THE CRYPT: NELSON’S TOMB.

The present view represents one of the most picturesque scenes in the Crypt. Here, surrounded by an arcade, in the very heart of the Cathedral, immediately beneath the centre of the Dome, stands the tomb of England’s greatest naval hero.

The Sarcophagus itself has a strange history. It is usually said to have been designed by Torregiano as a portion of the memorial of Wolsey. “It lay for centuries neglected in Wolsey’s Chapel at Windsor. Just at the time of Nelson’s death, George III. was preparing to make that chapel a cemetery for his family. It was suggested as fit to encase the coffin of Nelson. It is a fine work marred in its bold simplicity by a tawdry coronet, but the master Italian hand is at once recognised by the instructed eye.” So Dean Milman writes.

Recent researches have shown that the Sarcophagus, which is of white and black marble, is the work of Benedetto da Rovezzano, by whom it was commenced in 1524 as part of a stately monument intended by Cardinal Wolsey as a magnificent memorial of himself. It appears that Henry VIII. took possession of the materials prepared for Wolsey’s monument, and that Benedetto was commissioned to transform it into a memorial for the king. The sculptor spent upon it eleven years of labour, but the costly work was never completed. The body of Nelson rests, not in the Sarcophagus, but beneath it.

THE CRYPT: NELSON’S TOMB.

THE CRYPT: WITH THE TOMB OF SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN.

Near the eastern end of the South Aisle of the Crypt, under a very simple tomb, lie the mortal remains of the great Architect of the Cathedral. On a black marble slab, part of which is seen in the picture, are the following words:—Here lieth Sir Christopher Wren, Kt., the builder of this Cathedral Church of S. Paul, &c., who dyed in the year of our Lord MDCCXXIII, and of his age XCI. A singularly modest epitaph for so great a man, and that, too, at a period when fulsome phrases abounded. A little westward of the tomb, on a tablet affixed to the wall, are the memorable words, admirable in their brevity and point:—Lector, si monumentum requiris, circumspice. The tomb itself, including the black marble slab, is only sixteen-and-a-half inches in height. Closely adjoining the tomb, on its northern side, are buried two eminent presidents of the Royal Academy, Sir Frederick Leighton and Sir John Millais; at the extreme distance are seen, on the left side the bust of Sir John Alexander Macdonald, late Premier of the Dominion of Canada; and on the right side, that of Sir Henry Smith Park, Minister Plenipotentiary in Japan and China. Nearer to the spectator, on the right, is the memorial to Archdeacon Claughton, Bishop of Colombo, whilst on the left, is dimly seen a monumental brass, commemorating the Special Correspondents who fell in the Campaign in the Soudan; opposite to which, on the right, is the bust of the painter, James Barry.

THE CRYPT: WITH THE TOMB OF SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN.

THE LIBRARY.

This noble room, situated at the west end of the Cathedral, immediately above the Chapel of the Order of S. Michael and S. George, contains an interesting and important collection of books; comprising a number of early English Bibles, a few ritual books, a large and valuable series of Sermons preached at Paul’s Cross or in the Cathedral; a few plays acted by the “Children of Paul’s,” some royal and other important autographs, and over ten thousand printed books, besides as many separate pamphlets.

In the view is seen a model of part of