and Lowick; some of those to the noble family of the Spencers at Brington; and to the Parrs (1546) at Horton.

Whilst still later may be enumerated some in the beautiful church of Easton Maudit to the Yelvertons (1611-1703); those at Weekly, to the Montagus; those at Dean, to the Brudenels (1531-1652); those at Fawsley, to the Knightleys: a costly and cumbrous one at Raunstone, to Lord Nottingham, and that at Stowe Nine Churches, (1617), to Lady Danvers3.

It would be difficult to represent these accurately, and impossible to describe them. They should all be visited, if a person wishes to gain any satisfactory knowledge of what they are: and there is not one church that has been enumerated, but what will amply reward him for the trouble of looking within its walls.

and drawing. The grey and simple monument of Edward Stafford, Earl of Wiltshire, (1499,) in the South aisle, is solemn and imposing. That in the North chancel, of Ralph Grene and his wife (1459), is a most refined conception of the sculptor, who, from the style of it, was probably an Italian. There is an air of gallantry in the idea of the husband having cast aside his gauntlet to take hold of his wife's hand; a placid and noble sentiment, not to say a devotional one, characterises this splendid memorial of an ancient family. But all description of such things is superfluous; they can only be understood by contemplation and study, and no individual's mind can be thoroughly imbued with chaste notions of English art, or capable of rightly appreciating creations that are marked by genius and truth, unless works like these receive his attention. A knowledge of them serves to advance not merely the cause of antiquarianism, but it enriches the mind, makes the eye conversant with the swelling outlines that graceful figures assume, and in fact refines and dignifies, at the same time that it excites the better feelings of our nature. In Halsted's Genealogies the whole of the monuments at Lowick are engraved, as well as those to the Lords Mordaunt, at Turvay, in Bedfordshire, and Robert de Vere, at Sudborough; unfortunately this elaborate and beautifully executed work is rare and costly, and therefore less known than its interesting contents deserve to be.

3 It was the work of Nicholas Stone, statuary and stone-cutter, master-mason to James and Charles the First, and cost £220. (See Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, vol. ii. p. 23.)

From the foregoing observations, it will readily be gathered, that Monumental Sculpture has been encouraged to a very great extent in this country; sometimes inconveniently so, and to the detriment of church accommodation; the building frequently being circumscribed through the number of its effigies in relief, and the space for pewage consequently lost.

These circumstances gave rise to a totally different kind of monument to those already described; that is to say, different as to surface and material, but not at all so in the valuable results that they offer to the enquirer.

The fashion of representing on tombs the likeness of the deceased, graven on a plate of brass, which was imbedded in melted pitch, and fastened down by rivets to a slab, either of sandstone or forest marble', appears to have been adopted about the middle of the thirteenth century. They are recorded to have been introduced into England long before any specimen now existing. That of Simon de Beauchamp, who completed the foundation of Newenham Abbey, and died before 1208, and was buried in front of the high Altar, in St Paul's Church, at Bedford, is the earliest instance that can be quoted. They were not unfrequently placed to the memory of Ecclesiastics, during the remainder of this century; though none of them have remained to the present day. The earliest Sepulchral Brass perhaps that continues is the fine one of Sir Roger de Trumpington, which may be assigned to the year 1290, as he died in the year preceding.

Having brought our subject to this point, it becomes needful to explain more particularly the nature of this class of monuments, and to state how they were manufactured.

In its original and more perfect state, the Sepulchral

The Kirdford Quarries, in Sussex, furnish this kind of marble in the highest perfection: the material lies from ten to twenty feet beneath the surface, embedded in flakes from nine inches to a foot in thickness. (See Dallaway's History of Sussex, vol. ii. p. 367.)