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royal arsenal, carried the rest to world. By no means. his own house.

"Notwithstanding the invidious representations of Ravago, Gavay was applauded for his invention, and taken into favor by the emperor, who promoted him one grade, gave him two hundred thousand maravedises, and ordered the jealous treasurer to pay all the expenses of the experiment. But Charles was then taken up with some military expedition, and the occasion of conferring an inestimable benefit on mankind was neglected for the business of bloodshed and devastation; while the honor which Barcelona might have received from perfecting this noble discovery was reserved for a city which had not yet started in the career of existence.

"The fact that a vessel was propelled by steam as early as the sixteenth century thus rendered certain, the question next occurs, whether it in any way detracts from the honor due to Fulton, not for having made the first successful application of steam to purposes of navigation, (for he was even anticipated by Fitch in the United States,) but for having brought it into use over the whole civilized

This ex

periment at Barcelona, owing to the absence of journals and newspapers, those modern vehicles and wings of intelligence, was unknown to the world generally, at the time of making it, as it ever was to Fulton. And, besides, who can tell but that in like manner many inventions, which constitute at once the pride and profit of the present age, may have existed centuries ago in countries of forgotten civilization?"

STEAM ENGINE. The steam engine is one of the noblest monuments of human ingenuity. It was originally invented by the Marquis of Worcester, in the reign of Charles II. What inventions do we not owe to a knowledge of this simple power of steam! In the language of Webster, "it is on the rivers, and the boatman may repose on his oars; it is in highways, and begins to exert itself along the courses of land-conveyance; it is at the bottom of mines, a thousand feet below the earth's surface; it is in the mill, and in the workshops of the trades. rows, it pumps, it excavates, it carries, it draws, it lifts, it hammers, it spins, it weaves, it prints."

It

About the year 1762, Mr. Watt, a Scottish gentleman, began to turn his attention to making improvements in the steam engine, and since then it has been brought to a great degree of perfection.

The locomotive, or travelling engines, used on railroads, are all what are called high-pressure engines. The speed of these engines may be increased to forty miles an hour. They are employed on most of our railroads, and trains of cars being attached, passengers or goods are conveyed with great expedition from place to place. It is only within the last five years that these engines have been introduced in this country.

STEEL is iron refined in the fire with certain ingredients, that render it white, and impart to it a harder and finer grain than that of the original metal. Iron is converted into steel either by fusion or cementation. The former method is employed for making steel immediately from the ore, or from the crude, cast metal; in the latter, bars of iron are placed in furnaces, with a stratum of charcoal between every two, till the pile is raised to a sufficient height; the whole is

then closely covered to prevent the

access of the air, when a strong fire is kindled, and uniformly continued during the whole process. The surface of the metal, manufactured in either way, generally exhibits numerous vesicles, whence it is called blistered steel; but these may be removed by repeated ignition between red-hot coals, and by forging.

The finest metal of this description is the Damascus steel, which is imported from Syria; but the process pursued in the Turkish manufactories is not accurately known in Europe. The celebrated Brescian steel is obtained by roasting the iron ore in strata, with layers of wood between; and when these are sufficiently smelted, the metal is taken out of the furnace, broken in pieces, picked, and washed in troughs of pure water. It is next conveyed to an oblong square cavity, termed the fluxing bed, which is strewed with a mixture of finely sifted ashes and sand, that are carefully compressed; a stratum of charcoal is then laid on, the smelted metal is gradually added, and at the end of three or four days the conversion is completed.

Steel is usually divided into three

sorts, according to the method in which it is prepared; as natural steel, steel of cementation, and caststeel. The latter is the most valuable of all, as its texture is the most compact, and it admits of the finest polish. It is used for razors, surgeons' instruments, and similar purposes.

STEERAGE: on board a ship, that part of a ship next below the quarter-deck, before the bulk-head of the great cabin, where the steers. man stands.

STEREOTYPE PRINTING. The Chinese and Japanese first practised the art of printing by means of wooden blocks. The mode of stereotype printing is, first to set up a page, for instance, in the common way with type, and when it is rendered perfectly correct a cast is taken from it with plaster of Paris, and into this cast the metal for the stereotype plate is poured.

STERLING: a term frequent in British commerce. A pound, shilling, or penny sterling signifies as much as a pound, shilling, or penny of lawful money of Great Britain, as settled by authority.

STOCKS. The property of a company or corporation, or the mo

ney invested by them for certain purposes, either in a bank or an insurance office, in building a steamboat or speculating in lands, is usually known by the name of stock. Thus we have "Boston and Worcester railroad stock," "United States Bank stock," &c. See PAR, PERCENTAGE, &C.

STORAX: the most fragrant of the solid resins, and indeed of all the known vegetable substances. It is obtained from a tree of the same name, said to grow most plentifully in Syria, Cilicia, and Pamphylia. America likewise produces storax trees.

STUCCO properly a composi tion of white marble pulverized, and mixed with plaster or lime, the whole being sifted, and wrought up together with water. It is much used in Europe as a coating for the exterior of houses, to give them the appearance of stone.

SUGAR: a sweet granulated substance, too well known to require any particular description. It is everywhere in extensive use, and in this country ranks rather among the indispensable necessaries of life than among luxuries. In point of commercial importance it is second to few articles. It is

chiefly prepared from the expressed juice of the sugar-cane; but it is also procured from an immense variety of other plants, as maple, beet-root, birch, parsnep, &c.

The sugar met with in commerce is usually of four sorts,-brown or Muscovado sugar, clayed sugar, refined or loaf sugar, and sugar candy. The difference between one sort of sugar and another depends on the different modes in which it is prepared.

Brown or Muscovado Sugar.— The plants or canes being crushed in a mill, the juice, having passed through a strainer, is collected in the clarifier, where it is first exposed to the action of a gentle fire, after being "tempered," (mixed with alkali,) for the purpose of facilitating the separation of the liquor from its impurities. It is then conveyed into the large evaporating copper boiler, and successively into two others, each of smaller size; the superintendent of the boiling freeing it, during the process, from the scum which rises to the surface. The syrup then reaches the last copper vessel, where it is boiled till sufficiently concentrated to be capable of granulating in the cooler, whence it is

transferred with the least possible delay. Here it soon ceases to be a liquid; and, when fully crystallized, is put into hogsheads, placed on their ends in the curing-house, with several apertures in their hottoms, through which the molasses drains into a cistern below. In this state they remain till properly cured, when the casks are filled up, and prepared for shipment.

Clayed sugar is prepared by taking the juice, as in the case of Muscovado sugar, when boiled to a proper consistency, and pouring it into conical pots with the apex downwards. These pots have a hole at the lower extremity, through which the molasses or syrup is allowed to drain. After this drain has continued some time, a stratum of moistened clay is spread over the surface of the pots; the moisture of which, percolating through the mass, is found to contribute powerfully to its purification.

Refined sugar is prepared from Muscovado or clayed sugar, by redissolving the sugar in water, and, after boiling it with some purifying substances, pouring it, as before, into conical pots, which are again covered with moistened clay. A

repetition of this process produces moist land it sometimes attains the

double-refined sugar.

The sugar-cane must be considered as a native of China, since it has been pretty accurately shown that its cultivation was prosecuted in that empire for two thousand years before sugar was even known in Europe, and for a very long period before other eastern nations became acquainted with its use. A knowledge of the origin of canesugar was correctly revealed in the middle of the thirteenth century, by the celebrated traveller Marco Polo; though it was partially known much earlier. The plant was soon conveyed to Arabia, Nubia, Egypt, and Ethiopia, where it became extensively cultivated. Early in the fifteenth century the sugar-cane first appeared in Europe. took the lead in its cultivation; thence it passed to Spain, Madeira and the Canary islands; and shortly after the discovery of the new world by Columbus, this plant was conveyed to Hayti and Brazil, from which latter country it gradually spread through the islands of the West Indies.

Sicily

The sugar-cane varies exceedingly in its growth, depending upon the nature of the soil. In new and

height of twenty feet. It is always propagated from cuttings. The hoeing of a cane-field is a most laborious operation, when performed, as it must be, under the rays of a tropical sun. When the canes are fully ripe, they are cut close to the ground, and being then divided into convenient lengths, are tied up in bundles, and conveyed to the mill. Upon an average every five gallons of cane-juice will yield six pounds of crystallized sugar, and will be obtained from about one hundred and ten well-grown canes.

Dutrone calls sugar the most perfect alimentary substance in nature, and the testimony of many physicians establishes the fact. Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, says, in com mon with all who have analyzed it, that "sugar affords the greatest quantity of nutritive matter of any substance in nature." Used alone, it has fattened horses and cattle in St. Domingo for a period of several months, during the time when the exportation of sugar and the importation of grain were suspended from the want of ships.

The Cochin Chinese consume a great quantity of sugar; they eat it generally with their rice, which is

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