wers, though graceful enough in outline, are poor
in detail, and are finished off with a very ugly combination of hollow
curves and bulbous domes.

The centre dome, too, is very poor in outline with a drum and lantern
far too tall for its size; though of course, had the drum been of a
better proportion, it would hardly have shown above the palace roof.

Still more monotonous are the other sides with endless rows of windows
set in a pink plastered wall.

Very different is the outline of the Escorial, whose very plainness and
want of detail suits well the rugged mountain side in which it is set.
The main front with its high corner towers and their steep slate roofs,
and with its high centre-piece, is far more impressive, and the mere
reiteration of its endless featureless windows gives the Escorial an
appearance of size quite wanting to Mafra. Above all the great church
with massive dome and towers rises high above all the rest, and gives
the whole a sense of unity and completeness which the smaller church of
Mafra, though in a far more prominent place, entirely fails to do.

Poor though the church at Mafra is outside, inside there is much to
admire, and but little to betray the late date. The porch has an
effective vault of black and white marble, and domes with black and
white panels cover the spaces under the towers. Inside the church is all
built of white marble with panels and pilasters of pink marble from Pero
Pinheiro on the road to Cintra. (Fig. 101.)

The whole church measures about 200 feet long by 100 wide, with a nave
also 100 feet long. The central aisle is over 40 feet wide, and has two
very well-proportioned Corinthian pilasters between each bay. Almost the
only trace of the eighteenth century is found in the mouldings of the
pendentive panels, and in the marble vault, but on the whole the church
is stately and the detail refined and restrained.

The refectory, a very plain room with plastered barrel vault, 160 feet
long by 40 wide, is remarkable only for the splendid slabs of Brazil
wood which form the tables, and for the beautiful brass lamps which hang
from the ceiling.

Much more interesting is the library which occupies the central part of
the floor above. Over 200 feet long, it has a dome-surmounted transept
in the middle, and a barrel vault divided into panels. All the walls are
lined with bookcases painted white like the barrel vault and like the
projecting gallery from which the upper shelve