34 Transactions of the 



church was the place where Chatterton could usually be found 

 during liis spare hours. 



Tlie church has three chief entrances, — by the north and south 

 porches, and by the large doors in the middle of the west side. 

 The one most used now is the south porch entrance. Just inside 

 it, and nearly over the door, there is a block of wood with a 

 curious old sword carved on it. The sword was the property of 

 Sir Robert Yeamans, who was Mayor of Bristol in the year 1669. 

 In various parts of the church are fragments of old stone coffins. 

 Time, however, has worn them away so much, that the inscriptions 

 are illegible. This does not matter much, as coffins of this descrip- 

 tion are not uncommon in connection with old cathedrals or 

 churches throughout England. I think you will nearly all re- 

 member having seen old stone coffins at any ecclesiastical ruins 

 you may have been to. Of course, some people have pretended to 

 know all about the coffins, and some will almost tell you even the 

 histories of their inhabitants, but they have no ground for their 

 stories but their own fertile imaginations. I think the most im- 

 portant office of archaeology is to detect old mistakes and prevent 

 their perpetuation by tradition of people who are either too simple 

 or too lazy, and who, knowing but little themselves, take for fact 

 anything connected with their subject that they can find in print. 

 In connection with St Mary Eedcliffe Church, there is a great deal 

 of tradition which is entirely untrustworthy, but as the mistakes 

 have been perpetuated through centuries, it is nearly impossible 

 to detect them. We all know what extravagant stories spring up 

 in connection with nearly all famous places. When we visit any 

 famous old ruin, we usually accept the guide's version of its 

 history, minus about fifty per cent. 



On the wall facing the south entrance is a monument in the 

 shape of a Avhite marble scroll on a grey slab, with an open Bible 

 carved above. On the Bible are inscribed two texts taken from 

 the Psalms, and on a shield at the base there is inscribed, ' Nun- 

 quam nisi honorificeutissime ' — never unless most honourably. 

 With the motto are engraved the arms and crest of Sir Francis 

 Freeling. Sir Francis was quite worthy of the monument which 

 his children raised to him. His father kept a small confectioner's 

 shop on Eedcliflfe Hill. He went to one of the smaller Bristol 

 Grammar Schools, and on leaving it became a servant in the Bristol 

 Post Office. Stage by stage, for more than half a century, he 

 mounted up higher till he reached the position of secretary to the 

 General Post Office. George IV. created him a baronet in the 

 year 1825, and in the course of the next year he died at his house 

 in London. Near his monument is another to Sir William Penn, 

 father of William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania. William 



