274 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECTS JOURNAL. 



[August, 



found useful as a protection against persons cutting turf up to the very 

 road fence, and in a short time, leaving the road (as is frequently the 

 case) an embankment dangerous for travelling on, and liable to slip. 

 The surface water should then be tapped off by means of mitre drains 

 judiciously placed, and when the whole is perfectly free from water, 

 the inequalities of the surface should be reduced by filling the hollows 

 with heaty sods, and the formation conducted in the usual manner for 

 roads upon ordinary upland ground, but it will be judicious to give 

 the cross section greater convexity to allow for compression. 



The laying on of the soling is the nest operation to be attended to; 

 and as to the period for undertaking this work, I must differ in opi- 

 nion from many engineers, who strenuously insist that the soling 

 should not be laid on, until one, and in some cases two seasons, after 

 the grips have been opened. I would recommend, that when the 

 surface of the intended road had been freed from water, by the means 

 before mentioned, that the soling should be immediately put on, as 

 the superincumbent weight will compress the bog, and thereby acce- 

 lerate the process of drainage, and also protect it from the frequent 

 saturations with rain, to which it would otherwise be subject, as by 

 the formation all the surface water must fall oft" into the grips. 



This opinion, which I now venture, is founded upon practical ob- 

 servation. About three years ago, when superintending the execution 

 of a long line of road in the south of Ireland, under the direction of 

 the Board of Works, which for about six miles was carried across 

 bog of various depths, a portion of it was solid immediately after 

 being drained, and a portion after the drains had been opened aud the 

 surface formed was left unsoled, in consequence of the winter setting 

 in: in the following summer, when proceeding to complete the opera- 

 tions in the bog, 1 found that part which had been soled was firm aud 

 well consolidated, and in excellent condition for receiving the metal- 

 ling, while that portion which had been unsoled, was in a much worse 

 and softer state than the adjacent bog, especially where the surface 

 had been cut for the purpose of reducing the inequality. 



As the durability of a road will depend in a very great measure 

 upon the soling, the quality of the material to be used for this pur- 

 pose, is of great importance. Vegetable earth is certainly bad, and 

 if, in the absence of better material, made use of, cartage should not 

 be permitted upon it until after the metalling had been laid on. A 

 compound of stiff clay and sharp sand, mixed naturally, constitutes an 

 excellent soling substance, as it will form a tenacious unyielding crust, 

 which will not be liable either to wash away or sink into the bog. 

 This substance is frequently found under bog, and in such cases, will 

 be the best which can be used, and the most economical. Seven 

 inches in depth of soling will be sufficient for country roads where 

 the traffic is not very great. 



After the soling has been laid on and the compression and drainage 

 completed, the fences should be made in the usual manner, with pipes 

 or outlets underneath, to convey the water from the water-tables into 

 the grips. Road contractors generally construct the fences, when 

 cutting the grips, with the sods and turf mould which is raised there- 

 from ; but this is both an incorrect practice and false economy, as the 

 subsidence aud compression of the bog will cause the feuces to form 

 a waving line, instead of the direction first laid out, and the weight 

 of the soling will generally cause the surface between the fences to 

 spread out, and then a larger area than required must be covered over 

 with metalling, which will greatly increase the expense. In a bog 

 road in the county of Kerry, fenced at the time of sinking the grips, 

 and laid out 21 feet wide between the fences, 1 found, after the soling 

 had been laid on and consolidated, and when about to spread the 

 broken stones, that the width between the fences measured 23 feet. 

 In this case there was a decided loss to the contractor, as he was 

 obliged to cover with metalling the entire surface of the road, to 

 within IS inches of the water tables on each side. 



The stoning and blinding is conducted in the same manner as in or- 

 dinary roads. 



When a road is to be formed on an embankment over bog, the base 

 of the embankment should be very wide, in order to extend the su- 

 perincumbent weight over a large surface, aud the sides should slope 



2 feet horizontal to 1 foot perpendicular. The irregularities of the 

 surface, upon which the embankment is to be raised, should be re- 

 duced, and then covered over with regular courses of dry heathy 

 sods, with the heathy side placed downward, but the top course should 

 be laid with the heathy side upward. When the embankment has 

 been raised to the required height, the road should be formed solid, 

 faced and stoned as before described. In a soft and yielding deep 

 bog, the sods for the embankment should not be cut from that portion 

 of the bog adjoining the road, or the embankment may subside very 

 much, and cause the adjacent surface, from which the sods have been 

 cut, to elevate. 



I have seen the injurious consequences of this practice exemplified 

 in many cases, but in two in pcrticular: in the first, the embankment 

 subsided very much, and the gradients were completely altered, the 

 longitudinal section of the road forming a waving line : in the second 

 case, a gullet constructed about the centre of the embankment, sunk 

 beneath the level of the bog, before the embankment was completed, 

 and the adjacent surface was elevated; a second gullet was built over 

 it, and also disappeared, and a third gullet was built over the second, 

 after the necessary precautions had been taken, and the embankment 

 has since remained firm. 



In constructing a road in cutting in bog, after the stuff has been ex- 

 cavated, the surface should be covered with one or more courses of 

 bog sods, and then formed, soled, fenced, and stoned in the usual 

 manner, having previously paid due attention to the drainage. 



F. V. C , A.B., C.E. 



Dublin, 6th July, 1843. 



THE CARTOON'S— 1819, 1843. 



It is exactly nine and thirty years ago, when a youth named Henry Ardor 

 was waiting for the mail, which was to carry him from his father's roof and 

 his mother's affections, to London, to try his fate as an historical painter, 

 that an old friend of the family, a very wise and worthy man, and brother 

 of Northcote the painter, came to bid this youth farewell. " Ah. it will 

 never do," said his father. " I hope it will," sobbed his mother. " I am de- 

 termined it shall," said the youth : his venerable friend shook his hand, and 

 said, " Be sure, my dear young friend, you begin with the skeleton, and 

 study hands and feet, for there is not a painter in London who understands a 

 hand or a 'cot. ' 



The horn was heard, now dying away, now bursting out as it turned the 

 corner of the street in full view, and the horses were seen, trampling and 

 curbed, the royal coachman, with his white hat and scarlet coat, and the 

 guard, red-faced and important, drove up like lightning, and drew up in 

 style. Hi-' youth kissed his sobbing mother ; " God bless you," echoed from 

 all the assembled friends in a country town, the door drove home with a 

 slain, the horn again blew, and away rattled Henry Ardor, wrenching his 

 alfections, with a spasm that squeezed the burning tears out of his eyes, 

 which scalded his cheeks as they fell. 



His love of art was a passion of his being, and had been from his earliest 

 infancy ; he had often ridiculed in his native town the tip-toed absurdities 

 of the old portrait school, and had often been corrected by his father for 

 presumption : he had made up his mind to devote himself, with all his heart 

 and all his soul, to reform the design of his country, by mastering the con- 

 struction of the figure, to take pupils as soon as he was qualified, and if 

 talented, to spread the sound doctrine of beginning with the skeleton, and 

 enforcing that as the basis. He entered London, May 14, 1804,.aud over- 

 whelmed with the intensity of his great object, he went to the new church 

 in the Strand, and falling on his knees, prayed God for success only in pro- 

 portion as he deserved it. Remembering the warning of his worthy friend, 

 his application was incessant, so that in two years he produced works which 

 honoured his name; he had been admitted a student at once in the Academy, 

 and greatly benefitted by that excellent sch jol, and such a cluster of genius 

 was admitted at the same time, that the men of that period have been the 

 support and the reformers of the art ever since. Such was his obedience 



1 What would he say now P 



