THE CERNE VALLEY. XXxix. 



FOURTH SUMMER MEETING. 



THE CERNE VALLEY. 

 Tuesday, 24:th September (adjourned from 21th August). 



Mr. Nelson M. Richardson, the Rev. H. Pentin, and the 

 Rev. Canon Mansel-Pleydell were accompanied on this, the 

 last outdoor meeting of the year, by nearly eighty Members 

 and their friends. A start was made from Dorchester, the 

 first halting place being Charminster Church, where the Club 

 was received by the Ven. Archdeacon DUNDAS, who had 

 prepared a paper dealing with the architectural and historical 

 features of the building. 



The oldest parts of the church, the ARCHDEACON observed, were the 

 nave and the chancel arch, dating from the third quarter of the 12th 

 Century. The clerestory contains, not only six Perpendicular windows, 

 three on each side, inserted in the 15th century, but also, between 

 them, four small Norman windows, two on each side. These 

 were discovered and opened out in the course of the successful 

 restoration effected in 1897 under the direction of Mr. Chas. 

 E. Ponting, F.S.A. The south arcade was remarkably like that 

 at Bere Regis, so like as to suggest that the same architect 

 was responsible for the design. Although the arches of the bays 

 were pointed, yet it was erroneous to suppose that they were of 

 later date than the semi-circular chancel arch. The original chancel, 

 28 feet deep and wider than the present one, was pulled down in the 

 Civil Wars under an agreement between the impropriator and the 

 parishioners. The existing chancel, neither large nor interesting, 

 was built only 80 or 90 years ago. Attention was called to such other 

 features as the handsome panelling in Ham Hill stone of the soffits of 

 the three tower arches, the hagioscope, the original stone newel stair- 

 case leading into the roodloft, and the two beautiful 15th Century 

 canopied altar tombs of the Trenchard family, now standing in the 

 south aisle ; the Jacobean pulpit, and the ancient texts and decorations 

 in fresco on the wall, including a diapering in a conventional treatment 

 of what Mr. Micklethwaite pronounced to be a Spanish pomegranate. 

 The north aisle was rebuilt, of the same width as the nave, in 1838, 

 when the original Perpendicular windows were reinserted. The oak 

 altar rails, the Archdeacon continued, were carved by the late Rev. C. 

 W. H. Dicker. 



