sverse arches thrown
across the nave and aisles. This was the system adopted in the
cathedrals of Braga and of Oporto before they were altered, in this
church and in that of Pombeiro not far off, and in that of Bayona near
Vigo in Galicia.[37] (Fig. 14.)

All the details are extremely refined--almost Byzantine in their
delicacy--especially the capitals, and the abaci against the walls,
which are carried along as a beautiful string course from pier to pier.
The bases too are all carved, some with animals' heads and some with
small seated figures at the angles, while the faces of the square blocks
below are covered with beautiful leaf ornament. But the most curious
thing in the whole church is the tomb of Egas Moniz himself.[38] (Fig.
15.) Till the eighteenth century it stood in the middle of the chancel,
then it was cut in two and put half against the wall of the south aisle,
and half against that of the north. It has on it three bands of
ornament. Of these the lowest is a rudely carved chevron with what are
meant for leaves between, the next, a band of small figures including
Egas on his deathbed and what is supposed to be three of his children
riding side by side on an elongated horse with a camel-like head, and
that on the top, larger figures showing him starting on his fateful
journey to the court of Alfonso of Castile and Leon and parting from his
weeping wife. Although very rude,--all the horses except that of Egas
himself having most unhorselike heads and legs,--some of the figures are
carved with a certain not unpleasing vigour, especially that of a
spear-bearing attendant who marches with swinging skirts behind his
master's horse. Outside the most remarkable feature is the fine west
door, with its eight shafts, four on each side, some round and some
octagonal, the octagonal being enriched with an ornament like the
English dog-tooth, with their finely carved cubical capitals and rich
abaci, and with the four orders of mouldings, two of which are enriched
with ball ornament. Outside, instead of a drip-mould, runs a broad band
covered with plaited ribbon. On the tympanum, which rests on corbels
supported on one side by the head of an ox and on the other by that of a
man, are a large circle enclosing a modern inscription, and two smaller
circles in which are the symbols of the Sun and Moon upheld by curious
little half-figures. The two apses east of the transept are of the
pattern universal in Southern Europe, being