The <g>Chapter-House</g> was the monastic council chamber, and as such, being one of the most important rooms in the abbey, was also the most richly decorated. Its delicately-groined roof is entirely destroyed, and trees grow on its floor; but the elegantly-proportioned arches which adorned its walls, and the clustered columns which support them, still bear testimony to its former beauty. This apartment forms a regular square of thirty-six feet. Each wall is divided into three arches, between which sprung the ribs of the vaulted roof. Within the three arches on the east side are the windows, which likewise are more ornamental than those of the other apartments of the abbey. The extreme arch to the right on the west wall forms the entrance from the great quadrangle. In the recesses of the other arches are the remains of the stone seats on which the monks placed themselves when assembled in chapter to deliberate on the affairs of the monastery, or when they met to listen to the spiritual or moral exhortations of their Superior. We have already stated that the chapter-house was the place in which the discipline, or flogging, was administered to the unruly brethren and other offenders. The Cistercian monks are said to have been particularly addicted to the use of the rod-- “Est ibi virga frequens, atque diæta gravis.” The southern wall of the chapter-house divides it from the passage we have already mentioned as forming the communication between the first and second courts. This passage forms the separation between those apartments of the abbey which were devoted to the spiritual concerns of the brotherhood, and those which were set apart for their bodily comforts. The chapter-house itself appears to have had no communication with this passage; but on the opposite side is a door which leads us into the Abbey <g>Parlour</g>, a room which answers to what is now called in our colleges the Combination-Room.[231] This parlour, which possesses a fire-place, was the place of social meeting for the inmates of the abbey. The next apartment in the south was the <g>Refectory</g>, hall, or dining-room, and is the largest room in the abbey. Its windows, like those of all the chambers in this line of buildings, look to the east. On the opposite wall we can still trace a large arch, built up with masonry, under which was perhaps a seat or side-table for the use of the attendants.