Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 4.djvu/824

 810 VEDEIUL EEPOKTER. �in furnaces for roasting ores, and more particularly for ex- tracting the volatile portions of ores, from which it is only desired to save the fumes, sueh as cinnabar or quicksilver- yielding orea, and also for improvements in the condensers, whereby the metallic or other sulphurous vapors are rapidly and elÏ3ctually refrigerated without actual contact with water. The specifications describe minutely the improvements, and are accompanied with drawings illustrating the construc- tion of a furnace with them. The principal feature of the improvements consists in placing the fire-place on the side of the body of the furnace several feet from its bottom, sepa- rated from the chamber in whioh the ores are deposited by grate bars called a pigeon-hole partition, and having on the opposite side of the chamber, a little higher up than the fire- place, a discharge or draft opening faced with a similar pigeon- hole partition, though of greater capacity than the gratings of the fire-place. A cross draft is thus produced, subjectint; the ores, as is said, to a greater beat than if the draft were vertical, and the fumes passed out at or near the top of the furnace. Another feature of the improvements consists in the graduai contraction in width of the furnace towards the bottom, with an incline which conveys the refuse ore to a floor, from which it can be readily removed by hand or machinery. A third feature of the improvements consists in having a small door at the upper end of the furnace, through which the ore is passed into the chamber; and, if the chamber is kept filled, the ore will constantly settle towards the bottom, and aa it passes between the fire-place and draft opening be thoroughly roasted, and the vapors carried off through the draft opening and down a vertical pipe into the condenser. The specifications also describe an alleged im- provement in the condenser; but, as this improvement was not pressed on the argument, it need not be further noticed. The claims made upon these improvements, omitting the one in relation to the condenser, are : (1) Placing the fire- place and draft opening on opposite sides of the body of the furnace, so as to draw the heat through the passing ore, sub- atantially as described. [^) Contracting the chamber at the ����