A Short Account of King's College Chapel Part 4

The Woodwork, Organ, etc.

[Ill.u.s.tration: H.A. FROM THE SCREEN]

THE _Screen_ dividing the choir from the ante-chapel is one of the earliest and purest examples of renaissance woodwork in this country and is no doubt the work of foreign artists (probably Italian), several having been brought over and employed by Henry VIII. Carved upon it are the badge of Anne Boleyn, a crowned falcon holding a sceptre; the initials H. R., R. A., H. A., with true lovers' knots entwining these two letters; the arms of Henry VIII and Anne impaled; while below in the same compartment is a bull's head caboched. This last is not a rebus[9]

in the true sense of the term (for at least one would expect the letter N or something similar to appear), yet I venture to say it refers to Anne, and, with the rest, shows the date of the work to be 1533-1536, during which period her influence was at its height. At the back of the Provost's stall is carved an admirable representation of St. George and the dragon. Over the door on this side are the arms of King's and Eton emblazoned. The definition of the arms of King's is as follows: Sable, three roses argent, a chief per pale, azure a fleur-de-lis of France, and gules a lion of England.[10] That of Eton is the same, with the exception of three lilies in the place of the roses.[11]

The organ was put up in 1688 by Rene Harris,[12] taking the place of one erected in 1606 by an organ-builder named Dalham; some portions of the case date back to the time of Henry VIII. On the outer towers of the organ facing west are two angels holding trumpets. These were put up in 1859, taking the place of two pinnacles, which in their turn were subst.i.tuted for two figures about the size of David on this same side.

In 1859 the organ was much enlarged by Messrs. Hill, of London.

The _Coats of Arms_ at the back of the stalls on the north and south sides were put up at the expense of Thomas Weaver, a former Fellow of the College, in 1633. Amongst them are the arms of England as they were at the time; those of Henry V, VI, VII, VIII, Eton and King's College--for Henry VI (no doubt following out the scheme adopted by William of Wykeham, who founded Winchester School and New College, Oxford) founded Eton also--also the arms of Cambridge University, and, to show a friendly feeling to the sister University, those of Oxford placed on the opposite side. The canopies of the stalls and the panel work east of them were executed in 1675-1679.

The _Altar Table_, from a design by Mr. Garner, was first used on Advent Sunday, 1902; and the woodwork round the chancel was finished in 1911.

The architects were Messrs. Blow and Billary, the work being executed by Messrs. Rattee and Kett, the celebrated ecclesiastical builders, of Cambridge.

The _Candelabra_ which stand within the Chancel, were the gift of Messrs. Bryan, Wayte, and Witts, sometime Fellows; conjointly with the College, and are of the date 1872.

The _Candlesticks_ on the Altar were given by Edward Balston, a former Fellow, in 1850; and the _Cross_ (by Mr. Bainbridge Reynolds) is in memory of the late Rev. Augustus Austen Leigh, Provost, 1889-1905.

The _Picture_ on the north side, "The Deposition," by Daniel de Volterra, was presented to the College by the Earl of Carlisle in 1780.

It previously occupied the central position in the woodwork placed there in 1774, and was removed in 1896 when the east window was re-leaded. The handsome _Lectern_ was given to the College by Robert Hacomblen, who was Provost from 1509 to 1528. The candle branches were added in 1668. It was removed to the Library in 1774, where it remained until 1854.

Before I go on to speak of the side Chapels, I think it is worth recording that on Wednesday, May 4, 1763, nine Spanish Standards taken at Manilla by Brigadier General Draper, formerly Fellow, were carried in procession to the Chapel by the scholars of the College. A Te Deum was sung, and the Revd. William Barford, Fellow, and Public Orator, made a Latin oration. The colours were first placed on each side of the Altar rails, but afterwards were hung up on the Organ Screen; they eventually found a resting-place in one of the South Chapels. About 20 years ago they were sent to a needlework guild in London with a view to their being restored, but it was found they were too far gone. Some of the remnants that were returned are preserved in a gla.s.s case in the vestry, where they may be seen.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] A rebus was invariably a badge or device forming a pun upon a man's surname. It probably originated in the canting heraldry of earlier days.

A large number of rebuses ending in "ton" are based upon a tun or barrel; such are the _lup_ on a _ton_ of Robert Lupton, Provost of Eton 1504, which appears in the spandrils of the door in the screen leading into his chapel at Eton College, or the _kirk_ and _ton_ of Abbott Kirkton on the deanery gate at Peterborough. The _eye_ and the _slip_ of a tree, which form, together with a man falling from a tree (I slip!), the rebuses of Abbot Islip, are well known. The _ox_ crossing a _ford_ in the arms of Oxford, and the _Cam_ and its great _bridge_ in the arms of Cambridge are kindred examples.

[10] "The founder designed, by the colour of the field, to denote the perpetuity of his foundation; by the roses, his hope that the college might bring forth the choicest flowers, redolent of science of every kind, to the honour and most devout wors.h.i.+p of Almighty G.o.d and the undefiled virgin and glorious mother; and by the chief, containing portions of the arms of France and England, he intended to impart something of royal n.o.bility, which might declare the work to be truly regal and renowned."--_Cooper's Memorials of Cambridge._

[11] At a meeting of old Etonian generals at Eton on May 20, 1919, the following reference was made to the arms of Eton:--

"What bears Etona on her s.h.i.+eld?

What each true son should be; A lion valiant in the field; At heart a fleur-de-lis."

_Daily Telegraph_, May 21, 1919.

[12] Mr. T. F. b.u.mpas in his _London Churches, Ancient and Modern_, speaks of him as an organ builder of some note. Renatus Harris he is there styled. "In 1663 the Benchers of the Temple Church being anxious of obtaining the best possible organ, we find him in compet.i.tion with one Bernard Schmidt, a German, who afterwards became Anglicized as 'Father Smith.' Each builder erected an organ which were played on alternate Sundays. Dr. Blow and Purcell played upon Smith's organ, while Draghi, organist to the Queen Consort, Catherine of Braganza, touched Harrises. The conflict was very severe and bitter. Smith was successful.

Harrises organ having been removed, one portion of it was acquired by the paris.h.i.+oners of St. Andrew's, Holborn, while the other was s.h.i.+pped to Dublin, where it remained in Christ Church Cathedral until 1750, when it was purchased for the Collegiate Church of Wolverhampton. In 1684 he competed again with Father Smith for the contract for an organ for St.

Laurance, Gresham Street, and was successful. In 1669 he built a fine large organ for St. Andrews, Undershaft." He was also engaged in 1693 to keep in order the organ in Jesus College Chapel, Cambridge, at a yearly salary of 3.

The Side Chapels

I WOULD next draw the attention of my readers to two of the side chapels. The second from the west on the south side is known as _Hac.u.mblen's Chapel_, and contains a bra.s.s marking the place of his burial. It also contains a tomb (the only one in the Chapel) to the great Duke of Marlborough's only son, John Churchill Marquis of Blandford, who died of the small-pox in 1702 while resident in College.

In the window next the Court is a portrait of the Founder, and the other figure is St. John the Evangelist. In the tracery are the evangelistic symbols and the four fathers of the Latin church--St. Jerome, St.

Ambrose, St. Augustine and St. Gregory; and in the window which divides the chantry from the Ante-chapel is to be seen the Annunciation, with, on the one side, St. Ursula and the eleven thousand virgins, and St.

Christopher with the infant Jesus; on the other, St. Anne with the Blessed Virgin, and St. John the Baptist with the Lamb.

The third chapel on the same side is _Provost Bra.s.sie's Chapel_, where he was buried in 1558. In the window is some fifteenth century gla.s.s, which, having been removed from the north side chapels, was repaired in 1857 and placed here. The Provost of Eton, whose knowledge of old gla.s.s makes him a competent authority, is now of opinion that it was made for the side Chapels, and was probably the gift of John Rampaine, Vice-Provost in 1495.

Of the remaining chantries on the south side, the first contains the Music Library; the next three are to be utilized as a Library of Ancient Theological works; and the last two will be fitted up and dedicated, as a War Memorial to those members of the College who made the great sacrifice in the War 1914-1919. Some fine Flemish gla.s.s, given by Mrs.

Laurence Humphrey, and two lights purchased of St. Catherine's College, and other fragments of the XVth and XVIth century of great interest and beauty have already been placed in the windows, and a reredos is in course of erection. In the window of the second chantry from the west on the north side are the arms of Roger Goad (Provost 1569-1610) impaling the arms of the College,[13] in a most beautiful floral border.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ROSE AND PORTCULLIS. (Badges of Henry VII.)]

[Ill.u.s.tration: ARMS OF HENRY VII. ]

Two other _Side Chapels_ deserve to be mentioned, viz. the two eastmost on the north side, which were the first roofed with lierne vaulting. The one furthest east has been lately restored to use for early celebrations of the Holy Communion and other devotional services. Visitors should pay special attention to the lovely doorway in stone through which you enter, and the one on the opposite side. In the apex of the arch are the arms of Edward the Confessor, on the left those of East Anglia, on the right those of England. On that of the opposite side is a figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary at the top, flanked on the right by one of St.

Margaret, and on the left by St. Catherine. These figures have been defaced, probably by William Dowsing, who is said to have gone about the country like a lunatic, breaking windows, etc. He visited the College in 1644.

The _Ante-chapel_ is profusely decorated with the arms of Henry VII, with a dragon and greyhound as supporters, "the dragon of the great Pendragons.h.i.+p" and the greyhound of Cecilia Neville, wife of Richard Duke of York in every severy, and with crowned roses and portcullis alternating with each other, intimating that, as the portcullis was the second defence of a fortress when the gate was broken down, so he had a second claim to the crown through his mother, daughter of John de Beaufort. After the accession of the Tudor dynasty there arose a mania for heraldic devices; in some cases an unsatisfactory mode of decoration, but in this building one that possesses not only historical interest, but great decorative value.

During the time when these styles of Gothic architecture prevailed that are now called the Decorated and the Perpendicular, the roof,[14] the columns, the stained gla.s.s windows, the seats, altar, tombs, and even the flooring, were filled with emblasonment. Nor was heraldic ornament confined to architecture; it formed the grand embellishment of the interior of palaces and baronial castles.[15]

In the middle of one of the roses at the west end, toward the south, may be seen a small figure of the Virgin Mary, about which Malden says: "Foreigners make frequent enquiries, and never fail to pay it a religious reverence, crossing their b.r.e.a.s.t.s at the sight, and addressing it with a short prayer." I cannot say that, in my long experience, I have ever observed an instance of this.

FOOTNOTES:

[13] Heads of Colleges have the right of impaling with their own arms the arms of the College of which they are the head in the same way as a Bishop impales the arms of the See over which he presides. Deans of secular churches and the Regius Professors of Divinity at Cambridge (since 1590) have the same privilege.

[14] Of Melrose it is written:

"The keystone that locked each ribbed aisle Was a fleur-de-lys or a quarterfoil."

[15] "The gorgeous halls which were on every side With rich array and costly arras dight."

Memorials of the Dead

HAPPILY the chapel does not abound in _epitaphs_, a species of memorial often extravagant or even ridiculous, but there is one, viz. of Thomas Crouch, a former Fellow, M.P. for the University, who died 1679, written by himself, which, in my opinion, is of a high character. It is as follows:

"At the last day G.o.d will lay open the graves, and bring forth All men from their sepulchres.

It shall be known, when that day Shall come, what manner of man I was."

One may notice two striking features contained in this epitaph: (1) He believes in the resurrection; (2) he does not care what man thinks of him, it is G.o.d who shall decide whether he was good or bad.

Money was not a dominant motive with those employed on our old buildings, but master and man worked together for a common object, with a common sympathy; and especially in our cathedrals and minsters they kept uppermost in their minds that they were working for the glory of G.o.d. "They thought not of a perishable home Who thus could build."