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The New Building—Interior 78 The Transepts, looking North 79 Evangelistic Symbols, from Lantern Tower Roof 80, 81 Boss from Lantern Tower Roof 82 The Nave, looking East 83 The Choir and Nave, looking West 85 Head of S. Peter in Ancient Stained Glass 89 Part of the Monks' Stone 92 Saxon Coffin Lids in North Transept 93 Portions of Abbots' Tombs 94, 95, 96 South Aisles of Choir and Nave 97 South Side of the Close, 1801 99 Cathedral Gateway, 1791 101 Door to Palace Grounds from the Cloisters, 1797 104 Door way to Cathedral from the Cloisters 105 Archway from Cloisters, North-West 107 Church of S. John the Baptist and Guildhall 109 Rose Windows and Details of West Front 117 Tomb of an Abbot, possibly Abbot Andrew, 1201 120 Iron Railings, 1721 123 Details of Chasuble on Abbot's Tomb 129 Details of Albs on Abbots' Tombs 133 PLAN OF THE CATHEDRAL. 135

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CHAPTER I.
HISTORY OF THE CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF S. PETER.

Until the middle of the nineteenth century, Peterborough remained one of the most unchanged examples in the kingdom of the monastic borough. The place was called into existence by the monastery and was entirely dependent on it. The Abbot was supreme lord, and had his own gaol. He possessed great power over the whole hundred. And even after the See of Peterborough was constituted, and the Abbey Church became a cathedral, many of the ancient privileges were retained by the newly formed Dean and Chapter. They still retained the proclamation and control of the fairs; their officer, the high bailiff, was the returning officer at elections for parliament; they regulated the markets; they appointed the coroner. Professor Freeman contrasts an Abbot's town with a Bishop's town, when speaking about the city of Wells.[1] "An Abbot's borough might arise anywhere; no better instance can be found than the borough of S. Peter itself, that Golden Borough which often came to be called distinctively the Borough without further epithet." And again, "the settlement which arose around the great fenland monastery of S. Peter, the holy house of Medeshampstead, grew by degrees into a borough, and by later ecclesiastical arrangements, into a city, a city and borough to which the changes of our own day have given a growth such as it never knew before."

Situated on the edge of the Fens, some miles to the east of the great north road, without any special trade, and without any neighbouring territorial magnates, it is hardly surprising that the place seemed incapable of progress, and remained long eminently respectable and stagnant. In one of his caustic epigrams Dean Duport does indeed speak of the wool-combers as if there were a recognised calling that employed some numbers of men; but he is not complimentary to those employed, for he says that the men that comb the wool, and the sheep that bear it, are on a par as regards intelligence: