century; the clerestory has been destroyed, and the arches walled up, the aisles being entirely destroyed. Its architectural features were described by Mr. Parker. There is some German stained glass, and on the north wall is a tablet to Ezekiel Danois, a native of Compiegne, pastor of the French congregation at Thorney from the time of their first coming, in 1652, until his death in 1674. The incumbent, the Rev. J. Cautley, exhibited a register of their baptisms, marriages, and burials. Their engineering skill is commemorated in the fen country in the name of "French Drove.

At Crowland the remains of the abbey-church were elucidated by Mr. Freeman, who for nearly two hours was occupied in directing the visitors from one point of interest to another, and discoursing on the various parts of the building. The Rev. Edward Moore, F.S.A., described the means recently taken to maintain the central west front with its remarkable array of statues; this work had been carried out under the direction of Mr. G. G. Scott, and the fall of the fabric, which appeared imminent, has been effectually arrested. The well-known bridge at Crowland attracted notice; it is of late Decorated or Transition style.

After luncheon at the George Hotel at Crowland, the party proceeded to Peakirk to examine its small, very ancient church, with carved oak fittings. The original church was Norman; the west front has been altered; the south aisle is Early English, and there is an Early English lancet at the end of the aisle, and another at the west front of the nave. In the church may be seen the stem of an Early English lectern, which deserves to be preserved; it is of oak, set in a socket of stone. About a hundred yards from the east end of the church is a small interesting chapel, dedicated to the Saxon saint Pega, now converted into a dwelling house called The Hermitage. It consists of a diminutive nave and chancel, with an east window of beautiful design. It is of the best geometric date. The next place visited was Northborough; the church has as a south transept a chantry of bold Decorated work, and of a magnificence overpowering to the older part of the edifice; it was erected by the last of the family of Delamere. This fine church has an unusually high spire, nearly twice as high as the tower, and remarkable for its bulging sides. Under the belfry lies a defaced effigy of a man, apparently the companion to an effigy of a female in the churchyard; the latter has the wimple. In the churchyard are several stone coffin lids of the thirteenth century. Northborough House, once the residence of Lady Claypole, a daughter of the Protector, is still more remarkable for its structure than its history. Mr. Parker pronounced it to be the best specimen of a medieval house in this country. It is of the age of Edward II., in plan resembling the letter H, the hall occupying the centre, whilst the butteries, kitchens, and servants' rooms were in one wing, and the chambers of the family in the other. One gable of the hall is boldly crocketed, and terminates in a beautifully-carved circular chimney. This house was surrounded by a moat and fortified walls, of which the gatehouse remains, with its original oaken gates.

At Glinton Church are some effigies, which it has been thought were removed from recesses in the chantry at Northborough ; but this is unsupported by proof, neither do their proportions fit. An effigy of a lady in a

1 Domestic Architecture in England, vol. ii. p. 252. The chimney above

noticed is figured ibid. p. 90.

In the wimple and long veil remains exposed in Glinton churchyard. tower lies a male effigy of unusual character; it is in civil costume, with a hunter's horn at the right side, a sheaf of arrows is stuck under a strap by which the horn is suspended, and under the left arm is either a staff or a long-bow. The last object to which attention was directed was Woodcroft House, an edifice of the fourteenth century. The moat ran directly round the walls, and in part remains, as well as the round tower at one of the angles, the scene of the cruel death of Dr. Hudson the chaplain and confidential attendant of Charles I.

After the return of the party from an excursion which presented so varied a field of interest, the members of the Institute with their friends were invited to a Conversazione at the Vineyard, the residence of the High Bailiff of Peterborough, Henry P. Gates, Esq., adjacent to the Cathedral. A collation was served in a marquee in his gardens; the cathedral choir contributed to the gratification of the evening, glees and madrigals being sung; a military band was also in attendance, and played at intervals. More favorable weather was alone wanting to the enjoyment of this very friendly reception offered to the Institute by several residents in Peterborough, who took this occasion of shewing their kind feeling towards the Society. The Museum was again lighted up, and it attracted numerous visitors throughout the evening.

On Sunday, July 28, there was full choral service at the Cathedral; and in the afternoon the Lord Bishop of Oxford preached an eloquent and impressive sermon on the importance of the consideration of the past, in connection with man's hope of the future. His text was taken from Psalm

xc. v. 2.

MONDAY, July 29.

The Historical Section again assembled at the Cathedral School, the DEAN OF ELY presiding.

The two following memoirs were read by the Rev. EDMUND VENABLES, in the absence of their respective authors :

The History and Charters of Ingulfus considered; with the intention of shewing the fictitious character of the whole of his Chronicles. By HENRY THOMAS RILEY, Esq., M.A.

On the Foundation and early Fasti of Peterborough. By the Rev. WILLIAM STUBBS, Vicar of Navestock, Essex (Printed in this volume, page 193).

At the conclusion of the meeting an excursion was made to Warmington, and several other places of interest in the direction of Oundle. The church at Warmington, according to the remarks offered on the spot by Mr. Freeman, is probably the finest specimen of the Early English style in Northamptonshire. Its details are of the richest character and worthy of attentive study; they have been illustrated in the views published by Mr. Caveler. The church is of the familiar Northamptonshire pattern; the western tower with its massive broach is quite of the usual type, differing from inferior examples solely in richness of detail; it is evident from the position of the belfry-windows, that the nave never had a high-pitched roof. The triplets in the south aisle are remarkable both for elaborate detail and

2 Domestic Architecture, vol. ii. p. 249.

for their position, which does not seem well suited to the form. But the great feature of Warmington is the interior of the nave with its timber vault. This nave has something of a French character, at least it does not exhibit the purely English Lancet style, free from all traces of Romanesque on the one hand, and from all tendencies to Geometrical on the other. In many of the finest French buildings windows with tracery fully or nearly developed rest on pillars which are by no means clear of Romanesque. So it is at Amiens, so it is also at Warmington; the piers, with their capitals, and the moldings of the pier-arches, are still half Romanesque, while the clerestory has Geometrical windows, early indeed, but still real traceried windows and not mere groupings of lancets. The vault again, so rare in English parish churches, except now and then in the chancel, is in itself a French feature, though the beautiful corbels from which it rises are of a purely English kind. The timber vault is more common in our great churches than some may suppose, as in the eastern limbs of Winchester and St. Albans, and there can be no objection to it when the pillars will not bear a vault of stone. Many windows at Warmington church are excellent studies of that Early Geometrical tracery in which North Northamptonshire abounds.

The

At Fotheringhay Mr. Freeman discoursed on the history and architecture of the Church and College. The College of Fotheringhay was a Society of secular Priests and Clerks under a Master, established by the Dukes of York, owners of the neighbouring castle, for the better performance of service in their parish church, and for other purposes for which secular Colleges were founded. The College was founded towards the end of the fourteenth or beginning of the fifteenth century; it received benefactions from several successive Dukes, and the date of the foundation seems not certain. It appears most probable that, whatever may have been planned, the College had no legal existence till 1412, when Edward, Duke of York, obtained a charter for its endowment. This is however in no way inconsistent with the belief that the choir had been built by his father Edmund, son of Edward III., as part of the preparation for the foundation. College was suppressed with similar institutions, t. Edward VI., and its property granted to John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland. The Collegiate buildings, including the choir of the church, were dismantled, and have gradually vanished. In Queen Elizabeth's time the choir was ruinous, and she caused the bodies of her ancestors, the Dukes of York, to be removed into the nave, where she placed tombs over them. The destruction of the choir is remarkable, showing that there must have been a division in the property of the church, the nave belonging to the parishioners, and the choir to the College. This, as had been shown at Thorney, Crowland, and elsewhere, was a very common arrangement when a church was shared between a monastery and a parish, but there are not many examples in the case of secular colleges. Of the choir and collegiate buildings nothing remains except their juncture with the present church; the choir had aisles, and was considerably lower than the nave. Its loss gives the church a disproportioned appearance. The present church was begun in 1435 by Richard, Duke of York; the architect being William Horwood. The contract is preserved, and has been published by the Oxford Architectural Society. It forms one of our best sources for medieval architectural technicalities. The site of the Castle, where the ill-fated Queen of Scots passed the last days of her sad captivity, was viewed with considerable

interest; it is now marked, however, only by a mound, some remains of the moat, and a single mass of stone. Miss Agnes Strickland, who accompanied the party, observed that, according to old tradition, the total destruction of the castle, the scene of his mother's suffering, had been carried out by order of James I., but that tale appears to be unfounded. A Survey of the buildings exists, taken in 1625, the last year of his reign; the materials were gradually removed, the building having become decayed. The remains were used in the last century in works connected with the navigation of the Nen, and a small portion of the building was uncovered in 1820, in digging for stone. A memoir on Fotheringhay, the collegiate foundation, &c., may be found in Nichols' Bibliotheca Topographica, and many interesting particulars are given by the Ven. Archdeacon of Lincoln in his Historic Notices in reference to Fotheringhay, where a view of the castle mound may be seen.

The fine fourteenth century church at Elton was visited, and also the manor-house of Elton Hall, rebuilt after the Restoration, but retaining a gatehouse of the time of Edward IV. The church is a beautiful fabric, the most ancient part being the chancel and the pillars of the nave, which are Early Decorated. There are several openings in the wall, one of which is supposed to have been a light for the rood stairs, one intended for a squint, and another may have been a window from the priest's house or chamber. The party then proceeded to Tansor. The only remarkable feature in the external appearance of the church is the disproportion in the nave and chancel; the former being of singularly extended dimensions, the latter one of the most diminutive in the series of ancient churches. But an examination of the interior, revealing the extraordinary process to which this disproportion is owing is of high interest. There are numerous features of great interest in this fabric, rendering it a subject of unusual value to the ecclesiologist; it is probable that, as at Raunds and Kingsthorpe in the same county, a portion of the chancel was taken into the nave, an encroachment which in this case may be referred to as early a period as the thirteenth century. There are two good door-ways, one of them retaining much Norman character, but it is probably contemporary with the Early English portions of the church, amongst which the south door-way is to be numbered. There are some remains of mural painting; and in the chancel may be noticed several stalls of good character, stated to have been brought from Fotheringhay on the dissolution of the Collegiate establishment and dismantling of the choir.

After a hurried inspection of the once collegiate church of Cotterstock, with a stately choir, a noble specimen of Decorated architecture, the excursionists hastened to Oundle, reaching that place so near the time fixed for the train to Peterborough, that little more than a glance at its objects of interest could be obtained. A small number, however, lingered behind, and availed themselves of the courteous invitation of the Vicar, the Rev. J. Nussey, who guided them to the church and other buildings in the town, including the ancient hostelry, the Talbot, said to have been built with the materials of Fotheringhay Castle.

3 See Domestic Architecture, vol. iii. p. 251.

4 See a detailed notice of this curious church, and the probable explanation of

the changes which caused the disproportion to which allusion is made above, Gent. Mag. 1861, Oct., p. 388.

TUESDAY, JULY 30.

The Annual Meeting of Members to receive the Report of the Auditors of the previous year, with that of the Central Committee, and to make selection of the place of meeting for the ensuing year, was held in the Cathedral School. The chair was taken by Lord TALBOT DE MALAHIDE.

The Report of the Auditors for 1860 (printed at page 192 in this volume), and also the Report of the Committee were then read by Mr. C. Tucker; both were unanimously adopted.

In their Annual retrospect of the progress of Archaeological science, subsequent to the last meeting of the Institute at Gloucester, the Central Committee took occasion to advert with satisfaction to the renewed interest with which the members generally, and numerous friends or correspondents of the Society at home and on the continent, had given hearty co-operation in promoting the purposes for which the Institute and other kindred Institutions had been formed. At no previous period had the periodical meetings. and exhibitions, illustrative of the antiquities of Great Britain and the history of ancient and Medieval Arts, been productive of so large a measure of friendly co-operation; an ample harvest of remarkable facts had been brought under consideration, to be recorded in the Journal of the Society. The communications had been of more than ordinary value in various branches of archæological research; the Committee desired to mention specially the important contributions towards the History of Ecclesiastical Architecture in England, brought before the Institute by the kindness of Professor Willis, amidst his numerous pressing avocations. His Discourse on vestiges of ancient buildings brought to light at Lichfield Cathedral, had been received with great satisfaction at the monthly meeting in January last (printed in this volume, page 1). More recently the Professor communicated, with his accustomed friendly consideration towards the Society, the results of his careful investigation of the fatal catastrophe at Chichester on. February 21, ult.,-the fall of the tower and spire of the cathedral, a structure which had presented a subject so skillfully treated by him at the annual meeting of the Institute held there in 1853.5

In the review of the proceedings of the previous session the Committee expressed the hope that the selection of subjects of antiquity or art for special illustration at some of the monthly London Meetings, had proved not less generally acceptable to the Society, than productive of instructive results in eliciting valuable archæological information. The exhibition of ancient Bronzes, arranged for the gratification of the members in February, called forth from their accomplished friend, Professor Westmacott, an able and erudite sketch of the important subject prepared for illustration; the Committee could not refrain from expressing their warm sense of the great kindness evinced on this and on subsequent occasions by possessors of treasures of ancient art liberally entrusted for general gratification, in many instances by persons not members of the Institute. Of scarcely less attractive interest had been the display of rich productions of the loom and the needle,-tapestries and tissues, brought together at the meeting in

5 See Professor Willis' Essay on the causes of this catastrophe, given with his Memoir on the Cathedral in the volume lately published at Chichester by Mr. VOL. XVIII.

Hayley Mason, in which the most important Architectural memoirs read at the meeting of the Institute in 1853 are to be found.

3 K