So
That The Length Of The Whole Building Is 489 Feet; The Breadth Of
Henry VII.'s Chapel, 66 Feet; And The Height, 54 Feet.
The nave and
cross aisles of the abbey-church are supported by fifty slender
pillars, of Sussex marble, besides forty-five demi-pillars or
pilasters.
There are an upper and lower range of windows, being
ninety-four in number, those at the four ends of the cross very
spacious. All which, with the arches, roofs, doors, &c., are of the
ancient Gothic order. Above the chapiters the pillars spread into
several semi-cylindrical branches, forming and adorning the arches
of the pillars, and those of the roofs of the aisles, which are
three in number, running from east to west, and a cross aisle
running from north to south. The choir is paved with black and
white marble, in which are twenty-eight stalls on the north side, as
many on the fourth, and eight at the west end; from the choir we
ascend by several steps to a most magnificent marble altarpiece,
which would be esteemed a beauty in an Italian church.
Beyond the altar is King Edward the Confessor's Chapel, surrounded
with eleven or twelve other chapels replenished with monuments of
the British nobility, for a particular whereof I refer the reader to
the "Antiquities of St. Peter, or the Abbey-Church of Westminster,"
by J. Crull, M.D. Lond. 1711, 8vo, and the several supplements
printed since; and shall only take notice of those of the kings and
queens in the chapel of St. Edward the Confessor, which are as
follows, viz., Edward I., King of England; Henry III.; Matilda, wife
of Henry I.; Queen Eleanor, wife of Edward I.; St. Edward the
Confessor, and Queen Editha, his wife; Henry V., and Queen Catherine
of Valois, his wife; Edward III., and Queen Philippa, his wife;
Richard II., and Queen Anne, his wife.
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