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WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
VOL. I
Hmh Altar and Baldacohino. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
[Frontispiece^ I.
WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
BY
WINEFRIDE DE L'HOPITAL
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
PROFESSOR W. R. LETHABY, F.R.I.B.A.
THE BUILDING OF THE CATHEDRAL
WITH 160 ILLUSTRATIONS IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. I
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND CO.
If i <J ij (5
PRINTED IN GKEAT BRITAIN
.>),(: N A
r ' "-7 n
DEDICATION OF WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL
To THE Most Peecious Blood of Our Lobd
Jesus Christ,
To His Blessed Mother,
His Foster Father St. Joseph,
And St. Peter His Vicar.
Scconbar^ jpatrona
St. Augustine and all British Saints. St. Patrick and all Saints of Ireland.
INTRODUCTION
Many years ago I had the privilege, by Mr. Bentley's permission, of seeing over every part of tlie Cathedral, I appreciated it, but not enough. Spectators have a way of thinking that a " piece of architecture " is erected so that they shall come and say whether they, like it or not, and they usually say that they don't quite like it, and something ought to be different, A younger man indeed may not understand the burden of such a work; the tens of thousands of decisions, adjustments, compromises, the power of getting things done, the responsibility, the strain — all are hidden except the skill of a wise master builder.
The opportunity of again recorr'ing my admiration for Mr. Bentley's Cathedral gives me much pleasure. The great things are the masterly structure and the sincerity of the whole work. The taste and learning are exquisite and astonishing, yet this taste and learning are the least parts of Bentley's work. He had to supply them to justify himself to his employers and his epoch, but the merit of the Cathedral goes altogether beyond stylism. It is a building nobly planned, carefully balanced, and soundly constructed. Beyond the echoes there is the universal and the livmg. Throughout all the preliminary talk about the choice of a style Bentley must have known that he wanted to build, and he has left us a building serious, serene, and really modern.
If I might I would venture to ask for reverence towards this
viii INTRODUCTION
remarkable work. It should not be lightly experimented with and modified ; everything added, which is not up to the height of Bentley's work, will really count as a subtraction, however costly it may be.
W. R. Lethaby.
JiUy 1919.
CONTENTS VOL. I
CHAPTER I
PAGE
The Laying of the Foundation-Stone ... 1
CHAPTER II
Birth of the Cathedral Idea : Acquisition of the
Site, 1853—1894
CHAPTER III
The Choosing of the Architect and the Style,
1892—1894 20
CHAPTER IV The Plan 37
CHAPTER V
The Structure — Building Progress — ^IVIaterials — Con- structional Problems ...... 63
CHAPTER VI
Description and Details of Exterior . . . 100
CHAPTER VII
Description and Details of Interior (I) . . . 117
CHAPTER VIII
Description'and Details of Interior — continued . . 148
X CONTENTS
CHAPTER IX
PAGE
The Adaptation and Development of Byzantine Archi- tecture AS exemplified in the Cathedral . . 208
CHAPTER X The Mosaics 223
CHAPTER XI Cathedral Finance ....... 259
CHAPTER XII
Archbishop's House, Library, Chapter Hall, Choir
School, and Clergy House ..... 273
CHAPTER XIII
The Architect's Last Visit — The Opening — The Con- secration ........ 305
APPENDIX A
Founders and Benefactors of Westminster Cathedral 327
APPENDIX B
Westminster Cathedral and Comparative Table of THE Twenty-One Ancient English Cathedrals and Westminster Abbey ...... 332
APPENDIX C
Sketch Plan showing Modification of the Sanctuary Levels, and Departure from Original arrangement
At end
APPENDIX D
Diagrammatic Scheme for Lady Chapel Mosaics . At end
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS VOL. I.
PLATES High Altar and Baldacchino .... Frontispiece
VIATB PAODJQ PAGE
I. Laying of the Foundation-Stone, June 29th, 1895 . . 6
II. John Francis Bentley, ^etat 60 ..... 7
III. View from South-West, looking North-East ... 20
IV. Great West Door ........ 21
V. Window of West Tribune and Balcony over Main Entrance 34
VI. SouthHalfofWestWindow OF Nave, withTribune Vaulting 35
VII. Roof of Baptistery, looking West ..... 48
VIII. North-West Porch ........ 49
IX. General View from South-East, looking North-West . 62
X. Lunette and Turret ....... 63
XI. View of Stepping of Sanctuary Dome .... 80
XII. Windows of Sanctuary Dome and Turret of East End . 81
XIII. Four Details of External Ornament : (A) Bird Finial on
Campanile. (B) Detail, North-West Porch. (C) Detail OF West Faqade. Engaged Shaft to Left of Central
Doorway. (D) Finial Cross of Campanile ... 94
XIV. View, from Tribune, of Nave, looking East ... 95 XV. View of Interior, from Choir, looking West . . 108
XVI. A Bay of the Nave ....... 109
XVII. North Transept, View from South Gallery of Nave . 122
XI 1
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PLATE
XVIII.
XIX. XX.
XXI. XXII.
Sanctuary, Upper and Lower Arcading
The Rood
S. Peter's Crypt, showing Reliquaries in South Wall
Four of the Crypt Capitals .....
Four Sculptured Capitals : A, B, and D, Interior C, Exterior ........
XXIII. Arcade between Baptistery and Chapel of SS. Gregory
and Augustine, from Chapel Side
XXIV. The Font
XXV. Original Drawing for Sculptured Capital between Side Chapels and Aisles (from Full Size Design)
The Brampton
XXVI.
Chapel of SS. Gregory and Augustine ; Chantry .....
XXVII. Original Drawing for SS. Gregory and Augustine's Chapel SHO^viNG Grille and Tomb as proposed .
XXVIII.
XXIX.
XXX.
XXXI.
XXXII.
XXXIII.
XXXIV.
XXXV.
XXXVI.
XXXVII.
XXXVIII.
XXXIX.
XL.
XLI.
XLII.
XLIII.
View of the Lady Chapel from the South Transept Detail of Lady Chapel Marble-Work Screen and Gates of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel Vaughan Chantry, Chapel of S. Thomas of Canterbury Chapel of the Holy Souls, Walmesley Chantry . Chapel of the Holy Souls, Altar and Altar-Piece The State Sacristy .....
Design for Mosaic Lunette for Chapel of Souls .......
Design for Mosaic Figure for Chapel of Souls .......
Archbishop's House .... Grand Staircase, Archbishop's House Throne Room, Archbishop's House Private Chapel, Archbishop's House The Diocesan Library, Westminster Cathedral Hall: Apse and Platform Cathedral Hall, showing Galleries
THE Holy THE Holy
PAGE
123 136 137 152
153
166 167
180
181
194 195 208 209 222 223 236 237
250
251
264 265 276 277 290 291 302
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xiii
FIGURES I^ THE TEXT
Pin. PACE
1. First Tentative Plan for Westminster Cathedral ... 38
2. Second Tentative Plan for Westminster Cathedral . . 40 8. Plan of SS. Sergius and Bacchus, Constantinople ... 44
4, Plan of San Vitale, Ravenna 44
6. Plan of S. Mark's, Venice ........ 45
6. Ground-Floor Plan of Westminster Cathedral ... 47
7. Plan at Triforium Levels 50
8. Plans at Level of Upper Windows ...... 53
9. Roof Plan 55
10. West Elevation .......... 57
11. North Elevation ......... 59
12. Elevation of East End ........ 61
13. Median Longitudinal Section ....... 65
14. Longitudinal Sections through Chapels and Transepts, North
AND South ........... 67
15. Longitudinal Sections through Choir, Baptistery, and Narthex 69
16. Longitudinal Sections of Aisles of Nave and Sanctuary . . 71
17. Transverse Sections through Sanctuary, looking East, and
through North Transept, looking East and West ... 73
18. Transverse Sections through Nave and Chapel and through
Main Piers and Arches of Nave 75
19. Main and Secondary Nave Counterforts ..... 77
20. Transept Counterforts ........ 79
21. Support and Abutment of the Sanctuary ..... 82
22. Diagram of Nave Vaulting 89
28. Diagram of Support and Abutment of Sanctuary Dome . . 93
24, Section through Campanile from a Height of 74 ft. 9 ins. . 97
25. Ground Plan of S. Sophia, Constantinople .... 216
XIV
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
26 AND 27. Diagrams illustrating Domical Support
28. Archbishop's House: Basement Plan .
29. Archbishop's House: Ground-Floor Plan .
30. Archbishop's House : First-Floor Plan
31. Sketch Plan of Alteration of Sanctuary Levei^
32. Diagrammatic scheme for Lady Chapel Mosaics .
PAGE
. 217
. 279 . 281 . 284 At end
FOREWORD
The difficulty of collecting material for this simple record of my father's life and work has been far greater than I anticipated. I am therefore the more deeply grateful to those whose kind help has been so freely given, and welcome this opportunity of again acknowledging it and recording my thanks. Mr. Charles Hadfield, his confrere, Mr, N. H. J. Westlake, the late Mr. T. C. Lewis, and Mr. W. Christian Symons contributed valuable reminiscences of his professional life, early and later, and the first named added a delightful pen portrait. The Misses Montefiore lent letters and illustrations of some very early work. For information relative to the construction and the marbles and mosaics of Westminster Cathedral I have to thank Mr. C. H. MuUis, Mr. Percy Lamb, Mr. Joseph Whitehead, Mr. Barnes of Messrs. Farmer & Briudley, Mr. George Bridge, the late Mr. John Clayton, and Mr. W. Schultz Weir. A large measure of gratitude is due to the Rev. Herbert Lucas, S.J., for the material contained in Chapter IX of the first volume, in which is wrought out the theme of the adaptation and development of Byzantine architecture as exemplified in West- minster Cathedral. And last, but by no means least, to Professor W. R. Lethaby special thanks are offered for his introductory tribute of appreciation of my father's magnum opus.
The assistance given with the illustrations has been no less valuable. My brother, Osmond Bentley, selected some of the original drawings, while for the loan of certain photographs of
xvi FOREWORD
Westminster Cathedral the book is indebted to Mr. R. Davis, Messrs. Farmer & Brindley, Messrs. Whitehead, and Messrs. Burns & Oates. I desire also to record my thanks to the Cathedral authorities for permission to take new photographs, and to give credit to Mr. Cyril Ellis for his fine camera pictures of that build- ing and of others in the second volume. Among the several lenders of photographs of which use has been made, acknowledg- ments are to be rendered to Mr. S. Taprell Holland for illus- trations of Holy Rood, Watford ; to Mrs. Ernest Hills for pictures of St. Luke's, Chiddingstone ; to Messrs. Elsley and Mr. H. Longden for photographs of metal-work ; to Mrs. W. R. Sutton for pictures of furniture ; to Messrs. Daymond for specimens of wood-carving ; and to the Rector of St. John's, Beaumont, for a fine photograph of the interior of the school chapel.
W. DE l' H.
July 1919.
WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
CHAPTER I
THE LAYING OF THE FOUNDATION-STONE
On Saturday, June 29th, 1895, came to fruition the hopes and prayers and labours of over thirty years. Dawn, overcast, chilly, and threatening rain, revealed the long-deserted prison site, now gay with awnings of scarlet and white and the fluttering flags of the Empire and the Papacy, mingled with those of the nations whose generous purses had contributed to the realization of this great day. Tier upon tier to north and south of the erstwhile desolate " four acres " rose the seats for those privileged to witness the function — while, before the very earliest gleams of light, shadowy forms had secured vantage-ground in the open space reserved for several thousand standing people at the westernmost end. From the far distant country, even from across the English Channel, came these eager pilgrims, unafraid of the long hours of waiting, to take their humble part in the laying of the founda- tion-stone of Westminster's new cathedral church.
As the light, gathering strength, broke through the chill grey clouds, gradually the watchers beyond the western barriers discerned, facing them, the scene set for the day's solemn act of dedication ; first the altar, scarlet-draped, set before a great plain red cross ' of wood, with arms, flung wide, symbolizing the dedication in chief to the Precious Blood of Our Lord ; next, on
^ On the apot where the high altar now standa.
2 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the Gospel side of the altar, twin thrones of crimson and gold for the Cardinal Primates of England and Ireland ; then the gathering light touched into prominence seats arranged to right and left of the sanctuary for the noble array of Founders^ and Bene- factors : finally revealing the grey corner-stone, mystic symbol of the "Rock" and the "sure foundation "—a massive block of Cornish granite from their Penryn quarries, the gift of Mr. W. G. Freeman and his sons, Messrs. John A. and Bernard A. Freeman.
Soon the interest of an ever-growing stream of arrivals helped to beguile the tedium of the weary hours of waiting. Men and women bearing the eminent names of an ancient nobility, men distinguished in law, in politics, in literature, in their country's service by land and sea, assembled to take their places in the seats reserved for the Founders and Benefactors of the cathedral that was to be. There sat Henry, fifteenth Duke of Norfolk, Premier Peer and Earl Marshal of England ; there, the Earls of Ashburnham and Denbigh, respectively fifth and ninth of their lines. Among ladies, distinguished as much by charity as by noble rank, sat the Dowager-Duchess of Newcastle, widow of the sixth Duke, the Countesses of Cottenham and Mexborough, the Ladies Mary and Margaret Howard, Lady Mary Savile, and Lady Lovat, widow of the thirteenth Baron of a loyal and stormy house. Prominent in the ranks of our Catholic Peers and their wives came Lord Acton, the liistorian, Lord Beaumont, Lord Braye, Lord Camoys, Lord and Lady Clifford of Chudleigh, Lord and Lady Herries, Lord Petre, Lady North, and Lady Sherborne. Close by knelt the Right Hon. Henry Matthews, Home Secretary till three years previously in Lord Salisbury's administration and soon destined to become Viscount Llandaff. Among members of the House of Commons came Lord and Lady Edmund Talbot and Sir Donald and Lady Macfarlane ; whilst among many Catholic laymen bearing distinguished and familiar names were Sir
• Founders were donors of £1,000 and upwards. For a complete list of these see Appendix A.
THE LAYING OF THE FOUNDATION-STONE 3
Stuart Knill, the first Catholic Lord Mayor of London since Reformation days ; Colonel Vaughan, of Courtfield, and Mr. Reginald Vaughan, the Cardinal's brothers ; Sir Walter de Souza ; General Sir William Butler and his wife, the artist known to the world as the painter of The Roll-Call ; Judges Stonor and Bagshawe, who both had brothers in the procession of bishops ; Sir John Haggerston ; Lady Vavasour ; Sir Humphrey and Lady de Trafford ; Sir Thomas Esmonde ; The O'Clery, a private Chamberlain to the Pope ; Mr. Wilfred Meynell ; Lady Hawkins, who later, when her husband, the eminent judge, entered the Catholic Church, gave with him the Chapel of SS. Gregory and Augustine to the cathedral ; Mr. and Mrs. Wilfrid Ward ; and Mr. (later Sir Francis) Burnand, the editor of Punch.
Foreign Catholic countries sent their representatives to do honour to this event of world-wide interest and significance : among whom were Baron de Courcel, the French Ambassador, the Italian Ambassador, Baron Whettnall and Senor Don Luis de Soveral, the Belgian and Portuguese Ministers, and the Mexican Minister.
Long before 11 o'clock, when the first triumphant notes of " The War March of the Priests " from Mendelssohn's Aihalie announced that the procession was taking its way through the intervening streets from Archbishop's House in Carlisle Place, every seat, every available inch of standing room was filled. So acute had become the tension of expectancy that as the leading cross-bearer and acolytes came into view on the site's eastern extremity, nearly ten thousand people arose simul- taneously, thrilled with the strong wave of emotion that seemed to sweep all present into this unity of impulse and desire. Then appeared the long array of the Church's organizations of Faith, of Hope, and of Charity — a procession picturesque, varied, illustrative of the catholicity and continuity of the Church. First, and most fittingly so, priests and students from St. Joseph's Missionary Society at Mill Hill, Cardinal Vaughan's earliest and most beloved work ; then, in slow-pacing succession, walked the Fathers of
4 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the Institute of Charity ; the Marist Fathers ; the Oblates of Mary Immaculate ; the Passionists with gleaming silver badges on their black habits ; Jesuits ; Servites ; Franciscans in brown habits and cord-knotted girdles, with Dominicans, their brother order in point of time and complementary spheres of labour ; Benedictines ; Canons Regular of the Lateran ; representatives of the Institute of St. Andrew ; Carmelites ; Capuchins ; Au- gustinians ; Oblates of St. Charles, the congregation of priests founded in Bayswater, at the desire of the first Archbishop of Westminster, by him who was to become the second, and which early admitted to its community the young priest who was to become the See's third occupant. Priests of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri came close on these last ; followed by a long array of secular clergy, missionary rectors, deans and monsignori bringing the first note of vivid colour into the ranks of black and white and brown.
Then, succeeding the Canons of the Metropolitan Suffragan Diocese of Southwark, came Bishops in cope and mitre, Mon- seigneur Chabot, the representative of the Bishop of Orleans, the Bishop of Davenport, U.S.A., the Bishop of Galle in India, among those of the English Province. Monsignor Stonor, the Archbishop of Trebizond, representing His Holiness Pope Leo XIII, walked next ; and then, preceded by the cross-bearer. Father John Vaughan, and by the sacred Pallium borne on a cushion, the two Princes of the Church, each in his cappa magna of glowing scarlet silk. Cardinal Logue, Archbishop of Armagh, and Cardinal Vaughan, Archbishop of Westminster, in the full dignity of his imposing presence. The Canons of the Chapter of Westminster ended the procession, in which no women took part ; the Sisters of Charity from their convent hard by, in Carlisle Place, had quietly and early slipped into the places reserved behind the altar, at which point their snowy cornettes made a pleasant note of contrast against its brilliant draperies.
From the massed choirs, under the baton of Father Charles Cox of the Pro-Cathedral, Kensington, to the right of the altar,
THE LAYING OF THE FOUNDATION-STONE 5
came the solemn Gregorian music continuing the reverent, im- pressive, yet withal triumphant note to which the procession had been marshalled. The Cardinal-Archbishop, laying aside his crimson robes, then vested as usual in sight of the people. By a special exercise of the Holy See's privilege, he was per- mitted, on this unique occasion, to wear the Pallium out of the Sacrifice of the Mass ; and thus vested, with the simple bands of white wool signed with black crosses across his shoulders, over a magnificent cope of white and gold, the Cardinal advanced across the sanctuary, now filled with those taking part in the ceremony, and after a few moments of silent prayer, approached with his attendants the canopy of scarlet and white under which hung the great stone above its concrete bed. The choirs sang " Quam dilecta tabernacula tua " during its blessing with holy water and incense, followed by the Litany of the Saints, at the close of whose long invocations the Cardinal rose, and with silver mallet and trowel again bent over the stone.
Standing or kneeling throughout, close to this spot, now the north-western angle of the sanctuary, might be observed the archi- tect, a figure of aloof humility, almost concealed behind the stone in the desire to remain in the background, and content that those who knew him not should fail to recognize the man on whom the success of the future edifice depended. To his interior vision the cathedral of the future was a glorious and harmonious reality ; he knelt beneath domes gleaming with mosaic, as he would have them clad ; shining marbles from quarries the wide world over encompassed him in walls and balustrades and columns ; the great red cross drew his eye of worship to the Holy of Holies under the baldacchino to be so faithfully wrought out. His feet rested in imagination on the marble floor wherein seemed to float the multitudinous fish of St. Peter's net.
As the solemn moment approached, the architect rose in his quiet fashion, and with the attendant masons, assisted Cardinal Vaughan at the precise setting of the stone in its appointed place, a cylinder containing a record of the event and a copy of the
6 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
dedication of the cathedral being placed in a cavity beneath. The stone thus laid " In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, that true faith may flourish here, and the fear of God and brotherly love, and that this place may be devoted to prayer," the Cardinal, after the singing of Ps. cxxvi, " Nisi Dominus asdificaverit domum," and the " Miserere," set forth again, with the long train of ecclesiastics, to bless the marked- out boundaries of the foundations as prescribed by the rubrics of the Roman Pontifical. These lines being external to the ground enclosed for the day's function, were invisible to those in the covered stands, though well in view of the great numbers of spectators who crowded the windows and roofs of surrounding houses.
On regaining the sanctuary the Cardinal intoned the hymn of joyful supplication, " Veni, Creator Spiritus," and after the recital of the collects. Canon Moyes announced in the name of Pope Leo XIII the indulgences granted and proper for the occasion. Low Mass with music, sung by Cardinal Logue, brought to a conclusion the spiritual part of the great ceremony.
At the luncheon, in a vast marquee specially made for the occasion on the southern side of the ground, about eleven hundred persons were present, and Cardinal Vaughan, presiding, gave the first toast : " The Health of the Sovereign Pontiff, our Holy Spiritual Father, Leo XIII." "The Holy Father," said his Eminence, " has been pleased to mark his appreciation of this solemn function by charging me to wear the sacred Pallium during the laying of the stone and the blessing of the foundations. I believe it to be a thing almost unheard of in the Church that it should be worn out of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. I propose in your name and in my own that we despatch at once to the Vatican the following telegram : ' To our Holy Fatlier, Pope Leo XIII. The Cardinal-Archbishops of Armagh and West- minster have laid the foundation-stone of Westminster Cathedral on this feast day of the Holy Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, in the midst of an immense gathering consisting of ambassadors and
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THE LAYING OF THE FOUNDATION-STONE 7
ministers of foreign Catholic countries, of bishops and prelates and clergy, secular and regular, and faithful laity. They all, assembled here at luncheon, send their homage, obedience, and love to their spiritual Father Leo XIIL' " The toast was drunk up- standing with great enthusiasm, and a similar burst of applause and loyalty honoured the second toast, proposed also by Cardinal Vaughan, to " Her Majesty the Queen," to whom, as his Eminence observed, none of her subjects are more loyal than the Catholics of this country.
The toast of " Success to Westminster Cathedral," proposed by Cardinal Logue, was responded to by the Duke of Norfolk. That of " The Founders " was proposed by Lord Acton, to which the Right Hon. Henry Matthews, M.P., responded. Lord Edmund Talbot proposed the health of Cardinal Logue, while " The Guests," toasted by Cardinal Vaughan, replied through the mouth of Sir Donald Macfarlane, M.P. The Marquess of Ripon was to have given this toast, but a Privy Council held at Windsor that day, owing to the change of government and the swearing-in of the new Ministry, rendered his absence unavoidable.
In glorious sunshine, triumphantly blessing the event, the day's ceremonies ended, and the great gathering dispersed.
CHAPTER II
BIRTH OF THE CATHEDRAL IDEA — ACQUISITION OF THE SITE.
1853—1894
As early as 1853, in that " second springtime " of English Catholic life (to use Cardinal Newman's oft-quoted phrase), the idea of a great metropolitan cathedral was germinating in the minds oi Catholics. Within a short three years of that storm of invective which broke upon the re-erected hierarchy, and almost threatened its destruction, the late Ambrose Phillips de Lisle wrote to Cardinal Wiseman of his conviction " that nothing could more conduce towards the conversion of England than the establishment of a glorious solemn cathedral church in London, in which the Divine Office could be carried out with all conceivable glory and magnifi- cence in a way worthy of England's past recollections, and in some degree commensurate with what so many holy Servants of God bid us to hope for her future."
Not yet had the hour struck for the realization of this splendid vision of faith. Cardinal Wiseman was sorely handicapped by the lack of sufficient priests to carry on the bare necessities of ministration among the poor of London. Churches and schools were few and ill-equipped, even had the "labourers for the vineyard" been ready. The remaining years of the life of the first Archbishop of Westminster were devoted to organizing and strengthening the body ecclesiastic, to meet these pressing spiritual needs — and thus prepare the way for the great educational and charitable developments to which his successor became pledged.
Cardinal Wiseman died on February 15th, 1865. Some few months earlier he had spoken of his desire that Westminster might raise a cathedral worthy of the metropolis of the world ; this
8
BIRTH OF THE CATHEDRAL IDEA 9
almost dying wish was treasured by his friends, who conceived that no more fitting monument could perpetuate his revered memory. At a preliminary, informal meeting held at Lord Petre's house on March 15th, the scheme took shape ; and received its public sanction and practical inception at a gathering of clergy and laity on May 15th. This crowded and representative meeting took place at Willis's Rooms in Hanover Square under the presidency of Dr. Manning (then only Archbishop-elect'), the resolutions proposed being warmly adopted. It was resolved to invite the co-operation of Catholics of the whole empire, and even of foreign countries, for the success of the great undertaking. A subscription list opened with the large sum of £16,000, given or promised before the close of the meeting, at which also trustees and officers were appointed, the treasurers being the second Earl of Gainsborough and the late Sir Charles Clifford, Bart,
Dr. Manning communicated to the meeting the approbation and blessing of Pope Pius IX ; and spoke of the great work in his eloquent and emphatic way as being not only a work of affection towards his illustrious and beloved predecessor, but also one which was absolutely needed for the Archdiocese and for the Catholic Church in this country. He announced in the course of his speech that he would gladly take up the burden laid upon him, for the decision, he was convinced, was both prudent and right. Many of the suffragan sees' were already provided with cathedrals, while the metropolitan see of Westminster, instead of a cathedral, had only, as a j9ro-cathedral, an ordinary church.' The see of West- minster needed a cathedral proportionate to the chief city of the British Empire — and feeling all this, he could not for a moment hesitate. Yet while accepting the burden and responsibility, he would do so on one condition : that before he could lay a stone
^ He had been appointed by Pius IX on April 30th.
' The London suffragan see of Southwark had built its Gothic Cathedral of St. George, by A. W. Pugin, in 1848.
^ St. Mary's, Moorfields (its foundation stone laid in 1817), was pulled down in 1900, the sale of the site contributing £48,.555 to the new Cathedral Building Fund. The new church, in Renaissance style, was built by Mr. George Sherrin in 1907.
10 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
upon a stone, the foundations of the spiritual church in the diocese must be completely laid — provision of schools and orphanages for the 20,000 deserted and neglected children of London must be made, and all precedence given to this most urgent spiritual need.
Manning's eight years of experience in the poor and crowded district of Bayswater and Notting Hill, where he had laboured with his fellow Oblates, had vividly impressed on him this crying and primary need for schools and orphanages, and to the work of creating them he dedicated his life. But, though as regards the cathedral scheme, the Archbishop's was of necessity a qualified enthu- siasm, nevertheless the work of collecting funds proceeded, both at home and abroad, without delay. The late Bishop of Emmaus, the Right Rev. J. L. Patterson, leaving his duties as Master of Ceremonies to the Archbishop, started for Austria at the end of 1865, and as the result of a six months' pilgrimage through that kingdom and the Italian dominions it was so soon to lose, brought home a notable contribution to the Cathedral Fund. Germany was canvassed by the Rev. C. Boeddinghaus ; Spain contributed generously through the hands of the late Canon Dalton ; Italy, visited by the late Monsignor Clifford, sent help likewise; while the Rev. C. H. Denny and the Rev. Dr. Anderdon, Cardinal Manning's nephew (who both later joined the Society of Jesus), travelled and collected throughout the United States of America.
So much for the sinews of war — these in part provided, the selection of an adequate site became the next duty. That the possibility of building the cathedral outside the City of West- minster was at one time under serious consideration, is shown by the following extract from a letter ' to Monsignor Talbot in Rome, dated November 8th, 1865. The Archbishop had returned but a week before from his journey to receive the pallium at the hands of Pius IX. He writes : " I believe that I can now tell you of the site for the cathedral — namely, the Chelsea Cemetery. It is a square of 300 ft. by 340, which could not have been got anywhere in London for £60,000 or £80,000. London is travelling westward.
'■ The Life of Cardinal Manning, by Edward S. Purcell, vol. ii, p. 265.
ACQUISITION OF THE SITE 11
From Belgrave Square to Kensington will be the best part of London. It is within ten minutes' walk of Eaton Square and twenty of Westminster. Upon the whole I cannot doubt that it is the best thing we can do. It would give room for a bishop's house and seminary."
These negotiations eventually came to naught ; and the difficulty of finding a suitable site in Westminster at a possible price gave rise to the delay and dissatisfaction which culminated at length in the resignation of their trusteeships by the Earl of Gainsborough and Sir Charles Clifford, the moneys collected for the Wiseman Memorial being handed over in trust to the Archbishop of Westminster. Manning, though faithful to his promise that " first I must gather in the poor children," had never for a moment shelved the project ; and with the sum of money then at his disposal, was enabled after two years of search, in September 1867, to pur- chase a piece of land in Westminster. He wrote again to Monsignor Talbot on September 6th : " I have bought the Jesuits' land at Westminster for the Cathedral. I was glad to indemnify them for the money they had spent there. It is sufficient for a fine church 480 ft. long by 86 wide."
This freehold site, bought for £16,500 (of which only £10,000 was then paid in cash), consisted of the long narrow strip of land on the right-hand side of Carlisle Place (entering from Victoria Street) between the Convent of the Sisters of Charity and the large corner building which was successively the Guards' Institute and Archbishop's House, and is now a department of the Office of Works. Notwithstanding the inconvenient narrowness of the site, it was decided to plan a church suited to its limitations, and the late Mr. Henry Clutton was commissioned to prepare designs for a Gothic cathedral of great length, but transeptless and only about 70 ft. wide, space for an archiepiscopal residence being left at the end.
Clutton was a kinsman of Manning's by marriage, and his selection as architect of Westminster Cathedral seems to have caused some heart-burning. Letters appeared in the Tablet
12 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
criticizing the appointment, and the rather heated discussion was at length closed by the editor's refusal to publish more cor- respondence, while defending the rights of bishops to a free hand in choosing their cathedral architects. It is of interest to recall here that John Bentley was for a few years Mr. Clutton's pupil ■ and assistant, and had he accepted the partnership at one time suggested, would doubtless have co-operated in these early cathedral plans.
In July 1868 came the opportunity to improve the site by acquiring also the vacant freehold land on the opposite or left- hand side of Carlisle Place, 430 ft. long, 108 ft. wide, at the reduced price of £20,000.^ The roadway between this land and that already in the Archbishop's possession never having been made public, the ownership and right of building thereon would belong to the freeholder of the combined sites, thereby increasing the total width for the greater part of their length to about 230 ft.
The money in the Archbishop's hands did not in his opinion justify the incurring on his own responsibility of a total site ex- penditure of £36,500, but the promises of support in response to a private and unsigned circular of inquiry were of so encouraging a nature that in August 1868 the second site was bought, £4,000 being paid down — the balance of the unpaid purchase money (in all £22,500 on the two sites) being charged with an interest of nearly £1,000 a year. The Archbishop was now in possession of a site of about two and one-third acres, and again Mr. Clutton made plans, this time for two alternatives — one, for a cathedral to be erected on the whole of the land acquired ; the other, for one intended for the second site only, in the event of a decision to sell all or part of the first.
In spite, however, of these preparations, progress still halted — partly perhaps because of the irregularity of the site, for the land first acquired was 90 ft. longer at one end than the second piece, though some 130 ft. shorter at its opposite end. It received further improvement in 1872 by the purchase of the before-
* See vol. ii, p. 342. '' £35,000 wae the original sum asked.
ACQUISITION OF THE SITE 13
mentioned Guards' Institute at the south-west corner of Carlisle Place. This spacious, though ugly and gloomy building had been erected a few years previously by the officers of the Brigade of Guards as a club-house for their men ; financially it was a failure, and the decision to sell it came opportunely for the Archbishop's purpose.
Four cogent reasons governed Manning's decision to buy this house for his own residence : (1) If not purchased by him it might have been bought by persons in whose possession it could have become a nuisance or an inconvenience to the services of the future cathedral. (2) By the Archbishop's coming to reside in it, close to the cathedral site, many persons might be drawn to take an interest in the cathedral project itself. (3) By adding to the cathedral site the land on which the building stood, and erecting another house in its stead at the other end of the site, near to the Sisters of Charity, the cathedral site could be greatly increased. (4) Until this should be done, the building would serve as a suitable residence for the Archbishop, and also as a spacious and convenient house of diocesan administration.
The house was bought, not with money subscribed for the cathedral, but partly with private means of his own; and to " Archbishop's House," as it was henceforth known, in the following year the administration of the diocese was moved from Cardinal Wiseman's inconveniently distant old dwelling- place at 8, York Place, Baker Street.
For the fourth time Mr. Clutton prepared designs, and at the Cardinal's wish, on a far grander and ampler scale. This final plan was for a cathedral in Early Pointed style, not unlike that of Cologne, externally about 450 ft. in length, by 250 ft. in width across the transepts. The internal measurements provided for a length of 412 ft., a width across the nave and its four aisles of 140 ft., and a height of 130 ft.
It might well be that those responsible for funds began to fear and to draw back as they counted the cost of building a Gothic church of dimensions so magnificent and in some so greatly exceed-
14 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
ing the largest of our English cathedrals. Mj uy thousands of pounds were being spent about that time on the Cardinal's pet scheme, the Diocesan Seminary at Hammersmith. He had laid in 1867 the foundation-stone of the Church of Our Lady of Victories at Kensington, which was destined to serve for five-and-thirty years as the Pro-Cathedral of the archdiocese. Perhaps, too, it was difficult to raise money for a cathedral scheme so vast that few, if any, contributors could hope to see its completion. No doubt to all these reasons was due the small progress made in the 'seventies by the Cathedral Fund, whence it followed that Mr. Glutton's plans yet remained on paper only.
Encouraged by a communication from the late Sir Tatton Sykes, Bart., in October 1882 the Cardinal made an enormous and final effort to raise money ; and was able to wipe out the debt still remaining on the cathedral site early in 1883. A total of about £43,500 had in all been spent on this land, exclusive of the reim- bursement of Mr. Clutton for his expenses, the only payment he would consent to receive for his great labours. Among the chief contributors to this site were the eight persons who between them subscribed over £29,000 of its cost. These Pioneers of the cathedral, as they have with truth been called, were : Cardinal Manning, the Duke of Norfolk, the 12th Baron Petre, the 1st Baron Gerard, the late Baroness Weld, the late Countess Tasker, Mr. F. M. Spilsbury, and lastly, a generous donor who desired that the veil of anonymity should never be lifted.
The correspondence above alluded to led the Cardinal to believe that, without the need of any further public contributions, a fine cathedral would, by the generosity of this one donor, be given to the diocese, complete and ready for divine worship, and in the elation of this hope he decided to exchange the existing site for one in a more open and splendid position.
The land on which had stood for many years the Middlesex County Prison of Tothill Fields (in earlier days part of the Abbey lands of Westminster) came at this juncture into the property market. Cardinal Manning, realizing the advantage of such a
ACQUISITION OF THE SITE 15
position over that of the land bought in 1867 and 1868, decided on its acquisition if within the bounds of possibility, and thereupon in November 1882 sent for his solicitor, tlie late Mr. Alfred J. Blount. The interview opened in the Cardinal's usual brief, laconic, and somewhat imperious fashion. Drawing Mr. Blount to the window of his room from which the prison site could be seen, and waving his hand to indicate the ground, he said : " That land is for sale. I wish you to buy it for me ! " The finding of ways and means was left to Mr. Blount, who at once set to work to carry out the Cardinal's wishes.
The price of the prison and its site was ascertained to be £115,000 ; the manner in which this large sum was raised may perhaps be best told in the words of the late Bishop Johnson, for over forty years diocesan secretary, and therefore more intim- ately acquainted than any other with the business of the arch- diocese. His record has been in parts slightly compressed.
" Mr. Blount, after the interview related above, put the matter before Mr. Herman Lescher, chartered accountant, who drew up an admirable scheme for the formation of a limited company which became, as it were, the machinery that gave effect to the Cardinal's wishes. The Memorandum and Articles of Association of the Westminster Land Company . . . were dated September 12th, 1883. T'^e subscribers thereto were the late Earl of Denbigh, the Count de lorre Diaz,' the late Sir Charles Clifford, Bart., the late Hon. H. W. Petre, Mr. Alfred J. Blount,' the late Mr. Herman Lescher, and Mr. (now the Rev.) F. C. New. . . . On August 16th, 1883, a Conditional Agreement for the purchase had been entered into between Sir Richard Nicholson, Clerk of the Peace for Middle- sex, and the late Earl of Denbigh, the Count de Torre Diaz, the ninth Baron Beaumont, and the late Sir Charles Clifford, Bart. Beside those whose names have already appeared in the Articles of Agreement, etc., the subscribers were Lord Arundell of Wardour, Lord Clifford of Chudleigh, the late Mr. T. Weld Blundell, Mr. Robert Vigers, Mr. W. Hussey Walsh, and Mr. E. F. D. Walshe.
' Both now deceased.
16 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
" The property was conveyed to the Westminster Land Com- pany by Sir Richard Nicholson, as Clerk of the Peace for Middlesex, by two indentures of February 19th, 1884 ; and the part of the prison site which Cardinal Manning had selected as the new site for the cathedral was conveyed to the Cardinal and others by the company at its cost price of £55,000 by a deed of the same date. In payment for the site thus purchased of the company, the Cardinal conveyed to the company the old cathedral site at a valuation of £35,000 ; and the balance he paid in money obtained by a mortgage of the new site,
" The old cathedral site was re-sold by the Company in February 1885 to the Building Securities Company, and the remainder of the prison site was disposed of in the same year to Mr. F. A. Blaydes. The last meeting of the Westminster Land Company was held on October 13th, 1886, and the company was then dissolved.
" The undertaking upon which the company courageously entered by the desire of the Cardinal might, through the uncertain- ties of land speculations, especially at that time, have involved them in heavy loss ; but happily their enterprise had a successful and profitable result. In acknowledgment of their success, the company in May 1885 made two gifts to the Cardinal of £1,000 each, which he at once set apart toward paying off the £20,000 mortgage on the new site. Also, from the same motive, two or more of the shareholders gave personal offerings to the Cardinal for the Cathedral Fund."
After the great effort to pay off the debt on the old site, and to exchange it for a better, it will be readily understood how bitter was the Cardinal's disappointment that the cathedral promised in 1882 never became a reality. The architectural conditions imposed by the would-be benefactor rendered his offer unfor- tunately impossible of acceptance. Resignation was, however, aUied in the Cardinal's mind to the satisfaction of knowing that he had kept his word and done all that in him lay to promote the scheme to which he became pledged in 1865. " Some thousands
ACQUISITION OF THE SITE IT
of pounds are given, and others left, for the building," he wrote in a note in his Journals dated 1878 — 1882 ; and he continued prophetically : " My successor may begin to build a cathedral. I have often said the Cardinal's death bought the land ; perhaps mine will begin the building."
The following details of the past history of this land have been gleaned from historians of old London :
" Tothill Fields ^ were, within three centuries, part of a marshy tract of land lying between Mill Bank^and Westminster Abbey, on which were a few scattered buildings, some of which were the resi- dences of noble personages." This great salt-water lagoon formed by the Thames had centuries earlier been reclaimed in part by the monks, who were brought there and settled on Thorney (or Bramble) Island by King Edgar, acting under the influence of St. Dunstan. For these twelve Glastonbury monks the King erected monastic buildings, and restored the Church of St. Peter, which had suffered seriously from the recent Danish raids. He further gave the new community by way of endowment all the land lying between the Fleet and the Tyburn east and west, and between the Thames and what is now Oxford Street, north and south. The Fleet and the Tyburn were of course both tributary streams of London's river. The actual site of the cathedral was under water, and was known then as Bulinga Fen.
In the reign of Henry III the fields were dry land, for the Abbot of Westminster in the thirty-fourth year of that monarch's reign obtained " leave to keep a markett in the Tuthill every Munday, and a faire every yeare, for three days," says Mr. Walford,^ and he informs us that " royal solemnities and goodly jousts " were held here in 1236, after the coronation of Eleanor, Queen of Henry HI. This fair, called St. Magdalen's because it was celebrated on her feast day, was held on the place where Westminster Cathedral now stands. Two centuries later " appeals
''■ Archer, Vestiges of Old London, text to Plate XIX. ' Old and New London, vol. iv, p. 14.
1—2
18 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
by combat " were fought in the fields, and later again, in the seven- teenth century, people used to flock to a " maze " there, and gener- ally to these fields for pleasure and recreation, " in the summer time in fair afternoons." They were used as a burial ground more than once in the seventeenth century, says the same author ; the Scottish prisoners — some 1,200 — taken at the battle of Worcester were buried there, and a few years later many of those who died of the plague found therein their last resting-place.
In the seventeenth century, too, they were a celebrated duelling ground ; later were used from time to time for bull-baiting ; and as late as 1793 a famous bear garden existed. Says Mr. Walford : " There is extant a curious etching, by Hollar, of Tothill Fields as they were in the time of Charles I. They appear to be a dead level broken only by a clump of trees in the centre, forming a sort of maze. The foreground is broken by a row of slight terraces, not unlike the ' butts ' ; and some ladies are promenading leisurely, dressed in the fashionable costume of the day." The fields retained their solitary and uncultivated character (with a group of lonely cottages in their midst) to a large degree till 1810, when the period of their development was ushered in by the construction of the iron bridge at Vauxhall, now superseded by a new granite structure.
Old Tothill Fields Bridewell, or " house of correction " for indolent paupers and vagrants, was built originally in 1618 on a plot of ground on the west side of Artillery Place, leading into Victoria Street; enlarged and altered in 1655, it was converted, in the reign of Queen Anne, into a prison for criminals also. In 1826 an Act of Parliament gave powers for the erection of a new and larger prison, and a fresh site was chosen, consisting of eight acres of land on the western side of the Green Coat School and close to Vauxhall Bridge Road. The cost of this site in 1826 was £16,000 : it is interesting to note that its value had, in the ensuing sixty years, increased about sevenfold. Cardinal Manning paying £55,000 for half of it in 1884.
The prison, built on the Panopticon plan, was completed and
ACQUISITION OF THE SITE 19
opened in 1834 at a cost of £186,000, the old prison being pulled down, and its contents transferred to the new one in 1836, All classes of convicted prisoners were received there till 1850, but after that date it was used only for women and for males under seventeen years of age. At first admired as a " solid and handsome structure " and a " fine specimen of brickwork," it came ultimately to be regarded as a costly blunder and as we have shown, the Middlesex authorities were glad to rid themselves for ever of the burden in 1883.
CHAPTER III
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT
" Had I that command of wealth of which we hear so much in the present day, I would purchase some of those squalid streets in Westminster and clear a great space and build a real cathedral where the worship of heaven should be perpetually conducted in the full spirit of the ordinances of the Church. I believe, were this done, even this country might be saved."
Thus, in Lothair, wrote Lord Beaconsfield about the time that the first cathedral site was purchased ; but the words, with the difference that the great clear space was ready to his hand, though the wealth hypothecated by the statesman-novelist was lacking, might almost have come from the pen of Herbert Cardinal Vaughan thirty years later. Called from the see of Salford to the archdiocese of Westminster in 1892, he plunged almost immediately, and with characteristic vehemence, into the labour of cathedral building ; and on taking up the high office, set this legacy of his predecessors in the forefront of its responsibilities. The cathedral, daily more urgently needed than when the pledge for its building was first given to the Catholics of London, was now to be the monument and memorial of his two great predecessors, " whose services and fame," as he eloquently phrased it, " are part of the heritage of the English-speaking peoples of the world."
Besides the site, fine in position and size, though unfortunately encumbered with a mortgage of £20,000, and shut away from the main street by tall houses on its western side, Cardinal Vaughan's chief assets were unbounded energy and faith, added to a marvel- lous capacity for enthusing others, and a supreme confidence, under Providence, in the generosity of the Catholic body. Never
29
Plate III. — View fbom South- West, looking Nobth-East. {Photo, Burns and Oates.)
20]
Plate IV. — Great West Dook. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
Pl
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 21
was there a more successful beggar — subsequent chapters will show how money rolled at his asking, in almost miraculous fashion, into the coffers of the Cathedral Building Fund.
Happily confident in his power to raise the necessary means, he was less certain of his own judgment when the choice of the architect and of the style of the building had to be made. In the eighteen months that intervened between the date of his return from Rome (in the autumn of 1892) and the summer of 1894, the Cardinal constantly obtained opinions and listened to advice from those best qualified for his guidance. The discussions were kept private at this early stage ; but, in spite of the secrecy necessarily observed, enough leaked out to cause about a dozen architects severally to approach the Cardinal and lay before him their claims to be chosen for the coveted honour. Bentley, of course, equally cognizant of the trend of events, was faithful to his lifelong practice of waiting for work to come to him, and lifted not a finger on his own behalf ; though certain of his friends, who had the Cardinal's ear, were actively and anxiously pressing his cause.
The Cardinal at length decided that the cathedral designs should be open to competition — a course that would have dealt the death-blow to the hopes of Bentley's supporters, for, to quote one of them : " He hated competition, and more than once told me he did not approve of the principle and moreover thought that the results were always unsatisfactory. He disdained the honour of rivalry." But, fortunately, before the Cardinal's decision was irrevocably announced, Bentley, asked if he would compete, had given a point-blank refusal. To Cardinal Vaughan, who hoped by this means to satisfy the many rival claimants^ while giving to the best man the supreme chance, Bentley's definite negative came as a blow. To him as the intimate associate of Manning's work at Bayswater and Westminster for so many years, Bentley's productions as an ecclesiastical architect must have been well known, and from the fact that the com- petitive idea was then dropped, it would seem that he had
22 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
decided personal leanings towards Bentley as the architect for the cathedral. Indeed, he wrote to his secretary, the late Mr. Austin Gates, under date July 5th : " The Finance Board and others want me to appoint the architect without competition — in that case I shall choose Bentley, I think. But there will be many heartburnings." Ten days later he said he had considered the question of a competition very anxiously and carefully : " The ultimate result is to appoint Bentley — all agree on Bentley," ' Thus before taking the final step, it had occurred to his Eminence to take a consensus of opinion among the leading English architects. When asked personally and individually to name the member of their profession best fitted to be entrusted with the building of the cathedral, they gave the palm with generous unanimity to John Francis Bentley.
This generosity on the part of his professional brethren gave him the keenest pleasure ; for always, theirs was the only approval and criticism that truly affected him, or that he ever really valued. That he was kept by friends well in touch with all that was going on, though himself studiously in the background, is shown by the following private letter :
"Jvlyb, 1894.
" Dear Bentley,
" I look upon it as more than probable that you will be offered the cathedral ; at the F.C to-day, his Eminence asked what the feeling was as to competition : this was scouted, and a unanimous opinion expressed that it ought to go to you. His Eminence evidently pleased to be backed by so strong an ex- pression. I think he has been told so by several other people, among others, he says, by two architects who would have hked to have been selected. The fear of offending the body of Catholic architects by making a selection seems to have given way to a bolder feeling. Your decision to go and study the basilica in
1 Life, of Cardinal V'aughan, by J. G. Snead-Cox, vol. ii, p. 330. ' Finance Committee.
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 23
its own native haunts has quite taken the Cardinal's fancy. . . I feel nearly certain it will be yours. . . ."
Bentley ventured, after this, to mention, in conversation with two or three of his most intimate friends, the probable good fortune awaiting him. Rather less than a fortnight after the above date, the Cardinal called at his office to announce his appointment as architect of Westminster Cathedral. After- wards relating the interview with simplicity and some emotion to a friend, he said : " I thanked the Cardinal, who replied : ' You are not to thank me ; it is your fellow architects you have to thank ! ' "
Thus, in his fifty-sixth year, and after thirty strenuous and selfless years devoted to the uplifting of ecclesiastical archi- tecture in this country, came the unique opportunity of his life, to which was stintlessly devoted its brief remaining span.
As rapidly as the days full of work and busy preparations would allow, he wrote to announce to old friends the good news. To Mr. Charles Hadfield, the architect, of Sheffield, and one of the first friends among that devoted little coterie at Bentley's chambers in the early 'sixties, he wrote at once.
" 13, John Street, Adelphi,
" 19 July, 1894.
" Dear Hadfield,
" Just a word to say that, to my surprise, the designing of the new cathedral is to be entrusted to me. Some time ago I was asked if I would take part in a competition, to which I replied emphatically ' No.'
" Since I first heard of the scheme I purposely avoided the Cardinal, and when you were in town ' last, I knew nothing of it, save that a dozen or more architects had written asking to be allowed to enter the lists, and that some of the dozen were individually urging all the powers at their disposal to influence
* Mr. Hadfield called at 13, John Street on July 2nd.
24 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the Cardinal in their favour. I trust you are busy and well. With kind regards to your wife and children,
" Always sincerely yours,
" John F. Bentley."
The rejoicing and warm congratulations of all his friends were voiced in Mr. Hadfield's immediate reply. He wrote on July 20t.h :
" Dear Bentley,
" Just a line of hearty congratulation on the glorious news in your letter this morning. The fact of your selection as archi- tect will be matter of sincerest pleasure to all your old friends, and to none more so than myself — and I need not add that if my dear father ' had been alive he would have been to the fore in wishing you health, strength, and every success in carrying out the work, which will be, let us hope, a great Catholic land- mark in the history of this wonderful nineteenth century.
" ' All comes to him who waits.' You have had many a disappointment, but at last the reward has come. I am glad to say I was not one of the ' Touting Twelve.'
" The Cardinal's action will gratify all thinking men who appreciate intellect and true art. I hope and trust it will be ' Ring out the false, ring in the true '• — and Catholic art should flourish the better for the change. . . .
" W^ith best regards and good wishes to your wife and self,
" I am always sincerely yours,
" C. Hadfield."
A phrase in the letter of July 5th, already quoted, shows that the decision against a Gothic cathedral had been taken before the architect was chosen. Bentley had been hitherto a " Gothic man," both by education, predilection, and necessity ; but that the Christian architecture of the near east held some attraction ,
' Bentley had looked upon Mr. Matthew Hadfield as a father : his own having died in 1856, within a short time of his son's departure from Doucatjter to study in Loudon.
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 25
for him in the early years of his practice will be shown in Vol. II of this book. As far back as the early 'sixties the study of By- zantine work was no new thing to him ; his early designs for decoration, glass, church plate, and so on were influenced by it to some degree, and he was enthusiastic also about the Romanesque architecture of Burgundy and Provence, of the Rhine and of North Italy. The opportunity to develop its possibihties had heretofore been wanting ; and at first it was not entirely welcome when it came. "Personally," said he later, "I should have preferred a Gothic church ; yet, on consideration, I am inclined to think that the Cardinal was right."
He was, however, entirely in disagreement with the Cardinal and those of his advisers who wished for a basilica church of the Italian type, and brought his most powerful arguments to bear against the adoption of a style for which he could feel neither interest nor admiration. The Cardinal finally abandoned the idea, and accepted Bentley's advice for the choice of the Christian Byzantine style.
The decision evoked some regret from Bentley's friends, and a considerable amount of criticism from the many to whom Gothic stood essentially for our national heritage of architectural style and who were still imbued with the enthusiasms of its " Revival." So fiercely raged this new Battle of the Styles that the Cardinal thought it prudent, before appealing for funds, to set forth clearly the motives that had governed his choice. Briefly stated, his reasons were threefold :
1. A church of this type, with its exceptionally wide nave and view of the sanctuary therefrom, unimpeded by columns or screen, was without question that best suited to the congregational needs of a metropolitan cathedral, where, day by day, the Hours of the Church's Office were to be solemnly sung, and her great liturgies enacted, in the sight as well as the hearing of the people.
2. The second weighty reason dealt with the question in its financial aspect. The Christian Byzantine style, argued the Cardinal, lends itself to an economical and most advantageous
26 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
mode of procedure. We can cover the whole space, we can erect the whole building, apart from the decoration and orna- ment which in other styles would form a substantial and costly part of the structure. In this way the essentials of space and of proportion are obtainable at once for a moderate sum. From this argument sprang the third.
3. That it would be impossible to set up a new Gothic cathedral in worthy competition with the ancient Abbey church close by without an immediate expenditure far in excess of the sum it would be prudent to expect from the purses of the Catholic body, generous and willing though it might be. It was agreed that it would be wiser to avoid the possibility of a comparison detri- mental to the cathedral that was to be.
Referring later to this decision, Bentley again expressed his entire agreement with the motives and choice of the Cardinal, who thought, " That to build the principal Catholic church in England in a style which was absolutely primitive Christian, which was not confined to Italy, England, or any other nation, but was, up to the ninth century, spread over many countries, would be the wisest thing to do." Certainly, as London had long been to the world of commerce what Constantinople once was, and in the world of Empire held the place that Rome once filled, it would seem fitting that the cathedral of the world-metropolis should be of a type rather international than limited by any national and perhaps insular characteristics of style.
Bentley, as we have said, had decided to study his subject at first hand in Italy and Constantinople before setting to work on the cathedral plans. During the summer months he laboured strenuously to set his professional house in order, in prepara- tion for an absence of several months. Some time had to be given to the study of Italian, a tongue quite unknown to him, except in so far as Latin might help ; doubtless the knowledge was often needed when travelling, as he did, rather off the tracks of the ordinary tourist.
At length, all was ready, and armed with his " Open, Sesame "
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 27
— an open circular letter in Italian, couched in terms highly flattering to its bearer, from the Cardinal-Archbishop of West- minster to the prelates and clergy of Italy, and others in charge of her architectural treasures — he left London on the night of November 22nd, 1894, travelling by way of the St. Gothard to Milan, the first town in his itinerary. Here the circular letter speedily proved its potency, and he was conducted over the Duomo, inside and out, by the architect in charge of the fabric, with a minvxte and untiring courtesy, ttie while Bentley's tongue had much ado to refrain from the pungent criticisms roused by the profusely ornate, Germanic Gothic, on which his guide expatiated in whole-souled enthusiasm for its multitudinous turrets, pinnacles, and statues.
In the brick-built church of Sant' Ambrogio, founded in the fourth century, and as it now stands a Romanesque basilica of the twelfth, Bentley found material more to his taste. The curious galleries over its fa9ade ; the baldacchino, supported by four ancient porphyry columns ; the atrium, in such fine con- dition ; and the lofty brick campanile of ninth-century construc- tion, alike interested him in a special way, as parts of the first building of its type he had yet beheld. He passed on to Pavia on December 7th, and was immensely struck with its Certosa — " the most sumptuous church I have yet beheld " — the Carthusian monastery founded by Gian Galeazzo Visconti in 1396, when the first stone of the Gothic nave was laid. The rest of the church and the cloisters were finished in Renaissance style by various artists in a period extending over nearly three centuries.
Pisa was his next resting-place ; in its cathedral of basilican type he found Byzantine influences ; a Latin cross in plan, it has a single cupola at the intersection of the nave and transepts. The arcade of the gallery continues unbrokenly across the tran- septs, and it has been thought that the architect, impressed by the feature, utilized the idea in the new cathedral. Indeed, the Rev. Herbert Lucas, S.J., gives expression to this opinion : " By continuing the arcade of the gallery across the transept . . . some-
28 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
what after the manner of the cathedral at Pisa, Mr. Bentley had reproduced in a Byzantine building one of the most striking and characteristic features of the older Roman timber-roofed basilicas. This is the convergence, in perspective, of horizontal lines, unbroken by any transept gap, which carry the eye forward to its proper resting-place, the altar and the baldacchino." ' As a matter of fact Bentley never liked the break in the continuity of line caused by open transepts, and for years had in mind the advantage of carrying the nave arcading straight on across the transepts ; this he had previously done, with excellent results, in his Gothic church of the Holy Rood at Watford in 1889, and at Corpus Christi, Brixton, earlier.
The principle on which the architect's journey was planned was to visit and study first the best Romanesque churches of North and Central Italy, before concentrating on those built under Eastern influence in the Adriatic provinces ; unfortunately he kept no diary of his travels, and made but few references in correspondence to the places visited. It may be supposed, therefore, in the absence of direct evidence, that he next rested at Lucca with its Romanesque churches of San Michele and San Martino, and Pistoia with its cathedral of similar type, before proceeding to Florence. Writing from thence on Decem- ber 15th (his last day in that city) to an old friend, Mr. Thomas C. Lewis, the organ-builder (for whom in forty years he had designed as many organ cases), he touched, in his wonted fashion, on the subject of most likely interest to his correspondent.
" One comes across singular things. In regard to organs, nearly in all instances when the instrument is not in use, a drop- blind covers the pipes, painted sometimes with a scriptural inci- dent, or more frequently with a representation of the pipes behind. What struck me particularly was that, with scarcely an exception, the organ is not boxed up as with us, but placed grandly out in the open. Some of the cases are exceedingly fine, but as a rule the instruments are sorry, very sorry produc-
" Article on the cathedral in The Xaverian, May 1910.
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 29
tions. In the great cathedral here, with nave arehes of 65 ft. span, I cannot discover the vestige of an organ, although I have heard office sung and made a searching examination of the place. Such, too, was it at the Certosa of Pavia, the most sumptuous church I have yet beheld, but with all its stupendous magnificence there was no organ."
Probably having been familiar with the Duomo at Florence in books and plans, he expected little or no pleasure from a closer acquaintance, and experienced no disappointment when he stigmatized it as " architecturally, the worst large building I have ever seen." The Campanile and the Baptistery and the many splendid churches and palaces stayed his steps, however and a visit to beautiful Fiesole followed, so it was not till the middle of December that he arrived in Rome, having previously engaged a room at the Grand Hotel. " But," as he afterwards humorously told the story, " I was nothing but a number in that huge caravanserai, and that means of identification being 666, the ' Number of the Beast,' was altogether more than I could stand ! " He moved very speedily into less magnificent quarters in the comfortable little hotel in the Via Bocca di Leone, then so well known to, and much frequented by, English travellers of the more intellectually interesting type — the Albergo d'Inghilterra.
Among other English visitors that Christmas was the late George Augustus Sala, of whom Bentley used to tell an amusing story, illustrative of the rigidity of etiquette at the Vatican. The same day was appointed for Sala and Bentley to attend the Pope's early Mass. Sala had with him only a dinner-jacket and happened to mention the fact to Bentley and others, who assured him that a proper dress-coat was essential, and that the other would not pass. However, Sala maintained that it would, and started forth for the Vatican thus arrayed. When Bentley began to ascend the Scala Regia, he beheld his unfortunate compatriot in violent gesticulation and protest with the guards on duty, who firmly refused to let him pass or to listen to any explanations.
30 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
In his despair and disappointment he appealed to Bentley, who advised that Sala, leaving his wife in his care, should make an immediate return to the hotel and borrow the dress-coat of the proprietor (which he trusted would probably fit his not slender proportions) and as hastily return to the Vatican. This Sala did, and as mine host of the Inghilterra was kindly disposed, the incident terminated happily. But this is a digression in the itinerary, and we must return to Bentley's first day in Rome.
How he entered Rome in the spirit of the pilgrims of old (though that spirit in no way veiled his critical artistic perception), was told in a letter to Mr. Charles Hadfield, dated December 22nd : " The morning after my arrival I made straight for St. Peter's — that is, as straight as the meandering ways would allow — not looking into any of the many churches I passed on the road, that my first act might be one of veneration to him who is the centre and keystone of Christian unity. I venerate the place more than I can say, and my only regret is that the human part of it is not more worthy of so august a purpose. Architecturally, I think it the worst large building I have seen, excepting, perhaps, the Duomo at Florence, and I cannot conceive that any architect can ' sing its praises.' Of course the effect is fine, very fine, but produced at the sacrifice of scale."
The six weeks Bentley spent in the Eternal City were filled with pleasant and profitable incidents by the numerous friends and acquaintances who hastened to show him attention and kindness. Writing New Year's greetings to an old friend, Mr. John Montefiore of Streatham (their warm friendship had ripened from acquaintance made at the Exhibition of 1862), he speaks of the splendid welcome received. " My wanderings until I reached Rome were somewhat lonely. Directly my arrival was announced callers came and invitations followed, so that I have had many pleasant interruptions during my short stay here. The Rector of the Scotch College, Monsignor Campbell, actually spent a whole day with me in the Catacombs of St. Callistus and St. Lucina, describing their history and explaining the many objects of
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 31
interest which they contain, and as he, now de Rossi is dead, knows more on the subject than any other Hving man, the treat was a rare one. But this is only a type of the many kindnesses either conferred or promised."
Monsignor Stonor, Archbishop of Trebizond, the true friend of all his compatriots visiting Rome ; Monsignor Stanley, who later became Bishop of Emmaus, and Bishop Assistant to Cardinal Vaughan in the last months of his life, and who, referring to this visit, says : " The time I spent with him in Rome was very delightful ; how tolerant he was of my occasional presumptuous difference of opinion with him ! " ; and Father Douglas, the Father- General of the Redemptorists, figured prominently among the many to whom the architect afterwards acknowledged his gratitude for many courtesies received.
Christmas Day, spent in Rome, was for him a day of mingled joy and sadness. In the morning he was at St. Peter's, and passed the afternoon at the church high on the Capitoline Hill, the Church of Ara Coeli, being much touched and charmed by the child preachers, who, as of ancient custom, were delivering their little sermons on the Nativity to their companions of like age. The sadness of the home-lover found expression in a letter to England : " I missed being at home : indeed it was a broken link in the chain of happy memories. At dinner there was a toast to all friends and those dear to us which almost brought tears to my eyes."
By his friends' good offices he obtained a greatly desired private audience with Pope Leo XIII. He was present first at the early Mass said by the Pontiff, who received him at its con- clusion with characteristic and paternal charm, and holding the architect's hands closely within his own long frail fingers, ques- tioned and talked to him in French for about ten minutes, finally blessing in a special manner the great cathedral which was ta take shape in his brain. Later, Bentley attended the impressive annual Requiem for Pope Pius IX in the Sistine Chapel, a seat next to the Cardinals' being allotted to him.
32 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
In such pleasant ways, intermingled with much serious study of Pagan and early Christian art, the month of January passed. He remarks in a brief note to Mr. C. Hadfield : " The number of callers during my stay in Rome were many, indeed too many ; all the colleges were open to me, and I had only to express a wish to see the things closed to the public and at once I received an order."
Thus were summed up the disappointing results of this thorough exploration of the city :
" My impression of Rome is that it is almost a modern city like Turin, dating from about the middle of the sixteenth century, with a great number of dreadful churches, mostly filled with accessories and decorations without the least Christian significance. Certainly I saw little, excepting, of course, the earlier work of which there are only a few examples left, that made any impres- sion on me. Italian detail is the most thoughtless, brainless stuff I have ever seen. . . . Indeed the worst building I have ever seen is St. Paul's Outside-the-Walls.^ . . . Happily the little left of the Early Christian work and the ruins of Imperial Rome more than occupied my attention and thought."
Bentley's stay of six weeks in Rome had been prolonged beyond his intention by Cardinal Vaughan's desire that he should await his arrival. At the end of January he spent a week in Naples, of course visiting Pompeii and climbing Vesuvius. In the comfortable light of retrospect, he could afterwards relate with humour the discomforts of that expedition. Having en- gaged a guide and arranged with him to procure a horse, two American tourists, who also wished to make the ascent, asked permission to join him and share the guide's services. Their company was considerably against Bentley's inclination, but politeness forbade a refusal, and the guide was instructed to produce three horses. He was within the trattoria at the base of the mountain paying for the meal of spaghetti his guide had just consumed, when the horses were brought round^three as
' He had ovideiitly boon forced to relegate the Daorao at Florence to the second worst place in this crescendo of bad construction and false taste !
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 33
sorry nags as ever laboured in the shafts of an Italian cab. When Bentley emerged, he discovered that the Americans had made hasty annexation of the two least unhappy-looking mounts, but being a Doncaster man, and therefore presumably not without some useful knowledge of horse-flesh (though he had not ridden for many years), he without comment apparently resigned himself to the third animal.
As they started up the mountain the guide drew close to his side to murmur that his companions were not as clever as they thovight, and would soon find it out ! And so it happened ; for soon he had the slightly malicious satisfaction of passing them and rapidly left them labouring heavily along, and finally quite out of sight. It was bitterly cold and snowy and a most difficult ascent to the crater, for the railway was, naturally, not working at that season. The roughness of the going, com- bined with his mount's peculiar and uncomfortable action, made all movement a weariness of the flesh for many subsequent days. How the tourists fared was never learned, for he did not see them again.
Bentley returned to Rome in the first week of February, to take leave of friends and continue his journey in a north-easterly direction. To the country hallowed by his second patron, St. Francis of Assisi, were his steps first bent. No letters remain to record his impressions at this shrine of faith and art ; though his moving enthusiasm in speaking of its glories is well remem- bered. Thence on to Perugia, the city in the hills of Umbria, in the bitterest winter weather within the memory of its oldest inhabitant, the snow being piled six feet on each side of the streets. Although the traveller suffered severely from the cold, in unwarmed churches and comfortless hotels, he pursued the journey and continued to study with unabated ardour. Here there was much to interest him, from the fourteenth and fifteenth century Gothic cathedral of San Lorenzo to the sixth-century circular church of S. Angelo, containing sixteen antique columns in its interior. 1-3
34 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
From Perugia he pushed on to the Ravenna district, " a flat, low, marshy plain, then covered with snow from two to four feet deep, but a most interesting part of the country." The ancient and splendid churches of the Adriatic seaboard, prototypes of the cathedral that was to rise in a northern city in that they alike emanated from the first phase of distinctly Christian architecture, were now to delight Bentley's aesthetic sense, weary of the mere- tricious tinsel from which it had so frequently hitherto suffered.
In the sixth-century church of S. Vitale, completed by Jus- tinian, regularly octagonal in plan, with a small apsidal choir extended on the eastern side ; and in that of S. Apollinare-in-Classe of similar date and history, he began to study the problem of adapting the Byzantine idea to modern congregational require- ments. The latter stands in the lonely marshes outside Ravenna, and has nave and aisles carried out by the Byzantine artists on Roman models. This atmosphere of the long-past ages of the great period of Ravenna's constructive activity into which he seemed to be transported was expressed by the man who drove him out to S. Apollinare-in-Classe — supremely reverent for the churches and tombs of these far-away centuries, his scorn for later productions was withering. The architect, as they drove along, was carrying on a conversation as well as his rather halting Italian would permit ; and pointing out a church near the road he inquired its name. " Ah, signor," came the reply, " that would not interest you ; it is not worth your while ; it is quite modern." A further question elicited that it dated from the eleventh century !
Returning to Ravenna on this occasion Bentley had an un- pleasant experience. Midway the horses stopped and refused to proceed ; and he had almost resigned himself to the idea of walking three or four miles through two feet and more of snow, by the time that they were at length induced to move.
He reached Bologna by February 18th, where the brick church pf S. Stefano and the unfinished Municipal Palace of the sixteenth century appear to have interested him most. Ferrara was
^^
Plate V. — Window of West Tribune and Balcony ovkk .Majn Entrance
[Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
34]
^^ -■^^■'^-^
PLATE; VI. — South Half of West Window of Nave, with Tkibune V^aultino.
{Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
[S5
THE CHOOSING OF THE ARCHITECT 35
visited en route to Venice, to see its important twelfth-century cathedral ; and he arrived in the city of the Doges, at length, utterly exhausted with cold and travelling. Writing home on March 4th he said : " I cannot tell you how thankful I am that I have passed through my recent journey ings without the least ill results, though on my first arrival here a little more than a week ago, I don't think I ever felt so tired in my life." In another letter he spoke of being in a semi-frozen state, and implied that a serious chill had probably been averted by the hot bath and fourteen hours of uninterrupted sleep taken on reaching Venice.
A minute study of the basilica of St. Mark's was begun as soon as the necessary repose had refreshed him in mind and body. Professor Lethaby and Mr. H. Swainson's book on Jus- tinian's great church of Sancta Sophia, then just published, was his companion at this time, in preparation for the projected visit to Constantinople, when his studies in St. Mark's should be com- pleted. News came that cholera was very seriously epidemic there at the moment and he was at length prevailed on by the urgent representations of friends in Venice to realize that the risk was too great and to abandon the idea. It was a disappointment, but when condoled with, on his return, at not being able to finish the itinerary, he remarked : " San Vitale at Ravenna and Lethaby's book really told me all I wanted."
The intimate knowledge of St. Mark's then acquired was increased later, but only about a year before his death, by the purchase of Ongania's detailed and monumental work.' Torcello, with its Early Christian foundations of a bishop's throne in the cathedral apse, and some early mosaics ; and Padua, now bust- lingly commercial, the city of the ancient famous university, with its seven-cupolaed basilica of the thirteenth century dedi- cated to St. Anthony, were both visited from Venice, which he finally quitted, turning his face homewards, on March 7th. Verona marked the first stage, to examine San Zenone, an impor- tant and interesting example of Lombardic construction of the
' St. Mark's, Venice. Venice, 1881, etc.
36 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
twelfth century, with severely simple facade and detached square campanile, finished with a pyramidal roof.
At Turin, reached the following day, his stay was of the briefest, since this modern commercial city had little of interest to offer him. The journey to Paris was broken at Dijon, probably as much to see the church of Notre Dame, typical of good Bur- gundian Gothic of the thirteenth and early fourteenth century, as the Romanesque crypt beneath the thirteenth-century cathedral of St. Benigne. A few days were spent in Paris, to renew the recollections of twenty years before, and on March 19th he arrived in London, safe and sound and none the worse for his many journeyings.
Immediately plans and sketches of the cathedral as it was already matured in his brain were prepared and submitted to the Cardinal — and preparations went forward apace for the laying of the first stone. The Feast day of the Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul being chosen for the event, two committees were formed to carry out the necessarily heavy preparations, one composed chiefly of churchmen to take charge of the liturgical portion, another chiefly of laymen to arrange for the seating accommoda- tion, the issuing of tickets, and the luncheon which was to follow the ceremony. On the architect lay the onus of preparing the site and all working details of the stone-laying. He wrote to a friend on June 8th : " The first stone-laying is to be made much of, and it is generally thought that it will be the greatest Catholic event of the century. The tickets are, I believe, out, but although I am on the committee of the mundane portion of the function I have not yet seen one. For reserved seats, 105. Qd., and for the luncheon, 10s. 6d., are the prices fixed."
Stands were erected north and south on the site to seat about 2,500 persons ; while a large portion of the western end was open as standing-room to persons paying a shilling for admission. With the large numbers who occupied adjacent balconies and roofs it was estimated that over 10,000 persons must have witnessed the ceremony, the account of which has already been related in the opening chapter of this book.
CHAPTER IV
THE PLAN
Bentley returned from Italy steeped in Byzantine art, with- out any sketches or written notes : it was never his habit to make either ; nevertheless he brought back, clear and definite in his mind's eye, a vivid presentment of the cathedral he meant to build. All through life he had taken pains to cultivate, to a remarkable degree, this gift of interior vision, never setting pencil to paper till his subject had arrived at complete mental develop- ment. "Everything," he would say, " the reality as though before me solidly — light and shade, colour, all is there — and not until I see this in its entirety do I ever begin to draw."
Very swiftly these formulated ideas were poured out on paper, and about six weeks after his return to London the Tablet of May 4th, 1895, announced that " as a tentative and suggestive project, Mr. Bentley has sent in two admirable ground plans, recalling to some extent features to be found in the great churches of Sant' Ambrogio, San Vitale, and San Marco." Apart from the exigencies of the site, of which we will speak later, six essential and primary requirements were the factors dominating and shaping the plan in its main lines. These determinants, both liturgical and congregational, were : (1) A sanctuary and choir sufficiently spacious for the ceremonial needs of a metropolitan see ; (2) a nave of generous breadth with an uninterrupted view of the sanctuary to render it ideal for the reception of great multitudes on ceremonial occasions, for which obviously the metropolitan cathedral must be specially adapted ; (3) aisles appropriate for processional purposes, and to give access to the side chapels with particular dedications ; (4) some adequate
37
4 «1 r
38
38 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
place reserved for the use of the monks who, according to the first arrangements for the service of the cathedral, were to sing there daily the Hours of the Church's Office ; (5) a crypt for the inter- ment of the Archbishops of Westminster ; (6) a campanile or bell-tower. In addition, of course, it would be required to make
lavish provision in the matter of sacristies and ofiices for the perfect service of a great church.
It will, we think, be interesting to recall the architect's original ideas by comparing these two plans with each other and with that ultimately adopted. No. 1, though undated, is doubtless that first produced ; it provides for two campanili in the western elevation, while at the south- western corner a domed baptistery projects in a semi-circular curve be- yond the line of the facade. The main entrance has two doorways opening into a spacious triple porch ; the central and largest portion, for the use of the Archbishop and clergy on ceremonial occasions, giving ac- cess to the narthex by two more entrances opposite ; while to right and left are doors leading to the smaller porches for the laity, which also give on to the narthex. This narthex, opening into the nave, runs the entire width of the building from north to south. The two first bays of the nave differ in no way from the final plan ; but in the third bay and transepts the divergence is very marked. In the first place there is no continuity of the nave arcading at the crossing, the tran- septs, with this third bay, showing an unbroken floor space from
Fig. 1.— First tentative Plan fob Westminsteb Cathedeai.
THE PLAN 39
north to south ; secondly, the transepts terminate laterally in apsidal form. We note also that the pulpit is built here against the north-east pier of the crossing. The small staircases to the roof levels outside in this plan appear at the west side of the transepts instead of at the east, as they actually are in the present arrangement.
Proceeding to compare the arrangement at the east end, we find that the high altar stands, not under the fourth dome, but, as at St. Mark's, Venice, in the apse beyond : a tri-apsal termination, with its column-borne exedrse, reminiscent of that of Sancta Sophia. Beyond the apse, following its form and continuing round the large chapels to right and left of the choir, runs an ambulatory connected with the transepts by openings in their eastern walls. This passage serves also to connect the sacristies with the church. The large chapels referred to above are not divided from the choir by aisles as in the adopted plan, but communicate directly with it through arched openings between the supports of the sanctuary tribunes. The high altar, which is double, as in the Church of St. Francis at Assisi, stands beneath a square baldacchino, while within the curves of the exedrse are shown the credence table or prothesis, on the north side of the bema, or sanctuary, and the diakonikon (table for vestments) on the south side.
There are three sacristies in this first scheme ; that for priests, with an altar, being at the south-east angle of the church and in connection with it through the ambulatory, whence a short flight of steps leads to the sanctuary level. Two more sacristies (one for working purposes) and a number of offices are arranged at the north-east angle, and have a lobby and street entrance.
It will of course be at once observed that the idea of the crypt, beneath a raised retro-choir, has not been entertained in this plan. The decision to appropriate the eastern termination to the choir, and to bring forward the sanctuary, coupled with the archi- tect's dissatisfaction with the complicated external arrangement at the east end and his dislike of the open transeptal arrangement.
40 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
led to the preparation of the second suggestion (dated June 1895, though presumably its rough draft was submitted to the Cardinal in May). This approaches more closely to the cathedral as we know it. One campanile has been dispensed Math, though that remaining still forms part of the fayade, in proximity to the western entrance. To quote Cardinal Vaughan with regard to
this drastic change, and indeed, to the general attitude he believed he had always maintained towards the archi- tect : " Having," he said, " laid down certain conditions as to size, space, chapels, and style, I left the rest to him. He offered me the choice between a vaulted roof and one of saucer-shaped domes : I chose the latter. He wished to build two cam- paniles ; I said one would be enough for me. For the rest he had a free hand." The square campanile in this case covers a rather larger area and together with the contiguous wall of the nortli-wcst entrance to the narthex, projects some distance beyond the line of the main entrance ; while at the other end of the facade the baptistery is somewhat recessed, having exteriorly lost its apsidal termina- tion. The position of the second campanile is now occupied by a
Fig. 2. — Second tentative Plan foe Westminster Cathedeal.
THE PLAN 41
turret, with a spiral staircase, and the arrangement of the porches is more open. The narthex no longer occupies the full width of the church, but ends on one side at the baptistery and on the other at the north-west entrance lobby ; it has also acquired the form of domed cubicles at the points of junction with the aisles. Pro- ceeding into the nave, we find the four chapels on the north side as before, whereas, on the south, the two westernmost have been amalgamated to form one large chapel. It was intended to make this the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, with an entrance — at the end adjacent to the baptistery — from the cloisters which, parallel with this side of the church, were to connect it with Archbishop's House, designed to occupy this position at its right-hand or south side. A second cloister entrance will be noted in the corresponding transept.
The main piers of the nave have varied their form, having semi-circular niches on their aisle sides, while the corresponding chapel piers are similarly recessed. The transepts have lost their apsidal ends, and that on the north is provided with an imposing entrance and lobby ; while, most important change of all, the nave arcading is carried in an unbroken line across the transepts, the open gallery being continued in the fashion of a bridge sup- ported on each side by coupled columns. This unbroken repetition of parts produces the vista and the impression of length and height that, as we have already pointed out, Bentley so greatly admired. The great chapels at the east end are now divided from the sanctuary by aisles, leading to the stairways, which give access to the gal- leries and higher levels, and to the crypt below. The high altar with its square baldacchino has been advanced to its present place under the sanctuary dome, while the apse, having lost the triple curve, exedrse and ambulatory, now becomes the place of the raised retro-choir, approached by a single flight of steps behind the high altar. Beneath this choir the apse contains a crypt, with places for the tombs of the two archbishops in the same relative position as that occupied by the high altar above. The chapel south of the sanctuary (here dedicated to St. Peter) has also an
42 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
aisle or processional way leading to the sacristies ; the priests' sacristy and the outer sacristy are on the ground floor, while an exit from the latter leads to the staircase, to the working sacristies, and offices on the crypt level. The chapel north of the sanctuary has a corresponding narrow external aisle, which, however, ter- minates apsidally and is intended for a shrine.
Having thus briefly reviewed the variations and developments in the first sketch plans, we will now proceed to describe that of the cathedral as it stands ; and as far as may be it shall be done in the architect's own words. In January 1896 was published the first number of The Westminster Cathedral Record, a magazine which aimed at fulfilling a threefold function. The idea of the Cardinal was to furnish thereby a means of making the new cathedral and its ideal more widely known, a bulletin of its progress, and a chronicle of its history. It was designed to appear quarterly, and in its pages the architect from time to time disclosed the develop- ment of his plan and published a minute record of work achieved. To the historian of the cathedral this magazine has been invaluable, and indeed without it the writing of its early story would have been wellnigh impossible. Unfortunately the death of Cardinal Vaughan in 1903 ended its brief career : the eleventh and last number with his final and touching appeal for financial help had come from the press in June 1902.
The cathedral had no journal for the next four and a half years, till in January 1907 The Westminster Cathedral Chronicle, under the editorship of the Administrator, Monsignor Canon Howlett, took up the tale and carries on the traditions of its pre- decessor. The Record was well illustrated with plans and sections and photographs of the works ; and in the first issue appears the second tentative plan we have just described, with the difference that it shows four chapels laterally to both nave aisles. Curiously, the descriptive article from the architect's pen describes essentially the third and final plan, which by then had been adopted. The accompanying plans of the churches to which he refers served to illustrate his remarks.
THE PLAN 43
" Of the genesis and growth of church architecture httle is known till the close of the reign of Diocletian ; but that it had its origin in Syria and Asia Minor, and that it gradually extended and developed is certain, till it culminated at Constantinople during the reign of Justinian. AVhen Christianity was proclaimed the religion of the State and the seat of Empire removed to Byzan- tium, locally this development received a check. No sooner had Constantine taken possession of his new capital, than he began to erect the church afterwards dedicated to the apostles, on the model of the churches he had already built in Rome, following closely the style and plan of the pagan basilica. In the subsequent reign the first Church of St. Sophia was raised under the same influence, emphatically indicating that the newcomers had brought with them ideas strange and foreign to the Hellenic mind. But this inter- ruption was of short duration ; the traditions of the age and place speedily reasserted themselves, and remained dominant for ages long following the erection by Justinian of that marvellous creation so fittingly dedicated to the Eternal Wisdom ; that wondrous ex- pression in material form of the apocalyptic vision of the Heavenly Temple — the second Church of St. Sophia at Constantinople.
" The characteristic features of this, the Byzantine style, are simple roofs, flat domes rising from square spaces and carried on massive piers, unbroken arched soffits, and barrel vaults ; the interiors were often clad with marble of rich patterns and many colours, and mosaics depicting stories from the life of our Lord and His Saints covered the ceiling and walls. The lighting gener- ally is from windows placed high up in the building, and not in- frequently in the domes. Lattices, from accounts given by ancient writers, filled the larger openings, though unfortunately few examples now exist. Unlike the basilica churches, columns take quite a subordinate position and are seldom employed construction- ally. Galleries are a constant feature, and were set apart for the use of women, like the curtained-off aisles in the early Roman churches. What gives the building of this period a pre-eminence and a greater interest over any other, is that it was the first phase
44 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Fig. 3. — SS. Sergius and Bac. CHTJS, Constantinople.
of Christian art ; that it expressed in full the hallowed genius of Christianity, and was the outcome of a sensitive, aesthetic people, inspired by the Seer of Patmos."
It has already been observed that in the early 'sixties Bentley was in- fluenced by and was an enthusiastic student of Byzantine art and its direct outcome, the Romanesque architecture of Burgundy, Provence, the Rhine, and Northern Italy, Obedient to the Car- dinal's wish for a church in this style, he had gone to southern Europe to steep in and saturate himself anew with the Byzantine spirit and, despite the long years of faithful alle- giance to the Gothic ideal, he now found himself aglow at the opportunity of developing and carrying on the Jus- tinian tradition. It was, as a kindly critic of his work once said, " as though an English writer should produce at the close of his life a masterpiece of French literature."
Describing the plan of his cathedral, he continues : " It may be stated that the arrangement is not that of an Eastern church of the Justinian period, but rather an example of what might have been un- folded had not the deca- j-io. 4.— San vitale, ravenna.
THE PLAN
45
dence of the Roman Empire terminated the growth of congrega- tional requirements in the East. From a glance at the plan of SS. Sergius and Bacchus, Constantinople (page 44), or of S. Vitale, Ravenna (page 44), both of about the same age, it is evident that they were arranged from a liturgical rather than a congregational standard, while the church of St. Mark, Venice, erected nearly four centuri e s later, in- dicates a marked ad- vance in the latter direc- tion, showing clearly the course the development was taking.
"On ap- proaching the precincts o f the cathedral from Victoria Street at the angle of the site will be
seen the campanile rising to an altitude of some 300 ft." and [facing^ the visitor] the western entrance ^ included in a composition ex-
' It is actually 273 ft. high and 284 ft. to the top of the cross.
- For explanatory purposes the church is assvuned throughout this book to be duly" oriented, though in reaUty the longitudinal axis is south-south-east. See page 57.
Fio. 5. — St. Mark's, Venice.
46 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
tending 65 ft. and embracing in the great arch of the central portion three entrance doors, the outer ones for the laity and the middle door for the Archbishop and clergy on solemn occasions. These entrances open into porches leading to lobbies that, in turn, give access to the narthex. This narthex runs the entire width of the church, terminating at one end with an entrance from the side street and with the baptistery at the other, and in front opening into the nave. From Ambrosden Avenue the side entrance gives into a large porch, flanked on the left by the campanile with a caretaker's lodge and on the right by coupled columns supporting deeply recessed arches. The domed cubicles formed by the junction of the aisles and narthex are centres from which the baptistery, the aisles, and the staircases leading to the galleries are approached.
" The nave, 60 ft. wide and 232 ft. long from the inside of the great door to the sanctuary step, is divided into three bays of 67 ft. each, covered with saucer-shaped domes rising out of pendentives that spring imperceptibly from the sustaining arches resting on enormous piers. Each bay will be sub-divided by another (and lesser) pier and again by columns, forming an arcaded aisle with a gallery over." [The height of these main arches is 90 ft., their span 60 ft. ; laterally in each bay are coupled secondary arches, 72 ft. 6 in. in height to the crown of the soffit and 25 ft. in span, embraced within the great archivolt. Thus each bay contains in its lateral face seven arches ; four forming the arcade on which the gallery rests, each with a span of about 12 ft. ; two secondary arches of 25 ft. span ; and finally the great archivolt "embracing all and unifying the whole system." ' The height of the three domes of the nave is 112 ft.]
" Laterally to the aisles (which are comparatively narrow, being only 15 ft. wide and planned exclusively for processional purposes) are four chapels on the south and three on the north side. Between the first chapel and the porch on the north, rises the campanile, 30 ft. square at the base ; of which the ground
' Rev. Herbert Lucas, S.J., TAe Xaverian, May 1910.
THE PLAN
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48 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
floor is assigned to the registry (with an entrance from the aisle) where parochial business may be conducted. Beyond the cam- panile are three chapels, two of them being each equal in length to half a bay of the nave, and the third, next the transept, somewhat longer. They are covered with barrel vaults and lighted by coupled windows — in the first and second chapel, of two lights each ; in the third chapel, of three lights. The chapels are separated from the aisle and the aisle from the nave by marble columns supporting a groined arcade, which extends from the narthex inclusively to the transept. The pavement of the chapels is raised 12 in. above the general level. A dwarf marble wall in the archway next the altar, and two steps in the opening, separates the chapels from the aisle.
" On the south side the arrangement is the same, except that an additional chapel, opening into the baptistery by a triple arcade, occupies the space given on the north side to the campanile. In each of the lateral chapels and elsewhere places are allotted for confessionals. The total internal Avidth across nave, aisle, and side chapels is 148 ft.
" From the last bay of the nave project transepts measuring 152 ft. across. In the western half of the one facing Ambrosden Avenue, an entrance is provided and access obtained to the interior through a porch and lobby. In the other half continuing the line of the porch, a chapel of small dimensions is introduced to enhance the scale of this portion of the structure. Crosswise, the north transept is divided by a wall pierced with two arches resting on a column of the same dimensions and character as the columns of the aisles. Continuing the line of the nave along the transept, columns are set in pairs to carry the arcade under a gangway, which connects the gallery in the nave with that in the sanctuary. The pier at the east angle of the transept encloses a staircase ascending to an external clerestory and to the roof. On the south side the transept is similarly treated, except that recesses for confessionals and a shrine are substituted
48]
Plate VII. — Roof of Baptisteky, looking West. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
I'LATK \'J1J.- XoUTH-WksT I'uKCll.
(Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
[49
THE PLAN 49
for the chapel and porch ; and an extra arch is added to the cross-divisional wall.'
" The communion step marks the separation between the nave and the sanctuary, A passage-way of ample width is formed between the communion rail and the low wall enclosing the sanctuary, which wall is recessed in the middle to take the ends of the first steps [there are six here], leading to the higher level. On the right and left are the canons' stalls, raised on a marble plinth of the same height as the [three] steps which ascend from the lower part of the sanctuary, called the Pres- byterium, to the Sanctuarium proper. On this plane stands the baldacchino, flanked by four columns on each side, resting on pedestals, taking a semi-circular form, and giving greater dignity to the high altar. The altar is raised five steps (including the predella) above the level of the Sanctuarium and is enclosed by a dossal extending from the centre to the second column on each side."
" On the left is the Archbishop's throne, on its own dais ; on the right are the seats for the officiating clergy and the credence table. Behind the baldacchino, under a marble parapet, five arches extend between the pier responds, four of which open into the crypt, the middle arch being a blank. From both sides a flight of steps rises and meets in a landing immediately at the back of the altar and a further flight leads to the monks' choir. The stalls of this choir are arranged in two rows, concentric with the apse, and detached from the wall by a passage, on a level with the floor of the higher seats, which opens on to a bridge communicating with the monastery. The height from the floor of the cathedral to the predella of the high altar is 7 ft, and from there to the floor of the choir 6 ft. The dimensions of the sanctuary bay are a length (from the high altar to the nave) of 62 ft,, by a width of 50 ft. The retro-choir extends the length 48 ft. more.
' Cardinal Vaughan did not care for this arrangement of the transepts. He thought it dreadful thus to divide them from the nave, and considered they would have been magnificent if left quite open.
' This dossal does not exist, since the architect's design was not CEtrried out in its integrity. See Chapter VII, p. 140.
1—4
50 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
O
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THE PLAN 51
The sanctuary dome measures 52 ft. in diameter and is pierced in its circumference by twelve round-headed window openings. The eastern end is roofed by a wide barrel vault, ending in a semi-dome over the apse.
" The staircases terminating the sanctuary aisles are ways to the lower sacristies, stores, vaults, and crypt ; and to the upper sacristies, choir, tribunes, and organ galleries. Access to the sanctuary for servers and others is obtained by the quadrant stairs in the last bay of the screen arcades.
" Between the sanctuary aisle and the aisle leading to the sacristies is the Blessed Sacrament Chapel ' of three bays and an apsidal termination broached with three alcoves — a feature common in the Byzantine plans. Dwarf walls of marble enclose the lower part of the arched openings, to prevent the chapel being used as a passage-way and to keep the aisles intact. Ad- joining the outer sacristy are lavatories and a strong-room for the safe-keeping of archives and church plate. ..." [The grand sacristy measures 60 ft. by 30 ft. and is entered from the outer sacristy, into the wall of which is built the safe just mentioned.]
" On the north side the Lady Chapel and aisles are disposed in like manner, except that the alcoves in the apse are omitted and the outer aisle terminates in a shrine."
Beneath the choir and extending over the same area a spacious crypt, dedicated to St. Peter, " forms an important feature and one seldom met with in modern churches. At the sides and round the apse runs an aisle one-fifth of its width (separated from its nave by six fine columns) and at its western end it is divided into five bays, four of which open into the sanctuary and the centre one forms an entrance to a mortuary chapel immediately under the baldacchino of the principal altar. In the nave of the crypt, between the two central columns, there will be an altar backed by a dossal extending to the second column on each side. Eight
• Converted afterwards into the Lady Chapel, when the obvious inconvenience, from the ceremonial point of view, of its position in relation to the prooessioneJ way from the sacristies, was recognized.
52 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
semi-circular headed windows in the outer wall of the aisle and the four arched openings .to the sanctuary in the end (western) wall light this part of the church. The ceilings are vaulted and hereafter will be covered with mosaics and the walls lined with marble.
" Adjoining the crypt, southwards are two lobbies, one form- ing a porch from the outside, and the other an entrance from the sanctuary aisle by the circular staircase to the lower or working sacristy. This sacristy will be divided longitudinally so as to reduce the span of the 60 x 30 ft. floor above, and provided with fittings that will enable the sacristan to carry on his work with the least amount of labour. It will be lighted by wide segmental-headed windows above ground in the side and end walls." The basement also contains store-rooms and heating chambers. " Westwards, towards the heating chamber, under the apse of the Lady Chapel is a room for storing and arranging candles and oil for the lamps. On the opposite side, beneath the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, a large, dry vaulted space is provided for keeping the many items of ecclesiastical furniture which only call for occasional use."
The cathedral is heated with a combination of hot air and steam, the former being discharged from gratings in the floor ; and the latter carried in pipes along the galleries, to counteract as far as possible any condensation occasioned by the cold sur- faces of the marble lining and the mosaics. The warm air is conveyed in ten brick flues, 4 ft. by 2 ft. 6 in. each, to the required points ; the steam is carried by wrought-iron pipes placed in channels covered by gratings. Under the baptistery and the Lady Chapel are two heating chambers, having coal cellars and shoots attached and access both from within and without. The heating extends to the crypt, sacristies, and tribunes.
At the four principal angles of the building, as we have seen, spacious staircases connect the ground floor with the whole range of galleries above and with the exits to the various roof levels. The tribune over the narthex is carried by the two first piers of
THE PLAN
53
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54 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the nave, much enlarged and strengthened for the purpose, which, with the two great supporting columns, form a triple arcading. This tribune, 40 ft. long by 15 ft. deep, is triply recessed in the western wall and is ceiled with a wide barrel vault. Above these recesses it is pierced by three windows similar to those in the side galleries, while the great arch forming the western support of the first dome contains the large semi-circular terracotta trellis, which is an important feature in the western elevation.
Capacious galleries, 27 ft. above the floor of the church, extend at the triforium level the length of the nave, guarded, as is the western tribune, with low balustrades of brick and wood, to be replaced ultimately with marble work. Continuity of communication is maintained across the transepts by the raised bridge or gangway to which reference has already been made and to which access is obtained from the galleries by a doorway in the thickness of the western pier of the transept. Similar doorways in the eastern piers lead to the tribunes of the sanctuary, which are designed to contain four portions of the organ, two on each side, and originally were intended also to accommodate the lay choir. They terminate eastwards in the spiral staircases which complete the circuit of the building.
Mounting yet higher, we reach the level of the passage over the clerestory, which receives light through small semi-circular open- ings in the external wall, and also from the body of the church, into which this passage opens at intervals by means of small balconies in pairs, protected by iron railings. There are twelve of these balconies, which, when the domes are clothed with their garment of mosaic, will afford a fine and close view of its rich details.
The problems of a satisfactory scheme of fenestration were solved by the insertion of the lateral secondary arches. The tympanum of each is filled by a great semi-circular light, nearly 25 ft. in diameter. These clerestory windows are composed of terracotta trellises, from the potteries of Messrs. Doulton & Co., glazed with faintly toned flint glass of great brilliancy and varying
THE PLAN
55
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56 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
thicknesses. Below each lunette are pairs of semi-circular headed windows, glazed with Venetian roundels enriched with borders in leaded patterns. Cardinal Vaughan objected very strongly to the slightly greenish tinted glass chosen by the architect, and pleaded for something warmer in effect. Bentley, with the future glow of colour from mosaic and marble in his mind, was obdurate, and for once had his own way. The transepts have each two pairs of lights at the triforium level and two rather smaller windows above. On the ground floor they have small square-headed two-light windows, four in the south and three in the north (of which one has three lights). The sanctuary is lighted north and south with a terracotta lunette, and below with two windows in each tribune. The apse has six round-headed windows. Of the lighting of the sanctuary dome, the west end, and the chapels we have already spoken.
The scheme of lighting has proved to be as undoubted a success as the acoustic effects of the building. " The westernmost dome," wrote the architect, "is in strong light which streams through a large lunette window immediately on a line with the pendentives. The dome of the next bay is deeper in mysterious shadows ; the third is still more so ; while the sanctuary dome is brilliantly lighted by the twelve windows round its drum, so that our attention is led up to and powerfully focussed upon the high altar, beneath its marble baldacchino, necessary to give it emphasis and dignity. . . . Beyond the sanctuary is the monks' choir with its apsidal termina- tion. Here the rather strong light admitted by six windows is necessary to enable the monks to sing their daily office. Perhaps the light may be found too strong ; if so it can readily be modified to suit their requirements and enhance the general effect."
The external dimensions of the cathedral are : extreme length, .360 ft. ; width, 156 ft. ; height of nave, 117 ft. ; height of fagade (not including the turrets), 99 ft. ; height of campanile, 273 ft., and to the top of the cross, 284 ft. It covers an area of about 54,000 square ft.
The campanile was moved from the west front to its present
THE PLAN
57
kueU^
position and the fagade carried back on two levels to satisfy light and air claimants. The other notable alterations in the third and final plan are the strengthening of the first piers of the nave to carry the tribune over the narthex ; these were rendered lighter in effect by being deeply recessed on their western sides : furthermore, the great piers of the nave and the corresponding chapel piers have lost the niches introduced in the second design.
And now, having described the plan in its main lines, it will be necessary to say something of the orientation of the building. Tiie site measures nearly 4 acres, its greatest length being 566 ft. and greatest width 360 ft., an area which unfortunately does not lie due east and west at its main axis. Now, besides the land allotted for the cathedral, space was needed for several other buildings in connection with its service ; beyond which, any super- fluous land, pro- vided it were of sufficient size and suitable shape, might be disposed of to help provide maintenance. Considerations of economy, therefore, de- cided the aban- donment of any idea of correct orientation ; so that, by placing the building
WEST BLEVATiairi.
Pg iOC^ jIL It
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Fio. 10.— West Elevation.
58 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
close to and parallel with the boundary lines of the site on its Ambrosden Avenue (or eastern and longest) side, the axis of the choir is actually turned to the south-south-east.
This wise arrangement^ — supported as it was by Roman pre- cedent, " where churches had to follow the lines of existing streets and ways, a condition equally filled in our densely crowded metro- polis " ' — provoked some discontent and adverse criticism. Even before the laying of the foundation stone, the Cardinal was refer- ring cavillers to the architect. Of one such he Avrote to Bentley :
" I told that I could not judge otherwise than I had, but that
if he considered his idea of great value he must communicate it to you, not to me. He said that you had designed a church with the wrong orientation in obedience to me — that left to yourself you would have— well, followed . . . [him] ! His plan is a monstrosity and should be kept as its own refutation." Indeed the fault- finding of the adherents of correct orientation continued long after it could be of any avail. Even after the architect's death a sug- gested method of orientation was resuscitated, one which would have left triangles of land wasted and unoccupied while covering much of the site at its western side, the valuable ground rents of which, according to Cardinal Vaughan's calculations, were to swell the income for cathedral maintenance. J^ortunately com- mon sense had triumphed against " such a quixotic taking leave of reason and sense," as a staunch defender of the adopted position phrased it, and there remains a handsome surplus of land along the whole length of the site, on its side parallel to Morpeth Mansions, to let on building lease ; while not a foot of that allocated to the Cathedral, Archbishop's House, Chapter Hall, Clergy House, and Choir School has been wasted.
Another feature in Bentley's plan which was to meet with bitter criticism was the position and arrangement of the raised retro-choir. Dom Aidan Gasquet, O.S.B., had expressed some dissatisfaction in the architect's life-time, but it was after his death that the most
' Mr. C. Hadfield, in Paper on WeetminBter Cathedral read before Royal Institute of British Architects, March 1903.
THE PLAN
59
violent fault-finders spoke. Father Gasquet thought that the rendering of the Church's daily Hours of Office in the retro- choir, separated from the people by the whole width of the sanctuary, and raised so much above them," would defeat Cardinal Vaughan's project that the liturgical portions of the Church's service should be- come familiar to, and be taken daily part in, by the laity. His objections were met and answered at once by the editor of the Cathedral Record, who pointed out the advantages of the arrangement as fol- lows: "(1) The retro-choir is raised so high that it will be visible from the en- trance door of the nave, visible to the whole nave. (2) Being in the apse, which will serve as a sounding
• It may be observed that the height from the floor of the nave to the predella (7 ft.) and from there to the floor of the choir (6 ft.) is considerably less than the levels of Canterbury, although the width is exceeded by more than a third.
60 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
board, the voices will reach further through the cathedral than if placed elsewhere. (3) The fathers will be removed from the dangers of draughts by the protection of the apse, which will be open only to the church. Thus protecting screens, which in our old cathedrals cut the choir off entirely from the congregation, will not be re- quired. (4) There will be nothing to prevent the fathers taking up a position in front of the altar, whenever this may be more desirable. (5) The above arrangement has been copied from the great church of Sant' Ambrogio in Milan. This church was served by a chapter of secular priests and by a community of Benedictine monks, and they used the same choir alternately at different hours."
As fate would have it, the scheme that Benedictine monks should return to the Westminster district in whose Abbey they had officiated for centuries till something over three hundred years before, was swept into the limbo of failures and disappointments, and the cathedral is served by twelve prebendaries. Obviously the spacious accommodation of the retro-choir is unsuited to so small a body, so the Divine Office is recited from the presbyterium or lower level of the sanctuary, the retro-choir being occupied by the lay choir, composed of choir scholars and men singers, and founded in September 1901 by Cardinal Vaughan. But as the raison d'etre for this arrangement of the building no longer existed, the extreme malcontents went further and demanded radical alterations in the apse. They would have the crypt swept away and the apse floor lowered to the sanctuary level ; and, as fault had been found with the position of the Archbishop's throne and exception taken to certain awkwardnesses in the sanctuary levels, they demanded that the throne should be removed to a central position in the apse with the stalls for the chapter to right and left.
Father Lucas came forward to champion warmly Bentley's design and defend one no longer here to defend himself ; and in a carefully reasoned reply to his critics, proved that he had been guided throughout by a loyal adherence to tradition allied to
THE PLAN
61
modern congregational requirements. With regard to the un- doubted awkwardness of the levels of the sanctuary, Father Lucas pointed out that they were in no way the fault of the archi- tect. " The sanctuary of the cathedral was designed by Bentley
EAST ELE¥M»PS.
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Fig. 12. — EiiEVATiOK or East End.
to meet certain requirements, the nature of which was carefully explained to him. After the design had been approved, and was in course of being carried out, it was indicated to him that the sanctuary must fulfil certain other requirements, for which.
62 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
naturally, he had made no provision. The result is the present exceedingly awkward arrangement of the sanctuary levels, which plainly allows of no free movement about the archiepiscopal throne. For this awkwardness it would be surely unfair to blame the architect. As he himself said, only a few months before his lamented death, ' Such matters should be thought of in time.' If any errors have been made," concludes Father Lucas, " they have been due to departures from the designs and ideas of the architect." (See Appendix C for subsequent rearrangement of levels.)
The accusation, both implied and expressed by his critics, that Bentley was ignorant of rubrics and liturgical requirements is one to raise a smile. The writer remembers hearing how very often his interposition averted serious mistakes in matters ecclesiological, due to carelessness or want of knowledge on the part of those who should have been familiar with correct detail.
Early in 1896 the plans were all completed, and a special set, provided with Italian measurements and inscriptions, was pre- pared to be sent to Rome. They were carried thither by Monsignor Canon Fenton (later Bishop of Amycla) and submitted to His Holiness Pope Leo XIII in April 1896. Destined for the Vatican Library, there, amongst its glorious and ancient archives, they now repose, together with a copy of the Cathedral Record bound in white vellum, on which are the Papal arms embossed in gold.
Plate X. — Lunettk an» TuHnKT.
[03
CHAPTER V
THE STRUCTURE
"Foundation — Coatraictors — Materials — Constructional progress — Problems of support,
abutnaent, roofing — -Campanile.
The Cardinal wi'ote to Bentley on July 8th to ask for the estimated cost of the foundations, and very shortly after the laying of the first stone the work of opening up the ground in preparation for them began. The discovery was then made that a great platform of concrete averaging 9 ft. in thickness, and excessively hard and solid, underlay rather more than half of the site included within the foundation boundary lines. This formed the substructure of the old prison, and became an important factor in deciding the levels and lie of the foundations, and the level of the crypt, of which, indeed, it forms the floor beneath a veneer of marble. This old concrete bed lies to the left of a diagonal line drawn from the north jamb of the great entrance portal to the south pier of the sanctuary arch, and on to the lobby of the working sacristy. It extends also beneath the whole of the ground now occupied by Archbishop's House. This valuable concrete, though in some parts needing to be supplemented with new material to bring it up to the level required, effected a considerable economy on the large outlay required by the foundations.
The site had long been used as a deposit for surplus earth, which, to the depth of about 13 ft., had to be excavated before the virgin soil was reached. This was found to consist of a rich black mould to the depth of 18 in., followed by 3 ft. of very soft loamy sand, deepening very considerably eastwards, thus necessi- tating excavations to the depth of 21 ft. for the sacristies and the south of the Lady Chapel. Towards the west end the nature of
63
64 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the strata improved, clean solid gravel being soon reached. A great quantity of the earth excavated was retained on the site and rammed around the foundations ; but the major part was carried up the river in barges, and thence to Dagenham in Essex, to be employed in filling up a disused dock.
Fourteen thousand five hundred tons of earth as well as a quantity of old brickwork were removed from the excavations by means of three cranes ; a large Scotch crane, serving a circle 100 ft. in diameter and with a lifting power of 3 tons when extended to its full reach of 50 ft., the lifting power increasing, of course, in proportion to the shortening of the length of reach. The two others used were steam travelling cranes, each serving a circle 30 ft. in diameter and with a lifting power of 2 tons ; and for these over 800 ft, lineal of temporary railways were laid, on which they travelled to and fro at the rate of eight miles an hour.
The excavations for the tower foundations were 17 ft. deep and 46 ft. square ; for each of the main piers and counterforts 19 ft. deep, 21 ft. wide, and 61 ft. long ; and for the three secondary piers and their abutments 19 ft. deep, 14 ft. wide, and 58 ft. long.
Six thousand tons of concrete, measuring over 4,000 cubic yards, were required for the new foundations. It was composed of Thames ballast and Portland cement, very accurately measured apart, and then combined in a dry state by three separate and careful shovellings to secure perfect admixture. During the third shovelling, just sufficient water to make the ingredients cling to- gether was gradually added from the rose of a watering pot. The concrete thus prepared was wheeled in barrows to the trenches, and thrown into them from the ground level in layers of about 2 ft. thick, the top layer being levelled to receive the brickwork of the walls and piers.
The cement above referred to was chosen as the result of a series of careful experiments. Samples of various manufactures were made up in boxes with varying proportions of Thames ballast, and allowed to remain long enough to test the fitness of the result- ing block of concrete. It was finally decided to use the best
THE STRUCTURE
65
quality "Goliath" brand, on account of its extreme fineness and power of resisting tensile strain. So fine is it ground that the residue on a sieve of 5,800 meshes to the square inch will not exceed 10 per cent. As regards its resist- ance, it was proved that, if mixed with water, made into briquettes in moulds and allowed to set, and kept for seven days (during the last six of which it was immersed in water), it will at the expiration of that time sustain a tensile strain of 400 lb. to the square inch. If kept four times as long, with an immer- sion of twenty-seven days, the tensile strain sustainable was in- creased to 550 lbs. per square inch. Six hun- dred tons of this emi- n e n 1 1 y satisfactory cement and 100,000 gallons of water were 1—5
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66 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
combined with 5,000 cubic yards of Thames ballast to make the 6,000 tons of concrete laid in the foundations. The excavations and this first portion of the foundations were carried out by Messrs. Mowlem & Co. of Westminster.
The second contract, for the brickwork foundations from the surface of the old and the new concrete to the ground line, was taken over by Messrs. Perry & Co., of Bow, in January 1896 and completed in the October following. Over 2,000,000 hand-made bricks were required for the foundations alone ; blue Staffordshire being used for the outside facing of the underground vaults and sacristry and for the damp-courses, while Fletton wire-cut bricks composed the large piers and the walls and Poole wire-cut bricks the smaller piers and abutments. The brickwork of the footings was in all cases double the width of that above, the concrete below where it is new extending from one to two feet on either side. These brick foundations, where there is no basement, are in many places, and owing to the loose nature of the ground, 12 ft. deep. Under all walls and piers was laid a damp-course consisting of a layer of blue Staffordshire vitrified bricks, set in almost neat cement ; and these same bricks form a vertical lining wherever the basement walls come against the earth outside.
The work was pressed on with great rapidity, and by the end of March there was appreciable progress. The foundations of the primary and secondary piers and of the columns to carry the gallery on the south side of the nave and transept had been built up to within 9 in. of the finished floor. The west front, from the centre line southwards, including the heating vault and the foundations for the great entrance and the narthex, had risen to the ground level ; while on the south the foundations of the lateral wall and the transverse walls connecting it with the great piers, as far east- wards as the Lady Chapel,' had been carried up 8 ft. above the concrete bed. The foundations of the walls and piers of this chapel and its aisles and of the walls of the lower sacristy, second
' Tlien and till long after intended for the Blessed Sacrament Chapel. To avoid, confusion we adopt throughout its present dedication in referring to it.
THE STRUCTURE
67
68 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
heating vault, and stores had risen to about the same level. Also completed were the foundations of the second and third large piers and the intermediate piers on the north side.
All was making rapid headway when on the afternoon of May 1st, 1896, the work suffered a temporary but none the less annoying check. All the labourers but two struck, and thus put an end to the bricklayers' activity. This action was due to a recent rise of a halfpenny an hour on bricklayers' wages (in- creasing them from 9M. to lOd.) conceded by the master builders, and to come into operation on May 1st. The labourers putting forward a demand for a similar advance, had been met with refusal on the ground that wages for unskilled labour ought not to rise at the same rate as those for skilled labour. Thus denied, the men decided to try the effects of a stoppage of work ; and as regards the cathedral, succeeded for a time in keeping it at a standstill. But the masters stood firm ; gradually fresh hands applied to be taken on, and by the end of May there were renewed signs of activity. By the middle of June the full complement of men was again employed.
The end of July saw the bringing up to the ground level of the walls of the working sacristy and stores adjoining, the walls and piers of the Blessed Sacrament and Lady Chapels, the enclosing walls of St. Peter's Crypt, and the outer walls and piers of the aisle transepts and chapels on the north side. In October Messrs. Perry were ready to remove from the works in readiness for the new contractor to whom the superstructure was to be entrusted. The outlay on the excavations and foundations up to that date amounted to about £14,000.
Out of five firms who tendered by schedule Messrs. Shillitoe & Sons, of Bury St. Edmunds, were selected, and the contract for the erection of the building up to the level of the domes and vaulting was signed on November 5th, 1896. This firm had previously carried out a number of important works ; notably Truro Cathedral, the new Admiralty Offices in St. James's Park, the then recent additions to the National Gallery, and the restoration of Westminster Hall.
THE STRUCTURE
69
The price of brick- work (for with vast areas of brickwork did the bulk of this con- tract mainly deal) was fixed at the rate of £20 a rod. Every fortnight the work was measured up by Mr. A. J. Gate, the sur- veyor to whom for many years had been entrusted the quan- tities of Bentley's works, and the con- tractors received pay- ment for it imme- diately on presentation of the architect's cer- tificate. Thus, as we shall show in a later chapter, was avoided the possibility of piling up debt ; the Cardinal raising the money and paying for the work continuously as it was carried on. The builders undertook to employ not less than 260 men, working full time ; if the exchequer were prosperous, there was nothing to prevent the em-
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70 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
ployment of as many more hands as they could find work for.
At an earlier date and before proceeding with any brickwork the architect had carefully and exhaustively tested the many samples of bricks submitted to him. Those selected for the piers (both great and secondary) and the interior of the walls were put through most rigorous weight-sustaining tests by Messrs. Kir- kaldy & Sons, testing engineers, in the following manner. Four parcels (marked A, B, C, D) each containing six Fletton bricks, and one parcel (marked E), containing six Poole bricks, were sent to them. Each brick was flushed true on the upper and lower bed, and was bedded between strips of pine f in. thick. They were then subjected to a gradually increased thrusting stress, as was shown by an elaborate table containing many hundreds of figures, with the following result :
In the mean " slightly cracking stress " of the twenty-four Fletton bricks, the resistance stands at 185'6 tons per square foot ; and in that of the six Poole bricks at 398'6 tons per square foot. Under similar conditions the ordinary London stock would have cracked with one-third of the load of the former. The blue Staffordshire bricks, employed for outside facing of underground work and for the damp-courses, showed satisfactory resistance to pressure up to 700 tons per square foot ; and being impervious to moisture were used in substitution for the usual asphalte vertical rendering and horizontal damp-course.
For the exterior Bentley chose Bracknell red facings, from Messrs. Lawrence & Sons' fields, an exceptionally fine thin type of brick, giving five courses to the foot. This exterior (thin brick) walling was bonded to the backing with one course of binders to four of stretchers, without the use of quarter bats. The points were raked out during progress, and pointed with a bold weathered joint as the scaffolding was removed. The building was lined interiorily with Favcrsham stocks, left rough and unpointed in order to afford a satisfactory surface for the adherence of the shell of marble and mosaic when the time came for its application.
THE STRUCTURE
71
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72 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Every brick used was hand-made, machine-made varieties being absolutely tabooed. At first the progress of the work was arrested from time to time by the difficulty of getting an ade- quate supply of bricks. To avoid these vexatious delays the contractors took a brickfield at Fletton, near Peterborough, and were thus enabled to deliver, if demanded, as many as 60,000 bricks a week.
It was feared at one time, owing to the high price of English granite, that it would be necessary to introduce what was needed for the exterior of the building from abroad, and probably from the famous quarries at Baveno, which produced the huge columns in St. Paul's Outside the Walls, at Rome. Fortunately, at the psychological moment the price of English granite was reduced and the order placed with Messrs. Freeman & Sons, of Penryn, who, it will be remembered, had presented the fine block of granite used for the foundation stone. They supplied the 8-foot granite plinth, fine-axed and set in four courses, besides the door dressings and joists and heads of windows lighting the vaults and sub- sacristy ; granite being used in all places contiguous to the public streets where excessive wear and risk of damage had to receive special consideration.
" In regard to the masonry in which there is, exteriorly, a quantity of decorative work," Mr. Charles Hadfield remarks,' " many different varieties of the best hard freestones had to be considered ; those of Northamptonshire and Rutland came under notice, but eventually considerations of cost and a ready supply made it manifest that a strong Portland stone from the Brown bed was the best for the external dressings." Even so it was sometimes difficult to obtain a supply equal to the demand and the builders suffered delays from this cause from time to time. All the masonry was worked on the site.
The bulk of the vast quantity of mortar used was composed of one part of " Goliath " brand Portland cement to three parts of clean, well-washed Thames sand ; but in the damp-courses
' Paper read before the Royal Institute of British Architects, March 16tb, 1903.
THE STRUCTURE
73
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74 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and blue Staffordshire facings the proportion of cement used was higher by one-third.
The work of supervision proving too onerous for one clerk of the works, the architect arranged very early in the operations for Mr. Percy A. Lamb (since in practice on his own account) to become assistant to Mr. C. H. Mullis. The latter had been in charge of the new monastery and transept built for the Redemp- torists at Clapham in 1893-4, and Bentley thought so highly of his capacity and integrity that he retained his services for the cathedral works. Mr. Mullis and Mr. Lamb continued this joint supervision (with an interval in 1898 when Mr. Lamb was away in charge of the building at the Franciscan Convent at Braintree) till the campanile was finished in 1903. Thereafter Mr. Lamb remained in sole charge till 1905, which year saw the completion of all structural work.
In April 1897, Bentley wrote cheerfully that " the red brick facing is making a great show." The enclosing walls of the chapels on the north and south sides had risen to a height of 7 ft., while the walls of the lower sacristy and vaults adjacent had attained a similar level. Along the north and west the granite plinth was in position ; the jambs of the two doorways on the north side were fixed as well as the sills of the crypt windows ; on the south the various arches and windows enclosed in the lower stage were nearly completed. The piers of the nave, moreover, had risen to a height of 12 ft. ; these piers, fourteen in number, include the eight great piers and the six secondary piers, each with its corresponding abutment.
The following remarks are taken from Mr. J. A. Marshall's paper ' on the construction of the cathedral. With regard to the main features of support and abutment he says :
" In the disposition of the piers and abutments, with a view not only to the sustentation of the pressure, but to reserving as much space as possible for the aisles, chapels, and galleries, a system has been adopted not unlike that to be seen in most
' Paper read before the Architectural ABSOciatioa, April 12th, 1907.
THE STRUCTURE
75
Gothic cathedrals, where huge, yet narrow, counterforts are pro- jected at intervals, and stiffened by transverse walls, arcading, and vaulting ; but while, in a Gothic cathedral, these counterforts are generally most conspicuous features outside the building, at the Westminster Cathedral they are practically limited to the interior, the spaces between being entirely utilised. . . ."
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He then proceeds to describe the counterforts and the vaulting they sustain.
" Only in one instance is a main counterfort permitted to retain what may be termed its simple unaffected character, all the others being more or less modified by the exigencies of the plan ; thus two of them form the flank walls of the transepts, where, on the east, they are further strengthened by the walls and vaulting of the sanctuary, so as to resist the cumulative pressure of the
76 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
nave vaulting. At the west end of the nave, the corresponding abutment has been very considerably affected — not to say weak- ened— in the upper part, by the retiring disposition of the western fa9ade, a concession to light and air claimants.
" Of the secondary counterforts, those dividing the transepts have also a distinct and complicated character, while the others retain their simple form — excepting that next the campanile, but this of course affects only one side of the building.
" The proportions of each compartment of the nave are those of a cube, up to the springing of the main arches — 60 ft. from the floor. Another 30 ft. 4 in., and we are at the springing of the domes, the total internal height being 111 ft., or about 10 ft. higher than the choir of Westminster Abbey.
" The extreme projection of the counterforts is 48 ft., but just above the chapel vaulting this projection is suddenly reduced to 24 ft., at which it is maintained to a height of nearly 90 ft. The lower projections — forming the divisions between the chapels — are but little more than ' flying buttresses,' filled in with thin walls, so as to form recesses for the altars. . . .
" The main counterforts are 10 ft. 6 in. wide, and from these, at a height of 60 ft. from the floor, spring the large transverse arches, 6 ft. 9 in. wide, that support the pendentives and the domes. As the thrust exerted by these arches and the penden- tives is at a level much below the springing of the domes, it was not considered necessary to raise the main counterforts higher than the lean-to roof of the passage over the triforium vaulting ; but the secondary counterforts, placed opposite the centres of the domes, are raised well above these roofs, and weighted with turrets, the supporting arches and wall at this level being comparatively thin."
Mr. Marshall then reverts to the exceptional character of the counterforts dividing the transepts (see fig. 20) :
" These consist on the ground plan of two piers, one next the nave, the other next the outer wall, the space between being arched over just above the level of the gangways or galleries that
THE STRUCTURE
77
78 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
cross the transepts. To dispel the weak appearance of the pier next the nave, and to ensure a uniformity of scale on the ground floor, the openings between the piers are filled in with arcades that agree in height with those of the galleries ; but these arcades do nothing towards counteracting the thrust of the arches over, and, indeed, they were not inserted till long after the main parts of the structure were built. In building the pier next the nave, the pre- caution had been taken to make it 9 in. wider than the correspond- ing piers of the nave, but this was not considered sufficient, so a rolled steel tie was inserted just below the springing of the arches, where it would be eventually concealed by the arcades ; and at a higher level — just above the crown of the arches — another similar tie was built in. When it is considered that the turrets of these transept counterforts are directly over the arches, and that the arches sustain nearly half the weight of the vaulting and the roofing, and that one of the domes is partly dependent on the pier, it will be admitted that these precautions are not altogether uncalled for."
The dimensions included in the foregoing paragraphs when applied to solid masses of brickwork afford an explanation of the excessive discontent of the bricklayers, with whom a good deal of friction occurred from time to time. They detested the monotony of these massive piers and walls ; with hands often raw and bleeding from perpetual handling of bricks, they objected above all to kneeling and leaning over to place them in position. Some, accustomed to building operations of a less enduring character, " downed tools " and took their wages, asserting gloomily that " they weren't engaged to lay a bloomin' pavement, and it wasn't their job." They were replaced, of course, and the work went steadily on, very little affected by such contretemps.
The enclosing walls of the structure, seldom less than 3 ft. thick, serve with the brick vaulting over the galleries and tran- septs to stiffen the counterforts and increase the abutment ; the lower concrete vaulting of the aisles and chapels being in this matter of less importance, it was delayed until the completion of
THE STRUCTURE
79
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Fig. 20. — Transept Countebfobts.
the main parts of the building, when it became possible to realize the full pressure of the superstructure.
The massive walls of the triforium are supported, not on the
80 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
slender arcades dividing the chapels from the aisles, " but on segmental relieving arches, turned over these arcades, between the counterforts and concealed in the pockets of the vaulting. The span of each relieving arch is 25 ft., and the skewbacks are not cut into the piers, but are formed on granite springers that project beyond. This expedient to reduce the span and maintain the piers intact was most essential next the transepts, where the triforium wall suddenly stops and the abutment has been weakened by the formation of a passage in the wall of the transept.
" In view of this and the complicated section of the relieving arches, due to the difficulty of clearing the vaulting of the chapels, it may perhaps be wondered why so favourable an opportunity for the use of steel girders that involve no thrust and occupy but little space, should have been neglected ; but the architect resolved not to introduce into the cathedral any ironwork as a support though " (as we have seen) " he did not feel justified in objecting to its use as a tie."
The above-described method of supporting the higher levels relieved the chapel arcades and vaulting of all extraneous weight and achieved the slender grace to which reference has been made, and by means of which extra space and a "suitable relative proportion or scale " were acquired. Continuing the details of construction, the lecturer remarked :
" The archways formed in the lower part of the counterforts, to preserve the continuity of the aisles, galleries, and passages, have been kept as small as possible, but in the upper parts hollow spaces have been left to economize material. These spaces were not enclosed until the brickwork had been exposed some time to dry, and small openings for ventilation were left in the upper and lower parts of the cavities, to facilitate the drying after the enclosing walls were built. It was also desirable to keep these walls down until the cavities were arched or corbelled over — as the case might be — to prevent the accumulation of rubbish that would have blocked up the ventilators at the bottom."
So much for the support and abutment of nave and transepts
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THE STRUCTURE 81
With regard to the treatment of these problems at the eastern end of the church, Mr. Marshall speaks with equal clarity, and we again quote him in full :
" The eastern portion of the cathedral, comprising the sanctuary, the lateral chapels, and the choir, presents a system of construc- tion essentially Byzantine, the luminous corona of the sanctuary dome being raised aloft on vaulting that seems to be independent of direct support. This buoyancy is due to the extensions that open out on all sides, equal in span to the dome itself. The en- closing walls of the sanctuary, on the north and south, have very materially affected the design of the eastern chapels. Originally these chapels were to have been enclosed by slender arcades on marble columns, corresponding with those of the organ galleries adjoining ; but — as in the case of the chapels of the nave — it was soon found that these arcades would not be sufficient to sustain the weight of the walls over, which are the highest in the building ; so the columns were changed into brick piers, and the two end bays of the arcades were filled in, leaving only two bays open in the middle, and a couple of narrow doorways at each end, for access to the aisles. Over the filled-in bays are built the solid portions of the outer wall, against which the organs will probably be placed, while over the two open bays is built the lighter portion of the wall, containing the windows. The weight of this central part does not, however, entirely depend on the arcade below, for above the two lower windows a relieving arch is turned, that transmits the weight of the upper part of the wall to the solid portion at the sides, and still further to reduce the weight, that portion of the brickwork under the relieving arch, and between the windows, is built hollow.
" The abutment for the main supporting arches of the sanctuary dome is provided by the staircase turrets on the east and by the transept piers on the west ; while for the dome itself abutment is provided, on the north and south by the vaults over the organ galleries, on the west by the dome of the nave, and on the east by buttresses built on the wide supporting arch that forms part of the vaulting to the choir ; these buttresses are stiffened by the 1—6
82 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
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outer wall of a passage way that passes through them, to provide communication between the staircase turrets."
The floor of the choir, is, as we have pointed out in the last
THE STRUCTURE 83
chapter, raised 13 ft. above that of the nave, so that only a very slight excavation was necessary to obtain the required height for the crypt beneath. This excavation was limited by the level of the old concrete, which forms the floor of the crypt. On account of this platform the architect was anxious to dispense with inside footings round the apse ; for which the required permission was obtained from the authorities. Footings were provided outside, however, though not structurally necessary. " At that time," says Mr. Marshall, " these footings were covered by the ground that rose above the floor of the crypt, but a subse- quent alteration of the levels led to their exposure, and they are now again concealed by a retaining wall that forms a low circular podium between the buttresses."
The choir vault has a span of 48 ft. and is, up to nearly half its height, a solid mass of brickwork, " roughly corbelled over to the curve and faced with concrete. Above this level the vault is a concrete shell 18 in. thick at the bottom and 12 in. at the crown. A retaining wall of concrete is built on the haunches to receive the counterforts or sleeper walls on which are placed the principal trusses of the roof. The buttresses of the apse rise to the height of the retaining wall, and the two are connected by massive con- crete lintels formed across the gallery " (an open colonnade under the eaves) " behind the buttresses. The gallery is covered with concrete slabs, cast in situ, that form a flat around the timber roof. To prevent the arcades of the gallery being pushed out by the expansion of the concrete, the flat and the lintels were kept clear of the brickwork until the concrete had thoroughly set ; the joints were then made good. The retaining wall above referred to was raised a little above the flat, to form a curb, on which is placed the wood plate for the rafters. The asphalte covering of the flat is turned up the curb and under the plate, the joint being covered by the lead apron flashing of the eaves. The roof is ventilated by drain pipes that pass through the retaining wall to the gallery.
" To convey the water from the asphalte flats throughout the building to the rain-water pipes, a dish is formed in the concrete,
84 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and at the bottom of the dish or cess-pool a curved length of glazed earthenware drain pipe is built in, with the socketed end upwards, so that the asphalte could be turned down or dressed into the socket. All rain-water conductors that are built into the brickwork are formed of glazed and socketed earthenware pipes."
Having travelled thus far in the story of the materials and constructive problems of the building, we may turn aside to take up for a brief space the history of its progress. So satisfactory was this, that early in 1898 the Record reiterated the opinion voiced by Cardinal Vaughan in the preceding November that, provided the necessary funds were forthcoming, it lay well within the bounds of possibility to finish the cathedral in time to celebrate therein the Golden Jubilee of the Re-established Hierarchy on Sep- tember 29th, 1900. The architect was of like mind, while the contractors were ready to give their assurance that the work could be still further accelerated, provided that funds warranted the employment of an increased staff.
At this period the monthly disbursement had risen to close on £2,500. In another chapter we shall tell how subscriptions came in to the exchequer, enabling the Cardinal to face this huge responsibility without quailing. He would order nothing he could not pay for, and the money desired seemed to be always, or nearly always, ready to his hand. In connection with his earnest wish for the opening ceremony to take place in September 1900, it must be remembered as characteristic of the man's ardour and impatience that at first he had really reckoned on the work being finished in two years (a manifest impossibility when we consider that the foundations alone occupied fifteen months), in order that the opening might coincide with the thirteenth centenary of St. Augustine's landing on our shores.
On the strength of this heavy monthly expenditure, the Cardinal made an appeal for help in the Record of March 1898 ; with the result tliat the exchequer was replenished sufficiently for work to proceed steadily ; so that in the May of 1899 — when a new contract was drawn with Messrs. Shillitoe for the erection of the
THE STRUCTURE 85
domes and vaulting — the architect calculated, after the previous three months of good uninterrupted labour, on roofing in by the end of that year.'
In February the brick and stone work of the walls of the aisles, chapels, transepts, apse, and the outer walls of the clerestories had reached the level of their respective copings, the staircase turrets were well above the roofs, and the remainder of the walls was up to the height of 85 ft. from the pavement level. At this date 9,300,000 bricks had been laid, in conjunction with 42,000 cubic feet of Portland stone dressings.
Furthermore the great transverse arches that carry the four domes were being turned, and here we may with advantage take up again the thread of the story of their construction : '
" On the north and south sides these main arches were not turned until the lower secondary arches and the brick filling over were finished, so that the brickwork served as centering for that portion of the main arch that passes through the wall ; but for the projecting portion, on which the pendentives rest, it was of course necessary to provide thin centering of wood. At the springing level of all the arches and brick barrel vaulting, rough stone corbels were built in to support the centering, the projection being afterwards worked off. The spandrels of the main arches are filled up to the crown level Avith brickwork, set back 13i in. from the faces of the arch, to reserve a seating for the concrete of the pendentives. The visible junction of the brick arch and the concrete forms merely an angle or line, and if we follow these lines down to the springing where the supporting arches separate, we shall find them meet, so that the surface of the pendentive expands or develops from a mere point ; but this apparent weak- ness in the construction is obviated by the very common method of building the lower portion of the arches and the pendentives of brick, in horizontal courses ; thus a continuous joint is avoided by cutting the brickwork to the required angle, and the top of the
' As a matter of fact this was not accompliahed till the autumn of 1900. ^ Mr. J. A. Marshall, loc. cit.
86 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
brick corbelling forms a seating of considerable area for the solid concrete backing.
" The lower portion of the pendentive just described rises to a height of 13 ft. above the springing ; fixed centering for this part was not necessary — the accuracy of the dome spherical curves being ensured by the application of movable templets. But for the upper part of the pendentive closely boarded centering was necessary, and to support this, at the bottom, a projecting stone landing was built in, on the top of the brick corbelling, the projection being afterwards worked off. To secure bond for the concrete backing of this upper part, and to distribute the bearing, 6-in. stone landings are built in at intervals in the height, across the angles formed by the enclosing spandrel walls.
" Projecting courses of brick are also formed on these walls, to serve as a key to the concrete. To limit the weight the top part of the pendentive has no solid backing ; it is, in fact, built as part of a dome, having a shell 2 ft. 6 in. in thickness, but on this shell radiating counterforts or ribs are formed, that incline up to the base of the dome, and on these counterforts there are light sleeper walls that support the flat roofing around.
" To ventilate the cavities 4|-in. drain pipes were inserted in the shell and counterforts communicating with the interior of the building. Constructionally, the pendentives may be regarded as corbels by which the weight of the domes is not merely sustained, but is directed to the piers."
Section H— H and Plans C, C"— D and E— F in the sheet of diagrams on page 89 serve to illustrate the above details.
Three months later, that is in May 1899, these great arches, rising vast and impressive 90 ft. from the pavement, were com- pleted. Turned also were the barrel vaults that span the spaces between the principal and intermediate piers and enclose the upper clerestory windows. On the ground floor the comparatively thin divisional walls, such as those to the porch cnti'ance in Am- brosden Avenue, and those of the chapel and lobby in the north transept, were in course of construction. It had not been con-
THE STRUCTURE 87
sidcred advisable to build them sooner, lest risk should be incurred from the pressure of the enormously massive walls adjoining. The underground vaulting was in hand, having been delayed till this period for the same reason.
The staircases at the eastern angle of the transepts were then practicable ; their steps are of artificial stone, a material harder than any known natural stone and so durable that it may rightly lay claim to the title of everlasting. Composed of Portland cement and granite reduced to a powder, the steps were cast in moulds and then immersed in a silicate bath. The finished steps were pinned into the outer circular walls, and carried on the inner side on cast corbels of the artificial stone built into a large hard newel of brick. The same material and method were employed in the other stair- cases.
In June it was announced that the brick and stone work (exclusive of that of the campanile) had been carried up to their full height, and that it only remained to finish the various turrets, when the external scaffolding would be struck and the brickwork pointed as this descended.
At the east end, the first portion of the vaulting begun was that of the apse of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel ; then followed the ceiling over the choir, and then the sanctuary dome. From this time, the interior of the cathedral almost resembled a great forest, whose trees had been suddenly struck dead and stripped of bark and foliage by some huge shock of nature. These vast avenues of timber, designed to carry the wooden centering of the domes, were constructed with such scientific skill and strength as has never before been required in any ecclesiastical building in this country, save perhaps the dome of St. Paul's.
" The domical construction, the direct outcome of the archi- tect's plan," says Mr. Charles Hadfield,' " cost him much thought and exercise of the inborn Yorkshire caution which characterised him through life. At one period his idea had been to save much centering by using cast segments of a sphere and building them up
1 Paper read before the Royal Institute of Britisli Architects, March 1903.
88 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
into domes. This, no doubt, was a practical constructive scheme, but probably it would have had a tendency to thrust outwards, and it was by degrees that he came to abandon this method for that of a homogeneous mass of concrete thrown on to a centering (really the expensive part of the method). I submit that this outlay has been proved to be a true economy, both in the light of results obtained and, possibly, of the outlay incurred. Had his first idea been carried out, the construction might have been a less perfect one than that of the dome of San Vitale, Ravenna {i.e. a spiral coil of earthenware tubes, with grooved socketed joints, and old amphorae set vertically) ; and, moreover, liable to the constructive failures which the history of our craft tells us have occurred time after time since the age of Justinian."
Bentley had from the beginning decided to avoid the use of iron, for wherever there is iron there will be some expansion under heat, and determined to trust for the roofing of his domes wholly to concrete made of Portland cement and broken brick. As to wood, it was avoided with the exception of a very sparing use of oak timber in the roofs of the apsidal choir and the transepts and of teak in the upper stages of the campanile. His strong convic- tions on the subject of girder-composite construction found ex- pression in a letter to Mr. Hadfield on January 13th, 1902. The architect had met Mr. Norman Shaw and Professor Lethaby in the cathedral a short while previously, when the latter was pre- paring an article on the subject for the Architectural Review, in which it appeared in January 1902. Writing to his old friend partly in reference to this appreciation of Professor Lethaby's (which had given him keen pleasure), he said : " I feel that the old principle of construction is carried on, and that curse of modern construction and source of decay- — the use of iron — has been avoided, against the consensus of opinion expressed by the en- gineers. This much I am proud of, for I feel that a service to building has been effected, and that I have disproved and broken the backbone of that terrible superstition, that the use of iron is necessary to long spans."
THE STRUCTURE
89
The centering for the domes consisted of radiating trusses supported from the ground on uprights 90 ft. in height, made of
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stout planking bolted together, so as to break joint, and cross- braced at intervals. The perfect rigidity of this centering
90 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
was a matter of the first importance, in order that the true curvature of the concrete might be preserved until it had thoroughly set.
The concrete for all the coverings, domes and others, was com- posed of four parts of broken brick to one part of Portland cement, mixed carefully together with the least possible quantity of water, the broken brick having been well saturated before the cement was added. Prepared on a stage erected in proximity to the dome or vault, it was thrown on to the boarded centre, previously sanded to prevent adhesion, in rings varying from 3 to 5 ft. deep, screeded on the upper surface to a graduated thickness, to ensure absolute uniformity in longitudinal and latitudinal sections. During the very hot weather, the domes were sprinkled with water, while in process of turning, to prevent the concrete setting too quickly. The broken brick was very carefully freed of old mortar and any other foreign matter, in order to increase both the strength and the tensile property of the concrete.
The age of the cement was a factor of prime importance. A warning, slight though not to be disregarded, had been received after the turning of the choir arch. Examination revealed that there the brickwork had risen from the centre on which it was built an inch and a half, while the great transverse arches across the nave, that are 10 ft. wider, had only risen half an inch. This difference of expansion was entirely attributable to the age of the cement ; that employed in the latter case was used nine weeks, and in the former about six weeks, after manufacture. Thus it was of vital necessity that the cement employed in the domes — where there is a body of material 66 ft. in diameter and about 700 tons in weight, starting with a thickness of 3 ft. and diminish- ing towards the crown to 13 in. — should be thoroughly well seasoned. Otherwise, the pressure on the clerestory walls, thick as they are, would be more than they could withstand. The prudent resolve to allow a wide margin of safety sent forth the architect's fiat that no cement should be used until it had been at least thirteen weeks on the site. During this time it was stored
THE STRUCTURE 91
in bins, in which it was periodically turned over, and its tempera- ture taken with equal regularity.
The ensuing fourteen months was a time of great anxiety for the architect and his clerks of the works. Mr. Lamb during 1898 had been away from the Westminster works ; Bentley needing him to take charge of the chapel and additions to their house then in progress for the Franciscan nuns at Braintree, Essex. The convent work was practically finished by the end of May 1899 ; when the architect, feeling that the supervision at Westminster was too heavy for Mr. Mullis, single-handed, recalled his assistant and allocated to him especially the supervision of the concreting of the domes, which as he said " required carefully and constantly watching."
The easternmost dome of the nave was turned first, its centering being in position early in June, together with that for the vault and apse of the " monks' choir," while at this date some of the small vaults at the west end were completed. The centering of the sanctuary dome and pendentives was also in preparation, and this dome was turned next, though as it differs in certain respects from the three roofing the nave, we will defer its description till these have been further dealt with. The construction of the middle dome of the nave followed, and finally that of the westernmost.
" The circle developed by the pendentives," says Mr. Marshall,' " is 60 ft. in diameter ; the base of the dome is corbelled over from this, so that the springing is clearly defined and a salient angle at the junction of the two surfaces is thus avoided, for the convenience of the mosaic workers of a future generation. . . . The independent external covering of the domes is formed of 3 in. artificial stone slabs, cast to the curve. They rest on radiating ribs 5 in. deep of similar material, fixed on the concrete and rebated to receive the slabs, thus leaving an air space of 2 in. between the inner shell and the outer covering, the object being to render the temperature of the interior more uniform. The top and bottom joints of the slabs are rebated. At the springing and at
^ loc. cit.
92 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the crown, the spaces between the ribs are left open for ventilation, and to prevent the wet being driven into the cavities at the top a circular raised curb is formed on the top edge of the upper slabs over which is placed a domical capping that allows the air to circulate freely. A reference to the diagram on page 89 will make this clearer (details at A and B).
" To form the outer covering more than 600 slabs were re- quired for each dome ; the exposed surface is therefore an elaborate network of jointing. ... By rebating the ribs for the slabs each radiating section of the covering is kept in position inde- pendently of the rest. The concrete flat roofing around the domes is covered with asphalte that passes up the lower portion of the dome to a height of about 4 ft. 6 in., under the outer covering, where it is keyed into the concrete."
All the asphalting of the flats, here and elsewhere, was carried out by the Val de Travers Company.
The sanctuary dome differs, as we have seen, materially from those of the nave. These seem to rest on the flat roofing of the church, while the former " emerges gradually out of the substruc- ture— the extrados of the pendentivcs forming a pyramidal series of offsets or steps, that follow the plan of the dome (see diagonal section, p. 93, and Plate XI, facing p. 80). The reason for thus exposing the pendentives outside was to limit the height of the supporting walls on the north and south, so as to give greater elegance to the eastern turrets and to bring this part of the building into closer harmony with the choir. To further this object, the vaults over the organ galleries are also exposed, the whole group presenting a subtle gradation of parts, more Oriental than the rest of the building, and perhaps more expressive of the internal arrangements.
" The circle developed by the pendentives is 52 ft, in diameter. On the closely boarded centering for this dome other centering had to be constructed for the window openings, the reveals of which represent a series of counterforts all round the dome. Centering had also to be constructed for the wall of the drum or
THE STRUCTURE
98
circular podium, designed to disguise the counterforts and to protect the glazing from the drainage of the dome. The cavities
WESfMWSiER^
3dJi€tuQTyJ)ome
yi.t
Fig. 23. — Diagram of Sitppokt akd Abutment of Sanctoaby Dome.
— between this wall and the shell of the dome — are covered by slabs of concrete, weathered to a sunk gutter or channel near the outer edge that conveys the water to projecting spouts or gargoyles
94 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
placed between the windows. The flat of the drum is covered with asphalte that passes partly up the dome, under the outer covering, as before described. The exposed vaulting and the pendentives around the dome are also asphalted ; the wall of the podium is cemented. All cavities are ventilated by drain-pipes communicating with the outer air."
Having completed this survey of the dome construction and other roofing, it is necessary to return to the interior of the cathedral and consider the arrangement of its upper levels. But before finally taking leave of the subject of the roofing, it would be well to dwell briefly on two questions — questions of material and form referring to singularities in the construction — raised by Mr. Marshall in his paper. Asking, " Why should the vaulting, in some cases, be entirely of concrete, and in others, entirely of brick ? " he replies, " Obviously, where the shell of the vaulting is of a graduated thickness and curved on plan, con- crete is the strongest and most adaptable material to use ; the complications of groin vaulting are also most readily cast in this material. So we find for the pendentives and domes, for the vaulting of the choir and chapels, for the more complicated vault- ing of the crypt, aisles, baptistery, and porches, concrete has been used ; but for the vaulting of the transepts and the corresponding vaulting of the triforia, brick is the material employed, in order that the deep soffits of the brick-supporting arches in front may appear as part of the vaulting behind, and the line of junction of the two should not show ; thus ensuring a uniformity of surface texture, until the unaffected dignity of the interior is impaired by the application of something more assertive and restless."
The second question regards the contrariety of the roofing. " Why should some of the vaulting be protected by extraneous roofs ; while in other places its surface is fully exposed to the weather ? . . . A timber roof over the nave and sanctuary, even of low pitch, would have been uncouth and harsh ; such a roof would have been commonplace. . . . But there is a law of con- trast as well as of analogy. ... At the Westminster Cathedral
(A) Blrd 1<'ini.i_l UN Campanile.
(B) Detail, North-West Pokch,
(C) Detail of West Facade. Engaged
Shaft to Left of Central Doorway.
The Dark Portion is Temporary Glazing, since Replaced by Great Door.
(D) FiNiAX L'Koss OF Campanile.
Plate XIII. — Four Details of External Ornament.
94]
Plate XIV. — View, fkom Tribune, of Nave, looking East. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
195
THE STRUCTURE 95
the most striking instances of its application are afforded by the campanile and by the roofs and turrets of the transepts, and the choir. Structurally, it would have been quite possible and more consistent to have exposed the vaulting outside throughout the building. . . . But the Greeks did not always expose their statues to the cold ; they appreciated, quite as much as we do, the charm of the rippling garment. . . . And so, at the Westminster Cathedral, the rounded surfaces of the vaulting are not everywhere exposed, but discreetly concealed, in places, by extraneous roofs suggestive, in a measure, of the forms beneath. A piquancy and an interest are thus imparted to the design."
The galleries throughout the cathedral — that is, those of the nave, the west end, and the organ tribunes of the sanctuary — are independent factors of the construction and were not added till the main parts were built. They are all vaulted in concrete, which vaultinsr in the case of the eastern tribunes and that of the west end is, to avoid weakening them, not let into the walls at the back, but supported on corbelling of brick and stone ; to ensure strength, the concrete was keyed to the wall by projecting courses of brick. Furthermore, gunmetal ties in the case of the organ galleries are inserted to tie the columns supporting the vaulting to the brick wall behind ; in the western gallery these metal ties are at the level of its floor, " where the wall of the narthex has most resist- ance." Conditions in the nave are, of course, different ; the side galleries have no supporting wall at the back, except that next the campanile ; but the main piers provide the necessary resistance to any forward tendency while the arcades carrying the vaulting are comparatively short.
Before the groining of the aisles and narthex and the arcade across the transepts could be completed, the marble columns supporting this and the galleries above had to be in place. In 1896 subscriptions had been invited for the twenty-one nave and transept monoliths, for the six large ones in the sanctuary and the fourteen smaller ones in the sanctuary tribunes. An account of these marbles will be found in a later chapter. By
96 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
May 1899 only five columns of the twenty-one required for the body of the church had been subscribed for as votive offerings, though the order for the complete number had long before been given. There was delay, owing to the vicissitudes of war, in the delivery of some, which were seized by the Turks, then in conflict with Greece, during the summer of 1897. However, eventually the marbles were released and reached their destination without further mischance. By December 1900 all were paid for and in position, and the peregrination of the galleries was complete about two months later.
It was impossible that the cathedral could be ready for opening in the previous September, as Cardinal Vaughan had hoped; the roofing of some of the side chapels was still incomplete, although, as we have seen, the nave, sanctuary, choir, transepts, aisles, baptistery and the two lateral chapels of the east end were covered. By Christmas Day it was possible to ascend internally by the staircases at the outer aisles of the sanctuary to the dome level, and from the small balconies at this great elevation to obtain an excellent idea of the grandeur and size of the almost developed building. The various levels of the floor of the sanctuary were then being formed. The crypt below was com- plete structurally, and so were the sacristies, with the exception of the plasterer's work.
It was also possible at that date to judge to some extent of the effect of the careful scheme of lighting ; the terracotta lattices of the great semi-circular windows of the sanctuary and the west end being in their places, and those of the clerestory in process of being fixed. These terracottas came from the famous factories of Doulton at Lambeth and are of various designs. The photo- graphs show some of these, and also the method of building up the trellises with cast segments. The patterns of the leaded glazing enclosed in the openings of terra-cotta are equally varied, and are composed, as noted in the previous chapter, of faintly toned flint glass of great brilliancy and varying thicknesses.
Externally, the composition of the great western doorway
THE STRUCTURE
97
was complete, with the exception of the carving of the medallions and (of course) the mosaic in the tympanum ; most of the scaffold- ing had been removed from the outside of the building, what remained being left till the finishing of the pointing and the cleaning of the stonework could be taken in hand in the spring.
Having now treated in general of the con- struction and progress of the body of the cathedral, it remains but to speak of the cam- panile or bell-tower, which shows externally regular 3-ft. courses of the small hard red bricks, banded with 12-in. courses of Portland stone, till a height of 185 ft. is reached. Here the upward sweep of the shaft is diversified on each of its four sides by a balcony with coupled arches, which breaks the monotony of the banding of brick and stone and leads the eye up to the elaborate treatment of the higher stages.
Tliirty feet square at the base, the tower diminishes from the point at which it springs clear of the main building by a gentle batter of only 7 inches till it reaches a height of 218 ft., when its plain solidity is further lightened by means of an arcaded balcony of stone and brick, with buttress-like projections capped by small turrets at the four angles. Its four arched openings on each side of the tower are supported alternately on stone columns and piers of brick and stone.
In plan the campanile now assumes a polygonal form, the twelve buttresses of the gallery being continued upwards to support a 1—7
V^
Fia. 24. — Section THROUGH Campanile,
FROM A HBIOHT OF 74 FT. 9 IN.
98 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
drum which terminates in a graceful dome or cupola, covered with decorated lead-work. Further details of the sculptural stonework of these higher stages are given in the ensuing chapter, so that it will be superfluous to dwell further upon them here.
The tower measures 273 ft. to the top of the cupola and another 11 ft. to the summit of the bronze finial cross, and consists of ten stories. On the ground floor is the registry, entered from the north aisle, a room with octagonal vaulting, whence access to the upper floors is by means of a spacious staircase of teak. Those hardy enough to make the ascent must be prepared to negotiate 374 steps before gaining the summit. Each of the upper floors is lighted by four small segmental-headed lights, one on each face of the tower, till the eighth story is attained ; here, the balconies already referred to give light and ventilation, pro- tected with parapets of pierced and latticed stonework.
The campanile was erected, after it had attained the height of the adjoining chapel roofs, by means of internal scaffolding, men and materials being conveyed upwards in baskets worked on a band by a small donkey engine in the nave. The pointing being done as the work proceeded, no external scaffolding was required until the construction of the cupola began. In the difficult work of covering-in, it was necessary to raise outside scaffolding. By December 1900 the tower had reached a height of 182 ft.; when the architect visited the building for the last time on March 1st, 1902, it had grown another 40 ft. ; but was not actually finished till 1903, when Mr. Mullis retired ' from the supervision of the work, leaving Mr. Lamb to take charge of what still remained to be done. Messrs. Shillitoe having removed from the site at an earlier date, the campanile was finished by independent labour,
■ When Mr. Mullis was leaving the cathedral after his eight years of devoted super- vision Cardinal Vaughan sent for him to say good-bye, and just before he left the room presented to him the ivory cruci6x which was standing on his writing-table. " This," he said, " has always been on my table ever since I was ordained, and I give it to you as a memento of my appreciation of your long and faithful service as clerk of the works."
THE STRUCTURE 99
engaged by and working under the direct control of the clerks of the works.
The foundations and construction of the cathedral (including the tower) had occupied a period of eight years, when in June 1903 it was opened for the first great solemnity within its walls, the body of the Cardinal Founder being borne over the threshold to lie in state beneath the domes he had raised in the plenitude of enthusiasm and energy.
CHAPTER VI
THE EXTERIOR
Western Facade : Main features, dimensions, main arch, tympanum, entrances, doors, colonnade — Loggie flanking great arch, its dedicatory inscription, balustrade of balcony over portico, narthex fenestration and vaulting, west end of nave, turrets of west end, staircase turrets, baptistery fenestration, loggia and roof, Cardinal Vaughan's arms— North-west porch windows and details of entrance and loggia — Campanile, measurements, structural details, windows, balcony, colonnades, cupola, cross, naming and dedication, bell " Edward." North Elevation: Length, general impres- sions, details of fenestration, lead-work — Transept, entrance, details of walls and roofing, staircase turret, loggia — Blessed Sacrament Chapel. East End: Sanctuary abutments, connecting bridges, apse buttresses and podium, crypt windows, windows of choir, open colonnade of apse, roof of apse, terminal cross, exterior gallery between eastern piers, bells in south-east turret — Sacristy roof and windows. South Eleva- tion: Absence of certain decorative features, Lady Chapel windows — Ascent to the roof, inspection of flats round domes of nave, construction of domical coverings, sanctuary dome, construction and differences of measurement, etc. — Prof. Lethaby's appreciation of exterior.
Coming upon the north-west corner of the cathedral precinct from Victoria Street, the eye, immediately caught and drawn heavenwards by the soaring campanile, " straight as the Sword of Justice and of Right," ' descends, on a nearer approach, to dwell upon the beautiful western facade.
In the chapter dealing with the plan we have seen how the design for the west front was materially affected by certain limitations imposed by rights of light and air ; whence the double terraces and the recession of the upper portions of this elevation (Plate III). The portico, with its noble arch, stands forward, therefore, bold and inviting ; while behind and above it appears the narthex, set back some 20 ft. ; higher yet rises the turreted terminal wall of the nave, pierced with its great west window and
' E. Vincent Wareing, " Tenebrse in Westminster Cathedral in 1907," Cathedral Chronicle.
100
THE EXTERIOR 101
recessed a further 20 ft. Right and left the porch is flanked by the two staircase turrets, surmounted by small lead-covered domes, without doubt the most distinctively Byzantine feature of the fa9ade whose southern end is occupied by the baptistery, its flat roof on a level with the balcony over the great arch. The north- west porch, an extension of similar proportions, balances the baptistery at the other end of the facade. These are the main features of the composition, the width being 156 ft. and the height, not including tlie turrets, 99 ft. It should be premised that in all measurements of external height the datum is the floor of the nave, which is raised by four steps above the level of the street paving.
We come now to the details of the main entrance, inspired by their designer's vivid and fertile fancy. The central State or Episcopal entrance and the two lateral doorways for the laity are sheltered beneath a deeply recessed arch, measuring no less than 40 ft. in span ' and 21 ft. 9 in. to the springing. The radius of its intrados measures 12 ft. 1 in., of the extrados, 20 ft. 4 in. ; the centre of these segments being 3 in. below the springing. Its receding orders are supported on three columns of the colormade, whose entablature is carried unbrokenly over the lesser doorways to meet the architrave of the great door. The inner mouldings, carried out in Portland stone, consist successively of an enriched bead, a cyma-recta with acanthus leaf carving, a double billet, a roll and another bead. Follows a triple astragal in stone, articu- lated with narrower voussoirs of brick, and divided from the next member in stone by a couple of fillets in moulded brick. Succeeding these comes a pair of torus mouldings separated by a single billet, and then again the triple torus with brick voussoirs, varied from the former by gradually increasing the breadth of these, the red banding thus being two bricks wide in the first bead, three in the second and four in the third. Yet another couple of moulded brick fillets, and then a rich and original ovolo precedes the boldly projecting dentils and outer moulding of the arch.
^ Four feet wider than that of St. Mark's, Venice.
102 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The tympanum thus enclosed remains at this date ' still in a primitive condition of stock-brick ; it measures 27 ft. across and will ultimately contain a mosaic picture of our Lord and several of the patron saints of the Church's dedication. The original, a very slight sketch, by Bentley has formed the basis of the design, with the difference, inter alia, that the two outer figures of the group are portrayed kneeling instead of standing, as he had them. For further details of this mosaic the reader must be referred to the tenth chapter of this book. Its estimated cost is £735, and benefactors have been invited to subscribe the price of the individual figures of the composition, with the result that those of St. Edward and St. Joseph are already provided for.
The central doorway, measuring 16 ft. 9 in. high and 10 ft. 6 in. broad, its framing moulded and panelled in restrained and delicate detail (Plate IV), is crowned with a lunette-shaped architrave sculptured in low relief with a pair of flying angels bearing the Sacred Host and chalice enclosed within a laurel wreath. The lateral entrances, intended for the daily use of the laity, measure 10 ft. high and 5 ft. wide, and have carved upon their architraves peacocks, symbolic of eternal life ; the birds support with their beaks laurel chaplets encircling the divine symbols Alpha, over the left door, and Omega over that on the right. Between the head of each door and the entablature of the colonnade occurs a pair of rectangular openings filled with strap-work latticing of stone ; these lattices, outlined with cable mouldings surmounted with interlacing swags of flowers and foliage, are instinct with extreme elegance and refinement of feeling. Plate XIII (C).
The panelled double-leaved doors made of teak are adorned with gammida?, plates, hinges, and bosses of bronze ; in which also are wrought the grilles effectively diversifying the four upper panels. The lesser doors are of similar design. Reference to the east elevation, p. 61, reveals the fact that the architect designed doors of far more sumptuous construction ; in fact the
' This was written in 1913; the mosaic lias since been completed from a design by Mr. Aiming Bell.
THE EXTERIOR 103
wood was to be overlaid with plates of bronze, like the famous doors of St. Mark's at Venice. He died before the order for them was given, and eventually considerations of expense set aside his drawings, Mr. Marshall being desired to plan something less costly. The latter's design was carried out by Messrs. Elliot, of Caversham.
Flanking the entrances is the graceful colonnade, consisting of nine columns on either side, whose pedestals interspaced with niches, rest on a podium of granite. Five of the columns are free, the remaining four being more or less engaged in the angles of the walling. The one thus placed right and left of the central doorway carries the termination of the entablature ; eight corre- spond with the orders of the great arch and its lateral balconies. The shafts are adorned with fluting, alternately straight and waved, for the space of 2 ft. 3 in. below their annulets, beneath capitals of most delicate and beautiful profile, no two alike, all inspired by the architect's rich and varied fancy, and vital with extraordinary interest.
Based on Byzanto-Ionic and Byzanto-Corinthian models, four of these caps are variants of the Bird and Basket type, the symbols of the evangelists replacing the conventional bird ; the Angel of St. Matthew and the Lion of St. Mark will be seen in Plate IV, which also illustrates in part the details of the door- ways, the great arch and its left-hand loggia. A lion's head gargoyle is placed " north " and " south " upon the cornice.
Encircling ribbons at the base of the above-mentioned fluting carry oval, enwreathed, inter-columnar medallions, five on either side, sculptured with demi-figures of twelve illustrious Archbishops of Canterbury, whose names and dates appear on stone tablets affixed to the wall behind the colonnade. This wall has the appearance of rustication, produced by the introduction of thin brick courses between the stone. The archbishops represented are : Left of the entrance, St. Augustine, 597 ; St. Laurentius, 604, and St. Mellitus, 619 (in one medallion) ; St. Justus, 624, and St. Honorius, 627 (also a pair) ; St. Theodore, 668 ; St. Dunstan,
104 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
960. Right are, St. Elphege, 1005 ; St. Anselm, 1093 ; St. Thomas, 1162 ; St. Edmund, 1234 ; B. Boniface, 1254.
The facade was achieved before Bentley's death, with the exception of the carving of these busts, which were subsequently put in hand by the Cardinal's orders ; an independent action which affords an explanation of their regrettable variation from the extremely low relief in which their execution was designed by the architect. Had the correct technique been employed, the unpleasant effect of overcrowding and the just criticism levelled at them that the heads appear as though looking out of windows would have been avoided.
The columns of the upper order, numbering six on either side, support the charming arcading of the loggie flanking the great arch and its balcony above. Their plain shafts, crowned with caps of Corinthian inspiration, spring from bases resting on the stone balconies, which are adorned with panels, richly carved in geometric and foliated designs on their front projections. Sym- bolic outspread wings are carved on the spandrels of the arcading. Stone doorways give access to the loggie from the turret stairways. The eye, travelling higher, next rests upon the dedicatory in- scription proclaimed in bold stone lettering upon the centre panel of the balustrade over the great arch :
DOMINE JESU REX ET REDEMPTOR PER SANGUINEM TUUM SALVA NOS.
The lateral panels are adorned with two rows of quatrefoils carved within square coffering. Behind this balcony are seen the three tall windows of the tribune (Plate V), set in masonry in which brick is now the predominant partner. Between its but- tresses the wall is adorned with an arcaded corbel table, above which rises a pediment arranged with herringbone brickwork between stone verticals, surcharged with a central panel of stone. This effective alliance of horizontal and vertical banding, herring- boning, together with fluted brickwork, is continued over the west wall of the nave whose twin stone-domed turrets from the
THE EXTERIOR 105
triforium level continue the stairway to the roof. Asphalte forms the surface covering on the extrados of the tribune vaulting, whose curved surface may be seen in the photograph of the south half of the west window of the nave (Plate VI). Therein also should be noted the effective lattices in these octagonal turrets, repeated on every secondary pier of the building, their gleaming white domes soaring in pleasing contrast to the sombre leaded coverings of the staircase towers below. The architect's design for the west elevation shows that he intended to finish the little buttresses of these upper turrets with bird finials in stone, which have been omitted.
Plate VII illustrates the polygonal balcony and domical ter- mination of the south-west staircase tower, viewed from the flat leads of the baptistery roof, and shows also the entrance to the higher turret staircase just mentioned, and the outside gallery linking this staircase to the passage above the clerestory, whose sloping roof is punctuated with a series of dormer windows. (See also " General View from the South-West," Plate III.)
The lower part of the baptistery being unfortunately partly hidden in the latter plate by the spreading tree, such details as are wanting may be discovered, though in greatly reduced scale, in the drawing of the west elevation. The large semi-circular terracotta latticed window and the charming arcaded loggia above it are most interesting features ; the four columns of this last being capped in markedly Corintho-Byzantine fashion. Two windows within the loggia give light to the private chamber over the baptistery, the parapet of whose flat leaded roof is adorned with a series of pierced lozenges of stone. High up on the right one notes Cardinal Vaughan's arms, surmounted by a cardinal's hat, carved upon a narrow upright stone panel, a detail approvingly remarked by Mr. Bernard Whelan as " a seeming accident which is an inspiration of decorative intention." The same writer praises this little wing of the baptistery as " in its spontaneous gaiety of composition, a recurring delight." '
' Westminster Cathedral Consecration Handbook, p. 43.
106 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
At the opposite comer of the fa9ade we find tlie composition balanced by a similar extension devoted to the north-west porch. It is minus the loggia and the great terracotta lunette that are features of the baptistery front ; but is lighted by a pair of triple- light windows, over which are small lattices in terracotta. The windows of the upper room are similarly set within arches of fluted brick ; from their springing to the coping-stone of the roof parapet, herringbone detail adorns the wall.
Turning the corner to view the north side, we find the spacious entrance of this porch (Plate VIII), four steps above the street level, second only in importance to that of the west end, and in direct line with the narthex. The composition includes an arch, deep on soffite, borne by a pair of elegant fluted columns, whose bases rest on the projecting granite podium. The wall posterior to each column is deeply recessed, the entablature, with acanthus cornice, being carried round to meet the architrave of the door. The deep soffite is coffered in square compartments, each carved in relief with a double-armed Greek cross, while a beautiful detail of vine leaves and grapes adorns the archivolt. Above the door we note the symbol of Constantine's sacred and victorious banner sculptured within a wreath of laurel leaves.
The doors, made of teak simply panelled and with plain and inconspicuous bronge hinge plates and fastenings, differ vastly from the superb portals indicated in Bentley's design of the north elevation, neither does the latter contain the quartette of circular enwreathed medallions sculptured, a pair each side of the entrance, with busts of renowned doctors of the Church. St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo and Pope St. Gregory on the left represent the early Fathers ; St. Francis of Sales and St. Alphonsus Liguori on the right typify the later exponents of the Church's doctrine. These details were added by Bentley, in place of the other decora- tive work indicated, after the original drawing of this elevation was made.
Within the spandrels are two more medallions, oval and similarly wreathed, containing half-figures of patron saints, St. Peter the
THE EXTERIOR 107
Key bearer (left), and St, Edward the Confessor (right), to whom the campanile is specially dedicated, holding a model of Westminster Abbey. The upper story of the porch has a loggia, whose twin arches spring from an Ionic column rising from the balustrade. Most beautiful and worthy of admiration is the wall treatment above this opening. Narrow vertical stone panels, bordered with a billet moulding, alternate with bands of herringbone brickwork, terminating alike beneath the coping in a series of stone panels, similarly bordered and centred with a circular moulded boss. Lions' heads, with scroll work boldly carved upon the cornice, correspond in position and number to the stone panels beneath (Plate XIII). The tympanum of the north-west porch will eventually receive a mosaic panel, representing the Blessed Virgin seated with the Child and two attendant saints, if Bentley's idea, sketched in the drawing, is ever carried out.
Adjoining the porch the campanile, in original and striking beauty, rises from its granite base. Lombardic in type, it measures 30 ft. square, and tapers, as we have seen, very slightly through the upper part of its height, being gathered from the square to an octagon at an altitude of 225 ft. It is crowned by a teak-framed cupola, covered with lead, and terminates in a majestic patriarchal cross of bronze ; bringing the total height of this combination of strength and grace up to 284 ft.' From granite plinth to leaded dome the tower is faced with red brick and Portland stone, mainly in horizontal banding, the stone being employed in increasing quantity and variety of detail as the summit is approached.
The long delicate curve of its wall surface is fluted, the flutes being square in section, while interest is enhanced at each succeeding stage by the refined and varied treatment of the openings. The registry on the ground floor is lighted from the north by a large six- light window, with rectangular leaded glazing, framed within a brick arch ; the next floor has a smaller arcuated opening enclosing a pair of rectangular lights. The north and west sides of the
* The campanile of Giotto at Florence has the advantage, being 292 ft. high.
108 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
third story are adorned with a sevenfold blind arcading of slight projection, with a small window occupying the upper half of the central recess. The fourth story springs clear of the main building and, together with the three succeeding, is pierced on every side by a single small rectangular window set in the upper half of semi-circular headed panels recessed in the masonry. At the eighth floor a charming balcony delights the aesthetic sense ; opening, on every aspect, by means of a pair of arches, column- borne within a containing arch, whose voussoirs alternate in brick and stone, and whose tympanum, pierced with a central polygonal opening, is filled with the familiar brick herringboning between stone verticals. The capitals of columns and pilasters are of Ionic descent, the convex balustrades between being of stone, carved and pierced.
Above these balconies an arcaded corbel-table carries the eye upward to the bold horizontal-banded cornice and its segmental projections at the angles, whence spring the four turreted but- tresses (pierced with openings that the circuit of the tower may be uninterrupted) of the colonnade on the ninth story. The sixteen arches of this colonnade are borne on alternate piers and columns, the former, with pomegranate finials, being carried above the entablature to support the arcading of the tenth story. Here there are twelve arched openings, yet further set back, the inter- vening wall being pierced with pairs of small unglazed windows to give light and air to the chamber within.
Vertical brick and stone banding faces the parapet surmounting the arcade, a dozen boldly carved stone eagles being set upon the coping at the points of intersection by the buttresses. Symbols of the architect's patron saint, they keep watch and ward at the base of the circular drum, whose lower half is faced with horizontal banding, its upper adorned with twelve stone panels, some sculp- tured in low relief with ileur de lys, some with pierced grille work. Two of the solid panels are arranged alternately with one of the latter. Upon the circle described by the stone cornice of this drum are built the piers to c arry the teak-framed cupola, with its orna-
Plate XV. — View of Interior, from Choir, looking West. {Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
lOS-
Plate XVI. — A Bay of the Nave. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
C10»
THE EXTERIOR 109
mental lead roofing, from which springs the simple yet majestic terminal cross. This gradual " recession from the summit of the square of the tower to its finial cross," says Mr. Bernard Whelan, " is a culminating joy of design." Plate XIII (D).
The patriarchal cross, made of bronze by Messrs. Elsley & Co. and measuring a height of 11 ft., was not cast, but was wrought in parts and bolted together. A small relic of the True Cross was enshrined within it before it was fixed upon the summit of the tower.
St. Edward the Confessor was chosen as the patron saint of the campanile on the occasion of the Coronation of King Edward VII ; two days later the daily papers of August 11th, 1902, made the fact public in the following announcement : " The Cardinal Arch- bishop intends to dedicate the campanile of Westminster Cathedral, now nearly completed, to St. Edward, and it will henceforth be called ' St. Edward's Tower.' It will thus be a monument to the great Saint and King whose body lies in Westminster Abbey, and its name will date from the Coronation Day of His Majesty King Edward the Seventh, St. Edward's successor to the Crown of England."
The formal blessing and dedication took place two months later on the feast of the saintly king, October 13th. After the celebration of High Mass in the Chapter Hall, clergy and choir ascended to the summit of the tower, and there took part in a dedicatory service, which included the singing of the offertory for St. Edward's Day, " Veritas Mea," the antiphon " Tu es Petrus," the hymn " Iste Confessor," followed by the antiphon, versicle, and prayer of St. Edward, and concluded with the prescribed prayer for the King.
The campanile possesses but one bell, " Edward," the gift of the Duchess of Norfolk, cast by Messrs. Mears & Stainbank at their ancient foundry in Whitechapel, established over three centuries ago. Though very similar to the famous " Bow Bell," the tenor of the peal at the church of St. Mary-le-Bow, Cheapside, cast by the same firm in 1738, the cathedral bell has the advantage in size.
110 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
It is 2 cwt. larger, 2 in. greater in diameter, and a little deeper in tone than its prototype. The casting took place in the presence of the Archbishop of Westminster, the Duke and Duchess of Norfolk, the widow and several members of the family of the deceased architect, at 9 o'clock in the morning of Saturday, April 30th, 1910. The Duchess, before leaving the foundry, afterwards cast a medal- lion to commemorate the event. The inscription on the bell runs as follows : " Pray for Gwendolen, Duchess of Norfolk, who has given this bell to the glory of God and in honour of St. Edward the Confessor in the year 1910. Whilst the sound of this bell travels through the clouds, may the bands of angels pray for those assembled in Thy Church. St. Edward, pray for England."
The bell was to have been baptized early in May, but owing to the death of King Edward the ceremony was postponed, and has never been performed. " Edward " was, however, raised to its place when ready, and hangs there like some musical old pagan, calling Christian people to their prayers under false pretences. In order to hoist it in position in the belfry it was necessary to enlarge the trapways ; it is hung on steel gudgeons, and the striking is effected by means of a lever fitted in the upper part of the clapper.
As the spectator allows his gaze to travel the length of the frontage to Ambrosden Avenue, he cannot fail to be impressed with the majestic effect of this unbroken line of buildings, measuring from the campanile to the extreme corner of Archbishop's House about 530 ft. Gazing up at the succession of flat saucer-like domes, he is enabled again to realize with what skill and success the architect, to satisfy modern requirements, has allied the Byzan- tine roofing to the long Latin church plan. He notes too the piquant effect of the tiers of red and white masonry, gaining by contrast with the slated gables of the Norman-looking transepts, and their square pyramidal-roofed flanking turrets. Then the details of the chapel windows will attract his more concentrated attention, notably, in the case of the two westernmost, the circular
THE EXTERIOR 111
wreath with depending swag, surcharged upon the vertical brick and stone facing of the tympana of their enclosing arches. The fenestration of the third side chapel eastwards is differently- treated ; herein small triple lights are set beneath a terracotta trellis, the voussoirs of the containing arch being composed alter- nately of stone and brick ; the glazing of these small windows is still temporary and awaits completion by some benefactor.
Above the flat asphalted roofs of the side chapels will be observed the six tall windows of the triforium, with their varied and effective leadwork, and roundel glazing (Plates III and V), and the equally diverse and interesting terracotta tracery of the three semi-circular clerestory lights, a turret-crowned secondary counterfort uprising between the second and third.
Neither will the lead rain-water pipes and heads have escaped attention ; cast lead was used throughout both in these and in the lead window-glazing and in the roofing of turrets, campanile, etc., the roofing and ridges being wrought with welted rolls. Com- menting on the excellence of the work (carried out by Messrs. Matthew Hall & Co.), Mr. Hadfield observed that " the finials have the individuality inseparable from Bentley's work. For many years he had been an adept at the designing of leadwork of all kinds, and the weight of metal used promises a durability worthy of the fabric." '
Coming to the western half of the north transept, one finds the third public entrance, a porch (four steps above the street level) whose entrance arch is turned in fluted brick. A similar articulation distinguishes the lower windows ; that on the right of the entrance, with three lights, serves the vestibule ; the pair on the left, each containing two-light windows, light the small transeptal chapel of St. Thomas of Canterbury, known as the Vaughan Chantry. Across the tympanum of the entrance arch, just above the archi- trave of the doorway, runs a quintuple corbelled brick arcad- ing, fluted on soffite. Flying angels upholding an enwreathed medallion with the letters M. R., sculptured in low relief upon the
' Paper on Westminster Cathedral read March 16th, 1903, before R.I.B.A.
112 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
architrave, remind us that, as originally designed, this would have been the Lady Chapel entrance. The teak door is similar to that of the north-west porch.
Beneath the sills of the four transept windows at the triforium level, the red brick is wrought in dog-tooth pattern, while inter- spacing its two small clerestory windows are triplets of arched niches with fluted vaults. The twin gable ends of the transept are effectively treated from eaves to apex with a diaper pattern wrought in the red and white material. Eastward rises the staircase turret, roofed in the pyramidal fashion already men- tioned, with horizontal bands of brick and stone. In the eastern wall of the transept occur the two arcaded openings of an attractive loggia, each containing two smaller arches borne on a single column ; the flat roof of this balcony forms the link between the staircase of the turret and that in the upper part of the north- west pier of the sanctuary, leading to the passage over the clerestory. From the loggia one may look down upon the vaulted roof and apsidal termination of the Blessed Sacrament chapel, and up to the vast terracotta tracery lighting the sanctuary. Higher yet will be observed on the sanctuary abutments the carved stone medallions displaying the symbols I.H.S. and X.P.C.
Reverting to the ground level, one examines the fenestration of the aforesaid chapel ; the three circular windows of its flat roofed north aisle, the three segmental-headed windows of its nave and the two smaller but of similar design pierced in the apsidal termination.
Now emerges into sight the eastern termination of the cathedral, though owing to the proximity of surrounding buildings it is better viewed as a whole from the south-east corner of the site. One pauses at this point, however, to mark the north-east abut- ment of the sanctuary, fluted, banded, and turreted, and with arcaded balconies where the octagon springs free of the adjoining walling ; the two bridges connecting the church with the residential pile of buildings (considered in Chapter XII) ; the massive but-
THE EXTERIOR 113
tresses of the apse and the retaining wall that forms a low circular podivim between them.
" The eastern termination of the cathedral," says Mr. Marshall, " suggests the Romanesque or Lombardic style — if you will — of Northern Italy : the crypt opening into the church, with the retro- choir above closely following S. Ambrogio's, Milan ; the open colonnade under the eaves, the timber roof over the vaulting, are all familiar features. The huge buttresses, however, give distinc- tion, and resist the pressure of a vault having a span of 48 ft." *
The roundel glazed windows of the crypt, eight in number, appear above the podium ; while below the level of the springing of the vault the apse is pierced with six segmental-headed windows, whose stone voussoirs, interspaced with thin brick, produce the familiar effect of rustication. Comparison of the structure with Bentley's drawing of the east elevation reveals the fact that his original idea was to have twelve windows in the apse, arranged in pairs. We venture to think that the second version as adopted is the more stately and effective.
The colonnade shafts of the eaves gallery, three of which sup- port four arches in the intervals between the buttresses, spring from the brick parapet and terminate in Ionic capitals ; the voussoirs of the arcading being of brick and stone like the windows below, details which are well seen in Plate IX. The gallery roof is constructed of concrete slabs forming a flat around the timber roof of the apse. From the apex of the latter, whose oak timbers are covered with greenish-tinted slates, rises an elegant cross fleurie, raised on a 4 -ft. shaft, the whole finial measuring 7 ft. high. The Crown of Thorns, suspended by a cable entmning it and passing over the arms, encircles the stem of the cross. This finial, the work of Messrs. Elsley & Co., is constructed of cast lead made up on a core of wood.
Behind the steep pitch of the apse roof one observes with pleasure another arcading, that of the exterior gallery which, built upon the wide arch of the choir vaulting, and passing through
1 Paper read before the Architectural Asaociation, April 12th, 1907.
114 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the eastern abutments of the sanctuary dome, provides com- munication between the staircase turrets. An object successfully- achieved by means of these numerous passages and balconies was that every window in the building should be readily accessible for cleaning.
Crowning the eastern view, rises the window-pierced circle of the sanctuary dome, flanked by the two white cupolas of the turrets (Plate X). The south-east turret contains three bells named Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel (the gift of the Sheldrake Brothers), which were cast by Mr. S. B. Goslin at his foundry in Southwark. Their tones are never heard, because persons living in the neighbourhood found them disturbing and made a request for their silence to Cardinal Vaughan.
The apse was quite finished externally by December 1900, so that, with the exception of the finial cross, it had the advantage of being carried out entirely under its designer's supervision.
The slated roof of the sacristy and the attractive fenestration of its east and south sides, next absorbs the eye before it travels along the line of the south elevation. The absence here, which immediately strikes one, of certain decorative features, especially noted on the lower levels on the north side, is explained by the fact that the vacant breadth of site has from the first been intended for letting on building lease : so that the multiplication of details, sooner or later to be concealed by adjoining buildings, was regarded as wasteful extravagance and therefore to be avoided.'
The only entrance on this side is the small and inconspicuous doorway at the base of the transept turret. It will be observed also that the apse of the Lady Chapel is destitute of openings, its nave being lighted by four segmental-headed window lights, that nearest the sanctuary being smaller than its fellows. Four circular windows pierce the wall of its flat-roofed aisle, which forms the processional way from the sacristy.
Having gazed his fill on the vista of domes and turrets, the
* The east end of the site, adjoining Clergy House and Choir School, was in 1913 being laid out as a garden.
THE EXTERIOR 115
student, eager and stimulated, will retrace his steps to the west end, there to ascend by the turret staircases of the narthex to make closer acquaintance with the roofing. Emerging from the balcony of either of these western turrets, he will cross as before explained to the circular stairway, continuing the ascent in either of the western counterforts of the nave, until the exit to the flat roofing on which the domes seem to rest is attained. These flats are formed, as we have seen, upon the built-up haunches of the pendentives. On the radiating ribs of their extrados were built light sleeper walls of concrete, over which was thickly laid Val-de- Travers asphalte. This flat roofing of concrete and asphalte inclines up the base of the domes to a height of about 4 ft. 6 in. under their outer covering, where it is keyed into the concrete.
The independent external covering of each of the three domes of the nave presents, as already stated, an elaborate network of jointing, being formed of over six hundred slabs of artificial stone, 3 in. thick and cast to the curve.
Arrived at the easternmost limit of the flat walk around the nave domes, one is confronted with the salient constructive differ- ences of the fourth or sanctuary dome. Not only is it smaller in diameter, the circle developed by its pendentives being only 52 ft., in comparison with the 60 ft. of the nave vaults, but the extrados of its pendentives are left uncovered, to form pyramidal series of concrete steps following the plan of the dome (Plate XI). North and south rises the revealed vaulting over the organ galleries. From the pendentives sweeps up the drum or circular podium, pierced by twelve windows (Plate XII and Fig. 23, p. 93), whose reveals represent a series of counterforts all round the dome. Gargoyles are placed between these windows to carry off the water collected by the guttered concrete slabs, fixed between this wall and the shell of the dome. The flat of the drum is covered with asphalte, which passes up under the artificial stone covering as before described. By either of the eastern turrets the descent to the ground floor may now be accomplished, after inspecting on the way the areaded passage contrived through the eastern counter-
116 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
forts of this dome, whence a closer view of the apse roofing and its finial cross may be obtained.
We could not, we think, close this chapter more happily than by a quotation from Prof. Lethaby's article on the cathedral,' published in the architect's lifetime. Speaking of the exterior he says : "If beauty were a merely abstract thing, there are thoughts, contrivances, delicacies of fancy here which might give fortune to a hundred buildings. No expedient of a critical refinement is here neglected. The great tower which climbs 220 ft. into the air has the entasis of a classic column. The capitals are elegantly profiled like the earliest perfect Greek. The mouldings are pur- poseful, sharp, and refined. Everywhere is change, adjustment, variety. Moreover, there is a certain universality — or at least synthesis — in the style, and every country and every age contri- butes its quota. Athens, Byzantium, Pisa, Bologna, Milan, Venice, the South of France, England's Gothic, the Renaissance of Dona- tello, the modern French of M. Due (not Viollet), and the modern English of Philip Webb — all these and many more antecedents colour this complex result."
' Architectural Review, January 1902.
CHAPTER VII
THE INTERIOR (l)
General description and details — Narthex, nave, sanctuary, apse — Baldacchino and furniture of sanctuary — Crypt and mortuary chapel.
" Internally," says the Official Handbook issued for tlie rite of its consecration, " the appearance of the cathedral, even in its unfinished state, is exceedingly imposing ; with the full view of its 342 ft. of length ; its vast nave higher and wider than any nave in England ; ' the twelve lower arches on each side of the nave supporting the tribunes or galleries ; above each two of these arches a lofty arch of 73 ft. in height ; above each two of the latter, a still loftier arch of 90 ft. ; and rising above these highest arches, the three domes of the nave. Besides the nave, there are its aisles, with their side chapels and the baptistery ; the transepts with the spacious chapel of the Blessed Sacrament on the left (or Gospel side) and the chapel of our Lady on the right (or Epistle side) of the sanctuary ; and the great sanctuary itself with its many marble columns, its dome with twelve windows, its aisles, its archiepiscopal throne, its baldacchino and high altar and the raised apsidal choir behind them " (Plate XI V).
Westminster Cathedral is, as we have seen, essentially a veneered building, outwardly covered with a comparatively thin skin of red brick and Portland masonry, internally destined to be clothed with a vesture of marble and mosaic. The various schemes of mosaic decoration, whether those merely suggested or those actually adopted, are, for the sake of convenience, discussed in another chapter; the marble wall linings, the monolithic
1 See Comparative Table, Appendix B, p. 332. 117
118 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
columns and all interior fittings fall properly within the compass of this. We propose to describe first the narthex, nave, sanctuary, retro-choir, and crypt, dealing with baptistery, aisles, and side chapels in the succeeding chapter.
The Narthex
On entering the church by the great western door, the eye is captured by two superb shafts of Norwegian gi-anite, very similar in its deep, glowing red to the ancient and precious porphyry of Egypt. Thirteen feet high and crowned with exceedingly ele- gant caps of unpolished Carrara, they stand like sentinels within the narthex, supporting the central arch below the western gallery. The adjoining walls and vaults are bare and unadorned, the sole hint of completion being the rich marble paving and the marble framing of the t\vo three-light windows which, in the wall to right and left of the main doorway, serve to illuminate the narthex from the lobby outside (Plate XV).
It must be recorded that Bentley left complete designs for the marble work of both sides of the three western doorways, and of the inside of the north-west porch door and those admitting to the turret staircases, and of the balconies over them, besides laying down the general lines of the revetment at this end.
Beneath the three central arcades the floor is laid with oblong slabs of the grey marble known as bleu fleuri, divided by a narrow transverse pattern of black diamond-shaped tesserse set on a white ground. In the recesses opposite to the lateral entrance lobby a square of green flanked by panels of blue-grey tint, is surrounded by a border of black and white. To right and left laurel wreaths in verde antico with interlacing ribbons of warm yellow give variety and enrichment to the design which at the juncture of aisles and narthex displays an intricate arrangement of circles in marble mosaic, the colour scheme introducing green, red, white and black tesserai, arranged concentrically with a circular motive of red or green.
THE INTERIOR 119
The Nave
The marble columns being the earliest decorative feature to be placed in the edifice, while ranking also among its secondary constructive requirements, it is fitting, indeed obvious, that they should receive here priority of attention and interest. There are in all twenty-nine columns in nave, aisles, and transepts — each a single block tapering slightly in graceful entasis — to carry the vaulting of the aisles and the galleries of the transepts. Looking east, the eye first rests in admiration on eight perfect shafts of verde antico, 13 ft. high, supporting, four on either side, the galleries of the nave.
The sovu'ce of this marble, so prized by the builders of classic times, was lost to the world for long centuries ; its re-discovery being due to the learning and enterprise of Mr. Brindley, F.G.S., directed by the words of Paul the Silentiary, a Greek, who more than fourteen centuries ago had sung with exquisite poetic fervour the glories of Santa Sophia. In this ode written to celebrate the opening of Justinian's great church on December 24ith, a.d. 563, he speaks of the " fresh green stone of Thessaly," so abundantly used by the architect, as " the marble that the land of Atrax yields, not from some upland glen, but from the local plains ; in parts fresh green as the sea or emerald stone ; or again like blue corn- flowers in grass, with here and there a drift of fallen snow, a sweet mingled contrast on the dark shining surface."
To this " land of Atrax " therefore Mr. Brindley went, and there, at Casambala, about seven miles to the north-east of Larissa, hard by the road leading to the vale of Tempe, he found the only quarry in the world of this marmor molossium, this fair green stone. In- credible labour and perseverance in excavating at length revealed the ancient road in the rock, furrowed by the wheels of waggons and dating from 170 B.C. A depth of 60 ft. of accumulated rubble had to be removed before it was possible to work the quarry, this consummation being attained just in time for the needs of the church that was to develope and carry on the Justinian tradition.
120 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The verde antico monoliths were hand-quarried, and from Casambala were carried across the fields of the Thessalian plain to rail-head at Larissa. The arrival in England of the first columns was somewhat seriously delayed by the fortunes of war. The Greco-Turkish struggle was then at its height ; the Turks, over- running Thessaly in the summer of 1897, seized the columns and prevented their embarkation. For some months theiy held them as spoils, with the result that the architect suffered from an irritating delay of progress. It was not until the Turkish troops were finally withdrawn across the border that the marbles ceased to be prisoners of war. Shaped and polished in the marble mer- chants' workshops in London, they were at length set in place in the cathedral late in 1899.
Besides the eight verde antico columns in the nave, there are three in the transepts : one coupled with a shaft of Italian breccia in the south transept, a second paired with one of Greek cipollino in the north transept, whilst a third stands alone there to support the vaulting. A considerable quantity of verde antico is employed also for " sheeting " and for inlaying, as will be seen.
The Silentiary sings the praises also of the marmor carystium, " the fresh green from Carystus," This, known as cipollino, was quarried by the ancients at Carystus, at the foot of Mount Ocha in the Island of Eubcea. The credit of discovering and reopening the ancient quarry near Stource again belongs to INIr. Brindley. Westminster Cathedral is enriched with six columns of this beauti- ful material, whose delicate clear green surface is figured with broad wavy lines of deeper green or purplish grey or with the characteristic " onion " marking, whence its name is derived. It is employed also with magnificent effect on many flat surfaces, most notably, perhaps, on the crypt arcading behind the high altar and in the ambulatory of the crypt itself, of which more later.
With regard to the position of the six cipollino columns, one paired with a shaft of Italian breccia supports the eastern half of the south transept gallery ; a second and third coupled respectively with a column of breccia and one of verde antico carry the gallery
THE INTERIOR 121
in the north transept. The remaining three from the Euboean quarries will be found in the two chapels, dedicated to St. Paul and St. Patrick, off the south aisle, and in that to St. Joseph on the north side.
Bentley was exceedingly elated with the beauty of all these columns ; " it is doubtful," wrote he in the Tablet in May 1899, " whether finer examples of columns, both in colour and marking, ever left the two famous classic quarries in ancient days. The verde antico are certainly not surpassed by those that separate the nave from the aisle in Justinian's wondrous church of Santa Sophia, nor are the cipollino columns inferior to those in S. Vitale and S. Apollonius at Ravenna."
Of Swiss cipollino from Sayonne are the two columns which carry the aisle arcading where it opens into the chapels dedicated to St. George (north) and St. Andrew (south). A fine pair of coupled shafts of this same marble fulfils a similar duty in the chapel of St. Gregory and St. Augustine, adjoining the baptistery.
To the three columns of Italian breccia in the transepts we have already referred in passing. They came from the quarries near Verona, between Pietro Santo and Serra Vezza, and are finely varied in colour and figured with broad markings of yellow, grey, purple, and white. One of the shafts originally selected, an excep- tionally perfect specimen, cracked in the working ; a similar fate befell two magnificent cipollino monoliths ; to the architect's great disappointment all three had perforce to be rejected and replaced.
We have now examined twenty- six columns ; of the three yet unmentioned, two are to be found in the centre of the south transept, forming with the Lady Chapel, to a spectator looking eastwards, part of a splendid vista. They are of rose-red marble from Languedoc, very perfectly matched. The last column, to complete this tale of twenty-nine, is a fittingly sombre shaft of labradorite in the chapel of the Holy Souls. Other columns there are, of course, of no less beauty and importance, but of these we will speak as we discover them in our tour of the buildings.'
' For the names of donors of columns, see Appendix, p. 329.
122 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Each column stands on a moulded base of labradorite, a Nor- wegian granite whose dark surface is broken by moonlight gleams of mica flakes. The capitals are of white statuary marble, left unpolished in order to avoid giving them a porcelain-like appear- ance, no two being duplicated in design. " All the caps and bases," wrote Bentley in July 1895, " will take a new departure, or, rather, a carrying out of a very old one, and so with all the other details. I am not attempting a new style — that is impossible — but intend, as far as I am able, to develope the first phase of Christian architecture." The group of caps photographed in Plate XXXII conveys some idea of the architect's copious yet restrained versatility, and of the harmonious ordering of his decorative adjuncts ; though to the professional mind the repro- duction of one of the half-size details will doubtless be more welcome (Plate XXV).
A veritable school of design have these capitals been aptly styled — and yet, varied as they are, they may roughly be grouped in five classes. In some, of Byzanto-Corinthian parentage, the bell is entirely foliated, the pointed acanthus leaves with long flowing lines, curving upward from the lowest moulding, while the foliation is repeated again vertically on the richly moulded abacus. In others of this type the abacus is moulded with greater sim- plicity and adorned with rosettes carved in relief. A second type of capital combines foliation with the characteristic strapwork of elaborate interlacement, in very low relief on the beU of the capital, while the dosseret is likewise scvdptured with close-set leafage. Those crowning the "grand antique" columns in the Vaughan Chantry belong to this class, being an example of ex- quisite design Avedded to perfect craftsmanship. Another type, employed for certain of the nave columns, is the lobed melon form, covered with lace-like tracery.
Yet a third variety, of Byzanto-Ionic type, is to be found in the transepts, where volutes of varying form are surmounted by acanthus leaves in basso-relievo curved round a conventional pineapple or a medallion displaying the divine monogram. A
Plate XVII. — North Tkansept, View froji. South Gallerv or Nave. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
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THE INTERIOR 123
fourth type, with volutes of small size and projection, is surmounted by a highly developed cushion stone or dosseret, adorned with diagonal strapwork, over which rectangular plaques with foliation in extremely low relief are (apparently) laid. In the fifth class come the caps of the crypt columns, which are about half the height of those we have already described ; their volviting is of diversified pattern, while their proportions well convey the feeling that these columns support a low and massive underground vaulting.
The capitals of the interior were carved after being placed in position by sculptors in the employment of Messrs. Farmer & Brindley ; each occupied the entire time of two men for the space of three months.
With the exception of the slender moulded frames of white marble on its piers, hereafter to contain the Stations of the Cross, the nave ' remains as the architect last beheld it, massive, unbroken, soaring brickwork, almost bare of mouldings, untrammelled and free for the garment of beauty with which this and generations yet unborn will be privileged to drape it.
It was Bentley's intention to employ over sixty species of marble from all quarters of the world, an incredibly richer variety than Byzantium with all her power and wealth could command. We enumerate in this and the succeeding chapters some forty varieties used in the relatively small portion of the decoration yet accomplished. The marble sheeting of the nave, for which fortunately he had prepared inch and half-inch scale drawings, will extend from the floor level to the sills of the lower gallery windows, a height of 38 ft. ; at this point the marble casing ceases, with the exception of some pilasters between and lateral to these windows. Above this line of marble will come the mosaics, but these, covering
* Since the above was written, the marble work of the westenunost pier of the nave on the south side has been partially carried out, but not in accordance with Bentley's designs. Moreover, the original frames for the Stations of the Cioss have been torn down and replaced by mouldings more in keeping with the strangelj- crude sculptured " Stations " which have taken the place of the opus seotile pictures intended for this position.
124 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the remaining portion of the walls, the vaults and the domes, cannot naturally be touched until the marble work is completed.
As at present proposed, the decoration of this " great, gaunt, wide nave " is to be executed, bay by bay, as funds permit ; firstly, the marble work up to the gallery level, including the marble balustrading in place of the present temporary wooden erection. Then, as finances render it possible, the marble could be carried to its upward limit. The rough approximate estimate of cost for each bay up to the gallery level, inclusive of the balustrade, is £1,000, or £500 for half a bay. The entire length of the nave from the sanctuary piers to the western gallery, including its three arches and balustrade, will, it is estimated, cost £8,000. The authorities hope that benefactors will come forward to undertake sections of the decoration, just as, during the past twenty-three years, they have nobly responded to the appeals for columns, capitals, chapels, and the rest.
Says Mr. Marshall : ' " Mr. Bentley's suggestions for the revet- ment of the interior show, as might be expected, an appreciation of the principles underlying the application of marble and mosaic as exemplified at Venice and at Ravenna. The well-defined line of demarcation between the two materials, at a uniform level ; the high and narrow slabs riveted to the walls and piers, and ' opened out ' so that they could not possibly be mistaken for solid masonry ; the strips or facets that roughly follow the curves ; the extreme thinness of the veneer, exposed at all salient angles ; and above all, the vast expanses of sheeting, due to the unbroken wall surfaces, and the massiveness of the piers, undisturbed by mouldings and made more impressive by the insertion, at rare intervals, of choicer slabs, and by the brilliancy of carving — these are some of the qualities we associate with the ideal type of marble revetment.
" This being so, it is evident that the essential features of Mr. Bentley's plan scarcely afford scope for a full development of this type. The sub-division or multiplication of the piers and the
* Paper read before tlie Architectural Association, April 12th, 1907.
THE INTERIOR 125
lack of unbroken wall surface on the ground floor demanded a treatment on independent lines that may best be described as a compromise between the Byzantine and the Renaissance. An- other marked divergence from the Byzantine type — in an opposite direction — is seen in the sparing use of columns for the gallery arcades, resulting in a wide inter-columniation, again in favour of the Renaissance.
" But if the piers and walls do not present an ideal field for the application of marble, this cannot be said of the floor space, where unbounded facilities are afforded for that most essential feature — from the architectural point of view — a marble pavement throughout the building. The value of the marble paving in relation to the wall lining can be seen in the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament and in the two western chapels of the nave."
As regards the furnishing of the nave, we note near the narthex, at its northern pier, a seated statue of St. Peter cast in bronze. A facsimile of the famous ancient figure in St. Peter's at Rome, it was given to the cathedral by the friends of the Rev. Luke Rivington, D.D., who died in 1899, as a memorial to this eloquent preacher, and was originally and appropriately intended to be placed in the crypt dedicated to the Prince of the Apostles ; but when taken there was discovered to be too large to look well, and so found its present place in the nave. Mr. Dudley Baxter was the prime mover in obtaining the statue and ordering the pedestal and had some correspondence with Bentley on the sub- ject, who, when he heard that it was to be made in Rome, had expressed his fears and doubts as to the artistic result. The pedestal mouldings are of alabaster, the centre panels of green Polcevera marble, with a suitable inscription incised thereon ; the base is of black and white marble. The statue itself is of a dark-coloured bronze like the original.
Against the secondary pier of the south transept is built the pulpit, with whose design it is at once obvious the architect had nothing whatever to do. Cardinal Vaughan when in Rome gave the commission for its design and production to Cavaliere Aristide
126 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Leonori, a Roman artist employed by the Vatican, who had never seen Westminster Cathedral. It is therefore hardly matter for surprise that the result should be so absolutely incongruous ; indeed it is but fair to state that Cavaliere Leonori himself ad- mitted the unsuitability of his design when he saw the pulpit in situ. Mercifully, Bentley never had that misfortune.
The pulpit is triple, as the metropolitan church requires, in order to accommodate, when the Archbishop is preaching, an assistant on either hand. The preacher is raised 4 ft. above his audience, access to the pulpit being obtained by a staircase of white marble. This material composes the moulding and framework of the structxire, enriched with cosmati work in various colom-ed precious marbles and glass mosaic. In the upper central panel of the front is a carved representation of the Lamb of God, enclosed within four interlacing circles of marble and mosaic. To right and left, within niches, are figures of the four evangelists bearing their emblems. In the lower portion of the pulpit, just beneath these figures, are four twisted columns, inlaid with coloured and gold mosaic. The pulpit is still without a sounding board, but the acoustic properties of the cathedral are so excellent that its absence is not so great a disadvantage as might be imagined. It was the gift of Mr. Ernest Kennedy, whose name also appears in the list of founders. A temporary wood pulpit, with sounding board, is now in more general use.
Bentley had prepared designs for a marble floor, for the nave and aisles, of surpassing beauty and originality, of which no illustra- tion could give more than a faint idea of the sumptuous effect it was intended to produce. In the nave, swimming in a sea of wave-like eipollino, were to be seen, in tints of rose and pearl, fish typifying all the varieties promised to St. Peter's net — -an allusion, too, to the symbolic idea of the Church as a ship, navis, bearing her burden safely over the troubled sea of this life.
The design for the nave floor is divided into sections measuring 10 ft. long by 9 ft. wide, containing five waved bands with inlaid fish, while the alternate compartments are patterned with slabs of
THE INTERIOR 127
a delicate light grey marble (bleu flcuri?) enclosed within a framing of small black and white squares, interspersed at regular intervals by pink or blue diamond-shaped tesserae set in a ground of golden yellow, a 9-in. bordering of some dark-hued marble en- closing the whole. Each 10 x 9 panel is divided laterally from its neighbour by a strip of light-toned marble, 2 ft. 9 in. wide, running the whole length of each bay. There are five oblong compart- ments tlms divided transversely across each bay, and six, not so divided, longitudinally, making thirty in all between one pair of great piers and the next. Dividing each bay from the next, in the breadth of the piers is a design of 4-ft. circles of rose-red marble, alternating with lozenges of green enclosed within tesserae-filled squares of equal diameter.
The floor between the columns and piers of the nave arcading lias been laid, and is very simply treated with oblong slabs of second statuary marble, measuring 8 ft. x 3 ft. 6 in., framed in Belgian grand antique, with surroundings of bleu fleuri, the fine grey marble which, as we have seen, is largely and effectively em- ployed in the paving of the narthex. The floor of the aisles is divided, in the design, into rectangular spaces, with external dimensions of 18 ft, x 8 ft., each roughly equivalent to the corre- sponding half-bay of the nave, and divided from the next by an oblong of bleu fleuri enclosed in a pattern of black and white tesserae. Four lozenges, two of green and two of pink marble, separated by light-coloured diagonal lines, occupy the large rect- angular spaces, a miniature repetition in small tesseras of these pink and green lozenges filling the intervening spaces,
" What a grand floor ! " wrote the Cardinal enthusiastically to the architect (whom he had been continually pressing for the design), when it reached him late in October, 1901. The design was shortly after submitted for estimates to a Belgian firm, probably with a view to that financial economy which the Cardinal had always in mind. The firm in question declined to give a price, on the ground of the difficulty likely to be experienced in obtaining certain of the marbles required by the specification. An
128 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
English company eventually estimated the cost at £l per square foot, or roughly £18,000 for the area to be covered.
The prospect of such heavy expenditure on paving alone, when so much else remained to be accomplished, coupled with other con- siderations frequently impressed upon him, decided the Cardinal to give up the marble floor. He had not sufficient funds for the purpose, but " even if they were at hand," argued he, in justifica- tion of his decision,' " the claims of hygiene and of comfort assert themselves with a positive defiance. A marble floor in England to stand or kneel upon during long services is synonymous with cold, rheumatism, influenza, and every other bodily ailment. How many in delicate health would venture to spend an hour or two upon such a pavement ? And delicate health is the rule rather than the exception. Again, in our damp climate, the moisture of the atmosphere would often settle on the cold surface of the floor in big beads of water. The experience of the cold that seems to arise from a marble pavement, even when covered with matting, is against the employment of marble. We heard only the other day of how in a certain fashionable Anglican church floored with marble, but covered with carpet or matting, ladies continually leave the church during the service on the plea of the cold striking up from the pavement. In Vienna the marble floor of the cathedral is overlaid with boards during winter ; in Spain the floors are covered with mats ; and even in St. Peter's in Rome a plank is put down on which the deacons stand while they sing the Passion in Holy Week. Again, it is said that the noise of moving chairs on a marble floor is extremely disagreeable and distracting, as many will remember from their experience, for instance, of the Gesii in Rome, and of other churches where movable chairs are in use."
And so the aesthetic ideal was banished by the utilitarian and economic considerations which decided the question in favour of wood block flooring, a small concession to the claims of con- gruity being made in the shape of the marble paving of the narthex
1 Westminster Cathedral Record, No. 11, June 1902.
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and the framing between the piers and columns, executed some years later from Bentley's designs. It was a bitter termination to the hours of thought and work bestowed on his beautiful conception — - yet another addition to the burden of thwarting and harassment which undoubtedly hastened his end.' Reasonable though the Cardinal's arguments appeared, and right as his motives certainly were, it is surely open to doubt whether, with the cathedral's extremely efficient heating system, the dreaded inconvenience of cold and damp would have actually existed ; while the risk of disturbance by noise could have been reduced to a minimum by the attachment of some simple contrivance such as rubber or metal domes to the chair legs. The argument of expense was one less easy to answer ; but we may be permitted to express the hope that by the generosity of some future generation the wood block flooring will one day be replaced by the architect's dream of marble.
We have already, in a footnote, referred to the white marble frames of the Stations of the Cross, which were fixed on the western sides of the main piers of the nave. Inscriptions on the paving below record the names of the fourteen donors ° who, at a cost of about £75 each, presented the sacred pictures. One would be interested to know whether they approved of the substitution of the sculptured panels around which controversy has raged so acutely, in place of the opus sectile for which they had paid. The sculptor of these Stations is Mr. Eric Gill. It has been explained by a writer in the Westminster Cathedral Chronicle (March 1918) that these panels are not carved in imitation of a bygone style, Byzantine or any other, and that the artist has confined himself to a diagrammatic treatment of the subjects, which may be best described as impassive reminders of the scenes of Our Lord's Passion.
The cathedral is lighted throughout with electric light, operated from a switchboard on the eastern side of the great pier of the south
^ We were assured by the late Mr. C. N. Hemy, R.A., that Mr. John Sargent, R.A., tried his utmost to persuade the Cardinal to have Bentley's floor carried out at once. 2 For a list of these benefactors, see Appendix, p. 331.
1—9
130 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
transept. The system of distributing the light about the building is the most brilliant that can be adopted ; the nave being provided with twelve pendants, six on each side, suspended from cantilevers fixed into the walls a few feet below the springing of the domes, on the level of the floor of the passages that run just above the vaulting of the galleries. The mains are laid in these passages, connections being made at each cantilever for the wiring that descends to the pendants. The mains descend to the basement by the newel of a turret staircase at the east end of the building. The sanctuary has three pendants on either side, suspended from cantilevers fixed into the walls, and resting on the marble organ screens. The mains run along the top of these screens and descend also by the turret staircases.
The nave pendants, fixed early in 1909, are reminiscent of the metal circles to bear lamps in Santa Sophia so eloquently described by the Silentiary. They were entirely designed by the firm of Messrs. Bentley, Son & Marshall, the architect having left no record of his intentions in this respect. They consist of a system of plain iron rings, varying in diameter and connected by a light network of chains. The topmost ring, 6 ft. in diameter, has fifteen lamps, each dependent electric bulb appearing like a flower bud with outspread calyx of metal. The next ring has ten lamps, and the lowest only three. Rings and chains are of wrought iron, painted a neutral green. The complete lighting of the nave cost £2,005 ; but though finished in 1909 it was, by an arrangement entered into with the firm who executed it, not to be used until the money to pay for it was forthcoming. An appeal for funds had been made in February 1907, but the nave remained in darkness till in 1912 certain generous benefactors came forward to remove the ban.
The sanctuary coronas, though similar in design to those in the nave, are a good deal smaller and gilt instead of painted.
A feature designed to attract attention immediately one enters the cathedral is the great crucifix, suspended by three stout chains from the soffit of the sanctuary arch. Thirty feet high and
THE INTERIOR 131
carved in wood, it was made in Bruges from Bentley's designs, though, from some error in measurement afterwards impossible to rectify, its proportions are not exactly as he intended. The wood is painted and gilt, canvas being stretched on both sides over the recessed centre of shaft and arms. The designs for its decoration were prepared by the late W. Christian Symons and submitted to the architect shortly before his death, the cross being made after this had taken place. On the obverse is painted a figure of Christ, about 18 ft. high, on a vermilion ground, bounded along the outer edge by a line of vivid green. This touch of contrasting colour was added at the suggestion of John Sargent, R.A., to produce a jewel-like effect in the setting. The emblems of the four evan- gelists occupy the extremities of shaft and arms. On the reverse side of the cross, facing the high altar, is depicted the Sorrowful Mother, clad in sombre draperies of purple and white ; while texts from the hymn Stabat Mater, selected by Cardinal Vaughan, appear in the four extremities.
The cross, painted by Mr. Symons in the cathedral on the floor level, was raised when completed by means of ropes and pulleys ; a bar being temporarily fixed across the arch to support a ladder. The weight of the cross is about 2 tons, and its fixing occupied some eighteen hours (Plate XIX).
The Sanctuary
The sanctuary, 62 ft. deep by 50 ft. wide, is enclosed north and south by a double row of superposed columns, the raised choir beyond being yet narrower: an arrangement which, it has been pointed out, has its special advantage in increasing the perspective effect of length and distance. All the lines of per- spective converge and focus upon the baldaechino and the high altar beneath it. The great piers supporting the sanctuary dome are plainly cased in slabs of dark reddish-brown Levantine, so quiet in effect that they in no wise distract the eye from the central feature.
132 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
On moulded circular bases of grey Derbyshire fossil marble rest the columns of the bold and simple arcading which carries the galleries or tribunes above. Three on either side, and dividing the sanctuary from the aisles of the Blessed Sacrament and Lady Chapels, these columns are of French jasper and a light pink Norwegian marble,' each selected with infinite care for its beauty and delicacy of colour and figure. The caps, of Carrara, have not yet been submitted to the tools of the carver. It is to be hoped that their completion may soon remove the somewhat rude effect produced among so much that is the per- fection of finish. The soffits and simple archi volts of these four lateral arches are of warm grey Hopton Wood stone, polished, the spandrels being faced with a horizontal banding in alternate strips of campan vert and pavonazzo (the former being about half the width of the latter), to a point just above their crowns (Plate XVIII).
Above rises the parapet of the tribunes, 3 ft. in height from their flooring to its coping 21 in. broad, on which stand the seven columns of the upper arcading. The marble work of this parapet is particularly charming ; vertical oblong slabs of red Veronese, alternately straight and concave on their lower edge, are set along it in positions corresponding to those of the columns above. In the alternate spaces lozenges of verde antico in a waved and carved framing of Carrara give the needed note of contrast to their surroundings of pale breccia, which, in conjunction with a further framing of white, occupy the whole of the rectangles between the red Verona slabs. The white marble parapet is 50 ft. long, and bears, as we have seen, seven pavonazzo columns. Seven feet six inches high, their yellowish-white surface is broken with beautiful markings of greyish-green and purplish-pink and an occasional mingling of warm yellow, the general effect, at a distance, remaining almost white.
Their capitals, alike in shape, but varying each in the details of their carving in low relief, have volutes of sliglit projection
' liiiowa as " Midnight Sun."
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above which a circular boss of marble, either red, green, pink, yellow, or bluish-green, is set jewel-like in each of their four sides. The arches they carry are turned in stone, faced on soffite with Carrara marble, which composes also the moulded cornice and — carved with acanthus in very low relief, around a coloured marble plaque or boss — the spandrels of these arches. The entablature shows above each column a panel of verde antico set in a narrow border of gold glass mosaic ; a pilaster against the pier at each end of the tribune being of the same rich green stone. Altogether this upper arcading is a delightful piece of fancy.
Though the inner side of these arcadings is left in a state as rough and unfinished as the brick walls behind, the tribunes have been floored with wood blocks, stained and polished. The width of each tribune is 8 ft. 9 in. A doorway, with door of teak, leads at their east end to the turret staircase, which at the same level is lighted by a triply-arched vaulted opening borne on two columns, whence it is possible to gaze directly down on the retro-choir and to inspect the details of the rear of the baldacchino. These columns of brecc ia, 6 ft. high and proportionately slender, rise without bases from the concrete floor and terminate in simple caps, elegantly carved in very slight relief. It is perhaps the unexpectedness of these openings in the westernmost part of the wall of the apse that lends so greatly to their charm. Fortunately Bentley left complete coloured designs for the marble work of these doorways and bal- conies. Whether they will ever be executed according to his drawings is quite another matter and one on which one hazards very slight expectation.
Similar doors at the western ends of the sanctuary tribunes give access to the galleries spanning the transepts. Originally the architect intended the former to accommodate the lay choir as well as parts of the organ, the casing of which will rise from the cornice of the arcading. Diverted as it is from its monastic intention, the retro-choir is now occupied by the choristers and by a small tem- porary organ.
Descending to the ground level and again approaching the
134 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
sanctuary from the nave, we first note the low chancel screen of porphyry-coloured rosso antico inset with panels of very rare and choice yellow Italian breccia. These panels, sawn from one unique block of this precious marble, are framed in narrow mould- ings of second statuary marble. The low wall or parapet, 5 ft. high from the nave floor, is curved navewards on either side at a distance of 8 ft. from the great piers to form a small ambo, for use when desired for brief announcements and instructions. These ambones measure 4 ft. 6 in. across and are 2 ft. deep at their radial axis, being roughly semi-circular on the inner side, while presenting a pentagonal face to the nave. The wall con- tinues for 5 ft. 8 in., till at the bottom step of the central flight it turns at an angle upwards along its ascent. The breadth of the parapet coping is 13 in. The inlaid slabs of breccia are set in a continuous framing on three of the five sides of each ambo ; the centre one measuring 17 x 18 in., those at the sides being 17 in. square. The three breccia panels which adorn the remainder of the wall on either side, two facing the nave and one on the wall bounding the steps, are 3 ft. 2 in. long by 17 in. broad. These six steps are composed of the same red-brown marble, the lowest measuring 14 ft. and the topmost 9 ft. across, so that the sanctuary wall, as we have seen, following their ascent, turns upwards and inwards.
Ascending to the lower sanctuary level or presbyterium, we find that its floor is laid with a fine warm -toned parquetry, the marble floor of the sanctuary proper reaching only to the three white marble steps which divide the one from the other at a distance of about 25 ft. from the parapet. As originally arranged by the architect, these steps were at a distance of 24 ft. east of the parapet, leaving ample space for movement about the throne and altar in the remaining length of 17 ft. 9 in. between this point and the lowest altar steps ; subsequently it was at one time (November 1901) almost decided to have no break in the sanctuary, but either to level up the lower part or to throw the steps forward into those before the altar. This
THE INTERIOR 135
marble floor composed of Irish red, Siena, red Languedoc, campan vert, verde antico and giallo antico, and black and white marbles, combined in refined and elegant designs " just saves the balda- cchino from the insult . . . and indignity of rising from a plat- form of wood-block flooring, though it can never compensate for defects due to the lack of Mr. Bentley's personal supervision." '
Bold lozenges of verde antico and red Languedoc framed in a small inlay of black and white form the main motive of the sanctuary floor, six of the green "diamonds" being set, in rows of three and three, below the steps before the high altar, and flanked on either hand by six of the red diamonds similarly arranged. Between are placed small rectangular slabs of giallo antico, which marble also forms a pattern outside the angles of the diamonds, with similar framing and dividing lines. The floor immediately to right and left of the high altar, beneath the canopy-like projections of the baldacchino, has circles of rosso antico, combined with the rich deep green of verde antico and the more delicate hues of campan vert. The predella is floored with red Languedoc surrounded by the pale yellow of Siena, and inset with campan vert and verde antico. The five steps are of white second statuary marble.
The Apse
Immediately behind the high altar a flight of eight steps to right and to left of it ascends to a central platform, whence rise nine more steps (all of the same white marble) to the retro-choir. The dividing wall or parapet of the retro-choir extends in a straight line from a point midway in the thickness of the eastward piers of the sanctuary to this platform behind the high altar. The height of this wall from the sanctuary level is 11 ft. 3 in., the retro- choir being raised 8h ft. above that level. Doors to right and left in the apse, just beyond the parapet, lead to the stairways earlier mentioned. In the centre of the apse is a doorway, now closed,
* Mr. J. A. Marshall, paper read before Architectural Association, April 1907.
136 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
intended as a means of access to the projected monastic buildings. This apsidal retro-choir is 48 ft. deep, and affords ample accom- modation for the forty men and boys of the trained choir.
The organ, worthy of the cathedral, that it is proposed to erect when funds permit, would have its console here to be in proximity to the choir and conductor. The instrument would be built in seven different parts, with four manuals, arranged as follows : the lowest manual to play the choir organ in the apse on the north side ; the second manual to play the great organ, which would comprise three parts : No. 1 being the " positive " or accompany- ing organ in the apse, on the south side ; No. 2, the second part of the great organ, in the south-east tribune ; No. 3, the organ in the western gallery. The third manual would operate the swell organ in the apse on its south side ; while the fourth would control the solo organ or continuation of the swell organ in the north-east tribune. The pedal board would play the choir pedal organ in the south side of the apse, and also the grand pedal organ situated partly in the south-west and partly in the north-west tribune. As regards the action of this nobly planned instrument, those portions in the apse would be under tubular-pneumatic working ; but electric control would be necessary for the rest on account of the great distance of the tribunes from the keyboards. It is proposed to work the blowing by six high-pressure hydraulic engines.
The organ thus designed would cost complete, but exclusive of the case and the blowing apparatus, about £8,000 ; that is, £6,500 for the instrument and £1,500 for motive power, structural neces- sities, etc. A further £2,000 would meet the cost of a suitable case and the six hydraulic engines. To raise this large sum an Organ Committee was formed, and an account called the " West- minster Cathedral Organ Account " opened in 1909. The archi- tect had always intended and hoped that his friend of many years, the late Mr. Thomas C. Lewis, who had bestowed infinite care and thought on its design, should buUd this organ.
To return to the parapet and wall between sanctuary and retro-
Plate XIX. — The Rood.
13G]
THE INTERIOR 137
choir. In an earlier chapter attention has been drawn to the four arched openings, two on either side of the steps, which serve to give Hght to the crypt and at the same time add variety and interest to the background of the altar. These openings are filled with grilles of bronze, gilt, and glazed to prevent draughts in the sanctuary. The surrounding wall space is covered with choice, vertically placed slabs of Greek cipollino, each bounded by a narrow strip of the fine rouge antique of the Pyrenees. In the centre of every panel of the green marble is set a lozenge of the red, outlined with a border of gold mosaic cubes. The coping of the wall is of white statuary marble, which is utilized also for the mouldings defining the four arches. The retro-choir is floored with parquetry, but its walls are, to this moment, quite destitute of decoration.
It is pleasing to be able to record that Bentley left inch-scale drawings of the marble work for the sanctuary, showing the marbles tinted, though unfortunately not specified by name, and from these designs the work has been carried out.
The High Altar and Baldacchino
Having examined the setting, it is now fitting to focus our attention upon the jewel it enshrines. It was Bentley's deter- mination that the high altar and baldacchino should be the crown of his work, the ark within the Holy of Holies. To this end he lavished infinite pains and thought upon their designs ; and the Cardinal's decision to have a plain unadorned block of granite for the altar came as a crushing disappointment. Forced to give way on this point, he was adamant as to the form of the canopy, though ready as ever to listen to those qualified to make suggestions.
He wrote in November 1901 : " At present I see no other way of doing the baldacchino than what I have shown, but I shall be glad of any suggestion. I know I spent a great deal of thought upon it, and I think it is the best thing about the cathedral." The design was a constructional development of the type of that of Sant' Ambrogio at Milan, which is borne on four pillars with carved
138 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
capitals, but without bases ; from these columns spring four semi- circular arches and a vaulted roof. Bentley's absolute resolve to have eight columns triumphed ultimately over the opposition of those who maintained that they were unnecessary, that four would be lighter, better, cheaper, and more in conformity with general usage. Patiently, though inexorably, he urged that the greater provision of space in his sanctuary allowed of a richer and more important structure, " that the baldacchino (and altar beneath) being the focus of the cathedral, ought to be presented as he had thought it out," as, in fact, an integral part of the whole.
Victorious at length as regards the design, on the question of material and execution he again found himself in opposition to the Cardinal. The eight monoliths, each 14| ft. high, were, according to the architect's provision, to be of an opaque yellow Veronese marble, of a deep honey colour in tone, durable and dependable in body. The Cardinal had set his heart on the partial translucency of onyx columns ; " but onyx, it was reported by the marble merchants of London, Belgium, and Paris, was not to be obtained in greater lengths than 5 or 6 ft. . . . All the columns in the cathedral are monoliths, and the baldacchino ought to be reared on nothing inferior. . . ." Thus and as follows wrote the Cardinal, in the last number of the Cathedral Record, published June 1902, to justify his acting in opposition to Bentley's anxious desire that the baldacchino should be carried out entirely by an English firm and under his own constant supervision. The article continued : " The Cardinal, however, had a friend in Marseilles, M. Cantini, who had supplied the marbles to the new Byzantine cathedral in that city, and is the owner of quarries of onyx in Africa. But onyx monoliths of the length required for Westminster had never been produced ; and although the owner of these quarries thought he could supply them, he said that it would require many months to do so. The winter [1901-2] passed in fruitless endeavours, but at length his efforts were crowned with success. The desired lengths are secured in onyx dore and onyx nuage. . . ."
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Subsequently to the architect's death the Cardinal had desired M. Cantini to submit an estimate for the whole baldacchino, which was to be prepared in Marseilles and delivered ready for erection ; but the idea came to naught, and eventually the con- tract went to Messrs. Farmer & Brindley, who began the work in 1905.
But long before this, the semi-translucent onyx columns from Africa had arrived in the cathedral, and had perforce been rejected, three on unpacking being discovered to be broken, and another in a badly cracked condition. This further delay was most disap- pointing to those in authority, who had already collected subscrip- tions of £250 each for six of the columns, though by those who longed for the perfect realization of Bentley's design the oc- currence was regarded as nothing short of providential — the order being almost immediately given for eight of the yellow Veronese shafts on which his desire had been fixed. The second set arrived in July 1905, and in the ensuing seventeen months the work went on apace, culminating in the unveiling of the baldacchino for the first time at the solemnity of midnight mass on Christmas Eve 1906.
The baldacchino occupies an area 31 ft. wide by 15 ft. deep, the central space over the high altar being canopied by a vault of 15 ft. span,' supported on four of the Verona columns, whose pedestals rest on the second lowest step of the flight of four below the predella. The height from the floor of the sanctuary to the springing of the vault is 26 ft., the total height of the canopy being about 38 ft. To resist the pressure of the vault at its springing, semi-circular canopy-like projections are provided on the north and south sides with flat ceilings supported each on two columns similar to those bearing the central vault, with the difference that, as they rise from the lowest step, the white marble portion of their pedestals is increased somewhat in height.
Upon this white marble footing stand the solid pedestals of verde antico, 2 feet square by 5 ft. high, inlaid on each face with
1 The original design was for a span of 18 ft. This reduction of 3 ft. has spoiled the proportions considerably.
140 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
an oval panel of breccia narrowly bordered with gold mosaic' These pedestals carry deep and finely moulded bases in statuary marble, the material which composes the capitals and all mouldings throughout the structure. The lowest member of each capital is adorned with small, upright and closely placed acanthi — from this circle spring large leaves, more freely treated, and shadowed by volutes of classic form. Their abaci are carved with an egg and tongue moulding above a minute bead. An oblong panel of the pale green campan vert gives the required note of relief in the entablature ; its cornice being adorned with the vertical acanthi, carved in slight relief.
Over the main arch is a gable or pediment of Carrara, borne on two transverse arches united by a barrel vault. Small lunettes break into the vault on either side, and open on to the flat roofs of the secondary, or side, canopies. The vaults and ceilings, constructed of concrete, are clothed with mosaic in a flower-like pattern of tesserae on a gold ground. The lunettes have their crescent- shaped soffits lined with a mosaic of deep blue and silver, while delicate grilles of wrought iron trebly gilt fill these small arches which break into the vault, as we have said, above the flat side canopies. The soffits of the two main arches show a succession of breccia panels in narrow mouldings of Carrara and enriched with delicate inlays of other marbles. In the spaces between gable and arch is a square-cut diaper inlaid with mother-of-pearl and lapis- lazuli and gold, and varied by a circular plaque of porphyry on either side and one of Thessalian marble within a diamond of vert campan in the centre. The complete cost of the baldacchino was £7,500.
The low reredos and flanking walls which formed an integral part of Bentley's design for the high altar and baldacchino were never carried out, and indeed at one time (early in 1904) there was grave risk of his plan for the latter being irretrievably spoiled by
' Cardinal Vaiighan had intended that the bases of the baldacchino columns should be adorned with the coat of arms of the donor, and that on all other columns subscribed for either the name or a suitable inscription desired by the donors should be engraved. In no case has this yet been carried out.
THE INTERIOR 141
considerable enlargement. To the Rev. Herbert Lucas the cathe- dral owes a deep debt of gratitude in this connection ; it has been already recorded in detail (in Chapter IV) how he fought for the integrity of the architect's plan of the sanctuary, although he failed unfortunately to get the central steps replaced in their intended position. His strenuous resistance to the idea of an enlarged baldacchino was largely instrumental in averting the threatened calamity. Bentley having left merely half-inch scale drawings for the baldacchino, but no full-size details and no design for the mosaic lining of its vaults and ceilings, these decorative adjuncts were completed by Mr. J. A. Marshall (Frontispiece).
The altar is formed of a single block of Cornish granite 12 ft. long by 4 ft. wide and 3 ft. 5 in. high, weighing 12 tons. This stone, the gift of the Hon. G. Saville, is unpolished but fine-axed, and is destitute of ornament, with the exception of a low retable of bronze placed upon the altar immediately after its consecration on June 28th, 1908. Upon this stand seven massive yet graceful candlesticks of bronze gilt, with a crucifix in the centre, each adorned with polished milky opals in the shape of pear-shaped pendants. They were executed from the designs of Messrs. Bentley, Son & Marshall, and were blessed and used for the first time for the mass of consecration.
At the Gospel side of the high altar stands the archiepiscopal throne, a facsimile, though smaller, of the throne in the basilica of St. John Lateran. It was the gift of the Catholic Bishops of England to the metropolitan see, upon the initiative of the late Dr. Patterson, Bishop of Emmaus. The choice of this design, as well as of that of the pulpit, was a very great grief to the archi- tect, who later told the story of how the Cardinal one day had literally taken his breath away by observing, as he proceeded to unroll the drawing, that he had " ordered a throne " — (" Just," said Bentley, " as though he had ordered an armchair in Tottenham Court Road.") " But where is the canopy ? " asked Bentley. " Oh ! there is no canopy : it is an exact copy of the throne at the Lateran." " Just so," came the ready retort, " a Papal — not
142 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
an archiepiscopal throne ! " But it was too late to protest ; the order had been given and the replica, duly carried out in Rome, arrived very soon after Bentley's death. It is composed chiefly of white statuary marble with mosaic ornament arranged in geometrical forms. On the front, below the seat, is cut the following inscription :
HERBERTO S. R. E. CARDINALI VAUGHAN
ARCHIEPISCOPO WESTMONASTERIENSI
METROPOLITANAM SEDEM
TOTIUS ANGLIC EPISCOPI
OBTULERUNT A.D. M.D.CCCC.
The arms of the Cardinal-Archbishop appear in its high back. The canopy required for an episcopal throne was eventually de- signed by the Bentley firm. Constructed in fumed oak and walnut, inlaid with holly and ebony, the head is upheld by a panelled and carved backing, which stands on the floor behind the throne, and is flanked by side wings. The marble chair, elevated on three steps, is placed symmetrically between the two columns on the north side of the sanctuary proximate to the altar, while the temporary stalls for canons and prebendaries in two rows occupy the length of the presbyterium between the throne and the parapet, a 7-ft. interval between throne and stalls, and 3 ft. between the latter and the parapet, allowing space for circulation.
The architect was for a time under the impression that the choir stalls were provided for by the gift of the famous Dupplin carvings. He it was who had casually mentioned to Cardinal Vaughan the fact of the existence of these fine stalls, and that they were again in the market. Briefly, their description and history is as follows. The carvings consist of fifty-four superb stalls of ancient workmanship, which originally formed the com- plete furnishing of the chapel of the Cistercian monastery of St. Urban, near Lucerne. The monastery was suppressed in 1841, and the carvings being sold, passed into English hands. They
THE INTERIOR 143
were bought in 1866 and moved in forty railway trucks to Uupplin, by the eleventh Earl of Kinnoull, who died in 1897. It was owing to this event that the carvings were again to change hands.
Inquiry revealed the price to be prohibitive as far as the Cardinal's own resources were concerned ; but, as usual, instant assistance was at hand. A generous benefactor came forward, bought the stalls, and presented them to the Cardinal, promising moreover to bear the expense of fitting them into the cathedral. After the purchase the architect for the first time inspected them, to discover that they were absolutely unsuited, both in style and size, to the requirements of the sanctuary ; it was unfortunate that he had not been consulted before the transaction was so hastily concluded. He thereupon prepared a complete and very beautiful set of designs for stalls to be executed in various inlaid woods, which have not yet been carried out.
The Crypt
Beneath the high altar repose the bodies of the first two Cardinal-Archbishops of Westminster, and by descending to the crypt, dedicated to St. Peter, which occupies the whole of the space under the retro-choir, it is possible to examine closely their tombs and the other details of the mortuary chapel of St. Edmund. The approach is by means of the stairways already mentioned in the description of the choir.
The crypt is lighted from the exterior by eight round-headed windows on its eastern and northern sides, while six superb columns of red Norwegian granite with shallow bases of labra- dorite and voluted caps of pale grey marble support the vaulting (Plates XX and XXI). The four piers at the western end are sheeted with the same red granite, conveying impressions of great strength and durability. Between the two innermost stands the altar, dedicated to St. Peter, which was brought here from the Church of St. Mary, Horseferry Road, closed in 1903, when the cathedral was partly opened for parish use. Fronted with superb cipoUino slabs, it is approached by means of three steps of the grey Hopton
144 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Wood stone, the floor of the main portion of the crypt being laid with polished parquetry.
The curved wall of the ambulatory beyond the columns has received the greater part of its marble vesture, completed in 1907, which consists of very finely matched slabs of the Greek cipollino of a particularly fresh green hue, and so skilfully worked and arranged that almost the effect of a drapery is pro- duced by the repetition of the fold-like markings. The slabs are enclosed in bands and mouldings of Hopton Wood. In the window reveals the brickwork still remains as bare as the concrete vaulting, alike awaiting their mosaic covering from the generosity of some future benefactor.
On the south side of the ambulatory three reliquaries have been constructed in the thickness of the wall, in positions corre- sponding with the windows opposite. Faced with polished Hopton Wood stone, and lined with cedar of Lebanon, they are enclosed by metal grilles or casements, glazed and gilded. Particularly charming and effective is the break thus made in the continuity of the cipollino walling.
The inner crypt immediately under the high altar contains the tombs of the two Cardinals, that of Wiseman being in the centre and of Manning on the north side. An altar dedicated to St. Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, occupies the corre- sponding recess on the south side ; it is of the grey Derbyshire marble, with an open front beneath which repose relics of the saintly prelate. The altar steps are of the same material, the re- mainder of the floor space being paved with cipollino. In the arcosolium above the altar is a mosaic lunette of an incident in the life of the saint, designed by the late W. Christian Symons. It depicts St. Edmund, accompanied by several attend- ants, blessing the city of London, before leaving England. The saint is standing beside " silver-flowing Thames," while London Bridge, the Tower, and old St. Paul's form the background of the picture. A silver cross in the sky symbolizes the blessing bestowed. Though the treatment of water and sky is successful, the panel
THE INTERIOR 145
is perhaps rather too near the eye to be decoratively altogether satisfactory.
The bodies of Cardinals Wiseman and Manning were removed with the utmost privacy from Kensal Green Cemetery to the cathedral crypt, after a number of years spent in overcoming the legal difficulties involved. The long-desired permission at length obtained by the good offices of the Right Hon. H. J. Gladstone, then Home Secretary, was due to the persevering efforts of the fourth Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Bourne. The leaden coffin containing the remains of Cardinal Wiseman was found still perfect and hermetically sealed, though the oak shell had com- pletely perished ; its metal plate was discoloured, but un- injured, and was laid on the leaden coffin when entombed in the crypt. Cardinal Manning's oak coffin, interred fifteen years before, was perfectly sound, with the inscription plate attached. The work of exhumation was attended with considerable diffi- culty, owing to both coffins having been embedded in cement.
On the nights of January 25th and January 30th, 1907, the quiet and solemn ceremony of re-interment took place. Closed hearses conveyed the coffins to the cathedral, where they were met by the Archbishop and a few representatives of the chapter and the cathedral clergy. A solemn requiem for the two great men, devoted in life and henceforth to rest side by side in death, was chanted in the cathedral on February 15th, the forty- second anniversary of Wiseman's death.
Cardinal Wiseman's resting-place in the crypt is marked by the Gothic monument, designed by Edward Pugin and subscribed for by the Catholics of England, that covered his grave at Kensal Green. This, though always protected from the weather by a chamber of glass, needed some renovation before its re-erection. The mitred head of the recumbent figure is supported by angels, the body resting on a tomb of alabaster with a slender column of dark marble at each angle. Centrally on either side beneath a crock eted and triple-arched canopy are figures of saints. The lateral quatrcfoil panels have sculptured representations of inci-
I— 10
146 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
dents in the lives of these saints, in bas-reUef. The plinth is of a dark-toned marble.
Bentley, inspired by deep affection and veneration for one whom he had always regarded as a saint, had prepared in 1892 a very beautiful design for Cardinal Manning's tomb. That the design was only in part carried out was probably due to the rapid development of the cathedral project so soon after his death, whence naturally followed the idea that Kensal Green was to be but a temporary resting-place.
Cardinal Manning's tomb occupies the recess opposite to that in which the altar of St. Edmund stands. The recumbent effigy — cast in bronze by Messrs. Singer & Sons, from a model by the well-known sculptor and friend of the Cardinal, the late John Adams-Acton — is clad in cappa magna and rochet, with the right hand resting on a biretta at his side. The letters R.I.P., enclosed within a graceful laurel wreath, appear in the centre of the bronze bed on which the figure reposes, while heads of cherubim resting on their folded wings support it at the corners. The bust, now in the possession of the Duke of Norfolk, for which Cardinal Manning gave the sculptor twenty sittings, served as the model for the head of this effigy. It was of this bust, when expressing his pleasure at Mr. Adams-Acton's success, that Manning had said : "I wish that representation of me to be the one carried down to posterity as my portrait."
The sarcophagus beneath is of white marble, with a central oblong panel of deep red set between the carved armorial bearings of Cardinal Manning and the see of Westminster. Incised in the red stone is the following inscription :
CARDINAL HENRY EDWARD MANNING SECOND ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER, BORN JULY 15, 1808. CONSECRATED ARCHBISHOP JUNE 8, 1865. CREATED CARDINAL PRIEST MARCH 15, 1875. DIED JANUARY 14, 1892, AND BURIED AT KENSAL GREEN. HIS BODY WAS TRANSLATED TO THIS TOMB
JANUARY 25, 1907.
THE INTERIOR 147
The recess which embraces the tomb is lined with alternate vertical strips of cipoUino and breccia up to the springing of the arch, where a cornice of acanthus leaves carved in white marble makes an elegant termination, A little below this moulding are two oval panels of the rich red marble enclosed in wreaths of bronze gilt. A slab of campan melange, a black and white breccia from the Pyrenees, fills the centre portion of the tympanum, while the vault above is coffered with panels of the red that composes the ovals. The Cardinal's red hat, which had hung since his death in the " Pro-Cathedral " at Kensington, is suspended from the arch above the body. The cost of the monument was met by subscriptions. Unfortunately the remaining brick and con- crete work of the mortuary chapel is still destitute of adornment, though Bentley left complete designs for the marble-work of the crypt, inclusive of the entrances.
CHAPTER VIII
THE INTERIOR (Continued)
Baptistery — Font — Chapel of SS. Gregory and Augustine — Chapel of St. Patrick and the saints of Ireland — Chapel of St. Andrew and the Scottish saints — Chapel of St. Paul — South aisle — South transept — Lady Chapel — Blessed Sacrament Chapel — Shrine of the Sacred Heart and St. Michael — Vaughan Chantry — North transept and porch^ Chapel of St. Joseph — Chapel of St. George and the English Martyrs — Chapel of the Holy Souls — The tower chamber or registry — The north-west porch — The sacristies.
Having concluded the examination of nave, sanctuary, apse, and crypt, the visitor will retrace his steps to the narthex, thence to begin the tour of the lateral portions of the interior. We will preface this description of the chapels of the cathedral by remarking that, with but two exceptions — the chapel of St. Thomas of Canter- bury and the Shrine of the Sacred Heart, for which no designs were made — Bentley left half-inch scale drawings in which the main lines of their marble decoration were laid down ; and, except in the case of the chapel of St. Andrew, which has received its completion both of marble and mosaic from another hand, there is no valid reason why these designs should not be used as the basis of their marble revetment. At least, so we are informed by com- petent professional advisers. And Cardinal Vaughan's solemn public promise that the unity of Bentley's work should be preserved to the end would lead one to imagine that every scrap of paper bearing but the slightest indication of his ideas for the completion of the magnus opus would be reverently treasured and the lines thereby indicated as faithfully followed. Unhappily it is to be feared that the fact will be very far removed from this reasonable supposition. Of course, in the case of the chapels of St. Gregory and St. Augustine and of the Holy Souls, the full sets of drawings were completed and the marbles chosen before Bentley's death.
148
THE INTERIOR 149
The Baptistery
Through a broad and deep brick archway at the south side of the narthex, we enter the baptistery, a square cross-vaulted compartment whose walls, as yet of unadorned brickwork, enclose Bentley's splendid font as a glowing jewel in a setting of un- polished bronze. The south wall is broken by an arched recess of similar proportions, while the west end gains in interest and charm by means of a group of vaulted niches which will become features of great decorative worth when the marble wall lining is applied. The west wall is constructed with an arch deep on soffite containing a pair of lights ; flanking this are four niches, two in the west wall and one on each side just beyond its angle of junction with the north and south walls. Over the pair of segmental-topped lights, glazed with the usual greenish glass in ornamental leadwork, the tympanum contains a small glazed opening of irregular pentagonal form. Above the window arch additional light filters through the great lunette of terracotta latticing, glazed with Venetian roundels as in the clerestory lattices.
The baptistery is separated from the chapel of St. Gregory and St. Augustine by a marble screen (Plate XXIII), which, it will be readily conceded, is one of the most charming bits of interior detail in the whole building. In design and choice of material it owes everything to the mind of the master, while its successful interpretation is due to the marble firm of Whitehead. From two superb columns of milky pavonazzo,'^ crowned with deli- cate Byzantine-Ionic caps of the same material, springs an arch of elegant proportions, its soffit lined with pavonazzo, its face mould- ings enriched with a bead and reel detail in unpolished Carrara. The entablature, thrown from pier to pier, there meets pavonazzo pilasters, and rests on acanthus caps of unpolished Carrara. Above the arch occur slabs of pale violet breccia, divided by
* These columns were quarried in Greece and shared the fate of the nave monoliths, when these suffered capture by the Turks in 1897.
150 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
narrow vertical strips of campan vert ; while surmounting each lintel this green marble is repeated in a diamond-shaped device, set in a fine panel of veined campan melange. The cornice of statuary is carved in low relief with ten acanthus leaves, these and the other details being identical on both sides of the screen. The bases of the columns and the low parapet of pavonazzo (measuring 4 ft. high on the baptistery side and 2 ft. 11 in. on the chapel side) rest on a plinth of portoro (a black marble with yellowish veining), which occurs also in the skirting of the chapel. There is thus an ascent of two steps from the baptistery level.
The font, of octagonal form, 4 ft. 4 in. high and 7 ft. 6 in. in diameter, has a deep circular basin 5 ft. in diameter to contain the baptismal water. For the convenience of the celebrant, there is a segmental projection on the western side, hollowed to contain a small oval uncovered basin of white marble. The great basin is closed with a flat undecorated lid of oak, and there is no provision for a canopy.
As regards material, the general effect is obtained by means of three tones and varieties of green marble, although plinth and coping are composed entirely of strongly marked pavonazzo. The eight angular pilasters are of verde antico, capped with pavonazzo mouldings ; the upper panels on the eight faces of the font are executed in moss-green marble, carved in low relief with a cross above a disc, symbolic of the world dominated by the power of Christ's sacrifice for us. Of verde antico again are the lower panels, cut back at their lower edges to form an arched moulding enclosing lunettes of well-chosen specimens of cipollino. The required note of contrast in this gamut of green is struck with the utmost restraint and refinement by means of the two narrow superimposed panels of fine red marble which, set in a slender inlay of gold mosaic, flank the upper panels.
The font is raised on a dais of white marble, ascended by three steps, and inlaid with six circles of rosso antico, with interlacing borders of lozenge work in giallo antico. An oblong slab of Coimemara green occupies the spot on which the celebrant
THE INTERIOR 151
stands before the font. The baptistery floor is composed of white marble inset with large squares of Siena, alternately plain or enclosing circles of greyish-green Connemara ; these latter, note- worthy on account of their exceptional size, were not obtained without great difficulty, as this marble is treacherous to work in slabs of any considerable dimensions. It was distinctly an achieve- ment, therefore, and the result of infinite pains on the part of Farmer & Brindley, who laid this flooring, to produce these circles 4 ft. 6 in. in diameter.
The Dowager Lady Loder (whose death took place in 1907) was the generous donor of the font, made in Rome in 1901. It was by Cardinal Vaughan's arrangement that Bentley's design was thus deprived, much against his approval, of the devoted super- vision he always lavished on the execution of his work. Specimens of the marbles to be used were, at least, submitted for his approval early in the year ; and at the end of December the Cardinal announced that the font was finished and had left Rome. Bentley never saw it, for it remained in packing-cases until many months later, when the Roman masons came over to set it in place (Plate XXIV).
Within the recess of the southern wall of the baptistery is placed a large and roomy confessional of Austrian oak, fumed and wax polished. The exterior is effective, with elaborately carved panels in interlaced strapwork designs, and a cornice with the favourite acanthus supported on six pilasters. Similar double confessionals will ultimately be provided for most of the side chapels, to be placed against their west walls ; while single boxes will find a place against the piers of the nave on their eastern sides.
The niche adjoining the above-mentioned recess now contains a statue of St. John the Baptist, the gift of the third Marquess of Bute, whose devotion to his patron saint is thus commemorated. Of this statue, which is a replica, in block tin, of that by the Danish sculptor Thorwaldsen, it has been very justly remarked that it cannot in any way claim to be in harmony with its
152 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
surroundings,' though the merciful finger of Time has effected a shght improvement by subduing to some extent the harsh tones of the material.
Chapel of St. Gregory and St. Augustine
Very gay and brilliant is the general effect produced by the decoration of this chapel, dedicated to England's two great apostles (for Pope St. Gregory may surely be claimed as her apostle, con- secrated by desire). Of course on the lower surfaces of the piers will be found the deeper tones needed to convey a true impression of strength and solidity. The slabs of very light breccia which line the south wall are divided by vertical strips of black marble with white inlaid patterns, and rise from a low seating of figured levanto, which runs the whole length of this wall and supports the simple credence table of statuary marble. The uni- formity of this breccia revetment is broken by the introduction of a vertical panel of verde antico in the centre of this wall, pro- jecting about Ij in. and framed in a slender moulding of the second statuary marble which composes the simple cornice at the height of the window-sills. This white string continues round the piers at the same height ; below it they are clothed with alternate slabs of levanto with smoky figuring and verde antico. Above, the lighter effect demanded by proximity to the golden mosaic is produced by a combination of campan melange with the light grey-green of a variety of campan vert, crowned at the height of the springing with the main cornice of Carrara.
It will be observed that here, as in the opposite chapel dedicated to the Holy Souls and in the sanctuary arcading, the architect has " initiated the principle of framing the variegated revetment with white marble only ; thus there is not that confusion of colour or workmanship, nor that rampant effect of the strings, cornices, and
1 Mr. Bernard Whelan, Consecration Handbook, June 1910.
I'LATK XXI. — Four of the Crypt Capitals.
152]
'f^"
B.
c.
D.
Plate XXII. — Four Sculptured Capitals : A, B, and D, Interior (Photo by Mr. Percy Lamb.) ;
C. Exterior {Photo by Mr. R. Davis).
[153
THE INTERIOR 153
architraves that one so often sees when the reverse method is adopted ; in a word, the effect is refined rather than bizarre." '
The chapel is entered from the aisle through two arched openings borne on a pair of splendid coupled columns of Swiss cipollino. The arches are lined on soffite, and have face mouldings of Verona marble, in a warm pinkish variety ; the soffits being inlaid with a series of panels of light red Brocatello marble, with interlaced bordering lines of black and gold mosaic. Beneath the unpolished sculptured corbels, at their springing are square moulded frames of polished Carrara, containing subjects in opus sectile ; the story of the Just Judge being depicted on the east, and an incident in the life of St. Augustine on the west pier.
Turning now to the east end, we note to right and left of the altar a superb slab of rouge jaspe marble, with pale markings, inset with an oval of Swiss cipollino, fi-amed in a billet moulding of Carrara. The altar is of pavonazzo, with a mensa of Norwegian pink marble and a frontal of orange hue, composed of four invisibly united slabs of straw Siena, bordered with an inlay of lapis-lazuli and mother-of-pearl. As originally carried out, this frontal was of golden-toned breccia, and the altar slab of rosa d'ltalia ; but after some years these two marbles unfortunately began to evince signs of decay, produced by the green condition of the brick backing, and were replaced, at Messrs. Whitehead's cost, by the marbles described. The dossal is composed of three superbly figured panels of Greek cipollino, a clear green with wave-like markings, bordered with delicate lines of gold mosaic and framed in moulded Carrara (Plate XXVI).
The altar is recessed within an arch, the altar-piece occupying its entire width and continuing the line of the upper cornice. Framed in Carrara, it consists of a central canopied portion and two wings, whose subjects are executed in opus sectile, mosaic being unsuitable on account of proximity to the eye. This reredos supplies the key, as it were, to the idea embodied in the mosaic
' Mr. John A. Marshall, paper read before the Architectural Association, April 12th, 1907.
154 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
decoration of the chapel — viz : the evangelization of England directly from Rome.
Beneath the central pediment stand, side by side and facing the spectator, a golden arcading behind their heads, the two great saints of the chapel's dedication. Pope St. Gregory, on the left, with pallium and triple crown, and bearing his pastoral staff in his left hand, is seemingly giving heed to the message brought by the Holy Spirit as a dove, who is seen approaching his right ear. St. Augustine, in monkish habit, carries in his left hand the repre- sentation of the Sacred Face, borne as the banner of his little mission to English shores. In the double panels of the wings are the figures of St. Augustine's companions ; clad all in epis- copal garments and standing on pedestals inscribed with their names. St. Laurence and St. Mellitus appear on the right, St. Justin and St. Paulinus on the left. The background, of which but a small portion is revealed, is of a deep rich blue, with deco- rative borders of gold.
The colouring of the altarpiece is rich and glowing, with the exception of the flesh tints, which are somewhat anaemic ; the treatment, in the conventional modern manner familiar to all who know Clayton & Bell's careful work, cannot be said to be inspired by the precept of "Byzantine style and Greek drawing" im- pressed so strenuously by Bentley on those who were to take part in the decoration of his magnum opus. The late Mr. Clayton's faith in progress in art and his belief that the attempt to re- suscitate the dead in styles of art is a profound mistake, are the reasons given for employing a treatment so remote from the methods of Byzantine workers.
Panels in opus sectile fill, as we have said, the frames on the two northern piers of the chapel. In reference to the profession adorned by the donor of the chapel, that on the north-eastern side depicts the story of Solomon, the just judge. Seated on his throne of judgment, before him stand and kneel the rival claimant mothers, while to the right a soldier with a sword holds the unfortunate infant by its foot, preparatory to giving effect to Solomon's
THE INTERIOR 155
judgment. The inscription timver : regem videntes sap : dei ESSE IN EO AD FACiEN : JUD : appears at the foot of this picture, which was the generous gift of Messrs, Clayton & Bell.
The frame on the north-west pier remained empty for several years, the original intention being to illustrate therein a divine judgment tempered with mercy, our Lord's forgiveness of the woman taken in adultery. The panel was at length completed in October 1912, with an historical subject which really comes first in point of time in the sequence of decoration. Pope St. Gregory is seen standing in the slave market of Rome, in converse with the golden-haired children of the Angles ; his hand rests on the head of the youngest of the group of three, behind which stands the owner, apparently with free gesticulation emphasising the merits of the slaves he desires to sell. A negro slave appears in the background to the left ; on the other side of St. Gregory stands an attendant, carrying his pastoral staff. Behind the figures is a marble portico through which we glimpse green trees, the blue of southern skies, and the distant hills of the Campagna. Along the top of the panel runs the inscription : non angli sed angeli si CHRiSTiANi : along the base we read : patri patri^ nostra
ET BIS SUO PUERILI CANTORES.
Bentley's most sumptuous design for the floor of this chapel had from considerations of economy, urged by Lord Brampton, to be greatly simplified, and as carried out it consists in the main of slabs of Bardiglio fiorita, a cold grey marble with darker veining. Running from the cipollino columns to the opposite wall is a dark strip of inlaying to break the uniformity of the grey, composed of lines of black marble, and the deep green known as vert des Alpes with a Siena yellow inlay in bead and reel pattern. Longitudin- ally on the north and south sides run squares of breche violette, set in a white marble surround and framed by chequered borders of black and white.
The altar steps are of white marble, the predella displaying a panel of Brocatello between two of breche violette enclosed in a banding of Siena. The two white steps which raise the chapel
156 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
floor above the level of that of the aisle meet, beneath the north- eastern arch, with a temporary bed of wooden planking. Here should be placed the exquisite grilles which formed an important part of the original design. The illustration shows that Bentley intended the tombs of the joint founders to be in this space to the left of the altar, with the gilt metal screen above them up to the springing of the arch. Recumbent effigies were to rest on the tomb to perpetuate their memory, and mutely beg the suf- frages of the faithful through the long ages to come. The com- mission to prepare the models for these figures had evidently been given to the late Joseph W. Swynnerton, and inspired the fol- lowing letter addressed to Bentley from his studio in Rome, to explain a sketch previously forwarded :
"2, Via Montebello, Rome. "February 21««, 1901.
" Dear Sir,
" I hasten to acknowledge your letter, for I fear I have not sufficiently explained that my sketch is merely a suggestion. I placed a man on a couch — a man of about the proportions of Lord Brampton — and drew him in full robes and wig. But I should look to you for the design of the tombs themselves, as they have to be in harmony with the chapel.
" If you will kindly send me some such idea in a sketch, how- ever rough, I will endeavour to carry your idea out in a new drawing. Do you propose to make the tombs side by side, or one on each side of the chapel ? And if side by side, should both figures lie on one couch ? I thought of placing an open book against the feet of Lord Brampton — or some such thing, to break the ugly line — and at Lady Brampton's feet a dog. In conclusion I want your guidance and I will do my best to content you. I shall hope if the work goes on to see you in Rome when I have the model in clay. We will very gladly put you up.
" Faithfully yours,
" Joseph W. Swynnerton."
THE INTERIOR 157
The work was fated never to proceed ; Lord and Lady Bramp- ton made no provision for any such memorial during their life- time, and at their death, within a few weeks of each other, six years later, the bulk of their large fortune was left unconditionally to the Archbishop of Westminster, with the suggestion that the testators would wish, subject to his approbation, to benefit the diocese and the hospital of St. John and St. Elizabeth in Marylebone Road. To this purpose, therefore, we believe that the whole bequest was applied, and hence there is no special memorial or record in this chapel of St. Gregory and St. Augustine to keep green the memory of those by whose piety it was erected and adorned.
Better known to the world of his day and to the terror of evil- doers as Sir Henry Hawkins, the eminent lawyer and judge. Lord Brampton (as he became in 1899) was during many years honoured with Cardinal Manning's warm friendship. In those days he had no thought of joining the Catholic Church, and has left it on record that never did the Cardinal make the slightest attempt to prosely- tize him. His second wife was a Catholic, and a splendid bene- factor to the Cathedral Building Fund. It was undoubtedly due to her prayers and influence that her distinguished husband made profession of the same faith in 1898, a few months before his retirement from the Bench. The chapel thus given as a joint thank-offering by husband and wife was intended to be their chantry; we have seen how it happened that in the absence of the beautiful sarcophagus and grille Bentley desired to raise beneath the eastern arch, this idea remains incompletely expressed. The cost of the fabric, and the marble and mosaic work, exclusive of the opus sectile panels on the piers, was £8,500 (Plate XXVII).
Lord Brampton died in October 1907, and his body was carried to the cathedral to lie in solemn state in his chantry chapel on the 10th of that month, the solemn requiem being sung by Dr. Johnson, Bishop of Arindela, on the following day. He was soon followed to their chantry and to his grave in Kensal Green by his wife, who died on December 17th following.
158 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Before proceeding to describe the mosaics we may recall that a melancholy interest attaches, for those who knew and loved the architect, to the marble work of the south wall. Here, on February 28th, 1902, apparently in better health than he had enjoyed for long past, Bentley with characteristic concentration stood watching the masons who applied the first slabs of breccia and verde antico, truly the first fruits of his cathedral's internal adornment, all that, in the inscrutable designs of Providence, he was to be per- mitted to enjoy. Forty hours later his earthly race was run.
The surfaces to be covered with mosaic comprise (a) the barrel vault roofing the chapel, with the spandrels of the lateral arches ; (6) the two lunettes and the spandrels of the great supporting arches of the east and west ends respectively ; (c) the tympanum of the arch of the altar recess with its soffit and archivolt ; and {d) the jambs and reveals of the window arches.
To observe the historical sequence of the story pictured, one must begin with the tympanum above the altarpiece. Here the central figure is St. Gregory, enthroned and turning with out- stretched hands to St. Augustine, who kneels on his right, to charge him with the apostolic mission the sainted Pope himself had so long yearned to undertake. The Pontiff is clad in a white garment, beneath a robe of purple bordered with gold ; he wears the triple crown, and holds in his left hand a scroll on which the words : cor CORAM DEO are legible.
The throne draperies of crimson and gold are in effective contrast with the sober grey habit of St. Augustine, who with yearning hands joyfully accepts the apostleship of England. On the Pope's right stands the cross-bearer and a group of St. Augustine's companions. On the left of the throne four standing figures gaze towards the missionary band ; a bishop in mitre and cope of deep red, powdered with golden crosses, accompanied by a cleric carrying his pastoral staff and the banner of the holy vernicle ; two more priestly figures, one with a censer, complete the picture. They stand on a tessellated floor, against a background of plain gold mosaic, its upper edge bordered with the explanatory
THE INTERIOR 159
inscription : + s. gregorius magnus augustinum in angliam
MITTIT REGI ETHELBERTO EJUSQUE POPULO CHRISTI FIDEM PR/EDI-
caturum. Outside this a decorative band in a conventional design mainly of blue and white on a gold ground meets the plain gold lining of the soffit, the blue and white arabesque being repeated to border the arch face.
The great lunette of the east end carries us to the next incident in the story, the reception of St. Augustine and his band by Ethelbert, King of Kent. Centrally, the king and his Christian wife Bertha sit enthroned side by side beneath the spreading branches of a tree, attended, on the queen's left, by a group comprising one of her ladies, the king's chamberlain, and a warrior with sword and spear. The royal pair look to their right, at the standing group of three missionaries, with whose leader, St. Augustine, the king appears to be in argument ; the queen listens devoutly and humbly, her hands joined in supplication. Along the base of the picture runs the inscription : sanctus augustinus anglorum
REGI ETHELBERTO CHRISTI FIDEM PR^DICAT.
Demi-figures of St. Peter and St. Paul vsfithin circular medal- lions appear in the upper part of the spandrels, the lower halves being filled with foliated arabesques in blue, white, and green on the gold ground. Both saints face the spectator ; St. Paul, on the right, carries the sword of his martyrdom and a scroll with the word paulus servus jesu christi. St. Peter holds the keys in his right hand and in the other a scroll inscribed petrus apos- tolus jesu CHRISTI ; the names of the saints being repeated in a label beneath their respective medallions.
A sheathing of gold mosaic encrusts the crown of the barrel vault, the tesserae of unvarying size and shape being set with precision, close-jointed, longitudinally in straight lines. Six full- length figures of saints occupy the ramp of the vault, three on either side, standing on herbage of tender green sown with the flowers of spring. Behind, to half their height, runs a low arcaded parapet (distinctly Romanesque in detail), executed in a low tone of bluish-grey. Each saint is divided from the next by a long-
160 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
stemmed blossoming tree of extremely conventional form. On the north one observes, nearest to the altar, St. Edmund, king and martyr, bearing the arrows of his martyrdom and the royal orb ; next. Venerable Bede with book and pen ; thirdly, St. Oswald, King of Northumbria, bearing sceptre and cross. On the op- posite ramp are depicted St. Wilfrid of York, bishop and martyr ; St. Benedict of Nursia, founder of the Benedictine Order ; and St. Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, all carrying pastoral staves. Cardinal Vaughan's first list of saints to occupy these positions included St. Alban, who, being a British saint and therefore not in historical continuity with St. Augustine's mission, was suitably replaced by St. Oswald. The spandrels are filled with foliated ornament in green upon a background of crimson and gold ; while the deco- ration of the window jambs and reveals is a repetition of that employed in the arch above the altar.
The historic aspect of the evangelization of England is aban- doned when we come to the pictorial decoration of the west end adjoining the baptistery, and instead we find in symbol and alle- gory representations of the sacrament of baptism. The lunette above the arch is divided into three compartments by vertical lines of ornament ; in the centre St. John the Baptist and St. Augustine stand side by side ; the side panels contain allegorical three-quarter length figures, enclosed in circles of decorative detail, representing the waters of baptism, which flow down in a copious stream into the spandrels of the arch from the tilted vessels in their hands. In the soffit are four demi-figures of angels bearing scrolls inscribed with the names of the four rivers of the garden of Paradise, Tigris, Pison, Gihon, and Euphrates. These are surrounded with foliation, which is repeated more formally in the border on the archivolt.
The marble work of this chapel was ordered from Messrs. Whitehead in February 1901, and its fixing began under the devoted supervision of Mr. Joseph Whitehead in February 1902. It was rapidly pressed forward to completion by October of that year, so that without undue delay the mosaicists were enabled
THE INTERIOR 161
to set up their scaffolding. In July Cardinal Vaughan wrote from Nauheim (where he was undergoing a cure) to Mr. Clayton to desire him to employ whom he thought fit to carry out his then practically completed designs. The firm of Clayton & Bell had been selected at Lord Brampton's express wish ' to design the mosaics for this chapel about a year before Bentlcy's death, the principal, the late Mr. J. R. Clayton, having been known to the latter for many years as a friend of Mr. T. C. Lewis, the organ- builder, and Mr. John Whitaker, both numbered among the architect's friends and clients.
The architect and the mosaicist met, of course, to discuss preliminaries ; but, the commission once offered and accepted, they saw very little of each other, and although Bentley took op- portunity to speak emphatically against the importation of any Gothic spirit into the designs, the question of technique, said Mr. Clayton, was never raised between them. We have already had occasion to refer to the latter's views on the " resuscitation of the dead in art." Bentley's position was that the art of Byzan- tium was by no means dead, but, so to say, in a trance and awaiting, since the days of Mohammedan conquest, its re-awakening and call to a new life. It is precisely this attitude towards the style and this adaptation of its principles that has rendered Bentley's cathedral a living soulful thing — qualities that would have been lacking had it been moulded by the hands of a slavish copyist.
Before setting to work Mr. Clayton had desired' that all angles should be hollowed and rounded to receive the tesserae, for these, if applied to angular surfaces, woxild have a tendency to drop from their setting ; besides, the high lights repeated by such an arrangement of concave and convex surfaces would produce a softened effect in the mantle of gold. Bentley arranged for this preparation of the surfaces to receive the mosaics,
' Bentley wrote to a friend on March 23rd, 1900 : " The chapel opposite [to that of the Holy Souls] has been given, I believe, on the understanding that the work is placed in the hands of Clayton."
' We do not intend to imply that Bentley was unaware of this technical point. The old mosaicists were well aUve to the fact and he had given careful study to their work.
I~ll
162 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and here his influence on Mr. Clayton's work ended. Mr. George Bridge, the mosaicist, who had been thoroughly imbued with the architect's views, carried them out with fidelity in the technique of the first chapel decorated, i.e. that of the Holy Souls ; but when he came to execute Mr. Clayton's cartoons we find that the latter's instructions have been no less faithfully observed. The tesserae here as we have seen, are rectangular, close- jointed, and set with almost geometrical precision.
The mosaics, begun in December 1902, were completed in May 1904. The marble floor was then laid, and the chapel emerged triumphant from its long imprisonment behind screens of wood and canvas.
The Chapel of St. Patrick and the Saints of Ireland
This national dedication has been given to the adjacent chapel in the south aisle, since it is intended to be specially the gift of the Irish people to the cathedral. At present the decoration has made but little advance ; the altar being its sole adornment. It is hoped that Erin's devout sons and daughters will not long suffer bare walls to testify to their love of their great patron saint.
Since the chapel's east end is formed in the structure of a main pier, there is scope for a somewhat deeper recessment of the arch above the altar, to right and left of which it is broached with a vaulted niche producing a charming variety of effect. The steps and predella are of Irish green fossil marble, which, arranged in conjunction with cipoUino in alternate horizontal courses, forms the reredos (hereafter to be completed with a canopy). The altar frontal of pale green marble from Connemara, like to the waves that wash its shores, has a centre panel of dark red, known as Victoria marble, from Cork, the symbolic entwined serpents at each end being of Italian cipollino, carved in low relief. Black Irish fossil marble composes mensa and dossal ; the latter being powdered with an inlay of shamrock leaves in mother-of-pearl, and terminated at either end with reeded pilasters of Italian cipollino. It is intended to use Irish marbles as much as may be practicable
THE INTERIOR 163
in this chapel. The altar, in its colour and material, certainly seeks to express something of the mysticism attributed to the Celtic temperament. It was designed by Mr. J. A. Marshall, of the Bentley firm, and carried out by Farmer & Brindley in 1910. Bentley himself had prepared designs for a reredos and a con- siderable portion of the marble wall revetment.
The column of the north side is of Greek cipoUino, with the usual rather low base of grey-toned labradorite, raised by two steps above the aisle level. The pair of two-light windows, filled with rough temporary glazing, await the artistic lead and glass work planned by the architect.
The Chapel of St. Andrew and the Scottish Saints
In the next chapel eastwards again we find a national dedica- tion in a shrine whose decoration of marble and mosaic has recently been completed and enclosed behind tall grilles of white metal. The chapel was unveiled on the Feast of St. Andrew, 1915, when Cardinal Bourne celebrated Mass at its altar (which had been consecrated in 1910), being served, as befitted the occasion, by the donor. The nmnificent benefactor is the present (fourth) Marquess of Bute, who promised £10,000 to complete the chapel on the condition, accepted by Cardinal Bourne, that Mr. Schultz Weir should carry out in its entirety the marble and mosaic decoration. We are told that designs, based on Bentley's drawings, had already been prepared by the Bentley firm ; but in some mysterious and unexplained fashion the entire set disappeared and their fate has never become known.
The following description of the decoration of the chapel ap- peared in The Builder of December 10th, 1915 :
" Tall openwork screens of white metal separate the chapel from the south aisle. The floor is of marble and carries on the ancient tradition of a ' pavement like the sea.' Large slabs of purple breccia marble occupy the central space and round this are edgings of verde antico, enclosing a border of sea-green lona marble, in which fishes are inlaid. The walls of the chapel are
164 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
lined with marble up to the level of the abacus of the capital of the great pillar of the arches dividing it from the church proper. The scheme is divided into two in height, the lower part up to the level of the window-sill consisting of a high dado of blue Hymettian marble, with a skirting and string-com'se of white Pen- telic ; over this are panels of old cipollino and red Skyros bordered with strips of white Pentelic. The frieze is formed of two different sorts of marble, a yellow and a green, arranged in a simple pattern cut by a fret-saw in such a way that there is no waste of material. Round the upper part of the blue slabs forming the high dado have been incised the names of Scottish saints arranged in clrronological order according to centuries, thus emphasizing the full dedication of the chapel, which is to ' St. Andrew and the Saints of Scotland.'
" The window Unings are formed of white PenteUc with pavon- azzo slabs, pillars of Levanto and outer pilasters of giallo antico. In the tympana are figures of the two archangels Gabriel and Michael in low relief. Three steps lead up to the altar, which is of the open type, the table-top being a large slab of dark Alloa granite supported on five pillars of red Peterhead granite with bronze capitals and a base slab of grey Aberdeen granite. The altar is placed under a baldaccliino supported on pillars and pilasters of verde antico marble with bronze capitals and bases, the canopy over and the blocks under the pillars being of Pentelic. The wall behind the altar is lined with cipollino with a cross inlaid into same of old Egyptian porphpy, the border being of white Pentelic. On this cross is placed a beaten copper figure of our Lord, the living Christ, the Intercessor. On the east wall on either side are four panels containing figm'es of four principal Scottish saints — Ninian, Margaret, Bride, and Columba. These are sculptiu'ed in low relief on Pentelic marble slabs. Long fiat pilasters divide the marble lining of the chapel from that of the church proper ; these are of porphyry-colom'cd rosso antico marble.
" On the south side are two pairs of windows glazed with ' crystal-white ' glass in leaded patterns with the wliite cross of St. Andrew on a blue ground (azure, a saltire argent) introduced.
THE INTERIOR 165
Between the windows are two detached pillars of cipoHino with carved capitals, supporting the arches over. On the wall beliind these pillars is a slab containing the dedicatory inscription, which reads as follows :^' This chapel is dedicated to the Glory of God under the invocation of Saint Andrew and the Saints of Scotland. Anno Domini mcmxiv.'
" The upper part of the walls and the arches and vaults are covered with mosaics. These deal with the story of St. Andrew, and are designed in a simple and conventional way after the manner of the old Byzantine mosaic workers. The limitations of the material have been carefully kept in view, and there has been no attempt made to translate into mosaic designs which would have been more suitable as wall paintings. On' the west wall a figure of St. Andrew clad in blue cloak and wliite tunic holds up his hands in the act of Adoration of the Cross, on which he suffered martyrdom and which is represented on the east wall opposite. On either side of the Saint are rose-bushes and trees — the olive and the locust — under which stand figm'cs of deer, and the greensward below is interspersed with blooming flowers. On the upper part of this west wall is set forth in simple language in the vulgar tongue, so that all who run may read, the main facts of the story of St. Andrew, as follows :
" SAINT ANDREW
OUR lord's first apostle.
A FISHERMAN OF BETHSAIDA IN GALILEE
WHOM WITH HIS BROTHER SIMON PETER
JESUS SAW FISHING AND CALLED THEM TO HIM SAYING,
' FOLLOW ME AND I WILL MAKE YOU FISHERS OF MEN.'
HE PREACHED THE GOSPEL IN SCYTHIA AND IN GREECE
AND SUFFERED MARTYRDOM ON THE CROSS AT PATRAS IN ACHAIA.
HIS RELICS WERE TRANSLATED TO CONSTANTINOPLE
AND AFTERWARDS IN PART TO AMALFI AND MILAN
AND TO SCOTLAND, WHERE THE CITY AND CATHEDRAL OF ST. ANDREW
WERE FOUNDED AND DEDICATED TO HIS HONOUR BY KING ANGUS
AND SAINT REGULUS. THE SCOTS VENERATE HIM AS THEIR PATRON SAINT.
166 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
"The central feature on the east wall is the representation of St. Andrew's Cross, from which golden rays exude and over which hovers a wiiite dove, indicating the Divine Blessing. On either side are panels inscribed with the prayer of St. Andrew, which he uttered on seeing the Cross on which he was to suffer martyi'dom. This prayer comes in the office for St. Andrew's Day. It is here inscribed on the one side in Latin and on the other in English. The latter rendering is taken from the late Marquess of Bute's English translation of the Roman Breviary, and is as follows :
" ' O Precious Cross, which the Members of my Lord have made so fair and goodly, welcome me from among men, and join me again to my Master, that, as by thee He redeemed me, so by thee also He may take me unto Himself.'
" The lower parts of the vault are views of cities connected with the story of the saint. Appropriate borders of a Celtic type frame the pictures and appear on the faces of the east and west arches. The plain gold mosaic is executed in fair shaped forms which may be taken to signify golden clouds screening Paradise from earthly view.
" A row of seven inlaid ebony stalls fill in the recess of the west end of the chapel. The altar candlesticks and the reliquary set into a niche at the base of tlie cross over the altar are in bronze and enamel. Altar cards have been specially engrossed and illuminated on vellum for this chapel. The marble work has been executed by the firm of Messrs. Farmer & Brindley, the metal screen by Mr. W. Bainbridge Reynolds, and the glazing by Messrs. Lowndes & Drury. Mr. Stirling Lee is responsible for the sculpture, Mr. Ernest Gimson for the stalls, Mr. Harold Stabler for the reliquary and the candlesticks, and Mr. Graily Hewitt for the altar cards.
" The full-size cartoons for the mosaic were prepared by Mr. George Jack and the mosaic work carried out by Mr. E. Debenham's group of mosaic workers under the personal direction of Mr. Gaetano Meo, the friend and assistant of Rossetti, Burne-Jones, Richmond, and other artists. To his intimate knowledge of the selection and
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THE INTERIOR 167
disposition of the material is due the most excellent effects of colour and texture which have been obtained in the work.
" With the exception of one Italian who helped with the mosaics for a short time, all the workmen employed were British. The list of Scottish saints inscribed on the walls has been arranged by Father Michael Barrett, O.S.B., the compiler of the Kalcndar of Scottish Saints printed and issued by the Abbey of Fort Augustus."
The Chapel of St. Paul
This chapel and that dedicated to St. Joseph in the corre- sponding position on the north side vary in two important par- ticulars from those already examined ; and most notably in the apsidal termination of their east ends made possible by the massive brickwork of the western piers of the transepts. The gradine is set well back in this apse, so that only the lowest altar step projects beyond its radius. The second variation occurs in the fenestration ; the two window recesses, though of the same proportions as those in other chapels, each enclose three small fiat-topped lights (as yet only temporarily glazed) beneath the tympanum filled with a terracotta lattice.
The column bearing the northern arches is a fine specimen of Greek cipollino ; the altar, designed by Mr. J. A. Marshall, of the Bentley firm, rests at present on a temporary platform of wood, and is constructed of second statuary marble, with mensa of pavonazzo. The frontal contains three coloured panels, a central one of the dark green marble from Tinos, flanked by two upright oblongs of rosso antico. A scheme of marble revetment to half- inch scale had been prepared and partly coloured by the deceased arcliitect.
Dedicated to the great patron of converts, the cost of the chapel decoration was originally intended to be defrayed by the thank- offerings of those who have thus become members of the Catholic Church and a box to receive such offerings was placed in the chapel.
168 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Funds had come in but slowly in this way when a speedier means of completing the chapel presented itself in the person of Mrs. Samborne-Palmer, who proposed to the Cardinal in 1913 to make it a memorial to her parents. The marble wall linings were soon put in hand and the chapel was opened in the autumn of 1917, although the mosaics and the marble pavement are still wanting.
The apse is lined with a pale blue-grey marble emphasized with narrow vertical strips of a cool pale green, their continuity being interrupted right and left of the altar by piscinae of buff-tinted stone with decorative borderings in inlays of red and white. Above the altar and affixed to the wall is a triptych of gilt bronze with a figure of St. Paul in bold relief surmounted by a panel representing his martyrdom. An enamelled shield bearing the arms of the Saint is fixed to the lower part of the triptych, on the doors of which is the following inscription :
VAS ELECTIONIS EST MlHI ISTE VT PORTET NOMEN MEVM CORAM GENTIBUS ET REGIBVS ET FILIIS ISRAEL.
The west wall, up to the level fixed by the window-sills in the south wall, is covered with a scheme of marble revetment in which the predominant features are eight tall verde antico panels, headed each with a lozenge of pale green set in an oblong of deep-toned red, and both separated and enframed by strips and mouldings of pavonazzo and statuary marble. The piers up to this level are sheeted with cipoUino. Above this and up to the lunette, which is left bare for the future mosaic, we find the same blue-grey marble which forms the clothing of the apse, in slabs cleverly " opened out " to obtain the full value of their symmetrical and effective figuring. Below the windows the chief feature is the range of ten slender pavonazzo shafts with distinctive capitals which rise from a low seating of white marble to carry an effective arcading, the wall behind it being sheathed with well-marked cipollino. The arms of the donor in opus sectile of marble appear on the west wall with the dedicatory inscription :
THE INTERIOR 169
this chapel was given for the glory of god and the honour of s. paul the apostle and to be a memo- rial to her beloved parents, john filmer anstey and anna maria anstey, by their daughter caroline mary samborne- palmer, for whose intentions the holy sacrifice of the mass shall be offered daily in this chapel in perpetuity. 7 october, 1913.
The South Aisle
Paved with wood block flooring and destitute of mural decora- tion, the aisle strikes a sharp note of contrast to the finished per- fection of the Brampton chantry. The sole promise of the marble encrustation of the future, for which the architect has left details, is given by the consecration crosses of red and white marble, inlaid in circular plaques of Hopton Wood stone, let into the brickwork of the main piers, and by the marble sheeting on the outer piers of that chapel. But, before passing into the transept, we recommend the visitor to turn and look westwards along the aisle : he cannot fail to be impressed by the beautiful effect of the long vista of brick groining, formed by the interpenetration of the nave and chapel arcading with the longitudinal barrel vault which roofs the aisle.
The South Transept
Though Bentley left half-inch scale drawings of the major part of the revetment, here again all the walls are bare and unfinished ; but the dingy bricks accentuate the beauty of the splendid pair of columns of rosy Languedoc, from between which one sees the Lady Chapel in an effective coup d^ceil. These columns carry the narrow bridge of brick which forms a bond of union between the continuation of the triforium gallery across the transept, and the gallery that clings to the south wall beneath the transept window, and is borne on a couple of auxiliary piers, introduced between the primary and secondary abutments. Single confes-
170 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
sional boxes occupy the spaces between the interior buttresses. Througli the arch in the main eastern pier, recessed to form vaulted niches on either side, we enter the Lady Chapel, to which the south transept serves, in fact, almost as a nave. Independent access to it from the outside of the building is provided by means of a small door at the west end of the chapel's southern aisle (Plate XXVIII).
The Lady Chapel
With a length of 70 ft., this chapel measures 21 ft. wide and 38 ft. high to the crown of its barrel vault, the nave bein» composed of three bays, open to the aisles, save for the low parapet wall of marble built across the openings between the piers. The north aisle divides the chapel from the sanctuary ; that on the south serves as a processional way from the sacristies. The sanctuary apse is triply niched or recessed, an arrangement calculated to suit the circular baldacchino provided in the original plan. The marble- work is complete and extends from the skirting to a richly moulded cornice of white marble at the height of the sills, from which point the mosaic sheathing of the brickwork will begin. The vault is intersected on its south side by four segmental-headed windows, two unpierced recesses of similar form corresponding in the opposite ramp. Further light is shed from the four circular windows of the south aisle (Plate XXVIII).
Since no enclosing grilles or gates enter into the scheme of decoration, there was scope for greater elaboration of treatment of the piers than was advisable in the case of the Blessed Sacra- ment Chapel,^ where their inner faces are simply lined with white marble to afford contrast to the gilding and enamel work of the metal screens. The general lines of the marble-work are illustrated by the photograph (Plate XXIX). A string of white marble, sometimes polished, sometimes not, is carried round the chapel at the height of the springing of the nave arcading ; below this
'■ The reason for departure from the original dedication of this as the Blessed Sacrament Cliapel has already been given. See footnote, p. 51.
THE INTERIOR 171
line the marbles are generally rather darker in tone than those employed between it and the carved cornice.
As regards details, the great niches on either side of the en- trance from the transept are lined, above a skirting of grey Irish limestone, with alternate narrow vertical strips of pale pavonazzo and campan vert from the Pyrenees, a symphony in white and green, whose upper edges meet a border of black and white chevrons, at the base of the conch, lined with mosaic A white billet moulding outlines the entire recess and the panels of pavonazzo framed in a mosaic of dull red and yellow, which face the pier above it. Below the white string or lower cornice, these great piers are clothed with rosso antico. The pilasters on the fronts of the small piers of the nave are made of exquisitely marked giallo antico, the pink-flushed variety obtained from the ancient Roman quarries at Klaber in Algeria.
Within the arches, the piers display fine panels of the ser- pentinous dark green marble from Thessaly, the verde antico already so abundantly employed. Four of the Klaber pilasters, two on each side of the nave, are further adorned on their upper edge with laurel wreaths in bronze gilt enclosing plaques of rosso antico, that porphyry-coloured marble which is the nearest that can be obtained to the precious porphyry of the ancients.' These red plaques carry the salutation ave in letters of gilt bronze, and are surmounted by a carved cornice of acanthus, which rises in segmental form concentric with the wreaths.
The deep soffits of the nave arches are lined with white, inlaid with an interlacing lozenge design, carried out in gold and blue mosaic. Their low parapet walls are of delicately veined pavonazzo, panelled and moulded. The first bay contains door- ways of access to each aisle, lined with pavonazzo, outlined with billet ornament and having laurel wreaths of white marble enclosing
* The difficulty (and consequent expense) of getting the real thing is almost in- surmountable, the only quarries known being situated in an arid desert in Arabia, twenty- three miles inland from the shores of the Red Sea. In consequence this nearly akin marble, rosso antico as it is called, is almost always substituted when the effect of porphyry is required.
172 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
circular medallions of golden-tinted Italian breccia above their lintels. Three white steps lead to the higher floor level of the sanctuary aisles.
Above the first string-cornice of the Lady Chapel we come to a band of light decoration, mainly in green and white. The spandrels of the arches are filled with alternate vertical strips of vert campan and pavonazzo ; the pier pilasters have panels of fine Italian purple breccia, with an inlaid frame of red and gold, surmounted with richly carved pediments, below which an anato- mized ram's head projects on either side above a depending swag of husk ornament. The main cornice of Carrara, with its acanthus ornament, will form an effective line of junction between the marbles and the mosaic hereafter to be applied.
In the decoration of the apse the designer has allowed himself a greater wealth of colour and of rare and precious marbles. Deep red has a large share in the general effect beneath the lower cornice, the walls being covered with a variety of the ancient Greek red marble ; the niches behind the altar are treated in the same way as those of the west end, with strips of cool green and white. Small pavonazzo-lined doorways provide on either side of the apse convenient means of access for those engaged in the service of the altar. Rare and splendid slabs of grand antique, the bianco e nero of the Pyrenees, occupy the panels above these doorways, with broad framings formed of diamonds of red marble set among tesserae of gold and black. Between lower and upper cornices, unique specimens of pink pavonazzo from Italy are combined with Siena, pale-toned breccias, white marble mouldings and borders of rosso antico and gold mosaic, to form an opulent setting for altar and reredos.
The gradine, against which the white marble altar is placed, projects boldly from the curved wall of the apse and supports a reredos of the same material that rises up to the main cornice. This carved frame, enclosing a mosaic representation of the Blessed Virgin and Child, is richly inlaid with a mosaic of gold, lapis-lazuli, and pearl. Below the frame stretches a slab of dark
THE INTERIOR 173
purple-veined Siena, having an oval of campan vert set in it centrewise ; campan vert forms the retable, while another and clearer tone of green is to be found in the frontal, where a fine slab of Greek cipoUino is framed in white, and enriched with two rosso antico enwreathed medallions, displaying the Holy Mother's monogram in letters of gilt bronze. The frontal Bentley had in mind for the altar was not in the least like this ; his was to be inlaid with adoring seraphim, carried out in opus sectile, probably, and it would have been a very beautiful and imagi- native production.
The predella is of Siena and grey Greek marble ; while the flooring of the sanctuary combines verde antico, red Languedoc, Belgian black, pavonazzo and second statuary, and is raised by two steps above the nave floor. This level, again, is interrupted by a single step occurring between the first and second bays ; the whole being covered at present with wood block flooring, with the exception of the pier recesses, where it is replaced by a white marble pavement inset with bay-leaf wreaths in dark and light green marbles.
Although over four years have elapsed since the marble-work was finished, but little achievement can be recorded in regard to the mosaic decoration, indeed at present only the altarpiece and the lining of the apse recesses are completed. These were executed from Mr. Anning Bell's designs by Miss Martin, a lady who at one time was one of Mr. Bridge's assistants, and who had gained her experience in the work in the chapels of the Holy Souls and St. Gregory and St. Augustine.
Mr. Anning Bell's reredos panel is well under the Byzantine spell in drawing and treatment ; indeed the figures of the Mother and Child are slightly reminiscent of the famous ancient picture (attributed by some to St. Luke) in the Redemptorist Church of St. Augustine in Rome. The Blessed Virgin, in veil and robe of blue and white, beneath a green mantle, its folds accentuated by lines of gold, stands facing the spectator, the Holy Child seated erect and supported on her right arm. He is clad in a white robe, and
174 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
looks out of the picture with His right hand raised in benediction. A crossed nimbus of red and gold encircles His head ; that of the Mother is closely draped, and has a golden nimbus, with the symbols MP and ©V on circular plaques of gold on the back- ground to right and left. The blue background is diapered with a slight arcading in white — each tiny arch enclosing a white cross. The conches of the apse niches and of those flanking the entrance from the south transept are covered Avith foliated arabesques in light tones of green, lavender, and white on a light blue ground, encirchng the heads of the prophets Isaias, Ezechiel, Daniel, and Jeremias.
The idea of making the Immaculate Conception the subject for the altarpiece was at one time entertained, though Bentley's own intention to have the Annunciation, with St. Anne and St. Joachim, parents of the Blessed Virgin, on either side and under- neath, treated as three smaller pictures — the Presentation of our Lady in the Temple, the Nativity, and the Salutation of St. Eliza- beth—was embodied in the verbal outline of an elaborate scheme for the mosaics and opus sectile in this chapel prepared by him as far back as 1899. It was published first anonymously in the February Cathedral Record, and subsequently reprinted with an illustrative diagram in the supplement to the Tablet of December 29th, 1900. Since it is reprinted in extenso on page 243 it will suffice to remark here that Bentley confined the historical treatment of his subject to the altarpiece, and elaborated its symbolic and mystical aspect in the major portion of the surfaces at his disposal for pictorial effects.
The artificial lighting of the Lady Chapel is, as far as the nave is concerned, provided by rough temporary electric pendants, sus- pended from cantilevers fixed above the upper cornice. But the sanctuary has recently been endowed with a pair of pendants of silvered copper, depending from bronze cantilevers. They take the form of a deep corona repouss^ and pierced with lozenge detail, suspended by four finely devised chains from a horizontal many-pointed star. From medallions pierced with a fleur de lys
THE INTERIOR 175
and attached to the corona hang four electric lamps ; a fifth, depending from the centre of the chandelier, is attached to a larger oval medallion pierced with the monogram of the Blessed Virgin. These effective pendants, designed by the Bentley firm, add con- siderably to the effect of the chapel decorations.
The silver crucifix and six altar candlesticks, whose designs were from the same source, were presented by a generous bene- factor in 1910. They are appropriately enriched with lapis-lazuli, the cross, 3 ft. 4| in. high, bearing on its base the following inscription :
AD MAJOREM DEI GLORIAM ET IN HONOREM BEAT^ MARI^ VIRGINIS HANC CRUCIFIXI EFFIGIEM UNA CUM CANDELABRIS SEX EJUSDEM MATERIA SACELLO EJUSDEM BEATISSIM^
VIRGINIS IN ECCLESI^ CATHEDRALI WESTMONASTERIENSI DONO DEDICAVIT FREDERICUS ROBERTUS RICHARDSON ANNO DNI MCMX.
When Cardinal Vaughan faced the problem of cathedral building left for solution by his predecessor, he discovered that a. substantial sum, bequeathed for the erection and decoration of a chapel in the future cathedral, had been steadily accumulating in value since 1871, when the death of the testatrix, Baroness Weld, took place. The original sum, £11,333, left by her in memory of her son, had in fact almost doubled in the thirty-five years that had elapsed before it could be applied to its intended purpose. The Lady Chapel being, with the exception of the Blessed Sacra- ment Chapel (already otherwise provided for), the most costly to complete. Cardinal Vaughan very early decided to allocate thereto Baroness Weld's great bequest; but owing, among other reasons, to pressure of work earlier taken in hand, it was not until 1907 that the contracts to carry out the designs prepared by Mr. Marshall were signed. Just after Easter 1908, the fixing of the marble-work was begun, and hastened to completion in less than six months, to be unveiled for the great Eucharistic Congress held in London in the September of that year.
This chapel was the earliest portion of the cathedral opened for
176 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
divine worship ; here, on Lady Day 1903, the first mass ' was cele- brated, and thereafter, until the opening of the whole building, it continued, roughly enclosed with screens of canvas, in daily occupation as the parish church. The old parish church of St. Mary in Horseferry Road, served by the Jesuits, was then given up and closed.
The Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament
Retracing his steps to the south transept and thence across the nave, the visitor will next proceed to the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, which though in general dimensions and plan the replica of its sister-chapel, possesses certain divergences, one of which has been already mentioned. We refer to the triple broaching of the apse of the Lady Chapel, designed, when the Blessed Sacra- ment Chapel was to occupy the south-east position, to accom- modate a baldacchino of dignity and importance. A second structural difference occurs in the fenestration, the vault of the apse here being pierced by a couple of segmental-headed windows, providing a much-needed increase of illumination when we con- sider the amount of light screened away laterally by the tall flats of Ashley Place. Furthermore this chapel is enclosed as of custom by grilles and gates, shutting it off as a Holy of Holies from the transept, which serves it as nave, and from the narrow aisles, the northern of which is the chapel or Shrine of the Sacred Heart ; both aisles have pavonazzo-lined arched openings into the chapel westward of the enclosing screen. The chapel is completed as far as its marble and metal work are concerned ; the scheme of mosaic decoration remains as yet concealed in the unknown future, al- though there is probably sufficient money in hand for its realization.
The aim achieved in the marble decoration is extreme lightness of tone (for the reason above noted), the marbles being combined in a style comparatively simple and severe when contrasted with
' A mass had been celebrated at an earlier date in the cathedral precincts, namely that sung on Ascension Day 1902, with great pomp and solemnity in the chapter hall wliich served as a chapel until December 1903.
THE INTERIOR 177
the opulent variety of those which gleam upon the Lady Chapel walls. The reason for this comparative plainness is not far to seek, and lies in the splendour and elaboration of the metal screens with their wealth of gilding and enamel, which in the interest of refinement demand a simpler setting (Plate XXX).
The marble sheeting begins at the niched eastern piers of the transept, whose recesses are outlined with white billet mouldings and lined with vertical alternate strips of pavonazzo and verde antico up to the springing of the conch (still wanting its mosaic lining), where they are headed with a black and white chevron banding. The pier above the recess is faced with three panels of pavonazzo, bordered with Siena inlays. A white string or simple cornice is carried round the chapel at the height of the springing of the arcading ; below it the pier faces are covered with an effective horizontal arrangement of " opened-out " rose de Numidie slabs (deep yellow with a pink flush) divided by narrow bands of greyish campan vert. The inner sides of the piers and the soffits of the arches are lined with very lightly marked pavon- azzo, which also fills the square-headed openings to right and left of the sanctuary, their jambs outlined with a billet moulding of the white marble, while the panel above the lintel is adorned with an interlacing design in black and gold mosaic. The opening on the north side of the apse contains an aumbrey for holy oils, its door of copper having a central panel of repousse brass. The corresponding opening on the south provides the means of access to the sanctuary from the aisle, and is closed by a simply moulded teak door.
To right and left of the altar the continuity of the Numid- ian marble banding is yet again interrupted by a pair of 3-ft. breadths of pavonazzo, framed with billet mouldings, that on the Epistle side being recessed to contain the credence and piscina of white marble. The conch of this recess is lined with overlapping vine leaves and tendrils, carved in unpolished Carrara in very low relief. Behind the altar three upright panels of Siena form a species of r credos rising from the topmost step of the double 1—12
178 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
flight behind it to the line of the upper cornice. These slabs are " opened out " and flanked by bands of white marble broken with a pattern in verde antico oblongs edged and connected with fine lines of gold mosaic.
Above the white marble string the decoration assumes a vertical arrangement in both nave and sanctuary. In the former, the pier pilasters are surmounted by entablatures of pavonazzo, with verde antico panels, the intervening wall spaces showing vertical strips of campan vert and rose de Numidie, In the sanctuary similar strips of campan vert alternate with those of pale pavonazzo, except above the recesses and doorway already de- scribed, which are headed with splendid panels of breccia, mingling purple, grey, and white, enclosed within a mosaic band of lapis and pearl and framed in the billet moulding that occurs below.
The simply conceived altar of Siena, cipollino, and Carrara is approached by three steps of white marble ; frontal and mensa are composed of fine golden-yellow Siena, displaying a somewhat strong " figure " ; while of verde antico are the inlays in the retable, bordered with a single row of golden tesserae. The white marble dossal which rises to the extent of 2 ft. above the cipollino gradine contains a splendid panel of this light green marble with the usual golden edging.
A flat wooden canopy or celatura, of hexagonal form, is sus- pended above the altar by means of a massive chain and pierced bulb of silvered bronze. One is constrained to regret the pro- nouncedly " Roman " type of this canopy, wliich takes the place of the circular baldacchino with six columns conceived by John Bentley, which, as already indicated, had been rendered wholly impracticable by the altered conditions. Cardinal Vaughan having decided, for reasons sufficiently good though unhappily somewhat tardily recognized, to reverse the dedication of the two eastern chapels, Bentley was forced to concur, though the change necessitated, in his opinion, the abandonment of this important part of the design. His untimely death prevented the planning of another form of canopy.
THE INTERIOR 179
Mr. Marshall has thrown further light on the Cardinal's views and motives. " The difficulty of accommodating the baldacchino in the apse that was not designed for it did not influence the Cardinal in his decision to abandon it altogether, though it might very well have done so. Apart from this incompatibility, he very strongly objected to the idea of a baldacchino on columns in addi- tion to that over the high altar of the sanctuary, A chapel had been specially set apart for the Holy Eucharist, and the Cardinal preferred that it alone should be the shrine enclosed by grilles and gates, and with a simple canopy suspended over the altar. When the present Archbishop succeeded his Eminence, there was some idea of reverting to Mr. Bentley's original intention, but it was found that the work of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel was so far advanced that any further change would have been beset by many serious difficulties." '
Mr. Marshall was therefore requested to design a canopy for suspension, the design submitted being duly carried out. Hexa- gonal in plan, it is made of wood painted and gilt with a fine silvery tint of gold. The upper member of the border moulding is carved at intervals with acanthus leaves in low relief ; on the lower portion an interlacing bead forms a series of oblong hexa- gonal panels. Winged heads of cherubim look down from each of the six corners of the canopy. Depending from the lowest moulding is a species of carved " fringe " composed of small shields painted with a white cross on an azure ground, alternating with short strings of golden beads ; these, at the angles beneath the cherubim, carry each a golden cross. The flat ceiling of the canopy is broken by gilt bead-and-reel mouldings into lozenge- shaped panels, coloured red and enclosing a smaller lozenge carved in relief and tinctured in blue and gold.
The tabernacle thus canopied is also from Mr. Marshall's design, and is 4 ft. 6 in. in height from its base to the top of the finial surmounting the dome, and 24 in. in diameter. It is circular in plan, and wrought in silver gilt, inlaid with precious stones and
1 Westminster Cathedral Chronicle, January 1908.
180 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
further enriched with repousse work. Above the double doors is a repousse plaque, enclosed in a wreath, on which are represented the chalice and the sacred host with the words of consecration :
HOC EST CORPUS MEUM, HIC EST CALIX SANGUINIS MEI. In the
beaten design which fills the panels of each door, the hanging grape clusters are formed alternately of chrysoprases and ame- thysts. A figure of the Divine Pelican with wings outstretched broods over the dome.
The decorated exterior encloses a cylindrical steel safe, lined with cedar of Lebanon and white silk, and strongly secured to the altar. These silken curtains are suspended by means of a number of gold wedding rings, each inscribed with the name of its donor. To a benefactress of the cathedral is due this pious and charming idea ; having set herself the task of collecting gold rings for the tabernacle curtains, she persuaded certain of her relatives and women friends to leave their wedding rings to be used for this purpose. The required number of golden circlets, thus bequeathed and hallowed, was completed in 1909.
The effective altar crucifix and candlesticks, the gift of another benefactress in that year, are of a primitive Byzantine type, massive and solid, and carried out in bronze mercurial-gilt, set with natural stones. The hemispherical base, adorned with pierced decoration, is supported by three plain feet. The lower half of the shaft is set with three circles of light red stones ; the knop being elaborately chased in a design of vine leaves and fruit ; a curvilinear beading encircles the upper portion of the shaft, which terminates in spreading acanthus leaves carrying the bowl. The crucifix is double-armed, and reproduces the general details of the candlesticks.
Behind the tabernacle the throne rests at present on a tem- porary wooden staging, erected at the back of the altar. It is likewise of wood, and takes the form of a simple circular plateau, borne by two kneeling angels with upcurving wings; the whole is plainly gilt.
The floor of the sanctuary is a harmony of rose and green,
^. '''\! ,iyj^\Lyk % ¥^ f v;^s:^^
A^
■r--^-^ ^
f 4 '
/
Plate XXV. — Original Drawing for Sculptured Capital between Side Chapels and
Aisles.
180]
Plate XXVI. — Chapel of SS. Uregory and Augustine; the Brampton Chantky.
[181
THE INTERIOR 181
squares of fair Greek cipollino being combined with pointed ovals of the marble from Languedoc, in a setting of white. That of the nave (within the gates) displays the dark green of Thessaly, the paler tones of Varallo and cipollino, with the gold of Siena and the pink of Languedoc. The flooring of the space that extends from the gates to the first transeptal piers is laid with great hexagonal slabs of bleu fleuri, bordered with a bead and reel in black and white inlay, and interspaced with Carrara, which also forms the single step on which the gates are mounted.
All the metalwork in this chapel was designed by Mr, Marshall. Beyond that already mentioned, we have yet to notice the central screen and gates, the lateral grilles, the altar rail, and the devices for artificial lighting. The drawings for the gates and grilles, made very shortly after Bentley's death, were approved by Cardinal Vaughan, and the execution begun in his lifetime. Their material is bronze, cast and chased, and enriched with much delicate orna- ment in gilding and blue and white enamel. The design, based on Roman detail, is strongly suggestive of Pompeian work, and un- avoidably, therefore, reminiscent of the classic art adopted and modified a hundred years ago by the artists of the First Empire. How far a design thus inspired is suitable to the cathedral is a question that cannot with profit be discussed now ; though, in spite of the Divine Pelican crowning the central arch, one cannot help feeling that the composition is animated with a sensuous gaiety remote from the spirit of an Early Christian church, and more akin to the triumphal arch of a Roman holiday. This is not in any way to deny the inherent beauties of the design, nor the super- excellence of the workmanship (Plate XXX).
The screen is composed of two corniced wings, with a gateway, arched and recessed, in the middle. On the summit of this arched gateway stands the symbolic pelican, gilt and chased. The soffit of the arch is enriched with a design in blue and white enamel, continued along the frieze of the wings. These wings, it will be seen, are composed of a lower latticed portion containing three panels interspaced by four fluted pilasters, which are continued
182 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
upwards to the cornice by slender shafts of bronze, delicately en- twined with golden foliage and linked, beneath their more elaborate terminal chasing and moulding, by three swags of golden laurel leaves. Between the shafts are spaced two slender rods of bronze, strung with bead-like enamelled bosses at regular intervals. Each gate, its top arched above a circular laurel wreath, with depending ribbons, is composed of gilt balusters associated Avith moulded up- right and cross supports. Rosettes of blue and white enamel powder the stout supports of the gates. Grilles of similar design occupy the arched openings on either side of the chapel, from the coping of their low marble walls to the level of the springing.
The screen alone took three and a half years to make, at a cost of £2,350 ; the grilles being subsequently finished by June 1907, at an additional cost of about £1,500, by Messrs. J. W. Singer of Frome, who were responsible for all the decorative metalwork in this chapel.
The communion rail, also in Roman classical style and of cast bronze, chased and gilt, is fixed on the upper of the two steps of the sanctuary. The rail proper, to ensure durability, was treated with the costly process of fire gilding, the remainder being electro-gilt. Suspended between the fluted railings, on their outer side, are eight oval wreaths, enclosing enamel plaques, on six of which are depicted the instruments of the Passion, in white enamel on a red ground. The two end plaques contain the symbols Alpha and Omega.
The three silver lamps of the sanctuary depend from a bar of silvered bronze by chains of wrought metal, strung with small enamel lozenges in blue and yellow and globes and pendants of carved rock crystal. Similar crystal drops form a fringe along the bar. Enriched with dark blue and apple-green enamels and set with onyx and crystal are the hexagonal silver lamps, of which the two outer hang considerably lower than the central one.
The six electric light pendants are carried out in a lozenge form in bronze gilt pierced and enamelled, and display on the obverse the Alpha and Omega in two of the four enamelled com-
THE INTERIOR 183
partments into which their flat surfaces are divided. On the reverse side the enamel plaques show a red diamond surrounded by one of white, and again by one of blue. Each pendant, hung from a cantilever above the upper cornice, bears five electric lights, suspended from and between the three lower angles of the lozenge, the bottom one being attached to a cross.
This brief account of the Shrine of Shrines in the cathedral would be incomplete were we to omit the rather interesting chronicle of the manner in which the funds for its decoration were obtained. Father Kenelm Vaughan, a younger brother of the Cardinal Founder, a man of ascetic and humble life, imbued with intense devotion to our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, begged and obtained permission, under the impulse of this devotion, to collect money for the building and adornment of a chapel of expia- tion and adoration in the new cathedral. His life thenceforth was devoted with fine singleness of purpose to this chosen task. To Spain, a land of historic faith and devotion akin to his own, and to the Spanish-speaking races of South America, he resolved alone to make his appeal, and something in the fashion of a pilgrim of old, with the blessing of his superiors he left England in 1896.
During eleven long years, undaunted by hardship and fatigue, he pursued with unfaltering zeal the self-set labour, begging his way from door to door and from town to town. Two years were spent profitably in Spain, where the subscription list, headed by such august names as those of his Most Catholic Majesty Alfonso XIII and the Queen Mother Maria Cristina among the Fundadores del Sagrario (as contributors of £50 and over were entitled), soon reached £4,000. On the beginning of hostilities between Spain and the United States in 1898, Father Vaughan sailed for South America, where in the ensuing nine years he brought up the net total of his collection to £18,634.
The decoration of the chapel being entered upon in 1904, its marbles, altar, canopy and most of the metalwork were completed by 1908, so that on his return to England Father Kenelm had the
184 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
happiness of seeing, in a great measure, the realisation of his dream. He died on May 19th, 1909, nearly six years after liis brother the Cardinal and two after his return from South America. His greatest desire was that perpetual Exposition of the Blessed Sacra- ment and special services all the year through should take place in the chapel ; but though the money he had collected was ample for material requirements, it was insufficient to provide endowment for these spiritual ideals. About £3,750 of the above sum yet unspent is set aside for the mosaics of the vaulting and apse, which, it was said, are to be put in hand as soon as those in the Lady Chapel are completed.
The Shrine of the Sacred Heart and St. Michael
This shrine, occupying the north aisle of the chapel just de- scribed, is very narrow in proportion to its length, and terminates eastward in a small apse, whose effect is unfortunately almost destroyed by the disproportionate scale of the statue placed above the altar. The lighting is by means of three circular windows in the north wall, and the general effect of the marble wall lining, which on this side ceases about 2 ft. below these openings, is green and white. Here we have a dado of openednaut vertical slabs of cipoUino, headed by two bands of equal width of Irish fossil and pavonazzo. This banding is repeated beneath the simple Carrara cornice, the intervening wall space showing, cen- trally between the piers, a light breccia panel within a larger one of verde antico, alike edged with narrow white mouldings and alternating with plain slabs of cipollino.
On the south side the arcading of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, with its enclosing grilles, has pier pilasters of verde antico up to the height of the string already mentioned ; surmounted with an entablature of pavonazzo, which, moulded and relieved by the introduction of diamonds of rosso antico, carries the eye up to the springing of the arcading, where the mosaic of the vault begins. This note of red, to be emphasized so strongly in the
THE INTERIOR 185
mosaics, is repeated in the altar slab of Cork marble ; the frontal has a central panel of second statuary, carved in bas-relief with a representation of St. Michael and the Dragon, flanked by panels of strongly figured cipollino, the whole enclosed in a broad pavon- azzo framing. The retable carries a pedestal of campan vert on which stands the conventional life-size statue of the Sacred Heart carved in white marble.
The recess behind the statue is lined with vertical strips of choice black of Pandemia, an extremely rare marble, the small quantity of which here introduced was brought from Asia Minor by the Farmer & Brindley firm over forty years ago. Alternate strips of pavonazzo redeem the space thus treated from the fault of excessive contrast, and terminate in a simply moulded cornice beneath the mosaics of the apse vault. To right and left of the statue at about elbow height, circular medallions of red Languedoc, enframed in white mouldings, are applied to the wall to break the monotony of the vertical treatment.
The areas requiring mosaic treatment were the four com- partments of the cross vaulted roof, the lunette of the west end, the vault of the apse, and the upper part of the north wall above the marble dado. On account of the small vaults and broken wall spaces, it was deemed advisable to avoid subjects in tiie mosaic, certain conventional designs including symbolic hearts, foliation and geometrical figures being chosen instead and repeated in the general colour scheme of red and gold, relieved with a little green and white. An exception occurs at the west end, where, in this small tympanum, the eye is arrested by an im- pressive and majestic presentment of the Holy Face, gazing out upon the world from a ground of plain gold mosaic. This portion of the mosaic, the last work of the late W. Christian Symons, completed shortly before his lamented death in 1911, was due to the generosity of Mrs. Evelyn Murray.
The marble work, begun early in 1910 with funds provided by old pupils of the Sacred Heart convents, was finished by the June of that year. The nuns of the same order gave the alabaster
186 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
statue of the Sacred Heart, already mentioned, which was carved in the studios of Messrs. Farmer & Brindley.
The electric light pendants in this chapel bear a close relation- ship in form to certain of the ancient lamps (light crosses) in the church of Santa Sophia at Constantinople, described in Messrs. Lethaby and Swainson's book in quotations from the Silentiary's account of its wondrous treasxu-es. In the Westminster shrine two silvered bronze beams, with hammered ornament, are thrown across the chapel, above the cornice level, from each of which hang a pair of cruciform pendants of the same metal with three electric lights swinging from arms and foot of the cross. The silver lamp before the statue is suspended from the vault and is less severely Byzantine in character. It was the gift of Sir Charles Paston-Cooper, Bt., and was designed by Mr. Osmond Bentley and Mr. Marshall ; the latter also was the designer of the electric light pendants.
Chapel of St. Thomas of Canterbury
The narrow chapel thus dedicated in the north transept, and wholly enclosed by grilles of gilt bronze, is Cardinal Vaughan's chantry (Plate XXXI). Here naturally is raised the monument to the Cardinal Founder, although by his own desire his body rests, not within the walls of this culminating achievement of his career, but in the garden of the Missionary College at Mill Hill, into whose foundations the best years of his life were built. In the chantry chapel at Westminster the recumbent effigy ' of pure white Pentelic faces the altar, the head reposing on a pair of tasselled cushions. Clad in rochet and mozetta, with the hands joined in prayer, the body is more slender than the great man was in life, and inexpressive of his majestic and dignified carriage. The Cardinal's hat rests across it between knees and feet, its tassels falhng down on either side to the lower edge of the white
* Designed by Mr. J. A. Marshall and carved by Henry McCarthy, a sculptor who had worked for Bentley during many years.
THE INTERIOR 187
marble sarcophagus, which is inscribed with this strikingly simple epitaph :
PRAY FOR THE SOUL OF HERBERT VAUGHAN CARDINAL PRIEST OF THE HOLY ROMAN CHURCH THIRD ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER AND FOUNDER OF THIS CATHEDRAL BORN APRIL 15, 1832 ; DIED JUNE 19, 1903. R.I.P.
The base of the tomb, with circular projections at the four corners to receive candlesticks, is of verde antico and rests on a platform of red Greek marble, the surrounding floor being com- posed of green and black marble inlaid in white.
The chapel is entered through an arcading carried on a central pier and on two columns of the precious black and white breccia known as grand antique- This pier and the lateral ones are alike sheeted with porphyry-coloured rosso, while above the former a white marble tablet displays the carved and tinctured arms of the Cardinal Founder. The very characteristic capitals (of Bentley's designing) with their highly developed dosserets, and the sofRts and carved face mouldings of the arches, are in white statuary marble. The inner sides of the piers have verde antico pilasters.
Interiorly the chapel is clothed with marble to the level of the window-sills, where in a pair of arched openings four rectangular lights filled with greenish tinted glazing in decorative leading are set side by side. This marble dado, consisting of broad slabs of heavily marked pavonazzo emphasized with narrow vertical divisions of verde antico, is continuous round the three sides of the chapel ; with the exception of the pier facings of porphyry-coloured rosso. The altar, without retable, is of verde antico, its wreath-adorned frontal being carved out of solid blocks 4 in. thick. The floor surrounding the altar repeats, as regards the diamonds of Irish green on a white ground, the detail of that in the tomb bay ; but its central panel introduces, in a more in- tricate design, a variety of marbles, dark green, red, yellow, black and white.
188 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The screens enclosing the chantry were the gift of the clergy of England and Wales.' Extending from the floor to the lower member of the capitals, they consist of a series of slender balus- ters supporting a frieze, and bearing the late Cardinal's initials, H. v., and a mitre beneath a patriarchal cross, in a lozenge applied to the superior part of each arcade. These scrolls and the frieze are hand wrought, the remainder being cast. The material is solid bronze, gilt throughout, and richly chased.
The four massive candlesticks of cast bronze, for the base of the tomb, the gift of the Dowager Duchess of Newcastle, were designed by the Bentley firm, who also produced the altar crucifix of bronze inlaid with silver, with its antique ivory figure. Above the head of Christ, a hand, holding a wreath which surrounds a dove, descends from the scroll of superscription. This crucifix, the gift of Lady Alice Fitzwilliam, was made by the Bromsgrove Guild of Metal Workers.
The suggestion that the decoration by the Catholic clergy of England of a chapel in Westminster Cathedral to be dedicated to St. Thomas of Canterbury would be a fitting testimony of their gratitude to the martyred defender of the Church's liberties, emanated in November 1900 from the Right Rev. Francis Bourne, then Bishop of Southwark (now Cardinal Archbishop of West- minster). The idea finding ready acceptance, funds continued to accumulate till the summer of 1907, when it was decided to begin the marble wall lining. Very shortly after Cardinal Vaughan's death this chapel was set apart as his chantry, and on June 19th, 1907, the fourth anniversary of his death, this marble effigy was solemnly unveiled by his successor in the see of Westminster.
It was Monsignor Thomas Dunn, now Bishop of Nottingham, then a Canon of Westminster, and for several years secretary and chaplain to the late Cardinal, who collected the moneys for his monument, and also opened a fund for a diurnal chantry mass. By this arrangement the sum of £10 secures one annual mass in perpetuity. The tomb cost £640, while close on £350 was ex-
' They were luade by Messrs. Singer & Co. of Frome, from Mr. Marshall's desigas.
THE INTERIOR 189
pended on the marble altar and dado and £825 on the grilles. It remains to complete the work by adding the mosaic sheathing to walls and vaults. A scheme of decoration which includes, we understand, a representation of the Adoration of the Magi in the tympanum of the west end was prepared in 1907 and has received the approbation of authority.
That Bentley left nothing in the way of detail for the decora- tion of the chapel of St. Thomas is doubtless to be attributed to his knowledge of Cardinal Vaughan's intentions regarding it in the year 1900. The Cardinal, in his anxiety to accelerate the completion of the Cathedral, seems to have conceived the idea that Bentley was willing to receive help with certain decorative schemes. It is true that Bentley had never intended to undertake unaided all the mosaic work, but wished and, with the Cardinal's sanction, invited others to co-operate. But there can be little doubt that he was determined to retain in his own hands all the designs for the marble-work. Under this misapprehension, for such we must suppose it to have been on the Cardinal's part, Mr. Thomas Garner was invited to undertake the marble decora- tion of St. Thomas's Chapel.
This architect, who died in 1906, was for a long period' in distinguished partnership with the late G. F. Bodley, R.A., and together they produced ecclesiastical architecture of a high order over the length and breadth of England. The former, though personally unknown to Bentley, was a friend of Vaughan's, and as a co-religionist was likely to be favourably received in the ranks of aspirants to the honour of sharing in the decoration of the new cathedral. On receiving the Cardinal's invitation, Mr. Garner very properly communicated with the architect as follows :
"The Manor House,
" Fritwell, Oxon. ''October 21th, 1900.
*' Dear Mr. Bentley,
" The Cardinal has asked me to undertake the decoration of the chapel of St. Thomas of Canterbury in the new cathedral,
» 1869-1897.
190 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and says that you are pleased that he should do so. If this is your wish I should much like to call on you and talk the matter over, for I should not like to do anything you would disapprove of. I know how very kindly you have spoken of mc, and I should have written to thank you, but I understood that Monsignor Barry was going to arrange an interview between us, and as I heard no more, I concluded that you did not feel up to it at present.' If this is still the case I will, of course, wait your convenience, but I do feel that we ought to know each other, and I assure you that no one is a warmer admirer of your abilities than myself. I am so glad to hear that you are better.
" Yours very truly,
" Thomas Garner."
The reply, tiiough somewhat delayed, was evidently kindly and encouraging, for Mr. Garner wrote again :
" Thb Manor House,
"Fbitwell, Oxon. "November Sth, 1900.
" Dear Mr. Bentley,
" Thank you for your kind letter, which I was glad to get, as I feared my letter had vexed you. I will try to call at John Street next week, and give you due notice. I am very sorry to hear you have had trouble.' With kind regards.
" Yours in haste,
" Thomas Garner."
Garner eventually proceeded to make the drawings for the chapel of his name saint, but the designs were never accepted, and as we have seen, the work reverted to the Bentley firm, which was requested to undertake it four or five years after the archi- tect's death.
' Ho had been ill for many weeks since his second paralytic seizure in the summer of that year.
• One of Bentley's daughters had been severely burned at the end of October and for
a long time wiw not expuctod to ncovor.
THE INTERIOR 191
The North Transept
A single central column of vcrde antico carries the bridge-like gallery, thrown, as in the south transept (though this has two columns), across the opening in the main pier, to link the gallery of the crossing with that above the porch and the Vaughan chantry. The architect's designs for the marble-work, drawn to i-inch scale, include the walling over the latter. He left, more- over, full-size details for the completion of the doorway from the transept to the porch. The lobby of this porch is domically vaulted and is projected 6 ft. into the transept, its entrance being closed by swing doors of teak, enriched with bronze grilles and applied ornament. The lobby lighting is effected by a pair of small level-topped windows in twin arched recesses of the north wall. The entrance from Ambrosden Avenue involves an ascent of four steps to the interior of the porch, which receives some light from the cathedral through an opening of small pro- portions filled with a gilt and glazed grille (Plate XVII).
There is an ascent of three steps again from the lobby to the transept, within which, above the window just mentioned, is a mosaic panel representing Blessed Joan of Arc. The holy warrior maiden, a simple yet majestic figure clad in shining mail from shoulders to feet, stands facing the spectator, bearing in her left hand a long sword, and wearing a flowing cope-like mantle of white. Her right hand proudly upholds the lilied Oriflamme of France. The panel measures 3 ft. by 7 ft. 6 in., its design being almost the last work from the hand of the late W. Christian Symons, and was carried out by Mr. George Bridge. The white marble frame, surrounded M'ith a mural revetment of very pale cipollino, is footed with a projecting ledge intended for flower vases.
The cost of the panel and its frame was £325, raised by means of a penny collection among the women and girls of England, organised by the Catholic Women's League in May 1909, and inspired by the idea that such an expression of reparation should fittingly come from the women of the nation which five
192 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
centuries ago had sent this inspired and holy woman to a cruel and shameful death.
The Chapels of the North Aisle
Bentley contributed to the Tablet of May 13th, 1899, an illus- trated scheme for the decoration of one of the chapels of the north aisle. The chapels had not, at that time, all been allotted their dedications, so that he has perforce left the patron saint un- named. In the hope that we shall some day see the fulfilment of his idea, we reproduce the scheme; though unfortunately none of the partially completed altars corresponds in the slightest with the one he describes.
" Framework and slab of altar in onyx ; gradine, side jambs, and plinths of columns in cipollino ; columns in verde antico. On the frontal of opus sectile will be painted seraphs between golden stars enclosed in a border of inlaid pearl and lapis-lazuli. Above the gradine will be a dossal of verde antico, surmounted by a reredos enriched with panels filled with figures of saints, executed in opus sectile. White Pentelic marble will be used for the caps which support an entablature of pavonazzo, carrying a tester of wood richly carved and gilt. In the tympanum of the recess would be placed one of the principal incidents from the saint's life, and on the soffit of the arch demi-figures associated with him either mystically or historically.
" The vault forming the ceiling will be covered with silver mosaic, glazed with golden-green and enriched with wreaths of green and gold. The angels are to carry plaques inscribed with memorials of the donors. A marble dado under the windows is to consist of cipollino marble slabs, rich in colour and markings, divided by strips of inlay, while the floor is to be paved with marble of various colourings in large forms divided into patterns by mosaics of small tesserae. The windows will be glazed with Vene- tian roundels of toned white glass."
THE INTERIOR 193
The Chapel of St. Joseph
This chapel is on plan similar in all respects to that dedi- cated to St. Paul on the south side, and calls for little remark for the reason that it has at present no equipment beyond an altar of fair marbles designed by the Bentley firm. Its Siena frontal, bordered with an inlaid band of lapis-lazuli and gold mosaic, is centrally inset with a wavy lozenge of choice Irish green marble with borders of inlaid lapis and pearl. The mensa is a fine slab of pavonazzo ; the simple retablc is of bronze ; and the altar will hereafter be completed by a reredos of opus sectile rising within the curve of the apse.
Very little money had been subscribed for the decoration of this chapel, probably because for some time it was understood to be the gift and the chantry of the Weld-Blundells, one of the old Catholic families. Indeed Cardinal Vaughan in the Cathedral Record of February 1899 (No. 7) made definite announcement of this interesting fact. The intention, it is to be presumed, came to naught, for subsequently the Catholic laity were asked to con- tribute the sum of £6,000, which, it was computed, will cover the cost of the marbles, the mosaic work, the opus sectile, and the bronze screen required to complete the chapel. However, part of the need to press for public subscriptions was relieved in 1913 when Mrs. Claude Watney undertook to be responsible for all the marble-work at an estimated cost of £2,615. Bentley has left designs, partly coloured, for the details of the marbling.
Before passing into the aisle one will do well to remark the fine figure of the Greek cipollino column here, and the delicate tracery of its capital.
Chapel of St. George and the English Martyrs
In this, the next chapel westwards, we observe the central column of Swiss cipollino (more yellow in tone and waxy in texture than that quarried from the Euboean land) rising from a light 1—13
194 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
labradorite base. The altar, made from a design prepared in the Bentley office, was executed by a firm of marble- workers not hitherto employed in the cathedral, Messrs. Arthur Lee & Co., of Hayes. The altar and mensa are carried out in very light pavonazzo, a strong contrast being provided in the three panels of the frontal, verde antico forming its side panels and rouge sanguine of Klaber the centre. The low dossal is of red Greek marble powdered with conventional roses of England in pearl inlay and framed in white marble, with the shield of St. George carved on the terminal pilasters. Brick piers faced with the red marble, capped and based with white, rise on either side, to carry the canopy designed to complete the altar, for which, together with other work in tliis chapel, Bentley left coloured drawings, the marbles being, in some instances, named. The predella is of wood with an inscription as follows on the white marble surrounding it, of which the steps also are composed :
PRO SALUTE SEMPITERNA ALICIA M. CALLAGHAN QU^ HOC EREXIT ALTARE ET PARENTUM EJUS GEORGII M. ARNOLD ET ELIZABETHS C. ARNOLD PLETATE TUA SACERDOS ALIQUANDO SACRA FACIAS.
An eminently suitable suggestion — put forward in 1915 and supported by the late Duke of Norfolk in a letter to The Tablet under the heading "Lest we forget" — that St. George's Chapel should be made a permanent and abiding memorial to CathoUcs who gave their lives in the war, has taken shape and a beginning has been made in the marble tablets to the fallen which form part of the decoration on the window side of this chapel. These tablets, in a pale cream-toned marble, with wreaths and lettering incised in red, record the names of the gallant dead and are surmounted with a frieze of grey-gieen adorned with panels of dark red marble, inlaid in white with the rose emblem of St. George and England. A suitable inscription will eventually be cut above the frieze.
o
H
Q
<
« o
o
e Q
M O
Plate XXVIII. — View op the Lady Chapel i-uom the South Tbansept, whose Splendid Columns of Rose de Languedocj ake seen in the Fokeground.
(Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
1196
THE INTERIOR 195
Chapel of the Holy Souls
This, we believe, will be unanimously admitted to be the most interesting chapel in the cathedral, and for two reasons. The first, which applies equally to the Brampton chantry, is that every detail of the marble-work and the enclosing grille of gilt bronze emanated from the master-mind : the second, in respect of which this chapel is unique, resides in the fact that the design and cartoons for the mosaics were produced under Bentley's constant supervision by an artist who had known his mind intimately for many years ; so that, although they were not completed till after his death, they reflect, as faithfully as may be, the architect's ideal of the proper technique and application of this art.
As befits the dedication, the colour scheme is laid in sombre tones, a general black-and-white effect being thus attained ; even the conventional gold ground of the mosaic is dispensed with and replaced by one of dull silvered tesserae. In the column of splendid labradorite is struck, as it were, the keynote of this theme of natural human mourning, passing, in the perfect capital of white marble, into the Christian's faith and hope in a joyous resurrection. Throughout we shall be impressed with this sym- bolic mingling of sorrow and hope. The two arches of this south side are soberly faced and lined on soffite with a grey Zola marble, while opposite, carrying the arches of the window openings, in delightful contrast, is a most elegant column of nearly white pavonazzo, its swag-adorned base resting on a rectangular ped- estal of green of Tinos. This pair of arches is likewise faced with grey moulding, the tympani, reveals, and soffits of the window recesses being mosaic clad, in a pattern of blue and red chevrons on a silver ground. An irregular pentagon of Imperial yellow marble is set centrally above the pair of segmental-headed lights within each arch (Plate XXIII).
The north wall, curved into two slight recesses below the win- dow-sills of white marble, and the west end are covered with vertical slabs of verde mare, each headed with a narrow panel of
196 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Levanto and separated by narrow white bands inlaid with a repeating design of pomegranates in black cement. The white string at the height of the window-sills is continued round the western and eastern ends. Slabs of red Levanto sheet the brick piers up to this level, its dusky tone in no wise interfering with the general note of mourning ; above, up to the main cornice, whence springs the mosaic work, the clear grey tones of Bardiglio fiorito contrast with the angle pieces of dark dove.
The west wall is treated above the lower moulding with great opened-out slabs of the Bardiglio fiorito, the line of the cornice being broken and to enclose them extended upwards at right angles to the point in the lunette where the mosaic begins. On the inner sides of the southern piers are carved frames of white marble destined to enclose subjects in opus sectile ; at the moment of writing the spaces remain bare brickwork. The foliated and fluted corbels of white marble, whence spring the mouldings of the archivolts, are placed above these frames.
Deeply recessed within the eastern arch stands the altar beneath a majestic altarpiece framed in white marble carved and moulded. Its Greek cipollino dossal is similarly framed, the mensa being of breccia ; while the frontal is composed of three panels of portoro, or black and gold, a very dark marble whose sobriety is accentuated by edging bands of white and black. The predella is inset with rouge antique from the Pyrenees. Bardiglio fiorito is again largely employed, being used for the gradine, the altar steps, and the flooring of the chapel; being combined in the last with narrow lines of rosso antico, inlaid with black and white dia- monds, running longitudinally at intervals of 20 in. These lines are diverted and interrupted by the arms of the Walmesley family, quartering those of Weld-Blundell, represented in marbles of correct tincturing at the foot of the altar steps. Canadian blue, Siena and grande breche de Klaber furnish the required hues of azure, or, and gules. On both sides of the chapel the grey flooring is bordered with a pattern of squares within narrow lines of black, each square consisting of alternating halves of grey and white.
THE INTERIOR 197
Very charming are the little vaulted niches to right and left in the altar recess, lined with vertically placed strips of Belgian black and breche verte, under a banding of black and white chevrons ; this same device, in tesserae of black and gold, also lines their vaulting. Above each niche a panel in opus sectile, carrying the decoration up to the main cornice, displays a deep blue ground patterned with interlacing circles of gold on which are suspended snowy draperies inscribed, on the left, with the words : justorum
ANIM^ IN MANU DEI SUNT ; OU the right : ET NGN TANGET ILLOS TORMENTUM MORTIS.
Yet another variety of marble, hitherto unnoticed, has been introduced into the decoration of this chapel, namely, the green marble of Genoa, which forms the wall covering at either side of the altar below the first cornice. Above that we find again the Bardiglio fiorito panels.
The altarpiece in opus sectile represents Christ our Lord en- throned and displaying His Five Wounds. The figure occupies a sort of plaque which covers the centre of a cross and is clad in drapery of dusky crimson, very rich in colour, its folds accentuated with gold lines in the Byzantine manner. Below are the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph interceding, with hands upraised, for the Holy Souls. Surrounding the cross are the seraphs of the apoca- lyptic vision, the seven spirits before the throne. Silver and white are the throne draperies, violet-red the six- winged seraphs, outlined and feathered with lines of gold. The golden cross of the back- ground with ornamentation of red and white displays the symbolic Alpha and Omega at its extremities, and with the throne rises from a boldly tessellated pavement of black and white, which serves to give perspective to the whole (Plate XXXIII),
The background is a diaper in deep blue and gold. In the lower corners are inset two small panels representing the donor of the chapel and her husband in the attitude of prayer. Mrs. Robert Walmesley on the left is in the habit of the third order of St. Benedict, which she entered after her husband's death ; he, on the right, garbed in a dark cloak, kneels before the " Vera
198 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Effigies " in commemoration of a devotion to which in hfe he was particularly attached.
Let us now examine the mosaics in this chapel, prefacing our description by explaining that the surfaces thus covered include : (a) the barrel vault, penetrated on either side by the two pairs of arches already mentioned, and continuing downwards between these arches so as to form a kind of curved spandrel whose lower edge rests on the bevelled capital of the marble coltman ; (b) the two terminal tympani or lunettes ; (c) the two flat archivolts with corresponding soffits which intervene at either end of the chapel between the barrel vaulting and the terminal lunettes.
An interesting account of the mosaics, by the Rev. Herbert Lucas, S.J., was published in the Tablet of November 14th, 1903, very shortly after their completion. Since it would be difficult to improve upon this description, we venture, -vvith the writer's permission, to transcribe a large portion of his article :
" The subjects depicted, bold in their simplicity, are strongly knit together by living bonds of analogy and symbolism so as to form an organic scheme. . . . The leading theme is expressed by the two figures which occupy the spandrels mentioned above, and which tower above them into the main field of the barrel vault. These are the figures of Adam, the progenitor of the human race and the author of its ruin, and of Christ, the second Adam and the restorer of the broken fortunes of mankind. On the southern ramp of the vault is depicted Adam, standing in an open grave, with his spade beside him, beneath the fateful tree. Round this and round himself is coiled the serpent, who presents in his distended jaws the forbidden fruit in the form of a skull (Plate XXXVI).
" On the northern ramp of the vault, opposite to Adam, stands Christ, new-risen from the tomb, holding aloft the cross as His standard of victory. To the thorns which hedge round Adam's grave correspond, in the opposite picture, flowers white and red. The texts : (1) sicut in adam omnes moriuntur, (2) ita in CHRiSTO OMNES viviFiCABUNTUR, Suitably interpret the two figures which they respectively accompany. These two inscriptions are
THE INTERIOR 199
executed in extremely bold letters on a silver background, ... so large indeed are the letters that such of them as are visible from any given point can be read with ease from the opposite side of the broad nave. . . . The general effect of the two inscriptions, giving as they do the key to the whole composition, is no less pleasing than it is striking.
" In the western lunette, in conformity with the most primitive iconographic tradition in the case of mortuary chambers or chapels, are shown the Three Children in the fiery furnace. The angel who walks in the midst of them is none other than Christ Himself, bearing bread and wine for their sustenance and refresh- ment ; a bold conception admirably expressed. Above on a trapezoidal plaque, superimposed, as it were, on the field of the picture (somcw^hat after the fashion of a ' shield of pretence ' on a coat of arms) is seen Nabuchodonosor taking counsel with his wise men or officers, and asking them, as the accompanying inscription indicates : nonne tres viros misimus in medium IGNIS COMPEDITOS ? and exclaiming in surprise : ecce ego video
QUATUOR VIROS SOLUTOS ET AMBULANTES IN MEDIO IGNIS, ET NIHIL CORRUPTIONIS IN EIS EST, ET SPECIES QUARTI SIMILIS FILIO
DEI (Dan. iii. 91, 92). The glare from the flames of the furnace pervades the whole of the lunette, and is the more striking by contrast with the silver-grey which forms the background of the entire barrel vault,
" It is, however, in this part of the composition that the one jarring note (as it seems to me) is struck. If the subject of the Three Children had been treated as a historical scene, then, of course, it would have been necessary to represent the fate of these ministers of the tyrant King, who, when they would have heaped fire on the furnace, were themselves destroyed. But here the treatment is not historical but symbolical ; and the question suggests itself, whether it was either necessary or desirable to represent, with a somewhat gruesome realism, the luckless fate of these men. . . . Of course it may be replied that these figures, like the rest, are to be understood symbolically, and that the fate of the would-be
200 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
executioners has its analogue in the frustrated schemes of the superhuman enemies of mankind, the demons. But even this con- sideration hardly reconciles one, or, at least, it does not reconcile me, to the relative prominence which the artist has thought well to give to this supposable diabolic element in his allegorical group. . . . This frank criticism may at any rate serve to show that I have no desire to deal out undiluted praise, even to such a master- piece as I believe the mosaics of this chapel to be.
" The subject set forth in the eastern lunette answers to the one just described as antitype answers to type. It exhibits the suffering in process of liberation from their prison house. On the left as one faces the altar, stands an archangel (? Raphael), who presides over the cleansing fires, and before whom pass the souls, loaded with chains and with soiled garments. On the other side stands Michael welcoming them as they come forth, their bonds broken and their garments cleansed, and sending them forward and upwards to the heavenly light. The words of the liturgy, ' Signifer sanctus Michael reprsesentet eas in lucem sanctara,' are here, as it were, translated into action.
" The whole subject is treated processionally, some seven souls being represented in different stages of purification and liberation, and the general effect is extremely fine. The figures of the two archangels, in their garb of regal splendour, dominate the whole picture and contrast with the pale faces and vesture of the suffering souls, the distinctions among whom are marked by delicate shades of difference which at first sight are apt to escape notice, but which grow on the beholder as he looks and learns to admire. The inscription : si cujus opus arserit detrimentum patietur
IPSE AUTEM SALVUS ERIT SIC TAMEN QUASI PER IGNEM, needs nO
comment, but is itself the obvious commentary explaining the subject represented (Plate XXXV.)
" On the soffit of the arch which canopies the altar, we read the words, enclosed in a border of scroll-work : beati mortui
QUI IN DOMINO MORIUNTUR AMODO JAM DIGIT SPIRITUS UT RE- QUIESCANT a LABORIBUS SUIS OPERA ENIM ILLORUM SEQUUNTUR
THE INTERIOR 201
ILLOS ; while on the ramp of the arch, on either side of this central inscription, are brief texts (not scriptural) recording the exercise of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. The arch-face bears the inscription in very large letters : requiem
^TERNAM DONA EIS DOMINE ET LUX PERPETUA LUCE AT EIS.
The corresponding recess at the western end of the chapel is shallower (since it contains no altar) than that at the east end, and its treatment is simpler and, if one may say so, more con- ventional. Neither arch-face nor soffit has any inscription.
" Something must now be said of the colour scheme and technique of the work, for the execution of which the greatest credit is due to Mr. George Bridge and the lady mosaicists who worked under his direction. As has already been implied, the whole field of the great barrel vault has been covered with silver tesserae ; and although the brilliancy of these is considerably toned down and subdued to a greyish hue by the salmon-tinted cement ' which fills the interstices, and although, moreover, the continuity of the field is relieved or broken by two exquisite gar- lands from designs drawn by Mr. Bentley, the treatment of sur- faces so large with a single colour or metal could hardly fail to present considerable difficulty. It is not too much to say that the difficulty has been overcome with the most marked success. If the tesserae had been placed side by side and row by row like the squares on a chessboard and worked to a smooth surface (an ar- rangement which seems to be favoured by some artists in mosaic, the effect of the silver- sheathed vault would have been one of almost intolerable monotony.
" But nothing of this sort is to be observed in Mr. Symons's design, as it has been admirably carried out by Mr. Bridge. By consistently adhering to the fundamental principle which has been so well understood by Sir W. B. Richmond in his work at St. Paul's, viz. that the technical excellence of mosaic which is in- tended to be seen from a distance largely depends on roughness of
^ In whose composition a considerable proportion of red lead was employed. —
W. DE l'H.
202 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
surface which produces an effect otherwise unattainable, and by most skilfully varying the contours of the rows of tesserae, Mr. Bridge has achieved an effect of stippling which entirely does away with the monotony that would otherwise have marred this portion of the scheme. The two leading figures, those, namely, of Adam and Christ, receive all the prominence which their isola- tion can give, while the great surface of silver produces an im- pression of richness without dazzling brightness or featureless smoothness which could have been attained perhaps in no other way."
To conclude with the chronology of this chapel. The marble facing of the window arches, ordered from Messrs. Whitehead in December 1901 and completed in April 1902, was a necessary prelude to the work of the mosaicists. By June 1902 the Chapel was filled with scaffolding for Mr, George Bridge and his lady as- sistants to begin the mosaic incrustration, certain portions of this having previously been prepared on canvas in the Oxford Street studios to which Bentley paid frequent visits in the winter pre- ceding his death. After eighteen months of incessant labour the mosaicists completed their work by November 1903. Messrs. J. Whitehead & Sons having signed the contract for the main part of the marble-work in February 1902, finished all theirs with the exception of the floor in nine months from that time. Mr. Symons then proceeded with the painting of the opus sectile altar- piece, and the panels above the side recesses, which were placed in position in 1904.
Next the floor, ordered in March 1906 from Whitehead, was completed in the following June, and finally the chapel received its bronze gilt grille in 1908. This, stretching from pier to column, and screening the altar, is 15 ft. high by 11 ft. wide. Its design, which formed part of Bentley's own completed details for this chapel, is superb in the Byzantine severity of its twisted and beaded balusters, bearing a broad frieze of beaten and interlaced metalwork, with a row of spiked spheres along the topmost mould- ing. This screen is extraordinarily in harmony with the spirit of
THE INTERIOR 208
the building and with its position therein, and commands much admiration.
Mrs. Robert Walmesley generously gave £10,000 for the building and decoration of this chantry, which, as we have seen, is complete with the exception of the opus sectile subjects for the two pier panels on its southern side. When this lady became a widow she entered the Benedictine Order, and later, as Mother Etheldreda, became prioress of their convent at East Bergholt, Suffolk. The cathedral owes her an immense debt of gratitude.
Before leaving the chapel there yet remains to notice the wooden confessional, which, set against the west wall, is of the elaborate design, previously described, to which ultimately all those placed in the cathedral will conform. This one was speci- ally adapted for the convenience of the lame and the deaf.
The Tower Chamber or Registry
Through a pair of oaken doors in the aisle ingress is obtained to the ground-floor chamber of the campanile, an octagonal vaulted apartment known as the registry, which serves also as a robing room on ceremonial occasions. Thence ascends the spacious oak staircase of 374 steps, whereby the adventurous and energetic may attain the summit of St. Edward's Tower and a fair and ever- widening view of London as the higher stages are successively reached.
The North-West Porch
This entrance, occupying the north-west corner of the church, opens into the narthex, whence one descends by a trio of segmental white marble steps to the level of the porch floor. The street level is reached by a further external descent of four steps. This porch is lobbyless, a cross- vaulted square compartment projected west- wards to the extent of about half its width again by a deep barrel- vaulted recess, pierced with two triple-light windows, each set
204 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
beneath a small glazed lunette of terracotta, A larger terracotta lattice, segmental-headed, opens the tympanum of the containing arch.
Much charm is concentrated in the slender coupled columns of Norwegian granite which rise from a dwarf wall of brickwork (extending at right angles from between the window arches) to carry the vaulting ; and no less attractive, when ultimately clothed with marble, will be the small vaulted niches which break the monotony of the wall to right and left in the window recess. As yet this porch is internally destitute of decoration if one excepts such structural matters as the columns just mentioned, although Bentley left the required coloxu-ed designs, to one-inch scale, for its completion.
The Sacristies
To inspect this essentially important department of a church's administrative equipment, we must revert to the south-eastern side, where will be found, at the end of the processional way' coincident with the south aisle of the Lady Chapel, the entrance to the lobby and outer sacristy. The latter is a cross-vaulted com- partment with a central column of pink granite, its stone capital carved to represent the four elements of nature, as our fore- fathers called them, earth, fire, wind, and water. The floor is paved with a very enduring composition of marble crushed small, and set in cement. The plastered walls are mostly lined with presses and cupboards of no particular merit, while built into the wall on the left is a great fire- and burglar-proof safe. The portrait of the architect painted shortly before his death by his future son- in-law, Rene de I'Hopital, and presented to the cathedral by the late Canon White and other subscribers, hangs on the opposite wall, on the left of the entrance to the great or "state " sacristy.
Through an arched doorway whose tympanum is glazed with
* The architect prepared a general scheme for its marble revetment and a complete design for the doorway leading to the outer sacristy.
THE INTERIOR 205
Venetian roundels over an imposing pair of oaken doors, panelled and moulded, the upper panels being replaced by grille-work of bronze, we enter this stately apartment, 60 ft. long, 30 ft. in breadth, and 38 ft. high to the crown of its barrel-vaulted roof. It is lighted from the south by a pair of small windows set within an arched opening beneath a semi-circular-headed roundel-glazed light ; from the east by three couples of similar windows and a fourth pair with a window- seat placed at a necessarily lower level (Plate XXXIV).
A glance at the plan (fig. 6) reveals the fact that the room consists of five bays, four having the maximum breadth of 30 ft., wliile the fifth at the north end is in part but 20 ft. wide, and is extended by the little apse which was in Bentley's design intended to embrace the altar required by rubric, now placed in a bare fashion against the south wall. The barrel vault, strengthened by massive ribs and coffered in alternate octagons and squares of decorative plaster-work, extends over the four broad bays only, the lunette of its supporting wall at the northern extremity of the fourth bay being pierced with a roundel-glazed window above the arched opening into the fifth bay. As things are now ar- ranged, a screen of wood and glass extending across the floor of the sacristy at this point, cutting off the narrower bay from the main body of the sacristy, reduces it to the duty of serving as a mere passage-way from Archbishop's House. There is no doubt that thus to continue the cloister in a straight line to the outer sacristy without (apparently) passing through the state sacristy is an additional convenience ; under the original arrangement the altar must have been in the line of perpetual traffic; but in extenuation of what may at first sight appear a defective piece of planning, it must be borne in mind that Bentley's original dispositions at the east end were seriously disturbed by the giving up of the original idea of a monastic establishment to serve the cathedral, after the building of the church was far advanced.
The bay to the right of the great doors is shown with ad-
206 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
joining lavabos on the plan, now omitted ; the central bay was intended to contain a stately fireplace with a shallow arched recess on either side of the chimney breast, but it is liidden by the oak presses wliich are continuous the length of this wall. On the op- posite side they cease, as the illustration shows, at the deep recess in which occur the low window and Avindow seat. In common with the cathedral and its other offices, the sacristy is kept at an adequate temperature by the hot-air apparatus ; it was for this reason, reinforced by motives of economy in money and space, that the Cardinal decided to forego the dignified fireplace Bentley had planned.
It will be further observed that the provision made on the plan for a great press raised upon a platform in the centre of the floor has not been carried out. Those seen in the photo- graph were adapted to suit the altered conditions of the room from Bentley's own simple Renaissance designs in the style familiar under the name of Jacobean. They, as well as the vest- ing altar, were carried out in Bruges by Monsieur L. Beyaert, who, also by the Cardinal's wish, made the library bookcases. Their details are, we think, rendered sufficiently clear by the illus- tration. The altar, also of oak fumed and wax polished, with four slender oak columns to carry the mensa, is sparingly inlaid with holly and bog oak. The cupboards which project in front of four of the piers have flat tops intended to receive the carved and tinctured armorial bearings of the Archbishops of Westminster. Those of the Cardinal-Founder and of the present occupant of the see are thus placed on either side of the " fireplace " bay. It is to be noted that all the fittings of this sacristy are based on the model of those in the Chiesa Nuova in Rome.
The staircase of the cathedral's south-eastern turret is con- tinued down to the half-basement, where we shall find the working sacristy and other offices. The former, of equal width with the state sacristy, is shorter by the amount of the passage bay, and is fitted in practical fashion with every requirement for the efficient service of a great and well-organised ecclesiastical building. Two
THE INTERIOR 207
semi-circular windows at the south end and three on the east at the outside ground level afford satisfactory illumination. The sacristy floor being considerably lower than that of the corridor which unites the cathedral to the lower cloister of the house, the descent is accomplished by means of a short flight of stairs within the room.
CHAPTER IX'
THE ADAPTATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE AS EXEMPLIFIED IN WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL
The mention of Byzantine architecture commonly fails to arouse enthusiasm — at least in those who have not seen the Westminster Cathedral — for the very good reason that previous to its erection there was not a Byzantine church in the world that was not either vitiated — like Santa Sophia at Constantinople and San Marco at Venice^by obvious flaws and shortcomings, or else, like San Vitale at Ravenna or St. Luke's at Stiris, was too small to sug- gest at first sight all that might be done on a vast scale with the same structural elements. Bentley, who lived only to see the outer shell of his great work completed, divined, as no one in modern times had divined before him, the capabilities of Byzantine architecture ; and we have here the outcome of his perception. This absence of enthusiasm or interest no doubt partly arises also from a mere lack of familiarity with good examples of Byzan- tine architecture and from long association with Gothic ; but partly also from the habit of judging of a style by its superficial appearance without reflection on the structural principles which underlie it and which it presupposes, and without recognition of those limitations which the very nature of building materials im- poses on the architect. The warmest admirers of Bcntley's master- piece will readily admit that in certain particulars a Gothic cathedral
^ For the material of this chapter the author is entirely and gratefully indebted to the Rev. Herbert Lucas, S. J., who, while kindly permitting her to make use of articles from his pen published from time to time in the Tablet and the CatJiedral Record and of liis contributions to the Catholic Encyclopoedia and the Manual of Consecration of Westminster Cathedral issued in 1910 by Messrs. Burns & Oates, has revised the chapter and eiu:iched it with a considerable amount of new material.
208
Plate XXIX. — Detah. of Lady Chatel Mahble-Work. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 209
is far more beautiful than any Byzantine church could possibly be. But this admission must not blind us to the truth that beauty of form may be too dearly bought, and that the characteristic beauties of Gothic architecture are unattainable in conjunction with that ample spaciousness at which the Roman and By- zantine builders aimed, and which Bentley has achieved at Westminster.
It cannot be too constantly borne in mind that the characteristic features of the great architecture of the world are due, not, in the first instance, to a striving after beauty of form, but to the need of a practical solution, with the means available, of some struc- tural problem. To such structural considerations all manner of ornament, whether embedded (so to say) in the structure or applied to it, was in its origin, as indeed it should always be, strictly subordinate.
Confining our attention for the present to ecclesiastical archi- tecture, it may be said that all varieties of architectural " style," in the case of vaulted buildings, have their roots in two markedly contrasted structural systems, which may be described respectively as the rigid and the balanced. Not of course that any structure can be absolutely rigid, or that balance alone, without cohesiveness, can ever ensure practical stability. The distinction has reference to tendencies and aims rather than to perfect accomplishment. To state the matter in a concrete form, the aim of the Roman builder was so to construct his building that it might be, in effect, a solid mass of concrete, in which the thrust of the vaulting should be rendered as far as possible latent or potential, rather than actual.
And yet, because thrust could not be entirely eliminated, and because its effects or results would be fatal to a rigid vault which could only " give " by cracking, the Roman builder was careful to make ample provision for resistance by means of massive buttresses, all the more necessary when continuous barrel vaulting was used. The Gothic builders of mediaeval Europe, on the con- trary, strove so to counteract every thrust by means of a counter-
1—14
210 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
thrust or strut (such as was provided by the " flying buttress "), that the cohesive function of the mortar, and consequently the rigidity of the vaulting, should be reduced to a minimum.
But again, these contrasted structural systems were not adopted (as a " style " is sometimes adopted in our days) arbi- trarily. The Roman Imperial builders on the one hand possessed the secret of a strongly cohesive mortar or cement and the materials necessary for its composition, and on the other hand they had at command large numbers of comparatively unskilled workmen, by whose united and rapid labour massive edifices could be quickly raised, to be afterwards beautified by skilled artificers. And although this last remark might seem to apply exclusively to the civil architecture of Imperial Rome, yet it so far bears upon ecclesi- astical architecture that the methods of construction employed by the Roman builders in Imperial times continued to be employed, with modifications, long after the circumstances and conditions to which they owed their origin had ceased to exist.
The Gothic builders, on the other hand, had plenty of skilled labour at their command, but had either lost the Roman art of mixing cement or lacked the necessary materials.' Hence, the treatment of thrusts as actual and active, needing to be resisted, as has been said, by strut or counter-thrust, and hence, ultimately, the wonderful lightness and elasticity or non-rigidity of the Gothic vault.
So much for the fundamental contrast, in point of structural system, between Roman and Gothic architecture. But in several respects the Byzantine builders improved on Roman methods,
* It is curious but, I believe, undoubtedly true, that the loss of the art of making mortar (or the difficulty of obtaining the necessary cement) had much to do with the process of development from Romanesque to Gothic. Truro Cathedral — a modern Gothic church, built rigidly with strong mortar, cracked in various directions within a very short time of its completion. The thirteenth-century " Goths " were wiser. They knew that so complex a structure must be allowed to settle, and that it would be fatal to make the joints rigid. In fact the masonry of these old cathedrals did settle, but without cracks, by the simple process of stone slipping slightly on stone. Afl a rule, of course, the mortar held, but here and there it " gave " and allowed the parts of the vault to settle into their place. — H. L.
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 211
even while in the main they held to the principle of rigidity.' First of all, they employed domical in preference to barrel vaulting or cross vaulting, thereby securing greater stability, a better distribution of thrusts, and a less monotonous appearance in their vaulting. In this more universal use of the dome they employed it, not merely as the central and dominant feature of a building, but in successive bays, as a substitute for the monotonous and structurally unsatisfactory barrel vault.
Secondly, they constructed their vaults, and in particular their domes,^ as light as possible. For instance, there could hardly be a greater contrast than between the ponderous vaulting of the Pantheon in Rome and the egg-shell dome of S. Vitale at Ravenna, constructed as this is of jars fitted neck and foot together in spiral coils.
Thirdly, they took over and adapted the Greek classical column in a fashion unrealized and unattained by the architects of the Italian neo-classical school.
The Roman and Italian neo-classical style of ecclesiastical architecture, and the Byzantine, are both in a sense composite and in both the same primary elements are combined, but in very different ways. The Italian classical style resulted from the adoption of the Greek column, with its architrave, frieze, and cornice, by architects who continued to build in the old Roman fashion. They adopted the Greek column, however, rather as an ornament than as a genuine means of support ; and as the orna- ment did not fit its new surroundings it was made to do so by a process of enlargement and external application, being set up in front of the structure, so as in a measure to hide it from view. Hence the degradation of the column to a mere pilaster ; while the entablature, which had served a useful purpose on the outside
1 We say " in the main," for the Byzantine architects, in constructing their curtain walls between piers or buttresses, were awake to the importance of " live joints " for the avoidance of cracks in the mural masonry. But this is a technical detail into which it is hardly necessary here to enter.
2 Moreover, whereas the architects of Imperial Roman days never got beyond covering a circular or polygonal buUding with a dome, the Byzantines by means of pendentives (t}ieir invention) solved the problem of the domical roofing of a square chamber.
212 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
of the building, was brought indoors without such modifications as might have adapted it for its altered position.
The Byzantine architects were wiser. As we have shown, they took over, and improved upon, the methods of construction which the Roman builders had taught them. They retained their massive piers and vaults of immense span, but they used them without con- cealment. With a true sense of the fitness of things they introduced the comparatively slender Greek monolithic column only for those subordinate purposes which it was suited to fulfil, and in fulfilling which it incidentally helped to enhance by contrast the massive grandeur of the main structure. If an illustration of this state- ment is needed by any one who may not be conversant with the subject, he may find it by noticing the use of monolithic columns, for the manifestly subordinate purpose of supporting the galleries, in the Westminster Cathedral.
And fourthly, when the Byzantines took over the Greek column they did not fail to observe that in its classical form (such as may be seen at St. Mark's, Venice) it was quite unsuited, with its widely projecting capital, for the immediate support of an arch. A primitive method of getting over the difficulty was to interpose a sort of cushion-stone or super-capital between the true capital of the column and the springing of the arch as in the Ravenna churches. A better way was to modify the shape of the Ionic or Corinthian capital by reducing its horizontal splay, and to adorn it (as Bentley has done) with delicate carving in basso-relievo. The Greek cornice or entablature was, by the Byzantine builder, either omitted altogether (as at Westminster) or else transformed so as to serve the useful purpose of affording a secure passage " for the lamplighter " (as Paul the Silentiary has it) or for others engaged in the adornment or cleaning of the church.
Moreover, Byzantine builders saw that the best way to adorn solid blocks and great surfaces of masonry or brickwork was not to overlay the main supports of the vaulting with illusory pilasters, whose only work was to carry more or less useless cornices, or to break up into coffers the surface of a vault as though it had been
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 213
a flat ceiling, but to cover the whole interior of a building or chamber with a sheathing of marbles and mosaics — a method of adornment suitable to the objects to be adorned, and in the latter case capable not merely of decorative but of pictorial treatment, which is obviously of a higher order than merely decorative work.
But Bentley did much more than to revive, in a single monu- mental example, a style of architecture whose raison d'etre had well-nigh been forgotten, and had never, perhaps, been thoroughly apprehended in Western Europe. As a mere matter of historical fact the Byzantine builders of the sixth and eleventh centuries had allowed themselves to be ruled, to an even greater degree than some of the Renaissance architects of Italy, by the notion that the most perfect form of church was that in which a great central dome dominated every other member of the building. And for this ideal there would be much to be said if a church were to be judged chiefly by its external appearance, or if its primary purpose were to serve as a great hall of assembly. But a church like Santa Sophia or our own St. Paul's, in which the great dome serves as a canopy, not for the altar, but for the people, and in which the altar is relegated to what is, after all, a secondary position, may be not unreasonably regarded as involving a kind of architectural solecism.
On the other hand, if the altar be placed, as at St. Peter's, under the dome, then the insoluble difiiculty arises, as between architects and churchmen, whether the building shall have the form of a Greek or of a Latin cross. The difiiculty, as is well known, arose in the case of St. Peter's, and exercised the minds of all concerned in the building of it for considerably more than a century. Nay, as a matter of criticism, the question exercises men's minds still. Architectural writers for the most part assume as all but axiomatic that St. Peter's ought to have been completed in the form of a Greek cross. Those who hold that the form of a building ought to be subordinated to its purpose will continue, in spite of architectural critics, to rejoice that ecclesiastical authority was strong enough to insist on the lengthening of the nave of St. Peter's, and may be excused for suggesting that, if a long nave
214 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
is incongruous with the original designs and with the portions actually built or begun by Bramante and Michael Angelo, the fault is to be found in the original design, rather than in the com- promise by which that design was modified to meet the needs of Christian devotion and worship.
It may be asked what all this has to do with Westminster Cathedral. It has just this to do with it, that to our certain know- ledge, for we had it from his own lips, Bentley seriously considered the question whether or no his cathedral should have a great dome, comparable — in proportion — to that of St. Peter's ; and that he deliberately decided in the negative. His decision was determined (so far as we could gather his mind on the subject) not merely by the conflict which a great dome inevitably intro- duces between the claims of " form for form's sake " and the practical exigencies of liturgical and congregational worship, but also by another consideration.
A central dome, whose ambit is greater than the width of the nave, all but necessarily postulates an open transept. And this Bentley would not have. Profoundly convinced of the capabilities of the Byzantine system of construction, he was not less impressed by the wisdom shown by the early Roman church builders in de- signing their basilicas. He was not alone in perceiving that one of the most characteristic and admirable features of the true Roman basilica is that all the lines of the perspective converge upon the altar, which, surmounted by its civory or baldacchino and framed, as it were, in the terminal apse, was plainly intended to be the focus of sight, as well as of worship.' Now this perspective effect is to a great extent destroyed by an open transept, and he would none of it. Nor was he content merely to screen off the transept, as in old St. Peter's and in S. Paolo fuori, by means of a section of projecting wall, but, like the architect of the Duomo at Pisa,
' Originally the mysteries were secret (veiled). Gradually this law of the arcanum was relaxed and the opposite extreme is reached when the altar occupies a central position. The desirable ideal is that the altar be in a place withdrawn from tho tlirong, yet BO arranged that functions may be visible. This is best secured by the device of a retro- choir.
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 215
he would carry his colonnade and his gallery across the transept openings, would place his sanctuary in the next bay further cast, would make it narrower by some 10 ft. than the nave, and would shut it in on either hand by a double range of superposed columns. It should be an adytum, a sacrarium, a holy place, open indeed to the view of the faithful in the nave, but enclosed on either hand ; visible to the congregation of worshippers, but not the open centre of a vast crowd.
Perhaps it is not too much to say that old St. Peter's came nearer to his ideal of what a Christian church should be than the monument of Renaissance architecture raised by the genius of Bramante and Michael Angelo. But old St. Peter's, like every other Roman and Romanesque basilica, was constructively im- perfect and insecure by reason of its timber roof ; and the syn- thesis which Bentley has so successfully effected at Westminster is the combination of the idea of a Roman basilica with the con- structive improvements introduced by the Byzantine architects.
When, then, we come to search for a prototype of Westminster Cathedral among other Byzantine churches, S. Vitale (Fig. 4, p. 44), S. Lorenzo at Milan, St. Luke at Stiris, and St. Sergius at Constan- tinople Fig. 3, p. 44) must be left out of the reckoning. They are all Centralbauten, and they are buildings in which the practical requirements of public worship are subordinated to symmetrical perfection of form. To say this is not to condemn them as unsuit- able to their place and time. They are in their several ways admirable architectural monuments, but no one of them is in the least suited to modern conditions, least of all to the conditions obtaining at Westminster.
Nor could Santa Sophia (Fig. 25) have served as a model. Of its splendours this is not the place to speak at length. Nor must it be taken as indicating a lack of appreciation of these splendours if attention is here drawn to the defects and shortcomings of that building. Even apart from its drawbacks as a Centralbau, it is lacking in structural stability, being quite inadequately buttressed towards the east end and perhaps also towards the west. One
216 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
of the first things that strikes the critical observer, or even the careful student of its plans and sections, is the fact that all the columns, without exception, are linked together, neck to neck as it were, by iron tie-bands, the use of which is diversified at certain points by that of wooden struts or lateral supports. It would of course be impossible to determine from the mere inspection of drawings whether these makeshift devices (for as such we cannot but regard them) belonged to the original design or not. There
Fig. 25. — St. Sophia, Constantinople: Ground Plan.
seems indeed to be good reason for thinking that these subsidiary supports are contemporary with the original erection of the church. But whether this be so or no, in any case they point to some radical defect of construction. Nor is this defect far to seek. While plentiful provision of buttress piers has been made to resist the horizontal thrust of the dome towards the north and south, a very superficial study of the plan is sufficient to reveal the fact that no similar provision has been made for resistance to the longitudinal thrust (if we may so call it) towards the east and west.
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 217
It is true that, so far as the northern and southern arches are concerned, their thrust has been diminished and the resistance to it increased by tlie following architectural device. Not only are these arches considerably less in span than those on the east and west (their utmost extension measuring only 72 ft. instead of 100 ft.), but the abutment against which they rest has a depth of nearly 30 ft. instead of only 15 ft. And this diminution of the span of the arch, together with the extension of the abutment, may perhaps be regarded as an adequate compensation for the lack of secondary piers towards the east and west. But then it must be remembered that the outward thrust of the dome is not transmitted through the lateral arches alone, but acts also, lever- wise, on the brickwork of the transverse arches.
To counteract this portion of the thrust the great semidomes are of course available ; and indeed it is sufficiently obvious that without them the whole building could make no pretence to stability. But their effect as buttresses is greatly weakened by the circumstance that their continuity is broken by the apsoids of the lateral exedrse, of which the axes are inclined obliquely to that of the semidomes themselves, and of which the inward thrust is not directly opposed to the principal force to be resisted. For whereas subsidiary conches when ranged around a dome aptly serve as buttresses, thus (Fig. 26) :
JD
Fio. 26.
Fio. 27.
218 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
this is not so when (as in the case of the eastern and western ends of Santa Sophia) a dome is, as it were, split into two halves, each of which has to serve as a buttress to a larger dome placed between them. For then the subsidiary conches A, B, C, D, weaken instead of strengthening the resistance to the outward thrust •^— — > of the great central dome. You cannot cut a dome in two, separate its halves and expose them to a pressure which is axial rather than radial, and then treat these half-domes as if, when thus separated, they were in fact parts of a single dome. This, if we mistake not, is what Anthemius of Tralles has attempted to do. And this is what necessitated from the very outset the use of tie-bands such as, in a modern edifice, would suggest the doubtful arts of the jerry-builder (Fig. 27).
A flaw such as this might well be regarded as altogether unpardonable, and it may be worth while to inquire whether it is or is not the inevitable result of such a construction as is involved in the breach of continuity in the great eastern and western semi-domes to which we have just referred. For, indeed, had their continuity not been broken, the effect of spherical sur- faces so immense, at a level relatively so low, and in such close relation with the great dome itself, would have been intolerable. In order to avoid a tasteless monotony and at the same time to emphasise the scale of the dome, some kind of articulation of the semi-domes was a matter of all but absolute necessity. The mistake would seem to have lain, not so much in what the architect did, as in what he omitted to do.
It is easy to be wise after the event ; but with plan and section and elevation before us, and with the help that may be derived from the study of the designs carried out in the case of other churches, it seems plain enough that the true solution of the problem lay in the erection of massive towers at the angle of the great square described about the circle of the dome. By means of such towers the buttress supports could have been equalized quite independently of the semidomes with their annexes, and instead of displaying, as at present, ugly protruding shoulders
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 219
(for nothing can redeem the exterior of Santa Sophia as it is from the reproach of being hump- shouldered and ungainly) the brick- work of these unsightly supports would have entered into the construction of the corner towers, and these would have very greatly improved the external appearance, no less than the in- trinsic stability of the building.
The sides of the towers, measuring some 40 ft. across, would, of course, have added about 80 ft. to the length of the nave ; but it would be futile to say that the dimensions thus attained would have been either excessive in themselves or inharmonious as regards the proportion of the length of the building to its width. If it be asked why so obvious a device did not suggest itself to the mind of Anthemius, we can only conjecture that he was perhaps somewhat dominated by the rudimentary model which he had before him in the church of St, Sergius. Even architects are to some extent subject to the unrecognised operation of the laws of progressive evolution.
Nevertheless Westminster Cathedral owes something to Santa Sophia, for it is impossible to compare the lateral galleries of the great church at Constantinople with the double colonnade (two ranks of columns superposed) on the north and south sides of the sanctuary at Westminster, without being struck with at least a generic resemblance. That the advantage in point of gracefulness lies with Westminster will hardy be questioned. In particular the somewhat clumsy device of cushion super-capitals adopted by the architect of Santa Sophia has been wisely discarded. The crown of windows round the sanctuary dome is also reminiscent of Santa Sophia.
It has been repeatedly remarked by those who have written on the Westminster Cathedral that whereas no single item in the building has been copied from any pre-existing model, hints and suggestions have been drawn from many sources. Set the plan of Westminster side by side with those of St. Sophia and St. Irene at Constantinople, of St. Vitale at Ravenna, of St. Mark's at Venice (Fig. 5, p. 45), or of others that could be named, and it will
220 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
at once be evident that Bentley has not even approximately followed any earlier model, though he has drawn suggestions from several, as he would seem to have done likewise from at least two Romanesque churches, widely different in character, viz. the Duomo at Pisa, as we have already had occasion to remark, and the Domkirche at Speyer.
But this is by no means the whole of the truth. A careful comparative study of Bentley's masterpiece with the most renowned examples of early and mediaeval Byzantine architecture brings to light (as we have just seen in the case of Santa Sophia) many par- ticulars in which the designer of the Westminster Cathedral has successfully avoided certain faults and defects which, to a greater or less extent, mar the perfection of even the best work of his predecessors.
A further, and an equally important, instance of this avoidance of errors into which the earlier church designers unwarily fell, may be realized by a consideration of the treatment of the lateral bays at Westminster Cathedral. Its nave has three principal bays, formed by the three pairs of great arches which, with the trans- verse arches, support the saucer domes. Now in more than one example of early and mediaeval Byzantine chiu-ches, e.g. in those of St. Irene at Constantinople and St. Mark at Venice, similar bays are found, and like those of the Westminster Cathedral, they are crossed by a gallery supported by columns.
But, in connection with this arrangement, two rather glaring defects reveal themselves in the older churches. The first lies in the arrangement of the windows, the disposition of which, in a huge curtain wall, is apt to lack articulation and definite character. The harmonious articulation of extended surfaces is one of the standing problems which again and again exercise the ingenuity of the architect who aspires to success in the employment of the Byzantine style. That they have failed in this may be seen in the case of the examples cited, where the rows of plain round-topped lights, so many rows and so many in a row, almost suggest the windows in the wall of a modern factory.
ADAPTATION OF BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE 221
And the second defect lies in the way in which the great arched opening above the gallery, in the churches named, seems dwarfed and thrown out of proportion by the horizontal line of the gallery parapet, which cuts it across. The effect is almost as though one should bury the columns or pillars supporting a well-proportioned arch up to nearly half their height. Bentley knew a better way than that ; taking a hint, perhaps, from the Romanesque archi- tecture of mediaeval Europe. He has introduced into the lateral structure of his nave the great principle of coupled arches (two arches side by side within a great arch), carried out on a scale of magnitude never before attempted in the whole history of church building, and perhaps never attempted at all in a corresponding position, except in the cathedral at Speyer.
It is the coupled arches which have solved the problem of articulation and fenestration, and which give to the nave of Westminster Cathedral its altogether unique character. Twenty- five feet in the span, 72 ft. 6 in. in height to the crown of the soffit, these secondary arches stand within the embrace of the great 60 ft. archivolts. Crossed by the gallery at a height of 27 ft. (to the architrave of the balustrade) they rise above it 33 ft. to the springing of the arches and nearly 46 ft. to the crown. It is the insertion of these secondary arches which relieves the gallery arcade from the reproach of dwarfing, as at St. Mark's and St. Irene's, the principal arches. But more than this. By means of them the problem of the harmonious distribution of the windows has been perfectly solved. A great semi-circular light of nearly 25 ft. diameter fills the tympanum of each, while a pair of lights below does not offend the eye as a featureless series of such open- ings would have done. And, if the general effect be considered, it will be observed that each principal bay now holds in its lateral face a system of no less than seven arches ; four on the lowest stage, each with a span of about 12 ft., forming the arcade on which the gallery rests ; two secondary arches of 25 ft. span ; and the great archivolt embracing all and unifying the whole system.
222 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Another point to be noted in regard to St. Mark's and West- minster Cathedral concerns the practical utility of the transepts of the one as compared with the other. In St. Mark's, as in other " monumental " churches, the effort to secure symmetry of form has led to the provision of spacious transepts, which do not, after all, lend themselves to the needs of public worship, the high altar being invisible from the great portion of these open spaces ; while, on the other hand, they are not needed as providing quasi-naves to side-chapels as at Westminster.
In some respects St. Irene comes nearest in general design to Westminster. But St. Irene is spoiled by the stilted domes which surmount the nave. Bentley wisely adopted the device of " saucer " domes, in order (among other reasons) to break the line of visible roof as little as possible, so that the eye might be carried forward towards the sanctuary.
It is matter for rejoicing that Bentley, who had once considered giving a triapsidal termination to the east end, was subsequently led to abandon this design. Not only would it have savoured of a somewhat slavish imitation of Santa Sophia (a slavish imitation was a thing which he abhorred), but such a breach of continuity in dealing with an apse of 50 ft. span would surely have incurred the reproach of something very like triviality. It would have afforded a regrettable instance of over-articulation.
1'late XXXII. — Chatel of the Holy Souls, \\'ALMESi,Ey Chantky.
123S
CHAPTER X
THE MOSAICS
Preliminary questions concerning pictorial schemes, choice of artists and style — Paint not to be introduced in any form — Need of a general plan — Father Bridgett con- sulted— His letter to the Cardinal — Suggestion of a committee of advice — Luncheon at Archbishop's House — Invitation to certain clerics and laymen to submit schemes — Seven hsts of subjects and saints — Mr. Edmund Bishop's scheme — Mr. Charles Weld-Blundell's list — Columns of Tablet opened to suggestions — Mr. Dudley Bax- ter's plan — Father Herbert Lucas's full scheme for nave, sanctuary, and choir — Bentley's scheme for Lady Chapel — Father Bridgett's scheme for the same — Mr. Symons chosen to make designs for Chapel of Holy Souls — Correspondence and suggestions — Appreciation of Mr. Symons's work — Messrs. Clayton & Bell selected to decorate chapel of SS. Gregory and Augustine — Osntrast and criticism of different styles of technique — Desire of certain artists to be consulted on decoration — Sir William Richmond's opinion and letters — Designs for tympanum of west front.
Since but a minute proportion of the mosaic revetment of Westminster Cathedral has yet been achieved or even designed, this chapter can pretend, unfortunately, to no degree of complete- ness or finality. It is proposed to devote it to recording, as far as may be possible, the attempts made by authority to answer certain questions concerning the decoration of the cathedral, which began to press for solution about the end of the year 1898,
It was never the desire nor the intention of the architect to grapple unaided with the problem of mosaic decoration, either as regards preparing a unified scheme or making the designs for carrying out such a scheme. He was fully aware that his time was too short and that he must be content with setting others on the right path. It was imperative then, when the time arrived for serious consideration of the enterprise, to find the solutions to a trio of pressing problems which may be put briefly as follows : (1) What principles shall guide and govern the production of the general and subsidiary schemes of pictorial treatment ? (2) Who,
223
224 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
in a country so little accustomed to the uses of mosaic decoration, are the right men to be entrusted with this age-enduring work ? and (3) \^ hat technique shall govern the execution of the designs as prepared by the elect ?
It must be understood, of course, that there was never any intention to introduce paint in the cathedral in any form — the aim being that the decoration should be permanent, and that people of generations to come should, so far as the interior is concerned, see the building as it left the hands of its creators, unaffected and undisturbed by time, like the glorious little mortuary of Galla Placidia at Ravenna, which to this day remains to tell how a person may be had in everlasting remembrance by a memorial almost eternal in its character.
It was at the close of 1898, in view of the approaching roofing- in of the church, that Bentley, with a mind free from constructive problems, was able to indulge in the luxury of considering decora- tive ideals. Long consideration of the matter impelled him to the conclusion that, subject to the formulation on broad lines of a general scheme for the mosaics, the most satisfactory procedure would be to complete first, as to their dual revetment of marble and mosaic, one or more of the side chapels. Such a finished specimen of decoration would, he argued, be in the nature of an experiment, in the light of which the technique to be adopted in the treatment of the main body of the church might be decided. It would also be helpful from the financial point of view, by en- couraging further subscriptions for decorative work. And, in the third place, since the cost of four chapels had been wholly provided, it was clearly desirable that their benefactors, if still living, should enjoy without further delay the fruits of their generosity.
Primarily, then, it was essential that those responsible should agree upon the outlines of a broad general plan in order to avoid overlapping in the choice of schemes of decoration suitable to the dedications of these four chapels and the remaining eight (including that of St. Peter in the crypt) for which no monetary provision
THE MOSAICS 225
had yet been made. In the matter of this general scheme, Cardinal Vaughan, realising that the widest co-operation should be sought, invited and welcomed suggestions from all qualified to frame them.
Bentley's thoughts flew at once to an old friend for whom he possessed an almost filial admiration and respect, the learned historian and controversialist, the Rev. Thomas Bridgett, a member of the order of missionary priests known as the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer. At that time Father Bridgett was endur- ing with touching fortitude the sufferings of his last illness at the monastery of St. Mary's, Clapham, built by Bentley some five years earlier. Probably it was on the latter's suggestion that Cardinal Vaughan consulted the author of " Our Lady's Dowry " about the decoration of the Lady Chapel, and that in January 1899 he wrote a second time to obtain the dying man's ' advice on the subject of the general scheme.
Before replying. Father Bridgett, in the rare intervals of free- dom from pain, discussed the matter with Bentley ; and then, in a letter which pathetically reveals the strong brain eclipsed by suffering, summed up the result of their conference and urged the immediate formation of a committee of advice. With the com- position of a committee, such as that outlined by Father Bridgett, we feel convinced that Bentley would have been a good deal less than satisfied.
" Fbom my Sickbed,
"January 29th, 1899.
" My dear Lord Cardinal,
" You were so kind as to ask for my suggestion as to the decoration of Our Lady's Chapel in the cathedral. I selected certain historic events, admitting pictorial treatment, all illustra- tive of England as Our Lady's Dowry.' Since then I have talked over the whole matter with Mr. Bentley. He remarked :
1 Father Bridgett died on February 17th, 1899.
' Cardinal Vaughan had from the outset expressed the wish that the nave should tell the history of the Cathohc Church in England ; and that the chapels of Our Lady and St. Peter should illustrate the devotion of the people of England to the Mother of God and the Vicar of Clirist.
1—15
226 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
" 1. That before any part — such as a chapel — is either begun or planned, a general plan should be adopted, so that each smaller part may help to complete the whole.
" 2. That your Eminence has expressed your wish that the body of the cathedral should have a historical character ; should give scenes from the history of the English Church or Church in England, British, Celtic, Saxon, Norman and later.
"3. That the chapels should be rather treated theologically without excluding history, English or other.
" 4, The ceiling from the apocalypse (?).
" This general scheme seems to me excellent, but my little proposal for the Lady Chapel ' does not harmonize with it altogether. I should be appropriating to this chapel too much of the general plan. On the other hand it might be well planned that Our Lady's Dowry should be specially treated in Our Lady's Chapel, and St. Peter's patrimony in St. Peter's Chapel, etc. Presuming, then, on your Eminence's condescension, I venture to propose a course, though, as the proposal only emanates from the wearied brain of a sick man, it is little better than a dream.
" I should think your Eminence, as well as the illustrious architect, would derive much assistance from the speedy appoint- ment of a committee to consider carefully the matter of mosaic decoration, which will be a new and special feature of your cathedral. The committee will, of course, only suggest, your Eminence decide. In a multitude of rulers there is only confusion, in a multitude of counsellors there is wisdom. The committee would consist prin- cipally of priests, but not necessarily of priests only, of your Eminence's diocesans, but with help from outsiders. Some might be versed in English history, some in theology, some in art. Your Eminence might begin by instructing a few to think out the subject ; these would propose to you other names for a committee, as also advisers or consulters, certain laymen as well as priests and ladies of culture and taste. Mr. C. N. Hemy, A.R.A.,' the only Catholic in the Academy, will gladly act on the committee. They would
* See page 245. ^ Admitted to full academic honours in 1910.
THE MOSAICS 227
draw up a general plan, which, once approved, must be the guide on all special plans.
" If the historic plan is approved a long list should be drawn up of historic scenes, admitting pictorial treatment, and these might be arranged chronologically or in groups of subjects. Prob- ably not a third part of these subjects would be finally selected. But the subjects should not be merely named : reference should be given to the original authorities or to accessible manuals, where the artists might study the subject. After each saint or English primate might be stated where a good likeness (or type) could be found : the date, so that the costume could be studied. If it is a matter of historical monument, then what information have we ? To the word Glastonbury could be added the date of sup- posed foundation by St. Joseph of Arimathaea, or, if this is too apocryphal, the imaginary Chapel of Our Lady, wattled, or the present state of the ruins. To the word St. German, the Alleluia Victory and its date, so that an artist could supply ecclesiastical customs, Celtic dress, etc. . . .
" When the outlines of the plan have been approved, a circtdar letter might be sent to cultivated people, asking for other sugges- tions or criticisms. Artists would apply to the committee for instructions, and would receive warning not to encroach on sub- jects to be treated elsewhere. Other members of the committee would suggest how certain subjects, e.g. the Precious Blood, the Blessed Sacrament, the Blessed Virgin, could be treated theo- logically. Perhaps some competitions with prizes might be pro- posed.' If the general plan of the church and nave were once fixed, there would be no need to find an artist at once for the whole. A portion might be begun at once under the care of a special artist."
Father Bridgett's letter then proceeds with a long list of historic scenes, under the headings of British and Celtic, Saxon, Norman
' We may feel very certain that Father Bridgett never induced Bentley to approve tliis suggestion.
228 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and later times, from the age of tradition down to the consecration of England to Our Lady and St. Peter at the London Oratory in 1893. He concludes by summarizing the duties of the proposed " Committee of Decoration " :
" I have said that the labour of the committee would consist at first in proposing plans : 1. So that the general public might enter into the spirit of the thing. 2. That the rich may be en- ticed to select some portion as their own share, and understand what that share would be, its extensions and its limits. 3. And in facilitating reference to history . . .
" Your Eminence's devoted servant,
" T. G. Bridgett."
The idea of a consultative committee appears to have received favourable consideration at the moment since the Cardinal went so far as to invite certain artists and other men of influence to dine with him one Sunday that spring, to discuss the decorative scheme. But their meeting did not result in the formation of any definite body of counsellors, and ultimately the idea died out.' The meeting in question being arranged for Sunday, April 16th, Bentley wrote some days earlier to his old friend W. Christian Symons to warn him of possible developments :
"13, John Street, Adelphi, "April Sth, 1899.
" Dear Mr. Symons,
" Some time ago at an interview I had with the Cardinal, the subject of the decoration of the cathedral was broached, when I told him that I should like you and Sargent ' to do a chapel each, and that I would take up a third. I have just heard from the Cardinal to the effect that Sargent is to dine with him next Sunday, and he wishes me to join the party, I at once accepted
^ Those to be invited to serve on the Committee were the R.A.'s, Sargent, Tadema, Abbey, Herkomer, and Hemy.
* The late Mr. C. N. Hemy told the writer that subsequently he called on Mr. Sargent, at the Cardinal's request, to invite him to make designs for tlie mosaics, but that the invitation was declined.
THE MOSAICS 229
his invitation and suggested, if the decorative scheme was to be discussed, that you also should be present. Doubtless you will hear from his Eminence, but will of course not repeat anything of this. Let me further add, if you care to come up on Saturday we shall be delighted to give you bed and board for as long as you please to accept it. With best wishes to you all.
" Always sincerely yours,
" John F. Bentley."
Mr. Symons gladly accepted the invitation and, besides the architect, the guests on what should have been a memorable occasion included two members of the Academy, Mr. J. S. Sargent and the late Sir Laurence Alma-Tadema. As a matter of historical fact very little discussion took place, the Cardinal being at the moment particularly enthusiastic over the work of a certain German mosaicist and apparently anxious above all else to obtain a favour- able opinion from those present on some photographs of his pro- ductions. Though a unanimous verdict on the absolute unsuitability of his style for the cathedral was pronounced, it did not wean the Cardinal from the idea of employing this artist on some part of the decoration. Fortunately, as fate would have it, the opportunity to do so never presented itself.
An immediate result of the meeting was an invitation issued in May to certain prominent Catholics, both laymen and ecclesiastics, to submit historical schemes for the decoration of the nave, which met with a fairly encouraging response. It must be premised that in the nave there are thirty-four wall spaces, measuring each about 15 ft. by 12 ft., intended to be covered with scenic representa- tions in mosaic. Sixteen of these are on the north and south sides respectively, and two at the west end. As to single figures, about 8 ft. high, the faces of the piers, etc., will admit of thirty each on the north and south and ten at the west end. For the guidance, therefore, of those framing schemes, it was laid down that each should include from thirty-four to thirty-eight subjects, and from seventy to eighty single figures from our ecclesiastical history.
230 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Seven lists without commentary were sent in from four clerics : the Right Rev. Monsignor Moyes, the Rev. Dom Aidan Gasquet, the Rev. Sydney Smith, S.J., the Rev. Herbert Thurs- ton, S.J. ; and three laymen, Messrs. C. Boothman, T. Longueville, and F. Urquhart. These historical synopses included scenes varying in number from thirty-four to forty-nine, and covering the landmarks of our island story from the time of the ordination by Pope Eleutherius of the earliest British missionaries Fagan and Deruvian, sent to Rome by King Lucius to pray for the evan- gelization of their country, down to, alternatively, the Restoration of the English Hierarchy in 1850, or the opening of the new cathedral at Westminster. To these lists their authors appended exhaustive symposivims of English saints, from St. Alban, proto- martyr, to the victims of sixteenth and seventeenth-century persecutions.
The eighth scheme emanated from Mr. Edmund Bishop, who, not content with the preparation of a bare list of subjects, increased its worth by first laying down the principle that should, in his opinion, govern the selection of these subjects. " Shall scenes or stories," he asked, " which have no more than a more or less feeble legendary authority to warrant them, be included ? Or is it desirable to restrict these pictures to events that certainly took place ? " His conclusion was overwhelmingly in favour of the omis- sion of any scene without a genuine basis of historical fact, and interesting though the traditions of St. Joseph of Arimathea and Glastonbury, of King Lucius and his embassy to Rome, and other such might be, Mr. Bishop felt constrained to pass them over.
His list, then, beginning with the martyrdom of St. Alban (and omitting the whole range of Welsh saints from the middle of the fifth century), proceeded to the end of the first chapter of our Church history, closing this with the episode of the learned Alcuin teaching at the Court of Charlemagne, and presented the outline of historical events suitable for pictorial representation down to the present time. Like the seven lists already mentioned, however, it keeps within the limit of a list and makes no suggestions as to
THE MOSAICS 231
arrangement or technique with reference to the areas requiring mosaic treatment, and is simply, as they were, a response to Father Bridgett's suggestion that a large number of subjects should be collected and prepared with a view to selection later to form a homogeneous scheme.
A ninth list, prepared by Mr. Charles Weld-Blundell, was arranged with the intention of tracing and displaying for popular edification and instruction the close resemblance between the methods adopted in the post-Reformation persecutions and those employed by the Roman emperors in the early centuries of our era. Mr. Weld-Blundell, moreover, brought his scheme to a slight extent into relationship with the spaces available in the cathedral, though by the use of the word " frescoes " he appeared to think (unless it was due to a slip of the pen) that this method of decoration might be admissible. He suggests " that the central space inside and over the great central door should be occupied by the great central Sacrifice, the Crucifixion (reversing the old English practice of traversing the chancel arch with a rood screen), the series con- tinuing all round till they finish at the same point, with the result that (say) three or four of the first or more prominent martyrdoms of early Christianity would face at the lower or west end of the cathedral four others of Tudor times. . . . The main practical difficulty would be to make the meaning of this parallelism obvious. This, it seems to me, could be effected if the Byzantine mediaeval method were followed, of large gold-lettered legends interspersing the frescoes, as e.g. ' Csesarism under the Tudor Kings,' sur- mounting the martyrdoms or clusters of martyrs, each in a panel with their special description at foot ; or, say, ' Victims of High Treason to the Divinity of Augustus' over the early Christian martyrs, and ' Victims of High Treason to the Royal Supremacy ' over the post-Reformation martyrs."
Mr. Weld-Blundell says in conclusion : " Much, in such matters, must necessarily depend on the height at which the sub- jects are placed above the spectator, and the relative position of the pictures to one another, so that it seems to me the best plan would
232 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
be to select out of the lists sent in for approval the subjects which at once seem to be most important, and also lend themselves best to pictorial illustration."
That a complete pictorial scheme for the lower walls of the nave alone should be the first consideration was certainly the Cardinal's opinion ; for it is, we imagine, fairly obvious that the article on cathedral mosaics in the Tablet of June 17th, 1899, was inspired, if not actually written, by him. It is therein stated " that the Biblical, allegorical, or mystical treatment of the domes, transepts, sanctuary, apse, and side chapels had better be deferred for the present." The columns of the Tablet were to be freely opened to suggestions for the decoration of the nave. The writer of the article insists, however, that one or two of the side chapels should be brought to completion by the proposed date of opening, September 29th, 1900, and expresses with emphasis the hope that some portion of the work may be entrusted to Professor Seitz, a German mosaicist " of the newer school," who had then recently restored the Borgian and other apartments in the Vatican, and had decorated the choir of the basilica at Loreto with mosaic work, the gift of the Catholics of Germany.
We venture to range ourselves in entire disagreement with such a piecemeal method of attacking the problem, one which could never, one feels assured, bring it within reach of a satisfactory conclusion. It seems sufficiently obvious that the rave decoration should be not only in intimate relationship with the pictorial treatment of the domes, but the complement and corollary of that treatment. And, even were it ultimately decided to carry out first the lower portion of the work, this could not be attempted, for the above reason, with any reasonable prospect of success unless and until a complete verbal scheme for the whole pictorial treat- ment had been formulated and approved.
Mr. Dudley Baxter, who submitted a tenth plan at the close of the year 1900, evidently was convinced of the truth of this. His scheme " combined to portray the Catholic Faith of the Uni- versal Church, and to illustrate the glorious history of the Church
THE MOSAICS 233
in England and Wales," and accordingly the first dome (west- wards) " would illustrate the Creation of the World ; the second, the Old Testament and the Old Law ; the third, the Incarnation, thus leading in due sequence of time to the Holy Rood of Re- demption and the New Law. The fourth dome, overshadowing the sanctuary, would appropriately depict the Church and Christ's kingdom on earth. The space above the high altar would show our blessed Lord in glory surrounded by His immaculate INIother and the apostles, while beyond, in the apse, would be portrayed heaven and the apocalypse with ' the Lamb as it were slain,' and the seraphic host according to the liturgy of the Mass.
" Then along the walls and arches of the nave and the transepts — in opposite sequence of time — the mosaics on either side of the basilica, beginning with the second century and near the rood, might iliiistrate scenes century after century from the history of the first and the second Ecclesice Anglicance, together with the martyrdoms and sufferings of the penal days. All along, too, figures of our principal martyrs and saints, and also of the popes especially connected with England, might be interspersed. Then would come, on either side, with the nineteenth century, the ' second spring ' ; and thus some illustration of the restoration of the hierarchy, of Pope Pius IX, of Cardinals Wiseman, IMan- ning, and Newman, might be in close proximity to the first chapel on the right of the nave, viz. that of SS. Gregory and Augustine, the first of the old English hierarchy.
" Lastly the outer wall of the narthex and the west end of the nave might be connected with the Solemn Homage to the Divine Redeemer at the commencement of the new century, and with the dedication of the cathedral in its opening year : here, according to ancient custom, might be represented the builder and the architect of the cathedral, viz. his Eminence Cardinal Vaughan and Mr. Bentley, while just outside would be the proposed votive statue of the Redeemer. Thus, too, the first dome pictured with the first century would adjoin the commemoration of the twen- tieth, but a series of figures of angels all along the roof and its
234 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
spans would prevent any clashing of illustrations. According to custom the nave would represent, as regards its domes, the Old Testament, and the choir and sanctuary the New : the attention of the worshippers would be led in instructive sequence to the high altar, and the Majesty above the great crucifix : at Mass they would behold the eucharistic worship of heaven depicted beyond the sanctuary, as well as the representation of Calvary's Sacrifice, then being renewed on the altar underneath. Finally the whole blaze of glittering mosaics would — the nave walls in one way and the domes in another — lead the eye up to the Holy Rood, and the principal dedication of the great cathedral — the Most Precious Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ — surrounded by the patron saints."
The Rev. Herbert Lucas, S.J., among those invited to frame schemes for the mosaic decoration, published a suggestion in the Tablet of December 28th, 1901, which was by a very long way the most complete of those contributed. By two series of articles on " Byzantine Architecture with special reference to the Cathedral," and on " Mosaic Schemes of Decoration of Early Churches," printed in the same paper in the earlier months of that year, Father Lucas had established his right to speak with authority, and we propose, therefore, to reproduce, without cur- tailment, Ms homogeneous and carefully thought-out scheme with its prefatory notes.
Father Lucas opens by observing that in framing a scheme of subjects for the mosaics of the Cathedral the following points must be kept in mind :
"1. A due regard must be had for artistic tradition, based as this is on Holy Scripture and on the patristic exegesis of the same.
"2. A due regard must be had for the architectural features of the building.
" 3. A due regard must be had for the multiple dedication of the Cathedral.
"1. As regards this point it is mentioned here with special reference to the idea, which at one time seems to have found
THE MOSAICS 235
favour, of choosing, as subjects for the more prominent mosaics, scenes from the history of the Church in England. Now not- withstanding that this idea had, as I understand, the support of so distinguished and venerated an authority as the late Father Bridgett, I cannot but think that it would have been a regrettable departure from what is here spoken of as ' artistic tradition.' There is, so far as I am aware, no instance either actually extant or on record of such a scheme of decoration for a great cathedral. The idea strikes me as a little — perhaps I should say, more than a little — insular ; and insularity is about the last characteristic which should distinguish a church which will be, it is to be hoped, in a very large sense the heir of the Christian ages. Historical scenes, or rather scenes from our national history, might indeed be in place in a chapel, an aisle, a gallery of the cathedral ; but the place of honour ought surely to be reserved for those mysteries of our faith which are of world-wide and age-long significance. The history of a national church, however thrilling in its incidents, is, after all, only the outcome of certain fundamental and divinely revealed truths energizing through a human medium ; and the important thing would seem to be to bring and keep before the eyes of the faithful of coming generations those same truths which were the stay and the support of our own particular ancestors in the faith, just as they may have been the stay and the sup- port of saints and of faithful men and women in all lands and in every age.
"2. Then, as regards the second point, you cannot treat a church whose leading architectural features are a series of cupolas with their attendant pendentives, spandrels, and so forth, just as if it were a plain Roman basilica of the older type, presenting to the hand of the mosaicist a series of rectangular spaces, to be filled with a continuous succession of co-ordinate scenes. As the structure of the Westminster Cathedral is far more complex than that of such a church, so also must its scheme of decoration show a more highly organized combination of unity with multiplicity, a manifold subordination of subsidiary topics to principal themes.
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just as, architecturally, there is due subordination of secondary parts to dominant structural elements. To speak less vaguely, each bay of the nave, with all its annexes, should be devoted to the expression of some leading idea, and the ideas expressed by the several bays should be related to one another in some definite and intelligible way.
" (3) The cathedral, as every one knows, is to be dedicated, in the first place, to the Precious Blood of our Lord ; secondly, to our Lady, to St. Joseph, and to St. Peter ; and lastly, as secondary patrons, to St. Augustine and St. Patrick and all Eng- lish and Irish saints. It hardly needs an argument to show that some account must be taken of this manifold dedication in the drawing up of any satisfactory scheme of subjects for the mosaic decoration. Now it is not very easy to combine pictorial references to St. Joseph and St. Peter with themes which relate to the Precious Blood ; and I venture to suggest that if one aisle be devoted to St. Joseph, and the other to St. Peter, the greater surfaces of the nave and choir may well be entirely reserved for biblical subjects of the kind which have heretofore found a place in the pictorial adornment of great and historic churches. These subjects ought in one way or another to be brought into subordination to the central idea of the efficacy of the Precious Blood.
" I proceed then to set forth, as I have been invited to do, my proposal for the adornment, in the first place, of the nave and choir. And I would venture to point out that the general scheme may possibly prove acceptable even though many modifications in detail may not improbably be deemed desirable. For this reason, at the risk of some repetition, I will first sketch the out- line, and afterwards fill in the details.
" First Bay — General Idea, Baptism, whereby, being washed in the Blood of the Lamb, we are made children of God and members of the Church. With the idea of the new birth in baptism may be associated scenes from the mysteries connected with the birth and infancy of our Lord. These scenes will answer to the verse of St. Thomas's hymn, ' Se nascens dedit socium.'
236]
Plate XXXIII. — Chapel of the Holy Souls, Altak and Altar-Piece. {Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
THE MOSAICS 237
" Second Bay — General Idea, the Eucharist, the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. With this central idea will be associated certain miracles of our Lord and certain incidents of His public (and risen) life on earth. These will answer to the verse, ' Convescens in edulium.'
" Third Bay — General Idea, the Sacrifice of the Cross. With this, of course, will be associated various scenes from the history of the Sacred Passion ; and the whole will answer to the verse, ' Se moriens in pretium.'
" Fourth Bay — General Idea, Christ in Glory, entering into the heavenly sanctuary, ' not by the blood of goats and of calves, but by His own Blood, having obtained eternal redemption ' ; and the whole will answer to the verse, ' Se regnans dat in prse- mium.'
" Now for the details. The first cupola would have in its centre a circular medallion, on which would appear, on a blue ground, a white dove with gold-tipped wings, symbolical of course of the Holy Spirit, with the legend, ' This is my beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased.' In the four compartments into which the cupola might be divided would be represented (1) the Baptism of Christ ; (2) St. Philip and the Chamberlain ; (3) St. Peter's Vision relating to the reception of Cornelius ; and (4) Saul and Ananias. On the faces of the four pendentives would be repre- sented the following subjects, viz. (1) Moses striking the rock; (2) the waters of Mara ; (3) the impotent man healed at the pool of Bethesda ; and (4) the man born blind, healed at the pool of Siloam. The treatment of these subjects would, of course, be rather suggestive and conventional than realistic, as the position which they would occupy seems to require.
" In the two great tympana under the principal archi volts, north and south, would be depicted (1) the crossing of the Red Sea, an acknowledged type of baptism and specially suitable as suggesting the relation between this sacrament and the Blood of Christ ; and (2) the ark on the waters of the deluge, with the dove and olive branch.
238 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
" Then, within the lesser bays formed by the secondary arches, the following scenes might find a place, four in the north and four in the south bays : (1) the Annunciation, (2) the Visitation, (3) the Nativity, (4) the Magi, (5) the Presentation in the Temple, (6) the Flight into Egypt, (7) the Finding in the Temple, (8) the Holy Family at Nazareth. These scenes would occupy the lateral walls of the secondary bays, and from their position would admit of a more pictorial treatment. The background would be gold in each case, but I would venture to suggest that in each bay the soffit of the vaulting should have a blue ground, on which would be depicted angels displaying suitable texts, or in some other way brought into connection with the mystery depicted below. Thus above the Annunciation, Gabriel might be shown winging his way to execute his high commission. Above the Visitation, Gabriel would again appear, displaying the words, ' And behold, thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived,' etc., or, ' Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, because He hath visited and wrought the redemption of His people,' etc. Above the Nativity, the angelic hosts would sing, ' Glory to God in the highest,' etc. Attendant angels would likewise be in place in the scenes of the Magi and of the Flight into Egypt, and the rest.
" This may perchance seem a crude notion, but it seems, I am strongly inclined to think, that simplicity and transparent intelligi- bility are desirable, especially in those portions of the design which it would require a considerable effort to examine if the theme were not quite plain. The blue background in the vaulting would, I think, emphasize the effect of aerial distance, and would afford an effective contrast to the heavily gilt cupolas. So much then for the first bay, with the exception of some accessories to be dealt with presently.
" In the second cupola the medallion would be occupied by the Pelican (on a blue ground, as in the case of the Dove), and the subjects occupying the four compartments of the cupola might be : (1) the washing of the disciples' feet, as symbolizing the disposi- tions with which the great gift ought to be received ; (2) the Last
THE MOSAICS 239
Supper ; (3) the disciples at Emmaus ; and (4) the scene on the shore of the Lake of Gennesareth, from St. John xxi. On the pendentives might be figured (1) Melchisedech ; (2) EHas and the loaf, from 3 Kings xix. ; (3) the shcw-bread ; and (4) in de- fault of a better suggestion, the table with bread and fish, which is so familiar an object in the pictorial adornment of the Catacombs. On the great tympana would appear (1) the eating of the Paschal Lamb, and (2) the Manna. The eight scenes required for the secondary bays might be : (1) the miracle at Cana ; (2) the multi- plication of the loaves and fishes ; (3) the discourse in the syna- gogue at Capharnaum ; (4) Jesus in the Pharisee's house, with the penitent sinner at His feet ; (5) the parable of the Great Supper ; (6) the parable of the Prodigal Son (with the slaying of the fatted calf) ; and (7) and (8) two other parables, perhaps those of the Good Samaritan and of the Sower.
" In the third cupola, the medallion would be occupied by the Lamb, and the four compartments would show (1) Judas bargaining for the thirty pieces of silver, ' the price of the blood ' ;
(2) the Agony in the garden ; (3) Jesus before Pilate at the moment when the people cry, ' His Blood be upon us and upon our chil- dren ; ' (4) the Crucifixion. The pendentives would show (1) the murder of Abel ; (2) the sacrifice of Isaac ; (3) the Serpent raised aloft in the wilderness ; and (4) the scapegoat. On the tympana, north and south, might be depicted (1) Noah's sacrifice, and (2) the Inauguration of the Covenant with the sprinkling of the blood upon the people. The scenes represented in the lateral bays might be (1) the assent of the Jews ; (2) Jesus before Caiaphas ;
(3) Jesus before Herod ; (4) Christ and Barabbas ; (5) the scourg- ing ; (6) the crowning with thorns ; (7) the ' Ecce Homo ' ; and (8) the carrying of the Cross. As the lateral bays in this case have the full depth of the transepts, these scenes could be depicted on a very large scale, or, again, they might be multiplied.
" The fourth cupola, which surmounts the sanctuary, will require a treatment differing somewhat from that of the others. Its diameter is less by about 10 ft., and on the other hand it is
240 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
broken up into twelve compartments by the windows which are pierced in it, and which will throw its mosaics into a clearer light, so that rather more detail can be introduced with advantage. Instead of a central medallion, then, I would suggest a celestial ' glory ' with cherubim and clouds, towards which Christ would ascend from the easternmost of the twelve interfenestral compart- ments, the other eleven being occupied by scenes from those connected with the resurrection and risen life of our Lord, those only being omitted which have already found a place elsewhere. The following might serve, viz. (1) the sealed Tomb, with Guards ; (2) the Resurrection ; (3) the appearance of Christ to the Blessed Virgin Mary ; (4) the Maries at the Sepulchre ; (5) Peter and John at the Sepulchre ; (6) Christ and Mary Magdalene ; (7) the ap- pearance to St. Peter and (8) to the disciples going to Emmaus ; (9) to the disciples on the evening of Easter day ; (10) to Christ and St. Thomas ; (11) Christ with St. Peter on the lake shore.' Or, if it were thought desirable to represent the Ascension in the central compartment, then a twelfth subject might be introduced, e.g. Christ uttering the words, ' Whose sins you shall forgive they are forgiven,' etc.
" On the pendentives might appear (1) the taking up of Elias ; (2) the raising of the widow's son by Eliseus ; (3) the raising of Jairus' daughter ; and (4) the raising of Lazarus. (Or, the Vision of Ezechiel might be substituted for No. 2.) In this bay there are no lateral tympana, but, on the other hand, there is the great triumphal arch, over the choir recess, to be provided for. For this I would suggest the apocalyptic scene of ' the Lamb standing, as it were, slain,' with the four-and-twenty Elders, the great multitude of them that were ' signed,' and that other great multi- tude, * which no man could number, of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues.' The ' four living creatures ' would also demand a place, but they need not be made quite so prominent,
1 Observe that the scone of " tlie disciples going to Einiuaus " is not identical with that of " the disciples at Emmaus " mentioned above. So too " Christ with St. Peter on the lake shore " suggests a treatment quite distinct from that of the meeting of the apostles with our Lord on the same occasion, also mentioned above.
THE MOSAICS 241
or be so realistically presented, as in some early and mediaeval examples.
"In the apse of the choir the most suitable subject would probably be the Coronation of our Lady, and the abundant space on the side walls would give ample scope for the representation of groups of saints, after the manner of Fra Angelico,
" In the foregoing sketch, nothing has been said of the designs for the soffits of the great transverse arches, three in number. Such vaulted svirfaces produce, I think, the best effect when treated with medallions set in scroll-work, as at Monreale and at San Vitale. On this point I must be content to refer to the Tablet of June 1st. But as to the subjects (heads of saints) which are to occupy the medallions, it is not so easy to make an appro- priate choice. And the same may be said of the full-length figures of saints which are to occupy the faces of the great piers. Perhaps I might suggest for the first pair of piers St. Augustine and St. Patrick, for the second pair, two Virgin Saints of England, and Ireland respectively, and for the third pair two Martyr Saints, St. Alban and St. Thomas of Canterbury. Then in the soffits of the corresponding arches I would place (1) St. Paulinus, St. Aidan, St. Columba, St. Wilfrid, as representing the Apostolate of Eng- land ; (2) a series of Virgin Saints ; and (3) B. John Fisher, B. Thomas More, and other representatives of the English martyrs. The connection between the idea of apostolic work and that of baptism (first bay), between the idea of virginity and the Holy Eucharist (second bay), and between the idea of martyrdom and that of the Sacrifice of the Cross (third bay) is perhaps sufficiently obvious.
" Above the narthex is a very broad arch on which St. Joseph and St. Peter might appear on either hand, while a larger medallion at the summit would naturally be occupied by a figure of our Lady en buste.
" A word, now, on some of the accessory features of the adorn- ment of the cupolas. At the base of each a broad band should form the base of the whole design. In the first, this band would 1—16
242 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
represent flowing water with fish. In the second, sheep would browse on a rich pasture. In the third, stags would quench their thirst ad jontes aquarum. Above this basal band should run an inscription in gold letters on a deep blue ground, or rather a series of four inscriptions, appropriate to the four subjects repre- sented immediately above. The background of the principal subjects would be gold, but that of the medallion at the summit should be blue, both as bringing into relief the Dove, the Pelican, and the Lamb, respectively, and also as enliancing the sense of height. But the blue of these central medallions should be of a less deep hue than that which forms the background of the in- scriptions, and it should be carefully graded by means of irregular stippling in various shades, so as to give the effect of aerial space.
" In the rib borders, separating the four subjects in each cupola from one another, it would be obvious to make use of an ivy pattern in the first cupola, a pattern involving ears or sheaves of corn in the second, and, of course, the vine in the third. The broad face border of the triumphal arch would be treated with a richly floriated design, in which the brilliantly plumaged birds of the old symbolism would not be forgotten.
" And here, for the present, I must stop. It would, indeed, be premature to offer suggestions for the aisles, unless this scheme for the nave and choir should meet with at least provisional approval."
At this point, too, the discussion of unified decorative schemes arrived at a full stop, whence, as far as we are aware, it has never since moved. Bentley's death two months later, removing his initiative, came as a paralysing blow to progress. But mean- while in the three years that had elapsed since the January of 1899, the subsidiary matter of chapel decoration had passed through the era of suggestion and reached a stage of definite achievement in which the architect naturally had taken a con- siderable share, in spite of his earnest desire that a unified scheme for nave and aisles should precede the individual plans for the chapels. The difficulties and delays which set back the prepara-
THE MOSAICS 243
tion of the major scheme constrained him at last to put forth certain suggestions for the auxiHary decorations.
The first, pubhshed anonymously in the Record of February 1899, and reprinted with a plan in the Tablet supplement of December 29th, 1900, dealt with the Lady Chapel. Father Bridgett's scheme for this chapel, which we append in order to contrast the two points of view, is framed from the purely historical standpoint. Bentley's idea, coloured with his innate love of the mystical, embodies a scheme very largely devotional and symbolic, in which, we venture to think, is to be found unity of conception, conformity with ecclesiastical tradition, and a strict regard to the exigencies of situation and material. Father Bridgett was ham- pered by a too close adherence to the theme of our Lady's Dowry.
Bentley's suggestion should be read in conjunction with the plan in Appendix D, page 334.
Scheme for Mosaic Decoration of Lady Chapel
Apse of Chapel. — Ceiling. — Coronation of our Lady; north, Gabriel olive-crowned and bearing olive branch ; south, Michael, protector of the Sacred Humanity, carrying a flaming sword.
North and South. — The nine Choirs of Angels ; soffit, front of vault, angels carrying emblems of our Lady.
Frieze Under. — Demi -figures of Virgin Martyrs, SS. Agnes, Cecilia, Catherine, Winefride, Hilda, Margaret, Etheldreda, and Edith.
At back of Altar. — The Annunciation : on each side SS. Anna and Joachim ; underneath (small subjects), the Presentation of our Lady in the Temple, the Nativity, and the Salutation.
Altar Frontal. — Seraphim.
Frieze under Vault. — Demi -figures, types of our Lady, Eve, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Miriam, Deborah, Huldah, Ruth, Judith, Esther, Hannah, Susannah.
Soffit of Arch from Transept. — Two sibyls on each side ; above, angels playing musical instruments.
244 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
1 . Sibylla Persica, holding a lantern and open book, she having foretold the birth of Christ and the overthrow of Satan.
2. Sibylla Delphica, holding a crown of thorns, prophesied that our Lord should be born of a Virgin, and that He should be crowned with thorns.
3. Sibylla Erythrsea, holding a sword, prophesied that a Virgin should conceive and bear a son.
4. Sibylla Cumana, holding a sponge, prophesied that our Lord should be born of a Virgin in a stable at Bethlehem.
On the Vault of the Chapel
7. Isaiah holding a brazier of charcoal : I have foreshown you in this lamp of burning charcoal the name of the Kingly Throne.
8. Jeremiah pointing to the Divine ]Mother : I have seen thee, O Virgin maiden of Israel, led forth to tribulation.
9. Ezekiel holding a gate : I have beheld you as the closed gate of God.
10. Daniel holding a moun- tain : I have forenamed thee as a spiritual mountain whence a stone was cut out.
11. Habakkuk holding a shady mountain : I have beheld you as a mountain, covered by impenetrable shade.
12. Zachariah holding a seven-branched candlestick : I beheld a candlestick of gold and his seven lamps thereon to en- lighten the world.
6. Solomon holding a throne: I have named you a Royal Couch predicting you prodigious won- ders.
5. David holding an ark : Gazing on the beauty of the Temple, O young Virgin, I have forenamed you, O Virgin, the holy Ark.
4. Gideon holding a fleece : O pure Virgin, this fleece has foreshewn you to me.
3. Aaron holding a blossom- ing rod : This rod has fore- shewn to me, O spotless Virgin, that you have given birth to the Creator, even as a plant to the flower.
2. Moses holding a bush : In a bush I beheld a great mystery,
1. Jacob holding a ladder : I beheld you as a ladder planted upon earth, etc.
THE MOSAICS 245
Compare the above with Father Bridgett's suggestion, which is arranged as follows :
I. Four Archbishops of Canterbury. — St. Dunstan and his Vision (see Our Ladifs Dozory, p. 251). St. Ansclm giving docu- ment for Feast of our Lady (p. 231). St. Thomas of Canterbury receiving from our Lady knowledge of her heavenly joys (p. 66). St. Edmund's Espousals (p. 322). If room for fifth, Archbishop Arundel might be given promulgating the decree about our Lady's Dowry (i. 217), but he is not canonized.
II. Four Great Sanctuaries of our Lady. — 1. Glastonbury (see woodcuts of mine in Gasquet's Abbots). 2. Walsingham (see woodcuts in Our Lady's Dowry). 3. St. Paul's, London, singing of Antiphon (p. 310). 4. Fountains, present ruins.
III. Churches in Old London or Old Diocese. — 1. Willesden, old Village Church. 2. Our Lady of Barking (near Tower), citizens' wives. 3. Our Lady of Undercroft, Canterbury (p. 319). 4. Muswell Hill (p. 314).
IV. England's Consecration and Reconsecration. — 1. Copy of old picture in St. Stephen's Chapel, Westminster (copies extant). 2. Scene in Oratory, South Kensington, 1893.
V. Visions or Scenes. — 1. Abbot Helsius' Vision at Sea (p. 233) 2. William Longespee's Vision at Sea (p. 233). 3. Henry VI. giving Rosary to the Eton Boys (p. 206). 4. The Village School in Prioress's Tale. N.B. — In England according to St. Peter Celes- tine (p. 170). 5. St. Simon Stock, scapular.
VI. Writers on our Lady. — Bede, Alcuin, St. Aldhelm, St. CElred, Baldwin. (Alcuin and Baldwin not saints.)
VII. The Burning of our Lady's Statues in London. — See Lati- mer {Our Lady's Dowry, p. 307).
The learned priest added the following notes : " I selected four churches to represent our Lady's Dowry for these reasons : Glas- tonbury was in the hands of the Benedictines, Walsingham of Augustinians, Fountains of Cistercians, St. Paul's of secular clergy. There is a special reason for these two, since Fountains belongs to the Marquess of Ripon and St. Paul's is in your diocese.
246 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The description of the antiphon at St, Paul's presents a beautiful picture (see Our Lady's Dowry, p. 310). Mr. Brewer ' is a great authority on old St. Paul's, and would make a good sketch. If you prefer Canterbury to London, the crypt as it formerly was would make a good picture. Of course the ruins of Glastonbury, Walsingham, and Fountains could be represented as they now are. With regard to St. Stephen's, Westminster, it was not part of the old abbey : the present lobby of the House of Commons stands on its site. It was a great royal chapel and our Lady of the Pew formed a side."
All this is intrinsically interesting and undoubtedly worthy of preservation, although there can be no question that Bentley's plan was incomparably the more suitable. A glance at the figure illustrating it shows that it was made before the change of dedica- tion of the two eastward chapels, for the windows in the apse of what is now the Blessed Sacrament Chapel are shown. Moreover, the broaching of the apse of the south-eastern chapel by the two niches is not allowed for. On account of the reversal of position it became necessary to abandon Bentley's suggested subjects in the apse behind the altar, and to substitute a simpler treatment ; which, as we have seen in Chapter IX., Mr. Anning Bell has done. We will venture to hope that the rest of Bentley's plan will be carried out when the time comes for the designs to be completed.
Meanwhile the Cardinal had agreed that W. Christian Symons should be entrusted with the mosaic decoration of one chapel, and Bentley wrote to him accordingly :
" 13, John Street, Adelphi, "March 3rd, 1900.
"Dear Mr. Symons,
" Like yourself, but not so severely, I have been very unwell and had to keep in bed. I am delighted to hear that you are now convalescent, and hope you will be soon in harness again.
" Some time ago you said you would like to undertake the
1 The late Mr. H. W. Brewer was the draughtsman who made the interior perspective of the cathedral published for the laying of the foundation stone.
THE MOSAICS 247
Holy Souls' Chapel. What subjects or figures would you suggest ? There will be an altarpiece with a subject over and a subject op- posite, both within semi-circles, about 18 ft. across, and figures in the ceiling — two would suffice.
" We must avoid anything pictorial and the drawing must be severe and very Greek in character. More anon.
" Always sincerely yours,
" John F. Bentley."
W^ith the artist's immediate suggestion that the story of the Three Children in the Fiery Furnace should be represented, Bentley concurred.
" 13, John Street, Adelphi, "March 6th, 1900.
" Dear Mr. Symons,
" I think you have made a good suggestion — the type of Purgatory — but on the space over the altar what think you of representing Purgatory itself with St. Michael on the right, leading out souls, and St. Raphael (the angel of death) bringing others in ? I am not sure about Adam and Eve : I think we may suggest something better ; besides, those figures are sure to come in else- where.
" In a day or two I will send you diagrams of the chapel. In the meantime think the matter out. All I say after, and in- cluding this, is on the authority of the Cardinal. Think also about the style ; personally I am convinced that for mosaic the design should be simple and the style Greek in character.
" Always sincerely yours,
" John F. Bentley."
The suggestion of Adam, as the " old Adam," spade in hand, serpent-twined and standing in his open grave, was retained. Eve being replaced by the " new Adam," Christ holding aloft the Cross, His standard of victory. Otherwise the subjects first suggested
248 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
in this correspondence were adopted.' Mr. Symons was then hving at Robertsbridge in Sussex ; but finding it essential to be near Bentley and the cathedral, he came to London, and estab- lished himself in one of the " Riviera " studios on the river bank at Grosvenor Road. Here Bentley was a frequent visitor, advising and supervising in the production, first of the sketches, and then of the full-size cartoons, and afterwards watching closely over the technique of reproduction, when these were handed over to Mr. Bridge and his mosaicists at the Oxford Street Studio. It was intended to prepare a good deal of the mosaic there beforehand by doing it face downwards on canvas, but the plan was not a success and was soon given up.
Bentley, keen to imbue every mosaicist with his own ideals, often impressed on them the importance of absorbing the char- acteristics of Greek art, urging that all should visit the basement at the British Museum for the special pm'pose of studying an archaic Venus, as an excellent example of the simple, conventional style they were to employ. Moreover, he never tired of emphasizing the necessity that every decorative artist should be familiar with the possibilities of his material — so that a mosaicist, for example, should never make the mistake of attempting to express in solid cubes of glass the flowing lines and less simple chiaroscuro of plastic art.
The following remarks summarize Mr. Bridges' recollections of many conversations with the architect and epitomize his ex- perience gained from the mosaic work executed for the cathedral :
" I think Mr. Bentley took an interest in me from the first interview he gave me, when I showed him a mosaic panel that I had designed and executed entirely myself. It was a peacock executed in pieces of glass which were simply little lumps broken from large lumps, while the plain background was the only part worked in the ordinary tesserae, producing an effect which was quite out of the ordinary. He then told me he wanted an individual to be responsible for the execution of the mosaic — not a firm —
' See description of the mosaics in the Cliapel of the Holy Souls, page 198.
THE MOSAICS 249
and thus a direct personal interest as opposed to the supervision of a foreman. He desired moreover that the individuahty, not only of the principal, but of each worker should be freely expressed in the work, although under one control. As regards material, he did not mind whether the fixing medium was water or oil, so long as it was the most durable and always providing that the mosaic was worked in situ on the walls. It was decided, however, to use the oil mastic, since it does not set nearly so quickly as water cement and can be worked in for two or three days after application to the wall surface. Mr. Bentley came constantly to my studio and seemed to be able to teach a craftsman a little more about his craft every time he came in contact with him. He did not believe in the modern Italian method of working mosaic by fixing the tesserae face downwards on paper and then pressing them into the cement and beating them flat with wood blocks hammered by a mallet, a procedure which renders the work utterly flat and lifeless. Moreover in this way the right strength of colour cannot be gauged, since the tesserae are matched to the cartoons and laid upon the paper under a top light, a light which they do not receive when fixed upon the wall. Actually the colour of the mosaic must be very much stronger than that of the cartoons and the right strength can only be gauged wliile actually working on the walls. Further, the cement joints tend to lower the colour, and this can be seen at once upon the walls and allowed for. Yet another objection to the use of the Italian method is that a mosaic, like a picture, requires altering not only while in progress, but even at the end to get the right values. To prove all this, imagine a figure stuck down on paper surrounded with gold — when the gold on back shows green ; when this is reversed on to the wall and the gold face exposed, the effect is totally opposite ; since the colovu-s of the figm-e, which when in a horizontal position and surrounded by shimmering green may look wonderfully beautiful, will be killed completely when reversed and surrounded with glaring gold. . . . When I began work and asked Mr. Bentley for instructions as to the method of execution, he told me to go ahead and translate the
250 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
cartoons into mosaic. We started on the little winged busts of the ten Mercies in the Holy Souls' Chapel and these obtaining, without alteration, the approval both of Mr. Bentley and of Mr. Symons, set the key for the whole of the mosaic in the chapel. . . . The Brampton Chapel was executed in mastic by Mr. Bentley's order, as Mr. Clayton wished the mosaic worked in the Italian method and had the work executed in a manner very different from that of the chapel opposite. The whole surface was flattened, and the tesserae generally kept to one size, while the gold background, without break or variety, was set as though in ruled lines. Hence there is an entire absence of freedom in the effect."
Mr. Symons' s work in the Holy Souls' Chapel has won high and generous praise from contemporaries, notably from that great artist and friend of his, Mr. John Sargent, and from jMr. Robert Ross, the well-known critic, who asserted that " Bentley's masterpiece could hardly have been adorned by a more sym- pathetic and more appropriately chosen craftsman."
Between 1902 and his lamented death in 1912, Mr. Symons produced the designs for the altarpiece in the crypt mortuary chapel, " St. Edmund blessing London " ; the panel of Blessed Joan of Arc in the north transept, regarding which we agree with Mr. Ross that the technique employed in the mosaic "has hardly done justice to the design ; the effect is a trifle garish and com- monplace, and the treatment too realistic " ; and the " Sacred Face " in the west lunette of the Shrine of the Sacred Heart. He had made, in Bentley's time, a design for the tympanum of the west front which was not accepted ; and it must be a matter for deep regret that no other great opportunity was offered to him.
In the opinion of Father Lucas the decorations of the Holy Souls' Chapel are worthy (with certain reservations) to be taken as " providing a sort of norm for the carrying out of the vast undertaking of which they are the presage and the overture . . . I believe the work which has been done by Mr. Symons in the chapel of the Holy Souls to be precisely of the character which Mr. Bentley had set before him as his ideal ; and it is my belief
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Plate XXXVI. — Design fok Mosaic Figuhe ron Chapel ok the Holy Souls. The Old Adam (b.v W. r'hri^tinn Symons.)
[2SII
THE MOSAICS 251
that in all the United Kingdom there has not lived a better or more competent judge in such matters than he." '
The exceptions taken by the distinguished critic concern two points on the management of colour in which he differs from the artist. He contends that " in treating an arched recess it will be found to be a safe principle that there should be a grada- tion in depth of colour from arch-face to lunette. The arch-face should be made impressive by the prevalence of deep tones, an end which in many cases is most easily and effectively attained by the simple device of setting out an inscription in gold letters on a dark blue ground. Gold and blue would, of course, have been out of place in this particular chapel, but at least the great inscription ' Requiem seternam,' etc., might perhaps with advantage have been done in silver letters on a dark ground rather than in dark letters on a silver ground. The soffit above the recess should, as a rule, I think be somewhat less dark in tone than the arch-face, instead of being darker as in Mr. Symons's chapel. The opinion which I am expressing is, of course, one which must be tested by experiment and observation ; but I have little doubt that a deep- toned and bold arch-face and a soffit of which the prevalent hue is slightly lighter will be found to afford the best framework for a lunette in which the background is to be (as that of all the other lunettes in the cathedral will be) of bright and gleaming gold. The foregoing remarks must be understood as having reference to the relative values in the colour scheme. Looking to absolute values, it may be suggested that having regard to the fact that the chapel is lighted from one side only, and that on this side it is over- shadowed by tall buildings, a generally lighter tone would have been desirable."
It has already been said that the contract for the mosaic work in the Brampton chantry was given to the firm of Clayton & Bell, by the express wish of the donor. The designs were made by the late Mr. J. R. Clayton, head of this firm, which is, perhaps, best known all over the country through its production of ecelesi-
1 The Tablet, November 14th, 1903.
252 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
astical stained glass. Apart from the style of design, there exist striking technical differences between the mosaic treatment of this chapel and that on the opposite side. The first difference may be termed constructive. The two large window recesses, holding dovible-light windows, are features common to both chapels, but while these recesses in the Brampton Chapel are rounded in the mosaic itself, and completely carried out in that material, they have in the Holy Souls' Chapel marble facings covering the fundamental brickwork, the mosaics only beginning above the archivolt. In the former case the rounding of the blunt angles in the gold produces the impression that the whole wall is constrvicted of this substance ; while, in the latter, the mosaic is merely applied ornament, and without constructional signifi- cance.
This distinction was remarked by a critic of Byzantine archi- tecture writing in the Edinburgh Review of October 1904, who set himself to prove that the " structural " use of mosaic is the test of the Byzantine style — the architecture of " colour," as he terms it, in contradistinction to the architecture of form. But he admits that Santa Sophia as it stands is a study of form and that in Santa Sophia the mosaics have a decorative and not an archi- tectural motive, having nothing whatever to do with the com- position of the architecture, and being reduced to the mission of a mere surface covering.
It must be borne in mind that Bentley described Westminster Cathedral as a " veneered " building — veneered within and with- out— and it seems that he was but acting in conformity with this principle when he treated his mosaic in the manner of a surface covering (finding his precedent in Santa Sophia) rather than as a solid building material in which the spectator might be led to suppose these arches were turned.
The second difference between the two Westminster chapels has just been referred to and lies in the technique of execution. Whereas on the one side we find uneven tesserae, irregularly placed and set with wide joints in their cement bed, in the manner
THE MOSAICS 253
of the early mosaicists, on the other we are confronted with the modern ItaKan style, whose characteristics are precisely the op- posite of those we have enumerated. It would be idle to pretend that Bentley would have tolerated for a moment such a divergence from what he believed to be the true canons of mosaic art.
In the latter part of 1900, it appears that certain artists whose advice had not been sought expressed a desire to be consulted on the decoration of the cathedral, and one of their number appealed to Sir William Richmond for his support. In a reply which must have been gratifying to Bentley as a model of dignity and good taste, he says : " I regard Mr. Bentley with the highest respect ; he is not only a great architect, but he has a knowledge of the arts generally which places him in a very high position. Trust to Mr. Bentley — an artist must have free play, or he is hampered and his judgment becomes chaotic and confused. If Mr. Bentley desires to consult his colleagues upon the subject of the decoration, he will doubtless do so. But I could not take any part whatever in a movement such as you indicate unless I had Mr. Bentley's entire sanction."
Bentley's reply was to enter forthwith into a discussion on mosaic decoration with his champion, who came to dine and to talk things over with him at his house in Clapham before leaving for Sicily, either in the early spring of 1901 or at the close of the previous year. From Palermo Sir William Richmond wrote as follows. (It is deeply to be regretted that we have not Bentley's interesting reply, which the writer of this memoir believes she took down from his dictation.)
" Gband Hotel des Palmes, Palermo, "February 3rd, 1901.
" My dear Bentley,
" I have been thinking of you a great deal during the last two days, and wondering if your scheme for the decoration of your great cathedral is taking root in your mind. Impressions are apt to be delusive, so after a day at Monreale and the Palatine Chapel, I felt pretty much convinced that the scheme of your
254 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
decoration, generally speaking, should be in a light key and that the detail and groups of figures should be uncrowded, and that plenty of gold should appear in masses — possibly more back- ground than subject. I like the use of silver very much ; there is a beautiful effect obtained contiguous with gold, or, rather, with blue between, in the Palatine Chapel and superposed, out- lined with grey and red, a white horse or ass appears. I think the subject is the Entry into Jerusalem, but the effect of colour, the white on silver, again both on gold, is astonishingly fine. I think you will have to avoid large masses of red, unless you break them up pretty freely with rather pale orange tones, getting in the lights almost to white. Whatever you do, avoid pure white. I notice in all the restored portions both in Monreale and the Palatine Chapel, that the white being glaring bounces away from the wall in the most unpleasant fashion. Blue, if it is not rather amply relieved by light grey, appears black and heavy. Black avoid entirely, except in lines. On one side of black red, upon the inside grey or cool green, has an extremely pleasant effect ; the red seems, while it warms the black, not to reduce its power. If you find occasion for quite pure white, and have to do so in dark corners, a line of yellow on one side, and a line of red upon the other, will help to modify what would otherwise probably appear crude. I think you will probably decide in your own mind what the whole effect of colour is to be qua mosaic ; and I confess to feeling that the general roof effect — i.e. the first impression pro- duced upon the eye — is gold.
" Now comes a question which is not an easy one to decide. If you lay your tesserae very near together, you are apt to get a brassy rather than a goldy effect ; on the other hand, if you leave the joints between the tesserae showing, and they are white, the golden effect becomes so modified, owing to the expansion of the white, that it can hardly be said to be a golden one. I do not think you will be wise to adopt intonaco only of lime and sand, or even marble dust. The cement that I have used in St. Paul's, I got from a recipe, I think it was, of Simone Memmi, who
THE MOSAICS 255
restored the mosaics of Andrea Tafi in the Baptistery at Florence. Those mosaics had been set into lime, and before many years elapsed had fallen out in quantities, I have had no experience of such a calamity, partly because of the cement I used, and partly because I insisted upon the mosaic workers ramming the tesserae well home.
" So far for method. Now for scale. I beg and implore you not to be led into what always seems to me a vulgar error, that size necessarily means dignity. It is an error which grew in Italy in base times. I think the great figure of Christ at Monreale is stupendously fine, but its majesty is immensely increased by its being the only big figure in the church. I question if the largest figures in the nave are over 7 ft. 6 in. ; and I suspect that you will find 8 ft. quite tall enough for your biggest figures. It is amazing how soon a figure becomes colossal after it has measured 7 ft.
" I suspect that your apse should dominate over all other first impressions. Your difficulty will be in designing a figure upon it which will not look odd from midway down the nave, because of your curve. The success of the Monreale figure is, I think, due to the fact that the curve is so high up, that what is drawn upon it is but slightly influenced optically ; but, your apse being a low one, your design will be subjected to considerable contortion, unless great care is observed and insisted upon by yourself, as to the relation of curve on curve. I don't think I have ever seen a satisfactory drawing done by an Englishman upon a curved apsidal surface, because the fact has been neglected or forgotten that to look right it must be drawn wrong !
"Do you mean to make your decoration dark on a light base, or light on a dark base ? — or do you mean to carry out the same quality of tone in both mosaics and marble ? If so I should be inclined to use cut-up marble from the same blocks which you use for facing, as the tesserae which are to give the governing tone to your mosaic ; hence I think you will preserve a unity which it would be otherwise difficult to achieve. You will thank
256 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
me too much for this letter, which is not half I mean to write to you in time. I can only claim its dictation, a kind hand is doing the rest. Do write to me to Posta Restante, Florence, and ask me to be of any service to you I can.
" W. B. Richmond."
The sole other completed chapel is the Shrine of the Sacred Heart, which occupies, as we have seen, the north aisle of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, and is adorned in its western wall by the impressive " Vernicle," designed by Mr. Symons. The rest of the mosaic, designed by Mr. Marshall, consists of a repetition of small conventional patterns on a ground of gold or red.
It only remains now, we think, to mention the designs for the mosaic to fill the tympanum in the western fa9ade. Witliin the life-time of architect and founder, several were submitted, the first, no more than a slight sketch, being that drawn by Bentley for the western elevation of the cathedral published in No. 4 of the Record (October 1896).
Other designs came from ]\Ir. Anning Bell, Mr. Frank Brang- wyn, Mr. Symons, and Professor Seitz, a detailed description of this last appearing in the Tablet supplement of December 29th, 1900. It represented the idea of the dedication of the cathedral to the Precious Blood. The Cross, raised on a mount, richly jewelled and coloured, with the Pelican at the crossing of the arms, sends down its streams of Blood and of Water — these bring spiritual fertility, life, and happiness to the world. Below are the harts, thirsting after the fountains of water, and the sheep and lambs feeding upon the precious and life-giving Blood, which in streams is carried over the globe. On one side stands the Blessed Mother of God in prayer, and on the other, the Keybearer, whose jurisdiction is over the whole flock. Above, round the semi- circular margin of the tympanum, are the words from the hymn of St. Thomas Aquinas :
Pie Pelicano, Jesu Domine
Me unmundum raunda tuo Sanguine.
THE MOSAICS 257
Such strong objection was taken to this design, on the plea that it offered possible ground for the mockery of the irre- ligious, that the idea was quietly dropped, and Bentley's sketch adopted.
This pencil sketch, much worn by time, was developed and worked out by Mr. J. A. Marshall, of the Bentley firm, in 1907, and is thus described : " The central group of figures in the semi- circular panel represents God the Son, the author of Christianity, attended by the Virgin Mother, and by her spouse, St. Joseph. Christ, robed in red and white, is seated on a throne, displaying the wounds in His extended hands. Our Lady, on the right, robed in blue and white, and St. Joseph on the left in dtdl red, stand in attitudes of pensive humility. A cruciform nimbus sur- rounding the head of our Lord is displayed against the tasselled drapery behind the throne, on which are shown the letters Alpha and Omega. To His right, in the extreme left of the panel, St. Peter holding his keys is represented, kneeling in adoration, as the first bishop of the Christian church. In the opposite corner kneels St. Edward, king and confessor, with crown and sceptre, holding in his right hand the ring he gave to St. John the Evangelist, who, in the guise of a poor man, had begged him for alms. St. Peter's robe is of russet and brown, while St. Edward is clad in a dress of purple, white, and green. The upper part of the back- ground is designed to be a deep blue ; the lower part, representing an inlaid parapet of stone, will in general effect be white."
It will be observed that the two outer figures of saints are in a kneeling posture in the above design, whereas in the tympanum shown in Bentley's drawing of the western elevation they are depicted standing.
The main idea of tliis design, with certain modifications of detail, was finally carried out by Mr. Anning Bell, A.R.A., and executed by Messrs. Powell & Co., being completed and exposed to view in the early spring of 1916. It contains the five figures, placed as above described, but the background is wholly white and without any accessories, even the parapet of stone which 1—17
258 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
served to give scale to the earlier composition being omitted. The colour scheme is a sober arrangement of browns and greys with some red for emphasis and a little blue and green. The white ground was selected for reasons of durability and visibility, gold and blue being both rejected on the score of climatic objections. The tesserae employed are of various shapes, mainly oblong, and the ground in which they are set is grouted up flush with their surface to ensure durability, at the sacrifice of a good deal of tech- nical and artistic effect.
CHAPTER XI
CATHEDEAL FINANCE
Directly it was announced that the building was a matter to be immediately put in hand, money poured into the cathedral coiTcrs in what appears a remarkable, indeed an almost miraculous fashion, when one remembers the perpetual and heavy demands of charity and education on the none too well plenished purses of the Catholic body in England, Almost without appeals abroad (with two exceptions, 'of which one was only for a specific portion of the building) ; without recourse to any of the modern (and deplor- able) methods of raising funds by bazaars, entertainments, and house-to-house collections ; and, for the first five years of the work, almost without any public appeal at all, the marvellous collection of a quarter of a million pounds was accomplished.
Cardinal Vaughan's confidence and inspiration were dauntless. He was energized indeed with the Christ-command : Ask and it shall be given unto you — ask and you shall receive. None could refuse his compelling, his magnetic appeals. As a con- temporary writer paraphrased it, amazed at the bold faith of his undertaking, " It was not business, it was magnificent."
And yet behind all this enthusiasm of faith, there was business and a sound commercial instinct, without which the venture covdd never have been carried through to success.
The imperial ideal, side by side with, or perhaps rather under- lying the Catholic ideal, as presented by Cardinal Vaughan to the Catholic people of England, together made a stirring appeal to faith and patriotism ; the union of motives so powerful and so inspiring could not fail to rouse a prompt and enthusiastic response to the needs of the metropolitan cathedral, destined to take its
259
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stand as the visible embodiment of the Catholic Church at the historic centre of the English-speaking countries of the world.
In the words of the Cardinal to his people, they too desired, as ardently as he, that the Empire should " possess in its very centre a living example of the beauty and of the majesty of the worship of God, rendered by solemn daily choral monastic service, as in the olden time within the walls of Canterbury, during a thousand years." " We want to announce," said he, " the glad tidings of Redemption in our Saviovir's Precious Blood ; to offer, without price, the exhaustless treasures of the daily Sacrifice; and to give to many a weary soul the peace and hope that silently distil under the unceasing melody of the Church's liturgy of prayer and praise. We desire that, at least in this immense capital of a world-wide empire of power and influence, in this great com- mercial mart of human industry, there should arise without delay a cathedral fully presenting the cosmopolitan faith and devotion of the Catholic Church."
The wisdom of the Cardinal's appeal to such sentiments was abundantly justified — fortified as it was by a scheme whereby a more personal interest could be awakened and brought into play. It needed not a very deep knowledge of human psychology to realize how liighly even the most altruistic appreciate a visible and tangible record of their services in any cause ; how individuals will rejoice with mild egotism in tliinking of some particular detail : " This is my gift to God's service ; this column of rare and beautiful marble commemorates one dear to me ; this altar lamp makes perpetual mute intercession on my behalf ; this mosaic picture or this marble wall represents the sacrifice and self- denial of many pleasant things." It is all very human and very natural, and, as has been said, the Cardinal gave the oppor- tunity for the gratification of such instincts by announcing from time to time the cost of certain details of the building, in order that benefactors might make a choice according to their means. Thus it was shown that a marble column and cap in the nave would cost £150 ; one in the sanctuary £110 ; those in St. Peter's
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Crypt cost £90 each ; those in the tribune, being much smaller, only £50 each. Fxirthermore, should a donor desire to have a part in the actual building of the walls of this national monument, this great enduring pile, £33 would pay for 10,000 bricks ' laid in cement in the foundations or piers.
There were, of course, many who preferred to give what they could afford without allocating the sum to any specified purpose. Special recognition and gratitude, it was announced, was to be accorded to these by inscribing their names in a book called Liber Vitce, which was to be carefully preserved in the cathedral, and honoured according to ancient usage. Three classes of benefactors were to be named in this book :
1. The Founders of Westminster Cathedral, persons who have given not less than £1,000 towards the building.
2. Special Benefactors, those who have given or collected not less than £300 within three years.
3. Named Benefactors, those who have contributed any sum not less than £10.
It was further promised that the names of the Founders should be inscribed upon a tablet to be placed in the main entrance, begging the prayers of all who enter : that a monthly mass in per- petuity should be offered for all the Founders ; that a Requiem Mass, within the Octave of All Saints', would be offered for all Founders and Benefactors ; and that in the sacristy would be placed a tablet, asking for a memento on behalf of all Founders and Benefactors, in every Mass said in the cathedral.
We publish in an Appendix to this volume a complete list of the noble roll of founders, the record of whose Catholic faith, as Cardinal Vaughan predicted, will be handed down the centuries as an example and encouragement to their children's children. The names of the founders will also be engraved on two large bronze tablets ^ which are shortly to be placed on the side walls of the main entrance porch. It is a matter of
^ The total number of bricks employed was 12,454,474.
" The roll of founders is temporarily recorded on wooden tablets in the great porch.
262 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
regret that lack of space prevents the putting on record of the names of the multitude of others to whose generosity, according to their means, the cathedral owes so much.
At the luncheon on the occasion of the laying of the founda- tion stone it was announced that an account called the " West- minster Cathedral Account " had been opened in the names of the trustees, the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster and the Duke of Norfolk, E.M., K.G., at the London Joint Stock Bank, 69, Pall Mall, S.W., the Hon. Treasurer being the Right Rev. Monsignor Canon Johnson, D.D., and the Hon. Secretary Mr. Austin Gates, K.S.G.' A statement followed, from which the financial position emerged thus : The estimated approximate cost of the main structure was £124,000, to which had to be added a further sum of £16,000 for fees and contingencies, making £140,000. A further heavy liability was the mortgage of £20,000 on the land, bringing up the total of the preliminary sum required to £160,000. As has been previously noted, the total disbursements on land, interest, law costs, and architects' fees from 1867 to 1883 had exceeded £44,223.
In the financial statement of the Hon. Treasurer it was also announced that the total amoimt of subscriptions paid or promised during the preceding twelve months (since June 1894) — since the moment that the Cardinal had begun to " write a few simple letters to his friends " — was £55,492. This sum was increased to £72,243 by two previous bequests : that of £6,417 15s. 8d. from the late Miss E. J. Dodsworth, who died in 1883 ; and by the bequest of £11,333 6s. 8d. from Baroness Weld, who died in 1871, for a memorial chapel in the cathedral. This latter was reserved for the building and decoration of the Lady Chapel. Actually, £42,870 of this total was in hand. The founders of the cathedral at this date numbered thirty-five ; the roll now contains one hundred and fourteen names, besides several unnamed donors.
Eloquent appeals for speedy financial assistance were made in
* At that time Cardinal Vaughan'a private secretary. He was succeeded by Moa- signor Pover.
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the several speeches on this occasion, and with happy results — £2,309 being promised during the luncheon.
Two names, besides those of the Cardinal and the architect, seem to be woven into the fabric and the finance of the cathedral from its earliest beginnings. Monsignor Canon Johnson, Hon. Treasurer to the building fund, was familiar with its every detail^ — had watched its rise as it were brick by brick with loving enthusiasm — indeed, Bentley, greatly attached to this saintly hard-working priest, who returned his affection, used often jokingly to say that Monsignor Johnson knew the cathedral better than he did himself. To William Antony Johnson, who for over forty years had been Diocesan Secretary, and as such the intimate confidant of Cardinal Manning's hopes and plans and disappointments, the realization of the ideal so long unattainable was a source of deep happiness. Appointed Vicar-General in 1904, he continued to work, if possible, even more strenuously for the good of the diocese. On May 1st, 1906, he was consecrated in the cathedral Bishop Aiixiliary of Westminster under the title of Arindela, and unfortunately died eleven months later, without the happiness of seeing the consecration of the building to which he had given such unstinted devotion.
The second name— or perhaps, as Chairman of the Executive Committee, his should have taken the prior place — is that of Monsignor Fenton, Bishop of Amycla,' one of the first to whom Cardinal Vaughan confided his great idea, asking him to make its promotion, thenceforward, the leading work of his life. He was installed a canon of the cathedral on the eve of the laying of the foundation stone, and became its first Administrator. The first Bishop to be consecrated in the cathedral, on May 29th, 1904, he assumed the title of Amycla, becoming Bishop Auxiliary to Archbishop Bourne ; and three years later, on the death of Bishop Johnson, Vicar-General. Besides being Chairman of the Executive Committee, he was specially appointed one of the collectors for the fund, and it was due largely to his perseverance
1 He died in 1918.
264 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
and untiring effort that £20,000 was collected within a very short time.
Monsignor Fenton journeyed to Rome in 1896, and after an interview with Pope Leo XIII, collected there, and subsequently in Florence, a large sum of money. On his return he stayed in Paris to consult the Due d'Aumale, the head of the French ex- Royal Family, regarding the appeal he had drawn up to French Catholics, suggesting that to commemorate and as a mark of gratitude for the great kindness received in England by the French emigres, they should undertake the building of a chapel in the new cathedral, to be dedicated to St. Louis. The Duke's reply was that if Monsignor Fenton would refrain from publishing the appeal, he would himself bring the project before the members of his family, in the certainty that they would combine to pro- vide the chapel. Unhappily death overtook the Duke before he had carried out his plan, and when his representatives were reminded of the promise, they replied that he had left no instruc- tions concerning this matter. And so there is no chapel to the French patron, though Blessed Joan of Arc, the saintly protector of his house, has been commemorated and honoured by the women of England, in the north transept of the cathedral.
By December 31st, 1895, nearly £80,000 had been given or promised. The list of subscriptions compiled at this date by Monsignor Johnson reveals the names of many founders : the Duke of Norfolk, with a magnificent gift of £10,000 ; Cardinal Vaughan, £5,000 ; Lt.-Col. Horace Walpole, £l,200 ; thirty-two donors (three under the veil of anonymity) of £1,000 each, eleven of £500 each, and numerous subscriptions of sums ranging from 2s. to £400.
Four months later the name of His Holiness Pope Leo XIII figures at the head of the growing list of founders ; and to the sub- scription list has been added, besides, £5,179 18s. 6d. The pay- ments, to April 30th, to contractor, architect, clerk of the works, etc., amounted to close on £10,000 for preparing the site, laying the foundation stone, and for work on the foundations. The
2Gt]
Plate XXXVII. — Archbishop's House. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
CATHEDRAL FINANCE 265
total outlay on the foundations was about £14,000. The expendi- ture continued roughly at the rate of about £800 a month, while subscriptions paid or promised seem in the next few months of 1896 to have come in at about an equal amount.
And so the work progressed till at the close of the following year the Cardinal found that the monthly liabilities had risen to the large sum of £2,500, while the average of the subscriptions coming in remained at, roughly, £1,000 a month. Clearly the time for a public appeal had come. At an imposing gathering of clergy at Archbishop's House on November 5th, 1897, assembled to present an address to Cardinal Vaughan on the occasion of his Silver Episcopal Jubilee, he took the opportunity to refer to the coming celebration, three years thence, of the Golden Jubilee of the Restoration of the Catholic Hierarchy in England, inviting all present to prepare to celebrate it with gifts and generosity and sacrifices. And he ended his moving exhortation by an ex- pression of hope that these being forthcoming, might accelerate the completion of the metropolitan cathedral.
The Record of January 1898, in publishing this appeal fortified by the details of current expenditure, pointed out that the mortgage of £20,000 still remained, while the bank balance, unless funds were forthcoming, would soon be a thing of the past. The total expenditure then was £37,000. Now the lists of moneys received or promised, issued by the Hon. Treasurer from 1894 till January 1898, show a total equal to more than twice the dis- bursements ; in fact, the former had almost reached £85,000 (exclu- sive of the £12,000 given for the Lady Chapel and moneys collected in Spain for the Blessed Sacrament Chapel). We must therefore conclude that in many cases " promise had outrun performance " and that the cry for help in the Record was directed as much to those who had not redeemed their pledges as to the enlisting of new subscribers.
This number of the magazine was its last as an independent publication. So many difficulties conspired to prevent its regular quarterly appearance, that an arrangement was then entered into
266 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
to produce it in future and from time to time as a supplement to the Tablet. These supplements were also to be made up under their familiar pale green cover (with its picture of the west end differing so markedly from the actuality), and sent to subscribers to the Record and to all the benefactors ; but it was not till over a year later that the next official bulletin of progress (No. 7 of the Record) appeared in this guise in the Tablet of the second week of February 1899. It records additional subscriptions to the amount of nearly £14,600, the names including eight new founders ; and announces further that five of the chapels have been provided for wholly or in part.
The money left by Baroness Weld (and now greatly increased by compound interest) had long been set aside, as we have already noted, for the building and decoration of the chapel of our Lady. That of St. Joseph had been promised by Mr. Weld-Blundell ; the chapel dedicated to St. Gregory and St. Augustine by Lord and Lady Brampton (the former having recently been received into the Catholic Church) ; and that of the Holy Souls by Mrs. Robert Walmesley. Subscriptions for the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament were being collected by the Rev. Kenelm Vaughan, the Cardinal's brother, who in 1896 began to traverse Spain begging from door to door for this chapel of " expiation and adoration, dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament, as the gift of the Spanish race."
The title of " Fundadores del Sagrario" (founders) was be- stowed upon donors of £50 and over ; 1,500 pesetas (nearly £60) being the actual amount of the highest individual subscription received. The scheme was taken up and warmly recommended by the Bishops of Spain, the Archbishop of Seville leading by becoming a founder ; and the Royal Family also gave generously. Father Vaughan in something over two years gathered about £3,980 ; the war with the United States then broke out, and he started for the Spanish-speaking provinces of South America, there to continue the work of piety. The Archbishop of Buenos Ayres received him with open arms and addressed an enthusiastic
CATHEDRAL FINANCE 267
pastoral letter, recommending Father Vaughan's mission to all his flock, and desiring them to contribute to the Blessed Sacra- ment Chapel Fund as though they were giving to a work of their own nation.
Through eleven years of toil and hardship, eleven of the best years of his life, Kenelm Vaughan never faltered. It was estimated that about £13,000 ' would be needed for the construction and decoration of the chapel ; but his aim went far beyond that. Proposing that in the Chapel of Expiation perpetual exposition and special services should be carried out all the year round, he intended to continue collecting until he had a sum sufficient to produce the income to meet the necessary expense. Begging thus from door to door, from State to State, he ultimately came home with the net sum of £18,634, due (with the exception of a few small offerings from friends in England) to the generosity of the Spanish races, awakened by his wonderful enthusiasm and devotion. He only survived his exertions for two years, dying on May 19th, 1909.
The eighth number of the Record published with the Tablet of May 13th, 1899, announced that moneys actually received since June 1894, amounted to £100,848 ; and pointed out that not all of this sum was available for general building expenses, since some of it had been ear-marked for specific purposes. Labour, materials, and fees had absorbed up to date £88,367, and though the building was not yet roofed in, the architect expected that this would be accomplished by the end of the year.
In view of the heavy expense to be incurred in constructing the domes and vaults, the balance in hand of the building fund was all too small, and it was felt that the time had come to frame an appeal to the great mass of the people, who had not yet been invited to make their offerings. This was effected by means of a joint pastoral letter from the suffragans of the Province, which, dated June 24th, 1899, received the signature of fifteen bishops, and was appointed to be read in all the churches of their
1 This estimate has been very greatly exceeded.
268 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
dioceses on July 2nd, 1899. The subsequent chuieh collections realised £3,496 lis. 4d., a very substantial help towards the com- pletion of the fabric. The subscriptions announced in the ninth issue of the Record, dated June 14th, 1899, amounted to £4,264.
At the close of the last year of the century the building was externally almost complete. True, the campanile had attained but 182 ft. of its total height of 273 ; some of the side chapels were still unroofed, and the turrets of the great western staircases were incomplete ; still it was possible to gain a very good idea of the general effect without. For some time past the public had been admitted to view the building, a charge of 6d. a head being made at a turnstile placed near the western entrance. The scene inside the cathedral at that period was imposing in its rugged grandevu ; the eye was drawn irresistibly upwards to the wide saucer-like circles of the flat domes crowning the nave, and then on to the brilliantly lighted sanctuary dome and the noble sweep of the apse beyond. The marble columns, the great masses of brickwork, the staircases and galleries alike served to whet curiosity and increase the interest already .roused by the unfamiliar style of architecture, and brought many visitors, whose sixpences went to swell the building fund to good purpose. Actually about £3,109, clear of expenses, was realized in this way in the eighteen months after the roofing in of the church.
The tenth number of the Record in the Tablet of December 29th, 1900, gives a further increment of subscriptions given or promised during the previous six months, totalling £18,720. This included a second contribution of £5,000 from the donor of the Holy Souls' Chapel.
A year and a half elapsed before the next issue, in June 1902, of the bulletin of progress, a Record in which melancholy prominence was given to Cardinal Vaughan's panegyric of the deceased archi- tect, who three months earlier had laid down his pencil for the last time. The thirteenth centenary of St. Augustine's landing had come and gone, and the cathedral, to the bitter disappointment of many, was not yet opened for public worship.
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The explanation of the delay was to be found in the Cardinal's leading article, under the title, " When will the Cathedral be opened ? " He replied : " As soon as it shall be possible to give it over, in fee simple, to God, by the liturgical act of consecration. For this it must be absolutely free of debt. At the present mo- ment it is not free. Outstanding liabilities actually exceed the money in hand. To meet these obligations and to complete structural and other works that must precede the consecration, it is estimated that a further sum of £16,000 will be required. We must collect this amount, with all speed, or stop the works. The date of the consecration and of the formal opening depends upon this. By means of the splendid charity of many founders and benefactors, and of the sum allocated by the Charity Commissioners from the sale of St. Mary's, Moorfields, to the extinction of the mortgage, and to the building fund, the shell of a spacious, massive, and imperishable cathedral has been built, upon a site absolutely free."
W^hen the Cardinal had provisionally fixed September 29th, 1900, as the date for the consecration and opening, he had ex- pressly pointed out that it was money, not time, that was wanting for the achievement of his purpose. The long delay of its realiza- tion saddened the last months of his life ; in prophetic vein ' he closed the final appeal : " It is no longer the question of the morning, Is it prudent to set out upon the gigantic task of building in Westminster a worthy metropolitan cathedral ? You have answered that question. You have bui t the cathedral. The question now is, Shall a last effort, a last sacrifice be made to complete and consecrate it to God before the nightfall ? Founders and friends must decide. It is needless to labour an appeal with a string of motives that are all too obvious. Suffice it to say, that this is my final appeal for the building fund — that there will be no further call upon you for the building fund in our life-time, if the sum now asked for be obtained."
The sum granted by the Charity Commissioners from the sale
^ Cardinal Vaughan died on June 19th, 1903.
270 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
of the Moorfields property was £48,555. The receipts by subscrip- tions from December 25th, 1900, to May 20th, 1902, amounted to £7,035, exclusive, of course, of further contributions by Father Kenelm Vaughan towards the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, bring- ing the total of general subscriptions received or promised up to date to £148,699.
With Cardinal Vaughan's death the Westminster Cathedral Record ceased to exist, and the work remained without any official organ for foiir and a half years. In January 1907 appeared the first number of a new venture, one that has been blessed with a steady existence and large success. This is the Westminster Cathedral Chronicle, planned and edited by the present Adminis- trator, Monsignor Canon Howlett, D.D., and issued monthly. Its piirpose is to record works projected, begun, or accomplished in the cathedral, to chronicle the ceremonies and sacred events from year to year, and to meet a strongly felt want for an official organ to keep the clergy in touch with the laity, and to make known the cathedral work and needs to those at a distance. This monthly magazine, well illustrated, has amply fulfilled the inten- tions with which it began, and has noted from time to time dona- tions for special purposes in the work of decorating and completing the building. But since that last list of general subscriptions in the Record of June 1902, no further list has been published.
From the Archbishop, in the first number of the new magazine, an explanation was forthcoming as to why the collection of funds had appeared to be stagnating during the first years of his tenure of the see. " It was," wrote he, " of set purpose, taking into account the great effort of generosity put forth for so many years, and the other even more pressing claims upon the resources of the faithful, that no special appeal has been made, since the opening of the cathedral, for the funds which are required for the completion of the fabric." By this date (January 1907) £235,420 had been ex- pended, and on the general building account there was a deficit of £8,391, temporarily covered by a loan at 3| per cent.
To the dismal forebodings of the prophets of failure who had
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said that the cathedral would be a mere monument of extrava- gance, the packed congregations at all the services, morning, afternoon, and evening, all the year round, afforded the most eloquent answer and encouraged the authorities to ask that this remaining debt should, by a new burst of popular generosity, be speedily liquidated. The announcement of the forthcoming date of consecration (June 29th, 1910) in the February of that year gave added weight to the Archbishop's appeal for £7,000 to clear off what was still owing, a sum that must be paid before the ceremony could take place. A great and final effort was made, and by the night of April 30th every farthing had been subscribed, and the cathedral structure stood entirely free from debt, over a quarter of a million sterling (£253,666) having been expended up to May 1st, 1910.
With regard to the maintenance of its service, a very heavy charge upon the future. Cardinal Vaughan had, as there has already been occasion to mention, foreseen and made provision almost before he set out to build. He had given generously from his own resoiirces, and had obtained from the Holy See the definite assign- ment to the cathedral maintenance of certain funds, the income of which had previously been left free for the disposal of the reigning Archbishop. Cardinal Vaughan wrote on the subject three days before his death to one of his executors : " Your fears that the maintenance of the serving of the cathedral will not be effected by the provision I am striving to make for it, chiefly from my own resources, are not exhaustive. I have always held in reserve a large proportion of the cathedral property for letting, and so bringing in a good income. If this could be avoided, I thought, all the better. But failing other resources you have an easy income coming in."
As a matter of fact, the income is not sufficient without letting the surplus land. This important site has been in the market now for some years, but the authorities have received no suitable offer to justify disposing of it on building lease. If the land were left vacant and laid out as a garden, which from the aesthetic
2T2 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
view-point would be most desirable, a further capital sum of not less than £30,000 would have to be provided to add to the endowment provided by the Cardinal builder. May some generous millionaire be inspired thus to beautify the cathedral precincts !
Much generous giving will be needed ere the day when the interior decoration of the cathedral shall be completed, a great day that we may hope oxu: children's children will be privileged to see. By the piling up of little gifts it may sooner be effected ; indeed the authorities look for its accomplishment rather through small and numerous donations, than by means of the great and few.
CHAPTER XII
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS
Archbishop's House: Introductory — Preparation of site — Plan — Elevations of faQade and side — Basement — Ground floor — Porch — Grand staircase — First floor — Roof garden — Second floor — Third floor — Throne room — Library — Reception room — Chapel. Diocesan Library : Dimensions — Plan — Lighting — Fittings — Galleries — Contents — Cloister — Dimensions — Arrangement — Purpose. Cathe- dral Hall : Plan — Construction — Fenestration — Decoration — Fa5ado and roofing — Entrances — Main porch^Staircase — Galleries — Secondary porch — Bridge from cathedral apse — First Mass in hall. Choir School: History of foundation — Directors — Endowment — Church music — Choir School built. Clergy House: Ihirpose — Frontage and entrance — Garage.
In May 1899, it was announced to the Catholic body that a Diocesan Hall and Library, with a new residence and administrative offices for the Archbishop, were in process of erection at the east end of the cathedral, and that, with the exception of the Diocesan Hall and cloister, no part of their cost would be borne by the Cathedral Fund, At the same time it was made clear that separate con- tributions for these works, so vital to the satisfactory working of both diocese and parish, would be gratefully welcomed. The sale of the gloomy house in Carlisle Place, which, as a temporary expedient, had housed the Archbishops of Westminster for over a quarter of a century, since its purchase by Cardinal Manning in 1873, was expected to provide the major portion, at least, of the sum required for the new building.
The Cardinal wrote to Bentley in July 1898, when instructing him to prepare plans of the house : " I cannot think of going beyond an outlay of £20,000 in cash for housebuilding : but I can borrow as much more as I can find interest for — interest and gradual repayment of capital — out of rents coming in from flats and apartments. It would be therefore well to bear this in
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274 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
mind, and to make a plan that can be carried out at once, if business considerations allow. This would be far more satisfactory, in a business point of view, if money be borrowed, than building piecemeal. . . . The sale of the house is complete, and we must leave it in two years from July 1st."
Selection was made of the waste ground lying beyond the north- east termination of the cathedral, in order that the new pile might extend a convenient and dignified frontage along Ambrosden Avenue. The preparation of the 300 ft. of site, superintended in the early summer months of 1898 by the clerk of the works, Mr. Tet, was no light task ; beneath the accumulated soil lay part of the concrete foundations of the old prison, with quantities of the bricks, set fast in Roman cement, that had once footed its walls. The labour involved in the clearance of these bricks and other rubbish may be easily imagined; the concrete, naturally, being allowed to remain, to be utilized in the new foundations. Bentley's plans were completed by September 1898, and the contract was signed by Messrs. Shillitoe & Sons, the cathedral contractors, towards the close of the year, work beginning as soon after as weather conditions permitted.
As regards the main outlines of the plan, an asphalted court- yard separates the eastern end of the church from the block of auxiliary buildings, which are however united to it by two raised and covered bridges, of which more later. The Diocesan Hall runs north and south at practically right angles to the cathedral termination. The library is embodied in the plan of the house, which, as wc see, is quadrangular in form, and built round a central courtyard, the main portion, the two wings, and the cloister forming its four sides (Fig. 28).
The total frontage measures 188 ft., making with the cathedral a continuous pile of buildings with a length of about 560 ft. The depth of the central part of Archbishop's House is 54 ft., with a central back extension up to the first floor of a further 22 ft. of depth. The right, or library wing, is carried back for 94 ft. to meet the cloister, whose breadth (external measurement) is 14 ft.
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 275
The left wmg, brought forward 8 ft. on the frontage, extends to a total depth of 116 ft., the courtyard of the interior thus sur- rounded having a max»mum breadth of 40 ft. and length of 76 ft. It must be understood tliat the measurements of the left wing are relative to Bcntley's original plan, as illustrated ; since Iiis death it has been extended and altered by the addition of the Clergy House, producing a considerable increase in the length fronting Francis Street. Behind the cloister, and united to it about midway, now rises the Choir School, in place of the monastery originally destined to occupy a similar position.
Variety to the composition of the fagade is given by the slight advancement of the left wing ; while balance is attained by a similar projection of the Chapter Hall, whose external length is thus (since the cloister occupies the 14 ft. of space beyond its apse) 102 ft.
The style of the buildings is in harmony with that of the cathe- dral, though reduced to the plainest components, expressed in the same dignified combination of red brick and Portland stone. Here are no colonnades, no carved swags or medallions, no decorative chimneys. The simplest mouldings, allied to the fine proportions of windows and portico and the little domical lead-roofed turrets at either end suffice to produce, in the case of the house, an im- pressive and satisfying effect. The photograph (Plate XXXVII) reveals better than any verbal description the extreme severity and reticence of detail. This restraint was due in some measure to Cardinal Vaughan's oft-reiterated instructions to the architect to design for him the plainest possible dwelling. He went so far as to produce a rough plan himself, though he admitted he was " not wedded to it," and Bentley's, naturally, prevailed.
The Cardinal would have liked to combine in some fashion a reception room, 50 ft. long, with the Diocesan Hall, making it capable of enlargement by communication on one side with the hall, and on the other with mezzanine or 12 ft. higli rooms which, he thought, would be quite high enough for the ordinary reception of individuals, etc. Bentley's conception of a suite of lofty rooms.
276 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
with a combined length of 100 ft., in addition to the hall, was, in the Cardinal's opinion, extravagant and unnecessary. So he wrote in August when the plans were in hand. Bentley could be as inflexible as Vaughan when convinced that he was right, though his opposition was ever tempered by an enormous respect for the dignity of a Prince of the Church. He evidently succeeded in convincing the Cardinal that the balance of wisdom and practic- ability lay on the side of the large and independent suite of state apartments.
When it came to the elevation, however, the Cardinal was yet more concerned to have his own way in the matter of economy. " I am afraid of features," wrote he ; " they run into money, and are always devoid of that severe simplicity which I want in Arch- bishop's House," This ruthless determination to deny the archi- tect any indulgence in decorative details seems to have resulted in little satisfaction to the Cardinal, who complained bitterly that his house was the ugliest in London. That, in spite of the limita- tions imposed upon him, Bentley succeeded in avoiding failure and produced a fine result, we think most people will admit, and there need be no fear that posterity will endorse Cardinal Vaughan's opinion.
Archbishop's House
As regards the main portion and the anterior part of the right wing, the residence thus unpretentiously styled consists of four storeys ; the left is carried one floor and part of another higher. The central feature of the fa9ade is the stone porch beneath the wrought-iron balcony of the throne room windows. The entrance arch of this vaulted porch is borne on two pairs of engaged coupled shafts, raised on pedestals, and crowned with capitals of Roman Ionic form. The courses of inch-thick bricks inserted between those of the stone piers arc very effective. Tall and relatively narrow openings in these side walls give light to the interior, the porch being 8 ft. deep and 12 ft. wide. The roof is covered
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with cast lead, with the usual welted rolls. Seven steps within the porch lead up to the hall, on the so-called ground-floor level, whose commonplace doors of varnished oak obviously never passed Bentley's critical eye.
The Cardinal, with the above-quoted dislike of " features," ob- jected to the design of the porch, and sought to replace it with what he termed " a really useful and characteristic thing ... a great covering or roof projecting right across the side way under which all would be safe from rain, and it would be visible from both ends of the street and might be made quite light and free of affecta- tion. It would also cost less than a structural affair." Here, we may imagine, Bentley refused to be further coerced, and his porch design was allowed to stand, with the charming little wrought-iron balcony above it, borne on six lion-headed corbels.
At the basement level the fayade is built in horizontal banding of brick and stone, five courses of the small red bricks alternating with a single course of stone. Thereafter the walls are of brick with stone window-dressings for two storeys until the plain stone frieze above the stately range of first-floor windows is attained. Above this is the projection of the stone corbel table. In the top storey there is a reversion in part to the banded treatment, the buttresses being thus constructed, the remainder of the walling being in plain brick, and the stone coping narrow and of slight weather- ing. The features of this top storey are the three large semi- circular windows and the charming little end turret. The left wing being flush with the pavement, and therefore unprotected by railings, has, like the Diocesan Hall, a stone plinth of nine courses, and is continued in plain brick up to the coping. The single window in the front on the first floor with a little wrought- iron balcony, borne on stone corbels similar to those of the great balcony, is that of the Archbishop's private room. A gabled roof of low pitch covers the single room on the top floor of this wing.
The side elevation to Francis Street possesses several charming details, notably the stone oriel windows at the termination of
278 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
the main ground-floor corridor, and the similar window in the Archbishop's bedroom above. The windows of the second and third floors are set within arches of fluted brickwork in very effective fashion. Further to the left is the deep archway of brick opening into a passage in line with the sub-cloister, which forms the tradesmen's entrance to the domestic offices ranged around the flagged courtyard of the interior. Above this entrance archway we get a view of the apsidal end of the private chapel, its little semi-dome with a stone cross almost hidden behind the broad stone coping of the apse wall.
The Clergy House is, as we have seen, a continuation of this wing ; but it is carried up to four storeys only.
The roofing of Archbishop's House consists for the most part of asphalted flats. Exceptions are the Diocesan Library, the fourth-floor attic of the left wing, and a stretch of just over 30 ft. of roof in the central part of the same, all of which have roofs of low pitch covered with small greenish slates and lead ridging.
A most pleasing coup d'ceil of the various forms and levels of roofs and windows mingled in effective grouping may be obtained from points of vantage on the cathedral's eastern roof. First and nearest to one's gaze comes the low-pitched covering of the Diocesan Hall, with its asphalted semi-dome ; then that of the library ; further yet in the centre one sees the outline of the triple-bayed landing of the great staircase, with its double row of casements ; opposite in the left wing the low turret of a circular stairway, and the great segmental window of the private chapel ; and, on the long line of the cloisters to the right the green relief of a garden, with evergreens in tubs set upon its level roof. On the extreme left lie the flats of the main part of the house, while most distant is the stretch of slated roof in the Francis Street wing.
Reference to the basement plan shows that this is allotted as regards the main part and the left wing entirely to domestic purposes ; the right wing being occupied by the extension of the Diocesan Hall and a large cloak room and heating chamber. A
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corridor, 10 ft. wide, runs centrally the whole length of the house, and unites with the corridor of the left wing, 7 ft. 6 in. wide, which terminates at its other end in the passage to the tradesmen's entrance. In the centre of the house are housekeeper's and butler's rooms, servants' bedrooms, wine and beer cellars, store and strong rooms, lavatory accommodation, and a passenger lift. The wing contains servants' hall, larder, serving room with service lift, kitchen, scullery, and tradesmen's entrance. A short flight of steps leads to the sub-basement, beneath these two last, where coal cellarage is provided. Communication with the upper floors is effected by means of two stairways to the entrance hall, and a staircase in the wing.
The offices of the basement abut on to the paved courtyard, having on its further side the open arcading of the sub-cloister, whose range of six red-brick arches affords a delightful prospect, though unfortunately the space within is used for storing ladders, wood, and various kinds of jetsam. Its ceiling is cross vaulted in concrete, its floor paved with stone. The door at the end on the right leads through a deep brick-vaulted porch to the asphalted walk at the east end of the cathedral, while directly opposite is the sacristan's entrance to the cathedral offices.
The ground floor of Archbishop's House is largely devoted to the secretariat, the whole range of front rooms to the left of the hall being thus utilized. On the right is a waiting-room, and the librarian's room, now used also as the meeting place of the cathedral chapter and measuring 25 ft. in length by 21 ft. in breadth. It is separated from its bookcase-lined antechamber by a screen of oak and glass. The wooden model of the cathedral is kept here. On the opposite side are the great doors of the Diocesan Library. The main corridor runs the whole length of the house, and ends in the fine bay already observed in the side elevation. Its ceiling is cylindrically vaulted, as are those of the other corridors, and its walls are painted with a plain high terracotta-coloured dado. The opening to the passage of the left wing was bricked up to isolate it when the addition of the Clergy House was made. On
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the inner side of the corridor are waiting-rooms, cloak-rooms, and lavatories, occupying the central extension : the left wing accom- modates the serving, dining, and common rooms of the cathedral clergy, shut away from Archbishop's House by the aforementioned walling up of the lateral corridor. For this reason the only way now from the house into the cloister is through the Diocesan Library.
Entering Archbishop's House by the porch in Ambrosden Avenue, one finds oneself in a lofty hall, 17 ft. square, containing a minor lobby 7 ft. square screened with oak and glass at the front door. The flat ceiling of the hall is supported on massive beams, and is whitened ; the walls have a high panelled dado, and are coloured pale terracotta above it for a certain height, the remainder being creamy white. The hall obtains light from the tall narrow windows on either side of the door, and from one above it of horseshoe shape, also with leaded glazing.
A flight of eleven stone steps brings us to the level of the ground-floor corridor, which at this point has a flat ceiling like that of the hall, carried on four pairs of stone columns. The shafts of these columns are painted pale green, their bases and caps are uncoloured, the echinus and abacus being of very slight height and projection. The first pair of columns, 8 ft. apart, stands at the head of the hall stairway, the second pair is placed on the further side of the corridor, i.e. at a distance of 10 ft. ; the third and fourth pairs are placed at intervals of 5 ft., the last being at the foot of the main staircase. Fluted pilasters, painted green like the pillars, carry the ends of their architraves. The six latter columns rise from a very low podium projected from the adjoining wall.
The staircase is single as far as the first landing, whence it breaks into two parallel flights, ending at the corridor of the first floor. Very effective is the arrangement of the landing, ceiled with a vault and projected in three bay windows. The lateral bays are bowed and brilliantly lighted by a double row of three-leaded casements. The central bay is rectangular and
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contains three lights, set beneath a glazed lunette. A pair of columns on the landing at the head of the stairs, and another pair in the corridor above, all painted a dull terracotta, with white bases and Ionic capitals and light green pedestals, carry the transverse cylindrical vaulting over the staircase, which receives further light from a semi-circular window set in the lunette on either side. The vaulting and arch soffits are white, the walls are painted in cold tones of light and dark green, with vertical chevron banding in dark green and white on the landing. The central bay is carried out in a yellower shade of pale green.
The treads and risers are of stone, while the landing floor is laid with a durable composition of marble fragments set in cement, which is used also in the corridors. The photograph of the stair- case reveals how extremely poor and common are the handrails ; one may hope that they are but a temporary expedient. It also shows one of the ceils -de-boeuf lighting the cloak-rooms beneath the staircase (Plate XXXVIII).
The light and graceful effect of the staircase as designed by Bentley has been greatly diminished by the filling up of the arcading on the corridor of the first floor. The oaken screen, which thus completely shuts off that part of the house reserved to himself and his entourage, was added by the present Archbishop, Cardinal Bourne, and was designed by Mr. J. A. Marshall. There is no objection to the screen per se ; one merely regrets that it should have been found necessary thus to cramp and limit the vista of the grand staircase from the state rooms, to which it afforded a dignified approach. Double doors at the head of each flight now admit the visitor, upon ringing, to these and to the Archbishop's private apartments.
Entering the 12-ft. wide vaulted corridor, one is confronted with the two double doors of the throne room ; their jambs and architraves are white, the panelled doors being painted a pale sage- green. At the end of the corridor, on the left, there is a similar doorway, though of oak, slightly polished, which is the entrance to the private library. A window, consisting of two leaded case-
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ments beneath a semi-circular light, occurs on right and left of the entrance doors. The corridor is 53 ft. in length to the arch on the right, whence one passes into its prolongation of 8 ft. under a transverse vault, in which occurs the entrance to the Archbishop's reception room. Thereafter narrowing to a width of 6 ft., it contains the second door of the reception room just before its point of junction with the corridor of the left wing.
Turning to the left, one comes to the Archbishop's sitting-room and bedroom ; to the right, and up four steps, are successively the two rooms allotted to his private secretary, a staircase, the private chapel and sacristy, and the corridor of the newer building, viz. the Clergy House. Here one must observe a departure from Bentley's plan ; the apartment intended by him to be the sacristy has now become a continuation of the corridor, to link up the two buildings, a new sacristy having been added, built out on to the flat asphalted roof of the cloister. From this sacristy, ceiled with a vault, one emerges through a narrow doorway on to the cloister roof-garden with its shrubs and flowers, a pleasant spot in which to take the air, screened from the public gaze and within range of a superb view of the cathedral's beautiful east end. The Arch- bishop's dining-room is now in the new building.
The stairway passed on the right in the corridor just described — whose walls, by the way, are coloured pale green, and the doors Venetian red — ascends to the second floor, on which ten bedrooms and a bathroom for the clergy are provided in the main body of the house ; in the left wing there are the Bishop's suite, two more small bedrooms and a sitting-room of comfortable proportions. The upper part of the chapel occupies, of course, the end of the wing. As has been already remarked, the third floor only exists on this side, and comprises two guest-rooms, six smaller bedchambers, and a bathroom. The staircase affords access to the single front bedroom yet a floor higher and to the flat roof whereon a capacious cistern room is built.
Having completed this general impression of the plan and arrangement of Archbishop's House, it will be interesting to
286 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
describe m some detail the state apartments, a splendid suite of reception rooms over 100 ft. in length. A few words on the private chapel must also be said before proceeding to the Diocesan Library, the cloister, and the Cathedral Hall.
The Throne Room
This, the central and necessarily the largest of the three apart- ments, possesses noble and dignified proportions, combining a length of 53 ft. with a breadth of 35i ft. and a height of 17 ft., and consists of three bays. The photograph (Plate XXXIX) gives as good an idea of the decorative scheme as one can hope to convey by an uncoloured illustration. Unfortunately it has not been found possible to show the other side of the room, with the six tall sash windows already observed in the facade.
The doorways, likewise numbering six, are planned on a scale equally impressive, the breadth of the opening measuring 6 ft., and the height to the architrave 10 ft. ; the jambs and con- taining arches are finely moulded, and their tympana contain plaques moulded in relief, painted with armorial bearings. Two of these doors afford, as has been seen, means of ingress from the corridor ; while those to right and left of the fireplace communicate with the Archbishop's library, and those at the oppo- site end with his reception room. In the chimney-breast an arched recess of similar detail encompasses the fireplace, the simple grate of polished steel and brass being surrounded by slabs of a fine Siena marble, golden-yellow with greyish veining. The hearth is of black marble, enframed with white ; the wood- work of the jambs and characteristic chimney-piece is painted white, the wall above being pale green with bordering scroll-work in tones of pink.
The great beams of the ceiling, 30 in. broad, are thrown across from the intcr-fenestral piers (which have a projection of 3 ft.) to the fluted Ionic pilasters opposite. Similar pilasters, with moulded pedestals 18 in. high, adorn the faces of the piers.
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An examination of the first-floor plan reveals the fact that in these structural details we have a departure from Bentley's expressed intention. A projection of no more than 2 ft. is here provided for his inter-fenestral piers, while each is fronted with a column, and half-shafts take the place of the pilasters of the opposite wall. It seems probable that Cardinal Vaughan, in- fluenced by economic considerations, was responsible for the change.
The pilasters terminate in Ionic capitals beneath the elaborately moulded and painted frieze and cornice. Within the window bays the ceiling is divided by a moulded bead into five rectangular panels. Walls, ceilings, and beams are plastered and enriched with a classically-inspired scheme of painted decoration, designed by Mr. Marshall, Bentley having left neither sketch nor other indication of his intentions. The predominating colours are a very delicate sage-green and a pale dull pinkish red. Green are the dado and moulded chair-rail and green the pilaster bases and the pilasters up to the fluting, which is treated with green and a warm toned white, convex surfaces being white and concave green. From chair-rail to frieze the walls are coloured light red, and painted at intervals of 20 in. with vertical laurel garlands, suspended from the formal ribbons painted beneath the frieze and secured a few inches above the chair-rail to the rings there simulated.
The Archbishop's throne, a gilt rococo armchair without a canopy, is raised on a small dais in the middle bay. For back- ground it has a painted curtain 6 ft. wide, having a design of twelve panels divided by interlacing foliage on a dull blue ground. Centrewise in each panel the sacred pallium is depicted within an oval of red, enclosed within a narrow band of pale blue. This " cloth of estate," heavily fringed along its upper edge, appears as though suspended by means of the four laurel wreaths which cross it ; along its upper edge between the supporting ribbons are represented three eagles standing with wings outspread.
Each leaf of the doors of this fine apartment is divided into
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four panels beneath a moulded pediment, and painted sage green, the jambs and architraves being white, powdered with pinkish rosettes at intervals. Their tympana are also white with vertical lines of ornament and arms painted in their moulded panels. The six coats of arms represented are those of Leo XIII, the Pontiff in whose reign the cathedral was begun ; of the reign- ing Pope Pius X, of the three previous Archbishops of Westminster and of the present occupant of the see with their respective mottoes. Cardinal Wiseman's is omnia pro cheisto ; Cardinal Manning's, malo moki quam fcedari ; Cardinal Vaughan's, amare ET SERViRE ; and Cardinal Bourne's ne cede malis. White, too, are the windoAv frames with a repeating pattern of conventional leaves, buds, and flowers on jambs and architraves. The space intervening between window and cornice is divided into four squares, adorned with a delicate interlacement of lines in alter- nately light and dark green on white. Placed high up on the returns of the piers is painted a dark green tablet bordered with pendent swags.
The frieze is adorned with a painted acanthus design in green and white and a little yellow above the egg and tongue moulding, similarly coloured. In the corona of the cornice we get the greenish turquoise-blue which becomes in the ceiling a dominant colour note, and here is relieved at intervals with acanthus leaves painted in greenish- white tones.
The groundwork of the ceiling is white, subdivided in each bay by means of broad blue bands into three compartments, which again by a painted bead are broken into fifteen squares. These are grounded pale green, and each displays a radiant sun, set on a background of darker green. The blue bands are diversified at their angles, and at intervals along their length, with foliated arabesques in green and white. The under-surface of the beams, divided by interlacing laurel garlands into a series of panels, have each panel filled with white strap-Avork on a pale green ground, surcharged with oval medallions coloured alternately light blue or green.
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 289
The coffered ceiling between the piers is treated with conven- tional foliation in tones of green and white arranged round central panels of blue.
The colour scheme is completed by a harmonious floor covering of light green felt toning exactly with the paint on the dado.
The Archbishop's Library
This fine apartment, entered, as we have seen, through the great doorway at the left-hand end of the corridor, has likewise two doors of communication with the throne room. It possesses more- over a fourth and much smaller single door near the window end (added since Bentley's plan was made), giving on to the upper gallery of the Diocesan Hall.
The library is 48 ft. long, 21 ft. wide, and 17 ft. high. That part of its length which corresponds roughly to the width of the corridor outside forms a sort of antechamber to the main body of the room, having a vaulted ceiling carried on the inner side by a pair of columns. A glance at the plan reveals the noteworthy fact that the architect provided a second pair of columns to carry this vault, and designed the antechamber with an open arcaded end, the counterpart of that opposite. This effectively arranged arcade would have afforded communication with the Diocesan Library at its gallery level, by means of a short flight of steps, starting beneath the lintels on either side of the central arch. It will be seen when we come to examine the great library how extremely effective is this feature, in spite of being diverted from its original purpose. The private library is enclosed by a wall built up in front of the arcading, and has suffered by reason of the mutilation a considerable loss of interest.
The stone columns stand 7 ft. 6 in. apart on moulded rectangular bases, their shafts 9 ft. high, crowned with graceful Ionic caps, the height to the springing being 10 ft. 6 in. The height to the crown of the arch is 15 ft. 6 in. The lunette of the barrel vault is filled with a semi-circular window at the end facing the doorway. 1—19
290 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The main ceiling is simply plastered and whitened with the exception of a breadth of 3 ft. across the window end, where it is enriched with mouldings dividing it into seven square panels. The broad cornice combines egg and tongue and bead mouldings. The three tall windows are 2 ft. 8 in. from the floor, the intervening piers being 1 ft. 6 in. wide and 1 ft. in projection.
The chimney-breast has an arched recess of corresponding di- mensions with that in the throne room. A fine dark green marble with white veining is utilised for the fireplace surrounds, and also for the hearth and curb ; the mantelpiece being of oak fumed and wax polished like the bookcases. These, 8 ft. high, except in the antechamber, where they rise to 10 ft. 6 in., are of suitable but quite unpretentious design. They occupy all the wall space up to the heights mentioned, with the exception of that allotted to a radiator, above which a useful table shelf is fixed. The skirting and chair-rail are also of oak.
The decoration of the library is extremely quiet. A light cool sage-green paint is employed for the walls and great doors to the throne room (the other doors are of oak wax polished), the dado at the window end being coloured a darker and bluer shade of green. The woodwork of the windows is white, and the fireplace recess and the antechamber are similarly treated.
The walls above the bookcases are himg with portraits, for the most part of slender merit as works of art, although historically interesting, since the sequence includes the bishops of the London district from Bishop Giffard of penal days, who died in 1734, and the Archbishops of Westminster since that " second spring " which budded in 1850. Plaster busts of Cardinals Manning and Newman crown the smaller bookcases right and left of the fireplace. A relic of the former, eloquent testimony to his statesmanship and broad humanity, hangs on the opposite wall. It is a carved ebony triptych, enframing the address of eulogy and thanks pre- sented to the great prelate by the Jewish community of London in 1890. The doors of the triptych are carved in linen-fold pattern and have central octagonal panels, one enclosing the year and the
290]
Plate XLI. — The Diocesan Library, Westminster. (Photo, Cyril Ellis.)
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 291
other the Cardinal's cipher. His armorial bearings surmount the frame.
In this lofty, nobly proportioned apartment, with a pervading atmosphere of dignified calm, meet in council at the great horse- shoe table which runs nearly all its length the suffragan bishops of the Province. The assurance rises strong within one that here should be the birthplace of good counsel and wise governance.
The Reception Room
This, the third stately apartment of the suite, adjoining the other end of the throne room, is with those just described thrown open on ceremonial occasions to form a magnificent whole. Here, as the name implies, the Cardinal Archbishop receives his guests. In breadth and height it is equivalent to the library, its length being coincident with the width of the throne room. Its two entrances from the corridor have single doors, panelled and painted a deep wine-coloured red ; their framing is white, the architrave being raised in the centre in pediment form. The two doors to the throne room are double- leaved, but otherwise similar in detail. A fifth small leather- covered door that does not exist on the plan was made subsequently to connect with the Arch- bishop's sitting-room, which is preceded by a sort of antechamber, formed by a curtain-hung arcading borne on two columns, re- miniscent of that in the library, the sole internal decorative feature, and a very attractive one, in this otherwise simple room. Out- side the window has the little wrought-iron balcony already mentioned.
The details of windows, cornice, and chimney-breast of the reception room are as those of the library. The dado is painted a light bluish-green, with skirting and chair-rail somewhat lighter ; the walls are coloured reddish-pink, a stronger tone than that of the throne room. The deorations of the state apartments were wholly designed by Mr. Marshall and executed tmder his supervision.
292 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
The Chapel
Its present entrance, on the left of the corridor, was originally, as already explained, the sacristy door, the entrance proper to the chapel, through a little lobby, having been blocked up. Within we find the acme of austere simplicity, a nave 18 ft. wide and 24 ft. long terminating in an apsidal sanctuary with a depth of 12 ft. A segmental vault ceils the nave, the height to the springing being 14 ft. 9 in. and to the crown 21 ft. The crown of the apse is 9 inches lower than the main vault.
Comparing plan and photograph (Plate XL) one sees that Bentley's arrangement of the east end has undergone considerable alteration, the barrel vault over the sanctuary being now omitted, and the size of the little apse, which in his plan has a depth of only 4 ft. and a breadth of 13, having been increased till it measures, as has been said, 12 ft. deep and 18 ft. across. The vaulted recesses to right and left of the altar have been altered in consonance. That on the Epistle side, intended for the credence table, now embraces a statue of the Blessed Virgin, a demi-figure on a marble pedestal. The other contains a semi-circular-headed window to tlirow extra light upon the altar, adequate general illumination being provided by the great segmental triple light in the lunette of the west end. Beneath this window is the wide arch of the main entrance, a similar recess on the left marking the blocked-up door already mentioned ; a vesting table now stands there. The arch mouldings are white, the recess dark green, while the panelled door is painted Venetian red.
The details and decoration of the chapel are of an extraordinary simplicity, its cornice, for example, consisting of a single cavetto moulding, painted white. The nave walls are distempered pale green up to a narrow white string, emphasized with a heading of black lines and red squares, and the vault is white. The sanctuary, which demands, of course, something more in the way of decoration, is destitute of a moulded cornice, but is painted with a series of panels beneath a broad frieze, up to the springing,
THE AUXIIJARY BUILDINGS 293
whence the vault is white. These light red panels are surrounded with banding like that of the nave ; the frieze is in pale yellowish green headed with the banding and set out with five panels in which are white crosses on a black ground. Vertical bands formed of black and white chevrons break up the remainder of the green ground. The mouding outlining the archivolt of the apse is the same as the nave cornice.
The extremely simple altar is that made for Cardinal Manning in 1873. The gradine and retable are of Derbyshire fossil marbles, with plinth and coping of Hopton Wood, which also constitutes the mensa borne on a pair of columns with shafts of dark green marble and pedestals, bases, and caps of statuary ; the recessed plain frontal is composed of slabs of indifferent alabaster.
The chapel furniture, with the exception of the Archbishop's seat, a gilt armchair of Louis XV period, and his priedieu, an elaborate traceried modern Gothic production, is utterly beneath notice, being shop-made Gothic of pernicious style, without the slightest pretension to be in keeping with its surroundings. One must except, of course, the inlaid table on the left near the apse, designed by Mr. Marshall to carry the coffer containing the pallium.
The Diocesan Library
The library with its passage, ante-room, and librarian's room occupies, as we have earlier noticed, the entire ground floor of the right wing. Its scale, eminently satisfactory, combines a length of 42 ft. with a width of 21 J ft. The height to the spring- ing is 23 ft. ; to the crown of the ribbed vault 31 ft. It is a structure of four bays, lighted at the posterior end by a great semi-circular window, with leaded glazing and sub- divided into six lights. Laterally four segmental-topped windows on either hand intersect the vaulting. The fenestration of the ground floor is on a smaller scale : four little sash windows on the right (supposing that we have entered from Archbishop's House) give
294 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
upon the central courtyard, and a tiny casement in the first bay on the opposite side opens into tlie Diocesan Hall below, affording a good view of the platform.
Great double doors of oak, set in broad archways with glazed tympana, are provided at both ends of the library. The bookcases which line the walls, and, on the ground floor, project at right angles therefrom, were carried out from Bentley's designs by the firm of Beyaert of Bruges, Monsieur L. Beyaert coming to London to receive the architect's instructions and see the plans in November 1900. The photograph (Plate XLI) shows their details very well, and also the manner in which the gallery appears to rest upon those that project, of which there are three on either side, measuring each 3 ft. in width and 6 ft. 6 in. in projec- tion. Cases of similar projection, but of only half the width, are placed on either side of the great doorways. Others line the walls wherever there is space available.
The library is thus divided into eight recesses, four on either side, with a clear central passage way 8| ft. wide. The gallery, raised 9 ft. from the floor at the sides and 11 ft. 6 in. at each end, extends round the hall, supported at the ends upon stout moulded oaken corbels, placed right and left of the doorways. The lateral galleries and that at the cloister end are 5 ft. 6 in. wide ; the other, in front of the arcading which Bentley intended to be open, is but 3 ft. wide, and higher by an ascent of four steps than the side galleries. Taller bookcases are here carried up to the spring- ing, a height of 10 ft. 6 in., those in the gallery otherwise measuring only 8 ft. high. The galleries have a simple balustrading of wrought iron with handrail of oak. A small oak door in the last bay on the right leads to the winding stone gallery staircase, which also descends from the means of communication with the platform of the Diocesan Hall.
In the wall over the above-mentioned arcading, a pair of ancient sculptured lions' heads have been inserted. Centrally and higher is a narrow upright stone panel, displaying the arms of Cardinal Vaughan carved and tinctured. A great concrete barrel
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 295
vault, showing the marks of the wooden centering on which it was turned, spans the library, its five stone ribs, a yard wide, enriched with double rows of coffering. It has already been observed that the roof is exteriorly low pitched and clothed with small greenish tiles and leaden ridging.
The wood block flooring is stained and wax polished to match the bookcases.
Here is a spot ideal for study and quiet thought, as tranquil and apparently as remote from busy haunts as any monastic scriptorium of old. Volumes ancient and worn, exhaling the musty smell of old leather, and filled with the wisdom and the sanctity of ages, hem one in on every side and overflow in their many hundreds into the cloister beyond. " A valuable collection," says the Cathedral Chronicle,^ " of some thousands of books, including many standard works on theology, Scripture, canon law, history, and literature." And yet the library is by no means complete, for we have it on the same authority that " many important works of reference are wanting, notably the Greek patrology and the writings of modern Catholic scholars." Here is an opportunity for bookish benefactors.
The Cloister
We emerge from the library into the cloister, which continues its uninterrupted way for 156 ft., from the left wing of the house to the door of the state sacristy, the last 16 ft. being flung as a bridge over the asphalted courtyard below. The cloister has a ribbed barrel vault similar to that of the library. Its width is 10 ft., height to springing 8 ft. and height to crown 13 ft. The walls are wood panelled and lined with bookcases up to the spring- ing, all the woodwork being painted a satisfactory olive-green. There are six leaded casements looking on to the interior court- yard, with a low green window-seat in each arched recess, and a moulded panel occupying the lunette above. Two similar windows
1 Issue of May 1908.
296 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
occur in the " bridge " end, one on either side. About midway the Choir School is built up against the cloister, and connected with it by doors of communication. One bears the inscription " Director of the Choir." The cloister constitutes therefore the bond of union between Archbishop's House, Clergy House, library. Choir School, and cathedral, though it is, of course, never utilized as a passage-way for the choristers.
The Cathedral Hall
The Cathedral Hall, originally and for several years known as the chapter hall, is now thus more correctly styled (since the canons hold their meetings in Archbishop's House). It is some- times alternatively called the Diocesan Hall. Enthusiastically praised by an architectural critic as one of the most beautiful rooms in London,' it certainly deserves this eulogy, its beauty being the result of noble proportions allied to fine construction. To applied decoration it owes little, for such details are rather conspicuous by their absence, exceptions being the moulded vaulting ribs and their lion's head corbels.
The hall is constructed in seven bays terminating in an apse, the 35-ft. span of the barrel vault extending over the main body for a length of 82 ft., and being 26 ft. high to the spring- ing and 38 ft. to the crown of the vault. The apse measures 17i ft. deep, 26 ft. across beneath the archivolt, 23 ft. to the springing, and 33 ft. 9 in. to the crown. The total length of the building is therefore just under 100 ft., its seating capacity being about 600. Additional space is provided by the lateral extensions of the fourth, fifth, and sixth bays into aisles, as they may be termed, recessed to a depth of 8 ft. between the piers. The flat roof of the right aisle is seen in the side eleva- tion ; that on the left is further extendisd beneath the Diocesan Library, its width of 25 ft. affording ample space for the storage of
■ Consecration Handbook, p. 20.
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 297
chairs, tables, etc. The additional 17 ft, is usually screened off with curtains. The height to the flat ceiling of the aisles is 8 ft. 6 in.; that on the outer side of the hall is rendered continuous by arched openings, pierced through the thickness of the piers, and each recess is lighted by a pair of small square leaded lights.
A platform convexly curved on plan fills the apse ; the flight of steps now attached in the centre do not occur in Bentley's plan. At the opposite end are the galleries,' the lower extending to a width of 20 ft., the upper being about half that width and added, we believe, after Bentley's time, for he does not indicate it on the first-floor plan, but the photograph shows the configuration of both galleries. The construction of these is iron on the can- tilever system, cased up with joinery (Plates XLII and XLIII).
The lighting is excellent. At the gallery end each level is provided with windows, which exteriorly give distinction to the fa5ade, the topmost being a large semi-circular triple light, while the lower gallery has a trio of square leaded lights, the central one opening in its upper half, and on the ground floor there are two small oblong windows. On the right side of the hall a series of six openings ' occupies the wall arcading which intersects the waggon vault ; each comprises a pair of lights set beneath a semi-circular light, whose middle third is practicable for ventila- tion. Other windows there are, chiefly internal, which can be mentioned as they are met in a survey of the decoration.
The photographs are sufficiently illustrative of the double tiers of wall arcading, which it will be admitted are extremely effective. The lions' heads boldly carved beneath a scroll upon the corbels are no less so ; the types vary : some are open-mouthed, angrily roaring ; others with mouths slightly open, as though purring ; others again have closed lips, as in repose.
In the painted decoration, designed by Mr. Marshall, since, as we understand, the architect had not left any suggestions for it,
• Cardinal Vaughan proposed to have side galleries ; he eventually decided to omit them on account of the cost.
2 The window of the second bay (in the gallery) has been blocked up with the excep- tion of its top light.
298 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
a refined and classical effect, based on Pompeian models, is pro- duced. We will first deal with the body of the hall, whose prevailing colour is a light sage-green, much like that in the state rooms, and particularly satisfactory in reflecting light. It is used for the faces of the piers at the ground floor level, also within the recesses of the aisles and in the arcading above them and the gallery woodwork. The skirting and dado are painted a rather dark olive-green. The cornice likewise is pale green, the span- drels beneath it being painted a buffy yellow, broken up by vertical bands of dark green and white chevrons between two white-bordered dark green tablets. The space between spandrels, arch-crown, and cornice is painted white, and adorned with pinkish beads on a festoon. White also is the soffit of the arch and the wooden panel beneath the three small casements which give on to the library and its antechamber. Their lateral chevron bands are carried out in red and white, the ornament bordering the lower edge of the tympanum being white patterned with linear ornament in dark green and red.
The upper arcading strikes a warmer note by reason of its combination of dull light red and yellow, the piers being red with central and bordering chevron banding in dark green and white, and oval medallions of the same. The walls within the arcading are of the dull yellow, bordered with green and white lozenge banding. The soffits and the vault are white.
In the apse a panelled effect has been obtained above the lower string cornice, which runs at a height of 6| ft. from the platform floor. Up to this point the wall is pale green and the cornice white, the painted panels which extend up to the springing being alter- nately dark green and light red, the interspaces being white with dark outlining. Each red panel is charged at its upper end with a lozenge composed of smaller lozenges of green and white. The small window set high up on the right side of the apse is intended to light the staircase from the cathedral choir to the cloister, to which reference must be made again later. The vault and archi- volt are white, the sole decoration of the latter being the two
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 299
high and narrow panels on the piers above the string. Below they are pierced with two narrow doorways," painted Venetian red, whieh admit to the short stairway to the platform doors. The stairs on the right also connect the hall with the Diocesan Library. There are three more means of communication with Archbishop's House on the ground floor, viz. that beneath the gallery which leads into the cloak-room and two little doors in the left aisle, one opening on to the basement corridor and the other, near the heating chamber, giving on to the interior courtyard.
The two external entrances to the Diocesan Hall are both placed on the right of the hall, the porch for the public pro- viding a feature in the front elevation to Ambrosden Avenue. Its vaulted roof is lead sheeted. The facade of the hall is built of stone for nine courses and of brick up to the top of the tiny windows of the ground floor. Thereafter there is an arrange- ment of horizontal brick and stone banding up to the space between the pediment and the great window, which is treated with vertical stone bands and herring-bone brickwork. A stone finial of flattened sugarloaf form crowns each buttress. The roof is tile hung, with leaden ridging, the slates employed being small and of a greenish tint. The roof of the apse is asphalted externally.
The porch door is double and painted Venetian red like those within the hall. Within the tympanum of its arch is a represen- tation of St. Peter and St. James seated in their boat, with the net full of fishes, whose weight they are endeavouring to raise from the waves. This piece of sculpture was hurriedly given to a mason to design and execute shortly after Bentley's death; since the order never passed through his office, it happened that the work was done without any proper supervision, which accounts for its bad composition and poor modelling. The result was an eyesore ; fortunately time and weather have combined in some measure to soften its asperities.
Passing into the pleasant stone- flagged lobby, one notices the
' Bentley provided only one platform door. That on the right is a later addition, the passages behind the apse to the sub-cloister having been blocked up.
300 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
small ticket office on the left, the staircase to the gallery on the further side, and two stone columns of the Ionic order, 8 ft. apart, in the centre to carry the central vault. The ceiling of the porch is compound, consisting of a barrel vault between two groined vaults. The window, two rectangular lights beneath a semi-circular one, fills the lunette of the central vault, while more light enters through the small window on the left of the entrance. The ascent to the gallery is by two flights of stone steps lighted at the upper storey by a small square window. The lower gallery consists of six tiers of seats, the door on its further side communicating with the librarian's room in Arch- bishop's House. The upper gallery is not open to the public ; the only entrance to it being the small door, already noticed, in the private library.
A descent of three steps from the lobby brings one to the panelled swing doors of the hall which have glazed upper panels and tympanum.
The second entrance, corresponding with the seventh bay of the hall, is under the covered bridge built to connect the monks' choir with the monastery as originally planned. This bridge ends in a little porch chamber, which has a small square window giving into the hall, and two three-light openings, with charm- ing stone details, in its side walls. The passage way was con- tinued on the right behind the lateral wall of the hall apse to a descending stairway and a passage emerging at last into the cloister. The bridge broadens at its cathedral end and is bifurcated inter- nally by the central pier of the apse. There is a descent of four steps to the choir level, which is entered by two inconspicuous and now little used doorways. The bridge spans a distance of 16 ft. between cathedral and porch, and is 7 ft. 6 in. wide at its narrower and 14 ft. wide at its curved broader part.
The chapter hall was fitted up as a temporary chapel, and first used for the celebration of Mass and the chanting of the Divine Office on Ascension Day, May 1902. It continued to be so used for eighteen months, until the cathedral was permanently
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 301
opened for daily use at midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, 1903. The following aecount of the Ascension Day ceremonial is quoted from the Cathedral Guide : '
" The cathedral choir, under the direction of Mr, R. R. Terry, occupied the platform space which was screened off from the body of the hall. Below the platform an altar was erected with a throne for the Archbishop ; and benches were arranged choir-wise for the canons and cathedral chaplains. The first vespers of the Feast, followed by Compline, were solemnly chanted at 3.30 on the eve of the festival. On the Feast at 11.30 a.m. the Hours of Prime and Terce were recited. A solemn High Mass was sung and was followed by the offices of Sext and None. At 3,30 the second Vespers of the Feast, followed by Compline, were solemnly sung, and the greater number of the canons of the metropolitan chapter were present in their places. His Eminence the late Cardinal Archbishop presided at all the services. The music was beautifully rendered by the new choir, and the Mass chosen for the occasion was the five-part setting by William Byrd, the great Catholic composer of the sixteenth century, with the motet ' Tu es Petrus,' by Palestrina, Thus in the first solemn Mass sung within the precincts of Westminster Cathedral were appropriately blended the voice of our Catholic past and the anthem of loyalty to the see of Peter ; and the note of the olden time, echoing across the centuries, was happily taken up by the new. The ceremonies, which were strictly modelled upon those observed in the great Roman basilicas, were admirably carried out under the direction of the Rev. G. Wahlis, a prebendary and master of ceremonies to the new cathedral."
The Choir School
At a Synod held at Westminster in 1901, Cardinal Vaughan announced to his clergy that unforeseen difficulties had arisen over the proposal to call in the services of a religious order to
^ Published by Messrs. Burns & Oates. Fourth Edition.
302 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
carry out the daily chanting of the cathedral liturgy ; and that therefore he gladly availed himself of the readiness of the secular clergy of his diocese to take up the work and maintain the indis- pensable high standard of efficiency. The announcement, notes the Tablet,' was received with feelings of the liveliest satisfaction. It was perhaps hardly to be expected that the seculars would take kindly to the idea of a metropolitan cathedral in large part served by a monastery ; while the inevitable clashing of authority certain to result from attempts to work it with monks in the choir and secular priests in the sanctuary was likely to prove, as was happily foreseen by those with the clearest vision, a difficulty well-nigh insuperable.
The important part of Cardinal Vaughan's new scheme as then announced involved the immediate foundation of a Choir School. His Eminence's plans were quickly brought to fruition and on October 1st he welcomed his first choir-boys, a little awe- stricken group of thirteen, in their temporary schoolroom, the lower sacristy. The welcome was brief and characteristic. " You," cried he, with that large and expressive sweep of the arm he in- variably used when in emphatic mood, "You are the foundations of the cathedral ! "
The boys were at first housed in Archbishop's House in dormi- tories, refectory, and classroom fitted up under the Cardinal's supervision. Their sleeping accommodation was on the top floor, the large cloak-room adjoining the cathedral hall served as their dining-room, and the great bare hall made an excellent playroom, where even football could be played in wet weather. The play- ground consisted, as it still does, of the vacant land adjoining the cathedral.
Dr. R. R. Terry came from Downside School to take up his appointment as director of the music and choir-master, bringing to the work his proved talent and immense knowledge of ecclesi- astical music. The Rev. Dr. Francis Aveling became the first rector of the school. The endowment provides for seventeen
J Tablet, June 15th, 1901.
THE AUXILIARY BUILDINGS 303
scholars and eight exhibitioners, the school being at first limited to twenty boarders (now twenty-five), to whom a good general education is given, under the charge of the rector, two assistant masters, and a matron. The ordinary pension of fifty guineas a year is entirely remitted for the scholars, preference being given, other things being equal, to the sons of gentlemen in reduced circumstances. The exhibitions are of the annual value of £30 and are tenable until a scholarship is gained or until the voice breaks. Candidates for admission must be at least eight years of age and under eleven.
An exceptionally high ideal of church music was set before the new choir. That it has long since taken its place in the front rank among the first in this country, choirs of ancient tradition and foundation, speaks eloquently of the energy and perseverance of those to whom the attainment and maintenance of this ideal were entrusted. The school of church music adopted was the Gregorian and the polyphonic style of the sixteenth century, of which Palestrina is the greatest master and Byrd and Blow are the most eminent exponents in England.
The full strength of the choir on the occasion of its first per- formance in the cathedral hall on Ascension Day 1902, after a training of barely six months, was 17 choristers, 8 probationers, 5 altos, 4 tenors, and 6 basses. The men, all professional singers, are paid by the Administration.
The structure of the Choir School, a plain red-brick house of four stories, conveniently united to Archbishop's House by the cloister, was begun in 1904, and was ready for habitation in 1905.
Clergy House
Since the Benedictine monks were not to sing the liturgy at Westminster, it was imperative that the Cardinal should at once proceed to form a college of cathedral chaplains or prebendaries. The selection took place early in 1902. They number seventeen, and are under the management of the Administrator of the
304 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
cathedral. For a time these minor canons occupied part of Arch- bishop's House ; but the pressure on space soon becoming too great in a house that was never designed for so large a body, plans were prepared by the Bentley firm, and a Clergy House of four storeys built on to the left wing. It was completed in 1906, and is satisfactorily in harmony with the other buildings. The entrance is in the low boundary wall in Francis Street, the hall, low and flat-roofed, projecting from the front of the house.
The Archbishop's new garage is a yellow brick structure adjoining the Clergy House.
CHAPTER XIII
THE architect's LAST DAYS IN THE CATHEDRAL AND ITS SUB- SEQUENT HISTORY DOWN TO THE CONSECRATION IN 1910
Bentley'a life bound up with the cathedral — His constant visits — Opening hoped for in 1900 — Unsatisfactory state of his health — Second paralytic seizure — Slow convales- cence— Resolve to concentrate all powers on accomplishment of cathedral^General scheme of marble decoration planned — Disappointments and their effect — Recogni- tion of genius — Norman Shaw and Lethaby on cathedral — King's Gold Medal — State of work on March 1st, 1902 — The architect's last visit — Death — Desire to bury him in cathedral — Requiem and funeral oration — The Cardinal's pledge — Arrange- ments for carrying on his work — Opening again impossible in June 1902 — Performance of sacred music to test acoustics — Dream of Gerontius, 1903 — Cardinal Vaughan's death — Lying-in-state, and funeral — Enthronisation of Archbishop Bourne, 1903 — First High Mass, Christmas Eve 1903 — Centenary of St. Gregory the Great, 1904 — Translation of bodies of Cardinals Wiseman and Manning, 1907 — Eucharistic Congress, 1908 — Centenary of St. Ansebn of Canterbury, 1909 — Consecration of cathedral, June 1910 — Remaining debt defrayed — Pomp and dignity of three days' ceremonies — Message from Pope Pius X — Diamond Jubilee of the Restoration of the Hierarchy celebrated — Banquet at the Mansion House— In conclusion.
The closing years of the architect's life, from that summer day of 1895 when the first stone was laid, were passed wholly in spirit and often in person in his cathedral. Other commissions necessarily occupied some of his time and thought, and it is true that he crossed the Atlantic at the call of one ; but the indisputable fact remains that Westminster was the central and engrossing theme upon which his energy and supreme devotion were concentrated. Every morning, on the journey between his home at Clapham and office off the Strand, he visited the works, and again at evening his feet were drawn thither to stroll alone among scaffolding and masonry, and note the day's progress in the twilight hush, when the clamours of labour were stilled. The solitary figure in frock coat and tall hat became familiar to dwellers in the neighbour-
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306 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
hood ; it is told that on one occasion a visitor, trying to gain admittance to the site one Saturday afternoon in the early days of building, was assisted by an interested cabby, who shouted encouragingly from the point of vantage of his vehicle, " The architec's inside — e's 'ere day and night ! "
On Santa Sophia, built and decorated by Justinian in a little under six years, ten thousand workmen were employed and untold gold poured forth. The structure of Westminster Cathedral was seven years a-building, the daily number of men contracted for being 260 ; this marked inferiority of labouring strength being equalized to some degree by modern methods and appliances. But though the Cardinal intended, and Bentley hoped and endeavoured, to complete the shell in five years (indeed the former made an- nouncement that the Golden Jubilee of the Restoration of the Hierarchy in England would be solemnized in the new cathedral in the summer of 1900), it was otherwise ordained, and to neither founder nor architect was vouchsafed the realization of this sanguine dream.
Bentley's health had for some time been very unsatis- factory, so that he was not unprepared for the tragedy of the second warning which came in the summer of that year. The first, a comparatively slight stroke of paralysis, had overtaken him in November 1898 — he was not an old man, being then only fifty-nine, and indeed very young and vigorous in appearance for his years. But this second seizure made serious inroads on his strength and power of resistance. For weeks he lay almost helpless, the clear brain striving against an enfeebled body and sadly affected speech. He realized, none more clearly, the portent of this illness ; and knew that, with so much yet to be accomplished, the time remaining was running out fast. Nothing would persuade him to take the absolute repose ordered. Always the sick-bed was littered with samples of marble, and encumbered with clay models of carving from the mason's yard. In spite of the handicap of defective speech, business was transacted and corre- spondence continued through all those weeks of illness, one of his
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daughters acting as amanuensis and praying as she wrote that she might interpret correctly the halting and indistinct words, and so avoid giving further pain to the beloved sufferer.
At length in the autumn, with health sufficiently restored for resumption of the daily routine, he took up his labour in the tranquil and certain knowledge that he would never see the end, and schooled himself to face it with the calm and undaunted courage of a self-contained nature. It must not be supposed that these thoughts were ever uttered, for the habits of reserve of a lifetime had not been relaxed by illness, and even to his nearest he rarely spoke about professional matters ; but looking back over the long perspective of years, one is able to realize something of the im- mense will-power with which all the forces of body and mind were concentrated from day to day upon the task in hand, and to admire the unwavering resolution with which everything tending to distract or make undue demands upon his strength was put entirely outside his life. To a friend who on one occasion inquired whether the future of his family and the cathedral were not a source of worry to him, he admitted this much : " Yes, if I were ever to allow myself to think about the future, I should achieve nothing, and I believe I should go mad."
All his life he had been an insatiable worker — holidays gave him scant pleasure, and were avoided as far as possible. No quantity of work ever seemed to fatigue him or affect his health ; but " It is worry that kills me," he said pathetically on some occasions when tried beyond endurance, and there is unhappily no room for doubt that the tendency to tinker with his designs and certain great disappointments concerning his wishes for the cathedral materially affected an already weakened constitution and contributed to hasten the end.
Impelled by this ever-present sense that the sands were fast run- ning out, Bentley rapidly laid down the general scheme of the marble revetment for nave, sanctuary, and side chapels, and hastened to design the details for the sanctuary and for the two chapels which were to be first completed as specimens and guides
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for the future. Working under immense pressure, he produced also the superb set of designs for the marble pavements. The decision to substitute wood-block flooring in nave and aisles, based on utilitarian and economic grounds, came as a cruel blow, and was in the nature of a climax to such previous disappoint- ments as the Cardinal's ordering in Rome, without consulting him, the entirely unsuitable pulpit and throne.
We have no wish to draw too sombre a picture of these last months. Disappointments were many, but compensations there were also. Happy and rare indeed is the architect whose vision finds its perfect fulfilment. To Bentley was given a great opportunity and he used it nobly ; it is vain to sigh for the might have been had the chance been his ten years earlier.
Singularly unheeding of public opinion, of the voices that had dubbed the new bmlding " Cardinal Vaughan's Railway Station " and the campanile " the Roman Candle," and so forth, Bentley valued highly the approval of his professional brethren. As bit by bit the scaffolding came down, and the cathedral emerged, as it were, from the chrysalis state, a rapidly increasing chorus of praise and recognition of the supreme value and significance of his achievement came from those who understood and were qualified to criticise. Professor Lethaby, in an article in the Architectural Review for January 1902, was the spokesman of professional opinion. He and Norman Shaw had visited the building in the architect's company some time in December 1901, and, as Bentley modestly phrased it in a letter to Mr. Charles Hadfield, " Both said [they were] and appeared pleased with all they saw."
Shaw's generous admiration was expressed later in glowing terms. " Beyond all doubt the finest church that has been built for centuries. Superb in its scale and character, and full of the most devouring interest, it is impossible to overrate the magnificence of the design. The genius of the architect has converted conditions which to many would have been serious obstacles into the stepping stones to a great artistic triumph."
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Professor Lethaby, whose valuable book on Santa Sophia Bentley had carried with him and absorbed while on his tour of study in Italy, dwelt, in his article on Westminster Cathedral, as Bentley remarked, " strongly on the practical phase." The learned professor regards it as a "building homogeneous, simply seen, and directly constructed — monumental as we say. The larger parts cohere into organic unity and it is set out on lines liberal and suave, without unnecessary art-nooks and transparent pre- tences of spontaneous simplicity. The scale is very large, the span equal indeed to the largest known, and the height ample. Subsidiary parts, like the baptistery and the side chapels of the Virgin and the Sacrament, are themselves large, but the main church carries them as proudly as a liner carries little ships slung on davits."
The writer, after describing the plan and something of the construction, thus summarizes its excellences :
" Throughout the church indeed the constructive ideas are finely conceived and realized with great daring, assurance, and success. Other points which particularly appealed to me are : the masterly simplicity of the whole scheme by which a huge unit bay of 60 ft. square, four times repeated, and a noble apse form the effective interior ; the interweaving of the nave arcades with the mighty piers which stand within the curtain walls : the contrivance of treating the buttress space thus formed as a second aisle roofed above, with a lean-to abutting the thrust of the nave cupolas ; the doubling of the bays to the great squares, so that outside the weighted buttress masses come opposite the centres of the dome thrusts ; the simple service of the great stairs ; the contrivance of the passage-ways across the transepts, and at various heights of the building ; the concrete vaulting of the aisles, which forms vast slabs of stiffening between the great pier masses ; the selection and management of the materials, as, for instance, the solidity of the masses of common brickwork ; the direct ingenuity by which the thin facing is applied, one course of headers bonding with the backing securing to four courses of stretchers ; the large use
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of concrete, asphalt, terracotta, and cast lead ; the non-use of concealed structural ironwork ; the monolithic marble columns. Other dispositions for convenience and effective display are very fine, and amongst these I would especially call attention to the change in the dome over the crossing whereby light as from a crown is radiated over the high altar ; the management of the transepts where by means of a transverse colonnade and large lunette above, the double space is opened up as one ; the way the crypt is made visible from the presbytery by a series of arches ; the colonnades supporting the singers' galleries right and left of the presbytery ; the two exedrse which open as watching-chambers from the staircases north and south of the altar. . . . Inside ' . . . the instant impression is that of reality, reason and power, serenity and peace. Almost a sense of nature — the natural law of structure."
The natural outcome of this symposium of appreciation was the decision in February of the Royal Institute of British Archi- tects to nominate the architect for the King's Gold Medal ' of that year. Bentley appreciated the honour, " coming really as it does from my confreres whose opinion I value and to whose judgment I attach the utmost importance, especially the men of thought, and those who are endeavouring to make architecture a living and not a dead art." ' But it was an honour he was destined never to receive. Endurance was wearing low. " At times," he wrote, " I am tempted to wish for a long rest. For some time I feel that I have been at straining tension. I suppose weak health and years are beginning to tell." * The cry of the brave, weary spirt was soon to be answered.
On March 1st the whole of the shell of the cathedral was com- pleted with the exception of some carving on the fa9ades and the
1 Elsewhere (Chapter VI.) we have quoted what Professor Lethaby htid to say about the exterior.
2 But for Queen Victoria's death he would have been nominated for it a year earlier ; for that reason no medal was given in 1901.
3 Letter to Mr. Charles HadQold, February 13th, 1902. * Ibid., December 29th, 1901.
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last 50 ft. of the campanile, whose brickwork would have been finished but for a hard frost which had stopped all building for about three weeks. The first slabs of marble veneering, all that Bentley's mortal eyes were to behold, were fixed in the Brampton Chapel on February 28th. He was at his office as usual on Saturday, March 1st, and spent part of the morning showing the drawings of the great crucifix and the marble pavements to Mr. Charles Hadfield, who had come from Sheffield to see him. " He was full of enthusiasm about the cathedral's progress," says this friend, and it was observed how comparatively well he was that morning, speaking with less difficulty and talking of a probable visit to the United States in the early summer. He quitted his office earlier in the afternoon than was his wont (usually Satui'day was for him a long working day) and it is supposed that the last conscious hours of his life were spent at the cathedral. Thus only can the time be accounted for that preceded his arrival at the house of some friends in Grosvenor Road, where in a short space the fatal seizure overwhelmed him.
A priest from the cathedral came to minister to him before he was carried home. At dawn on Sunday morning, without regain- ing consciousness, the tired spirit passed.
His family and friends hoped that the arcliitect's body might be laid to rest where mind and heart so long had dwelt — beneath the campanile would be a fitting spot, suggested one — but they were informed that the legal difficulties were insurmountable, permission to remove the bodies of the two Cardinal Archbishops from Kensal Green to Westminster having then for several years been sought in vain. Cardinal Vaughan arranged therefore that the requiem should be sung in his presence at St. Mary's, Clapham, preceding the burial at the little Mortlake cemetery, on Wednesday, March 5th. There is no doubt that he felt Bentley's death very deeply ; the late Mr. Austin Gates was with him at breakfast when the news came and afterwards told the writer that the Cardinal was completely overwhelmed by the tragic suddenness of the calamity, for which he was not in tlie least prepared. At the
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requiem he gave the last absolution, and preached a panegyric as a tribute of his affection and admiration for the dead architect, wherein the highest proof of his regret was the pledge publicly and solemnly given to carry on his work on the lines Bentley had indicated and for which he had left sufficient guidance.
Although Bentley had prepared a quantity of detail in a more or less finished condition, he had made no dispositions what- ever for the carrying on of the work in the event of his death. In view of the Cardinal's promise, it was decided to constitute a firm to be styled John F. Bentley, Son & Marshall, and to make Mr. John A. Marshall, for many years in Bentley's office and latterly his chief assistant, a partner therein ; provision being made that the architect's second son Osmond should join him as soon as he had gained sufficient experience. The continuity of ideas and tradition was thus thought to be assured as far as, humanly speaking, it could be without the guidance of the master- mind, provided of course that a faithful and rigid adherence to Bentley's plans was observed. Herein lay the sole possibility of success.
Chiefly on account of the architect's death and also because there was not the faintest chance of the baldacchino being ready, the opening of the cathedral could not take place, as the Cardinal had expected, in the week fixed for King Edward VII's Corona- tion. It was arranged, however, to open it to the public for a concert of sacred music, to be in the nature of a trial of the building's acoustic properties. Small and informal experiments made soon after the roofing was completed had given encouraging results, and the authorities were eager to put the matter to a more searching and satisfactory test. The choristers, assembled, as we have seen, in the autumn of 1901, were in six months sufficiently trained for performance in public and had already, on Ascension Day, taken part in the first Mass solemnized in the cathedral precincts.
This performance of sacred music was therefore advertised to take place in the cathedral on the afternoon of June 11th, the
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tickets being sold for the benefit of the Choir School and to defray expenses. The musicians included an orchestra of one hundred performers and a chorus of two hundred voices, composed of the united choirs of Westminster and the Oratory, with other singers included to make up the number, under the direction of Dr. R. R. Terry, director of Westminster Cathedral Choir. The concert opened with Wagner's " Holy Supper of the Apostles," for men's voices and orchestra, and embraced the works of composers so far apart in time and school as Beethoven and Palestrina. Purcell's " Te Deum " in D, composed for St. Cecilia's Day, 1694, finely rendered by soloist, chorus, and orchestra, was followed by Beethoven's Symphony in C Minor, Palestrina's " Surge illuminare " given by an unaccompanied double choir, four old English motets by Byrd, Tallis, and Blow, and Wingham's MSS. motet "AmavitSapientiam," rendered by a soloist, chorus, and orchestra.
The Cardinal, surrounded with bishops, monsignori, and other clergy, sat in the west tribune, and about three thousand other persons were present. The building, absolutely bare and un- decorated, had been cleared of every trace of scaffolding, and the result, awaited in an attitude of keen expectancy, was all that could be desired. This concert proved that the building was endowed with rare acoustic properties, not only with the true cathedral quality of increasing the beauty of sound and endowing the human voice with unwonted splendour and beauty, but — and this was more vital — with an absolute freedom from echo and a perfect conductivity of tone. During the summer months free organ recitals were given every Saturday afternoon with the object of attracting people to the cathedral and interesting them in its music.
On Saturday, June 6th, 1903, a year later, followed a second musical festival, when Cardinal Newman's Dream of Gerontius, composed by Sir Edward Elgar, was for the first time presented to a London audience, by permission of Cardinal Vaughan, in the cathedral. The composer conducted an orchestra of one hundred performers, the Symphonic Orchestra of Amsterdam, with an
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established continental reputation, which, then on a visit to England, had appeared three days earlier at St. James's Hall. Dr. Terry was at the organ, the choruses were sung by the North Staffordshire District Choral Society, numbering over two hundred voices, and the semi-choruses by twenty-four voices, under the baton of Mr. J. Whewall. The tenor part of Gerontius was taken by Dr. Ludwig Wiillner, who had successfully interpreted it at Diisseldorf at the Lower Rhenish Festival in the May of the previous year. Miss Muriel Foster sang the soprano music, the part of the Angel ; and Mr. Ffrangcon Davies, baritone, imper- sonated the priest and the Angel of the Agony with great earnest- ness and religious intensity.
The performance aroused much interest in the musical world, in view of the previous successful renderings of the oratorio at the Worcester and Sheffield Festivals in 1902 ; while others were attracted by the locale, so that the floor of the great cathedral was packed, many persons finding seats in galleries and tribunes. The tickets for reserved seats ranged from five guineas to 10s. 6rf. ; unreserved were 5s. and admittance 2s. 6d., the net proceeds being again for the benefit of the cathedral Choir School. The Cardinal this time was not present ; he was lying on his sick bed at St. Joseph's College, Mill Hill.
A fortnight later, through the great west door thrown wide for this first solemn religious ceremony, the body of the Cardinal Founder was borne in the June twilight to lie in state in the embracing shelter of his vast nave. He had passed away shortly before midnight on Friday, June 19th. On Sunday night the coffin, brought from Mill Hill, was received at the doors by the Bishop of Emmaus, Monsignor Johnson, Monsignor Fenton, Monsignor Moyes, Monsignor Dunn, the whole college of pre- bendaries and chaplains, and the brothers of the dead Cardinal, and escorted in procession to the black-draped catafalque beneath the dome of the crossing. One who was present has recorded ' his impressions of that mournful moment :
1 The Tablet, June 27th, 1903.
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" The great cathedral was touched with a strangely pathetic interest that will cling to it for evermore, when the mortal remains of its great builder were brought to dwell for a while within its yet unfinished walls, before being laid to rest in the grave. The drenching rain of the previous week had ceased on Sunday, and a thin mist hung round the domes and turrets in the chill night air. Faithful groups had been waiting patiently outside the doors some hours when at twenty minutes to eleven the simple hearse and a single coach arrived. The doors closed on the leaden casket, which was received by the cathedral clergy, the people went their way. Simple, solemn, and impressive was the scene without. Within, the body was placed on the catafalque, the customary prayers were recited, the vigil began, and the deep mysterious shadows of the mighty pile closed round the body as in the tomb. The noble monument of a splendid faith, the builder raised it as a house of prayer for the living and the dead. He was not destined to intone the grand ' Te Deum ' of its consecration, but a solemn dirge for his faithful soul was to signalize its sacred dedica- tion, and as he lay there in the silence of the night and the stillness of death, up in the domes the echoes seemed to linger of Newman's deathless Dream, ' Praise to the Holiest in the height and in the depth be praise.' "
On Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights the vigil round the body continued, being kept by members of the four Mendicant orders, Franciscans, Dominicans, Carmelites, and Ser- vites, and by four nuns from the convent of the Sisters of Nazareth and the Sisters of Charity. The watches of the deeper night were performed by the cathedral clergy, each in turn taking duty from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. Each morning a succession of Low Masses were said from 6 o'clock till 9 at a temporary altar erected at the foot of the sanctuary steps. At nine daily was celebrated a solemn High Mass of Requiem, except on Wednesday, the Feast of St. John the Baptist, when the Mass of the Feast was sung instead.
Throughout the day on Monday and Tuesday the cathedral was open to the public, who came in thousands to pass in reverent
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procession by the simple bier of the dead prelate ; as many as 27,000 were counted on one day. At nightfall vespers and matins of the dead were sung by the clergy and choir, after which the church was given over to the watchers in their solemn vigil. On Wednesday the cathedral was closed all day after the High Mass until the dirge at 6 p.m., in order to prepare for the funeral on Thursday.
The Cardinal's express wish that not a single unnecessary sixpence should be spent upon his funeral was faithfully observed, and all was characterized by the severest simplicity and plainness. The sanctuary was draped entirely with black, the catafalque was black, save for a border of gold and the scarlet hat suspended at the head of the coffin, with its great tasselled ends hanging to the floor. Six tall candles had burned round the coffin dvu-ing the lying- in- state ; at the funeral it was surrounded by four rows of many closely set tapers. A square enclosure was reserved round it to allow space for the bishops, when giving the last absolutions ; the six rows of seats on either side being occupied by the clergy. The sanctuary and transepts were reserved for other bishops and clergy ; a great multitude representative of the whole Catholic Church in the British Isles crowding the cathedral, floor and galleries. It was a memorable and impressive scene.
The music of the requiem was magnificently rendered by two choirs, that of the cathedral and a choir of priests from the dioceses of Westminster, Southwark, and Portsmouth, the Mass being cele- brated by Monsignor Algernon Stanley, Bishop of Emmaus and Bishop-assistant to the late Cardinal. It fell to the lot of Dr. Hedley to pronounce the panegyric, as eleven years before he had preached that of Cardinal Manning. The absolutions were given in turn by four bishops, the final absolution coming from Cardinal Logue, Archbishop of Armagh, thus once again intimately associated Avith the history of that cathedral whose first stone he had helped to lay almost to the day eight years before.
And so the ceremonial of mourning and hope ended, the coffin was left again to the watchers, until at six o'clock on Friday
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morning it was removed to the chapel of the Missionary College at Mill Hill, to be interred there the following day.
The enthronization of the present Cardinal Archbishop was the next public event in 1903, followed by the opening of the cathedral for daily use on the Christmas Eve of that year. The solemn celebration of the thirteenth centenary of St, Gregory the Great marked the year 1904. In 1907 the bodies of the two first Archbishops of Westminster were translated from their graves in Kensal Green Cemetery to their places in the crypt beneath the high altar. In 1908 the cathedral welcomed and witnessed the splendid Eucharistic Congress, presided over by the Legate, Cardinal Vanutelli, and attended by six other cardinals and over a hundred bishops. The celebration of the eighth centenary of St. Anselm of Canterbury, which took place in 1909, concludes this brief survey of the main outstanding events in the ceremonial history of the cathedral, previous to the greatest event of all, its consecration and dedication in fee simple to the service of God in June 1910.
A debt of close on £7,000 on the general building fund which still encumbered the fabric had to be liquidated before the long- delayed consecration could take place. The Archbishop issued in February a special appeal, and by the end of April every farthing of the debt having been discharged by generous benefactors, nothing further stood in the way of the consecration.
The ceremonies, carried out with the utmost pomp and dignity as befitted the unique occasion, occupied three days. They began on Monday, June 27th, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon by the Exposi- tion of the Relics in the Cathedral Hall, wliieh Archbishop Bourne entered in procession, and ascended the platform whereon an altar had been erected. Here he sealed in silver caskets, together with three grains of incense, and an inscribed strip of parchment, the relics of the bodies of the saints intended to be deposited under each of the thirteen altars of the cathedral. Those for the high altar were relics of four English saints, St. Boniface of Fulda, St. Thomas and St. Edmund of Canterbury, and St. William of
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York and of the patron of the Archbishop, St. Francis of Sales. After the sealing of the caskets each was placed on a miniature shrine to await the ceremony of sepulture on the morrow. The cathedral choir, seated in the body of the hall facing the cathedral clergy, sang the anthem " Justorum Animae," by William Byrd, 1607, during the rite which terminated with the singing of Matins and Lauds.
On Tuesday, June 28th, the Pope gave a special dispensation from the fast of the Vigil of the Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul to all those attending the ceremonies of the 28th, a necessary and much appreciated privilege when it is realized that the clergy taking part were on duty for seven and a half hours, and some had fasted as prescribed on the vigil of the ceremony, and the laity, not admitted to the church till eleven o'clock, were there for three and a half hours, preceded by the long and exhausting wait outside in the discomforts of a blazing sun and abnormally high wind.
The rite of consecration was preceded by the office of Prime, sung in the Cathedral Hall at 7 a.m. At half-past seven the con- secration ceremonies, full of strange and half-forgotten symbolism, began with the recitation of the seven penitential psalms before the relics. At eight o'clock the Archbishop, vested in a cope of white gold-embroidered brocade and a plain gold mitre, and carrying his pastoral staff, emerged from the Cathedral Hall, and, accompanied by deacon and sub-deacon vested in albs and pre- ceded by crossbearer and thurifers, walked in procession to the west end of the cathedral, where in these quiet early morning hours the outside ceremonies began.
First the litanies of the saints, then the blessing and mingling of the salt and water, placed on a table outside the great door, wherewith the Archbishop was to sprinkle with a spray of hyssop the outer walls and ground, making, with two acolytes carrying lighted tapers, the three-fold circuit prescribed, symbolic of holy baptism and triple immersion into its saving waters. At the close of each circuit the Archbishop made his claim of admission, knocking at the door once over the threshold with the end of his
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pastoral staff. The choir formed a wide half-circle around, and at the third time of knocking, on the words " Open, open, open " and the tracing of a cross on the threshold with the end of his staff, the door was thrown wide open by the solitary deacon within, and the procession having entered the empty building, it was again closed, none of the laity, except the masons to fix the altar stones, being allowed to enter.
The third stage of the rite was then begun, the nave having been previously painted with two broad diagonal white paths intersecting at the centre and having heaps of ashes placed thereon at intervals of about 6 ft., a card traced with a letter of the alpha- bet, Latin or Greek, being placed by each heap. At a faldstool placed at the point of intersection, the Archbishop took his place during the singing of the hymn " Veni Creator," the chanting of the litanies of the saints, and the canticles of Zacharias. During this last he set forth with mitre and staff, accompanied by deacon, sub-deacon, crossbearer, and acolytes, towards the west end, and starting from the north-west corner traced the twenty-three letters of the Greek alphabet in the little mounds of ashes set along the prepared path. Then, returning to the south-west corner, he formed in like manner the twenty-four letters of the Latin alphabet along the second path, this curious ancient ceremony symbolizing the instruction of the newly baptized in the elements of faith and piety ; the crossing of the two lines, it is said, pointing to the cross, i.e. Christ crucified, as the central point of Christian teaching. The doxology having been intoned three times successively by the celebrant, he proceeded to the exorcism of the salt and water, and the blessing of the ashes, finally mingling all three, and pouring into the water the wine, also hallowed.
The next portion of the ritual was the simultaneous consecra- tion of the altars, the high altar by Archbishop Bourne and the thirteen other altars by thirteen of the bishops present :
1. Altar of the Blessed
Sacrament . . Dr. Ilsley, Bishop of Birmingham.
2. Altar of our Lady . Dr. Hedley, Bishop of Newport.
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3. Altar of the Sacred Heart
and St. Michael
4. Altar of St. Joseph
5. Altar of St. Peter in
Crypt
6. Altar of St. George and
the English Martyrs .
7. Altar of St. Andrew and
the Saints of Scotland
8. Altar of St. Patrick and
the Saints of Ireland
9. Altar of St. Paul
10. Altar of SS. Gregory
and Augustine .
11. Altar of St. Thomas of
Canterbury
12. Altar in the Chapel of
the Holy Souls
13. Altar of St. Edmund of
Canterbury, in Crypt Chapel
Dr. Singleton, Bishop of Shrews- bury. Dr. Whiteside, Bishop of Liverpool.
Dr. Amigo, Bishop of Southwark.
Dr. Mostyn, Bishop of Menevia.
Dr. Keating, Bishop of Northamp- ton.
Dr. Lacy, Bishop of Middles- brough.
Dr. Brindle, Bishop of Nottingham.
Dr. Burton, Bishop of Clifton.
Dr. Casartelli, Bishop of Salford. Dr. Collins, Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle.
Dr. Fenton, Bishop of Amycla.
Next followed the thrice-repeated procession round the interior to sprinkle the walls on their lower part, at the height of a man's face, and again yet higher, the floor being hallowed in like manner from the altar to the main entrance crosswise from side to side and north, east, south, and west.
Then at length were the vast crowds waiting outside the cathedral permitted to take some part in the ceremony, even though it were only that of passive spectators. A great procession of all those taking part in the ceremonial set out to fetch the holy relics from their temporary resting-place in the Cathedral Hall, and to carry them shoulder high in solemn state round the exterior of the church.
It was a marvellously gay yet reverent pageant under the hot June sun, banners and flags waving joyously in the almost too boisterous breeze and every note of colour giving its utmost value
SUBSEQUENT HISTORY DOWN TO 1910 321
to the spectacular sum total of this triumphant progress. The purple-clad macebearer followed by a long line of regulars, Augus- tinians, Carmelites, Franciscans, Benedictines, Dominicans, Ser- vites, Passionists, Oratorians, Redemptorists, and Jesuits in their habits, and of secular clergy in cassocks and cottas, called vividly to memory with a poignant sense of loss a similar procession winding round an empty site, where, fifteen years since, founder and architect had stood together beside a great granite block, the corner-stone of the noble sanctuary to be. Canons representative of all the dioceses of England walked next preceding the relics laid on four biers, surmounted by silken canopies and borne on the shoulders of young priests, attended by thurifers. Next, mitred and vested in rich copes, came the twelve bishops-consecrators, and lastly Archbishop Bourne, bearing his pastoral staff, and attended by eight papal chamberlains in scarlet uniforms with swords and white plumed cocked hats.
The beautiful and appropriate words of the four antiphons appointed by the rubric were sung by the choir as the procession moved on its way. The circuit of the walls completed and the great doors regained, above which the Union Jack and the Papal Flag flew side by side, the Archbishop took his seat on a faldstool there set, and gave the prescribed exhortation to reverence in consecrated churches, followed by the anointing of the door with chrism in the sign of the cross. The procession with the relic biers then entered the church, and deposited them upon the altar. Then the thirteen bishops-consecrators, taking their thirteen several caskets of relics, carried them in procession to their respective altars, and began at once the ceremonial of deposition.
At this point the patient laity were admitted, several thousand chairs to accommodate them having been arranged while the pro- cession was in progress outside. In a small sepulchre hollowed in the centre on the top of each marble altar the silver casket was placed, and the cavity closed by a slab, secured with the prepared mortar, each celebrant being attended by a mason to complete the work, a privilege reserved at the high altar for Osmond 1—21
322 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
Bentley, son of the architect. Then followed all the long ritual of incensing, anointing the altars, accompanied with many psalms, antiphons, and prayers ; then the unction of the twelve consecra- tion crosses ' of stone affixed to the walls. Next, on the altars, took place the burning of the five crosses of tapers and incense, and further anointing of their stones, terminating with the vesting of the altars and blessing of their altarcloths, vases, and ornaments.
Over six hoxirs had this ancient and wonderful ceremonial lasted, when at length the Pontifical Mass of the Dedication was begun. It was celebrated by Dr. Cotter, Auxiliary Bishop of Portsmouth (Dr. Cahill, the Bishop of this diocese who was to have sung it being incapacitated by illness), in the presence of the Archbishop of Westminster and twenty-six bishops and abbots assembled in the sanctuary. The music, exquisitely rendered in spite of intense fatigue by the cathedral choir, was the " Missa Quinti Toni " by Orlando di Lasso (1520-1594) and the motet " Elegi abjectus esse" for five voices by Peter Philips, an English ecclesiastic of the sixteenth century.
Thus was forged another link in the chain of continuity, for the rite of consecration of Westminster Cathedral in the year of grace 1910 was identical with that by which Westminster Abbey was hallowed in 1065, nearly eight hundred and fifty years before. The musical tones of the great bell Edward in the tower dedicated appropriately to the sainted builder of the abbey church, were heard for the first time at the Elevation during this Mass of Dedication of Westminster Cathedral.
At half-past two the Archbishop gave the final benediction, and the huge congregation dispersed for a time for rest and refresh- ment. At seven o'clock the cathedral was again crowded for vespers and benediction, sung in the presence of the Archbishop and the Hierarchy. During the service the Bishop of Clifton ascended the pulpit, to read the following message received from Pope Pius X ; " To his Grace the Archbishop of Westminster, at the Archbishop's
^ The cost of these, £8 each, was defrayed before the consecration by a generous benefactor.
SUBSEQUENT HISTORY DOWN TO 1910 323
House, Westminster — The Holy Father, present in spirit at to-day's solemn consecration of Westminster Cathedral, whilst the sweet strains of their hymns still resound in the ears of the faithful, begs God that He would ever hear their prayers from the throne of His glory on high. His Holiness, whilst he thanks your Grace for the gift of the volume relating to to-day's event, lovingly imparts to you, to the bishops, to the clergy, and the whole people of your archdiocese his apostolic blessing." The bishop also read the text of the telegram to be despatched in response : " The Archbishop of Westminster, together with his chapter, clergy, and people, and the bishops of England, together with their chapters, have received the message and blessing of the Holy Father with feelings of the greatest gratitude. They tender to him the expression of their most devoted attachment both to Peter and to Peter's successor."
On Wednesday, June 29th, the feast of the apostles St. Peter and St. Paul and the anniversary of the laying of the first stone, was celebrated with high pomp the Diamond Jubilee of the Restoration of the Hierarchy in England. Matins, Lauds, and Prime were sung at 8.45. At 10 o'clock solemn Terce, chanted entirely in Gregorian, was followed by a procession round the cathedral, the Archbishop wearing the pallium while the episco- pate were all vested in scarlet copes and gold mitres, making a vivid and picturesque scene. The hymn during the procession was " Felix per omnes." High Mass was then sung by the Arch- bishop of Westminster in the presence of three archbishops — of the titular sees of Trebizond, Ptolemy, and Seleucia — twenty bishops, eight abbots, and hundreds of the clergy, secular and regular. The vast lay congregation included Sir John Knill, Bt., Lord Mayor of London, in his state robes of black and gold, and Lady Knill ; the Mayors of Darlington, Oswestry, and Hyde, wearing their red robes and chains of office ; most of the Catholic peers, and many other founders of the cathedral, representatives of religious orders of women, and an immense number of men and women of all classes. The cathedral was open free, but to
324 WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND ITS ARCHITECT
regulate the crowd it was necessary to admit only ticket-holders to the nave ; a certain number of reserved seats at a guinea for the two days were sold, however, towards defraying the heavy expenditure entailed.
The music for the High Mass was William Byrd's setting for five voices, the motet chosen being Palestrina's six-part " Tu es Petrus." The sermon on this auspicious occasion was preached by Dom Hedley, O.S.B,, Bishop of Newport, who seven years earlier had spoken the panegyric of the dead Cardinal Founder in that same place. He took for his text the words from Joshua iii. 6, " Take ye the Ark of the Covenant, and go before the people." The offices of Sext and None followed the Mass. At four o'clock in the afternoon vespers were sung, and benediction given by the Bishop of Birmingham, and so the great festival drew to its close. No words could exaggerate the striking beauty and solemnity with which the high ceremonies of this historic occasion had been ordered and performed. Their memory will live unfadingly in the minds of those privileged to be present.
That the occasion should also be celebrated in some social manner was assuredly fitting. Sir John Knill came forward as host, and issued invitations to a great banquet at the Mansion House " to meet Archbishop Botirne and the Roman Catholic Bishops." The flower of the Catholic body in England were assembled, and the usual loyal toasts were drunk and honoured.
Thus the day of consecration so long delayed and so ardently desired passed into the realm of achievement and the roll of history. There remains to be fulfilled the adornment of the great church's interior, a consummation which eyes now living may scarcely hope to see, but a splendid and unique opportunity for generations yet unborn to prove their faith and gratitude. May these artists of the future be endowed with reverence and understanding of the spirit of Bentley's noble idea ; far better else the puritan coat of whitewash advocated by some for walls and domes alike to preserve their simple grandeur.
SUBSEQUENT HISTORY DOWN TO 1910 325
Founder and architect both sleep far from the stately walls they reared ; but effigy and chantry perpetuate Vaughan's memory within them. Though Bentley's name, like those of the cathedral architects of old, is unrecorded on tomb or tablet, surely the waters of oblivion will never roll over it. Well might he say, as Wren before him, " Si monumentum requiris, circumspice," for the cathedral itself shall be his monument, great and enduring.
APPENDIX A FOUNDERS OF WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL
Deceased Founders and Benefactors are marked thus : t-
I. Pioneers, who Gave £1,000 or More to the Purchase of the Site
fHis Eminence Henry Edward, t^ord Gerard (1st Baron).
Cardinal Manning. t^elen, Countess Tasker.
tHenry, 15th Duke of Norfolk, E.M., JBaroness Weld.
K.G. F. M. Spilsbury.
fLord Petre (12th Baron). Anonymous.
II. Founders who have Given £1,000 ok More since May 1894
tHis Holiness Pope Leo XIII. •{"His Eminence Herbert, Cardinal
Vaughan. tHenry, 15th Duke of Norfolk, E.M.,
K.G. t Alfonso H., 1st Duke of Gandolfi,
G.C.S.G. fHenrietta A., Duchess Dowager of
Newcastle. •j-John, 3rd Marquess of Bute, K.T. John, 4tli Marquess of Bute. tGeorge F. S., 1st Marquess of
Ripon, K.G. fThe Marquis de Misa. •{"Bertram, 5th Earl of Ashburnham. tHenry, Viscount Llandaff, P.C. •^Isabella, Lady Beaumont. ■fHenry, 1st Baron Brampton, and
Jane Louisa, his wife. ■fMary Elizabeth, Lady Herbert of
Lea.
fAnne, Lady Milford. fSusan Elizabeth, Lady Sherborne. •{"The Baroness Weld. •fCount Arthur Moore. Hon. and Right Rev. Monsignor Stanley, Bishop of Emmaus. Maria Georgiana, Lady Loder. Sir Humphrey de Trafford, 3rd Bt. fSir Edward Blount, K.C.B. ■fSir Walter de Souza. Anonymous (A.F.). Anonymous (G. P.). Anonymous (" George "). Anonymous (H. A. D.). Arnold, G. M. Aungier, John. fBailey, John Rand. Bates, Escalanti Y. Belton, John,. Berners, Miss Julia. Bowring, Algernon.
327
328
APPENDIX A
Bretherton, F. Stapleton-, and Isa- bella Mary, his wife
■fButler, In memoriam James and Arthur.
Carr-Smith, Miss Agnes M.
Caulfield, James F.
■fCave, Lawrence Trent.
Clowes, Miss Anna Maria.
Coats, Sir Stuart A., Bart,, K.C.S.G.
Coleman, John.
Colvin, Mrs.
Curtis, Robert L.
Dalglish-Bellasis, William, and his wife.
D'Arcy, W. K.
Davidson, Henry.
de Trafford, Sister Mary Edith.
Dobson, William E.
tDodsworth, Miss E. J.
Donahue, P. J., Esq.
Dunn, Very Rev. Monsignor Thomas, Bishop of Nottingham.
fEyre, Thomas.
Fenton, Right Rev. Monsignor, Pro- vost, V.G., Bishop of Amycla.
Fitzgerald, Mary.
Giles, Colonel William Oughton, and Ellen, his wife.
Gray, Miss A. E.
Harmar, Mrs.
Harris, E. A.
Hicks, J. J., K.C.S.G.
Holland, S. Taprell.
Jump, James.
fKearsley, Henry.
Kennedy, Sydney Ernest.
tKing, Miss Emily.
Knight, Colonel (In memory of the family of Knight of Lincolnshire).
Lavery, Robert B.
Lavie, Luis G.
Lennon, Very Rev. Monsignor James.
fLennon, Very Rev. Dean.
Liddell, John.
Loughnan, Miss Elizabeth A.
■fLouis, Madame Jane.
Lowenfeld, Henry.
fLyall, W. H., and his wife.
fMacdonell of Keppoch, Ewen (in memory of), and Annie Char- lotte Hill, his wife.
Mackay, Mrs. {in memory of a Be- loved Son).
Marks, John.
fMills, Richard.
Murphy, Mrs.
Nettlefold, Mrs. Maria M.
Palmer, Mrs. Caroline Mary Sam- borne- (nde Anstey) (in memory of her beloved parents).
Petre, Miss Maude.
fPurssell, Alfred.
Reynolds, James P.
Robertson, Charles, and Norah, his wife
Shaw, Charles C.
Smith, J. P.
Smythe, Very Rev. Canon C. J. Moncrief-.
Sperling, Mrs. Annie Maria.
Stephenson, Ada Mary Augusta.
fUzielli, Madame.
+Van Wart, Miss Emily.
Walmesley, Mrs. Robert.
Watney, A. Claude.
Watson, Very Rev. Monsignor Ed- ward J., M.A.
Weld-Blundell, Charles.
fWhite, Very Rev. Alfred Canon White.
Whitmore, Capt. T. F. C. Douglas.
tWillmott, Mrs. Ellen.
Woodroffe, James T., K.C.S.G. And several Anonymous Donors.
APPENDIX A 329
III. Founders of Chapels in the Cathedral
(1) The Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament. — The people of Spain and the
Spanish nations in South America.
(2) The Lady Chapel. — fBaroness Weld.
(3) The Chapel of the Holy Souls.— Mrs. Robert Walmesley (Sister Ethel-
dreda^O.S.B.)
(4) The Chapel of St. Gregory and St. Augustine. — fThe Lord and Lady
Brampton.
(5) The Chapel of St. Andrew and all the Saints of Scotland. — John, fourth
Marquess of Bute.
(6) The Chapel of St. Patrick and all Irish Saints. — Subscriptions being
received from Irish Catholics.
(7) The Chapel of St. Paul. — Mrs. Caroline Mary Samborne-Palmer.
(8) The Chapel of St. Thomas of Canterbury. — The clergy of Great Britain
(Cardinal Vaughan's Chantry).
(9) The Shrine of the Sacred Heart and St. Michael. — The Religious and Past
and Present Pupils of the Sacred Heart Order.
(10) The Chapel of St. Joseph. Mrs. Claude Watney (Marble work).
IV. Donors of Columns in the Cathedral
(a) Twenty-one Columns in Nave and Transepts, costing £150 each
(1) Rudolph, 9th Earl and the late (10) James J. Ford.
Dowager Countess of Denbigh. (11) Alfred J. Gate.
(2) The Hon. and Right Rev. Mon- (12) Frederick John Haskew and
signer Stanley, Bishop of Em- Mary Haskew.
maus. (13) Walter L. Hodgkinson.
(3) The Rev. Thomas Abbot. (14) Miss Kirkpatrick.
(4) Mr. and Mrs. Francis Berkeley (15) Miss Leeming.
and Miss M. Weld. (16) John Liddell.
(5) Mrs. Callaghan. (17) fW. H. Lyall.
(6) Miss Caroline M. Clifford. (18) Mrs. W. H. Lyall.
(7) Colonel Eden. (19) John Pattison.
(8) Edward Eyre and family. (20) fMrs. Scrope.
(9) Lewis Eyre. (21) Richard Ward and Miss Mary
A. Ward.
(i!>) Six Columns in Sanctuary, costing £110 each
t
(1) The Catholic Social Union. (5) A Priest (thank-offering for con-
(2) The Guild of Ransom. version).
(3) (4) Mrs. Nettlefold. (6) Major Ratton.
330 APPENDIX A
(c) Fourteen Columns in Sanctuary Galleries at £50 each
(1) (2) Mr. and Mrs. Boothman. (10) League of the Cross.
(3) (4) ChUdren of Mary. (11) Philip Lodwige.
(5) Colonel and Mrs. Fitzgerald (12) John Charles Rees.
Cologan. (13) Mrs. More Smyth (in memory of
(6) tMrs. M. A. Costelloe. her husband).
(7) Colonel Eden. (14) A Widow {in memory of her
(8) The Hon. Mrs. Fraser. father).
(9) William and Mary Hoggett.
(d) Six Columns in the Crypt at £90 each
(l)t Henrietta A., Duchess Dowager (4) ^Rev. W. H. Bodley.
of Newcastle. (5) John Lancaster.
(2) (3) fAlfred J. Blount. (6) Miss EmUy Paynter.
{e) Four Granite Piers in the Crypt, at £100 each
(1) John and Annie Martin. (3) (4) J. F. Woodroffe, K.C.S.G.
(2) J. P. Smith.
(/) Two Columns in North-west Porch
(g) One Column in Outer Sacristy
{h) Four Small Columns in the Tribunes looking into the Apse
{i) Eight Veronese Columns {with Capitals and Bases) of the Baldacchino, at
£250 each
(1) The Hon. and Right Rev. Mon- (5) James Adamson.
signor Stanley, Bishop o f (6) fThe Right Rev. Monsignor Pat- Emmaus. terson, Bishop of Emmaus.
(2) Mrs. Lyall. (7) (8) (4) S. Ward. (8)
APPENDIX A 381
V. Donors of Special Objects in the Cathedral
The Foundation Stone. — W. G. Freeman.
The High Altar.— The Hon. G. Savile.
The Font. — fMary Georgiana, Lady Loder.
The Pulpit. — S. Ernest Kennedy.
The Archiepiscopal Throne. — The Catholic Bishops of England (to Cardinal
Vaughan). The Statue of St. Peter in the Nave.— The friends of the late Rer. Luke Riving-
ton, D.D., as a memorial to him. The Mosaic of Blessed Joan of Arc in North Transept. — The Catholic women
and girls of England, by means of a penny subscription organized by
the Catholic Women's League. The Stations of the Cross :
I. |
Mrs. Brown Westhead. |
II. |
Major H. Knight, R.A. |
III. |
Mrs. Mansell. |
IV. |
Mrs. Chilton Thomas. |
V. |
Mrs. Barrow. |
VI. |
Mrs. Carey-Price. |
VII. |
P. J. Smith. |
VIII. |
Mrs. Shee. |
IX. |
Metropolitan Chapter of Westminster, |
X. |
Mrs. Field Stanfield. |
XI. |
Miss Sherlock. |
XII. |
Canon Joseph Burke. |
XIII. |
Mrs. Coxon. |
XIV. |
fMiss E. Van Wart (a thank-offering). |
APPENDIX B
WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL AND COMPARATIVE TABLE OF THE TWENTY-ONE ANCIENT ENGLISH CATHE- DRALS AND WESTMINSTER ABBEY ^
TOTAL |
NAVE AND |
|||||
NAME. |
ABBA. |
NAVE. |
AISLES. |
HEIGHT. |
||
Sq. ft. |
Length. |
Breadth. |
Area. |
Breadth. |
||
Westminster Cathedral |
54,848 |
234 |
60 |
14,040 |
150 |
109 |
York |
72,860 |
251 |
43 |
13,244 |
110 |
93 |
Lincoln . |
66,900 |
225 |
37 |
8,767 |
78 |
81 |
Winchester |
64,200 |
245 |
32 |
10,272 |
88 |
78 |
Westminster Abbey . |
61,729 |
165 |
30 |
6,810 |
68 |
105 |
Ely ... |
61,700 |
281 |
30 |
8,430 |
74 |
72 |
Canterbury |
56,280 |
214 |
27 |
6,156 |
73 |
80 |
Salisbury |
55,830 |
243 |
32 |
8,096 |
78 |
81 |
Durham . |
55,700 |
235 |
37 |
9,694 |
82 |
70 |
Peterborough . |
50,516 |
195' |
35 |
10,220 |
79 |
73 |
Wells |
40,680 |
193 |
32 |
7,424 |
70 |
68 |
Norwich . |
40,572 |
200 |
28 |
6,524 |
70 |
75 |
Worcester |
38,980 |
213 |
30 |
6,150 |
78 |
67 |
Exeter |
35,370 |
167 |
31 |
3,906 |
72 |
66 |
Lichfield . |
33,930 |
173 |
26 |
4,888 |
66 |
58 |
Bristol |
27,280 |
158 |
31 |
4,928 |
69' |
54» |
Carlisle . |
16,350 |
— |
— |
— |
72' |
— |
Chester . |
39,725 |
180 |
41 |
6,724 |
84 |
— |
Chichester |
35,320 |
152 |
26 |
4,680 |
100 |
65 |
Gloucester |
31,360 |
163 |
33 |
6,435 |
85 |
68 |
Hereford . |
33,073 |
154 |
28 |
4,480 |
70 |
63 |
Oxford |
15,782 |
82 |
22 |
1,804 |
53 |
45 |
Rochester |
21,950 |
145 |
32 |
5,504 |
73 |
55 |
^ Reprinted, by kind permission of Mr. Percy Lamb, by whom the table was prepared, from the Westminster Cathedral Record, January 1896.
^ Line of present stalls.
8 Choir.
N.B. — In the above Table the total areas down to Lichfield (inclusive) are taken from Fergusson's History of Architecture, London, 1893 ; the breadths and heights of the naves are froi.-^ Britton's Dictionary of the Architecture and Archoeology of the Middle Ages, London, 1838. The nave lengths are measured from west end to rood screen, and are taken from The Cathedrals of England and Wales ; Builder Series, London, 1894.
332
APPENDIX C
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FlO. 31. — HAI.F-PLAJJ OF THE SANCTUABY SHOWING, IN BROKEN LINES, THE EXISTING ARRANGEMENT OF THE LEVELS, IN CONTRAST WITH THE ARCHITECT'S INTENTIONS, WHICH ARE REPRESENTED BY SOLID LINES. THESE LATTER MARK THE ORIGINAL POSITION OF THE THREE STEPS DIVIDING THE PbESBYTERIUM FROM THE SaNCTUABIUM, A PLAN WHEREBY AMPLE ROOM WOULD BE LEFT FOR CEREMONIAL MOVEMENTS WHEN
THE Archbishop's Throne was in use.
APPENDIX D
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Fig. 32. — Scheme of Mosaic Decoeation foe the Lady Chapel. By J. F. Bentley.
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