392 Visit to St. Katherine's by the Tower. building, for the purposes of speculation, is doubly execrable;—a building endeared by its venerable age, by the splendid and elegant specimens of ancient carvings and sculpture within its walls, and as preserving in its collegiate chapter a memento of times and usages long gone by and forgotten. Your late ever-to-be-lamented Correspondent John Carter is spared the pain of witnessing this destruction. Could he rise from his grave and behold this fine old Church destroyed, and the materials scattered about as rubbish, what pain would it give him! He once rejoiced at its preservation from an infuriated mob, excited by fanaticism, to attempt its destruction; how would he have grieved to behold its fall merely to swell the lists of the speculations, to which the present time has given birth. Painful is it to reflect that at this moment the work of destruction is going on; that a few months will behold the bones of the pious, the titled, and the more humble and numerous tenantry of the Church-yard, scattered about by the careless hands of labourers, and eventually sunk in the mud which will occupy the site, to be turned up at every repair and cleansing of the place. When the remaining ashes of Dr. Andrew Coltée Ducarel, the late venerable Commissary of St. Katherine's, shall be disturbed; let the Innovators tremble lest his ghost should haunt their pillows. Turning from the Church, let us view the thickly peopled precinct surrounding it-see the poor man, the honest humble labourer, driven from his habitation to seek his lodging miles perhaps from the station of his work, toiling after a day of hard labour to reach a distant suburb, while the purchasers of the ground on which his home once stood, are eagerly grasping at profits and anticipating luxuries from their undertaking. Happily for other buildings which we are taught to view with a sort of veneration, the publick are heartily tired of the bubbles which have been every day blown for their delusion. If the ominous word "Discount" had not dissipated the shadows which have been raised, who could say where future sets of projectors might stop? The destruction of this Church having established a precedent, we might have [Nov. seen some future Company petitioning Parliament to appropriate the "building, called St. Paul's Cathedral," for a pawnbroker's warehouse, or some other receptacle of lumber which they might require. I have heard a report that every thing which can be preserved from the old Church is to be transferred to the new building intended to be erected in that fashionable area of patrician magnificence, the Regent'spark, where a Gothic Church is to rear its head amidst those paragons of plaster in the shape of Italian palaces and Grecian villas which occupy the site of that highly-favoured spot. I can easily imagine an edifice, rich in all that compo and painted deal can make it, run up in some corner next door perhaps to a tall house in a different, but not less ludicrous, style of architecture, possessing an appearance so equivocal that it may be mistaken for a lodge or a dog-kennel, or perhaps as completely puzzling the spectators for an appropriation as that pile of absurdity in Langham-place. Now, if the Chapter have the advice of an architect of taste, they will have it still in their power in some measure to preserve their Church. There can be little doubt that the whole of the columns, arches, and other architectural details in the present building might with a little care be removed and re-constructed in the new situation. This would be some atonement for the destruction we now deplore. As soon as the works are in a state of forwardness, I will visit the site of the intended Church, and watch the proceedings, and at a future period shall have occasion again to address you, Yours, &c. E. I. C. Respecting the Monostich NIYON, &c. already noticed in pp. 2. 194, as being inscribed on the Fonts of St. Martin, Ludgate; Worlingworth, Suffolk; and Dulwich College; A. H. desires to add that it is to be seen upon the Font in the Church Pauli Columerii Opera, p. 316, to which at St. Sophia at Constantinople. See A. H. has been lately referred by a literary correspondent.-OMICRON remarks that the same inscription appears round the edge of a large and capacious bason used in Trinity College, Cambridge, for the purpose of holding rose water to dip the fingers in after dinner. New 1825.] Trinity Church, Newington Butts, Surrey. NEW CHURCHES.-No. V. Trinity Church, Newington Butts, THIS increasing and increasing neighbourhood. It is situated on the South side of Suffolk-street East, at a short distance from Blackman-street, and nearly on the verge of the parish of St. Mary, Newington. It will be enclosed in a small square formed by Suffolk-street on the North, and new rows of houses running at angles with that street on the East and West, and continued on the South side of the Church to a street which will lead from thence to Horsemonger-lane. Encircled as it obviously would be with houses, it was evident that the general plan must be deviated from; this the architect, Mr. Bedford, of Cam berwell, has done by placing the portico and principal front of the edifice, with the steeple, on the North side of the body of the Church, instead of the usual situation at the West end. The engraving shews the West and North sides (see Plate 1.), a point of view in which the Church will not long be seen. The portico consists of six fluted Corinthian columns, raised upon three steps, and supporting a plain entablature and pediment. In the wall behind are five entrances, and above are the same number of windows, four of which are blank, the central alone being glazed, and lighting the belfry. The side window seen in the building behind the portico lights the gallery for the male charity children, as a corresponding one eastward does that appropriated to the girls. In addition to these several galleries, this attached building contains the different staircases, and the basement story of the tower. From the roof rises the steeple in three stories. The first two are decided copies from the steeple of Camberwell new Church, built by the same architect; the sole variation in the present instance is the filling up the intercolumniation with weather boards. Upon the second story a square pedestal, or namented on its sides with long pannels filled with carved honey-suckles, serves as a plinth to an octagon tower, with a ball and cross on the apex of its roof, which finishes the elevation. In the arrangement of this part of the erection, the architect has deviated from the simplest rule of building. Did he GENT. MAG. November, 1825. 393 never hear that it was inconsistent was The body of the Church is a parallelogram situated East and West, and in height is divided into two stories, by by a plain course. In both stories is a series of windows, as shewn in the engraving. The angles are finished with antæ, and the entablature is continued as a finish round the whole building; both the East and West ends are ter minated with pediments. On the centre of the South side is an unsightly projection, containing a flight of stairs to the gallery, and an entrance beneath it to the Church. The roof is covered with copper. The interior presents a large unbroken room roofed in one span. The walls are finished with an entablature, charged with a rich honey-suckle moulding, resting on antæ of the Ionic order, ranging from the floor of the Church to the architrave. The ceiling is made into square panels by architraves, crossing each other, and entering the walls of the Church, above the surrounding cornice; in the centre of each panel is a large expanded flower. The South, North, and Western sides are occupied by galleries resting on Doric pillars, the fronts panelled with slight mouldings. The whole of the interior as exactly resembles Mr. Bedford's other Churches as the steeple does those already named. Of those Churches I shall have occaion to speak before long. The genius of an architect derives but little credit from designs which are such exact counter parts 394 Trinity Church, Newington Butts, Surrey. parts of each other, as the productions The uniformity of the building is greatly broken by the situation of the portico. A large space on the North side, is occupied by two deep recesses on each side a window, which receives a false light from the belfry story of the tower. These recesses contain additional galleries for the charity children, ranging on each side of the steeple; they are consequently hid from the view of the greater part of the congregation. This fault is not attributable to the architect so much as to the site; but it is to be lamented, inasmuch as the effect of the interior is greatly hurt by this irregular arrangement. The pulpit and reading desk are counterparts of each other, and stand on opposite sides of the Church, a fashionable arrangement among architects, but nevertheless an absurd one. They [Nov. forget that the service is read from a desk, and not a pulpit. An useless sacrifice is here made to uniformity of appearance, at the expence of propriety. If the profession would condescend to look into the older churches of the Metropolis, they might learn an arrangement in this respect far superior to their modern ideas. The font stands in the nave beneath the Western gallery; it is made of composition in imitation of stone, and enriched with honeysuckles and other Grecian mouldings. The design is an antique vase, with han dles. It should have been an imitation of veined marble, for as it at present appears, it resembles both in design and composition the vases which may be purchased for a few shillings of the itinerant Italians, who are met with in every part of the Metropolis. In this gallery is placed the organ, in an oak case, with gilt ornaments. A noble chandelier of brass depends from the centre of the roof, which diffuses a brilliant light over the greater part of the Church. The first stone was laid on the 2d of June, 1823, by his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, attended by the Bishop of Worcester, and the Rector, Trustees, and parochial officers of Newington. The foundations had been raised to a level with the ground, at that time having been in progress for nearly six months previous. On the 16th of December, 1824, it was consecrated by the same Primate. The service was read by the Rev. C. V. H. Sumner, the first incumbent. The Rev. A. C. Onslow, M.A. the Rector of the parish, preached an able sermon from the 93d Psalm, v. 6, "Holiness becometh thine house for ever." The parish, though situated in the diocese of Winchester, is a peculiar of the Archbishop, who was attended by Sir John Nicholl, knt. as Dean of the Arches. The present is said to be the largest of the new Churches yet erected. It contains sittings in pews for 1277 persons, free seats 519, seats for charity children 252, making a total of 2048. but a far greater number can always be accommodated without inconvenience. The tower contains a peal of eight powerful bells, from the well-known foundry |