An Illustrated Glossary of Technical (Continued from page 106.) BALL FLOWER, a ball-shaped ornament placed in a circular flower, the three petals of which form a cup round it. It is generally charac BELL TURRET or GABLE, a place where bells teristic of the decorated style of the fourteenth century, although it sometimes occurs in buildings of the previous century, or early English style of architecture. BARRY (in heraldry), an escutcheon divided are hung in small churches having no towers. barways into an even number of partitions which must be specified. BARRY BENDY, an escutcheon divided evenly BEVILE (in heraldry), signifies broken or families of the same name, although bearing no relation to each other. Bordures are sometimes engrailed, gobonated, invected, indented, counter company, vairy, and checky. BOTTONY (in heraldry), a cross of this description. Argent, a cross bottony sable. BRAIDED MOULDING, a Saxon ornament. BROACH, a spire. (To be continued.) Varnishes. UNDER this name are generally classed all liquid or dry substances capable of imparting a gloss to the surface of the material over which they are spread; but in order that this quality should be obtained, a resinous or gummy body is requisite, which may be dissolved by three agents-namely, fixed oil, volatile oil, and alcohol, which respectively form separate varnishes, as the fat or oily, the essential, and the spirit varnish. When Before a resin or gum is dissolved in a fixed oil, it is necessary to render the oil drying; for this purpose the oil is boiled with metallic oxides, in which operation the mucilage, or fatty portion of the oil, combines with the metal, while the oil itself unites with the oxygen of the oxide. To accelerate the drying of this varnish, it is necessary to add oil of turpentine. The essential varnishes consist of a solution of resin in oil of turpentine. The varnish being applied, the essential oil flies off, and leaves the resin. The goodness of spirits of turpentine can always be estimated from its inflammability-that most readily burning being the best. The smell too, may be taken as a criterion, that of the commonest sort being very unpleasant and weak. doubts are entertained as to its purity, pour a small quantity into a saucer or other shallow vessel, and place it to evaporate in the sun, which it ought to do entirely in the course of two or three hours; if a greasy residuum or a soft sticky mucus be left, it is a proof that the turpentine is adulterated, and it ought, therefore, to be rejected. The spirit varnish is only prepared from the most solid resins, which are not easily dissolved by any other vehicles than alcohol, which for this purpose should be of the strongest description and distilled over alkali. To soften the resins and to prevent brittleness, gum elemi, turpentine, or balsam of copaiva should be added in proper proportion prior to the solution in alcohol. We will now present a few recipes: 1. Linseed Oil Varnish. CEMENT FOR THE JOINTS OF CAST IRON.Take eight pounds of linseed oil and boil for Take of cast iron borings, twenty pounds; one hour, then add one pound of the best flour of sulphur, two ounces; muriate of resin, previously powdered, and stir the mixammonia, one ounee; mix intimately in the ture until the resin is perfectly dissolved. Now dry state, and then add a sufficient quantity of add half a pound of turpentine, let the whole warm water to render the whole quite wet; cool, and it is ready for use. press the mass together in a lump, and allow it to remain until such time as the combined action of the materials renders it quite hot, in which state it must be hammered with proper tools into the joints. It is not very generally known that impure water may be cleansed by means of a small quantity of alum in powder, which precipitates all ordinary impurities in a few hours. A cargo of 20,000 Dutch bricks has been imported at Liverpool for home consumption. A quantity of granite is also said to have arrived from China! 2. Amber and Copal Varnish. Gum copal and amber are the substances principally employed in oil varnishes; they possessing the properties necessary for varnishes, solidity and transparency. The copal being whitish, is used for varnishing light, the amber for dark colours. It is best to dissolve them before mixing them with the oil, because by this means they are in less danger of becoming scorched, and at the same time the varnish is more beautiful. They should be melted in a pot on the fire; they are in a proper state for receiving the oil when they paint windows, some of them after the best Italian masters, from glass-cutters, chandelier manufacturers, glaziers, upholsterers, housepainters, dealers in curiosities, ironmongers, and carpenters, all of whom had, no doubt, represented themselves as the fitting_superafraid, the grand consideration with them would be, in a majority of cases, how much per cent. could be obtained by the transaction, give no resistance to the iron spatula, and various businesses, and not to the artists by when they run off from it drop by drop. The whom the windows were to be painted,-the oil employed should be a drying oil, and painter being usually kept in profound ignoperfectly free from grease. It should be rance as to its destination, and the person for poured into the copal or amber by little and whom it was painted, lest, by the artist belittle, constantly stirring the ingredients at the coming known, the orders should flow into his same time with the spatula. When the oil is hands. He, himself, had had applications to well mixed with the copal or amber, take it off the fire; and when it is pretty cool, pour in a greater quantity of the essence of turpentine than the oil that was used. After the varnish is made, it should be passed through a linen cloth. To make gold-coloured copal varnish ::-visors and directors of works of art. He was Take one ounce of powdered copal, two ounces of essential oil of lavender, and six ounces of essence of turpentine. Put the oil of lavender into a matrass of a proper size, placed on a sand-bath subjected to a moderate heat. When the oil is very warm, add the copal, from time to time, in very small quantities, and stir the mixture with a stick of white wood, rounded at the end. When the copal has entirely disappeared, put in the turpentine in almost a boiling state, at three different times, and keep continually stirring the mixture until the solution be quite completed. (To be continued.) Glass-Painting. Ar a late meeting of the Freemasons of the Church, in reference to a subject which had been before mooted, namely, the decayed state of the painted window in Limehouse Church, by reason of which the original surface of the glass had become visible, Mr. Wilmshurst read some remarks, stating that the simple reply to a question on the matter would be that the colours, instead of being vitrified, have been either entirely or partially used in varnish; but as this method of reasoning would not be in consonance with the permanent object aimed at by those gentlemen originally sanctioning the outlay, some other cause must be looked for. their first inquiry, who will paint it for the least money; in fact, from the artist being unknown, they were enabled to give any sum they thought proper. Could the result they now witnessed in the two churches under consideration be marvelled at? The painter had no prospect of fame to incite him, no character to lose, and was only anxious to finish his dreary task, by hook or by varnish, in order to receive the beggarly reward of his toil. To such expedients did tradesmen have recourse to prevent the patron and the artist becoming acquainted, that if the former expressed a wish to see the work in progress, he was told, to get a good work painted he had sent it to Italy, &c. And the large sums paid for works, and the small price paid to the painters, would, if stated, be incredible. These circumstances would, he thought, in part account for the wretched state of many modern windows. He was very happy to say, that the system is now much altered for the better, and a tradesman would now find it difficult to get any one of repute to execute a window for him,-although there were many examples occurring at the present time, both of committees and professional men giving the preference to men in business, rather than have direct intercourse with the painter; thus checking the advancement of art, and procuring inferior works; as, until the artist feels his true position, and that his best aspirations He then went on to state that his attention are dependent upon the character of his works, having some time since been called profes- it is hopeless to expect works of equal merit to sionally to the window of Poplar Church, it those produced where royalty and public opihad, on his first visit, a most singular appear-nion reward the meritorious. ance, just as if small streamlets of dirty water Under proper encouragement, there could were running over it from top to bottom. be no doubt that works would be transmitted Upon examining it, he found the figure (that to posterity equally durable and beautiful as of Christ) to be painted or laid on in vitrified the most celebrated examples of antiquity. colours, which were, of course, immoveable; then it had been finished to a deep and full tone of colour, completely in varnish, which is now, and has been for some years, rapidly disappearing; and if the varnish colour was completely removed, the window would be like a vision of its former self. Upon inquiry, he came to the following conclusion as to the cause of many windows, painted about the same period, being in this lamentable state. Until within a very few years, it was the constant and almost undeviating practice for gentlemen and committees to give commissions for stained-glass windows to men in OIL FROM STONE.-A communication was made, some short time ago, to the French Institute about what was called huile aux pierres. The oil is perfectly clear and transparent, does not soil, and yields a flame of great intensity and clearness. A company, formed for the manufacturing of this mineral oil, possesses, in the vicinity of Autun, inexhaustible strata of rock, from which not only oil, but other valuable substances, as a sort of grease (graisses), tar, ammoniacal water, paraffine-substances of which some are valuable as manures-are extracted. |