MELLOW ENGLAND. 



iS7 



effect in the wall. Then a very short space of time in 

 that climate suffices to take off the effect of newness, 

 and give a mellow, sober hue to the building. Another 

 advantage of the climate is that it permits outside plas- 

 tering. Thus almost any stone may be imitated, and 

 the work endure for ages ; while our sudden changes, 

 and extremes of heat and cold, of dampness and dry- 

 ness, will cause the best work of this kind to peel off 

 in a few years. 



Then this people have better taste in building than 

 we have, perhaps because they have the noblest samples 

 and specimens of architecture constantly before them 

 — those old feudal castles and royal residences, for 

 instance. I was astonished to see how homely and 

 good they looked, how little they challenged admira- 

 tion, and how much they emulate rocks and trees. 

 They were surely built in a simpler and more poetic 

 age than this. It was like meeting some plain, natural 

 nobleman after contact with one of the bedizened, 

 artificial sort. The Tower of London, for instance, is 

 as pleasing to the eye, has the same fitness and har- 

 mony, as a hut in the woods ; and I should think an 

 artist might have the same pleasure in copying it into 

 his picture as he would in copying a pioneer's log cabin. 

 So with Windsor Castle, which has the beauty of a 

 ledge of rocks, and crowns the hill like a vast natural 

 formation. The warm, simple interior, too, of these 

 castles and palaces, the honest oak without paint or 

 varnish, the rich wood carvings, the ripe human tone 



