The Poetry of Architecture/The Villa/Chapter 4
IV. The British Villa. The Cultivated, or Blue, Country.—Principles of Composition.
In the papers hitherto devoted to the investigation of villa architecture, we have contemplated the beauties of what may be considered as its model in its original and natural territory, and we have noticed the difficulties to be encountered in the just erection of villas in England. It remains only to lay down the general principles of composition, which, in such difficulties, may, in some degree, serve as a guide. Into more than general principles it is not consistent with our plan to enter. One obstacle, which was more particularly noticed, was, as it may be remembered, the variety of the geological formations of the country. This will compel us to use the divisions of landscape formerly adopted in speaking of the cottage, and to investigate severally the kind of domestic architecture required by each.
First. Blue or cultivated country, which is to be considered as including those suburban districts, in the neighborhood of populous cities, which, though more frequently black than blue, possess the activity, industry, and life, which we before noticed as one of the characteristics of blue country. We shall not, however, allude to suburban villas at present; first, because they are in country possessing nothing which can be spoiled by anything; and, Secondly, because their close association renders them subject to laws which, being altogether different from those by which we are to judge of the beauty of solitary villas, we shall have to develope in the consideration of street effects.
Passing over the suburb, then, we have to distinguish between the simple blue country, which is composed only of rich cultivated champaign, relieved in parts by low undulations, monotonous and uninteresting as a whole, though cheerful in its character, and beautiful in details of lanes and meadow paths; and the picturesque blue country, lying at the foot of high hill ranges, intersected by their outworks, broken here and there into bits of crag and dingle scenery; perpetually presenting prospects of exquisite distant beauty, and possessing, in its valley and river scenery, fine detached specimens of the natural "green country." This distinction we did not make in speaking of the cottage; the effect of which, owing to its size, can extend only over a limited space; and this space, if in picturesque blue country, must be either part of its monotonous cultivation, when it is to be considered as belonging to the simple blue country, or part of its dingle scenery, when it becomes green country; and it would not be just, to suit a cottage, actually placed in one color, to the general effect of another color, with which it could have nothing to do. But the effect of the villa extends very often over a considerable space, and becomes part of the large features of the district; so that the whole character and expression of the visible landscape must be considered, and thus the distinction between the two kinds of blue country becomes absolutely necessary. Of the first, or simple, we have already adduced, as an example, the greater part of the south of England. Of the second, or picturesque, the cultivated parts of the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire, generally Shropshire, and the north of Lancashire, and Cumberland, beyond Caldbeck Fells, are good examples; perhaps better than all, the country for twelve miles north, and thirty south, east, and west, of Stirling.
Now, the matter-of-fact business-like activity of simple blue country has been already alluded to. This attribute renders in it a plain palpable brick dwelling-house allowable; though a thing which, in every country but the simple blue, compels every spectator of any feeling to send up aspirations, that builders who, like those of Babel, have brick for stone, may be put, like those of Babel, to confusion. Here, howevever, it is not only allowable, but even agreeable, for the following reasons:—
Its cleanness and freshness of color, admitting of little dampness or staining, firm in its consistence, not mouldering like stone, and therefore inducing no conviction of antiquity or decay, presents rather the appearance of such comfort as is contrived for the enjoyment of temporary wealth, than of such solidity as is raised for the inheritance of unfluctuating power. It is thus admirably suited for that country where all is change, and all activity; where the working and money-making members of the community are perpetually succeeding and overpowering each other; enjoying, each in his turn, the reward of his industry; yielding up the field, the pasture, and the mine, to his successor, and leaving no more memory behind him, no farther evidence of his individual existence, than is left by a working bee, in the honey for which we thank his class, forgetting the individual. The simple blue country may, in fact, be considered the dining-table of the nation; from which it provides for its immediate necessities, at which it feels only its present existence, and in which it requires, not a piece of furniture adapted only to remind it of past refection, but a polished, clean, and convenient minister to its immediate wishes. No habitation, therefore, in this country, should look old: it should give an impression of present prosperity, of swift motion and high energy of life; too rapid in its successive operation to attain greatness, or allow of decay, in its works. This is the first cause which, in this country, renders brick allowable.
Again, wherever the soil breaks out in simple blue country, whether in the river shore, or the broken roadside bank, or the ploughed field, in nine cases out of ten it is excessively warm in its colour, being either gravel or clay, the black vegetable soil never remaining free of vegetation. The warm tone of these beds of soil is an admirable relief to the blue of the distances, which we have taken as the distinctive feature of the country, tending to produce the perfect light without which no landscape can be complete. Therefore the red of the brick is prevented from glaring upon the eye, by its falling in with similar colours in the ground, and contrasting finely with the general tone of the distance. This is another instance of the material which nature most readily furnishes being the right one. In almost all blue country, we have only to turn out a few spadefuls of loose soil, and we come to the bed of clay, which is the best material for the building; whereas we should have to travel hundreds of miles, or to dig thousands of feet, to get the stone which nature does not want, and therefore has not given.
Another excellence in brick is its perfect air of English respectability. It is utterly impossible for an edifice altogether of brick to look affected or absurd: it may look rude, it may look vulgar, it may look disgusting, in a wrong place; but it cannot look foolish, for it is incapable of pretension. We may suppose its master a brute, or an ignoramus, but we can never suppose him a coxcomb: a bear he may be, a fop he cannot be; and, if we find him out of his place, we feel that it is owing to error, not to impudence; to self-ignorance, not to self-conceit; to the want, not the assumption, of feeling. It is thus that brick is peculiarly English in its effect: for we are brutes in many things, and we are ignorami in many things, and we are destitute of feeling in many things, but we are not coxcombs. It is only by the utmost effort, that some of our most highly gifted junior gentlemen can attain such distinction of title; and even then the honour sits ill upon them: they are but awkward coxcombs. Affectation[1] never was, and never will be, a part of English character: we have too much national pride, too much consciousness of our own dignity and power, too much established self-satisfaction, to allow us to become ridiculous by imitative efforts; and, as it is only by endeavouring to appear what he is not, that a man ever can become so, properly speaking, our truewitted Continental neighbours, who shrink from John Bull as a brute, never laugh at him as a fool. "Il est bête, il n'est pas pourtant sot."
The brick house admirably corresponds with this part of English character; for, unable as it is to be beautiful, or graceful, or dignified, it is equally unable to be absurd. There is a proud independence about it, which seems conscious of its own entire and perfect applicability to those uses for which it was built, and full of a good-natured intention to render every one who seeks shelter within its walls excessively comfortable: it therefore feels awkward in no company; and, wherever it intrudes its good-humoured red face, stares plaster and marble out of countenance, with an insensible audacity, which we drive out of such refined company, as we would a clown from a drawingroom, but which we nevertheless seek in its own place, as we would seek the conversation of the clown in his own turnip field, if he were sensible in the main.
Lastly. Brick is admirably adapted for the climate of England, and for the frequent manufacturing nuisances of English blue country: for the smoke, which makes marble look like charcoal, and stucco like mud, only renders brick less glaring in its colour; and the inclement climate, which makes the composition front look as if its architect had been amusing himself by throwing buckets of green water down from the roof, and before which the granite base of Stirling Castle is mouldering into sand as impotent as ever was ribbed by ripple, wreaks its rage in vain upon the bits of baked clay, leaving them strong, and dry, and stainless, warm and comfortable in their effect, even when neglect has permitted the moss and wallflower to creep into their crannies, and mellow into something like beauty that which is always comfort. Damp, which fills many stones as it would a sponge, is defied by the brick; and the warmth of every gleam of sunshine is caught by it, and stored up for future expenditure; so that, both actually and in its effect, it is peculiarly suited for a climate whose changes are in general from bad to worse, and from worse to bad.
These, then, are the principal apologies which the brick dwelling-house has to offer for its ugliness. They will, however, only stand it in stead in the simple blue country; and, even there, only when the following points are observed.
First. The brick should neither be of the white, nor the very dark red, kind. The white is worse than useless as a colour: its cold, raw, sandy, neutral has neither warmth enough to relieve, nor grey enough to harmonise with, any natural tones; it does not please the eye by warmth, in shade; it hurts it, by dry heat in sun; it has none of the advantages of effect which brick may have, to compensate for the vulgarity which it must have, and is altogether to be abhorred. The very bright red, again, is one of the ugliest warm colours that art ever stumbled upon: it is never mellowed by damp or anything else, and spoils everything near it by its intolerable and inevitable glare. The moderately dark brick, of a neutral red, is to be chosen, and this, after a year or two, will be farther softened in its colour by atmospheric influence, and will possess all the advantages we have enumerated. It is almost unnecessary to point out its fitness for a damp situation, not only as the best material for securing the comfort of the inhabitant, but because it will the sooner contract a certain degree of softness of tone, occasioned by microscopic vegetation, which will leave no more brick-red than is agreeable to the feelings where the atmosphere is chill.
Secondly. Even this kind of red is a very powerful colour; and as, in combination with the other primitive colours, very little of it will complete the light, so, very little will answer every purpose in landscape composition, and every addition, above that little, will be disagreeable. Brick, therefore, never should be used in large groups of buildings, where those groups are to form part of landscape scenery: two or three houses, partly shaded with trees, are all that can be admitted at once. There is no object more villainously destructive of natural beauty, than a large town, of very red brick, with very scarlet tiling, very tall chimneys, and very few trees; while there are few objects that harmonise more agreeably with the feeling of English ordinary landscape, than the large, old, solitary, brick manor house, with its group of dark cedars on the lawn in front, and the tall wrought-iron gates opening down the avenue of approach.
Thirdly. No stone quoining, or presence of any contrasting colour, should be admitted. Quoins, in general (though, by the by, they are prettily managed in the old Tolbooth of Glasgow, and some other antique buildings in Scotland), are only excusable as giving an appearance of strength; while their zigzag monotomy, when rendered conspicuous by difference of colour, is altogether detestable. White cornices, niches, and the other superfluous introductions in stone and plaster, which some architects seem to think ornamental, only mock what they cannot mend, take away the whole expression of the edifice, render the brick-red glaring and harsh, and become themselves ridiculous in isolation. Besides, as a general principle, contrasts of extensive colour are to be avoided in all buildings, and especially in positive and unmanageable tints. It is difficult to imagine whence the custom of putting stone ornaments into brick buildings could have arisen; unless it be an imitation of the Italian custom of mixing marble with stucco, which affords it no sanction, as the marble is only distinguishable from the general material by the sharpness of the carved edges. The Dutch seem to have been the originators of the custom; and, by the by, if we remember right, in one of the very finest pieces of colouring now extant, a landscape by Rubens (in the gallery at Munich, we think), the artist seems to have sanctioned the barbarism, by introducing a brick edifice, with white stone quoining. But the truth is, that he selected the subject, partly under the influence of domestic feelings, the place being, as it is thought, his own habitation; and partly as a piece of practice, presenting such excessive difficulties of colour, as he, the lord of colour, who alone could overcome them, would peculiarly delight in overcoming; and the harmony with which he has combined tints of the most daring force, and sharpest apparent contrast, in this edgy building, and opposed them to an uninteresting distance of excessive azure (simple blue country, observe), is one of the chief wonders of the painting: so that this masterpiece can no more furnish an apology for the continuance of a practice which, though it gives some liveliness of character to the warehouses of Amsterdam, is fit only for a place whose foundations are mud, and whose inhabitants are partially animated cheeses, than Caravaggio's custom of painting blackguards should introduce an ambition among mankind in general of becoming fit subjects for his pencil. We shall have occasion again to allude to this subject, in speaking of Dutch street effects.
Fourthly. It will generally be found to agree best with the business-like air of the blue country, if the house be excessively simple, and apparently altogether the minister of utility; but, where it is to be extensive, or tall, a few decorations about the upper windows are desirable. These should be quiet and severe in their lines, and cut boldly in the brick itself. Some of the minor streets in the King of Sardinia's capital are altogether of brick, very richly charged with carving, with excellent effect, and furnish a very good model. Of course, no delicate ornament can be obtained, and no classical lines can be allowed; for we should be horrified by seeing that in brick which we have been accustomed to see in marble. The architect must be left to his own taste for laying on, sparingly and carefully, a few dispositions of well-proportioned line, which are all that can ever be required.
These broad principles are all that need be attended to in simple blue country: anything will look well in it which is not affected; and the architect, who keeps comfort and utility steadily in view, and runs off into no expatiations of fancy, need never be afraid here of falling into error.
But the case is different with the picturesque blue country.[2] Here, owing to the causes mentioned in the notes at p. 86, we have some of the most elevated bits of landscape character, which the country, whatever it may be, can afford. Its first and most distinctive peculiarity is its grace; it is all undulation and variety of line, one curve passing into another with the most exquisite softness, rolling away into faint and far outlines of various depths and decision, yet none hard or harsh; and, in all probability, rounded off in the near ground into massy forms of partially wooded hill, shaded downwards into winding, dingles or cliffy ravines, each form melting imperceptibly into the next, without an edge or angle.
Its next character is mystery. It is a country peculiarly distinguished by its possessing features of great sublimity in the distance, without giving any hint in the foreground of their actual nature. A range of mountain, seen from a mountain peak, may have sublimity, but not the mystery with which it is invested, when seen rising over the farthest surge of misty blue, where everything near is soft and smiling, totally separated in nature from the consolidated clouds of the horizon. The picturesque blue country is sure, from the nature of the ground, to present some distance of this kind, so as never to be without a high and ethereal mystery.
The third and last distinctive attribute is sensuality. This is a startling word, and requires some explanation. In the first place, every line is voluptuous, floating, and wavy in its form; deep, rich, and exquisitely soft in its colour; drowsy in its effect, like slow, wild music; letting the eye repose on it, as on a wreath of cloud, without one feature of harshness to hurt, or of contrast to awaken. In the second place, the cultivation, which, in the simple blue country, has the forced formality of growth which evidently is to supply the necessities of man, here seems to leap into the spontaneous luxuriance of life, which is fitted to minister to his pleasures. The surface of the earth exults with animation, especially tending to the gratification of the senses; and, without the artificialness which reminds man of the necessity of his own labour, without the opposing influences which call for his resistance, without the vast energies that remind him of his impotence, without the sublimity that can call his noblest thoughts into action, yet, with every perfection that can tempt him to indolence of enjoyment, and with such abundant bestowal of natural gifts, as might seem to prevent that indolence from being its own punishment, the earth appears to have become a garden of delight, wherein the sweep of the bright hills, without chasm or crag, the flow of the bending rivers, without rock or rapid, and the fruitfulness of the fair earth, without care or labour on the part of its inhabitants, appeal to the most pleasant passions of eye and sense, calling for no effort of body, and impressing no fear on the mind. In hill country we have a struggle to maintain with the elements; in simple blue, we have not the luxuriance of delight: here, and here only, all nature combines to breathe over us a lulling slumber, through which life degenerates into sensation.
These considerations are sufficient to explain what we mean by the epithet "sensuality." Now, taking these three distinctive attributes, the mysterious, the graceful, and the voluptuous, what is the whole character? Very nearly—the Greek: for these attributes, common to all picturesque blue country, are modified in the degree of their presence by every climate. In England, they are all low in their tone; but as we go southward, the voluptuousness becomes deeper in feeling, as the colours of the earth and the heaven become purer and more passionate, and "the purple of ocean deepest of dye; "the mystery becomes mightier, for the greater and more universal energy of the beautiful permits its features to come nearer, and to rise into the sublime, without causing fear. It is thus that we get the essence of the Greek feeling, as it was embodied in their finest imaginations, as it showed itself in the works of their sculptors and their poets, in which sensation was made almost equal with thought, and defied by its nobility of association; at once voluptuous, refined, dreamily mysterious, infinitely beautiful. Hence, it appears that the spirit of this blue country is essentially Greek; though, in England and in other northern localities, that spirit is possessed by it in a diminished and degraded degree. It it also the natural dominion of the villa, possessing all the attributes which attracted the Romans, when, in their hours of idleness, they lifted the light arches along the echoing promontories of Tiber. It is especially suited to the expression of the edifice of pleasure; and, therefore, is most capable of being adorned by it. The attention of every one about to raise himself a villa of any kind should, therefore, be directed to this kind of country; first, as that in which he will not be felt to be an intruder; secondly, as that which will, in all probability, afford him the greatest degree of continuous pleasure, when his eye has become accustomed to the features of the locality. To the human mind, as on the average constituted, the features of hill scenery will, by repetition, become tiresome, and of wood scenery, monotonous; while the simple blue can possess little interest of any kind. Powerful intellect will generally take perpetual delight in hill residence; but the general mind soon feels itself oppressed with a peculiar melancholy and weariness, which it is ashamed to own; and we hear our romantic gentleman begin to call out about the want of society, while, if the animals were fit to live where they have forced themselves, they would never want more society than that of a grey stone, or of a clear pool of gushing water. On the other hand, there are few minds so degraded as not to feel greater pleasure in the picturesque blue than in any other country. Its distance has generally grandeur enough to meet their moods of aspiration; its near aspect is of a more human interest than that of hill country, and harmonises more truly with the domestic feelings which are common to all mankind; so that, on the whole, it will be found to maintain its freshness of beauty to the habituated eye, in a greater degree than any other scenery.
As it thus persuades us to inhabit it, it becomes a point of honour not to make the attractiveness of its beauty its destruction; especially as, being the natural dominion of the villa, it affords great opportunity for the architect to exhibit variety of design.
Its spirit has been proved to be Greek; and therefore, though that spirit is slightly manifested in Britain, and though every good architect is shy of importation, villas on Greek and Roman models are admissible here. Still, as in all blue country there is much activity of life, the principle of utility should be kept in view, and the building should have as much simplicity as can be united with perfect gracefulness of line. It appears from the principles of composition alluded to in speaking of the Italian villa, that in undulating country the forms should be square and massy; and, where the segments of curves are small, the buildings should be low and flat, while they may be prevented from appearing cumbrous by some well-managed irregularity of design, which will be agreeable to the inhabitant as well as to the spectator; enabling him to change the aspect and size of his chamber, as temperature or employment may render such change desirable, without being foiled in his design, by finding the apartments of one wing matched foot to foot, by those of the other. For the colour, it has been shown that white or pale tints are agreeable in all blue country: but there must be warmth in it, and a great deal too, grey being comfortless and useless with a cold distance; but it must not be raw nor glaring. [3] The roof and chimneys should be kept out of sight as much as possible; and, therefore, the one very flat, and the other very plain. We ought to revive the Greek custom of roofing with thin slabs of coarse marble, cut into the form of tiles. However, where the architect finds he has a very cool distance, and few trees about the building, and where it stands so high as to preclude the possibility of its being looked down upon, he will, if he be courageous, use a very flat roof of the dark Italian tile. The eaves, which are all that should be seen, will be peculiarly graceful; and the sharp contrast of colour (for this tiling can only be admitted with white walls) may be altogether avoided, by letting them cast a strong shadow, and by running the walls up into a range of low garret windows, to break the horizontal line of the roof. He will thus obtain a bit of very strong colour, which will impart a general glow of cheerfulness to the building, and which, if he manages it rightly, will not be glaring or intrusive. It is to be observed, however, that he can only do this with villas of the most humble order, and that he will seldom find his employer possessed of so much common sense as to put up with a tile roof. When this is the case, the flat slabs of the upper limestone (ragstone) are usually better than slate.
For the rest, it is always to be kept in view, that the prevailing character of the whole is to be that of graceful simplicity; distinguished from the simplicity of the Italian edifice, by being that of utility instead of that of pride.[4] Consequently, the building must not be Gothic or Elizabethan; it may be as commonplace as the proprietor likes, provided its proportions be good; but nothing can ever excuse one acute angle, or one decorated pinnacle, both being direct interruptions of the repose with which the eye is indulged by the undulations of the surrounding scenery. Tower and fortress outlines are, indeed, agreeable, from their fine grouping and roundness; but we do not allude to them, because nothing can be more absurd than the humor prevailing at the present day among many of our peaceable old gentlemen, who never smelt powder in their lives, to eat their morning muffin in a savage-looking round tower, and admit quiet old ladies to a tea-party under the range of twenty-six cannon, which, it is lucky for the china, are all wooden ones, as they are, in all probability, accurately and awfully pointed into the drawing-room windows.
So much, then, for our British blue country, to which it was necessary to devote some time, as occupying a considerable portion of the island, and being peculiarly well adapted for villa residences. The woody, or green country, which is next in order, was spoken of before, and was shown to be especially our own. The Elizabethan was pointed out as the style peculiarly belonging to it; and farther criticism of that style was deferred until we came to the consideration of domestic buildings provided with the means of defence. We have, therefore, at present only to offer a few remarks on the principles to be observed in the erection of Elizabethan villas at the present day.
First. The building must be either quite chaste, or excessively rich in decoration. Every inch of ornament short of a certain quantity will render the whole effect poor and ridiculous; while the pure perpendicular lines of this architecture will always look well if left entirely alone. The architect, therefore, when limited as to expense, should content himself with making his oriels project boldly, channelling their mullions richly, and, in general, rendering his vertical lines delicate and beautiful in their workmanship; but, if his estimate be unlimited, he should lay on his ornament richly, taking care never to confuse the eye. Those parts to which, of necessity, observation is especially directed, must be finished so as to bear a close scrutiny, that the eye may rest on them with satisfaction: but their finish must not be of a character which would have attracted the eye by itself, without being placed in a conspicuous situation; for, if it were the united attraction of form and detail would confine the contemplation altogether to the parts so distinguished, and render it impossible for the mind to receive any impression of general effect. Consequently, the parts that project, and are to bear a strong light, must be chiseled with infinite delicacy; so that the ornament, though it would have remained unobserved, had the eye not been guided to it, when observed, may be of distinguished beauty and power; but those parts which are to be flat, and in shade, should be marked with great sharpness and boldness, that the impression may be equalised. When, for instance, we have to do with oriels, to which attention is immediately attracted by their projection, we may run wreaths of the finest flowered-work up the mullions, charge the terminations with shields, and quarter them richly; but we must join the window to the wall, where its shadow falls, by means of more deep and decided decoration.
Secondly. In the choice and design of his ornaments, the architect should endeavor to be grotesque rather than graceful (though little bits of soft flower-work here and there will relieve the eye); but he must not imagine he can be grotesque by carving faces with holes for eyes and knobs for noses; on the contrary, wherever he mimics grotesque life, there should be wit and humour in every feature, fun and frolic in every attitude; every distortion should be anatomical, and every monster a studied combination. This is a question, however, relating more nearly to Gothic architecture, and, therefore, we shall not enter into it at present.
Thirdly. The gables must, on no account, be jagged into a succession of right angles, as if people were to be perpetually engaged in trotting up one side and down the other. This custom, though sanctioned by authority, has very little apology to offer for itself, based on any principle of composition. In street effect, indeed, it is occasionally useful; and, where the verticals below are unbroken by ornament, may be used even in the detached Elizabethan, but not when decoration has been permitted below. They should then be carried up in curved lines, alternating with two angles, or three at the most, without pinnacles or hip-knobs. A hollow parapet is far better than a battlement, in the intermediate spaces; the latter, indeed, is never allowable, except when the building has some appearance of being intended for defence, and, therefore, is generally barbarous in the villa, while the parapet admits of great variety of effect.
Lastly. Though the grotesque of Elizabethan architecture is adapted for wood country, the grotesque of the clipped garden, which frequently accompanies it, is not. The custom of clipping trees into fantastic forms is always to be reprehended: first, because it never can produce the true grotesque, for the material is not passive, and, therefore, a perpetual sense of restraint is induced, while the great principle of the grotesque is action; again, because we have a distinct perception of two natures, the one neutralising the other; for the vegetable organisation is too palpable to let the animal form suggest its true idea; again, because the great beauty of all foliage is the energy of life and action, of which it loses the appearance by formal clipping; and again, because the hands of the gardener will never produce anything really spirited or graceful. Much, however, need not be said on this subject; for the taste of the public does not now prompt them to such fettering of fair freedom, and we should be as sorry to see the characteristic vestiges of it, which still remain in a few gardens, lost altogether, as to see the thing again becoming common.
The garden of the Elizabethan villa, then, should be laid out with a few simple terraces near the house, so as to unite it well with the ground; lines of balustrade along the edges, guided away into the foliage of the taller trees of the garden, with the shadows falling at intervals. The balusters should be square rather than round, with the angles outwards; and, if the balustrade looks unfinished at the corners, it may be surmounted by a grotesque bit of sculpture, of any kind; but it must be very strong and deep in its carved lines, and must not be large; and all graceful statues are to be avoided, for the reasons mentioned in speaking of the Italian villa: neither is the terraced part of the garden to extend to any distance from the house, nor to have deep flights of steps, for they are sure to get mossy and slippery, if not superintended with troublesome care; and the rest of the garden should have more trees than flowers in it. A flower-garden is an ugly thing, even when best managed: it is an assembly of unfortunate beings, pampered and bloated above their natural size, stewed and heated into diseased growth; corrupted by evil communication into speckled and inharmonious colours; torn from the soil which they loved, and of which they were the spirit and the glory, to glare away their term of tormented life among the mixed and incongruous essences of each other, in earth that they know not, and in air that is poison to them.
The florist may delight in this: the true lover of flowers never will. He who has taken lessons from nature, who has observed the real purpose and operation of flowers; how they flush forth from the brightness of the earth's being, as the melody rises up from among the moved strings of the instrument; how the wildness of their pale colours passes over her, like the evidence of a various emotion; how the quick fire of their life and their delight glows along the green banks, where the dew falls the thickest, and the low mists of incense pass slowly through the twilight of the leaves, and the intertwined roots make the earth tremble with strange joy at the feeling of their motion; he who has watched this will never take away the beauty of their being to mix into meretricious glare, or to feed into an existence of disease. And the flower-garden is as ugly in effect as it is natural in feeling: it never will harmonise with anything, and, if people will have it, should be kept out of sight until they get into it. But, in laying out the garden which is to assist the effect of the building, we must observe, and exclusively use, the natural combination of flowers.[5] Now, as far as we are aware, bluish purple is the only flower colour which nature ever uses in masses of distant effect; this, however, she does in the case of most heathers, with the Rhododéndron ferrugineum, and, less extensively, with the colder colour of the wood hyacinth. Accordingly, the large rhododéndron may be used to almost any extent, in masses; the pale varieties of the rose more sparingly; and, on the turf, the wild violet and pansy should be sown by chance, so that they may grow in undulations of colour, and should be relieved by a few primroses. All dahlias, tulips, ranunculi, and, in general, what are called florist's flowers, should be avoided like garlic.
Perhaps we should apologise for introducing this in the Architectural Magazine; but it is not out of place: the garden is almost a necessary adjunct of the Elizabethan villa, and all garden architecture is utterly useless unless it be assisted by the botanical effect.
These, then, are a few of the more important principles of architecture, which are to be kept in view in the blue and in the green country. The wild, or grey, country is never selected, in Britain, as the site of a villa; and, therefore, it only remains for us to offer a few remarks on a subject as difficult as it is interesting and important, the architecture of the villa in British hill, or brown, country.
- ↑ The nation, indeed, possesses one or two interesting individuals, whose affectation is, as we have seen, strikingly manifested in their lake villas: but every rule has its exception ; and, even on these gifted personages, the affectation sits so very awkwardly, so like a velvet bonnet on a ploughman's carroty hair, that it is evidently a late acquisition. Thus, one proprietor of land on Windermere, who has built unto himself a castellated mansion with round towers, and a Swiss cottage for a stable, has yet, with that admiration of the "neat but not gaudy," which is commonly reported to have influenced the devil when he painted his tail pea-green, painted the rocks at the back of his house pink, that they may look clean. This is a little outcrop of English feeling in the midst of the assumed romance.
- ↑ In leaving simple blue country, we hope it need hardly be said that we leave bricks at once and for ever. Nothing can excuse them out of their proper territory.
- ↑ The epithet "raw," by the by, is vague, and needs definition. Every tint is raw which is perfectly opaque, and has not all the three primitive colours in its composition. Thus, black is always raw, because it has no colour; white never, because it has all colours. No tint can be raw which is not opaque: and opacity may be taken away, either by actual depth and transparency, as in the sky; by lustre and texture, as in the case of silk and velvet, or by variety of shade, as in forest verdure. Two instances will be sufficient to prove the truth of this. Brick, when first fired, is always raw; but, when it has been a little weathered, it acquires a slight blue tint, assisted by the grey of the mortar; incipient vegetation affords it the yellow. It thus obtains an admixture of the three colours, and is raw no longer. An old woman's red cloak, though glaring, is never raw; for it must, of necessity, have folded shades; those shades are of a rich gray: no grey can exist without yellow and blue. We thus have three colours, and no rawness. It must be observed, however, that, when any one of the colours is given in so slight a degree, that it can be overpowered by certain effects of light, the united colour, when opaque, will be raw. Thus, many flesh-colours are raw; because, though they must have a little blue in their composition, it is too little to be efficiently visible in a strong light.
- ↑ There must always be a difficulty in building in picturesque blue country in England; for the English character is opposed to that of the country; it is neither graceful, nor mysterious, nor voluptuous; therefore, what we cede to the country, we take from the nationality, and vice versâ.
- ↑ Every one who is about to lay out a limited extent of garden, in which he wishes to introduce many flowers, should read and attentively study, first Shelley, and next Shakspeare. The latter, indeed, induces the most beautiful connexions between thought and flower that can be found in the whole range of European literature; but he very often uses the symbolical effect of the flower, which it can only have on the educated mind, instead of the natural and true effect of the flower, which it must have, more or less, upon every mind. Thus, when Ophelia, presenting her wild flowers, says: "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance; pray you love, remember: and there is pansies, that's for thoughts:" the infinite beauty of the passage depends upon the arbitrary meaning attached to the flowers. But, when Shelley speaks of
"The lily of the vale,
Whom youth makes so fair, and passion so pale,
That the light of her tremulous bells is seen
Through their pavilion of tender green,"
he is etherealising an impression which the mind naturally receives from the flower. Consequently, as it is only by their natural influence that flowers can address the mind through the eye, we must read Shelley, to learn how to use flowers, and Shakspeare, to learn to love them. In both writers we find the wild flower possessing soul as well as life, and mingling its influence most intimately, like an untaught melody, with the deepest and most secret streams of human emotion.