The Cathedral Church of St. Andrew, Wells.

FROM NORTH-WEST.

“The traveller who comes down the hill from Shepton Mallet,” says Professor Freeman, “looks down on a group of buildings without a rival either in our own island or beyond the seas.” “From a distance,” says Mr. Peabody, “the towers and lantern of the cathedral rise above rounded masses of green foliage. When we reach its walls, we find them springing from the azure depths of crystalline pools, from emerald lawns and arching trees, the home of cawing rooks and soaring pigeons. Close to the very walls of the ancient cathedral rises one of the noblest springs in the world, to which city and cathedral owe their name; an ever-abounding and magnificent outburst of waters at the side of the Lady chapel, surging up in a boiling heap in the midst of the unfathomed depths of a translucent pool; then bounding over in an impetuous cascade, which carries it into the Bishop’s moat, to encircle palace and rampart and towers, till it rests in glassy clearness over many-coloured forests of branching or feathery or star-like water-weeds.Never did a Frenchman form such harmonies of church and scenery as one sees at Lichfield, at Salisbury, and at Wells, in their setting of close and cloister and lake, of brilliant garden and clipped green lawn and immemorial elms. Above rise three gray, time worn towers; the music of the chimes vibrates and dies away:

“‘Lord, through this hourBe Thou our guide,That by Thy powerNo foot may slide.’

“‘Lord, through this hour

Be Thou our guide,

That by Thy power

No foot may slide.’

So from hour to hour chant the bells over the peaceful beauty of the bishop’s gardens and terraces and the ancient ivy-clad palace; while within the lonely nave, as the fading sunlight shines through the western window, and casts its coloured glories on sculptured tomb and carved boss and gray stone wall, the organ notes pulsate through the stony fabric:

“‘Through long-drawn aisle and fretted vaultThe pealing anthem swells the note of praise.’

“‘Through long-drawn aisle and fretted vault

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.’

The great solemn place is filled with the thrilling sweetness of boyish voices, and we heartily join in their tuneful, long ‘Amen,’ as it rings and resounds down the empty nave, and echoes again and again from distant chapel and far-receding vaults.

“The Bishop’s palace is romance made tangible, even to ‘spell-bound princes oaring their way as swans among the lilies of the moat.’ In this home of peace good Bishop Ken led his simple, happy life, awaking with the sun and joining with the birds in their morning hymn, and each eventide singing to his lute—

“‘Glory to thee, my God, this night,For all the blessings of the light.’

“‘Glory to thee, my God, this night,

For all the blessings of the light.’

Beyond the gardens and the moat run avenues of stately elms; hard by, to the north, are the cathedral’s triple towers,and, for background, the mighty range of the Mendips; all round is meadow-grass; to the west nestles the little town, with the stately tower of St. Cuthbert’s church; and, five miles away, conical tors rise on either side of the isle of Avalon, the storied land of Glastonbury, where twice each year bloomed the sacred thorn struck by Joseph of Arimathea from a thorn in the Saviour’s crown; where, too, lies King Arthur, borne thither after the fatal battle of Camelot, and buried in an unknown grave with the inscription, ‘Hic jacet Arturus rex quondam rexque futurus.’ This land of Somerset to the Englishman should be holy ground.”

NORTH TRANSEPT.

The peculiar charm of Wells lies, as Professor Freeman remarks, in the union and harmonious grouping of the cathedral with its surroundings. It does not stand alone. On the other hand, it is not crowded by incongruous buildings, like the great cathedrals of France, rising in precipices from narrow lanes or stone pavedplace. Nor, again, is it isolated from those buildings which are its natural and necessary complement—the palace of the Bishop, the deanery, the residence of the Archdeacon, the Cathedral school, the Vicar’s Close, the homes of precentor, organist and architect. Nearly all the officials still live in the houses which Bishop Beckington built four centuries ago. And with the most perfect and picturesque of all these, “a double row of little ancient houses,” the Vicar’sClose, the north transept of the cathedral is connected by a delightful mediæval bridge.

SUGAR’S CHANTRY IN NAVE.

The diocese of Wells is an offshoot of that of Winchester. When Wessex grew populous, the bishopric of Sherborne was split off from that of Winchester; and in 909 the shire of the Sumorsaetas was split off from Sherborne, and the men of Somerset got a bishop of their own. The diocese long had two cathedrals: one at Wells, served, as at this day, by secular canons; the other at Bath, served by the monks of the Benedictine abbey. The latter was suppressed by Henry VIII., and ever since the bishop has been but in name Bishop of Bath.

Of the earlier cathedrals not a trace remains. The oldest part of the present cathedral consists of the nave, transepts, and the piers and arches of the three western bays of the choir. All this was designed, and much of it built in the time of Fitz-Bohun, who became bishop in 1171. The design is what is called Transitional. It is not early Transitional; for there is none of the heaviness and massiveness of the early Transitional work of Malmesbury, Kirkstall, or Fountains. It is not middle Transitional; for the semicircular arch, which still appears here and thereat Ripon, is conspicuously absent. It is late, very late, Transitional work, done at the very end of the Transitional period (1145-1190), and therefore contemporaneous with the famous French choir of Canterbury(1175-1184) and the beautiful presbytery of Chichester (built after the fire of 1187). But it is more Gothic than either Canterbury or Chichester. In fact, Wells is the most advanced of all the cathedral designs of the Transitional period. There is indeed little of the Romanesque or Norman about it; still it is there. Among the survivals of Romanesque feeling may be noticed the zigzag ornament in the doorways of the north porch, the classical character of several foliage-capitals, the retention of man-headed birds and other Romanesque monsters in the capitals, and, above all, the universal square abacus. All these, however, except the square abacus, find parallels in advanced Gothic work of the thirteenth century elsewhere. And as we find precisely the same stiff foliage-capitals in Chichester presbytery subsequent to 1187, and in St. Joseph’s chapel, Glastonbury (1180-1190), we may be certain that the design belongs to Fitz-Bohun’s episcopate, before whose death in 1191 the church was rising fast, and its style an object of universal admiration.

TRIFORIUM OF NAVE.

Now this is a very important matter, at any rate to Englishmen. In the first place, we are provided with another example of first-rate importance, of what architects were doing in this country just before the final plunge into Gothic,i.e., just before St. Hugh commenced his work at Lincoln. Hitherto we have had to rely on what we see in Canterbury choir; now we have Wells also. To these we may add the little-known Abbey of Dore, in the Black Mountains. In its lovely choir we go one step farther. Even the square abacus, universal at Wells, alternates there with theround form, and is more and more infrequent as one proceeds to the retro-choir, where indeed the work, to all intents and purposes, is pure Gothic. And thus we get what we never had before, a bridge or series of stepping-stones to Gothic architecture. Formerly one passed at a bound, an impossible bound, from Canterbury choir to Lincoln Minster. Now we can leave out the French work of Canterbury choir altogether, and accomplish the passage from Norman to Gothic through Malmesbury, Kirkstall, Ripon, Wells, Abbey Dore. Before, it was inconceivable how Lincoln came into existence; it was an architectural Melchisedek, without father or mother; and those who did not believe in spontaneous generation in architecture were driven, in spite of their wishes, to seek out an ancestor for St. Hugh’s choir in France. Now the whole difficulty is removed, the missing link has been found, Lincoln is but the logical development of Wells and Abbey Dore. The architectural chain is complete. Lincoln is no Melchisedek we have found its parents; and, what is profoundly satisfactory, they are true-born Englishmen, not Frenchmen. Wells, therefore, deserves all the attention that the architectural student can give to it, as evidence that the Gothic architecture of England did not originate with the French choir at Canterbury of William of Sens, but is native and indigenous to the soil.

The design of the nave of Wells, however, has more than archæological interest; it has a decided artistic distinction of its own. In the first place, the interior looks taller than it is—i.e.it is the very reverse of Lichfield. It is but 67 feet high, and is thus one of the lowest of our cathedrals; but so just are its proportions, so well adjusted the tall clerestory to the stages below, that to the eye the ratio of height to breadth is entirely satisfactory. Equally remarkable is the way in which the impression of great length is produced. This is due to the obliteration of vertical divisions in the triforium and ground-story, which are not separated off, as usual, into bays by vaulting-shafts. The vaulting-shafts are stopped justbelow the sill of the clerestory, and the triforium runs in an uninterrupted arcade, the whole distance from west to east. Such a treatment of the triforium is unusual in England, but is found also at Glastonbury and Llandaff: perhaps it hails originally from Matilda’s church, the Abbaye aux Dames, at Caen. And the free flow, east and west, of the broad horizontal band of the triforium is aided still further by designing it void of shafts, bases, and capitals alike. The central tower seems to have collapsed in 1248, and many of the capitals seem to be of this or of a still later date. The capitals, corbels and the carving generally of this part of the cathedral are most spirited and interesting; there is hardly any mediæval work in the country to excel it in spirit, variety and execution; it should be examined with the utmost care. When you have seen the carving in Wells cathedral, you will not be so much surprised at the excellence of that in the choirs of Lincoln and the west front of St. Albans. The plan of the piers should also be noted.

WEST FRONT.

Lancet Period.West Front.—Looking westward, we see to the south (on the left) the chapel of St. Edmund,and to the north the chapel of the Holy Cross, now the Consistory Court. The west front, including these chapels, is Bishop Jocelyn’s work; it is in the purest early English Gothic, probably built after his return from exile in 1213, and finished by him before 1239. There has been, however, some rebuilding here, and a parapet added, in the fifteenth century. Passing out, we can now survey the famous façade, and its immense collection of sculpture—by far the best mediæval figure-sculpture in England, and only surpassed by the yet finer and earlier sculpture of Chartres and Rheims. The visitor will do well to study it in detail in the admirable series of photographs, taken when the scaffolding was up for the restoration of the façade. Professor Cockerell suggests that the façade is to be regarded as a Te Deum in stone.

CHAPTER HOUSE

As for the composition of the west front, it has been severely criticised, but two things must be borne in mind. The first is, that the towers were probably designed for spires. Add the spires, and as Notre Dame, Paris, the squatness of the façade disappears. Secondly, it was designed for the sculpture—a sort of open-air reredos—and not the sculpture for the façade. Nevertheless, it is not good, even as a reredos. The windows are mere slits in the wall, the doorways mere “holes for frogs and mice.” It lacks variety: the six big buttresses project, but have all the same amount of projection. The arcading below the west window is confused and muddled, and cut intoanyhow by the central doorway. Nevertheless, its great breadth makes this façade of Wells more impressive than any other in the country, except that of Peterborough. What would it be with the spires added!

LADY CHAPEL.

Geometrical Period.Undercroft, Staircase, Chapter house.—When the west front had been peopled with statuary, the undercroft of the chapter-house was built. A similar chapter-house, two stories high, once existed in precisely the same situationi.e.—east of the north transept—at Beverley minster, the exquisite staircase to which still survives. Westminster chapter-house and that of Old St. Paul’s also had undercrofts. These undercrofts probably served as sacristies. The staircase or vestibule to the chapter-house, with simple tracery of cusped circles in its windows, is also of the early Geometrical period: its date is 1286-1320. The work here deserves the closest inspection; it is the best work in Wells cathedral, and unsurpassed by anything in Great Britain. The naturalistic foliage of the capitals and corbels is superb: especially notice the first corbels, representing a monk and a nun treading on serpents. The staircase leads by the chain bridge to the vicars’ close, as well as to the chapter-house. The chapter-house is one of the noblest in England. The long-lobed trefoils in the window tracery indicate that it is a work of the latter half of the Geometrical period (1280-1320); the profusion of ball-flower round and beneath thewindows, and the ogee dripstones outside the windows, would seem to indicate that it was not completed till the very end of the period. Canon Church has ascertained that it was not finished before 1320.

FROM SOUTH-EAST.

NAVE.

Curvilinear Period.Lady Chapel,Choir,Central Tower.—But a much more important work remained, which had hitherto been postponed, owing perhaps to the great expense involved in the completion of the west front and the chapter-house. It was to extend the choir eastwards. Many of the great cathedrals had finished their eastward extensions long before. Canterbury choir had been prolonged at the beginning of the twelfth century, and again about 1180. Hereford also was lengthened about 1180. The Angel Choir of Lincoln had been built about 1280. But at Wells, Lichfield and Chester, the extension of the choir was not effected till the Curvilinear period (1315-1360). As at Lichfield, the Wells architect seems first to have built the Lady chapel as a detached building, afterwards joining it up to the Transitional bays of Fitz-Jocelyn’s choir. As every one knows, it is the most beautiful east end we have in England. It may be worth while to try to see how this design was arrived at—a design as exceptional as it is effective. The simplest form of east end in English Gothic is seen at York and Lincoln: it consists merely of a low wall with a big window above it. The next improvement is to build an aisle or processional path behind the east end; at the same timepiercing the east wall with one, two, or three arches. This was done at Hereford about 1180; and on a magnificent scale in the Chapels of Nine Altars at Durham and Fountains early in the thirteenth century. But the French apsidal cathedrals—of which we have an example in Westminster—have not only an encircling processional aisle, but also a chevet of chapels radiating out from it; thus providing ever-changing vistas of entrancing beauty. The next step in England also was to provide our rectangular choirs with a chevet as well as with a processional aisle. An early example of this plan is to be seen at Abbey Dore, in Herefordshire, about 1190. It occurs early in the thirteenth century, on a still grander scale, at Salisbury; where one finds not one, but two processional aisles, as well as chapels to the east of them; and, in addition, a Lady chapel projecting still farther to the east, thus producing a design of great complexity and beauty. Nevertheless, at Salisbury, since the chief supporting piers of the retro-choir and the chevet are in a line with those of the choir, there is by no means the same changeful intricacy of vista that affords one ever fresh delight in an apsidal church. At Wells, however, the architect attained all the success of the Continental builder, simply because he built his Lady chapel not rectangular but octagonal. For,to get this octagon, of which only five sides were supported by walls, he had to plant in the retro-choir two piers to support the remaining three sides; and these piers are necessarily out of line with the piers of the choir. He had got the Continental vista. He saw it; but he saw also that it could be improved upon. And he did improve it, by putting up an outer ring of four more piers round the western part of the octagon of the Lady chapel. It was an intuition of genius: it makes the vistas into the retro-choir and Lady chapel a veritable glimpse into fairyland; and provides, here alone in England, a rival to the glorious eastern terminations of Amiens and Le Mans. And that is not all. We saw in the chapter-house the grand effect of the central stalk branching upward and outward in all directions, like some palm tree transmuted into stone. This beautiful effect he transfers to the retro-choir, but multiplied—four palm trees in place of one; for each of the four external piers of the octagon emulates the chapter-house’s central stalk. “It is difficult to determine whether the effect is more striking in the early morning, when the ancient splendours of the stained glass, are reflected on the slender shafts of Purbeck marble and the clustered vault; or at the late winter services, when the darkened figures of saints and prophets in the clerestory combine with the few lights burning in the choristers’ stalls to add something of mystery and solemn gloom to the maze of aisles and chapels, half hidden, half revealed” (Murray). And where did the idea of having an octagonal Lady chapel come from? Possibly it came from Lichfield. If one follows the outline formed by the five walls of Wells Lady chapel and the fourouterpiers, which complete the octagon, it will be seen that the Wells octagon is of precisely the same elongated form—two long sides and six short ones—as the chapter-house of Lichfield. We may fairly suppose, then, that the Wells architect got the design for his east end by tacking on the elongated octagon of Lichfield chapter-house to the rectangular retro-choir of Salisbury. This Lady chapel is an early work of the Curvilinear period; for it seems to have been complete in 1324. The windows have beautiful reticulated tracery of early type. There is lovely carving in the capitals, bosses, reredos, sedilia and piscina. The Curvilinear foliated capitals here and in the choir should be compared with the somewhat earlier capitals of the chapter-house, with the early Geometrical capitals of the staircase, the Lancet capitals of the west front, and thestill earlier ones of porch, nave, and transepts. The ancient glass here and in the Jesse window of the choir is superb in colour.

CHOIR.

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 theCentral Towerwas 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 theexceedingly 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 mereobjet 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.

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