Quarter Jacks over the Clock on exterior of North Wall of Wells Cathedral.
An illustration is given of the palace at Wells, which is one of the finest examples of thirteenth-century houses existing in England. It was begun by Jocelyn. The great hall, now in ruins, was built by Bishop Burnell at the end of the thirteenth century, and was destroyed by Bishop Barlow in 1552. The chapel is Decorated. The gatehouse, with its drawbridge, moat, and fortifications, was constructed by Bishop Ralph, of Shrewsbury, who ruled from 1329 to 1363. The deanery was built by Dean Gunthorpe in 1475, who was chaplain to Edward IV. On the north is the beautiful vicar's close, which has forty-two houses, constructed mainly by Bishop Beckington (1443-64), with a common hall erected by Bishop Ralph in 1340 and a chapel by Budwith (1407-64), but altered a century later. You can see the old fireplace, the pulpit from which one of the brethren read aloud during meals, and an ancient painting representing Bishop Ralph making his grant to the kneeling figures, and some additional figures painted in the time of Queen Elizabeth.
The Gate House, Bishop's Palace, Wells
When we study the cathedrals of England and try to trace the causes which led to the destruction of so much that was beautiful, so much of English art that has vanished, we find that there were three great eras of iconoclasm. First there were the changes wrought at the time of the Reformation, when a rapacious king and his greedy ministers set themselves to wring from the treasures of the Church as much gain and spoil as they were able. These men were guilty of the most daring acts of shameless sacrilege, the grossest robbery. With them nothing was sacred. Buildings consecrated to God, holy vessels used in His service, all the works of sacred art, the offerings of countless pious benefactors were deemed as mere profane things to be seized and polluted by their sacrilegious hands. The land was full of the most beautiful gems of architectural art, the monastic churches. We can tell something of their glories from those which were happily spared and converted into cathderals or parish churches. Ely, Peterborough the pride of the Fenlands, Chester, Gloucester, Bristol, Westminster, St. Albans, Beverley, and some others proclaim the grandeur of hundreds of other magnificent structures which have been shorn of their leaden roofs, used as quarries for building-stone, entirely removed and obliterated, or left as pitiable ruins which still look beautiful in their decay. Reading, Tintern, Glastonbury, Fountains, and a host of others all tell the same story of pitiless iconoclasm. And what became of the contents of these churches? The contents usually went with the fabric to the spoliators. The halls of country-houses were hung with altar-cloths; tables and beds were quilted with copes; knights and squires drank their claret out of chalices and watered their horses in marble coffins. From the accounts of the royal jewels it is evident that a great deal of Church plate was delivered to the king for his own use, besides which the sum of £30,360 derived from plate obtained by the spoilers was given to the proper hand of the king.
The iconoclasts vented their rage in the destruction of stained glass and beautiful illuminated manuscripts, priceless tomes and costly treasures of exceeding rarity. Parish churches were plundered everywhere. Robbery was in the air, and clergy and churchwardens sold sacred vessels and appropriated the money for parochial purposes rather than they should be seized by the king. Commissioners were sent to visit all the cathedral and parish churches and seize the superfluous ornaments for the king's use. Tithes, lands, farms, buildings belonging to the church all went the same way, until the hand of the iconoclast was stayed, as there was little left to steal or to be destroyed. The next era of iconoclastic zeal was that of the Civil War and the Cromwellian period. At Rochester the soldiers profaned the cathedral by using it as a stable and a tippling place, while saw-pits were made in the sacred building and carpenters plied their trade. At Chichester the pikes of the Puritans and their wild savagery reduced the interior to a ruinous desolation. The usual scenes of mad iconoclasm were enacted—stained glass windows broken, altars thrown down, lead stripped from the roof, brasses and effigies defaced and broken. A creature named "Blue Dick" was the wild leader of this savage crew of spoliators who left little but the bare walls and a mass of broken fragments strewing the pavement. We need not record similar scenes which took place almost everywhere.
