13*9.] 



THE CIVIL EKGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



337 



ON CIVIL ENGINEERING AND ARCHITECTURE. 



An Introductory Lecture, given at the Putney College for Practical 

 Science, September, 1849. By Samuel Clegg, jun., Esq. 



Civil engineering and architecture, the subjects upon which I am called to 

 lecture, are both essentially practical sciences, and are in some measure so 

 connected as to be synonymous ; both engineers and architects must be well 

 versed in the strength of the various materials with which they have to deal, 

 and be so acquainted with their numerous propertiss as to be enabled to 

 make a choice of tbera for any peculiar circumstances attending their work. 

 Both must be mathematicians, draughtsmen, carpenters, masons, and be 

 acquainted with the details of all, or nearly all, the mechanical trades; at 

 least they must be learned judges of them, if not skilful operators. They 

 must both be men of business, and should not he ignorant of law. 



Both architecture and engineering, therefore, in their most comprehensive 

 meanings, are studies of many and singularly opposite qualities, and are al- 

 lowed by all whose opinions are worth regarding, to he sciences of the 

 highest importance to the well-being of society : thus far the two professions 

 go side by side. But architecture, as well as being a science, is also essen- 

 tially a fine art, and here the two professions separate. The path of the ar- 

 chitect will, after he has gained his practical knowledije of construction and 

 building, be parallel with that of the painter and the poet in the regions of 

 cultivated tasie. The path of the civil engineer is widely different, but if 

 his labours be less in the captivating regions of beauty than tlie arcliiteet's, 

 they are perhaps more among the grand, certainly more among the stern 

 development of massive strength, to resist shocks, inundations, and storms, 

 — which, from the simplicity of the requisite forms and their associations, 

 constitute grandeur. I come amongst you fully sensible of the responsi- 

 bilities of my office, and with an equally fnll determination to perform its 

 duties to the utmost of my power; and I shall expect you to go with me, 

 cheerfully, to the tasks which lie before us, and assist me with your 

 diligence. Nothing is more necessary to the due understanding and proper 

 study of engineering and architecture, and to the formation of a proficient 

 in either, than habits of application and industry. Without theui even the 

 lowest departments of the professions are not to be mastered. It is not a 

 rapid growth that produces a sound and skilful practitioner, any more than 

 precocity is an emblem of a great statesman. It is not by occasional fits of 

 application, by short starts of preparation, by numerous progenies of little 

 works, performed in a little time, and with less study, sometimes discontinued, 

 and again renewed, that eminence is to be obtained in either of these arts ; on 

 the contrary, it is only by regular application — by a constant study of good 

 examples — by able instruction, — by deep and intense study of the elementary 

 principles, with an uninterrupted practice, solely directed to the object, 

 grown up almost into a habit, and ready to be called into use at the shortest 

 notice; it is only by sacrificing every comfort that aims at prevention, — by 

 having resolution to suflFer nothing to impede your progress, and by avoiding 

 the Dead Sea of idleness and pleasure, that you can be enabled to shine 

 either as an architect or as an engineer. 



MiCHAEi, Angelo Buonarroti, full of the great and sublime ideas 

 of his art, lived very much alone, and never suffered a day to pass with- 

 out handling his chisel or his pencil. When some person reproached him 

 with leading so melancholy and solitary a life, he said, " Art is a jealous thing, 

 and requires the whole and entire man." He was also both frugal and 

 temperate, and so persevering in his labour, that he used occasionally at 

 night to throw himself upon his bed without disencumbering himself of the 

 clothes he had worked in. 



Inigo, or John, Jones was a native of Llanvrost, in Denbighshire, and by 

 his indefatigable zeal, raised himself from the position of a working me- 

 chanic to that of the first architect of the day. Like his father, he fol- 

 lowed the occupation of a carpenter and mason in his native town, and 

 built Llanvrost bridge when he was 23 years of age. It was with the money 

 thus obtained that he went to Italy, with letters of introduction from the Duke 

 of Ancaster. When at Rome, finding that he bad more talent for design- 

 ing palaces than adorning cabinets, he turned his study to architecture. By 

 denying himself the common necessaries of life, — by rising early, and retir- 

 ing late, sometimes not going to his bed at all, he conquered all the difficul- 

 ties in his path ; and after remaining some time in Italy, shackled by poverty. 

 Christian the Fourth of Sweden invited him to Denmark, and appointed him 

 his architect. He afterwards returned to England, and was made surveyor- 

 general of the king's works to James the First, but refused to accept any 

 salary until the heavy debts contracted under his predecessor had been 

 liquidated. Upon the accession of Charles, he was continued in his office, 

 when his salary as surveyor was Ss. id. per day, with an allowance of 46/. 

 per year for house rent. 



Sir Christopher Wren is an eminent example of a great architect 

 excelling in mathematics, and producing works bearing the evident impress 

 of their author's learning. From the number and diversity of his occupa- 

 tions, may be gathered the fact of his close study and application ; and al- 

 though, unlike Inigo Jones, he had not poverty to fight against, infinite credit 

 is due to him. He was one of the original members of the club which was 

 formed at Oxford in 1648, for philosophical discussion and experiments, and 

 which eventually gave rise to the Royal Society. In 1657 he was chosen 

 professor of Astronomy at Gresham College, and on the Restoration was ap- 

 pointed to the Savilian professorship of astronomy at Oxford. It was very 

 soon after this that he was first called upon to exercise bis genius in archi- 



tecture (a study, however, which had previously pngagcd a good deal of his 

 attention), by being appointed assistant to the surveyor-general. This led to 

 Wren's employment on the work upon which his popular fame principally 

 rests — the rebuilding of the cathedral of St. Paul's after the great fire. The 

 erection of this noble edifice occupied him for thirty-five years, but did not 

 prevent him during the same period from designing and superintending the 

 completion of many other buildings, nor even interrupted his pursuit of the 

 most abstract branches of science. Wren was created a doctor of law and 

 logic by the University of Oxford in 1661, and was knighted in 1674. In 

 1680 he was elected to the presidency of the Royal Society, and in 1685 he 

 entered Parliament as the representative of the borough of Plympton. 

 While superintending the erection of St. Paul's, all the salary Wren received 

 was 200/. per year. He was also in other respects used by the commis- 

 sioners with extreme illiberality, and was obliged to yield so far to their 

 ignorant clamour as to alter the design of his building, and to decrease the 

 size of his dome, which he had intended should spring from the outside 

 larger gallery which surrounds it, and give up bis magnificent idea of enrich- 

 ments for embellishing the interior. If he had had the moral courage of 

 Michael Angelo, we should have had yet a nobler monument of his fame, 

 lie, like Wren, had obstacles thrown in his way, and we are told the fol- 

 lowing anecdote: — Under the papacy of Julius III. the faction of Michael 

 Angelo's rival, San Gallo, gave him some trouble respecting the building of 

 St. Peter's, and went so far as to prevail upon that pope to appoint a com- 

 mittee to examine the fabric. Julius told him that a particular part of the 

 church was dark. " Who told you that, holy father ?" replied the artist. 

 " I did," said Cardinal Marcelln. "Your eminence should consider, then," 

 said Michael Angelo, '• that besides the window there is at present, I intend to 

 have three in the ceiling of the church." " You did not tell me so," replied 

 the cardinal. " No, indeed, I did not. Sir; 1 ara not obliged to do it, and I 

 would never consent to be obliged to tell your eminence or any other person 

 whomsoever anything concerning it. Ynur business is to take care that money 

 is plenty in Rome, that there are no thieves there, — to let me alone, and to 

 permit me to proceed with my nlan as I please." Wren's ungrateful em. 

 ployers, in 1718. dismissed him from his place of surveyor of public works ; 

 he was at this time in the 86th year of his age. This great and good man 

 died at Hampton Court on the 25th of February, 1723, in the 91st year of 

 his age. His remains were accompanied by a splendid attendance to their 

 appropriate resting-place under the noble edifice which his genius had 

 reared, and over the grave was fixed a tablet, with the following inscription : 

 — " Beneath is laid the builder of this church and city, Christopher Wren, 

 who lived about 90 years, not for himself but for the public good. Reader, 

 if thou seekest for his monument, look around." 



Great architects, if uniting with their works any other pursuit or study, 

 have generally fixed upon some branch of science or art connected with ar- 

 chitecture: tiius, Michael Angelo was a sculptor; Inigo Jones was a painter, 

 and Sir Christopher Wren an astronomer. But Sir John Vanbrugh was a 

 dramatist as well as an architect; he wrote "The Provoked Wife," "jEsop," 

 and other comedies, and built Blenheim and Castle Howard. 



Were I to give the character of each and all the eminent architects of this 

 or any other country, they would serve to show bow great was the amount 

 of their labour, and with what cheerfulness and perseverance they pursued 

 their tasks at the commencement of their career, and with what determined 

 energy they maintained their name and fame after they had risen to excel- 

 lence : nor will the characters of civil engineers lose by comparison with the 

 already-named artists. 



When the state of civilization and trade in England required more con. 

 venient and cheaper modes of transit for its goods than the common roads 

 and wagons of the day afforded, a system of inland navigation was proposed, 

 and Mr. Smeaton was employed in making rivers available for this purpose: 

 afterwards, more direct routes became desirable, and canals were projected, 

 in imitation of those made before by the Dutch and French. The Duke of 

 Bridgewater was the great patron of these schemes, and brought forward 

 James Brindlev, who constructed the canal called the Bridgewater 

 Canal, between Liverpool and Manchester. This immense work, which was 

 ridiculed by most of the scientific men of the period as impracticable, Brindley 

 undertook, and completed so as to form a junction with the Mersey. This 

 success caused him to be employed, in 1766, to unite the Trent and Mersey, 

 upon which he commenced the Grand Trunk Navigation Canal. From this 

 main branch Mr. Brindley cut another canal near Heywood, in Staffordshire, 

 uniting it with the Severn in the vicinity of Bewdley, and finished it in 1772. 

 From this period scarcely any work of the kind in the kingdom was entered 

 upon without his superintendence or advice. Among other designs, he pre- 

 pared one for draining the fens of Lincolnshire, and the Isle of Ely, and 

 another for clearing the Liverpool Docks of mud, which was especially suc- 

 cessful. The variety of his inventions, and the fertility of his resources, 

 were only equalled by the simplicity of the means by which he carried his 

 expedients into effect. He seldom used any model or drawing, but when 

 any material difficulty presented itself, he used to seclude himself for days, 

 or until an idea presented itself to him for overcoming it ; and so partial was 

 he to inland navigation, that upon a question being put to him by the oppo- 

 sition to one of bis schemes, " for what purpose he imagined rivers were 

 created," he at once replied, " undoubtedly to feed navigable canals." The 

 intensity of his application to business brought on a fever, of which he died 

 in 1772, in the filty-sixth year of his age. i""*^ 



John Smeaton, another engineer who did much to advance his profesion 

 in this country, may almost be said to have been horn an engineer, his 



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