ARCHITECTURE.
CHAPTER III.
THE WINDOW.—GIRDERS, TIES, AND BUTTRESSES.—THE TUNNEL.—THE SUSPENSION-BRIDGE.
The Window, and its Modifications according to Climate.—Bars and Tracery.—The Wheel-window and the Caddis.—Curious Structure of the Caddis-tube.—Object of its Window.—The Girder as applied to Architecture.—The Radius and Ulna.—The Tie as applied to Architecture, and its Value.—Combination of the Tie and Girder.—Structure of the Crystal Palace.—Leaf of the Victoria Regia.—A Gardener turned Architect.—The Buttress in Art and Nature.—The Tunnel used as a Passage of Communication.—Natural Tunnel of the Ship-worm.—The Thames Tunnel.—The Piddock, or Pholas.—The Driver-ant.—The Suspension-bridge.—The Palm-wine Maker and his Bridge.—Suspension-bridges of Borneo and South America.—The Creepers and the Monkey Tribes.—The Spider and Little Ermine Caterpillar.
The Window.
HAVING traced, though but superficially, the chief parts of a building, such as the walls, the door which is opened through the walls, and the roof which shelters them, we naturally come to the Windows by which light is admitted to them, and enemies excluded.
There are, perhaps, few points in Architecture in which such changes have been made as in the Window, which, instead of being a difficulty in the way of the architect, is now valued as a means of increasing the beauty of the building. Taking for example even such advanced specimens of Architecture as those furnished by Egypt, Greece, and Rome, we find that the Window is either absent altogether, its place being supplied by a hole in the roof, or that, when it is present, it was made quite subordinate to the pillars and similar ornaments of the building.
This fact is, perhaps, greatly owing to the influence of climate. In the parts of the world which have been mentioned in connection with this subject, light and heat appear to be rather enemies than friends, and the object of the architect was to enable the inhabitants of his houses to avoid rather than to welcome both. Consequently, the Windows were comparatively insignificant. They were not needed for the purposes of light or air, those being generally furnished by the aperture in the roof, and consequently were kept out of sight as much as possible.
But when architects had to build for a sterner, a colder, and a darker clime, where the sun never assumed that almost devouring heat and light which in hot countries drive the inhabitants to invent endless devices for obtaining coolness and shade, a different style of Architecture sprang up. In this the Window became nearly the most prominent part of the building: the elements were excluded by glass instead of stone, and the principal modifications of light were obtained by staining the glass in various rich colours. Perhaps the Window has attained its culminating point in the Crystal Palace, which is all window except its foundations.
Partly in order to enable the glass to be inserted, and partly to increase the beauty of the building, and to avoid the mean appearance of Windows filled in with plain iron bars crossing each other at right angles, the interior of the Windows was adorned with stone “tracery,” varying much according to the epoch of the building.
