tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">[18] The corpse was accordingly taken from its grave at Peterborough, and removed to the place where it now lies, at Westminster, under the care of Richard Neile, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, on October 11th, 1612."

The next event of public interest happened during the bishopric of John Towers, in 1643; namely, the destruction and defacement of all the monuments and ornamental pictures of the cathedral, through the foolish prejudices and blinded bigotry of the puritanical followers of Cromwell, who destroyed every thing valuable within it, and spread terror over the surrounding country. The stately front, the curious altar-piece, and beautiful cloister, for which the cathedral was remarkable, were defaced and injured by them as they passed through the city, on their way to Croyland, which they were going to besiege, it having declared in favour of the king. To reduce that town, the Parliamentarian forces marched through Peterborough about the middle of the month of April. The first regiment that came did no harm to the church, for, being commanded by one Hubbart, who seems to have been a great improvement upon the puritanical leaders of that time, the soldiers received orders, in no way to injure the Cathedral. But unfortunately, about two days after, a regiment of horse arrived, commanded by Colonel Cromwell; and these men the morning after their arrival, commenced the work of destruction. They broke open the doors of the church, demolished the monuments, and turned the building into a stable.

The fury of Cromwell's soldiers is thus described in an old paper called:—

"A short and true narrative of the Rising and Defacing the Cathedral Church of Peterborough, in the year 1643."

"The next day after their arrival, early in the morning, they break open the church doors, pull down the organs, of which there were two pair. The greater pair which stood upon a high loft over the entrance into the quire, was thence thrown down upon the ground, and then stamped and trampled on, and broke in pieces.

"Then the souldiers entered the quire, and their first business was to tear in pieces all the common prayer books that could be found. The great bible indeed, that lay upon a brass eagle for reading the lessons, had the good hap to escape with the loss only of the apocrypha.

"Next they break down all the seats, stalls and wainscots that was behind them, being adorned with several historical passages out of the old testament, a latin distich being in each seat to declare the story. Whilst they were thus employed, they happened to find a great parchment book, behind the ceiling, with some twenty pieces of gold laid there, by a person a little before.—This encourages the souldiers in their work, and makes them the more eager in breaking down all the rest of the wainscot. The book was called 'Swapham,' and was afterwards redeemed by a person belonging to the minster for ten shillings.[19]

"There was also a great brass candlestick hanging in the middle of the quire, containing a dozen and a half of lights, with another bow candlestick about the brass eagle. These both were broke in pieces, and most of the brass carried away and sold.

"A well disposed person standing by and seeing the souldiers make such spoil speaks to an officer, desiring him to restrain them; who answered, 'See how these poor people are concerned to see their idols pulled down.'

"When they had thus defaced and spoiled the quire, they made up next to the east end of the church, and there break and cut in pieces, and afterwards burn the rails that were about the communion table. The table itself was thrown down, the table cloth taken away, with two fair books in velvet covers; the one a bible, the other a common prayer book, with a silver basin gilt, and a pair of silver candlesticks beside. But upon request made to Colonel Hubbert, the books, bason, and all else, save the candlesticks, were restored again.

"Not long after, on the 13th day of July, 1643, Captain Barton and Captain Hope, two martial ministers of Nottingham or Darbyshire, coming to Peterburgh, break open the vestry, and take away a fair crimson satten table cloth, and several other things, that had escaped the former souldiers hands.

"Now behind the communion table there stood a curious piece of stone-work, admired much by strangers and travellers: a stately skreen it was, well wrought, painted and gilt, which rose up as high almost as the roof of the church, in a row of three lofty spires, with other lesser spires growing out of each of them. This now had no imagery work upon it, or any thing else that might justly give offence, and yet because it bore the name of the high altar,[20] was pulled all down with ropes, lay'd low and level with the ground.

"Over this place, in the roof of the church, in a large oval yet to be seen, was the picture of Our Saviour seated on a throne; one hand erect, and holding a globe in the other, attended with the four evangelists, and saints on each side, with crowns in their hands, intended, I suppose, for a representation of Our Saviour's coming to judgment. Some of the company espying this, cry out and say, 'Lo, this is the God these people bow and cringe unto; this is the idol they worship and adore.' Hereupon several souldiers charged their muskets, (amongst whom one Daniel Wood, of Captain Roper's company was the chief) and discharge them at it: and by the many shots they made, at length do quite deface and spoil [the] picture.

"The odiousness of this act gave occasion (I suppose) to a common fame, very rife at that time, and whence Mercurius Rusticus might have his relation, viz.:—that divine vengeance had signally seized on some of the principal actors; that one was struck blind upon the place; by a rebound of his bullet; that another dyed mad a little after, neither of which I can certainly attest. For, though I have made it my business to enquire of this, I could never find any other judgment befal them then, but that of a mad blind zeal, wherewith these persons were certainly possest.

"Then they rob and rifle the tombs, and violate the monuments of the dead. And where should they first begin, but with those of the two queens, who had been there interr'd: the one on the north side, the other on the south side of the church, both near unto the altar. First then they demolished Queen Katherin's tomb, Henry the Eighth his repudiated wife: they break down the rails that enclosed the place, and take away the black velvet pall which covered the herse,—overthrow the herse itself, displaced the gravestone that lay over her body, and have left nothing now remaining of that tomb, but only a monument of their own shame and villany. The like they had certainly done to the Queen of Scots, but that her herse and pall were removed with her body to Westminster by King James the First, when he came to the crown. But what did remain they served in like manner; that is, her royal arms and escutcheons, which hung upon a pillar, near the place where she had been interr'd [which] were most rudely pulled down, defaced and torn.

"In the north isle of the church there was a stately tomb in memory of Bishop Dove, who had been thirty years bishop of the place. He lay there in portraicture in his episcopal robes, on a large bed under a fair table of black marble, with a library of books about him. These men that were such enemies to the name and office of a bishop, and much more to his person, hack and hew the poor innocent statue in pieces, and soon destroy'd all the tomb. So that in a short space, all that fair and curious monument was buried in its own rubbish and