circular brick pinnacles--one over each side of the tower— which look extremely like a collection of chimneys.

Detached from the church, and standing at an angle to it, is a simple campanile of later date (1399), and of four stages in height. The combination of this eccentrically placed tower with the rest of the church is very remarkable, and appears to have been simply a caprice. Its effect certainly does not warrant the sort of admiration which should lead any modern architect engaged in studying the church to recommend the copying of the relative positions of it and its bell-tower. I ought not to forget one feature-the buttress -which is treated here in quite the French or English fashion, with bold projection and good steep sloped weatherings instead of in the usual Italian fashion as a mere pilaster.

North of the nave of the church is a good cloister, on the east side of which is a fine square chapter-house, divided by groining piers into nine bays. The original triple entrance to the chapter-house-a door with window on each side-still remains, and there is a communication also through a groined sacristy with the north transept. I know few churches which shew more just sense of the best treatment of a good Gothic interior than this does. In its original state, when the brickwork was exposed in its natural colour, the effect was of course much better than it is now; but the effect is still so good that I may safely assert that, were the exterior equal to the interior, there would be few more beautiful churches in Northern Italy.'

There is an interesting monument in the south-east chapel, corbelled out from the wall and decorated with sculpture and painting. In the gable is the Coronation of the Blessed

1 It is worth notice that the regular-looking bays of the nave are of very various widths. The two eastern are 21 feet; the next two, four feet less; and the fifth still narrower. The bricks here measure 1 ft. in. x 5 in., and are 3 in. high, and have all been chiselled on the face.

Virgin, below a figure kneeling before her, and said to represent the architect of the church, who died in 1246, being Abbat as well as architect. Immediately opposite the church is a hospital founded by the same cardinal. It has been much altered, but there are still some ancient portions, which I could not get leave to see.

From Vercelli we retraced our steps to Milan, and halted no longer than was necessary before going on to Monza on our way to Como. Here we were well rewarded and most agreeably surprized. We found a very curious and good Broletto, a cathedral of fine and elaborate brickwork with a great west front of marble, and another brick church of most elaborate detail. The west front of the Duomo is a very fine example of Italian Gothic in marble; it is divided into five divisions in width, those in the centre and at the sides being the widest, and is constructed in yellow and dark grey marbles in alternate courses, the former very deep, the latter generally shallow, but varying without much rule.

All the roofs are flat, but finish at the west at different levels, and not in one continuous slope. The eaves have heavy cornices, and under these, all the way up, is an arcade resting upon shafts supported on corbels. The windows are all filled with traceries which are certainly not at all equal to English tracery, as they are very flat in their effect, and have no proper subordination of parts. There is a large rose window in the centre division treated in a better manner than is usual, and set within a square line of moulding, with small circles in the spandrels, and a line of square panels on each side continued in the most unpleasing way above; five other smaller circular windows are similarly treated. In some parts of the wall the courses of black marble are continuations of the black arch-stones of the windows, which, though not uncommon in Italian pointed work, is never satisfactory in its effect. In the upper part of the front this is not the case.

The central division has a porch resting upon detached shafts, and with a semicircular arch, which is, however, richly cusped; and throughout the front semicircular and pointed arches seem to have been used quite indiscriminately. The buttresses which divide the front were originally finished

with pinnacles, of which one only now remains; this is certainly very beautiful, of precisely the same type as the pinnacles on some of the tombs of the Scaligers at Verona, standing on detached shafts, with gables on either side, supported on trefoiled arches, and with small pinnacles between the gables, all of which are crocketed; the mouldings are