Page:History of Indian and Eastern Architecture Vol 2.djvu/379

 CHAP. X. MYSORE AND OUDH. 325 The General was apparently his own architect, and has produced a design somewhat fantastic in arrangement, which sins against most of the rules of pure Palladian Art to an extent that would not be pardonable except in such a climate and under the peculiar circumstances in which it was erected. Not- withstanding this, there is something very striking in the great central tower, rising from a succession of terraced roofs one over the other, and under which are a series of halls grouped internally so as to produce the most pleasing effects, while their 438. View of the Martiniere, Lucknow. (From a Photograph. ) arrangement was at the same time that most suitable to the climate. The sky-line is everywhere broken by little kiosks, not perhaps in the best taste, but pleasing from their situation, and appropriate in the vicinity of a town so full of such ornaments as the city in whose proximity it is situated. Taken altogether, it is a far more reasonable edifice than the rival capriccio of Beckford, at Fonthill ; and if its details had been purer, and some of those solecisms avoided which an amateur his immense fortune (of about ^330,000) to found educational establishments at Lyons, Calcutta, and Lucknow ; but, owing to the length of his will, and his having drawn it up himself, in bad English, the principal part of his money was wasted in law expenses.