of its ablest and oldest members, and one to whose continuous and unceasing devotion the Society owes no small share of its present welfare. Sir Frederick Bramwell's first appearance at the Society was in a discussion on a paper by the late Thomas Webster, Q.C., in 1865. Nine years later— in 1874-he himself read a very important paper on "Protection for Inventions," the discussion on which was twice adjourned, and for which the Society's Silver Medal was awarded to him. He had joined the Society this same year, and in the following year (1875) he became a member of its Council. From that time to the present he has served continuously upon it either as Ordinary Member, Vice-President, Treasurer, or Chairman (1881-1882). When His Majesty, on his accession, resigned the Presidency of the Society, which he had held since 1863, Sir Frederick Bramwell was elected to the Presidency by the Council. This election was confirmed by the Annual General Meeting in 1901, and Sir Frederick retained the office until it was accepted in December of that year by H.R.H. the Prince of Wales. In recognition of his services the Council presented the Society's silver medal to Sir Frederick in June, 1902, that medal being the first struck with His Majesty's head as Patron upon it. Sir Frederick Bramwell also read another paper on Patent Law before the Society in 1883, as well as one on "Railway Safety Appliances" in 1876, and in 1875 he gave a Cantor course of four lectures on the .. Modern Steam Engine." But his chief services to the Society were rendered in the Council room. He took a special interest in its work, was one of the most regular attendants, and his wide judgment and shrewd commonsense were always at the service of his colleagues when any difficult question arose for decision. He was also a frequent attendant at the regular evening meetings, where he very often presided and took a useful part in the discussion. It is certain that the Society owes much of the repute and the authority it now posseses to the fact that such men as Siemens, Abel, Galton and Bramwell (to name only a few of the most prominent, and those who have passed away) were willing to devote themselves to its concerns, and among the remarkable group of men who have formed its Council for the past twenty or thirty years-to go no further backthere is no one who rendered fuller or more ready service than the one who has just left us. Born in 1818 the same year, he was fond of reminding his friends, as that of the foundation of the Institution of Civil Engineers-he was the youngest son of Mr. George Bramwell, a partner in the firm of Dorrien and Co., bankers, of Finch-lane. His elder brother was Lord Bramwell, the Judge. His profession was marked out for him from the first, his tastes being always mechanical. In 1834 he was apprenticed to John Hague, a well-known engineer of his time. After the expiration of his indentures he became a draughtsman, afterwards chief draughtsman and then manager of different engineering establishments. He started in private practice as an engineer in 1853. Much of his early experience was in connection with steam locomotion on common roads, and he was fond of relating his experiences with Hancock and others who, in the first half of the 19th century, unsuccessfully anticipated the present application of mechanical power to ordinary traffic. But it was neither as a civil nor as a mechanical engineer that he achieved his great reputation. He soon found a career in the legal side of his profession. His marvellously clear power of exposition, his quickness of appreciation, his great readiness, his facility for rapid reply and humorous repartee, made him probably the ablest scientific witness that the courts have ever known; while in later years his great judicial powers made him in constant demand as an arbitrator. And while his advice and help were sought by litigants in nearly all important law cases of a technical nature, his knowledge and ability were also utilised by the Government. He was one of the two lay members of the Ordnance Committee from 1881 to the present time. He reported on such subjects as the Thunderer explosion, and the site of the Mint, and he served on various departmental committees dealing with boiler explosions legislation, patent law, electric lighting, and the like. One of the busiest of men-till the end of his life, after a hard day's work he would go home to work far into the night-he found time and vent for his superfluous energy in voluntary labour, which, to most men, would have supplied sufficient occupation for their whole lives. In the great institutions connected with his own profession he was for many years a conspicuous figure. He was President of the Mechanical Engineers in 1874-1875, of the Civil Engineers in 1884-1885, and both institutions relied upon his assistance to a very large extent in the management of all their business affairs. He was also a Vice-President of the Institution of Naval Architects, and served for many years on its Council. The British Association was another of the institutions in which he took a keen interest, and to which he devoted time and work. Section G-formerly Mechanical Science, now Engineering-long relied upon his help. It was in his offices that the preliminary meetings of its committee were generally held, and it was his advice that was always sought in the preparation of its programme. He was President of this section in 1872, and again when the Association visited Montreal in 1884. Four years later-in 1888-he was elected President of the Association itself, a distinction which perhaps gave him as much genuine pleasure as any of those which fell to his lot in the later years of his life. The Royal Institution too occupied for many years much of his thoughts and attention. In 1885, he became its honorary secretary, and he held this post until 1900. When the very successful series of exhibitions were held at South Kensington, Sir Frederick Bramwell served as Chairman of the Inventions Exhibition, 1884, and this post was filled with the strenuous care which was characteristic of the man. Finally, when the City and Guilds of London Institute was formed for the promotion of technical education in 1877, he became the Chairman of its Council, as representative of the Goldsmiths' Company, of which company he was at one time Prime Warden. That he was able to give so much time and attention to such work, was owing to the fact that he had no hobbies and no amusements. He was unhappy if he was not busy. His relaxation was only in variety of work. Life for him must be crowded with work, and such life he enjoyed to the full. Many of his intimates looked forward with some dread to the inevitable time when failing powers would enforce which he most hated, rest and quiet, and deprive him of his only solace, strenuous hard work. But that time never came. At an age when his few remaining contemporaries were at best content with a placid interest in the progress of the work they had left, he was still busy. He ignored failing powers and diminishing strength. He refused to recognise any of the signs of weakening health. Till his fatal illness seized him he was as regular as ever in his attendances at Councils and Committees. Within the past month he took part in meetings at the Society of Arts and at the Institution of Civil Engineers, and he went home late on the evening of Tuesday, the 10th November, after an unusually full day at his office in Great Georgestreet, to be struck down by the illness which ended in his death on Monday last. So after all he died, as he would have wished to die-in harness. General Notes. H. T. W. INSURANCE BUSINESS IN GERMANY.-According to an official statement recently issued by the German Government, there were 418 German and 76 foreign companies doing business in Germany in 1901. Of the whole, 355 were life assurance companies, the whole balance being composed of companies insuring against loss by fire, water, storms, accidents, robberies, &c. The premiums received by the several companies during the year were as follows:-Life, £18,162,500; fire and water, £8,265,000; accident and guarantee, £2,466,000; hailstorms, £1,187,coo; cattle, £439,000; miscellaneous, £250,000. The German companies participated in these receipts to the amount of £27,956,000, leaving to the foreign companies £2,813,000. MEETINGS OF THE SOCIETY. Wednesday Evenings, at 8 o'clock: DECEMBER 9.-"Furnaces suitable for Jewellers' Work, Enamelling, Art Casting, and other similar MEETINGS FOR THE ENSUING WEEK Adelphi, W.C., 8 p.m. (Cantor Lecture) Mr. Surveyors, 12, Great George-street. S.W., 4 p.m. 1. Dr. R. A. Lehfeldt, "Total and Free Energy o the Lead Accumulator." 2. Mr. D. A. Sutherland, "Bitumen in Insulating Compositions." (Part 1.) 3. Mr. Sherard Cowper-Coles, “Notes on Aluminium Welding." 4. Dr. F. M. Perkin, "Electrochemical Installation at the Borough Polytechnic Institute." Royal Institution, Albemarle-street, W., 3 p.m. Civil Engineers, 25, Great George-street, S.W., Anthropological, 3, Hanover-square, W., 8 p.m. Pharmaceutical, 17, Bloomsbury-square, W.C., WEDNESDAY, DEC. 9...SOCIETY OF ARTS, John-street, Adelphi, W.C., 8 p.m. Mr. H. H. Cunynghame, "Furnaces suitable for Jewellers' Work, Enamelling, Art Casting, and other similar Industries." Biblical Archæology, 37, Great Russell-street, W.C., 4 p.m. Central Chamber of Agriculture (at the House of II a.m. Royal Literary Fund, 7, Adelphi-terrace, W.C., 3 p.m. United Service Institution, Whitehall, S. W., 3 p.m. Mr. C. E. Stromeyer, "Short Service Training of Reserve Officers on the German System." THURSDAY, DEC. 10...SOCIETY OF ARTS, John-street, Adelphi, W.C., 4 p.m. (Indian Section.) Mr. J. M. Maclean, India's Place in an Imperial Federation." Royal, Burlington-house, W., 4 p.m. Antiquaries, Burlington-house, W., 8 p.m. London Institution, Finsbury-circus, E.C., 6 p.m. Mr. E. W. Maunders, "Mars and its Canals'"' Electrical Engineers, 25, Great George-street, S.W., 8 p.m. 1. Gilbert Tercentenary Commemoration. Presentation of an Historical Picture (representing Dr. Gilbert in the act of showing his Electrical Experiments to Queen Elizabeth and her Court) by the Institution to the Borough of Colchester, in which town Gilbert was born in 1544, and died in 1603. 2. Mr. E. Hospitalier, "The Show Registra tion of Rapid Phenomena by Strocographic Methods: The Ondographe' and 'Puissancegraphe' (Wave Recorder and Power Recorder)." 3. Dr. Hans Behn-Eschenburg, "The Magnetic Dispersion in Induction Motors, and its Influence on the Design of these Machines." Mathematical, 22, Albemarle-street, W., 5} p.m. FRIDAY, DEC. 11...Tramways and Light Railways Association (at the HOUSE OF THE SOCIETY OF ARTS), Johnstreet, Adelphi, W.C., 8 p.m. Mr. Atherley-Jones, "Protection in special relation to Tramway and Light Railway Enterprise." North-East Coast Institute of Engineers and Ship. Astronomical, Burlington-house, W., 5 p.m. Physical, Royal College of Science, South Kensing ton, S. W., 5 p.m. SATURDAY, DEC. 12...Botanic, Inner Circle, Regent's park, N.W., 31 p.m. MONDAY, DECEMBER 14, 8 p.m. (Cantor Proceedings of the Society. Lecture.) BENNETT H. BROUGH, 'The Mining of Non-Metallic Minerals." (Lecture IV. Precious Stones.) TUESDAY, DECEMBER 15, 8 p.m. (Applied Art Section.) FRANK WARNER, "The British Silk Industry." WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 8 p.m. (Ordinary Meeting.) SIR WILLIAM H. PREECE, K.C.B., F.R.S., "The Science of Taxation and Business." Further details of the Society's meetings will be found at the end of this number. CANTOR LECTURES. On Monday evening, 7th inst., Mr. BENNETT H. BROUGH delivered the third lecture of his course on "The Mining of the Non-Metallic Minerals." The lectures will be printed in the Journal during the Christmas recess. INDIAN SECTION. Thursday afternoon, December 10, 1903, SIR EDWARD A. SASSOON, Bart., M.P., in the chair. The paper read was "India's place in an Imperial Federation," by J. M. Maclean. The paper and report of discussion will be published in a future number of the Journal. FOURTH ORDINARY MEETING. Wednesday, December 9, 1903; CHARLES VERNON BOYS, F.R.S., in the chair. The following candidates were proposed for election as members of the Society :Chandler, Lincoln, Abbotsfield, Kenilworth. Cooper, John Ashley, F.S.I., Surveyor's Office, Cooper's-hill, Castries, St. Lucia, British West Indies. Gilfillan, Samuel, 7, Hampstead-hill-gardens, N.W., and 2, Billiter-avenue, E.C. Loram, Albert Edmund, F.S.A.A., P.O. Box 105, Pietermaritzburg, Natal, South Africa. Short, Thomas S., M.I.N.A., 3, Gray-road, Sunderland. Tenison, Arthur Heron Ryan, F.R.I.B.A., 12, Little College-street, Westminster, S. W., and 19, Bathroad, Bedford-park, Chiswick, W. The following candidates were balloted for and duly elected members of the Society :Ashton, Augustus George, 90, Chesnut-road, Plumstead, S.E. Carter, Gillmore T., Dorset-house, Kingsdown, Bristol. Gutekunst, R., 16, King street, St. James'ssquare, S.W. Higginson, Eduardo, Consul for Peru, Southampton. Krebs, Rev. Stanley L., A.M., Greensburg, Pa. U.S.A. Turbervill, Malcolm W., Stanwell-house, Lymington, Hants. The paper read was FURNACES SUITABLE FOR JEWELLERS' WORK, ENAMELLING, ART CASTING, AND OTHER SIMILAR INDUSTRIES. BY H. H. CUNYNGHAME, C.B. The subject which I am about to bring to your notice this evening, is one of considerable practical importance. Everyone who has worked at any industry in which it was necessary to heat a small piece of metal uniformly up to 1,500° Fahr. or so, knows how hard it is to arrange a suitable furnace for the purpose. If the muffle is bigger than an inch or two in width, it becomes necessary to have a chimney through which the fumes of the fuel employed may escape, and the heat given off is very unpleasant for the operator. It is the object of my paper to show you some furnaces that I have recently invented, which are designed to obviate these difficulties. Before, however, I describe the furnaces, it seems desirable that I should briefly describe the various furnaces that are at present in use and the fuels employed in them. In the middle ages the monks used muffle furnaces for burning in the colours and lines on painted windows and for jewellery work. Thus the Monk Theophilus in his most interesting and accurate work on glass and metal work, written about the 11th century, describes a clay furnace. (See Book II., chapters xxii. and xxiii.) "Take flexible rods, fixing them in the earth in an angle of the house at both ends equally in the form of arches, which arches may have the height of a foot and a half, and also a similar breadth and a length of a little more than two feet. You will then beat up clay strongly with water and horse litter, so that three parts may be clay and a fourth dung. With which, being well beaten together, you will mix dry hay, making of it long flat pieces, and you will cover the arch of rods, inside and outside, to the thickness of a fist, and in the middle above you leave a round opening through which you can put your hand; make for yourself also three iron bars of the thickness of a finger, and of such length that they may traverse the breadth of the furnace, in which, on both sides, make three holes, so that you can place and withdraw them when you wish. Then place fire and wood in the furnace until it is dried." "In the meantime make an iron tablet for yourself of the size of the furnace inside, two fingers in length and two in breadth excepted, upon which you will sift quick-'im, or (wood) ashes, the thickness of a straw, and (arrange them) with a flat piece of wood that they may lie firmly. The same tablet will have an iron handle by which it can be carried and placed and withdrawn. Lay the painted glass carefully upon it, joined together so that on the outer part, towards the handle, you place the green and sapphire, and on the inner the white, yellow, and purple, which is the most resisting against the fire, and thus, the bars being put in, place the tablet upon them. Then take beech wood, well dried in the smoke, and light a small fire in the furnace, afterwards larger, with great precaution, until you see the flame rise at the back and on both sides between the furnace and the tablet, and by passing over the glass cover it, as if in lick. ing it, until at length it glows; immediately with. drawing the wood, carefully close the mouth of the furnace and the upper opening through which the smoke escaped, until it cool by itself. The lime and ashes upon the tablet are useful for this, to preserve the glass, that it may not be broken upon the bare (iron) by the heat. The glass being taken out, assay if you can scrape off the colour with your nail; if not, it is sufficient for it, but if you can, replace it again. All the pieces being burnt in this manner, relay each in its place upon the table; then found the rods from pure lead in this manner."... The muffle they used generally consisted of a large iron shovel on which the work was laid. and which was covered over with a cupshaped cover with small holes in it. (Book III., ch. liv.). "That which remains over, replace in its small cup and cover it, and do this with each colour until one piece is filled: taking away the wax, to which it had adhered, place this piece upon a thin iron, which may have a short handle, and cover it with another iron which is hollow like a cup, and let it be perforated: finely all over, so that the holes may be inside flat and wide, and outside finer and rough, in order to stop the cinders if by chance they should fall upon it; this iron may also have a small ring above, in the middle, by which it may be superposed and taken off. Which being done, arrange large and long coals, making them very hot, among which you make a space, and equalise with a wooden mallet, into which the iron is raised by the handle with the pincers, so that when covered you will place it carefully and arrange the coals round and above it everywhere, and taking the bellows with both hands you will blow on every side until the coals glow equally. You have also a wing of a goose, or other large bird, which is extended and tied to wood, with which you will wave and fan strongly all over it, until you perceive between the coals that the holes of the iron quite glow inside, and thus you will cease to fan. Waiting then about half an hour you uncover by degrees until you remove all the coals. and you will again wait until the holes of the iron grow black inside, and so raising the iron by the |