GAS FOR THE MILLION.—THE LATEST NONELTY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 78, 2 April 1877, Page 4

GAS FOR THE MILLION.—THE LATEST NONELTY.

(Otago Guardian, March 9.) The drapery warehouse of Mr Alex. Inglis, at. the corner of High and Princes-street, was lighted up yesterday evening in a manner that should be a caution to gas companies generally^ With' seven patent burners they produced a ligUt through their extensive establishment immeasurably superior to anything that they. ever, succeeded in accomplishing : with twenty*four Corporation jets. But the secret ot their success was not so much- in 'the burners J — wVlyclj m are startling patterns of the ingenuity of the race " that licks creation''—as in the material from which the gas is prepared. Instead of depending on the ordinary Corporation will-o'-the-wifcpy the'gns is actually made on tbe premises. In the cellar immediately beneath the shop we were shown the whole apparatus. It consisted simply of a brightly polished, corj'ppr cylinder four feet in length by three, feet in diameter, a piece of steel cable, and a big, concrete cneese weigh-ing37o-lbs. The wire was attached to tha concrete weight and wound round a ~?SkW ** ty? 3?d of the cylinder, so as to subject the air inside, to a regular pressure. The. way in which/ the gas is produced appears to be as remarkaie for its Simplicity as it is singularly safe and cleanly: AJI 'the ingredients required are air, water, and a small supply oi gasoline. . The gasoline occupies a small chamber at one end of the cylinder. ' As the gas js consumed the air is forced through the water, then passes through the gasoline, and thus converted into an inflammable and very superior gas, with an illuminating power equal to 30.candles, it ascends through the pipes to supply the warehouse above with bottled daylight. A more cleanly, ingenious, or useful apparatus we have never witnessed. The patent for the colonies has been secured : by Mr Hepburn, of the wellknown firm of M'liandress^ Hepburn and Co. The invention hails from America, where the new gas has come into extensive use, and is reckoned so safe that it**' manfacture involves no alteration in the rate of insurance premiums. An inspection of Mr Inglis's warehouse when lighted np is all that is needed to convince any one of its value. The apparatus was fitted up ih a way so satisfactory that the gas was in full and perfect swing all' over the premises a few. minutes after the operations were completed. Qne of its smallest recommendations is that instead of 10a per 1000 feet, the price of Corporation twilight, the enterprising drapers' will be 4ple to display their goods under a dazzling li^ht which is estimated to cost exactly 6s per 1000 feet. This new gas machine is, we believe, the first that has been imported to the Southern' Hemisphere. ' Its value to up-country townships dependent for their nocturnal enlightenment on candles and kerosine, should be something immense, and as a means of keeping greedy coal-gas corporations in thorough -.subjection, every student of domestic economy, from the vendor of colored baloons to the garrulous housewife, who is everlastingly fretting away the last remnants of a transitory smile over her monthly increasing gas bill, the innovation of this Yankee notion will doubtless be hailed with unequivocal delight.