THE 



GARDENER 



JUNE 1879. 



HEATING BY HOT WATER. 



HE discussion on the above subject is increasing in force. 

 If it goes on much longer, 'The Gardener' will be in 

 danger of exploding, unless provided with a safety-valve. 

 In the issue for April two of your correspondents bring 

 forward — the one an equalised mixed forcing, the other 

 a push - and - pull theory of circulation; and in the May issue Mr 

 A. D. Makenzie furnishes a strata theory. 



The latter gentleman says that my paper in the February issue " only 

 brings forward the ghost of an old friend with a new face," and that 

 the system of fitting up a hot-water apparatus therein advocated " has 

 been familiar to gardeners and hot- water engineers for a generation." 

 Now, I am not going to dispute this. It may be all true, for anything 

 I know to the contrary. I only know that if the method " has been 

 familiar to hot-water engineers for a generation," they have kept the 

 matter to themselves, and, as a rule, carried out a different one. Mr 

 Makenzie disposes of several of the statements contained in my paper 

 by simply calling them grievous and serious mistakes, errors, <fcc, &c. 

 It is not surprising, however, that he adopted this hurried manner, 

 seeing that he was only dealing with "the ghost of an old friend." 

 Indeed it would be unfair to expect him to examine it minutely. 

 Ghosts, whether of friends or foes, are said to be uncanny ; and none 

 of us would like to have more to do with them than we possibly could 

 help. I fancy, however, that unless more logical reasons are furnished 

 for the incorrectness of the statements which I have made in reference 

 to the subject under consideration than those supplied by Mr Makenzie, 

 that " the ghost of an old friend with a new face " will be an appari- 

 tion of frequent occurrence to hot-water engineers. 



