BUILDINGS 21

the Chapter House, a magnificent octagonal parlia-
ment house of one immense chamber : later the
Chapter House was connected with the main building
by the Vestibule. Then the Choir was replaced by
a larger and finer building in the then latest archi-
tectural fashion. The new choir contained the east
window, wrhich in the eyes of contemporaries was
wonderful and unrivalled for its size and painted
glass. It occupies nearly all the central space of
the east wall from a few feet above the ground
to almost the apex of the gable. Gothic archi-
tecture wras so marvellously adaptable that all these
parts, built at widely different times, at various
and strongly-contrasted stages of the development
of this English mediaeval architecture, together
make a single building that appears to possess the
most felicitous unity of general design and a per-
fectly wonderful diversity of sectional design, for
every part is in complete sympath}^ with the scheme
as a wrhole.

To the east of the Central Tower is the Choir,
which was kept exclusively for the services ; to the
west, the Nave, the poptdar part. The entrance to
the Choir from the west is made through the stone
screen of Kings, which, \\ith the lofty organ wrhich
rests on it, prevents people in the Nave from getting
anything more than a glimpse of what is taking place
in the Choir. Over the western ends of the Nave
aisles are the twin west towers, which contain the
bells. The high altar and reredos stood in the middle
of the Choir between the two choir transepts, the
huge windows of which present in picture the life
stories of St. Cuthbert and St. William respectively.
The I^ady Chapel, the part of the choir to the east
of the reredos, was very important in pre-Reforma-
tion days when the cult of the Virgin wras very

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