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explosions from carburetted hydrogen gas (fire-damp) in 

 mines altogether, the most efficient remedy would be to obtain 

 a more powerful ventilation in the place of the old plan of 

 using a furnace, or cupola, by causing a larger current of air 

 to pass through the workings, so that the whole of the 

 atmosphere should be sufficiently diluted below the " Firing 

 Point" and thus the materials for combustion and explosion 

 would be removed or rendered harmless, and no accidents 

 occur from that cause. With this view he constructed a 

 model of a machine to effect so desirable an object, in 

 October, 1835. Having succeeded thus far, he says "My 

 next business was to look out for a well which was sur- 

 charged with carbonic acid gas; I found one in Balloon 

 Street, Brewery Field, Leeds. I applied it to this well, 

 which was 27 yards deep, and four feet six inches in diameter. 

 The model cleared this well, which was at the commence- 

 ment entirely filled with foul air, in 25 minutes. A few 

 weeks afterwards, being in the immediate neighbourhood, 

 I was called upon to attend without loss of time, as there 

 were two men sufibcating in the well. When I arrived, I 

 found this correct, and set the machine to work; the men 

 almost immediately recovered, and without any other assist- 

 ance came out of the w^ell. The master well-sinker said it 

 was certainly a most capital invention, but that the well- 

 sinkers could not encourage it. I asked him his reason, 

 ' Well,' he replied, « you have deprived me of the profits 

 of my men's wages for one day, which time it would have 

 taken to fix the bellows.'" This model was twelve inches 

 in diameter by five inches broad, and could be carried on 

 the shoulder to any part of the town, and applied to a 

 well in one minute. Subsequently, in November, 1837, 

 a machine of larger dimensions, five feet in diameter by 

 two feet broad, was constructed and applied to a pit at 

 Osmondthorpe Colliery, near Leeds, in connexion with 



