Nature and Art, August 1, 1866.] 
THE PARIS EXHIBITION, 1867. 
83 
South Kensington building. The double dotted 
lines, radiating from the centre, represent secondary 
avenues or passages for the public. It should be 
mentioned that the avenue leading from the chief 
entrance, which is at the lower end of our diagram, 
is made wider than the other avenues, in order to 
allow for grand effects in that portion of the 
building. These avenues supply the means of direct 
ingress and egress to and from all parts of the 
building, and are therefore arranged radially as 
described. The courts, or galleries as they are 
called — the new building possessing the immense 
advantage of being entirely on one floor, and there- 
fore having no staircases and no dark shadows from 
upper floors — are arranged in rings or zones, as seen 
in the diagram. In the centre is a garden, with 
an open colonnade all round it, which will supply 
an agreeable retreat from the crowded galleries at 
times when old Sol regards weak mortals with too 
much fervour. 
The first small zone or gallery, that which 
immediately surrounds the central garden, is to be 
devoted to the History of W orkmanship ; in fact, a 
retrospective museum of the art manufacture of all 
nations, from the earliest times to the past century. 
The second gallery, of considerably larger propor- 
tions, is to contain works of fine art, painting, 
sculpture, engraving, architecture. Next to this, 
again, is a smaller gallery, for the exhibition of 
the materials and practical applications of art ; in 
short, all that appertains to the fine arts in any 
way. These three galleries form one portion of 
the building, and their walls are of solid stone, in 
order to exclude as far as possible the dust and 
noise, which are almost inevitable where large 
crowds are collected. A considerable portion of 
these walls is erected, and the forms of the 
galleries are now clearly marked out. 
The next three, or “ Intermediate galleries,” as 
they are called, are to be devoted to the exhibition 
of raw materials and ordinary manufactures of all 
kinds. Two of these are constracted of cast iron, 
and present no special features. 
Lastly, we arrive at the great outer zone, the 
machinery court, or great nave as it is called, in 
which are to be exhibited, not only the machinery, 
but processes of all kinds, whether aided by 
mechanism or dependent solely on the fingers of 
the workmen. We have explained the views of 
the Imperial Commission on this head, in our 
previous article in the first number of Nature 
and Art ; we will now attempt to convey some 
notion of this grand feature of the Exhibition 
building. The outer wall of the great nave will 
form the exterior of the building, and will conceal 
all the inner galleries from view. This stupendous 
hall of industry will be 107 feet wide, 82 feet high, 
and 4,500 feet, or about four-fifths of a mile, in 
length. In order, as before, to have the benefit of 
comparison, we may state that the principal nave 
of the Exhibition building of 1862 was 85 feet 
wide, 100 feet high, and 800 feet long. The 
superficial area of the floor of the former will be 
rather more than seven times that of the latter. 
This great nave, with its lateral galleries, of 
which we shall speak lower down, is being erected 
in three sections, simultaneously, by different con- 
tractors. In consequence of the immense size of 
this portion of the building, the engineers who 
designed it wisely determined to construct it of 
wrought iron ; and every portion of the pillars, 
roof girders, in fact, all the parts, with the single 
exception of the window-frames, are made of iron 
plates riveted together like those of a steam-boiler. 
The great pillars are rectangular, about eighty- 
five feet high, and two feet by four at their bi'oadest 
part. They are prepared in the workshops of the 
contractors, one of whom brings them on to the 
ground all complete, while the others convey them 
there in three sections, which are riveted together 
on the spot. The foundation for each of these 
pillars is carefully prepared beforehand ; an iron 
shoe of the form of the base of the pillar being 
firmly secured by masonry set in concrete ; the 
pillar is then raised by means of a crab or windlass, 
and, when erect, its foot is securely bolted to the 
shoe in which it is to stand for the next two years 
at least. There will be eighty-six pairs of these 
gigantic pillars, each pair being connected by a 
great curved girder, and by a pair of tie-rods above, 
which, in their places, look like threads stretched 
across from pillar to pillar, but which are in fact 
110 feet long, and nearly as thick as a man’s wrist. 
When finished, there will be nothing between the 
floor of this grand gallery and its curved roof. The 
roof is covered with stout corrugated iron plates, 
the waves being about twice as wide and deep as 
in ordinary corrugated iron, and is unpierced, the 
nave being lighted from the sides. The whole of 
the upper portion of the spaces between the columns 
will be filled with light iron window-frames, so that 
there will be a complete clerestory all round, both 
on the inner and outer side of the nave. The upper 
ends of the pillars will be masked by iron or wood 
work forming a running frieze all round the outside 
and decorated with slight ornaments, but the build- 
ing will not present any great architectural effect ; 
it will be simple in appearance and in good keeping 
with the object for which it is intended. 
In order not to interfere with the description of 
the great Machinery Court or nave, we have pur- 
posely avoided above any special mention of the 
lateral portions of this zone or section of the build- 
ing, but they are extremely important parts of the 
structure itself, and one of them will form a very 
interesting feature as regards both the appearance 
of the building and the convenience of the public. 
Beyond the great Machinery Court, and outside the 
outline given in our woodcut, is a series of small 
pillars supporting lattice girders, with large brackets 
in all the angles ; there are two of these small pillars 
to each of the great pillars. The whole of this 
portion is also of wrought iron, and its great object 
is to give support to the main building and relieve 
the girders and tie-rods above from a portion of the 
enormous strain which would otherwise fall upon 
them ; this small outer gallery represents, in fact, 
the flying buttresses in a Gothic building. 
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