We enter "by a small side door, . . . descend the rugged steps, and are down in the crypt." It is very spacious, and vaulted with stone. Even by daylight, here and there, "the heavy pillars which support the roof engender masses of black shade, but between them there are lanes of light," and we walk "up and down these lanes," being strangely reminded of Durdles as we notice fragments of old broken stone ornaments carefully laid out on boards in several places. Formerly there were altars to St. Mary and St. Catherine in the crypt or undercroft, but Mr. Wildish's local guide-book says:—"They seem not to have been much frequented; consequently these saints were not very profitable to the priests."
We "go up the winding staircase of the great tower, toilsomely turning and turning, and lowering [our] heads to avoid the stairs above, or the rough stone pivot around which they twist." About ninety steps bring us on to the roof of the Cathedral over the choir, and then, keeping along a passage by the parapet, we reach the belfry, and from thence go on by ladder to the bell-chamber, which contains six bells—dark—very—long ladders—trap-doors—very heavy—almost extinguish us when lowering them—more ladders from bell-chamber to roof of tower. The parapet of the tower is very high; we can just see over it when standing on a narrow ledge near the top-coping of the leaded roof. There are a number of curious carved heads on the pinnacles of the tower, and the parapet, to our surprise, appears to be about the same height as the top of the Castle Keep. A panoramic view of Cloisterham presents itself to our view (alas! not by moonlight, as in the story), "its ruined habitations and sanctuaries of the dead at the tower's base; its moss-softened, red-tiled roofs and red-brick houses of the living, clustered beyond."
We are anxious to go round the triforium, but there is no passage through the arches; it was closed, we are told, at the time of the restoration, about fifteen years ago, when the walls of the Cathedral were pinned for safety. The verger, on being asked, said he did not call to mind that Dickens ever went round the triforium or ascended the tower. If this is so, then much of the wonderful description of that "unaccountable sort of expedition," in the twelfth chapter of Edwin Drood, must have been written from imagination.
As it is Sunday, and as the summer is nearly over, Mr. Miles, with a feeling akin to that which George Eliot has expressed regarding imperfect work:—
"but God be praised,
Antonio Stradivari has an eye
That winces at false work and loves the true,"—
apologetically explains that one-half the choir are absent on leave, and perhaps we shall not have the musical portion of the service conducted with that degree of efficiency which, as visitors, we may have expected. Nevertheless we attend the afternoon service; and Mendelssohn's glorious anthem, "If with all your hearts," appeals to us with enhanced effect, from the exquisite rendering of it by the gifted pure tenor who takes the solo, followed by the delicate harmonies of the choir, as the sound waves carry them upwards through and around the arches, and from the sublime emotions called into being by the impassioned appeal of the Hebrew prophet.
We study "the fantastic carvings on the under brackets of the stall seats," and examine the lectern described as "the big brass eagle holding the sacred books upon his wings," and in imagination can almost call up the last scene described in The Mystery of Edwin Drood, where Her Royal Highness, the Princess Puffer, "grins," and "shakes both fists at the leader of the choir," and "Deputy peeps, sharp-eyed, through the bars, and stares astounded from the threatener to the threatened."
Upon being interrogated as to whether he knew Charles Dickens, our guide immediately answers with a smile—"Knew him! yes. He came here very often, and I knew him very well. The fact is, they want to make me out to be 'Tope.'" And indeed there appears to be such a relevancy in the association, that we frequently find ourselves addressing him as "Mr. Tope," at which he good-humouredly laughs. He further states that Dickens was frequently in Rochester, and especially so when writing Edwin Drood, and appeared to be studying the Cathedral and its surroundings very attentively.
The next question we put is:—"Was there ever such a person as Durdles?" to which he replies, "Of course there was,—a drunken old German stonemason, about thirty years ago, who was always prowling about the Cathedral trying to pick up little bits of broken stone ornaments, carved heads, crockets, finials, and such like, which he carried about in a cotton handkerchief, and which may have suggested to Dickens the idea of the 'slouching' Durdles and his inseparable dinner bundle. He used to work for a certain Squire N——." His earnings mostly went to "The Fortune of War,"—now called "The Life-Boat,"—the inn where he lodged.
Mr. Miles does not remember the prototypes of any other "cathedraly" characters—Crisparkle and the rest—but he quite agrees with the general opinion previously referred to as to the origin of Mr. Sapsea. He considers "Deputy" (the imp-like satellite of Durdles and the "Kinfreederel") to be decidedly a street Arab, the type of which is more common in London than in Rochester. He thinks that the fact of the rooms over the gatehouse having once been occupied by an organ-blower of the Cathedral may have prompted Dickens to make it the residence of the choir-master. He also throws out the suggestion that the discovery in 1825 of the effigy of Bishop John de Sheppey, who died in 1360, may possibly have given rise to the idea of the "old 'uns" in the crypt, the frequent object of Durdles's search, e.g. "Durdles come upon the old chap (in reference to a buried magnate of ancient time and high degree) by striking right into the coffin with his pick. The old chap gave Durdles a look with his open eyes as much as to say, 'Is your name Durdles? Why, my man, I've been waiting for you a Devil of a time!' and then he turned to powder. With a two-foot rule always in his pocket, and a mason's hammer all but always in his hand, Durdles goes continually sounding and tapping all about and about the Cathedral; and whenever he says to Tope, 'Tope, here's another old 'un in here!' Tope announces it to the Dean as an established discovery."