“Hic jacet humatus Johann: Willino.”
The sepulchral brasses have all disappeared. For a century and more after the Dissolution, the Abbey appears to have been abandoned to every species of wilful depredators, who defaced the altars, ransacked the graves, and carried off without molestation whatever was curious or portable.
In the same aisle, close to the wall, and now preserved with great care, is the lately-discovered pavement of encaustic tiles, with escutcheons of the ancient Clare and Bigod families intertwined. The figures on these coloured tiles represent flowers, animals, and knights in full career at a tournament. This pavement was probably that of a private altar, belonging to the founder, or benefactor of the Abbey. In the process of clearing away the vast accumulation of rubbish, many of the ancient memorials were removed in fragments; and of the few that remain, not one, probably, now covers the dust over which it was originally placed.
Leaving the grassy lawn-like floor of the Abbey, the ascent to the top is still practicable by means of a spiral staircase in an angle of the northern transept. Those who conclude their survey of the ruins by this experiment, will be amply rewarded for any fatigue it may occasion. At the time of our visit, however, in the month of August last year, some unexpected obstacle prevented the custodier from gratifying our curiosity by a view from the summit: for the steps were either so unsafe or deficient, as to make the experiment rather hazardous.
Mr. Thomas, from whose notes we have already quoted, and whose late professional residence near the Abbey rendered him familiar with all its minutest features, tells us that the prospect it commands is highly picturesque; and in turning from the outward landscape, to look down into the cloistered depths below, the view of clustering pillars, lofty arches, mullioned windows, and flowing tracery, is indescribably grand and impressive.
The broken summit of the walls, throughout its whole outline, is adorned with a profusion of shrubs and flowers, that, with interlacing leaves and tendrils, cover the mouldering coping like a fragrant mantle. Where the labour of man appears to decay, nature has put forth her vigour and beauty, and transformed those roofless walls into a wild botanic garden. Here, and amidst the débris immediately adjoining, Mr. Thomas[53] found a luxuriant crop of shrubs and flowers, all of different families, some of them rare, and in number between forty and fifty.
Reed, in his ‘Remains,’ gives the following eloquent and highly poetical description of the Abbey by moonlight:—“The great tree or vegetable rock, or emperor of the oaks, if you please, before which I bowed with a sort of reverence in the fields of Tinterne, and which for so many ages has borne all the blasts and bolts of heaven, I should deem it a gratification of a superior kind to approach again with an ‘unsandalled foot,’ to pay the same homage, and to kindle with the same devotion. But I should find amidst the magnificent ruins of the adjoining Abbey, something of a sublime cast, to interest and give pregnancy to my feelings. I must be alone. My mind must be calm and pensive. It must be midnight. The moon, half-veiled in clouds, must be just emerging from behind the neighbouring hills. All must be silent, except the wind gently rustling among the ivy of the ruins; the river lulling, by its faint murmurings, its guardian genius to repose; and the owl, whose funereal shriek would some time die along the walls in mysterious echoes. I should then invoke the ghosts of the Abbey; and Fancy, with one stroke of her magic wand, would rouse them from their dusty beds, and lead them into the centre of the ruin. I should approach their shadowy existences with reverence; making inquiries respecting the customs, and manners, and genius, and fate of antiquity—desire to have a glimpse of the destiny of future ages, and enter upon conversations which would be too sacred and even dangerous to communicate.” The lines by Sir Walter Scott, on “Melrose Abbey by Moonlight,” are equally descriptive of Tinterne.[54]
It has been well observed, that, as the Abbey of Tinterne is the most beautiful and picturesque of all our Gothic monuments, so is the situation one of the most sequestered and delightful. One more abounding in that peculiar kind of scenery which excites the mingled sensations of content, religion, and enthusiasm, it is impossible to behold. There, every arch infuses, as it were, a solemn energy into inanimate nature; a sublime antiquity breathes mildly in the heart; and the soul, pure and passionless, appears susceptible of that state of tranquillity which is the perfection of every earthly wish.[55] By the late Sir C. Colt Hoare, a man of taste and many travelled acquirements, this “seat of devotion, solitude, and desolation,” is pronounced as surpassing every other ruin he had seen in England or in Wales. Captain Barber, whose “Tour” is now very scarce, was so charmed with the scene, that he locked himself up in the Abbey, and employed several hours in delineating its picturesque features.
From the general aspect of this venerable pile—a coup d’œil that never fails to captivate the stranger—we proceed to a few detached features of the picture, all more or less interesting as relics of men, and times, that have long passed away.