Astley Church,
Warwickshire, now destroyed, was so conspicuous an object at a distance,
that it was denominated the lantern of Arden. The spires of the churches
of Monkskirby and Clifton, in the same county, now also destroyed, were
formerly noticed as eminent landmarks.

[Illustration: Little Saxham Church Tower, Suffolk.]

[Illustration: Open Seat, Culworth Church, Northamptonshire.]

Anciently the body of the church appears to have contained no other fixed
seats for the congregation than a solid mass of masonry raised against the
wall, and forming a long stone bench or seat. A bench of this description
runs along great part of the north, west, and south sides of the Norman
church of Parranforth, Cornwall. In the Norman conventual church of Romsey
plain stone benches of this description occur; they are likewise to be met
with in Salisbury and other cathedrals; also in some of our ancient
parish churches, as in the south aisle of Kidlington Church, Oxfordshire.
Seats for the use of the congregation are noticed in the synod of Exeter,
held A. D. 1287. Open wooden benches or pew-work are rarely, if at all, met
with of an earlier era than the fifteenth century, when the practice of
pewing the body of the church with open wooden seats, if not then
introduced, began to prevail. In 1458 we meet with a testamentary bequest
of money "to make seats called puying," and several of our churches still
retain considerable remains of the ancient open seats of the fifteenth
century. At Finedon, in Northamptonshire, the body of the church and
aisles are almost entirely filled with low open seats, with carved tracery
at the ends, disposed in four distinct rows; so that the whole of the
congregation might sit facing the east. Similar seats occur in Culworth
Church, in the same county, and these are likewise of the fifteenth
century. The pulpit was anciently disposed towards the eastern part of the
body of the church, but not in the centre of the aisle. Pulpits are now
rarely to be found of an earlier date than the fifteenth century, when
they appear to have been introduced into many churches, though not to have
become a general appendage. Ancient pulpits of that era, whether of wood
or stone, are covered with panel-work tracery and mouldings; and some
exhibit signs of having been once elaborately painted and gilt. Mention,
however, is made of pulpits at a much earlier period; for in the year 1187
one was set up in the abbey church, Bur