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is produced in the whole, and the minutest examination presents a never-ending variety, by which the first impression is extended and maintained. The whole of these architectural restorations are being executed under the direction of Mr. Savage, of Essex Street. When completed, this ancient edifice will become an additional ornament to the metropolis—a perfect and unrivalled specimen of the olden time. But the restoration of this beautiful church is not the only good which the liberality of the Societies of the Temple will have effected; they have been the means of proving what may and can be done by the artists and artizans of England, when taste directs and liberality remunerates. Such an example, set in such an edifice, will, in all probability, have a powerful effect in the progress of church decoration in all its departments. LAND SURVEYING—THE SCALING INSTRUMENT. Sir—Though having had something to do with the improvement of the new scaling instrument, now used in the Tithe Commission Office, yet I do not feel called on seriously to contradict the assertions of “Surveyor,” which appeared in your last month’s publication. Nor would I presume to obtrude the following observations on your pages, if the remarks that called them forth had not a tendency to contravene the great principle upon which your very useful work is professedly based. It appeared that your valuable publication was to be made the great reservoir wherein to deposit the beneficent contributions that freely emanate from the generous and communicative head of genius, and from which source, those valuable contributions may be made liberally to circulate for the noble and philanthropic purpose of giving increased facility to the practical efforts of such persons as may not be so largely endowed with the inventive faculty. Some few however there are to be found so exceedingly contuma cious—so irresistably wedded to old prejudices—and so very vain of their fancied perfections in their several professions, that, like the barbarian Chinese, they reject with affected scorn every proposed im provement, the adoption of which would involve them in the painful and humiliating admission, that there existed such a monster as a superior ! With “Surveyor,” continuous labour is professedly preferable to ease and dispatch. If labour be the consequence of a “ curse,” every inventive ability given and exercised, to remove or lessen that physi cal incubus, evinces a disposition somewhere to lighten the anathema: but if the stand still or retrograde movement stupidly advocated by « Surveyor,” be acted on, we must be content (though human necessi ties daily increase) painfully to endure the miserable infliction: we must be satisfied to spend months at the drudgery of trigonometrical, or astronomical, or other calculations in the old.way, rather than avail ourselves of the “ ready reckoner” or the log books prepared by a Napier or a Newton—lest the month’s labour should be diminished to so many days—and that we might not dishonourably substitute the easy effort of the boy, for the overstrained and painful exertions of the man!! But we tell “Surveyor” that there is not the slightest chance that his intimation will have any effect. And likewise, that the advocates of all petty interests and monopolies, however they may frown and storm in their pigmy habiliments, must bow the neck to the over whelming force of successful improvement and reform. From the self-conttdent tone of “ Surveyor,” one would be led to suppose that he would willingly submit to a fair trial between his old method and the application of the instrument; if it were only for the purpose of convincing other persons who have given it a trial, that he was sincere in his rejection of it; and that he had no sinister motive for giving public expression to the act of “laying it on the shelf.” I now confidently assert that the same quantity of average work may be done twice with the instrument, for once that it can be done by “Surveyor’s” method, and with a much greater degree of accuracy, and defy him to the practical disproof upon any fair conditions he may propose. One can scarcely suppress the full ebulition of his risible faculties on reading the latter part of his letter, at his puerile attempt to touch the high reputation of a notable and eminent engineer, by his (“ Sur veyor’s”) generous offer of a lesson at the chain. From such a sample we may expect that the next unsolicited proposal of this astonishing preceptor will be, to instruct some ot the first literary characters of the day in the letters of the alphabet. On this point, however, it is apparent that the very limited extent of his own acquirements has rendered him incapable of recognizing or appreciating the full extent and variety of, individual acquisition. With these few remarks I beg to conclude, hoping that if “ Sur veyor” should again have any desire for entering your columns, that he will do so with a single eye to the main object of your Journal, and not under the mere influence of selfish or vindictive passions. I have the honour to remain, Sir, Your very obedient servant, B. T. C. O. December 24, 1840. REVIEWS. (Continued from page 16.) A Practical Inquiry into the Laws of Excavation and Embankment upon Railways, <j-c. By a Resident Assistant Engineer. London: Saunders and Otley, 1840. (Second Notice.) The remaining part of this work which we have announced our in tention of noticing, is devoted to the investigation of the barrowing system, in which the author proposes to give the result of his inquiry into the subordinate system of removing earth by means of wheel barrows and human labour. We regret that even the small share of praise we felt justified in bestowing on the first part of the treatise cannot be extended to the part now before us. And in order that our readers may the better judge in what degree the author is warranted in the strong contrast which he draws between his own labours in this field of inquiry, and those of former writers, we shall present them with an extract from his works, rather out of its true position, namely, the concluding paragraph, in which he glances with some contempt at the efforts of his predecessors, and turns with infinite complacency to the superiority, in all respects, of the process which he has himself employed. It will also be seen, that the principles upon which former authors at tempted to develope the general laws of excavation and embankment, were evidently adopted, without any reference to the practical working of the sys tem ; and, that the mode of making their observations, (whenever they were made), was much too isolated, for the purpose of affording an expanded and comprehensive view of the various agencies—collateral and direct—which are continually acting, one upon the other, and by which the ultimate results are collectively influenced. The error into which they have fallen, seems to have consisted in assuming, as their constants, quantities in the abstract; or in observing in detail, instead of the aggregate : and adopting the results of these separate observations, as if entirely independent one of the other : and therefore it is not to be wondered at, that many matters, essential to the thorough sifting of the subject, were altogether excluded ; and that the argu ments founded upon these self-begotten phenomena, led them to a belief, in the inverse ratio to probability, if not of possibility itself. Thus, the ante cedents being widely unconnected, and, from their number, subject to fre quent error; the consequents derived from their combination, turned out utterly fallacious. The method we have pursued is exactly the reverse; our coustants depend upon observations, made upon the combined effects, pro duced by the various agencies in the aggregate ; and, by an analysis of these we have descended, step hv step, to the details ; and not advanced, from the minutite of detail to abstract generalities, which have no foundation in truth We shall reserve till the end of our review the observations we have to make upon the boasting presumption of the latter sentence, remarking merely, in the mean time, that a more, complete delusion never entered into the mind of man than that which seems to have taken possession of our author, when he imagines that he has made any thing like an analysis of the subject of which he is treating. His process has been on the contrary purely synthetical, and we fear that rarely have such weighty and important conclusions been based upon such a miserably scanty foundation. The experimental part of this investigation commences with three experiments, from which our author derives the following fact: “ that the mean time spent in filling a ban-row, wheeling it four runs of twenty- live yards each, and returning with the empty barrow, is 5' 45". He then gives two experiments which determine 7' 20" for the time spent in filing one barrow, wheeling it four runs of twenty-five yards each, and returning with the empty barrow, including also the tune spent infilling the same barrow a second lime, and wheeling it forward two runs. Hence taking the difference of these two times, the author makes 7'20"—5’ 45'—1' 35", the times which elapsed in filling one barrow and wheeling it forward two runs, or which is the same thing, 1' 35"— the time of hlling a barrow, wheeling it one run, and returning with the empty barrow. E 2
