In 1771 was finally destroyed the famous Cross which had been built, 1541-3, by Sir William Hollis, once Lord Mayor of London, who came of a Coventry family. It was described by Dugdale as "one of the chief things wherein this City most glories, which for workmanship and beauty is inferior to none in England." A few relics of it exist in St. Mary Hall, a statue of Henry VI, and, in the oriel, two smaller figures. So too does the very interesting contract for its building, which shows how much was left to the craftsman's pride in his work and how little he was trammelled by conditions, save that the work was to be "finished in all points, as well in imagery work, pictures, and finials, according to the due form and proportion of the Cross at Abingdon." Another building, which was destroyed in 1820, was the Pilgrims' Rest, a fine timbered house of three storeys, "supposed," as the inscription upon it records, "to have been the hostel or inn for the maintenance and entertainment of the palmers and other visitors to the Priory." Some pieces of carved work were patched together in the windows of the inn built on its site and there remain. The modern history of Coventry, consisting of the ordinary events and vicissitudes of civic life and the changes and fluctuations in its trades, apart from that of its parish churches which is elsewhere given, does not come within the scope of this handbook. [Illustration: SEAL OF THE PRIORY.] FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 1: St. Osburg's name is not found in the Calendar. As at the Dissolution the Cathedral possessed relics of St. Osborne, including his head in copper and gilt, these saints may be identical.] [Footnote 2: Earl Street and Bishop Street are still principal streets in either half of the town.] [Footnote 3: The walls of London were about three and a quarter miles long (including the river front), with ten or eleven gates; those of York three miles, of Chester hardly two.] [Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE WEST END OF THE PRIORY CHURCH.] THE RUINS OF THE PRIORY AND CATHEDRAL CHURCH The Priory buildings and grounds covered a large area to the North of the two parish churches on the gentle slope descending to the little river Sherbourne, Priory Row forming its southern boundary.