At this transition state, through which Venice passed so nobly, have we now arrived. We have collected our materials, and piled them up together, but just as all seems most propitious, le mouvement s'arrête, the materials will not coalesce. The brass and the silver, the iron and the gold, are all in the crucible, but there is no fusion, only a discordant clash.
Alas! there is no heat. We are not warmed, as yet, with any love for art. We are too much absorbed in the rapid accumulation of wealth, or the passing excitement of the hour, to attend to anything that is noble or honest or beautiful. And now that devastating war is sweeping through the land and clogging the wheels of progress, we are learning terrible lessons; but, with experience for our teacher, learning them well. Where war prevails, civilization for the time must stand still. Inter arma silent—artes. And so long as we consider art a marketable commodity, and consign it, like merchandise, to soulless builders, so long will it remain in hopeless embryo. Only by taking a personal interest in it can we hope to make it our own.
So much for what we have done. There is little to be proud of, and little, we hope, that will influence our future art. To which we now turn our attention.
To begin with, great public buildings will never form a distinguishing feature of American architecture. It is to be preeminently a domestic style. Herein shall we differ from the European nations, for in art, as in politics, the people are the rulers. It is discouraging, at first thought, to reflect that no such magnificent architectural combinations as those of the French capital can ever find place in an American city. They are grand, they are superb, these endless successions of palaces and gardens and triumphal arches, with groves and fountains all in perfect symmetry, and well-balanced vistas radiating in all directions; but they are the result of centuries of despotism—of the impoverishment of the many and the aggrandizement of the few. This, we hope, is not to be the fashion in America. It is true that the ground plan for the city of Washington exhibits a design analogous to the above, but we think it will be a long time before it exists elsewhere than on the map. The Greeks and Romans, we know, confined their efforts to public buildings, but that was their business. They served their Governments, but our Government serves us: the spirit of the age points in an opposite direction. Since we are so fond of the classic, why not have chariots for carriages, and triremes instead of gunboats and steamers?
Our real style will first appear in our residences and warehouses, in our banks and hotels and railroad depots. It sounds odd, but it is manifestly so to be. We are a commercial republic. Old European palaces and cathedrals are doubtless very grand, and—for those who need such things—most excellent models. But with us the private element already predominates; we only need to begin honestly, and the thing is half done.
Our national dread of Gothic, except it be for church purposes, should be done away with. The Gothic principle, we mean; the style we may follow or may not. But to be sincere and constructive, to build with a purpose, we must do as did the mediæval builders. In their hands, our daguerrean sky-lights and shot towers, our factory chimneys and signboards, would have become glorious objects, become useful objects. Their art did not confine itself to one day in seven; it permeated the commonest details of every-day life, because they were common. Hence they ennobled everything.
But the Romans, unfortunately, never had any shot towers, or hotels, or railroad depots, and so we think such things exceptions to the ordinary rules of architecture. But after all, perhaps, this is all the better for their future, as it leaves them comparatively untrammelled. In the matter of railroad depots, England has certainly stolen a march upon us, the large city stations in that rail-bound country being perfect Crystal Palaces in size and elegance, while those for the more rural places are often the most exquisite little villas, unapproachable in neatness and taste. In some parts of the Continent, the Swiss style has been pressed into this service with notable success.
In regard to fire-alarm towers, we rejoice to be able to make an exceptional remark. New York city has actually produced two or three of these of new and elegant shape, perfectly adapted to their purpose; and yet, so far as we know, not copied from anything else. Those in Sixth and Third avenues have a grace of outline that is really elegant, and show what we can accomplish if we only build what we want in a natural and appropriate way.
Nothing, however, is to exert a vaster influence on our style than the hotel. This 'institution,' as we have it, is comparatively unknown in Europe; beyond all nations are we a travelling and hotel-building people. Our hotels have not grown up with the scant traffic of the post chaise or diligence; they overleaped that feeble infancy, and started at once with the railroad and steamboat. Large, luxurious, and well appointed, they are usually the prominent buildings in all our large cities.
But as yet it is only their size and social importance that distinguishes them, not their architecture. The recipe for a first-class city house is simple: a vast square front of white, with ninety-six or a hundred and forty-four windows, as the case may be, all alike, and all equidistant. The variety afforded by this arrangement is much the same as that of an uncut sheet of postage stamps. In such large masses, a single color—white especially—is always disagreeable, unless treated with some variety of form. Brick, with stone dressings, will almost invariably produce a finer front than stone alone. But, after all, the most desirable kind of variety is that which seeks to express exteriorly the inner arrangement of the building, by giving some degree of prominence to the principal rooms. As to interior, our hotels neglect a grand opportunity in making no capital of the central space they generally enclose. This, instead of being abandoned to cats and ash barrels, might be made the feature of the establishment. Fancy such a court roofed over with glass,[23] and surrounded with light arcades of ironwork forming a continuous balcony at each story, arrange a garden in the centre with a fountain, and give the whole a sort of oriental treatment, and what a really elegant effect could be produced! The main entrance in this case would be, not on the street, but on one of the sides of this inner court, while an arched carriage way, to connect with the street, would render vehicles accessible under cover. The arcades, connecting all parts of the house, would take the place of halls and corridors, besides forming delightful promenades. Some few hotels could be named, in our large cities, which seem to have the germ of this idea, but we know no instance of its complete development.