nd although a foreigner
may be inclined at first, from its very strangeness, to call it Eastern,
it is really only a true development in the hands of a real artist of
what Manoelino was; an expression of Portugal's riches and power, and of
the gradual assimilation of such Moors as still remained on this side
the Straits. Of course it is easy to say that it is extravagant,
overloaded and debased; and so it may be. Yet no one who sees it can
help falling a victim to its fascination, for perhaps its only real
fault is that the great cusps and finials are on rather too large a
scale for the rest. Not even the greatest purist could help admiring the
exquisite fineness of the carving--a fineness made possible by the
limestone, very soft when new, which gradually hardens and grows to a
lovely yellow with exposure to the air. No records tell us so, but
considering the difference in style between the upper and the lower part
it may perhaps be conjectured that the elder Matheus designed the lower
part, and the younger the upper, after his father's death in 1515.

In the great octagon itself the first thing to be done was to build huge
piers, which partly encroach on the small sepulchral chapels between the
larger apses. These piers now rise nearly to the level of the central
aisle of the church where they are cut off unfinished; they must be
about 80 or 90 feet in height. On the outer side they are covered with
many circular shafts which are banded together by mouldings at nearly
regular intervals. Haupt has pointed out that in general appearance they
are not unlike the great minar called the Kutub at Old Delhi, and a
lively imagination might see a resemblance to the vast piers, once the
bases of minars, which flank the great entrance archways of some mosques
at Ahmedabad, for example those in the Jumma Musjid. Yet there is no
necessity to go so far afield. Manoelino architects had always been fond
of bundles of round mouldings and so naturally used them here, nor
indeed are the piers at all like either the Kutub or the minars at
Ahmedabad. They have not the batter or the sharp angles of the one, nor
the innumerable breaks and mouldings of the others.

Between each pier a large window was meant to open, of which
unfortunately nothing has been built but part of the jambs.

Inside the vaulting of the apsidal chapels was first finished; all the
vaults are elaborate, have well-moulded ribs, and bosses, some carved
with crosses of t