Ah,' said Jones, I remember how that "commination of Horace haunted my con

science, while I was employed on my skreen "against the quire, in your cathedral of Win"chester. Often I viewed with admiration "the lofty vault of the nave, your work. "There I observed the combination of so many "lines into one great whole, so managed that, seen altogether, it impressed the eye with

a character even of simplicity in its com

plicated magnificence. Then I looked to the "quire, where I saw architecture of the same

general character, though in parts consider66 ably differing; of merit too, though inferior. "On each side was the clumsy Norman. To

accommodate a new part to all these around. was clearly impossible; and if, chusing among them, I had been able to emulate, in my little work, the style of your great one, it would hardly, in those days, have been allowed me." "I think so,' said the bishop smiling, 'and I "am much flattered by your compliment to my "work. Certainly the style of my day had

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advantages for just that kind of building, the "interior of a cathedral. But did you never "observe its disadvantages for almost every other kind, and especially for the exterior?' 'In considering the style of my earliest days,' Jones ' answered, and in viewing the examples of

great and splendid buildings within my reach, "which, before I went to Italy, were all in the "better style of your time, it was impossible the disadvantage you mention should escape me, "It appears to me that the pointed arch belongs "to the clustered pillar, whence it naturally "springs; and that hardly any management can

bring it to harmonize in any other combination. "Hence I reckon it was that the style, of great .66 magnificence and elegance, of yours and follow"ing ages, was changed, under the Tudor reigns, "for one of neither elegance nor magnificence, "which continued to my time. The magnifi

cence and elegance of the former were found "fit only for a cathedral: the homely parallelo

grams of the latter, on the contrary, were capable of being accommodated to use, in building for any purpose. This quality of "Usefulness then becoming the favorite of the day, Greatness was looked for only from "extension and multiplication: Grace seems "to have been out of question."

"I think,' said Wickham, you may have seen indication, in my building at Winchester, that I "felt forcibly the truth of your observation, while "I was employed upon that work. I thought I "had profited from numerous examples, within

my observation, to design my buttresses, and "the pinnacles above them, passably well; but,

"when I saw them in their places, on the northern side of the cathedral, I was, I must own, "shocked with the effect: the sin against the "golden rule, which I so highly respect, Sit

quidvis simplex et unum,' was too glaring. "Even the Norman transept, protruding itself, "clumsy in its parts, wholly without elegance in " its proportions, but comparatively magnificent by "its unbroken loftiness, seemed to look with some scorn upon my frittered lines, though of neater " and more decorated masonry. Disgusted thus, "I ventured, against all common practice of my

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age, on the southern side, to discard buttresses. "I took care the walls should be stout enough 66 to need no buttresses for use. Whether the "fancy may arise, in these times, to add them “for ornament, I cannot tell. But, from what "I learn, it seems likely that the dissonance of "the two sides of my building, may rather be "considered as a merit; for irregularity and

incoherency seem to be reckoned even vir"tues in the style, now called Gothic. Mix"tures of the ecclesiastical architecture of "all ages with the military of all ages, in "forms, and in plans, and for purposes, such

as never were seen or thought of by those "who formerly built in any of those styles, .it are already in vogue. Even the Chinese "has favor as a variety. variety. A passion for

"the Egyptian ran high for a moment, but "passed like a meteor. Now the Indian is gaining ground. The Roman and Greek " alone are excluded from the medley: the intru

sion of your skreen at Winchester is, I under"stand, especially anathematized. But I shall "not wonder if the fancy for mixture should gather as it rolls, so that the Roman and "Greek may soon be admitted; and then 66 your beautiful skreen in Winchester cathedral,

so far from being thought incongruous, may "come to be reckoned singularly well situated "there. But indeed ill taste, and even such ill

taste, is not limited to one age or country. Had "there been nothing of it at Rome, even in the "Augustan age, Horace would not have chosen "his reprobation of it for the exordium and "foundation of his discourse on the art of poetry. "Probably his discourse contributed to check the "disposition to extravagance, and to produce or "fix that justness of public fancy for which his

age is justly famous. But it might seem as if," now, a perverted edition of his works had vogue; admonishing to avoid whatever he "directed to do, and to do whatever he directed " to avoid :

Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam
'Jungere si velit, et varias inducere plumas
Undique collatis membris, ut turpiter atrum
• Desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne,

"Your skreen in Winchester cathedral is the "mulier formosa, in such kind of odly mixed company.' We had just then reached the door in the poet's corner, by which we passed into Old Palace-yard, and the bishop pro'ceeded: The nave, if you have a mind to compliment my work, may be the horse's "neck.'

'He had scarcely spoken these words when a 'spectacle struck all our eyes, so astonishing that ' at once we all stood motionless. It was a monster,

forty feet high, standing where formerly we knew 'the building called the Court of requests; robed in something like a winding-sheet, white but 'soiled. The form was squat, the arms extended, ⚫ with a club in the right hand, a switch in the left; 'both proportioned to its own size. The countenance was horrible. Two vast dark eyes, dull and of ghastly form, were drawn upward to a peak, downward to a horizontal line. "Where should have been the nose was an ⚫ indenture, nearly as in the human skull. Two prominences, on the top of the head, would have seemed ears, placed like a cat's or lynx's; but they were of no form or propor'tion to show any use. The ugliness was inhanced, but the terrific was somewhat abated, by the total failure of a mouth. Almost immediately under the nose and eyes were two protuberances, in the manner of female breasts;