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quired, must be placed in the retort, and the door screwed on and luted tight with a lute of clay and sand; this done, a strong heat being applied by means of a fire kept up in the furnace, hydrogenous gas, or inflammable air, will be driven out of the coal confined in the retort, and forced through the water in the bath in which the condenser is immersed; by passing through the water, the bituminous matter, which is a component part of the coal, is separated from the gas, which is washed and purified. From the condenser, the purified gas is passed by a pipe through the water in the cistern, to the gasometer, where it may be reserved for use. As the gas passes in, the gasometer will be raised up until it is filled; when full, (to prevent the escape of the gas underneath, and the smell which it occasions when it issues without burning,) it may be burned from the cock on the pipe which leads from the condenser to the gasometer. When the lights are required, by taking a weight off the balance, the gasometer bears with so much the greater force on the volume of gas contained in it, by which it will be propelled through the pipes to any distance and in any direction to the burners, which are situated where the lights are wanted. Immediately on the issuing of the gas from the aperture of the burner, and coming in contact with the oxygenous gas of the atmospheric air, it will take flame on the application of a taper, and burn with a brilliant light, without smell or smoke, as long as there is any gas in the gasometer.

The burners are fitted with keys by which each separate flame may be regulated to give more or less light at pleasure, or be instantaneously extinguished; and the whole (be there ever so many) may be regulated as to the size of the flame, or they may be instantaneously extinguished by turning the key in the main tube.

The quantity of coal required for any given number of lights will vary with its quality; the usual quantity is about forty pounds for fifty flames, equal to that of a moulded candle of six to the pound, to burn three hours. Two pecks of coal weighing forty pounds, put into the retort, will leave a resi

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Melville's Patent improved Gas - apparatus.

Tiebout

duum of near three pecks of coak, weighing twenty-eight pounds. The coak is better for many uses than raw coal, and if used in the furnace to extract the gas, will be nearly sufficient fuel for each succeeding operation.

Note. Any person or company wishing to be furnished with the Improved Gas Apparatus, are requested to apply to Winslow Lewis, Boston, or David Melville, Newport, (R. I.) who are the sole proprietors of the patent right.

VOL. V.

R

No. 17.

Medical and Philosophical Intelligence.

[From the Monthly Magazine for October, 1814]

It affords us the highest satisfaction to be able to state that the first of practical modern discoveries, the means of illumination by the gas of coal, proceeds in its application with all the success that can be desired. A new establishment has been opened in Worship-street in addition to that in the City Road, and both manufactories are constantly employed in evolving gas, which is preserved in butts, like beer, and sent for use to any distant place at which it is intended to be consumed. Many hundred butts, besides large reservoirs, have thus been manufactured during the summer, and kept in store for the winter. Already above a mile of the public streets is enlightened by this means, besides the Houses of Parliament and many public buildings. The beauty and brilliancy of the light exceed the powers of description, and can only be understood by being witnessed.

A new edition is printing, with considerable enlargements, of Mr. Arthur Young's celebrated Farmer's Kalendar, the most useful and important volume which perhaps ever issued from the press, a judgment in which the public opinion confirms us, by purchasing seven very large editions. Though the illustrious and veteran author is unhappily deprived of the enjoyment of his sight, yet his intellectual vigour continues unimpaired, and has been sedulously employed in the perfection of this favourite work.

Mr. Sawrey is preparing an account of the Morbid Anatomy of the Brain in Mania and Hydrophobia; with the pathology of the two diseases, and experiments to ascertain the presence of water in the ventricles and pericardium; collected

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