SKEW-BACK, in civil engineering, the course of ma- ground-plan of an oblique arch across a stream a b. Here sonry forming the abutment for the voussoirs of a segmen- it is evident that c g is the actual span of the arch; although tal arch, or, in iron bridges, for the ribs. In the latter case cd, the breadth of the stream, would be the span of a a plate of cast-iron is usually laid upon the stone skew-straight arch, leaving the same width of passage underbacks, extending the whole width of the bridge, and form- neath. ing a tie to the masonry. On account of the expansion and contraction of iron under changes of temperature, the ribs should not, especially in large arches, be fixed to their abutments. The ribs of Southwark Bridge, over the Thames, were originally bolted to the masonry of the piers; but it was found necessary, on this account, to detach them, during the progress of the works. SKEW-BRIDGE, a bridge in which the passages over and under the arch intersect each other obliquely. In conducting a road or railway through a district in which there are many natural or artificial watercourses, or in making a canal through a country in which roads are frequent, such intersections very often occur. As however the construction of an oblique or skew arch is more difficult than that of one built at right angles, skew-bridges were seldom erected before the general introduction of railways; it being more asual to build the bridge at right angles, and to divert the course of the road or of the stream to accommodate it, as represented in Fig. 1, in which a b is a stream crossed by the road, the general direction of which is indicated by the dotted line cd. In a railway, and sometimes in a common Fig. 1. Fig. 2. ་ Very little is known respecting the origin of skew-bridges. It has been repeatedly asserted that those built by George Stephenson on the Liverpool and Manchester railway were the first erections of the kind; but this is certainly incorrect, there being some of earlier date even in Lancashire. A paper in the Transactions of the Institution of Civil Engineers,' vol. i., p. 185, alludes to an oblique arch erected about the year 1530 by Nicolò, called 'Il Tribolo,' over the river Mugnone, near Porta Sangallo, at Florence. It appears however that the principle upon which such bridges should be constructed was too little understood to render an attempt at constructing them on a large scale advisable. The next information the writer has met with on the subject is contained in the article Oblique Arches,' in Rees's Cyclopædia;' an article which appears to have escaped the notice of modern writers on this branch of engineering science. It is written by an engineer named Chapman, who mentions oblique bridges as being in use prior to 1787, when he introduced a great improvement in their construction. Down to that time, as far as he was informed, such bridges had always been built in the same way as common square arches, the voussoirs being laid in courses parallel with the abutments. How very defective such an arch would be may be seen by reference to Fig. 3, in which lines are drawn to indicate the direction of the courses. It is evident that here the portion cdfe is the only part of the arch supported by the abutments; the triangular portions cdg and e f h being sustained merely by the mortar, aided by being bonded with the rest of the masonry. This plan could therefore only be adopted for bridges of very slight obliquity, and even then with considerable risk. About the time mentioned above, Mr. Chapman was employed as engineer to the Kildare canal, a branch from the Grand Canal road or a canal, such a deviation from the straight line of of Ireland to the town of Naas, on which it was desired to direction is inadmissible, and it therefore becomes necesavoid diverting certain roads which had to be crossed. He sary to build the bridge obliquely, as represented in the plan, was therefore led to think for some method of constructing Fig. 2. Where space and neatness do not require to be con- oblique arches upon a sound principle, of which he considered, an oblique arch may be avoided, either by building sidered that the leading feature must be that the joints of the bridge square with the upper passage, and making the the voussoirs, whether of brick or stone, should be rectanspan so wide as to allow the stream to pass under it with-gular with the face of the arch, instead of being parallel out being diverted; or by building the arch square with the stream, and of sufficient length to allow the upper passage to take an oblique course over it; but either of these is a clumsy expedient, although well adapted for some situations. The arches or tunnels by which the Birmingham railway is conducted under the Hampstead-road and Parkstreet, near the London terminus, are instances of the latter kind of construction; the length of the arches being such that they present faces square with the line of railway, notwithstanding the oblique direction of the roads over them. A similar case occurs at Denbigh Hall, on the same line, where the railway crosses over the London and Holyhead road at such an angle that the difference of direction is only 25°. In this case a long gallery is constructed under the railway, consisting of iron ribs or girders, resting upon walls built parallel with the turnpike road; the ribs, and consequently the faces of the bridge, being at right angles with it. This gallery is about two hundred feet long and thirty-four feet wide; and by its adoption, the necessity of building an oblique arch of eighty feet span was avoided. The necessity of increasing the span of an arch according to its degree of obliquity, by which the expense and difficulty are materially increased, is illustrated by Fig. 3, the Fig. 3. with the abutment. Thus the courses, instead of taking angle of only 39°; the oblique span being 25 feet, and On the Liverpool and Manchester railway, out of rather more than sixty bridges, about one-fourth were built on the skew; one, built of stone, conducting the turnpike-road across the line at Rainhill, being at an angle of only 34°, by which the width of span is increased from 30 feet, the width o the railway from wall to wall, to 54 feet, the width on the oblique face of the arch. Skew-bridges have since become very common, and some have been erected of even greater obliquity. That at Box-moor, on the Birmingham railway, is stated, in Roscoe and Lecount's history of the undertaking, to be unrivalled for obliquity by any other brick arch. Its angle is 32°, the square span 21 feet, and the oblique span 39 feet. There are also brick arches of great obliquity on the Greenwich and Blackwall railways, but with their precise angles we are unacquainted. The extended use of such structures has led to the promulgation of several methods for forming the voussoirs with accuracy, and disposing them in the most advantageous manner. The common theory, the credit of which is claimed, we believe, both by Mr. Nicholson and Mr. Fox, is that the courses of the stones should form portions of the thread of a square-threaded screw, or rather, of a thread somewhat of the dovetail form; the highest point of each thread, or that in the crown of the arch, being at right angles to the direction of the road. This theory, it is contended by the author of the article Skew-Bridge,' in the recent edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica, is imperfect; and he intimates that, in the present state of this branch of science, the most perfect way of constructing a skew-arch would be to cut the stones as they are wanted, forming each of them in such a manner that two of its opposite sides, or at least the middle parts of these sides, should be as nearly as possible at right angles both to the soffit and also to the direction of the passage over the bridge.' Those who wish for further information on this subject are referred to Nicholson's paper on the Principles of Oblique Bridges, presented to the British Association in 1838; the treatises of Messrs. Fox, Hart, and Buck on oblique bridges; and the article just quoted. ་ From Mr. Buck's treatise it appears that the difficulty of building skew-bridges increases with the obliquity of the angle from 90° to 45°, which is supposed to be the most hazardous angle for a semicircular arch; but that beyond that point, instead of increasing, it rather diminishes, to about 25°, which appears to be about the natural limit for a semi-cylindrical arch. Mr. Buck, whose experience renders his opinion highly valuable, considers that oblique arches of the elliptical form should not be attempted, as they are deficient in stability, more difficult to execute, and more expensive than semicircular or segmental arches. The construction of skew-bridges of iron or timber is comparatively simple, the ribs or girders of which such bridges are composed being of the usual construction, laid parallel with each other, but the end of each being in advance of that next preceding it. Fig. 5 represents the ground-plan of such a bridge, the dotted lines indicating the situation of the ribs upon which the platform is sup Fig. 5. ported. The extraordinary iron bridge by which the Manchester and Birmingham railway is conducted over Fairfield-street, Manchester, at an angle of only 2440, is a fine example of this kind of skew-bridge. It consists of six ribs, of rather more than 128 feet span, although the width of the street is only 48 feet, resting upon very massive abutments of masonry. The total weight of iron in this bridge, which is considered to be one of the finest iron arches ever built, is 540 tons. It was erected from the design of Mr. Buck, who has constructed several other oblique bridges of great size and very acute angles. Timber bridges, formed of trussed ribs or girders, are built on the same principle. One of very great obliquity, on the Sechill railway, is represented in the second series of Brees's Railway Practice. A somewhat similar mode of constructing skewbridges in brickwork has been introduced by Mr. Gibbs on the Croydon railway. The Jolly Sailor bridge, which crosses over this line near Norwood, consists of four separate ribs of brickwork, each forming an elliptical arch of 50 feet span, with a versed sine of 12 feet 6 inches, supporting a flat viaduct of Yorkshire flagstones. Each of these ribs, which are three feet wide on the transverse face, is built square, so that the brickwork is of the simplest kind; but by making the respective abutments project beyond each other according to the oblique direction of the railway, the ribs, taken collectively, form a skew-arch. In a bridge erected by Mr. Woodhouse on the line of the Midland Counties railway, the same principle is adopted, but the ribs are placed close together, so that no platform of flagstones is required. SKIDDAW. [CUMBERLAND] SKIMMER. [RYNCHOPS.] SKIN. The skin, or derma, is the outer covering of the body; and having to serve at once as a defence for the more deeply seated structures, as an organ of touch, and as an apparatus for secretion, it is one of the most compound of all the tissues. It is composed of two chief parts:-a vascular basis named Cutis, and a superficial layer named Epidermis or Cuticle, which is not vascular. The cutis is made up for the most part of fibres and laminæ, like those of common cellular tissue. They are much more densely woven near the surface than in the deeper part of the skin in the former they constitute a very tough and elastic compact membrane; in the latter they are arranged in irregular large cells, which in moderately stout persons are filled with fat, but in the emaciated are collapsed, and form a loose flocculent white tissue. This general form of structure prevails through the whole skin; but in different parts of the body, and still more in different persons, the density and thickness of its layers, the size of the cells, the quantity of fat which they contain in the deeper parts, and the fineness or coarseness of the tissue composing them, vary considerably. The external surface of the skin presents a variety of wrinkles. The larger of these are produced by the action of muscles, which in many parts throw the skin into folds; others result from its loss of elasticity in old age, and the removal of the fat beneath it; and again others, which are seen most plainly on the palms and the balls of the fingers, and on the corresponding parts of the foot, run in very close parallel arches, and indicate the arrangement of subjacent rows of sensitive papillæ, with which the whole surface of the skin is beset, and which in the parts just named, and in some others, are arranged in regular double lines. In their most developed state, on the balls of the fingers for example, the papillæ are very fine conical processes, standing somewhat obliquely, and so densely set, that their summits form a seemingly smooth surface. On these parts each elevated line which one sees on the surface has beneath it two rows of papillæ; for when looked at closely, each such ridge shows on its summit a little furrow dotted with minute apertures, and which fits into the space between the rows of papillæ. Over the rest of the body the papillæ are much smaller, and are irregularly arranged. Everywhere however they are the most vascular part of the skin, each papilla receiving a distinct loop from the subjacent network of blood-vessels. It is in them also that the greater part of the very numerous nerves of the skin terminate; for though every part of the skin be sensitive, yet the papillæ are so in the highest degree, and are the chief instruments by which the sense of touch is exercised. [SENSES; NERVE.] It is through their being so much developed, that the tips of the fingers are adapted for the perception of the finest impres sions of the sense; though even they have less delicate perception than the tip of the tongue, on which similar but larger and more pointed papillæ are set. The chief secretory apparatus of the skin consists of the perspiratory glands, which are disposed over its whole extent, but, like the papillæ, are largest and most numerous in the palms and soles. By looking on the surface of the cuticle covering these parts, one may see, especially on a warm day, or when perspiring freely, a number of minute orifices between and upon the tops of the arched ridges already described. These are the orifices of the glands by which the perspiration is secreted, and sometimes one may squeeze through them a drop of the clear crystal fluid which the glands produce. Each orifice leads to a fine tube of somewhat ess diameter than itself, which passes down through the epidermis, and into the deeper parts of the skin, making on its way several spiral turns, and ending in a slightly enlarged closed sac. each such tube makes from 15 to 20 spiral turns; in the In the sole palm, from 6 to 10; in other parts, fewer: in the right hand the spiral turns are made from left to right; in the left, from rigat to left. There are about 25 of these orifices in a square line of the surface of the tip of the fore-finger; and about 75 in the same space between the bases of the fingers taking therefore the whole superficies of the body at 14 square feet, it is probable that, as Eichhorn calculated, there are not less than ten millions of these glands scattered through the skin. It is in them that the perspiration is being constantly formed, though it most generally passes away as fast as it is produced in an invisible vapour, and during health collects in the form of sweat only when it is very rapidly formed, as during active exercise, or when the surrounding atmosphere is already saturated with moisture. The fluid of the perspiration is composed of water, with very small quantities of animal and saline manner, some free lactic acid, nitrogen, and carbonic acid. By thus removing carbonic acid from the blood, the skin is, next to the lungs, the most important and essential excretory organ of the body; some recent experiments have proved that animals prevented from perspiring die of suffocation as certainly, though not so rapidly, as when their respiration is obstructed. The quantity of perspiration secreted amounts to about two pounds in 24 hours; but it is liable to considerable variations, according to the habits of the individual, the state of the atmosphere, the activity of other glands, such as the lungs and kidneys, and other circumstances. Another secretion from the skin is that of the oily sebaceous matter by which its surface is always kept in a slight degree greasy, so that water adheres to it only in drops, and does not easily soak into the substance of the epidermis. The sebaceous glands by which this secretion is produced, as well as the hair-follicles on which they are almost always attendant, are already described. [HAIR.] The loss of fluid by these secretions from the skin is in some measure compensated by the absorption which it also exercises. It is uncertain how much, if any, of the vapour of the atmosphere around us is thus imbibed; but it is certain that the skin absorbs fluids placed for a short time in contact with it, and this so rapidly, that (especially after long fasting) a perceptible increase of weight is observed after a person has been immersed in a bath. The obstacle to a more constant and considerable absorption of fluid is the nearly impenetrable layer of epidermis; and hence the substances most rapidly absorbed are those which most easily pass through it, such as water, after having been imbibed into its deepest layers, vapours of sulphuretted hydrogen, hydrocyanic acid, &c., oils rubbed upon it, or corrosives which destroy its texture. Besides its secretions, there are produced from the vessels of the skin materials of which are formed certain appendages for its protection and other purposes, such as the cuticle, the hair, and the nails. The cuticle, or epidermis, is an insensible and non-vascular membrane, which is laid over the whole of the external surface of the body in a layer, the thickness of which is varied according to the protection required for the wellbeing of the subjacent cutis. The under surface, which lies next to the cutis, is accurately fitted into all its irregularities, and sends prolongations down into the interior of all its glands and follicles; the outer surface, which is exposed to friction, is comparatively smooth. The epidermis is composed of several layers of cells: of the two layers into which it may commonly in an ordinary dissection be split, the lower is called rete mucosum, or rete Malpighii; the upper and outer, more particularly, epidermis. In the deeper layers the epidermis is composed entirely of minute polygonal cells, adhering by their edges, and containing nuclei and a thin fluid; in the layers nearer the surface are cells of the same kind, but larger and flatter; and those on the very outer surface are dry and scale-like; they have lost almost all trace of form, and becoming loose, are removed by friction at exactly the same rate as, under ordinary circumstances, new cells are produced at the surface next the cutis. Thus the epidermis is subject to constant and rapid change: its cells, as fast as they dry and are removed in the form of scurf [SCURF] from its exterior, being replaced by new ones at its interior; and thus, whatever waste (within certain limits) it is subject to, its thickness is not diminished, but rather, as the waste is increased, so is its thickness, til it attains that degree which is competent to the protection of the subjacent cutis; as any one may see P. C., No. 1370. in the palms of his hands, soon after he has begun to occupy himself in a more than usually laborious handicraft. The epidermis is the seat of the characteristic national colours of the skin, as well as of the colours of freckles and other superficial marks. In dark-complexioned races, especially in negroes, it is very thick, and its cells are filled with minute black or otherwise coloured pigment-granules, many of which also lie loose among them. The thickness of the epidermis in these tribes renders it less penetrable by the rays of heat; and it is hence (and not on account of its colour, which would have an opposite effect) that a negro can bear the exposure of his skin to a degree of solar heat which blisters that of a European. The hairs are already described in a separate rticle. The nails are thin laminae of horny tissue, produced by the cutis on the back of the ends of the fingers and toes. Under each of the more perfect of the nails, such as those of the fingers and the great toe, the cutis ha a peculiar structure, called the matrix of the nail, compc sed of large sharply pointed and very vascular papillæ, which at the root are arranged irregularly, but at the body of the nail are placed in close-set rows or longitudinal ridges. By all this vascular surface the substance of the nail is produced in minute cells, which subsequently coalesce an 1 form the dense, obscurely fibrous, and transparent mass of the body of the nail. The crescentic opaque part at the root of the nail owes its whiteness in part to its own substance, which in the deeper layers is softer and more opaque han in those of the body, and in part to the surface beneath it being less vascular than the rest. The under surface of the nail is grooved or otherwise marked in correspondence with the matrix, to which it closely fits; the outer surface, exposed to fiction, is comparatively smooth, though still it presents traces of the ridges in which, when it was at the under surface, it was formed; for the nails are produced in the same method as the cuticle; as fast as their exposed surfaces or their ends are worn away, they are replaced by layera growing from the matrix; and the whole mass of the mail, growing at once from below its body and from its roet, is constantly pushed forwards and thickened, at the very same rate as its free extremity is cut or worn down, and its body thinned by friction. SKINNER, STEPHEN, M.D., born 1623, died 1667, a skilful physician and a very learned philologist. He was born in London or the neighbourhood; stud ed in the University of Oxford, where he was a commoner of Christ Church; but the civil war coming on, he left Oxford without taking a degree, and travelled abroad, occasionally remaining some time at the foreign universities. In 1646 he returned to Oxford, and took the usual academical deg ees; after which he again went abroad, living in France, Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands; frequenting the courts of princes and the halls of the universities, being highly esteemed both for his learning and his general deportment. He took the degree of M.D. at Heidelberg, and afterwards at Oxford, in 1656. He then settled at Lincoln, where he engaged in the practice of medicine with great success; but his career was short. In the beginning of autumn in 1667 febrile complaints were very prevalent in Lincolnshire, and he, among others, was fatally attacked. He died on the 5th of September in that year, at the age of forty-four, to the great regret of his friends, to whom the innocence of his life and the cheerfulness of his disposition had endeared him. His early decease was a great loss also to the world, for he was applying his vast stores of philological knowledge to the illustration of his native language; and had made no inconsiderable progress in a work which was designed to serve as an etymological dictionary of the language. This manuscript came after his death into the hands of Thomas Henshaw, Esq., of Kensington, who had a disposition_to the same kind of studies, and who made additions to it. He also superintended the publication of it, which was effected in 1671, in a folio volume, under the title of Etymologicon Linguae Anglicanae.' Dr. Skinner's work has the great disadvantage of having been left unfinished by the author, who, it may be presumed, would have struck out, as well as added, as his knowledge advanced and the general principles of philology became more distinctly perceived by him, which would probably have been the case had he proceeded in his work. As it is, it is to be regarded rather as containing anecdotes of the language than as a systematic body of English etymologies; but it contains numerou VOL. XXII.-N valuable suggestions, and many later English etymologists have made use of his labours. The etymological part of Dr. Johnson's Dictionary is almost wholly derived from Skinner and Junius. SKIPTON. [YORKSHIRE.] SKORODITE. Cupreous Arseniate of Iron. Occurs crystallized and massive. Primary form a right rhombic prism. Cleavage parallel to the primary planes, indistinct. Fracture uneven. Hardness, scratches carbonate of lime, and is scratched by fluor-spar. Rather brittle. Colour bluish-green of different degrees of intensity, also blackishgreen, brown, and black. Streak white. Lustre vitreous. Transparent; translucent; opaque. Specific gravity 3.162 to 3.2. Massive varieties, globular, fibrous, radiating. By the blow-pipe gives arsenical vapours, and fuses into a globule attracted by the magnet. Found in Cornwall, Saxony, near Huttenburg in Carinthia, Brazil, &c. Analysis by 2:00 But dually to confound distinctions of doctrine, and so to think little of the purer faith and system handed down to them by their ancestors. It has existed to the present day, and so late as 1840 the emperor of Russia, by a dispensing power as strange as that which he exercised originally, decreed that the United Greeks should exist no more. in the reign of Catherine II., under which Skovorodâ lived, the oppression of the inhabitants of the Ukraine (who had lost the privileges guaranteed to them by Peter the Great after the battle of Poltava) had so far spoiled their disposition, as to render them willing in their turn to oppress any one who was weak enough to fear them. The United Greeks, who had from the commencement of the sect lived under the protection of the throne, were selected as the objects of their persecution. The most rational way of checking these persecutions was to destroy the spirit which gave them birth. To this task Skovoroda applied himself: in the mixed character of priest and minstrel, he proceeded from village to village through his native Ukraine, preaching the words of peace, singing the religious songs which he had composed for them, and inculcating the same truths under the attractive form of fables. Still he constantly refused to head the 3140 sect of the Unites, as his object was not to create or foster 36-35 schism, but merely to give both parties the benefit of his 400 lessons. By this time the influence which he had justly 154 acquired had pleaded strongly in his favour, and the aca2.00 demy conferred on him the vicarage of his native village. In this station he prohibited all rigour against the persecuted 18.00 Unites, and endeavoured to gain them over by his doctrines, 1-40 which were enforced by an eloquence unequalled in the pulpit of South Russia. This at the same time gave an impulse to the clergy of the province, which however unhappily ceased with his death. Even when ordered by the synod, he refused to use the means of persecution, and his refusal led to his ejection from the cure which his exertions had so greatly benefited. His occupation being gone, he resolved to indulge a long-felt desire to visit Rome, the nurse of doctors and confessors, and to view her who, in his eyes, had been glorious as the queen of nations. But almost immediately on his arrival in that city he was recalled by the news of fresh persecutions at home; his works however show what an impression Christian rather than Pagan Rome had left on his mind. His return again checked the fury of the opposite parties; but his exertions, though successful, were only working out his own ruin. The jealousy of the court at St. Petersburg could not allow a single indvidual, in a cause however humane, to stand in the way of its views. He was considered as a rebel, and orders for his apprehension were issued, which he evaded by taking refuge at the country residence of a noble who had often pressed him to become tutor to his son. This sanctuary of feudal power could not be invaded even by the imperial authority, and he might still have lived in a diminished sphere of usefulness, but he died at the early age of fortyeight, and traditions say that he foretold his own death the day before it occurred, and dug his grave in the garden, unwilling to give this last trouble to the friends to whom he thought he had long enough been a burden. 96.59 It would appear that different substances have in this, as in other cases, been called by the same name. In one analysis we have arsenic and in the other arsenious acid; one contains no oxide of copper, and the other no oxide of manganese. A specimen examined by R. Phillips contained no copper. SKOVORODA (known in the Ukraine under the name of Gregory Sawicz, or Gregory the son of Sava) was born about 1730, of poor parents, in a village near Kiew, where his father was subdeacon or parish clerk. He was admitted at the age of twelve years into the ecclesiastical academy of Kiew, in the capacity of a servant, but was soon allowed to attend the lectures there, in consideration of the talent which he showed. After obtaining the reputation of being the best classical scholar of the place, and in vain soliciting permission to go abroad, he set out on foot, without the knowledge of his superiors, for Pesth, where he commenced the study of the German language, and in six months was able to profit by the lectures. His account of these lectures however shows them to have been very inefficient, and moreover the fame of Wolf was then at its height and attracting students from every part of Germany to Haile. Skovoroda went to Halle, where he devoted three years to metaphysical and theological studies; and that his country might profit by the advantages which he derived from foreign learning, he made at this time translations from the Homilies of St. Chrysostom, and composed moral fables which have been handed down orally by the inhabitants of the Ukraine, the surest possible test of their popularity. After four years he returned to Kiew, but was not re-admitted into the academy, nor appointed to any post in which his energies might find exercise. Upon this he applied himself to mitigate the persecutions of the United Greeks, concerning whom a few details are necessary. This sect had arisen in Russia from a kind of politicoreligious compact between the Holy See and the sovereign of Russia about the year 1610, for the purpose of reducing Russia under the papal dominion. In order to effect this, the two powers established a medium sect, partly Romanist, partly Greek: the pope sent Jesuits to teach the necessary doctrine; and the emperor Wladislaw, by a power over the consciences of his people which we can scarcely understand, imposed this body of doctrine as the creed of the provinces on the border of Russia and Poland, whose situation had already exposed them to the influences of both parties. The Unites (as the members of the Greek Church who acknowledge the supremacy of the pope are called in Russia) had already appeared in the north of Italy, in Illyria, and Croatia; but nowhere under similar circumstances. In Russia this sect became a sort of rallying-point for the members of both churches, teaching the Russians gra He was the only author in Little Russia who has yet written in prose: his work called 'Symphonon' is a solitary instance of that kind of composition, and it has the advantage over the works written in Great Russia in being formed rather on the antient Greek model than on that of the Latin or German languages, a style of which Lomonoss of was the founder. His translations have been already noticed. Some original essays in the Latin and Russian languages, which remain, show much good taste and elegance, with a great extent of reading, qualifications which were little known in his age or country. With the exception of the common songs of war and love, all traditional songs of the present day are attributed by the bandurists (the troubadours of the Ukraine) to Skovorodâ. The object of this notice is to rescue from utter neglect the name of one who in his exertions resembled Felix Neff (whose name and character have become generally known through the memoir of the Rev. W. S. Gilly), but has still further claims on our notice as the founder of a national literature. Further details, garnished with all the romantic circumstances with which tradition loves to invest its heroes, may be found in the Moskowski Telegraph,' SKULL. [SKELETON.] SKUNK. [WEASELS.] SKYE. [HEBRIDES.] SKYLIGHT. Including under this term every mode of admitting light into an apartment through its roof or ceiling, we may here briefly notice that particular fashion of skylight distinguished in Gothic architecture by the name of Lantern, though lanterns in Gothic buildings were not so much intended to admit light, as to supply ventilation and the means of escape to smoke. Accordingly their sides were generally left unglazed or open, whence such lanterns were distinguished by the name of Louvre (louvert); and though no longer required for its original purpose, after fireplaces were introduced, the lantern was still retained as a characteristic feature of the hall, not only in monastic and collegiate, but also in domestic architecture, when that apartment showed itself externally as a distinct portion of the building, being carried up as a small turret rising out of the ridge of the roof. The lantern over the hall of the Middle Temple, London, is an example. Lanterns of this kind appear to have been invariably polygonal in plan, octagonal or hexagonal, and had apertures or windows on all sides. But the term lantern is occasionally used in two other significations: it is applied to the lower part of a tower placed at the intersection of the transepts with the body of a church, which, being open below, forms a loftier portion of the interior, lighted by windows on each side; and again to an upper open story, that is, one entirely filled with windows, on the summit of a tower, and frequently forming a superstructure different in plan from the rest, as at Fotheringay Church, and that at Boston, Lincolnshire, in both which examples the lantern forms an octagon placed upon a square. The upper portion of the tower of St. Dunstan's, Fleet Street, London, may also be described as a lantern. Of skylights however, properly so called (that is, which are nearly in the same plane as the general surface of the ceiling), or of lanterns intended to light the whole of an interior, without other windows in its side walls, no examples are to be met with in our antient architecture; not but that skylights might be, and probably in some cases have been, introduced into buildings in the Pointed style, without doing violence to its character, by merely perforating some of the compartments and tracery in a groined ceiling. As one instance at least of the kind, we may mention the conservatory that was at Carlton House, which had a roof of fan-tracery, designed after that of Henry VII.'s Chapel, the whole of which was perforated and filled in with glass; but as the ceiling itself was low, and three sides of the building consisted entirely of windows, it conveyed only an imperfect idea of the effect that might be produced in an interior of the kind, if lighted from above only, particularly if the perforated parts of the ceiling were filled in with stained glass. Notwithstanding both the variety as to design and decoration of which skylights are susceptible, and the picturesque effect produced in an interior where the light falls in from above, so far from having been turned to account for architectural purposes, and studied as ornamental features, skylights have generally been considered and treated as mere shifts and expedients in building, excusable only when resorted to from necessity, and for inferior rooms situated where it was impossible to obtain side-windows. Hence scarcely anything on the subject, hardly the bare mention of skylights, is to be met with in architectural works. In Italian buildings such mode of lighting rooms is almost unknown, even where it recommends itself as being greatly preferable to that by side-windows, and in fact scarcely less than indispensable, as is the case with sculpture and picture galleries, staircases, and libraries; and though, as regards these last, it is not very material whether the light is admitted from the side of the room or from above, the second method is attended with this advantage, that it allows the bookcases to be continued on all sides of the room. bour or cylindrical wall immediately beneath it; instead of being concentrated and diffused through a single large opening, as in the Pantheon at Rome, which, though professedly so much admired, has very rarely indeed been followed as a model by the architects of Italy. The same remark applies to their followers in other countries: so far from studiously availing themselves of opportunities of lighting interiors from above, and varying the means of accomplishing it according to the particular occasion or design, they have rather avoided everything of the kind. Even where it would seem the most direct mode of obtaining light, as in the case where a dome is introduced, the effect that might be so produced is more frequently than not quite neutralised, if not destroyed, by the chief light being derived from lateral windows. Of this we have an instance in St. Stephen's, Walbrook, which, whatever merit it may possess in regard to proportions, most assuredly does not exhibit the most refined taste, the small oval holes in the walls, serving as windows, being in fact so many blemishes in the design. In that and most other examples of the same kind the lantern is so narrow or small in diameter compared with the dome, that it seems as much intended to obstruct as to admit light, and applied rather with a view to external than to internal effect and utility, as an architectural finish to the outside of the dome, than in order to light the inside of the building. It seems indeed a strange kind of perverseness, that while lighting interiors entirely from above has been employed not only for picture and sculpture galleries, but also for concert-rooms, lecture-rooms, and other places intended to accommodate an auditory or congregation, it should hardly in any instance have been applied to churches, though by getting rid of apertures in the walls, noises and sounds from the street would be excluded. If the style of the building be Gothic, such mode of course becomes out of the question; for windows in the walls themselves are then essen. tial, being not only characteristic features, but one chief source of decoration, while owing to their being divided by mullions into compartments, and more or less filled up with tracery, the glare of light is properly attempered. With regard to other styles, Grecian or Italian, the case is widely different: in them the windows are internally no better than so many gaps-mere glazed apertures, which, so far from contributing to decoration, have not even any kind of finishing bestowed upon them, neither architrave, mouldings, nor cornices. The only instance that we are acquainted with of a church lighted entirely from above, without lateral windows, is that of St. Peter-le-Poor, Broad Street, London, which is a rotunda, covered by a cove, and a large circular lantern, whose tambour forms a sort of clerestory, consisting of a conti nuous series of arched windows, while the ceiling makes a very flat or slightly concave dome. In point of design this example is not particularly tasteful, but the principle deserves attention. Other ideas of a similar nature have occasionally been thrown out, though not carried to the same extent: the centre of the interior of St. Mary Woolnoth's is covered by a square clerestory lantern, having a large semicircular window on each of its sides, a peculiarity probably forced upon the architect (Hawksmoor) on account of its being desirable to have no windows on the side towards Lombard Street, and it is only to be regretted that any were allowed on the opposite one, as the whole interior would have been materially improved by the omission of them. A more recent instance is that of Hanover Chapel, Regent Street, London, which has what may be conveniently distinguished by the term lantern-dome, viz. a dome where the light is admitted neither through a smaller lantern, or other aperture at its apex, nor through windows in a tambour beneath it, but by a series of windows or glazed panels in the lower part of the concave of the dome itself, similarly curved, and therefore narrower at top than below. Taken by itself, this is a very pleasing feature of the interior, but its effect is counteracted by the numerous windows on the sides, which, in addition to being mere plain openings in the walls, destroy all architectural repose, by the spotty Scarcely anything of the kind occurs in Italian architec- cross-lights which they occasion. Under such circumstances, ture, except it be in the form of a cupola over a central it is to be wished that the architect could not possibly obtain saloon. [SALOON.] Neither is the very best effect usually light except from above. Fortunately this is sometimes the studied in Italian cupolas and domes, the light being gene- case, if not in regard to churches, in other spacious apartrally admitted partly through small apertures in the con- ments, where it has been turned to more or less account in cave of the dome itself, or through a mere lantern on its the design, and the necessity of lighting them, if not imsummit, and partly through upright windows in the tam-mediately from the ceiling, at least through the upper part For rooms in general, the plan of lighting them from the ceiling would not be practicable; yet, where suitable opportunity offers, it should be adopted, not only for the sake of variety of effect, but also as affording great scope for ornamental design. |