WESTMINSTER ABBEY. Vol. I. of an Inventory of the Historical
Monuments in London. (Stationery Office. 21s.
net.)
Tax Royal Commission of Historical Monuments, having dealt with three of the Home Counties, has begun to describe the antiquities of London, and devotes a whole volume to the Abbey, the historic church of the English-speaking peoples. Though avowedly a mere inventory of all that remains of earlier date than 1714, it is a most fascinating book, precise in scholarly detail and copiously illustrated with excellent photographs and plans. Even those who think that they know the Abbey well must be surprised at the delightful mediaeval sculptures which are revealed by the camera— notably the angels high up in the south transept—or which, like William Torel's famous effigy of Queen Eleanor, are much more easily seen in these photographs taken from above. When one has looked through these innumerable plates illustrating the decorative and sepulchral carving, the mosaics, the ironwork and enamels, the woodwork and the glass, one realizes more fully than ever that this great and beautiful church is also an unsurpassed museum of English mediaeval art. Nor is the church alone described. All that remains of the Abbey buildings, whether used by the Dean and Chapter or by the School, is carefully noted, including the famous Jerusalem Chamber, where Henry the Fourth died, and the Jericho Parlour, Ashburnham House, where the Prior used to live, and the fourteenth-century Cellarer's Building. Much has perished, as the reader may see from a large coloured plan of the Abbey, but much has survived. The Provost of Eton sketches the history of the fabric and touches on its main features in an all too brief introduction ; the rest o, the book is purely descriptive, but excellent of its kind. Work of later date than Queen Anne is ignored, though we arc given a complete list of the modern monuments, including that of Walter Hines Page. If we might make a suggestion, it is that the text should be reprinted separately on thin paper, for use as the best of all guide-books in the Abbey itself. To do this need not be beneath the dignity of a Royal Commission,
and there should be a steady sale for the smaller as well as for the larger book.
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