lose of the eighteenth,
form the subject of this little volume. I have endeavoured to adopt as
free and simple a mode of treatment as is compatible with the accurate
statement of at least the outlines of so very technical a subject.

Though it is to be hoped that many professional students of
architecture will find this hand-book serviceable to them in their
elementary studies, it has been my principal endeavour to adapt it to
the requirements of those who are preparing for the professional
pursuit of the sister arts, and of that large and happily increasing
number of students who pursue the fine arts as a necessary part of a
complete liberal education, and who know that a solid and
comprehensive acquaintance with art, especially if joined to some
skill in the use of the pencil, the brush, the modelling tool, or the
etching needle, will open sources of pleasure and interest of the most
refined description.

The broad facts of all art history; the principles which underlie each
of the fine arts; and the most precious or most noteworthy examples of
each, ought to be familiar to every art student, whatever special
branch he may follow. Beyond these limits I have not attempted to
carry this account of Gothic and Renaissance architecture; within them
I have endeavoured to make the work as complete as the space at my
disposal permitted.

Some portions of the text formed part of two courses of lectures
delivered before the students of the School of Military Engineering at
Chatham, and are introduced here by the kind permission of Sir John
Stokes. Many of the descriptive and critical remarks are transcripts
of notes made by myself, almost under the shadow of the buildings to
which they refer. It would, however, have been impossible to give a
condensed view of so extended a subject had not every part of it been
treated at much greater length by previous writers. The number and
variety of the books consulted renders it impossible to make any other
acknowledgment here than this general recognition of my indebtedness
to their authors.

T. R. S.

[Illustration: {STAINED GLASS FROM CHARTRES CATHEDRAL.}]

CONTENTS.

PAGE

ILLUSTRATED GLOSSARY OF TECHNICAL WORDS. xv to xxxix

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION. 1

CHAPTER