Flambard probably began to build soon after he became Bishop, and though that part of the church which is due to him might not have been finished until near the time of his death, no material alteration seems to have been made in the plan. With regard to the upper part of the western towers, and the time when they were built, we are entirely left to the evidence of the architecture itself, for nothing has been recorded which has reference to their erection. The upper stages belong to a time when the style called the Early English was being developed, and they may have been constructed during the episcopate of Richard de Marisco (1217-26), or even of Philip de Pictavia (1197-1208). Although the towers have suffered much from weathering, and more from the paring process, which, however, to some extent, has been remedied by the late reparation, they are well designed and very effective additions to the church as originally planned. In combination with the end of the nave and the bold mouldings of Pudsey’s Galilee, they form a termination which will not suffer even when compared with some of our finest west fronts. The upper part of both is enriched by four arcades, two open and two blank, of alternately round-headed and pointed arches. The towers were, until the time of the Commonwealth, surmounted by spires of wood covered with lead. At present they are finished by a parapet with turrets, placed there at the beginning of the present century, which, though faulty in detail, are, nevertheless, by no means unworthy of the towers they crown, and add materially to the picturesque outline of the cathedral when viewed from a distance. Bishop Cosin, in his articles of inquiry at his first visitation in 1662, asks: "What is become of the wood and lead of the two great broaches that stood upon the square towers at the west end of the church?" (_Miscellanea_, Surtees Society, vol. xxxvii., p. 257). This inquiry was repeated in Cosin’s second visitation, July 17, 1665, and the reply made in the presentment of the minor canons, etc., was as follows: "And as for the lead and timber of the two great broaches at the west end of the church, Mr. Gilbert Marshall can give the best account how they were employed" (Hunter MSS., vol. xi., No. 94). To [Illustration: THE WESTERN TOWERS OF DURHAM CATHEDRAL, FROM THE WINDOW OF THE MONKS’ LIBRARY. _From a Drawing by R. W. Billings._] this reply James Green, minor canon and sacrist, adds: "Mr. Gilbert Marshall, Mr. Gilpin, and Mr. Anthony Smith, can best tell what became of it" (Hunter MSS., vol. xi., No. 98). Bishop Cosin would remember them as being on the towers when he was Prebendary before the time of the Commonwealth. That they were never rebuilt is shown by Buck’s view, published in 1732, where the towers are without spires.