Architecture. 477 



to indicate, in common with almost every other journalist, a very contrary 

 feeling with respect to the entrance front,-and the angular and side views 

 of this edifice. These display a want of simplicity, grandeur, and dignity. 

 There are too many parts, and consequently most of them are small ; there is 

 an unhappy termination of a wall with Doric columns at the extremes of 

 the two wings, indicating poverty of invention, one of the last defects 

 which we should expect to find in Mr. Nash. Two elevated vulgar forms, 

 one in each wing, resemble what are called cockney cottages, and seem 

 to be forced up into that situation as finishings to the regal building. We 

 wonder how they came there, and can hardly restrain our conviction that 

 they really are blue slate cottages, from the small bedroom windows in their 

 sides. There never was a more unhappy introduction of vulgar forms in a 

 building pretending to the character of a palace. We appeal to any one 

 who has ever looked down to this edifice from Piccadilly. More might be 

 said, but the public opinion as to this structure so entirely agrees with our 

 own, that we consider it superfluous. 



Grosvenor Palace. — It is gratifying to find a nobleman with a princely 

 fortune, like Earl Grosvenor, not doing good with his money indirectly 

 through the proprietors of gambling-houses, horse-keepers, or others of dif- 

 ferent kinds, who supply animal and degrading pleasures to the wealthy, 

 but laying it out directly through his own servants and artists in the build- 

 ing of palaces and the formation of gardens. Of the palace and gardens of 

 Eaton Hall we have already spoken. (Vol. I. p. 509.) A design for a town 

 residence is in part executed in Park Lane, which, we wish we could say, 

 will probably be as eminent as a Grecian structure, as Eaton Hall is cele- 

 brated as a specimen of palace Gothic. The part of this Grecian building 

 which is finished is not extensive ; but it contains one fault, which respect 

 for the architect intrusted with so great a work will not allow us to pass 

 over in silence. The part of the building to which we allude is a picture 

 gallery, which being lighted from the roof, no windows are required in the 

 sides, or at least not on that side which forms a part of the principal front. 

 To vary what would otherwise be a blank wall, three-quarter Corinthian 

 columns are employed, and between these blank windows are introduced. 

 It is these blank windows that we object to, as indicating vulgarity of idea, 

 and poverty of invention. The naked wall would have been preferable, 

 because it would have been negatively instead of positively bad. But what 

 does Grecian architecture suggest for such a situation ? Certainly, not win- 

 dows, but niches for statues below, and over them, if any thing, panels of 

 sculpture ; or the whole might have been treated as one grand panel of 

 sculpture, screened by the three fourth, or detached columns ; statues and 

 sculpture without, would. have been peculiarly appropriate for the picture 

 gallery within. Small panels of sculpture are indeed introduced in one 

 part ; but they merely display wreaths of flowers and fruits, objects of very 

 little meaning, and here executed on such a large scale, as to be by far too 

 conspicuous, and consequently add to their insignificance of expression. It 

 is the mind and character displayed by basso and alto relievos, that give them 

 their great interest, and even if at a distance the story cannot be made out, 

 still we know that a story is there, and something to exercise the mind 

 upon, if we were nearer and had leisure. Such flowers and fruits as are 

 met with in sculpture hardly give rise to two ideas; if they were correct 

 imitations of nature, they would be better; but as they generally are, they are 

 merely of use in a picturesque point of view, to supply roughness and shade. 

 There is a noble group of sculpture in the centre pediment of one of the 

 ranges of buildings in the Regent's Park, put up, as we understand, at the 

 expense of the builder, a private tradesman. Such instances of taste and 

 spirit deserve the highest applause. 



