FIFTY YEARS carries us back to the times of the Oxford Movement, the first rage of the Gothic Revival and the restorations of many of the finest churches in England, restorations whose results were often of the most deplorable kind. Pugin was at the head of the Gothicists; Wailes, Willement and Hardman were trying their prentice hands upon the rediscovery of the art of glass painting with very indifferent success; Newman had joined the Roman Church, and many other interesting names were in men’s mouths, of which I could tell you more if I happened to know anything about them.
Among the many beautiful country towns in the southern shires, few are more complete or fascinating than the town of Burford in Oxon. It is very much out of the world; there is hardly a new house in it, and there are several exceptionally fine old ones, as well as a magnificent parish church. To Burford it was that Cromwell’s Speaker, Lenthall, retired: there he built his beautiful home, now almost a ruin, and there he died and was buried. His house must be very shortly described. It is of stone, with a surprisingly rich front, and a chapel attached thereto by a covered walk, possessing one of the last rose windows ever made in England before this century. Texts are carved and painted on the walls, and there are indications that the fittings must at one time have been sumptuous. But the roof is gone and the place a shattered ruin.
But fifty years ago things were not quite so bad, though even then the chapel had been long disused. The house was inhabited, and was perfectly sound, and well-furnished, even to richness. It had passed away from the Lenthalls to the not less ancient and reputable line of the Claxtons, once considerable people in Suffolk; but they too had left off living there, and it was now held on lease by a rich clergyman, Mr. Cave, who had some sons and daughters, and in the evening of his days had retired from active duty and brought his family and his library to Burford where he found existence tolerable enough. A rich clergyman, said I, and one considerably learned in ancient matters, and with a strong turn for Gothic architecture as it was then understood.
What was more natural than that he should work upon the feelings of the rector—an old friend—and lead very handsomely a subscription list for the restoring of St. Mary’s Church? He had been little more than a year in the place when the Movement was fairly started; and now we find Mr. Cave, young Mr. Cave, Miss Cave, Mr. Eldon the rector, and Mr. Green the architect, a disciple of Pugin’s, conferring upon the necessary alterations, after dinner and a long day spent in and about the Church.
“The galleries and pews must go, Eldon; that is clear enough: the organ shifts into the north transept. The nave is reseated with pitch pine: the monuments ranged along the walls on each side. I do wish we could get rid of that hideous erection of Speaker Lenthall’s. It fills up the whole of the north choir aisle, and we might have arranged such a pretty little morning chapel there for the daily service.”
The erection alluded to is indeed large, but of alabaster and other marbles, and we do not nowadays call it hideous. It is covered with emblematical statuettes of virtues and arts and is really extremely imposing.
“Yes, my dear Cave, that is a block, to be sure: miserable debased work, one wonders that in any age it could have been thought to possess the least merit.”
“Well, can nothing be done? Could you get a faculty or whatever it is to remove it?” said young Cave (age some three and twenty and now at Trinity, Oxford).
“Ah, my dear sir, the faculty might be got easily enough,” said Mr. Green the architect. “The only question is, are there surviving relatives of Speaker Lenthall’s, and can their consent to the removal of the monument be obtained? If so, all is easy.”
“Really? Well, that sounds very promising. There can hardly be any Lenthalls left, I should think, eh, father?”
“Ask the rector, my boy; I should hardly imagine it, either?”
“Well, Harry, I think you may set your mind at ease on that point. We certainly have a Lenthall in Burford, but in Burford Almshouse. But she is nearer ninety than eighty and it has been ascertained, I believe with certainty, that she is the last of the name. One can hardly doubt that a five pound note would be more of an object to her than fifty Speaker’s monuments.”
“You are clear, Green, that we must get her consent to the removal in due form?” said Mr. Cave. “What I mean is that if there was likely to be any difficulty with her—if she is doting or obstinate or anything of that kind,—we might easily wait for the sand to run. It can’t in nature be long before the poor old thing is out of the way.”
“Yes, Mr. Cave; if there are any survivors, their written consent must be obtained. The law is very clear on that point.”
“Well, Cave,” said the rector, “I propose that Green and you and Harry and I go down in force tomorrow morning and call on Mrs. Elizabeth Lenthall with a document ready prepared, to which she can set her name. I fancy, do you know, that you might have some time to wait if you put off the matter till she is dead. She is as upright as a dart and certainly she has a will of her own. I don’t think she is on speaking terms with any of her neighbors in the almshouses. There has been a terrible feud about the pump, I understand, though I don’t know the rights of it. Green had better bring his drawings with him, hadn’t he, so as to impress the old lady with the extent of the improvement which would result from the clearing away of her ancestor’s tomb?”
“I think,” said the architect, “if it would help matters at all, Mr. Eldon, I could easily work some of the statuettes into a reredos for the Chapel. And of course we would have a sketch of the monument done before it was taken down, and a slab laid in the floor. The Speaker’s effigy could be kept in the vestry, could it not?”
“O yes, I think that could be managed easily enough. But really the whole thing is in such wretched taste that I would sooner make a clean sweep of it myself.”
“To be sure, so would I,” said Mr. Green. “Perhaps my suggestions had better be reserved to form the basis of a compromise; if that proves necessary.”
“What sort of person was Lenthall, papa?” asked Miss Mary Cave. “Was he a fine character at all?”
“Well no, my dear,” said her father. “By all accounts he was something of a trimmer in his later days and a very hard customer in money matters. They say he did most bitterly repent his share in King Charles’s death. But you should look him up in Clarendon. I’m afraid I am no authority on the Civil War period.”
“I suppose it’s very bad taste on my part,” said the young lady after a moment, “but I must say I always have admired that monument a good deal.”
“My dear! That gaudy half-classical nondescript erection! I always thought you had some sort of perception of what was good in art,” said her brother.
“Well, Harry, I said I supposed it was my bad taste and I daresay it is. But you must allow that the materials are really beautiful marbles, and the coloring and some of the modeling is very clever. Besides, I never could see the reason in refusing to admire a thing because it is not of a particular period or style. Surely there may be beautiful things made in more styles than one. I remember quite well when you used to admire St. Paul’s tremendously, Harry, before you went to Oxford.”
“Yes, precisely: before I went to Oxford, and before I ever looked at a Gothic Church, and before I had made any attempt at educating my tastes and before two or three other things of equal importance, perhaps I did like St. Paul’s. All I can say is I think differently now.”
“Well, perhaps in thirty or forty years you may be able to find room to admire St. Paul’s as well as Gothic Churches. However, I must go—Goodnight, Harry.” And when she had said the other goodnights Miss Cave departed, Mr. Green’s eyes following her with something of pity and amusement.
A declamation from Harry in the style peculiar to his University upon the wonderful character of female taste followed, which it is hardly necessary to transcribe: and soon after that the gentlemen dispersed also.
Next morning, they met again at Mr. Cave’s house, and proceeded, with drawings and documents, in an imposing procession to the Burford Almshouses founded by Lenthall’s daughter who had married a Claxton, in 1695. The houses are of the familiar type—a long row of cottages, one story high, date and inscription in a pediment in the center, a garden behind: her house and a share in the garden and pump belonging to each inmate. Mr. Green mourned melodiously over the design of the cottages and pointed out how far preferable to this would have been a Gothic hospitium with a chapel and statue of a patron saint.
“Well, Green,” said Mr. Cave, “who knows but we may see that here yet: the endowment of this place is pretty good, and a few years’ accumulation would go a long way toward supplying what you want. But that must wait until we have done with the Church.”
“Here is Mrs. Lenthall’s house—the one at the end,” interposed the rector. “Perhaps, as I be treasurer, pretty well, I had better begin the ball, Cave?”
The old lady was a fine and dignified object as she sat in her armchair by the fire, in the white cap and blue tippet which were de rigueur for the inheritrices of Dame Claxton’s bounty. She rose on the entrance of the four gentlemen, and it was plain that the rector had not been exaggerating when he said that she was as upright as a dart. She had fine dark eyes, rather thick white eyebrows and strongly cut features. The only thing that singled out the functions of her parlor was a small oval portrait of Speaker Lenthall over the mantelpiece. It was by a good hand, and showed something of the strength of character and will which had reappeared in his descendant’s face.
“We have come, Mrs. Lenthall,” said Mr. Green, “upon a matter of business which we hope may turn out as well to your advantage as to that of the parish at large. I think you know Mr. Cave who lives at the Hall. This is his son whom I daresay you also know, and this is Mr. Green, the gentleman who has been good enough to undertake the important work of restoring our beautiful Parish Church to something of its ancient comeliness.”
“I am very happy, gentlemen, to see you,” said the old lady, in a strong and rather masculine voice. “If you will be at the pains to find chairs for yourselves I shall be obliged to you: for I am rather past the age when bustling about suits me.”
There was a general murmur of “Oh pray don’t think of moving, Mrs. Lenthall,” and the four chairs were shuffled into position and occupied.
“The fact is, Mrs. Lenthall,” the rector went on, “that we are in a difficulty as regards the large monument to Speaker Lenthall that stands in the chancel aisle of St. Mary’s. It was no doubt considered a very beautiful structure in its day, and must have been a very costly one. But knowledge, we know, grows, and we have come to see in our more enlightened days that such memorials to the dead have much that is unsightly and unfitting about them.” Mrs. Lenthall fixed her eyes upon Mr. Eldon who coughed and went on.
“Now, Mr. Green has pointed out to us that were that monument removed from its position, we should be enabled to put up a most beautiful little chapel in which the beautiful liturgy of our Church might be daily said. And he has told us that in order to be able to obtain leave from our Bishop to destr … to remove the monument, we must first obtain the consent of the relations of the person who is buried there. I know, for you have often told me, that you are the last Lenthall now surviving—and I am sorry to think it …” Mrs. Lenthall bowed slightly. “And we have made bold this morning to come ask you if you would not be so kind as to put your name to this document which we have prepared, giving your consent to the dem … the alteration which we propose. Mr. Cave has been so good as to say that he will see that a sum of money shall be paid to you in consideration of your goodness, and I am confident that beyond that you will feel some satisfaction in having done a service to the parish in which you have been respected for so many years. Now, if you will just think it over quietly and look at this drawing which Mr. Green has prepared, showing the great advantage of the change, we shall be much indebted to you.”
Mrs. Lenthall examined the drawing for a minute or two. “Tis your work then, young gentleman?” she suddenly said to the architect—so suddenly that he jumped.
“Yes, my good friend,” he said on recovering his presence of mind, “and you see, do you not, what a handsome chapel for Matins will be the result of the destruction of that hideous pile that your ancestor erected.”
“That is sufficient, thank you kindly, young man,” said Mrs. Lenthall; “it is no good trade to speak of the dead in that kind. Butcher Green’s bills were paid regular by my grandmother, for I have them in the chest; and Lenthall’s money went some way, I reckon, to prentice Butcher Green’s great-grandson for a builder.”
There is no denying that Mr. Green was taken a good deal aback by this sally: he was of a burning red color for some minutes, and no word escaped him. The two elder gentlemen were amused, if rather sorry for him. But Harry Cave who had rather taken up the architect was exceedingly angry.
“I really think you might keep a civil tongue in your head, my good woman,” he said viciously. “We are only anxious to do our best for the Church, and you have a very plain question to answer—whether you object or do not object to Speaker Lenthall’s tomb being destroyed.”
Mrs. Lenthall looked at him and smiled to herself; and then, turning to Mr. Cave, she said, “Ah, sir, time flies, don’t it! Master Harry’s time for going to College will come soon enough, and maybe he’ll turn out a sharp lad at his works yet. Tis not easy to tell with the young: but I warrant you he’ll make a learner. But now, gentlemen, I have to answer you in regard of my great-grandfather’s monument; and I would be glad not to send you away disappointed. Yet the matter is thus. I never will give my consent while I am a living woman to the touching of the Speaker’s tomb in Burford Chancel. I have lived to hear it praised for a fine piece all my days, and I cannot tell but after I go, there will come those that will cry it up again. And, Rector, I say to you in all sadness, if there comes breaking down of Lenthall tombs when I am dead, Lenthalls will see to it and trouble will be heard. For the Speaker needs to rest quiet, and the Speaker was a strong man: and I am not very sure if Mr. Cave will not hear more of him than he thinks.”
Mr. Cave laughed quietly and said, “Well, well, Mrs. Lenthall, I think I will take the risk of that.”
But Harry was still fuming, and not to be held in.
“All I can say is that you, Madam Lenthall, may be very proud of your ancestor the Speaker, but most of us would rather not have such an old ratter and trimmer in the family. And another thing I can tell you is that it will give me the greatest pleasure to knock that hideous tomb to bits as soon as—as I can do it.”
“Sit you there a moment, Master Harry,” said the old woman whom this speech seemed to have touched very nearly. “You would say, as soon as I am in my grave, you will knock the Speaker’s marble tomb to bits—the tomb that he had men from Italy to make, and paid them four hundred pounds for it—you that lives in his house and sleeps, I daresay, in his chamber. Well, you may begin it: I daresay you will. But you will not carry it through: not one of you will go through with the business; and you were well advised to look to yourself in the doing. Now, gentlemen, I will wish you a good morning, for I am not well in myself and such talk is not good for an old heart.”
The gentlemen took back their document and their drawings to the Lenthall house, and found themselves reduced to leave the Morning Chapel out of their program for the present.
Miss Mary Cave paid a long visit to Miss Lenthall in the afternoon, and reported on her return that the old lady seemed very weak, and still much incensed against Harry; whom his sister took to task, but did not convince that he had been wanting in tact. This was on Thursday in March. On Saturday Mrs. Lenthall died; on Monday she was buried. Harry’s spirits were only superficially damped, for he went back to Oxford for the Easter Term, and the plans for the Morning Chapel were completed by Mr. Green.
It is now the Long Vacation: the faculty for the removal of Lenthall’s tomb has arrived. Harry is to superintend the destruction of that abomination of desolation. Miss Cave is still regretful and so are some of the inhabitants of Burford. Several farmers have driven their wives in to see the last of the monument, and Mr. Green has made a sketch of it, with a good deal of inaccuracy in detail, and has succeeded in making it appear as ugly and clumsy as he believed it to be. Enough.
The fated morning arrived. Harry and the workmen were around the monument, selecting the best point of attack: the headman suggested that the best way would be to get out one of the corner columns supporting the canopy; then the canopy would fall, and help to break up the effigy and the actual tomb below. So Harry was just loosening the base of the said column with the thin end of a mattock when smash!—down came the statuette of Envy which stood at the top of it, entwined with snakes, and took him on the shoulder in its descent. He could not get up and had to be helped. Evidently he was in a good deal of pain—collar bone broken and a cut on the head. No more mason’s work for Harry just at present, was the doctor’s verdict, and someone gave him an arm home. The masons meanwhile were examining the place whence the figure had fallen. It was a curious circumstance that it should have come down, for it was fixed on a strong iron dowel running up into it, and this did not seem to have rusted in the least. At any rate all the other figures were quite firm.
Harry Cave was so anxious to see the destruction of the tomb that the clerk of the works made no objection to putting it off for a week or two, as the men had plenty to do in other parts of the building. Harry spent a few days in bed and [an]other few in comparative quiet for him—interrupted by somewhat acrid disputes with his sister about the advisability of persisting in the design of the Morning Chapel. Pugin and Green were quoted on one side, and only Mrs. Lenthall and sentimental considerations on the other. Harry usually came off with flying colors, and these little battles aided him greatly in recovering his strength. It wanted now two days to the time when he had been told he might go to work again, and he was in great spirits at dinner and, I grieve to say, rather offensively exultant toward his sister. Bedtime arrived. Harry went to bed; but did not go to sleep very immediately after blowing out his candle. The room was rather light, only a blind being drawn over the window, and he was a little restless.
However, he turned his face to the wall, and composed himself by reflecting upon the improvements in ritual which he wished to see introduced at Burford. Suddenly he began to hear a faint sweeping or rustling noise approaching over the carpet. He turned half over—nothing to be seen—the room being, as I said, very fairly light by reason of the strong moonlight outside. It came to the side of the bed. Then a pause: next a very slight stretching of the bedclothes over his legs toward the outside of the bed, much as if a kitten had jumped up. Harry not much affected by this, but on the alert. The next phenomenon was the touch, on the bare back of his neck, of something bristly—so much so that it pricked the skin. He whipped over in the bed, thoroughly frightened, and had just time to see a very strange object against the white window blind before it disappeared. It was long and sharply crooked in the midst: he could only describe it by saying that it was like a very long finger covered thickly with short hairs. He was out of bed in a second, had a candle lighted, and searched the room thoroughly. The door was fastened and the window shut, and there was no sign of man or beast in any corner. For the rest of that night Harry read the Tracts for the Times.
He kept his experience to himself next day, feeling dimly that it was a point in favor of his sister’s view of the question, he could hardly tell why, or how he came to connect it with Lenthall’s tomb, but that he did so connect it, he couldn’t deny.
He went down to the Church in the morning and had a talk with the mason about tomorrow’s job. The mason showed him with pride the rope ready, attached to the pillar of the canopy, and pointed out that the fall of the heavy marble transoms would so effectually break up the Speaker that Miss Mary could construct a rockery from his remains. This was after Harry’s own heart and he retailed it at luncheon. Mary was really very nearly in tears over the matter. Mr. Cave chaffed her good naturedly but was a little sorry himself. Mr. Green who arrived that day was suave and instructive but distinctly triumphant. Miss Cave spent the evening in cleaning up the portrait of Speaker Lenthall, which old Mrs. Lenthall had presented to her on the day when she had visited her for the last time. The gentlemen were in their rooms by eleven o’clock p.m.
It is very fortunate for Harry Cave that his father sat up late in his bedroom over a bundle of papers which had to be sorted. Otherwise he would not have heard a choking and crowing sound rising into a scream, which came from Harry’s
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bed clothes; and then straight upon that two sharp points had been plunged into his neck. He had cried out and clutched with his hands at the spot only to feel something hairy, which pricked his fingers and seemed to melt away under them: the room, searched as strictly as possible, yielded no evidence whatever.
But this adventure daunted him completely: it became clear that he was now as much frightened at the thought of destroying Lenthall’s monument as he had been eager to do it. The scheme was dropped and Miss Cave triumphed. She bore it well. At the moment when Harry detailed to her the circumstances of his adventure she was engaged still in cleaning the lower half of the Lenthall portrait. Suddenly she started: “What in the world is this on the table in the picture? Why, it’s an enormous spider.” And so it was: painted there no doubt as the emblem of industry or avarice or both.