THE COAST LINE OF THE LONDON AND DOVER RAILWAY. THE energy displayed by the South-Eastern Railway Company in the formation of this portion of their line was acknowledged by the Cinque Ports Corporations in a banquet given by them to celebrate its completion. On that occasion, amongst the various mottos which decorated the apartments used for the festival, was the following "The Homage of Dover to Energy and Talent; and seldom has tribute of respect been more justly bestowed, for works of greater extent or more extraordinary character than those which the line exhibits have rarely been undertaken. On leaving the vale of Folkstone, the railway crosses the Foord stream by a lofty viaduct of seventeen arches, and taking a northerly direction, enters, by the Folkstone tunnel, the flank of that magnificent range of chalk hills which extends from Portsmouth, No. 787. through the southern counties, to the sea between the South Foreland and the town of Folkstone, where it forms a bold escarpment about twelve miles in length, and varying in height from two to six hundred feet. Along the first seven miles of this precipitous and lofty line the railway has been carried; and this has been done by tunnelling three of the larger headlands, blowing the smaller ones into the sea, carrying a seawall on the "unnumbered idle pebbles" which lie at the feet of others, and hewing immense cuttings through the slips and dislocations of the more chaotic masses; all of which have been accomplished with great apparent ease, though in the face of enormous and varied difficulties, by means of the irresistible power of sci entific skill aided by ample capital. The Folkstone tunnel is seven hundred and sixtysix yards in length, with an inclination of about one foot in two hundred and sixty-four-which is that of the rest of the line to Dover. For the most part the VOL. XIII.-2 L · chalk through which it is pierced is very 'shingly' in its character, wet, and a good deal mixed with a debris of blue clay and other argillaceous substances. The cutting of the tunnels was consequently a work of much difficulty, and there was a constant struggle with springs and noxious vapours. Nothing of any greater geological interest was found during this or the succceding excavations than lumps of pyrites, sold by the labourers as potato stones' or diamond nutmegs,' and preserved by the peasants of the neighbourhood as mantel-piece ornaments or cabalistic wonders. The interior or bore' of the tunnel is now well bricked; it is ventilated by several draft-towers; and-what struck us as a very useful adaptation of a recent invention the roof is drained throughout by sheets of fluted zinc, bent to the shape of the arch, each flute of the zinc acting as a gutter to carry off the drip. By this means passengers are effectually protected against wet, and the roadway of the tunnel is kept perfectly dry. five or six exceptions, an inclination inland of some two hundred feet or more, forming an irregular bay. Across this rugged and unequal bottom a surface had to be cleared, and a superstructure reared sufficiently strong to resist the action of the waves, high enoug to be beyond the reach of the spray, and at a point so far removed from the actual face of the cliff as to be beyond the reach of falling chalk, which, after wet and frosty seasons, sometimes slips from the superficial layers. In effecting these objects, obstacles of the most extraordinary and apparently insuperable character have been overcome. Several cliffs were found to project so much on the course of the line, and others were discovered to be so loose in their composition, that it became necessary to remove them altogether. This was accomplished in the case of the Round Down Cliff-a noble headland-and some others, by charges of gunpowder fired by galvanic action. Here, then, where billows roared, and the restless fuci scarcely found a point to fix their fibres upon, a road-a "pleasure line"-has been formed, as clear, as dry, and as safe as any old-established turnpike-road in the neighbourhood. On leaving the tunnel, the line enters the great cutting known as the Warren,' a romantic undercliff of about two miles' length, running parallel with the sweep of East Weir Bay. Perhaps no more wonder- The sea-wall conducts the line for a mile to the ful scene of wild natural beauty in connection with so southern face of Shakspere's Cliff, whose mighty mass, imposing a display of industrial enterprise is to be abutting in a huge promontory on the sea, seemed to seen in the world than the Warren presents, viewed forbid all farther progress in that direction. Its subfrom the summit of the Folkstone tunnel, a point stance, too-such was the nature of its chalk-was found which is reached by a precipitous sheep-walk from the to be opposed to ordinary tunnelling operations: its texNo. I. Martello,' north of the harbour. Beneath the ture was crumbly'-its mass was cut up by slips and eye, at the base of a line of cliffs five or six hundred fissures-and the whole mountain was devoid of those feet in height, lies a belt of smaller cliffs, each one girders of flint which in ordinary cases bind the great broken from its fellow, and occasionally tumbled one chalk formations together. What, then, could be upon another in confused groups. Through this rocky done? To have turned the position, by building a cirwilderness the road is cut to a depth of about one hun-cuitous wall round it, was impossible; and to have dedred feet. The bottom is a firm dry rock; the sides stroyed this cliff by gunpowder would, from its poetic are inclined at an angle of seventy degrees, and are association, have been considered, at the present time, "as smooth as a deal board." The colouring of the as a crime almost akin to sacrilege. In this difficulty scene is of striking beauty. The chalk, stained by the sailor's motto of "go through it" was adopted, impregnations of iron, presents a blended picture of and, in spite of aN the difficulties and of the opinions bright red and yellowish tints, alternating with whites, of its impracticability, a tunnel was commenced, and and relieved in their seasons by patches of mares- after a while a tunnel was made-and a very beautiful tail (Equisetum palustre), thrift (Statice Armeria), one it is, and perhaps, likewise, the safest that has the sea sunflower (Cistus Helianthemum), and some yet been constructed. This arises from its being a other marine plants of florid character. During double one; for the peculiar impediments of the the calms of summer, also, the serene silence which passage made it necessary to increase the ordinary size ordinarily rests upon a sea-side landscape seems to of the opening, and this again involved the need of a become more intense here by the contrast furnished central support for the superincumbent weight. The in the abrupt passage of a train, which, as it pursues complete tunnel is formed of two pointed parabolic its rapid course, sends a thousand reverberating thun- arches, twice the usual height, soundly built of five or ders through the adjacent hills, and then subsides to six layers of brick, and from end to end measuring stillness more suddenly than even the lazy flight of 1417 yards. The ventilation, which is very perfect, is the choughs and crows, which, for a moment scared from secured by seven shafts communicating with the top their nests, wheel a hasty circle in the midway air, of the cliff, and by occasional arches in the central and straightway drop to rest again. pier. After passing the Warren, the line enters the Abbot's Cliff Tunnel, a stupendous work one thousand eight hundred and fifty-seven yards in length, cut through chalk of so compact a structure as almost to rival limestone in hardness. This tunnel is nearly six hundred feet below the top of the cliffs, about twelve feet above high-water mark, and one hundred and fifty feet from the sea. It is partly bricked, and is well-drained, and ventilated by side galleries opening in the face of the cliff. Our engraving shows a view of it from the Warren. A zigzag walk at the back, through beds of samphire and wild cabbage, leads to the top of Abbot's Head, where splendid views of the coast of France, and of our own coast to Dungeness Point, are obtained. On emerging from the tunnel, the sea-wall is reached. This is a structure of concrete, built on the spreading and partially submerged feet of the cliffs, which, from the tunnel-mouth to Shakspere's Cliff, have, with Leaving the tunnel, the line arrives at a loose shingly beach, on which the sea continually beats, and in rough weather with great violence. Here, however, the intrepid engineer, by adapting his resources to the peculiar exigencies of the case, has succeeded in erecting a safe and convenient road. A sea-wall would not in this instance have served the purpose: the sea would have washed it away. But where a solid structure would have failed, a light open timber-work framing, carrying the rails on an elevated platform, bas been found to answer every requirement. A wooden viaduct, exposed to the fury of a south-wester, is in fact as safe as Waterloo Bridge. The mighty obstacles of sea and land had now been conquered-the line had reached to the very threshold of Dover: but, before it could enter its venerable walls, an impediment of another description had to be overcome. At the end of the Dover viaduct, and concealing the town from view, stands a small rock, sur mounted by a fort, called, from its position, the Archcliff Fort. To carry the line into the town, this rock, not twenty feet in width, had to be tunnelled; but so great was the repugnance of the military authorities against having what was terined one of the defences of the country" exposed even to apparent danger, that after the Company had surmounted every other difficulty, they were forbidden to take this the last step of their arduous journey. This difficulty was not removed without much trouble and delay, but at last, after many months of negotiation and dispute, the locomotive flag was planted on the chalk of the Archcliff, the souterraine was carried, the railway completed, and finally, on the sixth day of February last, the friends of the Company, with the writer of these notes, had the pleasure of celebrating their entire success, by riding through the fort-tunnel in the first train from London to Dover. ON FIGURE-CASTING IN BRONZE. A BRIEF account was given in No. 494 of the method of casting large statues in bronze or other metal, and of the numerous points of difficulty and delicacy involved in the process. We here give a few additional details connected more or less with the subject. It is rather curious that a compound of two particular metals should have been found especially adapted to three purposes so opposite and disconnected as statues, bells, and guns. Yet such is the case. Bronze, bell-metal, and gun-metal are all alloys of copper and tin, consisting of different proportions of the two ingredients, but always comprising much more copper than tin. Brass and other metals are sometimes added instead of the tin; and there does not seem to have been any good reason assigned why one mixture should be better than another, the whole having been developed simply by a series of trials, and individual opinion being left to settle the point. The early sculptors knew that by mixing tin with copper a metal is procured more fusible and much harder than copper alone; and they seem to have been led thereby to the employment of this mixed metal in casting statues. Indeed various articles, such as spears, daggers, belt-ornaments, axes, hammers, chisels, &c. found among ruins, testify that bronze was also employed in the fabrication of them. After the time of Alexander, the employment of bronze for statues became almost a passion, insomuch that the Greek and Roman towns became crowded with statues of great men. The island of Rhodes is said at one time to have contained nearly a hundred colossal statues in bronze. All those among the early writers who record the victories of the Romans over the Greeks after the time of Alexander, speak of the immense number of statues brought away by the conquerors; and it seems probable that this spoliation was the Source of a taste for such works of arts among the Romans. Augustus published an edict, to the effect that the statues erected during his reign to great men should remain, as an example to kings. It was from the time of this emperor to that of Nero that the art flourished most at Rome; after which it decayed slowly till the time of the irruption of the barbarians, when a stop was necessarily put to this as well as all other branches of the fine arts. The revival of the arts in Italy in later times, and especially the labours of Benvenuto Cellini, tended to raise the art of figure-casting again into importance; and it has ever since been carried on in the principal countries of Europe. Among the follies of the French Revolution was that of destroying all or most of the bronze statues which France contained; but when the people returned to their senses, many of these were re-erected, and new ones cast. It was an idea consistent with the notions of military glory entertained at that period, to cast honorary statues and columns with metal derived from guns taken in battle; the victory being thus commemorated doubly, both by the object itself and by the metal of which it was made. Some of the incidents attending these bronze foundings are curious, and well illustrate the niceties attending the art. We shall condense a few particulars from a French scientific work published a few years ago. One of the bronze statues cast by order of the French government was in honour of General Desaix. The execution was adjudged to the person who sent in the lowest estimate; and this person was a speculator who undertook to execute a colossal statue for a hundred thousand francs, exclusive of the bronze. He employed a bell-founder, who, not understanding the execution of so large a work, and calculating agreeably to the operations on the small scale to which he was accustomed, bound himself under forfeit to complete it for twenty thousand francs, stipulating at the same time that the sculptor should not be allowed to superintend the casting from the model, since this superintendence would (he probably thought) interfere with his profitable execution of the job. The model was formed by the sculptor, and placed in the hands of the bell-founder, who proceeded to fill up the hollow parts, to facilitate the process of casting; his framework, his furnaces, and all parts of the apparatus were in like manner formed in the cheapest and most inefficient manner, in accordance with the ideas of one who utterly misunderstood the nature of what he had to do. When the metal in the furnace was melted, the framework of the furnace tumbled to pieces, and the metal ran into the pit in such a way as to spoil the operation. Much metal was lost, and the founder had to begin again. He thought he should manage better if he were to cut the model to pieces, and make the cast in many distinct parts. He did so; but he used bronze of different qualities in the different castings, and these, by shrinking unequally, produced a whole in which all the proportions of the figure were changed, and a wretched failure resulted. Such was the result of employing the "lowest bidder" without sufficient guarantees. Another instance was that of the casting of the column in the Place Vendôme. A bargain was made with an iron-founder, who, though he had never before undertaken any work in bronze, agreed to mould and finish the column for one franc per kilogramme (rather more than four pence per pound); the government engaging on its part to supply a sufficient quantity of bronze from the cannon taken in the Austrian campaign of 1805. A celebrated chemist of that day advised both the government and the founder to cause an analysis to be made of the composition of the different pieces of ordnance, in order that an alloy might be made uniformly similar in every part of the column; but the advice was neglected on both sides. It was also suggested that a few preparatory trials would be expedient, to determine the best alloy, the best kind of loam for the casting, and the best modes of operating; but the ironfounder appears to have set to work without attending to the suggestion. A furnace similar to an iron-furnace was employed, and the bronze was melted in it; but from ignorance of the difference between the methods required for casting in iron and in bronze, the founder failed in the casting of many of the earlier pieces, and in recasting them his metal suffered change, and the different pieces were not alike in quantity. So much have been rubbed, and to imitate this is also one of the aims of modern art. A dry substance called gold powder or gold bronze (aurum musivum) is lightly applied to a surface previously coloured of a greenish tint, and a somewhat showy imitation is thus produced, which, when applied to plaster figures, has but little resemblance to the calm and sombre hue of the ancient bronzes. waste occurred in various ways, that when two-thirds | hue on the projecting parts of old bronzes, where they of the column were cast he found that all his metal was gone. Here was at once a sad perplexity; for the government had delivered to him the quantity of metal agreed on, and expected a complete column to be made from that quantity. In this dilemma he used up the scoriæ from the furnace, mixed with old brass and copper purchased at a cheap rate; but the pieces cast from this "forlorn hope" of the furnace were so full of holes and so badly coloured, that the government refused to take them the founder was full of trouble, and the government stopped his proceedings by putting a seal on his foundry. Subsequently a commission was appointed to examine the state of the accounts between the government and the founder. They found that a loss of ten per cent. as waste had been allowed to him, and that he had actually sold a little of the metal under the impression that the waste would be much less than this. Upon analyzing the pieces sent in, they found that about nine-tenths consisted of copper, threefourths of the remainder were tin, and a very minute quantity of lead, zinc, iron, and silver made up the other ingredients. These proportions, however, were not equal in all parts, for the pieces first cast were richer in copper than the standard required by the government, while the last pieces were of poorer quality. The pieces, too, were so badly east, that many tons of metal were chipped away in dressing them before fixing them in their places. By a sort of fatality which seemed to attend all the arrangements, the pieces were fixed up without due regard to the expansion resulting from the sun's heat; and much trouble was subsequently occasioned by this circum stance. One more example will tend to show the difficulties attendant on bronze-casting. After the fall of Napoleon, a bronze statue of Henri IV. was ordered to be cast by the French government, the materials for which were to be derived from several sources, viz., a statue of Napoleon which had been intended for the Boulogne monument, the bassi-relievi of the same monument, the statue of Desaix, and the statue of Napoleon which had till then surmounted the column in the Place de Vendôme. These were to be all melted together and cast into an equestrian statue of Henri Quatre, to be placed on the Pont-Neuf. As an error had been before committed by allowing a common founder to cast statues, it was resolved on the present occasion that the sculptor alone should have the management of the casting. This, however, was an error on the other side; for the sculptor was not acquainted with the temperatures at which different alloys of metal melt. He employed for melting the statues the same furnace which had before been employed for melting cannon; but the melting-point is different, and the same draught of furnace which was available for the one kind of metal would not do for the other. Much difficulty was experienced from this want of foresight, and the statue was not finished without many disappointments to all parties con cerned. Any one who has seen the ancient bronzes, such as those at the British Museum, must have observed a delicate greenish bloom or down on the surfaces. This is called by the French verde antique; and many attempts have been made to imitate it. But as this peculiar tint is probably the result of the action of the atmosphere on the metal during a long series of years, the artificial production of a similar appearance on new metal can be no more than partially successful. There is likewise a kind of rich and somewhat golden A new statue of Napoleon was put up by Louis Philippe on the Vendôme column in 1833. A remark may be made in conclusion respecting a suggestion made a few years ago for the establishment of National Collections of Casts in England. Mr. Wilson communicated to the Scottish Society of Arts, about six years ago, a paper on the nature and extent of the encouragement which an enlightened government should afford to the fine arts. After alluding to the advantages which artists derive from the study of ancient sculptures in Italy, and to the classical taste which such study engenders, Mr. Wilson draws attention to the desirability of government procuring casts of all the celebrated statues and busts from various quarters, and establishing collections of them in various parts of the country. He says, "The collection of sculptures in the British Museum has been a prodigious benefit to art, but this benefit is almost entirely confined to London: few students from the provinces can afford to visit the metropolis; and, as a means of generally diffusing taste throughout the country, museums in London are of little avail. Provincial galleries must be opened: meritorious efforts are making in this way, but the difficulty of procuring easts sadly impedes these efforts." These views are supported by an opinion which Dr. Waagen expressed before the Committee on the Arts of Design-"The best way of forming the taste of the people is by the establishment of accessible collections of the most remarkable monuments of antiquity and of the middle ages. In the capital of the country there should be the chief collection; but it is injurious when all is centralized and confined within the capital; it is also useful, as is partly the case in France, and intended to be in Prussia, to establish subordinate collections in the principal towns in the country. The principle on which such collections should be formed is, that the monuments of the best period, both of ancient and modern art, which are too expensive and two costly to be possessed by private amateurs, should more especially be placed in a public collection. Collections can only propagate taste and art in a nation, when every man can daily and hourly find free access to the collections of art." The Scottish Society of Arts passed a series of resolutions fully approving the principles involved in Mr. Wilson's suggestions. Supply of Air to the Roots of Plants.-The breaking up of the surface of cultivated land, either by the plough, spade, of hoe, for the reception of seeds or plants, is a process so universally practised and indispensable for the well-being of the crops intended to be raised thereon, that it may be deemed incredible that so common and simple an affair should not be universally understood. The surface of the earth is one of the sources whence plants obtain the elemental food requisite for their development, and certain conditions of this surface are absolutely dispensable both to the fibrous roots which are extended in the Humidity, heat, and air, in due proportions, are inearth, and to the head of the plant expanded in the air. There is more danger, however, from the excess of moisture than from the extremes of either heat or air; because, when the soil is saturated with water, the access of the general air and its gaseous properties is excluded, and the delicate fibres, imprisoned and choked, it may be said, for want of breath, must in such cases necessarily languish.-Journel of Agriculture. necessary. [1, Sambucaria; 2, Lunaria; 3, Vanaria; 4, Papilionarius; 5, Syringaria; 6, Amataria; 7, Defoliaria.] CURIOSITIES OF BRITISH NATURAL HISTORY. BRITISH MOTHS-continued. THE group of moths at the head of this article all belong to the family Geometridæ, or the geometric group of Stephens, the term applying to the caterpillars, and not the perfect insects. 1. The Swallow-tail moth (Ourapteryx Sambucaria), perfect insect, caterpillar, and pupa. The genus Ourapteryx was established by Dr. Leach, and contains only one European and six exotic species. The most remarkable character, and which at once distinguishes this form, consists in the form of the posterior wings, which terminate each in an elongated tail-like process, as in several diurnal butterflies. The Swallow-tail moth is spread over the whole of Europe, and is not uncommon in woods and gardens in our island: it is frequent about Paris. The flight of this moth is extremely rapid, as might be inferred from the extent and form of its wings, but it is seldom or never seen abroad by day, the hours of evening, dusk, and those just preceding the dawn of day being its times of activity. The caterpillar is a strange-looking creature of an elongated form; it is in the habit of adhering to the stem of a tree or bush by means of its posterior claspers, while it extends itself at a considerable angle from its support, appearing at first sight like a broken twig. It is of a cinnamon brown colour, furrowed longitudinally, and presenting three tubercles, two placed laterally on the sixth ring, and the other on the ninth. It lives principally on fruit-trees: it is said to feed on the leaves of the Elder, whence the name Sambucaria, but there is reason for doubting the truth of this fact. The pupa is remarkable for suspending itself from a branch by means of several delicate filaments of silk, to which a frail cocoon is attached, consisting of loose silk, among which bits of dry leaves are thickly interwoven, so that it resembles a loose packet of withered foliage. The pupa is presented thus suspended in its cocoon in the accompanying group of pictorial specimens. The moth comes forth at the end of June or the beginning of July; its colouring is as follows:-the four wings are of a pale yellow above, powdered with greenish grey, and with three transverse streaks of dusky yellow. The two first streaks are nearly straight, and in the interval between them is a little dusky crescentic mark; the third streak is somewhat flexuous. At the base of the posterior angle of the hinder wings are two black spots, of which the outermost is ocel |