The two bays of Early Decorated work, just alluded to, complete the nave eastwards. The transition from the round-arched to the pointed style is made still more conspicuous by an increase in the height of the arcades, which involved the discontinuance of the triforium; and the banded shafts of dark Purbeck marble clustered round the later piers also emphasize the change. The two piers at the junctions of the styles do not pair, but we cannot regret the difference on the south side, as we owe thereto the beautiful foliated capital here illustrated (p. 68). The clerestory of the nave is divided from the stories below by an enriched string course. It is of the same style throughout and dates from the Perpendicular period. The predilection of the architects of that time to substitute work of their own for that of their predecessors in clerestories and great west windows of ecclesiastical buildings, has been noticed by many writers. At Rochester they could not in either case resist temptation. Their clerestory contains plain and uninteresting three-light windows, which are, moreover, unsymmetrically placed with regard to the arches beneath them. The roof is apparently of the same date; it is flat and of wood, carried by corbels carved and painted to represent angels bearing shields. [Illustration: THE NAVE, LOOKING WEST (FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY H. DAN).] The two tower piers at the end of the nave, where the latter joins the main transept, have their Purbeck marble shafts stopped at some height from the ground. The most likely explanation of this is, that there used to be here a solid stone screen [1], or rood loft, against which the parish altar of St. Nicholas stood before 1423. On the west side of the northern of the two rises a mass of masonry, so high as to partly block the arch. It is built, to a great extent, at any rate, of old materials, for on both sides of it are to be seen stones with fragments of plaited Norman diapers. The purpose of this masonry has been the subject of much discussion. It was at one time generally believed to have been raised, as a buttress, to aid the pier in supporting the weight of the tower, but this notion has since been ridiculed. The tower, we are reminded, was not raised until 1343; the stability of its piers had been secured before this date by the two new bays of the nave, and additional support can not have been needed. Others suppose that the masonry belonged to the stone screen spoken of above. A fine walled up arch on the north side adds to rather than lessens our difficulties. It has good mouldings,--springing from the capitals of two Purbeck marble shafts, of which the eastern has unfortunately been broken away,--and the dripstone terminates in a head, so mutilated that the face is quite lost. This archway seems too wide to have been the entrance to the stairs leading to the rood loft, a use which has been suggested for it. The occurrence