from the forest of flying buttresses;
and the vaulting displays some resemblance to our English fan-vaulting
in general idea.

German churches include some specimens of unusual disposition or form,
as for example the Church of St. Gereon at Cologne, with an oval
choir, and one or two double churches, one of the most curious being
the one at Schwartz-Rheindorff, of which we give a section and view.
(Figs. 44, 45.)

In their doorways and porches the German architects are often very
happy. Our illustration (Fig. 47) of one of the portals of the church
at Thann may be taken as giving a good idea of the amount of rich
ornament often concentrated here: it displays a wealth of decorative
sculpture, which was one of the great merits of the German architects.

[Illustration: FIG. 44.--DOUBLE CHURCH AT SCHWARTZ-RHEINDORFF.
SECTION. (1158.)]

The latest development of Gothic in Germany, of which the Church of
St. Catherine at Oppenheim (Fig. 48) is a specimen, was marked (just
as late French was by flamboyant tracery, and late English by
fan-vaulting) by a peculiarity in the treatment of mouldings by which
they were robbed of almost all their grace and beauty, while the
execution of them became a kind of masonic puzzle. Two or more groups
of mouldings were supposed to coexist in the same stone, and sometimes
a part of one group, sometimes a part of the other group, became
visible at the surface. The name given to this eccentric development
is interpenetration.

[Illustration: FIG. 45.--DOUBLE CHURCH AT SCHWARTZ-RHEINDORFF.
(A.D. 1158.)]

Secular architecture in Germany, though not carried to such a pitch of
perfection as in Belgium, was by no means overlooked; but the examples
are not numerous. In some of the older cities, such as Prague,
Nuremberg, and Frankfort, much picturesque domestic architecture
abounds, most of it of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and even
later, and all full of piquancy and beauty. In North Germany, where
there is a large tract of country in which building stone is scarce, a
style of brick architecture was developed, which was applied to all
sorts of purposes with great success. The most remarkable of these
brick buildings are the large dwelling-houses, with facades ornamented
by brick tracery and panelling, to be found in Eastern Prussia,
together with some town halls and similar buildings.

GERMANY.--ANALYSIS OF BUILDINGS.

_Plan._

The points of difference betwee