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Gentleman's Magazine 1849 part 1 p.255
As it now stands, the plan of this church consists of a
tower; nave, with north and south aisles; a sacristy or
vestry taken off the west end of the south aisle; a south
porch; a chancel with north and south aisles, that on the
south being loftier and wider than the northern aisle; and a
chancel door. Viewed on the exterior it presents an
embattled square tower, about sixty feet in height,
supported by diagonal buttresses at the north-west and
south-west angles, of three stages each, which die away into
the walls about half-way up the tower. On the north and
south side, beneath the battlements, are two rude stone
water-spouts. At the south-west corner is the stair turret,
which rises a few feet above the roof, and is likewise
surmounted with battlements. In this angle a spiral stone
staircase, lighted by slits, winds to the leaden roof, from
whose lofty summit start into view -
A thousand beauties at one charming sight!
No pencil's art can such a landscape feign,
And Nature's self scarce yields the like again;
the whole forming a picture replete in every direction with
attractions of unequalled beauty.
The belfry carries a set of six sweet-toned bells, hung up
about seventy years ago, whose harmonious carillons,
"the most exhilirating and the most affecting of all
measured sounds" on a calm Sabbath morn, break upon the air
of the romantic vale with a melody that was ever listened to
with a holy pleasure by the late Laureate, to whom it spoke
of an immortality brighter by far than that of Fame. On the
western front of the tower, about midway from the ground, is
a large window of four lights, whose four upright mullions
and embattled transom assign its date to the latter period
of the Perpendicular or Tudor style, and on each side of the
story above is a small stone-mullioned, circular-headed,
belfry window of three lights.
A handsome south porch, too elaborate, indeed, for the style
of the church, occupies the site of the old one. It is built
of hammer-dressed dark grey stone, with dressings of
reddish-coloured sandstone at the quoins and buttresses, and
round the doorway. The gable is terminated by a handsome
floriated cross, and the high-pitched roof is supoorted by
four small buttresses of one stage each, that rise from
plain bases at the corners on each side of the portal, and
die under the eaves' courses. The doorway has small
clustered columns, from which spring a pointed arch of many
mouldings, surmounted by a hood moulding, resting on carved
heads. The roof is open to the framing, and the inner
doorway has a plain Tudor arch devoid on any ornament. There
is likewise a small chancel door, having a flat top and
sides, supported by a quarter circle from each side of the
jamb, and on the right-hand, outside, is a small niche and
mutilated stoup. The doors are all of oak, studded with
nail-heads, and have large scroll hinges, or ornamental
character and ancient design.
The church is 47 yards long, and exteriorly consists on the
south side of two bays, separated by three graduating
buttresses, each of several unequal stages, which all die
into the wall below the parapet, one at each end, and one
near the centre of the flank wall. In the first bay from the
west is the porch, and in the second is the chancel door.
The windows of the aisle on this side are six in number, and
are all of the same size and form, being of three
stone-mullioned, semi-circular-headed lights, each under
square-headed frames. At the west end of the south aisle of
the nave, under an upright, square-headed frame, is an
ogee-arched stone-mullioned, two-light, trefoiled window.
At the west end of the north aisle, in the re-entering angle
formed by the north wall of the tower and the west wall of
that aisle, is a plain narrow buttress of one stage only. On
the north side are three buttresses of similar form and
dimensions to those on the south. They support the flank
wall of the north aisle of the chancel only, and, dividing
it into two nearly equal-sized bays, die into the wall below
the eave course of the roof. On the north side of the north
aisles there are eight stone-mullioned windows, set within
square-headed frames; three, in the north aisle of the nave,
being of two lights each, with trefoiled heads under ogee
arches; two, of two lights each, with cinquefoiled heads,
under lancet arches; one
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