Various - The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 558, July 21, 1832

In our fourteenth volume we took a farewell glance of the old church of St. Dunstan, and adverted to the proposed new structure. Little did we then expect that within three years the removal of the old church would be effected, and a fabric of greatly surpassing beauty raised in its place. All this has been accomplished by the unanimity of the parishioners of St. Dunstan, unaided by any public grant, and assisted only by their own right spirit, integrity, and well-directed taste. The erection of this Church, as the annexed Engraving shows, is not to be considered merely as a parochial, but as a public, benefit, and must be ranked among the most important of our metropolitan improvements. The different situation of the new and the old churches will occasion an addition of 30 feet to the width of the opposite street, and it will be perceived by the Engraving, 1 1 Copied, by permission, from a handsome Lithograph, published by Mr. Waller, Fleet-street. that improvements are contemplated in the houses adjoining the church, so as to give an unique architectural character to this portion of the line of Fleet-street.

The church has been built from the designs and under the superintendance of John Shaw, Esq., F.R. and A.S. the architect of Christ's Hospital. The tower is of the Kelton stone, a very superior kind of freestone, of beautiful colour, from the county of Rutland. Of this material King's College Chapel, Cambridge, and many other of our finest edifices have been constructed. The tower has below an entrance doorway, finished with rich mouldings and tracery; on each side are the arms of his Majesty and the City of London. Above is a clock with three dials, and a belfry to admit the fine set of bells 2 2 The tower of the old church was furnished with a set of eight very excellent bells: there was also a bell of a smaller size suspended in one of the turrets, which was rung every morning at a quarter before seven o'clock. On the walls of the belfry were some records of exploits in ringing, which had been performed there on different occasions. from the old church, the sound of which will doubtless receive effect through the four large upper windows which are the main features of the tower. Above these windows, the tower, hitherto square, becomes gradually octagonal, springing from corbeled heads; till terminated by four octagonal pinnacles, and crowned by an octagonal moulded battlement. Upon the tower is an enriched stone lantern, perforated with gothic windows of two heights, each angle having a buttress and enriched finial; the whole being terminated by an ornamental, pierced, and very rich crown parapet. The height of the tower, to the battlements, is 90 feet; and the whole height of the tower and lantern is 130 feet.

The body of the church is of fine brick, finished with stone, and of octagon form, about 50 feet diameter. The interior has eight recesses; one of these being occupied by the altar with a large pointed window above, and three others by the organ and galleries for the children of the parish schools: the remaining four recesses are unoccupied by galleries; against their walls are placed the sepulchral monuments from the old church. The octagon form was often adopted in the lady-chapels at the east end of our most ancient cathedrals, where the recesses were devoted to tombs and private chapels. The upper or clere story is supported on arches, with an enriched gothic window in each compartment. The roof springs from clustered columns, branching into an enriched groined ceiling, with a very large and embellished pendent key-stone in the centre, from which will be suspended the chandelier to light the whole of the interior. The ornaments of this key-stone are of a very elegant character: its foliated tracery, as well as the richness of the bosses, corbels, and other embellishments throughout the interior, are extremely beautiful. The pewing, gallery fronts, and fittings will be of fine oak; and we learn that the altar and eight clere story windows will be filled with painted glass. The church is calculated to hold about 900 persons.

The tower is connected with the main body by a lobby, and will front the street, enclosed with a handsome railing. The builders of the church are Messrs. Browne and Atkinson, of Goswell-street, London; and the pewing and interior fittings are about to be executed by Messrs. Cubitt.

We could occupy a column or a page with enumerating the monumental remains of the old church, although we have already mentioned the principal of them. ( See Mirror , vol. xiv. p. 145-243.) It is our intention to return to them, even if it be but to point the attention of the lover of parochial antiquities to a Series of Views of St. Dunstan and its Monuments, with an Historical Account of the Church, by the Rev. J.F. Denham; which by its concise yet satisfactory details, leads us to wish that every parish in the metropolis were illustrated by so accomplished an annalist.

We ought not perhaps to insist too much on the opinions of the heathen philosophers, because the extension of knowledge, and a more matured experience, has shown the fallacy of many of their notions; but if we were permitted to lay any stress on the authority of these celebrated men, we might bring forward a mine of classical learning in commendation of a vegetable diet; we might point to the life of a Pythagoras, or a Seneca, as well as to the works of a Plato, and show how the wisest among the ancients lived, as well as thought, with regard to this subject.

But we shall be contented, as far as authority is concerned, to rest our claims to attention, rather upon that which bears a more modern date, and to bring forward the evidence of facts instead of the theories of ingenuity. The subject itself we may venture to hope, though a little homely, is not without interest, and certainly not unimportant. It is somewhat scientific from its very nature, and so far from being a matter confined to the medical faculty, it is one on which every man exerts, every day of his existence, his own free choice, as far indeed as custom has allowed him the exercise of that freedom.