Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Wells / A Description of Its Fabric and a Brief History of the Episcopal See

by Percy Dearmer

The Lady Chapel has been fitted up for the use of the Theological College, and its furniture contrasts favourably with that of the choir. A litany desk, stalls, and credence-table in oak have recently been given, and a retable carved by Miss Neville; the altar cross, however, is too stunted for its position. The eagle lectern, in spite of its dark appearance, is modern, of Dean Goodenough's time. The doorway on the south side led to the old vestry, so wantonly destroyed in the present century: now that the chapel is in daily use the need of the vestry is much felt, and a cupboard in St. John's chapel has to serve for a makeshift. The gas-brackets are of later and more pleasant work than those elsewhere.

Mr Ferrey discovered fragments of a reredos at the east end of the chapel, and set them up as best he could to form the present reredos: the original arrangement seems to be lost, for some of the pedestals are on the level of the floor, while some of the niches at the top are cut in half. Mr Ferrey restored the whole chapel at the same time, and paved it with tiles.

Glass in Lady Chapel.—The large windows of this chapel are all filled with beautiful fourteenth-century glass, but alas! in a marred condition. The side windows contain fragments packed together anyhow. The eastern window was made up out of old pieces by Willement at Dean Goodenough's restoration, and its colour almost completely spoilt by modern insertions. The harm, however, is not irreparable, for the figures are almost entirely genuine, and the bad effect is mainly due to Willement's blue background. A careful examination would easily separate the new from the old, and it would be quite easy at the present day to remove the bad work and replace it by glass that would carry out the old harmony of colour. The lower lights are filled with two tiers of figures in canopies, David and other patriarchs in the upper tier, and the following well-chosen series in the lower:—The Madonna in the midst, on her right the Serpent and Eve, on her left the Brazen Serpent and Moses. The upper lights of this window contain angels bearing the instruments of the Passion, which are unspoilt, as are also the busts of patriarchs in the north-east window, and of bishops in that on the south-east. Three of the topmost lights contain emblems of the Evangelists, the fourth is lost. One inscription remains, Ista capella constructa est ... but the date is gone.

A tall and light monument stands between the Lady Chapel and St. Catherine's; its crocketed finials, filled with tracery, rise almost to the ceiling. The canopy is open at the sides and western end, but the eastern end forms a niche; this part has been restored in colour and gilding, it is powdered with fleurs-de-lys, and bears a shield containing the Agnus Dei. No other part shows any trace of colour. The base is much higher than that of an ordinary tomb, and the canopy seems to have been somewhat altered at Ferrey's restoration.

The spot where the altar of St. Catherine and All Virgins stood is now "Sacred to the memory of John Phelips Of Montacute in this county esquire. Descended from a line of ancestors, Whose names for two centuries and a half abound in the annals of the county, He succeeded at an early age to the paternal estates, And sustained the wonted hospitality of his house. He soon became a most active and intelligent magistrate," etc., etc.

The Chapter-House Staircase is entered by the doorway in the eastern aisle of the north transept. There are few things in English architecture that can be compared with it for strange impressive beauty; the staircase goes upward for eighteen steps and then part of it sweeps off to the chapter-house on the right, while the other part goes on and up till it reaches the chain-bridge; thus the steps lie, worn here and there by the tread of many feet, like fallen leaves, the last of them lost in the brighter light of the bridge. Here one is still almost within the cathedral, and yet the carts are passing underneath, and their rattle mixes with the sound of the organ within.

The date of the staircase is clearly somewhere between that of the chapter-house and that of the church itself. It is later than the church, for it is built up against the transept buttresses, and it contains some of the best examples of simple geometrical tracery, while there are nothing but lancet windows in the church of Reginald and Jocelin. But the simple geometrical tracery of its two four-light windows prove that it was finished before the chapter-house was begun. The arches of these windows are rampant, to follow the level of the stairs; their beautiful circular tracery is massive, deeply-moulded, and filled with remnants of rich glass; their shafts of blue lias have naturalistic capitals which are in striking contrast both to the Early English carving in the church and the full Decorated of the chapter-house itself. Below the windows is a stone bench rising in steps with a foot-pace of similar construction; this arrangement adds much to the effect of the staircase, though it is marred by a modern hand-rail.

Before the Chain Gate was made, the vestibule ended with a graceful window of four lights similar to those at the side. The upper part of the window remains, but the lower part is occupied by a Perpendicular doorway, and the whole now forms a screen which, by breaking the light, adds considerably to the charm of the staircase. Through this doorway, where they are cut away to allow the door to open, the steps continue for two stages, but in a narrower flight. Here the windows are Perpendicular, and the vaulted ceiling has given place to a wooden roof, for this is the Chain Gate, as light and pretty within as without. It was only an after-thought, a matter of convenience, thus to connect the chapter-house with the Vicars' Close, and the screen that now breaks the light had for a century and a half been the outside window, just as the blocked window of the transept had been the outer light for the fifty years before the staircase itself was thought of. It was just a practical matter-of-fact device; but what magnificent utilitarianism, what an inspired after-thought!