otesque Gothic license. Most
of the modern buildings of Paris along the new Boulevards, around the
tower of St. Jacques, and wherever else the activity of the Emperor
has made itself felt in the improvements of the French capital, are by
masters or pupils of the _Romantique_ persuasion, and, in their design,
are distinguished by that tenderness of Love and earnestness of Thought
which are the fountains of living Art. One of the most remarkable
peculiarities of this school is, that it brings out of every mind which
studies and builds in it strong traits of individuality; so that every
work appears as if its author had something particular to express in
it,--something to say with especial grace and emphasis. The ordinary
decorations of windows and doors are not made in conventional shapes,
as of yore, but are highly idiosyncratic. The designer had a distinct
thought about this window or that door,--and when he would use his
thought to ornament these features, he idealized it with his Greek lines
to make it architectural, just as a poet attunes his thought to the
harmony and rhythm of verse. Antique prejudices, bent into rigid
conformity with antique rubrics, are often shocked at the strange
innovations of these new Dissenters from the faith of Palladio and
Philibert Delorme,--shocked at the naked humanity in the new works,
and would cover it with the conventional fig-leaves prescribed in the
homilies of Vignola. Laymen, accustomed to the cold architectural
proprieties of the old Renaissance, and habituated to the formalities
of the five orders, the prudish decorum of Italian window-dressings and
pediments and pilasters and scrolls, are apt to be surprised at such
strange dispositions of unprecedented and heretical features, that the
intention of the building in which they occur is at once patent to the
most casual observer, and the story of its destination told with the
eloquence of a poetical and monumental language. All great revolutions
have proved how hard it is to break through the crust of custom, and
this has been no exception to the rule; yet in justice it must be said
that every intelligent mind, every eye possessing the "gifted simplicity
of vision", to use a happy phrase of Hawthorne's, recognizes the truth
and wisdom there are in the blessed renovations of the _Romantique_,
and looks upon them as the sweeps of a besom clearing away the dust
and cobwebs which ages of prejudice have spread thickly around the
magn