BUILDING CONSTRUCTION; SHOWING THE EMPLOYMENT OF TIMBER, LEAD, AND IRON WORK, IN THE PRACTICAL CONSTRUCTION OF BUILDINGS. BY R. SCOTT BURN, Author of "The Hand-Book of the Mechanical Arts," and Editor of PREFACE. IN preparing the following pages, the author has been mainly desirous to place before the student a statement of the leading points connected with the employment of Timber, Lead, and Iron in the construction of buildings, in such a way that, while being to a large extent explanatory of the technical terms used in Building Construction, they would also convey a fair idea of the methods by which these various materials are used, and the forms and arrangements they assume in practice. An explanation of the natural peculiarities, and a description of the industrial characteristics and values of the materials, and of the principles upon which the structures in which they are used are based, forms no part of the scheme of the work. This is reserved for the volume on Building Construction, Advanced Course, in this series, to which, therefore, the student is referred. The plan of the work is based upon the Syllabus of the Government Science and Art Department, so that it may serve as a hand-book for those who design to pass the examinations in that department to which its pages refer. But while the syllabus in its general detail has been followed, a somewhat different arrangement has been aimed at, so as to permit of a wider range of subjects being given, and their more systematic treatment secured 19 |