steries the western side was usually occupied
by the "domus conversorum," or lodgings of the lay-brethren, with their
day-rooms and workshops below, and dormitory above. The cloister, with
its surrounding buildings, generally stood on the south side of the
church, to secure as much sunshine as possible. A very early example of
this disposition is seen in the plan of the monastery of St Gall (see
ABBEY, fig. 3). Local requirements, in some instances, caused the
cloister to be placed to the north of the church. This is the case in
the English cathedrals, formerly Benedictine abbeys, of Canterbury,
Gloucester and Chester, as well as in that of Lincoln. Other examples of
the northward situation are at Tintern, Buildwas and Sherborne. Although
the covered ambulatories are absolutely essential to the completeness
of a monastic cloister, a chief object of which was to enable the
inmates to pass from one part of the monastery to another without
inconvenience from rain, wind, or sun, it appears that they were
sometimes wanting. The cloister at St Albans seems to have been
deficient in ambulatories till the abbacy of Robert of Gorham,
1151-1166, when the eastern walk was erected. This, as was often the
case with the earliest ambulatories, was of wood covered with a sloping
roof or "penthouse." We learn from Osbern's account of the conflagration
of the monastery of Christ Church, Canterbury, 1067, that a cloister
with covered ways existed at that time, affording communication between
the church, the dormitory and the refectory. We learn from an early
drawing of the monastery of Canterbury that this cloister was formed by
an arcade of Norman arches supported on shafts, and covered by a shed
roof. A fragment of an arcaded cloister of this pattern is still found
on the eastern side of the infirmary-cloister of the same foundation.
This earlier form of cloister has been generally superseded in England
by a range of windows, usually unglazed, but sometimes, as at
Gloucester, provided with glass, lighting a vaulted ambulatory, of which
the cloisters of Westminster Abbey, Salisbury and Norwich are typical
examples. The older design was preserved in the South, where "the
cloister is never a window, or anything in the least approaching to it
in design, but a range of small elegant pillars, sometimes single,
sometimes coupled, and supporting arches of a light and elegant design,
all the features being of a character suited to the place where