"The facade," it is
well observed in an early Number of the _Athenaeum_, "enjoys one of
the most favourable sites for the display of a public building which the
metropolis affords; no limit has been set to the expense; the finest
materials the country yields have been used in its construction; the
richest example of the richest order which antiquity has left us, has
been lavishly employed in its decoration; and yet," continues the critic,
"is not the whole a failure?" He then describes the effect of it as "poor,
or at best but pretty," and attributes the absence of grandeur to the
"want of sufficient elevation."--"To the general elevation it may be
objected, that it has no prominent centre; that, composed of two wings
and an intermediate space receding, it has more the character of a flank
than a front building; and that the want of a central entrance derogates
greatly from its dignity as a principal facade."
But we are mere amateurs in these matters, and it will be as well to
leave the remainder of this criticism to the more studious reader. We
have, however, glanced at the principal defects which the writer in the
_Athenaeum_ points out, and we are bound to admit the justice of his
remarks.
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