Economy of Machinery and Manufactures. 125 



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The whole slide is sustained by about two thousand supports: and in many places, 

 it is attached, in a very ingenious manner, to the rugged precipices of granite. 



"The direction of the slide is sometimes straight, sometimes zigzag, with an in- 

 clination of from ten to eighteen degrees. It is often carried along the sides of hills 

 and the flanks of precipitous rocks, and sometimes over their summits. Occasion- 

 ally it goes under ground, and at other times it is conducted over the deep gorges 

 by scaffoldings one hundred and twenty feet in height. 



"The boldness which characterizes this work, the sagacity displayed in all its ar- 

 rangements, and the skill of the engineer, have excited the wonder of every person 

 who has seen it. Before any step could be taken in its erection, it was necessary to 

 cut several thousand trees to obtain a passage through the impenetrable thickets; 

 and as the workmen advanced, men were posted at certain distances, in order to 



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point out the road for their return, and to discover, in the gorges, the places where 

 the piles of wood had been established. M. Rupp was obliged more than once to 

 be suspended by cords, in order to descend precipices many hundred feet high. 

 He had to contend with the prejudices of the peasantry, but nothing could diminish 

 his invincible perseverance. They thought he had communication with the devil. 

 He was charged with heresy, and every obstacle was thrown in the way of an en- 

 terprise, which they regarded absurd and impracticable. All these difficulties, 

 however, were surmounted, and he had, at last, the satisfaction of observing the 

 trees descend from the mountain, with the rapidity of lightning. The large pines; 

 which were one hundred feet in length, and ten inches thick, at their smaller ex- 

 tremity, ran through the space of three leagues, or nearly nine miles, in two min- 

 utes and a half. . 



" The arrangements for this operation were extremely simple. From the low£r 

 end of the slide to the upper end, workmen were posted, at regular distances, and 

 as soon as every thing was ready, the man at the lower end of the slide cried out to 

 the one above him, "lachez" (let go.) The cry was repeated from one to another, 

 and reached the top of the slide in three minutes. The workman at the top, then 

 cried out to the one below him, "il vient" (it comes,) and the tree was instantly 

 launched down the slide, preceded by the cry, which was repeated from post to 

 post. As soon as the tree had reached the bottom and plunged into the lake, the 

 cry of " lachez" was repeated as before, and a new tree was launched in a similar 

 manner. By these means, a tree descended every five or six minutes, provided no 

 accident happened to the slide, which sometimes took place, but which was instant- 

 ly repaired when it did. 



" In order to show the enormous force which the trees acquired, from the great 

 velocity of their descent, M. Rupp made arrangements for causing some of the trees 

 to spring from the slide. They penetrated, by their thickest extremities, no less 

 than from eighteen to twenty four feet into the earth ; and one of the trees having, 

 by accident, struck against another, it instantly cleft it through its whole length, 

 as if it had been struck with lightning. 



"After the trees had descended the slide, they were collected into rafts upon the 

 lake, and conducted to Lucerne. From thence they descended the Reuss, then the 

 Aar to Hear Brugg, afterwards to Waldshut by the Rhine, then to Basle, and even 

 to the sea, when necessary. In order that none of the small wood might be lost, 

 M. Rupp established, in the forest, large manufactories for charcoal. He erected 

 magazines for preserving it, and had barrels constructed for carrying it to market. 

 In winter, when the slide was covered with snow, the barrels were made to de- 

 scend on a kind of sledge. The wood which was not fit to be carbonized was heap- 

 ed up and burnt, and the ashes packed up and carried away during the winter." 



" Such is a brief account of a work undertaken by a single individual, and which 

 has excited a very high degree of interest in every part of Europe. 



