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When the choir was rebuilt, in 1227, it was extended to a greater length by several feet than the nave itself. The choirs of Norman churches were all disproportionately short. Total length, 306 ft.; breadth, 122 ft.

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This is the most uniform of the cathedrals of England. It was ascertained, in 1737, that the roof altogether contained 2641 tons of timber. According to the account delivered to Henry III., it appeared that 40,000 marks (22,6661. 13s. 4d.) had, up to that time, been expended on the fabric. The original plan was given by Bishop Poore, and from it no variation was made by his successors. The church was twice consecrated. The Chapter House is octangular, with a central column, and the cloisters are 160 ft. square. The spire is of masonry only 7 in. thick, and would hence seem to be scarcely adequate to support its own weight. The total length is 474 ft., and the western front is 112 ft. wide. Great repairs were made to it by Sir Christopher Wren.

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This is a very extraordinary example. Its western façade is decorated with statues in a more perfect state than is seen in any cathedral excepting that of Lincoln. The subjects are kings, bishops,

and warriors. The original plan seems to have been strictly followed to its completion by Bishop Stillington. Speed says that Ralph de Shrewsbury, who died in 1363, was a great benefactor to the church, and prosecuted the original plan. The support of the central tower is assisted by the principle of the inverted arch as at Salisbury, and is a good example of constructive skill. Total length, 371 ft.; breadth, 185 ft.

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The flying buttresses of Henry VII.'s chapel are among the most beautifully decorated in England. The triforia of the church are lighted from a range of windows in the back wall, which are seen externally, each consisting of three circles, inscribed within a triangle, equilaterally composed of three segments of circles. The architect was Thomas Fitz-Otho, the king's Master of the Mint.

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The western front was finished by Edynton. The nave, which was finished by William of Wykeham, is longer than that of York, and considered one of the finest in England. The exterior of the choir is of the finest Gothic of the fifteenth century. The choir, as at Gloucester, is under the tower. Total length, 545 ft.; breadth, 186 ft.

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The Chapter House here, a decagon 58 ft. diameter, and the cloisters, 120 ft. long and 125 ft. in breadth, were erected in the time of W. de Wynne. The original church was built before 1150, and parts of it may still be traced. The refectory of the convent, 120 ft. by 38 ft., is still perfect. The nave is, for style and proportions, well worthy the attention of the student. The total length of the church is 410 ft.; its breadth, 130 ft.

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Octagonal Chapter House, erected by W. de Melton. The foundations of the church were laid in 1171, by Roger, then archbishop. The central lantern or steeple, built by Le Romain, was taken down in 1380 by Walter Skirlawe. The aisles surround the church in every part, are of similar dimensions, and were built at the same time. The open central tower, or louvre, is 188 ft. from the floor. The Rose Window, the finest in England, is 22 ft. 6 in. diameter. Total length, 498 ft.; breadth, 222 ft.

435. The following synoptical view of the general dimensions of the above cathedrals, we think, may prove occasionally useful to the reader, by enabling him to compare the whole of them and their parts with each other. The equality of the proportions is striking; and, in another part of this work, we hope to place before the reader some principles which tend to prove that there was a much more established practice founded on the laws of statics than has hitherto been conjectured. Dallaway, without the remotest idea of the principles in question, has observed, with his usual sagacity, that there appears in them "a distribution of parts which will hold almost generally, that the width of the nave is that of both the aisles, measured in the place to the extremity of the buttresses externally; and that the breadth and height of the whole building are equal. In the more ancient churches, the aisles are usually of the width of the space between the dividing arches." Some idea of the principle is conveyed in the plates of Milan cathedral, curiously introduced into the very early translation of Vitruvius by Cæsar Cesarianus, a work of great curiosity, and of which copies are now rarely met with.

A SYNOPTICAL VIEW OF THE LEADING DIMENSIONS OF THE ENGLISH CATHEDRALS.

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To the above we subjoin the correspondent dimensions of the several component parts of some of the cathedral churches enumerated, which we consider useful to the student as well as the general reader.

Total Length.

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The author just quoted, in reference to the tables here given, says of them, that "the parallel will afford us, at one view, authentic information concerning the proportion of one constituent part to another of every cathedral in England which is worthy the notice of an architect. Such," he continues, " a coincidence of dimensions as that which is found in many of them, can scarcely be supposed to be the effect of chance, especially where the buildings are contemporary and of an exactly correspondent style." It appears that the equality of proportions is confined to each era and style of ecclesiastical architecture in so remarkable a degree as to lead us to conjecture that they might have been designed by the same architect. "The constant rivalry," says Dallaway," which subsisted between the magnificent prelates, was excited upon the erection of any part of a cathedral of superior beauty, and imitated in those of the same kind which were then undertaken; and the architect who had once displayed great talents was invited to repeat the more perfect performance, upon which he had rested his professional fame." We have not considered it necessary to devote a special portion of our work to the conventual architecture of England, because it followed the style of the time. It was of great splendour. The ground plans of their habitable portions were usually, though not always, quadrangular, and in the later ages partook of the improvements in domestic architecture, as in the colleges built by Wykham and Waynflete, and many of the episcopal residences. Glastonbury and Reading presented exceedingly fine examples of it; the former comprised within its walls sixty acres of ground.

SECT. VI.

ELIZABETHAN ARCHITECTURE.

436. The revival of the arts in Italy has furnished the subject of Chap. II. Sect. XVI. It commenced, as we have there seen, with its author Brunelleschi, who died in 1444; and it was not till more than a century afterwards that, notwithstanding our constant intercourse with the Continent, its influence began to be felt in this country. The accession of Elizabeth, it will be recollected, took place in 1558.

437. Whilst the art was in the hands of the clergy, though here always, in point of time, behind that of the Continent, it flourished vigorously; but when that body was scattered by the dissolution of the religious houses, no one remained to foster it; and though Henry VIII. delighted in spectacle, and a gorgeous display of his wealth, he was far too great a sensualist to be capable of being trained to refinement in the arts. Neither, moreover, are the English, as a people, susceptible of high feeling in respect of the productions of art. Even to the present hour so low in the scale do they stand, that a lady's cap finds no adoption, receives no sanction among the higher classes, unless moulded and previously sanctioned in the capital of our lively neighbours. In short, the only period in which the arts seemed likely to take root here was under that unfortunate monarch Charles I.; since whose time they have languished, giving way to politics, which engross the attention of the higher class, and to commerce, which occupies the attention of the merchants. There is here no general pervading love of the arts, as among all classes on the Continent, though we believe the time for it approaches. The Elizabethan, or, as some have, perhaps more properly, called it, the last Tudor style, is an imperfectly understood adaptation of classic forms to the habits of its day in this country. It is full of redundant and unmeaning ornament, creating a restless feeling in the mind of the spectator, which, in the cinque cento work, the renaissance of Italy, was in some degree atoned for by excellence of design, by exquisite execution of the subject, and by a refinement in the forms which some of the first artists the world ever saw gave to its productions. In Italy, the orders almost

instantaneously rose in their proper proportions, soon leaving nothing to be desired; but in England they were for a long time engrafted on Gothic plans and forms, producing nothing but heterogeneous masses of absurdity. It was, nevertheless (strange to say), in this style and the Gothic, that the wisdom of the legislature thought proper to solicit designs from the architects of the country, in the year 1836, for new houses of Parliament, a proceeding which has excited the smiles of the artists of the Continent at our absurdity in

matters of art.

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438. The work of Andrew Borde has been before mentioned; but the earliest publication in England relative to practical architecture was, "The first and chiefe Grounds of Architecture used in all the ancient and famous Monyments, with a farther and more ample Discourse uppon the same than has hitherto been set forthe by any other. By John Shute, paynter and architecte." Printed by John Marshe, fol., 1563." This John Shute had been sent by Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, to Italy, probably with the intention of afterwards employing him upon the works which he was projecting. From this and many other circumstances, it is easy to discover that domestic architecture under Elizabeth had assumed a more scientific character. Indeed, there is ample evidence that no building was now undertaken without the previous arrangement of a digested and regulated plan; for early in the reign of this sovereign the treatises of Lomazzo and Philibert de Lorme were translated into English; and in the construction of the palatial houses of the aristocracy, the architects had begun to act upon a system. The principal deviation from the plans of the earlier Tudor houses was in the bay windows, parapets, and porticoes, whereof the two latter were intensely carved with all the forms that the most fantastic and grotesque imagination could supply. The exteriors of these porticoes were covered with carved entablatures, figures, and armorial bearings and devices. The galleries were lofty, wide, and generally more than a hundred feet in length; and the staircases were spacious and magnificent, often occupying a considerable portion of the mansion. Elizabeth herself does not appear to have set, during the passion of the period for architecture, any example to her subjects. She might have thought her father had done sufficient in building palaces; but, however, be that as it may, she encouraged the nobles of her court in great expenditure on their residences. With the exception of the royal gallery at Windsor, she herself did actually nothing; whilst on Kenilworth alone, Lord Leicester is supposed to have expended no less a sum than 60,000l., an almost royal sum of money.

439. Before proceeding further, it becomes our duty here to notice a peculiar construction which prevailed in the large manor houses of the provinces, and more especially in the counties of Salop, Chester, and Stafford, the memory of many whereof, though several are still to be seen, is chiefly preserved in engravings ; — - we allude to those of timber framework in places where the supply of stone or brick, or both, was scanty. The carved pendants, and the barge-boards of the roofs and gables, which had, however, made their appearance at a rather earlier period, were executed in oak or chesnut with much beauty of design, and often with a singularly pleasing effect. The timbered style reached its zenith in the reign of Elizabeth, and is thus illustrated in Harrison's description of England: "Of the curiousnesse of these piles I speake not, sith our workmen are grown generallie to such an excellence of devise in the frames now made, that they farre passe the finest of the olde." And, again : "It is a worlde to see how divers men being bent to buildinge, and having a delectable view in spending of their goodes by that trade, doo dailie imagine new devises of their owne to guide their workmen withall, and those more curious and excellent than the former." (p. 336.) The fashion was no less prevalent in cities and towns than in the country; for in them we find that timber-framed houses abounded, and that they also were highly ornamented with carvings, and exhibited in their street fronts an exuberance of extremely grotesque figures performing the office of corbels. The fashion was imported from the Continent, which supplies numberless examples, especially in the cities of Rouen, Bruges, Ulm, Louvaine, Antwerp, Brussels, Nuremburg, and Strasburg, which very far surpass any that this country can boast. We have, however, sufficient remains of them in this country to prove that the wealthy burgess affected an ornamental display in the exterior of his dwelling, rivalling that of the aristocracy, and wanting neither elegance nor elaborate finishing, whilst it was productive of a high picturesque effect in the street architecture of the day. "This manner," says

Dallaway, "was certainly much better suited to the painter's eye than to comfortable habitation; for the houses were lofty enough to admit of many stories and subdivisions, and being generally placed in narrow streets were full of low and gloomy apartments, overhanging each other, notwithstanding that they had fronts nearly composed of glass, with the projecting windows and the interstices filled for nearly the whole space." Fig. 201. is a representation of Morton Hall, an example of the style in question.

440. A better idea of the architecture of this age cannot be obtained than by a notice of the principal architects who have furnished materials for the foregoing observations; and for this purpose we shall use with freedom the notes to Walpole's anecdotes, by our late much valued friend Mr. Dallaway. A MS., belonging to the Earl of Warwick

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