MAKING LAMPS IN DIFFERENT FORMS, AND OF ANY KIND OF METAL OR METALIC SUBSTANCES, TO BE USED WITHOUT INCONVENIENCE ON HORSES, CAR- RIAGES, BREASTS OF MEN, OR ANY BODY UNDER MOTION, SO AS TO GIVE PERFECT LIGHT THOUGH EVER SO MUCH AGITATED, OR TO BE USED IN HALLS, ON STAIRCASES, TABLES, DESKS, OR FOR OTHER PURPOSES WHERE MOTION IS NOT REQUIRED
Year: 1787

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, JOHN
MILES, of Birmingham, in the County of Warwick, Gentleman, send
greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third, by His
Letters Patent, bearing date at Westminster, the Twelfth day of February,
in the twenty-seventh year of His reign, did give and grant unto me, the said
John Miles, His especial licence that I, the said John Miles, during the term
of years therein expressed, should and lawfully might make, use, exercise, and
vend, within England, Wales, and Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my In-
vention of "MAKING LAMPS IN DIFFERENT FORMS, AND OF ANY KIND OF METAL
OR METALIC SUBSTANCES, TO BE USED WITHOUT INCONVENIENCE ON HORSES, CAR-
RIAGES, BREASTS OF MEN, OR ANY BODY UNDER MOTION, SO AS TO GIVE PERFECT
LIGHT THOUGH EVER SO MUCH AGITATED, OR TO BE USED IN HALLS, ON STAIRCASES,
TABLES, DESKS, OR FOR OTHER PURPOSES WHERE MOTION IS NOT REQUIRED;" in
which said Letters Patent there is contained a provisoe obliging me, the said
John Miles, under my hand and seal, to cause a particular description of the
nature of the said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed,
to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within one calendar
month next and immediately after the date of the said recited Letters Patent,
as in and by the same, relation being thereunto had, will more fully and at
large appear..

page_text: NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said provisoe, I, the said
John Miles, do hereby declare my said Invention of Making Lamps in
Different Forms, and of any Kind of Metal or Metallic Substances, to be Used
without Inconvenience on Horses, Carriages, Breasts of Men, or any Body
under Motion, so as to Give Perfect Light though ever so much Agitated, or
to be Used in Halls, on Staircases, Tables, Desks, or other Purposes where
Motion is not required, is performed in the following manner (that is to
say): :-
I take of any kind of metal or mixture of metals or mettalic substances that
can be cast, rolled, drawn, or pressed into the form I wish and the purpose
requires; but as the most simple form is the most easily understood, I will
suppose the form of the lamp to be round, and the material of which it is to
made rolled tin'd plate. If, to bear agitation, I take the said rolled tin'd
plate, and cut out two round pieces,-suppose three inches diameter or there-
abouts, and a flat piece of a regular width (suppose one inch), long enough,
when the ends are soldered together, to form a round of such size as will fit
and solder to the two round pieces before described. Those I fit and solder
together, so as to be air-tight, to hold the oil or spirits which are to supply
the burner or burners, and this I call the reservoir; and if for a solid burner
or burner through which no air tube passes, I make a round hole in one of
the round parts sufficient to contain the top, which I mean to place therein,
suppose one inch and quarter diameter or thereabouts, and three eights of
an inch deep in the rim, to make which I cut two pieces of nearly an equal
length and width, so that when the two ends of each are soldered together
and made round they will screw or squeeze into each other air-tight, one of
which round rims I solder air-tight in the round hole of the reservoir, and
with the other I form the top, to do which I cut a round piece of tin'd plate
of such diameter as will fit and solder air-tight to the said top rim, in the
circle of which I make a hole wherein to fix the burner, tube or tubes,
which I make of tin'd plate of any size or any shape I think proper, and
then I solder the same air-tight in the hole or holes made in the top for that
purpose, part thereof to lead into the reservoir, and part to stand above, at
the bottom of which external part or parts I make one or more small hole or
holes through which the oil or spirits that fall down the tube or tubes from
the burner or burners may return again to the wick or wicks; and as such
oil or spirits with which the lamp is charged are liable to run about and
waste by agitation, I preserve the same by fixing a rim round the said burner
or burners, which will prevent the oil or spirits escaping; and this part I call
the preserver.
When all this is done, and I have filled the reservoir with oil

page_text: or spirits, and properly trimmed the burner tube or tubes with wick or wicks,
and fixed the top to the reservoir so as to be every way air-tight, except
through the burner tube or tubes, I then tin'd or light the wick or wicks, and
as they continue to burn the oil or spirits when they get warm will naturally
swell, and as the reservoir is every way air-tight, and the oil or spirits having
no other way for expansion, the liquid will flow superabundantly up the burner
tube or tubes, so as to overcharge the preserver, and afterwards, as the oil or
spirits diminish by burning, the air will press into the reservoir the same way
to supply the vacancy occasioned by the diminution of the oil or spirits, and so
retard the oil or spirits in rising to supply the burners, to prevent both which
inconveniences I make a small hole through the top into the reservoir that the
air may pass and repass as the swelling or sinking of the oil or spirits require,
which hole is so small that no more oil or spirits can escape than the preserver
will secure; and as the oil or spirits are liable to leak, as well through the wicks
or wicks as the small hole in the preserver, if by accident it should be laid
on one side or turned upside down, it is necessary to guard against it, to do
which I fix a small rim in the top of the preserver, leading part down the
same, leaving a space round such small rim withinside the preserver to contain
the oil or spirits that may chance to come therein, to which small rim I make
another that will screw or squeeze air-tight into such small rim, and of such
width that when one edge is screw'd or squeezed air-tight into such small rim,
the other will rise higher than the top of the burner or burners, so that it may
be put on and taken off without disturbing the wick or wicks; I then solder
a round bit of tin'd plate thereon air-tight, and it will then not only serve
for an extinguisher occasionally, but will secure any oil or spirits which may
chance to come in to the preserver by such accident. For making air burner
or burners, I make the top or other parts of the lamp upon the foregoing
principle, with the following difference :-I make a hole in the bottom of the
reservoir, suppose one quarter of an inch diameter or more, as the burner or
burner require, into which I solder, air-tight, a round air tube; the upper part
of which to stand in the center of the top. I then make another tube that
will screw or squeeze withoutside of the air tube, so as to render it air-tight,
which outside tube I fix in the center of the top (as before described) so as
to screw or squeeze air-tight round the air tube just as the top and reservoir
rums are, round or by the side of which outside tube (which is best in a
conical form) I fix one or more burner tube or tubes, in what form or shape
I think proper, and solder the whole within the top air-tight, as before
described, taking care to keep the top of the burner tube or tubes at such a
distance from the conical tube that the oil or spirits which fall from the burner

page_text: or burners cannot go therein, but be returned to the wick or wicks through
the hole or holes at the bottom of the external part of the burner tube or
tubes withinside the preserver, as before described, when, with a stopper or
stopple being put into the top of the conical tube, so as to be air-tight, will,
with the extinguisher before described, perfectly secure any oil or spirits that
may chance to come therein; and in order that all lamps made upon this
principle may continue to burn in all sorts of weather, I place or fix them in
a lanthern made for that purpose in any form or shape I think proper.
I
can make lamps in any form I think proper, upon the same principle; but it
must be observed that the thinner the wick, and the nearer the air is conveyed
to the burner or burners, the more brilliant the light will be; but the burner
or burners will then want trimming the oftener; but when motion is not
required, that part of the principle of being air-tight is unnecessary. To
make a
lamp that will continue to burn without trimming for a long space of
time, I make the reservoir (as I think best) of a much smaller diameter than
depth, which, by means a stopple or stopper being fixed in a hole at the top
thereof (for admitting the oil or spirits therein) to be made air-tight, or else
not make any hole at the top, but one at the bottom or lower part of the
side of reservoir, whereby the same may be filled, by laying the reservoir on
one side or upside down, to which hole I fix a tube, and at the end of it,
from the reservoir, a small bason proportioned to the size of the burner I
mean to place therein, into which the oil or spirits can only pass upon the
same principle as a bird-cage water fountain. When I have filled the reser-
voir, and set it perpendicular, and the oil and spirits have found their just
medium in the small fountain bason, I take a quantity of fine wire in pro-
portion to the size I intend the burner to be, twist it together, and turn it
into such form that it will stand of itself in the middle of the fountain bason,
which I take care to place at such a distance from the reservoir that the heat
of the burner may rarify the oil or spirits within the reservoir in proportion
to its consumption. I then make the burner hot till the oil or spirits take
fire, and it will then continue to burn (if defended from any sudden impulse
of air) so long as it is properly supplied.
In witness whereof, I, the said John Miles, have hereunto set my hand
and seal, the Seventh day of March, in the twenty-seventh year of the
reign of His said Majesty King George the Third, and in the
our Lord One thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven.
year of
J. MILES. (L.S.)

page_text: AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Seventh day of March, in the
year of our Lord 1787, the aforesaid John Miles came before our said Lord
the King in His Chancery, and acknowledged the Specification aforesaid, and
all and every thing therein contained and specified, in form above written.
And also the Specification aforesaid was stampt according to the tenor of the
Statutes made for that purpose.
Inrolled the Ninth day of March, in the year of our Lord One thousand
seven hundred and eighty-seven.