Volltext Seite (XML)
As far as I have seen it, most of our building work in the East is not cred.table to our taste, though it bears witness to our energy and vigour. It is unmistakeably European, but of a very bad type. N ow the proper corrective is not, I hold, the direct imitation of Asiatic types, but the adoption of those European styles which have grown up in sunshiny regions. Such styles are ancient Roman, or even Greek, when adequate materials and workmanship are procurable; or the Renaissance and Gothic of Southern Italy or Spain, or the early Gothic of Sotuhern France. In treating any of these styles, and, still more, in treating any more Northerly modifications, a leaning towards the peculiarities of the best Oriental styles is desirable. Among these peculiarities tie following may be enumerated as frequently found :—Walls of ample thickness, often covered with a profusion of delicate surface ornament, frequently beau tifully coloured; an absence of such vertical breaks as but tresses, and a prevalence of horizontal cornices and level projections; openings, usually wide and frequent, artistically grouped, often filled in with exquisite pierced patterns; mouldings infrequent ; balconies and various sorts of corbel- lings, covered usually with carving ; roofs of low pitch, flat or domical; walls, often replaced entirely by lines of piers or columns for the most part, and, with some notable exceptions, moderate height, but usually great extent and elaborate sur roundings : the whole has an aspect of breadth, of richness, and of ample shade. In concluding, I should like to throw out the hint that these peculiarities may be found worked out in the most perfect manner, and with complete adaptation to the exigencies of a fiery climate, in the best of the Mahonnnedan buildings, which mark, as I should like ours to do, the residence in India of a conquering race—a race, alas, far more artistic than we, and whose works are nobler monuments of art than it can be hoped ours may be. Many of the finest of those fast-decaying and ill- protected works, those at Ahmedabad, are partly represented by means of photography, and so available for study; and if, in addition to affording such information as at least a few of our members may find useful and interesting, I shall have succeeded by again pointing out these works, which have been already described here, in inducing architectural students to dig in this hitherto all but unexplored mine, I shall have the gratification of knowing that this paper has not been quite barren of results. HAVRE EXHIBITION. In the galleries of the Exhibition the marine group natu rally occupies the place of honour, namely, the vestibule and the front galleries to the right, which present a very attractive ap pearance, most of the models and machines being well got up, and the gallery being decorated with the gay flags of the Inter national Commercial Code of Signals ; and here, at Havre, it may be stated, visitors may see the working of the new coast semaphores and telegraphs. On the summit of the horseshoe shaped range of hills on and between which Sainte Adresse, the pretty rural neighbour of the busy town of Havre, is almost hidden amongst magnificent trees, stand a pair of twin light houses, which, with two others on the jetties of Havre, guide ships into the port; close by the former stands a tall mast, with elaborate rigging, a semaphore, and a telegraphic station. A ship in distress, or the commander of which desires to commu nicate with any port of the Continent, opens communication, by means of the new signals, with the semaphore, and may send or receive a dispatch from Paris, Berlin, and St. Petersburg, with the aid of the electric telegraph beneath the semaphore. These stations are, however, not confined to maritime dispatches ; the electric telegraph is in connection with the station at Havre, and messages are also received at the semaphore house itself. This station, perched upon a hill, nearly 200 feet above the level of the sea, seems to be very complete in all its arrangements, Havre being one of the most important towns on the French coast. We have also visited another of these stations, that which is placed on the top of the steep hill of Cette, and looks out on the waters of the blue Mediterranean, and the arrangements, although on a smaller scale, are equally complete. This system of inter national signals, and that of the coast semaphores, with their electric companions, certainly form together one of the most honourable achievements of the century. The marine gallery of the Havre Exhibition is peculiarly re markable in the same direction: almost every step brings to view some means of improving communication or saving human life. One of the subjects which seem to occupy much attention at the present moment in France and England is the establishment of instantaneous and certain communication be tween the officer in command of a ship, the steersman, and the engineer. There are six systems to be seen at work here, five of which have been employed, more or less, in the two coun tries and elsewhere, and one, quite new, which is a modifica tion of a former system. We believe the first English appa ratus of the kind was electric, but that this mode has been abandoned; at any rate, the three systems shown by British exhibitors are all mechanical, the communication being made either by chains or by rods and cog-wheels, while the French apparatus are electric and pneumatic. It is not in our pro vince to pass judgment on these various plans, but it will be interesting to many of our readers to state the effects which are common to nearly all those apparatus. The commander of the ship gives his orders by moving the pointer on a dial plate ; a bell rings, and the steersman or the engineer has the order repeated to him on a similar dial; when the order has been executed, a reply is given by the striking of a bell, or, what is better, the rudder or the engine itself records the fact on the commander’s dial; and, in one case, a small dial keeps constantly before the commander’s eye the direction and the speed of the engines, registered by themselves. All this may seem complicated, but the fact that the cost of one of these apparatus rarely exceeds £50 for a large vessel, dispels, to some extent, the supposition. There are many other maritime signals, for general purposes, shown by French, English, and American inventors. The collection of optical and other marine instruments, chro nometers, &c., is considerable, especially from French exhibi tors ; the English specimens, although of a very high character, are not so numerous as might fairly be expected in a town of such importance. Among special instruments may be mentioned Albini’s patent self-registering compass. Beneath the compass is placed a chronometer, and at the back of the latter are rollers which carry a band of paper, over which is a circular slip of carbonised paper ; the under edge of the compass card is provided with brass figures representing all the degrees of the compass, and once a minute, by a simple arrangement, the card is slightly pressed down and marks its position on the paper band. The principal value of the arrangement is to show what deviations have taken place in the course of a ship during any given lapse of time, but it would also show the direction of the ship’s head in the case of collision ; and in that of a vessel moored by means of two an chors getting them fouled or twisted, the registering compass would show the direction of the swinging and the number of times that the cables had been crossed. The submarine lunette is the application of a wellknown principle of the examination of the hull of a ship under water ; at the lower extremity of a large iron pipe is placed a large glass towards the ship’s side, and behind this is a mirror, as in a camera obscura, which reflects the image to the eye of the ob server at the upper end of the tube. The collection of life-saving apparatus is large, from the sim ple cork jacket and life-preserver to the boats and apparatus of the French and English societies. Amongst the means of saving life are an American liferaft, like that which crossed the Atlantic, and appeared at the Paris Exhibition last year; several life boats, and models of such boats, and a simple life-preserver, called “ Podoscaphe,” a flat buoyant object, boat-shaped, with a hole large enough for a man’s body near the centre, and a small staff, for a sail and signal of distress. Amongst life-saving ap paratus may well be enumerated means of lowering boats in bad weather, of which there are several in the exhibition, French, English, and American, deserving attention. There is a considerable show of ship medicine-chests, French and English, a collecton which deserves attention, not so much perhaps from any essential differences, as from the fact that it is stated that other ships, on account of more strict surveil lance, go to sea better provided in this respect than those which bear the British flag. We have no means of ascertaining the truth of the assertion, but we are convinced of the prevalence of the opinion,'; and in such a case, the more publicity is given to the charge the sooner will it be refuted, or the fault cor rected. In small ships, that do not carry a medical man, the medicine-chest and its appliances are of the utmost import-