DALE church: ITS STRUCTURAL PECULIARITIES. 175 



piety of this hermit ultimately led to the foundation of the noble, 

 but now ruined, Premonstratensian Abbey close by. But it is 

 strange that while so much has been contributed upon this Abbey 

 and its various remains,* the curious old fabric now used as the 

 Parish Church has not yet found a place in our Journal; yet it is 

 indisputably the most interesting fragment of monastic Dale. 

 Still it has not been neglected ; it has had a worthy exponent in 

 the Rev. Chas. Kerry, one of our most valued members, who 

 contributed an article, " Depedale and the Chronicle of Thomas 

 de Musca, Canon of Dale Abbey," to the Reliquary in 1880.+ 



The perusal of this article led the present writer to personally 

 make several examinations of the structure, and the result of 

 these was the section of his Dale and its Abbey,\ dealing with the 

 Church : the present paper is an amplification of that. In several 

 points this paper will be found to take exception to Mr. Kerry's 

 views at the time he wrote ; but essentially it is an advance 

 upon his article — he laid the foundation, and another has built 

 thereupon ; but in the superstructure he has also had a consider- 

 able hand. Its chief aim is to exhibit the peculiarities of the 

 fabric of the Church, and in order to explain them it will be 

 necessary to turn aside to local history and tradition, but only 

 so far as will fulfil the purpose, — these will undoubtedly be 

 exhaustively treated in the long-promised, but now soon-to-be- 

 published, monograph of the Rev. Dr. Cox and Mr. St. 

 John Hope. 



The Cursory Inspection. — Approaching the Church from 

 the village, the green little graveyard, the time-toned masonry, 

 the high-pitched gables, contrastive roof lines and background of 

 wooded hill-slope, make up a decidedly picturesque ensemble. 

 Pretty, indeed, is the new Church House adjoining ; but who would 

 not rather the former thatched and timber-framed consort, so 

 ruthlessly swept away ten years ago, were back again? We now 



* By Mr. St. John Hope, in Vols. I., II., and V. 



t Reprinted in pamphlet form as The Hermitages of Depedale, now rather 

 difficult to obtain. 

 X Derby : Bewley and Roe ; London : Elliot Stock. 



