Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

to make. Kent was a painter as well as an architect, though as the former very inferior to the latter; and to these accomplishments must be added those of a gardener, for he was the father of modern picturesque gardening. Kent's greatest, and, out of many, also his best work, was Holkham, in Norfolk, for the Earl of Leicester, the plan and elevations whereof were published in folio, 1761, by the late Mr. Brettingham, who had the unparalleled assurance to send them to the world as his own. The noble hall of this building, terminated by a vast flight of steps, produces an effect unequalled by anything similar to it in England. During, and, indeed, previous to, Kent's coming so much into employment, a great passion seems to have existed with the architects for ill-shaped, and, perhaps, almost grotesque, urns and globes, on every part where there was a resting-place for them. Kent not unfrequently disfigured his works in this way, but more especially so at the beginning of his career. The pile of building in Margaret Street, which will shortly have to make way for part of the new parliament houses, now, however, containing the law courts, a house at Esher for Mr. Pelham, the Horse Guards, and other buildings, which it is needless here to particularise, were erected under the designs of Kent, upon whom unbounded liberality and patronage were bestowed by Lord Burlington during the life of this artist, which terminated in 1748.

512. About 1733 appeared, we believe, the last of the stone churches with steeples, which the practice of Wren had made common in this country; this was the church of St. Giles's in the Fields, erected by Henry Flitcroft. The interior is decorated with Ionic columns resting on stone piers. The exterior has a rusticated basement, the windows of the galleries have semicircular heads, and the whole is surmounted by a modillion cornice. The steeple is 165 feet high, consisting of a square tower, the upper part decorated with Doric pilasters; above, it is formed into an octagon on the plan, the sides being ornamented with three quarter Ionic columns supporting a balustrade and vases. Above this rises an octangular spire. Besides this, Flitcroft erected the church of St. Olave, Southwark, and the almost entire rebuilding of Woburn Abbey was from the designs and superintendence of that master, who died in 1769.

513. During the reign under our consideration, the city of Bath may be said to have almost arisen from the designs of Wood, who built Prior Park for Mr. Allen, the friend of Pope, and Buckland was erected by him for Sir John Throckmorton. Wood died in 1754, To him and to his scholars Bath is indebted for the designs of Queen Square, the Parades, the Circus, the Crescent, the New Assembly Room, &c. The buildings of this city possess various degrees of merit, but nothing so extraordinary as to call for more than the mere notice of them. We are by no means, for instance, disposed to agree with Mitford, who reckons the crescent of Bath among "the finest modern buildings at this day existing in the world!"

SECT. X.

GEORGE III.

514. Though the works of the architects about to follow, belong partially to the preceding reign, they are only properly to be noticed under that of George III. Without a lengthened account of them, we commence with the mention of the name of Carr of York, who was much employed in the northern counties, where he built several noble residences, particularly that for Mr. Lascelles, afterwards Lord Harewood, and a mausoleum in Yorkshire for the late Marquis of Rockingham. Paine was engaged at Worksop Manor, Wardour Castle, and Thorndon; and Hiorne, whose county sessions-house and prison at Warwick exhibit considerable genius, was a promising artist, prematurely cut off. His talent was not confined to the Italian style, as may be learnt from reference to the church at Tetbury in Gloucestershire, and a triangular tower in the Duke of Norfolk's park at Arundel.

515. At a early part of the reign of George III., architecture was cultivated and practised here with great success by Robert Taylor, afterwards knighted. His best compositions were designed with a breadth and intimate knowledge of the art, that prove him to have been abundantly acquainted with its principles. That he was not always successful, the wings of the Bank, now removed, were a proof. Of his works sufficient would remain to corroborate our opinion, if only what is now the Pelican Office in Lombard Street existed. We believe it was originally built for Sir Charles Asgill, and ruined by the directors of the Pelican when they took to the place. There are, however, also to attest the ability of Sir Robert Taylor, Sir Charles Asgill's villa at Richmond, and his own house in Spring Gardens. After his visit to Italy he commenced his practice in sculpture, in which branch of the arts he has left monuments in Westminster Abbey and elsewhere; but he afterwards devoted himself to architecture alone. Among his works were a dwelling house for Sir P. Taylor,

near Portsdown Hill, a house in Piccadilly for the Duke of Grafton, a mansion in Herts for Lord Howe; Stone Buildings, Lincoln's Inn; Ely House, Dover Street; a very clever composition, Sir John Boyd's at Danson, near Shooter's Hill; the beautiful bridge at Henley on Thames, and Lord Grimstone's at Gorhambury. He had for some time a seat at the Board of Works, was surveyor to the Admiralty, the Bank, and other public bodies. His reputation was unbounded, and met with reward from the public. Sir Robert Taylor died in 1788 at the age of seventy-four.

516. Cotemporary with the last-named artist, was one to whom the nation is indebted for first bringing it to an intimate acquaintance with the works of Greece, to which he first led the way. The reader will, of course, anticipate us in the name of James Stuart, who began his career as a painter. After some time passed in Greece, he, in conjunction with Nicholas Revett, about the year 1762, published the well-known Antiquities of Athens, from which he acquired the soubriquet of Athenian. The public taste was purified by a corrected knowledge of the buildings of Greece, especially in respect of the form, composition, and arrangement of ornament; but we doubt whether mischief was not for a time induced by it, from the absurd attempt, afterwards, to adapt, without discrimination, the pure Greek porticoes of the temples of Greece to public and private buildings in this country, often with buildings with which they have no more natural relation than the interior arrangement of a church has with that of a theatre. The architects of our own time seem, however, at last to be aware of the impossibility of applying with success the forms of Grecian temples to English habitations; and a better system has been returned to, that of applying to every object a character suitable to the purposes of its destination. We consider Stuart's best work the house, in St. James's Square, which he built for Lord Anson. Among other works, he executed Belvedere, in Kent, for Lord Eardley; a house for Mrs. Montague, in Portman Square; the chapel and infirmary of Greenwich Hospital; and some parts of the interior of Lord Spencer's house, in St. James's Place. Stuart died in 1788, at the age of seventy-five. His collaborateur, Revett, shared with him a portion of the patronage of the public. He survived him till 1804, when he died at the advanced age of eighty-two years. He was employed on the eastern and western porticoes of Lord De Spencer's house at West Wycombe, and on some temples. For Sir Lionel Hyde he built the church of Ayot St. Lawrence, Herts, the front whereto is a Doric portico crowned with a low Grecian pediment, and on each side an Ionic colonnade connects the centre with an elegant cenotaph. He also built a portico to the eastern front of Handlinch, in Wiltshire, for Mr. Dawkins.

517. The chasteness and purity which the two last-named architects had, with some success, endeavoured to introduce into the buildings of England, and in which their zeal had enlisted many artists, had to contend against the opposite and vicious taste brought by Robert Adam, a fashionable architect, whose eye had been corrupted by the corrupt taste of the worst time of Roman art. It can be scarcely believed, the ornaments of Diocletian's palace at Spalatro should have loaded our dwellings contemporaneously with the use among the more refined few of the exquisite exemplars of Greece, and even of Rome, in its better days. Yet such is the fact; the depraved compositions of Adam were not only tolerated, but had their admirers. It is not to be supposed that the works of a man who was content to draw his supplies from so vitiated a source will here require a lengthened notice. Yet had he his happy moments; and that we may do him strict justice, we not only mention, but

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

present to the reader, in figs. 221. and 222., the ground plan and elevation of Kedlestone, in Derbyshire, which he erected for Lord Scarsdale. The detail of this is, indeed, not exactly what it ought to have been; but the whole is magnificently conceived, and worthy of any master. Adam died at the age of ninety-four, in 1792; and, besides the Adelphi, in the Strand, which he erected on speculation, he was engaged at Luton Park, in Bedfordshire, for the Earl of Bute; at Caenwood, near Hampstead, for Lord Mansfield; at Shelburne House, in Berkeley Square, now Lord Lansdowne's, well planned, but ill designed, a meagre affair; the disgraceful gateway at Sion, near Brentford; and on part of the Register Office at Edinburgh. None, however, would now do credit to a mere tyro in the art except the first named.

i

[graphic][ocr errors][subsumed][subsumed][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

518. Previous to the accession of George III. it had been considered by his tutors necessary to complete his education by the study requisite to give him some acquaintance with the art. We venerate the memory of that monarch as an honest good man, but are compelled to say that the experiment of inoculating him with a taste for it was unsuccessful, for during his reign all the bizareries introduced by Adam received no check, and seeing that Adam and Bute were both from the north, we are rather surprised that his education was not in this respect committed to the former instead of Sir William Chambers, whom, as one of the first architects of the day, it is incumbent upon us now to introduce. We believe that whatever was done to forward the arts, owes a large portion of its effect to that celebrated man; and it is probable, with the worthy motives that actuated the monarch, and the direction of his taste by that individual, much more would have been accomplished, but for the heavy and disastrous wars which occurred during his reign, and the load of debt with which it became burthened. The works of Chambers are found in almost every part of England, and even extended to Ireland; but we intend here chiefly to restrict ourselves to a short account of Somerset House, his largest work, in which, though there be many faults, so well did he understand his art, that it is a matter of no ordinary difficulty, and indeed requires hypercriticism, to find anything offensive to good taste in the detail.

519. This work was commenced in 1776, and stands on an area of 500 ft. in depth, and 800 ft. in width. The general interior distribution consists of a quadrangular court, 343 ft. in length, and 210 ft. in width, with a street or wide way running from north to south, on its eastern and western sides. The general termination towards the river is a terrace, 50 ft. wide, whose level is 50 ft. above that of the river, and this occupies the whole length of the façade in that direction. The front towards the Strand is only 135 ft. long. It is composed with a rustic basement, supporting ten Corinthian columns on pedestals, crowned by an attic, extending over the three central intercolumniations, flanked by a balustrade on each side. The order embraces two stories. Nine large arches are assigned to the basement, whereof the three central ones are open for the purpose of affording an entrance to the great court. On each side of them, these arches are occupied by windows of the Doric order, decorated with pilasters, entablatures, and pediments. The key stones are carved in alto-relievo, with nine colossal masks, representing the ocean, and the eight principal rivers of Great Britain. The three open arches of entrance before mentioned lead to a vestibule, which connects the Strand with the large quadrangular court, and serves also as the access to those parts of the building, till lately occupied by the Royal Academy, and on the opposite or castern side to the Royal Society and the Society of Antiquaries, the entrances whereto are within the vestibule. This is decorated with columns of the Doric order, whose entablature supports a vaulted ceiling. The front of this pile of building towards the quadrangle, is 200 ft. in extent, being much more than the length of that towards the Strand; the style, however, of its decoration is correspondent with it, the principal variation being in the use of pilasters instead of columns, and in the

Q

doors and windows.

The front next the Thames is ornamented in a similar manner to that already described. It was originally intended that the extent of the terrace should have been 1100 ft. This last is supported by a lofty arcade, decorated towards the ends with coupled Tuscan columns, whose cornice is continued along the whole terrace. The edifice was at the time the subject of much severe criticism, and particularly from the pen of a silly engraver of the name of Williams, under the name of Antony Pasquin; but the censures he passed on it, the author being as innocent of the slightest knowledge of the art as most of the writing architectural critics of the present day, were without foundation, and have long since been forgotten.

520. In the year 1759, Sir W. Chambers published a Treatise on the decorative part of civil architecture, whereof it was the lot of the writer to publish an enlarged edition in 1825. This work, as far as it goes, still continues to be a sort of text-book for the student; but as it is merely what its title imports, without touching on the historical or practical parts of the art, it is so far incomplete. Chambers held the office of surveyor general,

and died in 1796.

521. Among the architects of George III.'s reign, we must not forget Robert Mylne, the architect of Blackfriar's Bridge, constructed between 1760 and 1768; Holland, who erected Carlton House for George IV. when Prince of Wales, and Drury Lane Theatre, neither of which buildings now exists; Dance, the architect of Newgate, St. Luke's Hos pital, and many buildings about the city of London, to whose corporation he was architect; and, lastly, Willey Reveley, a pupil of Chambers, who followed the steps of Stuart and visited Athens and the Levant. He was the editor of the third volume of the Antiquities of Athens, and died prematurely in 1799. He built the new church at Southampton, and offered some beautiful designs for the new baths at Bath, which, however, were not adopted. We have now concluded a general view of the history of the art, from its dawn in this country to the end of the reign of George III.; having enumerated the professors of later days most worthy to be recorded. Further we should not be able to pursue our inquiry without coming so into contact with our cotemporaries and their connections, that our office, if not dangerous and fearful, might be unpleasant, and we must here close. We re. gret we cannot think our national architecture advances in the same ratio that the facilities of study in the present day would indicate. This is not to be imputed so much to the professors of the art as to the way in which it is treated by Government and the public; witness the National Gallery, made a job by a minister for an incompetent artist. It is a national, a social misfortune," says the late James Spiller, " that to the scientific study of this noble art, there is no reasonable, much less liberal encouragement. It is degraded and crushed under the most despicable spirit of calculation and parsimony!" If ever a deathblow was aimed at the art, that was done by the commissioners for building the recent new churches. What artist could hope to become celebrated under their pinching ordinances, competitions, and contracts, with their accompanying legal din and "smithery?" Far different was the conduct of those commissioners to whom Queen Anne entrusted the building of her churches, or their existence would have been matter only of history, a category that we are certain will apply, at the end of a century, to many of those of the present day.

BOOK II.

THEORY OF ARCHITECTURE.

CHAP. I.

ARITHMETIC AND ALGEBRA.

SECT. I.

INTRODUCTION.

522. THE abstract relations of quantity and figure ought to be thoroughly understood by the architect, that he may be able to prepare the designs which he has conceived, in a manner suitable for execution, and, when executed, to possess stability. The form and mechanical effect of each single block in a building depends on its position, and the form of one of its parts limits the forms of others. In groups of bodies, these limitations are still more perplexing; hence we must have recourse to the most easy and accurate means of ascertaining the practicable conditions which will produce the desired effect. To this end we propose to give a short and simple course of the elements of arithmetic and analysis, as our own experience informs us that occasions arise in the practice of architecture which require all the aid that science can afford. Those who have studied most closely, know that they have not acquired too much; whilst those who have not studied at all have to depend on the skill of others, and, like all similar dependents, become more or less the dupes of those they employ.

523. That which is capable of increase or diminution is called magnitude or quantity. Hence the different kinds of magnitude must be many. Mathematics, generally speaking, is the science of quantity, or that which investigates the means of measuring quantity. Now we cannot measure or determine any quantity except by pointing out its relation to some other known quantity, so that the determination or the measure of magnitudes of all kinds is the making any one known magnitude of the same species the measure or unit for determining the proportion of the proposed magnitude to this known measure. This proportion being always expressed by numbers, a number is but the proportion of one magnitude to another, arbitrarily assumed as the unit. Hence all magnitudes may be expressed by numbers, and the foundation of all mathematical science must be laid in a study of the science of numbers, and in an examination of the different methods of calculation involved in it. In Algebra, or analysis numbers, which represent quantities, are alone considered, without respect to the different kinds of quantity. The latter are the subject of other branches of mathematics. Arithmetic is the science of numbers properly so called, extending only to certain methods of calculation which occur in common practice. Algebra comprehends all the cases that can exist in the calculation of numbers.

SIGNS AND -.

524. (1.) When one number is to be added to another, the sign + (plus) is used, and is placed before the second number. Thus, 5 + 3 denotes that 3 is to be added to the number 5, the sum whereof every body knows to be 8. The same sign may be used to connect several numbers, thus 7+9+12+81 signifies that to the number 7 we must add 9, 12, and 81, which make 109. All this is evident, but in Algebra, in order to generalise numbers, they are represented by letters as a, b, c, d, &c. ; thus a+b+c+d signifies the sum of the numbers represented by those letters.

525. (2.) To subtract one number from another the sign (minus) is used, which is placed before the number to be subtracted; thus 10-6 signifies that the number 6 is to be taken from the number 10, so that the expression is equivalent to the number 4. So of several numbers; as, for instance, 62-6-15-31 signifies that 6 is to be take from 62,

« ZurückWeiter »