Page:History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 1.djvu/604

 572 FREXCri ARCHITECTURE. Part II. marking the point of the vault. These could not of course be used with circular arches, where there was no central line for them to mark ; and it probably was from this cause that the French seldom adopted them, having been accustomed to vaults not requiring them. Another reason was that all their * irlier vaults were more or less domical, or, in other words, the point c was liigher than the points a or b, though this is more apparent in hexapartite vaults, or where one com2)art- ment of the nave-vaults takes in two of the aisles, than in quadripartite, like those now under consideration. Still all French vaults have this pecu- liarity more or less, and con- sequently the longitudinal ridge-rib, Avhere used, has an up and down broken aj^pear- ance, which is extremely dis- agreeable, and must in a great measure liave prevented its adoption. There is, however, at least one exception to this rule in France, in the abbey church of Souvigny, repre- sented in the woodcut No. 427, where this rib is used with so pleasing an effect that one is surj^rised it Avas not in more general favor. These are the only features usually employed by French architects : but we do some- times find tiercerons, or secondary ogives, used to strengthen as well as to orna- ment the plain faces of the vaults, one or two on each face, as at e e (in Woodcut No. 426); small ribs or Hemes, r r, from Ker, to bind, were also occasionally used to connect all these at the centre, where they formed star patterns, and other complicated but beautiful ornaments of the vault. These last, however, are rare and exceptional in French vaidting, though they were treated by the English architects with such success that we wonder they Avere not more generally adopted in France. The most probable explanation ap])ears to be that the Frencli architects depended more on color than on relief for the effect of their vaults, while in England color 4l'' Abbey Church, Souvigny. (From " L'Ancien Bourbonnais.")