Choir.—The works in the choir consist of three parts. (1) The construction of three new eastern bays, to join up the Lady chapel to the western bays, as at Lichfield and Chester. (2) The transformation of the three western bays, except the piers and arches, and of the aisles. (3) The vaulting. All the lower work is of great beauty, especially the tabernacle work which replaces the triforium. The foliage of the capitals is naturalistic, and curiously diminutive. The vault, however, is unusual and objectionable in character. It is really a reproduction in stone of a kind of vault—the wagon or barrel vault—which, executed in wood, is a special peculiarity of Somerset. This type of stone tunnel, with ill-arranged liernes, sham ribs carved on its surface, and holes cut into it to admit the heads of the clerestory windows, is fortunately confined to Wells. It is, moreover, a gross blunder in design. The pattern of the ribs would be excellent in a flat ceiling; but in perspective it comes out all wrong, because the architect has omitted to take account of the curves of the vault. The stalls, with their stone canopies, are modern, with ancient misereres. The Transitional windows of the aisles were also replaced by Curvilinear ones.
Finally, the church assumed a more dignified appearance externally, for the Central Tower was carried up to its present height between 1318 and 1321; but as yet there were no western towers. As was so often the case, the raising of the central tower “caused the four great piers, on which it rested, to sink into the ground. This, of course, tore away the masonry of the four limbs of the church from the piers, and yawning gaps began to appear between the tower arches and the main walls of the church.” The piers had to be strengthened and the gaps filled up. This was done about 1338. At Canterbury and Salisbury the central piers were strengthened by running across a horizontal stone girder; at Wells the exceedingly strong and exceedingly ugly form of an arch carrying an inverted arch was adopted. This stone framework thus assumes something of the shape of St. Andrew’s Cross, by which name it is generally known. The eastern arch is not strengthened in this fashion, but by a massive screen, which is practically a solid wall, as at Canterbury, York and Ripon. What makes the St. Andrew’s crosses more objectionable still is the hugeness of their mouldings, whose vast scale dwarfs everything in the cathedral into insignificance: in this respect they compare very unfavourably with the horizontal girders at Canterbury. Probably one of the last works of the Curvilinear period was to crown the whole exterior of the cathedral with a fine pierced parapet.
Perpendicular Period.—The central tower being saved, the next thing was to carry up western towers. Of these the southern was built after the year 1386; the northern tower is later than 1424. Moreover, Perpendicular tracery was inserted in many of the Transitional windows—e.g., by Bishop Beckington in the clerestory and aisles of the nave (1443-1464). The same prelate built the three gatehouses, all of which display his rebus, a beacon in flames issuing from a barrel: viz. the Chain Gate, the Penniless Porch (opening to the Market Place), and Browne’s Gate (at the end of Sadler Street). The Early English Cloister was also rebuilt between 1407 and 1470. Of the earlier cloister the outer walls and two lovely doorways survive. As Wells was not a monastic cathedral, the cloister was a mere objet de luxe, except so far as it provided an enclosure for the cemetery and a covered way to the Bishop’s Palace. Accordingly, it is incomplete; the northern walk is wanting; and the chapter-house is on the other side of the cathedral.
The Cathedral Church of the Holy and Indivisible Trinity at Winchester.
FROM NORTH WEST.
The present legal designation of Winchester cathedral dates only from the time of Henry VIII. It was originally the church of the abbey of St. Swithun; and, next to St. Swithun, its greatest patron was St. Birinus. Later on, an alternative dedication was to St. Peter and St. Paul.
It is the longest mediæval cathedral in Europe. Once it was surpassed by old St. Paul’s, London; now its only rival is St. Alban’s. But Winchester has an internal length of 526 feet 6 inches; exceeding that of St. Alban’s by 5 feet 4 inches. Vast as it is, no cathedral shows up so little. It has but one tower, and that barely overtops the roof; in outline it is depressed and monotonous; there are none of the double transepts, and lofty side-porches, which so picturesquely break up the lines of Salisbury, Lincoln, and Hereford. It has no conspicuous façade to give it grandeur to the west; it lacks the wide reach of open square and verdant close that delights at Salisbury and Wells. So far from dominating the city, like Lincoln or York, it hides out of sight. You walk all the length of the High Street and never get a glimpse of it. Never was such a retiring cathedral. Generally, it is approached from the High Street through a hole in the wall; up a narrow passage, and down an avenue of obscuring elms. Slowly its huge mass uprears itself, sprawling over the ground like some stranded prehistoric monster. And, externally, it is as plain as it is huge: mainly an enormous bulk of blank wall. Once it presented a better appearance; for though the Lady chapel to the east was rather shorter, to the west the nave was 40 feet longer, and was flanked, like Southwell, by two Norman towers, forming a western transept, after the manner of Ely and of Peterborough. The present west front does anything but prepare us for an interior so vast; it seems rather the approach to some parish church of the second rank. All the more, perhaps, is one struck with the glorious interior.