Architecture 

 Arrest 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



44 



the surroundings and incidents subserve the 

 purpose of attaining the greatest possible 

 economy of space and time, and the most 

 comfort. For instance, the same species 

 will, in the Alps, live under stones that 

 absorb the rays of the sun; in a forest it 

 will live in warm, decayed trunks of trees; 

 in a rich meadow it will live in high conical 

 mounds of earth. AUGUSTE FOREL Fourmis 

 de la Suisse, p. 181. (Translated for Scien- 

 tific Side-Lights. ) 



222. ARCHITECTURE, ANCIENT AND 

 MODERN Sun-dried Bricks Straw Mixed 

 with Clay Modern Adobe a Survival in 

 Fact and Name from Ancient Egypt. Such 

 hut-walls of clay or mud are very usual in 

 dry climates, such as Egypt, where they are 

 cheaper and better than timber. This being 

 so, there is no difficulty in understanding 

 how sun-dried bricks came into use, these 

 being simply convenient blocks of the same 

 mud or loam mixed with straw which was 

 used to build the cottage walls. These sun- 

 dried bricks were used in the East from 

 high antiquity. Some of the Egyptian 

 pyramids still standing are built of them, 

 and the pictures show how the clay was 

 tempered and the large bricks formed in 

 wooden molds, much as in modern brick- 

 fields. With these the architects of Nine- 

 veh built the palace walls ten or fifteen feet 

 thick, which were paneled with the slabs 

 of sculptured alabaster. For such sun- 

 dried bricks, clay and water form a suffi- 

 cient cement. Building with mud-bricks, 

 which indeed suits the climate well, goes 

 on in these countries as of old. They were 

 used also in America, and to this day the 

 traveler in such districts as Mexico will 

 often find himself lodged in a house built 

 of them. The sun-dried brick is there called 

 adobe, a word which is actually their an- 

 cient Egyptian name tob, which when 

 adopted into Arabic became with the ar- 

 ticle, at-tob, and thence was adopted into 

 Spanish as adobe. Baked bricks seem to 

 have been a later invention, easy enough to 

 nations who baked earthen pots, but only 

 wanted in more rainy climates. Thus the 

 Romans, whom mere mud-bricks would not 

 have suited, carried to great perfection the 

 making of kiln-burnt bricks and tiles. 

 TYLOR Anthropology, ch. 10, p. 234. (A., 

 1899.) 



223. ARCHITECTURE, DEVICES OF, 

 ANTICIPATED Buttresses Built around 

 Tropical Trees Roots Spring Up to Sus- 

 tain Massive Crown. A very remarkable 

 feature in these trees is the growth of but- 

 tress-shaped projections around the lower 

 part of their stems. The spaces between 

 these buttresses, which are generally thin 

 walls of wood, form spacious chambers, and 

 may be compared to stalls in a stable; 

 some of them are large enough to hold half 

 a dozen persons. The purpose of these 

 structures is as obvious, at the first glance, 

 as that of the similar props of brickwork 



which support a high wall. They are not 

 peculiar to one species, but are common to 

 most of the larger forest-trees. Their na- 

 ture and manner of growth are explained 

 when a series of young trees of different 

 ages is examined. It is then seen that they 

 are the roots which have raised themselves 

 ridge-like out of the earth; growing grad- 

 ually upward as the increasing height of 

 the tree required augmented support. Thus 

 they are plainly intended to sustain the 

 massive crown and trunk in these crowded 

 forests, where lateral growth of the roots 

 in the earth is rendered difficult by the mul- 

 titude of competitors. BATES Naturalist 

 on the Amazon, ch. 2, p. 635. (Hum., 1880.) 



224. ARCHITECTURE OF THE EARTH 



Basaltic Columns the Silent Memorials 

 of Past Convulsions Fingal's Cave The 

 Giant's Causeway. The remarkable grotto 

 known as Fingal's Cave, in the Island of 

 Staffa, has been formed in the midst of a 

 lava-stream; the thick vertical columns, 

 which rise from beneath the level of the sea, 

 are divided by joints and have been broken 

 away by the action of the sea ; in this way 

 a great cavern has been produced, the sides 

 of which are formed by vertical columns, 

 while the roof is made up of smaller and 

 interlacing ones. The whole structure bears 

 some resemblance to a Gothic cathedral; 

 the sea finding access to its floor of broken 

 columns, and permitting the entrance of a 

 boat during fine weather. Similar, tho 

 perhaps less striking, structures are found 

 in many other parts of the globe wherever 

 basaltic and other lava-streams exhibit the 

 remarkable columnar structure as the re- 

 sult of their slow cooling. . . . This 

 kind of structure is admirably displayed at 

 the Giant's Causeway, County Antrim, in 

 the north of Ireland. JUDD Volcanoes, ch. 

 4, p. 107. (A., 1899.) 



225. AREA, TRIFLING, OF CORAL 

 ISLANDS Archipelago Less than a City. 

 To show how small the total area of the 

 annular reef and the land is in islands of 

 this class [coral atolls], I may quote a re- 

 mark from the voyage of Lutk6, namely, 

 that if the forty-three rings, or atolls, in 

 the Caroline Archipelago were put one 

 within another, and over a steeple in the 

 center of St. Petersburg, the whole would 

 not cover that city and its suburbs. DAR- 

 WIN Coral Reefs, ch. 1, p. 29. (A., 1900.) 



226. ARGUMENT A PRIORI CANNOT 

 DETERMINE FACT Popular Belief in Me- 

 teorites Scouted by Early Scientists. 

 Among the many superstitions of the early 

 world and credulous fancies of the middle 

 ages was the belief that great stones some- 

 times fell down out of heaven onto the earth. 



Pliny has a story of such a black stone, 

 big enough to load a chariot; the Mussul- 

 man still adores one at Mecca ; and a 

 medieval emperor of Germany had a sword 

 which was said to have been forged from 



