1343] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



359 



resort to, and by no means calculated to secure our admiration for the 

 intended fncade. 



Surely the Institute might, on such a highly important occasion, 

 exert themselves a little, and stepping a little out of their ordinary 

 course, might venture, in their character as a public body, to recow- 

 iiu:, that satisfactory information should be communicated relative 

 to the completion of the British Museum, and all pains be taken to 

 secure its being completed in such manner as to stamp it a national 

 edifice worthy of the nation and of the name it bears-— which it is 

 not likely tn prove by many degrees, if we can obtain no more valid 

 security for its excellence than the former productions of the archi- 

 tect to whom it is now blindly confided. No satisfactory pledge for 

 requisite grandeur and beautv in the facade, is afforded by the archi- 

 tecture of the inner court or quadrangle; on the contrary, if the former 

 is not to be of very superior quality and design, it may as well be at 

 once a mere plain and substantial piece of "homespun" building, 

 making no pretensions to any sort of beauty. The subject is one 

 which affords ample scope for the display of imagination and refined 

 taste ; and to what purpose, I would ask, are subjects of that poetical 

 class — one so very unlikely there should be any after occasion for, 

 proposed to architectural students at the Academy, if, whenever an 

 actual occasion does occur, nothing better than arrant common-place, 

 and dull humdrum, without even a particle of poetry in it, can be 

 provided. Leaving you and your readers to crack me this question, 

 I remain, 



Yours, and all that, 



Br.rrus Britannicus. 



[For inserting the above, in addition to what has already been said 

 in our Journal on the same subject, apology is unnecessary. It is one 

 of exceedingly great importance, if not to architects in particular, to 

 architecture and to our national credit in it. Either very much greater 

 importance is attached to the Houses of Parliament and their embel- 

 lishment than is consistent with public economy, or equal liberality 

 ought to be shown in the case of the British Museum — that is, in re- 



fard to what now remains to be done to it. Whether it be now ren- 

 ered a worthy monument of art, or not, a monument it will be, for 

 ages to come, unless it should happen to be destroyed by fire — a ca- 

 lamity no more to be apprehended for it than for the new edifice at 

 Westminster. The obstinate silence maintained in regard to the de- 

 sign for the fafade, is, however, of most evil omen in itself, and be- 

 speaks a determination neither to show, nor to make any appearance 

 of showing, the slightest deference to public opinion, unless upon the 

 extreme compulsion of a general public outcry to that effect. We 

 ourselves have done, and shall continue to do, all we can to force the 

 matter on the attention of our readers, but it is one that ought to be 

 taken up earnestly by the whole of the public press — at least by that 

 portion of it which affects to attend at all to the interests of art. 

 Yet such is not the case at present; for although we do not stand 

 exactly alone, in our anxiety as to the British Museum, there seems to 

 be a strange reluctance on the part of the daily press to bring forward, 

 or even touch upon, the subject in any way. We say " reluctance," 

 because a correspondent informs us that he addressed a letter to the 

 Times newspaper, relative to the intended facade of the Museum, 

 but it was neither inserted, nor made use of as a hint for any remarks 

 on the part of that paper. — Ed.] , 



"THE LIGHT FOR ALL NATIONS" LIGHTHOUSE. 



Sm — He who builds a lighthouse on the Goodwin sands, builds an 

 imperishable name and a monument to his fame, not only as a skilful 

 and successful architect, but also as the enviable deliverer of thou- 

 sands, and most probably of tens of thousands, of bis fellow creatures 

 from the jaws of destruction. The Goodwin bank, about 10 or 11 

 miles long from north to south, and between 3 or 4 broad, consists of 

 finely comminuted particles of sand firmly compacted together, offer- 

 ing a great resistance to the introduction of smaller bodies, but quickly 

 entombing ships of burthen which are so unfortunate as to be driven 

 upon them, being, as William Lambert remarks in his "Perambulations 

 of Kent, written in the year 1570, " a most dreadful gulfe and shippe 

 swallouer." 



Many years ago the Corporation of the Trinity House formed the 

 design of erecting a lighthouse upon these sands, but the idea was 

 abandoned when, after boring to a very great depth, no solid foundation 

 could be obtained; and since then no determined attempt has been 

 made to build a solid structure until the recent one of Mr. William 

 Bush, whose plan was certainly an excellent one as adapted to sands 

 of known superficial depth ; but wholly irreconcilable with tie con- 



stitution of this particular embankment. Not having these experi- 

 mental borings of the Trinity House before his eyes, and forgetting 

 the golden maxim "Never to begin a thins; until the end is well con- 

 sidered," he launched his caisson in an unknown void, to rest eventu- 

 ally on he knew not what: for although he speaks of a rock bottom, 

 this, at best, is but problematical, and our geological ideas lead us 

 rather to infer that the under soil is analogous to the low coast around 

 Pegwell Bay being intersected with chalk cliffs: be this us it m ijr, it 

 was absolutely necessary to the success of this particular plan, that the 

 exact depth of the quicksand should have been previous!) as- 

 certained. 



For carrying out the plan ! am now about to propose, this prelimi- 

 nary step is not necessary, other than in choosing the site upon which 

 to commence operations; and here I am far from thinking that the 

 most elevated portion of the bank is the best for the purpose, from the 

 simple reason that being the apex of the submarine hill, the sands are 

 here most probably the deepest, but I would rather choose that portion 

 of the bank which presents the most precipitous front to the sea, for 

 here it is highly probable the sands rest upon chalk hills or cliffs. The 

 site chosen, let 



A B C D, be a given area or superficial square, the angle A beiug 

 towards the most violent action of the waves : at E, the centre of the 

 square, let a circular well about eight feet in diameter be commenced, 

 the masonry about two feet thiok to be firmly cemented together, and 

 so secured as to resist the pressure it must experience as it descends. 

 Commencing at the lowest depth convenient, let the building be 

 rapidly carried on until above high water mark, still continuing it as 

 the lower portion disappears, every means being used to facilitate its 

 descent, should this be requisite. There is little doubt, however, of Jhe 

 building gradually sinking, the increasing weight giving the necessary 

 impetus to its descent, and thus must it continue without reference to 

 the depth, until it meet the consolidated bed on which the quicksands 

 rest: this object attained, the sands are then abstracted from the well, 

 and after the foundations are properly examined the wdiole is to be 

 filled up with solid masonry. 



Having by this central well ascertained the depth of sand, and the 

 nature of the lower bed, proceed to form wells of magnitude and 

 strength proportioned to the depth of sand to be passed through, at 

 points, A, B, C, D, and simultaneously or consecutively the connect- 

 ing well, as exhibited by the accompanying section, to be filled up in 

 like manner: thus a coffer dam of solid masonry will be formed, from 

 the midst of which the sands, if not very deep, may be abstracted, aud 

 solid masonry introduced in lieu thereof, binding the whole as one vast 

 solid foundation capable of supporting a noble edifice. 



The idea above given, so far as regards building upon quicksands, 

 is not original, for during my travels in India, my admiration has been 

 more than once excited by vast piles of solid masonry having their 

 foundations within the dry quicksand, a much more difficult under- 

 taking I presume, than building upon the Goodwin Sands, which, from 

 their compactness must offer great opposition to the intrusion of 

 bodies of this nature. The beautiful Scotch Church at Madras may 

 also be quoted as having its foundations laid within the quicksand, 

 being pillared on a great number of wells, as suggested by native 

 architects. 



The whole of the wells, and the entire foundation being completed, 



