350 
Account of Mr Samuel Morey’s 
cylinders and frames. This shaft, by means of a pinion, drives 
the axis u of the water-wheel 1 1. 
In order to save fuel, the engine has ^\QGas Fire^ applied to 
it in the following manner : The boilers being cylindrical, with 
an inside flue for fuel, two or three are placed close together, and 
set in the following manner ; first cross bars of iron are laid on 
the timbers; a platform of sheet iron is laid on these bars, coated 
over with clay, mortar, or cemented, to keep out the air. Up- 
on the sheet iron, and over the bars below, are placed cast iron 
blocks, in shape to fit the curve of the boiler, so as to raise it 
* The Gas Fire or Water Burner is the name given to a new method of pro- 
ducing light and heat, invented by Mr Morey, by which he conceives that all car- 
bonaceous fluids may be conveniently burnt, and derive great force from their com- 
bination with the oxygen and hydrogen of water or steam, at the moment of igni- 
tion. In the first form of this experiment, a tight cylindrical vessel containing 
rosin was connected with a small boiler by a pipe, which entered near the bottom 
and extended nearly its length, having small apertures over which were two in- 
verted gutters, inclining or sloping upwards over each other ; the upper one, 
which was longer than the other, being intended to detain the steam in the rosin 
in its way to the surface. When the rosin was heated, carburetted hydrogen gas 
issued from the outlet or pipe inserted near the top of the vessel, and, being igni- 
ted, afforded a small blaze about as large as that of a candle ; but when the steam 
was allowed to flow, this blaze instantly shot out many hundred times its former 
bulk, to the distance of two or three feet. Tar succeeds better than rosin, and 
has therefore been used in the steam-boilers. See American Journal of Science, 
vol. i. p. 91, 165, 401. 
M. Gay Lussac, in a note in the Annales de Chimie et de Physique, tom, x, 
p. 124, has examined the theory of this process, and is of opinion that no advan- 
tage can be gained from it. He maintains, that the tar cannot decompose the 
water at the temperature employed ; and that even if it did, it would not give out 
more heat or light than by the ordinary process of combustion. This distinguish- 
ed chemist explains the production of the augmented flame in the following man- 
ner : “ At the temperature to which the tar is exposed when alone, the elastic 
force of the inflammable vapour which it produces is not powerful enough to over- 
come the weight of the atmosphere, and to disengage itself copiously. Hence 
arises the smallness of the flame which it produces alone. But when the steam is 
brought against the burning tar, it draws along with it the inflammable vapour 
which could not disengage itself spontaneously, and therefore the flame is conside- 
rably augmented. Essence of turpentine, for example, which boils at 160*’ cent, 
will not disengage inflammable vapour at the temperature of 100° cent, and there- 
fore will not inflame ; but if a current of steam, or even of azot alone, is directed 
against it, a very considerable flame will be obtained. It is from the same cause 
that water, heated to 100° of the centgrade scale, in a vessel almost entirely shut, 
will not give off any steam, but as soon as we blow upon its surface, the steam, 
is copiously produced. 
