J 821.] On the first Usage of the Hydrogen and Oxygen Gases. 



To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 

 Sir, 



HUNDREDS of projects have been 

 made for fire-escapes: I never 

 heard of one feasible one : but a ma- 

 chine for building a hay-stack, struck 

 me many years ago as the most rational 

 one. Take two pair of old coach- 

 wheels and their axles, bind them by 

 a frame of timber, jjlant four perpen- 

 dicular props of wood at the four cor- 

 ners, 30 to 4() feet high, bind theni by 

 diagonal stays, lay platforms of wood 

 at different heights, thus • 



Let ladders be attached to the plat- 

 forms, and a rising and foiling frame 

 like a draw-bridge to each platform, or 

 a sliding frame of three feet broad and 

 ten long, with side rails. Now the 

 plan is tills, let every fire-engine have 

 attached to it such a machine. The 

 fire-men can mount, carry up their 

 leathern hose^ and pour in the water at 

 any point, and when escape is required, 

 thrust forward the sliding frame to the 

 A'ery window and rescue the inhabitant. 

 T!ie frame must be long in proportion 

 to the breadth of the sunken area of a 

 London house ; tlie ladders may be fixed 

 inside the frame work, and a hole cut 

 in the platforms to admit the ascent and 

 descent of the men. The whole may be 

 drawn by one horse. This machine, ex- 

 cept the sliding frame, is precisely such 

 as I used for building hay-stacks, and 

 found it most convenient, and I am 

 convinced it is the simplest machine, 

 either to assist in extinguishing fires, 

 or aiding escape. 



To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 

 SIR, 



DR. Clarke, in the History of the 

 Gas blow-pipe, says (I quote his 

 words,) " That the first usage of the 

 hy(h*ogen and oxygen gases in a state 

 of mixture (and propelled from a coni- 



29 



mon reservoir,) was believed to have 

 been made by an unknown native of 

 Germany, who employed for this pur- 

 pose a bladder to which a capillary tube 

 was affixed. The autiior receivell this 

 information upon report after he began 

 to write the account of his own experi- 

 ments, but no one has since laid claim 

 to the experiment, nor does he now 

 know whether there be any truth in the 

 rumour. He has been, however, the 

 more anxious to repeat it, because 

 upon the truth of it depend all preten- 

 sions to priority of invention." 



Through the medium, therefore, of 

 the Monthly Magazine, I take the liberty 

 of stating for the information of this 

 gentleman and the public, that it is to 

 the late Dr. Jngenhouz, a physician and 

 naturalist of great eminence, the friend 

 and correspondent of Franklin, and not 

 to an nnknown native of Germany, that 

 the merit of this invention should be 

 ascribed.* The Doctor used to mix 

 these gases in the proportion requisite 

 for the formation of water in a bladder, 

 with a capillary tube affixed to it, for 

 the purpose of inflating soap bubbles, 

 whiili upon contact with the flame of 

 a wax-taper, detonated with gi'eat noise 

 and violence, the gases so mixed 

 being propelled through the tube into a 

 pan of soap and water. 



The fusion of metal in pure oxygen 

 is likewise a discovery which belongs to 

 Dr. Ingenhoiiz, who may justly be con- 

 sidered as one of the fathers of ])neuma- 

 tic chemistry, in proof of which I need 

 only refer the readers to his works in 

 4 vols. 8vo, entitled Experiences sur les 

 Vegetaux, but containing however, a 

 variety of experiments upon other sub- 

 stances, dissertations upon atmospheric 

 air, electricity, the loart-stone, &c. 



He was a native of Breda, but wrote 

 with facility both in French and Eng- 

 lish, and is known to the learned be- 

 sides as the author of several Latin 

 treatises upon medical subjects, printed 

 but not published many yeara ago at 

 Vienna. 



He was a practical philosopher in 

 more than one sense of the word, and 

 the writer of this letter, indebted to his 

 kindness and friendship for many hours 

 of instructive amusement, can state 

 with truth, that he was not more re- 

 markable for the patient persevering 

 accuracy with which he investigated 

 the phenomena of nature, than for the 



• See an original letter and portrait of this 

 emioeot naan in our last Number. 



simplicity 



