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A R C H I T E C T U R E

part followed, under clerical influence, the old lines of the mediaeval revival; and there have been comparatively fewer churches built than in the middle portion British. 0f the century, nor has the general interest in abarches ’ ctu1,0!1 architecture been of late by any means what it was during the earlier revival, the enthusiasm of which has in fact to a great extent burned itself out. There are, however, some incidents worth special notice. The building of a new cathedral is an event which stands alone in modern England. It is true that Truro Cathedral, designed by the late Mr Pearson, R.A., is not completed, but it has been carried further towards

completion than was first hoped, and is perhaps the most remarkable and most successful example, in a scholastic sense, of revived Gothic, being internally almost (if one may say so) more mediaeval than a mediaeval cathedral itself, as far as detail is concerned, though not without original features, and externally showing the distinct impress of its architect’s special feeling. One may regret that a great modern cathedral should not have been planned and designed on more modern lines; but it is a study in Gothic which speaks the thorough capacity and knowledge of its architect, and which no other country could have produced. Some of Mr Pearson’s parish churches, as those of

Fig. 8.—Interior, St Clare’s, Liverpool. (Leonard Stokes.) Red Lion Square and Kilburn, London, are among the reason for allowing him to do what he liked with a buildbest and most striking modern buildings of their type. ing which is a national possession. There is probably no The addition of new naves to two mediaeval churches—that other civilized country in which such a proceeding would of Bristol, by Street, that of St Saviour’s, Southwark, by be possible. Among other events connected with the Blomfield, is an interesting achievement, and in these cases much-vexed question of restoration may be mentioned the use of revived Gothic was quite justified, for reasons the repairing of the north transept of Westminster Abbey of architectural consistency. In opposition to such work by Mr Pearson; in this case an excusable proceeding, as may be mentioned the curious and characteristic incident the archaeological as well as architectural value of the of the delivery of St Albans Abbey (now St Albans fa§ade had already been entirely destroyed by bad restoraCathedral), one of the most interesting and most valuable tion earlier in the century, and Mr Pearson merely subof the ancient mediaeval monuments of the country, into stituted good modern Gothic for bad. The taking down the hands of a wealthy lawyer with a taste for playing and rebuilding of the upper portion of the front of Peterthe architect, the fact of his providing the funds being borough Cathedral, rendered absolutely necessary on apparently accepted by public opinion as a quite sufficient account of its structural condition, will be long remem-