122 Images destroyed in Salisbury Cathedral. 
when there was neither Bishop nor Dean to take care of it, they 
employed workmen to keep that sacred and magnificent pile in re- 
pair. I have been told by some who then lived at Sarum, that 
they have several times seen men at work, sometimes on the inside 
of the Church, and at other times on the outside; and on asking 
them by whom they were set on work, received this answer, ‘They 
who employ us will pay us: trouble not yourselves to enquire who 
they are: whoever they may be they desire not to have their names 
known.’ There being therefore not much to be done as to the 
reparation, the Bishop employed himself in the decoration of the 
Cathedral.” 
As Dr. Pope takes care to inform us of the amount of damage 
which the episcopal premises had really undergone, consisting in 
short of the sale of the palace to Van Ling, a Dutch tailor, who 
pulled down the hall, converted part of the house into an inn, let 
the rest in tenements, and made a carriage-way through the garden 
wall facing Harnham bridge: it is clear that we have in this very 
interesting version, the whole case stated. It bears an aspect of 
completeness, quite inconsistent with the idea of any extensive di- 
lapidations having been recently perpetrated on the Cathedral itself, 
an establishment so vast, that the mere presence of workmen, such 
as those alluded to, must be a requirement of unceasing duration. 
But the west end and chapter house were defaced by some party, 
and what more natural than to refer the event to the era of Henry 
the Eighth’s Reformation, when more than one class of the com- 
munity were let loose against the monastic orders? when the com- 
mon people were indulged in the lust of destruction, as a sort of 
cover for the court minions, who gratified the lust of usurped 
possession? These events, combined with other reforms sanctioned 
by the monarchs, are quite sufficient to explain any church dese- 
cration that can be pointed out at Salisbury or elsewhere. Here 
let us again call in Mr. Hatcher’s aid. In his history of Salisbury 
he gives us the results of a Visitation, (under Edward VI.), to 
remove images and painted windows; and after lamenting over the 
ruthless destruction of so much that was beautiful, illustrates the 
1 Mr. Hatcher says that these benefactors were members of the Hyde family. 
