Page:Architectural Review and American Builders' Journal, Volume 1, 1869.djvu/19

 1868.] Introductory Review. hinds, by fives and tens, like the line of scythemen into the grass swaths, and threshing his grain by a steam-engine, which he fires up upon the lesser por- tion of the straw, whilst he has to burn the greater to get it out of the way. This largeness of ideas remains with him when he builds. Take the Lake cities, and their more inland river compeers. Detroit has twice as many first-class stores as Philadelphia. Chicago, Mil- waukee, Galena, and the other marvel- lous creations of the West, operate in the same general manner. The State of Minnesota is erecting a public school- house at Winona, to cost from one hun- dred to one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars. Its hospital for the Insane at St. Peter's is plain, but very spacious and commodious, and cost about three hundred thousand dollars. If we take New York, although Auburn, Canandaigua and Coopers- town, have the reputation, in America, of being finished, yet they contain many finished houses and noble piles. Utica, besides the spacious locks and heavy scales of the Brie Canal, the Insane Asylum, and a number of handsome churches, has many chaste and beautiful residences in the upper part of Genesee street, and numerous tasteful and ex- tensive stores on it, in the lower por- tion, near the Mohawk. Syracuse has much more ambition in all these classes, but it is, generally, not quite so artistic, although comparing well with that of most other places. The prevailing cast of style for stores and public buildings in the West and Northwest is Palladian, and for churches, Gothic. The earlier crudeness is fast merging in neatness, or even beautj^ ; although, there is still prevalent a de- structive waste of means in careless, ill- adjusted, and ugly designs, when the same amount of money, placed at the disposal of a good architect, would have produced edifices of the same room, su- perior accommodation, greater strength, and absolute elegance. This is the more deplorable, when it occurs, as it often has, in churches, these being sup- posed to be the most elegant and stately edifices the vicinage can produce. How- ever, all things considered, the West and Northwest, in most architectural desiderata, are quite in advance of the East and Northeast. They now aim to produce something permanent and good. In New England, where timber is none too abundant, but rock prevalent, and stones are generally so plenty and handy, that they often have fairly to grub, to obtain level space enough to put a house upon, the stones obtained at such cost of time and trouble, from the surface and out of the cellar, added to the other boulders of the farm, are built into field divisions, whilst the house is constructed of timber. In the West they build their houses of stone or brick, and make the fences of timber. Where stone is very plenty, the true construction would be stone outer-wall and brick inner, with a clear space about four inches wide be- tween, to obviate dampness, and aper- tures through both walls, for the sake of ventilation. Such a house, well plastered, would be very dry and very healthy There is in central New York, and parts of the West, a kind of burnt brick, appearing unburnt to those only ac- quainted with the brick of the Atlantic cities, or of the near interior, and from the color very desirable to introduce, either alone or intermixed, in various patterns, with the ordinary red brick. As a prevalent hue, Indian red is not really disagreeable, neither is it at all agreeable, but may fairly be called in- different, except as reflecting a very bright sun, when it is simply intolerable. Yet all feel it to be, in sum, the most reliable and durable material, and its rather advancing color is therefore endured. Its common tone is insep- arable from the usual proportion of iron contained in clay throughout the world. There are, however, some local- ities free from the iron, and the clay of