HORIZONTAL ROTARY RETORTS.

Ill

the construction of an apparatus, the great inge-nuity and superiority of which, entitles what iscalled the horizontal rotary retort, to all the meritand praise that belongs to the character of anoriginal invention.

The numerous and great advantages of this dis-tillatory apparatus,the rapidlyincreasing adoption ofit,# and the almost certain prospect which exists oftheir ultimately superseding all former methods ofdecomposing coal, make it proper that I should laybefore the reader, as full an account as my limitswill permit, of the construction and operation ofthis retort, and the mode of applying it; and thisbecomes the more necessary on account of the manyimportant improvements which the apparatus hasundergone since its first adoption,f and of whichno description has yet been laid before the public.

* Retorts of this description have been lately adopted, in the GasWorks at Bristol, Birmingham , Chester, Kidderminster , and at manyother provincial Gas Establishments.

t'An account of the original construction of the rotary retort maybe seen in the Repository of Arts, No. CLXXVI, 1816, page I. andalso in the Journal of Science, Vol. II. page 133.