This venture of faith was triumphantly rewarded by the discovery in 1887 of the foundations of three apses, corresponding with these two arches, and with a third between them, of which traces were found shortly after. The first excavation in the canon's garden took the form of a trench outside the southern arch, and led to the discovery of part of the foundation of an apse, which measured a quarter-circle. The rest of this foundation had been destroyed, evidently when the wall of the Norman presbytery was built (which, it is notable, is quite twelve inches thicker than the wall containing the arches); but it was evident that the archway in the wall must have stood in the centre of a perfect apse. Similar foundations were next laid bare opposite the northern arch. Then the earth was removed opposite the Norman pilaster buttress, which, standing midway between the two arches, led the investigators to suppose that it hid a centre Saxon archway. Nothing was found at first but a small piece of concrete walling (2 feet by 1-1/2 feet) which it was at once seen might prove to be part of the north wall of the chancel of the ancient church, if a centre apse could be proved to have projected beyond the two side apses. Excavations were therefore commenced further east, with the result that the foundations of the central apse were discovered under a drive in the garden. The missing portion of this apse was accounted for by a main drain which had been cut across its inner side, and by a pit which had been made for the interment of bones found elsewhere in the Close. About the same time Mr. A.J. Evans, the Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, found rag-stones by the side of the Norman buttress, which proved to be part of the central archway, a little wider and higher than the two side ones. It now became clear that this archway was really not a doorway at all but a small chancel-arch, the three arches being similar to those still used in the conservative churches of the East. It is a foot wider than the chancel-arch of the Saxon church at Bradford, Wilts, and two feet wider than the arch between the tower and chancel of Wotten Wawen church in Warwickshire, the jambs and arches of which were also built of rag-stone. Further evidence of the antiquity of this east wall is the fact that the sill of the south archway was found to be 2 feet 8 inches below the level of the pavement of the Norman church, as is shown in the elevation. [Illustration: CONJECTURAL PLAN OF EARLY SAXON CHURCH.]