Page:Architectural Review and American Builders' Journal, Volume 1, 1869.djvu/754

 612 TJie Architectural Review and American Builders' Journal. [April, reflected from the other side of the water. When sailing up the Hudson, during her visit to this country, Miss Bremer had her attention called to a pigmy edifice on the shore, which she was told, represented, on a small scale, one of those baronial castles on the Rhine. To which she quietly replied, " a very small scale, indeed." How ridiculous, then, must be the figure our "palatial" efforts present to the eyes of reflecting Euro- peans, accustomed, as they must be, to structures on a scale, which would be quite uncalled for in this country. The time must come, sooner or later, (and wiry not now?) when an original American style must be born of the Na- tional genius. This will be our Nais- sant style which would be of the coun- try, as well as for the country. It will be subject to our peculiar climate ; not requiring the ponderous walls, so de- pressive of taste, which the stormy lands, whence we now borrow ideas, are compelled to construct. The astonishing clearness of our at- mosphere, giving us so great an altitude of zenith, is an advantage our architects possess, which belongs, besides, but to Italy, or the Orient, in the older world. Here, then, may the art of our profes- sional find ample scope, for the fullest development of the poetry that is in him. And in a region so boundless, that the sun's course, across it, marks a semicircle, surely there is plentiful room for fancy. We allow all possible credit to the architects of England and France, as well as the rest of Europe, for what they have done, and are now doing. But their position, in reference to archi- tecture, is very different from ours, in many respects. Their taste must, more or less, be governed by the institutions they live under, and the demand upon them,' to keep alive, in their works, the history of past ages. The American Architect has no such nightmare on his shoulders. To him the past is as noth- ing to the mighty Future. He feels, or should feel, that he has a nationality, in his ideas, alone. His thoughts are unchained by the commands of rulers; and his true patron is the public, whose favor he must win, but whose wide- spread liberal opinion is more worthy of his best effort, than the single sanction of any emperor, or king, upon this earth. In our NaUsant style we would be governed altogether by the fitness of design. Its fitness for the purpose for which it is to be erected. Its fitness for the locality, where it is to stand. Its fitness in the material chosen, not alone as regards strength and durabil- ity, but with respect to color also. The fitness of ornamentation is a feature of our Naissant style, which should be especially attended to. Let us have no leaves, or flowers, that belong not to our soil ; no animals, that never had an existence, such as Qriffins, dragons, and the like. None of these. Let every thing be American, in feeling and effect. Such is our idea of what a National style ought to be. Let us consider the possibility of such a consummation as this most desirable one. We hope no American Architect thinks it impossible. Already we have enlarged on manj^ things in Domestic Architecture, and no one will doubt the prevalence of an American style in this department of the art. In our public buildings, civil and ecclesiastical, the grand effort must be made. It was something of a relief to the eye, wearied with the ever-recurring Roman and Grecian stjdes, in our jails, court-houses, custom-houses, banks, and public halls, to see the modernizing of the Venetian, Italian, and Romanesque styles occasionally showing themselves, and attracting, by their novelty, more, than by their intrinsic worth. In our churches, we see the modernized Gothic, the Norman, and the Romanesque, with an occasional B} T zantine effort, as at New York and Baltimore. But all these fail to meet the end we seek ; for, they