sted of a nave, transepts and choir, with fan-tracery
vault, of which some fragments have been lately fixed in the cloister
wall. Most profusely ornamented and panelled within, as can be seen by
the west end against the cloister wall, it is considered to have been
the _chef d'oeuvre_ of the Somerset Perpendicular, surpassing even
Sherborne and St. Mary, Redcliffe.

But its glory was not to be for long. Stillington was buried in this
"goodly Lady Chapell in the Cloysters," says Godwin, "but rested not
long there; for it is reported that divers olde men, who in their
youth had not onely scene the celebration of his funeral, but also the
building of his tombe, chapell, and all did also see tombe and chapell
destroyed, and the bones of the Bishop that built them turned out of
the lead in which they were interred." This was in 1552, when Bishop
Barlow and the chapter made a grant to that barbarous scoundrel, Sir
John Gates, of "the chappie, sett, lyinge and beynge by the cloyster
on the south syde of the said Cathedral Church of Wells, commonly
called the Ladye Chapple, with all the stones and stonework, ledde,
glasse, tymbre, and iron ... the soyle that the sayd chappie standeth
upon only excepted." The condition was that the rubble should be all
cleared away, and the ground made "fayre and playn," within four
years; but before this period had elapsed, Sir John's head had gone
the way of the Lady Chapel.

[Illustration: Doorway, South-east Of Cloister.]

The CLOISTER in its more prominent features is Perpendicular, having
been rebuilt in the fifteenth century. Nevertheless the outer walls
are of Jocelin's date, together with the doorway leading into the
palace (see illustration on this page); and the lower part of the east
cloister wall, including the two small doorways therein, is said by Mr
Buckle to be undoubtedly earlier than Jocelin's time, and contemporary
with the north porch, _c._ 1185. Thus we have still the original plan
at least of the thirteenth-century cloisters. This plan is
characteristic of a non-monastic church, where the cloister is not the
centre of a common life, but merely an ornamental convenience which
might or might not be added, and when added might be of any fashion
that was desired. There is no walk on the north side, no refectory or
dormitory, and the plan is not square, as would be the case with a
conventual building, but an irregular parallelogram, while the eastern
walk is built up against