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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io* s. n. SEPT. 2*. MM.
-co. Durham, is on a rockery in the rectory
garden.
That of Benton, Northumberland, stands in the churchyard there.
The old font of Urswick Church, Lanca- shire, was at the beginning of this year standing in a small garden in front of an untenanted and partly ruinous house near to that place ; in addition there were portions of columns, tracery from the windows, and other fragments from the same church. I communicated this to the Cumberland Anti- quarian Society, and trust that ere this they have all been removed back to the church.
The last time I saw the Norman " truncated cone " font of Witton-le-Wear it was knocking about the churchyard. A brand-new font was supplied to the church, and where the old one now is I cannot say. R. B R.
I fear the reasons for styling the Sileby font Saxon are not such as to satisfy MR. HEMS. A local antiquary assigned it to that period on account of its unusual shape and the uncouth nature of the ornaments cut upon it. But some of the Norman sculptures to be seen elsewhere in the county are marvels of uncouthness. W. T. H.
Canon Woodward's 'The Parish Church of Folkestone,' p. 92, states :
"This older (thirteenth-century) font seems to have been broken, and then removed from the church and built into the churchyard wall. It was discovered when taking down a part of the wall in order to build a vestry some few years ago. The broken parts have been put together again, and so reconstructed the font has been placed in the churchyard within the iron rails at the western end of the church. Upon the base is inscribed ' Old Font, found in the Churchyard Wall June llth, 1884.' "
R. J. FYNMORE.
Sandgate.
There is an eighteenth-century font serving the purpose of a flower-pot outside the door of a cottage in the village of Mytton, in Yorkshire. The owner brought it with him from Gisburn, some ten miles further up the valley. FEED. G. ACKERLEY.
Libau, Russia.
The following will be found under the heading of ' Kirkham, Castle Howard and Oambe' in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1815 :
"In a farmhouse opposite the gate way is preserved the abbey font, which was dug from among the ruins not many years since. It is perfect and very much ornamented, but does not appear to be much older than the reign of Henry VI. It may be deemed a great curiosity, as this decorative appendage to a church was generally marked as an object for destruction."
It is interesting to note that the old font
from Harrow Church has been replaced and
restored. Has the one from Kirkhatn Abbey
been equally fortunate ?
JOHN T. THORP, RR.S.L.
Leicester.
This subject is, I should say, interminable. Some little excuse, not exactly for the desecration of the fonts, but for their disuse, might be alleged from the fact that the stone of which some are made is of a porous nature, and often the lead with which they are lined is cracked, causing the water to leak.
The old font of Trinity Church, Stratford- on-Avon, was in a garden in the town, and there is a small artistic engraving of it in a pretty little book ** Shakspere : his Birthplace and Neighbourhood, by John R. Wise, illus- trated by W. J. Linton, 1861," in which wild flowers are represented as growing in it and around it.
In former years basins made of earthenware, sometimes of Spode china, sometimes fine specimens of china, were placed in the font, and I can remember Bishop Wilberforce, then of Oxford, finding one in a font in a country church, and, when letting it fall from his hands, saying to the churchwardens as it broke, ** You have no need to replace this," a practical reproof indeed.
JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.
Newbourne Rectory.
There was formerly in St. Peter's Church, Oxford, a most curious rotund font, repre- senting in stalls, under circular arches sup- ported by massive columns, the twelve Apostles. This was many years since con- veyed away by an ignorant and sacrilegious churchwarden, and placed over a well on the north side of the church ; but the well has long been stopped up, and the font de- stroyed. CHAS. F. FORSHAW, LL.D.
There are two fonts in the churchyard at Brympton, Somerset.
At Great Stainton the old font was dis- covered, a short time ago, buried beneath the flooring of the church.
At Hilperton, near Trowbridge, Wilts, there is a Norman font, which used to decorate a garden at Whaddon, from which church it was taken. .
At Minehead Church, Somerset, the old font is placed at the east end of the south aisle, and a new marble font has taken its place.
At Preston Church, Brighton, the same thing has. happened, but unfortunately the old one has disappeared.
ANDREW OLIVER.
