TARRAXT RUSHTON CHURCH. 61 



But to come nearer home. In the Churchwardens' Accounts 

 of Wimborne Minster for 1541, as given in Hutchins, is the 

 following entry : " Payd for 2 potts of cley for wyndfyllyng of 

 the Chyrch, 8d." 



The so-called leper window. The object of this is also a matter 

 of dispute. Barr says of the small low window frequently found 

 on the south side of the chancel, at about the height for a man to 

 look through, that it is supposed to have been for watching the light 

 in the Easter sepulchre. This may have been one of its uses ; but 

 was it the only one ? Others regard it as the place where doles 

 were given or where at the burial of the dead the service was 

 begun, or as an external confessional. In this Church we have 

 not only the low window in its usual place, but also in the north 

 transept a lancet window, unusually low, and as the Hospital of 

 St. Leonard was only a few yards off it gives some colour to the 

 opinion that lepers were not admitted within a church, and that it 

 was at such a window that they took part in the service.* I am 

 inclined to think that the north transept was the chantry of the 

 hospital. Certainly it has its separate entrance, which immediately 

 faced the hospital, and it was formerly from one to two feet below 

 the level of the nave. 



It may not be without interest to some to hear of a bequest to 

 Rushton Church by George Lovelly, probably Lovell, who died in 

 1639. These are the words of his will " I give unto the Church 

 of Rushton j!0s., which I desire my successors to bestow in a silver 

 plate to put the bread in at the Communion table, that the clerk, 

 i.e., the clergyman, may not carry it about in his bare hand after 



* In Vol. xiv., p. 37, of the Club's Proceedings Mr. Fletcher points out 

 that where such windows existed they had been at some time invariably 

 closed up, probably to do away with the possibility of their being used 

 for the purpose for which they held been originally constructed. It is 

 some confirmation of this statement that the low window on the south 

 si\e of the Ilushton chancel was half blocked up, and the fact that the 

 lancet window in the north transept was entirely walled in seems to 

 favour the opinion that it had been used for the same purpose. 



