found. The Roman brick was often flat and large--in fact, more like our
common paving tiles, known as foot tiles, only of larger size than like
the bricks that we use. They vary, however, in size, shape, and
thickness. Not a few of them are triangular in shape, and these are
mostly employed as a sort of facing to concrete work, the point of the
triangle being embedded in the concrete and the broad base appearing
outside. After the Roman time, brick making seems to have almost ceased
in England for many centuries.

It is true we find remains of a certain number of massive brick
buildings erected not long after the Norman conquest; but on examination
it turns out that these were put up at places where there had been a
Roman town, and were built of Roman bricks obtained by pulling down
previous buildings. The oldest parts of St. Albans Abbey and portions of
the old Norman buildings at Colchester are examples of this sort.
Apparently, timber was used in this country almost exclusively for
humble buildings down to the 16th century. This is not surprising,
considering how well wooded England was; but stone served during the
same period for important buildings almost to the exclusion of brick.
This is more remarkable, as we find stone churches and the ruins of
stone castles in not a few spots remote from stone quarries, and to
which the stone must have been laboriously conveyed at a time when roads
were very bad and wheel carts were scarce.

About the time of the Tudors, say the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the
making of bricks was resumed in England, and many dwelling houses and
some few churches were built of good brickwork in that and succeeding
reigns. We find in such buildings as Hampton Court Palace, St. James'
Palace, and Chelsea Hospital examples of the use of brickwork in
important buildings near London at later dates. The fire of London, in