At Astwell, in Northamptonshire, there are the remains of some gates dated 1638 which were fitted into an old Gothic opening (Fig. [59]). They have traceried heads of a sort, in imitation of mediæval work, but the mouldings are allied more nearly to the ordinary work of the time, and the whole is an interesting example of the mixture of old and new ideas.
Swakeleys, near Uxbridge, which carries its date, 1638, on some of its rain-water heads, is a good example of late Jacobean work, in which the old treatment is more apparent than the new (Fig. [60]). It has mullioned windows and many gables, but the flat pediments which crown the latter are evidence of its having been built towards the close of the Jacobean period. The actual roofs behind the gables are quite steep and are so complicated that some difficulty was found in getting rid of the rain water. Part of it is taken in a trough in the thickness of the attic floor; and in order to lessen the number of down-pipes, much of it is collected into lead troughs which are carried along the inside of the attic walls to the few pipes which are provided. The result of these arrangements is that every heavy storm or fall of snow entails an inspection by the plumber in order to prevent the accumulation of debris and the risk of spoiled ceilings and walls. The whole of the cornices and pediments are worked in cement, and not, as might be supposed, in stone.
Fig. 60.—SWAKELEYS, near Uxbridge, 1638.
Fig. 61.—NEW WING AT SOMERSET HOUSE, 1638, by Webb.
From the Worcester College Collection.
Fig. 62.—The Chapel, Burford Priory, Oxfordshire.
If this house is compared with Webb’s drawing of a proposed new wing at Somerset House (Fig. [61]), made in the same year, 1638, the difference becomes strikingly apparent between the style of the ordinary designer and that of the learned student; and yet Swakeleys was less than twenty miles from London, where the new methods were being sedulously cultivated.