474 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



cover that tlic slow method was due to any cause but stoppage or slowness 

 of the cash ! I saw an opera house of great cost, run up in four months, 

 and a hall of music in fifteen weeks. 



Jlr. Garbanati. — Why, then they did not give it time enough to tumble 

 down in. 



John Johnson. — Some singular, hard, durable conglomerates are formed 

 in the sea sand. I found some at the edge of low water on sea shore ; 

 they enveloped pebbles, and were as hard as granite. Do these teach us 

 a lesson ? 



Mr. Veeder. — Workmen tried lately, to save bricks of an old brick 

 house pulled down in Albany, but they could make no profit of it, as the 

 bricks adhered, so that brick and mortar broke alike. 



Mr. Seeley. — A very great array of facts would be necessary either to 

 sustain or impeach scientific theory ! We want, therefore, a multitude of 

 facts. Berzelius, trying chemical experiments on a mere teaspoon full of 

 7natter, determined more truth than all the masons. I mean builders, not 

 professors. All precious stones as well as mortars, are silicates. 



Mr. Meigs. — Except the diamond, which is pure carbon. 



Mr. Seeley. — Certainly ; the proximate idea of cement would be bullets 

 in viscid matter — like thick molasses and a certain amount of cohesion. 



Mr. Sykes. — Frost is a severe enemy of buildings. I would glaze the 

 outsides of all walls, so as to render them impenetrable to moisture, ren- 

 dering the walls dry, and leaving nothing for that enemy. 



Mr. Meigs said that Alfred Hall, of Perth Amboy, in New Jersey, sub- 

 mitted to the Institute, ten years ago, bricks which he had glazed with that 

 object, and proposed, also, to have such color added to the glazing as taste 

 might select — such as white, blue, green, yellow, brown, &c. ; since that 

 the matter sleeps ; all the past, all controversy, the theory of dry and 

 durable walls is carried out in facts. 



Mr. Veeder. — Furnace builders find blisters in some fire bricks, on 

 account of their clay having been frosted before burning. 



Prof. Hedrick. — As common bricks consist of silicate and alumini, it 

 vitrifies in strong heat, first on its surface, and ultimately almost wholly. 



Prof. Mason. — A perfect edifice requires that every stone or brick shall 

 be exactly alike, so that it may be said of it, it is homogeneous ; not like 

 that ancient image, so typical of some of our edifices — legs of brass, with 

 feet of clay. 



Prof. Hedrick. — We have many popular errors to contend with — like 

 that of my friend the country builder, who wanted me to break the round 

 Sstones for my cement walls. 



Chairman — How did you form the walls ? 



Prof. Hedrick. — I plastered right on them without furring ; I used 

 Hydraulic lime mortar on the bottom of my walls, in order to shut ofi" the 

 capillary rising of moisture from the ground. 



Prof. Mason. — Bricks are made with holes through them so arranged, 



