Page:Account of the dreadful accident and great loss of lives which occurred at Kirkcaldy, on Sunday the 15th June, 1828.pdf/13

13 but here the same reckless rapacity, or rather spirit of culpable homicide by anticipation, has been at work. The grooves or notches in the longitudinal beam for receiving the lower extremities of the cross beams are only an inch deep at the upper part, and scarcely a quarter of an inch at the lower; so that if the front of the gallery had by any accident been deflected half an inch from the perpendicular, the destruction of the whole was inevitable. When the church was "finished," as it was called, this Macfarlane had become bankrupt, and the litigation, we believe, took place between his creditors and the heritors of the parish as to its sufficiency; the consequence of which was, that the whole was referred to a builder, who, confining his examination to the mason-work, reported it as sufficient; but the heritors never, we understand, received any report as to the sufficiency of the carpenters’ and joiners’ work; and it is notorious that the galleries have all along been considered insecure and dangerous. So very general was this apprehension some years ago, that it was found necessary to put in two additional pillars immediately behind those at the extremities of the semicircle facing the pulpit; and had it not been for this slight precaution, the whole would unquestionably have tumbled down on Sunday last, and buried hundreds more in its ruins. As it is, the whole of the southern gallery is damaged; the transverse beams have evidently been drawn by the shock from their shallow sockets; the lath and plaster are broken;