dea of what architecture means; he never thinks of
what is right, or what is beautiful, but he builds what is most adapted
to his purposes, and most easily erected: by suiting the building to the
uses of his own life, he gives it humility; and, by raising it with the
nearest material, adapts it to its situation. This is all that is
required, and he has no credit in fulfilling the requirement, since the
moment he begins to think of effect, he commits a barbarism by
whitewashing the whole. The cottages of Cumberland would suffer much by
this piece of improvement, were it not for the salutary operation of
mountain rains and mountain winds.

60. So much for the hill dwellings of our own country. I think the
examination of the five examples of the cottage which I have given have
furnished all the general principles which are important or worthy of
consideration; and I shall therefore devote no more time to the
contemplation of individual buildings. But, before I leave the cottage
altogether, it will be necessary to notice a part of the building which
I have in the separate instances purposely avoided mentioning, that I
might have the advantage of immediate comparison; a part exceedingly
important, and which seems to have been essential to the palace as well
as to the cottage, ever since the time when Perdiccas received his
significant gift of the sun from his Macedonian master, [Greek:
perigrapsas ton helion, hos en kata ten kapnodoken es ton oikon
esechon].[12] And then I shall conclude the subject by a few general
remarks on modern ornamental cottages, illustrative of the principle so
admirably developed in the beauty of the Westmoreland building; to
which, it must be remembered, the palm was assigned, in preference to
the Switzer's; not because it was more labored, but because it was more
natural.

OXFORD, _Jan., 1838._

[Footnote 12: Herodotus viii, 137, freely quoted from memory. The story
was that three brothers took service with a kinglet in Macedonia. The
queen, who cooked their food herself, for it was in the good old times,
noticed that the portion of Perdiccas, the youngest, always "rose" three
times as large as any other. The king judged this to be an omen of the
lad's coming to fortune; and dismissed them. They demanded their wages.
"When the king heard talk about wages--you must know _the sun was
shining into the house, down the chimney_--he said (for God had hardened
his heart) 'There's your wage; all you d