1900-1901.] ^gg 



should be allowed to tail into ruins without anything being done 

 to prevent the ultimate collapse of the structure. Owing to 

 the nature of the site the cloister garth and some of the 

 domestic buildings are placed on the north and west sides of 

 the church proper. The church itself was perfectly oriented, 

 and was lighted from the east end and south side. The east 

 window was tall and well proportioned, and was filled in with 

 tracery. Following the usual Franciscan rule, the church 

 appears to have been long and narrow — over 130 feet by 22 feet 

 4 inches — with a long transept about the same width on the 

 south side. No trace remains to indicate the existence of the 

 usual graceful tower, which generally rose from the centre of 

 those churches, dividing the nave from the chancel. The north 

 wall of the church is broken at about 45 feet from the east end, 

 leaving a gap of 37 feet, the width of the garth, and against this 

 gap was the south cloister, covered with a lean to roof abutting 

 on the church wall. At the point where the break commences 

 in the north wall the east cloister starts at right angles to the 

 church with a walk of 7 feet 6 inches wide. This walk was 

 covered by a range of buildings extending northwards and 

 eastwards lineable with the chancel gable. These must have 

 comprised the slype, sacristy, chapter house, and scriptorium, 

 for it is stated that the monastery contained a fine library. A 

 staircase starting for the south-east corner of the cloister leads 

 to the dormitories over the east range of buildings, and from 

 the slype was the prior's door, which still remains. The wall 

 of the cloister on the extreme north also shows evidence of a 

 two-storey range of buildings, but it is purely conjectural what 

 form filled up the ground on the west side of the walk. The 

 details of the architectural work are nearly all gone, and the 

 cloister arcading is the only piece of any importance left. 

 There is a series of well-shaped and double chamfered pointed 

 arches springing off semi-octagonal doubly worked piers, whose 

 section is carried round the arch, and whose caps and bases are 

 skilfully moulded. Larger arches seem to have spanned the 

 junction of the cloisters of double orders, the inner one spring- 



