TREES IN ARCHITECTURE 179 



seen it, set themselves to increase it. In Nor- 

 man and even in Early English architecture 

 we find the resemblance little if at all worked 

 out ; but in the Decorated period, that is to 

 say, in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth 

 century, it is taken up and elaborated. It 

 was not done, however, in a realistic manner ; 

 the base of the column was not made to re- 

 semble the tree-roots gathering themselves into 

 the stem, to which the column itself was not 

 made to bear any close resemblance ; the capi- 

 tal was not abandoned because no such feature 

 had any counterpart in the tree ; when, at a 

 later date, it was often dispensed with, the re- 

 semblance of the architecture as a whole to 

 vegetation had diminished; the vaulting-ribs 

 never approached a deceptive likeness to leafy 

 branches ; all that was done was by the use of 

 the forms of flower and foliage, at certain 

 salient points such as the capital and the key- 

 stone, to emphasise the likeness of the whole 

 structure to the forest-aisles, and in the work 

 of art to recall the beauty of nature. 



Having thus stated and limited the natural- 

 istic work of the Gothic builders, we may, 

 without danger of being misled by his elo- 



