The pulpit and desk, as well as the large sounding-board above them, are very elaborately carved; and a marble font standing in the south aisle has an oak cover of curious design. Among many mural tablets are three which have been erected at the cost of the parishioners, commemorative of the Rev. Thomas Green, curate twenty-seven years, who died in 1734; the Rev. John Farrer, rector (1820); and the Rev. W. Valentine Ireson, who was lecturer of the united parishes thirty years, and died in 1822.
In digging a new sewer in Lombard Street a few years ago (says Pennant, writing in 1790), the remains of a Roman road were discovered, with numbers of coins, and several antique curiosities, some of great elegance. The beds through which the workmen sunk were four. The first consisted of factitious earth, about thirteen feet six inches thick, all accumulated since the desertion of the ancient street; the second of brick, two feet thick, the ruins of the buildings; the third of ashes, only three inches; the fourth of Roman pavement, both common and tessellated, over which the coins and other antiquities were discovered. Beneath that was the original soil. The predominant articles were earthenware, and several were ornamented in the most elegant manner. A vase of red earth had on its surface a representation of a fight of men, some on horseback, others on foot; or perhaps a show of gladiators, as they all fought in pairs, and many of them naked. The combatants were armed with falchions and small round shields, in the manner of the Thracians, the most esteemed of the gladiators. Some had spears, and others a kind of mace. A beautiful running foliage encompassed the bottom of this vessel. On the fragment of another were several figures. Among them appears Pan with his pedum, or crook; and near to him one of the lascivi Satyri, both in beautiful skipping attitudes. On the same piece are two tripods; round each is a serpent regularly twisted, and bringing its head over a bowl which fills the top. These seem (by the serpent) to have been dedicated to Apollo, who, as well as his son Æsculapius, presided over medicine. On the top of one of the tripods stands a man in full armour. Might not this vessel have been votive, made by order of a soldier restored to health by favour of the god, and to his active powers and enjoyment of rural pleasures, typified under the form of Pan and his nimble attendants? A plant extends along part of another compartment, possibly allusive to their medical virtues; and, to show that Bacchus was not forgotten, beneath lies a thyrsus with a double head.
On another bowl was a free pattern of foliage. On others, or fragments, were objects of the chase, such as hares, part of a deer, and a boar, with human figures, dogs, and horses; all these pieces prettily ornamented. There were, besides, some beads, made of earthenware, of the same form as those called the ovum anguinum, and, by the Welsh, glain naidr; and numbers of coins in gold, silver, and brass, of Claudius, Nero, Galba, and other emperors down to Constantine.
St. Mary Abchurch was destroyed by the Great Fire, and rebuilt by Wren in 1686. Maitland says, "And as to this additional appellation of Ab, or Up-church, I am at as great a loss in respect to its meaning, as I am to the time when the church was at first founded; but, as it appears to have anciently stood on an eminence, probably that epithet was conferred upon it in regard to the church of St. Lawrence Pulteney, situate below."
Stow gives one record of St. Mary Abchurch, which we feel a pleasure in chronicling:—"This dame Helen Branch, buried here, widow of Sir John Branch, Knt., Lord Mayor of London, an. 1580, gave £50 to be lent to young men of the Company of Drapers, from four years to four years, for ever, £50. Which lady gave also to poor maids' marriages, £10. To the poor of Abchurch, £10. To the poor prisoners in and about London, £20. Besides, for twenty-six gowns to poor men and women, £26. And many other worthy legacies to the Universities."
The pulpit and sounding-board are of oak, and the font has a cover of the same material, presenting carved figures of the four Evangelists within niches. On the south side of the church is an elaborate monument of marble, part of which is gilt, consisting of twisted columns supporting a circular pediment, drapery, cherubim, &c., to Mr. Edward Sherwood, who died January 5th, 1690; and near it is a second, in memory of Sir Patience Ward, Knt., Alderman, and Lord Mayor of London in 1681. He died on the 10th of July, 1696. The east end of the church is in Abchurch Lane, and the south side faces an open paved space, divided from the lane by posts. This was formerly enclosed as a burial-ground, but was thrown open for the convenience of the neighbourhood.
The present church was completed from the designs of Sir Christopher Wren in 1686. In the interior it is nearly square, being about sixty-five feet long, and sixty feet wide. The walls are plain, having windows in the south side and at the east end to light the church. The area of the church is covered by a large and handsome cupola, supported on a modillion cornice, and adorned with paintings which were executed by Sir James Thornhill; and in the lower part of this also are introduced other lights. "The altar-piece," says Mr. G. Godwin, "presents four Corinthian columns, with entablature and pediment, grained to imitate oak, and has a carved figure of a pelican over the centre compartment. It is further adorned by a number of carved festoons of fruit and flowers, which are so exquisitely executed, that if they were a hundred miles distant, we will venture to say they would have many admiring visitants from London. These carvings, by Grinling Gibbons, were originally painted after nature by Sir James. They were afterwards covered with white paint, and at this time they are, in common with the rest of the screen, of the colour of oak. Fortunately, however, these proceedings, which must have tended to fill up the more delicately carved parts, and to destroy the original sharpness of the lines, have not materially injured their general effect."
CHAPTER XLVII
THREADNEEDLE STREET