The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1840-10-16 00:00:00

LITERARY NOTICES.

The Combustion of Coals and the Prevention of Smoke
Chemically considered. By C. W. WILLIAMS. Part I.
Liverpool : Thomas Bean, &c., 1840.
There is, perhaps, no subject affecting the increasing and
profitable commerce of our country more worthy of philo-
sophical attention than the economising of fuel employed in
the working of steam engines, and the prevention of smoke,
particularly as relates to ocean steam navigation ; and we
therefore hail the appearance of a work in which it is prac-
tically considered, from the pen of a gentleman of long ex-
perience, and of acknowledged ardour in the improvement of
that important branch of our modern marine. The author,
whose unwearied and successful exertions in the promotion
of steam traffic between this port and Ireland in particular,
during a series of years, entitle him to the gratitude of the
whole community, dedicates his treatise to the proprietors
of the City of Dublin Steam-packet Company, " as a tribute
of respect, and an acknowledgment of the obligations he feels
for the confidence they have so long reposed in him ;" and
states, " It is the result of experiments undertaken with the
view of advancing the interests of your establishment, by
removing the uncertainties, correcting the errors, and induc-
ing a greater economy in the important department of the
steam-vessel which relates to the use of fuel." A preface
follows, in which the author remarks, " Being much lute-
. rested in the improvement of steam-vessels, from my con-
nexion with several steam navigation companies, and having
had a longer and more extended experience in the details of
their building and equipping them, than perhaps any indivi-
dual director of a steam company in the kingdom, my atten-
tion has been uninterruptedly given to the subject since the
year 1823, when I first established a steam company, and
undertook to have the first steam-vessel constructed capable
of maintaining a commercial intercourse across the Irish
Channel, during the winter months •, and which till then had
been considered impracticable. Since that time to the
present, my object has been the imparting, through the
instrumentality of the most experienced ship-builders and
steam-engine manufacturers, the greatest practical degree of
perfection and efficiency to every part of the hull and ma-
chinery of steam-vessels."
Our author, then, with respect to the improved state of
the hulls of steam-vessels, refers to the papers and detailed
specification for the building of the last of those belonging to
the City of Dublin Steam Co., as furnished by himself and
Mr. J. G. Shaw, the marine manager of that company, to
the commissioners of steam vessels inquiry ; and for a prac-
tical illustration of the perfection to which both hull and
machinery have been brought, he refers to the steam-ship
Oriental, one of those under contract to convey the mails
between Great Britain and Alexandria. The hull of the
Oriental, most of our readers will know, was built by Messrs.
Thomas Wilson and Co., and the machinery constructed by
Messrs. Fawcett and Proctor, of Liverpool. (That fine
vessel arrived on Saturday last from Alexandria, after a
splendid passage out and home, her speed having exceeded
even the hi4h-expectations that were formed of her capabi-
lities.)
Our author goes on to remark that, notwithstanding the
improved state of the hulls and machinery of steam vessels,
" great uncertainty and risk of failure still prevail in the de-
partment of the boiler, and all that belongs to the use of
fuel and the generation‘ of steam." Even experienced en-
gineers are ' still unable to decide, previously to trial,
either as to the quantity of steam that will be consumed or
of steam generated." What is meant by a sufficiency of
steam has not yet been decided upon fixed data ; and the
evils of a deficient supply, or a great expenditure of coal,
are left unabated. While steam-vessels, he continues, were
employed only in coasting voyages, the consequences of de-
fects in boilers, as regards the quantity of fuel, was a mere
question of expenditure ; but when long sea voyages were
undertaken the consequences involved the question of prac-
ticability or otherwise. Our author long felt, in common
with other directors of steam companies, an unwillingness to
interfere with engineers ; but having watched their efforts to
arrive at some degree of certainty in what was admitted to
be a serious drawback to long voyages ; and perceiving the
absence of any intelligible or well-founded principle in the
construction of the boiler, which was left to the working
boiler-maker and brickmaker ; seeing, in fine, that "the
combustion of coals, the production of smoke, and the wear
and tear of the furnace part of the boiler, remained in the
same statu quo of uncertainty and insufficiency," his re-
luctance to interfere gave way to an imperious necessity.
" To remain (be adds) any longer a mere spectator was in-
consistent, if not with the interests of steam navigation at
least with the vital interests of those with whom he was act-
ing.
Our author thus proceeds :—" The ultimo ratio for inter-
ference—necessity, became also the more urgent, since long
sea voyages have been contemplated. The determination to
examine for myself, and exercise my own judgment, was
forced upon me by the failure of the steam-ship Liverpool,
on her first voyage to New York."
Our author here introduces a note, which we cannot deny
ourselves the gratification to extract, inasmuch as it conveys
a deserved compliment to a gentleman who, at the time al-
luded to, laboured under no small degree of undeserved cen-
sure when, in fact, he merited the greatest praise. Mr.
Williams says :
" The errors of the engineers and others, which led to the
failure of the first voyage of the Liverpool,' were erroneously
and unworthily attributed to Mr. Shaw, Marine Manager of
the Dublin Steam Company. The details hereafter to be
given will show, that whatever interference took place on his
part was dictLtecl by sound judgment and experience, and
tended to relieve, if they could not remove, the original errors
in the construction of the furnaces and boilers. The cir-
cumstances connected with this vessel furnish an additional
motive for interference on the part of the managers and
directors of steam companies ; for here we have a practical
illustration of the fact, that, not only may the owners of
steam-vessels be doomed to suffer, in a pecuniary point of
view, the consequences of the errors of engineers, but, pos-
sibly, be subjected to censure and even calumny, from the
efforts of others to throw the onus of public disappointment
from their own shoulders.
" I cannot allow this opportunity to pass without noticing
the unwearied efforts towards effecting improvement, and the
knowledge of all the details of the steam-vessel and its ma-
chinery, which have, during fifteen years, been brought to
bear on this subject by Mr. Shaw, with whom much of those
details of practical improvement originated, and which are
now exhibited in the Oriental,' steam-ship."
The concluding passages of Mr. Williams's preface con-
vey in so comparatively small a space a summary of the
several branches of his subject of which he purposes to treat,
the facts he will adduce, and the conclusions at which be will
therefrom arrive, that we cannot do better than here quote
them at length :
" In the proper place I will show, that, of lute years, as
much uncertainty as to the success of a new boiler has pre-
vailed as when I first began operations eighteen years ago ;
and that few boilers, for land, as well as marine engines,
even from well-established houses exhibit more in the way
of effecting perfect combustion of the fuel than those of any
former period since the days of Watt.
" Among the proofs of this stationary or retrograding sys-
tem I shall adduce the boilers originally placed in the
Liverpool.' I shall give the details of those boilers, and
the several efforts, on the part of the engineers, to remedy
what I will show were inherent defects, and instances of
contempt for those chemical principles on which combustion
and the right use of fuel alone -depend. I shall show, that
the cause of that wasteful expenditure of coals which marked
the first voyage of the Liverpool' was induced by the ori-
ginal mal-construction of the boilers, with their twenty fur-
naces ;—by the injudicious mode of placing them in the ves-

sel ;—and the facility thus afforded to mismanagement in the'r
working; and that this latter, combined with the absence of
sound judgment, in this instance, on the part of those in
command, and an unnecessary and wasteful expenditure of
fuel, at the time when common sense would have suggested
its being economized and reserved, were the direct causes of
the failure which attended the first attempt of that vessel to
cross the Atlantic. I will, from these facts, show, that, how-
ever well-judged and considerate may be the plans of the
directors of steam companies ; however spirited may be their
efforts to have every thing as perfect and efficient as money
or determination can make it ; still the comparative efficiency
of a steam-vessel—the satisfaction and patronage of the public
—and the general success of the speculation will mainly de-
pend on the manner in which the engineer performs his part.
" Whether the following pages may succeed in leading to a
diminution of those evils which accompany the use of coal in
our furnaces, remains to be proved. They will, at least,
give a different, and, I trust, a more practical and useful,
direction to the inquiries of other labourers in the same
vineyard.
" I conclude these prefatory observations with the unequi-
vocal assertion, that, if we study the chemical principles on
which combustion is effected, and which I have endeavoured
to explain, and if we apply those principles to practice in
the manner I have pointed out, we shall not only be enabled
effectually to banish smoke, with its numerous and accom-
panying inconveniences, from our towns and manufactories,
but, at the same time, considerably to increase the effective
power of our furnaces, and thus add economy to comfort."

In a clever and comprehensive introduction, our author
defines the nature and objects of the proposed inquiry. The
object of the present tract is the examination of the various
circumstances connected with the germination of heat from
fuel ; in a word, all that pertains to the furnace, and which,
he well remarks is strictly and exclusively within the depart-
ment of chemistry. He does not undertake to show how the
smoke from coals can be burned ; but to show how coals can
be burned without smoke. He believes it to be difficult or
impossible to burn smoke when it is once produced in a flue
or furnace. In conclusion Mr. W. says, with that modesty
which is ever the concomitant of talent :
" In undertaking, myself, to lead others and to avoid the
imputation of presumption, I observe, in limine, that I do
not affect to give any new view of the nature of combustion,
much less do I make any claim to discovery. What I take
credit for is, the practical application, on the large scale of
the furnace, of those chemical truths which are taught by
the ablest chemists of the day and so well known in every
laboratory. I also take credit for bringing together the
detailed and scattered facts and illustrations of such autho-
rities as bear on the subject before us. and of so arranging
and applying them, (with such additional illustrations as ap-
peared to me conducive to the object in view,) as will, I
trust, enable practical men, without going deeper into the
science than is compatible with their time and other avoca-
tions, to understand the part which chemistry has to act in
the construction, arrangements, and working of our fur-
naces. By this means only will they be enabled to neutralize
that opposition and counteraction which ignorance and pre-
judice are so apt to give to the suggestions of science. This
disposition to counteract our efforts we may deplore, but
cannot prevent. All practical men acknowledge it to be a
main ingredient in retarding the onward march of improve-
ment, though to a less extent, certainly, in our days than
formerly ; and it is, therefore, the more important, that me.
chanical engineers, in whose department these matters prin-
cipally lie, should see the reason and understand the princi-
ples on which so much of their success depends."
Our author then proceeds with his treatise, which he di-
vides into sections, successively explaining—the constituents
of coal, and the germnation of coal gas—gaseous combina-
tions, and the union of coal gas and atmospheric_ air—the
constituents of coal gas, and the air required for their com-
bustion—and a variety of other heads, showing the nature of
various gases, &c., in the progress of combustion in the
furnace; the best mode of introducing the air, &c. These
are considered chemically, and the positions of the writer are
illustrated by a number of highly interesting diagrams. We
shall not, however, follow him in his able demonstrations,
which would scarcely be interesting to general readers, but
shall content ourselves with recommending them to the at-
tention of all who are connected with steam-engines, and are
desirous to redeem past errors, and remove existing uncer-
tainties by the application of strictly scientific principles, in
place of relying upon chance, or the assumption of ignorant

We may add that the book is got up in a manner highly
creditable to the publisher; and that the diagrams are ex-
ceedingly well executed. The second part will we find con-
tain all that can further be said of the construction and
management of the furnace, so as to attain the object in
view—economy in fuel with consumption of smoke—and we
doubt not the whole will form a treatise highly valuable to
the engineer, and in its practical results highly beneficial to
the public at large.

Shakspere's Tragedy of Richard 111., considered Drama-
tically and Historically, and in comparison with Cibber's
Alteration as at present in Use on the Stage. By TIIOS.
STUART, of the Theatre-Royal, Liverpool.
Mr. Stuart, the author of this pamphlet, is well qualified,
by his intelligence no less than by his profession, to judge
between the acting version of Richard 111. and the tragedy
as written. Ile has consequently produced arguments which,
whilst they interest, carry conviction to the mind. The
opening paragraph affords at once a view of his opinions,
and of the general style of the work :
" In the year 1700 Colley Cibber, the vainest possessor of
the vain title of laureate ever known, not satisfied with the
master tragedy of Shakspere, perpetrated a most daring as-
sault on the bard of Avon, in the mutilation of this. and
others of his noble dramas—mixing up the sterling ore of our
mighty poet with his own base metal, for the construction
of a new tragedy of Richard the Third • and, to the condem-
nation of every actor's taste, from Sandford, the fop laure-
ate's Gloster, down to the present period, including, such
'
artists as Garrick, Cooke, Kemble, and Kean, no effort has
hitherto been made to restore the original. Satisfied with
the outrageous points and the melodramatic ravings of Cib-
ber's alteration, and the starts, jumps, screams, attitudes,
and other tricks necessary to make it effective, the British
audience even has forborne its just right of demand for the
wit, pathos, and sublimity of the original. No character in
Cibber's play stands out of the canvas, save Gloster, and he
s bereft of most of those traits which, in the original play,
impart a grandeur to the terrible ambition which led to so
many crimes. Cibber's play is crowded with clap-trap and
stage effect. but loses the picture which Shakspere has drawn,
of a man, stained with guilt of the deepest dye, for ambition's
sake ; a murderer and a hypocrite, but nevertheless a power-
ful and warlike monarch ; daring, and opposite to every dan-
ger, both of body and conscience, in obtaining and protecting
a crown, and justly falling, at last, after his career of crime
and ambition is fulfilled. Upon no occasion has Shakspers
made him depart from the deep policy, which so powerfully
distinguished his real character ; whereas Cibber's hero is
made up of a series of outbreaks, and noisy ebullitions of
boisterous rage, qualifying him more for a strait waistcoat
and an asylum, than for

The supreme seat—the throne majestical—
The sceptred office of his ancestors.' "
The subsequent pages are devoted to a comparison between
the two versions, in which great historical knowledge, and a
complete appreciation of the manifold beauties of the origi-
nal, are strongly developed.
We have, however, to allege something like inconsistency
in Mr. Stuart. In the above quotation he justly ohserves,
that " no effort has hitherto been made to restore the ori-
ginal." Unwilling—or, what we hope is more probable,
from circumstances, unable—to make that effort himself, he
has advertised another play for his benefit on Monday next !
Thus a golden opportunity is lost to himself of acquiring
both profit and fame, and to the public of rightly deciding
the controversy.
In conclusion, we strongly recommend all admirers of
Shakspere (and who is not ?) to add this production to their
collections: