The church of Crayford, dedicated to the Apostle {97} of the North, St. Paulinus, who did much good work in the Thames valley before he became Bishop of York, is a noteworthy structure, in the perpendicular style, with a fine timber roof that probably belonged to an earlier building. It is of somewhat unusual construction, having no nave but two very broad aisles connected by the chancel arch, and it contains some interesting monuments, including one to William Draper and his wife, who died, the former in 1650, the latter in 1652, and one to Dame Elizabeth Shovel, who passed away in 1752. North Cray, about two miles from Crayford, is still a charming scattered hamlet, and from it a pathway leads across fields to Foot's Cray, the latter said to be named after Godwin Fot, who owned the manor at the time of Edward the Confessor. It passed, after changing hands several times, to the Walsingham family, and in its manor-house was born Sir Francis Walsingham, the Puritan statesman who was so bitter an enemy of the unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots. Foot's Cray owns a very interesting old church--unfortunately a good deal spoiled by unskilful restoration--with traces of Saxon and Norman work, and a little to the north of it is a fine eighteenth-century mansion belonging to the Vansittart family. Still more noteworthy is the relic of the once beautiful Ruxley church, now used as a barn, that is about three-quarters of a mile from Foot's Cray and deserves careful examination, the sedilia and piscina, with part of the original chalk walls faced with flint, having been preserved when the rest of the materials were sold for building. {98} Built on the river Cray, that is bridged over in its principal street, Bexley has recently grown almost into a town, but it is still a pretty place and owns an interesting old church--with a lofty tower surmounted by an octagonal spire--that is supposed to occupy the site of a Saxon chapel founded in the ninth century by Wilfrid, Archbishop of Canterbury. A beautiful Norman arch above the Early English southern doorway is probably a relic of a second building that preceded the present one. The latter, that dates from the twelfth or thirteenth century, was well restored some thirty years ago, when portions of a fine old rood screen were skilfully dovetailed into a modern one, the ancient oak stalls were replaced in the chancel, and several brasses that had long been buried were set up in their former positions, including one to the memory of the At Hall family--who owned the eighteenth-century Hall Place on the road from Bexley to Crayford--that bears the symbol of the horn, proving that they held their manor on what was known as a hornage tenure, a horn having been the token of a forester's office.