112 DE CLAEKE ON HOLT ISLAND PRIORY. 



by the execrable tyrant who then wielded the sceptre of England, and 

 the Priory of Holy Island was included in the general wreck. 



From that hour it dates its gradual decay and present state of irre- 

 trievable ruin. Sir Walter Scott has thus described it in "Marmion." 



" In Saxon strength that abbey frown'd, 

 With massive arches broad and round, 

 That rose alternate row on row, 

 On pondeions columns short and low, 



Built ere the art was known. 

 By pointed aisle and shafted stalk, 

 The arcades of an alley' d walk, 



To emulate in stone." 



The latter part of the stanza is a complimentary allusion to the 

 fanciful theory of Sir James Hall concerning the origin of the pointed 

 arch. The application of the term Saxon, it would be impossible to 

 verify or substantiate. 



There are no buildings in this country with the characteristic forms 

 of this church, or the distribution into nave and aisles, that belong to 

 so early a period. A few rude structures there certainly are which 

 may have been erected by Saxon architects, one of which occurs in our 

 own district — the tower of Whittingham Church, Northumberland — 

 characterized by a peculiar sort of quoining — consisting of long and 

 short stones, placed alternately over each other — small round-headed 

 apertures divided by a rude baluster, and the absence of buttresses. 

 The term Norman may be safely used, if it be understood simply to 

 designate a style which appeared in this country at the conquest, and 

 prevailed for 125 years, during the Norman rule ; but it is in reality 

 Eoman, and was derived from the Imperial city by the architects who 

 diffused it over Europe, with the religion to which these structures 

 were consecrated. It flourished during the first thousand years of the 

 Christian era, with long interruptions during the dark ages, but its 

 rudiments may be discerned at this day in the Temple of Peace at 

 Pome, erected during the first century, and in the Halls of the Baths 

 — those colossal structures in which the grandeur of thought and mag- 

 nificent aims of the Poman people are most conspicuously combined. 

 In these edifices we perceive the general arrangement of our Norman 

 and Grothic churches — a wide central space arched over at top, with 

 the vaults resting on pillars corresponding to our nave ; between these 

 pillars lofty arches open into as many vaulted apartments on either 

 side intercommunicating b}' similar archways and constituting side- 

 aisles. The roof of the side-aisles being considerably lower than that 

 of the central vault, admits the insertion of lights in the main wall 

 looking into the nave, which corresjiond with our clerestory windows. 



The general character of Holy Island Priory is Norman, or to speak 

 more corectly, Eomanes^ue. The west front is almost perfect — 



