Science in Short Chapters

by W. Mattieu Williams

The most remarkable that I have seen are those presented by the cooling of the “tap cinder” from puddling furnaces. This, as it flows from the furnace, is received in stout iron boxes (“cinder-bogies”) of circular or rectangular horizontal section. The following phenomena are usually observable on the cooling of the fused cinder in a circular bogie.

First a thin solid crust forms on the red-hot surface. This speedily cools sufficiently to blacken. If pierced by a slight thrust from an iron rod, the red-hot matter within is seen to be in a state of seething activity, and a considerable quantity exudes from the opening. If a bogie filled with fused cinder is left undisturbed, a veritable spontaneous volcanic eruption takes place through some portion, generally near the centre, of the solid crust. In some cases, this eruption is sufficiently violent to eject small spurts of molten cinder to a height equal to four or five diameters of the whole mass.

The crust once broken, a regular crater is rapidly formed, and miniature streams of lava continue to pour from it; sometimes slowly and regularly, occasionally with jerks and spurts due to the bursting of bubbles of gas. The accumulation of these lava-streams forms a regular cone, the height of which goes on increasing. I have seen a bogie about 10 or 12 inches in diameter, and 9 or 10 inches deep, thus surmounted by a cone above 5 inches high, with a base equal to the whole diameter of the bogie. These cones and craters could be but little improved by a modeler desiring to represent a typical volcano in miniature.

Similar craters and cones are formed on the surface of cinder which is not confined by the sides of the bogie. I have seen them well displayed on the “running-out beds” of refinery furnaces. These, when filled, form a small lake of molten iron covered with a layer of cinder. This cinder first skins over, as in the bogies, then small crevasses form in this crust, and through these the fused cinder oozes from below. The outflow from this chasm soon becomes localized, so as to form a single crater, or a small chain of craters; these gradually develop into cones by the accumulation of outflowing lava, so that when the whole mass has solidified, it is covered more or less thickly with a number of such hillocks. These, however, are much smaller than in the former case, reaching to only one or two inches in height, with a proportionate base. It is evident that the dimensions of these miniature volcanoes are determined mainly by the depth of the molten matter from which they are formed. In the case of the bogies, they are exaggerated by the overpowering resistance of the solid iron bottom and sides, which force all the exudation in the one direction of least resistance, viz., towards the centre of the thin upper crust, and thus a single crater and a single cone of the large relative dimensions above described are commonly formed.

The magnitude and perfection of these miniature volcanoes vary considerably with the quality of the pig-iron and the treatment it has received, and the difference appears to depend upon the evolution of gases, such as carbonic oxide, volatile chlorides, fluorides, etc. I mention the fluorides particularly, having been recently engaged in making some experiments on Mr. Henderson’s process for refining pig-iron, by exposing it when fused to the action of a mixture of fluoride of calcium and oxides of iron, alumina, manganese, etc. The cinder separated from this iron displayed the phenomena above described very remarkably, and jets of yellowish flame were thrown up from the craters while the lava was flowing. The flame was succeeded by dense white vapors as the temperature of the cinder lowered, and a deposit of snow-like, flocculent crystals was left upon and around the mouth or crater of each cone. The miniature representation of cosmical eruptions was thus rendered still more striking, even to the white deposit of the haloid salts which Palmieri has described as remaining after the recent eruption of Vesuvius.

The gases thus evolved have not yet been analytically examined, and the details of the powerful reactions displayed in this process still demand further study; but there can be no doubt that the combination of silicic acid with the base of the fluor spar is the fundamental reaction to which the evolution of the volatile fluorides, etc., is mainly due.

A corresponding evolution of gases takes place in cosmical volcanic action, whenever silicic acid is fused in contact with limestone or other carbonate, and a still closer analogy is presented by the fusion of silicates in contact with chlorides and oxides, in the absence of water. If the composition of the Moon is similar to that of the Earth, chlorides of sodium, etc., must form an important part of its solid crust; they should correspond in quantity to the great deposit of such salts that would be left behind if the ocean of the Earth were evaporated to dryness. The only assumptions demanded in applying these facts to the explanation of the surface configuration of the Moon are, 1st, that our satellite resembles its primary in chemical composition; 2d, that it has cooled down from a state of fusion; and 3d, that the magnitude of the eruptions, due to such fusion and cooling, must bear some relation to the quantity of matter in action.

The first and second are so commonly made and understood, that I need not here repeat the well-known arguments upon which they are supported, but may remark that the facts above described afford new and weighty evidence in their favor.

If the correspondence between the form of a freely suspended and rotating drop of liquid and that of a planet or satellite is accepted as evidence of the exertion of the same forces of cohesion, etc., on both, the correspondence between the configuration of the lunar surface, and that of small quantities of fused and freely cooled earth-crust matter, should at least afford material support to the otherwise indicated inference, that the materials of the Moon’s crust are similar to those of the Earth’s, and that they have been cooled from a state of fusion.

I think I may safely generalize to the extent of saying, that no considerable mass of fused earthy silicates can cool down under circumstances of free radiation without first forming a heated solid crust, which, by further radiation, cooling, and contraction, will assume a surface configuration resembling more or less closely that of the Moon. Evidence of this is afforded by a survey of the spoil-banks of blast furnaces, where thousands of blocks of cinder are heaped together, all of which will be found to have their upper surfaces (that were freely exposed when cooling) corrugated with radiating miniature lava streams, that have flowed from one or more craters or openings that have been formed in the manner above described.