Stonehenge.-Church at Hexham.-Norman style.

concerning these fragments is, that they formed a rude British temple or altar, erected by the Druids. Similar arrangements of fragments, though on a smaller scale, are found in other parts of the kingdom, particularly at Arebury, Stanton-Drew, and Lundie in Fifeshire.

Down to the Norman conquest, with the exception of some Norman edifices, built by Edward the Confessor, who was educated in Normandy, the Anglo-Saxons seem to have possessed little taste for architecture, public or private. Eddius, who wrote the life of Winfred, informs us that the church of Hexham, built in 674, was one of the most magnificent fabrics of the time, and was constructed of polished stone, with columns, subterraneous chapel, and spiral stairs. The capitals and walls of the sanctuary were decorated with histories, statues, and various figures in stone, as well as a variety of pictures. The principal architects. of those days were churchmen. The Anglo-Saxon architecture was a debased Roman, differing from the Anglo-Norman in its want of harmony and purity, its semicircular apses and peculiar mouldings, without aisles or transepts.

The Norman, or new style as it was then called, was established and confirmed by William the Conqueror, who erected castles and strongholds in all the principal towns.

The Anglo-Norman castles, often of large dimensions, exhibited a certain rude grandeur, and served both for residence and defence. Though differing from each other in size and plan, the largest and most perfect were invariably distinguished by leading features. They were generally situated on an eminence near a river, or the junction of two rivers, or on a rocky precipice or promontory on the sea-shore. The whole extent of the castle was surrounded by a deep and broad ditch, sometimes filled with water, sometimes dry, called a fosse. On the inside of the ditch

Anglo-Norman castles.-London in the 12th century.-Religious houses.

rose the wall of the castle eight or ten feet thick, and twenty or thirty feet high, flanked with round or square towers of three stories, for the accommodation of the principal officers. On the inside were erected lodgings for the retainers, storehouses, offices, &c. On the top of this wall, and on the roofs of the houses stood the defenders of the castle. The great gate was likewise defended by two towers, with rooms over the archway, which was closed with thick folding doors of oak plated with iron, besides an iron portcullis or grate, let down from above. Within the outer wall was a large area, called when large, a ballium or outer bayle, in which stood the chapel. On the inside of this outer bayle was another ditch or wall, flanked with towers, enclosing the inner bayle or court, in the centre of which stood the principal tower or keep of the castle, often a very large and lofty fabric of four or five stories, with gloomy apartments and small windows. It contained the great hall in which the retainers assembled to enjoy the hospitality of their chief. Under ground were the dungeons in which prisoners were confined.

In London, towards the end of the twelfth century, the houses were still of wood, while the palaces and castles of the AngloNorman princes, nobility, and prelates, were of stone. As building churches and monasteries was believed to be one of the most effectual means of obtaining the favour of heaven, prodigious numbers of both were erected, both in England and Scotland, in the course of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. In the reign of Henry III. alone, one hundred and fifty-seven abbeys, priories, and other religious houses, were founded in England. Many of the cathedrals and conventual churches were large and magnificent fabrics, raised at a vast expense. In the reign of Henry VII. the purity and grandeur of the Gothic began to degenerate into an excess of minute ornament,

Florid style.-Elizabethan style.-Architecture in Scotland.

and subdivision of compartments, known as the florid or perpendicular style, of which the superb chapel of Henry VII., at Westminster, is the most splendid example. Christ-church college, at Oxford, was built by Cardinal Wolsey in the same style and with equal magnificence.

In the reign of Henry VIII., a corrupt style was introduced by John of Treviso and John of Padua, who were brought over by Holbein. The dissolution and confiscation of the monasteries and religious houses in this reign, were the means of bringing many of them into the possession of noblemen and gentlemen, who fitted them up for their own residences. Others imitated the same style in their new buildings and additions; and thus was gradually matured the English Tudor or Elizabethan style, of which many splendid examples still remain. In the latter part of the reign of Elizabeth and beginning of that of James, the rich nobles, not content with the splendor of the Tudor style, called in the aid of Italian architecture, and produced a modification, known as the style of James I., which, in spite of its corrupt and anomalous admixture, and somewhat fantastic decorations, admitted of considerable magnificence. The dis tinctive features of the Tudor or Elizabethan, are the cupola with its gilded vane crowning the lofty towers and turrets, either round, square, or polygonal, connected with long, embattled galleries; the carved oriels, the deep and many-lighted bay-windows, projecting in fantastic angles and curves; the richly-embossed finials, wreathed chimney-shafts, florid pinnacles, and panelled walls; battlements and buttresses, sculptured dripstones, with all their rich mouldings and carvings.

In no country was architecture, in early times, more encouraged or better practised, according to the taste of the age, than in Scotland. The Norman and Gothic ecclesiastical edifices

Italo-Roman style.-Ancient monuments in the United States.

of Scotland, with the exception of some foreign features, exhibit the same style and characteristics, the same beauty and delicacy of taste, as those of England. They are all much dilapidated, having suffered more from the double reformation and civil wars than those of the sister kingdom.

The introduction of Italo-Roman architecture into England, was almost two centuries later than its revival in Italy. The Tudor style, as we have already seen, began, in the reign of James, to exhibit a mixture of Roman and Italian, first in porches and small parts, and afterwards in larger portions. At length, the Banqueting House at Whitehall, by Inigo Jones, Greenwich Hospital and St. Paul's cathedral, by Wren, fixed the complete introduction of the Italo-Roman style.

In proportion as the Roman and Italian styles prevailed, the Gothic began to be despised; all the architects and writers of the day, thinking it necessary to show their taste, by heaping upon it every sort of vituperation and contempt. But such is the instability of fashion, that now, while the Roman and Italian are in their turn despised and abused, the Gothic, after being consigned to oblivion and contempt for nearly a century and a half, has again come into repute. Its beauty, excellence, and sc'ence of construction, are universally recognized and appreciated

Remains of Ancient Architecture in the Auited States.

"THE ancient monuments of the western United States," says Mr. Squier, the author of a late work on the subject, "consist for

Relics.-Vases, bracelets, &c.—Embankments.-Enclosures.-Mounds.

the most part of elevations and embankments of earth and stone, erected with great labour and manifest design. They are found. chiefly in the great valleys of the West, and it is a remarkable fact that they are most numerous near the positions which have been chosen for the towns which have increased the most rapidly. They are always found, when explored, to contain relics, such as personal ornaments and useful utensils, of various substances. They consist mostly of earthen vases of elegant form, sometimes with tasteful bas-reliefs on the exterior; of copper knives, bracelets, &c. The carved pipe is of constant recurrence. All of them are executed with strict fidelity to nature, and with exquisite skill. Not only are the features of the various objects represented faithfully, but their peculiarities and habits are in some degree exhibited. The otter is shown in a characteristic attitude, holding a fish in his mouth; the heron also holds a fish; and the hawk grasps a small bird in his talons, which he tears with his beak. The panther, the bear, the wolf—the heron, crow, buzzard, swallow, paroquet, toucan, and other indigenous and southern birds-together with the turtle, frog, toad, rattlesnake, &c., are recognized at a glance.

"Lines of embankments, varying in height from five to thirty feet, and enclosed areas of from one to fifty acres, are common; while enclosures of one or two hundred acres are far from infrequent. They appear to have been raised both for defensive and religious purposes. The group of works at the mouth of the Sciota has an aggregate of at least twenty miles of embankment; yet the entire amount of land embraced within its walls, does not probably much exceed two hundred acres. Perhaps the larger portion of them are regular in outline, the square and the circle predominating. The mounds are of all dimensions, from those of but a few feet in height and a few yards in diameter, to those