evn 
XXXIV. 
THE APPLICATION OF THE KITSON LIGHT TO LIGHT- 
HOUSES AND OTHER PLACES WHERE AN EX- 
TREMELY POWERFUL LIGHT IS REQUIRED. By 
JOHN R. WIGHAM, M.RB.I.A. 
[Read NovemBer 21, 1900; Received for Publication Aprin 26; Published 
JuNE 7, 1901.] 
Recent experience has shown that the electric light is not the 
best light as a lighthouse illuminant, sea captains and others 
competent to judge having testified that it is misleading in clear 
weather, and absolutely useless in foggy weather. The Trinity 
House appear to have concurred in this view, for they have not 
established any electric light since the date of their Report on 
the South Foreland Experiments. On the contrary, when they 
recently established the great Lundy Island Lights the old oil lamp 
was adopted as the illuminant, and the controversy seems to have 
been conclusively settled by the statement of Mr. Ritchie, President 
of the Board of Trade (who is also the mouthpiece of the Trinity 
House in Parliament), in reply to a question in the House, that it 
was true that electric lights had been found inferior, under certain 
- circumstances, to oil. 
The claims of the electric light as a lighthouse illuminant 
having thus been disposed of, the question arises: Can we find a 
light with the intensity of the electric light without its defects 
for lighthouse purposes? ‘The new light which I am about to 
describe is one which seems to possess that desideratum ; it is also 
rich in the red and yellow rays, in which the electric light is 
deficient, and it has besides the necessary volume which con- 
tributes to the power of making itself visible in foggy weather, 
and has also a uniform steadiness not attainable by the electric 
are light. This light is an American invention, and is called, 
_ after the name of its inventor, the ‘‘ Kitson” Light. Itisreally a 
_ gas light, though made from cold petroleum, and possesses those 
valuable properties which originally commended the gas system 
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