n outline, and are evidently much relied upon as giving
play to the sky-line. Indeed, for variety of form and piquancy of
detail the German roofs are the most successful of the middle ages.
The spires, as will have been easily gathered from the descriptions of
those at Strasburg, Cologne, &c., became extremely elaborate, and were
constructed in many cases entirely of open tracery.

[Illustration: FIG. 47.--WESTERN DOORWAY OF CHURCH AT THANN. (14TH
CENTURY.)]

[Illustration: FIG. 48.--CHURCH OF ST. CATHERINE AT OPPENHEIM. (1262
TO 1439.)]

_Openings._

Openings are, on the whole, treated very much as the French treated
them. A good example is the western doorway at Thann (Fig. 47); but
the use of double tracery in the windows in late examples is
characteristic. Sometimes a partial screen of outside tracery is
employed in other features besides windows, as may be seen by the very
elegant doorway of St. Sebald's Church at Nuremberg, which we have
illustrated (Fig. 49).

_Ornaments._

The ornaments of German Gothic are often profuse, but rarely quite
happy. Sculpture, often of a high class, carving of every sort,
tracery, and panelling, are largely employed; but with a hardness and
a tendency to cover all surfaces with a profusion of weak imitations
of tracery that disfigures much of the masonry. The tracery became
towards the latter part of the time intricate and unmeaning, and the
interpenetrating mouldings already described, though of course
intended to be ornamental, are more perplexing and confusing than
pleasing: the carving exaggerates the natural markings of the foliage
represented, and being thin, and very boldly undercut, resembles
leaves beaten out in metal, rather than foliage happily and easily
imitated in stone, which is what good architectural carving should be.

The use of coloured building materials and of inlays and mosaics does
not prevail to any great extent in Germany, though stained glass is
often to be found and coloured wall decoration occasionally.

[Illustration: FIG. 49.--ST. SEBALD'S CHURCH AT NUREMBERG. THE
BRIDE'S DOORWAY. (1303-1377.)]

_Construction and Design._

The marked peculiarities of construction by which the German Gothic
buildings are most distinguished, are the prevalent high-pitched
roofs, the vaulting with aisle vaults carried to the same height as in
the centre, and the employment in certain districts of brick to the
exclusion of stone,