274 Description of the American Tar and lVater Burner. 
plify the apparatus and operations so as to bring them within the 
reach of an intelligent person, even although “jgnorant of che- 
mistry. 
This interesting class of experiments ought to be resumed, 
not with the spirit of quackery nor of extravagant expectation, 
but with the sobriety of philosophical research and it is more 
than probabie that the nitrous oxide, which is now little more 
than the subject of merriment and wonder, if properly diluted 
and discreetly applied, would be productive of valuable effects. 
XLVII. Description of the American Tar and Water Burner 
invented by Mir. SAMUEL Morny of the United States*. 
Th FE inventor, not unskilled in chemistry, and aware of the at- 
traction of oxygen for carbon, conceived it ‘practicable to convert 
the constituents of water into fuel, by means of this affinity. 
Whatever may be the fact, chemiéally considered, the opera- 
tion in various experiments promises to afford a convenient me- 
thod of applying to use several of the most combustible substances 
not hitherto employed as fuel. By the process which I shall 
briefly describe, all curbonaceous fluids may beconveniently burnt, 
and derive great force from their combination with the oxygen 
and hydrogen gases of water or steam, before or at the moment | 
of ignition. 
“A tight vessel, cylindrically shaped, and placed horizontally, 
was first employed, containing resin, connected with a small 
boiler by a pipe which entered one of its ends near the lower side, 
and extended nearly its length, having small apertures, over which 
were two inverted gutters one over the other; the upper one 
longer than the other, intended to detain the steam in the resin 
in its way to the surface. The resin being heated, carburetted 
hydrogen gas issued from the outlet or pipe inserted near the 
upper part ‘of the vessel, and, being ignited, afforded a small blaze 
about as large as that of a candle; but when the steam was al- 
lowed to flow, this blaze instantly ‘shot out many hundred times 
its former bulk to the distance of two or three feet. It is pre- 
sumed the steam was decomposed, and that carburetted hydro- 
gen and carbonic oxide or carbonic acid were produced as the 
steam passed, very near the hot bottom of the vessel. y 
“¢ Another apparatus was constructed, consisting of two vessels 
one within the other having a cover common to both; the inner: 
one to contain far (as a more convenient substance than resin), 
* In our 247th Number (vol. lii,) we gave a brief notice of this inven- 
tion, The present account is copied from Professor Silliman’s American 
Journal oF Sciaee No. [. 
the 
