nies, flues, and air tubes, with the stoves and other apparatus connected therewith, for the purpose of preventing the escape of smoke into apartments, and for warming and ventilating buildings. Sealed 13th July-6 months for inrolment.

Benjamin Beale, of East Greenwich, engineer, for certain improvements in engines, to be worked by steam, water, gas, or vapours.-Sealed 13th July-6 months for inrolment.

Moses Poole, of Lincoln's-inn, Gent., for improvements of steam baths and other baths,-being a communication.-Sealed 13th July-6 months for inrolment.

Miles Berry, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery-lane, civil engineer, for improvements in the construction of locks, latches, or such kinds of fastenings, for doors and gates, and other purposes to which they may be applicable,—being a commucation.-Sealed 14th July-6 months for inrolment. Thomas Peckston, of Arundel-street, Strand, Bachelor of Arts, and Philip Le Capelain, of the same place, coppersmith, for certain improvements in meters, for measuring gas and other aeriform fluids.-Sealed 15th July-6 months for inrolment. Andrew Smith, of Belper, engineer, for certain improvements in the arrangement and construction of engines to be worked by the force of steam or other fluids; which improved engines are also applicable to the raising of water or other liquids. -Sealed 21st July-6 months for inrolment.

John Mc Bride, manager of the Nursery Spinning and Weaving Mills, Hutchesontown, Glasgow, for certain improvements in the machinery and apparatus for dresssing and weaving cotton, silk, flax, wool, and other fibrous substances.-Sealed 21st July-4 months for inrolment.

John White Welch, of Austin Friars, merchant, for an improved reverberatory furnace, to be used in the smelting of copper ore or other ores which are or may be smelted in reverberatory furnaces.-Sealed 21st July-6 months for inrolment.

Frederick Theodore Philippi, of Belfield Hall, calico printer, for

certain improvements in the production of sal-ammoniac, and in the purification of gas for illumination,-being a communication.-Sealed 21st July-6 months for inrolment.

William Ward Andrews, of Wolverhampton, ironmonger, for an improved coffee pot.-Sealed 21st July-6 months for inrol

ment.

William Newton, of the Office for Patents, 66, Chancery-lane, civil engineer, for certain improvements in machinery for making pins and pin nails,-being a communication.-Sealed 28th July 6 months for inrolment.

Anthony Bernhard Von Rathen, of Kingston-upon-Hull, engineer, for improvements in high pressure and other steam boilers, combined with a new mode or principle of supplying them with water.-Sealed 28th July-6 months for inrolment. Anthony Bernhard Von Rathen, of Kingston-upon-Hull, engineer, for a new method or methods, (called by the inventor "The United Stationary and Locomotive System,") of propelling locomotive carriages on railroads and common roads, and vessels on rivers and canals, by the application of power produced or obtained by means of machinery and apparatus unconnected with the carriages and vessels to be propelled.— Sealed 28th July-6 months for inrolment.

ERRATUM.

In Vol. XVIII., page 366, line 12, instead of "astride such furnace,"

read "outside such furnace."

THE

London

JOURNAL AND REPERTORY

OF

Arts, Sciences, and Manufactures.

CONJOINED SERIES.

No. CXVII.

Recent Patents.

In presenting to our readers the recently patented improvements connected with the deposition of metals by electric action, we consider it advisable to place them chronologically, in order that, together with the papers which have already appeared upon that subject in our Journal, they may, as it were, form a history of this newly developed art.

The first specification here given cannot possitively be said to belong to the electrotype process; but when looked upon as the precursor of the latter improvements, we could not consider our series complete without it.

As a striking illustration of the principles of Electrometallurgy being usefully applied, before the experiments of Mr. Spencer brought the discovery into notice, (see Vol. XV. and XVI. of our Journal,) we beg to refer to the specification of Messrs. Elkington and Barratt, in which it will be perceived that articles were coated with zinc by keeping them in contact with pieces of that metal in a solution of the same; and in the instances of the other patents

VOL. XIX.

I

of Messrs. Elkington, the operation was due to electric action. But a limit here existed to the extent of depositing the metal, the electric circuit being destroyed the moment the article was perfectly coated; a considerable thickness of the reduced metal being thereby unattainable; but even this difference did not exist in an experiment which was for many years practised in lectures on galvanic electricity; many of our readers have, no doubt, seen it performed;-it consisted in immersing two platinum blades in a solution of sulphate of copper, connecting one to the positive and the other to the negative pole of a voltaic battery; by which arrangement, that connected to the former became coated with metallic copper; the blades were then changed, when the copper, formerly precipitated, and now in connection with the negative pole, became dissolved and transferred to that in connection with the positive pole. Not only, however, was this daily repeated, but it was generally a matter of some anxiety to the lecturer to avoid getting the deposited metal too thick.

We are told, that Professor Daniel (whose invaluable invention of the sustaining battery led directly to the discovery of the electrotype) had long noticed the deposition of copper, which accumulated upon the surface of his cells; and, on displacing it from the metal to which it adhered, perceived and pointed out the fact, that the minutest scratches were faithfully copied; but the researches of theory, the depths of abstract science, conquered in him the power of practical application; and not to the great but to the no less meritorious are we indebted for the direct introduction of the important art of Electro-metallurgy.

Having taken this matter under our especial care, we shall, from time to time, afford our readers information of its progress in the fine and useful arts.