PERPETUAL MOTION.
[To THE EDITOR OW TEE SPECTATOR."]
Sin,—In your last issue, you say of accumulators of electric force, that "once small enough to be carried, they might drive a steamer across the Atlantic, being perpetually recharged by a dynamo driven by the motion itself." Surely, if this could be done, the ancient problem of perpetual motion would be solved ! The only force available for driving the dynamo under such circumstances would be the force of the wind, and we may live to see ships carrying windmills, instead of sails. Any wind except one dead ahead could be used for the purpose, and fifty per cent. of its power utilised. Moreover, if sufficient accumu- lators could be carried, the violence of the gale might be stored up, till wanted during the next calm.—I am, Sir, &c.,