Where the heavy pillars and arches gather thick beneath the dome, in spite of his memorable words at the battle of the Nile—­“Victory or Westminster Abbey”—­is the grave of Lord Nelson.  Followed to the grave by the seven sons of his sovereign, he was buried here in 1806, when Dean Milman, who was present, “heard, or seemed to hear, the low wail of the sailors who encircled the remains of their admiral.”  They tore to pieces the largest of the flags of the “Victory,” which waved above his grave; the rest were buried with his coffin.

The sarcophagus of Nelson was designed and executed for Cardinal Wolsey by the famous Torregiano, and was intended to contain the body of Henry VIII. in the tomb-house at Windsor.  It encloses the coffin made from the mast of the ship “L’Orient,” which was presented to Nelson after the battle of the Nile by Ben Hallowell, captain of the “Swiftsure,” that, when he was tired of life, he might “be buried in one of his own trophies.”  On either side of Nelson repose the minor heroes of Trafalgar, Collingwood (1810) and Lord Northesk; Picton also lies near him, but outside the surrounding arches.

A second huge sarcophagus of porphyry resting on lions is the tomb where Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, was laid in 1852, in the presence of 15,000 spectators, Dean Milman, who had been present at Nelson’s funeral, then reading the services.  Beyond the tomb of Nelson, in a ghastly ghost-befitting chamber hung with the velvet which surrounded his lying in state at Chelsea, and on which, by the flickering torchlight, we see emblazoned the many Orders presented to him by foreign sovereigns, is the funeral car of Wellington, modeled and constructed in six weeks, at an expense of L13,000, from guns taken in his campaigns.

In the southwest pier of the dome a staircase ascends by 616 steps to the highest point of the cathedral.  No feeble person should attempt the fatigue, and, except to architects, the undertaking is scarcely worth while.  An easy ascent leads to the immense passages of the triforium, in which, opening from the gallery above the south aisle, is the Library, founded by Bishop Compton, who crowned William and Mary, Archbishop Seeker refusing to do so.  It contains the bishop’s portrait and some carving by Gibbons.

At the corner of the gallery, on the left, a very narrow stair leads to the Clock, of enormous size, with a pendulum 16 feet long, constructed by Langley Bradley in 1708.  Ever since, the oaken seats behind it have been occupied by a changing crowd, waiting with anxious curiosity to see the hammer strike its bell, and tremulously hoping to tremble at the vibration.