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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[Oct. 



come, the increase of size being obtained by an increased number of 

 lights and mullions, and a consequent increase of tracery ribs in the 

 " head" of the window ; whereas, unless the general opening were divided 

 in its lower part into lesser apertures, there could be no tracery above. 



After the idea of them had been fully developed and brouRht to ma- 

 turity, Gothic windows exemplify very strikingly how admirably that 

 disposition of them which originated in conveuience if not in actual neces- 

 sity, was made to conduce to both character and decoration ; for the 

 division into separate compartments or " lights," systematically combined 

 into one general whole, resulted in some degree from the exigencies of 

 construction — not indeed as regards the arch which is so filled in, but in 

 order to afford due support, and also the appearance of it, for the glazing 

 ^nd its lead-work. Instead, therefore, of causing mere vacancies and 

 voids in the walls, and of being little better than dull gaps and blanks in 

 the architecture, without any of the bold effect attending unglazed open- 

 ings, the apertures themselves become positive features in it, they forming 

 so many perforated screens inserted into the arched voids which they 

 occupy. Hence, they dilfer not only most decidedly but most advantage- 

 ously from windows in the Greco-Roraan and Italian styles, in which or- 

 namental design is entirely confined to the dressings enclosing the aper- 

 ture, which, however rich they may be in themselves, contribute 

 nothing whatever to internal effect, the aperture itself remaining nothing 

 more than a mere large circular — or square-headed, opening, without any 

 possible variety of design for it; whereas, in Gothic architecture, the ac- 

 tual windows, and not the mere external framing around them, admit of 

 almost inexhaustible diversity ; and however plain they may be in their 

 splays and external mouldings, they are both integral and ornamental 

 parts of the structure. 



In some instances, however, much external and adscititious decoration 

 is bestowed on Gothic windows, — even such extraneous additions as small 

 crocketed gables enclosing their heads, which therefore seem to offer a 

 direct precedent for the application of pediments to windows in Italian 

 composition, and must accordingly be condemned as gross solecisms, — that 

 is, by those who are intolerant of window-pediments, such gables or 

 (iothic pediments being, like the oihers, merely " stuck on," and minia- 

 ture resemblances of constructive forms diverted and perverted from their 

 original intention into mere accessories for the sake of embellishment. 

 Indeed, miniature gables, we may stop to remark, are so exceedingly 

 common in Gothic architecture, that the term Gablet has been expressly 

 invented for them ; and some of them— ej-. grat, on the several stages of 

 buttresses — are so diminutive, that they ought to be held very " ludicrous" 

 tilings indeed by those who adopt the profound dictum that " the ludicrous 

 is inseparable from diminutive resemblances of things noble and dignified 

 in themselves." 



To return to windows, — those who denounce the application of pediments 

 and columns to windows in the Italian style, must be equally scandalized 

 at those examples of Gothic windows in which miniature buttresses fortify 

 the lower part of the principal mullions, and again, at such enormities as 

 "embattled" transoms. In claiming for Gothic windows the merits and 

 advantages we have done, we must of course be understood to refer to 

 genuine and worthy examples, since we can by no means extend the same 

 praise to that sort of "something like Gothic" that gives us little more than 

 the mere skeletons and rudiments of mullioned windows and tracery, — 

 such as, till very lately, we have been doomed to behold in churches and 

 other modern Gothic buildings, for whose windows, proportions as to the 

 mullions and intervals between them are totally disregarded; — probably, 

 because it has not been even so much as suspected that there are any pro- 

 proportions at all to be attended to. Nevertheless, though it may not have 

 been formally entered among bookish rules, the same principle regulates 

 the spacing of mullions — or, what is the same thing, the breadth of the 

 mullions in proportion to the width of the lights — as regulates intercolum- 

 niation. The mullions should not be further apart than 3 or 4 at the most 

 of their diameters, so to call tliem ; — or, in other words, should not be 

 much narrower than from about a third to nearly a fourth of the width of 

 the " lights." It is owing to the non-observance of such proportions that 

 so many modern Gothic windows are very unsatisfactory in character, 

 even when correctly designed in other respects, the mullions being reduced 

 comparatively to mere upright bars, so that the whole window has a wiry 

 and meagre appearance, as offensive to the eye as yawning and stran- 

 gling intercolumniation, the disagreeableness of which is felt even by those 

 who are unable to account for it. Another point to be attended to, yet 

 frequently disregarded altogether in modern practice, is sijstcmalic unifurm- 

 ill) of division of the windows for all of them alike, both large and small ; 



that is, the width established for the lights in one nindow shonid be ad- 

 hered to for those in all the others, whether the number of lights be more 

 or less ; instead of which, modern architects — even those who are very 

 particular and exact indeed in matters that are comparatively quite indifler- 

 ent and unimportant in compostion — do not scruple to vary the width of 

 lights, just as suits their convenience or their indolence. 



f attention to uniformity with regard to the width of the lights seems to be 

 a fettering restriction in Gothic design, there is freedom enough in all other 

 respects as far as windows are concerned, for their dimensions, forms, and 

 position may be varied in the same building, as circumstances require. 

 Nor is it the least recommendation of the Gothic style, that even where 

 exact uniformity, both as to dimensions and general design, is required for 

 windows, they need not be precisely alike in pattern. It is, again, in 

 favour of Gothic windows — at least, for churches and other spacious 

 halls— that even when there is no stained glass in them, the light is con- 

 siderably moderated by the mullions, transoms, and tracery. 



As the value of advantages is generally best appreciated by comparing 

 them with contrary deficiencies, we will now consider how the case stands 

 with windows for churches in other styles of architecture, nor have we long 

 to consider since it is easy to perceive immediately that they have been and 

 continue to be made blemishes in the architecture. Nothing equivalent to 

 tracery has ever been invented or adopted for them, accordingly they are 

 invariably mere vacant though glazed spaces, and as the glass is always of a 

 very ordinary sort and in small panes — in conformitj with churcli etiquette, 

 we presume, — they become actually mean in appearance, and externally pre- 

 sent only so many dingy and paltry-looking surfaces, which contrast rather 

 grotesquely with the dressings around them, if these latter are at all noble 

 or elegant in design. The larger too the window the worse does the defect 

 become : the glazing appears insecure and to need support ; and no better 

 method, of strengthening it can, it seems, be devised than that of employing 

 sometimes rude metal bars which have an equally mean and clumsy appear- 

 ance. If Wren's churches in general are not disfigured by their windows, it 

 is — we make bold to say — because there is nothing to be disfigured in them, 

 they being exceedingly uncouth both in composition and style, though there 

 may be a bit of tolerable detail or good feature in their elevations here and 

 there, hut the system of design adopted there is radically faulty and taste- 

 less, it being modelled upon the Gothic without possessing any of the quali- 

 ties or resources of th.it style : on the contrary, windows which are the 

 source of so much character, beauty and variety in the Gothic style are at 

 the very best only dull, insipid and monotonous features in the other, and to 

 make matters worse, very obtrusive ones. In that otherwise noble edifice, 

 St. Paul's, the windows are sad drawbacks on the architecture generally, 

 both within and without ; and within, although thire is not that offensive 

 rawness which is occasioned tiy undue quantity of light scattered in every 

 direction to the destruction of that valuable ingredient — shadow, there is no 

 effect of light — no brilliancy, no relief, for the windows show as so many 

 harsh and cutting spots or holes, in comparison with which the rest looks 

 gloomy. Never do we enter the building without regretting that Wren did 

 not bethink him of getting rid of side windows altogether except those form- 

 ing the clerestory of the nave ; nor would it have cost him much study to do 

 so, the mode of effecting it being obvious enough, for he had only to open 

 the small blind domes in the vaultings over the aisles, and there would have 

 been not only abundance of light but a charming effect of it. In that case the 

 spaces occupied by the present windows would have afforded large compart- 

 ments for fresco painting, which if such decoration for the edifice was ever con- 

 templated at all, could not have been introduced half so effectively any where 

 else, since the light would diffuse itself upon them from above, and from the 

 nave each picture would have been seen in succession, framed in, as it were, 

 by the arch between the nave and aisle. 



At the time St. Paul's was built, Hijpatliral Fenestration — as we may 

 for distinction's sake call that mode in which the light is admitted from 

 above through the roof of a building, does not seem to have been even so 

 much as thought of, not even for domes, since the light was made to pro- 

 ceed chiefly from windows in the tambour beneath the dome, where they 

 form a circular clerestory. A most noble object externally, the dome of St. 

 Paul's shows itself almost the reverse within, presenting to the eye little 

 more than a mass of sullen gloom, rather increased than the contrary by 

 Thornliill's paintings. It seems therefore to require to be lit up by the most 

 lustrous surfaces and ornameuts of the purest white and gilding, which might 

 perhaps sufficiently overcome the obscurity which now prevails in it. As to 

 obtaining a sufficiency of light in a single volume of it by enlarging the eye 



