Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/222

 198 COTTAGE, FARM, AND VILLA ARCHITECTURE. 343 generally employed by painters, and by poets, or other descriptive writers, •vvho wish to portray a cottage of the present day. In the like manner, a certain degree of coarseness or homeliness of dress and manner may be said to have hitherto characterised the British labourer, as contradistinguished from the British gentleman. A romantic writer would, therefore, make use of these characteristics ; and a poet or a sentimentalist might pro- bably regret their disappearance, and the gradual assimilation of dress and manners between the labourer and the gentleman. The fault of the Architect is, that he has too closely followed the painter and the man of literature ; forgetting that his art, being founded upon and guided by utility, ought to embrace allimprovements, not only in Ar- chitecture, but in the uses of buildings, as they are brought into notice. It is surely the duty of landed proprietors who build cot- tages, to encourage and elevate the character of the people who live on their lands ; and that of the Architect, in con- formity with this object, to consider, not what a cot- tage has hitherto been, but what it is capable of being made. Putting a servant into a handsome Gothic cottage, is like putting him into a hand- some suit of livery ; but there is, unfortunately for the servant, this difference, that the faults of the dwelling, if it does not fit, cannot be so readily per- ceived as those of the coat ; and nobody may know, but the occupant and his family, how little comfort sometimes exists under a gay exterior. For our own part, we have seen so many ornamental cottages and lodges on gentlemen's estates, both in England and Scotland, small, damp, and badly contrived with- in, that we are compelled to consider them as much badges of slavery as a suit of livery. Let us hope that another generation will effectually simplify and improve the former, and entirely abolish tiie ; latter. We are aware that there is a great prejudice in favour of Gothic buildings of every description, from the cottage to the palace ; arising from the associations of reverence, antiquity, and chivalry, which are connected with them. Maturely considered, however, we cannot help some- times doubting whether the existing prejudice in favour of Gothic Architecture does not reflect more discredit than honour on human nature ; at all events, it is a prejudice un- worthy of an age of rapid improvement like the present. We freely acknowledge that we do not expect many converts to our views in this respect ; because simplicity is one of the last refinements men arrive at, not only in the progress of the arts, but in the progress of opinion. Believing, as we do, that this principle is undeniable, we have little doubt but that much of what is now considered beauty, both in art and in litera- ture, will, by the next generation, be neglected ; and, as the French characteristically fxpress it, " r^duit au m^rite historique." {Gard. l{ag.,o. viii. p. 260.)