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Praise for Functional Programming in Java
Venkat has done a superb job of bringing core functional language concepts to
the Java ecosystem. Once you have peered into his looking glass of functional
language design, it will be hard to go back to old-school imperative programming.
➤ Stephen Chin, Java technology ambassador and JavaOne content chair
The introduction of lambdas to Java 8 has made me excited to use Java again,
and Venkat’s combination of technical details and best practices make it easy to
apply functional thinking to this new feature.
➤ Kimberly D. Barnes, senior software engineer
Java 8 lambda expressions are an incredibly important new language feature.
Every Java developer should read this excellent book and learn how to use them
effectively.
➤ Chris Richardson, software architect and Java champion
Many can explain lambdas; Venkat makes them useful.
➤ Kirk Pepperdine, Java performance tuning expert
I highly recommend this book for Java programmers who want to get up to speed
with functional programming in Java 8. It is a very concise book but still provides
a comprehensive overview of Java 8.
➤ Nilanjan Raychaudhuri, author and developer at Typesafe

Functional Programming in Java
Harnessing the Power of Java 8 Lambda Expressions
Venkat Subramaniam
The Pragmatic Bookshelf
Dallas, Texas • Raleigh, North Carolina

Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products
are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book, and The Pragmatic
Programmers, LLC was aware of a trademark claim, the designations have been printed in
initial capital letters or in all capitals. The Pragmatic Starter Kit, The Pragmatic Programmer,
Pragmatic Programming, Pragmatic Bookshelf, PragProg and the linking g device are trade-
marks of The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC.
Every precaution was taken in the preparation of this book. However, the publisher assumes
no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages that may result from the use of
information (including program listings) contained herein.
Our Pragmatic courses, workshops, and other products can help you and your team create
better software and have more fun. For more information, as well as the latest Pragmatic
titles, please visit us at http://pragprog.com.
Sir Charles Antony Richard Hoare’s quote is used by permission of the ACM.
Abelson and Sussman’s quote is used under Creative Commons license.
The team that produced this book includes:
Jacquelyn Carter (editor)
Potomac Indexing, LLC (indexer)
Candace Cunningham (copyeditor)
David J Kelly (typesetter)
Janet Furlow (producer)
Ellie Callahan (support)
For international rights, please contact rights@pragprog.com.
Copyright © 2014 The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted,inanyform,orbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical,photocopying,
recording, or otherwise, without the prior consent of the publisher.
Printed in the United States of America.
ISBN-13: 978-1-937785-46-8
Encoded using the finest acid-free high-entropy binary digits.
Book version: P1.0—February 2014

To the loving memory of my grandmothers,
Kuppammal and Jayalakshmi. I cherish my
wonder years under your care.

Contents
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
1. Hello, Lambda Expressions! . . . . . . . . . 1
Change the Way You Think 1
The Big Gains of Functional-Style Code 5
Why Code in the Functional Style? 6
Evolution, Not Revolution 12
A Little Sugar to Sweeten 15
Recap 17
2. Using Collections . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Iterating through a List 19
Transforming a List 23
Finding Elements 26
Reusing Lambda Expressions 27
Using Lexical Scoping and Closures 29
Picking an Element 33
Reducing a Collection to a Single Value 35
Joining Elements 38
Recap 40
3. Strings, Comparators, and Filters . . . . . . . 41
Iterating a String 41
Implementing the Comparator Interface 44
Multiple and Fluent Comparisons 51
Using the collect Method and the Collectors Class 52
Listing All Files in a Directory 56
Listing Select Files in a Directory 57

Listing Immediate Subdirectories Using flatMap 59
Watching a File Change 60
Recap 62
4. Designing with Lambda Expressions . . . . . . . 63
Separating Concerns Using Lambda Expressions 63
Delegating Using Lambda Expressions 68
Decorating Using Lambda Expressions 72
A Peek into the default Methods 77
Creating Fluent Interfaces Using Lambda Expressions 80
Dealing with Exceptions 83
Recap 86
5. Working with Resources . . . . . . . . . . 87
Cleaning Up Resources 87
Using Lambda Expressions to Clean Up Resources 91
Managing Locks 95
Creating Concise Exception Tests 97
Recap 101
6. Being Lazy . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Delayed Initialization 103
Lazy Evaluations 108
Leveraging the Laziness of Streams 111
Creating Infinite, Lazy Collections 115
Recap 119
7. Optimizing Recursions . . . . . . . . . . 121
Using Tail-Call Optimization 121
Speeding Up with Memoization 129
Recap 134
8. Composing with Lambda Expressions . . . . . . 135
Using Function Composition 135
Using MapReduce 138
Taking a Leap to Parallelize 143
Recap 145
9. Bringing It All Together . . . . . . . . . 147
Essential Practices to Succeed with the Functional Style 147
Performance Concerns 151
Adopting the Functional Style 153
Contents • viii

A1. Starter Set of Functional Interfaces . . . . . . . 155
A2. Syntax Overview . . . . . . . . . . . 157
A3. Web Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Contents • ix

Foreword
Venkat Subramaniam would never be described as a “waterfall” sort of guy. So,
when he mentioned that he was starting on a Java 8 book—long before the design
of Java 8 was settled—I was not at all surprised. It was clear this was going to
be an “agile” book project.
Despite having to more than occasionally rework the text as the language and
library features evolved, Venkat had a secret advantage—he knew where we were
going. The Java 8 design was heavily influenced by the core principles of functional
programming: functions as values, immutability, and statelessness. We didn’t do
this because functional programming is trendy or cool; we did it because programs
that are expressed as stateless transformations on immutable data, rather than
as modifications of mutable data structures, tend to be easier to read and main-
tain, to be less error prone, and to parallelize more gracefully.
The new features introduced in Java 8 were designed together to facilitate devel-
opment of more expressive and parallel-friendly libraries. Lambda expressions
reduce the syntactic overhead of encoding behavior as data; default methods
allow existing libraries to evolve over time, enabling core JDK classes such as
Collections to take advantage of lambda expressions; the java.util.stream package
leverages these language features to offer rich aggregate operations on collections,
arrays, and other data sources in a declarative, expressive, and parallel-friendly
manner. All of this adds up to more powerful and performant code, as well as a
more pleasant programming experience.
This book not only provides lots of examples of how to use these new features,
but offers readers a peek into the underlying principles behind their design, and
why they result in better code. Let Venkat be your guide to this new and improved
Java—you’re in for a treat.
Brian Goetz
Java Language Architect, Oracle Corporation
September 2013
report erratum • discuss

Acknowledgments
Writing a book is like taking a road trip—we know where we’re heading, but
some details emerge only after the start. The journey may involve detours—
opportunities to explore unexpected places—and it’s more fun with good
company. I’m thankful for the great company of people on this voyage: smart
reviewers, an amazing editor, a wonderful set of people at The Pragmatic
Bookshelf, and a very supportive family.
I first thank the Java language team members at Oracle for their hard work
to bring the functional style of programming to one of the most popular
mainstream languages. You’ve taken the language in the right direction—not
through shortcuts and quick fixes, but by way of sound reasoning and prudent
design decisions. Kudos, team.
I express my sincere gratitude to the smart developers who volunteered their
personal time to review this book. Thank you, Kimberly Barnes, Fred Daoud,
Raju Gandhi, Marty Hall, Praveen Kumar, Rebecca Parsons, Kirk Pepperdine,
Chris Richardson, Ian Roughley, Nate Schutta, Ken Sipe, and Dan Sline. Your
comments were critical yet very constructive and motivational; they helped
make this book better. I’m honored and humbled by Bruce Tate reviewing
this book. He’s been a great mentor for me over the years. He reviewed this
book multiple times, at different stages, and took the time to motivate me as
to why certain changes were essential. Thank you, Bruce. I’d also like to
express my gratitude to Brian Goetz for reviewing the book multiple times,
for the encouragement starting early on, and for kindly agreeing to write the
foreword. Any errors in the book are solely mine.
The biggest benefit of publishing a beta copy of a book is the opportunity to
improve it based on valuable feedback from early readers. I’m indebted to the
following readers for taking their valuable time to provide feedback on the
forum for this book or reporting errors on the errata page. Thank you, Greg
Helton, Günter Jantzen, Narayanan Jayaratchagan, Wacek Kusnierczyk,
Nabeel Ali Memon, Marc-Daniel Ortega, Arjo Ouwens, Philip Schwarz,

Ekaterina Sh, Dan Talpau, Benjamin Tan, Brian Tarbox, Marco Vermeulen,
and Jason Weden.
I benefited greatly from every interaction with Jackie Carter. She did not just
edit; she motivated me and helped shape this book. Thank you, Jackie, for
your hard work, fast responses, and truly making this a fun experience.
Impatience is one of my many weaknesses, but the kind folks at The Pragmatic
Bookshelf turned that into a strength when I set out to write this book.
Susannah Pfalzer, Andy Hunt, Dave Thomas, and several others worked
behind the scenes to help me succeed on a self-imposed fast-paced schedule.
You make writing books so much easier and more fun, much more than you
may realize.
I have enjoyed the privilege of being part of various conferences, and the No
Fluff Just Stuff (NFJS) conference series in particular. I have learned a lot
from the interactions I’ve had with other speakers and developers. Special
thanks to my friends on the conference circuit, especially Jay Zimmerman,
director of NFJS.
I thank my wife Kavitha and sons Karthik and Krupa for letting me hide in
my office during the holidays to work on this book. It was a true pleasure to
have their support and above all to see their curiousness. Special thanks to
my parents for their blessings and encouragement.
Acknowledgments • xiv

In any field, find the strangest thing and then explore it.
➤ John Archibald Wheeler
Preface
You’re in for a treat. One of the most prominent and widely used languages
in the world has evolved. Until now Java gave us one set of tools—the object-
oriented paradigm—and we did the best we could with it. Now there’s another,
more elegant way to solve the common problems we encounter when develop-
ing applications. We can now do quite effectively in Java what was previously
possible only on the JVM using other languages—this means more power to
Java programmers.
I’m thankful to have had the privilege over the past few decades to program
with multiple languages: C, C++, Java, C#, F#, Ruby, Groovy, Scala, Clojure,
Erlang, JavaScript… When asked which one’s my favorite, my resounding
answer has been that it’s not the language that excites me, but the way we
program.
The science and engineering in programming drew me in, but the art in pro-
gramming keeps me. Coding has a lot in common with writing—there’s more
than one way to express our ideas. Java helped us write code using objects.
Now we have an additional way to implement our designs and ideas.
This is a new way in Java, one that will make our code more expressive,
easier to write, less error prone, and easier to parallelize than has been the
case with Java until now. This way has been around for decades and widely
used in languages like Lisp, Clojure, Erlang, Smalltalk, Scala, Groovy, and
Ruby. It’s not only a new way in Java, but a better way.
Since coding is like writing, we can learn a few things from that field. In On
Writing Well [Zin01], William Zinsser recommends simplicity, clarity, and
brevity. To create better applications, we can start by making the code simpler,
clear, and concise. The new style of programming in Java lets us do exactly
that, as we will explore throughout this book.

Who’s This Book For
This book is for programmers well versed in object-oriented programming in
Java and keen to learn and apply the new facilities of lambda expressions.
You’ll need good experience programming in previous versions of Java, espe-
cially Java 5, to make the best use of this book.
Programmers mostly interested in JVM languages like Scala, Groovy, JRuby,
and Clojure can benefit from the examples in this book and can relate back
to the facilities offered in those languages. They can also use the examples
to help fellow Java programmers on their teams.
Programmers experienced with the functional style of programming in other
languages and who are now involved in Java projects can use this book, as
well. They can learn how what they know translates to the specifics of the
lambda expressions’ usage in Java.
Programmers who are familiar with lambda expressions in Java can use this
book to help coach and train their team members who are getting up to speed
in this area.
What’s in This Book
This book will help you get up to speed with Java 8 lambda expressions, to
think in the elegant style, and to benefit from the additions to the Java
Development Kit (JDK) library. We’ll take an example-driven approach to
exploring the concepts. Rather than discuss the theory of functional program-
ming, we’ll dive into specific day-to-day tasks to apply the elegant style. This
approach will quickly get these concepts under our belts so we can put them
to real use on projects right away.
On the first read, take the time to go over the chapters sequentially as we
build upon previously discussed concepts and examples. Each chapter closes
with a quick summary to recap what was covered. Later, when working on
applications, take a quick glance at any relevant example or section in the
book. There’s also a syntax appendix for quick reference.
Here’s how the rest of the book is organized:
We discuss the functional style of programming, its benefits, and how it differs
from the prevalent imperative style in Chapter 1, Hello, Lambda Expressions!,
on page 1. We also look into how Java supports lambda expressions in this
chapter.
Preface • xvi

The JDK collections have received some special treatment in Java 8, with
new interfaces, classes, and methods that support functional-style operations.
We will explore these in Chapter 2, Using Collections, on page 19.
In Chapter 3, Strings, Comparators, and Filters, on page 41, we exploit func-
tional-style and lambda expressions to work with strings, implement the
Comparator interface, and use filters for file selection.
In addition to using the functional-style facilities in the JDK, we can benefit
from applying the elegant style in the design of methods and classes we create.
We’ll cover functional-style design techniques in Chapter 4, Designing with
Lambda Expressions, on page 63.
The lambda expressions facilitate a code structure that helps delineate oper-
ations to manage object lifetimes and resource cleanup, as we’ll discuss in
Chapter 5, Working with Resources, on page 87.
We’ll see lambda expressions shine in Chapter 6, Being Lazy, on page 103;
they provide us the ability to postpone instance creation and method evalua-
tions as well as create infinite lazy collections, and thereby improve the code’s
performance.
In Chapter 7, Optimizing Recursions, on page 121, we will use lambda
expressions to optimize recursions and achieve stellar performance using
memoization techniques.
We’ll put the techniques we cover in the book to some real use in Chapter 8,
Composing with Lambda Expressions, on page 135, where we’ll transform
objects, implement MapReduce, and safely parallelize a program with little
effort.
In Chapter 9, Bringing It All Together, on page 147, we’ll go over the key concepts
and the practices needed to adopt those techniques.
In Appendix 1, Starter Set of Functional Interfaces, on page 155, we’ll take a
glance at some of the most popular functional interfaces.
A quick overview of the Java 8 syntax for functional interfaces, lambda
expressions, and method/constructor references is in Appendix 2, Syntax
Overview, on page 157.
The URLs mentioned throughout this book are gathered together for your
convenience in Appendix 3, Web Resources, on page 163.
What’s in This Book • xvii

Java Version Used in This Book
To run the examples in this book you need Java 8 with support for lambda
expressions. Using automated scripts, the examples in this book have been
tried out with the following version of Java:
java version "1.8.0"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0-b128)
Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 25.0-b69, mixed mode)
Take a few minutes to download the appropriate version of Java for your
system. This will help you follow along with the examples in this book.
How to Read the Code Examples
When writing code in Java, we place classes in packages, and executable state-
ments and expressions in methods. To reduce clutter, we’ll skip the package
names and imports in the code listings. All code in this book belongs to a package:
package fpij;
Any executable code not listed within a method is part of an undisplayed main()
method. When going through the code listings, if you have an urge to look at the
full source code, remember it’s only a click away at the website for this book.
Online Resources
A number of web resources referenced throughout the book are collected in
Appendix 3, Web Resources, on page 163. Here are a few that will help you get
started with this book:
The Oracle website for downloading the version of Java used in this book is
https://jdk8.java.net/download.html. The JDK documentation is available at
http://download.java.net/jdk8/docs/api.
This book’s page at the Pragmatic Bookshelf website is http://www.pragprog.com/
titles/vsjava8. From there you can download all the example source code for the
book. You can also provide feedback by submitting errata entries or posting
your comments and questions in the forum. If you’re reading the book in PDF
form, you can click on the link above a code listing to view or download the
specific examples.
Now for some fun with lambda expressions…
Venkat Subramaniam
February 2014
Preface • xviii

CHAPTER 1
There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to
make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the
other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious
deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult.1
➤ Sir Charles Antony Richard Hoare
Hello,LambdaExpressions!
Our Java coding style is ready for a remarkable makeover.
The everyday tasks we perform just got simpler, easier, and more expressive.
The new way of programming in Java has been around for decades in other
languages. With these facilities in Java we can write concise, elegant, and
expressive code with fewer errors. We can use this to easily enforce policies
and implement common design patterns with fewer lines of code.
In this book we’ll explore the functional style of programming using direct
examples of everyday tasks we do as programmers. Before we take the leap
to this elegant style, and this new way to design and program, let’s discuss
why it’s better.
Change the Way You Think
Imperative style—that’s what Java has provided us since its inception. In this
style, we tell Java every step of what we want it to do and then we watch it
faithfully exercise those steps. That’s worked fine, but it’s a bit low level. The
code tends to get verbose, and we often wish the language were a tad more
intelligent; we could then tell it—declaratively—what we want rather than
delve into how to do it. Thankfully, Java can now help us do that. Let’s look
at a few examples to see the benefits and the differences in style.
The Habitual Way
Let’s start on familiar ground to see the two paradigms in action. Here’s an
imperative way to find if Chicago is in a collection of given cities—remember, the
1. Hoare, Charles Antony Richard, "The Emperor’s Old Clothes," Communications of the
ACM 24, no. 2 (February 1981): 5–83, doi:10.1145/358549.358561.

listings in this book only have snippets of code (see How to Read the Code
Examples, on page xviii).
introduction/fpij/Cities.java
boolean found = false;
for(String city : cities) {
if(city.equals("Chicago")) {
found = true;
break;
}
}
System.out.println("Found chicago?:" + found);
This imperative version is noisy and low level; it has several moving parts.
We first initialize a smelly boolean flag named found and then walk through each
element in the collection. If we found the city we’re looking for, then we set
the flag and break out of the loop. Finally we print out the result of our finding.
A Better Way
As observant Java programmers, the minute we set our eyes on this code
we’d quickly turn it into something more concise and easier to read, like this:
introduction/fpij/Cities.java
System.out.println("Found chicago?:" + cities.contains("Chicago"));
That’s one example of declarative style—the contains() method helped us get
directly to our business.
Tangible Improvements
That change improved our code in quite a few ways:
• No messing around with mutable variables
• Iteration steps wrapped under the hood
• Less clutter
• Better clarity; retains our focus
• Less impedance; code closely trails the business intent
• Less error prone
• Easier to understand and maintain
Beyond Simple Cases
That was simple—the declarative function to check if an element is present
in a collection has been around in Java for a very long time. Now imagine not
having to write imperative code for more advanced operations, like parsing
Chapter 1. Hello, Lambda Expressions! • 2

files, working with databases, making calls to web services, programming
concurrency, and so on. Java now makes it possible to write concise, elegant,
less error-prone code, not just for simple cases, but throughout our
applications.
The Old Way
Let’s look at another example. We’ll define a collection of prices and try out
a few ways to total discounted price values.
final List<BigDecimal> prices = Arrays.asList(
new BigDecimal("10"), new BigDecimal("30"), new BigDecimal("17"),
new BigDecimal("20"), new BigDecimal("15"), new BigDecimal("18"),
new BigDecimal("45"), new BigDecimal("12"));
Suppose we’re asked to total the prices greater than $20, discounted by 10%.
Let’s do that in the habitual Java way first.
introduction/fpij/DiscountImperative.java
BigDecimal totalOfDiscountedPrices = BigDecimal.ZERO;
for(BigDecimal price : prices) {
if(price.compareTo(BigDecimal.valueOf(20)) > 0)
totalOfDiscountedPrices =
totalOfDiscountedPrices.add(price.multiply(BigDecimal.valueOf(0.9)));
}
System.out.println("Total of discounted prices: " + totalOfDiscountedPrices);
That’s familiar code; we start with a mutable variable to hold the total of the
discounted prices. We then loop through the prices, pick each price greater
than $20, compute each item’s discounted value, and add those to the total.
Finally we print the total value of the discounted prices.
And here’s the output from the code.
Total of discounted prices: 67.5
It worked, but writing it feels dirty. It’s no fault of ours; we had to use what
was available. But the code is fairly low level—it suffers from “primitive
obsession” and defies the single-responsibility principle. Those of us working
from home have to keep this code away from the eyes of kids aspiring to be
programmers, for they may be dismayed and sigh, “That’s what you do for a
living?”
A Better Way, Again
Now we can do better—a lot better. Our code can resemble the requirement
specification. This will help reduce the gap between the business needs and
Change the Way You Think • 3

Random documents with unrelated
content Scribd suggests to you:

Copyright, by International News Service.
CLIVEDEN, GERMANTOWN, PHILADELPHIA. 1761.
Middle Colonies Georgian, second phase.

MANTEL IN PARLOUR, MOUNT PLEASANT, PHILADELPHIA. 1761.
Middle Colonies Georgian, second phase.

THE WOODLANDS, SOUTH FRONT. PHILADELPHIA, C. 1770.
Middle Colonies Georgian, third phase.
of the 1754 addition were fetched from England in Colonel Coultas’s ships.
The pilasters and cornices in the hall are exceptionally fine. Rosettes are
carved in the dog ears of the door trims and the cheeks and soffits of the
jambs are set with bevel-flush panels. In the parlour the carving of the
overmantel and the panelling are unsurpassed for either execution or design.
The central panel above the fireplace is three feet high and nearly six feet
wide, and not a joint can be discovered in it. Below it is a band of
exquisitely wrought floriated carving in high relief. Although it is possible
to find more elaborate woodwork, it is rarely that one meets with a degree
of elaboration tempered with such dignified restraint and consummate good
taste.”
Another house of the second Georgian type is Mount Pleasant, or Clunie,
as it was at first called, in Fairmount Park, built in 1761 by Captain John
Macpherson, and in later years the home of Benedict Arnold. Mount
Pleasant is a structure of almost baronial aspect, with east and west fronts
alike of imposing mien. An high foundation of carefully squared stones is
pierced by iron barred basement windows set in stone frames. Above this
massive, grisly base, the thick stone walls are coated with yellow-grey

roughcast. Heavy quoins of brick at the corners and, at the north and south
ends of the building, great quadruple chimneys joined into one at the top by
arches, create an air of more than usual solidity. A broad flight of stone
steps, their iron balustrades overgrown with a bushy mass of honeysuckle,
leads up to a doorway of generous breadth. The pillars at each side of the
door and the superimposed pediment, the ornate Palladian window
immediately above on the second floor and, above that again, the cornice
pediment springing from the eaves, all contribute to set a stamp of courtly
distinction upon the pile.
Above the second floor the hipped roof springs, pierced east and west by
two graceful dormers and crowned by a well turned balustrade that
traverses nearly the whole distance between the chimneys. The fan light
over the door has remarkably heavy, fluted mullions and much of the detail
throughout the house, though highly wrought, is heavy. The two flanking
outbuildings, set 30 or 40 feet distant from the northeast and southeast
corners of the house, designed for servants’ quarters and domestic offices,
give Mount Pleasant a peculiarly striking appearance. Without them it
would be only an unusually handsome Georgian country house, with them it
at once takes on the manorial port of one of the old Virginia mansions. The
interior woodwork, both upstairs and down, is rich in elaboration of detail,
and the door frames, with their heavily moulded pediments, are
exceptionally fine.
Cliveden, the third member of the second group, was built in 1761 by
Chief Justice Chew. Its solid and heavy masonry is of carefully dressed
Germantown stone, and at the peaks of the gables and corners of the roof
are great stone urns. Back of the house are two wings, one semi-detached
and the other entirely so, used for servants’ quarters and domestic offices.
All the features and detail about Cliveden are thoroughly in keeping with
the same characteristics as in the other two houses already described.
The windows are broad and fill a great part of the wall space in the
façade, and the doorway is an essential feature that has been made the most
of by the architect. Both indoors and out the strongly classic feeling has
been emphasised in pillar and pediment, pilaster and entablature. Triglyphs,
guttæ and every other detail of classic embellishment have been wrought
with the nice precision due a worthy subject.

Comparing Whitby, Mount Pleasant and Cliveden with the former
houses of the first Georgian type, certain differences at once strike us. The
whole aspect is changed by the greater breadth of windows and doors. The
houses look wider awake. This change in the size of the windows means, of
course, that the rooms within in most cases were lighter and more cheerful
than before. Then, too, the Palladian window has appeared. Both Mount
Pleasant and Cliveden afford good examples of it, Cliveden’s being placed
at the side while at Mount Pleasant it forms an important feature in both the
east and west fronts.
At Mount Pleasant and Cliveden we see, too, that the door has become a
subject for elaborate treatment, quite in contrast to the extremely simple and
unassuming manner of dealing with the same feature in the earlier houses.
At Mount Pleasant the severity of the roof line is tempered by a balustrade
and the effective management of the chimneys while, at Whitby and
Cliveden, urns embellish the peaks and corners. Within we find that
acanthus leaves and thistles have begun to grow, the rose has blossomed,
other conventional flowers and foliage have budded and egg and dart
mouldings have appeared. In other words, carving as a mode of
embellishment has attained an established vogue. The moulding profiles
have lost some of their trenchant boldness and, though the ornamental
detail, both indoors and out, is still vigorous, and at times massive, there is
generally visible an air of delicacy and refinement not present before.
The Woodlands, the Highlands, and Upsala exemplify for us the third
type of Georgian. William Hamilton built the Woodlands about 1770.
Anthony Morris finished the Highlands in 1796, and Norton Johnson began
Upsala in 1798 and completed it three years later. Across the north front of
the Woodlands, at regular intervals, are six Ionic pilasters above whose tops
runs an elaborately ornamented entablature with pateræ and flutings, the
whole surmounted by a pediment. Before the house is a low and broad
paved terrace filling the space between the semi-circular bays that project
from the ends of the building. Between the two middle pilasters, a round
arched doorway with a fan light opens into the hall. On the south or river
front a flight of steps ascends to a lofty white pillared portico from which a
door opens directly into the oval shaped ballroom.
In another respect the whole exterior aspect of the Woodlands is different
from the houses of the second type. Window treatment is always a most
important item in determining architectural character and it is just here that

a significant change is to be noted. The size of the opening is, in some
cases, the same, in others it is larger but, more noticeable still, the muntins
are far smaller and we lose the bold, trenchant barring of white that
emphasises the aspect of windows of the earlier buildings.
The interior is finished with all the delicacy that one might expect
judging from the evidences of Adam influence without. One highly
significant feature of interior treatment in houses of the third type is the
change made in the arrangement of the mantels. We have seen that in
houses of the first type, such as Graeme Park and in houses of the second
type, such as Whitby Hall or Mount Pleasant, the overmantel panelling and
embellishment were accorded much care and elaboration. The chimney
breast often extended a considerable distance into the room and the
ornamental superstructure above the fireplace reached all the way to the
ceiling.
Although these ornate overmantels reaching to the ceiling had begun to
fall into disfavour in England a little after the middle of the eighteenth
century, when houses of the second Georgian type were being erected in the
Philadelphia neighbourhood, Colonial conservatism disregarded the newer
style and clung to the mode approved by time-honoured precedent. The
fireplace with its setting has always held a position of such exalted honour
as the centre of family life that the following extract from Clouston’s
Treatise on Chippendale is particularly illuminating in this connexion. In
speaking of the influence exerted by Sir William Chambers on architecture
as well as on furniture, he says:—“When he returned to England in 1755,
[from the Continent] he was

THE WOODLANDS, NORTH FRONT.
THE HIGHLANDS, WHITEMARSH VALLEY, PA. 1796.
Middle Colonies Georgian, third phase.

Copyright, 1908, by Rogers & Manson
HOMEWOOD, NEAR BALTIMORE.
Southern Georgian, second phase in transition to third.
accompanied by Wilton and Cipriani, afterwards so well known as an artist
and decorator. He also brought Italian sculptors to carve the marble
mantelpieces he introduced into English houses.
“These were made from his own designs, and the ornament of figures,
scrolls, and foliage was free in character. Strange to say, these mantelpieces,
designed and made by an architect, were yet the means of taking away this
important part of interior decoration from the hands of the architect
altogether and causing it to become quite a separate production, made and
sold along with the grates.
“In former times it had been an integrant portion of the room, reaching
from floor to ceiling, balanced and made part of the wall by having its main
lines carried round in panelling and enriched friezes. It was the keynote of
decoration and the master builder of the times grew fanciful and exerted his
utmost skill upon its carving and quaint imagery, centralising the whole
ornament of the room around the household shrine.
“Mantelpieces had gradually come down in height, though still retaining
much of their fine proportions and classic design. Many causes had
contributed to this, the chief being the disuse of wood panelling and the
preference given to hangings of damask, foreign leather and wall-paper. In
the reigns of Queen Anne and the Little Dutchman the custom of panelling

was partially kept up but the lining was only white painted deal, after the
fashion in Holland. At this time the upper part of the chimney piece was
still retained, but only reached about half way up the wall. Gibbs, Kent and
Ware kept the superstructure as much as they could, but Sir William
Chambers dealt it the most crushing blow it had yet received by copying the
later French and Italian styles and giving minute detail more consideration
than fine proportion. He discarded the upper part altogether and helped to
make ‘continued chimney pieces’ things of the past.”
The much used Adam oval found expression even in the shapes of
rooms, and besides the oval ballroom at the Woodlands, we frequently find
in houses of the third type rounded or elliptical hallways and chambers.
At the Highlands, in the Whitemarsh Valley, we see the front of the
house adorned with tall Ionic pilasters rising from base course to cornice,
which is itself elaborately wrought. The woodwork inside is excellent, but
unfortunately the Adam mantels with their compo decoration have been
removed and now grace another house some miles distant. At Upsala, in
Germantown, however, we are in better luck, for there the Adam mantels
have remained untouched. The illustrations show the rest of the house and
make further specific comment unnecessary, save to remark, regarding the
windows, that here, as in other houses of this latest type, larger panes of
glass than in the two earlier types are met with in not a few instances.
Before proceeding further in the course of comparison, a word ought to
be said about the colour of the paint used for interior woodwork of the
Georgian houses of all three types. For some reason there seems to be an
impression abroad that white was employed to the exclusion of everything
else. There was, it is true, a preponderance of white but its use was by no
means universal. A close examination of successive layers of paint on some
old woodwork reveals various shades of greys, blues, drabs, brownish
yellows and other hues beneath one or more coats of white. Grey seems to
have been one of the earliest variants from white and, in some places,
nothing else was ever used. At Graeme Park, for instance, the first coat of
paint was grey, and no other colour ever adorned its panelling and door and
window trims. At Stenton, on the other hand, the taste of the occupants
dictated a change of colour from time to time and we find a good deal of
variety in the successive coats. During the prevalence of the second
Georgian type white seems to have found more general favour. With our
last type, delicate colours again began to be used.

Contrasting the Woodlands, the Highlands and Upsala with the houses
illustrating the second Georgian type, we find still further evidences of
architectural evolution. During the prevalence of the second type individual
features were singled out for decorative emphasis, but in the days of the
third type the entire front of the house or sometimes the whole exterior was
regarded from a decorative point of view. At Cliveden the treatment of the
doorway and the urns on the roof are the features relied upon for the
embellishment of the façade. At Mount Pleasant the doorways of the east
and west fronts, the Palladian windows above them, the balustrade on the
roof and the treatment of the chimneys supply a fuller and more ornate
decorative effect. But when we reach the third period we see that the
architect has considered carefully the decorative element in both the
proportions and detail of the whole building. It would be hard to believe
that the designer of the Woodlands, in drawing his plans, had not carefully
aimed at the pleasing ensemble of the masses. The effect of the rounded
ends is agreeable and a marked departure from the straightforward
rectangularity of most of the houses of preceding types. The lofty portico of
the Woodlands south or river front had no precedent in Philadelphia. Vaux
Hill or Fatland, erected about the same time, and Loudoun, a few years
later, had the same motif, and even John Bartram, in his last addition to his
house, adopted the same treatment. Neither was there a precedent for the
method of dealing with the north front, so we see that the Woodlands struck
two new notes in local architecture.
At the Woodlands and the Highlands we find pilasters carried the full
height of the walls—a new feature. The fenestration is arranged with more
regard to outward appearance and not solely from a utilitarian point of view.
We find that the high panelled overmantels, which constituted an important
architectural feature, had given place to the low and elaborately adorned
mantel that ought to be regarded rather as a piece of furniture than as an
architectural entity. Fireplaces had grown smaller, fan lights above doors
had become common and were enriched with beautiful and sometimes
intricate metal tracery. The comparison between these later fan lights with
their airy grace, and the earlier fan lights of Mount Pleasant, with their
ponderous mouldings, is instructive. In the detail of all ornament heaviness
has vanished and the polished elegance of Adam influence has taken its
place. Everywhere we find pateræ, drops and swags, fluting and quilling,
oval fans and dainty urns and vases with delicate leaf and flower treatment.

Regarding the texture of stone walls, we ought also to note that in the
second and third types we find neatly squared and dressed stones used to a
considerable extent. At Cliveden, the Highlands and Upsala the fronts alone
are of cut stone while at Whitby Hall the walls on all sides are treated with
the same formal precision.
Briefly summing up, then, it is clear that three distinct types exist. The
first has Queen Anne affinities but is Georgian in time and much of its
feeling. Ornamental detail is simple and bold and at times a trifle heavy.
The profiles of mouldings are strong and in high relief. Simplicity and
strength, combined with grace, give the prevailing note in every instance.
The second type is lighter and more ornate, but with characteristic
conservatism and abhorrence of the new fangled whims of Sir William
Chambers and the Brothers Adam, Philadelphia adhered to the modes in
vogue in England from twenty to twenty-five years before and kept Ware in
countenance who, in 1750, was still crowning his buildings with heavy
Queen Anne urns.
Notwithstanding the staunch adherence to conservative architectural
principles, however, a new feeling is everywhere perceptible. Though the
overmantel decorations still extended all the way to the ceiling, the
character of the ornamentation employed was vastly more elaborate and
graceful than anything to be found in buildings of the first type. If the
profiles of mouldings were not so bold and insistent they were,
nevertheless, quite as graceful. With the advent of floriated and foliated
motifs in the carving, we naturally find a closer care to detail of all kinds. At
the same time there is to be seen a more punctilious heed to all the little
niceties and characteristic distinctions between the classic orders.
By the time our third Georgian type appears, Adam influence has
become paramount and put to flight all mid-Georgian ponderosity. Even in
the case of manifestly “carpenter built” houses of the period, where, quite
unlike the three excellent examples here chosen to represent their particular
classes, no especial architectural merit is to be looked for, we find no
heaviness of line, and the character of ornamentation employed is distinctly
either a copy or an echo of Adam motifs and, in not a few cases, has caught
much of their spirit.
It must be understood that the houses used for illustration have been
chosen because they represent their many contemporaries in the same

neighbourhood, all of which display the same characteristics according to
the date at which they were built. The foregoing analysis does not pretend
to be complete—it would take far more space to trace all the subtleties of
the subject—but aims only to direct attention to certain facts that may
conduce to our clearer understanding of American Georgian and its
resources in supplying our present needs.
In considering the variations between the Georgian types of the
Philadelphia neighbourhood it must be borne in mind that they ought not to
be judged too straitly by contemporary work in England. Such comparison
would only be misleading and unfair for several reasons. In the first place,
at the beginning of the Georgian period, local conditions forbade the lavish
display of carved ornamentation that marked so many houses of the same
date in England. At that time there were few craftsmen in the Colonies
capable of executing the elaborate carving in vogue on the other side of the
Atlantic. The builders of mansions, therefore, must perforce content
themselves by a close adherence to line and proportion and do without the
highly wrought carved embellishment. Then, too, besides this difficulty,
many of the builders of these early houses belonged to the Society of
Friends, most of whom from their religious principles were averse to a
wealth of ornament. In the second place, judging by contemporary English
standards would be misleading because at the time the second Philadelphia
Georgian type began to flourish, and the means and inclination for elaborate
ornament were both present, Colonial conservatism had become an
important factor in the dictation of style, and however closely
Philadelphians might copy the current modes of London in matters of dress,
in their manners and architecture they chose to cling to well established
precedent and had always remained thenceforward from twenty to thirty
years back of their British cousins in the method of their architectural
expression. Hence, for instance, the overmantels reaching to the ceiling
built as late as 1765. In all its phases, however, Philadelphia Georgian,
whatever minor differences there might have been, was true to the traditions
of the great English architects, and because of its purity of style is worthy of
close study today for the vital inspiration it can supply.

I
CHAPTER IX
THE GEORGIAN ARCHITECTURE OF THE SOUTH
F ever the architecture of a region or period truly reflected the personality
and manner of life of the people, it was surely the Georgian architecture
of the South in the eighteenth century. The planters of that region were
affluent and highly cultured and so eminently gifted with the social instinct
that the manor houses and mansions could not fail to indicate by their
material aspect the lavish hospitality and splendid estate that it was the
wont of their owners to maintain. The great Georgian houses, surrounded
by broad plantations, that dotted the whole land, could have been erected
only in a society possessed of abundant wealth. And the South was opulent.
Blessed by nature, as the country was, with a genial climate and fruitful
soil, and favoured by exceptional economic conditions, great fortunes had
accumulated which permitted the existence of a large leisure class and
encouraged a profound regard for all the comforts and refinements of
physical environment. In New England we have seen that the architectural
riches of the Georgian style were chiefly reserved for interior
embellishment, while the majority of exteriors were allowed to go
comparatively unadorned, with a few notable exceptions. In the South, on
the other hand, the exuberance of nature and the seductive charm of the
climate invited the builder of a house to expand his plans and take full
advantage of impressive physical settings. Consequently we have the
amplitude of aspect so typical of the Southern mansion, an amplitude that is
also in some measure due to the extensive domestic entourage and made
possible by the abundant means of the occupants.
That the wealthy Southern planters should require surroundings of
domestic splendour that would have been impossible in most other parts of
the Colonies, either from lack of means or lack of inclination to indulge in
so lavish an expenditure, surroundings that had much in common with the
conditions obtaining on many of the baronial estates in England, we may
understand when we consider, by way of example, the history of the Byrd
family of Westover in Virginia. Colonel William Byrd, the first of the
family in America, came to Virginia in 1674. He built the first house at

Westover in 1690 and at his death left, as part of his estate, a domain of
26,231 acres. His son, Colonel William Byrd 2nd, succeeding to this great
wealth and further increasing his fortune by his second marriage, began the
erection of the present house about 1727 and completed it some time prior
to 1735. When this second William Byrd, “William the Great of Westover,
died in 1744, the acres of the noble estate numbered 179,440, about 281
square miles, a veritable principality indeed.” It has been said of him that
“his path through life was a path of roses. He had wealth, culture, the best
private library in America, social consideration, and hosts of friends; and
when he went to sleep under the monument in the garden at Westover, he
left behind him not only the reputation of a good citizen, but that of the
great Virginia wit and author of the century.” His epitaph, after calling
attention to the educational advantages he had enjoyed and his close
friendships with many of the greatest men of his day in England, goes on to
relate that “he was called to the bar in the Middle Temple, studied for some
time in the Low Countries, visited the Court of France, and was chosen
Fellow of the Royal Society. Thus eminently fitted for the service and
ornament of his country, he was made Receiver general of his Majesty’s
revenues here, was thrice appointed publick agent to the Court and ministry
of England, and being thirty-seven years a member, at last became President
of the Council of this Colony. To all this were added a great elegancy and
taste of life, the well bred gentleman and polite companion.”
It is scarcely to be wondered at that a man so endowed by nature,
education and the possession of vast wealth should build in a manner suited
to his condition. In fact it would have been strange if he had not. But
William Byrd was not alone in his enjoyment of unusual advantages.
Although the incidents of his history were not duplicated, his case was
nearly paralleled by other men of his century in the South. Almost without
exception these favoured children of good breeding, to which was joined
the convenience of ample affluence, manifested an elegant taste and an
active personal interest in the building of their homes and it is to this
interest on their part that we of to-day are indebted for much of what is best
in the execution of American Georgian work. Not a few of the Southern
planters were themselves competent architects but, as representatives of
their class in this particular, it will be sufficient to mention two of them,
persons no less illustrious than George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.
Washington always manifested a deep interest in architecture, is believed to

have designed Pohick Church, had some hand in the plans of Christ Church,
Alexandria, supervised building on his own estates, exercised a directing
influence over the destinies of the public buildings planned or begun during
his lifetime in the Federal City and left an example of his capacity as a
decorative designer in the plastic ornaments of the famous mantel at
Kenmore. How deeply Jefferson was concerned with architectural matters,
both public and private, and how he maintained a lifelong interest in
everything pertaining thereto, an interest that began in early youth and
became stronger with advancing years, we well know. Pressure of onerous
public duties never abated his desire for architectural betterment throughout
the country nor diverted him from using all possible efforts to secure the
realisation of ideals. “Architecture,” he once wrote, “is worth great attention
—the most important of the arts, since it shows so much.” At another time
he penned the following:—“To give buildings symmetry and taste would
not increase their cost, it would only change the arrangement of the
materials, form and combination of members. This would cost less than the
burden of ornament with which these public buildings are often charged.
But the very first principles of the art are unknown.” These views might
find some application not inappropriate at the present day. Jefferson did not
confine his architectural interests to matters theoretical nor to designing. He
was
HARWOOD, ANNAPOLIS, 1774.
Southern Georgian, second phase.
BRICE HOUSE, ANNAPOLIS, 1740.

SHIRLEY, JAMES RIVER, VA.
WESTOVER, JAMES RIVER, VA.
Southern Georgian, first phase.

often to be found in the actual rôle of workman. When he began the
operations at Monticello, about 1770, that left it in its present form, he not
only planned and supervised the work, “but was personally responsible for
such practical phases as heating, ventilation, plumbing and drainage. He
planned the farm buildings and the laying out of all the roads and bridle
paths about the place. In addition, he trained all his own workmen and even
made experts of several of his slaves, whom he later set free to earn their
living at the trades he had taught them.”
In the South, as in New England and the Middle Colonies, we may
without much difficulty discern three phases of the Georgian modes of
expression, all of them with characteristics more or less clearly defined. In
view of the extended analysis of those phases made in the chapter devoted
to the Georgian period in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, it will
be unnecessary to dwell at length upon the corresponding characteristics to
be found in the domestic architecture of the South, a course that would
merely involve bootless repetition. As occasion arises, therefore, in
considering typical examples of Southern building, attention will be
directed chiefly to points of divergence and local peculiarities and
modifications. The practices of building kitchens and offices in structures
apart from the body of the house; of planning bedchambers on the ground
floor and of making the hall of ample enough proportions to be used as a
living-room, when so desired, have already been adverted to in the chapter
on the Southern Colonial style. All three practices were developed during
the seventeenth century and by practical usage proved their excellence so
that they were retained when a new and more elegant architectural mode
supplanted the fashion of an earlier day.
In several instances, such as Tuckahoe, erected about 1707, Belvoir in
Anne Arundel County, Maryland, built about the same date, and Gunston
Hall, finished after the middle of the eighteenth century, we may trace a
transitional form, retained from seventeenth century precedents. The
general contour of these houses exhibits strong affinities with the truly
Southern Colonial type of dwelling but in the manner of execution and the
employment of ornamental detail we are on the Georgian side of the
boundary.
For the first Georgian phase, we cannot do better than study such houses
as Carter’s Grove on the James River, built about 1737, and Westover,
finished several years prior to that date. In both places we find many of the

characteristics that we should be disposed to look for after a careful perusal
of the notes on the earliest type of Georgian houses given in Chapter VIII.
In general contour and the treatment of the roof, Carter’s Grove is not
unlike Stenton. In addition, however, to the particulars alluded to in Chapter
VIII, we find at Carter’s Grove the exceptionally broad hallway peculiar to
the South, twenty-eight feet wide. It is to be noted also that there and at
other places, too, in the South, are to be seen richly wrought baluster
spindles, spiral turned or carved, just as in some of the finer houses in New
England. In this connexion it is important to remember that at Tuckahoe, in
addition to the spiral turned balusters, there is some unusually fine carving
on the staircase executed in a more expansive and flowing style than the
carving of the middle or end of the century. The rich pilasters and pediment
of the doorway at Westover also show kinship to an earlier tradition just as
do some of the adornments of contemporary doorways in New England.
Tulip Hill at West River, Anne Arundel County, Maryland, offers an
excellent example of the Southern Georgian house erected about the middle
of the eighteenth century. In point of detail it has the usual earmarks of the
date of its erection which it is unnecessary to revert to. Several other points,
however, are to be noted. Decorative panels in relief at each side of the
circular window in the front gable and a decorative device in the pediment
of the portico are touches of embellishment of a kind not frequently found
in the North and they have their counterpart in many similar ornaments to
be found on other Southern houses built about this period. It is to be noted,
too, that the portico or porch is beginning to have a recognised architectural
place in the South. A few years later it assumed more imposing proportions
in the shape of the great white pillars, two storeys in height, supporting a
massive pediment carried forward as an integral part of the roof. While
speaking of porches it must not be forgotten that credit is due the South
Carolina type of Georgian house for the double-decked or two storey porch
so frequently met with in that state.
The necessity or desirability of developing the porch feature may have
hastened the welcome of the Classic Revival in the South because of the
opportunity it gave of constructing that architectural adjunct in an imposing
and thoroughly well-mannered and congruous method. At all events, the
Classic Revival seems to have met with earlier favour in the South than
elsewhere and its vogue was practically synchronous with the third or Adam

type of Georgian expression. As a case in point, there is Monticello but it
should be observed that Jefferson’s conception of the Classic Revival
CARTER’S GROVE, VA. 1728.
Southern Georgian, first phase.
ANDALUSIA ON THE DELAWARE, PENNSYLVANIA. 1794-1832.
Classic Revival.

OLD MARITIME EXCHANGE, PHILADELPHIA.
Classic Revival.
mode, if Monticello is to be regarded as a specimen of Classic Revival
work, had a dignity, honesty and sincerity about it that was afterwards often
lost sight of when employed by other men.
One cannot quit the task of reviewing the Georgian architecture of the
South without feeling deeply impressed with the great dignity and breadth
manifested in all its forms. It was a sincere expression of the architectural
needs of an important social condition and while it was founded on time-
honoured precedent, at the same time its application was thoroughly
American and full of vitality.

A
CHAPTER X
THE POST-COLONIAL PERIOD AND THE CLASSIC REVIVAL
FTER the close of the Revolutionary War came a period of
comparatively rapid evolution in architecture. This phase of post-
Colonial evolution reached its culminating point in the signal successes
and almost ludicrous failures of the Greek or Classic Revival, successes and
failures that occurred simultaneously, strange as it may seem, though
caused by the same influences, and are still to be seen in the older cities of
our land, oftentimes standing in close proximity.
Historically considered, this process of swift evolution is attributable to
several causes of which the chief were the rapidly increasing affluence and
prosperity of the new republic and the general approval with which French
influences and fashions were regarded. In the era of vigorous mercantile
and industrial reaction after the stress and strain of a long and exhausting
war, it was but natural that not only merchants, manufacturers and other
men of substance, but also whole communities as well, should seek to
express in structures domestic and public the proper pride and confidence of
their new-found political importance and freedom. New social and civic
demands were to be met and architecture was quick to reflect the spirit of
growth and progress. In a measure, too, there were the ravages of shot, shell
and fire and the decay incident to a long financial depression to be repaired.
With an access of material prosperity came also an access of economic
elegancies and men of means and position demanded that their domestic
surroundings should measure up to new standards of luxury. When they
found themselves in circumstances to build anew, as they not infrequently
did, their houses, while usually following much the old arrangement of plan
and number of rooms, displayed new influences of ornamental detail and
the alteration or addition of features in conformity to the new mode.
Furthermore—and this was by no means the least factor affecting the new
conditions—in the general social overturn, wrought by the event of war, the
Loyalists, who represented a large portion of the wealth and refinement of
the Colonial period, had been ruined, dispossessed of their estates, driven
from the country or had withdrawn to England or some of the other

Colonies and their places had oftentimes been taken by persons who had
hitherto held a humbler state of life. These men of new wealth and standing,
who owed their advancement to their warm espousal of the American cause,
built themselves houses to accord with their recently acquired rank and
sought by the fineness of their dwellings, as is the wont of parvenus, to
make up for lack of birth and breeding. It was but natural, too, in all these
cases just mentioned, that popular taste should incline toward an
architectural vogue that was French in its immediate inspiration rather than
toward any style whose precedents were to be found in the Mother Country
whose recent political domination was still held in bitter remembrance.
Architecturally considered, this evolution that culminated in the full
fruition of the Classic Revival shows three influences that are to be
reckoned in any attempt at its analysis. In the first place, there was the
Adam phase of the Georgian mode which had begun to find pronounced
expression in the American Colonies from about 1770 onward. The greater
refinements of this type, as analysed in preceding chapters, were strongly in
evidence up to 1800 or shortly afterward and their Adam provenance was
clearly distinguishable. In the second place, there were the carpenter-
designed and built houses of plainly defined Georgian ancestry. During the
eighteenth century, the public mind had become so thoroughly imbued with
the Georgian spirit of architectural classicism, tempered and modified, to be
sure, by conveyance through a British medium, but classicism all the same,
that even the most unpretentious little houses gave evidence of the
prevailing influence in one form or another. It might be a house door with
pilasters and pediment or it might be a mantel. The pilasters flanking the
doorway might have lost all traces of near kinship to any of the classic
orders, so far as their details were concerned, and so might the pediment
also, but the mere fact that they were there showed plainly the source
whence they were derived. These carpenter-designed-and-built houses of
the end of the eighteenth century may be regarded as a residuum of the
architectural spirit of the epoch. Last of all, there was the pure classic
influence, the circumstances of whose transplanting to America we shall
examine in detail.
Both the architecture of the Georgian period and the architecture of the
Classic Revival were essentially classic in spirit but there was a vast
difference between their several manifestations of classicality and it is most
important that we should grasp that fundamental difference. The classicism

of Georgian architecture was free in its spirit and interpretation and was
elastic in its adaptability to the requirements of domestic or public edifices.
The architects who applied it were blessed with common sense and while
they incorporated a distinct element of formal order in their work, they were
not trammelled by so narrow a conventionalism that they feared to make
such adaptations as their own original genius prompted, provided they were
consistent with the source of general inspiration. In other words, the
classicism of Georgian architecture was classicism humanised and
rationalised by transmission through the channels of the Renaissance or the
labours of such discriminating students of antiquity as the Brothers Adam.
It was elastic and suited alike to public edifices and abodes of both high and
low degree. It was also direct and simple and had the dignity and vitality
that art unaffected and ingenuous always shows. For this very reason it was
so convincing and so long retained its hold upon popular taste.
The classicism of the Classic Revival, on the other hand, was essentially
and unalterably rigid in its adherence to the forms of antiquity and the
archæological manner of applying those forms. It was not an adaptation, it
was, in very truth, a revival of the modes of two thousand years ago, a
gigantic exhibition of architectural archæology. The strength of Georgian
architecture lay in the freedom and elasticity of its classicism and its ready
flexibility to adaptation. The weakness of the architecture of the Classic
Revival was in its rigidity and inflexible resistance to efforts to adapt it to
varied modern requirements. In the South, it is true, it showed a few traces
of freer interpretation, perhaps because in some cases the artisans were
incapable of rendering the accurate reproductions executed by better skilled
Northern mechanics but, even with this slight allowance, the stamp of
rigidity remained indelible.
Despite a degree of stiffness and pedantry, however, the architecture of
the Classic Revival, in its more felicitous manifestations, displayed not a
little real excellence, stateliness and grace. Many truly important structures
were built during the period of classic ascendancy and to-day, after years of
vicissitude in popular taste, their charm of grace and quiet dignity is still
fresh and enduring and constantly reminds us of the courtliness of the
generation that wisely planned and achieved them. In its less regulated
forms, on the contrary, probably due to the ambitious contractor rather than
to even an inferior architect, the architecture of the Classic Revival was
often unsuitable in its application, uncomfortable and sometimes ridiculous.

In the fore part of the nineteenth century, classicism became an obsession
among builders whose sole aim seems to have been to transform each city
in the land into a second Athens or Rome. Everywhere could be seen
buildings that, if not planned on classic lines in their interior divisions or
their side elevations, were at least adorned with Greek and Roman orders.
This church or bank was embellished with a portico of Corinthian columns,
that one across the street had a corresponding portico of severest Doric
character while another, perhaps, around the corner rejoiced in graceful
Ionic pillars and, doubtless, just beyond was a house whose owner took a
proper pride in the impeccable purity of his Tuscan piazza. Sometimes all
the orders got inextricably jumbled together on the same edifice and
overrun with a veritable forest of acanthus leaves and anthemia, and yet the
effect was not wholly bad, however much it might distress a purist, because
the builders, in the exuberance and freshness of their vigour, could not help
producing some vitality, although they were trying to be scrupulously
accurate while expressing themselves in a medium they did not fully
understand. These unseemly mix-ups of architectural botany or botanical
architecture, whichever one prefers to call it, were not of common
occurrence it is pleasant to record. They were the exception, and served to
lend point to the really excellent and creditable things that were achieved at
a time when a decorous formality went hand in hand with cultivated taste
and not a little vigour of thought.
The mutation of architectural style from the Georgian mode to that of the
Classic Revival was virtually synchronous and correspondent with the sway
of the Empire styles in furniture, the decorative arts and personal attire. The
Classic Revival style is altogether post-Colonial in date and its exotic
impetus and inspiration, derived from the France of the First Napoleon and
grafted upon a Georgian stock, cannot be regarded as essentially a part of
the logical process of architectural evolution which had hitherto progressed
by gradual and, for the most part, well nigh imperceptible steps from one
traditional form to another.
The vigorous classicism of the Georgian period, thanks to its filtration
through Renaissance channels, was elastic and appropriate in its
application. Even the elegancies and refinements of the Adam school of
Georgian expression, though drawn direct from the store of classic
antiquity, were judiciously adapted to current needs by masters of the art of
discrimination. But the type of classicism exemplified in the Classic

Revival was deliberately transplanted bodily and de novo from the ancient
world by Napoleonic fiat, in like manner with the designs for furniture and
the patterns to dominate the products of the other decorative arts. The
transplanters sometimes showed a predilection for heavy Roman forms
rather than for the delicacy of Greek refinements, and the transplanting was
occasionally done in a clumsy way with little apparent regard for fitness or
the principles of sane adaptation. With all the wealth of antiquity to draw
from, it would have been strange indeed if the fautors of revived classicism
had not produced much that was both exceedingly worthy and beautiful. As
pointed out before, whatever defect or weakness characterised the
expression of the Classic Revival style, viewed in the aggregate, is not to be
attributed to the forms employed but to the manner in which those forms
were sometimes misapplied and forced into uses or combinations to which
they were ill suited.
This neo-classic inspiration of Napoleonic French contrivance found
favour in America, thanks to the strong Francophile sentiment prevailing in
the latter part of the eighteenth century and at the beginning of the
nineteenth, which even dictated the colour and design of ladies’ gowns and
their method of coiffure. In the able hands of such men as Charles Bulfinch,
the neo-classic manifestation well merited all the popular approval accorded
it. It is scarcely fair, however, to put Bulfinch forth, at least in his earlier
period, as a typical exponent of Classic Revival architecture. He was, it is
true, imbued with the new influences but he had too much creative instinct
and too much sense of fitness ever to descend to mere copying or wholesale
borrowing. Besides, he was, one might say, by date of birth and training, a
product of the Adam age and, by native bias, in full sympathy with its
delicate and refined methods of expression. Indeed, we may properly regard
Bulfinch as marking the transition from the Adam or last phase of Georgian
architecture to the modes of the Classic Revival for he combined in his
work many of the best features of both. He knew how and when to employ
Adam delicacy and refinement of detail or Adam exuberance of
embellishment without falling into a surfeit of finicky and saccharine over-
elaboration; he knew also when and where to use classic boldness and
vigour and even classic austerity without sinking from classic grace into
any of the heavy Roman forms of brutal vulgarity and military bombast that
sometimes marred the work of later exponents of Classic Revival
inspiration.

Bulfinch was possessed of consummate good taste, a fine sense of
proportion and a genius for judicious adaptation. He was educated while the
Adam influence was at its height, had broadened his field by observation
and foreign travel and began to practise just before the first fresh impetus of
direct classicism was launched. It was, therefore, quite natural that, with his
trained perception and happy faculty of selection and combination, he
should have picked out the best in each school, and peculiarly appropriate
that his work should exemplify the transitional stage by which one was
merged into the other for, in the evolutionary process, already alluded to,
the purest form of neo-classic design found its analogue in the earlier Adam
practice.
Along with Bulfinch, as a representative of the transition stage, must be
classed Samuel McIntire, of Salem, whose work both public and domestic
has always been justly esteemed. He, too, retained a large share of Adam
elegance and wealth of detail which he successfully incorporated with
motifs and methods of treatment inspired by the more recent impetus of
classicism. To McIntire’s influence may be attributed much of the slender
delicacy of proportion and the attenuation of pillars and pilasters—this
attenuation had a counterpart in some of the contemporary New York Dutch
design—so noticeable in a great deal of New England architecture of this
period. He eliminated all grossness and pared down the dimensions of
columns while he drew out their length to a degree that had no precedent in
ancient practice and would have shocked the French purists under whose
auspices the new movement

ANDREW SAFFORD PORCH, SALEM,
MASS.
Transition to Classic Revival.
INTERIOR DOORWAY, NICHOLS HOUSE,
SALEM, MASS.
Photograph by C. V. Buck, from Underwood & Underwood, N. Y.
THE CAPITOL AT WASHINGTON.
Classic Revival.

GIRARD COLLEGE, PHILADELPHIA.
Classic Revival.
had been inaugurated. Despite these departures from architectural and
archæological orthodoxy, however, McIntire’s work is replete with
exquisite charm and is justified by applying to it the touchstone of good
taste.
Latrobe, McComb, in his later work, L’Enfant, Hoban, Dr. Thornton,
Thomas Jefferson, Strickland and other noted architects of the last years of
the eighteenth century and the fore part of the nineteenth followed classic
precedent somewhat more closely in the practice of their profession and
may, therefore, be considered the most faithful and typical exponents of
Classic Revival principles. Much of their work is noble in conception and
peculiarly suited to the monumental character of the buildings they
designed.
The influence of the Classic Revival was to be noted earliest in public
edifices such as the Boston State House on Beacon Hill, the New Theatre or
the Bank of the United States in Philadelphia or, most of all, in the Capitol
at Washington in the design, erection and restoration or rebuilding of which
so many of the most eminent architects of the day had a share. There the

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