The mortuary chests are certainly among the most interesting things possessed by any English cathedral.  They are supposed to contain the bones of Kings Eadulph, Kinegils, Kenulf, Egbert, Canute, Rufus, Edmund, Edred, Queen Emma, and Bishops Wina and Alwyn.  They no doubt got much mixed up when removed from the crypt by Henry de Blois, and again when the chests were broken open by the Parliamentarians, so that a detailed identification has been made impossible.  It is now generally acknowledged that the bones of Rufus are in one of these chests, and that the so-called Rufus tomb in the retro-choir is the burial place of some great ecclesiastic.  Such at any rate is the opinion of Dean Kitchin, who has done so much to elucidate the past history of the city and its Cathedral.

When one of these boxes was taken recently out of its enclosing chest and examined, it was found to have a roof something like a low gable, which was decorated with painting about a century later than the time of de Blois.  On the outside appeared the words in Latin:  “Here are together the bones of King Kinegils and of Ethelwolf”.  Four of the Italian chests that held the inner boxes were the gift of Bishop Fox.  The other chests have revealed five complete sets of human bones, and among the remains in another were the bones of a female, possibly those of Queen Emma.

[Illustration:  ENTRANCE TO THE DEANERY]

The visitor will not fail to have pointed out to him by the well-informed vergers the innumerable features of interest, such as the Lady Chapel, the retro-choir, the Holy Hole where the relics were kept, the black oak stalls of the choir, the fine pulpit given by Prior Silkstede, and the magnificent screen begun by Beaufort and completed by Fox.  The monuments, apart from those contained in the chantries, are many, and include one surmounted by a beautifully wrought cross-legged effigy, which has not yet been identified.  There are memorials or tombs of James I and Charles I, by le Suer, who wrought the statue of the latter at Charing Cross; Dr. Warton, Professor of Poetry at Oxford, and headmaster of Winchester; Jane Austen; and William Unwin, the intimate friend of Cowper.  A flat stone, with an inscription by his brother-in-law, Ken, marks the resting-place of Izaak Walton, “whose book”, a modern writer tells us, “makes the reader forget for the time the cruelty of his sport”.

The curiously carved font, whereon are depicted symbolical figures and incidents from the legendary life of St. Nicholas of Myra, bears much similarity to three others found in Hampshire—­at St. Michaels’, Southampton; East Meon; and St. Mary Bourne.  They are all of the same era, and possibly the work of the same hand, being among the most interesting of our Norman fonts.  The material of which they are made has never been settled, some authorities defining it as Tournai marble, others as basalt, and yet others as nothing more than slate.