The Press.
London, England, 1856-08-23 00:00:00

glisallantous.

A NEW INVENTION, to prevent steam-boiler explo-
sions, has just been patented by Mr. Routledge of
Manchester. The apparatus consists of an elbow
pipe connecting the furnace with the side flue, and
is fixed just below the water level in the boiler.
This pipe is perforated with a number of holes, about
half an inch in diameter, so placed as to be subject
to the immediate action of the furnace fire. In these
holes are metal plugs, more or less fusible, according
to the working pressure of the boiler. The moment
the water in the boiler, from neglect or otherwise, is
below the level, and leaves this pipe bare, the heat
from the furnace acts upon the plugs, which melt,
and the steam escaping through the holes imme-
diately relieves the pressure in the boiler, and in a
short time extinguishes the furnace fire, thus pre-
venting at once any possibility of the boiler bursting
from want of water, or injury to the boiler from the
action of the fire arm the plates bare of water. Au

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experiment tried on Monday at Mr. Routledge's
works was very suxessful. In less than one minute
after the water was let off, so as to leave the pipe in
the boiler just bare, the plugs melted away and the
steam escaped through the holes. The pressure of
steam in the boiler at that moment was forty pounds,
and in about ten minutes it was down to twenty-five
pounds. There was no inconvenience caused in the
furnace, as the steam, after acting for a few moments
upon the fire, can be turned off through the regular
channel. The apparatus can be refitted with plugs,
and the boiler be at work again in two or three
hours. The principle is said to be quite new ; for,
though fusible plugs have long been applied to
boilers, they have generally proved a failure in con-
sequence of depending upon the temperature of the
water (which, after all, is no criterion of pressure) to
act upon them. In this invention the fusible plugs have
the immediate action of the fire upon them, and the
instant the water is below the level of the pipe, plugs
and pipe must melt. The expense of the apparatus
is very trifling ; the elbow pipe can be fixed at any
elevation, and can be applied to every description of
boiler.

THE REV. WILLIAM CURETON, Canon of Westmin-
ster, and one of the chaplains to her Majesty, has
just had conferred upon him by the University of
Halle, and under the auspices of the King of Prussia,
the degree of D.D., as some acknowledgment for the
services rendered by hint to the cause of religion, by
his publication of the genuine remains of St.
Ignatius in the original Syriac, from MSS. in the
British Museum, as well as for his other services
rendered to the cause of religion and learning.
Mr. ROBERTSON GLADSTONE lays down his views of
diplomacy in a letter to the mayor and citizens of
Philadelphia, in reply to a recent friendly address
from those officials. As chairman of the still exist-
ing Financial Reform Association, Mr. Gladstone
says :

In these days of steam and electricity, there is no occa-
sion for resident Ministers of State in foreign countries.
They are intriguers at best, and too often nothing better
than spies vested with official immunity. The ordinary
intercourse of friendly nations can be carried on much
better without than with them ; and for special occasions,
special Ministers, chosen for their intelligence, practical
knowledge, honesty, and particular aptitude for the busi-
ness in hand, ought to be deputed.

" A LONDON LAWYER" in a letter to the Times on
Tuesday states that the Au.trian Embassy in
London refused to vise his Foreign-office passport,
because he was supposed "to belong to a family
which had shown 'des sympathies avec la props-
gande Italienne !'"—
I do not pretend to know in what this charge consists
(says the correspondent), but I at once admit that I
number among my friends several of the Italian refugees
in this country. Comment on the above is scarcely
needed. The pettiness of this system of espionage is a
fitting pendant to the oppression of the Government of his
Most Apostolic Majesty.

THE AUTHENTIC NATURE OF THE CIAIKS Of the
family of Henry Cort (whose inventions in the
manufacture of iron have been a great national
benefit), a correspondent of the Times this week thus
sets forth :
Forty-one firms in 1811 subscribed to a resolution,
thanking the deceased Henry Cort for his two great inven•
tions, and contributed a sum in relief of the distress of his
widow and nine orphan children. It is true the contribu-
tion amounted to only 1.20 th part of a farthing in the
pound upon the profits these inventions had then realised
to them, but it was at least a fair and open acknowledg-
ment of the obligation and the debt. The profits which
these manufacturers have since that date realised by pud-
dling and rolling have been ten times greater than in the
previous twenty-five years, and cannot fall much short of
thirty millions sterling. A subscription of only the same
amount as that of 1811, which would be at the rate of 1.200 th
part of a farthing in the pound on the whole profits,
would alleviate the immediate distress of the inventor's
aged and only surviving son, and give time and ease to
bring properly before the Legislature in the next session
his unparalleled claims upon the gratitude of the nation at
large.

A MILITARY DINNER PARTY fifty years ago,
given by Lord Romney to the Kent Volunteers, when.
George 111. reviewed them near Maidstone, on
August 1, 1799, affords a model for similar entertain-
ments at present. The tables, amounting to ninety-
one in number, wore seven miles and a half long,
and the boards for the tables cost 1,5001. The en-
tertainment, to which 6,500 persons sat down, con-
sisted of sixty lambs in quarters, two hundred dishes
of roast beef, seven hundred fowls (three in a dish),
220 meat pies, three hundred hams, three hundred
tongues, 220 fruit pies, 220 dishes of boiled beef,
220 joints of roast veal. Seven pipes of port were
bottled off, and sixteen buts of ale, and as much
small beer was also placed in large vessels, to supply
the company. After dinner his Majesty's health was
given in a bumper by the volunteers, all standing
uncovered, with three times three, accompanied by
the music of all the bands.