In the House of Lords no great alteration was made, except in height. In the original design the roof was kept low, in deference to authorities in acoustics; but on more careful inquiry it was found that they differed widely from each other, and the architect not unnaturally thought that certain beauty of proportion need not be sacrificed to a doubtful acoustical advantage. The roof accordingly was raised. It could not be made open, because of the requirements for ventilation; but, in fact, even in Gothic buildings Mr. Barry was disinclined to employ open roofs. For inhabited rooms he preferred a coved or arched ceiling, and believed that, in the abstract, a cove was the best method of connecting a horizontal ceiling with vertical walls. In the gorgeous decorations of the house not a little was due to the work and the influence of Mr. Pugin, which added a stimulus, hardly needed, to the architect’s own love of enrichment. The carved and metal work, and generally the purely ornamental details, were designed by Mr. Pugin, under Mr. Barry’s direction, and subject to his frequent alterations; the painted windows were not only designed by Mr. Pugin, but carried out under his superintendence, the architect only stipulating for a sufficient amount of white glass to produce the “jewelled effect” he admired in many ancient windows.[98] The unsightly black effect of these windows at night was a great difficulty; a system of external gas-lighting was adopted to remedy it, but it has since been disused. The ceiling was a subject of much consideration; Mr. Barry wished to produce as much as possible the effect of solid gold, the enrichment of colour being purely subsidiary. His notion always was that decoration, if begun, should be thoroughly carried out, and that only by failure in this respect, and by partiality of decoration, was the effect of tawdriness produced. The House of Lords he considered as not a mere place of business, not even a mere House of Lords at all, but as the chamber in which the sovereign, surrounded by the court, summoned to the royal presence the three estates of the realm. He thought, therefore, that it should partake of royal magnificence, and lavished upon it all the treasures of decoration.