architecture of this portion of the church corresponds in
its style with the date of the foundation,--the commencement of the
thirteenth century: the lancets, with their mouldings, are strictly
of that date, and the capitals of the shafts, which are worked with
great boldness, are of the late Norman period, rather than of that
which is called Early-pointed."

"Of all that portion of the nave which occurs between the central
tower and the western end, nothing remains but the outer wall of the
southern aisle; the western end of it, however, still stands, and is
a beautiful example of the richest and purest architecture of the
middle of the thirteenth century. Over a central doorway, with
deeply recessed mouldings and shafts, and with a bold dog-tooth
ornament, each projection of which is elegantly carved into four
converging fleurs-de-lys, occur three lofty windows, the central one
taller than those at its sides--all with remarkably bold splays, both
internally and externally, enriched with shafts and mouldings. The
central window appears to have been of only one light, though broad,
and to have had its arch occupied by a foliation of six cusps, and
therefore of seven recesses,--the foliating spaces being solid. The
side windows are each of two lights, the principal arch-head being
solid, but pierced with a single aperture divided into six
foliations. Above these three windows runs a kind of framework,
analagous in some respects to that at the eastern end of the choir.
The gable is pierced above these windows with a small but beautiful
wheel-window of eight pointed compartments, each trifoliated; the
divisions being moulded in one order, and converging to a central
ring, itself pierced to admit the light. Above all is a square
quatrefoliated aperture in the very apex of the gable. On the
external face of the western end are two bold buttresses of a single
stage, that on the south-eastern side being pierced with loopholes
for a circular staircase formed in the thickness of itself and the
wall."

The Abbey of Valle Crucis was dissolved in the year 1535, and is said to
have been the first of the Welsh monasteries which underwent the doom of
abolition.

Romantic Abbey! hallow'd be the rest
Of those, who rear'd thee in this wild green vale
A temple lovely as the place is blest--