Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 6.djvu/525

 AT MIXSTKK, ISLH OP SHEPPEY. 357 an'nnd,^ &c. This last example is figured in Cotmaii's work, vol. ii., pi. 10.3. From the instances above quoted, it will be seen that the figm-c of a heart closely connects the precatory sentences on l)rasses with the sculptured images of souls found on the breasts of mortuary statues. Both heart and image are seen occupying the same position in the u])raised hands of the deceased, and there can be little doubt that both figures typify the same mystery. It is, indeed, by no means im- probable, that the former had often the symbol of the soul in prayer pictured upon its surface ; while the rarity of the latter emblem can in no degree surprise us, when we recol- lect the crusade that was carried on against everything having the smallest semblance of " image-worship.'' It is not easy to assign the Minster effigy to its proper owner ; for neither inscri]:)tion, heraldry, nor tradition, affords us the least help in our search. The two potent houses of the neighbourhood were the Cheneys and the Northwoods,* of whose families there are many records of interment in •• the Monastery of Saint Segebert of Minster." Sir William Cheney, who died in 1442, may be the knight commemo- rated, as the arming suits his time ; but in that case we must suppose him to have had two monuments (by no means an unusual case), for Stowe tells us that, in his time, St. Benet Ilithe, " a proper parish church over against Powle's wharf, had the monument of Sir Wm. Cheiny, knight, and Margaret his wife, 1442, buried there." If a Northwood, this figure, probably, represents John Northwood, Esquire, who died in 141G, when, "leaving no issue male, his two sisters became his co-heirs."^ And it would, therefore, be to the pious care of these sisters that the last of the North woods was indebted for this memorial. The effigy, to whomsoever it may have belonged, was, most probably, buried in the churchyard in the troublous times of the sixteenth century. It was Sir Thomas Cheney who, at the suppression of the monasteries, got the revenues of •' After the words, Prkz iwiu- I (time de, the concluding words arc : " orate ; i"v.c., in some monuments appear the pro aninia  ei  Pat ; nost  " This letters, " y-*;-." They have been explained curious memorial is engraved in Boutell's to mean, /'/•/<.-, a repetition of the injvuic- Clirist'uiii Mouunirnix, sec. 2, ]>. '2Ci. tion to pray. They seem rather to 'See in Harl. MS. II 0(i, fol. -fJ, b, a irulicate the particular |>rayer desired, a curious inifsiwj monument of a North /'attf. Tlius on the sculptured slal) of wood. Matilda Ic Caus, at Brampton, Derbyshire, '^ liasted's A'lnt, ii, 456.