There are also some rebuses, and some lettering.  On the north wall, in six several squares, are the letters of the name Ashton interwoven with scrolls; the letters AR before a church, and a bird on a tun occur more than once.  This certainly refers to Abbot Robert Kirton; but what the bird means is not clear.  In the moulding over the large arch to the south choir aisle are four sets of letters.  They form the last verse of the psalter.  The words are contracted:  they stand for Omnis spiritus laudet Dominum.

=The Transepts=, including the arch to the aisles, are of four bays, and, as has before been pointed out, are of precisely the same character as the work in the choir.  The central piers here are octagonal.  All round the Norman portion of the church, below the windows, is an arcade of round arches with simple round mouldings and plain cushion capitals:  in the transepts these have not intersecting heads, as in the choir and nave.  The western sides of the transepts have no proper triforium, but a passage runs along in front of the windows in the triforium range.  The chapels to the east have Perpendicular screens.  In the north transept those three chapels were made into one which was used for early service, and called the morning chapel.  We read in the chapter records of a minor canon being appointed to read the prayers at 6 o’clock, and once at least the hour is named as 5 o’clock, in the morning.  This chapel was fitted up with some of the desks from the choir; and, judging from a number of names and initials that had been cut upon the desks, it has been conjectured that it was at one time used for the chapel of the King’s School.  At the north end is a desk for the reader or readers made out of two Early English stalls; there are three double shafts with admirably carved wooden foliage in the capitals.  A very fine little Norman door leads to the staircase to the triforium.  It should be mentioned that in the triforium is arranged an excellent series of stones, fragments, mouldings, and various ornaments, found in different places during the recent restoration.

[Illustration:  The New Building—­Interior.]

The series of basins of Alwalton marble was found, during the recent underpinning of the west front, in use as foundation stones; they appear to be of late Norman date.  One window in the north transept aisle and all three in the south have fine geometrical tracery.  The three chapels in the south transept were used as vestries until a few years ago, when the space beneath the bell-tower and part of the north aisle of the nave was converted into a large vestry for both clergy and choir.  In the chapel here nearest the choir there remains the lower part of the newel staircase which led to an upper chapel.  On the west side of the south transept has been erected a building which has in its time served many different purposes.  It can hardly be called an aisle, as there is only access to the transept by a single ogee-headed