Decorated work, but they are Perpendicular. There are also a few good Perpendicular stalls. The east wall and the roof are modern." So many of our party were struck with the aspect of these beautiful ruins, that many a pencil was in requisition. Not the least industrious among the draughtsmen was a noble Marquess, who is second to no archæological pilgrim in zeal or in taste; whilst a Very Reverend dignitary was scrutinising, after his wont, the nature of the materials, and others were intently watching an excavation made on the ruined site of the south aisle. On the adjoining farm resides a farmer named England, a noble specimen of the intelligent agriculturists of the vicinity of Holkham, and a truly English entertainment did he offer to his antiquarian visitors. We now approached the main object of our pilgrimage. But we first stopped at the church of Old Walsingham, or Great Walsingham as it is sometimes called, though the little town eventually became the greater. We again refer to Mr. Parker's pamphlet for architectural details; remarking only that this church is distinguished by some very beautiful decorated tracery in the windows, and by some nice open seats, adorned with little statuettes of the apostles, &c. An inscription reads from seat to seat, intelligible for some distance, but the latter part baffled us: OR P IMA J' li W WR arch and gable over the east window; but the window itself is destroyed. In the gable is a small round window, with flowing tracery, set in the middle of a very thick wall." This striking feature of the Walsingham ruins will be found represented in most of the engraved views of the place, of which the two best are that by Coney in the New Monasticon, and that in Britton's Architectural Antiquities. Mr. Parker has followed former writers in calling this a part of the Chapel of our Lady; but we think it must have belonged to the larger Priory Church. The dimensions of the several churches at Walsingham are preserved by William of Worcestre. The writer of the description in Mr. Britton's work charges Parkin (the continuator of Blomefield) with having confounded the New Work and the Chapel of the Virgin. This he has not exactly done: and, if he had, he would have been right. Parkin incorrectly conjectured that the New Work was "probably at the east end of the choir," instead of its being a separate building as Erasmus tells us. But Mr. Britton's author has himself gone wider astray; for he has confused the church of the Franciscan Friars of Walsingham with that of the Canons: and this although Worcestre had inserted the dimensions of the church of Scottow between the two. Worcestre says, the length of the New Work of Walsingham was sixteen yards, its interior width ten yards. The length of the chapel of the blessed We now entered the streets of Virgin (that is, the wooden chapel) WALSINGHAM, which presented a very was seven yards, thirty inches; its different aspect to their appearance at width four yards, ten inches. The the visit of Erasmus. The occupation length of the whole church of Walsingof the place had been gone for more ham from the end of the chancel was than three centuries. There were no 136 of Worcestre's paces, its breadth busy hostelries, no throng of strangers, 36 paces; the length of the nave from except our own company; the town the west door to the tower in the was now a quiet village; the glitter- middle of the church 70 paces; the ing shrine was levelled to the dust, and square of the tower 16 paces; the its site restored to the hands of na- breadth of the nave without the two ture. ailes 16 paces. The length of the quire was 50 paces, and the breadth 17. "The remains of this once celebrated place (remarks Mr. Parker) are_now very small. Of the Chapel of our Lady we have only part of a fine Perpendicular east front, consisting of two stair-turrets covered with panelling of flint and stone, with rich niches, &c. and fine buttresses connected by the GENT. MAG. VOL. XXVIII. The cloister was square, 54 paces in each walk: the length of the chapter-house 20 paces, its breadth 10 paces, but the length of the entrance of the chapter-house from the cloister was 10 paces, so in all it was 30 paces. Few traces of these buildings now 2 M exist. The ruins were more considerable when described by Parkin in Blomefield's Norfolk, and when a view of them was published in the Vetusta Monumenta in 1720; but they have given way to trees, and walks, a trim lawn, and all the agremens of modern pleasure grounds. Some ruins close adjoining to the modern mansion are a portion of the refectory: they consist of a range of four early Decorated windows, with the staircase to a pulpit in the wall. There is also a doorway and vault of another apartment. In the contrary direction (west of the church) are the Holy Wells, lined with plain ashlar stone; on one side of them is a square bath (perhaps altered since the days of the canons); on the other, a small early-English doorway. The family of Lee Warner have owned this beautiful estate from the time of Dr. Warner, Bishop of Rochester, by whom it was purchased in 1766; and before we quit its embowered shades we must make our acknowledgments for the liberal hospitality with which the archæological pilgrims (who, like their prototypes, seemed to be subsistent on those whom they visited), were received by the present Mr. Lee Warner in his dining room. His son the Rev. James Lee Warner afterwards conducted them over the parish church of St. Mary, a spacious Perpendicular structure, containing the beautiful font already mentioned, and a grand Elizabethan monument to Sir Henry_Sidney, a cousin of the Sidneys of Penshurst, whose father was the grantee of the priory at its dissolution. There is here a funeral slab (now bare) in the pavement, of the largest dimensions, namely 11 feet 4 inc. long by four feet wide; and here, loose upon the floor, we were shewn one of those external tombs or massive coffin lids, which have not often been preserved. It was brought from the churchyard, and has no other figures but this shield of arms on each side, A chevron charged with three roses between two roses in chief and a holly-leaf in base. We also visited the ruins of the Franciscan Friary of Walsingham. They consist of flint walls of no very early date nor very interesting character, inclosing a garden; and appear to have been chiefly, as at present, the domestic buildings of the establish ment. Our conductors now sounded the signal for our return, and we were soon pursuing our flight as rapidly as we came. But suddenly they cried halt, as we came to a cross road, which led to the little Chapel of Houghton in the Dale. A kind of foot race now took place, for it was desired that we should lose no time. The labour was rewarded by the sight of a little architectural gem, of which we offer the opposite view. Of the history of this building nothing has been ascertained. It is unnoticed in the History of Norfolk; unless it be unconsciously in the following line: "In 1509 a legacy was given to the hermite of St. Catharine in this town." The architecture is styled "good Decorated" by Mr. Parker, and he notices the "fine east window." To our eyes it is a model of elegance, and a model worthy of imitation. The battlemented turrets, with angles facing the spectator, are paralleled in the later part of the front of Croyland abbey church. The chapel itself is used as an outhouse or barn; a cottage is built behind, against the east window. The last object of our attention was the Hall of East Bursham,—that hall, it will be remembered, from which Henry VIII. took his pilgrimage barefoot to Walsingham. It has been often noticed, but it is not the less interesting, as one of the finest existing specimens of fictile architecture. Those who do not understand us will do so by referring to the plates given in the IVth volume of Vetusta Monumenta, from drawings by Mr. John Ady Repton, F.S.A. There are also two views in Britton's Architectural Antiquities, and others, we believe, in one of Mr. Pugin's works. It will be seen that it appears highly enriched with sculpture, but this is produced by the repetition of moulded tiles, or bricks, of which there is a great variety. In the gatehouse even the shields of arms, the royal supporters, and two great statues of armed guards or porters, are produced (perhaps partially carved?) in brick. The only exceptions are said to be the arms of Henry VII. on the porch of the house, the windows over it, which are carved in chalk-stone, and also the jambs of the arch of the gatehouse. The property came to the family of Fermor about the 11th Hen. VII. The house seems to have been erected in that reign; the arms of the monarch supported by a dragon and greyhound being over the door. The magnificent gatehouse was added in the following reign. It has outside, in a very large panel, the royal arms, supported by a dragon and lion, flanking which are shields of Fermor, in one case impaling Argent, three pallets gules; in the other a lion rampant These coats (the tinctures of which are supplied from stained glass formerly in the windows of the mansion, and which was removed by Sir John Fenn the antiquary to his house at East Dereham,) are supposed to have been those of the two wives of Sir Henry Fermor the founder; who first married Margaret, widow of Sir John Wode, Speaker of the House of Commons; and secondly Winefred, widow of Henry Dynne, of Heydon, and daughter of Thomas Cawse, al derman of Norwich. Sir Henry was sheriff of Norfolk in 24 Henry VIII. The coat of the rampant lion is attributed by Parkin to Stapleton, but it would seem to have belonged to Cawse. This lion and the saltire out of the shield of Fermor form an ornamental frieze running round the house, showing that it was built during Sir Henry's second marriage. On the inner front of the Gatehouse (that which faces the mansion) are other shields, one of them bearing the arms of Fermor alone differenced by a label, and the other the same impaling Knevett, quarterly of six coats. These therefore belong to Henry the heir apparent of Sir William, who married Katharine, daughter of Sir Thomas Knevett. He was afterwards knighted, and served sheriff of Norfolk in 32 Hen. VIII. The arms of this family of Fermor were, Argent, on a saltire azure between four lion's heads erased gules, a martlet or and four bezants, a chief of the second |