1798.] Problem....Tour in Ireland. MY prefent intention is to give (through the medium of the Monthly Magazine) an impartial view of fome parts of Ireland in its prefent ftate, which I hope will not prove unentertaining or altoge. ther unworthy the attention of your numerous readers; and as a defcription of thofe parts of Ireland which I fhall mention is my fole object, I thall not dwell upon fuch parts of England and Wales as I pafs through on my route, but notice them fo far only as they are fubfervient to the defign of this paper. From London then, through Kew,Richmond, Staines, Windfor, Henley-uponThames, Oxford, and Blenheim, I proceeded to Shrewfbury. Thence I directed my courfe through thofe beautiful parts of North Wales, Llangollen, Llanwft, Conway, Bangor, and Bangor Ferry, as far as to Holy-head, where I embarked on board one of his majefty's packets for Dublin. This veffei fets fail every evening (Tuesday excepted) as foon after the arrival of the Irish mail from London (which is generally about fix o'clock in the evening) as the tide will permit. MONTHLY MAG. XXVII. 17 The distance from the fhore whence you embark to that on which you land is about twenty leagues, and the paffage, which is a very fafe one, varies of course in point of time, according to a favourable or unfavourable wind; fometimes being made in fix and at others not in 48 hours; but the general average paffage is from twelve to twenty-four hours. Whenever the packet arrives near the Irish coast, which in confequence of the packet generally failing in the evening, is about. fun-rife, Dublin Bay prefents itself to the view, being one of the most delightful and picturefque fcenes in the world. Indeed its fplendid appearance has never been questioned by any traveller, nor has even a parallel been drawn between it and any other view, except that of the Bay of Naples; and connoiffeurs are still undetermined to which of the two the preference ought to be given. It presents a long range of diverfified mountains, enriched by a multiplicity of beautiful demefnes, which, when thus befpangled with the beams of the morning fun, cannot be delineated with equal beauty by the pencil of the moft fcientific artift. These mountains begin from the water's edge, and gradually and proudly rife in fucceffion for many miles, until, in the beaven." language of Othello, "Their tops touch In the midst of this apparent diftance, but nearer the bottom of the fcene, is difcovered the city of Dublin (the Metropolis of Ireland)whose steeples, indeed it is to be lamented, are fo few, at the fame time that this view of Dublin is the most unfavourable which can be taken. The most eligible is that which presents itself from the Phoenix Park, a place weftward of Dublin, of which I fhall fpeak hereafter. As you approach near the capital, you behold that grand promontory, the hill of Howth, proudly pro jefting into the fea upon the right hand while upon the left, or to the fouthward, and a little nearer the capital, is the Cafoon, or light-house, a very handfome circular building, raifed in the ocean, five miles from Dublin. Upon this extent, which runs five miles into the fea, there is now completed a great wall of dura ble ftone-work, rifing about ten feet above high water mark, and thirty feet wide upon the furface. This great undertaking is of the most effential fervice to fhips trading to and from Dublin, as it prevents a great bank of floating fand which lies to the fouthward, from joining with another fimilar bank to the northward, called the North Bull, which D has has been, and ftill in tempeftuous weather continues to be, extremely injurious, and fometimes fatal to trading veffels, which are not perfectly acquainted with the entrance into this harbour. This wall thus keeps the mouth of the harbour from being choked up. Three miles pearer Dublin, at a place called the Pigeonhoufe, and fituated upon this wall, the packet lands her paffengers in a fine and newly erected dock, where now allo a very fpacious hotel is nearly compleated, into which the paffengers can inftantly retire upon landing; a circumftance hitherto much wanted by all perfons, reforting to that part of the fifter kingdom. In committing my obfervations upon the city of Dublin to paper, I fhail begin with the public buildings, and firt with the Parliament-houfe, the fouth front of which has, for many years, been the admiration of all who are well skilled in ar. chitecture. It is compofed of a maffy colonnade of the Ionic order; the bife of every column being three feet fix inches in diameter. These columns all fpring from an elevated platform, to which you afcend by a fight of steps, which do not, as is too often the cafe, tamely reft upon the bafe of the column, but are regularly elevated upon the pedeftal truly belonging to that order of architecture, and thus giving the whole order in perfection. Independent of the entrance in the centre of this colonnade, the caftern and western extremities of this front prefent you with a bold proje&ion of the fante colonnade, continued for many feet, and forming two other grand infulated entrances. About twelve years ago, it was thought expedient to take away a little of the overflowing money from the Irish treafury, and with it to erect a new front to that part of the building called the Houfe of Lords. For this purpose a committee of these hereditary counsellors of the crown was appointed, and a plan and elevation was propofed, which was carri ed into execution, and finished in 1791. This now forms the eaft front of that building and had this eastern front been erected in any place unconnected with other buildings, it certainly would deferve to be celebrated, as it is compofed of a very handfome portico, confifting of fix columns in a fancied order, nearly refembling, but not exactly, the Corinthian. This portico has no pedeftals fpringing from the bafe of the column, which refts apon a platform, elevated by three ftone [Jan. fteps. Over this colonnade is a pediment, upon which is erected three ftatues larger than life, excellently fculptured in Portland ftone, reprefenting WISDOM, JUSTICE, and LIBERTY. It is, however, a circumftance no lefs extraordinary than true, that although this expenfive eaftern front was defigned for the grand entrance of the Lord Lieutenant, when he proceeds to parliament to open and clofe the feffions, as well as to give the royal affent to fuch bills as the Irish parliament enact, yet not any Lord Lieutenant has ever entered the Irish houfe of peers through the fuperb portico fince thofe faid three ftatues of WISDOM, JUSTICE, and LIBERTY have been erected, but he proceeds in his ufual state through the old front, which bas never been decorated with any of thofe emblems. To which we may add, that this handfome, though uncorrefponding, eaftern front, is joined to the fouth front, by an unmeaning heavy curtain-wall. A few years after this portico was raifed, the Houfe of Commons was refolved to have a front erected to the weftward of the building, as if determined not to be outdone by the lords; and, accordingly, a committee of the guardians of the public purfe was appointed to fix and deterinine upon a plan and elevation. A weftern front indeed they did erect. But how? Not like either the fouth or the eaft front; but one defigned by themfelves, forming a portico, conffting of four columns of the Ionic order, and much inferior to thofe in the fouth; to which grand front, however, they have connected it, by a range of unmeaning columns projecting about fix feet beyond another clumfy currain-wall. Thus is this once grand, and now expenfive pile,of building, rendered, by the jarring op nions of lords and commons, one of the moft heterogeneous edifices ever erected. The infide of the Irish Houfe of Lords is fomething fimilar to that at Westminfter. The walls are hang with tapiftry, finely executed, reprefenting King Wil liam at the battle of the Boyne; but the infide of the Irish Houfe of Commons is a very beautiful structure of an octagonal form, round which there is a large and commodious gallery for fpectators. Columns which fupport a fine dome, fpring. from this gallery, and between thofe columns, in the front of the gallery, is an handfome balustrade. This Houfe of Commons, which is juft finished, is, with a little improvement, fimilar to one which 1798.] Metronarifton defended. which was destroyed by an accidental fire on the 27th of February, 1792, and which stood upon the fame fite. Dublin Caftle, the feat of the resident Lord Lieutenant, is a very handsome and commodious palace. I's beauty, however, has been much injured by the prefent Marquis of Buckingham, both externally and internally; externally, by ftopping up a very chafte and light arcade in the principal front, when he was there in 1783 as Earl Temple, which now, has an edious appearance, and is, at the fame time, rendered totally ufelefs; and internally, when he was Lord Lientenant there in 1783, by converting a magnificent hall at the top of the great ftair-cafe, at that time called the Battleaxe Guard-hall, into a prefence chamber. This apartment is totally unnecefla y, as prior to this there was a moft excellent one; and instead of the former grand entrance, you must now pafs through a lobby which was before merely the landing (as it is called in architecture) of the great ftair-cafe, which at prefent refembles the confined lobby of a decent prifon. He has, indeed, caufed fome allegorical pictures to be placed in the cieling of the ball-room. This room, in honour of the order of knighthood of St. Patrick, and in which upon that day, viz the 17th of March, 1783, the knights of that order dined, has been called, fince the firft inftallation, St. Patrick's Hall. The muta bility of public favour was, perhaps, never more predominant than in the two periods of that nobleman's administration in Ireland. For in the year 1783, when he refided there as Earl Temple, he rendered himself the idol of the Irish nation; but in the years 1788-9, when he was there as Marquis of Buckingham, he became to the fame people progresively obnoxious; privately quitted the kingdom, from a fmall fea bathing place near Dublin, called the Black Rock, and carried with him the cenfure of the Iifh Houfe of Commons, which record remains upon the Journals of that Houfe to this very hour. [To be continued] 19 Mekerchus, is not a rhyming hexameter. It is not only rhyming, but doubly rhyming as perfectly fo, as Suadendo ftultis oleum difperdere vultis ? or any other leonine verfe. But having learned, it should feem, from the profodical differtation to which he infers, that the two laft fyllables of uxori form a fpondee; and continuing in his vicious habit of reading as a trochee the two laft fyllabies of forori, which form a spondee alfo, himfelf viciates the rhyme. And if he had not read with grear inattention, he would have feen, that (directly con trary to his affertion 1) the detaching or feparating, in pronunciation, any fyllable from a word, is difapproved: and that even in the scanning, according to the method there recommended, the very fy liable he mentions, the laft in uxori, would not be feparated from the preceding fyllable. As to the "Formal Attack," which H. M. feems to threaten, it had need to be conducted with confiderable skill and power, if he hopes with any effect to counteract the public approbation which the revived doctrine of Mekerchus has obtained, and to diflodge it from the ftrong-hold it occupies, in the countenance already given to it by one of the firft, if not the firft, of the fchools of reputation in the kingdom. Were it not befide the queftion, a good defence might be made for the rhymes, though nothing can be faid for the style, of the trochaic couplet, by (as H. M. properly expreffes himself) a worthy fabricator of birth-day odes; for no one ought to be able to write in a better style who would accept an office fo degrading letters as a laureateship-worthily refused by that fterling poet who has fo elegantly taught, that Virtue's an ingut of Peruvian gold, די די 120 Inflammation of Pyrophori. THEORY OF THE INFLAMMATION OF PYROPHORI. To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. SIR, SEE, with great pleafure, that you are extremely fuccefsful in your at tempts to cook up the utile with the dulce. The public relish the difh. Nay, I be lieve, there never was a Scotsman fonder of hi raggice, nor a Englishman of his beef-fieak, nor a Spaniard of his olla podrida, nor an Italian of his macaroni, than are all thofe among my neighbours, who are thought connoiffeurs in the food of the mind, of the Monthly Magazine. You cannot be ill-pleafed to know, that your Mifcellany has found its way as far north as did Cromwell's foldiers, and English cabbages, in the middle of the laft century; and is read with eagerness on the claffic grounds of Macbeth, and of Offidn. It is not, however, a claffic matter, but a fmall chemical trifle, with which I now with to trouble you. There is a particu lar compofition, known to chemifts by the name of pyrophorus, because it pof feffes the property of being liable to fpontaneous inflammation in the open air. It was compofed by Homberg, apothecary and chemift to the famous regent duke of Orleans, by the diftillation of alum with the refidue of human excrement. There are very many vegetabies and animal matters which, if treated with alum, afford this pyrophorus. It may be obtained from the greater number of thofe falts which contain fulphuric acid in union with whatever cafe. M. Prouft has even proved, that any fubftance containing carbonaceous matter, in union with an earth or oxyde, is fufceptible of this fpontaneous combuftion in the air, It is now commonly prepared by melting three parts of alum with one part of fugar, honey, or meal, expofing the melted, cooled, and hardened mixture, a fecond time, to heat, till it be kindled to burn for a few moments, with a blueish flame; then cooling the matter thus burned, and preferving it in a dry flafk, clofely flopped, to be ufed as pyrophorus, Exposure to the atmosphere brings it intantly to burn with a flame fufficiently vivid. The more humid the air, fo much the more readily does this inflammation take place. To account for a phenomenon fo remarkable, as the fpontaneous inflammation of this pyrophorus, chemifts have offered leveral different theories, which are almost all alike unfatisfactory. Hom [Jan. berg and Lemery fuppofed, that the prefence of calcareous earth in the mixture was the caufe of the inflammation. Le Jay de Savigny imagined the mixture to containa glacial oil of vitriol, which, attracting moisture from the atmosphere, gradually heated the mafs to inflammation by this means. Mr.Bewly, in a letter to Dr.Prieftley, afcribes the fame effect to the presence of a principle in the pyrophorus, by which there is nitrous acid attracted from the atmosphere. Others have conjectured, that the combustion of pyrophorus by fpontaneous inflammation, might be owing to its always containing in it a quantity of phosphorus. But none of all thefe theories has been received in the world as completely juft and fatisfactory. Now, fir, I think I can exhibit a new and peculiar theory of the relations of this curious chemical phenomenon, of which the ftriking truth and fimplicity thall not fail to command the immediate affent of all intelligen: chemifts. In combuftion in general, the principal thing that always takes place is the new combination of oxygen on the one hand, with carbon, or fome different matter, on the other hand. The oxygen for this new combination is ufually detached out of its union with light and caloric in vital air. The light and caloric which it deferts, are, in confequence of this defertion, commonly evolved int a momentarily free fiate, in which they prefent themfelves to our fenfes, as heat and flame. But carbon and other combustible matters cannot, in every temperature, nor in every fate of aggregation, detach oxygen out of vital air, and by its abftraction produce an evolution of heat and flame. It is neceffary, in order to this event, that the carbon or other combustible matter be, where it is prefented to the contact of the vital air, confiderably comminuted; and that the vital air exhibited to it be, at the fame time, fupercalorated, in fuch a manner, as that the ordinary mutual attractions of its ingre dients may be greatly weakened by the fuper-caloration. In this state alone of the refpective fubftances, does the phenomenon of combuftion ufually take place. But there are oxygenous compounds in which the oxygen is much more flightly combined than it is in vital air; and it is poffible to exhibit carbon to oxygen in fome ftates which thall be more favourable to combuftion than others. In certain fates of most of the acids and the metallic oxydes, oxygen undeniably exifts in them, in a very loofe combination. Destroy, 1798.] Electric Property of India Rubber. Deftroy, as much as poffible, the aggregation of thefe acids and oxydes; and let the aggregation of the carbon, which is to be brought into contact with them, be, in a like manner, deftroyed. Mix thefe two comminuted fubftances together, and the mixture will be always a pyrophorus, if the feebleness of the combination of the oxygen in the oxyde and the acid, together with the comminution and the commixture of the carbon and the oxygenous compound, be particularly fa. vourable to combuftion, in the fame pres cife degree with the comminution and the fuper-caloration of ordinary cafes: but the prefence of air is neceffary to the fpontaneous inflammation of this pyrophorus; becaufe only air can begin combuftion, and make it not tacit, but perceptible, by means of light and flame. If not before the air be prefented, yet at leaft almost as foon as it prefented, the temperature, neceffary to the decompofition of vital air, is already excited. Moifture in the atmosphere is favourable to the inflammation of pyrophorus, for the fame reafon for which water poured in fmall quantities upon a strong fire, rather feeds than tends to extinguish the flame. The water or vapour is decompofed into its conftituent parts; and these aid the combuftion. "1. Pyrophorus, therefore, burns fpontaneoufly with accefs of air, because it contains oxygen in fo loofe a combination, and in fuch mixture with carbon, that these advantages towards inflamma. tion are fully equivalent to that fupercaloration which is produced in ordinary combuftions by the application of free, external heat. "2. All mixtures are fufceptible of fpontaneous inflammation, in which oxy gen and combustible matters are mingled together, with the above advantages.' Such is my humble theory of the fpontaneous inflammation of pyrophori. I am, fir, An admirer of your Mifcellany, Inverness Academy, Dec. 12, 1797. To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 21 fame time, is a little fingular; but it may in a degree account for the apparent pla giarifms in the writings of people whose purfuits" are fimilar. About the time that your correfpondent obferved the electric fluid occafioned by the friction of India rubber upon paper, I, alfo, accidentally noticed fimilar effects, which I communicated in November laft, to a fociety for experiments in natural philofophy, of which I am a member, in this place. Previous to this, I had written a letter, with an intention of fending it to you; but being defirous of making farther experiments, I deferred fending it. From the different experiments I have made, it appears to me, that your correfpondent is mistaken, if, by faying "the property belonging to the elastic refin," he fuppofes that the electric fluid is produced from the India rubber. I apprehend it will be found to proceed from the fubftance on which the paper is laid to be rubbed upon, for if it be laid upon a quire of paper, a deal table, a piece of leather, or parchment, which are very weak nonelectrics, no effect, or very little, will be produced, not more than if laid on a plate of glafs, which is an electric; on a linen cloth laid on a table, more will be obferved; and, if laid on the following fubftances, the electric power will be very perceptible, and, I believe, more and more in the order of enumeration used, viz. a fmooth ftone, a mahogany board, a board painted yellow, a board painted chocolate, a board painted white, a plate of iron, &c. It is to be understood, that in every experiment the paper must be warmed a little, and if the fubftance on which it is laid to be rubbed be a good conductor, a fpark of a confiderable length may be drawn from it (hence an eafy criterion to judge of the best non-electrics.) The paper may be held by one corner,. and railed from the table, or whatever it may lie upon, while under the strokes of the rubber (of which a few will be fufficient) when the fpark may be drawn. If the India rubber, or any other electric, be applied to the excited paper, iç will difcharge itself immediately; but the cracking noife made when difcharged by a non-electric, will not be heard. The property of exciting paper does not belong exclufively to India rubber; almost any fubftance, either electric or non-electric, will produce the electric fluid, if applied to paper as a rubber, though not quite fo much as India rubber: amongst many other fubftances which I have tried, with the fame effect, I men tion |