Excursion on Thursday, August \§th. 



149 



central tower. The pinnacles and the flying buttresses were of the 

 fourteenth century. The door on the north side leading to the 

 cloisters was Norman, but had had another inserted within it in the 

 fourteenth century ; and to the latter period might be referred the 

 north aisle windows and the lofty west window. Within the Abbey, 

 attention was called to the contrast between the twelfth and four- 

 teenth century work, to the excellence of tracery in the eastern 

 screens to aisles, to the quadripartite vaulting, and to the Perpen- 

 dicular watching- chamber projecting from one of the triforium 

 arches on the south side. Both the grand towers had fallen ; that 

 at the intersection of transepts, which probably contained the large 

 peal of bells, and which fell in the reign of Henry VIII., and a 

 second, chiefly of fourteenth century character, which came down 

 in the reign of Charles II. Mr. Brock said the history of these 

 towers was a warning to ambitious people ; their ruin was evidently 

 due to successive additions to their height and the building of lofty 

 spires, first on the central and then on the western steeples, whereas 

 the existing remains showed that no attempt was made to strengthen 

 the foundations. The central tower was one of an unusual class, 

 broader on the east and west faces than on those north and south : 

 a glance at the remaining north-east fragment would show that 

 instead of attempting pointed arches on the narrower transept side, 

 as in the similar example at St. John's, Devizes, the circular arches 

 were brought to equal height as that of the nave by "stilting" them. 

 On this weak erection once stood one of the highest spires in England, 

 and in it a heavy peal of bells was hung. A question having arisen 

 as to the purpose of a peculiar series of large circular medallions or 

 rosettes of flat ornament between the clerestory windows on the 

 eastern portions, Mr. Ewan Christian said they indicated that a 

 Norman clerestory was at least commenced, and replaced in the 

 fourteenth century by the present rather poor windows, proving his 

 point by showing that one or two of these rosettes formed springers 

 of semi-circular arches. Mr. John Reynolds explained the situation 

 of the conventual buildings, which have entirely disappeared, the site 

 being a piece of pasture and a private garden : he also showed that 

 a plain unpierced wall, with deep string-course above the nave, was 



VOL. XIX. NO. LVI. M 



