On Monday an invention—the work of a M. Dubois—was exhibited
in London which, if it turns out practical, may prevent the sinking of ships after collisions or contact with rocks. Air reservoirs made of water-tight tissue and in " concertina-shape " are placed under various decks or in the ceilings of cabins. If a hole is made in the ship's side, these concertina-shaped reservoirs are inflated by gas. The gas— in the experiment on Monday the gas used was liquid carbonic acid—is stored in the ship, but can be liberated and sent into the reservoirs either by moving a lever on deck, or automatically by "floats at the bottom of the vessel," which, moved by the water rushing in, act in the same way as the lever. The experiments made with a model vessel on Monday are said to have been very satisfactory, but of course this does not prove that the invention is really valuable. If real ships always acted like the inventors' models there would be no such thing as loss at sea. Still, the invention may have something in it. There is nothing impossible per as in turning a ship into a balloon to prevent its sinking.
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