Page:Charles Moore--Development and Character of Gothic Architecture.djvu/303

Rh the abstraction, in treatment of nature, which the material demands was wanting in the mind of the carver. The close relation, too, which had formerly existed between structural members and their carved ornaments, soon ceased under the naturalistic treatment that was now coming into vogue.

In Fig. 119, p. 209, a capital from one of the chapels of the choir of Amiens, for instance, the leaf ornament which adorns the lower part of the bell has no expression of integral relation with it. It is merely a leaf applied to the surface. It does not rise from the in sympathy with the form of the bell, enriching its surface, and harmonising with its outline.

FIG. 183. The bell is treated as an independent surface, a considerable portion of which is entirely unoccupied by the ornament, and the independence of the leaf is further emphasised by the imitative treatment of its foot-stalk, which shows, at its base, the natural enlargement, and the portion of clinging fibre which adheres where a leaf is torn from its parent stem.

Other instances of misadaptation and over-naturalism marking departure from the best types of Gothic sculpture, are those of the leaf ornaments upon the lower portions of the twisted shafts of the porches of Chartres. And finally, as among the still more pronounced examples of over-naturalism which occur before the time of what may be called debased Gothic (such as some of the capitals and