24 



usually evanescent, and ftiding with tlic short season of their production; in 

 other words, you propose 1o regenerate the table of Summer and Fall, at any 

 period of the Winter and Spring, with the same facility that the moderate tem- 

 peratures of Summer are re-produced by fire throughout the more inclement 

 seasons. 



2. The difficulties of preserving food lie in various kinds of natural fer- 

 mentations, acetous, vinous, putrefactive and mouldy, to which it is subject. 

 These difficulties are, in some instances, very great, and are perhaps greatest 

 of all when the delicate taste and flavor of fruits are to be retained. These 

 results you propose to attain by a suitable degree of cold and dryness, and the 

 practical exclusion of light and air. 1 can conceive of no other principle re- 

 quired, except perhaps that of economy, in attaining these ends. I propose to 

 remark on the mode which you adopt and the results you attain. 



3. I observed that the preserving house was practically air-tight and dark, 

 from its construction of sheet-iron, with its double walls, about 'S^ feet apart, 

 the space between them being filled in with shavings, &c.. and the floor similarly 

 made, and laid on a bed of cement, to prevent the possible entrance of moist- 

 ure from below. The top is constructed of a water-tight metal floor, on which 

 is a stratum of some (J feet of ice, with its usual non-conducting covering of 

 saw-dust, etc.. and a simple roof cuvers the whole. 



The entrance door, below, is doubled, both of which, and those opening 

 into each compartment of the interior, are rendered practically air-tight by 

 good workmanship, and a very simple and ingenious contrivance. The build- 

 ing is practically air-tight; and, in further proof, I may mention that while I 

 breathed freely, and a candle burned brightly in the hall, between the ranges 

 of compartments, one of the latter being opened, and in which were stored 

 some 500 boxes of lemons, a candle thrust in was instantly extinguished by 

 an atmosphere of carbonic acid, deadly to fire and animal lite, but preservative 

 of vegetable life. When it becomes necessary to enter such a room there is 

 no difficulty in removing the carbonic acid, which is again supplied by the 

 fruit after closing. 



The necessary cold is of course maintained by the complete covering of 

 ice above, which being charged in one winter, lasts until the next, with a sur- 

 plus to spare. I observed that some half a dozen thermometers in the entry 

 and rooms indicated 34° Fahr., only one being a shade above. I may observe 

 in passing, that this degree, just above the freezing point, and uniformly main- 

 tained, is an important element in your mode of preservation. 



The dryness of the compartments, secured by the use of chlorides of cal- 

 cium and magnesium, obtained at a trifling cost from the waste bittern of salt 

 works, seems to be as perfect as desirable, and its degree is ingeniously 

 measured by a balance weight of the same salts, visible through glass from 

 the hall, in each compartment. 



The mode of construction, and the simple materials used, appear to me to 

 attain all the objects required, as far as we know them, in the most perfect 

 manner. The question of economy is easily settled by the moderate cost of 

 construction, and the extreme cheapness of ice and the chlorides. 



4. It would seem to me unnecessary, with the experience and observation 

 I have had, to state that where such a degree of cold and dryness as I have 

 witnessed in your house, so perfect an exclusion of light and air have been 

 attained, that as perfect preservation is eft'ected as seems practicable, — cer- 

 tainly much more than by any other plan I have ever heard of; but for the 

 sake of those not acquainted with the principles involved, I may state that the 

 results prove the soundness of the conclusions and the perfection of your ar- 

 rangements, by the perfect retention of taste and flavor by the fruits contained 

 in your houses, after long months of repose. The harvest apple of July, 1865, 

 is at this moment as perfect as the day it was put in. An unripe apple, of the 

 Fall of 1865, is now in exactly the same condition of unripeness as when 



