because no two people had precisely the same ideas, wishes and
requirements; and the material was dictated by the stone or timber
provided by the district. Every building was in old times the
combined expression of the individual man and the _genius loci_.

The timber cottages which are still to be found in the town tell of
the time when tracts of the original forest still lingered, and oak
was the cheapest material fit for building. Often the foundation of
the walls is of stone, and the earliest stone to be used was that
which could be had for the digging, the blue lias found in thin layers
embedded in the clay of which the vale is composed. In the back
streets which retain, as would be expected, more of their primitive
character than the more respectable thoroughfares, this blue stone has
been much used, and in the churches it can be seen in the earlier
parts making a very pretty wall with its thin horizontal lines. The
tower of the church of All Saints shows it to great advantage.

Another stone is also employed, and one far better suited for
building, because it can be obtained in blocks of almost any size, and
carved with the utmost delicacy. This is oolite, the stone of which
the Bell Tower is built. From Norman times it was used in the more
important parts of the Abbey, as is shown in the foundations of the
great tower now exposed to view, and in Abbot Reginald's gateway. But
the oolite stone could not be got much nearer than Broadway, and what
was used by the monks in all probability came from the hill above
that village. In numerous old houses this stone is made use of, but in
almost all it must have come indirectly, having once formed part of
the structure of the monastic buildings, or perhaps of the castle
which for a short time flanked the bridge on the Bengeworth side of
the river.