Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Carlisle Part 4

There is a memorial tablet to Robert Anderson, "the c.u.mberland Bard,"

1770-1833. Born in Carlisle, he had but little schooling, and at ten years of age he was earning wages as a.s.sistant to a calico printer; later, he was bound apprentice to a pattern-drawer in his native city.

He went to London to pursue his calling, and he seems to have been led to attempt to write poetry through hearing some imitation Scottish songs sung at Vauxhall. He published his first volume in 1798, and his c.u.mberland Ballads in 1805. His verses, not altogether dest.i.tute of real poetry, are valuable for the pictures they give of obsolete manners and customs of the district.

The #Choir.#--A low doorway in the eastern arch of the tower gives entrance to the choir. Some of the woodwork of the stalls fills the lower part of this arch, and the entrance has been placed towards the north, so as to open exactly on the centre of the choir. In point of beauty the choir compares favourably with any we possess in England, and the eye can rest upon it again and again with renewed satisfaction and delight. Its superb main arcade, with the boldly-designed and finely-carved capitals representing the twelve months of the year--unrivalled in this country; its handsome clerestory windows; its great east window (the pride of the cathedral); and, overhead, its richly-coloured roof, unique in shape, afford a combination not easily to be surpa.s.sed.

The choir is about 134 feet long, 34 feet 6 inches wide between the columns, and 72 feet 6 inches between the aisle walls.

The nave is not so wide by about 12 feet, and as the columns of both nave and choir on the south side are on the same line, the extra width is all on the north.

Looking westward, the view is marred by the tower arch not being in the centre of the west wall, in consequence of which there is an ugly s.p.a.ce of blank wall between the arch and the north choir aisle.

There are eight bays, averaging about 18 feet in width. Those at the end, however, east and west, are not so wide. At the east they probably suffer from the intrusion of the east wall, which is about six feet thick. The western bays may have lost the s.p.a.ce taken for the choir entrance. They have very acute arches, and at the west end rest on responds or half-piers against the tower walls. Those at the east end rest on brackets, and their mouldings lose themselves in the wall on each side of the great window.

The presbytery is reached by two steps from the choir, and the last bay but one (in which the altar stands) is raised three steps above the presbytery.

The main arcade practically dates from after the terrible fire in 1292.

The arches escaped, and are splendid specimens of Early English, "of the Pointed style in all the purity of its first period." They were underbuilt with Early Decorated piers, while the capitals were finished at the same time as the triforium and clerestory (Late Decorated) 1350-1400.

The piers are not equal in diameter to those of the nave; they measure but five feet and a quarter. Each consists of eight cl.u.s.tered pillars of red sandstone. The four facing the cardinal points of the compa.s.s are larger than the intermediate ones, which are filleted. The base moulding is very deep and hollow. These piers support the Early English arches, with dog-tooth ornament large in the interior, small in the exterior.

Altogether, these fine arches give a very pleasing impression of lightness and grace, and make us feel "the fascination of the Pointed style."

At the junctions of the arches are small grotesque heads very well executed. On the north side, where the presbytery begins, is a queen's head, and on the opposite side a figure with a dog's head.

There are altogether fourteen complete, and two half piers, the capitals of which are carved with foliage alone, or with the addition of winged monsters, birds, beasts, and human figures. Twelve of them represent the domestic and agricultural occupations of the months. The first capital on the south side (east end) shows a creature with a man's head, wings, and a tail terminating in the head of a serpent, which bites the monster on the temple. January is symbolised on the next one, and the series continues westward, then crosses over, and proceeds from west to east on the north side, finishing at the last pier but one.

_January._--A figure in a loose-fitting tunic, sitting down. He has three faces--two in profile--and is drinking with the right and left mouths. At his feet is a third vessel.

_February._--A man in a loose tunic, and head closely wrapped up. He appears to suffer from cold, for his face is woe-begone, and he is sitting over a fire, holding out one boot upside down as if to drain water from it, while he lifts up one foot to catch the heat. The fireplace is very skilfully carved.

_March._--A man, hood on head, digging with a spade at the foot of a leafless tree. Other decorations are, a squirrel, a bear with hands, birds, and a beast's body with a mitred head.

_April._--A bare-legged man with his head tied up, pruning a tree. On this capital are also two figures half-human, half-b.e.s.t.i.a.l, clasping each other round the neck.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ONE BAY OF THE CHOIR.]

_May._--A woman in a long gown holding in each hand a bunch of foliage, which she offers to a young man clad in a tunic, with his hood thrown back. In addition there are three winged beasts with human heads, one mitred.

_June._--A horseman, bareheaded, holding on his right hand a hawk, and bearing a branch of roses in his left hand. There are also some half-human figures, and men playing musical instruments. This capital is more elaborately carved than any of the others.

_July._--A man mowing. In addition there are owls carrying mice in their mouths.

_August._--A man working in a wheat-field. He wears a conical hat, and grasps a crutch with one hand while he holds a pruning hook in the other.

_September._--A man reaping with a sickle.

_October._--A man whose head is tied with a handkerchief; he is engaged in cutting grapes. A fox carrying off a goose is also vigorously carved on this capital.

_November._--A man sowing grain from a basket. There is a stag on his right and a horse on his left hand.

_December._--A man wearing a loose tunic, who is about to fell an ox which another man holds by the horns. In addition there is a man tending swine.

The last capital shows several heads, and a man sitting on a tree stump.

In each bay of the #Triforium# there are three arches with curvilinear tracery. The princ.i.p.al mullions have octagonal bases. On account of their reduced width, the extreme eastern and western bays have only two arches.

The courses of stone above the base of the triforium are not by any means so smooth and well-proportioned as those beneath. The workmen do not seem to have been actuated by the spirit of those builders "in the elder days of Art" who

"... wrought with greatest care Each minute and unseen part, For the G.o.ds see everywhere."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CHOIR, LOOKING EAST, IN 1840. From Billings.]

The #Clerestory# consists of two planes. Each compartment on the face of the choir wall has three high-pitched arches, the middle one being higher than those at the side, and more than twice as wide in the opening. The eastern bay has only the central arch, while the western bay is blank.

The base is decorated with a low parapet pierced with quatrefoils, four in the centre, and two in each side opening. On the south, however, the quatrefoil decoration is slightly different. There are only three quatrefoils in the centre and two smaller ones on each side. This parapet is in great part a restoration, the original having been almost entirely removed, in the vain hope of admitting more light to the lower part of the choir.

In the other plane the windows are in triplets, three lights in the central and single lights on either side, decorated with flamboyant tracery.

The eastern bay has no side lights.

Although the windows seem to be all different, there are but six varieties, distributed as follows:

On the north side beginning at the east the design of the first window is not repeated. That of the next window occurs in the second window on the south side. The third and fifth are alike. The sixth and the last are like the fourth. The design of the seventh window does not occur again.

On the south side one new pattern appears in three windows--the first, fourth, and sixth from the east. The second is like the window opposite, and the third, fifth, and seventh are like the third on the north side.

Of all the windows the second from the east is the most beautiful.

Before 1764 they were filled with stained gla.s.s of which some remains are still to be seen. The trefoil heads above the mullions have a brown border with the insertion in some cases of a yellow diamond ornament, and in others of a crown.

The #Roof#--This unique specimen of a waggon-headed ceiling, semi-circular in all its parts, is of oak. Bishop Welton began its construction about 1350. A plaster ceiling, put up in the year 1764, hid this fine timber roof until its removal in 1856. It was then found that enough remained of the original to allow a faithful restoration to be made. But the scheme of colouring--red and green upon white--was not copied. In its stead Owen Jones suggested another--a background of blue plentifully ornamented with golden stars.

The _Sat.u.r.day Review_ is responsible for the statement--for the truth of which, however, it does not vouch--"that on the first occasion when Dean Close found himself beneath the roof, then glowing in all the brilliancy of modern painting and gilding, in semblance of 'the spangled firmament on high,' he solemnly e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, 'Oh my stars!'"

At the triforium base foliated brackets support vaulting shafts of three cl.u.s.tered columns. At the point of contact with the base of the quatrefoil parapet they are ornamented with rings, and their capitals are foliated, but not so naturally as the capitals below. Great semi-circular rafters spring from the capitals and cross the choir.

Smaller rafters start from the cornice of the clerestory. These are intersected in the centre of the ceiling by a longitudinal beam. Small moulded ribs divide the s.p.a.ce between each great rafter and the longitudinal beam into sixteen panels. The intersections are decorated with carved bosses.

#Hammer-beams.#--From the foot of three of the princ.i.p.al ribs hammer-beams project. They seem to indicate an intention on the part of the builders to cover the choir with an open-timber roof like that of the Great Hall at Westminster. But having decided on the waggon-headed roof, they did not trouble to remove these beams. Wall pieces and curved struts now connect them with the vaulting shafts, and they have been decorated with "carved angels ever eager-eyed, with hair blown back and wings put cross-wise on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s."

More than one hundred carved figures ornament the cornice, and the following texts in black-letter appear above them:--

NORTH SIDE.--Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of the Lord.

(Eccles. v. 1.)

Lift up your hands in the sanctuary and bless the Lord. (Ps. cx.x.xiv. 2.)

Praise ye the name of the Lord. (Ps. cx.x.xv. 1.)

Praise G.o.d in His sanctuary, (Ps. cl. 1.)