you is that of the difference between ordinary stove coal and chestnut coal. Chestnut coal was formerly cheaper at retail than stove coal, but in use it was found that for many reasons chestnut was more desirable, and so gradually the price was raised until the retail price of chestnut is now the same as that of stove coal. Then again, there has been a lot of coal piled up in culm heaps that formerly was considered good for nothing. Pea coal was brought into market in 1867, and in 1876 buckwheat coal was introduced. There is also rice coal, although the latter is used for fuel only at the mines, and that coal has recently had a market price of its own; whereas, years ago it could not be given away. We all know that there are certain goods and valuables that bear transportation better than others, and on account of high freights I would like to ask Dr. Perrine, about the kind of coal that is used in California. We know that they use a certain amount of anthracite. That has to be brought from long distances and we can all well understand that there are certain grades of coal which it is economical to use only near the mines, and where there is no cost for transportation. But if you have to carry that coal a great way, of course the freight on it is as much as it would be on a better class of coal. Consequently, it appears to me that the practice in different localities would show that it is only the best coal that can be transported and used economically.

As a matter of record it might be well to quote here a table prepared by Wm. McClave, of Scranton, and included in a paper read by him at Philadelphia, January 9th, 1895, before the "Anthracite Coal Operators Association." He takes the best bituminous or anthracite as a standard.

It can hardly be expected that such figures can be exact under the varying conditions, but they were obtained in actual practice.

DR. PERRINE: The practice in steaming in California is very bad, and it is largely for this reason that the coal dealers are the only steam makers. The coal is purchased in California for the electric railroads and power plants on the basis of the production of pounds of steam per hour. The coal is entirely paid for by the thousand pounds of dry steam produced. The coal dealer has the option of using his own firemen or using the firemen belonging to the company he is supplying. Of course in either case the company supplied pays the wages of the men, but the coal dealer may take entire charge of the fire room and hire the employes, or he may simply have a representative there. The best coal that we get out there, the coal which has the highest calorific power, is Welsh anthracite, which is obtained by the largest dealers at about $6.00 per ton. I paid $11.00 a ton for it, and I can get a lower grade of bituminous for $10.50. But the largest dealers can obtain a lower grade of bituminous coal at about $4.50 a ton, but no coal could be had in California for less than about $4.50 a ton by the largest dealers, and those are people who charter their own ships and bring in coal by the shipload. The most of our bituminous coal comes from Australia and our anthracite coal comes from Wales. There is very little Pennsylvania anthracite used. That has to come overland and costs from $11.00 to $12.00 per ton. Some people who are very particular and want good hard coal buy it. One would expect that these men would work out thoroughly the best possible grates and the best possible methods of handling coal, but the greatest advance they have made consists simply in bringing from the boiler a steam jet to serve as a blower to the fire. That serves not only as a blower, but gives a flame to this Welsh anthracite coal which it does not possess without that agency. Only recently have some few of the younger engineers made careful tests with change of gratebars and the use of the cheaper coals, and up to the present time they have not obtained very good results because the manufac turers are slow to see that the experiments may result in any great advantage. They buy steam, not coal, and they are reasonably satisfied with the price that the steam costs them, so they are not willing to put much money into change of furnaces, especially as the coal is controlled by a very close combination, and they do not know but that if they should generally introduce bituminous coal of a low grade, that then the bituminous coal of a low grade would be held at the same price as the anthracite of a high grade. Furthermore there is hesitancy on account of the fact that the low grade bituminous coal comes from Alaska and Washington, with which there are comparatively no return freights, so that while we can bring a little coal down from that country cheaply, if we should have to carry a great amount of coal it would mean freights only in one direction and the freight rates would run up. The coal is brought in the wheat vessels. A good deal of our flour goes to Australia and a great deal of our wheat goes to

England. The whole stock of California coal comes into the State during the autumn, when the wheat ships are arriving for their fall cargoes, and these combined elements have held the question of consumption at one point for a great many years, and as I say have directed steam users to the economic value of the very best coal that we can get, which is really a better coal than many coals you get here on the Atlantic coast. I do not think there is any, except possibly the gas coal that you have here in the east, that has as high calorific power as the Welsh coal.

PROF. R. B. OWENS:-I feel that one of the best directions in which electrical engineers can direct their efforts is in inducing the owners of small electric light and power plants, to keep a continnous coal and water record. Of course it is done in our large plants and in a few isolated ones. For instance, in the Board of Trade plant in Chicago, a continuous record of water and coal is kept and averages are obtainable which it is impossible to get in two or three ten-hour tests. Coals of all kinds are tried, and the number of pounds of water evaporated, under standard conditions, per dollar's worth of coal, is obtained, which is really the only proper way to express the value of coal, or any other fuel used for steam generation. In some of our large lighting plants, the cost of coal is now, I believe, less than the lamp breakage. It has come to be one of the smallest items of expense; whereas, in smaller lighting plants in interior towns, it is more than one-third the total expense of operation. In these latter, therefore, the coal pile must be watched with especial care, but as I said before, very little of value is obtained by short runs. For instance, it is possible to get from New River coal, an evaporation of 13 pounds, from and at 212, under proper conditions of firing. Captain Jones of Chicago, formerly of the Navy, last year made a test, using New River coal, of a wellknown water-tube boiler fitted with a good automatic stoker, and after three or four preliminary trials, actually got 13 pounds13.1 pounds evaporation, I think it was, from and at 212. N. such record, however, has ever been made under the ordinary conditions of continuous service, or, is likely to be.

A MEMBER-Is that per dollar's worth of coal?

PROF. OWENS:-No, per pound. It simply shows that short tests amount to very little. It is only when records are kept extending over months and perhaps years that anything of real value can be obtained.

MR. DOUGLASS BURNETT:-Before we change the subject, I wish to say that Mr. Foster has my own personal and hearty thanks for the great care that he has evidently bestowed in fishing out a lot of information which is certainly valuable-extremely valuable and I think that one of the aims of the INSTITUTE should be to combine the science with the commercial side, and I believe that in this respect Mr. Foster's paper is perhaps the best paper that I have heard, because he combined what we are taught in our colleges, the work that we do in connection with our mechan

ical engineering, with the results obtained in commercial practice. I have encountered personally some of the difficulties that Mr. Foster has, and I know that when he is able to summarize 22 cases in which he can get accurately at the cost of power he has done a great deal of work. He has my personal thanks.

MR. W. H. RIPLEY:-In regard to what Prof. Owens says about the importance of keeping a close record, I noticed on Long Island a couple of years ago, where a plant was started, there was a large supply of coal on hand in the yards. The coal was of very good quality and high cost, and the plant was started on that coal. The engineer in charge was a man of a great deal of experience, and had studied a good deal besides his actual firing work. When the supply gave out, the directors of the company, who were not very far-seeing people anyway and had all along been complaining of the price of coal, got a chance to buy a quantity of very much cheaper coal-that is what they looked at, the price of it; and this man had been keeping very careful records of the evaporation per pound every day, and he made a weekly summary and a monthly report to the company, and kept track of the percentage of ash. The percentage of ash in the coal they started with was, I believe, about 8 and with this cheaper coal the ash was over 13 per cent. After over two months of talk, presenting the matter to those directors who were mostly residents there, we finally convinced them that they were getting a smaller amount of steam, and that the increased amount of ash just about balanced the difference in price in the coals, but it took a long while, and I think that is an example of the difficulties that men in charge of steam plants have that managers or purchasing agents look at the cost of the coal alone, and unless some very careful record is taken it is almost impossible in some cases to make any improvements in the cost of the steam.

THE PRESIDENT :--If the discussion is over, there will be some

announcements.

MISS FARMER-I have a telegram which should have been received on Monday, July 26th, which I will read :

MISS SARAH J. FARMER.

"I regret exceedingly that recent absence abroad and urgent business engagements since my return have prevented the preparation of my intended paper on electric railways, and to my great disappointment I am also denied the privilege of attending the meeting of the AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS at the noble memorial you have established to the memory of your distinguished father.

I am, however, with you in spirit, and, furthermore, by a coincidence which I hope may prove an auspicious augury, this day, the fiftieth anniversary of the first exhibition at Dover by Moses G. Farmer of the movement of a car by electricity, has seen the inauguration and first public demonstration of an electric train, properly speaking, that is, one in which each car is individually equipped with motors and all are electrically controlled from any desired point. This marks a new departure in electric propulsion as distinguished from locomotive practice. It is the logical sequence of the adoption of electricity for railway work, and to-day a train of six cars has been successfully operated by a boy of nine years.

The advancement of the electric railway in the decade since the installation of the Richmond railway is unparalleled, and no advance in the industrial world

has had a more widespread and beneficial effect on the social and moral well being of the community. In 1887 there were scarcely a dozen electric railways in existence, to-day there are 700 in the United States alone. Then there were scarcely 100 miles of track, now there are nearly 14,000 miles. From 150 cars, the equipment has grown to over 35,000, propelled by 52,000 motors.

"Prediction would perhaps be idle, but it would seem that we are entering on a new era of railway progress whose extent cannot well be limited, in which not only city but suburban, and in a large measure interurban, passenger traffic will be electric in all its essentials. FRANK J. SPRAGUE."

THE PRESIDENT:-I am sure we are all very much interested to hear this telegram read on this occasion. It is most unfortunate, however, that we do not have Mr. Sprague here in person, because his personality is particularly strong and interesting, but he shows some of it, I think, in his telegram.

I believe Prof. Owens has an invitation to present to the INSTITUTE. The INSTITUTE would be glad to hear it.

PROF. OWENS:--I have the pleasure of extending on behalf of the President and Board of Directors of the Trans-Mississippi Exposition, an invitation to the INSTITUTE to hold its next general meeting in Omaha. Every facility will be afforded for making the meeting a success. Probably in a great many years the west will not have such features of electrical interest as may be seen in Omaha next summer. I hope that some expression may be obtained from those present in this regard, for the sooner the place of meeting is decided upon, the easier it will be to make arrangements for a successful one.

MR. T. C. MARTIN --Mr. President, I think most of us have listened to the invitation from Prof. Owens as a special Commissioner from the State of Nebraska with a good deal of interest and pleasure. It seems to me that after coming, as we have here, to the extreme eastern tip of the continent, it would at least be proper and in order that our next oscillation, as you might call it, should carry us somewhere toward the centre of the country. We have been inclined in our meetings to linger eastward and it is certainly high time that once more we turn our faces to the west; and perhaps to render the contrast complete I do not know that we could seek anything in sharper difference from the sweet serenity and peace of our surroundings here than the bustle and hurlyburly of the west, as we shall find it, proceeding from Chicago and staying a few days at Omaha during that exposition. I think, moreover, that we, as a body, owe a little to the State that our friend represents. I had the pleasure of being in Lincoln last year and I was deeply impressed with the magnificence, the splendor, the regal generosity with which that State had endowed her educational facilities, and particularly the eagerness with which they were seeking there to give further scope and larger aim, and higher purpose, to the scientific and technical training of her young men. If we go west upon such an occasion as this, we shall not only be doing something that Nebraska will deeply appreciate, but we shall be furthering the purpose which underlies the existence of the INSTITUTE itself. I would like, therefore, if it please you sir, to offer this resolution, which, I will say just