AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 603 



freestone: but where a multiplicity of the same is needed, they 

 can be cast in iron at an expense not to be named in comparison, 

 even with that of wood; and with this advantage, that they will 

 retain their original fullness and sharpness of outline long after 

 those in stone have decayed and disappeared. Fluted columns 

 and Corintliian capitals, the most elalDorate carvings, and the rich- 

 est designs, which the architect may have dreamed of, but did not 

 dare represent in his plans, may thus be reproduced for little 

 more than the cost of ordinary castings. Ornamental architec- 

 ture — which, with our limited means, is apt to be tawdry, because 

 incomplete — thus becomes practicable; and its general introduc- 

 tion would greatly tend to elevate the public taste for the beauti- 

 ful, and to purify and gratify one of the finest qualities of the 

 human mind. 



Indeed, so apparent have become the advantages and economy 

 of cast-iron for ornamental purposes, that there is danger lest the 

 public overlook the character of the structure of a building, in 

 the contemplation of its architectural beauty; and that, deceived 

 thereby, and by the name of the material employed, tliey imagine 

 themselves to be admiring a building which has all the superior 

 qualities already described : whereas, being without stability in 

 the combination of its parts, it is in reality more insecure than 

 our ordinary buildings. 



Some have asserted, and it is generally believed, that, as iron 

 is so good a conductor of heat, it would expand and contract so 

 much by the changes of temperature, as to dislocate its joints in a 

 short time, and render the building unsafe. It has been already 

 mentioned, that the assumed impossibility of forming a safe and 

 economical joint for massive structures of cast-iron, was the pro- 

 bable cause why such buildings had not been earlier introduced. 

 It may now be added, that the supposed necessity of making some 

 provision for the expansion and contraction of the metal, was the 

 probable reason why efforts were not made to overcome this difiB.- 

 culty. Indeed, such has been the prevalence of this belief, that, 

 even within a few weeks, a writer in the Daily American Organ, 

 published at Washington, has said : — " Nothing prevents the 

 speedy and general adoption of iron for building purposes, but 

 the practical difficulty in applying it to the substantial portion of 

 architecture, resulting from some of its elementary properties : 

 these are, its expansive and contractible action under the inllu- 

 ences of heat and cold, and its extraordinary conducting powers.'' 

 And in support of his statement, respecting the destructive effects 



