Water tower

“ Hence you may mount, but leisurely, in compassion for your guide if not for yourself, the central tower, till you reach the lantern-like construction that at a height of a hundred feet crowns the summit of the town hall. There stand, and look down far and wide over the most fertile plain that ever alluvial deposit formed in the new world, or the old either. On every side extends a green tree-grown level as far as the eye can reach, its surface just high enough raised above water-mark to escape becoming a swamp, yet nowhere too high for easy irrigation ”

“ At high tide, the whole of the land on which are now situated Crane-street and the neighbourhood, was covered with water. At the south angle of the walls is an old square tower, anciently called Bonwaldesthorne’s Tower, from which is an embattled passage to the Water Tower, which was built in 1322, by contract for £100, by John Helpstone, a mason. The dimensions were 24 yards in height, and 101⁄2 yards in diameter. ”

“ On all sides Corinthian columns, plain or fluted, little towers with crenelated tops, and a mass of kiosks meet the eye. Lions rampant are mounted on the battlements, whilst curious gargoyles protrude from every corner. From story to story we have the rise of the central tower, each platform being marked by the octagonal towers at the corners, and the winding flight of stairs. The dome which crowns the top is formed by the "intersection of two semicircular arches built up with steps and balustrades, which look not unlike arcs boutant or flying buttresses." ”

“ Considering the enormous weight and height of the Water Tower, with its huge tank at the top, capable of containing several hundred tons of water, it became necessary to take every precaution, the matter being of great importance both as regards the safety of the tunnel, with its huge superincumbent weight, and the Water Tower, which, from its great height, and also from being placed at some little distance laterally from the tunnel, might easily have been thrown out of the perpendicular, had any settlement taken place after its erection. ”

“ It must be clear, therefore, to everyone, that difficulties, unusual in magnitude and peculiar in kind, must have stood in the way of the daring engineer who should undertake the erection of a tower on a rock twelve miles out on the stormy sea, and the foundation of which was covered with ten or twelve feet of water every tide ”

“ They can scarcely have been intended for defence, indeed I am not certain that they extend round the whole enclosure. The ditch may have been a canal bringing water to the palace or fortress.
We rode out of one of the western gates of Ḳâdisîyah and in a little over an hour reached the enigmatic tower of Ḳâim. It stands in the angle formed by the Tigris and the channel of the Nahr el Ḳâim, which has silted up so that no water runs down it from the river. The tower is a truncated cone composed of pebbles and concrete; there is no chamber inside it and no means of climbing to the top of it. ”

“ Now, if a submarine cannot rise to the surface, it is possible for a man to climb into this conning tower. Another man then closes the lid below and floods the tower very slowly. When the water reaches the head of the man in the tower there is just enough pressure for him to push open the lid at the top and shoot up to the surface. ”

“ It is a tall four-sided tower built upon a squat snub-nosed boat. It has a great proboscis, that it sticks down into canal-boats full of grain, which it sucks or dips out so that it can load the grain into the holds of ships that are to carry it to Europe. Our floating baths are square one-story houses, hollow in the middle, where the bathers swim, with lattice-work or perforated boards under them to let in the water without letting out the bathers. ”

“ As our boat glides onward from under the shadow of the arch, we see near the eastern shore a strongly built stone tower. This stands over the mouth of the aqueduct (as the huge pipes are called which convey the water to Birmingham) . The water flows into the tower through several large openings on all sides, and its entrance into the aqueduct is controlled by hydraulic machinery.
Bending to our oars again we follow the curves of the lake for about three miles, with the railway running close to the water's edge. It was laid by the engineers to assist them in this great undertaking. ”

“ Once washed at high tide they are now separated from the water’s edge by a wide roadway and promenade. The walls, which are about forty feet in height, are embattled, and pierced for the discharge of arrows and firearms by the defenders. One of the most prominent features of this stretch of wall along the west shore is the fine, high corner tower—but alas! ”

“ Another current was attracted by the eave gutters at the east angle of the dwelling near the tower, and passed along them to the north east angle, splitting them through the centre. At this point its course was changed to the west, and passed into the assistant keeper’s yard and down the rain water pipe to the water tank, splintering it and the slating and brick wall, &c. ”

“ The sea has been encroaching on this tower until its base is in the water. Brush mattresses were made, pinned down to the sand with small iron screw piles, covered with sand and occasionally blocks of concrete, to further check such encroachment, but the almost constant surf, beating against the mattresses, tore them to pieces. * * * An appropriation for a new tower, further inland is badly needed. It is recommended that a skeleton iron tower be erected ”

“ The first glance at your feet falls on a broad simple carpet of turf, around which a softly winding gravel-walk leads to the entrance and exit of the gigantic edifice. Looking backwards, your eye rests on the two black towers, of which the oldest, called Guy’s Tower, rears its head aloft in solitary threatening majesty, high above all the surrounding foliage, and looks as if cast in one mass of solid iron;—the other, built by Beauchamp, is half hidden by a pine and a chestnut, the noble growth of centuries. ”

“ A little beyond where the double line of rocks ended, I saw a round tower of unusual height with machicolations and embattlements, in apparently perfect preservation, rising from the midst of what once must have been a fortress of great strength, which on the side of the river had no need of a moat, for it was there defended by the escarped rock, to the edge of which the outer ramparts were carried. ”

“ Imagine a slender tower, built amid the smother of foam on a wave-swept rock. Imagine the supreme impudence of man who boldly sets himself the task of building there a cylinder of stone surmounted by a cage of glass. Nor does his impudence end there. Although it may be that for weeks at a time no boat may come near the spume and flying spray about the rocks above which stands the tower, yet in the tower are men. They calmly go about the tasks assigned to them. They polish the powerful lenses about the light. Each night they light the lamp. ”

“ Such care is nevertheless doubly necessary with this structure, on account of its delicacy of ornamentation, as the slightest damage would readily entail a greater and more dangerous one; for the gigantic tower has no foundation wall running round its base but is built upon piles, between which deep in the ground below flows a navigable canal. ”

“ Of the walls there remain only some scattered ruins; the stones of the watch-tower have fallen one above another into the moat, filling it to the top; in the court-of-arms grow briers and patches of yellow mustard; in whatever direction you look, you see only broken arches, blackened and crumbling blocks of stone; here a section of the barbican in whose fissures springs the ivy, there a round tower, standing yet, as by a miracle; further on, pillars of cement with the iron rings which supported the drawbridge. ”

“ A description of the elevated tank, which is novel in design, with the reasons for adopting the type of structure used, the method of construction, and the detailed cost, form the basis of this paper.
The tower is on the top of the highest hill in the city, in the heart of the most exclusive residential district, beautiful homes clustering about its base. The necessity for architectural treatment of the structure is thus seen to be of prime importance. ”

“ Run down it as swiftly as you may, and then fling yourself on your back among the creeping pines and look up straight into the sky, where more than 4,000 feet overhead the vapours meet and part round the astounding rock-tower which shoots up solitary and unsupported until its top is lost in the sky. ”

“ I found the stack which I had been brought to see forming the picturesque centre of a bold tract of rock scenery. It stands out from the land as a tall insulated tower, about two hundred feet in height, sorely worn at its base by the breakers that ceaselessly fret against its sides, but considerably broader atop, where it bears a flat cover of sward on the same level with the tops of the precipices which in the lapse of ages have receded from around it. ”

“ Upon an isolated rock at the very brink of the cataract stands a round tower. It is approached by a long, narrow bridge, resting now upon ledges of solid rock, and now upon loose bowlders. From the balcony upon its summit, you can lean far over the edge of the precipice, and there catch the freshness of the cloud of spray that rises evermore from the unseen foot of the great fall. Or you can climb down the low rock upon which the tower stands, and gather shells and pebbles from within arm’s length of the verge of the descent, so gentle, to all appearance, is the current. ”

“ Beautiful for its figure and its decoration, is that spire, and so is the incomparable tower, from which it springs like a plant; and wherever the eye rests in wandering over the splendours of its surrounding walls, buttresses, pinnacle, arches, and gables, all is in keeping, and one spirit seems to animate the pile. I am sorry to confess disappointment as to the interior. It is so neglected, and has been so much impaired. The clustered columns that support the tower have yielded to its weight, and are visibly bowed and sprung from their piers. ”

“ A lake near by is reached by an underground passage, and miracles of healing are said to be wrought upon the sick who come here with faith, and stay until they get well. In the midst of the enclosure rises a tower more than three hundred feet, and a blind bell-ringer delights in leading you to the look-out loft, and answering every question you can ask respecting every object in your sight. ”

“ Every now and then from one of the hills you get a glimpse of the square red tower, massive and battlemented, rising among the grey of its ilexes, beckoning one across a ridge or two and a valley; then disappearing again, engulfed in the oak woods, green in summer, copper-coloured in winter; to reappear, but on the side you least expected it, plume of ilexes, battlements of tower, as you twisted along the high-lying vineyards and the clusters of umbrella pines fringing the hill-tops ”

“ The whole three miles of granite table-land, seals, sea-birds, and human beings, are mere accidents and appendages—the pedestal and the ornaments of that great white tower in the centre, whose sleepless fiery eye blinks all night long over the night-mists of the Atlantic. ”

“ As we drew nearer, the aerial structures which we had first seen began to tower up to an amazing height, just perceptibly swaying and undulating with the gentle currents of air that flowed through their traceried lattices, while behind them began to loom an immense number of floating towers, rising stage above stage, like the steel monsters of New York before they have received their outer coverings, but incomparably lighter in appearance, and more delicate and graceful ”

“ Its weather-worn walls are now moss-encrusted and lichen-laden; tiny weeds and grasses—bird or wind sown—find a home in many a crevice of the time-rent masonry. The tower is a study of colour, its rugged surface shows plainly the stress and stains of countless winter storms. Yellow and gray stones, green grasses and vegetation, ruddy bricks and broken tiles, form a blending of tints that go to make a harmonious whole, mellowed as they are by the magic hand of Time. The tower stands there silently eloquent of the past, beautiful with a beauty it had not at first, and that is the dower of ages ”

“ We note these things complacently as we toil in the sun up the hill to the Victoria Hotel, which stands well up on the backbone of the ridge, and from the upper windows of which we have a fine view of the harbor, and of the hill opposite, above Carleton, where there is the brokenly truncated ruin of a round stone tower. This tower was one of the first things that caught our eyes as we entered the harbor. It gave an antique picturesqueness to the landscape which it entirely wanted without this. Round stone towers are not so common in this world that we can afford to be indifferent to them. ”

“ Remains of chambers on either side are discoverable, the one on the left hand possessing a garderobe; the outer entrance is defended by two half–round towers, which are pierced with loopholes for repelling attack. The tower gateway leads out upon the high bank, which was originally a portion of the dam of the great lake, and was used as a tilt–yard. It extends for a distance of about eighty yards to the Gallery Tower placed at the end of this isthmus–like strip of land, which in ancient times separated the lower lake from the great lake. ”

“ The flying buttresses supporting the tower are of very great beauty and grace, two springing from each pinnacle of the main tower and resting against the angles of the octagonal lantern, above which rises the beautiful spire to a further height of 130 feet, the total elevation of the whole being just over 300 feet. ”

“ In some places the light is placed in mid-stream, and perhaps mounted upon a massive, high, steel caisson, resting upon a concrete foundation, thereby proving immovable to the most powerful of ice-shoves. Or a large pier carried out in ferro-concrete and pyramidal in shape is used. In the case of the back light there is a skeleton tower, which structure is employed to gain the necessary height. This is carried upon a high, huge, solid plinth of concrete, even if built against the bank. ”