Chapter II: Part 2

“The stone laid by the Prince forms the keystone, archivolts and two spandrils of the central archway of the George street front. Upon the face are to be carved the Royal arms, and upon the coffered soffits the arms of the Duke. The dimensions of the stone are:—Length 13 feet 6 inches, width 4 feet 6 inches, and height 6 feet 6 inches—the whole being equal to 394 cubic feet. The weight is twenty-six tons. This stone is doubtless the largest yet laid by his Royal Highness, and it is probably the largest block of sandstone he will ever lay, for it would be difficult, if not indeed impossible, to get _sound_ blocks of sandstone of equal size from any quarry in England, or elsewhere. Few cities are so favorably situated for sandstone as Sydney, for in almost every direction blocks of this description of freestone may be obtained of almost unlimited dimensions, and without a flaw. The most casual observer of the new Post Office cannot fail to notice the massiveness of the stones used in the building, and the solidity of the structure is unequalled by any other erection in the city. The contractor has placed very powerful cranes in his quarries at Pyrmont, whence these immense blocks of stone are obtained, and great credit is due to Mr. C. Saunders for the workmanlike manner in which these blocks—far exceeding in size anything previously attempted in the colony—have been quarried. The difficulty of removing these heavy blocks of stone must be very considerable; and the stone laid by the Duke of Edinburgh was equal to the force of twenty-one horses, calculating a horse to draw about twenty-five cwt. Ordinary wagons or trucks usually carry weight not exceeding 5, or, at most, 6 tons; and as there are in this building many blocks of granite and freestone of 10 to 20 tons, the difficulty of carriage can easily be seen. In hoisting and fixing these large stones ‘travellers’ are used, which can move longitudinally and crossways; and as the lift is directly over the stone to be fixed, there is less liability of accident than by the use of cranes or other contrivances.

“The building progresses as rapidly as the elaborate nature of such work will admit. It is now to the height of the first story, twenty-five feet from the floor line, which is three feet above the causeway in George street. The works are being carried on under the superintendence of the Colonial Architect, Mr. James Barnet. The contractor has fixed all the polished granite columns on the work front facing the street, which is to be taken through from George street to Pitt street. They are exceedingly beautiful, and are resplendent with a lustre brighter than that of marble. The polish has been brought out by an elaborate process, and is, we believe, ineffaceable by atmospheric influences. Each column is polished by machinery—incessant friction continued for a fortnight being requisite to bring out the lustre. There are to be twenty-seven columns in the George street front, which the Government have also decided shall be of polished granite, material which for beauty and durability cannot be surpassed even in Europe. The building, when completed, will compare favorably with any structure erected for a similar purpose elsewhere.

“The blue granite used in the edifice is obtained by Mr. Young from his quarries at Moruya, about one hundred and sixty miles to the south of Sydney. The quarries are opened in the side of the hill—a mountain of granite in fact—and about half a mile of railway constructed across the swamp carries it to a granite jetty, which has been built in the river, into water deep enough to admit of vessels drawing fifteen feet of water loading alongside. The granite is sound—sufficiently so, indeed, to admit of two hundred feet lengths being quarried. A block has been got out for the front columns of the Post Office, which weighs nearly three hundred tons, and the dimensions of which are:—Length, 22 feet; breadth, 22 feet; thickness, 8 feet; total contents being 3,520 feet.”

BUILDING IN CONCRETE.

It is something to be wondered at, the slowness with which the advantages of concrete, as a building material, have been developed and accepted by practical men. As a foundation it is beyond all doubt the firmest, simplest, and most economical. But, its merit is not confined to underground operations; for, as has been repeatedly maintained during the last twenty years, it is capable of making walls of unsurpassing strength and durability, giving comforts which no other material will. It is true that certain parties have sought to astonish the world with securely patented _inventions_, by which Nature’s humble efforts at making granite were at once surpassed, and the old fogy way of the consolidation, by the tedious action of time, of grains of mica, quartz, and feldspar, set aside by the use of this invaluable mode of making as good an article with one man power at a rate fully equal to supplying the demands of all who want stone houses erected rapidly from the raw material!

All this is arrant folly, and should not be listened to, much less patronized. The making or undertaking to make stone in blocks is a step, aye, a long stride backwards.

The object of cementing together blocks, whether of brick or stone, is simply to produce one solid mass. And it is because we cannot conveniently carve out in a _monolith_ or mass together in one _tumulus_ the desired dwelling or temple, that we are forced either to break blocks of stone into fragments, or mould and burn earth into bricks. Now the idea of forming artificial stone into blocks still leaves the expensive necessity for cementing them together; and therefore instead of improving our condition, actually leaves us worse off, by giving us, as a substitute for Nature’s well-tested material, a most unreliable article, which has already too clearly proved its utter worthlessness. However, this should not cause the friends of progress to give up all idea of simplifying and economizing the mode of wall structure. On the contrary it should stimulate them to make that exertion in the right way, which has hitherto been so persistently and blindly made in the wrong.

In Europe they are taking this subject into serious consideration. In England, under the name of CONCRETE; in France, under the title of BÉTON. In the latter country, much has been done lately, and all arising out of the excellent work on cements given to the world by M. VICAT, whose name should be enshrined forever in the Temple of Fame, for the amount of good, present and prospective, which his earnest labors have done the Art of Building.

One of the most indefatigable and successful of experimenters in _béton_ is M. COIQUÉT, who has proved beyond all cavil the excellence of that composition when applied to the sustaining of weight or resistance of pressure.

In London we find Messrs. Drake, Brothers and Reed, under Her Majesty’s Letters-Patent, undertakers of Building in Concrete.

It is the machinery they use that is patented, we believe, and not the material; for there are many others in this branch of business. Mr. JOSEPH TALL, of London, has also a patent for a peculiar method of building in concrete, and has executed some contracts in Paris, where, in 1867, he took a prize at the Exposition.

It is evident, then, that concrete is forcing its way, and that it is not an unworthy subject for the inventive minds of our astute countrymen.

What we particularly need in order to give an impetus to construction in concrete is a well-systematized apparatus, movable and always available, and that men should be drilled to work to the greatest possible advantage; for it is the want of these requisites that makes concrete to-day a material so little known and so seldom used.

Let an active company, with sufficient capital, start the business in any of our large cities, and concrete will soon assert its excellence as a building material, and an investment will be secured, giving profit to its holders and satisfaction to a very large section of our population, to whom economy must prove the key to comfortable independence.

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The quarry companies in Connecticut were never doing a heavier business than this season. Three quarries now employ over one thousand laborers, seventy-five horses and one hundred yoke of cattle.

A REMARKABLE CENTENARY.

How few there are who pause for one instant from their plodding after the deified “Dollar,” to reflect that this present year, 1869, is the most remarkably commemorative of any yet on the Book of Time.

It is now one hundred years since HUMBOLDT, CUVIER, the first BRUNELL, JAMES WATT, Jr., and Sir THOMAS LAWRENCE, among the most eminent of the world’s civilians—and NAPOLEON the First, WELLINGTON, SOULT and NEY, among the most advanced rank of mighty military chiefs, had birth.

It is one hundred years since the elder WATT’S condensing steam engine was invented, and that invention which brought poverty with its production has, in these hundred years, revolutionized the globe, and made not alone individuals, but whole nations wealthy and powerful.

No nation on the globe owes more to WATT’S steam engine than does this of ours. Where now would Civilization be coiled up? Where now would Science be secluded comparatively unnoticed and unknown—were it not for that one invention?

The peoples of the world have been growing and multiplying, and where would have been the room, or the employment for the teeming millions, were it not for that happy thought which in 1769 became a palpable fact?

A wise Providence was over all, and the brain that worked out the idea of the condensing steam engine was but doing its special part in the great work of civilization and progress.

This Centenary is one which should not be allowed to pass unheeded, especially now that we have just drawn the extremes of the earth nearer, not alone to the ear, but to the eye itself.

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“How fast they build houses now!” said H.; “they began that building last week, and now they are putting in the lights.” “Yes,” answered his friend, “and next week they will put in the liver.”

AUTOMATIC WATER ENGINE.

An important discovery connected with the raising of water is claimed to have been made by Dr. Bouron, a physician of some reputation, residing at Heverville, Seine Inférieure. It appears that by a very simple piece of mechanism he can raise a continuous stream of water to almost any altitude, without labor of any kind, and without expense, beyond that necessary for the first cost of the machine, and this is by no means large, considering the amount of useful work which it yields. Dr. Bouron states that the power of the machine is based upon a natural and immutable mechanical principle, and that by it there may be created a continuous current of water at the surface of the soil, wherever there exists, no matter at what depth it may be, a spring of water. The machine is intended to supersede all existing pumps, its construction not being more expensive, whilst it has the additional advantage that no expense is incurred for keeping it constantly and usefully at work, although other pumps, especially when the water is raised a great height, necessitates enormous expenses compared with the useful effect produced, and that, too, during the whole time they are at work. It must not be forgotten, however, that it is a stream and not a jet of water which the new machine produces, so that, although it would be well adapted to supply water to fire engines, for example, it could not replace them. It is claimed that the machine will yield the same quantity of water as that being produced by the spring to which it is adapted, (less, of course, the loss inseparable from the working of all mechanical apparatus), and at any height, whether it be one thousand metres, two thousand metres, or more. Dr. Bouron also observes that, however paradoxical it may appear, he has found “the greater the height to which the water has to be raised the greater is the power of the machine.” But the relative proportion of the power to the speed is quite in conformity with the principles of mechanics. The greater the height to which the water has to be raised, the greater the power and the speed that can be brought to bear upon it; but the greater the horizontal section of the column of water to be lifted, the more will the speed diminish.

REMARKABLE MASONIC INCIDENT.

The first masonic funeral that ever occurred in California took place in the year 1849, and was performed over the body of a brother found drowned in the Bay of San Francisco. An account of the ceremonies states that on the body of the deceased was found a silver mark of a Mason, upon which were engraved the initials of his name. A little further investigation revealed to the beholder the most singular exhibition of Masonic emblems that was ever drawn by the ingenuity of man upon the human skin. There is nothing in the history or traditions of Freemasonry equal to it. Beautifully dotted on his left arm in red or blue ink, which time could not efface, appeared all the emblems of the entered apprentice. There were the Holy Bible, the square and the compass, the 24-inch gauge and the common gavil. There were also the mosaic pavement representing the ground floor of King Solomon’s Temple, the intended tessle which surrounds it and the blazing star in the centre. On his right arm, and artistically executed in the same indelible liquid, were the emblems pertaining to the fellow craft degree, viz.: the square, the level, and the plumb. There were also the five columns representing the five orders of architecture—the Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, Composite.

In removing the garments from his body, the Trowel presented itself, with all the other tools of operative Masonry. Over his heart was the Pot of Incense. On the other parts of his body were the Bee Hive, the Book of Constitutions, guarded by the Tyler’s Sword, the sword pointing to a naked heart; the All-seeing eye; the Anchor and Ark, the Hour Glass, the Scythe, the forty-seventh problem of Euclid; the Sun, Moon, Stars, and Comets; the three steps emblematical of Youth, Manhood, and Age. Admirably executed was the weeping Virgin, reclining on a broken column, upon which lay the Book of Constitutions. In her left hand she held the Pot of Incense, the Masonic emblem of a pure heat, and in her uplifted hand a Sprig of Acacia, the emblem of the immortality of the soul. Immediately beneath her stood winged Time, with his scythe by his side, which cuts the brittle thread of life, and the Hour Glass at his feet which is ever reminding us that our lives are withering away. The withered and attenuated fingers of the Destroyer were placed amid the long and gracefully flowing ringlets of the disconsolate mourner. Thus were the striking emblems of mortality and immortality beautifully blended in one pictorial representation. It was a spectacle such as Masons never saw before, and, in all probability, such as the fraternity will never witness again. The brother’s name was never known.

NECESSITY FOR PURE AIR.

Those of our citizens who were “to the manor born,” and never left their native land, cannot form any idea of the comfort they enjoy as compared with the misery endured from birth to death by thousands of kindred humanity in the other parts of the world. Even in highly cultivated and brilliant England and her dependencies, we find enough to shock the feelings and make us ask ourselves “can such things be?”

In a pamphlet recently given to the world, DR. MORGAN, a Master of Arts, and a prominent member of the British Medical Association, repeats in print a paper which he read before that learned body at Oxford, in August last; and but for which publication we would have been in ignorance of the actual depth of misery to which so many good and faithful subjects of that proud and wealthy monarchy are condemned uncared for and unthought of.

“The author remarks that the housing of the poor, while beset with great difficulties, is most intimately connected with the future prosperity of the great mass of the people. In all our great cities, there are unhealthy quarters, where the death rate is exceptionally high, and the reason of this, after careful inspection of many such places, Dr. Morgan believes is to be found in this statement. Bad air, or too little of it, kills the people.

“Men will grow robust and vigorous, the author remarks, on very poor food, in very dirty cabins, and in very sorry attire, provided they enjoy a pure and bracing atmosphere, and the great physical development of the nations of the Hebrides and the western highlands of Scotland is cited as an example. In striking contrast to this, we find that in the Isle of St. Kilda, a small island, numbering about eighty inhabitants, three out of every five infants born alive are carried off a few days after birth by a convulsive affection allied to tetanus, the difference being apparently due to the huts having no smoke-hole in the thatch, and being rendered impervious to air by double walls filled in with peat and sods, the object of which is to prevent the escape of smoke, and in due time the soot is collected and used as manure.”

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DRINKING FOUNTAINS—This philanthropic movement which offers the grateful cup of Nature’s refreshing beverage to the parched lip of the passenger, is one that takes a high place indeed in the church universal, at whose shrine all bend in unison, and know no discordant thought, but love one another for the love of God.

LESSONS FOR LEARNERS.

PRACTICAL GEOMETRY.

We will not commence our instructions with the hackneyed “definitions,” but give our readers full credit for the knowledge of what is a _point_, _a right or straight line_, _a curved line_, _parallel lines_—and so forth, and proceed at once to practice.

There are some persons who think that with a drawing-board and square, they can, without fail, make all sorts of horizontal, perpendicular, or parallel lines, and that therefore any geometrical rules for such purpose are to them unnecessary. But, suppose the drawing-board, or the square is absent, or that neither can be had. In such an emergency the want of the following items of knowledge would be severely felt, and, therefore, the acquirement and retention of them is something desirable, and even highly necessary.

PROBLEM I. _To erect a perpendicular on a given right line._

A, B, is the given right line. From the point C, with a radius longer than the perpendicular distance describe the arc, or part of a circle, D, D. And from the points of intersection with the right line A, B, describe arcs cutting each other at C and E. Join C and E, and the perpendicular is obtained on either side of the right line A, B.

PROBLEM II. _To erect a perpendicular at the middle of a right line._

From the extreme points of the right line A, B, with radii less than the length of the line describe two arcs intersecting each other at C and D, and through the points of their intersection draw the line, which will be perpendicular to the given right line at the middle.

In this way, too, may any line be divided into too equal parts with facility and exactness.

PROBLEM III. _To erect a perpendicular at or near the end of a given right line._

Take any point, D, on the given right line A, B, as a centre, and to the required point C, as a radius, and describe an arc C, E, F. Take a portion of this arc, say E, and make from C, E, equal to E, F. Join F and C. Now with E, C, for a radius, describe the arc G, E, H, and make from E to H equal to from E to G. Then through H from C draw the perpendicular required.

There are other methods of accomplishing this, but we will not introduce them here, as the one now given is sufficient.

We will now proceed to the formation of geometrical figures which enclose space.

That which is bounded by one line is called a _circle_; and a right line dividing it into two equal parts is called its _diameter_; from the centre of which to either end is called the _radius_: and the boundary line is termed the _circumference_ from the Latin words _circum_, around, and _fero_ to carry. That is: a line carried around. Thus we see an area or space is enclosed by one line. An area may be enclosed by two lines; but one, or both of them, must be curved; as two right lines cannot enclose a space. But three can; and the figure is called a _triangle_.

PROBLEM IV. _In a given circle to construct a Triangle._

Take the radius of the circle, and with it mark off six points on the circumference. Take two of these lengths of the radius and join their extreme points A and B, which will be the base. Now take this base as a radius and describe alternately two arcs cutting each other at C. Join A, C, and B, C, and a triangle is formed, whose sides being equal is termed an _equilateral triangle_.

In order to ensure its being upright, erect a perpendicular at the centre, and let the two sides A, C, and B, C, meet that perpendicular where it intersects the circumferences. Or, begin the triangle at this point, and mark off two lengths of the radius, joining the extreme points as before; and do this at each side of the perpendicular; finally connecting the distant extremities of the two sides for a base.

PROBLEM V. _To construct an upright square in a given circle._

Let fall a perpendicular, I, E, from the centre to the circumference, and with that as a radius and E as a centre, cut the circumference at A, B, C, and D, and join the points. The four-sided figure called a square is thus formed.

PROBLEM VI. _On a given right line_, A, B, _to construct a pentagon, or five-sided figure_.

Draw B, F, perpendicular and equal to the half of A, B. Produce A, F, to G, making F, G, equal to F, B. From the points A and B, with the radius B, G, describe arcs cutting each other at I. From I, with the radius I, B, describe a circle. Inscribe the successive chords A, E; E, D; D, C; C, B, which with the base A, B, completes the pentagon.

If the circle be given, and a pentagon to be inscribed in it, the following is as simple as it is practical. From the centre erect a perpendicular, which shall meet the circumference at D. At each side of this point divide the circumference into five equal parts, and connect every two of them from D to E, from E to A, and from D to C, C to B. Now connect A and B and the pentagon is formed.

PROBLEM VII. _On a given line_ A, B, _to construct a hexagon, or six-sided figure_.

Take the length of the radius I, G, and lay it off from F to A, A to B, B to C, C to D, D to E, and E to F.

PROBLEM VIII. _To form an octagon, or eight-sided figure._

Refer back to _Fig. 5_. Draw the radius I, E, till it meets the circumference at E. Join the points E, A, and E, B. Repeat this at each of the four sides, and the octagon is formed.

PROBLEM IX. _To form a decagon, or ten-sided figure._

Refer to _Fig. 6_, and proceed as in the preceding problem.

PROBLEM X. _To construct a duo-decagon, or twelve-sided figure._

Refer to _Fig. 7_, and duplicate the chords, as already shown.

We do not present 7, 9, or 11 sided figures, because they seldom or ever come into practice. Our object being to give what is useful and not overburden the memory unnecessarily.

The learner should go over and work out each of the foregoing problems several times. In fact, until they are soundly secured in his memory, so that on any emergency he can apply them to a required practice. They are the simplest rudiments, but as practically useful as they are simple. The Architect, the builder, as well as the several trades of carpenter, joiner, carver, stone-cutter, mason, and in fact, all in any way concerned in the practice of construction will at some time or other wish to recall one of these useful problems. Therefore do we dwell on the necessity for committing them, understandingly, to memory, and likewise the advantage required in being able to draw them neatly and perfectly on paper. In order to do this with satisfaction to one’s self, it is desirable that a fine point be constantly maintained on the pencil, and that uniform nicety be preserved with the curved lines, as well as the right or straight lines. For nothing looks worse than undue thickness in the one or the other. All should be alike.

In theoretical geometry a line, whether right or curved, is but imaginary, not having any thickness whatever, and therefore no palpable existence. In practical geometry the line must be visible, but ought to be so uniformly fine as to occupy scarcely any perceptible thickness. And herein lies the greatest beauty in geometrical draughting. By strict attention to this apparently trifling matter, its advantages will show wherever minute angles occur. They will be clear and distinct, and always satisfactory.

The learner should keep his first attempts, however coarse, for they will by comparison hereafter, show the advance he has made. Nor should he be content to “let well enough alone.” There is no “well enough” in drawing. It is a progressive science, and the true artist never believes he has done his best. Go as near to perfection as you can, and do not turn aside from, or step over obstacles to reach the end you have in view. Whatever you have neglected in early study will surely haunt you through after years, and trouble you when you can least bear the annoyance.

We now conclude this primary lesson, hoping that our learners may profit by the hints we have thrown out, and will thoroughly prepare themselves for the advance in our next.

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THE first brick house in Iowa was built by Judge Rerer, of Burlington, in 1839.

VINES FOR THE DECORATION OF COTTAGES.

THE GROUND NUT VINE.

A tourist riding a few miles in almost any New England city, would hardly fail to notice that a large number of the rural residences display a profusion of architectural embellishment, without wearing a cheerful, home-like look. He would pass cottage after cottage ornamented with slender porticoes, fanciful verandas, sculptured gables and deep bay windows, but situated in a pen-like looking enclosure, and surrounded with fixtures, dark and dismal; and with arbor vitæ hedges whose yellow cast clearly indicated that they had been planted in ungenial soil. In each narrow yard he would notice flower beds, containing many unhealthy looking plants, and most of these beds would exhibit the same arrangement and the same multifarious specimens of the odds and ends of Nature for miles. He would remark concerning these suburban seats that they were _pretty_; he would hardly say beautiful, certainly not charming. They were not satisfying to the eye—they were designed to impart an expression of exquisite rurality but failed. As the same tourist passed by some old-fashioned farm house, with its broad green lawns in front, shaded with green old elms; as he noticed the wood colored porch covered with luxuriant woodbine, the dove-cote with its glittering birds, the dark orchards beyond the yard, the pond in the meadow overhung with willows; or, as he descried some inexpensive cottage, removed from the road and half hidden from view by graceful arbors and vigorous native trees, he would ride slowly and express his satisfaction at each of these scenes of rural taste and beauty.

It is not the richness of art that gives to English cottages their picturesqueness and poetic expression, but the beauty of the grounds that surround them, and the vines that adorn them. It is not the fantastic gables, nor the latticed windows that so captivate the eye of the traveller, but the tasteful foliage that drapes them, and the lustrous vines that embower them. Denude these cottages of these embellishments, and many of them would appear as uninviting to the eye as the mouldering tower without the classic ivy.

Louis XIV had his Versailles, and his elegant queen her embowered Triannon; but the simple charms of Triannon proved more inviting to the cultivated minds of the court, than the gorgeous pile and artificial gardens at Versailles.

We devote too much time to the cultivation of exotics, and too lightly value the vines and shrubs of our native soil. Again, we sacrifice rich foliage that lasts for a season, to gaudy flowers that last only for a brief period. The double prairie rose is a very delightful sight—for a single week—and during the remaining season it is a miserable brier, commonly wormy and lousy. Yet the prairie rose is in common use as an ornament for the veranda, while the jessamine, the woodbine, the wisteria and the luxuriant honeysuckle are, put in less conspicuous places, or their cultivation wholly neglected.

It may be cited as an evidence of improving taste in the rural art, that rustic work, which imparts to a place an expression of delightful rurality, is taking the place of images, porcelain vases, etc., that long have been conspicuous objects in almost every parterre. The perfection of beauty to which this work may be carried has been admirably illustrated in Central Park, New York City, and widely copied by gentlemen of taste. Few objects are more pleasing than rustic arbors or even rustic urns over-running with foliage.

Among the most pleasing vines for embellishment of rural seats are the honeysuckle (_Lonicera japonica_ and the trumpet vine), the woodbine, the jessamine and the American ivy. For adorning stone work, the English ivy is very rich, though it grows imperfectly in our Northern latitudes.

The woodbine forms a massive drapery for a cottage porch. It has a rich marine hue in summer, and it is very richly tinted in autumn after the early frosts. The Japan honeysuckle is deliciously fragrant, and it retains its dark lustrous foliage until mid-winter. Unlike many climbers this honeysuckle, together with the trumpet vine, is not liable to be infested with insects. The feathery _clematis_, known also by the names of the _virgin’s bower_ and the _traveller’s joy_, is a pretty creeper for walls and fences; and the common hop vine may be made to add beauty to the dove-cote and the martin boxes, when these are placed after the old English manner, upon poles.

The American ivy is one of the most prolific of foliage vines. The leaves when they are young are of a delicate pea-green color, but they become dark and lustrous as the season advances. They are very gorgeous after the early autumn frosts, displaying the richest tints of orange and vermillion. The ivy forms a sort of net-work for old crumbling walls, and it is indigenous to stormy places.

There is a slender vine very common in the Eastern States that is seldom used for ornamental purposes, to which we would especially invite the attention of the florists. It is called the ground nut, (_Apios tuberosa._) Its foliage is dark, thick, and very graceful. The flowers are remarkable. They are dark purple in color and present a peculiar waxy appearance, in dense predunculate, axillary racemes. Their odor is wonderfully sweet, and it is so powerful and inexhaustive as to fill perpetually the air. The vine entwines itself among low bushes in its native state. A florist of our acquaintance supplemented the charms of her trellises of roses by entwining these vines among the branches. Her rooms were filled with fragrance whenever the windows were thrown open during the whole of the hot season. The flowers of the ground nut vine last for a very long period. Remember this vine in your summer rambles.—_Working Farmer._

CLEAN THE CELLAR.—The Boston _Journal of Chemistry_ says: “Diptheria, typhoid, and scarlet fevers, and many other most serious illnesses, have their origin in cellars both in city and country; and we can do our readers no greater service than to urge them to see that at all times they are in a dry, sweet, wholesome condition. Why should farmers and farmer’s families, living in the country away from the pestilential vapors of the cities, be so subject to attacks of malignant diseases? There is a reason for it, and we can point it out. They arise from the indifference manifested to the observance of hygienic rules and the violation of sanitary laws. Cleanliness is essential to health, and it is just as necessary in the country as in the city. A family living over a foul cellar is more liable to be poisoned and afflicted with illness than a city family living in its polluted atmosphere, but without cellar or basement filled with fermenting roots and fruits. There is far more sickness in the country among husbandmen than there ought to be. With plenty of pure air, water, and exercise, the evil imp Disease ought to be kept at bay, and he would be better if an observance of certain hygienic conditions were maintained. Bad conditioned cellars, small, close sleeping rooms, stoves—these are all agents of evil, and are fast making the homes of farmers almost as unhealthy as those of the dwellers in cities. Are not these suggestions worthy of consideration?”

ON THE ART OF GARDENING.

BY THOMAS HOPE.

What was, in the earlier times, the origin of the garden? The wish that certain esculent plants and fruits, which in the waste field and the wide forest are scattered at great distances, in small quantities, intermixed with useless vegetables and fruits, precarious in their appearance, and stinted in their growth, difficult to collect, and scarce worth the gathering, might in a nearer, a smaller, and a more accessible spot, be better secured, more abundantly produced, kept clearer of the noxious herbs and weeds which destroy their nutriment and impede their growth. This was, in its origin, the sole object of the entire garden; this, to the present hour, continues to be the principal purpose of that essential portion of the garden, devoted to the uses of the kitchen and the table.

In these parts of the garden then, which are destined immediately for the gratification, not of the eye, but merely of the palate, it is only in proportion as we more fully deviate from the desultory and confused dispositions of simple nature—firstly, by separating the different species of esculent plants, not only from their useless neighbors, but from each other; and secondly, by confining the vegetables thus classed in those symmetric and measured compartments, which enable us with greater ease to discover, to approach, and to improve each different species in the precise way, most congenial to its peculiar requisites, that we more fully attain that first of intellectual beauties, which, in every production, whether of nature or of art, resides in the exact correspondence between the end we propose and the means we employ. Nay, if it be true that contrast and variety of colors and of forms are amongst the most essential ingredients of visible beauty, we may say that even this species of sensible charm is greatly increased in the aspect of a country by the opposition to the more widely diffused, but more vague shades and outlines of the unsymmetrical surrounding landscape, offered by the more vivid hues and more distinct forms of the gay Mosaic work of nicely classed and symmetrized vegetables which clothe these select spots.

Even where the general unadorned scenery is as bold and majestic as in Switzerland, or as rich and luxuriant as in Sicily, the eye with rapture beholds the variety, and enjoys the relief from the vaster and sublimer features of rude Nature, offered by the professed art of a neat little patch of ground, whether field, orchard, or garden, symmetrically distributed. It looks like a small but rich gem—a topaz, an emerald, or a ruby, sparkling amidst vast heaps of ruder ore; or rather like a rich carpet, spread out over a corner of the valley. It appears thus incontrovertible, that in that part at least of the garden which is immediately intended for utility, we incidentally produce not only greater intellectual, but greater visible beauty, by not confining ourselves to the desultory forms of unguided Nature, but by admitting the more symmetric outlines of avowed art, and it therefore only remains to be inquired, whether in that other and different part of the artificial grounds, in later times added to the former, which is directly intended for beauty, and which we therefore call the pleasure-grounds, we shall really produce more beauty, intellectual or visible, or, in other words, more pleasure to the mind or eye, by only employing the powers of art in a covert and unavowed way; in still only preserving the closest resemblance to the interminable and irregular forms of mere nature, or by exhibiting her additional resources in a more open and avowed manner; in contrasting these more indeterminate and desultory features of pure nature, with some of those more determinate and compassed outlines, which, indeed, on a small scale, are already found in many of the spontaneous productions of Nature herself; but which on a more extended plan, are only displayed in the works of art. I say, more pleasures to the mind or eye; for the portion of the garden here alluded to, no less than the one before mentioned professes itself to be a piece of ground wrested from Nature’s dominion by the hand of man, for purposes to which Nature alone was inadequate; and thence contending that there is the least necessity or propriety in rendering this district, appropriated by art, a fac-simile of pure Nature, independent of any consideration of superior beauty which this imitation may offer to the eye or mind, and merely because, to form a garden, we use materials supplied by Nature—such as air, water, earth, and vegetables, would be absurd in the extreme. As well might we contend, that every house, built of stone should resemble a cavern, and every coat made of wool, a sheepskin. Every production of human industry whatsoever, must, if we trace it to its origin, arise out of one or more definite ingredients of pure nature; and unless, therefore, by the same rule, every production of human industry whatsoever be obliged everlastingly to continue wearing the less regular forms of those peculiar objects of nature, out of which it is wrought, we cannot with more justice arraign gardens in their capacity as aggregates of mere natural substances and productions, for assuming the artificial forms of a terrace or a _jet-d’eau_, an avenue or a _quincunx_, than we can condemn opera-dancers and figurantes, in their capacity of compounds of natural limbs and features, for exhibiting the artificial movements of the minuet and the gavot, the entrechat and the pas-grave.

If, then, the strict resemblance to the desultory forms of rude nature be not indispensably requisite in the artificial scenery of pleasure-grounds, on account of any invariable reasons of propriety or consistency, inherent in the very essence of such grounds, this resemblance of studious art to wild nature, in the gardens that adorn our habitations, can only be more eligible on account of some superior pleasure which it gives the eye and mind, either in consequence of certain general circumstances connected with the very nature of all imitation, or only in consequence of certain more restricted effects, solely and exclusively produced by this peculiar species of imitation; namely, of natural landscapes through artificial grounds.

Now, with regard to the former of these two considerations, I allow that a faithful imitation, even of a deformed original, is capable of affording great intellectual pleasure to the beholder, provided that imitation, like that displayed in painting and sculpture, be produced through dint of materials, or tools so different from those of which is composed the original imitated, as to evince in the imitator extraordinary ingenuity and powers; but the imitation of a natural landscape, through means of the very ingredients of all natural scenery; namely, air, earth, trees, and water, (and which imitation will in general offer greater truth in proportion as it is attained through greater neglect,) cannot possess that merit which consists in the overcoming of difficulties and the display of genius; unless, indeed, it be an imitation of such a species of wild scenery as is totally foreign to the genius of the locality in which it is produced; unless it consists in substituting mountains to plains, waterfalls to puddles, and precipices to flats; and in that case, on the contrary, the attempt at imitation will become so arduous as to threaten terminating in a total failure, by only offering, instead of a sublime and improved resemblance, a most paltry and mean caricature. Since, then, in a garden, the imitation of the less symmetric arrangements of rude nature can afford little or no peculiar gratification to the mind in their sole capacity as imitations, the question becomes restricted within a very narrow compass; and all that remains to be inquired into is, whether, in that garden, the exclusive admission of mere unsymmetric forms of simple nature, or their mixture with a certain proportion of the more symmetric forms of professed art, will give more intense and more varied pleasure to the eye? And, when thus stated, I should think the question would be nearly answered in the same way by every unprejudiced person. I should think it would be denied by none, that if, on the one hand, the most irregular habitation, still, through the very nature of its construction and purposes, must ever necessarily remain most obviously symmetric and formal; if not in its whole, at least in its various details, of doors, windows, steps, entablatures, etc., and if, on the other hand, as I take it, all beauty consists in that contrast, that variety, that distinctness of each of the different component parts of a whole, from the remaining parts, which renders each individually a relief to the remainder, combined with that harmony, that union of each of these different component parts of that whole with the remaining parts, which renders each a support to the remainder, and enables the eye and mind to glide over and compass the whole with rapidity and with ease, fewer striking features of beauty will be found in a garden, where, from the very threshold of the still ever symmetric mansion, one is launched in the most abrupt manner, into a scene wholly composed of the most unsymmetric and desultory forms of mere nature, totally out of character with those of that mansion; and where the same species of irregular and indeterminate forms, already prevailing at the very centre, extend, without break or relief, to the utmost boundaries of the grounds, than will be presented in another garden, where the cluster of highly-adorned and sheltered apartments that form the mansion, in the first instance, shoot out, as it were, into certain more or less extended ramifications of arcades, porticoes, terraces, parterres, treillages, avenues, and other such still splendid embellishments of art, calculated by their architectural and measured forms, at once to offer a striking and varied contrast with, and a dignified and comfortable transition to, the more undulating and rural features of the more extended, more distant, and more exposed boundaries; before, in the second instance, through a still further link, a still further continuance of this same gradation of hues and forms, these limits of the private domain are again made in their turn, by means of their less artificial and more desultory appearance, to blend equally harmoniously on the other side, with the still ruder outlines of the property of the public at large.

No doubt, that, among the very wildest scenes of unappropriated nature, there are some so grand, so magnificent, that no art can vie with, or can enhance their effect. Of this description are the towering rock, the tremendous precipice, the roaring cataract, even the dark, gloomy, impenetrable forest. Of such, let us take great care not to destroy, or to diminish the grandeur by paltry conceits or contrivances of art. But even these are such features as, from certain conditions unavoidably attendant on them, we would not wish to have permanently under our eyes and windows; or even if we wished it, could not transport within the narrow precincts which immediately surround the mansion. A gentleman’s country residence, situated in the way it ought to be, for health, for convenience, and for cheerfulness, can only have room in its immediate vicinity for the more concentrated beauties of art. In this narrow circle, if we wish for variety, for contrast, and for brokenness of levels, we can only seek it in arcades and in terraces, in steps, balustrades, regular slopes, parapets, and such like; we cannot find space for the rock and the precipice. Here, if we admire the fleeting motion, the brilliant transparency, the soothing murmur, the delightful coolness of the crystal stream, we must force it up in an erect _jet-d’eau_, or hurl it down in an abrupt cascade; we cannot admit so near us the winding torrent, dashed at wide intervals from rock to rock. Here, if we desire to collect the elegant forms, vivid colors, and varied fragrance of the choicest shrubs and plants, whether exotics, or only natives, oranges, magnolias, and rhododendrons, or roses, and lilies, and hyacinths; we still must confine them in the boxes, the pots, or the beds of some sort of parterre; we cannot give them the appearance of spontaneously growing from amongst weeds and briers. Here, in fine, if we have a mind to secure the cool shade and the convenient shelter of lofty trees, we can only plant an avenue, we cannot form a forest. And for that, since we admire, even to an excess, symmetry of lines and disposition in that production of art called a house, we should abhor these attributes in the same excess in that other avowed production of art, the immediate appendage of the former, and consequently the sharer in its purposes and character, namely, the garden, I do not understand. There is between the various divisions of the house and those of the grounds, this difference, that the first are more intended for repose, and the latter for exercise; that the first are under cover, and the latter exposed. The difference should make a corresponding difference in the nature of the materials, and in the size and delicacy of the forms; but why it should occasion on the one side an unqualified admission, and on the other, as unqualified an exclusion of those attributes of symmetry and correspondence of parts which may be equally produced in coarser as in finer materials, on a vaster as on a smaller scale, I cannot conceive. The outside of the house is exposed to the elements as well as the grounds; and why, while columns are thought invariably to look well at regular distances, trees should be thought invariably to look ill in regular rows, is what I cannot comprehend. Assuredly the difference is as great between the eruptions of Etna, or of any other volcano, and artificial fire-works, as it is between the falls of the Niagara or of any other river, and artificial water-works. Why, then, while we gaze with admiration on a rocket, should we behold with disgust a _jet-d’eau_? And why, while we are delighted with a rain of fiery sparks, should we be displeased with a shower of liquid diamonds, issuing from a beautiful vase, and again collected in as exquisite a basin? If the place be appropriate, if the hues be vivid, if the outlines be elegant, if the objects be varied and contrasted, in the name of wonder, how should, out of all these partial elements of positive, unmixed beauty, arise a whole positively ugly? No, there can only arise a whole as beautiful as the parts; and so, those travellers who have not allowed any narrow and exclusive theories to check or destroy their spontaneous feelings, must own they have thought many of the suspended gardens within Genoa, and of the splendid villas about Rome; so they have thought those striking oppositions of the rarest marbles to the richest verdure; those mixtures of statues, and vases, and balustrades, with cypresses, and pinasters, and bays; those distant hills seen through the converging lines of lengthened colonnades; those ranges of aloes and cactuses growing out of vases of granite and of porphyry, scarce more symmetric by art, than these plants are by nature; and, finally, all those other endless contrasts of regular and irregular forms, everywhere, each individually increasing its own charms, through their contrast with those of the other, exhibited in the countries, which we consider as the earliest schools, where beauty became an object of sedulous study.

But the truth is, that in our remoter climes, we carry every theory into the extremes. Once, that very symmetry and correspondence of parts of which a certain proportion ever has, to all refined ages and nations, ancient and modern, appeared a requisite feature of the more dressy and finished parts of the pleasure garden, prevailed in all English villas with so little selection, and at the same time, in such indiscreet profusion, as not only rendered the different parts insipid and monotonous with respect to each other, but the whole mass a most formal, unharmonious blotch with regard to the surrounding country. Surfeited at last with symmetry carried to excess, we have suddenly leaped into the other extreme. Dreading the faintest trace of the ancient regularity of outline as much as we dread the phantoms of those we once most loved, we have made our country residences look dropped from the clouds, in spots most unfitted to receive them; and, at the expense, not only of all beauty, but of all comfort, we have made the grounds appear as much out of harmony, viewed in one direction with the mansion, as they formerly were viewed in the opposite direction with the country at large. Through the total exclusion of all the variety, the relief, the sharpness, which, straight or spherical, or angular, or other determinate lines and forms might have given to unsymmetric and serpentining forms and surfaces, we have, without at all diminishing the appearance of art, (which in a garden can never be totally eradicated,) only succeeded in rendering that art of the most tame and monotonous description; like that languid and formal blank verse, which is equally divested of the force of poetry and the facility of prose. Nature, who, in her larger productions, is content with exhibiting the more vague beauties that derive from mere variety and play of hues and forms; Nature herself, in her smaller and more elaborate, and if I may so call them, choicer bits of every different reign, superadds those features of regular symmetry of colors and shapes, which not only form a more striking contrast with the more desultory modifications of her huger masses, but intrinsically in a smaller space, produces a greater effect than the former can display. Examine the radii of the snow-spangle, the facettes of the crystal, the petals of the flower, the capsules of the seed, the wings, the antennæ, the rings, the stigmata of the insect and the butter-fly; nay, even in man and beast, the features of the face, and the configuration of the eye, and we shall find in all these more minute, more finished, and more centrical productions of the mineral, the vegetable, and the animal kingdoms, reigns the nicest symmetry of outline and correspondence of parts. And if art, which can only be founded upon, only spring out of nature; if art, I say, should ever only be considered as the further development of nature’s own principles, the complement of nature’s own designs, assuredly we best obey the views of nature, and best understand the purposes of art, when, leaving total irregularity to the more extended, more distant, and more neglected recesses of the park, we give some degree of symmetry to the smaller and nearer, and more studied divisions of the pleasure-ground. This principle of proportioning the regularity of the objects to their extent, the Greeks well understood. While in the Medici Venus the attitude of the body only displays the unsymmetric elegance of simple nature, the hair presents all the symmetry of arrangement of the most studious art; and unless this principle also become familiar among us there is great danger that unable to make the grounds harmonize with the mansion, we attempt to harmonize the mansion with the grounds, by converting that mansion itself into a den or a quarry.

REMARKS ON FIRE-PROOF CONSTRUCTION.