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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



[February, 



The character of the sculpture of the figures denotes a very remote period 

 of art, and it i», to a certain degree, rude ; but the forms and embellishments 

 of the bronze chairs are extremely refined, and betoken a class of art not 

 unlike that of the triple temple in the Acropolis of Athens. 



When the other marbles and fragments brought from Xanthus have beeu 

 removed into the upper halls of the Museum, the committee will proceed 

 with their examination on this interesting subject, and they will, if neces- 

 sary, report to the Institute the result of their inquiries. 



The Chairman, in consequence of the unavoidable absence of Mr. Britton, 

 who was to have read a paper this evening, was requested by the secretaries 

 to supply a paper, which he readily acceded to with his usual promptness in 

 all similar difficulties; the subject of the paper was " On the ruins of the 

 city of Ani, in Armenia," but as we are likely to give the paperin full next 

 month, we defer giving any abstract. 



The meetings for February will take place on Monday 6th, and 20th, at 8 

 o'clock. 



INSTITUTION OF CIVIL ENGINEERS. 

 Jan. 10. — James Walker, Esq., President, in the chair. 

 This was the first meeting of the session, and was occupied by a discus- 

 sion on a paper by Mr. Davison, describing the sinking of the deep well at 

 Messrs. Truman and Co.'s, brewery, which was read at the close of last ses- 

 sion. See Journal, Vol. 5, 1342, page 420. 



Jan. 1 7. — The President in the Chair. 

 This was the annual general meeting of the Society, and was occupied in 

 reading the report of the council, the election of the council and the dis- 

 tribution of the prizes ; we must defer until next month a report of the pro- 

 ceedings when we hope to be able to give them in full. 



DESTRUCTION OF THE ROUND-DOWN-CLIFF BY GUNPOWDER. 



[We are partly indebted for the accompanying report to the Times, and 

 through the kindness of two professional friends, who were on the spot and 

 witnessed the explosion, we have been enabled to give considerable additional 

 information; and have also added a rough sketch of the cliff, that was 

 hastily taken, just before and after the explosion took place.] 



Dover, Jan. 26th, 18t3. 



You will not be surprised to hear that the announcement that an explo- 

 sion of 18,0001b. of powder was to be made in the Round Down Cliff this 

 afternoon brought an influx of strangers into this town ; still, though con- 

 siderable, it was not so large as 1 had expected. Curiosity was, I think, pa- 

 ralyzed by a vague fear of danger, which kept some thousands at home who 

 might have witnessed it, as the event turned out, without the slightest shock 

 to their nervous system. The experiment succeeded to admiration, and, as a 

 specimen of engineering skill, confers the highest credit on Mr. Cubitt, who 

 planned, and on his colleagues who assisted, in carrying it into execution. 



Everybody has heard of the Shakspeare Cliff, and I (have no doubt that a 

 majority of your readers have seen it. I should feel it a superfluous task to 

 speak of its vast height were not the next cliff to it, on the west, somewhat 

 higher. That cliff is Round Down Cliff, the scene and subject of this day's 

 operations. It rises to the height of 375 feet above high-water mark, and 

 was, till this afternoon, of a singularly bold and picturesque character. To 

 understand the reasons why it was resolved to remove yesterday no inconsi- 

 derable portion of it from the rugged base on which it has defied the winds 

 and waves of centuries, I must make your readers acquainted with the in- 

 tended line of railway between Folkestone and this place. 



At Folkestone there will be a viaduct of great height and length. Then 

 there will be a tunnel, called from a martello tower near it, the s Tower 

 Tunnel, one third of a mile in length. Then comes a cutting through the 

 chalk of two miles in length, called Warren's Cutting. Then comes the Ab- 

 bott's Cliff tunnel, one mile and a quarter in length, and now half finished, 

 although only commenced on the 16th of August last. From the Abbott's 

 Clifl tunnel to the Shakespeare Cliff tunnel the railroad will be under the 

 cliffs close to the sea, and protected from it by a strong wall of concrete two 

 miles lung, and with a parapet of such a height as will not preclude passen- 

 gers from the splendid marine view which lies under them. Now it was 

 found that when a straight line was drawn from the eastern mouth of the 

 Abbott s Cliff tunnel to the western mouth of the Shakespeare tunnel, there 

 \ras a projection on the Round Down Cliff which must be removed in some 

 way or other to insure a direct passage. That projection, seen from the sea, 

 had the appearance of a convex arc of a circle of considerable diameter. It 

 is now removed, and some idea of its size may be formed from the fact that a 

 square yard of chalk weighs two tons, and that it was intended by this day's 

 experiment to remove 1,000,000 tons. The §haKsg%a tunnel is three-quar- 

 ters ot a mile long, and it is about the same distance from that tunnel to the 

 town of D^ver. 



Having premised thus much as to the locality of Round Down Cliff, I 

 now proceed to describe, as briefly as I can, the means employed to detach 

 from it such an immense mass of solid matter. A horizontal gallery T. Fig. 

 3, extended for about 100 yards parallel with the intended line of railway, 

 from which cross galleries were driven from the centre and extremes. At the 

 end of these cross galleries shafts were sunk, and at the bottom of each shaft 

 was formed a chamber, 11 feet long, 5 feet high, and 4 feet 6 inches wide. 

 In the eastern chamber were deposited 50001b. of gunpowder, in the western 

 chamber 60001b., and in the centre chamber 7000 lb., making in the whole 

 18,0001b. The gunpowder was in bags, placed in boxes. Loose powder was 

 sprinkled over the bags, of which the mouths were opened, and the bursting 

 charges were in the centre of the main charges. The distance of the charges 

 from the face of the cliff was 70 feet at the centre and about 55 feet at each 

 end. It was calculated that the powder, before it could find a vent, mtul 

 move 100,000 yards of chalk, or 200,000 tons. It was also confidently ex- 

 pected that it would move 1,000,000 tons. 



The following preparations were made to ignite this enormous quantity of 

 powder;— At the back of the cliff a wooden shed was constructed, in winch 

 three electric batteries were erected. Each battery consisted of 18 Daniels' 

 cylinders, and two common batteries of 20 plates each, to which were attached 

 wires which communicated at the end of the charge by means of a very fine 

 wire of platina, which the electric fluid as it passed over it, made red-hot, to 

 fire the powder. The wires covered with yarn were spread upon the grass 

 to the top of the cliff, and then falling over it were carried to the eastern, the 

 centre, and the western chamber. Lieutenant Hutchinson, of the Royal 

 Engineers, had the command of the three battt-ries, and it was arranged that 

 when he fired the centre, Mr. Hodges and Mr. Wright should simultaneously 

 fire the eastern and the western batteries, to ensure which they had practised 

 at them for several previous days, The wires were each 1,000 feet in length, 

 audit was ascertained by experiment that the electric fluid will fire powder 

 at a distance of 2,300 feet of wire. After the chambers were filled with 

 powder, the galleries and passages were all tamped up with dry sand, as is 

 usually the case in all blasting operations. 



At 9 o'clock in the morning a red flag was hoisted directly over the spot 

 selected for the explosion. The wires were then tested by the galvanometer, 

 the batteries were charged, and every arrangement was completed for firing 

 them. 



It was arranged that the explosion should take place at 2 o'clock ; at that 

 time there was an immense concourse of people assembled. In a marquee 

 erected near the scene of operation, for the accommodation of the directors 

 and distinguished visitants, we observed among the number assembled. Sir 

 John Herschell, General Pasley, Col. Rice Jones, Mr. Rice, M.P., Professors 

 Sedgwick and Airy, the Rev. Dr. Cope, and there was also a strong muster 

 of engineers, among whom were Mr. Tierney Clark, Mr. Juhn Braithwaite, 

 Mr. Charles May, Mr. Lewis Cubitt, and Mr. Frederick Braithwaite ; the 

 engineers and directors of the Greenwich. Croydon, Brighton, and South 

 Eastern Railways, besides numerous foreigners of eminence. 



At 10 minutes past 2, Mr. Cubitt, the company's engineer in chief, ordered 

 the signal flag at the western marquee to be hoisted, and that was followed by 

 the hoisting of all the signal flags. A quarter of an hour soon passed in deep 

 anxiety. A number of maroons, in what appeared to be a keg, was rolled 

 over the cliff, and on its explosion with a loud report, all the flags were 

 hauled down. Four more minutes passed away, and all the flags except that 

 on the point to be blasted were again hoisted. The next minute was one of 

 silent, and breathless, and impatient expectation. Not a word was uttered, 

 except by one lady: who, when too late, wished to be at a greater distance. 

 Ga'eatitm sero duelli pienitet. Exactly at 26 minutes past 2 o'clock a slight 

 twitch or shock of the ground was felt, and then a low, faint, indistinct, inde- 

 scribable moaning subterranean rumble was heard, and immediately after- 

 wards the bottom of the cliff began to belly out, and then almost simulta- 

 neously about 500 feet in breadth, with reference to the railway's length of 

 the summit began gradually to sink. 



There was no roaring explosion, no bursting out of fire, no violent and 

 crashing splitting of rocks, and wdiat was considered extraordinary, no smoke 

 whatever ; for a proceeding of mighty and irrepressible force, it had little or 

 nothing of the appearance of force. The rock seemed as if it had exchanged 

 its solid for a fluid nature, for it glided like a stream into the sea, which was 

 at a distance of about 100 yards— perhaps more — from its base, tearing up 

 the beach in its course, and forcing up and driving the muddy substra- 

 tum together with some debris of a former fall, violently into the sea, and 

 when the mass had finally reached its resting place a dark brown 

 colour was seen on different parts of it, which had not been carried 

 off the land; the shattered fragments of the cliff are said to occupy an 

 area of 15 acres, but w e should judge it to be much less. I forgot to minute 

 the time occupied by the descent, but I calculate that it was about four or 

 five minutes. The first exclamations which burst from every lip was — 

 "Splendid, beantifu'. !" the next were isolated cheers, followed up by three 

 times three general cheers from the spectators, and then by one cheer more- 

 These were caught up by the groups on the surrounding downs, and, as I 



