IV.] OF SELBORNE. 169 



disturbing or displacing the bones of his ancestors. There is 

 reason to suppose that it once was larger, and extended to what 

 is now the vicarage court and garden ; because many human 

 bones have been dug up in those parts several yards without 

 the present limits. At the east end are a few graves; yet 

 none till very lately on the north side; but, as two or three 

 families of best repute have begun to bury iu that quarter, 

 prejudice may wear out by degrees, and their example be 

 followed by the rest of the neighbourhood. 



In speaking of the church, I have all along talked of the east 

 and west end, as if the chancel stood exactly true to those 

 points of the compass ; but this is by no means the case, for 

 the fabric bears so much to the north of the east, that the 

 four corners of the tower, and not the four sides, stand to the 

 four cardinal points. The best method of accounting for this 

 deviation seems to be, that the workmen, who probably were 

 employed in the longest days, endeavoured to set the chancels 

 to the rising of the sun. 



Close by the church, at the west end, stands the vicarage 

 house ; an old but roomy and convenient edifice. It faces very 

 agreeably to the morning sun, and is divided from the village 

 by a neat and cheerful court. According to the manner of old 

 times, the hall was open to the roof; and so continued, pro- 

 bably, till the vicars became family-men, and began to want 

 more conveniences ; when they flung a floor across, and, by 

 partitions, divided the space into chambers. In this hall we 

 remember a date, some time in the reign of Elizabeth ; it was 

 over the door that leads to the stairs. 



Behind the house is a garden of an irregular shape, but well 

 laid out ; whose terrace commands so romantic and picturesque 

 a prospect, that the first master in landscape might contem- 

 plate it with pleasure, and deem it an object well worthy of 

 his pencil. 



VOL. II. 



