"jews harp engine", 1845

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Sat Sep 22 01:41:19 UTC 2012


Another NZ mention:

http://goo.gl/W69oX
--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain


On Fri, Sep 21, 2012 at 9:29 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 21, 2012 at 5:21 PM, Garson O'Toole
> <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com> quited:
>> "Her engine is of the kind, known as the
>> steeple engine, improved by the addition of double connection
>> rods, with vibrating cross head, which passes through
>> the main cross head and works upon guides; by balance
>> valves fitted with expansion gear to cut off the steam at from
>> 1/4 to 2/3 of the stroke of the piston, and also by an
>> improvement in the air pump bucket, which has a circular
>> double-opening valve."
>
> Precisely my understanding. It's the modifications cited that give to
> this type of "steeple" engine its supposed resemblance to a Jew's
> harp.
>
> Another mention of "steeple engine" in connection with Jew's harp:
>
> http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=AS19070629.2.88&l=mi&e=-------10--11----0nickisson--
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
> to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



More information about the Ads-l mailing list