admirer of tasteful building to witness nothing but these pepper-box towers on every new church, it is more so to see obvious and well-recognised rules departed from without any cause but mere caprice.

The body of the church is a parallelogram situated east and west, and in height is divided into two storeys by a plain course. In both storeys is a series of windows, as shown in the engraving. The angles are finished with antæ, and the entablature is continued as a finish round the whole building. Both the east and west ends are terminated with pediments.

On the centre of the south side is an unsightly projection, containing a flight of stairs to the gallery and an entrance beneath it to the church. The roof is covered with copper.

The interior presents a large unbroken room roofed in one span. The walls are finished with an entablature, charged with a rich honeysuckle moulding, resting on antæ of the Ionic order, ranging from the floor of the church to the architrave. The ceiling is made into square panels by architraves crossing each other, and entering the walls of the church above the surrounding cornice; in the centre of each panel is a large expanded flower. The south, north, and western sides are occupied by galleries resting on Doric pillars, the fronts panelled with slight mouldings. The whole of the interior as exactly resembles Mr. Bedford's other churches as the steeple does those already named. Of those churches I shall have occasion to speak before long. The genius of an architect derives but little credit from designs which are such exact counterparts of each other as the productions of Mr. Bedford in this neighbourhood.

The unoccupied eastern wall is cold and unornamented; a pediment surmounting four slabs, inscribed with the Decalogue, etc., and a small space railed in, informs us it is intended for the altar. The window above is adorned with fillets of poorly-executed stained glass, and the usual crimson velvet covered Communion-table stands below; but all this is not enough. Architects should know that a distinction ought to be made between the altar of a church and the upper end of a Presbyterian conventicle. Surely a spot where the most solemn rites of our religion are solemnized, where an episcopal Communion is administered, to which we have from our infancy been taught to look up to as the most sacred part of the building, and which in an architectural point of view is regarded as the principal object in the edifice, should be marked by some distinguishing feature. I could wish our hierarchy would enforce the old and almost disused practice of placing the holy table in a recess distinct from the rest of the church. At all events, some care, some little attention, should be paid to its decorations. It is discreditable to the Establishment to see the altar adorned with such inferior ornament as in the present case. The Dissenters always place their

pulpit in a situation corresponding with our altar, in which respect they are consistent with their principles, which we are not.

The uniformity of the building is greatly broken by the situation of the portico. A large space on the north side is occupied by two deep recesses on each side a window, which receives a false light from the belfry story of the tower. These recesses contain additional galleries for the charity children, ranging on each side of the steeple ; they are consequently hid from the view of the greater part of the congregation. This fault is not attributable to the architect so much as to the site; but it is to be lamented, inasmuch as the effect of the interior is greatly hurt by this irregular arrangement. The pulpit and reading desk are counterparts of each other, and stand on opposite sides of the church-a fashionable arrangement among architects, but, nevertheless, an absurd one. They forget that the service is read from a desk, and not a pulpit. A useless sacrifice is here made to uniformity of appearance at the expense of propriety. If the profession would condescend to look into the older churches of the Metropolis, they might learn an arrangement in this respect far superior to their modern ideas.

The font stands in the nave beneath the western gallery; it is made of composition in imitation of stone, and enriched with honeysuckles and other Grecian mouldings. The design is an antique vase with handles. It should have been an imitation of veined marble, for as it at present appears it resembles, both in design and composition, the vases which may be purchased for a few shillings of the itinerant Italians, who are met with in every part of the Metropolis. In this gallery is placed the organ, in an oak case, with gilt ornaments. A noble chandelier of brass depends from the centre of the roof, which diffuses a brilliant light over the greater part of the church.

The first stone was laid on June 2, 1823, by His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, attended by the Bishop of Worcester and the rector, trustees, and parochial officers of Newington. The foundations had been raised to a level with the ground, at that time having been in progress for nearly six months previous. On December 16, 1824, it was consecrated by the same Primate. The service was read by the Rev. C. V. H. Sumner, the first incumbent. The Rev. A. C. Onslow, M.A., the rector of the parish, preached an able sermon from Ps. xciii. 6: "Holiness becometh thine house for ever."

The parish, though situated in the Diocese of Winchester, is a peculiar of the Archbishop, who was attended by Sir John Nicholl, Knt., as Dean of the Arches.

The present is said to be the largest of the new churches yet erected. It contains sittings in pews for 1,277 persons; free seats, 519; seats for charity children, 252-making a total of 2,048;

but a far greater number can always be accommodated without inconvenience.

The tower contains a peal of eight powerful bells, from the wellknown foundry of Mr. Mears, of Whitechapel. The tenor weighs 20 hundredweight.

The ground on which the church is built was given by the corporation of the Trinity House, who are the owners of considerable property in the vicinity.

The poem referred to on p. 59 is as follows:

OF DEATH AND RESURRECTION.

Like to the rowling of an eye,

Or like a starre shott from the skye,

Or like a hand vpon a clock,

Or like a wave vpon a rock,

Or like a winde, or like a flame,

Or like false newes which people frame :
Even such is man of equall stay,

Whose very growth leads to decay.

The eye is turn'd, the starre downe bendeth,
The hand doeth steale, the wave descendeth :
The winde is spent, the flame vnfir'd,
The newes disprov'd, man's life expir'd.

Like to an eye which sleepe doeth chayne,
Or like a starre whose fall wee fayne,

Or like the shade on Ahaz watch,

Or like the wave which gulfes doe snatch,
Or like a winde or flame that's past,
Or smother'd newes confirm'd at last :
Even so man's life pawn'd in the grave,
Wayts for a riseing it must have.

The eye still sees, the starre still blazeth;
The shade goes back, the wave escapeth;
The wind is turn'd, the flame reviv'd;
The newes renew'd, and man new liv'd.

E. I. C.

V.

COUNTY OF LONDON
(continued).

FORMERLY INCLUDED IN THE COUNTY OF KENT

[1820, Part II., p. 323.]

CHARLTON.

CHARLTON, a pleasant village in Kent, on the edge of Blackheath, is distinguished for a fair held on St. Luke's Day, called Horn Fair. It consists of a frolicsome mob who, after a printed summons dispersed round the country, meet at a place called Cuckold's Point, near Deptford, whence they march in procession through Greenwich to Charlton, with horns of divers kinds on their heads. This assembly was formerly disorderly, but now they are kept in a state of some regularity by the peace officers, who are ordered to attend.

The origin of the fair, according to tradition, is as follows: King John, who had a palace at Eltham, having been hunting, rambled from his company to this little hamlet; he alighted at a cottage, and taking a liking to the mistress, prevailed in the end over her modesty. In the meanwhile the husband came home, and vowing to kill the adulterer, the king was obliged to discover himself, and by way of reparation gave the man a purse of gold and a grant of all the land from Charlton to the place now called Cuckold's Point, besides making him master of the whole hamlet. In memory of this grant, and the occasion of it, the husband established a fair here for the sale of horns, and of all sorts of goods made of horn, which are to this day the chief article sold at this fair. W. R.

[1865, Part I., pp. 576-585.]

With the view to perpetuate in print a record of numerous coats of arms borne by families of mark, several of them long since extinct, and of some brasses and monuments of much interest, now extant in the church, as well as certain heraldic memorials in the adjoining mansion at Charlton, near Woolwich, which have escaped mention by the indefatigable Hasted in his "History of Kent," but which opportunity has lately enabled me to investigate, I append

the result of inspections of family documents and of communications obligingly made to me by the present patron and possessor, himself a lover of heraldry and its kindred sciences.

King James I. granted the manor to John, Earl of Mar, who in 1606 sold it for £2,000 to Sir James Erskine.* Sir James the next year transferred it for £4,500 to Sir Adam Newton, Knight and Bart., who constructed a noble manor-house, and designed to have rebuilt in corresponding character the parish church, but died January 13, 1629, before he could accomplish his wish, "which was performed with money left for the purpose," observes Philipot, "to Sir David Cunningham, knight and bart., late cofferer to Prince Charles, Mr. James Newton, his brother, and Mr. Peter Newton, gentleman usher to King Charles, who have most amply discharged the trust, and in a manner new built a great part thereof, and erected the steeple new from the ground, and furnished it with a new ring of bells, decorating the said church without and within that it surpasses most in the shire." Sir Henry Newton (second son of Sir Adam), who had taken the name of Puckering, § aliened the estate in 1659 to Sir William, second son of Sir Richard Ducie, the banker of King Charles I. Sir William was made Knight of the Bath at the coronation of King Charles II., and afterwards raised to the peerage as Viscount Downe in Ireland. His representatives in 1680 sold it to Sir William Langhorne, Bart., who by his will entailed this and other estates upon his nephew (son of his sister) and heir, Sir John Conyers, Bart.,|| and his heirs male, which, failing by the death of Sir Baldwin Conyers and his son without issue male, they went by entail, first, to William Langhorne-Games, another nephew (who died January 27, 1732, without issue male), and then with ultimate remainder to Sir William's kinsman, the Rev. John Maryon, who devised them to his niece Margaretta Maria (only daughter of his sister Mary Maryon, by her husband, William Peers, Esq.), the wife of John Badger Weller, Esq., of Hornchurch, in Romford (she married, secondly, John Jones, Esq.), with remainder to her only daughter, Jane, the wife of Sir Thomas Spencer Wilson, Bart. T

A villa, agreeably placed, now called "The Cherry Orchard," is said to have been built by Inigo Jones for his own residence, and

* Wilson Papers, Hasted, vol. i., p. 35; Lysons' "Environs," vol. iv., p. 336. † Dean of Durham, September 27, 1606; tutor to Henry, Prince of Wales, whose life he wrote, and afterwards to Prince Charles; Latin inscription on tomb. Hutchinson's "Durham,” vol. ii., p. 153; Evelyn's "Memoirs," vol. i., p. 141, vol. ii., p. 53, etc.

Villare Cantianum, fol. 1659, p. 96.

§ Dugdale's "Warwick," p. 341; Hasted, vol. i., p. 35.

Buried in Great Staughton Church, where there is a noble monument.

¶ Wilson Papers, Wilson estates, Act 6, George III., Hasted, vol. i., p. 36; Lysons' "Environs," vol. ii., p. 529; vol. iv., p. 326.

VOL. XXIX.

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