One piece of modern restoration was not done by Lord Grimthorpe, namely that of the Wallingford screen behind the high altar. The statues on this having been destroyed and the screen itself damaged, Mr. H.H. Gibbs, now Lord Aldenham, offered to restore it, working under Lord Grimthorpe's faculty. After a time a dispute arose between them, chiefly over the introduction of a statue of Christ on the Cross in the centre of the screen, and the erection of an altar with a stone top below it. This led to a lawsuit, the final result of which was that Mr. Gibbs was allowed to finish the screen in his own way, but not to do anything to any other part of the church, a thing he wished to do. The altar is not yet in position; when this is placed where it is intended to stand, the work of restoration will be complete, and nave, choir and presbytery, and Lady Chapel will then alike be capable of being used for service, forming in reality three distinct and fully fitted churches under one roof, the retro-choir being intended for use as a chapter-house whenever a chapter shall be created.
[Illustration: FLOOR TILE WITH ARMS OF BEAUCHAMP.]
[Illustration: ANGLE BETWEEN NAVE AND TRANSEPT.]
The visitor who wishes to obtain, at first sight, the most impressive view of the Cathedral Church of St. Alban, should alight at the London and North-Western Station, at which all the trains from Euston and many of those from King's Cross arrive. This station is about half a mile south of the city, and from it a road runs up Holywell Hill, which, passing eastwards of the church, leads to the centre of the city. But a road running off to the left before reaching the top of the hill leads past the south side to the entrance at the west front of the Cathedral. Seen from the south the church, though it does not actually stand quite on the summit, seems to crown with its enormous length the ridge of hill to the north. Most of those who visit St. Albans for the first time feel a sense of disappointment. The church has no far-projecting buttresses to give light and shade, no flying buttresses or pinnacles like those that lend such a charm to most French and many English churches. All is severely plain, partly on account of the very early time at which the greater part of the existing church was built, partly on account of the material used for its walls. Abbot Paul of Caen, who designed it, trusted entirely to mass and proportion for the effect he wished to produce. But we do not see it as he designed it, and possibly built it. When we remember that he came from Caen, and seems to have used St. Stephen's Church, at that time recently built by Duke William, as a model, though he planned his own church on a grander scale, he must have contemplated two western towers even if he did not erect them--though, as previously stated, there is a division of opinion on the part of authorities on this subject. These western towers, if they were built, as well as the central one, would be crowned by pyramidal caps; and such towers, finely proportioned, would give the church the height which it so much needs, and the lack of which we feel so acutely to-day. The raising of the roofs at the time of the restoration to their original pitch was an undoubted gain, for without it the building looked lower and longer even than it does now. The church as we see it has been sadly injured by Lord Grimthorpe's work at both ends of the transepts, and whatever may be said about the western front in itself, yet no one can deny that, had the church been flanked by two towers standing, as at Wells and Rouen, outside the line of the aisles, even though the front itself were as plain as that of St. Stephen's at Caen, it would have been far more impressive.