On the other hand, there can be no doubt that an opening without either a door or stops on the jambs is far the best form for a crowd of people to pass through. I am sorry to say that I have not as yet taken the obvious course of examining the jambs of all the doorways with a view of ascertaining what ironwork has been let into them, and this may probably throw some light on the subject. The first features about the ruin which originally attracted my attention, and caused me to puzzle over it, were the doorways which have been inserted in the central window on each side, and I will not trespass upon your time further than to describe them to you, and, perhaps, offer a humble suggestion. The south window has had a doorway with a two-centred arch placed in its middle, flush with the outside wall. Both arch and jamb have a plain chamfer on them, and the jamb is of the usual door-jamb section, i.e., it widens out after passing about six inches into the wall, and it is then taken straight through to the inner face of the wall, where a segmental arch struck from one centre is thrown over the opening. This arch is very flat and has a chamfer upon it. Clearly then the door on this side of the chapel must have been hung in the usual way like the one below it and have opened into the building. Now the window on the north side of the chapel has been filled, in exactly the reverse way to the window on the south side. On the inside it has a doorway with a two-centred arch, similar to the one described as being on the outside of the south wall, and an arch struck from one centre, but not so flat as the one in the south wall, has been placed on the outside of the north wall. Therefore the doorway on the south side lead into the building and the doorway on the north side lead out of the building. Are we not justified in supposing that a gallery must have existed between the two doorways and that its object was to allow people to pass through the chapel? I venture to think that it could have had no other use and that it justifies my suggested origin of the two doors on the ground floor. There are no signs whatever of any stage having existed outside these doors on either side and it is almost impossible to assign a date to the doorways, but I am inclined to believe that they were added very soon after the chapel was built. As, however, I have been bold enough to start a theory, I had better make myself clear by stating how I believe this chapel was used, even at the risk of repetition. I believe the present chapel was built originally for the accommodation of the pilgrims, and that at times of the year when there were but few coming, the great west doorway was left open, so that it could be used at unusual times when pilgrims and others were not expected, but that when the crowds of pilgrims came they passed in the south door and out at the north. After a time this was found to give insufficient accommodation and it was then that a gallery over head was resorted to and temporary ladders or wooden steps were put up against the building to give a way in and out of the gallery. NOTES ON PAINTED SCREENS AND ROOFS IN NORFOLK1 By G. E. FOX, F.S.A. The following few notes have been arranged for the purpose of directing attention to a class of antiquities for which East Anglia is celebrated. No other county in England except Suffolk can exhibit such a display of painted roofs and screens as Norfolk does, and Suffolk alone equals Norfolk in the number and beauty of such remains. I venture to call your attention to Norfolk screens and roofs for the reason that during the meeting fine examples of both will be seen. The screens are for the most part Chancel screens, the forms of which are too well known to need elaborate description, the upper portion, consisting, beneath the rood loft, of open work tracery in various forms, the lower, filled in solidly and divided into narrow panels, varying in number with the size and divisions of the screen. All these screens are of wood, richly painted and gilt, but the interest they have for us lies in the treatment of the panels of the lower portion. These are generally enriched by a painting of a single figure in each, and the backgrounds are often beautifully powdered with rosettes and sprays, in gold and colours, to represent embroidered hangings, The ordinary arrangement of a Norfolk screen shows in its panels the twelve apostles, six on one side of its central doorway or opening, six on the other, or if the screen, from its width, contains more than twelve panels, then the centre ones are filled with the figures of other saints, or very commonly with the four Docters of the church, though if there are doors to the screen, these are placed on the Read in the Architectural Section, at the Annual Meeting of the Institute, ut Norwich, August 10th, 1889. VOL. XLVII K door panels. Many saints are, however, represented in the panel paintings, and naturally the local saints are frequently found amongst them. Occasionally the heavenly hierarchies are represented but not commonly. Those on the screen of the church of Barton Turf are good examples, but are not equal to similar ones on the screen at the east end of the north aisle of Southwold Church, Suffolk, where the arrangement is far more complete. Representations of subjects, i.e, compositions of several figures, as distinguished from single ones, are not common. A few instances can, however, be given. The first two panels of the screen at North Walsham contain the subject of the Annunciation, the figure of the Virgin being in one, and the Archangel in the other. Panels of the screen in Loddon Church exhibit the Martyrdom of St. William of Norwich, the Adoration of the Magi, and the Circumcision. Two subjects of singular nature are to be found on the panels of the screen at Sparham church. In the first of the southern division. stand two skeletons, side by side, of a gallant and a lady, both richly attired, the gallant holds in his hand a flaming torch, with a scroll round it having the words " Sic transit Gloria Mundi," the lady offers him a nosegay. Behind both of the figures are inscriptions relating to the brief and fleeting nature of human life. In the next compartment a single skeleton, in its shroud, rises from a tomb and points to a font in the background, on which various scrolls bear inscribed a text from Job, also on the transitory nature of human life (Job, chap. x., v. 19.') Occasionally figures of donors kneeling, occur in late paintings, as on the Fritton screen, which perhaps may be dated as late as 1520 or later.2 Nothing can exceed the richness of detail in the painted ornamentation of some of these screens. The delicate flower and spray work which fills every hollow of the mouldings, and is powdered over the backgrounds of the figures, the wonderful elaboration of the patterns of the dresses of those figures-such patterns as are only to be equalled by the productions of the Flemish looms-the delicately applied "Gentleman's Magazine," 1846. July to December, p. 135. 2"Illustrations of the Rood Screen at Fritton," published by the Norfolk and gilding,-all combine to make up a whole of the greatest beauty. And to enhance the effect, on some of the larger and later screens, the backgrounds of the figures are worked in gesso, in the most delicate relief, and richly gilt. Even the broad flat fillets of the mullions are covered with gesso stamped in intricate patterns of tracery, and having at intervals diminutive niches with tiny figures painted in them, which are protected by morsels of glass set in the pattern, as in a frame. For variety of detail, both in figure and ornament, few screens will equal the one at Randworth. For splendour of effect and multiplicity of forms in the gilt gesso work, certainly none can surpass that at Southwold, but this is a Suffolk screen. Remains of this delicate plaster work occur on the Cawston screen, which though a fine and large one, fails somewhat in its figures. These are for the most part but poorly conceived and executed. In the choice of the figures the usual arrangement is followed, the whole of the Apostles being represented together with St. Helena and St. Agnes, the Docters of the Church occupying their accustomed place upon the doors. Another effigy may be seen here, an exception to the usual saintly company, that of Master John Schorn, who is represented in the act of performing the miracle of conjuring the Evil one into a boot. This worthy, though not a saint, appears occasionally on the Norfolk screens, possibly because he was believed in the middle ages to have power to cure the ague, which, in a county possessing so much marsh land as Norfolk, must have been a malady only too common. Master John Schorn is said to have held the rectory of North Marston, Bucks, in 1290, and seems to have been at one time a canon in the Augustinian Priory of Dunstable. The well blessed by him at North Marston was an object of pilgrimage. There are two periods in the figures on this screen; some of the figures on the south side including that of the above-mentioned worthy, were painted at a later date and in a better style than the old ones, on paper or vellum and glued over the older work. The later ones may have been executed when the fabric received the further adornment of the stamped and gilt gesso work which covers the flat surfaces of its main divisions. Some of this decoration remains on these more |