); entirely true and effective
as far as his time allowed.
Half destroyed, or more, I said it was,--Time doing grievous work on
it, and men worse. You heard Vasari saying of it, that it stood on
twelve degrees of twelve-faced steps. These--worn, doubtless, into
little more than a rugged slope--have been replaced by the moderns with
four circular steps, and an iron railing; [1] the bas-reliefs have been
carried off from the panels of the second vase, and its fair marble
lips choked with asphalt:--of what remains, you have here a rough but
true image.
[Footnote 1: In Mr. Severn's sketch, the form of the original
foundation is approximately restored.]
In which you see there is not a trace of Gothic feeling or design of
any sort. No crockets, no pinnacles, no foils, no vaultings, no
grotesques in sculpture. Panels between pillars, panels carried on
pillars, sculptures in those panels like the Metopes of the Parthenon;
a Greek vase in the middle, and griffins in the middle of that. Here is
your font, not at all of Saint John, but of profane and civil-
engineering John. This is _his_ manner of baptism of the town of
Perugia.
42.
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