However this may be, the difficulty is one which the improved system of roads in England renders of a comparatively trifling nature. If horses were resorted to as the means of assistance up such hills as the engine would be incapable of surmounting, such aid would not be requisite more than twice or thrice upon the mail-coach road between London and Holyhead; and the same may be said of the roads connecting the greatest points of intercourse in the kingdom. Such hills as the ascent at Pentonville upon the New Road, the ascent in St. James's Street, the ascent from Waterloo Place to the County Fire Office, the ascent at Highgate Archway, present no difficulty whatever. It is only Old Highgate Hill, and hills of a similar kind, which would ever require a supply of horses in aid of the engine. I therefore incline to agree with Mr. _Farey_, that, at least for the present, it will be more expedient to construct carriages adapted to surmount moderate hills only, and to provide post horses in aid of the extreme emergencies to which I have just alluded.
(110.) In the boiler to be used in the steam carriage projected by Mr. _Walter Hancock_, the subdivision of the water is accomplished by dividing a case or box by a number of thin plates of metal like a galvanic battery, the water being allowed to flow between every alternate pair of plates, at E, fig. 66., and the intermediate spaces H forming the flue through which the flame and hot air are propelled.
In fact, a number of thin plates of water are exposed on both sides to the most intense action of flame and heated air; so that steam of a high-pressure is produced in great abundance and with considerable rapidity. The plates forming the boiler are bolted together by strong iron ties, extending across the boiler, at right angles to the plates, as represented in the figure. The distance between the plates is two inches.
There are ten flat chambers of this kind for water, and intermediately between them ten flues. Under the flues is the fire-place, or grate; containing six square feet of fuel in vivid combustion. The chambers are all filled to about two thirds of their depth with water, and the other third is left for steam. The water-chambers, throughout the whole series, communicate with each other both at top and bottom, and are held together by two large bolts. By releasing these bolts, at any time, the chambers fall asunder; and by screwing them up they may be all made tight again. The water is supplied to the boiler by a forcing-pump, and the steam issues from the centre of one of the flues at the top.