I have upon the table.

This system of ignition has been found very reliable, and capable of
acting as often as 400 times per minute, which the Otto ignite is quite
incapable of doing. By this cycle the advantages of compression are gained
and one step nearer to the steam engine is attained, that is, an impulse
is given for every revolution of the engine.

As a consequence, I am able with my engine to give a greater amount of
power for a comparatively small weight. In addition to this, I have
introduced a method of self-starting; in this I believe I was the
first--about 100 of my engines are now using self-starting.

The largest single engine I have yet made indicates 30 H.P. The
consumption of gas in Glasgow is: Clerk engine consumes in Glasgow 18
cubic feet per I.H.P. per hour; Clerk engine consumes in Manchester 22
cubic feet per I.H.P. per hour. So far as I know, the Otto engine and my
own are the only compression engines which have as yet made any success in
the market. Other engines are being continually prepared, gas engine
patents being taken out just now at the rate of 60 per annum, but none of
them have been able as yet to get beyond the experimental stage. The
reason is simply the great experience necessary to produce these machines,
which seem so very simple; but to the inexperienced inventor the subject
fairly bristles with pitfalls.

I have here sections of some of the earlier engines, including Dr.
Siemens' and Messrs. Simon and Beechy. Although interesting and containing
many good points, these have not been practically successful.

The Simon engine is an adaptation of the well-known American petroleum
motor, the Brayton, the only difference consisting in the use of steam as
well as flame.

Dr. Siemens worked for some twenty years on gas engines, but he aimed
rather high at first to attain even moderate success. Had he lived, I
doubt not but that he would have succeeded in introducing them for large
powers. In 1882 he informed me that he had in hand a set of gas engines of
some hundreds of horse power for use on board ship, to be supplied with
gas from one of his gas producers modified to suit the altered
conditions.

Summarizing the ground over which we have passed, we find the origin of
the gas engine in the minds of the same men as were first to propose the
steam engine, Huyghens and Papin, 1680 and 1690. Greater mechanical
difficulties and ignorance of the nature of explosives caused the
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