bable reason of this
is that it was a nuns' church, and that the nuns found their way into the
church from the domestic buildings through the doors on the south side.
There is still a doorway (there was formerly a porch) on the north side,
by which, on special occasions, outsiders were admitted to the north
aisle, but as the parishioners had no right of entry into the nave it was
unnecessary to make any provision for them in the form of a west doorway.
From this position at the west of the building we notice that the roof of
the south end of the transept differs from that at the north end. We can
see no tiles above the parapet. Originally, no doubt, all the roofs had a
high pitch, their central ridge rising almost to the parapet of the tower,
but here, as in many another church, when the timbers of the roof decayed,
it was found more economical to decrease the slope of the roof, and in
some cases simply to lay horizontal beams across the tops of the wall,
which of course did not give rise to the outward thrust of sloping
timbers. This appears to have happened at Romsey; but, since the time when
the restoration was begun, all the roofs save that of the south end of the
transept have been raised to their original pitch. This roof, no doubt,
will in due course be altered in a similar way.

A fine and noteworthy feature in this church is the corbel table which
runs nearly all round it. Here and here only do we find any carving on the
exterior walls, but these corbels are carved into many fantastic devices:
among them we find the very common forms of evil spirits and lost souls
driven away from the sacred building. A legend is connected with a corbel
stone near the west end of the north aisle. It is fashioned into the
likeness of a grindstone and it is handed down by tradition that once upon
a time towards the end of the twelfth century or the beginning of the
thirteenth a nobleman ran away with a blacksmith's wife, but afterwards
repented of his sin and had imposed on him as penance the completion of
the west end of the Abbey church. The grindstone, emblem of the
blacksmith's calling, was, it is said, placed on the newly erected western
bay to commemorate the incident.

[Illustration: SOUTH TRANSEPT, FROM THE WEST]

The #South Side# of the Church differs from the north in some respects:
there is not the same rich arcading along the clerestory level of the
nave, only the real windows appear, not the blind arcading. The wind