78 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[March, 



right angles to that of the frame, for winding the strand npon the reel, as 

 fast as they were wound off the bobbins; a guide was attacked which 

 regulated the winding. The whole was worlied by one of Watt's steam 

 tn'ines. By this beaolifully-contrived piece of mechanism, tlie whole of 

 the yarns were twisted into a strand of the required dimensions. The 

 l)itch and tar employed was used either cold or warm, and derived the 

 appellation of warm or cold register cordage accordingly. The cables 

 were formed by a larger machine, combining three of the above-described 

 frames together, each having one of the strands to form the cable wound 

 upon its reel; but the axes of the three frames, instead of being horizontal, 

 as in the first case, were vertical, and all mounted in one large frame, 

 which received a rotatory motion, about a vertical axis of its own, and 

 carrying round the minor frames combined within it in order to twist the 

 three strands together. The several strands were unwound from the reels, 

 in the minor frames, as fast as the three were twisted together into the 

 intended cable, which was drawn upwards between pairs of grooved 

 rollers, disposed above the centre of the main frame, and the cable was 

 conducted away by the same machinery and c liled up for use. Nothing 

 could be more striking than the spectacle of one of these magnificent ma- 

 chines, resembling a great orrery in motion, pursuing its silent yet resist- 

 less course, producing the means of securing at anchor the gigantic vessel 

 of war against the raging tempests of the ocean. This magnificent ma- 

 chinery, after returning a handsome reward to its ingenious inventor, and 

 the enterprising capitalists who erected it, was bought by Government, 

 and erected at the Ifoyal Arsenal, Deptford. Chapman's rope machinery, 

 and Curr's for making flat ropes, chielly used for mines, as well as a new 

 machine, lately introduced at Portsmouth from France, said to be the in- 

 vention of Hubert, are worthy of notice. 



Dyer's machines for making cards, for cotton and wool, and others for 

 cutting nails ; Wilkinson's, for making weavers' reeds ; the self-acting 

 mules of Eaton, Roberts, Smith, and others ; those for weaving bobbin- 

 net lace, by Heathcoat, Morley, and others ; Holdsworlh's, Dyer's, and 

 other improved machines for preparing cotton rovings ; Marshall's, P. 

 Fairbairn's, and other machines for flax, are all ingenious and important 

 inventions of self-acting niiichinery, well calculated to improve, expedite, 

 and economise the manufacture of the various articles for which they were 

 intended. Amongst the same class may be mentioned the curious inven- 

 tions and improvements of Didot, Donkin, Fourdrinier, Dickinson, Cromp- 

 ton, Towgood, Ibotson, Koenig, Nicholson, Tilloch, Congreve, Stanhope, 

 Cowper, Applegath, Spottiswood, and others, for making and drying 

 paper, and printing by steam ; Oldham's various contrivances for printing 

 bank-notes at the banks of England and Ireland ; Lowry's, Maudslay's, 

 Perkins's, and other machines for engraving on metal plates; Holling- 

 drake's method of casting copper under pressure, for engraving ; Brunei's 

 block machinery, executed by Maudslay, at Portsmouth, by which every 

 operation is performed, from the sawing of the rough piece of wood until 

 the perfect completion of the block for naval purposes; his saw-mills at 

 Chatham and Woolwich; Bramah's planing machine at Woolwich; Wil- 

 kinson's machine for boring large cylinders, are splendid specimens of 

 machinery ; neither must we omit Watt's simple operation of making 

 small leaden shot, by pouring melted lead through holes in a cullender at 

 the top of a lofty tower, when they assume a spherical form in cooling, as 

 they fall through the air, and (iually into cold water below. Leaden bul- 

 lets are compressed into a spherical form with great solidity by self-acting 

 machines by Napier. The manufacture of crown and plate glass has 

 been improved, and promises great extension; in this latter branch, Green, 

 Pellatt, Chance, and others, are making great progress. The universal 

 and widely extended application of machinery to every manufacturing 

 operation rendered a corresponding activity and means of supplying the 

 increased demand for it absolutely necessary ; and additional means of 

 making machines have been invented. Self-acting turning lathes, with 

 slide rests, planing machines for metals, also for screwing bolts and nuts, 

 were introduced by Fox; mortising machines, similar to those of Brunei, 

 were adapted by Sharp and Roberts for metals, and shaping machines by 

 Penn; these have been improved by Whitworth, Nasmyth, and others, by 

 whom also new ones have been invented. The former has introduced an 

 ingenious adaptation of machinery for sweeping roads and streets, and 

 which, from its eliiciency, is coming into general use ; and to the latter we 

 are indebted for the steam hammer and steam pile-driving machine, which 

 serve materially to economise and facilitate these operations. Rennie, as 

 far back as 18U1, had applied steam for driving the piles of the coirer-dam 

 for the London Docks ; it has since been applied at Sunderland for a simi- 

 lar purpose, and he proposed it for working the cranes there as well as at 

 the West India Docks ; but it was not adopted. Otis' American machines 

 for excavation have been tried, but are not as yet much employed. The 

 invention and application of these various new and ingenious contrivances, 

 famished the means of executing machinery with a degree of economy 

 and accuracy which without them could uever have been attempted. 



With the advancement of machinery, the art of founding in iron, which 

 commenced at Carron, soon became an indispensable p^irt of machine 

 making. In this department Boultou and Watt took the lead, m conse- 

 quence of the demands for their steam engine, and made great improve- 

 ments in it, which wire afterwards followed by Maudslay, and by 

 others. The working in metals towards the commencement of this century 

 thus became so much facilitated, that it was generally adopted, instead of 

 wood, for the framing and moving parts of machinery ; and castings in 

 iron, of excellent quality, could be obtained in any number exactly like 



each other, so as to be fitted together with great facility. In the progress 

 of modern improvements, wrought or forged iron cauie into more general 

 use, and was substituted for cast iron in many cases, such as for railways, 

 suspension bridges, tie beamj, and roofs for bud lings; various parts of 

 steam engines, mill-work, and machines of dilVerent kinds, and in some 

 instances steel has been adopted. As the improvement in machinery for 

 manufacturing advanced, so did the arrangement, convenience, economy, 

 and construction of the buildings in which it was contained; fire-proof 

 arching for floors, with cast iron beams, wrought iron ti'is, cast iron co- 

 lumns, and wrought and cast iron framing for roofs, window frames, and 

 every other part where the introduction of metal was practicable ; in these 

 improvements, Strutt, Rennie, and others, took a leading part. Apparatus 

 for vi'arming buildings by heated air was adopted by Strutt and Sylvester; 

 and by steam, which had been employed by Smeaton. for drying gunpow- 

 der, was generally introduced by Snodgrass in 17i)S, and improved by 

 Houldsworth and Creighton. This system has been more recently suc- 

 ceeded by that of heating the air by contact with pipes or vssels, in 

 which a circulation is kept up, as practised by Price, Manby, Perkins, 

 Hadeu, and others. These and many other improvements have been in- 

 troduced, and combined in the most scientific manner in the great cotton- 

 mills of Messrs. Phillips and Lee, M'Connell and Kennedy, Hou! Isworth, 

 Birley, and numerous others, at Manchester; Messrs. Horrock:.' «' Pres- 

 ton, Strutt's at Belper, the flax-mills of Marshall, and the woollf ii-:i: Us of 

 Jlessrs. Gott, at Leeds, and of Wilkins near Bath, the silk-mills •■" lirote 

 at Yarmouth, the lace-manufactories of Heathcoat at Tiverton, B i len and 

 Morley at Derby, and Fisher at Nottingham, Cartwright and Warner's 

 steam power stocking-weaving manufactory at Loughborough, and many 

 other magnificent establishments all over the kingdom. The workshops of 

 Fox, Nasmyth, Sharpe, Roberts, Whitworth, and others, for making tools; 

 the steam engine and machine manufactories of Boulton and Watt, Faw- 

 cett, Bury, the Butterly Company, Stephenson, Hawthorn, Donkin, Hall, 

 Fairbairn, Hick, Napier, Miller and Raveohill, Maudslay and Field, 

 Penn, Rennie, Seaward, £cc., are a few of the vast establishments which 

 abound, and which fill us with astonishment at the immense productive 

 powers of this country ; we are at a loss which to admire most, the genius 

 and skill which has designed them, the energy and talent which directs 

 them, or the capital which has brought them into operation. For accounts 

 of many of the numerous branches of the immense manufacturing indus- 

 try of Great Britain, we are indebted to Farey's articles in the Cyclopedia 

 of Rees, the Encyclopiedia of Brewster, and the Supplement to the En- 

 cyclopajdia Brilannica, also to those of Babbage and Barlow in the En- 

 cyclopaedia Metropolitana, and likewise to Dr. Ure. 



The improvement and extension of manufactures required a constant, 

 active, and steady comninuication between the several districts where they 

 were carried on, and soon produced a corresponding improvement in the 

 roads, railways, canals, rivers, and ports. The cost of every article was 

 reduced to the greatest nicety, and economy was carried to the minutest 

 degree ; being so intimately connected together, the extension of the one 

 kept pace with the other. The same may be said of the arts of mining 

 and metallurgy, by which coals for fuel and metals for manufactures are 

 furnished to the different establishments. 



Waterworks. 



Id the supply of that important necessary of life — water, which was so 

 much studied by the ancients, but so greatly neglected in the middle ages, 

 great progress has been made in modern times. Spring water was for- 

 merly conveyed to public reservoirs in the City of London, by leaden pipes 

 from various springs in the vicinity : viz., from Tyburn in Pi'iG, from 

 Highbury in 143S, from Hackney in l.i35, from Hampstead in 1.543, and 

 from Hoxton in 1546. For these useful works, the citizens were indebted 

 to the munificence of several lord mayors and other individuals, but those 

 of Hampstead and Highgate are the only ones now remaining. The open 

 watercourse or conduit from Dartmoor, 21 miles long, for supplying Ply- 

 mouth with water, commenced by Sir Francis Drake, in the reign of 

 Elizabeth, and the New River, for the supply of London, 39 miles long, 

 28 feet wide, and 4 feet deep, falling 3 inches in a mile, by Sir Hugh Mid- 

 dleton, in 1613, are considerable works of the kind, and were planned 

 and executed at the cost of those distinguished individuals. Middleton 

 was, in fact, mined by it, and adopted the profession of an engineer and 

 surveyor to obtain a livelihood. 



London Bridge Waterworks were commenced by Morice, in 1582, with 

 water-wheels turned by the liood and ebb current of the Thames, passing 

 through the purposely-contracted arches of Old London Bridge, and 

 working pumps for the supply of water to the metropolis ; it was the earli- 

 est example of public water service by pumps and mechanical power, 

 which enabled water to be distributed in pipes to dwelling-houses. Pre- 

 viously, water had only been supplied to public cisterns, from whence it 

 was conveyed, at great expense and inconvenience, in buckets and water- 

 carts. In addition to the London Bridge and New River, several minor 

 establishments of the same kind were afterwards erected on the banks of 

 the Thames, to supply separate districts in their immediate vicinity. Some 

 were worked by water-wheels on the sewers which discharged themselves 

 into the Thames ; others, by horses ; and one by a wind-mill. That at 

 Broken Wharf in 1594, at Shadwell and York Buildings, worked by 

 horses, and at Chelsea by water-wheels, may be mentioned. Early in last 

 century, when the old cisterns had nearly disappeared, and water was 

 supplied to the dwellings, a great improvement took place, by the applica- 



