PROBABLY IN WATER COLOURS. 1.-At north end of gallery in west aisle of south transept. II.-In St. Blaize's Chapel. III-In several parts of Chapter House. IV.-In St. Erasmus' Chapel. ANCIENT. MODERN.. GLASS, STAINED AND PAINTED. I.-North and south aisles of nave. II.-Clerestory windows, east end of choir III.—Eastern window of Henry the Seventh's Chapei. I. Great west window. III.-South transept IV.-Window above Henry the Seventh's Chantry. MOSAIC S. On Edward the Confessor's Shrine. On Henry the Third's Tomb. On pavement in Confessor's Chapel. On pavement before the altar. On tomb of Henry the Third's children in Ambulatory. In glass frame near King Sebert's Tomb. SCULPTURES ON EDWARD THE CONFESSOR'S ILLUSTRATIVE OF HIS LIFE AND VISIONS: BEGINNING I.-Prelates and nobles doing fealty to Edward the Con II.-Birth of Edward the Confessor. III. Edward the Confessors coronation. IV-Edward the Confessor witnessing the devil dancing on the Danegelt Tax deposited in casks. The figure of the devil is gone. V.-Edward admonishing the thief stealing his treasure. VI.-Christ appearing to Edward whilst taking the sacrament. VII.-The King of Denmark falling into the sea-one of Edward's visions. VIII. Quarrel between Tosti and Harold before Edward. IX. The Emperor Theodosius before the Cave of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus-one of the visions of Edward. X.-Edward giving his ring as alms to St. John the Evangelist. XI. Restoration of the blind men to sight, by the use of the water in which Edward had washed. XII.-St. John giving Edward's ring to the pilgrims. XIV.-Called "Dedication of Edward the Confessor's Church." IMAGES ON HENRY THE SEVENTH'S TOMB. South Side-Virgin and Saviour, and St. Michael. St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. East Side-Boys supporting Henry the Seventh's arms. North Side-St. Mary Magdalene and St. Barbara, the latter holding a three-storied tower, symbolical of the Trinity. St. Christopher and St. Anne. Edward the Confessor and St. John. St. Vincent. West Side-Dragon and greyhound supporting a rose. ON THE SCREEN. The statues of St. Edward (S.), St. Bartholomew (S.): St. John the Evangelist (W.), St. George (W.), St. Basil (N.); and St. James (E.), are all that now remain of thirty-six statues 105 IT Monuments in Westminster Abbey. has often been observed, that the monuments in Westminster Abbey, in their varieties—“ some burlesque, some profane, almost all unbeseeming their place and purpose," as characterized in a paper in the Athenæum, No. 788, which all should read before they visit heremake the place look rather like the show-room of the statuary than the house of God, and it must be admitted that there is much truth in the remark. The Abbey has been, from the earliest times, the admitted resting-place of our kings and heroes; but whilst they were honoured in the triumphs of monumental art, the solemn character of the building which held their remains was never forgotten. Our "hero worship," * "If we select examples of monuments from periods antecedent to the reign of Henry the Eighth, we seldom find anything incongruous; a harmony, propriety, and fitness, are discernible, putting to shame the works of more modern times. Sculptors worked in subordination to the plans of the architects, and the most ingenious of the latter displayed all their talents in the suitable decorations of shrines and tabernacles, applied to burial chapels or sacella. The chapels and tombs were erected entirely upon architectural principles. With the introduction of the debased Italian style, taste in monumental sculpture was almost, if not altogether banished." "Amongst the works of earlier days, the altar tomb with its recumbent effigies, occasionally surmounted by a gorgeous and appropriate canopy, conveys to the mind of the spectator a feeling of solemnity and awe. The supplicating attitude of the ecclesiastics and warriors, who sleep below, awaiting their awful summons, associates well with our hope to be numbered with the saints in glory everlasting;' and when the eye glances on them in the hour of prayer, feelings are awakened which ought not to be hastily dismissed. "These ane altar tombs gave place to piles of marble and stone as happily, is not extinct; and Westminster Abbey has been filled to overflowing with evidences of the fact. But who will say that our modern monuments have any religious character about them? Where is a single monument in the transepts and nave, erected in the last two centuries, which does not keep the beholder's associations on earth rather than elevate them to heaven? The sentiment of the best of them is the glorification of the individual. Does it not seem like profanity, that in God's house, the orator, the warrior, the actor, should each be exhibiting himself in the appropriate attitude of his calling, in self-glory? In an age of cold scepticism alone (let us not blink the fact) could such things have been brought forth. The disconnexion of the Hero from his Maker is flying in the very face of true art; for its aspirations are towards divinity, and have been so in all its truthful and genuine phases, from the age of the Pharaohs to the fifteenth century. With the sculpture, as consisting of objects of mere beauty, apart from religious fitness, we ought to have little to do here. Who would be insensible to the merits of Flaxman's "Lord Mansfield," in a hall of justice* Chantrey's "Horner," or Westmacott's " Charity," in a public gallery? But what single link connects these beautiful works with that devotional feeling ever suggested by the old tombs ? Admitting, then, with regret, the absence of that devotional character in the modern monuments, which is ever present in the ancient, we would very briefly direct the visitor's attention offensive to the eye of taste as the monument of Sir Cloudesley Shovel in later times, of which Addison so justly complains.”—Markland on English Churches. "Let the statues and busts of literary men be placed in those institutions with which they have been connected. Let those of lawyers be placed in the courts of justice, or in the halls of the inns of court; those of medical men in the colleges, which they have benefited by the exercise of their talents and philanthropy; and those of eminent ecclesiastics in their college libraries or halls. Let provision be made in the Houses of Parliament now rising, for the introduction of statues within their walls. How much more advantageously might those of Lord Chatham and of Pitt, of Fox, Horner, and Canning, have appeared in such a building, than in a crowd, almost buried as they are, in the adjoining Abbey of Westminster."-See Markland on English Churches, a little volume, pleasant, learned, tasteful, and pious, in which it is most welcome to find the opinions I have glanced at, corroborated. 66 66 to a few of the most remarkable of them as mere works of art. In tender sweetness, and pathetic treatment,_no modern sculptures seem to us to have surpassed "The Soldier's Widow," by Sir R. Westmacott (No. 201, Appendix), which sometimes passes under the title of Charity." His monuments to Pitt (No. 100), Addison (No. 33), Fox (No. 218), seem to us as much failures, as his monumental effigies of the Duke of Montpensier (No. 307) is most successful-compared with every other modern work here, in its architectonic character. Grandeur, and dignity, and beauty, of outline, are everywhere apparent in Flaxman's "Lord Mansfield;" but it is entirely unsuitable to a Gothic church. As memorials grandly elevated of individuals, yet singularly faithful in likeness and character, all must esteem Chantrey's statues of Canning" (No. 209), and "Sir John Malcolm " (No. 211), and "Horner" (No. 197). There is an exquisite peaceful serenity, too, about Chantrey's "Sir Stamford Raffles" (No. 159). Joseph's "Wilberforce" (No. 161) is a very clever victory over difficulties, which make the subject altogether an unfit one for sculpture. "Handel," for Vauxhall, was the first, whilst the "Handel" here (No. 34) was the last of Roubiliac's works. How far mediocrity may misinterpret the lessons of genius, is shown in the monument of "Admiral Tyrrell" (No. 91), the production of Nathaniel Read, Roubiliac's pupil. The clouds of dough, and crystallized sea, are an utter violation of all principles of sculpture, and present a most conclusive memento of the taste of 1766. But, perhaps, the choicest standard of the sculpture, painting, and poetry of its day, is the monument of Sir Godfrey Kneller. When you are next looking on Sir Godfrey's picture of "William the Third and Neptune," at Hampton Court, imagine Nature extinguished and lost to a weeping world, because the coxcomb Kneller had departed this life. Even Pope must have had rather peculiar views about Nature and Art, to indite such a conceit as the following: "Kneller, by Heaven, and not a master taught, Whose art was nature, and whose pictures thought, |
