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The following inventions have been patented this week, as will be found by referring to our List of Claims : — Feeder for Steam Boilers.—George Brodie, of Little Rock, Ark., has invented a new feeder for boilers, the object of which is to gradually supply steam boilers with water equal at all times to the amount evaporated, and used so that the water within boilers will be constantly kept at a given hight, and by the most simple means, requiring the least possible expenditure of power for its operation. Machine for Finishing Soldered Tubing.—Edmund Jordan, of Waterbury, Conn., has invented an improved machine for finishing soldered tubing, in which a peculiar means is employed for operating a file or cutter for the purpose of filing or finishing off the soldered seams of the tubes, and there is also a clamp for holding tubes while being operated upon by the cutters. The inventor has assigned his invention to the Benedict and Burn-ham Manufacturing Company of the same place. Improved Process of Tanning.—Jesse Morgan, of Sumterville, S. C, has invented an improved method of tanning leather, which consists in treating hides or skins when they have been partly tanned by the usual process, with a compound of sugar or other saccharine matter, glaubers salts and chloride of soda, for the purpose of completing the tanning process more expeditiously than when it is completed in the usual way, and at the same time making leather equal in quality, weight and durability to that tanned entirely by the old process. Helypsometer—This is an instrument for taking the altitude of the sun at sea or on land, to which the inventor, J. Oakes, of New York, has given the above name. The end attained by this instrument is, that with it the altitude of the sun can be taken when the natural horizon is obscured by fog or is invisible from other causes. It consists of two parts, one of which is employed to record the altitude by the action of the sun's rays upon a sensitive coating of similar nature to those employed in photographic processes, and the other to measure the altitude thus recorded. The first mentioned portion of the instrument consists of a hollow hemisphere whose equatorial plane is kept in a horizontal position or as nearly so as possible, and has a small orifice in the center, and whose concave is prepared with the sensitive coating. The rays of the sun being admitted through the orifice produce a mark upon the sensitively prepared concave surface, and by applying the measuring portion of the instrument to measure the distance in degrees of a circle from the equatorial plane of the hemisphere, the altitude is obtained, being represented by the said distance in degrees.
