EFFECTS PEODUCED UPON EUILDINGS. 



101 



liar system of splits in the S.W. and N.E. corners of 

 the houses.' This is well shown in the accompanying 

 sketch, which evidently illustrates the effect of a shock 

 oblique to the direction of two walls at right angles to 

 each other. 



Buildings in ToJdo. — For the purpose of finding out 

 what has been the effect produced by earthquakes upon 

 the buildings of Tokio, and at the same time for ascer- 

 taining whether blocks of buildings ranging in different 

 directions suffered to the same extent, the author ex- 

 amined, in company with Mr. Josiah Conder, a large 

 number of foreign-built houses in the district of the Grinza. 

 The chief reason for choosing this was because it was the 

 only district where a 

 large number of sivii- 

 lar buildings could be 

 found. By examining 

 houses or buildings 

 of different construc- 

 tions, the effects pro- 

 duced upon them by 

 earthquakes are very 

 often likely to show so 

 many differences that 

 it becomes almost an 

 impossibility to deter- 

 mine what the general effect has been — unsymmetrical 

 construction involving unsymmetrical ruin. 



A number of similarly constructed buildings in one 

 locality may be regarded as a number of seismographs, 

 the effect upon any one of them being judged of by the 

 average of the general effect which has been produced 

 upon the whole. The general form of two of these houses 

 which were examined is shown in fig. 17. In this figure 



Fig. 17. — Brick buildings in Tokio, 

 showing fractures. 



