Page:The Building News and Engineering Journal, Volume 22, 1872.djvu/406

 384 THE BUILDING NEWS. May 10, 1872. as to the manner in which the work has been carried out. Plans and a specification were pre- pared for the work by Mr. G. G. Scott, but the restoration was not executed under that gentleman’s superintendence, but was entrusted to a local com- mittee, and it is alleged that the ancient remains of painting, plastering, &c., have been removed in an incompetent manner by “dragging” the stonework, and the whole of the surface of the masonry has been re-tooled. These allegations were made by Mr. Fowler, of Louth, and are sustained by Mr. James Fowler, of Wakefield, the local secretary of the Society of Antiquaries for Yorkshire, and have not been refuted by the committee, although an attempt has been made to show that it was impossible to remove the paint from the stonework by the use of potash, and it was necessary to resort to tooling to effect the removal. We are glad to notice that Mr. James Fowler, in a communication to a local paper, refers to the instructions issued by the Institute with regard to church restoration, one clause of which is that “in the restoration of decayed stonework, no scraping or tooling of the surface of the stonework should take place under any circumstances.” It is a matter of serious regret that churches should be interfered with without some competent supervision, and the clergy are much to blame when such a pro- ceeding is permitted. Yarron.—S. Mary’s Church, Yatton, was on Monday reopened, after restoration by Mr. Street, at ata cost of £3,000. An open parapet has been con- structed on each side of the nave roof, and some traceried work introduced into the tower. The nave ceiling{has also given place to an open oak roof, with the timber gilded. There is an entirely new west window. A new floor has been laid throughout of wood where the seats are, and of plain tiles in the other portions of the nave. An oak screen separates the chancel from the chapels, and choir stalls have been fixed, while there is also a new altar. The doors throughout the church have been renewed, and the chancel rebuilt. BUILDINGS. ABERDEEN.—Steps are being taken to erect anew theatre and opera-house here, the present one being found unsuitable. With this aim a company has Ween formed, and most ofthe shares have been taken up. Operations are so far advanced that the building is to be proceeded with at once, and is expected to be ready by December 1. It is to cost £7,600, and the architect is Mr. Phipps, of London. Axrrincnim.— A new branch bank has been erected at Altrincham for Messrs. Cunliffe, Brooks, & Co. The banking-room is 40ft. by 30ft., and 30ft. high. It will have, when finished, a dado of marble and ornamental tiles, marble chimney-pieces, panelled vak ceiling and doors, &e. The exterior of the build- ing is in the old Cheshire style of half-timbered houses. The whole of the external woodwork is good solid English oak, all well put together, moulded and carved. The roofs are covered with tiles, the turret and other portions of roof with lead, the lower por- tion of building of Runcorn (Cheshire) stone. The gas standards, counters, fittings, &c., of every description will be designed by the architect, Mr. ‘Truefitt, of 5, Bloomsbury-square, London. Mr. Watson is the clerk of the works, Mr. Cardwell the joiner and builder ; Messrs. Smith & Calderbank did the stonework; Mr. Owen, of Bowdon, is the plumber and glazier. Bristour.—On Tuesday the corner stone of the new schools in connection with S. Simon’s Church, Bristol, was laid by the Mayor of Bristol. The schools consist of a girls’ school-room, 60ft. by 21ft. ; girls’ class-room, 16ft. by 21ft.; infants’ school-room, 60ft. by 27ft.; infants’ class-room, 22ft. by 20ft. Messrs. Medland & Son, of Gloucester, are the archi- tects; and the builder is Mr. James P. Stephens, of York-street, S. Paul’s. The building will be of brick, with freestone facings. The total cost of the building will be about £1,400. GiAscow.—A new building for the City of | Glasgow Bank is about to be erected in Glasgow. The new building is designed after the Roman style, with vermiculated rustic work and arches on the ground floor, enriched windows in the upper floors, and surmounted with bold cornice work on the top. The angle of the building is made to contain the entrance to the bank, which is to be decorated with Corinthian columns and entablature, having the arms of the bank carved in pediment. The bank premises are to be on the ground floor, having a telling-room 33ft. square, andlofty ceiling panelled and enriched; ageut’s room, safes, &e. A portion of the ground floor will be divided into shops, and the upper floors will contain bank accountant’s dwelling-house, and other dwelling-houses or places of business, as may be required. Messrs, Baird & Thompson, of Glasgow, are the architects. TO CORRESPONDENTS, [We do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions of our correspondents. The Editor respectfully requests that al] communications should be drawn up as briefly as possible, as there are many claimants upon the space allotted to correspondence.) To Our READERS.—We shall feel obliged to any of our readers who will favour us with brief notes of works con- templated or in progress in the provinces. Letters relating to advertisements and the ordinary business of the Paper should be addressed tothe EDITOR, 31, TAVISTOCK-STREET, COVENT-GARDEN, W.C. Advertisements for the current week must reach the office not later than 5 p.m, on Thursday. TO AMERICAN AND BELGIAN SUBSCRIBERS, In answer to numerous inquiries, the Publisher begs to state that subscribers in the United States can be supplied with the BUILDING NEWS, post free from this Office, for the sum of 17s. 4d. (4 dols. 16¢., gold) per annum, and in Belgium for the sum of 21 franes, payable in advance. The remittance should, in all cases, be made by International Post-office Order, t= American and Belgian Subscribers, especially when renewing their subscriptions, are particularly requested to advise the Publisher of the transmission of the Post-Office Order, and the exact amount for which it is made payable. RecrtvedD.—E. M. W.—O, H.—W. B. B.—C. & H.—H.F.S. —T.H. B.—N. B.—G. W.—W. & B.—W. O.—J. BR. S.— L. F. D.—J. S. N.—R. E. & Co. J. Hall.—We can't say. WitirAm A, GOss.—We have no space for personal con- troversy. ——— es Correspondence, st LLANDAFF CATHEDRAL. To the Editor of the Buitpine News. Si1r,—The restoration of Llandaff Cathedral, is, probably, the most complete which has been effected in the present century, when there is scarcely one of our great churches which has not put on a new beauty under the hands of men jealous of their trust. A reference to Storer or Winkle will show the miserable condition to which only a few years since what is now a beautiful building was reduced. The west front showed a ruin, a N.W. tower with a hideous battlement, and a mere fragment of its fellow on the south, covered with dense folds of ivy. Now the Jasper tower has its upper stage of unique stateliness, and bearing a strong, likeness to that of S. Stephen’s, Bristol, familiar as it is with projecting flying buttresses and open tracery; and a grand S.W. tower has arisen capped with a superb gpire of great height. The naye arches are concealed by aisles, the abomination erected as a place of worship in domestie brick with urns at the corners has dis- appeared ; the chapter house has a tall roof crowned with an angel, I presume 8. Michael watching over the cemetery, which is adorned with a graveyard cross; and the Lady Chapel has been revived in all its outer grace. It is only used for the burial ser- vice. There is a slanting orifice in the wall of the aisle, commanding a view of the site of the altar. There cannot be a more striking approach; we pass the ruins of the Bishop's Palace with its solid gateway and the village cross, and before us, as if rising out of the earth, soars the snow-white spire of the Cathedral, looking like the solitary ornament of a parish church of noble dimensions ; and then, sud- denly, as we stand beside the lych gate down in a green hollow, full of bright turf and tall trees—with on either side a deep descent—appears the long line of the Cathedral, unlike any other building of its class—not quite parochial, not quite of cathedral form—an oblong, unbroken by transepts, but re- lieved by the traceried windows of the aisles, the lancets of the clerestory, the tall roof of the chapter house, and the shaft of the cross; the pale blue slating and the crest standing out clear against the sky; the two western towers and the pointed windows of the gabled front presenting features of great dignity ; and behind all a lovely landscape of woodland, terminating in a blue breastwork of hills. The view on the south is less impressive, but the cemetery is so admirably kept that all seems in har- mony with the house of God's rest and what our devout forefathers loved to call the paradise. The interior is really grand; there is no triforium, but the arcade below, and the clerestory above showering down broad spaces of light in the nave ; the eanopied stalls, perhaps too crowded, but of great delicacy in carving, and remarkable for the use of two kinds of coloured wood; the tall spire over the bishop’s throne at the south, the noble sanctuary arch above the altar, with faint glimpses of the Lady Chapel beyond, make up an interior full of force and architectural power. The two blots in the view are the unneces- sary projection of portions of the organ, and the very commonplace triple canopied reredos with feeble painting in the niches. It was a thousand pities that the original reredos, now relegated to the north choir aisle, was not replaced on its site. Is it yet too late to do what is right in the matter? The altar is left bare, but in front of it are two good standards, and on the south is a credence table, with a useless chair on the north side. There is a daily morning service, and on Sundays the Cathedral is completely filled, the nave chairs being wholly unappropriated and free. The old monuments have been replaced in a manner worthy of their interest; the modern glass is not remarkable and deserves no comment. Llandaff is easily and quickly reached from Bristol, and well deserves a careful study.—Yours, &c., Mackenzie E. C. Waucorr. A MASON’S SUGGESTIONS ON THE WAGES QUESTION. Sir,—If I am not occupying too much of your valuable space I hope you will allow this letter to be published. I am a mason, and am in connection with the agitation for shortening the hours of labour. Our employers have had notice to concede, in July, an advance of one penny per hour. As an individual, I throw out two suggestions that I think would meet the views of the masons and the em- ployers also, unless they are stubborn, and still adhere to their previous resolutions. If so, there is every prospect of a struggle and a loss to both parties. I think it would be better for them to meet half way. 1 would suggest, in the first place, that 51 hours constitute a week’s work through the year, with an advance of one halfpenny per hour, bring- ing their wages to £1 16s. 14d. per week, thereby purchasing the 5} hours less labour weekly, or 1s. 63d. less than they have been receiving hitherto, the present working hours being 563 at 8d. per hour, total weekly wages £1 17s. 8d. Or, second, 50 hours per week for 14 weeks in the winter months, and 53 hours in the summer for 38 weeks, at 8$d. per hour. The total sum per week would be: winter rate, £1 15s. 5d.; summer rate, £1 17s. 63d. To divide the time of working: winter, to commence half-past six a.m., leaving off at five p.m. and twelve Saturdays; summer, commence at six a.m., leave off at five p.m. for five days and twelve Saturdays. Sir, in throwing out these suggestions I have taken upon myself to ascertain what is the feeling of my shopmates and gthers who are working for different firms, and I find several that are willing to accept either of those suggestions, providing the employers would meet their committee amicably, and come to an arrangement before a struggle ensues. If this letter should meet the eye of any employer I hope he will take the question into consideration, and, if possible, try to meet the opera- tives in a friendly spirit, as experience must tell them that when a strike does take place with the masons they are obliged to engage inferior workmen to supplant the old hands by offering them some- thing as a compromise to what the men were re- ceiving when they struck. I will put it to them conscientiously : which would be the wisest on their part, to meet the masons’ committee, and, if pos- sible, try to settle the nine hours in the way that I have suggested, thereby retaining their old hands, and the works to go on without any stoppages, or cause a struggle, entailing great loss to themselves, besides the ill feeling that will be created in the trade against them ?—I am, &e., J. G. Pimlico, London. GENERAL SCOTT AND THE SEWAGE PROBLEM. Sm,—An extract from the Leeds Mercury in your last week’s edition, referring to the above interesting subject, conveys a somewhat erroneous impression respecting the present position of the Ealing Works. These works, of which the eminent chemist, Professor Way, spoke in his report to the Ealing Local Board, 1870, “as being amongst the best, if not the best of their class in England,” are being used by General Scott at the present time for carrying out and perfecting his experiments in con- nection with the sewage question. The superinten- dence of the said works still remains in my hands (as they have been since they were designed by me some nine years since), as engineer to the board. TI may add that, notwithstanding the strong testimony in its favour given by Mr. Thomas Hawksley, Mr. Bramwell, Dr. Odling, Dr. Voelcker, and Dr. Frank- land, before the Birmingham Sewage Parliamentary Inquiry Committee, the Ealing Local Board have not committed themselves to General Scott’s process at present. It does appear, however, that General Scott has proved beyond a doubt that there are