A SALAMANDER.

Waipawa Mail, Volume I, Issue 12, 23 October 1878, Page 3

A SALAMANDER.

Some time ago an experiment was carried out at Rue Rivoli, Paris, in the pr. - seuce of upwards of 200 people, to ascertain the degree of heat it is possib’e for a man to endure. A large dome- j shaped oven was heated by a very powerful fire for four hours. At ten minutes I past eight a Spaniard of Andalusia, named j Martinez, aged 43, went into this oven, j wearing large pantaloons of red flannel—a bail conductor of heat—a thick cloak of the same material, and a broad-brimmed quilted felt hat. Therein he remained, seated on a footstopol, fourteen minutes exposed to the heat of from 40 to 50 deg. of the metallic thermometer, the gradation of which only ascended to 50 deg. He sang a Spanish song while a fowl roasted by his side. On coming out of the over, his pulse heat 134 pulsations per minute ; before entering it heat 72. In the second experiment he ate the fowl when it was sufficiently roasted, and drank a bottle of wine to the spectators. On coming out from his longer stay in the oven his pulse heat 175, and the thermometer indicated a heat of 110 degs. of R- aimer. immediately after, for a third experiment, he was stretched on a plank surrounded with lighted candles and thrust in tiie oven, the door of which was closed. ll<* was there nearly five minutes, when there was a erv “ Enough, enough, take him out.” On opening the oven doors, a noxious and suffocating vapour had filled the oven, and the candles were all melted away. The Spaniard, whose pulse beat 200, immediately precipitated himself into a cold hath, and in a few minutes appeared smiling, and apparently safe and sound, before the audience.