JOURNAL 
OF THE 
ROYAL AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 
OF E^^GLAND. 
The following Report on the Preservation of Timber has been 
presented to the Society by the North-Eastern Railway Com- 
pany. It embodies the results of experiments undertaken by 
Dr. Richardson for that Company, extending over a period of 
some years. 
The importance of the question to railway companies may be 
gathered from the fact that the money value of the timber con- 
sumed by the North-Eastern Company alone has for the last three 
years considerably exceeded 60,000/. per annum. 
The subject is treated exclusively with reference to the preser- 
vation of timber in large quantities, for consumption in the con- 
struction and maintenance of railways, docks, and other important 
works of a similar kind ; but the Report contains a large amounr. 
of information which cannot fail to be interesting to all landed' 
proprietors, and, in fact, to all residents in the country who have- 
any quantity of gates, palings, &c., to keep in repair. ^ 
The Report, as presented to the Society, has an Appendix con- 
taining abstracts of the Specifications relating to the Preservation . 
of Timber attached to the various Patents taken out for this pur- 
pose from 1728 to 1858. This portion of the Report, on account^ 
of its length, is not published in the Journal ; but those who 
take sufficient interest in the subject can consult the original- 
pamphlet in the Society's library in Hanover- square. One quo- 
tation only from this Appendix will be made here, viz., a- 
portion of the specification of the earliest patent granted (9th Ma}-,, 
1728). It professes to make known a method of "Preserving 
plank and sheathing of ships, which will not only prevent the 
worms and other small insects from eating and fouling their 
bottoms, but enable the ships so sheathed, even in their long 
voyages, to outsail any other ships of the same burthen." This 
patent was either so successful as apparently to supersede the 
necessity of further improvements, or so complete a failure as 
to discourage several successive generations from making any 
further attempts of the kind ; for it appears that no subsequent 
application for a patent for the preservation of timber was 
made from 1728 until the taking out of Mr. Kyan's patent in 
1832 for the preservation of timber by soaking or boiling in 
a solution of corrosive sublimate. Since that date the increasing 
VOL, XX. B 
