336 



IJote an % Cjjmjj f) late of IJortJj Milk 



By the Eev. E. H. Goddaed. 

 *#* For Notes on Church Plate in South Wilts see vol. xxi., p. 355. 



HE study of Church plate as one of the minor branches of 

 ecclesiastical art is attracting a good deal of attention at 

 the present time, though until the last few years it has been 

 singularly neglected. Whilst ecclesiastical architecture and ecclesi- 

 astical antiquities of all kinds have been long the object of diligent 

 and enthusiastic enquiry, few have cared to enquire what is the date 

 or fashion or history of the plate belonging to the Churches whose 

 other points of interest have been so generally investigated. 



If the result of this want of interest in and knowledge of the 

 ancient plate of our Churches had been that it was allowed to 

 remain in safe obscurity there would, perhaps, have been little 

 cause to regret it — but unhappily the obscurity which has sur- 

 rounded it has by no means conduced to its safety. It is probably 

 not too much to say that more interesting Church plate has been 

 got rid of by its natural guardians, the clergy and churchwardens, 

 during the last fifty or sixty years, simply from want of knowledge 

 of its value and interest, than the accidents of time have destroyed 

 or the ingenuity of the dishonest has appropriated during the last 

 two centuries. 



A Church is being " restored." The Church plate is old — it has 

 worn thin and is a good deal dented and battered. It really does 

 not agree at all with the delightful freshness of the newly-scraped 

 stonework, or the spick and span pitch pine seats. Besides, its 

 shape — Elizabethan, perhaps, or that of the seventeenth century — 

 is by no means fashionable — it may even be considered " objection- 

 able.'" A new set on the approved model would be far more suitable. 

 So the silversmith is asked whether he will take the old plate in 

 part exchange for a new set, and he kindly consents to do so ; but 



