In another and different direction some of the French books would seem to have had an interesting effect. Philibert de l’Orme and Androuet du Cerceau had published remarkably fine illustrations of the more important buildings then recently erected in France. It is certain that John Thorpe, who was the most accomplished and ingenious of the English surveyors of his time, had studied du Cerceau’s books, and it is quite conceivable that, fired by such an example, he may himself have contemplated a similar production for England, and that to this idea is owing the very interesting collection of drawings now preserved at the Soane Museum. But however this may be, it is clear that some of the men who were concerned with the design of large houses thought it worth while to preserve their drawings, for, in addition to the Thorpe collection, there is that other collection by Thorpe’s contemporary and successor, Smithson; while in later years are those connected with the work of Inigo Jones, John Webb, and Wren; and in still later times Campbell, Gibbs, and other architects made a point of publishing illustrations of the buildings which they and their contemporaries had designed. [Illustration: Ground Floor. Upper Floor. FIG. 14.--MY LORD SHEFFIELD’S HOUSE. From the Smithson Collection.] [Illustration: FIG. 15.--GROUND AND UPPER PLANS OF A HOUSE, NOT NAMED. From the Smithson Collection.] But although we may perhaps see in the books of the sixteenth century the genesis of our own English architectural publications, their immediate interest lies in the fact that whatever was published about the beginning of the seventeenth century dealt with classic architecture, and that anyone who sought in books for information about building, found nothing about the old Gothic detail, but only instructions how to design in the classic style. The Thorpe collection of drawings is well known, and belongs to the order of things which was passing away. But the Smithson collection is but little known, and as it forms a link between what was passing and what was approaching, it will be of interest to say a few words about it, and to give a few illustrations from it.