[47] The Rumford Medal, to be hereafter noticed.
[48] This is a very interesting fact, and gives much support to the theory advanced at page [62] of this volume.
[49] Of the value of about one hundred and eighty guineas.
[50] The death of the Princess Charlotte.
[51] He here alludes to an estate in the neighbourhood of Nether Stowey, which he wished to purchase, and about which he had requested Mr. Poole to make enquiries.
[52] A short notice of them first appeared in the third number of the "Journal of Science and the Arts," edited at the Royal Institution.
[53] This theory of Davy is well illustrated by the change produced in the flame of gas-light, when acted upon by the wind, as may be seen during an illumination. The loss of light under these circumstances evidently arises from the more rapid combustion of the gas, by its more complete admixture with air; in consequence of which the decomposition above described does not take place.
[54] Quere. Is this theory correct? May not the effect be mechanical, the appulse of the air separating the flame from the wick.—Upon the principle suggested by Davy, how are we to explain the fact of rekindling the flame by a blast?
[55] "It is upon this principle that, in the Argand lamp, the Liverpool lamp, and in the best fire-places, the increase of effect does not merely depend upon the rapid current of air, but likewise upon the heat preserved by the arrangement of the materials of the chimney, and communicated to the matters entering into inflammation." The art of making a good fire depends also upon the same principle of economising the heat.
[56] From a calculation of the ratio in which the density of the atmosphere decreases with its altitude, and from that of the relative combustibility of different bodies, it follows that the taper would be extinguished at a height of between nine and ten miles—hydrogen, between twelve and thirteen—and sulphur, between fifteen and sixteen.