On the south side of the Lady Chapel are the curious chapels—known as the mortuary chapels—with their gabled fronts lying in the three spaces between the buttresses. These are more fully described in their place in the next chapter.
From this end of the cathedral can be well seen the arcaded parapet with its battlements, which runs round the top of the eastern half of the building and of the transepts, also the turrets of the sacristry with their high crocketted pinnacles; from here, too, can be seen, what Professor Willis draws attention to, "that the rebuilt clerestory of the western part of the choir betrays by the lighter colour of its stone that it was a work subsequent to the eastern part." On one of the buttresses of the choir on this side is an ancient image of a female figure, but it is too much decayed to afford any clue to the character represented, though it remains a very charming instance of Gothic sculpture. On the east corner of the sacristry there is a modern figure of Godefroi de Bouillon, and at the other corner is a figure of St. Chad.
Photochrom Co. Ltd., Photo.]
In the gable of the South Transept is a very beautiful rose window, which is hidden by the stone groining from the inside. Mr J. O. Scott, in a lecture already referred to, declared that "this rose window is so high up in the gable that it never could have been combined with any stone groining. But, by referring to York Minster, between which and Lichfield many curious parallels may be traced, it is seen at once how a rose window in this position may be brought into the general design. This is effected by using a particular kind of wooden groining, the part of which nearest to the gable wall is lifted up so as to exhibit the window from within the building."
The large doorway in the south transept, which as seen from the outside is at the top of a flight of steps, very much resembles the doorway on the north side, but the carving is not so fine; it has been very much restored, and three shields have been in comparatively recent times carved in the tympanum. The shields show the arms of the see, of Bishop Lloyd, and Dean Addison, thus declaring this to have been done about 1700.
To the right of this doorway, outside the southern end of the transept aisle, is an ancient monument, probably of an archdeacon. A carved figure lies in a recess surmounted by a stone canopy.
The large heavy buttresses which disfigure the outside of this transept were the work of Wyatt at the end of the last century. The outside of the nave on this side presents a very different appearance to the other side. Here everything is new and uninteresting. The entrance to the bell tower is on this side, and a winding stair leads to the belfry stage.
There are ten Bells, seven of which date from about 1687, and are therefore of the same age as the bishop's palace. In that year Hacket's six bells, which can only have been hanging some sixteen or seventeen years, were found to be useless, and a subscription was raised to replace them with a peal of ten. There is a letter from the dean and chapter to Elias Ashmole, in which it is stated that Henry Bagley of Ecton, the bell-founder, had "so over-sized the eight bells he had cast, that they had swallowed up all the metal for the ten," and that eighty pounds more would be required, but that they did not regret the mistake as it "would make extremely for the advantage and glory of the cathedral (the bigness of such a ring far more befitting the place)." Only seven of these bells are now in use; the other three are by Rudhall of Gloucester and Mears of London. In 1748 the belfry caught fire and the ninth bell cracked with the heat, but it was recast in the same year, and since then there has been no change.