NEW ELECTRIC LIGHT. (From the European Times.)

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XVII, Issue 1350, 16 November 1860, Page 3

NEW ELECTRIC LIGHT. (From the European Times.)

Some exceedingly interesting experiments took place on Tuesday evening, tde 31st July, oft Osborne house, the beautiful marine residence of her Majesty, in the Isle of Wight, and also in Cowes-ioads, with Piofessor Way's electric light, and which we believe are pieliminaiy to moie impoitant experiments about to be carried out by the Government. The principle of the light is simply the application of electricity to a column or running stream of quicksilvei — in this instance as fine as the point of a lady's needle. So long as the voltaic battery retains powei to act with its wires upon this column so long must the light bum — the stiongest and piuest light in the known woild, and the neaiest approach to sunlight that the skill of the chymist and men of science have yet pioduced, and this without actual combustion taking place or the quantity of the mercury being reduced, the supply of acids to the bat tery being its sole expense after its first cost, excepting wear and tear. The professor with his appai atus left Portsmouth haibour in a steamer shortly before dark on Tuesday evening, and steered direct for Cowes. On the sponson of the Rteamer was placed the batteiy. Abaft the foremast hung one of the professor's simple apparatuses as a mast-liead liglit On a mirveable circular platform placed on the vessel's after-hatch a similar apparatus to the one hung up aloft stood, to which was attached a lens, but both of them as yet unlit. The apparatus is of the simplest possible foim, consisting merely of an oval-shaped pair of tubes connected at each end, a round hollow globe about the size of an orange, in which is placed the mercury. The mercury runs from a point to a cup in the centie, enclosed within a glass tube, and here the subtle liquid is heated to a white heat, as it flows in a fine stieam fiom the upper ball into the cup, and thence into the lower one, thus pioducing an indestructible wick. The wires which connect the battery with the apparatus were made by Messrs. Silver, and are, perhaps, the most perfect of their kind yet constructed. These wiies are coated with silver, entlosed in India rubber, and have an outside coating of braid hemp, the whole pliable as common packthread: To look at the light, with a view to a close inspection of the cup, with the naked eye. would be about as useless as to look at the sun at noonday. A pair of coloured glasses, however, show that this light, which can only be compared te the sun for its brilliancy and power, is only of the same chcumfeience as the cup itself — the size of a threepenny silver piece, and of little more diameter. Midway between the aftermost light and the voltaic battery is a brass standaid a few inches high, with which the wires are connected, and by pressing a button on the top of this,- simple as the key of a piano, the light can bo given in flashes of as long or as short a duration as the operator pleases. This is, however, more beantifully and coirectly cairied out by a small instrument of- Mr. Way's. It consists of a piece of clockwork, having * n f ron * a 1 evolving disc, the face of which is coveied with numerous holes with pins to fit in as may be required. In front of the disc are two small cylinders with pistons and arms attached. As the disc revoives the pins in its face lift the pistons in the cylinders and cut off the connexion between the battery and the lighting apparatus, producing flashes of light of any duration that may be required, with their accompanying intervals of darkness, and admirably adapted for a revolving light, or as a code of signals for night service. In fact, there would appear to be no limit to the uses to which this discovery may be applied, and so simple is it in its manipulation that the choicest music of the great masters may be henceforth accompanied by expressive flashes of electric light. When the steamer arrived off the Motherbank the light aloft was lit by attaching to it tho ends of the wires from the voltaic battery. So soon as the glass tube became sufficient heated to throw off the mercury from its surface the light exhibited its power and beauty, the steamer's usual mast-head light, which was hoisted in its usual position, appearing but a dull red speck alongside it Its effect upon the human countenance was, however, by no means favourable, casting on all on board the steamer a strange unearthly hue. Mauvre colour, as it has become fashionable to term it on the ladies' dresses or bonnets, was biought out by the light with groat brilliancy. On reaching Cowes roads, crowded with yachts, and all displaying lighte, the contiast between the electric light and those shown by the yachts was something wonderful. The electric light was shining in its pulo blue brilliancy aloft, while the hundreds of lights displayed by the yachts and by the town of Cowes, ite club-house and

hotels, dwindled down to dull red specks. The Jens applied to tho after light threw broad pathways of light to and fro as the lens might be directed, bathing the low black hulls of the craft that were in the line of . light with a flood of sunshine, as nlso the delicate tracery of their spara and rigging. A boat which left the steamer here ior one of the yachts was lighted on its way by the lens. On the steamer's return Norrjs ' Castle was passed, and the light thrown on its) picturesque front. Ivy-covered towers, walls, and parapets were illustrated as with a stroke from an enchanter's wand. Off Osborne house the steamer was stopped for some time, and the light must have shown itself with good effect on the still waters of the Solent, in front of the beautiful marine residence of Her Majesty. The experiments, which, as already stated, are only preliminary to more impoitant ones, were considered to have been fully satisfactory. "With a light on this principle under her bows the Great Eastern herself might have lighted her path acioss the waters of the Atlantic.

Thtc National Rifle Association. — Under tho title of " Wimbledon," one of the Swiss competitors at our Volunteer Rifle Match, M. Albert Wessel, of Geneva, has published a compte rendu of the week's proceedings It gives a brief and clearly written history of the contest from a foreigner's point of view ; and some inshuctivo facts and remarks may be gathered from it. The great difference between the Wimbledon match and the Swiss Tirs, local or federal, M. Wessel thinks is this : — The Swiss rifle grounds are schools for practice, open to novices as well as to skilled maiksinen. A chance shot may be the best, and, if lodged in the exact centre of the bullseye, may gain one of the highest prizes of the grand periodical competition. The match at Wimbledon was a contest between picked men of the different corps of volunteers represented. Three things disconcerted the Swiss champions at Wimbledon, — the light Enfield rifle, the long range", and the want of any signal from the markeis for the shots that missed the target. It is important at first to know how they miss; whether they fly over the target, pass on one side of it, or fall shoit. This lack of guidance in an essential point was, M. Wessel states, fatal to the foreigners ; as they were obliged to use a weapon to which" they were unaccustomed, without any previous trial, they lost three shots out of five befoie they could ascertain the right direction. The pool targets, at a shilling a shot, weie open to them, they' admit, but these were at short distances, and weie no help to the eye for the long ranges. The long distances were the Swiss difficulty, increased by the change of weapon. M. Wessel fcays, "We have no experience of these singular matches, in which a target of six square feet becomes a point barely visible;" and thoso who could hit the mark with certainty at 200 yards found they had everything to learn at 1,000. But it is intimated the Whitworth rifles that have gone to Switzerland as prizes will carry their long range with them. The comparison of weapons at Wimbledon is very favourable to the English rifle. For such shoifc dibtances as 200 or 300 yaids the Swiss fusil de chasseur and army rifle aie both good. They aie sine, and the wind has but little effect on the ball. But at the range of 500 and 600 yards, and moie decidedly at 800, 900, and 1000, "the English weapons are iucontestably superior." M. Wessel describes the meritb of the Enfield, the Westley-Eichards, the Lancaster, a«sd the Whitworth with an enthusiasm that almost rises to poetry. But if he has a piefeience where all aie good it is for the two last If the Lancaster is an a? me exti ao> dinaire, the precision of the Whitwoith has quelque chose de merveiHeux. The rules that were won by the Swiss at Wimbledon will be used for the first time at the local Tir to be held at Geneva during the present month. By the side of these acknowledgments of the excellence of our English weapons, there are reiterated expressions of giatitude for the kind reception and friendly treatment the Swiss competitors experienced from all the English authorities with whom they came in contact. It was an agreeable surprise to our visitors to find that they could walk, armed, through the stieets of the metropolis as fieoly as in their own. valleys Altogether the Swiss weie higlily pleased with all they saw, and they hope to return next year with more experience of our "long range" piactice; in that case it is possible the English champions in the late contest may lose a leaf or two of their laurula.