106 PAPERS, ETC. 



ing ; again there is sacred service in the edifice thus 

 operated on ; the good rector can hardly be heard for the 

 emotion which well nigh strangles hirn in his efforts to 

 moderate the expression of his joy at the fulfilment of his 

 hopes and labours ; the committee-men assunie airs of 

 well-inerited importance ; and the parishioners at large 

 look kindly on, glad to get back to tkeir church, and more 

 than ever conscious of the misery of absence from its con- 

 secrated walls. Thenceforth matters proceed as usual, 

 only that every day some stranger or other, attracted by 

 the report of what has been done, comes to exercise his 

 critical taste in blame or praise of the result, and goes 

 away delighted or disgusted more in proportion to the 

 amount of his knowledge than of the skill displayed in the 

 " restoration " itself. The latter is usually small ; and, the 

 more the visitor knows, the more, in general, his feelings 

 are outraged. 



There is, nevertheless, very often rauch that has been 

 effected about which words, even many, would not be 

 thrown away. I have in my mind's eye a church where, 

 in the room of a piain but good Perpendicular porch, 

 leading to a nave of the same age, separated by a Norman 

 arch from a Decorated chancel with a graceful piscina, 

 such a pilgrim may notice the following arrangement : — 

 He may enter by an early English porch, with mouldings 

 multitudinous ! He may proceed to a nave whose 

 windows are of the geometrical Decorated period. The 

 Norman chancel-arch has been retained, though re-orna- 

 mented ; but at present the chancel is early English, with 

 sedilia, two piscina?, and an east window of five lights ! 

 The whole is new, and cost four thousand five hundred 

 pounds. 



I make no rcflection on the spirit which in numberless 



