Its character may easily be judged of from what remains. It was nobly massive and grand, not of lofty proportions, but still such as to satisfy the eye. The pillars were alternately round and canted squares, flanked with attached shafts; the triforium consisting of arcades, interrupted only by the vaulting shafts. At the east end is a beautiful Lady Chapel, vaulted on light clustered pillars.
The restoration of the choir was carried out by the late Mr. George Gwilt, aided by his sons; and it is impossible too warmly to praise the zeal and ardour with which they pursued the work, their study of the style then so little understood, or the untiring pains they took to render their restoration accurate. All these ardent lovers of ancient art are now deceased, and I feel a melancholy pleasure in bearing witness to their merits. I was intimately acquainted with one of the sons, and never did I meet a man more enthusiastically devoted to the style on which his artistic education had been founded. He absolutely adored everything which was Early English; and, in carrying out restorations—in one of which he aided me—so faithfully did he reproduce the whole work, that nothing could induce him to alter even the positions of the jointing of the ashlar work.
The pains which Mr. Gwilt took in restoring the choir disgusted the heartless parishioners, who, on proceeding to the transepts, placed the work in other hands; but, on the Lady Chapel being undertaken by private individuals, Mr. Gwilt nobly undertook the work gratuitously, and carried it out with the same care he had bestowed on the choir.
Shortly after this, a report having arisen that the nave roof was decayed, a surveyor was employed to examine it, who, recklessly condemning it as unsafe, it was taken off, and none put on in its place. The walls, being of chalk, became shattered by exposure to the frost of several winters; and when the restoration of the nave was proposed to the parishioners, that enlightened body of men negatived it, and, taking down the glorious old structure, erected the present abject monstrosity in its place.[43]
Happily, however, the interiors of the choir and Lady Chapel are still perfect. Let us hope and pray that their widowhood may not be of much longer duration, but that a reproduction of the noble nave may be substituted for its unworthy supplanter.
Fig. 110.—Temple Church, London. View of Choir.
I should mention that the nave was entered on the south side by a very noble double doorway, of great height and depth, though when I knew it its decorative features had perished. I will only add that if measured drawings of this church are in the possession of the family of Mr. Gwilt, it would be most desirable that they should be deposited among public archives, to await the time when they must be wanted as a guide to the re-erection of the lost portions. In the meantime let me beg of you to study well what remains.[44]
Next in importance, and probably in date, comes the choir of the Temple Church, which was consecrated in 1240—a more fortunate building than the last, and not needing from me any chronicle of its restoration. It is, in idea, a magnified transcript of the Lady Chapel at St. Saviour’s, being, like it, vaulted throughout upon pillars of equal height, and is probably about the most perfect specimen in England of this beautiful mode of construction.