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Rh The personality of the architect is seldom thus identified with his buildings, and this has much to do with the lack of interest taken in them by lovers of art as well as by the general public. Add to this that a building is not the work of the architect's own hands in the immediate and direct sense that a picture or a statue is the handiwork of his brother artists of the brush and chisel, and his personality becomes more obscure, and the interest in his work diminishes proportionately. "Why should not the architect inscribe his name on his building as the painter does on his canvas, or the sculptor on his marble and bronze ? It is done in France, and the French take a deeper and more real interest in architecture than we do. How many of those mer- chants or students we spoke of know the name of the architect of the building they frequent, or would be interested in remembering it though they heard it ? Yet one never looks at a painting or a statue without asking, ' Who is it by ? ' Erase the names from the canvases in the picture galleries, and how much of the interest vanishes with them ? Let me not be understood to say that by inscribing the architecfs name upon the corner of our buildings, general interest would at once be excited in architecture. The interest would not be immediate, and I have already indicated my belief that interest in architecture will never be so general nor so deep as in painting and sculpture. But I submit that the absence of a personal identity of the architect with his work has much to do with the lack of interest in this important department of art. G. WaSHINGTOiV BltOWNE.

HE critic of architecture must ever have regard to the limitations, economic, practical, and constructive, under which the subject of his remarks has been produced. This is especially true in the case of such a work as the Exhibition buildings, where the temporary character of the structure, and the brief time available for working out the design, form hindrances to its artistic completeness alto- gether abnormal. In passing, it may be remarked that the first of these limitations has to a large o extent been disregarded, the necessarily short existence of the building has been overlooked, and the design has been invested with so much of a serious arcliitectural character as to consti- tute in itself an architectural fault. 'To what pui'pose is this waste ' of brick towers, painted arches, and plaster capitals (for once in such a cry the economical public and the architect may agree), seeing that wooden struts and iron ties would in many cases have served as well constructionally, and artistically would have been more consonant with the character of the work. Be this as it may, in the design and execu- tion of the Exhibition buildings Mr. Sellars has undoubtedly furnished fresh proof of his ability as an architect. Grave faults there are, faults of judgment in planning, of artistic perception in decoration, yet, alike in the selection of the style, in the general conception of the design, and in the elaboration of the details, the Exhibition shows itself the work of a clever artist. The selec- tion of the Oriental style of architecture as one which naturally lends itself to gay and fantastic treatment, and the logical use of it throughout all parts of the design, give the Exhibition a marked character thoroughly in keeping with its pur)30se, and differentiate it from all previous efforts in this country. At the same time, the facility with which its forms can be imitated in wood is a snare which has been only too readily fallen into to the sacrifice of constructional beauty and truth in design. Witness the great arches under the dome, which but serve to mask the horizontal iron girders upon which the whole is carried. The general design and grouping are in every way admirable ; each of the three elevations has been made interesting, while each has a charac- ter of its own. As regards the details, a very large amount of credit is due to the architect for the variety and interest with which he has treated them.