Chapter IV: Part 4

The rebuilding of the Abbey Church choir in the fifteenth century recalls to our mind the great quarrel between the Abbey and the townsfolk, which came to a head in the year 1437. It has already been noted that in ancient times the townsfolk had been allowed by the Abbot and Convent to use the western part of the Abbey Church nave as a parish church. Thus the Abbey Church had become a divided church—part was conventual, part parochial. But as time went on this arrangement ceased to please one or other, or both, parties, and the consequence was that All Hallows was built at the west end of the Abbey Church for the use of the parishioners. After this addition was made, the large Norman doorway at the west end of the south aisle of the Abbey Church nave was narrowed by the insertion of a smaller doorway. Now, All Hallows had not the _status_ of a parish church; technically, the parish church was still the western part of the Abbey Church nave, and here it was still necessary for all Sherborne children to be baptised in the font, which originally stood where the present font stands. The parishioners, to get to the font, had to enter All Hallows’ Church, and pass thence into the Abbey Church through the Norman doorway, which had been narrowed. This the parishioners regarded as a grievance. It appears, also, that the Abbot had moved the font from the place where it now stands to some other site which the parishioners regarded as inconvenient. The parishioners, therefore, in 1436, took the law into their own hands, and eight of them are charged before the bishop with having set up a font in All Hallows. The Abbot, of course, regarded this as a usurpation of the rectorial rights of the Convent; he complained, also, of another grievance, to wit, that the parish bells rang to matins at too early an hour, and disturbed the morning slumbers of the monks. For though they got up at midnight to sing matins and lauds, they went to bed again, and slept till the hour for prime, somewhere between 6 and 7 a.m. Abbot Bradford, therefore, appealed to the Bishop of Sarum, Robert Nevile, who came to Sherborne and held an inquiry on the 12th November, 1436, in what is now the chapel of the school, but was then the Abbot’s hall. He examined one hundred or more of the parishioners, many of whom had not approved of the high-handed course taken in the matter of the font. After a thorough investigation, the Bishop, by the advice of his counsel learned in the law, gave his decision from his manor of Ramsbury, on the 8th January, 1437. It was to this effect—(_a_) that the font in All Hallows was to be at once utterly destroyed and removed and carried out of the church by those who had caused it to be set there; (_b_) that the ringing of the bells to matins for the parishioners throughout the year was not to be made till after the sixth hour had struck on the _clocka_ or _horologium_ of the monastery, except on the following solemn feasts: All Saints, Christmas, Epiphany, and Easter; (_c_) that the font of the Abbey Church was to be replaced in its old accustomed position, and all infants born or to be born in Sherborne were, as of old, to be baptised therein; (_d_) that the intermediate door and entrance for the procession of parishioners to the font was to be enlarged and arched so as to give ample space and bring it to its original form; (_e_) that the manner of the procession and other ceremonies about the font were to be observed in the old and wonted way; (_f_) that there must be made, at the expense of the monastery, in the nave of the monastic church, close to the monks’ choir, a partition, so that there should be a distinct line of separation between the monks and the parishioners; (_g_) that the replacing of the Abbey Church font in its wonted place, and the enlarging of the door, must effectually be completed before the following Christmas.

This admirable judgment was not received by the disputants with the respect which it deserved; delays and evasions on both sides brought about a violent termination of the dispute. The monks induced “one Walter Gallor a stoute Bocher dwelling yn Sherborne” to enter All Hallows, where “he defacid cleane the Fontstone; the townsmen, aided by an Erle of Huntindune lying in these Quarters ... rose in playne sedition ... a Preste of Alhalowes shot a shaft with fier into the Toppe of that part of St. Marye Church that divided the Est Part that the monks usid; and this Partition chauncing at that tyme to be thakked yn the Rofe was sette a fier, and consequently al the hole Chirch, the Lede and Belles meltid, was defacid.” After the fire the monks were induced to agree to the legal transformation of All Hallows’ _Chapel_ into the parish _Church_, in order to get rid of the parishioners altogether.

The monks never removed the smaller doorway by which the old Norman entrance was narrowed; there it stands to this day, a monument of that stormy time, and connected with it there is still a curious tale to tell. Among the eight parishioners who, “casting behind them the fear of God,” set up the obnoxious font in All Hallows, and complained of the narrowed doorway, there was a certain Richard Vowell. Anyone who now examines this doorway will notice that the wall, which now blocks it up, is almost wholly occupied by a large monumental tablet to the memory of Benjamin Vowell, who died in 1783, and to his three wives; thus, as Professor Willis neatly showed, the doorway which in the fifteenth century Richard Vowell felt to be too narrow, Benjamin Vowell in the eighteenth blocked up altogether. The “partition” referred to, which was being thatched, must have been the tower, which was being raised in height, and was covered with a temporary roof of thatch to keep out the rain; no doubt, also, the new choir, which was already built as high as the springing-stones of the vault, was also thatched for the same purpose. The reddened stones in the choir and tower still bear witness to this fire.

John Barnstaple, last Abbot of Sherborne, surrendered the Abbey into the hands of King Henry VIII. on the 18th March, 1539. He received a pension of £100 a year, and the Rectory of Stalbridge in 1540; this living had been in the patronage of the Abbot and Convent. He died in 1560; we know neither the place of his death nor of his burial, but he certainly was not buried at Stalbridge; he left a small legacy to Sherborne School.

Henry VIII. sold the Abbey Church, and the demesne lands of the Abbey, to Sir John Horsey, of Clifton Maybank; Sir John, in 1540, sold the Abbey Church to the parishioners; the lead, however, with which the church was roofed, had not been granted to Sir John, and the parishioners had to buy that through him from the King. The parishioners appear to have begun at once to sell All Hallows for building stone. The parish accounts for 1540 and 1541 are missing, but that for 1542-3 shows the process of selling going merrily on, until, finally, in the account for 1548-9, we get the last of it in such entries as these: “George Swetnam, for vi. yerds off one syde off the Tower, xxs.; Robert ffoster, for foundation stones of ye Northe Syde of ye Tower, xiiis.; Mr. Sergyer, for a yard off the grace table off the sowthe syde and for the dore yn the north syde off ye Tow^{r}, xs.”!

It may be interesting to set down here what the parishioners paid for the Abbey Church and lead. We have already noted that the parish accounts for 1540 and 1541 are missing. They were not missing, however, in the eighteenth century, as is evident from an entry in the parish account book in use from 10th April, 1721, to 4th April, 1809. This entry is due to Francis Fisher, a Sherborne attorney, who was steward to the Governors of the School during the years 1720-1730. He tells us that by an indenture made the 28th September, 1545, between the King on the one part and Sir John Horsey on the other, the parishioners paid £230 for the body of the church and tower and for the lead. He adds that the parish account rolls give us the following information: In 1540 the parish paid £40 for the church, in 1541 £26 13s. 4d. for the same, in 1541 £17 17s. 6d. for the bells of the Abbey, in 1542 £100 for the lead, in 1544 £80 in full payment for the church and lead. So that, if the King got in 1545 £230, and the parish actually paid £264 10s. 10d., Sir John put into his pocket the balance. However we may regard this matter, the parishioners of Sherborne made an excellent bargain.

No man can doubt but that the dissolution of the monastery meant serious loss to Sherborne. Its Abbots had ruled wisely and well, as far as we can judge, a strip of territory stretching, though not in an unbroken line, from Stalbridge to Exmouth. Anyone who will make for himself a map of the manors in Dorset and Devon belonging to our Abbey, will see that this is so; and besides these, our Abbey held other lands as well, so that when Sherborne ceased to be the _caput_ of this fair estate, much that had once come our way ceased to come hither any more. Though the presence of the school here has in later times done much to redeem this loss, one cannot say that it has entirely done so.

Of all the ancient institutions in Sherborne, that one which has kept its dwelling-place longest, which is to-day what it was before Wessex became one with England, is Sherborne School. The old Castle is a ruin, the Almshouse dates only from the fifteenth century, the Abbey Church became the parish church only in 1540. But the School, though it suffered pecuniary loss in 1539 by the dissolution of the monastery, suffered no breach of continuity; it was in existence when the Almshouse was founded, it educated St. Stephen Harding in the eleventh century, and we have no reason to think that its existence suffered any break from Ealdhelm’s day till then. A school with such a history may well call forth some reverence from those who love Wessex and know something of its history. Our school has roots which stretch down into the very beginnings of things Christian among the West Saxons, and there is certainly no existing school in Wessex that can rival its claim to antiquity.

Sherborne School is fortunate in possessing many ancient documents illustrative of its history; among these special mention must be made of a series of accounts commencing in 1553 and continuing to the present time. Only eleven are missing. Till towards the end of the eighteenth century they are written on rolls of parchment, and are for the most part in excellent condition. Besides these there are a few early court rolls of the school manors at Bradford Bryan and Barnesby, Lytchett Matravers and Gillingham, and schedules and leases of its other lands. Among these documents, too, are records belonging to the old chantries, with the lands, of which Edward VI. endowed the school; some of these go back to the reign of Henry VII.

There is no existing minute book of the governors’ proceedings older than that which begins in 1592; but, luckily, a draft of minutes exists relating to the years 1549 and 1550, relating, that is to say, to the time of transition from the old condition of things which obtained before the dissolution of the monastery, to the new condition created by the charter granted to the school by Edward VI. The series of minute books from 1592 onward is complete.

From the school statutes much can be gathered about the character of the education given in the school. The oldest statutes of the post-Reformation epoch are lost; they were based, as we learn from the accounts, on those drawn up by Dean Colet for his school, once attached to St. Paul’s Cathedral. In 1592, however, a new set was drawn up for the School of Sherborne by its visitor, Richard Fletcher, Bishop of Bristol, who, as Dean of Peterborough some years before, had imposed on him the terrible task of attending Queen Mary Stuart on the scaffold. Great stress is laid in these statutes on the “abolishing of the Pope of Rome and all fforrein powers superiorities and authorities.” From time to time after this new statutes were made to suit the changing educational and political views. The statutes all still exist, except those made in 1650 by the Puritans; of these all trace is lost, except the bill for engrossing them, which amounted to 25s. Statutes were drawn up in 1662 by Gilbert Ironside, Bishop of Bristol, which the Governors were unwilling to accept, because by these statutes the headmaster was protected from arbitrary interference on the part of the Governors. It was not till 1679 that Bishop William Gulston succeeded in making them accept a new body of statutes, which contain almost all that Gilbert Ironside proposed, together with some additional matter. In Bishop Ironside’s draft and Bishop Gulston’s statutes, it is laid down that it is never lawful “for subjects to take up armes ag^{t} theire Soveraigne upon any pretence w^{t}soever.” The language used in and out of school in all official matters was Latin, and no scholar was to go about the town alone, but with “a companion one of the Schollars that may be a witness of his conversation and behaviour under penalty of correction.” The system of monitorial rule has always been in vogue in the school; in 1592 these rulers are called _Impositores_—a somewhat awkward term one must admit; in 1662 and 1679 they are called _Prepositores_; nowadays they are called _Prefects_. In 1679 they were four in number: “One for discipline in the Schoole, to see all the Schollars demeane themselves regularly there, the Second for manners both in the Schoole and abroad any where, the Third for the Churche and Fields, the Fourth to be _Ostiarius_, to sitt by the doore, to give answere to strangers and to keepe the rest from running out.”

When the assizes were held at Sherborne, the judge sat in what is now the schoolhouse dining-hall—it was then the big schoolroom; and just before the assizes took place, we get from time to time an entry of the following kind in the school accounts: “for washinge of ye King, 6d.” The King referred to is the statue of Edward VI., which still adorns the room; it is of painted Purbeck marble, and is the work of a certain Godfrey Arnold; it cost £9 5s. 4d., and was set up in 1614.

The two royal coats of arms, which may still be seen on the south wall of the old house of the headmaster, and over the south door of the schoolhouse dining-hall, were taken down by order of a Commonwealth official in 1650; but they were carefully preserved, and were restored to their old positions at the Restoration. That on the old house dates from 1560; that on the dining-hall from 1607. They used to be bright with tinctures and metals, but since 1670 they have been “only washed over with oil or some sad colour, without any more adorning.” The chronogram on the dining-hall is unique, for it can be made to give two different dates, according to the ways in which the significant letters are taken. Mr. Hilton, our chief authority on chronograms, knows of no other which gives two dates in this fashion. The first date which our chronogram gives is 1550, the date of the granting of the charter; the second date which it gives is 1670, that of the rebuilding of the dining-hall.

Among other school buildings of ancient date we must not omit the library, partly of the thirteenth century, but certainly restored in the fifteenth; and the school chapel, with its undercroft of the twelfth century, and its upper story of the fifteenth. The undercroft is a very precious relic of the past, but the school chapel, which was once the Abbot’s Hall, has undergone changes and additions; it still keeps its fine fifteenth century timber roof. The library, on the other hand, has gone through little change. It was the Guest House of the Monastery, and has kept its timber roof of the fifteenth century. It is curious that the windows on the east side of the room are not quite opposite those on the west side, nor is the divergence uniform; the large window in the south end of the room is not in the middle of the wall, but rather towards the west side.

The modern buildings of the school harmonize well with the older work, for they are all built of the same lovely stone, and the style in which they are built, though it is in no sense an imitation of this older work, is yet in harmony with and worthy of it. One of these buildings deserves more than passing notice, viz., the new big schoolroom, completed in 1879. The whole group of buildings, with its surroundings, classrooms, museum, laboratory, drawing school, music house, Morris tube range, bath and fives courts, deserves more attention than it usually gets from visitors to Sherborne. These sojourners often forget that the north side of the exterior of the church is likely to be as interesting as the south side; if once they take the trouble to get to this north side, they will be surprised to find how much fine work, ancient and modern, is to be seen there.

Sherborne Old Castle is situated on an elevated piece of ground to the east of the town; this ground is about 300 yards long by 150 yards broad; the surface has been made level, and an oval area, 150 yards long by 105 yards broad, has been traced out, and its edges scarped to a steep slope, with a ditch about 45 feet deep. The material taken away in forming this scarp and ditch has been thrown outward, so that the counter scarp is formed of a mound more or less artificial. It was within this area, above described, that our Pageant of 1905 was given.

The remains of the Castle are as follows: parts of the curtain wall, with the gatehouse, the keep, the chapel and hall, along with other parts of the domestic buildings—all ruinous. The builder of this castle was Bishop Roger; and William of Malmesbury, who knew it well, has described the masonry in glowing terms. All that remains is of this Norman period, though it was somewhat restored and altered in the fifteenth century. The keep belongs to the class of square keeps. To judge from two windows of the chapel which still remain in a fragmentary condition, that building must have been of a very ornate character. The barrel vaulting of the basement of the keep is worth study, and a Norman pillar, still standing and supporting a quadripartite vault, is well known to students of architecture. There is also a Norman chimney with three flues in the gatehouse.

The ruinous condition of the Castle is not so much due to time as to gunpowder, for in 1645, after the Castle was taken by Fairfax, it was blown up by order of the Long Parliament, so as to be no longer tenable as a fortress. After this, while the troops of the Parliament occupied Sherborne, their barracks were the school, and their “Court of Guard” the schoolhouse dining-hall.

This is not the place to deal with the vicissitudes in the tenure of Sherborne Castle—how the Bishops of Sherborne lost and regained it. It finally passed from Bishop Henry Cotton into the hands of Queen Elizabeth in 1599. Sir Walter Ralegh had, however, been tenant of it since 1592, and when Queen Elizabeth got the fee-simple of it, she gave it to Ralegh. Ralegh, however, did not care to live in it; other magnates in this part of the world were building fine modern houses, and he followed their example. Thus arose the modern Castle, known in former days as Sherborne Lodge, on the other side of the lake, the central and loftier part of which is due to Ralegh. There is no trace of any evidence that Sherborne Castle was ever besieged before the great Civil War. It was used at times in the Middle Ages as a prison; for example, in King John’s reign. King John himself stayed here in 1207 and in 1216.

After some tragic vicissitudes the Sherborne estate came to the Digbys in 1617, and since this date, with the exception of the troublous period of the great Civil War, it has remained with them.

Sherborne Castle was twice besieged during the Civil War, first in 1642, and again in 1645. The first siege was uneventful and unimportant. In 1644 Charles I. had been here after his successful campaign in the West; Prince Rupert, too, had come, and there had been great doings with reviews of men in Sherborne Park, after which followed the second battle of Newbury and the self-denying ordinance and the creation of the New Model. The second siege, that of 1645, was more important; not only was Fairfax drawn hither by it, but Cromwell, too, came as general of cavalry. Though the Parliamentary troops destroyed much of the old castle that we should like to see standing now, we must, on the whole, acquit them of having done any great injury to the buildings of the church or school.

In 1688, King William III.—then Prince of Orange—on his advance from Exeter to London, stayed in the modern castle here; his proclamation to the English people is said to have been printed in the drawing-room at a printing-press set up on the great hearth-stone, which was cracked by it.

Let us now turn to the last of our four ancient institutions, viz., the Almshouse. This institution is certainly older than the year 1437, in which year, by a license from King Henry VI. to Robert Nevile, Bishop of Sarum, to Humfrey Stafford, Kt., Margaret Goghe, John Fauntleroy, and John Baret, it was refounded in honour of St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. It is actually older than this, because some accounts of the charity exist for a few years prior to this date. Some day, no doubt, the history of the institution will be more fully worked out than it is at present. Plenty of material exists in its account rolls which could hardly fail to throw light on old Sherborne life.

According to the deed of foundation, there were, we are told, to be twenty brethren, called the Masters of SS. Johns’ House—they are now called master and brethren—together with a perpetual priest to pray for the good estate and the souls of the founders and inmates. The house was to contain twelve poor men and four poor women, who were to be governed by one of themselves, called the Prior, of their own election, and a woman of domestic ability was to buy their food and dress it, wash their clothes and make their beds, who should be called the Housewife of SS. Johns’ House. The older part of the building was finished in 1448, and here still stand, not much altered from what they were then, the chapel, ante-chapel, and dining-hall, with a long dormitory over the dining-hall; this dormitory used to open into the chapel, so that the sick and infirm might hear the service, and, so far as they could, join in it. The chapel contains an interesting triptych of the fifteenth century by a Flemish artist, name unknown. One cannot imagine a more desirable haven of rest than this for those who are fortunate enough to become its inmates.

Enough has now been told to show that among old English towns Sherborne holds a peculiarly interesting place. It still keeps much of its old-world look and ancient dignity, and its inhabitants, many of whom bear the names of the old stock who were living here in in the time of Henry VI., are a kindly race, among whom it is a pleasure and a privilege to live.

MILTON ABBEY

BY THE REV. HERBERT PENTIN, M.A.

The county of Dorset is one of the few counties in England that contain three great minsters in good repair and in parochial use—Sherborne, Wimborne, and Milton. And each of these minsters is of Saxon and Royal foundation. King Athelstan, the grandson of Alfred the Great, founded the Monastery and Collegiate Church of Milton for Secular Canons, in or about the year 938. In the year 964 King Edgar and Archbishop Dunstan of Canterbury converted the monastery into an abbey, with forty Benedictine monks, and chose a very able man, Cynewearde (or Kynewardus), as the first Abbot. This Cynewearde, a few years afterwards, to the loss of Milton, was made Bishop of Wells.

The original minster built by Athelstan was a noble stone building of its time, and was very rich in shrines and relics. The King gave a piece of our Saviour’s Cross, a great cross of gold and silver with precious stones, and many bones of the saints, which were placed in five gilt shrines. The bones of his mother were also brought to the church (for burial). We also know that the Saxon Minster was restored and enlarged, if not rebuilt, in Norman times. It has been reasonably conjectured that the size of the Norman Abbey was that of the choir and presbytery of the present church. Some large fragments of Norman masonry have been dug up,[23] which show that the Norman Abbey was a building of some considerable architectural pretensions; and encased in the south wall of the present choir and presbytery are the remains of two enriched Norman arches which escaped destruction in the fire of 1309. In that year the church was struck by lightning, and was almost entirely burnt to the ground. Thirteen years later, however, under Abbot Walter Archer, the present Abbey Church was commenced on the same site, but on a much larger and grander scale; and building operations went on, from time to time, until within a short period before the Dissolution in 1539.

The following styles of architecture are represented in the main portions of the church, built of stone from Ham Hill and Tisbury:—First Decorated, the choir and presbytery of seven bays, with aisles; Second Decorated, the south transept; Third Decorated, the two western piers of the “crossing”; Perpendicular, the north transept and central tower. The Perpendicular work was undertaken by the penultimate Abbot, William de Middleton, assisted by Bishop Thomas Langton, of Salisbury and of Winchester, the Abbey of Cerne, and the families of Bingham, Coker, Latimer, Morton, and others.

At the Dissolution, the Abbey estates were granted by Henry VIII. to Sir John Tregonwell, who had helped to procure the King’s divorce from Catharine of Aragon; but the whole of the Abbey Church was preserved for the parishioners, with the exception of the Ladye Chapel, which was pulled down, although some of its vaulting shafts can still be seen outside the east end of the church. The last of the Abbots (John Bradley, B.D.), after leaving Milton in Tregonwell’s hands, was consecrated Suffragan Bishop of St. Asaph, with the title of Bishop of Shaftesbury,[24] and the Abbey Church of Milton then passed under the sole spiritual control of Richard Hall, Vicar of Milton, and his successors.

Unfortunately, the Abbey underwent a “restoration” in 1789, when the church was despoiled of many of its fittings; and chantry chapels and other valuable objects of interest went down under the hand of the “restorer.” But Sir Gilbert Scott, in 1865, restored the church at the expense of the late Baron Hambro, and left the Abbey in its present beautiful condition, and, as far as was possible, in its original state.

The view of the church at the beginning of this chapter will save the necessity of a description of its exterior. But the interior contains many things which demand notice.

And first of all must be mentioned the “ornament,” which many antiquaries consider to be a Tabernacle for reserving the Eucharist. This very beautiful and richly carved “Sacrament-house” dates from the fifteenth century, and is made of oak in the form of a spire composed of four storeys, the lowest containing the opening through which the reserved elements may have been passed. It is not in its original position, but is now fastened to the west wall of the south transept beneath the triforium.

The great altar-screen is a very lofty, beautiful, and peculiarly rich construction, even though the two long rows of ornamental niches now lack the statues of the saints that once stood in them—saints with “very bluff countenances, painted in very bright colours and heavily gilded.” On its lower portion there is a Latin inscription, which bids prayers for the souls of William Middleton, Abbot of Milton, and Thomas Wilken, Vicar of the parish, who worthily decorated (“_honorifice depinxerunt_”) the screen in 1492. The three stone sedilia in the sanctuary are fine specimens. The bosses throughout the church are of very rich design.

The Abbey also contains two fifteenth century oil paintings of a crude description, one of which represents Athelstan, the founder, giving to the first head of the monastery a model of the minster (with three spires)[25] over which he was to preside. The other painting is supposed to represent Athelstan’s mother—Egwynna, “_femina illustris_.”[26]

The tombs of the abbots within the Abbey are most interesting. In front of the altar steps there is a Purbeck marble grave-slab of the fourteenth century, which was once inlaid with the brass figure of an abbot clad in _pontificalia_, with a marginal Latin inscription in Lombardic capitals:

ABBA : VALTERE : TE : FATA : CITO : RAPVERE : TE : RADINGA : DEDIT : SED : MORS : MALE : NOS : TVA : LEDIT.

This is the slab of an Abbot of Milton whose Christian name was Walter, and who was formerly a monk of Reading, probably Walter de Sydelinge, who died in 1315. In the north transept there is a thirteenth century grave-slab of another abbot. This slab is also of Purbeck marble, but the upper portion is broken off. The remaining portion shows part of an incised figure of an abbot, with pastoral staff, chasuble, stole, maniple, alb, and an imperfect marginal inscription in Norman French:

VVS ⁝ KI ⁝ PAR ⁝ I ⁝ CI ⁝ PASSET ⁝ PVR ⁝ LEALME ⁝ PRIE...
...RCI ⁝ LISET ⁝ LE ⁝ PARDVN ⁝ I ⁝ CI[27]

There are other large marble grave-slabs, without inscriptions, in the church, which are supposed to cover abbots, monks, and benefactors. On some there are the matrices of missing brasses. One, in front of the altar steps, shows the outline of a civilian in a plain gown, and his wife wearing a “butterfly” head-dress, with their five sons and four daughters, _circa_ 1490. In St. John the Baptist’s Chapel, at the east end of the north aisle of the church, there is a small fifteenth century brass to John Artur, one of the monks of the Abbey, with a Latin inscription, which bids God have mercy on his soul. In the same chapel, a very fine coloured armorial brass over Sir John Tregonwell’s altar-tomb contains the latest tabard example on a brass in England (1565).[28]

But to mention all the ancient or modern memorials (some of wondrous beauty, such as those of Lord and Lady Milton, and Baron Hambro) would take far too much space. A marble tablet in the vestry informs the reader that John Tregonwell, Esquire, who died in the year 1680, “by his last will and testament gave all the bookes within this vestry to the use of this Abby Church for ever, as a thankfuld acknowledgement of God’s wonderfull mercy in his preservation when he fell from the top of this Church.” This incident happened when he was a child; he was absolutely uninjured, his stiff skirts having acted as a parachute.[29] The chained library of sixty-six leather-bound volumes comprises the works of the Latin and Greek Fathers and other early Christian writers, and some standard theological works of the seventeenth century. The books have been kept at the vicarage for many years.

The abbey now contains very little painted glass.[30] There is a large “Jesse window” by the elder Pugin in the south transept, and some coloured coats of arms and devices of kings, nobles, and abbots in some of the other windows. The dwarfed east window contains the only pre-Reformation glass in the church.[31] The Abbatial Arms are emblazoned in several parts of the building. They consist of three baskets of bread, each containing three loaves. On one of the walls in the south aisle, near the vestry, there is the carved coloured rebus of Abbot William de Middleton, with the date 1514 in Arabic numerals—the 4 being represented by half an eight. It comprises the letter W with a pastoral staff, and a windmill on a large cask—in other words, a mill and a tun (Mil-ton). The old miserere seats still remain in the choir, but the carving thereon is not very elaborate, and many of them have been renewed. The inscriptions on the Communion plate (which consists of two large silver barrel-shaped flagons, a bell-shaped chalice, and a large and a small paten) tell us that “John Chappell, Sitteson and Stationer of London, 1637,” and “Mary Savage, 1658,” and “Maddam Jane Tregonwell, widdow, 1675,” gave these to “Milton Abby.”

There are several other interesting things in the church, albeit not ancient—_e.g._, the rood-loft, the font, and the pulpit.

The rood-loft, although not entirely ancient, is composed of ancient materials. When the party-walls of St. John the Baptist’s Chapel, the chantry of Abbot William de Middleton, and other side-chapels, were destroyed or mutilated at the “restoration” in 1789, some of the materials were used to reconstruct the rood-loft. The eastern cornice, for instance, is probably a portion of Abbot Middleton’s chantry, and bears thirteen coats of arms, including those of the Abbeys of Milton, Sherborne, and Abbotsbury, and the families of Chidiock, Latimer, Lucy, Stafford of Hooke, Thomas of Woodstock, and others.

The font of the Abbey, in the south transept, is modern, but of unusual design. It is composed of two beautiful life-sized white marble female figures, representing Faith and Victory, with a baptismal shell at their feet.

Near the font is an oak case containing a fourteenth century coffin chalice and paten, and fragments of a wooden pastoral staff and sandals, discovered during the restoration of the church in 1865.[32]

The pulpit is also modern, of carved oak; but it is interesting, because it contains statues of all the patron saints connected with the Abbey and the parish, and of these there are no fewer than six, viz.: St. Sampson of Dol, St. Branwalader,[33] St. Mary the Blessed Virgin, St. Michael the warrior-archangel, St. Catherine of Alexandria, and St. James the Great.

St. Catherine of Alexandria is the patron-saint of “King Athelstan’s Chapel,” which stands in the woods at the top of the hill to the east of the Abbey. And this little church has also had a history well worth the telling. When Athelstan was fighting for his throne he had to pass through the county of Dorset, and he encamped on Milton Hill, and threw up an earthwork, or made use of one already existing there, the remains of which can still be seen beyond the east end of the chapel. During the night he believed that some supernatural revelation was made to him, assuring him that he would conquer his many enemies and become King of all England. He pushed on, and at Brunanburh, “Christ helping him, he had the victory, and there slew five kings and seven earls” (_Saxon Chronicle_). The song commemorating this important and decisive victory is given in the _Old English Chronicle_; and the first stanza of Professor Freeman’s version and that of Lord Tennyson reads thus:

Now Æthelstan King,
Of Earls the Lord,
In warriors the ring giver
And his brother eke,
Eadmund Ætheling,
Eld-long glory
Won in the fight
With the swords’ edge
By Brunanburh,
The boardwall they clave,
And hewed the war-linden,
With hammer’s leavings
Offspring of Eadward.
_Freeman._

Athelstan King,
Lord among Earls,
Bracelet bestower and
Baron of Barons,
He, with his brother
Edmund Atheling
Gaining a life-long
Glory in battle,
Slew with the sword-edge
There by Brunanburh,
Brake the shield-wall,
Hew’d the linderwood,
Hack’d the battle-shield,
Sons of Edward, with hammer’d brands.
_Tennyson._

Athelstan, being a thoroughly religious man, as well as a great warrior, expressed his thankfulness to God in the way usual in those times. He founded the monastery at Milton, and erected the _ecclesiola_, afterwards dedicated to St. Catherine, within the entrenchment where he received the remarkable revelation. Chapels on the top of hills were often dedicated to St. Catherine of Alexandria, on account of the legend which tells that St. Catherine’s body was buried by angels on Mount Sinai. Other instances, in many places, of this dedication with its connection still remain—in Dorset, for example, at Abbotsbury and Holworth. The little church at Milton did its work in Saxon times, and then underwent a considerable restoration in Norman days. It also underwent a lesser restoration in the early part of the sixteenth century. As it stands at present, it consists of a nave and chancel. The main walls, which are very thick, and the door arches are Norman. On the west jamb of the south door there is a curious and rare inscription in Lombardic capitals relating to an indulgence:

INDVLGENCIA ⁝ H’ ⁝ SC̄I ⁝ LOCI ⁝ C ⁝ E ⁝ X ⁝ DIES ⁝[34]

The windows in the nave are Early Norman and Perpendicular. The old west front was taken down for some reason in the eighteenth century, and at this time an effigy of a monk in his habit (lying along and resting on his hands, looking down at the Abbey below) was destroyed. Some paintings also perished at the same time. The chancel was also partly rebuilt, and the roof raised, but the Transition-Norman chancel-arch was preserved. On the south side of the altar is a pedestal, on which the statue of St. Catherine may have formerly stood. The encaustic tiles in the chancel were removed from the Abbey Church in the year 1865. Some of these mediæval tiles are heraldic, and contain the arms of the See of Exeter, the Earls of Cornwall, Gloucester and Hertford, and others. A tile manufactured at Malvern has an inscription and date, 1456.

In pre-Reformation days King Athelstan’s Chapel was possibly used as the _capella extra portas_—the chapel, that is, outside the gates of the monastery, at which strangers and women who were not admitted within the gates might hear Mass. That women used St. Catherine’s Chapel for another purpose is also possible. St. Catherine is the patron-saint of spinsters, and in days gone by she was supposed to have the power of finding a husband for those who sought her aid. The following Milton rhymes in use to-day may be echoes of the mediæval Latin doggerels:—

St. Catherine, St. Catherine, O lend me thine aid,
And grant that I never may die an old maid.

A husband, St. Catherine,
A _good_ one, St. Catherine;
But arn-a-one better than
Narn-a-one, St. Catherine.

Sweet St. Catherine,
A husband, St. Catherine,
Handsome, St. Catherine,
Rich, St. Catherine,
_Soon_, St. Catherine.

After the Reformation the chapel was allowed to decay and to become desecrated. In the eighteenth century there is a record that it was being used as a pigeon-house. Then, when more houses were needed in the parish, the “Chapel Royal” was turned into a labourer’s cottage—the interior was whitewashed, and a ceiling added; the chancel became a bedroom, and the nave a living room, with a kitchen grate and chimney affixed. Afterwards the little church was used as a carpenter’s workshop, and then as a lumber store. But, in 1901, the neglected building was cleaned out, and a service was held there on St. Catherine’s night (November 25th). The parishioners assembled in the building, the roof of which was full of holes (admitting ivy, wind and wet), the windows had long been broken, and the south wall was dangerously bulging. Confession of wrong was made for the past desecrations, and prayers were offered that the Church of St. Catherine might for the future be reverently treated as a “holy place” (as the Indulgence-inscription calls it); and, happily, the building has since been most conservatively restored by Mr. Everard Hambro, the lord of the manor. Thus, the little church which commemorates a very critical event in the early history of England has been saved from further desecration and

decay; and King Athelstan’s Chapel is once again used for the service of God, while remaining a valuable historic relic of Saxon days.

Another _capella_ belonging to the Abbey, but now in private ownership, has been less fortunate. Liscombe Chapel,[35] in the parish of Milton, five miles from the Abbey Church and two miles from Chesilborne, is still desecrated. This little building, built principally of flint, stone, and large blocks of rock chalk, is entire, and consists of chancel and nave, divided by a handsome Transition-Norman arch, with massive rounded columns. The east window and the two other chancel windows are Norman, with some later work inserted. But the chapel of Liscombe has been desecrated for a long time. The nave thereof is now used as a bakehouse (there is a large open grate, oven, and chimney in the centre), and the chancel is used as a log-house. A flight of stone stairs has been erected in the chancel, which leads to the bedrooms over the bakehouse and log-house. The bedrooms have been ceiled, and the whole interior of the little church has been whitewashed, including the handsome chancel arch; the roof of the building is of thatch. An old stone sundial is preserved in the west wall. Warne, in his _Ancient Dorset_, states that the chapel is credited with being “tenanted by a supernatural visitor”; and this is still believed by the country folk. The house adjoining this desecrated sanctuary is also ancient, and built chiefly of flint and stone. It possesses several interesting windows of various dates (including a _loup_ in the east wall), and an old stone sundial on its south wall. The interior contains some oak-work, portions of which may be pre-Reformation. This house is now used as a labourer’s cottage; but there is a tradition that it was formerly inhabited by the monks, who ministered (“_Divina celebrant_:”) in the little church. And the building itself, from its position and evident antiquity, lends colour to the tradition; but there are marks that it became the manor farmhouse after the Dissolution. There is also a tradition that the stream which now runs through the hamlet of Liscombe was formerly larger than it is now, and that there were fish-ponds close by, and that the monks at Liscombe supplied their overlord, the Abbot of Milton, with fresh-water fish.

Milton Abbey also possessed three other Norman _capellae_—in Woolland, Whitcombe, and Holworth respectively; but Woolland is now a separate ecclesiastical parish; Whitcombe is a donative held by the Rector of Came (it was held for many years by William Barnes, the Dorset poet); and Holworth, alone of the three, still remains a part of the ecclesiastical parish of Milton.

Holworth is sixteen miles from the Abbey Church, and now possesses a modern chapel, on a hill near the “Burning Cliff,” known as the Chapel of St. Catherine-by-the-Sea. It is said that in days gone by the monks at Holworth supplied their Abbot, at Milton, with salt-water fish. The hamlet of Holworth, overlooking Weymouth Bay and Portland Roads, has been well described as resting in “a most lonely and most lovely valley by the sea, an earthly paradise, which those who have discovered cherish and dream about. It is far away from the haunts of men, and remote from the cares of life; where the newspaper is two days’ old before it invades the religious calm of a mind attuned by the most exquisite scenery to rise to thoughts above this world; where one may walk along the undulating downs that skirt the Channel, held in place by parapets of cliff that break down straight into the sea; where one may walk mile after mile on natural lawn and not meet a soul—just one’s self, the birds, the glorious scenery, and God.”[36]

The hamlet of Holworth is, indeed, worthy of being a portion of the parish that is acknowledged to be one of the most beautiful places in Dorset. The village of Milton lies enfolded between richly-wooded hills, at the foot of a wonderfully picturesque descent. Sir Frederick Treves, in his _Highways and Byways in Dorset_, says that “there is nothing like to it in any part of England.” He calls it a “surprising” village, “a toy town.” The first impression on seeing it “is one of amazement, for the place is both extraordinary and unexpected.” Each of the houses is of the same pattern, and each is separated from the others by a chestnut tree. The builder of this unique village, as will be seen, was Joseph, Lord Milton (afterwards Earl of Dorchester). The old town of Milton lay near the south side of the Abbey Church; but the ancient town was pulled down by Lord Milton about the year 1780, as it was too close to his new mansion (in which he had incorporated the magnificent fifteenth century monastic refectory), and proved an annoyance to him. The death, in 1775, of his wife (“the most noble and most excellent Lady Caroline, Lady Milton, daughter of Lyonel, Duke of Dorset, the wisest and most lovely, the best and most virtuous of women”), to whom he was passionately attached, and the suicide, in the following year, of his eldest son (the husband of “the beautiful Anne Seymour Damer”[37]), probably had a hardening influence on Lord Milton’s character, and made him use his giant’s strength tyrannously like a giant. At any rate, he swept away the old town, and the “new town” was then built, further off, as a substitute. Some fragmentary particulars of the old town of Milton have been gathered together,[38] which perhaps are of sufficient interest to be reproduced here.

The old town was one of the most ancient in Dorset. It grew up with the Abbey, and was known as Middleton (of which Milton is a contraction), because it was the middle town of the county. It contained shops of all kinds, four inns, a pre-Reformation Grammar School, almshouses built in 1674, and a brewery, which helped to supply Weymouth, Poole, and other large towns in Dorset. Milton Abbey ales were at one time among the most famous in the county; they could also be obtained in London. The tradesmen of old Milton were prosperous, but the “working classes” were very poor. Their staple food was barley cake; and to keep down expenses they saved every morsel of fat and made their own candles in pewter moulds. Two, if not more, of the leading shopkeepers issued “tokens” in the seventeenth century,[39] specimens of which exist; and among the old parish papers are a number of apprenticeship indentures which bound poor boys to various tradesmen in the place. The girls of the parish were taught to spin.

The handsome fifteenth century market cross was one of the finest in the kingdom, quite worthy of its position near the Abbey Church. It had an ascent of no fewer than thirty steps. Its site is marked in the present park by a very massive octagonal socket stone, which is said to be a portion of the original cross. The parish registers state that, in the days of the Commonwealth, banns of marriage were published “in the markett.”[40] The weekly market was well attended, it being the central market of the county, and was held around the market cross. The annual fair was held on St. Sampson’s Eve and Day, July 27th and 28th, St. Sampson being the chief patron saint of the Abbey. This fair, like the market, was granted by King Athelstan; but it was practically discontinued when the old town was pulled down.

The sports in old Milton were badger-baiting under the cedar trees in the Abbey churchyard; cock-squailing, cock-fighting, and “fives,” outside the west end of the church; bowls were played on the bowling green, and ringing was very popular. The ringers only claimed “bread and beare” for their services each year—on the Restoration Day of Charles II. (May 29th), on Guy Fawkes’ Day (November 5th), and on Christmas Day. They were also paid on special occasions, such as “for ringing ye Bishope throu Towne”; but episcopal visits were rare. During Lent the children went “shroving” and “Lent crocking.” On Shrove Tuesday the children, carrying sticks, knocked at the doors of the principal residents and repeated this doggerel verse:

Please I’ve come a-shroving
For a piece of pancake,
Or a little ruckle cheese
Of your own making.
If you don’t give me some,
If you don’t give me none,
I’ll knock down your door
With a great marrow bone
And a-way I’ll run.

The result of this threat was that the children were given hot half-pence, apples, eggs, a piece of pancake, or a hunch of ruckle-cheese. A ruckle-cheese was a small sour-milk home-made cheese, weighing about one pound. It could be ruckled—_i.e._, rolled along the ground. Hence its name. In the evening the “Lent-crocking” began. Those people who had not given the children anything when they came “a-shroving” were then punished by having pieces of crockery and pans and other missiles thrown at their doors. In this way real damage was often done, and the two parish constables do not seem to have interfered. The practice of shroving is still continued in the present village of Milton: it is one of the customs that have survived the demolition of the old town. It obtains in other Dorset parishes, but is gradually dying out.

The Abbey churchyard was a very large one. Its area was about three times the area of the Abbey Church. The sports which took place therein have been already mentioned. It was also used as a public flogging-place for offenders against the law. Lord Milton, when he decided to pull down the old town, had all the headstones in the churchyard removed, broken up, or buried. In converting the churchyard into lawns, many bones of parishioners were turned up and irreverently treated; and the superstitious tradition in the present village is that, in consequence of this, Lord Milton died of a gruesome disease. There was an ancient cross in the churchyard called the “Druid’s Cross,” and also a preaching cross.[41] It is hardly necessary to add that these perished with the churchyard.

The old Grammar School, founded by Abbot Middleton in 1521, was also pulled down. It was one of the chief public schools in the south-west of England, and was known as “the Eton of the West.”[42] It had, as a rule, between eighty to one hundred boys, mostly boarders, sons of the leading county families. There were several boarding-houses for the boys in Milton, and the existence of the school helped on the prosperity of the town. Two of its most distinguished _alumni_ were Thomas Masterman Hardy, Nelson’s favourite captain, who in after life did not forget his old friends at Milton[43]; and Thomas Beach, a native of Milton, the famous Dorset portrait painter, who from 1772 to 1800 “limned the features of everybody who was anybody.”

It must be admitted, reluctantly, that the Grammar School boys were an undoubted nuisance to Lord Milton. They lived within a stone’s throw of his mansion, they broke into his privacy and seclusion, they scoured his gardens and plantations in every direction, stole his fruit, and disturbed his game. Records exist of the expulsion of some boys bearing the most honoured of Dorset names for persistent stone-throwing down chimneys, and for stealing cucumbers from the Abbey gardens, and game-fowl eggs for the purpose of rearing birds to compete in fighting. In the Abbey Church the Grammar School boys sat in a large gallery which stretched from the rood-loft to the west wall. This gallery was pulled down by Lord Milton’s orders as soon as he had removed the school. The headmaster and assistant-masters of the school, being in Holy Orders, frequently held the position of Vicar or Curate of the Abbey Church. Among them was John Hutchins, the Dorset historian, who was Curate of the Abbey and “usher” of the school.[44]