British Highways and Byways from a Motor Car: Being a Record of a Five Thousand Mile Tour in England, Wales and ScotlandMurphy, Thos. D. (Thomas Dowler)
History
British Highways and Byways from a Motor Car: Being a Record of a Five Thousand Mile Tour in England, Wales and Scotland
Murphy, Thos. D. (Thomas Dowler)
Great Britain -- Description and travel; Great Britain -- Maps
The cathedral is one of the largest and most remarkable in England,
being altogether different in architecture from any other in the
Kingdom. Instead of a spire, it has a huge, castellated, octagonal
tower, and while it was several hundred years in building, a harmonious
design was maintained throughout, although it exhibits in some degree
almost every style of church architecture known in England. Ely is an
inconsequential town of about seven thousand inhabitants and dominated
from every point of view by the huge bulk of the cathedral. Only a
portion of the space inside the vast building was occupied by seats, and
though the great church would hold many thousands of people if filled to
its capacity, the congregation was below the average that might be found
in the leading churches of an American town the size of Ely. One of the
cathedral officials with whom I had a short talk said that the
congregations averaged small indeed and were growing smaller right
along. The outlook for Ely he did not consider good, a movement being on
foot to cut another diocese from the territory and to make a cathedral,
probably of the great church, at Bury St. Edmunds. In recent years this
policy of creating new dioceses has been in considerable vogue in
England, and of course is distasteful to the sections immediately
affected. The services in Ely Cathedral were simpler than usual and were
through well before noon.
Before returning to Cambridge we visited St. Ives and Huntingdon, both
of which were closely associated with the life of Cromwell. The former
is a place of considerable antiquity, although the present town may be
said to date from 1689, at which time it was rebuilt after being totally
destroyed by fire. One building escaped, a quaint stone structure
erected in the center of the stone bridge crossing the River Ouse and
supposed to have been used as a chapel by the early monks. Cromwell's
connection with St. Ives began in 1628, after he had been elected to
Parliament. He moved here after the dissolution of that body and spent
several years as a farmer. The house which he occupied has disappeared
and few relics remain of his residence in the town. In the market square
is a bronze statue of the Protector, with an inscription to the effect
that he was a citizen of St. Ives for several years. A few miles farther
on is Huntingdon, his birthplace. It is a considerably larger town, but
none of the buildings now standing has any connection with the life of
the Protector. Doubtless the citizens of Huntingdon now recognize that
the manor house where Cromwell was born, which was pulled down a
hundred years ago, would be a valuable asset to the town were it still
standing.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account