BLOXHAM.—Altitudes: high town 400, low town 310; population, 1340; 3 miles south-west of Banbury. The village stands on the red rock of the middle Lias which bears a capping of clay on the high lands: the lower levels are of the usual marls. Field ways from Banbury run from the end of West Bar, and by a less direct but pretty route across the farm field on the Oxford Road. The buildings of All Saint’s School, founded about half a century since, are at the entrance of the village. The school has earned good place by the excellence of its tuition. The brook cutting through the town from west to east and the many side streets and jetways add a pleasant appearance to the many good homesteads and gardens.

Bloxham Church (St. Mary’s) is one of the most perfect specimens of Gothic architecture in the county of Oxford. Part of the materials of the chancel, the mouldings, walls, and buttresses are Norman, though the church is mainly of the 14th century, about which time it was re-built. The west doorway is surmounted by figures of the apostles, with a canopied representation of the Saviour at the apex; on the left and right are sculptured representations also of the rising of the dead and the punishment of the lost. The spire, which is 195 feet high, presents a particularly graceful outline. The square tower is crowned by an octagon middle stage, rising above which is a balcony, projected on corbels from the face of the tower. Within the balcony the spire springs, and from the four angles of the square tower stage slender turrets, terminating in spirets, are carried up through the middle stage to above the springing of the spire. The geometric tracery of the windows of the west front, and the grotesque cornice carvings on the north side, are exceedingly good work. The decorated oak chancel screen is again a noticeable feature, and its restoration has brought to light the remains of paintings on its lower panels. There are also remains of a mural painting of St. Christopher on the north wall, and of others on the wall above the rood loft. There are large perpendicular windows in the Milcombe chapelry, on the south side of the church, and in its north aisle is a beautiful decorated column, having an enriched capital, with sculptures of mailed figures and heads of saints. A good Gothic font, the carved work of the hoods of the north and south doorways, and a handsome modern reredos and other portions of the chancel can here be mentioned only.

KING’S SUTTON.—Altitudes: 385-282; population, 1037; 5 miles south-east of Banbury. It is built on the red rock and marls of the Middle Lias. The old life is represented in the handsome manor house, by tradition also connected with the wanderings of King Charles I., and a good house on the south side of the green said to have been a prebendary manor. The town was in the eighteenth century, with the adjoining village of Astrop, of resort for the use of its mineral waters. The chalybeate spring (St. Rumbald’s well) is in Sir Wm. Brown’s park at Astrop. The well basin and the carved stone hood stand as in old time together with the Well House. The Well House, by the work of the doorway and windows, would appear to be of earlier date than the well hood, but the spring is at present conveyed from its source to a replica of the well head by the road side. The associated buildings have long since disappeared, but the pleasant walk up the old road past the Well Close and the Long Spinney remain. Near the railway station at King’s Sutton is the other mineral spring charged with sulphate of soda, yet in common use by the people of the homesteads near. Celia Fiennes in her diary, “Through England on a side saddle,” writes of her journey: “Thence I went to Astrop where is a Steele water much ffrequented by ye Gentry, it has some mixture of Allum so is not so strong as Tunbridge. There is a ffine Gravell Walke that is between 2 high cutt hedges where is a Roome for the Musick and a Roome for ye Company besides ye Private Walkes. The well runnes very quick, they are not curious in keeping it, neither is there any bason for the spring to run out off, only a dirty well full of moss’s which is all changed yellow by the water. There are Lodgings about for ye Company at a little place called Sutton.” Halliwell gives the following rhyme in his nursery series:

“King’s Sutton is a pretty town,
And lies all in a valley:
There is a pretty ring of bells,
Besides a bowling-alley:
Wine and liquor in good store,
Pretty maidens plenty:
Can a man desire more?
There aint such a town in twenty.”

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KING’S SUTTON CHURCH.

King’s Sutton Church is dedicated to St. Peter. The chancel is principally Norman work, and has along each side a continuous stone bench under an arcade, exhibiting the characteristic zigzag moulding. The piers and arches on the south side of the nave are also Norman; those on the north side are early English. The rood loft turret and staircase remain in the south abutment of the chancel arch. The appearance of the tower from the north and south-west is very beautiful. Crocketed pinnacles, connected by flying buttresses with the face of the spire, are arranged around the junction of the spire and tower, and the spire itself is boldly crocketed from base to apex. It is of the early perpendicular period. The deeply recessed doorway of the western entrance may be of somewhat later date, and contains the original west door. Separating the chancel from the nave is a beautiful oak screen, which was designed by Sir Gilbert Scott.

A well-known local rhyme, referring to the spires of the three famous churches of the neighbourhood, says:—

Bloxham for length,
Adderbury for strength,
And King’s Sutton for beauty.