The Children's Story of Westminster AbbeyTroutbeck, G. E. (Georgina E.)
History
The Children's Story of Westminster Abbey
Troutbeck, G. E. (Georgina E.)
Westminster Abbey
Close to these a beautiful new window has been erected to the memory of
Sir Benjamin Baker, who died in 1907. He was the engineer of the Forth
Bridge, the Assouan Dam, and other important works. In the window are
full-length figures of Edward III and of Cardinal Langham, once Abbot of
Westminster.
Near the graves of Stephenson and Telford are buried four distinguished
architects of the nineteenth century. These are:—
(1) Sir Charles Barry, who built the present Houses of Parliament, and
who died in 1860.
(2) Sir Gilbert Scott, who died in 1878. He was one of the leaders in
the revival of Gothic architecture in England.
(3) George Edmund Street, who died in 1881. A distinguished architect in
the Gothic style. He designed the present Law Courts.
(4) John Loughborough Pearson, who died in 1897.
Sir Gilbert Scott and Mr. Pearson were both of them “Surveyors of the
Fabric” to the Abbey. This means that they had charge of the actual
building from the architectural point of view.
In the Chapel of St. John the Evangelist is a memorial to the great
Arctic explorer, Sir John Franklin, who was lost in 1847, with both his
crews, while making the discovery of the North-West Passage. The
monument was put up by Lady Franklin. On it is a representation of the
vessel fast in the Polar ice, and round the sculptured scene are the
words—
“O ye ice and snow, O ye frost and cold, bless ye the Lord; Praise him
and magnify Him for ever.”
Below are Tennyson’s beautiful lines—
“Not here: the White North has thy bones; and thou
Heroic sailor soul,
Art passing on thy happier voyage now
Towards no earthly pole.”
Close by is the memorial to another Arctic explorer, Admiral Sir Leopold
M‘Clintock, who died in 1907. It was he who discovered the remains of
Franklin’s ships, and thus found out how he had died.
Before ending this long list of people who are gathered into remembrance
in the Abbey, we must not forget the names of some of those who have
served their fellow-men by special works of love and kindness.
Close to the great West Door is a fine statue of Anthony Ashley Cooper,
Earl of Shaftesbury, who did a great deal to make the lives of poor
children healthier, happier, and better, and to whom England owes many
improvements in the laws about work in factories and mines.
Lord Shaftesbury is remembered in Westminster as President of the
Westminster Window Garden show, a flower show which was intended to
encourage poor people to grow nice flowers in their windows, and so to
brighten the dulness and ugliness of town streets, as well as to teach
them something about Nature. Lord Shaftesbury used to come every year to
give the prizes at this show, which used to be held in Dean’s Yard.
Lord Shaftesbury also took great interest in George Peabody’s scheme for
improving the dwellings of the poor, and tried all he could to help on
this good work. He died in 1883.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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