Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 1.djvu/473

 CHAP. V. CIVIL ARCHITECTURE. 419 they were applied. To these defects, it must be added, that the whole style is generally characterised by a vulgarity it is difficult to understand in a people who have generally shown themselves capable of so much refinement in former times. In some parts of the north of India matters have not sunk so low as in the Madras Presidency, but in the south native civil architecture as a fine art is quite extinct, and though sacred architecture still survives in a certain queer, quaint form of temple-building, it is of so low a type that, as exemplified especially in the temples which the Nathukottai Chettis are engaged in renovating or reconstructing, it would be no matter of regret if it, too, ceased to exist, and the curtain dropped over the graves of both, as they are arts that practically have become extinct.