The Arkansaw traveler., 1888-01-28
THE BULL" PUDlP.
BY PHIL MOORE.

"W hat time did you stop lt!"
 "Three o'clock this morning."
 "Then the pumps more than half full of water?"
 "Yes, it'll overflow the bay by noon."
 "The middle valves clogged, you say?"
 "I think that's the one. The leather is probably worn out"
 "Get new leather in the press di- rectly, and send for Joe"
 "It" was the large bull pump at the Marvine shaft; the questioner was my father, Samuel Rogers and the engin- eer who stopped the pump was work ing on the night shaft that week, Newrick Featenby. was Joe.
 The pump, being the topic of the above conversation, is now entitled to some further consideration. It is of English origin, and is used extensively in the middle counties of England and the southern counties of Wales to pump water from the shafts, hun- dreds of yards deep, that abound there.
 The principle of it's working is a very simple one. The steam cylinder is in an engine room on top, and di- rectly over the shaft, standing verti- cally several feet in diameter, and from nine to fifteen feet high, giving it a stroke" of equal height.
 Extending from the large piston rod that plays in and out of it is another rod made of heavy timbers firmly bolted together and running on ''gibs," or, in simple terms, guides, from it to the water cylinder at the bottom of the shaft, five hundred or 8 thousand feet below the top. Any one of mathematical turn can figure the weight of this immense rod.
 It is generally made of oak timbers in twelve and fourteen feet lengths, with heavy iron casting at each joint, and four timbers eight to ten inches square constituting a length. The "plunger," attached to the lower end of it, is brass where the mine water is very strong, of the same length as the steam cylinder, and about fourteen inches in diameter. A strong timber work extends from the top to the bottom of the shaft on each side of this rod, and at each joint a shoulder fits into grove to keep the whole thing in place.
 The bull pump-but we have for gotten it's name!
 This immense rod of timber (weigh- ing, how much did you say?), with it's iron joints and brass plunger, is heavier than 8 column of water of equal length. It is evident then, with the water cylinder full of water and the weight of this rod pressing down upon it, the water is expelled into the pipe and up the shaft, the stream rushing into the upper cylinder as soon as the down stroke is finished, Hitting the enormous weight again, and then rushing out with roar like the believing of 8 bull.
 For the steam simply raises the rod and plunger and fills the water cylin- der, and gravitation does the rest. To prevent a column pipe bursting with the weight of water, there is & large valve in it every two hundred feet on which the water rests, while the pump IS filling up again for another pour out Meanwhile, ,Newrick had brought me to the shaft.
 "Joe," my father said, Ayou have to go down the pipe again and put in a new leather"
 "Going down the pipe" was noth- ing new to me, though decidedly un- pleasant said I was ready. The pipe was eighteen inches in diameter, a narrow hole to go down two hun dred feet in itI
 While the men were getting the rope to lower me, I went into the engine-room and put on an oversuit I had there, we'll smeared with "yellow- boy," as it is called, a deposit of sul- phur from the impregnated water with which the pipes were coated, and soon presented myself in it, lamp in hand.
 There were, perhaps, ten men stand ing around two of them were fire men, three of them machinists in my hthers gang, Newrick, the engineer, and the rest company -mep.