200.—Hawking-tower, Althorp Park, Northamptonshire (1612-13).
At Scole, in Norfolk, a very curious survival of the old classical motifs was to be seen, till the end of last century, in a great sign erected in 1655 for the "White Hart" Inn (Fig. [201]). The hart itself lies couchant on the middle of the main beam, beneath a pediment supported by Justice and Plenty, two qualities for which the host may be excused if he considered his house noted. On one side of the centre-piece stands Actæon, about to be torn in pieces by his dogs, to whom he is supposed to be addressing the Latin legend beneath him: "I am Actæon, know your master." On the other side stands Diana, and beyond her is Time, about to devour his child, beginning with its hand; beneath him his identity is made quite clear by the sentence "Tempus edax rerum." In the frieze below the beam are two figures representing (probably) Bacchus and Gambrinus, supported on either side by coats of arms. Angels and lions hold further coats of arms. There is Cerberus with his three heads, while numerous bunches of grapes, men blowing horns, and other devices suitable to the purpose occupy the rest of the space. The whole design might have come from the fertile brain of George Gascoigne, who was responsible for most of the entertainments at Kenilworth when Queen Elizabeth paid her celebrated visit there nearly eighty years before this sign was erected. The fundamental idea which underlay all design of the time was to combine strong classic feeling with picturesqueness of expression.
201.—The Sign of the "White Hart" Inn, formerly at Scole, Norfolk (1655).
Work in Churches.
It has already been stated that there is no ecclesiastical architecture of early Renaissance character in England. There were a number of churches built during the first thirty years of the sixteenth century, but they are all Gothic in treatment. The influence of the Renaissance on certain features to be found in churches, such as chantries and tombs, has already been dealt with. It remains to glance at the changes that occurred in church fittings as the century grew older. Although no churches, or extremely few, were built after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, still the Elizabethan and Jacobean squires were not backward in embellishing the ancient structures, and there are plenty of screens, pulpits, font-covers, and particularly tombs, to be found all over the country, although it cannot be denied that under the influence of the revival of Gothic feeling which took place about fifty years ago, a great deal of Elizabethan and Jacobean work was either destroyed, or removed to the vestry, into which confined space it was made to fit by a ruthless exercise of the axe and saw.
202.—Chichester Tomb, Pilton Church, Devonshire (1566).
