44 ABBOTSBURY ABBEY. 



way back, we have still to consider only the last, that now used as 

 a stable and workshop. It has been a building of dignity and 

 importance, judging by the excellent second pointed two-light 

 window, arched, with a six cusped light in the head, in the north 

 wall. Adjoining is a square-head window, of same date, and also 

 good ; and in the east gable there is a very queer little window, 

 only a yard each way. It is square-headed, without hood 

 moulding, or any reveal. It contains eight tiny lights in two 

 ranks, each light arched and trefoiled at top. To my eye it seems 

 a very curious window, and probably of the i4th century. 



Now, what was this building ? It stands in a position suitable for 

 the chapter house, and I venture to suggest that use.* It was a not 

 uncommon thing, to say the least, to have an altar in the chapter 

 house ; and that curious little window, facing east, may possibly 

 have had the altar below it, or perhaps forming its sill. But 1 am 

 ashamed to wander in this wilderness of conjecture ; and in now 

 taking up the buildings below the plateau above spoken of, vague 

 conjecture still surrounds us. 



I dismiss the traditionary assignments of the dormitory, 

 brewhouse, and malthouse, believing the two latter to be most 

 likely parts of the monastery converted to those uses in 

 Strangways' times, and the first to be unlikely, to say the least of 

 it, from the distance of any of these buildings from the church. 

 To begin with the dairyhouse. The large blocked-up arch in it 

 suggests that it was the gatehouse of the Abbot's garden at the 

 back of it. I cannot indeed see or hear anything about a 

 corresponding arch on the west side of the house, to prove a 

 thoroughfare, but that seems to have been altered and added to. 

 If a gatehouse, it might be the dwelling of a lay brother in charge 

 of the 14 acre garden the best bit of land in Dorset, I have 

 heard and of the fish pond supposed to have been there. The 

 lay brother kept grand fires, judging by the great chimney in 



* This is disputed by a gentleman who thinks that the building in 

 question was the Abbot's house. It is very possible. If so the chapter 

 house may have been on the east of the cloisters, and the monks' dwelling 

 on the south of them. 



