136 ST. aldhelm's chapel. 



surrounding the building is composed simply of a fillet supported 

 on one side only by corbels. The ancient roof must have been 

 pyramidal, and was covered with thick slates, but at the time 

 of his visit it was so ruined and overgrown with grass that it 

 could not be traced with certainty. Parts of the groins, however, 

 having fallen in, its proprietor. Lord Eldon, had directed it to be 

 repaired ; and the workmen who were employed had just dis- 

 covered on the top of the building, a cylindrical foundation of 

 three feet in diameter, which had no doubt been the base of some 

 erection. 



The inside is extremely simple, yet elegant in its design. In 

 the centre, a square pier ornamented with pilasters, having the 

 angles chamfered, support the ends of four arches, which extend 

 to similar pilasters on the middle of the walls. These arches 

 are obtusely pointed ; they have their centres a little above the 

 level of the springing, and consequently approach, in a slight 

 degree, to the form of the Moorish arch. Had I examined them 

 less carefully, I might have supposed that this was owing to a 

 slight failure in the arch ; but it was evidently the original de- 

 sign. Two other similar, but higher pointed arches, cross each 

 other in each of the squares so formed, extending from the 

 middle pier to the angles of the building ; and in each inter- 

 section of these ribs, a small cross is cut in the moulding. There 

 are no remains of carved work in the chapel. The only window 

 is a loop-hole, splayed inwards, and finished with a semicircular 

 head. This looks to the sea. 



It is said that this edifice was anciently a chantry, where 

 masses were performed for the safely of mariners that passed by 

 the shore, who left some gratuity at the first port they landed at 

 for the maintenance of the priest, the building not being endowed. 



Its form and situation indeed strongly favour the idea of such 

 a destination. The square pillar in the centre seems to have 

 been originally designed to support some weighty superstructure, 

 of which the cylindrical base on the top, is a part, and might 

 have been a beacon, or some species of light-house. 



The window looking to the sea no doubt must have afforded 

 the view of many a dismal scene, and excited the fervour of its 

 religious inhabitant by the contemplation of the dangers to which 

 the passing vp<:<:p1«; wptp. exposed. 



