PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 3 



generalisations, I shall endeavour to call your attention to such examples of waste in the 

 past and present as shall give an idea of what has been already accomplished in its pre- 

 vention and what still remains to be done. 



Beginning first with the mineral kingdom, I shall refer to instances of waste in con- 

 nection with the operations of metallurgy and chemical industry. 



"When, in the year 1856, I took my first walk from the old mining town of Freiberg, 

 in Saxony, to the Muldner smelting works, I did not require to use any of my broken 

 German to enquire the M'^ay. " A pillar of cloud by day " stood always over the site of 

 the furnaces or spread itself over the surrounding country, inflicting damage on crops and 

 forests. The claims of the farmers and proprietors for compensation were, at that time, 

 fully admitted, the first payment for such having been made in 1855. Li;ckily for the 

 farmers, and as it turned out, also for the smelting works themselves, the latter stood 

 under one proprietorship or administration, and there was no room for doubt as to who 

 was responsible for the damage. Just as plainly was it seen that the smelting works 

 could not continue to pay damages and exist. The stoppage of the furnaces meant the 

 abandonment of the mines and the ruin of Freiberg, but indeed, svich alternatives were 

 never allowed any consideration. On the contrary, it was resolved that the furnace 

 smoke should be rendered harmless, and by the year 1884, when I revisited Freiberg, 

 this task had been fully completed ; for. as early as ISTG, after paying damages for twenty- 

 one years, the expenditure by the smelting administration for compensation to no less 

 than six hundred proprietors had ceased. The means by which this great change was 

 effected are worthy of most minute study, but on the present occasion, I can only point 

 out a few of their most prominent features. The furnace fumes consisted of sulphur 

 dioxide, suli^huric anhydride, arsenious acid and the oxides of zinc and lead. In the 

 year 1882 alone, the useful materials produced from this waste were as follows : — 



140,584 -00 Centners sulphuric acid of 00° Boaume. ' 



The_di{liculties encountered in thus converting a cause of direct pecuniary loss into a 

 source of profit were of a very extraordinary character. One of these was the separation 

 of the arsenious acid from the furnace gases and from the sulphuric acid which these 

 were made to yield. It was found necessary to conduct them through a series of flues or 

 chambers constructed of sheet lead and having a capacity of 2,1*70 cubic meters, in order 

 to cause the deposition of most of the dust. This operation lowered their temperature to 

 such an extent as to make them useless for concentrating the acid, and, for this reason, 

 there are no Glovers towers in use at the Muldner acid works. These dust chambers do 



' Freibergs Berg und Huttenwesen, 1883. 



