degree to another style of architecture, the military; and indeed, I imagine, had its origin in military purpose. I shall therefore quit it here to add a very few words only on some other kinds of buildings, more or less partaking of the ecclesiastical character. Those monumental edifices, which have their name from the cross which their summits bore, in many instances mark no common talent in the designer, and especially those erected by Edward the first, in honor of his deceased queen. For ingenious invention, elegance of general form, proportion of parts, beauty of parts, no exterior, of the ornamental kind, in the architecture now in England called Gothic, can compare with them. I can by no means equally admire the richly-wrought shrine; heavy in its general form; beautiful only in its parts. But the aspiring shape of the cross, between pyramid and obelisk, and the very ingenious contrivance of the gradual reduction of breadth in gaining elevation, assist the light elegance of its parts, to give it singularly a character of airy gracefulness. Not that, after all, it can bear a comparison with the very different clegance of the Grecian monumental buildings. Simplex munditiis,' is not its description: the Plantagenet architecture originated in large works, with interior effect the object; and its proper characteristic is sublimity. Of this the long perspective of the

Cloister partakes: but in the interior of the lofty Cathedral alone it has its full display.

LETTER XVIII.

Old English Military and Domestic Architecture. THE ecclesiastical architecture of the Plantagenet era is a wide subject, and in its way a great one. But if I have tolerably explained my idea of its principles, you will allow me now to proceed to a very different kind, the MILITARY; with which, in that era, another was much connected, the DOMESTIC, and especially the highest order of the domestic, the PALATIAL. Through the deficiency of domestic security, which governments, in all those called the middle ages, could afford, the domestic residences of the wealthy, but especially of sovereigns, were fortified; even within walled towns, they were more or less separate fortresses; and thence the term CASTLE, originally describing only a military fortified post, became the distinguishing name, more particularly on the continent, for the residence of a family of high rank. In England, before the Norman reigns, the houses of the greatest appear to have been mostly of wood, and their security depended principally upon the multitude of retainers.

Some few royal castles, Corfe in Dorsetshire, and possibly others, had been raised under the Saxon kings but the more familiar use of stone in building, and the extension of castellan architecture, and the establishment of any English character of that architecture, appear to have followed the Norman conquest.

In Italy, Adrian's mausoleum at Rome, and the tomb of Cæcilia Metella, on the Appian way, were found, by the barbarian conquerors of that luxurious country, adapted to the purpose of fortresses, beyond anything they were able to build; so the former remains to this day the citadel of Rome, and the other in its present solitude, instead of its original elegant summit, bears the ruins of the rude battlements of a barbarian baron. Thus the unlettered and artless warriors of those times converted to the purpose of fortresses, either for public or domestic use, edifices raised by the better art of former ages, with far other views. When they found, ready to their hands, such as might serve immediate need, they used them. If it became necessary to build, they imitated, as with workmen then to be found, they best could, the military art of more inlightened ages.

Thus, in England also, the castellan architecture, both that of the early Norman reigns, and what little may have been before raised under the

Saxon princes, was, equally with the ecclesiastical, corrupt Roman; being what may most properly be called Gothic, and, on the continent, continues to hold that name. In some of the buildings now generally attributed to that era, as Pevensea castle in Sussex, and Bamborough in Northumberland, is found an excellence, both of design and workmanship, which has excited question whether they were not remaining from the Roman times. That part, indeed, of Pevensea which is allowed Roman, is far more barbarous than what is attributed to Saxon or Norman times, possibly the work of builders from Constantinople.

When that extraordinary phenomenon of the arts, the new ecclesiastical architecture, was brought forward, it did not occasion immediately any alteration in the castellan style, to which indeed it was little adapted. But every castle had its chapel, and for this portion of the building the new style soon obtained favor.

Already that style had reached its first, and perhaps altogether its highest perfection, when the first Edward, having subdued Wales, proposed to use his conquest, not as a barbarian, but as a great Christian prince, for the benefit, not more of the conquerors, than of the turbulent, divided, and lawless people whom he had reduced to a salutary submission. Civilization and public and

private order being his objects, in building fortresses, for maintaining his conquest, he looked far beyond the military purpose; he would have palaces in which he might himself not only reside conveniently, but hold his court splendidly; and not only communicate with his new people, but, after the manner of the age, assemble his great council or parliament, not of his new principality alone, but, if need should be, of his whole kingdom.

Of the extraordinary buildings, which, in the prosecution of these noble designs, he raised, the castles of Carnarvon and Conway, though both in ruins, afford still large matter for the curious after design in architecture, as well as for the curious after history and antiquities. They have been intended, as the plans evince, for different purposes, and designed, as the differences in style show, by different architects; and those differences are the more remarkable, as they were built almost at the same time. Carnarvon castle has been proposed as the palace of the capital of North Wales; or, from its extent and magnificence, it might be supposed of the whole kingdom, perhaps with a view even to the inclusion of Ireland. The site of Conway castle, admirably selected as for a fortress, has evidently also recommended itself, to the taste of the royal builder, by the superior beauties of landscape around: it has