Report of Society's Meetings. 193 
the saving of coal, I went fully over the books of Point St. Simon and 
Marin, and at the former usine the books show from 50 to 60 per cent, 
of saving in coal by the day, but they were not made up for the whole 
crop ; at the latter, the savings for the whole year was 40 per cent. P 
At Lamartin they say the saving is from 60 to 68 per cent., but as I did 
not see the books, I cannot put this as being correct. I am convinced, 
however, that a saving of 50 per cent, may be effected by adopting 
them." 
This statement, staggering as it may appear, was the statement of a 
sane planter, who I believe had no intention to mislead or exaggerate, 
but who reported things exactly as he believed them to exist. Strange 
as it may seem, his report was received as gospel and acted upon by 
many, and Marie was proclaimed as the great prophet of economy in 
fuel ; and planters fondly hoped that 50 per cent, of the money they 
were now spending on coal would go to increase the profit of the trade. 
How have these hopes never been realised, or if they have in only very 
small degree ? 
My impression, expressed at the time and confirmed since, is that the 
Marie furnace owes its fame to an accident — the accident of its happen- 
ing to be connected with a loco- or semi-portable boiler. In a boiler of 
this type the fire-box is by far the best part of the heating surface. 
Stephenson says it is in proportion of 3 to 1 to any other part of the 
boiler. To fire such a boiler as this direct with such a fuel as megass 
would be to sacrifice almost the whole of the fire-box as a heating sur- 
face- owing to the cold air that would rush in along with the fuel, and 
for the same reason the temperature in the fire-box would never be 
sufficiently high to enable effective combustion to be carried on, and the 
temperature of the gases would be so low that they would be extin- 
guished as soon as they entered the tubes, and pass to the chimney as 
smoke rather than flame. In such circumstances the adoption of any 
well-constructed furnace would no doubt effect a vast saving in fuel, but 
the saving is effected by adopting a good instead of a very baa mode of 
firing, and not by any charm in the furnace, and nothing can be more 
absurd than the idea that it is due to the consumption of wet rather 
than dry megass. The inventors of patent furnaces and their supporters 
often claim that those furnaces do very well when applied to a boiler, 
although they fail when applied to a copper wall. How is this ? Is it 
not the effect of a faith which is the substance of things not seen, in the 
first case, while in the latter, they cannot shut their eyes to the fa& 
BB 
