 1375;</p>
+
+<p>Perpendicular from 1375 till stopped by the Reformation.</p>
+
+<p>In a careful study of the history of Ely Cathedral we shall find a
+confirmation of these dates.</p>
+
+<p>Let us, for instance, stand outside the Minster at the east end, and
+we shall have before our eyes specimens of all these four great styles
+of Gothic architecture. We can see early <span class="pagenum"><a id="page335" name="page335"></a>(p. 335)</span> Norman work in the
+transepts begun under Simeon, who was Abbot from 1081 to 1093. If we
+direct our attention to the east window with its lancet-shaped lights,
+built by Hugh de Northwold, Bishop from 1229 to 1254, we shall gain an
+idea of the exquisite grace and beauty of Early English architecture.
+In the windows of the Lady Chapel, constructed under John Hotham,
+Bishop from 1316 to 1337, we see Decorated work, with its branching
+tracery, at its culminating point; while in the chapel built by Bishop
+West, who filled the See of Ely from 1515 to 1533, on the south side
+of the east window, we have an instance of Perpendicular tracery, with
+its characteristic upright shafts running straight from the top to the
+bottom of the window. Comparing the table given above with the dates
+at which the work before us is known to have been carried out, we
+shall find it confirmed, and we may gain much by letting it be well
+impressed on our minds.</p>
+
+<p>At Ely one feature of beauty is lamentably absent, namely stained
+glass contemporary with the building. In the Cathedrals of York and
+Lincoln much ancient glass survives, while remnants exist in many
+village churches; but at Ely, once no less richly be-jewelled, nearly
+all has been swept away. There is no record of its destruction, which
+may have taken place under the unsparing hand of Bishop Goodrich, or a
+century later, it may be, during the Civil Wars. We are the losers,
+and we can hardly feel that our loss is made good by the coloured
+glass with which during the last hundred years many of the windows
+have been refilled, though here and there fine modern glass sheds its
+glow on the grey stonework around.</p>
+
+<p>Yet as we walk round this glorious Minster, surveying it whether from
+within or from without, the feeling uppermost in our minds is rather
+one of thankfulness that so much has been spared than of indignation
+that so much has been destroyed. We can understand what the
+poet-philosopher Coleridge meant when he spoke of Gothic architecture
+as "Infinity made imaginable"; and we may enter into the feelings of
+the peasant woman who, in simpler language, expressed the same idea,
+when after her visit to Ely Minster she remarked, "That Cathedral is
+like a little Heaven below; everybody should see it, both rich and
+poor."</p>
+
+<p>We have now come to the end of the story of the building of Ely
+Minster; her Bishops and Deans have since then had <span class="pagenum"><a id="page336" name="page336"></a>(p. 336)</span> enough to
+do in keeping her stonework in repair without adding to it; and this
+work of restoration has been carried on from century to century with
+real, if sometimes misguided, devotion. Originators have had their
+day; the repairer is now in possession.</p>
+
+<p>Great as were the architectural achievements of the seventy monks of
+Ely, we must not suppose that all their time went in superintending
+such work. We do not know, indeed, whether they did much of it with
+their own hands at all. We have, it is true, seen John of Wisbech, the
+builder of the glorious Lady Chapel, himself digging out the
+foundations with his mates; but on the other hand we are told how
+skilled artisans from a distance were hired to undertake the more
+delicate work in completing the lantern. That the Brethren spent much
+time in writing we have abundant proof. Our own familiar word <i>ink</i> is
+a standing testimony to their industry in this respect, being derived
+from <i>inc.</i>, the abbreviation universally used in the Abbey account
+books for <i>incaustum</i>, the Latin word for their writing fluid.</p>
+
+<p>In the reign of William Rufus, that monarch's Commissioners came to
+Ely, and carried off 300 volumes from the Abbey library, besides all
+the Service books; and we need hardly doubt that most of these books,
+if not all, had been copied on the spot. One beautifully written
+Breviary from Ely is still to be seen in the University Library at
+Cambridge. It is of the fourteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>The monks and Bishops were, moreover, constructors of bridges, of
+roads, and of causeways; they made new ones, they restored the old;
+and they were licensed to exact tolls for the upkeep of their work. In
+1480 Bishop Morton led the way towards the draining of the Fens, by
+cutting the great drain, forty feet across, extending twelve miles,
+from Peterborough to Guyhirn, and still known as Morton's Leam. The
+Bishops also built numerous episcopal residences. Among others, Ely
+Place in Holborn, a castle at Wisbech, palaces at Somersham and
+Downham, manor houses at Doddington, at Fen Ditton, at Hatfield, were
+erected as the centuries slipped by; and seeing that the Bishops were
+also Abbots of Ely, we may believe that the monks did their part in
+carrying out episcopal work.</p>
+
+<p>Ely possesses a unique record of her early days in her celebrated
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page337" name="page337"></a>(p. 337)</span> Liber Eliensis, a folio volume of 189 leaves of vellum, ten
+and a-half inches by seven and a-half, begun by Thomas, a monk of the
+convent, who lived about the close of the twelfth century, and
+professing to give the history of the monastery from its foundation up
+to his own day. Two copies of this manuscript are known to exist,
+bearing witness to the industry of the monks as scribes, while others
+have doubtless perished. The monks of Ely, moreover, wrote the
+Episcopal Rolls and Registers with the utmost care; these are still
+preserved with their entries as to the expenditure of money, as to
+ordinations, as to the granting of indulgences, as to appeals to the
+Pope, all kept with scrupulous exactitude.</p>
+
+<p>Ely is rich, moreover, beyond most foundations, in other written
+records of her past; and these are preserved, some in the Cathedral
+library, some in the muniment room of the dean and chapter forming
+part of the restored "Steeple" or "Sextry" gateway, some in the
+library of Lambeth Palace, some in the British Museum. The existing
+rolls, or account books, kept by the chief officers of the monastery,
+number 288 in all, and give us full and clear detail as to what was
+spent not only on the building, the alms, and the services of the
+Abbey Church, but also on the food, the wine, the clothing, and the
+medicine of the monks. One item of medicine is "dragon's blood," one
+of food is "blankmang, a mixture of rice and almonds."</p>
+
+<p>The following summary from the Chamberlain's Roll, recounting what was
+the cost of clothing a monk, will show us that he was expected to
+dress with dignity and comfort. The clothing of an Ely monk was really
+a very serious item of expenditure. A monk, like the parson of a
+church, was in England <i>ex officio</i> a gentleman; and his maintenance
+cost his convent the equivalent of £200 per annum (in the present
+value of money).<a id="footnotetag214" name="footnotetag214"></a><a href="#footnote214" title="Go to footnote 214"><span class="smaller">[214]</span></a> Of this sum at least a fourth went in clothing,
+which, as compared with food, was much dearer then than now. The
+account books still preserved at Ely give us <span class="pagenum"><a id="page338" name="page338"></a>(p. 338)</span> the items. Each
+monk received annually the following garments (for which we give the
+value at the present rate of money):</p>
+
+<table class="margleft" border="0" cellpadding="2" summary="Garments.">
+<tr>
+<td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
+<td class="right">£</td>
+<td class="right"><i>s.</i></td>
+<td class="right"><i>d.</i></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Cowl</td>
+<td class="right">1</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Monk's Frock</td>
+<td class="right">5</td>
+<td class="right">10</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Pellice<a id="footnotetag215" name="footnotetag215"></a><a href="#footnote215" title="Go to footnote 215"><span class="smaller">[215]</span></a></td>
+<td class="right">3</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Winter coat</td>
+<td class="right">4</td>
+<td class="right">10</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Summer ditto</td>
+<td class="right">4</td>
+<td class="right">5</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Shirt (?)</td>
+<td class="right">2</td>
+<td class="right">5</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Pair of linen drawers</td>
+<td class="right">3</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>2</td>
+<td>Pair boots<a id="footnotetag216" name="footnotetag216"></a><a href="#footnote216" title="Go to footnote 216"><span class="smaller">[216]</span></a></td>
+<td class="right">2</td>
+<td class="right">5</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Pair Gaiters and Slippers</td>
+<td class="right">1</td>
+<td class="right">5</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>"Wilkok"<a id="footnotetag217" name="footnotetag217"></a><a href="#footnote217" title="Go to footnote 217"><span class="smaller">[217]</span></a></td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td class="right">10</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Counterpane</td>
+<td class="right">4</td>
+<td class="right">10</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Coverlet</td>
+<td class="right">2</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+<td class="right">0</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>1</td>
+<td>Blanket<a id="footnotetag218" name="footnotetag218"></a><a href="#footnote218" title="Go to footnote 218"><span class="smaller">[218]</span></a></td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td class="right">12</td>
+<td class="right">6</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p>This was in the year 1334,<a id="footnotetag219" name="footnotetag219"></a><a href="#footnote219" title="Go to footnote 219"><span class="smaller">[219]</span></a> and is a fair average specimen of the
+cost, which varied very little from year to year. Readers of Chaucer
+will remember how comfortably, and even luxuriously, he represents his
+monk in the Canterbury Tales as being dressed. The old garments of the
+monks were, at the end of the year, returned to the Camerarius for
+distribution amongst the poor.</p>
+
+<p>Each monk had to enter the convent provided with a pair of blankets,
+garments of all kinds, bedding, towels, a bag for clothes for the
+wash, a furred tunic, day and night boots, a silver spoon, and many
+other articles. The novices had tablets hung round their necks on
+which to write in pencil each breach of the rule as it was committed
+lest it should be forgotten in the public confession of such formal
+transgressions which every brother had to make at the daily Chapter.
+These youths had also each to carry, in a pouch provided for the
+purpose, a knife, a comb, a needle, and some thread.</p>
+
+<p>A complete set of Cellerarius Rolls is preserved at Ely, and these
+give a full account of the food in use in the monastery, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page339" name="page339"></a>(p. 339)</span>
+with details as to its cost; and it appears to have been both
+wholesome and plentiful. Beef, mutton, venison, bacon, fowls, fish,
+butter, vegetables, rice, and sugar were provided, and bread of five
+different qualities. No less than 2,450 eggs were required for a
+single week's consumption. There was an ample allowance of milk; but
+the principal drink was beer, made in the brewhouse bequeathed to the
+convent by Bishop Hugh de Balsham, and supplied, like the bread, in
+five different qualities, the most inferior being known as "Skegman."
+All the food was in charge of the Cellerarius and Granatarius,
+themselves brethren of the monastery. The latter functionary was
+responsible for the bread and the beer, as being both made from grain.
+Wine was only produced at special festivals, and was almost wholly
+imported from Bordeaux, Oporto, or Xeres in Andalusia; a trade still
+recorded in our current words "port" and "sherry." For though
+vineyards were common in mediæval England (and notably at Ely, as the
+epitaph to Alan of Walsingham reminds us), yet they very seldom
+produced drinkable wine, and practically existed only to supply
+vinegar, a condiment much in use for rendering dry fish less
+unpalatable.</p>
+
+<p>The Benedictine Rule was strict in itself. The day began at 2 a.m.,
+when every monk had to leave his bed for Mattins and Lauds, a Service
+occupying two hours. Then came an hour during which he might return to
+his bed,<a id="footnotetag220" name="footnotetag220"></a><a href="#footnote220" title="Go to footnote 220"><span class="smaller">[220]</span></a> to be waked again at 5 a.m., for Prime and Terce.<a id="footnotetag221" name="footnotetag221"></a><a href="#footnote221" title="Go to footnote 221"><span class="smaller">[221]</span></a>
+Then followed the daily Chapter Meeting, when the work of the coming
+day was apportioned, and the faults of the past day rebuked. This
+ended, all had to attend Low Mass, and at eight o'clock High Mass,
+which was over by ten. Then, and not till then, the monks partook of
+the first meal of the day. For this they repaired to the refectory,
+and on entering they paused and saluted with a profound bow the
+crucifix, hanging over the High Table, and known to them as the
+"Majestas." (This title was due to the phrase in the familiar hymn,
+<i>Vexilla Regis</i>, "God reigneth from the tree."<a id="footnotetag222" name="footnotetag222"></a><a href="#footnote222" title="Go to footnote 222"><span class="smaller">[222]</span></a>) Their food was
+eaten <span class="pagenum"><a id="page340" name="page340"></a>(p. 340)</span> in silence while portions of Scripture were read aloud
+by one of the brethren. He was bound to prepare this reading
+carefully, and was directed to avoid all hurry, and to repeat any
+passage of special note, in order that it might make the deeper
+impression on his hearers. After this came study in the Cloisters,
+varied by a stroll in the Burial Ground for meditation on mortality.
+At 3 p.m. they went again to the church, to sing Vespers; at 5 p.m.
+came supper with the same accompaniment as the morning meal; Compline
+followed; and then it was bed-time. On some occasions the Rule was
+relaxed and the monks were allowed to take part in quiet games,
+particularly at Christmastide.</p>
+
+<p>Once in six weeks each monk had to undergo the <i>Minutio sanguinis</i>, or
+blood-letting, supposed in those days to conduce to health; and this
+drove him into the infirmary, where he had to spend about a week along
+with a batch of his brethren undergoing the same treatment. This
+custom, which sounds to us so unreasonable, tended at least to break
+the monotony of monastic life. Those who could stand it all, and gain
+good by it, must have been men of iron both in mind and body.</p>
+
+<p>Such was the discipline through which those men had to pass who built
+Ely Minster, and dwelt and worshipped there for close upon nine
+hundred years. The "Liber Eliensis" tells us "There was one Rule for
+all; the chief requirement was obedience, love of sacred worship, and
+a full resolve to maintain the honour of God's House." In words that
+form part of their Rule, they could say "We believe that the Divine
+Presence exists everywhere, but above all when we attend Divine
+Service."</p>
+
+<p>In the year 1539 the Monastery was dissolved by Henry the Eighth, and
+reconstituted as a Chapter of Dean and Canons. As we read this the
+question forces itself upon our minds "What became of the monks thus
+disbanded?" At Ely the monastery could, it is true, hold seventy
+monks, but the full roll were seldom, if ever, in residence at one
+time. After the Black Death (in 1349) the number fell to twenty-eight;
+and in the year 1532, seven years before the monastery was dissolved,
+there were only thirty-six monks on the spot, besides the Prior.
+Father Gasquet, a most diligent searcher into the history of that
+time, allows that, in spite of all his labour, "hardly any <span class="pagenum"><a id="page341" name="page341"></a>(p. 341)</span>
+detail of the subsequent lives of those ejected from the dismantled
+cloisters of England is known to exist." It is, however, recorded that
+three of the Ely monks, being noted as good choir men, received a
+pension of £8 a year (equivalent to about £80 now) besides an office.
+But such traces are scanty indeed; some monks who were priests were
+appointed to the cure of souls; others lived on the pensions allotted
+to them which were usually equivalent to about £50 a year, paid as a
+rule fairly and punctually; some received on quitting the monastery a
+grant of money; we hear that one band of monks went out into the world
+each with a sum of twenty-six shillings and eightpence in his pocket
+(barely £15 at the present value of money). Such was the fate of the
+inmates of the Abbeys that submitted to the demands of the King, as
+did Ely under Goodrich, the last of the Abbots. Where "voluntary
+surrender" was refused, as it was by the Abbots of Glastonbury,
+Reading, Jervaulx, and other Houses, on the ground that their
+monastery was "not theirs to give," the monks were turned adrift
+without any provision whatsoever for the future. Some fled to the
+Continent, others to Scotland, while many died as the natural result
+of a sudden change in their mode of life combined with privation and
+distress.</p>
+
+<p>It is nearly four hundred years since all these changes befell Ely.
+Many devoted men have during these long years filled the See, men of
+mettle, of learning and piety. Among others we may mention Thomas
+Thirlby, Bishop from 1554-1559 during the reign of Mary Tudor, who was
+deposed under Elizabeth on refusing to take the oath of the royal
+supremacy, "having declared that he would sooner die than consent to a
+change of religion." For this he was imprisoned in the Tower for three
+years, till a visitation of the plague led to his being sent from the
+infected air of London to the purer atmosphere of Canterbury, as the
+prisoner-guest of Archbishop Parker, under whose charge he remained
+for seven years. His imprisonment does not appear to have been
+rigorous, as far as physical comfort was concerned; but, with the
+illiberality universal in those days, he was denied the consolations
+of his religion; he might neither say nor hear Mass, he might read no
+books except Protestant ones; he might write no letters, nor even
+converse with anyone save under strict supervision. At Lambeth Palace
+lodging was provided for him, till he died <span class="pagenum"><a id="page342" name="page342"></a>(p. 342)</span> in the summer of
+1570, and was buried in the adjoining Parish Church.</p>
+
+<p>In the reign of James the First, from 1609-1619, Ely had as her Bishop
+Lancelot Andrewes, whose well-known Book of Devotions bears witness to
+his piety. That he was also a man of culture is evident by his being
+chosen to be one of the translators of the Bible.</p>
+
+<p>In Matthew Wren, who was Bishop of Ely for twenty-nine years, from
+1638-1667, we meet with another prisoner for his faith. Bishop Wren
+was anti-puritan in his aims; throughout his diocese his influence was
+exercised in favour of the re-introduction of reverent ceremonial in
+public worship; and for this he was sent to the Tower, where he
+remained for eighteen years, till the Restoration set him free and
+brought him back once more to his well-loved Cathedral.</p>
+
+<p>He died in 1667, and by his own wish was buried in the chapel of
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, which he had built as a thankoffering for
+his release from prison&mdash;(that prison which his friend Archbishop Laud
+had left only for the scaffold); his nephew, the famous Christopher
+Wren, being engaged as architect. Thirty years before, he had, while
+Master of Peterhouse, built from his own designs the chapel of that
+college. The two chapels still face each other across the Cambridge
+street in strange contrast. The earlier one betokens an effort to
+restore Gothic architecture; the later shows that classical ideals
+had, for the time being at least, won the day.</p>
+
+<p>Peter Gunning, who was Bishop of Ely for eight years, from 1675 to
+1683, had likewise faced imprisonment for the sake of his religion. As
+vicar of the church of St. Mary the Less at Cambridge, and later at
+Tunbridge, while on a visit to his mother, he preached sermons in
+support of King Charles the First and in defence of the Church of
+England, which excited against him the resentment of the prevailing
+faction and led to his imprisonment. But before long he regained his
+liberty and returned to Cambridge, where, on his refusing to subscribe
+the Covenant, he was deprived of the Fellowship he held at Clare Hall.
+He then sought refuge with the King at Oxford; and on the surrender of
+that city to the Parliamentary forces betook himself to London, where
+his use of the English Liturgy, and the sermons preached by him in the
+Exeter House <span class="pagenum"><a id="page343" name="page343"></a>(p. 343)</span> Chapel, drew down upon him the censure of
+Cromwell in person. At the Restoration he was given posts of high
+responsibility. He was called upon to assist at the Savoy Conference
+in the remodelling of the Book of Common Prayer, in which the "Prayer
+for all sorts and conditions of men," compiled by him, took its place.
+At Cambridge he held successively within the next ten years the
+Masterships of St. John's and of Corpus Christi, and was also
+successively the Lady Margaret and the Regius Professor of Divinity;
+he was appointed to the See of Chichester in 1670, and in 1675 was
+translated to Ely, where, after eight years, he died. It is recorded
+of him that in 1678 he had the courage to raise in the House of Lords,
+where he sat as Bishop of Ely, a strong protest against the shameful
+Test Act, which imposed upon all civil servants of the Crown, all
+officers, both in army and navy, all professional men, lawyers,
+doctors, and teachers of every grade, that odious formula, the
+so-called Royal Declaration, an age-long source of bitterness, now,
+happily, at last, no longer Royal.</p>
+
+<p>Francis Turner likewise, who held the See from 1684 till 1691, was yet
+another Bishop of Ely who suffered for his principles. He was one of
+the famous seven bishops committed to the Tower in 1688 for refusing
+to promulgate James the Second's Declaration of Indulgence, which they
+regarded as an unjustifiable stretch of the royal prerogative; and
+later he was deprived of his bishopric for declining, as a non-juror,
+to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, whom he considered
+to be usurpers of the royal dignity; showing thus (as Sir Walter Scott
+puts it) that while he could, in the interests of what he held to be
+justice, resist his sovereign, even in the plenitude of his power,
+like a free-born subject, so he would at all sacrifices maintain what
+he believed to be his king's legitimate rights, even in the depths of
+his adversity, like a loyal one.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page344" name="page344"></a>(p. 344)</span> CHAPTER XVI</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Approach to Ely.&mdash;The Park.&mdash;Walpole Gate.&mdash;Crauden
+     Chapel.&mdash;Western Tower,
+     Galilee.&mdash;Nave.&mdash;Baptistery.&mdash;Roof.&mdash;Prior's
+     Door.&mdash;Cloisters.&mdash;Owen's Cross&mdash;Octagon.&mdash;Alan's
+     Grave.&mdash;Transepts.&mdash;St. Edmund's Chapel.&mdash;Choir
+     Stalls.&mdash;Presbytery.&mdash;Norman Piers.&mdash;Reredos.&mdash;Candlesticks.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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."</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page345" name="page345"></a>(p. 345)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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 mediæval 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.</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page346" name="page346"></a>(p. 346)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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&mdash;it only measures 31 feet by 15 feet&mdash;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.</p>
+
+<a id="img087" name="img087"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img087.jpg" width="350" height="454" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Prior Crauden's Chapel.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page348" name="page348"></a>(p. 348)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page349" name="page349"></a>(p. 349)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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;
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page350" name="page350"></a>(p. 350)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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."</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<a id="img088" name="img088"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img088.jpg" width="350" height="452" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>South Aisle of the Nave, Ely.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Over the westernmost archway is a modern window inserted <span class="pagenum"><a id="page351" name="page351"></a>(p. 351)</span> 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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page352" name="page352"></a>(p. 352)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>We return to the Tower, and pause for a moment to notice "the
+Maze"<a id="footnotetag224" name="footnotetag224"></a><a href="#footnote224" title="Go to footnote 224"><span class="smaller">[224]</span></a> 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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page353" name="page353"></a>(p. 353)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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 mediæval date; but in the
+main it was his own conception.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page354" name="page354"></a>(p. 354)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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,<a id="footnotetag225" name="footnotetag225"></a><a href="#footnote225" title="Go to footnote 225"><span class="smaller">[225]</span></a> 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.</p>
+
+<p>We shiver at the very thought of the cold that life in the cloister
+must have entailed. We hear of a scribe whose hands <span class="pagenum"><a id="page355" name="page355"></a>(p. 355)</span> 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
+"<i>calefactorium</i>" 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.</p>
+
+<p>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,</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  "To walk the studious Cloister's pale."</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page356" name="page356"></a>(p. 356)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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),</p>
+
+<p class="poem30">
+  LUCEM TUAM OVINO<br>
+  DA DEUS ET REQUIEM.<br>
+<span class="add3em">AMEN.</span></p>
+
+<p class="poem20">Grant O God to Owen Thy light and rest. Amen.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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&mdash;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
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page357" name="page357"></a>(p. 357)</span> supporting piers, instead of on four like its fallen
+predecessor, Alan of Walsingham gave it greatly increased stability.</p>
+
+<a id="img089" name="img089"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img089.jpg" width="350" height="439" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Tower from the Cloisters.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Thomas Fuller, whom we have quoted before, thus racily describes the
+Lantern at Ely, as it was at the close of the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page358" name="page358"></a>(p. 358)</span> 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 <i>motum trepidationis</i> of fear
+and trembling, stands firmly fixed on the basis of a true faith."</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page359" name="page359"></a>(p. 359)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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:</p>
+
+<ul class="roman">
+<li>She appears at her second marriage, as a most reluctant bride,
+     forced into holding the bridegroom's hand.</li>
+
+<li>Having escaped from her husband, she takes the veil from St.
+     Wilfrid.</li>
+
+<li>Her pilgrim's staff bears foliage and fruit.</li>
+
+<li>Seated on a rock, the tide protects her from her husband's
+     pursuit.</li>
+
+<li>She is enthroned as Abbess by St. Wilfrid.</li>
+
+<li>Her death and burial.</li>
+
+<li>A prisoner is miraculously released by her prayers.</li>
+
+<li>The first translation of her body.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<p>Just where the nave and the Octagon Tower join is a slab, which some
+hold to cover the grave of Alan of Walsingham. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page360" name="page360"></a>(p. 360)</span> 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:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"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."</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<a id="img090" name="img090"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img090.jpg" width="350" height="470" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Cathedral Towers.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>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
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page362" name="page362"></a>(p. 362)</span> leave it with the sense that the highest message the
+minster has to give is still remembered among us.</p>
+
+<p>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 mediæval, 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.</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page363" name="page363"></a>(p. 363)</span> their power of discernment, in
+discovering further and less obvious correspondence.</p>
+
+<p>The stall seats are on hinges, and are known as "Miserere" (<i>i.e.</i>
+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.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page364" name="page364"></a>(p. 364)</span> 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.</p>
+
+<p>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&mdash;those graces
+and virtues which made the saints here represented to be such.</p>
+
+<p>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 <span class="pagenum"><a id="page365" name="page365"></a>(p. 365)</span> 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&mdash;plus a
+wheelbarrow and a broom.</p>
+
+<p>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.</p>
+
+<p>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:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Love delights to bring her best,<br>
+  And where Love is, that offering evermore is blest."</p>
+
+<p>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</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">"Let Knowledge grow from more to more."</p>
+
+<a id="chapxvii" name="chapxvii"></a>
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page366" name="page366"></a>(p. 366)</span> CHAPTER XVII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Monuments.&mdash;West's Chapel.&mdash;Alcock's Chapel.&mdash;Northwold
+     Cenotaph.&mdash;Basevi.&mdash;Shrine of Etheldreda.&mdash;Lady Chapel.&mdash;View
+     from Tower.&mdash;Triforium.&mdash;Exterior of Minster.&mdash;Palace, "Duties"
+     of Goodrich.&mdash;St. Mary's.&mdash;St. Cross.&mdash;Cromwell's
+     House.&mdash;Cromwell at Ely.&mdash;St. John's Farm.&mdash;Theological
+     College.&mdash;Waterworks.&mdash;Basket-making.</p>
+
+<p>The monuments within the Ambulatory may now claim our attention.
+Starting at the southern entrance, let us look first at a canopy of
+coloured stone, the tomb of De Luda, Bishop of Ely from 1290 to 1298.
+The builder of Ely Chapel,<a id="footnotetag226" name="footnotetag226"></a><a href="#footnote226" title="Go to footnote 226"><span class="smaller">[226]</span></a> Holborn, he was eminent for learning,
+and was keen to enrich the See; as a man of note he was sent by Edward
+the First to France to settle terms of peace. Here we can study the
+details of Decorated work at its best. Close at hand is Bishop
+Barnett's tomb of grey marble, of a date somewhat later, robbed of the
+effigy in brass which was once part of it. Next we come to the
+cenotaph of Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, who lived during the Wars of
+the Roses. He had travelled to Jerusalem, and had made his home in
+Italy, and was known as "The Pilgrim Scholar." A pioneer of Greek,
+then reviving in the schools of Western Europe as the result of the
+fall of Constantinople, he was also a patron of Caxton and his novel
+printing press. Under Edward the Fourth he tried his hand at governing
+Ireland, where his cruelty toward the Lancastrians gained for him the
+name of "the Butcher." He was beheaded in 1470, and appears here in
+marble lying between his two wives. Next note Bishop Hotham's tomb, of
+the Decorated period. His name is familiar to us as having promoted by
+every means in his power the work carried out by Alan of Walsingham.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page367" name="page367"></a>(p. 367)</span> So far the tombs we have noticed have stood in a line under
+three arches of the Presbytery, as the eastern part of the Choir is
+called: we now turn to the south aisle to look at that of Peter
+Gunning, Bishop of Ely under Charles the Second, who wrote (as we
+mentioned before) the prayer to which we owe the phrase "All sorts and
+conditions of men." The mitred bishop rests his head on one hand, in
+an attitude somewhat ungainly, and his monument is of little artistic
+merit. But the resolute, delicately-cut features deserve our study,
+and the epitaph is of interest as recording how he had vindicated the
+Church of England in the presence of Cromwell himself. Let us pause a
+few steps further east to look at the calm face of Canon Selwyn, a
+nineteenth century lover of the cathedral; and then, as we pass the
+tomb of Bishop Eustace, who built the western porch, let us go back in
+thought to the far-off troublous days of King John.</p>
+
+<p>From the Retro-choir we enter Bishop West's chapel, rich with the
+ornament of Perpendicular architecture at its highest pitch of
+elaboration. Nicholas West was Bishop of Ely under Henry the Eighth,
+from 1515 to 1533; and little did he foresee that the sanctuary he was
+adorning with the devotion of a lover who offers of his best would be
+despoiled and defaced by his own immediate successor in the See.</p>
+
+<p>He was no novice as an architect when he came to Ely; for while Dean
+of Windsor he had completed the vaulting of St. George's Chapel. This
+chantry abounds in work characteristic of the Renaissance, extremely
+rare in England. Again and again, always with arabesque ornament that
+recalls the designs of Raphael in the Loggie of the Vatican, is
+reproduced the bishop's favourite motto, <i>Gratia Dei sum quod sum</i>
+("By the grace of God I am what I am"), alluding, it may be, to his
+own humble parentage; for, born the son of a baker in Putney, he rose
+to be Bishop of Ely, and to live "in the greatest splendour of any
+prelate of his time"; he kept a hundred servants; nor did he forget
+the poor, feeding two hundred of them daily at his gate; or it may be
+that the motto refers to his having in early life brought upon himself
+disgrace by his violent temper. He had been turned from these evil
+ways to become the friend and ally of the two saintliest men in
+England&mdash;Sir Thomas More and Bishop Fisher.</p>
+
+<p>Besides embellishing this chapel with this motto, he adorned <span class="pagenum"><a id="page368" name="page368"></a>(p. 368)</span>
+it further with exquisite statuary. Here delicate canopies, upwards of
+two hundred in number, still overhang corresponding pedestals, on
+which there stood once, for a few short years, statuettes of
+workmanship equally delicate; but of these nothing is left beyond a
+few traces of their feet, which being carved out of the solid stone
+did not give way when the tiny statue of which they formed a part was
+broken off by the mandate of Bishop Goodrich. When the quarrel arose
+between Henry the Eighth and the Pope as to his repudiating Catharine
+of Aragon, Bishop West was true throughout to the cause of the injured
+Queen; but he died in 1533, just before the bursting of the storm in
+which his friends, More and Fisher, laid down their lives, and was
+buried in the chapel that bears his name.</p>
+
+<p>Here, too, lie the bones of the great Earl Brithnoth, who, as we
+remember, was brought back hither headless, from the battle of Maldon,
+by the monks of Ely to be buried amongst them according to their
+promise. We connect this warrior's character with the dying words
+attributed to him in Anglo-Saxon poetry, "God, I thank Thee for all
+the joy that I have had of Thee in life."<a id="footnotetag227" name="footnotetag227"></a><a href="#footnote227" title="Go to footnote 227"><span class="smaller">[227]</span></a> Other Anglo-Saxon
+worthies of the ninth and tenth centuries rest also in this chapel: an
+Archbishop of York, a Swedish Bishop, and several Bishops of Elmham,
+in Suffolk, and Dorchester, in Oxfordshire&mdash;Sees which were in later
+years transferred to Norwich and Lincoln respectively. It is held that
+these were retired prelates, who had come to end their days at Ely;
+where they were welcome guests, as they were licensed by the Diocesan
+to perform the often-needed episcopal functions of the Abbey, without
+calling in the distant and over-busied Bishop of Dorchester, to whose
+See Ely belonged. This was a convenience both to the Brotherhood and
+to the Diocesan himself. The names of Earl Brithnoth and of these
+contemporaries are inscribed on tablets let into the wall of this
+chantry.</p>
+
+<p>Touching it on the northern side, behind the screen of the High Altar,
+we see a fine tomb, Perpendicular in style, where lies buried the
+Cardinal de Luxembourg, a foreign prelate presented to the See of Ely
+in 1438 by King Henry the Sixth, but never (it seems) canonically
+confirmed as Bishop. In order to gain space for his chapel, Bishop
+West did not scruple to take a slice off the tabernacled work of
+unrivalled beauty that <span class="pagenum"><a id="page369" name="page369"></a>(p. 369)</span> adorned this adjoining tomb, but the
+northern side he left in its perfection. Notice, too, close at hand, a
+bronze monument to Dr. Mills, professor of Hebrew, who died about the
+middle of the nineteenth century. The recumbent figure is of great
+beauty.</p>
+
+<p>Next we come to Bishop Alcock's chapel, occupying the northern corner
+of the ambulatory, as Bishop West's does the southern. It was built, a
+generation earlier, by Bishop Alcock only a few years after his
+reconstitution of St. Radegund's Priory at Cambridge as Jesus College,
+recorded in our sixth chapter, and is marked as his by the frequent
+recurrence of his "canting" armorial bearings, a shield and crest <i>all
+cocks</i>, or, rather, black cocks' heads. He was a great builder, a
+great worker, and, like many another ecclesiastic of his day, a great
+politician, being Lord President of Wales, and Comptroller of the
+Royal Works to Henry the Seventh; yet withal he was a man of marked
+sanctity. His chapel is rich in Perpendicular ornament. A wreath of
+grapes and vine-leaves in stone runs round it in all directions, as if
+verily clambering. The undercutting of this wreath is wondrous, but
+perhaps the marvel of it culminates in a pendant boss of vine-leaves
+on the northern side so deeply wrought that we can see right through
+it, yet perfect to-day as when first carved.</p>
+
+<p>The masons who worked here liked their joke; and one of them made a
+boss of foliage, graceful enough when seen from above,&mdash;but stoop down
+to look at it from below, and behold a grinning imp. This stonework
+was chiselled <i>in situ</i>, the rough blocks were placed where they were
+to stay, and there they were cut into the shape required, several
+being even yet unfinished. Canopied niches abound here, but of the
+statuary that once filled them one figure alone has escaped
+destruction, and still indicates how beautiful its companions must
+have been. To Bishop Alcock Jesus College, Cambridge, owes its
+existence, and Peterhouse many benefactions; and here is his tomb. In
+1900 Bishop Alwyne Compton filled the window of this chapel with
+stained glass, depicting four of his most noted predecessors.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving this chantry behind we see on our right, under his own Early
+English bays, the monument to our old friend, Hugh de Northwold, who
+lies buried not in this spot but in the middle of his presbytery.
+Before he became Bishop of Ely <span class="pagenum"><a id="page370" name="page370"></a>(p. 370)</span> he had been Abbot of Bury St.
+Edmund's, for which place he ever retained a warm affection. His feet
+touch a block of marble, on which is sculptured the martyrdom of St.
+Edmund, whom we see tied to a tree and shot to death by Danish arrows,
+while his beheading is also represented. Here, too, is a wolf guarding
+the Saint's head, according to the legend. The story ran that, after
+the Saint's martyrdom and decapitation, his surviving subjects, to
+whom his "universal graciousness which yet suffered no unbecoming
+familiarity" had deeply endeared him, sought, so soon as the Danes had
+marched away, to take up his remains for fitting burial. The body they
+soon found, but the head had been cast into a thicket, and was not
+discovered till the searchers heard a voice crying, "Here! Here!
+Here!" which guided them to the spot where it lay. A huge wolf was
+standing, as it were, on guard over the sacred relic, but did not
+offer to attack the finders, who, on their part, suffered it to remain
+unhurt. The faithful beast followed them like a dog till it saw the
+head laid together with the body, and then quietly departed into the
+forest, no man doing aught against it.</p>
+
+<p>Close at hand, leaning against the northern wall of the aisle, is a
+detached fragment of stonework, once the arm of Northwold's abbatial
+chair which he brought with him from Bury St. Edmund's. This, too, is
+made in the form of a beast of prey (somewhat distantly resembling a
+wolf), holding between its paws a human head. The Abbey of Bury St.
+Edmund's, it may be mentioned, was, in some sort, a daughter House of
+Ely. When King Edgar, "the Peacemaker," founded that monastery in
+honour of the Royal Martyr he populated it, in the first instance, by
+drafting forty monks from Etheldreda's earlier royal foundation.</p>
+
+<p>We will next look at the impressive monument of William of Kilkenny,
+Bishop of Ely for three years under Henry the Third. He gave great
+offence through being consecrated bishop by the Archbishop of
+Canterbury in Italy, instead of in England, where it was felt that
+both prelates ought to have been attending to their duties at home;
+he, moreover, died abroad on a journey to Spain, whither he was going
+on the King's business. A traveller and statesman, he was also a
+generous promoter of education, as is shown by his founding
+scholarships at Barnwell Priory. A recumbent figure holding a crozier,
+he rests on a pillow as if asleep.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page371" name="page371"></a>(p. 371)</span> Next we reach the tomb of Bishop Redman, who held the See for
+a very short time in the opening years of the sixteenth century. The
+tomb is of fine Perpendicular work, and the Bishop lies under a canopy
+rich in armorial bearings; but the figure is strangely truncated at
+the foot, which derogates not a little from its beauty.</p>
+
+<p>Retracing our steps for a few yards, we find beneath our feet a brass
+which records one of the tragedies that the Minster has witnessed;
+here lies buried Basevi, the gifted architect of the Fitzwilliam
+Museum at Cambridge, who met with his death in 1845 while accompanying
+Dean Peacock over the work of repair going on in the western tower.
+The Dean had just a moment before given the architect a caution to
+take care how he walked. Basevi, familiar with scaffolding, smiled at
+the advice, and going on with his hands in his pockets, came to a hole
+he had not perceived, and fell through in a way that would have been
+well-nigh impossible had his hands been free; his feet struck the
+pavement below with a jar so intense that death was almost
+instantaneous.</p>
+
+<p>And now we end our tour round these sepulchres and monuments by
+contemplating all that remains of what was once the rallying centre
+for those countless pilgrims who travelled hither in search of
+spiritual and physical benefit&mdash;the shrine of St. Etheldreda. It was
+once enriched with gems and costly hangings. It has been told how
+Queen Emma, in 1016, gave it a "purple cloth worked with gold and set
+with jewels."<a id="footnotetag228" name="footnotetag228"></a><a href="#footnote228" title="Go to footnote 228"><span class="smaller">[228]</span></a> Sixty years later the shrine is described as "made
+in part of silver, as adorned with pearls, emeralds, onyxes,
+alamandine stones, embossed with images in relief, among which were
+two lions carved in crystal, also four figures of angels carved in
+ivory." Such it was made by Theodwin, who was Abbot for three years
+under William the Conqueror, and such he left it. After another sixty
+years it was robbed by Bishop Nigel, who took away much of its gold
+and silver and used it for his own purposes.</p>
+
+<p>But if it was despoiled in one century it was enriched in the next.
+From 1252 it stood behind the High Altar in Bishop Northwold's
+Presbytery, erected purposely for its reception; with the figure of
+the Foundress of the Abbey gazing down upon it from the central boss
+of the vaulting overhead. The <span class="pagenum"><a id="page372" name="page372"></a>(p. 372)</span> shrine was thus held in honour
+till the reign of Henry the Eighth; when the Royal greed swooped down
+upon it, the dust of Etheldreda was thrown we know not where (though
+the chapel in Holborn bearing her name, and the church of the
+Dominicans at Stone in Staffordshire claim to possess relics of her
+hand), her coffin was broken up and destroyed, the treasures that
+adorned her shrine were dispersed. Love of loot was the great motive
+for this spoliation; hatred of abuses, some real, some imaginary, was
+the hypocritical excuse. Whatever may have been the pretext for its
+demolition, the shrine was robbed and left empty.</p>
+
+<p>The existing monument is a vaulted canopy of the fourteenth century,
+and is held to be due to Alan of Walsingham. Much of the ancient
+colouring survives on its northern side, but the southern has been
+completely refaced with new stone-work. Let no one leave without
+stooping down to pass beneath it, where it is easy to stand upright.
+It was here that pilgrims congregated, happy in the sense that they
+were in close proximity to the bones of the sainted Abbess. Here once
+was sheltered the sarcophagus of marble that held the body of the
+Foundress of the Abbey. Sturdy blows must have been needed to
+annihilate it; but destroyed it was, and no tradition gives any record
+of its fate, nor has any remnant of it ever been recovered. Stripped
+as we see the shrine, now set aside in the northern aisle of the
+presbytery, it seems left to prove that dignity may linger on for
+ages, long after the word has been spoken "Thy glory is departed."</p>
+
+<p>Before leaving the cathedral we must pass into the Lady Chapel
+adjoining the north-eastern transept, connected with it by a passage.
+We have already told when and by whom it was built, and when and by
+whom it was desecrated. At the Reformation it was rededicated to the
+Holy Trinity, and became a parish church, replacing the church of St.
+Cross, which once stood close to the cathedral, but was pulled down
+during the sixteenth century. Our visit must have its painful side, as
+we remember how one form of faith built this chapel and another
+defaced it. We could envy those who saw it fresh from the hand of
+gifted sculptors and masons, its windows, now so bare, all aglow with
+colour of a richness to which the few poor fragments that remain bear
+eloquent testimony.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page373" name="page373"></a>(p. 373)</span> This chapel measures a hundred feet in length and is about
+half that width, the roof is of a single span, with no pillars to
+support it. Around it runs a stone bench, divided up by canopied
+niches still bearing traces of the old colouring&mdash;red, blue, green and
+gold. The canopied work over these niches is in almost perfect
+preservation, rich and free in design, but the statuary which once
+abounded under and above it has been ruthlessly and deliberately
+broken. Only one head half hidden by sculptured foliage escaped the
+iconoclasts as they went round the hallowed walls to "break down all
+the carved work thereof with axes and hammers."</p>
+
+<p>We look up and see some relics of stained glass, accidentally spared
+when the rest was smashed, in colour most harmonious, the greens and
+reds incomparably mellow in tone; while certain small outlined figures
+strangely traversing it, stiff yet vigorous, recall the painting on
+Egyptian monuments. A few square feet of this precious glass, a
+multitude of headless yet graceful statuettes canopied by unblemished
+stone-work, are still left to show us how beautiful the whole must
+have been when in its glory. We leave with a sigh the chapel, designed
+by Alan of Walsingham, and built by his faithful subsacrist John of
+Wisbech.</p>
+
+<p>Those who desire it can, before they quit the Minster, climb to the
+top of the western tower, and if the day is clear they will be well
+rewarded by a superb view over the "boundless plain" below; towns and
+hamlets, steeples and spires, spread there beneath us, nor must we
+forget the railways, with their kindly evidence of modern life at its
+fullest. To the east the horizon is bounded by those East Anglian
+uplands which nurtured Etheldreda for her great work here. But, beyond
+almost any other, this is essentially a man-made landscape; its
+salient features are not hills, but buildings, not rivers but lodes.
+Peterborough, the sister Abbey-Cathedral, is in view twenty miles away
+to the north-west, and many a church of note and beauty is prominent
+within nearer range, including the towers and spires of Cambridge
+fifteen miles to the south. The very cornfields and pastures beneath
+us have been reclaimed from the marsh by man; while, far on the
+north-east, is "Denvers Sluice" protecting the rich fenland from
+inundation. The view from the top of the tower is well worth a climb,
+if we have time and strength for the venture.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page374" name="page374"></a>(p. 374)</span> Those who wish to be acquainted with the structural secrets
+of the cathedral should make an effort to gain admittance to one of
+the spiral staircases to the upper passages that lead from triforium
+to triforium, from clerestory to clerestory. In these higher regions
+we shall still come upon deeply wrought crocketing, such as that in
+the upper eastern lancet windows&mdash;crocketing seen only by the stray
+visitor, yet worked with ungrudged labour and skill. Here we may step
+along the plank that takes us from beam to beam for a hundred feet
+over the vaulting of the Choir, through the spacious chamber that
+separates this vaulting from the outer roof. On every beam stands a
+pail of water ready in case of fire.</p>
+
+<p>Through a low doorway at the end we pass to the circle of the lantern.
+Here a shutter-like panel can be opened and we can look downwards if
+we will, but we shall probably elect rather to spend these rare
+minutes in gazing upwards, on the figure of Christ in the key boss of
+the vaulting, now that for once in our lives we find ourselves near
+enough to John of Burwell's carving to see how bold and yet how
+reverent it is.<a id="footnotetag229" name="footnotetag229"></a><a href="#footnote229" title="Go to footnote 229"><span class="smaller">[229]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>One question forces itself upon us, how was it placed here? How was
+Mr. Gambier Parry able to paint the glowing angels on these panels? We
+see in imagination the scaffolding, the ropes, the pulleys, that have
+been in use here, where now all is calm and rest, and we feel that
+William Watson might have had this very scene before him when he wrote
+the lines:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>No record Art keeps<br>
+  Of her travails and woes:<br>
+  There is toil on the steeps,<br>
+  On the summit repose."</p>
+
+<p>The tourist has one further duty to perform; for he must not leave Ely
+without walking round the cathedral outside. He will then be perplexed
+by the anachronisms before him; he will see Perpendicular windows
+inserted in Norman aisles, Decorated tracery in Early English masonry;
+he will observe this from without more plainly than from within, and
+he will realise how the monks who designed and built it all had a firm
+belief in themselves, and in their own age, so that they did not
+shrink from what we should now count as acts of Vandalism. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page375" name="page375"></a>(p. 375)</span>
+They no more hesitated to displace the work of their forefathers by
+their own, than we hesitate to light our houses and churches with
+electricity, instead of being content with the gas that was good
+enough for our grandparents.</p>
+
+<p>As we turn to the north, on leaving the cathedral by the western door,
+we shall be puzzled by the strange appearance of the steeple on its
+northern side. For Ely Minster, we cannot deny it, is lop-sided; it
+has no north-western transept to correspond with the south-western. On
+the north side of the tower there is masonry proving that once it had
+the support of such a transept; but there is no record of its fall or
+demolition, so we are left to surmise that perchance it shared the
+fate of the adjoining church of St. Cross, described as a "lean-to,"
+dark and "uncomley, very unholdsome for want of thorrowe ayre" which
+we know to have been pulled down during the reign of Elizabeth.</p>
+
+<p>We must now go eastward, and, keeping close to the cathedral as we
+follow the path that surrounds it, we shall be able to drink in the
+view, described earlier, of the Minster as seen from the east. From
+this point we can grasp it all, and we can feel ourselves in close
+touch with the builders of yore, with Simeon, and Richard, and Hugh,
+and Alan, and John; for the work of each is here before our eyes at
+once. They now rest from their labours, leaving them as a priceless
+legacy to benefit ourselves and others. Look at Richard's transepts
+resting on old Simeon's foundations; look at Hugh's lancet windows, at
+Alan's incomparable lantern, at the Lady Chapel which John was able to
+build through his finding of that brazen urn. The space that lies
+between us and these men of mark seems bridged by a span as we
+contemplate their work and try to understand it.</p>
+
+<p>As we complete our circuit of the East end, and stand at that of the
+south transept, we shall be struck with a conspicuous range of ruined
+arches built into the Canons' residences to the south-east. These are
+the remains of the Infirmary; which we have seen to play such an
+important part in the life of the Abbey. It had its own chapel, hall
+and kitchen, and stood on the site of the original Saxon church. The
+space between it and the Minster was called the Slype, and served as a
+kind of market, whither travelling merchants brought their wares for
+the inspection of the Prior, Sacrist, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page376" name="page376"></a>(p. 376)</span> and other chief
+officers of the Abbey. These officers, we may mention, did not share
+the common life of the monks, but had houses of their own, fragments
+of which still dot the "College,"&mdash;mostly, like the Infirmary, now
+built into the residences of the various Canons.</p>
+
+<p>Not a stone's throw from the Galilee Porch, just across the street
+towards the west, stands the episcopal palace. At one time this palace
+was actually connected with the cathedral by a covered gallery
+crossing the street. We can see from an old print how seriously this
+erection must have blocked the traffic, and on this account it was
+finally removed; yet its name adheres to the thoroughfare over which
+it once passed, and which is still called "the Gallery." The Bishop of
+Ely is fortunate in having his house close to his cathedral, unlike
+too many of the episcopal residences, which are at an inconvenient
+distance from the central city of the See. Moreover, his palace is of
+reasonable size; not too large nor yet too small for the hospitality
+to which a bishop must be given if he is to live up to the Scriptural
+standard; and it has another great practical advantage in being near
+to a station where several lines converge, and where all trains stop.</p>
+
+<p>The Palace was built in the main by Bishop Alcock toward the end of
+the fifteenth century. It is of chequered red brick with stone
+facings; his own arms, three heads of the barn-door cock, and the arms
+of the See, three crowns, are worked in stone on the face of the front
+wing looking north; there project, moreover, three niches (now empty)
+with the canopies he loved so well. Thirty years later Bishop Goodrich
+(who robbed these niches of their statuary) added the western gallery,
+a hundred feet long, with its beautiful oriel window, on whose outer
+panels he caused to be engraved his original version of our Duty
+toward God and our neighbour, which we may still read for ourselves if
+we can contrive to see through certain bushes that hide it. These
+inscriptions are on two slabs of freestone beneath the two side-lights
+of the oriel window in the gallery of the palace. Unhappily they are
+rapidly perishing under the action of the weather, and will soon be
+altogether lost. This is unfortunate, as they are of no small
+interest, representing, as it would seem, Goodrich's original draft
+for the "Duties," which were afterwards expanded into the form so
+familiar to us in the Catechism. Nor does any one seem <span class="pagenum"><a id="page377" name="page377"></a>(p. 377)</span> to
+have been at the pains to record them verbatim while they remained
+legible; so that now many conjectural words have to be supplied, by
+considering the number of letters in the spaces worn away. In the
+following reproduction these conjectural words are placed within
+brackets and italicised. The duty towards God, which is on the eastern
+side, is in Roman capitals, and probably had eleven lines, the first
+three of which are wholly gone. It runs thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  [<i>The . duty . toward . god . is . to .<br>
+  believe . in . him . to . love . him .<br>
+  with . all . our . hert . &amp; . soul .<br>
+  and</i>] . all . our . power . to . wors<br>
+  hippe . god . to . give . him . tha<br>
+  nkes . to . put . our . whole . trust<br>
+  in . him . and . to . cal . on . him . to<br>
+  honoure . his . holy . name [<i>and<br>
+  his</i>] . worde . and . to . serve . god<br>
+  [<i>truly</i>] . all . the . days . of . our<br>
+  lyfe.</p>
+
+<p>The duty towards our neighbour, on the western side, is in Old English
+letters, in fourteen lines, as follows:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+  The . duety . [<i>towards . our . neigh</i>]boure . is<br>
+  to . love . him . a[<i>s . we . do . ourself . an</i>]d . to<br>
+  do . to . all . men . as . I . wo[<i>uld . they . do .</i> ]to . me<br>
+  to . honour . and . obay . [<i>the . King . and . all . set</i>] under . him<span class="lspaced2"> ?    ?    ?</span><br>
+  beme    ?    ?  [<i>and . to . order . ourselves</i>]<br>
+  lowly . to . all . [<i>our . betters</i>] . to . hurt . no<br>
+  body . by . word . nor . d[<i>eed . to . be . jus</i>]te . in . all<br>
+  our . delyng . to . bear . no . [<i>malice</i>] . in . our . hert<br>
+  to . kep . our . handes . from . stelyng . &amp; . our<br>
+  tong . from . evil . speaking . to . kep . our . bo<br>
+  dys . in . temperance . not . to . covet . other . mens .<br>
+  goods . but . laboure . truly . for . our . lyvyng . in . y<sup>e</sup><br>
+  state . of . lyfe . it . plese . God . to . call . us . on . to .</p>
+
+<p>Of the many residences once belonging to the See, this palace is all
+that is left. In looking back, we must remember that in days when
+travelling was difficult it may have been of real advantage to the
+Bishop to have places of abode dotted all over his diocese, where he
+could stay, and where he could exercise his episcopal functions. We
+read, for instance, how, in 1487 and the following year, Bishop Alcock
+admitted <span class="pagenum"><a id="page378" name="page378"></a>(p. 378)</span> between forty and fifty persons to minor or higher
+orders in his chapel at Downham Manor.</p>
+
+<a id="img091" name="img091"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img091.jpg" width="500" height="414" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Mary's Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Beyond the Palace stands St. Mary's Church, built by Bishop Eustace
+about 1200, while Norman architecture was developing into Early
+English. It has been remarked that "its architect was disposed to
+adopt the new style without quitting the old one." The columns of the
+nave are simple Norman; the chancel and chapel on the south are
+distinctly Early English; the tower and spire are of Decorated work;
+and we meet with inserted Perpendicular windows. In the midst of a
+well-kept churchyard may be seen a broken and ancient font, with an
+inscription embossed in lead stating that it has been so placed that
+it may receive only the water of heaven.</p>
+
+<p>The citizens of Ely throughout the Middle Ages were well provided with
+churches, having for their devotions both St. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page379" name="page379"></a>(p. 379)</span> Mary's and
+also St. Cross, of which we have spoken before. The name St. Cross has
+an interesting history. When first the abbey was built, there stood
+against the stone rood-screen thrown across the nave an altar known as
+the Altar of the Holy Cross; here the inhabitants of the city were
+invited to worship, while the monks said their office quite apart
+within the screen. But, as time went on, the monks found that this
+twofold worship was not convenient, and, wishing to have the Abbey to
+themselves, they built, immediately outside it on the north, a church
+for their lay neighbours, "for doing such things as should be done in
+a parish church," and named it St. Cross, after the altar within the
+Minster which was thus superseded. With the dispersion of the monks
+the nave came again into public use, and the church of St. Cross was
+permitted to decay, and was finally removed.</p>
+
+<p>Adjoining the churchyard of St. Mary's stands the vicarage. It is a
+rambling house of moderate size, quaintly made of rough hewn beams
+with reed-stiffened clay in between, and opening on to the street.
+This house has a notable history. It was first built as a tithe house,
+and was within the same ring-fence as the great barn or granary for
+the storing of the tithe sheaves belonging to the monastery. In this
+house lived the farmer of the tithes, who bore the title of Steward,
+and collected tithe, first for the monks, later for the Dean and
+Chapter of Ely; and as this office became hereditary the name of
+Steward was taken as a family surname. The last of these Stewards was
+Sir Thomas, who died in 1636, leaving no son to succeed him; but his
+daughter Elizabeth was the mother of Oliver Cromwell, and Oliver by a
+very natural arrangement stepped into his grandfather's office. He
+accordingly left his home at St. Ives, sixteen miles distant, bringing
+his wife, his mother, and several children, to live in the tithe house
+at Ely; the older lady thus returning to the home of her childhood.</p>
+
+<a id="img092" name="img092"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img092.jpg" width="350" height="433" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Cathedral from the West Fen Road.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>For ten years the Cromwell family occupied this very house, which
+still remains pretty much what it was in their time. Here two children
+were born, and one died. Mrs. Cromwell was an excellent housewife,
+being we are told "as capable of descending to the kitchen with
+propriety as she was of acting in her exalted position with dignity."
+To Cromwell's duties as tithe farmer were added, in the course of
+time, those of Governor of the Isle of Ely. On St. Mary's Green, in
+front <span class="pagenum"><a id="page380" name="page380"></a>(p. 380)</span> of this house, he used to drill and instruct the
+levies of his newly-formed "Eastern Counties' Association," which by
+and by developed into his formidable "Ironsides." The result of his
+drilling speaks for itself in the history of the Civil War; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page381" name="page381"></a>(p. 381)</span>
+of his precepts, one at least, commonly attributed to him, was good,
+"Say your prayers, and keep your powder dry."</p>
+
+<p>The same house served as the residence of the tithe farmers till the
+passing of the Tithe Commutation Acts, when, after the death of the
+last of the officials in 1840, the Dean and Chapter sold it. Only in
+1905 was it purchased by the Vicar of St. Mary's, to become the
+vicarage of his church; appropriate in every way from size and
+position and association for this purpose. The Tithe Barn was a
+massive structure of stone thatched with reeds, but no trace of it is
+left; for it was pulled down about the middle of the nineteenth
+century, when tithe having ceased to be paid in kind<a id="footnotetag230" name="footnotetag230"></a><a href="#footnote230" title="Go to footnote 230"><span class="smaller">[230]</span></a> it no longer
+served any useful purpose; and on its site were built the almshouses
+and national schools, now to be seen quite close to the vicarage.</p>
+
+<p>Cromwell was no friend to the cathedral services, nor did his
+residence near at hand tend to make him love them. He at the tithe
+house, and Bishop Wren at the Palace, must have lived in avowed
+antagonism; but they ceased to be neighbours in 1642, when the Bishop
+was sent to the Tower by warrant of Parliament for his persistent
+effort to restore reverent ceremonial in public worship. The services
+in the Minster were conducted at this time by Canon Hitch, Vicar of
+Holy Trinity, to whom Cromwell wrote as follows from his house hard
+by:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+
+<p class="right10">Ely <i>10th January 1643</i>.</p>
+
+<p class="smcap">Mr. Hitch,</p>
+
+     <p>Lest the soldiers should in any tumultuary or disorderly way
+     attempt the Reformation of the Cathedral Church, I require you to
+     forbear altogether your Choir Service, so unedifying and
+     offensive:&mdash;and this as you shall answer for it if any disorder
+     should arise thereupon. I advise you to catechise, and read and
+     expound the Scriptures to the people; not doubting but the
+     Parliament with the advice of the Assembly of Divines will direct
+     you further. I desire your sermons too where they usually have
+     been, but more frequent.</p>
+
+<p class="right10">Your loving friend,<br>
+  <span class="smcap">Oliver Cromwell</span>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page382" name="page382"></a>(p. 382)</span> Canon Hitch took no notice of this letter, and the "Choir
+Service" went on as before; wherefore Cromwell, sword in hand, his hat
+on his head, attended by a party of soldiers, went to the cathedral at
+the time of Divine Service, and spoke aloud these words: "I am a man
+under authority, having soldiers under me, and am commanded to dismiss
+this assembly." Canon Hitch, who was conducting the Service at the
+Communion Table, paid no attention, and went on without stopping;
+whereupon Cromwell, followed by soldiers and rabble, went up to the
+clergyman, laid his hand on his sword, and, bidding him "leave off his
+fooling and come down," drove the congregation out of the cathedral.</p>
+
+<p>Five years after this scene took place, an order was made by the House
+of Commons to the effect "that the Cathedral Church in the Isle of
+Ely, being in a ruinous condition, should be examined with a view to
+its being pulled down and its material used to make provision for sick
+and maimed soldiers and their families." Providentially this order was
+not carried into effect, Cromwell's own influence being presumably
+used against it.</p>
+
+<p>If we continue our walk for a few minutes further westward along the
+street, we come to a quaint and picturesque building now known as St.
+John's Farm. It was built by Bishop Northwold, in order to unite the
+two Hostels of St. John the Baptist and St. Mary Magdalene. These
+Hostels had been founded for the use of monks who, though residing in
+Ely, wished to be independent of the greater monastery; Bishop
+Northwold put an end to this undesirable state of things by erecting
+one Hostel for the use of the two communities, and placing it under
+the direct supervision of the Sacrist of Ely. The Hostel is now an
+unpretending homestead, much rebuilt, yet retaining bits of thirteenth
+century work still untouched and therefore of interest.</p>
+
+<p>Those who approach Ely from the south must notice two prominent
+buildings standing quite apart from the cathedral. One is the
+Theological College, a structure of red brick well placed on rising
+ground, where twenty students can reside while preparing to take Holy
+Orders in the Church of England; it was founded by Bishop Woodford,
+who filled the See for twelve years from 1873. The College has its own
+private chapel for daily use, but by its constitution the students are
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page383" name="page383"></a>(p. 383)</span> bound to attend many services in the cathedral; the founder
+having insisted on this proviso as tending to maintain the link
+between the new foundation and the ancient Minster, a link which he
+foresaw might otherwise dwindle away. As a rule students have one year
+of special training and study; and during this time they take part in
+the parochial work of the cathedral city.</p>
+
+<a id="img093" name="img093"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img093.jpg" width="400" height="392" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. John's Farm.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The other conspicuous building is a round castellated structure that
+might well pass for a Norman keep, but is, in fact, the water tower of
+Ely, supporting a huge tank into which water is forced from springs at
+Isleham some seven miles <span class="pagenum"><a id="page384" name="page384"></a>(p. 384)</span> distant.<a id="footnotetag231" name="footnotetag231"></a><a href="#footnote231" title="Go to footnote 231"><span class="smaller">[231]</span></a> The inhabitants of
+the city have good reason to be thankful for this water supply; not a
+hundred years ago the natural springs on the spot were so inadequate
+for their use that most of the water for brewing and washing had to be
+brought up from the river, slung in a pair of leather bags on
+horseback, an arrangement manifestly inconvenient, "though providing,"
+as the historian adds, "a comfortable subsistence for many industrious
+poor." Let us hope that these poor folk did not bear a grudge against
+Dean Peacock, to whose zeal the waterworks of Ely are mainly due.</p>
+
+<p>One of the chief industries of Ely is the making of jam, for which the
+rich fruit-growing fields in the neighbourhood supply the material.
+And if we follow the main street down to the wharf on the river Ouse
+we shall see in the piles of willow wands that lie ready stripped on
+its banks, evidence of a much older industry still carried on here.
+This is the basket-making, for the which the fenland districts of
+Britain were famed even before the Romans reached the country.
+Posidonius, the Rhodian geographer under whom Cicero studied, and who
+himself visited our island about 100 B.C., mentions "British baskets"
+as exported for use on the Continent. A century later Strabo tells us
+of their extensive home use, for storing corn, and Martial, in the
+next generation, gives us the very word, which was adopted into the
+Latin from the Celtic original (still used in Welsh), as it has since
+been adopted into English. In sending a present to a lady he alludes
+to it as:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>A basket rude, from painted Britons come."<br>
+<span class="min66em">("</span>Barbara de pictis venio <i>bascauda</i> Britannis.")</p>
+
+<p>The withies of which the baskets are made were at first, doubtless,
+the shoots of the willows found growing wild along the streams. Now
+they are cut from carefully tended osier-beds, small enclosed areas
+which are periodically flooded, where the willows are regularly
+cultivated with a view to the production of long shoots suitable for
+this industry. "They are regularly cut, peeled, and seasoned and
+afford employment to large numbers of people."<a id="footnotetag232" name="footnotetag232"></a><a href="#footnote232" title="Go to footnote 232"><span class="smaller">[232]</span></a> Nor is the making
+of baskets the only purpose for which willows may be profitably
+cultivated; for, as Fuller says:&mdash;"This tree delighteth in moist
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page385" name="page385"></a>(p. 385)</span> places and is triumphant in the Isle of Ely, where the roots
+strengthen the banks and the lop affords fuel for the fire. It groweth
+incredibly fast; it being a by-word in this county that the profit by
+willows will buy the owner a horse before other trees will pay for his
+saddle."</p>
+
+<p>Having thus come to know something of Ely Minster, we shall feel the
+greater interest in all our further explorations through those
+highways and byways of the surrounding district over which she
+presides with the air of a Mother, and a Queen.</p>
+
+<a id="img094" name="img094"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img094.jpg" width="500" height="346" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Willow Walk.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page386" name="page386"></a>(p. 386)</span> CHAPTER XVIII</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Boundary of Fens.&mdash;Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall,
+     Causeway.&mdash;Archipelago.&mdash;Littleport, Agrarian Riots.&mdash;Denver
+     Sluice.&mdash;Roslyn Pit.&mdash;Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey,
+     Peterborough, Thorney, Crowland.</p>
+
+<p>The vast Fenland district of which the Isle of Ely is the core
+consisted, until the fens were drained, of an archipelago of scattered
+islets rising out of a morass, through which the rivers from the
+uplands around stagnated in a complex system of waterways, constantly
+changing, as one branch or another got silted up and the streams had
+to make themselves new channels.</p>
+
+<p>The foreshore of the uplands may still be traced on a contour map, and
+is seen to be deeply indented, with bays running in from the fen and
+capes running out into it. The southernmost point of the morass was at
+Fen Ditton on the Cam, two miles below Cambridge. Its western boundary
+went by, Waterbeach, Cottenham, and Willingham, to Earith; thence
+through Huntingdonshire to Ramsey and Peterborough; thence, by
+Deeping, Holbeach, and Spalding, to the Witham, a few miles below
+Lincoln. Throughout all this length ran a Roman earthwork, the Car
+Dyke, still existing at many points, evidently thrown up by these
+mighty civilisers to keep the floods in check. A like Roman
+embankment, of much larger dimensions, is to be seen on either shore
+of the great estuary which of old brought the sea-shore as far south
+as Wisbech. The eastern boundary of the Fenland needs no such defence,
+as on this side the higher ground sinks much more abruptly to the fen
+level. It passes from Fen Ditton by Horningsea, Bottisham, Swaffham,
+and Reach to Burwell. Here a peninsula projects to Soham, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page387" name="page387"></a>(p. 387)</span>
+followed by a deep inlet to Isleham and Mildenhall. Then it runs north
+and west to Downham, in Norfolk, and thence due north to the sea by
+Lynn.</p>
+
+<p>We must not, however, suppose that the whole of this immense tract was
+always morass. Oscillations in the land level have more than once
+raised it high enough and long enough for great forests to clothe it;
+the trees of which, frequently of giant size, are constantly exhumed
+from the peat which the later depressions have formed over them.<a id="footnotetag233" name="footnotetag233"></a><a href="#footnote233" title="Go to footnote 233"><span class="smaller">[233]</span></a>
+The last of these forests seems to have lingered on into Roman times.
+A Roman roadway may still be traced, running east and west across the
+whole breadth of the district, from Denver, at the south-western point
+of the Norfolk uplands, to Stanground, near Peterborough, on the
+Huntingdonshire mainland. The Fens must have been very different from
+what they afterwards became for such a road to be in use. But before
+the collapse of Roman Britain in the fifth century of our era all
+seems to have gone to fen once more; and the islets in it served as a
+refuge for the remnant of the British population when the flood of the
+Anglo-Saxon Conquest burst over the land.<a id="footnotetag234" name="footnotetag234"></a><a href="#footnote234" title="Go to footnote 234"><span class="smaller">[234]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>These islets number some thirty and more, and vary considerably in
+size. Far the largest is that on which Ely stands, the southern part
+of which has been spoken of in Chapter XII. At its extreme northern
+point, on a subsidiary islet of its own, is the large village of
+Littleport, chiefly memorable as having been the focus of a most
+serious agrarian outbreak, which in the year 1816 convulsed the
+district. Widespread agricultural distress marked the first decades of
+the nineteenth century. The wholesale enclosure of the common fields
+and the waste lands brought with it no small suffering to the
+peasantry; who everywhere lost, by the Enclosure Acts, the advantages
+which the waste lands had afforded them, receiving in exchange a
+scanty portion of "town land" in each parish, the rent of which is
+applied to local charities. And in many instances the policy of the
+Government placed these "town lands" in the least accessible corner of
+the parish; for the express purpose of preventing labourers from
+acquiring allotments in them and thus becoming less dependent on their
+wages. The draining of the fens, moreover, which was then in full
+progress, by exterminating the old abundance of fish and wildfowl
+deprived the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page388" name="page388"></a>(p. 388)</span> marsh-men at once of their chief recreation and
+their most savoury food. Wages were only nine shillings a week, while
+wheat was no less than five guineas a quarter. These grievances
+actually drove the peasantry to arms, not without countenance from
+sympathisers of a superior class, who felt that the demand of the
+rioters for wages enough to purchase a stone of flour a week, which
+was all they asked, could not be called unreasonable.</p>
+
+<p>"Assembling by sound of horn at Littleport, they sacked some of the
+houses of the most prosperous, levied contributions on others, and
+then marched on Ely in formidable force, armed with guns, pistols,
+scythes, etc., and under cover of a waggon, on which they had mounted
+four punt-guns. These formidable weapons, used for wild-fowl shooting,
+with barrels eight feet long, whose charge was no less than a pound of
+gunpowder, projected over the front of the vehicle to clear the way if
+needful. But though the leading inhabitants of Ely had hastily armed
+themselves, and been sworn in as special constables they were not
+prepared to face this artillery, and the town passed without
+resistance into the power of the mob, who repeated their Littleport
+doings on a larger scale, though with little bodily hurt to anyone.
+Unhappily the mob soon got out of hand, and the movement rapidly
+degenerated into a mere drunken riot, the chief sufferers in which
+were, as usual, those who had done most for the relief of the
+poor&mdash;the local shopkeepers, who had aided them by credit, and the
+local clergy, who had organised soup-kitchens for them.</p>
+
+<p>"At the first approach of the military force sent for to suppress
+them, the rioters retreated in good order, still under cover of their
+armed waggon, to Littleport, where, however, only a handful made any
+sort of stand when the soldiers actually arrived."<a id="footnotetag235" name="footnotetag235"></a><a href="#footnote235" title="Go to footnote 235"><span class="smaller">[235]</span></a> The rest
+dispersed in panic, and not a blow was struck in defence of those,
+some eighty in number, who were selected to be made an example of. A
+special commission was held for the trial of these unhappy men. "In
+spite of strong testimony to character, five were hanged, and five
+more transported for life, the rest undergoing various terms of
+imprisonment; all to the accompaniment of ecclesiastical rejoicings,
+the Bishop entering the cathedral in solemn procession, to the strains
+of the triumphal anthem, "Why do <span class="pagenum"><a id="page389" name="page389"></a>(p. 389)</span> the heathen rage?", with
+his Sword of State borne before him (by his butler!), and escorted by
+fifty of the principal inhabitants, carrying white wands. No fewer
+than three hundred of these wand-bearers guarded the execution of the
+five rioters; yet the sympathy for them was so strong that the bishop
+could not get a cart to carry them to the gallows under five guineas
+for the trip."</p>
+
+<p>Such was the last serious exercise of the Bishop's long-descended
+secular jurisdiction over the Isle. From the Girvian Princes to the
+Abbesses of Ely, from the Abbesses to the Abbots, from the Abbots to
+the Bishops that Palatinate jurisdiction had been handed on for twelve
+hundred years;&mdash;and this was its sordid close. It died none too soon.</p>
+
+<p>Littleport is now quite a thriving and prosperous place, with a
+shirt-factory employing over 300 hands and a most effective system of
+agriculture in the reclaimed fens around. It has a fine Early English
+church, and a grand tower, through the basement of which goes the
+footway of the street. Until the nineteenth century the place was so
+inaccessible by land that the Cambridgeshire annalist Carter (1752)
+tells us that "it is as rare to see a coach at Littleport as a ship at
+Newmarket."</p>
+
+<p>From Littleport the road pursues its level way for seven miles across
+the fen, till, after crossing the small islet of Hilgay, it strikes
+the Norfolk uplands at their south-western corner, hard by Denver
+Sluice; the present boundary of the North Sea tide, which once ran up
+almost to Cambridge. This magnificent Sluice is the keystone of the
+whole drainage scheme of the fenland. Here the New and the Old Bedford
+Rivers, whose start we saw at Earith (p. <a href="#page280">280</a>), once more rejoin the
+Ouse, having conveyed in twenty-two miles the waters which by the old
+channel would have taken thirty-three. This, of course, gives them a
+better fall, and renders them less liable to silt themselves up.</p>
+
+<p>Practically the New River does all the work, very little water being
+in the Old except what the tide brings up. It is a striking sight to
+be on the Sluice at high water and gaze at the sea waves ridging up
+this old river with force that seems illimitable. And yet not enough
+pass in, before the ebb calls them back, ever (or hardly ever) to
+reach Earith, as a glance at the channel there instantly shows. Still
+more striking is it to be on the Sluice when the spring tides are on,
+and see the sea on the north of <span class="pagenum"><a id="page390" name="page390"></a>(p. 390)</span> the Sluice standing fifteen
+or twenty feet higher than the fresh waters on the south. One realises
+what widespread disaster would ensue if the Sluice were to give way.
+Small wonder that during the Fenian dynamite scare of 1867 the place
+was watched day and night by a guard of soldiers. The Sluice itself is
+a massive dam of stonework; having a big lock with two sets of gates,
+one against the stream of the river, the other against the tideway of
+the sea, which reaches this point by a broad cut from the important
+seaport of King's Lynn.</p>
+
+<p>This present erection was built 1752. Its earlier predecessor was set
+up 1651 by the Dutch engineer Vermuyden, the maker of the Bedford
+Rivers, to whose genius the whole present scheme of drainage owes its
+existence. He carried through his plan in face of most determined
+opposition, especially from the towns of Lynn and Cambridge, who
+complained that "whereas of old ships from Newcastle were wont to make
+eighteen voyages in the year to Cambridge with sea coal, now, since
+the blocking of the stream at Denver and the diversion of its waters
+at Earith, they can make but ten or twelve, whereby the price of fuel
+hath increased by half." When this first sluice was "blown up" by the
+tide in 1713 there were loud rejoicings. The consequences, however,
+proved so serious, that the next generation was fain to see it
+replaced.</p>
+
+<p>Lynn is the point to which the road we have been following ultimately
+leads. On leaving Ely by this road, the first turn to the right will
+bring us down to the famous Roslyn (or Roswell) Pit, beloved of
+geologists and botanists. It is a large water-filled excavation by the
+side of the railway, nurturing various rare water plants, and
+presenting the wonderful spectacle of chalk lying <i>above</i>
+boulder-clay, a phenomenon now attributed to ice action.<a id="footnotetag236" name="footnotetag236"></a><a href="#footnote236" title="Go to footnote 236"><span class="smaller">[236]</span></a></p>
+
+<a id="img095" name="img095"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img095.jpg" width="350" height="584" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>St. Wendreda's Church, March.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The western declivity of the Island plunges down to the fen at Mepal,
+on the New Bedford River. After crossing this, the road leads straight
+across the fen to Chatteris, and is called Ireton's Way; the causeway
+on which it runs having been made by that great Puritan general, for
+strategic purposes, during the Civil War. Chatteris was the first of
+the wonderful chain of Abbeys which swept round the Fenland from Ely
+into Lincolnshire. The others are Ramsey and Peterborough on the last
+verge of the mainland; with Thorney and Crowland, rising, like
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page392" name="page392"></a>(p. 392)</span> Chatteris, on islands in the morass.<a id="footnotetag237" name="footnotetag237"></a><a href="#footnote237" title="Go to footnote 237"><span class="smaller">[237]</span></a> Of these,
+Chatteris and Thorney alone are in Cambridgeshire; though Peterborough
+is within half a mile of the county boundary. The former, a nunnery,
+was founded by the Lady Alwyn, foster-mother to Edgar the Peacemaker.
+It was never a large House, and no remains of it survive; but
+Chatteris is now the seat of another Benedictine community, exiled
+from France in 1901. The place possesses some curious wells of warm
+water, not of any great depth, as such usually are, but penetrating
+only some ten or twelve feet into the fen deposits. Local chemical
+decomposition is supposed to account for the phenomenon. The fen
+hereabouts is rich in geological and archæological remains. And within
+sight of his mother's convent, only six miles away across the fen, her
+son (also an Alwyn), the Alderman or Earl of the district, founded, on
+the projecting cape of the Huntingdonshire mainland, the much larger
+abbey of Ramsey, whose abbot was one of the higher or "mitred" class,
+privileged to give the "Minor" Orders (<i>i.e.</i> those beneath the grade
+of Deacon).</p>
+
+<p>Thorney was of earlier date; coeval, indeed, with Peterborough. Of its
+foundation a graphic description is given by the chronicler. After
+telling how King Wulfhere of Mercia (whose wife was sister to St.
+Etheldreda), endowed Peterborough and its abbot Sexwulf with broad
+possessions, he continues:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"Then said the King: 'This gift is little, but it is my will they
+     hold it so royally and so freely that neither geld nor fee be
+     taken from it....And thus free will I make this Minster, that it
+     be under Rome alone: and my will it is that all we who may not go
+     to Rome visit St. Peter here.'</p>
+
+     <p>"While thus he spake, the Abbot prayed of him that he would give
+     him whatsoever he should ask. And the King granted him. Then said
+     the Abbot: 'Here have I God-fearing monks, who would fain live as
+     anchorites (<i>i.e.</i>, hermits), knew they but where. And here is an
+     island which is called Ancarig<a id="footnotetag238" name="footnotetag238"></a><a href="#footnote238" title="Go to footnote 238"><span class="smaller">[238]</span></a> (Thorney). And my boon is
+     that we might there build a Minster, to the glory of St. Mary, so
+     that they who would lead the life of peace and rest may dwell
+     therein.'</p>
+
+     <p>"Then the King answered and said: 'Beloved Sexwulf, lo! not only
+     that which thou hast asked, but all else on our Lord's behalf I
+     thus approve and grant.' ... And King Wulfhere first confirmed it
+     by word, and after <span class="pagenum"><a id="page393" name="page393"></a>(p. 393)</span> subscribed it with his fingers on
+     the Cross of Christ" (<i>i.e.</i> he signed his name with a cross, on
+     which he laid his finger, saying, "I deliver this as my act and
+     deed," as we do with the seal on a deed at present. Seals did not
+     come in till the Norman Conquest). Amongst the witnesses to his
+     signature we find "Wilfrid the Priest, who was afterwards
+     Bishop," <i>i.e.</i> the great St. Wilfrid of Ripon.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Thorney, however, was long in rising to abbatial dignity, and remained
+the abode of anchorites, so humble and so sequestered that in the
+great Danish raid of 870, when Ely and every other Religious House
+throughout the Fenland was destroyed, the plunderers did not take the
+trouble to seek it out, and it became a haven of refuge for the
+survivors of the sack of Crowland. The story is graphically told in
+the "Chronicle of Crowland"; in its present form probably a thirteenth
+century work, but obviously compiled from earlier sources.</p>
+
+<p>After describing vividly the utter overthrow, at a great battle in
+Kesteven (West Lincolnshire), of the local forces hastily called out
+to meet the Danish host, he tells how a few poor fugitives got them to
+the Church of Crowland, and interrupted the Midnight Service with
+their crushing tidings.</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"At this news all was confusion. And the Abbot, keeping with
+     himself the oldest of the monks and a few of the children (of the
+     Abbey School), bade all those in their prime to take along with
+     them the sacred relics of the monastery (namely the holy body of
+     St. Guthlac, his scourge, and his psalter) and the other chief
+     treasures, and thus to flee into the neighbouring fens. With
+     sorrow of heart did they his bidding, and, having laden a boat
+     with the aforesaid relics and the charters of the Kings, they
+     cast into the cloister well the frontal of the High Altar (which
+     was covered with plates of gold) along with ten chalices ... and
+     other vessels. But the end of the frontal, so long was it, always
+     showed above the water; whereupon they drew it out and left it
+     with the Abbot; for ever could they see the flames of the towns
+     in Kesteven draw nigher and nigher, and feared lest the Heathen
+     should on a sudden burst in upon them. So took they boat, and
+     came unto the wood of Ancarig on the southern march of their
+     islet. And here abode they with Brother Toretus, an anchorite,
+     and other brethren, then dwelling there, four days, thirty in
+     all, of whom ten were priests. But the Abbot, and two old men
+     with him, hid the aforesaid frontal outside the church, to the
+     North; and afterwards he and all the rest clad in their sacred
+     vestments, met in Choir, and kept the Hours of Divine Service
+     according to their Rule. And the whole of the Psalms of David
+     went they through from end to end. After this sang they High
+     Mass, the Abbot himself being Celebrant....</p>
+
+     <p>"Now, when the Mass was drawing to an end, and the Abbot and his
+     deacon and subdeacon and the taper-bearers had already
+     communicated in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page394" name="page394"></a>(p. 394)</span> the Holy Mysteries, came the Heathen
+     bursting into the church. And upon the very Altar, by the cruel
+     hand of King Oscytel, was the venerable Abbot himself sacrificed,
+     a true martyr and victim of Christ. All they who stood round and
+     ministered with him were beheaded by the savages; and the aged
+     men and children, as they fled from the Choir, were taken and
+     questioned under the bitterest tortures, to make them show the
+     treasures of the church. Dom<a id="footnotetag239" name="footnotetag239"></a><a href="#footnote239" title="Go to footnote 239"><span class="smaller">[239]</span></a> Asker, the Prior, was slain in
+     the vestry, and Dom Lethwyn, Sub-prior, in the refectory. Behind
+     him there followed close Brother Turgar, a ten year child,
+     shapely, and of a fair countenance; who, when he saw his superior
+     slain, besought earnestly that he too might be slain with him.
+     But Earl Sidroc the Younger, touched with pity for the lad,
+     stripped him of his cowl, and gave him a Danish cloak, bidding
+     him follow everywhere his steps.... And thus, out of all who
+     abode in the Monastery, old and young, he alone was saved; coming
+     and going amongst the Danes throughout all his sojourn amongst
+     them, even as one of themselves, through this Earl's favour and
+     protection.</p>
+
+     <p>"Now when all the monks had been done to death by the torturers,
+     and no whit of the Abbey treasures shown thereby, the Danes, with
+     spades and ploughshares, brake open right and left all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints round about that of St. Guthlac. On the
+     right was that of St. Cissa, priest and anchorite, and of St.
+     Bettelin, a man of God, erst an attendant on St. Guthlac, and of
+     Dom Siward (the Abbot) of blessed memory. And on the left was
+     that of St. Egbert, St. Guthlac's scribe and confessor, and of
+     St. Tatwin, the pilot who guided St. Guthlac to Crowland.... All
+     these did the savages burst open, looking to find treasure
+     therein. And finding none, they were filled with indignation; and
+     piling up all these holy bodies on a heap, in piteous wise, they
+     set fire to them, and, on the third day after their coming, that
+     is to say, on the 7th of the Kalends of October (September 25),
+     they utterly consumed them, church and monastery and all.</p>
+
+     <p>"But on the fourth day off they went, with countless droves of
+     beasts and pack-horses, to Medehampstead (Peterborough). And
+     there, dashing at the outer precinct of the Monastery, with its
+     barred gates, they assailed the walls on every side with arrows
+     and machines. At the second assault the Heathen brake in, and, in
+     the very breach, Tubba, the brother of Earl Hubba, fell
+     grievously wounded by a stone cast. By the hands of his guards he
+     was borne into the tent of Hubba his brother, and despaired even
+     of life. Then did Hubba's rage boil over, and he was altogether
+     wild against the monks, so that he slew with his own hand every
+     soul clad in the religious habit; the rest sprang upon the rest;
+     not one in the whole Monastery was saved; both the venerable
+     Abbot Hedda, and all his monks, and all the lay-brethren were
+     massacred; and Brother Turgar was warned by his master, Earl
+     Sidroc, never anywhere to cross the path of Earl Hubba. Every
+     altar was uprooted, every monument broken in pieces, the great
+     library of holy books burnt, the plenteous store of monastic
+     papers scattered to the winds; the precious relics of the holy
+     virgins Kineburgh, Kinswith, and Tibba,<a id="footnotetag240" name="footnotetag240"></a><a href="#footnote240" title="Go to footnote 240"><span class="smaller">[240]</span></a> trodden under foot;
+     the walls utterly overthrown; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page395" name="page395"></a>(p. 395)</span> the buildings burnt up,
+     church and all, blazing with a bright flame for five whole days
+     after.</p>
+
+     <p>"Then on the fourth day the Host drew together, with spoil beyond
+     tale from all the country round, and set off towards Huntingdon.
+     The two Sidroc Earls, at the crossing of the rivers, ever came
+     last, to guard the rear of the whole army. Now all their host had
+     passed over the river Nene safely; but, as they were themselves
+     crossing, they had the bad luck to lose two carts, laden with
+     untold wealth and plenishing, which sank in a deep eddy of the
+     stream to the left of the stone bridge, so that horses and all
+     were drowned before they could be got out. And while the whole
+     household of Earl Sidroc the younger was busied in drawing out
+     these same carts, and in transferring the spoil to other waggons
+     and carriages, Brother Turgar slipped away and fled to the
+     neighbouring forest. All night did he walk, and with the earliest
+     dawn came into Crowland. There he found his fellow monks, who had
+     got back from Thorney the day before, and were hard at work
+     putting out the fires, which still had the mastery in many of the
+     ruins of the Monastery.</p>
+
+     <p>"And when they saw him safe and sound they were somewhat
+     comforted; but on hearing from him where their Abbot and the
+     other Superiors and Brethren lay slain, and how all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints were broken down, and all the monuments,
+     and all the holy books and all the sacred bodies burnt up, all
+     were stricken with grief unspeakable; and long was the
+     lamentation and mourning that was made. Satiated at length with
+     weeping, they turned again to putting out the conflagration. And
+     when they raised the ruins of the church roof about the High
+     Altar, they found the body of their venerable father and abbot,
+     Theodore, beheaded, stripped, half burnt, and bruised, and
+     crushed into the earth by the fallen timbers. This was on the
+     eighth day after his murder, and a little away from the spot
+     where he was slaughtered. And the other ministers, who fell with
+     him, found they in like manner crushed into the ground by the
+     weight of the beams&mdash;all save Wulfric the taper-bearer.</p>
+
+     <p>"But not all at once. For the bodies of some of the Brethren were
+     not found till half a year after their martyrdom, and not in the
+     places where they were slain. For Dom Paulinus and Dom Herbert,
+     very old men, and decrepit, whose hands were cut off and
+     themselves tortured to death in the Choir, were found, after a
+     diligent search, not there but in the Chapterhouse. In like
+     manner Dom Grimketyl and Dom Egmund, both some hundred years old,
+     who had been thrust through with swords in the Cloister, were
+     found in the Parlour. And the rest too, both children and old
+     men, were sought for in divers places, even as Brother Turgar
+     told just how each had been slain; and at last were all found,
+     with many a doleful plaint and many a tear, save Wulfric only.
+     And Dom Brickstan, once the Precentor of the monastery, a most
+     skilful musician and poet, who was amongst the survivors, wrote
+     on the ashes of Crowland that Lament which is so well known and
+     begins thus:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">'</span>Desolate how dost thou sit, who late wast Queen among Houses<br>
+  Church so noble of old; erst so beloved of God.'</p>
+
+<p class="poem20">
+<span class="min33em">(</span>Quomodo sola sedes, dudum regina domorum,<br>
+  Nobilis ecclesia, et nuper amica Dei).</p>
+
+     <p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page396" name="page396"></a>(p. 396)</span> "Now when the Monastery, after long and hard work, was
+     cleared, so far as was then possible, from filth and ashes, they
+     took counsel on choosing them a Pastor; and when the election was
+     held, the venerable Father Godric, though much against his will,
+     was made Abbot. To him came that venerable old man Toretus, the
+     Prior of Thorney, and his Sub-prior, Dom Tissa, both anchorites
+     of the utmost sanctity. And devoutly they prayed him that he
+     would deign to take with him certain Brethren and come to
+     Peterborough, and give, of his charity, Christian burial to the
+     bodies of their Abbot and the other Brethren, which yet remained
+     unburied and exposed to beasts and birds. The Abbot gave heed
+     unto their prayer, and with many of the brethren (amongst them
+     Brother Turgar) came unto Peterborough, where all the Brethren of
+     Thorney met him. And with much labour the bodies of all the monks
+     of that Monastery were got together, 84 by tale, and buried in
+     one wide grave in the midst of the Abbey cemetery, over against
+     what was once the East End of the Church. This was on St.
+     Cecilia's day (November 22).</p>
+
+     <p>"And over the body of the Abbot, as he lay amid his children, he
+     placed a three-sided stone, three feet high and three long and
+     one broad, bearing carved likenesses of the Abbot, and his monks
+     standing around him. And this stone, in memory of the ruined
+     Abbey, bade he thenceforward to be called Medehampstead. And once
+     in every year, while he lived, did he visit it; and, pitching his
+     tent above the stone, said Mass for two days with instant
+     devotion for the souls of those there buried.</p>
+
+     <p>"Through the midst of that cemetery there ran the King's highway
+     (<i>Via Regia</i>); and this stone was on the right thereof, as one
+     comes up from the aforesaid stone bridge towards Holland (S.E.
+     Lincolnshire); and on the left stood a stone cross bearing a
+     carven image of the Saviour; which our Abbot Godric then set
+     there, to the intent that travellers who passed by might be
+     mindful of that holy Abbey, and pray to the Lord for the souls of
+     the Faithful who lay in that cemetery."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Abbot of Thorney was also "mitred," and the House ranked as second
+only to Ely in the county. William of Malmesbury (<span class="smcap">A.D.</span> 1135) describes
+it as "a little paradise, delightsome as heaven itself may be deemed,
+fen-circled, yet rich in loftiest trees, where water-meadows delight
+the eye with rich green, where streamlets glide unchecked through each
+field. Scarce a spot of ground lies there waste; here are orchards,
+there vineyards. Nature vies with culture, and what is unknown to the
+one is produced by the other. And what of the glorious buildings,
+whose very size it is a wonder that the ground can support amid such
+marshes? A vast solitude is here the monks' lot, that they may the
+more closely cling to things above. If a woman is there seen, she is
+counted a monster, but strangers, if men, are greeted as angels
+unawares. Yet there none speaketh, save for the moment; all is holy
+silence.... Truly I may call that island a hostel of chastity,
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page397" name="page397"></a>(p. 397)</span> a tavern of honesty, a gymnasium of divine philosophy. From
+its dense thickets it is called Thorney."</p>
+
+<p>At the draining of the Fens, in the seventeenth century, Thorney was
+assigned to the Earls (now Dukes) of Bedford, who, during the
+nineteenth century alone, have expended on their Thorney estates
+nearly £2,000,000. Yet the Thorney property does not even pay its way.
+The noble owners have, however, their reward in the genuine success
+which has crowned the experiment from a philanthropic point of view.
+Thanks to their efforts, Thorney is again, as in the old days of the
+Benedictines, a smiling, well-wooded oasis amid the dreary Fenland;
+where the welfare of the tenantry is, as of old, the chief object of
+the landlord, and where, in consequence, pauperism, drunkenness, and
+crime are alike practically unknown. The remains of the Abbey Church
+are still used for parochial worship, but only 117 of its original 290
+feet of length have survived Henry the Eighth's demolitions.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page398" name="page398"></a>(p. 398)</span> CHAPTER XIX</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Draining of Fens.&mdash;Monastic Works, Morton's Leam.&mdash;Diversion of
+     Ouse.&mdash;Local Government, Jurats, Discontent.&mdash;Jacobean
+     polemics.&mdash;First Drainage Company.&mdash;Rising of Fen-men.&mdash;Second
+     Company, Huguenot Labourers.&mdash;Third Company, Earl of Bedford,
+     Vermuyden.&mdash;Old River.&mdash;Cromwell.&mdash;Fourth Company, Prisoner
+     Slaves, New River, Denver Sluice.&mdash;Later Developments.</p>
+
+<p>The thought of the Fenland Abbeys leads on to the fascinating story of
+the draining of the fens. For the monks were the first to reclaim from
+the morass such little patches of ground as each Abbey could bank in,
+and to discover how very fertile such reclaimed soil is. Their early
+chronicles speak with rapture of the hay that could be mown three
+times a year, and the amazing fecundity of the corn-land. Thus it was
+their interest constantly to be enclosing fresh acres. They
+discovered, too, that by judiciously letting in the flood water on to
+a field they could get a fresh deposit of silt, and gradually raise
+the level of the soil. And the first attempt at drainage work on a
+large scale was also due to a monk, Bishop Morton, Abbot of Ely, who
+in 1480 cut the twelve mile long "Leam," or channel, which still bears
+his name, to divert the River Nene from its long meandering course
+through Whittlesea Mere and Outwell, and to bring it straight to
+Wisbech.</p>
+
+<p>Thus it came about that the reclamation of the fens went hand in hand
+with the prosperity of the Abbeys around them. When these were
+prosperous, the whole district prospered; when misfortune befell them,
+the fens likewise suffered; and it often took many years for the marks
+of the ruin to be effaced. After the wholesale destruction wrought by
+the great Danish raid of 870, centuries did not suffice for this. The
+story we have just told of the sack of Crowland clearly <span class="pagenum"><a id="page399" name="page399"></a>(p. 399)</span>
+shows that the place was then accessible by land. But in the hundred
+and fifty years of desolation that followed, such works as the
+brethren had effected fell into decay, and the land once more became
+waterlogged. Even when William of Malmesbury wrote, in the twelfth
+century, he tells us that Crowland could still only be reached by
+boat. And the yet more wholesale destruction wrought by Henry the
+Eighth was followed by a like period of reversion to waste.</p>
+
+<p>The zeal, however, of these early civilisers was not always according
+to knowledge; and at quite an early date a grievous mistake was made,
+which caused endless difficulties ever after, and still affects the
+whole drainage system of the district. This was the cutting, at some
+date between 1215 and 1270, of a leam, not two miles long, from the
+Great Ouse at Littleport to the Little Ouse,<a id="footnotetag241" name="footnotetag241"></a><a href="#footnote241" title="Go to footnote 241"><span class="smaller">[241]</span></a> thereby diverting
+the waters of the former into the channel of the latter, and bringing
+their united volume into the sea at Lynn. Before that date the Great
+Ouse ran from Littleport to Outwell, where it was met by the Nene, and
+by a branch of the Little Ouse. The joint river was called the Well
+Stream, and poured into the sea at Wisbech.</p>
+
+<p>That this had been the age-long course of the Fenland waters is shown
+by the existence of a huge Roman sea wall running round the old coast
+line from Lynn to Wisbech, and from Wisbech to Sutton in Lincolnshire.
+This wall traces for us the outline of a great tidal estuary running
+up to Wisbech, which continued an estuary even to the eighteenth
+century. But the diversion of the greater part of its river water to
+Lynn proved fatal to it. Such stream as was left, scarcely more than
+that of the Nene, could not, at the ebb, scour out the channel through
+the sands which the flood-tide continually tended to silt up. Wisbech
+became more and more shut off from the sea, and is now ten miles away
+from it. And further, the inability to escape quickly enough through
+these choking sands drove the river water at Wisbech back upon itself
+and forced it to "drown" the neighbouring fens; while at Lynn the same
+disastrous effect was produced by the new volume of water being too
+great for the narrow bed of the Little Ouse and flooding over the
+banks all round. The Marshland, as the Norfolk district protected by
+the Roman wall was called, suffered especially from this result of
+interfering with Nature.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page400" name="page400"></a>(p. 400)</span> Nor did it prove possible to undo the mischief. When once a
+short cut has been made for a great river, it is no easy matter to
+turn the stream back into its old tortuous course; and, when once an
+estuary has got thoroughly silted up, it is yet more difficult to
+restore it to its old condition. Throughout the Middle Ages constant
+complaints were made, and occasional attempts; but these were always
+brought to nought by some conflicting interest or other which got the
+ear of the Government. The fen problem was early recognised as a
+matter of national concern, and, from the time of Edward the First
+onwards, the Crown tried to grapple with it, but by hopelessly futile
+methods.</p>
+
+<p>To begin with, the system of Local Government already established for
+the regulation of Romney Marsh in Kent was extended to the Fenland.
+The Sheriff was bound to summon twenty-four "jurats" from the
+inhabitants of the neighbourhood, to deal with each difficulty as it
+arose. But a plan which worked well enough for a district only some
+ten miles by fifteen, and with no river to speak of, was wholly
+inadequate to deal with the huge area and mighty forces of the
+Fenland, even when this was divided (as it still is for drainage
+purposes) into three "Levels," "North," "Middle," and "South." The
+jurats hated their invidious office, and were themselves hated by the
+inhabitants; each man always declaring that they had saddled him with
+repairs which ought to have been laid upon some neighbour, and each
+man ready to see his own land "drown" rather than put in a single
+spadeful of work which, in his view, should have been someone else's
+job.</p>
+
+<p>Besides, the drain or the dam or the embankment which was good for one
+set of interests was bad for another. We have seen how Cambridge
+complained of the erection of Denver Sluice; and like grievances fill
+page after page of the Plantagenet Rolls. The men of Lynn complain
+that whereas they were of old able to sail straight to Peterborough,
+only thirty miles, they now have to go round by Littleport, over fifty
+miles, owing to the erection of a dam by the jurats. And, again, that
+a new cut has so diverted the waters that they can no longer take
+"navigable" (<i>i.e.</i> sea-going) vessels to Yaxley and Holme in
+Huntingdonshire, "whereby our trade is greatly decayed." Loud and
+incessant are the cries from all quarters (except Lynn alone) to
+"bring back the waters into their <span class="pagenum"><a id="page401" name="page401"></a>(p. 401)</span> natural outfall" at
+Wisbech. But this, as we have said, had become beyond the power of
+man; and, despite the well-meant efforts of the unhappy jurats, and of
+such philanthropists as Bishop Morton, things kept getting worse
+decade by decade; till the suppression of the Abbeys completed the
+ruin, and the fens became the dismal tangle of decayed waterways,
+small and great, new and old, artificial and natural, usable and
+unusable, the unravelling of which occupied the next three centuries.</p>
+
+<p>Feeble efforts were locally made here and there to control the waters;
+but, as the historian Carter puts it, the next wet and windy winter
+"down comes the bailiff of Bedford (for so the country people call the
+overflowing of the river Ouse), attended, like a person of quality,
+with many servants (the accession of tributary brooks), and breaks
+down all their paper banks as not waterproof, reducing all to their
+former condition." He goes on to give a vivid description of the
+puzzle-headed conservatism with which the reformers had to contend:</p>
+
+<div class="quote">
+     <p>"This accident put the wits of that and succeeding ages upon the
+     dispute of the feasibility of the design; and let us sum up the
+     arguments for and against this great undertaking.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 1. Some objected that God said to the water, 'Hitherto
+     shalt thou come, and no further.' It is therefore a trespass on
+     the Divine prerogative, for man to presume to give other bounds
+     to the water than what God hath appointed.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 1. The argument holdeth in application to the Ocean,
+     which is a wild horse, only to be broke, backed, and bridled by
+     Him who is the Maker thereof; but it is a false and lazy
+     principle if applied to fresh waters, from which human industry
+     may and hath rescued many considerable parcels of ground.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 2. Many have attempted but not effected it. None ever
+     wrestled with it, but it gave them a foil, if not a fall, to the
+     bruising, if not breaking, of their backs. Many have burnt their
+     fingers in these waters, and instead of draining the Fens have
+     emptied their own pockets.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 2. Many men's undertaking thereof implies the possibility
+     of the project; for it is not likely so many wise men should seek
+     for what is not to be found; the failing is not in the
+     improbability of the design, but in the undertakers either
+     wanting heads or hearts to pursue, or pay the people employed
+     therein.</p>
+
+     <p class="lspaced2">************</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 4. An alderman of Cambridge affirmed the Fens to be
+     like a crust of bread swimming in a dish of water. So that under
+     eight or ten feet earth it is nothing but mere water. Impossible
+     therefore the draining thereof, if surrounded by that liquid
+     element both above and below.</p>
+
+     <p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page402" name="page402"></a>(p. 402)</span> "Answer 4. Interest betrayed his judgment to an evident
+     error, and his brains seemed rather to swim than the floating
+     earth; for such as have sounded the depth of that ground find it
+     to be Terra Firma, and no doubt so solid to the centre as any
+     other earth in England.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 5. The river Grant or Cam (call it what you will),
+     running by Cambridge, will have its stream dried up by the
+     draining of the Fens. Now, as Cambridge is concerned in its
+     river, so that whole County, yea, this whole Kingdom, is
+     concerned in Cambridge. No reason, therefore, that private men's
+     particular profit should be preferred before an universal good,
+     or good of an University.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 5. It is granted the water by Cambridge kindles and keeps
+     in the fire therein; no hope of sufficient fuel on reasonable
+     rates, except care be taken for preserving the River navigable;
+     which may be done and the Fens drained nevertheless. To take away
+     the thief is no wasting or weakening of the wick of the candle.
+     Assurances may be given that no damage shall rebound to the
+     stream of Grant by stopping other superfluous waters.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 6. The Fens preserved in their present property afford
+     great plenty and variety of fish and fowl, which have therein
+     their seminaries and nurseries; the which will be destroyed on
+     the draining thereof, so that none will be had but at excessive
+     prices.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 6. A large first makes recompense for the shorter second
+     course of any man's table. And who will not prefer a tame sheep
+     before a wild duck? a good fat ox before a well-grown eel?</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 7. The Fens afford plenty of sedge, turf, and reed; the
+     want whereof will be found if their nature be altered.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 7. These commodities are inconsiderable to balance the
+     profit of good grass and grain, which those grounds, if drained,
+     will produce. He cannot complain of wrong, who hath a suit of
+     buckram taken from him, and one of velvet given instead thereof.
+     Besides, provision may be made that a sufficiency of such
+     ware-trash may still be preserved.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 8. Many thousands of poor people are maintained by
+     fishing and fowling in the Fens, which will all be at a loss for
+     a livelihood if their farms be burnt; that is, if the Fens be
+     drained.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 8. It is confessed that many who love idleness live (and
+     only live) by that employment. But such, if the Fens were
+     drained, would quit their idleness, and betake themselves to more
+     lucrative manufactures.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 9. Grant that the Fens be drained with great
+     difficulty, they will quickly revert to their old condition, like
+     to the Pontine Marshes in Italy.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 9. If a patient, perfectly cured, will be careless of his
+     healthe, none will pity his relapse. Moderate cost, with constant
+     care, will easily preserve what is drained; the Low Countries
+     affording many proofs thereof.</p>
+
+     <p>"Argument 10. Grant them drained and so continuing; as now the
+     great fishes prey upon the less, so then wealthy men would devour
+     the poorer sort of people; injurious partage would follow upon
+     the inclosures, and rich men (to make room for themselves) would
+     jostle the poor people out of their Commons.</p>
+
+     <p>"Answer 10. Oppression is not essential either to draining or
+     enclosing, though too often a concomitant of both. Order may be
+     taken by <span class="pagenum"><a id="page403" name="page403"></a>(p. 403)</span> Commissioners of quality, impowered for that
+     purpose, that such a proportion of Commons may be allotted to the
+     poor that all private persons may be pleased and advance accrue
+     hereby to the Commonwealth."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The outcome of these vigorous polemics was that King James the First
+threw himself whole-heartedly into the idea of a general drainage
+scheme; and under his auspices a Company of "Adventurers" or
+"Undertakers" was formed to carry out the business. This, however, was
+regarded by the Fen-men as an unmitigated piece of tyranny; the
+Opposition in Parliament made violent protests; "Libellers" wrote
+inflammatory broadsides inciting the Fen-men to rise;<a id="footnotetag242" name="footnotetag242"></a><a href="#footnote242" title="Go to footnote 242"><span class="smaller">[242]</span></a> and the
+Fen-men, who wanted little inciting, did rise in no small numbers.
+Nocturnal raids destroyed every work begun by the Company's labourers;
+the labourers themselves were intimidated; and before long progress
+became impossible. The Company became bankrupt, and the thousands of
+reclaimed acres which were to have been divided amongst the
+"Adventurers" never actualised.</p>
+
+<a id="img096" name="img096"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/img096.jpg">
+<img src="images/img096tb.jpg" width="500" height="318" alt="" title=""></a>
+<p>THE OLD FENLAND<br>
+(Northern District)</p>
+</div>
+
+<a id="img097" name="img097"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<a href="images/img097.jpg">
+<img src="images/img097tb.jpg" width="500" height="318" alt="" title=""></a>
+<p>THE OLD FENLAND<br>
+(Southern District)</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The Crown, however, did not lose sight of the scheme. A special
+Commission of enquiry was formed, which sent in a most pessimistic
+Report, representing Wisbech as demanding that the "upland men" should
+contribute to the scouring of the outfall there, inasmuch as it
+drained their lands, to which the upland men retorted that Wisbech
+might mind its own business <span class="pagenum"><a id="page406" name="page406"></a>(p. 406)</span> and bear its own burdens.
+"Hence the country about Crowland and Thorney, formerly good ground,
+hath become mere Lerna,<a id="footnotetag243" name="footnotetag243"></a><a href="#footnote243" title="Go to footnote 243"><span class="smaller">[243]</span></a>&mdash;which doth not only cause overflowing in
+the upland country, to their infinite loss, but the Islanders
+themselves are in like danger, as for their cattle and their own
+safety; out of fear whereof they oftentimes, upon the swelling of the
+waters, ring their bells backward, as in other places when the town is
+on fire."</p>
+
+<p>So things dragged on till 1620, when another Company was formed by the
+King, again doomed to speedy failure.<a id="footnotetag244" name="footnotetag244"></a><a href="#footnote244" title="Go to footnote 244"><span class="smaller">[244]</span></a> Ten years later again,
+Charles the First took up his father's idea, and formed a third
+Company, placing at its head the powerful Earl of Bedford. His first
+act was to call in a Dutch engineer, Cornelius Vermuyden, acquainted
+with the drainage methods so successful in Holland, whose fee was an
+award of no less than 95,000 acres in the lands he might reclaim.
+Under the auspices of this expert was dug from Earith to Denver the
+Old Bedford River already spoken of.<a id="footnotetag245" name="footnotetag245"></a><a href="#footnote245" title="Go to footnote 245"><span class="smaller">[245]</span></a> But the local opposition was
+still too strong, fostered as it now was by the powerful influence of
+Oliver Cromwell; and it was not lessened when the King himself bought
+up the Company. His action was represented as one more encroachment
+upon the liberties of England, and a regular part of the Puritan
+programme was "to break the King's dykes, to drown his lands, and to
+destroy his tenants." These drastic measures proved only too
+effective; and, with the outbreak of the Civil War, this third
+attempt, like those before it, came to nought.</p>
+
+<p>When, however, that war was over, and Charles beheaded, Cromwell
+himself, now Lord Protector of the Realm, came forward as an advocate
+of the scheme, and formed yet a fourth Company, again under the Earl
+of Bedford, who had followed his fortunes, and again with Vermuyden
+for engineer. This time the result was permanent. Cromwell was, as the
+Fen-men speedily discovered, a far more dangerous personage to bully
+than they had found his predecessors at the head of the State.
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page407" name="page407"></a>(p. 407)</span> Troopers were quartered upon the malcontents, and a
+plentiful supply of extra cheap labour was furnished by the penal
+servitude of Scotch prisoners taken at Dunbar and Dutch sailors
+captured by Blake in the Channel. This method of making war pay its
+own expenses was familiar to Cromwell, who had already sold many
+shiploads of these gallant enemies as slaves, some to toil under the
+lash for the West Indian planters, some to tug at the oars of Venetian
+galleys. Happily, as he was the first Christian commander to adopt
+this all too thrifty procedure, so he was the last, and such atrocious
+exploitation of fellow Christians and fellow soldiers died with him.</p>
+
+<p>Thus was dug, in 1651, the New Bedford River, and thus was built,
+somewhat later, Denver Sluice. Vermuyden's plan, which continued for
+two centuries to be gradually developed on the lines he originally
+laid down, was to cut a few main water-courses through the district,
+running at a higher level than the swamps around, with Lynn for their
+chief outfall, and an infinite number of short straight cuts at right
+angles to these, whence the water draining from the morass should be
+pumped into them. This pumping was originally done by windmills, and a
+picturesque sight it was to see their white sails dotting the wide
+expanse. But all are now superseded by the less poetical but more
+dependable steam pumping stations, whose tall chimneys form a notable
+object in the Fenland landscape.</p>
+
+<p>The work was very gradual, with many drawbacks. The Denver Sluice, on
+which the whole plan depended, was, as has been said, destroyed in
+1713, and not rebuilt till 1750, when the very towns which had most
+rejoiced in its fall were the loudest in demanding its replacement.
+Other calamities also affected the work, which was not finally
+completed till towards the end of the nineteenth century. The
+opposition, too, was unceasing, though it took the form of lawsuits
+rather than violence. But this, too, died out. The very last of them
+was an attempt by Wisbech, in 1844, to force the hand of the Bedford
+Level Corporation (as the old Company of Adventurers is now called) by
+proposing a rival scheme in Parliament.</p>
+
+<p>Now, however, all is victory. For many years past the reclaimed fen
+has borne excellent crops; and if, since the agricultural depression
+of the later nineteenth century decades <span class="pagenum"><a id="page408" name="page408"></a>(p. 408)</span> set in, it can no
+longer merit so fully as it did the title of "the Golden Plain of
+England," yet the widespread cultivation of fruit and flowers (mostly
+narcissus) has furnished no small compensation, and the district as a
+whole enjoys a very large share of prosperity. At this moment the vast
+areas allotted to the great Adventurers are being largely broken up
+into small holdings, with the happiest results.</p>
+
+<p>Sentimentally, and even to a certain extent economically, we may
+regret the Fenland of old, with its vanished wealth of picturesque
+life; its reeds which made such splendid thatch, its marsh flowers,
+its butterflies, its shoals of fish, its endless skeins of wild-fowl,
+its clever "decoys" where these were taken in such exhaustless numbers
+that a single one (in 1750) sent up to London 3000 couples a week and
+let for £500 a year. But with these have also vanished the incessant
+fever and ague and rheumatism which were an ever-present torment in
+the old Fen life, and the incessant opium-eating in which the Fen-Folk
+were fain to find relief. Taking things altogether, the gain has
+outweighed the loss in the draining of the Fens.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page409" name="page409"></a>(p. 409)</span> CHAPTER XX</h3>
+
+<p class="chaptitle">Coveney.&mdash;Manea.&mdash;Doddington.&mdash;March, Angel
+     Roof.&mdash;Whittlesea.&mdash;Old Course of Ouse, Well Stream.&mdash;Upwell,
+     Outwell.&mdash;Emneth.&mdash;Elm.&mdash;The Marshland.&mdash;West
+     Walton.&mdash;Walsoken.&mdash;Walpole.&mdash;Cross
+     Keys.&mdash;Leverington.&mdash;Tydd.&mdash;Wisbech, Church, Trade, Castle,
+     Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson.&mdash;The Wash.&mdash;King John.</p>
+
+<p>In close contiguity to the Island of Ely, on the west, is a tiny
+satellite, which supports the little village of Coveney. Here the
+church has some remarkable modern woodwork from Oberammergau, the gift
+of Mr. Athelstan Riley. The pulpit is also remarkable, dating from
+1703 and being of Danish work. More remote are Manea and Stonea, both,
+happily for themselves, now on a railway line, but otherwise
+unspeakably inaccessible. It is strange at Manea to see the towers of
+Ely a short five miles away, and to know that twenty miles of bad road
+will scarcely get you there. Both names seem to have the same
+signification, Stone Island; which (as they are eminently unstony,
+being merely low elevations of gravel) may perhaps refer to the
+selenite crystals with which the ground here teems. Manea Station is
+one of the few inland places where the curvature of the earth can be
+clearly seen. The line (towards March) is perfectly straight and
+perfectly level, and along it you may observe the trains rising into
+sight over the horizon like ships at sea.</p>
+
+<p>March stands on a much larger island, seven miles in length. At its
+southern extremity is Doddington, where the fine Early English church
+was once the richest in England. It was the Mother Church of a wide
+district, including its whole island and the fens for miles around. As
+these were drained so did the value of the benefice increase, till it
+became worth over £7,000 per annum. Parliament then stepped in, and
+divided <span class="pagenum"><a id="page410" name="page410"></a>(p. 410)</span> the parish (and income) into seven Rectories, three
+of these being in the town of March, a modern growth around its
+important railway junction at the furthest northern point of the
+island. A fourth is Old March, a quiet "village-hamlet" (as Cardinal
+Wolsey calls it) two miles south of its larger offspring. The church
+here is most exceptionally beautiful. It is a Perpendicular structure,
+with a fine crocketed spire and flint patterns in the outer walls of
+the clerestory. The roof is beyond all magnificent, with "an
+innumerable company of Angels" along its vista of double hammer-beams.
+A brass commemorates William Dredeman, the donor of this crowning
+glory, who died in 1503; and there is another to Catharine Hansard,
+1517, on which the Annunciation is depicted. The church is dedicated
+to St. Wendreda, a purely local saint.<a id="footnotetag246" name="footnotetag246"></a><a href="#footnote246" title="Go to footnote 246"><span class="smaller">[246]</span></a> The Parish account-books
+here give a striking picture of the mutations of the Reformation
+period. There are payments "for pluckynge doun emags [images] in ye
+Chyrch and for drynkynge thereat" (1547); "for breckyng down the Altar
+and carrying forth ye stons" (1550); "for makyng the Hy Alter" (1553);
+"for pulling doun ye hy alter" (1558); and "for a comunion tabull"
+(1559).</p>
+
+<p>March is the half-way house between Ely and Peterborough, and between
+it and the last-named lies Whittlesea, also on a good-sized island of
+its own, which extends nearly to the Northamptonshire mainland. It is
+a pleasant little town, with a picturesque market place, where the
+ancient Market House still rises in the centre. And its church almost
+rivals that of March, with a still more glorious spire. In 1335
+Whittlesea was the scene of a most unedifying conflict between the
+Abbeys of Ramsey and Ely. To begin with, the Abbot of Ramsey and his
+monks raided the lands at Whittlesea belonging to Ely, drove away
+sixteen horses, and (by firing the sedge) burned twenty others,
+besides ten oxen, eighty cows, and one hundred swine, along with much
+grass, reeds, and other property. In retaliation for this outrage the
+Prior of Ely (and he, too, the saintly Prior Crauden) organised a
+regular military expedition, and came, at the head of the whole Abbey
+musters, "with banners flying as in war," to Ramsey itself, where, as
+that House complains, he "hewed down our woods, depastured our grass,
+and drove off our cattle." Both <span class="pagenum"><a id="page411" name="page411"></a>(p. 411)</span> parties appealed to the
+King; but the discreditable transaction seems to have ended in a
+compromise. That such wild work should be possible at all in England
+reminds us that at this date the country had not yet recovered from
+the confusions attendant on the fall and murder of Edward the Second
+eight years before.</p>
+
+<p>Till the latter part of the nineteenth century Whittlesea gave its
+name to a famous mere, lying to the south of the town, and on the very
+border of the fens. It was a sheet of shallow water a couple of miles
+in length and breadth, and furnished a splendid field for angling,
+skating, and boat-sailing. Its shallowness made it none the less
+dangerous; for the bottom was fathomless ooze, so soft that the
+punting poles used here had to be furnished with a round board at
+their extremities, and demanded special skill, for if you once let
+this board get underneath the mud, it was much more likely to pull you
+in than you to pull it out.</p>
+
+<p>Other islets of the fen archipelago are Murrow, between Thorney and
+Wisbech, Westry near March, and Welney, on the Old Bedford river to
+the north of Manea. The name of the last reminds us that by it ran the
+old Well Stream, long robbed of its waters by their diversion to Lynn
+in the thirteenth century. To this day, however, its course may be
+traced on the map by the meandering boundary between Cambridgeshire
+and Norfolk across the fen. Following this line northwards we shortly
+come to the outskirts of the firm ground on which Wisbech stands, an
+<i>artificial</i> island dating from Roman times and owing its existence to
+the great Roman sea wall around the Wash.</p>
+
+<p>Through this island ran the great Well Stream, giving their names to
+the villages (or rather the village, for they form a continuous row of
+houses) of Upwell and Outwell. This is the longest village in England,
+stretching on either side of the road for nearly five unbroken miles.
+It contains over 5,000 inhabitants, and lies partly in Cambridgeshire
+partly in Norfolk. The churches are in the latter county, and are
+grand specimens of the splendid series of churches which glorify the
+Marshland, as this district by the Wash has for ages been named. Both
+are of Perpendicular date, with a tower somewhat older. That of Upwell
+has an elaborate turret for the Sanctus bell. The canopy over the
+pulpit is still more elaborate. The roof has <span class="pagenum"><a id="page412" name="page412"></a>(p. 412)</span> a series of
+angels, but far less numerous and effective than those at March. At
+Outwell there is a fine Decorated door, like that of Barrington.</p>
+
+<a id="img098" name="img098"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img098.jpg" width="500" height="314" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Elm Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Emneth, on the further road to Wisbech, also has an angel roof, of
+specially interesting character. Each figure is holding some symbol of
+the Faith; one the Host, another a candlestick, another a Gospel-book.
+At Elm, hard by, may be seen a still more interesting development of
+church architecture. The tower is Early English, enriched on its
+internal face with exquisite shafting, and opening into the nave by an
+Early English arch. But both shafting and arch must have been
+insertions in much older work, for between the two may be seen the
+high-pitched string-course and the rude little window of the original
+Saxon church. The nave is also Early English (clerestory and all,
+which is rare hereabouts), while the chancel is Decorated, with its
+roof higher than that of the nave.</p>
+
+<p>Here at a farm house called Needham Hall (from a famous historic
+mansion formerly on the site) is shown an old table formed of one
+solid piece of oak, on which Oliver Cromwell is said to have once
+slept. When he arrived here at the head of his command during the
+Civil War, he chose this rude couch <span class="pagenum"><a id="page413" name="page413"></a>(p. 413)</span> in preference to the
+best bed in the house, that he might fare no better than his men, who
+were bivouacking in the yard and outhouses.</p>
+
+<p>The churches along the Roman sea-wall on either side of the old Well
+Stream estuary are also of rare magnificence. To the east, in Norfolk,
+we find a series of villages deriving their names from the wall
+itself,&mdash;Walsoken, West Walton, Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St.
+Andrew. In every one of these the church is a joy; above all at West
+Walton, with its bell-tower (fifty yards to the south of the main
+building) uplifted on four graceful arches enriched with dog-tooth
+moulding. Octangular buttresses support the angles, which are
+ornamented with blank lancet arches. The next floor has on each side
+an arcade of three lancets, and the storey above a window of two
+lights beneath an arch of two mouldings, forming a splay of four
+banded pillars. No more perfect gem of composition exists; and the
+Perpendicular parapet which now crowns it very inadequately takes the
+place of the spire which seems to have been purposed by the original
+builder. The church itself displays similar features of Early English
+grace. The nave pillars have Purbeck marble shafts, with beautifully
+foliated capitals, and the clerestory is pierced with seventeen small
+archlets, alternately blind and light.</p>
+
+<p>Walsoken, now practically a suburb of Wisbech, has a Perpendicular
+shell around a Norman nave, which is (next to Norwich Cathedral) the
+best example of the style in all Norfolk. The chancel arch is a
+deservedly famous specimen of Transition work. It springs from six
+banded pillars, and has a soffit exquisitely worked with zig-zags and
+cusps. The screens of the chapels which formerly occupied the east end
+of either aisle are rich Perpendicular woodwork. The roof is also
+Perpendicular, with angels on the transome beams.</p>
+
+<p>Walpole St. Peter's is even more remarkable; for there is actually an
+ancient right of way through it, <i>underneath the Altar</i>. The
+thirteenth century chancel, with its five large Decorated windows on
+either side, ascends by no fewer than eleven steps from the nave to
+make room for this unique passage way. The five windows of the nave
+are of the earliest and best Perpendicular, and its eastern gable is
+crowned with three beautifully proportioned pinnacles. In this parish
+is the hamlet of Cross Keys, the name of which is sometimes supposed
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page414" name="page414"></a>(p. 414)</span> to be connected with St. Peter. But it is much more probably
+the <i>quay</i> at the starting point of the ancient low-tide passage
+across the sands of the estuary which led to Sutton Crosses on the
+Lincolnshire side, five miles away, and which played, as we shall
+shortly tell, so notable a part in English history. From Walpole the
+sea-wall sweeps round by Terrington to Lynn. But here we are far in
+Norfolk. We must not, however, forget that we owe one of our Cambridge
+Colleges to Terrington, for Dr. Gonville, while Vicar here, founded in
+1347 his "College of the Annunciation," the embryo of Caius College.</p>
+
+<a id="img099" name="img099"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img099.jpg" width="500" height="377" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Walpole St. Peter.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>On the Cambridgeshire side of the Well Stream we also find churches
+fully equal to those on the Norfolk bank. Leverington is one specially
+to be noted, with its beautiful steeple, an Early English tower
+surmounted by a Decorated spire so exquisitely proportioned that it
+seems absolutely to melt away into the sky. There is also a fine
+Decorated porch with a stone-roofed parvis <span class="pagenum"><a id="page415" name="page415"></a>(p. 415)</span> chamber of
+original and singular beauty. The chancel is also Decorated, while the
+grand nave is Perpendicular. The font, too, is Perpendicular, an
+octagonal structure of oolite, with richly ornamented niches on every
+face, each containing the head of a saint in high relief. The east
+window of the north aisle retains much of its ancient glass, proving
+it to be a "Jesse" window, tracing the descent of Christ from that
+patriarch through David.</p>
+
+<hr class="hr20">
+
+<p>Tydd St. Giles lies at the northernmost extremity of the Isle of Ely,
+where the "Shire Drain" divides the village from its sister parish of
+Tydd St. Mary in Lincolnshire. Here, too, the church is remarkable,
+having its tower fifty feet beyond the East End, a unique position.
+Like Leverington, it has a specially fine octagonal font, richly
+traceried, and carved with emblems of the Passion and with the arms of
+the See of Ely. In the floor of the nave is a thirteenth century
+gravestone, bearing a floriated cross, and the legend (in Old English
+characters): "Orate.pro.anima.dni John.Fysner,
+cujus.aie.deus.ppiciet.Amen." (Pray for the soul of Mr. John Fysner,
+on whose soul may God be merciful.)</p>
+
+<p>On one of the pillars is a more interesting inscription in rude
+capital letters, much worn. It is in French, and would seem to be of
+the early fourteenth century, when that language was becoming very
+fashionable in England, as our current legal phraseology still shows.
+It runs thus:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p class="poem20">
+  CEST . PILER . CVME<br>
+  NCAT . RICARD . LE . PRE<br>
+  STRE . PRIMER . PRE<br>
+  YEZ . PVR . LVI</p>
+
+<p><i>i.e.</i> in modern French: "Ce pilier commença Ricard le Prêtre
+premièrement. Priez pour lui"; and in English "This pillar Richard the
+Priest first began. Pray for him."</p>
+
+<p>After having told of so much loveliness all around, it is
+disappointing to be obliged to confess that at Wisbech itself, the
+metropolis of the northern Fenland, the church is comparatively
+commonplace. Not that it is otherwise than a fine structure, and, like
+Great Yarmouth, splendidly wide, having a double nave and a double
+chancel; but it is hopelessly outclassed by those in the neighbouring
+villages. The best feature is the <span class="pagenum"><a id="page416" name="page416"></a>(p. 416)</span> tower, which is richly
+ornamented with sacred and heraldic devices of the later Perpendicular
+period. And in the nave is a fine fifteenth century brass. Otherwise
+there is little to say about it; and, indeed, little to say about
+Wisbech at all. It is a picturesque old place, with that somewhat
+pathetic picturesqueness of an ancient seaport town which the sea has
+deserted.</p>
+
+<p>Wisbech, however, is not by any means a "dead city." It has 10,000
+inhabitants, and keen local ambitions, which have developed an
+excellent museum and other up-to-date municipal equipment. Modern
+energy and science have, moreover, made so effective a waterway
+through the ten miles of silted-up estuary that vessels of 3,000 tons
+can now, at high tide, reach the wharf. Such, however, are almost
+unknown visitants. Last year (1909) the vessels clearing from the port
+numbered 209, of 36,000 tons in all. Two of these are registered at
+Wisbech itself, as are also twelve sea-fishing boats. A characteristic
+photograph of Wisbech's shipping is given by Mrs. Hughes in the
+"Geography of Cambridgeshire" (p. 118). Other photographs (pp. 47, 48)
+show the great height to which the tide rises in the river, there
+being a difference of over twenty feet between high and low water
+mark. The Nene still has its outfall here, and flows through the town
+in a fine sweep locally called the Brink.</p>
+
+<p>It is hard to believe that this Brink is not the Beach whence the name
+of the town is vulgarly supposed to be derived. But you must not
+suggest this to a Wisbech man. The single vowel is an integral part of
+local faith and local pride, and to insert the "a" is to show yourself
+a hopeless outsider. With it the name would come from <i>Ouse-beach</i>
+(like Land-beach and Water-beach near Cambridge). Without it the
+derivation is <i>Ouse-beck</i>. This last syllable is a Scandinavian word,
+well known throughout the north of England, and there signifying a
+running brook. Throughout the Fenland it is frequently used for a
+drain. But can the mighty Well Stream of the Ouse, at its tidal
+outfall here, have ever suggested either drain or brook to the men of
+old who named the place? And can these have been Scandinavians?</p>
+
+<a id="img100" name="img100"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img100.jpg" width="400" height="456" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Leverington.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>The chief oversea trade of Wisbech is in timber from Norway; and it
+also does a large traffic in fruit, flowers, and vegetables, which are
+extensively grown hereabouts. In this neighbourhood, moreover, may be
+seen a much rarer cultivated <span class="pagenum"><a id="page417" name="page417"></a>(p. 417)</span> crop, nothing less primitive
+than the woad with which the ancient Britons dyed their bodies; though
+it is a mistake to suppose that this dye took the place of clothing,
+for as far back as history traces them they were quite fairly
+civilised, and used woad only for tattooing, like sailors.<a id="footnotetag247" name="footnotetag247"></a><a href="#footnote247" title="Go to footnote 247"><span class="smaller">[247]</span></a> It is
+now used for dyeing cloth. "An old woad mill, built of turf blocks
+arranged in <span class="pagenum"><a id="page418" name="page418"></a>(p. 418)</span> the ancient herring-bone pattern, with a timber
+and reed-thatched roof, can still be seen at the village of Parson's
+Drove, about six miles from Wisbech. The plant (<i>Isatis tinctoria</i>)
+grows about six feet high, and has a blue-green leaf and bright yellow
+flower; the people still call it by its old name, <i>w&#257;d</i>. The young
+plants are delicate, and the crop requires much care. It is weeded by
+men and women clad in hardened skirts and leathern knee-caps, who
+creep along the ground and take out the weeds with a curious little
+handspade which fits into the palm. The plant is picked by hand. The
+leaves are crushed to a pulp in the mill by rude conical crushing
+wheels dragged round by horses, and are then worked by hand into large
+balls and laid on "fleaks" of twined hazel, or on planks, in special
+sheds, for three months to dry. After this, the balls are thrown
+together, mixed with water and allowed to ferment in a dark house for
+five or six weeks. The woad is then rammed into casks and is ready to
+be sold to cloth manufacturers."<a id="footnotetag248" name="footnotetag248"></a><a href="#footnote248" title="Go to footnote 248"><span class="smaller">[248]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Wisbech plays but little part in history. Its position at the
+convergence of the two great Roman sea-walls, east and west of the
+estuary, makes it pretty certain that they must have had a station
+here; but, if so, it has wholly passed out of memory. Wisbech Castle
+is said to have been built by William the Conqueror, and certainly
+existed in the time of King John. It passed into the possession of the
+Bishops of Ely, and was rebuilt by two famous holders of the See,
+Bishop Morton, the designer and excavator of Morton's Leam,<a id="footnotetag249" name="footnotetag249"></a><a href="#footnote249" title="Go to footnote 249"><span class="smaller">[249]</span></a> and
+Bishop Alcock, the Founder of Jesus College, Cambridge.<a id="footnotetag250" name="footnotetag250"></a><a href="#footnote250" title="Go to footnote 250"><span class="smaller">[250]</span></a> Both
+these prelates were singularly thoroughgoing reformers. The former
+went into minute details about the dress of his clergy, forbidding
+them to wear gaudy attire (such as "lirripoops" or gowns open in front
+like a present-day M.A. gown), and charging them straitly to cut their
+hair "so that all men may see their ears." And the latter was an
+indefatigable pulpiteer; one of his University sermons is recorded to
+have lasted three mortal hours on end.</p>
+
+<a id="img101" name="img101"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img101.jpg" width="400" height="475" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Bell Tower, Tydd St. Giles.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This episcopal connection of Wisbech Castle led to its <span class="pagenum"><a id="page419" name="page419"></a>(p. 419)</span>
+becoming, in the reign of Elizabeth, the final scene of that pathetic
+and lingering tragedy, the fate of the old Catholic Hierarchy of
+England. Such of that hierarchy as were alive at Elizabeth's
+succession were, with one exception, deposed for refusing the Oath of
+Supremacy, to the number of fifteen. <span class="pagenum"><a id="page420" name="page420"></a>(p. 420)</span> Shortly afterwards they
+were imprisoned, not by any process of law but by the Royal fiat, and
+continued under more or less severe restraint for the rest of their
+lives. This was wholly on account of their religion. Lord Burghley, a
+hostile witness (in his <i>Execution of Justice in England</i><a id="footnotetag251" name="footnotetag251"></a><a href="#footnote251" title="Go to footnote 251"><span class="smaller">[251]</span></a>),
+testifies to their blameless characters, describing them as "faithful
+and quiet subjects," "persons of courteous natures," "of great
+modesty, learning and knowledge," "secluded only for their contrary
+opinions in religion, that savour not (like those of the seminary
+priests) of treason."</p>
+
+<p>Yet, though thus inoffensive, their doom was grievously heavy.
+Committed, to begin with, to solitary confinement, in what Froude
+calls "the living death of the Tower" and other London prisons, for
+three or four years, they were afterwards quartered (singly) on the
+Protestant prelates, who were stringently ordered by the Council to
+prevent them from communication, either by word or letter, with
+anyone, and to see that they had neither paper to write withal, nor
+books to read (except Protestant ones). Thus deprived of every
+intellectual, social, and religious solace, "pining away in miserable
+desolation, tossing and shifting from one keeper to another," they one
+by one drooped and died. But all remained steadfast to their Faith;
+and finally the "obstinate" survivors were, in 1580, closely
+imprisoned, along with others in like case, in Wisbech Castle.</p>
+
+<p>Here they were under the charge of Cox, the new Protestant Bishop of
+Ely, who writes of them as "sworn against Christ," and boasts that "if
+walls, locks, and doors can separate them from out-practice they shall
+not want a sufficient provision of each." "Nor let it be thought, as
+some bishops have reported, that I mind to make trade by over-ruling
+such wretches." The "trade" was handed over to a favourite servant, to
+make what he could out of the unhappy prisoners (who, like all
+prisoners in those days, had to be supported by their friends),
+subject only to providing out of his takings £80 per annum for the
+upkeep of two Protestant preachers, "who are well able to set down
+God's anger" against Popery. These preachers <span class="pagenum"><a id="page421" name="page421"></a>(p. 421)</span> (amongst whom
+one regrets to find "Lancelot Andrewes of Pembroke Hall") were ever
+and anon to pester the "recusants" with denunciatory discourses in the
+castle hall. "And the recusants shall be conveyed thither by a secret
+way, without seeing any; and they shall have a secret place for
+themselves to be in, to hear and not be seen.... This is the holy
+ordinance of God."<a id="footnotetag252" name="footnotetag252"></a><a href="#footnote252" title="Go to footnote 252"><span class="smaller">[252]</span></a></p>
+
+<p>Kept with this rigour the Confessors lingered on, year after year,
+till death set them free. The latest to be released were Thomas
+Watson, Bishop of Lincoln, who died in 1584, and Feckenham, the last
+Abbot of Westminster, who died in 1585. Both are buried (as the Parish
+Registers testify) in Wisbech churchyard.</p>
+
+<p>The castle was sold by the See of Ely in 1783, and has since been
+almost wholly pulled down. Nearly at the same date a young man, born
+at Wisbech, was beginning those efforts which have reflected glory on
+his native town, and have revolutionised public opinion throughout the
+civilised world. The man was Thomas Clarkson, and the cause to which
+he devoted his life was the abolition of slavery. That institution, up
+to his time, was regarded as a very foundation of the earth. Rooted in
+the furthest past of man's history, and as world-wide as it was
+ancient, the idea of questioning its place in the eternal fitness of
+things never occurred even to philanthropists. A virtuous man would
+treat his slaves kindly; but as for not having such, he would as soon
+have scrupled at having sheep and oxen, or at employing hired
+servants.</p>
+
+<p>It was left for young Clarkson, while a student at Cambridge, to
+realise that the time was come when, if the human conscience was to
+make any further progress in enlightenment, this hoary iniquity must,
+root and branch, be abolished. On a steep hillside above Wade Mill, in
+the road between Cambridge and London, a monument by the wayside still
+marks the spot where he dismounted from his horse, and, kneeling on
+the ground in the fervour of youthful enthusiasm, solemnly vowed
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page422" name="page422"></a>(p. 422)</span> to God that for this holy object he would live and, if need
+be, die.</p>
+
+<p>At once he set to work. Gathering a band of like-minded friends round
+him (mostly belonging to the so-called Clapham Sect, who were then
+inaugurating the great Evangelical Revival)&mdash;Wilberforce, Zachary
+Macaulay, Babington, Thornton, Buxton, Cropper, and the rest&mdash;he
+started an agitation in and out of Parliament, which carried all
+before it. The Slave Trade was abolished in 1807; on August 1st, 1834,
+slavery itself ceased throughout the British Empire; the example of
+Britain was followed by other European Powers; and finally, in 1864,
+after a last desperate struggle for existence in the American Civil
+War, it was cast forth from its last stronghold in the United States.
+If practised at all now, it is practised under some feigned name and
+elusive system. No civilised man dare any longer proclaim himself an
+avowed slave-driver. Well indeed does Clarkson deserve the monument
+which Wisbech has erected to her glorious son.</p>
+
+<p>At Wisbech, till the reclamation of the neighbouring Washes,
+Cambridgeshire (or rather the Isle of Ely) possessed an actual strip
+of seaboard extending from Wisbech town northward to the county
+boundary between Tydd St. Mary and Tydd St. Giles. This strip was
+itself reclaimed ground, but of far earlier date, due to the era of
+Roman civilisation in Britain. The old coast-line, as has been said,
+is still marked for us by a massive embankment extending from Sutton,
+in Lincolnshire, to Wisbech, and thence to King's Lynn, in Norfolk&mdash;an
+embankment sufficiently old to have given its name to the ancient
+villages along its course. The designations of Walsoken, West Walton,
+Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St. Andrew, all testify to this sea
+wall having been already in existence when the East Anglians, in the
+fifth century, first took possession of the land.</p>
+
+<a id="img102" name="img102"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img102.jpg" width="350" height="506" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>Wisbech Church.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This embankment kept back, to the west and to the east, the tide-water
+of the Well Stream (see p. <a href="#page399">399</a>), a wide inlet of the sea, narrowing
+southward till it reached its extremity at Wisbech, and forming the
+estuary for the united outfall of all the Fenland waterways. In later
+days operations connected with the draining of the fens have diverted
+nearly the whole <span class="pagenum"><a id="page424" name="page424"></a>(p. 424)</span> volume of the Great Ouse and its tributary
+streams to fall into the sea at King's Lynn, and have led the Nene
+straight to Wisbech. But till the thirteenth century was well advanced
+the Ouse and the Nene joined each other near Outwell, the united river
+being called the "Well" or "Well Stream." The names of Upwell,
+Outwell, Welney, &amp;c., still preserve the memory of this old waterway.</p>
+
+<p>The estuary was, of course, tidal, leaving at low water a broad
+expanse of sands, amidst which the shifting channel of the river was
+so far broadened out as to be fordable at certain points; thus
+admitting of passage across the whole breadth of the inlet, even where
+it became five miles wide. The regular track for this passage was from
+the little hamlet of Cross Keys, on the Norfolk coast (the name of
+which is derived from this circumstance) to Sutton Crosses, near the
+village of Long Sutton, on the Lincolnshire side, and is approximately
+marked for us to-day by the line of the Great Northern Railway between
+these spots, traversing the level fields and meadows which have (since
+the year 1830) finally replaced the sands of old.</p>
+
+<p>The conditions of the passage were identical with those to be found
+now at Morecambe Bay. That estuary can also be crossed at low tide;
+but to do so in safety a good deal of local knowledge is essential.
+The right points for fording the river channels must be found, the
+numerous quicksands must be avoided, while the localities of both
+fords and quicksands are constantly changing. It is therefore
+exceedingly rash to make the attempt without guides; for across the
+level sands of every estuary the tide makes with extreme rapidity,
+sometimes coming in before the wind faster than any man can hope to
+outrun it. These guides are professionals, who await on either bank
+the demand for their services.</p>
+
+<p>All this is exactly what is said of the Well Stream "Washes" in
+authorities of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As late as
+1775, though successive reclamations had by that time reduced the
+breadth of the passage by more than half, we hear of the guide "always
+attending at Cross Keys to conduct passengers over, bearing a wand or
+rod in his hand, probably in imitation of Moses, who held a rod when
+he conducted the Israelites through the Red Sea." The rod was
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page425" name="page425"></a>(p. 425)</span> really used for probing the sand in front, lest it should
+prove "quick," and also for taking the bearings on the opposite shore
+by which the course was steered.</p>
+
+<p>It was through neglect of such expert advice that the Well Stream
+estuary became the scene of that dramatic episode in English history,
+which, on the 13th of October in the year 1216, cost King John his
+treasures and his life. The story is narrated by the contemporary
+historian Roger of Wendover, and the Barnwell and Coggeshall
+chroniclers. The whole circumstances have been most carefully and
+minutely elaborated by Mr. St. John Hope, through whose kindness I am
+enabled to use his materials. His able monograph on the subject is to
+be found in Vol. LX. of "Archæologia."</p>
+
+<p>John was, in 1216, at death-grips with the Barons, who, in the
+previous year, had wrung from him the signature of Magna Charta. The
+rights and wrongs of the quarrel were not so wholly one-sided as is
+popularly supposed, and the appeal of both parties to the Pope had not
+sufficed to clear them up. The offer of the Crown by the Barons to
+Louis, Dauphin of France, was for the moment more successful. Most of
+England acknowledged him as King, and even the King of Scots came to
+do homage for his sub-kingdom (as Scotland then was); only a few
+strongholds, notably Windsor Castle, holding out for John and being
+besieged by the Barons.</p>
+
+<p>John himself, however, was still at large, and at the head of a small,
+but very effective, mercenary army of filibusters from all the
+countries of Europe. He met the situation by a campaign of
+extraordinary energy; his object being to relieve his invested
+fortresses by drawing off their assailants to the defence of their own
+lands. Incidentally, desire of revenge, and the need of paying his
+troops by plunder, operated as a further motive for the merciless
+destruction which, in a series of brilliant and ferocious raids, he
+meted out to the districts owned by his opponents. The speed of his
+movements is almost incredible, considering the conditions of travel
+in the thirteenth century; but they can be traced with accuracy by the
+still existing entries in the Patent and Close Rolls; for day by day
+John did not cease to do royal business and to sign the documents
+submitted to him, however far he might have marched since morning. In
+the eyes of his Continental contemporaries <span class="pagenum"><a id="page426" name="page426"></a>(p. 426)</span> this consuming
+energy came to be held his chief characteristic. In the "Dittamondo"
+of the Italian poet, Fazio degli Uberti, written early in the
+fourteenth century, which gives a brief notice of the successive Kings
+of England from the Norman Conquest onwards, the one thing mentioned
+about John is the "hot haste" of his riding.</p>
+
+<p>Hot haste it was, indeed! Week after week the King made his army
+(which, though small, cannot have numbered fewer than two or three
+thousand men) cover distances that would be creditable to a solitary
+bicycle tourist on the macadamised roads of to-day. From Corfe Castle,
+in Dorsetshire, whither he had retreated on the landing of Louis, he
+dashed across England (<i>via</i> Bristol) to Cheshire, ravaged that
+district for over a fortnight, and was back at Corfe within six weeks
+of setting out. The very next day he was off again, and by a
+circuitous route of 155 miles (for his enemies' forces barred the
+direct way) reached Oxford within a week. A few days later another yet
+more wonderful week of 225 miles carried him from Reading to Lincoln;
+his daily stages being Bedford (45 miles), Cambridge (30), Castle
+Hedingham, in Essex (25), Stamford (70), Rockingham (10), and Lincoln
+(50). Here he remained ten days, during which he raised the siege of
+the castle; having also succeeded in relieving Windsor, for the Barons
+who were attacking it hastily broke up, and marched to Cambridge in
+hopes of cutting him off at this strategic point&mdash;the only place, as
+we have said,<a id="footnotetag253" name="footnotetag253"></a><a href="#footnote253" title="Go to footnote 253"><span class="smaller">[253]</span></a> where the Cam was passable for an army. It was
+doubtless to escape this danger that John undertook, on September
+19th, the forced march of 70 miles from Hedingham to Stamford, which
+had perforce to be made <i>via</i> "the Great Bridge" of Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p>Yet another week of marches up and down Lincolnshire, 115 miles in
+all, brought him round the Wash to Lynn (by way of Wisbech); and then
+came the great catastrophe.</p>
+
+<p>It was on Wednesday the 12th of October, 1215, that King John, after
+three days' stay at Lynn, retraced his steps, with his wonted
+celerity, by way of Wisbech, to Swineshead Abbey near Boston, a
+distance of over forty miles. Documents signed by him on this day at
+all three places are to be found in the Patent and Close Rolls. His
+baggage train, which obviously <span class="pagenum"><a id="page427" name="page427"></a>(p. 427)</span> could not have kept up with
+this pace, he ordered to follow by the direct route across the sands.
+We read with some surprise that his flying column was accompanied by
+such a train at all; but the contemporary historians agree in telling
+us of "carts, waggons, and sumpter horses," loaded with the King's
+treasures and properties (including even a portable chapel), and with
+the spoil amassed during this long raid.</p>
+
+<p>Such a train would cover at least a mile on any road, and could only
+move quite slowly, three miles an hour at the very outside. How it
+kept touch with the column at all is a wonder, and we may be sure that
+it could never have done so during the forced march from Hedingham on
+the 19th of September. After that date the occupation of Cambridge by
+the Baronial forces would effectually bar the way against any attempt
+to follow in the King's track; and it is highly probable that he,
+knowing that this would be so, had ordered the train and its escort to
+make their way instead from Hedingham to Lynn, and that he paid his
+hurried visit to that place with the sole object of once more getting
+into touch with them.</p>
+
+<p>However that may be, there is no doubt that the train did set out from
+Lynn, along the road to Cross Keys, after the King and his troops had
+ridden off towards Wisbech. It was impossible, however, to attempt the
+passage that same day, for the channel of the Well Stream could only
+be forded during the hour or so on either side of low-water, which, as
+calculations show, was on this day about noon. The long line of
+vehicles had, accordingly, to halt for the night at Cross Keys, for to
+have attempted the passage in the dark (the moon was nearly at the
+new), would have been simply suicidal.</p>
+
+<p>Next morning, Thursday, October 13th, they woke to find the tide
+lapping against the old Roman embankment behind which they lay, for it
+was a spring tide, and at its highest about 6.30 a.m. Rapidly it
+receded, and by 9 a.m. the wide expanse of the sands would lie bare
+before them. The moment these were dry enough for the passage of carts
+they would start, for their leaders knew well the urgent necessity for
+speed. To get such a train across the Well Stream channel in the short
+space of two hours they must be at the ford the very moment it was
+<span class="pagenum"><a id="page428" name="page428"></a>(p. 428)</span> practicable. Every instant was precious, and every driver
+did his utmost to press on, regardless of the warnings of the guides
+(if they had any).</p>
+
+<p>But to drive a loaded cart over wet sand is at the best a slow job.
+Readers of Sir Walter Scott will remember his vivid description, in
+<i>Redgauntlet</i>, of the difficulties attending such attempts:</p>
+
+<p class="quote">"The vehicle, sinking now on one side, now on the other,
+     sometimes sticking absolutely fast and requiring the utmost
+     exertions of the animal which drew it to put it once more in
+     motion, was subjected to jolts in all directions.... There seemed
+     at least five or six people around the cart, some on foot, others
+     on horseback. The former lent assistance whenever it was in
+     danger of upsetting or sticking fast in the quicksands: the
+     others rode before and acted as guides, often changing the
+     direction of the vehicle as the precarious state of the passage
+     required.... Thus the cart was dragged heavily and wearily on,
+     until the nearer roar of the advancing tide excited apprehension
+     of another danger.... A rider hastily fastened his own horse to
+     the shafts of the cart, in order to assist the exhausted animal
+     which drew it, ... but at length, when, after repeated and
+     hair-breadth escapes, it actually stuck fast in a quicksand, the
+     driver, with an oath, cut the harness, and departed with the
+     horses, splashing over the wet sand and through the shallows as
+     he galloped off."</p>
+
+<p>Multiply all this at least a hundred-fold, throwing in the added
+turmoil caused by the multitude of carts jamming and impeding one
+another, and we can picture something of the scene as that fatal
+morning advanced and the doomed cavalcade ploughed its way on to
+destruction. For there was no margin of time; and though the leading
+vehicles seem to have reached the Well Stream channel, they reached it
+too late. Already it was unfordable, for such traffic at least as
+theirs. Some of the carts doubtless tried to make a dash across; but
+their horses, exhausted by the strenuous effort of the last two hours,
+were unequal to the tremendous strain of negotiating the soft bottom
+of the stream. A very few such failures would entirely bar the way to
+those who were eagerly pressing on behind, and almost in a moment the
+whole column would be in irremediable confusion. In the struggling
+press, to turn would be as impossible as to proceed, while momentarily
+the laden carts, for which the only hope was to be kept going, would,
+at a standstill, sink deeper, inch by inch, into the ever quickening
+sand. And then in the midst of the welter, up came the tide, <span class="pagenum"><a id="page429" name="page429"></a>(p. 429)</span>
+sweeping over the level sands, as spring tides in the Wash do
+sweep;&mdash;and, when the waters once more went down, of all that mass of
+treasure and plunder, of all those horses and drivers and carts and
+waggons not a trace was to be seen. The sands had swallowed all; and
+to this day they retain their prey. As Shakespeare makes King John
+say:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">"These Lincoln Washes have devoured them."</p>
+
+<p>The expanse of sands is now an expanse of fields and meadows, through
+which the River Nene is led by a straight cut from Wisbech to the sea.
+Where that cut is crossed by the Great Northern Railway (which, as has
+been said, runs almost along the line of the old crossing-track) is
+the traditional spot of the disaster, and Mr. St. John Hope believes
+that excavation might there bring to light some of its relics, even
+after the lapse of so many years.</p>
+
+<p>Matthew Paris (in his <i>Historia Anglorum</i>), writing in the generation
+following the catastrophe, tells us that John himself was on the scene
+and barely escaped from the rising waters. But he, as we have seen,
+was the previous night (and the next) at Swineshead Abbey. It is just
+possible that, with his astounding energy, he may have ridden in the
+morning with a few attendants to Long Sutton (a distance of twenty
+miles, as before the reclamation of the fens travellers from Boston
+thither would have to go round by Spalding), and thence across the
+sands, to overlook in person the passage of the Well Stream. If so, he
+may well, in the confusion, have been surprised by the tide and have
+barely escaped by hard riding. Anyhow the catastrophe cost him his
+life; for this heart-breaking blow, coming on top of his three months'
+herculean exertions, brought on a feverish attack that very night. Ill
+as he was, he was on horseback again by dawn, and rode fifteen miles
+to Sleaford. Next day he struggled on twenty miles to Newark, where
+"the disease increasing, he received the counsel of Confession and the
+Eucharist from the Abbot of Croxton," and died that same evening
+(October 18th), fairly burnt out by his own consuming and tireless
+energy. If ever King did, he "died standing."</p>
+
+<p>"Foul as Hell is, it is defiled by the fouler presence of John." Such
+is the uncompromising verdict of the inimical chronicler; <span class="pagenum"><a id="page430" name="page430"></a>(p. 430)</span>
+and such (in less trenchant phraseology) has been very much the
+verdict of popular historians even to our own day. But it was a
+verdict by no means universally accepted by contemporaries. John did
+not, like William Rufus, receive what Professor Freeman calls "the
+distinction of a popular excommunication." For Rufus no prayer was
+said, no psalm was sung, no Mass was offered. All men felt that prayer
+was hopeless. But John was buried in peace; and it speedily appeared
+that the cause for which he stood was the cause which (more especially
+when the weight of his own personal unpopularity was removed) most
+commended itself to the heart of England. Men had no desire to see the
+English Crown become an appanage for the heir to the French monarchy.
+And so Louis rapidly found. Within nine days of his father's death the
+infant Henry the Third was crowned at Gloucester,&mdash;with his mother's
+bracelet, in default of the proper crown (which, however, is not
+likely to be amongst the treasures lost in the Wash, as many histories
+assume); and within six months men were flocking "as to a Holy War,"
+from all parts of the country, to take part in that decisive battle
+known as "the Fair of Lincoln," which crushed, once and for all, the
+foreign intrusion, and established irrevocably the claim of the
+native-born ruler to succeed his father on the throne of England.</p>
+
+<p>And with this stirring story we take our leave of the Highways and
+Byways of Cambridgeshire, the stage of so many a story, the home of so
+many a memory; the scene&mdash;to those who have eyes to see&mdash;of so much
+quiet loveliness; where the Present is ever brooded over by the Past,
+and where on the anvils of Thought and Science the Future is ever
+being shaped. We have explored the County from end to end, we have
+mounted her uplands, we have traversed her fens, we have clambered her
+earthworks, we have entered her churches. Her Manor-houses have told
+us their tale of struggle, her Colleges have borne their witness to
+the growth of knowledge. We have been able to</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">"Watch Time's full river as it flows";</p>
+
+<p>and the pathos of all that has come and gone stands out before us, as
+a record more thrilling than the most daring romance, as a theme more
+inspiring than the noblest poem. We bid <span class="pagenum"><a id="page431" name="page431"></a>(p. 431)</span> good-bye to the
+County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely feeling that no hue of dulness
+attaches to them, as is commonly supposed by the unappreciative crowd,
+but that rather the footprints of the past which abound within their
+borders give promise of a future that shall not be unworthy of what
+has gone before.</p>
+
+<a id="img103" name="img103"></a>
+<div class="figcenter">
+<img src="images/img103.jpg" width="500" height="414" alt="" title="">
+<p><i>The Old Court of Corpus.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page432" name="page432"></a>(p. 432)</span> ADDENDA.</h3>
+
+<p>Attention should have been called to two remarkable ecclesiastical
+inscriptions, on the Eastern and Western borders of our district
+respectively.</p>
+
+<p>In the upland churchyard of Castle Camps (p. <a href="#page206">206</a>), hard by the
+Priest's Door into the Chancel, a tombstone has the following epitaph:</p>
+
+<p class="poem20">Mors Mortis Morti mortem nisi morte dedisset<br>
+<span class="add1em">Æternæ Vitæ janua clausa foret.</span></p>
+
+<p class="poem10">["Except the Death of Death Death's death by death had been<br>
+<span class="add2em">Ne'er would Eternal Life with door unshut be seen."]</span></p>
+
+<p>And in the church of Fen Stanton, low down amid the Ouse meadows near
+St. Ives, is the following ancient rebus (also hard by the Priest's
+Door):</p>
+
+<table border="0" cellpadding="3" summary="Rebus.">
+<tr>
+<td>QV</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>A</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>D</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>T</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>M</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>P</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>OS</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>NGVIS</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>IRVS</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>RISTI</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>VLCEDINE</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>AVIT</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td>H</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>SA</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>M</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>X</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>D</td>
+<td>&nbsp;</td>
+<td>L</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class="poem20">
+  <i>I.e.</i>&mdash;Quos Anguis dirus tristi mulcedine pavit<br>
+<span class="add2em">Hos Sanguis mirus Christi dulcedine lavit.</span></p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min66em">["</span>Whom the dire Serpent fouls with poisonous food<br>
+    Christ washeth in His sweet and wondrous Blood."]</p>
+
+<p>A variant of these lines is to be seen in the Alpine sanctuary of
+Champéry near the Lake of Geneva.</p>
+
+<h3><span class="pagenum"><a id="page433" name="page433"></a>(p. 433)</span> INDEX</h3>
+
+<div class="index">
+<p class="add2em">A</p>
+
+<p>Abbeys:<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Barnwell,</span>
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Chatteris,</span>
+<a href="#page390">390</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Crowland,</span>
+<a href="#page137">137</a>,
+<a href="#page393">393</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Denny,</span>
+<a href="#page30">30</a>,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Ely,</span>
+<a href="#page302">302</a>-341,
+<a href="#page345">345</a>-376<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Peterborough,</span>
+<a href="#page373">373</a>,
+<a href="#page390">390</a>,
+<a href="#page394">394</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Ramsey,</span>
+<a href="#page75">75</a>,
+<a href="#page198">198</a>,
+<a href="#page279">279</a>,
+<a href="#page310">310</a>,
+<a href="#page392">392</a>,
+<a href="#page410">410</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Soham,</span>
+<a href="#page178">178</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Thorney,</span>
+<a href="#page392">392</a>,
+<a href="#page396">396</a><br>
+
+  Abbey Barn,
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+
+  Abington,
+<a href="#page203">203</a><br>
+
+  Adams, Prof.,
+<a href="#page266">266</a><br>
+
+  "Ad eundem,"
+<a href="#page265">265</a><br>
+
+  Adventurers,
+<a href="#page403">403</a><br>
+
+  Adwulf,
+<a href="#page304">304</a><br>
+
+  Agincourt,
+<a href="#page184">184</a><br>
+
+  Aidan, St.,
+<a href="#page175">175</a><br>
+
+  Akeman Street,
+<a href="#page252">252</a>,
+<a href="#page258">258</a>,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Alan of Walsingham,
+<a href="#page329">329</a>,
+<a href="#page345">345</a>,
+<a href="#page356">356</a>,
+<a href="#page360">360</a>,
+<a href="#page362">362</a>,
+<a href="#page366">366</a>,
+<a href="#page373">373</a><br>
+
+  Alcock, Bp.,
+<a href="#page146">146</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page332">332</a>,
+<a href="#page376">376</a>,
+<a href="#page418">418</a><br>
+
+  Aldreth,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page295">295</a>,
+<a href="#page316">316</a><br>
+
+  Alfred the Etheling,
+<a href="#page314">314</a><br>
+
+  Alfred the Great,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page38">38</a>,
+<a href="#page169">169</a>,
+<a href="#page183">183</a>,
+<a href="#page213">213</a><br>
+
+  Alum,
+<a href="#page92">92</a><br>
+
+  Ambulatory,
+<a href="#page366">366</a><br>
+
+  Ancarig,
+<a href="#page392">392</a><br>
+
+  Andrewes, Bp.,
+<a href="#page342">342</a><br>
+
+  Andrew, St., Oratory of,
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+
+  Anna, King,
+<a href="#page303">303</a><br>
+
+  Archdeacon of Ely,
+<a href="#page282">282</a><br>
+
+  Armeswerke,
+<a href="#page306">306</a><br>
+
+  Arnold, Matthew,
+<a href="#page268">268</a><br>
+
+  Arrington,
+<a href="#page258">258</a><br>
+
+  Artesian,
+<a href="#page260">260</a><br>
+
+  Ashwell,
+<a href="#page248">248</a><br>
+
+  Ashwell Bush,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Assandun,
+<a href="#page205">205</a>,
+<a href="#page313">313</a><br>
+
+  Assize of Barnwell,
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+
+  Athelney,
+<a href="#page308">308</a><br>
+
+  Audley End,
+<a href="#page234">234</a><br>
+
+  Audrey's Fair, St.,
+<a href="#page307">307</a><br>
+
+  Augustine, St.,
+<a href="#page38">38</a>,
+<a href="#page303">303</a><br>
+
+  Augustinians,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page158">158</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">B</p>
+
+<p>B.A.,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Babraham,
+<a href="#page202">202</a><br>
+
+  Backs,
+<a href="#page2">2</a>,
+<a href="#page41">41</a>,
+<a href="#page85">85</a><br>
+
+  Bacon,
+<a href="#page90">90</a>,
+<a href="#page102">102</a><br>
+
+  Baitsbite,
+<a href="#page296">296</a><br>
+
+  Balsham,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page216">216</a><br>
+
+  Balsham, Bp.,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page25">25</a>,
+<a href="#page112">112</a>,
+<a href="#page325">325</a><br>
+
+  Baptistery (Ely),
+<a href="#page352">352</a><br>
+
+  Barham Hall,
+<a href="#page205">205</a><br>
+
+  Barnack,
+<a href="#page329">329</a><br>
+
+  Barnett, Bp.,
+<a href="#page366">366</a><br>
+
+  Barnwell,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+
+  Barnwell Gate,
+<a href="#page35">35</a>,
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+
+  Barnwell Priory,
+<a href="#page16">16</a>,
+<a href="#page160">160</a>,
+<a href="#page370">370</a><br>
+
+  Barrington,
+<a href="#page238">238</a>,
+<a href="#page289">289</a><br>
+
+  Barrow,
+<a href="#page102">102</a><br>
+
+  Bartlow,
+<a href="#page205">205</a><br>
+
+  Barton,
+<a href="#page254">254</a><br>
+
+  Barton Road,
+<a href="#page252">252</a><br>
+
+  Basevi,
+<a href="#page371">371</a><br>
+
+  Basket-making,
+<a href="#page384">384</a><br>
+
+  Bassingbourn,
+<a href="#page247">247</a><br>
+
+  Bateman, Bp.,
+<a href="#page82">82</a><br>
+
+  Bath,
+<a href="#page252">252</a><br>
+
+  Becket, Thomas à,
+<a href="#page235">235</a>,
+<a href="#page246">246</a><br>
+
+  Bedford, Earl of,
+<a href="#page406">406</a><br>
+
+  Bedford Rivers,
+<a href="#page280">280</a>,
+<a href="#page389">389</a><br>
+
+  Bedmakers,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Belsars Hill,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page292">292</a><br>
+
+  Benedictine Rule,
+<a href="#page339">339</a><br>
+
+  Benson, A. C.,
+<a href="#page138">138</a><br>
+
+  Bentham,
+<a href="#page345">345</a><br>
+
+  Bentley,
+<a href="#page40">40</a>,
+<a href="#page101">101</a>,
+<a href="#page105">105</a>,
+<a href="#page109">109</a><br>
+
+  Bible (St. John's Coll.),
+<a href="#page117">117</a><br>
+
+  Bidding Prayer,
+<a href="#page128">128</a><br>
+
+  Biggin "Abbey,"
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Bishop's Delph,
+<a href="#page178">178</a><br>
+
+  Bishopsgate,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Black Death,
+<a href="#page248">248</a>,
+<a href="#page340">340</a><br>
+
+  Blaise, St.,
+<a href="#page284">284</a><br>
+
+  Blazer,
+<a href="#page119">119</a><br>
+
+  Bluntisham,
+<a href="#page280">280</a><br>
+
+  Boadicea,
+<a href="#page172">172</a><br>
+
+  Boat Houses,
+<a href="#page146">146</a><br>
+
+  Boat Races,
+<a href="#page88">88</a>,
+<a href="#page146">146</a>,
+<a href="#page296">296</a><br>
+
+  Boat Show,
+<a href="#page43">43</a><br>
+
+  Bonfire,
+<a href="#page85">85</a><br>
+
+  Borough,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page8">8</a><br>
+
+  Borough Green,
+<a href="#page188">188</a><br>
+
+  Botolph, St.,
+<a href="#page32">32</a>,
+<a href="#page34">34</a>,
+<a href="#page304">304</a><br>
+
+  Bottisham,
+<a href="#page189">189</a><br>
+
+  Bourn,
+<a href="#page273">273</a><br>
+
+  Bourn Brook,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Bourne R.,
+<a href="#page202">202</a><br>
+
+  Brazier,
+<a href="#page97">97</a><br>
+
+  Brandon,
+<a href="#page185">185</a><br>
+
+  Bretwalda,
+<a href="#page178">178</a><br>
+
+  Bridges:<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Clare,</span>
+<a href="#page42">42</a>,
+<a href="#page84">84</a>,
+<a href="#page93">93</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Great,</span>
+<a href="#page46">46</a>,
+<a href="#page136">136</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Hauxton,</span>
+<a href="#page235">235</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Hostel,</span>
+<a href="#page43">43</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Huntingdon,</span>
+<a href="#page278">278</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">King's,</span>
+<a href="#page42">42</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Magdalene,</span>
+<a href="#page136">136</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Newnham,</span>
+<a href="#page41">41</a>,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Queens',</span>
+<a href="#page41">41</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. John's,</span>
+<a href="#page118">118</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page43">43</a><br>
+
+  Bucer,
+<a href="#page23">23</a>,
+<a href="#page131">131</a><br>
+
+  Buckingham College,
+<a href="#page137">137</a><br>
+
+  Bulldogs,
+<a href="#page132">132</a><br>
+
+  Burgesses,
+<a href="#page12">12</a><br>
+
+  Burgraed (King),
+<a href="#page309">309</a><br>
+
+  Burnt Mill,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Burwell,
+<a href="#page195">195</a>,
+<a href="#page198">198</a><br>
+
+  Bury St. Edmunds,
+<a href="#page320">320</a>,
+<a href="#page370">370</a><br>
+
+  Butcher's Broom,
+<a href="#page227">227</a><br>
+
+  Butterflies,
+<a href="#page182">182</a>,
+<a href="#page211">211</a><br>
+
+  Butter Measure,
+<a href="#page12">12</a><br>
+
+  Buttery,
+<a href="#page95">95</a><br>
+
+  Butts,
+<a href="#page254">254</a><br>
+
+  Byron,
+<a href="#page90">90</a>,
+<a href="#page94">94</a><br>
+
+  Byron's Pool,
+<a href="#page220">220</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">C</p>
+
+<p>Caldecote,
+<a href="#page271">271</a><br>
+
+  Cam,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page40">40</a>,
+<a href="#page222">222</a>,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Cambridge and Oxford,
+<a href="#page2">2</a>,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Camden Society,
+<a href="#page134">134</a><br>
+
+  Camp of Refuge,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page316">316</a><br>
+
+  Canute,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page205">205</a>,
+<a href="#page313">313</a><br>
+
+  Car Dyke,
+<a href="#page297">297</a><br>
+
+  Carmelites,
+<a href="#page11">11</a><br>
+
+  Castle,
+<a href="#page4">4</a>,
+<a href="#page138">138</a><br>
+
+  Castle Camps,
+<a href="#page206">206</a><br>
+
+  Cavendish Laboratory,
+<a href="#page159">159</a>,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Caxton,
+<a href="#page273">273</a><br>
+
+  Ceilings,
+<a href="#page100">100</a><br>
+
+  Chad, St.,
+<a href="#page176">176</a>,
+<a href="#page355">355</a><br>
+
+  Chained books,
+<a href="#page83">83</a><br>
+
+  Chancellor,
+<a href="#page125">125</a><br>
+
+  Chantries,
+<a href="#page239">239</a><br>
+
+  Chapel, Bush,
+<a href="#page238">238</a><br>
+
+  Chapel lists,
+<a href="#page104">104</a><br>
+
+  Chapels (College):<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Christ's,</span>
+<a href="#page153">153</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Clare,</span>
+<a href="#page84">84</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Corpus,</span>
+<a href="#page35">35</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Emmanuel,</span>
+<a href="#page158">158</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Girton,</span>
+<a href="#page144">144</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Jesus,</span>
+<a href="#page146">147</a>,
+<a href="#page148">148</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">King's,</span>
+<a href="#page52">52</a>-77,
+<a href="#page290">290</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Pembroke,</span>
+<a href="#page30">30</a>,
+<a href="#page342">342</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Peterhouse,</span>
+<a href="#page26">26</a>,
+<a href="#page342">342</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Queens',</span>
+<a href="#page48">48</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. John's,</span>
+<a href="#page113">113</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page102">102</a><br>
+
+  Chapels (at Ely):<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Bishop Alcock's,</span>
+<a href="#page332">332</a>,
+<a href="#page369">369</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Bishop West's,</span>
+<a href="#page332">332</a>,
+<a href="#page367">367</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Crauden's,</span>
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page346">346</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Lady,</span>
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page372">372</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Catherine's,</span>
+<a href="#page352">352</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Edmund's,</span>
+<a href="#page360">360</a><br>
+
+  Charles the First,
+<a href="#page101">101</a>,
+<a href="#page138">138</a>,
+<a href="#page182">182</a>,
+<a href="#page190">190</a>,
+<a href="#page268">268</a>,
+<a href="#page406">406</a><br>
+
+  Charles the Second,
+<a href="#page173">173</a><br>
+
+  Cherry Hill,
+<a href="#page345">345</a><br>
+
+  Cherryhinton,
+<a href="#page208">208</a><br>
+
+  Chester,
+<a href="#page221">221</a><br>
+
+  Chesterford,
+<a href="#page232">232</a><br>
+
+  Chesterton,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Chevely,
+<a href="#page185">185</a><br>
+
+  Childerley,
+<a href="#page271">271</a><br>
+
+  Chimes,
+<a href="#page101">101</a>,
+<a href="#page129">129</a><br>
+
+  Choirs,
+<a href="#page114">114</a><br>
+
+  Choir School (Ely),
+<a href="#page314">314</a><br>
+
+  Christopher, St.,
+<a href="#page205">205</a><br>
+
+  Chum,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Church ales,
+<a href="#page247">247</a><br>
+
+  Churches (Cambridge):<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Abbey,</span>
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">All Saints',</span>
+<a href="#page108">108</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Christ Church,</span>
+<a href="#page162">162</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Holy Sepulchre,</span>
+<a href="#page133">133</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Holy Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Our Lady's,</span>
+<a href="#page21">21</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Andrew's the Great,</span>
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Andrew's the Less,</span>
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Benet's,</span>
+<a href="#page36">36</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Botolph's,</span>
+<a href="#page32">32</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Clement's,</span>
+<a href="#page136">136</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Giles',</span>
+<a href="#page140">140</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Mary's the Great,</span>
+<a href="#page127">127</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Mary's the Less,</span>
+<a href="#page25">25</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Michael's,
+<a href="#page12">13</a>,</span>
+<a href="#page86">86</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Paul's,</span>
+<a href="#page162">162</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Peter's,</span>
+<a href="#page140">140</a><br>
+
+  Churches (Ely):<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Holy Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page372">372</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Cross,</span>
+<a href="#page379">379</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Mary's,</span>
+<a href="#page378">378</a><br>
+
+  Clapham Sect,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  Clapper Stile,
+<a href="#page204">204</a><br>
+
+  Clarence, Duke of,
+<a href="#page94">94</a><br>
+
+  Clarkson,
+<a href="#page421">421</a><br>
+
+  Clayhithe,
+<a href="#page296">296</a><br>
+
+  Clergy Training School,
+<a href="#page148">148</a><br>
+
+  Clerks,
+<a href="#page11">11</a><br>
+
+  Clerk-Maxwell,
+<a href="#page97">97</a><br>
+
+  Cloisters,
+<a href="#page92">92</a>,
+<a href="#page353">353</a><br>
+
+  Clough,
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+
+  Clunch,
+<a href="#page198">198</a>,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Codex Bezæ,
+<a href="#page82">82</a><br>
+
+  Coe Fen,
+<a href="#page159">159</a><br>
+
+  Coleridge,
+<a href="#page150">150</a><br>
+
+  "College" (Ely),
+<a href="#page376">376</a><br>
+
+  Colleges:<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Christ's,</span>
+<a href="#page152">152</a>-155<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Clare,</span>
+<a href="#page83">83</a>-85,
+<a href="#page342">342</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Corpus Christi,</span>
+<a href="#page35">35</a>-38<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Downing,</span>
+<a href="#page159">159</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Ely Theological,</span>
+<a href="#page382">382</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Emmanuel,</span>
+<a href="#page156">156</a>-158<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Girton,</span>
+<a href="#page144">144</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Gonville and Caius,</span>
+<a href="#page120">120</a>-124<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Jesus,</span>
+<a href="#page146">146</a>-150,
+<a href="#page369">369</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">King's,</span>
+<a href="#page50">50</a>-79<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Magdalene,</span>
+<a href="#page137">137</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Newnham,</span>
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Pembroke,</span>
+<a href="#page28">28</a>-34,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Peterhouse,</span>
+<a href="#page25">25</a>-28,
+<a href="#page369">369</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Queens',</span>
+<a href="#page47">47</a>-50<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Ridley Hall,</span>
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. Catherine's,</span>
+<a href="#page39">39</a>-40<br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. John's,</span>
+<a href="#page109">109</a>-119<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Selwyn,</span>
+<a href="#page144">144</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Sidney Sussex,</span>
+<a href="#page151">151</a>-152<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page86">86</a>-107,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity Hall,</span>
+<a href="#page82">82</a>-83<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Westminster,</span> 1
+<a href="#page42">42</a><br>
+
+  Comacine Guild,
+<a href="#page353">353</a><br>
+
+  Comberton,
+<a href="#page254">254</a><br>
+
+  Combination Rooms,
+<a href="#page26">26</a>,
+<a href="#page97">97</a><br>
+
+  Commons,
+<a href="#page1">1</a><br>
+
+  "Commons,"
+<a href="#page95">95</a><br>
+
+  Common Fields,
+<a href="#page3">3</a><br>
+
+  Conduit,
+<a href="#page23">23</a>,
+<a href="#page130">130</a>,
+<a href="#page158">158</a><br>
+
+  Confessionals,
+<a href="#page263">263</a><br>
+
+  Conington,
+<a href="#page292">292</a><br>
+
+  Conqueror, William the,
+<a href="#page187">187</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page315">315</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Coprolites,
+<a href="#page240">240</a><br>
+
+  Corporation,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page185">185</a><br>
+
+  Coton,
+<a href="#page89">89</a><br>
+
+  Cottenham,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+
+  Courts (College),
+<a href="#page2">2</a><br>
+
+  Courts, Christian,
+<a href="#page11">11</a><br>
+
+  Covenant,
+<a href="#page91">91</a><br>
+
+  Coveney,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  Cox, Bishop,
+<a href="#page289">289</a><br>
+
+  Cratendune,
+<a href="#page179">179</a>,
+<a href="#page303">303</a><br>
+
+  Cranmer, Abp.,
+<a href="#page150">150</a><br>
+
+  Crauden, Prior,
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page346">346</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a>,
+<a href="#page410">410</a><br>
+
+  Cromwell, Oliver,
+<a href="#page32">32</a>,
+<a href="#page128">128</a>,
+<a href="#page151">151</a>,
+<a href="#page272">272</a>,
+<a href="#page278">278</a>,
+<a href="#page367">367</a>,
+<a href="#page381">381</a>,
+<a href="#page406">406</a>,
+<a href="#page412">412</a><br>
+
+  Cross Keys,
+<a href="#page413">413</a>,
+<a href="#page424">424</a>,
+<a href="#page427">427</a><br>
+
+  Crusades,
+<a href="#page328">328</a><br>
+
+  Cycloid,
+<a href="#page89">89</a><br>
+
+  Cyclone,
+<a href="#page276">276</a><br>
+
+  Cymbeline,
+<a href="#page172">172</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">D</p>
+
+<p>Darwin,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  Deanery (Ely),
+<a href="#page348">348</a>,
+<a href="#page353">353</a><br>
+
+  Decorated,
+<a href="#page334">334</a><br>
+
+  Degrees,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Denver,
+<a href="#page387">387</a><br>
+
+  Denver Sluice,
+<a href="#page280">280</a>,
+<a href="#page389">389</a>,
+<a href="#page407">407</a><br>
+
+  Devil's Dyke,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page187">187</a>,
+<a href="#page194">194</a>,
+<a href="#page212">212</a>,
+<a href="#page300">300</a><br>
+
+  "Disinherited,"
+<a href="#page325">325</a><br>
+
+  Divinity schools,
+<a href="#page109">109</a><br>
+
+  Doddington,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  Dominicans,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  Dowsing,
+<a href="#page56">56</a>,
+<a href="#page187">187</a>,
+<a href="#page189">189</a>,
+<a href="#page205">205</a>,
+<a href="#page222">222</a>,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Dry Drayton,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Dullingham,
+<a href="#page188">188</a><br>
+
+  Dunstan, Abp.,
+<a href="#page309">309</a><br>
+
+  Dunwich,
+<a href="#page180">180</a><br>
+
+  "Duties,"
+<a href="#page377">377</a><br>
+
+  Duxford,
+<a href="#page228">228</a><br>
+
+  Dykes,
+<a href="#page170">170</a>-173</p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">E</p>
+
+<p>Earith,
+<a href="#page298">298</a>,
+<a href="#page389">389</a><br>
+
+  Early English,
+<a href="#page334">334</a><br>
+
+  Eastern Counties Association,
+<a href="#page380">380</a><br>
+
+  Edgar the Peacemaker,
+<a href="#page309">309</a>,
+<a href="#page373">373</a>,
+<a href="#page192">192</a><br>
+
+  Edmund the Ironside,
+<a href="#page206">206</a>,
+<a href="#page313">313</a><br>
+
+  Edmund, St.,
+<a href="#page175">175</a>,
+<a href="#page180">180</a>,
+<a href="#page262">262</a><br>
+
+  Edmundhouse,
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+
+  Edward the Confessor,
+<a href="#page314">314</a><br>
+
+  Edward the Elder,
+<a href="#page6">6</a>,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page169">169</a>,
+<a href="#page212">212</a>,
+<a href="#page278">278</a><br>
+
+  Edward the First,
+<a href="#page328">328</a><br>
+
+  Edward the Second,
+<a href="#page86">86</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a>,
+<a href="#page411">411</a><br>
+
+  Edward the Third,
+<a href="#page86">86</a>,
+<a href="#page101">101</a>,
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page348">348</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Edward the Seventh,
+<a href="#page94">94</a>,
+<a href="#page268">268</a><br>
+
+  Egbert,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page169">169</a><br>
+
+  Eleanor, Queen,
+<a href="#page324">324</a><br>
+
+  Electoral roll,
+<a href="#page125">125</a><br>
+
+  Elizabeth, Queen,
+<a href="#page126">126</a>,
+<a href="#page290">290</a>,
+<a href="#page419">419</a><br>
+
+  Elm,
+<a href="#page412">412</a><br>
+
+  Elsworth,
+<a href="#page292">292</a><br>
+
+  Eltisley,
+<a href="#page274">274</a><br>
+
+  Ely,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page140">140</a>,
+<a href="#page188">188</a>,
+<a href="#page236">236</a>,
+<a href="#page302">302</a>-385,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  Ely House,
+<a href="#page290">290</a>,
+<a href="#page332">333</a><br>
+
+  Ely Place,
+<a href="#page322">322</a><br>
+
+  Emma, Queen,
+<a href="#page314">314</a><br>
+
+  Emneth,
+<a href="#page412">412</a><br>
+
+  Enclosure Acts,
+<a href="#page387">387</a><br>
+
+  Epigrams,
+<a href="#page80">80</a><br>
+
+  Erasmus,
+<a href="#page47">47</a><br>
+
+  Erconwald, St.,
+<a href="#page176">176</a>,
+<a href="#page262">262</a><br>
+
+  Ermine Street,
+<a href="#page244">244</a>,
+<a href="#page258">258</a>,
+<a href="#page273">273</a><br>
+
+  Ermenilda,
+<a href="#page176">176</a>,
+<a href="#page307">307</a><br>
+
+  Esquire, Bedell,
+<a href="#page128">128</a><br>
+
+  Ethandune,
+<a href="#page308">308</a><br>
+
+  Etheldreda, St.,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page169">169</a>,
+<a href="#page175">175</a>,
+<a href="#page179">179</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page303">303</a>,
+<a href="#page358">358</a><br>
+
+  Ethelred, the Unready,
+<a href="#page310">310</a><br>
+
+  Eton,
+<a href="#page51">51</a><br>
+
+  Eustace, Bp.,
+<a href="#page349">349</a>,
+<a href="#page367">367</a><br>
+
+  Eversden,
+<a href="#page289">289</a><br>
+
+  Examination Hall,
+<a href="#page15">15</a><br>
+
+  Examinations,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page98">98</a><br>
+
+  Exeat,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Exning,
+<a href="#page173">173</a>,
+<a href="#page175">175</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">F</p>
+
+<p>Fagius,
+<a href="#page23">23</a>,
+<a href="#page131">131</a><br>
+
+  Fairy-cart,
+<a href="#page260">260</a><br>
+
+  Falcon Cup,
+<a href="#page84">84</a><br>
+
+  Felix, St.,
+<a href="#page178">178</a><br>
+
+  Fellow Commoners,
+<a href="#page151">151</a><br>
+
+  Fellows,
+<a href="#page2">2</a>,
+<a href="#page89">89</a><br>
+
+  Fen Ditton,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Fields,
+<a href="#page3">3</a><br>
+
+  Firehooks,
+<a href="#page38">38</a>,
+<a href="#page204">204</a><br>
+
+  First Trinity,
+<a href="#page88">88</a>,
+<a href="#page148">148</a><br>
+
+  Fisher, Bishop,
+<a href="#page110">110</a>,
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+
+  Fisher, Osmund,
+<a href="#page149">149</a><br>
+
+  Fitzwilliam,
+<a href="#page23">23</a>,
+<a href="#page371">371</a><br>
+
+  Fleam Dyke,
+<a href="#page170">170</a>,
+<a href="#page210">210</a><br>
+
+  Fordham,
+<a href="#page176">176</a><br>
+
+  Fowlmere,
+<a href="#page230">230</a><br>
+
+  Foxton,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Franchise of Ely,
+<a href="#page321">321</a><br>
+
+  Franciscans,
+<a href="#page11">11</a>,
+<a href="#page100">100</a>,
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+
+  Free School Lane,
+<a href="#page36">36</a><br>
+
+  Freshman's Pillar,
+<a href="#page92">92</a><br>
+
+  Friars,
+<a href="#page11">11</a><br>
+
+  Fulbourn,
+<a href="#page209">209</a><br>
+
+  Fuller,
+<a href="#page344">344</a>,
+<a href="#page357">357</a>,
+<a href="#page384">384</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">G</p>
+
+<p>Galilee,
+<a href="#page324">324</a>,
+<a href="#page349">349</a><br>
+
+  Garret Hostel,
+<a href="#page43">43</a><br>
+
+  Gating,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Geoffry de Magnaville,
+<a href="#page34">34</a>,
+<a href="#page200">200</a><br>
+
+  George the First,
+<a href="#page80">80</a><br>
+
+  George the Third,
+<a href="#page90">90</a><br>
+
+  Gibbet,
+<a href="#page273">273</a><br>
+
+  Gibbons,
+<a href="#page90">90</a><br>
+
+  Girton,
+<a href="#page268">268</a><br>
+
+  Girvii,
+<a href="#page169">169</a><br>
+
+  Godmanchester,
+<a href="#page278">278</a><br>
+
+  Godolphin,
+<a href="#page202">202</a><br>
+
+  God's House,
+<a href="#page153">153</a><br>
+
+  Gogmagogs,
+<a href="#page201">201</a><br>
+
+  Gonville,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page120">120</a><br>
+
+  Goodhart,
+<a href="#page95">95</a><br>
+
+  Goodrich, Bp.,
+<a href="#page332">332</a>,
+<a href="#page341">341</a>,
+<a href="#page376">376</a><br>
+
+  Granby, Marquis of,
+<a href="#page98">98</a><br>
+
+  Granta,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page202">202</a>,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Grantabridge,
+<a href="#page7">7</a><br>
+
+  Grantabrigshire,
+<a href="#page8">8</a><br>
+
+  Granta-ceaster,
+<a href="#page7">7</a><br>
+
+  Grantchester,
+<a href="#page7">7</a>,
+<a href="#page221">221</a><br>
+
+  Grantset,
+<a href="#page7">7</a><br>
+
+  Gray,
+<a href="#page28">28</a><br>
+
+  Great Ouse,
+<a href="#page399">399</a><br>
+
+  Greek,
+<a href="#page47">47</a><br>
+
+  Greensand,
+<a href="#page240">240</a><br>
+
+  Guild Hall,
+<a href="#page130">130</a><br>
+
+  Guilden Morden,
+<a href="#page262">262</a><br>
+
+  Gunning, Bp.,
+<a href="#page342">342</a>,
+<a href="#page367">367</a><br>
+
+  Guyhirn,
+<a href="#page289">289</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">H</p>
+
+<p>Haddenham,
+<a href="#page282">282</a>,
+<a href="#page356">356</a><br>
+
+  Halls,
+<a href="#page15">15</a><br>
+
+  Hardwick,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Harlton,
+<a href="#page255">255</a><br>
+
+  Harvard,
+<a href="#page156">156</a><br>
+
+  Haslingfield,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Hauxton,
+<a href="#page235">235</a><br>
+
+  Hemingford,
+<a href="#page279">279</a><br>
+
+  Henrietta Maria, Queen,
+<a href="#page116">116</a><br>
+
+  Henry the First,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Henry the Third,
+<a href="#page324">324</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Henry the Sixth,
+<a href="#page41">41</a>,
+<a href="#page51">51</a>,
+<a href="#page54">54</a><br>
+
+  Henry the Eighth,
+<a href="#page87">87</a>,
+<a href="#page97">97</a>,
+<a href="#page118">118</a>,
+<a href="#page152">152</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page372">372</a><br>
+
+  Hereward,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page315">315</a><br>
+
+  Hermits,
+<a href="#page41">41</a>,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Hervey, Bp.,
+<a href="#page180">180</a>,
+<a href="#page321">321</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Hervey de Stanton,
+<a href="#page86">86</a>,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Hiding-hole,
+<a href="#page225">225</a><br>
+
+  High-table,
+<a href="#page15">15</a>,
+<a href="#page96">96</a><br>
+
+  Hilda, St.,
+<a href="#page303">303</a><br>
+
+  Hildersham,
+<a href="#page203">203</a><br>
+
+  Hinxton,
+<a href="#page230">230</a><br>
+
+  Histon,
+<a href="#page268">268</a>,
+<a href="#page286">287</a><br>
+
+  Hithes,
+<a href="#page44">44</a>,
+<a href="#page194">194</a><br>
+
+  Hobson,
+<a href="#page21">21</a>,
+<a href="#page158">158</a><br>
+
+  Holcroft,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Holme,
+<a href="#page400">400</a><br>
+
+  Holywell,
+<a href="#page279">279</a><br>
+
+  Honours,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page98">98</a><br>
+
+  Horningsea,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Horseheath,
+<a href="#page209">209</a><br>
+
+  Hospital of St. John,
+<a href="#page25">25</a>,
+<a href="#page112">112</a><br>
+
+  Hospitallers,
+<a href="#page258">258</a><br>
+
+  Hostels,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page43">43</a><br>
+
+  Hotham, Bp.,
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page335">335</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a>,
+<a href="#page363">363</a>,
+<a href="#page366">366</a><br>
+
+  Hubert, St.,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Huddleston,
+<a href="#page225">225</a><br>
+
+  Hundreds,
+<a href="#page10">10</a><br>
+
+  Huntingdon,
+<a href="#page138">138</a>,
+<a href="#page278">278</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">I</p>
+
+<p>Iceni,
+<a href="#page168">168</a>,
+<a href="#page211">211</a><br>
+
+  Ickleton,
+<a href="#page231">231</a><br>
+
+  Icknield Way,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page203">203</a>,
+<a href="#page234">234</a>,
+<a href="#page244">244</a><br>
+
+  Indulgence,
+<a href="#page91">91</a>,
+<a href="#page235">235</a><br>
+
+  Ink,
+<a href="#page336">336</a><br>
+
+  Ireton,
+<a href="#page272">272</a><br>
+
+  Ireton's Way,
+<a href="#page390">390</a><br>
+
+  Isle of Ely,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page168">168</a>,
+<a href="#page282">282</a><br>
+
+  Isleham,
+<a href="#page183">183</a><br>
+
+  Ivo, St.,
+<a href="#page279">279</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">J</p>
+
+<p>Jacutus, St.,
+<a href="#page205">205</a><br>
+
+  James the First,
+<a href="#page154">154</a>,
+<a href="#page173">173</a>,
+<a href="#page403">403</a><br>
+
+  Jesus Lane Sunday School,
+<a href="#page162">162</a><br>
+
+  Jewry,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page108">108</a><br>
+
+  Job,
+<a href="#page248">248</a><br>
+
+  John, King,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page136">136</a>,
+<a href="#page425">425</a>-430<br>
+
+  Jowett,
+<a href="#page129">129</a><br>
+
+  Julitta, St.,
+<a href="#page191">191</a><br>
+
+  Jurats,
+<a href="#page400">400</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">K</p>
+
+<p>Kendal,
+<a href="#page166">166</a><br>
+
+  King's Ditch,
+<a href="#page3">3</a>,
+<a href="#page34">34</a><br>
+
+  King's Hall,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page86">86</a>,
+<a href="#page101">101</a><br>
+
+  King's Mill,
+<a href="#page34">34</a><br>
+
+  Kingsley,
+<a href="#page138">138</a><br>
+
+  Kingston,
+<a href="#page271">271</a><br>
+
+  Kirtling,
+<a href="#page186">186</a><br>
+
+  Kitchen (Trinity),
+<a href="#page96">96</a><br>
+
+  Kitchener, Lord,
+<a href="#page131">131</a><br>
+
+  Knapwell,
+<a href="#page273">273</a><br>
+
+  Knee-holm,
+<a href="#page227">227</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">L</p>
+
+<p>Landbeach,
+<a href="#page296">296</a><br>
+
+  Landwade,
+<a href="#page176">176</a><br>
+
+  Lantern (Ely),
+<a href="#page356">356</a><br>
+
+  Lantern (Trinity),
+<a href="#page97">97</a><br>
+
+  Lectures,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Lepers' Chapel,
+<a href="#page162">162</a><br>
+
+  Leverington,
+<a href="#page414">414</a><br>
+
+  Leverrier,
+<a href="#page266">266</a><br>
+
+  Leys School,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+
+  "Libellers,"
+<a href="#page403">403</a><br>
+
+  Liber Eliensis,
+<a href="#page303">303</a>,
+<a href="#page337">337</a><br>
+
+  Libraries:<br>
+    <span class="add1em">Corpus,</span>
+<a href="#page38">38</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">King's,</span>
+<a href="#page52">52</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Pepys,</span>
+<a href="#page137">137</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Peterhouse,</span>
+<a href="#page26">26</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">St. John's,</span>
+<a href="#page44">44</a>,
+<a href="#page116">116</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity,</span>
+<a href="#page43">43</a>,
+<a href="#page80">80</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">Trinity Hall,</span>
+<a href="#page82">82</a><br>
+    <span class="add1em">University,</span>
+<a href="#page79">79</a>-82,
+<a href="#page100">100</a><br>
+
+  Lincoln,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+
+  Lingay Fen,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Linton,
+<a href="#page204">204</a><br>
+
+  Littlego,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  "Little John,"
+<a href="#page226">226</a><br>
+
+  Little Ouse,
+<a href="#page399">399</a><br>
+
+  Littleport,
+<a href="#page387">387</a>,
+<a href="#page400">400</a><br>
+
+  Littlington,
+<a href="#page264">264</a>,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Lock-up,
+<a href="#page264">264</a><br>
+
+  Lode,
+<a href="#page191">191</a>,
+<a href="#page194">194</a>,
+<a href="#page300">300</a><br>
+
+  Logan,
+<a href="#page2">2</a>,
+<a href="#page95">95</a>,
+<a href="#page100">100</a><br>
+
+  London Stone,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+
+  Long Stanton,
+<a href="#page289">289</a><br>
+
+  Long Vacation,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Lycidas,
+<a href="#page154">154</a><br>
+
+  Lynn,
+<a href="#page326">326</a>,
+<a href="#page390">390</a>,
+<a href="#page399">399</a>,
+<a href="#page400">400</a>,
+<a href="#page426">426</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">M</p>
+
+<p>Macaulay,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page107">107</a>,
+<a href="#page136">136</a><br>
+
+  Madingley,
+<a href="#page268">268</a><br>
+
+  Maitland,
+<a href="#page3">3</a>,
+<a href="#page185">185</a><br>
+
+  "Majestas,"
+<a href="#page286">287</a>,
+<a href="#page339">339</a><br>
+
+  Maldon,
+<a href="#page310">310</a><br>
+
+  Manea,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  March,
+<a href="#page410">410</a><br>
+
+  Margaret, Lady,
+<a href="#page110">110</a>,
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+
+  Margaret, Queen,
+<a href="#page41">41</a><br>
+
+  Mark,
+<a href="#page318">318</a><br>
+
+  Market Hill,
+<a href="#page130">130</a><br>
+
+  Marshland,
+<a href="#page399">399</a>,
+<a href="#page411">411</a><br>
+
+  Martial,
+<a href="#page384">384</a><br>
+
+  Martin V., Pope,
+<a href="#page161">161</a>,
+<a href="#page238">238</a><br>
+
+  Mary Stuart,
+<a href="#page278">278</a><br>
+
+  Mary Tudor,
+<a href="#page97">97</a>,
+<a href="#page225">225</a><br>
+
+  Maur, St.,
+<a href="#page252">252</a><br>
+
+  Mayor of Cambridge,
+<a href="#page12">12</a><br>
+
+  May pole,
+<a href="#page255">255</a><br>
+
+  Mazes,
+<a href="#page254">254</a>,
+<a href="#page352">352</a><br>
+
+  Medhampsted,
+<a href="#page308">308</a>,
+<a href="#page394">394</a>,
+<a href="#page396">396</a><br>
+
+  Melbourn,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Meldreth,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Mepal,
+<a href="#page390">390</a><br>
+
+  Merton,
+<a href="#page25">25</a>,
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+
+  Michael House,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page86">86</a><br>
+
+  Midsummer Common,
+<a href="#page146">146</a><br>
+
+  Mildenhall,
+<a href="#page185">185</a><br>
+
+  Mildmay,
+<a href="#page156">156</a><br>
+
+  Milestone,
+<a href="#page82">82</a>,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+
+  Mill Hill,
+<a href="#page345">345</a><br>
+
+  Mill, St.,
+<a href="#page50">50</a><br>
+
+  Milton,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Milton, John,
+<a href="#page56">56</a>,
+<a href="#page58">58</a>,
+<a href="#page91">91</a>,
+<a href="#page154">154</a><br>
+
+  Miserere seats,
+<a href="#page363">363</a><br>
+
+  Monks' Door,
+<a href="#page356">356</a><br>
+
+  Monks' garments,
+<a href="#page338">338</a><br>
+
+  Morning Talks,
+<a href="#page36">36</a><br>
+
+  Morton, Bp.,
+<a href="#page336">336</a>,
+<a href="#page398">398</a>,
+<a href="#page418">418</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">N</p>
+
+<p>Needham Hall,
+<a href="#page412">412</a><br>
+
+  Needingworth,
+<a href="#page279">279</a><br>
+
+  Nene,
+<a href="#page398">398</a><br>
+
+  Neotus, St.,
+<a href="#page276">276</a><br>
+
+  Neptune,
+<a href="#page266">266</a><br>
+
+  Nevile,
+<a href="#page92">92</a>,
+<a href="#page100">100</a><br>
+
+  Nevile's Court,
+<a href="#page92">92</a>,
+<a href="#page94">94</a>,
+<a href="#page95">95</a><br>
+
+  Newcastle,
+<a href="#page390">390</a><br>
+
+  New College,
+<a href="#page51">51</a><br>
+
+  Newmarket,
+<a href="#page173">173</a>,
+<a href="#page174">174</a>,
+<a href="#page389">389</a><br>
+
+  Newton, Isaac,
+<a href="#page41">41</a>,
+<a href="#page91">91</a>,
+<a href="#page92">92</a>,
+<a href="#page102">103</a>,
+<a href="#page107">107</a>,
+<a href="#page265">265</a><br>
+
+  Non-Collegiate Students,
+<a href="#page15">15</a><br>
+
+  Northwold, Bp. Hugh de,
+<a href="#page307">307</a>,
+<a href="#page324">324</a>,
+<a href="#page329">329</a>,
+<a href="#page335">335</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a>,
+<a href="#page363">363</a>,
+<a href="#page365">365</a>,
+<a href="#page369">369</a>,
+<a href="#page371">371</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">O</p>
+
+<p>Oakington,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Oasland,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Oath of Supremacy,
+<a href="#page419">419</a><br>
+
+  Observatory,
+<a href="#page221">221</a>,
+<a href="#page265">265</a><br>
+
+  Octagon,
+<a href="#page356">356</a><br>
+
+  Oddy,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Old North Road,
+<a href="#page244">244</a><br>
+
+  Opponencies,
+<a href="#page14">14</a><br>
+
+  Organs,
+<a href="#page105">105</a><br>
+
+  Orwell,
+<a href="#page256">256</a><br>
+
+  Ostorius,
+<a href="#page172">172</a>,
+<a href="#page211">211</a><br>
+
+  Ouse R.,
+<a href="#page277">277</a>-280,
+<a href="#page301">301</a><br>
+
+  Outwell,
+<a href="#page398">398</a>,
+<a href="#page411">411</a><br>
+
+  Over,
+<a href="#page286">286</a>,
+<a href="#page294">294</a><br>
+
+  Overcote,
+<a href="#page280">280</a>,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Owen,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page355">355</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">P</p>
+
+<p>Paley,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  Pandiana, St.,
+<a href="#page275">275</a><br>
+
+  Parallax,
+<a href="#page280">280</a><br>
+
+  Parchment,
+<a href="#page224">224</a><br>
+
+  Paris, Matthew,
+<a href="#page325">325</a>,
+<a href="#page328">328</a><br>
+
+  Park (Ely),
+<a href="#page345">345</a><br>
+
+  Parker, Abp.,
+<a href="#page39">39</a><br>
+
+  Paxton,
+<a href="#page278">278</a><br>
+
+  Peacock, Dean,
+<a href="#page384">384</a><br>
+
+  Peas Hill,
+<a href="#page130">130</a><br>
+
+  Pembroke,
+<a href="#page28">28</a><br>
+
+  Penda,
+<a href="#page175">175</a>,
+<a href="#page303">303</a><br>
+
+  Pensioners,
+<a href="#page15">15</a><br>
+
+  Pepys,
+<a href="#page137">137</a><br>
+
+  Perne,
+<a href="#page23">23</a><br>
+
+  Perpendicular Architecture,
+<a href="#page334">334</a><br>
+
+  Perry, Bp.,
+<a href="#page105">105</a>,
+<a href="#page155">155</a>,
+<a href="#page162">162</a><br>
+
+  Peterborough,
+<a href="#page298">298</a>,
+<a href="#page308">308</a>,
+<a href="#page315">315</a>,
+<a href="#page373">373</a>,
+<a href="#page400">400</a><br>
+
+  Peter Pence,
+<a href="#page203">203</a><br>
+
+  Peters, Hugh,
+<a href="#page183">183</a><br>
+
+  Philippa, Queen,
+<a href="#page330">330</a>,
+<a href="#page348">348</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a><br>
+
+  Picot,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page160">160</a><br>
+
+  Pilgrim's Progress,
+<a href="#page166">166</a><br>
+
+  Pitt Press,
+<a href="#page40">40</a><br>
+
+  Pitt, William,
+<a href="#page32">32</a><br>
+
+  Plate, College,
+<a href="#page31">31</a>,
+<a href="#page84">84</a>,
+<a href="#page95">95</a><br>
+
+  Poison Cup,
+<a href="#page84">84</a><br>
+
+  Population,
+<a href="#page4">4</a>,
+<a href="#page10">10</a><br>
+
+  Posidonius,
+<a href="#page384">384</a><br>
+
+  Preachers' Street,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  Premier College,
+<a href="#page50">50</a><br>
+
+  President,
+<a href="#page48">48</a><br>
+
+  Prior's Door,
+<a href="#page353">353</a><br>
+
+  Priory Chapel,
+<a href="#page161">161</a><br>
+
+  Probus,
+<a href="#page201">201</a><br>
+
+  Proctors,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page16">16</a>,
+<a href="#page125">125</a><br>
+
+  Provost,
+<a href="#page12">12</a>,
+<a href="#page48">48</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">Q</p>
+
+<p>Quarles,
+<a href="#page155">155</a><br>
+
+  Queen's Lane,
+<a href="#page50">50</a><br>
+
+  Querela Cantabrigiensis,
+<a href="#page31">31</a>,
+<a href="#page129">129</a><br>
+
+  Quy,
+<a href="#page169">169</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">R</p>
+
+<p>Radegund, St.,
+<a href="#page10">10</a>,
+<a href="#page144">144</a><br>
+
+  Railroads,
+<a href="#page20">20</a>,
+<a href="#page203">203</a><br>
+
+  Rampton,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+
+  Reach,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page187">187</a>,
+<a href="#page194">194</a>,
+<a href="#page196">196</a>,
+<a href="#page300">300</a><br>
+
+  Regent Street,
+<a href="#page159">159</a><br>
+
+  Residence,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Richard the Third,
+<a href="#page322">322</a><br>
+
+  Ridley, Bp.,
+<a href="#page31">31</a><br>
+
+  Ringmere,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page214">214</a><br>
+
+  Roger of Wendover,
+<a href="#page309">309</a>,
+<a href="#page324">324</a><br>
+
+  Rolls, C. S.,
+<a href="#page91">91</a><br>
+
+  Romney Marsh,
+<a href="#page400">400</a><br>
+
+  Romsey Town,
+<a href="#page208">208</a><br>
+
+  Röntgen,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Roof Climbing,
+<a href="#page91">91</a><br>
+
+  Rooms,
+<a href="#page15">15</a><br>
+
+  Roubillac,
+<a href="#page102">102</a><br>
+
+  Round Churches,
+<a href="#page133">133</a><br>
+
+  Royston,
+<a href="#page244">244</a><br>
+
+  Rufus, William,
+<a href="#page336">336</a>,
+<a href="#page430">430</a><br>
+
+  Rustication,
+<a href="#page16">16</a><br>
+
+  Rutherford, Professor,
+<a href="#page267">267</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">S</p>
+
+<p>Sacring Bell,
+<a href="#page231">231</a>,
+<a href="#page294">294</a><br>
+
+  Saffron,
+<a href="#page209">209</a><br>
+
+  St. Ives,
+<a href="#page279">279</a><br>
+
+  St. John's Farm,
+<a href="#page382">382</a><br>
+
+  St. Neots,
+<a href="#page276">276</a><br>
+
+  Sancroft, Abp.,
+<a href="#page156">156</a><br>
+
+  Sarcophagus,
+<a href="#page307">307</a><br>
+
+  Sawston,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Scholars,
+<a href="#page14">14</a><br>
+
+  Schools,
+<a href="#page14">14</a><br>
+
+  Screens,
+<a href="#page95">95</a>,
+<a href="#page98">98</a><br>
+
+  Seals,
+<a href="#page393">393</a><br>
+
+  Sea Wall,
+<a href="#page399">399</a>,
+<a href="#page411">411</a>,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  Sedgwick, Adam,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Selenite,
+<a href="#page292">292</a>,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  Selwyn, Bp.,
+<a href="#page367">367</a><br>
+
+  Senate House,
+<a href="#page15">15</a>,
+<a href="#page125">125</a><br>
+
+  Sexburga,
+<a href="#page176">176</a>,
+<a href="#page306">306</a><br>
+
+  Sexwulf,
+<a href="#page392">392</a><br>
+
+  "Shammy" Leather,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Sharpinhoe,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Shelford,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Shepreth,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Shingay,
+<a href="#page258">258</a><br>
+
+  Ship Money,
+<a href="#page244">244</a><br>
+
+  Shudy Camps,
+<a href="#page206">206</a><br>
+
+  Sibyl,
+<a href="#page149">149</a><br>
+
+  Simeon, Abbot,
+<a href="#page319">319</a>,
+<a href="#page335">335</a>,
+<a href="#page359">359</a>,
+<a href="#page360">360</a><br>
+
+  Simeon, Charles,
+<a href="#page152">152</a><br>
+
+  Simon de Montfort,
+<a href="#page325">325</a><br>
+
+  Slavery,
+<a href="#page421">421</a><br>
+
+  Snailwell,
+<a href="#page176">176</a><br>
+
+  Soham,
+<a href="#page178">178</a>,
+<a href="#page180">180</a><br>
+
+  Sophs,
+<a href="#page96">96</a><br>
+
+  Sound,
+<a href="#page92">92</a><br>
+
+  Southey,
+<a href="#page114">114</a><br>
+
+  Spark, Bp.,
+<a href="#page321">321</a><br>
+
+  Spenser,
+<a href="#page32">32</a><br>
+
+  Spikes,
+<a href="#page78">78</a><br>
+
+  Stanground,
+<a href="#page387">387</a><br>
+
+  Stapleford,
+<a href="#page222">222</a><br>
+
+  Steeple Morden,
+<a href="#page263">263</a><br>
+
+  Stocks,
+<a href="#page242">242</a><br>
+
+  Stokes, Sir George,
+<a href="#page32">32</a>,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Stonea,
+<a href="#page409">409</a><br>
+
+  Stone altar,
+<a href="#page134">134</a><br>
+
+  Stourbridge Fair,
+<a href="#page163">163</a>-167<br>
+
+  Stretham,
+<a href="#page283">283</a>,
+<a href="#page298">298</a><br>
+
+  Stuntney,
+<a href="#page180">180</a><br>
+
+  Suffolk,
+<a href="#page175">175</a><br>
+
+  Sutton,
+<a href="#page286">286</a><br>
+
+  Sutton Crosses,
+<a href="#page424">424</a><br>
+
+  Swaffham,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Swaffham Bulbeck,
+<a href="#page189">189</a><br>
+
+  Swaffham Prior,
+<a href="#page191">191</a><br>
+
+  Swavesey,
+<a href="#page292">292</a><br>
+
+  Syndicates,
+<a href="#page125">125</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">T</p>
+
+<p>Tabula Eliensis,
+<a href="#page319">319</a><br>
+
+  Taxers,
+<a href="#page12">12</a><br>
+
+  "T.B.C.,"
+<a href="#page88">88</a><br>
+
+  Tennyson,
+<a href="#page55">55</a>,
+<a href="#page91">91</a>,
+<a href="#page97">97</a>,
+<a href="#page102">102</a>,
+<a href="#page104">104</a><br>
+
+  Terms,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Terrington,
+<a href="#page120">120</a>,
+<a href="#page414">414</a><br>
+
+  Teversham,
+<a href="#page209">209</a><br>
+
+  Thackeray,
+<a href="#page91">91</a>,
+<a href="#page97">97</a>,
+<a href="#page107">107</a><br>
+
+  Theodore of Tarsus,
+<a href="#page306">306</a><br>
+
+  Thetford,
+<a href="#page180">180</a><br>
+
+  Third Trinity,
+<a href="#page88">88</a><br>
+
+  Thirlby, Bp.,
+<a href="#page341">341</a><br>
+
+  Thompson,
+<a href="#page104">104</a><br>
+
+  Thomson, Sir J. J.,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Tillotson, Abp.,
+<a href="#page288">288</a><br>
+
+  Tithe Barn,
+<a href="#page381">381</a><br>
+
+  Toft,
+<a href="#page270">270</a><br>
+
+  Tonbert,
+<a href="#page169">169</a>,
+<a href="#page283">283</a><br>
+
+  Triplow Heath,
+<a href="#page228">228</a><br>
+
+  Tripos,
+<a href="#page14">14</a>,
+<a href="#page127">127</a><br>
+
+  Trumpington,
+<a href="#page219">219</a>,
+<a href="#page310">310</a><br>
+
+  Trumpington Gate,
+<a href="#page35">35</a><br>
+
+  Turf-cutting,
+<a href="#page196">196</a><br>
+
+  Turner, Bp.,
+<a href="#page274">274</a>,
+<a href="#page343">343</a><br>
+
+  Tydd,
+<a href="#page415">415</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">U</p>
+
+<p>Ulfcytel,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page214">214</a><br>
+
+  "Undertakers,"
+<a href="#page403">403</a><br>
+
+  Union,
+<a href="#page134">134</a><br>
+
+  University, Origin of,
+<a href="#page11">11</a><br>
+
+  Upper River,
+<a href="#page220">220</a><br>
+
+  Upware,
+<a href="#page194">194</a>,
+<a href="#page300">300</a><br>
+
+  Upwell,
+<a href="#page411">411</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">V</p>
+
+<p>Vacations,
+<a href="#page17">17</a><br>
+
+  Valence, Marie de,
+<a href="#page30">30</a><br>
+
+  Vandlebury,
+<a href="#page201">201</a><br>
+
+  Vanity Fair,
+<a href="#page166">166</a><br>
+
+  Vermuyden,
+<a href="#page406">406</a><br>
+
+  Via Devana,
+<a href="#page21">21</a>,
+<a href="#page159">159</a>,
+<a href="#page206">206</a><br>
+
+  Vicars Brook,
+<a href="#page23">23</a><br>
+
+  Vice-Chancellor,
+<a href="#page125">125</a><br>
+
+  Victoria, Queen,
+<a href="#page257">257</a><br>
+
+  Vigor, St.,
+<a href="#page210">210</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">W</p>
+
+<p>Walden,
+<a href="#page137">137</a><br>
+
+  Wall-rue,
+<a href="#page295">295</a><br>
+
+  Walpole,
+<a href="#page413">413</a>,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  Walpole Gate,
+<a href="#page345">345</a><br>
+
+  Walsoken,
+<a href="#page413">413</a>,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  War Ditches,
+<a href="#page208">208</a><br>
+
+  Warstead Street,
+<a href="#page209">209</a><br>
+
+  Washington Arms,
+<a href="#page26">26</a><br>
+
+  Waterbeach,
+<a href="#page289">289</a>,
+<a href="#page296">296</a><br>
+
+  Wat Tyler,
+<a href="#page131">131</a>,
+<a href="#page248">248</a><br>
+
+  Waynflete, Bp.,
+<a href="#page52">52</a><br>
+
+  Wedmore, Peace of,
+<a href="#page8">8</a>,
+<a href="#page308">308</a><br>
+
+  Well Stream,
+<a href="#page399">399</a>,
+<a href="#page411">411</a>,
+<a href="#page416">416</a>,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  Welney,
+<a href="#page411">411</a><br>
+
+  Wendred, St.,
+<a href="#page176">176</a>,
+<a href="#page275">275</a><br>
+
+  Wendy,
+<a href="#page260">260</a><br>
+
+  Wentworth,
+<a href="#page286">286</a><br>
+
+  West, Bp.,
+<a href="#page332">332</a>,
+<a href="#page335">335</a>,
+<a href="#page367">367</a><br>
+
+  Westcott House,
+<a href="#page148">148</a><br>
+
+  Westley Waterless,
+<a href="#page188">188</a><br>
+
+  Westminster College,
+<a href="#page142">142</a><br>
+
+  Westmorland,
+<a href="#page166">166</a><br>
+
+  Weston Colville,
+<a href="#page188">188</a><br>
+
+  Westry,
+<a href="#page411">411</a><br>
+
+  West Walton,
+<a href="#page413">413</a>,
+<a href="#page422">422</a><br>
+
+  Whalley,
+<a href="#page272">272</a><br>
+
+  Whewell,
+<a href="#page104">104</a>,
+<a href="#page108">108</a><br>
+
+  White Hill,
+<a href="#page236">236</a><br>
+
+  Whitgift, Abp.,
+<a href="#page124">124</a><br>
+
+  Whittlesea,
+<a href="#page410">410</a><br>
+
+  Whittlesford,
+<a href="#page227">227</a><br>
+
+  Wicken Fen,
+<a href="#page180">180</a>,
+<a href="#page300">300</a><br>
+
+  Wilbraham,
+<a href="#page210">210</a><br>
+
+  Wilburton,
+<a href="#page283">283</a><br>
+
+  Wilfrid, St.,
+<a href="#page303">303</a>,
+<a href="#page393">393</a><br>
+
+  Will of Henry the Sixth,
+<a href="#page52">52</a><br>
+
+  Williams, Bp.,
+<a href="#page116">116</a><br>
+
+  Willingham,
+<a href="#page286">286</a>,
+<a href="#page290">290</a><br>
+
+  Wimpole,
+<a href="#page256">256</a><br>
+
+  Wireless Telegraphy,
+<a href="#page267">267</a><br>
+
+  Wisbech,
+<a href="#page399">399</a>,
+<a href="#page403">403</a>,
+<a href="#page415">415</a>,
+<a href="#page426">426</a><br>
+
+  Wisbech, John of,
+<a href="#page331">331</a><br>
+
+  Witchford,
+<a href="#page286">286</a>,
+<a href="#page318">318</a><br>
+
+  Woad,
+<a href="#page417">417</a><br>
+
+  Wood Ditton,
+<a href="#page171">171</a>,
+<a href="#page187">187</a><br>
+
+  Wordsworth,
+<a href="#page55">55</a>,
+<a href="#page101">101</a>,
+<a href="#page102">102</a>,
+<a href="#page113">113</a>,
+<a href="#page118">118</a><br>
+
+  Wranglers,
+<a href="#page14">14</a><br>
+
+  Wren, Bp.,
+<a href="#page25">25</a>,
+<a href="#page189">189</a>,
+<a href="#page209">209</a>,
+<a href="#page342">342</a><br>
+
+  Wren, Christopher,
+<a href="#page30">30</a>,
+<a href="#page43">43</a>,
+<a href="#page360">360</a></p>
+
+
+<p class="p2 add2em">Y</p>
+
+<p>Yaxley,
+<a href="#page400">400</a></p>
+</div>
+
+
+<p class="p4 center smaller"><span class="smcap">Richard Clay and Sons, Limited</span><br>
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND<br>
+  BUNGAY SUFFOLK.</p>
+
+<div class="p4 advert">
+<p class="noindent"><span class="bigger">Sussex.</span> By <span class="smcap">E. V. Lucas</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Frederick L.
+     Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>WESTMINSTER GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"A delightful addition to an excellent
+series.... Mr. Lucas's knowledge of Sussex is shown in so many fields,
+with so abundant and yet so natural a flow, that one is kept
+entertained and charmed through every passage of his devious
+progress."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Berkshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">James Edmund Vincent</span>. With Illustrations by
+     <span class="smcap">Frederick L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY CHRONICLE.</i>&mdash;"We consider this book one of the best in an
+admirable series, and one which should appeal to all who love this
+kind of literature."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Oxford and the Cotswolds.</span> By <span class="smcap">H. A. Evans</span>. With Illustrations by
+     <span class="smcap">Frederick L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY TELEGRAPH.</i>&mdash;"The author is everywhere entertaining and fresh,
+never allowing his own interest to flag, and thereby retaining the
+close attention of the reader."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Shakespeare's Country.</span> By The Ven. <span class="smcap">W. H. Hutton</span>. With
+     Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Edmund H. New</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>PALL MALL GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"Mr. Edmund H. New has made a fine book a thing
+of beauty and a joy for ever by a series of lovely drawings."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Hampshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">D. H. Moutray Read</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Arthur B.
+     Connor</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>STANDARD.</i>&mdash;"In our judgment, as excellent and as lively a book as
+has yet appeared in the Highways and Byways Series."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Dorset.</span> By Sir <span class="smcap">Frederick Treves</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Joseph
+     Pennell</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>STANDARD.</i>&mdash;"A breezy, delightful book, full of sidelights on men and
+manners, and quick in the interpretation of all the half-inarticulate
+lore of the countryside."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Wiltshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">Edward Hutton</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Nelly
+     Erichsen</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY GRAPHIC.</i>&mdash;"Replete with enjoyable and informing reading ...
+Illustrated by exquisite sketches."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Somerset.</span> By <span class="smcap">Edward Hutton</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Nelly Erichsen</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY TELEGRAPH.</i>&mdash;"A book which will set the heart of every
+West-country-man beating with enthusiasm, and with pride for the
+goodly heritage into which he has been born as a son of Somerset."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Devon and Cornwall.</span> By <span class="smcap">Arthur H. Norway</span>. With Illustrations by
+     <span class="smcap">Joseph Pennell</span> and <span class="smcap">Hugh Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY CHRONICLE.</i>&mdash;"So delightful that we would gladly fill columns
+with extracts were space as elastic as imagination.... The text is
+excellent; the illustrations of it are even better."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">South Wales.</span> By <span class="smcap">A. G. Bradley</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Frederick L.
+     Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>SPECTATOR.</i>&mdash;"Mr. Bradley has certainly exalted the writing of a
+combined archæological and descriptive guide-book into a species of
+literary art. The result is fascinating."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">North Wales.</span> By <span class="smcap">A. G. Bradley</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Hugh Thomson</span>
+     and <span class="smcap">Joseph Pennell</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>PALL MALL GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"To read this fine book makes us eager to visit
+every hill and every valley that Mr. Bradley describes with such
+tantalising enthusiasm. It is a work of inspiration, vivid, sparkling,
+and eloquent&mdash;a deep well of pleasure to every lover of Wales."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Cambridge and Ely.</span> By Rev. <span class="smcap">Edward Conybeare</span>. With Illustrations
+     by <span class="smcap">Frederick L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>ATHENÆUM.</i>&mdash;"A volume which, light and easily read as it is, deserves
+to rank with the best literature about the county."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">East Anglia.</span> By <span class="smcap">William A. Dutt</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Joseph
+     Pennell</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>WORLD.</i>&mdash;"Of all the fascinating volumes in the 'Highways and Byways'
+series, none is more pleasant to read.... Mr. Dutt, himself an East
+Anglian, writes most sympathetically and in picturesque style of the
+district."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Lincolnshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">W. F. Rawnsley</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Frederick
+     L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>PALL MALL GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"A splendid record of a storied shire."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Nottinghamshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">J. B. Firth</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Frederick
+     L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY TELEGRAPH.</i>&mdash;"A book that will rank high in the series which it
+augments; a book that no student of our Midland topography and of
+Midland associations should miss."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Northamptonshire and Rutland.</span> By <span class="smcap">Herbert A. Evans</span>. With
+     Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Frederick L. Griggs</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>TIMES.</i>&mdash;"A pleasant, gossiping record ... Mr. Evans is a guide who
+makes us want to see for ourselves the places he has seen."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Derbyshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">J. B. Firth</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Nelly Erichsen</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY TELEGRAPH.</i>&mdash;"The result is altogether delightful, for
+'Derbyshire' is as attractive to the reader in his arm-chair as to the
+tourist wandering amid the scenes Mr. Firth describes so well."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Yorkshire.</span> By <span class="smcap">Arthur H. Norway</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Joseph
+     Pennell</span> and <span class="smcap">Hugh Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>PALL MALL GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"The wonderful story of Yorkshire's past
+provides Mr. Norway with a wealth of interesting material, which he
+has used judiciously and well; each grey ruin of castle and abbey he
+has re-erected and re-peopled in the most delightful way. A better
+guide and story-teller it would be hard to find."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Lake District.</span> By <span class="smcap">A. G. Bradley</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Joseph
+     Pennell</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"A notable edition&mdash;an engaging volume, packed
+with the best of all possible guidance for tourists. For the most part
+the artist's work is as exquisite as anything of the kind he has
+done."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Northumbria.</span> By <span class="smcap">P. Anderson Graham</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Hugh
+     Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">The Border.</span> By <span class="smcap">Andrew Lang</span> and <span class="smcap">John Lang</span>. With Illustrations by
+     <span class="smcap">Hugh Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>STANDARD.</i>&mdash;"The reader on his travels, real or imaginary, could not
+have pleasanter or more profitable companionship. There are charming
+sketches by Mr. Hugh Thomson to illustrate the letterpress."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Galloway and Carrick.</span> By the Rev. <span class="smcap">C. H. Dick</span>. With Illustrations
+     by <span class="smcap">Hugh Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>SATURDAY REVIEW.</i>&mdash;"The very book to take with one into that romantic
+angle of Scotland, which lies well aside of the beaten tourist track."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Donegal and Antrim.</span> By <span class="smcap">Stephen Gwynn</span>. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Hugh
+     Thomson</span>.</p>
+
+<p><i>DAILY TELEGRAPH.</i>&mdash;"A perfect book of its kind, on which author,
+artist, and publisher have lavished of their best."</p>
+
+<p class="p2 noindent"><span class="bigger">Normandy.</span> By <span class="smcap">Percy Dearmer</span>, M.A. With Illustrations by <span class="smcap">Joseph
+     Pennell.</span></p>
+
+<p><i>ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE.</i>&mdash;"A charming book ... Mr. Dearmer is as
+arrestive in his way as Mr. Pennell. He has the true topographic eye.
+He handles legend and history in entertaining fashion."</p>
+</div>
+
+<p class="p2 center">MACMILLAN AND CO., <span class="smcap">Ltd.</span>, LONDON.</p>
+
+<h2>Notes</h2>
+<div class="footnote">
+
+<p><a id="footnote1" name="footnote1"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag1">1</a></b>: The word "Fellow" signifies, in any College, one of the
+strictly limited corporation to whom its whole property legally
+belongs. This corporation is kept filled up by co-option; the most
+distinguished of the junior students being usually chosen.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote2" name="footnote2"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag2">2</a></b>: The kingdom of Mercia comprised the Midlands, and was
+(roughly) bounded on the north by the Humber and Mersey, on the west
+by Wales, on the south by the Thames, and on the east by the Cam and
+the Lea.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote3" name="footnote3"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag3">3</a></b>: An ordinary "Hundred" contained an area some five miles
+square, instead of the five square miles which was that of old
+Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote4" name="footnote4"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag4">4</a></b>: Till the nineteenth century was well advanced the
+Mathematical Tripos was the only avenue to the attainment of "Honours"
+at Cambridge; so that even such a distinguished scholar as Lord
+Macaulay was debarred from them by his inability to pass that
+examination, and had to content himself with the lower status of an
+"Ordinary" or "Poll" Degree (so called from the Greek &#960;&#959;&#955;&#955;&#953;
+= many, as being the refuge of the common herd of candidates).
+Triposes in many other branches of knowledge, classical, scientific,
+legal, historical, and linguistic, have since been added.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote5" name="footnote5"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag5">5</a></b>: These corresponded to the still existing "Scouts" at
+Oxford.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote6" name="footnote6"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag6">6</a></b>: The corresponding Oxford name is "Common Room."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote7" name="footnote7"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag7">7</a></b>: The Washington arms are, in heraldic language: Barry of
+four, gules and argent. On a chief azure three mullets of the second.
+Crest, a demi-eaglet sable rising from an earl's coronet.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote8" name="footnote8"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag8">8</a></b>: This word reminds us that archery practice was, in
+England, a regular feature of mediæval College life.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote9" name="footnote9"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag9">9</a></b>: This is shown in our first wood-cut.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote10" name="footnote10"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag10">10</a></b>: The speediest possible destruction of such buildings was
+the only way of dealing with fires before effective engines came in,
+which was not until the nineteenth century. Rings to facilitate the
+use of fire-hooks are to be found under the eaves of many old houses
+hereabout. The hooks had 30 foot handles, mounted on a pair of
+wheels.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote11" name="footnote11"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag11">11</a></b>: Bishop Latimer, the Protestant martyr, also belonged to
+Corpus.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote12" name="footnote12"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag12">12</a></b>: The University had licensed printers from the time of
+Henry the Eighth, but did not set up a Press of its own till the
+eighteenth century, when influenced by the great scholar and critic
+Richard Bentley.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote13" name="footnote13"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag13">13</a></b>: See page <a href="#page17">17</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote14" name="footnote14"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag14">14</a></b>: See Chapter <a href="#chapvi">VI</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote15" name="footnote15"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag15">15</a></b>: Sculptures over the piers represent the bridge itself, a
+very unusual feature.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote16" name="footnote16"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag16">16</a></b>: This rank is one of the privileges due to the Royal
+Founder. Another was the exemption of King's men from the authority of
+the Proctors; another their right to a Degree without passing the
+usual examinations. This was given up in the middle of last century,
+and now every King's student is required by the College to take
+Honours in some Tripos.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote17" name="footnote17"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag17">17</a></b>: A current story tells how a millionaire, who boasted
+that his money should make him a lawn as perfect, was discomfited by
+being told that to attain such perfection "you must mow and roll it
+regularly for 400 years. That is what has been done here."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote18" name="footnote18"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag18">18</a></b>: His statue surmounts it, flanked by two figures
+representing Science (gazing at the Chapel) and Religion (with her
+eyes devoutly fixed upon the Hall). To leap across from the lawn to
+the pedestal of this group is a feat seldom accomplished.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote19" name="footnote19"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag19">19</a></b>: These figures are somewhat larger than life-size.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote20" name="footnote20"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag20">20</a></b>: The Portcullis was adopted by Henry the Seventh as the
+Tudor badge, to signify that his claim to the throne was double
+(through his mother, Lady Margaret, as well as his wife), even as a
+portcullis doubled the defensibility of a castle gate.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote21" name="footnote21"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag21">21</a></b>: The former is from Huddleston in Yorkshire, the latter
+from Weldon in Northamptonshire.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote22" name="footnote22"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag22">22</a></b>: This gift called forth a satirical epigram from Oxford;
+where the prevalent Toryism was made the pretext for quartering a
+regiment of cavalry in the city to suppress Jacobite demonstrations:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>King George, observing with judicious eyes<br>
+  The state of both his Universities,<br>
+  To Oxford sent a troop of horse;&mdash;and why?<br>
+  That Learned Body wanted Loyalty.<br>
+  To Cambridge books he sent; as well discerning<br>
+  How much that Loyal Body wanted Learning."</p>
+
+<p>A retort (in which the humour is a trifle less spontaneous) was
+speedily penned by Sir William Browne, who specialised on epigrams and
+left prizes for their encouragement which are still annually awarded:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>The King to Oxford sent a troop of horse,<br>
+  For Tories own no argument but Force.<br>
+  With equal skill to Cambridge books he sent;<br>
+  For Whigs admit no force but Argument."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote23" name="footnote23"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag23">23</a></b>: Atkinson and Clark, <i>Cambridge Described</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote24" name="footnote24"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag24">24</a></b>: Foster and Atkinson, <i>Old Cambridge Plate</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote25" name="footnote25"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag25">25</a></b>: Michaelhouse (like Peterhouse) derived its name from the
+neighbouring church which was used for worship by the Scholars till
+they got a chapel of their own.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote26" name="footnote26"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag26">26</a></b>: The T.B.C. boat was one of the two first boats to appear
+on the river. The other was the "Lady Margaret" or St. John's boat,
+whose colours were (and are) bright red. These two boats used to row
+along, challenging each other, by sound of bugle, to extempore bursts
+of racing. This was in the Twenties. The first regular College races
+began in the year 1827; but only five Colleges rowed (Trinity, St.
+John's, Caius, Jesus and Emmanuel). Not till 1859 were all
+represented.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote27" name="footnote27"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag27">27</a></b>: Hallam's rooms were on the southern side of the New
+Court, in the central staircase (letter G), and were the western set
+on the first floor. Tennyson himself never "kept" in College, but had
+lodgings, first in Rose Crescent, and afterwards opposite the Bull
+Hotel.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote28" name="footnote28"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag28">28</a></b>: Its line was determined by the distant spire of Coton
+Church which for two centuries closed the vista. (It is now hidden by
+these trees.) A current witticism was that the view symbolised a
+Trinity Fellowship&mdash;a long, straight-forward prospect, closed by a
+village church. Till the year 1878 every Fellow had to become a Priest
+of the Established Church within seven years, on pain of forfeiting
+his Fellowship. After this he was a Fellow for life, unless he
+married. And each Fellow in turn had a right to any College living
+that fell vacant. All this is altered now. Fellows are elected
+unconditionally for a limited period (which may be renewed), and
+College livings are assigned to the best men to be had, whether of
+Trinity or not.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote29" name="footnote29"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag29">29</a></b>: A cycloid is the curve described by any single point on
+the rim of a rolling wheel.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote30" name="footnote30"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag30">30</a></b>: Nocturnal exploration of the College roofs has been so
+favourite an amusement amongst undergraduates that not long ago a book
+was actually published entitled <i>The Roof-Climber's Guide to Trinity
+College</i>. Every eminence in the College has been scaled, save only the
+Great Gate Tower. The Hon. C. S. Rolls, who was afterwards the first
+man to fly from England to France and back, and who fell a martyr to
+his zeal for aviation, was, in his day, the most daring and systematic
+of all Trinity roof-climbers.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote31" name="footnote31"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag31">31</a></b>: Byron himself was morbidly sensitive on this point. Mr.
+Clark (<i>Guide to Cambridge</i>, p. 140) tells how he abused a friend who
+fell behind out of courtesy: "Ah! I see you wish to spy out my
+deformity." He was in residence 1805-8.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote32" name="footnote32"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag32">32</a></b>: This instrument bound its subscribers to zealous
+endeavour, far from any "detestable indifference and neutrality," for
+the "extirpation of Popery, Prelacy, ... Archbishops, Bishops, Deans,
+Chapters, Archdeacons, and all that Hierarchy." Every adult in the
+kingdom had to sign this very thoroughgoing test, on pain of
+imprisonment.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote33" name="footnote33"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag33">33</a></b>: These same rooms (on the south-westernmost staircase)
+were probably those occupied by Lord Byron.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote34" name="footnote34"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag34">34</a></b>: The entrance was from the New Court, which communicates
+with Nevile's Court by an arcade in the southern cloister of the
+latter.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote35" name="footnote35"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag35">35</a></b>: All the Colleges have thus suffered severely; King's
+being hit hardest of all. Trinity was less seriously affected, owing
+to the fact that much of its land lies in the North of England.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote36" name="footnote36"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag36">36</a></b>: <i>Cambridge Described</i>, p. 444.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote37" name="footnote37"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag37">37</a></b>: A "Grace-cup" is a large silver tankard which at College
+feasts is solemnly passed down the High Table, each guest in turn
+standing up to drink it. Three, indeed, must always be so standing,
+the drinker, the last man, and the next man; whence the cup has
+sometimes three handles. At each potation the three concerned formally
+bow to each other.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote38" name="footnote38"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag38">38</a></b>: For the first year of his residence the student is
+called a Freshman, in the next he is a "Junior Soph," and in the third
+a "Senior Soph." The origin of the word "Soph" is doubtful. It is
+presumably short for Sophist; but all Americans will recognise it as
+the origin of their "Sophomore." And American University nomenclature
+is largely derived from Cambridge. The word, however, has of late gone
+out of general use, and practically survives scarcely anywhere but in
+Trinity.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote39" name="footnote39"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag39">39</a></b>: At the battle of Minden, 1759.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote40" name="footnote40"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag40">40</a></b>: Besides the University Examinations needed to obtain a
+Degree, every College keeps its students up to the mark by extra
+examinations of its own, held usually twice a year. There are also
+competitive examinations for the College Scholarships, and (at
+Trinity) for the Fellowships. About seventy per cent. of Trinity
+students are "Honour men"; reading, not for the ordinary (or "Poll")
+Degree, but for one or other of the various Triposes. And of these
+"Honour" candidates of Trinity, over thirty per cent. attain a First
+Class; which is thus gained by nearly twenty-five per cent. of Trinity
+students, the highest College average in the University.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote41" name="footnote41"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag41">41</a></b>: The water is from an ancient conduit made originally to
+supply the Franciscan Convent, and comes from a spring some two miles
+to the west. Till recently this was the only supply for Trinity, and
+(by a charitable tap outside the Great Gate) for many neighbours also.
+Now it is supplemented by an artesian well behind the chapel, bored to
+a depth of 120 feet into the Greensand.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote42" name="footnote42"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag42">42</a></b>: These same craftsmen probably made the beautiful
+ceilings in the Combination Room at St. John's College (which is
+copied from that in one of the rooms in this Court), and in the
+University Library.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote43" name="footnote43"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag43">43</a></b>: See <i>Cambridge Described</i>, p. 443.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote44" name="footnote44"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag44">44</a></b>: Both clock and bells are due to Dr. Bentley, the famous
+Master who bullied the College into so many happy and undesired
+expenses during his tenure of office (1700-1742). The repeating is
+solely for convenience; one often fails to note the first stroke or
+two of an hour.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote45" name="footnote45"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag45">45</a></b>: This was given to the College in 1755 by the then
+Master, Dr. Robert Smith.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote46" name="footnote46"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag46">46</a></b>: Wordsworth in "The Prelude" tells us how he loved</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>The antechapel, where the statue stood<br>
+  Of Newton, with his prism and silent face,<br>
+  The marble index of a mind for ever<br>
+  Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote47" name="footnote47"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag47">47</a></b>: Barrow's great wish was that the University should build
+a theatre (like the Sheldonian at Oxford), instead of having its
+dramas performed, as they then were, in the University Church. When
+the Senate boggled at the expense, he declared that Trinity should
+shame them by erecting unaided a yet finer building than he proposed,
+and "that very afternoon" himself staked out the foundations of the
+Library. (<i>Clark's Guide</i>, p. 123.)</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote48" name="footnote48"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag48">48</a></b>: Of the astonishingly wide sweep of Whewell's knowledge
+many tales are yet told. There was no subject on which he could not
+talk with authority. It is related how an impertinent Fellow once
+hoped to puzzle him by getting up an article on Chinese music in a
+back number of the <i>Edinburgh Review</i>, and introducing the subject in
+Hall. "Ah," replied Whewell, "it is a long time since I thought of
+that. But you will find an article of mine about it in the
+<i>Edinburgh</i>, some ten or fifteen years ago."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote49" name="footnote49"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag49">49</a></b>: On Sundays and Festivals all wear surplices, and the
+throng then presents a very striking appearance. It suggested
+Tennyson's vision of "Six hundred maidens clad in purest white," in
+"The Princess."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote50" name="footnote50"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag50">50</a></b>: This is now the College Council, consisting of the
+Master, the Tutors, and other Members elected for a certain period.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote51" name="footnote51"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag51">51</a></b>: It was made early in the eighteenth century by the
+celebrated Father Smith, an organ-builder of world-wide fame.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote52" name="footnote52"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag52">52</a></b>: By his arrogance Bentley incurred the undying hatred of
+Pope, who denounces him in the "Dunciad" as boasting himself (in
+addressing Dullness)</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>Thy mighty Scholiast, whose unwearied pains<br>
+  Made Horace dull, and humbled Milton's strains;<br>
+  Turn what they will to verse, their toil is vain;<br>
+  Critics like me shall make it prose again."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote53" name="footnote53"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag53">53</a></b>: To every College is attached some high-placed personage
+as Visitor, with a vague, but by no means unreal, power of
+interference when appealed to. Bentley was only saved from deposition
+by the sudden death of the Visitor.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote54" name="footnote54"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag54">54</a></b>: The Senate is the general assembly of Masters of Arts,
+which is the supreme University authority.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote55" name="footnote55"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag55">55</a></b>: <i>Guide to Cambridge</i>, p. 129. The meaning of the curious
+word "Harry-Soph" is apparently equivalent to a student unequal to a
+Degree. Bentley was deprived of all his Degrees.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote56" name="footnote56"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag56">56</a></b>: Readers of <i>Esmond</i> will remember that Thackeray
+quarters that hero on this same staircase, "close by the gate, and
+near to the famous Mr. Newton's lodgings." Thackeray was in residence
+1829-31, Macaulay 1818-24, Newton 1662-1717.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote57" name="footnote57"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag57">57</a></b>: Whewell was Master of Trinity from 1841 to 1866.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote58" name="footnote58"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag58">58</a></b>: This Bowling Green lies to the west of Trinity Chapel,
+and is one of the choicest gems of Cambridge, a gracious, walled
+oblong of turf, with a wooded terrace overlooking the river at its
+western end, and at the east, the lately discovered fourteenth century
+front of the College Bursary, once forming part of King's Hall. The
+privilege of entering this Paradise can only be attained under the
+escort of a Fellow.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote59" name="footnote59"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag59">59</a></b>: The above quotation, as well as that which follows, is
+from the sermon preached by Fisher in Westminster Abbey at her burial.
+(I have modernised the spelling.)</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote60" name="footnote60"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag60">60</a></b>: Amongst these we must count Erasmus; who composed the
+epitaph on her tomb.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote61" name="footnote61"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag61">61</a></b>: Michaelhouse was one of the constituent Colleges of
+Trinity.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote62" name="footnote62"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag62">62</a></b>: We need not, however, take too literally the statement
+in the Instrument of Suppression, that but two ill-conducted Brethren
+remained. For, as Mr. Clark has shown, that Instrument was copied
+verbatim from the earlier one used for the turning of St. Radegund's
+Priory into Jesus College.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote63" name="footnote63"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag63">63</a></b>: There was no attempt at music, no organ even, anywhere
+save at King's, Trinity, and St. John's, and these three Colleges kept
+between them a choir of six "lay clerks" (elderly for the most part),
+who used to hurry from service to service, as did also the single
+organist employed! And this went on till 1842!</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote64" name="footnote64"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag64">64</a></b>: At St. John's, the title of President is given to the
+Vice-master of the College.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote65" name="footnote65"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag65">65</a></b>: In one of these windows should be noted a portrait of
+Henrietta Maria, the Queen of Charles the First, who was once
+entertained in this apartment.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote66" name="footnote66"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag66">66</a></b>: It need scarcely be pointed out that this breach was not
+made from any Protestant zeal, but only to enable the King to put away
+the wife he was tired of, and marry Anne Boleyn, which the Pope would
+not authorise.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote67" name="footnote67"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag67">67</a></b>: The gratings are to prevent any nocturnal escape from
+College. Only one man is ever known to have "squeezed himself betwixt
+the bars."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote68" name="footnote68"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag68">68</a></b>: This word, now used of all flannel sporting jackets,
+was, for several decades&mdash;till nearly 1880, in fact&mdash;confined to the
+fiery coats of the St. John's (or, officially, "Lady Margaret") Boat
+Club. When, about that date, the question of having a "universal
+blazer" was debated by the undergraduates, an elderly clergyman
+protested, in all shocked seriousness, against the "incendiary
+tendencies" of such a notion.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote69" name="footnote69"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag69">69</a></b>: The two infant cherubs which (without any heraldic
+authority) act as supporters to the College Shield over the gate of
+the new buildings (those to the east of the street) are popularly
+supposed to be meant for the innocent souls of the two Founders. The
+shield itself (duly granted by the Heralds' College, 1575), comprises
+both their Coats with a blue and silver bordure. That of Dr. Caius is
+curious; two green serpents standing on their tails upon a green stone
+amid flowers of amaranth. This is declared (in the grant) to signify
+"Wisdom stayed upon Virtue and adorned with Immortality"&mdash;a
+characteristic Elizabethan "conceit."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote70" name="footnote70"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag70">70</a></b>: It was not till after Gonville's death that it began to
+be called by his name.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote71" name="footnote71"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag71">71</a></b>: The present gateway is not, however, the original one,
+but erected in mid-Victorian days at the same time as the large
+pinnacled gate at the south-east corner of the College, but the humble
+character of the original is fairly reproduced.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote72" name="footnote72"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag72">72</a></b>: Each side of the hexagon was originally a sun-dial.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote73" name="footnote73"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag73">73</a></b>: "Passage" is the local name applied to the many paved
+footways which intersect Cambridge. They are forbidden ground to
+vehicles, including bicycles, a prohibition which constantly brings
+undergraduates before the Police Court.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote74" name="footnote74"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag74">74</a></b>: At this date King's was a highly conservative College,
+and its discipline strict with a strictness long discarded by the
+University at large.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote75" name="footnote75"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag75">75</a></b>: "To the Universities," Froude (our most ardent
+Protestant historian) tells us, in his <i>History of England</i>, "the
+Reformation brought with it desolation.... They were called Stables of
+Asses&mdash;Schools of the Devil.... The Government cancelled the
+exhibitions which had been granted for the support of poor Scholars.
+They suppressed the Professorships and Lectureships&mdash;Degrees were held
+anti-Christian. Learning was no necessary adjunct to a creed which
+'lay in a nutshell.' ... College Libraries were plundered and burnt.
+The Divinity Schools at Oxford were planted with cabbages, and the
+laundresses dried clothes in the School of Arts."</p>
+
+<p>At Cambridge Dr. Caius gives a long list of University Hostels,
+filled, within his memory, by zealous students, which, when he wrote
+had become wholly deserted and taken possession of by the townsfolk.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote76" name="footnote76"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag76">76</a></b>: The pillage was actually presided over by the
+Vice-Chancellor of the University, Dr. Whitgift, Master of Trinity,
+whose Protestant zeal raised him later to the Archbishopric of
+Canterbury.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote77" name="footnote77"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag77">77</a></b>: This officer is the acting Head of the University, and
+is appointed by the Council from amongst the Heads of the Colleges,
+usually by rota, year by year. The Chancellor, whom he represents, is
+always some specially distinguished notability, and is appointed for
+life. He is only present on state occasions.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote78" name="footnote78"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag78">78</a></b>: Members are often able to introduce ladies, when there
+is likely to be room for them. And undergraduates may listen to
+proceedings from the Galleries, where, in defiance of rule, they are
+often heard as well as seen, should the business be exciting.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote79" name="footnote79"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag79">79</a></b>: Such discussion as may seem needful has already taken
+place before a Meeting of the resident Members of the Senate, who have
+spent at least forty nights in Cambridge during the last Academic
+year, and whose names are accordingly on the "Electoral Roll." They
+are summoned, as required, by the Vice-Chancellor, to discuss the
+various matters which it is proposed to embody in "Graces."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote80" name="footnote80"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag80">80</a></b>: The office thus requires no mean scholarly and
+oratorical powers. When Queen Elizabeth visited Cambridge, the Public
+Orator had to make her a laudatory address of half an hour in
+duration, without notes, "with the Queen's horse curvetting under her"
+(for this was not in the Senate House&mdash;yet unbuilt&mdash;but in the open
+air before King's College Chapel), and with constant mock-modest
+interruptions from her Royal lips. Her only thanks were a commendation
+of his excellent memory.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote81" name="footnote81"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag81">81</a></b>: One apartment was called the Regent House, as being thus
+used by the Governing Body of the University.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote82" name="footnote82"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag82">82</a></b>: As Protestantism lost its first militant fervour, these
+performances more and more dropped their polemical features. But they
+still remained most inappropriate for a place of worship. We have seen
+how the higher minds of the University, such as Dr. Barrow, felt about
+them before the seventeenth century came to an end. (See p. <a href="#page104">104</a>.)</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote83" name="footnote83"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag83">83</a></b>: On the Sunday after All Saints' Day, when the "Lady
+Margaret Preacher," appointed by the Vice-Chancellor, officiates, he
+begins by reading the long roll of benefactors to the University from
+the earliest times; in itself a specially inspiring predication.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote84" name="footnote84"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag84">84</a></b>: It is hard upon Dr. Jowett that his name should have
+come down to posterity associated, not with this real contribution to
+the gladness of the world, but with a satirical quatrain on the tiny
+plot which he reclaimed from the street in the angle of Trinity Hall
+adjoining Clare:</p>
+
+<p class="poem10">
+<span class="min33em">"</span>A little garden little Jowett made,<br>
+  And fenced it with a little palisade;<br>
+  And would you know the mind of little Jowett,<br>
+  This little garden will a little show it."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote85" name="footnote85"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag85">85</a></b>: There was a fountain here, however, long before Hobson's
+day&mdash;at least as early as the fourteenth century&mdash;but whence the water
+came is not known. If, as seems probable, it was a natural spring, its
+existence was probably the factor which originally determined the site
+of the Market.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote86" name="footnote86"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag86">86</a></b>: This is the name bestowed on the stalwart officials a
+couple of whom attend each Proctor and exercise such physical coercion
+of delinquents as he may bid.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote87" name="footnote87"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag87">87</a></b>: One specially remembered conflict, when Rose Crescent
+was held by the Gown against an overwhelming force, till a police
+charge drove them in headlong rout to take refuge in Trinity, was made
+the subject of a parody of Macaulay's Horatius, to be found in Clark's
+<i>Guide to Cambridge</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote88" name="footnote88"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag88">88</a></b>: This design included the undoubted feature of a stone
+altar, the setting up of which gave occasion, after much litigation,
+for the promulgation of the well-known Judgment, which declares that
+in the Church of England the Law permits only a movable wooden table.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote89" name="footnote89"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag89">89</a></b>: So called because in union with the twin Society at
+Oxford; members of each having, <i>ipso facto</i>, all the privileges of
+membership in the other.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote90" name="footnote90"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag90">90</a></b>: So called to distinguish it from the smaller town
+bridges by Newnham Mill and Garret Hostel.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote91" name="footnote91"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag91">91</a></b>: We find "Magdalene Bridge" in Wordsworth's "Prelude."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote92" name="footnote92"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag92">92</a></b>: Over the entrance gateway may be seen the arms of Lord
+Braybrooke's family, the Nevilles. These are also the arms of the
+College.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote93" name="footnote93"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag93">93</a></b>: In spite of the enticing similarity of sound, it is
+fairly established that the word Camboritum is not the parent of the
+word Cambridge. In mediæval times we only read of "Granta-bridge."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote94" name="footnote94"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag94">94</a></b>: These were Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambs, Hunts, Beds
+and Herts, which combined to raise a common force (on the
+Parliamentary side).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote95" name="footnote95"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag95">95</a></b>: Newnham is just younger, having been opened 1875. It
+then consisted of one Hall only.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote96" name="footnote96"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag96">96</a></b>: These are large wooden edifices containing sheds for the
+boats below and dressing-rooms for the crews above.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote97" name="footnote97"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag97">97</a></b>: See Chapter <a href="#chapxiii">XIII</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote98" name="footnote98"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag98">98</a></b>: There are also races in the Lent Term for the less
+exalted boats. But only the first division in the May races has any
+general interest. Each division contains sixteen boats, and the last
+boat of each division is also the first of the division below, being
+thus known as a "sandwich boat."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote99" name="footnote99"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag99">99</a></b>: The races end at Chesterton, about a mile below the
+boathouses.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote100" name="footnote100"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag100">100</a></b>: This church, as has been already said, formerly stood
+at the other end of its Parish, in the old Jewry, hard by Trinity and
+St. John's.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote101" name="footnote101"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag101">101</a></b>: This restoration had the advantage of being carried out
+under the auspices of a man of real architectural taste (though better
+known by his geological distinction), the Rev. Osmund Fisher, then
+Dean of the College. The discovery of the Chapter House entrance in
+the cloisters was also due to him.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote102" name="footnote102"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag102">102</a></b>: Some words put by Virgil into the mouth of the Sibyl
+(or prophetess) of Cumae were supposed by the early Christians of Rome
+(to whom the idea of Sibylline books being prophetic was familiar from
+Roman History) to foretell the Incarnation. Hence she, and her sister
+Sibyls of other fictions as well, came to be considered inspired, and
+before long a whole literature of imaginary Sibylline predictions was
+in circulation.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote103" name="footnote103"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag103">103</a></b>: The Jesuits, of course, did not come into being for
+years after Cranmer's academic day.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote104" name="footnote104"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag104">104</a></b>: Her husband had been over the Royal Excise, and the
+College shield bears the familiar Broad Arrow of that department.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote105" name="footnote105"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag105">105</a></b>: The church is architecturally naught, outside; but the
+tower arches, within, form the loveliest gem in Cambridge.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote106" name="footnote106"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag106">106</a></b>: The rod retained its use in this connection till the
+eighteenth century. In the seventeenth, during the period of Puritan
+ascendancy, it was made a University enactment that if any
+undergraduate should "by day or night enter any river, ditch, lake,
+pond, mere, or any other water within the County of Cambridge, whether
+for the sake of swimming or of washing," he should be flogged in his
+College hall. It must be remembered that students then entered at
+least five years earlier than now.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote107" name="footnote107"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag107">107</a></b>: This crest is absent from the Johnian gate-tower, but
+is found above the iron gate leading into the Backs.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote108" name="footnote108"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag108">108</a></b>: This front belongs to an isolated block known as the
+"Fellows' Buildings," erected shortly after Milton's time.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote109" name="footnote109"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag109">109</a></b>: "L'Allegro."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote110" name="footnote110"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag110">110</a></b>: "Il Penseroso."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote111" name="footnote111"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag111">111</a></b>: A small back door, however, leads from the kitchen into
+"Christ's Lane" (on the south). On one famous occasion, when, at a
+time of popular excitement, the students were confined to the College,
+sympathisers from without burst this in (using the bar which closes
+the lane to vehicles as a battering-ram) and set them free.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote112" name="footnote112"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag112">112</a></b>: Paley's <i>Evidences</i> is still one of the set subjects in
+the "Littlego" (or "Previous Examination") which every student must
+pass before being allowed to proceed further.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote113" name="footnote113"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag113">113</a></b>: Unlovely as this church is, it is a monument of the
+piety and generosity of one of the most pious and generous men
+Cambridge has ever known, Dr. Perry, first Bishop of Australia, who,
+while a Fellow of Trinity, devoted his private fortune to the
+ecclesiastical needs of the town, and thus enabled no fewer than three
+large churches to be built. Unhappily it was at a period of execrable
+taste (the earliest Victorian), and the three are far from beautiful
+or correct examples of ecclesiastical architecture. But when the then
+newly formed Camden Society (for the revival of a purer style of
+building) ventured to hint as much, a storm of Protestant indignation
+arouse throughout Cambridge, and a public protest against such Romish
+criticism was actually signed by every resident Fellow of Trinity!</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote114" name="footnote114"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag114">114</a></b>: This was on the site of the Dominican Refectory. Sir
+Thomas Mildmay boasts that, in contempt of their religion, he has
+turned their Refectory into a Chapel, and their Church into a
+Refectory. The Hall and Combination Room still occupy the site of the
+Church.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote115" name="footnote115"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag115">115</a></b>: This occupied all but the whole space bounded by
+Downing Street, Tennis Court Road, Lensfield Road, and Regent Street.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote116" name="footnote116"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag116">116</a></b>: The ethnological series of skulls here ranks (with
+those at Berlin, St. Petersburg, and Washington) as the most complete
+in the world.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote117" name="footnote117"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag117">117</a></b>: On the wall here is engraved Pasteur's inspired saying:
+"<i>Dans les champs de l'observation le hasard ne favorise que les
+esprits préparés.</i>"</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote118" name="footnote118"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag118">118</a></b>: This is called the Cavendish Laboratory, being the gift
+of the late Duke of Devonshire, Chancellor of the University. The word
+laboratory we may note is, in student speech, invariably "Lab," which
+is even used as a verb.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote119" name="footnote119"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag119">119</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page4">5</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote120" name="footnote120"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag120">120</a></b>: Here was held, in 1430, under the representatives of
+Pope Martin the Fifth, the famous "Assize of Barnwell," which decided,
+by Papal authority, that in the University alone was vested all
+spiritual jurisdiction over its students, to the exclusion of the
+ordinary Diocesan and Parochial claims.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote121" name="footnote121"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag121">121</a></b>: So called to distinguish it from "Great St. Andrew's,"
+opposite Christ's College.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote122" name="footnote122"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag122">122</a></b>: This School still flourishes, and is still staffed by
+undergraduates. It is known as "Jesus Lane Sunday School," its first
+quarters having been in that street.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote123" name="footnote123"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag123">123</a></b>: The parish has now been divided into half a dozen
+districts. And its earliest houses, immediately round the Abbey
+Church, remain (as they have been from the first) outlying fragments
+of two small Town parishes, St. Benet's and St. Edward's.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote124" name="footnote124"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag124">124</a></b>: There were other minor Dykes (such as the Warstead
+Street, from Cherry Hinton to Horseheath), but these play no part in
+history.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote125" name="footnote125"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag125">125</a></b>: These forms show that the C was sounded hard. On the
+coins of the clan the name is written ECEN. These coins are of gold
+and bear the figure of a horse, being rude copies of the Macedonian
+staters which the tin trade brought to Britain. The earliest known are
+of the third century <span class="smcap">B.C.</span>, the latest (those inscribed with the name)
+of the first half century <span class="smcap">A.D.</span></p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote126" name="footnote126"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag126">126</a></b>: Tin was precious as a component of bronze, which, till
+iron came in, was the material for weapons and tools. See my <i>Roman
+Britain (S.P.C.K.)</i>, p. 33.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote127" name="footnote127"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag127">127</a></b>: In the Register of Fordham Church (a few miles north of
+Newmarket) is an entry to the effect that, on 27 February 1624, "The
+Most High and Mighty Prince, King James the First of England and Sixth
+of Scotland condescended to hunt six hares in Fordham Field!"</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote128" name="footnote128"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag128">128</a></b>: Her abbey was for generations the favourite
+boarding-school in France for young ladies from England.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote129" name="footnote129"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag129">129</a></b>: These borders are now marked only in the Ordnance maps.
+The line runs right across the county from west to east, following the
+West River (the ancient course of the Ouse), to its junction with the
+Cam, and then almost straight eastward to the boundary of Suffolk,
+along a water-course known as the "Bishop's Delph" (<i>i.e.</i>, ditch,
+from the verb <i>delve</i>).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote130" name="footnote130"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag130">130</a></b>: This title implied a vague Primacy amongst the various
+Anglo-Saxon monarchs, conferred, by as vague a recognition on their
+part, upon him who was for the time the most powerful amongst them.
+But though vague it was far from unreal. We find Ethelbert's
+protection enabling St. Augustine to preach all over England. Indeed
+the name (which etymologically signifies merely Broad Wielder) very
+early got to be regarded as meaning Wielder of Britain.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote131" name="footnote131"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag131">131</a></b>: Augustine, true to his mission from St. Gregory, strove
+to rekindle all over the land such embers of the Faith as still
+smouldered on amongst the British refugees. For those in the fenland,
+the Girvii, he had set up a small religious house at Cratendune near
+Ely, which was afterwards absorbed by Etheldreda's larger Abbey.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote132" name="footnote132"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag132">132</a></b>: William the Conqueror had already run a military
+causeway across Willingham Fen to the south-west side of the island at
+Aldreth.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote133" name="footnote133"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag133">133</a></b>: The word "stunt" in the dialect of Cambridgeshire
+signifies <i>steep</i>. The shores of Stuntney rise from the fen with most
+unusual abruptness.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote134" name="footnote134"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag134">134</a></b>: Macaulay.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote135" name="footnote135"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag135">135</a></b>: After the suppression of the alien Priories this
+property went to the Crown, and was granted by Henry the Sixth to
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, in whose hands it still remains.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote136" name="footnote136"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag136">136</a></b>: He fought at Agincourt, and was one of the knights told
+off to kill the French prisoners.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote137" name="footnote137"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag137">137</a></b>: The Peytons held Isleham till the eighteenth century.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote138" name="footnote138"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag138">138</a></b>: <i>Township and Borough</i>, p. 96.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote139" name="footnote139"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag139">139</a></b>: The original Corporation (not yet so called) consisted
+of the local residents who held (or were rated at) a "hide" of land
+(120 acres). This was at the end of the ninth century, when the
+landowners were Danes and heathen.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote140" name="footnote140"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag140">140</a></b>: A constant tradition declares that she was imprisoned
+(or hidden) here during part of her sister's reign, but it cannot be
+verified.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote141" name="footnote141"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag141">141</a></b>: The frequent occurrence of "West" in their
+names&mdash;Westley, Weston, West Wratting, West Wickham&mdash;reminds us that
+their geographical and historical connection is with Suffolk, to the
+east of them, rather than with Cambridgeshire.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote142" name="footnote142"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag142">142</a></b>: <i>i.e.</i>, An observer of holy times and seasons.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote143" name="footnote143"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag143">143</a></b>: These martyrs were son and mother, and suffered in the
+Diocletian persecution, the former being of very tender years. Julitta
+cheered him on to his glorious death, and was then herself executed.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote144" name="footnote144"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag144">144</a></b>: This family came into England amongst the Huguenot
+refugees from France early in the eighteenth century.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote145" name="footnote145"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag145">145</a></b>: Reach is commonly spoken of as a "hamlet," but there is
+still enough historical pride amongst the inhabitants to make them
+resent this phrase.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote146" name="footnote146"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag146">146</a></b>: The oaks are always found lying prostrate, but the fir
+stems are frequently still upright for several feet of their length.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote147" name="footnote147"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag147">147</a></b>: It is now the residence of H. Gray Esq. In the stable
+yard a monument records the celebrated "Godolphin," one of the first
+Arabs (or, more probably Barbs) to be imported, at the beginning of
+the eighteenth century, for the improvement of our thoroughbred
+stock.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote148" name="footnote148"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag148">148</a></b>: This branch of the Granta is more properly called the
+Bourne.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote149" name="footnote149"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag149">149</a></b>: From the ninth century onwards the Pope could claim, by
+Royal grant, a penny a year from every house in England. This tribute
+was known as "Peter Pence." The phrase is now used amongst Roman
+Catholics for voluntary contributions to the Papal Exchequer.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote150" name="footnote150"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag150">150</a></b>: The fourteenth century historian, Matthew Paris, is
+said to have belonged to this family.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote151" name="footnote151"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag151">151</a></b>: Local antiquarian research, however, considers that the
+name is more probably Audley. One of the Audleys of Horseheath (who
+were in no way connected with the Reformation Audleys, of Audley End
+and Magdalene College), distinguished himself at the battle of
+Poictiers.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote152" name="footnote152"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag152">152</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page183">183</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote153" name="footnote153"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag153">153</a></b>: The legend ran that St. Christopher was a giant heathen
+who heard of Christ and desired to serve Him. Enquiring how he could
+do this, he was told to devote himself to deeds of charity, which he
+did by carrying pilgrims over a dangerous ford. Finally, a child whom
+he thus transported proved to be Christ Himself, whence he gained the
+name of Christopher (the Christ-bearer).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote154" name="footnote154"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag154">154</a></b>: Hughes' <i>Geography of Cambs</i>, p. 139.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote155" name="footnote155"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag155">155</a></b>: <i>Ibid.</i> p. 96.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote156" name="footnote156"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag156">156</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page170">170</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote157" name="footnote157"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag157">157</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page171">171</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote158" name="footnote158"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag158">158</a></b>: Footpaths, however, lead across the fen from its
+termination to Fulbourn and to Wilbraham.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote159" name="footnote159"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag159">159</a></b>: Hughes' <i>Geography of Cambs</i>, p. 77.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote160" name="footnote160"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag160">160</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page172">172</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote161" name="footnote161"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag161">161</a></b>: <i>Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.</i></p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote162" name="footnote162"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag162">162</a></b>: SS. Mary, John, Katharine, Paul, Magdalene, John
+Baptist, Etheldreda, Peter, Margaret, Wilfrid.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote163" name="footnote163"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag163">163</a></b>: These are SS. Michael, James, Katharine, Gabriel,
+Margaret, ? ? John Baptist, Peter, Asaph, Bridgett, John, Andrew,
+Nicolas, Winifred.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote164" name="footnote164"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag164">164</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page153">153</a>. After this preliminary domestic castigation
+he was again flogged on the morrow in the University Schools by the
+Proctors. A second offence meant expulsion from the University!</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote165" name="footnote165"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag165">165</a></b>: "Chester," "Caster," "Cester," are various Anglicised
+forms of the Latin "castra" (= camp), which our conquering forefathers
+applied to the Romano-British cities which they so ruthlessly
+destroyed in the first sweep of their invasion.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote166" name="footnote166"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag166">166</a></b>: On the western bank, hard by, is a large meadow known
+as Lingay Fen, which is always (artificially) flooded during the
+winter, in hopes of a frost. It forms an excellent skating ground, on
+which even National Championships have been decided.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote167" name="footnote167"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag167">167</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page41">41</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote168" name="footnote168"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag168">168</a></b>: Prof. Hughes' <i>Geography of Cambridgeshire</i>, p. 106.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote169" name="footnote169"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag169">169</a></b>: See my <i>Roman Britain</i>, p. 266.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote170" name="footnote170"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag170">170</a></b>: This "bush" is actually a group of young elms.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote171" name="footnote171"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag171">171</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page191">191</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote172" name="footnote172"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag172">172</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page230">230</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote173" name="footnote173"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag173">173</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page198">198</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote174" name="footnote174"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag174">174</a></b>: The Chantry Priests, of whom there were two in
+Barrington, often acted as village schoolmasters, the Chantries
+themselves serving as classrooms.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote175" name="footnote175"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag175">175</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page221">221</a>. The gravel here is older than that at
+Grantchester.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote176" name="footnote176"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag176">176</a></b>: So called because full of green grains of "glauconite,"
+which appear to be the internal casts of the shells of foraminifera.
+This bed, however, is not the true Upper Greensand, but "riddlings"
+from it.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote177" name="footnote177"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag177">177</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page230">230</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote178" name="footnote178"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag178">178</a></b>: This word is derived from the Latin <i>Opus</i> ("work")
+which in the Manorial account books was usually written j.op. (<i>i.e.</i>,
+one <i>Opus</i>).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote179" name="footnote179"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag179">179</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page236">236</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote180" name="footnote180"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag180">180</a></b>: Chronicle of St. Neots.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote181" name="footnote181"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag181">181</a></b>: The discovery of Neptune is by no means the only
+discovery the honour of which has been lost to Cambridge through that
+scientific temper of mind which is loth to publish investigations at
+an early stage of their verification. Months before Marconi introduced
+wireless telegraphy to the public it had been practised here by
+Professors Rutherford and Sir J. J. Thomson; the first serious
+messages being exchanged, over a distance of two miles, between the
+Cavendish Laboratory and the Observatory. At the same Laboratory the
+Röntgen rays were being investigated ere yet Röntgen became a
+household word. And long years before Bunsen and Kirchoff (in 1859)
+published the true explanation of Fraunhofer's dark lines in the solar
+spectrum, that explanation had been given to his pupils by yet another
+Cambridge Professor, Sir George Gabriel Stokes. Such indifference to
+mere fame reminds us of the old saying that an Oxford man looks as if
+all the world belonged to him, a Cambridge man as if he did not care
+whom it belonged to.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote182" name="footnote182"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag182">182</a></b>: <i>I.e.</i> genuflecting.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote183" name="footnote183"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag183">183</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page182">182</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote184" name="footnote184"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag184">184</a></b>: Childerley was then the seat of the Cutts family.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote185" name="footnote185"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag185">185</a></b>: Quoted in <i>East Anglia and the Civil War</i> by Mr.
+Kingston.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote186" name="footnote186"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag186">186</a></b>: <i>I.e.</i> Irish. The name of the Scots lingered on in
+their original home for many centuries after it became more famous in
+North Britain, whither they began to migrate in the fifth century.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote187" name="footnote187"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag187">187</a></b>: See Miss Arnold Forster's Studies in Church
+Dedications, chap. xxxi.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote188" name="footnote188"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag188">188</a></b>: The Chronicle of St. Neots.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote189" name="footnote189"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag189">189</a></b>: To this Chronicle we owe some of the best known legends
+in English History, the story of Alfred and the cakes, for instance.
+It was probably written in the tenth century. (See my "Alfred in the
+Chroniclers.")</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote190" name="footnote190"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag190">190</a></b>: See Chap. <a href="#chapxiv">XIV</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote191" name="footnote191"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag191">191</a></b>: See Chap. <a href="#chapviii">VIII</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote192" name="footnote192"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag192">192</a></b>: See Chap. <a href="#chapxiv">XIV</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote193" name="footnote193"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag193">193</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page144">144</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote194" name="footnote194"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag194">194</a></b>: <i>Cambs. Monthly Repository X.</i></p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote195" name="footnote195"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag195">195</a></b>: When praised for loveliness by the Public Orator she
+showed, to the loud admiration of her auditors, that she both
+understood and spoke Latin by exclaiming coyly "Non est verum."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote196" name="footnote196"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag196">196</a></b>: This roof is traditionally said to have been that of
+the great church of Barnwell Abbey (see p. <a href="#page160">160</a>). It obviously was made
+for a larger nave than that of Willingham, and has been cut down to
+fit its present purpose.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote197" name="footnote197"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag197">197</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page283">283</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote198" name="footnote198"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag198">198</a></b>: See Chap. <a href="#chapxvii">XVII</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote199" name="footnote199"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag199">199</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page231">231</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote200" name="footnote200"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag200">200</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page252">252</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote201" name="footnote201"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag201">201</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page146">146</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote202" name="footnote202"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag202">202</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page170">170</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote203" name="footnote203"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag203">203</a></b>: This word is invariably abbreviated to "Cox," which is
+also used as a verb.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote204" name="footnote204"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag204">204</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page282">282</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote205" name="footnote205"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag205">205</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page194">194</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote206" name="footnote206"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag206">206</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page180">180</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote207" name="footnote207"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag207">207</a></b>: This is the word used by the "Historia Eliensis." Bede,
+our earliest authority, speaks of "a small waste city, which in the
+English tongue is called Grantchester." He almost certainly means
+Cambridge. See p. <a href="#page221">221</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote208" name="footnote208"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag208">208</a></b>: Doubt has been cast on this story, owing to the
+incidental mention by the chronicler of a shaped head-space in this
+coffin. This has been held to point to a twelfth century origin for
+the Legend, inasmuch as such head-spaces were not used until that
+date. In the present year(1910), however, an undoubtedly Roman
+sarcophagus thus shaped has been unearthed in Egypt. It is figured in
+the <i>Illustrated London News</i> (July 23, 1910).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote209" name="footnote209"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag209">209</a></b>: Archdeacon Cunningham doubts this.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote210" name="footnote210"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag210">210</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page178">178</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote211" name="footnote211"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag211">211</a></b>: See my <i>History of Cambridgeshire</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote212" name="footnote212"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag212">212</a></b>: A mark of silver was worth 13<i>s.</i> 4<i>d.</i>; a mark of gold
+was 100 shillings. A labourer's wage was at this date 1<i>d.</i> per day,
+so that these sums must be multiplied thirty-fold to get their
+equivalent value at the present day.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote213" name="footnote213"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag213">213</a></b>: The county, at this time, comprised only the district
+south of the Isle. This ecclesiastical connection between it and the
+Isle was the first towards their later unification. See p. <a href="#page8">8</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote214" name="footnote214"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag214">214</a></b>: We find the monks complaining that the £300 a year
+(equivalent to £9,000 now), to which the Abbey income sank in the
+twelfth century would barely support forty monks. The best working
+standard by which to ascertain how much money is worth in any given
+age is the current day-wage of a labourer. In the fourteenth century
+this was 1<i>d.</i>; it is now 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> Therefore money went thirty
+times as far then as now.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote215" name="footnote215"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag215">215</a></b>: This was a cassock lined with wool. The word <i>surplice</i>
+is derived from it, being an alb roomy enough to wear over a pellice.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote216" name="footnote216"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag216">216</a></b>: The boots were of soft leather rising nearly to the
+knee.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote217" name="footnote217"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag217">217</a></b>: This was probably the head-covering which the monks of
+Ely wore, by special licence from the Pope, "on account of the windy
+situation of their church." The name may survive in our modern
+"billy-cock."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote218" name="footnote218"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag218">218</a></b>: The blanket was 3-1/2 yards long, as blankets are
+still.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote219" name="footnote219"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag219">219</a></b>: It is given by Bishop Stubbs, in his <i>Historical
+Memorials of Ely</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote220" name="footnote220"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag220">220</a></b>: The beds were stuffed with hay, which the Camerarius
+was bound to change once a year, at the annual cleaning of the
+dormitory.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote221" name="footnote221"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag221">221</a></b>: The remaining "Short" Offices were probably said, Sext
+after High Mass, and Nones at mid-day (whence our word Noon).</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote222" name="footnote222"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag222">222</a></b>: In this earliest type of crucifix Christ was royally
+crowned and robed (as in the famous <i>Volto Santo</i> at Lucca). See p.
+<a href="#page288">288</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote223" name="footnote223"></a>
+<b>223</b>: See page <a href="#page274">274</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote224" name="footnote224"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag224">224</a></b>: This is a wholly modern device. Mediæval mazes are
+common in Continental churches; but none are found in England.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote225" name="footnote225"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag225">225</a></b>: 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.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote226" name="footnote226"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag226">226</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page322">322</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote227" name="footnote227"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag227">227</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page312">312</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote228" name="footnote228"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag228">228</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page314">314</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote229" name="footnote229"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag229">229</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page358">358</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote230" name="footnote230"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag230">230</a></b>: Within living memory the tithe paid to the parson or
+other tithe owner, was actually the tenth sheaf in every row
+throughout the harvest field. The corn might not be carried till the
+owner's agent had "docked" these sheaves, (<i>i.e.</i> marked each by
+crowning it with a dock leaf). He might begin his count with any one
+of the first ten, for obvious reasons. The docked sheaves were
+conveyed to the tithe barn either before or after the carrying of the
+others.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote231" name="footnote231"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag231">231</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page183">183</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote232" name="footnote232"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag232">232</a></b>: Hughes. <i>County Geography of Cambs</i>, p. 98.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote233" name="footnote233"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag233">233</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page196">196</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote234" name="footnote234"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag234">234</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page168">168</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote235" name="footnote235"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag235">235</a></b>: From my <i>History of Cambridgeshire</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote236" name="footnote236"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag236">236</a></b>: See Hughes' <i>Geography of Cambridgeshire</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote237" name="footnote237"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag237">237</a></b>: The history of the Houses outside our county we only
+touch upon where connected with spots inside.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote238" name="footnote238"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag238">238</a></b>: This name has probably nothing to do with "anchorite,"
+but is of Celtic derivation.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote239" name="footnote239"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag239">239</a></b>: <i>Dominus</i> is thus abbreviated amongst Benedictines.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote240" name="footnote240"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag240">240</a></b>: Kineburgh and Kinswith were sisters of Wulfhere,
+the first Christian King of Mercia. Tibba is usually identified
+with St. Ebba of Coldingham.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote241" name="footnote241"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag241">241</a></b>: The Little Ouse drains the south-western districts of
+Norfolk.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote242" name="footnote242"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag242">242</a></b>: A specimen of one of the "libels" is given by Dugdale:</ü>
+
+<div class="poem10">
+<p><span class="min33em">"</span>Come brethren of the water, and let us all assemble<br>
+  To treat upon this matter, which makes us quake and tremble;<br>
+  For we shall rue, if it be true the Fens be undertaken,<br>
+  And where we feed in rush and reed, <i>they</i> feed both beet and bacon.</p>
+
+<p><span class="min33em">"</span>Away with boats and rudders, away with boots and scatches [skates],<br>
+  No need of one nor t'other; men now make better matches.<br>
+  Stilt-makers all and tanners complain of this disaster;<br>
+  For they would make each muddy lake for Essex calves a pasture.</p>
+
+<p><span class="min33em">"</span>Wherefore let us intreat our ancient Winter Nurses<br>
+  To show their power so great, and help to drain <i>their purses</i>,<br>
+  And send us good old Captain Flood to lead us out to battle,<br>
+  Then Twopenny Jack, with scales on back, shall drive out all their cattle."</p>
+
+<p>["Jack" here simply means a pike, the average price of which at this
+time would seem to have been twopence. The "Winter Nurses" are the
+rivers feeding the Fen.]</p></div>
+
+<p><a id="footnote243" name="footnote243"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag243">243</a></b>: The Lernaean swamp was the legendary home of the famous
+Hydra overcome by Hercules.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote244" name="footnote244"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag244">244</a></b>: The head of this company was Lord Popham, one of whose
+cuts is still called Popham's Eau. The last word reminds us that many
+of his settlers were exiled French Huguenots.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote245" name="footnote245"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag245">245</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page280">280</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote246" name="footnote246"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag246">246</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page275">275</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote247" name="footnote247"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag247">247</a></b>: See my <i>Roman Britain</i>, p. 47.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote248" name="footnote248"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag248">248</a></b>: Hughes' <i>Geography of Cambs.</i>, p. 97, where there is an
+interesting photograph of this Woad Mill.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote249" name="footnote249"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag249">249</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page398">398</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote250" name="footnote250"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag250">250</a></b>: See p. <a href="#page146">146</a>.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote251" name="footnote251"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag251">251</a></b>: This work was published in 1583, to justify the
+execution of the seminary priests in England. Burghley's point is that
+quiet Papists were not put to death.</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote252" name="footnote252"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag252">252</a></b>: See Bridgett and Knox, <i>Queen Elizabeth and the
+Catholic Hierarchy</i>, p. 197 <i>et seq.</i> It may have been these highly
+specialised discourses which put so fine an edge on Wisbech
+Protestantism that, in the Civil War, the Parson here was ejected for
+no more heinous offence than that "he called a Godly Minister (Mr.
+Allison) <i>Brother Redface</i>."</p>
+
+<p><a id="footnote253" name="footnote253"></a>
+<b><a href="#footnotetag253">253</a></b>: P. <a href="#page6">6</a>.</p>
+</div>
+
+<h2>Transcriber's notes</h2>
+<div class="tn">
+<p>Obvious printer's errors have been corrected,
+all other inconsistencies are as in the original. The author's
+spelling has been maintained.</p>
+
+<p>Page 117: "Last year (1809)" has been corrected to "Last year (1909)".</p>
+
+<p>Page 343: The footnote 223 present there has no anchor in the text.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and
+Ely, by Edward Conybeare
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+***** This file should be named 38735-h.htm or 38735-h.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/7/3/38735/
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+
+</pre>
+
+</body>
+</html>
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img000.jpg b/38735-h/images/img000.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8fc63ac
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img000.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img001.jpg b/38735-h/images/img001.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c147eef
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img001.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img002.jpg b/38735-h/images/img002.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c64d8c1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img002.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img002tb.jpg b/38735-h/images/img002tb.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b64cffc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img002tb.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img003.jpg b/38735-h/images/img003.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ff56051
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img003.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img004.jpg b/38735-h/images/img004.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0bbeac6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img004.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img005.jpg b/38735-h/images/img005.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f7866f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img005.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img006.jpg b/38735-h/images/img006.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d5d9061
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img006.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img007.jpg b/38735-h/images/img007.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..546ad0d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img007.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img008.jpg b/38735-h/images/img008.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4842105
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img008.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img009.jpg b/38735-h/images/img009.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f7ae3d6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img009.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img010.jpg b/38735-h/images/img010.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b937d66
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img010.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img011.jpg b/38735-h/images/img011.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3a66b3f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img011.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img012.jpg b/38735-h/images/img012.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7f319cc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img012.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img013.jpg b/38735-h/images/img013.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4e9f94f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img013.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img014.jpg b/38735-h/images/img014.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..497bdce
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img014.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img015.jpg b/38735-h/images/img015.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d225b21
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img015.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img016.jpg b/38735-h/images/img016.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d787934
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img016.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img017.jpg b/38735-h/images/img017.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5afc523
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img017.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img018.jpg b/38735-h/images/img018.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3e3bb44
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img018.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img019.jpg b/38735-h/images/img019.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b3b5673
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img019.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img020.jpg b/38735-h/images/img020.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..071980b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img020.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img021.jpg b/38735-h/images/img021.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d9e5edd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img021.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img022.jpg b/38735-h/images/img022.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f453362
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img022.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img023.jpg b/38735-h/images/img023.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..48a97f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img023.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img024.jpg b/38735-h/images/img024.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..934fe84
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img024.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img025.jpg b/38735-h/images/img025.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4d67792
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img025.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img026.jpg b/38735-h/images/img026.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b8d32be
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img026.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img027.jpg b/38735-h/images/img027.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8251065
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img027.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img028.jpg b/38735-h/images/img028.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..09a8d7c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img028.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img029.jpg b/38735-h/images/img029.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..91d75dc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img029.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img030.jpg b/38735-h/images/img030.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3f2f5c7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img030.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img031.jpg b/38735-h/images/img031.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c9e4148
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img031.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img032.jpg b/38735-h/images/img032.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..597c5e7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img032.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img033.jpg b/38735-h/images/img033.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b450af7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img033.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img034.jpg b/38735-h/images/img034.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..60f60d1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img034.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img035.jpg b/38735-h/images/img035.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c2a04e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img035.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img036.jpg b/38735-h/images/img036.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f21897b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img036.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img037.jpg b/38735-h/images/img037.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4b1078d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img037.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img038.jpg b/38735-h/images/img038.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3c922f8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img038.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img039.jpg b/38735-h/images/img039.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9c34235
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img039.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img040.jpg b/38735-h/images/img040.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7d454b0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img040.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img041.jpg b/38735-h/images/img041.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ae696ee
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img041.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img042.jpg b/38735-h/images/img042.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..50e576b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img042.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img043.jpg b/38735-h/images/img043.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d3020dd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img043.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img044.jpg b/38735-h/images/img044.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..605df06
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img044.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img045.jpg b/38735-h/images/img045.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7f91af8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img045.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img046.jpg b/38735-h/images/img046.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ef05596
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img046.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img047.jpg b/38735-h/images/img047.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..db3ad3d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img047.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img048.jpg b/38735-h/images/img048.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3d0b298
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img048.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img049.jpg b/38735-h/images/img049.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5488c35
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img049.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img050.jpg b/38735-h/images/img050.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..af60e47
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img050.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img051.jpg b/38735-h/images/img051.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9563693
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img051.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img052.jpg b/38735-h/images/img052.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f224df2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img052.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img053.jpg b/38735-h/images/img053.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9bfa702
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img053.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img054.jpg b/38735-h/images/img054.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9763b26
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img054.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img055.jpg b/38735-h/images/img055.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..439b7dd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img055.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img056.jpg b/38735-h/images/img056.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9c7762e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img056.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img057.jpg b/38735-h/images/img057.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9647405
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img057.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img058.jpg b/38735-h/images/img058.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8b9102e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img058.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img059.jpg b/38735-h/images/img059.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d4e8b8e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img059.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img060.jpg b/38735-h/images/img060.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a5e21a3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img060.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img061.jpg b/38735-h/images/img061.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..fbcd47b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img061.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img062.jpg b/38735-h/images/img062.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..53445b6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img062.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img063.jpg b/38735-h/images/img063.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0e446bb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img063.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img064.jpg b/38735-h/images/img064.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ce0e376
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img064.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img065.jpg b/38735-h/images/img065.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ca3257d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img065.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img066.jpg b/38735-h/images/img066.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f8240b0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img066.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img067.jpg b/38735-h/images/img067.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c2cbe0b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img067.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img068.jpg b/38735-h/images/img068.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3678e30
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img068.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img069.jpg b/38735-h/images/img069.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..71c7b4a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img069.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img070.jpg b/38735-h/images/img070.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..071f494
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img070.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img071.jpg b/38735-h/images/img071.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..fc44a12
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img071.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img072.jpg b/38735-h/images/img072.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3fa72d5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img072.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img073.jpg b/38735-h/images/img073.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e532498
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img073.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img074.jpg b/38735-h/images/img074.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4f0fa36
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img074.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img075.jpg b/38735-h/images/img075.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8eda0fd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img075.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img076.jpg b/38735-h/images/img076.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..039e4b6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img076.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img077.jpg b/38735-h/images/img077.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..311ab1d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img077.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img078.jpg b/38735-h/images/img078.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f963168
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img078.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img079.jpg b/38735-h/images/img079.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8f09d1b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img079.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img080.jpg b/38735-h/images/img080.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ed96257
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img080.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img081.jpg b/38735-h/images/img081.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..39de764
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img081.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img082.jpg b/38735-h/images/img082.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f5b2433
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img082.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img083.jpg b/38735-h/images/img083.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..310dd57
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img083.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img084.jpg b/38735-h/images/img084.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..87aa28f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img084.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img085.jpg b/38735-h/images/img085.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9581075
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img085.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img086.jpg b/38735-h/images/img086.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3791fc9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img086.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img087.jpg b/38735-h/images/img087.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..77eb4c1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img087.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img088.jpg b/38735-h/images/img088.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a96e0a7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img088.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img089.jpg b/38735-h/images/img089.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3ce8923
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img089.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img090.jpg b/38735-h/images/img090.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4728931
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img090.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img091.jpg b/38735-h/images/img091.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..712259d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img091.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img092.jpg b/38735-h/images/img092.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c65ec25
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img092.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img093.jpg b/38735-h/images/img093.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..83853ef
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img093.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img094.jpg b/38735-h/images/img094.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ce110e4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img094.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img095.jpg b/38735-h/images/img095.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8cfd08d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img095.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img096.jpg b/38735-h/images/img096.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..94f31b8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img096.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img096tb.jpg b/38735-h/images/img096tb.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..14eb5a7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img096tb.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img097.jpg b/38735-h/images/img097.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0d3bb16
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img097.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img097tb.jpg b/38735-h/images/img097tb.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ec07317
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img097tb.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img098.jpg b/38735-h/images/img098.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4c4fd75
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img098.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img099.jpg b/38735-h/images/img099.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6325831
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img099.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img100.jpg b/38735-h/images/img100.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7b218fd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img100.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img101.jpg b/38735-h/images/img101.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5a2da88
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img101.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img102.jpg b/38735-h/images/img102.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5172152
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img102.jpg
diff --git a/38735-h/images/img103.jpg b/38735-h/images/img103.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..140fc5e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735-h/images/img103.jpg
diff --git a/38735.txt b/38735.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2450337
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,17051 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely, by
+Edward Conybeare
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Highways and Byways in Cambridge and Ely
+
+Author: Edward Conybeare
+
+Illustrator: Frederick L Griggs
+
+Release Date: February 1, 2012 [EBook #38735]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY
+
+
+
+
+  MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
+
+  LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
+  MELBOURNE
+
+  THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+
+  NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO
+  ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO
+
+  THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd
+
+  TORONTO
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Ely Cathedral. Western Tower._]
+
+
+
+
+  _HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS_
+
+  IN
+
+  _CAMBRIDGE AND ELY_
+
+  BY THE
+
+  Rev. EDWARD CONYBEARE
+
+  AUTHOR OF
+  "HISTORY OF CAMBRIDGESHIRE," "RIDES AROUND CAMBRIDGE," ETC.
+
+  WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
+  FREDERICK L. GRIGGS
+
+  MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+  ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
+  1910
+
+
+
+
+  RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, Limited.
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND
+  BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+The Highways of Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely are usually
+regarded as unattractive compared with those of England in general.
+Nor is this criticism wholly unfair. The county does lack the features
+which most make for picturesque rural scenery. There are no high
+hills, little even of undulation, and, what is yet more fatal, a sad
+sparsity of timber. The Highways, then, seem to the traveller merely
+stretches of ground to be got over as speedily as may be, and he
+rejoices that their flatness lends itself so well to this end.
+
+It is however far otherwise with the Byways. These abound with
+picturesque nooks and corners. In every village charming features are
+to be found,--thatched and timbered cottages, hedgerow elms, bright
+willow-shaded watercourses, old-time village greens, and, above all,
+old-time village churches, often noble, and never without artistic and
+historical interest of high order. Few counties better repay
+exploration than Cambridgeshire.
+
+And if the Highways are devoid of attraction during their course
+through the country districts, they make up for it by the supreme
+beauty and interest of their passage through the towns. Cambridge
+itself is, as all know, amongst the loveliest and most interesting
+places in existence, with its world-famed colleges and its
+epoch-making history. And Ely stands in the very first rank amongst
+the glorious cathedrals of England.
+
+To introduce my readers, then, to the unique interest of these two
+places, with special regard to the points mostly passed over in
+guide-books, has been my chief purpose in the following pages. And to
+those who may think that a disproportionate amount of my space has
+been allotted to these, I would apologise by reminding them that the
+vast majority of travellers perforce confine their visits to such
+special centres, and have no time for exploring country lanes. But
+those who can make the time will find it (as this book, I hope, will
+show them) time well spent, and their exploration no small treat.
+
+I need scarcely add that on such well-worn themes originality is
+hardly possible, and that I have made use both of my own earlier
+writings on the subject, and of those of others, my debt to whom I
+gratefully acknowledge. Most especially am I bound to do so with
+regard to Messrs. Atkinson and Clark, whose monumental work "Cambridge
+Described" is a veritable mine of information, and to Professor and
+Mrs. Hughes for the help which I have found in their "County Geography
+of Cambridgeshire."
+
+                                                     EDWARD CONYBEARE.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+  CHAPTER I                                                       PAGE
+
+  Cambridge Greenery. -- The Backs. -- The Lawns. -- Logan's Views. --
+  Old Common Fields. -- Old Cambridge. -- Origin of Cambridge. -- The
+  Castle. -- Camboritum. -- Granta-ceaster. -- Danes in Cambridge. --
+  Cambridgeshire formed. -- Battle of Ringmere. -- Norman Conquest. --
+  The Jewry. -- Religious Houses. -- Rise of University. -- Town and
+  Gown. -- Proctors. -- The Colleges. -- Examinations. -- College
+  Life. -- Cambridge and Oxford                                      1
+
+
+  CHAPTER II
+
+  Entrance to Cambridge. -- Railways. -- Roman Catholic Church. --
+  Street runlets, Hobson, Perne. -- Fitzwilliam Museum. --
+  =Peterhouse=, Chapel, Deer-park. -- Little St. Mary's Church,
+  Washington Arms. -- Gray's window. -- =Pembroke College=, Large and
+  Small Colleges, "Querela Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's Farewell. -- St.
+  Botolph's Church. -- The King's Ditch. -- =Corpus Christi College=,
+  Cambridge Guilds, St. Benet's Church, Firehooks, Corpus Library,
+  Corpus Ghost. -- =St. Catherine's College.= -- King's Parade. --
+  Pitt Press. -- Newnham Bridge, Hermits. -- The Backs River, College
+  Bridges, Hithes                                                   20
+
+
+  CHAPTER III
+
+  =Queens' College=, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel. -- Old
+  Mill Street. -- =King's College=, Henry VI, King's and Eton, Henry's
+  "Will." -- King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton, Windows, Rosa
+  Solis, Screens, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels, View from Roof    47
+
+
+  CHAPTER IV
+
+  Spiked gates. -- Old Kings. -- =University Library=, Origin, Growth,
+  Codex Bezae. -- =Trinity Hall=, Colours, Library. -- =Clare College=,
+  "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue. -- The Backs, Sirdar Bonfire,
+  College Gardens. -- =Trinity College=, Michaelhouse, King's Hall,
+  Henry VIII, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge, Library,
+  Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's Pillar," Prince
+  Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College Plate, Grace-cup,
+  Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of Granby, Tutors, Old
+  Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge, Chapel, Newton, Organ,
+  Bentley, Windows, Macaulay                                        78
+
+
+  CHAPTER V
+
+  Whewell's Courts. -- All Saints' Cross. -- The Jewry. -- Divinity
+  School. -- =St. John's College=, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+  Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+  Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second Court,
+  Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New Court,
+  Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness. -- =Caius College=, Gonville,
+  The Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues." -- =Senate House=, Congregations,
+  Vice-Chancellor, Voting, Degree-giving. -- =University Church=, Mr.
+  Tripos, Golgotha, Sermons, Tower, Chimes, Jowett. -- Market Hill,
+  Peasant Revolt, Wat Tyler, Bucer and Fagius, Bonfires, Town and
+  Gown                                                             103
+
+
+  CHAPTER VI
+
+  Round Church. -- Union Society. -- The "Great Bridge," Hithe. --
+  =Magdalene College=, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles Kingsley,
+  the "College Window," Master's Garden. -- Castle Hill, Camboritum,
+  Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I, the "Borough," View from
+  Castle. -- St. Peter's Church. -- "School of Pythagoras." --
+  Westminster College. -- Ridley Hall. -- =Newnham College.= --
+  =Selwyn College.= -- Convent of St. Radegund, Bishop Alcock. --
+  Midsummer Common. -- Boat Houses, Bumping Races. -- =Jesus College=,
+  "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House, Chapel, Cranmer, Coleridge  132
+
+
+  CHAPTER VII
+
+  =Sidney College=, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners. -- Holy
+  Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn. -- =Christ's College=, "God's House,"
+  Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden, Milton,
+  Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin. -- Great St. Andrew's, Bishop
+  Perry. -- =Emmanuel College=, Harvard, Sancroft, Chapel, Ponds. --
+  University Museums. -- =Downing College=, Miss Edgeworth. -- Coe
+  Fen. -- First Mile Stone. -- Barnwell, Priory, Abbey Church. --
+  Lepers' Chapel, Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair                    151
+
+
+  CHAPTER VIII
+
+  Roads from Cambridge. -- Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East Angles,
+  Mercians, Formation of County. -- Newmarket Road. -- Quy. -- Fleam
+  Dyke. -- Devil's Dyke. -- Icknield Way. -- Iceni, Ostorius,
+  Boadicea. -- Newmarket Heath, First Racing. -- Exning, Anna. --
+  Snailwell. -- Fordham. -- Soham, St. Felix. -- Stuntney. -- Wicken.
+  -- Chippenham. -- Isleham, Lectern. -- Eastern Heights. -- Chevely,
+  Cambridge Corporation. -- Kirtling. -- Wood Ditton. -- Stetchworth.
+  -- Borough Green. -- Bottisham. -- Swaffham Bulbeck. -- The Lodes.
+  -- Swaffham Prior. -- Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest. -- Burwell,
+  Church, Clunch, Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville             168
+
+
+  CHAPTER IX
+
+  Hills Road. -- Gog Magogs. -- Vandlebury. -- Babraham, Peter Pence.
+  -- Old Railway. -- Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper Stile. -- Linton. --
+  Horseheath. -- Bartlow, St. Christopher, Battle of Assandun. --
+  Cherry Hinton, War Ditches, Saffron. -- Teversham. -- Fulbourn,
+  Brasses. -- Wilbraham. -- Fleam Dyke, Wild Flowers, Butterflies,
+  Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle. -- Balsham, Battle of Ringmere,
+  Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones                         201
+
+
+  CHAPTER X
+
+  London Road. -- Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+  Pool, Upper River. -- Grantchester, Church. -- Cam and Granta. --
+  The Shelfords. -- Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+  "Little John." -- Whittlesford, Old Hospital. -- Duxford. -- Triplow
+  Heath, Civil War. -- Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell. -- Ickleton,
+  Monolith Pillars. -- Chesterford. -- Icknield Way. -- Saffron
+  Walden                                                           219
+
+
+  CHAPTER XI
+
+  London Road. -- Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket Fresco.
+  -- Burnt Mill. -- Haslingfield. -- White Hill, View, Clunch Pits,
+  Chapel, Papal Bulla. -- Barrington, Green, Church, Porch Seats,
+  Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging, Hall. -- Foxton. --
+  Shepreth. -- Meldreth, Parish Stocks. -- Melbourn, Shipmoney. --
+  Royston, Origin, Cave, Heath. -- Bassingbourn, Old Accounts,
+  Villenage. -- Black Death. -- Ashwell, Source of Cam, Church,
+  Graffiti. -- Akeman Street. -- Barton Butts. -- Comberton Maze. --
+  Harlton Church, Old Pit. -- Orwell Maypole, Church, Epitaph. --
+  Wimpole Hall, Queen Victoria. -- Arrington. -- Shingay,
+  Hospitallers, Fairy Cart. -- Wendy. -- Artesian Wells. -- Guilden
+  Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals                        235
+
+
+  CHAPTER XII
+
+  Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge Discoveries. -- Coton.
+  -- Madingley. -- Hardwick. -- Toft, St. Hubert. -- Childerley,
+  Charles I. -- Knapwell. -- Bourn. -- Caxton. -- Eltisley, St.
+  Pandiania, Storm. -- St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred. -- Paxton Hill.
+  -- Godmanchester, Port Meadow. -- Huntingdon, Cromwell's Penance. --
+  The Hemingfords. -- St. Ives. -- Holywell. -- Overcote. -- Earith,
+  the Bedford Rivers, "Parallax"                                   265
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIII
+
+  Island of Ely. -- Haddenham. -- Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+  Belsars Hill. -- Wilburton. -- Sutton. -- Wentworth. -- Via Devana.
+  -- Girton, College. -- Oakington, Holdsworth. -- Elsworth. --
+  Conington, Ancient Bells. -- Long Stanton, Queen Elizabeth. --
+  Willingham, Stone Chamber. -- Over, Gurgoyles. -- Swavesey, Finials.
+  -- Ely Road. -- Chesterton. -- Fen Ditton. -- Milton, Altar Rails.
+  -- Horningsea. -- Bait's Bite, Start of Race. -- Clayhithe. --
+  Waterbeach. -- Car Dyke. -- Denny. -- Stretham. -- Upware. -- Wicken
+  Fen.                                                             282
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIV
+
+  Ely. -- Island and Isle. -- St. Augustine. -- St. Etheldreda, Life,
+  Death, Burial, St. Audrey's Fair. -- Danish Sack of Ely. -- Alfred's
+  College. -- Abbey Restored. -- Brithnoth, Song of Maldon. -- Battle
+  of Assundun. -- Canute at Ely. -- Edward the Confessor. -- Alfred
+  the Etheling. -- Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman Conquest, Tabula
+  Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster. -- Bishops of Ely, Rule over
+  Isle. -- Ely Place, Ely House                                    303
+
+
+  CHAPTER XV
+
+  Bishop Northwold. -- Presbytery Dedicated. -- Barons at Ely. -- Fall
+  of Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon. -- Queen Philippa. -- Lady
+  Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich. -- Bishop Alcock. --
+  Bishop West. -- Styles of Architecture. -- Monastic Industries. --
+  Mediaeval Account Books. -- Clothing and Food of Monks. --
+  Benedictine Rule. -- Dissolution of Abbey. -- Bishop Thirlby. --
+  Bishop Wren. -- Bishop Gunning. -- Bishop Turner                 324
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVI
+
+  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                     344
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVII
+
+  Monuments. -- West's Chapel. -- Alcock's Chapel. -- Northwold
+  Cenotaph. -- Bassevi. -- Shrine of Etheldreda. -- Lady Chapel. --
+  View from Tower. -- Triforium. -- Exterior of Minster. -- Palace,
+  "Duties" of Goodrich. -- St. Mary's. -- St. Cross. -- Cromwell's
+  House. -- Cromwell at Ely. -- St. John's Farm. -- Theological
+  College. -- Waterworks. -- Basket-making                         366
+
+
+  CHAPTER XVIII
+
+  Boundary of Fens. -- Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall, Causeway. --
+  Archipelago. -- Littleport, Agrarian Riots. -- Denver Sluice. --
+  Roslyn Pit. -- Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey, Peterborough,
+  Thorney, Crowland                                                386
+
+
+  CHAPTER XIX
+
+  Draining of Fens -- Monastic Works, Morton's Learn. -- Diversion of
+  Ouse. -- Local Government, Jurats, Discontent. -- Jacobean polemics.
+  -- First Drainage Company. -- Rising of Fen-men. -- Second Company,
+  Huguenot Labourers. -- Third Company, Earl of Bedford, Vermuyden. --
+  Old River. -- Cromwell. -- Fourth Company, Prisoner Slaves, New
+  River, Denver Sluice. -- Later Developments                      398
+
+
+  CHAPTER XX
+
+  Coveney. -- Manea. -- Doddington. -- March, Angel Roof. --
+  Whittlesea. -- Old Course of Ouse, Well Stream. -- Upwell, Outwell.
+  -- Emneth. -- Elm. -- The Marshland -- West Walton. -- Walsoken. --
+  Walpole. -- Cross Keys. -- Leverington. -- Tydd. -- Wisbech, Church,
+  Trade, Castle, Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson. -- The Wash. -- King
+  John.                                                            409
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                                                                  PAGE
+
+  ELY CATHEDRAL, WESTERN TOWER                          _Frontispiece_
+
+  MAP OF CAMBRIDGE                                     _Facing_      1
+
+  ST. BENET'S CHURCH AND CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE                      1
+
+  PETERHOUSE WALL, COE FEN                                           5
+
+  THE BACKS, CLARE COLLEGE GATE                                      9
+
+  ST. MICHAEL'S AND ALL ANGELS                                      13
+
+  ORIEL IN LIBRARY, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                              18
+
+  PETERHOUSE                                                        24
+
+  ST. MARY THE LESS, SOUTH SIDE                                     27
+
+  PETERHOUSE FROM ST. MARY'S CHURCHYARD                             29
+
+  ST. BOTOLPH'S CHURCH                                              33
+
+  ST. BENET'S CHURCH, INTERIOR                                      37
+
+  CLARE BRIDGE                                                      42
+
+  ST. JOHN'S BRIDGE                                                 45
+
+  THE PRESIDENT'S GALLERY, QUEENS' COLLEGE                          49
+
+  ORIEL IN QUEENS' COLLEGE                                          51
+
+  QUEENS' COLLEGE GATEWAY                                           53
+
+  CLARE COLLEGE FROM KING'S                                         57
+
+  KING'S COLLEGE CHAPEL                                             61
+
+  OLD GATE OF KING'S COLLEGE                                        81
+
+  OLD SCHOOLS' QUADRANGLE                                           87
+
+  CLARE COLLEGE FROM BRIDGE                                         93
+
+  TRINITY BRIDGE                                                    99
+
+  THE FOUNTAIN, TRINITY COLLEGE                                    103
+
+  TRINITY COLLEGE CHAPEL AND ST. JOHN'S GATEWAY                    111
+
+  HALL, ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                                         115
+
+  ORIEL IN SECOND COURT OF ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE                      117
+
+  THE GATE OF HONOUR, CAIUS COLLEGE                                123
+
+  PEAS HILL                                                        130
+
+  THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE                                 135
+
+  ST. PETER'S CHURCH                                               139
+
+  REMAINS OF ST. RADEGUND'S PRIORY                                 141
+
+  JESUS COLLEGE GATEWAY                                            143
+
+  THE BACK COURT, JESUS COLLEGE                                    145
+
+  JESUS COLLEGE CHAPEL, EAST END                                   147
+
+  ORIEL OF HALL, JESUS COLLEGE                                     149
+
+  CHRIST'S COLLEGE CHAPEL                                          153
+
+  EMMANUEL COLLEGE                                                 157
+
+  THE LEPERS' CHAPEL, BARNWELL                                     163
+
+  QUY CHURCH                                                       170
+
+  FORDHAM CHURCH                                                   177
+
+  FORDHAM                                                          179
+
+  SOHAM                                                            181
+
+  SWAFFHAM BULBECK                                                 191
+
+  SWAFFHAM PRIOR                                                   192
+
+  SWAFFHAM PRIOR CHURCHES                                          193
+
+  THE CASTLE MOAT, BURWELL                                         195
+
+  BURWELL CHURCH, WEST END                                         197
+
+  BURWELL CHURCH, N.E. VIEW                                        199
+
+  CHERRY HINTON CHURCH                                             207
+
+  GREAT WILBRAHAM CHURCH                                           211
+
+  GREAT WILBRAHAM                                                  212
+
+  LITTLE WILBRAHAM                                                 213
+
+  BALSHAM TOWER                                                    214
+
+  COTTAGE AT BALSHAM                                               217
+
+  GREAT SHELFORD CHURCH                                            223
+
+  WHITTLESFORD                                                     227
+
+  ST. PETER'S CHURCH, DUXFORD                                      229
+
+  HASLINGFIELD CHURCH                                              237
+
+  FARMHOUSE AT HASLINGFIELD                                        239
+
+  SOUTH PORCH, BARRINGTON CHURCH                                   241
+
+  SHEPRETH                                                         243
+
+  MELBOURN                                                         245
+
+  ASHWELL                                                          249
+
+  ASHWELL CHURCH FROM THE N.W.                                     251
+
+  ASHWELL CHURCH                                                   253
+
+  GREAT EVERSDEN                                                   257
+
+  ROOD SCREEN, GUILDEN MORDEN CHURCH                               261
+
+  COTTAGE AT STEEPLE MORDEN                                        263
+
+  COTON                                                            269
+
+  COTTAGE AT TOFT                                                  271
+
+  WILBURTON                                                        284
+
+  THE BURYSTEAD, WILBURTON                                         285
+
+  SUTTON CHURCH                                                    287
+
+  ALL SAINTS' CHURCH, LONG STANTON                                 291
+
+  OVER, SOUTH PORCH                                                293
+
+  OVER                                                             294
+
+  SWAVESEY                                                         296
+
+  SWAVESEY CHURCH                                                  297
+
+  COTTAGE AT RAMPTON                                               299
+
+  DOVECOTE AT RAMPTON                                              300
+
+  THE QUAY, ELY                                                    301
+
+  THE NORTH TRIFORIUM OF THE NAVE, ELY                             305
+
+  WEST AISLE OF THE NORTH TRANSEPT, ELY                            311
+
+  ELY: THE PRESBYTERY                                              327
+
+  ELY LANTERN                                                      333
+
+  PRIOR CRAUDEN'S CHAPEL                                           347
+
+  SOUTH AISLE OF THE NAVE, ELY                                     351
+
+  THE TOWER FROM THE CLOISTERS                                     357
+
+  CATHEDRAL TOWERS                                                 361
+
+  ST. MARY'S CHURCH                                                378
+
+  THE CATHEDRAL FROM THE WEST FEN ROAD                             380
+
+  ST. JOHN'S FARM                                                  383
+
+  WILLOW WALK                                                      385
+
+  ST. WENDREDA'S CHURCH, MARCH                                     391
+
+  THE OLD FENLAND (NORTHERN DISTRICT)                              404
+
+  THE OLD FENLAND (SOUTHERN DISTRICT)                              405
+
+  ELM CHURCH                                                       412
+
+  WALPOLE ST. PETER                                                414
+
+  LEVERINGTON                                                      417
+
+  BELL TOWER, TYDD ST. GILES                                       419
+
+  WISBECH CHURCH                                                   423
+
+  THE OLD COURT OF CORPUS                                          431
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGE AND ELY
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Walker & Boutall sc._ Cambridge]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Benet's Church and Corpus Christi College._]
+
+
+
+
+HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS
+
+IN
+
+CAMBRIDGESHIRE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+     Cambridge Greenery.--The "Backs."--The Lawns.--Logan's
+     Views.--Old Common Fields.--Old Cambridge.--Origin of
+     Cambridge.--The Castle.--Camboritum.--Granta-ceaster.--Danes in
+     Cambridge.--Cambridgeshire formed.--Battle of Ringmere.--Norman
+     Conquest.--The Jewry.--Religious Houses.--Rise of
+     University.--Town and Gown.--Proctors.--The
+     Colleges.--Examinations.--College Life.--Cambridge and Oxford.
+
+
+Cambridge has been described by an appreciative American novelist as
+"a harmony in grey and green." And indeed it is true that few towns
+are so shot through and through with greenery. The London Road enters
+the place through two miles of umbrageous leafage; wide, open spaces
+of grass-land--Stourbridge Common, Midsummer Common, Coldham Common,
+Empty Common, Donkey Common, Peter's Field, Parker's Piece, Christ's
+Pieces, Jesus Green, Sheep's Green, Coe Fen--penetrate from the
+outskirts, north, south, and east, right to the heart of the town;
+while the world-famous "Backs," where the road runs beneath ancestral
+elms, between a continuous series of bowery College gardens and
+precincts--Queens', King's, Clare, Trinity, St. John's--with their
+beckoning vistas of long avenues of lime and chestnut, ring it in to
+the west, and form a scene of park-like loveliness to be found nowhere
+else on earth. Port Meadow, at Oxford, and the Magdalen Walks, furnish
+the nearest comparison; but only to show how far in front Cambridge
+stands in greenery. Even inside the Colleges this precedence shows
+itself; for in Cambridge every College Court in the place, almost
+without exception, unlike so many of the "Quads" of Oxford, has its
+central grass-plot.
+
+These lawns, it may be noted, are sacrosanct, not to be profaned by
+the foot of anyone but a Fellow of the College[1] itself. No outsider,
+from another College, however high in academic rank, may, unless
+accompanied by a Fellow, cross over them; still less any member of the
+College, old or young, who is not himself a Fellow, nor any casual
+visitor, even of the privileged sex. Should any such attempt be made,
+the College porters will politely, but quite firmly, remove the
+transgressor. This convention is absolutely necessary for the very
+existence of the greensward, which, if allowed to be traversed by
+all-comers, would speedily be cut up and ruined.
+
+[Footnote 1: The word "Fellow" signifies, in any College, one of the
+strictly limited corporation to whom its whole property legally
+belongs. This corporation is kept filled up by co-option; the most
+distinguished of the junior students being usually chosen.]
+
+This greenery, however, is a comparatively recent development in the
+history of Cambridge, most of it dating no further back than the
+latter half of the seventeenth century. In the last decade of that
+century an artist named David Logan (or Loggan), said to have been of
+Danish nationality but Scotch extraction, made a series of views of
+the various Cambridge Colleges, elaborated with extraordinary care and
+fidelity. So truthful and observant was he that a mysterious bird,
+long a puzzle in his drawing of the great court of Trinity, has lately
+been discovered, by reference to the College muniments, to have been a
+tame eagle then kept by the Society. His views were reissued in 1905
+by Mr. J. W. Clark, the greatest living authority on Cambridge
+antiquities, and should be consulted by all who are interested in the
+development of Cambridge. In these views the existing avenues in the
+College enclosures at the "Backs" may be observed, but all of young
+trees quite recently planted (as indeed we know to have been the case
+from the College records), while right up to these enclosures run open
+treeless fields, not meadows, but corn-land, where harvesters may be
+seen at work and sheep grazing upon the fallow land. Most of the now
+green Commons are in like manner shown to have been then under the
+plough.
+
+The late Professor Maitland, whose recent death has been so
+irreparable a loss to Cambridge and to the whole historical side of
+English education, has shown (in his _Township and Borough_) how truly
+these views of Logan's represent the seventeenth century facts, and
+how, somewhat earlier, the arable fields had come even to the river
+bank on the west of the town; or, to use his own more accurate
+language, that the western fields of Cambridge extended to the river
+bank. Every old English town and village, it must be remembered, was
+in theory (and originally in practice) self-supporting, and contained
+within its boundary sufficient arable and pasture land to feed its own
+inhabitants and their cattle. These were known as the "Common Fields"
+of the place. They were not "Commons" in our modern sense of the word,
+but were divided into small holdings amongst the townsmen, each man's
+holding consisting of so many tiny strips, never more than an acre in
+extent, scattered as widely as possible to make things fair for all.
+They were cultivated upon the three course system; every landholder
+having the right to pasture a proportionate number of cattle on the
+fallow of the year, as well as in the Common Meadows. The Common
+Fields of Cambridge comprised about five square miles, with the
+inhabited part of the township nearly in the centre, and roughly
+coincided with the existing Parliamentary Borough, though somewhat
+more extensive.
+
+This inhabited part, the mediaeval town of Cambridge, was comprised,
+(at least from the tenth century to the eighteenth,) in the space
+bounded by the river on the west, and on the east by a ditch, known
+finally as the "King's Ditch," from having been widened by Henry the
+Third in the Barons' War. This ditch left the Cam at the "King's
+Mill," (the modern representative of which still stands just above
+Silver Street Bridge,) and proceeded along the line of Mill Lane,
+Pembroke Street, Tibbs Row, Hobson Street, and Park Street, to fall
+into the river again opposite Magdalene College. Beyond the "Great
+Bridge," from which the place derived its name, a small cluster of
+houses climbed the steep bank, on the summit of which stood the
+Castle. Our earliest records show this area as by no means thickly
+covered with houses. Not only the inhabitants, but all their cattle
+lived in it; so there must have been many little farmyards and gardens
+interspersed amongst the dwellings.
+
+Domesday Book gives the number of these as only 400, and a couple of
+centuries later, in 1279, when the University was already in full
+existence, there were scarcely more. By the middle of the eighteenth
+century this number had trebled. But even in 1801, as may be seen in
+Lyson's plan of the town, the King's Ditch, which was then still an
+open watercourse, remained substantially the boundary of inhabited
+Cambridge. And the vast suburban extensions in the areas of Barnwell,
+Newnham, Chesterton, and Cherry Hinton are mostly very recent indeed;
+the bulk in fact belonging to the last half century. Their rise, and
+the continuous intrusion of ever fresh University and College
+buildings, has had the effect of once more depleting the area of
+mediaeval Cambridge, which to-day contains barely 800 houses. The whole
+of the University buildings, whether ancient or modern, are contained
+within this area, with the exception of the Colleges of Peterhouse,
+Pembroke, Christ's and Jesus (which together with a few of the
+Museums, stand just beyond the Ditch), and the New Court of St. John's
+College, which is on the other side of the river, in the old Common
+Field. The ecclesiastical and feminine foundations similarly situated,
+Selwyn College, Westminster College, Ridley Hall, Newnham College, and
+Girton College, are not recognised by the University as being strictly
+"Colleges" at all.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse Wall, Coe Fen._]
+
+Such was old Cambridge; with its eleven ancient parishes of St. Peter,
+St. Giles, St. Clement, Holy Trinity, St. Michael, St. Mary (the
+greater), St. Edward, St. Benet, St. Botolph, All Saints, and St. John
+(which was destroyed to make room for King's College). Before the
+twelfth century closed three more churches were added, those of the
+Holy Sepulchre, of St. Peter (now St. Mary's the less) outside the
+"Trumpington Gate," of St. Andrew (the greater) outside the Barnwell
+Gate, and St. Andrew (the less) in the detached suburb which grew up
+round the great "Abbey" (really an Augustinian Priory) of Barnwell.
+
+Old Cambridge probably owed its constitution--(quite possibly its very
+existence)--to the genius with which "the Children of Alfred," Edward
+the Elder and his Sister, the "Lady of the Mercians," reorganised the
+Midlands after the great cataclysm of the Danish wars, which in the
+previous generation had swept over the district, obliterating all
+earlier landmarks and boundaries. One pirate horde, under the most
+renowned of all their chieftains, Guthrum--the deadliest antagonist,
+and afterwards the most faithful ally, of our great Alfred,--had for a
+space settled themselves in Cambridge, and from that strategic
+position overawed East Anglia on the one hand and Mercia on the
+other.[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: The kingdom of Mercia comprised the Midlands, and was
+(roughly) bounded on the north by the Humber and Mersey, on the west
+by Wales, on the south by the Thames, and on the east by the Cam and
+the Lea.]
+
+The Cambridge which they sacked was not, however, as it would seem,
+the later mediaeval town which we have been already considering, but a
+much smaller stronghold on the western bank of the River, comprising
+what is now known as "Castle End," and is still sometimes called "the
+Borough" _par excellence_. At this point the Cam, one bank or other of
+which is usually swampy even now, and was actually swamp in early
+days, is touched by higher and firmer ground on both sides. The height
+to the west is quite respectable, rising some eighty feet above the
+stream. Here, therefore, and here alone, was there of old any
+convenient passage-way for an army; the river elsewhere forming an
+almost insuperable barrier to military operations, from the Fens
+almost to its source. Such a site was sure to be amongst the earliest
+occupied; and we find, accordingly, that both Romans and Anglo-Saxons
+(presumably Mercians) successively held it. Most probably it was also
+a British site; but the great Castle mound, which earlier antiquaries
+attributed to the Britons, has been shown by Professor Hughes to be,
+mainly at least, a Norman work.
+
+This site was the original Cambridge, and may even have been called by
+that very name in its earliest form. For it is hard not to identify
+the Roman settlement (which the spade shows to have existed here) with
+the "Camboritum," which from the "Itinerary of Antoninus" (an official
+road book, probably of the third century A.D.) must have been
+somewhere in this immediate neighbourhood. And the word Camboritum is
+plausibly derived from the British _Cam Rhydd_ "the ford of the Cam."
+Cam (which, being interpreted, signifies crooked) may well have been
+the British name for a stream with so tortuous a course. But, if so,
+it was not continuously used, so far as records can tell us.
+
+The Roman Camboritum doubtless shared the almost universal destruction
+of Roman stations which marked the English conquest of Britain; and
+the site is described as still "a waste chester" two centuries later,
+when the monks of Ely sought amid the ruins for a stone coffin in
+which to entomb their foundress, St. Ethelreda. By this time the older
+name both of the town and of the river seems to have been forgotten.
+The latter was called, by the English, the Granta, and the former was
+accordingly known only as Granta-ceaster--the chester, or ruined Roman
+city, upon the Granta. (It should be noted that the village now called
+Grantchester was, till comparatively recent days, known as Grant-set.)
+
+Yet another century, and we find, in the days of King Egbert, the
+grandfather of Alfred and the first King acknowledged by the whole
+English nation, that a bridge had been built (or rebuilt) over the old
+ford; and therewith the old site of Camboritum had been reoccupied
+under the new name of Granta-bridge, by which it is known throughout
+mediaeval history. We do not meet with "Cambridge" in literature till
+the fourteenth century, nor with "Cam" till almost the date of "Camus,
+reverend sire," in Milton's Lycidas.
+
+However this may be, it is pretty certain that the Cambridge on which
+Guthrum, in the year 872, marched from Repton was the "Borough" of
+Castle End. After holding, or, as one chronicler (Gaimar) would have
+us believe, only besieging it, for a whole year, the Danish host
+hastily made off to Wareham in Dorsetshire, to take part in that life
+and death struggle in the west which began with Alfred's great naval
+victory off Swanage, then drove him into hiding at Athelney, and ended
+with the Peace of Wedmore. By that treaty all England north of the
+Watling Street was ceded to the Danes as an under-kingdom, the
+"Dane-Law"; Guthrum, now a Christian and Alfred's godson, being set on
+the throne. Cambridge thus became undisputedly a Danish town. The
+district around was divided "with a rope" (_i.e._ by chain measure)
+amongst the invaders, and submitted as an organic whole, some half
+century later, to King Edward the Elder. It was probably at this time
+that the town began to extend itself into the East Anglian district to
+the east of the Cam. (Throughout its whole length the river, with its
+marshy banks, was the boundary between the old English kingdoms of
+Mercia and East Anglia; and traces of this are to be found in the
+distinctive customs of adjoining villages, on one side or the other of
+the stream, even to this day.) The "Saxon," or Romanesque, tower of
+St. Benet's Church, may well be of this date, erected by the English
+inhabitants dispossessed of their homes in the Borough by the
+conquering Danes who lorded it over them.
+
+After its submission to Edward the Elder, Cambridge began its career
+as a County Town, giving its name, (as was the case in nearly all
+these new Edwardian counties,) to the surrounding district, which thus
+became known as Grantabrig-shire. The name covered only the southern
+part of the present county; for the Isle of Ely was reconstituted
+under the ancient jurisdiction of its great abbots and bishops. To
+this day, indeed, it has its own separate County Council, and even a
+separate motor-car lettering. The new political unit soon began to
+display no small local patriotism; for we read that in the fatal
+battle of Ringmere, fought on Ascension Day, 1010, between the fresh
+Danish invaders, who were then pouring over the land, and the united
+forces of East Anglia under the hero Ulfcytel, "soon fled the East
+English. There stood Grantabryg-shire fast only."
+
+[Illustration: _The Backs, Clare College Gate._]
+
+The victorious Danes, naturally, proceeded to wreak special vengeance
+on such obstinate foes. The county was ravaged with a ferocity even
+beyond the usual Danish harryings, and Cambridge itself was sacked and
+burnt. When it arose from its ashes, in the quieter days of the Danish
+Canute, the first "King of England," (his native predecessors having
+been Kings "of the English,") it was organised, Danish fashion, into
+ten Wards, each with its own "Lawman." In the reign of Edward the
+Confessor, it had, as we have seen, 400 dwelling-houses (_masurae_),
+not urban cottages closely packed in rows, but mostly tenements of the
+farmhouse type, each with its farmyard, the abodes of the husbandmen
+who owned and tilled the Common Fields of the town.
+
+This number of houses shows Cambridge to have been at this time an
+important place, equal in population to a whole average "Hundred,"
+with its ten villages; and as such we find it counted for legal
+purposes under the Norman and Plantagenet dynasties. But its Common
+Fields were by no means proportionately extensive,[3] so that many of
+the inhabitants must already have depended upon trade for their
+living.
+
+[Footnote 3: An ordinary "Hundred" contained an area some five miles
+square, instead of the five square miles which was that of old
+Cambridge.]
+
+If Cambridge fared ill at the hands of the Danes, it fared little
+better at those of the Normans. William the Conqueror made the place
+his headquarters in his operations against Hereward's "Camp of Refuge"
+at Ely. This resulted in the ruin of fifty-three out of the 400
+houses, besides twenty-seven more pulled down to make room for his new
+Castle, which with its outworks and huge central keep occupied the
+greater part of the old Roman site to the west of the Bridge. The loss
+of these eighty houses probably brought down the population to little
+over 2,000 souls. Even with this reduction, however, the town might
+still claim to rank in the first class of English cities at the time;
+and this is shown by the growth of a Jewry within its walls, in the
+area bounded by St. John's College, Trinity College, and Bridge
+Street. For the Jews, (who first came into England as camp-followers
+of the Norman invaders,) naturally struck for the wealthier towns in
+which to form their settlement. As the place grew in importance
+Religious Houses began rapidly to spring up in and around it; the
+first being the great Augustinian Abbey of Barnwell, founded by Picot,
+the Sheriff of Cambridge under William the Conqueror.
+
+The next generation saw Augustinian Canons settled in the town itself,
+at the Hospital (now the College) of St. John; and Benedictine nuns at
+the Priory of St. Radegund just beyond the King's Ditch, where their
+conventual church is still used as the Chapel of Jesus College. A
+century later, and friars of all the Orders came flocking into
+Cambridge; the Grey Franciscans, the Black Dominicans, the White
+Carmelites, the Austin Friars, the Friars of the Sack, the Friars of
+Bethlehem. The sites occupied by the first three of these names are
+to-day represented by the Colleges of Sidney, Emmanuel, and Queens'.
+Friars always made for the chief centres of life, and by the
+thirteenth century Cambridge had become emphatically such, by the rise
+of that institution destined to give it a perennial fame, the
+University.
+
+How this rise of the University came about is an as yet unsolved
+problem in history. As in the case of Oxford, the great name of Alfred
+was invoked, by unscrupulous mediaeval fabricators, as concerned in its
+foundation. And it is possible that there may be really traceable some
+distant connection with that great saint and hero. For Alfred actually
+did found amidst the ruins of Ely, after its sack by the Danes, a
+small College of priests, which lived on to be the nucleus of the
+restored Abbey in the days of his grandson Edgar the Peaceful. And it
+is also historical fact that this restored Abbey was specially
+renowned for the famous school attached to it--so famous as to count
+amongst its scholars more than one future monarch. Furthermore we know
+that the Ely monks taught in Cambridge also, and this may well have
+been the first germ of the University.
+
+At any rate it is certain that, in 1209, when the schools of Oxford
+were for a while closed by the Government, as the outcome of a more
+than usually outrageous "rag," large numbers of the students migrated
+to Cambridge; which seems to point to the place having already some
+educational repute. From henceforward, at all events, it attained
+European reputation in this respect, for, in 1229, we find another
+batch of expelled students, this time from Paris, settling themselves
+here, and yet another swarm of Oxonians twenty years later.
+
+The University had now become an organic body, with its Chancellor,
+its masters, and its scholars or "clerks," so called because, being
+not wholly illiterate, the Law considered them as potential members of
+the clerical profession, and gave them special immunities accordingly.
+They were not amenable to lay jurisdiction, but only to the milder
+"Courts Christian," in which the death-penalty was never inflicted. It
+seems not infrequently to have been deserved; for the earliest
+undergraduates were, at first, an utterly lawless lot, and made
+themselves most unpleasant neighbours to the "burgesses" of the Town.
+
+When first they made their appearance the inhabitants of Cambridge had
+just bought the right to call themselves by this dignified name. This
+bargain was the upshot of a Royal visit in 1207 from King John, who,
+in consideration of a payment of 250 marks, (equivalent to L5,000 at
+the present value of money,) granted Cambridge a Charter of
+Incorporation, with the right to be governed by a Provost and bailiffs
+of their own (instead of by the King's Sheriff), and to regulate their
+own markets. Twenty years later, (by a further contribution to the
+royal purse,) the Provost acquired the higher title of Mayor.
+
+But almost simultaneously, his prerogatives began to be curtailed by
+the rising power of the University, to whose "Taxers" was given, in
+1231, the sole right of fixing the rents which might be demanded for
+lodgings from the inrushing swarm of students; while the regulation of
+the market weights and measures became vested in the Proctors. The
+authority of the Taxers died out when the Collegiate system became
+universal, but has been revived in recent days by the "Lodging-house
+Syndicate": that of the Proctors over the Market has become obsolete;
+not so long, however, but that, to this day, there may be seen, in the
+possession of the Senior Proctor for each year, an iron cylinder, a
+yard long and an inch in diameter, which was, not so many decades ago,
+the standard test for the dimensions of every roll of butter sold in
+Cambridge. For butter in Cambridge was retailed by the inch; a custom
+which still lingers on sporadically amongst our vendors.
+
+The student population speedily became far more numerous than the
+townsfolk, and their accommodation must have been no small problem. At
+first the need was met wholly by private enterprise: University
+lodgers thronged the private houses and the annexes, or "hostels," as
+they are named, run up for their sole use by speculative landlords.
+These hostels gradually attained to more or less of official
+recognition by the University, and paved the way for the setting up of
+Colleges.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Michael's and All Angels._]
+
+The first actual College was Peterhouse, founded by Hugh de Balsham,
+Bishop of Ely, in 1284, and was of the nature of an experiment, the
+success of which it took a whole generation to establish. Once
+proved, a host of imitators appeared; and the following generation saw
+no fewer than seven similar foundations, Michaelhouse and King's Hall
+(the germs of Trinity College), Clare, Pembroke, Gonville, Trinity
+Hall, and Corpus Christi College. Then came a break of a century,
+followed by another outburst of zeal, which in the next hundred years
+produced yet another seven: King's, Queens', St. Catharine's, Jesus,
+Christ's, St. John's, and Magdalene. The last four of these were
+earlier religious and scholastic foundations remodelled; and a like
+process during the half century succeeding the Reformation has given
+us the Colleges of Trinity, Caius, Emmanuel, and Sidney. Not till the
+nineteenth century was the list added to by the appearance of Downing.
+
+The original idea in all these foundations was to provide, not so much
+for the students as for the masters who taught them. To these it was
+an immense advantage to be able to dwell together in small groups and
+in quiet quarters, where they could engage in research and prepare
+their lectures, shut away from the turmoil of the seething crowd of
+Town and Gown in the streets. And it speedily appeared that if the
+seclusion of a College was helpful to the teacher it was even more
+helpful to the taught. For the test applied to students by the
+University before conferring upon them a Degree was by public
+disputations in the schools, each candidate having to support or
+oppose some literary or scientific thesis.
+
+The memory of these wordy "opponencies" is still preserved in the
+denomination of "Wrangler" bestowed on the candidates who obtain a
+First Class in the Mathematical Examination for an "Honour" Degree,
+and by every examination through which such a Degree can be obtained
+being called a "Tripos,"[4] from the three-legged stool which played a
+notable part in those old ordeals. The test demanded steadiness of
+nerve and readiness of wit, as well as mere knowledge; and, in all
+these, the Scholar of a College, well catered and cared for, was far
+better equipped than his lawless, and often all but foodless,
+non-Collegiate competitor.
+
+[Footnote 4: Till the nineteenth century was well advanced the
+Mathematical Tripos was the only avenue to the attainment of "Honours"
+at Cambridge; so that even such a distinguished scholar as Lord
+Macaulay was debarred from them by his inability to pass that
+examination, and had to content himself with the lower status of an
+"Ordinary" or "Poll" Degree (so called from the Greek [Greek: polloi]
+= many, as being the refuge of the common herd of candidates).
+Triposes in many other branches of knowledge, classical, scientific,
+legal, historical, and linguistic, have since been added.]
+
+Thus every College found itself confronted by a great demand for
+admissions, which was met by the introduction of Scholars, so far as
+the pecuniary resources of the Foundation would admit, and,
+ultimately, by the admission of "Pensioners";--students who, without
+being members of the Foundation, were willing to pay for a share in
+its educational advantages. These Pensioners finally came to
+outnumber, (in every College), the masters and scholars together, as
+they do still. The original non-Collegiate students proportionately
+dwindled in number; till the depopulation of the University during the
+religious ups and downs of the Reformation era put an end to them
+altogether. For three hundred years afterwards no one was admitted to
+the University unless attached to one of the Colleges, till, in the
+later decades of the nineteenth century, the great expansion which
+marked that period called Non-Collegiate Students, on a limited and
+tentative scale, once more into existence.
+
+Substantially, however, at the present day, the Colleges _are_
+Cambridge; and to the visitor their buildings completely out-bulk
+those which belong to the University--the Senate House, the University
+Church and Library, the Examination Hall, and the various Museums and
+Laboratories. Each College consists of an enclosed precinct, (to which
+the students are confined at night,) containing blocks of apartments,
+(usually arranged in "Courts,") for Fellows, Scholars, and Pensioners,
+a special "Lodge" for the Master; a Chapel; a Library; and a Hall,
+with Kitchen and Buttery attached. Here the Masters sit at the "High
+Table" on a dais across the upper end of the Hall, and the students at
+less pretentious boards arranged longitudinally. All are bound to dine
+in Hall, unless by special leave; but other meals may be in your own
+rooms, of which each student has a suite of three, in which he is said
+to "keep." All three are within one general outer door, or "oak," to
+be opened only by a latch-key, and "sported" whenever the owner
+desires his citadel to be inaccessible. Over the oak, on the outside,
+is painted his name (always in white capital letters upon a black
+ground), while at the foot of each staircase a similarly painted list
+gives the names of all the men whose rooms are to be found upon it.
+Each student's suite invariably comprises a sitting (or "keeping")
+room, a bedroom, and a pantry, or "gyp-room." This last name records
+the fact that till lately the functions of a housemaid were discharged
+by male servants known as "gyps,"[5] who are now almost universally
+superseded by female "bedmakers" appointed by the College Tutors.
+
+[Footnote 5: These corresponded to the still existing "Scouts" at
+Oxford.]
+
+The Tutors are immediately responsible for the general supervision of
+the students in the College: the actual teaching is done by Lecturers
+in the various subjects, who have special apartments, "Lecture Rooms,"
+provided in every College for their purposes. Every student has to
+attend a certain quota of lectures, but otherwise is very much left to
+educate himself, his progress being checked by periodical College
+examinations, in addition to those required by the University to be
+passed before he can be admitted to a Degree. The lowest Degree is
+that of B.A. (Bachelor of Arts). Three years after attaining this a
+man may proceed to become M.A. (Master of Arts), when he ceases to be
+"in statu pupillari," and is no longer subject to the authority of the
+Proctors.
+
+These officers perambulate the town after dark to punish University
+wrong-doers, usually by a fine of 6_s._ 8_d._, or some multiple of
+that sum, the unit being a survival from mediaeval numismatics, as
+equivalent to half a "Mark." More serious offences are met by
+"Rustication," for a Term or a year, during which the offender may not
+show himself in Cambridge, and, in extreme cases, by expulsion from
+the University altogether. These punishments can also be inflicted by
+the authorities of each College on the students of that College. But
+in this domestic forum, for smaller offences the place of fines is
+taken by "gating" for a certain period, during which the nocturnal
+enclosure of the culprit begins at some earlier hour than usual.
+
+As a regular rule the College gates are shut at ten p.m., after which
+no outsider (student or visitor) may enter, and no inmate (under the
+Degree of M.A.) pass out; though to students already out uncensured
+admission is given until midnight. Once inside the gates the student
+is under no obligation to keep to his own rooms, but has the run of
+the College all night. He is bound, however, to spend his nights
+within the walls, and not even for a single night may he be absent
+without a duly signed _exeat_ from the College authorities giving him
+leave. And, as he must be in residence when they require it of him, so
+is he also forbidden to be in residence at such seasons as they bar;
+during the greater part of each Vacation, for example, comprising half
+the year.
+
+Theoretically the Three Terms into which the Academic Year is divided
+consist of about ten weeks apiece; but, in practice, they have only
+eight of "Full Term," during which residence is compulsory. The first
+of these is the "Michaelmas," or, as it is popularly called the
+"October" term, lasting from about mid-October to mid-December. After
+the Christmas vacation follows the "Lent" term, from the middle of
+January to the middle of March. Then comes a month of Easter vacation,
+and then the "Easter" (more generally known as the "May") term; at the
+end of which the close of the working year is celebrated by a series
+of social festivities in connection with the College boat races,
+collectively designated "the May Week," though invariably taking place
+in June. Finally comes the "Long Vacation" (the last word being
+omitted in popular parlance), lasting till a new year begins in
+October. Many of the more studious men are, however, permitted to
+reside during July and August for the purposes of private reading. A
+man in residence, we may mention, is said to be "up"; thus we meet
+with such phrases as "coming up," "going down," and being "sent down,"
+when ordered to leave Cambridge, temporarily or permanently, for
+disciplinary reasons.
+
+All this is very unlike Continental or American University life, but
+is almost the ditto of Oxford. For Cambridge is the sister-daughter of
+Oxford. It was by Oxonian colonists that the University of Cambridge
+was begun; the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse, was not only
+suggested by the earliest Oxford Foundation, Merton, but borrowed its
+very Statutes; and the development of the two seats of learning has
+twinned itself throughout the centuries to an extent unparalleled
+elsewhere in history. The result is that to-day there are no two
+places in the world so alike, socially, intellectually, and even
+physically, as Oxford and Cambridge. The latter has at present the
+larger number of students; but each has approximately the same number
+of Colleges, and of satellite Collegiate institutions, formally or
+informally connected with the University (_e.g._, the Ladies'
+Colleges); and in each the Academic organisation, the social code,
+and the life led by both students and teachers, is almost absolutely
+identical. To experts well acquainted with both places the minute
+shades of difference are of extreme interest; but to the average
+visitor the places are as like as twin sisters. The very names of the
+Colleges are the same in no less than a third of the cases. If there
+is a Trinity at Cambridge there is also a Trinity at Oxford, if there
+is a Magdalen at Oxford there is a Magdalene at Cambridge; while St.
+John's, Jesus, Corpus Christi, and Pembroke are all in like manner
+duplicated. And, both at Oxford and Cambridge, Colleges are named from
+Queens; though a subtle difference in spelling (Queen's and Queens')
+records the fact that, while one Queen founded the Oxford College, two
+were concerned in the Cambridge foundation.
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Library, St. John's College._]
+
+With regard to picturesqueness and architectural merit it is difficult
+to assign the pre-eminence to either place, so far as the University
+and Collegiate buildings are concerned. Of each distinctive feature,
+considered separately, the choicest specimen is to be found in
+Cambridge--the best College Chapel at King's; the finest College Hall
+and College Courts at Trinity; the most characteristic and beautiful
+Library at St. John's. But, out-taken these, Oxford can show several
+examples of each feature better than the next best at Cambridge. And,
+apart from the University buildings, the town of Cambridge, with its
+narrow streets and mean public edifices, is hopelessly outclassed by
+the beautiful city of Oxford. Invidious comparisons, however, are, in
+the case of sisters, more than ordinarily odious.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+     Entrance to Cambridge.--Railways.--Roman Catholic Church.--Street
+     runlets, Hobson, Perne.--Fitzwilliam Museum.--=Peterhouse=,
+     Chapel, Deer-park.--Little St. Mary's Church, Washington
+     Arms.--Gray's window.--=Pembroke College=, Large and Small
+     Colleges, "Querela Cantabrigiensis," Ridley's farewell.--St.
+     Botolph's Church.--The King's Ditch.--=Corpus Christi College=,
+     Cambridge Guilds, St. Benet's Church, Fire-hooks, Corpus Library,
+     Corpus Ghost.--=St. Catharine's College.=--King's Parade.--Pitt
+     Press.--Newnham Bridge, Hermits.--The Backs River, College
+     Bridges, Hithes.
+
+
+Having thus given the reader a very meagre and sketchy outline of the
+sort of knowledge needful for a due appreciation of Cambridge, and
+leaving him to fill in such details as he pleases from the numberless
+histories and guide books, large and small (and for the most part
+excellent) which he will find quite readily accessible, we will now
+suppose him to be entering the town.
+
+Should he do this from the railway station he will have to face a mile
+or so of "long unlovely street" to begin with. For when railroads were
+first made--(the Great Eastern line from London to Cambridge being
+constructed in 1845)--they were regarded with extreme suspicion and
+dislike by the authorities of both Universities. The noise of the
+trains, it was declared, would be fatal to their studies; the facility
+of running up to London would hopelessly demoralise their
+undergraduates; bad characters from the metropolis would come down in
+shoals to prey upon them. Thus both Oxford and Cambridge strenuously
+opposed any near approach of this new-fangled abomination to their
+hallowed precincts. Oxford actually succeeded in keeping the main line
+of the Great Western as far off from it as Didcot, ten miles away,
+whence it did not penetrate to the city itself till a considerably
+later date, when prejudice had been overcome by the patent advantages
+of the new locomotion, and a station hard by was welcomed. At Oxford,
+therefore, no such distance divides the railway and the Colleges as at
+Cambridge, where from the first the station stood in its present
+place. This, at the date of its construction, was far beyond even the
+outermost buildings of the town, with which it is connected by the old
+Roman road, the main artery of Cambridge, running straight, as Roman
+roads do run, for miles on either side to the "Great Bridge." To
+antiquarians this road is known as the Via Devana, because its
+objective is supposed to have been the old Roman city of Deva
+(Chester); during its passage through Cambridge it has no fewer than
+seven official designations, to the frequent discomfiture of
+strangers.
+
+Where it conducts the visitor townwards from the railway station it
+presents, as we have said, a somewhat dreary vista; dignified only by
+the beautifully proportioned spire of the Roman Catholic Church, built
+in 1885. The erection of this edifice was due to the generosity of a
+single benefactor, Mrs. Lyne-Stephens, a French lady, who, early in
+the reign of Queen Victoria, won fame and fortune as the most renowned
+ballet dancer of the London stage. The Church is popularly called, in
+Cambridge, a Cathedral; but this is a misnomer, for the Bishop's See
+is not here but at Northampton.
+
+The cross-roads at which the church is placed rejoice in the inane
+designation of Hyde Park Corner. The best approach to Cambridge is by
+the westward road of the four, which leads into the London Road (or
+Trumpington Road, as it is here called), that umbrageous avenue of
+leafage spoken of in our opening sentences. Keeping along this towards
+the town, we find ourselves confronted with one of the prettiest and
+most uncommon amongst the minor attractions of Cambridge, the runlets
+of clear water which sparkle along the side of either pavement.
+
+This pleasant feature is attributed to the benevolence of an ancient
+Cambridge worthy, Thomas Hobson, who dwelt here from the reign of Henry
+the Eighth to that of Charles the First. By trade he was a "carrier," a
+profession which at that date included not merely the transport of goods
+but the provision of locomotion for passengers--then almost wholly
+equestrian. Thus Hobson not only himself travelled regularly to and
+from London with his stage-waggon, but kept a large stable of horses,
+not fewer than "forty good cattle," ready for hire--even supplying his
+customers with boots and whips for their journey. But he was very
+autocratic in the matter, and would never allow any steed to be chosen
+except in accordance with his will. "This or none" he would say to any
+hirer who dared to remonstrate. And his business was so prosperous that
+he could afford to say it, and thus give rise to the still current
+expression "Hobson's Choice." He rose to be Mayor of Cambridge, and his
+portrait still hangs in the Guildhall.
+
+Finally when he died, at the age of eighty-six, in 1630, he gained the
+honour of a serio-comic epitaph from Milton, then a student of
+Christ's College, "on the University Carrier who sickened in the time
+of his Vacancy, on being forbid to go to London by reason of the
+Plague."
+
+  "Here lieth one who did most truly prove
+  That he could never die while he could move;
+  So hung his destiny, never to rot
+  While he might still jog on and keep his trot.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  Rest, that gives all men life, gave him his death,
+  And too much breathing put him out of breath;
+  Nor were it contradiction to affirm
+  Too long Vacation hastened on his Term.
+       *       *       *       *       *
+  But had his doings lasted as they were
+  He had been an immortal carrier."
+
+The popular tradition, (attested by an inscription on the fountain in
+the Market Place,) which gives this hero the whole credit of the
+street runlets, seems, however, to go too far, though they were
+certainly first made during his life-time. Their source is in some
+springs which issue from the chalk near Great Shelford, four miles
+south-east of Cambridge, and which are called, as such sources are
+commonly called hereabouts, "The Nine Wells"--nine being used as an
+indefinite number. It is interesting to remember that this conception
+evolved itself also amongst the ancient Greeks, who talked of the
+"Nine Fountains" at Athens, and the "Nine Ways" at Amphipolis, with
+exactly the same indefiniteness of numeration. The ancient outfall of
+these springs seems to have been by what is now called "Vicar's
+Brook," which is bridged by the London Road at the first milestone
+from Cambridge. Till the eighteenth century the bridge was a ford,
+known as Trumpington Ford. The earliest proposal to intercept the
+stream near this spot and divert its course through the town, was due,
+not to Hobson, but to another worthy (or unworthy) contemporary of
+his, Dr. Andrew Perne, then Master of Peterhouse College, a divine of
+such an accommodating breadth of view that he alone, amongst all the
+higher authorities of the University, succeeded in retaining his post
+and his emoluments throughout the horrible see-saw of the Reformation
+period.
+
+We first hear of him in the reign of Edward the Sixth, as a Protestant
+of such stalwart calibre that he destroyed as "idolatrous" almost
+every single book in the University Library. Under Mary he figures as
+no less ardent a Catholic, even to the degree of digging up and
+publicly burning (in default of living heretics) the corpses of the
+celebrated Protestant teachers Bucer and Fagius. Finally the accession
+of Elizabeth convinced him once more that Protestantism was the truest
+form of Christianity; and she lived long enough to keep him from again
+changing his principles. This amazing versatility naturally did not
+pass without comment. The wits of the University coined from his name
+the Latin verb _pernare_ "to be a turn-coat," and declared that the
+A.P. which showed on a new weather-cock given by him to his College
+stood for A Protestant or A Papist indifferently.
+
+It was this man who, in 1574, started the idea of bringing the
+Shelford water into Cambridge. The plan was carried out by
+"Undertakers" (who hoped to make money by it), in 1610, and amongst
+these Hobson would seem to have been the predominant partner.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse._]
+
+Accompanied by the rippling of these runlets (which only represent a
+very small amount of the water brought by "Hobson's Conduit" into
+Cambridge) we shortly reach our first University edifice, the
+Fitzwilliam Museum, fronted by a singularly fine facade of classical
+architecture, and having in the Entrance Hall a really magnificent
+staircase of coloured marbles. It should be noted that the four lions
+which flank the facade are (unlike those in Trafalgar Square) all in
+differing attitudes. The Museum (which is open to the public three
+days in the week and to members of the University on all days)
+contains a fine collection of pictures and antiques, the nucleus of
+which is a bequest made in 1816 by Viscount Fitzwilliam. The Egyptian
+section is specially noteworthy, and the water-colours by Turner. The
+building was commenced in 1837, but was not finally completed till
+1875, when the cost had run up to a hundred and fifteen thousand
+pounds.
+
+The long-fronted Hospital on the opposite side of the road is the
+modern representative of an ancient institution which gave to this
+region, then quite the extremity of Cambridge, the name (as appears in
+our oldest maps) of Spittal End.
+
+Adjoining the Museum we find ourselves arriving at our first College,
+St. Peter's College, more commonly called Peterhouse, the same of
+which the inevitable Dr. Perne was so long Master. (We may here note
+that in Cambridge this name "Master" is the designation of the Head of
+every College except King's, which has a "Provost," and Queens', with
+its "President.") Peterhouse, as has been mentioned in our first
+chapter, was the earliest College to be founded in Cambridge. Its
+founder Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely, derived his idea from Merton
+College at Oxford, which had been in existence some twenty years when,
+in 1281, he introduced its system into Cambridge, and even adopted its
+very statutes. He first designed to incorporate his College with the
+already existing quasi-monastic Brotherhood of the Hospital of St.
+John (now St. John's College). The double Rule, however, bred so many
+quarrels that he settled his "Scholars of Ely" on their present site;
+their abode being dubbed Peterhouse from the adjoining church of St.
+Peter (now St. Mary's the Less), which for three hundred and fifty
+years served as the College Chapel, and is still connected by a
+covered passage with the College buildings.
+
+The existing Chapel was built by yet another Bishop of Ely closely
+connected with the College, Dr. Matthew Wren, Master here 1625-1634.
+He was uncle to the great Sir Christopher Wren, the architect of St.
+Paul's, and had enough architectural originality of his own to aim at
+copying the beautiful tracery of the mediaeval church-builders. It was
+the first time that any such attempt had been made in England; and
+this going behind the Reformation roused the Protestant feeling of the
+time to fury. Men declared it incredible that there could be "so much
+Popery in so small a chapel"; and when the Civil War gave the
+Puritans their opportunity Wren paid for being so far in advance of
+his age by an imprisonment of not less than eighteen years, till
+released, in 1660, by the Restoration. The Chapel windows are now
+filled with some fine Munich glass, the only example of this work in
+Cambridge.
+
+Besides the Chapel, the Library here is remarkable, and the
+"Combination Room" boasts itself as almost, if not quite, the finest
+apartment of its kind in all Cambridge. This name, we may mention, is
+given in every College to the parlour whither the M.A.'s retire, after
+dining in Hall, for wine, dessert, and conversation.[6] That of
+Peterhouse is a luxurious apartment, panelled with oak, and with
+stained-glass windows.
+
+[Footnote 6: The corresponding Oxford name is "Common Room."]
+
+Another feature of the College is its little deer park, the only one
+in Cambridge, and, with the exception of Magdalen College, Oxford, the
+only one in either University. Access to this is obtained by passing
+through the passage between the Hall and the Kitchen. Beyond the deer
+park again an iron gate leads to the College Gardens, the only College
+Gardens in Cambridge which visitors may freely enter. And they are
+well worth entering.
+
+There is, however, no way through this College, as there is through
+many, and we must leave it through the same gate as we entered by,
+thus returning to the street. Over the gate we observe the coat of
+arms belonging to the College, the armorial bearings of the founder
+surrounded by a border of crowns. This feature will be seen in every
+College, for each has its own arms, and these are invariably
+emblazoned above the entrance.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Mary the Less, South side._]
+
+Architecturally attached to Peterhouse is, as has been said, the
+church of St. Mary "the less," so called in contradistinction to
+"Great" St. Mary's, which here, as at Oxford, is the designation of
+the "University Church." This is the only really beautiful church in
+Cambridge, the tracery of the windows being exquisite flowing
+Decorated. All date from the fourteenth century, when the present
+structure displaced the earlier church dedicated to St. Peter. One
+feature of interest here is a monument put up to Richard Washington,
+who was minister of this church in the beginning of the eighteenth
+century. He was of the same family as the great George Washington, and
+in the coat of arms here displayed we may see the origin of the
+American Stars and Stripes, while the crest has become the American
+eagle.[7]
+
+[Footnote 7: The Washington arms are, in heraldic language: Barry of
+four, gules and argent. On a chief azure three mullets of the second.
+Crest, a demi-eaglet sable rising from an earl's coronet.]
+
+To the west of the church we get a view of the back of Peterhouse in
+its untouched picturesqueness, abutting on the churchyard, at the end
+of which comes another Museum, that of Classical Archaeology. This is
+reached by a narrow lane, having the church on one side, and on the
+other "Emmanuel," the leading Congregationalist place of worship in
+Cambridge. As we return between these into the street we should look
+up at the buildings of Peterhouse and notice, in front of the window
+at the top corner of the ivy-clad wall, an erection of stout iron
+bars. By these hangs a tale; for the window belongs to the rooms
+traditionally occupied by the poet Gray when in residence here. It is
+said that he caused these bars to be put up, from his constitutional
+dread of fire, and that he kept a stout rope constantly affixed to
+them as a means of escape in case of need. Awakened one night by
+shouts of "Fire! Fire!" he slid down this rope in deshabille--to find
+himself plunged at the bottom into a huge vat of water placed there by
+his friends. So runs the tale; which adds that Gray migrated in
+disgust from Peterhouse to Pembroke. That he did so migrate is quite
+historical.
+
+To reach his new College, Gray had only to cross the street; for
+almost immediately opposite to Peterhouse are seen the more widely
+extended buildings of Pembroke. Not so very many years ago they were
+the less widely extended of the two; for while Peterhouse has remained
+comparatively stationary, Pembroke, more than any other College, has
+partaken in the wonderful expansion which the last half century has
+wrought in the number of University students at Cambridge.
+
+[Illustration: _Peterhouse, from St. Mary's Churchyard._]
+
+From the Restoration onwards the Colleges of Cambridge were for two
+hundred years, till the middle of the nineteenth century, divisible in
+numerical strength between two strongly marked classes. At the top
+came the two great Societies of Trinity and St. John's; of which the
+former gradually drew ahead, and came to have some four hundred
+students to St. John's two hundred. The remaining fifteen Foundations
+were classed together as the "Small Colleges"; the largest of them
+being well under a hundred strong, and the smallest (amongst them
+Pembroke) small indeed. But with the great extension of the University
+curriculum, by the addition of a host of literary and scientific
+subjects to the Mathematics which had previously been the sole avenue
+to a Degree, there has come as marked an increase in the number of
+students, and the old College classification has broken down. Trinity,
+indeed, remains at the top, even more than ever, having almost doubled
+its overwhelming numbers; but St. John's has been caught up and
+overpassed by several of the once "small" Colleges, amongst them by
+Pembroke. And yet, in the year 1858, Pembroke had only one solitary
+freshman; and he migrated to Caius, in dread, as the tale then ran, of
+being divided into sections by the authorities, to satisfy the demands
+of the Mathematical, Classical, and Philosophical lecturers provided
+by the College.
+
+The result is that Pembroke, even beyond most Colleges, is a medley of
+architectural additions. When Gray migrated to it, and for a century
+thereafter, the modest range of low white stone which still contains
+the main entrance, formed the whole frontage; the College buildings
+being a small quadrangle about half the size of the present First
+Court. It was, in fact (except for a new Chapel, built by Wren in
+1663, and still in use), no larger than it was at its first
+foundation, in 1346, by Mary, widow of Amory de Valence, Earl of
+Pembroke, and daughter of Guy, Count of Chatillon and St. Paul. Her
+widowhood was brought about, according to tradition, by her husband
+being accidentally slain, before her eyes, on their very wedding day,
+at the tournament held to celebrate the nuptials. Modern criticism
+disputes this tragic tale, but it was believed in Gray's day, and he
+has referred, in his well-known list of the Founders of Cambridge
+Colleges, to
+
+        "sad Chatillon, on her bridal morn
+  Who wept her bleeding love."
+
+On her widowhood, however occasioned, she retired from the world, and
+took the veil at Denny Abbey, between Cambridge and Ely. The College
+was founded by her in her husband's memory, and has ever since
+displayed her armorial bearings, the coats of Valence and St. Paul
+dimidiated.
+
+At the time of the Civil War, the "Querela Cantabrigiensis" (a
+contemporary publication, written in the Royalist interest), in
+denouncing the misdeeds of the Parliamentary forces, complains
+bitterly that "fourscore ragged soldiers, who had been lowzing before
+Crowland nigh a fortnight, were turned loose into Pembroke Hall, being
+one of the least Halls of the University, to kennel there, and charged
+by their officers to shift for themselves, who, without more ado,
+broke open the Fellows' and Scholars' chambers, and took their beds
+from under them."
+
+A century before this we find Bishop Ridley, the famous Protestant
+martyr, dwelling on this College (of which he had been Master) in his
+touching farewell to Cambridge, composed shortly before his execution:
+
+     "Farewell, Pembroke Hall, of late my own College, my care and my
+     charge ... mine own dear College! In thy orchard--(the walls,
+     butts,[8] and trees, if they could speak, would bear me
+     witness)--I learnt without book almost all Paul's Epistles; yea,
+     and I ween all the Canonical Epistles also, save only the
+     Apocalypse--of which study, although in time a great part did
+     depart from me, yet the sweet smell thereof I trust I shall carry
+     with me into Heaven; for the profit thereof I think I have felt
+     in all my lifetime ever after. And, I ween, of late there was
+     that did the like. The Lord grant that this zeal and love toward
+     that part of God's Word, which is a key and true commentary to
+     all the Holy Scripture, may ever abide in that College so long as
+     the world shall endure."
+
+[Footnote 8: This word reminds us that archery practice was, in
+England, a regular feature of mediaeval College life.]
+
+Besides Bishop Ridley, Pembroke can boast other well-known Protestant
+divines of the Reformation era, Grindal, Archbishop of Canterbury,
+Whitgift, his successor, and Lancelot Andrewes, Bishop of Winchester.
+The mitre and pastoral staff of the last named (both of brass, and the
+former quite unwearable) are preserved amongst the College treasures.
+So is also a magnificent silver-gilt cup, the gift of the Foundress,
+which still goes round the High Table on special Feast Days. It bears
+two inscriptions in old English characters. Round the bowl is an
+exhortation to "drenk and mak gud cher" for love of St. Dennis--to
+whom Marie de Valence, as a Frenchwoman, had a special devotion--while
+round the stem are the words "M.V. God. help.at.ned."
+
+This cup is the more valuable as being almost the only piece of
+mediaeval plate still surviving in Cambridge. In ancient days the
+College Halls and Chapels were abundantly supplied, but when the Civil
+War broke out the loyal Gownsmen, with one accord, devoted all their
+silver to the service of the King and sent it off to him at Oxford.
+But it never got there; for Cromwell gained his first distinction by
+pouncing upon the convoy "with a ragged rout of peasants," and then
+compelled the surrender of what little was left in Cambridge. How this
+cup escaped is not known.
+
+Nor is Pembroke's lay list of distinguished alumni less notable than
+its clerical. Besides Gray, it has another poet of the first rank in
+Edmund Spenser, and no less a statesman than the younger Pitt. Amongst
+men of science it counts the late Sir George Gabriel Stokes, whose
+memory is still fresh, and the all too much forgotten seventeenth
+century astronomer, Dr. Long. Of the latter a striking memorial long
+remained in the College--a copper globe, eighteen feet in diameter,
+pierced to represent the celestial sphere, and so arranged that thirty
+observers at once could find place within it and see the sequence of
+the constellations as the globe revolved. Unhappily this object of
+unique interest has been improved off the face of the earth, amongst
+the various innovations to which Pembroke has specially lent itself.
+
+The original foundation of this College (which was for some time more
+commonly called "Marie Valence Hall") consisted of a Master, fifteen
+scholars, and four Bible clerks. It has now twelve Fellows,
+thirty-three scholars, and upwards of two hundred students in
+residence.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Botolph's Church._]
+
+A few yards from Pembroke stands the Parish Church of St. Botolph,
+which, according to the original design of the Foundress, would have
+been as closely connected with the College as is Little St. Mary's
+with Peterhouse. In the first inception of the Collegiate system the
+idea was that the Members of each College (which was only regarded as
+a glorified dwelling house of the period, and the Society of which,
+till their "Hall" was built, were, actually, to begin with, quartered
+in already existing dwelling houses) should worship in the nearest
+Parish Church, like other parishioners. Only by special licence from
+the Pope could a private Chapel for a College, or any other mansion,
+be erected. That granted by Pope Urban the Fifth (during the Papal
+exile at Avignon) for the Chapel of Pembroke is still extant in the
+Papal Register. It is dated July 1366, and runs as follows:
+
+     "To the Warden and College of Scholars of Valence Marie Hall,
+     Cambridge:
+
+     License, on the petition of their Foundress, Mary de Sancto
+     Paulo, Countess of Pembroke, to have a Chapel founded and built
+     by the said Countess within their walls, wherein Masses and other
+     Divine Offices may be celebrated by Priests of the said College;
+     saving the rights of the Parish Church."
+
+The Parochial rights here spoken of mean the exclusive right of the
+Parish Priest to celebrate marriages and to receive the dues known as
+"Easter Offerings "and "Surplice Fees."
+
+The dedication of St. Botolph's Church notifies us that we are now
+entering Cambridge proper. For this Saint, who was historically an
+abbot, the pioneer of the Benedictine Order in East Anglia, became
+adopted by travellers as their special patron; and his churches were,
+accordingly, placed for the most part at the gates of towns that his
+benediction might speed the parting voyager. We thus find them at no
+fewer than four of the London exits, Aldgate, Aldersgate, Bishopsgate,
+and Billingsgate, and in more than sixty other places, mostly in East
+Anglia. That which we are now considering was associated with the
+entrance to Cambridge known as "Trumpington Gate," where the mediaeval
+traveller from London made his way into the town by crossing the
+ancient defensive work called "The King's Ditch."
+
+The construction of this great trench was popularly ascribed to King
+Henry the Third, who, in his struggle with the Barons, desired to keep
+a firm hold on the important strategic centre of Cambridge. There is
+some reason, however, to suppose that he did not actually initiate the
+idea of thus insulating the town by running a ditch across the bend of
+the river on which it stands, but merely deepened and widened an
+earlier trench, originally made, perhaps, by the Danes during their
+occupation of the place, and remade by King John. However this may
+be, the ditch utterly failed of its purpose. Not only was it unequal
+to keeping the Barons out, but it could not even preserve the town
+from being pillaged by a local marauder, Geoffry de Magnaville or
+Maundeville, who made his lair in the neighbouring fens.
+
+The King's Ditch left the river at "the King's Mill" (now Newnham
+Mill), and re-entered it opposite Magdalene College. It remained an
+open watercourse (and a common sewer) till near the beginning of the
+nineteenth century, when it was filled in, none too soon, for sanitary
+reasons. Timber bridges spanned the stream at "Barnwell Gate," where
+the "Via Devana" entered the town, as well as here at "Trumpington
+Gate." These gates themselves, if they ever had any material
+existence, were probably, at the most, little more than toll-bars.
+
+St. Botolph's Church was intended, as we have seen, to be specially
+connected with Pembroke College. Between them, however, there has
+always existed a block of buildings, while immediately adjoining the
+church on the other side there has arisen a College of later
+foundation, that of St. Mary and Corpus Christi, familiarly known as
+"Corpus." Unlike the other Colleges of Cambridge, this owes its
+existence not to the generosity of any private benefactor, but to that
+of two mediaeval Guilds, the Guild of St. Mary and the Guild of Corpus
+Christi, which combined to leave future ages this splendid memorial of
+their beneficence.
+
+These Guilds were merely two out of many such bodies in the Cambridge
+of that day; for the Guild was the Benefit Society of the mediaeval
+period, and every respectable citizen was enrolled in one--often,
+indeed, in more than one. The Guild, collectively, saw to the personal
+interests of its members; aided them in distress, old age, and
+sickness; contributed towards the expenses of their burial; and
+finally provided Masses for their souls. This last item ultimately
+proved fatal to the Guilds, which were suppressed wholesale at the
+Reformation, as being thus tainted with Popish superstition, and their
+property confiscated for the benefit of the Royal exchequer.
+
+Guilds, like our Benefit Societies, were voluntary associations,
+co-opting their members, and established on various bases. Earliest to
+rise, in all English boroughs, was the Merchant Guild, which regulated
+the entire trade of the town; fixing at its general meetings, called
+"Morning Talks," the market price of each staple commodity, and the
+hours and places at which it might be bought and sold, besides
+punishing rigorously (by fine or expulsion from the Guild) any unfair
+dealing, such as underselling, or "regrating,"--_i.e._, making a
+"corner" in any article as we should now say. Somewhat later each
+craft began to have its own Guild, supplanting to a large extent the
+older and more general organisation, whose executive insensibly became
+merged in the Town Council. To this day, however, the building in
+which that Council meets for its "Morning Talks," is called the
+Guildhall in most English towns.
+
+Besides the trading Guilds, there arose others organised on a
+definitely religious basis, the members of which were bound to special
+devotion in some particular direction, from which the Guild took its
+name. Amongst these were the two to whom we owe the existence of
+"Corpus"--those of "Corpus Christi" and "Blessed Mary," the former
+having been (in 1342) the original inceptors of the idea. The armorial
+bearings of the College still testify to its double origin, being,
+quarterly, three lilies, (the emblems of Our Lady,) and a pelican "in
+her piety" (_i.e._, feeding her young with her own blood, as
+contemporary legend imagined to be the case), as a reference to the
+Holy Eucharist.
+
+The College, which was founded 1352, was originally intended only for
+the education of a small number of priests, and consisted only of one
+small court, now known as the Old Court, which happily still exists in
+almost its original condition. It is a venerable and secluded spot,
+with ivy-grown walls and mullioned lattices, well worth a visit. From
+its north-eastern corner extends a long gallery pierced by an archway,
+connecting the College with the Church of St. Benedict, or "Benet," as
+it is commonly vocalised.[9] From this connection the College became
+popularly known as "Benet College," just as Peterhouse was so called
+from its like connection with the ancient church of "St. Peter by
+Trumpington Gate." But while Peterhouse retains its old designation,
+that of "Benet" has now become wholly disused, though only within the
+last century.
+
+[Footnote 9: This is shown in our first wood-cut.]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Benet's Church, Interior._]
+
+This connecting gallery is of red brick, toned by age into delicious
+mellowness, and is best seen from the back of the College, where a
+quiet little lane ("Free School Lane"), one of the most charming
+amongst the byways of Cambridge, gives access through the above
+mentioned archway into the quiet little church yard of this quiet
+little church, with its Saxon tower, the oldest monument of
+ecclesiastical architecture in Cambridge, and one of the most
+picturesque. The precise date of its erection, and how the church came
+to exist at all, is, and will probably remain, an unsolved problem in
+history. Some authorities imagine that it points to an East Anglian
+settlement to the east of the Cam, distinct from the Mercian
+"Grantabridge" on the western bank, where the old Roman town once
+stood; others believe that it was built by the English inhabitants
+expelled from that town by the Danes in the time of King Alfred.
+Whatever may be the truth there is no small fascination in this
+venerable relic of the old English days, with its "long and short"
+stonework, the rudely-fashioned Romanesque pilasters in its windows,
+and the nondescript "portal-guarding" lions of its interior archway.
+The body of the church has been altered and re-altered time and again
+during the ages: at the bases of the present chancel-arch those of two
+earlier predecessors may be observed, and the south wall of the
+chancel is honeycombed with disused openings once leading into the
+Collegiate buildings of Corpus, while the existing stairway (also
+disused) is seen in the eastern corner of the south aisle. The church
+is thus of rare interest to the architectural student, and its history
+has been exhaustively dealt with by Mr. Atkinson (_Cambridge
+Illustrated_, p. 133). A glass case in the south aisle contains
+various relics of antiquity belonging to it, and beside them an
+ancient iron "fire-hook," used of old for tearing down blazing roofs
+and buildings.[10]
+
+[Footnote 10: The speediest possible destruction of such buildings was
+the only way of dealing with fires before effective engines came in,
+which was not until the nineteenth century. Rings to facilitate the
+use of fire-hooks are to be found under the eaves of many old houses
+hereabout. The hooks had 30 foot handles, mounted on a pair of
+wheels.]
+
+Out-taken the Old Court, Corpus has nothing in the way of buildings
+that has either beauty or interest, the College having been
+remorselessly remodelled about 1825. But the contents of its Library
+surpass all else of the kind in Cambridge, containing, as it does,
+what is probably the identical Gospel Book used by St. Augustine in
+his conversion of the English, and what is probably the identical copy
+of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle written for King Alfred, if not by his
+own hand. These priceless treasures once formed part of the library
+of Canterbury Abbey, which was sold by Henry the Eighth, at its
+suppression, as waste paper. Such relics as survived twenty years of
+this profanation were rescued by Archbishop Parker (the first
+Protestant Archbishop), in Elizabeth's reign, and were presented by
+him to the College, of which he had been Master.[11] To guard, so far
+as possible, against their again coming "to such base uses," he
+accompanied his gift with the condition that if a certain number of
+the MSS. were ever missing, the whole should pass to Caius College,
+and thence to Trinity Hall in case of a like loss. The authorities of
+these Colleges have (and exercise) the right of annual inspection: so
+far quite fruitlessly, as no single MS. has disappeared during the
+last three centuries. But the result has been to render this Library
+harder of access to visitors than any other, and it can only be seen
+by special arrangement with the Librarian, who has to be present in
+person, along with some other Fellow or Scholar of the College, before
+strangers can be introduced.
+
+[Footnote 11: Bishop Latimer, the Protestant martyr, also belonged to
+Corpus.]
+
+Corpus has the reputation of being haunted by a ghost, the existence
+of which has been taken quite seriously even within the present
+century. But the tale of its origin has a most suspicious number of
+variants. Some hold it to be the spirit of a poor motherless girl of
+seventeen, the daughter of Dr. Spenser (Master from 1667 to 1693), who
+died of fright at being discovered by her father while enjoying a
+clandestine interview with her undergraduate lover. (This tragedy is
+fairly historical.) Others declare that it is the lover; who was
+locked, or locked himself, into a cupboard, where he died of
+suffocation! Others again have a tale of a student from King's, who
+(in order not to haunt his own College) came hither to kill himself!
+That strange noises, not yet accounted for, are heard in some of the
+rooms, is, apparently, an established fact.
+
+Opposite the Gate-tower of Corpus an open roadside esplanade, shaded
+by lime trees, marks the still vacant space destined by St.
+Catharine's College, in the seventeenth century, for a Library, to
+complete its red-brick quadrangle, a design which has come to nothing.
+The interior of the Court, which is not without dignity, still lies
+open to view, shut in only by what was then meant to be a merely
+temporary iron railing, with St. Catharine's wheel conspicuous above
+the entrance. The College was founded as a kind of satellite to King's
+College, by Robert Woodlark, the third Provost of that great
+Foundation, in 1475. It has always remained a small and comparatively
+poor Society.
+
+If we pass through the Court, such as it is, of St. Catharine's,
+(familiarly known as "Cat's,") the western gate will bring us out into
+Queens' Lane. We shall, however, do better to reach this most
+fascinating of all Cambridge byways not thus but through the College
+from which it derives its name, Queens'. To do this we must turn
+westwards down Silver Street, a few yards south of St. Catharine's,
+and just opposite St. Botolph's Church. Before taking this turn we
+should give a glance northward along Trumpington Street at the
+splendid mass of Collegiate and University buildings which here come
+into view. High above all rises the glorious fabric of King's College
+Chapel, while, beyond it, the classical facades of the Senate House
+and the University Library, the fine gateway of Caius College, and the
+further off tower of St. John's College, fill the eye with a
+delightful sense of aesthetic culture and harmony.
+
+Entering Silver Street, a mean thoroughfare, all too narrow for its
+volume of traffic, and demanding no small caution from all and sundry,
+we have on our left a building for all the world like a College--so
+frequently, indeed, mistaken for one by newcomers, as to have gained
+the nickname of "the Freshman's College." In reality this is the
+University Printing Press, or the Pitt Press, as it is commonly
+called; the existing frontage opposite Pembroke having been erected in
+1831, in memory of that statesman, who was a member of Pembroke
+College.[12] All the official printing of the University is done here,
+and the building also serves as the quarters of the University
+Registrary, who keeps the record of Entrances, Degrees, etc.
+
+[Footnote 12: The University had licensed printers from the time of
+Henry the Eighth, but did not set up a Press of its own till the
+eighteenth century, when influenced by the great scholar and critic
+Richard Bentley.]
+
+At the end of Silver Street, which is, happily, little over a hundred
+yards in length, we reach an iron bridge over the Cam; its placid
+stream "footing slow," as Milton says (in Lycidas), and only some
+thirty feet in breadth. Above the bridge, however, it widens out into
+a broad pool, enlivened by the rush of water from the "King's Mill,"
+beyond which the eye ranges over the open levels of "Sheep's Green."
+Both the mill and the bridge are amongst the oldest features of
+Cambridge, and the tolls payable at both were in mediaeval times a
+Royal monopoly. The King's agent in collecting them on this bridge
+(known as "The Small Bridge" in contradistinction to the more
+important structure beneath the Castle) was a hermit, for whose
+accommodation a small bridge-house and chapel were built. This curious
+use of hermits, as keepers of roads and bridges, was common in
+Cambridgeshire before the Reformation.
+
+At Silver Street bridge the river enters on its course through the
+enchanted ground of the "Backs," and the visitor will do well to take
+water at the adjoining boat-house; for the stream here forms for half
+a mile a byway lovely beyond words, not to be matched elsewhere in all
+the world; flowing, as it does, between venerable piles of academic
+masonry, and "trim gardens," the haunts of "retired leisure";
+umbrageous, as it is, with the shade of lime, and elm, and beech, and
+chestnut, and weeping willow, and laburnum; spanned, as it is, by
+bridge after bridge, each a new revelation of exquisite design.
+
+First we find ourselves with the old red brick fabric of Queens'
+College on the one bank and the thicket of "Queens' Grove" on the
+other, joined together by a wooden bridge, attributed to Sir Isaac
+Newton, the Great Natural Philosopher and discoverer of the Law of
+Gravity. A miracle of ingenious construction is this bridge, formed of
+a series of mutually supporting beams requiring not a single bolt to
+hold them together. Such at least it was till a few years ago, when
+the old timbers, after two hundred years' wear, fell into decay and
+had to be replaced, as nearly in facsimile as modern skill could
+compass.
+
+A few yards further and the red brick of Queens' gives place to the
+white stone of King's; the proximity reminding us that the Founders of
+these two beautiful Colleges were husband and wife, "the Royal Saint,"
+King Henry the Sixth, and his heroic Consort, Margaret of Anjou. Poor
+young things! They were but twenty-two and fifteen respectively when
+they began these monuments of their liberality and devotion--upon the
+very eve of that miserable conflict, the wars of "the rival Roses,"
+which brought about the downfall and death of both. But their work
+survived them, to be completed by Royal successors; King's by Henry
+the Seventh, Queens' by Elizabeth Woodville, wife of Henry's rival,
+Edward the Fourth of York.
+
+[Illustration: _Clare Bridge._]
+
+King's Bridge, beneath which we now glide, is a single delicate rib of
+stone, a marked contrast to the elaborate woodwork of Queens', and to
+the three arches of grey stone and balustraded parapet of Clare, the
+next in order. Between these the river widens, and the view opens out
+on either side; a spacious meadow dotted and bounded with elms and
+limes on the west, and on the east as spacious a lawn beyond which
+rise the buildings of King's and of Clare College, and the west front
+of that glory of Cambridge and of the world, King's College Chapel.
+This reach of the river used, a few years ago, to be the scene of a
+pretty annual merry-making, known as the "Boat Show," which formed
+part of the attractions of the "May Week."[13] Hither the College
+boats which had been contending for precedence in the May Races used
+to row up in procession and draw up side by side in a mass occupying
+the whole breadth of the stream. Each crew rose in turn with uplifted
+oars to salute the victors who had attained (or retained) the Headship
+of the River; after which the procession returned to the boat houses
+two miles below. (The races were rowed two miles below again, where
+the stream is wide enough for the due manipulation of an
+eight-oar.)[14]
+
+[Footnote 13: See page 17.]
+
+[Footnote 14: See Chapter VI.]
+
+Clare Bridge passed, the College gardens of Clare and Trinity Hall
+(which last must not be confounded with the larger and later
+foundation of Trinity College) flank our course on either side for a
+short space, till the next bridge, Garret Hostel Bridge, which
+proclaims its non-Collegiate origin by being (like Newnham Bridge) a
+tasteless structure of iron. It is, in fact, a public thoroughfare;
+the road leading to it, Garret Hostel Lane, being the solitary
+survival of the dozen or so of little streets which gave access to the
+River from mediaeval Cambridge, till the banks were usurped by the
+Colleges. And in its name we have the last surviving reminder of those
+"Hostels," or officially recognised lodging houses, which, before
+Colleges came into being (and for some while after), provided
+accommodation for the swarming students of the mediaeval University.
+
+Garret Hostel itself, together with others, was swallowed up by the
+gigantic College which we now reach, Trinity. Trinity Bridge, a
+cycloidal curve carried on three arches, is led up to on either side
+by the "long walk of limes" sung by Tennyson in "In Memoriam"; and the
+splendid range of chestnuts which, as we pass beneath it, opens upon
+us to the north-west, forms the boundary between the paddocks of
+Trinity and St. John's. On the east rises the vast fabric of Trinity
+Library built by Sir Christopher Wren, with its magnificent range of
+arched windows and its warm yellow sandstone, an occasional violet
+block adding to the effect, a veritable feast of quiet colour,
+especially when glowing in the evening sun, and contrasting pleasingly
+with the paler tint of the New Court of St. John's College, which,
+with its plethora of crocketed pinnacles, here bounds our view to the
+left front. To the right front rises the square tower of St. John's
+Chapel, picturesquely reflected in the still waters.
+
+A slight bend in the stream, overhung by great elms, brings us to St.
+John's Bridge, a fine three arched structure of brick and stone built
+in 1696.[15] Beyond it the College buildings rise, like those of
+Queens', directly from the water--to the west the white stone
+abutments of the New Court, to the east the red brick walls and oriel
+window of the Library, the most beautiful building of its class in
+either Cambridge or Oxford. On it we can read the date 1624, and the
+letters I. L. C. S. standing for _Johannes Lincolnensis Custos
+Sigilli_, which commemorate the benefactor John Williams, Bishop of
+Lincoln, and Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, to whose generosity we owe
+this gem of architecture. In his day, and for long after, St. John's
+was quite the largest College in Cambridge, rivalled only, for a
+moment, by Emmanuel. The present supremacy of Trinity did not begin
+till late in the eighteenth century.
+
+[Footnote 15: Sculptures over the piers represent the bridge itself, a
+very unusual feature.]
+
+The river is here spanned by the latest of the College bridges, a
+single arch of stone high in air, carrying a pathway vaulted over with
+stone and lighted on either side by grated windows, after the fashion
+of the "Bridge of Sighs" at Venice. It was built about 1830 to form a
+communication between the older part of the College on the eastern
+side of the river and the recently erected New Court on the western,
+while giving no opportunity for illicit leaving of the College. As has
+been already stated, students, while bound to be inside the College
+gates all night, are not bound to keep to their rooms, but may wander
+about the Courts at any hour.
+
+[Illustration: _St. John's Bridge._]
+
+With St. John's the Collegiate buildings cease and are succeeded by
+the last remaining "Hithes," or quays, used for commercial traffic,
+which of old lined the banks for the whole length of Cambridge. We
+read of Corn Hithe, Pease Hithe, Flax Hithe, Garlic Hithe and others.
+For the river was to old Cambridge all and more than all that the
+railways are now, the great artery of traffic, by which goods were far
+more easily and cheaply conveyed than along the roads of the period,
+which were always rough and often mere "Sloughs of Despond." Most
+especially was this the case with fuel, so that in the seventeenth
+century it was a familiar local saying that "here water kindleth
+fire." These ancient hithes, like the street-ways leading to them,
+have been almost all absorbed by the various College precincts. The
+last, as we have said, are to be seen yet, still in use, with barges
+(still laden chiefly with firewood) lying at them, below St. John's,
+by the side of the "Great Bridge," that famous passage of the river to
+which Cambridge owes both its name and its very existence. Opposite
+the lowest of them there is one more riverside College, Magdalene, an
+old monastic educational establishment turned to its present purpose
+at the time of the Reformation by Lord Thomas Audley of Saffron
+Walden, a courtier of King Henry the Eighth, who had obtained a grant
+of it from that rapacious monarch.
+
+Our Cam byway here ends; for the river here passes out of the
+populated area of Cambridge. It is noteworthy that this area abuts on
+its banks to the same extent and no more than it did seven hundred
+years ago. The King's Ditch, which then bounded it, left the stream at
+the King's Mill, where our voyage started, and rejoined it just
+opposite Magdalene, where that voyage closes. It is well worth while,
+however, to retrace our course, for we shall find fresh loveliness in
+the reverse views of the exquisite scenery through which we have
+passed; and may note the many disused archways in the College walls,
+which tell how, scarcely a generation ago, this unique gem of English
+landscape was actually defiled by being used as a shamelessly open
+sewer.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+     =Queens' College=, Erasmus, Cloisters, Carmelites, Chapel.--Old
+     Mill Street.--=King's College=, Henry the Sixth, King's and Eton,
+     Henry's "Will."--King's College Chapel, Wordsworth, Milton,
+     Windows, Rosa Solis, Screen, Stalls, Vaulting, Side-Chapels, View
+     from Roof.
+
+
+When we disembark once more at Silver Street Bridge, we find ourselves
+standing beneath the sombre old red-brick walls of Queens', indented
+just above us by a small projecting turret which we should not leave
+without notice, for it bears the name and, by tradition, was assigned
+to the use of the famous Erasmus during the months he spent in
+Cambridge. This great light of the Reformation, or, more properly
+speaking, of the intellectual revival which led up to it, was brought
+here by the influence of the saintly chancellor, Sir Thomas More,
+whose great wish was to broaden the University outlook by the
+introduction of the Classical spirit. Hitherto its curriculum had been
+almost exclusively confined to Aristotelian philosophy, adapted to
+dogmatic Christianity by the great mediaeval Schoolmen, especially St.
+Thomas Aquinas. Erasmus brought in the knowledge of Greek, which he
+had acquired from the learned exiles whom the capture of
+Constantinople by the Turks in 1453 had driven to the west. Unhappily
+he, in no small degree, depreciated this great gift, by clogging it
+with his own self-opinionated pronunciation of the language, instead
+of taking it as actually spoken. Strange to say, this "Erasmian"
+barbarism shortly became a badge of Protestantism (though Erasmus
+himself lived and died a Catholic). It was thus enforced during the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, forbidden in that of Mary, and enforced
+again under Elizabeth. To this day it remains with us, and cuts us off
+from the living tongue of Hellas.
+
+To enter Queens' it is advisable to cross the iron bridge, and recross
+the river by Sir Isaac Newton's wooden structure. Passing through the
+low doorway into which it leads we find ourselves in the most
+picturesque of all College Courts, bounded by the Hall in face of us,
+and on the other three sides by a low range of ancient red-brick
+cloisters. These once belonged to the Carmelite nuns, who removed to
+this site when flooded out of their original quarters at Newnham. In
+1538 they sold their House to the College, just in time to escape its
+confiscation, at the suppression of the monasteries, by Henry the
+Eighth, who, as it was, required the purchase-money to be paid over to
+_him_. Having obtained the property Queens' at once built over the
+northern cloisters the beautiful gallery which serves as the
+drawing-room of the President's Lodge--(it has been stated that the
+Head of a College is, in Cambridge, always called the "Master," except
+here, where he is "President," and at King's where he is "Provost").
+The gallery, which is a wooden construction overhanging the Cloister,
+is eighty feet long by twelve in width, with three large oriels
+looking into the Court. Those on the other side open into the
+President's garden, a charming enclosure abutting upon the river. Both
+gallery and garden are, of course, strictly private. Opposite the
+gallery, at the south-east corner of the cloisters, is a small Court
+of Elizabethan date, known as "Pump Court," and now-a-days as "Erasmus
+Court"; while from the north-east corner a tortuous little passage
+brings us into a more modern Court, shaded by a fine walnut-tree
+(whence its name of "Walnut Tree Court"). Here stands the New Chapel,
+the best bit of modern work in all Cambridge, erected in 1895 from the
+designs of Messrs. Bodley and Garner. The beautiful proportions and
+effective decoration of the interior are specially noteworthy.
+
+[Illustration: _The President's Gallery, Queens' College._]
+
+On the southern side of this court a passage (between the old Chapel
+and the Library) leads to the "Old Court," the original enclave of the
+College. This has remained practically unaltered since the Foundation,
+and is the best example remaining of the way in which a College was
+designed of old, after the fashion of the large country-house, as then
+built--Haddon Hall, for example, in Derbyshire. The red-brick and the
+white stone dressings, have mellowed, as elsewhere in Cambridge, to a
+tone of rich sombreness most restful and satisfying to the eye. The
+somewhat gaudy clock and clock tower are modern, as is also the yet
+gaudier sun-dial often, but erroneously, ascribed to Sir Isaac Newton.
+Over the Hall is emblazoned the very elaborate shield of the College,
+quartering the six bearings to which the poor little Queen Margaret
+laid claim--those of Hungary, Naples, Jerusalem, Anjou, Lorraine, and
+De Barre, all within a bordure "vert" added by Queen Elizabeth. Hence
+it is that green is to-day the distinctive Queens' colour at boating,
+cricket, etc.
+
+Passing out of Queens', beneath the dignified gate-tower, we find
+ourselves in Queens' Lane, the quiet byway already referred to. Quiet
+byway as it now is, this was once a main street of Cambridge, known as
+Mill Street, forming (as it did before the great Colleges of King's,
+Trinity, and St. John's were built across it) the line of interior
+communication between the two bridges of the town, "the Small Bridge"
+by the King's Mill and "The Great Bridge" beneath the Castle. In those
+days it was a busy thoroughfare, thick set with burgher houses; now,
+in such broken lengths of it as survive, the buildings are almost
+wholly Collegiate. As we emerge from Queens' gate, and turn leftwards,
+we have on one side the dark-red bricks of that College, on the other
+the like buildings of St. Catharine's, while, at the further end of
+the street in front, our view is bounded by the white stone of the new
+gateway of King's. The whole effect is delightful.
+
+Through this gateway we now make our way into the Premier[16] College
+of Cambridge, and soon find ourselves face to face with one of the
+most beautiful views of the world. Before us spreads a spacious lawn,
+the most extensive in existence,[17] bounded on three sides by the
+white and grey walls of College buildings, while on the fourth it
+merges into the wooded grass-land of the Backs; the river which
+divides it from these being scarcely perceptible from this point. We
+get a glimpse, however, of Clare Bridge, terminating the graceful
+facade of that College, which is in our immediate front. Behind us are
+the nineteenth-century additions to King's, and to our right front the
+fine pile of "Gibbs' Buildings," erected, in the eighteenth century,
+as a first attempt to approximate in some degree to the wishes of the
+Royal Founder, and transfer his College from the cramped position it
+had hitherto occupied, at the north of the Chapel, to the ampler site
+on the south which he had originally destined for it, and had cleared
+for his purpose by buying up and sweeping away, church and all, one of
+the most thickly populated parishes in Cambridge, that of "St. John
+Zachary" (_i.e._ St. John the Baptist), including a furlong's length
+of Mill Street.
+
+[Footnote 16: This rank is one of the privileges due to the Royal
+Founder. Another was the exemption of King's men from the authority of
+the Proctors; another their right to a Degree without passing the
+usual examinations. This was given up in the middle of last century,
+and now every King's student is required by the College to take
+Honours in some Tripos.]
+
+[Footnote 17: A current story tells how a millionaire, who boasted
+that his money should make him a lawn as perfect, was discomfited by
+being told that to attain such perfection "you must mow and roll it
+regularly for 400 years. That is what has been done here."]
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Queens' College._]
+
+For the scale on which Henry VI. intended to build was something
+hitherto quite unprecedented, and his plan took years to mature. The
+inspiration of it was originally caught from William of Wykeham,
+Bishop of Winchester, whose genius first conceived the idea of twinned
+Colleges, in the provinces and at the University, from the former of
+which the Scholars should pass on to complete their education at the
+latter. This idea Wykeham himself first carried into effect by the
+foundation of the College at Winchester and of New College at Oxford.
+And, fired by his example, Henry VI., when only twenty, resolved on
+doing the same thing himself with truly Royal magnificence. His
+Scholars should begin their course at Eton, beneath the walls of
+Windsor Castle, his birthplace and favourite residence, and should
+thence pass to finish it at Cambridge, in the College which he would
+there dedicate to his own Patron Saint Nicolas, on whose Feast,
+December 6th (still "Founder's Day" to all Etonians and King's men),
+he was born.
+
+This was in 1440. He at once put hand to the work, and that same year
+signed the Charters for both Colleges; the Head of each being called
+"Provost," in order, as he said, "to weld the two Colleges together in
+a bond of everlasting brotherhood,"--a bond which actually lasted in
+its entirety till 1870, and of which traces even yet remain.
+
+The acquisition of the sites involved complicated legal transactions
+which occupied several years; but by 1444 Eton was sufficiently
+advanced to receive its first Scholars, a colony brought by William of
+Waynflete from Winchester; and by 1446 Henry was able to dedicate the
+first stone of his Cambridge chapel. Every dimension of this glorious
+edifice he himself worked out with the utmost minuteness, and set
+down, as he would have it completed, in that notable record of his
+purposes still preserved in the College Library, and known as his
+"Will." The word had not in those days its present purely posthumous
+signification, but was used of any formal disposition of a man's
+estate, or any part of it, to some given purpose.
+
+In this document, "one of the most remarkable works in the English
+language," as Mr. J. W. Clark styles it, the King describes his future
+College so accurately that a complete plan and elevation of the whole
+can be drawn from it. We thus learn that Gibbs' Building represents
+what was meant to be the western side of an enclosed court, with a
+fountain in the midst of it. The Chapel was to form the northern side
+of this court; the entrance, with its turreted gate-tower, the
+eastern; the Hall and Library, the western. The great lawn before us
+was not to be, as now, an empty space, but was to be occupied, partly
+by a small "kitchen court" containing the various offices (bake-house,
+brew-house, etc.), partly by a cloistered cemetery between the Chapel
+and the river, from the western side of which was to rise a pinnacled
+tower, 220 feet high, the rival to that at Magdalen, Oxford, which was
+already being planned by William of Waynflete. Another turreted
+gate-tower, on the very bank of the river, was to give access to the
+College Bridge (further north than the present one). Had this plan
+been carried out in its entirety, King's would indeed have been, as
+the historian Stow puts it, "such that the like colledge could scarce
+have been found again in any Christian land."
+
+[Illustration: _Queens' College Gateway._]
+
+Unhappily its splendid design was brought to nought by the great
+tragedy of the Wars of the Roses, which broke out almost immediately.
+The singular mildness with which that conflict was waged (except on
+the actual field of battle), with no wasting of lands, with no burning
+of towns or villages, with no slaughter (and scarcely any plunder) of
+non-combatants, permitted the work on the Chapel, which, as we have
+seen, was already begun, to proceed, though slowly, and did not even
+stop the conveyance of stone from the chosen quarry at Huddleston in
+Yorkshire. The payment of the workmen was a harder matter, for Henry
+was far from being a wealthy monarch. He and his wife between them had
+less than the equivalent of L50,000 per annum, all too little for the
+expenses of their position, even in days of peace. Still the pay was
+found, in a certain measure, and the workmen came and went till
+dispersed by the appalling tidings that their Royal Saint had been
+deposed and murdered in the Tower. Then in panic horror they flung
+down their tools and fled, with such haste that they did not even
+complete the job on a block of stone, already half sawn through, which
+lay, as Logan's print of 1680 shows it, in the south-east corner of
+the present Great Court, Henry's intended quadrangle, a testimony to
+their despair, for upwards of three centuries. Then, when the idea of
+carrying out his intention was at last revived, this stone was
+appropriately used as the first to be employed for that purpose, the
+Foundation Stone of Gibbs' Building.
+
+The work on the Chapel thus abruptly stopped by the Founder's death
+remained in abeyance for the remainder of the century. Not till 1508
+was it resumed. The shell of the building was finished 1515; the glass
+and woodwork being added under Henry the Eighth. But in the end it was
+completed substantially in accordance with the Founder's Will, and is
+the only part of his design that has been so completed. His huge
+campanile, his cloisters, his gate towers, never came into being; and
+though the Great Court is now where he meant it to be, it is built in
+a fashion very different from his design.
+
+This we see at a glance as we enter it round the southern end of
+Gibbs' Building. For it is not an enclosed quadrangle, but formed of
+two detached blocks to south and west, while the east side is only a
+stone screen, erected in 1825, and of a sadly inferior style. But the
+"goodly conduit" of the Founder's Will does rise in the midst,[18] and
+the north side is actually formed, as he decreed, by his glorious
+Chapel, the most magnificent in the world, which now rises before us
+in all its grandeur as we behold it across the Court.
+
+[Footnote 18: His statue surmounts it, flanked by two figures
+representing Science (gazing at the Chapel) and Religion (with her
+eyes devoutly fixed upon the Hall). To leap across from the lawn to
+the pedestal of this group is a feat seldom accomplished.]
+
+And if the outside view is impressive, that which greets us when we
+enter is absolutely overpowering in its majesty. The sense of space
+and repose; the up-running lines of the shafting catching the eye
+whithersoever it turns, and leading it up to the myriad-celled spans
+of the vault; the subdued light through the pictured windows staining
+the venerable masonry; the great organ, upborne by the rich oaken
+screen, dominating the whole vista, combine to form, as has been well
+said, "a _Sursum Corda_ done into stone," uplifting indeed to heart
+and sense alike. And when to this feast of visual harmony is added the
+feast of aural harmony, when the clear and mellow voices of the Choir
+blend with the majestic tones of the organ,
+
+  "And thunder-music, rolling, shakes
+   The prophets blazoned on the panes,"
+
+we can understand how the inspiration of the scene has thrilled poet
+after poet, not Tennyson only, as above quoted, but Wordsworth, and
+even Milton, Puritan as he was, yet more. To the former King's College
+Chapel suggested one of the most exquisite of his sonnets:
+
+  "Tax not the Royal Saint with vain expense,
+   With ill-matched aims the architect, who planned,
+   Albeit labouring for a scanty band
+   Of white-robed scholars only, this immense
+   And glorious work of fine intelligence.
+   'Give all thou canst! High Heaven rejects the lore
+   Of nicely calculated less and more.'
+   So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense
+   These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof,
+   Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells,
+   Where light and shade repose, where Music dwells,
+   Lingering and wandering on as loth to die;
+   Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof
+   That they were born for immortality."
+
+And Milton, when he came under the spell of this most glorious
+sanctuary, forwent all his conscientious objections to the Laudian
+revival of ornate services, "the scrannel pipes of wretched straw,"
+and all the rest of his denunciations, and was, in spite of himself,
+carried away into forgetfulness of all save the glory and the beauty
+around him. Hear him in "Il Penseroso":
+
+  "But let my due feet never fail
+   To walk the studious cloister's pale,
+   And love the high embowed roof,
+   With antique pillars massy proof,
+   And storied windows richly dight,
+   Casting a dim religious light.
+   There let the pealing organ blow
+   To the full-voiced choir below,
+   In Service high and Anthem clear,
+   As may with sweetness, through mine ear,
+   Dissolve me into ecstasies
+   And bring all Heaven before mine eyes."
+
+[Illustration: _Clare College from King's._]
+
+This passage is memorable, not only for its own intrinsic loveliness,
+but because we, very probably, have in it a key to the great
+historical puzzle connected with King's College Chapel. How came these
+"storied windows," with their hundreds of pictured prophets, saints,
+and angels, to escape the ruthless destruction which was meted out to
+all such "idolatrous" representations, throughout the length and
+breadth of the county, by the Parliamentary authorities at Cambridge?
+William Dowsing, their authorised agent, went from church to church,
+in town and village, shattering and defacing, and has left us a minute
+record of his proceedings, in which he evidently took a keen personal
+delight. Thus, amongst the colleges we have already noticed, he tells
+us that, at Peterhouse, "we pulled down two mighty great Angells with
+wings, and diverse other Angells, and the four Evangelists, and Peter
+with his Keies over the Chappell Dore, and about 100 Chirubims." At
+Queens' "we beat down a 110 superstitious pictures, besides
+Chirubims"; and so on, with monotonous repetition, entry after entry.
+The account also records the sums which each college had to pay him
+for his trouble, and such a sum (of extra amount in consideration of
+the magnitude of the task) was actually paid him by the Bursar of
+King's. Yet here are the windows before our eyes to-day in unbroken,
+unblemished dignity.
+
+No contemporary explanation is forthcoming, and the true facts of the
+case seem to have been kept so close, and to have been known to so
+few, that no tradition, even, of them was handed down to posterity. As
+time went on, the wildest and most impossible theories were evolved to
+account for the marvel. It was gravely said that the windows had been
+taken down by the Fellows themselves in a single night, and securely
+buried from the baffled spite of the Roundheads before morning, till
+better times; the place of each being known to one Fellow only! That
+the west window alone remained plain till the latter part of the
+nineteenth century (a peculiarity really not explained by history),
+was held proof positive that the Fellow in charge of that particular
+burial was done to death by the Puritans without betraying his secret;
+which equally defied the researches of later generations. Such
+searches were actually made. A more sentimental variant of the story
+made the hider a pious little chorister, shot down by Cromwell in the
+chapel itself for refusing to reveal where lay his precious charge!
+Through the empty casement a white dove flew in, and hovered over the
+heroic innocent! It need scarcely be pointed out that to remove the
+glass from a single one of these huge windows would be a work of days
+for a fully equipped band of professional glaziers supplied with
+scaffolding; yet these absurd tales were gravely repeated, and the
+missing window was actually sought for. The truth of the matter will,
+probably, now never be known. But it is certain that the windows could
+not have been spared without the connivance, at least, of Oliver
+Cromwell, whose influence was at that time paramount in Cambridge; and
+it is a plausible conjecture that his protection of them was due to
+the intercession of his friend John Milton, to whom, as we have seen,
+the Chapel and its "dim religious light" meant so much.
+
+A full study of these wonderful windows, crowded as they are with
+marvellously elaborate detail, is a work demanding hours of close
+attention under the direction of a competent guide. Even for the
+cursory examination which will suffice most of us the use of a
+guide-book is essential; and it is fortunate that one has been brought
+out (purchasable at any Cambridge book-shop for the modest sum of
+sixpence) by Dr. M. R. James, the present Provost of King's, who is
+the supreme European authority on ancient stained glass.
+
+The general scheme of decoration is the representation of the life of
+Our Lady (to whom the College is dedicated), beginning in the
+westernmost window of the north side, with her traditional birth, and
+going on round the Chapel, till it ends, in the westernmost window of
+the south side, with her Assumption and Coronation. But as the
+traditions concerning her did not provide a sufficient number of
+scenes for the requirements of the designer, the series is eked out,
+not only by various incidents in her Son's life wherein she does not
+appear (such as His Baptism, Temptation, and Passion), but by the
+three windows to the western side of the great screen on the south
+being filled with subjects drawn from the stories of St. Peter and St.
+Paul; all being, however, within the traditional period of her
+life-time.
+
+A first glance at the windows produces only the effect of a gorgeous
+maze of colouring, through which we marvel that any clue should have
+been found. Next to the general effect of the ineffably harmonious
+blending of hues, the audacious vividness of the hues themselves, red
+and green and blue and gold and purple, is what first impresses the
+eye. Then we notice how, down the central light of each window, stand,
+one above another, four great figures, human or angelic, each
+displaying an inscribed scroll.[19] These figures are known as the
+Messengers, and when not Angels they are Old Testament Prophets. Their
+scrolls, which are in Latin, refer, sometimes by direct description,
+oftener by a suggestive text, to the subjects depicted in the Lights
+on either hand of them. The inscriptions, however, are of very little
+practical use to the visitor. Age has rendered many of them wholly,
+and more partially, illegible; while the black-letter characters of
+their crowded Latin words are not easy to decipher at the best. They
+are, moreover, by no means free from actual blunders, and the
+connection between text and scene is sometimes far from obvious. Their
+interest, in fact, is for experts; and less-gifted visitors will do
+well to content themselves with the interpretation given in the
+guide-book.
+
+[Footnote 19: These figures are somewhat larger than life-size.]
+
+The same advice applies to the glass in general. It is not worth while
+to spend on a detailed study of the windows the time necessarily
+involved. Much of the work is excellent, and almost every window has
+its points of interest, but much, especially amongst the heads of the
+figures, is far from pleasing. This fact is largely owing to a
+considerable "restoration" undertaken in the Early Victorian era; when
+the art of glass-painting was at a sadly low ebb, and when the
+uncurbed restorer positively revelled in substituting for ancient
+decay his spick-and-span modern conceptions. But, as has been said,
+almost every window has features deserving that time should be made
+for their notice, which we now proceed to point out.
+
+Each window contains four scenes, the upper and lower, to left and
+right of the central "Messengers," being normally co-related as Type
+and Antitype. This relation, however, is not universal, and does not
+occur in the first window of the series (that in the north-west corner
+of the Chapel), where the four scenes consecutively illustrate the
+legend connected with the birth of Our Lady. The story runs that her
+parents, Joachim and Anna, were childless even unto old age, and that,
+in consequence, Joachim, on presenting his offering in the Temple, was
+insulted by the High Priest. As he sadly sought retirement in the
+country an Angel appeared to him with the message that he should
+return to Jerusalem, where his wife would meet him at the Temple gate,
+and a daughter would be born to them.
+
+The upper left-hand of the window shows the mitred High-Priest waving
+away Joachim, who is sorrowfully departing. His face is beautifully
+rendered. In the upper right-hand corner we see him kneeling before a
+green and gold angel hovering downwards. The rural surroundings are
+suggested by a pastoral composition. Note the sheep-dog and the
+shepherd's bagpipes.
+
+[Illustration: _King's College Chapel._]
+
+In the lower left-hand light Joachim and Anna are meeting before the
+Temple gate; and in the right-hand Anna is sitting up in a blue bed
+with red curtains, watching the infant Mary being washed. Mary has
+long golden curls, and her face is that of an adult; but Dr. James
+considers this head a later insertion. This window is known to have
+been repeatedly and promiscuously repaired (even as early as 1590),
+and was in utter confusion till the latest releading (1896). The
+repairs seem to have been executed with any old bits of glass the
+glazier might happen to have in stock. On one fragment (now removed)
+some coins of Charles the First were represented. Most of the windows
+have suffered, more or less, in this way, but none (except that over
+the south door) to the same extent as this first window, which though
+the first in order of subject, seems not to have been the first
+inserted, or at least completed; for at the top may be read the date
+1527, whereas the window over the screen on the north side contains
+that of 1517.
+
+These two dates are respectively near the inception and the completion
+of the glazing, which was begun 1515, the year when Luther began the
+Reformation by the publication of his famous Theses, and finished
+1531, the year in which that Reformation was first inaugurated in
+England by the King being declared Supreme Head of the Anglican
+Church. The windows, however, must have been designed at a date
+considerably earlier, for in the heraldic devices which fill the small
+top lights Henry the Seventh, not Henry the Eighth, is treated
+throughout as the reigning monarch; his shield being blazoned in the
+central compartment, while the latter is only commemorated by the
+initials H. K.,--the last standing for his ill-fated wife Katharine of
+Aragon. These heraldic devices are the same in all the windows, and
+show the rival roses of York and Lancaster, the Tudor Portcullis and
+Hawthorn Bush, the Fleur-de-lys, and the initials H. E. (for Henry the
+Seventh and his Queen, Elizabeth of York). All the glass is of English
+manufacture, the work of four London firms, but it seems probable that
+the artists were to some extent under both Flemish and Italian
+influence.
+
+Passing on to the second window, we find it thus arranged:
+
+                 TYPE                |              TYPE
+  Presentation of a golden table in  | The Marriage of Tobias and Sara.
+        the Temple at Delphi.        |          (_Tobit_ vii. 13.)
+                                     |
+               ANTITYPE              |            ANTITYPE
+  Presentation of the Virgin in the  | The Marriage of Mary and Joseph.
+        Temple at Jerusalem.         |
+
+The first scene here is the only instance in the Chapel of a
+non-Scriptural incident being made use of as a Type. It is the
+Classical legend (found in Valerius Maximus, an obscure Latin writer
+used in the sixteenth century as a school book), which tells how a
+question as to the ownership of a golden table found in the nets of
+some Milesian fishermen was referred to the Delphic oracle of Apollo
+for solution. To whom should this table of pure gold be made over? The
+Oracle replied "To the Wisest." The prize was therefore given to
+Thales, the wisest Milesian of the day, who modestly passed it on to
+another sage, and he to yet another. Finally, after thus going the
+round of the Seven Wise Men of Greece, it came into the hands of Solon
+the Athenian, who declared that "the Wisest" could be no other than
+Apollo himself, and accordingly presented the table to the God in the
+Temple of Delphi. By a strange application, this tale was considered,
+in mediaeval literature, as typical of the Presentation of the Virgin
+in the Temple at Jerusalem; her purity and that of the gold being,
+apparently, the connecting idea.
+
+In the window we see the offering of the golden table; Apollo being
+represented by a golden image bearing a shield emblazoned with the
+Sun, and a banner. Beneath is Mary, as a young girl dressed in blue,
+walking up the steps of the Temple; an incident much dwelt on in the
+legend. In the upper Marriage scene note the Angel Raphael, the
+comrade and guide of Tobias; and, in the lower, Joseph's rod, the sign
+from which (a dove appearing upon it) marked him out, amongst all her
+suitors, as Mary's destined husband. This scene suggests a
+reminiscence of Raphael's well-known cartoon on the subject, which had
+lately been painted.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the third window the arrangement is:
+
+          TYPE                 |             TYPE
+        The Fall               |        The Burning Bush
+  (Eve's disobedience).        |     (remaining unconsumed).
+                               |
+        ANTITYPE               |           ANTITYPE
+     The Annunciation          |         The Nativity
+    (Mary's obedience).        |    (Mary remaining a Virgin).
+
+Note the human head and hands of the Serpent, and the brilliant
+ruddiness of the apple. Also the ruby flames of the bush, and the
+representation of God the Father at its summit. Moses is in the act of
+putting off his shoes from his feet. In the Nativity scene the Babe
+can only be discovered by following the gaze of the child Angels who
+are clustering round in adoration. Contrary to the usual convention,
+which shows Him sitting on His Mother's knee as if a couple of years
+old, He is here represented realistically as an actual new-born baby.
+Above both lower lights in this window is a renaissance arcading.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the fourth window we have:
+
+           TYPE                |             TYPE
+  The Circumcision of Isaac.   | The visit of the Queen of Sheba
+                               |          to Solomon.
+                               |
+         ANTITYPE              |           ANTITYPE
+  The Circumcision of Christ.  | The visit of the Wise Men to
+                               |            Christ.
+
+The face of Abraham and that of the officiating priest below are both
+good, and so is that of the Queen. The Epiphany Star is a fine object,
+and the effect of its light irradiating the thatch of the manger-shed
+is most powerfully rendered.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window gives us
+
+           TYPE                      |        TYPE
+  The Legal Purification of a woman. | Jacob's flight from the
+                                     |   vengeance of Esau.
+                                     |
+         ANTITYPE                    |      ANTITYPE
+  The Purification of Mary.          | The Flight into Egypt.
+
+In the Purification scene the faces of Simeon, who is the main figure,
+Mary, and Joseph (carrying the dove-cage), are all worth looking at.
+So is Joseph in the Flight episode; which, however, is chiefly
+remarkable for introducing in the back-ground a legend from a late
+carol, which tells how Herod's soldiers pursued the Holy Family, and
+how the pursuit was miraculously checked. The fugitives met a
+husbandman, and instructed him to answer any inquiry for them by
+saying, "They passed whilst I was sowing this corn"; which was
+actually the case. But, lo! when the pursuers shortly came up the corn
+had sprung up, and was ripe already to harvest. It takes some little
+trouble to decipher this scene. The Purification is seen through an
+arcade of the Temple, on the frieze of which is a group of classical
+horsemen like those of the Parthenon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next window is that over the great organ screen dividing the
+ante-chapel from the choir. It is arranged thus:
+
+               TYPE                 |              TYPE
+          The Golden Calf           | The Massacre of the Seed Royal by
+    (the introduction of Idolatry). |         Queen Athaliah.
+                                    |
+             ANTITYPE               |            ANTITYPE
+  The idols of Egypt falling before | The Massacre of the Innocents by
+           the Holy Child           |           King Herod.
+     (the overthrow of Idolatry).   |
+
+The Golden Calf is set high on a magnificent ruby pillar. Before it
+Moses is breaking the Tables of the Law; one fragment of which shows a
+Flemish inscription. Below, an idol is falling headlong from a
+precisely similar pillar. The kneeling figure in this scene is the
+Governor Aphrodisius, who was converted by the miracle; as is recorded
+in the apocryphal "Gospel of the Infancy." In the Massacre scene Queen
+Athaliah is represented by a conventional figure of the _Virgo
+Coronata_ (with her Babe in her arms). The artist evidently had this
+figure in stock, and used it rather than take the trouble of producing
+something less incorrect. Near her there is a minutely depicted
+mediaeval thatched house worthy of notice. So is the business-like
+callousness in the expression on the leading soldier's countenance.
+This window bears, as has been said, the date 1517, written 15017.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We are now in the choir, where our first window gives:
+
+             TYPE                  |             TYPE
+  Naaman washing in Jordan.        | Esau tempted by Jacob to sell
+                                   |        his birthright.
+                                   |
+           ANTITYPE                |           ANTITYPE
+   Christ baptised in Jordan.      | Christ tempted by the Devil.
+
+All three Temptations are given, the first being in the foreground.
+The countenance of the Devil (as a respectable old man) is a
+marvellous study.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The second window in the choir is:
+
+                  TYPE               |             TYPE
+  The raising of the Shunamite's son.|     The Triumph of David
+                                     |       (I _Sam._ xvii).
+                                     |
+                ANTITYPE             |           ANTITYPE
+     The raising of Lazarus.         |     The Triumphal Entry.
+
+The Shunamite's house is another bit of minute detail. Note the dishes
+on the shelf in front. Note also the magnificently gigantic head of
+Goliath borne by David on the point of the Philistine's own huge
+sword.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The third window:
+
+       TYPE             |           TYPE
+     The Manna.         |   The Fall of the Angels.
+                        |
+     ANTITYPE           |         ANTITYPE
+  The Last Supper.      |  The Agony in Gethsemane.
+
+The manna is shown as falling in the shape of Communion Breads. Below,
+Christ gives the sop to the red-haired Judas, while Peter, who thus
+becomes aware of the traitor's identity, clenches his fist with a
+gesture of menace extraordinarily forcible.
+
+The connection between the right-hand subjects is not obvious. Dr.
+James suggests that it refers to Christ's speaking of the casting out
+of Satan as a result of His Passion (John xii. 31). The smaller scale
+of this scene, and the nimbi given to Christ and the Apostles point to
+its having been the work of a special artist.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fourth choir window:
+
+        TYPE              |           TYPE
+  Cain murders Abel.      | The mocking of David by Shimei.
+                          |
+      ANTITYPE            |         ANTITYPE
+  Judas betrays Christ.   |     The mocking of Christ.
+
+Cain is killing Abel with a large bone. Note the ruby fires of their
+respective altars in the back-ground, Abel's spiring upwards in full
+flame, while Cain's is blown down to the earth. In the betrayal scene
+the face of Malchus, as he lies upon the ground with his broken
+lantern under him, should be observed. It is highly expressive.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window:
+
+         TYPE           |          TYPE
+   Jeremiah in prison.  |   Noah mocked by Ham.
+                        |
+       ANTITYPE         |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ before Annas.  |  Christ mocked by Herod.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We have now reached the last window of the northern range, that in the
+north-east corner of the Chapel. It shows us:
+
+         TYPE                |          TYPE
+  Job scourged by Satan.     | Solomon crowned by his mother.
+                             |    (_Cant._ iii. 11.)
+                             |
+       ANTITYPE              |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ scourged by Pilate. |  Christ crowned with thorns.
+
+In the scourging scene we may note the singularly unpleasing features
+and expression of the Saviour's face; which Dr. James holds to be
+purposely so delineated, in reference to the words of Isaiah: "He hath
+no form nor comeliness, and when we see Him there is no beauty that we
+should desire Him." We do not, indeed, find in the entire series of
+windows one single attempt to represent Him worthily. The conventional
+face, familiar throughout the ages to Christian Art, even from the
+first century, and probably a real recollection of Him, is
+consistently departed from (as is characteristic of the Renaissance
+period), and with it has gone every divine and exalted association.
+Where even the genius of Michael Angelo failed, we cannot look to find
+the glassworkers of London succeeding.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The great east window has no central messengers, and thus contains six
+scenes, each occupying three lights, arranged thus:
+
+  The Nailing to the | Christ crucified | The Descent from the
+         Cross.      |  (the Piercing). |        Cross.
+                     |                  |
+      Ecce Homo!     |  The Sentence.   | The Way of Sorrows.
+
+There is little to call for special notice in this window. Structural
+conditions necessitate the Cross being of abnormal height. In the
+background of the Way of Sorrows is a vivid ruby patch, which may be
+meant for the Field of Blood.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Turning to the south-east window, we are confronted with an entirely
+exceptional development. The whole of the upper half is occupied with
+a single subject (the Brazen Serpent), and that in Early Victorian
+glass inconceivably poor and crude. The lower half is ancient and
+typical, the type and antitype being placed side by side:
+
+      TYPE                      |         ANTITYPE
+  Naomi bewailing her husband.  | The Holy Women bewailing Christ.
+               (_Ruth_ i. 20.)  |
+
+The history of this marked departure from the norm is that the
+buildings of the Great Court were planned to abut upon the Chapel
+here, so as to block the lower half of the window, for which,
+accordingly, no glass was provided. That which is there now was
+originally in the upper half and was moved down in 1841, the Brazen
+Serpent being substituted for it. The remaining windows on this side
+of the choir also underwent a sad amount of "restoration" at the same
+period.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next window (the fifteenth in the entire sequence) is of the
+normal arrangement.
+
+           TYPE                   |          TYPE
+  Joseph cast into the pit.       |   The overthrow of Pharaoh.
+                                  |
+        ANTITYPE                  |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ laid in the Sepulchre.   |      The Harrying of Hell.
+
+The last scene is a most forcible representation of Christ's
+victorious "Harrying of Hell," as conceived by mediaeval imagination
+and referred to by Dante in his Inferno. The Conqueror of Death has
+forced His resistless way through the shattered gates of Hell, on
+which He stands, treading under His feet the gigantic leaden-coloured
+bulk of their demon warder. Before Him kneels Adam, at last rescued
+from his age-long captivity, and other Holy Souls. In the back-ground
+a blue devil gazes in dismay from the red mouth of Hell (represented
+after the usual mediaeval fashion, as an actual mouth, with teeth,
+etc.), while another, in livid green, is dancing with demoniac rage
+above, and yet another, white and gold, is scudding away in terror as
+fast as his wings will carry him.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The remaining windows of the choir on this side deal with the
+Resurrection. In the first of these (the third from the east) the
+subjects are:
+
+               TYPE                  |            TYPE
+    Jonah escaping from the Fish.    |  Tobias appearing to his mother
+                                     |    (who had thought him dead).
+                                     |
+             ANTITYPE                |          ANTITYPE
+  Christ arising from the Sepulchre. |  Christ appearing to His Mother.
+
+The Fish is represented as a long green sea-serpent with a black,
+cavernous mouth, out of which Jonah is stepping. In the background is
+a ship, and, beyond, Nineveh. The Sepulchre is in the frequent
+unscriptural shape of a table monument.
+
+In the right-hand type, Tobias has his dog with him, and also his
+angel guardian Raphael. That Christ appeared to His Mother is first
+found in St. Ambrose, who mentions it as undoubted. She is here shown
+kneeling at a prayer-desk.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the next window we find:
+
+             TYPE                    |           TYPE
+    Reuben finds Joseph taken away   | Darius, at the Lions' den, sees
+              from the pit.          |         Daniel living.
+                                     |
+           ANTITYPE                  |         ANTITYPE
+  The Marys find Jesus taken away    |Mary Magdalene, at the Sepulchre,
+        from the Sepulchre.          |        sees Jesus living.
+
+In the last scene Christ is represented with a spade, inasmuch as Mary
+Magdalene supposed Him to be the gardener. Her very pronounced
+costume, with its astonishing golden ear-covers, is probably a German
+fashion of the early sixteenth century.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The fifth window gives the story of Christ's appearance to the
+disciples who went to Emmaus:
+
+             TYPE                    |         TYPE
+  Tobias, on his journey, is joined  | Habakkuk shares his meal with
+  by the angel Raphael, in           | Daniel at Babylon.
+  appearance a wayfaring man.        | (_Bel and the Dragon_, v. 33.)
+             (_Tobit_, v. 4.)        |
+                                     |
+           ANTITYPE                  |       ANTITYPE
+  The two disciples on their journey | Christ shares the meal of
+  are joined by Christ, in           |   disciples at Emmaus.
+  appearance a wayfaring man.        |
+
+Observe that the bread in Our Lord's hand appears to be, not broken,
+but cut clean as with a knife. There was a mediaeval legend to the
+effect that He showed His divine power by thus breaking it. Note, too,
+Raphael's brilliant green and crimson wings, put in to denote his
+angelic nature, though the story postulates their absence.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The following window (that next to the screen) deals with the story of
+St. Thomas (John xx.), and has been wrongly arranged: what are now the
+right-hand scenes should be the left so as to come first. It now
+stands thus:
+
+           TYPE                     |          TYPE
+  The Prodigal Son returns to his   |  Joseph meets Jacob in Egypt.
+              Father.               |
+                                    |
+         ANTITYPE                   |        ANTITYPE
+  Thomas returns to belief in Jesus.| Jesus meets His Disciples at
+                                    |         Supper.
+
+We find in the first scene here what is perhaps the most ably drawn
+figure in the entire series of windows, that of the Elder Brother.
+Observe the utter contempt and disgust written on his face and in his
+whole attitude. He wears a pair of most aggressively red leggings.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The window over the organ loft shows us the Ascension, and the Coming
+of the Holy Ghost.
+
+         TYPE                  |          TYPE
+  Elijah going up into Heaven. | Moses and the Israelites receiving
+                               |      the Law at Pentecost.
+                               |
+       ANTITYPE                |        ANTITYPE
+  Christ going up into Heaven. | Mary and the Disciples receiving
+                               |  the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
+
+Elijah is deliberately turning round in his golden chariot of fire to
+cast down his ample ruby mantle upon Elisha. Moses is taking the
+Tables of the Law from the hand of God.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The subjects of the three windows between the screen and the south
+door are all from the lives of St. Peter and St. Paul, and nearly all
+from the Acts of the Apostles, from which also all the texts are
+taken. Accordingly the place of the usual prophetic Messengers is, in
+these windows, taken by figures of St. Luke (all identical), habited
+in the costume worn by a Doctor of Medicine in the sixteenth century.
+The series of type and antitype is dropped in these windows, and no
+strict chronological order is observed in the sequence of the
+subjects. Probably some have been misplaced, either originally or at
+one of the various releadings to which they have necessarily been
+subjected. Every century brings fresh need for this operation.
+
+The subjects in the first window are:
+
+  Peter and the Apostles entering   | Peter and John bound and
+          the Temple.               |        scourged.
+                                    |
+  Peter and John healing the lame   |   The Death of Ananias.
+        man in the Beautiful Gate.  |
+
+The design of the last scene is directly copied from Raphael's
+well-known cartoon.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The second window gives:
+
+  The Conversion of St. Paul.   | St. Paul at Damascus and his
+                                |       escape in a basket.
+                                |
+  St. Paul adored at Lystra.    | St. Paul stoned at Lystra.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The third window is also Pauline:
+
+  St. Paul giving a farewell blessing |St. Paul before the Chief Captain at
+          before embarkation.         |              Jerusalem.
+                                      |
+  St. Paul exorcising the demoniac at |St. Paul before Caesar at Rome.
+  Philippi.
+
+The first of these scenes is interesting. The text (Acts, xvi. 2)
+connects it with St. Paul's departure from Troas on his first voyage
+to Europe. But the subject seems to be the touching scene at Miletus
+(Acts, xx) on his final departure for Jerusalem. The ship here, whence
+the boat is rowing to fetch him, should be noticed, as it is a fine
+and accurate specimen of sixteenth century naval architecture. Observe
+the lateen yard on the mizen mast. The man who drew that ship, unlike
+most artists, knew his ropes, they are all in their right places. In
+the last scene note the startled and awed expression on Nero's almost
+obliterated face, also his Imperial crown.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+We have now almost completed our round of the Chapel, and are again at
+the south door by which we entered. Only two more windows remain, and
+in these we return to the typical treatment of Our Lady's life. That
+over the south door has, by accident (as it appears), been more
+shattered and defaced than any other in the Chapel. It is arranged
+thus:
+
+      TYPE              |       TYPE
+  The death of Tobit.   | The burial of Jacob.
+                        |
+    ANTITYPE            |     ANTITYPE
+  The death of Mary.    | The burial of Mary.
+
+Mary is dying with the full rites of the Church. St. Peter sprinkles
+her with holy water, while St. John places in her hand a lighted
+"trindall" (three candles twisted together). The prayer book and cross
+are borne by other Apostles. Her bier is covered by a white pall with
+gold cross, and two severed hands may (with difficulty) be seen
+clinging to it. This refers to the legend that a certain Jew who
+sought to overthrow the bier was thus miraculously dismembered, and
+did not recover his hands till he penitently besought her to restore
+them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Finally the south-west window completes the wondrous series:
+
+         TYPE                |         TYPE
+  The Translation of Enoch.  | Bathsheba enthroned by her son
+                             |        Solomon.
+                             |      (_I. Kings_, ii., 19.)
+                             |
+       ANTITYPE              |       ANTITYPE
+  The Assumption of Mary.    | Mary crowned by her Son Jesus.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The west window remained unglazed, for some unknown reason, till as
+late as 1879, when there arose a benefactor, Mr. Francis Stacey, a
+Fellow of the College, who has left this noble memorial of his
+generosity. The glass is by Messrs. Clayton and Bell, and the subject,
+as is usual in west windows, is the _Last Judgment_. The heraldic
+devices in the tracery are not those found in the older windows, but
+comprise (in order) the Tudor Portcullis,[20] the Plantagenet Rose,
+and the shields of King's College, Eton College, Cambridge University,
+King Henry VI., King Henry VII., King Henry VIII., Queen Victoria, and
+Stacey. There are also the shields of the See of Lincoln, whose Bishop
+is _ex officio_ Visitor of the College, impaling Wordsworth (then
+Bishop), and of Okes (then Provost of the College).
+
+[Footnote 20: The Portcullis was adopted by Henry the Seventh as the
+Tudor badge, to signify that his claim to the throne was double
+(through his mother, Lady Margaret, as well as his wife), even as a
+portcullis doubled the defensibility of a castle gate.]
+
+The glass of King's College Chapel by no means exhausts the interest
+of the building. The next point to be observed is the great organ
+screen, erected during the brief ascendancy of the miserable Ann
+Boleyn, whose initials are carved upon it. On either side of the
+door-way, within, are emblazoned the twin shields of King's and Eton;
+differing only in that the former bears three red roses, the latter
+three white lilies (not fleurs-de-lys) on the sable ground beneath the
+chief, with its lion of England and fleur-de-lys of France on their
+respective red and blue. The organ itself was not put up till 1606,
+but the nondescript Renaissance dragons supporting it show that the
+case must have been in hand more than half a century earlier. They
+are for all the world like Raphael's wonderful creations in the
+Vatican. The great trumpeting angels on the top of the organ are
+eighteenth century work. Originally much smaller angels stood there,
+which in the seventeenth century were replaced by pinnacles. The doors
+of the screen belong to the Laudian revival, and bear the arms of
+Charles the First. The west door of the Chapel is of the same period,
+but the north and south doors are the original ones.
+
+The Choir stalls date from Henry the Eighth, but the elaborate coats
+of arms carved over each were not added till 1633, and the canopies
+not till 1675. The magnificent brass lectern was given by Provost
+Hacombleyn, at the opening of the chapel; but the present altar is a
+very modern addition, having been only put up in the twentieth
+century. It stands, as directed by the Founder, no fewer than 16 feet
+from the eastern wall. The wood-work of the sanctuary walls is not
+even yet (1910) fully completed. It is of Renaissance character, as is
+also the altar. The lighting of the Chapel, it should be said, is
+still, happily, done only with candles; and, on a winter afternoon,
+their twinkling points of fire, in endless range, amid the vasty
+gloom, give an impression of mysterious solemnity to be obtained
+nowhere else.
+
+Beautiful as the Chapel is, it would, had the designs of the Founder
+been carried out, have been yet more beautiful. His Will expressly
+deprecates that "superfluitie of too gret curious werkes of entaille
+and besy moulding" which the ante-chapel now exhibits in the elaborate
+series of Royal coats of arms beneath every window. They are
+beautifully carved, it is true, and we may note that the attitudes of
+the supporters (the Tudor dragon and greyhound) are in no two cases
+identical. But the whole effect is somewhat to weary the eye. So also
+do the perpetual roses and portcullises with which the walls are
+bestudded. One of the former, however, deserves special notice, as in
+it is framed one of the very few mediaeval images of Our Lady which has
+weathered the storm of the Reformation. It is to be found at the
+southern corner of the west wall, and is what is known as a _Rosa
+Solis_. The inner petals are sun-rays, and in the midst is the "Woman
+clothed with the sun." (The White Rose of York is also sometimes
+represented in the windows as a sun-rose, the sun being also a
+Yorkist badge, but in this the rays are external to the flower.)
+
+The walls, then, would have been less ornate, and more truly beautiful
+for the absence of profuse ornament, had the Founder's design been
+carried out. And we can see that even the exquisite roof was meant to
+be yet more lovely than as it now enraptures the eye. If we look at
+one of the soaring pilasters and follow up its lines, we shall see
+that each of the flutings is prolonged in a rib of the fan vaulting.
+No, not quite each. There is one member which has no such
+prolongation, but ends meaninglessly at the capital. And this tells us
+that the pilasters were designed to carry not a fan but a _liern_
+vaulting; so called because it appears to be a mesh of intertwined ivy
+(_lierre_) binding the fabric together. And beautiful as a fan roof
+is, a liern roof is capable of expressing harmonies of proportion yet
+more delicate and soul-satisfying. How subtle and exalted these
+harmonies would have been here we shall best learn if we have the good
+fortune to gain admission to the range of small side-chapels which
+flank the fane on either hand, nestling between the mighty buttresses.
+For in these, while the more western have the fan roof, the eastern
+and earlier built show liern vaulting of the most delicious character.
+
+These side-chapels were intended each to have an altar, at which the
+Priest to whom it was assigned should say his own Mass daily, while
+all should meet later before the High Altar to assist at the
+Collegiate Mass. They are now used for various subsidiary purposes
+connected with the services. One contains the heating apparatus,
+another the hydraulic bellows of the organ, while many are mere
+lumber-rooms. These last are those abutting on the Choir, which have
+no opening into the Nave, such as those adjoining the ante-chapel
+possess. Through the gratings we may note some stained glass of an
+entirely different character from that in the Chapel windows. It is,
+in fact, of the previous (Fifteenth) Century, and thus older than the
+Chapel itself. From what earlier building it has been transferred is
+uncertain. Tradition, for some unknown reason, assigns it to Ramsey
+Abbey; but it seems more reasonable to suppose that it came from the
+old church of St. John Zachary hard by, when that was pulled down to
+make room for the College, and its fragments, as excavation has shown,
+utilised for levelling the site.
+
+In one of the southern side-chapels will be found a verger, from whom
+it is well worth while to obtain access to the roof of the Chapel.
+This is reached by a wide spiral stairway in the north-western turret.
+Our first goal is a small door (the key of which should be specially
+asked for) leading into a narrow loop-holed passage, from which we can
+scramble into the space between the two roofs of the Chapel. We are
+here on the top of the fan vaulting which we have so much admired from
+below, and can note with what wondrous skill its huge stones are
+dovetailed into one another with the round keystone boss in the centre
+of each span. Above, and only just above, our heads are the mighty
+beams of Spanish chestnut composing the upper roof, the long vista
+being lighted by a small grated window at either end.
+
+Returning to the staircase it does not take many steps more to bring
+us to the roof proper, with its open-work parapets and long leaden
+slope. This should be climbed to get the full benefit of the view, and
+those gifted with steadiness of head and sureness of foot will do well
+to make their way along the ridge from end to end, for each has its
+own beauties to show. To the West we see below us the great lawn, and
+the court of Clare, and the river, and the delicious verdure of the
+Backs, amid which rise the red walls of the Ladies' College at
+Newnham, and the adjoining Anglican foundation of Selwyn; while beyond
+is the open country, bounded by the low chalk upland stretching from
+Madingley Hill on the North to Barrington Hill on the South. The
+spire, so conspicuous on the summit of this range, is that of
+Hardwicke Church. To the South we can distinguish the places already
+described, (the little glass dome of the Fitzwilliam Museum, and the
+graceful spire of Our Lady's Church, being conspicuous objects,) and,
+beyond, the distant range of the East-Anglian Heights from the
+furthest north-east to the furthest south-west, that form the
+watershed of the wide valley of the Cam. To the East, the tower of the
+University Church, Great St. Mary's, raises its turrets almost to the
+level of our feet, and we look down on a maze of Cambridge house-roofs
+bright with the variegated tiling which is their special and
+beautiful characteristic. Beyond them the near promontory of the Gog
+Magog Hills juts out from the East-Anglian Heights on which lies
+Newmarket. To the North come College after College, Clare, Trinity
+Hall, Caius, Trinity, St. John's, Magdalene; while the University
+Library and the Senate House lie nearer still. Due north, across
+these, and across the wide-flung plain beyond them, the plain of the
+Southern Fenland, we can, if the day be clear, discern on the far
+horizon the shadowy towers of Ely Cathedral, fifteen miles away as the
+crow flies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+     Spiked gates.--Old King's.--=University Library=, Origin, Growth,
+     Codex Bezae.--=Trinity Hall=, Colours, Library.--=Clare College=,
+     "Poison Cup," Court, Bridge, Avenue.--The Backs, Sirdar Bonfire,
+     College Gardens.--=Trinity College=, Michaelhouse, King's Hall,
+     Henry the Eighth, Boat-clubs, Avenue, College Livings, Bridge,
+     Library, Byron, Nevile's Court, Cloisters, Echo, "Freshman's
+     Pillar," Prince Edward, Royal Ball, Goodhart, Buttery, College
+     Plate, Grace-cup, Kitchen, Hall, Combination Room, Marquis of
+     Granby, Tutors, Old Court, Fountain, Gate Towers, Clock, Lodge,
+     Chapel, Newton, Organ, Bentley, Windows, Macaulay.
+
+
+On leaving King's Chapel we should give a glance to the marked line of
+demarcation between the whitish stone of which the lower courses are
+built and that employed in the upper.[21] It is of historical interest
+as showing how far the work had progressed before the long break
+caused by the Founder's death. Then, passing round the West Front, and
+noting the exquisitely delicate tracery of the canopies over the empty
+niches on either side of the door (wherein the two saints Mary and
+Nicolas to whom the building is dedicated were destined to stand) we
+leave the College by the iron gate on the North.
+
+[Footnote 21: The former is from Huddleston in Yorkshire, the latter
+from Weldon in Northamptonshire.]
+
+The formidable chevaux-de-frise which crown this gate are supposed at
+once to figure and to emphasise the danger run by such presumptuous
+students as dare to contemplate illicit exit from or entrance into the
+College during prohibited hours. It has already been said that between
+10 p.m. and 7 a.m. no undergraduate resident in College may leave its
+precincts, and no outsider may enter, under divers pains and
+penalties. Every College supplements this moral pressure by more or
+less effectual and awe-inspiring physical barriers. None however are
+more fearsome to see, and less effective in fact, than these. For not
+only can the College be entered or left with comparative ease by way
+of the Backs, but even this ghastly array of spikes is not unscalable
+to those who know the trick of it. Tennyson, as will be remembered,
+has referred to this exploit in his "Princess."
+
+Passing beneath them we find ourselves again in that same ancient
+street of Cambridge, here again now a wholly Academic byway, by which
+we entered King's. But though we have left the College behind us we
+have not yet quite got clear of its associations. The fine modern
+Gothic pile to our right embeds, as we see, an ancient gateway. For
+more than three and a half centuries this was the entrance to the one
+small Court which alone represented the magnificent design of Henry
+the Sixth for his Royal Foundation. Not till the nineteenth century
+dawned were the students moved to the other side of the Chapel. The
+old precincts were then mostly destroyed, and the site made over to
+the University Library; for the growth of that magnificent institution
+has long taxed to the utmost all the accommodation that can be
+provided for it.
+
+The mediaeval Library of the University was a collection of
+manuscripts, requiring only one small room. Of its eighteen
+book-cases, eight were devoted to Theology, four to Law, and one
+apiece to Classics, Mathematics, Medicine, Logic, Moral Philosophy,
+and Scholasticism. This original Library was utterly swept away at the
+Reformation: Dr. Perne of Peterhouse, when Vice-Chancellor in the
+reign of Edward the Sixth, thus signalising his new-born zeal for
+Protestantism. A few years later, however, we find him amongst the
+first founders of the present Library, which now ranks third amongst
+the great Libraries of England; that of the British Museum standing
+first, and the Bodleian Library at Oxford second. All three are
+entitled to a free copy of every book published in the kingdom; so
+that their growth is now-a-days portentously rapid. One of the most
+striking features in this Library is the tableful of new books, scores
+in number, which is cleared every Friday.
+
+This rapid growth however is modern. The one ancient room sufficed
+for the Library, till George the First rewarded the Whig loyalty of
+the University by a gift of 30,000 volumes.[22] The expansion thus
+begun has continued with accelerated speed. One by one the various
+ancient "Schools" which, with the old Library room, formed a small
+quadrangle, have been absorbed by its growth; until now the whole
+block belongs to it, as well as the old site of King's College, the
+main edifice on which, known as "Cockerell's Building," was erected
+1837, where the College Hall once stood.
+
+[Footnote 22: This gift called forth a satirical epigram from Oxford;
+where the prevalent Toryism was made the pretext for quartering a
+regiment of cavalry in the city to suppress Jacobite demonstrations:
+
+  "King George, observing with judicious eyes
+   The state of both his Universities,
+   To Oxford sent a troop of horse;--and why?
+   That Learned Body wanted Loyalty.
+   To Cambridge books he sent; as well discerning
+   How much that Loyal Body wanted Learning."
+
+A retort (in which the humour is a trifle less spontaneous) was
+speedily penned by Sir William Browne, who specialised on epigrams and
+left prizes for their encouragement which are still annually awarded:
+
+  "The King to Oxford sent a troop of horse,
+   For Tories own no argument but Force.
+   With equal skill to Cambridge books he sent;
+   For Whigs admit no force but Argument."]
+
+The Library is open only to Members of the University (Masters of Arts
+having the privilege of taking out not more than ten books at a time)
+and such ladies as are fortunate enough to find a place on the
+admission list. For this it is needful that two Masters of Arts should
+certify that the lady is, to their personal knowledge, seriously
+engaged in some branch of study or research. And even when admitted,
+she finds herself under disabilities, being forbidden to occupy any
+seat except in one room (the oriel window of which is visible from our
+standpoint at the gate of King's). Ordinary visitors may only enter
+under the escort of an M.A., who may take in six at a time.
+
+[Illustration: _Old Gate of King's College._]
+
+Those who have the good hap to be thus inducted, will, besides the new
+books, probably be most impressed by the long range of volumes forming
+the catalogue, and by the densely packed shelves of long-forgotten
+fiction in the "Novel Room." But the real treasures of the Library are
+to be found in Cockerell's Building. Here, in a range of cases, are to
+be seen our best Manuscripts, including a Thirteenth Century life of
+Edward the Confessor, the illustrations in which were found useful as
+a precedent even at the coronation of his latest namesake on the
+British Throne. At the extreme end, in a separate case, is the crown
+of all, one of the earliest manuscripts of the Gospels, dating from
+the Fifth Century. Only four others of equal authority are known, one
+in the British Museum, one in the Vatican Library, one at Paris, and
+one at St. Petersburg. Ours is known as "D" or "Codex Bezae," from
+being the gift of the celebrated Calvinist divine Theodore Beza, who
+procured it from a soldier after the sack of its early home, the
+Monastery of St. Irenaeus at Lyons, in the Sixteenth Century. It is
+noteworthy for containing passages not found in any other Codex, one
+of which may be read (in Greek and Latin) on the single leaf here
+exposed to view. It narrates how our Lord, "seeing a certain man
+working on the Sabbath, said unto him: Man, if thou art doing this
+with Knowledge thou art blessed, but if without Knowledge thou art
+cursed."
+
+Space does not permit us to enlarge further on the Library; and we
+return to our station at the old gate of King's College. As we look
+along the lane our view is bounded by the College whose name it now
+bears, Trinity Hall. This must not be confounded with the larger and
+later Foundation of Trinity College, next door to it beyond. Trinity
+Hall was founded in 1350, by Bishop Bateman of Norwich, specially for
+the education of Clergy. It has, however, actually, become especially
+given to the study of Law, and is yet more widely known by its prowess
+in aquatics. Its boat, for the last half century, has never been far
+from the Headship of the River, and has oftener attained that coveted
+position than any other. The colours of the College, white and black,
+are thus of wide renown. They are derived from the College Shield,
+which in heraldic language is sable a crescent ermines with a bordure
+ermines. Visitors who approach Cambridge by the London road see this
+device upon the milestones near the town, which were set up by the
+College in the eighteenth century, and were the first milestones
+erected in Britain since the days of the Roman occupation.
+
+The Library here (which is open to visitors from noon to 1 P.M. in
+Full Term) is the best example left us of what libraries were of old
+in Cambridge. It was built about 1560, and still retains its original
+book-cases, the tops of which form desks for reading the folios in the
+shelves beneath. These were in old days chained to rings sliding on a
+locked bar which ran the whole length of each desk. Some of the books
+are so chained still, but not in the ancient fashion; for of old books
+were shelved with the backs inward, the title being written across the
+closed leaves of the front.
+
+Otherwise the College has little to show us; and, instead of seeking
+it, we shall do better if we turn westwards through the specially
+beautiful iron gate which leads us into Clare College. The coat of
+arms beneath which we pass as we enter has its tale to tell concerning
+the foundation of the College. They are those of the noble lady who,
+in 1338, thus commemorated her widowhood, an example followed, as we
+have seen, in the next decade, by Marie de Valence at Pembroke. But
+Lady Elizabeth, daughter of Gilbert de Clare (the "Red Earl" mentioned
+in _Marmion_), had gone through no fewer than three of these
+lamentable experiences. She therefore not only charged her College
+Shield with the golden chevronels of Clare impaled with the golden
+cross of De Burgh (her latest husband), but surrounded the whole with
+a sable bordure besprinkled with golden heraldic tears, bearing
+perennial witness to her repeated sorrows. Hence it comes that the
+Clare "colours" are to this day black and gold.
+
+Few College edifices convey such a sense of unity as these of Clare.
+"Their uniform and harmonious character gives them, at first sight,
+the appearance of having been built from one design, and carried out
+at one time."[23] As a matter of fact, however, the existing buildings
+are of no fewer than five separate dates, each separated by decades,
+and extending altogether over nearly a century and a half (1638-1768);
+while of the original fourteenth century structure no trace whatever
+is left. The eastern and northern sides of the Court are the earliest,
+built between 1638 and 1643, when the work was stopped, five years
+after its commencement, by the outbreak of the Civil War; while the
+stones and beams made ready for its continuance were commandeered by
+the Roundheads for the new works which they were then throwing up to
+strengthen the defences of Cambridge Castle. Not till 1669 did the
+College finances so far recover from this blow as to permit the
+resumption of the building. The western side was then built, followed
+by the northern (1683-93), while the Chapel was not added till 1768.
+But the result of all this patchwork is an exquisite little gem of a
+Court, its balustraded walls overshadowed by the towering pinnacles of
+King's College, and giving, as we have said, a wonderful sense of
+unity, which is partly owing to older work having been altered to
+harmonise with the newer.
+
+[Footnote 23: Atkinson and Clark, _Cambridge Described_.]
+
+The College treasury contains some most interesting and beautiful
+specimens of sixteenth-century plate. One tankard is known as the
+"Poison Cup," because, mounted in the cover, it has a conical fragment
+of crystal, such as was supposed, in the pharmacy of the day, to
+change colour if poison were poured into the vessel. This cup is of
+glass enclosed in exquisitely wrought filigree work. The thumb-piece
+is an angel with outspread wings. Another tankard is the "Serpentine
+Cup," the bowl being of that stone. This too is enclosed in most
+beautiful silver-gilt work, adorned with flowers and fruit and birds
+and arabesques. Yet another is the "Falcon Cup," a receptacle in the
+shape of that bird, originally intended, it would seem, for holding
+sweetmeats. All these were presented to the College by Dr. Butler,
+Court Physician to King James the First, of whom Fuller says that "he
+was better pleased with presents than money, and ever preferred
+rarities before riches."[24]
+
+[Footnote 24: Foster and Atkinson, _Old Cambridge Plate_.]
+
+Passing through the court, we come to the beautiful bridge, already
+familiar to us from the river. Its balustraded parapet is surmounted
+by fourteen large balls of stone, thirteen of them whole, and one out
+of which a cantle of nearly a quarter of its bulk has, for some
+unknown reason and at some unknown date, been cut. A cheap laugh may
+thus be obtained by challenging a stranger to count these balls
+accurately; for the missing cantle, being turned towards the river, is
+quite invisible from the bridge itself. Another feature in connection
+with these balls is that one of them is visibly much newer than the
+rest (which, like the bridge, date from the middle of the seventeenth
+century). This is due to a not very far off feud between Clare and St.
+John's, when a piratical Johnian crew came up the river after dark and
+stormed the bridge. Before the enraged Clare men could open the iron
+gate under the College archway and pour out to the rescue, the enemy
+had begun throwing the balls into the water, where one sank so deep
+into the muddy bottom that it could never be recovered.
+
+From the bridge we get a lovely view of the College "Backs." To the
+south the single slender arch of King's Bridge flings itself over the
+river in the graceful curve which is all its own; to the north we see
+the iron span of Garret Hostel Bridge, hiding from us the beauties of
+Trinity Bridge beyond. But, if there be no ripple upon the water, the
+three graceful arches of this invisible bridge are seen reflected upon
+the glassy surface with a specially charming effect. The whole view is
+amongst the world's loveliest, especially in the May term, when the
+Master's little garden to our right glows with bright colour, answered
+across the stream by that of the Fellows; when the water is alive with
+gay little craft, gigs, punts, and canoes; and when the "ambrosial
+dark" of the Avenue before us beckons us on to explore the delights of
+its umbrageous depths. It was planted in 1691, and is carried for 150
+yards on a wide embankment, dense with shrubs and closed with
+jealously-spiked gates at either end, across what was once an island
+in the river (known as Butts Close), till it debouches on to the
+elm-shaded length of greensward described in our opening page, and
+named, in old maps of Cambridge, "King's College Back-sides." The
+whole does, in fact, belong to King's, but the many rights of way
+which traverse it make it practically an open park.
+
+Not so long ago oaken railings (still to be seen in places) ran
+between it and the road, till a visit from Lord Kitchener (then Sirdar
+of Egypt, fresh from his Ethiopian victories) was made the occasion of
+a gigantic bonfire in the Market Place, to feed which the whole were
+torn up and carried away by gangs of enthusiastic undergraduates. A
+like fate befell the wooden palings and gates of the College gardens
+across the road, now replaced by iron, and altogether the damage done
+ran into hundreds of pounds; while the town police and the University
+proctors waited for each other to act until too late. There are three
+of these College gardens on end--King's, Clare, and Trinity; and
+rarely lovely they are, with their wide "smooth-shaven" lawns, broken
+into glades by clumps of ornamental trees. But each can only be
+entered under the aegis of a Fellow of its own respective College, and
+they are so carefully planted out from the road that scarcely even a
+glimpse can be gained of the delights within, "where no profaner eye
+may look."
+
+Leaving these on our left we proceed along the northward-leading path
+till we reach the fine iron gate which bears the escutcheon of
+Cambridge's mightiest College, Trinity, a College more than twice as
+large as any other, numbering something like 700 residents, students
+and teachers together. Like London, which an Indian visitor once
+described as "not a city, but a herd of cities," Trinity may be
+described as a conjoined herd of colleges, for it was created by the
+amalgamation of no fewer than nine earlier institutions. Two of these,
+Michaelhouse[25] and King's Hall, were amongst the most noteworthy
+colleges in Cambridge. The former was founded by Henry de Stanton,
+Chancellor to King Edward the Second, in 1323, and was thus, next to
+Peterhouse, the oldest college in Cambridge. And King's Hall was but a
+few years younger, being founded by King Edward the Third in 1336.
+Indeed, it may claim to be actually the elder in embryonic existence,
+for Edward the Second, in 1317, was already maintaining
+scholars--"children of our Chapel" as his writ calls them--in
+Cambridge. And that these "children" (who were required to be at least
+fourteen years of age on coming into residence) were quartered
+hereabouts is evident from King's Hall having been built across the
+line of an ancient street running down to the river and known as
+"King's Childer Lane." The town agreed to the expropriation of this
+lane in consideration of one red rose annually to be paid by the
+College to the Corporation on Midsummer Day. The remaining seven
+foundations incorporated in Trinity College were hostels (institutions
+for lodging students, more or less organised in college fashion, but
+not recognised by the University as colleges). These were St.
+Catharine's Hostel, Physwick Hostel, Crutched Hostel, Gregory's
+Hostel, Tyled Hostel, Oving's Inn, and St. Gerard's or "Garret"
+Hostel; which last, as we have seen, is still kept in memory by the
+name of the public bridge crossing the river between Trinity and
+Clare.
+
+[Footnote 25: Michaelhouse (like Peterhouse) derived its name from the
+neighbouring church which was used for worship by the Scholars till
+they got a chapel of their own.]
+
+[Illustration: _Old Schools' Quadrangle._]
+
+All these, Colleges and Hostels alike, were seized upon by Henry the
+Eighth, when that rapacious and unprincipled monarch desired to pose
+(in 1546, a year before his death) as a Pious Founder, and go down to
+posterity as a benefactor. He gained this credit cheaply; for not only
+did he thus get his edifices ready made, but their endowments also;
+while such additional endowments as he bestowed on his new College
+were almost wholly derived from the spoil of the Abbeys suppressed by
+him. Nor did he fail to take toll of each transfer of this stolen
+property for the benefit of his exchequer. His professed object,
+meanwhile, was "to educate Youth in piety, virtue, self-restraint,
+charity towards the poor, and relief of the distressed." His alumni,
+in short, were to be made as opposite to himself in character as
+possible.
+
+From the very first, Trinity thus became almost the largest and
+wealthiest College in Cambridge. For a century it disputed the
+headship of the University with its neighbour, St. John's College, and
+for another century and more sang second to that great rival. But in
+1785 it drew ahead, and since that date has improved its lead without
+a check, till now it stands not only first but without a second. So
+large is it that it cannot, for very sportsmanship, row as a whole in
+the bumping races, but has to be divided for that purpose into two
+boat clubs, denominated respectively "First Trinity" and "Third
+Trinity,"--or, in common speech, "First" and "Third" simply. The
+former is the original "Trinity Boat Club" and this is still its
+official name, whence it is also known as the "T.B.C." It wears the
+original Trinity colours,--dark blue,[26] with the badge of a golden
+lion and three crowns, the device of King Edward the Third. The latter
+consists of Trinity men from the two great rowing schools, Eton and
+Westminster. It is, of course, a very much smaller body than "First,"
+but, as its members come up ready-made oarsmen, it has been almost as
+frequently Head of the River. Both boats are always in the first
+flight. Once there existed a "Second Trinity" club, which has long
+since ceased to maintain its existence.
+
+[Footnote 26: The T.B.C. boat was one of the two first boats to appear
+on the river. The other was the "Lady Margaret" or St. John's boat,
+whose colours were (and are) bright red. These two boats used to row
+along, challenging each other, by sound of bugle, to extempore bursts
+of racing. This was in the Twenties. The first regular College races
+began in the year 1827; but only five Colleges rowed (Trinity, St.
+John's, Caius, Jesus and Emmanuel). Not till 1859 were all
+represented.]
+
+We enter the precincts of this great College by "that long walk of
+limes," up which Tennyson passed, as he tells us in "In Memoriam,"
+when he re-visited Cambridge, "to view the rooms" once inhabited by
+his friend and hero, Arthur Hallam.[27] This avenue was planted in
+1672,[28] and leads us to the fine cycloidal[29] bridge, built at the
+same period. After crossing this, we should not keep straight, which
+would bring us into the "New Court" where Hallam dwelt (a poor bit of
+architecture erected 1825), but rather turn to the left, by the path
+that sweeps along the bank of the river, with its fine weeping
+willows. Looking back, as we leave the bridge behind us, we may admire
+the climbing agility which frequently enables undergraduates to
+descend to the projecting piers just above the water, and find their
+way back again, without a ducking.
+
+[Footnote 27: Hallam's rooms were on the southern side of the New
+Court, in the central staircase (letter G), and were the western set
+on the first floor. Tennyson himself never "kept" in College, but had
+lodgings, first in Rose Crescent, and afterwards opposite the Bull
+Hotel.]
+
+[Footnote 28: Its line was determined by the distant spire of Coton
+Church which for two centuries closed the vista. (It is now hidden by
+these trees.) A current witticism was that the view symbolised a
+Trinity Fellowship--a long, straight-forward prospect, closed by a
+village church. Till the year 1878 every Fellow had to become a Priest
+of the Established Church within seven years, on pain of forfeiting
+his Fellowship. After this he was a Fellow for life, unless he
+married. And each Fellow in turn had a right to any College living
+that fell vacant. All this is altered now. Fellows are elected
+unconditionally for a limited period (which may be renewed), and
+College livings are assigned to the best men to be had, whether of
+Trinity or not.]
+
+[Footnote 29: A cycloid is the curve described by any single point on
+the rim of a rolling wheel.]
+
+We have here in front of us the New Court of St. John's College, seen
+across its lawn-tennis grounds; while to our left is the magnificent
+range of horse-chestnuts along the boundary of the two Colleges.
+Splendid at all times, these are seen at their very best when duly
+touched by frost. To our right rises the fine mass of Trinity Library,
+built by Sir Christopher Wren in 1675; whose walls of warm-coloured
+stone have been already dwelt upon. The lower portion of the building
+forms an open cloister, with grated windows and gates barring it from
+the Backs where we stand.
+
+Through one of these gates our path leads us, and we find ourselves
+within the College, and at the door of the Library. At certain hours,
+usually between three and four in the afternoon, this is open to
+visitors; at others the escort of a Member of the College is needed.
+Of all the College Libraries in Cambridge this is the most interesting
+in its miscellaneous contents. Mounting the wide stone stair-way, we
+enter the long, wide, lofty, vaulted gallery, with a series of wooden
+book-cases projecting from either wall all along its course. The
+carved wreaths of flowers and leaves and fruitage which adorn these
+cases deserve careful notice. They are by Grinling Gibbons, probably
+the most wonderful wood carver who ever lived, and their intricacies
+bear striking testimony to his almost superhuman skill. In the
+recesses between the cases are to be seen sundry curios, from the
+College estates and other sources, while more are to be found in the
+long ranges of glass-covered tables topping the smaller book-shelves
+which line either side of the central passage way. Roman and
+Anglo-Saxon antiquities, and a splendid series of coins and medals,
+are here exhibited. Amongst the miscellaneous curios are a model of
+Caesar's famous bridge across the Rhine and a globe of the planet Mars.
+
+What will, however, first catch our eye on entering, will be the
+window at the southern end of the room, with its painted glass so
+unlike anything to be seen elsewhere. It is, in fact, unique, having
+been made in the middle of the eighteenth century by the discoverer of
+this particular method of staining glass, who kept the process
+secret--a secret which died with him and has never been recovered. The
+window cannot be called artistically beautiful, and the subject is
+weird. The University of Cambridge, represented as a lady in a
+somewhat scanty robe of yellow, is presenting Sir Isaac Newton to King
+George the Third (who did not come to the Throne till 1760, many years
+after the great philosopher died), while the transaction is being
+recorded by Francis Bacon Lord Verulam of Elizabethan fame!
+
+Beneath this window is Thorwaldsen's fine marble statue of Lord Byron,
+one of Trinity's greatest poets. This was originally intended for
+Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey, but the Dean and Chapter of the
+period so strongly disapproved of Byron's morality that they refused
+it a place there. Apart from his poetical genius, he as little
+deserved to be honoured in Trinity library; for, as an undergraduate,
+he not only accomplished the apparently impossible feat of climbing by
+night to the roof (which others have more than once done since)[30]
+but abominably disfigured the statues upon it, in which he has had,
+happily, no imitators. Other relics of him are preserved hard by,
+which are supposed to bear upon the thrilling question as to how far
+he had or had not a club foot.[31]
+
+[Footnote 30: Nocturnal exploration of the College roofs has been so
+favourite an amusement amongst undergraduates that not long ago a book
+was actually published entitled _The Roof-Climber's Guide to Trinity
+College_. Every eminence in the College has been scaled, save only the
+Great Gate Tower. The Hon. C. S. Rolls, who was afterwards the first
+man to fly from England to France and back, and who fell a martyr to
+his zeal for aviation, was, in his day, the most daring and systematic
+of all Trinity roof-climbers.]
+
+[Footnote 31: Byron himself was morbidly sensitive on this point. Mr.
+Clark (_Guide to Cambridge_, p. 140) tells how he abused a friend who
+fell behind out of courtesy: "Ah! I see you wish to spy out my
+deformity." He was in residence 1805-8.]
+
+For these few will care; but this end of the library contains things
+which few can fail to care about. Here is the death-mask of Sir Isaac
+Newton, and a reflecting telescope, on the model invented by him. Here
+is Thackeray's manuscript of "Esmond," and Tennyson's manuscript of
+"In Memoriam." Here is Milton's manuscript of "Lycidas," and his first
+design for "Paradise Lost," all cut and scored about with alterations
+and corrections, showing that he originally designed his great poem to
+be a drama, the characters of which (headed by Moses) are here listed.
+Here, too, is a copy of the "Solemn League and Covenant" imposed on
+all men by the Puritans at the time of the Great Rebellion.[32] This
+was found hidden amongst the rafters of a village church near
+Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 32: This instrument bound its subscribers to zealous
+endeavour, far from any "detestable indifference and neutrality," for
+the "extirpation of Popery, Prelacy, ... Archbishops, Bishops, Deans,
+Chapters, Archdeacons, and all that Hierarchy." Every adult in the
+kingdom had to sign this very thoroughgoing test, on pain of
+imprisonment.]
+
+And here is a copy of the famous Indulgence sold by Tetzel, Luther's
+denunciation of which gave the signal for the earliest outburst of
+Protestantism at the Reformation. When the crabbed old printing is
+deciphered it proves to be a startlingly mild document, no licence to
+commit sin, as is generally supposed, but merely granting to the
+purchaser the privilege of confessing, once in his life, to a priest
+of his own choice instead of to the parson in whose parish he dwelt.
+The priest so chosen is given authority to absolve from nearly all
+sins, but not from the heinous offence of buying alum from anyone
+except the Pope, in whose territory it had, at that date (1515), been
+recently discovered. Alum was in those days a most valuable substance,
+and had hitherto been attainable only at the Turkish town of Roc, in
+Syria, whence the name of "rock alum" still surviving in use amongst
+pharmacopoeists. To buy it there was not only to take money out of the
+pocket of the Pope, but to put it into those of the enemies of
+Christendom. Hence the heinousness of the offence.
+
+Trinity library forms the western side of one of the Courts of the
+College, known as "Nevile's Court" (from Dr. Thomas Nevile, Master at
+the close of the sixteenth century, who planned and began it in 1610),
+and also as "Cloister Court," from the wide cloisters which surround
+it on the north, south, and west. The eastern side is formed by the
+Hall, raised four feet above the ground level, and reached by a
+beautiful balustraded and terraced staircase of stone. It is the
+finest college hall in either university, and was also the work of
+Nevile.
+
+In the northern cloister which leads us to it, there are sundry points
+not to be overlooked. As we look along it from the library entrance we
+perceive at the far end a door with a stalwart iron knocker. Now there
+is a fine echo in this cloister, and a stamp of the foot at our end
+will evoke a sound from the door precisely like that of a knocker. So
+great a part does illusion play in human impressions, that five people
+out of six, when they hear this sound, are ready to declare that they
+have seen the knocker actually move. It was by timing this echo, we
+may mention, that Sir Isaac Newton first measured the velocity of
+sound. The echoing properties of these cloisters are referred to by
+Tennyson in the "Princess":
+
+  "our cloisters echoed frosty feet."
+
+The massive block which pillars the angle of the cloister is known as
+the "Freshman's Pillar"; a favourite old-time amusement of the junior
+students (not yet wholly disremembered) having been to traverse the
+very narrow base-top right round, without setting foot to the ground.
+In old times, indeed until the last quarter of the nineteenth century,
+these cloisters played a notable part in undergraduate life. Athletic
+pursuits were far less general than now, and exercise was largely
+pedestrian. On a wet day, accordingly, when the roads were uninviting,
+the cloisters used to be crowded with a veritable swarm of trampers,
+doing "quarter-deck" from end to end of the three covered sides of the
+court.
+
+[Illustration: _Clare College from Bridge._]
+
+The stair-case entrances here lead to specially delightsome sets of
+rooms, with oak panels and beautiful plaster ceilings. One of these
+was occupied by the late Duke of Clarence, when, as "Prince Edward,"
+he was an undergraduate of Trinity, mingling freely with the college
+life around him, and making himself generally beloved by his simple
+unaffected pleasantness.[33] His royal father, when Prince of Wales,
+was also an undergraduate of Trinity; but Court etiquette was stricter
+in those days, and, instead of being in College, he was quartered at
+Madingley Hall, four miles away. A few months after his wedding, in
+June, 1864, he brought his beautiful bride to visit Cambridge and take
+all hearts by storm. In their honour the whole area of Nevile's Court
+was tented in and floored over and made into one vast ball-room, which
+included the cloisters and the hall stairway. The former were used for
+promenading, all the best settees and arm-chairs to be found in
+College being commandeered to be placed in them; the Hall served for
+supper; while the band was housed beneath the Library. All was
+beautifully decorated and lighted (though it was before the days even
+of paraffin lamps), and the whole scene was one of unforgettable
+brilliance.[34] The cost was, naturally, something portentous; but
+those were the times of academic prosperity, before the great
+agricultural depression of the following decade brought down rents,
+and with them college incomes, almost (sometimes altogether) from
+pounds to shillings.[35]
+
+[Footnote 33: These same rooms (on the south-westernmost staircase)
+were probably those occupied by Lord Byron.]
+
+[Footnote 34: The entrance was from the New Court, which communicates
+with Nevile's Court by an arcade in the southern cloister of the
+latter.]
+
+[Footnote 35: All the Colleges have thus suffered severely; King's
+being hit hardest of all. Trinity was less seriously affected, owing
+to the fact that much of its land lies in the North of England.]
+
+The beautiful rooms of Nevile's Court are mostly held by Fellows of
+the College whose names may be known in the doorway lists by the "Mr."
+prefixed to them. Over one doorway we see a small bronze bust, set up
+as a memorial to Mr. Goodhart who once "kept" there and was an object
+of special admiration to all who knew him. He was, in fact, a kind of
+Admirable Crichton; not only a man of great intellectual power (as
+Fellows of Trinity must needs be, for these fellowships are the "blue
+riband" of the University), but excellent at all athletic pursuits,
+and able to do successfully whatever thing he set his hand to. It is
+recorded that on one occasion a bet was laid that he could not make
+himself an entire suit of clothes, and wear them for a month without
+their amateur origin being detected. Goodhart won the bet.
+
+Beautiful as Nevile's Court is, it was originally yet more beautiful,
+with transomed windows, and gabled dormers instead of the present
+eighteenth century parapet. These are shown in a view "after Logan,"
+given by Atkinson,[36] from the terrace before the Hall, by which we
+leave the court, passing through a low and massive wicket gate of
+black oak. This admits us into the "screens," a short and narrow
+passage having the Hall on one side, and, on the other, the kitchen
+and the Buttery. This last word has no connection with butter (though
+butter is here issued), but is derived from _butler_, as being the
+place where the ale for the hall dinners is served out. Its door, as
+is universal in such places, is a "hatch," the upper and lower halves
+of the door opening independently, and a broad sill on the top of the
+latter forming a sort of counter across which the business of the
+place is transacted. Of old the buttery served as an office, where
+much of the clerical work of the College was done; but this branch of
+its usefulness is now transferred to a special department.
+
+[Footnote 36: _Cambridge Described_, p. 444.]
+
+When each College brewed its own ale and baked its own bread, as was
+the case till some half-century ago, the Buttery was a really
+important place. Even now the daily ration of bread and butter to
+which each Collegian in residence has a right, is here booked to him.
+This ration is called his "Commons." If for any approved reason he
+does not desire to draw it in any given week he is said to be "out of
+Commons"; and if, as sometimes happens, he is deprived of the right
+for misconduct, he is said to be "discommonsed" for such or such a
+period. (The equivalent phrase at Oxford is "to be crossed at the
+Buttery.") The Buttery officials also have charge of the adjoining
+strong-room in which the magnificent store of the College plate is
+secured; mighty salvers and bowls and "grace-cups,"[37] besides
+dishes, and the hundreds of spoons and forks, all the gifts of
+benefactor after benefactor since the College was first founded. A
+visitor may sometimes be fortunate enough to get a sight of these
+resplendent piles.
+
+[Footnote 37: A "Grace-cup" is a large silver tankard which at College
+feasts is solemnly passed down the High Table, each guest in turn
+standing up to drink it. Three, indeed, must always be so standing,
+the drinker, the last man, and the next man; whence the cup has
+sometimes three handles. At each potation the three concerned formally
+bow to each other.]
+
+A sight of the kitchen, which adjoins the Buttery, can almost always
+be had, and is worth having; though the glory of the place has largely
+departed with the substitution of gas stoves for the old open ranges,
+six feet high and twelve feet long, before which scores of joints and
+fowls might be seen simultaneously twisting on huge spits. If less
+picturesque, the cooking is now more scientific, and the kitchen is a
+splendid chamber, the finest of all College kitchens, with an open
+pitched roof, and an oriel window, having been traditionally the
+ancient Hall of Michaelhouse. The walls are adorned with the shells of
+turtles, emblazoned with the dates of the great occasions on which
+they were immolated for soup. It is not only the dinners in Hall which
+are here cooked. Members of the College may order dishes to be sent to
+their own rooms, in reason; though any very extra expenditure in this
+respect would need to be authorised by your Tutor. This extraneous
+fare may constantly be seen being carried about the Courts, in large
+flat blue boxes, on the heads of the kitchen servants.
+
+The doors of the Hall may usually be found open, or a request at the
+Buttery may open them; though there is a certain amount of luck in the
+matter, as the Hall is not only used for meals but for College
+examinations also, which, of course, must not be disturbed by
+intruders. A common lunch is served during Full Term, from 12 till 2,
+at which such as list sit where they will, Dons and undergraduates,
+cheek by jowl. The three daily dinners which the size of the College
+makes necessary are more formal affairs, especially the latest at
+7.45, which the authorities of the College attend, sitting at the two
+High Tables on the dais, and faring more sumptuously than the students
+in the body of the Hall. Of these only the "Senior Sophs"[38] may be
+present, the "Junior Sophs" and Freshmen being relegated to the
+earlier hours. The westernmost range of tables is sacred to Bachelors
+of Arts and to the Scholars of the College. The rest may sit where
+they please at the remaining tables, and diners may enter and leave at
+their pleasure during the meal, but any course missed by lateness is
+missed for good. Ordinary morning dress is worn, except on special
+Feasts. Conversation may be freely indulged in, though it hardly,
+nowadays, rises to the height of Tennyson's heroic phrase in "In
+Memoriam," "the thunder of the Halls." The Master of the College
+himself does not dine in Hall except at great Feasts, but in his own
+adjacent Lodge, to the north, which communicates directly with the
+Hall by a door in the panelling between, and also by a sliding panel
+above, whence he (and his ladies) can, unobserved, overlook, and more
+or less overhear, what passes.
+
+[Footnote 38: For the first year of his residence the student is
+called a Freshman, in the next he is a "Junior Soph," and in the third
+a "Senior Soph." The origin of the word "Soph" is doubtful. It is
+presumably short for Sophist; but all Americans will recognise it as
+the origin of their "Sophomore." And American University nomenclature
+is largely derived from Cambridge. The word, however, has of late gone
+out of general use, and practically survives scarcely anywhere but in
+Trinity.]
+
+The high-pitched roof with its elaborate beams is copied, as are the
+other features (and the dimensions) of the Hall, from the Hall of the
+Middle Temple in London. Its ridge is broken in the centre by a
+"Lantern," or small openwork spire of wood (the openings being now
+glazed). This once served as a ventilating shaft, through which might
+escape the fumes of the great brazier (a yard in depth and two yards
+across) standing beneath it, and, till this generation, the only means
+used to warm the Hall. Over the doors is a "Music Gallery," usually
+closed in by quaintly carved shutters, whence, on Feast days, the
+College Choristers still discourse melody. The armorial bearings in
+the windows are those of eminent members of the College; while
+pictures of its more prominent Worthies (or Unworthies) hang on the
+walls. Conspicuous amongst these is Holbein's great portrait of Henry
+the Eighth, who stands "straddled over the whole breadth of the way,"
+above the centre of the High Table, in all his underbred
+self-assertion, looking indeed "all our fancy painted him." His
+unhappy daughter Mary (who built the College Chapel) hangs near him,
+her full dourness and wretchedness in her face. Thackeray (a
+singularly powerful presentation) is also here, so is Clerk-Maxwell,
+so is Bishop Lightfoot, and many another light of literature, science,
+and theology; for the great size of Trinity has given it as great a
+proportion in the rolls of Fame.
+
+On the other side of the Screens, in the "Combination Room," whither
+the High Table adjourns for dessert, may be seen other famous Trinity
+men, the most conspicuous being the celebrated Marquis of Granby,
+standing by his war-horse, with the bare bald head which won him his
+renown. He was in the act of charging the enemy[39] at the head of his
+regiment when the wind of a cannon ball carried away his hat and wig;
+and he did _not_ halt his soldiery that they might be picked up. This
+unexampled pitch of heroism awoke the wildest enthusiasm throughout
+the length and breadth of England and made "The Marquis of Granby," as
+readers of Pickwick will remember, a favourite sign for inns
+throughout many years. Entrance to the Combination Room is only
+obtained through favour. There is little else to notice in it except
+the beautiful polish of the mahogany tables.
+
+[Footnote 39: At the battle of Minden, 1759.]
+
+In the Screens are posted up the current College Notices--the hours
+and subjects of the lectures, the dates and results of the College
+examinations,[40] and the various tutorial admonishments of the Term.
+There is usually only one Tutor in a College, but the great size of
+Trinity requires the services of four; each being responsible for his
+own "Side," as it is called, consisting of some 150 students, to whom
+he is supposed (and the supposition is no unfounded one) to be "guide,
+philosopher, and friend," keeping a wise eye to their progress, moral,
+social, and intellectual.
+
+[Footnote 40: Besides the University Examinations needed to obtain a
+Degree, every College keeps its students up to the mark by extra
+examinations of its own, held usually twice a year. There are also
+competitive examinations for the College Scholarships, and (at
+Trinity) for the Fellowships. About seventy per cent. of Trinity
+students are "Honour men"; reading, not for the ordinary (or "Poll")
+Degree, but for one or other of the various Triposes. And of these
+"Honour" candidates of Trinity, over thirty per cent. attain a First
+Class; which is thus gained by nearly twenty-five per cent. of Trinity
+students, the highest College average in the University.]
+
+[Illustration: _Trinity Bridge._]
+
+Passing through the eastern doorway of the Screens we meet what is
+perhaps the most ideal academic view in the world. From our feet
+descends a semicircular stairway with steps of worn stone leading down
+to a vast enclosure of greensward, surrounded and traversed by broad
+walks of flags and pebbles, and enclosed on all sides by venerable
+Collegiate buildings with battlemented parapets. These buildings are
+not very lofty; which makes the court look even larger than it is, and
+gives the greater effect to the three grand gate towers, one of which
+adorns each of the three sides before us. In the midst of the Court
+(which is not far from square but delightfully irregular in shape)
+rises the inspired gracefulness of the fountain--with its octagonal
+base of broad steps (surrounded by bright flowerbeds) and its
+crocketed canopy upborne upon slender pillars with beautifully
+proportioned arches.[41] The whole is a veritable miracle of design,
+and would hold its own with any fountain even in Italy. It is, indeed,
+the work of Italian craftsmen of the best period,[42] brought over
+specially by Dr. Nevile, to whose genius we owe this most splendid of
+all College quadrangles, the "Old Court" (sometimes called the "Great
+Court") of Trinity.
+
+[Footnote 41: The water is from an ancient conduit made originally to
+supply the Franciscan Convent, and comes from a spring some two miles
+to the west. Till recently this was the only supply for Trinity, and
+(by a charitable tap outside the Great Gate) for many neighbours also.
+Now it is supplemented by an artesian well behind the chapel, bored to
+a depth of 120 feet into the Greensand.]
+
+[Footnote 42: These same craftsmen probably made the beautiful
+ceilings in the Combination Room at St. John's College (which is
+copied from that in one of the rooms in this Court), and in the
+University Library.]
+
+To appreciate the greatness of this debt, we must bear in mind that,
+when he became Master of the College, Nevile found the ground occupied
+by heterogeneous ranges of old buildings, the remains of the
+suppressed Colleges and Hostels, running chaotically in all sorts of
+directions. These are shown in the earliest map of Cambridge,[43] made
+in 1592, just before he began his great work of pulling down, setting
+back, building and rebuilding. He thus remodelled almost the whole;
+the Chapel alone (built fifty years earlier) and the great eastern
+gate-tower remaining as they were before his reconstructions. In
+reality this Court, far more than the Cloister Court, deserves to be
+called by his name, and to remind us of his motto _Ne vile velis_
+("Nothing cheap and nasty").
+
+[Footnote 43: See _Cambridge Described_, p. 443.]
+
+Since his day, indeed, surprisingly little alteration has been made.
+Plaster has been put on (and stripped off) here and there, stonework
+has been touched up, the Master's Lodge has been altered and
+re-altered, but the only radical change has been in the south-west
+corner beyond the Hall, which was rebuilt in 1775, with results as
+artistically deplorable as may well be, especially in comparison with
+the older work. Nevile had left in this corner a beautiful oriel
+window, still to be seen in Logan's view of the College (1680).
+
+Of the three gate towers only one is of Nevile's own building, that on
+the southern side of the Court, known as the Queen's Gate from the
+statue of Anne of Denmark, the Queen Consort of James the First,
+which stands above its inner archway. The gate of this tower is used
+only on occasions. The other two both belonged to King's Hall; the
+eastern being still in its original place, the northern, which
+formerly aligned with it, having been moved back by Nevile to align
+with the Chapel. Both set forth the glories of Edward the Third; the
+former displaying over its entrance gate the armorial bearings of his
+seven sons, while over the archway of the latter he stands himself,
+with his three crowns (of England, France and Scotland) spitted on the
+long naked sword which he holds erect in front of him, and the proud
+motto "_Fama super aethera notus_" ("Known by Fame beyond the skies").
+From his like niche in the eastern tower he has been displaced by
+Henry the Eighth. The statues on the inside of this tower are James
+the First, with his wife and son (afterwards Charles the First).
+
+The northern tower is commonly known as the Clock Tower; being the
+dwelling place of the famous timepiece referred to by Wordsworth in
+the "Prelude" as breaking the silence of his rooms at St. John's
+College, which were not many yards away:
+
+  "Near me hung Trinity's loquacious clock,
+   Who never let the quarters, night or day,
+   Slip by him unproclaimed, and told the hours
+   Twice over, with a male and female voice."
+
+The clock actually does repeat the hour, striking it first on the
+biggest of the three bells in the tower, whose note is A flat, and
+then on the second, E flat, a fifth above. The quarters are notified
+by two, four, six and eight strokes respectively on the first and
+second bells, F and E flat, a tone apart.[44]
+
+[Footnote 44: Both clock and bells are due to Dr. Bentley, the famous
+Master who bullied the College into so many happy and undesired
+expenses during his tenure of office (1700-1742). The repeating is
+solely for convenience; one often fails to note the first stroke or
+two of an hour.]
+
+To complete the round of the Court outside the grass-plots while
+midnight strikes is a favourite test of running powers amongst the
+Undergraduates. It is a fairly severe one; for the distance is 383
+yards, with four sharp corners to negotiate, on somewhat pronounced
+pebbling, and the time occupied by the 32 strokes (8 for the 4
+quarters and a double 12 for the hour) is only 43 seconds. An easier
+performance is to make a standing jump from top to bottom of the
+steps before the Hall; this is chiefly a trial of nerve. There are 8
+steps, each 6 inches high and 15 wide, so that the drop is only 4 feet
+and the distance under 10; but it is a fearsome thought, looking down,
+to contemplate the result should one's heel catch on a step. To jump
+clear _up_ the flight is a real feat, which only two men are known to
+have accomplished: even with the preliminary run which is possible
+below though not above the stairway.
+
+On our way through the Court towards the Chapel, we have on our left
+hand the Master's Lodge, the front of which is an exceptionally happy
+piece of early Victorian restoration. A poor classical facade had
+(under Bentley) replaced Nevile's original front. But this front was
+still to be seen in Logan's print, and was thus (in 1842)
+reconstructed with little alteration. The Lodge contains splendid
+reception rooms, worthy of a palace. The Chapel, though by no means of
+the first rank as regards artistic beauty, is well worth seeing, for
+it contains what high authorities consider the very finest statue ever
+made since the palmy days of Greek art, Roubillac's wonderful
+presentation of Sir Isaac Newton.[45] There he stands at the west end
+of the Chapel, prism in hand, the king of all scientists, gazing with
+rapt eyes into Infinity, and a smile full of hope and illumination
+upon his lips.[46] The story goes that the expression on these lips
+did not wholly satisfy the sculptor at his first sight of his creation
+on its pedestal, and that he climbed up, then and there, chisel in
+hand, to give the effect he desired with a few exquisitely directed
+blows.
+
+[Footnote 45: This was given to the College in 1755 by the then
+Master, Dr. Robert Smith.]
+
+[Footnote 46: Wordsworth in "The Prelude" tells us how he loved
+
+  "The antechapel, where the statue stood
+   Of Newton, with his prism and silent face,
+   The marble index of a mind for ever
+   Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone."]
+
+Other heroic figures are grouped around, Francis Bacon, (Tennyson's
+
+       "Large-browed Verulam
+  The first of those that know,")
+
+[Illustration: _The Fountain, Trinity College._]
+
+Tennyson himself, Macaulay, Dr. Barrow, the Master to whom the
+College owes its Library,[47] and the massive virility of his
+omniscient successor, Dr. Whewell.[48] Brasses affixed to the walls
+commemorate many another great inmate of the College, who, "having
+served his own generation according to the will of God," is here laid
+to rest:
+
+  "Trinity's full tide of life flooding o'er him
+   Morning and evening as he lies dead."
+
+[Footnote 47: Barrow's great wish was that the University should build
+a theatre (like the Sheldonian at Oxford), instead of having its
+dramas performed, as they then were, in the University Church. When
+the Senate boggled at the expense, he declared that Trinity should
+shame them by erecting unaided a yet finer building than he proposed,
+and "that very afternoon" himself staked out the foundations of the
+Library. (_Clark's Guide_, p. 123.)]
+
+[Footnote 48: Of the astonishingly wide sweep of Whewell's knowledge
+many tales are yet told. There was no subject on which he could not
+talk with authority. It is related how an impertinent Fellow once
+hoped to puzzle him by getting up an article on Chinese music in a
+back number of the _Edinburgh Review_, and introducing the subject in
+Hall. "Ah," replied Whewell, "it is a long time since I thought of
+that. But you will find an article of mine about it in the
+_Edinburgh_, some ten or fifteen years ago."]
+
+These lines were written to commemorate Dr. Thompson, the late Master
+(renowned for his sarcastic humour), and refer to the fact that
+undergraduates are expected to put in every week a certain number of
+attendances at the morning and evening Services held daily in the
+Chapel.[49] This obligation is now very leniently construed by the
+Senior and Junior "Deans," under whose cognisance offences against it
+come; but not so very long ago it was exceedingly strict, and the
+Chapel Lists, on which the attendances were recorded, were objects of
+real dread to the slothful. In 1838 the Senior Fellows (then the
+Governing Body of the College),[50] decreed that every student must be
+present twice on Sunday and once on every other day of the week. This
+ukase brought about something like a rebellion. A secret "Society for
+the Prevention of Cruelty to Undergraduates" was formed, and avenged
+their wrongs by publishing every week regular lists exposing the far
+from adequate attendance of the Senior Fellows themselves (Thompson
+being one), to the intense annoyance of these dignitaries. Finally,
+they actually had the assurance to give a prize to the Fellow who had
+been most regular, Mr. Perry, who afterwards became the first Bishop
+of Melbourne, and who cherished the Bible thus won to the end of his
+life. The Society kept their secret for a whole Term, and, when
+finally discovered, were able to escape punishment by promising that
+the publication of their Lists, which made the Seniors the weekly
+laughing-stock of the University, should be brought to an end.
+
+[Footnote 49: On Sundays and Festivals all wear surplices, and the
+throng then presents a very striking appearance. It suggested
+Tennyson's vision of "Six hundred maidens clad in purest white," in
+"The Princess."]
+
+[Footnote 50: This is now the College Council, consisting of the
+Master, the Tutors, and other Members elected for a certain period.]
+
+All these statues and memorials are in the Ante-Chapel, which is
+separated from the Chapel proper, as at King's, by the screen on which
+stands the great organ. This organ is the largest and best-toned in
+Cambridge,[51] but it is far from being as effective as the King's
+organ, to which the magnificent acoustic properties of its Chapel lend
+so wondrous a power. In Trinity there is always the sensation that the
+harmonies are boxed in; indeed the shape of the Chapel does very much
+suggest a box. In justice, however, to its designers, it must be
+remembered that the box-like effect would be very much lessened by the
+east and west windows with which it was originally provided. The
+latter was closed by Nevile's putting back the clock tower to abut
+upon it; the former still exists, as may be seen from the outside, but
+is utterly shut off from the interior by a huge and far from beautiful
+baldachino erected (not at his own cost but at that of the
+impoverished Fellows) by Dr. Bentley. This famous scholar was one of
+the few unpleasant Masters with whom the Crown (in which is here
+vested the right, usually belonging to the Fellows, of appointing the
+Head of the College) ever saddled Trinity. He passed his whole time as
+Head in one long unceasing quarrel with his College. To begin with, he
+was unpopular as being a member of the adjoining Foundation of St.
+John's, between which and Trinity there existed an age-long rivalry.
+Not many years before something like open war had been levied between
+the Colleges on the occasion of a Trinity merry-making, the Johnian
+onlookers being attacked with burning torches and using swords in
+their defence; while an attempt which they made to rush the great
+gates was beaten off by showers of stones and brickbats which had
+been stored to that end on the roof of the Gate Tower.
+
+[Footnote 51: It was made early in the eighteenth century by the
+celebrated Father Smith, an organ-builder of world-wide fame.]
+
+St. John's was at this time the largest College, and despised Trinity;
+a sentiment which Bentley, who was a born bully,[52] expressed with
+the utmost frankness, publicly calling the Fellows "asses," "dogs,"
+"fools," "sots," and other scurrilous names, as they piteously set
+forth in their complaints to their Visitor,[53] the Bishop of Ely.
+Finally he was degraded by the Senate,[54] and reduced to the status
+of "a bare Harry-Soph," as a contemporary diarist (quoted by Mr.
+Clark)[55] puts it. But no Master, except Nevile and Barrow, has left
+so enduring a mark upon the College; for the ruinous expenditure into
+which he dragooned the unhappy Fellows has given the Chapel not only
+the baldachino, but the stalls, the panelling, and the organ; to say
+nothing of the clock, and the splendid oak staircase in the Lodge.
+
+[Footnote 52: By his arrogance Bentley incurred the undying hatred of
+Pope, who denounces him in the "Dunciad" as boasting himself (in
+addressing Dullness)
+
+  "Thy mighty Scholiast, whose unwearied pains
+   Made Horace dull, and humbled Milton's strains;
+   Turn what they will to verse, their toil is vain;
+   Critics like me shall make it prose again."]
+
+[Footnote 53: To every College is attached some high-placed personage
+as Visitor, with a vague, but by no means unreal, power of
+interference when appealed to. Bentley was only saved from deposition
+by the sudden death of the Visitor.]
+
+[Footnote 54: The Senate is the general assembly of Masters of Arts,
+which is the supreme University authority.]
+
+[Footnote 55: _Guide to Cambridge_, p. 129. The meaning of the curious
+word "Harry-Soph" is apparently equivalent to a student unequal to a
+Degree. Bentley was deprived of all his Degrees.]
+
+The profuse gilding and painting which enriches walls and roof in the
+Chapel is due to a restoration some forty years ago, when the outside
+was also faced with stone, and the windows filled with stained glass,
+commemorating ecclesiastical and other celebrities throughout all the
+Christian centuries. The Apostles appear in the most easterly windows
+on either side; whence the series progresses in chronological order
+westwards. The figures are for the most part powerfully drawn, and
+should be examined through an opera glass to appreciate their wealth
+of detail. We can thus see that Hildebrand has driven his crosier
+through the eagles of the Imperial Crown, that Dante, Matthew Paris,
+and Roger Bacon, hold in their hands copies of their own greatest
+works, that Giotto is studying an elevation of his Campanile; while
+noted church-builders, like St. Hugh of Lincoln and William of
+Wykeham, carry models of their edifices. The hapless Mary Tudor holds
+one of this very Chapel, of which she was the Foundress. It is
+appropriate that the beautiful silver cross over the Altar should be
+Spanish work of her date, though only placed there a few years ago by
+the generosity of some members of the College who met with it while
+travelling in Spain. It was originally a processional cross, and has
+been adapted for its new purpose with artistic skill of the first
+order.
+
+When we leave the Chapel, and proceed towards the Great Gate, we are
+treading on classic ground. For it was along this flagged path that
+Macaulay, while at Trinity, used to take his daily exercise, pacing
+assiduously up and down, always the while devouring some author, whose
+pages he turned over with incredible rapidity, and at the same pace
+whether they were filled with the weightiest thought or the lightest
+fancy. Yet whether the book were profound philosophy or exquisite
+poetry or the trashiest of rhyme and fiction, he was ever afterwards
+able to recall its whole scheme and even to quote lengthy portions of
+it verbatim. His rooms were in the staircase facing us--the set on the
+ground-floor to the left of the entrance. This particular staircase
+has been the home of more great men than any other in the University.
+The ground-floor rooms opposite Macaulay's were those of
+Thackeray,[56] and the set above Thackeray's are hallowed as the
+habitation of Sir Isaac Newton: for whom the College built an
+observatory on the roof of the Gate Tower, and who also had the use of
+a small bit of ground which we see outside the gate, now a railed-in
+lawn, but then a pretty little garden, as Logan's view shows, with
+trees and flower-beds, surrounded by a high wall.
+
+[Footnote 56: Readers of _Esmond_ will remember that Thackeray
+quarters that hero on this same staircase, "close by the gate, and
+near to the famous Mr. Newton's lodgings." Thackeray was in residence
+1829-31, Macaulay 1818-24, Newton 1662-1717.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+     Whewell's Courts.--All Saints' Cross.--The Jewry.--Divinity
+     School.--=St. John's College=, Trinity and John's, Lady Margaret,
+     Fisher, Hospital of St. John, Gate Tower, First Court, Hall,
+     Wordsworth, Compulsory Worship, Combination Room, Second Court,
+     Library, Great Bible, Third Court, Bridge of Sighs, New Court,
+     Roof-climbing, Blazers, Wilderness.--=Caius College=, Gonville,
+     The Three Gates, Kitchen, "Blues."--=Senate House=,
+     Congregations, Vice-Chancellor, Voting,
+     Degree-giving.--=University Church=, Mr. Tripos, Golgotha,
+     Sermons, Tower, Chimes, Jowett.--Market Hill, Peasant Revolt, Wat
+     Tyler, Bucer and Fagius, Bonfires, Town and Gown.
+
+
+We are now outside the Great Gate of Trinity; but, across the street,
+in front of us, rises yet another gate belonging to the College, and
+leading into its two newest Courts, named from Dr. Whewell, who left
+this noble memorial of his Mastership.[57] Those who list to enter
+them will at once see why the first is popularly known as "the
+Spittoon," and the second as "the Billiard Table"; but there is little
+more to see or to say about them.
+
+[Footnote 57: Whewell was Master of Trinity from 1841 to 1866.]
+
+The slender and lofty stone cross to the north of these buildings
+marks the site of the ancient church of All Saints, which was pulled
+down in the middle of last century, to be rebuilt at the further
+extremity of its parish, opposite the entrance to Jesus College. Its
+earliest name (in the twelfth century) was "All Hallows in the Jewry";
+for Cambridge made good its claim to be amongst the larger towns of
+England by having, like the most of them, its Ghetto, or quarter (more
+or less sharply divided off from the rest), in which alone the Jews
+might reside. They were nowhere popular residents, for they were
+outside the pale of the Law (which refused to take cognisance of
+aliens in race and religion) and mere "chattels" of the Crown. This
+position, however ignominious, gave them special privileges as against
+their neighbours. They were too useful as financial assets to allow of
+their being murdered or robbed by anyone but their Royal owner
+himself; and, secure in his protection, they took small pains to
+conceal their contempt for their Christian neighbours, who retaliated
+by as much petty persecution as they dared, and, now and then, by a
+wholesale massacre. Finally matters became so strained that in the
+fourteenth century, under Richard the Second, the whole race of Israel
+were expelled from England, not to return till the days of Cromwell.
+They had originally come to our shores in the train of the Conqueror's
+army, thus conveniently enabling the Norman soldiers to turn their
+English loot into hard cash. Their quarter in Cambridge was the small
+triangular piece of ground between St. John's Street, Sidney Street,
+and All Saints' Passage.
+
+North again of All Saints' Cross we see the new red-brick walls and
+white stone dressings of the Divinity School, where the Professors of
+that subject hold their classes and lectures. Opposite to this rise
+the stately buildings of St. John's College. We may note how very near
+they approach to those of Trinity. These two great Foundations, so
+long holding undisputed pre-eminence in the University, are, in fact,
+nearer neighbours than any other two Colleges in Cambridge--nearer,
+even, than King's and Clare. The narrow lane that parts their
+respective buildings belongs to St. John's, and is bounded on the
+Trinity side only by a brick wall. This flimsy partition induced Dr.
+Bentley, when congratulated on becoming Master of Trinity, to reply,
+with characteristic infelicity, "By the help of my God, I have leapt
+over a wall." An unverified tradition hence arose that he had actually
+made his way into the College, on the Great Gate being shut against
+his entry, by a ladder applied to the wall of the Trinity Fellows'
+Bowling Green.[58] Keen as has been the age-long rivalry between
+Trinity and St. John's, they have been more closely connected than
+any other two Colleges; and no fewer than four times has a Johnian
+become Master of Trinity. The respective Founders were also closely
+connected; for St. John's was founded (earlier in her grandson's
+reign) by Lady Margaret Tudor, grandmother to Henry the Eighth.
+
+[Footnote 58: This Bowling Green lies to the west of Trinity Chapel,
+and is one of the choicest gems of Cambridge, a gracious, walled
+oblong of turf, with a wooded terrace overlooking the river at its
+western end, and at the east, the lately discovered fourteenth century
+front of the College Bursary, once forming part of King's Hall. The
+privilege of entering this Paradise can only be attained under the
+escort of a Fellow.]
+
+This noble lady is one of the choice characters of history. Her
+disposition, as depicted for us by the one who knew her best, her
+Confessor, the saintly Bishop Fisher, reads almost like an embodiment
+of St. Paul's encomium on Charity: "Bounteous she was, and liberal ...
+of singular easiness to be spoken unto ... of marvellous gentleness
+unto all folk ... unkind to no creature, nor forgetful of any kindness
+or service done to her (which is no little part of very nobleness).
+She was not vengeable nor cruel; but ready anon to forget and forgive
+injuries done unto her, at the least desire or motion made unto her
+for the same. Merciful also and piteous she was unto such as was
+grieved and wrongfully troubled, and to them that were in poverty or
+sickness or any other misery. To God and to the Church full obedient
+and tractable, searching His honour and pleasure full busily. A
+wareness of herself she had always, to eschew everything that might
+dishonour any noble woman.... All England for her death have cause of
+weeping."[59]
+
+[Footnote 59: The above quotation, as well as that which follows, is
+from the sermon preached by Fisher in Westminster Abbey at her burial.
+(I have modernised the spelling.)]
+
+[Illustration: _Trinity College Chapel and St. John's Gateway._]
+
+Lady Margaret was of Plantagenet stock, being great-granddaughter to
+"old John of Gaunt, time honoured Lancaster," and one of the
+legitimatised family of the Beauforts. Her first husband was the Welsh
+Earl Edmund Tudor, the father of her only child, Henry of Richmond,
+who afterwards succeeded to the throne of England as Henry the
+Seventh. After his death she twice married again; but none of her
+nuptials were of long continuance, and her true life was that of her
+widowhood, when she became famed as the Lady Bountiful of the Kingdom:
+"the mother of both the Universities; the very patroness of all the
+learned men of England;[60] the loving sister of all virtuous and
+devout persons; the comforter of all good Religious; the true
+defendress of all good priests and clerks; the mirror and example of
+honour to all noble men and women; the common mediatrice for all the
+common people of this realm.... Everyone that knew her loved her, and
+everything she said or did became her." Before her death she had
+endowed Preacherships and Professorships of Divinity (which still
+remain), both at Oxford and Cambridge, and had seen her first
+Collegiate Foundation, that of Christ's College, rise into full life.
+Her second and greater Foundation, St. John's College, she only lived
+to plan and to endow. When she died, on the 29th of June, 1509 (in the
+bright dawn of her grandson's reign and marriage--both alike destined
+to end in so miserable a tragedy), the buildings were not yet
+commenced.
+
+[Footnote 60: Amongst these we must count Erasmus; who composed the
+epitaph on her tomb.]
+
+She left their erection, however, in the best of hands. It was to her
+friend and counsellor, Bishop Fisher, who knew her so well, and
+appreciated her so dearly, that she committed the carrying out of her
+great design. He was markedly qualified for this purpose, not only by
+his connection with herself, but by special acquaintance with the
+spot. For in him we find yet another link between St. John's and
+Trinity. As Master of Michaelhouse,[61] some years earlier, he had
+been a close neighbour of the ancient Hospital of St. John, and had
+noted how far that venerable fraternity had outlived its usefulness.
+Originally a semi-monastic institution, founded in 1135, as a sort of
+alms-house for necessitous old men, the lack of any sufficient
+discipline had brought it to decay. The attempt made by Bishop Hugh de
+Balsham, in the century after its foundation, to leaven it with the
+scholars whom he afterwards transported to Peterhouse had proved a
+failure, and by the sixteenth century the few Brethren left were far
+from satisfactory in their ways.[62] Fisher, therefore, suggested to
+Lady Margaret to turn the Hospital into a College, under the same
+patronage, and after her death, set promptly to work to make the
+requisite alterations in the existing buildings.
+
+[Footnote 61: Michaelhouse was one of the constituent Colleges of
+Trinity.]
+
+[Footnote 62: We need not, however, take too literally the statement
+in the Instrument of Suppression, that but two ill-conducted Brethren
+remained. For, as Mr. Clark has shown, that Instrument was copied
+verbatim from the earlier one used for the turning of St. Radegund's
+Priory into Jesus College.]
+
+His first act was to enclose a Court, the Gate Tower of which should
+worthily commemorate the Foundress. In this his success was complete.
+The tower, which to this day forms the main entrance to the College,
+is a delightful example of what may be done in architecture by a
+skilful use of red brick. The quoining is of stone, and of stone also
+are the elaborate decorations. In the centre above the first
+string-course a richly-canopied niche contains the statue of St. John
+the Evangelist. Below this, and immediately above the gate, is to be
+seen Lady Margaret's shield, the three lions of England, quartered
+with the three lilies of France, within a bordure barred azure and
+argent, supported by the antelopes of the Beaufort family. On either
+side of both statue and shield appear the Plantagenet rose and the
+Tudor portcullis, each surmounted by an Imperial crown (just as we so
+constantly find them in King's College Chapel), and all round is
+sprinkled the Margaret flower, the daisy. The whole forms a beautiful
+piece of composition which makes us regret that more of Fisher's work
+is not left. All the First Court, indeed, is his, but it has been
+altered out of all knowledge. Now its chief feature is the soaring
+mid-Victorian chapel, the largest in Cambridge (except, of course,
+King's), the most pleasing view of which is to be gained from the
+Trinity Backs, where the tower, framed in foliage, exquisitely doubles
+itself on the surface of the river. This ambitious fabric was built by
+Sir Gilbert Scott in the 'sixties; and a line of cement on the lawn of
+the Court alone traces for us the foundations of Fisher's original
+Chapel.
+
+The Hall ranks in size and beauty next to that of Trinity. The most
+interesting of its portraits are those of Lady Margaret, Bishop
+Fisher, and the poet Wordsworth, who was a resident member of the
+College from 1787 to 1791. His rooms, as he tells in "The Prelude,"
+were in the south-western staircase of the "First Court," just above
+the kitchen:
+
+  "The Evangelist St. John my Patron was:
+   Three Gothic Courts are his, and in the first
+   Was my abiding-place, a nook obscure.
+   Right underneath, the College Kitchens made
+   A humming sound, less tuneable than bees,
+   But hardly less industrious, with shrill notes
+   Of sharp command and scolding intermixed."
+
+Wordsworth was not a very contented student. He shared the anarchical
+ideas then floating in the air, and soon to explode in the French
+Revolution. College discipline was eminently distasteful to him, and,
+above all, he detested the obligation to attend the Services in the
+College Chapel (which, indeed, were, in those days, conducted in far
+from ideal fashion).[63] In "The Prelude," he breaks out against them
+in unmeasured terms:
+
+  "Be Folly and False-seeming free to affect
+   Whatever formal gait of Discipline
+   Shall raise them highest in their own esteem:
+   Let them parade amongst the Schools at will,
+   But spare the House of God! Was ever known
+   The witless shepherd who persists to drive
+   A flock that thirsts not to a pool disliked?
+   A weight must surely hang on days begun
+   And ended with such mockery. Be wise,
+   Ye Presidents[64] and Deans, and to your bells
+   Give seasonable rest, for 'tis a sound
+   Hollow as ever vexed the tranquil air;
+   And your officious doings bring disgrace
+   On the plain steeples of our English Church,
+   Whose worship, 'mid remotest village trees
+   Suffers for this."
+
+[Footnote 63: There was no attempt at music, no organ even, anywhere
+save at King's, Trinity, and St. John's, and these three Colleges kept
+between them a choir of six "lay clerks" (elderly for the most part),
+who used to hurry from service to service, as did also the single
+organist employed! And this went on till 1842!]
+
+[Footnote 64: At St. John's, the title of President is given to the
+Vice-master of the College.]
+
+It is interesting to note that these sentiments are echoed, a year or
+two later, from Oxford, by Southey, then also in his youthful paroxysm
+of Revolutionary fervour. He lets himself go in his "Ode to the Chapel
+Bell":
+
+  "O how I hate the sound! It is the knell
+   That still a requiem tolls to Comfort's hour;
+   And loth am I, at Superstition's bell,
+   To quit, or Morpheus', or the Muse's bower.
+   Better to lie and doze than gape amain,
+   Hearing still mumbled o'er the same eternal strain,
+       *       *       *       *       *
+   The snuffling, snaffling Fellow's nasal tone,
+   And Romish rites retained, though Romish faith be flown."
+
+[Illustration: _Hall, St. John's College._]
+
+The Hall of St. John's was the scene of notable Christmas feasting in
+the good old days of academic prosperity. Daily, from Christmas to
+Twelfth Night, boars' heads, turkeys, gargantuan pasties, and cups of
+a peculiarly enticing composition, went the round of the board. After
+the fatal agricultural depression of the 'seventies these hospitable
+doings dwindled more and more, till now they are wholly of the past.
+
+From the Hall we can often obtain permission to ascend to the unique
+glory of St. John's College, the Combination Room, which is
+incomparably finer than any other apartment of the same kind, either
+at Oxford or Cambridge. It is a spacious panelled gallery, running
+east and west, nearly 100 feet in length, lighted by transomed
+windows[65] along the southern side, and with a richly decorated
+plaster ceiling, the work of the same Italian artists who erected the
+fountain in the Great Court of Trinity, just at the time when this
+room was in building. For here we have got beyond Lady Margaret's
+"First" Court. The Combination Room forms the north side of the
+"Second" Court, erected at the very end of the sixteenth century
+(simultaneously with the Great Court of Trinity) by another noble
+benefactress, Lady Mary Cavendish, Countess of Shrewsbury, whose coat
+of arms (Cavendish impaled with Talbot) stands over the western gate.
+
+[Footnote 65: In one of these windows should be noted a portrait of
+Henrietta Maria, the Queen of Charles the First, who was once
+entertained in this apartment.]
+
+This splendid benefaction was intended to be anonymous, as was also
+that which, in the "Third" Court, has given to St. John's yet another
+unique beauty, its exquisite Library, which (like the Combination
+Room) stands at the head, architecturally, of all College libraries,
+whether at Oxford or Cambridge. The benefactor in this case was Dr.
+John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln and Keeper of the Great Seal. His
+initials, as has been already mentioned, may be seen upon the outside
+of the western wall, beside the beautiful oriel window, overlooking
+the river, with which the room terminates, and his escutcheon hangs on
+the eastern wall, inside, over the door. For in his case, too, as in
+that of Lady Mary Cavendish, the secret leaked out before the work was
+finished, and in 1624 the letters I. L. C. S. (denoting Iohannes
+Lincolnensis Custos Sigilli) disclosed to passers-by the donor's
+identity.
+
+The original bookcases of dark oak still project from either wall.
+They have mostly been heightened to make room for more books, but the
+additional shelves have been added not above but at the bottom, so
+that the sloping desks of the old tops still remain, though too high
+to be used; but the pair nearest the door remain at their original
+height. In the panelled end of each shelf may be noticed a tiny
+folding door, which on being opened proves to contain the catalogue,
+in crabbed early seventeenth century writing, of the books which the
+shelf held when first filled. The Library, however, contains nothing
+of any very special interest, its most noteworthy exhibit being an
+edition de luxe of the "Great Bible" issued in 1540 by Royal authority
+under the auspices of Archbishop Cranmer. This was the first English
+Bible authorised to be read in churches, and a copy was ordered to be
+set up in every parish church throughout the realm; the object being
+that every man might have access to it, and read for his own
+edification. He was not, however, allowed to take it home with him,
+and it was usually chained to the reading-desk to prevent this. And,
+as yet, there was no provision for any reading of Scripture in public
+worship, beyond the Epistles and Gospels of the Mass, the "sense"
+(_i.e._ the English) of which each parish priest had long been bound
+to give his congregation every Sunday as best he might.
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel in Second Court of St. John's College._]
+
+This first Authorised Version was founded on the work of Miles
+Coverdale, published five years earlier, with a specially fulsome
+dedication to King Henry the Eighth, who, in consideration of his
+recent breach with the Papacy,[66] is described as "our Moses ... who
+hath brought us out ... from the cruel hands of our spiritual Pharao."
+In this edition (of which we have here a copy printed on vellum, and
+perhaps destined for the King's own hands) this idea is enlarged upon
+in a highly elaborated frontispiece. Henry sits, smiling imperially,
+in the middle of the page, distributing Bibles right and left to all
+sorts and conditions of men--bishops, clergy, monks, nobles, commons,
+artisans, husbandmen, and, notably, prisoners;--while out of every
+mouth proceeds a label bearing the universal acclamation "Vivat Rex,"
+the English equivalent of which, "God save the King," is first found
+in this Version.
+
+[Footnote 66: It need scarcely be pointed out that this breach was not
+made from any Protestant zeal, but only to enable the King to put away
+the wife he was tired of, and marry Anne Boleyn, which the Pope would
+not authorise.]
+
+The main approach to the Library is by a fine stone staircase in the
+north-western corner of the "Second Court;" but access is more
+generally obtained at present by an unpretending doorway in the middle
+of the northern side of the "Third Court." This door opens into the
+lower storey of the Library, which contains nothing of interest except
+a not very inspired statue of Wordsworth. Hence a circular iron stair
+leads up to the Library proper.
+
+The "three Gothic courts," mentioned in Wordsworth's "Prelude" as
+belonging to St. John's, sufficed the College till the reign of George
+the Fourth. When it was then determined to expand, the bold departure
+was taken of erecting the new buildings on the other side of the
+river. Never, before or since, has any other College, either at Oxford
+or Cambridge, done the like; and one could wish that the experiment
+had been made at a period when architecture was at a less debased
+level. It was the period which Sir Walter Scott, in the "Antiquary,"
+has in mind when he says "The Lord deliver me from this Gothic
+generation." But, of that period, the "New Court," as it is called, is
+a favourable specimen, most especially the grated[67] bridge
+connecting it with the main body of the College, which has a really
+graceful span. The idea of this structure was suggested by the Bridge
+of Sighs at Venice, and it is commonly known by that name, which
+provokes unkind comparisons. From it we get good views of the Library
+oriel to the north, and, on the other side, of the older bridge
+belonging to St. John's, three arches in the characteristic Johnian
+style of red brick with stone dressings, built at the end of the
+seventeenth century.
+
+[Footnote 67: The gratings are to prevent any nocturnal escape from
+College. Only one man is ever known to have "squeezed himself betwixt
+the bars."]
+
+The New Court has practically but one side, the ends being very
+slightly returned, running east and west, with a quasi-cupola in the
+centre, surrounded by pinnacles and surmounted by a gilded vane. It is
+hard to believe, but it is quite historical, that one morning (in the
+'sixties) this vane was found to be decked out in the brilliant
+scarlet "blazer"[68] of the College boat club, the perpetrator (who
+was never discovered) having actually scaled the roof by means of one
+of the water-pipes! And it was some time before the resources of
+civilisation in the hands of the College authorities availed to abate
+the outrage.
+
+[Footnote 68: This word, now used of all flannel sporting jackets,
+was, for several decades--till nearly 1880, in fact--confined to the
+fiery coats of the St. John's (or, officially, "Lady Margaret") Boat
+Club. When, about that date, the question of having a "universal
+blazer" was debated by the undergraduates, an elderly clergyman
+protested, in all shocked seriousness, against the "incendiary
+tendencies" of such a notion.]
+
+The New Court, on its southern side, is separated by a traceried
+cloister from the College Backs. On passing through the gate of this
+it is well to bear to the left and walk along the bank of the river,
+here overhung by magnificent elms, and affording a picturesque
+prospect of the Trinity buildings on the other side. The grounds of
+both Colleges to the west of the river are here divided up into a
+series of lawn-tennis courts, and are parted from each other by a
+broad ditch, which runs beneath the boughs of bowery horse-chestnut
+trees. In spring the Trinity bank of this ditch is bright with
+daffodils, the Johnian with narcissus. An iron foot-bridge, common to
+both Colleges, with a gate at either end, gives access from one to the
+other; but we had best continue by the path which skirts the Johnian
+bank. This finally leads out of the College grounds into the Backs
+proper, by a fine iron gate bearing a gilded eagle rising from a
+crown, the crest borne by Lady Margaret.
+
+Before we reach this, we find water on either side of us; that to the
+west being not from the Cam, but a small tributary brooklet which
+joins the river near the Great Bridge. It is here dammed up so as to
+afford space for the College swans to make merry in, and on the
+further side is the Fellows' Garden, known as "the Wilderness." The
+wealth of spring flowers here cultivated--snowdrops, daffodils,
+crocuses, primroses, anemones, and hyacinths--is delicious in a
+country like Cambridgeshire, where Nature supplies their charms with
+very niggardly hand in comparison with the more favoured regions of
+England. Outside the Eagle gate we are close to the entrance of the
+Trinity avenue.
+
+Let us stand once more before the great gate of Trinity. Turning to
+the south, instead of the north as before, we find ourselves in a few
+score yards with the buildings of a College again to the east and west
+of the street at once. This College is commonly known as Caius
+(pronounced Keys), and officially as "Gonville and Caius," after the
+original founder in the fourteenth century, and the benefactor who,
+two hundred years later, so largely developed it as to leave his name
+also attached to the site.[69] The former was a simple parish priest,
+rector of Terrington, on the Norfolk seaboard of the Wash. His little
+college, designated the "College of the Annunciation,"[70] and
+consisting only of a Master and three Fellows, found its original
+quarters hard by Pembroke, with which it was founded simultaneously in
+1347. A few years later, on Gonville's death, his friend and diocesan,
+Bishop Bateman of Norwich, moved it to its present site, next door to
+his own new college, Trinity Hall.
+
+[Footnote 69: The two infant cherubs which (without any heraldic
+authority) act as supporters to the College Shield over the gate of
+the new buildings (those to the east of the street) are popularly
+supposed to be meant for the innocent souls of the two Founders. The
+shield itself (duly granted by the Heralds' College, 1575), comprises
+both their Coats with a blue and silver bordure. That of Dr. Caius is
+curious; two green serpents standing on their tails upon a green stone
+amid flowers of amaranth. This is declared (in the grant) to signify
+"Wisdom stayed upon Virtue and adorned with Immortality"--a
+characteristic Elizabethan "conceit."]
+
+[Footnote 70: It was not till after Gonville's death that it began to
+be called by his name.]
+
+There Gonville Hall, as it was now called, gradually developed, but
+remained a very puny bantling till the reign of Queen Mary, when one
+of its own scholars took upon himself the task of expanding it. His
+name was really Keys, which according to the fashion of the day, was
+transliterated into the Latin equivalent Caius, and he was a
+celebrated doctor of medicine, President of the College of Physicians,
+and himself physician to the Royal household. It was in the interests
+of his favourite study that he refounded the college, which to this
+day has a specially medical tinge. He was also a singularly devout
+man, and the spirit in which he built is exemplified by the three
+gates through which we successively pass in our progress through the
+College. From Trinity-street we enter beneath a narrow, plain,
+low-browed archway, known as the Gate of Humility, and inscribed
+HUMILITATIS.[71] A short avenue of lime-trees (also a part of the
+Founder's design) leads across the small court to a loftier, wider
+portal, over which we may read the word VIRTUTIS. Through this we gain
+another court, and, looking back, we discover that in using the Gate
+of Virtue we have indeed used the Gate of Wisdom; for it bears the
+inscription IO. CAIVS. POSVIT. SAPIENTIAE. And, finally, a small,
+beautifully designed turret, rich with Renaissance figures and
+pilasters, and inscribed HONORIS, covers our exit through the Gate of
+Honour, to which those of Humility, Virtue, and Wisdom have
+successively led us on.
+
+[Footnote 71: The present gateway is not, however, the original one,
+but erected in mid-Victorian days at the same time as the large
+pinnacled gate at the south-east corner of the College, but the humble
+character of the original is fairly reproduced.]
+
+This Gate of Honour is really a wonderful little gem of architecture,
+quite unique in its design, which is due to Dr. Caius himself, though
+the work was not finished till after his death. The turret is an
+oblong mass of stone-work, some twelve feet in width by six in depth,
+rising to a height of about twenty feet, and topped with a singularly
+graceful hexagonal cupola.[72] The view of it, more especially from
+the further side of the Court, whence it groups with the Senate House
+and University library just outside, and with the soaring pinnacles of
+King's College Chapel beyond, is one nowhere to be surpassed. From a
+picturesque point of view no one can regret the absence of the
+somewhat gaudy coats of paint and gilding with which it originally was
+covered; but the result of their removal has been that the stone
+(which is soft, and was never intended to stand exposure to the
+atmosphere) is rapidly decaying.
+
+[Footnote 72: Each side of the hexagon was originally a sun-dial.]
+
+The paved footway into which the Gate of Honour leads is known as
+Senate House Passage,[73] and is still the route along which the
+students of the College pass to receive in the Senate House such
+honours as their University examinations may have entitled them to. It
+forms the southern boundary of the College, which, alone amongst the
+Colleges of Cambridge, is wholly surrounded by public ways,
+Trinity-street being on the east, Trinity-lane on the north, and
+Trinity Hall-lane on the west. The tasteless mass of modern red brick
+(erected 1853) at the north-west angle of the block contains the hall;
+with the kitchens, by an unusual arrangement, beneath. These kitchens
+have an immemorial gastronomic renown in Cambridge, and are credited
+with the possession of culinary secrets enabling them to surpass all
+rival establishments. In some verses written about the end of the
+eighteenth century (concerning a well-known young lady of Cambridge)
+we find this referred to:
+
+  "The sons of culinary Caius,
+   Smoaking from the eternal Treat,
+   Gazed on the Fair with greedy air,
+   As she were something good to eat:
+   Even the sad Kingsman lost his gloom awhile,
+   And forced a melancholy smile.[74]
+
+[Footnote 73: "Passage" is the local name applied to the many paved
+footways which intersect Cambridge. They are forbidden ground to
+vehicles, including bicycles, a prohibition which constantly brings
+undergraduates before the Police Court.]
+
+[Footnote 74: At this date King's was a highly conservative College,
+and its discipline strict with a strictness long discarded by the
+University at large.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Gate of Honour, Caius College._]
+
+Dr. Caius himself became the first Master of his new College, a post
+which he accepted with a reluctance which proved only too well
+justified, for he himself was a devout and pious man of the old
+school, and wholly out of sympathy with the militant Protestantism
+which was then fast becoming the dominating spirit at Cambridge, as in
+England generally. He has left in writing his lamentation over the sad
+depletion of the University which was the first result of the
+Reformation.[75] The wholesale destruction of ancient works of
+art--beautifully illuminated service books, and elaborately
+embroidered vestments--by which the votaries of the new religion
+sought at once to express their loathing of the older faith and to
+make its revival the harder, did but recall to him the like policy
+pursued by the Pagan antagonists of Jehovah in the days of the
+Maccabees. And he did what in him lay to stem the tide, rescuing here
+a Missal and there a Chasuble from the iconoclasts, till he had
+accumulated in his Lodge quite a little store of these sacred objects.
+But the times were too hard for him. He was denounced as a
+reactionary, a sympathiser with Popery; a riot broke out among the
+College students; the Lodge was stormed; the Papistical relics thrown
+out of the window and burnt in the midst of the Court;[76] whilst the
+Master and Founder himself was expelled from his own College and (as
+he had spent upon it all he had) ended his days in penury and exile.
+He was, however, allowed a grave in the chapel, which bears the
+touching inscription FUI CAIUS ("I _was_ Caius").
+
+[Footnote 75: "To the Universities," Froude (our most ardent
+Protestant historian) tells us, in his _History of England_, "the
+Reformation brought with it desolation.... They were called Stables of
+Asses--Schools of the Devil.... The Government cancelled the
+exhibitions which had been granted for the support of poor Scholars.
+They suppressed the Professorships and Lectureships--Degrees were held
+anti-Christian. Learning was no necessary adjunct to a creed which
+'lay in a nutshell.' ... College Libraries were plundered and burnt.
+The Divinity Schools at Oxford were planted with cabbages, and the
+laundresses dried clothes in the School of Arts."
+
+At Cambridge Dr. Caius gives a long list of University Hostels,
+filled, within his memory, by zealous students, which, when he wrote
+had become wholly deserted and taken possession of by the townsfolk.]
+
+[Footnote 76: The pillage was actually presided over by the
+Vice-Chancellor of the University, Dr. Whitgift, Master of Trinity,
+whose Protestant zeal raised him later to the Archbishopric of
+Canterbury.]
+
+The undergraduates of Caius wear a gown of a singular and not very
+pleasing violet hue with velvet trimmings. The College "colours" are
+light blue and black; the former, which is, as all know, the
+University colour, having been granted them to use, in memory of a
+famous race, in the early days of College boating, seventy years ago,
+when their crew beat the University Eight. It is, of course, an
+axiomatic rule of sportsmanship that no Club may assume the insignia
+of another (or any colourable imitation thereof), without leave from
+the previous users. The earliest "Light Blues" were the Eton Boat
+Club, by whose permission the Cambridge Boat Club took the colour. The
+Cricket Clubs, at both Eton and Cambridge, were then permitted to use
+it, and now this permission has been extended to all engaged as
+champions of the University, at athletics, football, etc.
+
+The Senate House, to the entrance of which the Gate of Honour has
+brought us, is the nerve-centre of the University. Here are held,
+usually on each Thursday during Term, the meetings ("Congregations" is
+the official word) of that august body the "Senate," to whose vote all
+University legislation must ultimately be submitted. This body,
+however, consisting as it does of all who have attained the Degree of
+Master of Arts, several thousands in number, is far too large to
+initiate that legislation. This is done by a small elected General
+Committee, the "Council," and by special Committees (or "Syndicates")
+dealing with the various special subjects to be considered. Both
+Council and Syndicates also act as executive authorities, and by them
+"Graces" embodying this or that proposal are from time to time laid
+before the Senate. The Grace is read aloud by one of the Proctors, in
+his robes of office, standing beside the Chair, which is occupied by
+the Vice-Chancellor.[77] The benches are tenanted by such members of
+the Senate as care to be present.[78] There is no discussion;[79] but,
+on the Grace being read, any member may utter the words "Non Placet,"
+whereupon the Proctor cries "Ad scrutinium," and the congregation
+divides; the "Placets," (or "Ayes" as they would be called in
+Parliament), moving to the right of the Chair, and the "Non-Placets"
+to the left. Should this grouping not sufficiently disclose the sense
+of the meeting, a poll is held; each member's vote being given
+publicly by writing, on an official form, avouched by his signature.
+These papers are then counted by the Proctors, and their respective
+numbers read out by the Vice-Chancellor.
+
+[Footnote 77: This officer is the acting Head of the University, and
+is appointed by the Council from amongst the Heads of the Colleges,
+usually by rota, year by year. The Chancellor, whom he represents, is
+always some specially distinguished notability, and is appointed for
+life. He is only present on state occasions.]
+
+[Footnote 78: Members are often able to introduce ladies, when there
+is likely to be room for them. And undergraduates may listen to
+proceedings from the Galleries, where, in defiance of rule, they are
+often heard as well as seen, should the business be exciting.]
+
+[Footnote 79: Such discussion as may seem needful has already taken
+place before a Meeting of the resident Members of the Senate, who have
+spent at least forty nights in Cambridge during the last Academic
+year, and whose names are accordingly on the "Electoral Roll." They
+are summoned, as required, by the Vice-Chancellor, to discuss the
+various matters which it is proposed to embody in "Graces."]
+
+These numbers are usually but small; indeed most of the business is
+altogether unopposed. But when some subject which excites general
+interest is brought forward, "backwoods-men" flock (and are whipped)
+up from all parts of England. Macaulay has given us a humorous poem on
+the coach-loads of country clergy thus pitch-forked into Cambridge to
+vote against the admission of Roman Catholics to the University; and
+within the last few decades, similar scenes were witnessed in
+connection with the question of their being allowed a recognised
+Public Hostel of their own, and with those of Compulsory Greek, and of
+granting Degrees to women.
+
+Such is the procedure at the Senate House; or, rather, such it has
+hitherto been, for the whole question of University legislation is
+even now in the melting-pot. The use of the building for the chief
+University examinations is also dying or dead, now that a vast
+"Examination Hall" has been built for that purpose. But Degrees still
+continue to be conferred there; the students found worthy by the
+examiners successively kneeling before the Vice-Chancellor, and being
+admitted by him to their degree in the name of the Trinity. They are
+presented by the "Fathers" of their respective Colleges, in a
+recognised order, beginning with the Royal Foundations, King's always
+coming first and Trinity second. When the Degree of Doctor ("Honoris
+causa") is conferred on any distinguished visitors, the place is
+thronged, and each in turn is introduced with a laudatory Latin speech
+by the "Public Orator," who has to exert his ingenuity in composing
+some neat and appropriate epigrammatic remark about him.[80]
+
+[Footnote 80: The office thus requires no mean scholarly and
+oratorical powers. When Queen Elizabeth visited Cambridge, the Public
+Orator had to make her a laudatory address of half an hour in
+duration, without notes, "with the Queen's horse curvetting under her"
+(for this was not in the Senate House--yet unbuilt--but in the open
+air before King's College Chapel), and with constant mock-modest
+interruptions from her Royal lips. Her only thanks were a commendation
+of his excellent memory.]
+
+The Senate House is a stately classical building, running east and
+west, erected in the early decades of the eighteenth century. Up to
+that date the functions which it now discharges were served partly by
+the old Schools (now the University Library), which have been already
+spoken of, and which adjoin it on the west, and partly by the
+University Church (called here, as at Oxford, "Great St. Mary's"),
+which stands hard by to the east. The legislative meetings of the
+Senate were held in the former,[81] the Degrees were conferred, and
+other gatherings held, in the latter.
+
+[Footnote 81: One apartment was called the Regent House, as being thus
+used by the Governing Body of the University.]
+
+This was all very well before the Reformation, whilst reverence for
+consecrated places still held its own; but, after that great
+convulsion, the proceedings too frequently were markedly
+unecclesiastical in tone. The conferring of Degrees was originally a
+solemn function beginning with High Mass, and continuing with a
+serious _viva voce_ exercise of the candidates in the presence of the
+Vice-Chancellor. But when the Reformation had made it fashionable to
+show a healthy Protestant contempt for the old Catholic superstitions,
+the whole ceremony was deliberately turned into a farce. The
+questioning of the candidates was no longer done by grave University
+officials, but by an "old" (_i.e._ a senior) Bachelor, who sat upon a
+three-legged stool, and made his interrogations as profane and
+scurrilous as possible. He was known, from his stool, as "Mr. Tripos,"
+and so essential a part of the proceedings did he become that "Tripos"
+got to be (as it still is) the regular name for an "Honour"
+examination at Cambridge. To judge by the few that have come down to
+us, the jokes current on these occasions were poor to the last degree.
+Thus, in 1657, we read that two Oxonians, got up as hobby-horses,
+presented themselves, giving as their qualification that they "had
+smith's work at their digits' ends," (Smith being a then current
+writer of school books). They were duly admitted, on the ground that
+"such _equitation_ gave them an _equitable_ claim!" And all this was
+in the church; where, indeed, far less innocent performances were
+constantly given, including stage-plays and recitations in which the
+most solemn mysteries of the Catholic Faith were often travestied and
+held up to ridicule.[82]
+
+[Footnote 82: As Protestantism lost its first militant fervour, these
+performances more and more dropped their polemical features. But they
+still remained most inappropriate for a place of worship. We have seen
+how the higher minds of the University, such as Dr. Barrow, felt about
+them before the seventeenth century came to an end. (See p. 104.)]
+
+The church which was thus so long profaned is of late Perpendicular
+architecture. Huge galleries have been inserted for the accommodation
+of such undergraduates as may attend; the nave being appropriated to
+the Master of Arts. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
+the east end was filled with tier above tier of semicircular benches
+for the seniors of the University, from whose prevailingly bald heads
+this elevation became profanely known as "Golgotha." All is now
+arranged in decent fashion, and since the building of the Senate House
+the church has only been used for strictly ecclesiastical purposes.
+Here each Sunday afternoon is preached the "University Sermon," the
+preacher being some clergyman selected by the Council of the Senate.
+No service is held in connection with this sermon, but the preacher,
+before commencing, reads from the pulpit what is known as the "Bidding
+Prayer"--a long list of subjects for intercession, comprising the
+various authorities in Church and State, the Clergy, and (as the
+source of their supply) the Universities and Colleges. Amongst these
+"as in private duty bound" the preacher specifically names the College
+to which he himself belongs, finally concluding with the Lord's
+Prayer.[83] The sermon is officially attended by the Vice-Chancellor
+and Proctors, who gather in the Senate House and cross the street in
+procession to the West door of the church. One of the Proctors carries
+the University Bible, a ponderous tome suspended by a chain; and in
+front is borne the silver mace of the University, by an official
+designated the "Esquire Bedell."
+
+[Footnote 83: On the Sunday after All Saints' Day, when the "Lady
+Margaret Preacher," appointed by the Vice-Chancellor, officiates, he
+begins by reading the long roll of benefactors to the University from
+the earliest times; in itself a specially inspiring predication.]
+
+The church has witnessed various vicissitudes of doctrine. Here,
+during the first outbreak of Protestantism, the Missal was solemnly
+torn up and burnt amid the hooting of the crowd; and when, a century
+later, the Puritans gained the ascendancy, a like fate befell the Book
+of Common Prayer, Cromwell himself presiding at the ceremony. This was
+on Good Friday, 1643, when the Vice-Chancellor and several other Heads
+of Colleges were, for refusing to abet the proceeding, shut up in the
+church "all the long cold night, without fire or candle." They were
+afterwards haled to London, and, after being pelted through the City,
+were subjected to a sort of Black Hole treatment, under hatches on
+board a hulk in the river, with all port-holes closed, and no air
+"save such as they could suck from each others' breaths," as the
+"Querela Cantabrigiensis" piteously complains.
+
+Till lately the tower of Great St. Mary's was a historical record of
+the stirring scenes amid which it arose, for it was slowly built
+during the course of no fewer than 120 years, being begun in the last
+decade of the fifteenth century and finished in the first of the
+seventeenth. Thus the lower stages were of Perpendicular Gothic, the
+higher of Renaissance style. Unhappily the Victorian restorers took it
+in hand, and rebuilt the top as, in their view, it would have been
+built had it been completed without this long delay, so that all
+historical interest is now lost. It contains a fine peal of twelve
+bells, on which sound the famous chimes composed in 1790 by Dr.
+Jowett,[84] tutor of Trinity Hall, which, since their adoption in the
+Westminster clock tower, have spread so widely throughout the country
+and the Empire. Their cadences are:
+
+  1st Quarter 1236
+  2nd  "      3126, 3213
+  3rd  "      1326, 6213, 1236
+  4th  "      3126, 3213, 1326, 6213
+
+[Footnote 84: It is hard upon Dr. Jowett that his name should have
+come down to posterity associated, not with this real contribution to
+the gladness of the world, but with a satirical quatrain on the tiny
+plot which he reclaimed from the street in the angle of Trinity Hall
+adjoining Clare:
+
+  "A little garden little Jowett made,
+   And fenced it with a little palisade;
+   And would you know the mind of little Jowett,
+   This little garden will a little show it."]
+
+The hour is struck on the tenor bell. These bells are of eighteenth
+century date: two more have been added since.
+
+[Illustration: _Peas Hill._]
+
+Great St. Mary's, for all its University connection, still remains
+what it was before the University came into being, a Parish Church;
+its Parish consisting of the Market Place, which opens out to the east
+of it, and is called locally "Market Hill." Whence this curious use of
+the latter word arose is not known, but it is immemorial at Cambridge
+for any expansion of a street into something wider. Besides Market
+Hill, there are the smaller spaces of Peas Hill and St. Andrew's Hill.
+All are utterly flat; yet, so potent is the word in the imagination of
+the Cambridge townsfolk, that such expressions as "I wonder the Hill
+don't fall down upon you" may be overheard in market disputes. Market
+Hill is not very large for its purpose even now; but till the
+nineteenth century it was much smaller, with more than one range of
+houses encumbering its area. On the southern side stands the
+Guildhall, a far from imposing structure, and in the centre rises the
+fountain supplied by the water of Hobson's Conduit, as described in
+our first chapter. The present structure was erected in 1855, the
+earlier one (put up in 1614) being then removed to its present
+position at the junction of Lensfield Road and Trumpington Road.[85]
+
+[Footnote 85: There was a fountain here, however, long before Hobson's
+day--at least as early as the fourteenth century--but whence the water
+came is not known. If, as seems probable, it was a natural spring, its
+existence was probably the factor which originally determined the site
+of the Market.]
+
+Like the University Church, the Market Place has witnessed many
+stirring scenes. Here, in the fierce but short-lived Socialistic
+outbreak which we commonly associate with the name of Wat Tyler, when
+dreams were afloat of melting down all existing distinctions into one
+great _Magna Societas_, which should redress all wrongs and make all
+men equal in all things, a mighty bonfire was made by the insurgent
+peasantry of all the books and documents which could be looted from
+the University Chest in Great St. Mary's, and from the various
+Colleges and Hostels then existing. The Mayor of Cambridge was
+compelled to give the sanction of his presence to the deed; and
+finally the ashes were scattered to the winds, with the cry: "Away
+with the skill of the clerks! Away with it!"
+
+Two centuries later, in 1555, the Hill saw another burning, of a more
+gruesome character. The Catholic reaction under Queen Mary was then in
+full swing; and it was determined to visit with the extreme penalty of
+the laws against heresy the corpses of two notable pioneers of the
+Reformation, Dr. Bucer and Dr. Fagius. Both were amongst the band of
+German Protestants who, under King Edward the Sixth, flocked over to
+disseminate the new Religion in England, and both had died while
+promulgating their tenets at Cambridge. They were now torn from their
+graves, and chained, in their coffins, to the stake, the pyre which
+incinerated them being chiefly composed of their own condemned books.
+
+Within the last decade two other notable conflagrations have here been
+kindled. When Lord Kitchener, then Sirdar of Egypt, and fresh from his
+victories over the Mahdi, visited Cambridge to receive an Honorary
+Degree, his presence amongst us was greeted by the wildest orgies. A
+huge bonfire was kindled on the Hill, the pile ultimately stretching
+diagonally across almost the entire area, and fed with ever fresh
+supplies of wood, for which the whole town was scoured. Railings were
+torn up wholesale (notably, as has been said, in the Backs), shutters
+were wrenched from shop windows, and even doors from houses; while
+hoardings, gates, and tradesmen's barrows were seized and devoted to
+the flames. Like scenes, a few years later, on a somewhat smaller
+scale, celebrated the relief of Ladysmith in the Boer War.
+
+These riotous proceedings were the work of the wilder spirits of
+University and Town alike. But in the earlier part of the Nineteenth
+Century many a fierce collision between Town and Gown took place on
+the Hill. The Fifth of November was the annual occasion consecrated by
+custom to these conflicts. Bands of undergraduates paraded the streets
+shouting "Gown! Gown!" while bands of the fiercer element amongst the
+townsfolk did the like, to the cry of "Town! Town!" Fights were thus
+frequent, in spite of the efforts of the authorities, both Civic and
+Academic. Gownsmen took to flight at the appearance of the Proctors
+and their "Bulldogs,"[86] but it was to re-form elsewhere, and few
+were actually caught. The Police, when they came into existence, in
+the early 'forties, were more formidable. They invariably took the
+side of the Town,[87] and it was due to them that the "Fifth" became
+less and less pugilistic, till it is now only a memory. Fisticuffs
+were all very well, but batons made the fun not good enough.
+
+[Footnote 86: This is the name bestowed on the stalwart officials a
+couple of whom attend each Proctor and exercise such physical coercion
+of delinquents as he may bid.]
+
+[Footnote 87: One specially remembered conflict, when Rose Crescent
+was held by the Gown against an overwhelming force, till a police
+charge drove them in headlong rout to take refuge in Trinity, was made
+the subject of a parody of Macaulay's Horatius, to be found in Clark's
+_Guide to Cambridge_.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+     Round Church.--Union Society.--The "Great Bridge,"
+     Hithe.--=Magdalene College=, Buckingham College, Pepys, Charles
+     Kingsley, the "College Window," Master's Garden.--Castle Hill,
+     Camboritum, Cromwell's Rampart, Repulse of Charles I, the
+     "Borough," View from Castle.--St. Peter's Church.--"School of
+     Pythagoras."--Westminster College.--Ridley Hall.--=Newnham
+     College.=--=Selwyn College.=--Convent of St. Radegund, Bishop
+     Alcock.--Midsummer Common.--Boat Houses, Bumping Races.--=Jesus
+     College=, "Chimney," Cloisters, Chapter House, Chapel, Cranmer,
+     Coleridge.
+
+
+Starting once more from the Great Gate of Trinity and turning
+northwards past St. John's we soon reach the "Via Devana," the old
+Roman road which, as has been said, is the backbone of Cambridge,
+traversing the town, under various names, from end to end. At this
+point of its course it is called Bridge-street. Opposite to us, as we
+enter it, rises one of the most distinctive buildings of Cambridge,
+the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, popularly known as "the Round
+Church." Its strange shape is an echo of the Crusading period, during
+the whole of which such reproductions of the famous church of the Holy
+Sepulchre at Jerusalem, the deliverance of which from the Turks was
+the Crusaders' dream, were erected in various parts of England.
+Earliest in date comes the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at
+Northampton, built at the very beginning of the twelfth century, in
+the opening fervour of the first Crusade, which has also given us the
+beautiful old chapel of Ludlow Castle (now in ruins) and this church
+in Cambridge. The gallant but fruitless effort of Richard Coeur de
+Lion to retrieve the disastrous loss of Jerusalem is commemorated by
+the Temple Church in London, completed at the very close of that
+century; while the yet more fruitless endeavours of Edward the First,
+a century later again, in the last expiring flash of Crusading zeal,
+inspired the latest of our English Round Churches, that of Maplestead
+in Essex. In all these churches the reproduction of their original is
+of a very modified character.
+
+So it is with our Cambridge example. It consists, indeed, (or, rather
+originally consisted) of a circular nave surrounded by an ambulatory,
+like its Jerusalem prototype, and _may_, like it, have had a domed
+roof, though this is scarcely probable. But there the likeness must
+always have ended; and the structure has, in later days, been altered
+and re-altered time after time. At first there was probably a small
+semicircular eastern apse, which within a century gave place to an
+Early English chancel. This, in turn, was superseded by the present
+chancel with its aisles, built in the fifteenth century, when an
+octagonal bell-tower was also erected over the nave. Finally, in 1841,
+the newly-formed "Camden Society" for the restoration of ancient
+churches was permitted to work its will upon this one, and proceeded
+to reconstruct it in accordance with what they imagined ought to have
+been the design of its first builders.[88] And this imaginary ideal,
+with its pointed roof and tiny Norman windows, is all that we now see.
+Nevertheless, the sight, more especially inside, is impressive in no
+small degree.
+
+[Footnote 88: This design included the undoubted feature of a stone
+altar, the setting up of which gave occasion, after much litigation,
+for the promulgation of the well-known Judgment, which declares that
+in the Church of England the Law permits only a movable wooden table.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Church of the Holy Sepulchre._]
+
+Behind the Round Church rise the sumptuous rooms of the "Union[89]
+Society," a University club primarily instituted as an association for
+the cultivation of oratory amongst undergraduates, which has now added
+to its central debating hall a library, dining-room, smoking-room, and
+the other adjuncts of a first-class club. Here, on each Tuesday
+evening during Term, debates are held, usually on current political or
+social situations, theological polemics being strictly barred. When
+the Society was first instituted, in the early decades of the
+nineteenth century, current politics were also prohibited (by the
+University authorities), and could only be discussed under a decent
+veil of reference to antiquity. But the comparative merits of the
+causes championed by Caesar and Pompey, or by the Cavaliers and
+Roundheads, were so easily made to apply to the burning questions of
+the day, that the prohibition speedily become obsolete. Many a
+well-known Parliamentary orator has won his first fame on the benches
+of the Union, Lord Macaulay being a notable example. His perfervid
+outpourings here swept away all opposition, and his friend and
+contemporary, Mackworth Praed, records how the issue of any debate is
+irrevocably decided--
+
+      "When the Favourite comes,
+       With his trumpets and drums,
+  And his arms, and his metaphors, crossed."
+
+[Footnote 89: So called because in union with the twin Society at
+Oxford; members of each having, _ipso facto_, all the privileges of
+membership in the other.]
+
+Leaving the Round Church behind us, and proceeding westwards, we pass
+the Church of St. Clement, with its inscription DEUM COLE ("Worship
+God"), which has nothing to detain us, and shortly arrive at "the
+Great Bridge,"[90] that famous passage of the river to which the town
+owes its name and its very existence. It can never have been an
+imposing structure, in spite of its high-sounding title, and is now
+represented by an exceedingly commonplace iron span. But, as the only
+passage of the Cam approachable by an army, in fore-drainage days, for
+many a long mile, it was of old a strategic point of first-class
+importance, and more than once played a notable part in English
+history. Its possession by the anti-monarchical forces shattered the
+last efforts both of King John and of Charles the First, and brought
+about, as we shall see, the speedy ruin and death of the former.
+
+[Footnote 90: So called to distinguish it from the smaller town
+bridges by Newnham Mill and Garret Hostel.]
+
+To the North of the Bridge, and on the Eastern bank of the River, is
+the last of the many "Hithes" (or Quays), of which we read so much in
+connection with old Cambridge, remaining in actual use for traffic.
+Here we may to this day see exemplified the ancient local proverb,
+"Here water kindleth fire;" for barges loaded with fire-wood and turf
+from the fens still discharge their cargoes at this spot.
+
+The old name of the Great Bridge has, for at least a century,[91] been
+commonly superseded by the appellation of "Magdalene Bridge," which
+provokes singularly humiliating comparisons with the beautiful
+structure bearing that name at Oxford. In both cases it is derived
+from the adjoining College of St. Mary Magdalene (spelt, by a mere
+freak, at Oxford without the final e). Our College, however, is of a
+sadly lower grade than that at Oxford, with its ideal tower, and its
+beautiful chapel, and its grey cloisters, and its green "Walks" beside
+the Cherwell. Here we have but little beauty, and no very great
+historical interest. The College was first founded, in the middle of
+the fifteenth century, for the benefit of Benedictine students. It
+belonged to the great Abbey of Crowland, in the Huntingdonshire
+Fenland (though Ely, and other neighbouring Benedictine Houses, took
+part in the building), and was called Buckingham College, from its
+first special benefactor, Henry Stafford, the second Duke of
+Buckingham. At the suppression of the Abbeys, this College, like all
+other monastic property, was confiscated by King Henry the Eighth, who
+granted it to his favourite, Thomas Audley, Lord Chancellor. By him it
+was re-founded under its present name, and the nomination of the
+Master continues, even to this day, to be vested in his descendants.
+The existing representative of his family is Lord Braybrooke;[92] the
+name of whose seat, at Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex,
+records the fact that the whole property of the Benedictine Abbey of
+Walden was also granted to Lord Chancellor Audley. This Abbey had
+shared in the building of Buckingham College.
+
+[Footnote 91: We find "Magdalene Bridge" in Wordsworth's "Prelude."]
+
+[Footnote 92: Over the entrance gateway may be seen the arms of Lord
+Braybrooke's family, the Nevilles. These are also the arms of the
+College.]
+
+The beginnings of the re-founded College were on a very small scale,
+with only a single College servant (who acted as cook). Even forty
+years later this number, as Dr. Caius tells us, had only increased to
+three. To this day, indeed, Magdalene remains a small and select
+College. It consists of a single Court, representing Buckingham
+College, and the further side only of a second Court beyond. This
+isolated side, an admirable arcade, built at the close of the
+seventeenth century, contains the special treasure of the College, the
+collection of books bequeathed to it by the famous diarist, Samuel
+Pepys. This remains, as he himself arranged it, in twelve oaken
+"presses" with glass doors; the books on each shelf being brought to a
+common top level by appropriately graduated blocks of wood (shaped in
+imitation of their backs) inserted under each. The Library is on view
+on Tuesdays and Thursdays during Full Term, from 11.30 to 1 o'clock.
+Over the door is the Pepys motto: _Mens cujusque is est quisque._
+("Each man's mind is his very Self.")
+
+Pepys had been a student here, and his portrait, by Lely, hangs in the
+Hall. So does that of another distinguished Magdalene man, Charles
+Kingsley, who was in residence 1839 to 1842. College tradition still
+records how he used surreptitiously to climb out of the College in the
+very early summer mornings, to be off on one of those piscatorial
+excursions which he so dearly loved. Another well-known writer
+connected with Magdalene is Mr. A. C. Benson, whose "College Window"
+was in the ground floor of the Pepysian Library range, on the North
+side, looking into the gardens of the Master's Lodge. In these gardens
+is a high terraced walk, beneath an old wall. Both terrace and wall
+are supposed to be connected with the ancient defences of Cambridge,
+but this is not proven.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Peter's Church._]
+
+We have, however, now come to the region where those defences did
+actually exist. For beyond this wall to the West rises the steep
+slope, partly natural and partly artificial, of the "Castle Hill,"
+towering into the great mound on which stood the Norman Keep. This was
+built by William the Conqueror; but long before his day the site,
+defensible by nature, and commanding the all-important passage of the
+river, had been utilised for military purposes. Here, probably, was a
+British post, the _Cam-Rhydd_ or "Ford of the Cam," which became the
+Roman Camboritum.[93] Here Oliver Cromwell, as commander over the
+forces of the "Associated Counties,"[94] set up fortifications which
+baffled the gallant effort to retrieve his fallen fortunes made by
+Charles the First after the fatal battle of Naseby. Having there left
+his matchless infantry, "lying with their pikes charged every way as
+when they lived," the unfortunate monarch, with the remains of his
+cavalry, broke through the network of the enemies' squadrons in full
+pursuit "like hounds after a fresh stag," and made a dash for the
+Eastern Counties, "where he had a party forming." Huntingdon he took
+by surprise, and "twice affronted the lines of Cambridge." But these
+were too strong to be rushed by horse-soldiers, and, as there was no
+other passage over the Cam, he had to retire, finally evading his
+pursuers, and making his way safely to Oxford, with all the loot
+acquired in this raid, "six waggons loaded with money, two thousand
+horses, and three thousand head of cattle." And the remembrance of
+Anglo-Saxon lines of defence round the site is perpetuated in the name
+"Borough," which still clings to it.
+
+[Footnote 93: In spite of the enticing similarity of sound, it is
+fairly established that the word Camboritum is not the parent of the
+word Cambridge. In mediaeval times we only read of "Granta-bridge."]
+
+[Footnote 94: These were Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambs, Hunts, Beds
+and Herts, which combined to raise a common force (on the
+Parliamentary side).]
+
+Many antiquarians, indeed, hold that the Cambridge of early days
+(anyhow down to the ninth century) was wholly confined to this small
+area, some quarter of a mile square, and that the extension of the
+town across the river was due to the expulsion of the inhabitants by
+Danish and Norman intruders. Be that as it may, we are here
+undoubtedly in the earliest Cambridge. The Castle has gradually passed
+away, till no ruins, even, are now left. Its modern representative,
+the County Court-house, where the Assizes are held, and the County
+Gaol, stand at the western foot of the great mound, whereon the Norman
+Keep no longer rises. From the summit is to be obtained a delightful
+view of Cambridge, with the "green-muffled" ring of the Backs, and the
+grey inner ring of the river-side Colleges, dominated by King's
+College Chapel, girding in the western flank of the Town, and starting
+almost from our feet; the long line of the East Anglian heights
+bounding our southern and eastern prospect; and to the north the
+"boundless plain," with the towers of Ely on the far horizon.
+
+Close below us, and really at our very feet, rise the two churches of
+this earliest Cambridge, that of St. Giles, now merely a handsome
+modern edifice of imposing size, and that of St. Peter, also modern in
+its present form, but embodying some ancient features. It is the
+smallest church in Cambridge, only thirty-five feet in length by
+fifteen in width, being the reconstructed fragment of a larger
+structure built in the twelfth century, and pulled down in the
+eighteenth, when the Parish was united to that of St. Giles. It
+contains a fine late Norman font, with grotesque figures at each
+corner--two-tailed Mer-men, each grasping his tails in either hand. At
+one time the Borough had yet a third church, "All Hallows by the
+Castle" (so called to distinguish it from "All Hallows in the Jewry"),
+but this has wholly disappeared, Parish and all.
+
+[Illustration: _Remains of St. Radegund's Priory._]
+
+Beyond the spire of St. Peter's, as seen from the top of Castle Hill,
+may be distinguished a small mediaeval building, known, for some
+forgotten reason, by the high-sounding title of "the School of
+Pythagoras." This lies just off the street to the eastward, at the
+point where this ceases to be a street, and merges into the open road
+that runs along the Backs. It is worth seeking out, for it is a
+picturesque little edifice, and an interesting example of a
+twelfth-century house built of stone. Wood, or, at the best, brick,
+were the materials then commonly used. In spite of the name, there is
+no reason to suppose that it was ever used for scholastic purposes, or
+anything more than a mere private dwelling-house. But Walter de
+Merton, the founder of Merton College, Oxford, actually acquired land
+hereabouts, apparently with some idea of starting a sister
+establishment at Cambridge. This land still belongs to Merton.
+
+The great red brick and white stone edifice opposite the entrance to
+the School of Pythagoras is "Westminster College," wherein candidates
+for the Presbyterian ministry go through their theological course,
+after completing their secular studies at the University. A like
+institution for Anglicans, built in like style (which, indeed, is all
+but universal in modern academic work), is Ridley Hall, at the other
+end of the Backs. Neither of these is recognised by the University as
+anything more than a private lodging-house, nor is the similar (but
+much smaller) Roman Catholic seminary of Edmundhouse, on the slope
+above Westminster College.
+
+The same non-recognition extends to the great Ladies' College of
+Newnham, which flings out its widespread "halls" over a lavish space
+adjoining Ridley. The grand bronze entrance gates to these "vestal
+precincts," inscribed with the name of the first Principal of the
+College, Miss Anne Jemima Clough (sister to the poet Arthur Clough)
+are hard by the more modest entrance to Ridley, and admit the visitor
+to a scene which reminds us of those in Tennyson's "Princess." And
+there are almost as many maidens here as he has assigned to his
+imaginary College, for Newnham is surpassed in the number of its
+students by Trinity only. Each has her own room, in which the bed
+becomes by day a sofa. Each is assigned to one of the "Halls," which
+in many respects are treated as separate entities, but all share the
+common collegiate life. There is, however, no chapel, for Newnham is
+most strictly undenominational. Students are, of course, free to
+attend any place of worship they may prefer, the preference being
+largely given to King's College Chapel. Hence a French traveller, who
+came over to study Women's Education in England, is said to have
+answered when asked on his return what religion was professed at
+Newnham: "Mostly, I think, the King's religion."
+
+[Illustration: _Jesus College Gateway._]
+
+The other Ladies' College, at Girton, has got a chapel, where the
+Church of England services are performed. This is the oldest of all
+the ladies' colleges connected with Oxford or Cambridge, and hence
+comes its position no less than two miles to the west of Castle Hill;
+for when the idea was first started, the close proximity of young men
+was deprecated almost in the trenchant spirit of Princess Ida. The
+very first start, indeed, was made (in 1869) no less than thirty miles
+away, at Hitchin, and only when this was found intolerable did the
+pioneers move (in 1872) to Girton.[95] There the beautiful grounds and
+splendid range of buildings give an impression of space rivalling
+Newnham; but the College is not nearly so large, and is somewhat more
+select. Here each student has a sitting-room as well as a bedroom,
+after the fashion of the men's Colleges.
+
+[Footnote 95: Newnham is just younger, having been opened 1875. It
+then consisted of one Hall only.]
+
+Immediately to the north of Newnham is Selwyn College, a
+denominational institution belonging to the Church of England,
+corresponding to Keble College at Oxford, and, like it, recognised by
+the University, not indeed as a College, but as a "Public Hostel,"
+whose undergraduates are not mere "non-collegiate students." Such
+"unattached" students are under a "Censor" and a special syndicate,
+and have a centre in the "Fitzwilliam Hall" (close to the museum of
+that name), where they have to report themselves daily.
+
+[Illustration: _The Back Court, Jesus College._]
+
+Looking eastwards from the Castle Hill, we see a wide, open green
+stretching from the further bank of the river, and beyond it a low
+church tower rising amid trees. This is the tower of Jesus College
+Chapel, once the Priory Church of St. Radegund. This lady was a
+Frankish queen of the sixth century, and a friend of the poet
+Venantius, the author of the well-known hymns _Vexilla Regis_ and
+_Pange Lingua_. Under her dedication a Benedictine nunnery was founded
+here at the beginning of the eleventh century. It was never a large or
+wealthy institution, but continued to flourish for four hundred years
+and more. In 1455 its account books, still preserved among the
+archives of Jesus College, show an income of L70 per annum, equivalent
+in purchasing power to some L1,200 at the present value of money.
+Every Benedictine nun ranked socially as a gentlewoman, so that this
+income needed careful administration to make it suffice for the nine
+or ten sisters in residence. The Convent, however, was at this date
+quite solvent, but in less than twenty years a single incapable
+Prioress had run it deep in debt. The butcher's bill alone then
+amounted to L21 (equivalent to over L350), and, having no cash to pay
+withal, the nuns were taking two of his daughters free amongst the
+boarders whom they educated. They were also alienating their capital,
+so that the income was rapidly dwindling. In 1481 it had decreased by
+more than 50 per cent., and was only L30. The next Prioress was a
+strong and capable ruler, imposed upon the convent by the Bishop of
+the Diocese, who was its Visitor. But things had gone too far, and, in
+spite of her efforts, the place dwindled away. By 1496 there were only
+two nuns left, and, under Royal license, the convent was turned into
+"Jesus College" by the same Visitor. His name was Alcock, so his coat
+of arms bore three cocks' heads, with yet another cock for crest. This
+device confronts us at every turn in our passage through the College.
+
+[Illustration: _Jesus College Chapel, East End._]
+
+To reach it from Castle Hill, the most pleasant way is by descending
+the street, and turning to the left past St. Giles' Church. This road
+will soon bring us to the river, at a lock, where we cross by an iron
+foot-bridge. We are now on the open Green we saw from above, which is
+known as "Midsummer Common," from the great fair held there at that
+season. As we make our way over it, we see to our left along the river
+bank the long white boathouses[96] of the various colleges; for it is
+not till below this lock that the river becomes navigable for an
+eight-oar, and all the University rowing is done between it and that
+next below, at Baitsbite, three miles and more down the stream to the
+northward. Baitsbite[97] is the starting-point of the annual college
+races, held at the conclusion of the May Term.[98] As is well known,
+these are decided by "bumping," the boats all starting simultaneously
+one behind another, with a clear interval of two lengths between
+each. Any boat making a bump takes the place of its defeated rival in
+the next race, and has the privilege of rowing back to its boat-house
+with its flag flying.[99] This is also done by the boat Head of the
+River, which, of course, cannot bump, though it may be bumped. Should
+a boat make its bump on each of the four evenings that the races last,
+the crew are said to "get their oars," each man's oar becoming his
+personal property and being usually hung in his rooms as a trophy,
+appropriately painted with the College colours. These colours are also
+worn for racing; the most easily recognised being the bright scarlet
+of Lady Margaret (St. John's), the black and white of Trinity Hall,
+the green of Queens', the black and yellow of Clare, and the red and
+black of Jesus. The flags always bear the College arms, except that
+"First Trinity" fly the three crowned lions of King Edward the Third.
+
+[Footnote 96: These are large wooden edifices containing sheds for the
+boats below and dressing-rooms for the crews above.]
+
+[Footnote 97: See Chapter XIII.]
+
+[Footnote 98: There are also races in the Lent Term for the less
+exalted boats. But only the first division in the May races has any
+general interest. Each division contains sixteen boats, and the last
+boat of each division is also the first of the division below, being
+thus known as a "sandwich boat."]
+
+[Footnote 99: The races end at Chesterton, about a mile below the
+boathouses.]
+
+Leaving the distant prospect of the boathouses behind us, we resume
+our way to Jesus College, the grounds of which are separated from
+Midsummer Common by a broad ditch. Skirting this, we come to "Jesus
+Lane," and, turning to the right, reach the main entrance to the
+College, opposite the red brick facade of "Westcott House" (like
+Ridley Hall, an Anglican Clergy Training School), and the tall spire
+of the new Church of All Saints.[100] Iron gates admit us into a long
+passage, between red brick walls, known as "the Chimney," which
+conducts us to the College gate. Jesus is a large college, with
+several courts, but all that is much worth seeing is the chapel with
+its cloisters, to reach which we must seek a low-browed doorway to the
+east of the entrance gate. Both are relics of the nunnery. The latter,
+indeed, were rebuilt in the eighteenth century; but the nineteenth has
+rediscovered, in their eastern range, the beautiful Early English
+entrance into the Nuns' Chapter House. At the north-east corner of the
+cloisters we find the door into the chapel.
+
+[Footnote 100: This church, as has been already said, formerly stood
+at the other end of its Parish, in the old Jewry, hard by Trinity and
+St. John's.]
+
+This bears little resemblance to the conventional College Chapel,
+being a cruciform church of the ordinary Norman shape, with a central
+tower. Very little of the work, however, is Norman, for the nuns did
+not get far on with their design till the twelfth century had come in
+and the Early English period had commenced. A beautiful gem of this
+style the chapel is, and, for once in a way, the drastic "restoration"
+to which it was subjected in early Victorian days is matter of real
+thankfulness.[101] The building had been sadly mauled about in the
+course of ages; the high-pitched roof lowered, the eastern lancets
+destroyed. All is now brought back, in excellent taste, to what it was
+at first. The old chancel has become the chapel proper, the transepts
+and the short nave serving as the ante-chapel.
+
+[Footnote 101: This restoration had the advantage of being carried out
+under the auspices of a man of real architectural taste (though better
+known by his geological distinction), the Rev. Osmund Fisher, then
+Dean of the College. The discovery of the Chapter House entrance in
+the cloisters was also due to him.]
+
+[Illustration: _Oriel of Hall, Jesus College._]
+
+In this the windows are filled with fine Morris glass, the rich hues
+of which are, unfortunately, much faded from their pristine
+brilliance. That at the end of the south transept, which first meets
+the eye, is occupied, above, by a magnificent group of the Celestial
+Hierarchy, in all its nine Orders--Angels, Archangels, Virtues,
+Principalities, Dominions, Powers, Thrones, Cherubim, Seraphim, with
+the addition, in the tenth place, of Man, as the image of God; and,
+below, by nine Saints, including St. Radegund, with the addition of
+Bishop Alcock. The four other windows of the transept show the four
+Evangelists, each attending a pair of Sibyls,[102] and, in the tower
+lights, Gospel scenes illustrating the Incarnation, Passion,
+Resurrection, and Ascension of Christ respectively. The nave windows,
+on the south, have Patriarchs and Prophets, with scenes beneath from
+the life or writings of each; and, on the north, emblematic figures
+representing the Cardinal and Theological Virtues, each trampling
+under her feet the contrary Vice.
+
+[Footnote 102: Some words put by Virgil into the mouth of the Sibyl
+(or prophetess) of Cumae were supposed by the early Christians of Rome
+(to whom the idea of Sibylline books being prophetic was familiar from
+Roman History) to foretell the Incarnation. Hence she, and her sister
+Sibyls of other fictions as well, came to be considered inspired, and
+before long a whole literature of imaginary Sibylline predictions was
+in circulation.]
+
+The most notable of the alumni of Jesus College was also one of the
+earliest--Archbishop Cranmer. It is from his having been here that he
+is so often and so ridiculously said to have been brought up in a
+_Jesuit_ seminary![103] Another notability was the poet Coleridge, who
+was here from 1790 to 1792. He was not an academic success, for, like
+his contemporaries, Wordsworth at St. John's, and Southey at Christ
+Church, he was carried away by the revolutionary spirit then rampant,
+and, being more audacious than they, got into more scrapes. One of his
+freaks was to trace out in gunpowder on the college lawns the words
+LIBERTY AND EQUALITY, which not only produced a sensation when the
+train was fired, but left the obnoxious sentiment permanently branded
+on the sacred grass. Finally he ran away. But he was taken back, and
+did not lose his love for his old college; for, long afterwards, we
+find him writing of "the friendly Cloisters and happy Grove of quiet,
+ever-honoured Jesus College, Cambridge." The Grove is the name given
+to the grassy field, begirt with trees, which is bordered by the ditch
+separating the College grounds from Midsummer Common.
+
+[Footnote 103: The Jesuits, of course, did not come into being for
+years after Cranmer's academic day.]
+
+The western portion of that common is often called "Jesus Green." It
+witnessed the execution of the only Marian martyr burnt at Cambridge.
+His pile was largely formed of Protestant books of devotion, one of
+which, "a Communion Book," he picked up and read diligently till the
+flames overpowered him, "praising God, who had sent him this
+consolation in his death."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+     =Sidney Sussex College=, Oliver Cromwell, Fellow Commoners.--Holy
+     Trinity, Simeon, Henry Martyn.--=Christ's College=, "God's
+     House," Lady Margaret, Flogging of Students, Bathing forbidden,
+     Milton, Lycidas, Gardens, Paley, Darwin.--Great St. Andrew's,
+     Bishop Perry.--=Emmanuel College=, Harvard, Sancroft, Chapel,
+     Ponds.--University Museums.--=Downing College.=--Coe Fen.--First
+     Mile Stone.--Barnwell, Priory, Abbey Church.--Lepers Chapel,
+     Stourbridge Fair, Vanity Fair.
+
+
+Following Jesus Lane from the "Chimney" gate townwards, we once more
+strike into the Via Devana, here called Sidney Street, from the
+College filling the angle between the two roads. It is not a
+pretentious institution, having always been amongst the smallest
+colleges. But it has nurtured one man of colossal individuality, the
+great Protector, Oliver Cromwell. For Sidney Sussex College (as its
+full name runs, from its foundress, Lady Frances Sidney,[104] Countess
+of Sussex) was instituted (in 1596) for the very purpose of fostering
+such _alumni_. The earliest statutes of the College decree that its
+members shall be taught, before all else, to "detest and abhor
+Popery." Besides Cromwell, his right-hand man, Edward Montagu, Earl of
+Manchester, who distinguished himself when in authority at Cambridge
+during the Civil War by ejecting from their parishes so many recusant
+High Church parsons and filling their places with Puritan divines, was
+also a Sidney man. Both he and Cromwell were "Fellow Commoners," a
+name given to privileged undergraduates who, on payment of extra fees,
+were permitted to rank with the Fellows and to dine at the High Table.
+They also wore a more ornate gown than the ordinary undergraduate. It
+is only of late years that this plutocratic arrangement has been
+discontinued in the University. The site of Sidney was formerly that
+of the Franciscan Convent, with its splendid church, considered the
+finest in Cambridge. At the dissolution of the convent the University
+tried to secure this from King Henry the Eighth as the University
+Church. But the King's price was too high, the negotiations fell
+through, and the glorious building was remorselessly and utterly
+demolished.
+
+[Footnote 104: Her husband had been over the Royal Excise, and the
+College shield bears the familiar Broad Arrow of that department.]
+
+Passing by Sidney, which has nothing to detain us, we shortly note a
+church on our right hand. This is Holy Trinity, the special home of
+the Evangelical movement in Cambridge. In the early days of that
+movement (and of the nineteenth century) the pulpit here was occupied
+by its great leader, Charles Simeon, Fellow of King's College, who
+through much persecution, through evil report and good report,
+championed the cause till he saw it triumphant. And a series of
+like-minded men has followed him.[105] The grey stone building just
+beside the church is the Henry Martyn Hall, built in memory of that
+great Evangelical pioneer and missionary. It is used for meetings
+connected with the movement.
+
+[Footnote 105: The church is architecturally naught, outside; but the
+tower arches, within, form the loveliest gem in Cambridge.]
+
+Leaving Holy Trinity to our right, a turn in the street brings us face
+to face with the grey stone front of Christ's College, one of the most
+ideal in Cambridge. We owe it, like St. John's, to the bounty of the
+Lady Margaret Tudor, King Henry the Seventh's mother, whose beautiful
+character has already been dwelt upon in our last chapter. And she
+bestowed it upon us under the same inspiration as in the case of St.
+John's, that of her friend and confessor, Bishop Fisher, and, in doing
+so, adopted the same plan of transforming and expanding an earlier
+Foundation. This was a very small "School of Grammar," which never
+attained to the dignity of collegiate rank, founded in 1430 by John
+Bingham, parson of St. John Zachary, just before he and his Church
+were swept away to make room for King's College. It was then removed
+to this site, just outside the "Barnwell Gate" of Cambridge, where it
+maintained a microscopic existence for the rest of that century.
+
+[Illustration: _Christ's College Chapel._]
+
+At the beginning of the next it had the good fortune to be taken up by
+Lady Margaret, who increased the number of residents maintained in it
+from five to sixty, and changed the name from "God's House" to
+"Christ's College." At the same time she planned out the principal
+court, as it now exists. Unlike St. John's, it was at least partly
+completed before her death, for the historian Fuller tells a pretty
+story of how she here beheld from a window the dean administering to
+one of the scholars the corporal chastisement which was at that day
+the recognised means of discipline,[106] and called out to him
+"_Lente! Lente!_" ("Gently! gently!") The College is appropriately
+full of her memory: her portrait adorns the Hall; on the front of the
+Gate Tower stands her statue, between the Plantagenet Rose and the
+Tudor Portcullis, and beneath it are carved her armorial bearings, as
+at St. John's, with the addition of the crest, a demi-eagle of gold
+rising out of a crown.[107] On either side are the three feathers of
+the Prince of Wales. These same arms, emblazoned, are over the inner
+gateway that leads into the Gardens, with her own beautiful motto,
+"_Souvent me souvient_" ("Oft I bethink me"). And in the Library under
+a glass shade is a reproduction of the upper part of her person, with
+the hands folded in prayer, from her monument in Westminster Abbey.
+
+[Footnote 106: The rod retained its use in this connection till the
+eighteenth century. In the seventeenth, during the period of Puritan
+ascendancy, it was made a University enactment that if any
+undergraduate should "by day or night enter any river, ditch, lake,
+pond, mere, or any other water within the County of Cambridge, whether
+for the sake of swimming or of washing," he should be flogged in his
+College hall. It must be remembered that students then entered at
+least five years earlier than now.]
+
+[Footnote 107: This crest is absent from the Johnian gate-tower, but
+is found above the iron gate leading into the Backs.]
+
+But, to the ordinary visitor, the memory of even Lady Margaret is, at
+Christ's, overshadowed by the mightier memory of John Milton, who was
+in residence here for seven years, from 1625 till, in 1632, he became
+a Master of Arts. In residence along with him was his "Lycidas," whose
+real name was Edward King. In the gardens an ancient mulberry tree, so
+old that its stem has to be encased in a pyramid of turf, and its
+remaining arms jealously shored up, is called by his name. The
+tradition that he himself planted it is probably unfounded, but it was
+actually there in his day, one of the score of these trees which, by
+the desire of King James the First, were placed in the gardens.
+
+The gardens here are amongst the few College Gardens which at
+Cambridge are open to the public. During certain hours visitors are
+admitted, and no small privilege it is; for there are few lovelier
+spots than this verdurous lawn, shut in on one side by the grey
+"Garden Front" of the College,[108] with its balustraded cornice and
+transomed windows, and everywhere else "bosomed high in tufted
+trees";[109]--an ideal place for Milton's own
+
+                         "retired Leisure,
+  That in trim gardens takes his pleasure."[110]
+
+[Footnote 108: This front belongs to an isolated block known as the
+"Fellows' Buildings," erected shortly after Milton's time.]
+
+[Footnote 109: "L'Allegro."]
+
+[Footnote 110: "Il Penseroso."]
+
+Hidden in a thicket at the north-eastern corner is a sequestered
+swimming-bath, fed by a stream drawn off from Hobson's conduit. To
+climb the statue beside this and dive off the head is a current feat
+amongst Christ's men. Something of a feat it is; requiring
+considerable sureness of foot and skill in balancing oneself.
+
+To reach the Gardens we must cross the first court, a singularly
+pleasant example of a College Court, rendered the more picturesque
+by the central grass-plot being circular instead of the usual
+rectangle, and pass on through the "Screens" at its north-eastern
+corner. Here we are in another Court, only in part surrounded by
+buildings; the "Fellows' Buildings" being immediately in front of
+us. As Christ's, unlike most Colleges, has but one entrance,[111] we
+shall have to retrace our steps. In passing the Hall we should, if
+possible, look in to note the portraits of the College worthies.
+Amongst these are to be found not only Lady Margaret, Bishop Fisher,
+and Milton, but Quarles (the author of the "Emblems"), Paley, the
+Evidencer of Christianity,[112] who was a Fellow here in the
+eighteenth century, and the epoch-making name of Charles Darwin, the
+Apostle of Evolution.
+
+[Footnote 111: A small back door, however, leads from the kitchen into
+"Christ's Lane" (on the south). On one famous occasion, when, at a
+time of popular excitement, the students were confined to the College,
+sympathisers from without burst this in (using the bar which closes
+the lane to vehicles as a battering-ram) and set them free.]
+
+[Footnote 112: Paley's _Evidences_ is still one of the set subjects in
+the "Littlego" (or "Previous Examination") which every student must
+pass before being allowed to proceed further.]
+
+From Christ's we continue along the Via Devana, here called St.
+Andrew's Street from the unlovely church of that name[113] which we
+see opposite the College. Of old the name was Preachers' Street, from
+the great preaching Order of the Dominican Friars, who from the
+thirteenth to the sixteenth century here found their home. The site
+of their House is now occupied by our next College, Emmanuel, as that
+of the Franciscans was by Sidney. It is remarkable that the ground of
+both the great Orders which were called into existence specially to
+preach the doctrines of Catholicism should have passed into the hands
+of men whose main object was to contest those doctrines. But so it
+was. Emmanuel, like Sidney, was founded (1584) expressly to combat the
+errors of Popery; and the Founder, Sir Thomas Mildmay, a courtier of
+Queen Elizabeth, has left on record his special wish that his College
+should turn out a constant supply of able Puritan divines.
+
+[Footnote 113: Unlovely as this church is, it is a monument of the
+piety and generosity of one of the most pious and generous men
+Cambridge has ever known, Dr. Perry, first Bishop of Australia, who,
+while a Fellow of Trinity, devoted his private fortune to the
+ecclesiastical needs of the town, and thus enabled no fewer than three
+large churches to be built. Unhappily it was at a period of execrable
+taste (the earliest Victorian), and the three are far from beautiful
+or correct examples of ecclesiastical architecture. But when the then
+newly formed Camden Society (for the revival of a purer style of
+building) ventured to hint as much, a storm of Protestant indignation
+arouse throughout Cambridge, and a public protest against such Romish
+criticism was actually signed by every resident Fellow of Trinity!]
+
+His hope was realised. Emmanuel at once sprang to the front as the
+great power-house of the Puritan movement in Cambridge; and so strong
+was that movement that for the moment it carried the College to the
+very top of the list, so that it surpassed in numbers even Trinity and
+St. John's. Many of the stalwarts who belonged to the Pilgrim Fathers
+of New England were here educated; notably John Harvard, whose name is
+borne by the Premier University of America. So also were many of the
+preachers who kindled and sustained the ardour of the Roundheads
+through the stress of the Civil War. Even after the Restoration the
+College retained the impress of its Founder's hope. When, in 1664, the
+Duke of Monmouth visited Cambridge, a satirical guide to the
+University, written in doggerel Latin verse for his benefit, sneers at
+the strict moral tone of Emmanuel: "You may well perceive that they
+are all Puritans here." And Archbishop Sancroft, famous as the chief
+of the Seven Bishops who made so staunch a stand against the
+toleration of Roman Catholics under James the Second, was an Emmanuel
+man.
+
+[Illustration: _Emmanuel College._]
+
+For the first century of its existence, the students of Emmanuel
+worshipped in an unconsecrated building running north and south,[114]
+where they received the Sacrament "sitting on forms about the
+Communion Table, and pulling the loaf one after other when the
+minister hath begun. And so the cup; ... without any application of
+the sacred words." But in 1679 this room was turned into the College
+Library, and the present chapel built on the usual Anglican lines.
+
+[Footnote 114: This was on the site of the Dominican Refectory. Sir
+Thomas Mildmay boasts that, in contempt of their religion, he has
+turned their Refectory into a Chapel, and their Church into a
+Refectory. The Hall and Combination Room still occupy the site of the
+Church.]
+
+Emmanuel has little architectural beauty; but there are pleasant
+grounds, with a swimming-bath, as at Christ's, and two larger ponds,
+in which swans and wild ducks are kept. The swimming-bath and the
+smaller pond are accessible only by the favour of a Fellow; but the
+large piece of water is in a great open court (beyond the first
+court). All are fed from a branch of the Hobson's Conduit stream,
+runlets from which run down St. Andrew's Street, even as they run down
+Trumpington Street. Beyond the swan-pond lie the new buildings, lately
+erected to meet the greater expansion of the College, for Emmanuel,
+after over two centuries of depression, now ranks (along with Caius
+and Pembroke) at the head of the list with regard to relative numbers,
+except Trinity alone. In actual numbers she broke in 1890 her record
+of 1628, and has gone on advancing steadily since. Her shield bears a
+blue lion ramping on a white ground and holding a laurel wreath,
+emblematic of the victory of the "Lion of the tribe of Judah."
+
+Immediately opposite the front gate of Emmanuel there runs off, at
+right angles, from the Via Devana, a thoroughfare known as Downing
+Street. Till the present century it actually gave access to Downing,
+the youngest of the Colleges to which the University officially
+accords that title. In those days Downing consisted of a huge
+parallelogram of prettily be-treed greensward, a furlong across and
+three furlongs long,[115] thus covering far more space than any other
+college. But in numbers it was the smallest of all, and also in
+income, till finally agricultural depression reduced it to such
+straits that it was forced to sell its northern frontage to the
+University. Thus Downing Street now leads, not to Downing, but to the
+great central huddle of University museums, laboratories, and
+lecture-rooms, which have been incessantly rising during the last two
+generations, and which are still continuing to rise. Here, cheek by
+jowl (on the site of the old Austin Friary), are the magnificent
+Geological Museum erected in memory of Professor Sedgwick, the Museum
+of Botany, the Law Schools, the Museum of Archaeology, the Museum of
+Anatomy,[116] the Museum of Mineralogy, the Chemical Laboratory, the
+Medical Schools,[117] the Physical Laboratory,[118] the Engineering
+Laboratory, the Optical Lecture-room, and, beside these, the
+Philosophical Library, and the huge Examination Hall which is the
+latest addition to the equipment of the University.
+
+[Footnote 115: This occupied all but the whole space bounded by
+Downing Street, Tennis Court Road, Lensfield Road, and Regent Street.]
+
+[Footnote 116: The ethnological series of skulls here ranks (with
+those at Berlin, St. Petersburg, and Washington) as the most complete
+in the world.]
+
+[Footnote 117: On the wall here is engraved Pasteur's inspired saying:
+"_Dans les champs de l'observation le hasard ne favorise que les
+esprits prepares._"]
+
+[Footnote 118: This is called the Cavendish Laboratory, being the gift
+of the late Duke of Devonshire, Chancellor of the University. The word
+laboratory we may note is, in student speech, invariably "Lab," which
+is even used as a verb.]
+
+To reach Downing to-day, one must turn to the left on leaving
+Emmanuel, and continue along the Via Devana (here called Regent
+Street) till large iron gates on the opposite side of the road invite
+us to enter the College grounds. These give still an impressive sense
+of space, though now curtailed at the southern as well as the northern
+end, and form a pretty setting for the two parallel ranges of yellow
+stone, which date from the beginning of the nineteenth century. For
+though Downing was by that time keeping the centenary of its
+foundation (by Sir George Downing, of Gamlingay in Cambridgeshire),
+the funds had not hitherto admitted of the erection of college
+buildings. When first set up, these classical frontages were
+considered the _ne plus ultra_ of architectural perfection, and
+strangers were taken to see them as the great glory of Cambridge.
+
+Regent Street, after we leave Downing, will soon bring us again to the
+Church of Our Lady, so that we have now completed our circuit of
+Cambridge. There remain, however, a few outlying spots worth a visit
+should time serve. Nearest and most picturesque of these is Coe Fen, a
+long strip of common, lying along the eastern bank of the river,
+before it enters on its course through the Backs. The best time to see
+it is at sunset, and the best way to gain it is by following down the
+narrow byway beside Little St. Mary's, and turning to the left at the
+bottom. We shall then find ourselves on the Fen, beneath the old wall
+of Peterhouse deerpark, a delicious, heavily-buttressed, mass of red
+brick-work, leaning over and curved with age, patched and re-patched
+all over with all kinds of fragments, giving colour effects that are
+quite charming.[119] Passing beyond its shelter, and that of its
+continuing hedge (which divides us from Peterhouse and other gardens),
+we may take the first turn to the left, up a narrow (and often dirty)
+byway, which will lead us past the Leys School, the great Wesleyan
+educational outpost of Cambridge, into the Trumpington Road, where it
+joins Lensfield Road at Hobson's Conduit. Or, instead of turning to
+the left we may turn to the right, and, crossing the Cam by the iron
+footbridge, make our way over "Sheep's Green," the Common east of the
+river, to Newnham Mill and the Backs. Or we may hold straight on, by
+the footpath that runs the whole length of the Fen, which will bring
+us out on the Trumpington Road just by the first milestone, where that
+road crosses "Vicar's Brook."
+
+[Footnote 119: See p. 5.]
+
+It is from this side that we notice how this is no ordinary milestone,
+but a grand monolith twelve or fifteen feet in length, and feel that
+it must have a story. And so indeed it has, for it is the very first
+milestone ever set up in Britain since the days of the Roman dominion
+here. In those days every great road in the country had its series of
+milestones recording the distance from the central milestone in
+London, which still exists, in its decay, as "London Stone." But after
+the mighty organisation of the Roman Empire lost its hold upon the
+land, roads went to ruin, and milestones were broken up or used for
+Anglo-Saxon gate-posts. Not till 1729 was the idea of restoring the
+system entertained; and it was a Cambridge College, Trinity Hall, that
+first took it up, and carried it out on the road from Cambridge to
+London. Hence it is that these milestones bear the Crescent of the
+College shield. And for their inaugural milestone was chosen this
+grand monolith, which was itself an old Roman milestone.
+
+North-east of Cambridge stretch the mesh of dingy streets which make
+up the great suburb of Barnwell. Hither and thither they run, in
+soul-crushing monotony; yet even here there are gems of interest to be
+found. The suburb came into existence, to begin with, through the
+proximity of a great Abbey, the Augustinian Priory of Barnwell. This
+House of Religion was founded in the first instance by Hugoline, the
+pious wife of Picot, William the Conqueror's far from pious Sheriff of
+Cambridgeshire. It was by her located close beneath his
+dwelling-place in the Castle, and dedicated to St. Giles. Half a
+century later, the Picot land was forfeited for treason, and granted
+to Richard Peverel, who had been, in the First Crusade,
+standard-bearer to Robert Curthose, the Conqueror's eldest son. He
+transferred the House to the riverside, hard by a holy spring, the
+Burn Well (or source of the Brook), where a hermit of special sanctity
+had already reared an Oratory dedicated to St. Andrew. He also raised
+the number of monks from six to thirty, to correspond with that of his
+own years at the time.
+
+The Abbey grew and flourished. Its inmates, as appears from their
+"Custom Book" of 1296 (lately published by Mr. J. W. Clark), led a
+very civilised life--cleanliness being specially insisted upon; and
+its proximity to Cambridge placed it in touch with political life.
+Royalty stayed in it now and again; in 1388 even Sessions of
+Parliament were held in it; Papal Legates visited it.[120] And when
+civil wars broke out, it was a prize worth plundering; a fate it more
+than once suffered. When the final plunder came, under Henry the
+Eighth, the whole was utterly swept away; the only thing left being a
+small stone building, which was apparently the Muniment room of the
+Abbey. Though utterly ruinous, this little block is by no means
+without architectural merit, and may be found by following the
+Newmarket Road (which enters Cambridge as "Jesus Lane") to its
+junction with East Road (the eastward continuation of Lensfield Road).
+Here Abbey Street runs down to the river, and just off it is our
+building, commonly known as the "Priory Chapel." Hard by is an old
+red-brick dwelling-house, bearing the date 1578, and called the "Abbey
+Barn"; and in its grounds are several venerable fragments.
+
+[Footnote 120: Here was held, in 1430, under the representatives of
+Pope Martin the Fifth, the famous "Assize of Barnwell," which decided,
+by Papal authority, that in the University alone was vested all
+spiritual jurisdiction over its students, to the exclusion of the
+ordinary Diocesan and Parochial claims.]
+
+In close proximity to these ruins is an actually surviving relic of
+Barnwell Priory. This is a tiny church of Early English Architecture,
+known as the "Abbey Church," or "Little St. Andrew's."[121] Small as
+it is, it is the Mother Church of a huge parish (now happily divided
+into districts) containing more than half the entire population of
+the Borough of Cambridge. It was built by the Canons of Barnwell, when
+their Priory was a century old, for the use of the little knot of
+hangers-on whom every great abbey attracted to its doors, and whose
+secular (and, perhaps, far from cleanly) presence was unwelcome at the
+fastidious worship of the Priory Church. And they made it the
+representative of the old hermit's Oratory of St. Andrew. For long
+ages it sufficed for the adjoining population; but when that
+population increased by the hundred-fold, as it did at the opening of
+the nineteenth century, things got to a desperate pass, and Barnwell
+became practically heathen, with an only too well-deserved reputation
+for vice of every kind.
+
+[Footnote 121: So called to distinguish it from "Great St. Andrew's,"
+opposite Christ's College.]
+
+So matters stood when, in 1839, Dr. Perry, Fellow of Trinity College,
+who was Senior Wrangler in 1828, and whom we have met with as the
+devoutest attendant at the College Chapel, and as the builder of Great
+St. Andrew's, came forward to stem the evil. Renouncing the comfort of
+College life, he took upon himself the charge of this hopeless
+district; for which he built, at his own expense, the commodious (if
+ugly) red-brick church opposite the Abbey, and a like fabric (St.
+Paul's) at the other end of the area, on the way to the railway
+station. He laboured devotedly himself, he inspired others to work, he
+invoked the help of a band of pious undergraduates who had already
+begun a Sunday School on their own account,[122] and when he departed
+to become the pioneer Bishop of Australia, he left a well-equipped
+Parish organisation which is still in full activity.[123]
+
+[Footnote 122: This School still flourishes, and is still staffed by
+undergraduates. It is known as "Jesus Lane Sunday School," its first
+quarters having been in that street.]
+
+[Footnote 123: The parish has now been divided into half a dozen
+districts. And its earliest houses, immediately round the Abbey
+Church, remain (as they have been from the first) outlying fragments
+of two small Town parishes, St. Benet's and St. Edward's.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Lepers' Chapel, Barnwell._]
+
+Pursuing the Newmarket Road, we find (at the point where it at last
+ceases to be a Barnwell Street, and crosses the railway into the open
+country beyond), yet another tiny ancient church, called traditionally
+the "Lepers' Chapel." It is of Norman date, and probably served the
+Lepers' Hospital, which we know to have existed hereabouts, as remote
+as might be from the town. This hospital was endowed by King John
+with the tolls of the great Fair held hard by on Stourbridge Common,
+which even so late as the Eighteenth Century boasted itself the
+largest and most important in all Europe, a position now claimed by
+that of Nijni Novgorod in Russia. And, to judge by the accounts that
+have come down to us, the boast was not unfounded. The Cambridgeshire
+historian, Carter, writing in 1753, thus describes it:
+
+     "Stourbridge Fair ... is set out annually on St. Bartholomew by
+     the Mayor, Aldermen, and the rest of the Corporation of
+     Cambridge; who all ride thither in a grand procession, with music
+     playing before them, and most of the boys in the town on
+     horseback after them, who, as soon as the ceremony is read over,
+     ride races about the place; when returning to Cambridge each boy
+     has a cake and some ale at the Town Hall. On the 7th of September
+     they ride in the same manner to proclaim it; which being done,
+     the Fair begins, and continues three weeks; though the greatest
+     part is over in a fortnight.
+
+     "This Fair, which was thought some years ago to be the greatest
+     in Europe, is kept in a cornfield, about half a mile square,
+     having the River Cam running on the north side thereof, and the
+     rivulet called the Stour (from which and the bridge over it the
+     Fair received its name) on the east side, and it is about two
+     miles east of Cambridge market-place; where, during the Fair,
+     coaches, chaises, and chariots attend to carry persons to the
+     Fair. The chief diversions at Stourbridge are drolls,
+     rope-dancing, and sometimes a music-booth; but there is an Act of
+     Parliament which prohibits the acting of plays within fifteen
+     miles of Cambridge.
+
+     "If the field (on which the Fair is kept) is not cleared of the
+     corn by the 24th of August, the builders may trample it under
+     foot to build their booths; and, on the other hand, if the same
+     be not cleared of the booths and material belonging thereto by
+     Michaelmas Day at noon, the plough-men may enter the same with
+     their horses, ploughs, and carts, and destroy whatever they find
+     on the premises. The filth, dung, straw, etc., left behind by the
+     fair-keepers, make amends for their trampling and hardening of
+     the ground.
+
+     "The shops or booths are built in rows like streets, having each
+     their name, as Garlick Row, Booksellers'-row, Cook-row, etc. And
+     every commodity has its proper place, as the Cheese Fair, Hop
+     Fair, Wool Fair, etc.; and here, as in several other streets or
+     rows, are all sorts of traders, who sell by wholesale or retail,
+     as goldsmiths, toy-men, brasiers, turners, milliners,
+     haberdashers, hatters, mercers, drapers, pewterers, china
+     warehouses, and, in a word, most trades that can be found in
+     London, from whence many of them come. Here are also taverns,
+     coffee-houses, and eating-houses in great plenty, and all kept in
+     booths, in any of which (except the coffee-booth) you may at any
+     time be accommodated with hot or cold roast goose, roast or
+     boiled pork, etc.
+
+     "Crossing the main road at the south end of Garlick Row, and a
+     little to the left hand, is a great Square, formed of the largest
+     booths, called the Duddery, the area of which Square is from 240
+     to 300 feet, chiefly taken up with woollen drapers, wholesale
+     tailors, and sellers of second-hand clothes; where the dealers
+     have room before their booths to take down and open their packs,
+     and bring in waggons to load and unload the same. In the centre
+     of this Square was (till within these three years) erected a tall
+     May-pole, with a vane at the top; and in this Square, on the two
+     chief Sundays during the fair, both forenoon and afternoon,
+     Divine Service is read, and a sermon preached from a pulpit
+     placed in the open air, by the Minister of Barnwell; who is very
+     well paid for the same by the contribution of the fair-keepers.
+
+     "In this Duddery only, it is said, there have been sold L100,000
+     worth of woollen manufactures in less than a week's time; besides
+     the prodigious trade carried on here, by the wholesale tailors
+     from London, and most other parts of England, who transact their
+     business wholly in their pocket-books, and meeting here their
+     chapmen from all parts, make up their accounts, receive money
+     chiefly in bills, and take further orders. These, they say,
+     exceed by far the sale of goods actually brought to the Fair, and
+     delivered in kind; it being frequent for the London wholesale men
+     to carry back orders from their dealers for L10,000 worth of
+     goods a man, and some much more. And once in this Duddery, it is
+     said, there was a booth consisting of six apartments, all
+     belonging to a dealer in Norwich stuffs only, who had there above
+     L20,000 worth of those goods.
+
+     "The trade for wool, hops, and leather here is prodigious; the
+     quantity of wool only sold at one fair is said to have amounted
+     to L50,000 or L60,000, and of hops very little less.
+
+     "September 14, being the Horse Fair day, is the day of the
+     greatest hurry, when it is almost incredible to conceive what
+     number of people there are, and the quantity of victuals that day
+     consumed by them.
+
+     "During the Fair, Colchester oysters and white herrings, just
+     coming into season, are in great request, at least by such as
+     live in the inland parts of the kingdom, where they are seldom to
+     be had fresh, especially the latter.
+
+     "The Fair is like a well-governed city; and less disorder and
+     confusion to be seen there than in any other place where there is
+     so great a concourse of people: here is a Court of Justice always
+     open from morning till night, where the Mayor of Cambridge, or
+     his Deputy, sits as Judge, determining all controversies in
+     matters arising from the business of the Fair, and seeing the
+     Peace thereof kept; for which purpose he hath eight servants,
+     called Red-coats, attending him during the time of the Fair and
+     other public occasions, one or other of which are constantly at
+     hand in most parts of the Fair; and if any dispute arise between
+     buyer and seller, on calling out 'Red-coat,' you have instantly
+     one or more come running to you; and if the dispute is not
+     quickly decided, the offender is carried to the said Court, where
+     the case is decided in a summary way, from which sentence there
+     lies no appeal.
+
+     "About two or three days after the Horse Fair day, when the hurry
+     of the wholesale business is over, the country gentry for about
+     ten or twelve miles round begin to come in with their sons and
+     daughters; and though diversion is what chiefly brings them, yet
+     it is not a little money they lay out among the tradesmen,
+     toy-shops, etc., besides what is flung away to see the puppet
+     shows, drolls, rope-dancing, live creatures, etc., of which there
+     is commonly plenty.
+
+     "The last observation I shall make concerning this Fair is, how
+     inconveniently a multitude of people are lodged there who keep
+     it; their bed (if I may so call it) is laid on two or three
+     boards, nailed to four pieces that bear it about a foot from the
+     ground, and four boards round it, to keep the persons and their
+     clothes from falling off, and is about five feet long, standing
+     abroad all day if it rains not. At night it is taken into their
+     booths, and put in to the best manner they can; at bed-time they
+     get into it, and lie neck and heels together until the morning,
+     if the wind and rain do not force them out sooner; for a high
+     wind often blows down their booths, as it did A.D. 1741, and a
+     heavy rain forces through the hair-cloth that covers it.
+
+     "Though the Corporation of Cambridge has the tolls of this Fair,
+     and the government as aforesaid, yet the body of the University
+     has the oversight of the weights and measures thereof (as well as
+     at Midsummer and Reach Fairs) and the licensing of all
+     show-booths, live creatures, etc.; and the Proctors of the
+     University keep a Court there also to hear complaints about
+     weights and measures, seek out and punish lewd women, and see
+     that their Gownsmen commit no disorders."
+
+Fuller (in the seventeenth century) gives us the tradition that the
+fair originated with some Westmorland cloth dealers, who were here
+overtaken by a storm on their way to Norwich, and found so ready a
+market for the goods which they spread out to dry on the grass of the
+common that they went no further but returned hither the next year,
+and again. Thus the special prominence given to the "Duddery" here is
+accounted for. The tradition does not seem improbable, for Kendal has,
+from time immemorial, been renowned for its cloth--the famous "Kendal
+green" worn, in old ballads, by the English archers. To this day the
+shield of that town bears cloth-making implements, with the motto
+"_Pannus mihi panis_" ("Flock is my food"). And Norwich was
+(throughout the Middle Ages) the great commercial centre of the cloth
+trade. That there was some marked connection between Cambridgeshire
+and Westmorland is proved by the constant occurrence here of family
+names derived from Kendal place-names (Sizergh, Docwray, Strickland,
+Sedgwick, etc.) which have been current amongst the peasantry of
+Cambridgeshire since the fourteenth century at least.
+
+Since Carter wrote, the great development of communication has made
+fairs a mere survival, and Stourbridge Fair has fallen from its high
+estate. It is now a very commonplace affair of a few days' duration,
+mainly for the horse trade. But it still is declared open by the Mayor
+of Cambridge or his delegate, and a dish of the white herrings which
+Carter speaks of still forms part of the opening ceremony. And it has
+an abiding interest for English readers, as the prototype of "Vanity
+Fair" in the "Pilgrim's Progress." Bunyan, as a Bedford man, would be
+familiar with the bustling scene, and, if we compare his pages with
+those which we have transcribed from Carter's History, we see how
+vividly he has allegorised it:
+
+     "At this Fair are all such Merchandize sold as Houses, Lands,
+     Trades, Places, Honours, Preferments, Titles, Countreys,
+     Kingdoms, Lusts, Pleasures, and Delights of all sorts, as Whores,
+     Bauds, Wives, Husbands, Children, Masters, Servants, Lives,
+     Blood, Bodies, Souls, Silver, Gold, Pearls, Precious Stones, and
+     what not.
+
+     "And moreover at this Fair there is at all times to be seen
+     Juglings, Cheats, Games, Plays, Fools, Apes, Knaves, and Rogues,
+     and that of every kind.
+
+     "Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, Thefts, Murders,
+     Adulteries, False Swearings, and that of a blood-red colour.
+
+     "And as, in other Fairs of less moment, there are the several
+     Rows and Streets, under their proper Names, here such and such
+     Wares are vended, so here likewise you have the proper Places,
+     Rows, and Streets (namely Countries and Kingdoms) where the
+     Wares of this Fair are soonest to be found. Here is the Britain
+     Row, the French Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row, the German
+     Row, where several sorts of vanities are to be sold. But, as in
+     other Fairs some one Commodity is the Chief of all the Fair, so
+     the Wares of Rome and her Merchandize is greatly promoted in this
+     Fair."
+
+We find also reference to the standing Court of summary jurisdiction
+under "the Great One of the Fair," with "the trusty Friends" who
+formed his police, that took cognisance of the "Hubbub and great Stir
+in the Fair" caused by the demeanour of the pilgrims.
+
+As an instance of how wide a range the commodities sold at this fair
+covered, we may mention that Sir Isaac Newton there bought his famous
+prisms--three of them for L3. They were probably of French or Italian
+make; no glass of this character was as yet manufactured in England.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+     Roads from Cambridge.--Cambs and Isle of Ely, Girvii, East
+     Angles, Mercians, Formation of County.--Newmarket
+     Road.--Quy.--Fleam Dyke.--Devil's Dyke.--Icknield Way.--Iceni,
+     Ostorius, Boadicea.--Newmarket Heath, First Racing.--Exning,
+     Anna.--Snailwell.--Fordham.--Soham, St.
+     Felix.--Stuntney.--Wicken.--Chippenham.--Isleham,
+     Lectern.--Eastern Heights.--Chevely, Cambridge
+     Corporation.--Kirtling.--Wood Ditton.--Stetchworth.--Borough
+     Green.--Bottisham.--Swaffham Bulbeck.--The Lodes.--Swaffham
+     Prior.--Reach, Peat, Submerged Forest.--Burwell, Church, Clunch,
+     Brass, Castle, Geoffry de Magnaville.
+
+
+At the Lepers' Chapel we are clear of Cambridge and well on the road
+to Newmarket, probably the most trafficked of all the great roads
+which radiate from Cambridge. Of these there are seven; this Newmarket
+Road going to the north-east, the Hills road to the south-east, the
+Trumpington Road to the south, the Barton Road to the south-west, the
+Madingley Road to the west, the Huntingdon Road to the north-west,
+and, finally, the Ely Road to the north. This last takes us into the
+Isle of Ely; the other six serve the county of Cambridge, more
+strictly so-called, _i.e._, the southern half of the Cambridgeshire of
+our maps, not so long ago quite separate, politically, from the
+northern half, and even now not wholly united for administrative
+purposes.
+
+The Isle, which contains the whole of the fenland forming this
+northern half of Cambridgeshire, is far older as a political entity
+than the southern part of the county. Its existence dates back to the
+far-off days of the Anglo-Saxon conquest, in the fifth and sixth
+centuries, when the poor remnants of the British population in East
+Anglia, once the proud tribe of "the great Iceni," fled for refuge
+into the "dismal swamp" of the Fens. Here they held out for centuries,
+and formed themselves into a new tribe, the Girvii (as our earliest
+Latin chronicler transliterates the Welsh name Gyrwy, signifying
+"brave men," by which they called themselves). This Girvian
+principality has ever since held together. It passed as a whole into
+the hands of St. Etheldreda, by her marriage (in 652 A.D.) with the
+last Girvian Prince, Tonbert, and from her to her successors the
+Abbots and Bishops of Ely, whose jurisdiction survived until the
+nineteenth century.
+
+Meanwhile the old southland homes of the unhappy Britons were being
+shared up by their English exterminators. The East Anglians swarmed
+over the uplands to the east, and joined hands (not in friendship)
+with the more powerful Mercians swarming in from the west. Roughly
+speaking the Cam divided these jarring tribes, which lived in undying
+hostility till the various English Kingdoms were united into one (in
+A.D. 827) by the genius and valour of Egbert, the first "King of the
+English." But the boundaries were not effaced till the desolating
+flood of the Danish invasions poured over all.
+
+When that flood was stayed by Egbert's glorious grandson, Alfred the
+Great, and the district once more made English and Christian by his
+only less glorious son, Edward "the Elder," it was formed by him into
+a County called, from its chief town, Cambridgeshire (or, as it was
+then, "Granta-bryg-shire"). This was in the year 921. But for the
+first idea of any union between this new County and the old Isle of
+Ely we must wait another two centuries, when, in 1107, the Abbot of
+Ely became a Bishop, with the Isle and the County together for his
+See. The ecclesiastical tie thus formed has gradually developed into a
+civil tie also; just as the first union of the English race under a
+common Primate, the Archbishop of Canterbury, paved the way for its
+union under a common King.
+
+To many charming byways amid the streamlets and the meadows and the
+gentle slopes of this southern Cambridgeshire the seven highways out
+of Cambridge will successively conduct us. The highways themselves
+are, as has been said, seldom inspiring thoroughfares, save for their
+far-flung horizons; and the Newmarket Road least of all, for it is, as
+might be looked for, motor-swept beyond all the rest. The one
+near-hand object alone worth mention is the little Church of Quy,
+whose far-seen tower dominates some miles of the road. But this has
+little interest except its curious name, which is matter of dispute
+amongst etymologists. "Cow-ey" is the most commonly accepted
+derivation, meaning the Island of Cows. But Quy can never have been an
+island. More probably it is "Cow-way," like the "Cowey Stakes" on the
+Thames, signifying that here was a passage for cattle across the
+marshy ground which bordered the little stream crossed by the road
+before reaching the church. This stream flows out of Fulbourn Fen, an
+isolated patch of fen-land a mile square, even yet only half
+reclaimed, and of old so impassable that it determined the line of the
+great Fleam Dyke, which runs up to it on either side but does not need
+to cross it.
+
+[Illustration: _Quy Church._]
+
+The Fleam Dyke is one of the great prehistoric lines of defence which
+were run from the Fens of the Cam to the summit of the East Anglian
+heights. Those heights were in ancient times clothed with dense
+forest, and formed an impenetrable barrier against enemies from the
+west seeking to invade the East Anglian districts. So too did the
+morasses of the fenland. But between fen and forest stretched a strip
+of open grassland furnishing easy access. To defend this, the only
+gate into their territory, was the great object of the inhabitants of
+those districts; and they ran across it two stupendous earthworks, the
+Fleam Dyke as their outer bulwark and the Devil's Dyke, which we meet
+at Newmarket, as the inner.[124] The former stretches for a length of
+some ten miles from the banks of the Cam at Fen Ditton to the uplands
+by Balsham (its course broken by Fulbourn Fen); the latter ranges in a
+long unbroken rampart from the Fen at Reach to Wood Ditton (_i.e._
+"the ditch-end in the forest").
+
+[Footnote 124: There were other minor Dykes (such as the Warstead
+Street, from Cherry Hinton to Horseheath), but these play no part in
+history.]
+
+When these were constructed we do not know. They first appear in
+history as the scene of desperate fighting between Britons and Romans
+in the first century of our era. But they may very probably have
+existed before even the Britons came into the land. Magnificent
+earthworks they are, some 10 feet high on the inner side, and on the
+outer at least 30, from the bottom of the great ditch which flanks
+them to the crown of the parapet. When that parapet was topped by a
+palisade of timber, they must have presented formidable obstacles
+indeed. The Fleam Dyke we do not see from this road. But as we
+approach Newmarket, and enter upon its famous Heath, we cross the
+Devil's Dyke; and, as we look at its mighty dimensions, we cease to
+wonder that our simple-minded ancestors should have ascribed its
+formation to superhuman agency.
+
+The gap by which we pass through the Devil's Dyke deserves notice. It
+is the one gap in the whole line of the work, and was left to admit,
+not our road, but that which we now join, the London Road of
+Newmarket. For this is one of the most venerable tracks in the land,
+being the "Icknield Way," made how long ago Heaven only knows. From
+the very first settlement of the country there must always have
+existed some route along this open strip between fen and forest which
+formed the only line of communication from the eastern to the midland
+regions of our island. In British days the former were occupied by the
+great clan of the Iceni, whose name survives in the English
+appellation of the road, and can be traced in many place-names along
+it, such as Ickleton in Cambridgeshire, and Ickleford in
+Hertfordshire.[125] The road followed the western slope of the chalk
+hills to the Thames and beyond, till it tapped the line of the great
+Tin-road, by which that then precious metal was brought from Cornwall
+to Thanet.[126]
+
+[Footnote 125: These forms show that the C was sounded hard. On the
+coins of the clan the name is written ECEN. These coins are of gold
+and bear the figure of a horse, being rude copies of the Macedonian
+staters which the tin trade brought to Britain. The earliest known are
+of the third century B.C., the latest (those inscribed with the name)
+of the first half century A.D.]
+
+[Footnote 126: Tin was precious as a component of bronze, which, till
+iron came in, was the material for weapons and tools. See my _Roman
+Britain (S.P.C.K.)_, p. 33.]
+
+At the Roman conquest of Britain in 55 A.D. the Iceni were friendly to
+the invaders, whom indeed they had invited into the land, to free them
+from their subjection to the House of Cymbeline, King of Britain. But
+when, a few years later, during the settlement of the country, the
+Roman general Ostorius ordered them to give up their arms, they
+regarded the demand as an intolerable insult, and bade him defiance,
+manning the Fleam Dyke against him. But such was his energy that,
+though he had no regular troops with him, his light-armed auxiliaries
+stormed the whole length of the line at a single rush. The routed
+Icenians fled in panic homewards, only to find their way hopelessly
+barred by their own fortifications along the Devil's Dyke, and all but
+the few who could force their way through the mad crush at this one
+narrow gap, were, in spite of a desperate resistance, slaughtered
+wholesale. The tribe were then disarmed, and endured unresistingly the
+licence and greed of Roman officials and Roman moneylenders, till
+goaded into madness, twelve years later, by the wrongs of their
+"warrior-queen," Boadicea. Then followed that convulsive explosion of
+popular rage and despair, in which every Roman within reach was
+massacred with every circumstance of horror, and to which the Romans,
+after their victory, replied by such a policy of extermination as to
+blot the Icenian name from the page of history. Never again do we meet
+with it.
+
+Between the Dyke and Newmarket lies the Heath, renowned as the
+earliest English race-course. This form of amusement seems to have
+come in with the Stuart Dynasty. James the First is said to have
+inaugurated the sport. But the well-known tale of how Edward the First
+escaped from his captivity at Hereford, by inducing his guards to ride
+matches till their horses were exhausted and then galloping off on
+his own fresh mount, shows that the idea was afloat long before. And
+at Newmarket in particular such matches must often have been ridden in
+connection with the great horse mart which has given the town its
+name.
+
+This New Market is, like the New Forest, now far from new. It dates
+from the year 1227, when a frightful outbreak of sickness frightened
+away buyers and sellers from their older market-place two miles off at
+Exning (a pretty natural amphitheatre of turf bright with many
+springs), and sent them to meet for the future in the freer air of the
+Heath. This word, by the way, does not, in Cambridgeshire, imply the
+existence of heather, merely meaning an open space.
+
+Thus Newmarket came into being. The sport we first hear of in
+connection with it is not racing but hunting. For the boundless range
+of the moorlands to the east of the town (which even now astonish all
+who first see them) were then haunted by innumerable herds of wild
+deer, and afforded ideal ground for the chase. James the First,
+accordingly, had here a hunting-box,[127] in which his unhappy son was
+afterwards imprisoned for a while by the victorious army of the
+Commonwealth. And thus the Heath became known to his "merry" grandson,
+Charles the Second, who speedily saw how specially adapted its expanse
+was for horse-racing, and established a regular annual race-meeting,
+the first to be introduced into England.
+
+[Footnote 127: In the Register of Fordham Church (a few miles north of
+Newmarket) is an entry to the effect that, on 27 February 1624, "The
+Most High and Mighty Prince, King James the First of England and Sixth
+of Scotland condescended to hunt six hares in Fordham Field!"]
+
+The Royal sport spread like wildfire, and the bare Heath became year
+by year crowded by the gayest throng in England, thus vividly
+described by Macaulay:
+
+     "It was not uncommon for the whole Court and Cabinet to go down
+     there," Charles himself, to the admiration of his subjects,
+     posting down from London in a single day, with only two relays of
+     fresh horses. "Jewellers and milliners, players and fiddlers,
+     venal wits and venal beauties, followed in crowds. The streets
+     were made impassable by coaches and six. In the places of public
+     resort peers flirted with maids of honour, and officers of the
+     Life Guards, all plumes and gold lace, jostled professors in
+     trencher caps and black gowns. For on such occasions the
+     neighbouring University of Cambridge always sent her highest
+     functionaries with loyal addresses, and selected her ablest
+     theologians to preach before the Sovereign and his splendid
+     retinue. In the wild days before the Revolution, indeed, the most
+     learned and eloquent divine might fail to draw a fashionable
+     audience, particularly if Buckingham announced his intention of
+     holding forth; for sometimes his Grace would enliven the dulness
+     of a Sunday morning by addressing to the bevy of fine gentlemen
+     and fine ladies a ribald exhortation which he called a sermon.
+     With lords and ladies from St. James's and Soho, and with doctors
+     from Trinity College and King's College, were mingled the
+     provincial aristocracy, fox-hunting squires and their
+     rosy-cheeked daughters, who had come in queer-looking family
+     coaches, drawn by cart-horses, from the remotest parishes of
+     three or four counties to see their Sovereign.... Racing was only
+     one of the many amusements of that festive season. On fine
+     mornings there was hunting. For those who preferred hawking,
+     choice falcons were brought from Holland. On rainy days the
+     cock-pit was encircled by stars and blue ribbons.... The Heath
+     was fringed by a wild, gipsy-like camp of vast extent. For the
+     hope of being able to feed on the leavings of many sumptuous
+     tables, and to pick up some of the guineas and crowns which the
+     spendthrifts of London were throwing about, attracted thousands
+     of peasants from a circle of many miles."
+
+Nor were these beggars the only ones to profit by the festive
+occasion. The townsfolk of Newmarket reaped a golden harvest; lodgings
+for the press of visitors were at fancy prices, and many were glad to
+pay a guinea a night for even the third of a bed; and "at Cambridge,"
+we read, "a hackney-horse is not to be got for money."
+
+When Newmarket became only one of many racing centres throughout the
+land, this height of glory naturally departed. But to this day its
+meetings rank in the very first class of such fixtures. And as a
+training ground for race-horses it stands second to none. Training
+stables rise all round it, and strings of young thorough-breds are
+constantly to be met along the road, and are treated with reverence,
+even by the drivers of motor-cars, who, for some distance on either
+side of the town are not allowed to travel at any speed over ten miles
+an hour. There are now seven principal annual racing fixtures here,
+the chief being the "Craven," in the spring, and the "Two Thousand" in
+the autumn.
+
+The town of Newmarket is now wholly in Suffolk, although till a few
+years ago it lay partly in Cambridgeshire, for it is built on either
+side of the Icknield Street, which here formed the county boundary.
+But the Old Market at Exning was always in Suffolk; a little island of
+which may be seen on the map, surrounded by Cambridgeshire territory.
+Here we have an interesting historical survival. Whence came about
+this curious delimitation? The answer is that when Cambridgeshire was
+first formed into a county by Edward the Elder it was not yet
+forgotten that Exning had long been a special residence of Suffolk
+royalty.
+
+Suffolk, it must be remembered, is not, like Cambridgeshire,
+Bedfordshire, and other counties named after their chief town, an
+artificial division of the land, called into being by the Government
+merely as an administrative unit, but, like the Isle of Ely, one of
+the originally independent principalities the gradual accretion of
+which has formed England. Very early Suffolk and Norfolk joined
+together in one East Anglian Kingdom; but that Kingdom endured for
+centuries, and was not extinguished till its last monarch, St. Edmund,
+was murdered by the Danes in their great raid of 870 A.D. He was,
+indeed, but a tributary monarch, under the King of the English; but
+this was then only a quite recent arrangement, and his predecessors
+had been wholly independent sovereigns. For many years they were
+engaged in a heroic struggle to preserve their independence against
+Mercia, the great power which occupied all the Midlands, and therefore
+it was that they fixed their Royal abode at Exning, close to the great
+dyke which bulwarked the East Anglian realm, as, long before, it had
+bulwarked the Icenian.
+
+Hence it came about that Exning was the birthplace of St. Etheldreda,
+the foundress of our great "sacred fane" at Ely, round which, almost
+more than Cambridge itself, the fortunes of Cambridgeshire have
+centred. Her father, King Anna, was called to the East Anglian throne
+in troublous times. Christianity and Paganism were at death-grips
+throughout the land. And the latter cause was championed by the
+monarch who was, for the moment, far the most powerful of the English
+sovereigns, Penda, King of Mercia. From his central position he struck
+out north, south, and east, at his Christian neighbours. His first
+blows were against Northumbria, where he successively shattered the
+Roman Mission of Paulinus and the Celtic Mission of Aidan. Next he
+drove into exile Kenwalk, the first Christian King of Wessex, and
+finally, in 654, burst over the East Anglian frontier "like a wolf, so
+that Anna and his folk were devoured as in a moment."
+
+But this breaking up of the Exning family did but scatter its members
+to spread far and wide the cause of the Gospel. And a splendid band
+they were. Not for nothing is Anna described by Bede as "a good man,
+and the father of an excellent family." His eldest son followed him on
+the throne (for Penda was slain shortly after his last victory, and
+the Mercian dominion fell with him), and helped St. Etheldreda in her
+great work at Ely; another son, St. Erconwald, became one of the most
+famous of all the Bishops of London; while, of the daughters, one was
+Abbess of Barking, another of Dereham, another of Brie, in
+France.[128] Yet another, Sexburga, after being Queen of Kent,
+succeeded Etheldreda as Abbess of Ely, and was herself succeeded by
+her daughter Ermenilda, who, as Queen of Penda's son Wulfhere, had
+taken part in St. Chad's great work of converting Mercia. Seldom has
+any place bred such a household of Saints as this quiet little village
+of Exning. A pretty village it still is; but is now fast becoming a
+suburb of Newmarket. The bright little stream running through it is
+derived partly from springs in the old market meadow already spoken of
+(known as "the Seven Springs"), and partly from sources in a copse
+some half-mile to the south, known as St. Wendred's Well. All we know
+of this obscure Saint is that she had a local fame in the tenth
+century, when her body, in a golden coffin, was brought from Ely to
+the great battle between Edmund Ironside and Canute at Assandun, and
+became the spoil of the victor. The church at March is dedicated to
+her.
+
+[Footnote 128: Her abbey was for generations the favourite
+boarding-school in France for young ladies from England.]
+
+The road from Newmarket to Ely (twelve miles) passes several places
+worth notice. First comes Snailwell, with the flint-built round tower
+of its little church rising so picturesquely above the "well," now a
+broad, clear pond, from which the little river Snail crawls away into
+the adjacent fen. At the adjoining hamlet of Landwade there was lately
+unearthed a Roman villa, the fine tesselated pavement of which is now
+in the Sedgwick Museum of Cambridge.
+
+Fordham, which we next reach, is a larger village, with a church of
+most unusual architectural interest. The north porch has a stone roof
+of no fewer than six vaulted bays, running east and west, and
+supporting a parvis chamber, with late Decorated windows, approached
+by a stone staircase from without, and, seemingly, designed for a
+chapel with a separate dedication to St. Mary Magdalene, the Church
+being St. Peter's. This development is unique.
+
+[Illustration: _Fordham Church._]
+
+Three miles on, we come to the furthest outpost of the East Anglian
+uplands, the little market town of Soham, situated on an almost
+isolated peninsula of the chalk, which here runs out into the fen, and
+upon the very borders[129] of the Isle of Ely. The Cathedral is here a
+conspicuous object, rising high upon its hill over the intervening
+fen, and only five miles away. But Soham is associated with a yet
+earlier development of local Christianity than Ely itself. Forty years
+before St. Etheldreda founded her Abbey, one was here established by
+St. Felix, "the Apostle of East Anglia." That title does not mean that
+he was absolutely the first to preach the Gospel to the East English,
+but the first whose work was permanent. For the introduction of the
+Faith into these parts met with more than one set-back before it was
+fairly established.
+
+[Footnote 129: These borders are now marked only in the Ordnance maps.
+The line runs right across the county from west to east, following the
+West River (the ancient course of the Ouse), to its junction with the
+Cam, and then almost straight eastward to the boundary of Suffolk,
+along a water-course known as the "Bishop's Delph" (_i.e._, ditch,
+from the verb _delve_).]
+
+Within two years of the first coming of St. Augustine in 597 A.D.,
+Redwald King of East Anglia, who had succeeded the earliest Christian
+monarch, Ethelbert of Kent, in the dignity of Bretwalda,[130] followed
+him also in seeking baptism. His Christianity, however, was of too
+unconventional a type to be acceptable. Bede tells us how "in the same
+temple he had an altar for the sacrifice of Christ, and a small one to
+offer sacrifices unto devils." This attempt (made under the influence
+of his heathen wife) was foredoomed to failure, and was followed by a
+period of religious confusion, till Sigebert, his son, succeeded to
+the throne. He had been an exile in France, where he had become "a
+most Christian and learned man," under the influence of St. Felix, a
+holy man of Burgundy, whose help he asked, on becoming King, "to cause
+all his province to partake" of his religion.
+
+[Footnote 130: This title implied a vague Primacy amongst the various
+Anglo-Saxon monarchs, conferred, by as vague a recognition on their
+part, upon him who was for the time the most powerful amongst them.
+But though vague it was far from unreal. We find Ethelbert's
+protection enabling St. Augustine to preach all over England. Indeed
+the name (which etymologically signifies merely Broad Wielder) very
+early got to be regarded as meaning Wielder of Britain.]
+
+[Illustration: _Fordham._]
+
+The landing-place of the Saint is still commemorated in the name
+Felixstowe near Harwich, and thence he proceeded to preach with
+entire success throughout all Sigebert's realm. Soham was his furthest
+point, for the fenland beyond was already Christian (the population
+being British, and provided for by Augustine's church at
+Cratendune).[131] And at Soham he set up an Abbey, where he himself
+was buried in 634, three years only after his landing. St. Etheldreda
+(who was probably Sigebert's niece) was at this time a young girl.
+Some imagine Soham to have been the site of a famous school set up by
+Felix, "after the model of those in France, with masters and
+teachers." But this is more likely to have been in his Cathedral city
+of Dunwich, once the leading town in East Anglia, now wholly submerged
+by the encroachments of the German Ocean. The See was transferred to
+Thetford and then to Norwich. Soham Abbey flourished on side by side
+with Ely, till both were destroyed in the great Danish raid of 870
+A.D. Why, when Ely was rebuilt, a century later, Soham was not, is
+unknown.
+
+[Footnote 131: Augustine, true to his mission from St. Gregory, strove
+to rekindle all over the land such embers of the Faith as still
+smouldered on amongst the British refugees. For those in the fenland,
+the Girvii, he had set up a small religious house at Cratendune near
+Ely, which was afterwards absorbed by Etheldreda's larger Abbey.]
+
+The present parish church has a lofty Perpendicular nave, with fine
+flowing Decorated windows in the chancel and transept, and a really
+splendid tower, one hundred feet in height, crowned with a pinnacled
+parapet of flint-work. Shortly after the Norman Conquest, Soham became
+the objective of the first causeway to be made for civil purposes
+between the island of Ely and the mainland.[132] This was due to
+Bishop Hervey (the first to be Bishop of Ely as well as Abbot), and
+was felt to be so epoch-making a work that it was ascribed to
+supernatural influence. St. Edmund, the high-souled King of East
+Anglia (who, after his martyrdom by the Danes in 870, became the
+Patron Saint of the Eastern Counties), was said to have appeared in a
+dream to a man of Exning, bidding him suggest the design to the
+Bishop. The little island of Stuntney[133] formed a stepping-stone for
+this causeway, so that only three miles out of the six between Ely and
+Soham needed an actual embankment.
+
+[Footnote 132: William the Conqueror had already run a military
+causeway across Willingham Fen to the south-west side of the island at
+Aldreth.]
+
+[Footnote 133: The word "stunt" in the dialect of Cambridgeshire
+signifies _steep_. The shores of Stuntney rise from the fen with most
+unusual abruptness.]
+
+[Illustration: _Soham._]
+
+Soham, as has been said, was on all sides surrounded by fen, except on
+the narrow ridge of firm ground between it and Fordham. So
+water-logged, indeed, was the country round that sea-going vessels
+made a port here. This fen is now all drained and become most prosaic
+cornland. But a few miles east and west of Soham two little patches,
+each about a mile square, remain in their original state. These are
+Chippenham Fen to the east, and Wicken Fen to the west. Both are
+fairly inaccessible spots, but when we get to them they enable us to
+form a vivid idea of what the state of things must have been when the
+whole fenland was such as this. Both give the impression of a morass
+hopelessly impenetrable, covered with a dense growth of tall reeds
+rising high above your head, through which you push your way blindly,
+to be constantly checked by some sluggish watercourse, too wide to
+jump, too shallow to swim, and impossible to wade, for the bottom is a
+fathomless stratum of soft turf and ooze giving no foothold. To
+stumble into one of these watercourses is, indeed, no small peril. If
+you are alone the case is well-nigh hopeless, and even a friend on the
+bank would find it hard to pull you out. His best course is to cut a
+fairly large bundle of reeds, by trampling which under your feet you
+may for a moment be able to stand while he rescues you.
+
+One can well understand how it came about that such a country was an
+almost inviolable sanctuary for those whom despair drove to seek
+refuge in its recesses. These small fragments of it still form a
+sanctuary; for many rare plants and insects, exterminated elsewhere by
+the march of progress, here still nourish. Conspicuous amongst these
+is the lovely swallow-tail butterfly; which flits about, dashing with
+bright touches of colour the weird and sombre beauty of the silent
+scene. Very silent it is now. But it was not so of old, when the whole
+fen was crowded with the swarming bird-life, so vividly described by
+Kingsley in "Hereward the Wake": "where the coot clanked, and the
+bittern boomed, and the sedge-bird, not content with its own sweet
+song, mocked the notes of all the birds around, ... where hung
+motionless, high over head, hawk beyond hawk, buzzard beyond buzzard,
+kite beyond kite, as far as eye could see. Into the air whirred up
+great skeins of wildfowl innumerable, with a cry as of all the bells
+of Crowland; while clear above all their noise sounded the wild
+whistle of the curlews, and the trumpet note of the great white swan."
+Such was the fenland of old; but all this wealth of commotion is long
+since gone, and scarcely do we see a bird now at Wicken or Chippenham,
+except here and there a waterhen, and (at Chippenham) the pheasants
+which are reared in coops on its margin.
+
+These birds belong to Chippenham Hall, a mansion built by Admiral
+Russell, the hero of La Hogue in 1692, our first great naval victory
+since the rout of the Armada, "and the first great victory that the
+English had gained over the French since the day of Agincourt."[134]
+It stands on the site of an earlier house, which, in its day, served
+as a place of confinement for Charles the First in 1647, after the
+raid by Cornet Joyce on Holmby House had transferred his custody from
+the hands of the Parliament to those of the Army. Here he remained for
+some weeks, while the somewhat sordid game of political intrigue (out
+of which he still hoped to make his own) was being played around him,
+"very pleasant and cheerful, taking his recreation daily at tennis,
+and delighting much in the company of Cornet Joyce," but refusing to
+listen to the famous Puritan stalwart, Hugh Peters, who was
+accustomed to hold forth "with the Bible in the one hand and a great
+pistol in the other," and who here "moved His Majesty to hear him
+preach. Which His Majesty did the rather decline."
+
+[Footnote 134: Macaulay.]
+
+Within sight of Soham, across the fen to the east, and only three
+miles away, stood for awhile another House of Religion, the Priory of
+Isleham. But to get from one to the other it was (and is) needful to
+go round by Fordham, making the distance at least double. A more out
+of the way place than Isleham cannot well be found, but it is worth a
+visit. All that remains of the Priory is an oblong structure of stone
+buttressed with red brick, looking on the outside like a barn, and,
+indeed, used as such. But it is, in fact, the hulk of the Priory
+Church; and, inside, the pillars and capitals are in very fair
+condition. The work is all Norman. This short-lived establishment was
+built in the eleventh century, as a "cell" (or outlying colony), of
+the Abbey of St. Jacutus de Insula, near Dol in Brittany. Within two
+centuries the monks abandoned it in favour of their sister house at
+Linton.[135]
+
+[Footnote 135: After the suppression of the alien Priories this
+property went to the Crown, and was granted by Henry the Sixth to
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, in whose hands it still remains.]
+
+They may have found Isleham too sequestered. It stands, like Soham, on
+the verge of the Isle of Ely, and also on the verge of Suffolk, to
+which county it seems actually to have belonged throughout great part
+of the Middle Ages. But it was in the Bishopric neither of Ely nor of
+Norwich, but of far away Rochester, to which it had been annexed, as
+tradition went, by Alfred the Great. The Church, dedicated to St.
+Andrew, has an exceptionally fine hammer-beam roof, bearing the
+inscription:
+
+     CRYSTOFER PEYTON DID MAK THYS ROFE
+     IN THE YERE OF OURE LORD MCCCCLXXXXV
+     BEING THE X YERE OF KINGE HENRY THE VII.
+
+A splendid brass records the memory of this benefactor's father,
+Thomas, who brought the Isleham estates into the family by his
+marriage with Margaret Bernard, the heiress of the former possessors.
+She as well as her successor, Margaret Francis, are on either side of
+him, in low-necked and high-waisted robes with ample skirts. That of
+Margaret Bernard bears a large flower and scroll pattern, and on her
+head-gear is inscribed the prayer "Jesu, mercy! Lady, help!" That of
+Margaret Francis is plain, trimmed with fur. Both wear an identical
+necklace, presumably the very same. Thomas himself (who was High
+Sheriff of Cambridge and Huntingdonshire in 1442 and 1452) is in plate
+armour of the most highly developed kind, with quaint and enormous
+elbow-guards. The figures, which are some thirty inches in height, are
+surmounted by an elaborate triple canopy.
+
+Another brass, much more worn, shows somewhat smaller figures of the
+last of the Bernards, Sir John, and his wife, Dame Elizabeth Sakevyle.
+He is also in plate armour of a simpler type,[136] and she in a
+close-fitting kirtle and long gown, fastened by a cord across the
+breast, with a horned head-dress from which a veil depends over her
+shoulders. The dog at her feet implies that she was a lady in her own
+right. And yet a third brass gives us Sir Richard Peyton (1574), who
+was a Reader at Gray's Inn. Over his doublet he wears a gown, long,
+loose, and lined with fur. In his left hand he holds a book, whilst he
+lays the right upon his heart. His wife, Mary Hyde, beside him, is in
+a plain dress, falling open below the waist to show a richly brocaded
+petticoat.[137]
+
+[Footnote 136: He fought at Agincourt, and was one of the knights told
+off to kill the French prisoners.]
+
+[Footnote 137: The Peytons held Isleham till the eighteenth century.]
+
+Besides these brasses, there is the fine tomb, in the north transept,
+of the first Bernard to be Lord of Isleham, a Crusader, as is shown by
+the crossed legs of his recumbent effigy. The _tailed_ surcoat over
+his coat of mail fixes his date at about 1275. He was, in fact, one of
+those who accompanied Edward the First (not yet King) to Palestine.
+The moulding of the canopy above the tomb also connects him with that
+monarch, for it is the same as that of the Coronation Chair in
+Westminster Abbey, placed by Edward over the Holy Stone of Scone,
+which he had carried off from Scotland in token of his claim to be
+indeed the rightful King of that stubborn realm.
+
+Yet another point of interest in this church is the eagle lectern, an
+exquisite piece of mediaeval brasswork, so good, indeed, that it has
+been copied in the lectern of Ely Cathedral. It is apparently
+fifteenth century work, and was found buried in the fen, some half
+century ago, between Isleham and Soham, so nearly half way that both
+parishes laid claim to it, and even now Soham folk are not reconciled
+to its loss. Whoever were the original possessors, it was probably
+concealed in the fen to save it from the Puritan iconoclasts of the
+seventeenth century, who, during the Civil War, habitually destroyed
+lecterns of this type as "abominable idols."
+
+Eastward from Newmarket radiate most fascinating roads, leading
+through heather and pine woods to Mildenhall, with its splendid church
+and ancient market hall; and to Brandon, where men still make (as they
+have made for 5000 years) palaeolithic flint implements by the very
+same methods used in those prehistoric days; and to Bury St. Edmunds,
+with its wonderful ruins and great historical associations. But these
+are all out of our beat. To the southward, however, we are in
+Cambridgeshire, and a fine avenue, two miles in length, known as "the
+Duchess's Drive," leads up to the ridge of the East Anglian heights.
+It is noteworthy that almost along the whole length of that ridge, and
+particularly hereabouts, villages cluster thick, whereas the slopes
+below can show scarcely any, but form an unoccupied belt, two miles
+wide, between the upland and the lowland populated area. A very
+out-of-the-way district is this watershed between the broad basin of
+the Ouse and those of the little rivers running into the North Sea,
+for the nearest railways are miles away, and an old time peace broods
+over everything.
+
+The first village we come to is Cheveley. The church here is
+cruciform, with a piscina of rare beauty in its Early English chancel,
+which is closed in by a fourteenth century rood screen of Decorated
+work. To the same period belongs the church chest, which has the
+unique feature of being made of cypress wood, and the tower, also with
+the unique feature of an external bartizan or watch-turret, apparently
+for a beacon fire. The dedication of the church is no less unique,
+"St. Mary and the Sacred Host."
+
+The name of Cheveley is associated with what Professor Maitland calls
+"the curious if disgraceful story of the decline and fall" of the
+ancient Corporation of Cambridge.[138] When the Revolution of 1688 had
+put a final end to the old Royal prerogatives over local
+administration, "the Corporation stood free from national
+supervision"; and Parliament, as time went on, appointed Commissioners
+to undertake the duties of police and hygiene, which had formerly been
+entrusted to it. With the cessation of recognised responsibilities the
+Corporation also ceased to have a conscience, and shamelessly
+squandered the corporate property on the personal greediness of its
+members. The Duke of Rutland, from his great seat at Cheveley, became,
+till the flood of nineteenth century reforms cleansed the Augean
+stable, its absolute master, and his nominees only were chosen into
+it, and thus, after a thousand years of strenuous, and mostly
+beneficent life, "first as a knot of heathen hidesmen,[139] then as a
+township of early English burg-men, then as a corporation of mediaeval
+burgesses," it finally dwindled to a small dining club, "with good
+wine, and plenty of it," absolutely dominated by one great Tory
+magnate, and claiming "the right to expend their income on themselves
+and their friends, without being bound to apply any part of it to the
+good of the Town." Reform came none too soon.
+
+[Footnote 138: _Township and Borough_, p. 96.]
+
+[Footnote 139: The original Corporation (not yet so called) consisted
+of the local residents who held (or were rated at) a "hide" of land
+(120 acres). This was at the end of the ninth century, when the
+landowners were Danes and heathen.]
+
+Cheveley is some three miles from Newmarket, and, as much further on,
+we reach another interesting little village, Kirtling. The local
+pronunciation of the name is "Catlage," which is unhappily becoming
+obsolete, like so many other local pronunciations throughout England,
+under the orthographical dead level of elementary scholasticism. The
+most striking edifice here is the great red-brick gate tower, with its
+four octagonal turrets, which is all that remains of a mansion, in its
+day one of the most famous in England. It was built in the reign of
+Queen Mary by the first Lord North, whose family still hold "Kirtling
+Tower," and whose son here magnificently entertained Queen
+Elizabeth.[140]
+
+[Footnote 140: A constant tradition declares that she was imprisoned
+(or hidden) here during part of her sister's reign, but it cannot be
+verified.]
+
+The wide moat which surrounded it still exists, and reminds us that
+this mansion was on the site of a great mediaeval castle belonging to
+the Tony family, from the days of William the Conqueror to those of
+Henry the Eighth. The manor had once been the property of the
+ill-fated King Harold, and was given by the Conqueror to Judith, widow
+of the saintly hero Waltheof, after his judicial murder. The church
+contains many North monuments, and Kirtling also possesses a pretty
+little Roman Catholic church, being one of the five "Missions" in
+Cambridgeshire--along with Cambridge, Ely, Newmarket, and Wisbech. For
+the Norths still hold, not only their ancient seat, but their ancient
+Faith.
+
+Not far from Kirtling is Wood Ditton; the last word signifying either
+Ditch Town, or, more probably, Ditch End, for it stands at the upland
+extremity of the Devil's Dyke. Along this ridge of the East Anglian
+Heights the primaeval forest was of old so dense that no artificial
+defence was needed to check the progress of an invading army. It was a
+veritable wall of oak, and ash, and thorn, and holly, and alder; no
+route for an army at any time, and where the felling of a few trees
+across the glades would speedily form an absolutely impenetrable
+obstacle. Here then the great earthwork, which we saw on Newmarket
+Heath, ends its ten-mile climb from the Fen at Reach, 350 feet below.
+Wood Ditton is a picturesque little place, still suggestive of
+woodland, especially around the flint-built church (constructed in the
+twelfth century and remodelled in the fifteenth), which has an
+octagonal steeple of specially graceful poise. A large brass, in
+somewhat poor condition, dating from 1393, commemorates "Henry
+Englissh and Wife Margt." Henry was a Knight, and wears what is known
+as "Camail" armour, which consisted of a series of small steel
+roundels fastened on to leather, hardened by boiling. Dowsing records
+(under date March 22, 1643), "We here brake down 50 superstitious
+pictures and crucifixes. Under the Virgin Mary was written: 'O Mother
+of God have mercy upon us.'"
+
+The neighbouring village of Stetchworth (or Stretchworth) also
+suffered in Dowsing's visitation. But he failed to notice that one of
+the two ancient bells in the steeple had a "superstitious"
+inscription:
+
+     SANCTA MARGARETA ORA PRO NOBIS.
+
+So it remained unshattered, and still hangs in the belfry, where the
+other bells also have noticeable inscriptions, two bearing the words
+"God save Thy Church. 1608," and the third
+
+                OMS.SPT.LAVDA.DNM.
+  ("Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.")
+
+This and the Margaret bell are ascribed to the fifteenth century.
+
+Stetchworth Manor, in the tenth century, was given to the Abbey of
+Ely, to provide clothing for a newly-professed monk, the son of the
+donor. This sounds an extraordinarily disproportionate gift; but the
+clothing of an Ely monk was really a very serious item, and, as the
+Abbey account books show, cost the convent the equivalent of something
+very like L50 per annum. Readers of Chaucer will remember how
+comfortably, and even luxuriously, the monk of his "Canterbury Tales"
+is dressed.
+
+Of the remaining villages along this upland line there is not much to
+tell.[141] They present a pleasant field for wandering exploration;
+each has its picturesque features, no church is without something of
+antiquarian interest, and over all broods a delicious aloofness.
+Westley Waterless Church has a flint-built round tower, of the Norfolk
+fashion, and a fine brass of 1325, representing Sir John de Creke and
+his wife, Lady Alyne. He is shown wearing the curious surcoat then in
+fashion, known as a _cyclas_, which, in front, reached only to the
+waist, and, behind, to the knees. The lady is one of the first
+examples of female portraiture in brass: her figure is strangely out
+of drawing.
+
+[Footnote 141: The frequent occurrence of "West" in their
+names--Westley, Weston, West Wratting, West Wickham--reminds us that
+their geographical and historical connection is with Suffolk, to the
+east of them, rather than with Cambridgeshire.]
+
+Weston Colville has also a brass, now affixed to the wall, and too
+much damaged for identification. The church here is almost wholly
+Early English, as is that of Dullingham. Borough Green contains some
+fine twelfth century monuments, sadly knocked about. The Parson here
+was ejected by the Puritan Earl of Manchester, Governor of Cambridge,
+during the Civil War, for the heinous offence of saying "that he ought
+to shorten his sermons rather than neglect reading the Common Prayer,
+and that the Collects were to be preferred before preaching." Grounds
+no less frivolous were a sufficient excuse for a like ejection of
+half the parsons in Cambridgeshire at this period. The rest signed the
+Covenant and renounced their Anglican heresies, sometimes with
+considerable emphasis. One curate is recorded to have stamped the Book
+of Common Prayer under his feet, in the face of the congregation,
+declaring that he would henceforth be their minister "by no Prelatical
+and Popish imposition of hands." Some score of these Vicars of Bray
+lived to turn their coats once more at the Restoration.
+
+Half-way between Cambridge and Newmarket, and half a mile from the
+main road, stands the fine Church of Bottisham, with good Decorated
+windows, a stone rood screen of Perpendicular work, and noteworthy
+sedilia and piscina. The beautiful fluting round the clerestory
+windows is still more noteworthy, and also the arcading beneath those
+of the south aisle both within and without. Here is the tomb of Elyas
+de Beckingham, Justice of the Common Pleas under Edward the First,
+who, almost alone, escaped in the clean sweep which that monarch made
+of his Bench for corruption. Here, in 1664, the parson was ejected on
+the grounds "that he was a time-server,[142] and one that observed
+bowing towards the east, standing up at the _Gloria Patri_, reading
+the Second Service at the Communion Table, and such-like superstitious
+worship and innovation in the Church. That he is a very unable and
+unfit man for the ministry; for half his parishioners cannot hear him,
+neither did he ever preach to their edifying, neither is he able, as
+the deponents do verily believe."
+
+[Footnote 142: _i.e._, An observer of holy times and seasons.]
+
+Bottisham, in all probability, played a part in that pathetic episode
+in the life of King Charles the First, which began with his flight
+from Oxford and ended with his vain appeal to the loyalty of the
+Scottish army then besieging Newark. Finding that Oxford must needs
+surrender to the Parliamentary forces closing in upon it, the King cut
+off his hair and beard, and in the disguise of a servant, carrying the
+cloak-bag of the two faithful chaplains who accompanied him, stole
+away at three in the morning, on Monday, April 27, 1646, from the
+beleaguered city, which had been his headquarters for so long. A long
+day's ride of 50 miles brought the party that night to Wheathampstead,
+near St. Albans, where a faithful adherent was found to give him
+shelter, though the Parliament were proclaiming, with drum and
+trumpet, that "what person soever shall harbour and conceal, or know
+of the harbouring and concealing of the King's Person, and shall not
+immediately reveal it to both Houses, shall be proceeded against as a
+traitor, forfeit his whole estate, and die without mercy." The next
+day, Tuesday, in clerical attire this time, and with only one
+companion, Mr. Ashburnham, the hunted Monarch entered Cambridgeshire
+(avoiding the towns) and that night, after another 50 miles of riding,
+slept "at a small village, seven miles from Newmarket." This village,
+Mr. Kingston, the historian of the Civil War in East Anglia, to whom I
+am indebted for this picturesque story, thinks may have been
+Bottisham, whence Charles could have reached Downham, his next stage,
+by water.
+
+Bottisham is the first of a line of interesting villages. We next
+reach, through a mile or two of pretty lanes, Swaffham Bulbeck, where,
+again the church has some good Decorated work, and fifteenth century
+seats, also a cedar chest of the same period, with carvings of the
+Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the Assumption of Our Lady. It is
+remarkable that these should have escaped the specially thorough
+"purification" which Dowsing here describes. "We brake down two
+crucifixes (and Christ nailed to them), one hundred superstitious
+pictures, and twenty cherubims, two crosses from the steeple, and two
+from the church and chancel, and digged down the altar-steps." The
+vicar was also ejected for being "zealous to put into execution Bishop
+Wren's fancies." Wren, the builder of Peterhouse Chapel, was Bishop of
+Ely 1638-1667, and deeply offended the Puritans by ordering the
+Communion Tables to be set "altar-wise" at the east end of the
+chancels (instead of being merely boards, which were habitually leant
+against the walls, and at Communion time were placed on trestles
+anywhere about the church). His High Church proclivities earned him
+eighteen years' imprisonment in the Tower, till released by the
+Restoration.
+
+To the north of Swaffham Bulbeck runs out an extension of the village
+known by the remarkable name of "Commercial End." It consists of one
+picturesque street, at the extremity of which we find ourselves on the
+banks of a deep, narrow waterway, like an old canal. An old canal in
+fact it is, and shows us that we have here reached the beach-line of
+the ancient Fen; for this is Swaffham Lode, one of those artificial
+cuts through the tangled swamp by which barges and even sea-going
+vessels were enabled of old to reach the mainland. Of these Lodes
+there were several; and the knot of population at the termination of
+each shows the amount of traffic they anciently carried. Bottisham
+Lode has given its name to a village larger than Bottisham itself, and
+some three miles from it. And here at Swaffham the commerce of those
+bygone days has left us Commercial End. Hard by are the insignificant
+remains of a small Benedictine nunnery founded by the Bulbeck family
+in the reign of King John.
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Bulbeck._]
+
+A mile further on brings us to another Swaffham, Swaffham Prior, with
+its picturesque churchyard rising steeply fifty feet above the
+village, and containing not one but two churches, dedicated
+respectively to St. Mary, and SS. Cyriac and Julitta.[143]
+
+[Footnote 143: These martyrs were son and mother, and suffered in the
+Diocletian persecution, the former being of very tender years. Julitta
+cheered him on to his glorious death, and was then herself executed.]
+
+Till the Restoration these represented two separate incumbencies; the
+former having been given to the Abbey of Ely by Brithnoth, the heroic
+Alderman of East Anglia under Ethelred the Unready. Both churches have
+passed through singular architectural vicissitudes. The design of the
+Norman tower of St. Mary's (the lower of the two), square below and
+octagonal above, was copied by the fifteenth century builders of St.
+Cyriac's, and is the only surviving portion of their work--the body of
+the church having been pulled down in 1667, at the union of the
+benefices.
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Prior._]
+
+A century later the steeple of St. Mary's was struck by lightning,
+which occasioned so unreasoning a panic amongst the worshippers that
+they resolved to abandon the church altogether. In vain did the Squire
+(then, as now, one of the Allix family)[144] offer to repair the
+damage, which was but slight, at his own charge. Nothing would serve
+but dismantling St. Mary's and using its spoil towards the rebuilding
+of St. Cyriac's, in the shape of a hideous brick tabernacle, of the
+worst Georgian style, attached to the ancient tower. St. Mary's would
+have been entirely pulled down had not the ancient masonry proved so
+solid that the work of demolition did not pay the local builder who
+got the job. As it was, it remained a ruin for yet another century,
+and it was not till the end of the nineteenth that it was
+restored--still under Allix auspices. Now it is once more the place of
+worship, and contains a specially well-executed rood-screen. But the
+beautiful spire which crowned the whole steeple still awaits
+replacement. The Georgian St. Cyriac's yet stands, and is used as a
+parish museum.
+
+[Footnote 144: This family came into England amongst the Huguenot
+refugees from France early in the eighteenth century.]
+
+[Illustration: _Swaffham Prior Churches._]
+
+From the churchyard of Swaffham Prior we get a grand view over the
+limitless fen to the northward; Ely Cathedral, ten miles away, rising
+conspicuous above it. The road we have been pursuing leads us on
+Ely-wards; but, a mile hence, comes to a dead stop at the little
+hamlet of Reach, once one of the most important places in the whole
+county. For here the mighty earthwork of the Devil's Dyke runs down
+into the fen. To meet it the greatest of all the Lodes was cut from
+the Cam at Upware, and at its hithe (or quay) our road has its
+termination. It is a striking surprise, for one comes upon it abruptly
+round a corner, and suddenly finds oneself at the end of all things.
+The hithe is a quiet green meadow now; but the clear brown water of
+the lode still sleeps beside it, and even yet barges, laden with turf
+or coal, occasionally creep up hither. Of old it was a constantly busy
+spot, where sea-going ships were loaded and unloaded, and trains of
+waggons attended, bringing and carrying off the cargoes.
+
+[Illustration: _The Castle Moat, Burwell._]
+
+Tradition gives Reach seven churches; but for this there is no
+historical evidence whatever, and it is probably only a hyperbolical
+way of extolling the ancient importance of the place. It is now merely
+a chapelry under Swaffham Prior, in which parish the western side of
+the township[145] is situated. For here the houses run in two lines,
+about a hundred yards apart, with a little village green between, on a
+gentle slope some quarter of a mile in length, having the fen level as
+its lower boundary, and, for the upper, the stupendous bulk of the
+Devil's Dyke, here cut clean off as if with a knife. All looks
+ancientry itself; but, in fact, this cutting off of the Dyke is quite
+a modern affair, not yet even two centuries old. Till then the Dyke
+ran right through the village down to the fen itself, effectually
+isolating the Swaffham Prior houses on the west from those on the
+east, which belong parochially to Burwell. Cole, the prince of
+Cambridgeshire chroniclers, whose voluminous MS. notes on the county
+still await a publisher, mentions that when he visited Reach in 1743
+the Dyke still reached the fen; but when he came again in 1768 he
+found the present state of things. Of how, or by whom, this act of
+vandalism was perpetrated I can find no record.
+
+[Footnote 145: Reach is commonly spoken of as a "hamlet," but there is
+still enough historical pride amongst the inhabitants to make them
+resent this phrase.]
+
+Reach was of importance even in Roman days. The Dyke, of course, was
+already ancient when they ruled Britain, and the lode, too, may very
+probably have been already cut. The remains of one of their villas
+have been unearthed here, near the point where the Cambridge and
+Mildenhall railway now cuts through the Dyke. It has a well-preserved
+hypocaust, or apparatus for warming the house by hot air. The Roman
+"villa," we must remember, was the country mansion of the period, and
+equipped with every known luxury. In the Middle Ages the annual Fair
+at Reach (on the Monday before Ascension Day) was big enough to bring
+over the Mayor of Cambridge to open it. And the custom survives even
+today, when the occasion has dwindled to a very petty little
+gathering.
+
+Reach, however, has still a local industry; the cutting of the peat,
+or "turf" as it is here called, in the neighbouring fen, for use as
+fuel. This peat forms a layer often many feet in thickness, and is
+formed for the most part of moss, mingled with the vegetable mould
+made by the decay of the dense forests with which the district was
+covered for uncounted ages; before its final submergence, early in the
+Christian era, destroyed the last of them. A like subsidence had more
+than once produced the same results earlier; for the remains of four
+or five forest beds at different levels have been found in the peat.
+
+The trunks of these prehistoric trees are often of enormous size,
+especially the oaks.[146] One no fewer than 130 feet in length was
+unearthed in 1909. The wood, after its ages of immersion, has become
+black, hard, and heavy, like the Irish bog oak. Associated with such
+debris, the peat often furnishes remains of the dwellers in these
+archaic woodlands; whence we know that bears, wolves, wild boars, and
+gigantic wild bulls roamed their shades. In the skull of one of these
+last, now in the Sedgwick Geological Museum at Cambridge, is imbedded
+a flint axe-head. The arm of the primeval savage who wielded that
+weapon must have been strong beyond the arms of common men.
+
+[Footnote 146: The oaks are always found lying prostrate, but the fir
+stems are frequently still upright for several feet of their length.]
+
+[Illustration: _Burwell Church, West End._]
+
+The peat is cut with a spade of peculiar construction, being flat, and
+both longer and narrower than ordinary spades. It is shaped somewhat
+like a fire shovel with a flange on either side, the object being that
+each "turf" extracted should be of uniform size, like a brick. A
+thousand of these should go to the ton; but though uniform in size
+they are not of uniform weight, for the peat, as might be expected, is
+more dense at its lower levels than near the surface. There is a good
+market for this turf, which makes a hot and lasting fire with a
+minimum of smoke, and that pleasant smoke. It is mostly sent off by
+water to Cambridge, Ely, Wisbech, etc.
+
+This turf-cutting is not, of course, confined to Reach, but it has its
+greatest development here, and at the neighbouring village of Burwell,
+a mile or so to the eastward (to which, as we have seen, part of Reach
+belongs). Burwell is an important village of considerable extent, with
+a population of 2000, and a magnificent church, capable of seating
+them all. It is of the finest fifteenth century workmanship, with a
+few remains of Norman in the tower. The exterior is mostly flint; the
+interior, like that of so many churches in Cambridgeshire, is of
+"clunch," a hardened form of chalk, well adapted for building, and
+easily worked for carving. The beautiful sculptures of the Lady Chapel
+at Ely are of this material, drawn from the large quarries between
+Burwell and Reach. Clunch is found in many places throughout the
+county and has been worked (as existing remains show) ever since Roman
+days.
+
+Burwell Church is specially connected with the University of
+Cambridge, in whose gift is the preferment, burdened with the
+condition that on Mid-Lent Sunday a sermon shall be preached there by
+the Vice-Chancellor or his deputy. Till the nineteenth century this
+condition was no light one; for the roads were in such a state that
+half a dozen men on each side could hardly keep the preacher's
+carriage from overturning, and, whenever possible, the cortege took to
+the newly-ploughed fields in preference. The route was not round by
+Reach but direct from Swaffham Prior.
+
+Here is a remarkable brass of John Lawrence de Wardeboys, the last
+Abbot of Ramsey in Huntingdonshire. For his readiness in abetting the
+designs of Henry the Eighth, not only by eagerly surrendering his own
+abbey, "which was not his to give," but by persuading others to do
+like violence to their conscience, he was rewarded with a pension
+equivalent to between two and three thousand pounds a year. His brass
+records this venality of his principles. It was originally made during
+his abbacy, and showed him in full abbatical vestments, mitre and all
+(for Ramsey was a mitred abbey). After the surrender he had it turned
+over, and on the reverse side, now uppermost, we see him in a simple
+clerical gown and cap. He only lived a few years to enjoy his
+ill-gotten gains, dying in 1542.
+
+[Illustration: _Burwell Church, N.E. View._]
+
+South-west of the church are some scanty remains of Burwell Castle,
+which was built by King Stephen during the miserable "nineteen
+winters" of his war with Queen Matilda, so forcibly described in the
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, when the country was laid desolate by the
+outrages of the robber barons. The particular brigand who afflicted
+Cambridgeshire was one Geoffry de Magnaville, an outrageously wicked
+plunderer, who "did not spare even the churches," regarded as
+inviolable by ordinary malefactors. Both Cambridge and Ely were looted
+by him, and he terrorised the whole district, till at length he was
+slain, by an arrow through the throat, in attacking Burwell Castle.
+"Nor was the earth permitted to give a grave to the sacrilegious
+offender."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+     Hills Road.--Gog-Magogs.--Vandlebury.--Babraham, Peter
+     Pence.--Old Railway.--Hildersham, Brasses, Clapper
+     Stile.--Linton.--Horseheath.--Bartlow, St. Christopher, Battle of
+     Assandun.--Cherry Hinton, War Ditches,
+     Saffron.--Teversham.--Fulbourn, Brasses.--Wilbraham.--Fleam Dyke,
+     Wild Flowers, Butterflies, Ostorius, Last Cambs Battle.--Balsham,
+     Battle of Ringmere, Massacre, Church Brasses, Grooved Stones.
+
+
+At Burwell we are within touch of Exning, Fordham, and Soham, so that
+we have now exhausted the interest of the Cambridge-Newmarket Road.
+Next in order comes the Via Devana, which when it leaves Cambridge for
+the south-east is denominated the "Hills Road." The reason for this is
+that it shortly brings us to the most ambitious elevation neighbouring
+the town, no less than 220 feet in height, and bearing the
+high-sounding name of the Gog-Magog Hills.
+
+The origin of this curious appellation is still to seek. According to
+some archaeologists it is derived from the prehistoric figure of a
+giant which was formerly to be seen on the slope, traced there by
+cutting away the turf along the outline of the shape, such as that
+still extant near Cerne Abbas in Dorsetshire. This, if it ever
+existed, has long since disappeared. Others consider the name to be a
+seventeenth century skit on the gigantic height of the hills. Others
+again see in it a dim traditional recollection of the days when a set
+of gigantic barbarians really were, for a time, quartered here. This
+was in the reign of the Roman Emperor Probus (277 A.D.), who leavened
+his mutinous British forces with prisoners from the Vandal horde
+lately defeated by the Romans on the Danube. From one such detachment,
+placed here in garrison, the name of Vandlebury is supposed to have
+clung ever since to the great earthwork on the summit of the
+Gog-Magogs.
+
+That earthwork, however, is of far older date, being of British, or
+even earlier, inception. It is a triple ring of gigantic ramparts,
+like those of Maiden Castle near Dorchester, and nearly a mile in
+circumference. All is now buried in the shrubberies of Gog-Magog
+House, the seat successively of Lord Godolphin and of the Dukes of
+Leeds.[147] But before being thus planted out it must have been one of
+the most striking examples in the kingdom of such fortifications. Till
+the eighteenth century it was a favourite scene of bull-baiting and
+other illegal sports amongst undergraduates, because the bare open
+country all round made it impossible for the authorities to surprise
+the offenders. Vandlebury was the original home of the legend, used by
+Sir Walter Scott in _Marmion_, which told how in the ancient camp, by
+moonlight, an elfin warrior would answer the challenge of any
+adventurous knight bold enough to encounter him in single combat.
+
+[Footnote 147: It is now the residence of H. Gray Esq. In the stable
+yard a monument records the celebrated "Godolphin," one of the first
+Arabs (or, more probably Barbs) to be imported, at the beginning of
+the eighteenth century, for the improvement of our thoroughbred
+stock.]
+
+In the early decades of the nineteenth century the then Duchess of
+Leeds here set up for her tenantry one of the earliest rural
+elementary schools. Children of both sexes were taught in this
+institution to read and to sew, the boys making their own smock
+frocks. The boys might, if they would, also learn, as an extra, to
+write; but not the girls, for Her Grace considered that it would
+deleteriously affect their prospects in domestic service if they were
+possessed of the dangerous power of deciphering their employers'
+correspondence.
+
+Our road climbs the hill to the gate of Gog-Magog House, and plunges
+down into woodlands on the other side, in a fashion very unlike the
+usual Cambridgeshire highway, to meet the infant stream of the
+Granta[148] on its meandering way to Cambridge. Our further course is
+amongst the pretty villages along its valley, the best-wooded vale in
+all the county. First of these comes Babraham (anciently Bradburgham),
+with a pretty little Saxon-towered church snuggling in the park beside
+the Hall. Babraham is noted for the epitaph of an old-time swindler,
+who was enabled to pocket the Peter Pence[149] which he collected
+under Queen Mary by sharing his spoil with Queen Elizabeth. It runs
+thus:
+
+  "Here lies Horatio Palavazene,
+   Who robbed the Pope to lend the Queen."
+   "He was a thiefe." "A thiefe? Thou liest;
+   For why? he robbed but Antichrist.
+   Him Death with besome swept from Babram
+   Into the bosome of old Abram.
+   But then came Hercules with his club,
+   And struck him down to Beelzebub."
+
+[Footnote 148: This branch of the Granta is more properly called the
+Bourne.]
+
+[Footnote 149: From the ninth century onwards the Pope could claim, by
+Royal grant, a penny a year from every house in England. This tribute
+was known as "Peter Pence." The phrase is now used amongst Roman
+Catholics for voluntary contributions to the Papal Exchequer.]
+
+A curious fresco on the north wall of the church is thought to
+represent King Edward the Second.
+
+A little beyond Babraham we cross the Icknield Street, on its way from
+Newmarket to Chesterford. Beside it runs, what is almost unknown in
+England, a deserted railroad, built by the Eastern Counties Railway
+Company (now the Great Eastern) in 1848, to afford direct
+communication between Newmarket and London, and abandoned, as a
+financial failure, in 1852, since which date the trains have gone
+round by Cambridge. Where this long disused line runs on the level it
+has melted back again into the adjoining fields, but the old cuttings
+and embankments and bridges still exist, and a weird sight they are.
+
+At the adjoining villages of Great and Little Abington the road makes
+a picturesque zig-zag through the village street, and passes on,
+beneath a fine beech avenue, to Hildersham, where a pretty byway leads
+across the stream to the fourteenth century church. Here there are
+four good brasses (to members of the Parys[150] family), one of them
+showing the unique feature of a lance-rest fastened to the cuirass,
+and another (of 1530) being simply a skeleton. There are also two very
+striking recumbent effigies representing a crusader and his wife, each
+carved out of a single block of wood, now black with age. The
+churchyard here is effectively planted with junipers and fir trees,
+and the east end of the church is embowered in shrubs of rosemary,
+said to be the finest in Cambridgeshire.
+
+[Footnote 150: The fourteenth century historian, Matthew Paris, is
+said to have belonged to this family.]
+
+From Hildersham the road goes on to Linton, a mile or so further;
+while the two places are also connected by a specially pleasant
+footpath, starting from a fine old smithy, and so through the meadows
+by the clear trout-stream, and past the yews and thorn-trees of the
+moated grange of "Little Linton," while above rises (to nearly four
+hundred feet, a proud height in Cambridgeshire) the appropriately
+named Furze Hill, with some real gorse patches (also a proud
+distinction in Cambridgeshire) upon its ridge.
+
+Before we reach Linton we cross the famous "Clapper" stile, which can
+best be described as formed by three huge sledge-hammers (of wood)
+with exceptionally long shanks, hinged near the head to an upright
+post, each about a foot above the next. Normally the three
+hammer-heads rest upon one another and look like a single post (about
+a foot from the first); but, on attempting to cross, the shanks (the
+ends of which are _not_ fastened but slide in a grooved post at their
+side of the stile) yield to our weight, the heads fly apart, and, when
+we are over, come together again with the "claps" whence the name of
+the stile is derived. How old this curious device is does not appear,
+but it is here immemorial. An effective sketch of this stile is given
+by Dr. Wherry, in his "Notes from a Knapsack."
+
+Linton is a tiny town, smaller than sundry villages, but obviously not
+a village, with a long street of undetached houses (duly lighted)
+swinging down the slopes on either side the little river. There is a
+fine Perpendicular church, with some Norman work remaining in it, and
+a good tower, on the top of which an Ascension Day service is annually
+held. Against a wall are suspended two fire-hooks (much lighter than
+the one at St. Benet's, Cambridge) for the destruction of burning
+houses. (See note on page 38).
+
+The main road here goes on, to pass out of Cambridgeshire into
+Suffolk, a few miles further, at the upland village of Horseheath,
+with its picturesque old-world village green on the hillside. The
+church here has a fine fourteenth century brass to Sir John de
+Argentine (a name familiar to readers of Sir Walter Scott, in the
+"Lord of the Isles")[151] and some notable monuments, somewhat
+knocked about, presumably by Dowsing, who records how he here "brake
+down four pictures of the prophets Ezekiel, Daniel, Zephaniah, and
+Malachi," besides other damage.
+
+[Footnote 151: Local antiquarian research, however, considers that the
+name is more probably Audley. One of the Audleys of Horseheath (who
+were in no way connected with the Reformation Audleys, of Audley End
+and Magdalene College), distinguished himself at the battle of
+Poictiers.]
+
+But a more interesting road from Linton is that which continues along
+the Bourne Valley, and leads, not into Suffolk, but into Essex, which
+is here bounded by that stream. A mile beyond the town we pass Barham
+Hall, now a farm-house, but of old a Priory of the same Order that we
+found at Isleham,[152] a Cell (or Colony) of the Abbey of St. Jacutus
+de Insula in Brittany. Another mile brings us to Bartlow, where, hard
+by the church, stand the three huge tumuli from which the name of the
+village is said to be derived. How they came to exist is an unsolved
+problem. Remains found in them, when excavated in 1835, were reported
+to be Roman, but the science of archaeology was then in its infancy,
+and this report can hardly outweigh the wholly un-Roman appearance of
+the "Hills," as they are locally called. They look far more like
+British or Scandinavian work; but, indeed, three such mounds so close
+together are not found elsewhere, of any age.
+
+[Footnote 152: See p. 183.]
+
+The little church has an ancient fresco of St. Christopher, placed, as
+usual, opposite the entrance. For this Saint, by virtue of the legend
+which tells how he carried Christ over a river,[153] was in mediaeval
+times regarded as a special example for Christians in their going out
+and their coming in; to whom, therefore, was due their first and last
+thought in passing the doorway. More noteworthy is the Saxon tower,
+with its walls no less than six feet in thickness. For in this it is
+quite possible that we may have a part of the very "minster of stone
+and lime" raised by Canute in memory of his crowning victory over
+Edmund Ironside at Assandun.
+
+[Footnote 153: The legend ran that St. Christopher was a giant heathen
+who heard of Christ and desired to serve Him. Enquiring how he could
+do this, he was told to devote himself to deeds of charity, which he
+did by carrying pilgrims over a dangerous ford. Finally, a child whom
+he thus transported proved to be Christ Himself, whence he gained the
+name of Christopher (the Christ-bearer).]
+
+The location of that most dramatic of English battles, fought in the
+year 1016, is hotly disputed amongst historians; but there is much to
+be said for the early view which identifies Assandun with Ashdon in
+Essex, hard by Bartlow. For ten miserable years, under Ethelred the
+Unready, England had been ground in the dust, deeper and ever deeper,
+beneath the heel of the invading Dane. Year by year the degrading
+tribute wherewith she strove to buy off the foe had gone up by leaps
+and bounds. All hope seemed dead, when the accession of a hero to the
+throne roused the harried and exhausted nation into one last
+convulsive effort for freedom. Six times in as many months did Edmund
+of England and Canute of Denmark clash in battle. Five of these fields
+were indecisive, and then, on St. Luke's Day, 1016, the champions met
+once more at Assandun, perhaps on the slope still known as Bartlow
+End.
+
+Treason decided the day against England. The fight began with a
+brilliant charge by Edmund at the head of his bodyguard, which crashed
+through the Danish phalanx "like a thunderbolt." But his absence from
+the English line enabled a traitorous noble, one Edric (who was always
+playing into Canute's hands, in hope of thereby making his own
+advantage), to raise a cry that the King was slain. A panic set in at
+once; and before Edmund could cut his way back, the whole army had
+broken, and was being fearfully cut up in its flight by the pursuing
+Danes. "And there the whole nobility of England was utterly
+destroyed." Edmund died of his exertions the same year; and Canute
+became King of England, the first monarch so to call himself. The
+native title had always been "King of the English." In thanksgiving he
+built a minster on the scene of his victory; and, as he had promised,
+he lifted up the head of Edric "above all the nobility of
+England"--upon the highest turret of the Tower of London. The "Roman"
+theory notwithstanding, the three Bartlow barrows may well be a
+memorial of this great fight, and so may the names of Castle Camps and
+Shudy Camps which attach to the furthest villages in this far-away
+corner of Cambridgeshire. The "Castle," however, of which only the
+moat now remains, was built later by De Vere, the first Earl of
+Oxford. Shudy Camps has a far-seen church on its lofty brow, visible
+even from Barrington Hill, on the other side of the Cam basin, fifteen
+miles away as the crow flies.
+
+[Illustration: _Cherry Hinton Church._]
+
+From the Via Devana, where it leaves Cambridge (just after the bridge
+over the Great Eastern Railway), there branches off to the left
+another road, which leads us to the scenes of earlier battles
+between Dane and Englishman. This is the Cherry Hinton Road, named
+after the first village along its course, some three miles on. Its
+long straight vista suggests at first sight the idea that it too may
+be a Roman road. In fact, however, it dates only from the enclosure of
+the land (about the beginning of last century), when the best
+ploughman in the village was employed, so the story goes, to drive his
+straightest furrow across the whole breadth of the Common Field as a
+guide for the road-makers. The older track between Cherry Hinton and
+Cambridge was by what used to be, till within the last fifty years, a
+pretty footpath across the fenny ground to the north of the field. It
+is fenny no longer, and the path has become for three-fourths of its
+length a somewhat dreary street through the dingy suburb of "Romsey
+Town."
+
+Cherry Hinton itself is not yet absorbed by Cambridge, and remains a
+bright spacious village, with a rarely beautiful church. The exquisite
+Early English chancel is lighted on either side by four couplets of
+lancet windows, in ideal proportion, while five equally ideal lancets
+serve for an East window. Both walls have an arcading of cinque-foil
+pattern; and the double piscina and the graduated sedilia are of no
+less merit. All this loveliness is within a fine oaken screen of the
+fifteenth century, and the rest of the church is not unworthy of it.
+The great quarry, whence the "clunch" of which the church is mainly
+built was drawn, is a conspicuous object on the hill-side above the
+village; and above that again, equally conspicuous, is the reservoir
+of the Cambridge Water-works, looking like a redoubt, on the summit of
+the slope. At the foot clear springs break out from the chalk, which
+are also utilised to supply the town.
+
+Close to the reservoir there is an actual fortification, an ancient
+earthwork, known as the War Ditches, which the researches of Professor
+Hughes have shown to be of British date.[154] At the bottom of the
+fosse he discovered rough British pottery along with the bones of
+domestic animals, and above these a layer of disjointed human
+skeletons of both sexes and all ages, apparently due to a general
+massacre, in some prehistoric struggle, of men, women, and children,
+whose corpses were hurled over the parapet. Above these again came
+Romano-British remains. From this earthwork the line of an ancient
+dyke, now called Warstead Street, may be traced to the East Anglian
+heights near Horseheath.
+
+[Footnote 154: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs_, p. 139.]
+
+Till the nineteenth century the fields between Cherry Hinton and
+Cambridge were bright with the purple flowers of the saffron crocus,
+which was grown, as it was by the ancient Greeks and Romans, for
+medical use and for dyeing purposes. Its cultivation may very probably
+have been introduced into Britain by the Romans. The saffron here
+grown was considered the best in Europe, and fetched no less than
+thirty shillings a pound. But its use, after so many centuries,
+suddenly went out of fashion, and the plant is now wholly extinct in
+Cambridgeshire.[155]
+
+[Footnote 155: _Ibid._ p. 96.]
+
+From Cherry Hinton Church a green lane leads to Teversham, a short
+mile distant, but, except for pedestrians, more easily approached from
+the Newmarket Road. The church here is a pretty little structure,
+mainly Early English, with curious oval clerestory windows, and a nice
+Perpendicular screen. The octagonal pillars have floreated capitals.
+Dowsing's record of his destructions here is of special interest,
+inasmuch as the objects of his Protestant zeal were not, as usual,
+relics of pre-Reformation Popery, but the newly painted devices of the
+Laudian vicar, Dr. Wren (the Bishop of Ely and builder of Peterhouse
+Chapel). They consisted of the name JESUS, "in big letters" no fewer
+than eighteen times repeated, of those of the Three Persons of the
+Blessed Trinity, and of texts from Scripture: "Let this mind be in you
+which was also in Christ Jesus," and "O come let us worship and fall
+down and kneel before the Lord our Maker." All these were "done out"
+as "idolatries"!
+
+From the springs at Cherry Hinton the furrow-drawn road (passing on
+its way the County Lunatic Asylum) makes another bee-line of three
+miles to Fulbourn. Here the church is of special interest. There are
+no fewer than five mediaeval brasses, including one, almost life-size,
+of Canon William de Fulburne, 1380, which is notable as being,
+probably, the earliest known example of a priest vested in a cope.
+This ecclesiastic was one of Edward the Third's chaplains. In a wooden
+shrine on the north side of the chancel is a moribund effigy of John
+Careway, vicar here in 1433. This is beneath a sept-foiled arch,
+beside which is another strangely irregular arch over a sedile. There
+is also the very unusual feature of a fourteenth century pulpit of
+richly-carved oak.
+
+The dedication of this church is as unusual. It is to St. Vigor, an
+obscure sixth century bishop of Bayeux, who has only one other church
+in England, at Stratton-on-the-Fosse in Somerset. Till late in the
+eighteenth century there was a second church here in the same
+churchyard, as at Swaffham Prior. This was All Saints', and was ruined
+by the fall of its tower in 1766. The ruins were gradually stolen, the
+wood going first, but it took ten years for the last of the bells to
+disappear.
+
+At the church the road divides. The northern branch meanders through
+the village past an ancient row of old-time almshouses to the station,
+beyond which it becomes a pretty lane leading to the adjoining
+villages of Great and Little Wilbraham. The church at the former has a
+tower arch of strikingly peculiar development, a tall lancet, flanked
+by segments of arches of much larger radius, inserted in the wall on
+either side, which support the central member somewhat in the fashion
+of flying buttresses. The parson here, "a widower with three small
+children" (as the Puritan report gloatingly points out), was ejected
+in 1644 by the Puritans, because "he said it was treason for any man
+to give any money against the King, and in his sermons discouraged his
+parish from doing anything for the Parliament, and that he never read
+any book coming from the Parliament." Caution should be observed in
+passing through these villages, as sundry well-seeming roads simply
+lead down to Fulbourn Fen[156] and end there. Springs feeding the fen
+are plentiful, and the ground is still very much of a swamp.
+
+[Footnote 156: See p. 170.]
+
+But the road to take from Fulbourn Church is that which winds away
+south-eastwards, for in less than three miles it will bring us to the
+Icknield Street,[157] close to the point where that famous war-path
+cuts through the no less famous Fleam Dyke. This is the best place for
+viewing and ascending that splendid prehistoric earthwork, the sister
+and rival of the Devil's Dyke. It makes a most fascinating byway to
+walk along, though it leads nowhither, ending abruptly where it dips
+down into Fulbourn Fen.[158] The dry chalk is clothed with flowers
+all the summer through. At Easter time we may here find the glorious
+purple Pasch-flower, that queen of all the anemone clan; later on "the
+turf is sweet with thyme and gay with yellow rock-rose, blue flax,
+milkwort, pink-budded dropwort, sainfoin, kidney vetch, and viper's
+bugloss, and here and there a bee orchis; with a dancing accompaniment
+of butterflies overhead, graylings, skippers, chalk hill and Bedford
+blues, and a host beside."[159]
+
+[Footnote 157: See p. 171.]
+
+[Footnote 158: Footpaths, however, lead across the fen from its
+termination to Fulbourn and to Wilbraham.]
+
+[Footnote 159: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs_, p. 77.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Wilbraham Church._]
+
+The air is inspiring and so also is the view, with Ely on the far
+horizon to the north; and the historical associations are not less so.
+We can imagine the oaken palisade which topped the dyke lined with the
+Icenian clansmen in their tartan plaids shouting defiance to the
+presumptuous Roman who dared to demand their arms; then the incredibly
+audacious onslaught which, along the whole length of the Dyke at once,
+carried Ostorius and his light-armed troops at one rush clear across
+the mighty ditch, and up the forty feet of precipitous slope beyond,
+to crown the parapet and whirl away the patriot levies in headlong
+flight; then the merciless pursuit which forbade any chance to rally,
+till the fugitives were stopped by their own second line of defence
+at the Devil's Dyke, and slaughtered like rats beneath its
+rampart.[160]
+
+[Footnote 160: See p. 172.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Wilbraham._]
+
+Or our thoughts may turn to the later day when here was beheld the
+last fight worthy to be called a battle ever fought in Cambridgeshire.
+It is the year 905 A.D.; the great Alfred has been dead four years,
+and his son Edward the Elder has been chosen King in his stead. For
+the English monarchy is still elective, though already with a strong
+tendency to become hereditary. And this tendency now gives trouble.
+When Alfred himself was made King his nephew Ethelwald Clito, son of
+his elder brother Ethelred, the late King, was passed over in his
+favour. At that fearful crisis, when it was doubtful whether even an
+Alfred could stem the Danish inrush, there could be no thought of
+choosing a child as King.
+
+[Illustration: _Little Wilbraham._]
+
+But the Danes are now quietly settled in the Eastern Counties, and
+Ethelwald has grown up to manhood, and is bitterly angry at being
+again passed over, this time for his cousin Edward. If the English
+will not choose him, he will try the Danes. So to the Danes he goes,
+with promises of unlimited loot if they will support him, and, in the
+words of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "entices them to break the peace,"
+so that they cross the Watling Street, and make a ferocious raid into
+Mercia. "They took all they might lay hands on, and so turned homeward
+again. Then after them came King Edward, as fast as he might gather
+his force, and overran all their land between the Dykes and the Ouse,
+as far North as the Fens."
+
+The Devil's Dyke and the Fleam Dyke are by this time known as "the two
+dykes of St. Edmund," and now play their latest part in history as
+defences. Edward is no Ostorius, being a valiant warrior of the
+cautious rather than the daring type, and the Fleam Dyke brings his
+avenging host to a standstill. Finally he resolves that to storm it
+would cost too much, and retires his command. But his levies from Kent
+are of another temper, and positively refuse to obey what they look
+upon as an ignominious order. One after another, seven royal
+messengers repeat it in vain; and finally the main body of the English
+army marches off under the Royal banner, leaving the mutineers still
+before the Dyke--probably at the very point where the Icknield Way
+cuts it.
+
+This is the Danes' opportunity. They have now safely deposited their
+plunder, and are ready for another outbreak. With their whole force
+they sally forth, and fall upon these stubborn Kentish men, and the
+fighting becomes desperate. The Kentish Alderman (who combined the
+offices of High Sheriff and Lord Lieutenant) is slain, so is the
+Danish King Eric, so is Ethelwald "the Atheling" himself, "and very
+many with them. And great was the slaughter there made on either hand;
+and of the Danish folk were there the more slain, yet won they the
+field."[161] And thus, after so many ages of warfare, does the Fleam
+Dyke, or Balsham Ditch, as it is also called, enter on its millennium
+of peace.
+
+[Footnote 161: _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle._]
+
+[Illustration: _Balsham Tower._]
+
+For it played no part in the tragedy which, a hundred years after this
+last fight, is associated with its alternative name. Once more Danes
+and Englishmen are at hand-grips; but now it is no mere loose
+aggregate of private hordes pressing, each on its own, into the land,
+but Swend Forkbeard, the monarch of a great Scandinavian Empire
+purposing to add England also to his dominions. And under the weak
+sceptre of Ethelred the Unready, nothing beyond local resistance has
+been offered him; and here alone is the local resistance serious. East
+Anglia is under the governorship of the hero Ulfcytel, who has already
+given the Danes an unforgotten taste of his "hand-play," and he
+gathers her whole force to meet them at Ringmere. But the appalling
+tidings of what Swend has done elsewhere, "lighting his war-beacons
+as he went" throughout the length and breadth of the land, "with his
+three wonted comrades, fire, famine, and slaughter," have taken all
+the heart out of the English levies. For "all England did quake before
+him like a reed-bed rustling in the wind." The battle is speedily
+over. "Soon fled the East Angles; there stood Grantabryg-shire fast
+only."
+
+Upon Cambridgeshire accordingly this vainly gallant stand brought down
+the special vengeance of the conquerors. To and fro went Danish
+punitive columns, and visited the district with a harrying even beyond
+their wont. "What they could lift, that took they; what they might not
+carry, that burned they; and so marched they up and down the land."
+And at Balsham, perhaps because of some local resistance, they are
+said to have killed out the entire population, man, woman, and child;
+save one single individual only, who successfully defended against
+them the narrow entrance to the Church steeple.
+
+It is quite possible that this doorway is the very one which we see
+when we reach Balsham, where the Dyke ends, high on the East Anglian
+heights: for, though the church was rebuilt in the fourteenth century,
+the basement of the tower seems to be far older. Here we are four
+hundred feet up, and the air has quite an Alpine freshness, after the
+damp, sluggish atmosphere of the sea level at Cambridge. We feel well
+why the old Chronicler, Henry of Huntingdon, speaks of "Balsham's
+pleasant hills."
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Balsham._]
+
+There are in this church two most noteworthy brasses, one a
+magnificent memorial, no less than nine feet in length, to John de
+Sleford, rector here, the rebuilder of the church. He was a
+distinguished personage, being Chaplain to Queen Philippa, Master of
+the Wardrobe to her husband King Edward the Third, and Canon both of
+Ripon and of Wells. The orphreys of his cope are embroidered with the
+figures of Saints, five on either side,[162] and in the canopy over
+his head his soul is being borne by angels to the Blessed Trinity with
+the prayer PERSONIS . TRINE . POSCO . ME: SVSCIPE . FINE. The other
+brass is no less magnificent in size and decoration, and commemorates
+a yet more magnificent pluralist, John Blodwell, who was Rector here
+in 1439, besides being Dean of St. Asaph, Canon of St. David's,
+Prebendary of Hereford, and Prebendary of Lichfield. He, too, has
+eight Saints on his cope, and eight more in his canopy.[163] Twelve
+Latin verses give a dialogue between himself and Death, whose words
+are incised, while his are in relief. The chancel has twelve fine
+stalls on either side, and a grand rood screen, all from the
+generosity of Rector Sleford. Yet another, and earlier, worthy
+connected with this place, is Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely and
+Founder of the earliest Cambridge College, Peterhouse.
+
+[Footnote 162: SS. Mary, John, Katharine, Paul, Magdalene, John
+Baptist, Etheldreda, Peter, Margaret, Wilfrid.]
+
+[Footnote 163: These are SS. Michael, James, Katharine, Gabriel,
+Margaret, ? ? John Baptist, Peter, Asaph, Bridgett, John, Andrew,
+Nicolas, Winifred.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+     London Road.--Trumpington, Church, Brass, Chaucer's Mill, Byron's
+     Pool, Upper River.--Grantchester, Church.--Cam and Granta.--The
+     Shelfords.--Sawston, Old-world Industries, Hall, Hiding-Hole,
+     "Little John."--Whittlesford, Old Hospital.--Duxford.--Triplow
+     Heath, Civil War.--Fowlmere, Hinxton, Sacring Bell.--Ickleton,
+     Monolith Pillars.--Chesterford.--Icknield Way.--Saffron Walden.
+
+
+Due south from Cambridge goes the great London Road, a name now
+practically supplanted by the local designation of Trumpington Road.
+Trumpington, two miles out, is already joined to Cambridge by a string
+of suburban villas; but these are only on one side of the road, while
+the other is a continuous line of nightingale-haunted elms, not even
+the stench and dust of the motorist having availed to drive away those
+fearless songsters. In leaving the Town the road starts along Hobson's
+Conduit, passing the Botanic Gardens, and crosses Vicar's Brook at the
+historic milestone already described on page 160, the first to be set
+up in England since the days of the Romans.
+
+Trumpington Church shares with Salisbury Cathedral the distinction of
+being built wholly in the Early English style at its best; and it has
+what is, perhaps, the best-known brass in England, that of Sir Roger
+de Trumpington, one of the crusading comrades of Edward the First. The
+knight is in full panoply of chain-armour, with steel epaulettes (or
+ailettes as they were then called) protecting his shoulders. His
+helmet is secured by a chain to his girdle, an unusual precaution, and
+his large concave shield is charged with his punning arms, two golden
+trumpets.
+
+From the Church an alluring hollow lane winds down to a flat green
+island meadow (once a swamp, and still often flooded) between two
+branches of the Cam, dividing Trumpington from the sister village of
+Grantchester. On the Grantchester side of this island we come to a
+mill, with a specially delicious mill-pool below it, overhung by a
+wreath of foliage, chiefly chestnut. This is the representative of the
+mill immortalised by Chaucer, in the Canterbury Tale which describes
+so picturesquely the somewhat unsavoury adventures of the Cambridge
+"clerks":
+
+  At Trompyngtoun, nat far fro Cantebrigge,
+  There goth a brook, and over that a brigge,
+  Upon the whiche brook ther stant a melle,
+  And this is verray sothe that I you telle.
+
+The present mill, however, is not on the actual site of Chaucer's,
+which stood some quarter of a mile higher up the stream. Its mill-pool
+still exists, and is famed as "Byron's Pool." Hither the poet used
+constantly to make his way when an undergraduate, as a retired spot
+where he might enjoy his favourite delight of bathing, which even in
+his day was a practice somewhat frowned upon by the academic
+authorities. A century or so earlier, as has been already said, any
+student found guilty of it was publicly flogged in the Hall of his
+College.[164] It is a fascinating place, overhung by fine trees, and
+remained in favour as a bathing-place even to the middle of the
+nineteenth century. Now it has become so silted up as to be
+practically useless. But on the river above it there is still a good
+swimming reach, little used, however, as most students are content
+with the University bathing sheds between Grantchester and Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 164: See p. 153. After this preliminary domestic castigation
+he was again flogged on the morrow in the University Schools by the
+Proctors. A second offence meant expulsion from the University!]
+
+The footpath past these sheds is a pleasant byway between the two
+places, through the green meadows along the riverbank, and so also is
+the river itself, hereabouts no more than the "brook" which Chaucer
+calls it. It is, however, by no means a water to be played with
+rashly, having a tortuous course full of deep holes, in which many
+lives have been lost. Indeed, no student is now allowed on this "Upper
+River," unless a certified swimmer. A third alternative route is
+afforded by the lane between Grantchester and Newnham. Though the
+southern half of this suburb is actually in Grantchester parish, the
+lane still runs through open fields, and Grantchester itself is in no
+sense suburban.
+
+A strangely zig-zag road (with no fewer than four right-angle bends to
+left and right alternately in as many hundred yards), climbs from the
+mill to the church, which stands, like Trumpington, on the gravel
+terrace above the river. These river gravels are amongst the most
+interesting of Cambridgeshire geological formations. Not only does
+their height above the present stream level (sometimes as much as
+thirty feet) point to an age when the rivers must have been much
+larger than now, but they are prolific in organic remains, indicating,
+sometimes a warmer, sometimes a colder climate than ours. Here, at
+Grantchester, bones of the mammoth and of the woolly rhinoceros
+connote subarctic conditions; but a few miles further up the Cam, at
+Barrington, the terrace is full of hippopotamus, along with elephant
+and rhinoceros of African type, postulating a sub-tropical
+temperature.
+
+Grantchester Church is chiefly noteworthy for its singularly beautiful
+chancel, an almost ideal example of fourteenth century work, perched
+most effectively above one of the bends in the road. The name, with
+its "chester" has led many antiquarians to hold that here was a Roman
+station.[165] But the application of the name to the village is only
+some three centuries old. In earlier days it is always "Grantset." We
+do find "Grantchester" in Bede (as mentioned in our account of Ely);
+but the spot indicated is almost certainly Cambridge, then still in
+ruins after its destruction during the English conquest of Britain.
+
+[Footnote 165: "Chester," "Caster," "Cester," are various Anglicised
+forms of the Latin "castra" (= camp), which our conquering forefathers
+applied to the Romano-British cities which they so ruthlessly
+destroyed in the first sweep of their invasion.]
+
+On the top of the church-tower here we may notice a weird-looking
+piece of iron work. This was put up in 1823 to facilitate the
+astronomical work in the University Observatory, as it is exactly
+south of the telescope dome there, two miles and a half away. With the
+acquisition of collimating telescopes, in 1869, this relationship
+ceased to be of value, and now the growth of trees has rendered the
+tower wholly invisible from the Observatory.
+
+Not far from Byron's Pool we find the watersmeet of the two main
+streams which make our Cambridge river; each so equal in size to its
+sister that neither can be called the tributary of the other. The name
+Granta is usually appropriated to the eastern stream, that of Cam to
+the western. On some maps the latter is called the "Rhee," but this
+(like the Isis at Oxford), is merely a map-maker's name.[166]
+
+[Footnote 166: On the western bank, hard by, is a large meadow known
+as Lingay Fen, which is always (artificially) flooded during the
+winter, in hopes of a frost. It forms an excellent skating ground, on
+which even National Championships have been decided.]
+
+And as the river divides, so also does our London Road, one route
+following either valley. The Granta route goes via Bishop Stortford
+and Epping Forest, entering London by the Mile End Road, the other via
+Royston, Ware, and Tottenham, coming in by Bishopsgate Street. The
+division comes just as we leave Trumpington, at the lych-gate of the
+village cemetery, whence the left-hand branch brings us to the twin
+villages of Great and Little Shelford, with the Granta running between
+them. Both churches are good, the former with an octagonal steeple,
+and a churchyard kept like a garden, and the latter with a grand
+square-headed Decorated window in its transept, where are preserved
+some nice fragments of the ancient alabaster reredos. There are also
+various good fifteenth century monuments of the De Freville family,
+whose name still lives on as that of a suburban district in Cambridge.
+Great Shelford Church is richly decorated, as it seems to have been of
+old, for here Dowsing destroyed no fewer than 128 "superstitions." The
+bridge over the Granta between the two villages was in mediaeval times
+under the charge of a hermit, like Newnham Bridge at Cambridge.[167]
+
+[Footnote 167: See p. 41.]
+
+[Illustration: _Great Shelford Church._]
+
+Villages continue to be found on both banks as we ascend the Granta.
+The main road, on the east of the stream, leads through Stapleford, a
+small place, to the large and important Sawston. Its size and
+importance are due to the existence of that all too rare development,
+a really thriving rural industry. For here is not only a flourishing
+paper-mill, turning out its twenty tons a week of superfine
+copper-glazed paper, but the much more uncommon manufacture of
+parchment, and of the "shammy" leather used for cleaning plate, etc.
+And this is produced in a delightfully rural and old-time fashion.
+There are no machines here automatically grinding out facsimile
+products; every process is confided to the skill and judgment of the
+individual in charge of it. There are fifteen or sixteen such
+processes involved, and a very little carelessness in any one of them
+would spoil the whole series. Thus every workman is an expert, and
+takes a pride in his work impossible to the mere driver of a machine.
+The great aim of each is to "keep his skin in condition" while under
+his hands, so as to have a right to glory in the finished article.
+
+The very terms used in this manufacture have an ancient smack about
+them. The sheepskins used are called "pelts," and are supplied by the
+"fell-monger." They are first immersed for a while in a solution of
+lime, and then hung over nothing less primitive than the half of a
+tree, sawn lengthwise, while a "flesher" scrapes and "couches" them
+(_i.e._, removes all wrinkles). They are then "split," the inner skin,
+called the "mutton" or "lining," being adroitly separated from the
+outer "grain." This "lining" is next "frized" (_i.e._, rubbed), to
+remove all fat, then again "limed," and thoroughly washed. It is then
+"squeezed" and "punched" till "the water is killed," then soaked with
+cod-liver oil. This causes fermentation to set in, during which the
+skins have to be carefully watched by men whose duty it is to "turn
+the heats" before "burning" takes place. Alkaline treatment follows,
+and, finally, the skins are "ground," _i.e._, pared with a round knife
+and smoothed with a wooden "scurfer," being sprinkled the while with
+water from a bunch of butchers' broom, called by its old English name
+"knee-holm." They are then packed in "kips" of thirty apiece, and put
+on the market. Before "grounding," the taste of the ordinary customer,
+who likes a pretty white "shammy," is consulted by bleaching most of
+the skins with sulphur. Appearance, however, is thus dearly purchased,
+for sulphur blackens silver, besides shortening the life of the skin.
+The useful colour is dark brown.
+
+"For parchment the 'linings' are tied in a frame by strings fastened
+round grooved pegs, on the same principle as a Spanish windlass....
+After being scraped with a 'half-round' knife, dried, 'shaved,' dabbed
+with whitewash, and heated in a stove to remove the grease, they are
+then scalded and rubbed with pumice until they are fine and
+smooth.... The parchment workers wear clogs, sheepskin leggings, and
+'basil' aprons. A basil is an unsplit tanned sheepskin. In this
+well-managed factory all the refuse goes to make soap, glue, dubbin,
+or manure, and not one scrap of material is wasted."[168]
+
+[Footnote 168: Prof. Hughes' _Geography of Cambridgeshire_, p. 106.]
+
+Sawston, moreover, is not only full of present interest, but rich in
+associations with the past. The Village Cross stands on its ancient
+site, and the church, which retains some Norman features, has several
+mediaeval brasses, though none of special merit. The Hall is yet more
+remarkable. It was built in the reign of Queen Mary with materials
+from the ruins of Cambridge Castle, granted by her in consideration of
+the earlier hall having been destroyed for sheltering her. At the
+death of her brother Edward the Sixth, the Protestant Lords of the
+Council sought to arrest her as she approached London. Hearing of
+their design she took refuge at Sawston Hall, then as now the seat of
+the Huddleston family, who then as now steadfastly adhered to the
+ancient faith. Her presence there being reported at Cambridge, a
+Protestant mob, under the direction of the authorities, pounced upon
+the hall so suddenly that she had barely time to escape on horseback
+behind one of the serving men, her course lighted by the flames of the
+burning building, which was utterly destroyed by the disappointed
+Protestants. A missal taken in the sack was, on the following Sunday,
+held up to public derision and formally torn to pieces in the
+University Church.
+
+By the time the rebuilding of the hall was completed another, and more
+thoroughgoing, Protestant persecution had broken out. To hear Mass was
+made treason-felony, punished by forfeiture of goods and perpetual
+imprisonment, while to say it was an act of high treason, for which
+the offending priest suffered the lingering death assigned by the law
+to traitors, being first half-hanged, then disembowelled, and finally
+quartered. The Catholic chapels of the day were accordingly placed in
+the garrets, as in that still existing at Sawston Hall, where the
+worshippers had most warning in case of a domiciliary visit by the
+authorities. Secret cupboards were contrived for hiding the sacred
+vessels, books, and vestments, and secret exits by which the priest
+might, if possible, be smuggled out of the house, and, in case these
+proved unavailable, "Hiding Holes" in which he might take refuge. That
+at Sawston Hall is in the staircase, and is described by Mr. Allan Fea
+in his _Secret Chambers and Hiding Places_:
+
+     "The entrance is so cleverly arranged that it slants into the
+     masonry of a circular tower, without showing the least
+     perceptible sign, from the exterior, of a space capable of
+     holding a baby, far less a man. A particular board in the landing
+     is raised, and beneath it, in a corner of the cavity, is found a
+     stone slab containing a circular aperture, something after the
+     manner of our modern urban receptacles for coal. From this hole a
+     tunnel slants downwards, at an angle, into the adjacent wall,
+     where there is an apartment some twelve feet in depth, and wide
+     enough to contain half a dozen people.... The opening is so
+     massive and firm that, unless pointed out, the particular
+     floor-board could never be detected, and when secured from the
+     inside could defy a battering ram."
+
+This is an unusually commodious Hiding Hole, large enough to hold not
+only the refugee priest but provisions to maintain him during the
+search, a very necessary item of the precautions. For when the
+pursuivants pounced upon a Catholic mansion they always began by
+locking up the inmates, that no succour might be given to the outlaw
+whose presence they suspected, and then proceeded to a most systematic
+and thoroughgoing search, in which chimneys, cellars, and roofs were
+exhaustively explored, panellings pulled down, and floors torn up, for
+days together. The ransacking and wrecking sometimes lasted a whole
+fortnight on end; but with such art were these retreats constructed
+that they constantly defied even so stringent a test, unless
+betrayed--sometimes by the unintentional emotion of those in the
+secret.
+
+Like most others in England this Hiding Hole at Sawston Hall was due
+to the ingenuity of a Jesuit, one Nicolas Owen (nicknamed "Little
+John" from his diminutive stature), who, "with incomparable skill and
+inexhaustible industry," devoted his life to contriving these
+recesses. "And by this his skill," says a seventeenth century writer,
+"many priests were preserved from the prey of persecutors." Finally he
+was himself betrayed into the hands of the Protestant Government, who
+write exultingly of their "great joy" in his arrest; "knowing his
+skill in constructing hiding-places, and the innumerable number of
+these dark holes which he hath schemed for hiding priests throughout
+the kingdom." It was hoped that he might be induced to reveal these
+places, "to the taking of great booty of priests." But Owen remained
+staunch against all threats and blandishments, and finally allowed
+himself to be tortured to death without suffering the secret "to be
+wrung from him," as Cecil ordered that it should be. "The man is
+dead--he died in our hands," is the laconic report of the Governor of
+the Tower in answer to this order.
+
+The knee-holm, or butchers' broom, used in the Sawston leather work,
+grows at Whittlesford, on the other side of the Granta, a pretty,
+shady village with an interesting church; the development of which,
+from a Saxon nucleus, is a nice (and not yet satisfactorily solved)
+problem for lovers of mediaeval architecture. There is a wooden porch
+(oak) of the fourteenth century. At Whittlesford Bridge, where the
+Granta is crossed by the Icknield Street, close to the railway
+station, one sees, hard by the road, a decayed stone edifice, with a
+high pitched roof thatched with reeds, now used as a barn.
+
+[Illustration: _Whittlesford._]
+
+This is the chapel of the ancient Hospital of St. John, founded in the
+thirteenth century. There were several such institutions in
+Cambridgeshire, started, not specially for the care of the sick, but
+for "hospitality" in the widest sense of the word. Here travellers
+were entertained, the hungry were fed, the needy were ministered to,
+according to their several necessities. The Hospitals were rarely
+large institutions, and this one, as the size of its chapel shows, was
+quite a small affair, only endowed with some sixty acres of meadow
+land and a water-mill, equivalent, probably, to some L200 a year in
+all. But having been under the direction of a prior (appointed by the
+Bishop of Ely), it is sometimes known by the high-sounding title of
+Whittlesford Priory. The interior of the building still retains some
+beautiful early English work. A specially pleasant roadside hostelry
+next door (the Red Lion), with deliciously quaint carvings on mantel
+and ceiling, may be held, in some sense, its modern representative;
+and, indeed, is thought by many authorities to have actually formed
+part of it.
+
+Though, for some reason, always associated with the name of
+Whittlesford, this Hospital is actually in the adjoining parish of
+Duxford, or rather in one of the two (now consolidated) parishes of
+St. John and St. Peter, between which this little village is divided.
+Both churches still exist (though St. John's is now only used for
+burials in its churchyard), and both are very much of the same build,
+mainly Early English, with a little Norman, of which St. John's
+steeple is the most noteworthy example. St. Peter's has a beautiful
+"low-side" window in the northern wall of the chancel.
+
+To the west of Duxford the Icknield Street traverses a wide bleak
+expanse of treeless fields which, until the nineteenth century, were
+the unenclosed turf-land forming the famous Triplow Heath, the scene
+of the first breach between the Long Parliament and its army. In the
+view of the Parliament that force had now done its work. The Cavalier
+levies had been stamped out, the king had been "bought" from the
+Scots, and was in Parliamentary custody at Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, the Scots themselves had withdrawn to their own
+country; why then should not this costly, and rather dangerous, army
+be disbanded?
+
+But this was far from being the view of the soldiers themselves. A
+return to the monotonous routine of civil life, after the thrilling
+excitements of civil war, had no attractions for them; least of all, a
+return without their pay. That pay--one shilling a day--was more than
+double the current wages; and now it was many months behindhand--a
+whole year in some cases. The suggestions of disbandment were met,
+accordingly, by the concentration of the troops, including Cromwell's
+famous regiments, on Triplow Heath, in his own East Anglian district.
+This was on the 10th of June, 1647.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Peter's Church, Duxford._]
+
+Commissioners from the Parliament were sent down from Westminster,
+with offers of two months' pay in cash and debentures for the
+remaining arrears, contingent on disbandment. But this was not nearly
+good enough; and the offers were met with cries of "Justice! Justice!"
+from the men, and with significant hints from the officers of a march
+on London if their claims were not speedily satisfied, "for a rich
+city may seem an enticing bait to poor beggarly soldiers to venture
+far to gain the wealth thereof."
+
+And, while the baffled Commissioners returned, to call out the London
+train-bands to meet the threatened attack (finding them so reluctant
+to face this new and terrific foe that the death-penalty had to be
+denounced against all malingerers), the Army took more effective
+action by despatching Cornet Joyce, with a troop of horse, to seize
+the King at Holmby House and bring him along as a prisoner; or, as
+they put it, to rescue him from his Parliamentary jailers, and invite
+him to trust his person with his faithful soldiers. They might thus be
+able to sell him again to the Parliament, as the Scots had done, or
+they might really restore him, for a sufficient consideration, or make
+their own of him some way. And, while Charles was being thus carried
+off, as we have already seen, to Chippenham, they struck their camp
+and marched off along the Icknield Street to Royston, and thence to
+St. Albans, as a demonstration against London. When the unhappy
+monarch, a fortnight later, on Midsummer Day, was brought by the same
+route from Newmarket, crossing Whittlesford Bridge and passing through
+the midst of Triplow Heath, the scene had already returned to its
+habitual loneliness.
+
+Triplow itself lies to the west of the Heath, and has a far-seen
+cruciform Church, sister to that in the adjoining village of Foulmire,
+or Fowlmere as it ought to be spelt. An actual mere, noted for its
+wealth of wild fowl, existed here till little more than half a century
+ago. It is now a worthless patch of land, full of springs and runlets.
+There is also a small prehistoric earthwork, known as "The Round
+Moats."
+
+From Duxford, a pretty byway--far prettier till, a year or two ago,
+the picturesque wooden foot-bridge across the Granta was replaced by
+an iron modernity--leads to Hinxton, where the church has some
+interesting architectural developments, and a good brass to Sir Thomas
+de Skelton, steward to "old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster."
+He is shown in full plate-armour, and his two wives lie beside him.
+The Parochial Register here dates back to the very first institution
+of such documents, in 1538, by Thomas Cromwell. This is quite rare;
+for the idea was, in its first inception, to the last degree unpopular
+both with clergy and people, who suspected, from their experience of
+Henry's illimitable greed, that a tax would be exacted upon each of
+the ecclesiastical functions thus registered.
+
+On the outside of the spire, which is of wood covered with lead, hangs
+a "Sanctus" (or "Sacring") Bell, which of old was rung at those places
+in the High Mass where a small bell is sounded by the Server at the
+Altar; that is to say, at the _Ter Sanctus_ and the Consecration of
+the Host. Thus those of the faithful who were unable to attend church
+were invited to unite themselves in spirit with the worshippers there
+at the most solemn moments of the Service. Few of these bells remain,
+as their associations were, of course, specially distasteful to
+Protestant feeling, so that they were mostly destroyed at the
+Reformation.
+
+At Hinxton we are on the borders of Essex, and a shady
+westward-running lane takes us on, across the river and the railway,
+to the last Cambridgeshire village on this line, Ickleton, where the
+church is of quite unique interest. Here, too, there is a Sacring
+Bell, on the side of the steeple; surviving, doubtless, through the
+same unknown local influence which also saved that on the sister spire
+of Hinxton. But the real interest of the church is entirely hidden
+from passers by. Those even who look from the pretty little Village
+Green to the southward see nothing that calls for notice, except the
+Sacring Bell and a fairly good Geometrical window in the steeple. The
+rest of the exterior shows only poor fourteenth century work--and
+cruelly "restored" at that.
+
+But, once inside, we discover that the unsightly exterior is but an
+outer shell, built round, and over, a smaller and far older church,
+still standing, and so entirely enclosed that its clerestory lights
+now open into the existing aisles. Above them are the lights of the
+later fourteenth century clerestory, which, no doubt, originally
+contained Geometrical, or more probably Flowing, tracery. Now,
+however, they are mere "churchwarden" apertures, of various indefinite
+shapes, with mean wooden sashes, having been remorselessly doctored in
+the second decade of the nineteenth century.
+
+It is when we look closely at this interior church that we note its
+truly astonishing features. At the first glance it might be taken for
+an ordinary Norman structure, with its round pillars and round arches;
+and, in fact, it is usually so described by the few authorities who
+notice it at all. The rudeness of the capitals, however, and the
+general aspect of the arcade, does not somehow look like Norman work,
+but more suggests Saxon architecture. And the very small clerestory
+lights, mere loopholes, still more lead us to this conclusion. Some
+archaeologists, therefore, consider this interior church at Ickleton to
+be a Saxon edifice; and, so far as the clerestory is concerned, it is
+exceedingly probable that they are right. The piers of the tower
+arches, however, are unmistakably Norman, as is also the west doorway.
+
+But what is the arcade? When we examine the massive circular pillars
+which support it, we see to our amazement that, instead of being built
+up in the usual manner, every one of them is a monolith! We are now
+obliged to confess ourselves in the presence not of Norman or Saxon
+but of _Roman_ work, for no example of such monolithic construction is
+known in any later architecture, and was, indeed, sparingly employed
+even by the Romans.
+
+How did these pillars come to be here? They are of Barnack stone from
+Northamptonshire, and must have been brought at an expense well-nigh
+prohibitory to the finances of a small country parish. We may dismiss
+the idea that they were hewn out of the quarry in this specially
+costly form, and fetched all the way from Barnack by the builders of
+this little unpretending church.
+
+Dismissing this, there remain two other alternatives. A mile distant
+from Ickleton to the southward stands Chesterford, the site of an
+important Roman station, commonly identified with the _Icianos_ of the
+third century "Antonine" Itinerary. The place derived its name, and
+its importance, from its position at the point where the River Granta
+is crossed by the Icknield Way, the line of communication along the
+strip of greensward between the Cambridgeshire fens and the forest
+topping the East Anglian heights, which gave access to the territory
+of the Iceni in Norfolk and Suffolk. The Saxon builders of Ickleton
+Church may have found these pillars amid the ruins of _Icianos_, or of
+some villa in the neighbourhood, and have brought them that short
+distance for their edifice. As they were ready made this would be a
+cheap job.
+
+Such is the one alternative. The other, to which I myself incline, is
+that they did not need to fetch the pillars at all, but utilised them
+on the very spot where they originally stood. According to this view
+we have here an example, unique in Britain, of Roman work _in situ_.
+The very arcading which we see I take to have stood north and south of
+the central hall of some large Roman mansion. Such a mansion usually
+contained an oblong central hall of this kind (often roofless), with a
+peristyle, or cloister, on either side opening into it, a portico at
+one end, and a smaller _tablinum_ or guest-chamber at the other.
+Lanciani has pointed out how this structural arrangement suggested the
+nave, aisles, porch, and chancel of the earliest ecclesiastical
+edifices at Rome.[169] The same suggestion may have influenced the
+builders of Ickleton Church to utilise this old Roman arcading,
+roofing in the enclosed space, but with a clerestory to prevent too
+great loss of light. If this view is correct the narrow north aisle
+probably represents the width of the original peristyle.
+
+[Footnote 169: See my _Roman Britain_, p. 266.]
+
+The south aisle is far wider, as wide indeed as the nave and north
+aisle together; and one asks why the fourteenth century architect
+planned his work so very unsymmetrically. The answer, I think, is to
+be found in the remarkable architectural development of the steeple.
+The piers of the tower are, as I have said, unmistakably Norman, but
+upon them are set, quite unconformably, arches at least a century
+later in date. The tower is pierced by these arches on all four sides,
+and was evidently meant as the centre of a cruciform church with
+transepts. For some reason this Norman plan was never completed, but
+it is very probable that the south wall of the church marks the limit
+to which the transept (which may have been actually begun) was meant
+to extend.
+
+The church has also later features of interest. There are some good
+mediaeval seat finials, shaped with the axe and bearing grotesque
+figures, musical instruments, and symbols; the word ORATE being
+decipherable upon one of them. The rood-screen is fifteenth century,
+and is placed across the eastern arch of the tower, with no trace of
+there having ever been a rood-loft.
+
+The land of Ickleton was almost wholly _Terra Ecclesiae_. A priory of
+Benedictine nuns existed here, founded in the twelfth century by
+Aubrey de Vere, the first Earl of Oxford; while the Abbeys of East
+Dereham in Norfolk, Tyltey in Essex, and even Calder (a "cell" of
+Furness), in far-off Cumberland, each possessed a Manor in the
+Parish. All alike were given by Henry the Eighth to Goodrich, Bishop
+of Ely, in exchange for the far more valuable property of Hatfield
+House. Queen Elizabeth, however, afterwards demanded them all back
+again, with much other land, as a condition of appointing Bishop
+Heton, in 1600, to the See, which she had kept vacant to fill her
+coffers for no less than nineteen years. The Manors were sold by the
+Crown, and are now in private hands. The benefice is in the gift of
+the Lord Chancellor.
+
+The name Ickleton, like those of Ickborough in Norfolk, Ickingham in
+Suffolk, and Ickleford in Hertfordshire, is derived from the position
+of the village on the line of the Icknield Way. It may indeed be the
+direct linguistic descendant of the Roman _Icianos_. We must bear in
+mind that a prehistoric track, such as the Icknield Way, was not one
+single-metalled thoroughfare like a Roman road or a modern highway,
+but a broad line of route along which each traveller made his own
+"trek," so that the "Way" was a series of roughly parallel ruttings
+over the breadth of a mile and more. Such, to this day, are the routes
+across the Siberian steppes, which are often four or five miles
+across. Thus we found the Icknield Way at Whittlesford, three miles
+north of Chesterford, and it is probable that all the various "fords"
+we have been meeting--Shelford, Stapleford, Whittlesford,
+Duxford--have to do with its various passages of the Granta.
+
+Beyond Chesterford the Granta comes down in tiny streamlets from the
+Essex chalk near Saffron Walden, with its wide-naved church, which
+Cromwell's troops used for a drill-shed and council-chamber, and its
+historic mansion of Audley End, once Walden Abbey, and its memories of
+the days, scarcely a century by-gone, when great crops of saffron were
+grown in its fields, leaving their only existing trace in the name.
+And even that is dying out; few of the inhabitants call their home
+anything but Walden. But this town is beyond our Cambridgeshire
+border.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+     London Road.--Hauxton Bridge, Indulgences, Church, Becket
+     Fresco.--Burnt Mill.--Haslingfield.--White Hill, View, Clunch
+     Pits, Chapel, Papal Bulla.--Barrington, Green, Church, Porch,
+     Seats, Chest, Fountains, Finds, Coprolite Digging,
+     Hall.--Foxton.--Shepreth.--Meldreth, Parish Stocks.--Melbourn,
+     Shipmoney.--Royston, Origin, Cave, Heath.--Bassingbourn, Old
+     Accounts, Villenage.--Black Death.--Ashwell, Source of Cam,
+     Church, Graffiti.--Akeman Street.--Barton, Butts.--Comberton,
+     Maze.--Harlton Church, Old Pit.--Orwell Maypole, Church,
+     Epitaph.--Wimpole Hall, Queen Victoria.--Arrington.--Shingay,
+     Hospitallers, Fairy Cart.--Wendy.--Artesian Wells.--Guilden
+     Morden, Screen, St. Edmund, Confessionals.
+
+
+The Cam Valley road from Trumpington leads us over a singularly bare
+mile, edged by sparse thorn-trees, to Hauxton Mill, where we cross the
+Granta. The repair of the bridge here was, in mediaeval days, paid for
+by the grant to all who aided this good object of a forty days'
+Indulgence. This does not mean a licence to sin with impunity for that
+period, as perfervid Protestants imagine, but merely the abrogation of
+any ordinary ecclesiastical censure incurred. The little church of
+Hauxton, not far beyond, is one of the few Norman village churches
+existing in Cambridgeshire, for the county suffered so severely in the
+Norman Conquest that little church building could be afforded till a
+century later, when Norman had given place to Early English.
+
+In this church, upon the east wall of the south aisle is a fine fresco
+of Thomas a Becket, dating from within a few decades of his own
+lifetime. Representations of this Saint are extremely rare, for, as an
+ecclesiastic who had braved his king--and that king a Henry,--he was
+specially detested by Henry the Eighth. His Festivals were all
+suppressed, his name was erased from every Service Book, and his
+effigies were destroyed with ruthless diligence, so that this is
+almost the only one known to exist in all England. It was only saved
+by the niche in which it is painted being hastily bricked up and
+plastered over; to be forgotten for upwards of three centuries, till
+accidentally discovered in 1860 during some restoration work.
+
+Hauxton Church stands a little off the main road, on a by way running
+from Shelford on the Granta to Haslingfield on the Cam. West of
+Hauxton this route becomes a mere field track, but quite a pretty one,
+crossing the Cam at an idyllic nook called Burnt Mill Bridges, where
+the green banks and clear waters are closed in by ancient elms and
+thorn bushes. It brings to the mind Milton's lines in Il Penseroso:
+
+  There in close covert, by some brook,
+  Where no profaner eye may look,
+  Hide me from day's garish eye."
+
+Haslingfield (which is more directly reached from Cambridge by the
+Barton Road) has a fine and spacious church of the fourteenth century,
+the steeple being of special merit. Above it rises steeply the eastern
+extremity of a chalk spur to the height of 220 feet. From the summit,
+though so low, we get one of the widest panoramic views in England,
+embracing the whole valley of the Cam. "Ashwell Bush,"[170] which
+marks the source of the river, is conspicuous on a hill some ten miles
+to the south-westward, and Ely Cathedral, just beyond its junction
+with the Ouse, may be seen, twice as far away to the north; Cambridge,
+with its spires and pinnacles, lying between, five or six miles
+distant. Our eastward limit of vision is the long line of the East
+Anglian Heights, from Swaffham steeple[171] on their northernmost
+visible swell, twenty miles away, to the far-off jut of Sharpinhoe,
+near Dunstable, more than thirty miles in the opposite direction.
+Beneath us, in the valley, steeple after steeple rises amid its
+village elms, dotting the landscape like knots in net-work. No fewer
+than eighty of these can be made out, the most conspicuous being the
+cruciform church of Triplow.[172]
+
+[Footnote 170: This "bush" is actually a group of young elms.]
+
+[Footnote 171: See p. 191.]
+
+[Footnote 172: See p. 230.]
+
+[Illustration: _Haslingfield Church._]
+
+This eminence was anciently known as White Hill, from the three great
+"clunch" quarries,[173] which still conspicuously scar its sides,
+and must have done so much more conspicuously of old, when this
+material was much more generally used for building than it is now.
+From these quarries came, for example, the stone used in the First
+Court of St. John's College, Cambridge. The "pits," as they are
+locally called, are rapidly greening over, for the clunch is now only
+dug for the mending of farm roads, and occasionally for marling the
+fields; as Pliny records that the ancient Britons marled them two
+thousand years ago.
+
+[Footnote 173: See p. 198.]
+
+At the summit of the ridge a small roadside cottage, known as "Chapel
+Bush," represents the once famous shrine of "Our Lady of White Hill";
+in mediaeval days a noted centre of local devotion, which drew pilgrims
+in large numbers from a wide area, so that their accommodation, as we
+read, was no small profit (and, often, difficulty) to the neighbouring
+villages. No ruins, even, of this ancient chapel remain; but, in 1885,
+there was discovered on its site a leaden _bulla_ of Pope Martin the
+Fifth, the first Pope to be generally acknowledged after the Great
+Schism; when for forty years two (or three) claimants to the Holy See
+were reigning simultaneously, supported some by one part of
+Christendom, some by another. He reigned 1417 to 1431, and was the
+consecrator of Milan Cathedral. It was he who, at the "Assize of
+Barnwell" (1430), pronounced that all spiritual jurisdiction over the
+students of Cambridge was exclusively vested in the University
+authorities. His _bulla_ bears the heads of SS. Peter and Paul, with
+the traditional features, which Lanciani has now established as
+historical; St. Peter having a broad face with curly hair and beard,
+while St. Paul is thin-faced and straight-haired.
+
+On the southern side of the hill lies Barrington, perhaps the
+loveliest of all Cambridgeshire villages. It consists of two long
+lines of scattered cottages, straggling along either side of a Village
+Green nearly a mile in length. The Green is traversed from end to end
+by the "Church Path," a pebbled causeway of immemorial antiquity. The
+church, to which this leads, stands at the north-eastern extremity of
+the Green, and is a noble structure of the twelfth century, with later
+developments. The south doorway and door are thirteenth century, and
+are wonders of graceful work; while the fourteenth century seats are
+of special interest as having been constructed with book-boards,
+showing that reading was not the rare accomplishment in those days
+that it is commonly supposed to have been.[174] There is also an
+iron-bound chest dating from the tenth century, a splendid specimen of
+the smiths-work for which England was then so famous. The font, too,
+is equally old, showing on its margin the depressions (now filled in),
+often provided in fonts of the period when baptism by immersion was
+the rule, as outlets for accidental overflow.
+
+[Footnote 174: The Chantry Priests, of whom there were two in
+Barrington, often acted as village schoolmasters, the Chantries
+themselves serving as classrooms.]
+
+[Illustration: _Farmhouse at Haslingfield._]
+
+Here and there along the Green gush out bright fountains of delicious
+water from artesian wells driven into the "greensand," some 200 feet
+below the surface. Throughout all its length the village is sheltered,
+on the north, by the ridge of White Hill, while, on the south, the
+orchards and closes with their "hedge-row elms," slope down to the Cam
+and its water-meadows. The stream here runs beneath a gravel-terrace
+of its own formation, which has proved exceptionally rich in the
+remains of pleistocene mammalia, mostly, as has been said,[175]
+connoting a semi-tropical climate. Specimens of elephant,
+hippopotamus, rhinoceros, bison, urus, lion, bear, hyaena, derived from
+Barrington, are to be seen in the Sedgwick Museum at Cambridge.
+Associated palaeolithic flint implements, and red-deer antlers rudely
+cut, show that human intelligence existed here along with these
+monsters, at least 5000 years ago, at the lowest estimate, which some
+geologists multiply fifty fold; and excavation has shown that the site
+has been populated pretty well ever since. Neolithic, British, Roman,
+Anglo-Saxon, and Mediaeval relics have here been unearthed in quite
+astonishing abundance; and, though no Roman villa has yet been
+located, Roman coins have been found literally by the hundred.
+
+[Footnote 175: See p. 221. The gravel here is older than that at
+Grantchester.]
+
+This wealth of finds has been largely due to the "coprolite" digging,
+as it was inaccurately called, which went on here (and throughout the
+neighbourhood) during the whole latter half of the nineteenth century.
+It had been discovered that the "upper greensand"[176] (here a narrow
+deposit immediately over the gault and usually some fifteen or twenty
+feet below the surface) was full of organic remains worth extracting
+for manure. These remains were never true coprolites, but mostly
+formless nodules rich in phosphate of lime, many being sponges, along
+with abundance of sea-urchins, mollusca, crabs, and innumerable
+sharks' teeth.
+
+[Footnote 176: So called because full of green grains of "glauconite,"
+which appear to be the internal casts of the shells of foraminifera.
+This bed, however, is not the true Upper Greensand, but "riddlings"
+from it.]
+
+The industry brought a wave of prosperity to the district; for
+coprolites were worth some L3 per ton, and the average yield was some
+300 tons per acre. The merchants were, therefore, willing to pay well
+for the privilege of digging them out, and usually offered the
+landowner L150 or more per acre for three years' occupation of the
+land (more than its capital value); being bound also to level and
+resoil it at the end of their tenancy. Wages, too, ran high; a good
+"fossil-digger" could earn his 40_s_. per week. This produced a
+corresponding rise in agricultural wages, which went up from 10_s_. or
+12_s_. per week to double that amount. The fossil-digging was all
+piecework, the men being paid by the cubic yard of earth moved.
+
+[Illustration: _South Porch, Barrington Church._]
+
+After being brought to the surface the fossil-bearing greensand was
+washed in a horse-mill on the spot, an artesian well being bored, if
+necessary, to supply the water. This separated out the nodules, while
+the greensand and water was run off as thick mud; used, when dry, for
+levelling the land, and sometimes for brick-making. The nodules were
+ground to powder in central works at Royston and elsewhere, and
+treated with sulphuric acid, thus producing super-phosphate of lime
+adapted for manure. At the height of the industry as many as 55,000
+tons per year were extracted from the Cambridgeshire beds; but with
+their gradual exhaustion the trade dwindled away till it was finally
+destroyed by imports from Charleston, U.S.A., where the like
+"coprolites" are found as a superficial deposit, needing no digging.
+And with the trade has disappeared the artificial prosperity which it
+brought, to be succeeded by the full weight of the agricultural
+depression.
+
+Barrington Hall is the seat of one of the oldest of English county
+families, the Bendyshes, who have held their estate here since the
+reign of John. Their residence at Barrington dates, however, only from
+that of Edward the Third, for whom, during his siege of Calais, they
+raised money by mortgaging their earlier abode at Radwinter, in Essex,
+to the monks of that place. Before the king by repaying their loan put
+them in case to redeem the mortgage, the monks had foreclosed; thus
+driving the family to reside on their Cambridgeshire property at
+Barrington. They are not, however, lords of the Manor there (though
+they are in the adjoining parish of Foxton). That position belongs to
+Trinity College, Cambridge, who are also rectors of the church, by the
+gift of their earliest founder, Hervey de Stanton, Chancellor to
+Edward the Second.
+
+From either end of Barrington lanes lead southward across the Cam to
+Foxton and Shepreth respectively. Both these villages are hard by the
+main road which we are following. Foxton Church has a most beautiful
+Early English east window, and some very good Geometrical tracery.
+Here is found that rare form of rural industry, a book-printing
+establishment, which to some extent mitigates the depression mentioned
+above. At Shepreth this is done on a larger scale by the making of
+cement, for which the clay procurable here is, like that on the
+Medway, peculiarly adapted. This is a little gem of a village, with a
+clear and copious brook running across its maze of thick-shaded lanes.
+The source of these waters is in the ancient Fowl Mere already spoken
+of.[177]
+
+[Footnote 177: See p. 230.]
+
+Another such tributary rises in our next village, Melbourn, and runs,
+on its way to the Cam, through the adjoining Meldreth, an old-world
+place, where the parish stocks are still to be seen at the village
+cross-roads. Till the nineteenth century was well on its way, these
+instruments of punishment were in actual use for the correction of
+minor offences such as vagrancy. They consist of a low upright frame
+of rough wood, so contrived that the prisoner's feet, as he sat upon
+the ground beside it, were passed through holes in the structure and
+there secured. The parish constable was supposed to keep sentry over
+him, but actually seldom kept off either the friends, who might
+alleviate his captivity by beer and tobacco, or the more numerous
+enemies, who found it a good joke to tease and pelt his helplessness.
+The hands were sometimes also secured, sometimes not; but in any case
+the culprit's situation was exceedingly unpleasant, and the stocks
+proved a most wholesome deterrent.
+
+[Illustration: _Shepreth._]
+
+Melbourn is a larger place, and boasts that rare possession, a village
+trysting-tree. This is a huge elm, standing by the roadside at the
+churchyard gate. It is now at the extremity of elm life, some three
+hundred years old, and only the stump (still clothed with leafage)
+remains. But the vast massiveness of the roots show its former
+grandeur. At this tree, in 1640, the villagers spontaneously gathered
+to resist the imposition of the "ship-money," whereby Charles the
+First was striving to recruit his exhausted exchequer. "And they fell
+upon the sheriff's men with stones and staves, and hedgestakes and
+forks, and beat them and wounded divers of them, and did drive them
+out of the highway into a woman's yard for their safety. And were
+forced for saving of their lives to get out of the town a back way;
+which, notwithstanding, some thirty or forty able men and boys pursued
+them above a quarter of a mile, stoning them, and driving the bailiffs
+into a ditch, where some of their horses stuck fast. And the multitude
+got some of the bailiffs' horses and carried them away, and would not
+redeem them without money."
+
+This stirring episode shows that the men of Melbourn were already
+Puritan stalwarts, a character which the place has ever since
+maintained. Three years later the parson himself removed from the
+church "sixty superstitious pictures," and a cross from the steeple,
+and digged down the altar steps. And after the Restoration, when
+Nonconformity was put under the straitest ban of the law, its worship
+still continued here to be practised, so that the place became, as it
+still remains, the chief centre of the Free Church form of religion in
+this part of the county.
+
+Three miles further the road brings us to the small but flourishing
+town of Royston, which, though now wholly in Hertfordshire, was till a
+few years ago partly in Cambridgeshire, with which it has a far closer
+physical connection than with its new county. The place has an
+interesting history. Like Newmarket, at the other end of
+Cambridgeshire, it is not, as are the villages around, one of the
+original English settlements dating from the fifth or sixth centuries,
+but a burgh of mediaeval growth, owing its existence (again like
+Newmarket) to its position on the line of the Icknield Way, here
+crossed by another presumably British and certainly Roman road, the
+Ermine Street, which joined, as it still joins, the two great
+nerve-centres of Roman Britain, York and London. It is still known as
+the Old North Road.
+
+Such a junction was necessarily an important spot, and the wonder is
+that there was not always a town here. It was left however still
+occupied when, in the eleventh century, the Lady Roesia, wife of Eudo
+Dapifer, the Norman chieftain to whom the land hereabouts was assigned
+by William the Conqueror, set up here, at the meeting of the ways, one
+of those stone wayside crosses by which mediaeval piety so often marked
+such junctions. A century later the new-born devotion to St. Thomas of
+Canterbury led the then lord of the manor, Eustace de Mark, to found
+and dedicate to him a Priory, called, from the neighbouring cross,
+"_De Cruce Rosae_." This, as so often happened, became the nucleus of
+a little town, which got to be called Roesia's Town, or Royston.
+
+[Illustration: _Melbourn._]
+
+At the same period Royston was the scene of yet another ecclesiastical
+development, by the establishment of a famous hermitage in its still
+celebrated cave. This cave is a curious bottle-shaped excavation in
+the chalk below the Icknield Way, of prehistoric origin, having been
+apparently one of those "dene holes" from which the ancient
+inhabitants of Britain used to procure chalk for marling their fields.
+It is not so long since this method was discontinued, and numbers of
+these holes are still to be found in Kent and elsewhere. They were
+always made on the same plan. A shaft was sunk to the desired depth,
+and the chalk excavated all round the bottom as far as safety
+permitted. The hole was then abandoned, and usually filled in. This
+one at Royston, however, remained open, and in the twelfth century was
+taken as his abode by a hermit, who employed himself in carving
+devotional figures and emblems all round the walls.
+
+He must have been a true Solitary, for his shrine was only accessible
+by a rope ladder twenty-five feet long let down through the narrow
+opening at the top. It remained, however, a place of devotion till the
+Reformation, when it not only became disused, but was so effectually
+filled up that its very existence was forgotten for some two hundred
+and fifty years. Then curiosity was aroused by a subsidence at the top
+(under the very centre of the town), and the hole once more cleared
+out, a more convenient approach being cut from adjacent premises, by
+which it may still be visited.
+
+The Priory of Royston was, of course, suppressed under Henry the
+Eighth. But its church was suffered to be bought by the inhabitants of
+the town, who besought the king to spare it to them on the ground
+that, though Royston stood in five several parishes, there was "never
+a parish church within two miles." This was literally true, the
+parochial boundaries having been already long established before the
+town grew up. The five parishes were those of Melbourn, Barley,
+Bassingbourn, Reed, and Therfield. They had therefore attended the
+Priory church, and been ministered to by its monks. The place was, in
+answer to this petition, constituted a parish, and the church
+rededicated to St. John the Baptist instead of to Henry's _bete
+noire_, Thomas a Becket. But the old connection of Royston with this
+saint survives to this day in the annual Fair held in July (near the
+date of his "Translation"), which is still popularly called "Becket
+Fair."
+
+At Royston the Icknield Way used to be the boundary of
+Cambridgeshire, as at Newmarket, so that it was convenient for the
+resident magistrates to be in the Commission for both counties. Thus,
+by merely crossing the road, they could exercise their authority in
+whichever might be desired. Beyond the town, the way continues to run
+south-westwards, along the foot of the East Anglian heights, which
+here form the watershed between the basin of the Ouse and that of the
+Thames. Their northern escarpment is, at this point, still in its
+primaeval condition, a steep slope of virgin turf, known as Royston
+Heath, the common property of the township. The Heath has a
+far-reaching view and delicious air, and the Royston folk do well in
+jealously guarding against any usurpation of their rights in it. That
+golf links should not exist on such a magnificent stretch of turf
+would almost be unthinkable, but even over this development many shake
+their heads as an encroachment.
+
+As we continue our way along the hedgeless road at the foot of this
+delightful common, the Great Northern Railway, from Cambridge to
+London, keeps us close company on our right. A mile or so beyond it
+rises a conspicuous line of poplar trees. These mark the village of
+Bassingbourn, one of the most interesting in the county to the
+historian. For here there is preserved in the church a whole library
+of antique books, and amongst these (in manuscript) the churchwardens'
+accounts from 1498 to 1534, kept with an accuracy which enables us to
+picture faithfully the village life of those days. We find that it was
+a period of high wages, for a labourer got threepence a day if
+boarded, and fivepence unboarded. His board then was worth a shilling
+per week. Nowadays it is reckoned at ten shillings at least, so that
+we must multiply all the items by ten to express them in current
+value. His wages were thus equivalent to twenty-five shillings per
+week, double the present rate, while artisans could command nearly
+twice as much. The times were thus abnormally prosperous, and the
+parishioners could afford to spend so lavishly in merrymaking at the
+"Church Ales" that an annual profit equivalent to nearly L50 was
+usually made on these entertainments, which corresponded to the
+Parochial Teas and concerts of the present day. These profits went
+towards the "reparacyon" of the church, and the current church
+expenses, including such heavy items as refounding the bells, at a
+cost equal to over L200, and renovating the clock and the organ.
+Further funds were raised by a great "Miracle Play" of St. George and
+the Dragon, to which the whole neighbourhood assembled.
+
+All this prosperity (founded, as always, on the high rate of wages)
+was the result of that fearful catastrophe, the Black Death, which, a
+few generations back, had all but decimated the population, and
+shattered the old social system of England, wherein the labourers were
+"villains," tied to the manor on which they were born, and bound to do
+for their lord (in lieu of rent) so many "jobs"[178] a year. A "job"
+meant 100 minutes' work, a strange subdivision of time, implying some
+fairly accurate means of measuring its flight, though we know not what
+these may have been. A Cambridgeshire "inquisition" of 1313 values
+each job at a halfpenny, so that the day's work of a "villain" was
+worth about threepence.
+
+[Footnote 178: This word is derived from the Latin _Opus_ ("work")
+which in the Manorial account books was usually written j.op. (_i.e._,
+one _Opus_).]
+
+But the demand for labour after the "Death" became so great, and so
+many of the estate owners had died, that villenage came to an end, and
+the labourers could, as now, go where they would and make the best
+wages they could get in open market.
+
+The result, after a while, was, as we have seen, a great increase in
+prosperity, testified to by the abundant Perpendicular work in almost
+every parish church in England. But the immediate effect was fearful
+distress, and a chaotic dislocation of the old feudal relationships,
+giving birth to the socialistic dreams which for a moment so vainly
+tried to materialise themselves in the anarchical outbreak which we
+call Wat Tyler's Rebellion. An example of this dislocation of ordinary
+conditions is furnished by the Papal registers, which tell us that the
+rectory of this very Bassingbourn (estimated at the equivalent of no
+less than L1,200 per year) was made over, in 1410, to the Chapel Royal
+of St. Martin's-le-Grand, London, "considering that the said chapel
+hath been ruined by the Great Storm, and its lands lie waste for lack
+of labourers through the pestilence."
+
+The "great storm" here referred to took place on St. Maur's Day
+(January 15th), 1361. Of both storm and pestilence we shall find a
+most interesting record in the church of Ashwell, the next and last
+place which we should see in this corner of the county. To reach it we
+have, indeed, to cross the border and go some half mile beyond; but
+though politically in Hertfordshire, Ashwell physically belongs to
+Cambridgeshire. For here is the source of the Cam, and such a source
+as few would dream of for the sluggish unclear stream that we see at
+Cambridge. In the midst of the village the ground sinks into a sort of
+amphitheatre, some 100 yards in length by thirty in breadth and ten in
+depth, with abrupt sides covered with brushwood and overshadowed by
+ancestral ash-trees. All round the floor of this gush forth springs
+upon springs of the brightest, most sparkling water; so copious that
+when the infant stream escapes through a breach towards the north it
+is already nearly thirty feet broad. No prettier river-source is to be
+found throughout the length and breadth of England. The ash-trees,
+however, are not, as one is apt to think at first, the origin of the
+name, but its consequence. The first syllable really embodies that
+Celtic word for water which, as Axe, Exe, Esk, and Usk, meets us in so
+many places all over Great Britain; and this syllable, at some
+far-back date, suggested the planting of ashes around the well.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell._]
+
+Not far from these bounteous springs rises the splendid tower of the
+church, springing high into the air with the same undaunted Early
+English ambition which raised the spire of Salisbury. And on its wall
+(inside) is carved, in rude and deeply incised lettering of Old
+English style, varied by some curiously Greek characteristics, the
+record already spoken of, dealing with the Black Death and the storm.
+This consists of four lines, intended for Latin elegiacs, again with a
+Greek touch, and runs thus:
+
+  M . Ct . Xpenta . miseranda . ferox . violenta .
+         M.CCC.L.
+  Supest . plebs . pessima . testis . in . fineque . vents .
+  Validus . oc . anno . maurus . in . orbe . tonat.
+          M.CCC.LXI.
+
+The opening words stand for the date:
+
+  Ct = Cter = CCC, and Xpenta = XXXXX = 50
+
+The interpretation therefore is:
+
+  1350! Miserable, wild, distracted,
+        1350!
+  The dregs of the people alone survive to witness.
+  And in the end a wind
+  Full mighty. This year St Maur thunders in the world.
+        1361.
+
+The year 1349 marked the most fatal stage of the Black Death in these
+parts. In that year, to judge by the Diocesan records, no less than
+eighty-five per cent. of the beneficed clergy were swept away, which
+implies a corresponding mortality amongst other classes. By 1350 the
+worst was over, but the full wretchedness of the situation was now
+developing itself. The plague lingered on, constantly growing milder,
+till 1361, when the great storm was supposed to have cleared the fair
+of the last remnants of infection. A like popular distich about this
+later visitation is quoted by Adam of Murimuth:
+
+  C ter erant mille decies sex unus, et ille,
+  Luce tua Maure, vehemens fuit impetus aurae.
+  Ecce flat hoc anno Maurus in orbe tonans.
+
+That is, in English:
+
+  There were 300 + 1000 + 60 + 1 and that
+  Mighty blast of wind was on thy day, Maurus.
+  Lo! in this year bloweth Maurus thundering in the world.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell Church from the N.W._]
+
+St. Maur was a Gallican saint of the sixth century who was the first
+to introduce monasticism into France. There are several other
+interesting _graffiti_ on the same wall as the above, one of them
+representing old St. Paul's with its lofty steeple, the highest in the
+world (510 feet), and the famous Rose Window of the transept which
+Chaucer mentions in his Canterbury Tales.
+
+Another, and perhaps prettier, way of reaching Ashwell from Cambridge
+is by taking the road that runs along the Backs, and following it out
+of the town in its course to the south-west. Its local designation is
+the Barton Road, but to antiquarians it has been known, since the
+seventeenth century, as the Akeman Street. It was at that period that
+the accepted identification of our Roman roads came into being, mainly
+through the fearless erudition of Gale. Their names (except that of
+the Via Devana) are as old at least as the Norman Conquest; but, save
+only in the case of the Watling Street, the main line of which has
+never been disputed, the connection between any given name and any
+given road has been matter for the wildest conjecture. Thus, Geoffrey
+of Monmouth, writing in the eleventh century, makes the Ermine Street
+(which we now, with strong reason, identify with the Old North Road
+from London to York) run from St. David's to Southampton! Our Akeman
+Street is supposed to connect Wells on the Wash with Aust on the
+Severn, passing on its way through Bath (the Ake-man-chester of the
+Anglo-Saxons, _i.e._, "the stone stronghold of Aquae," Aquae being the
+Roman name for Bath). But a lot of this is mere conjecture. The
+"Barton Road," however, is undoubtedly on the line of a Roman road.
+
+In spite of its name, it does not pass through the village of Barton.
+Indeed, like the other roads leading westwards from Cambridge, it
+curiously avoids the villages on its line, or rather (for the road is
+older than they) the villages have curiously avoided being directly
+upon it, though they lie thick on either side. Possibly the first
+Anglo-Saxon settlers may have had in this district some superstitious
+dread of a deserted Roman road, such as they certainly entertained at
+first for the deserted Roman towns, which they did not occupy for many
+a year (as at Cambridge), though they located their hamlets all round
+them.
+
+[Illustration: _Ashwell Church._]
+
+But though the Akeman Street does not actually take us through
+Barton village, it does lead us past the rare object of interest to be
+found connected with the place, the ancient Archery Butts of the
+parish. These are to be seen just opposite the sign-post which points
+to Haslingfield, and are worth a pause to contemplate, for they give a
+most impressive idea of what archery meant to our forefathers. Every
+parish, it must be remembered, was bound by law in mediaeval times to
+have such a stretch of ground, and every yeoman was bound to constant
+practice upon it. And what practice! These "butts" are a stretch of
+greensward, some hundred yards across, and in length no less than
+three furlongs (660 yards). It looks an almost incredible distance for
+a bowman, but it was the standard, so far as we can judge by the very
+few butts of which the memory still survives. The length of the short
+street in South London, still called Newington Butts, is nearly the
+same.
+
+Here, then, we can picture the sturdy archers of Plantagenet days
+stretching themselves; their bows, not the toys of the modern
+toxophilite with their thirty or forty pounds of pull, but of twice
+the power (eighty lb. being a common pull in those times), and their
+"cloth-yard" arrows, over three feet long, whistling to a target not
+planted forty or fifty yards away, but twelve times the distance--the
+whole length of these butts. Indeed, for anything under two furlongs
+light arrows were not allowed, and the heavy regulation war arrow had
+to be used. Each man was taught, as Bishop Latimer tells us in
+recording his own youthful training, to draw his bow not by mere
+strength, but by sleight of hand, "to lay the weight of his body into
+the bow," and to draw the bowstring not to his breast, like other
+nations, but to his ear. Small wonder that with eye and sinews so
+trained our English archers became the wonder and the dread of Europe,
+or that their shafts decided so many a battlefield--Cressy, Poictiers,
+Agincourt, Flodden.
+
+A mile further we cross the Bourn Brook, a tiny tributary which joins
+the Cam near Grantchester, hard by a small station on the Cambridge
+branch of the London and North Western Railway, called Lord's Bridge,
+from the Lord Hardwicke who, in the beginning of the nineteenth
+century, substituted a bridge for the earlier ford here. To our right
+we see, across the fields, the church tower of Comberton; where, on
+the little village green, can still be seen the worn remains of a
+turf-built "maze," first traced out no one knows when, but certainly
+not later than the sixteenth century. Various mystical reasons are
+conjectured for the origin of these mazes, of which a fair number
+still exist in England (especially in the Eastern counties), while
+many more are known to have been destroyed by the Puritans of the
+seventeenth century as relics of heathen superstition. Such, indeed,
+they probably are. Mr. Walter Johnson, in his "Folk Memory," considers
+them to be exceedingly primitive, begun in connection with "ceremonial
+dances of painted heathen round a prehistoric camp fire." This
+Comberton maze is fifty feet in diameter, while the tracks are two
+feet in width, divided by slight banks of turf, once, it would seem,
+about a foot in height, but now much worn down.
+
+The next turn (to the left) leads to Harlton, a pretty, shady village,
+with a fine Perpendicular church, having a stone rood screen, which is
+rare, and, what is yet rarer, a still surviving stone reredos of the
+fifteenth century, with a central recess, once closed with a door, and
+evidently intended as a "Tabernacle" for the Reservation of the
+Blessed Sacrament. The six niches on either side of this recess were
+as evidently meant for images of the twelve Apostles.
+
+Harlton lies close under White Hill, that chalk spur which we have
+already met at Haslingfield.[179] Here, too, there is a "clunch-pit"
+in the hill-side, from which the material for the church was probably
+dug. It is now disused, except for occasional marling purposes, and
+some unknown benefactor has planted its slopes with larches and
+laburnums, forming a most fascinating little dell, the charms of which
+are free to all.
+
+[Footnote 179: See p. 236.]
+
+Our road now climbs the hill, which it crosses through a cutting, with
+a fine view from the summit in either direction. In the little clump
+of trees just to the west of the road there stood, till the 'seventies
+of the nineteenth century, Orwell Maypole, the last of its class to
+survive in these parts. In mediaeval times every village had its
+maypole, round which the lasses and lads hied them to dance on May
+Day. But, like the mazes, they were called (and actually were)
+remnants of heathenism, and, as such, were destroyed wholesale in the
+years of Puritan ascendancy. So it befell with the great maypole which
+gave name to the church of St. Andrew _Under-shaft_ in the City of
+London. It was hewn down, and, as it lay along the street, sawn in
+pieces, each householder taking for firewood the length that lay
+opposite his own door. The Restoration set a certain number up again,
+but the continuity of their use had been broken, and its revival (as
+May Day was connected with no special Festival of the Church, like
+Easter and Christmas, which were also originally heathen feasts)
+became a merely artificial reaction, bound to dwindle away. So it
+befell that Orwell Maypole, after being disused for generations,
+finally perished by natural decay. It stood almost exactly upon the
+meridian of Greenwich, so that it was a valuable and far-seen
+landmark.
+
+Orwell itself lies, as usual, just off the road, on the southern slope
+of the hill. Half a century ago it was the prettiest of villages, with
+its eponymous "well," shaded by magnificent trees, gushing from the
+hill-side, in the midst of a prehistoric earthwork, just below the
+noble church. But, about 1870, the earthwork, unhappily, was found to
+contain "coprolites" (worth probably about L100 after the expenses of
+getting them had been paid). For this paltry sum the whole place was
+destroyed. Well, trees, earthwork, all are now gone; only the church
+is left, perched on its slope high above the village street. It has a
+grand decorated chancel, the roof of which is covered with heraldic
+devices, and contains an interesting epitaph in Latin verse to one of
+the seventeenth century rectors of the parish, beginning:
+
+  Pastor eram dum pastor eram tunc fistula dulcis
+  Tunc tuba qua torvum sprevit ovile lupum.
+
+  ("I _was_ a Pastor, while a Pastor I;
+    Sweet then my pipe; loud then my trumpet-call,
+    Whereat my flock defied the wolf so grim.")
+
+In the south aisle is preserved a small crucifix of stone, dating from
+the thirteenth century. It had been built into the wall to save it
+from destruction at the Reformation, and was not discovered for three
+hundred years.
+
+About a mile further we find a village along the road itself, the
+village of Wimpole. But we notice that the houses are all modern, and
+that no church is to be seen amongst them. A church there is belonging
+to them, but it stands a mile to the west, where the village also
+stood till towards the close of the eighteenth century. At that time
+the mansion and park of Wimpole Hall were being enlarged to their
+present magnificence by Philip, the first Earl of Hardwicke (the
+builder of Lord's Bridge). Plebeian cottages were not to be tolerated
+"betwixt the wind and his nobility," so he pulled down the entire
+village and planted it, where it now is, along the Akeman Street. The
+church, which could not well be moved, he faced with red brick to
+match his new-built stables, close to which it is situated.
+
+[Illustration: _Great Eversden._]
+
+Wimpole Hall has passed through various hands. The central portion was
+built, in 1632, by Sir Thomas Chicheley, the wings were added a
+century later by the Earl of Oxford, from whom it came to the
+Hardwicke family. It is now the seat of Viscount Clifden. The house is
+on a splendid scale, and the grounds on a scale yet more splendid,
+with a double avenue of elms, three miles long, running to the south.
+Here Queen Victoria stayed when visiting Cambridgeshire shortly after
+her marriage, and won all hearts by her graciousness. It is still
+remembered how when, by some blunder, the attendant in charge of her
+jewels was not forthcoming, she came down to the ball-room with a
+simple wreath of roses in her hair, "and not all the jewels in the
+world could have made her look so queenly."
+
+There is, of course, a public road leading from Wimpole village to the
+church, which is also accessible from the west, where the great iron
+gates of the park are usually unbarred at the request of respectable
+visitors. These gates open upon the Ermine Street, which the Akeman
+Street crosses a mile beyond New Wimpole, after also crossing the
+great avenue. Close by them is another transplanted village,
+Arrington, whose church stands on the hill half a mile westward. The
+traffic of the old North Road is responsible for this move, and also
+for the delightful old coaching inn here, the Hardwicke Arms, with its
+old-fashioned rooms and long range of stables.
+
+At the junction our road ceases. To continue our westward course we
+must go along the Ermine Street for half a mile, either northward or
+southward, where we shall find lanes, either of which will carry us
+on. The northern lane here will take us along the line of the hill, to
+Tadlow, Wrestlingworth, Potton, and, finally, Bedford, and will enable
+us, if we will, to explore the three Hadleys (East Hadley, Hadley St.
+George, and Cockayne Hadley), of which the two last have fine halls
+and parks. The southern, however, is the preferable route. It follows
+the course of the infant Cam, crossed by a bridge on the Ermine
+Street, and brings us first to the wholly obliterated Shingay, which,
+though once the most important parish hereabouts, and still giving its
+name to the Rural Deanery, has absolutely ceased to exist, church and
+all; its parishioners being affiliated to the neighbouring village of
+Wendy.
+
+The cause of this ruin was the suppression, at the Reformation, of the
+institution which was literally the life of Shingay, a House of the
+Crusading Order of St. John of Jerusalem, or, as they were commonly
+called, the Knights Hospitallers. This title was given them because,
+at their original foundation, they dwelt in a Hospital (or house for
+the hospitable entertainment of pilgrims) at Jerusalem. We now connect
+this name only with places where the sick are ministered to; but it
+originally connoted far wider ministrations, and, indeed, rather
+corresponded to the other form in which the word has survived into our
+present speech--hotel. We read it on a leaden seal found here at
+Wendy, in 1876, which bears on one side a conventional representation
+of the Shrine of the Holy Sepulchre, surrounded by the legend
+IHERVSALEM, HOSPITALIS. On the other is the name of Guarin de
+Montaigu, who, from 1232 to 1269, was Grand Master of the Order.
+
+The Hospitallers, as readers of "Ivanhoe" know, were, like the
+Templars, a military Order, who, for over six centuries, fought
+unceasingly for Christendom. First at Jerusalem, then at Rhodes, then
+at Malta, they held out with never-failing devotion against the
+on-sweeping torrent of Mahommedan aggression; and it is scarcely too
+much to say that but for their eight-pointed cross Christianity might
+well have been crushed throughout Europe. Not till the nineteenth
+century was their last stronghold, Malta, reft from them by Napoleon,
+to pass finally under the flag of England. The Order still survives,
+but the modern sodality calling itself by the same name, connected
+with what we now call hospital work, was set up in quite recent days.
+
+Preceptories of the Order, as their branch Houses were called, were
+found in every land, and not least in England, where they were so much
+beloved that, when the rival Order of the Temple was suppressed, in
+the fourteenth century, its property was made over to them. Here, at
+Shingay, their establishment was a small one consisting of the
+preceptor, two knights, and three priests, one of whom acted as Vicar
+of Wendy. The gross income of the House was, in 1332 (as we know from
+a Report still existing in the Record Office at Malta), L187 12s. 8d.,
+equivalent to about L3,500 at the present value of money. Of this the
+land (about 1,000 acres) brought in L71; the mills, houses, etc., L4
+13s. 4d.; the work of the villains L38 10s. 0d.; and the Rectories of
+Wendy and Sawston, which formed part of their endowment, L66 13s. 4d.
+The rest was derived from the fees paid by visitors; for, by the rule
+of the Order, the doors of the House were open to all comers. The
+expenses of the year amounted to less than half the income, for they
+lived frugally, their keep only coming to about L3 a week (in present
+value) for the six inmates, besides servants and guests. Men servants
+were paid at the rate of L12 a year (besides their keep), and each
+knight was allowed the equivalent of L25 a year for clothing and
+pocket-money. Thus a large sum was available for the war-chest of the
+Order, and was annually forwarded to the headquarters at Jerusalem or
+Rhodes.
+
+One of their sources of income was a special privilege which is still
+remembered in local tradition. Their House (like those of the
+Templars) was exempt from every ban, even that of the Pope himself.
+Thus, in the dismal days of King John, when England was placed under
+an Interdict, when no rites of religion could be observed, and even
+burial of the dead was forbidden, so that "you might see human bodies
+lying everywhere about the fields unsepultured," Shingay shone out as
+the one spot in the whole district where the consolations of religion
+were still attainable. Here Mass continued to be said, here the
+departed could still be laid in hallowed earth. And hither they were
+brought from all sides. And thus it is that peasants may be found who
+still tell how, at some far off, unknown period, those who, for some
+forgotten, inexplicable reason, might not be buried like Christians in
+their own churchyard, were spirited away by night in a "fairy-cart" to
+Shingay, there to be committed in peace to the ground. This
+"fairy-cart" is an echo of the word _feretorium_ (or bier on wheels),
+in which the conveyance was actually effected.
+
+[Illustration: _Rood Screen, Guilden Morden Church._]
+
+Not a building of any kind now exists at Shingay, and very few at the
+adjoining Wendy, where, at every turn, we are greeted by a wealth of
+fresh-springing waters, derived from the artesian wells of the old
+coprolite diggings. The height in which the water in these wells rises
+is strangely variable. They are always made on the same system; an
+ordinary well being dug through the upper strata till the impervious
+gault is reached, which may be any distance from six to sixty feet
+below the surface. A four-inch bore is then made through the gault by
+means of a sort of Brobdingnagian cheese-taster, four or five feet
+long, screwed to an iron handle three times that length. Again and
+again the taster is brought up, full of gault, and its contents or
+"core" thrown aside. As the bore gets deeper more irons are added,
+till the water-bearing greensand or "rock" is attained, usually in the
+second hundred feet of the bore. The taster is then removed and a
+"chisel" substituted for "striking the rock," _i.e._, punching a hole
+by lifting the entire length of irons a few feet and letting it fall.
+By and by up comes the water, quite suddenly for the most part,
+gushing from the bore and filling the well till it finds its level.
+This, as we have said, is curiously different in different spots; in
+some it does not reach the surface, and has to be pumped up; in
+others, as here at Wendy, it will supply a fountain eight or ten feet
+in height. One of these picturesquely gushes out from the top of an
+old wooden gate-post, up which some artistically-minded
+coprolite-digger has engineered its course. It is almost medicinal in
+the quantity of iron with which it is impregnated, but delicious to
+drink, and the softest possible.
+
+This gate-post is beside the lane leading on Guilden Morden, the last
+village before we once more reach Ashwell, and itself standing on an
+outlying mound of the Ashwell chalk. Round this elevation the Cam
+takes a wide sweep. We may record that Wendy is the highest point
+along its course which navigation has ever attained. The breadth at
+Ashwell at once suggests to visitors that a canoe could reach the
+spot, and many an attempt has been made by ambitious undergraduates.
+But the upper reaches are so choked up with reeds and weeds and rushes
+and bushes that no one has ever penetrated further than this spot,
+some four miles, by water-way, below the source.
+
+Guilden Morden has a far-seen church, a conspicuous object from White
+Hill, over Barrington, twelve miles away. It is a fine building, with
+an unusually spacious tower of Northamptonshire stone, and a Saxon
+font. But it is chiefly interesting for the remarkable development of
+the fourteenth century rood-screen, which on either side expands into
+a small "parclose" or pew, enclosed to the height of twelve feet by
+rich decorated tracery, ornately painted (the original pattern having
+survived sufficiently to be restored). On the west panel of the
+northern parclose may be discerned the figures of St. Erconwald and
+St. Edmund, both members of the royal line of East Anglia. The former
+was a brother of St. Etheldreda, the foundress of Ely, and became a
+much-beloved Bishop of London in the seventh century. The latter was
+the hero king martyred by the Danes a century later, the chosen friend
+of our great Alfred, of whom so lovely a picture has been left us by
+the old chroniclers:--
+
+     "From his earliest years the truest of Christians, he showed
+     himself of such promise that, by the unanimous will of all his
+     folk, he was not so much chosen as rushed into the kingship over
+     them. For his very look was worthy of this high estate; so bright
+     was it with the calm beauty of holiness and of a conscience like
+     the sea at rest. Kind was he of speech and courteous to all; the
+     grace of Humility came natural to him; and amongst his comrades
+     he kept his place as their Lord with wondrous meekness and no
+     touch of pride. For already the Saint bare in his face that which
+     he was afterwards, by God's will, to show forth; seeing that as a
+     boy he had pressed with all his might into the Way of
+     Righteousness, which, as God's pity foreknew, would end for him
+     in the Way of Martyrdom.... And walking in the King's Highway, he
+     turned aside neither to the right hand, by being puffed up with
+     his own merits, nor to the left, by yielding to the faults of
+     human weakness. To the needy was he a cheerful giver, to the
+     widows and orphans the kindest of Patrons; ever keeping before
+     his eyes the saying of the Wise Man: "Behold they have made thee
+     Prince; but be thou among them as one of themselves."[180]
+
+[Footnote 180: Chronicle of St. Neots.]
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Steeple Morden._]
+
+These parcloses seem to have been made to serve as confessional boxes,
+devices which were very rare in England before the Reformation.
+"Shrift," of course, was universal; but neither priest nor penitent
+were shut from view. The former sat in a chair, usually at the altar
+rail, while the latter knelt beside and facing him. In these parcloses
+the priest's head as he sat on the seat would be visible to those in
+the church, but the kneeling penitent would be hidden. That such was
+the purpose here would appear from the lines in old English lettering
+painted upon their sides:--
+
+  Ad . mortem . duram . Jhesu . de . me . cape . curam .
+  Vitam . venturam . post . mortem . redde . securam .
+  Fac . me . confessum . rogo . te . Deus . ante . recessum .
+  Et . post . decessum . caelo. mihi . dirige . gressum .
+
+  "Jesu, in Death's dark vale, be Thou my stay,
+  Make safe my Life to Come from every foe,
+  Grant me Confession, Lord, ere hence I go,
+  And then to Heaven do thou make straight my way."
+
+From Guilden Morden a lane leads straight to Ashwell, leaving on the
+left Steeple Morden (which lost its steeple in the great storm of
+1703), and Littlington, the cradle of Cambridgeshire Nonconformity, of
+which hereafter. Here the old parish Lock-up survives; a dismal den of
+red brick, some ten feet square, with iron-clenched door and
+closely-barred window.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+     Oxford Road, Observatory, Neptune, Cambridge
+     Discoveries.--Coton.--Madingley.--Hardwick.--Toft, St.
+     Hubert.--Childerley, Charles
+     I.--Knapwell.--Bourn.--Caxton--Eltisley, St. Pandiana,
+     Storm.--St. Neot's, Neotus and Alfred.--Paxton
+     Hill.--Godmanchester, Port Meadow.--Huntingdon, Cromwell's
+     Penance.--The Hemingfords.--St.
+     Ives.--Holywell.--Overcote.--Earith, the Bedford Rivers,
+     "Parallax."
+
+
+Due westwards from Cambridge, turning leftwards out of the Via Devana
+just beyond Magdalene College, runs what used to be the old coaching
+road to Oxford. Till quite recently the milestones along it gave the
+distance to that city, between which and Cambridge there was of old a
+good deal of traffic, for the Universities were more closely connected
+then than even now. Popularly this road was called the _Ad eundem_
+road, a nickname referring to the not so long by-gone privilege by
+which any graduate of either place might be admitted to the same
+degree (_ad eundem gradum_) in the sister University simply on payment
+of the fees and without any further examination. It is now spoken of
+as the Madingley Road, from the first village along its course, or the
+St. Neots Road, from the first town to which it leads. Thence it went
+on to Oxford by way of Bedford, Buckingham, and Bicester.
+
+A short two miles along this road brings us to the porticoed front and
+white domes of the University Observatory, erected in 1822. More than
+a century earlier its embryo had been set up on the summit of the
+Great Gate Tower at Trinity College, for the benefit of Sir Isaac
+Newton; but this seems to have been little used after the death of
+that greatest of scientists. Even after the new Observatory was set up
+a certain lack of keenness pervaded its work. Thus it came about that
+Cambridge and England lost the glory of the discovery of Neptune, the
+most distant planet of our Solar System.
+
+For more than a decade the irregularities in the motion of Uranus
+(itself not long discovered) had suggested to astronomers that there
+must be another planet exterior to it, when, in 1841, John Couch
+Adams, then only an undergraduate of St. John's College, set himself
+to grapple with the arduous task of finding by analytical computation
+the orbit and place of this supposititious body. So stupendous were
+the difficulties that when, after four years of concentrated effort,
+he submitted his results to the Astronomer Royal, begging that the
+planet might be looked for in a certain spot (where we now know that
+it actually was visible at the time), his suggestion received very
+incredulous acceptance. Was it likely that a mere youth should have
+solved this gigantic problem?
+
+That very autumn of 1845 another young man, quite independently,
+devoted himself to the same quest, the brilliant French mathematician
+Leverrier. He, in the following summer, published the results he had
+so far attained. Adams had never published; but these new results so
+strikingly agreed with his that the Astronomer Royal's incredulity
+gave way, and he desired that search should be made with the great
+equatorial telescope, then newly erected at Cambridge through the
+generosity of the Duke of Northumberland.
+
+His injunctions were carried out; but the lack of a trustworthy star
+map made the work long. And it was made longer by lack of promptitude.
+The minute celestial object (only equal to a star of the eighth
+magnitude) had been actually seen, but further observations were
+needed to establish the fact that it was indeed a planet moving
+amongst the stars around it. And these observations were delayed at
+the crucial point by the observers adjourning for a cup of tea! When
+they returned the sky had clouded over and no favourable night
+occurred for many evenings after. Meanwhile Leverrier had called in
+the aid of the Berlin Observatory; where there did exist a good star
+map, and also the eagerness so sadly lacking here at Cambridge. The
+very day his letter was received (23rd September, 1846), the great
+Berlin telescope was directed to the spot which he indicated,--and
+there was the planet.
+
+The story goes that when the tidings of this overthrow of hope
+reached Cambridge, and were reported to the Fellows of Trinity as they
+sat at dinner in their Hall, it was as if a thunderbolt had fallen
+amongst them:
+
+  "And all talk died, as in a grove all song
+   Beneath the shadow of some bird of prey;
+   Then a long silence came upon the Hall,"
+
+broken at last by Adam Sedgwick, the venerable Professor of Geology,
+who solemnly raised his clenched fist and brought it down upon the
+High Table, not with violence but with a concentrated tension of
+indignation, saying slowly, with an equal solemnity: "Confound their
+lymphatic souls."[181] As for the Observatory, the blow thoroughly
+roused it up; and ever since it has remained, both in material and
+moral equipment, amongst the foremost of the great Observatories of
+the world, where solid and useful work is continuously being done,
+while up-to-date instruments, methods, and records are never to seek.
+On one evening of each week during term time any member of the
+University may see the practical working of the place, and bring
+friends with him.
+
+[Footnote 181: The discovery of Neptune is by no means the only
+discovery the honour of which has been lost to Cambridge through that
+scientific temper of mind which is loth to publish investigations at
+an early stage of their verification. Months before Marconi introduced
+wireless telegraphy to the public it had been practised here by
+Professors Rutherford and Sir J. J. Thomson; the first serious
+messages being exchanged, over a distance of two miles, between the
+Cavendish Laboratory and the Observatory. At the same Laboratory the
+Roentgen rays were being investigated ere yet Roentgen became a
+household word. And long years before Bunsen and Kirchoff (in 1859)
+published the true explanation of Fraunhofer's dark lines in the solar
+spectrum, that explanation had been given to his pupils by yet another
+Cambridge Professor, Sir George Gabriel Stokes. Such indifference to
+mere fame reminds us of the old saying that an Oxford man looks as if
+all the world belonged to him, a Cambridge man as if he did not care
+whom it belonged to.]
+
+A mile further we reach the foot of the chalk slope which bounds the
+Cam valley. At this point lanes diverge to the right and left. The
+latter almost immediately brings us to Coton, a tiny village with a
+tiny, but most picturesque, fourteenth century church, having a
+(restored) Norman chancel, a pretty spire, and a yet prettier south
+doorway. There is, too, a massive rood screen, and a curious
+"palimpsest" Table of Commandments, the original sixteenth century
+lettering showing beneath repainted characters of the seventeenth
+century. Altogether the place is well worth the slight divergence
+needed to visit it, more especially as the lane between it and our
+road gives a view of Cambridge almost comparable to the prospect of
+
+  "That sweet City, with her dreaming spires"
+
+which the Cumnor slopes (as Matthew Arnold sings) provide for
+Oxonians. Coton can also be reached from Cambridge by a delightful
+field path beneath overhanging oaks, which runs straight from Garret
+Hostel Bridge. Coton spire (as has been already mentioned) is the
+"objective" of the Trinity avenue, though the view has long been
+closed out by the growth of the branches.
+
+The other lane, to the right, which leads to Madingley, is also worth
+traversing. From its hedgeless "switch-back" terraces we look
+northwards across the valley, not of the Cam but of the Ouse, bounded
+by the uplands of the island of Ely, ten miles away at the nearest
+point, and nearly twice as far where the ridge is crowned by the dim
+and distant towers of the cathedral. Conspicuous in the nearer
+distance is the red-brick mass of the Ladies' College at Girton, some
+three miles away from us. Madingley, to which half a mile or so of
+this prospect leads us, is a little place of steep pitches and
+tree-shaded lanes, very different from the usual Cambridgeshire
+village, but with a special charm of its own. It has a pretty little
+church nestling beneath a fine Elizabethan hall of red-brick. Both
+church and hall contain portions of the spoil of the church of St.
+Etheldreda, which once stood at Histon and was pulled down by Mr.
+Justice Hinde, the first builder of Madingley Hall, to whom the sacred
+edifice was given by Henry the Eighth. Its Norman font is now in
+Madingley Church, while part of its roof is still to be seen in the
+Hall.
+
+At Madingley Hall King Edward the Seventh was quartered while an
+undergraduate of Trinity College. Tradition asserts that it once
+sheltered another monarch, the ill-fated Charles the First, in a
+momentary attempt to escape from the clutches of the rebel army during
+his enforced residence at the neighbouring Hall of Childerley, as will
+be narrated in connection with that place. The Hall has, since that
+date, passed from one family to another, and is now the seat of
+Colonel Harding, D.C.L.
+
+[Illustration: _Coton._]
+
+Madingley is a centre of pretty lanes. Besides that already spoken
+of, another, an avenue of greenery, leads northwards to the Via
+Devana, another westwards to the village of Dry Drayton, and another
+up the hill southwards, to rejoin our St. Neots road on the summit of
+the ridge. Here we are 220 feet above the sea, overlooking the valley
+of the Ouse to the north and to the south that of the Cam, or, rather,
+of its tributary the Bourn Brook. The road keeps the highest ground,
+almost on the level, while a succession of lanes to the right and left
+lead down to the villages on either slope.
+
+First comes a southward turn to Hardwick, the church of which is so
+conspicuous an object in the view from the roof of King's College
+Chapel. Here, in 1644, "Mr. Mapletoft, parson thereof, with a wife and
+seven children, had these articles exhibited against him, viz., that
+he refused to read anything from the Parliament, but read many things
+from the King at Oxford with great boldness; that he prayeth not for
+the Parliament nor hath found them any arms at all; that he is a man
+devoted to many superstitious ceremonies, and commonly useth
+altar-worship, east-worship, and dropping-worship,[182] and after his
+sermon came out of the pulpit into the chancel and there made an end
+of his will-worship." Whereupon, by the Earl of Manchester's warrant,
+he was promptly ejected and sequestrated. The previous year the church
+had been purified by Dowsing, who notes with disgust that for dealing
+with "ten superstitious pictures and a cross" he was here paid only
+3s. 2d. instead of the 6s. 8d., which was his regular fee.
+
+[Footnote 182: _I.e._ genuflecting.]
+
+The great iconoclast has the same grievance in the adjoining village
+of Toft, where he got "only 6s. 8d." for a specially heavy
+"purification" of the church, involving the destruction of
+"twenty-seven superstitious pictures in the windows, ten others in
+stone, three inscriptions, _Pray for the souls_, divers _Orate pro
+animabuses_ [sic] in the windows, and a bell _Ora pro anima Sancta
+Katharina_." The "pictures in stone" were doubtless the alabaster
+images of the reredos, fragments of which are still preserved in the
+church, exquisite in modelling and colour. The most noticeable is a
+headless figure of St. Hubert, the mighty hunter of legend, who was
+converted by meeting a white hart with golden horns (supposed to be an
+emblem of Christ), and received from St. Peter a key wherewith to cure
+hydrophobia. The key is here in his hand, with a dog beneath it, and
+the golden-horned hart couched by his side.
+
+Just before we reach the seventh milestone from Cambridge another
+south-running lane diverges to Caldecote, with its retired little fane
+on the hill-side over the Bourn, a very oasis of devotional peace and
+quietude. Confronting it across the stream is the steeple of Kingston,
+where there is a fine fourteenth century fresco in the north aisle,
+and a delicious little niche in the western wall of the tower,
+outside.
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Toft._]
+
+At the point where this lane leaves the road, another, looking like a
+mere farm road, turns off northwards. This leads to Childerley Hall,
+now a farm house, but in 1647 of sufficient consequence to serve as a
+sleeping place for Royalty. Hither King Charles the First was brought
+by his captors, when carried off by Cornet Joyce from Holmby House in
+Northamptonshire, as has been already narrated.[183] He was not
+altogether an unwilling captive, for both he and the Army hoped to
+arrive at some mutual accommodation which would make both independent
+of that Parliamentary control of which both were heartily wearied.
+
+[Footnote 183: See p. 182.]
+
+He was treated, accordingly, with the utmost respect; and during his
+stay at Childerley Hall[184] (from Saturday, June 5, to Tuesday, June
+8), the students of Cambridge "flocked apace" to pay their homage to
+him. "He is exceedingly cheerful," writes a contemporary scribe,[185]
+"shows himself to all, and commands that no scholler be debarred from
+kissing his hand, for which honour they return humble thanks and
+_Vivat Rex_; and there the Sophs are in their gowns and caps as if no
+further than Barnwell." Nay, even the great chiefs of the army, the
+men who at Marston and Naseby had faced and conquered him, Fairfax,
+Ireton, and Whalley, and Cromwell himself, came hither to join in this
+hand-kissing, and, one after another, to be astonished at the ability
+and graciousness which their distressed Sovereign showed in the
+private interview granted to each in turn.
+
+[Footnote 184: Childerley was then the seat of the Cutts family.]
+
+[Footnote 185: Quoted in _East Anglia and the Civil War_ by Mr.
+Kingston.]
+
+But, if local tradition is to be trusted, beneath all this gallant
+show of gracious acquiescence in the inevitable, there lurked in the
+King's heart a deep conviction that the hope on which it was founded
+was forlorn indeed. For this tradition tells of a truly desperate dash
+for freedom, the success of which was all but impossible. It has been
+constantly handed down at Madingley Hall that on one of these June
+midnights a white figure knocked at the door, and a subdued voice
+asked for "Jack" (Sir John Cotton, a noted loyalist, whose seat the
+Hall was at that time). He came, and found this mysterious visitor
+none other than the King himself, disguised in a peasant's smock, and
+imploring concealment till he could escape from the country. By a
+secret stair, traces of which still exist, he was conducted to a
+hiding place in the roof. But it was too late; his flight had been
+discovered, and the pursuing troopers were already out in search of
+him. Madingley Hall would, of course, be amongst the very first places
+to be suspected of harbouring him, and the wild venture ended in
+despair. All was hushed up; for both he and his captors wished to keep
+up the fiction that he was with them willingly.
+
+But they kept a tight grip upon him, and, when he left Childerley that
+Tuesday morning, would not allow him to ride on to his state prison
+at Newmarket through Cambridge (where the streets were being decked in
+his honour with "whole rose-bushes and strewn with rushes and herbs"),
+lest these demonstrations should kindle too ardent a flame of loyalty.
+He was accordingly carried round by way of Grantchester and
+Trumpington. Since that time Childerley Hall has been rebuilt, but the
+room in which the King slept is still to be seen. And hard by the Hall
+there still stands the unpretentious little red-brick chapel (now a
+barn) in which he worshipped on that memorable Sunday.
+
+A mile further along the road, lanes again branch off north and south.
+The northern leads to the secluded hamlet of Knapwell, where a spring
+of ferruginous waters, held of old to be wonder-working, still
+justifies its ancient name of the Red Well. The southern brings us to
+Bourn, where the Bourn brook rises. On the slope above the stream
+stands the beautiful cruciform church, of late Norman and Early
+English architecture; the arches which open from the tower into the
+nave and the aisles being particularly noticeable. Bourn Hall is a
+fine Elizabethan mansion, the seat of J. Briscoe, Esq., and is the
+modern representative of a castle (the moat of which still exists)
+erected here by Picot, Sheriff of Cambridgeshire under William the
+Conqueror, and the scene of hard fighting in the Barons' War, when it
+belonged to the Peverells.
+
+Eleven miles from Cambridge we cross the Ermine Street, a junction
+sufficiently important to have been selected by the wisdom of our
+ancestors as the site of a gibbet; the object being that as many as
+possible should see the gruesome spectacle of malefactors hanging in
+chains, and thus, if evilly disposed, take warning, or, if well
+disposed, be encouraged by this visible vindication of the Law's
+majesty. The gibbet has been gone for a century and more; but till
+quite lately the sign-post here directed the traveller simply TO
+LONDON and TO YORK on either hand, reminding us that this was the old
+North Road.
+
+A mile along it, towards London, stands the little town of Caxton,
+from which the gibbet derived its name. A prosperous place in the old
+coaching days (as the size of its inns still testifies), it is now a
+mere village with 450 inhabitants. But it continues to boast itself a
+town. As the nearest point on the North Road to Cambridge, it was an
+important junction. The historian, Carter, writing in 1753, mentions
+that a mail was carried twice a week (on horseback) between Caxton and
+Cambridge; the only mail connection our University town then had,
+except with London and Bury St. Edmunds! We read also that, in the
+Jacobite rising of 1745, when it was seriously expected that the
+Stuart forces, after their wonderful success in reaching Derby, would
+march on to London, many Cambridge students, who cared little about
+the issue, secured windows at Caxton "to see the Scots pass by."
+
+Sixty years before this another gleam of interest lights up the name
+of Caxton. In 1686 the Bishop, Francis Turner (one of the famous Seven
+prosecuted by James the Second and afterwards deprived by William the
+Third as a non-juror), made a strenuous effort to get Mattins and
+Evensong said daily, according to the Rubric, throughout his Diocese.
+The following characteristic letter addressed by him to the Vicar of
+Caxton was discovered in 1908 amongst the church muniments:
+
+                                                             Ely,
+                                                   _Sept. 11th, 1686._
+
+     GOOD BROTHER,
+
+     The good character I have received concerning you ... has given
+     me a particular confidence in yr. care to putt the directions of
+     my printed letter in practice. Yr. parish, if it be not so
+     numerous as I suppos'd, yet lyes on the Great Northern Roade; it
+     would be for our Churches Honor and for the consolation of well
+     dispos'd travellers to find Daily Prayers in yr. Church. I press
+     them all over the Diocese where it is practicable, but at Caxton
+     I wd. have them by all means, tho' you begin with a congregation
+     of but a widdow or two. Have them if you please at 6 or 7 in the
+     morning if that will be best for passengers. My good friend you
+     have been bredd in a camp to toyle and hardship. I know the
+     putting my orders in execution, that is the making of so many
+     careless people Christian indeed, will cost you a great deale of
+     labour. But do not grudge it; you are sure of as great a Reward
+     in Heaven; and in good time you may find your account by it
+     here.... In the mean time do your Business with all your might,
+     and sett into it presently, before the Visitation. By which you
+     will more than a little oblige, Sir,
+
+     Yr. affect. friend and Brother,
+                                                            FRAN. ELY.
+
+     MR. SAY OF CAXTON.
+
+     P.S.--If you have no little Schoole in your town I shall wonder,
+     and you ought to procure one. If there bee one, then you need not
+     want a congregation for both morning and evening prayers.
+
+After crossing the Ermine Street we come to Eltisley, where there is a
+pretty Village Green and a good village inn; and the church, though
+small, has some fine Early English work. It is dedicated to St. John
+the Baptist and St. Pandiana (or Pandionia), an obscure personage,
+said by Leland to have been a Scottish[186] princess, who found in
+this remote spot a refuge from the importunities of her suitors, and
+was here buried by the side of a spring still known as St. Pandiana's
+Well. Her nunnery perished after the Conquest, and in the fourteenth
+century her body was translated into the church, along with that of
+the yet more obscure St. Wendreda,[187] a purely Cambridgeshire saint,
+whose name is also connected with the church of March, and with a
+"well" near Newmarket.
+
+[Footnote 186: _I.e._ Irish. The name of the Scots lingered on in
+their original home for many centuries after it became more famous in
+North Britain, whither they began to migrate in the fifth century.]
+
+[Footnote 187: See Miss Arnold Forster's Studies in Church
+Dedications, chap. xxxi.]
+
+The village is the scene of a dramatic tale found in Roger of
+Wendover, under the date 1234. A famine was raging, and the hungry
+poor invaded the ripening harvest-fields and devoured the crops, "for
+which they may scarce be blamed. Of the farmers, however, (who ever
+from their avarice, look upon the poor with an evil eye,) many were
+highly wroth at this pious theft. And they of Alboldesley hied them
+all on the next Sunday (July 16th) to the church, and with tumult
+required the priest to excommunicate upon the spot all who had thus
+plucked their wheat-ears. But one pious man alone adjured him in God's
+name to pronounce no such sentence for _his_ crops; adding that he was
+right well content that the poor should take from him in their need,
+and that he commended to the Lord's care whatsoever was left.
+
+"Now scarcely had the priest perforce begun the curse, than there
+suddenly arose such a storm of thunder, lightning, whirlwind, rain and
+hail, that the corn in the fields was torn from the ground as by a
+blast from hell; and all that grew therein, and the cattle, and the
+very birds, were destroyed, as though trodden down by carts and
+horses. But that just man found his land without trace of harm. And
+thus it is clear that as the angels sing Glory to God in the Highest,
+so on earth is there Peace toward men of Good-will.
+
+"This storm began on the borders of Bedfordshire (at Eltisley), and
+passed eastwards through the Isle of Ely. And here is a wondrous
+thing. Such crops as still stood when it was over were found so
+rotted that neither horse nor ass, steer nor pig, goose nor hen, would
+eat thereof." A cyclone of precisely the same character devastated
+Essex on June 24, 1897, and was as capricious in its visitations.
+
+At Eltisley we reach the termination of the long ridge which has kept
+us at an upland level all the way from Madingley, and our road now
+runs rapidly down into the valley of the Ouse. We reach that noble
+stream at the old-world, but thriving, town of St. Neots, where there
+is a fine old bridge and a magnificent church. The name of this place
+is locally pronounced not _Neats_, but _Notes_. This last is the
+correct form, for the name is derived from Neotus, the eldest brother
+and friend of King Alfred, whom that greatest of our monarchs
+recognised as the good genius of his life.
+
+The original name of this notable personality was Athelstane. He was
+the eldest grandson of Egbert, the first "King of the English," and
+held, accordingly, the under-kingship of Kent, at that time the usual
+appanage of the heir-apparent. This dignity he resigned to enter
+Religion, at the Abbey of Glastonbury, under the name of Neotus. A
+special bond of affection united him with his youngest brother,
+Alfred, who, as an enthusiastic boy of seventeen, took this dearest of
+brothers as his spiritual guide and counsellor. When, five years
+later, the successive deaths of the intervening brethren brought him
+to the throne, we read that the inconsiderate zeal with which he
+suppressed abuses drew anxious warnings from St. Neot, who foresaw
+that this overweening course would surely bring disastrous
+consequences.
+
+"But Alfred heeded not the reproof of the man of God, nor listed what
+he foretold. Wherefore (seeing that a man's sins must needs be some
+way punished, either in this world or in that which is to come), the
+Righteous Judge and True willed that he should not be unpunished here,
+that so he might be spared hereafter."[188]
+
+[Footnote 188: The Chronicle of St. Neots.]
+
+The punishment was that sudden and disastrous Danish inroad which
+overwhelmed the whole of the kingdom, and drove Alfred himself into
+hiding at Athelney. While he was there St. Neot died at the
+neighbouring Glastonbury. We read there, ere his departure, the saint
+had promised that as he had been Alfred's spiritual guide in life, so
+should that spiritual guidance and wardship still abide with him.
+"Thy guide have I been ever; thee and thine will I lead on." "I will
+be thy captain, I will be thy champion; thou shalt be glad and rejoice
+in me." "Lo, I will go before thy banner; thine enemies shall perish
+at my presence." And when, a few weeks later, the King led on his
+forces to the crowning victory over the Danes at Ethandune, he was
+persuaded that this promise was being fulfilled. With the eye of
+ardent faith he beheld the blessed spirit of his brother leading on
+the Christian banners to the onset. "See ye not?" he exclaimed to his
+men, "See ye not? That is indeed Neotus, Christ's glorious servant,
+Christ's unconquered soldier; and through him is the victory even now
+given to our hands."
+
+Thus it came about that St. Neot remained the object of unforgotten
+reverence, not only to Alfred himself, but to his heroic son and
+daughter. The former christened after this sainted uncle his own
+eldest son Athelstane, afterwards "Athelstane the Magnificent," the
+mighty King of the English and Emperor of Britain; and when the latter
+delivered Mercia from the yoke of the Danes, she called by his name
+one of the fortress towns, which she founded on the Ouse to keep them
+in check, St. Neots.
+
+It is appropriate that one of the earliest and most spirited of the
+Chronicles that record the great deeds of Alfred should have been
+preserved for five centuries in the Church of St. Neots, and should
+still be known as the "Chronicle of St. Neots."[189] The north aisle
+of this church is known as the "Jesus Chapel," having been built by a
+local mediaeval fraternity called "The Guild of Jesus." The sacred
+monogram IHC, is to be seen on the beams of the roof inside and on the
+buttresses outside.
+
+[Footnote 189: To this Chronicle we owe some of the best known legends
+in English History, the story of Alfred and the cakes, for instance.
+It was probably written in the tenth century. (See my "Alfred in the
+Chroniclers.")]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+One of the most delightful routes of the district is that by which we
+make our way along the Ouse from St. Neots to Ely, by way of
+Godmanchester, Huntingdon, and St. Ives. On leaving St. Neots the road
+climbs Paxton Hill, where its shady course overhangs a beautiful sweep
+of the broad stream 120 feet below. Thence it drops to the river at
+Paxton itself, where the church has some good Saxon features, and
+thence continues along the water to the twin villages of Offord Darcy
+and Offord Cluny, close together on the right bank, and so over
+another little eminence to strike the river again at Godmanchester.
+
+The etymology of this name shows it to have been a Roman station, and
+Roman remains have been found here. It is commonly identified with the
+_Durolipons_ of the Antonine Itinerary. Here the Via Devana, running
+straight from Cambridge, strikes the Ermine Street, and the final
+syllable of the Latin name suggests that the united roads crossed the
+river by a bridge before separating on their respective lines towards
+Chester and York. If so the bridge must have stood somewhere near the
+present one, which, however, was not built till the thirteenth
+century. Godmanchester is now a reposeful little town, with a uniquely
+picturesque view across the verdant expanse of Port Holme, the largest
+meadow, as it boasts itself, in the world, a wide, wide flat of breezy
+grass, across which, more than a mile away, rise the buildings of
+Huntingdon. In flood time, when this flat becomes a shining lake, the
+scene is striking indeed.
+
+From the northern end of the town a long causeway, pierced with many
+arches to carry off these floods, leads across the fields to the
+bridge, with its high pitch, its recessed and pointed buttresses, and
+its old bridge-chapel (now used for secular purposes) on the central
+span. Immediately behind lies the town of Huntingdon, larger and more
+stirring than its elder sister Godmanchester. It owes its existence to
+the same cause as St. Neots, being one of the fortresses erected by
+the "Children of Alfred," Edward the Elder and his sister Ethelfleda,
+"the lady of the Mercians," to ensure their pacification of these
+parts when reconquered from the Danes. It is famous as the birthplace
+of Oliver Cromwell, the entry of whose baptism, in 1599, is still to
+be seen in the register of All Saints' Church. The same book contains
+a record of his having been put to public penance, at the age of
+twenty, for scandalous living. The register of St. John's (now united
+to All Saints') tells us that the body of the unhappy Mary Stuart
+rested in that church during its removal by her son, James the First,
+from Peterborough Cathedral to Westminster Abbey.
+
+From Huntingdon our road, keeping close in touch with the river,
+takes us through the pretty villages of Hartford, Wyton, and Houghton,
+to St. Ives. A yet prettier way is to recross the stream at Houghton
+Lock and take a field-road across the meadows to the two Hemingfords,
+Hemingford Abbots and Hemingford Grey. The latter is famous as the
+birthplace of the Misses Gunning, who were the leading beauties of the
+Court in the early days of the reign of George the Third, and married
+into the highest families of the Peerage. Both churches stand on the
+very brink of the Ouse, about a mile apart, their graceful steeples,
+with that of Houghton to the north-east and that of St. Ives to the
+north-west, watching as guardian sentinels over the rich Ouse meadows
+between. All have spires, but that of Hemingford Grey lost its upper
+part by an equinoctial gale in the middle of the eighteenth century,
+and only the base now remains.
+
+St. Ives is yet another of Edward the Elder's fortresses, and is
+probably named from the Cornish town similarly designated. It is
+possible that it may be even a colony from that far-off strand, which
+had never swerved in its allegiance, planted here to leaven the
+turbulent Danish elements around. Certain it is that here Ednoth,
+Abbot of Ely, erected a church dedicated to St. Ivo. Who this saint
+may have been originally is not known; probably he (or she) was one of
+the many obscure Celtic saints whose names dot the map of Cornwall.
+But there grew up in the eleventh century a wild legend that Ivo, a
+Persian (!) bishop, had settled down in the neighbourhood. In the
+fifteenth century a stone sarcophagus, found by a peasant when
+ploughing, was declared to contain the body of this holy Oriental, and
+was translated with due pomp to the neighbouring Abbey of Ramsey. St.
+Ives was specially connected with this House, and it was an Abbot of
+Ramsey who built the beautiful bridge, the ditto of that at
+Huntingdon, by which we here recross to the left bank of the Ouse.
+
+Our next point, on leaving St. Ives, is the tiny village of Holywell,
+which we may reach either by road, through the hamlet of Needingworth,
+or (preferably) by a field-path running westwards from near the
+railway station. The little church here stands on a slope above the
+river, and in the churchyard the holy well is still to be seen. But
+the delight of the place is its strand along the Ouse, a rarely
+picturesque medley of old houses on one side of the road and on the
+other the broad clear stream, here crossed by a ferry. This road
+continues (as a mere field-path) to another delicious ferry a mile
+lower, with a charming little inn beside it, in a grove of lofty
+trees. This lovely spot is named Overcote. Here travellers may cross
+into Cambridgeshire and make their way along the "Hundred Foot"
+embankment (so called because it is thirty yards in width) along the
+river to Earith. For motors the way lies through Needingworth, and
+past the pretty little Church of Bluntisham, with its three-sided apse
+and its churchyard yews.
+
+Earith is a hamlet of Bluntisham, but a much larger place, owing its
+importance to its situation on the point where the great works
+connected with the drainage of the fens have their beginning by the
+diversion of the Ouse waters from their ancient bed into the two
+"Bedford Rivers," the Old and the New, which from this point run
+straight as a die (like the supposed "canals" in Mars) across the fen
+to Denvers Sluice, twenty-two miles away. The former was made in 1630,
+the latter in 1650, at the expense of what we should now call a
+company, promoted by the Earl of Bedford. No such cuts exist elsewhere
+in the world. Along them a clear horizon is to be obtained, and here,
+accordingly, was conducted, some forty years ago, a decisive
+experiment for proving the sphericity of the earth.
+
+At that time a deluded gentleman, who called himself "Parallax," was
+obsessed with the notion that the globe was a flat disc, and used to
+go lecturing with great vigour on the subject. After these lectures he
+invited questions, none of which were able to shake his belief. When
+asked, for example, "Why does the hull of a ship disappear below the
+horizon while the masts remain visible?" he would answer, "Because the
+lowest stratum of air is the densest, and, therefore, soonest conceals
+objects seen through it." In view of the present Polar exploration, it
+may interest our readers to know that one of his points was the
+absolute non-existence of the South Pole. "Explorers say they cannot
+get near it, because of an icy barrier. Of course. That barrier is the
+raised rim of our world plate, and they can but sail round and round
+inside it." Finally he showed his wholehearted belief in his absurd
+views by laying a heavy wager that no one would disprove them. The
+stakes were deposited in the hands of judges, and the trial, under
+agreed conditions, took place upon the New River. Three boats were
+moored three miles apart, each provided with a cross-tree of equal
+height. If the earth was spherical the central cross would appear
+above the other to an observer looking through a telescope levelled
+from the cross-tree of the boat at either end; if it was flat he would
+see both the other cross-trees as one. "Parallax" declared that he did
+so (!), but the judges decided against him, and the poor man lost his
+money.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+     Island of Ely.--Haddenham.--Aldreth, Conqueror's Causeway,
+     Belsars Hill.--Wilburton.--Sutton.--Wentworth.--Via
+     Devana.--Girton, College.--Oakington,
+     Holdsworth.--Elsworth.--Conington, Ancient Bells.--Long Stanton,
+     Queen Elizabeth.--Willingham, Stone Chamber.--Over,
+     Gurgoyles.--Swavesey, Finials.--Ely Road.--Chesterton.--Fen
+     Ditton.--Milton, Altar Rails.--Horningsea.--Bait's Bite, Start of
+     Race.--Clayhithe.--Waterbeach.--Car
+     Dyke.--Denny.--Stretham.--Upware.--Wicken Fen.
+
+
+From the bridge over the Ouse by the Earith sluice we see the
+sea-board (for that and nothing less is the word which its appearance
+irresistibly suggests) of the Island of Ely, rising before us, with a
+couple of miles of level fen between. We may reach it, if we will, by
+the main road, which leads eastward to Haddenham, the southernmost of
+the island villages. Haddenham stands on a projecting peninsula of
+high ground, the highest in the island, rising to nearly 150 feet,
+almost cut off from the rest by two inlets of fen (Grunty Fen on the
+north-east and North Fen on the north-west), and nearer than any other
+part to the mainland on the south. This quasi-insulation has left a
+curious mark on the Ecclesiastical map of Cambridgeshire. Throughout
+the whole Isle of Ely--the old Fenland Archipelago--the Bishop acts as
+his own Archdeacon. An Archdeacon of Ely there is; but his
+jurisdiction is confined to Cambridgeshire proper, Cambridgeshire
+south of the Isle. It extends, however, over Haddenham and the
+neighbouring village of Wilburton, the two parishes in this peninsula.
+
+Haddenham has a fine Decorated church; the tower showing the first
+development of that style from Early English (1275), and the transepts
+its transition into Perpendicular (1375). The fifteenth century font
+is richly panelled, with roses and shields supported by lions and
+angels. This church was founded by Owen, the "Over-alderman" who
+governed the Island of Ely under St. Etheldreda, the Foundress of the
+Cathedral, and Queen of the Isle as the childless widow of its last
+native ruler, King Tonbert.[190] Owen's name is interesting as
+testifying to the Celtic survival in the fenland, already spoken
+of.[191] The broken cross bearing his name, now in the south aisle of
+Ely Cathedral, was originally set up at Haddenham; and, after being
+for ages an object of veneration, was, at the Reformation, mutilated
+and degraded into a horsing-block. At length the revived decency of
+the eighteenth century removed it to Ely.
+
+[Footnote 190: See Chap. XIV.]
+
+[Footnote 191: See Chap. VIII.]
+
+The village of Haddenham lies chiefly along the road running southward
+to the hamlet of Aldreth, on the very verge of the Island. The nearest
+point of the low-lying mainland is only half a mile away; the "Old
+River" of the Ouse (now, since the construction of the Bedford Rivers,
+become quite a scanty watercourse) flowing between. This was the point
+selected by William the Conqueror for the famous Causeway, whereby,
+after being once and again baffled by the valour of Hereward, he
+ultimately succeeded in forcing his way into the Island.[192] For
+centuries afterwards this continued to be the chief entrance from the
+Cambridge district, till superseded by the present road via Stretham. A
+small barrow at the southern end of this causeway, which is now a mere
+field-track, still bears the name of Belsar's Hill, after the knight
+who, in this campaign, acted as the Conqueror's Commander-in-Chief.
+
+[Footnote 192: See Chap. XIV.]
+
+Wilburton, a mile to the east, was given to Ely by St. Ethelwold,
+Bishop of Winchester, the prelate who aided in King Edgar's
+restoration of the Monastery of Ely, after its destruction by the
+Danes, in 870, had laid it waste for upwards of a century. The church
+has some fine woodwork in stalls, screen, and roof, adorned on the
+spandrills and bosses with the three cocks of Bishop Alcock, the
+founder of Jesus College. While Archdeacon of Ely he here entertained
+Henry the Eighth, when, as Prince of Wales, he accompanied his father
+on the last Royal Pilgrimage ever made to the shrine of St. Etheldreda
+at Ely, which he himself was so soon to despoil and destroy. A good
+brass (now affixed to the wall) commemorates Alcock's predecessor in
+the archidiaconate, Richard Bole (1477). And yet another Archdeacon,
+Wetheringset, is also here buried. Some curious metal-work hangs from
+the roof, and on the north wall of the nave are ancient frescoes,
+representing not only St. Christopher, the usual subject, but the much
+less known St. Blaise and St. Leodegar. The former was Bishop of
+Sebaste, and was martyred in 316 A.D. He became the patron saint of
+wool-combers, and was specially venerated in Leeds and Bradford. The
+latter was Bishop of Autun in Gaul, during the seventh century. There
+is here a fine old red-brick manor-house, called the Burgh-stead (or
+Bury-stead), built in 1600 by a London alderman to whom Queen
+Elizabeth sold the Manor,--after filching it from the Bishop of Ely,
+according to her usual practice.
+
+[Illustration: _Wilburton._]
+
+The whole peninsula is specially rich in memorials of long past ages.
+In the peat of the old Ouse channel by Wilburton was found a great
+hoard of bronze weapons, lying in a promiscuous heap, "in such a
+manner as to suggest that a canoe with a cargo of bronze scrap had
+been upset there," as Professor and Mrs. Hughes picturesquely put it,
+in their "Geography of Cambridgeshire." Grunty Fen has produced a
+bronze sickle, and two splendid ornaments of twisted gold; while, a
+mile east of Wilburton, a British urn was discovered, associated with
+the bones of the urus, or gigantic wild ox of the Neolithic Age. And
+between Earith and Wilburton there has been dug out gold ring-money.
+
+[Illustration: _The Burystead, Wilburton._]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But a yet more striking approach to the Island of Ely may be made by
+taking at Earith the road through the toll-gate which leads northward
+immediately alongside the great embankment of the New River, and lies
+some few feet below the level of its waters. For three miles this
+association continues; then road and river part company, and the
+former drives straight across the fen to climb the western shore of
+the island. The change of scenery when you reach that shore is
+striking in its suddenness. You have been travelling for miles through
+the bare, treeless, dead level of the fen, with its immense width of
+view; then, almost in a moment, you find yourself ascending a steepish
+hill through a tree-shaded hedge-bordered cutting which might be in
+Kent or even Devonshire.
+
+At the top of this brow you look down on the fen behind you and on
+either hand, your southern horizon being bounded by the near uplands
+of Haddenham, with the flat bay of North Fen between. And very shortly
+you come to the undulating village street of Sutton, with its highest
+point crowned by the truly glorious church. This church is all in one
+style, Decorated, on the verge of developing into Perpendicular,
+having been built by Barnet, Bishop of Ely 1366 to 1373. The splendid
+tower is crowned by an octagonal steeple, and that again by a second,
+richly pinnacled, and is a landmark for many miles along the valleys
+of the Ouse and Cam.
+
+From Sutton we reach Ely by way of Wentworth and Witchford. The former
+name is supposed to be a corruption of Owensworth, and to commemorate
+that the place was of old the property of St. Owen. The little church
+has a Saxon porch, with twisted pillars, and contains a remarkable
+carving of the same date, representing an ecclesiastic wearing the
+pall of a Primate. His left hand supports an open book, while in his
+right he holds, not a cross or pastoral staff, but something more
+suggestive of an aspersory for holy water. The corbel in Ely Cathedral
+depicting the burial of St. Etheldreda shows us a figure similarly
+equipped.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+In looking southward from Sutton Church, three steeples are specially
+conspicuous in the Ouse valley. They are those of Over, Swavesey, and
+Willingham. All are churches of the first class, and all are best
+reached from Cambridge by way of the Via Devana, which, after crossing
+the "Great Bridge" and climbing the ascent past the Castle, continues
+its straight course to the north-west under the designation of the
+Huntingdon Road. Just as it leaves the town a branch-road on the right
+leads to the village of Histon, which the jam factories of Messrs.
+Chivers have made one of the most flourishing in the county. The
+church here has some good Early English work, and a remarkable "Rood"
+(much defaced) on the gable of the S. transept. This is an almost
+unique example of the early "Majestas" type of crucifix (p. 339).
+Christ, with outspread arms, wears, not the Crown of Thorns, but the
+Old English "king-helm," and is fully robed. About 1200 this ideal
+type gave place to the later "realistic" crucifix.
+
+[Illustration: _Sutton Church._]
+
+A mile beyond the last houses of Cambridge the Via Devana comes to the
+huge red-brick mass of Girton College, which has been already spoken
+of.[193] Its spacious grounds and never-ending corridors impress the
+mind with admiration for the enthusiasm and energy which has thus
+materialised Tennyson's vision of University education for women. At
+this point another northward turn takes us to Girton Church, where
+there are good brasses to two successive fifteenth century parsons. In
+their day the living belonged to Ramsey Abbey, by the gift of Eric,
+Bishop of Dorchester (1016). We next come to Oakington, the Mecca of
+Cambridgeshire Free Churchmen. For here, in the quiet little
+Nonconformist Cemetery, rest, side by side, the three men to whom the
+chief sects of the county trace their spiritual ancestry--Francis
+Holcroft, Joseph Oddy, and Henry Oasland.
+
+[Footnote 193: See p. 144.]
+
+The first named was a Fellow of Clare College where he had for his
+"chum" (_i.e._ chamber-mate, as we find the word used in "Pickwick")
+Tillotson, the future Archbishop of Canterbury. He began his
+ministerial career by taking on himself to supply the place of a
+brother collegian, the Puritan minister in charge of Littlington, near
+Royston, who, most un-Puritanically, was often incapacitated by drink
+from performing his duties. Later, in 1655, when still only
+twenty-two, he himself became pastor of the adjoining parish of
+Bassingbourn. When the "Black Bartholomew" of 1662 deprived him of
+this charge under the Act of Uniformity, he preached, at the risk of
+fine and imprisonment, throughout the neighbourhood, binding together
+his adherents in a loosely-knit organisation, whose members were
+admitted on subscribing the following Profession of Faith:
+
+     "We do in the presence of the Lord Jesus, the awful crowned King
+     of Sion, and in the presence of his holy angels and people and
+     all besides here present, solemnly give up ourselves to the Lord
+     and to one another, by the will of God, solemnly promising and
+     engaging in the aforesaid presence to walk with the Lord and with
+     one another in the observation of all Gospel ordinances, and the
+     discharge of all relative duties in this church of God and
+     elsewhere, as the Lord shall enlighten us and enable us."[194]
+
+[Footnote 194: _Cambs. Monthly Repository X._]
+
+His efforts were vigorously seconded by Oddy and Oasland, whose
+consciences, like his own, would not permit them to use the Anglican
+Prayer Book; and the units of this embryo Church, who were often
+spoken of at the time as "Mr. Holcroft's disciples," became widely
+spread throughout the county. Already, before the end of 1662, they
+had regular meetings at Barrington, Eversden, Waterbeach, and Guyhirn,
+as well as Cambridge; and when, ten years later, they became licensed
+by the King's Proclamation of Indulgence, we find the number increased
+fourfold. So far Nonconformity had been the only bond between these
+scattered bands of worshippers; but they now began to differentiate
+themselves into Baptist, Independent, and Presbyterian Congregations,
+though the lines were not as yet sharply drawn, and, indeed, are not
+even now sharply drawn in the country villages, where a man is
+"Church" or "Chapel," caring little what may be the precise
+denomination of his chapel. The strength of the Dissenting spirit thus
+implanted at Oakington may be measured by that of the language
+employed by the zealous Archdeacon of Ely, who, in 1685, declares this
+to be "the most scandalous parish and the worst in the diocese. The
+people most vile. A Fanatic Schoolmaster."
+
+From Oakington the lane leads on to Long Stanton, where the two
+churches of St. Michael and All Saints are both noteworthy. The former
+is a simple Early English building with a _thatched_ roof (till lately
+made of reeds from the fen, a far more durable material than straw,
+but now unobtainable), a rich double piscina, and an oak chest dating
+from the twelfth century. The latter, at the other end of the "long"
+village street, is a Decorated cruciform structure, the south transept
+having become the mortuary chapel of the Hatton family, who bought the
+lordship of the manor from Queen Elizabeth.
+
+That rapacious monarch, her father's worthy daughter in ecclesiastical
+spoliation, had seized upon it amongst the surrenders which she
+exacted from Bishop Cox, the first Protestant to be Bishop of Ely. On
+his accession she confiscated a full half of his episcopal property,
+and was constantly insisting on further denudations, including Ely
+House, Holborn. On this final act of despotism goading him into
+remonstrance, she is reported (in Strype's _History of the
+Reformation_) to have made the well-known reply, "Proud priest! I made
+you. And I will unmake you. Obey my pleasure, or I will forthwith
+unfrock you." Only his speedy death (in 1581) prevented her from
+actually carrying out this threat. After it she kept the whole
+property of the See in her own hands for no less than nineteen years,
+when she handed it over to Bishop Heton, shorn of yet another moiety,
+which included the Manor of Longstanton with its ancient episcopal
+palace.
+
+This palace had a further connection with Elizabeth; for in it she was
+entertained by Bishop Cox after that visit to Cambridge in 1564, when
+her erudition so thrilled the University.[195] And it was here that
+she was disgusted by the blasphemous entertainment got up for her
+benefit by the Protestant undergraduates, in which a performing dog
+danced with a consecrated Host in his mouth. King's College Chapel was
+the scene originally intended for this outrage; but the graver
+academic programme there lasted so long that the Queen could not stay
+for the afterpiece. The disappointed students begged leave to follow
+her and give an evening performance at Long Stanton. Mutual disgust
+was the result. As soon as Elizabeth understood what was going on she
+indignantly swept from the room, ordering every light to be instantly
+extinguished, leaving the wretched boys to grope for their properties
+and get back to Cambridge as best they could.
+
+[Footnote 195: When praised for loveliness by the Public Orator she
+showed, to the loud admiration of her auditors, that she both
+understood and spoke Latin by exclaiming coyly "Non est verum."]
+
+[Illustration: _All Saints' Church, Long Stanton._]
+
+Following the road to Long Stanton station (six and a half miles), we
+there cross the G. E. R. (St. Ives Branch) and proceed, along a
+somewhat dreary stretch, to Willingham (nine miles), where an
+exceptionally fine church (All Saints) rewards our toil. After
+lingering in neglect and decay for years beyond the neighbouring
+churches, it has now become an ideal example of judicious restoration,
+very different from the drastic process too often known by that name.
+Every ancient feature and development has been preserved, including
+the beautiful roof,[196] with its elaborate carving, its tiers of
+angels and its double hammer beams, the fine parclose screens, and the
+Perpendicular pulpit. Beneath the clerestory may be seen traces of no
+fewer than four successive layers of frescoes, which, from the twelfth
+to the seventeenth century, each in turn adorned the walls. But the
+most striking feature of the church is the small Decorated "treasury"
+adjoining the north wall of the chancel. It is wholly of stone, even
+to the roof with its richly wrought "beams"; an almost unique example
+of this method of treatment. Dowsing here destroyed, on 16 March,
+1643, "forty superstitious pictures, a crucifix, and two superstitious
+inscriptions, also two pictures of the Holy Ghost and one of the
+Virgin Mary in brass."
+
+[Footnote 196: This roof is traditionally said to have been that of
+the great church of Barnwell Abbey (see p. 160). It obviously was made
+for a larger nave than that of Willingham, and has been cut down to
+fit its present purpose.]
+
+From Willingham a field road will take us, if desired, to Belsar's
+Hill,[197] which, besides its historical associations, is rich in the
+pretty crystals of selenite or gypsum. And though, as has been said,
+the track is now all but disused, it is still possible to follow the
+Conqueror's causeway to the Ouse and get ferried over to Aldreth.
+
+[Footnote 197: See p. 283.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next turn on the Via Devana is the southward lane to Madingley,
+already described. Southward also lie Lolworth, Boxworth and Elsworth.
+The last has an exceptionally fine church, Decorated throughout, and
+displaying the almost unique feature of small lockers for books in the
+fourteenth century stalls. Conington, near the road on the same side,
+has a stone-ribbed spire containing three mediaeval bells--a rare
+survival. They bear the following inscriptions:
+
+  1. ASSVMPTA . EST . MARIA . IN . CELIS . GAVDENT . ANGELI
+     LAVDANTES . BENEDICVNT . DOMINVM.
+
+     Mary is taken up to Heaven. The Angels are glad.
+     They praise and bless the Lord.
+
+  2. SANCTA . MARIA . ORA . PRO . NOBIS
+     Holy Mary pray for us.
+
+  3. VIRGO . CORONATA . DVC . NOS . AD . REGNA . BEATA .
+     O crowned Maid lead us to realms of bliss.
+
+[Illustration: _Over, South Porch._]
+
+Northward we find the magnificent churches of Swavesey and Over
+already mentioned. The former is one of the noblest in Cambridgeshire.
+The nave is Perpendicular, but the large windows in the south aisle
+are really Early English lancets, the Perpendicular tracery being
+inserted--a most unusual development. The finials of the fourteenth
+century benches are to be noticed, especially in the north aisle,
+where they take the form of grotesque animals. The small size of these
+seats suggests that they were meant for children. The little ones
+would be charmed with these delightful finials, representing a fox
+and a goose, a fox and a stork, a bear and a dog, a wolf and a hound,
+an eagle and a snake, a wild boar, a lion, a pelican, a cherub, St.
+Peter, and an angel playing upon a dulcimer.
+
+[Illustration: _Over._]
+
+At Over every feature of the church is noteworthy. It is entirely
+built of Barnack stone, richly ornamented externally with running
+ball-flower patterns. The southern porch is beautifully proportioned,
+and the gargoyles extraordinary specimens of birds and beasts,
+apparently under the same inspiration as the Swavesey finials. Over
+the west door is a sculpture (almost weathered out of knowledge) of
+Our Lady in Glory, a very rare subject; also the arms of Ramsey Abbey,
+to which the benefice was presented by Ednoth, Bishop of Dorchester,
+who lies buried in Bishop West's chapel at Ely.[198] The tracery in
+general is Decorated, but the spire rises from an Early English tower,
+and the chancel is also Early English, with inserted Perpendicular
+windows. The Sanctus Bell[199] still hangs over the eastern gable of
+the nave. The interior woodwork is of the best, the roof is
+Decorated, and there is an exceptionally good sixteenth century
+pulpit. The arcading above the windows of the south aisle, with its
+banded Early English shafts, is another beautiful feature here. On
+some of the churchyard tombstones wall-rue may be found growing, a
+rare sight in this neighbourhood. From Over a lane leads on, crossing
+the Hundred Foot Bank to Overcote, that fascinating Ferry Inn upon the
+Ouse whose charms have already been dwelt upon.
+
+[Footnote 198: See Chap. XVII.]
+
+[Footnote 199: See p. 231.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Formerly, as we have said, the regular road from Cambridge to Ely was
+by way of the Causeway at Aldreth. But this roundabout route of over
+twenty miles compared unfavourably with the shorter line taken by the
+Cam, which was accordingly the favourite for such as could afford
+boat-hire. In the eighteenth century regular packet-boats ran daily
+between the two places, drawn by horses. To-day the only passengers on
+the river are pleasure-seekers, and the ordinary way to Ely from
+Cambridge is by the road supposed to represent the hypothetical Akeman
+Street of Roman days.[200] This road turns northwards round Magdalene
+College, and runs through the suburb of New Chesterton. Old Chesterton
+stands on the river, east of the road, and has a finely-proportioned
+steeple, with particularly melodious bells, and a slender spire. At
+this point is the winning-post of the College boat races.[201] On the
+opposite bank, a mile lower down the stream, is Fen Ditton, the "Ditch
+End" where the Fleam Dyke strikes the river.[202] Ditton Corner, just
+beneath the parish church, is the favourite spot for seeing these
+races, as it commands a view of two long reaches, and is also (as a
+bend in the stream must needs be) a highly probable spot for bumps.
+
+[Footnote 200: See p. 252.]
+
+[Footnote 201: See p. 146].
+
+[Footnote 202: See p. 170.]
+
+Leaving these to the right, we reach Milton, whence the poet's family
+name is said to be derived, and where the church has seventeenth
+century altar rails, a very rare possession. Just opposite, with a
+ferry between, is Horningsea, where there is another good church.
+Between this and Fen Ditton is an ancient building, now used for farm
+purposes, which the Ordnance Map marks as "Biggin Abbey." An abbey,
+however, it never was, being only one (and the smallest) of the many
+scattered mansions of the Abbot and Bishop of Ely. On the stream
+beside it is Baitsbite Lock, the starting-point of the boat races.
+Here along the towing path may be seen the posts, set at regular
+intervals on the brink of the stream, to which each boat is moored by
+the "starting cord" held in the coxswain's[203] hand. He must not let
+it go till the gun is fired. Thrilling moments pass while he counts
+aloud the last seconds--"five ... four ... three ... two ... one," and
+the muscles of the crew grow ever tenser, till, at the signal, he
+flings the cord into the water, and every oar strains its utmost in
+the first stroke.
+
+[Footnote 203: This word is invariably abbreviated to "Cox," which is
+also used as a verb.]
+
+[Illustration: _Swavesey._]
+
+The next lock is Clayhithe, two miles further down the river, with an
+inn beside it in special favour for Cambridge boating pic-nics. Here,
+too, is the lowest bridge over the Cam, indeed the only one below
+Cambridge. It belongs to a private company, and is rigorously tolled.
+A pretty shady lane leads to it from Horningsea. Hard by, on the left
+bank, are the villages of Waterbeach and Landbeach. They are
+respectively four and twelve furlongs from the stream, and mark
+successive boundaries of the fenland waters. Between them runs an
+ancient earthwork, the Car Dyke (probably of Roman date), which of old
+kept those waters in flood time from drowning the meadows to the
+south. Starting from the Cam at Clayhithe it runs along the whole
+western limit of the fenland. It reaches the Ouse near the large
+village of Cottenham (where the east window of the fourteenth century
+church is copied from one in Prior Crauden's Chapel at Ely) with over
+2,000 inhabitants, and goes on past the tiny and picturesque Rampton,
+with under 200, to Willingham and Earith, Ramsey and Peterborough,
+Deeping and Sleaford; finally ending its long course on the banks of
+the far off Witham, hard by Lincoln.
+
+[Illustration: _Swavesey Church._]
+
+For a mile or so our "Akeman Street" follows the course of the Car
+Dyke, and then strikes northward across the fen, along a causeway of
+its own, passing near the remains of Denny Abbey, a small foundation
+which passed through unusual vicissitudes. Originally a Benedictine
+House, it was transferred in the twelfth century to the Templars, and
+in 1290, passed from them to the Minor Sisters of the Franciscan
+order. Marie de Valence, the foundress of Pembroke College, was a
+noted benefactress to Denny, and in her statutes solemnly enjoined on
+the scholars of the former institution "kindness" towards the recluses
+of the latter. The abbey is now a farm, but there are more remains of
+the monastic buildings here than almost anywhere else in the county.
+Much of the church is built into the farm house, and the refectory is
+in use as a barn. Many old walls and dykes may be traced, while a
+large entrenchment to the south is known as "Soldiers' Hill." This
+name may be due to the Templars.
+
+Two miles further we cross the old bed of the Ouse (containing now
+only such scanty waters as the Bedford rivers have left to it) at
+Elford, and enter the Isle of Ely. The ramp of the Island, however,
+lies two miles further on yet. We climb it by the village street of
+Stretham, where the ancient Town Cross still exists, an interesting
+and rare feature. It stands hard by the church, which contains various
+ancient tombstones, one to Nicholas de Ryngestone, rector under Edward
+the First, and a late fifteenth century brass to Dame Joan Rippingham,
+mother of two other rectors. A later rector was ejected in 1644 "for
+having made new steps to the altar, himself bowing twice as he went
+up, and as often while he came down." The church was an ancient
+possession of Ely, but was reft from the See by Elizabeth. Stretham
+lies at the extreme end of the little peninsular ridge on which
+Wilburton and Haddenham stand.[204] Beyond it we sink to the enclosed
+inlet of Grunty Fen, passing the hamlet of Little Thetford, and rise
+again to the higher ground where the towers of Ely greet our eyes, a
+little over a mile away.
+
+[Footnote 204: See p. 282.]
+
+[Illustration: _Cottage at Rampton._]
+
+After leaving Waterbeach our road has diverged widely from the Cam.
+Those who have followed the river course, either by boat or by the
+towing-path, will be rewarded by finding themselves, in course of
+time, at Upware, the tiniest and most sequestered of hamlets, where
+the wide Fens spread all around, bare, treeless, houseless, open to
+the sweep of every breeze, and giving the same delicious sense of
+space as a sea view. The whole atmosphere breathes remoteness, the
+very inn calls itself "FIVE MILES FROM ANYWHERE." But, though wide,
+the view is not like a sea view, boundless. The Island of Ely limits
+it to the north-west, and to the south-east the nearer uplands of East
+Anglia. For here is the nearest point on the Cam to Reach, the little
+hamlet once so important an emporium, where the Devil's Dyke runs down
+to the Fen.[205] To Upware, accordingly, there was cut through the
+sedge and peat, at some time beyond memory, the long straight waterway
+of Reach Lode, whereby even sea-going ships were able to discharge
+their cargoes on Reach Hithe. At a later date, but as early as the
+twelfth century, Burwell Lode was led to the same outlet. Those to
+Swaffham and Bottisham come in somewhat higher up the river.
+
+[Footnote 205: See p. 194.]
+
+[Illustration: _Dovecote at Rampton._]
+
+A mile to the east of Upware we can see how mighty a task those men of
+old undertook who cut these lodes through the primaeval jungle. For
+here is that Wicken Fen, which we have already spoken of,[206] where
+a square mile of that jungle is preserved in its primaeval condition,
+and where (in all but the old bird life) the fauna and flora of the
+old Fenland may still be studied in their old environment; where the
+peat is still spongy under your foot, and the tall crests of the reeds
+rise high above your head. To dig out masses of that spongy peat, to
+cut through miles of those tall reeds would be no light business even
+with our own modern means of excavation. What must it have been to the
+rude implements of the ancients?
+
+[Footnote 206: See p. 180.]
+
+[Illustration: _The Quay, Ely._]
+
+Some two miles beyond Upware the Cam falls into the Ouse, and the
+united stream sweeps past Thetford and round the corner of the island
+to Ely, where the Cutter Inn (near the railway station) makes a good
+landing-place.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+     Ely.--Island and Isle.--St. Augustine.--St. Etheldreda, Life,
+     Death, Burial, St. Audrey's Fair.--Danish Sack of Ely.--Alfred's
+     College.--Abbey restored.--Brithnoth, Song of Maldon.--Battle of
+     Assandun.--Canute at Ely.--Edward the Confessor.--Alfred the
+     Etheling.--Camp of Refuge, Hereward, Norman Conquest, Tabula
+     Eliensis, Nomenclature, Norman Minster.--Bishops of Ely, Rule
+     over Isle.--Ely Place, Ely House.
+
+
+The tourist through Cambridgeshire should now turn his attention to
+Ely, a place second only in interest, if indeed second, to Cambridge
+itself. The central point of note in Ely is the Cathedral; known to us
+ever since our schooldays through Macaulay's picture-giving pen, which
+sets it before us as "Ely's stately fane." We hope soon to learn
+something of the history of this great church, of her growth, of her
+decay, of her restoration, of those men and women who have made her
+what she is, of the tumults and storms she has over-lived. Truly we
+may say, with Stirling the poet that the Minster at Ely
+
+  "Still ship-like on for ages fares,
+     And holds its course, so smooth so true,
+     For all the madness of the crew;
+   It must have better rule than theirs."
+
+Before we actually visit the place itself let us make ourselves
+familiar with the outline of its chequered history.
+
+The city of Ely has a population approaching 8,000, and stands on the
+western edge of the Island of Ely, once truly an island, being an area
+of dry land rising from the midst of the fens, and, till their
+drainage, accessible only by boat or causeway. This _Island_, a true
+bit of natural _terra firma_, measures about eight miles by six, and
+lies at the southern end of a much more extensive fenland
+archipelago, of irregular shape, measuring approximately thirty miles
+by twenty, known from of old as the _Isle_ of Ely. The waters of the
+Fen, which, so lately as a century ago, made this wide area an
+archipelago indeed, have now given place to a "boundless plain" of
+fertile corn-land, so rich in harvests as to be often called "The
+Golden Plain of England."
+
+A twelfth century chronicler, the writer of the "Liber Eliensis,"
+asserts that, within the first years of the seventh century A.D.,
+Ethelbert, King of Kent, newly converted to Christianity, founded a
+monastery at Cratendune, about a mile south of Ely, and that Saint
+Augustine, the first Archbishop of Canterbury, consecrated it. But we
+cannot say that the authentic history of Ely begins till seventy years
+later, when we see an Anglo-Saxon lady founding a monastery on this
+rising ground in the midst of the Fens. The lady is Etheldreda, once
+Queen of Northumbria; her monastery is known to us as Ely. She is the
+daughter of Anna, King of East Anglia, who had reigned at Exning,
+almost within sight of Ely.
+
+King Anna was a devout man, who himself died a hero's death, fighting
+for the Cross and for his country against the overwhelming onset of
+Penda, the heathen King of Mercia, who made it the object of his life
+to stamp out English Christianity. But, though Anna fell, his cause
+triumphed. Penda shortly died, and his work perished with him. Not so
+Anna's. After his death the tide of Christian progress ran the
+stronger; and all over England it was through members of his family
+that it was specially championed.
+
+Married to the King of Northumbria, his daughter Queen Etheldreda had
+renounced her husband and her northern kingdom, and had returned to
+her native Fenland, there to found a monastery for both monks and
+nuns. In taking this step she had been influenced by two persons of
+note; by St. Hilda, her aunt, the foundress and first Abbess of
+Whitby, and by St. Wilfrid, Bishop of York. Hilda had in early life
+gained a firm hold on the heart of her niece, who had become fired
+with the wish to follow her example and herself to found a monastery.
+In spite of this resolve, of which she made no secret, she had been
+forced (while strongly protesting) into a nominal marriage with
+Egfrid, the youthful King of Northumbria. After twelve years of
+unhappy life, she had been induced by St. Wilfrid to quit her
+husband; from St. Wilfrid's hand she had received the veil, before him
+she had taken the vows that bound her to a monastic life. It is a
+strange, unnatural tale, that cannot claim our approval; but there it
+is, and its truth is not questioned.
+
+Queen Etheldreda, accompanied by certain attendants had then fled
+southward, with her deeply wronged husband in chase. She had been
+sheltered on one occasion from his pursuit by a tide of unprecedented
+height, which protected her on a rocky hiding-place while the King
+passed by, all unaware that he was close to her. At length she had
+reached her own fenland country; and here, still following Hilda's
+example, she set herself to build a monastery, choosing the highest
+ground available. She was a well dowered lady, for her first husband,
+Tonbert, was a Prince of the Girvii, a Celtic tribe descended from
+those refugee Britons who had sought safety in the fens when all else
+was conquered by the English invaders two centuries earlier. This
+prince had bequeathed to his childless widow all his wide fenland
+domains; so Etheldreda had no need to seek further for an endowment
+for her monastery; while her brother Adwulf, now King of East Anglia,
+defrayed the cost of the new buildings. These ere long became the home
+of both monks and nuns, who lived in separate houses and met only for
+their common worship in the Abbey church. No Abbot was appointed, but
+Etheldreda herself was their Abbess, ruling both sexes alike.
+
+It is probable that from its foundation the monastery at Ely was under
+the influence of the rule of St. Benedict, for St. Wilfrid during
+Etheldreda's life-time was a frequent resident there, and he was in
+close touch with St. Botolph, that most influential, though half
+legendary saint, who, from his hermitage at Ickenhoe in Suffolk, was
+introducing throughout East Anglia the rule of the monks of St.
+Benedict, those great preservers of civilisation, which, but for them,
+must in many lands have perished, when the strong hand of the Roman
+Empire lost its grip.
+
+[Illustration: _The North Triforium of the Nave, Ely._]
+
+Little is recorded of Etheldreda's life as abbess; and, after a rule
+of seven years, she died at the age of forty-nine, in the year 679,
+her death being due to an epidemic then prevalent, combined with a
+tumour in the neck. The death-bed scene is sculptured on one of the
+corbels of the Octagon Towers at Ely, where the more picturesque
+events of her life are quaintly set before us in stone. The saintly
+lady died after much suffering, which the ministrations of her devoted
+physician Cynifrid failed to allay; though he did for her all that the
+surgery of those days allowed. She bore her sickness with composure of
+mind, and when she knew that the end was at hand, she (as others have
+done before and since) summoned her whole household to her chamber to
+take her last farewell of them all. She told them that the time of her
+departure was at hand; she spoke to them of the vanity of this world's
+enjoyments, and recommended them to keep Heaven always in view,
+whereby they might in some measure have a foretaste of its joys. After
+this she received the Communion in both kinds from the hands of Huna,
+a priest devoted to her service; then, while praying for the
+inhabitants of the monastery, she passed from earth. It may be of
+interest to remember that throughout the seven years of her rule at
+Ely, Theodore, the great organiser of the Anglican Church, "the first
+Archbishop whom the whole Church of England obeyed," filled the See of
+Canterbury.
+
+It was Etheldreda's wish to be buried with all simplicity in the
+cemetery set apart for the nuns of Ely; so we are glad to learn that
+this her last desire was respected by her followers, and that she was
+laid to rest among the nuns in a wooden coffin. Her elder sister, St.
+Sexburga, widow of the King of Kent, took her place as Abbess, and
+ruled at Ely till another generation was arising. After sixteen years
+had gone by, those who still remembered and loved Etheldreda wished
+that her body should be with them at their devotions in the church,
+and they resolved to translate her remains from the cemetery to the
+Abbey.
+
+No common coffin was held to be a fitting casket for those precious
+relics; but in a waste place named Armeswerke,[207] fifteen miles up
+the River Cam (which may be identified as now forming part of the
+Fellows' garden at Magdalene College, Cambridge, between the terrace
+and the river), there was found a marble sarcophagus of Roman
+workmanship.[208] This was brought to Ely; and with careful and simple
+ceremony the body of the first Abbess was lifted from the wooden and
+laid in the marble coffin, all being carried out under the
+superintendence of Sexburga. On beholding the uncorrupted body of the
+dear sister who had died in so much pain, Sexburga was heard to
+exclaim, "Glory to the name of the Lord most high!" All the look of
+suffering had gone, and the Saint appeared as if asleep on her bed.
+Gently removed from the wooden to the stone coffin, the body was
+carried into the Abbey Church, and placed behind the high altar; and
+for eight centuries the shrine of St. Etheldreda was visited by troops
+of pilgrims, who came from far and near to worship, to leave their
+offerings, and to seek healing from disease and infirmity. Sexburga
+was followed as Abbess by her sister, Ermenilda, Queen of Mercia. Thus
+Ely had three sister queens as her first three Abbesses; and hence
+perhaps the three crowns that still form the arms of the Bishopric.
+
+[Footnote 207: This is the word used by the "Historia Eliensis." Bede,
+our earliest authority, speaks of "a small waste city, which in the
+English tongue is called Grantchester." He almost certainly means
+Cambridge. See p. 221.]
+
+[Footnote 208: Doubt has been cast on this story, owing to the
+incidental mention by the chronicler of a shaped head-space in this
+coffin. This has been held to point to a twelfth century origin for
+the Legend, inasmuch as such head-spaces were not used until that
+date. In the present year(1910), however, an undoubtedly Roman
+sarcophagus thus shaped has been unearthed in Egypt. It is figured in
+the _Illustrated London News_ (July 23, 1910).]
+
+St. Etheldreda was long remembered with affection, and was commonly
+spoken of as St. Audrey. The popular Pilgrims' Fair held at Ely was
+known at St. Audrey's Fair; and the cheap fairings bought and sold
+there (especially the coloured necklets of fine silk known as "St.
+Audrey's chains") were called, from her name, "tawdry"; and thus a new
+word was coined for us with a strange story of its own, a word hardly
+worthy of the great Abbess of the Fenland to whom it owes its origin.
+Centuries later, St. Audrey's Fair, held in October, had grown to be
+one of the most important in the land, lasting for a fortnight. By the
+year 1248 it had become such a centre of merchandise as to interfere
+with the traffic of the Fair which Henry the Third had lately
+established at Westminster in honour of St. Edward the Confessor; the
+King therefore issued a warrant interdicting the fair at Ely. This
+suspension meant serious loss to the Bishop, Hugh de Northwold, "who
+made a heavy complaint to the King concerning the matter, but he
+gained from him nothing except words of soothing promises of future
+consolation," says the chronicler.
+
+For two hundred years after the death of the foundress, the abbey of
+monks and nuns went on with its pious works and ways. Then, in 870,
+appeared the Danes, still pagans; and after working their way through
+Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, where they "wasted with fire and sword all
+that ever they came to, they brake down all the abbeys of the fens;
+nor did Ely, so famous of old, escape." Having laid waste
+Peterborough, then known as Medhampsted, they came across the fens to
+Ely. The abbey and all the buildings pertaining to it were burnt; the
+monks and nuns put to the sword. Before setting fire to the buildings
+the Danes had secured for themselves all they contained of value, and
+great was the store, for the people of the neighbourhood had brought
+their goods into the monastery as to a place of safety. All was seized
+by the invaders, and what they could not carry away they destroyed.
+Thus Etheldreda's Abbey, after lasting 200 years, was left a deserted
+ruin; but her coffin of stone escaped without injury. One of the
+depredators, indeed, is said to have made an attempt to break into it,
+with the result that his eyes started from his head, and then and
+there he died, as the chronicler relates. The ancient sarcophagus had
+proved worthy of its trust.
+
+The hour was one of direst need; for all England lay spent and gasping
+beneath the bloodstained feet of the heathen pirates. But, with the
+need, there arose the deliverer. In 871, the year after the sack of
+Ely, Alfred the Great, "England's darling," succeeded to the kingship
+of the exhausted realm; and the life and death struggle entered on its
+last and most desperate phase. For one moment even he seemed to go
+under, and was driven to an outlaw life in the marshes of Athelney;
+the next, we see him shattering the invaders by his miraculous victory
+of Ethandune, and, with incomparable state-craft, negotiating that
+Peace of Wedmore, whereby the Danes had to acknowledge him as their
+Overlord.
+
+As such, he shortly established a College of Priests at Ely. Eight of
+the clerics who had witnessed the sack of the monastery came back to
+their old home, and rebuilt a part of the church that it might serve
+again as a place of worship. These priests were not monks, and are
+said to have had wives and children. They lived in poverty; for all
+the endowments of the Abbey had been seized by Burgraed, the last King
+of Mercia. But gradually, as the children of Alfred won back the
+kingdom, the endowment of Ely began afresh. Here a fishery, and there
+a wood, and again a mill with adjoining pastures, was bestowed on the
+little College--a term which still clings to the Cathedral precincts
+of Ely, called to this day the College, not the Close as in most
+Cathedral cities.
+
+With the accession, in 958, of the great Edgar, the first English King
+to be Emperor of all Britain, the monarch who, nearly a thousand years
+ago, gained for himself, as but one of our kings has done since, the
+title of "Peacemaker," brighter days dawned. Then, as now, the
+Catholic Church might have been well called "Cette eternelle
+recommenceuse," able to rise from her ashes with life renewed. From
+the havoc wrought by the Danes, the Abbey of Ely, as a Benedictine
+House, arose once more, rebuilt, refounded, and re-endowed by King
+Edgar, who restored to it by Royal Charter all that Etheldreda had
+originally bestowed; adding thereto several demesnes and sundry
+privileges. The re-constitution of the Abbey was carried out under the
+guidance of Ethelwold, Bishop of Winchester.
+
+The monks were thus restored; but the nuns of Ely have disappeared
+from view. As for those secular priests who were in possession and had
+maintained the sacred character of the spot for well-nigh a hundred
+years, ever since its devastation by the Danes, they were allowed to
+stay on if they submitted to the Benedictine Rule, otherwise they were
+dismissed.
+
+In the year 970, on the Feast of the Purification, a day that we shall
+again find eventful in the annals of Ely, the new and restored
+monastic buildings were consecrated by Dunstan, who now, as Archbishop
+of Canterbury, filled the highest office in the Church of the land.
+The chronicler, Roger of Wendover, tells us how, by Dunstan's counsel,
+King Edgar "everywhere restrained the rashness of the wicked,
+cherished the just and modest, restored and enriched the desolate
+churches of God, gathered multitudes of monks and nuns to praise and
+glorify the Great Creator, and built more than forty monasteries."
+This shews us that, the events taking place at Ely were in no sense
+isolated, but were part of a great revival going on throughout the
+whole country.
+
+In the year 991 the restored Abbey becomes connected with one of the
+most stirring poems of the English language, the "Song of Maldon." The
+Danish invasions, which had been checked for a century by the glorious
+line of monarchs who inherited King Alfred's blood and energy, were
+beginning again. One of these pirate hordes had landed in East Anglia,
+now no longer a separate principality but merely a district of the
+United Kingdom of England, governed by an "Alderman" named Brithnoth.
+Ethelred, surnamed the Unready, was on the throne--a King who for his
+lack of good judgment well deserved this contemptuous sobriquet--and
+his want of energy and capacity threw on to the shoulders of his
+subordinates the burden of the defence of his realm.
+
+Brithnoth rose to the emergency, as a true Christian hero. At the head
+of his retainers he hurried to meet the foe, calling out the local
+levies to join his march. At Ely, as he hastened past, he, with his
+men, was royally entertained. The day before, when he was passing
+Ramsey Abbey, the Abbot had offered him hospitality, but only for
+himself and half a dozen picked friends. This niggardly invitation
+drew from Brithnoth a scornful answer: "Tell my Lord Abbot," he
+replied, "that I cannot fight without my men, neither will I feed
+without them." At Ely meat and drink were placed before leader and
+followers without distinction, and well were the monks rewarded, for
+Brithnoth requited their hospitality by the gift of no fewer than nine
+manors, all lying near Cambridge--Trumpington, Fulbourn, and
+others--stipulating only that, if slain in battle, his body should be
+brought back to their church for burial.
+
+At Maldon in Essex on the River Panta (or Blackwater, as it is now
+called), he met the Danes, who began by sending a herald demanding a
+ransom, to be fixed by themselves, as the price of peace:
+
+  "Then back with our booty
+   To ship will we get us,
+   Fare forth on the flood,
+   And pass you in peace."
+
+This degrading offer Brithnoth contemptuously refuses:
+
+  "For ransom we give you
+   Full freely our weapons,
+   Spear-edge and sword-edge
+   Of old renown."
+
+The Danes at once make their way across the river and attack the
+English levies:
+
+  "Then drave from each hand
+   Full starkly the spear,
+   Showered the sharp arrows,
+   Busy were bows,
+   Shield met shaft,
+   Bitter the battle."
+
+In the end the pirates are driven back to their ships, but at the cost
+of Brithnoth's own life. He is pierced by a spear, and sinks dying to
+the ground; to the last exhorting his soldiers to fight on, and
+commending his own soul to God in the following beautiful and touching
+lines:
+
+  "To Thee give I thanks,
+   Thou Lord of all living,
+   For all good hap
+   In this life here.
+   Sore need I now,
+   O Maker mild,
+   That Thou should'st grant
+   My spirit grace;
+   That my soul to Thee
+   May depart in peace,
+   And flee to Thy keeping,
+   Thou King of Angels.
+   To Thee do I pray
+   That the Gates of Hell
+   Prevail not against me."
+
+[Illustration: _West Aisle of the North Transept, Ely._]
+
+The Danes carried off Brithnoth's head; but his body was rescued; and,
+according to his wish, the monks came and brought it back to Ely,
+where the Abbot buried it, replacing the missing head by one of wax.
+During the eighteenth century the skeleton was met with in the course
+of some excavations and recognised as Brithnoth's by the absence of
+the skull. It now lies in Bishop West's beautiful chapel, along with
+the bones of other Anglo-Saxon worthies.
+
+The Lady Elfleda, Brithnoth's widow, added largely to the benefactions
+he had bestowed on Ely; she gave the Abbey valuable lands within easy
+reach of the monastery, and she moreover presented to the church a
+golden chain, and a curtain worked with the most notable deeds of her
+husband's life. Those who have seen the Bayeux tapestry, representing
+the events of the life of William the Conqueror, can picture to
+themselves what Lady Elfleda's curtain may have been a century
+earlier.
+
+In the next generation (1016) a body of the monks of Ely accompanied
+another hero to battle against the Danes. The hero of this generation
+was Ethelred's son, King Edmund Ironside; the battle was the great
+fight of Assandun, a place impossible to locate with certainty, but
+not improbably situated on the south-east border of Cambridgeshire.
+During the last twenty-five years the Danes had become more and more
+daring, and now, under their great king, Canute, the mightiest of all
+Scandinavian monarchs, they were attempting nothing less than the
+organised conquest of England. Thus Canute and Edmund were face to
+face in a desperate struggle, and, after five indecisive battles in a
+single year, Edmund was defeated, on St. Luke's Day, at Assandun, and
+his defeat was shortly followed by his death. Canute then assumed the
+crown, by right of conquest, a right which he proclaimed by calling
+himself not, like his predecessors, "King of the English," but "King
+of England."
+
+He proved, however, not at all a bad king. He had been brought up a
+Christian, and he took the Church under his protection. He bore no
+malice against the monks of Ely for their support of Edmund Ironside,
+but, on the contrary, treated the Abbey with marked favour, and gave
+her rich endowments. More than once he visited Ely, and we all know
+the lines of the cheery old ballad which relates how Canute in his
+barge was rowing near the island. It runs thus:
+
+  "Merrily sang they, the monks at Ely,
+   When Cnut the King he rowed thereby;
+   Row to the shore, men, said the King,
+   And let us hear these monks to sing."
+
+This was in the summer-time,[209] when the waters were open; but not
+seldom Canute made his visits in the depth of winter, when, on the
+Feast of the Purification, the Abbot of Ely each year entered on his
+Chancellorship of the realm, an office which he shared in turn with
+the Abbots of Canterbury and Glastonbury, each holding this office for
+four months at a time. The legend may well be true, which tells how,
+on one of these mid-winter visits, Canute reached Ely (from
+Soham)[210] in a sledge, preceded by the heaviest man that could be
+found (characteristically nick-named "Pudding"), who skated ahead of
+the King to ensure the ice would bear. On another occasion Canute was
+accompanied by his wife Queen Emma, and she, in token of her regard
+for the Abbey, left behind, as her gift, splendid hangings for the
+church, and for the shrine of the foundress. An altar frontal of green
+and red and gold, and a shrine cover of purple cloth, bedecked with
+gold and jewels, are described as being of exceptional beauty and
+value, "such as there was none like to them in richness throughout all
+the realm."
+
+[Footnote 209: Archdeacon Cunningham doubts this.]
+
+[Footnote 210: See p. 178.]
+
+This was not Emma's first connection with Ely. While she was yet the
+second wife of Ethelred the Unready (after whose death she married the
+victorious Canute), her younger son, Edward, afterwards King Edward
+the Confessor, had here been presented in infancy at the altar, and
+had been in childhood a pupil of the choir school, where his special
+proficiency in learning psalms and hymns gave promise of his future
+saintliness. The Ely choir school was, at this time, probably the most
+noted educational institution in England, and was under the direction
+of the Precentor, who had general charge over all the literary work of
+the house, such as the reproducing of books, etc. That this precocious
+scholar, who left Ely at nine years old, ultimately came to the
+throne, while Alfred, his elder brother, did not, is due to one of the
+most ghastly tragedies of English history.
+
+After the death of Canute in 1035, it became a question whether this
+same Alfred, "the Etheling" (_i.e._ Prince), Emma's eldest son by
+Ethelred, now a man of over thirty, or Harthacnut, her only son by
+Canute, a boy of sixteen, or one Harold, who, though not an Etheling,
+claimed to be Canute's eldest son, should be chosen King of England.
+Harold, in spite of grave doubts as to his paternity, "had all the
+cry"; and when Alfred, "the innocent Etheling," made an attempt to
+protect his widowed mother against the new King's oppression, he was
+sent as a prisoner by ship to Ely. Before being landed his eyes were
+put out, in a manner so brutal that he shortly died of the shock, to
+find a grave in the Abbey church under its western tower. The
+Anglo-Saxon Chronicler records this crime in a pathetic ballad,
+denouncing it as even beyond the horrors of the Danish wars:
+
+  "Nor was drearier deed
+   Done in this land,
+   Since Danes first came."
+
+That no blame need be attached to the monks of Ely for this atrocity
+is indicated by the fact that, when Alfred's brother, Edward the
+Confessor, came to the throne, he confirmed all their ancient
+charters, granting lands and privileges to the Abbey, and himself
+became a benefactor to the place of his education.
+
+With the Norman invasion, Ely again becomes a centre of war. Led by
+Christian the Bishop, and Osbiorn the Earl, a force of Danish
+adventurers had appeared in the Humber, professing to be the allies of
+the English in their struggle with the Normans. Their real object was
+to place their own King Sweyn, the nephew of Canute, on the throne of
+England, and, if foiled in this purpose, at least to enrich themselves
+with England's plunder. After partaking in scenes of devastation in
+Yorkshire, they sailed southward till they reached Ely, where they
+took up their quarters. Here the fenland folk forgathered with them,
+for the Norman was a more thoroughgoing oppressor than any Dane; and,
+in especial, the "strenuous" outlaw Hereward "the Wake" joined them
+"with his gang."
+
+To show their zeal against the French--and to indulge their lust of
+plunder--they set off, by water, to Peterborough, where the Abbey had
+been recently conferred on a Norman ruffian named Thorold. To save
+this good old English foundation from such degrading occupancy,
+Hereward, as their guide, led them on, first to sack and then to burn
+it to the ground. The Danes, having got their booty, promptly sailed
+away, while Hereward returned to Ely, there to make his memorable
+stand against William and the Normans. Fiction may have embroidered
+the tale of his prowess; but there remains a foundation of truth, even
+after the superstructure of romance has been removed. At Ely were now
+gathered together to him a mixed company of fugitives; misfortune,
+according to her repute, making strange bed-fellows.
+
+When William had conquered at Hastings, England, as a whole, was at
+first disposed to accept the verdict of battle, and to acknowledge
+his claim to the throne, as it had acknowledged Canute's. But when the
+necessities of his position, as the captain of an invading army,
+forced him to confiscate every estate in England (except the Church
+lands), and to bestow it on some Norman adventurer; when every single
+Englishman in high office, Sheriff and Alderman, Bishop and Abbot, was
+turned out to make room for a Frenchman,[211] the whole nation glowed
+with outraged patriotism, and Ely seemed likely to become a second
+Athelney, whence the spark of resistance to the tyrant might spread
+like wildfire throughout the length and breadth of the land.
+
+[Footnote 211: See my _History of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+And had there been a second Alfred this might well have actually come
+to pass. As it was, many of the magnates who could not brook
+submission retired to the "Camp of Refuge," as the Island of Ely now
+got to be called. This fastness, being surrounded on all sides by deep
+fens "as by a strong wall," promised them a sure retreat, and for a
+while enabled them to baffle all the efforts even of the mighty
+Conqueror to subdue them. Thither came Archbishop Stigand (deposed by
+the Conqueror to make way for the great Lanfranc); thither came the
+Abbot of St. Albans, thither came the valiant Ethelnoth, Bishop of
+Durham; thither came Morcar, the last Earl of Northumbria, "with many
+a hundred more," both clergy and laity. Here they received shelter and
+hospitality from Thurstan, the last of the English Abbots of Ely.
+
+By the general voice Hereward was chosen as their captain, and
+fortified the island against the Conqueror. William, on hearing of
+this, hastened to Cambridge with his whole army, and invested the
+place (so far as it was possible to invest it) both by land and water,
+building a castle at Wisbech on the north, and at Reach on the south.
+At Aldreth, where scarcely a mile of fen parted the Island from the
+mainland at Willingham, he made a floating bridge of trees and
+faggots, fastened underneath with cow-hides; but when his men
+attempted to cross it, the unsteady structure capsized, and that
+portion of the army engaged in the attempt was drowned.
+
+Perplexed and almost daunted, William, with his court and army,
+retired for a time to Brandon in Suffolk; while the refugees at Ely
+spent stirring days. The knights and churchmen were hospitably
+entertained in the refectory of the abbey, every man with his shield
+and lance hanging near him, to be ready in case of sudden alarm. Their
+days were diversified by raids into the surrounding country beyond the
+fens, to snatch what provisions they could for their fastness; and
+these raids of the islanders were so dreaded throughout the district,
+that its inhabitants were thankful for the protection of William's
+soldiery.
+
+Hereward, according to the legend, hearing that another attack was
+imminent, followed the example of Alfred the Great by betaking himself
+in disguise to Brandon to learn the King's designs. He found that
+William, by a judicious mixture of severity and conciliation, had won
+over a certain number of the outlying fen-folk, and had imposed upon
+them the task of conveying a great store of wood and faggots for him
+to Aldreth, with which to construct there a causeway once more.
+Hereupon Hereward, still in his disguise, feigned that he was himself
+one of these traitors to England, and eager above all the others to
+help the Conqueror against the marauding thieves of the Camp of
+Refuge. It was he who was foremost in collecting faggots for the
+wood-pile at Aldreth, and then, when all was gathered, who was it but
+Hereward that set it on fire so that all was lost? And once more, when
+the besiegers were making a third attempt to gain the island, under
+the auspices of a reputed witch whom the pious William deigned to
+employ for the sustaining of his men's sunken courage, it was Hereward
+who fired the reed-beds through which the foe was advancing, so that
+the whole column, witch and all, were involved in one common
+destruction.
+
+Finally William, finding that he could not reduce the island by force,
+resolved to bring it under by political pressure, and threatened to
+grant to his supporters all the Abbey lands within his power. On
+hearing this the Abbot and monks resolved to surrender, and they sent
+secret messengers to William, who was at Warwick, offering to submit
+to him on condition that he would spare the possessions of the Abbey.
+To this the King consented; and during Hereward's absence from Ely on
+a foraging expedition, he landed without resistance on the fen-girt
+island. Hereward on his return found that all was lost, and himself
+barely escaped with a few followers, to live on as outlaws in the
+greenwood for a few desperate years, till at length he, too, "came
+in," and was granted "the King's peace."
+
+On William's unopposed success through their connivance the monks
+fondly imagined that they had something to expect from his gratitude,
+and were preparing a formal welcome and act of submission when it
+should please him to visit the abbey church in thanksgiving for his
+victory. William, however, had other designs, and paid his visit
+without notice, at an hour when he knew that the brethren would be in
+the refectory at dinner. He stood alone before the High Altar, and
+casting upon it a single mark of gold, equivalent to about L150,
+quietly departed.
+
+Meanwhile the hapless monks were startled from their meal by the
+abrupt entrance of a Norman knight, Gilbert de Clare, with whom they
+had made interest, and who now rushed in shouting to them: "Ye
+wretched drivellers! Can ye choose no better time for guzzling than
+this when the King is here, yea, in your very church?" Instantly every
+monk sprang to his feet, and the whole community made a rush for the
+church. But it was too late. William was already well on his way out
+of Ely, and the unhappy monks had to run three miles before they
+caught up to him at Witchford. There they did at last succeed in
+impetrating his pardon, but he laid upon them a fine of no less than
+700 marks of silver,[212] to meet which almost all the ornaments of
+the church had to be melted down. The ingots were minted into coin in
+the abbey itself; but the moneyers employed proved fraudulent, and the
+royal officers at Cambridge, to whom the cash was paid, reported it
+deficient in weight. This gave William an excuse for laying on a
+further fine of 300 marks, so that altogether no less than the
+equivalent of L20,000 was wrung by him out of the Brotherhood.
+
+[Footnote 212: A mark of silver was worth 13_s._ 4_d._; a mark of gold
+was 100 shillings. A labourer's wage was at this date 1_d._ per day,
+so that these sums must be multiplied thirty-fold to get their
+equivalent value at the present day.]
+
+Yet the monks were not mistaken in thus casting in their lot with the
+Normans, for though William imposed these heavy fines upon them,
+though he heaped vexatious indignities upon them, though he inflicted
+shocking mutilations on their adherents (not on themselves, for he was
+careful to spare the monks in this respect), though he compelled them
+to maintain a foreign garrison of forty French knights at their very
+doors, yet in spite of all this the Abbey, with its seventy monks,
+prospered under his iron rule. The strange condition of the house at
+this juncture is vividly recorded for us by a picture, still preserved
+in the Bishop's palace at Ely and known as the "Tabula Eliensis."
+
+This "tabula" is a painting of no artistic merit, dating probably from
+the reign of Henry the Seventh, but copied from an older one which has
+perished. It is divided into forty squares, and in each of these
+appears a knight and a monk, the names of both being given fully and
+distinctly. The knight is helmeted and holds his drawn sword in his
+right hand, while between him and his neighbour, the cowled monk,
+hangs his shield emblazoned with his arms. All indicate how the
+knights and monks, when thus forced to dwell in close contact, became
+friendly together as time went by.
+
+Several of the monks bear names which show us that the ancient British
+stock of the Girvians still survived in the neighbouring fenlands.
+Among them we find, Donald, Evan, Cedd, Nigel, Duff, David,
+Constantine: names familiar to us in connection with Highland, Welsh,
+or Cornish literature. Strange as it seems to include such names as
+David and Constantine in this list, we have history, legend and
+geography to justify our counting them as in use among the later
+Britons. And it may be noted that, until the twelfth century at least,
+a man's name is an almost certain guide to his nationality, as (to
+some extent) it is to this day. After that, the old English
+nomenclature, both male and female, was almost wholly supplanted by
+that of the Normans; the only native names to survive being those of
+special heroes and saints, such as Alfred, Edward, Edmund, Edgar,
+Ethel, Audrey and Hilda.
+
+The nave and transepts of Ely Minster erected during the century that
+followed, still stand to show us to what splendid purpose Norman
+architects could design and Norman workmen could build. For here, as
+elsewhere throughout England, one of the first and most striking
+results of the Conquest was such an outburst of church building as the
+country had never yet known. Edgar's church, though barely a century
+old, was condemned as hopelessly out of date. Something on a much
+grander scale was now felt needful. The new Church was founded, in
+1083, by the aged Abbot Simeon, an act of great courage and faith in a
+man so old. He it was who began to build the north and south
+transepts. He also laid the foundation of the central tower and of an
+apsidal choir. Both tower and choir have fallen and been replaced, but
+the transepts stand to this day.
+
+As soon as the choir was ready for it, the body of the first Abbess
+was brought from the Anglo-Saxon church close by, built under Edgar
+the Peacemaker, where it had rested for 130 years, and was placed in
+the new Norman choir behind the high altar. At her feet was laid her
+sister Sexburga, who had succeeded her as Abbess, and, on either side,
+the sister and niece who had, each in turn, followed after her as
+rulers of the house. The earlier church was then pulled down. All this
+did not take place till 1106, and long before then Simeon, like his
+namesake a thousand years before, had sung his "Nunc dimittis,"
+leaving his work to be carried on by the devoted and energetic
+Richard, the last of the non-episcopal Abbots of Ely.
+
+For an event of even greater moment than the building of the church
+took place about this time. Early in the twelfth century, in order to
+quell some dispute that had arisen as to the authority of the Bishop
+of Lincoln over the Abbot of Ely, the Pope had consented, at the
+request of King Henry the First and Archbishop Anselm, that the Abbot
+of Ely should become a Bishop, with the Isle of Ely and the County of
+Cambridge as his See.[213] More than 700 years went by before any
+change was made in the extent of the diocese thus created; for it was
+not till 1837 that the counties of Huntingdon and Bedford and the
+western half of Suffolk were added to it.
+
+[Footnote 213: The county, at this time, comprised only the district
+south of the Isle. This ecclesiastical connection between it and the
+Isle was the first towards their later unification. See p. 8.]
+
+We owe to the creation of this Bishopric the very existence of Ely
+Minster as it now stands; had it remained merely an abbey, instead of
+being also a cathedral, it would have perished at the Reformation,
+along with the yet greater church at Bury St. Edmund's not far away,
+and with many another sister abbey throughout the land. At Ely, too,
+we should see before us ruined arches open to the sky, beautiful
+indeed and pathetic, but no longer a centre of worship. To this day
+the Bishop of Ely sits in his cathedral not as Bishop but as Abbot;
+not at the south-eastern but at the south-western end of the choir
+stalls, while the Dean occupies the seat once belonging to the Prior
+at the north-western end. Richard, as we have said, was the last of
+the Abbots of Ely who were Abbots and nothing else. Hervey, appointed
+in 1109, was the first Bishop-Abbot. He had already been Bishop of
+Bangor, whence he had been driven by a Welsh revolt.
+
+This may be the place to say something of the abnormal civil position
+held by the Bishops of Ely till recent times. Etheldreda, the
+foundress of the Abbey, reigned, as the widow of her first husband,
+Tonbert, over the whole Isle of Ely, and exercised therein the full
+Royal rights of secular jurisdiction. These rights passed on to the
+Abbesses who succeeded her, and then in turn to the Abbots who
+followed; they were confirmed by the Charter of Edgar in 970, and
+again by Edward the Confessor, and when the abbots became bishops they
+still continued to exercise this jurisdiction. Each succeeding Prelate
+enjoyed rights throughout the Isle somewhat resembling those of the
+Prince Bishops of the continent.
+
+This went on until Henry the Eighth fell upon the Church, and took
+away not only many of the Episcopal demesnes but also many of the
+Episcopal privileges (if indeed they may be so termed). Such rights as
+the King spared survived for 300 years longer. The Bishop of Ely still
+possessed a jurisdiction of considerable importance and dignity,
+holding almost sovereign authority within his "Franchise," which was
+styled "the Royal Franchise or Liberty of the Bishops of Ely." He
+himself appointed his own Judges to hear all cases within the Isle of
+Ely; Assize and Quarter Sessions were held in his name and at his
+pleasure; his chief bailiff acted as High Sheriff, and he nominated
+the magistrates. It was the Bishop's Peace, and not the King's Peace,
+against which malefactors throughout the Isle were held to offend.
+This went on till 1836, when on the death of Bishop Spark, these last
+remnants of Etheldreda's jurisdiction as Queen-Abbess ceased by Act of
+Parliament.
+
+But to this day there live on some far-off echoes of the Girvian
+principality. The Isle of Ely, with its three Rural Deaneries and
+forty-six benefices, is ecclesiastically under the immediate
+jurisdiction of the Bishop; no Archdeacon holds any authority there,
+as in other parts of the diocese, except in the parishes of Haddenham
+and Wilburton. True, we have an Archdeacon of Ely, but he ought
+rather to be designated Archdeacon of Cambridgeshire, for, with the
+exceptions named, beyond the limits of the county proper he is
+powerless. The Isle, moreover, has its own County Council quite
+distinct from that of Cambridgeshire, while the common High Sheriff of
+both divisions is nominated from each in turn.
+
+And in the very heart of London, close to Holborn Circus, traces of
+this civil jurisdiction still survive in Ely Place, where stands,
+abutting on houses of the most commonplace type, the beautiful chapel
+dedicated to St. Etheldreda, built at the close of the thirteenth
+century, and once attached to the town palace of the Bishops of Ely.
+Ely Place was a "Liberty," and, within the memory of those still
+living, the Royal writs did not run here, and no police-officer or
+sheriff could follow a debtor who had here taken sanctuary; it was,
+moreover, rated on a basis peculiar to itself. The "Liberty" is still
+governed by certain Commissioners, elected annually by the
+householders. It has its own day and night watchmen, with their
+gold-laced hats, who fulfil the function of policemen, and the silence
+of the night is, even in this twentieth century, broken by their call,
+hour by hour, as of yore. We all remember how Shakespeare makes
+Richard the Third say to the Bishop of Ely,
+
+  "My lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn
+   I saw good strawberries in your garden there,"
+
+and the reference to these lines in the "Ingoldsby Legends" is hardly
+less familiar. Palace, strawberries, garden are no more; the property
+once held in this region by the See of Ely has passed by purchase into
+other hands, but the chapel is still here, well tended, the same House
+of Prayer, after many vicissitudes, that it was 600 years ago; the din
+of modern city life being there shut out by walls eight feet thick.
+
+There exists in London one more very different relic of the old
+demesne of the Bishops of Ely. On the frontage of a great house in
+Dover Street, now occupied by the Albemarle Club, with massive stone
+facings without and marble halls within, there may be seen, over the
+second storey, a mitre carved in stone, shewing that once it was the
+abode of the Bishops of Ely; for after their old Palace in Holborn was
+sold, this "Ely House," built about 1775, took its place, to be sold
+in turn early in the twentieth century with a view to forming a
+nucleus toward the endowment of a new bishopric, when the proposed
+subdivision of the present diocese can be carried out. Times have
+changed; and the Bishop of Ely is now free from the burdensome luxury
+of an official residence in London.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+     Bishop Northwold.--Presbytery Dedicated.--Barons at Ely.--Fall of
+     Tower, Alan of Walsingham, Octagon.--Queen Philippa.--Lady
+     Chapel, John of Wisbech, Bishop Goodrich.--Bishop Alcock.--Bishop
+     West.--Styles of Architecture.--Monastic Industries.--Mediaeval
+     Account Books.--Clothing and Food of Monks.--Benedictine
+     Rule.--Dissolution of Abbey.--Bishop Thirlby.--Bishop
+     Wren.--Bishop Gunning.--Bishop Turner.
+
+
+The fact that Ely had been made a Bishop's See did not prevent her
+from remaining a monastery, the home of busy monks, living in
+refinement and cleanliness according to the Benedictine Rule. Year by
+year they beautified their Abbey Church; the western tower rose stage
+by stage till it became, as it still continues to be, a landmark for
+the surrounding plain. During the episcopate of Eustace, lasting from
+1198 till 1215, the western porch, known as the Galilee, came into
+being.
+
+The year of his death was disastrous for Ely. It was then raided by a
+horde of foreign mercenaries, hired by King John to support him
+against the Barons; they robbed the Minster of its treasures, and only
+on receiving a heavy ransom were they dissuaded from burning it. "When
+the Barons" (who were in London, at that time their headquarters)
+"heard these things," writes the chronicler, Roger of Wendover, "they
+looked one upon the other and said, 'the Lord gave and the Lord hath
+taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.'"
+
+Later in the same century a Choir, or Presbytery, of exquisite design
+and workmanship, in the Early English style, was thrown out eastward
+by Hugh de Northwold, Bishop of Ely from 1229 till 1254. We have heard
+already of this prelate, and we must now do more than mention his
+name. It was he who had been chosen to take the "toilsome and
+perilous" journey to Provence, thence to bring back Eleanor as bride
+for Henry the Third, and that weakling monarch turned to him on other
+occasions, when in need of a trusty servant.
+
+We read that the Presbytery of Ely Minster was built at the sole
+expense of Hugh, Bishop of that place, a special observer of all that
+was honourable and good. His hospitality knew no bounds. At the
+dedication of his presbytery and other works in the Minster, the King
+himself, with his eldest son, Prince Edward, a boy of thirteen, was
+present; innumerable prelates and nobles came to Ely, and after a due
+observance of spiritual festivities (which included the rededication
+of the whole church to St. Peter, St. Mary, and St. Etheldreda), were
+regally entertained by the Bishop in the leaden-roofed palace he had
+lately built; yet he lamented the small number of the assembled
+guests, declaring that the entertainment was in great measure shorn of
+its dimensions. He, however, "rejoiced in spirit that by God's favour
+he had been allowed to wait for that day, in which he had seen the
+happy consummation of all his designs."
+
+This dedication took place in 1252. "Two years later the good bishop
+died at his manor at Downham, and his body was carried with much
+reverence to Ely, where it was buried in a magnificent Presbytery
+which he had founded and built." Such is the witness of Matthew Paris,
+a contemporary chronicler. We may mention that the income of the See
+of Ely was at this time equivalent to L30,000 a year.
+
+Many years had gone by since the festivities thus described for us,
+when Henry and his son again appeared before Ely under very different
+circumstances. The Barons who had fought against the King, in their
+struggle to secure constitutional liberty, had met with a crushing
+defeat at Evesham (1265), where their heroic leader Simon de Montfort
+had been slain. Their lands had been virtually, though not nominally,
+confiscated, and for this reason they called themselves "the
+Disinherited," and gloried in the name. They refused to accept defeat,
+and made the Island of Ely their headquarters. In vain did the Bishop,
+Hugh de Balsham (the founder of Peterhouse), endeavour to prevent this
+occupancy of his domains; his efforts were fruitless, and only brought
+upon him the reproaches of the King and many others, who attributed
+his misfortunes to his incapacity. The insurgent Barons refused to
+quit the Island, and lived on there, supporting themselves by raid and
+pillage, as Hereward and his comrades had done of old. We are told
+that they entered Cambridge, and carried off abundance of booty; and
+that they seized on the persons of Jews and other rich citizens
+residing there, and took them back to the island as prisoners, to be
+set at liberty only on the payment of a heavy ransom.
+
+The inhabitants of Lynn, then as now the chief seaport of the Fenland,
+found these marauding Barons such objectionable neighbours, that they
+resolved on an expedition against them. A number of citizens, mostly
+of the lower orders, manned a fleet of boats and went up the river
+toward Ely. Forewarned of their coming, the insurgent Barons met them
+drawn up on the bank, with a great array of standards and banners;
+then, feigning terror at the approach of the enemy, they fled inland;
+whereupon the men of Lynn, unversed in war and its strategy, landed
+intent on pursuit. Suddenly they found themselves surrounded by the
+foe; in vain were their efforts to regain their boats; many were slain
+by the dauntless Barons, others were made prisoners, while the few who
+escaped were received with derision on their return to Lynn.
+
+The Bishop and the burghers of Lynn had failed alike to overcome the
+Disinherited; the Papal Legate now tried what he could do, as the
+state of affairs in the Fenland was growing desperate. He sent
+messengers admonishing the insurgents "to return to their Faith and to
+obedience to the Roman Curia, and to unity with Holy Mother Church;
+and to cease from robbery and to make reparation." To this, from their
+fastness, the Disinherited reply, "that they hold the same Faith as
+other Catholic men; that they believe and keep the articles of the
+Creed, that they believe in the Gospels, and in the Sacraments of the
+Church as the Church Catholic believeth, that they are ready to live
+and die for this Faith. They avow further that they do indeed owe
+obedience to the Church of Rome as the Head of all Christendom, but
+not to the avarice and greed of those who ought to govern it better."
+
+[Illustration: _Ely: The Presbytery._]
+
+They urge that they had been unjustly disinherited by order of the
+Legate, and that he ought to make amends to them; that he had been
+sent to England to make peace, but that by adhering to the King he
+kept up the war: that the Pope had ordered that no one should be
+disinherited, but that the King had demanded a ransom equivalent to
+disinheritance; that their first oath had been for the benefit of
+the kingdom and the whole Church; that they were still ready to die
+for it. They asserted, moreover, that many of the partisans of the
+King and Prince Edward had committed robberies, feigning that they
+belonged to the Disinherited; they insisted that their own lands must
+be restored to them, so that they might not be under the necessity of
+pillaging. Lastly, they exhort the Legate to recall his sentence;
+otherwise they would appeal to the Apostolic See, to a General
+Council, and, if needs must, to the Supreme Judge of all (_i.e._, the
+God of Battles), "seeing that they fight for the common weal of Church
+and Realm."
+
+Such was the daring message that, according to Matthew Paris, issued,
+in the year 1267, from the Fenland stronghold. The Bishop and the men
+of Lynn had failed to daunt the recusants, and now the Legate had met
+with no better success. The following year came the King in person,
+along with his valiant son Edward "Longshanks," to try what the Strong
+Hand could do; and besieged the island. We can imagine how the father
+and son, as they sighted Ely, must have felt the contrast between
+their approach this time and their arrival fifteen years before. Then
+all was peace and welcome, now it is bitter war. They had Scottish
+troops at their command, and by constructing bridges of hurdles and
+planks they forced an entrance to the island; and soon the insurgents
+had no choice but to yield; some surrendered, while the rest took to
+flight. Their cause seemed lost; but in truth it was destined to
+triumph, for when Edward the First, six years later, returned as King
+from his Crusade, he granted all, and more than all, that the Barons
+had asked for, by calling into being England's first representative
+Parliament.
+
+Throughout the course of these wars and tumults the House of God at
+Ely stood uninjured in beauty and security. But about the opening of
+the fourteenth century there appeared cracks in the great Central
+Tower. These massive Norman towers were not so strong as they looked,
+their piers being not, as they appeared to be, of solid stone, but
+only hollow pipes filled in with rubble. It was known that a similar
+tower at Winchester had fallen; the same disaster now threatened Ely;
+the monks were warned against entering the Abbey Church, and were
+bidden to say their office in an ancient chapel adjoining the Chapter
+House.
+
+The catastrophe long foreseen came to pass on February 22, 1322. Late
+in the evening, as the monks were retiring to their dormitories, "with
+such a shock," says the chronicler, "that it was thought an earthquake
+had taken place," the tower fell toward the east, crushing the walls
+and pillars of the Norman choir. Northwold's presbytery further east
+remained unhurt, nor did the shrine of St. Etheldreda behind the high
+altar receive any damage. The nave and transepts likewise escaped
+injury. No one was killed, for in consequence of the timely warning
+the church was deserted.
+
+Providentially the monk at this time in charge of the Cathedral fabric
+was an architect of rare genius, the most gifted, probably, that
+England has ever produced. For the Sacrist when this calamity befell
+was none other than the famous Alan of Walsingham, who was called by
+his contemporaries "the flower of craftsmen," and he it was who, in
+virtue of his office, was responsible for repairs. In the full vigour
+of life, a man of twenty-eight, who had been trained as a goldsmith,
+he rose to the occasion, and proved well able to cope with the problem
+and task before him.
+
+The chronicler tells us how he "rose up by night and came and stood
+over the heap of ruins, not knowing whither to turn. But recovering
+his courage, and confident in the help of God and of His kind Mother
+Mary, and in the merits of the holy virgin, Etheldreda, he set his
+hand to the work." In answer to his prayers, an inspiration came to
+him. In place of the square tower that had fallen, he would build one
+octagonal in form, with a wider base gained by cutting off the angles
+of the transepts and choir, and he would crown it with a lantern of
+woodwork. His idea was bold and original, and the lantern-crowned
+Octagon of Ely Cathedral as it now stands, a glorious specimen of the
+Decorated work of the fourteenth century, still bears witness to the
+genius and courage of the young architect who designed and engineered
+it, while at the same time he planned the reconstruction of the Norman
+choir.
+
+With this scheme in his mind, Alan of Walsingham set labourers at once
+to remove the huge mass of rubbish, and meantime he sent far and near
+to procure timber for the work in hand; while the famous quarries of
+Barnack in Northamptonshire supplied him with stone. By 1349, after
+twenty-six years of toil, the tower with its lantern of wood was
+finished. This wood was covered outside with lead, while within it was
+gorgeous with gold and stencilled painting, all the work of the most
+skilled hands that could be hired. We are told that the Sacrist
+himself provided gold florins to be turned into leaf by "Ralph le
+goldbeter." The very names of the workmen employed have an interest
+for us, as we read of John Attegrene, the master mason, of William
+Shank, the chief decorator, of John of Burwell, the best wood-carver.
+Nor must we forget John Hotham, of whom we shall hear more. Being
+Bishop at this juncture, he provided funds for the restoration and
+beautifying of his cathedral.
+
+King Edward the Third and his well-loved Queen Philippa came down to
+see the work, already famous, that was being carried out at Ely. In
+honour of her visit the Queen brought her robes of state, embroidered
+with "squirrels," first worn at her thanksgiving for the birth of the
+Black Prince. These robes she gave to the Prior John of Crauden, to be
+made into three copes and other vestments for the clergy. Whether the
+ancient cope still preserved at the Deanery can be identified as one
+of these is doubtful. It is of rich myrtle-green velvet, worked in
+gold thread, silk, and pearls, with plume-like flourishes that might
+well suggest the term "squirrels." Along its straight edge there is
+laid on a richly embroidered border, representing the Annunciation in
+the centre and saints with their emblems on either side. The design of
+the border indicates that it belongs to a date somewhat subsequent to
+1330, the year when the Black Prince was born; but, seeing that it is
+quite separate from the velvet, it must have been added later, and the
+main portion of the vestment may actually be part of Queen Philippa's
+gift.
+
+But we must not suppose that the Ely builders were engaged during
+these twenty-six years only on the Octagon Tower and the adjacent
+restoration. Almost contemporary with the tower is Prior Crauden's
+lovely chapel, built to the south of the Minster from the designs of
+Alan of Walsingham, while at the same time, adjoining the
+north-eastern transept, there arose the glorious Lady Chapel. The
+foundation-stone of this wondrously elaborated edifice was laid in
+1321, on Lady Day, by Alan of Walsingham himself; for it was he who,
+as architect, designed the building, though the actual carrying out of
+the work was committed to John of Wisbech, the Subsacrist of the
+Abbey.
+
+The funds were partly supplied by Bishop Montacute (whose premature
+death prevented the full completion of the design); partly by "the
+alms of the Faithful," or, as we should now say, by public
+subscription, and partly from a find of treasure-trove which is thus
+picturesquely described by the Abbey chronicler:
+
+     "Now when the aforesaid chapel was in beginning, this Brother
+     John had but little money in hand, or laid by, for the
+     prosecution of so great a work. He betook himself therefore to
+     prayer, and thereafter called his mates together, some being
+     monks, some, likewise, seculars. And them he besought to meet at
+     a certain hour, and help him in digging out a square trench which
+     might serve for the foundation of the whole fabric.
+
+     "At the appointed time, accordingly, they met one night, and
+     began to dig, each separately by himself in the place assigned to
+     him. Thus it chanced that the aforesaid Brother John was digging,
+     all alone by himself, in the place allotted to him. And, by the
+     special will, as we verily believe, of God, he found there, not
+     one of his mates wotting thereof, a brazen pot full of money, as
+     if placed there on purpose to relieve his need.
+
+     "And when the whole night was well nigh spent, in the earliest
+     dawn, a small rain came on, to the annoyance of those digging.
+     Calling then his mates from their work, he said: 'Brethren mine,
+     and fellow labourers, yea, most heartily do I thank you for all
+     your long and well-wrought task. And good it is now to pause a
+     little after your work. Therefore I commend you to God. And may
+     He pay you a full worthy wage for your labour.' But when they
+     drew off, he himself remained on the spot all alone, and bare off
+     that urn, as secretly as he might, and hid it in the dormitory
+     under his own bed. And he took that money, all befouled with rust
+     as it was, and cleansed off the rust by rubbing it with chalk and
+     water, and paid therefrom, while it lasted, the wages of his
+     workmen."
+
+From this account it would seem that this money was not gold, as that
+never tarnishes, but silver; probably old Saxon coins hidden at the
+time of the Danish sack of Ely. Even in the fourteenth century money
+was still largely estimated by weight, without much regard to the
+particular coinage; so that these old pennies would still be good
+currency.
+
+The chapel is surrounded by seats of stone, each with its canopy of
+the same material, a veritable dream of artistic design and
+workmanship. With its completion, at the close of the year 1348, John
+of Wisbech ended his work on earth; a few months later, on June 18th,
+1349, he, like many another priest of these eastern counties, fell a
+victim to the Black Death, which in some districts slew nine priests
+out of ten. He left as his monument this church, a wonderful example
+of the latest Decorated work, in its detailed sculpture and all but
+Perpendicular windows. It is built of clunch, a local stone that lasts
+well for interior use, but perishes somewhat when exposed to the
+weather. This was brought by water from Reach, where the great
+quarries from which it was hewn may still be seen.
+
+This chapel was built, as its name denotes, in honour of the Virgin;
+above and below its canopies stood figures of exquisite grace,
+representing, for the most part, scenes from her life as related in
+the Apocryphal Gospels and later legends then current. For two hundred
+years these sculptures remained intact, till Thomas Goodrich became
+Bishop in 1533. He held the See for twenty-one years, and he made it
+his business deliberately to deface all this statuary. We may
+attribute his action either to his zeal for the extirpation of
+Mariolatry, or to his fear lest sacred legend should be confounded
+with sacred history. Whatever may have been the actuating motive, his
+deeds as an iconoclast remain before our eyes. In October, 1541, he
+issued a mandate to the clergy of his diocese, ordering the utter
+abolition and destruction of all shrines, images, and relics; and we
+find it hard to forgive him for such indiscriminating breakage, even
+when we remember how much we owe to him for his admirable setting
+forth of our duty to God and to our neighbour preserved to us in the
+Catechism of the Church of England. He was also the translator of St.
+John's Gospel in the version known as the "Bishop's Bible."
+
+[Illustration: _Ely Lantern._]
+
+With the close of the fourteenth century the development and
+beautifying of Ely Minster almost comes to a standstill. She is rich
+in Norman, in Early English, in Decorated work; but when Perpendicular
+architecture arose, that type peculiar to England, there came a pause
+at Ely; and the instances of the Perpendicular style to be met with
+here are comparatively unimportant insertions. In Bishop Alcock's
+Chapel, built by 1500, we meet with late Perpendicular work; while in
+Bishop West's, built about 1525, are traces of the Renaissance
+decoration that came in with the revival of classical literature and
+art. Such decoration gained hardly any foothold in England, and is
+extremely rare within our shores, but on the Continent it swept away
+before its inrush many a shrine of earlier date, sparing nothing for
+the sake of its associations or antiquity. With Bishop West's Chapel,
+the story of growth and development closes. Then came the
+Reformation under Henry the Eighth, and we come face to face with the
+work of iconoclasts rather than of builders.
+
+Of all English cathedrals Ely perhaps possesses the most complete
+series of every style of Gothic architecture; and as the Minster
+records and registers relating to the whole period of her construction
+have been fortunately preserved, we can date approximately every arch
+and window, knowing when it was built, and, in many cases, who was the
+builder. Thus Ely provides a key to the dating of all English Gothic
+architecture. As we travel through our own country, and on the
+Continent, we realise the marvellous solidarity that in those Middle
+Ages held Christendom together. Whenever a new architectural
+development calculated to promote beauty, strength, or light, came
+into being in one Catholic land, it spread without fail to the others,
+even to those furthest removed; what was the fashion in Italy, Spain,
+or France became the fashion in Scotland, and, so long as the Latin
+Kingdom of Jerusalem endured, even in the Holy Land; where the
+Crusaders built most diligently, as the yet surviving ruins of their
+churches and castles abundantly demonstrate, even to the present day.
+
+But with the development of the Perpendicular style, about the year
+1375, England began to strike out a line of her own. Buildings of this
+insular type arose, year by year, all over our land, but it never came
+into vogue on the Continent, where the more floreated styles of
+architecture, known as Flamboyant, became prevalent; while in England
+there was a reaction in the opposite direction in favour of less
+ornate tracery.
+
+Roughly speaking we may say that mediaeval architecture in England
+occupied four periods:
+
+Norman architecture prevailed from 1075 to 1175;
+
+Early English from 1175 to 1275;
+
+Decorated from 1275 to 1375;
+
+Perpendicular from 1375 till stopped by the Reformation.
+
+In a careful study of the history of Ely Cathedral we shall find a
+confirmation of these dates.
+
+Let us, for instance, stand outside the Minster at the east end, and
+we shall have before our eyes specimens of all these four great styles
+of Gothic architecture. We can see early Norman work in the transepts
+begun under Simeon, who was Abbot from 1081 to 1093. If we direct our
+attention to the east window with its lancet-shaped lights, built by
+Hugh de Northwold, Bishop from 1229 to 1254, we shall gain an idea of
+the exquisite grace and beauty of Early English architecture. In the
+windows of the Lady Chapel, constructed under John Hotham, Bishop from
+1316 to 1337, we see Decorated work, with its branching tracery, at
+its culminating point; while in the chapel built by Bishop West, who
+filled the See of Ely from 1515 to 1533, on the south side of the east
+window, we have an instance of Perpendicular tracery, with its
+characteristic upright shafts running straight from the top to the
+bottom of the window. Comparing the table given above with the dates
+at which the work before us is known to have been carried out, we
+shall find it confirmed, and we may gain much by letting it be well
+impressed on our minds.
+
+At Ely one feature of beauty is lamentably absent, namely stained
+glass contemporary with the building. In the Cathedrals of York and
+Lincoln much ancient glass survives, while remnants exist in many
+village churches; but at Ely, once no less richly be-jewelled, nearly
+all has been swept away. There is no record of its destruction, which
+may have taken place under the unsparing hand of Bishop Goodrich, or a
+century later, it may be, during the Civil Wars. We are the losers,
+and we can hardly feel that our loss is made good by the coloured
+glass with which during the last hundred years many of the windows
+have been refilled, though here and there fine modern glass sheds its
+glow on the grey stonework around.
+
+Yet as we walk round this glorious Minster, surveying it whether from
+within or from without, the feeling uppermost in our minds is rather
+one of thankfulness that so much has been spared than of indignation
+that so much has been destroyed. We can understand what the
+poet-philosopher Coleridge meant when he spoke of Gothic architecture
+as "Infinity made imaginable"; and we may enter into the feelings of
+the peasant woman who, in simpler language, expressed the same idea,
+when after her visit to Ely Minster she remarked, "That Cathedral is
+like a little Heaven below; everybody should see it, both rich and
+poor."
+
+We have now come to the end of the story of the building of Ely
+Minster; her Bishops and Deans have since then had enough to do in
+keeping her stonework in repair without adding to it; and this work of
+restoration has been carried on from century to century with real, if
+sometimes misguided, devotion. Originators have had their day; the
+repairer is now in possession.
+
+Great as were the architectural achievements of the seventy monks of
+Ely, we must not suppose that all their time went in superintending
+such work. We do not know, indeed, whether they did much of it with
+their own hands at all. We have, it is true, seen John of Wisbech, the
+builder of the glorious Lady Chapel, himself digging out the
+foundations with his mates; but on the other hand we are told how
+skilled artisans from a distance were hired to undertake the more
+delicate work in completing the lantern. That the Brethren spent much
+time in writing we have abundant proof. Our own familiar word _ink_ is
+a standing testimony to their industry in this respect, being derived
+from _inc._, the abbreviation universally used in the Abbey account
+books for _incaustum_, the Latin word for their writing fluid.
+
+In the reign of William Rufus, that monarch's Commissioners came to
+Ely, and carried off 300 volumes from the Abbey library, besides all
+the Service books; and we need hardly doubt that most of these books,
+if not all, had been copied on the spot. One beautifully written
+Breviary from Ely is still to be seen in the University Library at
+Cambridge. It is of the fourteenth century.
+
+The monks and Bishops were, moreover, constructors of bridges, of
+roads, and of causeways; they made new ones, they restored the old;
+and they were licensed to exact tolls for the upkeep of their work. In
+1480 Bishop Morton led the way towards the draining of the Fens, by
+cutting the great drain, forty feet across, extending twelve miles,
+from Peterborough to Guyhirn, and still known as Morton's Leam. The
+Bishops also built numerous episcopal residences. Among others, Ely
+Place in Holborn, a castle at Wisbech, palaces at Somersham and
+Downham, manor houses at Doddington, at Fen Ditton, at Hatfield, were
+erected as the centuries slipped by; and seeing that the Bishops were
+also Abbots of Ely, we may believe that the monks did their part in
+carrying out episcopal work.
+
+Ely possesses a unique record of her early days in her celebrated
+Liber Eliensis, a folio volume of 189 leaves of vellum, ten and
+a-half inches by seven and a-half, begun by Thomas, a monk of the
+convent, who lived about the close of the twelfth century, and
+professing to give the history of the monastery from its foundation up
+to his own day. Two copies of this manuscript are known to exist,
+bearing witness to the industry of the monks as scribes, while others
+have doubtless perished. The monks of Ely, moreover, wrote the
+Episcopal Rolls and Registers with the utmost care; these are still
+preserved with their entries as to the expenditure of money, as to
+ordinations, as to the granting of indulgences, as to appeals to the
+Pope, all kept with scrupulous exactitude.
+
+Ely is rich, moreover, beyond most foundations, in other written
+records of her past; and these are preserved, some in the Cathedral
+library, some in the muniment room of the dean and chapter forming
+part of the restored "Steeple" or "Sextry" gateway, some in the
+library of Lambeth Palace, some in the British Museum. The existing
+rolls, or account books, kept by the chief officers of the monastery,
+number 288 in all, and give us full and clear detail as to what was
+spent not only on the building, the alms, and the services of the
+Abbey Church, but also on the food, the wine, the clothing, and the
+medicine of the monks. One item of medicine is "dragon's blood," one
+of food is "blankmang, a mixture of rice and almonds."
+
+The following summary from the Chamberlain's Roll, recounting what was
+the cost of clothing a monk, will show us that he was expected to
+dress with dignity and comfort. The clothing of an Ely monk was really
+a very serious item of expenditure. A monk, like the parson of a
+church, was in England _ex officio_ a gentleman; and his maintenance
+cost his convent the equivalent of L200 per annum (in the present
+value of money).[214] Of this sum at least a fourth went in clothing,
+which, as compared with food, was much dearer then than now. The
+account books still preserved at Ely give us the items. Each monk
+received annually the following garments (for which we give the value
+at the present rate of money):
+
+                                  L   _s._  _d._
+
+  1 Cowl                          1    0     0
+  1 Monk's Frock                  5   10     0
+  1 Pellice[215]                  3    0     0
+  1 Winter coat                   4   10     0
+  1 Summer ditto                  4    5     0
+  1 Shirt (?)                     2    5     0
+  1 Pair of linen drawers         3    0     0
+  2 Pair boots[216]               2    5     0
+  1 Pair Gaiters and Slippers     1    5     0
+  1 "Wilkok"[217]                     10     0
+  1 Counterpane                   4   10     0
+  1 Coverlet                      2    0     0
+  1 Blanket[218]                      12     6
+
+[Footnote 214: We find the monks complaining that the L300 a year
+(equivalent to L9,000 now), to which the Abbey income sank in the
+twelfth century would barely support forty monks. The best working
+standard by which to ascertain how much money is worth in any given
+age is the current day-wage of a labourer. In the fourteenth century
+this was 1_d._; it is now 2_s._ 6_d._ Therefore money went thirty
+times as far then as now.]
+
+[Footnote 215: This was a cassock lined with wool. The word _surplice_
+is derived from it, being an alb roomy enough to wear over a pellice.]
+
+[Footnote 216: The boots were of soft leather rising nearly to the
+knee.]
+
+[Footnote 217: This was probably the head-covering which the monks of
+Ely wore, by special licence from the Pope, "on account of the windy
+situation of their church." The name may survive in our modern
+"billy-cock."]
+
+[Footnote 218: The blanket was 3-1/2 yards long, as blankets are
+still.]
+
+This was in the year 1334,[219] and is a fair average specimen of the
+cost, which varied very little from year to year. Readers of Chaucer
+will remember how comfortably, and even luxuriously, he represents his
+monk in the Canterbury Tales as being dressed. The old garments of the
+monks were, at the end of the year, returned to the Camerarius for
+distribution amongst the poor.
+
+[Footnote 219: It is given by Bishop Stubbs, in his _Historical
+Memorials of Ely_.]
+
+Each monk had to enter the convent provided with a pair of blankets,
+garments of all kinds, bedding, towels, a bag for clothes for the
+wash, a furred tunic, day and night boots, a silver spoon, and many
+other articles. The novices had tablets hung round their necks on
+which to write in pencil each breach of the rule as it was committed
+lest it should be forgotten in the public confession of such formal
+transgressions which every brother had to make at the daily Chapter.
+These youths had also each to carry, in a pouch provided for the
+purpose, a knife, a comb, a needle, and some thread.
+
+A complete set of Cellerarius Rolls is preserved at Ely, and these
+give a full account of the food in use in the monastery, with details
+as to its cost; and it appears to have been both wholesome and
+plentiful. Beef, mutton, venison, bacon, fowls, fish, butter,
+vegetables, rice, and sugar were provided, and bread of five different
+qualities. No less than 2,450 eggs were required for a single week's
+consumption. There was an ample allowance of milk; but the principal
+drink was beer, made in the brewhouse bequeathed to the convent by
+Bishop Hugh de Balsham, and supplied, like the bread, in five
+different qualities, the most inferior being known as "Skegman." All
+the food was in charge of the Cellerarius and Granatarius, themselves
+brethren of the monastery. The latter functionary was responsible for
+the bread and the beer, as being both made from grain. Wine was only
+produced at special festivals, and was almost wholly imported from
+Bordeaux, Oporto, or Xeres in Andalusia; a trade still recorded in our
+current words "port" and "sherry." For though vineyards were common in
+mediaeval England (and notably at Ely, as the epitaph to Alan of
+Walsingham reminds us), yet they very seldom produced drinkable wine,
+and practically existed only to supply vinegar, a condiment much in
+use for rendering dry fish less unpalatable.
+
+The Benedictine Rule was strict in itself. The day began at 2 a.m.,
+when every monk had to leave his bed for Mattins and Lauds, a Service
+occupying two hours. Then came an hour during which he might return to
+his bed,[220] to be waked again at 5 a.m., for Prime and Terce.[221]
+Then followed the daily Chapter Meeting, when the work of the coming
+day was apportioned, and the faults of the past day rebuked. This
+ended, all had to attend Low Mass, and at eight o'clock High Mass,
+which was over by ten. Then, and not till then, the monks partook of
+the first meal of the day. For this they repaired to the refectory,
+and on entering they paused and saluted with a profound bow the
+crucifix, hanging over the High Table, and known to them as the
+"Majestas." (This title was due to the phrase in the familiar hymn,
+_Vexilla Regis_, "God reigneth from the tree."[222]) Their food was
+eaten in silence while portions of Scripture were read aloud by one
+of the brethren. He was bound to prepare this reading carefully, and
+was directed to avoid all hurry, and to repeat any passage of special
+note, in order that it might make the deeper impression on his
+hearers. After this came study in the Cloisters, varied by a stroll in
+the Burial Ground for meditation on mortality. At 3 p.m. they went
+again to the church, to sing Vespers; at 5 p.m. came supper with the
+same accompaniment as the morning meal; Compline followed; and then it
+was bed-time. On some occasions the Rule was relaxed and the monks
+were allowed to take part in quiet games, particularly at
+Christmastide.
+
+[Footnote 220: The beds were stuffed with hay, which the Camerarius
+was bound to change once a year, at the annual cleaning of the
+dormitory.]
+
+[Footnote 221: The remaining "Short" Offices were probably said, Sext
+after High Mass, and Nones at mid-day (whence our word Noon).]
+
+[Footnote 222: In this earliest type of crucifix Christ was royally
+crowned and robed (as in the famous _Volto Santo_ at Lucca). See p.
+288.]
+
+Once in six weeks each monk had to undergo the _Minutio sanguinis_, or
+blood-letting, supposed in those days to conduce to health; and this
+drove him into the infirmary, where he had to spend about a week along
+with a batch of his brethren undergoing the same treatment. This
+custom, which sounds to us so unreasonable, tended at least to break
+the monotony of monastic life. Those who could stand it all, and gain
+good by it, must have been men of iron both in mind and body.
+
+Such was the discipline through which those men had to pass who built
+Ely Minster, and dwelt and worshipped there for close upon nine
+hundred years. The "Liber Eliensis" tells us "There was one Rule for
+all; the chief requirement was obedience, love of sacred worship, and
+a full resolve to maintain the honour of God's House." In words that
+form part of their Rule, they could say "We believe that the Divine
+Presence exists everywhere, but above all when we attend Divine
+Service."
+
+In the year 1539 the Monastery was dissolved by Henry the Eighth, and
+reconstituted as a Chapter of Dean and Canons. As we read this the
+question forces itself upon our minds "What became of the monks thus
+disbanded?" At Ely the monastery could, it is true, hold seventy
+monks, but the full roll were seldom, if ever, in residence at one
+time. After the Black Death (in 1349) the number fell to twenty-eight;
+and in the year 1532, seven years before the monastery was dissolved,
+there were only thirty-six monks on the spot, besides the Prior.
+Father Gasquet, a most diligent searcher into the history of that
+time, allows that, in spite of all his labour, "hardly any detail of
+the subsequent lives of those ejected from the dismantled cloisters of
+England is known to exist." It is, however, recorded that three of the
+Ely monks, being noted as good choir men, received a pension of L8 a
+year (equivalent to about L80 now) besides an office. But such traces
+are scanty indeed; some monks who were priests were appointed to the
+cure of souls; others lived on the pensions allotted to them which
+were usually equivalent to about L50 a year, paid as a rule fairly and
+punctually; some received on quitting the monastery a grant of money;
+we hear that one band of monks went out into the world each with a sum
+of twenty-six shillings and eightpence in his pocket (barely L15 at
+the present value of money). Such was the fate of the inmates of the
+Abbeys that submitted to the demands of the King, as did Ely under
+Goodrich, the last of the Abbots. Where "voluntary surrender" was
+refused, as it was by the Abbots of Glastonbury, Reading, Jervaulx,
+and other Houses, on the ground that their monastery was "not theirs
+to give," the monks were turned adrift without any provision
+whatsoever for the future. Some fled to the Continent, others to
+Scotland, while many died as the natural result of a sudden change in
+their mode of life combined with privation and distress.
+
+It is nearly four hundred years since all these changes befell Ely.
+Many devoted men have during these long years filled the See, men of
+mettle, of learning and piety. Among others we may mention Thomas
+Thirlby, Bishop from 1554-1559 during the reign of Mary Tudor, who was
+deposed under Elizabeth on refusing to take the oath of the royal
+supremacy, "having declared that he would sooner die than consent to a
+change of religion." For this he was imprisoned in the Tower for three
+years, till a visitation of the plague led to his being sent from the
+infected air of London to the purer atmosphere of Canterbury, as the
+prisoner-guest of Archbishop Parker, under whose charge he remained
+for seven years. His imprisonment does not appear to have been
+rigorous, as far as physical comfort was concerned; but, with the
+illiberality universal in those days, he was denied the consolations
+of his religion; he might neither say nor hear Mass, he might read no
+books except Protestant ones; he might write no letters, nor even
+converse with anyone save under strict supervision. At Lambeth Palace
+lodging was provided for him, till he died in the summer of 1570, and
+was buried in the adjoining Parish Church.
+
+In the reign of James the First, from 1609-1619, Ely had as her Bishop
+Lancelot Andrewes, whose well-known Book of Devotions bears witness to
+his piety. That he was also a man of culture is evident by his being
+chosen to be one of the translators of the Bible.
+
+In Matthew Wren, who was Bishop of Ely for twenty-nine years, from
+1638-1667, we meet with another prisoner for his faith. Bishop Wren
+was anti-puritan in his aims; throughout his diocese his influence was
+exercised in favour of the re-introduction of reverent ceremonial in
+public worship; and for this he was sent to the Tower, where he
+remained for eighteen years, till the Restoration set him free and
+brought him back once more to his well-loved Cathedral.
+
+He died in 1667, and by his own wish was buried in the chapel of
+Pembroke College, Cambridge, which he had built as a thankoffering for
+his release from prison--(that prison which his friend Archbishop Laud
+had left only for the scaffold); his nephew, the famous Christopher
+Wren, being engaged as architect. Thirty years before, he had, while
+Master of Peterhouse, built from his own designs the chapel of that
+college. The two chapels still face each other across the Cambridge
+street in strange contrast. The earlier one betokens an effort to
+restore Gothic architecture; the later shows that classical ideals
+had, for the time being at least, won the day.
+
+Peter Gunning, who was Bishop of Ely for eight years, from 1675 to
+1683, had likewise faced imprisonment for the sake of his religion. As
+vicar of the church of St. Mary the Less at Cambridge, and later at
+Tunbridge, while on a visit to his mother, he preached sermons in
+support of King Charles the First and in defence of the Church of
+England, which excited against him the resentment of the prevailing
+faction and led to his imprisonment. But before long he regained his
+liberty and returned to Cambridge, where, on his refusing to subscribe
+the Covenant, he was deprived of the Fellowship he held at Clare Hall.
+He then sought refuge with the King at Oxford; and on the surrender of
+that city to the Parliamentary forces betook himself to London, where
+his use of the English Liturgy, and the sermons preached by him in the
+Exeter House Chapel, drew down upon him the censure of Cromwell in
+person. At the Restoration he was given posts of high responsibility.
+He was called upon to assist at the Savoy Conference in the
+remodelling of the Book of Common Prayer, in which the "Prayer for all
+sorts and conditions of men," compiled by him, took its place. At
+Cambridge he held successively within the next ten years the
+Masterships of St. John's and of Corpus Christi, and was also
+successively the Lady Margaret and the Regius Professor of Divinity;
+he was appointed to the See of Chichester in 1670, and in 1675 was
+translated to Ely, where, after eight years, he died. It is recorded
+of him that in 1678 he had the courage to raise in the House of Lords,
+where he sat as Bishop of Ely, a strong protest against the shameful
+Test Act, which imposed upon all civil servants of the Crown, all
+officers, both in army and navy, all professional men, lawyers,
+doctors, and teachers of every grade, that odious formula, the
+so-called Royal Declaration, an age-long source of bitterness, now,
+happily, at last, no longer Royal.
+
+Francis Turner likewise, who held the See from 1684 till 1691, was yet
+another Bishop of Ely who suffered for his principles. He was one of
+the famous seven bishops committed to the Tower in 1688 for refusing
+to promulgate James the Second's Declaration of Indulgence, which they
+regarded as an unjustifiable stretch of the royal prerogative; and
+later he was deprived of his bishopric for declining, as a non-juror,
+to take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, whom he considered
+to be usurpers of the royal dignity; showing thus (as Sir Walter Scott
+puts it) that while he could, in the interests of what he held to be
+justice, resist his sovereign, even in the plenitude of his power,
+like a free-born subject, so he would at all sacrifices maintain what
+he believed to be his king's legitimate rights, even in the depths of
+his adversity, like a loyal one.
+
+[Footnote 223: See page 274.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+     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."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+     Monuments.--West's Chapel.--Alcock's Chapel.--Northwold
+     Cenotaph.--Basevi.--Shrine of Etheldreda.--Lady Chapel.--View
+     from Tower.--Triforium.--Exterior of Minster.--Palace, "Duties"
+     of Goodrich.--St. Mary's.--St. Cross.--Cromwell's
+     House.--Cromwell at Ely.--St. John's Farm.--Theological
+     College.--Waterworks.--Basket-making.
+
+
+The monuments within the Ambulatory may now claim our attention.
+Starting at the southern entrance, let us look first at a canopy of
+coloured stone, the tomb of De Luda, Bishop of Ely from 1290 to 1298.
+The builder of Ely Chapel,[226] Holborn, he was eminent for learning,
+and was keen to enrich the See; as a man of note he was sent by Edward
+the First to France to settle terms of peace. Here we can study the
+details of Decorated work at its best. Close at hand is Bishop
+Barnett's tomb of grey marble, of a date somewhat later, robbed of the
+effigy in brass which was once part of it. Next we come to the
+cenotaph of Tiptoft, Earl of Worcester, who lived during the Wars of
+the Roses. He had travelled to Jerusalem, and had made his home in
+Italy, and was known as "The Pilgrim Scholar." A pioneer of Greek,
+then reviving in the schools of Western Europe as the result of the
+fall of Constantinople, he was also a patron of Caxton and his novel
+printing press. Under Edward the Fourth he tried his hand at governing
+Ireland, where his cruelty toward the Lancastrians gained for him the
+name of "the Butcher." He was beheaded in 1470, and appears here in
+marble lying between his two wives. Next note Bishop Hotham's tomb, of
+the Decorated period. His name is familiar to us as having promoted by
+every means in his power the work carried out by Alan of Walsingham.
+
+[Footnote 226: See p. 322.]
+
+So far the tombs we have noticed have stood in a line under three
+arches of the Presbytery, as the eastern part of the Choir is called:
+we now turn to the south aisle to look at that of Peter Gunning,
+Bishop of Ely under Charles the Second, who wrote (as we mentioned
+before) the prayer to which we owe the phrase "All sorts and
+conditions of men." The mitred bishop rests his head on one hand, in
+an attitude somewhat ungainly, and his monument is of little artistic
+merit. But the resolute, delicately-cut features deserve our study,
+and the epitaph is of interest as recording how he had vindicated the
+Church of England in the presence of Cromwell himself. Let us pause a
+few steps further east to look at the calm face of Canon Selwyn, a
+nineteenth century lover of the cathedral; and then, as we pass the
+tomb of Bishop Eustace, who built the western porch, let us go back in
+thought to the far-off troublous days of King John.
+
+From the Retro-choir we enter Bishop West's chapel, rich with the
+ornament of Perpendicular architecture at its highest pitch of
+elaboration. Nicholas West was Bishop of Ely under Henry the Eighth,
+from 1515 to 1533; and little did he foresee that the sanctuary he was
+adorning with the devotion of a lover who offers of his best would be
+despoiled and defaced by his own immediate successor in the See.
+
+He was no novice as an architect when he came to Ely; for while Dean
+of Windsor he had completed the vaulting of St. George's Chapel. This
+chantry abounds in work characteristic of the Renaissance, extremely
+rare in England. Again and again, always with arabesque ornament that
+recalls the designs of Raphael in the Loggie of the Vatican, is
+reproduced the bishop's favourite motto, _Gratia Dei sum quod sum_
+("By the grace of God I am what I am"), alluding, it may be, to his
+own humble parentage; for, born the son of a baker in Putney, he rose
+to be Bishop of Ely, and to live "in the greatest splendour of any
+prelate of his time"; he kept a hundred servants; nor did he forget
+the poor, feeding two hundred of them daily at his gate; or it may be
+that the motto refers to his having in early life brought upon himself
+disgrace by his violent temper. He had been turned from these evil
+ways to become the friend and ally of the two saintliest men in
+England--Sir Thomas More and Bishop Fisher.
+
+Besides embellishing this chapel with this motto, he adorned it
+further with exquisite statuary. Here delicate canopies, upwards of
+two hundred in number, still overhang corresponding pedestals, on
+which there stood once, for a few short years, statuettes of
+workmanship equally delicate; but of these nothing is left beyond a
+few traces of their feet, which being carved out of the solid stone
+did not give way when the tiny statue of which they formed a part was
+broken off by the mandate of Bishop Goodrich. When the quarrel arose
+between Henry the Eighth and the Pope as to his repudiating Catharine
+of Aragon, Bishop West was true throughout to the cause of the injured
+Queen; but he died in 1533, just before the bursting of the storm in
+which his friends, More and Fisher, laid down their lives, and was
+buried in the chapel that bears his name.
+
+Here, too, lie the bones of the great Earl Brithnoth, who, as we
+remember, was brought back hither headless, from the battle of Maldon,
+by the monks of Ely to be buried amongst them according to their
+promise. We connect this warrior's character with the dying words
+attributed to him in Anglo-Saxon poetry, "God, I thank Thee for all
+the joy that I have had of Thee in life."[227] Other Anglo-Saxon
+worthies of the ninth and tenth centuries rest also in this chapel: an
+Archbishop of York, a Swedish Bishop, and several Bishops of Elmham,
+in Suffolk, and Dorchester, in Oxfordshire--Sees which were in later
+years transferred to Norwich and Lincoln respectively. It is held that
+these were retired prelates, who had come to end their days at Ely;
+where they were welcome guests, as they were licensed by the Diocesan
+to perform the often-needed episcopal functions of the Abbey, without
+calling in the distant and over-busied Bishop of Dorchester, to whose
+See Ely belonged. This was a convenience both to the Brotherhood and
+to the Diocesan himself. The names of Earl Brithnoth and of these
+contemporaries are inscribed on tablets let into the wall of this
+chantry.
+
+[Footnote 227: See p. 312]
+
+Touching it on the northern side, behind the screen of the High Altar,
+we see a fine tomb, Perpendicular in style, where lies buried the
+Cardinal de Luxembourg, a foreign prelate presented to the See of Ely
+in 1438 by King Henry the Sixth, but never (it seems) canonically
+confirmed as Bishop. In order to gain space for his chapel, Bishop
+West did not scruple to take a slice off the tabernacled work of
+unrivalled beauty that adorned this adjoining tomb, but the northern
+side he left in its perfection. Notice, too, close at hand, a bronze
+monument to Dr. Mills, professor of Hebrew, who died about the middle
+of the nineteenth century. The recumbent figure is of great beauty.
+
+Next we come to Bishop Alcock's chapel, occupying the northern corner
+of the ambulatory, as Bishop West's does the southern. It was built, a
+generation earlier, by Bishop Alcock only a few years after his
+reconstitution of St. Radegund's Priory at Cambridge as Jesus College,
+recorded in our sixth chapter, and is marked as his by the frequent
+recurrence of his "canting" armorial bearings, a shield and crest _all
+cocks_, or, rather, black cocks' heads. He was a great builder, a
+great worker, and, like many another ecclesiastic of his day, a great
+politician, being Lord President of Wales, and Comptroller of the
+Royal Works to Henry the Seventh; yet withal he was a man of marked
+sanctity. His chapel is rich in Perpendicular ornament. A wreath of
+grapes and vine-leaves in stone runs round it in all directions, as if
+verily clambering. The undercutting of this wreath is wondrous, but
+perhaps the marvel of it culminates in a pendant boss of vine-leaves
+on the northern side so deeply wrought that we can see right through
+it, yet perfect to-day as when first carved.
+
+The masons who worked here liked their joke; and one of them made a
+boss of foliage, graceful enough when seen from above,--but stoop down
+to look at it from below, and behold a grinning imp. This stonework
+was chiselled _in situ_, the rough blocks were placed where they were
+to stay, and there they were cut into the shape required, several
+being even yet unfinished. Canopied niches abound here, but of the
+statuary that once filled them one figure alone has escaped
+destruction, and still indicates how beautiful its companions must
+have been. To Bishop Alcock Jesus College, Cambridge, owes its
+existence, and Peterhouse many benefactions; and here is his tomb. In
+1900 Bishop Alwyne Compton filled the window of this chapel with
+stained glass, depicting four of his most noted predecessors.
+
+Leaving this chantry behind we see on our right, under his own Early
+English bays, the monument to our old friend, Hugh de Northwold, who
+lies buried not in this spot but in the middle of his presbytery.
+Before he became Bishop of Ely he had been Abbot of Bury St.
+Edmund's, for which place he ever retained a warm affection. His feet
+touch a block of marble, on which is sculptured the martyrdom of St.
+Edmund, whom we see tied to a tree and shot to death by Danish arrows,
+while his beheading is also represented. Here, too, is a wolf guarding
+the Saint's head, according to the legend. The story ran that, after
+the Saint's martyrdom and decapitation, his surviving subjects, to
+whom his "universal graciousness which yet suffered no unbecoming
+familiarity" had deeply endeared him, sought, so soon as the Danes had
+marched away, to take up his remains for fitting burial. The body they
+soon found, but the head had been cast into a thicket, and was not
+discovered till the searchers heard a voice crying, "Here! Here!
+Here!" which guided them to the spot where it lay. A huge wolf was
+standing, as it were, on guard over the sacred relic, but did not
+offer to attack the finders, who, on their part, suffered it to remain
+unhurt. The faithful beast followed them like a dog till it saw the
+head laid together with the body, and then quietly departed into the
+forest, no man doing aught against it.
+
+Close at hand, leaning against the northern wall of the aisle, is a
+detached fragment of stonework, once the arm of Northwold's abbatial
+chair which he brought with him from Bury St. Edmund's. This, too, is
+made in the form of a beast of prey (somewhat distantly resembling a
+wolf), holding between its paws a human head. The Abbey of Bury St.
+Edmund's, it may be mentioned, was, in some sort, a daughter House of
+Ely. When King Edgar, "the Peacemaker," founded that monastery in
+honour of the Royal Martyr he populated it, in the first instance, by
+drafting forty monks from Etheldreda's earlier royal foundation.
+
+We will next look at the impressive monument of William of Kilkenny,
+Bishop of Ely for three years under Henry the Third. He gave great
+offence through being consecrated bishop by the Archbishop of
+Canterbury in Italy, instead of in England, where it was felt that
+both prelates ought to have been attending to their duties at home;
+he, moreover, died abroad on a journey to Spain, whither he was going
+on the King's business. A traveller and statesman, he was also a
+generous promoter of education, as is shown by his founding
+scholarships at Barnwell Priory. A recumbent figure holding a crozier,
+he rests on a pillow as if asleep.
+
+Next we reach the tomb of Bishop Redman, who held the See for a very
+short time in the opening years of the sixteenth century. The tomb is
+of fine Perpendicular work, and the Bishop lies under a canopy rich in
+armorial bearings; but the figure is strangely truncated at the foot,
+which derogates not a little from its beauty.
+
+Retracing our steps for a few yards, we find beneath our feet a brass
+which records one of the tragedies that the Minster has witnessed;
+here lies buried Basevi, the gifted architect of the Fitzwilliam
+Museum at Cambridge, who met with his death in 1845 while accompanying
+Dean Peacock over the work of repair going on in the western tower.
+The Dean had just a moment before given the architect a caution to
+take care how he walked. Basevi, familiar with scaffolding, smiled at
+the advice, and going on with his hands in his pockets, came to a hole
+he had not perceived, and fell through in a way that would have been
+well-nigh impossible had his hands been free; his feet struck the
+pavement below with a jar so intense that death was almost
+instantaneous.
+
+And now we end our tour round these sepulchres and monuments by
+contemplating all that remains of what was once the rallying centre
+for those countless pilgrims who travelled hither in search of
+spiritual and physical benefit--the shrine of St. Etheldreda. It was
+once enriched with gems and costly hangings. It has been told how
+Queen Emma, in 1016, gave it a "purple cloth worked with gold and set
+with jewels."[228] Sixty years later the shrine is described as "made
+in part of silver, as adorned with pearls, emeralds, onyxes,
+alamandine stones, embossed with images in relief, among which were
+two lions carved in crystal, also four figures of angels carved in
+ivory." Such it was made by Theodwin, who was Abbot for three years
+under William the Conqueror, and such he left it. After another sixty
+years it was robbed by Bishop Nigel, who took away much of its gold
+and silver and used it for his own purposes.
+
+[Footnote 228: See p. 314.]
+
+But if it was despoiled in one century it was enriched in the next.
+From 1252 it stood behind the High Altar in Bishop Northwold's
+Presbytery, erected purposely for its reception; with the figure of
+the Foundress of the Abbey gazing down upon it from the central boss
+of the vaulting overhead. The shrine was thus held in honour till the
+reign of Henry the Eighth; when the Royal greed swooped down upon it,
+the dust of Etheldreda was thrown we know not where (though the chapel
+in Holborn bearing her name, and the church of the Dominicans at Stone
+in Staffordshire claim to possess relics of her hand), her coffin was
+broken up and destroyed, the treasures that adorned her shrine were
+dispersed. Love of loot was the great motive for this spoliation;
+hatred of abuses, some real, some imaginary, was the hypocritical
+excuse. Whatever may have been the pretext for its demolition, the
+shrine was robbed and left empty.
+
+The existing monument is a vaulted canopy of the fourteenth century,
+and is held to be due to Alan of Walsingham. Much of the ancient
+colouring survives on its northern side, but the southern has been
+completely refaced with new stone-work. Let no one leave without
+stooping down to pass beneath it, where it is easy to stand upright.
+It was here that pilgrims congregated, happy in the sense that they
+were in close proximity to the bones of the sainted Abbess. Here once
+was sheltered the sarcophagus of marble that held the body of the
+Foundress of the Abbey. Sturdy blows must have been needed to
+annihilate it; but destroyed it was, and no tradition gives any record
+of its fate, nor has any remnant of it ever been recovered. Stripped
+as we see the shrine, now set aside in the northern aisle of the
+presbytery, it seems left to prove that dignity may linger on for
+ages, long after the word has been spoken "Thy glory is departed."
+
+Before leaving the cathedral we must pass into the Lady Chapel
+adjoining the north-eastern transept, connected with it by a passage.
+We have already told when and by whom it was built, and when and by
+whom it was desecrated. At the Reformation it was rededicated to the
+Holy Trinity, and became a parish church, replacing the church of St.
+Cross, which once stood close to the cathedral, but was pulled down
+during the sixteenth century. Our visit must have its painful side, as
+we remember how one form of faith built this chapel and another
+defaced it. We could envy those who saw it fresh from the hand of
+gifted sculptors and masons, its windows, now so bare, all aglow with
+colour of a richness to which the few poor fragments that remain bear
+eloquent testimony.
+
+This chapel measures a hundred feet in length and is about half that
+width, the roof is of a single span, with no pillars to support it.
+Around it runs a stone bench, divided up by canopied niches still
+bearing traces of the old colouring--red, blue, green and gold. The
+canopied work over these niches is in almost perfect preservation,
+rich and free in design, but the statuary which once abounded under
+and above it has been ruthlessly and deliberately broken. Only one
+head half hidden by sculptured foliage escaped the iconoclasts as they
+went round the hallowed walls to "break down all the carved work
+thereof with axes and hammers."
+
+We look up and see some relics of stained glass, accidentally spared
+when the rest was smashed, in colour most harmonious, the greens and
+reds incomparably mellow in tone; while certain small outlined figures
+strangely traversing it, stiff yet vigorous, recall the painting on
+Egyptian monuments. A few square feet of this precious glass, a
+multitude of headless yet graceful statuettes canopied by unblemished
+stone-work, are still left to show us how beautiful the whole must
+have been when in its glory. We leave with a sigh the chapel, designed
+by Alan of Walsingham, and built by his faithful subsacrist John of
+Wisbech.
+
+Those who desire it can, before they quit the Minster, climb to the
+top of the western tower, and if the day is clear they will be well
+rewarded by a superb view over the "boundless plain" below; towns and
+hamlets, steeples and spires, spread there beneath us, nor must we
+forget the railways, with their kindly evidence of modern life at its
+fullest. To the east the horizon is bounded by those East Anglian
+uplands which nurtured Etheldreda for her great work here. But, beyond
+almost any other, this is essentially a man-made landscape; its
+salient features are not hills, but buildings, not rivers but lodes.
+Peterborough, the sister Abbey-Cathedral, is in view twenty miles away
+to the north-west, and many a church of note and beauty is prominent
+within nearer range, including the towers and spires of Cambridge
+fifteen miles to the south. The very cornfields and pastures beneath
+us have been reclaimed from the marsh by man; while, far on the
+north-east, is "Denvers Sluice" protecting the rich fenland from
+inundation. The view from the top of the tower is well worth a climb,
+if we have time and strength for the venture.
+
+Those who wish to be acquainted with the structural secrets of the
+cathedral should make an effort to gain admittance to one of the
+spiral staircases to the upper passages that lead from triforium to
+triforium, from clerestory to clerestory. In these higher regions we
+shall still come upon deeply wrought crocketing, such as that in the
+upper eastern lancet windows--crocketing seen only by the stray
+visitor, yet worked with ungrudged labour and skill. Here we may step
+along the plank that takes us from beam to beam for a hundred feet
+over the vaulting of the Choir, through the spacious chamber that
+separates this vaulting from the outer roof. On every beam stands a
+pail of water ready in case of fire.
+
+Through a low doorway at the end we pass to the circle of the lantern.
+Here a shutter-like panel can be opened and we can look downwards if
+we will, but we shall probably elect rather to spend these rare
+minutes in gazing upwards, on the figure of Christ in the key boss of
+the vaulting, now that for once in our lives we find ourselves near
+enough to John of Burwell's carving to see how bold and yet how
+reverent it is.[229]
+
+[Footnote 229: See p. 358.]
+
+One question forces itself upon us, how was it placed here? How was
+Mr. Gambier Parry able to paint the glowing angels on these panels? We
+see in imagination the scaffolding, the ropes, the pulleys, that have
+been in use here, where now all is calm and rest, and we feel that
+William Watson might have had this very scene before him when he wrote
+the lines:
+
+  "No record Art keeps
+   Of her travails and woes:
+   There is toil on the steeps,
+   On the summit repose."
+
+The tourist has one further duty to perform; for he must not leave Ely
+without walking round the cathedral outside. He will then be perplexed
+by the anachronisms before him; he will see Perpendicular windows
+inserted in Norman aisles, Decorated tracery in Early English masonry;
+he will observe this from without more plainly than from within, and
+he will realise how the monks who designed and built it all had a firm
+belief in themselves, and in their own age, so that they did not
+shrink from what we should now count as acts of Vandalism. They no
+more hesitated to displace the work of their forefathers by their own,
+than we hesitate to light our houses and churches with electricity,
+instead of being content with the gas that was good enough for our
+grandparents.
+
+As we turn to the north, on leaving the cathedral by the western door,
+we shall be puzzled by the strange appearance of the steeple on its
+northern side. For Ely Minster, we cannot deny it, is lop-sided; it
+has no north-western transept to correspond with the south-western. On
+the north side of the tower there is masonry proving that once it had
+the support of such a transept; but there is no record of its fall or
+demolition, so we are left to surmise that perchance it shared the
+fate of the adjoining church of St. Cross, described as a "lean-to,"
+dark and "uncomley, very unholdsome for want of thorrowe ayre" which
+we know to have been pulled down during the reign of Elizabeth.
+
+We must now go eastward, and, keeping close to the cathedral as we
+follow the path that surrounds it, we shall be able to drink in the
+view, described earlier, of the Minster as seen from the east. From
+this point we can grasp it all, and we can feel ourselves in close
+touch with the builders of yore, with Simeon, and Richard, and Hugh,
+and Alan, and John; for the work of each is here before our eyes at
+once. They now rest from their labours, leaving them as a priceless
+legacy to benefit ourselves and others. Look at Richard's transepts
+resting on old Simeon's foundations; look at Hugh's lancet windows, at
+Alan's incomparable lantern, at the Lady Chapel which John was able to
+build through his finding of that brazen urn. The space that lies
+between us and these men of mark seems bridged by a span as we
+contemplate their work and try to understand it.
+
+As we complete our circuit of the East end, and stand at that of the
+south transept, we shall be struck with a conspicuous range of ruined
+arches built into the Canons' residences to the south-east. These are
+the remains of the Infirmary; which we have seen to play such an
+important part in the life of the Abbey. It had its own chapel, hall
+and kitchen, and stood on the site of the original Saxon church. The
+space between it and the Minster was called the Slype, and served as a
+kind of market, whither travelling merchants brought their wares for
+the inspection of the Prior, Sacrist, and other chief officers of the
+Abbey. These officers, we may mention, did not share the common life
+of the monks, but had houses of their own, fragments of which still
+dot the "College,"--mostly, like the Infirmary, now built into the
+residences of the various Canons.
+
+Not a stone's throw from the Galilee Porch, just across the street
+towards the west, stands the episcopal palace. At one time this palace
+was actually connected with the cathedral by a covered gallery
+crossing the street. We can see from an old print how seriously this
+erection must have blocked the traffic, and on this account it was
+finally removed; yet its name adheres to the thoroughfare over which
+it once passed, and which is still called "the Gallery." The Bishop of
+Ely is fortunate in having his house close to his cathedral, unlike
+too many of the episcopal residences, which are at an inconvenient
+distance from the central city of the See. Moreover, his palace is of
+reasonable size; not too large nor yet too small for the hospitality
+to which a bishop must be given if he is to live up to the Scriptural
+standard; and it has another great practical advantage in being near
+to a station where several lines converge, and where all trains stop.
+
+The Palace was built in the main by Bishop Alcock toward the end of
+the fifteenth century. It is of chequered red brick with stone
+facings; his own arms, three heads of the barn-door cock, and the arms
+of the See, three crowns, are worked in stone on the face of the front
+wing looking north; there project, moreover, three niches (now empty)
+with the canopies he loved so well. Thirty years later Bishop Goodrich
+(who robbed these niches of their statuary) added the western gallery,
+a hundred feet long, with its beautiful oriel window, on whose outer
+panels he caused to be engraved his original version of our Duty
+toward God and our neighbour, which we may still read for ourselves if
+we can contrive to see through certain bushes that hide it. These
+inscriptions are on two slabs of freestone beneath the two side-lights
+of the oriel window in the gallery of the palace. Unhappily they are
+rapidly perishing under the action of the weather, and will soon be
+altogether lost. This is unfortunate, as they are of no small
+interest, representing, as it would seem, Goodrich's original draft
+for the "Duties," which were afterwards expanded into the form so
+familiar to us in the Catechism. Nor does any one seem to have been
+at the pains to record them verbatim while they remained legible; so
+that now many conjectural words have to be supplied, by considering
+the number of letters in the spaces worn away. In the following
+reproduction these conjectural words are placed within brackets and
+italicised. The duty towards God, which is on the eastern side, is in
+Roman capitals, and probably had eleven lines, the first three of
+which are wholly gone. It runs thus:--
+
+  [_The . duty . toward . god . is . to .
+  believe . in . him . to . love . him .
+  with . all . our . hert . & . soul .
+  and_] . all . our . power . to . wors
+  hippe . god . to . give . him . tha
+  nkes . to . put . our . whole . trust
+  in . him . and . to . cal . on . him . to
+  honoure . his . holy . name [_and
+  his_] . worde . and . to . serve . god
+  [_truly_] . all . the . days . of . our
+  lyfe.
+
+The duty towards our neighbour, on the western side, is in Old English
+letters, in fourteen lines, as follows:--
+
+  The . duety . [_towards . our . neigh_]boure . is
+  to . love . him . a[_s . we . do . ourself . an_]d . to
+  do . to . all . men . as . I . wo[_uld . they . do ._ ]to . me
+  to . honour . and . obay . [_the . King . and . all . set_] under . him ? ? ?
+  beme    ?    ?  [_and . to . order . ourselves_]
+  lowly . to . all . [_our . betters_] . to . hurt . no
+  body . by . word . nor . d[_eed . to . be . jus_]te . in . all
+  our . delyng . to . bear . no . [_malice_] . in . our . hert
+  to . kep . our . handes . from . stelyng . & . our
+  tong . from . evil . speaking . to . kep . our . bo
+  dys . in . temperance . not . to . covet . other . mens .
+  goods . but . laboure . truly . for . our . lyvyng . in . y^e
+  state . of . lyfe . it . plese . God . to . call . us . on . to .
+
+Of the many residences once belonging to the See, this palace is all
+that is left. In looking back, we must remember that in days when
+travelling was difficult it may have been of real advantage to the
+Bishop to have places of abode dotted all over his diocese, where he
+could stay, and where he could exercise his episcopal functions. We
+read, for instance, how, in 1487 and the following year, Bishop Alcock
+admitted between forty and fifty persons to minor or higher orders in
+his chapel at Downham Manor.
+
+[Illustration: _St. Mary's Church._]
+
+Beyond the Palace stands St. Mary's Church, built by Bishop Eustace
+about 1200, while Norman architecture was developing into Early
+English. It has been remarked that "its architect was disposed to
+adopt the new style without quitting the old one." The columns of the
+nave are simple Norman; the chancel and chapel on the south are
+distinctly Early English; the tower and spire are of Decorated work;
+and we meet with inserted Perpendicular windows. In the midst of a
+well-kept churchyard may be seen a broken and ancient font, with an
+inscription embossed in lead stating that it has been so placed that
+it may receive only the water of heaven.
+
+The citizens of Ely throughout the Middle Ages were well provided with
+churches, having for their devotions both St. Mary's and also St.
+Cross, of which we have spoken before. The name St. Cross has an
+interesting history. When first the abbey was built, there stood
+against the stone rood-screen thrown across the nave an altar known as
+the Altar of the Holy Cross; here the inhabitants of the city were
+invited to worship, while the monks said their office quite apart
+within the screen. But, as time went on, the monks found that this
+twofold worship was not convenient, and, wishing to have the Abbey to
+themselves, they built, immediately outside it on the north, a church
+for their lay neighbours, "for doing such things as should be done in
+a parish church," and named it St. Cross, after the altar within the
+Minster which was thus superseded. With the dispersion of the monks
+the nave came again into public use, and the church of St. Cross was
+permitted to decay, and was finally removed.
+
+Adjoining the churchyard of St. Mary's stands the vicarage. It is a
+rambling house of moderate size, quaintly made of rough hewn beams
+with reed-stiffened clay in between, and opening on to the street.
+This house has a notable history. It was first built as a tithe house,
+and was within the same ring-fence as the great barn or granary for
+the storing of the tithe sheaves belonging to the monastery. In this
+house lived the farmer of the tithes, who bore the title of Steward,
+and collected tithe, first for the monks, later for the Dean and
+Chapter of Ely; and as this office became hereditary the name of
+Steward was taken as a family surname. The last of these Stewards was
+Sir Thomas, who died in 1636, leaving no son to succeed him; but his
+daughter Elizabeth was the mother of Oliver Cromwell, and Oliver by a
+very natural arrangement stepped into his grandfather's office. He
+accordingly left his home at St. Ives, sixteen miles distant, bringing
+his wife, his mother, and several children, to live in the tithe house
+at Ely; the older lady thus returning to the home of her childhood.
+
+[Illustration: _The Cathedral from the West Fen Road._]
+
+For ten years the Cromwell family occupied this very house, which
+still remains pretty much what it was in their time. Here two children
+were born, and one died. Mrs. Cromwell was an excellent housewife,
+being we are told "as capable of descending to the kitchen with
+propriety as she was of acting in her exalted position with dignity."
+To Cromwell's duties as tithe farmer were added, in the course of
+time, those of Governor of the Isle of Ely. On St. Mary's Green, in
+front of this house, he used to drill and instruct the levies of his
+newly-formed "Eastern Counties' Association," which by and by
+developed into his formidable "Ironsides." The result of his drilling
+speaks for itself in the history of the Civil War; of his precepts,
+one at least, commonly attributed to him, was good, "Say your prayers,
+and keep your powder dry."
+
+The same house served as the residence of the tithe farmers till the
+passing of the Tithe Commutation Acts, when, after the death of the
+last of the officials in 1840, the Dean and Chapter sold it. Only in
+1905 was it purchased by the Vicar of St. Mary's, to become the
+vicarage of his church; appropriate in every way from size and
+position and association for this purpose. The Tithe Barn was a
+massive structure of stone thatched with reeds, but no trace of it is
+left; for it was pulled down about the middle of the nineteenth
+century, when tithe having ceased to be paid in kind[230] it no longer
+served any useful purpose; and on its site were built the almshouses
+and national schools, now to be seen quite close to the vicarage.
+
+[Footnote 230: Within living memory the tithe paid to the parson or
+other tithe owner, was actually the tenth sheaf in every row
+throughout the harvest field. The corn might not be carried till the
+owner's agent had "docked" these sheaves, (_i.e._ marked each by
+crowning it with a dock leaf). He might begin his count with any one
+of the first ten, for obvious reasons. The docked sheaves were
+conveyed to the tithe barn either before or after the carrying of the
+others.]
+
+Cromwell was no friend to the cathedral services, nor did his
+residence near at hand tend to make him love them. He at the tithe
+house, and Bishop Wren at the Palace, must have lived in avowed
+antagonism; but they ceased to be neighbours in 1642, when the Bishop
+was sent to the Tower by warrant of Parliament for his persistent
+effort to restore reverent ceremonial in public worship. The services
+in the Minster were conducted at this time by Canon Hitch, Vicar of
+Holy Trinity, to whom Cromwell wrote as follows from his house hard
+by:
+
+                                              Ely _10th January 1643_.
+
+     MR. HITCH,
+
+     Lest the soldiers should in any tumultuary or disorderly way
+     attempt the Reformation of the Cathedral Church, I require you to
+     forbear altogether your Choir Service, so unedifying and
+     offensive:--and this as you shall answer for it if any disorder
+     should arise thereupon. I advise you to catechise, and read and
+     expound the Scriptures to the people; not doubting but the
+     Parliament with the advice of the Assembly of Divines will direct
+     you further. I desire your sermons too where they usually have
+     been, but more frequent.
+
+     Your loving friend,
+                                                      OLIVER CROMWELL.
+
+Canon Hitch took no notice of this letter, and the "Choir Service"
+went on as before; wherefore Cromwell, sword in hand, his hat on his
+head, attended by a party of soldiers, went to the cathedral at the
+time of Divine Service, and spoke aloud these words: "I am a man under
+authority, having soldiers under me, and am commanded to dismiss this
+assembly." Canon Hitch, who was conducting the Service at the
+Communion Table, paid no attention, and went on without stopping;
+whereupon Cromwell, followed by soldiers and rabble, went up to the
+clergyman, laid his hand on his sword, and, bidding him "leave off his
+fooling and come down," drove the congregation out of the cathedral.
+
+Five years after this scene took place, an order was made by the House
+of Commons to the effect "that the Cathedral Church in the Isle of
+Ely, being in a ruinous condition, should be examined with a view to
+its being pulled down and its material used to make provision for sick
+and maimed soldiers and their families." Providentially this order was
+not carried into effect, Cromwell's own influence being presumably
+used against it.
+
+If we continue our walk for a few minutes further westward along the
+street, we come to a quaint and picturesque building now known as St.
+John's Farm. It was built by Bishop Northwold, in order to unite the
+two Hostels of St. John the Baptist and St. Mary Magdalene. These
+Hostels had been founded for the use of monks who, though residing in
+Ely, wished to be independent of the greater monastery; Bishop
+Northwold put an end to this undesirable state of things by erecting
+one Hostel for the use of the two communities, and placing it under
+the direct supervision of the Sacrist of Ely. The Hostel is now an
+unpretending homestead, much rebuilt, yet retaining bits of thirteenth
+century work still untouched and therefore of interest.
+
+Those who approach Ely from the south must notice two prominent
+buildings standing quite apart from the cathedral. One is the
+Theological College, a structure of red brick well placed on rising
+ground, where twenty students can reside while preparing to take Holy
+Orders in the Church of England; it was founded by Bishop Woodford,
+who filled the See for twelve years from 1873. The College has its own
+private chapel for daily use, but by its constitution the students are
+bound to attend many services in the cathedral; the founder having
+insisted on this proviso as tending to maintain the link between the
+new foundation and the ancient Minster, a link which he foresaw might
+otherwise dwindle away. As a rule students have one year of special
+training and study; and during this time they take part in the
+parochial work of the cathedral city.
+
+[Illustration: _St. John's Farm._]
+
+The other conspicuous building is a round castellated structure that
+might well pass for a Norman keep, but is, in fact, the water tower of
+Ely, supporting a huge tank into which water is forced from springs at
+Isleham some seven miles distant.[231] The inhabitants of the city
+have good reason to be thankful for this water supply; not a hundred
+years ago the natural springs on the spot were so inadequate for their
+use that most of the water for brewing and washing had to be brought
+up from the river, slung in a pair of leather bags on horseback, an
+arrangement manifestly inconvenient, "though providing," as the
+historian adds, "a comfortable subsistence for many industrious poor."
+Let us hope that these poor folk did not bear a grudge against Dean
+Peacock, to whose zeal the waterworks of Ely are mainly due.
+
+[Footnote 231: See p. 183.]
+
+One of the chief industries of Ely is the making of jam, for which the
+rich fruit-growing fields in the neighbourhood supply the material.
+And if we follow the main street down to the wharf on the river Ouse
+we shall see in the piles of willow wands that lie ready stripped on
+its banks, evidence of a much older industry still carried on here.
+This is the basket-making, for the which the fenland districts of
+Britain were famed even before the Romans reached the country.
+Posidonius, the Rhodian geographer under whom Cicero studied, and who
+himself visited our island about 100 B.C., mentions "British baskets"
+as exported for use on the Continent. A century later Strabo tells us
+of their extensive home use, for storing corn, and Martial, in the
+next generation, gives us the very word, which was adopted into the
+Latin from the Celtic original (still used in Welsh), as it has since
+been adopted into English. In sending a present to a lady he alludes
+to it as:
+
+   "A basket rude, from painted Britons come."
+  ("Barbara de pictis venio _bascauda_ Britannis.")
+
+The withies of which the baskets are made were at first, doubtless,
+the shoots of the willows found growing wild along the streams. Now
+they are cut from carefully tended osier-beds, small enclosed areas
+which are periodically flooded, where the willows are regularly
+cultivated with a view to the production of long shoots suitable for
+this industry. "They are regularly cut, peeled, and seasoned and
+afford employment to large numbers of people."[232] Nor is the making
+of baskets the only purpose for which willows may be profitably
+cultivated; for, as Fuller says:--"This tree delighteth in moist
+places and is triumphant in the Isle of Ely, where the roots
+strengthen the banks and the lop affords fuel for the fire. It groweth
+incredibly fast; it being a by-word in this county that the profit by
+willows will buy the owner a horse before other trees will pay for his
+saddle."
+
+[Footnote 232: Hughes. _County Geography of Cambs_, p. 98.]
+
+Having thus come to know something of Ely Minster, we shall feel the
+greater interest in all our further explorations through those
+highways and byways of the surrounding district over which she
+presides with the air of a Mother, and a Queen.
+
+[Illustration: _Willow Walk._]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+     Boundary of Fens.--Roman Works, Car Dyke, Sea Wall,
+     Causeway.--Archipelago.--Littleport, Agrarian Riots.--Denver
+     Sluice.--Roslyn Pit.--Fenland Abbeys, Chatteris, Ramsey,
+     Peterborough, Thorney, Crowland.
+
+
+The vast Fenland district of which the Isle of Ely is the core
+consisted, until the fens were drained, of an archipelago of scattered
+islets rising out of a morass, through which the rivers from the
+uplands around stagnated in a complex system of waterways, constantly
+changing, as one branch or another got silted up and the streams had
+to make themselves new channels.
+
+The foreshore of the uplands may still be traced on a contour map, and
+is seen to be deeply indented, with bays running in from the fen and
+capes running out into it. The southernmost point of the morass was at
+Fen Ditton on the Cam, two miles below Cambridge. Its western boundary
+went by, Waterbeach, Cottenham, and Willingham, to Earith; thence
+through Huntingdonshire to Ramsey and Peterborough; thence, by
+Deeping, Holbeach, and Spalding, to the Witham, a few miles below
+Lincoln. Throughout all this length ran a Roman earthwork, the Car
+Dyke, still existing at many points, evidently thrown up by these
+mighty civilisers to keep the floods in check. A like Roman
+embankment, of much larger dimensions, is to be seen on either shore
+of the great estuary which of old brought the sea-shore as far south
+as Wisbech. The eastern boundary of the Fenland needs no such defence,
+as on this side the higher ground sinks much more abruptly to the fen
+level. It passes from Fen Ditton by Horningsea, Bottisham, Swaffham,
+and Reach to Burwell. Here a peninsula projects to Soham, followed by
+a deep inlet to Isleham and Mildenhall. Then it runs north and west to
+Downham, in Norfolk, and thence due north to the sea by Lynn.
+
+We must not, however, suppose that the whole of this immense tract was
+always morass. Oscillations in the land level have more than once
+raised it high enough and long enough for great forests to clothe it;
+the trees of which, frequently of giant size, are constantly exhumed
+from the peat which the later depressions have formed over them.[233]
+The last of these forests seems to have lingered on into Roman times.
+A Roman roadway may still be traced, running east and west across the
+whole breadth of the district, from Denver, at the south-western point
+of the Norfolk uplands, to Stanground, near Peterborough, on the
+Huntingdonshire mainland. The Fens must have been very different from
+what they afterwards became for such a road to be in use. But before
+the collapse of Roman Britain in the fifth century of our era all
+seems to have gone to fen once more; and the islets in it served as a
+refuge for the remnant of the British population when the flood of the
+Anglo-Saxon Conquest burst over the land.[234]
+
+[Footnote 233: See p. 196.]
+
+[Footnote 234: See p. 168.]
+
+These islets number some thirty and more, and vary considerably in
+size. Far the largest is that on which Ely stands, the southern part
+of which has been spoken of in Chapter XII. At its extreme northern
+point, on a subsidiary islet of its own, is the large village of
+Littleport, chiefly memorable as having been the focus of a most
+serious agrarian outbreak, which in the year 1816 convulsed the
+district. Widespread agricultural distress marked the first decades of
+the nineteenth century. The wholesale enclosure of the common fields
+and the waste lands brought with it no small suffering to the
+peasantry; who everywhere lost, by the Enclosure Acts, the advantages
+which the waste lands had afforded them, receiving in exchange a
+scanty portion of "town land" in each parish, the rent of which is
+applied to local charities. And in many instances the policy of the
+Government placed these "town lands" in the least accessible corner of
+the parish; for the express purpose of preventing labourers from
+acquiring allotments in them and thus becoming less dependent on their
+wages. The draining of the fens, moreover, which was then in full
+progress, by exterminating the old abundance of fish and wildfowl
+deprived the marsh-men at once of their chief recreation and their
+most savoury food. Wages were only nine shillings a week, while wheat
+was no less than five guineas a quarter. These grievances actually
+drove the peasantry to arms, not without countenance from sympathisers
+of a superior class, who felt that the demand of the rioters for wages
+enough to purchase a stone of flour a week, which was all they asked,
+could not be called unreasonable.
+
+"Assembling by sound of horn at Littleport, they sacked some of the
+houses of the most prosperous, levied contributions on others, and
+then marched on Ely in formidable force, armed with guns, pistols,
+scythes, etc., and under cover of a waggon, on which they had mounted
+four punt-guns. These formidable weapons, used for wild-fowl shooting,
+with barrels eight feet long, whose charge was no less than a pound of
+gunpowder, projected over the front of the vehicle to clear the way if
+needful. But though the leading inhabitants of Ely had hastily armed
+themselves, and been sworn in as special constables they were not
+prepared to face this artillery, and the town passed without
+resistance into the power of the mob, who repeated their Littleport
+doings on a larger scale, though with little bodily hurt to anyone.
+Unhappily the mob soon got out of hand, and the movement rapidly
+degenerated into a mere drunken riot, the chief sufferers in which
+were, as usual, those who had done most for the relief of the
+poor--the local shopkeepers, who had aided them by credit, and the
+local clergy, who had organised soup-kitchens for them.
+
+"At the first approach of the military force sent for to suppress
+them, the rioters retreated in good order, still under cover of their
+armed waggon, to Littleport, where, however, only a handful made any
+sort of stand when the soldiers actually arrived."[235] The rest
+dispersed in panic, and not a blow was struck in defence of those,
+some eighty in number, who were selected to be made an example of. A
+special commission was held for the trial of these unhappy men. "In
+spite of strong testimony to character, five were hanged, and five
+more transported for life, the rest undergoing various terms of
+imprisonment; all to the accompaniment of ecclesiastical rejoicings,
+the Bishop entering the cathedral in solemn procession, to the strains
+of the triumphal anthem, "Why do the heathen rage?", with his Sword
+of State borne before him (by his butler!), and escorted by fifty of
+the principal inhabitants, carrying white wands. No fewer than three
+hundred of these wand-bearers guarded the execution of the five
+rioters; yet the sympathy for them was so strong that the bishop could
+not get a cart to carry them to the gallows under five guineas for the
+trip."
+
+[Footnote 235: From my _History of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+Such was the last serious exercise of the Bishop's long-descended
+secular jurisdiction over the Isle. From the Girvian Princes to the
+Abbesses of Ely, from the Abbesses to the Abbots, from the Abbots to
+the Bishops that Palatinate jurisdiction had been handed on for twelve
+hundred years;--and this was its sordid close. It died none too soon.
+
+Littleport is now quite a thriving and prosperous place, with a
+shirt-factory employing over 300 hands and a most effective system of
+agriculture in the reclaimed fens around. It has a fine Early English
+church, and a grand tower, through the basement of which goes the
+footway of the street. Until the nineteenth century the place was so
+inaccessible by land that the Cambridgeshire annalist Carter (1752)
+tells us that "it is as rare to see a coach at Littleport as a ship at
+Newmarket."
+
+From Littleport the road pursues its level way for seven miles across
+the fen, till, after crossing the small islet of Hilgay, it strikes
+the Norfolk uplands at their south-western corner, hard by Denver
+Sluice; the present boundary of the North Sea tide, which once ran up
+almost to Cambridge. This magnificent Sluice is the keystone of the
+whole drainage scheme of the fenland. Here the New and the Old Bedford
+Rivers, whose start we saw at Earith (p. 280), once more rejoin the
+Ouse, having conveyed in twenty-two miles the waters which by the old
+channel would have taken thirty-three. This, of course, gives them a
+better fall, and renders them less liable to silt themselves up.
+
+Practically the New River does all the work, very little water being
+in the Old except what the tide brings up. It is a striking sight to
+be on the Sluice at high water and gaze at the sea waves ridging up
+this old river with force that seems illimitable. And yet not enough
+pass in, before the ebb calls them back, ever (or hardly ever) to
+reach Earith, as a glance at the channel there instantly shows. Still
+more striking is it to be on the Sluice when the spring tides are on,
+and see the sea on the north of the Sluice standing fifteen or twenty
+feet higher than the fresh waters on the south. One realises what
+widespread disaster would ensue if the Sluice were to give way. Small
+wonder that during the Fenian dynamite scare of 1867 the place was
+watched day and night by a guard of soldiers. The Sluice itself is a
+massive dam of stonework; having a big lock with two sets of gates,
+one against the stream of the river, the other against the tideway of
+the sea, which reaches this point by a broad cut from the important
+seaport of King's Lynn.
+
+This present erection was built 1752. Its earlier predecessor was set
+up 1651 by the Dutch engineer Vermuyden, the maker of the Bedford
+Rivers, to whose genius the whole present scheme of drainage owes its
+existence. He carried through his plan in face of most determined
+opposition, especially from the towns of Lynn and Cambridge, who
+complained that "whereas of old ships from Newcastle were wont to make
+eighteen voyages in the year to Cambridge with sea coal, now, since
+the blocking of the stream at Denver and the diversion of its waters
+at Earith, they can make but ten or twelve, whereby the price of fuel
+hath increased by half." When this first sluice was "blown up" by the
+tide in 1713 there were loud rejoicings. The consequences, however,
+proved so serious, that the next generation was fain to see it
+replaced.
+
+Lynn is the point to which the road we have been following ultimately
+leads. On leaving Ely by this road, the first turn to the right will
+bring us down to the famous Roslyn (or Roswell) Pit, beloved of
+geologists and botanists. It is a large water-filled excavation by the
+side of the railway, nurturing various rare water plants, and
+presenting the wonderful spectacle of chalk lying _above_
+boulder-clay, a phenomenon now attributed to ice action.[236]
+
+[Footnote 236: See Hughes' _Geography of Cambridgeshire_.]
+
+[Illustration: _St. Wendreda's Church, March._]
+
+The western declivity of the Island plunges down to the fen at Mepal,
+on the New Bedford River. After crossing this, the road leads straight
+across the fen to Chatteris, and is called Ireton's Way; the causeway
+on which it runs having been made by that great Puritan general, for
+strategic purposes, during the Civil War. Chatteris was the first of
+the wonderful chain of Abbeys which swept round the Fenland from Ely
+into Lincolnshire. The others are Ramsey and Peterborough on the last
+verge of the mainland; with Thorney and Crowland, rising, like
+Chatteris, on islands in the morass.[237] Of these, Chatteris and
+Thorney alone are in Cambridgeshire; though Peterborough is within
+half a mile of the county boundary. The former, a nunnery, was founded
+by the Lady Alwyn, foster-mother to Edgar the Peacemaker. It was never
+a large House, and no remains of it survive; but Chatteris is now the
+seat of another Benedictine community, exiled from France in 1901. The
+place possesses some curious wells of warm water, not of any great
+depth, as such usually are, but penetrating only some ten or twelve
+feet into the fen deposits. Local chemical decomposition is supposed
+to account for the phenomenon. The fen hereabouts is rich in
+geological and archaeological remains. And within sight of his mother's
+convent, only six miles away across the fen, her son (also an Alwyn),
+the Alderman or Earl of the district, founded, on the projecting cape
+of the Huntingdonshire mainland, the much larger abbey of Ramsey,
+whose abbot was one of the higher or "mitred" class, privileged to
+give the "Minor" Orders (_i.e._ those beneath the grade of Deacon).
+
+[Footnote 237: The history of the Houses outside our county we only
+touch upon where connected with spots inside.]
+
+Thorney was of earlier date; coeval, indeed, with Peterborough. Of its
+foundation a graphic description is given by the chronicler. After
+telling how King Wulfhere of Mercia (whose wife was sister to St.
+Etheldreda), endowed Peterborough and its abbot Sexwulf with broad
+possessions, he continues:
+
+     "Then said the King: 'This gift is little, but it is my will they
+     hold it so royally and so freely that neither geld nor fee be
+     taken from it....And thus free will I make this Minster, that it
+     be under Rome alone: and my will it is that all we who may not go
+     to Rome visit St. Peter here.'
+
+     "While thus he spake, the Abbot prayed of him that he would give
+     him whatsoever he should ask. And the King granted him. Then said
+     the Abbot: 'Here have I God-fearing monks, who would fain live as
+     anchorites (_i.e._, hermits), knew they but where. And here is an
+     island which is called Ancarig[238] (Thorney). And my boon is
+     that we might there build a Minster, to the glory of St. Mary, so
+     that they who would lead the life of peace and rest may dwell
+     therein.'
+
+     "Then the King answered and said: 'Beloved Sexwulf, lo! not only
+     that which thou hast asked, but all else on our Lord's behalf I
+     thus approve and grant.' ... And King Wulfhere first confirmed it
+     by word, and after subscribed it with his fingers on the Cross
+     of Christ" (_i.e._ he signed his name with a cross, on which he
+     laid his finger, saying, "I deliver this as my act and deed," as
+     we do with the seal on a deed at present. Seals did not come in
+     till the Norman Conquest). Amongst the witnesses to his signature
+     we find "Wilfrid the Priest, who was afterwards Bishop," _i.e._
+     the great St. Wilfrid of Ripon.
+
+[Footnote 238: This name has probably nothing to do with "anchorite,"
+but is of Celtic derivation.]
+
+Thorney, however, was long in rising to abbatial dignity, and remained
+the abode of anchorites, so humble and so sequestered that in the
+great Danish raid of 870, when Ely and every other Religious House
+throughout the Fenland was destroyed, the plunderers did not take the
+trouble to seek it out, and it became a haven of refuge for the
+survivors of the sack of Crowland. The story is graphically told in
+the "Chronicle of Crowland"; in its present form probably a thirteenth
+century work, but obviously compiled from earlier sources.
+
+After describing vividly the utter overthrow, at a great battle in
+Kesteven (West Lincolnshire), of the local forces hastily called out
+to meet the Danish host, he tells how a few poor fugitives got them to
+the Church of Crowland, and interrupted the Midnight Service with
+their crushing tidings.
+
+     "At this news all was confusion. And the Abbot, keeping with
+     himself the oldest of the monks and a few of the children (of the
+     Abbey School), bade all those in their prime to take along with
+     them the sacred relics of the monastery (namely the holy body of
+     St. Guthlac, his scourge, and his psalter) and the other chief
+     treasures, and thus to flee into the neighbouring fens. With
+     sorrow of heart did they his bidding, and, having laden a boat
+     with the aforesaid relics and the charters of the Kings, they
+     cast into the cloister well the frontal of the High Altar (which
+     was covered with plates of gold) along with ten chalices ... and
+     other vessels. But the end of the frontal, so long was it, always
+     showed above the water; whereupon they drew it out and left it
+     with the Abbot; for ever could they see the flames of the towns
+     in Kesteven draw nigher and nigher, and feared lest the Heathen
+     should on a sudden burst in upon them. So took they boat, and
+     came unto the wood of Ancarig on the southern march of their
+     islet. And here abode they with Brother Toretus, an anchorite,
+     and other brethren, then dwelling there, four days, thirty in
+     all, of whom ten were priests. But the Abbot, and two old men
+     with him, hid the aforesaid frontal outside the church, to the
+     North; and afterwards he and all the rest clad in their sacred
+     vestments, met in Choir, and kept the Hours of Divine Service
+     according to their Rule. And the whole of the Psalms of David
+     went they through from end to end. After this sang they High
+     Mass, the Abbot himself being Celebrant....
+
+     "Now, when the Mass was drawing to an end, and the Abbot and his
+     deacon and subdeacon and the taper-bearers had already
+     communicated in the Holy Mysteries, came the Heathen bursting
+     into the church. And upon the very Altar, by the cruel hand of
+     King Oscytel, was the venerable Abbot himself sacrificed, a true
+     martyr and victim of Christ. All they who stood round and
+     ministered with him were beheaded by the savages; and the aged
+     men and children, as they fled from the Choir, were taken and
+     questioned under the bitterest tortures, to make them show the
+     treasures of the church. Dom[239] Asker, the Prior, was slain in
+     the vestry, and Dom Lethwyn, Sub-prior, in the refectory. Behind
+     him there followed close Brother Turgar, a ten year child,
+     shapely, and of a fair countenance; who, when he saw his superior
+     slain, besought earnestly that he too might be slain with him.
+     But Earl Sidroc the Younger, touched with pity for the lad,
+     stripped him of his cowl, and gave him a Danish cloak, bidding
+     him follow everywhere his steps.... And thus, out of all who
+     abode in the Monastery, old and young, he alone was saved; coming
+     and going amongst the Danes throughout all his sojourn amongst
+     them, even as one of themselves, through this Earl's favour and
+     protection.
+
+     [Footnote 239: _Dominus_ is thus abbreviated amongst
+     Benedictines.]
+
+     "Now when all the monks had been done to death by the torturers,
+     and no whit of the Abbey treasures shown thereby, the Danes, with
+     spades and ploughshares, brake open right and left all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints round about that of St. Guthlac. On the
+     right was that of St. Cissa, priest and anchorite, and of St.
+     Bettelin, a man of God, erst an attendant on St. Guthlac, and of
+     Dom Siward (the Abbot) of blessed memory. And on the left was
+     that of St. Egbert, St. Guthlac's scribe and confessor, and of
+     St. Tatwin, the pilot who guided St. Guthlac to Crowland.... All
+     these did the savages burst open, looking to find treasure
+     therein. And finding none, they were filled with indignation; and
+     piling up all these holy bodies on a heap, in piteous wise, they
+     set fire to them, and, on the third day after their coming, that
+     is to say, on the 7th of the Kalends of October (September 25),
+     they utterly consumed them, church and monastery and all.
+
+     "But on the fourth day off they went, with countless droves of
+     beasts and pack-horses, to Medehampstead (Peterborough). And
+     there, dashing at the outer precinct of the Monastery, with its
+     barred gates, they assailed the walls on every side with arrows
+     and machines. At the second assault the Heathen brake in, and, in
+     the very breach, Tubba, the brother of Earl Hubba, fell
+     grievously wounded by a stone cast. By the hands of his guards he
+     was borne into the tent of Hubba his brother, and despaired even
+     of life. Then did Hubba's rage boil over, and he was altogether
+     wild against the monks, so that he slew with his own hand every
+     soul clad in the religious habit; the rest sprang upon the rest;
+     not one in the whole Monastery was saved; both the venerable
+     Abbot Hedda, and all his monks, and all the lay-brethren were
+     massacred; and Brother Turgar was warned by his master, Earl
+     Sidroc, never anywhere to cross the path of Earl Hubba. Every
+     altar was uprooted, every monument broken in pieces, the great
+     library of holy books burnt, the plenteous store of monastic
+     papers scattered to the winds; the precious relics of the holy
+     virgins Kineburgh, Kinswith, and Tibba,[240] trodden under foot;
+     the walls utterly overthrown; the buildings burnt up, church and
+     all, blazing with a bright flame for five whole days after.
+
+     [Footnote 240: Kineburgh and Kinswith were sisters of Wulfhere,
+     the first Christian King of Mercia. Tibba is usually identified
+     with St. Ebba of Coldingham.]
+
+     "Then on the fourth day the Host drew together, with spoil beyond
+     tale from all the country round, and set off towards Huntingdon.
+     The two Sidroc Earls, at the crossing of the rivers, ever came
+     last, to guard the rear of the whole army. Now all their host had
+     passed over the river Nene safely; but, as they were themselves
+     crossing, they had the bad luck to lose two carts, laden with
+     untold wealth and plenishing, which sank in a deep eddy of the
+     stream to the left of the stone bridge, so that horses and all
+     were drowned before they could be got out. And while the whole
+     household of Earl Sidroc the younger was busied in drawing out
+     these same carts, and in transferring the spoil to other waggons
+     and carriages, Brother Turgar slipped away and fled to the
+     neighbouring forest. All night did he walk, and with the earliest
+     dawn came into Crowland. There he found his fellow monks, who had
+     got back from Thorney the day before, and were hard at work
+     putting out the fires, which still had the mastery in many of the
+     ruins of the Monastery.
+
+     "And when they saw him safe and sound they were somewhat
+     comforted; but on hearing from him where their Abbot and the
+     other Superiors and Brethren lay slain, and how all the
+     sepulchres of the Saints were broken down, and all the monuments,
+     and all the holy books and all the sacred bodies burnt up, all
+     were stricken with grief unspeakable; and long was the
+     lamentation and mourning that was made. Satiated at length with
+     weeping, they turned again to putting out the conflagration. And
+     when they raised the ruins of the church roof about the High
+     Altar, they found the body of their venerable father and abbot,
+     Theodore, beheaded, stripped, half burnt, and bruised, and
+     crushed into the earth by the fallen timbers. This was on the
+     eighth day after his murder, and a little away from the spot
+     where he was slaughtered. And the other ministers, who fell with
+     him, found they in like manner crushed into the ground by the
+     weight of the beams--all save Wulfric the taper-bearer.
+
+     "But not all at once. For the bodies of some of the Brethren were
+     not found till half a year after their martyrdom, and not in the
+     places where they were slain. For Dom Paulinus and Dom Herbert,
+     very old men, and decrepit, whose hands were cut off and
+     themselves tortured to death in the Choir, were found, after a
+     diligent search, not there but in the Chapterhouse. In like
+     manner Dom Grimketyl and Dom Egmund, both some hundred years old,
+     who had been thrust through with swords in the Cloister, were
+     found in the Parlour. And the rest too, both children and old
+     men, were sought for in divers places, even as Brother Turgar
+     told just how each had been slain; and at last were all found,
+     with many a doleful plaint and many a tear, save Wulfric only.
+     And Dom Brickstan, once the Precentor of the monastery, a most
+     skilful musician and poet, who was amongst the survivors, wrote
+     on the ashes of Crowland that Lament which is so well known and
+     begins thus:
+
+       'Desolate how dost thou sit, who late wast Queen among Houses
+        Church so noble of old; erst so beloved of God.'
+
+          (Quomodo sola sedes, dudum regina domorum,
+           Nobilis ecclesia, et nuper amica Dei).
+
+     "Now when the Monastery, after long and hard work, was cleared,
+     so far as was then possible, from filth and ashes, they took
+     counsel on choosing them a Pastor; and when the election was
+     held, the venerable Father Godric, though much against his will,
+     was made Abbot. To him came that venerable old man Toretus, the
+     Prior of Thorney, and his Sub-prior, Dom Tissa, both anchorites
+     of the utmost sanctity. And devoutly they prayed him that he
+     would deign to take with him certain Brethren and come to
+     Peterborough, and give, of his charity, Christian burial to the
+     bodies of their Abbot and the other Brethren, which yet remained
+     unburied and exposed to beasts and birds. The Abbot gave heed
+     unto their prayer, and with many of the brethren (amongst them
+     Brother Turgar) came unto Peterborough, where all the Brethren of
+     Thorney met him. And with much labour the bodies of all the monks
+     of that Monastery were got together, 84 by tale, and buried in
+     one wide grave in the midst of the Abbey cemetery, over against
+     what was once the East End of the Church. This was on St.
+     Cecilia's day (November 22).
+
+     "And over the body of the Abbot, as he lay amid his children, he
+     placed a three-sided stone, three feet high and three long and
+     one broad, bearing carved likenesses of the Abbot, and his monks
+     standing around him. And this stone, in memory of the ruined
+     Abbey, bade he thenceforward to be called Medehampstead. And once
+     in every year, while he lived, did he visit it; and, pitching his
+     tent above the stone, said Mass for two days with instant
+     devotion for the souls of those there buried.
+
+     "Through the midst of that cemetery there ran the King's highway
+     (_Via Regia_); and this stone was on the right thereof, as one
+     comes up from the aforesaid stone bridge towards Holland (S.E.
+     Lincolnshire); and on the left stood a stone cross bearing a
+     carven image of the Saviour; which our Abbot Godric then set
+     there, to the intent that travellers who passed by might be
+     mindful of that holy Abbey, and pray to the Lord for the souls of
+     the Faithful who lay in that cemetery."
+
+The Abbot of Thorney was also "mitred," and the House ranked as second
+only to Ely in the county. William of Malmesbury (A.D. 1135) describes
+it as "a little paradise, delightsome as heaven itself may be deemed,
+fen-circled, yet rich in loftiest trees, where water-meadows delight
+the eye with rich green, where streamlets glide unchecked through each
+field. Scarce a spot of ground lies there waste; here are orchards,
+there vineyards. Nature vies with culture, and what is unknown to the
+one is produced by the other. And what of the glorious buildings,
+whose very size it is a wonder that the ground can support amid such
+marshes? A vast solitude is here the monks' lot, that they may the
+more closely cling to things above. If a woman is there seen, she is
+counted a monster, but strangers, if men, are greeted as angels
+unawares. Yet there none speaketh, save for the moment; all is holy
+silence.... Truly I may call that island a hostel of chastity, a
+tavern of honesty, a gymnasium of divine philosophy. From its dense
+thickets it is called Thorney."
+
+At the draining of the Fens, in the seventeenth century, Thorney was
+assigned to the Earls (now Dukes) of Bedford, who, during the
+nineteenth century alone, have expended on their Thorney estates
+nearly L2,000,000. Yet the Thorney property does not even pay its way.
+The noble owners have, however, their reward in the genuine success
+which has crowned the experiment from a philanthropic point of view.
+Thanks to their efforts, Thorney is again, as in the old days of the
+Benedictines, a smiling, well-wooded oasis amid the dreary Fenland;
+where the welfare of the tenantry is, as of old, the chief object of
+the landlord, and where, in consequence, pauperism, drunkenness, and
+crime are alike practically unknown. The remains of the Abbey Church
+are still used for parochial worship, but only 117 of its original 290
+feet of length have survived Henry the Eighth's demolitions.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+     Draining of Fens.--Monastic Works, Morton's Leam.--Diversion of
+     Ouse.--Local Government, Jurats, Discontent.--Jacobean
+     polemics.--First Drainage Company.--Rising of Fen-men.--Second
+     Company, Huguenot Labourers.--Third Company, Earl of Bedford,
+     Vermuyden.--Old River.--Cromwell.--Fourth Company, Prisoner
+     Slaves, New River, Denver Sluice.--Later Developments.
+
+
+The thought of the Fenland Abbeys leads on to the fascinating story of
+the draining of the fens. For the monks were the first to reclaim from
+the morass such little patches of ground as each Abbey could bank in,
+and to discover how very fertile such reclaimed soil is. Their early
+chronicles speak with rapture of the hay that could be mown three
+times a year, and the amazing fecundity of the corn-land. Thus it was
+their interest constantly to be enclosing fresh acres. They
+discovered, too, that by judiciously letting in the flood water on to
+a field they could get a fresh deposit of silt, and gradually raise
+the level of the soil. And the first attempt at drainage work on a
+large scale was also due to a monk, Bishop Morton, Abbot of Ely, who
+in 1480 cut the twelve mile long "Leam," or channel, which still bears
+his name, to divert the River Nene from its long meandering course
+through Whittlesea Mere and Outwell, and to bring it straight to
+Wisbech.
+
+Thus it came about that the reclamation of the fens went hand in hand
+with the prosperity of the Abbeys around them. When these were
+prosperous, the whole district prospered; when misfortune befell them,
+the fens likewise suffered; and it often took many years for the marks
+of the ruin to be effaced. After the wholesale destruction wrought by
+the great Danish raid of 870, centuries did not suffice for this. The
+story we have just told of the sack of Crowland clearly shows that
+the place was then accessible by land. But in the hundred and fifty
+years of desolation that followed, such works as the brethren had
+effected fell into decay, and the land once more became waterlogged.
+Even when William of Malmesbury wrote, in the twelfth century, he
+tells us that Crowland could still only be reached by boat. And the
+yet more wholesale destruction wrought by Henry the Eighth was
+followed by a like period of reversion to waste.
+
+The zeal, however, of these early civilisers was not always according
+to knowledge; and at quite an early date a grievous mistake was made,
+which caused endless difficulties ever after, and still affects the
+whole drainage system of the district. This was the cutting, at some
+date between 1215 and 1270, of a leam, not two miles long, from the
+Great Ouse at Littleport to the Little Ouse,[241] thereby diverting
+the waters of the former into the channel of the latter, and bringing
+their united volume into the sea at Lynn. Before that date the Great
+Ouse ran from Littleport to Outwell, where it was met by the Nene, and
+by a branch of the Little Ouse. The joint river was called the Well
+Stream, and poured into the sea at Wisbech.
+
+[Footnote 241: The Little Ouse drains the south-western districts of
+Norfolk.]
+
+That this had been the age-long course of the Fenland waters is shown
+by the existence of a huge Roman sea wall running round the old coast
+line from Lynn to Wisbech, and from Wisbech to Sutton in Lincolnshire.
+This wall traces for us the outline of a great tidal estuary running
+up to Wisbech, which continued an estuary even to the eighteenth
+century. But the diversion of the greater part of its river water to
+Lynn proved fatal to it. Such stream as was left, scarcely more than
+that of the Nene, could not, at the ebb, scour out the channel through
+the sands which the flood-tide continually tended to silt up. Wisbech
+became more and more shut off from the sea, and is now ten miles away
+from it. And further, the inability to escape quickly enough through
+these choking sands drove the river water at Wisbech back upon itself
+and forced it to "drown" the neighbouring fens; while at Lynn the same
+disastrous effect was produced by the new volume of water being too
+great for the narrow bed of the Little Ouse and flooding over the
+banks all round. The Marshland, as the Norfolk district protected by
+the Roman wall was called, suffered especially from this result of
+interfering with Nature.
+
+Nor did it prove possible to undo the mischief. When once a short cut
+has been made for a great river, it is no easy matter to turn the
+stream back into its old tortuous course; and, when once an estuary
+has got thoroughly silted up, it is yet more difficult to restore it
+to its old condition. Throughout the Middle Ages constant complaints
+were made, and occasional attempts; but these were always brought to
+nought by some conflicting interest or other which got the ear of the
+Government. The fen problem was early recognised as a matter of
+national concern, and, from the time of Edward the First onwards, the
+Crown tried to grapple with it, but by hopelessly futile methods.
+
+To begin with, the system of Local Government already established for
+the regulation of Romney Marsh in Kent was extended to the Fenland.
+The Sheriff was bound to summon twenty-four "jurats" from the
+inhabitants of the neighbourhood, to deal with each difficulty as it
+arose. But a plan which worked well enough for a district only some
+ten miles by fifteen, and with no river to speak of, was wholly
+inadequate to deal with the huge area and mighty forces of the
+Fenland, even when this was divided (as it still is for drainage
+purposes) into three "Levels," "North," "Middle," and "South." The
+jurats hated their invidious office, and were themselves hated by the
+inhabitants; each man always declaring that they had saddled him with
+repairs which ought to have been laid upon some neighbour, and each
+man ready to see his own land "drown" rather than put in a single
+spadeful of work which, in his view, should have been someone else's
+job.
+
+Besides, the drain or the dam or the embankment which was good for one
+set of interests was bad for another. We have seen how Cambridge
+complained of the erection of Denver Sluice; and like grievances fill
+page after page of the Plantagenet Rolls. The men of Lynn complain
+that whereas they were of old able to sail straight to Peterborough,
+only thirty miles, they now have to go round by Littleport, over fifty
+miles, owing to the erection of a dam by the jurats. And, again, that
+a new cut has so diverted the waters that they can no longer take
+"navigable" (_i.e._ sea-going) vessels to Yaxley and Holme in
+Huntingdonshire, "whereby our trade is greatly decayed." Loud and
+incessant are the cries from all quarters (except Lynn alone) to
+"bring back the waters into their natural outfall" at Wisbech. But
+this, as we have said, had become beyond the power of man; and,
+despite the well-meant efforts of the unhappy jurats, and of such
+philanthropists as Bishop Morton, things kept getting worse decade by
+decade; till the suppression of the Abbeys completed the ruin, and the
+fens became the dismal tangle of decayed waterways, small and great,
+new and old, artificial and natural, usable and unusable, the
+unravelling of which occupied the next three centuries.
+
+Feeble efforts were locally made here and there to control the waters;
+but, as the historian Carter puts it, the next wet and windy winter
+"down comes the bailiff of Bedford (for so the country people call the
+overflowing of the river Ouse), attended, like a person of quality,
+with many servants (the accession of tributary brooks), and breaks
+down all their paper banks as not waterproof, reducing all to their
+former condition." He goes on to give a vivid description of the
+puzzle-headed conservatism with which the reformers had to contend:
+
+     "This accident put the wits of that and succeeding ages upon the
+     dispute of the feasibility of the design; and let us sum up the
+     arguments for and against this great undertaking.
+
+     "Argument 1. Some objected that God said to the water, 'Hitherto
+     shalt thou come, and no further.' It is therefore a trespass on
+     the Divine prerogative, for man to presume to give other bounds
+     to the water than what God hath appointed.
+
+     "Answer 1. The argument holdeth in application to the Ocean,
+     which is a wild horse, only to be broke, backed, and bridled by
+     Him who is the Maker thereof; but it is a false and lazy
+     principle if applied to fresh waters, from which human industry
+     may and hath rescued many considerable parcels of ground.
+
+     "Argument 2. Many have attempted but not effected it. None ever
+     wrestled with it, but it gave them a foil, if not a fall, to the
+     bruising, if not breaking, of their backs. Many have burnt their
+     fingers in these waters, and instead of draining the Fens have
+     emptied their own pockets.
+
+     "Answer 2. Many men's undertaking thereof implies the possibility
+     of the project; for it is not likely so many wise men should seek
+     for what is not to be found; the failing is not in the
+     improbability of the design, but in the undertakers either
+     wanting heads or hearts to pursue, or pay the people employed
+     therein.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+     "Argument 4. An alderman of Cambridge affirmed the Fens to be
+     like a crust of bread swimming in a dish of water. So that under
+     eight or ten feet earth it is nothing but mere water. Impossible
+     therefore the draining thereof, if surrounded by that liquid
+     element both above and below.
+
+     "Answer 4. Interest betrayed his judgment to an evident error,
+     and his brains seemed rather to swim than the floating earth; for
+     such as have sounded the depth of that ground find it to be Terra
+     Firma, and no doubt so solid to the centre as any other earth in
+     England.
+
+     "Argument 5. The river Grant or Cam (call it what you will),
+     running by Cambridge, will have its stream dried up by the
+     draining of the Fens. Now, as Cambridge is concerned in its
+     river, so that whole County, yea, this whole Kingdom, is
+     concerned in Cambridge. No reason, therefore, that private men's
+     particular profit should be preferred before an universal good,
+     or good of an University.
+
+     "Answer 5. It is granted the water by Cambridge kindles and keeps
+     in the fire therein; no hope of sufficient fuel on reasonable
+     rates, except care be taken for preserving the River navigable;
+     which may be done and the Fens drained nevertheless. To take away
+     the thief is no wasting or weakening of the wick of the candle.
+     Assurances may be given that no damage shall rebound to the
+     stream of Grant by stopping other superfluous waters.
+
+     "Argument 6. The Fens preserved in their present property afford
+     great plenty and variety of fish and fowl, which have therein
+     their seminaries and nurseries; the which will be destroyed on
+     the draining thereof, so that none will be had but at excessive
+     prices.
+
+     "Answer 6. A large first makes recompense for the shorter second
+     course of any man's table. And who will not prefer a tame sheep
+     before a wild duck? a good fat ox before a well-grown eel?
+
+     "Argument 7. The Fens afford plenty of sedge, turf, and reed; the
+     want whereof will be found if their nature be altered.
+
+     "Answer 7. These commodities are inconsiderable to balance the
+     profit of good grass and grain, which those grounds, if drained,
+     will produce. He cannot complain of wrong, who hath a suit of
+     buckram taken from him, and one of velvet given instead thereof.
+     Besides, provision may be made that a sufficiency of such
+     ware-trash may still be preserved.
+
+     "Argument 8. Many thousands of poor people are maintained by
+     fishing and fowling in the Fens, which will all be at a loss for
+     a livelihood if their farms be burnt; that is, if the Fens be
+     drained.
+
+     "Answer 8. It is confessed that many who love idleness live (and
+     only live) by that employment. But such, if the Fens were
+     drained, would quit their idleness, and betake themselves to more
+     lucrative manufactures.
+
+     "Argument 9. Grant that the Fens be drained with great
+     difficulty, they will quickly revert to their old condition, like
+     to the Pontine Marshes in Italy.
+
+     "Answer 9. If a patient, perfectly cured, will be careless of his
+     healthe, none will pity his relapse. Moderate cost, with constant
+     care, will easily preserve what is drained; the Low Countries
+     affording many proofs thereof.
+
+     "Argument 10. Grant them drained and so continuing; as now the
+     great fishes prey upon the less, so then wealthy men would devour
+     the poorer sort of people; injurious partage would follow upon
+     the inclosures, and rich men (to make room for themselves) would
+     jostle the poor people out of their Commons.
+
+     "Answer 10. Oppression is not essential either to draining or
+     enclosing, though too often a concomitant of both. Order may be
+     taken by Commissioners of quality, impowered for that purpose,
+     that such a proportion of Commons may be allotted to the poor
+     that all private persons may be pleased and advance accrue hereby
+     to the Commonwealth."
+
+The outcome of these vigorous polemics was that King James the First
+threw himself whole-heartedly into the idea of a general drainage
+scheme; and under his auspices a Company of "Adventurers" or
+"Undertakers" was formed to carry out the business. This, however, was
+regarded by the Fen-men as an unmitigated piece of tyranny; the
+Opposition in Parliament made violent protests; "Libellers" wrote
+inflammatory broadsides inciting the Fen-men to rise;[242] and the
+Fen-men, who wanted little inciting, did rise in no small numbers.
+Nocturnal raids destroyed every work begun by the Company's labourers;
+the labourers themselves were intimidated; and before long progress
+became impossible. The Company became bankrupt, and the thousands of
+reclaimed acres which were to have been divided amongst the
+"Adventurers" never actualised.
+
+[Footnote 242: A specimen of one of the "libels" is given by Dugdale:
+
+  "Come brethren of the water, and let us all assemble
+   To treat upon this matter, which makes us quake and tremble;
+   For we shall rue, if it be true the Fens be undertaken,
+   And where we feed in rush and reed, _they_ feed both beet and bacon.
+
+  "Away with boats and rudders, away with boots and scatches [skates],
+   No need of one nor t'other; men now make better matches.
+   Stilt-makers all and tanners complain of this disaster;
+   For they would make each muddy lake for Essex calves a pasture.
+
+  "Wherefore let us intreat our ancient Winter Nurses
+   To show their power so great, and help to drain _their purses_,
+   And send us good old Captain Flood to lead us out to battle,
+   Then Twopenny Jack, with scales on back, shall drive out all their cattle."
+
+["Jack" here simply means a pike, the average price of which at this
+time would seem to have been twopence. The "Winter Nurses" are the
+rivers feeding the Fen.]]
+
+[Illustration: THE OLD FENLAND
+
+(Northern District)]
+
+[Illustration: THE OLD FENLAND
+
+(Southern District)]
+
+The Crown, however, did not lose sight of the scheme. A special
+Commission of enquiry was formed, which sent in a most pessimistic
+Report, representing Wisbech as demanding that the "upland men" should
+contribute to the scouring of the outfall there, inasmuch as it
+drained their lands, to which the upland men retorted that Wisbech
+might mind its own business and bear its own burdens. "Hence the
+country about Crowland and Thorney, formerly good ground, hath become
+mere Lerna,[243]--which doth not only cause overflowing in the upland
+country, to their infinite loss, but the Islanders themselves are in
+like danger, as for their cattle and their own safety; out of fear
+whereof they oftentimes, upon the swelling of the waters, ring their
+bells backward, as in other places when the town is on fire."
+
+[Footnote 243: The Lernaean swamp was the legendary home of the famous
+Hydra overcome by Hercules.]
+
+So things dragged on till 1620, when another Company was formed by the
+King, again doomed to speedy failure.[244] Ten years later again,
+Charles the First took up his father's idea, and formed a third
+Company, placing at its head the powerful Earl of Bedford. His first
+act was to call in a Dutch engineer, Cornelius Vermuyden, acquainted
+with the drainage methods so successful in Holland, whose fee was an
+award of no less than 95,000 acres in the lands he might reclaim.
+Under the auspices of this expert was dug from Earith to Denver the
+Old Bedford River already spoken of.[245] But the local opposition was
+still too strong, fostered as it now was by the powerful influence of
+Oliver Cromwell; and it was not lessened when the King himself bought
+up the Company. His action was represented as one more encroachment
+upon the liberties of England, and a regular part of the Puritan
+programme was "to break the King's dykes, to drown his lands, and to
+destroy his tenants." These drastic measures proved only too
+effective; and, with the outbreak of the Civil War, this third
+attempt, like those before it, came to nought.
+
+[Footnote 244: The head of this company was Lord Popham, one of whose
+cuts is still called Popham's Eau. The last word reminds us that many
+of his settlers were exiled French Huguenots.]
+
+[Footnote 245: See p. 280.]
+
+When, however, that war was over, and Charles beheaded, Cromwell
+himself, now Lord Protector of the Realm, came forward as an advocate
+of the scheme, and formed yet a fourth Company, again under the Earl
+of Bedford, who had followed his fortunes, and again with Vermuyden
+for engineer. This time the result was permanent. Cromwell was, as the
+Fen-men speedily discovered, a far more dangerous personage to bully
+than they had found his predecessors at the head of the State.
+Troopers were quartered upon the malcontents, and a plentiful supply
+of extra cheap labour was furnished by the penal servitude of Scotch
+prisoners taken at Dunbar and Dutch sailors captured by Blake in the
+Channel. This method of making war pay its own expenses was familiar
+to Cromwell, who had already sold many shiploads of these gallant
+enemies as slaves, some to toil under the lash for the West Indian
+planters, some to tug at the oars of Venetian galleys. Happily, as he
+was the first Christian commander to adopt this all too thrifty
+procedure, so he was the last, and such atrocious exploitation of
+fellow Christians and fellow soldiers died with him.
+
+Thus was dug, in 1651, the New Bedford River, and thus was built,
+somewhat later, Denver Sluice. Vermuyden's plan, which continued for
+two centuries to be gradually developed on the lines he originally
+laid down, was to cut a few main water-courses through the district,
+running at a higher level than the swamps around, with Lynn for their
+chief outfall, and an infinite number of short straight cuts at right
+angles to these, whence the water draining from the morass should be
+pumped into them. This pumping was originally done by windmills, and a
+picturesque sight it was to see their white sails dotting the wide
+expanse. But all are now superseded by the less poetical but more
+dependable steam pumping stations, whose tall chimneys form a notable
+object in the Fenland landscape.
+
+The work was very gradual, with many drawbacks. The Denver Sluice, on
+which the whole plan depended, was, as has been said, destroyed in
+1713, and not rebuilt till 1750, when the very towns which had most
+rejoiced in its fall were the loudest in demanding its replacement.
+Other calamities also affected the work, which was not finally
+completed till towards the end of the nineteenth century. The
+opposition, too, was unceasing, though it took the form of lawsuits
+rather than violence. But this, too, died out. The very last of them
+was an attempt by Wisbech, in 1844, to force the hand of the Bedford
+Level Corporation (as the old Company of Adventurers is now called) by
+proposing a rival scheme in Parliament.
+
+Now, however, all is victory. For many years past the reclaimed fen
+has borne excellent crops; and if, since the agricultural depression
+of the later nineteenth century decades set in, it can no longer
+merit so fully as it did the title of "the Golden Plain of England,"
+yet the widespread cultivation of fruit and flowers (mostly narcissus)
+has furnished no small compensation, and the district as a whole
+enjoys a very large share of prosperity. At this moment the vast areas
+allotted to the great Adventurers are being largely broken up into
+small holdings, with the happiest results.
+
+Sentimentally, and even to a certain extent economically, we may
+regret the Fenland of old, with its vanished wealth of picturesque
+life; its reeds which made such splendid thatch, its marsh flowers,
+its butterflies, its shoals of fish, its endless skeins of wild-fowl,
+its clever "decoys" where these were taken in such exhaustless numbers
+that a single one (in 1750) sent up to London 3000 couples a week and
+let for L500 a year. But with these have also vanished the incessant
+fever and ague and rheumatism which were an ever-present torment in
+the old Fen life, and the incessant opium-eating in which the Fen-Folk
+were fain to find relief. Taking things altogether, the gain has
+outweighed the loss in the draining of the Fens.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+     Coveney.--Manea.--Doddington.--March, Angel
+     Roof.--Whittlesea.--Old Course of Ouse, Well Stream.--Upwell,
+     Outwell.--Emneth.--Elm.--The Marshland.--West
+     Walton.--Walsoken.--Walpole.--Cross
+     Keys.--Leverington.--Tydd.--Wisbech, Church, Trade, Castle,
+     Catholic Prisoners, Clarkson.--The Wash.--King John.
+
+
+In close contiguity to the Island of Ely, on the west, is a tiny
+satellite, which supports the little village of Coveney. Here the
+church has some remarkable modern woodwork from Oberammergau, the gift
+of Mr. Athelstan Riley. The pulpit is also remarkable, dating from
+1703 and being of Danish work. More remote are Manea and Stonea, both,
+happily for themselves, now on a railway line, but otherwise
+unspeakably inaccessible. It is strange at Manea to see the towers of
+Ely a short five miles away, and to know that twenty miles of bad road
+will scarcely get you there. Both names seem to have the same
+signification, Stone Island; which (as they are eminently unstony,
+being merely low elevations of gravel) may perhaps refer to the
+selenite crystals with which the ground here teems. Manea Station is
+one of the few inland places where the curvature of the earth can be
+clearly seen. The line (towards March) is perfectly straight and
+perfectly level, and along it you may observe the trains rising into
+sight over the horizon like ships at sea.
+
+March stands on a much larger island, seven miles in length. At its
+southern extremity is Doddington, where the fine Early English church
+was once the richest in England. It was the Mother Church of a wide
+district, including its whole island and the fens for miles around. As
+these were drained so did the value of the benefice increase, till it
+became worth over L7,000 per annum. Parliament then stepped in, and
+divided the parish (and income) into seven Rectories, three of these
+being in the town of March, a modern growth around its important
+railway junction at the furthest northern point of the island. A
+fourth is Old March, a quiet "village-hamlet" (as Cardinal Wolsey
+calls it) two miles south of its larger offspring. The church here is
+most exceptionally beautiful. It is a Perpendicular structure, with a
+fine crocketed spire and flint patterns in the outer walls of the
+clerestory. The roof is beyond all magnificent, with "an innumerable
+company of Angels" along its vista of double hammer-beams. A brass
+commemorates William Dredeman, the donor of this crowning glory, who
+died in 1503; and there is another to Catharine Hansard, 1517, on
+which the Annunciation is depicted. The church is dedicated to St.
+Wendreda, a purely local saint.[246] The Parish account-books here
+give a striking picture of the mutations of the Reformation period.
+There are payments "for pluckynge doun emags [images] in ye Chyrch and
+for drynkynge thereat" (1547); "for breckyng down the Altar and
+carrying forth ye stons" (1550); "for makyng the Hy Alter" (1553);
+"for pulling doun ye hy alter" (1558); and "for a comunion tabull"
+(1559).
+
+[Footnote 246: See p. 275.]
+
+March is the half-way house between Ely and Peterborough, and between
+it and the last-named lies Whittlesea, also on a good-sized island of
+its own, which extends nearly to the Northamptonshire mainland. It is
+a pleasant little town, with a picturesque market place, where the
+ancient Market House still rises in the centre. And its church almost
+rivals that of March, with a still more glorious spire. In 1335
+Whittlesea was the scene of a most unedifying conflict between the
+Abbeys of Ramsey and Ely. To begin with, the Abbot of Ramsey and his
+monks raided the lands at Whittlesea belonging to Ely, drove away
+sixteen horses, and (by firing the sedge) burned twenty others,
+besides ten oxen, eighty cows, and one hundred swine, along with much
+grass, reeds, and other property. In retaliation for this outrage the
+Prior of Ely (and he, too, the saintly Prior Crauden) organised a
+regular military expedition, and came, at the head of the whole Abbey
+musters, "with banners flying as in war," to Ramsey itself, where, as
+that House complains, he "hewed down our woods, depastured our grass,
+and drove off our cattle." Both parties appealed to the King; but the
+discreditable transaction seems to have ended in a compromise. That
+such wild work should be possible at all in England reminds us that at
+this date the country had not yet recovered from the confusions
+attendant on the fall and murder of Edward the Second eight years
+before.
+
+Till the latter part of the nineteenth century Whittlesea gave its
+name to a famous mere, lying to the south of the town, and on the very
+border of the fens. It was a sheet of shallow water a couple of miles
+in length and breadth, and furnished a splendid field for angling,
+skating, and boat-sailing. Its shallowness made it none the less
+dangerous; for the bottom was fathomless ooze, so soft that the
+punting poles used here had to be furnished with a round board at
+their extremities, and demanded special skill, for if you once let
+this board get underneath the mud, it was much more likely to pull you
+in than you to pull it out.
+
+Other islets of the fen archipelago are Murrow, between Thorney and
+Wisbech, Westry near March, and Welney, on the Old Bedford river to
+the north of Manea. The name of the last reminds us that by it ran the
+old Well Stream, long robbed of its waters by their diversion to Lynn
+in the thirteenth century. To this day, however, its course may be
+traced on the map by the meandering boundary between Cambridgeshire
+and Norfolk across the fen. Following this line northwards we shortly
+come to the outskirts of the firm ground on which Wisbech stands, an
+_artificial_ island dating from Roman times and owing its existence to
+the great Roman sea wall around the Wash.
+
+Through this island ran the great Well Stream, giving their names to
+the villages (or rather the village, for they form a continuous row of
+houses) of Upwell and Outwell. This is the longest village in England,
+stretching on either side of the road for nearly five unbroken miles.
+It contains over 5,000 inhabitants, and lies partly in Cambridgeshire
+partly in Norfolk. The churches are in the latter county, and are
+grand specimens of the splendid series of churches which glorify the
+Marshland, as this district by the Wash has for ages been named. Both
+are of Perpendicular date, with a tower somewhat older. That of Upwell
+has an elaborate turret for the Sanctus bell. The canopy over the
+pulpit is still more elaborate. The roof has a series of angels, but
+far less numerous and effective than those at March. At Outwell there
+is a fine Decorated door, like that of Barrington.
+
+[Illustration: _Elm Church._]
+
+Emneth, on the further road to Wisbech, also has an angel roof, of
+specially interesting character. Each figure is holding some symbol of
+the Faith; one the Host, another a candlestick, another a Gospel-book.
+At Elm, hard by, may be seen a still more interesting development of
+church architecture. The tower is Early English, enriched on its
+internal face with exquisite shafting, and opening into the nave by an
+Early English arch. But both shafting and arch must have been
+insertions in much older work, for between the two may be seen the
+high-pitched string-course and the rude little window of the original
+Saxon church. The nave is also Early English (clerestory and all,
+which is rare hereabouts), while the chancel is Decorated, with its
+roof higher than that of the nave.
+
+Here at a farm house called Needham Hall (from a famous historic
+mansion formerly on the site) is shown an old table formed of one
+solid piece of oak, on which Oliver Cromwell is said to have once
+slept. When he arrived here at the head of his command during the
+Civil War, he chose this rude couch in preference to the best bed in
+the house, that he might fare no better than his men, who were
+bivouacking in the yard and outhouses.
+
+The churches along the Roman sea-wall on either side of the old Well
+Stream estuary are also of rare magnificence. To the east, in Norfolk,
+we find a series of villages deriving their names from the wall
+itself,--Walsoken, West Walton, Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St.
+Andrew. In every one of these the church is a joy; above all at West
+Walton, with its bell-tower (fifty yards to the south of the main
+building) uplifted on four graceful arches enriched with dog-tooth
+moulding. Octangular buttresses support the angles, which are
+ornamented with blank lancet arches. The next floor has on each side
+an arcade of three lancets, and the storey above a window of two
+lights beneath an arch of two mouldings, forming a splay of four
+banded pillars. No more perfect gem of composition exists; and the
+Perpendicular parapet which now crowns it very inadequately takes the
+place of the spire which seems to have been purposed by the original
+builder. The church itself displays similar features of Early English
+grace. The nave pillars have Purbeck marble shafts, with beautifully
+foliated capitals, and the clerestory is pierced with seventeen small
+archlets, alternately blind and light.
+
+Walsoken, now practically a suburb of Wisbech, has a Perpendicular
+shell around a Norman nave, which is (next to Norwich Cathedral) the
+best example of the style in all Norfolk. The chancel arch is a
+deservedly famous specimen of Transition work. It springs from six
+banded pillars, and has a soffit exquisitely worked with zig-zags and
+cusps. The screens of the chapels which formerly occupied the east end
+of either aisle are rich Perpendicular woodwork. The roof is also
+Perpendicular, with angels on the transome beams.
+
+Walpole St. Peter's is even more remarkable; for there is actually an
+ancient right of way through it, _underneath the Altar_. The
+thirteenth century chancel, with its five large Decorated windows on
+either side, ascends by no fewer than eleven steps from the nave to
+make room for this unique passage way. The five windows of the nave
+are of the earliest and best Perpendicular, and its eastern gable is
+crowned with three beautifully proportioned pinnacles. In this parish
+is the hamlet of Cross Keys, the name of which is sometimes supposed
+to be connected with St. Peter. But it is much more probably the
+_quay_ at the starting point of the ancient low-tide passage across
+the sands of the estuary which led to Sutton Crosses on the
+Lincolnshire side, five miles away, and which played, as we shall
+shortly tell, so notable a part in English history. From Walpole the
+sea-wall sweeps round by Terrington to Lynn. But here we are far in
+Norfolk. We must not, however, forget that we owe one of our Cambridge
+Colleges to Terrington, for Dr. Gonville, while Vicar here, founded in
+1347 his "College of the Annunciation," the embryo of Caius College.
+
+[Illustration: _Walpole St. Peter._]
+
+On the Cambridgeshire side of the Well Stream we also find churches
+fully equal to those on the Norfolk bank. Leverington is one specially
+to be noted, with its beautiful steeple, an Early English tower
+surmounted by a Decorated spire so exquisitely proportioned that it
+seems absolutely to melt away into the sky. There is also a fine
+Decorated porch with a stone-roofed parvis chamber of original and
+singular beauty. The chancel is also Decorated, while the grand nave
+is Perpendicular. The font, too, is Perpendicular, an octagonal
+structure of oolite, with richly ornamented niches on every face, each
+containing the head of a saint in high relief. The east window of the
+north aisle retains much of its ancient glass, proving it to be a
+"Jesse" window, tracing the descent of Christ from that patriarch
+through David.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tydd St. Giles lies at the northernmost extremity of the Isle of Ely,
+where the "Shire Drain" divides the village from its sister parish of
+Tydd St. Mary in Lincolnshire. Here, too, the church is remarkable,
+having its tower fifty feet beyond the East End, a unique position. Like
+Leverington, it has a specially fine octagonal font, richly traceried,
+and carved with emblems of the Passion and with the arms of the See of
+Ely. In the floor of the nave is a thirteenth century gravestone,
+bearing a floriated cross, and the legend (in Old English characters):
+"Orate.pro.anima.dni John.Fysner, cujus.aie.deus.ppiciet.Amen." (Pray
+for the soul of Mr. John Fysner, on whose soul may God be merciful.)
+
+On one of the pillars is a more interesting inscription in rude
+capital letters, much worn. It is in French, and would seem to be of
+the early fourteenth century, when that language was becoming very
+fashionable in England, as our current legal phraseology still shows.
+It runs thus:--
+
+  CEST . PILER . CVME
+  NCAT . RICARD . LE . PRE
+  STRE . PRIMER . PRE
+  YEZ . PVR . LVI
+
+_i.e._ in modern French: "Ce pilier commenca Ricard le Pretre
+premierement. Priez pour lui"; and in English "This pillar Richard the
+Priest first began. Pray for him."
+
+After having told of so much loveliness all around, it is
+disappointing to be obliged to confess that at Wisbech itself, the
+metropolis of the northern Fenland, the church is comparatively
+commonplace. Not that it is otherwise than a fine structure, and, like
+Great Yarmouth, splendidly wide, having a double nave and a double
+chancel; but it is hopelessly outclassed by those in the neighbouring
+villages. The best feature is the tower, which is richly ornamented
+with sacred and heraldic devices of the later Perpendicular period.
+And in the nave is a fine fifteenth century brass. Otherwise there is
+little to say about it; and, indeed, little to say about Wisbech at
+all. It is a picturesque old place, with that somewhat pathetic
+picturesqueness of an ancient seaport town which the sea has deserted.
+
+Wisbech, however, is not by any means a "dead city." It has 10,000
+inhabitants, and keen local ambitions, which have developed an
+excellent museum and other up-to-date municipal equipment. Modern
+energy and science have, moreover, made so effective a waterway
+through the ten miles of silted-up estuary that vessels of 3,000 tons
+can now, at high tide, reach the wharf. Such, however, are almost
+unknown visitants. Last year (1909) the vessels clearing from the port
+numbered 209, of 36,000 tons in all. Two of these are registered at
+Wisbech itself, as are also twelve sea-fishing boats. A characteristic
+photograph of Wisbech's shipping is given by Mrs. Hughes in the
+"Geography of Cambridgeshire" (p. 118). Other photographs (pp. 47, 48)
+show the great height to which the tide rises in the river, there
+being a difference of over twenty feet between high and low water
+mark. The Nene still has its outfall here, and flows through the town
+in a fine sweep locally called the Brink.
+
+It is hard to believe that this Brink is not the Beach whence the name
+of the town is vulgarly supposed to be derived. But you must not
+suggest this to a Wisbech man. The single vowel is an integral part of
+local faith and local pride, and to insert the "a" is to show yourself
+a hopeless outsider. With it the name would come from _Ouse-beach_
+(like Land-beach and Water-beach near Cambridge). Without it the
+derivation is _Ouse-beck_. This last syllable is a Scandinavian word,
+well known throughout the north of England, and there signifying a
+running brook. Throughout the Fenland it is frequently used for a
+drain. But can the mighty Well Stream of the Ouse, at its tidal
+outfall here, have ever suggested either drain or brook to the men of
+old who named the place? And can these have been Scandinavians?
+
+[Illustration: _Leverington._]
+
+The chief oversea trade of Wisbech is in timber from Norway; and it
+also does a large traffic in fruit, flowers, and vegetables, which are
+extensively grown hereabouts. In this neighbourhood, moreover, may be
+seen a much rarer cultivated crop, nothing less primitive than the
+woad with which the ancient Britons dyed their bodies; though it is a
+mistake to suppose that this dye took the place of clothing, for as
+far back as history traces them they were quite fairly civilised, and
+used woad only for tattooing, like sailors.[247] It is now used for
+dyeing cloth. "An old woad mill, built of turf blocks arranged in the
+ancient herring-bone pattern, with a timber and reed-thatched roof,
+can still be seen at the village of Parson's Drove, about six miles
+from Wisbech. The plant (_Isatis tinctoria_) grows about six feet
+high, and has a blue-green leaf and bright yellow flower; the people
+still call it by its old name, _w[-a]d_. The young plants are
+delicate, and the crop requires much care. It is weeded by men and
+women clad in hardened skirts and leathern knee-caps, who creep along
+the ground and take out the weeds with a curious little handspade
+which fits into the palm. The plant is picked by hand. The leaves are
+crushed to a pulp in the mill by rude conical crushing wheels dragged
+round by horses, and are then worked by hand into large balls and laid
+on "fleaks" of twined hazel, or on planks, in special sheds, for three
+months to dry. After this, the balls are thrown together, mixed with
+water and allowed to ferment in a dark house for five or six weeks.
+The woad is then rammed into casks and is ready to be sold to cloth
+manufacturers."[248]
+
+[Footnote 247: See my _Roman Britain_, p. 47.]
+
+[Footnote 248: Hughes' _Geography of Cambs._, p. 97, where there is an
+interesting photograph of this Woad Mill.]
+
+Wisbech plays but little part in history. Its position at the
+convergence of the two great Roman sea-walls, east and west of the
+estuary, makes it pretty certain that they must have had a station
+here; but, if so, it has wholly passed out of memory. Wisbech Castle
+is said to have been built by William the Conqueror, and certainly
+existed in the time of King John. It passed into the possession of the
+Bishops of Ely, and was rebuilt by two famous holders of the See,
+Bishop Morton, the designer and excavator of Morton's Leam,[249] and
+Bishop Alcock, the Founder of Jesus College, Cambridge.[250] Both
+these prelates were singularly thoroughgoing reformers. The former
+went into minute details about the dress of his clergy, forbidding
+them to wear gaudy attire (such as "lirripoops" or gowns open in front
+like a present-day M.A. gown), and charging them straitly to cut their
+hair "so that all men may see their ears." And the latter was an
+indefatigable pulpiteer; one of his University sermons is recorded to
+have lasted three mortal hours on end.
+
+[Footnote 249: See p. 398.]
+
+[Footnote 250: See p. 146.]
+
+[Illustration: _Bell Tower, Tydd St. Giles._]
+
+This episcopal connection of Wisbech Castle led to its becoming, in
+the reign of Elizabeth, the final scene of that pathetic and lingering
+tragedy, the fate of the old Catholic Hierarchy of England. Such of
+that hierarchy as were alive at Elizabeth's succession were, with one
+exception, deposed for refusing the Oath of Supremacy, to the number
+of fifteen. Shortly afterwards they were imprisoned, not by any
+process of law but by the Royal fiat, and continued under more or less
+severe restraint for the rest of their lives. This was wholly on
+account of their religion. Lord Burghley, a hostile witness (in his
+_Execution of Justice in England_[251]), testifies to their blameless
+characters, describing them as "faithful and quiet subjects," "persons
+of courteous natures," "of great modesty, learning and knowledge,"
+"secluded only for their contrary opinions in religion, that savour
+not (like those of the seminary priests) of treason."
+
+[Footnote 251: This work was published in 1583, to justify the
+execution of the seminary priests in England. Burghley's point is that
+quiet Papists were not put to death.]
+
+Yet, though thus inoffensive, their doom was grievously heavy.
+Committed, to begin with, to solitary confinement, in what Froude
+calls "the living death of the Tower" and other London prisons, for
+three or four years, they were afterwards quartered (singly) on the
+Protestant prelates, who were stringently ordered by the Council to
+prevent them from communication, either by word or letter, with
+anyone, and to see that they had neither paper to write withal, nor
+books to read (except Protestant ones). Thus deprived of every
+intellectual, social, and religious solace, "pining away in miserable
+desolation, tossing and shifting from one keeper to another," they one
+by one drooped and died. But all remained steadfast to their Faith;
+and finally the "obstinate" survivors were, in 1580, closely
+imprisoned, along with others in like case, in Wisbech Castle.
+
+Here they were under the charge of Cox, the new Protestant Bishop of
+Ely, who writes of them as "sworn against Christ," and boasts that "if
+walls, locks, and doors can separate them from out-practice they shall
+not want a sufficient provision of each." "Nor let it be thought, as
+some bishops have reported, that I mind to make trade by over-ruling
+such wretches." The "trade" was handed over to a favourite servant, to
+make what he could out of the unhappy prisoners (who, like all
+prisoners in those days, had to be supported by their friends),
+subject only to providing out of his takings L80 per annum for the
+upkeep of two Protestant preachers, "who are well able to set down
+God's anger" against Popery. These preachers (amongst whom one
+regrets to find "Lancelot Andrewes of Pembroke Hall") were ever and
+anon to pester the "recusants" with denunciatory discourses in the
+castle hall. "And the recusants shall be conveyed thither by a secret
+way, without seeing any; and they shall have a secret place for
+themselves to be in, to hear and not be seen.... This is the holy
+ordinance of God."[252]
+
+[Footnote 252: See Bridgett and Knox, _Queen Elizabeth and the
+Catholic Hierarchy_, p. 197 _et seq._ It may have been these highly
+specialised discourses which put so fine an edge on Wisbech
+Protestantism that, in the Civil War, the Parson here was ejected for
+no more heinous offence than that "he called a Godly Minister (Mr.
+Allison) _Brother Redface_."]
+
+Kept with this rigour the Confessors lingered on, year after year,
+till death set them free. The latest to be released were Thomas
+Watson, Bishop of Lincoln, who died in 1584, and Feckenham, the last
+Abbot of Westminster, who died in 1585. Both are buried (as the Parish
+Registers testify) in Wisbech churchyard.
+
+The castle was sold by the See of Ely in 1783, and has since been
+almost wholly pulled down. Nearly at the same date a young man, born
+at Wisbech, was beginning those efforts which have reflected glory on
+his native town, and have revolutionised public opinion throughout the
+civilised world. The man was Thomas Clarkson, and the cause to which
+he devoted his life was the abolition of slavery. That institution, up
+to his time, was regarded as a very foundation of the earth. Rooted in
+the furthest past of man's history, and as world-wide as it was
+ancient, the idea of questioning its place in the eternal fitness of
+things never occurred even to philanthropists. A virtuous man would
+treat his slaves kindly; but as for not having such, he would as soon
+have scrupled at having sheep and oxen, or at employing hired
+servants.
+
+It was left for young Clarkson, while a student at Cambridge, to
+realise that the time was come when, if the human conscience was to
+make any further progress in enlightenment, this hoary iniquity must,
+root and branch, be abolished. On a steep hillside above Wade Mill, in
+the road between Cambridge and London, a monument by the wayside still
+marks the spot where he dismounted from his horse, and, kneeling on
+the ground in the fervour of youthful enthusiasm, solemnly vowed to
+God that for this holy object he would live and, if need be, die.
+
+At once he set to work. Gathering a band of like-minded friends round
+him (mostly belonging to the so-called Clapham Sect, who were then
+inaugurating the great Evangelical Revival)--Wilberforce, Zachary
+Macaulay, Babington, Thornton, Buxton, Cropper, and the rest--he
+started an agitation in and out of Parliament, which carried all
+before it. The Slave Trade was abolished in 1807; on August 1st, 1834,
+slavery itself ceased throughout the British Empire; the example of
+Britain was followed by other European Powers; and finally, in 1864,
+after a last desperate struggle for existence in the American Civil
+War, it was cast forth from its last stronghold in the United States.
+If practised at all now, it is practised under some feigned name and
+elusive system. No civilised man dare any longer proclaim himself an
+avowed slave-driver. Well indeed does Clarkson deserve the monument
+which Wisbech has erected to her glorious son.
+
+At Wisbech, till the reclamation of the neighbouring Washes,
+Cambridgeshire (or rather the Isle of Ely) possessed an actual strip
+of seaboard extending from Wisbech town northward to the county
+boundary between Tydd St. Mary and Tydd St. Giles. This strip was
+itself reclaimed ground, but of far earlier date, due to the era of
+Roman civilisation in Britain. The old coast-line, as has been said,
+is still marked for us by a massive embankment extending from Sutton,
+in Lincolnshire, to Wisbech, and thence to King's Lynn, in Norfolk--an
+embankment sufficiently old to have given its name to the ancient
+villages along its course. The designations of Walsoken, West Walton,
+Walpole St. Peter, and Walpole St. Andrew, all testify to this sea
+wall having been already in existence when the East Anglians, in the
+fifth century, first took possession of the land.
+
+[Illustration: _Wisbech Church._]
+
+This embankment kept back, to the west and to the east, the tide-water
+of the Well Stream (see p. 399), a wide inlet of the sea, narrowing
+southward till it reached its extremity at Wisbech, and forming the
+estuary for the united outfall of all the Fenland waterways. In later
+days operations connected with the draining of the fens have diverted
+nearly the whole volume of the Great Ouse and its tributary streams
+to fall into the sea at King's Lynn, and have led the Nene straight to
+Wisbech. But till the thirteenth century was well advanced the Ouse
+and the Nene joined each other near Outwell, the united river being
+called the "Well" or "Well Stream." The names of Upwell, Outwell,
+Welney, &c., still preserve the memory of this old waterway.
+
+The estuary was, of course, tidal, leaving at low water a broad
+expanse of sands, amidst which the shifting channel of the river was
+so far broadened out as to be fordable at certain points; thus
+admitting of passage across the whole breadth of the inlet, even where
+it became five miles wide. The regular track for this passage was from
+the little hamlet of Cross Keys, on the Norfolk coast (the name of
+which is derived from this circumstance) to Sutton Crosses, near the
+village of Long Sutton, on the Lincolnshire side, and is approximately
+marked for us to-day by the line of the Great Northern Railway between
+these spots, traversing the level fields and meadows which have (since
+the year 1830) finally replaced the sands of old.
+
+The conditions of the passage were identical with those to be found
+now at Morecambe Bay. That estuary can also be crossed at low tide;
+but to do so in safety a good deal of local knowledge is essential.
+The right points for fording the river channels must be found, the
+numerous quicksands must be avoided, while the localities of both
+fords and quicksands are constantly changing. It is therefore
+exceedingly rash to make the attempt without guides; for across the
+level sands of every estuary the tide makes with extreme rapidity,
+sometimes coming in before the wind faster than any man can hope to
+outrun it. These guides are professionals, who await on either bank
+the demand for their services.
+
+All this is exactly what is said of the Well Stream "Washes" in
+authorities of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As late as
+1775, though successive reclamations had by that time reduced the
+breadth of the passage by more than half, we hear of the guide "always
+attending at Cross Keys to conduct passengers over, bearing a wand or
+rod in his hand, probably in imitation of Moses, who held a rod when
+he conducted the Israelites through the Red Sea." The rod was really
+used for probing the sand in front, lest it should prove "quick," and
+also for taking the bearings on the opposite shore by which the course
+was steered.
+
+It was through neglect of such expert advice that the Well Stream
+estuary became the scene of that dramatic episode in English history,
+which, on the 13th of October in the year 1216, cost King John his
+treasures and his life. The story is narrated by the contemporary
+historian Roger of Wendover, and the Barnwell and Coggeshall
+chroniclers. The whole circumstances have been most carefully and
+minutely elaborated by Mr. St. John Hope, through whose kindness I am
+enabled to use his materials. His able monograph on the subject is to
+be found in Vol. LX. of "Archaeologia."
+
+John was, in 1216, at death-grips with the Barons, who, in the
+previous year, had wrung from him the signature of Magna Charta. The
+rights and wrongs of the quarrel were not so wholly one-sided as is
+popularly supposed, and the appeal of both parties to the Pope had not
+sufficed to clear them up. The offer of the Crown by the Barons to
+Louis, Dauphin of France, was for the moment more successful. Most of
+England acknowledged him as King, and even the King of Scots came to
+do homage for his sub-kingdom (as Scotland then was); only a few
+strongholds, notably Windsor Castle, holding out for John and being
+besieged by the Barons.
+
+John himself, however, was still at large, and at the head of a small,
+but very effective, mercenary army of filibusters from all the
+countries of Europe. He met the situation by a campaign of
+extraordinary energy; his object being to relieve his invested
+fortresses by drawing off their assailants to the defence of their own
+lands. Incidentally, desire of revenge, and the need of paying his
+troops by plunder, operated as a further motive for the merciless
+destruction which, in a series of brilliant and ferocious raids, he
+meted out to the districts owned by his opponents. The speed of his
+movements is almost incredible, considering the conditions of travel
+in the thirteenth century; but they can be traced with accuracy by the
+still existing entries in the Patent and Close Rolls; for day by day
+John did not cease to do royal business and to sign the documents
+submitted to him, however far he might have marched since morning. In
+the eyes of his Continental contemporaries this consuming energy came
+to be held his chief characteristic. In the "Dittamondo" of the
+Italian poet, Fazio degli Uberti, written early in the fourteenth
+century, which gives a brief notice of the successive Kings of England
+from the Norman Conquest onwards, the one thing mentioned about John
+is the "hot haste" of his riding.
+
+Hot haste it was, indeed! Week after week the King made his army
+(which, though small, cannot have numbered fewer than two or three
+thousand men) cover distances that would be creditable to a solitary
+bicycle tourist on the macadamised roads of to-day. From Corfe Castle,
+in Dorsetshire, whither he had retreated on the landing of Louis, he
+dashed across England (_via_ Bristol) to Cheshire, ravaged that
+district for over a fortnight, and was back at Corfe within six weeks
+of setting out. The very next day he was off again, and by a
+circuitous route of 155 miles (for his enemies' forces barred the
+direct way) reached Oxford within a week. A few days later another yet
+more wonderful week of 225 miles carried him from Reading to Lincoln;
+his daily stages being Bedford (45 miles), Cambridge (30), Castle
+Hedingham, in Essex (25), Stamford (70), Rockingham (10), and Lincoln
+(50). Here he remained ten days, during which he raised the siege of
+the castle; having also succeeded in relieving Windsor, for the Barons
+who were attacking it hastily broke up, and marched to Cambridge in
+hopes of cutting him off at this strategic point--the only place, as
+we have said,[253] where the Cam was passable for an army. It was
+doubtless to escape this danger that John undertook, on September
+19th, the forced march of 70 miles from Hedingham to Stamford, which
+had perforce to be made _via_ "the Great Bridge" of Cambridge.
+
+[Footnote 253: P. 6.]
+
+Yet another week of marches up and down Lincolnshire, 115 miles in
+all, brought him round the Wash to Lynn (by way of Wisbech); and then
+came the great catastrophe.
+
+It was on Wednesday the 12th of October, 1215, that King John, after
+three days' stay at Lynn, retraced his steps, with his wonted
+celerity, by way of Wisbech, to Swineshead Abbey near Boston, a
+distance of over forty miles. Documents signed by him on this day at
+all three places are to be found in the Patent and Close Rolls. His
+baggage train, which obviously could not have kept up with this pace,
+he ordered to follow by the direct route across the sands. We read
+with some surprise that his flying column was accompanied by such a
+train at all; but the contemporary historians agree in telling us of
+"carts, waggons, and sumpter horses," loaded with the King's treasures
+and properties (including even a portable chapel), and with the spoil
+amassed during this long raid.
+
+Such a train would cover at least a mile on any road, and could only
+move quite slowly, three miles an hour at the very outside. How it
+kept touch with the column at all is a wonder, and we may be sure that
+it could never have done so during the forced march from Hedingham on
+the 19th of September. After that date the occupation of Cambridge by
+the Baronial forces would effectually bar the way against any attempt
+to follow in the King's track; and it is highly probable that he,
+knowing that this would be so, had ordered the train and its escort to
+make their way instead from Hedingham to Lynn, and that he paid his
+hurried visit to that place with the sole object of once more getting
+into touch with them.
+
+However that may be, there is no doubt that the train did set out from
+Lynn, along the road to Cross Keys, after the King and his troops had
+ridden off towards Wisbech. It was impossible, however, to attempt the
+passage that same day, for the channel of the Well Stream could only
+be forded during the hour or so on either side of low-water, which, as
+calculations show, was on this day about noon. The long line of
+vehicles had, accordingly, to halt for the night at Cross Keys, for to
+have attempted the passage in the dark (the moon was nearly at the
+new), would have been simply suicidal.
+
+Next morning, Thursday, October 13th, they woke to find the tide
+lapping against the old Roman embankment behind which they lay, for it
+was a spring tide, and at its highest about 6.30 a.m. Rapidly it
+receded, and by 9 a.m. the wide expanse of the sands would lie bare
+before them. The moment these were dry enough for the passage of carts
+they would start, for their leaders knew well the urgent necessity for
+speed. To get such a train across the Well Stream channel in the short
+space of two hours they must be at the ford the very moment it was
+practicable. Every instant was precious, and every driver did his
+utmost to press on, regardless of the warnings of the guides (if they
+had any).
+
+But to drive a loaded cart over wet sand is at the best a slow job.
+Readers of Sir Walter Scott will remember his vivid description, in
+_Redgauntlet_, of the difficulties attending such attempts:
+
+     "The vehicle, sinking now on one side, now on the other,
+     sometimes sticking absolutely fast and requiring the utmost
+     exertions of the animal which drew it to put it once more in
+     motion, was subjected to jolts in all directions.... There seemed
+     at least five or six people around the cart, some on foot, others
+     on horseback. The former lent assistance whenever it was in
+     danger of upsetting or sticking fast in the quicksands: the
+     others rode before and acted as guides, often changing the
+     direction of the vehicle as the precarious state of the passage
+     required.... Thus the cart was dragged heavily and wearily on,
+     until the nearer roar of the advancing tide excited apprehension
+     of another danger.... A rider hastily fastened his own horse to
+     the shafts of the cart, in order to assist the exhausted animal
+     which drew it, ... but at length, when, after repeated and
+     hair-breadth escapes, it actually stuck fast in a quicksand, the
+     driver, with an oath, cut the harness, and departed with the
+     horses, splashing over the wet sand and through the shallows as
+     he galloped off."
+
+Multiply all this at least a hundred-fold, throwing in the added
+turmoil caused by the multitude of carts jamming and impeding one
+another, and we can picture something of the scene as that fatal
+morning advanced and the doomed cavalcade ploughed its way on to
+destruction. For there was no margin of time; and though the leading
+vehicles seem to have reached the Well Stream channel, they reached it
+too late. Already it was unfordable, for such traffic at least as
+theirs. Some of the carts doubtless tried to make a dash across; but
+their horses, exhausted by the strenuous effort of the last two hours,
+were unequal to the tremendous strain of negotiating the soft bottom
+of the stream. A very few such failures would entirely bar the way to
+those who were eagerly pressing on behind, and almost in a moment the
+whole column would be in irremediable confusion. In the struggling
+press, to turn would be as impossible as to proceed, while momentarily
+the laden carts, for which the only hope was to be kept going, would,
+at a standstill, sink deeper, inch by inch, into the ever quickening
+sand. And then in the midst of the welter, up came the tide, sweeping
+over the level sands, as spring tides in the Wash do sweep;--and, when
+the waters once more went down, of all that mass of treasure and
+plunder, of all those horses and drivers and carts and waggons not a
+trace was to be seen. The sands had swallowed all; and to this day
+they retain their prey. As Shakespeare makes King John say:
+
+  "These Lincoln Washes have devoured them."
+
+The expanse of sands is now an expanse of fields and meadows, through
+which the River Nene is led by a straight cut from Wisbech to the sea.
+Where that cut is crossed by the Great Northern Railway (which, as has
+been said, runs almost along the line of the old crossing-track) is
+the traditional spot of the disaster, and Mr. St. John Hope believes
+that excavation might there bring to light some of its relics, even
+after the lapse of so many years.
+
+Matthew Paris (in his _Historia Anglorum_), writing in the generation
+following the catastrophe, tells us that John himself was on the scene
+and barely escaped from the rising waters. But he, as we have seen,
+was the previous night (and the next) at Swineshead Abbey. It is just
+possible that, with his astounding energy, he may have ridden in the
+morning with a few attendants to Long Sutton (a distance of twenty
+miles, as before the reclamation of the fens travellers from Boston
+thither would have to go round by Spalding), and thence across the
+sands, to overlook in person the passage of the Well Stream. If so, he
+may well, in the confusion, have been surprised by the tide and have
+barely escaped by hard riding. Anyhow the catastrophe cost him his
+life; for this heart-breaking blow, coming on top of his three months'
+herculean exertions, brought on a feverish attack that very night. Ill
+as he was, he was on horseback again by dawn, and rode fifteen miles
+to Sleaford. Next day he struggled on twenty miles to Newark, where
+"the disease increasing, he received the counsel of Confession and the
+Eucharist from the Abbot of Croxton," and died that same evening
+(October 18th), fairly burnt out by his own consuming and tireless
+energy. If ever King did, he "died standing."
+
+"Foul as Hell is, it is defiled by the fouler presence of John." Such
+is the uncompromising verdict of the inimical chronicler; and such
+(in less trenchant phraseology) has been very much the verdict of
+popular historians even to our own day. But it was a verdict by no
+means universally accepted by contemporaries. John did not, like
+William Rufus, receive what Professor Freeman calls "the distinction
+of a popular excommunication." For Rufus no prayer was said, no psalm
+was sung, no Mass was offered. All men felt that prayer was hopeless.
+But John was buried in peace; and it speedily appeared that the cause
+for which he stood was the cause which (more especially when the
+weight of his own personal unpopularity was removed) most commended
+itself to the heart of England. Men had no desire to see the English
+Crown become an appanage for the heir to the French monarchy. And so
+Louis rapidly found. Within nine days of his father's death the infant
+Henry the Third was crowned at Gloucester,--with his mother's
+bracelet, in default of the proper crown (which, however, is not
+likely to be amongst the treasures lost in the Wash, as many histories
+assume); and within six months men were flocking "as to a Holy War,"
+from all parts of the country, to take part in that decisive battle
+known as "the Fair of Lincoln," which crushed, once and for all, the
+foreign intrusion, and established irrevocably the claim of the
+native-born ruler to succeed his father on the throne of England.
+
+And with this stirring story we take our leave of the Highways and
+Byways of Cambridgeshire, the stage of so many a story, the home of so
+many a memory; the scene--to those who have eyes to see--of so much
+quiet loveliness; where the Present is ever brooded over by the Past,
+and where on the anvils of Thought and Science the Future is ever
+being shaped. We have explored the County from end to end, we have
+mounted her uplands, we have traversed her fens, we have clambered her
+earthworks, we have entered her churches. Her Manor-houses have told
+us their tale of struggle, her Colleges have borne their witness to
+the growth of knowledge. We have been able to
+
+  "Watch Time's full river as it flows";
+
+and the pathos of all that has come and gone stands out before us, as
+a record more thrilling than the most daring romance, as a theme more
+inspiring than the noblest poem. We bid good-bye to the County of
+Cambridge and the Isle of Ely feeling that no hue of dulness attaches
+to them, as is commonly supposed by the unappreciative crowd, but that
+rather the footprints of the past which abound within their borders
+give promise of a future that shall not be unworthy of what has gone
+before.
+
+[Illustration: _The Old Court of Corpus._]
+
+
+
+
+ADDENDA.
+
+
+Attention should have been called to two remarkable ecclesiastical
+inscriptions, on the Eastern and Western borders of our district
+respectively.
+
+In the upland churchyard of Castle Camps (p. 206), hard by the
+Priest's Door into the Chancel, a tombstone has the following epitaph:
+
+  Mors Mortis Morti mortem nisi morte dedisset
+    AEternae Vitae janua clausa foret.
+
+  ["Except the Death of Death Death's death by death had been
+      Ne'er would Eternal Life with door unshut be seen."]
+
+And in the church of Fen Stanton, low down amid the Ouse meadows near
+St. Ives, is the following ancient rebus (also hard by the Priest's
+Door):
+
+  QV   A     D    T     M        P
+    OS  NGVIS IRVS RISTI VLCEDINE AVIT
+  H   SA     M    X     D        L
+
+  _I.e._--Quos Anguis dirus tristi mulcedine pavit
+        Hos Sanguis mirus Christi dulcedine lavit.
+
+  ["Whom the dire Serpent fouls with poisonous food
+    Christ washeth in His sweet and wondrous Blood."]
+
+A variant of these lines is to be seen in the Alpine sanctuary of
+Champery near the Lake of Geneva.
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+  A
+
+  Abbeys:
+    Barnwell, 10, 160
+    Chatteris, 390
+    Crowland, 137, 393
+    Denny, 30, 298
+    Ely, 302-341, 345-376
+    Peterborough, 373, 390, 394
+    Ramsey, 75, 198, 279, 310, 392, 410
+    Soham, 178
+    Thorney, 392, 396
+
+  Abbey Barn, 161
+
+  Abington, 203
+
+  Adams, Prof., 266
+
+  "Ad eundem," 265
+
+  Adventurers, 403
+
+  Adwulf, 304
+
+  Agincourt, 184
+
+  Aidan, St., 175
+
+  Akeman Street, 252, 258, 295
+
+  Alan of Walsingham, 329, 345, 356, 360, 362, 366, 373
+
+  Alcock, Bp., 146, 283, 332, 376, 418
+
+  Aldreth, 283, 295, 316
+
+  Alfred the Etheling, 314
+
+  Alfred the Great, 11, 38, 169, 183, 213
+
+  Alum, 92
+
+  Ambulatory, 366
+
+  Ancarig, 392
+
+  Andrewes, Bp., 342
+
+  Andrew, St., Oratory of, 161
+
+  Anna, King, 303
+
+  Archdeacon of Ely, 282
+
+  Armeswerke, 306
+
+  Arnold, Matthew, 268
+
+  Arrington, 258
+
+  Artesian, 260
+
+  Ashwell, 248
+
+  Ashwell Bush, 236
+
+  Assandun, 205, 313
+
+  Assize of Barnwell, 161
+
+  Athelney, 308
+
+  Audley End, 234
+
+  Audrey's Fair, St., 307
+
+  Augustine, St., 38, 303
+
+  Augustinians, 11, 158
+
+
+  B
+
+  B.A., 16
+
+  Babraham, 202
+
+  Backs, 2, 41, 85
+
+  Bacon, 90, 102
+
+  Baitsbite, 296
+
+  Balsham, 171, 216
+
+  Balsham, Bp., 12, 25, 112, 325
+
+  Baptistery (Ely), 352
+
+  Barham Hall, 205
+
+  Barnack, 329
+
+  Barnett, Bp., 366
+
+  Barnwell, 10, 160
+
+  Barnwell Gate, 35, 152
+
+  Barnwell Priory, 16, 160, 370
+
+  Barrington, 238, 289
+
+  Barrow, 102
+
+  Bartlow, 205
+
+  Barton, 254
+
+  Barton Road, 252
+
+  Basevi, 371
+
+  Basket-making, 384
+
+  Bassingbourn, 247
+
+  Bateman, Bp., 82
+
+  Bath, 252
+
+  Becket, Thomas a, 235, 246
+
+  Bedford, Earl of, 406
+
+  Bedford Rivers, 280, 389
+
+  Bedmakers, 16
+
+  Belsars Hill, 283, 292
+
+  Benedictine Rule, 339
+
+  Benson, A. C., 138
+
+  Bentham, 345
+
+  Bentley, 40, 101, 105, 109
+
+  Bible (St. John's Coll.), 117
+
+  Bidding Prayer, 128
+
+  Biggin "Abbey," 295
+
+  Bishop's Delph, 178
+
+  Bishopsgate, 222
+
+  Black Death, 248, 340
+
+  Blaise, St., 284
+
+  Blazer, 119
+
+  Bluntisham, 280
+
+  Boadicea, 172
+
+  Boat Houses, 146
+
+  Boat Races, 88, 146, 296
+
+  Boat Show, 43
+
+  Bonfire, 85
+
+  Borough, 7, 8
+
+  Borough Green, 188
+
+  Botolph, St., 32, 34, 304
+
+  Bottisham, 189
+
+  Bourn, 273
+
+  Bourn Brook, 270
+
+  Bourne R., 202
+
+  Brazier, 97
+
+  Brandon, 185
+
+  Bretwalda, 178
+
+  Bridges:
+    Clare, 42, 84, 93
+    Great, 46, 136
+    Hauxton, 235
+    Hostel, 43
+    Huntingdon, 278
+    King's, 42
+    Magdalene, 136
+    Newnham, 41, 222
+    Queens', 41
+    St. John's, 118
+    Trinity, 43
+
+  Bucer, 23, 131
+
+  Buckingham College, 137
+
+  Bulldogs, 132
+
+  Burgesses, 12
+
+  Burgraed (King), 309
+
+  Burnt Mill, 236
+
+  Burwell, 195, 198
+
+  Bury St. Edmunds, 320, 370
+
+  Butcher's Broom, 227
+
+  Butterflies, 182, 211
+
+  Butter Measure, 12
+
+  Buttery, 95
+
+  Butts, 254
+
+  Byron, 90, 94
+
+  Byron's Pool, 220
+
+
+  C
+
+  Caldecote, 271
+
+  Cam, 7, 8, 40, 222, 295
+
+  Cambridge and Oxford, 2, 11, 17
+
+  Camden Society, 134
+
+  Camp of Refuge, 10, 316
+
+  Canute, 8, 205, 313
+
+  Car Dyke, 297
+
+  Carmelites, 11
+
+  Castle, 4, 138
+
+  Castle Camps, 206
+
+  Cavendish Laboratory, 159, 267
+
+  Caxton, 273
+
+  Ceilings, 100
+
+  Chad, St., 176, 355
+
+  Chained books, 83
+
+  Chancellor, 125
+
+  Chantries, 239
+
+  Chapel, Bush, 238
+
+  Chapel lists, 104
+
+  Chapels (College):
+    Christ's, 153
+    Clare, 84
+    Corpus, 35
+    Emmanuel, 158
+    Girton, 144
+    Jesus, 147, 148
+    King's, 52-77, 290
+    Pembroke, 30, 342
+    Peterhouse, 26, 342
+    Queens', 48
+    St. John's, 113
+    Trinity, 102
+
+  Chapels (at Ely):
+    Bishop Alcock's, 332, 369
+    Bishop West's, 332, 367
+    Crauden's, 330, 346
+    Lady, 330, 372
+    St. Catherine's, 352
+    St. Edmund's, 360
+
+  Charles the First, 101, 138, 182, 190, 268, 406
+
+  Charles the Second, 173
+
+  Cherry Hill, 345
+
+  Cherryhinton, 208
+
+  Chester, 221
+
+  Chesterford, 232
+
+  Chesterton, 295
+
+  Chevely, 185
+
+  Childerley, 271
+
+  Chimes, 101, 129
+
+  Choirs, 114
+
+  Choir School (Ely), 314
+
+  Christopher, St., 205
+
+  Chum, 288
+
+  Church ales, 247
+
+  Churches (Cambridge):
+    Abbey, 161
+    All Saints', 108
+    Christ Church, 162
+    Holy Sepulchre, 133
+    Holy Trinity, 152
+    Our Lady's, 21
+    St. Andrew's the Great, 155
+    St. Andrew's the Less, 161
+    St. Benet's, 36
+    St. Botolph's, 32
+    St. Clement's, 136
+    St. Giles', 140
+    St. Mary's the Great, 127
+    St. Mary's the Less, 25
+    St. Michael's, 13, 86
+    St. Paul's, 162
+    St. Peter's, 140
+
+  Churches (Ely):
+    Holy Trinity, 372
+    St. Cross, 379
+    St. Mary's, 378
+
+  Clapham Sect, 422
+
+  Clapper Stile, 204
+
+  Clarence, Duke of, 94
+
+  Clarkson, 421
+
+  Clayhithe, 296
+
+  Clergy Training School, 148
+
+  Clerks, 11
+
+  Clerk-Maxwell, 97
+
+  Cloisters, 92, 353
+
+  Clough, 142
+
+  Clunch, 198, 236
+
+  Codex Bezae, 82
+
+  Coe Fen, 159
+
+  Coleridge, 150
+
+  "College" (Ely), 376
+
+  Colleges:
+    Christ's, 152-155
+    Clare, 83-85, 342
+    Corpus Christi, 35-38
+    Downing, 159
+    Ely Theological, 382
+    Emmanuel, 156-158
+    Girton, 144
+    Gonville and Caius, 120-124
+    Jesus, 146-150, 369
+    King's, 50-79
+    Magdalene, 137
+    Newnham, 142
+    Pembroke, 28-34, 298
+    Peterhouse, 25-28, 369
+    Queens', 47-50
+    Ridley Hall, 142
+    St. Catherine's, 39-40
+    St. John's, 109-119
+    Selwyn, 144
+    Sidney Sussex, 151-152
+    Trinity, 86-107, 242
+    Trinity Hall, 82-83
+    Westminster, 142
+
+  Comacine Guild, 353
+
+  Comberton, 254
+
+  Combination Rooms, 26, 97
+
+  Commons, 1
+
+  "Commons," 95
+
+  Common Fields, 3
+
+  Conduit, 23, 130, 158
+
+  Confessionals, 263
+
+  Conington, 292
+
+  Conqueror, William the, 187, 283, 315, 359
+
+  Coprolites, 240
+
+  Corporation, 12, 185
+
+  Coton, 89
+
+  Cottenham, 298
+
+  Courts (College), 2
+
+  Courts, Christian, 11
+
+  Covenant, 91
+
+  Coveney, 409
+
+  Cox, Bishop, 289
+
+  Cratendune, 179, 303
+
+  Cranmer, Abp., 150
+
+  Crauden, Prior, 330, 346, 359, 410
+
+  Cromwell, Oliver, 32, 128, 151, 272, 278, 367, 381, 406, 412
+
+  Cross Keys, 413, 424, 427
+
+  Crusades, 328
+
+  Cycloid, 89
+
+  Cyclone, 276
+
+  Cymbeline, 172
+
+
+  D
+
+  Darwin, 155
+
+  Deanery (Ely), 348, 353
+
+  Decorated, 334
+
+  Degrees, 16
+
+  Denver, 387
+
+  Denver Sluice, 280, 389, 407
+
+  Devil's Dyke, 171, 187, 194, 212, 300
+
+  "Disinherited," 325
+
+  Divinity schools, 109
+
+  Doddington, 409
+
+  Dominicans, 11, 155
+
+  Dowsing, 56, 187, 189, 205, 222, 270
+
+  Dry Drayton, 270
+
+  Dullingham, 188
+
+  Dunstan, Abp., 309
+
+  Dunwich, 180
+
+  "Duties," 377
+
+  Duxford, 228
+
+  Dykes, 170-173
+
+
+  E
+
+  Earith, 298, 389
+
+  Early English, 334
+
+  Eastern Counties Association, 380
+
+  Edgar the Peacemaker, 309, 373, 192
+
+  Edmund the Ironside, 206, 313
+
+  Edmund, St., 175, 180, 262
+
+  Edmundhouse, 142
+
+  Edward the Confessor, 314
+
+  Edward the Elder, 6, 8, 169, 212, 278
+
+  Edward the First, 328
+
+  Edward the Second, 86, 359, 411
+
+  Edward the Third, 86, 101, 330, 348, 359
+
+  Edward the Seventh, 94, 268
+
+  Egbert, 7, 169
+
+  Eleanor, Queen, 324
+
+  Electoral roll, 125
+
+  Elizabeth, Queen, 126, 290, 419
+
+  Elm, 412
+
+  Elsworth, 292
+
+  Eltisley, 274
+
+  Ely, 7, 11, 140, 188, 236, 302-385, 409
+
+  Ely House, 290, 333
+
+  Ely Place, 322
+
+  Emma, Queen, 314
+
+  Emneth, 412
+
+  Enclosure Acts, 387
+
+  Epigrams, 80
+
+  Erasmus, 47
+
+  Erconwald, St., 176, 262
+
+  Ermine Street, 244, 258, 273
+
+  Ermenilda, 176, 307
+
+  Esquire, Bedell, 128
+
+  Ethandune, 308
+
+  Etheldreda, St., 7, 169, 175, 179, 283, 303, 358
+
+  Ethelred, the Unready, 310
+
+  Eton, 51
+
+  Eustace, Bp., 349, 367
+
+  Eversden, 289
+
+  Examination Hall, 15
+
+  Examinations, 14, 98
+
+  Exeat, 17
+
+  Exning, 173, 175
+
+
+  F
+
+  Fagius, 23, 131
+
+  Fairy-cart, 260
+
+  Falcon Cup, 84
+
+  Felix, St., 178
+
+  Fellow Commoners, 151
+
+  Fellows, 2, 89
+
+  Fen Ditton, 171, 295
+
+  Fields, 3
+
+  Firehooks, 38, 204
+
+  First Trinity, 88, 148
+
+  Fisher, Bishop, 110, 152
+
+  Fisher, Osmund, 149
+
+  Fitzwilliam, 23, 371
+
+  Fleam Dyke, 170, 210
+
+  Fordham, 176
+
+  Fowlmere, 230
+
+  Foxton, 242
+
+  Franchise of Ely, 321
+
+  Franciscans, 11, 100, 152
+
+  Free School Lane, 36
+
+  Freshman's Pillar, 92
+
+  Friars, 11
+
+  Fulbourn, 209
+
+  Fuller, 344, 357, 384
+
+
+  G
+
+  Galilee, 324, 349
+
+  Garret Hostel, 43
+
+  Gating, 16
+
+  Geoffry de Magnaville, 34, 200
+
+  George the First, 80
+
+  George the Third, 90
+
+  Gibbet, 273
+
+  Gibbons, 90
+
+  Girton, 268
+
+  Girvii, 169
+
+  Godmanchester, 278
+
+  Godolphin, 202
+
+  God's House, 153
+
+  Gogmagogs, 201
+
+  Gonville, 14, 120
+
+  Goodhart, 95
+
+  Goodrich, Bp., 332, 341, 376
+
+  Granby, Marquis of, 98
+
+  Granta, 7, 202, 222
+
+  Grantabridge, 7
+
+  Grantabrigshire, 8
+
+  Granta-ceaster, 7
+
+  Grantchester, 7, 221
+
+  Grantset, 7
+
+  Gray, 28
+
+  Great Ouse, 399
+
+  Greek, 47
+
+  Greensand, 240
+
+  Guild Hall, 130
+
+  Guilden Morden, 262
+
+  Gunning, Bp., 342, 367
+
+  Guyhirn, 289
+
+
+  H
+
+  Haddenham, 282, 356
+
+  Halls, 15
+
+  Hardwick, 270
+
+  Harlton, 255
+
+  Harvard, 156
+
+  Haslingfield, 236
+
+  Hauxton, 235
+
+  Hemingford, 279
+
+  Henrietta Maria, Queen, 116
+
+  Henry the First, 359
+
+  Henry the Third, 324, 359
+
+  Henry the Sixth, 41, 51, 54
+
+  Henry the Eighth, 87, 97, 118, 152, 283, 372
+
+  Hereward, 10, 283, 315
+
+  Hermits, 41, 222
+
+  Hervey, Bp., 180, 321, 359
+
+  Hervey de Stanton, 86, 242
+
+  Hiding-hole, 225
+
+  High-table, 15, 96
+
+  Hilda, St., 303
+
+  Hildersham, 203
+
+  Hinxton, 230
+
+  Histon, 268, 287
+
+  Hithes, 44, 194
+
+  Hobson, 21, 158
+
+  Holcroft, 288
+
+  Holme, 400
+
+  Holywell, 279
+
+  Honours, 14, 98
+
+  Horningsea, 295
+
+  Horseheath, 209
+
+  Hospital of St. John, 25, 112
+
+  Hospitallers, 258
+
+  Hostels, 12, 43
+
+  Hotham, Bp., 330, 335, 359, 363, 366
+
+  Hubert, St., 270
+
+  Huddleston, 225
+
+  Hundreds, 10
+
+  Huntingdon, 138, 278
+
+
+  I
+
+  Iceni, 168, 211
+
+  Ickleton, 231
+
+  Icknield Way, 171, 203, 234, 244
+
+  Indulgence, 91, 235
+
+  Ink, 336
+
+  Ireton, 272
+
+  Ireton's Way, 390
+
+  Isle of Ely, 8, 168, 282
+
+  Isleham, 183
+
+  Ivo, St., 279
+
+
+  J
+
+  Jacutus, St., 205
+
+  James the First, 154, 173, 403
+
+  Jesus Lane Sunday School, 162
+
+  Jewry, 10, 108
+
+  Job, 248
+
+  John, King, 12, 136, 425-430
+
+  Jowett, 129
+
+  Julitta, St., 191
+
+  Jurats, 400
+
+
+  K
+
+  Kendal, 166
+
+  King's Ditch, 3, 34
+
+  King's Hall, 14, 86, 101
+
+  King's Mill, 34
+
+  Kingsley, 138
+
+  Kingston, 271
+
+  Kirtling, 186
+
+  Kitchen (Trinity), 96
+
+  Kitchener, Lord, 131
+
+  Knapwell, 273
+
+  Knee-holm, 227
+
+
+  L
+
+  Landbeach, 296
+
+  Landwade, 176
+
+  Lantern (Ely), 356
+
+  Lantern (Trinity), 97
+
+  Lectures, 16
+
+  Lepers' Chapel, 162
+
+  Leverington, 414
+
+  Leverrier, 266
+
+  Leys School, 160
+
+  "Libellers," 403
+
+  Liber Eliensis, 303, 337
+
+  Libraries:
+    Corpus, 38
+    King's, 52
+    Pepys, 137
+    Peterhouse, 26
+    St. John's, 44, 116
+    Trinity, 43, 80
+    Trinity Hall, 82
+    University, 79-82, 100
+
+  Lincoln, 298
+
+  Lingay Fen, 222
+
+  Linton, 204
+
+  Littlego, 155
+
+  "Little John," 226
+
+  Little Ouse, 399
+
+  Littleport, 387, 400
+
+  Littlington, 264, 288
+
+  Lock-up, 264
+
+  Lode, 191, 194, 300
+
+  Logan, 2, 95, 100
+
+  London Stone, 160
+
+  Long Stanton, 289
+
+  Long Vacation, 17
+
+  Lycidas, 154
+
+  Lynn, 326, 390, 399, 400, 426
+
+
+  M
+
+  Macaulay, 14, 107, 136
+
+  Madingley, 268
+
+  Maitland, 3, 185
+
+  "Majestas," 287, 339
+
+  Maldon, 310
+
+  Manea, 409
+
+  March, 410
+
+  Margaret, Lady, 110, 152
+
+  Margaret, Queen, 41
+
+  Mark, 318
+
+  Market Hill, 130
+
+  Marshland, 399, 411
+
+  Martial, 384
+
+  Martin V., Pope, 161, 238
+
+  Mary Stuart, 278
+
+  Mary Tudor, 97, 225
+
+  Maur, St., 252
+
+  Mayor of Cambridge, 12
+
+  May pole, 255
+
+  Mazes, 254, 352
+
+  Medhampsted, 308, 394, 396
+
+  Melbourn, 242
+
+  Meldreth, 242
+
+  Mepal, 390
+
+  Merton, 25, 142
+
+  Michael House, 14, 86
+
+  Midsummer Common, 146
+
+  Mildenhall, 185
+
+  Mildmay, 156
+
+  Milestone, 82, 160
+
+  Mill Hill, 345
+
+  Mill, St., 50
+
+  Milton, 295
+
+  Milton, John, 56, 58, 91, 154
+
+  Miserere seats, 363
+
+  Monks' Door, 356
+
+  Monks' garments, 338
+
+  Morning Talks, 36
+
+  Morton, Bp., 336, 398, 418
+
+
+  N
+
+  Needham Hall, 412
+
+  Needingworth, 279
+
+  Nene, 398
+
+  Neotus, St., 276
+
+  Neptune, 266
+
+  Nevile, 92, 100
+
+  Nevile's Court, 92, 94, 95
+
+  Newcastle, 390
+
+  New College, 51
+
+  Newmarket, 173, 174, 389
+
+  Newton, Isaac, 41, 91, 92, 103, 107, 265
+
+  Non-Collegiate Students, 15
+
+  Northwold, Bp. Hugh de, 307, 324, 329, 335, 359, 363, 365, 369, 371
+
+
+  O
+
+  Oakington, 288
+
+  Oasland, 288
+
+  Oath of Supremacy, 419
+
+  Observatory, 221, 265
+
+  Octagon, 356
+
+  Oddy, 288
+
+  Old North Road, 244
+
+  Opponencies, 14
+
+  Organs, 105
+
+  Orwell, 256
+
+  Ostorius, 172, 211
+
+  Ouse R., 277-280, 301
+
+  Outwell, 398, 411
+
+  Over, 286, 294
+
+  Overcote, 280, 295
+
+  Owen, 283, 355
+
+
+  P
+
+  Paley, 155
+
+  Pandiana, St., 275
+
+  Parallax, 280
+
+  Parchment, 224
+
+  Paris, Matthew, 325, 328
+
+  Park (Ely), 345
+
+  Parker, Abp., 39
+
+  Paxton, 278
+
+  Peacock, Dean, 384
+
+  Peas Hill, 130
+
+  Pembroke, 28
+
+  Penda, 175, 303
+
+  Pensioners, 15
+
+  Pepys, 137
+
+  Perne, 23
+
+  Perpendicular Architecture, 334
+
+  Perry, Bp., 105, 155, 162
+
+  Peterborough, 298, 308, 315, 373, 400
+
+  Peter Pence, 203
+
+  Peters, Hugh, 183
+
+  Philippa, Queen, 330, 348, 359
+
+  Picot, 10, 160
+
+  Pilgrim's Progress, 166
+
+  Pitt Press, 40
+
+  Pitt, William, 32
+
+  Plate, College, 31, 84, 95
+
+  Poison Cup, 84
+
+  Population, 4, 10
+
+  Posidonius, 384
+
+  Preachers' Street, 155
+
+  Premier College, 50
+
+  President, 48
+
+  Prior's Door, 353
+
+  Priory Chapel, 161
+
+  Probus, 201
+
+  Proctors, 12, 16, 125
+
+  Provost, 12, 48
+
+
+  Q
+
+  Quarles, 155
+
+  Queen's Lane, 50
+
+  Querela Cantabrigiensis, 31, 129
+
+  Quy, 169
+
+
+  R
+
+  Radegund, St., 10, 144
+
+  Railroads, 20, 203
+
+  Rampton, 298
+
+  Reach, 171, 187, 194, 196, 300
+
+  Regent Street, 159
+
+  Residence, 17
+
+  Richard the Third, 322
+
+  Ridley, Bp., 31
+
+  Ringmere, 8, 214
+
+  Roger of Wendover, 309, 324
+
+  Rolls, C. S., 91
+
+  Romney Marsh, 400
+
+  Romsey Town, 208
+
+  Roentgen, 267
+
+  Roof Climbing, 91
+
+  Rooms, 15
+
+  Roubillac, 102
+
+  Round Churches, 133
+
+  Royston, 244
+
+  Rufus, William, 336, 430
+
+  Rustication, 16
+
+  Rutherford, Professor, 267
+
+
+  S
+
+  Sacring Bell, 231, 294
+
+  Saffron, 209
+
+  St. Ives, 279
+
+  St. John's Farm, 382
+
+  St. Neots, 276
+
+  Sancroft, Abp., 156
+
+  Sarcophagus, 307
+
+  Sawston, 222
+
+  Scholars, 14
+
+  Schools, 14
+
+  Screens, 95, 98
+
+  Seals, 393
+
+  Sea Wall, 399, 411, 422
+
+  Sedgwick, Adam, 267
+
+  Selenite, 292, 409
+
+  Selwyn, Bp., 367
+
+  Senate House, 15, 125
+
+  Sexburga, 176, 306
+
+  Sexwulf, 392
+
+  "Shammy" Leather, 222
+
+  Sharpinhoe, 236
+
+  Shelford, 222
+
+  Shepreth, 242
+
+  Shingay, 258
+
+  Ship Money, 244
+
+  Shudy Camps, 206
+
+  Sibyl, 149
+
+  Simeon, Abbot, 319, 335, 359, 360
+
+  Simeon, Charles, 152
+
+  Simon de Montfort, 325
+
+  Slavery, 421
+
+  Snailwell, 176
+
+  Soham, 178, 180
+
+  Sophs, 96
+
+  Sound, 92
+
+  Southey, 114
+
+  Spark, Bp., 321
+
+  Spenser, 32
+
+  Spikes, 78
+
+  Stanground, 387
+
+  Stapleford, 222
+
+  Steeple Morden, 263
+
+  Stocks, 242
+
+  Stokes, Sir George, 32, 267
+
+  Stonea, 409
+
+  Stone altar, 134
+
+  Stourbridge Fair, 163-167
+
+  Stretham, 283, 298
+
+  Stuntney, 180
+
+  Suffolk, 175
+
+  Sutton, 286
+
+  Sutton Crosses, 424
+
+  Swaffham, 236
+
+  Swaffham Bulbeck, 189
+
+  Swaffham Prior, 191
+
+  Swavesey, 292
+
+  Syndicates, 125
+
+
+  T
+
+  Tabula Eliensis, 319
+
+  Taxers, 12
+
+  "T.B.C.," 88
+
+  Tennyson, 55, 91, 97, 102, 104
+
+  Terms, 17
+
+  Terrington, 120, 414
+
+  Teversham, 209
+
+  Thackeray, 91, 97, 107
+
+  Theodore of Tarsus, 306
+
+  Thetford, 180
+
+  Third Trinity, 88
+
+  Thirlby, Bp., 341
+
+  Thompson, 104
+
+  Thomson, Sir J. J., 267
+
+  Tillotson, Abp., 288
+
+  Tithe Barn, 381
+
+  Toft, 270
+
+  Tonbert, 169, 283
+
+  Triplow Heath, 228
+
+  Tripos, 14, 127
+
+  Trumpington, 219, 310
+
+  Trumpington Gate, 35
+
+  Turf-cutting, 196
+
+  Turner, Bp., 274, 343
+
+  Tydd, 415
+
+
+  U
+
+  Ulfcytel, 8, 214
+
+  "Undertakers," 403
+
+  Union, 134
+
+  University, Origin of, 11
+
+  Upper River, 220
+
+  Upware, 194, 300
+
+  Upwell, 411
+
+
+  V
+
+  Vacations, 17
+
+  Valence, Marie de, 30
+
+  Vandlebury, 201
+
+  Vanity Fair, 166
+
+  Vermuyden, 406
+
+  Via Devana, 21, 159, 206
+
+  Vicars Brook, 23
+
+  Vice-Chancellor, 125
+
+  Victoria, Queen, 257
+
+  Vigor, St., 210
+
+
+  W
+
+  Walden, 137
+
+  Wall-rue, 295
+
+  Walpole, 413, 422
+
+  Walpole Gate, 345
+
+  Walsoken, 413, 422
+
+  War Ditches, 208
+
+  Warstead Street, 209
+
+  Washington Arms, 26
+
+  Waterbeach, 289, 296
+
+  Wat Tyler, 131, 248
+
+  Waynflete, Bp., 52
+
+  Wedmore, Peace of, 8, 308
+
+  Well Stream, 399, 411, 416, 422
+
+  Welney, 411
+
+  Wendred, St., 176, 275
+
+  Wendy, 260
+
+  Wentworth, 286
+
+  West, Bp., 332, 335, 367
+
+  Westcott House, 148
+
+  Westley Waterless, 188
+
+  Westminster College, 142
+
+  Westmorland, 166
+
+  Weston Colville, 188
+
+  Westry, 411
+
+  West Walton, 413, 422
+
+  Whalley, 272
+
+  Whewell, 104, 108
+
+  White Hill, 236
+
+  Whitgift, Abp., 124
+
+  Whittlesea, 410
+
+  Whittlesford, 227
+
+  Wicken Fen, 180, 300
+
+  Wilbraham, 210
+
+  Wilburton, 283
+
+  Wilfrid, St., 303, 393
+
+  Will of Henry the Sixth, 52
+
+  Williams, Bp., 116
+
+  Willingham, 286, 290
+
+  Wimpole, 256
+
+  Wireless Telegraphy, 267
+
+  Wisbech, 399, 403, 415, 426
+
+  Wisbech, John of, 331
+
+  Witchford, 286, 318
+
+  Woad, 417
+
+  Wood Ditton, 171, 187
+
+  Wordsworth, 55, 101, 102, 113, 118
+
+  Wranglers, 14
+
+  Wren, Bp., 25, 189, 209, 342
+
+  Wren, Christopher, 30, 43, 360
+
+
+  Y
+
+  Yaxley, 400
+
+
+
+
+  RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, Limited
+  BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND
+  BUNGAY SUFFOLK.
+
+
+
+
+     =Sussex.= By E. V. LUCAS. With Illustrations by FREDERICK L.
+     GRIGGS.
+
+_WESTMINSTER GAZETTE._--"A delightful addition to an excellent
+series.... Mr. Lucas's knowledge of Sussex is shown in so many fields,
+with so abundant and yet so natural a flow, that one is kept
+entertained and charmed through every passage of his devious
+progress."
+
+
+     =Berkshire.= By JAMES EDMUND VINCENT. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY CHRONICLE._--"We consider this book one of the best in an
+admirable series, and one which should appeal to all who love this
+kind of literature."
+
+
+     =Oxford and the Cotswolds.= By H. A. EVANS. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"The author is everywhere entertaining and fresh,
+never allowing his own interest to flag, and thereby retaining the
+close attention of the reader."
+
+
+     =Shakespeare's Country.= By The Ven. W. H. HUTTON. With
+     Illustrations by EDMUND H. NEW.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"Mr. Edmund H. New has made a fine book a thing
+of beauty and a joy for ever by a series of lovely drawings."
+
+
+     =Hampshire.= By D. H. MOUTRAY READ. With Illustrations by ARTHUR
+     B. CONNOR.
+
+_STANDARD._--"In our judgment, as excellent and as lively a book as
+has yet appeared in the Highways and Byways Series."
+
+
+     =Dorset.= By Sir FREDERICK TREVES. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_STANDARD._--"A breezy, delightful book, full of sidelights on men and
+manners, and quick in the interpretation of all the half-inarticulate
+lore of the countryside."
+
+
+     =Wiltshire.= By EDWARD HUTTON. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY GRAPHIC._--"Replete with enjoyable and informing reading ...
+Illustrated by exquisite sketches."
+
+
+     =Somerset.= By EDWARD HUTTON. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A book which will set the heart of every
+West-country-man beating with enthusiasm, and with pride for the
+goodly heritage into which he has been born as a son of Somerset."
+
+
+     =Devon and Cornwall.= By ARTHUR H. NORWAY. With Illustrations by
+     JOSEPH PENNELL and HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_DAILY CHRONICLE._--"So delightful that we would gladly fill columns
+with extracts were space as elastic as imagination.... The text is
+excellent; the illustrations of it are even better."
+
+
+     =South Wales.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by FREDERICK
+     L. GRIGGS.
+
+_SPECTATOR._--"Mr. Bradley has certainly exalted the writing of a
+combined archaeological and descriptive guide-book into a species of
+literary art. The result is fascinating."
+
+
+     =North Wales.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by HUGH
+     THOMSON and JOSEPH PENNELL.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"To read this fine book makes us eager to visit
+every hill and every valley that Mr. Bradley describes with such
+tantalising enthusiasm. It is a work of inspiration, vivid, sparkling,
+and eloquent--a deep well of pleasure to every lover of Wales."
+
+
+     =Cambridge and Ely.= By Rev. EDWARD CONYBEARE. With Illustrations
+     by FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_ATHENAEUM._--"A volume which, light and easily read as it is, deserves
+to rank with the best literature about the county."
+
+
+     =East Anglia.= By WILLIAM A. DUTT. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_WORLD._--"Of all the fascinating volumes in the 'Highways and Byways'
+series, none is more pleasant to read.... Mr. Dutt, himself an East
+Anglian, writes most sympathetically and in picturesque style of the
+district."
+
+
+     =Lincolnshire.= By W. F. RAWNSLEY. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"A splendid record of a storied shire."
+
+
+     =Nottinghamshire.= By J. B. FIRTH. With Illustrations by
+     FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A book that will rank high in the series which it
+augments; a book that no student of our Midland topography and of
+Midland associations should miss."
+
+
+     =Northamptonshire and Rutland.= By HERBERT A. EVANS. With
+     Illustrations by FREDERICK L. GRIGGS.
+
+_TIMES._--"A pleasant, gossiping record ... Mr. Evans is a guide who
+makes us want to see for ourselves the places he has seen."
+
+
+     =Derbyshire.= By J. B. FIRTH. With Illustrations by NELLY
+     ERICHSEN.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"The result is altogether delightful, for
+'Derbyshire' is as attractive to the reader in his arm-chair as to the
+tourist wandering amid the scenes Mr. Firth describes so well."
+
+
+     =Yorkshire.= By ARTHUR H. NORWAY. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL and HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_PALL MALL GAZETTE._--"The wonderful story of Yorkshire's past
+provides Mr. Norway with a wealth of interesting material, which he
+has used judiciously and well; each grey ruin of castle and abbey he
+has re-erected and re-peopled in the most delightful way. A better
+guide and story-teller it would be hard to find."
+
+
+     =Lake District.= By A. G. BRADLEY. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE._--"A notable edition--an engaging volume, packed
+with the best of all possible guidance for tourists. For the most part
+the artist's work is as exquisite as anything of the kind he has
+done."
+
+
+     =Northumbria.= By P. ANDERSON GRAHAM. With Illustrations by HUGH
+     THOMSON.
+
+
+     =The Border.= By ANDREW LANG and JOHN LANG. With Illustrations by
+     HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_STANDARD._--"The reader on his travels, real or imaginary, could not
+have pleasanter or more profitable companionship. There are charming
+sketches by Mr. Hugh Thomson to illustrate the letterpress."
+
+
+     =Galloway and Carrick.= By the Rev. C. H. DICK. With
+     Illustrations by HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_SATURDAY REVIEW._--"The very book to take with one into that romantic
+angle of Scotland, which lies well aside of the beaten tourist track."
+
+
+     =Donegal and Antrim.= By STEPHEN GWYNN. With Illustrations by
+     HUGH THOMSON.
+
+_DAILY TELEGRAPH._--"A perfect book of its kind, on which author,
+artist, and publisher have lavished of their best."
+
+
+     =Normandy.= By PERCY DEARMER, M.A. With Illustrations by JOSEPH
+     PENNELL.
+
+_ST. JAMES'S GAZETTE._--"A charming book ... Mr. Dearmer is as
+arrestive in his way as Mr. Pennell. He has the true topographic eye.
+He handles legend and history in entertaining fashion."
+
+MACMILLAN AND CO., Ltd., LONDON.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's note: Obvious printer's errors have been corrected, all
+other inconsistencies are as in the original. The author's spelling
+has been maintained.
+
+Text enclosed in = is printed in bold in the book.
+
+Letters preceded by a ^ are superscribt.
+
+Page 117: "Last year (1809)" has been corrected to "Last year (1909)".
+
+Page 343: The footnote 223 present there has no anchor in the text.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Highways and Byways in Cambridge and
+Ely, by Edward Conybeare
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS IN ***
+
+***** This file should be named 38735.txt or 38735.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/7/3/38735/
+
+Produced by Colin Bell, Christine P. Travers and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive)
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
diff --git a/38735.zip b/38735.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..01947c6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/38735.zip
diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6312041
--- /dev/null
+++ b/LICENSE.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in
+the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org.
+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b55c0be
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #38735 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/38735)