Among the many deeply interesting objects to be seen in the Abbey is the stone Sanctuary seat—­the Frid Stool, or seat of peace—­at which fugitives, fleeing from their enemies, might find refuge.  It is believed that this was the “Cathedra” of St. Wilfrid himself.  The arms and back of the chair are ornamented with a twisted knot-work pattern.  The right of Sanctuary extended for a mile round the Abbey, the boundaries being marked by crosses, one at each point of the compass at that distance.

[Illustration:  HEXHAM ABBEY FROM NORTH WEST]

Other treasures of the Abbey are the beautiful Old Rood Screen, dating from the end of the fifteenth or beginning of the sixteenth century; some wonderful old paintings, especially the portraits of the early Bishops of Hexham, Alcmund, Wilfrid, Acca, Eata, Frithbert, Cuthbert, and John, which date from the fifteenth century; the mediaeval carved and painted pulpit, and the tomb of good King Alfwald of Northumbria.  Many of the stones used by Wilfrid’s builders were of Roman workmanship, and seem to have come from the Roman city of Corstopitum, at Corbridge.  An inscription on one of these old stones in the crypt takes us back some centuries before even Wilfrid’s time, for it commemorates the Emperor Severus and his two sons, Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Caracalla) and Publius Septimius Geta, and has the name of the latter erased, as was done on all similar inscriptions throughout the Empire, by order of the inhuman Caracalla, after his murder of his brother.

A very interesting feature of the building is the stone stairway in the South transept, by which the monks ascended to their dormitories above.

Quite near to the Abbey, at the other side of the Market Place, the ancient Moot Hall claims attention.  The modern visitor to the old town walks beneath the gloomy archway, with its time-worn stones, which forms the basement over which the Moot Hall stands.  Another building, grim and dark, near at hand, is the Old Manor House, in which the business connected with the ancient Manor of Hexham was transacted.

An old foundation in the town was the Queen Elizabeth Grammar School, which, after having fallen into desuetude for many years, has been revived in a form appropriate to modern needs, and housed in a worthy building, formally opened by Sir Francis Blake on November 2nd, 1910.  The site on which the new Grammar School of Queen Elizabeth stands is one of the finest in the county, commanding, as it does, an uninterrupted view of the river valley for some distance, and of the rising ground beyond.

At the beginning of last century, Hexham was famed for its glove-making:  but that industry has forsaken the town for many years.  Now, Hexham is surrounded by acres of market-gardens, from which the produce of Tynedale is carried far and wide.

The spacious stretch of level meadow-land below Hexham, rising gradually up to the swelling ridges beyond, is said to have been the scene which John Martin had in mind when he painted the “Plains of Heaven”; though the level reaches above Newburn, unencumbered with buildings in John Martin’s time, and then a scene of quiet pastoral beauty, also claim that honour.