1844.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



115 



glass bottles, having corresponding screws in the neclis thereof, and also the 

 use of softened wax or india-rubber, which may be applied either in a semi- 

 fifuid state or in the form of a washer between the surface of the stopper and 

 the top of the bottle ; he also claims the arrangement of machinery for 

 forming the necks of bottles and upon stoppers as described. 



AN IMPROVED LAMP. 



Pierre Pei.letan. of Fitzroy Square, Middlesex, for " hnprovmenfs in the 

 production of light."— GranleA September 6, 1843; enrolled March 6, 1844. 



This invention has reference to a 'patent granted to Mr. Pelletan on the 

 2nd of May last, for improvements in the production of light, in which spe- 

 cification was explained the mode of producing light from volatile substances, 

 and applied to a manner of mixing the spirit of turpentine or other less 

 combustible matter with water, which were mixed in a generator in the pro- 

 portion of from 4 to 10 of water to 1 of turpentine. 



The present specification states that the above mixture will boil in a gene- 

 rator under atmospheric pressure at 212, (turpentine boiling at 272,) at 

 which temperature (212) steam will be generated from the water, and will 

 carry off with it, in passing through the turpentine, a portion of that spirit, 

 so that the vapour which is allowed to pass through a burner is a mixture of 

 of turpentine and water, and will burn with a bright white flame, tut on at- 

 tempting to increase its length will emit a large quantity of smoke, to ob- 

 viate which the patentee employs a burner of peculiar construction, which 

 forms the subject of this patent, and consists of a tube through which the 

 steam passes to the burner; this tube has four openings at the bottom for 

 admitting common air to be mixed with the steam ; these openings can be 

 regulated by a screw slide : the upper part of this tube is enlarged, and 

 forms an annular space, into which the steam after passing through a per- 

 forated plate enters ; it also passes through another perforated plate before 

 leaving the burner : a current of air is admitted through four short tubes 

 which pass in a horizontal direction through the annular space, or that 

 part forming the burner, for the purpose of supplying the centre or middle 

 of the flame with air, by which means a flame may be obtained as white 

 and voluminous as may be required. 



ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF VOLCANIC ACTION. 



Volcanic action is the co-operative cause of numerous changes in the 

 local disposition of the earth's surface, and in the character and quali- 

 ties exposed to its influence ; atfecting not only those matters exposed 

 to the direct action of heat, but also the surrounding strata. It is the 

 minister of change, of production, and re-production: and while it 

 insatiably devours entire beds of the earth, and amalgamates their 

 organic and inorganic bodies as one grand result, thus obliterating for 

 ever their former character and qualities; it gives liberty to their 

 gaseous products, creates new and important compounds, causing 

 matter to enter into new combinations; which, from their peculiar 

 character and qualities, remain for after ages the unerring indicators 

 of the magnitude and extent of its destructive powers : but, in the 

 multiplicity of the phenomena, we must not forget, that there are 

 limits to its extent, and that while so far as by awaking electrical action 

 in bodies exposed to its influence, and thereby generating numerous 

 beautiful results, it is still the humble and ineffectual imitation of that 

 greater power, the sun, whose universal and continuous operations 

 give birth to the most stupendous as well as the most beautiful of 

 natural products. Geologists, awed by the terrors of volcanic action 

 and by the wide-spreading havoc it occasions, have in uurneious in- 

 stances been led to attribute to it powers of creation and disposition 

 of matter, which it does not possess; and some of them go so far as 

 to attribute to it tlie entire formations of the superticial crust of the 

 earth, such as we now behold it, the material of every crystalline rock 

 having, as they suppose, been elaborated within the interior, from 

 whence it has issued in the exquisite beauty and peculiar order in 

 which we now behold it: overlooking the simple fact that it is in the 

 nature of volcanic action to destroy rock, which once destroyed, can 

 never be reproduced in its primary state, its elementary constituents 

 in decomposition and re-combination with bodies of other nature, 

 giving results widely different from the body to which they previ- 

 ously belonged. We cannot shut our eyes to the almost endless di- 

 versity in the character and composition of crystalline rocks, their 

 gradual transition into each other, the organic constitution of many 

 of them, as proved by the configuration of their parts, as well as by 

 their bituminous and other peculiar organic properties: nor can we 

 doubt the evidence of our senses, when we witness in tropical regions 

 both within and above the waters, the gradual consolidation into the 



crystalline body of calcarious and earthy matters uninfluenced by 

 volcanic action and its attendant phenomena. 



The high lands of South America are analogous to the low lands of 

 the North, and exhibit the deserted bed of a primitive ocean ; they are 

 extensive steppes, bare and desolate, save a few saline plants; muriate 

 of soda being comman to all of them, and also entering into combination 

 with, and giving character to many mineral products. Enormous 

 masses of white marble abound on the elevated savannahs of Cuba, 

 which are principally composed of raadripores, ocean marls, and 

 the coverings of molluscous animals. Coal is found on the Pe- 

 ruvian heights, and the cinders ejected from some of the volcanoes 

 evidence that abundance of this mineral exists within the lower beds: 

 the sulphates are common in all these elevated regions, the high and 

 dry climate is also extremely favourable for the development of 

 electro-chemical action, as the abundance of inflammable products is 

 favourable for the sustenance of internal fires. 



The phenomena of the volcanoes in that portion of the globe vary 

 in their nature, in conformity to the vast range through which the in- 

 ternal heat traverses, and also to the nature of the material : water, it is 

 evident, being the grand essential necessary to produce intensity of ac- 

 tion: this is sometimes abstracted from the neighbouring, or from subter- 

 ranean lakes, and at other times it is supplied from the melting snows : 

 sometimes it is abstracted from the neighbouring sea. The Jurago, 

 being a small hill in 1760, in that year, on the 29th of September, 

 it began to burn with furious explosions, ruining entirely the sugar 

 works, and the neiglibouring village of Guacana, and from that time 

 continued to emit fire and burning rocks in such quantities, that the 

 erupted matters, in six years, had formed themselves into three high 

 mountains, nearly three miles in circumference. During the time of 

 the first explosion, the ashes were carried as far as the city of Quere- 

 taro, 150 miles distant from the volcano; and at Valladolid, distant 60 

 miles from it, they were so abundant that the people were obliged to 

 sweep their yards three or four times a day. In this exuded material 

 we identify the well known madrepore limestone, and various kinds 

 of felspathic rock. Humboldt, who probably never saw the historical 

 record of this event, tells us, "that from his own observations, as well 

 as from the testimony of those who were actual eye witnesses of the 

 event, that a large tract of ground, from three to four square miles in 

 extent was up-heaved, in a convex form, to the height of 550 feet, and 

 that from the midst of this protuberance arose six conical hills, the 

 least of them 300 feet in height, and the loftiest, Jorulla, elevated 

 1,600 feet above the level of the plain." To the shame of geology, 

 this, and a silly woman's (Mrs. Maria Graham's) report of the eleva- 

 tion of the whole line of coast of Chili, for the extent of 100 miles by 

 an earthquake, have been made the bases of systems of elevation, as 

 incompatible with the operations of nature, as they are in violation of 

 common sense. In support of this uplifting theory, Mr. Phillips ob- 

 serves, "Those who admit the uplifting of a whole island at once 

 from the bed of the ocean (and who that is conversant wiih volcanic 

 phenomena can question that such events have occurred) need feel no 

 difiiculty in admitting the testimony of the Indians, or the opinions of 

 Humboldt, with respect to the fact of a mountain like Jorulla having 

 been uplifted from the interior of the earth." This is the argument ad 

 absurdum ; for if the latter admission be made, the like admission 

 may be required for elevating continents. Again, Humboldt damages 

 the value of his statement, by adding that the whole mountain was 

 composed of trachyte, as well as by several other similar sweeping 

 assertions. The islands of Santarino and Sciacea were raised piece- 

 meal by a succession of continuous and violent explosions, and many 

 volcanic cones have been elevated in like manner. 



Admitting, as geologists express it, the whole country of Quito is 

 one volcanic hearth, still we find, that in all eruptions the ejected 

 material is such as is palpably manifest tlie well-known constituents 

 of the superficial beds of tlie earth. Combustion proceeding slowly 

 through the beds formed during the eocene period, is at length 

 awakened into action by the sudden intrusion of waters, the natural 

 consequences follow, the generated steam and expanding gases rend 

 the upper beds asunder, and deep-seated earthquakes extend to the 

 distance of some hundred miles; the ejected material being the com- 

 mon minerals of the soil, sulphureous gases, sulphur, mud, and water, 

 but very seldom lava; the torrents of water are generally supplied 

 from the melted snows capping the heights of the crater. Cotopax 

 became a volcano about the time the Spaniards arrived in Peru; an 

 eruption occurred in 1743, which had been for some days preceded 

 by a continual interior rumbling noise. The ignited substances that 

 were ejected being mingled with considerable quantities of snow, 

 which melted amidst the flames, were carried down with such rapidity 

 that the plain from Callao to Latacunga was overflowed, and all the 

 houses, with their wretched inhabitants, were swept away in the 

 general and instantaneous destruction. The river Latacunga was the 



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