CHAPTER XVITHE CATHEDRALSermons in Stones.

About three o’clock (A.M.) we made an end of the shrine here at Wynchester.... We think the silver thereof will amount to near two thousand marks. Going to our beds-ward, we viewed the altar, which we purpose to bring with us. Such a piece of work it is that we think we shall not rid it, doing our best, before Monday next or Tuesday morning, which done we intend, both at Hyde and at St. Mary’s, to sweep away all the rotten bones that be called relics, which we may not omit lest it be thought that we came more for the treasure than for avoiding the abominations of idolatry.

The words are significant, and the hour 3A.M.tells its own tale. The abbot and other inmates received pensions, very modest ones, and the manors fell into various lay hands. Wriothesley secured the lion’s share. The abbey buildings were sold for the material they were built of, and so rapidly did most of it disappear, that Leland in 1539 says in his well-knownItinerary: “In this suburb stood the great abbey of Hyde, and hath yet a parish church.” Camden, writing shortly after, speaks of the “bare site, deformed with heaps of ruins, daily dug up to burn into lime.” In 1788 what still remained of the ruins was nearly all rooted up to make a County Bridewell. No thought of Alfred, or the other mighty and illustrious dead buried within the precincts, seems to have stayed the Vandal hands; numerous relics, patens, chalices, ringswere found. A slab of stone bearing Alfred’s name was taken away, and is still preserved at Corby, in Cumberland. It was not part of Alfred’s tomb, as it bears the date 891. So far all attempts to locate the position of Alfred’s tomb have been unsuccessful. Like Moses of old, “no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day.”

The suppression of St. Swithun’s had results less drastic. Hyde Abbey was simply swallowed up in the catastrophe. St. Swithun’s was transformed into the capitular body of the Cathedral, the Prior, Sub-prior, and monks disappeared, and in their places succeeded the Dean, the Chapter, and Canons of Winchester.

The new establishment thus formed was at first composed of the Dean, twelve prebendaries, and six minor canons. The Prior, William Kingsmill, proved ‘very conformable,’ and became the first Dean of the new collegiate body. The commissioners, here as at Hyde, stripped the Cathedral of its ornaments. The silver shrine of St. Swithun disappeared, and various other shrines, and the glorious treasures of gold and silver, and precious stones, the gifts of Cnut, Bishop Stigand, and many another pious donor, which had graced the high altar, were all swept away by the greedy hands of the spoilers.

The domestic buildings have almost all now disappeared. The chapter-house was pulled down in 1570 by Bishop Horne, largely for the sake of the leaden roof; and the cloisters later on suffered a similar fate. Part of one of the convent kitchens remains in one of

MEMORIAL GATEWAY, WINCHESTER COLLEGEThe Memorial Gateway, opening on to Kingsgate Street, was erected recently in memory of Wykehamists who fell in the South African War.

MEMORIAL GATEWAY, WINCHESTER COLLEGE

The Memorial Gateway, opening on to Kingsgate Street, was erected recently in memory of Wykehamists who fell in the South African War.

the houses at the west side of the cloister garth, and some portions of the domestic buildings still remain in the Deanery, but practically all connected with the domestic life of the monastery has now disappeared. In 1632 Bishop Curle opened a passage, now called ‘The Slype,’ by cutting through the great buttress on the south side, and so converted the cloister garth into a thoroughfare. Two curious Latin anagrams cut on the west front of the Cathedral and on the wall adjoining commemorate this. But the Priory, thus transformed, gained rather than lost in usefulness. Much of the property was indeed seized by the king, but the Dean and Chapter have remained otherwise in full possession of the powers and privileges granted to them, while the fuller and less restricted range of activity has rendered the Cathedral the centre of ecclesiastical life and of extended usefulness, far exceeding what the Priory in its later days ever succeeded or perhaps ever aimed at securing.

The suppression of St. Swithun’s was the first in point of time; later on, in 1538, Hyde was dissolved; in 1539, St. Mary’s Abbey—Nunna Mynstre—founded by Alswitha, Queen of Alfred the Great, suffered a like doom. St. Elizabeth’s College lasted a few years longer, and was finally sold to Winchester College in 1547, and the buildings pulled down. The college luckily survived the visitation, so, also, equally fortunately, did St. Cross and St. John’s Hospital, and these remain in continued and more extended usefulness till the present day.

Todeal adequately with Winchester Cathedral would be almost to write the history of England, a task manifestly impossible within the limits of such a work as this. For the Cathedral is not merely a building, but a veritable history in stone, and that not a history—as historic buildings very often are—of a community which has raised but a small eddy in the waters of national life, but of one which has profoundly affected the fortunes of the nation during almost every period of its existence. It is safe to say that scarcely a single storm of national strife has burst upon the land without leaving in some way an impress upon these grey stone walls, and during a period of many centuries there was scarcely one single actor of eminence in the national drama who did not leave, in some form or other, a record imperishably graven here behind him. Not only have these stones witnessed the coronations of kings—the baptisms, marriages, and burials of princes—the consecration ofbishops, and many another ceremony of high national significance, but they enshrine within their circuit the sacred dust of generations of the great departed, subject and king, soldier and priest, statesman and prelate; they are a great national Valhalla with which no other in the land save Westminster Abbey can claim to compare. As the preceding pages have shown, a Christian cathedral has existed continuously on the present site since the days of Kynegils and Kenwalh, in the 7th century. Bishop Swithun and Bishop Æthelwold successively added to or rebuilt large portions of the fabric, but the only Saxon work now remaining is in the crypt and foundations. The pillars and arches are splendidly massive and curiously fashioned, and show that Æthelwold’s work was solidly constructed. The Cathedral, as we see it to-day, is the Norman and Angevin Cathedral—the cathedral of Walkelyn and of Godfrey de Lucy, transformed in later Plantagenet days by Edyngton, Wykeham, and Beaufort, and adorned by Silkstede, Fox, and many others. Walkelyn’s Cathedral was a typical Norman building, and the disposition of its parts reflected a symbolism as well as a harmony. The central truths of Christian doctrine, those of the Trinity and of the redemption, were beautifully symbolised in the three-fold repetition of nave, triforium, and clerestory in the elevation, and of nave, choir, and transepts disposed in the form of a cross in the ground plan. The arches and pillars are characteristic examples of the Norman style—semicircular arches springing from heavy,cushion-shaped capitals surmounting the strong circular pillars. The general effect of the interior, though heavy, was one of impressiveness and dignity, as can be well seen from the transepts, which remain for all practical purposes unaltered from their original form, or better still from the interior of Chichester Cathedral of to-day. It reflected alike calmness, dignity, and strength—the dignity of a strength conscious of a burden indeed, but self-reliant and adequate to the task. It is no light burden that those giant pillars are bearing, nor do they support it joyously or even with ease: each one is rather an Atlas, bearing his load strongly and uncomplainingly, but needing to put forth all his powers in the effort.

Godfrey de Lucy, Bishop in Richard I.’s time, extended the church eastwards by adding the retro-choir with its beautiful Early English arcading, graceful columns, and lancet windows,—an extension which, owing to the insufficient foundation on which he built, is in large measure responsible for the insecure condition of the fabric to-day. This we will revert to later on in the chapter. Godfrey de Lucy’s object was to afford space for the ever-increasing numbers of pilgrims who crowded to Winchester to see the shrine of St. Swithun, but who in other respects were unwelcome guests. His extension eastward afforded every facility to admit the pilgrims in to view the shrine, without giving them access to the choir, nave, or domestic parts of the Priory. In Edward III.’s reign came the transformation of the nave and aisles—a daring work commenced by Bishop Edyngton, and completed by William of Wykeham, almost equal in magnitude to the reconstruction of the fabric itself. Edyngton’s work may be seen in the aisle windows at the extreme west of the building; Wykeham’s, which is lighter and more graceful, fills the rest of the nave. The general result has been to impart to the interior gracefulness and lightness. The columns on either side of the choir steps, which were left partly unaltered, show us in some measure how the change was effected, partly by pulling down and rebuilding, partly by cutting away from the face of the columns. The triforium was removed bodily, and the triple row of Norman arches thrown together into a single range of light, lofty, and graceful Perpendicular-Gothic arches, surmounted by smaller Perpendicular windows serving as clerestory. Triforium proper no longer exists, but its place is taken by a continuous narrow balcony running along both sides of the nave. The impressiveness and beauty of the effect thus produced it is impossible to describe. As you enter at the west end the majesty of the whole at once silences and uplifts you—a forest almost of lofty shafts and pillars rising unbroken and towering overhead, where they branch out and interlace in the beautiful intricacy of the fan-tracery of the roof.

It is not without appropriateness that Wykeham and Edyngton both lie buried here in the beautiful chantry chapels which they respectively erected between the pillars on the south side of the nave.

The work of transformation from Norman to Perpendicular was continued through the choir and presbytery aisles by Beaufort and others, and later bishops extended the building eastward beyond the limits of Godfrey de Lucy’s work. The three chapels at the east end, Orleton’s Chapel, commonly spoken of as the Chapel of the Guardian Angels, Langton’s Chapel, and the Lady Chapel, contain much interesting and varied work.

In one sense the retro-choir is, architecturally speaking, the most interesting part of the Cathedral. It presents wonderful variety, and contains specimens of practically every stage of architectural development since de Lucy’s day. But it must be confessed that the general effect is rather a confused medley of seemingly haphazard or tentative reconstructions, and the piecemeal character of the separate parts deprives it to a large extent of the dignity and completeness of a harmonious whole. Nowhere is this exemplified better than in the three east windows of the south transept—all altered from the original Norman windows, and each entirely different in character from its neighbours. Yet this very want of harmony is strangely eloquent. Winchester Cathedral, and its east end more particularly, is not an architect’s cathedral, so to speak—one complete harmonious design like Salisbury; rather is it a document in stone—a deed to which many participants have affixed their sign-manual, each in his characteristic writing, and bearing the direct impress of his personality.

Yet fascinating as its architectural features are, they are dwarfed and unimportant beside the wealth of historical association that lies locked up within these walls as in a treasure-chest.

Of the many great and solemn ceremonials which these walls have witnessed—such indeed, to mention one or two only, as the second coronation of Richard Cœur-de-Lion, the baptism of Henry VII.’s son, Arthur of Winchester, Prince of Wales, the marriage of Henry IV. with his second wife Joan of Navarre, and that of Mary Tudor, Queen of England, to Philip of Spain—we will not now speak in detail. Rather will we concentrate our attention on the historic and architectural monuments which meet our eye almost wherever we turn, and among this wealth of historical and architectural treasures three may be singled out for special notice—the chantry chapels, the reredos, and the mortuary chests. The chantry chapels are gems of beauty and of interest, enshrining the mortal remains as well as the memories of six notable men,—Edyngton, Wykeham, Beaufort, Waynflete, Fox, and Gardiner. Wykeham’s chantry is almost daringly constructed out of and between two of the great pillars of the nave. The memories of the three chantry monks who served it in Wykeham’s lifetime are preserved by three charming miniature figures placed in effigy at Wykeham’s feet. The chantries of Beaufort, Waynflete, Fox, and Gardiner are east of the choir. Beaufort’s chantry, less beautiful perhaps architecturally, is wonderfully suggestive. How eloquently the recumbent effigyseems to recall the strong features of the man who desired power so earnestly, and could dare greatly in the effort to possess it—those rigid hands now clasped meekly in prayer betoken a humility and repose which their owner when in life probably never enjoyed, nor it may be even desired. Waynflete, again, had a notable career. Headmaster of Winchester, he was chosen by Henry VI. as first headmaster of his new foundation of Eton, and shortly after from headmaster became Provost, from which position he rose to become Bishop of Winchester. Waynflete founded Magdalen College, Oxford; and Magdalen College has but recently been discharging a pious duty by undertaking the work needed for the preservation of her founder’s chantry. With Waynflete, Wykeham, and Foxe (founder of Corpus), all buried in these chantries, Winchester might almost claim to have founded Oxford herself. Architecturally each chantry marks a step forward in the development of style, and registers the successive stages in the rise, culmination, decline, and death of Perpendicular Gothic.

Of the great altar-screen we have already spoken. Here we have Perpendicular Gothic at its very best, rich in effort, yet in perfect taste, without the least suggestion of the florid or the bizarre—the detail so varied, the execution so delicate. The statuary is modern, but is beautifully executed and in perfect keeping—a somewhat unusual excellence—with the original work. It would be hard to meet with so illustrative and remarkable a series of Christian saints and examples as are here shown in effigy grouped

SECOND MASTER’S HOUSE, WINCHESTER COLLEGEWykeham’s ‘children,’ the seventy scholars that is, are still lodged in College, as they have been from the first, under the charge of the second master, whose house lies between Outer Gateway and Chamber Court, over which latter some of the windows look out.

SECOND MASTER’S HOUSE, WINCHESTER COLLEGE

Wykeham’s ‘children,’ the seventy scholars that is, are still lodged in College, as they have been from the first, under the charge of the second master, whose house lies between Outer Gateway and Chamber Court, over which latter some of the windows look out.

round the Saviour’s figure—the four archangels, the Virgin and St. John, St. Paul and St. Peter, doctors like Jerome, teachers like Ambrose, Christian missionaries like Birinus, bishops like Swithun, Æthelwold, Wykeham, and Wolsey. Among sovereigns we have Egbert, Alfred, Cnut, and Queen Victoria. Among the others of note are Earl Godwine, Izaak Walton, Ken and Keble. Many of these lie actually buried within the Cathedral walls, and nearly all left their mark inseparably and honourably stamped, alike on the national, as on the city history.

Of all the historical memorials, however, none is capable of so profoundly stirring the imagination or arresting the attention as the six beautiful mortuary chests placed above the side screens of the choir. Think what associations the inscriptions on these recall. Early Wessex chieftains, as Kynegils and Kenwalh: kings of Wessex, when Wessex was supreme over all England, as Egbert and Æthelwulf: the union of Saxon and Dane, as personified by Cnut and Queen Emma; the Norman tyrant as represented by Rufus. Not even in Westminster Abbey itself can names such as these be read. And close at hand are other significant names too: Harthacnut: Richard, son of the Conqueror, fated, like his brother Rufus, to meet a violent death in the New Forest, but otherwise unknown to history: Duke Beorn, murdered at sea by Sweyn, son of Earl Godwine. These and other striking names can be found graven on the stone-work which carries the mortuary chests above.

Of former bishops of Winchester the majority are buried here. Some of these—and among them some of the most famous—have no visible sign to mark their tomb; these include such names as Birinus, Swithun, Æthelwold, Walkelyn, Henry of Blois. There are many others too over whom we should like to linger: Peter de Rupibus, for instance, the evil genius of Henry III.’s reign, and Ethelmar or Aymer, the absentee bishop, who died in Paris, but desired his heart to be placed in a casket for interment in the Cathedral, though when alive his affections seem to have been centred anywhere but here. His monument is more picturesque than his life was edifying. He is represented in effigy in the attitude of prayer, and holding his heart between his folded hands. In striking contrast to these are monuments to Bishops Morley, Hoadley, Samuel Wilberforce, and Harold Brown.

Over the remaining monuments, and there are many of very great interest, we cannot linger. Flaxman is represented by a bas-relief of Dr. Warton, famous in his day as headmaster of the College, seated in his magisterial chair, with a group of college boys ‘up to books.’ The details of schoolboy attire are curious and interesting. Appealing to a wider circle are two flat slabs of stone, one in Prior Silkstede’s Chapel, one in the north aisle. The former bears the name Izaak Walton, the latter Jane Austen. Truly Winchester Cathedral is a city of the mighty dead.

In addition to the monuments there are many other features of great attractiveness. Prior Silkstede’s carvedwooden pulpit, the quaint old font curiously carved in black stone, said to have been brought to Winchester by Henry of Blois, and themiserereseats in the choir stalls are among these. The Cathedral library, too, is of rare interest. The wonderful Illuminated Vulgate, with its almost romantic history, and numerous early Saxon charters are preserved here, along with Cathedral and city records of great historical value.

The exterior of the Cathedral presents less interest. It is grand and striking, but hardly beautiful. The West front is flat and featureless, the long straight roof of the nave is monotonous. The east end, with its varied work and the huge Norman transepts, is by far the finest portion. Taken as a whole the general effect is extremely dignified and impressive, and the surroundings are entirely in keeping.

As you pass down the beautiful lime avenue, or cross the grass to the west and north, the quiet dignity and repose impress you with an influence deeper than mere beauty, and the Cathedral Close, with its Jacobean and Georgian houses, is equally serene, dignified, and attractive. The Deanery is interesting, particularly the Early English work in the portico, and the beautiful green sward in Mirabel Close, with the Pilgrims’ Hall to the east, and Cheyne Court with its open-timbered and gabled houses, all both alike quiet, stately, and harmonious. A rare place this Close, with associations too of its own. Even nowadays it possesses its ghost—a female figure robed and veiled like a nun—which persons still living will describe to you, for they haveseen it themselves, they declare, and heard its ghostly footfall echoing as it has paced before them on the flags. Nor is the word ‘Close’ a word only. Still every night the gate is religiously locked at the stroke of ten, after which none may enter or depart save by favour of the Close porter, the lineal successor of the ‘proud portér’ so prominent in Early English ballad poetry.

Before leaving the Cathedral we must say a few words about the operations for the repair of the fabric to which reference has already been made.

The insecurity of a large part of the fabric is due mainly to the foundation on which Godfrey de Lucy built when he extended the Cathedral towards the east. To do this he had to build out over an area of peaty and water-logged land, wherein to reach a solid foundation it was necessary to go down through successive layers of marl and gravel and peat, to a considerable depth, varying from 16 to 24 feet. As this involved working under water, and as the task of dealing with water under foundations was beyond the skill of builders of the time, de Lucy made an artificial foundation of beech logs, or beech trunks rather, laid horizontally one over the other and kept in place with piles, with the result that a progressive subsidence has occurred, mainly, but not entirely, at the east end, causing walls to bulge and crack, and fissures to appear, until the present degree of insecurity has been reached. Thus it has been not a question of restoration, but of preservation, and the work has been taken in hand not a moment too soon.

The present operations have consisted, in the main, of systematic underpinning of the walls and buttresses, and as much of the work has had to be carried out under 10 feet or so of water, a diver has been employed to lay down concrete in section after section at the base of the new foundations, the water being afterwards temporarily drawn off by the help of powerful pumps, to enable the work of underpinning to go on. The employment of divers to lay foundations for a building 800 years old would appear a fantastic absurdity, transcending the wildest stretch of imaginative invention. Winchester Cathedral has actually realised it.

Unfortunately, the securing of the southern aisle of the nave may demand an addition,—not merely underpinning, but the construction of buttresses. But these, although novel, will be no more foreign to the general design than were the corresponding buttresses which Wykeham added to the north aisle; and these, with the further addition of the great tie-rods inserted at various spots in the transepts and retro-choir, will, it is hoped, give the Cathedral a stability which will ensure its preservation for centuries more. The operations, so novel in character, so daring in conception, so extensive in scale, are yet unfinished, and while some £90,000 has been already expended on the work, something like another £12,000 is still needed for its completion.

Schoolmasters in any schooleWriting with pen and ink.Childe Maurice.

“Mannersmakyth man”—‘manners’ in the old and wide sense of the word, the equivalent of the Latin ‘mores,’ or of the word ‘conversation’ in St. Paul’s epistles,i.e.moral worth and character as contrasted with wealth, or the symbols of rank and power. This is the motto inseparably connected with Wykeham’s foundations at Winchester and Oxford alike, and who shall say how potent this motto has been in inspiring and moulding the character of English manhood and English public schools during the five centuries and more since their great founder was laid to rest?

Winchester College is no common place. If Winchester Cathedral, which enshrines the bones of Egbert, should be the Mecca of all pious lovers of the Empire, Winchester College should be the Mecca for all English public school men. Not that Wykeham was the first to found an English public school, whateverexactly the term ‘public school’ may mean. Schools had existed in the land for six or seven hundred years before Wykeham’s day. There were schools in Winchester itself, as, for instance, the ancient Winchester Grammar School, seven of the poor scholars of which received a meal daily in the Hundred Mennes Hall at St. Cross. Wykeham did not invent schools as public schools, but what he did was to give to public schools the special impetus and character which they have borne ever since, and in this sense he is rightly named and revered as the ‘Father of English public schools.’

Earlier schools had almost invariably been linked to collegiate churches—the communities of secular canons—and had occupied always a subordinate position. Wykeham gave an independent position to his school, strengthening it indeed by making it part of a collegiate body, and linking it with the University, through the sister foundation of New College—St. Marie College of Wynchester in Oxford, to give it its full name—which Wykeham had completed in 1386.

Before the college could be commenced many preliminaries were necessary,—bulls from the Pope, and other official sanctions, lawsuits and agreements with all kinds of bodies which had an interest in the site; but Wykeham began to organise his school before the permanent buildings were ready, and for some years his scholars were lodged in temporary quarters somewhere by St. Giles’s Hill. The site chosen for the buildings was just outside the city walls to the south,and when at last all was ready, on March 20, 1394, the opening ceremony was solemnized. The aged bishop received the Warden and seventy scholars in the presence chamber of his Episcopal palace of Wolvesey, and the whole body left Wolvesey in solemn procession, and entered and took possession of their new abode.

Wykeham’s immediate purpose in founding a school appears to have been to help to provide a body of educated clergy. Successive visitations of the ‘Black Death’ had depleted the land of clergy, just as it had of labourers, and there was pressing need for a supply of educated men to recruit their ranks. It was to be part of the object of the college to provide such recruits.

The scheme of the college and the statutes of the founders were carefully thought out and elaborated. The college was part of a wide educational scheme: a school and something more—a society, with roots in Oxford as well as in Winchester. The society was to comprise a school, a chantry, and a body of Fellows. The school was to consist of seventy scholars, a number chosen very possibly in symbolical allusion to the seventy ordained to teach and preach throughout the land of Galilee, just as Dean Colet afterwards chose ‘a hundred and fifty and three’ as the number of his scholars in the school he founded—St. Paul’s School, London. Over these were a master orMagister informator, and an usher orhostiarius: the chantry was equipped with three chaplains, three chapel clerks, and

TOWER OF AMBULATORY, HOSPITAL OF ST. CROSS, WINCHESTERA picturesque red-brick corner of the domestic buildings of St. Cross Hospital, close to the magnificent grey-stone tower and archway known as Beaufort’s Tower.

TOWER OF AMBULATORY, HOSPITAL OF ST. CROSS, WINCHESTER

A picturesque red-brick corner of the domestic buildings of St. Cross Hospital, close to the magnificent grey-stone tower and archway known as Beaufort’s Tower.

sixteen choristers: the number of Fellows or Socii was ten. The supreme head over this varied community was the Warden.

This society, complete in itself and so far independent, was linked with another—the sister foundation of New College, Oxford—in such a way as to gain stability and dignity without subordination. Winchester was to be independent of New, but the influence of New was to be a potent factor in determining the policy of Winchester. The Warden of Winchester was to be appointed by New College, and New College was also to have extensive powers of visitation.

In Wykeham’s day any separation of the religious element from other aspects of education would have been deemed impossible, and everything was cast in a religious and even semi-monastic mould. Nevertheless the organisations for the school and chantry were kept quite distinct, and while divine service was celebrated practically continuously by the chantry staff, the scholars were required to attend chapel services only on Sundays, saints’ days, or other festivals. The Warden and Fellows alike were to be in priests’ orders. The Fellows had duties to perform connected with the chantry, but none connected with the school, except that the Warden and Fellows were to elect the headmaster. The headmaster was not necessarily to be in holy orders; he was to teach the scholars, and to maintain discipline, and was to be assisted by the usher orhostiarius. The ‘seventy’ were to bepauperes et indigentes,i.e.poor and in need ofassistance, apt to study, and well versed in the rudiments of Latin grammar, reading, and plain-song. They were to be elected by a body of six, known afterwards as ‘the Chamber,’ from the room overlooking Middle or Chamber Court, ‘Election Chamber,’ where elections took place. The ‘Chamber’ was to consist of the Warden and two Fellows from New (known as the senior and junior ‘posers’ respectively), with the Warden, Subwarden, and Headmaster of Winchester. In election preference was to be given to founder’s kin, and then to others in due degrees of priority of claim. They were to remain until the age of eighteen years, unless on the roll for New College; but founder’s kin could remain till the age of twenty-five years.

The scholars were to be lodged, boarded, clothed, and taught entirely free of expense: they were not to keep dogs, ferrets, or hawks: to carry arms or frequent taverns: to empty water, etc., on the heads of their companions from windows in the court—regulations which throw a curious light on the manners of the time. The scholars were to be lodged and fed under the charge of thehostiariusor usher—an arrangement which obtains even now, as the ‘seventy’ still reside in chambers in college, under the charge of the second master.

We must not suppose that Wykeham’s scholars were to be boys either destitute or in actual want. The termpauperes et indigenteswas probably a formal expression, designed to exclude the actuallywealthy rather than anything else, like the termin need of financial assistanceinserted in modern scholarship regulations.

In addition to the above, the statutes contemplated the admission of a limited number of outsiders, known ascommensalesor commoners, and later on town boys oroppidaniwere admitted as day boys. The conditions under which the commoners resided varied greatly from time to time. In 1727 Dr. Burton, then headmaster, made extensive additions to the College buildings, practically converting his own house into a boarding-house for them, and this building became known as ‘Old Commoners.’ In 1838 Commoners was rebuilt, under the name of New Commoners, but the result was not very satisfactory, and in 1860 the present plan of boarding in tutors’ houses was commenced, when the Rev. H. J. Wickham opened the first ‘House.’ In 1869, during Dr. Moberly’s tenure as headmaster, the system was extended. ‘Commoners’ was done away with, the commoners themselves lodged in tutors’ houses, and the building in part transformed into ‘Moberly Library’—so termed in memory of Dr. Moberly.

The College buildings and grounds are a charm and a delight. From the outer front in College Street, little indeed can be seen. The headmaster’s house, built on the site of the old Sustern Spital, is a flat-fronted modern building faced with squared flints, and the old Brewery presents little but a blank wall of ancientmasonry. The one external feature of interest is the delightful ‘Old Gateway’ surmounted by a statue of the Virgin.

Passing under Old Gateway with College Brew House on the right, and then under Middle Gate into Chamber Court, one is transported back immediately into mediaevalism. There over Middle Gate is the figure of ‘Sainte Marie,’ and scholars, juniors, at least, if not always seniors, as they cross the quad, doff their hats still in reverence to the Virgin as they have done from the beginning. Immediately opposite you are Chapel and Hall. Chapel, with Fromond’s chantry used by Lower-school ‘Men,’—for Winchester is remarkable among schools as having two chapels—and the beautiful cloisters behind it, those cloisters which the Founder himself seems almost to pervade and to spiritualize with his presence, is a place to wander in and dream dreams of the past. Hall, approached, as befits its dignity, up a grand old stairway, is splendidly impressive, with its magnificent open timber roof and carved wainscot, and the Founder’s portrait—a picture of real grace and beauty—dominating the high table or dais at the other end. In the lobby adjoining the kitchen they will show you the ‘Trusty Servant,’ the quaint old painting emblematic of loyal and devoted service. The riddle is explained in a copy of verses attached, and the absence of any reference to expectation of reward on behalf of the ‘Trusty Sweater’ is at least as suggestive as his loyalty and humble demeanour.

Most appealing, perhaps, after Hall, possibly more even than Cloisters, is ‘Seventh Chamber,’ Wykeham’s original schoolroom, or part of it at least, now used as a common study for senior College men, and a veritable museum of interesting reminders of old Wykehamical life mingled confusedly with aggressively incongruous and more modern ‘intrusive deposits,’—here perhaps a framed ‘Vanity Fair’ cartoon of the headmaster; there possibly a couple of Teddy Bears serving as mascots—for in college life the points of contrast between ancient and modern are curious and startling, while not the least alluring of its characteristic features is the rich flavour and vigour of college nomenclature. ‘Moab,’ the boys’ washing-place in earlier and less luxurious days—“Moab is my wash-pot”—is a delicious example of this. College phraseology is a subject almost worthy of separate treatment by itself.

‘Seventh Chamber Passage,’ itself originally part of Seventh Chamber, leads you to ‘School,’ the seventeenth-century schoolroom built by Warden Nicholas. Here you may see the ‘thrones’ or official seats in earlier days of headmaster and usher, and the world-famous Winchester emblem on the walls—

Aut disceAut discedeManet tertia sors—caedi.

which may be freely rendered—

Learn, or depart, or stay and be beaten;

though it is more than doubtful whether, in the experience of earlier Wykehamists at least, the first and the last-mentioned fates were at all often found to be mutually exclusive.

Beyond is ‘Meads,’ where ‘Domum’ is yearly held, and beyond, again, ‘New Meads,’ with its magnificent sward, its lofty trees, and its memories of ‘Eton Match’; and right away again, across the river, ‘Hills’ lies in full view—St. Catherine’s Hill, where Winchester boys in earlier days repaired for recreation on ‘remedies’ or holidays, the joys of which may be followed out in full in Bompas’s delightful life of Frank Buckland.

“Manners makyth man”—one is tempted to wonder if more may not here be meant than meets the ear, and whether ‘manners,’ in its Latin equivalentmoresat least, does not wrap up a punning allusion, after the method so dear to that age, to Warden Morys, to whose hands, on the erection of the building, Wykeham first committed the future of his great college. But be that as it may, the emblem seems to sum up the spirit of the college with literal fidelity. Passing through its chambers, its chapel, its courts, its cloisters, one is sadly tempted to linger to recall the memory of this great headmaster, or recount the quaint stories told of this famous warden or that, and the names of Ken, Arnold, Goddard, Gabell, Huntingford, Barter, rise almost instinctively to one’s lips. We shall find their memories all piously preserved and commemorated whether in portrait, tablet, or building, as for instancethe Memorial Gateway erected as a memorial of the old Wykehamists who fell in the South African War; but here we may not stop, and those who wish to do so can follow out their story in Leach’sWinchester Collegeor Adams’s delightfulWykehamica. But more striking than the past, the noble traditions nobly preserved is the vitality in the present. ‘Sainte Marie College’ has always known how to adapt herself successfully, as age succeeded age, to the requirements of the day, and has paid the truest respect to the Founder’s wishes in never allowing herself to grow old. There is no frost, mingled with the kindliness of age, in Winchester College.

And for great Arthur’s seat ould Winchester preferres,Whose ould Round Table yet she vaunteth to be hers.Drayton’sPolyolbion.

FromCollege one turns naturally to Wolvesey—Wolvesey with its wonderful grey stone walls, its memories of Saxon and Norman, Plantagenet and Stuart times. Here Alfred kept his Court, with all the learned men of his time around him; here theEnglish Chroniclewas first compiled; and here, above that very Wolvesey wall, it may be, the Danish pirates captured in the Solent were hanged—as has been already related—in retributive justice. But the big blocks of ruin in Wolvesey Mead are of later date; they recall to us the career of that notable figure among the Bishops of Winchester, Henry of Blois, King Stephen’s brother, bishop from 1129 to 1171—the masterful man, devoted churchman, and scheming politician, whose story has been somewhat fully related in Chapter VIII. To strengthen himself he fortified

CHURCH OF ST. LAWRENCE, WINCHESTERA small but extremely interesting parish church in ‘The Square,’ of which practically all the exterior, save the Western Doorway and the Tower, is hidden from sight by the houses and shops hemming it in on all sides. Every Bishop of Winchester on being installed proceeds in solemn procession from the Cathedral to St. Lawrence Church to ring the bell—a picturesque survival of feudal days. ‘The Square’ marks the site of a palace built for his own occupation by William the Conqueror.

CHURCH OF ST. LAWRENCE, WINCHESTER

A small but extremely interesting parish church in ‘The Square,’ of which practically all the exterior, save the Western Doorway and the Tower, is hidden from sight by the houses and shops hemming it in on all sides. Every Bishop of Winchester on being installed proceeds in solemn procession from the Cathedral to St. Lawrence Church to ring the bell—a picturesque survival of feudal days. ‘The Square’ marks the site of a palace built for his own occupation by William the Conqueror.

his dwelling at Wolvesey with an ‘adulterine’ castle—for he built here without royal warrant, as he built his castles elsewhere at Bishop’s Waltham and at Hursley,—and he sided alternately with Stephen and Empress Matilda in the civil war, as circumstances dictated. And so it befell that Winchester itself became divided into rival camps; Matilda’s forces held the Royal Castle and the Bishop held Wolvesey, and, here within his defences, now in ruins, the Bishop stood the siege valiantly. Ultimately peace was made, and Winchester saw Prince Henry make joyful entry into her ruined streets and ratify the compact. His later years were passed in works of peace and beneficence, and for these he will always be most gratefully remembered.

He built the Hospital of St. Cross, a permanent refuge for thirteen poor brethren, and a house of daily entertainment for the poor and needy outside its walls. He placed his foundation of St. Cross under the protection of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, an Order specially devoted to guarding the welfare of pilgrims and wayfarers. And so the Brethren of St. Cross still wear to-day the eight-pointed cross of the Order and the black gown which distinguished the Knights Hospitallers, and the wayfarer’s dole of bread and beer may still be asked for and obtained at its hospitable gates. Advancement, personal power, and political ascendancy, all these Bishop Henry desired for himself, strove for, won and lost in turn. St. Cross retains its vitality still,—such is the perennial virtue of unselfish kindliness and beneficence.

Though its fortifications were dismantled, Wolvesey remained the residence of the Bishops of Winchester for many centuries after Henry de Blois. Here, on March 28, 1394, in the presence chamber of Wolvesey, William of Wykeham received the warden, John Morys, and the seventy scholars of hisNewe College of St. Marie, and gave them his blessing as they set out in solemn procession to enter into occupation of their newly erected premises. In the Civil War, after Cromwell’s capture of the city, the old Bishop’s Castle was finally dismantled.

Present-day Wolvesey Palace stands on your left as you enter from College Street with the Norman ruins and the old Tilt yard in front of it and on your right. Bishop Morley, the friend of Ken and Izaak Walton, erected it. But Wolvesey and Farnham together proved too heavy an episcopal burden, and later bishops have preferred to reside at Farnham. So Wolvesey ceased to be the Bishop of Winchester’s official residence, and the greater part of Morley’s building was pulled down by Bishop North at the end of the eighteenth century. The growing need for the division of the diocese makes it quite possible, however, that the Bishops of Winchester may again be residing in Wolvesey Palace, as their predecessors did for so many hundreds of years.

Wykeham’s College, ‘the Newe Saint Marie College of Wynchester,’ is but a stone’s-throw from Wolvesey. The story of the College has been fully dealt with in a former chapter, and so, now, as we pass along College

Street from Wolvesey, our thoughts may well turn to a house on the left adjoining College, with memories of a different kind, those of Jane Austen. A tablet over the door recalls the fact of Jane Austen’s death within its walls in 1817. She had removed here from her home at Chawton, near Alton, in hope of recovery under the medical treatment which Winchester could afford her. But the hope was vain. She lies buried in the north aisle of the Cathedral nave. We know her now as among the rarest and most charming of women novelists. Of her we shall speak again in the chapter on ‘Winchester in Literature.’

Some half mile or so south of College, beyond New Meads and the meadows by the river—those meadows from which the tower and pinnacles of College Chapel form so poetic a picture as they mingle with the trees around, and the Cathedral behind—lies St. Cross, a foundation which has undergone many vicissitudes and been at various times “much abused” (see pp.188, 189), but which has happily now for many years past been rescued from the spoiler and restored to the full exercise of generous beneficence. Of its foundation by Henry of Blois we have already spoken, but in its associations another historic name figures, of equal prominence with Bishop Henry’s—that of Beaufort, Bishop and Cardinal in Henry VI.’s reign. Beaufort was a second founder, and the domestic buildings and the fine gateway are his work. Along with the Brethren with black gown and silver cross will be seen some wearing a mulberry gown, with the Beaufort Rose asemblem; these are Brethren of the order Beaufort founded—the Order of Noble Poverty. St. Cross is not a place to describe at all in words; its traditions, its characteristic customs, its general atmosphere belong to it and to it alone; to appreciate it it must be felt. Peaceful and dignified, with the clear transparent waters of Itchen flowing quietly by at its feet, there is no place in Winchester, or indeed anywhere else, where the sense of hallowed charm, of serenity, of contentment, and of rest seems quite so natural and so pervading as here.

Wherever else we turn in Winchester we find some treasure or other over which to linger. On the high ground forming the south-west angle of the city there is the County Hall, last surviving relic of the great royal castle, which William of Normandy first erected and which his successors added to. For some six hundred years that great keep, with its heavy battlements and frowning bastions, scowled down upon the city and overawed its burghers. Yet, grim and all but impregnable as those ‘rude ribs’ might seem to be, more than one assailant found means to penetrate within. Here, in 1140, Matilda the Empress, besieged by Stephen’s Queen, was forced by hunger to abandon resistance, and to seek safety by stealth and stratagem in a hasty and disastrous flight—her power of effective resistance broken finally and for ever. Here, in 1645, flushed with victory from Naseby field, came Cromwell, and, after nine days of hot cannonade, compelled the surrender of the citadel—a surrender which he followedup by ordering the castle to be ‘slighted,’i.e.razed to the ground.

The present Castle Hall was erected by a Winchester monarch—Henry III., Henry of Winchester. Here again the sense of the historic past swells and surges round you. It is almost a revelation in history to walk round it and follow out in detail the memories of those whose history is personally connected with it, their names and arms all emblazoned in the stained glass which fills the lights on either side. Local feeling has been just recently somewhat deeply stirred by the removal within the Hall of Gilbert’s well-known bronze statue of Queen Victoria, formerly placed in the Abbey grounds—a removal which has evoked a very unfortunate controversy, and as to the wisdom of which considerable cleavage of opinion exists. But whatever view be taken of this, as to the impressiveness of the great Hall, within and without, or the story it has to tell, no two opinions can be held. The grand interior with its splendid columns speaks of great assemblies within its walls; of Parliaments such as the one held here as early as 1265, within a year of the death of the great De Montfort, the ‘inventor,’ so to speak, of the representative assembly; of State ceremonial displays such as when Henry V. received the French ambassadors here, a few days only before the Agincourt expedition sailed—as when Henry VII. celebrated the birth of his first-born, Arthur of Winchester, Prince of Wales, and as when Henry VIII. received and fêted the great Emperor Charles V., the

Charlemagne of his day; of State Trials such as that which unjustly condemned Sir Walter Raleigh; of the Bloody Assize and the horror of the judicial murder of Dame Alicia Lisle; while the most characteristic touch perhaps of all is given by the quaint relic hanging on the western wall, the so-called King Arthur’s Round Table. A curious relic indeed this latter, and an ancient one, possibly 700 years old. We shall hardly accept it, as Henry VIII. and his royal Spanish guest did, as the actual table at which King Arthur and his knights used to seat themselves, even though we may read their names—Sir Launcelot, Sir Galahallt, Sir Bedivere, Sir Kay—inscribed upon its margin. Rather does it recall to us those quaintly attractive, uncritical mediaeval days, when historical perspective was unknown, that glorious age when “Once upon a time” almost satisfied the yearnings of the historical instinct. Yet one may question whether we are really better off, because for us King Arthur’s Round Table has no existence and Arthur himself is lost in the strange background of

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