a very pleasing feature in the general design.  The visitor should now return to the cathedral in order to inspect the Vicars’ Close, one of the unique features of Wells.  The flight of stairs which gives entrance to the chapter-house leads also by a covered bridge—­known as the Chain Gate—­across the street into the Close, and thus forms a private passage whereby the singers may pass from the church to their quarters.  The public have to find their way by returning to the street.  Pass under the chain-gate, turn sharply to the left under another archway, and the Close is before you.  It is a quaint oblong court closed at one end by the entrance gateway, and at the other by a chapel.  On either side is a “quiet range of houses” with picturesque gables and high chimneys.  Note the “canting” escutcheons of Swan, Sugar, and Talbot, Beckington’s executors, on some of the chimneys.  The houses, which were intended as the abode of the college of singing clerks, have been much modernised; but one or two still retain some semblance of their original design.  The idea of gathering the singers together into a fraternity was Bishop Ralph’s.  He provided them with these picturesque dwellings, and gave them the common dining-hall which forms the upper storey of the entrance gateway.  This is said to be one of the most beautiful examples of mid-14th-cent. domestic architecture in the country.  It was enlarged subsequently by Rich.  Pomeroy (temp. Hen.  VIII.), and Bishop Beckington’s executors are said to have built the chapel at the other end of the Close.  Regarded now-a-days as a devotional superfluity by the singers, it has been turned over to the Theological College.  The chapel and muniment room above should be inspected, but admission cannot now be obtained to the hall.  Before leaving the Cathedral precincts note on the same side of the road as the Vicars’ Close (in order, westwards):  (1) the Archdeacon’s House, now used as the College library, (2) the Deanery—­an embattled residence with gatehouse and turrets, built by Dean Gunthorpe, 1472-98 (the imposing character of the building is not discernible from the road, as the real front faces the garden), (3) Browne’s Gate, through which the Close is entered from Sadler Street.  The remainder of the official residences of the chapter lie to the N. of the Deanery, outside the Close, in a street called the E. Liberty—­so named because it lay outside parochial jurisdiction.  Though much modernised, they are mostly mediaeval buildings.  The path which traverses the Cathedral green enters the Market place by the third of the Close gate-ways—­Penniless Porch, where alms are said to have been periodically distributed.  This was the work of Beckington; note the prelate’s arms on W. face, and rebus (a beacon and tun) on the E. side.  Beckington made the city his debtor by giving it a water supply.  He tapped the well in the palace garden, which feeds the fountain in the square.  Note the quaint method of distributing the overflow.