Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 4.djvu/90

 76 FEDEBAIi EEPOETEB. - • �pipes ; would regulate the flow to the spigots and hy- drants. Where it had to be supplied by pumps the irregu- larity in the amount drawn at the spigots and hydrants ■Would not admit of a uniform supply to the mains, and if pumps were employed furnishing such a supply the incom- pressibility of water is such that when the drawing ceased the pipes would burst, or the pumps or machinery be broken. �The plaintiff's inventions obviated these difficulties bypro- viding pumping machinery which increasing pressure of ■water in -the mains -sv'ould slacken and decreasing pressure ■would ha,sten, and guarding against sudden shocks from the quick closing of hydrants by the use of an air chamber Con- necting yfith the mains and preventing the danger of eontin- ued pressure from that source, while the machinery was slack- ening by a peouliarly-arranged relief valve, applied to the mains so that t"^e ■svater could be pumped directly into the mains, and drawn therefrom by the spigots and hydrants at pleasure, with safety to the works, without any stand-pipe or reservoir, None of the Systems set up as anticipations had these contrivances combined in this mahner. The IvOndon \Vater--tvorks, constructed by Peter Maurice in 1582, asde- scribed by Thomas Ewbank in Hydraulics and Mechanics ; ihe System of ■water-'v/orks described in the English patent to Joseph Bramah, dated October 31, 1813; and the London bridge -water-works, described by William Mathevrs in Hy- draulia, 1835, — had pumps forcing -water directly into mains to be carried to iuhabitants, but neither of them had any eontrivances for slackening the quantity forced as any pres- sure increased from diminishing the quantity dra-wn as de- scribed; neither does it appear from the descriptions given, but that the water flo-wed through by a constant aow, and was caught as wanted for use, �Birkinbine's System, at the state lunatic hospital at Har- risburg, Pennsylvania, had connection with a reservoir at the top of the building. Linsley's System, at Burlington, Ver- mont, had connection with a reservoir above the city. Bir- kinbîne had no means for regulating the quantity pumped by ����