ON THE PERPENDICULAR OF SOMERSET. 27 



uufinislied west front with two towers. The Somerton 

 arrangement indeed Stands in the same relation to Exeter 

 and Ottery which St. Mary Kedcliffe bears to York and 

 Beverley, that is, a tower might be conceived fomiing the 

 other transept ; but the Exeter plan is so unfamUiar, and, 

 indeed, so grotesque, that it is not likely thus to present 

 itself to the mind. 



INTERIORS. 



I now come to the second main portion of my subject, 

 the interiors of the Somersetshire churches. The excellence 

 of the local style is shown in the best interiors Mly as much 

 as in the towers, but, from some cause or other, first-rate 

 interiors are by no means so usually met with as first-rate 

 towers. Nevei-theless they are decidedly common in pro- 

 portion to theh- frequency in parochial work in most other 

 parts of England. It is certainly by no means common to 

 find the interior of the nave and aisles of a parish church 

 forming a really grand arcliitectural whole during the Early 

 English andDecorated periods. Warmington, in Northamp- 

 tonshire, is well known as a glorious exception; but, imless 

 it be the nave of Berkeley, I am unable to provide it with 

 a fellow. St. Mary's at Haverfordwest has indeed an 

 arcade of perhaps unparallelled magnificence, but it is only 

 one arcade ; there is no other aisle to match it, and the 

 clerestory and roof are of a later date. It is in the Perpen- 

 dicular style, and, above all, in the Perpendiciüar of 

 Somerset, that we first find the interiors of parocliial 

 churches systematically constructed so as to deserve the 

 name of great architectural wholes. Elsewhere, and at an 

 earlier period, the impression on entering a church is usually 

 one of disappointment. The exterior niay, by dint of a 

 picturesque outline, or cven of a certain kind of proportion, 



