Brickwork must be said to be durable, but it requires care.  If not of the best, brickwork within the reach of the constant vibration caused by the traffic on a railway seems to be in danger of being shaken to pieces, judging from one or two instances that have come under my own observation.  The mortar, and even in some cases the bricks themselves, will rapidly deteriorate if moisture be allowed to get into the heart of a brick wall, and in exposed situations this is very apt to happen.  Care should always be taken to keep the pointing of external brickwork in good order, and to maintain all copings and other projections intended to bar the access of water coming down from above, and to stop the overflowing of gutters and stack pipes, which soon soaks the wall through and through.

Of course, if there is a failure of foundations, brickwork, as was pointed out earlier, becomes affected at once.  But if these be good, and the materials used be sound ones, and if the other precautions just recommended be taken, it will last strong and sturdy for an immense length of time.  In some cases, as for example in the Roman ruins, it has stood for 1,500 years under every possible exposure and neglect, and still shows something of a sturdy existence after all, though sadly mutilated.  If we now return to the question, What can be well done in brickwork? no better answer can be given than to point to what has been and is being done, especially in London and within our own reach and observation.

Great engineering works, such as railway viaducts, the lining of railway tunnels, the piers and even the arches of bridges, sewage works, dock and wharf walls, furnace chimneys, and other works of this sort are chiefly done in brickwork.  And notwithstanding that iron is far more used by the engineer for some purposes and concrete for others now than formerly, still there is a great field for brickwork.  The late Mr. Brunel, who was fond of pushing size to extremes, tried how wide a span he could arch over with brickwork.  And I believe the bridge which carries the G.W.R. over the Thames at Maidenhead has the widest arch he or any other engineer has successfully erected in brick.  This arch has, it is stated, a span of 128 ft.  It is segmental, the radius being 169 ft., and the rise from springing to crown 24 ft., and the depth of the arch 5 ft. 3 in.  Nowadays, of course, no one would dream of anything but an iron girder bridge in such a position.  Mr. Brunel’s father, when he constructed the Thames Tunnel, lined it with brickwork foot by foot as he went on, and that lining sustained the heavy weight of the bed of the river and the river itself.

If you leave London by either of the southern lines, all of which are at a high level, you go for miles on viaducts consisting of brick arches carried on brick walls.  If you leave by the northern lines, you plunge into tunnel after tunnel lined with brickwork, and kept secure by such lining.  Mile after mile of London streets, and those in the suburbs, present to the eye little but brick buildings; dwelling houses, shops, warehouses, succeed one another, all in brickwork, and even when the eye seems to catch a change, it is more apparent than real.