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[Illustration: Kirkstall Abbey.]


The first page or frontispiece embellisment of the present Number of the
MIRROR illustrates one of the most recent triumphs of art; and the above
vignette is a fragment of the monastic splendour of the twelfth century.
Truly this is the _bathos_ of art. The plaster and paint of the
_Colosseum_ are scarcely dry, and half the work is in embryo;
whilst _Kirkstall_ is crumbling to dust, and reading us "sermons in
stones:" we may well say,

"Look here, upon this picture, and on this."


Kirkstall Abbey is situated a short distance from Leeds, in the West
Riding of Yorkshire. Its situation is one of the most picturesque that
the children of romance can wish for, being in a beautiful vale, watered
by the river Aire. It was of the Cistercian order, founded by Henry de
Lacy in 1157, and valued at the dissolution at 329l. 2s. 11d. Its rents
are now worth 10,253l. 6s. 8d. The gateway has been walled up, and
converted into a farm-house. The abbot's palace was on the south; the
roof of the aisle is entirely gone; places for six altars, three on each
side the high altar, appear by distinct chapels, but to what saints
dedicated is not easy, at this time, to discover. The length of the
church, from east to west, was 224 feet; the transept, from north to
south, 118 feet. The tower, built in the time of Henry VIII., remained
entire till January 27, 1779, when three sides of it were blown down,
and only the fourth remains. Part of an arched chamber, leading to the