The table robs more than the thief.
Press it together by every available means. If water is
at hand, throw upon it as much as possible. If engines
arrive, let the water be thrown upon the blankets, &c.,
covering the adjoining stacks, and then upon the stack
on fire.
Among the numerous hands who flock to assist on
these occasions, many do mischief by their want of
knowledge, and especially by opening the fired stack
and scattering the embers. In order to obviate this
evil, place your best man in command over the stack
on fire, desire him to make it his sole duty to prevent it
being disturbed, and to keep it pressed and watered.
Place other men, in whose steadiness you have confidence, to watch the adjoining ricks, to keep the coverings over them, and to extinguish any embers flying from the stack on fire. In order to effect this, it is most desirable that there should be ladders at hand to enable one or two of the labourers to mount upon each stack.
If the ricks are separated from each other, and there is no danger of the fire extending to a second, it is of course desirable to save as much of the one on fire as may be possible. That, however, is not unfrequently accomplished by keeping the ricks compactly together rather than by opening it.
Send for all the neighbours' blankets and tarpaulins; these are invaluable; they are near at hand, and can be immediately applied.
Cautions respecting Objects liable to Spontaneous
Combustion.
ERIOUS accidents, and often conflagrations, ensue
be well to remember that sulphur and iron-filings,
moistened and buried in the ground, or laid in a heap,
will inflame in a few days. Iron pyrites, composed of
sulphur and iron, found naturally in coals, when laid in
a heap in the coal-mines, often take fire and burn for
a long time; and ships, freighted with coal, have been
set fire to from the coals containing too much of this
substance. Chips of wood, impregnated with turpentine,
if laid together in a heap, will burst into a flame in
Every oak must be an acorn.
Wherever the speech is corrupted, so is the mind.
The other side of the road always looks cleanest.
This has been observed in
manufactories of oil of turpentine, when the chips
(which the raw turpentine, brought from America, con-
tains) have been separated by straining. The mixture
used at theatres for a red light has ignited spontaneously
when a paper parcel, containing a pound of it, was laid
by on a shelf. This powder consists of nitrate of stron-
tium, sulphur, chlorate of potash, sulphurate of anti-
mony, and a little lampblack. Peat, when charred, is
very apt to take fire of itself. Wool that is much oiled,
and laid by in quantities, has been known to inflame
spontaneously. Tow, with lampblack and oil, is ex-
tremely liable to spontaneous inflammation.
these last have frequently been the cause of places
where they were kept being set fire to, without the
cause having been at first suspected.
The cause of most fires which have arisen from spon-
taneous combustion is lost in the consequence. Cases
occasionally occur where the firemen have been able to
detect it, as at Hibernia Wharf in 1846. It happened
that a porter had swept the sawdust from the floor
into a heap, upon which a broken flask of olive-oil, that
was placed above, dripped its contents. To these ele-
ments of combustion the sun added its power, and six-
teen hours afterwards the fire broke out.
This may
not occur again for a long period, if at all; but it is im-
portant to know that oiled sawdust warmed by the sun
will fire in sixteen hours, as it accounts for a number of
conflagrations in saw-mills, which never could be traced
to any probable cause. The great fire which occurred
at Liverpool in October 1854, was occasioned by the
explosion of spirits of turpentine, which blew out, one
after another, seven of the walls of the vaults under-
neath the warehouse, and in some cases destroyed the
vaulting itself, and exposed to the flames the cotton
above. The turpentine is said to have been fired by'a
workman, who snuffed the candle with his fingers, and
accidentally threw the burning wick down the bung-
hole of one of the barrels of turpentine.
Another cause of fire, which is of recent date, is the
use of naphtha in lamps-a most igniteable fluid when
mixed in certain proportions with common air.
It is commonly imagined that the introduction of
An empty skull is the devil's workshop.
Willows are weak, yet they bind other wood.
A bright knife will often assist a dull appetite.
hot water, hot air, and steam-pipes, as a means of heat-
ing buildings, cuts off one avenue of danger from fire.
This is an error. Iron pipes, often heated up to 400°,
are placed in close contact with floors and skirting-
boards, supported by slight diagonal props of wood,
which a much lower degree of heat will suffice to ignite.
Mr. Braidwood, in his evidence before a committee of
the House of Lords in 1846, stated it to be his belief,
that by long exposure to heat, not much exceeding
that of boiling-water, or 212°, timber is brought into
such a condition, that it will fire without the application
of a light. The time during which this process of
desiccation goes on, until it ends in spontaneous com-
bustion, is, he thinks, from eight to ten years; so that
a fire might be hatching in a man's premises during the
whole of his lease without making any sign.
THE past!—what is it but a gleam,
Which memory faintly throws?
The future!-'tis the fairy dream
That hope and fear compose.
The present is the lightning glance
That comes and disappears;
Thus life is but a moment's trance
Of mem'ries, hopes, and fears.
T should be remembered that unclean and disgusting fensiveness from repetition, to the parties who themselves practise them, yet that in most cases they are scarcely less offensive to those who do not participate in them, and who are forced to be spectators.
HE saying of the Duke of Wellington ought never to be forgotten, that "success can only be obtained by tracing every part of every operation from its origin to its concluding point."
A fog cannot be dispelled with a fan.
A thousand probabilities do not make one truth.
Who looks not before finds himself behind.
NEVER lose any time. I do not think that
lost which is spent in amusement or recreation,
some time every day; but always be in the habit of
being employed. 2. Never err the least in truth. 3.
Never say an ill thing of a person when thou canst say
a good thing of him: not only speak charitably, but
feel so.
4. Never be irritable nor unkind to anybody.
5. Never indulge thyself in luxuries that are not neces-
sary. 6. Do all things with consideration; and, when
thy path to act right is most difficult, feel confident in
that Power alone which is able to assist thee, and exert
thy own powers as far as they go.—MRS. FRY.
Get up, thou slug-a-bed, and see
The dew-bespangled herb and tree;
Each flow'r has wept and bow'd towards the East,
Above an hour since; yet you are not drest,-
Nay, not so much as out of bed,—
When all the birds have matins said,
And sung their thankful hymns ;—'tis sin,—
Nay, profanation,-to keep in.-HERRICK.
How to render Time valuable.
JEREMY BENTHAM was a great economist of time.
He knew the value of minutes. The disposal of his
hours, both of labour and of repose, was a matter of
systematic arrangement, and the arrangement was de-
termined on the principle, that it is a calamity to lose
the smallest portion of time. He did not deem it suf-
ficient to provide against the loss of a day or an hour;
he took effectual means to prevent the occurrence of
any such calamity to him; but he did more: he was
careful to provide against the loss even of a single
minute; and there is not on record any example of a
human being who lived more habitually under the
practical consciousness, that his days are numbered,
and that "the night cometh in which no man can
work."
Deride not the unfortunate.
A good servant makes a good master.
A word fitty spoken is lita années q“ potè n nera e SEE,
N Froriep's Journal of a recent date, an interesting
smoking, and on poisoning by nicotine. Among the
facts there mentioned, are the experiments instituted
by M. Malapert, a pharmacien of Poitiers. His inten-
tion was to ascertain the exact quantity of nicotine
absorbed by smokers, in proportion to the weight of
tobacco consumed. The apparatus used consisted of a
stone jar, in which the tobacco was made to burn, con-
nected with a series of bottles, communicating by tubes.
The bottles were either empty, or contained some
water, mixed or not, with a little sulphuric acid. From
a few experiments it was found that, in the smoke of
tobacco extracted by inspiration, there is ten per cent
of nicotine. Thus, a man who smokes a cigar of the
weight of twenty grains, receives in his mouth seven
grains of nicotine mixed with a little watery vapour,
tar, empyreumatic oil, &c. Although a large proportion
of this nicotine is rejected, both by the smoke puffed
from the mouth and by the saliva, a portion is never-
theless taken up by the vessels of the buccal and
laryngeal mucous membrane, circulated with the blood,
and acts upon the brain. With those unaccustomed
to the use of tobacco, the nicotine, when in contact
with the latter organ, produces vertigo, nausea, head-
ache, and somnolence, whilst habitual smokers are
merely thrown into a state of excitement, similar to
that produced by moderate quantities of wine or tea.
From further investigations, it is found that the
drier the tobacco the less nicotine reaches the mouth.
A very dry cigar, whilst burning, yields a very small
amount of watery vapour; the smoke cools rapidly, and
allows the condensation of the nicotine before it reaches
the mouth. Hence it comes that the first half of a
cigar smokes more mildly than the second, in which a
certain amount of condensed watery vapour and nicotine,
freed by the first half, are deposited. The same
remarks apply to smoking tobacco in pipes; and if
smokers were prudent, they would never consume
but half a cigar, or pipe, and throw away the other.
A blithe heart makes a blooming visage.
An angry man opens his mouth and shuts his
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