Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Gloucester Part 9

Before entering the Lady Chapel, a Perpendicular arch will be noticed, with two eye-shaped openings in the spandrels. The openings are well carved on their bevelled edges. The arch is of later date than the front of the chapel, and seems to have been necessary to support the triforium above. Nothing like it exists on the other side. There is an old cope-chest in this Ambulatory.

The #Lady Chapel.#--This beautiful chapel, which was built between the years 1457-1499 by the Abbots Richard Hanley and William Farley, stands on the site of a smaller building, dating back to 1224, and erected by Ralph de Wylington and Olympias, his wife, the architect of the work being Elias or Helias the Sacrist, a monk of the Gloucester monastery.

As Mr Bazeley points out ("Records," vol. iii. pt. 1, p. 14), "The only architectural evidences of its former existence are two Early English windows in the crypt, in the central eastern chapel."

Mr Waller thinks that this Early English Lady Chapel was "probably not a new building, but simply an alteration of the old east apsidal chapels on each floor to suit the 'Early English' times, just as the fourteenth-century men afterwards recased the cathedral. The inserted windows of this date in the crypt seem to confirm this view."

On the site of this chapel must have stood the chapel and altar (or at any rate the altar) dedicated to St. Petronilla, as Ralph and Olympias gave rentals to provide lights to burn thereat during ma.s.s for ever.

The vestibule or entrance to the Lady Chapel is a beautiful piece of work, and is another instance of the genius of the builders shown in making use of existing work. Special interest attaches to this chapel as a whole, as it was the last addition to the fabric by the monks before the Dissolution.

Firstly the walls of the vestibule should be noticed: the lower portions of the west wall are parts of the old Norman apsidal chapel, and are pierced by the opening for the door and by two perpendicular windows; and the west end of the chapel is contracted in breadth, as it is also in height, so as to minimise the loss of light to the great window of the choir. The shape of the chapel will be easily understood from the plan (p. 61).

The lierne vaulting of the vestibule is very delicate (the ribs, it will be noted, are run differently in the four quarters of the roof), and the pendants form a cross. These latter, at the present time, look new, but they have only been freed from the whitewash that was thick upon them.

One pendant has been renewed at the end. Over the vestibule is the small chapel which is entered from the Whispering Gallery (_vide_ page 77).

The open tracery of the west end over the supporting arch is particularly graceful, especially the way in which the open lights are arranged in the central portion. The Lady Chapel is 91 feet 6 inches long, 25 feet 6 inches high, and 46 feet 6 inches high, and consists of four compartments or bays, which, as the wall of the chapel is so low, are chiefly composed of fine tracery and gla.s.s. All the wall below the windows is arcaded with foiled arches, with quatrefoils above them. The wall between the windows is panelled with delicate tracery like that in the windows, and in its three chief tiers contains brackets for figures, with richly-carved canopies overhead. Many of these canopies (like the walls) show traces of colour.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE LADY CHAPEL.

_Photochrom Co. Ltd., Photo._]

Vaulting shafts of great beauty support one of the grandest Perpendicular roofs that has ever been made. Each boss in the roof is worth minute inspection, and since the restoration (1896) it is possible to see the bosses in practically the same condition as they were when they left the masons' hands in the fifteenth century. With three exceptions they are all representations of foliage, and it would be a hard task to arrange them in order of merit.

It has been said above that the chapel is cruciform. The arms of the cross are represented by the two side chapels, like diminutive transepts on the north and south sides, with oratories above them, to which access is given by small staircases in the angles of the wall. Both these side chapels contain some exquisite fan-tracery vaulting, which is supported upon flying arches, fas.h.i.+oned in imitation of the graceful flying arches in the choir.

On the north side the chapel contains a full-length effigy of Bishop Goldsborough (who died in 1604) robed in his white rochet, black chimero, with lawn sleeves, scarf, ruff, and skull-cap.

The east window in this chapel is in memory of Lieut. Arthur John Lawford (1885), and is dedicated to St. Martin.

The chapel above has a vaulted roof with bosses of foliage, and there are small portions of ancient gla.s.s.

Bishop Nicholson's tomb, which was formerly in the south chapel, where it blocked up the east window, is at present in pieces in this upper chapel. It is to be re-erected in another place.

There are some interesting scribblings on the walls of this chapel. On the shelf for books is a representation of a Cromwellian soldier with a dog, apparently in pursuit of a deer. There are also scribblings with devices, dating to 1630-1634. One love-sick swain described an equilateral triangle with a [Symbol: Cross] rising from the vertex, and then inscribed the initials of his _fiancee_ and also his own.

The #South Chapel# contains an altar tomb to Thomas Fitzwilliams, who died 1579, and there is a wooden tablet, painted with an inscription to tell that it was repaired in 1648.

A window has been put up in memory of S. Sebastian Wesley, a former organist of the cathedral, who died in 1876.

In the south chapel there are scribbles, dating back to 1588 and 1604.

Both of these chapels have shelves for books, but it is probable that one was for a small choir and the other for an organ.

The #Lady Chapel# is one of the largest in the kingdom, and is said, at the time of the Dissolution, to have been one of the richest. A great part of it is said to have been gilded and gloriously ornamented.

Traces of the colour can be seen in the mouldings of the panellings and in the carving upon the walls.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WEST END OF LADY CHAPEL.

_S. B. Bolas & Co., Photo._]

The #Reredos#, judging from the traces that are left, must have been a gorgeous sight, and literally a blaze of colour. Applique work has been lavishly employed in its decoration. Anyone who is privileged to examine it very closely will note the writing on the stonework, which has been laid bare in the niches by the ruthless removal of the figures.

At present what the present Dean, in his article on the Great Abbeys of the Severn Lands, calls its "pathetic scarred beauty," is temporarily veiled by a very modern screen. The reredos, though a ruin, has a charm all its own, and it is better to leave it frankly as it is now than to partly hide it. There are some, no doubt, who would restore it, but it is to be hoped that funds will not be forthcoming. Restoration has effectually marred the beauty of the pavement of the choir, and given us a flashy reredos there, of which the less said the better; but every one with a particle of feeling must feel that restoration and decoration of the Lady Chapel reredos would be a crime.

Bishop Benson covered the reredos with stucco, and put up a huge gold sun in front of it. Portions of this are now at Minsterworth. An engraving of it may be seen in Bonnor's "Perspective Itinerary,"

published in 1796, and this plate also shows the long rows of pews removed from the choir by the same bishop.

The sedilia are very fine, and worthy of careful inspection.

The #East Window# consists of nine lights, and has been terribly mutilated, partly by fanatics, partly owing to lack of care within the last century. In design the window resembles the windows on the north and south sides of the chapel. It was erected in Abbot Farley's time (1472-1479), and possibly by a Thomas Compton, seeing that in the quatrefoiled circles in the heads of the lower lights there are rebuses--a comb with T, and C with a TON (for Compton), as well as two intertwining initials. Much of the gla.s.s seems to have been put in after removal from other windows in the cathedral, and this makes the deciphering of this window no easy undertaking.

The tiles in the Lady Chapel are of great interest, and one cannot help regretting their gradual deterioration under the feet, occasionally the hobnailed feet of visitors, and the slower but surer destruction by the acc.u.mulations of grit under the matting on the floor. They may be best examined by turning up the matting near the Clent tablet on the south wall.

On a pattern made up of sixteen tiles, four times repeated can be read, "_Ave Maria gra' ple' Dus tec.u.m_" i.e. "_gratia plena Dominus tec.u.m_."

On others similarly designed, "_Domine Jhu (Jesu) miserere_." On others, "_Ave Maria gra' ple'_" and "_Dne Jhu miserere_." These tiles in square sets of sixteen and four respectively were placed alternately, and separated by plain dark bricks. On others again will be found "_Orate pro Aia Johis Hertlond (pro anima Johannis)_." Some too seem to have been transferred from Llanthony Priory to the south chapel. They are inscribed, "_Timetib' deu nihil deest_," i.e. "_Timentibus deum nihil deest_." There are others in the chapel, "_Letabor in mia--et sethera_,"

and "_Deo Gracias_."

The monument to Sir John Powell (1713) on the north wall is not beautiful, though a good specimen of its time. It is impossible not to regret that it was ever allowed to be erected in the chapel. Powell was a judge of King's Bench, and is here represented in his gown, hood, mantle, and coif.

Other monuments are those to Eliz: Williams, 1622 (the figure is raised on one elbow); to Margaret Clent, 1623, with a touching epitaph. On the floor, near the Williams monument is a small bra.s.s, concealed by matting, to Charles Sutton, an infant seven days old. The bra.s.s contains two Latin lines modelled on the lines of Ovid's "Tristia," and run:

"Parve, nec invideo, sine me, puer, ibis ad astra, Parve, nec invideas, laetus ad astra sequar."

Many of the slabs on the floor will repay perusal, most of them being well cut and fairly well preserved. In Brown Willis' "Survey of Gloucester" will be found a full record of all the tombstones which in his time (1727) were in this chapel, but have since been removed or re-used.

Turning to the right on leaving the Lady Chapel, the north-east chapel, which is called #Abbot Boteler's Chapel#, is the next in order. It dates from 1437-1450. The reredos should be closely examined, as it retains many of its original features--viz. statuettes, traces of painting on the s.h.i.+elds above, and a very good piscina.

The tiles in the floor are in many cases excellent specimens, especially those with fish upon them. It seems a pity that these tiles should be doomed to disappear under the nails of sight-seers, who as a rule look at nothing but the effigy of Robert, Duke of Normandy, and go away satisfied when they have proved for themselves that the effigy is of wood.

The effigy has had a curious history. As Leland says, "Rob'tus Curthoise, sonne to William the Conquerour, lyeth in the middle of the Presbitery. There is on his tombe an image of wood paynted, made long since his death." As to the date there is great uncertainty, and it would seem that the figure and the chest upon which it lies are not of the same date. Sir W. V. Guise in "Records of Gloucester Cathedral,"

vol. i., part 1, p. 101 (now out of print), says, "I am disposed to a.s.sign to the effigy a date not very remote from the period at which the duke lived. The hauberk of chain-mail and the long surcote ceased to be worn after the thirteenth century," and on p. 100, "The mortuary chest on which the figure rests is probably not older than the fifteenth century ..." Around the chest are a series of s.h.i.+elds bearing coats-of-arms, ten in number, nine of which were originally intended to commemorate the nine worthies of the world. On the dexter side: 1.

Hector. 2. Julius Caesar. 3. David. 4. King Arthur. On the sinister side: 5. Edward the Confessor. 6. Alexander the Great. 7. Judas Maccabaeus. 8.

Charlemagne. 9. (at the south end) G.o.dfrey of Bouillon. 10. (at the north end) The arms of France and England, quarterly. The blazoning of 10 proves the chest to be later than the time of Henry IV.

The oak figure was broken into several pieces in the civil wars of Charles I., but was bought by Sir Humphrey Tracey of Stanway, who had it repaired, and presented it to the Cathedral.

Leland says that the duke "lyeth in the middle of the Presbitery." The inscription in the chapter-house says "Hic jacet Robertus Curtus." The plain pavement in the choir is said to mark the site of the grave in the choir, but it is open to question whether there would be s.p.a.ce for interment between the tiling and the upper side of the vaulting of the crypt. It is to be hoped that at some future time the effigy may be moved back to its place in the Presbytery.

The next chapel--_i.e._ the north-west chapel, is dedicated to St. Paul, and is entered by a doorway, with the initials T. C. over it, in the spandrels. T. C. may stand for Thomas Compton.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TOMB OF ROBERT CURTHOSE.

_Photochrom Co. Ltd., Photo._]

The windows in the north ambulatory of the choir are as follows:--

The window next to Boteler's Chapel is a memorial erected by the dean and chapter to Mrs Tinling. The gla.s.s was designed by the late J. D.

Sedding, Esq., and was executed by Kempe.

Opposite to the tomb of Edward II. is a memorial window, also by Kempe, to the late Lieut.-General Sir Joseph Thackwell and his wife.

The third window is a memorial to Alfred George Price, who died in 1880, and it represents the four great builders of the church--viz. 1. King Osric. 2. Abbot Serlo. 3. Abbot Wygmore. 4. Abbot Seabroke.

Opposite this door in the north-east corner is a doorway--Perpendicular in style--with interesting cresting and carving, giving access to the vestries and the choir practising-room.