A BEAUTY SPOT IN WESTMINSTER.

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 91, 14 October 1922, Page 12

A BEAUTY SPOT IN WESTMINSTER.

One of London's most charming sequestered nooks is the venerable court-, yard of what was once the infirmary of the monks of Westminster, to-day known as the Little Cloisters of Westminster Abbey. It is a veritable revelation, after passing through, one or more obscure passages, suddenly to find oneself in this beautiful little place, with the fountain quietly pushing away in the centre, and the delightful seventeenth-century houses of warm-coloured red-brick standing around.

Quite recently the courtyard has been immensely beautified and improved, writes the Eev. J. Perkins, in the "Daily Telegraph." For some reason or other no attempt had been made for many a long year to do more than keep it just ordinarily tidy. It was always supposed that no plant would live in these rather cribbed, cabined,, and confined surroundings. Experiments have been made which go to show that grass at any rate, and probably flowers also to some extent, can be prevailed upon to .grow in this ancient courtyard. Accordingly, a process of renovatipn has been set on JE.oot, with the happiest results. A pavement of stone flags has been laid all rbund, while the fountain will have a quantity of grass for its immediate surrounding. In front of the arches.of the cloisters are a number of beds, which it may be hoped will be gay with .colours wh'en the spring of 1923 comes, round. Anything more charming than the combination of flowers and greenery and the old stonework and brickwork can hardly be imagined. In mediaeval times monks of Westminster retired to this infirmary when too old to fulfil the ordinary monastic duties, or. when they were out of health, or perhaps it was equally important for. •their- periodical "minutio.'y or blood-let, ting. Hard by js the abbey garden, said to be the oldest garden in England, where the invalid monks were able to take the air. Portions of the infirmary chapel, which was dedicated to St. Catherine, still survive. The entrance doorway leads to-day into, the house occupied by the Rev. Canon Barnes, while some of the pillars of this 1 building, which was su^iciently large to possess a nave and aisles of its own, still survive in the garden. This, the Chapel of St. Catherine, was a scene of many important assemblies, including one at whffth the great question of precedence was literally fought out' by their Graces of. Canterbury and York. Old Fuller has quaintly.described the -event :—

"A synod was called at Westminster, the Pope's Legate, being thereat, on whose right hand sat as in his proper place Richard of Canterbury, when in springs Roger of York, and finding Can-terbury-so seated, fairly sits him down in Canterbury's lap (a baby too big to. be dandled thereon, yea Canterbury's servants dandled this lap childe with a witness, who plucked him thence and buffeted him to, purpose).".

It is impossible to withhold our sympathy from the Archbishop of .York, who, with his torn cope, and bearing, other traces of, his rough handling, dashed off to.make his complaint to King. Henry 11. It was all to.no purpose. He received only jeers for his pains, and; from that time forward Canterbury hasbeen described as "Primate of All England," while his northern brother has to content himself, with the style of "Primate of England I'-only.