CLERIHEW’S PATENT. 
aud that he was not entitled to a patent for it) for 
drying coffee, without exposing it on mats to the sun 
at all. It was : make your store, as far as possible, 
air tight ; instead of plank flooring, lay down on the 
joists, battens, say 2 inches x inches apart ; over 
this place coir matting ; underneath the lower floor 
the ground was all well hollowed out. A pair of 
light plate-iron fanners were inserted in the wall at 
the end of the store, and at the other end a furnace 
was constructed, from which large iron pipes led into 
the store. This furnace was so constructed, that all 
the smoke went up a chimney, and the heat from it 
was drawn into the store through the iron pipes, a 
suction or draft of air being caused by the revo- 
lutions of the fans at the other end. For this 
purpose, the pulping- house was formed from the 
end section of the store, so that store and pulping- 
house were just one building. The fans were in 
a wooden frame, built into the wall, immediately 
behind the water-wheel ; they were driven by means 
of a connecting band on a large drum attached 
to the wheel, and on a smaller one fixed on the 
axle of the fanners. The fanners at one end, 
and the furnace at the other, caused a current 
of heated air to pass through the store. The 
Colombo coffee curers did not like this system ; they 
said, and I believe truly, that the silver skin never 
would ci'ine off, and the samples of cofiee were quite 
spoilt. Tlie writer once built and worked a store 
and pulping-house on this principle, and certainly 
W8LS disappointed in the result. Mr. Clerihew him- 
self called occasionally and gave personal instruction. 
All air from without was carefully excluded, light 
was admitted by means of glass windows. The roof, 
which WHS iron, and so of course not air-tight, was 
ceiled in, bungalow-fashion, with strong ceiling cloth, 
over which was washed a good coating of glue and 
rice kaiiji. It succeeded in drying to a slight ex- 
tent coffee, when spread out thin, but the question 
is. Would the coffee spread out thin on the coir 
matting not have dried equally well, without the 
fans and furnace ? for there was no very perceptible 
draft. It was only just perceptible, and we used 
often to try it, by smoking a pipe inside the store ; 
if we were near the fanners, the smoke would move 
slowly towards them, but from the centre of the store, 
or at the far end, near the furnace, there was no 
perceptible draft of the smoke : indeed sometimes to 
our great disgust, especially when shewing off the 
results to a visitor, the smoke would move off the 
other way ! on seeing which our visitor would break 
out into a loud guffaw, stating, as his opinion, tha 
