It would be easy to state the causes which have given rise to some of those accidents that have spread alarm amongst the public; but of this it is not my business to speak at length. It is sufficient, on the present occasion, to state, that those melancholy occurrences which have happened at some gas-light establishments which I have had an opportunity of examining, were totally occasioned by egregious failures committed in the construction of the machinery. Thus, an explosion very lately took place in a manufactory lighted with coal-gas, in consequence of a large quantity of gas escaping into a building, where it mingled with common air, and was set on fire by the approach of a lighted candle. That such an accident could happen, is an evident proof that the machinery was erected by a bungler, unacquainted with the most essential principles of this art; because such an accident might have been effectually prevented, by adapting a waste pipe to the gasometer and gasometer house. By this means, if more gas had been prepared than the gasometer would contain, the superfluous quantity could never have accumulated, but would have been transported out of the building into the open air, in as an effectual manner as the waste-pipe of a water cistern conveys away the superfluous quantity of water, when the cistern is full. Such an expedient did not form part of the machinery. Other instances might be named, where explosions have been occasioned through egregious mistakes having been committed in the erection of the gas-light machinery, were this a subject on which I meant to treat.