So many detailed architectural histories of the building have appeared that its principal features must be familiar to every lover of our national architecture.  There are, however, one or two features about this cathedral that should be noted.  Apart from its great length, which is greater than any church in the world, with the exception of St. Peter’s at Rome, it is remarkable for its parclose screens, with the mortuary chests upon them; and for the beauty and number of its chantries, in which it is richer than any other English cathedral.  They are said to have been saved from destruction during the Civil War by the Parliamentary colonel, Fiennes, an old Wykehamist; and certain historians describe the dramatic incident of the colonel standing with drawn sword to protect the chantry of the founder of his Alma Mater from the iconoclastic tendencies of his troopers.  The chantries number seven, and were built as chapels by bishops for their last resting-places.  Within these chantries are the tombs of Edington, Wykeham, Waynflete, Beaufort, Gardiner, Langton, and Fox, all of whom were bishops of the diocese.  Fox’s chantry was carefully restored by Corpus Christi College, Oxford; and that of Waynflete by Magdalen College, as a mark of reverence and esteem for the memory of their respective founders.

The first to be seen on entering the nave from the west is that of Wykeham, whose faith in the solidity of Norman building was so great that he did not hesitate to cut away more than a third of the two nave pillars between which it is placed.  Within the chapel, said to have been built on the site of an altar to the Virgin, is the effigy of the bishop-builder, with flesh and robes coloured “proper”, as the heralds say; and at his feet are the figures of his three favourite monks, to whom he left an endowment for the celebration of three masses daily in his chantry, while each was to receive one penny a day from the prior.  The effigy lies on an altar tomb, in episcopal attire, the head-pillow supported by two angels.  Five bays farther on is Edington’s chantry, but without effigy, as also are those of Fox and Langton.  Of the seven chantries those of Fox and Beaufort are usually considered the most beautiful.

The proud Cardinal Beaufort, founder of the “Almshouse of Noble Poverty” at St. Cross, is represented by Shakespeare as dying in despair: 

     “Lord Cardinal, if thou think’st on Heaven’s bliss
     Hold up thy hand:  make signal of thy hope. 
     He dies, and makes no sign!”

Dean Kitchin writes:  “One cannot look at his effigy, as it lies in his stately chantry, without noting the powerful and selfish characteristics of his face, and especially the nose, large, curved, and money-loving.  The sums Beaufort had at his disposal were so large that he was the Rothschild of his day.  More than once he lent his royal masters enough money to carry them through their expeditions.”