entrance of a house. When means of defence were a necessity, the access
was through a portion of the main building, and so into a courtyard.
The portal was flanked with turrets which at first were devised for its
protection, but in later times were retained as handsome architectural
features. Then came the period when defence was no longer necessary,
and the forecourt was merely surrounded by a wall. Access to this
court was generally obtained through a gate-house, and Elizabethan and
Jacobean houses have innumerable examples of these charming buildings.
In the smaller houses an archway replaced the gate-house, and in
course of time the archway gave place to gate-piers. But through all
the changes, the desire to give emphasis to the entrance remained,
and every house with architectural pretensions had gate-piers more
or less handsome. At Canons Ashby, in Northamptonshire, there are
several good types (Fig. 238); those between the green court and the
park have a Jacobean flavour about them, while those at the bottom
of the garden are surmounted by the family crest in the shape of a
demi-lion holding a sphere. The gates which formerly hung between these
piers (Fig. 239) are probably the earliest example of garden gates in
wood which survive, but they are so unconstructional in design that
they threatened to fall to pieces, and were replaced by something
plainer, but more convenient. Among the drawings by Jones and Webb
are many of gateways, some rich in appearance, and some quite plain.
The finest which remains is the well-known York water-gate at the
foot of Buckingham Street (Fig. 35). There are some careful drawings
of this by Webb in the Burlington-Devonshire collection at the Royal
Institute of British Architects. In the same collection is a design
for Temple Bar by Jones (Fig. 240), never carried out; a drawing of
the constructional brickwork for the same, signed by him and dated
1638; and a drawing by Webb dated 1636. The two large circular panels
represent “Lætitia Publica” and “Hylaritas Publica.” If this design
had been carried out, there would have been a grim irony in the custom
of exhibiting rebels’ heads just above roundels of such cheerful
intention. Among the numerous designs for gateways is the original by
Jones of the little doorway which was once at Beaufort House, Chelsea,
but is now at Chiswick, and an unnamed example illustrated in Fig.
241. By the same master, in all probability, are the splendid piers
at Coleshill, in Berkshire (Fig. 242). Next in order of date are the
gate-piers at Thorpe Hall, in Northamptonshire, by John Webb, shown
in Fig. 50, and shortly after them is the fine series at Hamstead
Marshall, of which some have already been illustrated in Figs. 110,
111. These bring us down to the time of Wren, and at Hampton Court is
the lordly pier shown in Fig. 244. At St John’s College, Cambridge, the
piers shown in Fig. 243 form part of the bridge built between 1696 and
1712. They perpetuate to some extent the feeling of Tudor work in the
rose, the portcullis, and the heraldic animals on their summits. All
the large houses of the early eighteenth century, and many of the
small ones, had noteworthy gates and gate-piers. There are hundreds of
examples up and down the country, and that at Burley-on-the-Hill, near
Oakham (Fig. 245), is typical of the larger kind. This treatment, with
lofty stone piers and iron gates of more or less elaborate design, is
more frequent than that adopted at Ince Blundell Hall, in Lancashire,
where an archway forms the main entrance, and is flanked on each side
by a length of wall containing gates for foot traffic (Fig. 246).
Many smaller examples might be cited, but their general effect can
be gathered from the three illustrations in Figs. 247, 249, and 250,
one of which is at a house at Castor, in Northamptonshire, another
at a little house in Barrow Gurney, Somersetshire, and the third at
one of the delightful houses in the Close at Salisbury. They are all
quite unpretentious, but they impart a pleasant amount of interest and
a certain degree of dignity to the houses which they serve. Another
simple example is taken from a derelict house at Rundhurst, in Sussex
(Fig. 248), and at Uffington, in Lincolnshire, is the more important
example in Fig. 251, one of a pair of stone piers which support some
good iron gates, through which, standing on the village road, a glimpse
of the hall gardens can be obtained.
[Illustration: FIG. 249.--Gateway at Barrow Gurney, Somerset.]
[Illustration: FIG. 250.--Gateway in the Close, Salisbury.]
[Illustration: FIG. 251.--Gate-Pier at Uffington, near
Stamford.
J. A. Gotch, _del._]
The tendency being, as already pointed out, towards a plain treatment
of the exterior, largely owing to the substitution of sash-windows
for mullioned, some amount of relief was imparted by a rich treatment
of the principal door, but there came a time when even this modicum
of decoration was abandoned, and the exterior of a house was dealt
with on purely utilitarian principles, the necessary openings being
provided, but devoid of any attempt at ornament. But before this last
stage of imaginative poverty, or inertia maybe, was reached, doorways
were provided which gave a touch of fancy to an otherwise bald front.
The form of circular hood, supported by carved brackets and filled with
a fluted cove, usually described as a shell, is a common feature of
the work of the end of the seventeenth century and twenty years later.
An example from Castle Combe, in Wiltshire, is shown in Fig. 252. The
centre from which the flutings radiate is here occupied by a small
shield of arms. There is a rather plainer rendering of the same idea
at Oundle, in Northamptonshire (Fig. 253). Another rich form of hood,
with straight outlines, may still be found in out-of-the-way streets
and lanes in London, where the necessity for radical changes has not
yet arisen. A simple form of this idea is shown in Fig. 257, where
one hood covers two contiguous doorways. A treatment very commonly
adopted was that shown in the example from York (Fig. 255), where
the circular-headed doorway is covered with a pediment supported by
pilasters; the semicircular space over the door is filled with a
fanlight divided by thick bars. In this case the bars are simple in
form, but they were often curved into curious patterns, surprising
in their variety, and suggesting that the designers of the time had
no lack of ingenuity had circumstances allowed them to display it.
The extinguisher to the left of the doorway should be noted. It is a
reminder of the times when there was no public lighting of the streets,
when indeed the casual illumination from shops and from houses, private
and public, was of the feeblest, and citizens had to find their way
home through thoroughfares where no scavenger was employed, by the
light of torches, which they extinguished as they entered their
houses.[82]
[Illustration: FIG. 252.--DOORWAY AT CASTLE COMBE,
WILTSHIRE.]
[Illustration: FIG. 253.--Doorway at Oundle, Northamptonshire.]
[Illustration: FIG. 254.--Doorway in Mark Lane, London.]
[Illustration: FIG. 255.--A Doorway in York.]
[Illustration: FIG. 256.--Doorways at Norwich.]
[Illustration: FIG. 257.--Nos. 16 and 18 Fournier Street,
London.]
[Illustration: FIG. 258.--Door, 22 Buckingham Street, Strand.]
Of the same type as the last is the doorway at No. 33 Mark Lane,
London (Fig. 254), but it is far more elaborate, and served as the
entrance to one of the fine private houses which lined Mark Lane, but
which now are utilised as offices, if by chance they have escaped the
wholesale demolition and rebuilding which expanding commerce entails.
Another good example is to be seen in Buckingham Street, Strand (Fig.
258). Of later date is the double porch at Norwich (Fig. 256), which is
simple and dignified, and will so remain as long as the two occupants
are of the same mind as to the colour it should be painted. It will
be noticed that in all these examples the doorway is the only feature
of interest; the surrounding work is quite plain. At the Stationers’
Hall, in London (Fig. 259), we get a still later treatment, dating from
the year 1800, when Robert Mylne cased the building with stone. The
iron standards were probably devised to carry lamps, which shed enough
light to help incomers up the steps; but all things are relative, and
doubtless, at the time, two oil lamps were considered a brilliant
illumination.
[Illustration: FIG. 259.--Doorway at Stationers’ Hall, London.]
[Illustration: FIG. 260.--House at Yarmouth.]
Here and there in old towns are to be found two-storied porches
projecting from the face of a house like that at Yarmouth (Fig. 260),
which is the central feature of a front rather more elaborately
treated than usual. In this case the porch stands on its own ground,
but occasionally porches were built over part of the pavement, and
the public traffic passed through them. It would be impossible for a
private owner to take such liberty in the present day, when plans have
to be submitted to the local council; but in those far-off times men
of influence did many things which nobody was bold enough to stop; and
while heartily agreeing that private interests must be subordinated to
public, we may, perhaps, indulge in feelings of secret gratification
that among our ancestors individuality had more play than is possible
in these well ordered times. Another picturesque but, strictly
speaking, intolerable effort at design is to be seen at The Martins,
Chipping Campden (Fig. 261). The great truncated corner pilaster, the
porch with its cornice running into the window, can be defended on no
grounds save that there they are. But so imperfect is our nature that
this bit of haphazard composition gives more pleasure than many a more
correct attempt at design; a pleasure allied, perhaps, to that cynical
satisfaction we experience in watching shortcomings in our friends from
which we ourselves are free.
The ironwork of the early eighteenth century is one of its most
remarkable productions. In England ironwork design seems to have burst
suddenly into full splendour, without any gradual preparation. There
are no elaborate specimens to be found throughout the seventeenth
century until its close, nor are there any drawings by Thorpe,
Smithson, Jones, or Webb, which lead one to suppose that they treated
ironwork in any but the simplest way. But with the advent in 1689 of
Jean Tijou, a native of France, who was probably brought over from
the Netherlands by Queen Mary, consort of William III., the whole
aspect was changed, and a school of clever blacksmiths grew up who
filled the country, and more especially London and its suburbs, with
beautiful bits of design in gates, fences, sign-boards, mace-holders
in churches, balustrades of staircases, screens, and other objects
where iron could be employed. Their work is marked by great judgment
in varying the sizes of the iron bars and scrolls, by the variety and
elaboration of the design, and by the judicious introduction of thin
sheet iron, hammered and modelled into foliage or some heraldic device.
The craftsmen seem to have known exactly how to handle their material
so as to combine strength with lightness, vigour with delicacy, the
open effect of scroll-work with the solid effect of foliage. The due
mixture of the curved line with the straight, the growth of one from
the other, the repetition of straight lines in suitable positions,
all seem to have come to them by intuition which seldom erred. Of the
immense amount of work which still survives, the proportion of weak,
unmeaning, or ill-adapted design is infinitesimal. Something, no doubt,
they owed to France, but they worked largely on their own lines, and
established a school of design which is essentially English.
[Illustration: FIG. 261.--The Martins, Chipping Campden, 1714.]
[Illustration: FIG. 262.--Part of Iron Screen, Hampton Court
Palace.]
[Illustration: FIG. 263.--Iron Gateway, Stoneleigh Abbey,
Warwickshire.]
Tijou worked for Queen Mary at Hampton Court, where he placed some of
the richest screens and gates which the country can boast. A portion
of his work is illustrated in Fig. 262. He also executed some splendid
ironwork at Chatsworth, Burghley, and St Paul’s, London. The balustrade
to the king’s staircase at Hampton Court (Fig. 264) may also in all
probability be assigned to him. He must have had assistants, among whom
Huntingdon Shaw, of Nottingham, has been reckoned the chief, and indeed
the actual work on the screens at Hampton Court has been claimed as
his; but recent investigations show conclusively that the claim cannot
be sustained.[83] Another of Tijou’s assistants was Robert Bakewell,
who settled in Derby and was widely employed in the Midlands. To him,
perhaps, we owe the gates at Stoneleigh Abbey, illustrated in Fig. 263,
although tradition says that these were brought here from Watergate, a
dismantled mansion beyond Southam.[84] The ironwork in and round London
may be largely attributed to Thomas Robinson and his successors, and
it would appear that skilful smiths settled in different centres in
England, round which they influenced the work over a wide area. Bristol
was the home of such a man, William Edney by name, and that he was an
accomplished craftsman is proved by the magnificent gates at St Mary
Redcliffe (Fig. 265), which date from 1710.
[Illustration: FIG. 264.--Balustrade to the King’s Staircase,
Hampton Court.]
[Illustration: FIG. 265.--IRON GATES AT ST MARY REDCLIFFE,
BRISTOL.]
[Illustration: FIG. 266.--Gateway formerly at Quenby Hall,
Leicestershire.
Museum, Leicester.]
Examples without number could be produced of English ironwork of this
period, but space forbids any but a few specimens being cited. There
was a splendid gateway at Quenby Hall, Leicestershire, with elaborate
iron piers, now in front of the museum at Leicester (Fig. 266).[85]
The four examples shown in Figs. 268–271 are of far simpler design,
but they are worth careful study, and are typical of the ordinary work
of the time. In the gate from Acton the solid work is aptly introduced
and gives it richness and importance; the others exhibit a judicious
combination of simplicity and richness which is quite admirable. Indeed
the ironwork of the early part of the eighteenth century has never been
bettered either in design or execution.
[Illustration: FIG. 267.--Lead Cistern in the possession of Mr
L. A. Shuffrey.]
[Illustration: FIG. 268.--Gate at Elm Hall, Snaresbrook.
A. H. Ough, _del._]
[Illustration: FIG. 269.--Gate at Acton, now demolished.
Launcelot Fedder, _del._]
[Illustration: FIG. 270.--Gate at Lawn House, Woodford Road, London.
A. H. Ough, _del._]
[Illustration: FIG. 271.--Gate at Romford Road, Stratford,
near London.
G. G. Poston, _del._]
[Illustration: FIG. 272.--Lead Rain-Water Head, High Street,
Birmingham.]
[Illustration: FIG. 273.--Lead Rain-Water Head at the
Aylesford Hotel, Warwick.]
Ornamental leadwork was a characteristic feature of English houses as
early as the time of Elizabeth, and many beautiful rain-water heads
of that period still survive. They had worthy successors all through
the seventeenth century and well into the eighteenth. Some of the
rain-water heads at St John’s College, Oxford, of the time of Charles
I., are splendid things of their kind. Many houses built during the
next hundred years retain fine examples of similar features (Fig.
272), and indeed, as long as it was necessary to fashion such things
by hand, the craftsman imparted character to his work even if it
was of a simple and unobtrusive kind (Fig. 273); but with the advent of
the speculative builder, the number of such things required, and the
necessity of a rapid and cheap supply, led to more expeditious methods,
and with the advent of cast-iron heads a general level of dullness
and monotony was reached. The scope of lead ornament was necessarily
restricted, it was only here and there that it was applicable; the
other direction in which it was largely used was in cisterns or
troughs of which examples occasionally occur, but lead being always a
marketable commodity, most of these objects, when once out of use, were
sold for melting and re-use. Some good examples dated 1728, 1714 and
1755 are shown in Figs. 267, 274.
[Illustration: FIG. 274.--Two Examples of Lead Cisterns.]
[Illustration: FIG. 275.--THE STAIRCASE, KING’S WESTON,
GLOUCESTERSHIRE.]
The English craftsman has always been able to do good work when he has
had the opportunity. Even during the period when house design may be
held to be void of interest, there are numberless examples of fittings,
or furniture, or household articles which show his skill, and if a free
and reasonable view of design is maintained, there is every prospect of
his doing as good work in the future as he has done in the past.
XI
INTERNAL FEATURES (EIGHTEENTH CENTURY)
The internal decoration of houses of the seventeenth century has
already been described, and incidentally a considerable number of
examples have been given of the treatment of later houses; but it
is desirable to treat the subject a little more fully than has been
possible in former chapters.
In entering an eighteenth-century house the visitor found himself
in a large vestibule or hall--not the old-fashioned hall of the
early seventeenth century, which was itself one of the principal
living-rooms, but a hall which was merely a vestibule or ante-room
leading to the living-rooms. Sometimes it had a fireplace, but
sometimes not; in either case it was not regarded as a room for
constant use. In houses of the middle size it contained the staircase,
and the same held good in many of larger size; but in the largest the
hall was frequently the most striking apartment in the house, as for
instance at Houghton (Fig. 174) and Prior Park (Fig. 182).
The staircases were always handsomely treated. As a rule they were of
wood, but a few instances occur of marble steps and balustrades, and
of stone steps with iron balustrades. The typical English staircase
is of wood, with turned wood balusters. For a short time during the
seventeenth century foliated balustrades had been the fashion (see
Figs. 80–82), but towards its close the turned baluster reasserted
itself. Massive handrails and solid strings were still retained, as
in the example from the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (Fig. 277); and many
examples of simple staircases of this type are to be found in the
Temple, London, and the surrounding neighbourhood.
An important development in design occurred when the old-fashioned
solid string was abandoned, and the balusters rested upon the steps
themselves. This change took place about the beginning of the
eighteenth century, and there is an early example at King’s Weston,
in Gloucestershire (Fig. 275). The steps are very deep from back to
front, so much so that each step overlaps the second one above it.
The nosings are carried along the end of every step and returned
back to the wall under the step above; the bottom edge of this is
finished with a moulding which returns and rests on the nosing of the
step below. A very similar treatment is adopted at Boughton House,
in Northamptonshire (Fig. 276), but here the edge of the soffit has
a moulding like the nosing, but reversed: the junction of the two is
masked by a wood block. These blocks are all painted with arms of the
Montagus and their alliances, which prompted Horace Walpole to inquire
whether the chief staircase at Boughton was intended for the “descent
of the Montagus.” Another point to be noticed in the King’s Weston
example is that the two bottom steps are carried out sideways beyond
the others and rounded off with a bold sweep, and that the handrail
is wreathed round instead of finishing against a large newel. This
is a treatment which only became possible on the abandonment of the
old-fashioned newels and strings.
[Illustration: FIG. 276.--Staircase at Boughton House,
Northamptonshire.
J. A. Gotch, _del._]
[Illustration: FIG. 277.--Staircase, Ashmolean, Oxford.]
[Illustration: FIG. 278.--Staircase in a House in Queen
Street, Salisbury.]
[Illustration: FIG. 279.--Staircase at Melton Constable,
Norfolk.]
A variation of the treatment adopted at Boughton may be seen in an old
house in Salisbury (Fig. 278), where the nosings are still carried back
some distance, but are supported by carved brackets. It will be seen
that the old stout newels have been replaced by small columns slightly
larger than the balusters, and that the handrail is continuous, being
bent upwards in a ramp where it has suddenly to attain a higher level.
It is curved at the bottom in a large sweep similar to those at Kings
Weston. At Melton Constable (Fig. 279) the same ideas are adopted, but
here the risers of the stairs are panelled. It is clear from this
that no stair carpets were contemplated, a point which is emphasised
elsewhere by the fact that the landings and treads were often inlaid
with different woods cut into patterns. Most of the staircases of the
time were broad and of easy gradient, the balusters were short, and
were either turned in graceful outlines or were twisted as at Melton
Constable. At Denham Place, in Buckinghamshire (Fig. 280), the effect
is quite satisfactory, although the stairs are narrower and steeper
than usual, and the balusters are longer. This effect is obtained by
the care bestowed upon the proportion and outline of the balusters.
[Illustration: FIG. 280.--Staircase at Denham Place,
Buckinghamshire.]
Towards the close of the eighteenth century another form of staircase
came into vogue. This consisted of a continuous flight of stone
steps, often oval in plan, leading from floor to floor in one sweep.
Each step rested on that below, and one of its ends was built into the
wall, thereby obviating the necessity of any expedient for supporting
the other end. By this means a free space was obtained beneath the
staircase. The general effect, although light and sometimes graceful,
was a little cold and meagre; but it was quite in character with the
rather severe schemes of decoration prevalent at the time (Fig. 281).
[Illustration: FIG. 281.--Staircase at No. 35 Lincoln’s Inn
Fields.]
In the larger houses much attention was bestowed upon the doorways:
there is a good example at Godmersham Park, in Kent (Fig. 282), where
the broken pediment affords space for the central feature of a design
modelled in high relief. As here, so in many other instances, the door
is of mahogany and the surrounding woodwork is painted white. The
example from Honington Hall, in Warwickshire (Fig. 283), not only shows
an important doorway, but also the domed and coffered ceiling of a
lofty room, as well as walls with panels of plaster, and large pendants
of fruit and birds in the manner of Grinling Gibbons. In houses of the
early part of the eighteenth century there was often one room occupying
two stories in height; sometimes it was the hall, sometimes, as in this
case, a saloon or drawing-room.
[Illustration: FIG. 282.--Doorway at Godmersham Park, Kent.]
[Illustration: FIG. 283.--HONINGTON HALL,
WARWICKSHIRE.]
In smaller houses were such doorways as that at Bourdon House, London
(Fig. 284), where there is carving enough to impart interest to the
design without over-weighting it; and at Seckford Hall, in Suffolk,
is a simple but effective treatment (Fig. 285) which is well within
the compass of an ordinary joiner. A great variety of effect can be
obtained at small cost by dint of a little thought and a determination
not to be too much bound by correct precedents. It is one of the
failings of the ordinary eighteenth-century designer that he feared to
depart from the patterns published in books.
[Illustration: FIG. 284.--Doorway at Bourdon House, Mayfair,
London.]
Very great changes in the manner of treating the walls of a room
occurred during the course of the century. At first they were panelled
with wood--not with the small panels of Jacobean times, but with large
panels surrounded by bold mouldings, such as those at Denham Place
(Fig. 287). Here the mouldings are enriched with carving, which adds
considerable richness, but as a rule the mouldings were plain; various
examples have already been given in Figs. 122, 126, 135, 139. There
was usually a low dado with long horizontal panels, and above the dado
rail were lofty vertical panels reaching up to a massive cornice. The
effect is always simple and dignified, whether the material is oak
or painted deal. Of course the panels very much restrict the freedom
of arrangement of pictures, but in those days pictures were not so
plentiful as they became later, prints were few, and so were the
amateur artists who bestow the fruit of their elegant leisure upon
their friends. The panels therefore hampered nobody, and they were
in themselves a sufficient decoration. Family portraits or notable
pictures were sometimes framed into them as part of the scheme.
[Illustration: FIG. 285.--Head of a Doorway, Seckford Hall,
Suffolk.]
[Illustration: FIG. 286.--Panelling in the Audit Room, Boughton House,
Northamptonshire.]
[Illustration: FIG. 287.--THE LIBRARY, DENHAM PLACE,
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.]
[Illustration: FIG. 288.--STONELEIGH ABBEY,
WARWICKSHIRE. THE SALOON, BY SMITH OF WARWICK.]
[Illustration: FIG. 289.--House in Queen Square, Bath.]
The backgrounds of engravings published during the first half of
the eighteenth century often show these large panels, as well as
sash-windows with stout bars. They seem to harmonise with the flowing
wigs, the wide coat skirts and knee-breeches of the actors in the
incidents which the prints are intended to record.