To the left of the chief entrance is St. Dunstan’s Chapel, sometimes called the North-West, or Morning Chapel. It is richly decorated and contains a Salviati mosaic representing the Three Marys at the Sepulchre.
In the south aisle, opposite, is the Chapel of the Order of St. Michael and St. George, a Colonial order, conferred only for distinguished services beyond the seas. The Sovereign’s stall is at the western end; and on each side of it is that of the Grand Master (Prince of Wales) and the Duke of Connaught. From these diverge the oak stalls of the Knights Grand Cross of the Order, over each of which is suspended a silk banner with his personal arms. The richly-gilded ceiling is decorated with the arms of the King, the Prince of Wales, the late Duke of Cambridge and Sir Robert Herbert, who were responsible for the scheme. In the south window is a kneeling figure of the donor, Sir Walter Wilkin. The chapel was dedicated on June 13, 1906, in the presence of King Edward, the Prince of Wales and many Knights.
Above this chapel the Library is situated to which the curious Geometrical Staircase leads. This is circular, of a diameter of twenty-five feet, and each step is supported by the one below it. This is in the South tower.
St. Paul’s is second only to Westminster Abbey in the number of Monuments to the celebrated dead. Immediately within the west door stands a gilt monument to the officers and men of the Coldstream Guards who fell in the South African War. In the north aisle of the nave we come to monuments of General Gordon, a recumbent figure on a sarcophagus by Sir Joseph Edgar Boehm; Wellington, by Alfred Stevens; Lord Leighton; Lord Melbourne. In the north transept Sir Joshua Reynolds, by Flaxman; and Admiral Rodney, by Rossi; in the south transept Nelson, by Flaxman, who thus describes his work:
“Britannia is directing the young seamen’s attention to their great example, Lord Nelson. On the die of the pedestal which supports the hero’s statue are figures in basso-relievo, representing the Frozen Ocean, the German Ocean, the Nile, and the Mediterranean. On the cornice and in the frieze of laurel wreaths are the words, Copenhagen, Nile, Trafalgar. The British Lion sits on the plinth, guarding the pedestal.”
In the South transept: Lord Cornwallis, by Rossi, commemorates his Indian career. He appears in his mantle of the Garter, with an allegorical female figure of the Eastern Empire and a male figure representing an Indian river.
At the east side of the south transept is the entrance to the Crypt, sombre, dimly lighted and sepulchral. In the centre a circle of pillars surrounds the tomb of Nelson, whose remains lie in a plain tomb under a black-and-white sarcophagus (Sixteenth Century), which was made for Cardinal Wolsey’s monument and confiscated with his other possessions. Through a grating here the dim light from the far-away dome sifts down upon England’s great admiral. To the left of Nelson lies Collingwood, and, to the right, Cornwallis. Not far away we come to the simple tomb of Arthur, Duke of Wellington, a great block of porphyry on a granite base.
In the east recess of the south-choir-aisle is the grave of Sir Christopher Wren marked by a plain black marble slab. On the wall is the celebrated inscription: “Lector, si monumentum requiris, circumspice.” Then comes Painters’ Corner with Sir Joshua Reynolds, Benjamin West, Lawrence, Turner, Landseer, Millais, Leighton and others.
We have yet to make the ascent of St. Paul’s. The way is long and grows more tedious and steeper as we ascend. It will be well to stop at the Stone Gallery (200 feet high), for although the Golden Gallery, at the top of the dome, is a hundred feet higher, the view is not so distinct. The Stone Gallery is safe, and delightful views are to be had in the spaces between the balustrades. The view extends from Harrow on the north-west, to the Crystal Palace, Shooter’s Hill and Greenwich Observatory in the south-east. The tourist will, however, take more pleasure in looking over the territory covered by the Great Fire of 1666 and all the Wren steeples (there are thirty at least) that rise through the mists below us. Here we again think of Sir Christopher’s genius and remember again his epitaph: “If you wish an estimate of his genius, look around.” It is interesting, too, to trace Fleet Street, Cheapside and the other great arteries of traffic and travel, to look at the Thames and understand its peculiar windings and to view from this height the grim old Tower half a mile below London Bridge—the oldest building in England and the most romantic. Without the Tower of London and without St. Paul’s what would London be? Westminster Abbey is the church of the King and the government; St. Paul’s is the church of the citizens, the church that, as we have seen, has been a central point for the stirring events of the City of London. Whenever the traveller thinks of London, he sees its majestic dome rising above London Bridge or Ludgate Hill, or Cheapside, purple in the mists, golden in the sunlight—the emblem of London’s antiquity and its present immensity.
“I always endow St. Paul’s Cathedral with life and human nature and sympathy. I cannot well explain what early associations and chances have made St. Paul’s a more living influence to me than the much grander and nobler Westminster Abbey; but so it is and I feel as if St. Paul’s were a living influence over all that region of the metropolis which is surveyed by its ball and its cross. But in another sense it is unlike other buildings to me. It is not one long-lived, long-living cathedral; it is rather a generation of cathedrals. Westminster Abbey takes us back in unbroken continuity of history to the earlier days of England’s budding greatness. Westminster itself, nevertheless, was only called so in the beginning to distinguish it from the earlier East Minster, which was either the existing St. Paul’s or a cathedral standing on Tower Hill. It would seem, then, that St. Paul’s rather than Westminster Abbey ought to represent the gradual movement of English history and English thought and the growth of the metropolis. But observe the difference. Westminster Abbey has always since its erection been sedately watching over London. It has been reconstructed here and there, of course—repaired and renovated, touched up and decorated with new adornments in tribute of grateful piety; but it is ever and always the same Westminster Abbey. Now observe the history of St. Paul’s. St. Paul’s has fallen and died time after time, and been revived and restored. It has risen new upon new generations. It has perished in flame again and again, like a succession of martyrs, and has come up afresh and with new spangled ore flamed in the forehead of the morning sky. St. Paul’s is a religious or ecclesiastical dynasty rather than a cathedral. It has been destroyed so often and risen again in so many different shapes, that it seems as if each succeeding age were putting its fresh stamp and mint-mark on it and so commending it to the special service of each new generation.”—(J. McC.)