Fig. 18.—Papin’s Engine and Water-Wheel, a. d. 1707.
The sketch is that given by the inventor in his memoir. It consists ([Fig. 18]) of a steam-boiler, a, from which steam is led through the cock, c, to the working cylinder, n n. The water beneath the floating-piston, h, which latter serves simply as a cushion to protect the steam from sudden condensation or contact with the water, is forced into the vessel r r, which is a large air-chamber, and which serves to render the outflow of water comparatively uniform, and the discharge occurs by means of the pipe q, from which the water rises to the desired height. A fresh supply of water is introduced through the funnel k, after condensation of the steam in n n, and the operation of expulsion is repeated.
This machine is evidently a retrogression, and Papin, after having earned the honor of having invented the first steam-engine of the typical form which has since become so universally applied, forfeited that credit by his evident ignorance of its superiority over existing devices, and by attempting unsuccessfully to perfect the inferior device of another inventor.
Subsequently, Papin made an attempt to apply the steam-engine to the propulsion of vessels, the account of which will be given in the chapter on Steam-Navigation.
Again disappointed, Papin once more visited England, to renew his acquaintance with the savans of the Royal Society; but Boyle had died during the period which Papin had spent in Germany, and the unhappy and disheartened inventor and philosopher died in 1810, without having seen any one of his many devices and ingenious inventions a practical success.
[ [6] The British Museum contains four manuscript copies of Hero’s “Pneumatics,” which were written in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. These manuscripts have been examined with great care, and a translation from them prepared by Prof. J. G. Greenwood, and published at the desire of Mr. Bennett Woodcroft, the author of a valuable little treatise on “Steam Navigation.” This is, so far as the author is aware, the only existing English translation of any portion of Hero’s works.
[ [7] Stuart’s “Anecdotes.”
[ [8] “Berg-Postilla, oder Sarepta von Bergwerk und Metallen.” Nuremberg, 1571.
[ [9] “History of the Steam-Engine,” 1825.