Mechanical Science, 399 



part ; a cuirass, with its brassets ; a piece of armour for the waist 

 and thighs ; a pair of boots of double wire-gauze ; and an oval 

 shield, five feet long, and two and a half wide, formed by extending 

 gauze over a thin frame of iron. The metallic gauze is of iron, and 

 the intervals between the threads about one-twenty-fifth of an inch 

 each. 



When at Geneva, Iff. Aldini instructed the firemen in the 

 defensive power of his arrangements, and then practised them, 

 before he made the public experiments. He shewed them that a 

 finger enveloped first in asbestos, and then in a double case of 

 wire gauze, might be held in the flame of a spirit-lamp or candle 

 for a long time, before inconvenient heat was felt ; and then clothing 

 them, gradually accustomed them to the fiercest flames. 



The following are some of the public trials made. A fireman 

 having his hand inclosed in a double asbestos glove, and guarded 

 in the palm by a piece of asbestos cloth, laid hold of a large piece 

 of red hot iron, carried it slowly to the distance of 150 feet, then 

 set straw on fire by it, and immediately brought it back to the 

 furnace. The hand was not at all injured in the experiment. 



The second experiment related to the defence of the head, the 

 eyes, and the lungs. The fireman put on only the asbestos and wire 

 gauze cap, and the cuirass, and held the shield before his breast. 

 A fire of shavings was then lighted, and sustained in a very large 

 raised chaffing-dish, and the fireman approaching it, plunged his 

 head into the middle of the flames, with his face towards the fuel, 

 and in that way went several times round the chaffing-dish, and for 

 a period above a minute in duration. The experiment was made 

 several times, and those who made it said they suffered no oppres- 

 sion or inconvenience in the act of respiration. 



The third experiment was with the complete apparatus. Two 

 rows of faggots, mingled with straw, were arranged vertically against 

 bars of iron, so as to form a passage between, thirty feet long, and 

 six feet wide. Four such arrangements were made, differing in 

 the proportion of wood and straw, and one was with straw alone. 

 Fire was then applied to one of these double piles ; and a fireman, 

 invested in the defensive clothing, and guarded by the shield, 

 entered between the double hedge of flames, and traversed the 

 alley several times. The flames rose ten feet in height, and joined 

 over his head. Each passage was made slowly, and occupied from 

 twelve to fifteen seconds ; they were repeated six or eight times, 

 and even oftener, in succession, and the firemen were exposed to 

 the almost constant action of the flames for the period of a minute 

 and a half, or two minutes, and even more. 



When the course was made between the double range of faggots 

 without straw, the fireman carried a kind of pannier on his back, 

 prepared in such a way as to be fire-proof, in which was placed a 

 child, with its head covered by an asbestos bonnet, and additionally 

 protected by the wire-gauze shield. 



