On the magnetic characters and relations of oxygen and nitrogen / Professor Faraday.
- Michael Faraday
- Date:
- 1851
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: On the magnetic characters and relations of oxygen and nitrogen / Professor Faraday. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![England]—an Ingot (weighing 324 oz.) and a cup of chemically pure Palladium [by Mr. G. Matthey]—Specimens of Printing in Colours, by Wood-blocks and Lithography [by Messrs. C. and G. Leighton]— Henley’s Magneto-Electric Telegraph, &c. &c. WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, Friday, January 31. W. Pole, Esq. F.R.S. Vice President, Treasurer, in the Chair. Professor Brande On Peat and its Products. Referring with commendation to an article entitled “The Irish California” in Dickens’s Household Words, No.41,p. 348, Professor Brande disclaimed any purpose of predicting the result of the great enterprize which is described in that able paper. He proposed to confine himself to a statement of what had been done, and what was doing, to make the products of peat commercially valuable. A peat bog was described as a superficial stratum of vegetable matter, which at different depths is undergoing, or has undergone, various stages of change and decomposition. Its superficial appear- ance is that of a mass of half-decayed mosses, rushes, heath, and grass; the roots having successively died away, though the plants continued to vegetate. The mass is ligneous, and imbued with humus and humic acid, among other products of slow decay ; and the abun- dance of moisture pervading the bog affects the character at once of the peat and of the district. The upper layers of the bog are usually loose and fibrous, and of a pale brown colour. Beneath the surface the density is found to increase, sometimes to a great extent. At last, the distinctive characters of the vegetables cease to be discernible, and the mass appears nearly homogeneous, and of a dark brown, or blackish colour. Trunks of trees, and some curious geological phenomena, occasionally present themselves. A peat district may be regarded therefore as the consolidated produce of enormous forests and fields of vegetation, amounting in the aggregate to millions of acres. In Ireland alone Tyth of the surface is covered by peat bog, which if removed would exhibit a soil fit for the operations of agriculture. Professor Brande then invited attention to different samples of peat taken from the upper, middle, and lower portions of the bog. He particularly noticed the tallow peat of the banks of Lough Neagh, which, from the brilliant flame attending its combustion, is sometimes used as a source of light as well as of heat. Peat may be rendered valuable, either 1. From the charcoal which may be obtained from it; — or](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22376975_0006.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
