BOOK III. MACHINES FOR RAISING WATER BY COMPRESSURE INDEPENDENTLY OF ATMOSPHERIC INFLUENCE. CHAPTER I. DEFINITION of machines described in this Book-Forcing Pumps-Analogy between them and bellows -History of the bellows that of the pump-Forcing pumps are water bellows-The Bellows of antediluvian origin―Tubal Cain-Anacharsis-Vulcan in his forge-Egyptian, Hindoo, and Peruvian blowing tubes-Primitive bellows of goldsmiths in Barbary-Similar instruments employed to eject liquids-Devices to obtain a continuous blast-Double bellows of the Foulah blacksmiths, without valves Simple Asiatic bellows-Domestic bellows of modern Egypt-Double bellows of the ancient Egyptians-Bellows blowers in the middle ages-Lantern bellows common over all the East-Specimens from Agricola -Used by negroes in the interior of Africa-Modern Egyptian blacksmiths' bellows-Vulcan's bellows -Various kinds of Roman bellows Bellows of Grecian blacksmiths referred to in a prediction of the Delphic oracle-Application of lantern bellows as forcing pumps-Sucking and forcing bellows pumps -Modern domestic bellows of ancient origin-Used to raise water-Common blacksmiths' bellows employed as forcing pumps-Ventilation of mines. MACHINES of the third class described in this Book, are such as act by compressure: the water is first admitted into close vessels and then forcibly expelled through apertures made for that purpose. This is effected in some by compressing the vessels themselves, as in bellows pumps-in others by a solid body impinging on the surface of the liquid, as in fire engines-sometimes a column of water is used for the same purpose, at others the expansive force of compressed air. Of the last two, Heron's fountain, air engines, and soda fountains, are examples. Strictly considered, these machines have nothing to do with the pressure of the atmosphere, (the active principle of those of the second class,) but in practice it is very generally employed. When the working cylinder of a forcing pump is immersed in the water it is intended to raise, or when the latter flows into it by gravity, it is a forcing pump simply; but when the cylinder is elevated above the water that supplies it, and consequently is then charged by atmospheric pressure, the machine is a compound one, embracing the peculiar properties of both sucking and forcing pumps. The latter therefore differ from the former in raising water above their cylinders; and to elevations that are only limited by the strength of their materials and the power employed to work them. They have been considered by some writers as the oldest of all pumps. We shall consider their varieties in the order in which we suppose they were developed. An intimate connection has ever subsisted between the forcing pump and the bellows; they are not only identical in principle, but every form adopted in one has been applied to the other. The bellows, from the simple sack or skin employed by the negroes of Africa to the complex and efficient instrument of China, and the enormous blowing machines of 232 Antiquity of Bellows. A [Book III. our foundries, has been used to raise water: and every modification of the pump, not even excepting the screw, has been applied as a bellows. singular proof of the analogy between them and of their connection in ancient times, is, that in one of the earliest accounts we have of the cylindrical pump, (viz. by Vitruvius) it was used as a bellows "to supply wind to hydraulic organs." And that rotary pumps are as numerous as rotary bellows, is known to every mechanic. Thus, while pumps have been used as bellows, bellows have been employed as pumps; and every device to obtain a continuous current of air in the one, has been adopted to induce an unbroken stream of water in the other. The history of the bellows is also that of the pump; and if we mistake not it affords the only legitimate source now open in which the origin of the latter can be sought for with any prospect of success. Under this impression we shall examine the bellows of various people, and in doing so the reader will find an auxiliary, but very important branch of the subject, illustrated at the same time, viz. that which relates to VALVES, for the bellows was probably the first instrument of which they formed a part. No other machine equally ancient can be pointed out in which they were required. In fine, the forcing pump is obviously derived from the bellows, or rather it is an application of that instrument to blow water instead of air-an application probably coeval with its invention. The origin of the arts is generally considered as a subject of mere conjecture. Antiquarians and historians despair of discovering any thing of importance relating to the early history of any of the simple machines. In the present case, however, there can be no doubt that the first bellows was the mouth; and it was the first pump too, both atmospheric and forcing. The representation of it when employed as a bellows was a favorite subject with ancient statuaries and painters. Pliny gives several examples, and among others, Stipax the Cyprian, who cast an elegant figure of a boy "roasting and frying meat at the fire, puffing and blowing thereat with his mouth full of wind, to make it burn." Aristoclides, was also celebrated for a painting of a boy, "blowing hard at the coals; the whole interior of the room appeared to be illuminated with the fire thus urged by the boy's breath, and also what a mouth the boy makes." Holland's Translation. That the bellows is of antediluvian origin, there can be little doubt, for neither Tubal Cain nor any of his pupils could have reduced and wrought iron without it. The tongs, anvil and hammer of Vulcan, (or Tubal Cain) have come down to our times, and although the particular form of his bellows be not ascertained, that instrument is, we believe, as certainly continued in use at the present day, as the tools just named. Nor is there any thing incredible in such belief, for if even the common opinion, that the whole globe was enveloped in the deluge, be true, Noah and his sons, aware that the destinies of their posterity, so far as regarded the arts of civilization, must in a great measure depend upon them, would naturally secure the means of transmitting to them the knowledge of those machines that related to metallurgy, as among the most essential of all. Of these, the bellows was quite as important as any other; without it, other tools would have been of little avail. Now if we refer to oriental machinery, (among which the bellows of the son of Lamech is to be found if at all,) we shall find, in accordance with its characteristic unchangeableness, that the instrument now used over all Hindostan and Asia in general, and by the modern blacksmiths of Cairo and Rosetta, is identical with a Hachette's Traité élémentaire des Machines, p. 142. Chap. 1.] Its Origin. 233 that with which the smiths of Memphis, and Thebes, and Heliopolis, urged their fires, between three and four thousand years ago, and is similar to those found figured in the forges of Vulcan on ancient medals and sculptures. Numerous were the forms in which the bellows was anciently made, but the general features of the one to which we allude, (the lantern bellows) have remained as unchangeable as those of blacksmiths themselves. Strabo attributed the bellows to Anacharsis who lived about 600 years B. C. but it is probable that some particular form of it only was intended, for it is not credible that the Greeks in Solon's time could have been ignorant of an instrument that is coeval with the knowledge of metals; and without which the iron money of Lycurgus, two centuries before, could never have been made. Pliny (B. vii, 56) attributes it with greater propriety to the Cyclops, who are supposed to have flourished before the deluge. The prophet Jeremiah, who lived long before Anacharsis, speaks of it in connection with metallurgical operations. "The bellows are burned, the lead is consumed of the fire, the founder melteth in vain." Isaiah, who lived still earlier, viz. in the 8th century B. C. alludes to the blacksmith's bellows-"the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire." And Job, nine or ten centuries before the Scythian philosopher flourished, speaks of "a fire not blown." The prophet Ezekiel also speaks of the blast furnace as common-"they gather silver, and brass, and iron, and lead, and tin, into the midst of the furnace, to blow the fire upon it to melt it." xxii, 20. Homer, as might be supposed, could not fully describe the labors of Vulcan, without referring to this instrument. His account of the great mechanic at work, is equally descriptive of a smith and his forge of the present day. Obscure in smoke, his forges flaming round, The first approach made to artificial bellows was the application of a reed or other natural tube, through which to direct a stream of air from the mouth-a device that has never passed into desuetude. Such was the origin of the modern blow-pipe, an instrument originally designed to increase the intensity of ordinary fires, but which subsequently became (as the arts were developed) indispensible to primitive workers in metal. How long blowing tubes preceded the invention of other devices for the same purpose is uncertain; but from the fact that oriental jewelers and goldsmiths still fuse metal in pots by them, it may be inferred they were the only instruments in use for ages, before the bellows proper was known: a circumstance to which their universal employment over all Asia at the present time may be attributed, and the skilful management of them by mechanics there. As the only contrivance for urging fires in primitive times, men would naturally become expert in using them, and, as in all the arts of the East, their dexterity in this respect would be inherited by their children, and be retained in connection with their use, with that tenacity that has scarcely ever been known to give up an ancient tool or the ancient mode of using it: hence the paucity of their implements; a file, a hammer, a pair of tongs, and a blowing tube, being in general all that the budget of an African or Asiatic jeweler contains. As we have given figures of sucking tubes to illustrate the origin of 234 Egyptian, Hindoo, and Peruvian Blowpipes. [Book III. the atmospheric pump, we here insert some of blowing tubes, as showing the incipient state of the forcing pump. No. 98. Egyptian using a reed. 1600 B. C. No. 99. Ancient Egyptian Goldsmith. No. 98, represents an Egyptian blowing a fire with a reed. It is from the paintings at Beni Hassan, and extends back through a period of 3,500 years. According to Mr. Wilkinson, the figure is that of a goldsmith, "blowing the fire for melting the gold," but from the comparative large size of the vessel, it would seem rather to be a cauldron in which the articles were pickled. No. 99, is the figure of a goldsmith either soldering or fusing metal with the blow-pipe, from the sculptures at Thebes. The portable furnace has raised cheeks to confine and reflect the heat. The pipe is of metal with the end enlarged and pointed. Sonnerat, has given (in the volume of illustrations to his voyages,) a plate representing modern goldsmiths of Hindostan, from which the annexed figure (No. 100) is copied. It will serve to show, when compared with the preceding cuts, what little changes have taken place in some mechanical manipulations in the East, from very remote times. A similar figure is in Shoberl's Hindostan. The same mode of fusing their metals was practiced by the ancient gold and silver smiths of Mexico and Peru. Instead of bellows, says Garcilasso, the latter had blow-pipes "made of copper, about a yard long, the ends of which were narrow, that the breath might pass more forcibly by means of the contraction, and as the fire was to be more or less; so accordingly they used eight, ten, or twelve of these pipes at once, as the quantity of metal did require." (Commentaries on Peru, p. 52.) No. 100. Goldsmith of Hindostan The next step was to apply a leathern bag or sack, formed of the skin of some animal, to one end of the tube (shown in No. 80) as a substitute for the mouth and lungs. The bag was inflated by the act of opening it, or by blowing into it, and its contents expelled by pressure. To such Homer seems to allude in his account of Eolus assisting Ulysses: The adverse winds in leathern bags he braced, Compressed their force, and locked each struggling blast. Odys. 10. a Ancient bronze tongs or forceps, similar to those in the cut, have been found in Egypt, which retain their spring perfectly. Crucibles similar to those used at the present day have also been discovered. Wilkinson's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians. vol. iii, 224. Chap. 1.] Origin of the Valve.-African Bellows. 235 A largess to Ulysses he consigned, And in a steer's tough hide enclosed a wind. Met. xiv. The goldsmiths' bellows of Barbary consists of a goat's skin, having a reed inserted into it: he holds the reed with one hand and presses the bag with the other.' (Ed. Encyc. vol. iii, 258.) The Damaras, a tribe of negroes in Southern Africa mentioned by Barrow, manufacture copper rings, &c. from the ore. The bellows they use, he observes, "is made of the skin of a gemsbok, (a species of deer) converted into a sack, with the horn of the same animal fixed to one end for a pipe." Simple instruments of this description have always been applied to eject liquids. Small ones were commonly used by ancient physicians in administering enemas; a purpose for which they are still used. Large ones were recommended by Apollodorus the architect, a contemporary of Pliny and Trajan, as a substitute for fire engines, when the latter were not at hand. When the upper part of a house was on fire, and no machine for throwing water to be procured, hollow reeds, he observed, might be fastened to leathern bags filled with water, and the liquid projected on the flames by compressing them. As the current of wind from a single sack or bag, necessarily ceased as soon as it was collapsed, some mode of rendering the blast continuous was desirable; and in the working of iron indispensible. The most obvious plan to accomplish this was to make use of two bags, and to work them so that one might be inhaling the air, while the other was expelling it—that is, as one was distended, the other might be compressed. This device we shall find was very early adopted, and by all the nations of antiquity. But by far the most important improvement on the primitive bellows or bag, was the admission of air by a separate opening-a contrivance that led to the invention of the VALVE, one of the most essential elements of hydraulic as well as pneumatic machinery. The first approach to the ordinary valve, was a device that is still common in the bellows of some African tribes. A bag formed of the skin of a goat, has a reed attached to it to convey the blast to the fire; and the part which covered the neck of the animal is left open for the admission of air. This part is gathered up in the hand when the bag is compressed, and opened when it is distended. No. 101. Bellows of the Foulah Blacksmiths. An improvement upon this primeval device is exhibited in the bellows of the Foulah blacksmiths, on the western coasts of Africa. It consists |