s profile, it is marked as distinctly belonging, by the bold convex
curve at its root, springing from the shaft in the line of the Christian
Doric cornice, and exactly reversing the structure of the other profile,
which rises from the shaft, like a palm leaf from its stem. Farther, in
the profile 13, the innermost line is that of the bell; but in the
profile 14, the outermost line is that of the bell, and the inner line
is the limit of the incisions of the chisel, in undercutting a
reticulated veil of ornament, surrounding a flower like a lily; most
ingeniously, and, I hope, justly, conjectured by the Marchese Selvatico
to have been intended for an imitation of the capitals of the temple of
Solomon, which Hiram made, with "nets of checker work, and wreaths of
chain work for the chapiters that were on the top of the pillars ... and
the chapiters that were upon the top of the pillars were of lily work in
the porch." (1 Kings, vii. 17, 19.)

Sec. XLVIII. On this exquisite capital there is imposed an abacus of
the profile with which we began our investigation long ago, the profile _a_
of Fig. V. This abacus is formed by the cornice already given, _a_, of
Plate XVI.: and therefore we have, in this lovely Venetian capital, the
summary of the results of our investigation, from its beginning to its
close: the type of the first cornice; the decoration of it, in its
emergence from the classical models; the gathering into the capital; the
superimposition of the secondary cornice, and the refinement of the bell
of the capital by triple curvature in the two limits of chiselling. I
cannot express the exquisite refinements of the curves on the small
scale of Plate XV.; I will give them more accurately in a larger
engraving; but the scale on which they are here given will not prevent
the reader from perceiving, and let him note it thoughtfully, that the
outer curve of the noble capital is the one which was our first example
of associated curves; that I have had no need, throughout the whole of
our inquiry, to refer to any other ornamental line than the three which
I at first chose, the simplest of those which Nature set by chance
before me; and that this lily, of the delicate Venetian marble, has but
been wrought, by the highest human art, into the same line which the
clouds disclose, when they break from the rough rocks of the flank of
the Matterhorn.

FOOTNOTES:

[84] In very early Doric it was an absolute right line; and that