The Church of St. Eustache at Paris was begun in 1532. Its arrange ment is completely Gothic, with the entire apparatus of buttresses and flying-buttresses clothed in the wire-drawn proportions of ultra-artificial Renaissance forms as in an unsuitable vestment, although some of the details are very charming. The impression made by the wild forms of a degenerate tracery which fills the round-arched windows is very dis Rote/de attractive, on the contrary, is the architecture of the Hotel de Ville at Paris, which was begun in 1533, but on which work• was afterward suspended until 1549, when it was resumed by the Italian Domenico Boccardo after a plan of his own. Notwithstanding the foreign birth of its architect, it exhibits entirely French peculiarities. The edi fice had, indeed, a long history down to its completion in 1841 and to its redestruction in 1871; and when examining the view on Plate 45 (jig. 2), we must not forget that there have been many changes in various parts of Boccardo's plan.
The Hold Ecoville, at Caen (1535), may be cited as in many respects one of the most charming works of the early French Renaissance. Nobil ity in the proportions of the details here reached its highest point; forms foreign to the Renaissance are already eliminated, and all that remains from the older period is that which can be readily assimilated and worked into a harmonious whole (p/. 44, fig. 4). Two examples of the ornament ' of that date (pt. 44, figs. t, 12) exhibit, the first the specifically French manner, the second a nearer approach to the Italian.
About the middle of the century the poetry gradually disappeared from the French Renaissance, and the so-called " House of Agnes Sorel," at Orleans, shows the prosaic nature which characterized the French bour of that period, while the bishop's palace at Sens exhibits the some what grander proportions aimed at by the clerical dignitaries of France.
At that period the display of a more strict classicality was attempted in the grand palaces. This induced, on the one hand, freer proportions; on the other, a magnificent but purely external artistic development of the facade. The ideal was like that at which Italian architects had aimed at the beginning of the century. It was not, indeed, so magnificent, nor was there so much striving after massiveness and simplicity of outline: there was only an endeavor to remove the last old survivals, while there was still an adherence to the custom of breaking the great masses into smaller portions. French edifices of this date present a central building with higher and lower wings, a sky-line enlivened by varied forms of gables, and finally, drawn over the whole, a screen of architectural forms simply decorative and calculated to produce an impression of richness and ele gance.
The new purpose found expression in the construction of the Louvre, which Francis I. began in 1528 in the place of the medi reval castle which then occupied the site. Pierre Lescot superintended the construction after 1546; this older portion is shown on Plate 45 3). On the river side Lescot built the so-called " Small Gallery," over which was the Galerie d'Apollon, and be also commenced the Long Gal lery, which is more than 40o metres (1322 feet) in length. This palace, like other great buildings, has had manifold vicissitudes, and was not -.entirely finished until very recently; so that we have shown the united
Louvre and Tuileries on Plate 5o (fig. 6) as a building of the present period. While it is clear from the above-mentioned characteristics, and can be seen in the illustration, that the poetic glamour of the earlier de cades no longer surrounds the structures of this period, yet the Château d'Ecouen (1541; pt. 44, fig. 7) exhibits a positive severity and au applica tion of strictly classical motifs which can have resulted only from a study of ancient art in Italy.
A prominent architect of his day, Philibert de l'Orme, built (after 1552) the Château Anet for Diana of Poitiers (pt. 45, fig. 9); in this also the severe classical element prevails.
The l'Orme commenced (about 1564) the construction of the Tuileries, a magnificent palatial design surrounding one large and four small courts, yet it was incomplete in execution, and was subse remodelled. The system (fig. 5) used by him exhibits in the ar .cades of the lower portion a relationship with the Italian order, but in the preservation of the transoms and mullions of the windows, as well as in the varied arrangement of the sky-line, it evinces French taste.
Elegance of form and richness of details are characteristic of the lower portion, and, in so far as this deviates from both the Italian and the antique, De l'Ornie was justifiable in designating the system invented by him as " the French order." Characteristic of this French order is the treatment of the shafts of the columns (pl. 45, fig. io), that have their unity destroyed by projecting blocks which run through both piers and columns, yet which were meant as a membering and decoration of the piers following naturally upon his mode of treatment, to which even the pilaster was necessarily forced to submit. The Italians had, indeed, already employed such blocking-courses in the treatment of both columns and pilasters (Palazzo Bevilacqua), but the perfecting of the details was reserved for the French. The ancients had used caryatides only exceptionally; the French idea was to employ them even more frequently than Michelangelo and his imitators had done, and to unite them in picturesque groups, as in the pavilion of the Louvre, or to employ in their stead the Hermes with a base narrower than the upper part (even at. the Chateau Chenonceaux, where they are perhaps a later addition). De l'Orme's successor at the Tuileries was the before-mentioned Bullant.
Jacques Androuet and his brother Baptiste du Cerceau had previously gained celebrity through their publications. The son of the latter was Les cot's successor at the Louvre, and erected, under commission from Henry IV., a part of the gallery which bears that king's name. While in the eastern part (fig. 4) he followed the system adopted in the Louvre, the western part has pilasters that run through two storeys, somewhat as they were applied by the Italians, who added an eittresof in the height of a pilaster, or, as at St. Peter's, used a single pilaster—which actually corre sponds to a single storey—through two rows of windows, which gave the aspect of two storeys, until finally Palladio provided two complete storeys with only one pilaster.