206 ON TASTE IN ORNAMENTAL DESIGN. Part II. 



on which it depends. Thus, Mr. Lane has found that the best 

 proportioned Saracenic domes are those in which the height 

 and breadth are described upon a circle. Two lines are then let 

 /^ \ fall perpendicular to the two opposite 



edges of the circle, to form the upright 

 sides; and another line drawn horizon- 

 tally, as a tangent to the lower edge, forms 

 the base of the drum of the cupola, the 

 height of which reaches about half-way 

 to the centre of the circle ; and in this are 

 placed the windows, with an inscription 

 above them running round the neck of 

 the dome. Its point is then formed by 

 the addition of two ogee curves meeting in a point, sur- 

 mounted by a cresent, and other ornaments. 



[It is certainly easier to detect imperfections in form and 

 detail than in proportion ; and as the perception of proportion 

 is of the highest importance in judging of effect, and as it has 

 the greatest influence on the eye of all who appreciate beauty, 

 so it is the last (when not possessed as a natural gift) which 

 the uncultivated taste attains. Professor Cockerell observes, 

 " that we begin by admiring ornaments, details, and forms ; 

 but it is in a more advanced stage only that we make all 

 these subordinate to that sense of mythical proportion and 

 that harmony of quantities which affect the mind like a 

 mathematical truth ; and like a concord of musical sounds on 

 the ear, are perceived, and confessed as obvious and unalter- 

 able." ..." Custom, convention, and often incapacity of 

 discernment, reconcile us to those proportions we are most 

 used to, and we are blind to those defects which a fresh and 

 accomplished eye is at once shocked at; yet the sense of 

 vision so studied by the Greeks is to be educated, like a real 

 moral sense, and every other, by the diligent culture of 

 science." . . . The informed artist recognises the claim which 



