602 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



old plan of learning A, B, C, at the knees of the school marm was the 

 best. It is of advantage to learn what A is of itself— to know that the 

 letter is A. Phonography in schools is useless— it is absurd. In the days 

 of his boyhood there were as good classical scholars made by the old method, 

 as are now made by any method. 



Mr. Garbanati exhibited a furniture caster, the invention of Mr. Fry, of 

 Brooklyn. It is a valuable, though simple improvement on the old form. 



Mr. Howe considered it very valuable and useful. 



The subject of the evening being called for, Mr. Ayres read the following 

 paper on 



IRON BUILDINGS. 



"Iron buildings belong to the nineteenth century. The increase of 

 material wealth, the stores accumulated by modern commerce, demanded 

 that greater care than had been deemed necessary or imperative, should be 

 called into action for their preservation. The vast losses which had been 

 in times past incurred through the agency of fire, and the hourly dangers 

 which beset the wealth and the ai't treasures of the world, called forth the 

 invention of men to provide some means of safety. In cities especially, 

 where, with an increase of population there was a corresponding decrease of 

 ground-room, the old building materials, stone, brick and timber, were 

 found to be no effectual guards against fire ; for, although a fire-proof 

 building could be made of stone, brick and mortar, such buildings would 

 necessarily be limited in size, and exceedingly expensive where ground room 

 was scarce. "When iron began to be abundant, it would seem that toward 

 the employment of it as a building material, at least so far as the beams 

 and interior supports of warehouses were concerned, the mind of the archi- 

 tect and the mechanic would immediately have inclined. Iron did indeed 

 claim some consideration, and received a little ; but it grew very slowly in 

 favor. In the early part of the present century a stout-hearted weaver 

 attempted to build his house in part of iron, using the columns as main 

 supports at once of the floors and of his machines ; but, so far as we know, 

 his project was abandoned. A. warehouse on one of the wharves in Liver- 

 pool, erected somewhere between 1840 and 1850, had columns of iron to 

 support the interior floors. Iron beams began to come in use in England ; 

 but their introduction was checked by some accidents which occurred on 

 account of improper construction. Popular prejudice, ever alive to battle 

 against the introduction of anything new and beneficial, was heightened by 

 these accidents. Scientific men, with their eyes upon the stars, or walking 

 amid the sea's dim lighted halls, busily investigating the laws which gov- 

 ern the earthquake and the storm, and the forces which first threw and then 

 kept rollmg in space the witnesses of the being and power of the Almighty — 

 too much engrossed to give the matter any of their valuable time — nodded 

 to the multitude, who thereupon shouted the louder their disapprobation. 



"Whether an absolute necessity for the introduction of a new material 

 for building existed, is hard to say. This much we are warranted, by 

 subsequent experience, in assuming, that there was room in abundance for 



