

by Evaporation on Faggots. 89 



8000 hogsheads, when received at Nos. 1 and 2, con- hocsh. 

 tain about l\ per cent, of salt . . . reduced to 4000 

 4000 hogsheads, when received at No. 3, contain 



about 3 per cent, of salt .... reduced to 1 000 

 1000 hogsheads, when received at No. 4, contain 



about 1 2 per cent, of salt . . . . reduced to 550 

 550 hogsheads, received at the pans, contain near 

 22 per cent, of salt. 



Thus, out of every 8000 hogsheads, passing through the 

 Maisons d'Epines, 7450 are evaporated by the air in summer, 

 and about 7000 in winter ; and only one-sixteenth part of the 

 fuel is consumed, that would be required for evaporating the 

 whole quantity of water by fire. 



The faggots are changed at periods of from four to seven 

 years. Those in Nos. 1 and 2, where the saline impregnation 

 is weak, will decay sooner than in Nos. 3 and 4. In No. 3 all 

 the twigs acquire so thick a coating of selenite, that when 

 broken off, they resemble stems and branches of encrinites. 



The Maison de Cordes was invented by an ingenious Sa- 

 voyard named Buttel. It is forty yards in length and eleven 

 wide : it is much stronger than the Maison d'Epines, the roof 

 being supported by six arches of stone work ; the intermediate 

 spaces on the sides being left open. In every one of these 

 divisions are twelve hundred cords, in rows of twenty-four 

 each, suspended from the roof, and fixed tight at bottom. 

 The cords are about sixteen feet in length. The water is 

 raised to a reservoir at the top of the building, and distributed 

 into a number of small transverse canals, each row of twenty- 

 four cords having one of these canals over it, which is so 

 pierced as to admit the water to trickle down each separate 

 cord, drop by drop. The original intention of this building 

 was to crystallize the salt itself upon the cords, for which pur- 

 pose the water was made use of from the pan? after it had de- 

 posited a quantity of salt in the first boiling, to save the ex- 

 pense of fuel in a second boiling; the residue-water of the 

 first boiling, by repeatedly passing over the cords, deposited 

 all its salt in about forty-five days, and the cords were in- 

 crusted with a cylinder of pure salt, which was broken off by 

 a particular instrument for the purpose*. This process is at 

 present abandoned for crystallizing; but the cords are still 

 used for evaporating, and are found to answer better for the 

 higher concentration of the water than the faggots. This 

 method did not answer for the first evaporation, because the 

 water rotted the cords ; but it was discovered that the cords 



* This process might be used for sea- water with particular advantage in 

 warm climates, and the necesssity tor boiling altogether avoided. 



Vol. 63. No. 310. Feb. 1824. M were 



