WINDSOR CASTLE.* To review adequately such a book as Mr.
Hope's immense and minute study of Windsor Castle would need more space than
• Windsor Castle: an Architectural History. By W. H. St. John Hope_ London: Country We. [56 6s. not.] .can be given to it in these Columns. The work is a vast quarry to which future'writers will go for materials. Every possible kind of information, historical, documentary, archaeological, and architectural, is to be found here, together with plans, photographs, .and pictures. We are not surprised to learn that such a work as this has taken twelve years to complete. During the:lifetime of Prince Albert a collection of documents ; Was begun. These were placed in Mr. Hope's bands at the end of the reign of Queen Victoria. King Edward corn- inanded that the history should be written, and now in the reign of his successor. it has been finished. This work occupies two huge volumes, and in addition there is a portfolio of plane. In these last can be traced clearly the different structures which have risen one on top of another. By study of this work we realize that there is still a great deal left of the mediaeval palace, but unfortunately it has been so much overlaid by • inharmonious additions, and, worse still, by ugly and soulless rebuildings and restorations, that outwardly very little remains of the old Castle. St. George's Chapel has kept • its character best. Here the exquisite details of the old work are still to be seen, and it is to this part of the Castle enclosure that the visitor turns With relief—relief from the sham Gothic exteriors which appear like second-rate stage castles rather than realities. Considering that this work is published by Country Life, we are surprised that the photo- graphs of the Castle are not better. We do not refer of course to the reprod uctions of architectural details, for these are excellent. Windsor Castle, in spite of a distinctly shoddy appearance when seen close, has the power, on account of its situation, of assuming most picturesque aspects at a little distance, and these have been ignored. Among the illustra- tions some of the most pleasing are the reproductions of the charming topographical drawings of Paul Sandby. In these we see the curious mushroom growths of mean though often picturesque buildings which grew up round the Castle. In a drawing by Schnebbelie of the west front of St. George's Chapel, it is curious to see the row of squalid little houses joining on to the stately Gothic building. No doubt modern rebuilding has tended to add to the stateliness of the Castle, and has done so when we do not examine the result too closely. At a distance the effect is great. From near by we see too much of the builders and masons trying to be artists and not succeeding.
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