Year: 1872

IT is very generally supposed that the
belief in perpetual motion, like the belief
in witchcraft, has died natural death
but this is net the case. 1t is as flourish
ing as ever, but in somewhat different
form, and the title improvements in mo-
tive power covers any number of me-
chanical fallacies. The patent records
furnish some instructive information on
the subject, and we will take the year
1866 as an example. In that year sixty
four patents were granted for obtaining
motive power, and twenty of these de-
pend for their presumed action upon the
simple principle that 2X2 is greater than
t. They are not only self-moving ma
chimes, but they supply power to drive
others. 1t is quite unnecessary to men,
ton them all in detail, but we may speak
of few of them. 1t is the old, old story
One engineer" has a wheel, provided at
the eXtremities of the arms with flexible
bags, weighted at one end. The bags
open and fill with air as they arrive at the
bottom, and the air is forced out as the
wheel brings the weighted end uppermost.
A ''mechanician' patents "a combination
of levers and rods" fearful to contemplate,
whereby a greater amount of power is
rendered available for use and aiding to
overcome the resistance. Another in
ventor speaks of power creating
Wheel" which consists of a wheel
lied India.rubber secured on a
being connected with the hollow axle to
which the wheel is attached. The other
wheel has an elastic tube on the opposite
portion of the periphery so that one tube
may always be undergoing compression.
BY this means a supply of compressed air
is obtained, which, says the enthusiastic
individual who proposes the plan, sis the
power | use for driving or prOpelling
such engine, carriage or apparatus" One
inventor proposes to gain power by means
of weight revolving at a high velocity,
while another lays down this principles
Amy body being plunged in liquid is
submitted to two opposite forces; first, its
own weight, which tends to lower it;
secondly, the pressure of the liquid,
which tends to raise ii with force equal
to the weight of the liquid displaced by
the body. The difference between these
two forces" is the motive power which the
inventor proposes to use. On the princi
pie of ''having ones cake and eating
it," weak-minded enthusiast attempts
"to produce motive power by the force
of steam acting on reaction and direct





time" In other words, his machine con
sists of the toy known as Hero's steam
engine" combined with Branca's engine.
Another equally greedy individual utilizes
the force of the steam expended ON the
top and bottom of the cylinder during the
up and down strokes of the piston, which
is effected by causing the steam cylinder
to slide in the reverse direction to the
piston. What, however, is most amusing
is the self-satisfied air of the motive power
man when he cOndescends to argue. We
will take, as an instance, the author of a
machine, the name of which perhaps indi-
Gates to some extent the cloudy" condi-
! ton of the inventors mind, and which is
described in the specifications as an EN-
| gine manufacturing a power" and of
which it is stated that ii constitutes that
desideratum so thoroughly tabooed' in
its assumed impracticability of attainment
that scientific bodies have in instances de.
termined to consider no such question:
quite right, too. The inventor then pro-
ceeds to develop his theory at length.


Skeptics are disposed of in the follow,
ing short and easy manner: "To any
one not educated to the point of incapaci
ty for such consideration, the demon.
stration given above would appear amply
sufficient. But, as a rule, the difficulties
OF surmounting an established creed
which has become part of the being of its
professor are as insuperable as would be
the difficulty of making an intelligent
Christian out of an intelligent Moham
medan."


We would give one more instance OF
the eccentricity of the inventorial mind
A patent was granted in 1864 for improve
ments in developing heat, boiling water
and generating steam. II took two gen
fuses to accomplish the invocation, the one
q surgeon and the other gentleman
They proposed to use boiler surrounded
by rubbers worked in the first instance by
an auxiliary engine. The friction Of the