THE OLD - Old Wirral.com

THE OLD CHURCHES OF WIRRAL
in some learned paper. If it is very
beautiful in design and craftsmanship, the
artist is willing to add his quota of praise.
But there, for the most part, the matter
ends, and the interesting local colour with
which most fonts may be painted remains
unheeded.
Even ecclesiologists seem to have paid
comparatively little attention to fonts,
while the carelessness with which these
venerable relics are cast into the churchyard,
the rectory garden, or even the rubbish
heap, testifies to the unmerited
obloquy they have received. Thus the
old Norman font at Wallasey oscillated
for several generations between the church
interior and the rectory garden. The
font at Neston suffered similar treatment ;
at Thurstaston an old font of uncertain
date has stood for years in a lonely position
in the churchyard, where it is permitted to
usurp the lowly functions of a plant pot ;
and in the grounds of the Abbey Manor,
West Kirby,
there was found a font which
probably came from the parish church and
seems to have been used as a drinking
trough.*
• This font is being removed to the Charles Dawson
Brown Museum, West Kirby.
C. Brooke Gwynne.
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