On the retable at the foot of the reredos, stand two massive candlesticks of silver gilt. These were procured for the cathedral in 1660, on the restoration of the Chapter and the return of Bishop Wren after his imprisonment of eighteen years. During the Commonwealth the cathedral staff had dwindled down to one canon and one verger. It is recorded that the first requisites purchased by the Chapter on being reinstated were these very candlesticks--plus a wheelbarrow and a broom. And now we shall do well to make an appreciable physical effort, in order to get a view of two bosses of special interest in the vaulting overhead. It is somewhat neck-racking work, and a glass is absolutely necessary if we are to carry away any definite impression of the sculptures in question. On one of these bosses the coronation of the Virgin is carved most gracefully and reverently; on the other is St. Etheldreda, crowned and gorgeously robed, seated with a crozier in her right hand, as Abbess. Both are richly coloured, and have escaped, through being inaccessible, the injury done to the other images in the cathedral. For more than 600 years they have looked down on the tomb of Bishop Northwold, the builder of this noble Presbytery, erected, we must remember, to do honour to the shrine of the Foundress. This Presbytery of wondrous beauty, enriched by the best that could be wrought by human hands, alike in the past and in our own days, may well recall to us Keble's lines: "Love delights to bring her best, And where Love is, that offering evermore is blest." The "Angel Choir" in Lincoln Cathedral, built at the same time, is so nearly a twin with Bishop Northwold's Choir at Ely that to distinguish the two, if their photographs are placed side by side, requires some nicety of observation. Whether either was actually copied from the other we do not know, for in those days the torch of architectural inspiration quickly passed from hand to hand. This is the case in our own time with regard to inventions due to the increase of scientific knowledge; when no part of the civilised world remains long behind the rest, if light, locomotion, or medicine is concerned. Age after age man sets himself to make his own the best that can be obtained, and to say for himself, no less than for the world at large "Let Knowledge grow from more to more." CHAPTER XVII Monuments.--West's Chapel.--Alcock's Chapel.--Northwold Cenotaph.--Basevi.--Shrine of Etheldreda.--Lady Chapel.--View from Tower.--Triforium.--Exterior of Minster.--Palace, "Duties" of Goodrich.--St. Mary's.--St. Cross.--Cromwell's House.--Cromwell at Ely.--St. John's Farm.--Theological College.--Waterworks.--Basket-making.