The Expedition of Humphry ClinkerSmollett, T. (Tobias)
General
The Expedition of Humphry Clinker
Smollett, T. (Tobias)
Epistolary fiction; Great Britain -- Fiction; Travelers -- Fiction
can enjoy it at all times of the tide, without the formality of an
apparatus--You and I have often plunged together into the Isis; but
the sea is a much more noble bath, for health as well as pleasure. You
cannot conceive what a flow of spirits it gives, and how it braces every
sinew of the human frame. Were I to enumerate half the diseases which
are every day cured by sea-bathing, you might justly say you had
received a treatise, instead of a letter, from
Your affectionate friend and servant, J. MELFORD SCARBOROUGH, July 1.
To Dr LEWIS.
I have not found all the benefit I expected at Scarborough, where I have
been these eight days--From Harrigate we came hither by the way of York,
where we stayed only one day to visit the Castle, the Minster and
the Assembly-room. The first, which was heretofore a fortress, is now
converted to a prison, and is the best, in all respects, I ever saw,
at home or abroad--It stands in a high situation, extremely well
ventilated; and has a spacious area within the walls, for the health and
convenience of all the prisoners except those whom it is necessary to
secure in close confinement. Even these last have all the comforts that
the nature of their situation can admit. Here the assizes are held, in a
range of buildings erected for that purpose.
As for the Minster, I know not how to distinguish it, except by its
great size and the height of its spire, from those other ancient
churches in different parts of the kingdom, which used to be called
monuments of Gothic architecture; but it is now agreed, that this stile
is Saracen rather than Gothic; and, I suppose, it was first imported
into England from Spain, great part of which was under the dominion of
the Moors. Those British architects who adopted this stile, don’t seem
to have considered the propriety of their adoption. The climate of the
country, possessed by the Moors or Saracens, both in Africa and Spain,
was so exceedingly hot and dry, that those who built places of worship
for the multitude, employed their talents in contriving edifices that
should be cool; and, for this purpose, nothing could be better adopted
than those buildings, vast, narrow, dark, and lofty, impervious to the
sun-beams, and having little communication with the scorched external
atmosphere; but ever affording a refreshing coolness, like subterranean
cellars in the heats of summer, or natural caverns in the bowels of huge
mountains. But nothing could be more preposterous, than to imitate such
a mode of architecture in a country like England, where the climate
is cold, and the air eternally loaded with vapours; and where, of
consequence, the builder’s intention should be to keep the people dry
and warm--For my part, I never entered the Abbey church at Bath but
once, and the moment I stept over the threshold, I found myself chilled
to the very marrow of my bones. When we consider, that in our churches,
in general, we breathe a gross stagnated air, surcharged with damps
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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