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known to happen from this manner of keeping coals since it was first used, which was about the year 1681. But some persons took it into their heads, that coal thus exposed to the weather lost some of its quality, and that it would be better to keep it under cover.

While they were deliberating upon the form of the new magazine, somebody remarked that it would be proper to leave a considerable space between the top of the coals and the roof of the building in which they were to be kept, that there might be sufficient room for fresh air; because it fre quently happened, that this coal took fire when shut close down in the hold of the vessels that brought it, if the voyage happened to be longer than usual, or the weather so bad that they could not open the scuttles: this opinion, however, was not regarded; the new magazine was built very close and compact, and covered in at the top: it was divided into two equal parts, within, by a wall; one division being called the Magazine, No. I. and the other the Maga zine, No. II.

No. I. was filled quite to the top, and contained about twelve hundred chaldron: in a very short time afterwards it took fire, which was perceived by the smoke that came out at the chinks of the door. As soon as the door was opened, the smoke burst out in great black clouds, and the labourers, who had been ordered to get the coal out, were obliged to throw great quantities of water upon it, before they could begin to work.

'They found a rafter of deal, which was within the building near the door, half burnt; and a beam which the coal touched, in the same condition; they had not flamed, but were burnt quite through to a cinder: the coals that lay on the top of the heap were only warmed by the smoke that had passed through them, but those in the middle had lost their inflammability, and were reduced to a kind of calx; and near the bottom they had suffered no injury, nor even contracted the least heat. About half the coals were then taken out of this magazine; the good were separated from the damaged, and part of them put back again, and the rest put into the other magazine.

It was now a second time proposed to give the magazines air; and it was urged, that though the coal should not again take fire, yet it would probably grow hot, and lose part of its quality; but the magazine was already built, and they thought all accidents would be effectually prevented, by not filling the magazine to the top; but a great quantity of coals arriving soon after in the port, and not daring to lay

them up in the magazine that had once taken fire already, they yet foolishly filled the other magazine with it quite to the top, without considering that this magazine was then in the same circumstances as those which had caused the accident that happened to the other; the consequence was, that this magazine also in a very short time took fire, and would have done the same damage if it had not been sooner discovered; the top of the heap being hot, the middle in part consumed, and the bottom unaltered. Add to this account another most remarkable instance of the same kind.

The sail cloth generally used in France, is made of coarse hempen thread; after it is woven, it is wetted, and shrunk, as we do our drab cloth, and is then painted on one side only, with red ochre ground with oil.*

On the 18th of July, 1757, the workmen had painted about fourscore yards of this cloth; and the weather being very hot, the sun dried it very soon: on the 20th, about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, the weather changed, and a sudden storm of thunder and rain being expected, the sail-cloth which had been thus milled and painted, was very hastily folded up while it was yet very hot by having lain exposed to the sun, the folds being so managed that the painted side did not come in contact with the other, but with itself only; the folds were pressed very close, that the cloth might lie in the least compass possible, and it was then put up in bales, and deposited, one upon another, in the warehouse, upon a kind of iron grating, the squares of which were about three inches wide, and which was about a foot from the ground: this warehouse is level with the ground, but floored; and it is the custom to place a kind of brasiers, or close chafing dishes of lighted small coal-dust under the grating, to keep the cloth that lies in bales over it perfectly dry, lest being moist in the middle, it should rot; and the warehouse is every night close shut up.

On the 22d, about four in the evening, one of the workmen having been lying some time upon these bales, found

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The experiment frequently repeated at St. John's Gate, by mixing a brown earth, found in the mines in Derbyshire, with linseed oil, is worth noting upon this occasion: the result was, that, upon grinding the two bodies together, upon a stone, the whole mass took fire and burnt with a most intense heat till the oil was consumed, and nothing but the dry earth remained. May not other earthy substances so mixed, produce the same effect? It was by grinding this earth with oil to make a paint, that its inflam mable quality was discovered.

them very hot, and putting his hand into one of them between the plaits, it burnt him. The supervisor being immediately acquainted with this accident, caused the bales to be brought out into the air, and upon opening them they sent out a thick smoke: some pretended that they saw a flame, but it is probable that they saw only the sun's rays reflected from the smoke.

It was at first suspected that these bales had been set on fire; the grating was therefore taken up; but after the strictest search, no appearance of fire was found, and it appeared that the suspicion was wholly groundless upon a farther inspection of the bales, for the fire had manifestly begun in the centre of each bale, the outward parts of them having received no injury: the plaits that had been pressed closest by the cord were most damaged, being burnt to a cinder, so as to crumble between the fingers.

Some of the old workmen declared, that the same thing had happened many years ago; but that, conceiving it impossible for the bales to take fire of themselves, they had concealed the accident, for fear of being taxed with negli gence, and punished accordingly.

That hay, put up wet, will take fire, is well known to our farmers; and many fires have happened by rain falling on unslacked lime.

1763, Jan.

XXXIII. On the prodigious Growth of Trees.

THERE are giants in the vegetable, as well as the animal kingdom. For proof of which, I shall here recite what I have observed in my reading, concerning monstrous trees, that have deserved the particular notice of travellers and natural

ists.

Thevenot, in his Travels, A.D. 1656, Part I. Chap. 71, tells us, that in the island of Coos, which the Turks call Stranchio, and Lango, or Isola Longa, there is a tree of such a vast extent, that it can easily cover two thousand men, and that the branches of it are supported by several stone and wooden pillars, there being under it several barbers' shops, coffee-houses, and such like, with many benches to sit on. This tree is like a sycamore, but the fruit it bears is like a chesnut, and serves for tanning of leather.

Dr. Plot, in his History of Staffordshire, Chap. vi. says, that there was, A. D. 1686, an apple tree within the moat at the parsonage house at Leigh, in that county, that spread about 54 yards in circumference, which allowing four square feet for a man, would shelter 500 foot men under its branches. This, indeed, is but small in comparison of the tree abovementioned by Thevenot, provided he was exact in the measuring of it, and observed the same proportion for the standing of his men; but it is an amazing growth for an apple

tree.

A pearmain, in New England, at a foot from the ground, measured ten feet and four inches round, and it bore one year 38 bushels. See Eames's Abridg. Phil. Trans. Part II. p. 342.

The dimensions, likewise, of the Witch-Elm that grew at Field, in Staffordshire, are really wonderful; of which Dr. Plot, in the aforesaid history of that county, in the 6th chapter, gives us the following particulars: 1. That it fell 120 feet 40 yards in length. 2. That the stool, or butend, was 5 yards and 2 feet in diameter, and 17 yards in circumference. 3. That it was 8 yards 18 inches, or 25 feet and a half about by girth measure in the middle. 4. That it contained 100 ton at least of neat timber; but, as far as I can inform myself, Fir-trees grow the highest of any; for we are told, that in the Canton of Bern, in Switzerland, there are some above 76 yards high. I have not read nor heard of any other trees, or in any other place, that really equal these in tallness.

Pliny says, in his Nat. Hist. lib. vi. c. 32. that in the Fortunate Islands, (now called the Canaries) there are trees that grow to the height of 144 feet. But he does not tell us what kind of trees they are; yet, in another place, viz. Nat. Hist. lib. xvi. c. 39. he says that the Larch-tree and Fir-tree grow to be the tallest and straightest of all trees. What he mentions in the next chapter of trees, so thick that they require three or four men to grasp them, is a very indeterminate way of speaking, neither can we easily credit what he reports of the German pirates, that they used boats made hollow out of one single tree, that would each of them hold thirty men; at least, we must conceive them to be made out of trees of a prodigious trunk. It also appears by this, that canoes were in use in the northern climates long before America was discovered. There seems likewise a little too much of the marvellous, where he informs us (Nat. Hist. lib. vii. ch. 2.) that in India there are trees of such a height, that a man cannot shoot an arrow to the top of them; and

that a troop of horse may be ranged under one of their Fig

trees.

But let us come nearer home, and we may find trees that are really wonderful, without any exaggeration. In Mr. J. Ray's Life, by Dr. Derham, published by George Scott, F. R. S. we have the following remarkable paragraph:Octob. 14, 1669, (says he) we rode to see the famous firtrees, some two miles and a half distant from Newport, in a village called Wareton, in Shropshire, in the land of Mr. Skrimshaw. There are of them 35 in number, very tall and straight, without any boughs till towards the top. The greatest, which seems to be the mother of the rest, we found by measure to be fourteen feet and a half round the body, and they say 56 yards high, which to me seemed not incredible.

At Torworth, (alias Tamworth) in Gloucestershire, there is a chesnut-tree, which, in all probability, is the oldest, if not the largest in England, being 52 feet round. This tree is said to have stood there ever since the reign of King Stephen, A.D. 1150.

Keysler, in his Travels, Vol. IV. p 459, tells us, that there is a Hazel-tree to be seen (A.D. 1731) in Mr. Hassel's garden, in the city of Frankfort, of which their annals make mention above 200 years ago. The lower part of its trunk is seven Frankfort ells* in circumference; its height is equal to that of the houses near it, and it still bears nuts every year, but the tree now begins to decay.

1763, Aug.

Yours,

W. MASSEY.

XXXIV. On Archbishop Secker's Death, and the brittleness of Human Bones in Frosts.

MR. URBAN,

ACCORDING to the excellent memoirs you have given us of Abp. Secker, in your last number, a very extraordinary accident befel him but a few days before he died. The account goes thus, that as he was turning himself on his couch, he broke his thigh bone. It was immediately set, but it

* A Frankfort ell is about 2 feet 3 inches

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