338 



NATURE 



[Feb. 24, 1876 



The cylinder is sold at one dollar per cubic foot (35 dols. per 

 cb.ro.), including the oxygen it contains under ordinary pres- 

 sure ; the refilling with oxygen costs five cents per cubic foot 

 under the pressure of one atmosphere,^ a veiy high price, ex- 

 ceeding the calculation of Kuppelwieser more than twenty-two 

 times. Tessie du Motay tried to apply oxvgen to the lighting 

 of streets and public places. The "Places^' before the Tuilc- 

 ries and Hotel de Ville were at that time brilliant with light 

 given off from zirconium-cones under the influence of coal gas 

 and oxygen. The unsteadiness of the flame and its great cost 

 led him to prefer the carburation of hydrogen and of coal gas, 

 by passing the gases through a vessel of heavy hydrocarbons 

 fixed to every lamp before it entered the burner. In this way the 

 Boulevards were illuminated from the Rue Drouot to the Rue 

 Scribe with seventy oxygen burners. But this method was given 

 up, and the preparation of a very h.avy gas instead of the usual 

 coal gas was at last resorted to, to be burnt by means of oxygen. 

 In this new form the visitor to the Vienna Exhibition met with 

 it at the railway station, Kaiserin-Elizabeth-Weitbahnhof. We 

 are permitted to extract the following description from an un- 

 printed report of Herr Karl Haase, director of the Berlin Gas 

 Company, given before the Berlin Town Council : — 



"The appearance of the grounds surrounding the Elizabeth 

 railway station, and of the hall itself, lighted up by a mixture of 

 coal gas and oxygen, is in the highest degree surprising. The 

 effects caused by the little bluish flames are quite peculiar, and 

 cannot be compared with any other light. The green of the 

 trees seems more vivid, the colours of the dresses more brilliant, 

 and, above all, the faces of the people appear clearer, every shade 

 and colour showing almost as distinctly as in full daylight, not- 

 withstanding which the light did not tire the eyes. 



"The favourable impression made on entering the grounds is 

 heightened on entering the large second-class waiting-room, 

 where everything, down to the minutest detail of ornamentation, 

 is most distinctly seen by the light of the little flames of only two 

 moderate-sized gaseliers. 



*' However, the best conception of the new method of lighting 

 is produced in the up-train station-hall. Here, in order to make 

 the comparison more striking, the ordinary platform used by 

 up-train passengers was lighted with heavy gas and oxygen, only 

 half the number of jets being lit as were used on the opposiie 

 platform, where the old gas was burning with the aid of oxygen. 

 Notwithstanding the double number of lamps and the good 

 quality of the gas, the space lighted by the new method was 

 incomparably more brilliant. The shadows of the candelabra, 

 and even of the smoky flames, were perceptible on the white 

 walls." 



In spite of this favourable impression, Herr Haase comes 

 to the conclusion that the new double gas, conducted in 

 two pipes, is not adapted for general private use, particu- 

 larly for the following reasons: — "The advantage of its bril- 

 liancy is more than counterbalanced by its cost, which in 

 Berlin, taking the usual lighting power as the standard of 

 comparison, would amount to double the price of the ordinary 

 gas : the consumer would not understand the working of the 

 cocks : the oxygen would deteriorate in the long conducting 

 pipes, and the repairs would be expensive, &c. Although for 

 public buildings, for shops, and some other purposes, the new 

 method might answer, it would be impossible to lay down three 

 gaspipes for these limited ends." This opinion stands diametri- 

 cally opposed to that of Schiele,^ who warmly recommends the 

 new method of lighting, but it is in close accordance with the 

 opinion stated by Le Blanc, ^ about a year before, in a report to 

 the Town Council of Paris. This report is the result of exten- 

 sive researches by Messrs. Peligot, Lamy, Troost, De Mondesir, 

 and Le Blanc, appointed a commission for the purpose by the 

 Prefect of the Seine in 1869. They undertook to test the 

 method on the Place de I'Opera, as well as in the laboratory, by 

 burning with half its volume of oxygen, in separate burners, ordi- 

 nary coal gas. Boghead gas, and gas saturated with fluid hydro- 

 carbons according to various systems. They came to the con- 

 clusion that at equal illuminating powers Tessie du Motay's 

 method is almost always more expensive, mostly twice as expen- 

 sive, as the usual illumination. Only in one case, where the 

 fluid hydrocarbons of Boghead coal were used for carburation, 

 according to Leveque's method, by saturating wicks with the 

 oil and letting the gas pas; over them, the price of the new 



' Deutsche Gewerbezeitung, 1867, 18 ; see also Vogel. 

 * Schiele, Journal fur Gasbeleuchtung, January 1873. 

 3 "Rapport de M. Felix le Blanc sar le nouvel eclairage oxhydrique." 

 Paris, 1872. Short extracts in the Journal f, Gasbel, 1872, 641, 



light appeared twice as cheap as the ordinary method, and that 

 only when large burners were used, and consequently a greater 

 quantity of light was produced. 



The calculations were of course founded on the data furnished 

 by the Tessie du Motay Gas Company respecting the prices of 

 oxygen, of the carburation, &c. In truth, however, it appeared 

 that in the last-named experiment I cb.m. of gas, instead of taking 

 up 50 gr. of fluid hydrocarbons, as the company pretended, 

 actually absorbed 266 gr. ; and thus the economy, to say the 

 least, became very questionable. As to the lighting power, it 

 was possible to increase it so as to form thiee to seven times the 

 power of ordinary street-burners. But Boghead gas can also 

 produce three times the quantity of light, in suitable burners, 

 without having recourse to pure oxygen, and for general pur- 

 poses such an intensity of light is not desired ; on the contrary, 

 the light is lessened 30 per cent, by globes or shades. The 

 Commisiion came to the decision, therefore, of advising the 

 Corporation of Paris not to authorise the laying down of oxygen 

 pipes, but rather to leave it to the company to supply oxygen 

 and carburetted coal-gas in portable vessels to the comparatively 

 few who stand in need of such an increased intensity of light. 



The results arrived at in Brussels were no more favourable. 

 During the last year lighting by oxygen was tried for a short 

 time in some cafes, as well as in the Passage St. Hubert, and 

 then discontinued 1 on account of the aforesaid objections. In 

 Vienna, in April 1874, the Westbahnhof was still lighted with 

 oxygen, but the system had spread no further ; for in spite of 

 its intensity and acknowledged beauty, the bluisl moonlike light 

 did not produce anything like a general satisfaction.^ 



The jury of the Vienna Exhibition inspected the oxygen light 

 ing at the Westbahnhof. In the Exhibition building itself, 

 oxygen industry was not represented. 



If further experiments confirm the above opinions, the industry 

 of oxygen will have lost the root from which it comme need to 

 grow, because wherever it has sprung up it was fostered by the 

 hope of being employed for illuminating purposes. 



Many of the alleged disadvantages, especially the cost of the 

 laying down of pipes, are avoided in the arrangement which 

 Philipps^ proposed for oxygen lighting. According to this 

 proposition lamps (manufactured by George Berghausen, of 

 Cologne) were to be fed with very heavy tar oil containing 

 naphthalin, whilst oxygen was introduced through the middle of 

 the wick. It is, however, very doubtful if any larger city would 

 renounce the advantages of gas-light in favour of this arrange- 

 ment, and consequently, if there is any chance of its application 

 on a large scale. 



Let us be all the more hopeful that oxygen industry will find 

 its saving ally in metallurgy. 



In medicine it has won no friend. Up to the present time 

 there is nothing to contradict Pereira's opinion * in spite of many 

 more recent praises of the medicinal powers of oxygen,^ and we 

 can therefore do no better than quote it anew : — 



"Soon after the discovery of oxygen, its therapeutical applica- 

 tion was in great favour. The want of a proper supply of 

 oxygen to the body was considered to be the cause of many dis- 

 eases, such for example as scorbute, and it was asserted to have 

 been used in many cases with brilliant success. Beddoes " and 

 Hill employed it in England. The latter declares that he found 

 it useful in cases of asthma, weakness, ulcer, humor albus, and 

 scrofulous bone diseases. 



" These opinions have nevertheless been greatly modified on 

 chemical, no less than on physiological grounds. In cases of 

 asphyxia, caused by want of air, or by inhaling noxious gases, 

 the respiration of oxygen may possibly be useful. For this 

 reason it has been administered in cases of asthma threatening 

 suffocation. But as the patients ia such cases are scarcely able 

 to inhale it, if it acts at all, it can only act as a palliative, and is 

 decidedly incapable of preventing fresh attacks. lu most cases 

 where oxygen has been inhaled it was therefore powerless t* 

 help ; and from the physical reasons stated above, very little 

 success can be anticipated from its employment. 



» Letter dated April 14, 1S74, of M. Melsens, Professor of Chemistry in 

 Brussels, to A. W. Hofmann. 

 ^ Verbal communication of Professor Hlasiwetz. 



3 Philipps on Oxygen. Berlin, 1871, 46. , t, uu - ■ 



4 Pereira, "Art of Healing," Translated into German by Buchheim, 1. 217. 



5 Verbal communication of Prof Dr. Oscar Liebreich. . 



6 " Considerations on the use of factious airs, and on the manner ol obtam- 

 ing them in large quantities." By F. Beddoes and J. \VM- Bnstol, 1 794-9i- 

 There was a Pneumatic Institute esublished iii Bristol "» 1798. m which 

 the medical properties of gases were tried, and it was here HumpHry U3.\y 

 discovered the effects of protoxide of nitrogen. 



