100 



BEISTOL BUTIiDING STONES. 



structures and other buildings intended to outlive the alioek 

 of figes. I have made experiments on pieces of this stone 

 such as are in ordinary use for building purposes, and 1 

 find that repeated freezing and thawing causes a consider- 

 able loss from superficial disintegration. 



For paving it is used throughout Bristol and Clifton, and 

 in this respect will, in Mr. Brock's opinion, compare 

 favourably with that of jiny other city or town in England. 



Old Red Sandstone is not much used in the neighbour- 

 hood of Bristol. Blocks have been built hero and there 

 into the old Cathedral walls, and illustrate well bow readily 

 this material, in its more sandy and friable varieties, suc- 

 cumbs to the action of the weather. Old lied Sandstone 

 from a quarry on the Somersetshire side of the Avon has 

 been used for the buttresses of the Suspension Bridge. The 

 (Jhurch of Abbots Leigh is built of soft and sandy Old lied 

 Sandstone, which has flaked olf badly in parts. In the 

 Church at Wostbury, the lovv'er part of the walls on tlio Ksoutli 

 side (13th century) are Old lied, which has stood well. In 

 St. Mary's, Portbury, sandy, conglomeratic, and gravelly Old 

 Red has boon used, the conglomeratic stones with milky 

 white quartz weathering well. Similar stone has been used 

 in the old tower of St. George's, Baston, while in the recent 

 restoration Old Red (from Markham, I am told), has been 

 nsed. The new Church, at Failand, lias boon built of Old 

 Red, quarried on the spot. The .stone is hard, and mostly 

 conglomeratic, with milky white quar'fcz, and is of admirable 

 quality. A few sandy stones should have boon rejected. 

 Across the Channel, in Tintern Abbey, we have a notable 

 example of this rock in construction. The stone was 

 obtained from the " Barbadoes Quarry " in the vicinity, and 

 though parts have perished badly, in other parts the stone 

 is in good ])resei'vatioii. In Chepstow Castle, built partly 



