Stanton Lacy.
In the north nave wall is the remarkable doorway shewn in the accompanying sketch. Here we find the long-and-short work both upon the jambs and the semicircular head, which is surmounted by a peculiarly shaped cross, and guttæ, or drops, like those found in classic architecture. Though now blocked up, this doorway is still in a good state of preservation.
The church is cruciform in plan, its massive central tower grouping prettily amidst a setting of verdant foliage, when viewed from the south, with the porch standing prominently out, and some curious stone effigies of the de Lacys under low, cusped, mural arches.
Inside we find traces of various styles and dates, with scraps of ornamentation here and there, such as the alternate shields and rosettes upon the otherwise plain stone font, and the little carved figures that look down from brackets on a beam of the chancel roof.
A pretty legend tells how this church first came into existence. Milburga, the pious daughter of King Penda the Mercian, fleeing one day from the too pressing attentions of a certain Welsh princeling, managed to escape across the Corve, near where the church now stands, before her lover came up. Then the good lady vowed a vow that, if permitted to escape, she would build a church as a thank-offering; whereupon a mighty flood swept down the stream and effectually put a stop to all pursuit; and so it came to pass that the first church arose hard by upon the banks of Corve.
So much, then, for Stanton Lacy church. In other ways, also, the place seems in bygone times to have been of some importance, for Anderson tells us that 'Stanton Lacy was free from hundredal subjection, and its seigneural lords claimed to have a gallows, to hold pleas of bloodshed and hue and cry, and an assize of ale.'
Upon resuming the onward route we traverse a pleasant vale, the road following up the course of the Corve, with low, wooded hills on either hand, and the topmost crests of the Clees peering over their shoulders. Beyond the fine old timbered farmhouse of Langley the valley broadens out, and the good red soil of Corve Dale shews rich and ruddy where the ploughshare has lately passed, and ripening crops by the wayside add a zest to the general outlook.