Compression Experiment

“If the strong tube, or barrel, be smooth, and equal on the inside, and there be fitted to it the solid piston, or plug a, so as to work up and down, air tight, by the handle b, the air in the barrel may be compressed into a space a hundred times less than its usual bulk. Indeed, if the vessel be of sufficient strength, and the force employed sufficiently great, its bulk may be lessened a thousand times, or in any proportion, according to the force employed; and if kept in this state for years, it will regain its former bulk the instant the pressure is removed.” —Comstock, 1850

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