TECHNOLOGY. 397 



The Siemens gas-furnace that replaced the above contain- 

 ed sixteen pots, each having a capacity of 1000 pounds 

 giving, therefore, 16,000 pounds to a melt, averaging twelve 

 hours to a heat, and consuming four and a half tons of coal 

 per twenty -four hours. The quality of product was uni- 

 formly excellent. If required, eight melts per week can be 

 made. The uniformity of the heating and the purity of the 

 flame effected a notable saving of pots (as much as 50 per 

 cent, over the old furnace). But trifling skimming was re- 

 quired, and the yield of product per melt is fully 30 per cent, 

 greater than in the coal-furnace. 



The gas-furnace supplying the above facts was started in 

 August, 1877, and at the time of writing shows but little 

 wear; and during September but four pots out of the six- 

 teen were broken. 



TELEGRAPHY. 



The report of the President of the Western Union Tele- 

 graph Company for the year ending June 30, 1877, showed 

 that the company operated 76,955 miles of line and 194,323 

 miles of wire being an increase of 3423 miles of line and 

 10,491 miles of wire as compared with the preceding year. 

 These data do not, of course, include the lines operated 

 by rival companies, and by numerous railroads and other 

 corporations and business firms throughout the country, and 

 which w T ould very largely swell the figures named above. 

 The arrangement made last year between the Western 

 Union Company and the Atlantic and Pacific Telegraph 

 Company, by which the gross receipts of the combined 

 companies shall be pooled and divided upon a certain basis 

 agreed upon, was one of the notable commercial events of the 

 past year, the substantial business effects of which consoli- 

 dation will be likely to accrue to the companies more palpa- 

 bly than to the public. The quadruplex system lias been 

 largely introduced in this country during the year, and is 

 rapidly growing in favor in England. 



The agitation of the question of underground lines in cit- 

 ies, which was more earnest than ever before, does not ap- 

 pear to have borne any substantial fruit during the past 

 year in this country. Abroad, however, the German Gov- 

 ernment has been steadily perfecting and completing an ex- 

 tensive network of subterranean lines to connect the chief 



