ir Thomas Deane, the architect of the new Museum at
Oxford, told me, as I passed through Oxford on my way here, that he
found that, owing to this cause alone, capitals of various design could
be executed cheaper than capitals of similar design (the amount of hand
labour in each being the same) by about 30 per cent.

33. Well, that is the first way, then, in which you will employ your
intellect well; and the simple observance of this plain rule of
political economy will effect a noble revolution in your architecture,
such as you cannot at present so much as conceive. Then the second way
in which we are to guard against waste is by setting our men to the
easiest, and therefore the quickest, work which will answer the purpose.
Marble, for instance, lasts quite as long as granite, and is much softer
to work; therefore, when you get hold of a good sculptor, give him
marble to carve--not granite.

34. That, you say, is obvious enough. Yes; but it is not so obvious how
much of your workmen's time you waste annually in making them cut glass,
after it has got hard, when you ought to make them mould it while it is
soft. It is not so obvious how much expense you waste in cutting
diamonds and rubies, which are the hardest things you can find, into
shapes that mean nothing, when the same men might be cutting sandstone
and freestone into shapes that meant something. It is not so obvious how
much of the artists' time in Italy you waste, by forcing them to make
wretched little pictures for you out of crumbs of stone glued together
at enormous cost, when the tenth of the time would make good and noble
pictures for you out of water-colour.

35. I could go on giving you almost numberless instances of this great
commercial mistake; but I should only weary and confuse you. I therefore
commend also this head of our subject to your own meditation, and
proceed to the last I named--the last I shall task your patience with
to-night. You know we are now considering how to apply our genius; and
we were to do it as economists, in three ways:--

To _various_ work;

To _easy_ work;

To _lasting_ work.

36. This lasting of the work, then, is our final question.

Many of you may perhaps remember that Michael Angelo was once commanded
by Pietro di Medici to mould a statue out of snow, and that he obeyed
the command.[6] I am glad, and we have all reason to be glad, that such
a fancy ever came into the mind of the unworthy prince, and for