probably the wooden altar, using the colours as her fancy
dictated, or as the various colours held out. The effect was
remarkable. A succeeding rector began at once the work of restoration,
scraping off the paint and substituting oak varnish; but when my
friend took a morning service for him the work had not been completed,
and he preached from a bright green pulpit.

[Illustration: Carving on Rood-screen, Alcester Church, Warwick]

The contents of our parish churches, furniture and plate, are rapidly
vanishing. England has ever been remarkable for the number and beauty
of its rood-screens. At the Reformation the roods were destroyed and
many screens with them, but many of the latter were retained, and
although through neglect or wanton destruction they have ever since
been disappearing, yet hundreds still exist.[31] Their number is,
however, sadly decreased. In Cheshire "restoration" has removed nearly
all examples, except Ashbury, Mobberley, Malpas, and a few others. The
churches of Bunbury and Danbury have lost some good screen-work since
1860. In Derbyshire screens suffered severely in the nineteenth
century, and the records of each county show the disappearance of many
notable examples, though happily Devonshire, Somerset, and several
other shires still possess some beautiful specimens of medieval
woodwork. A large number of Jacobean pulpits with their curious
carvings have vanished. A pious donor wishes to give a new pulpit to a
church in memory of a relative, and the old pulpit is carted away to
make room for its modern and often inferior substitute. Old stalls and
misericordes, seats and benches with poppy-head terminations have
often been made to vanish, and the pillaging of our churches at the
Reformation and during the Commonwealth period and at the hands of the
"restorers" has done much to deprive our churches of their ancient
furniture.

[31] _English Church Furniture_, by Dr. Cox and A. Harvey.

Most churches had two or three chests or coffers for the storing of
valuable ornaments and vestments. Each chantry had its chest or ark,
as it was sometimes called, e.g. the collegiate church of St. Mary,
Warwick, had in 1464, "ij old irebound coofres," "j gret olde arke to
put in vestments," "j olde arke at the autere ende, j old coofre
irebonde having a long lok of the olde facion, and j lasse new coofre
having iij loks called the tresory cofre and certain almaries." "In
the inner house j new hie almarie wi