In 1838, a company was formed for the sale and use of a composition of this kind, and an experiment was made in the Clapham Road to show its efficacy. The house, which was a small one, had been built in the usual way, with the intention of being fitted up in the ordinary style. While yet a mere shell, all the boards, timbers, floors, ceilings, stairs, and wood-work generally, were coated thickly with a greyish or slate-coloured composition, which dried to a state of great hardness. On a particular day the upper floor was covered with shavings in great abundance, to which a number of deal planks were subsequently added. The first floor front room was fitted up as a chamber, with bed and furniture, chairs, tables, &c., as nearly as possible in the usual style. The shavings and wood on the upper floor were then kindled, as were also planks and shavings placed on the floor of the furnished room. The consequence of this was that the two rooms speedily exhibited a blaze of light: the whole of the furniture (purposely selected of an inexpensive kind) being ignited. The flames burst from the windows; but although the entire contents of the room were consumed, the fire did not communicate to the floor above, nor to that beneath, nor even to the other room on the same floor. Several small parcels of gunpowder were introduced between the ceiling of the burning room and the floor of the room above it; but they did not ignite; nor were the other parts of the house injured in any material degree. Another trial took place at the White Conduit Gardens; where two close wooden buildings, of the size and shape of sentry boxes, were placed in the grounds. One of them was coated on the inside to the thickness of about an eighth of an inch with the composition, and was also partially covered on the outside; while the other was left in the plain wood state. A flooring was placed at about the centre of each of these, and through the holes in front shavings were put and then ignited. The box which was not coated with the composition was soon in flames; while the fire in the other went out without having had any effect upon the general structure. The building which was in flames was then placed contiguous to the partially-coated outside of the other, and although it was not materially injured, the exterior coating peeled off in some places, and the wood became charred; the interior, however, appeared perfectly uninjured by the flame.