St. Neot
The earliest appreciation by the outside world of the great natural wealth of England was evidenced by those perilous voyages out into the unknown sea beyond the Pillars of Hercules, undertaken by the early Phœnicians in order to trade for tin with the inhabitants of what we now call Cornwall. By one of the odd philological quirks of slang, the word “tin” is now endowed with a meaning inclusive of every form of wealth—a strange modern acknowledgment of the earliest form of English value. Many of these ancient mines are still worked, as we shall see for ourselves when we visit St. Neot. This centuries-old continuance of tin-mining is strongly in accord with all things Cornish, for in that westernmost corner of England change does not intrude, and as things have been so they continue to be. We will assume that the pilgrim has reached Plymouth, that western outpost of Devon, seated beside her ample harbour, whose many bays and estuaries running up into the land seem to symbolise Father Neptune laying his mighty hand upon the smiling country. Ferrying across to the Cornish side, we proceed by pleasant woody roads giving glimpses of Plymouth Harbour, and on to solid stone-built Liskeard. Pushing past along the high road that leads to Bodmin and the Land’s End, we shall be at some pains to notice a little road that, four miles beyond Liskeard, turns off to the right up a narrow valley. A mile of pretty windings past several ancient but still active tin mines, brings us to St. Neot, snugly stowed away among the hills. Here, in this small community, which shows no trace of ever having been any larger, nor any indication of becoming so in the future, stands one of the most interesting glass shrines in England. The church has the appearance of many another of the Perpendicular school—a type so common throughout the land. One notices that it is lighted by an ample number of large windows, each of four lancets. Once inside the door, however, and the change from the usual to the extraordinary is immediate. The roomy interior is practically unbroken by the usual divisions of chancel, nave, &c., and this very appearance of spaciousness assists admirably in showing off the windows to the greatest advantage. The oldest ones are at diagonally opposite ends of the church from each other, and are found in the north-westerly and south-easterly corners. The many small groups or scenes (each installed in a canopy) into which these are subdivided render their legends all the more attractive, because they depict so many different points in the story’s development. The architecture of their canopy frames shows that they date from rather early in the fifteenth century. In addition to this more common style of glazing there is another type, which has a number of examples here—a saint standing upon a bracket and displayed against a quarry background, but lacking a canopy. These date from a little later in the Perpendicular period. This bracket feature is very English, and may also be seen at Nettlestead and West Wickham in Kent. So pleased were the parishioners with these two types that, when some new windows were presented in 1528-29-30 (now seen along the north wall), the glazier did not work in the then prevailing Renaissance method, but designed his story of St. Neot’s life after the earlier many-scened type, as well as copying some of them after that of the bracketed saints. One of these sixteenth century windows was presented by the young men of the parish, another by the young women, a third by the married women, and the rest by private individuals or families. Below the two given by the married and the unmarried women are a row of kneeling donors which afford an interesting study of female costume. In the south wall is a window given by the Mutton family. Here the glazier did not copy earlier types, but struck out along a new line, making a very graceful use of winding scrolls. Extremely pleasing as is the effect of all these windows, the result would have been even more gratifying had it not been for a restoration which befell the church in 1820, and which, when it subsided, left behind it not only three unsatisfactory new windows, but also certain misguided retouchings of the old ones. Even this gentle criticism must not be allowed to affect the fact that the ensemble of the interior here is delightful and one of the most complete in England. Nor is this general effect one whit less engaging than the host of quaint details revealed by a close investigation of the glass, especially in the case of the Noah window (most easterly of the south wall), and that devoted to St. Neot (most westerly of the north wall). The mediæval idea of Noah’s Ark is very diverting, as is also the artist’s idea of how most of his wild animals must have looked. Then, too, the attention paid by good St. Neot to the sacred fish which his over-zealous servant had wickedly roasted and broiled is most entertaining. For beauty, and for interest as well, this noteworthy set of windows in far-off Cornwall amply repay the length of the trip necessary to seek them out.