Oh, what a pity such a pretty girl as I
Should be pent in a Nunnery to weep and to cry.
Let us leave then these recluses to the quiet enjoyment of their lot,—whether it be the nursing of the sick, the feeding of the hungry, or the schooling of the ignorant children of their communion,—and, “pursuing the even tenour of our way,” move quickly forward along Little St. John Street. The little row of Almshouses erected by Mrs. Salmon in 1738—the premises of Messrs. Royle and Son, builders—and the resuscitated fabric of St. John’s House, almost destroyed by fire in the summer of 1855, will each in their turn salute us on our progress, until the eye rests subdued before the silent grandeur of the Church of St. John.
St. John’s is the only Church with any pretensions to antiquity now left to the city outside the Walls,—the minor fanes of St. Thomas, St. John the Less, and St. Giles, having each disappeared ’neath the hand of the destroyer during the great Civil War. In Roman and early Saxon times the land to the southeast of the city, on both sides the Dee, was most probably a forest—the home of the wild deer, the fox, and the wolf—the genius of civilisation finding ample field for employment within the Walls. In those latter days, Ethelred, son of Penda, being king over Mercia, and withal an amiable and pious prince,
Myndynge moost the blysse of Heuen,
journeyed towards Chester, on a visit, it may be, to his virgin niece, the holy St. Werburgh, then Abbess of Chester. While there, we are told that, being admonished by God in a vision “to build a Church on the spot where he should find a white hind,” the king and his nobles engaged in the chace, and straightway coming upon a white hind at this very place, the royal hunter, in 689, founded and erected the Saxon Church of St. John the Baptist. A more beautiful site for the erection of such a Church could scarcely have been chosen. Seated on an eminence overlooking the river Dee,—the rock it rests on washed by a stream of far nobler proportions than the river of our day,—its banks studded with primæval woods, above which, and far beyond, the peaks of the Cambrian hills just showed their giant heads,—the yet nearer mountain ranges of Beeston and Peckforton,—the city itself, engirdled by the Walls of their Roman predecessors,—such was the prospect that gladdened the eyes of the good King Ethelred and the chaste Werburga, as they watched the progress of their newly-founded Church.
What were the actual dimensions of the Saxon St. John’s is now, and must ever remain a mystery;—whether any and what portion of the present edifice may be properly referred back to that remote age is, in like manner, doubtful. There are, however, many who believe, like ourselves, that much of the older work, here and there perceptible, belongs to a period anterior to the Norman conquest. The brothers Lysons, (no mean authority, you’ll say) pronounce much of the nave and east end of the church to be late Saxon work—portions, no doubt, of the structure re-edified by Leofric, Earl of Mercia, in 1057. Originally the steeple was in the centre of the Church, at the point where the transept intersects the nave; but in or about 1468, it suddenly gave way, and destroyed in its fall great part of the choir and east end of the Church. This tower was soon after rebuilt, and another erected at the west end of the nave:—the former again fell in 1572, and this time the parishioners declined to restore it. The west steeple shared a similar fate in 1574, destroying the whole of that extremity of the fabric. Look up, from our present position at the Gateway of the Churchyard, and the effects of this mishap will be at once apparent,—the steeple, one hundred and fifty feet high, stands isolated from the main body of the Church, that portion broken in by the fall having since been suffered to remain so by the authorities of the parish. If we pass round to the west side of the tower, we shall see midway a canopied niche, in which stands the statue of the abbot king Ethelred, caressing at his side the “white hind” of his vision. This statue originally decorated the centre tower; but being found miraculously unhurt amongst the heap of rubbish created by that structure in its fall, was removed by the parishioners to its present lofty and dignified position. This steeple enjoys a set of eight peerless bells, by far the most melodious of their kind in the city. Six were cast in 1710, and the other two in 1734, having replaced an older peal, which existed here at least as early as the reign of Henry VII. Doubtless, therefore, during the great Civil War, when the news of a royalist victory reached the ears of the loyal citizens,
Merrily, merrily rang the bells,
The bells of St. John’s church tower.
And “merrily, merrily” ring they still, as the bridal procession issues from the porch, as well as on days of public rejoicing—whenever, in fact, loyalty, love, or patriotism need their witching strains. So much for the outside of St. John’s Church,—now for a hasty glance at the interior.
Passing through the “old church porch,” adorned with an arch of most beautiful character, the mouldings of which spring from little delicately formed shafts, we enter the sacred edifice at its north-western extremity. Here a prospect awaits us enough to disgust even an out and out Puritan. Hideous galleries of giant build, through which the light of heaven can scarcely find its way,—long rows of high wooden boxes, by those in authority facetiously termed pews!—curtains of green exclusiveness, separating the rich from their brethren the poor—such, alas! are our first impressions of this venerable Church! With such incentives to drowsiness, no wonder the parishioners are so sleepy about their Church, and so painfully apathetic about its much-needed restoration!
Threading our way, so well as we can in the gloom, to the bottom of the centre aisle, we now begin to see, despite these grievous drawbacks, something of the original glory and magnificence of this ancient fabric. Following the line of sight eastward, we feast our eyes on the massive pillars and horse-shoe arches of the Saxon, or it may be early Norman architect:—noble ideas of strength and symmetry had the builder of those days! Above these, the double Triforium of later work stretches along the whole length of the Nave, giving to it an elegance and variety claimed for no other sacred edifice in Cheshire. Originally the Nave was just double its present length, boasting eight of those massive semicircular arches on either side, of which four only now remain,—the other four vanished ’neath the crash of the western steeple.