I847.J 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECPS JOURNAL. 



267 



gant tyrannical priestcraft on the one hand, and of the most grovelling and 

 besotted superstition on the other. 



IV. When he was paying a tribute to the artistic talent of Vanbrugh — 

 an architect gifted, if not with taste, with real conceptive power, and that 

 in a prosaic age, — Reynolds might very properly have thrown out a com- 

 pliment to Hawksmoor, and quoted the campanile of St. George's, Blooms- 

 bury, as a most strikingly happy composition, — one on which the eye of a 

 painter cannot but rest with delight. Happy as it is in itself, that masterly 

 production has been made a martyr — not to criticism, but to stupid ridicule, 

 — to the prosing imbecillity of such old women as Ralph, and the school- 

 boy pertness of such clever coxcombs as Master Horace. — Criticism for- 

 sooth ! — why crilicism rejects such grovelling, feehle-wit stull", and leaves 

 it to Punch and the penny-a-liners. Had he possessed aught of critical 

 faculty, it would have enabled Walpole to perceive how beautifully the 

 statue poses upon, how admirably it completes, and how essential it is to 

 the artistic completion of the ensemble. It is not an historic statue, ele- 

 vated to such a height that the personality it is intended to figure to us is 

 utterly lost ; nor is it hoisted on a pedestal of its own, clapped upon the 

 top-heavy capital of an overgrown column— a truly unhappy combination, 

 productive of the most harsh abruptness of outline at the general summit. 

 Here, on the contrary, the statue is incorporated with the architectural 

 mass, of which it is the efflorescence, springing out of it as its finial or 

 acroterion, and continuing to a point the lines of the obelisk-shaped part of 

 the structure which it crowns. 



V. Though it does not say much for Allan Cunningham's diligence or fit- 

 ness for the task he undertook, it is perhaps as well that he omitted a me- 

 moir of Hawksmoor, for it would, in all probability, have proved little more 

 than a mere re-echo of such senseless judgments as that of him who has 

 pronounced St. George's steeple to be "a masterpiece of absurdity" ! — 

 Would that our modern architectural absurdities were but half as poetical, 

 as graceful, and as picturesque ! In regard to that stupidly calumniated 

 church, there is another curious fatality, for no one has ever bestowed even 

 so much as a syllable upon its north fa(;ade. Indeed, it may be fairly 

 questioned whether it is yet known to exist, for of the thousands who pass 

 the portico, scarcely one, perhaps, suspects that the other side of the 

 building shows a piece of architecture of no ordinary merit — certainly one 

 marked by no ordinary degree of architectural energy ; and so far afford- 

 ing an excellent and much-needed study. Still, I may be committing 

 mischief by thus calling attention to what is by no means calculated to put 

 us into better conceit with what has since been done upon any similar 

 occasions. Improved we may have in some respects — such, perhaps, as 

 normal correctness of design, and normal attention to matters of detail ; 

 but we seem, on the other hand, to have lost the valuable qualities of 

 boldness and vigour. If we are more refined, we are also more emascu- 

 lated in our taste, and our buildings show as opera castrati — Buckingham 

 palace being one of the puniest of them — by the side of such architectural 

 " thews and sinews" as Vanbrugh and Havi ksmoor put into their works. 

 Unluckily, however, architects seldom look to more than " orders" and 

 other mere matter-of-fact circumstances, without perceiving, or if they 

 perceive, without noting and investigating, artistic qualities — some of 

 them so subtile as to elude satisfactory explanation ; consequently, much 

 less are they reducible to exact technical definition. Me have, however, 

 only to compare any one of M'ren's churches with this of Hawksmoor's, 

 to be able to account for one great difference of quality — the flatness and 

 poorness which set their mark on the former, and the energy of expression 

 which stamps the other. Although not entirely, this difference in a great 

 measure arises from what is a very simple matter in itself, namely, the 

 lesser or greater degree of relief produced according to the shallowness 

 or depth of the external embrasures of the windows — in other words, 

 accordingly as the plane of the glazing is approached to or set back from 

 the plane or external surface of the wall. In the windows of all Wren's 

 churches, there is scarcely any reveal ; in Vanbrugh's and Hawksmoor's 

 buildings, great depth of reveal — a difference that does not show itself in 

 geometrical elevation, but which is an exceedingly important and influen- 

 tial one in perspective effect — consequently, in the buildings themselves ; 

 for while the former mode is attended by the insipidity arising from the 

 absence of boldly-defining shadows, and of corresponding lights on the 

 opposite sides of the apertures, the other secures them. Besides which, 

 \re are impressed in the one case with the disagreeable idea of the walls 



being unusually thin, while in the other we at once perceive that they are 

 unusually thick and substantial. 



VI. The north side or front of St. George's, Bloomsbury, has escaped 

 the notice of architectural draftsmen as completely as it has that of other 

 people ; which, to whatever else it may be owing, most certainly cannot 

 be because it would not show %vell as a subject for the pencil. In that 

 respect, however, it is by no means singular, for hundreds and hundreds of 

 subjects for architectural delineation in the metropolis might be pointed 

 out, which are yet absolutely untouched, although draftsmen go or appear 

 to go again and again to very spots and places where they are to be found. 

 Entirely fresh pictorial representations of them might easily enough be 

 made of buildings which, although they have been shown again and again, 

 are shown almost invariably in just one and the same way, and that their 

 most formal and unpicturesque attitude. Now, it is all very well to have 

 such a general view of a building as serves to exhibit it in mass, but we 

 do not want so many repetitions as we get, of what is identically the same 

 view, — unless, indeed, there be visible improvement also in regard to 

 architectural delineation and artislical effect. Instead of which, deteriora- 

 tion is far more frequent than improvement, and many views of the kind 

 that are published are only wretched, vamped-up copies of better ones 

 which have preceded them. 



VII. Many both extol the simplicity of Greciau architecture and speak 

 of simplicity itself in the abstract, as if it were the most excellent and para- 

 mount quality in art, and which ought therefore, on every occasion alike, 

 to be the predominating one. Not content with admiring simplicity them- 

 selves, they insist not only that others shall admire it too, but that, like 

 themselves, they shall admire it exclusively, and be intolerant of the 

 qualities opposite to it, even though they should be so applied as to be 

 merits. Of Grecian architecture, the simplicity was by far too much of 

 exactly the same kind. The simplicity of one building just resembled the 

 simplicity of another; and, in fact, the simplicity was in a great measure 

 quite involuntary, and of a rather negative kind, arising as it did chiefly out 

 of the absence of complexity, or any other counteracting circumstances. 

 How could it fail to be obtained in buildings constituted like the temples 

 of the Greeks, which admitted of no combination, scarcely any other 

 variations from one uniform general design than as they were tetrastyle, 

 hexastyle, or octastjie, and deriving their individual character entirely 

 from the particular order employed, and the nuancing given to it in its 

 details and execution ? As far as we ourselves are concerned, pure Gre- 

 cian architecture is all very well for us in theory, but not to be thought of 

 by us for actual practice. We may study the Parthenon as we study the 

 Iliad, but would do well to desist from copying the one until we begin 

 seriously to think of imitating the other, and endeavour to bring the lofty 

 Epic strain into fashion again. 



VIII. It looks very much as if the decision of the Army and Navy Club 

 had been arrived at ic deference to Count D'Orsay's opinion, as expressed 

 by him in a note to the Builder, contradicting what had been rumoured as to 

 his being concerned with Messrs. Parnell and Smith's design (No. 46), but 

 expressing his hearty approbation of the design itself— of " the taste which 

 selected one of the most beautiful palaces (palazzi) in Europe for the 

 model," and declaring, that for the embellishment of the metropolis he 

 should very much like to see it executed. It is singular enough, I may 

 remark, that what is " one of the most beautiful" pieces of architecture of 

 its kind in Europe— viz., the Palazzo Cornaro at Venice, by Sansovino, 

 should hitherto have obtained so very little notice — scarcely any at all, 

 beyond the mere mention of iis name — from either architectural writers or 

 cognoscenti travellers. Woods, for instance, does not even name it. We 

 ought, therefore, to be the less surprised at the Club's not being struck by 

 its pre-eminent merits, until their eyes were couched by the Count, — and 

 had they discerned them before, they would doubtless have awarded the 

 second premium, at least, to Messrs. Parnell and Smith. All that we 

 ourselves can now recollect of that design is, that we merely glanced at it 

 and passed on, perceiving at once that it was a direct and very palpable 

 copy of some Venetian architect of Sansovino's time ; and we n anted not 

 to look at mere copies and leaves out of books, or published designs, but 

 to discover what fresh ideas had been produced for the occasion. In what 

 position, then, do Messrs. P. and S. put themselves, if not in that of mere 

 architectural ironscriiers? And in what position is architectural design 

 now put, except that of mere copyism, to which a bonus is thus directly 

 held out by the success of those who are unable to produce anything suffi- 



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