chancel, and decorated with an amazing variety of mouldings.  Those below form the grand characteristic of this venerable pile, being likewise circular; but so intersecting one another as to form perfect and beautiful pointed arches.”  This then is the hypothesis of Dr. Milner towards the settlement of the controverted origin of the pointed or English style of architecture.  It is, probably, the most reasonable of all solutions.  Sir Christopher Wren’s account of a Saracenic origin was vague and unsupported; and Warburton’s deduction from groves and interlacing boughs, though ingeniously illustrated by the late Sir James Hall, has more prettiness than probability.  Dr. Milner’s “intersecting hypothesis,” as it is technically termed, is brief and simple:  “De Blois,” he says, “having resolved to ornament the whole sanctuary of his church with intersecting semicircles, conceived the idea of opening them, by way of windows, which at once produced a series of highly-pointed arches.”  Hence arose the seeming paradox, that “the intersection of two circular arches in the church of St. Cross, produced Salisbury steeple.”  Conclusive as this hypothesis may appear, it has been much controverted, and among its opponents have been men of great practical knowledge in architecture.  Messrs. Brayley and Britton observe “though the specimens referred to by Dr. Milner may not entirely warrant the above supposition, yet they clearly mark the gradation by which the Saxon and Norman styles of architecture were abandoned, for the more enriched and beautiful order that has conferred so much celebrity on the ecclesiastical architects of this country."[9] The clever writer in The Crypt remarks “the history of the science appears so easy and natural according to Dr. Milner’s hypothesis, and so many difficulties must be softened down, so many discordances reconciled, according to any other, as to go a very great way towards establishing the credibility of his idea.  Here then is a complete history of an invention, for which every quarter of the globe has been ransacked.  And, be it remembered, that the pointed arch did not first display itself in those magnificent proportions, which would have accompanied it from the beginning, if brought over from foreign climes in its full perfection; but exactly in that want of proportion, which was the natural result of the intersection."[10]

[9] Beauties of England, vol. vi. p 110.

[10] The specimens at St. Cross were considered by Dr. Milner
to be the earliest instances of the experiment, but the
Abbey of Clugny, and several other edifices have disputed
its claim to priority.—­The Crypt, No. 8.

To return to the choir.  On each side of the altar is curious and elegant Gothic spire-work; and traces may be seen of ancient stone work, all that now remains of the high altar.  The wooden altar-screen is described as “execrable enough”; but sixteen stalls in the choir, which are referred to the time of Henry VII., are ingeniously ornamented with “carved figures of illustrious scripture personages."[11]