167.  This is a species of error which it is very difficult for persons paying superficial and temporary attention to architecture to avoid:  however just their taste may be in criticism, it will fail in creation.  It is only in moments of ease and amusement that they will think of their villa:  they make it a mere plaything, and regard it with a kind of petty exultation, which, from its very nature, will give liberty to the light fancy, rather than the deep feeling, of the mind.  It is not thought necessary to bestow labor of thought, and periods of deliberation, on one of the toys of life; still less to undergo the vexation of thwarting wishes, and leaving favorite imaginations, relating to minor points, unfulfilled, for the sake of general effect.

168.  This feeling, then, is the first to which we would direct attention, as the villa architect’s chief enemy:  he will find it perpetually and provokingly in his way.  He is requested, perhaps, by a man of great wealth, nay, of established taste in some points, to make a design for a villa in a lovely situation.  The future proprietor carries him upstairs to his study, to give him what he calls his “ideas and materials,” and, in all probability, begins somewhat thus:—­“This, sir, is a slight note:  I made it on the spot:  approach to Villa Reale, near Pozzuoli.  Dancing nymphs, you perceive; cypresses, shell fountain.  I think I should like something like this for the approach:  classical, you perceive, sir; elegant, graceful.  Then, sir, this is a sketch, made by an American friend of mine:  Whee-whaw-Kantamaraw’s wigwam, King of the—­Cannibal Islands, I think he said, sir.  Log, you observe; scalps, and boa-constrictor skins:  curious.  Something like this, sir, would look neat, I think, for the front door; don’t you?  Then, the lower windows, I’ve not quite decided upon; but what would you say to Egyptian, sir?  I think I should like my windows Egyptian, with hieroglyphics, sir; storks and coffins, and appropriate moldings above:  I brought some from Fountains Abbey the other day.  Look here, sir; angels’ heads putting their tongues out, rolled up in cabbage leaves, with a dragon on each side riding on a broomstick, and the devil looking on from the mouth of an alligator, sir.[32] Odd, I think; interesting.  Then the corners may be turned by octagonal towers, like the center one in Kenilworth Castle; with Gothic doors, portcullis, and all, quite perfect; with cross slits for arrows, battlements for musketry, machicolations for boiling lead, and a room at the top for drying plums; and the conservatory at the bottom, sir, with Virginian creepers up the towers; door supported by sphinxes, holding scrapers in their fore paws, and having their tails prolonged into warm-water pipes, to keep the plants safe in winter, etc.”  The architect is, without doubt, a little astonished by these ideas and combinations; yet he sits calmly down to draw his elevations; as if he were a stone-mason, or his employer an architect; and the fabric rises to electrify its beholders, and confer immortality on its perpetrator.