1879. 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



105 



Havina: progressed so far in examining Mr. 

 P.'s commnnication, the remaining points ap- 

 pear to be written for the edification of the 

 editor. However, that may be, the editor has 

 civen it to tlie pnblic, perhaps with tlie view 

 that some readers would answer some of the 

 (juestions for tlie benefit of the readers. Mr. P. 

 puts a question for you or some one to answer; 

 I wish you would answer it. " Has ever any 

 l>atentee ascertained and informed us of how 

 much heat in his boiler is secured to the water, 

 and how much escapes through the chimney?" 

 To answer the question as it reads, I would say 

 so long as a fire was under the boiler all the 

 heat in the iron goes into the water. However, 

 Mr. P. did not intend to put it that way, and I 

 will call it a slip of the pen. I presume he 

 wants to know how much of the heat from a 

 given amount of fuel is utilized. A patentee 

 said there was no known means of utilizing all 

 the caloric generated. More than half went up 

 the smoke flue and it might be seventy per cent. 

 Experiments by eminent chemists on the loco- 

 motive engine show that only ten per cent, of 

 the caloric is utilized ; full nine-tenths goes 

 somewhere. Gardeners not a few have shown 

 me furnaces and flues — they ought to be reliable 

 for every-daj' nature is their study, and ought to 

 be well read on natural philosophy, well and 

 capable to bring and keep us in the right path — 

 and say all the heat in their fuel produced was 

 used in the house. The philosopher tells us 

 that there is as much fuel used in boiling a ket- 

 tle of Avater for an old person's breakfast as 

 would generate steam to propel a locomotive 

 one mile. Mr. P. can bring his own decluctions 

 on any heater if he has one in use. I think we 

 may get twenty-five per cent, and more, likely 

 less, certainly not thirty, there being so many 

 avenues besides the chimney for its escape. I 

 have no desire to mislead anyone, even though 

 I were a patentee ; but there are facts about 

 fuel that every gardener should know is reallj' 

 indispensable, whetl\er they use the hot air flue, 

 steam, water, or any other method. My little 

 experience with gardeners is something curious — 

 they take all tlft information they receive 

 kindly, but quietly say they don't believe it. It 

 is easy to teach men, but up-hill work to unlearn 

 them. "As the twig is bent, the tree is in- 

 clined," is as true now as when it was first pro- 

 mulgated. Bituminous coal is used to make the 

 gas we burn. 2,000 lbs. produces 10,000 cubic 

 feet of gas. To burn the same to produce a 



white light without smoke it requires to be sup- 

 ported by two feet of oxygen to each foot of 

 gas. Should one foot of oxygen be used it would 

 produce smoke in abundance, but the two feet 

 of oxygen is required to give it perfect combus- 

 tion. There is only one-fifth oxygen in the at- 

 mosphere and son^etimes less, so that 10,000 

 feet of carburetted hydrogen requires 100,000 feet 

 of atmospheric air to give perfect combustion. 

 Taking in the coke it would use 130,000 feet of 

 air, and probably anthracite coal might refjuire 

 150,000 cubic feet of air to support a ton weight 

 of such fuel. Suppose you have to use 400 lbs. 

 of coal in one fire, in twenty-four hours you re- 

 quire nearly 2,800 lbs. of air to support the coal. 

 This has to pass through your chimney in the 

 form of carbonic acid gas, and the large bulk 

 of it between three o'clock P. M., and three 

 o'clock, A. M. It is absolutely necessary to 

 give a sharp draft to have a chimney of 

 ample dimensions to carry off the same. A 

 good draft can be diminished ; a poor one can 

 get no increase. 



The main piece of advice Mr. P. gives is to ex- 

 amine into the propriety of giving our pipes more 

 radiating surface than a four-inch pipe gives. 

 From it we have eleven inches radiating surface, 

 and twelve inches of water to the inch. With a 

 section of an eight-inch pipe you have to heat 

 twentj--five inches of water. Make it an oval 

 shape and you reduce it to six or eight inches and 

 a summer's work to put the article up. It 

 would quadruple the cost without the shadow of 

 an advantage. Gentlemen are driven from the 

 pleasure of keeping horticultural establishments 

 more on account of their gardeners than on ac- 

 count of love for horses or yachts. Many garden- 

 ers treat their employer as if his means Avere 

 for their own pleasure. No gentleman wants to 

 employ a tormentor. If horticulture is ne- 

 glected by men of means, many of the gardeners 

 of the present day may lay it as much to their 

 predecessors, chiefly as to any other rival pleas- 

 ure. Horticulture will increase, and the country 

 be covered with pleasant residences and horti- 

 cultural grounds when the employe studies the 

 comfort and pleasure of his employer, and not 

 sooner. Some may think I am putting facts in 

 too strong a light, but no one has a greater de- 

 sire to see horticulture flourish more earnestly 

 than I. 



[Though not authorized to attach the writer's 

 name to his communication, we may say that 

 he has been for many years an employer of 



