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NEW YORK FIRE DEPARTMENT.

the centre, forming a protection to the head: in We intend to give in successive numbers, front is a stiff piece of leather, in the form of a statistics of the Fire Department in each of our shield, on which the number of the company and arger cities respectively, with illustrations of the initials of the owner are usually painted. The costumes of the firemen, and forms of their frock coat and the pantaloons are made of stout engines, as far as we are able to obtain informa-pilot-cloth, black or brown, under which is worn tion. Among the many inventions of modern a red flannel shirt. Some of the companies have philanthropy, the organization of bands of men leather legs to their pantaloons, or rather, have against the destructive operations of fire, for boots with legs reaching to the knee and attachpublic good, stands conspicuous; and when such ed to the pantaloons. Their whole costume is organization is complete in any city or consider- at once a protection against wet and cold. able town, millions of dollars' worth of property is annually saved from destruction. Hence, information concerning the organization of different departments, may be considered very useful, inasmuch as efficient measures practised by one, may be made known to another, and mutual improvement be the consequence. There is yet a wide field for improvement, and much remains to be done in the invention of preventives, ere the destructive character of conflagrations in our large cities will be changed. We commence with the Fire Department of the city of New York.

The above engraving represents a New York fireman in full costume, and a correct exterior view of a New York engine, with its hose coiled and covered upon the windlass. The cap of the fireman is made of very strong leather; a rim wider back than front; the top covered with stiff projections crossing each other at right angles in

The whole Fire Department is under the direction of a chief engineer, and nine assistant engineers, whose duty it is to be present at all fires, if practicable, and to superintend the general concerns of the Department.

The chief engineer and assistant engineers are nominated by the whole body of firemen to the Common Council for appointment, and hold their offices at the pleasure of the Common Courcil. The candidates for nomination are ballotted for, and the persons receiving the highest number of votes are entitled to a nomination to the Common Council for appointment. The salary of the chief engineer is five hundred dollars (formerly twelve hundred) per annum.

According to the last published report of the chief engineer, (Cornelius V. Anderson,) there are in the city, thirty-five engines in good order, six in indifferent order and five rebuilding; twenty-four hose carriages, with 24,600 feet of

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hose-two carriages building, and one rebuilding; seven hook-and-ladder trucks, forty-one ladders and forty-six hooks; 37,000 feet of hose in good order, and 4,700 feet in ordinary, making in the whole, (including five hundred feet at the new almshouse,) 42,200 feet; one hundred and fifty buckets. There are in the department one hundred and twenty companies, of which twentyseven are not doing duty, twenty of which are hose companies. There are in the department 1758 men, of which two hundred and sixty-nine are not doing duty.

In the upper part of the city, a large reservoir is located, from which water flows in abundance through the principal streets in pipes which, through hydrants supply the hose and engines. This is a great aid, and it is believed that when the Croton water works are finished, such will be the abundance of water, that fires will become as infrequent in New York as elsewhere, and that she will lose her name of "City of Fires."

SCIENTIFIC NOTICES.

STRENGTH OF IRON.

THE temperature of maximum strength for cast

iron has been estimated at about three hundred and ninety-eight degrees; but the Committee on the Explosion of Steamboilers, appointed by the Franklin Institute, consider that the maximum for wrought iron is very rapid; at a red heat, or about eight hundred degrees, it is only one-sixth of the maximum; so that in a range of less than five hundred degrees, it loses five-sixths of its strength. As the relative strength of wrought iron at three hundred degrees to eight hundred degrees, is about six to one; therefore, if the temperature of the iron above three hundred degrees increase, in an arithmetical progression, whose rate is one hundred degrees, the relative strength will decrease in an arithmetical progression, whose ratio is one.

NEW MICROSCOPIC APPARATUS.

M. Dujardin has invented an apparatus in which, by means of achromatic lenses, fixed in a tube at the foot of the instrument, the illuminating light appears to issue from the objects themselves, and thus avoids the effects of diffraction, which often gives to small lines a false diameter. A greater clearness is thus given to objects and a permission to an indefinite augmentation of the light.

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PHILADELPHIA FIRE DEPARTMENT.

tion being connected with brass swivel screws FROM a full description of the Fairmount water-There are two thousand five hundred and ninetyworks, and of the organization of the Fire Department of Philadelphia, we extract the following statistics.

one active firemen in the city and districts, fortythree thousand nine hundred and ninety-one feet of hose, twenty-eight hose companies and twentyseven engine companies. There are one thousand and seven fire plugs, which are distributed as follows:-In the city, five hundred and ten Spring Garden, one hundred and forty-six Northern Liberties, one hundred and forty-three. Southwark, one hundred and twenty-one. Kensington, fifty. Moyamensing, thirty-seven. For the purpose of promoting harmony in the Fire Department, and generally to increase its respect ability and usefulness, the Board of Delegates of the Fire Association of Philadelphia, at a stated meeting on the fourth of March, 1839, proposed the organization of a Board of Control.

The Fire Department is conducted by voluntary associations of citizens, who govern themselves by certain rules and defray the expenses of the purchase and care of the various apparatus, principally from their own funds. The sum of three hundred dollars only, per annum, is appropriated to each company by the corporation of the city, Northern Liberties, Spring Garden and Southwark; two hundred dollars by the corporation of Kensington, and one hundred dollars by that of Moyamensing. The first engine company in Philadelphia was formed in 1732, at the instigation of Dr. Franklin, and since the establishment of the water-works, in 1803, a hose company was In connexion with the Department, there is a formed, principally through the exertions of Rob- Board of Control, consisting of one member erts Vaux and Reuben Haines, Esquires, for the chosen from each company that has adopted the purchase of a hose, and of a carriage to convey suggestion, being forty-seven out of the fifty-five. it to fires; the success of which was such that The controllers assemble upon an alarm of fire there are now twenty-eight carriages of that de-at the first corner north and west of the fire, and scription in the Fire Department. The hose used have the power to settle all disputes or difficul on these carriages is generally made of leather, ties which may occur between any of the comabout two inches and a half in diameter, and panies that acknowledge their jurisdiction. They divided into sections of about fifty feet, each sec- are elected for one year. The government of

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the Board is vested in a President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer and ten directors, chosen annually in August. It is the duty of the Board to superintend and direct the opera

tions of the controllers in times of fire.

There is also in connexion (in interest at least) with the Fire Department, an association for the

on the first conviction, a small hole was bored in the upper shell, and a cord of two or three yards in length was attached to it, and he tethered out in a convenient place a few rods distant from the vegetables, and marked on his breast-plate "S. H. W. 1828." The next day it was discovered that he had made his escape, having gnawed off his "tether string." A few days after this he was again detected in the same place of his forrelief of disabled firemen. This association was mer trespass, and to secure him from further deporganized in November 1834, and incorporated redations, a small ring of iron wire was linked March 1835. Its object is to afford pecuniary into the hole of the shell, a more substantial cord relief to firemen who are disabled or injured by attached to it, and the prisoner again placed upon attendance at fires, and also to afford assistance, his tether. This, however, proved insufficient for his safe-keeping. The new cord was soon severat the option of the Board of Trustees, to persons ed, and the vagrant carrying off with him his iron not firemen, who may be disabled by fire appara-ring and a small part of the cord, made his estus. All firemen are eligible to membership, by paying one dollar per annum. The payment of ten dollars, constitutes a person a member; and citizens not members of the Fire Department, may become life-members by paying the treas-was found guilty, the number of peapods, cucumurer twenty dollars. The government of the association is vested in a Board of twenty-one Trustees, chosen annually on the first Monday of January, by the members of the association. Several of the best physicians of the city have kindly volunteered their services gratuitously for the association, and thus it is made an insti-ed a commutation of his punishment from death tution of a truly benevolent character.

cape.

In June, 1829, "Monsieur Tonson came again!" and was detected in his old line of business. A trial for his crimes was instituted, the evidence against him was too clear to admit of doubt; he

bers, and melons, of different kinds, which he had champed and ruined, was ascertained as nearly as cipally of the females of the family, sentenced might be, whereupon the court, consisting prinhim to be immediately put to death by decapitation. But the poor convict had one friend in the court that exerted his influence, and finally obtain

to transportation, without limit of time. Pursuant to this order, he was conveyed to a small pond, about a quarter of a mile from the garden, the scene of his transgressions; but not pleased with his accommodations among frogs and other creeping things, soon found his way back to his old friends and their garden. He was then carried nearly half a mile in an opposite direction, and

Our engraving represents the external appearance of their engines, and a Philadelphia fireman in full costume. The hat of the fireman is made of stiff leather, his coat and pantaloons of pilot, or oil cloth, and over his shoulders is worn an oil-cloth cape, which is of material use in protect-thrown into a small muddy brook, environed with ing his whole person from water.

EVERY time you fail to perform a promise, you injure your character for truth; every time you do an unkind act, you harden your heart; and every time you fail to do what conscience dictates, you say to the monitor, which God placed within to warn you, "Hush, I want not your warning," and soon she will withdraw and leave you to slumber, unreproved, till the last trumpet shall call you forth to judgment.

SACRIFICE OF A LAND TORTOISE.

SOMETIME in June, 1828, an animal known by that name was found in my garden, in the act of treating himself to green peas and cucumbers, among which he had feasted several days, but the trespass had been attributed to the hens and chickens. Being unwilling to put him to death

bogs and sedge-grass. In June, 1832, who should appear but our old visiter again, with his marks and iron ring! What should now be done? The majority of the court denounced him as an outlaw, and utterly beyond the reach of mercy. His friend and advocate, however, urged in behalf of the convict that the sentence of transportation that if a convenient opportunity should offer, he was without limit of time, and assured the court would send him next to Botany Bay; but if not, he would pledge himself to carry him to a place

distant that little fear could be entertained of his returning to his old haunts. Upon these terms a respite was obtained, and his sponser caused him to be transported to Suffield, and there left in a grass-field a little north of the meetinghouse. In June, '33, we had another family visit from our old acquaintance. I wrapped him up in a piece of old carpet, so that he could have no means of noticing objects, carried him to Poquonoc, and threw him into a small stream in an alder-swamp near Rainbow Mills. But "true as the needle to the pole," he renewed his visit in 1835; and this summer (1838) he obliged us with another call, and I suppose is yet in my garden. He appears in fine health, plump and lusty, but has no discernible increase in size. SAMUEL WOODRUFF. Hartford Courant.

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scene which is now more humbly commemorated in the manner that the annexed engraving represents. The inscriptions on the stone are as follows:

ON THE NORTH.

Treaty Ground of William Penn

and the Indian natives, 1682.
Unbroken faith.

ON THE SOUTH.

William Penn,

Born 1644.
Died 1718.

ON THE WEST.

Placed by the Penn Society,

A. D. 1827, to mark the site of the great Elm-Tree.

ON THE EAST.

Pennsylvania founded. 1681,

By Deeds of Peace.

DISCOVERIES IN EARLY AGE.

THIS Compact, which for its justice and benevoLence, has conferred immortal honour upon the founder of Pennsylvania, was made under the widespreading branches of an elm-tree, that stood upon the bank of the Delaware at Shackamaxon. The stately tree was uprooted by a storm in 1810, when the trunk measured twenty-four feet in circumference, and its age was ascertained to be two hundred and eighty years, having been one hundred and fifty years old at the time the treaty took place. It was held in the highest veneration by the Indian nations, by the first settlers, and by their descendants. During the revEVEN in science the greatest discoveries have Sir Isaac Newton was olutionary war, in 1775, when the British army had been made at an early age. possession of the district of country within Kingston not twenty when he saw the apple fall to the ground. bay, and when firewood was very scarce, General Harvey, I believe, discovered the circulation of the Simcoe who had command of the troops there, from blood at eighteen. Berkeley was only six-and-twena regard which he entertained for the character of ty when he published his Essay on Vision. HartWilliam Penn, and the interest which he took in the ley's great principle was developed in an inaugural history connected with the tree, ordered a guard of dissertation at college. Hume wrote his "Treatise on Human Nature" while he was yet quite a young British soldiers to protect it from the axe. Many Hobbes put forth his metaphysical system curious recollections belong to this venerated spot, and some of these are noticed in a memoir concern- very soon after he quitted the service of Lord Bacon. ing the treaty, which may be seen by reference to I believe also that Galileo, Leibnitz, and Eulep comthe transactions of the Historical Society of Penn-menced their career of discovery quite young, and I sylvania, carefully prepared by Mr. Roberts Vaux, think it is only then, before the mind becomes set in whose correspondence with the late Judge Peters, its own opinions or the dogmas of others, that it can Mrs. Deborah Logan, and the Rev. Dr. Collin, relating have vigour or elasticity to throw off the load of to the traditionary account of the treaty, was the prejudice, and seize on new and extensive combinations of things. means of bringing out much other instructive and entertaining matter worthy of perusal and preservation. The Penn Society, in order to preserve a knowledge of the spot where the elm-tree stood, have caused a simple block of marble to be placed there, in the expectation, at some future day, of erecting a monument, altogether worthy of the event, and the

man.

LONGEVITY.

In the year 1827, there died in Russia 947 persons above a hundred years old, 202 above 110,98 above 115, 52 above 120, 21 above 125, and one above 135.

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