Notes on the Church of St Margaret-at-Cliffe

ST. MARGARET-AT-CLIEFE, 179 gable. Then, perhaps, something might be done to make the entrance more worthy of the church. The tower, too, has suffered much at the hands of the repairers, whose initials and date appear on the south side; but further restoration would certainly detract from its interest, and probably fail to add to its beauty.* A newel staircase that ran up the north-west corner of the tower has been destroyed. The entrance to it remains. The lintel of the doorway consists of one large stone, which from its rude character some have pronounced to be Saxon workmanship; it appears to the writer to be merely a bit of unfinished carving of the same age as the rest of the tower. PS.—Mr. J. T. Micklethwaite, in a recent report on the church, extracts from which have heen forwarded to me by the Eev. F. Case, says: " The church keeps still the form given to it in the first half of the twelfth century; and it is very uncommon to find a parish church so fully developed as this one is at so early a date." This plan, though it is a simple one, is not only very uncommon, it is almost unique. It is necessary to distinguish between churches of which aisles formed part of the original plan and churches which were originally built without aisles, and to which aisles were afterwards added. From before the middle of the twelfth century onwards to the fifteenth, people found the addition of an aisle to be the easiest way of enlarging a previously existing church of the common aisleless nave and chancel type. Under the influence of this * Is it too much to hope that the heavy and unsuitable modern stone pulpit may ere long be replaced by a wooden structure, and that the organ may be rebuilt and placed (? bracketed) where it shall not obstruct the view of the fine chancel ? sr 2