The Press.
London, England, 1854-04-22 00:00:00

ELECTRIC RAILWAY SIGNAL.

AN invention designed to accomplish the great
desideratum of establishing a means of constant
communication between the guards and drivers of
railway trains has been effected by Mr, Gluckman,
and has undergone a series of very successful trials
on the North Western line. The apparatus em-
ployed consists, in its simplest form, of a small
"constant battery," placed in the guard's van, and
communicating by a wire from each pole, led under
the carriages with an electro-magnet. A powerful
bell is placed near the hand-lever of the engine, the
hammer of which is the "keeper" of the magnet;
and as soon as the communication is made, by the
guard pressing with his finger upon a small button
in his van, the hammer commences to vibrate
rapidly, and produces a loud and continuous signal.
Experience has proved that the warning thus given
can be heard by the driver above all the rattle of the
train, even while passing through a tunnel.
With respect to the difficulty of connecting the
wires, and the expense of fitting up the carriages
with the apparatus, the invention does not appear
open to the objections which have been urged against
signals of this description. Each carriage has its
two wires permanently attached to it, insulated in a

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APRIL 22, 1854.

wooden trough ; the ends of the wires are formed of
an elastic coil, and provided with ingeniously-formed
hooks, which admit of ready attachment and detach-
ment at either end of the carriage. The expense of
fitting up each carriage is stated to be 175., and the
cost of the battery and bell apparatus for each train
21. 10s. The cost of maintaining the battery is
merely nominal, sulphate of copper being the only
substance used to generate the electricity. By a
slight alteration of the arrangement the signal could
be made to be given by breaking as well as making
the communication, and thus the breaking away of
a carriage, or any other interruption of the circuit,
would cause the ringing to commence, and .it
would continue until the communication was com-
pleted.
This electric signal has been at work continually
for the last two months upon the North-Western
line between London and Birmingham. It is
favourably regarded by the officials of that line, and
is now applied by the great Northern Company on
the 10 a.m. train from London to Hitchin.

RAW MATERIALS OF TEXTILE FABRICS
FROM INDIA.

AN interestirg paper " On the Indian Fibres Suitable
for Textile I abrics " was read before the Society of
Arts, at their meeting on Wednesday last, by Dr.
Forbes Royal :
" India (said the author) was a country of such vast
extent, so diversified iu soil and climate, that we might
believe it capable of producing every variety of natural
produce, and, among these, almost every kind of fibre that
was known elsewhere. Among the plants cultivated in
India, both the true hemp and flax were extensively culti-
vated in almost every part of the wide-spread territories of
the empire; but in few places were they valued for their
fibres, the hemp being esteemed for the intoxicating pro-
perties secreted by its leaves, and the flax or linseed plant
for the oil stored up in its seeds ; the stems of both were
thrown away or burnt. Countless loads of valuable fibres
were thus yearly destroyed, in consequence of the iguo-
ranee, carelessness, or prejudices of the cultivators. It
was now well known that India possessed various fibres
from several fast-growing plants; but of these fibres some
were deficient in strength, others were coarse and harsh in
texture, and therefore it had been inferred that the heat
aid moisture of the climates in which they grew were quite
unsuited to the production of good fibres. But this con-
clusion was hasty, for no distinction was made between
what is due to the nature of the plant itself and what to its
mode or place of growth. India grew plants in some of its
dry and barren plains which were as strong in fibre as any
produced in other parts of the world, and, indeed, equalled
only in such properties by others growing in some of its
moistest and warmest valleys, and all in sufficient quanti-
ties to be of commercial value. At the beginning of the
present century Dr. Roxburgh, then superintendent of the
Botanic Garden at Calcutta, made many experiments on
the fibres of India, wrote letters and reports, and sent home
numerous specimens. Considerable quantities of linen
and jute were also about that time imported by the East
India Company. These were at times discontinued and
again resumed. Iu the year 1850.51 there were exported
from Calcutta, of linen hemp, 7,635 ruaunds ; of jute,
793;299 maunds ; 8,759,185 gunny bags ; besides canvas-
twine and log-line ; with 518,683 gunny and 3,371 cwt. of
hemp and rope from Bombay. Many other fibres which
were tried at the same time still remained unknown,
though possessed of very valuable properties. Dr.
Royal then proceeded to describe in detail the character-
istics of the various Indian fibres, and their greater or less
capability for being manufactured into textile fabrics, rope,
and paper ; exhibiting specimens of each, both in the raw
and manufactured state. He also gave the. following as
the result of a test to which different fibres, in equal lengths
and equal weights, from the East India Company's military
stores, had been subjected :—Petersburg hemp broke
with 160 lbs. weight; Jubhulpore hemp, with 190 lbs.;
Wuckoo-nar fibre, from Travaucore, with 175 lbs.; Muda-
ron Yeretun fibre, common all over India, with 190 lbs. ;
China grass, with 250 lbs; rheea fibre, from Assam, with
3.201bs ; wild rheea, from Assam, with 343 lbs.; while
Kate Kongra hemp did not break even with 400 lbs.

THE IRISH IN THE STATES.
THE late American journals appear to attach much
importance to what they term a "military organisa-
tion of Irishmen " in the States, of which the declared
purpose is to stir up and aid a rebellion in Canada.
The New York Times states that it has received de-
tailed information of the extent of the organisation,
the numbers concerned, and the names of the agents,
but refrains from making such information public ;
and adds that a " similar scheme is on foot in Ireland."
The Times then refers to the "undying and unap-
peasable hatred of the Irish here to Great Britain,"
and also to an address just issued by John Mitchel,
the text of which is that "England's difficulty is
Ireland's opportunity." The writer hints that if a
public meeting were called in the Park in favour of
Russia it would be largely attended by the Irish.
This sounds very formidable; but the very fact of
thus publishing their intentions on the part of the
would-be invaders of Canada and revolutionists of
Ireland is the surest method that could have been
taken to defeat their schemes. It is more than
doubtful whether, under any circumstances, there
would be an Irish invasion of Canada ; but there is
no doubt that the organisation referred to, after