St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1884-07-12
Chinrf s.

Ch1mnf So
Two gentlemen were walking through
the manufacturing district along tAe
North River above Fourteenth street
yesterday when their attention was
drawn to tall brick chimney Of an
unused factory. The chimney was
more than one hundred and fifty feet in
height and stood apart from the build
ing to which it had been connected by
an iron fue about six feet from the
ground, but the fiue had been taken
away. Under the hole where the fue
entered the chimney was pile Of brick
and stone. The hole itself was
apparently open, but a second look
showed that heavy coffee sacking hung
over it on the inside of the chimney
wall, which seemed to be about twenty
inches thick. When the men first
looked at it, boy OF thirteen years was
climbing through the hole in the
chimney.
1.-THE boys have been in there, pre-
sume,'' said the older of the two men.
at is warm and dry and very like the
caves they read about in their dime
stories, black as a VOLTS mouth, you
know
Don't the light shine in at the top Of
tho chimney" the young man inquired.
Eyes, but it does not reach them. Let
me tell you something about chlmneys.
That pile of brick is twenty feet square,
and where the boy went in the wall is
twenty inches thick. Then comes a
space that is more than three feet across,
and then q twelve-inch wall that sur
rounds tlue about seven feet on a side.
That vacant space between the inner
and outer walls makes 8 fine cave for
the boys. That chimney is thick for its
size. There is one in Lawrence, Mass,
that is two hundred and thirty-four feet
high, and is no larger on the base than
this one. Down town, near the North
River ferries, is chimney that exceeds
all others in the world in size. The in
side of the hue is twenty seven feet ten
inches long by eight feet four inches wide.
It is two hundred and twenty-one feet
high. 1t takes the smoke from four
tiers of boilers, thirty-two in all, in
which one thousand tons Of coal are
burned in q day.
"There are some very queer chlmneyS
in the world. | have read of one in q
Mexican cotton factory which was made
of sun-dried bricks that were ten inches
long, and seven wide and three thick.
1t was laid up by Indians, and was a
very handsome piece of work. There
is a chimney in Pennsylvania made OF
old iron rails that does good service.
Queer, isn't it?"
ssYes," said the young man. ''Ihe
house that Christine Nilsson was born
in was made of unhewn logs piled up
with mud chinked into the cracks. The
chimney is said to have been Of wood
also. Long, fat pieces were split out
of logs and laid mp, as were the logs OF
the house, but into the shape of the tire.
/ place, tapering Ioff into . f1ue where
smaller sticks were used. Inside the
fireplace a wall of round stones was
piled up and thickly plastered with mud,
as was the inside of the wooden fue
above. When, as occasionally happened,
the mud cracked off her father climbed
up inside and plastered more on
| Whether that chimney was made so OF
not, plenty of others are in the West
and South. y
..Speaking about fireplaccs, " said the
older man, s.reminds me of very sin.
! guIar place where they were formerly
Used. One hundred and fifty years age
stoves were unknown. The fishing
smacks that sailed out Of Gloucester il
/ those days were small affairs OF from
/ twenty to forty tons, bat they had tx
carry a fire, of course. In the fore cud
dy they built "a brick fireplace, with
fiue running up through the deck.
never heard that any one OF them wa
burned either, although the back los
/ must have been well shaken up wher
they got q chop sea on the George
Bank. The Willow, the Blaney anc
the Squirrel were 'pinkeys' that were
fitted out in that way between 1720 AM
1886. Tradition says that the fiues wer
good places to smoke herring, and tina
| fhe fishermen were about as badl.
smoked in the cuddy as the herring wer
in the fiue. IN. ], Sun.
| j