s. This is
one example among many of the foreign origin of the arts in Russia.
But at all events let it be admitted that the materials used, as
well as the ideas often brought to bear, are local or national. For
example, the grandest of all architectural conceptions, the idea
of a dome, is here glorified in true Russian or Oriental manner,
not so much by magnitude of proportion as by decorative splendour,
heightened to the utmost by a surface of burnished gold. Then the
four porticos which terminate each end of the Greek cross with
stately columns and entablatures of granite from Finland, albeit
in design mere commonplace complications, are wholly national in
the material used. I do not now stop to mention the large and bold
reliefs in bronze, which though French in design were, I believe,
cast in St. Petersburg: indeed here, as in Munich, the government
makes that liberal provision which only governments can make, for
noble but unremunerative art. The great dome is said to be sustained
by iron; indeed the science of construction brought to bear is great,
yet again it must be acknowledged that whether the material be
iron, bronze, or stone, the art, the skill, and even the commercial
capital, are not Russian but foreign, and often English. Russian
workmen, however, are employed as mechanics or machines, partly
because in copyism and mechanism Russian artisans cannot throughout
Europe be surpassed. When I got to St. Petersburg I could scarcely
believe the statement to be true that the "English Magazine" and
not any Russian factory had executed the eight stupendous malachite
pillars within the church, weighing about 34,000 pounds and costing
L2,500 sterling. Yet while the organization might be English, the
operatives were Russians. The unsurpassed malachite pillars combine
in the grand altar-screen with columns of lapis-lazuli: the latter
are said to have cost per pair L12,000 sterling. I need scarcely
observe that this parade of precious metals partakes more of barbaric
magnificence than of artistic taste; indeed these columns of malachite
and lapis-lazuli, which to the eye present themselves as solid and
honest, have been built up as incrustations on hollow cast-iron
tubes. Thus hollow are the most precious arts of Russia. Justice,
however, demands that I should speak hereafter in fair appreciation
of the interiors of Russian churches, whereof the Cathedral of
St. Isaac is among the chief. Nevertheless, material rather