100 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



panels and screens. The general designs of the houses and public buildings 

 were very inferior to the execution of the details of construction. The former 

 were uniform, and probably in accordance with the ancient models, and 

 showed a constraint of inventive power within rules doubtless prescribed by 

 Government ; while the latter evinced that perfection of finish which belongs 

 to progressive experience. As in the carpentry so in the masonry, there was 

 no freedom nor boldness of conception, but the most complete execution. 

 Their stone was weh 1 cut, and then- walls strongly and regularly built, 

 generally in the massive Cyclopean style. The coopers were found to be 

 very expert at Hakodadi, where a large number of barrels was constantly in 

 the process of manufacture, for packing the dried and salted fish. The barrels 

 are firkin-shaped, bulging at the top, and are rapidly and skilfully hooped 

 with plaited bamboo. There are many workers in metal for ornamental and 

 useful purposes. The Japanese understand well the carbonizing of iron, and 

 the temper of much of their steel is good, as was proved by the polish and 

 sharpness of then 1 sword blades. The cutlery, however, in common use at 

 Hakodadi was of an inferior kind, and the barber of one of the ships pro- 

 nounced a razor purchased in the town as being abominably bad, neither cut- 

 ting nor capable of being made to cut. American Expedition to the Chinese 

 Seas and Japan. 



LIVERMORE'S BARBEL MACHINERY. 



It is difficult, if not impossible, to estimate how many millions of kegs, 

 casks, barrels, butts, hogsheads, &c., in all their varieties, are annually required 

 throughout the world. It has been said of the Chinese, whose skill in exe- 

 cuting other impossibilities in wood is unapproachable, that they can make 

 anything except a barrel ; but throughout the rest of the civilized world we 

 believe common consent agrees with the experience of ages in demanding for 

 general packing purposes precisely the qualities found in these constructions, 

 i.e. convenient size for handling, roundness for rolling, projecting chimes to 

 be seized in hoisting, and a swelled bilge to allow of tightening by driving the 

 hoops. Economy demands that the whole shall be of wood in separate pieces ; 

 but a due regard to efficiency and tightness requires a high degree of per- 

 fection hi the workmanship. To fulfil all these conditions by machinery, and 

 manufacture perfect barrels in any other manner than by the cooper's tools 

 and the cresset fire, has come to be considered almost an impossibility. Ma- 

 chines for sa,wing out a form tolerably approximating to that of a stave have 

 been put in use with good success for some purposes ; and a powerful engine 

 for biting off large shavings or chips in just the form desired has astonished 

 the curious at all our fairs; and both these, with many others, have con- 

 tributed their quota to the immense number of hooped and headed cases 

 which inclose the flour, rice, beans, fruit, and " sundries" in transportation or 

 storage in our widely-extended country. But the importance of tolerably 

 tight and well made barrels for flour is plainly apparent in every warehouse, 

 where the waste of the " double extra," "fancy," "superfine" material can be 

 observed, and the employment of barrels absolutely water tight, by preserving 

 the flour from damage, would under many circumstances add a large per- 



