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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



[Skpt. 



in fact, BfroDsW contradicted by the exterior of Newgate, which is cha- 

 racterized by breadth of surface, but which, had it not been Rusticated, 

 would have been comparatively an insipid blank; although admirably 

 combined in its general composition, in which respect it fulfils a condition 

 which the writer in question has made a very stringent one, although it is 

 frequently quite impracticable.. "It may be safely asserted," he says, 

 that no buildings, whatever may be the style adopted, can be architectur- 

 ally effective unless some portions of the building throw shadows on the 

 remainder." No doubt, bold relief and chiaroscuro contrasts are highly 

 valuable and impart unwonted spirit and energy to a composition ; and the 

 same distribution of projecting and receding parts which produces shadow, 

 produces also great varietyof perspective effect. Yet, except in some few 

 cases, how is it possible to plan town buildings so as to obtain tlie 

 requisite breaks for the purpose in the general line of frontage? Of what 

 can street architecture chiefly consist if not of what so greatly excites the 

 writer's positive indignation, viz., " show fronts" towards the street, and 

 "surface decoration" upon them,— terms which are quite favourite and 

 pet ones with him, and invariably intended to be emiuently reproachful ? 

 If, wiihout regard to its merits in what it does show, we are to be dis- 

 satisfied with every building that does not stand quite Insulated, and so as 

 to show itself on every side,— if that is to be made a sine qua non, we 

 must be prepared for being very much out of humour for a very long 

 while locome. There is no help for it; so let us console ourselves by 

 fairly damning modern architecture altogether, as our philosophical writer 

 appears disposed to do himself, and, if he can, to prevail on others to do 

 50 likewise. 



We cannot, however, afford to damn it just yet, because we have not 

 yet quite done with Kustication.— Rough rubble-work, we are told— not 

 that there was much occasion for the information,— would be unfit for the 

 cella of a Greek temple, because " the coarseness of the workmanship 

 would be quite out of character with the rest ;" and by this it is intended 

 to be insinuated that every mode of Rustication must be equally unsuitable 

 for the same style. Is there then, I ask, no distinction of character be- 

 tween rubble-work and rusticated masonry ?— none between the coarse 

 workmanship and rough surface of the one, and the uniform regularity and 

 elaborate workmanship of the other? This dilference— which striking as 

 it seems, the writer does not perceive, or else wilfully shuts his eyes to it, 

 — n-oes very far towards answering what he says when he calls upon those 

 who would defend Rustication, to point out wherefore, if unexceptionable 

 ir. itself, such mode of masonry should not be equally proper for buildings 

 in the Pointed as in the Classic style. He affects very innocently to won- 

 der what can possibly be " the characteristic differences between the two 

 styles," that they require, at least admit of, different modes of masonry 

 for them, just after he had himself said that rubble-work would be incoa- 

 gruiius in a Grecian edifice. If Rustication is to be held illegitimate, and 

 to be renounced because it does not become all styles alike, the irregular 

 masonry of the stonework in Gothic buildings, together with brickwork, 

 flintwork and rubble, may be all set down as vicious and absurd, unless it 

 can be shown Ihat Ihey are just as appropriate for the Classic as in the 

 Pointed and Old English styles. As well might we be told we ought to 

 be " prepared to adapt" flutings to columns in the Pointed style as well 

 as in the Classic, or else abandon such decoration altogether. 

 Thediflerence ofcharacler between the twostyles,orrat'herthetwodistinct 

 architectural rncfs, is so great that hardly any one except the writer whose 

 opinions and dicta I am controverting, would propose to reject Rustication 

 because though it accords with the idiom and practice of the one style, it 

 is contrary to the practice, and therefore to the idiom of the other. Had 

 rubble-work been used in classic buildings, it would have belonged to the 

 classic idiom of the art ; and in like manner had that species of masonry 

 which is distinguished by the term Rustication been practised by the me- 

 difcval archilecis, it would have been incorporated with the rest of their 

 system of design, and would have become idiomatic and characteristic. 

 Separate styles have, like separate languages, their respective idioms and 

 peculiarities ; but though peculiarities widely differing from each other, it 

 does not follow that tliey are therefore contrary to those universal and ca- 

 tholic principles which apply to all styles of the art alike. In architecture 

 a very great deal is purely conventional, and might be applied indiffe- 

 rently were it not tliat custom has stamped such or such particular mode 

 as belonging to a particular style, as being a part of its costume, conse- 

 quently proper to that, though in any other it might show as a decided 

 impropriety. Possildy, therefore, it will still be pertinaciously maintained, 

 that Rustication is foreign to pure Grecian architecture— a departure from 

 its costume : true; but it is Roman, and so far legitimately antique and 



classic, quite as much as the Roman, or what we call the Corinthian, order 

 itself And if the nom,wism which so decidedly pervades La Madeleine 

 in all other respects be not objected to, wherefore should its Romanism 

 in legard to Rustication and the " surface decoration" of its walls be con- 

 demned as nothing less than a barbarism at variance with all classical pre- 

 cedent' If we ought henceforth to abide strictly by pure Greek architec- 

 ture, just as it was practised by the Greeks themselves in such temples as 

 the Parthenon, without presuming to adopt into it innovations of any kind 

 -not even those which have become to ourselves rather arcUisms than in- 

 novations, let us be told so explicitly ; but let those who would enforce 

 such doctrine, keep to their own bond. Let them reject and discard all 

 and every thing that is at variance with Grecian practice and costuine-- 

 that is, the costume of Greek temples, almost the only class of Greek 

 buildings which we are sufficiently acquainted with to be able to judge of 

 them correctly asa class,-aDd then perhaps they will discover to what ex- 

 ceedingly limited resources they will have restricted architecture; yet 

 whether even then all of them would actually confess as much, may be 

 questioned, for some of them might feel far more exultation in having gain- 

 ed their own point, than any sort of concern for the consequences to archi- 

 tecture itself And this seems to be the case with some who not having 

 any real affection for the art, seem to regard it only as a very good subject 

 for them to discourse and debate about, more or less fluenlly, caring for 

 little else than displaNing their own expertness in logomachy. One cha- 

 racteristic of such critics and criticism, is that bigotted intolerance which 

 peremptorily decides every thing to be wrong which differs from their own 

 exclusive standard of what is excellent and right ;-nor is it at all difficult 

 to make it appear to those who are content to look merely at one side of a 

 question, and take up with a decisive and seemingly firmly settled opinion 

 without further trouble to themselves,-that whatever deviates from such 

 standard must of course be wrong. 



My opponent— at least, the writer to whom I have here presented myself 

 as an opponent, is certainly most intolerant of Rustication, for he insists 

 that it is absolutely intolerable-a gross abuse and absurdity that ought 

 to be no longer tolerated by us at all, nor any longer be recognized as a 

 mode of decoration to which the architect can have recourse on suitable 

 occasions. How greatly I differ from him is sufficiently attested by this 

 vindication of Rusticated masonry.-which, indeed, I could wish to see 

 more frequently and more effectively made use of among us than it now 

 is I am very far, however, from intending to recommend it as an infalli- 

 ble nostrum, or as what ought to be applied iu all cases. Rustication may 

 be well or ill applied ; may be either very good of its kind, or very bad; 

 yet the bad is so far from justly discrediting the good, that it rather adds 

 to the merit of the latter. Were not such the case, some of our modern 

 specimens of it would long ere this have brought -pure Classic architec- 

 ture" into utter discredit among us, they being far more deserving of 

 " detestation" than that " debased Classic architecture" which had openly 

 revolted from Classic precedent, had thrown off allegiance from it, and 

 had rendered itself independent of it. 



FENESTRATION AND WINDOWS. 

 Audi Alteram Pastem. 

 Although another writer has in the interim taken up the subject of the 

 Decoration of Windows, and given his opinions upon it, especially as regards 

 the emploving columns for such purpose, that is so very far from frustrating 

 the intention hinted at by us in a note (page 130), in the article on the 

 FitzwiU^am Museum, by forestalling what we meant to say, as rather to 

 stimulate us to take up our pen without further delay. Having thus ap- 

 prized the readers of this Journal that the remarks, in the May number, on 

 the building just mentioned, proceeded from ourselves, we may be permitted 

 to confess our surprise at finding, the following month, a second paper on 

 the Fitzwilliam Museum, denying it all those particular merits as a piece of 

 architecture, which had been claimed for it by ourselves. Had that second 

 article distinctly announced itself to be the production of a second writer, 

 and intended to reply to and correct the criticism that had just before ap- 

 peared, the sort of mvstification that must now have been occasioned by it 

 would have been avoided. Strangely enough, it did not even take the 

 slightest notice of what had been previously said,— no more than if nothing 

 had been said at all, at any rate nothing more than a mere account of the 

 building, without any criticism upon it. Admiration was still professed ; 



