some driven to caves in woods, some racked with torment, and some pursued to death with faggot and fire.”

SERIES OF ESSAYS ON THE SUBJECT OF ARCHITECTURE.

ESSAY THE SIXTH.

Doric Order.

THE Doric is allowed to be the most ancient of the five Orders of Architecture. Vitruvius gives the following account of its origin-the only account we have, and generally considered to be fabulous. He says that Dorus, the son of Hellen and the nymph Opticos, built a temple of Juno in Argos, which, by accident, no rule of proportion being known, came to be of this kind. The Ionian colonists on their arrival in Asia wishing to erect a temple to Apollo, and being ignorant of the method of proceeding, bethought themselves of measuring the human foot, and having discovered that it was about the sixth part of a man's height, they at once adopted this proportion, which henceforth they called Doric; inventing at the same time one of more slender proportions to imitate the female form, to be called by their own name. Beside the want of authority for this tradition, it is disproved by the most ancient specimens of Doric Columns being of very different dimensions; those found in the antiquities of Pæstum, Sicily, Ionia, and Athens, not exceeding in height four diameters, or four and a half.

The Doric temples, built in Athens in the time of Pericles, have the Columns of five and a half diameters in height; while in the temple of Augustus at Athens, they are of six diameters. In more modern buildings they are of eight; and have also a base, which the ancient Doric never had-a proof, as it is considered, of the antiquity of the Order.

Pub. by Baker & Fletcher. 18 Finsbury Place.

Whether the fluting, so often used in the Doric Column, originally belonged to it, is not known; but some of the oldest remaining specimens are fluted. It has been conjectured, but without authority, that these flutings were intended for resting-places for the warriors' spears.

The Triglyph, Plate 6, which is characteristic of the Doric Order, is thus accounted for by Vitruvius. "In building, they laid the beams from the interior wall to the exterior parts, and as much of the beam as appeared unhandsome, was sawed off: which, not having a pleasing effect, they made tablets, like the Triglyphs now in use, and fixed them against the sawed end. The Triglyph and Metope having thus their origin in wood-work, were afterwards imitated in stone. The same accident is made to account for the Guttæ or Drops, which are supposed to be the heads of large nails, used to fix the beams. A bull's skull, or other ornament, was often placed on the Metope, between the Triglyphs.

In modern buildings of the Doric Order, the proportions are, for the Column, including the Capital and Base, sixteen Modules; and the height of the Entablature four Modules. We have observed that the ancient Doric had no base: but in Fig. 2, Plate 6, we have a base which is now applied to it; and which also represents the fluting of the shaft, extending sometimes the whole height, sometimes only a part.

CONVERSATIONS ON GEOLOGY.

CONVERSATION XXV.

Chalk-Alcyonium-Mantellia-Ananchytes.

MAT.-In our late conversation on the Chalk formation, you mentioned Alcyonium more than once-I think this is not a fossil with which we are acquainted.

MRS. L.-It is an animal something approaching to the Sponge. Of one, a very curious form found in the Chalk, I have here a specimen. Fig. 1, Plate 24. It is fixed to the ground by the root, and rises in the form of a funnel. The external coat is composed of muscular fibres, which have the power of dilating and contracting. The interior is composed of small tubes, passing through the funnel-shaped cavity, terminating on the surface in small circular openings: each of the tubes was probably the abode of a Polypus.

MAT. This is a curious animal; I species.

suppose an extinct

MRS. L.-All those of the Chalk Strata are considered to be so, and some are even of unknown genera. Here is another strange animal quite peculiar to the Chalk. It is called Mantellia-Fig. 2. Fig. 3, is an Ananchytes, a species of Echinus found only in Chalk, and never seen recent.

MAT.-Does the Chalk contain fossils of superior

animals.

MRS. L.-It is said to contain many species of Fish; the teeth of a species of Shark; and some varieties of palates not belonging to any known genera. "The examination of the fossil remains in this stratum and those above it, leads to conclusions of much interest and importance. In the strata upon the coast of Dorsetshire, below the chalk, we find the remains of Crocodiles and Alligators; but there are no fossil relicks of mammiferous land animals, either here or in the Chalk itself; whence it has been concluded, that oviparous quadrupeds are of more ancient date than those of the viviparous class, and that dry lands and fresh waters existed before the formation of our present Chalk. In the vicinity of Paris, the Chalk is covered by a coarse ShellLimestone, in which the bones of mammiferous sea animals have been found by Cuvier: but no bones of mammiferous land quadrupeds occur, till we reach the more recent and superincumbent Strata."