Retrospective Criticism. 181 



bodies, they have emigrated from the grave, and become scattered, in a 

 gaseous state, to the four winds of heaven. 



Not satisfied with the above unjust sentence on all steam systems,! find 

 you urging their instant execution thus : — " If all those who now employ 

 it in that way do not adopt the water system, so much the worse for 

 them." (p. 191.) If so, farewell ! all toil, adieu! all effort; further experi- 

 ments and recondite thoughts on steam are useless, yea, pernicious, as they 

 can only harass, bewilder, and mislead ; the water system stretches forth an 

 unconquerable arm over all such investigations, and puts to everlasting 

 silence the humble claims of steam, in every possible mode of its employ- 

 ment. But what. Sir, would be your opinion of the assertion, that all who 

 now convert their steam-boilers into water-boilers, and their steam-pipes 

 into water-pipes, and thus submit to the unqualified claims of the water 

 system ; if all these do not abandon the object of their precipitate choice, 

 and retrace their steps from water to steam, they must, with the water 

 system, carry the galling chain of conscious inconveniences and loss. But this 

 you never expect to witness, whilst I am confident it must take place. 

 You think " steam will never again be employed in gardening, as a medium 

 of conveying heat;" and I think, where reason reigns no other medium 

 can be long continued in use. You think that if all do not adopt the water 

 system, so much the worse for them ; but 1 am certain, that for me to 

 abandon steam for the water system would be the very essence of folly. 

 Had your water system been, indeed, not only superior to every mode of 

 employing steam heretofore made public, but also superior to every plan 

 that lies within the confines of possibility, then your assertions would have 

 been justifiable ; but this is not the case. Or had these been confined to 

 the common mode of using steam, your opinion and mine would have per- 

 fectly accorded ; for I am fully convinced that, whether continued or not, 

 there are now in use many modes of employing steam, that are seriously 

 defective in those advantages which ought to repay the expense o,f their 

 establishment. 



Notwithstanding, your indiscriminate extermination of all steam, systems 

 will not stand ; and my advice is, that henceforth you speak with more 

 caution. For, Sir, supposing a system of heating by steam could be pre- 

 sented to your notice, which would demand little more than one ton of 

 coals where your water system would demand two, and if this system were 

 equally simple and safe as your water system ; if, also, it afforded a more 

 congenial and more extensively applicable heat than the water system can 

 give ; and if, likewise, this steam system would maintain as high and as 

 congenial a heat in all departments heated thereby, for 24 hours after 

 leaving the fire, as your water system would do for 12, would you then 

 think that " if all do not adopt the water system, so much the worse for 

 them." Yet, perhaps, you think that a steam system of this nature never 

 did, nor ever will, exist ; and I trust your confidence in the merits of the 

 water system is such, as will leave no hesitation in proving its superiority 

 over steam, in that way which, in my opinion, is of all others the best cal- 

 culated to end in a just decision of the point. The way in which this would 

 be best accomplished is as follows : — 



Let both parties appoint each a house, heated on the separate principles, 

 for strict observation, the next forcing season. I will give in a house heated 

 by steam, on the principles I advocate ; and you, one heated by hot water. 

 Let a proper system of observation be then agreed upon, and, in due time, 

 let the observations of each day, week, and month, be communicated to 

 you for publication in your Magazine. 



An experiment of this nature, on a subject of such importance, could not 

 fail to be both useful and interesting to many of your readers. In fact, it 

 is the very object which numbers are now desiring; for so many novel 

 schemes have of late been put into practice, and all, in the eyes of their 



N 3 



