identally struck in passing from
experiment on the one side, to affectation on the other; and it was so
far from ever becoming systematised, that I am aware of no type of
tracery for which a _less_ decided preference is shown in the buildings
in which it exists. The early pierced traceries are multitudinous and
perfect in their kind,--the late Flamboyant, luxuriant in detail, and
lavish in quantity,--but the perfect forms exist in comparatively few
churches, generally in portions of the church only, and are always
connected, and that closely, either with the massy forms out of which
they have emerged, or with the enervated types into which they are
instantly to degenerate.

Sec. XIII. Nor indeed are we to look upon them as in all points superior
to the more ancient examples. We have above conducted our reasoning
entirely on the supposition that a single aperture is given, which it is
the object to fill with glass, diminishing the power of the light as
little as possible. But there are many cases, as in triforium and
cloister lights, in which glazing is not required; in which, therefore,
the bars, if there be any, must have some more important function than
that of merely holding glass, and in which their actual use is to give
steadiness and _tone_, as it were, to the arches and walls above and
beside them; or to give the idea of protection to those who pass along
the triforium, and of seclusion to those who walk in the cloister. Much
thicker shafts, and more massy arches, may be properly employed in work
of this kind; and many groups of such tracery will be found resolvable
into true colonnades, with the arches in pairs, or in triple or
quadruple groups, and with small rosettes pierced above them for light.
All this is just as _right_ in its place, as the glass tracery is in its
own function, and often much more grand. But the same indulgence is not
to be shown to the affectations which succeeded the developed forms. Of
these there are three principal conditions: the Flamboyant of France,
the Stump tracery of Germany, and the Perpendicular of England.

Sec. XIV. Of these the first arose, by the most delicate and natural
transitions, out of the perfect school. It was an endeavor to introduce
more grace into its lines, and more change into its combinations; and
the aesthetic results are so beautiful, that for some time after the
right road had been left, the aberration was more to be admired than
regretted. The final con