Page:The ecclesiastical architecture of Scotland ( Volume 3).djvu/105

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

probably a tomb of the end of the sixteenth century. The foliage round the arch, modelled from seaweed, is carved with great spirit. Dunbar's tomb is perhaps the finest of the minor pieces of work now remaining here. It is remarkable how it escaped destruction on various occasions, and especially in 1693, when a gang of religious fanatics broke his effigy in pieces, defaced the inscription, smashed the hanging cusped tracery round

Fig. 1012.—St. Machar's Cathedral.

Monument of Bishop Leighton.

the arch (apparently firing guns at it), and threw down the top of the monument. The existing cornice, with its two rows of corbels, was erected afterwards; and it must be allowed that it harmonises well with the earlier work, although it has more of the spirit of domestic than of ecclesiastical architecture. A similar kind of battlement is introduced over the centre panel of the Amond Monument, at Ellon, in the same county (see