The clerestory walls are only 41½ feet high; therefore, to have adopted the usual Norman design—viz., triforium on the top of pier-arcade—would have made the interior look very squat: so, instead of building the triforium above the pier-arcade, it was built beneath it. The lofty pier-arches, thus gained, add greatly to the apparent height and dignity of the interior. The lower arches, however, which carry the vault of the aisle behind, are corbelled into the piers in very clumsy fashion. The design is not original; it was worked out at Romsey in a single bay of the nave, but, being thought ugly, was promptly abandoned. It is worked out more successfully in Dunstable Priory church and Jedburgh Abbey. The clerestory windows of the nave would be built not much before 1180; naturally, therefore, they are pointed. The capitals of all the twelfth-century work are full of interest. Indeed, Transitional capitals—each an experiment, and all differing—partly conventional, partly naturalistic, with a dash of Classic—are to me much more interesting than any of the Gothic capitals, except perhaps the naturalistic capitals of the later Geometrical period. There is a great sameness about the foliated capitals of the Early English, Curvilinear, and Perpendicular periods. I need hardly say that no one of these capitals came from Ethelred’s church. The whole church is exceedingly interesting. It fills a niche in the history of English architecture all by itself. It is not the plain and austere Transitional work of the Cistercians. On the other hand, it has not yet the lightness and grace of Ripon; still less the charm of Canterbury choir, Chichester presbytery, Wells and Abbey Dore—Gothic in all but name. In spite of its foliated capitals, in spite of a pointed arch here and there, it is a Romanesque design; yet not so Romanesque as Fountains, Kirkstall, Furness. III. In the LANCET period (1190-1245) the works went on apace. An upper stage was added to the tower, and on that the spire was built—the first large stone spire in England. It is a Broach spire: _i.e._, the cardinal sides of the spire are built right out to the eaves, so that there is no parapet. On the other hand, instead of having broaches at the angle, it has pinnacles. Moreover, to bring down the thrusts more vertically, heavy dormer-windows are inserted at the foot of each of the cardinal sides of the spire: altogether a very logical and scientific piece of engineering, much more common in the early spires of Northern France than in England.