By C. E. Pouting, F.8.A. 



175 



which is one having a stone panel with the sign of a tyler's hammer 

 (or, as local tradition has it, a butcher's cleaver) , and the initials 



and date j g 1656. Adjoining it is a house with two good two- 

 storied bays with stone mullions and a doorway with traces of 

 having had an oriel over it ; this house has fine chimney shafts set 

 diagonally on the base, and is inscribed with the same initials as 

 the other and with the date 1652. 1 



The Church of S. Margaret, Stratton St. Margaret. 



There is very little to be said about this Church. The Mr. 

 Browne quoted by Aubrey says of it :— 



"There is nothing very remarkable either ancient or moderne, only in the N. 

 wall of the Church is an old niche, but without any monument. In a windowe 

 on the South side, is the picture of St. Katharine with her wheele and another 

 in the first columne, which I suppose to be St. Margaret the Tutelar saint of this 

 Church." 



Since this was written the window pictures have disappeared, 

 yet the building bears evidence of having once possessed considerable 

 beauty and interest ; but I hardly know of any instance in which 

 such qualities have been so reduced to barrenness and poverty by 

 mutilation and misjudged restoration. Externally the Church has 

 lost its gable copings and whatever parapets it possessed, whilst 

 internally the old stonework has been scraped so that it is difficult 

 to distinguish it from a modern copy. 



The old parts which remain are the nave and north and south 

 aisles of four bays, with south porch. The nave and aisles date 

 from the latter part of the thirteenth century, but the north doorway 

 — now blooked up — is a Norman one, which was doubtless built in 

 again at this period. The nave arcades are rather unusual — the 

 columns are slender cylindrical ones, with richly-moulded caps, in 



1 I am indebted to Mr. Bennett, of Newport, Mon., for the loan of the charming 

 sketch of the latter house, here reproduced. 



