no Management of Light in Illumination. 



in introducing an entirely new system of domestic illu- 

 mination, which must necessarily be far more beautiful, 

 and at the same time more pleasant and more econom- 

 ical, than any of the methods hitherto put in practice. 



All that is ugly and disgusting in a lamp may be 

 concealed : the shadows projected by its solid parts 

 may be obliterated, and the luminous object presented 

 to the view may at the same time be of an elegant 

 form, and have a surface sufficiently large to dispense 

 a great deal of mild light, without being so brilliant as 

 to dazzle and injure the eyes. 



One of my first attempts to put these principles in 

 practice was made in the year 1800, in lighting the 

 reading-rooms and lecture-room of the Royal Institu- 

 tion. Argand lamps, with several burners suspended 

 from the ceiling or elevated on stands, were so covered 

 by large screens of white gauze, in the form of a flat 

 dome or truncated cone, as to conceal the lamps 

 entirely from the view, and at the same time, by dis- 

 persing the light over the whole surface of the dome, 

 to moderate the too intense brilliancy of the flames. 



This experiment succeeded even beyond my expec- 

 tation ; and the lighting of these rooms met with such 

 universal approbation that I was encouraged to pro- 

 ceed in my endeavours to improve the art of illumi- 

 nation. 



My next attempt was to light a large dining-room in 

 my house at Paris, by a single luminous dome sus- 

 pended over the middle of the dining-table ; and, in 

 order to prevent cross-lights, I ventured to place a clus- 

 ter of burners, on Argand's principles, in the axis of 

 this dome, and so near together as to touch each other, 

 and to feed them with oil from a circular reservoir, in 



