Page:The Building News and Engineering Journal, Volume 22, 1872.djvu/134

 118 THE BUILDING NEWS. Frx. 9, 1872. richer classes to use- proper means to effect it, and still greater to get the poor, who breathe an atmo- sphere stifling to persons unaccustomed to it. He recommended the Howard ventilator, which had been adopted with success in barracks. Light, he considered, to have great effect upon recovery in illness. In repapering a room, care should be take to remove the old paper, as where paper was put over the old, it has been proved to be a fertile source of disease. The CuHaArrMan then called upon Mr. Fletcher to reply. He, in answering Professor Kerr’s statement as to the one-room theory in model dwellings, he contended that even if each room were occupied by a single family, his would still be a great im- provement, inasmuch as they would have all their conveniences on the same floor, and consequently, only one-third the number to use them as in an ordi- nary house of three floors. With regard to the ventilation of sewers we ought to look more to the engineer than the architect for the mitigation of this evil. He stated that Dr. Fowler’s statements with respect to ventilation were not quite accurate, because it is well known that the fire draws the foul air up the chimney, and consequently the fresh would come in through the window. ————— MODERN METROPOLITAN ARCHITECTURE. CORRESPONDENT of the Times calls atten- tion to the unsatisfactory way in which public buildings are erected in London :— “Do the public and Parliament,” he asks, “realise the fact that at the present time more than £2,000,000 sterling is pledged to the erection of public buildings, the architecture of which has been decided in the most absurd and haphazardous fashion ? Never has the violation of common sense in the determination of what our public buildings are to be been so conspicuous as at the present time. To mention only great buildings, arrangements are made, or being made, for building the Law Courts, the Public Offices in Downing-street, the National Gallery, the South Kensington Museum, the Natural History Museum, and the Post Office. The plan for the War Office and Admiralty are being con- sidered, Heaven only knows how or by whom. We have a First Commissioner of Works, who is some- times in the Cabinet and sometimes not. He takes his orders from the Treasury, which by fits and starts let him have hisown way. If by chance the Chancellor of the Exchequer is a great connoisseur of architecture, or thinks himself so, then there arises a little friction between these functionaries, but the ‘Treasury is the constitutional authority for finance, and if it goes into architecture it steps beyond its province. Theoretically, the First Commissioner for Public Works is a Minister accountable directly to Parliament; he is not chosen, and ought not to be chosen, for any professional qualifications. His business is to be responsible to Parliament for the administration of a proper system. But the work- ing of the present ‘no system’ is to permit the First Commissioner for the time being to indulge in any whims of his own. At one time it may be ‘cost- liness and extravagance;’ as Mr. Gladstone says. He may be succeeded by a Minister who acts with Minister to whom Mr. Gladstone would impute the public were threatened with a period of Gothic buildings. The public offices in Downing-street were designed as Gothic and the harlequin wand of Lord Palmerston (not, by the way, First Commissioner of Works, but First Lord of the Treasury) turned them into what was intended to be Italian Renaissance. The building for the University of London was actually begun as a Gothie building, and it, too, turned into an Italian one. Just the opposite oc- curred with Captain Fowke’s designs for the Natural History Museums. He obtained by unanimous con- sent the first prize in an open competition for an Italian building. He dies ; Mr. Cowper Temple, with delightful innocency, puts the execution of it into the hands of a Gothie architect. Lord John Manners reappears in his fayourite character as First Com- missioner, and puts aside the design chosen by a public competition for one in a style of Gothic which it is difficult to characterise, and approved by no one but himself. Some people call the style Byzantine, and others Norman. It is said that Mr. Ayrton is going to be responsible for the execution of it if Parliament allow him. It is supposed that the pre- sent Chancellor of the Exchequer is the architectural authority for the Law Courts, having once recom- mended the House of Commons to adopt the style of Inigo Jones.” One method of curing this state of things, or of preventing the erection of unsatisfactory buildings, would be the production of models of the buildings to be erected. He also thinks the First Commis- sioner of Works, should have the advice of a Council. “Let this permanent Council consist of three archi- tects—one named by the Government, one named by the Royal Academy, and one named by the Institute of British Architects; of three artists named by the Government—one a painter, one a sculptor, and one a decorative artist, together with three laymen—one being a member of the House of Lords, and another a member of the House of Com- mons; in all, nine persons. To insure responsible attendance to the duty, let this Council be paid. A very moderate proportion on an expenditure of three millions spent on public buildings, say a farthing in the pound, would amply suffice. This Council would act as ajury to give a verdict on behalf of the public, and the First Commissioner would be the judge to adopt it or to give good reasons for refusing it. The operation of this plan would be as follows:—The planning of the building, its adaptation to site, its cost, and its execution, would rest upon the sole re- sponsibility of the First Commissioner of Works. He would get the plans either through his own office, or through an architect, or by public competition. The plans, with a sufficient model, would be laid before the Permanent Council of Taste. Their report would be made and published, and the model and plans exhibited to the public. The First Com- missioner would then report to the Treasury, and the cost of the proposed building would be submitted to Parliament. By this means the caprices of the past ten years, with their “extravagance, vacilla- tion, and meanness,” would be prevented. Parlia- ment would be made fully aware for what it has to vote public money, and the public would haye its proper voice of authority and the means of express- ing its opinion on buildings which are always to be before its eyes, to gratify or disgust them.” ee eee DECAY IN STONE: ITS CAUSES AND PREVENTION.* (Concluded from page 98.) ITH respect to the stone used in the Houses of Parliament, while generally they attribute the local character of the decay to structural dif- ferences obtaining in the stone, they say the compo- sition of the stone is such as to render it peculiary amenable to the sources of disintegration already mentioned. The chemical analysis of the Auston or Houses of Parliament stone is as follows: Carbonate of lime ........... ound ak iteh) Carbonate of magnesia . 42°07 Protoxide of iron..... 0-49 Peroxide of iron . 0-24 Silitareccne seu .. 0°56 WGOr (easnee ses pexeceee 0-51 from which it will be observed that the carbonates of lime and magnesia are, in fact, the principal constituents. Now it is well known that the chemical action of carbonic and sulphuric acids in combination with water will gradually dissolve and remove the carbonates of lime and magnesia. On this ground, therefore, the commis- sioner considered that dolomites or magnesian limestone were neither desirable nor safe materials for building purposes in London, The conclusion may not appear altogether warranted by the facts, because where, as in the case of the Geological Museum in Jermyn-street, proper care in selection had been exercised, the stone work appears to stand remarkably well. While the chemical effects of the atmosphere should, undoubtedly. in London and all large towns, always be considered in determining the character of any building stones, the mechani- cal effects, or in other words, the influence of wind, rain, and frost should receive an equal amount of attention. The chemical action of the atmosphere produces a change in the entire nature of limestones, and in the cementing substance of the sandstones, according to the amount of surface exposed to it. The mechanical action occasions either a remoyal or a disruption of the exposed particles, the former by means of powerful winds and driving rains, and the latter by the congelation of water forced into or absorbed by the external portions of the stone These effects are reciprocal chemical actions, render- ing the stone liable to be more easily affected by chemical action, which latter, by constantly present- ing new surfaces, accelerates the disintegrating effects of the former. It is now generally admitted, that buildings in this climate are found to suffer the greatest amount of decomposition on their south, south-western, and western fronts, arising doubtless from the prevalence of wind and rain from those Society, January 19th, 1872, by Mr. JAMES B. WALTON, Assoc. Inst. C.E. quarters ; it is highly desirable then to select stones of great durability for building fronts of such as- pects. A curious instance of the different degrees of durability of the same material subject to the effets of the atmosphere in the town and country vas given by the Commissioners of 1839, who were intrusted with the selection of the stone for the Houses of Parliament. It is worth repeating. During their visit to Portland they noticed a number of blocks of stone, which were quarried at the time of the erection of S. Paul’s Cathedral. These blocks were covered with lichens, and although they Ind been exposed to all the vicissitudesof the marine atmo- sphere for more than 150 years, they still exhibited beneath the lichens their original form, even to tie marks of the chisel employed upon them, whilst tae stone taken from the same quarries, selected 10 doubt with equal, if not greater care, and placed in the Cathedral itself, is in those parts which are ex- posed to the south and south-westerly winds fourd in some instances to be fast mouldering away. if this prove anything at all, it certainly upsets Mr. Cross’s theory that selection is everything. In the earlier part of this paper I alluded to the question of the stone being placed in the building upon its natural or quarry bed. For the want of a little attention and thought people blindly rush to the conclusion that the neglect of this pre- caution is the sole cause of the decay which too frequently follows. In the case of the Houses of Parliament, it is very evident that the bedding of the stone had nothing whatever to do with the decay, and it does not ap- pear to me to be a matter of much importance with many of the limestone rocks in ordinary building use whether this is attended to or not. But the case of sandstones is often very different ; let me give you an instance. Here are two specimens of the sandstone of which Furness Abbey is bnilt—one is from the quarry adjoining the ruins where the stone was obtained for the building, and the other from the Chapter House, which is, or rather was, an exquisite piece of twelfth-century work. These specimens I brought with me yesterday on my return from the district. The specimen from the quarry you will see is about the thickness of an ordinary half-inch tile; it was removed without any difficulty, the ten- dency being to partin laminated form. Now it is evident that if this stone had been indiscriminately used, without any regard to its natural bed, the effects would have been very disastrous, as from the fact of its being a highly-porous and absorbent stone, the mechanical effects of the atmosphere would soon have told upon it; on the contrary, when used in its natural position, nothing can be better than the way in which it has withstood the atmosphere and resisted decay. The specimen from the Chapter House has been faced for upwards of seven hundred years, and yet there is not the slightest trace of decay apparent. In proof of the value of this stone, soft and friable as it may appear, it may be stated that in several parts of the ruins the dog-tooth ornament has been extensively used to enrich the mouldings of the door and win- dow. This ornament in many cases is not more than an inch and a half across, and yet I saw num- bers of them as sharp and perfect as they were when first executed. There is another point with regard to these specimens worthy of notice, 7.e., the comparative difference in their weight ; that from the quarry was taken from a spot sheltered from the rain, and is light in the extreme, whereas the piece from the Chapter House was taken from a mass of débris lying on the ground and exposed to the full force of the rains, which, in those parts, have been incessant for the last twomonths. The amount of rainabsorbed by this piece must be something astonishing owing to the great increase in its weight. or my own satisfaction and study I shall weigh this specimen at once and again when it is dry, and also see what influence the first frost will have upon iz. The latter, one would judge, will be nothing at all, or the stone would have perished long ago. The difficulty in treating a question of this kind, is to know how to compress one’s thoughts, and in the compass of half an hour or so to put the results of years of observation and study. I have endea- voured to get hold of a few first principles rather than deluge you with the experience of other people, because, in this subject at least, it has been produc- tive of little good. The more I have thought about it, the more I have been convinced that it is better to pin one’s faith to no man, but to strike out on a path of observation for oneself. Our friend the Presi- dent has set us a good example, as I have been re- peatedly astonished at the amount of valuable prac- tical information and experience he has been able to accumulate. The decay of stone opens a vast field for our thought. The subject cannot stand alone or be con-
 * vacillation and uncertainty,’ and then may come a
 * meanness.’ During the reign of Lord John Manners
 * Paper read before the Civil and Mechanical Engineers’