1866. | Physics. 295 
be corroded by acids.” The metallurgical chemist will be rather 
puzzled to determine which of the agents in the alloy is the most 
effective. 
Mr. F. Claudet proposed to economize the oxide of iron resulting 
from the decomposition of the cupreous pyrites, as practised at 
Mostyn, at Newcastle, and other places, by moulding it into bricks 
by means of plaster of Paris. These, after they have been dried, 
can be used in the blast furnace as any ordinary iron ore. 
M. H. Caron has a clever paper, in a recent number of ‘ Les 
Mondes,’ on blistered steel, in which he gives the results of his 
experiments and observations. He is disposed to refer the forma- 
tion of these blisters to carbonic oxide, but he admits the necessity 
of a more extensive series of experiments. 
The Managing Director of the Bolton Iron and Steel Company 
writes us as follows :—“ In your January number for this year you 
publish a statement illustrative of the powers of modern metallurgy, 
and after describing the large ‘block of steel’ cast at Messrs. 
Bessemer & Sons’ works at East Greenwich, you go on to say that 
‘large as this block is, it was far exceeded by what has been done 
at Bolton by the “aid of” Messrs. Ireland & Sons’ patent upper 
twyer cupola furnaces, where a block of steel weighing 250 tons 
was cast. This furnace melts at the rate of thirteen tons of Bes- 
semer steel in an hour, &c., &c. As managing partner of the 
Bolton Iron and Steel Co.’s works, I think it my duty to correct 
this statement; and without wishing to detract in the least from 
the value of Messrs. Ireland & Sons’ patent cupolas, which did their 
work in a most satisfactory manner on. the occasion alluded to, I 
may state that the block in question is one of four which Mr. 
Treland cast at these works, but it is of iron and not steel, and the 
weight is something over 205 tons. A small quantity of Bessemer 
steel scrap was melted down along with the pig-iron, in place of 
putting in cold blast iron, and the time occupied in casting the 
block was ten hours from the blast beg put on to the cupolas, 
including the stoppages necessary for the workmen to take refresh- 
ment. I believe the block cast at Messrs. Bessemer & Sons’ works 
was entirely of iron.” 
IX. PHYSICS. 
Licut.—The Academy of Sciences have bestowed the Bordin 
Prize of 1,500 frances upon M. Janssen for a memoir “On the 
Terrestrial Lines of the Solar Spectrum.” The following abstract 
of the memoir will show the author’s line of research :—Sir David 
Brewster many vears ago discovered in the solar spectrum certain 
dark bands which become more and more marked as the sun 
VOL, III. x 
