The following has been referred to us for reply: St. John, N. B., April 15, 1887.

Sir: A range boiler, with cistern, bath, etc., fitted in same flat, is fitted with circulation pipe as per sketch. How can there be a circulation returning to the boiler? As we understand it, the circulation can only be by gravitation. We hold that the tank can have no effect, even if placed on floor above. We can see no use in the circulation pipe fitted as it is -architects to the contrary. We cannot see that the cistern has any effect. There are rooms between kitchen and bathrooms through which pipes on walls might be objectionable. C. E.

[An apparatus such as shown will not circulate, when by the word circulate we allude to the flow of warm water that goes on within properly arranged hot-water pipe from the head of a boiler to some distant faucet and returning again by a parallel pipe called a "circulation pipe." Therefore, it would be just as well, and would save something in first cost, to omit the pipe a in the apparatus shown in the sketch.

The increased height of a tank or cistern above the boiler has little or nothing to do in this case with the question of circulation so long as it remains above the level of the boiler, and the only effect it can have is to increase the pressures in the pipes generally. Anything, however, that will increase the pressure of the water in a properly arranged system will be the means of allowing the water to become relatively hotter before it forms steam, aud as an increase of temperature may be assumed to be tributary to the increase of circulation, other things being favorable, a high tank may then be considered as more advantageous than a low one, but this will not apply in this case, as the apparatus will not *' circulate."]