THE STYLES OF HENRY IV. AND LOUIS XIII. 237 



de' Medici is said to have instructed her architect to take the Pitti 

 Palace, the home of her girlhood, as his model, and she certainly sent 

 to her kinswoman the Grand Duchess of Tuscany for drawings of it. 

 The only point of contact between the two designs is, however, the 

 system of rustication adopted by de Brosse. Yet, while this is suf- 

 ficiently similar to that of Ammanati's garden and court elevations to 

 give the appearance of compliance, it hardly differs from the common 

 French practice of the day, with which the chateau conforms in other 

 respects. 



RICHELIEU. Both of these works of de Brosse were eclipsed in 

 size, if in nothing else, by the great chateau of Richelieu, built by 

 Le Mercier for the cardinal-minister (1627-37) on a scale of royal 

 splendour, and completed by the erection of a walled city at its gates. 

 The latter has maintained a somnolent existence, but a small fragment 

 of the dependencies is all that remains of the palace itself. A semi- 

 circular sweep of wall opposite the town gate led into a vast base- 

 court, separated by a screen from lateral courts containing stables and 

 kennels, and by a balustrade from a forecourt, only less vast, flanked 

 by offices and servants' quarters (Fig. 233). Beyond this stood the 

 chateau proper within its moat. It had a screen and entrance pavilion 

 like the examples described, three wings and four angle pavilions with 

 an additional central one in the back wing, but in several respects the 

 design was less advanced than its immediate predecessors. The plan 

 was simply that of a sixteenth century chateau, with little groups of 

 apartments and no suites of reception rooms. Projecting cabinets 

 carried on trompes small pavilions flanking the large ones, and 

 square domes alternating with pavilion roofs introduce an element of 

 complexity which sits ill on the rigid formality and ponderous pro- 

 portions of the scheme (Fig. 233A). Apart from a range of dormers 

 enriched with sculptured dolphins in allusion to Richelieu's office as 

 admiral, the treatment of the elevations consisted, externally at least, 

 almost wholly in their coigns and chaines, though enlivened towards 

 the court by niches between the windows. Although the architect 

 of Richelieu was inferior as an artist to the architect of Coulommier 

 and the Luxembourg, his grouping of the various parts of the huge 

 residence in an ordered and stately scheme, ever increasing in interest 

 as the centre is approached, betrays talents of no mean order. 



BLOIS : ORLEANS WING. A theme which under the rather uninspired 

 treatment of a Le Mercier leaves one cold was to prove capable, when 

 touched with the master hand of a Mansart, of exciting feelings of the 

 liveliest admiration and awe. The so-called Orleans Wing at Blois (see 

 plan, Fig. 48) is part of a vast scheme designed for Gaston, Duke of 

 Orleans, the intriguing and treacherous brother of Louis XIII. 

 (1635-40). It has long suffered obloquy owing to its lack of harmony 



