“Even the very walls of this dread place,
And the tall windows, with their breathing lights,
Speak to the adoring heart.”
The practice of painting the walls of our churches dates as far back as Saxon times; but very few fragments of pre-Norman art remain. Of Norman work we have numerous examples, and sometimes it is found that the early specimens of the art have been painted over in later Gothic times, and ruder and larger figures have eclipsed the more careful work of previous ages. An example of this was discovered in the church of St. Lawrence, Reading, where no less than five distinct series of paintings were discovered, painted one over another.
Several circumstances have combined to obliterate these specimens of the art of former days. It was not the intention of the Reformers themselves to destroy them. They distinguished carefully between “an embossed and gilt image, and a process of a story painted with the gestures and action of many persons; and commonly the sum of the story written withal hath another use in it than one dumb idol or image standing by itself.” It was left to the Puritans, impelled by fanaticism and ignorance, to make “a slanderous desolation of the places of prayer,” and it is to them we owe much of the destruction of the old mural paintings. At the end of the eighteenth century there was a prejudice against these works of art; for in 1773 we find the Bishop of London refusing to allow Reynolds, West, and Barry to clothe the naked walls of St. Paul’s Cathedral with pictures painted by themselves. Coated over by layers of plaster, or whitewashed until all traces were obliterated, these relics of ancient art have remained for generations, and it is only when an old church is being restored, and the coats of plaster and whitewash removed, that their presence is revealed; and then too often the colours fade away on exposure to the air.
One of the favourite subjects of mural decoration was a figure of St. Christopher with the Infant Saviour on his shoulder.[[8]] He usually has a staff, and strange-looking fish swim about his feet as he crosses the river; on one side there is a hermitage, with the figure of a hermit holding a lantern to guide the saint, and on the other a windmill. This figure usually was painted on the wall opposite the principal entrance, as it was deemed lucky to see St. Christopher on first entering a church. Moreover the sight of the saint was a preservative against violent death during the day, and also a preventive against drowsiness during the service, as the following verses show:—
“Christophori sancti speciem quicunque tuetur Illo namque die nullo languore tenetur.”
Churchwardens’ accounts record the painting of these figures—