horizontal architrave and entablature, or general horizontal trabeation. That by the substitution of arches for architraves, the character of the Greek system is forfeited, cannot be denied; but then another character is established whose difference from the original one ought not to be made its condemnation. To demand of a different mode that it should resemble and conform to the laws of that from which it differs, is absurdity in the extreme, for it is requiring at once that it shall be a different one and the same. Το compare different styles is a very useful sort of study; but to make any one style the criterion or standard by which others are to be judged, is preposterous.

The style in which the arch and column enter into direct combination with each other, and for which there is no specific name, has at all events some economical recommendations, inasmuch as shorter columns, and fewer of them, are required, than would be necessary for the same height and length according to the trabeated mode. In itself, too, it possesses much capability; yet as is the case with every other style, the merit of the works produced in it depends upon the manner in which it is treated, and the talent brought to it. There is no style of the Art so poetical that the flattest prose may not be made out of it; and hardly any so utterly prosaic as to be incapable of being kindled into poetry by the Promethean torch of generality-artistic treatment, and con amore æsthetic feeling.

INTERCOLUMNIATION.

Although Intercolumniation consists only in regulating and determining the spaces between the columns, and consequently does not affect the nature of the composition, for a tetrastyle, hexastyle, &c., would still be such, no matter how narrow or wide the intercolumniations or intervals between the columns may be, very much depends upon it with regard to expression and effect. How intercolumniation is regulated

in the Doric Order, has already been explained: in that the distances between the columns is generally governed entirely by the triglyphs of the frieze, so that there can be no medium between monotriglyphic and ditriglyphic in intercolumniation, accordingly as there is either one or two triglyphs over each intercolumn. But in the other orders there are no such restrictions: in them the intercolumns may be made wider or narrower, as circumstances require, but, of course, under the guidance of judgment and good taste; for what is left a discretion is not always very discreetly used. Vitruvius and his followers, however, have not cared to trust to discretion or indiscretion, but have fixed certain positive or distinct modes of intercolumniation, viz., five, to wit:

Pycnostyle, or closely set, in which the intercolumns are one diameter and a quarter or a half in width.

Systyle, in which they are two diameters wide.

Eustyle, or well spaced, in which they are two diameters and a half.

Dyastyle, in which they are three diameters.

Aræostyle, or thinly set, in which they are four diameters. Let us repudiate for Architecture all such formal, Act of of Congress legislation, and take pycnostyle and ærostyle as the greatest allowable degree of distance or closeness at which the columns can be placed, and it follows, that between such maximum and minimum, any intermediate measure is admissible, and that there is no occasion to fix it positively and arithmetically, and make distinctions which are, after all, only arbitrary. There are a great many matters in design which must be left to the architect, and intercolumniation is one of them. It is impossible to have precise rules for every thing, neither is it desirable; for, if everything in it could be done by rule, Architecture would forfeit its nature as one of the fine arts, and be reduced to one of the mechanical. What is done by rule can be done just as well as by one as another. Excepting the terms pycnastyle and aræostyle, which are useful as expressing the greatest degree of closeness or of

openness of inter-columniation consistent with well-proportioned arrangement, the others may be dispensed with. To designate one mode as eustyle, par excelence, is very much like saying that the proportions assigned to it, viz., 2.30', or 21 diameters, are the very best, and all the rest comparatively defective; according to which doctrine, the monotriglyphic mode of inter-columniation usually employed by the Greeks in their Doric temples, and which answers to the character of pycnostyle, is not so well-proportioned as what is emphatically called eustyle. Let it be whatever it may, as expressed in terms of the diameter of the columns, inter-columniation should always deserve the name of eustyle, or well-proportioned, by being such as satisfies the eye, and contributes to the particular character that befits the occasion, and harmonizes with the other proportions of the structure. Pycnostyle, or close spacing, carries with it the expression of both richness and strength, the solids, or columns, being very little less than the voids or inter-columns. Aræostyle, or wide spacing and ditriglyphic Doric inter-columniation may be called such-produces an effect of openness and lightness, but also partakes of meagreness and weakness, owing to the want of sufficient apparent support for the entablature a very frequent fault in modern architecture, where frugality as to columniation has often been allowed to produce a degree of poverty, which contrasts very disagreeably with that of the decoration affected by the Order itself. Inter-columniation ought to be made to depend, in some measure, upon the nature of the composition: a tetrastyle portico, for instance, or a distyle in antis, admits of wider. inter-columniation than would be suitable for an octrastyle; because pycnostyle, where there are only three inter-columns, would produce too great narrowness of general proportions for a portico.

Hardly is there need for observing, that, be their proportions what they may, the inter-columns in a colonade or portico must be all alike; nevertheless, in a Grecian Doric

portico there is, as we have seen, some difference, the two extreme inter-columns being there narrower by the width of half a triglyph. There is, besides, another exception from the general principle; for the centre inter-column of a portico was frequently made somewhat wider than the others, in order to mark the entrance, and the better to display and afford greater space for access to the door within.

One mode of columniation and inter-columniation which remains to be spoken of, is that which has been sometimes practised by modern architects, and combines the two extremes of pycnostyle, or still closer inter-columniation and aræostyle. This consists in coupling the columns, and making a wide inter-column between every pair of columns; so that, as regards the average proportion between solids and voids, that disposition does not differ from what it would be were the columns placed singly.

Although denounced by some critics, more especially Algaratti, as altogether licentious and indefensible, and although it is not to be specially recommended or indeed practicable ⚫on every occasion, the coupling of columns may, under some circumstances, be not only excusable, but advisable and proper. As is the case with almost everything else in matters of art, all depends upon how it is done, and whether with or without sufficient reason. That there is no classical authority for it, is no valid reason against it; in the constitution of the ancient temples there was nothing to require or motive it. It may be conceded, however, that coupled columns, forming a prostyle surmounted by a pediment, are objectionable; because where so strong a resemblance to the antique model is preserved in other respects, a departure from it in regard to the disposition of the columns has a disturbing effect.

Having gone through the Classical Orders, and explained their elements and constitution, we have performed as much as we purposed or as we promised. Within the same compass we might, no doubt, have touched upon a great deal