165. But further. The mosaic of this cross is so exquisitely fitted that no injury has been received by it to this day from wind or weather. And the horizontal dressed stones are laid so daintily that not an edge of them has stirred; and, both to draw your attention to their beautiful fitting, and as a substitute for cement, the architect cuts his uppermost block so as to dovetail into the course below.
Dovetail, I say deliberately. This is stone carpentry, in which the carpenter despises glue. I don't say he won't use glue, and glue of the best, but he feels it to be a nasty thing, and that it spoils his wood or marble. None, at least, he determines shall be seen outside, and his laying of stones shall be so solid and so adjusted that, take all the cement away, his wall shall yet stand.
Stonehenge, the Parthenon, the walls of the Kings, this gate of Lucca, this window of Orvieto, and this tomb at Verona, are all built on the Cyclopean principle. They will stand without cement, and no cement shall be seen outside. Mr. Burgess and I actually tried the experiment on this tomb. Mr. Burgess modelled every stone of it in clay, put them together, and it stood.
