and billiard room had cleared the space which the great hall now occupies.
The main object which Mr. Barry had in view was to give unity, and therefore grandeur, to a building, the effect of which was hardly commensurate with its size. It will be seen by the plan that he built the great entrance tower and corridor, completed the great hall, built the conservatory, and the Nineveh porch for the reception of some Assyrian marbles, presented by Mr. Layard to Sir John and Lady Charlotte Guest. The old kitchen he restored, uniting it to the main building, and remodelled or rebuilt the whole of the offices of the house. Besides this, he carried out several external works. The gardens were laid out with his usual care and interest, and with the objects which in such work he invariably sought. He also added lodges and other external works, besides the arch under the railway embankment for the main approach, which was executed after the death of Sir John Guest.
As the extent of his work on the main building is given by the plan, so its effect externally may be appreciated from the other illustration, which represents the south front, and so contains both old and new work. There can be no doubt that here, as elsewhere, that effect amounts to a re-creation. It is interesting, as being the best example of his treatment of a large Gothic house, and a proof that he could, on what seemed to him the proper occasions, value the variety and picturesqueness of grouping, on which so many authorities insist as the one thing needful.
Internally the plan shows, as in other cases, how perfectly real comfort and convenience can be united with much architectural grandeur. It should be observed that, unfortunately for the effect of the interior, the decorative portions of the work have not been fully carried out; and there is, therefore, observable in them some want of that beauty of finish and careful attention to minute detail, which is everywhere characteristic in his designs. With the exception of this drawback, he felt satisfied with a work, which he had carried out with great pleasure, and which is ordinarily considered as exemplifying most successfully his power to remodel existing buildings, with all the vigour and effect which belong to original designs.
Gawthorpe Hall.—The only other Gothic house of any importance, which Sir C. Barry had the opportunity of restoring and remodelling, was Gawthorpe Hall, near Burnley. The nature of the work here was different. He had to deal with a fine old house of the Elizabethan period, built about the year 1600, on the site of an older building, probably of the “Peel” or border-castle character, and presenting considerable variety of style in its different fronts. On one side it retained some of the stern and bare simplicity of the old border Peel; on another, the irregularity in position and size of the characteristic mullioned windows produced a quaint and picturesque effect; the principal front on the other side had greater regularity of fenestration, but was broken by two polygonal bays at the angles and one square bay
projecting from the centre front, in which a low-arched porch gave entrance to the house.