who were advocates of oil. Winsor's calculations
of profit were extravagant, his theories
ludicrous and impracticable, his exaggerations
manifest, his truthfulness not always too palpable.
He surrounded himself with low drunken clerks
and ignorant smiths and tinkers, who could not,
and would not, do their work well. The gas he
distilled was impure, and its pungent smell
annoyed and deterred his audience. The man
whom he employed to lecture used to be often
missing, till all the spectators had left the
Lyceum in disappointment and disgust. The
following will give a specimen of the manner
in which Winsor met all objections— many of
them stupid and ignorant. It is taken from
one of his pamphlets:

Q. Will your plan not hurt our fisheries, oil
and tallow trade, &c., nurseries of seamen, &c.?

A. No; they must increase by it, because,
from saving so many new products at home, we
increase our exportations; we can afford to
undersell in every foreign market all we gain at
home from worse than nothing, from miserable
smoke. We can employ hundreds of more
vessels, and thousands of more seamen, for the
benefit of our nurseries.

Q. What will become of our tallow-chandlers,
our oilmen, our wick and snuffer makers, &c.?

A. They may all work for exportation; that
is, become either exporters themselves, or sell
to merchants who export in general.
Thousands of chests, containing twenty to a hundred
dozen of indifferent candles, are annually sent
from Russia all the world over. I trust
England may command the foreign markets with
superior candles at a cheaper rate.

Q. But the lamp-lighters and chimney-
sweepers?

A. The former will light clearer lamps in a
cleaner dress, and no longer annoy the street
passengers with the smoke and dirt of train oil.
As for the poor chimney-sweepers, I hope they
will get a more Christian-like employment.

Q. Your tubes— will they not be very
expensive?

A. They will not be half the expense of
water-tubes, nor need they be all laid under
ground; but may, in part, be carried along the
basements of the lirst floors.

Q. Mischievous people will destroy them?

A. The same law which protects our windows
and street lamps will protect our light-tubes.

Q. Will not the tubes burst, and be often
out of repair?

A. This gas cannot possibly burst any tube,
because it is above a thousand limes lighter
than water. It is elastic and compressible to
the highest degree, and has no affinity either to
steam or water. The pressure of water arises
from its gravity, that of steam from sudden
condensation, neither of which can in the least
affect the nature of the cold and subtle fluid of
gas. The hardest frost will never hurt it.

In the mean time contemporaneous and more
genuine discoverers were also working. In
1802, Mr. (afterwards Dr.) Henry, lecturer at
Manchester, explained how gas was produced,
and, ignoring the noisy foreigner, exhibited gas
burning in an Argand lamp, on Mr. Murdoch's
plan. He succeeded in obtaining gas from
wood, peat, oil, and wax as easily as from coal,
and made numerous careful experiments as to
the relative value of coal as a light-producing
power. He also especially studied the various
means by which it could best be purified. In
1806, Mr. Josiah Pemberton, an intelligent and
ingenious man, exhibited various forms of gas-
lights in front of his manufactory at Birmingham,
and was the first to construct gas stoves
for the soldering required in the button
factories; the toy factories also soon learned the
value of the new power. This useful man
made no secret of his inventions, and the artful
effrontery and calculating selfishness of meaner
men benefited by his frankness. It is reported
that Mr. Cook, a toy manufacturer, to whom
he had sold a stove, received, in 1810, a silver
medal for its discovery. The race of Cooks has
not by any means died out.

In 1807 (August 16), a few gentlemen,
including the politically celebrated Alderman
Wood, a public-spirited man, however fond of
display, lit with gas the Golden-lane Brewery,
and a part of Beech-street and Whitecross-
street. The progress of even the rudest street
lighting had not been rapid in London. In
1417 (Henry the Fifth), Sir Henry Barton,
mayor of London, required every citizen to hang
out a lantern after dark from Hallowtide to
Candlemas. Paris was not lighted till 1524;
(Henry the Eighth). In 1690 (William the
Third), a special order was issued in London
for citizens to hang out lanterns or lamps from
Michaelmas to Christmas. In 1716 (George
the First), housekeepers were again enjoined
by an act of the Common Council to hang out
lights every dark night from six to eleven
o'clock, under pain of a penalty of one shilling.
In 1736 (George the Second), the City applied
to parliament for an act to enable them to erect
street lamps; and in 1744, the year before
Culloden, they obtained further powers for
lighting the City. The admirable way in which
they complacently performed their civilising
task may be seen in Hogarth's picture of the
Arrest of the Rake in St. James's-street— a
slovenly, ragged, tipsy-looking lad is on an
awkward ladder, carelessly filling a clumsy street-
lamp with fish-oil, which he is ruthlessly slopping
over on the richly powdered head of a
dandy beneath. As early as 1733 the vigorous
town of Birmingham was lit by street-lamps,
while London, less progressive and more
conservative, remained three years later wilfully
shutting her eyes to the necessity.

In the mean time, ignorant, impudent, but
energetic Winsor went on confident of success,
gradually teaching himself the secrets of his own
subject. January 28, 1807, the strenuous German
removed his exhibition to Pall-Mall, and
there lighted up a part of the street, to the
astonishment of the dandies. Gas was sneered at
as offensive, dangerous, expensive, and
unmanageable. Winsor was the butt of the day, but