ROOF-TREE. 277 



iron and stone, when the eye demands simplicity and 

 repose. No broad spaces, no neutral ground. The 

 architect in his search for variety has made his fa- 

 9ade bristle with meaningless forms. But now and 

 then the eye is greeted by honest simplicity of struc- 

 ture. Look at that massive front yonder, built of 

 granite blocks, simply one stone top of another from 

 the ground to the roof, with no fuss or flutter about 

 the openings in the walls. How easy, how simple, 

 and what a look of dignity and repose ! But prob- 

 ably the next time we come this way, they will have 

 put hollow metal hoods over the windows, or other- 

 wise marred the ease and dignity of that front. 



Doubtless one main source of the pleasure we take 

 in a brick or stone wall over one of wood is just in 

 this element of simplicity and repose ; the structure 

 is visible ; there is nothing intricate or difficult about 

 it. It is one stone, or one brick top of another all the 

 way up ; the building makes no effort at all to stand 

 up, but does so in the most natural and inevitable 

 way in the world. In a wooden building the anatomy 

 is more or less hidden ; we do not see the sources of 

 its strength. The same is true of a stuccoed or rough 

 cast building ; the eye sees nothing but smooth, ex- 

 pressionless surface. 



One great objection to the Mansard roof in the 

 country, now happily nearly gone out of date, is that 

 it fails to give a look of repose. It fails also to give 

 a look of protection. The roof of a building allies 

 it to the open air, and carries the suggestion of shelter 



