Bk. VI. Ch. IU. CHAPTER-HOUSES. 175 extent washed out by modern restorations, it still affords a very perfect type of an English chapter-house of the 13th century, at a time when the French geometric tracery was most in vogue. That at Wells (1293-1302, Woodcut No. 605), however, is more beautiful and more 605. Chapter-House, Wells. (Catli. Hb.) essentially English in all its details. The tracery of the windows, the stalls below them, and the ornaments of the roof, are all of that per- fect type which prevailed in this country about the year 1300. Its central pillar may, perhaps, be considered a little too massive for the utilitarian purpose of the building, but as an architectural feature its proportions are perfect. Still the existence of the pillar was a defect that it was thought expedient to remove, if possible ; and it was at
