184LJ 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



27 



is produced in the whole, and the minutest examination presents a 

 never-ending variety, by which the first impression is extended and 

 maintained. The whole of these architectural restorations are being 

 executed under the direction of Mr. Savage, of Essex Street. When 

 completed, this ancient edifice will become an additional ornament 

 to the metropolis — a perfect and unrivalled specimen of the olden 

 time. But the restoration of this beautiful church is not the only good 

 which the liberality of the Societies of the Temple will have erfected ; 

 they have been the means of proving what may and can be done by 

 the artists and artizans of England, when taste directs and liberality 

 remunerates. Such an example, set in such an edifice, will, in all 

 probability, have a powerful ertect in the progress of church decoration 

 in all its departments. 



With these few remarks I beg to conclude, hoping that if "Sur- 

 veyor" should again have any desire for entering your columns, that 

 he will do so with a single eye to the main object of your Journal, and 

 not under the mere influence of selfish or vindictive passions. 

 I have the honour to remain, Sir, 



Your very obedient servant, 



B. T. C. O. 

 Dtcember 24, 1840. 



REVIEV/S. 



LAND SURVEYING— THE SCALING INSTRUMENT. 



Sir — Though having had something to do with the improvement of 

 the new scaling instrument, now used in the Titlie Commission Office, 

 yet I do not teel called on striouslij to contradict the assertions of 

 " Survevor," which appeared in your last month's publication. Nor 

 would I presume to obtrude the following observations on your pages, 

 if the remarks that called them forth had not a tendency to contravene 

 the great principle upon which your very useful work is professedly 

 based. It appeared that your valuable iiublic;Uion was to be made the 

 great reservoir wherein to deposit the beneficent contributions that 

 freely emanate from the generous and communicative head of genius, 

 and from which source, those valuable contributions may be made 

 liberally to circulate for tlie noble ami philanthropic purpose of giving 

 increased facility to the praclical efforts of such persons as may not be 

 so largely endowed with the inventive faculty. 



Some few however there are to be found so exceedingly contuma- 

 cious — so irresistably wedded to old prejudices — and so very vain of 

 their fancied perfections in their several professions, that, like the 

 barbarian Chinese, they reject with affected scorn every proposed im- 

 provement, the adoption of which would involve them in the painful 

 and humiliating admission, that there existed such a iiwnsfer as a 

 Superior ! 



With "Surveyor," continuous labour is professedly preferable to 

 ease and dispatch. If labour be the consequence of a " curse," every 

 inventive ability given and exercised, to remove or lessen that physi- 

 cal incubus, evinces a disposition somewhere to lighten the anathema: 

 but if the stand still or retrograde movement stupidl)' advocated by 

 " Surveyor," be acted on, we must be content (though human necessi- 

 ties daily increase) painfully to endure the miserable infliction : we 

 must be satisfied to spend months at the drudgery of trigonometrical, 

 or astronomical, or other calculations in tin. old way, ratlier than avail 

 ourselves of the "ready reckoner" or the log books prepared by a 

 Napier or a Newton — lest the month's labour should be diminished to 

 So many days — and that we miglit not dishonourably substitute the easy 

 effort of the boy, for the overstrained and painful exertions of the 

 man! ! 



But we tell "Surveyor" that there is not the slightest chance that 

 his intimation will have any eft'ect. And likewise, that the advocates 

 of all petty interests and monopolies, however they may frown and 

 storm in their pigmy habiliments, must bow the neck to the over- 

 whelming force of successful improvement and reform. 



From the self-confident tone of " Surveyor," one would be led to 

 suppose that he would willingly .iubmit to a fair trial between his old 

 method and the application of the instrument ; if it were only for the 

 purpose of convincing other persons who have given it a trial, that he 

 was sincere in his rejection of it ; and that he had no sinister motive 

 for giving public expression to the act of "laying it on the slielf." 



I now confidently assert that the same quantity of a\'erage work may 

 be done twice with the instrument, for once that it can be done by 

 "Surveyor's" method, and with a much greater degree of accuracy, 

 and defy him to the practical disproof upon any fair conditions he may 

 propose. 



One can scarcely suppress the full ebulition of his risible faculties 

 on reading the latter part of his letter, at his puerile attempt to touch 

 the high reputation of a notable and eminent engineer, by his (" Sur- 

 veyor's") generous offer of a lesson at the chain. From such a sample 

 we may expect that the next unsolicited proposal of this astonishmg 

 preceptor will be, to instruct some of the first literary characters of 

 the day in the letters of the alphabet. On this point, however, it is 

 apparent that the very limited extent of his own acquirements has 

 rendered him incapable of recognizing or appreciating the full extent 

 and variety of, individual acquisition. 



CContiiiued from patje \(s.) 



A Practical Inquiry into the Lams of Excavation and Embankment 

 upon Rail/cays, Sfc. By a Resident Assistant Engineer. London : 

 Saunders and Otley, 1840. 



(Second Notice.) 



The remaining part of this work which we have announced our in- 

 tention of noticing, is devoted to the investigation of the harrowing 

 system, in which the author proposes to give the result of his inquiry 

 into the subordinate system of removing earth by means of wheel 

 barrows and human labour. We regret that even the small share of 

 praise we felt justified in bestowing on the first part of the treatise 

 cannot be extended to the part now before ns. 



And in order that our readers may the better judge in what degree 

 the author is warranted in the strong contrast which he draws between 

 his own labours in this field of inquiry, and those of former writers, we 

 shall present them with an extract from his works, rather out of its 

 true position, namely, the concluding paragraph, in which he glances 

 with some contempt at the efforts of his predecessors, and turns with 

 infinite complacency to the superiority, in all respects, of the process 

 which he has himself employed. 



It will also be seen, that the principles upon wliich former authors at- 

 tempted to develope the general laws of excavation and embankment, were 

 evidently adopted, without any reference to the practical working of the sys- 

 tem : and. that the mode of making their observations, (whenever they were 

 made), was much too isolated, for the purpose of affording an expanded and 

 comprehensive view of the various agencies — collateral and direct — which 

 are continually acting, one upon the other, and by which the ultimate results 

 are collectively infiaeuced. The error into which they have fallen, seems to 

 have consisted in assuming, as their constants, quantities in the abstract ; or 

 in observing iu detail, instead of the aggregate ; and adopting the results of 

 these separate observations, as if entirely independent one of the other : and 

 therefore it is not to be wondered at, that many matters, essential to the 

 tliorough sifting of the subject, were altogether excluded : and that the argu- 

 ments founded upon these self-hegotten phenomena, led them to a belief, in 

 the inverse ratio to probability, if not of possibility itself. Thus, the ante- 

 cedents being mdely unconnected, and, from their number, subject to fre- 

 quent error; the consequents derived from their combination, turned out 

 utterly fallacious. The method we have pursued is exactly the reverse : our 

 constants depend upon observations, made upon the combined efl'ects, pro- 

 duced by the various agencies in the aggregate ; and, by an analysis of these 

 we have descended, step by step, to the details ; and not advanced, from the 

 miuutiiE of detail to abstract generahties, which have no foundation in truth 



We shall reserve till the end of our review the observations we 

 have to make upon the boasting presumption of the latter sentenc ■, 

 remarking merely, in the mean time, that a more complete delusion 

 never entered into the mind of man than that which seems to have 

 taken possession of our author, when he imagines that he has made 

 any thing like an analysis of the subject of wduch he is treating. His 

 process lias been on the contrary purely synthetical, and we fear that 

 rarely have such weighty and important conclusions been based upon 

 such a miserably scanty foundation. 



The experimental part of this investigation commences with three 

 experiments, from which our author derives the following fact: "that 

 the mean time spent infilling a barrow, wheeling it four runs of twenty- 

 five yards each, and returning with the empty barrow, is ,5' 45". He 

 then gives two experiments which determine 7' 20" for the time spent 

 infilling one barrow, wlneling it four rims of twenty-five yards each, and 

 returning with the empty barrow, including also the time spent infilling 

 the same barrow a second time, and wheeling it forward two runs. Hence 

 taking the difference of these two times, the author makes 

 7' 20" — 5' 45''= 1' 35", the times which elapsed in filling one barrow and 

 wheeling it forward two runs, or which is the same thuig, 1' 35"=i the 

 time of filling a barrow, wheeling it one run, and returning with the 

 empty barrow. 



E 2 



