volutes in each of its faces being turned obliquely and foreshortened, while the other volute in the same face is seen directly in front, as in all the other capitals. Yet surely such partial and trifling irregularity may very well be excused, instead of being imputed as a defect, since it obviates far greater irregularities, and contributes so effectively to general harmony and symmetry. At all events, it is incumbent upon those who make the objection to show how much better they could have managed matters. So far are we from objecting to it, that we do not see why the same diagonal disposition of the volutes should not, _occasionally_ at least, be employed for all the capitals alike, thereby giving them, although in all other respects perfectly Greek as to style, four uniform faces, as in some of the Roman and Italian examples of the Order. How little modern Architects are capable of modifying the Ionic capital, and adapting it to particular circumstances, may be seen in the colonnades of the façade of the British Museum, where, at the re-entering or internal angle formed by colonnades at right angles to each other, the column at the angle has two adjoining voluted faces given to it; but as a re-entering or inner angle is circumstanced quite differently from an external one, the consequence is that each of those faces falls opposite the baluster side of the columns ranging with it either way. We explain this briefly in two simple diagrams, in which _f_ indicates the face or voluted side of the capital, and _b_ the baluster side. In an external angle, or the return of a portico, the faces and sides are arranged thus, so that _b b b b_ come opposite each other; but in an internal or re-entering angle, the reverse takes place; for we have then this disposition of the faces and sides of the capitals, in which a voluted face comes opposite to the baluster side of the next capital,—a most unsightly irregularity, and one all the more unpardonable because it could have been got over, if in no other way, by converting that column (_a_) into a square pillar, which would besides give strength, or the expression of it, where such expression is very desirable. [Illustration] [Illustration]