tranquil seclusion than Wells. In the precincts of Chester Cathedral, and
at many other points in England, there broods the same antique calm, but
here the whole place is pervaded by this reposeful spirit of the past; and
this culminates in the neighborhood of St. Andrew's Cathedral, the
bishop's palace, the old moat, the conventual buildings, and the three
venerable gates, or "eyes," as they are called, of the cathedral yard. The
moat about the bishop's palace, overhung by a thick curtain of aged elms
mingled with ivy, growing like a warrior's crest upon the high-turreted
interior walls, and reflected in deep shadows in the smooth, dark mirror
of the water, has a thoroughly feudal look, which is heightened by the
drawbridge over the moat, and the frowning castellated gateway. How
strange the state of society when a Christian bishop lived in such
jealously armed seclusion, behind moated walls and embattled towers! What
a commentary, this very name of "the close"! One of these old bishops was
himself a famous fighting character, who, at the age of sixty-four,
commanded the king's artillery at the battle of Sedgmoor....

The Cathedral of St. Andrew was built upon the site of a still more
ancient church founded by Ina, king of the West Saxons in 704. It also
goes back to a remote antiquity, for its choir and nave were rebuilt in
the middle of the twelfth century. The central tower, which is the noblest
and most finished part of the structure, is of the early English style to
the roof; the upper part is of the Decorated, with a mixture of the early
Perpendicular styles. It has an elegant appearance from its rich
pinnacles, and is of a softened and gray tint. Beginning to show signs of
sinking, it was raised in the fourteenth century, and was strengthened by
the introduction beneath it of inverted buttressing-arches, which give to
the interior a strange effect. These arches, architecturally considered,
are undoubtedly blemishes, but they are on such a vast scale, and so bold
in their forms, and yet so simple, that they do not take away from the