As I have so often mentioned, the Pointed style commences here with the choir, the smaller transept, and perhaps the chapter-house,[54] all of which seem to have been erected before the year 1200 by Bishop Hugh. It is commonly stated that his architect was a Frenchman from Blois; and M. Lassus broadly states that he reproduced at Lincoln, in 1188, the design of a church commenced at Blois in 1138. I am not able to speak as to the authorities on which these statements are founded, but I must say that the internal evidence afforded by the building itself gives it, so far as I can judge, little or no support. In the first place, an eastern transept, in addition to that at the main crossing, is much more frequent in England than in France; whether the cathedral of Blois (now destroyed) possessed this I do not know. In the second place, the polygonal chapter-house is an equally English feature. In the third place, one of the most remarkable characteristics of this work is the nearly universal use of the round abacus--that distinctively English detail--and that at a period somewhat earlier than that of its customary predominance. The general distribution of the parts seems to me rather English than French, and though the work displays some idiosyncrasies, I do not see in them anything to indicate a French origin, unless it be in the capitals of the main pillars; indeed, it is a work in which distinctively English characteristics appear in a somewhat advanced state of development. As to its being a reproduction of a work commenced at Blois in 1138, the assertion carries with it its own refutation; for, in an age of restless progress, is it likely they would take the trouble to bring over a foreign architect of so retrograde a taste as to ignore the artistic progress made in his own country during half a century? In fact, the wonder of the work is being so much in _advance_ of its age, and that advance is not in a French but an English direction. The Church of St. Nicholas, at Blois, is in the Early Pointed style of the latter half of the twelfth century, but bears not the least resemblance to this; it is of the same character which is usual in French transitional works, and its carving is strictly Byzantine, not a trace of which have I observed in Bishop Hugh’s work. If, then, a French architect was engaged here, he must not only have made over the details of his work wholly to Englishmen, but have studiously followed English forms in the general features.[55] The rebuilding of the cathedral seems to have been followed on systematically westward by the two successors of Bishop Hugh, till the completion of the nave by Bishop Grostete, about 1240.