Fergusson, James: A history of architecture in all countries, from the earliest times to the present day: in five volumes (Band 2) (London, 1893)

Bk. III. Ch. I.

PROYENCE.

63

freeclom and boldness, and at the same time with an elegance, not
often rivalled anywhere. They even excel—for tlie pnrpose at least
—the German capitals of the same age. Those at Elne are more
curious than those of any other cloister in Erance, so far as I know
—some of them showing so distinct an imitation of Egyptian work as
instantly to strike any one at all familiar with that style. Yet they
are treated with a lightness and freedom so wholly mediæval as to
show that it is possible to copy the spirit without a servile adherence
to the form. Here, as in all the examples, every capital is different
—the artists revelling in freedom from restraint, and sparing neither
time nor pains. We find in these examples a delicacy of hanclling
and refinement of feeling far more characteristic of the South than of
the ruder North, and must admit that their architects have in these
cloisters produced objects with which nothing of the kind we have in
England can compete.