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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[June, 



The next rliapfor nalurally brings to the subject of Perpendicular 

 mouldings. Their general characteristics are well expressed in tlie 

 following extracts : there is an implied moral in the remark respecting 

 the tendencies exhibited in the decline of Art to avoid labour, which 

 might be profitably listened to in our time. 



In mouldings of this style we shall at once perceive a debasing influence 

 ill the comparatively meagre, snve-iroulile method of working tliem. Large 

 and coarse members, with little of minute and delicate detail, wide and 

 sliallow hollows, occupying spaces which, in early work, would liave been 

 lillcd with groups of separate mouldings ; hard wiry edges in place of rounded 

 and softened forms, and general shallowness of cutting, are all conspicuous 

 characteristics. Add to these, that their general arrangement on the cham- 

 fer-plane, which is a marked feature of the Perpendicular period, gives a flat- 

 nessi which is unpleasing to the eye in comparison with the rectangularly re- 

 cessed grouping of the two preceding styles. P. 45. 



In the chapter on Columns, we find the following: — 



The most certain evidence of date is furnished by the mouldings of the 

 abacus. In Early English capitals it is' almost invariably undercut, or hol- 

 lowed out, so that it seems to overhang the bell just as the bell does the 

 shaft, and with the same profile, consisting of the halt of a roU-and-fillet. 

 The Decorated abacus consists of the scroll-moulding, with a cylindrical roll 

 of rather less size below it. P. 57. 



Peipendicular capitals present very marked features, which are seldom 

 liable to be mistaken. The mouldings are large, angular, meagre, and few. 

 Neither abacus nor bell is clearly defined, — a fact similar to that already 

 stated with regard to arch-mouldings, that the distinction of orders is gene- 

 rally lost. The abacus, in short, no longer appears as a separable member, and 

 the bell either wholly vanishes, or is very imperfectly developed. The upper 

 part of the abacus is usually sloped off to a sharp edge, like the chamfer of 

 an angle ; the section of the moulding below resembles the letter S inverted, 

 and, above all, the capital is octnrjonal, while that of the preceding styles is 

 round. The shaft, however, is circular in Perpendicular work ; while octa- 

 gonal capitals only occur in the other styles in the case of large single 

 columns of the same shape, if we except a very few cases of Early English 

 detached shafts with octagonal capitals, as in the transepts at lliston, near 

 Cambridge, and the west front of Peterborough Cathedral. P. 59. 



The extracts we have given, will we trust serve to give our readers 

 a general impression respecting the book. As a first step in classify- 

 ing mouldings, it is invaluable : imperfect as though it be (and us a 

 first effort it must necessarily be imperfect), it exhibits a fund of 

 inowlcdge which ought to render it at once indispensable to the archi- 

 tect. May we not be forgiven if in closing our review we lament 

 that, while an amateur like Mr. Paley, who pursues the study only 

 from ardent admiration of it, exerts his utmost industry, patience, and 

 thought, and above all a teachable spirit in his labours to advance the 

 knowledge of art, the professional architect sometimes spurn the in- 

 formation of books, looks upon efforts at making progress superci- 

 liously as reflecting on the state of Mi knowledge, and rather than 

 copy models, even the most beautiful, contents himself with his own 

 vicious principles of design, or in his very horror of servile imitation, 

 most servilely confines himself to the forms which h'^ was set to copy 

 when learning the elements of his profession. To this remark there 

 are indeed many illustrious exceptions, but there are still too many 

 who require books such as Mr. Paley has written to undeceive them 

 as to their own supposed infallibility. 



On some Remarkable Properties of Water and other Fluids, witJi re- 

 Jennce especially to the Causes and Prevention of Steam Boiler 

 Explosions. By John Eddowes Bowman, Member of the Chemical 

 Society of London. London : Parker, West Strand. 1845. Svo., 

 p.p. 10. 



This is a small pamphlet containing the substance of a lecture recently 

 read before the Royal Institution of Manchester, and, notwithstanding 

 its unassuming form, contains some most interesting, and in many 

 respects astonishing, facts respecting the properties of water when in 

 contact with heated metallic surfaces. The reader who takes an in- 

 terest in the philosophy of the steam engine, will find his account in 

 following us in an analysis of the results of Mr. Bowman's very valuable 

 investigations. We ought to premise that Mr. Bowman takes very 

 little credit to himself for the researches which he here details, and 

 wishes to attribute the merit of them to M. Boutigny, with whom he 

 conducted a seriss of experiments respecting the properties of fluids; 

 but the reader will feel inclined to suspect that our author's modesty 

 leads him to underrate his own just claims to approbation. 



It is a well known fact that if water be dropped on hot iron it will 

 frequently assume a globose form, and remain rolling about on the 

 Tttetal for a long time without evaporating. The most probable es" 



planation of this phenomenon is that the globe of water has its exte- 

 rior surface so highly polished that it reflects almost all the heat of the 

 iron. A familiar instance, adduced by Mr. Bowman, is thr test which 

 laundresses use to ascertain whether their smoothing irons be suflS- 

 ciently heated. 



I allude to the property which liquids possess, of assuming the form of a 

 globe or spheroid, when thrown upon any substance which is at a high tem- 

 perature. Of this property, a familiar instance is afforded by an experiment 

 performed every day in our laundries. When it is required to know whether 

 a smoothing iron is sufliciently hot for her purpose, the laundress, on taking 

 it from the stove, applies extemporaneously a drop of moisture from her lips, 

 and if this at once rolls otl' ia the form of a globule, she knows by experience 

 thiit the irou has reached a proper temperature ; while if the drop of water 

 bubbles and boils, however violently, it is condemned as not hot enough, and 

 returned to the stove. 



Once, then, in the flight of ages past, it was discovered that water, though 

 it so readily boils when thrown upon a moderately hot iron, does not boil at 

 all when in contact with metal considerably more heated. 



The illustration is certainly a rather homely one, but it is no worse 

 for that, as a distinct exposition of the phenomena which in fact form 

 the subject of the pamphlet. M. Boutigny succeeded in ascertaining 

 by experiment that many other liquids besides water could be made 

 to exhibit these phenomena : it was also found that water which under 

 ordinary circumstances would boil away in one minute, would in the 

 "spheroidal state" require an Jionr for its dispersion. 



The next point was to ascertain the temperature of water when 

 thus spheroidal, and the conclusions arrived at are very extraordinary. 



Let a large spheroid of water be formed in a tolerably thick crucible of 

 platinum or silver, and the bulb of a small and delicate thermometer be 

 carefully plunged into the middle of it, taking care not to allow it to come 

 in contact with the heated metal. The temperature of the water thus ascer- 

 tained is invariably 205°. 



Perhaps one of the most curious facts which have been established in con- 

 nexion with this subject is, that any variation in the temperature of the 

 vessel containing a spheroid, does not affect the temperature of the spheroid 

 itself. Thus it is found that a spheroid of water, when contained in a cru- 

 cible heated considerably below redness, is just as hoi as one contained in 

 a crucible intensely heated to whiteness in the most powerful blast furnace ! 



Prom numerous experiments, indeed, with water, alcohol, ether, and many 

 other liquids, the following law may be deduced : — " That bodies in the sphe- 

 roidal state remain constant at a temperature l/eloio thai of boiling, however 

 high the temperature oftlie containing vessel may be." 



Another most extraordinary fact which these experiments ascer- 

 tained was, that if boilirtg water instead of cold water were thrown on 

 the hot metal, still in the " spheroidal" state it maintained the same 

 temperature of 205°. 



The same remarkable results are obtained if, instead of pouring the liquids 

 while cold into the red-hot vessels, they be absolutely boiling at the moment : 

 strange, and almost incredible as it may appear, the instant they reach their 

 fiery resting-place, they absolutely become cooler, and as it were shaking otT 

 the trammels of all known laws of nature, cease to boil ! 



Liquids then, when in that peculiar physical condition which I have called 

 sp/ieroidal, always remain at one definite temperature ; and this temperature 

 is invariably, in the case of every liquid, lower than that, at which, under 

 ordinary circumstances, that liquid boils. Let us enquire a little more nar- 

 rowly into the consequences of this law. 



Similar experiments were made with other liquids ; among others, 

 with those produced by the compression of gases. .Sulphurous acid 

 gas which liquefies midera pressure of 30 lb. to the square inch, and 

 which maintains its liquid form below a temperature of 14° Fah., or 

 18° below freezing point of water, was found, on being thrown on 

 heated surfaces, to preserve a temperature actually lower than 14° its 

 evaporating point ! 



The experiment which was selected for the purpose of furnishing an an- 

 swer to this question, is perhaps one of the most striking and apparently 

 paradoxical in the whole range of physical science. Liquid sulphurous acid 

 is subject to the same remarkable law as water and other liquids, it being 

 invariably, when in the spheroidal state, at a temperature lower than its 

 boiling point which 14'^ of Fahrenheit's thermometoi ; so that if a spheroid 

 of sulphurous add he formeil, it remains constant at a temperature of about 

 12", even though the crucible containing it lie at a red or a white heat. If 

 a little water contained in a small glass bulb, gth or Jjjth of an inch in dia- 

 meter, be immersed in the spheroid of acid, it is almost instantly frozen, thus 

 affording incontestible evidence of the remarkably low temperature of the 

 spheroid. 



Most persons have seen the well-known lecture-table experiment of causing 

 water and other liquids to boil iu vacuo at temperature considerably below 

 their ordinary boiling points ; a result depending upon the diminished pres- 

 sure on their surface. When liquids in the spheroidal state, however, are 

 placed under the rec-civer of the air-pump, and the air removed, no sign of 

 boiUng is ever perceived. We may therefore suppose that the temperature 

 of the spheroid in vacuo, is lower than when exposed to the atmospheric 



