166. Now there are two most notable characteristics about this Cyclopean architecture to which I beg your close attention.
The first: that as the laying of stones is so beautiful, their joints become a subject of admiration, and great part of the architectural ornamentation is in the beauty of lines of separation, drawn as finely as possible. Thus the separating lines of the bricks at Siena, of this gate at Lucca, of the vault at Verona, of this window at Orvieto, and of the contemporary refectory at Furness Abbey, are a main source of the pleasure you have in the building. Nay, they are not merely engravers' lines, but, in finest practice, they are mathematical lines—length without breadth. Here in my hand is a little shaft of Florentine mosaic executed at the present day. The separations between the stones are, in dimension, mathematical lines. And the two sides of the thirteenth century porch of St. Anastasia at Verona are buil in this manner,—so exquisitely, that for some time, my mind not having been set at it, I passed them by as painted!
167. That is the first character of the Florentine Cyclopean. But secondly; as the joints
