In the Early English and Decorated periods a spire was sometimes added to the tower, as at Astbury and Bebington. The spire grew out of the pyramid-shaped roof with which the towers of Norman churches were covered. In the low-lying portions of the Cheshire plain, where stone was scarce but timber plentiful, the framework of a church was often built of wood. In the village of Warburton, on the banks of the Mersey, is a fourteenth-century wooden church, which served as the chapel of a priory that was established here by the Normans. The name itself ('Werburgh-ton') speaks to us of S. Werburgh, the patron saint of the Abbey of Chester, and a field by the river is still called the Abbey Croft; the stone coffins within the church once contained the bones of monks who lived here. [Illustration: INTERIOR OF WARBURTON TIMBER CHURCH. FOURTEENTH CENTURY] The arches within are made of rough-hewn timber, rudely shaped with the axe. Lantern pegs of buck-horn from the deer that once roamed the woodlands of Dunham Massey are fixed on the oak pillars; the roof is supported by stout cross-beams. The brick tower has been added at a later day, and the south wall built when the timbers on that side of the church collapsed. The timber churches of Lower Peover and Marton belong to the end of the thirteenth or beginning of the fourteenth century. Marton Church was the burial-place of the Davenports, who lived at Marton Hall. [Illustration: THE OLD PRIEST'S HOUSE, PRESTBURY] The Davenports had a more splendid home at Bramhall, the oldest portions of which were built when Edward the Third was king. The great hall at Baguley was built about the same time. The massive upright posts are cut from timber more than two feet square, and the spaces between them filled with wickerwork and plaster. The open roof is supported by a mighty 'tie-beam' and two uprights called 'queen-posts'[2]. The windows are tall and the lights narrow, and separated from one another by oak mullions. [2] Sometimes the roof was held up by a single 'king-post' in place of two queen-posts. The 'king-post' reached from the centre of the tie-beam to the point of the roof. Surely the men who built it had hearts of oak. The building reflects the rugged character of the men of the days when 'knights were bold' and 'might was right'. In this hall we can picture old Sir William Baggiley feasting with his family and his retainers, when the summons came from his king to follow him to the French wars. His effigy still rests in the hall that he himself perhaps built. It is broken and battered, but enough remains to show us that the knights who fought for Edward and the Black Prince had changed the fashion of their war dress since the Crusades. A hood of mail still protects the head and neck, but the suit of mail has given way to plates of steel riveted or hooked together, so that the whole body is cased in armour. CHAPTER XVII A DEPOSED KING