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Upon this subject I have nothing further to notice, except
the PLACES OF WORSHIP, which have mostly a little
school-house adjoining.* The architecture of these
churches and chapels, where they have not been recently
rebuilt or modernised, is of a style not less appropriate
and admirable than that of the dwelling-houses and other
structures. How sacred the spirit by which our forefathers
were directed! The religio loci is no where violated
by these unstinted, yet unpretending, works of human hands.
They exhibit generally a well-proportioned oblong, with a
suitable porch, in some instances a steeple tower, and in
others nothing more than a small belfry, in which one or two
bells hang visibly. But these objects, though pleasing in
their forms, must
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* In some places scholars were formerly taught in the
church, and at others the school-house was a sort of
anti-chapel to the place of worship, being under the same
roof; an arrangement which was abandoned as irreverent. It
continues, however, to this day in Borrowdale. In the parish
register of that chapelry is a notice, that a youth who had
quitted the valley, and died in one of the towns on the
coast of Cumberland, had requested that his body should be
brought and interred at the foot of the pillar by which he
had been accustomed to sit while a school-boy. One cannot
but regret that parish registers so seldom contain any thing
but bare names; in a few of this country, especially in that
of Loweswater, I have found interesting notices of unusual
natural occurrences - characters of the deceased, and
particulars of their lives. There is no good reason why such
memorials should not be frequent; these short and simple
annals would in future ages become precious.
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