1840.] I 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



249 



and -we think it will lie particularly so to our jimior branches and Members 

 from the country, as they may there enjoy all the advantages of a club, with 

 the additional one of being surrounded l»y their friends. 



We trust our Funds will ahvays admit of this arrangement being gratuitous, 

 as well as suffer us hereafter to add to it other means of attraction. 



In another point of view it may be found useful, as a central point where, 

 gentlemen may make laiown their being at liberty to accept engagements, 

 and the Engineer may find the assistance he is in need of. 



ROYAL INSTITUTE OF BRITISH ARCHITECTS. 

 June 1. — Mr. Kay, V.P., in the Chair. 



At the ordinary meeting of this society, several very valuable donations 

 were announced, amongst whicli a volume of Inigo Jones's designs for the 

 Wiiteliall Palace, being the original drawings by Flitcroft, for Kent's publi- 

 cation. The council have been for some time engaged in forming a collection 

 of all matters relating to Jones and bis works, and this present was therefore 

 a most valuable boon. A long conversation was held on the means of con- 

 structing flues, so as to render the employment of climbing boys unnecessarj', 

 and a strong desue was shown on the part of the meeting to aid the efforts 

 now being made I)y the society established for the purpose. Mr. Fowler 

 took occasion to mention to the meeting that i\\e Socif'h' Libre lies Beaux 

 .Iris, of Paris, had recently awarded to Mr. G. Godwin, jun., a silver medal, 

 in testimony of their approbation of his published works, and conmicnted 

 upon the liberal feehng the society bad thus evinced. A »imilar compliment 

 was paid to Mr. Donaldson, on the pulilicatiou of his work on doorways. 



A paper was read " On the Section of the London Bed of Clay T Hy Charles 

 Parker, Fellow. 



The principal subject of this paper was a description of the strata passed 

 through in boring two wells in the village of East Acton, which we cannot 

 follow without reference to the diagrams and tables by wliich it was accimi- 

 panied. The result was, a further confinnation of the estalilished geological 

 fact, that a stratum of sand extends under the clay, and bears upon a chalk 

 basin containing an immense quantity of pure water, and a further disproval 

 of a commonly received opinion, that when two weUs are formed in imme- 

 diate vicinity, of unequal depths, the water passes from the shallower to the 

 deeper. The two wells in this instance were 300 yards apart. In one, the 

 water was found at the depth of 333 feet, in the other, the spring extended 

 to the depth of 403 feet. In both, the water rose to within 18 feet of the 

 surface, and then gradually subsided to 23 feet. 



A section was also given of the strata in the vicinity of ShadwcU, and 

 some particulars of a well bored to the depth of 411 feet in the Temple, 

 which emitted an odour so disagreeable as to render the water useless. This 

 odoiu' (having been satisfactorily proved not to proceed from any contact with 

 drains) was supposed to arise from the disengagement of sulphuretted hydro- 

 gen. After three months had been expended in trying, without any benefit, 

 the suggestions of several eminent chemists for obviating this inconvenience, 

 the well was abandoned as a failure ; but another trial of the water being 

 accidentally made a year afterwards, it was then found to be free from smell, 

 and of a remarkably good quality. A comparison of the chemical analyses 

 made at the different periods, failed to explain in any way the cause of this 

 alteration. The paper concluded with some observations on the employment 

 of iron cylinders in well sinking, and a comiiarison with a similar mode of 

 proceeding by the ancients with cylinders of baked clay, illustrated by sec- 

 tions of a well at SiUnunte, and another at Girgenti. 



Mr, Godwin read some observations on the modern state of painting on 

 glass. This paper will be found in another part of the Journal. 



Jmie 15. — Mr. Moore in the Chair. 



A paper " On Original Composition in Architecture, illustrated by the 

 umrks of Sir John Vanbrvgh," was read by James Thomson, Fellow. (This 

 paper we shall give in full next month.) 



Mr. Donaldson read " A Memoir of the Life of Thomas Archer." 



Thomas Archer, an English architect, who flourished during the early 

 part of the eighteenth century. He was a pupil of Sir John Vanbrugh, who, 

 being appointed surveyor-general for the new churches in London, which 

 were to be built by the grant of Queen Anne, gave several of them to his 

 pupils. The new church of St. John the Evangelist, in Westminster, fell to 

 the lot of Archer, and was built in 1728. The plan consists of an oblong 

 with rounded corners, having at the east and west ends deep recesses for the 

 altar and vestry, and on the north and south sides, bold projecting enclosed 

 porticoes, flanked on each side by a tower, making four in all, and which 

 now have staircases, to aft'ord access to the modern galleries. At first the 

 interior was enriched by columns, and there were no galleries : so that the 

 inside must have originaBy been extremely effective. In 1741, the interior 

 and roof were consumed by fire, which left only the walls and columns 

 standing. The church was then rebuilt, the columns being omitted ; in 1 758 

 galleries were added, and subsequently lengthened in 1826 by Mr. Inwood, 

 architect. When this fine building was first completed, justice was not done 

 to the originality and powers of the architect ; and Horace Walpole, with 

 some other critics of the day, unable to appreciate its beauties, reprobated its 

 cumbrous aspect, and its four towers. 



The outside consists of a bold Doric order, well proportioned and elegantly I 



profiled ; the columns are about three feet foiu- inches in diameter, and stand 

 upon a lofty pedestal or podium, eight feet high. The north and south por- 

 ticos are hexastyle, each consisting of four outer pilasters and two central 

 columns ; the three centre intercolumniatious being recessed, and the outer 

 interpilastrations being solid, these latter serve as bases to the towers, which 

 rise at each end of the tympana. The entablature is surmounted by a balluE- 

 trade, except over the porticos, where there are pediments broken through 

 in the centre, for the width of three intercolmnniatioiis, to admit a kind of 

 fantastic pedimental group, with a perforated niche. The four towers have 

 square bases to the height of about eight feet above the springing of the 

 pediments, and then assume a circular plan. At the angles there are iso- 

 lated columns with circular pedestals and circular entablatures, projecting 

 from the main body of the towers. Above the ent.alilature thei'e is a gradu- 

 ally receding roof of concave profile, surmounted by a pine apple. The east 

 and west ends of the roof arc enriched by grouped gables, flanked by large 

 enriched scrolls or trusses in the Roman fashion. 



The whole composition is impressive, and its boldness loses nothing by the 

 graceful plarfulness of the outline. There are some inaccuracies of detail, 

 which a little more study of purer models might have corrected ; but the 

 whole is well worthy a distinguished place among the striking productions 

 of the Vanbrugh school. The exterior being entirely faced with stone, its 

 solid magnificence forms a striking contrast to the parsimonious meajmess, 

 which distinguishes the like buildings of the present day. In vol. iv. p. 70, 

 of Dallaway's edition of Horace Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, Hethrop, 

 J. PhiUip's church at Birmingham, a work of considerable merit, the quadrant 

 porticoes at Chefdcn House, and a house at Roeham|)ton, pecvdiar, but strik- 

 ing in its eflect, given in the Vitruvius Britannicus, arc mentioned as works 

 of Archer. To liirn also is attributed the fanciful and attractive pavilion at 

 the end of the piece of water which faces the centre of ^Vrest llousi;^ in Bed- 

 fordshire, the seat of the Earl de Grey. This pavilion is hexagonal in plan, 

 with a porch at the entrance, and, with very little attention to effect, might 

 be made a very graceful object, well worthy the splendid mansion which has 

 been recently erected by the present noble possessor, from his own designs 

 and under his own immediate direction, and in which bis lordship has evinced 

 a great feeling for art, sound discrimination, and a happy adaptation of the 

 style chosen, which is that of the French chateau of the time of Louis XV. 



Mr. Donaldson also read a brief memoir of the life of Chevalier Stefano 

 Gasse, of Naples, an Honorary and Corresponding Member of the Institute. 



THE ARCHITECTURAL SOCIETY. 

 W. TiTE, Esq., President, in the Chair, 



This society closed its session on the 2nd ult. with a conversazione, which 

 was attended by Earl de Grey, the President, and many of the Fellows of the 

 Institute of British Architects, also by Mr. Walker, the President, and nume- 

 rous members of the Institution of Civil Engineers, besides many members 

 of other scientific societies. The business of the meeting commenced by 

 Mr. Grellier, the Hon. Sec. reading the report of the Committee detailing 

 the lectures and papers that had been delivered, and the prizes awarded to 

 the student members, and expressing their warmest thanks and acknowledg- 

 ment to their President, iMr. Tite, for the energy aud zeal with which he has 

 forwarded the interests of the society. 



The President then proceeded to award the prizes to the successful can- 

 didates, after which he read a paper of considerable researcli and interest, 

 " On Exchanges," which we have the pleasure of giving in another part of 

 the Joiu'nal. 



NOTES OF THE MONTH. 



The Dean and Chapter of Westminster, we are happy to announce, intend to 

 have twelve of the windows in Westminster Abbey glazed with painted glass. We 

 hope that they will be ordered at once of the artists, and not of dealers, by 

 whom the artists will be screwed down. Painters aud sculptors are not sub- 

 jected to such a vexatious process, and we do not see why painters on glass 

 should be deprived of a great portion of the reward of thek exertions. — The 

 authorities at the Temple are also engaged in the restoration of their ancient 

 church. 



In the National Gallery, a very fine painting, the Infant Jesus, by Murillo, 

 has recently been placed. 



The Thames Tunnel will soon make its appearance on the Middlesex side. 

 The Company have commenced clearing the houses for the purpose of prose- 

 cuting their labours with energy. 



Mr. Cottingham the architect, invited a numerous party to a conversazione 

 at liis Museum of English .\ntiquities, in the Waterloo Bridge-road, on ThOTs- 

 day, the 25th ult. We, certainly, were never so much suqirised on passing 

 through the numerous rooms, to witness such an immense collection of spe- 

 cimens (about 31,000 we understand) of domestic and ecclesiastical arcliitec- 

 ture, painting, sculpture, ami furniture ; every architect, artist, and lover of 

 antiquities should not fail visiting this Museum — next month we intend to 

 give a description of it. 



We understand that a National Mausoleum has been projected upon a most 



2 L 



