Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Lichfield / A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Espicopal See

by A. B. Clifton

The Library is immediately above the chapter-house, and is of the same octagonal shape. The arrangements also are similar, but the room is less lofty, the carvings less elaborate, and there is no reading. Otherwise, we find the same central pillar, from which similar vaulting ribs spring, with corbels in the walls to receive them. It is not known for what purpose this room was originally intended, but certainly, until recent years, it was not used as a library. The old library, of which there are pictures by Hollar and King, stood to the north of the north transept in the close, or, as it is recorded in the Capitular Acts, vol. 3, "ex parte boreali in cimeterio." Dean Heywood gave £40 to build the library, and though it was not begun in his time, it was completed in the time of his successor, Dean Yotton, who also subscribed to its erection. This was at about the commencement of the sixteenth century, and the building remained until the middle of the eighteenth, when it was demolished.

The extent of the library has been increased by opening a doorway into the room above the vestibule. This room, it has recently been decided, was the old chapel of St. Peter. Though an upstairs chapel was not usual, yet it is not by any means unknown, and chapels were even sometimes to be found in the rood lofts of cathedrals. No trace can be found of the fresco, mentioned by Stukeley, of "St. Peter crucified with his head downwards, and two other apostles, etc." He tells us that the chapel was in his time used as a place for storing scaffolding and ladders, and that here was placed the mutilated remains of St. Chad's tomb.

The place still shows signs of its ill-usage, little having been done to repair the ravages of the Civil War. The vaulting is much broken, and the walls cracked: these facts strengthen the belief in the tradition that it was on this building, together with the choir, that the great central tower fell during the siege by the soldiers of the Parliament.

The library has had many generous donations of books at various times. Under the will of Frances, Duchess of Somerset, the cathedral received the library of her late husband, the Duke, who succeeded his grandfather as Earl of Hertford, and was restored to the family dukedom at the Restoration. The duchess was the daughter of the Earl of Essex who was the favourite of Queen Elizabeth, and whom she afterwards had beheaded. These books numbered about one thousand, and included many rare old Black-Letter chronicles and histories printed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Many others have contributed to the library, amongst whom are Archdeacon Davies, 1763; William Smallbroke, 1771; Canon Lamb, 1770; Richard Hurd, 1777; Bishop Cornwallis, 1783; Rev. Henry White, 1786; Dr Pegge, the well-known antiquary, who, amongst other things, wrote an account of the life of Bishop Weseham, and who left the library, by his will, one hundred books out of his own library; Andrew Newton, who left his books to the cathedral, and built the college in the close for the widows and orphans of the clergy, besides spending large sums on educational purposes; and Sir Brooke Boothby, 1815, who gave the "History of the Abbey of Herckenrode," referred to in the account of the glass now in the Lady Chapel. There have been besides many recent benefactions, including a valuable set of drawings, by herself, of most of the churches in the county of Stafford, left by Mrs Moore, the widow of the Archdeacon of Stafford. There is also in the library a fine old picture of the Duchess of Somerset, as well as an engraving from Sir Joshua Reynolds' picture of Dr Johnson.

Among the most valuable manuscripts and books in the library are the "Gospels of St. Chad," of which more immediately; a fine folio manuscript, on vellum, of Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales," but without the doubtful Ploughman's Tale; the initial letters, especially those at the commencement of each tale, being richly coloured and gilt; the "Valor Ecclesiasticus of Pope Nicholas IV."—this is an account taken of the value of ecclesiastical property in the time of Edward I., from which the tithe granted to the Pope could be ascertained.

Other notable volumes are, "Dives and Pauper," a MS. treatise on the Decalogue—this treatise was one of the earliest books printed in England; "Orders generally to be observed of the whole household of the prince his highness," a large folio, marked with the sign-manual of King Charles I. at every ordinance; and a collection of recipes by Sir John Floyer, physician to Charles II. There is also a volume of MSS. already often referred to, superscribed, "Cantaria Sancti Blasii; Ordinatio Majistri Thomoe Heywood decani Eccles. Lich de et super Cantaria Jesu et Sancta Anne in parte boreai eccles. Lich et de pensione Capellani ibidem perpetuo celebaturi et aliis articulis, etc." Besides these, there are many rare Bibles:—Cranmer's Bible, 1540; the "Breeches" Bible; the "Vinegar" Bible, and many others.

But to many the most interesting volume in the library will be a copy of South's Sermons, published in 1694. It belonged to Dr Johnson, and was used by him in the compilation of his Dictionary. His method, apparently, was to put a letter in the margin opposite the word whose particular use here he intended to quote; and it is interesting, Sermons in hand, to test his method with the dictionary. On one page a "K" in the margin is opposite the word "Key." In the dictionary will be found under "Key" the expected quotation from South, "that every man should keep the key of his own breast."

The most valuable book in the library is the Textus S. Ceddæ, generally known as "St. Chad's Gospels." This is written on vellum, and contains the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Mark, and a small portion of the Gospel of St. Luke. It is undoubtedly an Irish MS., probably about the end of the seventh century. There is a page in the book which, with its tesselated work enclosing a cross, recalls to antiquarians similar work in the famous Irish Book of Kells, and in the Gospels of St. Columba which are preserved at Dublin. The connection of an Irish MS. with St. Chad is not difficult of explanation, since, after being taught by St. Aidan at Lindisfarne, he is supposed to have gone, as so many other earnest priests did at the time, to Ireland, to one of the noted monasteries there. The MS. is in Latin, and, with many remarkable variations, follows closely the Codex Amiatinus of St Jerome. But its marginal notes are not the least interesting part of the book; from these, which are sometimes in Celtic and Anglo-Saxon, and sometimes in Latin, we learn something of its history, which is remarkable. The cathedral of Llandaff seems to have acquired it indirectly in exchange for a horse, and there is a note in Celtic, "underneath the record of this transaction, which is witnessed by Aidan; whether or no this is the Northumbrian bishop is not known." Another entry, on the page devoted to a picture of St. Luke, shows that the MS. was still at Llandaff at the end of the ninth century; but on the first page of all is a faint but legible signature which reads "Kynsy" or "Wynsy Praesul", both names of bishops of Lichfield at the end of the tenth century, so that it had probably arrived at its present home not so far short of a thousand years ago. There are other notes connecting it with Lichfield. All these have been printed many times in the pages of learned publications. It owes its escape at the time of the Civil War to the vigilance of William Higgins, Archdeacon of Derby, who was precentor of the cathedral. He abstracted it and kept it until the troubles were over. It now lies in a glass case in the library, side by side with the beautiful "Canterbury Tales." So marvellous are some of the decorations, that it is no wonder that, in an age more faithful than ours, popular belief declared some of them to be "the work of angels."