a new Infant was placed in her arms, an addition which was coarsely and clumsily rendered, as one would expect at that period. Four years after, on the plea that the woodwork of the upper part, including the cross on the top of all, was out of repair, a pyramid was substituted for the former finial cross, and a semi-nude statue of Diana for that of the Blessed Virgin. Queen Elizabeth ordered that a plain gilt cross should be set up on the summit of the pyramid. The City magnates demurred, but ultimately complied. Next, the statue of the Blessed Virgin was restored, and the whole structure cleansed; but only twelve nights after the erection of the new statue of the Virgin, the latter was again attacked, decrowned, and nearly beheaded, and the figure of the Infant taken away. In the course of its existence the cross of 1441 to 1486 had been repeatedly repaired and regilt. It had already lost every trace of its fifteenth-century origin by 1547, when, on 19th February, the coronation procession of Edward VI. passed at its foot, an incident which was depicted by a contemporary, or nearly contemporary, hand upon the stucco walls of the dining hall at Cowdray House, near Midhurst, Sussex (Fig. 132). The mural painting, unfortunately, perished in the devastating fire at Cowdray on the night of 24th to 25th September 1793. The rebuilding of Cheapside Cross was resolved upon in 1600. The new cross was erected in 1606 (Figs. 133 and 134). The question of the advisability of crowning the latter with a crucifix having been raised, the two Universities were formally consulted on the subject. Opinions were divided, but Dr George Abbot, then Vice-Chancellor of Oxford, and afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, pronounced definitely against a crucifix. A simple cross, therefore, unaccompanied by a dove, was attached to the top of the new structure; while the base was encircled by an iron railing as a precaution against attack. This, the third and last of the Cheapside crosses, stood for a shorter period than either of its predecessors. It was overthrown on 2nd May 1643, as recorded by Evelyn in his _Diary_, under this date, in the following passage: "I went to London, where I saw the furious and zealous people demolish that stately Crosse in Cheapside." [Illustration: 136, 137. CHARING, NEAR LONDON THE ELEANOR CROSS, AND THE CROSS WHICH SUCCEEDED THE FORMER ON THE SAME SITE]