The use of the low side window, common in some districts, near the south-west angle of the chancel, and sometimes, but not so frequently, near the north-west angle, and occasionally even in the aisle, has not been correctly ascertained; it has, however, been conjectured to have served for the purpose of a confessional; and on minute examination indications of its formerly having had a wooden shutter, which opened on the inside, are sometimes visible; and on the south side of Kenilworth Church, Warwickshire, is an iron-barred window of this description, on which the wooden shutter is still retained.[209-*] The sedilia or stone seats, so frequently found in the south wall of the chancel, are occasionally, though not often, to be met with in the south walls of side aisles or chantry chapels: when this is the case it is presumed the endowment was for more priests than one. Such, not to digress into more minute particulars, may suffice to convey a general idea of the manner in which our churches were internally decorated, and how they were fitted up, with reference to the ceremonial rites of the church of Rome, in and before the year 1535. The walls were covered with fresco paintings, the windows were glazed with stained glass; the rood-loft and the pulpit, where the latter existed, were richly carved, painted, and gilt; and the altars were garnished with plate and sumptuous hangings. Altar-tombs with cumbent effigies were painted so as to correspond in tone with the colours displayed on the walls; the pavement of encaustic tiles, of different devices, was interspersed with sepulchral slabs and inlaid brasses; and screen-work, niches for statuary, mouldings, and sculpture of different degrees of excellence, abounded. Suspended from aloft hung the funeral achievement; at a later period, even more common, the banner, helme, crest, gauntlets, spurs, sword, targe, and cote armour.[210-*] In addition to these were, in some churches, shrines and reliquaries, enriched by the lavish donations of devotees, and wooden images excessively decked out and appareled[211-*]--objects of superstition, to which pilgrimages and offerings were made. And if in the review of the conceptions of a prior age, viz. of the fourteenth century, we find a higher rank of art to be evinced, and the style and combination of architectural and sculptured detail to be more severe and pure, at no period were our churches adorned to greater excess than on the eve of that in which all were about to undergo spoliation, and many of them wanton destruction.