US. V. MAY 4, 1912.]
NOTES AND QUERIES.
359
Jlofcs on ISooks.
^1 History of Architectural Development. By F. M.
Simpson. Vol. III. (Longmans & Co.) THE third volume of Prof. Simpson's important work, which has been appeai-ing during the last ten years, is devoted to the Renaissance in Italy, France, and England, and manifests the same diligent and conscientious research and wide command of material as characterized the pre- vious volumes, which dealt with the Ancient and Mediaeval departments of the subject. It is adorned with no fewer than 268 illustrations, embracing plans, sections, and photographic reproductions of the utmost excellence, which make the book beautiful as well as instructive. Especially deserving of commendation are the delightful sketches of old English country-houses. We learn with some surprise that they were often designed by their owners, and not by any pro- fessional architect. The first, indeed, to call himself by that name was John Shute in 1563, the designers of buildings being generally content to be known as " surveyors " in Elizabethan and Jacobean times. The earliest Renaissance monu- ments in England are the tombs of Henry VII. and his mother, which were erected in West- minster Abbey by an Italian, Pietro Torrigiano, in 1512. As bearing on a recent discussion in
- N. & Q.,' it is interesting to note that sash windows,
as distinct from mullioned casements, are essen- tially an English feature, and came into vogue about the middle of the seventeenth century.
Some of Prof. Simpson's obiter dicta are natter- ing to our insular pride. Having visited the principal cities of Europe, he still thinks that the view of St. Martin's Church obtained from the foot of Ludgate Hill, with the great dome of St. Paul's rising in the background, is " one of the finest architectural pictures in the world ; and he maintains that nowhere can a more striking colour- effect be seen than in the Strand or beyond Westminster Abbey when the sun is setting on a November afternoon.
The phrase " vernacular work " in the sense of native or indigenous a favourite expression of the author's strikes us as at least unusual. The citation of a work (p. 236) as ' De Quinque C'olumnarum ' offends by its ungrammatical con- ciseness ; a text of Scripture is misquoted (p. 298) ; and " Tijon" in the index is a misprint for Tijou. Prof. Simpson's work will win a distinguished place for itself beside the existing books on Renaissance Architecture in England by Messrs. Blomfield, Gotch, Papworth, and C. H. Moore.
4 Concordance of all Written La ices concerning
Lo*ds of Mannors, theire Free Tenantes, awl
Copieholders. By William Barlee ; addressed
bv him to the High Sheriff of Essex in 1578.
(State Papers, Domestic Series, Eliz., vol. cxxiii.
No 14.) With Biographical Preface by the
Deputy Registrar of the Society. (Manorial
Society, 1, Mitre Court Buildings, Temple.)
WILLIAM BARLEE was evidently a lawyer, who,
having fallen on evil times, sought to retrieve
his fortunes by writing a book on manorial law.
It was to have run to forty chapters, the titles
of which he gives us, while one. \ve may suppose,
\vas finished. The MS. here published consist?
of 141 " notes " belonging to that first chapter
bllowed by several pages of general observations
ipon justice and religion, to which is appended a
etter to Gabriel Poyntz his kinsman and High
Sheriff of Essex setting forth the writer's condi-
ion and requirements. Last of all comes the
- able of chapter-headings. The whole is inter-
spersed with Latin " tags " of a moral character.
So far as manorial law is concerned, there is hus little in the way of directly imparted infprma-
- ion, though it is plain that the writer was himself
well informed upon his subject. One or two of the 144 " annotations " may be given as examples of his method :
" 10. Yt is proved that Ignorance of la we exist eth not: yet Ignorantes are to bee favored."
" 16. Yt ys proved that Reasonable Customes w h runne with landes doo bynde the Kynge & Quene : & that lawe will not suffer suche Dustomes to bee diffeted or extinguished."
" 19. Yt ys proved that omissions of townes n conveyances made of manors maye hurte'the purchasers."
" 56. Yt ys proved that the Kynge or Quene maye punishe often and by sondrie meanes even, 'or one offence."
"62. Yt ys shewed what Companies younge ords of manors sholde resorte unto : and what 'ellowshippes owght to bee flyen from : and how men owght to applie theire Imagynations."
For the rest we get William Barlee talking as- a sort of dramatis persona. He is a little crazed* one gathers, by his misfortunes, which seem to- tiave been in considerable part his own fault, so- that in his general discourse he wanders here, there, and everywhere and in his letter to the Sheriff he allows himself to indulge in unmanly whining, The difficulties in regard to justice which he hopes to solve by means of his ' Concordance ' arise largely from religious contentions, in which he finds that " manye lawles protestantes bee as grievous offenders agaynst god as papistes were." " I purpose," says he, " breifelie to tell them howe thei maye decentlie orderlie and lawf ullie sytte : trie : and determyne manye con- troversies towchinge religion withowt uncharitable- skoldinges tumultuous uprores or anye unsemelie- defasinges of o r Englishe lawes."
This purpose, so far as we know, was not carried out ; nor is Mr. A. L. Hardy, who gives us in the Biographical Preface all that is now known about Barlee, able to tell us whether Mr. Gabriel Poyntz took pity on his kinsman? and on the " eight small children, daylie crying after me for succour." Nowadays we fear the- length of his supplication would of itself have told against him ; but in those times people were more tolerant of prolixity.
James Hutchison Stirling : his Life and
By Amelia Hutchison Stirling. (Fisher Unwin. )
THE subject of this biography was born in 1820 and died in 1909. The best years of his man- hood thus belong to the mid-nineteenth century,, his chief work, ' The Secret of Hegel,' which cost him nine years' toil, having seen the light in 1865. Of this work Lord Haldane says in a short introductory appreciation that " no one since his time has got further, possibly no one as far," and that " it will hardly be superseded, for it has the quality of the work of genius."
