William de Colchester Abbot of Westminster   By: Ernest Harold Pearce

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When the body of the late Lord Kelvin was laid to rest, by a right which there was none to dispute, in the Abbey Church of Westminster, it was placed, by the same kind of right, close to the grave of Sir Isaac Newton. In the same corner there are the graves, or the memorials, of Darwin and Herschel, of Joule and Gabriel Stokes and John Couch Adams, to be joined shortly by tablets in memory of Alfred Russel Wallace, of Sir Joseph Hooker, and of another Joseph, who died Lord Lister. It was not likely that Kelvin would long lack some memorial more impressive than the slab which covers his remains, and it was a happy and appropriate impulse which caused the representatives of engineering science on both sides of the Atlantic to undertake the task of providing one. But what form could it best take? The walls of the church have been overcrowded, to the grievous destruction of some precious features. The floor space, as the centuries following the Reformation were apt to forget, is intended to serve the purposes of public worship. But the large windows of the Nave offer to those who would honour and foster the memory of the great dead a means of fulfilling their desire, and of adorning the fabric at the same time. In this case the chance was welcomed, and Kelvin has his Abbey memorial in stained glass. The window is one of a series projected in 1907 by Dr. Armitage Robinson, now Dean of Wells, and loyally accepted by his successor in the Deanery of Westminster a series in which there are placed side by side a King of England who contributed either to the greatness of the foundation or to the majesty of the building, and the Abbot through whom the King worked his pious will. The King in this case is Harry of Monmouth, and we are thinking with somewhat mingled feelings that October 25, 1915, brings us to the 500th anniversary of the battle of Agincourt. But it is Henry V.'s Abbot who concerns us now; for in such a scheme of windows the Abbots are more difficult to justify to the ordinary visitor than the monarchs, not because of unworthiness, but because there has been but little effort made to appraise their worth as heads of our ancient house, or as conspicuous figures in their generation... Continue reading book >>