WEEKLY LIST OF PATENTS SEALED. Sealed December 2nd, 1853. 1354. William Hammond Smith, of Gloucester row, WalworthImprovements in the manufacture of parchment. 1362. Jean Durandeau, jun., of Paris-Certain means of obtaining marks and designs on paper. 1363. Ferdinand Louis Gossart, of Rue Montmartre, Paris-System of permanent circulation of caloric, intended to produce and overheat steam, gas, and liquid. 1365. James Spotswood Wilson, of Tavistock place, Russell squareMachine or apparatus for digging or raising earth, and applicable to agricultural or engineering purposes. 1369. James Hayes, of Elton, Huntingdon-Improved machinery for raising and stacking straw, hay, corn, and other agricultural produce. 2113. Alfred Vincent Newton, of Chancery lane-Improved machinery for crushing and grinding mineral and other substances. (A communication.) 2187. Alfred Vincent Newton, of Chancery lane-Improved method of forming seams and ornamental stitching, and in machinery for effecting such operation, part of which machinery is applicable to the forming of other seams and stitches. (A communication.) 2225. William Edward Newton, of Chancery lane-Improved machinery for cutting metal or other substances. (A communication.) 2251. Robert Halliwell, of Bolton le Moor, and William Johnson, of Farnworth-Improvements in machinery for spinning and doubling cotton and other fibrous substances, and for grindingcards. 2261. Peter Rothwell Jackson, of Salford-Improvements in machinery for manu¡acturing hoops and wheels. 2269. William Gossage, of Widness-Improvements in obtaining certain saline compounds from solutions containing such compounds. Sealed December 5th, 1853. 1386. George Carter, of Mottingham, Kent, and George Marriott, of Hull-Improvements in the manufacture of white lead. 1388. John Walter Friend, of Caunto road, Southampton-Improved method of measuring and registering the distance run by ships and boats proceeding through the water, which is also applicable to measuring and registering tides and currents. 1396. Frederick Lipscombe, of the Straud-Improvements in the construction of ships and boats. 1399. Alexander McDougall, of Manchester-Improvements in the manufacture of potash and soda ash. 1409. Claude Aruoux, of Paris-New system of towing and traction. 1413. Edward Maniere, of Bedford row-Improvements in the manufacture of paper. 1431. Thomas James Perry, of the Lozells, Astoro-juxta-Birmingham-Improvements in raising and lowering Venetian and other blinds; applicable also to the raising and lowering of other bodies. 1459. Edward Walmsley, of Heaton Norris, and John Holmes, of Manchester-Improvements in, and applicable to, steam engines. 1515. Charles Cowper, of Southampton buildings-Improvements in the manufacture of cadrs, or substitutes for cards, for the Jacquard loom. (A communication.) 1580. Edward Davies, of Gothenburg, Sweden-Improvements in machinery or apparatus for carding and otherwise preparing cotton or other fibrous materials to be spun, and also for cleaning or stripping cards used in the said operations. 1583. Richard Bradley, and William Craven, of Wakefield-Improvements in moulding, forming, and compressing of clay for the manufacture of bricks, tiles, and other earthenware. 1603. Alfred Vincent Newton, of Chancery lane-Improved machinery for printing. (A communication.) 1657. Martin Samuelson, of Hull-Improvements in the manusacture of bricks and other articles from plastic materials. 1949. Alexander Cuninghame, of Glasgow-Improvements in the manufacture or production of alkalis and their salts, or alka line salts. 2126. John Wilson, of Manchester-Improvements in, and applicable to, machines for printing fabrics. 2301. Francis Whitehead, of Crayford, and William Whitehead, of the same place-Improvements applicable to lanterns, lamp shades, and reflectors for reflecting, concentrating, or diffusing light. 2305. Joseph Denton, of Prestwich, Manchester-Improvements in looms for weaving. 2313. William Edward Newton, of Chancery lane-Improvements in fire-arms and cartridges. (A communication.) 2319. Frederick Warner, and John Sholton, both of the Crescent, Jewin street-Improvements in the manufacture of large bells. 2359. Abraham Pope, of Edgware road-Improvements in furnaces. 2301. Charles Ludovic Augustus Meinig, of Leadenhall street-Improvements in galvanic batteries. 2375. Charles Coates, of Sunnyside, near Rawtenstall, LancashireImprovements in, and applicable to, looms for weaving. 2377. Benjamin Price, of Fieldgate street, Whitechapel-Certain improvements in the means of, or apparatus for, reducing the quantity of smoke from the furnaces of boilers, coppers, pans, and other like vessels. 1395. Henry George Rowe, Albert George Andrew, and William Henry Andrew, all of Sheffield-Improvements in the mode of fastening the handles to table knives and forks. 1430. Joseph Spencer, of Bilston-New or improved cupels. 1486. Edgar Breffit, of Castleford, Yorkshire-Improvements in the manufacture of glass-house pots. 1816. John Macintosh, or Pall Mall-Improvements in the construction of bridges, viaducts, and other like structures. 1970. Thomas Hill, and Alexander Thomson, both of Glasgow→ Improvements in the manufacture of pipes or hollow articles from plastic materials. 2006. Charles Goodyear, of Avenue road, St. John's Wood-Improvements in the manufacture of waterproof fabrics. 2075. Edwin Lumby, and Zacchaeus Sugden, of Halifax-Improvements in needles or wires, used in the manufacture of carpets, looped pile fabrics, and velvets. 2138. Thomas Swingler, of Victoria Foundry, Litchchurch-Improvements in the permanent way of railways. 2211. Henry Winter, of Castle street-Improvement in trousers to supersede the use of braces: which improvement is applicable to other articles of apparel. 2310. 2312. Henry Richardson Plumpton, and James Leonard Plumpton, of Massachusetts, U.S.-New and useful article of furniture to serve the purpose of a bedstead, a toilet table, or a washstand and a writing desk. Henry Clayton, of the Atlas Works, Upper Park place, Dorset square-Improvements in the manufacture of bricks and tiles. 2316. George Fergusson Wilson, of Belmont, Vauxhall-Improvements in treating wool and fabrics composed of wool. George Fergusson Wilson, of Belmont, Vauxhall-improvements in the manufacture of soap, 2318. 2370. William Edward Newton, of Chancery lane-Improved machinery for preparing and combing wool. (A communication.) 2386. George Laurie, of New York-Improvements in the manufacture of artificial teeth and gums. (A communication.) 2394. Samuel Cunliffe Lister, of Bradford, Yorkshire-Improvements in combing cotton and wool. 2396. Augustus Applegath, of Dartford-Improvements in letterpress printing machinery. 2412. George Collier, of Halifax, Yorkshire-Improvements in the manufacture of carpets and other fabrics. 2414. Charles Barraclough, of Halifax, Yorkshire-Improvements in the manufacture of carpets and other fabrics. No. 56. Vol. II.] JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF ARTS. Journal of the Society of Arts. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1853. Shoolbred, James, jun. Walmsley, Sir Joshua, M.P. Hambro, Baron C. Joachim Warren, John Loxdale The following Institutions have been taken into Union since the last announcement:314. Farnham, Mechanics' Institution. [Dec. 16, 1853. to call your attention to the new method of irrigation as practised successfully by me, involving in its consideration our water supply, sanitary condition, and physical support. The application of steam to cultivation will also deserve our notice. 66 However gloomy our last meeting, individually, I never despaired, and you will remember that I said, "I apprehend nobody expects that corn will long continue at the present low "prices, such an expectation would be contrary to all our historic evidences of fluctuations." And I also said, "No doubt, whatever the price of food may be, the land of this kingdom will continue to be cultivated; no one can seriously sup"pose for a moment that the large and active "population of this kingdom is to be unemployed "or unfed." These were bold assertions with wheat at 40s., but wheat now at near SOs. proves me to have been a true prophet. In taking a general review of the position of British Agriculture, there is, in my opinion, nothing so fatal as congratulations on our past progressions. A good mariner looks ahead, referring to the past only as a caution for the future, as he leaves behind him the shoals of error and preju 315. Newcastle-on-Tyne, Washington Chemical Works dice; let us do the same in agriculture; so long Reading Institution and Library.. The Paper read was :— THIRD PAPER ON BRITISH AGRICUL- RATIONS AT TIPTREE-HALL FARM. BY JOHN JOSEPH MECHI. Considering it to be both a public duty and public benefit to lay before the world our practice in any particular art, be it successful or unsuccessful, I venture once again to appear in your arena, feeling that it is the field on which has been fought and won, many a battle in the cause of progression and amendment. I am not here to flatter your Society, of which I have the honour to be a member; but I speak the truth, and my own sentiments when I say, that it has conferred, and that it will confer, important additions to the knowledge, comfort, and happiness of the British people. When last I addressed you, agriculture presented an aspect of doubt and melancholy; forsaken by legislation and politics, she was abandoned to her own resources, that unknown mine from which she is now beginning to draw important and untold treasures. as it continues so far in the rear of perfection, I can only excuse it, I cannot praise it. These are stirring times; in commerce, arts, becomes old-fashioned and out of date to-morrow; and manufactures, the grand invention of to-day new chemical processes may cause an immense and costly manufactory to be sold for its old materials; witness our sugar refineries, &c. The clipper-ship and winged and tailed steamers (combined screw and paddle) condemn their log-like competitors to inferior uses, and diminished values. So it will be in agriculture; Mr. Mechi is a most inconvenient person; he can't let old things or old prejudices alone; he is always agitating, and lets all the world know it, too. The old flail was superseded by the horse-gear threshing machine, and now the horse-gears are "trembling in the balance," by that inconvenient new comer Steam. Then there's the new American threshing machine-why, by Mr. Mechi's saying so much about it, it has suspended all the orders and bargains that were about to be made in old threshing machines all over the kingdom. Now I don't wonder at this, for I assure you, it is an implement that will supersede all ours in On the occasion to which I allude, my cele-cost, utility, lightness, durability, and general brated Balance Sheet was held up with political economy. But for all that, I have "a crow to triumph, or mourned over by sincere doubt and pull with our Yankee friends." mistrust; but those times are past, never to return, so we can now breathe freely, and discourse about the strength or weakness of agriculture, unbiassed by political asperities. I shall have to-night to present to you another Balance Sheet, and I purpose very particularly Would you believe it, they brought over with them horse-gear to work their machine, and tell me that their "cute Agricultural friends in the States" are universally "minus steam." Of course I felt much shocked; and having attached a small portable steam-engine of four horse power to show them the advantage over a relay of eight horses, they felt duly ashamed, and promised never again to permit horses to work their excellent machine. I am concerned to see that still so little steam is used in our own agriculture. Every farmer with 200 to 300 acres, who has not an engine, has a great lesson to learn, and I would have him to understand, that a strong four-horse power steam engine, worked at 70lbs. to 90lbs. to the inch, will tire any sixteen real horses he can find, the comparative cost being 1507. against 6007., besides eating nothing when not at work, occupying less space, and economizing an immense outlay in casualties by disease, cost of attendance, and daily food-six to seven hundred weight of coal, versus 32s. horse feed. I little thought, seven years ago, that I should outlive the storm of ridicule and censure poured upon me by my practical friends. But it is gratifying to me, on personal and public grounds, to find the Mechian medicine gradually taking effect. I have often to "congratulate" my neighbours with sly gravity on their steam engines, Garrett's horse hoes, covered yards, boarded floors, and drainage of tenacious clays; waggons and board and thatched buildings are still clung to with considerable affection, but with a some doubtful and half-calculating glance, at my new looking brick and slated buildings, although erected ten years since. If I meet the strong tea half a mile in advance of the farmery, after a heavy rain, and make some inquiries as to the condition of the tea leaves in the yards, glancing at the untroughed eaves, I am told "my landlord ought to do this;" and sometimes I say I suppose you would repay him interest for it? In fact, however unpalatable and unpopular it may be to uncover and expose agricultural errors or short comings, time convinces me that it is attended with the happiest ultimate results, and I can never afford to feel angry at former censures, when I see that many a sturdy old pollard has bowed to my influence, and that many a crooked hedge and way have been made straight by my example. By the bye, is it not very singular, that whilst our railway fences are efficient, trim, and thriving, it being profitable to dig beside them. annually, the lineal influence has never affected the inefficient monstrosities that diverge from them, at right angles? I now proceed to produce my Balance Sheet and I am sure most of you will rejoice with me, that it shows a most favourable and encouraging result, the benefit I derive for this year being in rent, profit, and interest, nearly 6007. I will say nothing of a further sum I ought to claim, for improved condition of soil, owing to my having purchased for consumption by my live stock 7007. worth of Corn, Oil Cake, &c. I shall have the benefit of this in next year's crop. 117 2 6 203 6 0 Sheep 347 0 0 Cattle and Cows Implements Tillages, Hay, &c . 526 10 0 Tillages. Hay, &c. £1670 10 6 45 0 0 .1280 648 0 0 Coals for Engine, Tradesmen's Bills. &c. . 130 0 0 £4391 10 6 Produce of Cows and Poultry Horse Work, Labour, Hay, Manure &c. for Private Establishment Live Stock, and Wool Sold Three Stocks of Old Straw 10 0 50 00 55 00 60 0 0 2002 0 0 30 0 0 £240 0 0 € 343 16 3 . 583 16 3 £4975 6 9 I recently incurred a brisk agricultural censure, for stating that "live stock is a necessary evil." We cannot do without it, because it produces manure, which enables us to sell grain; but, leaving out of view its manural gain, it certainly does not pay." Those who have a fancy for keeping pigs and other animals, will find, that after paying market prices for their food, adding shelter, attendance, and casualties, there will be a considerable loss, or charge against the manure. If you have a fine £4975 6 9 crop of turnips, which, in rent, manure, labour, &c. has cost you 107. per acre, and offer it on the market to be folded off for sheep, it is a great chance if you are bid 51. per acre; and if the parties give their sheep oil cake whilst so feeding them, they would probably give nothing for the turnips. These questions puzzle amateur farmers, but are well understood by the knowing old practical hands. Therefore, bear in mind, that every pound you spend in pur A Lincolnshire farmer told me a few days since, that a fine crop of turnips which cost him 101. per acre, he once sold for 10s. per acre, to be fed off with sheep. This was owing to the general abundance of turnips, and the necessity for feeding them off in time for barley. The 97. 10s. per acre loss would evidently become a heavy drag or charge on the barley, clover and wheat of the rotation. Another large grazier told me, "If I buy a thousand pounds' worth of oil cake, I charge half to the bullocks, and half to the manure." that, after paying for purchased food, nothing was left for the turnip, although we know they cost 10s. per ton or more. Breeding stock of first rate quality, if you have judgment and suitable land, is perhaps remunerative, although there are many expenses and anxieties attending it. As there is a great rage for poultry just now, may be as well to say that I include them in my observations. In a farm-yard they are useful to pick up and convert the unthrashed grain, but if you buy food for them, they entail a loss. Amateur farmers will do well to consider that ten per cent. on capital, or 17. per acre, is, on an average of years, considered a fair remuneration by farmers. It is true there is house rent free, beside some other advantages, but we see a great many ruined by farming, either from want of judgment, or by unpropitious seasons. In farming, as in all trades, a want of judgment is soon found out and availed of by knowing hands, who will buy of you too cheap and sell to you too dear. Your labourers, too, will take an exact measure of your capabilities. LIVE STOCK ACCOUNT. £ s. d. 753 8 6 £3018 16 0 Now this balance sheet opens up a vast question for reflection, both in town and country. Why is it so different from my former one ?-principally because I have the power of irrigation. It is true that prices are higher now than then, but crops are less productive, and expenses are higher. Nearly the whole difference between this balance sheet and the former one arises in the live-stock account. By irrigation I am enabled to double, if not triple, my green and root crops, and thus render them profitable instead of unprofitable. It is quite clear, that if I can double my stock, I also double the quantity of my manure, and thus affect importantly the cereal crops. If I double my green and root crops, I diminish their cost one-half. This is actually the fact, and therein is my present and most agreeable position. Every practical farmer knows that the losing part of his farm is the root crop (I mean in the Midland, Southern, and Eastern Counties, where we have hot summers and little rain). That root crop costs him more than the animals repay, and leaves a heavy charge on the ensuing grain crops. Irrigation changes all this, and permits each crop to be responsible for its own annual charge, thus rendering them all remunerative. I am forcibly and frequently reminded of the truth of this statement by a five-acre pasture opposite my residence. Vainly did I try, by solid manures, to render this vile plastic clay into a useful pasture. It was like birdlime in winter and cast iron in summer-poor, indigenous, and drab coloured grasses choaked and eradicated the finer kinds I had sown--and the animals wandered about, hollow and dissatisfied. In the space of eighteen months irrigation has changed all this-new, fine and fattening grasses have clothed the field with perpetual verdure-it keeps three times as many animals, and the close and shaven pasture indicates their affection for it-butter, milk, and cream, alike testify by their richness to the fertility of irrigation, whilst the animals are improved in their condition. Professor Way, in his recent valuable analysis of grasses, £3018 16 0 in the "Royal Agricultural Society's Journal," has revealed the astounding truth, that irrigated grasses contain twenty-five per cent. more meat-making matter than those not irrigated. We all know that grasses are voracious drinkers-they cannot stand drowning on undrained land in stagnant water, from which their roots soon extract all the oxygen; but see how prim and green they look beside any trickling rivulet. I venture, therefore, to predict, that the people of this country will soon connect ample watersupply, cleanliness, and health, with the idea of ample and cheap physical supplies-they will identify the wellwashed contents of their closets with rounds of beef, saddles of mutton, big leaves, and rich milk. The ladies, will recognise in every slop that leaves the house, a rich, cheaper, and more abundant supply of that element, milk, which is to develope in their offspring by bone and muscle, beauty and power, mental and physical. In these times of advancement and common sense, let us call things by their proper names. The light of science has dispelled the darkness of our ignorance on these subjects. We know by our great chemists, that our sewers contain the elements of our food-of, in fact, our very selves-and that to waste them, as we now do, is a cruel robbery on the welfare and happiness of our people. Practical experience has taught me that this sewerage is all the better for ample dilution-that the more you flood your cities with limped streams, washing from every tainted and poverty-stricken court and alley the elements of pestilence and suffering, the grateful earth will absorb them in her bosom, and return them to you as treasures of health and strength. I feel strongly that the time is come when the sanitary condition of two millions and a half of people can no longer be held in abeyance by paltry vested interests. We have in this country an estimated 15,000,000 of acres of grass-land. We know full well by our London milk, and by the appearance of the pastures on our London clay, that they require and are capable of enormous improvement. This can only be profitably done by draining them and saturating them to the depth of the drains with the sewerage of our towns and cities; this is already in a few instances, being done, and will result in enormous profit to those far-sighted men who have anticipated the general adoption of the system. The difficulties are insignificant; they exist in the brain, not in the fact. It is of no use to send a stream of sewerage to a farmer who allows his own manure to run down the ditches, and sends to Peru to bring it back again in the shape of birds' dung at 10 per ton. No! landlords and tenants too must be taught or brought to believe that food and liquified manure are one and the same thing, merely altered in form. Then you may make a small well by the side of each present sewer, and with your steam force pump take all that comes down that source, and distribute it through subterranean arterial pipes on the whole country; not a drop need run past your pump to taint your streams. There is no more difficulty in it, than in the water supply, but you must work a change in the minds of the agriculturists, or they will hardly take it as a gift, much less pay you for it. Our General Board of Health has done wonders in this matter. I for one, shall ever feel that the country owes to the philanthropic, talented, and energetic members of that board a deep debt of gratitude, for their exertions in a most unthankful and unpopular cause. We none of us like physic, however good it may be for us, and sanitary doctors are no favourites with rate-payers, although they can clearly have no other interest than the public welfare. When I speak of liquified manure, I must be understood as meaning all excrementitious matter, solid or liquid, rendered fluid or semi-fluid by the addition of water, or by decomposition in water. In dealing with large quantities of such decomposing matter, a disagreeable and unhealthy effluvia will arise, however small the trap or cover of the tank; but experience has at length taught me that a jet of waste steam admitted into the tank above the agitated mass of putrifaction, effectually Vain are all other antidotes prevents any noisome odour. cal portion of our manures is the most costly, and yet the As this is a general discourse, I will not overlay it with Fifteen yards per acre of three-inch iron pipe. Two hundred yards of two-inch Gutta Percha hose, with A pair of force pumps, capable of discharging 100 gallons gainer. For more comprehensive details of the whole system, I would refer you to the excellent "Minutes of Information of Sewerage as applied to Agriculture," issued by the Board of Health, and obtainable at the Queen's Printing Office, which every one interested should read. It is a curious and interesting fact, that while solid manure breeds animalculæ, liquified manure destroys them. Many fields of tares have been eaten by slugs this autumn, and so would mine, but for the discomfiting ammoniacal The losses by wire-worm and slug are very shower. serious, and are well worth preventing. At present prices, all this can be accomplished for about compared with this cheap and simple remedy. £6 per acre, so that the tenant paying 9s. per acre to The effects of liquified manure are so striking in im-his landlord for such an improvement, would be a great proving our crops, that the cause is worth tracing. We know that there is nothing of which a farmer is so much afraid as the subsoil six or seven inches below the surface; if he brings this at once to the surface, he will grow nothing for some time. This proves clearly that that dreaded subsoil has never received, or been improved by the solid manure ploughed in to the surface soil; but by applying the solid manure in a liquified form, it sinks deeply into the subsoil, saturating every granule, and by a thousand affectionate affinities improves its chemical condition, rendering its particles available and agreeable to the fibres of plants; change of air, and change of water, are as necessary to roots of plants as to living animals; all this is effected by drainage and irrigation. It is no uncommon thing for us to saturate the soil to the depth of five feet in the very strongest clays, making the drains run with the precious fluid, diminished of course in strength and value. The specific gravity and temperature of liquified manure are much higher than those of ordinary water, thereby warming the cold and inanimate subsoil we know the effect of bottom heat in our gardens. It is a significant fact that the liquid excrement of animals in dry weather destroys vegetation-dilute it well, as in our sewers, then it stimulates and fertilizes. If we believe that chemical action is the parent of heat, and that it is also electricity, it is easy to comprehend, that great chemical disturbance takes place in the cold subsoil, by the introduction of manure in a liquified and fermenting condition, and consequently there must be a much greater amount of bottom heat. This is actually the fact, for the irrigated grasses, both natural and artificial, retain their verdure through the winter, whilst those un-irrigated have a brown withered appearance. Experience has taught our farmers, that the ammonia The question of economizing the sewerage of our towns and cities, will soon force itself upon our landowners and agriculturists. Admiral Moresby's recent announcement, that the guano supply will be exhausted in ten years, will bring the matter to a crisis; our annual supply of 200,000 tons may be said to produce two million quarters of corn, or its equivalent in meat, &c., with an increased population, such a deprivation will compel us to look after our own guano. The waste of manure, and many other of our agricultural short-comings, arises from a want of knowledge. The more landlords and tenants understand the science of agriculture, the better will be their practice; and I regret that there are not yet, in each county, one or more Agricultural Colleges, on the principle of that excellent Institution, now so firmly established at Cirencester. We find, in many of our Midland and Southern districts, agricultural reform administered by Scotchmen, because their views are more enlightened by scientific education. While touching on irrigation, it may be useful to consider drainage, with which it has a close connection. Of |