471 



BUTTRESS. 



nrn 



47J 



hangings. In the first place, thin sheets of metal are catted on one 

 side with oopaj varnwh thinned with turpentine, and coloured accord- 

 ing to th<- colour of the flock to be employed. After being heated 

 in an oven to 150 Fahr.. and then allowed to cool, the surface U 

 coated with a kind of paint formed of white lead, limned oil, gold 

 ue, and colouring matter. While in thin wet state, a quantity of 

 flock is sifted orer the surface, and allowed to remain on it twelve 

 hour*, by which time a film of flock will have adhered firmly to the 

 metel The loon flock being shaken off, the sheet is fitted to be 

 cut up into collets or dues for the backs of buttons, to be made in the 

 usual way. 



Mr. Prosser's method of making buttons and other small articles of 

 compressed clay was patented in 1840. Clay, clayey earth, or clay 

 combined with a small portion of flint or felspar to give it hardness, 

 is thoroughly dried and ground to a fine powder. The powder in 

 passed through a sieve having about two thousand perforations in a 

 square inch : all particles too large to pau through the perforations 

 being rejected. For some coanter purposes a coarser sieve may be 

 used. Buttons and other small articles are made of this powder by 

 dies, or moulds, and a fly-press. The fly-press is firmly secured to a 

 strong bed, or frame; and a die carrying on its under face the form in 

 reverse (that is, hollow instead of relief), propoeed to be given to the 

 top of the button, is screwed to the follower of the press. A second 

 tool or die of a kind of T shape, with an impress of the back of the 

 button, fits loosely into a corresponding recess in the bolster. Below 

 the press there is a treadle supported on a fulcrum near its centre, 

 from one end of which a rod passes up through a small hole in the 

 bolster to the lower die or tool. The hollow or recess in the bolster 

 in which this tool rises and falls is of such a depth as to be an exact 

 measure of the quantity of powder necessary for the formation of a 

 button. The hollow in the mould being filled with powder, and the 

 ' powder squared off to an exact level with the top of the mould, such 

 power is applied to the press as will bring down the tool with a 

 force of about 200 Ib. on the square inch, upon the powder lying 

 in the mould. The powder is by this means compressed into a 

 very dense, hard, and durable substance, having on ita surface the 

 device imparted to it by the die. If the button is to have a 

 metallic shank attached to it, a recess U formed at the back of the 

 button for its reception, by a corresponding projection on the face 

 of the lower die. If the button is to have holes similar to a brace- 

 button, the dies must have such projections as will form these holes 

 while the powder is being pressed into the mould. In the course 

 of a year or two after this patent wan obtained, no less than 5000 

 gross of these buttons were made weekly, at Minton's porcelain works 

 in Staffordshire. 



The Vicomte de Serionne took out a patent in 1850, for a somewhat 

 complicated mode of making buttons, which should have a sort of 

 crystalline appearance. They are made of felspar, basalt, lava pumice, 

 granite, or flint. These minerals, or the one to be adopted, is reduced 

 to powder, and made into a paste with salt and flour ; the paste is 

 pressed into a. mould, of which the upper and under parts give the 

 device to the button; and by subsequent modes of treating the 

 surface, the button """"A. either a transparency, or an agate-like 

 opacity. 



It would be quite useless to endeavour to describe the numerous 

 patents for button-making introduced every year in England ; they 

 differ in points which, though important to manufacturers, are of little 

 interest to general readers. One curious invention, patented a few 

 years ago, was for ornamenting metal-buttons by printing a design 

 from blocks or rollers, with an ink of sulphate of copper and tin, and 

 then varnishing. 



Birmingham is the great seat of the button manufacture in this 

 country. By the census of 1851, there were 770 males under twenty 

 years of age, 1S50 above that age, 1265 females under twenty years of 

 age, and 1595 of twenty years of age and upwards, a total of 4980 

 persons employed in that town ; while the total number employed in 

 the trade in England and Wales was but 2988 males and 3950 females 

 of all ages ; and in Scotland there were but 11 males and 4 females of 

 all ages engaged in the manufacture. 



BUTTRESS, a projecting support to the exterior of a wall, most 

 commonly applied to churches in the Qothic style, but also to other 

 buildings, and sometimes to mere walls. Buttresses, in the sense in 

 which the term is commonly used, were not employed in Greek and 

 Roman buildings, the external support being obtained by pilasters, or 

 some other structural feature, to the presence of which, as an additional 

 support, was given as little prominence as possible. Norman or 

 Romanesque buttresses, which came into use probably from the time 

 of the decay of Roman architecture, are plain broad faces, slightly pro- 

 jecting from the wall of the building to which they belong. In appear- 

 ance they are very similar to the shaft of a pilaster, from which they 

 most probably derive their origin. The top of these buttresses is ter- 

 minated by an inclined plane or water-table, moulded underneath on 

 the front face only. The bands which often occur in Norman buildings 

 as a sort of capping to the basement of the wall are often continued 

 round the sides of the buttress, thus making the lower part of the 

 buttress as it were a pedestal to the upper part, or more properly to 

 the pilaster. Unlike the buttresses of pointed architecture, those of 

 the Norman period are not divided into stages diminishing in width as 



they ascend, but continue of the sain,- i.lth t> the top ; and they are 

 carried no higher than the cornice, under which they usually finish 

 with a slope. In later Norman and transition buildings, buttresses are 

 sometimes ornamented at the angles with columns, ss at Castle Rising 

 castle, Norfolk, Olastonbury Abbey, Ac. But these decorations are 

 sometimes of a later date. An additional resemblance to the Roman 

 pilaster appears in then buttresses when they are found with a narrower 

 face projected on the broader buttress. Castle Rising and Norwich 

 castles contain good examples of Norman buttresses. 



Of First Pointed or Early English buttresses, which immediately 

 succeeded the former, Mr. Kickman distinguishes four kinds. The 

 int is a flat buttress, narrower than the Norman, with mouldings 

 more delicate, but very similar to, and hardly to be distinguished from 

 the Norman. The teaand is a buttress projecting at times nearly as 



A, Norman BnttreM. 



B, Early English 

 Buttress, 



C, Decorated English 

 Huttress. 



much as its breadth ; at others, more than the breadth of the buttress. 

 These buttresses sometimes are without set-offs, or have only one 

 forming a division in the whole height. There are buttresses at 

 Salisbury which belong to this class, and are highly enriched with 

 niches and decorated with ornaments, but they have a very weak 

 appearance. The third kind consists of long slender narrow buttresses, 

 with a considerable projection, divided into several heights ; they occur 

 in some towers. The fourth kind of buttress of this period, and perliaps 

 the latest, is divided into stages or divisions, receding one behind the 

 it h. r ; but this also is not common. Like all the former, it is finished 

 with a triangular, or rather acute-angled top, similar to the roof and 

 gable ends of a building. These two last kinds are very similar in 

 character. 



Towards the close of this period, flying buttresses were first con- 

 structed, being thrown from the side aisle buttresses to the buttress of 

 tile nave and choir. Salisbury and Chichester cathedrals afford exc< 1!< i it 

 examples ; but flying buttresses did not become common till the next 

 period of Gothic architecture. Early English buttresses have generally 

 pyramidal tops ; the sides of these buttresses are sometimes splayed at 

 the edges, with pedestal-like bases. The shaft also is at times ilivi.lcd 

 into one or more divisions, as at Lincoln. Occasionally the buttresses 

 are very slender and carried up to a great height, becoming in fact 

 rather ornamental features than supports, as at Beverley Minster, 

 and the east end of All Saint's, Stamford. Beverley Minxter has 

 columns at the angles of the buttresses, with a niche in the pyramidal 



The Middle Pointed or Decorated English buttresses which succeeded 

 these, present many varieties ; they exhibit .. me of the leading features 

 of their predecessors, but are generally highly enriched. They are 

 almost invariably divided into stages ; are enriched with panels, niches, 

 crocketod canopies, and, in largo buildings, very frequently terminate 

 in pinnacles. The triangular heads are commonly enriched with cusps. 

 These buttresses, when used at the angles of buildings, are ni't. n 

 applied diagonally to the angle, an at St. Mary Magdalene, Oxford. 

 Examples of rich buttresses of the decorated style occur in the west 

 front of York Minster ; Exeter Cathedral ; Mahm-sl m i-y Abbey church ; 

 at the east end of Howden church, Yorkshire ; at 1 :< .uNmni, Cambridge- 



