sham by a former incumbent. There is a
sixteenth-century fresco on one of the nave pillars depicting St.
Thomas Aquidas disputing with the doctors. In the churchyard are
several interesting graves and a very ancient yew reputed to be over
800 years old.

Felpham is now the eastern suburb of Bognor, and is linked to the town
by a small bungalow colony. Here Hayley came after selling Eartham, but
the place is now more famous for its associations with the poet's
friend Blake, who lived for three years in the small thatched cottage
which still stands at the seaward end of the village. Hayley was buried
in the churchyard, which also contains the tomb of Dean Jackson, once
tutor to George IV. The church is a mixture of styles, one row of
pillars being Early English the other Transitional. The much quoted
epitaph on a blacksmith written by Hayley runs as follows:--

"My sledge and hammer lie reclin'd;
My bellows, too, have lost their wind;
My fire's extinct, my forge decay'd,
And in the dust my vice is laid;
My coal is spent, my iron gone,
The nails are driven, my work is done."

Blake's associations with the village came to a sudden end in
consequence of a stupid and unwarranted prosecution for treason, the
outcome of a struggle with a drunken soldier. The mystic poet-artist
gained some of his most characteristic inspirations while staying here,
and it was in the garden of his cottage that he saw a "fairy's
funeral," the description of which has been often quoted; it is
difficult to judge how much of his visions were, to himself, poetic
fancy or actual fact.

[Illustration: FELPHAM.]

We now resume our journey towards Chichester at Walberton, north of
which the high road runs west, with little of interest until a turning
on the right brings us to the finest ecclesiastical building in the
county excepting the Cathedral.

The Priory Church of St. Mary and St. Blaise _Bosgrave_ was founded in
the reign of Henry I by Robert de Haia of Halnaker. Being a Benedictine
church, the nave, now in ruins, formed the parochial section. The
choir, transepts and tower, which remain, belonged to the monks, and
this portion, with the exception of the Norman tower, forms one of the
most beautiful examples of Early English in the kingdom and dates from
about 1200. The fine Purbeck marble columns are much admired, as are
also the graceful clerestory and vaulting. The galleries of the
transepts have ornamented oak fronts, and