THE BRICKMAKER.

BRICKFIELD, SHED, KILN, &C.

It would be very difficult, and perhaps impossible, to discover at what time in the history of the world the art of brickmaking was first practised. In the earliest records of the human race the making of bricks is mentioned; this was part of the labour imposed upon the children of Israel, when they were in captivity in Egypt, and bricks of excellent quality are found in some of the most ancient buildings, the remains of which have been discovered. Though uncivilized nations, and even some which had madegreat progress in civilization, but lived in very warm or exceedingly cold climates, frequently built dwellings of wood, of wattles or strips of trees and branches covered with clay and lime, and of rough stone and earth; and though whole tribes lived and still live under tents, or in mere log huts and wigwams, or lodges made of the skins of animals, the manufacture of bricks formed of clay, and either burnt with fire or dried in the sun, is amongst the oldest of all known trades. In our own day it has arrived at such perfection and the varieties of bricks and tiles are so great in order to provide for the great diversity in buildings, that it is one of the most important branches of English industry.

We learn from the Bible that burnt bricks were used in building the Tower of Babel, and from early historians, as well as from recent discoveries, we know that they were also made for the walls of Babylon. The bricks of the ancient Egyptians were made of clay tempered with water and mixed with chopped straw, and afterwards dried in the sun, and the labour of the Israelites was made more severe by their being compelled to find straw for themselves. In Rome both burnt or kiln-dried bricks and those dried in the sun were employed, and though at a later date the art of brickmaking seems to have fallen into disuse, it was revived again in Italy after some hundreds of years. The trade seems to have been brought to England by the Romans, and many of the most ancient buildings in this country are made of very fine brickwork, though, till the reign of Elizabeth, only large mansions were so built, the common houses being formed of frame-works of timber filled in with coarse plaster supported by laths of wood.

There are few more interesting sights than a brick-fieldin full work with its great sheds, its horses going slowly round and round in the mills, grinding the clay which has been dug out of the deep pits; its great stacks covered with hurdles and screens made of reeds and its immense kilns, so cleverly and evenly built, where the smoke rises lazily from the dull fires by which the drying or burning is completed.

Clay Mill.

The methods of brickmaking differ considerably in various parts of England, but that which we most commonly see in practice near London will very well represent them all, and it is this which will now be described. The earth used for making bricks is found after digging till the labourers reach the loamy soil lying just above that blue clay which is known as London clay; and this earth is known as strong clay, mild clay, and malm, and this earthrequires preparation by mixing with them chalk and the dust of burnt ashes from the dust bins. These burnt ashes the brickmakers call “breeze.”

The chalk mill and the clay mill are placed close together on large mounds, high enough to allow the “malm” (which is a mixture of chalk and clay ground to a thin paste) to run down to the brick earth. The chalk mill is a round trough where the chalk is ground by heavy wheels fitted with spikes on their tires or hoops, and turned by one or two horses. The trough is supplied with water from a pump, and the chalk, as it is ground, runs off by a wooden gutter into the clay mill, where it is again stirred and ground till it mixes with the clay; the mixture then runs through a grating and through other gutters to the brick earth, which has been placed in heaps to receive it.

Hack Barrow. Barrow.

When the earth is mixed in this way, it becomes brick-clay, and is taken in barrows up a sloping board, to the pug mill. The pug mill is a great tub, the top of which is larger than the bottom, and in the centre of it there revolves an upright iron shaft fitted with knives. These knives cut and break the clay as it passes through the mill, and they also force it downwards till it reaches the bottom, where itpasses through a hole on to a machine called the Cuckhold, which is a sort of table containing a trough where the clay is cut into lumps ready for the moulder.

Pug Mill.

Barrow for carrying baked Bricks.

Kick and Stockboard. Mould. Board for Moulding. Strike. Brick-mould.

The moulder who shapes the clay into bricks uses moulding sand,—a peculiar sort of sand brought from thebed of the river, and spread out in the sun, where it is turned over and over till it is quite dry. It prevents the clay from shrinking, gives a harder surface to the bricks, and prevents them from sticking to the mould, or to each other; it also gives the London bricks their grey colour. The moulder stands at the moulding stool, which has a rim at each end to keep the moulding sand from falling off, and has a stockboard, which forms the bottom of the brick-mould, and a page, or two iron rods nailed at each end to wooden rails, used to slide the raw bricks from the moulder to the place from which the “taking-off boy” takes them to place on the “hack barrow,” by which they are carried away. The moulder is served with the lumps of clay by the “clot moulder.” The “brick-mould” is a kind of boxwithout top or bottom, and the moulder dashes the tempered clay into the mould with sufficient force to make the clay completely fill it; after which the superfluous clay is removed from the surface of the mould with the strike. The brick is then turned out on to a pallet or board, on which it is wheeled by the boy to the “hack ground,” where the bricks are built up to dry in low walls called “hacks.” The brick moulds are made of brass or iron, and often of wood.Sometimes the bricks are dried on a floor under a shed, but often in the open air, where they are covered with straw, reed-flats, or canvas and tarpauline screens, to protect them from wet, frost, or excessive heat. The bricks are afterwards burnt either in “clamps” or in “kilns.” In clamp burning the bricks are built up close together, and the bottom ones only are heated with burning breeze or cinders, the heat spreading to those at the top. A kiln is a sort of large chamber in which the bricks are loosely stacked with spaces between them for the heat to pass through, and they are baked by fires placed either in arched furnaces under the floors of the kiln, or in fire holes made in the side walls. The kilns are built of various shapes, and one of the principal arts in the trade of the Brickmaker is to construct them that the heat may be properly distributed, and the bricks equally and thoroughly baked.

Shovel. Pick. Reed Flats.

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