Page:County Churches of Cornwall.djvu/15

Rh to churches is the great amount of condensation that is necessary to keep the book within due limits. It is positively painful to write about churches, brimful of interest, after the model of a telegram; but the strictest abridgment is essential if the scheme of these books and their modest price are to be maintained. It is, too, pleasanter to read "thirteenth century" rather than "13th cent.," but the latter style and its equivalents have been adopted on the score of brevity. For the like reason, the cardinal points are indicated by initials, and abbreviations are adopted for the architectural terms Norman, Early English, Decorated, and Perpendicular. For my own part I should have much preferred, as in the case of some other books that I have written, to drop altogether the two last of these terms, for there is no doubt that they are singularly infelicitous and misleading; but I have yielded to the advice of several experienced friends. By Early English, roughly speaking, I mean work of the reigns of John and Henry III.; by Decorated, work of the first three Edwards; and by Perpendicular, work from Richard II. to Henry VIII. inclusive.

One other abbreviation must be explained. R.I.C., in notes or text, refers to the invaluable Journals of the Royal Institute of Cornwall. The considerable store of topographical works dealing with the Duchy, both ancient and modern (such as those of Carew, Borlase, Polwhele, Lysons,