774 



SPAIN. 



ond Chamber elected for its President Sefior 

 Ayala. On February 26th the Marquis of 

 Orovio, the Minister of Finance, made a state- 

 ment respecting the financial condition of the 

 country, which he said was very favorable. 

 The receipts and expenditures in the next 

 budget would balance, and the country had 

 discharged its obligations on their falling due, 

 without the necessity for any renewal. The 

 revenue from taxes during the financial year 

 1876-'77 had yielded an excellent result, and 

 the Minister hoped shortly to be able to reduce 

 the taxation. On March 7th the address in re- 

 ply to the speech from the throne was adopted 

 by 187 against 62 votes. Sefior Castelar, in 

 the debate preceding the vote, said that Spain 

 suffered from two wounds one at Gibraltar, 

 the other on the Tagus. The inhabitants of 

 Gibraltar, he said, were of Spanish blood, and 

 the place should be in Spanish hands. Allud- 

 ing to the recent Papal election, some speakers 

 accused the Government of exercising pressure 

 with the view of influencing the Conclave. 

 Sefior Canovas del Castillo, in his reply, de- 

 nied that any such pressure had been em- 

 ployed. The Marquis of Orovio presented his 

 budget to the Chamber on March 9th. The 

 revenue was set down at 752,000,000 pesetas, 

 and the expenditure at 760,000,000. The pro- 

 ceeds of the future sale of state property are 

 estimated at 25,000,000 pesetas. Petroleum 

 and other mineral oils are to be subjected to 

 special duties, which will, however, be re- 

 mitted on importations from countries enjoy- 

 ing the most-favored-nation clause, but main- 

 tained in regard to countries which have no 

 treaty with Spain. In the first week of May 

 the Minister of the Colonies submitted a bill 

 authorizing a Cuban loan of 500,000,000 pe- 

 setas, to be guaranteed by the Cuban customs 

 duties. The Cortes were prorogued on July 

 24th, and met again in the latter part of Octo- 

 ber. A new electoral bill was presented to 

 the Cortes and passed, restricting universal suf- 

 frage. 



On January 23d King Alfonso XII. was 

 married to Maria de las Mercedes, the second 

 daughter of the Due de Montpensier. The 

 young Queen was born June 24, 1860, and 

 died June 26, 1878. (See OBITUARIES, FOR- 

 EIGN.) By this marriage the two branches of 

 the house of Bourbon were united. The King 

 and Queen were also cousins, the mother of 

 the Queen being a sister of Queen Isabella, the 

 mother of King Alfonso. 



As King Alfonso was returning from a tour 

 of the provinces to Madrid on October 25th, 

 a young man pressed forward and twice dis- 

 charged a pistol, fortunately without hitting 

 any one. He was immediately arrested, and 

 after a trial sentenced to death. His name 

 was Juan Oliva y Moncasi. He was a cooper 

 6f Catalonia, and asserted that he had come 

 to Madrid for the purpose of murdering the 

 King. 



The insurrection in Cuba was officially de- 



STEAM-ENGINE, WELLS BALANCE. 



clared at an end on February 21st. On March 

 1st telegrams were read in the Cortes announ- 

 cing the submission of several thousand Cuban 

 insurgents, with arms and cannon, and a large 

 number of non-combatants. A royal decree 

 was published in Havana on March 2d, ordain- 

 ing that Cuba shall have its own deputies, mu- 

 nicipalities, and councils general, and shall be 

 treated in the same manner as Porto Rico. An- 

 other decree, issued at Puerto Principe, enact- 

 ed that all slaves born after the passage of the 

 law of February 10, 1869, shall be free if they 

 present themselves to the Spanish authorities 

 in Cuba before the expiration of the month. 

 Proprietors who had taken part in the rebel- 

 lion would not be indemnified for the loss of 

 the slaves thus freed ; but other owners, who 

 had not taken any part in the rebellion, would 

 receive compensation in virtue of the law for 

 the gradual abolition of slavery. 



STEAM-ENGINE, WELLS BALANCE. The 

 economy obtained by diminishing the length 

 of the piston-stroke, and proportionately in- 

 creasing the speed, has led engine-builders to 

 strive, for the highest obtainable velocity. The 

 advantages derived from small engines worked 

 at high speed are counterbalanced by the dis- 

 turbing effect caused by the inertia of the pis- 

 ton, piston-rod, and connecting-rod, which in- 

 creases with the rapidity of their motion ; so 

 that there is a point of velocity beyond which 

 an engine of a given size can not be worked 

 without wearing out the frame and the founda- 

 tion with the jars of the piston-strokes. This 

 difficulty seems to be overcome in the double- 

 piston balance engine, invented by Justin R. 

 Wells, of New York. He entirely counteracts 

 the inertia by working two pistons in the same 

 cylinder, each traversing half its length simul- 

 taneously in opposite directions. The steam 

 is admitted alternately in the middle part of 

 the cylinder between the pistons, to drive them 

 apart, and at the cylinder-heads, to drive them 

 together. The weight displaced is divided and 

 carried in opposite directions simultaneously, 

 thus entirely obliterating the shock; the in- 

 termittent action of the steam-pressure on the 

 cylinder is also balanced and the strain obvi- 

 ated. Another weighty advantage is the re- 

 moval of the dislocating strain on the journals 

 by the shaft, and the tendency to twist the 

 shaft produced by a single-piston engine: in 

 this engine two opposite forces act in the 

 cranks placed in opposite directions, leaving 

 the action of the shaft and journals perfectly 

 free and balanced. In three important partic- 

 ulars, therefore, is the wear and disturbance 

 produced in an ordinary engine, which in- 

 creases in proportion as the size of the engine 

 for the same work is reduced and the velocity 

 increased, removed in the Wells engine. The 

 full benefits derived from short strokes and 

 high speed can thus be obtained. An engine 

 of this type used by George R. Otis, of New 

 York, with a cylinder of a five-inch bore, and 

 a stroke of five inches for each piston, can 





