A History of the Growth of the Steam-Engine Part 2

[13] "Le Machine deverse del Signior Giovanni Branca, cittadino Romano, Ingegniero, Architetto della Sta. Casa di Loretto." Roma, MDCXXIX.

At this time experiments were in progress in England which soon resulted in the useful application of steam-power to raising water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 6.--Branca's Steam-Engine, A. D. 1629.]

A patent, dated January 21, 1630, was granted to David Ramseye[14] by Charles I., which covered a number of distinct inventions. These were: "1. To multiply and make saltpeter in any open field, in fower acres of ground, sufficient to serve all our dominions. 2. To raise water from low pitts by fire. 3. To make any sort of mills to goe on standing waters by continual motion, without help of wind, water, or horse. 4. To make all sortes of tapistrie without any weaving-loom, or waie ever yet in use in this kingdome. 5. To make boats, shippes, and barges to goe against strong wind and tide. 6. To make the earth more fertile than usual. 7. To raise water from low places and mynes, and coal pitts, by a new waie never yet in use. 8. To make hard iron soft, and likewise copper to be tuffe and soft, which is not in use in this kingdome. 9. To make yellow waxe white verie speedilie."

[14] Rymer's "F[oe]dera," Sanderson. Ewbank's "Hydraulics," p. 419.

This seems to have been the first authentic reference to the use of steam in the arts which has been found in English literature. The patentee held his grant fourteen years, on condition of paying an annual fee of 3 6_s._ 8_d._ to the Crown.

The second claim is distinct as an application of steam, the language being that which was then, and for a century and a half subsequently, always employed in speaking of its use. The steam-engine, in all its forms, was at that time known as the "fire-engine." It would seem not at all improbable that the third, fifth, and seventh claims are also applications of steam-power.

Thomas Grant, in 1632, and Edward Ford, in 1640, also patented schemes, which have not been described in detail, for moving ships against wind and tide by some new and great force.

Dr. John Wilkins, Bishop of Chester, an eccentric but learned and acute scholar, described, in 1648, Cardan's smoke-jack, the earlier aeolipiles, and the power of the confined steam, and suggested, in a humorous discourse, what he thought to be perfectly feasible--the construction of a flying-machine. He says: "Might not a 'high pressure' be applied with advantage to move wings as large as those of the 'ruck's' or the 'chariot'? The engineer might probably find a corner that would do for a coal-station near some of the 'castles'"

(castles in the air). The reverend wit proposed the application of the smoke-jack to the chiming of bells, the reeling of yarn, and to rocking the cradle.

Bishop Wilkins writes, in 1648 ("Mathematical Magic"), of aeolipiles as familiar and useful pieces of apparatus, and describes them as consisting "of some such material as may endure the fire, having a small hole at which they are filled with water, and out of which (when the vessels are heated) the air doth issue forth with a strong and lasting violence." "They are," the bishop adds, "frequently used for the exciting and contracting of heat in the melting of gla.s.ses or metals. They may also be contrived to be serviceable for sundry other pleasant uses, as for the moving of sails in a chimney-corner, the motion of which sails may be applied to the turning of a spit, or the like."

Kircher gives an engraving ("Mundus Subterraneus") showing the last-named application of the aeolipile; and Erckern ("Aula Subterranea," 1672) gives a picture ill.u.s.trating their application to the production of a blast in smelting ores. They seem to have been frequently used, and in all parts of Europe, during the seventeenth century, for blowing fires in houses, as well as in the practical work of the various trades, and for improving the draft of chimneys. The latter application is revived very frequently by the modern inventor.

SECTION II.--THE PERIOD OF APPLICATION--WORCESTER, PAPIN, AND SAVERY.

We next meet with the first instance in which the expansive force of steam is supposed to have actually been applied to do important and useful work.

In 1663, Edward Somerset, second Marquis of Worcester, published a curious collection of descriptions of his inventions, couched in obscure and singular language, and called "A Century of the Names and Scantlings of Inventions by me already Practised."

One of these inventions is an apparatus for raising water by steam.

The description was not accompanied by a drawing, but the sketch here given (Fig. 7) is thought probably to resemble one of his earlier contrivances very closely.

Steam is generated in the boiler _a_, and thence is led into the vessel _e_, already nearly filled with water, and fitted up like the apparatus of De Caus. It drives the water in a jet out through the pipe _f_. The vessel _e_ is then shut off from the boiler _a_, is again filled through the pipe _h_, and the operation is repeated.

Stuart thinks it possible that the marquis may have even made an engine with a piston, and sketches it.[15] The instruments of Porta and of De Caus were "steam fountains," and were probably applied, if used at all, merely to ornamental purposes. That of the Marquis of Worcester was actually used for the purpose of elevating water for practical purposes at Vauxhall, near London.

[15] "Anecdotes of the Steam-Engine," vol. i., p. 61.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Edward Somerset, the Second Marquis of Worcester.]

How early this invention was introduced at Raglan Castle by Worcester is not known, but it was probably not much later than 1628. In 1647 Dircks shows the marquis probably to have been engaged in getting out parts of the later engine which was erected at Vauxhall, obtaining his materials from William Lambert, a bra.s.s-founder. His patent was issued in June, 1663.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 7.--Worcester's Steam Fountain, A. D. 1650.]

We nowhere find an ill.u.s.trated description of the machine, or such an account as would enable a mechanic to reproduce it in all its details.

Fortunately, the cells and grooves (Fig. 9) remaining in the wall of the citadel of Raglan Castle indicate the general dimensions and arrangement of the engine; and Dircks, the biographer of the inventor, has suggested the form of apparatus shown in the sketch (Fig. 8) as most perfectly in accord with the evidence there found, and with the written specifications.

The two vessels, _A A'_, are connected by a steam-pipe, _B B'_, with the boiler, _C_, behind them. _D_ is the furnace. A vertical water-pipe, _E_, is connected with the cold-water vessels, _A A'_, by the pipes, _F F'_, reaching nearly to the bottom. Water is supplied by the pipes, _G G'_, with valves, _a a'_, dipping into the well or ditch, _H_. Steam from the boiler being admitted to each vessel, _A_ and _A'_, alternately, and there condensing, the vacuum formed permits the pressure of the atmosphere to force the water from the well through the pipes, _G_ and _G'_. While one is filling, the steam is forcing the charge of water from the other up the discharge-pipe, _E_.

As soon as each is emptied, the steam is shut off from it and turned into the other, and the condensation of the steam remaining in the vessel permits it to fill again. As will be seen presently, this is substantially, and almost precisely, the form of engine of which the invention is usually attributed to Savery, a later inventor.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 8.--Worcester's Engine, A. D. 1665.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 9.--Wall of Raglan Castle.]

Worcester never succeeded in forming the great company which he hoped would introduce his invention on a scale commensurate with its importance, and his fate was that of nearly all inventors. He died poor and unsuccessful.

His widow, who lived until 1681, seemed to have become as confident as was Worcester himself that the invention had value, and, long after his death, was still endeavoring to secure its introduction, but with equal non-success. The steam-engine had taken a form which made it inconceivably valuable to the world, at a time when no more efficient means of raising water was available at the most valuable mines than horse-power; but the people, greatly as it was needed, were not yet sufficiently intelligent to avail themselves of the great boon, the acceptance of which was urged upon them with all the persistence and earnestness which characterizes every true inventor.

Worcester is described by his biographer as having been a learned, thoughtful, studious, and good man--a Romanist without prejudice or bigotry, a loyal subject, free from partisan intolerance; as a public man, upright, honorable, and humane; as a scholar, learned without being pedantic; as a mechanic, patient, skillful, persevering, and of wonderful ingenuity, and of clear, almost intuitive, apprehension.

Yet, with all these natural advantages, reinforced as they were by immense wealth and influence in his earlier life, and by hardly lessened social and political influence when a large fortune had been spent in experiment, and after misfortune had subdued his spirits and left him without money or a home, the inventor failed to secure the introduction of a device which was needed more than any other.

Worcester had attained practical success; but the period of speculation was but just closing, and that of the application of steam had not quite yet arrived.

The second Marquis of Worcester stands on the record as the first steam-engine builder, and his death marks the termination of the first of those periods into which we have divided the history of the growth of the steam-engine.

The "water-commanding engine," as its inventor called it, was the first instance in the history of the steam-engine in which the inventor is known to have "reduced his invention to practice."

It is evident, however, that the invention of the separate boiler, important as it was, had been antic.i.p.ated by Porta, and does not ent.i.tle the marquis to the honor, claimed for him by many English authorities, of being _the_ inventor of the steam-engine. Somerset was simply _one_ of those whose works collectively made the steam-engine.

After the time of Worcester, we enter upon a stage of history which may properly be termed a period of application; and from this time forward steam continued to play a more and more important part in social economy, and its influence on the welfare of mankind augmented with a rapidly-increasing growth.

The knowledge then existing of the immense expansive force of steam, and the belief that it was destined to submit to the control of man and to lend its immense power in every department of industry, were evidently not confined to any one nation. From Italy to Northern Germany, and from France to Great Britain, the distances, measured in time, were vastly greater then than now, when this wonderful genius has helped us to reduce weeks to hours; but there existed, notwithstanding, a very perfect system of communication, and the learning of every centre was promptly radiated to every other. It thus happened that, at this time, the speculative study of the steam-engine was confined to no part of Europe; inventors and experimenters were busy everywhere developing this promising scheme.

Jean Hautefeuille, the son of a French _boulanger_, born at Orleans, adopted by the d.u.c.h.ess of Bouillon at the suggestion of De Sourdis, profiting by the great opportunities offered him, entered the Church, and became one of the most learned men and greatest mechanicians of his time. He studied the many schemes then brought forward by inventors with the greatest interest, and was himself prolific of new ideas.

In 1678, he proposed the use of alcohol in an engine, "in such a manner that the liquid should evaporate and be condensed, _tour a tour_, without being wasted"[16]--the first recorded plan, probably, for surface-condensation and complete retention of the working-fluid.

He proposed a gunpowder-engine, of which[17] he described three varieties.

[16] Stuart's "Anecdotes."

[17] "Pendule Perpetuelle, avec la maniere d'elever d'eau par le moyen de la poudre a canon," Paris, 1678.

In one of these engines he displaced the atmosphere by the gases produced by the explosion, and the vacuum thus obtained was utilized in raising water by the pressure of the air. In the second machine, the pressure of the gases evolved by the combustion of the powder acted directly upon the water, forcing it upward; and in the third design, the pressure of the vapor drove a piston, and this engine was described as fitted to supply power for many purposes. There is no evidence that he constructed these machines, however, and they are here referred to simply as indicating that all the elements of the machine were becoming well known, and that an ingenious mechanic, combining known devices, could at this time have produced the steam-engine. Its early appearance should evidently have been antic.i.p.ated.

Hautefeuille, if we may judge from evidence at hand, was the first to propose the use of a piston in a heat-engine, and his gunpowder-engine seems to have been the first machine which would be called a heat-engine by the modern mechanic. The earlier "machines" or "engines," including that of Hero and those of the Marquis of Worcester, would rather be denominated "apparatus," as that term is used by the physicist or the chemist, than a machine or an engine, as the terms are used by the engineer.

Huyghens, in 1680, in a memoir presented to the Academy of Sciences, speaks of the expansive force of gunpowder as capable of utilization as a convenient and portable mechanical power, and indicates that he had designed a machine in which it could be applied.

This machine of Huyghens is of great interest, not simply because it was the first gas-engine and the prototype of the very successful modern explosive gas-engine of Otto and Langen, but princ.i.p.ally as having been the first engine which consisted of a cylinder and piston.

The sketch shows its form. It consisted of a cylinder, _A_, a piston, _B_, two relief-pipes, _C C_, fitted with check-valves and a system of pulleys, _F_, by which the weight is raised. The explosion of the powder at _H_ expels the air from the cylinder. When the products of combustion have cooled, the pressure of the atmosphere is no longer counterbalanced by that of air beneath, and the piston is forced down, raising the weight. The plan was never put in practice, although the invention was capable of being made a working and possibly useful machine.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 10.--Huyghens's Engine, 1680.]

At about this period the English attained some superiority over their neighbors on the Continent in the practical application of science and the development of the useful arts, and it has never since been lost.

A sudden and great development of applied science and of the useful arts took place during the reign of Charles II., which is probably largely attributable to the interest taken by that monarch in many branches of construction and of science. He is said to have been very fond of mathematics, mechanics, chemistry, and natural history, and to have had a laboratory erected, and to have employed learned men to carry on experiments and lines of research for his satisfaction. He was especially fond of the study and investigation of the arts and sciences most closely related to naval architecture and navigation, and devoted much attention to the determination of the best forms of vessels, and to the discovery of the best kinds of ship-timber. His brother, the Duke of York, was equally fond of this study, and was his companion in some of his work.

Great as is the influence of the monarch, to-day, in forming the tastes and habits and in determining the direction of the studies and labors of the people, his influence was vastly more potent in those earlier days; and it may well be believed that the rapid strides taken by Great Britain from that time were, in great degree, a consequence of the well-known habits of Charles II., and that the nation, which had an exceptional natural apt.i.tude for mechanical pursuits, should have been prompted by the example of its king to enter upon such a course as resulted in the early attainment of an advanced position in all branches of applied science.

The appointment, under Sir Robert Moray, the superintendent of the laboratory of the king, of Master Mechanic, was conferred upon Sir Samuel Morland, a n.o.bleman who, in his practical knowledge of mechanics and in his ingenuity and fruitfulness of invention, was apparently almost equal to Worcester. He was the son of a Berkshire clergyman, was educated at Cambridge, where he studied mathematics with great interest, and entered public life soon after. He served the Parliament under Cromwell, and afterward went to Geneva. He was of a decidedly literary turn of mind, and wrote a history of the Piedmont churches, which gave him great repute with the Protestant party. He was induced subsequently, on the accession of Charles II., to take service under that monarch, whose grat.i.tude he had earned by revealing a plot for his a.s.sa.s.sination.