98 AUBREY'S NATUEAL HISTORY or WILTSHIRE. 



the art is lost [Among the rest Fuller, in his Worthies of England, gave currency to this absurd 

 opinion. J. B.] Nay, all the bishops and churchmen of that church in my remembrance did 

 believe it, till Bishop Ward came, who would not be so imposed on ; and the like errour runnes from 

 generation to generation concerning Stoneheng, that the stones there are artificiall. But, to returne 

 to the pillars of this church, they are all reall marble, and shew the graine of the Sussex marble 

 (sc. the little cockles), from whence they were brought. [These pillars arc not made of Sussex 

 marble ; but of that kind which is brought from a part of Dorsetshire called the Isle of Purbeck. 

 J. B.] At every nine foot they are jointed with an ornament or band of iron or copper. This 

 quarrie hath been closed up and forgott time out of mind, and the last yeare, 1680, it was accident- 

 ally discovered by felling of an old oake ; and it now serves London. (From Mr. Bushnell, the 

 stone-cutter.) 



The old tradition is, that this church was built upon wooll-pach, and doubtlesse there is something 

 in it which is now forgott I shall endeavour to retrieve and unriddle it by comparison. There is 

 a tower at Rouen in Normandie called the Butter Tower ; for when it M'as built a toll was layd 

 upon all the butter that was brought to Rouen, for and towards the building of tliis tower ; as 

 now there is a [duty] layd upon every chaldron of coales towards the building of St. Paul's Church, 

 London : so hereafter they may say that that church was built upon New-Castle coales. In like 

 manner it might be that heretofore, when Salisbury Cathedral was building, which was long before 

 wooll was manufactured in England (the merchants of the staple sent it then in woolpacks beyond 

 sea, to Flanders, &c.), that an imposition might be putt on the Wiltshire wool-packs towards the 

 carrying on of this magnificent structure. There is a saying also that London Bridge was built 

 upon wooll-packs, upon the same account. 



The height of Our Lady steeple at Salisbury was never found so little as 400 foot, and never more 

 than 406 foot, by the observations of Thorn. Nash, surveyor of the workes of this church : but Colo- 

 nell John Wyndham did take the height more accurately, An . 1684, by a barometer: sc. the height 

 of the weather-dore of Our Lady Church steeple at Salisbury from the ground is 4280 inches. The 

 mercury subsided in that height -^ of an inch. He affirms that the height of the said steeple is 

 404 foot, which he hath tryed severall times ; and by the help of his barometer, which is accurately 

 made according to liis direction, he will with great facility take the height of any mountain : quod 

 N.B. [Col. Wyndham's measurement has been adopted as correct by most authors who have 

 written on the subject since. J. B.] 



Memorandum. About 1669 or 1670 Bishop Ward invited Sir Christopher Wren to Salisbury, 

 out of curiosity, to survey the church there, as to the steeple, architecture, &c. He was above a 

 weeke about it, and writt a sheet or a sheet and a halfe, an account of it, which he presented to the 

 bishop. I asked the bishop since for it, and he told me he had lent it, to whom he could not tell, 

 and had no copy of it 'Tis great pity the paines of so great an artist should be lost Sir Christo- 

 pher tells me he hath no copie of it neither. 



This year, 1691, Mr. Anth. Wood tells me, he hath gott a transcript of Sir Chr. Wren's paper; 

 which obtain, and insert here. I much doubted I should never have heard of it again. 



[ Soon after writing this passage Aubrey probably obtained a copy of Sir Cliristopher Wren's re- 

 port, which he has inserted in his original manuscript It is dated in 1669, and occupies eleven 

 folio pages. In The History and Antiquities of tJie Cat/iedral of Salisbury, &c. (1723, 8vo.), it is 

 printed, and described as " An Architectonical Account of this Cathedral," by " an eminent 

 gentleman." Part of the same report was printed in Wren's Parentalia (1750) ; and a short abstract 

 of it will also be found in Dodsworth's Salisbury Cathedral (written by the late Mr. Hatcher), 



