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increafe to be only one twelfth part, though confi- 
derable in the expanded form of a fteam. Hence 
I was led to try what would be the effedt of caufing 
an inceflant fhower of air to afcend through the 
boiling liquor in a ftill j and this, to my furprize, I 
found on trial to be very confiderable. There was 
another circumftance alfo, which probably conduced 
to lead my mind to this thought, viz. About fix 
months before, Mr. Littlewood, a Ihipwright at 
Chatham, came thence purpofely to communicate to 
me an ingenious contrivance of his, foon to fweeteii 
{linking water, by blowing a fhower of frelh air 
through a tin pipe full of fmall holes, laid at the 
bottom of the water. By this means, he told me, 
he had fweetened the {linking bilge water in the well 
of fome fliips ; and alfo a butt of {linking water in 
an hour, in the fame manner as I blew up air thro’ 
corn and gunpowder, as mentioned in the book on 
Ventilators. 
1. The method, which I ufed to blowfhowers of 
air up through the dillilling water, was by means of 
‘ a flat round tin box, fix inches diameter, and an inch 
and half deep ; which is placed at the bottom of 
the flill, on four knobs or feet half inch high, to 
make room for the liquor to fpread over the whole 
bottom of the flill, that the heat of the fire may 
come at it. In larger ftills this box muft be propor- 
tionably larger, and have higher feet. And whereas 
the mouth of the flill is too narrow for the tin box 
to enter, which box ought to be within two inches 
as wide as the bottom of the flill ; therefore the box 
may be divided into tw'o parts, Vv^ith a hinge at one 
edge or fide, and a clafp at the other, to fix it toge- 
VoL. 45?. S f ther. 
