1842.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



205 



THE NEW PALACE OF MOORSHEDABAD, IN BENGAL, 

 Erected for His Highness Nuu-anb Nazim, by Major General M'Leod. 



Sir — Under this head, in the number for the present month of your very 

 valuable Journal, honourable mention is made of " Two very splendid water- 

 colour drawings by Mr. John Edward Jones, being perspective views of a 

 Palace built in India for one of the subsidiary princes." As the mistake into 

 which you have most unacco\intably fallen in the above notice is calculated 

 to do me some injury both in ray professional and private capacity, you will 

 excuse me for troubling you with a few lines on the subject. 



The drawings adverted to were sent to the Institution of Civil Engineers 

 from the office of Mr. J. E. Jones by whom I was engaged to prepare them, 

 but not one line was drawn nor one brush of colour applied by Mr. Jones to 

 either. The work, whatever it may be, was wholly mine — drawn from plans 

 supplied by and directions and explanations given to me, from time to time, 

 by General M'Leod personally, who has permitted me to refer to bira for the 

 accuracy of this statement. 



As I was fully prepared to bear any blame or criticism to wliieh these 

 exhibitions before such competent judges might have subjected me, I shall 

 not, I presume, be considered luircasonable in claiming any credit which these 

 productions of my pencil may be deemed worthy. 



The following extracts from a letter of a mucli respected and valued friend 

 in Manchester will, howev.:-!-. show that I have no choice in the matter, but 

 that I am imperatively called upon in support of my own character to make 

 this statement — " In this month's Civil Engineer's Journal, I find an 

 engraving of General M'Leod's palace, and great credit given to a Mr. Some- 

 body for having made the drawings. Is this a mistake, or have you misled 

 me .'" This leads me further to observe, that I have now in the Exhibition 

 of the Royal Academy two other drawings (Nos. 1027 and 1050) from the 

 same subject, and though not copies of those sent to "the Institution," they 

 are composed and drawn from the same source. The two sets of drawings 

 will be seen by many of the same individuals, and it might be imagined without 

 some explanation, that I had been guilty of plagiarism, and had pirated both 

 ideas and subjects from those first exhibited as the production of Mr. J. E. 

 Jones. As this would stamp me with a character which I, in common with 

 every honourable mind, despise and detest, I must beg of you to give 

 insertion to this communication in your next number. 

 Rutland Cottage, I am, Sir, 



John Street, Hampstead, Your obedient servant, 



Mag 9, 1842. J. W. Atkinso.v. 



Sir — I have seen and have been much gratified by your notice of the 

 Moorshedabad palace in your excellent Journal for this month, or rather that 

 you have thought it worthy of a place there. Mr. Jones' draughtsman has, 

 however, made one or two unfortunate mistakes in the drawings, which I 

 should be very glad if you could oblige me by in any way bringing to the 

 notice of those who look upon such matters with interest, in your next 

 monthly publication. 



In the first place, the scale for the elevation is just half what it should be, the 

 whole space from to 50 being divided into 50 instead of 100 feet. In the 

 next place he has been guilty of an omission in the plan, which I dare say 

 you will agree with me in considering in a great measure destructive of the 

 beauty of the southern portico, by leaving out the two internal columns 

 between the anta of the recess, as shown in the annexed engraving ; they 

 being a principal feature in the composition, while the capitals of the pilas- 

 ters or antas are very clumsily represented. 



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There are also one or two i-rrors of the press in the original report, which 

 I ought to have marked before 1 sent it to you through Mr. Jones. In de- 

 scribing the circular room, p. 152, column 2, line 48, it mentions four large 

 covered recesses instead of caved recesses, and at the same place the words 

 "over which are long panels," ought to have been within brackets [ ], 

 without which that which follows appears nonsense. There also appears the 

 word bricken-edge instead of brick-on-edge. 



I remain, 



2iO, Regent Street, ' Yours very faithfully, 



ifay 9, 1842. D. M'Leod. 



TREWHITT'S APPARATUS FOR DISCONNECTING PADDLE 

 WHEELS. 



Sir — In a recent number of your Journal, I observed a drawing and de- 

 scription of Trewbitt's Patent .\pparatus for disconnecting the paddle wheels 

 of steam vessels from the engines. 



This apparatus has been applied by Scott, Sinclair & Co. to the steam ship 

 Phoenix, which they have just completed, and the result of the trials made 

 with it is so satisfactory, I consider it due to the Patentee to state that for 

 its simplicity, facility of operation, and absence of lial)ility to derangement, 

 it has not been surpassed liy any invention yet introduced for that purpose. 



Tlie paddle wheels are connected to, or disconnected from the engines 

 with a friction strap by a few blows of a sledge hammer on the end of a key, 

 which is shown in your drawing; and the greatest proof of its superiority 

 over every other mode is that the paddle wheels were connected and discon- 

 nected when the vessel was at full speed. 



Your obedient servant, 



James M. Scott. 



Grenoch Foundry, May 21, 1842. 



REVIE-WrS. 



./f Treatise on Land Surveying and Levelling. By Heniit James 

 Castle, D.P.S. London : Simpkin ami Marshall, 1842. 



Practical Geology. By Butler Williams, C.E., F.G.S. London: 

 Parker, 1842. 



Course of Civil Engineerivg, comprising Plane Trigonometry, Surveying 

 and Levelling. By John Gregory, Esq., C.E. Dublin : Samuel 

 J. Machen, 1842. 



If all the books (hat have been written on the subject of surveying 

 had in reality been what the authors professed, and what the public 

 had a right to expect they should be, what a nation of surveyors would 

 this have been! Surely no other profession in the world has ever 

 been so blessed with the labours of industrious authors; — no other 

 profession can boast of an amount of printed paper devoted to its 

 especial use, which, had it been properly employed, would have sufficed 

 to teach the art of surveying to every man, woman and child in the 

 empire. But when we ask the question how many of these books 

 have been worth the labour bestowed in writing them, or rather in 

 copying and compiling them, how many have repaid the trouble of 

 reading, and been worth the expense of buying — one general expression 

 of indignant contempt for the stale and childish nonsense with which 

 the majority of these books have been filled, flashes upon us from 

 every side, an answer too correct for refutation, too bitter for ridi- 

 cule. 



The proof indeed that these books, in common with other means 

 more likely to succeed, have failed entirely in tli.it which the authors 

 sought to accomplish, may be found in the fact that a large number of 

 the provincial surveyors of this country are exceedingly incompetent 

 to conduct even the process of common land measuring, on any thing 

 like an extensive scale. The great survey which has been for some 

 years in progress for the combined object of eft'ecting the commutation 

 of tithes, and the establishment of a new parochial assessment has 

 tested in a remarkable degree the capacity of the local surveyors in 

 all parts of the country. It would be interesting to know, with respect 

 to each county of England and Wales, how many of its parishes or 

 townships have been surveyed by men locally established, and how 

 many have been done by surveyors from the sister isle, who have con- 

 tinued to swarm over to this country ever since the commencement 

 of these surveys. It would probably be found that those counties 

 where a great number of enclosure acts have been obtained within the 

 last 50 years — those which have been the site of large engineering 

 works, and particularly those which contain the vast tracts of land 

 brought into cultivation by lowering the outfalls of the Ouse and the 

 None, do possess at this time locar surveyors who understand their 

 business, and who would have been capable, had they been sufficiently 

 numerous, to conduct the whole of the tithe and poor law surveys of this 

 country. On the other hand, in those counties where there have been 

 no waste lands or no open fields to enclose and to allot — where the 

 development of manufacturing resources has not so extensively nor so 

 rapidly called lor the interchange and alienation of land — and where 

 no new creation of the solid acres has required allotments, divisions 

 and subdivisions to be made, it is quite natural to suppose that the art 

 of surveying should have fallen ort' for mere want of practice on the 

 part of its professors. 



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