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ARTICLE XIV.
OF DISTILLATION.
A KNOWLEDGE of the principles already stated, (see article 4) leads us to discover an improvement on distillation. When we consider that water and spirits may be prevented from boiling, by increasing the pressure on their surface, and that by boiling under a great pressure a much greater quantity of the fluid is raised by equal quantities of heat in a state of vapour, and much less fuel is used to obtain equal quantities of the fluid by raising it into vapour and condensing it again, as in distillation, and that spirits boil at a less degree of heat or under a greater pressure than water, we can by in creasing the pressure on the liquid in the still, suppress the watery vapour until the spiritous vapour rises rapidly. The essential oil which gives a bad flavour to spirits may perhaps be suppressed in the same way, and the spirits brought off pure at the first distillation, with much less fuel, by a rapid process. To this improvement another may be added, to make the operation perpetual, by constructing the still of a cylindric form, letting the beer in at one end, and the dregs out at the other, in a continual stream; the spirits are extracted during the passage: the operation may thus be continued at pleasure.
If any person is willing to bear the expense and fatigue
of the experiments, to put this improvement into complete operation, he
will find a full specification, with explanations and drawings thereof,
filed in the Secre-
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tary of State's Office (called the Patent Office) of the
United States. As a compensation for such trouble and expense, I am willing
to contract with such person, in writing to be legally executed, to convey
one half of the exclusive right of using and selling, to be used, the said
improvemerits.