ost commonly met with,
as the string-course.

[Illustration: Interior of Window, St. Giles's, Oxford.]

Q. How is the buttress of this age distinguished?

A. In general by its plain triangular or pedimental head, its projecting
more from the building than the Norman buttress, and from its being less
in breadth. It is also sometimes carried up above the parapet wall. The
edges of the buttresses are sometimes chamfered; and plain buttresses in
stages finished with simple slopes are not uncommon. We very rarely find
buttresses of this style disposed at the angles of buildings, though such
disposition was common in the succeeding style; but two buttresses placed
at right angles with each other, and with the face of the wall, generally
occur at the angles of churches in this style. Flying buttresses were
sometimes used to strengthen the clerestory walls of large buildings, and
have a light and elegant effect.

[Illustration: String-Course, Merton College Chapel, Oxford.]

Q. Were the walls differently built?

A. They were not so thick as those of an earlier period, which occasioned
the want of stronger buttresses to support them.

[Illustration: Pottern, Wilts.]

[Illustration: Hartlepool, Durham.]

Q. Were the Early English roofs of a different construction from those of
a later style?

[Illustration: Groining Rib, Salisbury Cathedral.]

A. The Norman and Early English roofs were high and acutely pointed. The
original roofs of most of our old churches, from their exposure to the
weather, have long since fallen to decay, and been replaced by others of a
more obtuse shape; but in general the height and angular form of the
original roof may be ascertained by the weather moulding still remaining
on the side of the tower or steeple. The interior vaulting of stone roofs
was composed of fewer parts and ribs, which were often not more numerous
than those of Norman vaulting, and does not present that complexity of
arrangement which occurs in the vaulting-ribs of subsequent styles. In the
cathedral of Salisbury also in the nave of Wells Cathedral are simple and
good examples of Early English vaulting. A curious groined roof, in which
the ribs are of wood--plain, cut with chamfered edges--and the cells of
the vaulting are covered with boards, is to be met with in the church of
Warmington, Northamptonshire, a very rich, perfect, and interesting
specimen of this style.

Q. Was not the spire introduced at this period?

A.