THE STYLE OF HENRY II. 163 



increased in elevations by every device, including that of the giant 

 order, but plans became more vast. This was often accompanied by 

 a restless striving after effect, a forcing of the note, a coarsening of detail, 

 a cruder, more cheerless character in the colour schemes. These 

 tendencies manifest themselves in a preference for complex, agitated, 

 or monstrous forms over simple, quiet, and natural ones, as in the use 

 of pediments one within another, or broken and even with their 

 halves reversed, architraves complicated with frequent shoulders and 

 ressauts, and lines interrupted by adventitious ornament, cornices 

 curled up at the ends into scrolls, the frequency of curved forms for 

 windows, dormers, and roofs, the introduction of polygonal arches and 

 elliptical columns, the abuse for architectural functions of human and 

 animal forms, which are sometimes composite monsters such as women 

 with moths' wings and dogs' legs ; or else of abnormal proportions or 

 conflicting scales. One symptom of the tendency to over-emphasis 

 is the love for rustication applied in and out of season, as well as in 

 strange forms, and with vermiculation carved into waves, ropes, or 

 fljwers. 



Some of the above characteristics may be traced in the early 

 phases of the Renaissance. The difference between them when 

 occurring at the beginning and at the end of the century is (inde- 

 pendently of the type of detail in which they are treated) that in the 

 former case they are the result of incomplete acquaintance with 

 classical forms, in the latter of a deliberate rejection of classical 

 tradition with the object of obtaining more varied effects. It is not 

 suggested that all such characteristics are necessarily reprehensible. 

 Many of them have now entered into the stock in trade of Renaissance 

 design and when treated with taste are capable of effective application. 



THIRD SUB-PERIOD ARCHITECTS AND BUILDINGS. 



DE L'ORME DISMISSED. The immediate result of Henry's death 

 was a revolution in the royal office of works similar to that which had 

 followed his accession de I'Orme was dismissed and Primaticcio 

 appointed Superintendent of the Royal Buildings. It has generally 

 been represented that Catharine de' Medici sought to avenge the 

 indignities she had suffered at the hands of her rival by wounding her 

 in the person of Diana's protege. The annoyance which de 1'Orme's 

 disgrace would cause to Diana may have added a spice to it for 

 Catharine, but she was ever guided rather by policy than vindic- 

 tiveness, and since at first the Guises were all powerful, and she 

 was in agreement with them in her dislike of Diana and Montmorency, 

 it was natural that their dependents, including not only de I'Orme but 

 Bullant as well, should be deprived of office. Beyond this, other 



