which Niccola was occupied upon, when a boy, under his Byzantine master. Here is the door of the Baptistery at Pisa, again by Mr. Severn delightfully enlarged for us from a photograph.[1] The general idea of it is a square-headed opening in a solid wall, faced by an arch carried on shafts. And the ornament does indeed follow this construction so that the eye catches it with ease,—but under what arbitrary conditions! In the square door, certainly the side-posts of it are as important members as the lintel they carry; but the lintel is carved elaborately, and the side-posts left blank. Of the facing arch and shaft, it would be similarly difficult to say whether the sustaining vertical, or sustained curve, were the more important member of the construction; but the decorator now reverses the distribution of his care, adorns the vertical member with passionate elaboration, and runs a narrow band, of comparatively uninteresting work, round the arch. Between this outer shaft and inner door is a square pilaster, of which the architect carves one side, and lets the other alone. It is
- ↑ Plate 5 is from the photograph itself; the enlarged drawing showed the arrangement of parts more clearly, but necessarily omitted detail which it is better here to retain.
