Certainly one of the most vertical of English cathedral towns, Lincoln’s cathedral sits atop a very steep hill, so steep I took a taxi from the train station. The cathedral is among the best of the English gothic and I enjoyed wandering around the cathedral, although it struck me as a bit too clean, as if some of the important accumulated stuff of the ages had been swept away. I had a lovely chat with a docent in the cathedral treasury and was delighted to happen upon the Duncan Grant murals in a chantry chapel dedicated to Saint Blaise. Each evening in Lincoln I heard a different choir at evensong. Lincoln is a lovely city with bits of medieval walls popping up here and there. The castle grounds were a lovely park with great views of the city and the cathedral from the castle walls. In the castle I toured a suitably grim Victorian prison, the most interesting room being the chapel, in which each prisoner had their own box pew from which all they could see was the preacher who preached repentance to them several times a day.
