, there an
animal's."[69] Evidently Vitruvius did not approve of grotesques, and
his contemporary criticism is most valuable and amusing.

In the Louis Quatorze period, a species of vegetable grotesque was the
fashion, from which we suffer even now, and it deserves censure.
Leaves and flowers of different plants were made to grow from the same
stem, as only artificial flowers could do. The Greeks introduced into
their decorations sprays and wreaths of bay, olive, oak, ivy, and
vine, with their fruits; which are exquisitely composed and carefully
studied from nature. It is true that they sometimes invented flowers
of different shapes, following each other on the same stem, and
untrammelled by any natural laws. These classical freaks of fancy are
so graceful that their want of truth does not shock us, but they are
more safely copied than imitated.

The Renaissance was particularly marked in Spain and Portugal by the
embroideries which the latter drew from their Indian possessions in
Goa, whilst we in England were sedulously thrusting from our shores
any beautiful Indian textiles that we imagined could injure our own
home manufactures. It was, consequently, the worst phase of needlework
with us, while Spanish and Portuguese embroideries of the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries are especially fine, their designs being
European, and their needlework Oriental. Their Renaissance, which went
by the name of the Plateresque, is a style apart. (Pl. 9.) The reason
of its name is that it seems to have been originally intended for, and
is best suited to, the shapes and decorations of gold and silver
plate. It is extremely rich and ornate; not so appropriate to
architecture as to the smaller arts, and wanting, perhaps, the
simplicity which gives dignity. The style called Louis Quatorze
following on the Renaissance in Germany, England, Spain, Italy, and
France, assumed in each of these countries distinguishing
characteristics, into which we have not time to enter now. In this
style France took the lead and appropriated it, and rightly named it
after the magnificent monarch who fostered it. This was a splendid
era; and its furniture and wall decorations, dress, plate, and books
shine in all the fertile richness and grace of French artistic
ingenuity.[70] The new style asserted itself everywhere, and
remodelled every art; but the long reign of Louis Quatorze gave the
fashion time to wane and change. Under Louis XV. the defects increa