The mediæval styles, that is to say, Romanesque in all its forms and Gothic of all epochs, have been copied in the nineteenth century with an accuracy even greater than that used for the classical and neo-classic styles. In all such reproductions the standard of criticism must be the same. Plate LVII shows the great church at Doncaster in Yorkshire, a building erected with singular care and forethought and at great expense, with the deliberate purpose of imitating what is often called the “decorated” style of English Gothic. The architect, and his principal adviser, a gentlemen who had given much thought and pains to the study of English Gothic, agreed that the perpendicular style, of the years from 1350 on, had been allowed too great an influence in the Gothic revival of the time (about 1860) and chose the work of the first half of the fourteenth century as their prototype. To this style they were faithful. It is nearly true to say that an imitation so close as to be deceptive would have been the greatest success, in the opinion of the designer and his employers. The main exception to this statement--the main difference avowedly preserved between the modern and an accurate transfer or cast of an ancient building is to be found in the sculpture of the capitals in which a modern realistic study of natural plant forms is evident; and in like manner the design of the font in the near foreground which is not like any old English font, but is an abstract design showing much study of old English metal work, silver altar vessels and the like. Plate LVII also shows the exterior of this interesting building which is very large for an English parish church, the tower being one hundred and seventy
[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST. GEORGE, DONCASTER, YORKS, ENGLAND, INTERIOR.]
[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST. GEORGE, DONCASTER, YORKS, ENGLAND, EXTERIOR.]
[Illustration: TRINITY CHURCH, BOSTON, MASS.]
feet high and almost exactly equal to the total length.
As there is no architectural style peculiar to the nineteenth century in any of the lands occupied by Europeans, it is inevitable that the greater number of modern buildings should be more or less completely suggested by the fine art of the time when there was a style of interest and of individual character. Very few are the nineteenth century buildings which are absolutely without such suggestion. At the same time there are a certain number in which only a general study of ancient art is visible, and it is of these that our tenth chapter treats.