Page:A History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 2.djvu/84

68 '68 POINTED STYLE IX GERMANY. Part II. conceal this defect, he made the vault of the ante-chapel equal m height to that of Cologne, the result being that the centre of the great western rose-window is just as high as the apex of the vault of the nave. It is true it can be seen in perspective from the floor of the church, but the arrangement a])pears to have been expressly designed to make the church look low and out of proportion. The spiral staircases at the angles of the spire are marvels of workmanship, and the whole is well calculated to excite the wonder of the vulo'ar, thouoh it must be condemned bv the man of taste as very inferior in every respect to the purer designs of an earlier age. It is not known whetlier the original design comprised two towers, like those of the great French cathedrals, or was intended to terminate with a flat screen-like fayade. Probably the latter was the case, as mass, and not proportion, seems to have been this architect's idea of raawnificence. The spire that now crowns this front, rising to a heiglit of 468 ft. from the ground, was not finished till 1439, and betrays all the faults of its age. The octagonal part is tall and weak in outline, the spire ungraceful in form, and covered with an unmeaning and constructively useless system of tracery. Besides the fault of proportion for which the design of Erwin is clearly blameable, all his work betrays the want of artistic feeling which is characteristic of the German mason. Every detail of the lower part of the front is wire-drawn and attenuated. The defect of putting a second line of unsyrametrical tracery in front of windows, the first trace of which was remarked ui)on in speaking of Gehihausen, is here carried to a painful extent. The long stone bars which protect and hide the windows are admirable si)ecimens of masonry, but they are no more beauties tlian those which protect our kitchen windows in modern times. The spreading the tracery of the windows over tlie neighboring walls, so as to make it look large and uniform, is another solecism found both here and at Cologne, utterly unworthy of the art, and not found in, I believe, a single instance in France and England, where the style was so much better understood than in Germany. Altogether the facade of the cathedral at Strasburg is imposing from its mass, and fascinating from its richness; but there is no building in either France or England where such great advantages have been thrown away in so reckless a manner and by so unin- telligent a hand. The cathedral at Ratisbon is a far more satisfactory specimen of German art tlian that of Strasburg. It is a small building, only 272 ft. in length, and 114 in breadth internally, and covering about 32,000 sq. ft. It was commenced in the year 1275 ; the works were continued for more than two centuries, and at last abandoned before the completion of the clmrch.