SPECIAL REPORT OF MR. HILL, ON MACHINERY. 427
It is a question how far tools of this class will gain in productive power, through increased weight and accuracy of workmanship, hut the writer cannot doubt that there is a demand for something of each, much beyond the average of ouu New England wood-working machinery.
Beyond the American department there was in this department little of interest, except in the English; and those machines which were the best in their design and arrangement, fire by a firm who are said to have had a leading American manufacturer as superintendent. The machinery was solid and heavy, and contained nothing of value which cannot be found in abetter form in, for instance, the productions of Richards, London & Kelley, of Philadelphia. A few special machines were shown, adapted to the continental market, for making parquetry floors. These consisted of a hand-matcher with a vertical spindle, the work carried by the cutter on a horizontal sliding table, and of a surfacing machine, which is simply a lathe with a large face-plate.
Perm’s band-saws attracted attention among a collection of otherwise inferior wood-working machinery in the French department. Some of these were very heavy, and adapted with side rollers for re-sawing lumber. Beyond the French there was nothing of value in wood-working machinery in the Exposition.
In reviewing the whole subject it may be said, of the matter °f steam-engineering, that the questions of steam-jacketing and compounding should receive careful attention on the part of our engineers, but that many crude and unsuccessful experiments have been made in the United States which have failed from imperfect understanding of the conditions of success, and the subject should be approached through a thorough study of the work and the publications of the English engineers. And the writer does not doubt that, when the principles at the bottom of the system are here w r ell understood, the ingenuity of our people will suggest many improvements over present forms.
In iron, and especially in wood-work in machinery, although °ur machines are most admirable for ingenuity and convenience, there is need of a more thorough study of the work °t outside manufacturers on the part of our makers. Massa-