BUILDING STONES : GREAT OOLITE SERIES, 479 
winter time. If used when "green," the stone easily falls to pieces 
through the action of frost, &c. The yellow oolitic freestone dries paler 
and almost white in tint. The stone is suitable for outside facings, and 
tracery, and for all inside work. 
Speaking generally, the Bath Stone, which is comparatively soft and 
moist when mined, hardens on exposure. It is said that a cubic foot of 
the stone will absorb one gallon of water. The best stone will stand a 
weight of about 70 tons to the square foot. 
The Stone from Lodge Hill, Combe Down, was used in the restoration 
of Heary YII.'s Chapel at Westminster (1819). That from Baynton 
(Bathampton) quarry, was used in the construction of Windsor Castle, 
and Bowood House. That from " Haselbury Quarre," Box (still worked 
by the Bath Stone Firms), was used in Malmesbury Abbey, Laycock 
Abbey, and the mansion of Longleat. That from Drewes Quarry, Monk- 
ton Farley, was used in Buckingham Palace (1827).* Corsham Ridge 
Stone was used in the .Royal Aquarium, at Westminster. 
Bath Stone was employed in the building of the Royal College of 
Physicians (1824), Apsley House, Piccadilly (1828), Exeter Hall, &c. 
The Stone at Minchinhampton has been very extensively quarried, and 
here there are no protecting beds of clay. (See p. 278.) 
The Weatherstone, is a hard oolitic and shelly limestone, of coarse 
aspect, and sandy in places, but very durable when dried by exposure to 
the sun. The stone does not readily absorb water, and consequently it 
resists the action of frost. A careful selection is however necessary .f 
White limestone, hard and compact (like the White Lias of the Rheetic 
Bed) was used by the Romans to form tesserae for pavements. Examples 
have been obtained at Cirencester and probably at Silchester, though of 
course it is almost impossible to definitely fix the age of the rock used, 
from the small fragments preserved. Some of these hard beds, which 
belong to the Great Oolite, are obtained, as in the neighbourhood of 
Cirencester, for paving ; and other beds are used for building and walling ; 
but Bath Stone has been employed in the more important buildings, for 
quoins, sills, mullions, &c., as it is better able to withstand the frosb.J 
Building-stone of excellent quality has been obtained from Windrush, 
and Taynton, in the neighbourhood of Burford. At the former locality it 
has been mined, while at Taynton the stone was obtained in quarries at 
or near the surface. The remarkable false-bedded character of the 
Taynton or Teynton stone, may have led to the opinion that when used 
for building it is best surbedded, that is, set "edgewise, contrary to the 
posture it had in the quarry." (See p. 306.) 
The best stone is of a dark brown colour, and this occurs sometimes at 
the base and sometimes at the top. There is no reason to believe that all 
the good stone has been exhausted at this locality, but I was informed that 
the present owner (E. R. Wingfield, Esq., of Barrington) is not desirous 
of further breaking up the ground. The stone now obtained J& employed 
only on the estate. Building-blocks and crests for ridging are shaped ; 
and formerly, cisterns, troughs, coping-stones, &c., were produced. 
As remarked by Prof. Hull, " The freestone at Tainton quarries has 
furnished the stone for some of the oldest buildings at Oxford, viz., those 
of the 12th, 13th, and 14th centuries, and is still in good preservation; 
the mouldings being sharper and less weathered than of some buildings of 
the 17th and 18th centuries, which are cut out of blocks from Heddington 
Hill quarries, near Oxfoi'd."|| Thus it has been used in the ancient 
parts of the Cathedral (Christ Church), in Merton College and Chapel, 
also in Blenheim Palace. 
* See Report -with reference to the Selection of Stone for building the New 
Houses of Parliament, 1839 ; and the Builder, Sept. 18, 1858. 
f Lycett, Proc. Cotteswold Club, vol. i. p. 17. 
J J. Bravender, in Hunt's Mineral Statistics, Part II. for 1858, 1860, p. 154. 
See Plot's, Oxfordshire, p. 77. 
j| See Hull, Geol. of the country around Cheltenham, p. 58. 
