«I this day was spectator of the most magnificent Triumph that certainly ever floted on the Thames, considering the innumerable number of boates & Vessels, dressd and adornd with all imaginabe Pomp: but, above all, the Thrones, Arches, Pageants & other representations, stately barges of the Lord Major, & Companies, with varius Inventions, musique, & Peales of Ordnance from both the vessels & shore, going to meet & Conduct the new Queene from Hampton Court to White-hall, at the first time of her Coming to Towne, exceeding in my opinion, all the Venetian Bucentoro?s &c on the Ascention, when they go to Espouse the Adriatic: his Majestie & the Queene, came in an antique-shaped open Vessell, covered with a State or Canopy of Cloth of Gold, made in forme of a Cupola, supported with high Corinthian Pillars, wreathed with flowers, festoones & Gyrlands: I was in our new-built Vessell, sailing amongst them»

«It is the Late city that first defies the land, contradicts Nature in the lines of its silhouette, denies all Nature. It wants to be something different from and higher than Nature. These high-pitched gables, these Baroque cupolas, spires, and pinnacles, neither are, nor desire to be, related with anything in Nature. And then begins the gigantic megalopolis, the city-as-world, which suffers nothing beside itself and sets about annihilating the country picture.»