And he did improve it, by putting up an outer ring of four more piers round the western part of the octagon of the Lady chapel. It was an intuition of genius: it makes the vistas into the retro-choir and Lady chapel a veritable glimpse into fairyland; and provides, here alone in England, a rival to the glorious eastern terminations of Amiens and Le Mans. And that is not all. We saw in the chapter-house the grand effect of the central stalk branching upward and outward in all directions, like some palm tree transmuted into stone. This beautiful effect he transfers to the retro-choir, but multiplied—four palm trees in place of one; for each of the four external piers of the octagon emulates the chapter-house’s central stalk. “It is difficult to determine whether the effect is more striking in the early morning, when the ancient splendours of the stained glass, are reflected on the slender shafts of Purbeck marble and the clustered vault; or at the late winter services, when the darkened figures of saints and prophets in the clerestory combine with the few lights burning in the choristers’ stalls to add something of mystery and solemn gloom to the maze of aisles and chapels, half hidden, half revealed” (Murray). And where did the idea of having an octagonal Lady chapel come from? Possibly it came from Lichfield. If one follows the outline formed by the five walls of Wells Lady chapel and the four _outer_ piers, which complete the octagon, it will be seen that the Wells octagon is of precisely the same elongated form—two long sides and six short ones—as the chapter-house of Lichfield. We may fairly suppose, then, that the Wells architect got the design for his east end by tacking on the elongated octagon of Lichfield chapter-house to the rectangular retro-choir of Salisbury. This Lady chapel is an early work of the Curvilinear period; for it seems to have been complete in 1324. The windows have beautiful reticulated tracery of early type. There is lovely carving in the capitals, bosses, reredos, sedilia and piscina. The Curvilinear foliated capitals here and in the choir should be compared with the somewhat earlier capitals of the chapter-house, with the early Geometrical capitals of the staircase, the Lancet capitals of the west front, and the still earlier ones of porch, nave, and transepts. The ancient glass here and in the Jesse window of the choir is superb in colour. [Illustration: CHOIR.]