The Chinese architect only used] the archi in situations where he could ensure stability with side supports of solid masonry. Thus the walled city is entered through a narrow noisome—beggar-haunted tunnel spanned by a slightly pointed almost semicircular arch raised high enough for dignity because failure is unthinkable. But with. bridges of many arches courage seems to have failed. Here the pointed arch still persists but the supporting piers are squat and clumsy, dwarfed by cowardice which shirked experiment and dreaded the ridicule of failure. Beauty indeed was achieved in bridges of the camel back type, but here utility is sacri ficed to ignorance. Back breaking steps too high in the rise are required for the negotiation of the camel's hump. This makes such bridges the meeting place of gossips, the highway of light travelling pedestrians.
The theory of arch design seems! to have entirely escaped the Chinese "The Chinese rule for pillar diameter emended that this should, be not less one tenth of the length. The!
not adhered to. work but little better, Thus it is that the squat Dram Towers pierced with archways a right angles are reckoned a supreme achievement. They are the product of a timid dwarfed intelligence.
So all the wonderful variants of the arch escaped him, all the devices which make for lightness and grace in the carriage of weights. This is well illustrated in the Chinese roof truss which is merely a triangle of solid timber with a few inadequate holes in it—the work of a child with a box of bricks.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.