Show I 1 BRICKS AND CEMENT SWELL absorb moisture and grow to a considerable sid erable extent Ave A cording to english publication flow much has your house or tile the wall at the bottom of your garden grown houses and walls inde indeed ed all things made of bricks do grow and this fact Is known to architects who sometimes have to allow tor for it when hen making plans for building says london answers in the old d days ays when the clay of which bricks blick s were made was mixed with ith waters water before being baked the amount of growth was wag not noticeable now that no water or ery little Is mixed with the clay which Is therefore said to be dry baked the bricks absorb moisture and swell sometimes to a considerable extent some ears ago in a garden at ely a pier was built of dry baked bricks and the garden hose was turned onto this pier for a considerable period every day for some weeks at the end of this time the pier was measured when it was found to have grown some inches cement Is another substance which grows that Is wily why you may often see on station platforms and on wall copings built of cement one of the joints missed out here and there the greatest growth naturally takes place where cements and bricks are used together as happened in a house of which the parapet was built of bricks placed endways and cement supported on iron the growth in this instance was so great that quite large spaces were visible between the iron supports and the parapet |