Page:Highways and Byways in Lincolnshire.djvu/283

 fonts, says that some of the fonts in our most ancient Lincolnshire churches, Cabourn, Waith, Scartho and Clee, look older than they are by reason of their coarse workmanship. He notes that the cover of the Skirbeck font belonged to a larger one destroyed by the Puritans, the present font having been put up in 1662.

The material of all the fonts described above is either stone or lead. We have very few of any other material, but of these by far the most interesting are those made of solid oak, of which specimens are extant at Dinas-Mawddwy (pronounced Mouthy) and Evenechtyd in Wales. But one might go on long enough talking about fonts, and I would only urge readers to go themselves and study them, and if they would pick out a few of the finest they should visit the fonts and font covers we have mentioned, and especially such typical fonts as are to be found at Winchester and Durham, at Walsoken in Norfolk, at Fishlake in Yorkshire, and Bridekirk in Cumberland, whenever they happen to be in those neighbourhoods.

The worst of fonts is that they are so easily removable. Even in such out-of-the-way places as Crowle the font has not remained, though the Norman south wall with its beautiful doorway is in quite good repair.