PKACTICAL PAPEKS—IMPROVED MACHINERY. 
331 
sisted of the machines, three in number, exhibited by Messrs. 
Cool, Ferguson & Co. of Glenn’s Fails, New York, for making 
casks and barrels. The three operations performed by these 
machines are—first, the cutting of the staves to the required 
length, finishing the ends, and providing them with the neces¬ 
sary groove for the introduction of the head ; secondly, the 
finishing of the sides of the staves, for which purpose a num¬ 
ber are firmly held together, and subjected to the operation all 
at the same time; and finally, the formation of the heads to 
the proper size and figure, and with edges suitably prepared 
to enter the grooves in the ends of the staves. The advan¬ 
tages afforded by these machines over the hand manufacture 
of casks, are not simply economy of expenditure and saving 
of time. The article produced is much better than the hand¬ 
made article. It is easy, indeed, to perceive that the perfect 
uniformity of parts secured by the machine-, and the perfect 
similarity of joints, must greatly improve the accuracy of 
fitting, and render the cask more solid, less liable to leak, and 
more durable than can be the case where, as often happens, 
the imperfection of workmanship is only masked or concealed 
by an excessive strain upon the hoops. The machines exhibit¬ 
ed found, it is said, a prompt sale in France, having been pur¬ 
chased for the use of an establishment manufacturing Portland 
cement. 
BRICK-MAKING MACHINES. 
The number of machines for the manufacture of brick is 
constantly increasing, and the great superiority of the product 
which they turn out, combined with the rapidity of production, 
is likely to secure for machine-made brick the command of 
the market to the entire exclusion of any other, except in situ¬ 
ations remote from the great centres of commerce or the great 
channels of transportation. These machines may be distin¬ 
guished in two classes: the first including those in which the 
bricks are moulded from plastic clay, and the second those in 
which the material is employed “ dry by which term, how¬ 
ever, it is meant only that the material is used with such small 
amount of water as it naturally contains when taken from the 
