s that
adorned its west front, it must have been almost as typical as that of
Lincoln or of Wells of the Early English style, and it still remains, in
its rectangular plan and square eastern termination, a true
representative of the ideals of native architects.

[Illustration: Decorated Ball Flower Ornament]

The transepts of York Minster, in one of which is the famous window with
lancet-headed lights, known as the Five Sisters, is a good example of
the transition from Early English to Decorated Gothic, and the same may
be said of portions of the ruins of Hexham Abbey, the Saxon crypt of
which has already been referred to, notably of the transepts with
windows resembling those of York Minster, and of the many relics of the
noble monastic buildings of Yorkshire, including those at Ripon,
Jervaulx, Rivaulx, and Whitby. The Cathedral of Glasgow is another
beautiful building in the first phase of Gothic, the choir, beneath
which is a noble crypt of earlier date, being especially fine, and with
it must be named the ruins of the great abbey churches of Kelso,
Jedburgh, and Dryburgh, that have distinctive Norman as well as Early
English details.

The first half of the 14th century was the golden age of English
architecture, during which the Decorated gradually grew out of the Early
English style, the two being in many cases so completely merged in each
other that no break is discernible. The foundations of a truly national
style had been laid in the Cathedrals of Wells and of Lincoln, in which
originality of design was combined with consummate technical skill of
execution, and in the buildings that succeeded them, architect and
craftsmen still worked together in complete harmony. The wealth of
imagination of the latter found its best expression in emphasising the
structural lines of the noble conceptions of the former; niches, with
their figures, cusping, finials and crockets, ball flowers and bosses,
all becoming essential details of one harmonious whole.

The nave and choir of Exeter Cathedral are especially typical of
Decorated architecture at its best. They rise from the foundations of an
earlier church, of which the Norman towers above the transepts are
relics, and are absolutely unsurpassed in the simple dignity of the
arcading spanning the clustered piers, the exquisite beauty of the
groined roofing, the bosses of which are decorated with delicate
carvings of a great variety of subjects, and the fine tracery of the