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driven-into-a-corner Classic, which is that of the City church towers of or about that date, they certainly would not have jarred our sense of congruity so much as the quasi-gothic existing ones do, and also, which is a great point, they would not have been so ugly. Wren's "restoration" of the south clerestory also, was to be seen a year or two ago; this had to do with the ornamental features of the windows, which were reduced to the Bible and Prayer-book style of the period, but left the main surface of the walling alone.

The beginning of the nineteenth century saw an important degradation, in the rebuilding of the exterior of Henry VII.'s Chapel by Wyatt; the type of the architects of the first period of Gothic knowledge, who were far more destructive than those of Gothic "ignorance", and moreover had no style of their own, and give us examples of the very extreme of academical lifelessness. Mr. Wyatt managed to take all the romance out of the exterior of this most romantic work of the late Middle Ages, and has left us little more than *caput mortuum*, an office study of the exterior of the Chapel.

Blore began in 1809 the recasing of the north aisle of the Church, a work which was finished by Gilbert Scott: the two between them completely destroyed all trace of the handwork of the mediæval masons in this part of the Church.

All these degradations belong to the time before the genuine "restoration" mania fell upon Westminster Abbey; they are well meant, ill-conceived, and disastrous pieces of repair of various degrees of stupidity, culminating in the last mentioned wholesale destruction of the thirteenth century masons' work.

Sir Gilbert (then Mr.) Scott was appointed architect of the Abbey in 1849, by which time the second period of architectural Gothic "knowledge" had arrived. He

IO

teeth of reason and logic he is compelled to accept the
makeshift for the real thing, and as a consequence to
leave his work bedizened rather than ornamented.

That this has necessarily been the case with the new
front of the north transept at Westminster must be
obvious to any one who understands art; and in spite
of all the knowledge and skill of the architects it could
not have been otherwise, considering the point they
started from. If any such person doubts this, let him
compare the new imagery of the porches with the
angels high up in the transept within; or let him look
at any piece of genuine carving there and compare it
with the subsidiary work in the porch; and he will
surely see in every line of the first the vigour and
pleasure of the hand of the workman, and in the other a
joyless putty-like imitation that had better have been a
plaster cast.

To sum up then the case of the outside of Westminster
Abbey; a long series of blunders of various kinds, all
based on a false estimate of the true value of the
building, have damaged it so vitally, that scarcely any
of its original surface remains, and we have nothing left
us but a mere outline, a ghost, so to say, of what it was.
A great misfortune truly, and an irreparable one.
What else is left us of the Abbey Church that is still so
valuable that we are in a trouble of anxiety lest this
also should be taken away from us?

In a few words the interior of the Church is left to
us; and this, while the exterior has suffered so griev-
ously as to have been all but entirely destroyed, has
been less damaged than many other great churches.
In fact, were it not for the result of the mania for
monuments, that as aforesaid has been so recklessly
indulged in up to the present moment, the interior of
the Abbey Church would be comparatively in a very
good condition, and would leave little to be desired
save the clearing away of the imitative and unoriginal

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attention to the matter for so long; but we feel that it
will not admit of indefinite delay, and accordingly put
our views before the public.

If we are asked what should be done, our reply is
very simple. We believe that one architect, however
distinguished and learned, is too heavily burdened by
having the sole charge of the Abbey in his hands. We
think that a consultation should be called of the best
practical architects, builders, and engineers, and that
they should report as to the stability of the fabric and
what means should be taken to render it thoroughly
secure; and, a satisfactory scheme having been agreed
on, funds should be obtained from Parliament, or if that
were not possible, by subscription from the public at
large, for carrying it out without delay. But we are
also sure that such a scheme should disclaim most
emphatically any intention of meddling with the orna-
mental features of the building.

The structural stability having been secured, the
Abbey should be kept clean, and otherwise not be
touched at all. That is the only thing to do, and there
is no second course which would not lead to fresh
disaster. Let bygones be bygones, but do not let us
enter on a second series of alterations and improve-
ments, which will deprive us at last of all that is now
left us of our most beautiful building.

WOMEN'S PRINTING SOCIETY, LTD., 66, Whitcomb Street, W.C