and of Rural Improvement generally, during 1838. 553 



stoves are quite light, and portable by hand from one part of the 

 house to another, for communicating extra heat to any room or 

 part of a house, at a few minutes' notice. The fuel is burned in 

 a vertical cylinder, three or more inches in diameter, and eighteen 

 inches or more in height ; the air which supplies combustion 

 entering in at the lower end of the cylinder, and the products of 

 combustion escaping at the upper end. Attached to the upper 

 end is a regulator, for adjusting the escape of vapour, and 

 consequently the rate of combustion, to the heat required. On 

 applying the mouth close to the upper orifice of the cylinder, and 

 inhaling the vapour which proceeded from it, nothing offensive 

 whatever could be perceived. On December 5. 1837., when the 

 stove was exhibited at the Horticultural Rooms, in Regent Street, 

 it was seen by from 50 to 100 persons, perhaps more ; a number 

 of whom, as well as ourselves, inhaled the air or vapour which 

 escaped by the upper orifice or chimney of the tunnel, and 

 none of us experienced the slightest inconvenience from doing so. 

 The merits of the stove were lauded to the skies.* The 

 inventor informed us that about this time he was offered 

 100,000^. for his invention; but he had already made his 

 arrangements, and formed a partnership with Mr. Harper, and 

 hence the apparatus is commonly called Harper and Joyce's 

 stove. The chemical world, after being puzzled for some weeks, 

 in endeavouring to discover what description of fuel was used, 

 were at last informed that it was charcoal prepared in a parti- 

 cular manner, and it was soon ascertained that this preparation 

 consisted in burning it more thoroughly, and afterwards saturating 

 it with an alkali, by steeping it in lime water. The stove now 

 suddenly fell in public estimation, and was decried by some as a 

 deception, and asserted by others to be little more than a com- 

 mon charcoal stove. The fuel was analysed by various chemists. 

 One of the stoves was sent to Paris, and there an analysis of the 

 fuel was made by M. Gay-Lussac, and reported on to the Institute. 

 This report was dated April 9. ; it was published in England, in 

 the AthencEum for April 28. 1838, and from that report the fol- 

 lowing is an extract. 



" The fuel employed [in Joyce's stove] is a very little charcoal, impregnated, 

 it is said, with carbonate of soda, to retain the carbonic acid produced in burn- 

 ing. I have found an authentic specimen of this fuel to contain, carbonate, 

 not of soda, but of potash, yet in so minute a quantity, that I am certain it 



* Lord Brougham is said to have exhibited one on his breakfast table every 

 morning ; to have carried it about with him in his carriage ; and to have pro- 

 nounced that its inventor would be inadequately rewarded by the transfer of 

 the national debt to his name." {Mech. Mag., May, 1838, p. 73.) We ex- 

 pressed ourselves in almost an equally sanguine manner ; questioning " if any 

 thing so remarkable had occurred, in a practical point of view, since the inven- 

 tion of gunpowder." (p. 57.) 



