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detaching of character — individualizing the houses : and, after 

 all, that is the most important point, as it immediately pro- 

 duces the great desideratum — variety, while the other qualities 

 for which I have contended, do it in but an indirect manner. 



"To a curved street, as I think I have shown, distinct 

 character in the houses is an advantage which should not be 

 dispensed with : it is requisite to the full development of that 

 variety which the eye requires, which nature everywhere pre- 

 sents, and of which a street is assuredly capable, but in a 

 straight street it is absolutely necessary, as an escape from the 

 most wearisome and complete monotony. In such a street the 

 houses should present every variety of size, form, style, hue, 

 and design, with the greatest possible variation of skybne." 



The author, admitting that the projectors of modern streets, 

 in adopting the straight line, might have pleaded ample pre- 

 cedent, glanced at the most remarkable instances of it in 

 celebrated cities, from Babylon downwards, noticing among 

 others, Athens, Rome, Pompeii, Antinoe in ancient, and 

 Washington, Philadelphia, and Mexico, in modern times; 

 and then for illustration of his theory, referred to others, 

 whose chief beauties might be traced to the operation of those 

 principles which he advocated, — to Naples, Venice, Oxford, 

 but particularly the latter, maintaining, that " though Col- 

 leges, Churches, and Halls are the chief objects in the view, 

 the whole charm may be traced to that wonderful variety of 

 form, hue, disposition, and style, that harmony with nature, 

 and obedience to her laws, which is seen around. The High 

 Street, like the ' Grand Canal/ is an embodiment of Hogarth's 

 line of beauty ; it is of a gentle, flexuous curve, meandering 

 through the city, and exhibiting beauties confessedly beyond 

 what any other European city can boast, beauties winch have 

 been evidently appreciated by Wordsworth, who in' a sonnet 

 on Oxford, forgets not 



• The stream-like windings of that glorious street.' 



' Sweeping along/ observes an old writer, ' in a gentle curve 



