1CXS 



Repetition; 



Experiment at 



Gotha. 



METHOD OP EXTINGUISHING FIRE. 



I 



rent of air from the bottom upwards, the combuflion might be 

 rendered as brifk as poflible when the building fhould be fet on 

 rlre. The infide of the partitions were ftrongly pitched, and 

 were befide covered with twitted ftraw, which was alfo 

 pitched. To the inner part of this ftraw covering, I fattened 

 wood (havings, and befides this a coarfe cotton cloth, foaked 

 in oil of turpentine, in order that the whole infide of the build- 

 ing might be quickly on fire. Very foon after lighting it, the 

 flames being rendered more britk by the wind, were every 

 where fo violent, that it was confidered by my affiftants as im- 

 poffibletoextinguifh them: I fucceeded, however, after the 

 method above directed, in little more than four minutes, and 

 with five buckets of water, a part of which was walled by the 

 negligence of my affiftants, as was proved by the following 

 experiment : 



Having invited only a few perfons to witnefs this, my firft 

 experiment, on the 8 th May, I repaired my apparatus, and 

 repeated it on the 1 1th, before a great number of fpe&ators : 

 the flames were no lefs violent than in the preceding experi- 

 ment. I now undertook to direct the jets of water in perfon, 

 and fucceeded in extinguifhing the fire in three minutes, and 

 employed only three buckets of water, each containing about 

 eighteen pints. 



Being at Gotha in July 1801, the duke and duchefs of Gotha 

 prefled me much for a repetition of my experiment at their own 

 expence, the details of which they had feen in the German 

 journals ; in order to make the matter more fully underftood 

 in that part of Germany, where, as in every other place, fires 

 often make the moft dreadful ravages, in confequence of the ig- 

 norance of the method of properly ufing the fmall quantity of 

 water which they may have at hand. The obliging manner in 

 which their highneffes made their requeft, and my own wifh to 

 render it more generally ufeful, induced me to repeat it. The 

 celebrated aftronomer, Von Zach, affifted me in this experi- 

 ment, and had the goodnefs to infert an account of it in a 

 German periodical paper, intitled Reichs Anrieger, 6th Auguft, 

 1798, No. 119. 



M. Lalandearrivingat Gotha on the 30th July, four days after 

 this experiment, was well acquainted with its refults, and, as 

 he has iince told me, fpoke of it at the National Inftitute, foon 

 after his return to Paris j but informed me, at the fame time, 



9 that 



