Notes On The Early Sculptured Crosses, Shrines And Monuments In The Present Diocese Of Carlisle (1899)

PREFACE. collect and to complete. at the desire of his representatives, these papers oT the Rev. TV. S. Calverley for the publication so long promised, has been a task at once painful and pleasant. I t has been pleasant to raise, as it were, a Cross to his memory but painful to rist the runes upon it, hewing them out letter by letter, with unskilled hands, in much diffidence, and In much regret. The aim has been to compile some such volume as Mr. Calverley intended-a general work giving account of the Christian relics ofnur north-west corner of England from the time when the Romans left to the 12th century, when a new order of things came into being. He did not live to write his cwn boolt. His working life was too short for all that might have been, though of the time and talents allotted him he made diligent and faithful use. I l e would have been the last to wish his biography written, and yet we cannot but say a few words upon his life, by way of preface to his worlc. Williarn Slater Calverley was born near Leeds in 1847, and after his school days proceeded to Nerv College, Orrard, which he left to take a private tutorship. During this pe iocl he was strongly inclined to the study of art, and worlcerl with r n c p h ro mise at oneofthe schools in connection with South Kensington. Indeed, it was only by an nccident of illness that he failed, on one occasion, to win the gold medal for dratcing from the figure. Hut his training wasby nomeans thrown awly. Not only was he able to make such drawings as are given in this volume, illustrating he art of ancient days with direct ness and emphasis, but he learnt the artists habit ofobserving form, and recording it. No one had a keener eye for nfragment of sculpture, lurking in a rubbish-heap, or built into a wall and he was always ready with his pencil and sketch-book to note the find. Wherever he went, he slrctched, accumulating the material from which he could make his comparisons and draw his conc usions. That was, perhaps, the secret of his unusual power ofgeneralization, by which he interpreted the Gosforth Cross, and created-it is not too much to say-a nerv era in this department of study. He was not satisfied even with sketching and drawing the monuments he loved. He took rubbings of the whole series, most carefully done, and casts of many and in the chapter on Aspatria he tells how, for the salte of entering into the spirit of the ancient a r t i s t s and craftsnlen, he went to the great labour of reproducing the great Gosforth Crclss in stone--the copy which may be seen and judged in Aspatria churchyard not a mere cast, be it understood, but a sculptors vorlc of art, following out the original in every detail, and with firlelity to style and spirit not so much as attempted by others. In spite nf this artistic turn he had always intencled himself for the Church. and in 1372 was ordained at Carlisle by, ishop Goodwin, taking-a curacy at Fsltdale, in South Cumberland...