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LIV. jin Account of the great Benefit of 
blowing Showers of frejh Air up through 
diftillingLiquors, ^ Stephen Hales, D,D. 
RR.S. 
Read Dec. i8, H E great importance of having a 
JL fufficient fupply of frefli water in 
fhips has been the occafion of many laudable at- 
tempts to make fea-water frelh and wholfome : but 
all the attempts and difeoveries hitherto made have 
laboured under this great and material objeftion, viz, 
the great quantity of fuel, that was neceffary to diftil, 
with a flow progrefs, a fmall quantity of water, by 
any methods of diflillation hitherto known. But 
I have lately happily, mofl unexpededly, difeovered 
an eafy and effedlual method to diftrl great quanti- 
ties of water with little fuel j which I was led to by 
the following incidents ; viz. Mr. Shipley, fecretary 
of our Society for the encouragefnent of arts^ ma- 
nufaSlures and commerce, brought me acquainted 
with Mr. V^'iiliam Baily of Salifbury-court, the au- 
thor of many ingenious contrivances 5 who (hewed 
me, in a fmall model of a tin velfe!, a method, by 
which he- has happily increafed the force of the en- 
gine to raife water by fire, viz. by lifting up fome 
of the boiling water^ at every ftroke, by means of a 
conical veflTel, with fmall holes in it, full of tow; 
whereby the quantity of the afeending fleam or 
wreak was confiderably increafed. This led me to 
think, that a greater quantity of liquor might alfo 
by this means be diflilledi but on trial I found the 
increafe 
