380 BULLETIN OF THE NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



read, is before us. In building, the horizontal position of 

 the bedded stone is of greatest importance. That is, the 

 stone should be laid on its bed, and not on edge.* Im- 

 proper position in the wall, where it is exposed to the 

 weather, has more to do with the disintegration and decay 

 of building stone, than the chemical composition, and, in 

 many cases, it is more effective than the inherent weakness 

 in its physical structure. ^ 



In New York, and in the smaller cities of this state, the 

 common practice is to pile the stone up edge-wise, making a 

 veneer, as it were, of stone. The use of granites, marbles 

 and limestones in this way would not be so reprehensible, 

 especially in stones which are massive and without lamina- 

 tion. In practice, however, it is the bedded rocks and the 

 sandstones which are thus laid on edge. The brownstone 

 of Connecticut has been, almost without exception, sub- 

 jected to the more effective action of the atmospheric agents, 

 through this faulty system of erection. The varying nature 

 of the material for any great thickness, and the oblique lam- 

 ination and cross-bedded structure, so common in sand- 

 stones, occasion the exposure of material of unequal hard- 

 ness, and consequent unequal weathering, when the stone 

 is dressed or smoothed to a plane surface, and is set on 

 edge in the wall.f In the case of the Connecticut brown- 

 stone this variation yields wavy lines in the the rubbed sur- 

 faces, which are a pleasing relief to the eye in material of so 

 sombre a shade of color. But when it is recognized as as- 

 sociated necessarily with elements of weakness, the culti- 

 vated sense of beauty is offended. The scaling or exfolia- 

 tion of large sheets, due to the action of infiltrating water 

 and frost, is evident after exposure for a few years, or, at 

 most, of two or three decades, and the result is an unsightly 

 front. Longer exposure tends to the breaking down of the 



* Not, necessarily, as in the quarry, as it may there have been tilted and on edge, 

 f Report on Building Stone, by Prof. James Hall, 39th Annual Report N. Y, State 

 Museum, Albany, N. Y., pp. 205-6. 



