Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 16.djvu/163

FORTY·—FIRST CONGRESS. Sess. II. Ch. 108. 1870. 129 Dcsmptim of the Improvemmts.—A. Main building on the. northern ImPl’°Y•• front. — The northern or avenue front will be appropriated to an edifice m°m'°' which consists, as per design, of projecting pavilions, with deep returns on Seventh and Ninth streets. These are five stories in height above the ground, exclusive of the prominent Mansard roofs ; further, it consists of connecting wings, four stories high above ground, and having also Mansard roofs. The main part of this building will be eighty feet in depth, exclusive of wide projections at center and at ends, towards the south, and of light ornamental projections to the north. The first story of this building is occupied by stores, and the upper stories will contain all the necessary and useful accommodations for offices, rooms, or other lawful purposes, the servants’ department of which is located in a basement, which has also cellars for the stores, and the necessary cold-air ducts, hot-air flues, coils of steam-pipes, chambers and fixtures for heating all the rooms and corridors of the whole building with low-pressure steam generated in non-explosive boilers, walled in fireprootl Among the modern accommodations are prominent separate elevators, with best mechanical appliances for the conveyance of persons and baggage to the different stories; liberal allowances for lobbies, public and private parlors, reading rooms, large and well-ventilated modern public and private halls, suites of rooms and single moms, with communicating bath-rooms and alcoves, good-sized plain rooms, spacious corridors, twelve feet in width, easy and wide stair ways in sufficient number, which afford easy egress in case of alarms; further, large dust shafts through the house; also speaking·tubes in all directions, electric bells and clocks. The whole avenue front, as well as the fronts of the pavilions, returned around their northern corners on Seventh and Ninth streets, will be faced with granite for entrance story, and with marble or cut sandstone of equal style and durability for upper stories up to the main cornice. The ornamental and molded or carved trimmings of the windows, and other details implying the art of the sculptor, will be constructed of metal. All the above cut-stone and ornamental work to be backed with and anchored to brick work of proportionate thickness, consisting of best hardburnt bricks, laid in cement mortar. The Mansard roofs will be covered with ornamental slate laid to chaste and tasty patterns; the roof of the cupola will be covered in likewise with projecting ribs of galvanized metal running up along the hips, and the prominent parts of which are gilded. The flat part of the Mansardroofs will receive a metal covering, laid on English felt, the scroll-work forming the crest·railings along the upper edges of the French roofs; and all similar parts, whether purely constructive or decorative, wherever they are exposed to the destructive agency of the elements, will be of cast or wrought iron, and bropzed. The shell of the building, respectively, the substance and finish of its exterior being thus clearly defined, we now proceed to specify the character and substance of construction and interior finish. The foundations and cellar walls to be started upon two courses of bluestones, of extra size, well bedded on the natural ground, and flushed in solid with good cement mortar. All the foundations to go down to solid natural ground. and wherever this or its equivalent cannot be obtanned, recourse must be had to pile foundations. The basement and cellar walls will be built with best blue-stone masonry, laid in cement mortar; the floors of cellars and basement to consist of a layer of concrete, consisting of cement,·br1ckbats, and broken stones in due proportions and of a proportionate thickness for the different purposes. The doors to be laid upon this substratum of cement will consist of bricks, pure cement, or wooden floormg, as the considerations of safety, health, and comfort of the occupants will require. t The ceiling of the cellar, or, rather, floor of the entrance story, will be constructed fire·proof, of rolled iron beams with mtermedtate brick arches von. xv:. Pun. -9