ONE:The two Pugins, father and son, had much to do with the revival of Gothic architecture among us. The father, Augustus, born in France in 1769, came over to London to practise his profession. In 1821-3 he published "Specimens of Gothic Architecture," selected from various ancient edifices in England; and in 1825-28 "Specimens of the Architectural Antiquities of Normandy." The year before his death, in 1832, he assisted his son in producing a work entitled "Gothic Ornaments," selected from various buildings in England and France. Augustus Welby Pugin, who was born in 1811, very soon eclipsed his father's fame. Having resolved to devote his time to the arch?ological study of style and symbolism in architectural ornaments, he settled down at Ramsgate in 1833, and carried his resolution into effect both with pen and pencil. In 1835 he published designs for furniture, in the style of the fifteenth century; and designs for iron and brass work, in the style of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The year following appeared his "Designs for Gold and Silver Ornaments, and Ancient Timber Houses." His exclusive and ardent devotion to these studies, aided, no doubt, by his habits of seclusion, began to produce a morbid effect upon his intellect, which was shown in the overweening arrogance of a tract entitled "Contrasts; or, a Parallel between Ancient and Modern Architecture." This morbid tendency probably was increased by his becoming a member of the Roman Catholic Church, in which a great field was opened for the display of his peculiar tastes by the construction of buildings which he expected would shame the degenerate taste of the age, but which, too often, were found to be gloomy and inconvenient. His principal works were the Cathedral of St. George, Southwark, the Church of St. Barnabas, at Nottingham, the Cistercian Abbey of St. Bernard, in Leicestershire, the cathedral churches of Killarney and Enniscorthy, Alton Castle, and the model structure which he erected at his own place near Ramsgate. The Medi?val Court in the Exhibition of 1851 was associated in all minds with the name of Pugin. In his case genius was too nearly allied to madness. The awful boundary was passed towards the close of his life, when his friends were obliged to confine him in a lunatic asylum, from which he returned only to die in 1852.
TWO:MUSTER OF THE IRISH AT MULLINAHONE. (See p. 568.)This was a blow which for a time completely prostrated the Prussian monarch. Nothing but the most indomitable spirit and the highest military talent could have saved any man under such circumstances. But Frederick had disciplined both his generals and soldiers to despise reverses, and he relied on their keeping at bay the host of enemies with which he was surrounded till he had tried a last blow. On the field of Rosbach, near the plain of Lützen, where Gustavus Adolphus fell, after having relieved Marshal Keith at Leipsic, Frederick gave battle to the united French and Austrians. The French numbered forty thousand men, the Austrians twenty thousand; yet, with his twenty thousand against sixty thousand, Frederick, on the 5th of November, took the field. His inferior numbers favoured the stratagem which he had planned. After fighting fiercely for awhile, his troops gave way, and appeared to commence a hasty retreat. This, however, was continued only till the French and Austrians were thrown off their guard, when the Prussians suddenly turned, and received the headlong squadrons with a murderous coolness and composure. The Austrians, confounded, fled at once; and Soubise, a general of the princely House of Rohan, who owed his appointment to Madame Pompadour, was totally incapable of coping with the Prussian veterans. He saw his troops flying in wild rout, and galloped off with them, leaving a vast number of slain, seven thousand prisoners, and the greater part of his baggage, artillery, and standards in the hands of the enemy.
