PLANTS, WITH GLASS ROOFS. 



155 



with roofs having upright glass with standards and wall-plates, more 

 especially when the sash-bar is of iron, admit much more light. The 

 ends of plant-houses are generally vertical planes, but in curvilinear 

 houses they are sometimes of the same curvature as the front, which 

 adds greatly to their beauty, as well as being favourable to the ad- 

 mission of the sun's rays, morning and evening, and to the transmis- 

 sion of diffused light when the sun does not shine. The only disad- 

 vantages attending curvilinear ends to plant-houses is, that the doors 

 cannot be placed in these ends without some intricacy of construc- 

 tion ; but when such houses are placed against walls, as in fig. 126, 



Fig. 126. 



^ 



Curvilinear glass roofs. 



they may be entered through a door made in the wall to a recess 

 taken from the back shed, as shown by fig. 127, in which a, a, repre- 

 sent the plans of portions of two curvilinear houses ; b, 6, back sheds to 

 these houses ; and c, lobby common to both. These houses may be 

 ventilated by openings in the upper part of the back wall, the orifice 

 within being covered with pierced zinc, and wooden shutters moving 



Fig. 127. 



Ground plan of a curvilinear plant-house, with the entrance through a lobby 

 in the back wall. 



in grooves simultaneously. Where a lobby cannot conveniently be 

 made in the back shed, one door may be made in the centre of the 

 front of each house, as at Messrs. Loddiges' ; and where the end is 

 semicircular, a door might be made in it in a similar manner, or with 

 a projection brought forward so as to form a porch ; the mode repre- 

 sented in fig. 127 is, however, greatly preferable, as occasioning no 

 obstruction to light. 



Roofs of greenhouses, &c., formed in the ridge and furrow 

 manner, and even glass sashes so formed for pits, were tried by us 

 many years ago (' Encyc. of Gard.,' 1st edit.) : and the idea has been 



