THE WORK OF JOHN WEBB 87 



of ye practique soe that he must of necessity have another at his 

 Mai ties charge to doe his business ; whereas Mr Webb himself 

 designes, orders, and directs, whatever given in command w th out 

 any other man's assistance. His Mai tie may please to grant 

 some other place more proper for Mr Denham's abilityes and 

 confirme unto Mr Webb the Surveyors place wherein he hath 

 consumed 30 years study, there being scarce any of the greate 

 Nobility or eminent gentry of England but he hath done service 

 for in matter of building, ordering of meddalls, statues and 

 the like." 



The common sense of this contention, although not flattering 

 to Mr Denham, was vindicated by the appointment of Webb 

 as assistant surveyor at Greenwich. But the petition and brief 

 are interesting in other ways. They assert that Charles I. 

 expressly caused Webb to be trained in architecture and the 

 preparation of masques, in order to succeed Inigo Jones and 

 carry on his work. They confirm roughly the date of his 

 apprenticeship : and the brief states that he had worked for 

 most of the great nobility and eminent gentry, thereby showing 

 that he was a man of large independent practice, and not merely 

 " Inigo Jones's man" a conclusion to which his drawings had 

 already led. 



The fact that Webb was actually trained in the preparation 

 of masques as well as in architecture has hitherto escaped notice, 

 but recent researches show that he made drawings for the scenery 

 of some of those devised by Inigo Jones, particularly in the case 

 of the pastoral of "Florimene" in 1635, and D'Avenant's 

 " Salmacida Spolia" in 1640. A year or two after the death of 

 Jones, namely in 1656, D'Avenant again sought Webb's help, 

 and got him to design the scenery for his " Siege of Rhodes," 

 the first opera produced in England. Webb's drawings for this 

 work are preserved at Chatsworth. 1 



The illustrations in the second volume of Kent's " Designs of 

 Inigo Jones," give a good idea not only of Webb's powers as a 

 designer, but also of the kind of house which was becoming 

 fashionable. But it is worth while to supplement them by others 

 which were actually carried out. 



1 "The Designs for the First Movable Scenery on the English Public 

 Stage," by William Grant Keith, in The Burlington Magazine, Nos. cxxxiii. 

 and cxxxiv., April and May 1914, where reproductions of Webb's drawings 

 are given. 



