108 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



[No. 2 



the cut diameter which had been flat became 

 curved, and the pieces more fit (or the purpose 

 they were intended. 



The yearly destruction of poles in the hop 

 grounds in England is very considerable. They 

 have to be renewed every six years, besides being 

 repaired every year. When steeped they will 

 last thirty years, barring breakage. The annual 

 expense of maintaining and repairing these poles 

 is estimated at £ 10 an acre, so thai by using this 

 process the hop grower might supply himself with 

 poles at one-fifth of the present cost. 



It is equally efficacious in preserving flooring. 

 Messrs. Harris and Warner, hatters, Southwark 

 London, laid a piece of lloonng partly prepared. 

 In three years the unprepared part entirely gave 

 way, whilst the other remained as I'rcsli as the 

 day it was laid down. 



The process is a protection against the attacks 

 of insects, both terrene and aquatic. A naturalist 

 who has long been in the habii of collecting in- 

 sects on old rails, cannot now find them lodged on 

 any that have been subjected to the process. The 

 piles used in jetties and dock gates, are eO'ectually 

 protected from the attacks of marine animals. 

 We have seen two pieces of elm which had been 

 cut out of the same log, and placed under water 

 at the Trinity Chain Pier near Newhaven; after 

 being a twelvemonth immersed, they were both 

 taken up covered with young muscles. The jire- 

 pared was quite hesh and sharp at the angles, 

 whilst the other was decayed or rather eaten away 

 at the angles and ends. 



The commercial navy have taken advantage of 

 the process. The ships Enderby and .luhn Palm- 

 er of London were built of prepared timber, and 

 both are South Sea Whalers. The Enderby sail- 

 ed from London on 11th October 1834, and return- 

 ed to Gravesend on 7th March 1837, having been 

 absent twenty-nine months. She fished about 

 the Equator, and although much subjected to a 

 tropical and vertical sun, her seams remained en- 

 tire. The John Palmer was away for three years 

 and a-half; and came home equally tight. The 

 bilge water in both cases was much sweeter and 

 freer Irom noxious effluvia than usual. Appre- 

 liension was expressed about the healthiness of 

 the crew of a ship that had been built of timber 

 prepared in mercury. A similar dread prevented 

 Sir H. Davy and Professor Faraday urging the 

 employment of corrosive sublimate as a means of 

 preventing the ravages of the book-worm in Earl 

 Spenser's library at Althorp. These apprehen- 

 sions may have arisen from a recollection ol" the 

 well-known circumstance of violent and even fatal 

 siilivation affecting the sailors on board H. M. S. 

 Triumph in 1810, from the rupture of bladders of 

 quicksilver, and the escape of it about the ship. 

 Jjut they may all be dissipated by the testimony 

 of Captain Lisle of the Enderby, who declares no 

 crew could have been more healthy than his was 

 all tire time she was at sea. 



But the process has the power of preserving 

 cordage and canvass as well as timber. Colonel 

 Sir John May, Inspector of the Royal Carriage 

 Department at Woolwich, subjected to the same 

 trial pieces ol" prepared cordage of five inches, 

 with a duplicate piece of while unprepared cor- 

 dage, also of two and a-half inches, one and a 

 quarter inch, and pieces of tent line. The pre- 

 pared pieces were quite sound, the unjn-eparcd 



quite rotten. Cart ropes, reins, and sheep nets 

 may thus be preserved in use a long time. Sir 

 John also subjected four pieces of canvass pre- 

 pared which were not at all affected with mildew, 

 whereas those pieces unprepared were affected, 

 and one became quite rotten. Captain Farquhar- 

 son of the Lord Hungerford of London, on his re- 

 turn from a voyage to the East Indies in June 

 1836, found an awning of canvass which was un- 

 prepared quite mildewed, whereas one of the 

 same kind of cloth prepared was perfectly sound 

 and clean. Thus barn sheets, cart covers, sacks, 

 and windmill sails may be preserved from destruc- 

 tion by this process. 



Wha,t need of adducing more evidence on the 

 efficacy of this process for preserving animal and 

 vegetable fibre? Let us rather investigate the 

 principle of the process and recommend the adop- 

 tion of it to those who have hitherto neglected to 

 take advantage of its utility. Dry-rot in timber is 

 frequently distinguished by a sort of mildew which 

 covers it, and the action of which in time causes 

 decay, or it assumes a less organized appearance 

 and crumbles down into powder. This mildew is 

 not the dry-rot, nor the cause of it, but rather its 

 eflfect. h may be distinctly seen by the micro- 

 scope to be a flingus, and springing up where it 

 does, it becomes a question whence its germs can 

 have found access into the wood. To assist in 

 answering this natural query, we may state that 

 Mr. Bauer, when treating of the pepper- brand, 

 Uredo fatida, states that fungus to be of a globu- 

 lar form and of the size of only ^-^^-^ part of an 

 inch in diameter, and therefore no less than 2,560,- 

 000 would be required to cover a square inch. 

 The germs of such plants must therelbie be infi- 

 nitely minute. Professor Ehrenberg, also, when 

 treating of the Monas and others of the Infuso- 

 ri£e, states, that in the twelfth part of an inch 

 there are 28,000, and in a square inch not less 

 than 500,000,000. It is, therefore, extremely 

 probable minute vegetable germs may be intro- 

 duced through the spongioles of the roots of 

 plants. Indeed Unger detected the existence 

 ol' such bodies in the stem of Galium Mollugo, 

 which he has termed the Protunnjces endogcnus, 

 developed in the coagulated juice of the intercel- 

 lular spaces. All plants, as is known, are com- 

 posed of cellular tissues, whether in the bark, al- 

 bumen, or wood. The tissue consists of various 

 shaped cells, and although no single cell may 

 pass along the whole length of the plant, as M. 

 de Candolle maintains, yet there is no doubt 

 water, air, or even mercury, can be made to pass 

 through those cells in the longitudinal direction of 

 the fibres of wood. Experiments with the air- 

 pump have proved this passage beyond doubt. 

 These cells contain the sap of the plant, particu- 

 larly those of the alburnum, and in the circulation 

 of the sap through the tree its watery particles fly 

 off' by the leaves, and the albumen remains. Al- 

 bumen is the nearest approach in vegetables to 

 animal matter, and is therefore, when deprived of 

 vitality, very liable to decomposition, particularly 

 when in the alburnum or sap-wood. On minute- 

 ly inspecting wood going to decay, Mr. Kyan 

 was impressed with the conviction that decompo- 

 sition of the sap in the alburnum gave rise eitlier 

 to the dry-rot, or, by the evolution of heat, vivified 

 the germs of the fungi that may have been lying 

 dormant in the cells of the alburnum. Now, as 



