Our domestic fire-places : a treatise on the economical use of fuel and the prevention of smoke : with observations on the patent laws / Frederick Edwards, Jun.

  • Edwards, Frederick, Jun.
Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Our domestic fire-places : a treatise on the economical use of fuel and the prevention of smoke : with observations on the patent laws / Frederick Edwards, Jun. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Vll peculiar a position, when compared with the vegetable and animal products of the earth, which are renewed in their season or generation, and with our metals, which, while serving the purposes of mankind, are not dissipated, should be so abused in its applications, and when it is considered that this mineral was formed on the surface of the earth, in periods vastly remote, for the benefit of the human race, and that the want of it is productive of an immense amount of discomfort and misery to large numbers of our fellow-beings, the urgent need of a general understanding of the efficient and economical use of coal will be forcibly seen. I have thought this an opportune time for endeavouring to call public attention to the subject, and will, as shortly and clearly as I can, explain the principal suggestions which have been made during this century for improve- ment in the use of a coal fire, and endeavour to deduce from these and other considerations the principles that should govern us in the construction of our fire grates. My occupation has brought the subject before me for many years, and if some might thereby consider that it would be difficult for me to be the most impartial witness, I trust and believe that no one who may carefully peruse this treatise will be able to do otherwise than consider me to have laboured to the best of my ability to discover and make known the truth. In the course of certain investigations which I have thought it desirable to pursue relative to a considerable number of suggested improvements that have never been brought before the notice of the public, I have seen much of the evil results of our present patent laws, which has confirmed a belief I had long previously entertained that those laws have been productive of far more evil than good in the branches of manufacture in which I have been