The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-01-11 00:00:00

THE LIVERPOOL POLYTECHNIC SOCIETY

We gave in our last a summary of the proceedings at
the meeting of this society the evening before, but could
not find room for the whole of what took place. We
find that in the report it was announced that Messrs.
Thomas Milner and Son had offered to the society one of
their holdfast and fire-resisting safes, for the custody of
their books and records. The Rev. Mr. Dwyer moved
a vote of thanks to them for their suitable and valuable
gift, which was seconded by the president, W. Bennett,
Esq., and warmly and unanimously passed. The follow-
ing letter was addressed by Messrs. Milner and Son to

the secretary :
" Milners

Holdfast and Fire-resisting Safe-works,
street and Cable-street, Liverpool,
December 27, 1847.

" Dear Sir,—Your allusion the other evening, at the
Council meeting to the circumstance of the books and
archives of the society. having been destroyed in Messrs.
Platt's fire, suggested to the writers an opportunity for
making the most suitable acknowledgment, on our part,
of the high sense we entertain of the service rendered to

our invention by the Polytechnic Society,—first, by the
patient and severe ordeal to which its capabilities were
submitted, in which so many of the members were en-
gaged day after day ; and, when its sterling claims were
brought, after being seven times tried, like gold refined,
out of the fire, by stamping them with the sanction of
the society, and giving them currency with the public.
In return for the good service the society has done our
fire-taming principle, by elicitir.g and strongly speaking
the truth for it, we beg most gratefully to tender for the
future safe custody of its archives one of our most im-
proved holdfast and fire-resisting safes,' and in doing so
we have pride and pleasure in warranting it as the
strongest safeguard against fire and robbery extant. So
as your documents are entrusting to its keeping, we will
venture to ensure them, without charge, against any
recurrence of the misfortune which you deplored the
other evening. The severe and patient investigation, and
awarded sanction of your society, have not been alone
serviceable to us, but also in diffusing over the world at
large a body of valuable information " on the preservation
of documents from fire," by means of Mr. Woods's
pamphlet, of which we have ourselves circulated some
hundred thousand copies; and though last, perhaps not
least, in assisting to place the valuable documentary pro-
perty of more than 20,000 of her Majesty's subjects in
much greater security within as many of our safes than
they would have been in any other. And now, sir, allow
us to assure you that we have not availed ourselves of the
approval which this and other similar societies and scien-
tific men generally have everywhere accorded us—our
theory commending itself to their knowledge, and the fire,
in practice, confirming our theory : nor have we availed
ourselves of our patent rights to merely enrich, the
ersmelevaenss
ofourselves,
but rather to enrich and improve our manufactures. At
this
preserving moment the
documentssubject
fromof your r e
l inquiry,
aimmense
import-
ance, the government being engaged in choosing means
of securing the national recordy inexcusably
neglected—" most
neglected—" Domesday Boke 'itself having been left for
near a thousand years to the guardian spirit of its great
compiler. We claim for our weapons the first place in
the fire-resisting ranks, 1000° of Fahrenheit in advance of
any others ; and as a sample of ourimproved holdfast and
fire-resisting safeguards, in a spirit of generous, fair, open
rivalry of skill, we wish to throw down our gage for the com-
ing contest on the safe we now propose to present to the Li-
verpool Polytechnic Society, and to summon its members
to see fair play when the trial comes.—We are, gc,c.,
" THOS. MILNER & SON.

" C. F. Salt, Esq., Secretary,
Liverpool Polytechnic Society

PHRENOLOGY AND MESMERISM.—Mr. Hicks, who
lectures and experiments created so much interest at Man
Chester, commences a course of lectures at the Concert
Hall this evening.—See advertisemst.
..nEXTRAORDINARY DESPATCH.—LMst week there were
discharged from the ship Parker, Captain Risien, from
Demerara, 591 hhds. and 5 brls. of sugar, and 159 casks
rum, into the transit sheds, Prince's Dock, in the almost
incredibly short time of 26 working hours, under the able
superintendence of Messrs. T. White and Son, coopers,
and Mr. James Campbell, lumper.