olumns are believed by experts to be undoubted relics of Roman work: they
are of circular form with Ionic capitals. A curious ropework decoration on
the bases is said to be characteristically Roman, occurs on a monument
outside the Porta Maggiore at Rome.

#The Deanery# is a very much revised version of what once was the "New
Lodging," a building set up for the entertainment of strangers by Prior
Goldstone at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Nicholas Wotton, the
first Dean, chose this mansion for his abode, but since his day the
building has been very materially altered.

[Illustration: NORMAN STAIRCASE IN THE CLOSE
(FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY CARL NORMAN AND CO.).]

[Illustration: DETAILS OF THE NORMAN STAIRCASE IN THE CLOSE.]

The main gate of the #Green Court# is noticeable as a choice specimen of
Norman work; on its northern side formerly stood the Aula Nova which was
built in the twelfth century; the modern buildings which house the King's
School have supplanted the hall itself, but the splendid staircase, a
perfect example of Norman style and quite unrivalled in England, is
luckily preserved, and ranks among the chief glories of Canterbury.

The site of the archbishop's palace is commemorated by the name of the
street--Palace Street--in which a ruined archway, all that remains of the
building, may still be seen. This mansion, in which so many royal and
imperial guests had been entertained with "solemne dauncing" and other
good cheer, was pillaged and destroyed by the Puritans; since then the
archbishops have had no official house in their cathedral city.

[Illustration: DETAILS OF ORNAMENT.]

CHAPTER III.

INTERIOR.

Dean Stanley tells us that in the days of our Saxon forefathers and for
some time after, "all disputes throughout the whole kingdom that could not
be legally referred to the king's court or to the hundreds of counties"
were heard and judged on in the south porch of Canterbury Cathedral. This
was always the principal entrance, and was known in early days as the
"Suthdure" by which name it is often mentioned in "the law books of the
ancient kings." Through this door we enter the nave of the cathedral; this
part of the building was erected towards the end of the fourteenth
century; Lanfranc's nave seems to have fallen into an unsafe and ruinous
state, so much so that in December, 1378, Sudbury, who was then
archbishop, "issued a mandate addressed to all ecclesiastical persons in
his di