(aura) 
On the Application of the Hot Blast, in the Manufacture of Cast- 
Iron. By Tuomas Crark, M. D., Professor of Chemistry in 
Marischal College, Aberdeen. 
( Read 16th March 1835.) 
Amone persons interesting themselves in the progress of Bri- 
tish manufactures, it can scarce fail to be known, that Mr Neit- 
son of Glasgow, manager of the Gas Works in that city, has taken 
out a patent for an important improvement in the working of 
such furnaces as, in the language of the patent, “are supplied 
with air by means of bellows, or other blowing apparatus.” In 
Scotland, Mr Nerison’s invention has been extensively applied 
to the making of cast-iron, insomuch that there is only one 
Scotch iron-work where the invention is not in use, and in that 
work, apparatus is under construction to put the invention into 
operation. Apart from the obvious importance of any consider- 
able improvement in the manufacture of so valuable a product as 
cast-iron, the invention of Mr Nritson would merit attention, 
were it only for the singular extent of the improvement effected, 
compared with the apparent simplicity—I had almost said 
inadequacy—of the means employed. Having therefore, by the 
liberality of Mr Duntop, proprietor of the Clyde Iron-Works, 
where Mr Neruson’s invention was first put into operation, ob- 
tained full and free access to all information regarding the results 
of trials of the invention in those works, on the large scale of 
manufacture, I cannot help thinking that an authentic notice of 
these results, together with an attempt to explain the cause of 
them, will prove acceptable to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
And that these results, as well as the cause of them, may be set 
forth with clearness, I shall advert, 
aBQ 
