ratus to rescue persons from the upper windows of a house, the lower part of which may be in flames; it is called a Fire-escape; it consists of a yard similar to that of a ship, made by quickly fitting together several pieces of wood, and a basket at one end; this is attached to the fire engine, by a windlass and very easy machinery it may be by two people thrust towards a window, to receive and rescue the persons within from the flames, and lower them safely to the ground.

There was a glass case containing a series of objects illustrating the manufacture of Caoutchouc, or India Rubber, with specimens of the raw vegetable gum, in various forms, as it is imported, and likewise numerous articles manufactured from it, from the ropes for the breechings of a ship's gun, to the silk-like fabric of a lady's dress. It is astonishing how extensively India Rubber is used in England; the climate is so variable that it is at all times, if you go far from home, advisable to be prepared for rain; it was therefore always considered right to possess an article of clothing that would resist wet. Mr. Mackintosh discovered a mode of dissolving India Rubber in a cheap spirit, called Naptha, obtained extensively from the manufactories where coal gas is made; and he applied this dissolved India Rubber to bringing together two pieces of cloth, and, passing them through heavy rollers, produced a goodlooking material, from which he made most ex

tensively cloaks, coats, trousers, and divers other articles, perfectly water-proof. These articles, although now manufactured by several persons, still all go by the name of Mackintoshes. A Mr. Cording, three or four doors to the westward of Temple Bar, has manufactured a light cloak of water-proof muslin, very durable, and so portable that you can with ease put it into a large pocket, whilst it keeps out the heaviest rain quite as well as the heaviest garment would. Tubes for various purposes are manufactured from India Rubber, and we have heard it can be used with iron wire so as to form a rope almost indestructible, and yet that it can be tied and spliced quite as readily as if it were made of hemp. There are elastic soles to boots and shoes, deposited in the Polytechnic, by Davie of Charing Cross, in which India Rubber largely enters. India Rubber is now used very extensively, instead of glass, for stoppers of decanters, and they are found highly serviceable, as they totally exclude the air.

Here is to be seen Bramah's and Dickson's Rotatory Engine; it consists of a cylinder having an inner cylinder whose axis is eccentric to the outer one, and which is furnished with four blades, or pistons, working freely through it; the steam acts on the outer edges of the blades and drives them round, thus producing a rotatory motion. Here we also saw an ingenious

model of the Thames Tunnel. Here is also to be seen a mast-rigging model, with specimens of cordage made of wire. We are told that the Blackwall Railway has a rope more than ten miles in length, made of wire, and that it has been in daily severe use for some weeks, and that it is highly spoken of for pliability and durability. Should the manufacture of this description of rope be found to answer, it will be a very grand thing for England.

Iron is found most abundantly in England, and of course in its manufacture gives employment to an immense number of persons, who all consume articles that bring in wealth to the Revenue, such as Beer, Tea, Sugar and Coffee, and wear clothes made from cotton which pays a duty, whilst hemp is brought from Russia and is paid for in English money and the Russians do not take in return any of the manufactured articles of English make, so that if iron wire can produce ropes even as good only as hemp, all that money will spread itself usefully over England from the hand working man through the shop-keepers and do much good. It is most extraordinary to see the multiplicity of purposes to which iron is now applied, steam boats, and indeed steam ships, are built now of iron; Mr. Waghorn has carriages on the desert on the overland route to India composed entirely of iron, lighter than they could be made of any other material and possessing this advan

tage that hot weather will not cause them to shrink. Iron cables we have all seen and the strong prejudice that existed against them, of their want of elasticity, is dying away, for singular as it may appear, iron cables have in use, really more elasticity than hempen ones; for a ship always rides with her hempen cable in a state of tension (that is drawn out in a line from the anchor to the ship's bow), but on the contrary from its weight the iron cable always hangs slack, (bellying as sailors term it,) and the fact is when the ship heaves the giving up of this bellying of the cable yields greater relief than the elasticity of a hempen cable can possibly do. We have chain used for standing rigging and for securing the bowsprit, we see it used most extensively for knees of ships, we use it in ships for hawse holes, and for facings to bit heads, it has been used for boats, it is used by thousands of tons for Rail-roads. Within doors in England every domestic article may be met with in cast iron, it is used for stair-cases, for mantle-pieces and for cooking kettles, and in the church yard it is used for monuments instead of tomb-stones, on the high road it is extensively used to supersede mile stones, and we hear that it is used even for coffins.

How much does England owe to her inexhaustible mines of coal and of iron; it is to them she is indebted for all her riches, gold and silver mines are not to be compared to those of coal and of

iron; gold and silver would employ but few persons and enrich but very few, but coals and iron in their processes afford employment to countless thousands, they are the parents of the steam engine, no country, destitute of coal and iron, can compete with England in steam machinery, it would be an endless subject to treat upon. Coals and iron are the parents of the power loom, of the spinning jenny, of all the machinery in England. Oh! happy England, possessing within yourself this source of employment, of manufacture, and of wealth, old happy England you are, and long will be, the wonder and envy of the world, you possess materials that enable you to work machinery, that allows you to bring cotton from India, thousands of miles, to manufacture it into fine muslin, and to send it back to India and to sell it there much cheaper than it can be made there, although a few pence per day will there keep those employed in manufactures ;-it enables Englishmen in every market upon the Continent of Europe to offer cloths, cottons, stockings and silks at prices so much lower than they can be produced even in those places were labour is cheap, that in many parts they prohibit English goods in order that their manufactories may not be closed, from inability to produce such goods so cheap. What does not coal and iron do? What is there in England that cannot be done by steam? Carriages fly upon iron rail roads heated by coal,