Observations upon the town of Cromer : $b considered as a watering place, and the picturesque scenery in its neighbourhoodBartell, Edmund
History
Observations upon the town of Cromer : $b considered as a watering place, and the picturesque scenery in its neighbourhood
Bartell, Edmund
Cromer (England) -- Description and travel
The present church, dedicated to Saint Peter and Saint Paul, was probably
erected in the time of Henry the fourth. It is a very handsome pile,
built with flint and freestone, consisting of a body and two aisles,
covered with slate; the tower, which is square, with an embattled top, is
an hundred and fifty-nine feet in height.
The entrance at the west end, is a beautiful specimen of gothic
architecture, now in ruins; as is the porch on the north side and the
chancel. The flinting in many parts of the building, for the beauty of
its execution, is, perhaps, scarcely any where to be excelled.
The inside of the church, which is kept in good repair, is capable of
containing a very great number of persons; it is also tolerably well
pewed; but except the double row of arches which support the roof and
divide the aisles, very little of what it has been remains; these,
however, are of beautiful proportions, and the windows which were
formerly of noble dimensions, and probably ornamented with that most
elegant of church-decorations, painted glass, are now in a great measure
closed up by the hands of the bricklayer.
Amongst the repairs done to the church is one, which though it may be,
and certainly is, in some measure beneficial, yet, as it affects the
beautiful proportions of the middle aisle, the eye of taste must regret—I
mean the flat ceiling, which diminishes the height of the building by
cutting off the roof. Height when duly proportioned proportioned
certainly adds much to grandeur. In churches and in most gothic
buildings the roof terminates in a point corresponding with the other
parts, and by the exclusion of which the proportion and beauty of the
building is in a great measure destroyed.
There is something too in the dark and sombre hue of the roofs of
churches, when the timbers are left in their original state, that is very
pleasing.
Monuments there are none of any consequence,—one or two of the Windham
and Ditchell families are all the church contains; but a well-toned organ
has been placed in the gallery within these few years, for which the
church is peculiarly adapted.
At about a third part of the height of the staircase, which leads up the
steeple, is a door which opens upon the lead of a small turret,
communicating with the stairs, from which a few years since, a boy, by
the name of Yaxley, fell into the church yard, between some timbers which
were laid there for the repairs of the church, without receiving any
other hurt than a few slight bruises, and is now on board a ship in his
Majesty’s service.
Robert Bacon, a mariner, of Cromer, (says the History of Norfolk) found
out Iceland, and is said to have taken the Prince of Scotland, James
Stewart, sailing to France for education, in the time of Henry the
fourth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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