taken from a quarry in the manor of Haselwood in the west riding, and there is little doubt that the stone used at Swine came from the same place.

The roads from the Humber to Swine, in the winter especially, must have been impassable for carriages, at the time when the church was built, and the conveyance by water would be much easier than by land. The principal entrance of the Holderness waters into the Humber was then known by the name of Sayer Creek, and probably was under the control of lord Sayer, of Sutton. From Sayer Creek, or from the fleet or creek at Marefleet, the passage by water to Swine through the low lands would not be difficult, and the stone might be landed within a very small distance of the west end of the church.

THE CHANCEL.

"Chancel, cancellus, seemeth properly to be so called, a cancellis, from the lattice-work partition betwixt the quire and the body of the church, so framed as to separate the one from the other, but not to intercept the sight."*

In many chancels are to be seen ancient seats or stalls like those which remain in the choirs of cathedral churches; and from hence it is that

* Burn's Eccles. Law, vol. 1, p. 342.

cancellus and chorus (the chancel and the choir) are words used to signify the same part of the church, where the body of the clergy of every church sung, or, at least, rehearsed their breviary.*

In ancient churches there were folding seats for those who sung in the choir, and when the singers were to stand, the seats were raised, or turned upwards.

In the chancel at Swine there were anciently many such seats; and on the south side of the chancel are still left eight folding seats of oak, which when turned up, exhibit various grotesque figures, rudely carved, some of which are scarcely consistent with decency. In our cathedrals, several seats and stalls exhibit not only satirical but indecent subjects, which shew that the persons who were employed in building our churches had not much reverence for religion or the ministers of it.

A modern writer informs us, that the seats of those who sung in the choir consisted of two parts: Antica and Postica. In the postica were the folding seats, which were raised when the singers were to stand. The folding part afforded a kind of seat, called a misericord. The part antica, made a leaning stock, upon which they

* Johnson's Clergyman's Vade-Mecum, vol. 1, p. 270.

reclined when the Venia was to be sought. Venia became a general term for genuflection, prostration, or similar gesture. The seniors only leaned upon the forms; the juniors and the boys lay prostrate upon the pavement, opposite the stalls; for to be raised to a forma, the word for a stall, was a promotion.*

SEATS AND PEWS.

Open seats, with backs, preceded pews in our churches before the reformation. The term pew was anciently applied only to the small places inclosed for confession, and to the reading desk and other inclosures. Only noblemen or the patrons of the church were privileged with particular seats. The seats were often moveable, and sometimes "the property of the incumbent, and so in all respects at his disposal;" and it seems that in some instances he might bequeath the seats to whom he thought fit.†

Pews, says an historian of Gloucestershire, destroy the architectural beauty of the finest churches, by apparently diminishing the due

* Fosbrooke's Brit. Monachism, p. 281, 282. Vide on this subject, Milner's Antiq. of Winchester, vol. 2, p. 37.

+ Johnson's Clergyman's Vade-Mecum, vol. 1, p. 178. Burn's Eccles. Law, vol. 1, p. 358.

elevation of the columns and arches, as well as by disproportionate and ugly intersections.

In the church at Swine were long, open, oaken seats, extending from the middle aisle to the north and south aisles, and shorter seats of the same sort, from the north and south aisles to the north and south walls, and some fragments of them are yet visible; but very nearly all those ancient seats have been torn up and destroyed, and pews of fir wood substituted for them.

The following observations relative to the seats in churches, are rather of a ludicrous sort. “My son Shuttleworth, of Hacking, made this form, and here will I sit when I come; and my cousin Nowell may make one behind me if he please, and my sonne Sherburne shall make one on the other side, and Mr. Catterall another behind him; and for the residue the use shall be, first come first speed, and that will make the proud wives of Whalley rise betimes to come to church.”*

CHANTRY IN THE CHURCH AT SWINE.

A chantry was commonly a small place in a church, or adjoining to a church, in which was a separate altar, where prayers were offered for the soul of the person who had left an endowment for the maintenance of a chantry priest.

* Surtees, from Whitakers's Whalley, p. 228.

Lands were frequently given "for the main"tenance of one or more priests, to pray for the "souls of the founders of chantries. Of these "chantries and free chapels there were two thou"sand three hundred and seventy four. They were "commonly united to some parochial, collegiate ❝or cathedral church. The free chapels, although designed for the same purpose were indepen"dent in their constitution, stood without being 66 annexed, and were better endowed." *

66

Chantries were said by the canonists to be sub tecto, or under the protection of the church, and they were generally erected by considerable persons, for the use of their own families; ut ibidem familiaria sepulcra sibi constituant.†

Burnet in his History of the Reformation says, "there were in the kingdom several colleges, chapels, chantries, hospitals and fraternities consisting of secular priests, who enjoyed pensions for saying mass for the souls of those who had endowed them. Now the belief of purgatory being left indifferent by the doctrine set out by the bishops, and the trade of redeeming souls being condemned, it was thought needless to keep up so many endowments to no purpose."‡

* Collier's Eccles. Hist. vol. 2, p. 238.