In fact, the building of Strawberry Hill was “the glimmering of the restoration” of gothic architecture, which had previously, for above a century, been so much neglected that its very principles seemed lost.  If we compare the Gothic of Strawberry Hill with that of buildings about the same period, or a little anterior to it, we shall see how vastly superior it is to them, both in its taste and its decorations.  If we look at some of the restorations of our churches of the beginning of the eighteenth century , we shall find them a most barbarous mixture of Gothic forms and Grecian and Roman ornaments.  Such are the western towers of Westminster Abbey, designed by Wren; the attempts at Gothic, by the same architect, in one or two of his City churches; Gibbs’s quadrangle of All Souls’ College, Oxford; and the buildings in the same style of Kent, Batty, Langley, etc.  To these Strawberry is greatly superior:  and it must be observed, that Walpole himself, in his progressive building, went on improving and purifying his taste.  Thus the gallery and round-tower at Strawberry Hill, which were among his latest works, are incomparably the best part of the house; and in their interior decorations there is very little to be objected to, and much to be admired.

It were to be wished, indeed, that Walpole’s haste to finish, to which he alludes in the letter just quoted, and perhaps also, in some degree, economy, had not made him build his castle, which, with all its faults, is a curious relic of a clever and ingenious man, with so little solidity, that it is almost already in a state of decay.  Lath and plaster, and wood, appear to have been his favourite materials for construction; which made his friend Williams (36) say of him, towards the end of his life, “that he had outlived three sets of his own battlements.”  It is somewhat curious, as a proof of the inconsistency of the human mind, that, having built his castle with so little view to durability, Walpole entailed the perishable possession with a degree of strictness, which would have been more fitting for a baronial estate.  And that, too, after having written a fable entitled “The Entail,” in consequence, of some one having asked him whether he did not intend to entail Strawberry Hill, and in ridicule of such a proceeding.

Whether Horace Walpole conferred a benefit upon the public by setting the fashion of applying the Gothic style of architecture to domestic purposes, may be doubtful; so greatly has the example he gave been abused in practice since.  But, at all events, he thus led the professors of architecture to study with accuracy the principles of the art, which has occasioned the restoration and preservation in such an admirable manner of so many of our finest cathedrals. colleges, and ancient Gothic and conventual buildings.  This, it must be at least allowed, was the fortunate result of the rage for Gothic, which succeeded the building of Strawberry Hill.  For a good many