time, but after having lain in ruins for many years it underwent a
complete restoration towards the middle of last century, with the
result that much of the Gothic character is lost. The general plan of
the church with its panelled arcade and open clerestory is original,
but the northern side is modern, and compared with the old work hard
and lacking in feeling. The east window and the chapel now used as the
baptistery are both fine examples of perpendicular architecture and
worthy of careful study. The carved detail round the east window with
its playful treatment of flying buttresses, battlements, and pinnacles
is charming in its delicacy and proportion; and some of the detail is
almost as sharp as when it left the mason's hand four hundred years
ago. The chapel is, in its way, perfect, a complete vault of fan
tracery. The decayed condition of the broken canopies, once flanking
an altar, and which were the work of the same hands as the east
window, shows into what a dilapidated condition the church had fallen.
There was a corresponding chapel on the north side of the nave, but
this has been long demolished. The present font is an unsympathetic
copy of the old one, dating from the fifteenth century and still
preserved at Abbey Manor. Outside the tower on the north side, and set
on a level with the eye, should be noticed a carving of the
Crucifixion, much worn by weather and rough usage; but even yet may be
traced a master hand in the attitudes and proportion of the figures.




CHAPTER VI

THE TOWN