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THE VILLA QUARTERS.
Mr.Ruskin's denunciation of the New Town of Edinburgh includes, as I have heard it repeated, nearly all the stone and lime we have to show.
Many however find a grand air and something settled and imposing in the better parts; and upon many, as I have said, the confusion of styles induces an agreeable stimulation of the mind.

But upon the subject of our recent villa architecture, I am frankly ready to mingle my tears with Mr.Ruskin's, and it is a subject which makes one envious of his large declamatory and controversial eloquence.
Day by day, one new villa, one new object of offence, is added to another; all around Newington and Morningside, the dismallest structures keep springing up like mushrooms; the pleasant hills are loaded with them, each impudently squatted in its garden, each roofed and carrying chimneys like a house.

And yet a glance of an eye discovers their true character.

They are not houses; for they were not designed with a view to human habitation, and the internal arrangements are, as they tell me, fantastically unsuited to the needs of man.