Retrospective Criticism. 429 



I intended, when I began, to have told you many things about the Girard 

 College, as I know you feel an interest in the work, and as my own anxiety 

 to bring it to a completion worthy of my profession and my country makes it 

 the most prominent object of my thoughts and my life ; but I have already 

 exceeded all bounds, and taxed your patience as far as would now be proper, 

 I shall therefore detain you with but a few brief allusions to it. Both of the 

 flanks of the main building are now completed, including the four coi'ner 

 columns, and the scaffolding is removed, the effect of the architecture is fully 

 equal to my expectations, the whiteness of the marble, the large masses in 

 which it is used, some of the column blocks being upwards of 6 ft. in length, 

 and 6 ft. in diameter, and the great accuracy with which the joints are made, 

 add immensely to the effect. 1 propose this season to finish the capitals for 

 the end columns, and put on the roof of the cell, a large portion of the tiles 

 for which are already prepared. In the design of the roof I have followed 

 the Greeks in their plan of those at Eleusis, making the tiles 4 ft. by 4 ft. 6 in., 

 and 3 in. thick. As this part of the building is somewhat of an out of the 

 way affair for modern times, I intend to take another opportunity to tell you 

 more about it. — T. U. W. 



Art. III. Domestic Notices. 

 ENGLAND. 



VfNUS Lambertiana. (Extract of a letter from J. H. to Sir J. H.) — You 

 mentioned to me that you were acquainted with Mr. Lambert, and, if you 

 happen to see him in town, you may let him know that I have just re- 

 ceived from my friend. Dr. M'Loughlin (who resides at Fort Vancouver, on 

 the River Columbia, on the Pacific side of North America), a parcel of the 

 cones of the Lambert pine, in good order and preservation, seeds and all. 

 They are not so large, however, as a few I had some years ago, and one of 

 which I gave to Mr. Lambert through our friend Mr. Ward of Kew Green. 

 The dimensions of the Lambert pine are enormous, and I fancy there grows 

 no tree in the globe so large. M'Loughlin told me that poor Douglas 

 the naturalist, who was killed some years ago when exploiting the woods in 

 his botanical pursuits, by falling into a concealed pit made for the purpose of 

 catching the wild bulls in the Sandwich Islands, where one of them happened 

 to be, and which killed him, had measured one of these trees that he had 

 found blown down in North America, the dimensions of which were as fol- 

 lows : the circumference at the ground was 52 ft., and at 230 ft. from that, 

 where the trunk at the top was broken off, and the top carried away by the 

 water, it was still 13 ft. in circumference. Sir George Simpson also told me 

 that he had found a Lambert pine blown down at Puget Sound Portage. The 

 trunk, from the root to the place where the branches grew at the top, measured 

 90 of his paces, say about 230 ft. Mr. M'Millan also paced it, but made it a 

 few paces less ; but he was a taller man than Simpson. The circumference, 

 about 8 ft. from the ground, where the trunk was broken off, measured 43 ft. 

 These pines are to be found chiefly in the country bordering the Umpqua, 

 or Wallaraatte River, that runs into the Columbia from the south. — J, H. 

 Richmond Hill, June 13. 1841. 



Art. IV. Retrospective Criticism. 



Mr. Nifen's Stove for various Purposes, (p. 334. 234. 49.) — To enter into 

 a discussion with Mr. Niven relative to the objections I have to his stove, &c., 



