:^. M4^' ""'Sm' ''im-^»^i^£^J0mi£x.. I I B RAFLY OF THE U N 1 VLR_S ITY or 1 LLl NOIS /6^o*o..^^^^^:— O^^^^^Uii^- '^ DE PIEROTTI AND HIS ASSAILANTS OK A DEFENCE OF JERUSALEM EXPLOEED." Cambritigc : PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. DR PIEROTTI AND HIS ASSAILANTS: OR A DEFENCE OP "JERUSALEM EXPLORED." BEING THE SUBSTANCE OF A PAPER, READ BEFORE THE OXFORD ARCHITECTURAL SOCIETY AT THEIR ANNUAL MEETING JUNE 6, 1864, AND NOW PUBLISHED BY THEIR REQUEST ; BY THE REV. GEORGE WILLIAMS, B.D. SENIOR FELLOW OF KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, AUTHOR OF " THE HOLY CITY." WITH AN APPENDIX OF DOCUMENTS. LONDON: BELL AND DALDY. CAMBRIDGE: DEIGHTON, BELL, AND CO. 1864. DEDICATOKY. TO THE PRESIDENT AND MEMBERS OF THE OXFORD ARCHITECTURAL SOCIETY. Mr PllESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN, Allow me, in the first instance, to express to you the very great satisfaction which I feel in availing myself of the opportunity which your kindness has afforded me of laying before your Society and, through your Society, before the Pub- lic in general, a plain statement of my views on the great Pierotti controversy, which occupied so large a space in the columns of the leading Journal some two or three months ago, until it was brought to a premature close by the necessary absence of Dr Pierotti from England, which has been pro- longed far beyond the time he had anticipated. Your invitation, conveyed to me through your Secretary, — entirely unsolicited by me, as you know, — is backed by the consideration that "as Dr Pierotti was first introduced to the English Public through the medium of our Society, there might be a fitness in giving an opportunity for a defence of him against his assailants before the VI same tribunal.'' I at once admit the propriety, so kindly and delicately suggested, and beg per- mission to add, that, as there is no Court of com- petent jurisdiction in the country to which I would more confidently submit any question in which I was myself personally concerned, so there is none before which I should more gladly plead the cause of a client than that which I am now ad- dressing ; because I know of none that, with quite a sufficient amount of artistic and professional knowledge and experience, is so likely to combine with a sound and impartial, as well as a practised critical judgment upon the merits of the ques- tion, a nice sense of honour and a due regard to the laws of literary controversy — which will be found to be no less essential qualifications for the Jury in this Case; which would indeed have been submitted to a regular legal decision had not Coun- sel declared some otherwise libellous letters to be protected by the technical plea of " privileged com- munications." Before you, Gentlemen, I shall at least be exempt even from the odious and unworthy suspi- cion of dishonestly tampering with my authorities, forging my documents, falsifying my evidence, and bribing my witnesses, in order "to make the worse appear the better cause," and to bol- ster up a case that I know to be hopelessly bad. If I may venture to anticipate your verdict, it will be this : That my friend, whose cause I have undertaken to advocate before you, is more sinned ^^s C/ against than sinning : for I am not going to ask you to acquit him of all error, or even of all care- lessness, in the preparation of his great work, " Quid quisque vitet, nuuquam liomiui satis Cautum est in lioras." Even Mr Fergusson, with the experienced aid of two most competent assistants, could not guard against a "horrid mistake" of the Admiralty en- gravers. All that I maintain is that Dr Pierotti's, or, his artist's blunders, whatever they may be, should no more discredit his labours than e.g. Mr Cather- wood's bad Plan of the City, for which he was responsible, j!?^M5 the "horrid mistake" in his Plan of the Haram, for which he was not responsible, should vitiate the authority of his most accurate survey of the Mosk enclosure. As to the value of Jerusalem Explored as an authority, either confirmatory of our previous knowledge, or sup- plying additional materials for future research, the Lectures which were given before this Society by Dr Pierotti two years ago, (the substance of which is embodied in his book) were too highly appreciated by you to leave any doubt on that point; and indeed I may appeal to Mr Fergusson and Mr Grove themselves as quite unexceptionable witnesses to this fact. Mr Fergusson, when not swayed by prejudice, can see that the precise agreement of two in- dependent artists in the delineation of the same object, is a conclusive proof of the truthfulness of both. In his Notes on the Site of the Ilohj Seiml- chre, &c., published in 1861, he wrote as follows: *' Mr Carl Haag, the well-known artist, has made a careful drawing of the aisle of the Dome of the. Rock. As good luck would have it, he chose the identical point of view from which Mr Catherwood made the drawing engraved as the Frontispiece of my book. So similar are the two drawings that I believe any jury would give me a verdict if I complained against Mr Haag for plagiarism. But the fact is, I believe, that he did not know of the existence of Mr Catherwood's drawing when he made his, and the coincidence speaks volumes for the conscientious truthfulness of both artists," (p. 20). I cannot understand why the argument is not quite as good when Dr Pierotti is in question. The extreme care with which the photographic illustrations have been transferred to stone is wit- nessed by Mr Grove, in his second letter to the Times, [Appendix, No. xiv.] He had tested their agreement very closely, and truly says it is "a great tribute to the accuracy of Messrs Day's litho- graphers," — and therefore, by consequence, to the value of the book; which I have no doubt will hold its place (notwithstanding all that has been done, and will be done, to ruin its credit) as an autho- rity on Jerusalem Topography, when other Essays and Notes, containing perhaps more original views and speculations on the same subject, put forward, it must be admitted, with far greater confidence, are consigned to oblivion. DEFENCE OF "JERUSALEM EXPLORED.' Introductory. In order chiefly that the most important contribution that has yet appeared to the Topography of Ancient Jerusalem, and to the Illustration of its Sacred Archaeo- logy, may not be entirely discredited ; in order also that a hard-working and intelligent foreigner may not have to complain that his wearisome toil of many anxious years has been entirely wasted and thrown away among us, without one testimony to its value, one word of hearty gratitude for its results ; in order, lastly, that the most remarkable example of literary or professional persecu- tion that ever came uuder my notice, may not pass unre- corded, I am induced, very reluctantly, somewhat tardily, and sorely against my better judgment, to enter into this controversy between Dr Pierotti and his assailants, knowing from past experience to what I expose myself by so doing: for all who have taken jjart in these discussions are per- fectly well aware that this question of Jerusalem Topogra- phy is one of a class in which no measure is kept by any of the disputants in the controversy, whatever side they may adopt. Lying scarcely within the verge of theological subjects, it seems to exasperate and exacerbate the odium theologicum more than any other topic of discussion; and 1 men, who on other subjects can argue with temper and moderation, with candour and courtesy and consideration, seem to " have lost their nature" when they came within the range of this exciting controversy. I by no means profess to form an exception to this rule. I have ex- changed many hard blows in my time in doing battle for the Holy Places, and have endeavoured — always, I trust, within the legitimate bounds of honourable warfare — to give as good as I received. But of all who have entered the lists in this quarrel I must ever regard the author of Jerusalem Explored as the most unfortunate; for I am fully persuaded that the head and front of his offending, the provocation of all others which has dra^^^^ do\\Ti upon his devoted head the indignation of a small but powerful party of Jeiiisalem theorists, is simply this ; that he has had the singular forbearance to abstain from noticing in his book Mr Fergusson's peculiar theory of the Constan- tinian origin of the Dome of the Rock, and has passed over with like discreet reticence, as he vainly thought, other original notions of the same author, which few who have studied the subject can trust themselves to discui^s with entire moderation of temper and language. To this, far more than to any demerits or defects in the book itself — which I am not goinsjj to dissemble — is to be ascribed that vehemence of disparagement and exuberance of vituperation which characterise some of the communications which will be found in the Appendix. But I shall be very much disappointed in my estimate of the English character, which so vaunts itself on its can- dour and love of fair play, if the attempt to ci^ush Dr Pierotti, and to ruin the credit of his book — successful as it has been for the time — does not ultimately recoil upon the aggressors. I will only add for my?elf that, I hope in my zeal for my unfortunate friend not to forget the prior claims of truth. What I advance in his defence shall be bona fde, and to the best of my knowledge and belief; and 3 where I think him wrong, I shall say so. If in so doing I may appear to weaken or betray his canse, I do not think I shall really do so. In any case, I shall be acting upon the two good old principles, that " honesty is the best policy," and that "you must do as you'd be done by." I. Preliminary and Personal. It cannot be supposed that I was an indifferent spec- tator of the controversy, which was carried on in the Times some months ago, between Messrs Fergusson, Grove, and Tipping on one side, and Dr Pierotti and Messrs Bell and Daldy on the other. Not only did the interest which I have long taken in the questions discussed in Jerusalem Esc^}lored commend the discussion to my serious consideration: I was farther personally interested in the author of that work, and in a certain manner responsible for him to his Publishers and others to whom I had intro- duced him; so as to feel that I had a very close private concern in the charges which were brought against him, and which affected not merely his professional skill and knowledge, but his credit as a man of honour and his character as a gentleman. If I took no part in the newspaper controversy it was partly because I felt that it was impossible to do justice to the subject within such limits as the columns of the Times could afford, during the session of Parliament ; but mainly because I had a very strong repugnance to come into collision with one at least of Dr Pierotti's assail- ants, of whose method of controversy I have had some experience many years ago. Very pressing engagements prevented me from entering at once upon such a full examination of the questions at issue as the importance of the subject and the interests at stake appeared to me to demand, and it is only now that I find myself at liberty 1—2 to record the results of my investigations into the charges of plagiarism and incompetency which have been so freely urged against Dr Pierotti, in a quarter best calculated to damage his reputation in the eyes of the world. As Dr Pierotti has, in the Preface to his work, ex- plained, in too flattering terms, the part which I have had in its publication, I feel it to be due to myself to record in very few words the history of my connection with him and his labours. It was at the commencement of the year 1862 that I first learnt from Miss Beaufort, now Lady Strang- ford, the nature and extent of Dr Pierotti's researches into the topogi-aphy and antiquities of Jerusalem. He was then in Paris, endeavouring to make arrangements for the publication of his Album, in which he had collected the results of his investigations during a sojourn of seven years in the Holy City. I soon opened commu- nications with him ; first through the kind intervention of Miss Beaufort, afterwards by direct correspondence ; and the result was that in February, 1862, he jDaid me a visit at Cambridge. Here a more detailed account of his investigations and the sight of his plans and drawings, soon convinced me that his discoveries were far the most important that had yet been made for the elucidation of some of the most vexed questions relating to the topo- graphy of ancient Jerusalem; particularly to the site of the Temple and the arrangement of its Courts. I thought that Mr Fergusson would feel a lively interest in these new discoveries, and very few days after Dr Pierotti's arrival I invited JMr Fergusson to meet him. I knew that Professor Willis would fully appreciate the importance of these investij_'ations — confirming as they did in a very remarkable manner some of his most in- genious and original theories — and introduced Dr Pierotti to him, as well as to many other friends in the Univer- sities and elsewhere. I was further the medium of his communications to the Architectural Societies of Oxford and Cambridge ; to the Institute of British Architects ; to the Architectural Museum at South Kensington, and to other learned Societies. In all this, I was actuated, I believe, solely by my conviction of the importance of his discoveries and by confidence in his good faith and capacity, and not by any special satisfaction in the accidental confirmation of some of my own views : for I had soon learnt that Dr Pierotti and myself were as much at variance on some of the most important points in the archseology of Jerusalem as was possible, consistently with the admission of the same historical basis and the same topographical data. In truth, while gratefully recog- nising the importance of the new facts brought to light by him, I found that I was almost always unable to accept his deductions and conclusions. It may have been on this account that I strongly ui'ged him to publish to the world only the processes and results of his original discoveries, so as to furnish materials for others to work upon in the further investigation of this important and interesting subject; but, as he had collected a vast mass of documentary evidence, in illustration of the history and topogi'aphy of Jerusalem, and had given much time and thought to the study, I was not surprised to find that he was bent on producing a more ambitious and elaborate work. What part I took in the editing that work has been stated by the author in the Preface, and is well known to Mr Bonney, the Translator, and to Mr Mayor, the University Librarian. It was strictly confined to revising the proof-sheets and correcting such palpable errors, clerical and typographical, as my local knowledge and long ac- quaintance with the subject enabled me to detect at a glance. I did not, of course, attempt to modify the state- ments of the author, even where most opposed to my own theories, for the obvious reason that the book was avow- edly designed to represent Dr Pierotti's speculations, not mine; and he had shewn himself so sensitive of any sus- picion of the originality of his topographical hypotheses, and so fearful lest he should be thought to have borrowed anything from me, that I considered the only safe course was to avoid discussion of differences until after the publi- cation of his book. II. Mk Fergusson and Dr Pierotti. Charge 1. Section of the Dome, &c. Jerusalem Explored was published at the end of January or the beginning of February this year. On the loth of February Mr Fergusson addressed to Messrs Bell and Daldy, the publishers, a letter which is given in full in the Appendix^; in which he charged Dr Pierotti 1st, with having in Plate XXVII. " copied literally and Avithout acknowledgment the Section of the Dome of the Rock, engi-aved in his work on the Topogi'aphy of Jerusalem, from a Drawing by Messrs Catherwood and Arundale ;" 2ndly, with not having hesitated, " without saying one word about it, to alter all the arches in Mr Arundale's drawing into acutely pointed arches, which they are not;" and he " insists that Signer Pierotti should acknowledge, in the first instance, that the Section in question was copied from the drawing of Messrs Cather- wood and Arundale, and secondl}'^, that he was not justified in making the alterations he has done." He concludes, as follows : " I request therefore that you will procure me this acknowledgment in a form that I may pubhsh. If this is not forthcoming very shortly, I shall be obliged to apply to the Court of Chancery for an Injunction to restrain you from publishing what is an infringement of my copyright, and a libel on the memory of two honour- able men ; or, if I fail there, I must appeal for justice ^ Document, No. I. to the public, and if forced to this, I shall have a great deal to say about other plates in the work, which have been appropriated with as little regard to fair dealing as has been the case with Plate xxvii." To this the Publishers replied^ on February 22, after communicating with Dr Pierotti, that " he himself made the measurements and drawings in the Mosque of Omar upon which his Section is formed, and constructed his Section years before he knew of the existence of your book:" that "these original measurements and drawings are now in his hands and shall be produced at our counting-house to you for your inspection, if you desire it, on receiving two days' notice," consequently that, " Signer Pierotti cannot comply with your request," &c. These drawings and measurements were contained in a small quarto note-book, which I had seen at Cambridge soon after Dr Pierotti's arrival in England; the leaves of which had been clumsily fastened together with gum, in order, as he explained to me at the time, to prevent the drawings from being copied ; as he had suffered much from the unauthorised and unacknowledged appropriation of his labours. They consisted, 1st, of a very rough out- line sketch of the Dome of the Kock, with all the vertical measures pencilled upon it, and letters of reference to the details of the ornamentation ; 2ndly, of a more careful drawing of the same Section with the various ornaments slightly sketched in, and the timber frame- Avork of the roof carefully drawn ; Srdly, of a ground- plan of the building, with all the measures requisite to give the horizontal dimensions of the Mosk ; 4thly, of the details of the lower story of the building very exquisitely drawn in pencil ; and 5thly, of the details of all the ornamentation referred to in the rough outline (No. 1), evidently drawn by the same skilful hand as No. 4. All the measures were in French metres. This * Appendix, Document, No. III. book was examined by Mr Fergusson and a friend on the 26th of February ; and on the 29th of the same month he wrote again to the Publishers^ "to reiterate, more emphatically than before, that the Section of the Dome of the Rock is a literal copy of his plate, and to express his astonishment that any one should venture to dispute so self-evident a fact" — " that the two Sections are iden- tical in every detail and every relative proportion." As to the note-book which he had seen on the 26th he writes : " I assert unhesitatingly that these details were not drawn by Pierotti at all... and the presumption was that they were drawn within the last fortnight after the receipt of my letter of the loth." Then follow a number of other charges confirmatory of this original accusation, to which I at present confine myself. This then was Mr Fergusson's hypothesis, that Dr Pierotti having appropriated with modifications the ex- quisitely finished Section constructed by Messrs Cather- wood and Arundale, and being called to account for the piracy by Mr Fergusson, worked back that highly finished drawing to its rudimentary elements in this old note- book, translating the English scale of feet into French metres, in order to refute the charge ! Happily it is quite unnecessaiy to examine the cre- dibility of this surmise, as there is direct evidence that the Section published by Dr Pierotti, which formed the substance of Mr Fergusson's charge, had been constructed exclusively from those pencil drawings which Mr Fer- gusson conjectures to have been prepared after his letter of February 15. M. Turpin, a young French artist, employed by Dr Pierotti to prepare this Section for the lithogi'apher, de- clares^ that "when I first became acquainted with Signor Pierotti in June 1862, and was engaged by this gentleman ' Appendix, Document, No. IV. ' Appendix, Document, No. VT. 9 as a draughtsman, all the drawings I had to copy were all Dr Pierotti's originals, and I am positively certain that they were drawn by himself." And then, after point- ing out the discrepancies between the two Sections, he adds : " Now I have explained to you what I know, and am ready to swear that I never used any other drawings but Dr Pierotti's own." This, I apprehend, is decisive as to the originality of Dr Pierotti's Section of the Dome of the Rock; at least it disposes effectually of the theory of his having prepared the sketches in the note-book with a view to rebut Mr Fergusson's charge of plagiarism. I have not trusted to my own judgment to determine whether the elements which I have mentioned as con- tained in Dr Pierotti's note-book, were sufficient for the construction of such a Section as that which he has pub- lished in his work. I have submitted them to some of the most eminent men in the profession, who entertain no doubt that they are ; and, as a crucial test, I have had a Section prepared from this note-book alone, by a skilful architectural draughtsman, who knew no particulars of the controversy between Dr Pierotti and his assailants, nor had seen Mr Arundale's Section. The result is pre- cisely what I had anticipated : close agreement with Dr Pierotti's published Plan, and consequently such divergence from Mr Arundale's io matters of minute detail as would be natural, almost unavoidable, in two different plans of the same building, both executed with extreme accuracy ; and I cannot help feeling that the friends and admirers of Messrs Catherwood and Anmdale, among whom I may be allowed to reckon myself, have cause to complain that Mr Fergusson, while professing great jealousy for their memory, has allowed prejudice so to warp his judgment, that instead of magnifying and exalting their labours (as he had every right to do) by this new evidence to the wonderful care with which they were executed, under circumstances of no little difficulty 10 and danger, has endeavoured to destroy this indepen- dent testimony to their value by his attack upon Dr Pierotti's originality. And it is worthy of remark, that in the particular instance in which he complains of Dr Pierotti for altering Mr Arundale's drawing, he has himself furnished conclusive evidence that it needed correction; since it gives not the slightest indication of the pointed arch. He has (says Mr Fergusson) altered " all the arches in Mr Ai'undale's drawing into acutely pointed arches, luhich they are not." Yet it is distinctly stated by Mr Fergusson himself, that " all the arches throughout the building are more or less pointed ;" and when, startled by this phenomenon, he appealed to Mr Arundale for corrobo- ration, he received for answer : " The arches under the dome, and those of the aisle are both slightly pointed, so much so that when reduced in the Section, it would scarcely be evident, but would be very apparent when viewed in perspective." [Essay &c. p. 112.] Mr Fergusson is hard to please. When Dr Pierotti agrees with him, he sins by plagiarism ; where he differs, he sins still more heinously by unauthorized alteration, and must acknowledge both under pain of an Injunction! It is only necessary to add under this head, that the Section of the Dome of the Rock, to which Mr Fergusson refers as seen by him in my rooms, and on which he mainly relies for his proof of Dr Pierotti's incapacity as a draughtsman, was not Dr Pierotti's at all, but was made by a Turkish engineer, Assaad Effendi, by whom it was presented to Dr Pierotti in 1855, and preserved in his album as a curiosity, until he presented it to the Queen of Spain on his visit to that country in 1862-3. Charge 2. Entabhiture in the Mosk. In addition to the charge contained in Mr Fergusson's first letter to Messrs Bell and Daldy, of Feb. 15, two new definite charges are advanced in his second letter of 11 Feb. 29 \ which must now be examined. The capital of the Pillar and part of the entablature in the Dome of the Rock (Plate xxix. fig. 2a), was claimed by Mr Fergusson, and admitted by the Publishers to be engraved from a tracing of a drawing in Mr Fergusson's book (p. 104). Yet Mr Fergusson admits that he had seen in Dr Pierotti's note-book the same capital and entablature " pencilled in by the same hand which drew the other details in the book," and which he describes as " exquisitely pencilled by a most accomplished architectural draughtsman, better in this respect than even Arundale, and I do not know half-a-dozen men in England who could do them as well." He indeed " asserts unhesitatingly that these details were not drawn by Pierotti at all :" and of course attaches no kind of credit to Dr Pierotti's positive assurance that every pencilling in the book was made by himself. But Mr Fer- gusson is bound to find some satisfactory explanation, on his theory, for one phenomenon which he has not recorded. The pencilling in the note-book, while precisely corre- sponding in all other respects with Mr Fergusson's, differs from it in this important particular: that the relative parts of the drawing are reversed in the note-book ; i. e. the entablature, which is placed on the right of the capital in both the engravings, is on the left in the note-book; and the soffit, which is placed above the entablature in the former, is drawn on the left side of it in the latter. What then is Mr Fergusson's presumption ? It is this : that Dr Pierotti, in order to meet the charge of plagiarism, instructed his artist to copy the drawing from Mr Fergusson's book, with these alterations, which do not correspond with his own published view, and then attempted to pass it off as the original of his drawing ! This would be almost as clumsy a fabrication as the re- duction of the finished Section to its elements, and the hypothesis is disposed of by the same testimony. The * Appendix, Document, No. IV. 12 truth is that Dr Pierotti, having an original drawing of his own " exquisitely pencilled," was induced by some inexplicable fatality to adopt Mr Fergusson's arrangement in preference to his own, and to save himself the trouble of reversing his own drawing chose rather to trace Mr Fergusson's : an act of inconceivable folly, had he known with whom he had to deal, for which Mr Fergusson has exacted a somewhat heavy penalty. Charge 3. Plan of the Haram. More serious is the accusation relating to the Plan of the Haram, Plate xi. of Jerusalem Explored, contained in Mr Fergusson's second Letter. " I assert," writes Mr Ferafusson, " that it is a reduction of a Plan which I constructed from Catherwood's original documents in my possession, with the assistance of Mr Croucher. That Plan was afterwards engraved by the Admiralty, and a copy of it left by Captain Washington with Pierotti at Jerusalem in 1860. When I held up Pierotti's 'own plan' at Cambridge, against the light with my own, they were found to be as identical as the section of the Mosque." I do not remember that Mr Fergusson had a copy of the Admiralty Plan when he was examining Dr Pierotti's Plan in my rooms at Cambridge: but, however this may have been, he is certainly in error as to his method of comparing them : for as Dr Pierotti's Plan was mounted on dark calico, and Mr Fergusson's is printed on stout paper, such a comparison would have baffled Lynceus himself More plausible are the arguments for the identity of the two plans derived (1) from their agreement in the details of the buildings about the north-west angle of the Haram ; which Mr Fergusson states that he supplied con- jecturally, as Mr Catherwood's survey was defective in this part : and (2) from the repetition of an error of Mr Cather- 13 wood's Plan in that of Dr Pierotti; — the "Admiralty engi-aver having made a horrid mistake in the South Wall, which was not in the original." Unfortunately Dr Pierotti's original Plan of the Haram, which was seen by Mr Fergusson at Cambridge, has been presented to the King of Spain: but several photographs were taken from it, from one of which the Plate in Jerusalem Exjilored was drawn; and I am bound to say that the clumsiness and roughness of execu- tion in the lithograph does scanty justice to the neatness and finish of Dr Pierotti's original. A comparison of this Plan with that prepared by Mr Fergusson shews (1) that the details of the build- ings in the north-west angle are so far from being identical, that Dr Pierotti has given careful detail, where Mr Fergusson has given mere tentative outline, supplied, he says, by conjecture, but probably not alto- gether unaided by the best plans to which he had access : — (2) that while both Plans shew a distortion in the South wall of the Haram, the distortion is not the same in both; that in Mr Ferojusson's being, as he tells us, the effect of a "horrid mistake" of the engraver, that of Dr Pierotti the result of design ; a correct representation, as he maintains, of the effects of clumsy repairs of an ancient wall. But the fact is that all such suspicions, were they far better supported than they are by evidence of identity — even in error — vanish altogether before the mass of proof which I have in my possession that Dr Pierotti had not only abundant opportunities for surveying the City and Haram, but also ample capacity and will to avail himself of them. Mr Fergusson does but beg the question more suo when he denies him both. A brief account of Dr Pierotti's various professional employments in Jerusalem between 1855 and 1861 will be found in the Appendix \ and I happily had rescued from 1 Document, No. XXII. 14 destruction many debris of his labours long before I had any notion of the good service they might do him in this controversy. Devotedly attached as I am to the stones and the dust of the Holy City, I begged of him the frag- ments of soiled and tattered plans which he would ruth- lessly have destroyed, after they had served his purpose. Among these is a plan of the Christian Quarter of the City, to the scale of ^^^j^ full size, coloured so as to shew the proprietorship of every house in the Quarter; and another of the entire city and suburbs on a scale of ^g^ full size, similarly coloured. This last is dated June 1859, and in it are found the details of the buildings in the N.W. precincts of the Haram, identical with those in his pub- lished Plate, and all the main features of the whole plan of the Haram ; which however he had further opportunities of verifying and correcting, up to the time of his leaving Jerusalem in 1861. There is, I submit, some presumption in all this that his Plan of the Haram was not traced from Mr Fergusson's Admiralty Plan in T8G0. He certainly was under no necessity to be beholden to any one. It is only necessary to add that the copy of the Ad- miralty Plan of the Haram was not " left with Signor Pie- rotti" by Captain Washington in 1860. He had it in his possession one night; made such cortections on it as he could in the limited time, by Captain Washington's re- quest, and returned it to him the following morning. This Plan, with Dr Pierotti's manuscript corrections, is doubtless still in Captain Washington's possession. Dr Pierotti's original Plan, from a reduction of which that in his book is engraved, had not only been completed, but had been seen by Lady Strangford^ and others long before Dr Pierotti knew of the existence of the Admiralty Plan ; and the undoubted discrepancies between this de- tailed Plan of the Haram Enclosure, and that exhibited in * Appendix, Document. No. IX. See below, p. 24. 15 the Plan of the City, are accounted for by the fact that, after the publication of the latter, he had increased oppor- tunities of correcting the former. It will be necessary now, before dismissing Mr Fer- gusson, to notice two paragraphs in his letter to the Times, dated March 22. (1) "As Signer Pierotti reserves liis defence against the principal charges contained in Mr Grove's letter, pending the legal proceedings which he assumes I am about to commence against him, allow me to assure him that he has nothing to fear from me in that respect. "When I first saw his work I wrote to the publishers demanding that Signor Pierotti shovdd acknowledge what he had borrowed from me, and when, to my astonishment, he replied denying the loan altogether, I wrote back somewhat indignantly, and ending with a vague threat which might be interpreted as meaning legal proceedings or anything else." Mr Fergussons memory must have failed him. The "vague threat" at the conclusion of his second letter to Messrs Bell and Daldy, can only be interpreted by the lan- guage of the first, which is certainly definite enough. " If this [acknowledgement] is not forthcoming very shortly, I shall be obliged to apply to the Court of Chancery for an Injunction to restrain you from publishing what is an in- fringement of my copyright," &c. (2) " There is nothing whatever in the work which can have any real bearing on any of the disputed points of the topography of Jerusalem. There is nothing, indeed, that is new or valuable, except some 13 pages devoted to the under- ground watercourse of the place, and these so absolutely con- firm all I have ever written regarding the site of the Temple and of the Holy Places that I, at least, for one, have no desire to throw stones at Signor Pierotti." These two statements are, I believe, about equally coiTCct. To deny the importance of Dr Pierotti's dis- coveries in their bearing on disputed points of the topo- graphy, I should have been disposed to ascribe to preju- dice, but for the assurance that immediately follows that 16 prejudice would be entirely misplaced, as Dr Pierotti's discoveries "absolutely confirm all that" Mr Fergusson " has written regarding the site of the Temple and of the Holy Places." This is no place to examine the bearing of Dr Pie- rotti's discoveries on the moot points of Jerusalem topo- graphy. I have already expressed my opinion, which I deliberately repeat, that they are the most important of all that have been hitherto published. I may however be allowed to express my inability to comprehend how the discovery of a cesspool under the sacred Rock of the Moslems, connected with an elaborate system of aqueducts, cisterns, and sewers, can in any way confirm the theory of Mr Fergusson that this Rock con- tained the Holy Sepulchre, or that the building which enshrines it is a Constantinian structure. I have indeed such confidence in the ingenuity of Mr Fergusson as to believe that he will prove this to his own satisfaction. To me the facts brought to hght by Dr Pierotti are nothing short of a demonstration of Pro- fessor Willis's most original and happy conjecture, that the sacred Rock of the Moslems was the site of the Jewish altar. And what adds to the value of this confirmation is this ; that at the time when Dr Pierotti made these won- derful discoveries, he was wholly ignorant of Professor Willis's h\'p)othesis. He arrived by a process of induction at the conclusion to which Professor Willis had been guided by that faculty of intuition, for Avhich he is so remarkable. As Mr Fergusson has staked his professional reputation upon an opposite theory, it is not perhaps to be expected that he should duly appreciate the exndence which, if admitted, must force him to abandon it : but it must be regretted that he has not shewn more considera- tion for those who, at the cost of no little labour and expense, are engaged in furnishing the evidence. Dr Pierotti has certainly fared worse at his hands even than others, and unhappily is not in a position to be in- 17 different to his attacks and tlieir consequences. He may be excused, liowever, for declining to submit his cause to the arbitration of a tribunal, of which all he knows is, that Mr Fergusson is its Secretary ; whose animus towards this unconscious ally of his Constantinian theory of the Archi- tecture of the Dome of the Rock, was sufficiently indicated on the occasion when I read his interesting paper before the Institute of British Architects, on which Mr Fergusson was pleased to comment in a tone of contumely and con- tempt, which it certainly did not deserve. III. Mr Grove and Dr Pierotti. In proceeding to notice Mr Grove's charges against Dr Pierotti I wish to speak with all respect of a gen- tleman to whose courtesy I am indebted for a sight of the photographs and drawings on which he grounded his accusations of plagiarism, and with whom I have already privately exchanged communications on the subject in a frank and friendly spirit, which I shall do my best to maintain in this public arena. He already knows my mind on the whole subject; and although I have not kept copies of my letters to him, I am sure the following is an accurate statement of what I wrote ; for my impres- sions have never undergone any cliauge. I admit then that there Avas prima facie ground of suspicion against Dr Pierotti, of having made an unauthorised use of the labours of his predecessors without acknowledgment. But I am quite convinced that he has not borrowed from others so largely as he was supposed to have done, and that he could not honestly have made the admissions which Mr Fergusson demanded of him under pain of an Injunction: consequently, I regard the charge of inaccu- racy as more damaging to his credit than that of plagia- rism; and, on the whole, I think that Dr Pierotti has had very hard measure. 2 18 Now, I do not complain of Mr Grove for having attacked the book in a letter to the Times, signed with his own name. No one who can gain admission to the columns of the Times ought to be satisfied with a less publicity for any subject which he deems worthy of atten- tion; and anonymous criticism is ever liable to abuse^ from the danger of which the course adopted by Mr Grove is free. Neither do I think there was anything in the contents, or in the tone, of his first letter which was not within the limits of fair and honourable criticism. But I do think he was dealing hard measure to the author when he availed himself of the accident of his position as Secretary of the Crystal Palace, to organise an exhibition of Dr Pierotti's "plagiarisms" under that roof, and announced in the Times that he had done so. I cannot consider this legitimate; because no author who had a spark of self-respect could regard such a measure as other- wise than a flagi'ant insult, which must of course preclude him from an opportunity of self-defence. Still more abhorrent to my notions of the laws of literary controversy was the attempt to damage Dr Pierotti's. credit by the revival of a charge of fifteen years' standing, gravely affecting his moral character; of which neither I nor any of those to whom I had introduced him had the remotest suspicion. I will do Mr Grove the credit to beheve that the first intimation which reached him of that charge came to him unsought. But the authenticated copy of the sentence, procured from the Italian War- Office, together with the English translation attested by a Notary Public under his hand and seal, now in Mr Grove's possession, too surely j)rove how eagerly the scent was followed up. Further, I can hardly believe that the visit of Mr Grove to Paris, in company with Mr Fergusson, in the month of April, immediately after obtaining possession of this damning document, was entirely without reference to this controversy. I know that my friend, M. de Saulcy, whom 19 they saw on the 18th of April, considered that the design of their visit was to collect information hostile to Dr Pierotti, and that their inquiries were not confined to his literary character, but bore also upon his private life. All this does not approve itself to my mind as legitimate warfare, and I deeply regi-et that Mr Grove has adopted it, I know indeed that he has hitherto exercised so much forbearance as not to publish the document; but I know also that the facts have been industriously circulated in the Clubs and in Societies where they would most damage the book and discredit the author. This is what I ven- tured at the outset to call "persecution." And now the reader will be prepared to apply to me the proverb, " Save me from my friends," and to think that I have as effectually gibbeted the author of Jenisa- lem Explored as Mr Fergusson and his other assailants could desire. I accept all the consequences of my indis- cretion, because I share with all those who have known Dr Pierotti intimately the conviction that he is incapable of the dishonourable act which is laid to his charge; and that, consequently, the revision of his sentence by a court- martial, which he has now obtained — after repeatedly declining the offer of influential friends to procure a par- don, which would have been a virtual acknowledgment of guilt — will issue in his acquittal. In this case Mr Grove will have done him excellent service. Meanwhile he is entitled to an answer to his literary charges, to which I now proceed in the order in which he has numbered them\ Charges 1 and 2. Photographs of the " Golden Gate " and of the " Wailing Place of the Jews." Mr Grove maintains that Plates xviil. and xxil. are taken respectively from photographs of Mr Robertson and ^ Appendix, Document, No. VII. 2—2 20 Mr Graham, and in his second letter to the Times he inckides in tlie same count with the former, Plates vii. XV. XVI. XVII. and xx., as all taken from Robertson's Photo- graphs, published by Gambart. As this charge is virtually admitted by Dr Pierotti, in his reply to Mr Grove ^ it will only be necessary to examine what he advances in extenuation of the plagiarism; and I think it will be admitted by every candid mind that his plea, confirmed as it is in every particular by Messrs Day and Son^, does very materially weaken the force of the accusation ; par- ticularly when it is considered that the photographs in question were not protected by the law of copyright, and might be reproduced by any one who chose to be at the cost of printing them, whether as photographs or engrav- ings. Undoubtedly the name of the photographers ought to have been put to them, though Mr Fergusson — as is obnous from his numerous illustrated works — does not consider this rule of universal obligation, but often satis- fies himself with the indefinite form, " from a Photograph," which may mean by himself or by any other. I do not think that it Avould have been right of Dr Pierotti to substitute his own name, simply on the ground that he had photographs of his own of the same views, which he might have used had he not been able to substitute these, which he considered more satisfactory: and, indeed, I told him repeatedly that he could not appropriate the photo- graphs of Robertson at all; as I was under the eiToneous imjDression that they were protected by the Cop}Tight Act. With regard to the great majority of the Views, they were to all intents and purposes his; and he was entitled, according to the universally acknowledged rules of the profession — by which, of course, he must be tried — to affix his OAvn name to them; for I learn from friends who ^ Appendix, Document, No. XI. 2 Appendix, Document, No. XJI, 21 have had their cartes de visite taken by the most distin- guished photographers in London or Paris, that the artist himself, whose name is printed on every impression, has nothing whatever to do with the process, except the jiosing of the figure; and I am informed by eminent architects that any plan or design prepared under their directions, or executed in their ofiice, is as much entitled to bear their name as though it had been executed by their own hand; although they may not so much as have taken a single measure nor have put in a single line. I am not justifymg the practice; I am merely stating what it is: — and that, more in vindication of Messrs Day and Son than of Dr Pierotti ; who on being asked by them what inscription the photographs should bear, told them distinctly that they had not been taken by himself, but were his pro- perty. He suggested for the inscription, "Drawn from a photogra23h belonging to K Pierotti," which would have applied equally to those which he borrowed from Robert- son and to those which were executed for himself, and have been equivalent to Mr Fergusson's " from a photo- gi'aph;" whereas, the form of inscription adopted by Messrs Day under these instructions was warranted in the case of the latter but not of the former. Now, when to these considerations is added another which is contained in a Letter of Mrs Finn to Lady Strangford*, I cannot doubt that all who can'carry them- selves indifferently in this controversy will feel with me that the involuntary error of Dr Pierotti has been very needlessly exaggerated by Mr Grove. It seems that the proprietorship in the photographs, taken at Jerusalem by the three artists named by Mrs Finn, was not very accurately defined; and it is very possible that in the interchange of professional services between Messrs Robertson, Graham, and Diness, the last-named may really have claimed a title to those of the two ^ Appendix, Document, No. X. 22 former, and so have passed them off on Dr Pierotti among those which he had taken by his order. Charges 3 and 4, Vaults and Section of El-Aksa. The two charges, relating to the Vaults of El-Aksa, will be considered when I come to speak of Mr Tipping's counts in this bill of indictment against Dr Pierotti; but this is the proper place to notice Mr Grove's charge of inaccuracy, in " the double range of clerestory windows in the west wall" of the Mosk, as shewn in Dr Pierotti s Section, Plate xxiv. He says, " none such exist there, and none are shewn in the [exterior] view of the Mosque, Plate XXI." The error here is wholly Mr Grove's. For, in the first place, the arches in the lower range are not windows at all, but simply openings into the side aisle; and, in the next place, the arches of the upper range, which were really the clerestory windows, have been blocked without, for some cause which I cannot explain; but it is a satis- faction to be able to point to the corresponding windows on the opposite, i.e. the east, side — which are still open, and may be seen in any photograph of the building taken from the Mount of Olives — in evidence of the existence of those on the west side; which is further attested in the rough section of Ali Bey (Vol. ii. p. 216), as also in the extremely accurate one given by the Count de Vogiie, in his magnificent work on the Haram esh-Sherif now in the course of publication {Temple de Jerusalem, Part I. Plate XXXI.), both of which shew the same side of the Mosk as is seen in Dr Pierotti's Section. Charges 5 and 6. Section of the Kuhhet es-Sakharah ; and Entablature. These are identical with Mr Fergusson's Charges 1 and 2, which have been fully considered above, and need not therefore detain us. 23 Charge 7. Capital of a Column. Dr Pierotti has copied one capital (B) of the thi-ee in Plate XXIV. from Mr Fergusson's book, (p. 109). Jeru- salem Explored contains upwards of 20 capitals never before published to my knowledge ; the originality of which is not questioned. One, easily accessible and per- fectly well known, which moreover the author had in his own collection, he preferred taking from Mr Fergusson, in order to simplify his labour. Is this a very heinous offence ? Charges. Tomhs of Absalom and Z ad larias. These I believe to be, as Mr Grove says, copied by Dr Pierotti (Plate LXi.) from the Atlas of M. de Saulcy's Voyage (Planches xxxviii., XL., xliii.), and this unques- tionably ought not to have been done without permission or without acknowledgment: although M. de Saulcy him- self, while with characteristic generosity he refuses to recognize the plagiarism, and indeed sets himself to dis- prove it, says distinctly, in his letter to Dr Pierotti, "if you had, copied it, you had a perfect right to do so." Charge 9. Plan of the Haram esh-Sherif This charge is identical in all its details with Mr Fer- gusson's accusation 3, already considered ; and I need only here express my regret that Mr Grove should have repeated the very incorrect statement of Mr Fergusson concerning the buildings outside the Mosk Enclosure at the N. W. angle. Here happily is a question on which all who care to do so may satisfy themselves. But I may add to what I have stated in reply to Mr Fergusson (p. 14), tliat I have since found among my archives another Plan of the City, beautifully drawn by Dr Pierotti (bearing date 24 August, 1860), in which all the buildings in that quarter are given, quite as much in detail (though on a smaller scale) as in his special Plan of the Haram Enclosure ; with regard to which Plan I may now add the testimony of Lady Strangford, which will be found in a letter to Dr Pierotti, which is given in the Appendix^ "We had not been a week in Jerusalem before you kindly brought us your admirable Plan of the whole Haram esh-Sherif to see, as well as the huge plan of Jerusalem as it is. Of course I cannot trust my memory as to whether there are any slight differences between them and the reduced copies in your book, / do not believe that there are. I know that with five months' constant study of both ... we never could detect the slightest flaw in either." Now, since the Plan published in the book was reduced from the larger one by photography, there is not of course the slightest difference ; and, as Lady Strangford and her sister arrived in Jerusalem in 1859, and Captain Wash- ington not till October, 1860, it is impossible that the ori- ginal of the Plan of the Haram given in Jerusalem Explored could have been copied from the Admiralty Plan. Charge 10. Disc7'epancies between the Plans of the City and of the Haram, This too has been already explained in replying to Mr Fergnsson's third Charge, and nothing need be added but this : that all who are acquainted with the modern history of Jerusalem chartography know too well the extreme difficulty of obtaining accurate results, even under the most favourable circumstances. Mr Catherwood's Plan of the City, which was far in advance of anything that had been published before, was utterly untrustworthy even as regards the principal streets of the city. The * Appendix, Document, No. IX. 25 trigonometrical Survey of our own Ordnance Officers, pub- lished with my Holy City, while minutely accurate in the compHcated network of streets, has introduced an original and utterly inexplicable blunder in the western wall of the Haram. Such differences as those that may be discovered by minute and unfriendly scrutiny between the general plan of the City and the detailed plan of the Haram, in Jerusalem Explored, are almost unavoidable, if they were to be entirely independent ; and all that can be said is, that they are fully compensated for by the general accuracy of both ; on which point none are better qualified to speak than M. de Saulcy and Captain Gelis, whose letters are given in the Appendix. Thus much may be extracted from them here ; and I quote them with the greater plea- sure because they reflect quite as much credit on my friend M. de Saulcy as on Dr Pierotti, and shew him to be entirely free from that miserable, narrow-minded, in- tolerant, professional jealousy which occasions so much injury to the cause of truth and justice at home and abroad. Thus he writes to Dr Pierotti, under date, Paris, April 28, 1864^: "Your plans are, I hesitate not to say distinctly, the best we have had up to this time — I speak of the Plans of the city of Jerusalem, and of the Haram ech-Cherif. Certainly they exhibit a few small inaccu- racies of detail, but they are of very small importance in respect to the eminent service which you have ren- dered us in surveying so exactly, with the small resources at your disposal, such important localities. I ought to tell you that, during the execution of our topographical labours,, completed scarcely three months since, not a single day passed without Captain Gelis and myself having had the pleasure of proving and proclaiming the excellence of this double work. It is to you, my dear friend, that we owe the knowledge of the fragments of the second wall of the Jerusalem of the kings of Juda; and I remember that ^ Appendix, Document, No. XX. 26 when I presented, in your name, to the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, your beautiful Plan of the city, I did not fail to call attention to the importance of the discoveries you had been so fortunate as to make behind the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It is to you asrain that we owe our earliest information of the subter- raneous channels, designed to caiTy off the sewage of the Temple. Those subterraneous conduits I recovered in the excavations which I lately made at the South of the Haram-ech-Cherif, and the proof of their existence is a fact of the utmost importance." Not less decided is the testimony of Captain Gelis, of the French Etat Major, attached to the Depot of War, the friend and travelling companion of M. de Saulcy, officially attached to his Expedition \ dated Paris, April 16, 1864. " I seize this opportunity to compliment you particu- larly on your Plan of Jerusalem. In my quality of Topo- grapher, I could appreciate all its meiit, and it is quite certain that it is the most complete and the most cor- rect plan of that locality. I carefully preserve the en- gTaved copy which you were so good as to give me on my first visit to Jerusalem in 1861. I have used it much • and have not hesitated to adopt from it much of the detail, for the execution of my great Plan, intended to accompany the work of M. de Saulcy.... My first visit to Jerusalem in 1861 was too short to allow me to judge of your beautiful Plan and Sections of the Haram-ech-Cherif, which you were then drawing ; but this time I could appreciate their importance and estimate that the trouble to which you were then putting yourself had been crowned with success." I have now done with Mr Grove's first letter to the Times; and I cannot but hope that he will himself feel on reading the above extracts, how favourably the kindly ^ Appendix, Document, No. XXI. 27 words of the two large-hearted Frenchmen contrast with what he has hhnself written on the subject ; for I must maintain that, if all his charges had been true in their worst sense, there was still a sufficient residuum of original matter, both in the text and in the Plates of Jerusalem Explored, to deserve a word at least of acknow- ledgment from one who can appreciate, as Mr Grove can, the importance of their bearing on the subjects of com- mon interest to us both. But he has allowed an amiable feeling, I am willing to believe, of loyalty for his friend Mr Fergusson, to degenerate into a blind partizanship for his theory, involving a very grievous injustice to Dr Pie- rotti ; for indeed the opening words of his second letter prove too plainly, as does the whole tenor of it, the ani- mus of his attack. On this second letter' very few words will suffice; for it is in fact little more than a reiteration of the charsfes of plagiarism of the photographs which Dr Pierotti had admitted, emphasised with a statement which never ought to have been made after reading Dr Pierotti's letter; in which he had distinctly denied that he had placed the photographs in the lithographer's hands " as his own productions." That denial was corroborated by Messrs Day and Sons, whose letter, I am glad to see, bears the same date as Mr Grove's second letter ; so that he could not have seen it when he repeated the libel. But then he ought to have been satisfied with Dr Pierotti's declara- tion, and not have given him the lie direct. I admit at once that, in this second letter, Mr Grove has hit the real blots of Jerusalem Explored, viz. the care- less reduction of the plans or of the scales, or both, in Plates II. and xi. and the unfortunate plan and views of the Holy Sepulchre in Plates xxxiv. and XXXV. They are obviously the first loose and hasty essays at a survey, done soon after the author's arrival in Jerusalem, and ^ Appendix, Document, No. XIV. 28 never subsequently corrected or revised ; probably on account of the gi-eater interest which he took in other researches. They never ought to have been published, and ought now to be cancelled, and recalled. IV. Mr Tipping and Dr Pierotti. In proceeding to notice Mr Tipping's charges against Dr Pierotti, I must acknowledge my obligations to that gentleman, both on public and on private grounds. His beautiful pictorial illustrations to Dr Traill's translation of Josephus are by far the most valuable contribution to sacred topography in that kind that has yet appeared ; not even excepting the splendid photographic works of Messrs Robertson, Graham, and Frith; and I can myself testify, from personal knowledge, to the general fidelity and ac- curacy of nearly all his representations. In particular, I can bear witness to the wonderful reality with which he has invested his views of the Vaulted Substructions of El-Aksa, which are here in question ; as it was through his courtesy, and under his guidance, that I had access to them (the only part of the Haram to which I obtained admission), not, to be sure, in a very dignified manner, but through a hole in the wall. He had frequently visited them before, and although it was always a service of dan- ger, yet he contrived in his successive stealthy visits, to make a complete series of perspective drawings, which together with a plan and section, are embodied in the volumes. There is nothing omitted that either the artist or the archaeologist could desiderate in them. Mr Tipping, I must further admit, exercised great for- bearance in not denouncing the supposed plagiarism until he was almost forced to do so. Mr Grove, among his other charges, had taxed Dr Pierotti with borrowing the two drawings in Plate xxv. from Mr Tipping. It was not 29 until Mr Tyrwhitt had come forward to rebut this charge ^ that Mr Tipping entered the lists*; although convinced from the first, as it seems, that an unauthorised and un- acknowledged use had been made of his labours by the author of Jerusalem Explored. His language then might have been more courteous, but his self-restraint contrasts so favourably with Mr Fergusson's violence and pre- cipitation, that I am disposed to regard his attack in a very diiferent light, and am not without hope that I may convince him that his suspicions against Dr Pierotti are not well founded. I own again that there was apparent ground for sus- picion, in the first instance ; for, familiar as I was with Mr Tipping's drawings, I could not but be struck with the great general resemblance of Dr Pierotti's to them when I first saw them : and at once expressed it to him. It was then I found that he was not so much as acquainted with Mr Tipping's drawings, or with the book that contained them. In fact, I doubt whether even now he has seen the two drawings which he is charged with copying ; for it hap- pened, singularly enough, that they had been taken out of my copy of Traill's Josephus (which he afterwards borrowed of me) for the purpose of making two large lecture-draw- ings, and have never been replaced. The case then is one of " mistaken identity," — if I may venture so to apply the term ; with the like of which, I presume, every architect or artist of wide experience must be familiar. One of the most eminent men in the former profession has told me of a case in which an old pupil of his own published some drawings and details from foreign cathedrals, from his original sketches, but so precisely similar to those which his master had made many years before, that he could have felt confident they were made from his drawings, had he not known the contrar}''. Not that there is actually such close similarity between ' Appendix, Document, No. XV. ^ Appendi.x, Documents, Nos. XVII. XIX. 30 Mr Tipping's prints and Dr Pierotti's lithographs ; as is indeed admitted : but then, as in the case of the substitu- tion of pointed arches for round in the Dome of the Rock, the differences are supposed — not to disprove — but to aggravate the guilt of the plagiarism ! The vertical wall e.g. in Plate xxv., fig. 1, — supposed by Mr Grove to be a misinterpretation of Mr Tipping's print, by the draughtsman who transferred it to stone for Dr Pierotti's book; — the shaft and capital in figure 2 of the same Plate, " which shews all the marks of venerable age" in Mr Tipping's view, " perfectly renovated, shaft and capital, without a flaw or blemish," in Jerusalem Explored; — "the lights and shadows exactly reversed;" — panelled stones instead of bevelled ; — an arch indicated by Dr Pierotti, not by Mr Tipping, — and so following : These divergences one might have supposed amply sufficient to establish the originality and independence of Dr Pier- otti's drawings, even if the agi'eement, in all other respects, had been so precise as to prove — as Mr Tipping tauntingly suggests, — " that he had placed the legs of his sketching- Stool in the very holes left by his twenty years ago." But a careful comparison of Dr Pierotti's original draw- ings with the published prints of Mr Tipping reveals many more discrepancies, and so furnishes additional proofs of the originality of the former. I mention a few, which may be tested even in the Hthogi-aphs, albeit Messrs Day's artist has taken, as their manner is, certain liberties, par- ticularly with the chiaro oscuro, to give effect to the pic- ture, which have softened down the diffei'ences. And first, it will be seen at a glance that, in figure 1, the vaulted passage in Mr Tipping's drawing is consider- ably wider in proportion to its height than in Dr Pierotti's : and this may be proved by actual measurement, for while in the former the height is to the width as 55 to 100, in the latter it is as 71 to 100 ^ and it is somewhat singular ^ i. e. measuring from the crown of the arched roof to the floor verti- cally, and between the piers and the wall horizontally. I am indebted to 31 that Mr Tipping's own plans prove, that while neither of them is correct, Dr Pierotti's is nearer the truth than his, the width according to the plan being 18, and the height not less than 17 feet. Again, the last four arches which are in true perspec- tive in Mr Tipping's drawing are in false perspective in Di- Pierotti's. Further, the piers supporting the arches are not nearly so massive in Dr Pierotti's drawing as they are in Mr Tip- ping's; and while four of the arched spaces on the right can be seen through in the former, three at the most stand clear in the latter. But the nicest and most critical point of difference remains to be mentioned. It relates to the perspective lines ; a comparison of which in the two drawings proves to demonstration that the one is not copied from the other ; and that while the two were taken from as nearly the same spot as possible, they were not taken in the same jyosture, the artist in the one case standing, in the other sitting at his work. It is just that difference and no more, which may be detected; and ought not to have escaped an artist's eye in comparing the views. It is especially remark- able in the direction of the joints between the ranges of massive stones, on the left of the gallery, viewed with refer- ence to the small window in the distance. The line of sight is clearly lower in Mr Tipping's than in Dr Pierotti's view. In proceeding to compare figure No. 2, in the same Plate XXV., with the corresponding view from Mr Tipping's pencil, the same divergence of the perspective lines is even more evident. It is owing probably to the same cause, though it may of course be that while in one the perspec- tive is correct, it is wrong in the other. But, in any case. a clever amateur artist for this and several other points of contrast, which, however, I have carefully tested myst-if. They are even more obvious in Dr Pierotti's original sketch. 32 it proves all that I use it to establish : viz., that one is not a copy of the other. The differences of the monolithic (?) column and its capital in the two drawings have already been pointed out in Mr Grove's language. Nothing can be more striking. But I suppose that, according to the process of cross rea- soning to which Dr Pierotti has been so often subjected, this not only proves but aggravates his offence. Yet his own account of the matter is simple enough and satis- factorily accounts for the differences. He had himself, it seems, scraped the plaister off the pillar and otherwise renovated it, and in that state he drew it. Since that, the churchwardens of the Mosk — their existence is proved by the fact — have " renovated it with whitewash ;" though not by Dr Pierotti's directions; and in this state it was drawn by Mr St John Tyrwhitt in March 1862, and, about the same time, or still more recently, by the Count de Vogue [Plate IV. of Le Temple de Jerusalem], whose drawing of this column much more closely resembles Dr Pierotti's than Mr Tipping's; — a proof I suppose, according to the new logic, that he too copied the latter! It is curious that Dr Pierotti's assailants should find such difficulty in grasping so palpable a truism as the first axiom of Euclid, that " things which are equal to the same are equal to one another," or should refuse to apply it to lines and curves and geometrical figures. They even reverse it when it suits their purpose; and read — "things that are unlike the same are identical with one another"! V. Conclusion. I believe now that I have gone through all the charges of the triumvirate of assailants, except one or two trumpery, captious objections, which will be found more than sufficiently answered in Dr Pierotti's own letter in the 33 Appendix'. It has, no doubt, been a very ii'ksome task ; but it has produced one good effect upon myself. It has convinced me more fully than I was before aware, not only how very frivolous, but how extremely ungenerous or even malevolent, this attack ujDon Dr Pierotti has been. I will not trust myself to enlarge upon this; for I am on the charmed ground of Jerusalem topography, the dangers of which to controversialists I indicated at the outset, by way of a remembrancer to myself: and I fear too that, if I were to denounce the ti'eatment he has met with as it deserves, I should scarcely confine myself to "parliamentary lan- guage," and might possibly incur even a worse penalty than a Vice-Chancellor's Injunction. I conclude with a brief recapitulation of the case, as it appears on the evidence which I have now laid before you, and shall be quite content that your verdict should modify or correct any expressions which may appear too partial to Dr Pierotti, as I am not ashamed to own to a strong bias in his favour. I. I apprehend then (1) that the original charge against Dr Pierotti of having appropriated Mr Arundale's Section of the Dome of the Rock, falls to the ground before the decisive proof of originality contained in his note-book which you have now seen ; and a minute com- parison of the two engravings reveals many points of difference which further establish their mutual indepen- dence ; (2) that the Plan of the Haram esh-Sherif, which Dr Pierotti was charged with copying from Mr Cather- wood's Survey, as published by the Admiralty, and (3) his two drawings of the Substructions of El-Aksa, supposed to be copied from Mr Tipping, have also been proved to be original and independent drawings, both by external and internal evidence. ' Appendix, Document, No. XI. 34 II. What he has really borrowed, are (1) some six "or eight photographic illustrations from Mr Robertson and others, which were public property ; but to which his name was put without his authority; (2) some details of tombs, contained in one plate, from three Plans of M. de Saulcy; (3) two Capitals from Mr Fergusson's Essay, which he ac- tually had in his ovm collection. One line in the Preface to explain Messrs Day's misin- terpretation of his directions; one word of acknowledge- ment to M. de Saulcy and Mr Fergusson, was all that the most rigorous laws of literary etiquette demanded ; and I deeply regret an omission which has given such advantage to his adversaries ; but I cannot admit that the oversight very seriously affects either the literary value of Jerusalem Explored, or the moral character of its Author. N.B. The Note-Book, Plans, and other documents re- ferred to in this paper, were exhibited before the Society; and I shall be happy to exhibit them to any persons interested in the question. G. W. APPENDIX OF DOCUMENTS. No. I. Mr Fergusson to Messrs Bell and Daldy. 20, Laxgham Place, i5