6 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[Janxjart, 



Or of Heylyn tlie geographer who, as such, was a valuable man, and 

 of great knowledge as a teacher, yet lost himself in the bvc path of 

 a wood at home ; but enough, we require a new class for the amphi- 

 bicc, for at this moment the poor Germans are bewildered and bewil- 

 dering themselves on the subject of oils. One Fernbach, who calls 

 himself a painter as well as a cliemisi, full of the elementary fractions 

 and elements of fractional elements of matter, with which Leibig is 

 muddling the brains of man, has published his lucubrations, and a 

 German lucubration is no joke. The national character of the man is 

 obvious; a German is a hard-working, word-catching, matter-spin- 

 ning pioneer, but attempt to follow his practice and you are as absurd 

 as the fool who without being able to swim, because of some learned 

 crochet just acquired at one of these gingerbeard rostrums, takes a 

 bath in Lake Huron and finds his just level some hundred fathoms 

 below the earth's surface. 



Fernbach is a goose. Seeing that all oils have something like acid 

 characteristics, that is neutralizi' alkalies and form soaps, determines 

 at a leap that this oleic acid, which he has pre-supposed, is the source 

 of pictorial change; and like the wooden leg invented by a talented 

 Dutchman, Mynheer Von Wodenblock, of Amsterdam, the springs of 

 which, if once touched, set in motion a more than monster of Franken- 

 stein power, which tlienceforlh strode, in defiance of his skill, over 

 mountain and moor, sea and land, to the end of lime, — M. Fernbach 

 proceeds at a similar pace, and, cxojiivio, teaches painters what colours 

 to use and liow to use them ! Now, of all the monsters the freaks of 

 nature have generated; a stupid Scotchman orametaphysicalGerman 

 the most defy description. 



Pictures change, in oil, from the simple cause already explained, 

 and by the mere oxygenisement of that oil which has not sufficiently 

 rapidly become dry or fixed — hence the time for rising and formation 

 of horn. And here I appeal to your correspondent, B. R. Haydon, 

 who iisex a very pure, simple, and non-tampered with oil, and yet it 

 rises and horns. Pictorial change, then, can in no other may be avoided 

 than by the means suggested by me to the Secretary of thi' Royal 

 Commission of the Fine Arts ' for conditional publication ; or, for I by 

 no means play the egotist, means acting by similar modus operandi in 

 drying. 



To dable with oils is absurd and fruitless. Oil bleached by light 

 alone, until it becomes as limpid and as colourless as water, rises as 

 soon and horns as much as oil untouched by Art ; to bleach it, there- 

 fore, is but a trick of trade, a change of the mere glowworm's light to 

 the true ignis fatuus flame of the moor. 



Oils, Sir, may be bleached in two opposite ways — by a pellet of 

 potassium, weighing three grains only, loosely rolleil in white-brovvu 

 curl paper, to every quart, and exposed corked to light, but here it is 

 bleached by abstraction of oxygen from its elements, its drying powers 

 are injured while the painter wants them increased; or by passing 

 chlorine into them, agitating them with the gas over water, and ulti- 

 mately separating the oil, here the object is bttter efTected because 

 brought about by abstracting hydrogen and leaving oxygen in excess 

 in its elements — something like this is done by Messrs. VViusor and 

 Newton — the result is beautiful to look at, but deceptive as I have 

 just shewn ; besides, the instant you use it, with eight pigments out of 

 ton it begins to go back again by an unerring law of nature, and skins 

 more, also, wh<Te oxides of lead or other metals are used. I may, 

 then, ask cui bono? let the smatterers who bleach oil, or those who 

 oxygenise it, reply if they can. 



Your correspondent, De Winterton, is also right iu saying that the 

 sulphate of zinc is some excejition to the rule, when really anhydrous, 

 as all pigments aud dryers ought to be — it partially bleaches oil as it 

 dries; but I am now prepared to suggest a much superior power, and 

 which shall fully render flake white, iu practice, equal to ultramarine 

 in ordinary oil ; and Heaven knows my interests therein may be unable 

 to prevent the collapse of a nut's shell, I shall therefore publish what 

 1 know. 



These may be taken as axioms : all native oils dry iu something like 

 the ratio of their quantity of mucilage ; and in proportion to their oxy- 

 genisement, or their aftinity for oxygen; all oils, by age, become oxy- 

 genized spontaneously — a state miscalled fat — when they are ap- 

 proaching the characters of varnish, and as an inverse proof, all tacky 

 varnish if de-osydized by potassium (treated as described) becomes 

 recdly J'al, that is, oily and flows well without tack ; all oils dry by the 

 formation of sAvh, which becomes horny and yellow, — hence, the use 

 of Mac Gelp and boiled oil, which have an increased skiuning power, 

 is sheer blindness and infatuation, besides the use of a dirty solution 

 of lead, repeated layers of which form a near imitation of caoutchouc. 



There is an error also, and a very natural one of practice, viz. to use 

 dryers only with non-drying colours ; now a proper dryer and vehicle 

 ought to be used also with good dryers, as for example flake or Krem- 

 nitz while ; without adding a dryer so as to lrans/,v it rapidly its ne- 

 cessary action on the oil, combined with its gravity, increases the dis- 

 position to skin, hence ils'rapid failure and horn, and it is but 

 sheer supererogation to add, he who n)akes a Mac Gelp irith any 

 bleached oil deceives himself; and he who uses any Mac Gelp at all, 

 or boiled oil, wants his eyes couching and his perceptions bleaching 

 by my hitherto endless waste of time, money, and mind. 

 1 am, faithfully yours, 



W. MaRRIS DlNiDALE. 



December ISM, 1844. 



■> In which I sacrifice, for public good, rf UIO out of ^160, and the further loss of more 

 than ^80 in expenditure on this subject alone, without any rsference to the cost of fniit- 

 lese attemi)ts at effecting a permanent barytic oil white, which I do not regret because, 

 bad it been effected, it would bare been trertblc9«. 



WESTMINSTER IMPROVEMENTS. 

 JVith an Engraving, Plate II. 



Sir, — I know of no other means of bringing this important subject 

 fairly and eft'ectually before those who can judge of its character, than 

 by detailing what is required and what is proposed to be done, in the 

 columns of a scientific journal, where the object itself, and not the 

 interests connected with it, is reviewed, and where harsh terms are 

 not likely to become substitutes for reasoning, I therefore beg the 

 favour that you will lay before your readers the following statement 

 of what is proposed to be effected in Westminster, and a few remarks 

 relevant to the subject in general. 



Accompanying this communication are two plans, shewing the same 

 parts of tlie city of Westminster, but having on one the line of street 

 which I have laid down, and wliich has received tbe sanction of the 

 Metropolitan Improvement Commissioners, and on the other the line 

 |)roposed by Mr. Penuethorne and those by the inhabitants of Totliill 

 Street. The line laid down by myself is marked AAA, called the 

 South line ; that by Mr. Pennethorn, B B B, and the one which now is 

 opposed to mine, laid down by the inhabitants of York Street, is 

 marked C C C, called the North line. 



The line I propose, AAA, the South line, is nearly similar to that 

 suggested by Mr. Rigby Wason some years since, differing only in its 

 sinuosities, which have been arranged in their present form to avoid 

 expensive public buildings and manufictories — namely, the Work- 

 house at the East end, the Westminster Bridewell at the West, 

 Wood's Brewery and Bryan and Price's Manufactorv in the middle, 

 these are I'ocks a head, but it is the Workhouse only which obtrudes 

 itself objectionably, had it not been there the opening of the West end 

 of Westminster Abbey would have been all that could be desired, as 

 it is, the opening will have no nu-an eft'ect, the towers will be seen 

 along the whole line, and the whole end of the abbey will sudderrly 

 break upon the observer some distance up the street, forming one side 

 of a magnificent quadrangle. The lines of a street gently curved, it 

 is well known, are very much more striking than those of a straight 

 street, and much more opportunity is afforded on a curved line for 

 architectural eflect and observation, so that I cannot, otherwise than 

 for the abbey's sake, regret that the Hue is not straight between its 

 termini, particularly as ihe radial lines of party-walls and the frontages 

 will be practically straight, and ventilation will not be impeded. I 

 would refer to the effect of the High Street, Oxford, and the Boule- 

 vards, at Paris, for the superiority of turned lines in wide streets over 

 those that are long and parallel. 



I am sensible that an ellbrt should be made to satisfy the public in 

 respect of the abbey, but the sum allotted for the whole street would 

 barely suflice to purchase the property in the way, and the question 

 remains, whether the lengthened view of the end of that building, or 

 indeed the gothic of Wien, is worth the large sum necessary for its 

 attainment. Perhaps those who have raised this objection, apart from 

 a consideration of the circumstances which oppose its remedy, may 

 after this (Explanation be induced to relinquish opposition, and assent 

 that a large amount of good should not be relinquished because the 

 whole amount they desire is unattainable. It has been said that Arabella 

 Row is the opening to which the street should be directed, but I have 

 not heard so fiom any practical men ; the environs are, it is well 

 known, extending rapidly to the North-west, and in that direction 

 improvement should follow. With respect to Mr. Pennethorne's line, 

 B B B, that gentleman, like myself, saw the futility of designing a 

 street which should cut through the workhouse, and his much greater 

 experience in these matters induced him to prefer even aquick curve 

 in his line when economy required it, to an expensive straight one. 

 The lines C C C, suggested by the residents and owners of property 

 in York Street, and must be considered highly effective, for they not 

 only include the improvements of my line B B B, but also the entire 



