THE CHURCH PLATE OF BERKSHIRE. Edited by John W. Walker
and Margaret I. Walker. (Published by the authors at East Hagbourne, Didcot. 42s.)—Mr. and Mrs. Walker have done a good piece of work in describing all the church plate belonging to the Berkshire parishes. Their scholarly and beautiful volume will be a permanent record to which reference can be made if any of the Church's possess- ions should hereafter go astray. It is well known that the Church has lost much in the past through the carelessness of parsons. Indeed, the authors say that on the mantelpiece of a Berkshire vicarage they found a seventeenth-century chalice which the parson had brought with him from a York- shire parish, so that some incumbents even now are unmindful of the fact that Church plate is the property of the parish and may not be alienated or even remodelled without a faculty. To its historical and artistic value the book bears abundant testimony. The Berkshire parishes have forty-five cups and thirty-three patens of the Elizabethan period, two of them as early as 1565-67, and there are a number of early Stuart pieces that escaped the ravages of the Civil War. The authors give full descriptions parish by parish, and many excellent photographs of notable examples ; it is pleasant to observe that some of the modern pieces are admirable in design and hold their own in the collection.
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