to us.

We shall not therefore pretend to say whether Wolmerforest existed as a royal domain before the conquest. If it did not, we may suppose it was laid out by some of our earliest Norman kings, who were exceedingly attached to the pleasures of the chase, and resided much at Winchester, which lies at a moderate distance from this district. The Plantagenet princes seem to have been pleased with Wolmer; for tradition says that king John resided just upon the verge, at Ward-le-ham, on a regular and remarkable mount, still called King John's Hill, and Lodge Hill; and Edward III. had a chapel in his park, or enclosure at Kingsley.* Humphrey, duke of Gloucester, and Richard, duke of York, say my evidences, were both, in their turns, wardens of Wolmer-forest; which seems to have served for an appointment for the younger princes of the royal family, as it may again.

I have intentionally mentioned Edward III. and the dukes Humphrey and Richard, before king Edward II. because I have reserved, for the entertainment of my readers, a pleasant anecdote respecting that prince, with which I shall close this letter.

As Edward II. was hunting on Wolmer-forest, Morris Ken, of the kitchen, fell from his horse several times; at which accidents the king laughed immoderately: and, when the chase was over, ordered him twenty shillings;† an enormous sum for those days! Proper allowances ought to be made for the youth of this monarch, whose spirits also, we may suppose, were much exhilarated by the sport of the day: but, at the same time, it is reasonable to remark that, whatever might be the occasion of Ken's first fall, the subsequent ones seem to have been designed. The scullion appears to have been an artful fellow, and to have seen the king's foible; which furnishes an early specimen of that his easy softness and facility of temper, of which the infamous Gaveston took such advantages, as brought innumerable calamities on the nation, and involved the prince at last in misfortunes and sufferings too deplorable to be mentioned without horror and amazement.

* The parish of Kingsley lies between, and divides Wolmer-forest from Ayles Holt-forest. -See Letter IX. to Mr. Pennant.

The church at Kingsley is a remarkably mean-looking edifice. The tower has a striking resemblance to a “dove-cote," and the edifice bears out the assertion made by Mr. White that some of the Hampshire "places of worship make little better appearances than dove-cots.--D.

↑ "Item, paid at the lodge at Wolmer, when the king was stag-hunting there, to Morris Ken, of the kitchen, because he rode before the king and often fell from his horse, at which the king laughed exceedingly, a gift, by command, of twenty shillings."-From a MS. in possession of Thomas Astle, esq., containing the private expenses of Edward II.

LETTER III.

FROM the silence of Domesday respecting churches, it has been supposed that few villages had any at the time when that record was taken; but Selborne, we see, enjoyed the benefit of one : hence we may conclude, that this place was in no abject state even at that very distant period. How many fabrics have succeeded each other since the days of Radfredrus the presbyter, we cannot pretend to say; our business leads us to a description of the present edifice, in which we shall be circumstantial.

Our church, which was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, consists of three aisles, and measures fifty-four feet in length by forty-seven in breadth, being almost as broad as it is long. The present building has no pretensions to antiquity ;* and is, as I suppose, of no earlier date than the beginning of the reign of Henry VII. It is perfectly plain and unadorned, without painted glass, carved work, sculpture, or tracery. But when I say it has

The churches of some of the adjoining parishes are of very great antiquity, and particularly deserving of the attention of the antiquary. Those of Empshot and Hartley (especially the latter) are very curious structures, and may I think be referrible to a period antecedent to the Norman conquest. Hartley church has been most ridiculously "beautified" by a sort of Inigo-Jones gable end, a piece of workmanship by no means bad in itself, but so outrageously out of character with the original architecture as to draw a smile of contempt from every observer of taste.-D.

no claim to antiquity, I would mean to be understood of the fabric in general; for the pillars which support the roof, are undoubtedly old, being of that low, squat, thick order, usually called Saxon. These, I should imagine, upheld the roof of a former church, which, falling into decay, was rebuilt on those massy props, because their strength had preserved them from the injuries of time.* Upon these rest blunt gothic arches, such as prevailed in the reign above mentioned, and by which, as a criterion, we would prove the date of the building.

At the bottom of the south aisle, between the west and south doors, stands the font, which is deep and capacious, and consists of three massy round stones, piled one on another, without the least ornament or sculpture: the cavity at the top is lined with lead, and has a pipe at bottom to convey off the water after the sacred ceremony is performed.

The east end of the south aisle is called the South Chancel, and, till within these thirty years, was divided off by old carved gothic frame-work of timber, having been a private chantry. In this opinion we are more confirmed by observing two gothic niches within the space, the one in the east wall and the other in the south, near which there probably stood images and altars.

In the middle aisle there is nothing remarkable: but I remember when its beams were hung with garlands in honour of young women of the parish, reputed to have died virgins;† and recollect to have seen the clerk's wife cutting, in white paper, the resemblances of gloves, and ribbons to be twisted into knots and roses, to decorate these memorials of chastity. In the church of Faringdon, which is the next parish, many garlands of this sort still remain.

The north aisle is narrow and low, with a sloping ceiling, reaching within eight or nine feet of the floor. It had originally a flat roof covered with lead, till, within a century past, a churchwarden stripping off the lead, in order, as he said, to have it mended, sold it to a plumber, and ran away with the money. This aisle has no door, for an obvious reason; because the north

In the same manner, to compare great things with small, did Wykeham, when he new built the cathedral at Winchester, from the tower westward, apply to his purpose the old piers or pillars of Bishop Walkelin's church, by blending Saxou and Gothic architecture together.-See Lowth's Life of Wykeham.

+ Virgin garlands were originally formed of real flowers, and garlands so made are alluded to by our old dramatists and "metre-ballad-mongers." Garlands of the description given by Mr. White are still common among the peasantry of the mountains of Craven in Yorkshire and Westmoreland.

side of the church-yard, being surrounded by the vicarage-garden, affords no path to that side of the church. Nothing can be more irregular than the pews of this church, which are of all dimensions and heights, being patched up according to the fancy of the owners: but whoever nicely examines them will find that the middle aisle had, on each side, a regular row of benches of solid oak, all alike, with a low back-board to each. These we should not hesitate to say are coeval with the present church: and especially as it is to be observed that, at their ends, they are ornamented with carved blunt gothic niches, exactly correspondent to the arches of the church, and to a niche in the south wall. The south aisle also has a row of these benches; but some are decayed through age, and the rest much disguised by modern alterations.

At the upper end of this aisle, and running out to the north, stands a transept, known by the name of the North Chancel, measuring twenty-one feet from south to north, and nineteen feet from east to west: this was intended, no doubt, as a private chantry; and was also, till of late, divided off by a gothic framework of timber. In its north wall, under a very blunt gothic arch, lies perhaps the founder of this edifice, which, from the shape of its arch, may be deemed no older than the latter end of the reign of Henry VII. The tomb was examined some years ago, but contained nothing except the scull and thigh-bones of a large tall man, and the bones of a youth or woman, lying in a very irregular manner, without any escutcheon or other token to ascertain the names or rank of the deceased. The grave was very shallow, and lined with stone at the bottom and on the sides.

From the east wall project four stone brackets, which I conclude supported images and crucifixes. In the great thick pilaster, jutting out between this transept and the chancel, there is a very sharp gothic niche, of older date than the present chantry or church. But the chief pieces of antiquity are two narrow stone coffin-lids, which compose part of the floor, and lie from west to east, with the very narrow ends eastward: these belong to remote times; and, if originally placed here, which I doubt, must have been part of the pavement of an older transept. At present there are no coffins under them, whence I conclude they have been removed to this place from some part of a former church. One of these lids is so eaten by time, that no sculpture can be discovered upon it; or, perhaps, it may be the wrong side upper

most: but on the other, which seems to be of stone of a closer and harder texture, is to be discerned a discus, with a cross on it, at the end of a staff or rod, the well-known symbol of a KnightTemplar.*

This order was distinguished by a red cross on the left shoulder of their cloak, and by this attribute in their hand. Now, if these stones belonged to Knights-Templars, they must have lain here many centuries; for this order came into England early in the reign of king Stephen in 1113, and was dissolved in the time of Edward II. in 1312, having subsisted only one hundred and ninety-nine years. Why I should suppose that KnightsTemplars were occasionally buried at this church, will appear in some future letter, when we come to treat more particularly concerning the property they possessed here, and the intercourse that subsisted between them and the priors of Selborne.

We must now proceed to the chancel, properly so called, which seems to be coeval with the church, and is in the same plain unadorned style, though neatly kept. This room measures thirty-one feet in length, and sixteen feet and a half in breadth, and is wainscoted all round, as high as to the bottom of the windows. The space for the communion table is raised two steps above the rest of the floor, and railed in with oaken balusters. Here I shall say somewhat of the windows of the chancel in particular, and of the whole fabric in general. They are mostly of that simple and unadorned sort called Lancet, some single, some double, and some in triplets. At the east end of the chancel are two of a moderate size, near each other; and in the north wall two very distant small ones, unequal in length and height: and in the south wall are two, one on each side of the chancel door, that are broad and squat, and of a different order. At the east end of the south aisle of the church there is a large lancetwindow in a triplet; and two very small, narrow, single ones in the south wall, and a broad squat window beside, and a double lancet one in the west end; so that the appearance is very irregular. In the north aisle are two windows, made shorter when the roof was sloped; and in the north transept a large triple

* See Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, Vol. II. where there is a fine engraving of a KnightTemplar, by Hollar.

+ It is not generally known that this order sprung out of freemasonry. It is one of the highest degrees in that society, and at the present day many "encampments," as they are called, of the order of Knights-Templars exist in the metropolis and other parts of the kingdom. Our modern templars boast of an uninterrupted series of encampments from the times of their ancient brethren, and deny that their order was ever effectually dissolved or suppressed.-D.